12th Feb: A new policy is being put in place for TRS threads: If there is no evidence provided in the Opening Post that the page is broken, the thread will be nuked immediately. See Everything You Wanted To Know About Changing Names for what constitutes evidence.
5th Feb: Echo Chamber Season 1 blooper reel on Youtube here
BioWare's Spiritual Successor to the legendary Baldur's Gate franchise, Dragon Age is a Dark Fantasy set in the world of Thedas (originally an acronym for 'The DA Setting'), a Deconstruction of the Standard Fantasy Setting, drawing inspiration from sources as diverse as The Wheel Of Time, A Song of Ice and Fire, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer and filled to the brim with Fantasy Counterpart Cultures and Black and Grey Morality.The first game in the series, Dragon Age: Origins, was released in 2009, to a great deal of critical and commercial success.The world is at threat from a Always Chaotic Evil race of subterranean monsters called Darkspawn. Every so often, the Darkspawn form armies and surge to the surface en-masse, an event known as a "Blight". In response, an elite band of warriors called the Gray Wardens was formed specifically for the purpose of fighting Darkspawn and defeating the Blight.The story of Origins effectively consists of three parts. The first places you in the role of a newly conscripted Grey Warden as you take arms against the Fifth Blight, only to find yourself in a nasty Last of His Kind situation and tasked with uniting the fractured political landscape of Ferelden against the Darkspawn threat.The second part unfolds in the Expansion Pack, Dragon Age: Awakening. The plot concerns the efforts of a Gray Warden (which can be the same one from Origins) to rebuild the forces of the Gray Wardens in Ferelden while dealing with the aftermath of the Fifth Blight and delving deeper into the motivations and origins of the Darkspawn.The third part is told in the DLC "Witch Hunt", which takes place two or three years after the end of Origins. It chronicles the search for Morrigan, an enigmatic companion (and possible love interest) in Origins who disappeared after the conclusion of the Fifth Blight.In addition to the game, the series contains two prequel novels, The Stolen Throne and The Calling, written by the game's lead writer, David Gaider. The series also contains a P&P RPG developed by Green Ronin Games, an upcoming comic book with Orson Scott Card set to be the writer, and a Flash game by EA 2D titled Dragon Age Journeys. A direct-to-DVD anime adaptation has also just been announced, provoking mixed reactions from the fans. Also released is a Webseries, Dragon Age: Redemption, produced by and starring Felicia Day, who is a fan of the franchise.Its sequel, Dragon Age II, was released in 2011 on March 8th in North America and on the 11th in Europe.Please post tropes associated with major in-game characters on the character sheet, not the main page.
Dragon Age: Origins contains the following tropes:
Aerith and Bob: The names of the four main types of darkspawn: genlocks, hurlocks, sharlocks, and... ogres. This also applies to character names to an extent. There are a lot of real-world names mixed in with the more fantastic fare.
Justified in the codices: Genlocks, Hurlocks, and Sharlocks (labeled in-game by the nickname "Shrieks") are the ancient terms for Blight-mutated Dwarves, Humans, and Elves respectively. But Ogres come from blighted Kossith Qunari, who are newcomers to the region, so Ogres apparently didn't exist until recently.
"I made you happy and safe. I gave you peace. I did my best for you. And you say you want to leave? Can't you think about someone other than yourself? I'm hurt. So very, very hurt."
After Combat Recovery: After combat, health and stamina/mana are quickly restored while fallen characters are automatically resurrected, with injuries that must be treated by either applying wound kits, retreating to the camp, or having a spirit healer in the party in order to remove associated status penalties.
All Girls Want Bad Boys: Morrigan, whose approval will rise when the Warden takes the selfish, invidualistic, power-hungry option when presented with a choice of actions. Oghren lampshades this trope when training the PC to be a berserker — standing around looking mysteriously angry apparently does wonders on the ladies.
Leliana can also basically say as much to Alistair.
