Dragon Age: Origins Playthrough - Orzammar, Part One

We keep Sten and Morrigan in the party, but ditch Zevran in favor of Leliana before heading west. The road to the Frostback Mountains is paved not with gold, nor with good intentions, but with Loghain's mercenaries. We have more trouble getting into Orzammar than we did freely wandering the streets of Loghain's stronghold, Denerim. First there's a group waiting for us on the road, second is a messenger and his bodyguards trying to convince the dwarf guarding the gate to let him in. The guard tells the messenger that only the king of Orzammar can respond to his request for an audience, and they don't have one right now. Oh no, Amy cries! Did something happen to King... Whats-His-Name?

"Loghain, the true king of Fereldan, will hear of this and-- wait. Did that dwarf really just say that?"

Loghain's messenger actually pities us for our lack of tact, until we flash the Grey Warden treaties and the guard says we have the right to enter the city. The dwarves are not particularly happy that we happen to be the casteless that everyone hates, though. The messenger is unhappy too, and demands that we be executed as a traitor to Ferelden but the gate guard politely asks us to get off his doorstep if we're going to kill each other. You don't have to tell Amy that twice.

With another group of Loghain's cronies defeated, we look around the area near the gate and remember that one of these guys is supposed to have Sten's sword. So we start shaking down merchants with our Qunari friend in tow and eventually find a guy who admits selling it to a dwarf... who lives in Redcliffe. For an object without wheels, this sword sure does get around. The task goes back into the procrastination bin.

After thanking us for killing the loudmouth human, the guard lets us into Orzammar and we pass through the hall of Paragons before entering the market district. There, two dwarven lords competing for the throne are having a heated discussion. By "heated", I mean that a supporter of Prince Bhelen pulls out an axe and eviscerates a supporter of Lord Harrowmont in front of everyone before both groups disperse. The captain of the guard is furious that the nobles did this in front of outsiders, but then he sees we're the casteless that everyone hates and tells us to sod off.

"Consider yourself lucky. If I could afford cutscene power on a guard captain's salary, I'd murder you."

So, off we sod to the Diamond District, where we're greeted by a richly-dressed lady dwarf and-- here's a switch-- she's happy to see us. We're about to flirt with her but then Amy remembers this is his sister, Rica. Apparently, she did find a man like Beraht wanted her to: she's a royal concubine to Prince Bhelen. And the mother of his son. This makes our choice of who to support for the throne pretty easy. We tell Rica we're going to talk to Harrowmont's men.

Rica gets flustered and says she can't talk to us when we're "like this"... a term that might as well mean "when you're breathing" given Amy's personality. That's family for you. We leave her behind and seek out Dulin Forender, one of Lord Harrowmont's most trusted advisors. He refuses to let us see Harrowmont directly but asks if we're willing to show our loyalty by ruining a Proving for him.
 

I just took this picture to remind everyone what his face looks like.

Remembering how many new friends he made that one time he impersonated Everd in a Proving, Amy accepts without hesitation. Apparently we're supposed to find out why Harrowmont's real fighters dropped out, but who cares? We get to relive our glory days as a respected member of the carta!

There are plenty of dwarves fighting for Bhelen and since we didn't bother to talk to the ones who were supposed to fight for Harrowmont, we have a couple of 2 on 1 battles ahead of us. The Proving Master tries to tell us at one point that we can choose a second, but we're pretty sure he's wrong about that, so we ignore him. Besides, fighting's only half the fun. We can insult our opponents before we stab them, too! No way is that talkative qunari, Sten, gonna steal our good insults!

You're wrong, friend! *I* will be the one to enjoy losing to you!

 

When all is said and done (or rather, shouted at and stabbed), a member of the royal family gets defeated by a blithering casteless idiot. The only thing Amy has to say about it is, "somebody get me a damn ale." As luck would have it, Dulin is waiting for us at the Tapster's Tavern and is more than happy to arrange a meeting with Harrowmont.

Lord Harrowmont, a grey-haired guy who's not as forceful as most dwarves, thanks us for being his champion in the Proving. However, Bhelen has many supporters and we need to do something that Orzammar will really notice. That's when he mentions that Beraht's right-hand woman, Jarvia, is running the carta these days and-- WHAT?! That's MY carta. I'M supposed to be running it. Sorry, Harry. Whatever errand you need us to run can wait. We've gotta kill Jarvia.

"That's what I was going to... umm... never mind."

Off to Dust Town we go, but we're delayed by some Bhelen fanatics who are upset that the Wardens have sided with Harrowmont. Get in line, guys. Right behind my sister, Rica. These angry dwarves become target practice for Amy's roaring rampage against Jarvia. Strolling into his old stomping grounds covered in blood, we're met by our carta buddy Leske, who wonders if we're back because we missed being treated like dirt. That never really stopped happening, man. Anyway, small talk's over. Where's Jarvia so I can kill her?

Leske tips us off that the carta took over the Brosca family home after Rica and the liquor cabinet called Mom moved to the Diamond District. I guess it's more target practice for now. We find an ambush waiting for us in our old house, which is fine with Amy. Thoroughly beaten, one dwarf tries to surrender but we hear the talking as an unfortunate sign that he's not dead yet. We finish the job before he can say, "wait!" Idiocy waits for no man.

