Dragon Age Origins

[Porksta]

For those of you cursing the whole "sign into EA to do stuff online", blame EA. Remember how during the Xbox years you couldn't play Madden online? One of the ways (only way?) EA would agree to Microsoft's rules was that everything EA related would be hosted on their own servers, not on Microsoft's servers. This is why they can shut down game servers (NBA Live 2006 and so forth).

[chicnstu]

I must be the most stupid person on this site because I'm dying constantly when almost everyone else says the game is way too easy even on hard. I've had to reload maybe 70% of my battles. I'll walk into a room with a couple of mages and three warriors and I'll die in less than 15 seconds.

I'm a Dwarf Warrior and my party members so far are Alistair, Leliana, Morrigan, Wynne, Zevran, and Sten. For a while I thought having my traveling party be Wynne, Sten, and Leliana or Zevran was a good choice. But I read that it's best to have mages so I've tried putting Morrigan and Wynne together and I have the same result. I loved FFXII and it's Gambits so I've tried setting my party member's tactics lists in a way that seems logical to me and I still die. I target the enemy Mages in a battle first but the Warriors will swarm around me and take me out. I try managing each party member during the battles but it feels like there's too much going on too quickly to be able to accomplish what I want. I'll switch over to Wynne to use Heal or Revival but she's either out of Mana or the spell needs time to recharge. I'm equipping the best armor and weapons on all party members as I find it.

I play a lot of RPGs and most of them I play I think are too easy, so what am I doing wrong in Dragon Age? I'm playing on PS3 BTW.

[brykasch]

tank, mage/healer, rogue, and dps warrior is my group makeup and its worked great. Go in and adjust your tactics, make sure there set to drik potions etc as well, it makes a big difference.

[Trebuken]

I must be the most stupid person on this site because I'm dying constantly when almost everyone else says the game is way too easy even on hard. I've had to reload maybe 70% of my battles. I'll walk into a room with a couple of mages and three warriors and I'll die in less than 15 seconds.

I'm a Dwarf Warrior and my party members so far are Alistair, Leliana, Morrigan, Wynne, Zevran, and Sten. For a while I thought having my traveling party be Wynne, Sten, and Leliana or Zevran was a good choice. But I read that it's best to have mages so I've tried putting Morrigan and Wynne together and I have the same result. I loved FFXII and it's Gambits so I've tried setting my party member's tactics lists in a way that seems logical to me and I still die. I target the enemy Mages in a battle first but the Warriors will swarm around me and take me out. I try managing each party member during the battles but it feels like there's too much going on too quickly to be able to accomplish what I want. I'll switch over to Wynne to use Heal or Revival but she's either out of Mana or the spell needs time to recharge. I'm equipping the best armor and weapons on all party members as I find it.

I play a lot of RPGs and most of them I play I think are too easy, so what am I doing wrong in Dragon Age? I'm playing on PS3 BTW.

It's not easy. There may be routes in the game that make the game easier, but likely anyone finding this easy is sitting down with their oversized strategy guide or browser open to the ultimate walkthrough -- or simply lying as they play it on easy.

Perhaps there are dificulty differences amongst the different versions of the game...

We got the same reaction from Demon's Soul's. It turned out that certain character classes and straegies did work better initially and that made the game appear easier to some...

Anyways...good game...better because it can be tough...

[Lady Jaye]

Finally, the offline mode does work on the 360. If you try to play offline and you get the message that it's missing DLC, follow the directions in the below thread. It worked for me, I managed to boot the game offline without any problem.

http://daforums.bioware.com/viewtopi...3093&forum=135

[chicnstu]

Some things I haven't liked:

- The menus are very annoying. Three different ways to move left or right through the categories.
- When you get a new item from someone, it just says at the bottom left "Items aquired", it doesn't tell you what the item is. So I think "I'll go and see what it was". But you can't always check because the new item may be near the bottom of the list. New items are highlighted but when they are at the bottom of the list they are automatically unhighlighted when you move over them. You don't get a chance to see what item was new.
- I don't understand the item limit. I'll find something in a chest to take but it'll say "Inventory Full". So I'll go to the inventory and remove something then go back and try to take the item but it still says the same thing. Does each item have a weight? How do I check that? Also, I tried to buy some elfroot from that elf merchant and it said inventory full. But then I can walk around their village and pick some from the plants...
- The quests are hard to follow, you have to find everything yourself so you can eventually get the arrow on your map. Always having something on your map would be nice.

I'm convinced this RPG is hard because it depends on luck and not skill (thought). I can go into a fight and die three times in a row, reload, then on my fourth try the battle goes by quickly with no problems. Almost all I play is RPGs, I really enjoy figuring out the right strategy to win the battles. This game though...I'm just not seeing it. I refuse to lower the difficulty. I've tried setting my party members to use potions when their health gets low (<50%) but they still die almost immediately. I'll just struggle through it, doing every battle five times before I get lucky and win. Then I might sell the game, I haven't used any of the four DLC codes.