Alistair: Beyond the fact that he's an assassin who's tried to kill us more than once. No... no, not really. Do women go for that sort of thing? Leliana: Where I come from they do, oh yes. Alistair: Huh. Really? I see.
The Archdemon personally leads its darkspawn armies in a massive attack on Ferelden's capital city in the finale.
Earlier, once you've assembled the entire party, your camp is attacked by Shrieks, along with an unpleasant surprise if you're a Dalish Elf.
Awakening's prologue involves retaking Vigil's Keep from a darkspawn horde. As well as a second, much larger assault at the end of the game on both the Vigil and the City of Amaranthine.
Always Chaotic Evil: The darkspawn (except for the Architect and his followers, who are morally ambiguous).
Mostly just the Architect and the Messenger are ambiguous. The Withered and the Seeker are plainly still as evil as they ever were.
And I Must Scream: The Arcane Warrior trainer, trapped inside a gemstone for untold millennia. At first, he thinks you're a hallucination.
Given the Grand Oak's description, most Sylvans fit this as well.
In the Wending Wood in Awakening, the Warden can find the Statue of War and the Statue of Peace — two Avvar brothers, petrified by a Tevinter mage and still aware. The Statue of Peace, who is more accepting of his fate, has been able to "sleep" on and off throughout the years, but the Statue of War's anger has kept him awake for countless centuries.
Shale spent 30 years frozen in place in a Village subject to the whims of its inhabitants. And spent even longer inactive in an abandoned Thaig in the Deep Roads, in the pitch black, for over a thousand years and conscious every second. And then there were pigeons.
And Man Grew Proud: According to the Chantry, it was men trying to conquer the "Golden City" in the heart of The Fade that first drew the darkspawn, and caused The Maker, their creator deity, to shun them. Though the first thing that caused Him to shun them was when they started worshiping dragons instead of Him. Then they did that, and He shunned them harder. Still later, he shunned them again for the death of Andraste. He is a very passive-aggressive deity.
An Entrepreneur Is You: Averted (perhaps spitefully, even) in that the prices may vary slightly if at all from location to location, regardless of relative supply/scarcity, and goods will never sell for the value paid for them. Ever. Anywhere. Even if you craft something, you can't even get the value of the raw materials bar certain exploits, i.e. Potent Lyrium potions, but farming those takes a silly amount of time and a lot of loading screens... so get back to shaking down those Money Spiders, twink!
Annoying Arrows: To a degree. On the one hand, getting shot with arrows doesn't kill you anymore than getting stabbed or hacked by swords or axes. On the other hand, a properly-built archer can consistently inflict incredible amounts of damage. With a powerful bow, Leliana, Nathaniel, or an archer Warden are reasonably capable of inflicting 25-50% more damage than even two-handed fighters with late-game weapons stacked with enchantments, and this is without resorting to special arrows.
Given the way the game scales enemies, it can potentially take a big jump up in difficulty right around the time every enemy archer suddenly learns scattershot (an area-effect stun that does strong damage), because until the leveling system teaches them an even higher-tier skill (none of which are nearly as disruptive), they will use it on you as much as possible in every fight.
Anti-Grinding: To the extreme. Enemies don't respawn, experience scales upwards so lower-level enemies offer insignificant exp, enemies scale with you, and the level cap is at 25 so you can't grossly overlevel anyway, random encounters technically aren't random, etc.
Anti-Hero: The Grey Wardens' mission statement is to "protect the lands from the Blight, no matter the cost", which is Type III-IV on the sliding scale. They are expected to sacrifice themselves without a second thought. They'll sacrifice others just as easily. Let's just say that no one will look twice at Duncan for killing Jory...
In gameplay terms, this means that no matter what action you take, it's the right one if it helps you in stopping the Blight. Hence the lack of Karma Meter.
Anti-Magic: The Glyph of Neutralization does this. Templars, who are trained to fight mages, have higher resistance to magic and can dispel status effects and glyphs.
