I think everyone tearing into DA2 so they'll be pleasantly surprised when it all comes together nicely. Hype it too much and it's bound to disappoint.

I'm generally optimistic. I love the world of Dragon Age, and would enjoy experiencing it in many different forms, whether it be a tactical old-school RPG or an action-RPG. So long as the experience isn't "watered down", I don't really care what form it takes.

No, they don't become more automatic or efficient. To counter DA's party-AI woes, I pause the game frequently to redirect party members. Keep in mind that scripted battles preceeded by forced teleporting of party members and the cliche villain speech open up a new can of worms: at combat start, your party members go through a forced repositioning sequence that usually cancels any directions you give them during the first few seconds.

Yeah, I remember giving garrus a lecture about how hes a terrorist with a badge, for endangering innocent lives... Rig after letting balek blow up hostages. I only saw "cant you disable the ship ?" I hate it when I cant see what I say.

K. Thanks for confirming that.


Alright. I guess I'll have control 4 characters entirely on my own. Thanks for the info.

+1 to SquareEnix for solid party AI and -1 for EA.

This will slow down the game by a lot. The best solution is to just play on easy mode.

[censored] Easy mode and [censored] Tactics. The only way to play this game to me is to take full control of the party on nothing less than Hard mode.

Heh, what can I say, I'm excited for this game. I'm not an extreme pessimist like some people on here, the Social Site, and pretty much anywhere.

I did that for my first playthrough and now I find the game really really boring. I mean, I made a new character (few months after the 1st) that got to somewhere into the Redcliffe quest before I just stopped playing and ultimately uninstalling the game. I'm surprised I finished the game a first time, but that just shows that I have no life more than anything. In the last mission, I soloed the enemies with Morrigan rather than "waste" my armies.

http://www.ustream.tv/biowaretv Because you can't actually see anything on the screens.

http://gamescom.gamespot.com/story/6273910/dragon-age-ii-updated-hands-on/ and some interesting quotes:
"f you remember the first Dragon Age, spells and abilities were all leveled up along a linear path. In Dragon Age II, it’s more of a branching tree of upgrades. So, for example, if you’ve gotten to expert combat tactics and you’re not particularly compelled by master combat tactics, you can veer over into a different skill path entirely without having to start over from the beginning of another field of specialization."
"Essentially, if you’re playing as a pure bastion of light and goodness, your character will tend to sound very genuine. But if you’re playing as a real salty scoundrel, for example, choosing the polite dialogue options will often result in your character saying the nice thing with a hint of sarcasm because it’s not really something that fits with the character you’ve built thus far."

I don't quite understand what they're getting at with the "branching skill trees" - it sort of sounds like what we had in DA:O. Get sick of Combat Tactics, and take a level in Coersion, right? Maybe I'm just reading it wrong.

I really hope we'll be able to choose our character's voice, but since the MC will have thousands of lines of dialog, that doesn't sound realistic. I don't know - what if I'm playing a smarmy rogue who happens to experience a brief episode of honor or benevolence? Will s/he sound sarcastic no matter what my intentions are?

The way I understand it, it means we will be able to reassign the highest level point of that one particular specialization to the highest level of another one, for example, if we are satisfied with the current level of our fire spell and do not wish to take the firestorm, we can instead choose Blizzard (or whatever the name is).

No, we will not be able to choose our character's voice. That would take too much time, even without the newly announced addition - different tones depending on your personality, which means Hawke's voice actor had to record a chunk of lines several times. It is all explained in lengthy detail http://social.bioware.com/forum/Dragon-Age-2/Dragon-Age-2-General-Discussion/Hawke039s-Tone-in-Dialogue-VO-Affected-by-Previous-Character-Choices-4498054-1.html. This feature, to me, is the most intriguing and ambitious one so far and I can't wait to see it in action.

Additionally, here we have a close-up of http://img101.imageshack.us/img101/9884/plugincontainer20100817.png, as you can see, she doesn't look all that young, and my, she does like Morrigan's make-up.