What makes me feel even more dumb is that I SOMEHOW MISSED the dog and I can't go back. I'm the OCD type that searches everywhere and everything so I can collect everything making sure I don't miss something. So how did I miss it?

Listen to me whine...

[chicnstu]

I want to add that I'm not completely hating the game. It's very well written and the combat is fun when I actually understand what to do.

Also, I do appreciate the advice I've been given, sorry if I seemed like I ignored you guys.

[Trebuken]

The dog was in Ostragar. You had to pick a flower in the wilds to cure it and then it bonds to you (shows up later to join you).

The inventory screen has a bar with a number on the bottom. I think it starts at 70. When you reach 70 you get inventory full. It does seem a little wonky. A couple of Elfrootsseem to weigh nearly as much as chainmail...it might be the number of items. Backpacks add 10 units, but they are overpriced.

I'm not having trouble following the quests...make sure you unlock as many as you can. There are the Chantry/Mage/Mercenary sets of quests. The Journal and Codexes are good guides for your quests...

[chicnstu]

The dog was in Ostragar. You had to pick a flower in the wilds to cure it and then it bonds to you (shows up later to join you).

The inventory screen has a bar with a number on the bottom. I think it starts at 70. When you reach 70 you get inventory full. It does seem a little wonky. A couple of Elfrootsseem to weigh nearly as much as chainmail...it might be the number of items. Backpacks add 10 units, but they are overpriced.

I'm not having trouble following the quests...make sure you unlock as many as you can. There are the Chantry/Mage/Mercenary sets of quests. The Journal and Codexes are good guides for your quests...

Yeah, I know the dog was in Ostegar, it's just disappointing that I missed a great feature of the game. I know the bar is there but my problem with the inventory is that I don't know how to tell what each item weighs. Also, the quest problems I had were getting them started, actually doing the task is simple.

[Nate Nanjo]

I actually got my Dog by starting as a Human Warrior, but I don't remember which location I choose to do that. The dog is better than like any other character I have right now.

[Lady Jaye]

If you play as a human warrior, you get the dog at home during the Noble origins story, since he's your dog to start with.

[chicnstu]

Good news. I spent a couple of hours setting up my Tactics and testing them. I haven't had any problems so far. Even the wolf random encounter people talk about went by with ease. I thought about how I had my Gambits in FFXII and made the Tactics similar and I chose abilities that seemed logical. I set my party members to attack the same enemy I'm attacking (couldn't find this option before) but I'm considering setting it to "Enemy with lowest health" since that worked so well in FFXII. I think things like this should have been explained better in-game.

Also, I was 26 hours into the game when I realized I missed the dog. I was thinking the whole time "When does the dog show up?" because I had a bunch of collars and warpaints saved for it. I checked online and found out it was right in the beginning. Can't go back now. I've read that you can still get it in a random enounter (not the same encounter for completing the dog quest).

[jedimind7]

Just purchaed. Im going to have to try to find time to play it. Modern Warfare 2 and being in several Madden 10 online franchises is taking up my gaming time.

[Zthun]

Gay dwarf elf sex. Nuff said......

[Raedon]

Lol! Yea I didn't get this game for the Elf / dwarf love scene "No one can resist a Dwarf." EGHH! :P I just saw that posted on gametrailers.

I just got the PC version of this one. From all the reviews I've read the PC version allows for more precise gameplay so I went that route (plus I don't own a 360 right now.)

From what I've heard from the few hardcore MMORPG nuts I keep in touch with, Dragon Age is a game that someone who's played a lot of a REAL MMO (i.e. not WoW) will be right at home with.

I like games that have the Warrior as the one and only meat shield agro machine. So many games give the people playing a Warrior class the ability to pick dmg output as an option. WoW really pissed me off early on when Warriors were outdamaging the rogues. They got plate AND could DPS tit-for-tat with the 'Main damage class' ... as Rogues were touted as by Blizzard.

I'm far more interested in Bioware's upcoming Star Wars - The Old Republic MMORPG. The last Star Wars MMO was crap and I love that universe. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DOvbv-LkK6w

Anywhoo, Eternal Tune won't play WoW with me (even though I was gonna twink the shit out of her) so I need something to play. I'm all out of RPGs to finish until I buy a new PS2 (mine finally died.) This RPG will kill a few weeks at least.

[Raedon]

>.>

<.<


I pirated this one. Sorry devs. I'll be paying you guys back with the large chunk of change I'll be throwing your way to play Star Wars: The Old Republic.