Dwarves have a very high magic resistance as well, a trade-off for not being able to use magic themselves.
Apocalyptic Log: You encounter two sets of them in Golems of Amgarrak. One of them is written by the leader of the expedition that you came to find, the other by the original inhabitants.
And then there's the ominous chant starting with "First day they come and catch everyone" leading up to the battle with Broodmother in Origins.
Averted during one battle in camp, as well as the first part of the final sequence... but then promptly reinstated from there on out. It's a little less arbitrary then, though, since the party members that you don't take with you defend Denerim's gates from the darkspawn.
Aristocrats Are Evil: Several examples. Beneath the dwarves' veneer of tradition and honour lies a Deadly Decadent Court waiting to stab you in the back. In ancient times, the Magisters of the Tevinter Imperium tried to kill the Maker and take His Golden City for themselves and created the darkspawn. When the game takes place, Tevinter is a Vestigial Empire, but its Magisters are still ruthless blood mages. On the other hand, the nobles of Ferelden are decent people, with a few exceptions.
As alluded to in conversations with Leliana and the prequel novels, Orlais has a Deadly Decadent Court. Although it is well-known that half the bards and minstrels in Orlais are spies and assassins, Orlesian nobles still welcome them, because outwitting a rival's agent is part of the game aristocrats play.
Arl Howe tries to set one up between the Human Noble and one of his children. It may just have been to conceal his motives, however, as he is intending for you and your entire family to die that very night.
A male Dwarven Noble can meet a would-be fiance on his return to Orzammar. Or a gold digger he knocked up in the origin, depending on your interpretation.
The Warden can set one up for Anora and Alistair, among other choices.
Sometimes your allies will just stand around in the middle of a battle, not doing anything as whatever large Eldritch Abomination you're fighting pulls your anus out through your nose.
Alternatively, one of them will activate their special, secret "rush headlong at the enemy (even if you are an archer and/or it's standing in a fire)" tactical option.
AoE spells. If you want to use one, your allies will disobey orders and rush right in to get blasted.
The tactics system allows you to Doom It Yourself — a novel way to transfer the responsibility for poor AI to the player.
Also, there's two t-shirts for sale at Bioware's website now, "Morrigan disapproves" and "Enchantment!"
In the "Darkspawn Chronicles" DLC, which is the final battle from the point of view of the darkspawn, the final battle is against Alistair and his remaining three companions (Morrigan, Leilana, and the Mabari Hound), as they attack the Archdemon. The dog, which has no canon name (the devs wanted to make it clear that the dog has whatever name you choose to give to him), in this alternate reality is called "Barkspawn" by Alistair, the joker.
It's actually a shout-out to a Penny Arcade strip that was released near the original game's release.
Aside Glance: Post-Coronation, the ruler of Ferelden (Anora or Alistair) speaks a few words to the Grey Warden, but before they're done, they're addressing the camera directly.
Weylon appears to do this more and more as he becomes agitated with the Warden's questioning.
Authority Equals Asskicking: Most of the Fereldan and Dwarven nobility. The Fereldan nobles are mostly descendants of barbarian warlords, so combat training is traditional, whereas a dwarven noble needs to be skilled to defend against the assassins that are commonly employed in dwarven politics.
Typified by demonkind, led by the strongest.
Inverted by the Grey Wardens, as their most respected get creamed, while the cadets have to save the world.
Averted by most of Ferelden, actually. The King and lords in charge bite the dust rather early, and the bad guys achieve coup by deceit and cowardice. When the player does get a chance to face them, said villains aren't particularly challenging.
Awesome, but Impractical: Almost every AoE attack has Friendly Fire. There are no tactical conditions under which you can ever trust companions' AI to use AoE spells or bombs, and the few situations you can lay an AoE trap without your companions stumbling in are still very tricky to set up. One reason Blood Wound is so overpowered is its lack of Friendly Fire.
Awesome Moment of Crowning: The player's monarch of choice gets one. The PC also gets one six months later, if Alistair or Anora were persuaded to marry him/her.