One of the thugs had a token made from a finger bone that is probably irrelevant, but we take it anyway. There are no secret doors inside, so we head back out to ask Leske what gives. He's gone, though. Bathroom break, I'm sure. Another casteless dwarf who remembers us tells us she's seen carta members go into another building with no handle on the door, but a slot that they put some kind of token into. Amy thinks for about a minute on what that could be... then has to lay down for a while because his head hurts.

"Come on! My fellow mobs and I have already spawned and we're not going to wait here all day!"
 

He eventually figures out that he has to put the finger bone token through the slot, and the door opens. We head down a staircase and find a group of thugs waiting for us. The leader of the group demands the password. We answer, "die!" Not the password he was looking for, but it's the right answer in its own way.
After carving through them, we find that the carta headquarters is bigger than we remember and there are some elf and qunari mercenaries who are definitely new, too. Apparently, Jarvia has done a good job running things but Amy's way too stubborn to admit that. We wreck all her new stuff and find her in a large room where one of her guards is none other than Leske.

Jarvia gloats that our friend is on her side now, and we yell at Leske that we never would have betrayed him. We can't yell that with a straight face, but we yell it anyway. Leske asks us what exactly he was supposed to do when all of Orzammar wanted him dead and Jarvia gave him a way out. Not our problem. Amy tells Leske it's time to kill Jarvia but he follows her orders, not ours. We have to kill him to get to her.

"This guy should have died from his own stupidity years ago. We can take him, right?  RIGHT??"

 

Jarvia's tough, and uses smoke bombs and traps to move around the battlefield and stay in an advantageous position. Amy, however, has not yet met a trick so clever he can't get around it by hitting it really hard. Jarvia eventually falls and we head back to the market district using a secret tunnel that runs through a very confused merchant's shop. Amy is now the leader of a carta consisting of one member since he killed everyone else, but that's good enough for him. With that done, decide to head back to Harrowmont to figure out what he wanted before we ran out.

Turns out, he wanted us to kill Jarvia. Huh. Well, that was serendipitous. So we ask him when he's going to give us our troops and he explains that he still can't win a vote against Bhelen and there's one more thing we need to do for him. Really, Harrowmont? You have a legion of supporters but sole responsibility for your succession falls on our shoulders?

Fortunately, the task isn't complicated. We just have to 1) enter the Deep Roads-- the home territory of the darkspawn. 2) Find any sign of a dwarven paragon named Branka-- who disappeared into the Deep Roads years ago with her own private army. 3) Help her find a lost dwarven relic-- which we have no clues for its location or even what it is.

We tell Harrowmont we'll be back in about an hour.

Dragon Age: Origins Playthrough - The Circle Tower

Amastacia somehow found a promising lead on the Urn of Sacred Ashes, but Arl Eamon looked pretty comfy on his deathbed last we checked. It'd be rude to disturb him. That just leaves the Circle and Orzammar as our remaining treaties. One area we know well, the other is completely alien to us. Off we go to harass the mages!

We're bringing Sten along because he mentioned something about losing his sword at Lake Calenhad, where the Circle is located. Not sure if that's a euphemism, but I sure don't want to think about it too hard. Zevran joins us too, because we'd like to see if he's a better rogue than Leliana. Lastly, Morrigan... because she's an illegal mage who hates the Circle so clearly she'll be comfortable with meeting them.

The first person we meet, however, is a looter. He tells us to scram cause he bought this spot fair and square. We congratulate him on his new land purchase. Confused, he says he just paid a guy for looting rights because apparently there were some dead Qunari here... at which point he realizes we have a live one with us. He immediately sells out the guy who found the sword and says he hangs out near Orzammar. So I guess Sten's sword will have to wait.

 

Normally, I'd rough you up for good measure... but you already look like you got kicked in the head by a horse.

We continue to the dock for now, where there's one boat that can be used to reach the Circle tower (which was built on an island in the middle of the lake). Unfortunately, the dock has a Templar on it, too. His job is to get in our way. We flash the Grey Warden documents and he claims to be Queen of Antiva. We claim to have business with the mages and he says that's impossible. His job is to stop unauthorized people and since he's stopping us, we must be unauthorized.

This guy is a master of non-sequiturs. That's supposed to be our job, damn it. We tell him we're getting mad so he immediately backs down and shows us to the boat. He and Amy are more alike than they'd care to admit.

We will duel to the death in a deleted scene. THERE CAN BE ONLY ONE!

Finally arriving at the Circle Tower, we find Knight-Commander Greagoir telling his Templars to lock the place down and keep anything from getting out. These guys take curfews seriously. Noticing us, he demands to know why we're here and we tell him we're just exploring. Unamused, he says there's nothing to see now that the tower is swarming with abominations. Ooh! Those sound like they'd be a great addition to our Grey Warden army! Greagoir doesn't like that idea, either. He assures us there will be no mages left to assist us once the Templars are granted the Right of Annulment and they "cleanse" the tower.

We know what cleanse means from Denerim. Cleanse means "paint with blood". Amy's good at that. We tell Greagoir we can handle it ourselves. He's doubtful, but says that if we eliminate the need for Templars to die fighting mages, he will pledge his support to fight darkspawn instead. Charging in with no backup sounds like a great plan to Amy. It's a deal.

"...I should probably stop him. On the other hand, he might kill ONE demon before getting slaughtered. Good enough for me."

One of the Templars shakes his head in disbelief as he shuts the door to the Tower behind us, and we get busy ransacking the place. Unfortunately, the damned apprentices keep their stuff locked up. Okay, Zevran, time to show those rogue skills!