[Porksta]

>.>

<.<


I pirated this one. Sorry devs. I'll be paying you guys back with the large chunk of change I'll be throwing your way to play Star Wars: The Old Republic.

Are you planning to pay more than the base subscription fee? If not, you aren't really paying them back.

[nebrazca78]

Some things I haven't liked:

- The menus are very annoying. Three different ways to move left or right through the categories.

No crap. Almost as bad as Silver for Dreamcast. What's funny is I played Silver for the first time RIGHT before getting Dragon Age Origins.

- I don't understand the item limit. I'll find something in a chest to take but it'll say "Inventory Full". So I'll go to the inventory and remove something then go back and try to take the item but it still says the same thing. Does each item have a weight? How do I check that? Also, I tried to buy some elfroot from that elf merchant and it said inventory full. But then I can walk around their village and pick some from the plants...

It seems like you can have 70 of 70 items but still get things that are allowed to have multiples with only one icon. For instance, go to a chest that has multiple items with your backpack full. You won't be able to grab any weapons or armor but you should be able to grab a poultice or something like that unless you have it maxed out at 99. Due to your comment above about buying elfroot it seems this isn't the case when buying but only when picking up.

- The quests are hard to follow, you have to find everything yourself so you can eventually get the arrow on your map. Always having something on your map would be nice.

If you read your codex it pretty much tells you where to go for every quest.

I'm convinced this RPG is hard because it depends on luck and not skill (thought). I can go into a fight and die three times in a row, reload, then on my fourth try the battle goes by quickly with no problems. Almost all I play is RPGs, I really enjoy figuring out the right strategy to win the battles. This game though...I'm just not seeing it. I refuse to lower the difficulty. I've tried setting my party members to use potions when their health gets low (<50%) but they still die almost immediately. I'll just struggle through it, doing every battle five times before I get lucky and win. Then I might sell the game, I haven't used any of the four DLC codes.

I think this is because the battles go differently based on tiny differences in what you do. Fractions of a second count here. Everyone's position and the computer's reaction charges with every little difference. Plus there is the randomization of your criticals and stuff like that. Even a normal attack randomly varies in strength almost every hit. It does take away slightly from the strategy aspect of the game, but this is an action RPG not a strategy RPG or a straight up strategy game.

The thing with setting your guys to use health is that often they don't use it in time because they're getting toasted OR because they get attacked right while they're using it and it gets canceled. Unfortunately even if you set your strategies the computer is often slow/stupid when executing. An example of how the computer is stupid is when the enemy they are attacking is immune to the attack type they are using yet they keep using it over and over anyway.


As far as my personal take on the game, I like it overall. Some of the graphics are laughable (low polygon counts) but some parts are really nice. The frame rate is a joke during some cut scenes. I mean really, some of the animation reminds me of Atari 2600 games. How can the 360 not handle a single guy walking across the screen during a cut scene? There are also some places where polygons are just totally missing. You'll look over at a mountain and there's a big ugly off-color square where a textured polygon should be. It does give the game a rushed and unfinished feel to me. At least almost all the chicks in the game have giant racks. It helps distract from the graphical problems.

Despite these graphical flaws and the sometimes cumbersome menu system it is still a fun game. You get a decent amount of attributes to use in building a character. The battles are very controllable you just have to keep your left trigger finger active constantly. Using this technique slows the game down immensely though. You have to pull the left trigger every few seconds in order to input commands for all four people.

I found that I ran out of spaces for the spells I needed in my assignable range, especially with Morrigan. The computer is also sometimes very easy to get cheap on. I went to fight Witherfang long before I should have been there. I was able to beat him/her (tranny) by hiding behind one of the trees that is growing in the werewolf lair. The computer AI would get really confused and kind of freeze frame or stutter as if it couldn't figure out exactly where I was while I blasted it incessantly. Sometimes it would come towards me at a snail's pace or not move towards me at all. That made it easy.

The high-level Revenants are a bitch! The mass pull spell they use is annoying as hell. Even worse when his buddies are Devouring Skeletons.

[Raedon]

Are you planning to pay more than the base subscription fee? If not, you aren't really paying them back.

What can I say ... I'm a scoundrel.

[chicnstu]

Yeah I finally figured out all of my problems on my own. They are still annoying though. You shouldn't have to search through your massive codex to find the steps for a quest. I've had to do it for a few quests. I also would like a "Swap and Destroy" option when viewing items in a chest. For example, sometimes I'll be at or on my item limit and find a sword I want a character to equip. Since I'm full I can't take it so I have to get rid of something other than an item already equipped by a character because if I unequip something it adds to the item amount. What if I don't want to get rid of anything other than a sword a character has equipped, possibly after going down the line equipping everyone with a hand-me-down better sword? If the sword is equippable by everyone, it would be nice to be able to swap for the weakest sword being equipped by any character then destroy it.