Whoever you pick to be king in Orzammar gets one as well, and it's really much more awesome than the human one.
Awful Truth: Where to begin? In fact, the farther you get into the story, the more you start to wonder if there are any truths you actually want to know. Like you may not survive the initiation process to become a Grey Warden. And if you do, you're guaranteed to succumb anyway in thirty years — if you don't have to make a Heroic Sacrifice first. And that's only from the main storyline, not even including revelations like those about Flemeth...
And what the darkspawn does with female prisoners...
Back Stab: If your rogue is melee, rest assured you are pigeonholed into this. (Although it's not entirely bad, given that a Cunning Rogue can kill an enemy faster than the Game breaking mages can.)
Badass Army: The Grey Wardens of yore. Even with their numbers considerably reduced today, they still fit the trope to a T, as does the dwarven Legion of the Dead.
In The Calling, it is revealed a national secret that when the Wardens were first banished from Ferelden, it took the entire Fereldan military to drive them out. Thousands against less than hundred, and they very nearly won.
Badass Boast: The Warden has a really nice one if you choose to drive out the leader of the Crimson Oars.
Warden: Hundreds have died in my wake. You're just a number to me.
Crimson Oars Leader: I, um... We... We were just leaving. Yes Oars, we go to the docks!
Awakening too;
Warden: "They will bow to my might."
Guard: "Eh... Then it's good to have you here, ser."
Although in both these cases, The Warden really isn't kidding. People seem to pick up on that.
The Grey Wardens: "In war, victory. In peace, vigilance. In death, sacrifice."
The Dalish Elves: "We are the Dalish: keepers of the lost lore, walkers of the lonely path. We are the last of the Elvhenan, and never again shall we submit."
Badass Damsel: The Female City Elf. Vaughn apparently recognizes this, as he orders two guards to escort you to his chambers, but only after your hands are bound first. Then Soris appears and slides a sword across the floor to you. Cue the reaction of the guards. Oh... sod. You then proceed to slaughter your way through the castle, save the other women taken, and effectively rescue yourself.
Bad Boss: One of the Vanguard's talents in the Darkspawn Chronicles DLC is "Execute Thrall", thralls being any darkspawn directly under your command. Supposedly it's for thralls who disappoint you, but there are no repercussions for doing it completely on a whim.
Bad Future: The Darkspawn Chronicles DLC — it lets you re-enact the battle of Denerim from the point of view of a Darkspawn Vanguard (a sort of general-like figure), in an Alternate Universe where the player's Grey Warden did not survive their joining, and it was left to Alistair to follow the quests the player had completed. Alistair almost manages to kill the Archdemon before being brutally slaughtered by the Vanguard.
Bag of Sharing: The game's inventory system. As demonstrated by the part where the Grey Warden is captured, it's rather awkwardly implemented.
Bag of Spilling: A rare single-game example: when freeing Arl Eamon's child from the demon by going into the Fade, you are unable to use Fade Shapeshifting, which you were able to use in another visit to the Fade that could be completed before.
Also, characters imported to Awakening lose all DLC items except for those obtained in Return to Ostagar.
Strangly, the Specialiations seem to avert this trope: Once you unlock them (through having a team mate teach you, to buying certain tomes, etc), any character can unlock the specialiation once they get an unlock point at level 7 or 14. Yes, that includes a Warrior who never went near Andraste's Ashes with evil intentions learning the Reaver Skill Tree.
The Beastmaster: Rogues get a Ranger specialization for this.
Becoming the Mask: If you romance Morrigan, then when she proposes her ritual to defeat the archdemon, you can ask her if this is the reason for the relationship. Tearfully, she says her feelings for you weren't part of the plan, and that even after she leaves, she will never forget your time together.