...It turns out Zev has no skill in picking locks, stealing things, or moving stealthily. Basically, he fights up close with two weapons like Amy but he's way more fragile. This was a great plan.

Of course, you could give him a bow... but he has no skills in archery, either.

Moving on, we discover that someone else is fighting abominations in the tower: an older woman named Wynne, whose impressive magic takes down a rage demon before our eyes. As we enter, she turns and threatens us, probably mistaking Amy for an abomination. Understandable. We tell her we're not going to kill her; the Templars can do that for us. Realizing the Templars intend to annul them, she says there's still time to take back the Tower and prevent it. That sounds like too much work. We want to go ahead with Annulment but she says if the Tower is truly lost, she wants to see it for herself. This is another one of those people who won't shut up until she gets her way, isn't she? Fine. You can kill demons with us.

Morrigan, however, is shocked at Amy's lack of senseless violence exactly when she was counting on it. Blinking slowly, we ask her why she doesn't like Circle mages. She's more than happy to repeat her previous rants to us about how they allow themselves to be caged and they deserve death if they accepted a master who wants them to die.

...Oh. Sorry, we forgot. Never mind, Wynne.

Once Wynne realizes we're friends with an illegal mage, she's more than happy to give Morrigan the fight she wants. Unfortunately for her, she's fragile and falls down pretty quickly. With Morrigan's hatred temporarily subdued, we press on and find that the halls of the Circle Tower are practically stuffed with demons and abominations. Admittedly, these are greater numbers than Amy was expecting but with him and Sten being as well-armored as they are, the attacks don't faze them much.

NOTE: The battle looks much more awesome here than it did when I played through it.

Amy continues to slash his way through the tower, opening every unlocked chest he can find and fiddling with all the unsupervised experiments along the way. At one point, he summons an extra demon for good measure. The real prize, however, comes when we find the First Enchanter's office. Inside an unlocked chest is a large, black and evil-looking spell book. It's all gibberish to Amy so he nonchalanty hands it to Morrigan and keeps looking for treasure.

Morrigan is stunned to see that Amy has just handed over her mother's grimoire. She gleefully says she will begin studying the dark secrets within it immediately.

...Maybe that wasn't the best idea in retrospect. Oh, well. At least she's happy for once.

As we're headed for the top levels of the tower, we enter a room where a mage is laying at the feet of an abomination-- asleep, not dead. The demon-thing tells us we must be tired of all this fighting and we deserve a rest. Amy realizes he's forgotten his manners. This must be the designated nap hour here in the Circle Tower. His companions try to tell him that the demon is trying to trick him, but he's already asleep by then.

 

Using his demonic powers, he removed the "JUST STAB THIS THING" option from the dialogue. Or something.

So, after a long section of gameplay that has us hacking demons apart, the game decides to give cutscene power to a random sloth demon and put us on the railroad to Something Completely Different. Our dwarf is now imprisoned in the demon's personal corner of the Fade without his companions. To escape, he must use a combination of strength of arms and shapeshifting into a mouse.

Yeah. I don't get it either. Many fans of this game loathe this section due to all the backtracking and the sudden loss of party members. As a warrior, we won't have much trouble going it alone... but if you designed your Warden to be the party healer? Good luck.

We start in a dream of the Grey Warden headquarters of Weisshaupt, where Duncan is alive and proud to say that not only was the Archdemon defeated, but we also set the Deep Roads ablaze and burned up every last darkspawn, ever. Amy says this world is boring as hell now. He's going to find some bandits to slaughter, or something. "Duncan" calls him a fool and says if all he wants is death, that's what he'll get. We slay the illusions easily and a pedestal appears which transports us further into the Fade.

Nice try, demon... but the real Duncan doesn't have a Photoshop filter.

The only island we can access leads to a wasteland occupied by a mage named Niall, the guy we found passed out asleep earlier. He says he was trapped here on his way to stop the blood mages and although he escaped the first illusion like us, his path has been blocked ever since. We decide to give it a go ourselves. We don't find a way out, but we do see a demon attacking a large mouse, so we step forward to stop it. There's no food here, after all... that mouse might be tasty if we can find a campfire and some salt.

The mouse, however, teaches us how to turn into a mouse ourselves and then vanishes. Awesome! Now Amy can cook and eat himself! At least, he would if he had a proper campfire. Maybe later, he thinks to himself, and goes back to the Fade pedestal.

Behold... (sigh) our new secret weapon in the war against the darkspawn.

Here's where things get annoying. There are five islands (including mouse island) surrounding the sloth demon's inner sanctum. Each island has a lesser demon on it, holding the portal to the inner sanctum closed. Defeating these demons also opens portals to the areas where your companions are stuck in dreams of their own, so you can free them before confronting the sloth demon.

To reach the demons, however, you have to bypass different kinds of obstacles... that can only be overcome by learning new forms to shapeshift into. In theory, this sounds kind of interesting but in practice, you wind up scurrying through mouse holes, trying to decipher your map and determine if you've really explored all you possibly can. It could be that you need a new shapeshifting ability to progress, but it's also possible you missed a mouse hole a ways back that leads you to a new form... and without that new form, of course, you won't get anywhere on the other islands.

It's possible to do this section without a guide, but it's frustrating-- especially given the relatively linear nature of the rest of the game. For those who are diligent, there are permanent increases to your attributes to be found... but deciding between finding them or getting the hell out of the Fade ASAP is a constant struggle.

