Arcane Warriors, dude. Best of both worlds.
I am not yet very far into the game, I have picked up most of the companions though. I just finished Orzgammar. I let Oghren come with me because I figured he’s got personal business with Branka. So I dropped Leiliana for Oghren, with the plan of swapping back later. The problem is, I have finished up my Orzgammar quests, but don’t seem to be able to kick Oghren out of the party. On the character select screen, I can remove everyone except him and my main.
I went back to the Circle Tower and cleared up some loose ends there, thinking it might just take some time, but Og refuses to be kicked. I can talk to him and ask him to leave, but then he’s gone for good. I don’t want to do this, I might need him later. Any ideas?
Is “A Paragon of Her Kind” listed under Completed Quests?
Just started the game and am really liking it so far. I’m going with an elf, coercive, dual wielding rouge/assassin type. I have a couple questions though. I noticed the manual states there is no level cap. I also noticed some people saying you’ll probably be around level 18 by the end of the game. I just became a gray warden and I’m already level 5. Obviously leveling will slow down as I progress but it’s fast early. My question is how open world is the game as I progress? In other words can I backtrack for side quests? Can I really over level my characters with side quests making the story quests easier? In keeping with that, does the game make enemies level with you akin to Bethesda games or is not open world enough for that to even matter?
Sorry, that’s a lot of questions but they really revolve around the same idea. On a side note, the blood spatter is ridiculous and absolutely comical.
One of the towns gets destroyed. Lothering? Ostagar? I dont remember, but whatever quests you didnt do there are gone forever. This only happens once so you can go back for sidequests in other towns.
It looks like it does.
The game does level scale like Mass Effect, but not quite as badly as Oblivion. It seems to have a specific modifier for each type of mob, the only one I really noticed is that generic Darkspawn tend to be exactly half your level, so around level 20 you can usually one shot Genlocks. The level cap is 25, the exp breaks there full stop, however I’m not entirely sure it’s even possible to get to that level in one play through. I finished at 22, but as I was a mostly good character I didn’t do a couple quest lines*, so I admit it MAY be possible, if only barely (DLC helps).
You can indeed backtrack for sidequests, one will be somewhat obvious, the other not quite as much. Don’t leave Lothering until you complete the sidequests there, and obviously Ostagar. After that you can pretty much bactrack at will until the game starts wrapping up after your adventures in Denerim (the point of no return seems to be the conversation that opens up the location where the Landsmeet is held, that’ll make sense when that questline starts).
*The one you get from the Bartender by asking if he needs help with something not strictly legal and the Antivan Crows questline to be specific.
Good to know, thanks. I was just doing some internet snooping and found out “no hard level cap” in the manual actually means “we didn’t place enough experience in the game to reach level 25”. Apparently it’s only doable with console commands on a PC.
The quick leveling at the beginning, and the manual stating no level cap, was starting to make me think I wouldn’t have to be extremely judicious in build choices but now I know that’s not true. Which is cool.
Another question, while I have your attention. Did you find you used your character mainly in combat or did you micromanage the entire party? In other words, how effective are the Tactics?
Also, I may be dense here, but how can I give a character in my party something that is in another characters inventory? Is the Junk shared or I am missing something that should be readily apparent?
I micro’d the entire party, but I was on hard. I also didn’t feel like tweaking tactics. The only one I did any tactics on was Wynne, simply because the healing was something that really was detrimental if you forgot about it. Tactics seem to be a personal preference, some people swear by them, some people don’t want to bother.
And yes, the junk is shared, your potions are everyone’s potions.
So one mage concentrating on healing is sufficient to keep your party going? Or do you find you still have to manage individual healing potion use throughout tough battles? Sorry for all the questions that could well be answered by experimenting but I’m a bit of stickler for planning out my progression in RPGs.
I’m currently playing through with only one mage in my party and am doing fine.
I have all of my other party members set in their tactics to drink a health potion if they get to <10% health as I just don’t want to be bothered with switching to other characters during battles, and that has worked. (But in all honesty, as my main is the party healer they rarely get that low.)
You actually can leave Lothering and return. The destructive trigger is starting any of the main plot areas. But the DLC areas ( Honnleath, Warden’s Peak ) don’t trigger the destruction of the town. I found this handy for going back and completing that one particular quest in Lothering I didn’t have the skillset for on the first pass through.
I think some micromanagement is essential, especially as the battle wears on. But properly set up tactics can buy you a couple of seconds while you are concentrating elsewhere.
To expand that slightly, tactics work best for tanks ( simpler task ) and healers, Wynne in particular ( lots of scripting + basically simple task ). It works just a little less well for archers ( which can have positioning issues ) and for DPS-oriented warriors ( ditto ) and is a lot less effective for DPS rogues and DPS mages, both of which really need a lot of micromanagement.
No, I have completed that one. Oghren still won’t go back to camp, it’s either in party or gone for good. The only thing I have left open in Orzgammar is “Exotic Methods”, because you need Master Herbalism, which I don’t have yet (and I just leveled so it’ll be a while yet)
You don’t need Master Herbalism yourself if Morrigan or Wynne has enough skill; they can make the recipe for you.
Well I bought Morrigan into the party, and she had enough unspent points that I was able to give her master Herbalism and complete that quest.
BTW how do you check what specializations you’ve unlocked? I think I got Oghren to teach me the Berserker spec, but am not sure. I have to go back to the Circle Tower docks anyway, so I’m going to try doing Oghren’s personal quest and see if that works. If not I’m going to have to perma boot him. He’s not that good of a damage dealer or tank, and I’d rather go with Alistair/Leliana/Wynne/my mage for this playthrough.
If you’re playing as a mage, he won’t teach it to you, but he may make it available to other party members if your approval score is high enough. You should know for sure if it’s available when you level up – it’ll be visible among the specializations of anyone who has ranks in warrior.
IIRC, each spec is a separate achievement, so that’s one way.
This was the setup for my first character. I made her an assassin duelist and maxed out everything in duel weapon, and she was quite awesome by the end.
I maxed out her pickpocketing. I wasn’t a fan of pickpocketing. Besides the main quest for it in Denerim, I found little use. You could only get trivial things from people, nothing too great. In the beginning it’s cute, “Oh, I got a root off of this beggar!” but towards the end it gets tedious and boring and it’s not like you get anything more significant off of a higher leveled person so it’s “Oh, I got a mushroom off of this king!..Huh.” I regretted not putting points into lock picking right away and, if I play the game again, I’d put more points into primarily that and persuasion.
They don’t seem to be listed under my achievements. I’m pretty sure I learned Berserker from Oghren though, it was listed on Alistair when he leveled (I didn’t take it, waiting on one of the others to open up). I know I’ve learned Bard from a book, but I don’t see that in my achievements either.