This is also true of any Warden that maxes out Morrigan's approval rating. When speaking with a female Warden with 100% approval after retrieving Flemeth's Grimoire, Morrigan actually gets choked up. She tells the Warden that she considers the Warden a friend, perhaps even a sister (if female), and to know that even if she [Morrigan] doesn't always prove worthy of that friendship, she [Morrigan] will always value it.
The Bechdel Test: Passes. Even if your Warden is male, the ladies in your party will often discuss things like magic, religion, clothes, and so on if you take at least two of them with you.
Bee Bee Gun: You can either cast a spell with this, or become a swarm of insects via Shapeshifting.
Beef Gate: The developers expressed intent to dissuade players from entering areas where level scaling is set to higher tiers, though it's rarely as straightforward as, for example, the bounty hunters just inside Frostback Mountains. These gates aren't insurmountable though, and can be passed with an early effective build and a greater consumption of healing resources, so many players carried on into steepening difficulty without being aware they were supposed to change course for an easier questline. For players who later complained about the difficulty, the developers released a list of areas by gradually increasing difficulty.
Bi the Way: Zevran hits on you, regardless of your gender. Leliana is less direct about it, though it is easy to accidentally stumble into relationship territory without any acknowledgement, which can be quite a surprise when she springs the "I love you." If you are romancing another character (especially if you are a female Warden and didn't know a relationship with Leliana is possible), this can lead to a confrontation where Leliana demands that you choose between the two of them. Meanwhile, the completely bewildered gamer is bumbling through dialogue options that all make him or her feel like a scumbag.
Also Oghren's ex-wife Branka.
Binding Ancient Treaty: The initial quests upon leaving the framework scenario are based on this, though it's subverted because none of the people that you have treaties with are in any condition to help you until you save them from their current problems.
Bishonen Line: Abominations. The weakest ones, Rage and Hunger Abominations, are just monstrous mooks who can't even use magic. The Sloth Abomination looks like them, but it can actually speak coherently and is powerful enough to put your entire party to sleep, sending you to the Scrappy Level. One Desire Abomination, Connor, still looks mostly human, except for the sunken eyes. It's powerful enough to summon more demons into corpses to start a mini Zombie Apocalypse. It can even Mind Control people. Uldred, a Pride Abomination, looks completely human, is able to transform other mages into Abominations using Blood Magic, and his One-Winged Angel form is one of the best bosses in the game.
Bittersweet Ending: Although the Archdemon is always slain by the end of the game, it inevitably comes at a price.
If Alistair sacrifices himself at the end, it becomes especially depressing if the PC was romancing him. He could also end up being executed by Anora if the player chose to spare Loghain, or if you persuaded her not to, he abandons his position as a Warden and becomes a homeless drunk.
This will always happen if the PC was in a romance with Morrigan, or was close friends with her, since she always runs off at the end no matter what. Witch Hunt DLC provides new endings for those who romanced Morrigan, however.
If you refuse Morrigan's ritual and slay the Archdemon yourself, rather than have Alistair or Loghain do it, your character will die, and the game ends on a seriously gloomy note with their funeral.
There doesn't seem to be any way to get a very good ending for Orzammar, as none of the choices you can make seem to bring a very positive outcome for them. If you make Harrowmont king, he isolates Orzammar from the surface and tightens the oppressive caste system. If you make Bhelen king, he gives the casteless rights and takes back several thaigs, at the cost of turning Orzammar into a dictatorship and sending assassins to hunt down and kill Harrowmont's surviving family just because Harrowmont dared to oppose him. If you decided to not destroy the Anvil of the Void, it results in an additionally very, very negative ending for the dwarves, no matter whom you choose to make king. And if you decide to complete Brother Burkel's quest and open a chantry in Orzammar, it too brings a really terrible end. On the other hand, refusing to do so and bringing Dagna to the Mage Tower will lead, through a series of events, to the Chantry contemplating an exalted march against Orzammar. And that's bad. Fortunately in that latter case, the events of Dragon Age II will likely cut any efforts at organizing an Exalted March short, considering the Templars and Circles are now at war.