How badly do I want to poke this glowing training dummy with a stick? ...This is a harder choice than I thought.

Anyway... nothing interesting story-wise here. We eventually find our companions: Morrigan is not fooled by the illusion of Flemeth, as the demon has mistaken her for a compassionate soul. Sten isn't fooled by the illusion of his brothers-in-arms, as the memory of their deaths is etched into his mind. Zevran, meanwhile, is having a kinky torture dream. Eww. With them freed, we proceed to the demon's inner sanctum, and Mr. Sloth tries to tell us he tried really hard to create enjoyable illusions. Well, you failed, man. You failed hard. The demon gets vanquished with extreme prejudice.

With him gone, not much is standing between us and Uldred, the leader of the blood mages. We find a Templar named Cullen who thinks we're illusions but we tell him we're just here to kill mages and ask questions later. He accepts us as a kindred spirit. Another Templar is under the thrall of a busty demon with flaming purple hair. We are SO sick of cats! We kill her and her pet Templar before she can attempt to parley.

The top of the tower is a disturbing sight. Uldred is torturing the remaining Circle mages and turning them into abominations when their wills are broken. He turns to us as we enter and asks what we want. Thoroughly creeped out, we tell him we'll be going now. He says that's rude and we should get possessed by demons as punishment. Uldred turns into something big and nasty in an attempt to do so, but we're so experienced at killing abominations at this point that the best he can do is corrupt a couple of other mages to fight for him instead. Sten and Amy prove to be the better meat shields.

When your strategy has degenerated to "hope the minions don't die too fast", that's not a good sign.

First Enchanter Irving gets up slowly, relieved that it's over. We let him think everything is fine as we march him down the tower to Greagoir. It is here that he learns the Templars have written this Circle off as a lost cause and his "saviors" are totally cool with that. Irving glumly says he will do what is best and cooperate with the little inquisition. Morrigan is positively beaming.

Greagoir promises to heed our call to battle once his Templars are finished hosing down this bloody tower. With that, two of our four armies have been assembled! Where to next? It seems like Eamon needs those sacred ashes as soon as possible... but Amy just remembered he was supposed to be running the carta in Dust Town by now. Our dwarf's going home.

Dragon Age: Origins Playthrough - Soldier's Peak

Happy with his gold sovereigns... for now... Amastacia gets back on the road to Soldier's Peak. Levi guides us through the tunnels and eventually, we find ourselves standing before an impressive castle. Upon entering, we discover that this place has a bit of a ghost problem that needs to be sorted out before we move in. Visions of the Wardens' last moments hound Amy as he searches for valuable loot and Levi keeps asking if we see what he's seeing. We have to keep telling him to shut up and focus on shiny objects... and the fact that we keep getting attacked by skeletons... but mostly shiny things.

"Hey! I'm providing some very important exposition, dwarf! Don't pretend like you didn't notice!"

Our exploration eventually leads us to a chamber that shows that the ghost problem was just this castle's way of warming us up for even worse news. We see a vision of Levi's ancestor, Sophia Dryden, fighting the king's soldiers with her mage ally, Avernus, behind her. She directs him to summon a small army of demons to assist them, which goes about as well as you'd expect. The demons refuse Avernus' orders and start killing everything. The strongest among them tells Avernus he has managed to tear a hole in the Veil of reality itself, and the mage runs like hell when he hears that. Sure enough, the glowing tear in the Veil is still in this room and Amy has no tasteful curtains that he can use to cover it up.

After vanquishing the demons that have come through the tear, we make our way to the commander's office and find Sophia Dryden still locked inside. Unfortunately, she was possessed by a demon after Avernus abandoned her. The demon makes a simple request: it will close the tear in the Veil and make Soldier's Peak safe for us to inhabit if we let it keep Sophia's body. At this point, we know of no other way to close this demon portal and it would be unwise to screw up what could be our only chance. So, Amy stabs the demon out of her body and takes her fancy armor. Curtains. That's our solution. Gotta find 'em.

That shade of purple is hideous in this room!  ...Also, a demon came through the purple thing and possessed the old Warden-Commander.

We find a door leading to Avernus' old part of the fortress and battle through some more undead on the way. A disturbing room full of blood stains awaits us, the site of Avernus' many experiments to unlock the secrets of Grey Warden blood. ...We're sensing a theme of "blood" and "magic" here. It's probably a coincidence.

Near Avernus' research logs is a flask filled with a dark liquid. The logs detail just how horrible the experiments were, but Amy can't read too well when he's thirsty. He grabs the flask off the table and chugs it like it's ale. The searing pain that follows tells him that definitely wasn't ale. It's a potion Avernus made to empower the magic in a Grey Warden's blood. Amy scribbles something in the logs about the potion needing more fruit flavor, and moves on.

The next room is Avernus' chambers and much to our surprise, he's still here... and not possessed by a demon. He senses that we have Grey Warden blood, and explains that his experiments have increased his lifespan significantly. When he asks why we're here, Amy tells him he only came because a total stranger asked him to. Levi Dryden then asks if any of his family records remain intact and Avernus regrettably informs him he's out of luck. 

"You're telling me I spent all that time convincing people to buy this DLC, and I don't get a damned thing out of it?!"

 
Avernus is more concerned with repairing the damage he did to the Veil however, and insists that we discuss his horrible ethics after all the demons are dead. Amy starts to mention the fruit flavor thing, but Avernus is already walking out of the tower, toward the tear in the Veil. No wonder people hate blood mages. Their manners suck!