How does Hawke manage to look so effeminate (or is it boyish?) despite the beard? Whatever it is, he doesn't look nearly as badass in the game as he does in the http://epicbattleaxe.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/DragonAge2_Hawke.jpg.

Huh, I always got the impression they were the Ottomans to Tevinter's Byzantium.



Or Tevinter mages?

That's kind of the role they have for them, yes. They're like technologically advanced Vikings, relying on raiding if the area they attack is not converting.

A semi serious post form Bioware's forums:

So apparently there will be sequences where the narrator exaggerates Hawke's exploits and you'll be able to play them that way. Seems like Bioware will really use the narrator as a strong story telling device, even thrown some http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unreliable_narrator in for good measure.
Again I'm glad Bioware has finally stopped rehashing the same plot and story elements ever since BG1, first with ME2 and now with DA2 they're finally using new plots and storytelling techniques( maybe they just finally have writers that have done more than just read LotR and watch Star Wars).

No, I'm pretty sure they're still using Gaider.

Some good news on my party AI woes. I went to BioWare's forums and found a thread with similar problems. Turns out if you have a party member's portrait highlighted along the left of the scene, they have a tendency to await commands and just sit there waiting. It's better to leave their portraits not highlighted if you want them automated with their AI that you have set within the Tactics window. Annoyingly enough though, if you set one party member to attack and have direct control of them, the minute you move them, their automation is interrupted.

Edit: For me, the reason why it's annoying if a party member's automation of attacks is interrupted by simply moving them, because I like to take a better vantage point of some of my foes. I like a better vantage for ranged attacks and one of my melee party members are right in the opponent's face.

There are even more combat annoyances, some of which become glaringly apparent in the bigger battles:

1) Party members unable to land melee attacks on a moving enemy until enemy stops, even if the enemy moves right past a party member's position. This actually works the other way, too - I've exploited it to the hilt by having my mage plow through a group of enemies without taking a melee hit. Key is not to stop and you can avoid hits indefinitely (aoe's are a different story).

2) As an extension of above, I've watched my controlled party member get pushed out of the way by an enemy while moving to intercept and attack that enemy. That shouldn't happen at all - if I path directly in front of an enemy, I should be hurting that enemy.

Yeah, I've kind of developed my own "exploit" tactic as well. I equipped all my party members with ranged weapons, then use my main rogue dwarven character to move on ahead as a scout while the rest of the party holds their position. I move just far enough to have one enemy show up within "draw distance" and lure them one by one back to my party where they get ambushed away from the throng of the enemy's allies.

2) If I understand this correctly, you're saying if you have a different opponent targeted doing damage and another enemy steps into your line of fire, that other enemy should be getting the damage rather than being able to push you out of the way to get at their target? If so, then like in Oblivion, any of your party members that get in your line of fire should get damaged by friendly fire.

Nope, you misunderstand. I'll try to break down what's happening more clearly:

1) The enemy is moving - whether because it's scripted to move from point A to B (you'll see this in the larger scale battles) or it's attacking an ally not currently controlled by me.

2) I move my character to intercept and attack this enemy

3) The enemy continues on its course, pushing my attacking character out of the way. My character is unable to land a hit, until the enemy reaches its desitnation.

Indeed. Would be nice if you could draw the aggro and damage for your party members before your opponent has to finish moving.

http://dragonage.bioware.com/da2/

I don't know if this has been posted, but here's a brief interview with Laidlaw: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lg8gE63TnMg

So DA2 focuses on:

Graphics: Because gameplay isn't important. I personally liked "console players complained that the graphics fidelity was not on par with PC" (I'm paraphrasing). Of course it's not on par with the PC- the PC can have much better hardware.
Gameplay: But in the wrong way. Combat svcks because it's RTWP and there's too much of it, not because it's unresponsive.
Story: I honestly can't complain. It seems different than anything Bioware has done so far (except it's still "epic").

http://kotaku.com/5621738/dragon-age-origins-ends-with-a-witch-hunt.

They finally release it after I've lost my save games and sold my copy of Origins. Damn you, BioWare.