Black and Gray Morality: Unlike almost every other Bioware RPG game, this one has no Karma Meter. Individual characters will like or dislike you based on personal preference, but the game itself does not judge your actions. You can choose some actions of extremely questionable morality, and some of the moral quandaries you must face are rather complex.
Black Magic: Blood Magic is considered this due to its ghastly power source, ability to take control of people (like, say, a king or a noble which Avernus admits he did to help the Grey Wardens in their rebellion long ago), and just being creepy in general. Due to the Chantry's constant preaching against the very real dangers of magic, almost everyone in Ferelden who isn't a mage (and one mage NPC) considers all magic Black Magic. The Qunari have an even harsher stance against magic, and just cut out the tongues and chain to leashes any potential mages born to them to prevent them from ever casting spells.
What's important about Blood Magic is that it is pure life force, and can thus provide plenty of energy. And it isn't limited to Mages, either. Anybody can learn how to tap into it, even a warrior (exemplified by the Reaver, who uses a different path, but one which still uses the power inherent in blood as energy). Since it was originally taught by an Old God (demons are the only ones who still remember it in most cases, however), it may not even be evil. The Soldier's Peak DLC introduced Avernus, who had worked out how to change blood as the fuel source for the Taint. And then there are the Chantry Templars, who gain their abilities from the energies within lyrium (apparently - that it is possible to wield what is essentially Templar-created magic without using lyrium might speak to some other source), all without being Mages. Even Spirit Healers can draw power from benevolent Fade spirits to augment their own abilities. While the Fade is probably the easiest source to learn how to use (and the one with the least reliance on an outside source to power one's spells), it's definitely not the only source. Indeed, it might be that anybody could learn how to use magic, as long as they were willing to use something else as fuel (absent a Mage's connection to the Fade). The problem, of course, being that unless you're willing to use your own life force, Blood Magic needs the contribution of somebody else.
Being a mage pretty much means you have a big neon sign reading "POSSESS HERE" in the eyes of Demons. This isn't quite as great a danger as the Chantry makes out, however, so long as you're properly trained. Of course, everyone religious you encounter would pretty much gladly burn you at the stake if they weren't terrified by your powers — the first thing they usually assume is that you'll turn them into frogs.
It's not easy being a Grey Warden either. The first test of your mettle is the Joining: fail it and die horribly. Succeed, and die horribly too — only this time it takes a decade or two for the darkspawn taint to eat you alive from the inside, eventually turning you into a monster, if you don't commit suicide-by-darkspawn in the Deep Roads first. In the interim, you'll have insane dreams about the Archdemon talking to you: if you're lucky, you, too, may be able to understand it one day! Unless a Blight is happening. Then you can throw yourselves against the Archdemon, hoping to slay it in a process that completely annihilates your soul! Of course, if there's no Blight, that means you basically sacrificed your life and sanity for nothing. Oh, and one more teeny tiny detail: Ever wanted to have a kid? Good luck with that. Don't even think of trying to have one with another Grey Warden. And in this game, the Grey Wardens are composed of two new recruits and are being hunted down as criminals.
Being a mage and a Grey Warden makes the disadvantage of each null and void: since you're a Grey Warden, you're free to leave the Circle tower without the Templars hunting you down (legally, at least) and you're even free to learn the forbidden art of blood magic thanks to the "anything that helps us kill darkspawn is allowed" exemption of the Grey Wardens. As for the problem of the taint, as Avernus demonstrates, a mage can cheat with its effect for a couple of centuries. Sure, you're still supposed to risk your life against the Darkspawn, but if you're as broken as the Warden Commander of Ferelden, chances are that nothing short of an Archedemon will pose any threat to you past the first decade or so.
And Avernus was able to live for that extra several hundred years while in a near constant war with the demons occupying the same building as him, including the reanimated bodies of his Gray Warden comrades, and the possessed corpse of his former commander. All that, and he seems to have aged about thirty years.