Back in the main fortress, Avernus begins the process of closing the summoning circles. The demons aren't happy about that, and make a final push through the tear to stop us. Rage demons, shades, wraiths and even a desire demon shows up, but the attacks bounce off Amy's new armor and the Veil is repaired.

His work done, Avernus says he'll be happy to stay in his tower and conduct more grisly experiments to help the Wardens. Unfortunately for him, Amy still hasn't gotten the foul taste of that energy drink out of his mouth. He decides the mage had outlived his usefulness and kills him, too.

 

I don't care about the ethics of your experiments... but as a person, you creep me out too much.  DIE!

Levi parts ways with us a little disappointed, but says he'll stay at Soldier's Peak and provide what support he can to the Wardens. Whatever, Levi. We have some new armor and a belly full of blood that need to be washed down with something mystical and fruit-flavored… and we know just the place to get it.

Mages of the Circle Tower! I seek a legendary potion of ambiguous fruitiness! The Grey Wardens demand your assistance!

Dragon Age: Origins Playthrough - Denerim, Part One

Our campsite continues to attract new visitors.  Upon returning, we see a Dalish clan liaison and some supply crates that can be used to donate materials to our allies. The elves are good at making potions and poisons, so collecting weeds found in the countryside and throwing them in a box will make them happy. It's an elf thing, I guess. Our dwarf doesn't question it.

There's also a visitor who has been around for a while, but I haven't mentioned him yet: Levi Dryden, a man who claims that Duncan promised to do him a favor before he died at Ostagar. Amastacia tries to get dead people's friends to honor their promises too, so we get along nicely. He says there's a fortress called Soldier's Peak that used to be a Grey Warden stronghold and we'd be welcome to use it again if we go with him to find evidence that his family used to be nobility.

(INTERLUDE: I know I said I wasn't going to talk about this, but I should mention at this point that if you haven't purchased the Soldier's Peak downloadable content, this conversation will lead you directly to a storefront page to pay real-world money for it. This character stays in your camp until the quest is completed, effectively making him a pop-up ad in human form that you can't get rid of. I generally don't complain about extra content for a game-- if you don't want to pay more money, you can just ignore it-- but I hate the way that Electronic Arts implemented it in this case.)

 

"I know it's annoying, but my family name is dirt right now and I have to pay the bills somehow. Buy my DLC!"

Naturally, Amy is willing to put the whole quest to build an army and fight the darkspawn on hold to do this completely unverifiable favor. We take Morrigan, Leliana and Shale on the road north... but in order to get to Soldier's Peak, we have to pass through Loghain's stronghold: the city of Denerim. That's not a problem! It's a big city. I'm sure there are plenty of hideous-looking dwarves with face tattoos there and I won't get recognized.

Before Amy even reaches the city of Denerim, however, a woman runs up to him on the road and says her wagon is being attacked by bandits. We run up the road to see if there's any good loot left, but instead we see a group of armed men, along with a handsome blonde-haired elven man. He gives a signal, and a henchman on a hill nearly crushes us with a log. They then draw their weapons, only to have their ambush routed by Amy, his personal golem and his two lady friends.

"Crap... I changed my mind. You never seeing me again after that cut scene was a much better idea."

Our dwarf finds the elf laying on the ground, barely breathing, his fine-looking blades beside him... and immediately decides this poor guy was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. We wake him up and, surprised to be alive, he asks what we intend to do with him. We tell him we're going to torture him because that's a funny joke as far as Amy is concerned. The elf assumes we want information and decides to save us the trouble by admitting he is Zevran, an Antivan Crow hired by Teyrn Loghain to hunt down and kill Grey Wardens. Having failed, his order will kill him if they find him alive so he asks to fight alongside us instead.

This comes as something as a shock to Amy. Firstly because apparently hideous tattooed dwarves are less common than he thought, and secondly because there was no way he could have known this elf was an assassin! Regardless, he appreciates someone whose loyalties shift as rapidly as his own and welcomes Zevran to the team. Morrigan points out the obvious possibility that Zevran is just trying to buy himself another opportunity to finish the job but that thought hadn't crossed Amy's mind. Leliana welcomes him however, and Zevran decides that means he can flirt with her now. Shifting loyalties and questionable social skills, huh? I think he'll fit right in.

We'll travel with Zevran eventually but for now, Amy is headed to Denerim with his golem in tow because that will certainly help him blend in with the crowd. You would think we would be stopped at the city gate, or at least soon after entering the market district, but the guards don't appear to be interested. We decide to tempt fate by walking up to a sergeant, pointing at him and warning, "don't even try to arrest me."

"Uh... I'm pretty sure you broke at least one law just now, but... you know, I really don't care."

"Are you kidding?" he replies, "Even if I gave the order, my men would wet their breeches and leave me by lonesome! As long as you don't cause trouble in the market district, we don't have a problem."

The only part of that sentence we heard was "cause trouble in the market district." So, we approach a shady-looking individual named Slim Couldry who recognizes us from our wanted poster (again, HOW??) and asks us if we're interested in working with him. Sounds like a great way to avoid suspicion. We slip him a bribe of 50 silver coins and he tells us he saw a courtier in a green dress in the main square with a hefty bag of gemstones. Amy's not a rogue, but his time in Dust Town taught him a thing or two about cutting purses and we easily liberate this woman from her gems.

"Stick with me, master dwarf! I'm as good at picking victims as I am picking nicknames for myself!"

It turns out there's plenty of paying work in Denerim if you're not too picky about who you're dealing with. A man with a funny hat is hanging out in one of the many back alleys, with a bag full of requests from mages who have left the Circle for various reasons. Among the many tasks is a job that requires us to smear ox blood on a few doors. Like Amy needs a reason to do that. We take the ox blood and head off.

Having completely forgot about his quest to vanquish the darkspawn and mad with a lust for gold, Amy accidentally enters a house that he's not supposed to paint with ox blood (or was he just supposed to smear it on the door? Doesn't matter). Undaunted, he decides to root through the valuables for treasure before the occupant tells him that the back room of the house is off-limits because Brother Genitivi is a very private person. I feel like we've heard that name before... oh well. We reassure whats-his-name that we're just exploring and won't mess anything up. The man attacks when we try to force our way through the door and we leave him in a pool of his own blood.

NPCs in this kind of video game rarely object when the main character wanders into their house and starts looking for treasure.

This one objected. Now he's dead. Are you learning an important lesson, NPCs??

Upon entering the back room, Amy sees a dead body-- and the weird part is, it's not one he's responsible for. It turns out that the guy we just stabbed was impersonating Brother Genitivi's assistant in order to hide the fact that Genitivi found a solid lead on where to find the Urn of Sacred Ashes. Oh! That thing Teagan wanted! If anyone asks, we totally meant to do all this. We're good like that.

Denerim is so large that it has its own map and we have to pass through some bad sections of town in order to get to the houses that need to be marked with ox blood. We inevitably run afoul of bandits as a result, but that's okay because the Chantry was looking for someone to clean up the streets anyway. Our definition of "clean up" apparently involves getting blood, ox and otherwise, everywhere... but the Chant of Light isn't literal, right? You need priests to interpret it. We assume the same is true for the jobs they give out.

While heading back to the market district to collect some gold, another shocking twist occurs: the city guard, who weren't supposed to be riled up unless we caused trouble, have heard that we're stealing things and decide to arrest us. Amy doesn't see the problem. It's not like he was caught! In any case, this goes about as well as you'd expect for the guards and the streets are a whole lot "cleaner" by the time we're done.

Truly, this slum is a thing of beauty now that I've killed everyone in it.

So, Amy gets to collect gold from both the Mages' Collective and the Chantry for his ox blood-fueled destruction and wonders to himself why the hell he didn't come here sooner.  Unfortunately, he's wasted the better part of a day showing his face aroud roughly half of the city... and we're no closer to accomplishing our recruitment goals for the Grey Warden army, let alone doing that favor that put us on this road in the first place.  Happy with his gold for now, Amy decides he's better look into this fortress of questionable value called Soldier's Peak.

...Right after he visits an establishment called The Pearl.

Dragon Age: Origins Playthrough - Brecilian Forest

Now that things have calmed down in Redcliffe, we find ourselves faced once again with an array of options. Bann Teagan seems to think that we should go to Denerim to chase down leads on Brother Genetivi, a scholar who apparently had promising news about the Urn, but we still have these treaties to exploit too. As a dwarf, Amy has never heard of the Dalish elves, and has no ideas whatsoever about where they can be found... so that's the group we're going after next. Thankfully, the "Brecilian Forest" is marked on our world map so finding these nomadic elves won't actually involve wandering aimlessly through the woods. A funny thing happens on the way to the forest, though....

Dragon Age: Origins includes a random encounter feature that provides you with one of several possible events that happen to your party on the way to their destination. In this case, Amy runs into a group of villagers crowded around an Axe in a Stump. This is no ordinary axe as far as the locals are concerned, though. This is a magical axe that can only be retrieved by the true ruler of Thedas. There are obvious references to both the Sword in the Stone and Monty Python's Quest for the Holy Grail here, and the encounter is incredibly rare. As a champion of improbability, however, Amy pulls the axe out to the amazement of the villagers and proudly puts it in his inventory.

After some more walking, Amy comes face to face with a Dalish patrol that is understandably suspicious of this ugly dwarf and his companions (Morrigan, Leliana and Shale, for the record). Amy chides them for not being hospitable and the Dalish scout sternly reminds him that the elves have been enslaved by humans, and they don't take kindly to that. He reassures them by saying he has business here, which the scout is also doubtful of, but eventually the "Grey Warden" title is dropped and we are reluctantly allowed to meet with the Keeper of this tribe.

I'm also voiced by the guy who played Tuvok on Star Trek: Voyager. If you don't like me, that may be why.

 

The Keeper's name is Zathrian and apparently he's been the leader of this tribe for quite some time. He suspects we're here about the treaty his people signed with the Grey Wardens and calmly explains that they're in no position to honor this promise. He directs our attention to a number of elven warriors writhing in agony after running afoul of werewolves and being inflicted with lycanthropy. Amy fails to see the problem because in his mind, this means he'll have access to an army of werewolf elves. Zathrian reminds him that lycanthropy turns people into mindless, raging beasts that don't take order no matter how nicely you ask them. Amy understands, and decides he had better look for help elsewhere.

By "elsewhere", Amy means "elsewhere in this immediate vicinity". We take a walk around the Dalish camp to see if anyone is more helpful. The master craftsman is willing to barter with us and there's a Dalish woman who's nice enough, but she's hanging out with some really weird-looking deer called halla and doesn't want to talk about our ancient treaties. There's also a novice hunter who has never seen a dwarf before and is clearly nervous about the possibility that he might offend us. We politely shout at him to stop stammering, but this does us no good. So, with great exasperation, we tell Zathrian that we're willing to end the werewolf menace if that's what it takes to get Dalish help.

Zathrian tries to warn us that there are dangers in the forest beyond just werewolves, but we're too eager to use our new axe of destiny to heed these warnings. There's a nice variety of enemies to slaughter in the Brecilian Forest, ranging from wolves and werewolves, to bears, to angry trees and finally more darkspawn, just in case we forgot that they're the main threat in this game. After some aimless slaughter, we cross a bridge and encounter a werewolf named Swiftrunner who... talks to us. He's as confused as we are about why the Dalish would send a dwarf to retaliate for the recent attack. Taking the whole "talking werewolf" thing in stride, Amy reassures Swiftrunner that he means the werewolves no harm. He's just here to kill Witherfang, the werewolf leader, and take his heart back to Zathrian to end the curse. Surprisingly, the werewolves don't like this idea.

"Fear us, dwarf, for we are-- damn it, Razorclaw! Don't scratch your armpits while I'm trying to intimidate people!"

 

The werewolves attack, but between Morrigan's spells, Leliana's arrows and Shale's flaming golem punches, Swiftrunner decides that it would be prudent to let the forest's natural defenses whittle us down first. More werewolves attack us after Swiftrunner flees, but these enemies are a kind of obstacle sometimes referred to as a "glass cannon". They can dish out damage, but they can't take it... and when one of your companions is a living construct made of stone, they don't last long. The aforementioned angry trees are a bigger problem than the actual werewolf menace.

In fact, it's not long before we run into the leader of the angry trees: a hulking wooden monstrosity with reddish leaves who speaks only in rhyme. He asks what manner of beast we are so naturally, we pretend we're a werewolf. The Great Oak recognizes this as a lie immediately and tells us he just wants to know if we could retrieve his acorn for him. Amy demands to know what he'd get out of this deal and the Oak promises enchanted wood that will allow us to travel to the center of the forest, where the werewolves are hiding out. We tell him it'd be easier to kill him and take the wood. With great patience, the Oak points out that it'd be worthless if he didn't enchant it, and Amy responds by trying to intimidate him. At this point, the talking tree has officially had enough of our crap, and attacks. Unfortunately for the Great Oak, Amy has just acquired an axe that is perfect for cutting trees down to size, so our best chance to confront the werewolves gets destroyed.

My branches broken, woe am I / You chopped me down and don't know why

Amy also finds a Dalish hunter who is barely holding onto life after running afoul of werewolves. We try to strike up a conversation but he rudely passes out. So, we loot all his equipment while he's napping, then wake him up. He only talks for another minute before passing out again, and Amy decides that stabbing him is easier than trying to revive him. Leliana freaks out. Sorry, girl. Forgot you were there. Fine, we'll take him back to the camp, but YOU'RE carrying him.

We eventually walk deeper into the woods, where we find an elf who has already turned into a werewolf. Barely holding back her rage, she pleads with us to kill her and give her scarf to her mate back in the village. We insist that she can just rejoin her people as she is. They won't even notice all the new fur! This idea is so stupid that the rage overwhelms her and we kill her just like she wanted. Frustrated, Amy wonders to himself if anyone in these woods actually talks sensibly!

His prayers are answered when we run into a hermit who lives in a dirty stump. We say hello and he immediately lays down the ground rules: question for a question, answer for an answer. So we trade questions back and forth for a while. It's a good system. Amy likes it. Morrigan tries to point out he's a madman who knows old and powerful magic. That's a rude thing to say about the most sane individual we've met in this game. The hermit agrees, saying it's no fair bringing a wizard to a guessing game, then asks if we're the kind souls who slaughtered that annoying talking tree. Amy says that depends on whether or not there's a reward. The hermit says maybe... do we want to know the perfect spot for a picnic in these woods?

"Seriously, look at the online reviews for this tuffet! 'Try the mixed grubs with lice, it's Dalishious!'"

 

The hermit says he can use a werewolf pelt to trick the trees into thinking we're one of the lycanthropes, allowing us to pass into their lair. Our only question is, how many werewolf pelts does he want? He only needs one, and after musing about turning it into a pair of slippers instead, he enchants it as promised. That's kind of a shame. We could have used a nice pair of werewolf slippers.

So, purely by accident, we're right on track to enter the werewolves' lair. The misty barrier blocking the path leading deeper into the woods is no impediment to us and no one is more shocked than Swiftrunner, who is waiting on the other side. Seeing that we've outsmarted a bunch of trees, he attacks... briefly. Flaming golem punches ensue. Amy moves forward to finish him off but he's knocked down by Witherfang, who promptly flees into a large, ruined temple with its werewolf reinforcements.

"Ah-ha! I know your greatest weakness: CUTSCENE POWER!"

 

The werewolf lair is much nicer than expected: instead of a smelly cave network, they set themselves up in an ancient Elven ruin. Concerned about future resale value, most of the lycanthropes elect not to fight indoors. They retreat into a lower chamber instead, and bar the door behind them. You'd think a simple door bar would be no major obstacle to a witch and/or a golem, but the game insists we have to take the long way around.

For the most part, all we have to worry about in the ruins are the vengeful undead bodies of the former Elven residents. There are occasionally giant spiders too, and the dead Elves do nothing to help their race's bad image in Ferelden by being less threatening than the arachnids. The unimpressive enemies give way to a bigger challenge, however.

Leliana keeps complaining about having a bad feeling about a room up ahead, and before we can tell her to shut up, a dragon appears. Not a terribly impressive one... this little guy is only about 10 feet long from tail to snout. He doesn't take kindly to us thinking he's cute, though, and puts up an admirable fight. He's not strong enough to take out Amy and Shale though, and ranged support from Morrigan and Leliana finish him off.

What the-- what a ripoff! I've seen 'Desolation of Smaug'! This is a falsely advertised hoard!

 

We shamelessly loot the dragon's "hoard" and the chambers ahead before finding a precious gem that could be valuable if it wasn't filled with blood. Amy tries to break it open and get the icky stuff out, but it won't shatter. Leliana suspects it's a phylactery. Amy doesn't know what that word means, so he assumes it's unimportant.

At some point while handling it, however, Amy hears a voice in his head and not one of the usual ones that keep daring him to snort lyrium dust. It's some kind of elf wizard whose spirit has been trapped for hundreds of years and begs to be destroyed. The visions are confusing, but the elf seems to remember being a spellcaster who could wear armor, and the spirit offers to impart the knowledge of how to do so as thanks for destroying the phylactery. We accept... then casually toss the gem into a pile of rubble and move on.

The tunnels lead to a pool of water that is a secret passage to the werewolves's inner sanctum... somehow. The camera zooms in on what looks like a puddle and suddenly, we're face to face with werewolves again. We kill the half dozen or so that attack before one shows up that asks if we're willing to parley. Amy decides there's no way this could be an ambush and agrees right away.

The lycanthropes lead us to a green-skinned beauty called the Lady of the Forest. We're pretty sure we remember her from this one Star Trek episode, but she insists she's a spirit who calms the werewolves' bestial nature and taught them speech. It turns out she was also summoned by Zathrian quite a long time ago in order to impart the curse of lycanthropy on some humans who wronged him. The heart of Witherfang could treat the illness, but Zathrian has the power to end the curse.

"No, I'm not an Orion slave girl... or a Desire Demon... or a cat. Seriously, what gave you those ideas?"

 

Swiftrunner, the Lady's right-hand wolf, angrily says the Dalish will never bargain and this is pointless. Amy agrees, and tells the werewolves that he'd be happy to help them kill all the elves. He fails this persuade check so hard, it's kind of amazing. Swiftrunner, who was out for blood a minute ago, hears Amy say this and decides that if this moronic dwarf thinks killing the Dalish is a good idea, it can't possibly be a good plan.

So, Amy tells the Lady that he thinks killing Witherfang is the best backup plan. The Lady says she has it in her power to ensure that Witherfang remains hidden forever if we act against her. We immediately switch loyalties and agree to kill Zathrian. Or force him to talk to the werewolves. Whatever.

We leave the Lady of the Forest behind and take the werewolves' shortcut back to the entrance hall of the ruins. Unexpectedly, Zathrian is there, having followed our trail of destruction through the forest. He demands to know why we're leaving without having killed Witherfang and we tell him we're on the Lady of the Forest's side now. He informs us that the Lady is actually Witherfang. That leafy bitch! She lied to us! We immediately switch loyalties again and agree to help Zathrian kill the Lady.

"People like you are the reason I dabble in neverending curses. I'm just sayin'."

 

Five minutes after leaving the werewolves' lair, we're back to see them with Zathrian in tow. He proudly tells the Lady of the Forest that the Warden is going to help him kill her... at which point Amy bursts out laughing and says he only said that to get Zathrian down here. Leliana tells us she's relieved, because we changed sides so many times that she had no idea what our intent was anymore. Little does she know that Amy still hasn't figured it out yet. The Lady of the Forest, meanwhile, tells Zathrian that she knows that ending the curse comes with a price: both his death and hers. The curse is the only thing that's sustaining them after this many years, but the Lady is willing to die to see it end. Zathrian says his hatred is eternal, and demands that we pick a side. Shale summarizes our thoughts perfectly: "somebody please kill somebody."

Amy tells Zathrian to fight the Lady and her werewolves, and we'll watch from a safe distance. The Dalish Keeper decides that remark means we deserve to die too... and he kind of has a point. Unfortunately for him, Amy is very adept at living through stupid decisions and beats Zathrian handily. After that, the elf has finally had enough. His hatred has clearly gotten the better of him and he agrees to end the curse. Standing in a circle with the werewolves, he taps his staff once on the ground, falls dead and the Lady fades away as her pack gazes at her one last time. The werewolves then transform back into their human form.

It's finally over, the humans say. No it isn't, Amy says. These humans put him through a lot of trouble and he intends to make them pay for it. The man who was once Swiftrunner says he still has an old, beaten-up kite shield if Amy wants it. Luckily, Amy decides that one old shield is easily worth the lives of a couple dozen humans and lets them go.

So, after a long day of doing the right thing for the dumb reasons, Amy returns to the Dalish camp and reports to the new Keeper of the clan. She pledges her support to us in the coming war and thanks us for saving the lives of the hunters suffering from lycanthropy. Amy leaves the forest, confident that any future experience he has with an elf will be a completely pleasant one.

No, damn it! I said we'd never see you again!