Blood Knight: Qunari, as part of their culture, take pride in their class, so soldiers and warriors want nothing more than to be soldiers and warriors. Also, the dwarven Legion of the Dead, who take dedication of their life to battle to its logical conclusion, and get a head start on the inevitable, by holding their funerals right after they take their vows. Dwarven warriors in general display a positive attitude towards prospects of combat, though it may be more complicated in their case; as victory in battle leads to greater social standing in their profession. And one's degree of social standing is very important to how one is perceived in Dwarven society.
Warriors unlock the Reaver specialization by drinking Dragon's Blood.
The Grey Wardens drink a cocktail of lyrium, darkspawn blood, and Archdemon blood at their initiation to gain their unique abilities.
In the Warden's Keep DLC, the Blood Mage Grey Warden Avernus figured out how to weaponize the darkspawn taint. One manifestation of this is the ability to spew blood like a firehose at your foes, having roughly the same effect as turning a firehose would on most humans: putting them squarely on their asses.
Bloody Murder: The Reaver specializations, as well as the Power of Blood talents you can learn in the Warden's Keep DLC.
Bloodier and Gorier: This is possibly the first game to feature persistent blood splatter on character models; it's certainly very visceral compared to other BioWareRPGs. You're going to see quite a bit of it flying through the air, too, moreso if you took a skill which involves weaponizing blood.
In Golems of Amgarrak, The Harvester is a flesh golem made from the corpses of multiple casteless dwarves. It grows more powerful by brutally murdering people and adding their flesh to its own.
Boisterous Bruiser: Alistair reminisces about a Grey Warden named Gregor... Besides being "the biggest man you ever saw" with a beard worthy of a Dwarf (or so you hear), the man could reportedly drink any other Grey Warden under the table, and make Duncan crack up laughing.
Oghren counts as one within the party as well, though he's not quite as boisterous as most examples.
Bond Creatures: Mabari hounds imprint on a single master until death (either their own or the master's, whichever comes first).
Bonus Boss: the Revenants, Gaxkang, the sundered Fade Beast, and any instance of a High Dragon.
Boomerang Bigot: There is one mage in the Circle who begs the Maker's forgiveness just for existing. She wants the Templars to kill all mages, as it's the only thing they deserve. Being a mage is a punishment, after all.
On Normal at least, one of the easiest and simplest ways to take down Bonus BossGaxkang is to just have Sten and Oghren beat the crap out of him after mastering Two-Handed Weapon feats, including Stunning Blows.
Mages can use Mana Clash to devastate NPC mages. (Even a couple mage-class bosses will go down in one blast.)
Spoony complained that he spent the entirety of the game using the Walking Bomb technique and its variants to kill everything but the bosses.
Bread, Eggs, Milk, Squick: Courtesy of Anders: All I want is a pretty girl, a decent meal, and the right to shoot lightning at fools.
Massive plate armor, which has no difference between male and female models, except in shoulder width, thoroughly averts this trope.
Medium and heavy armor, which is made of different kind of mails (splint, scale, chain) justifies it, as the material is supposed to be flexible and could very well be form fitting without sacrificing protective qualities, and they don't show any cleavage whatsoever.
Light armor shows plenty of cleavage and plays this trope straight, especially the Dalish armor. It's made of deerskin, bares the wearer's midriff, and offers more protection and flexibility than a full suit of leather armor.
Broke Your Arm Punching Out Cthulhu: You can end the Blight for good... but one of the Grey Wardens has to die. Or father a baby that will steal Cthulhu's soul.
Lampshaded by the bandits holding Bensley's daughter for ransom after the Warden introduces himself as 'Commander of the Grey'. The savvier ones flee after their leader orders them to attack, and one goes so far as to jump off the cliff rather than face you.
You can see it as early as your first visit to Lothering, where you can easily intimidate an entire bandit gang to run away by just mentioning that you're Grey Wardens. Their leader tries to be cocky even after that, but his slow-sounding henchman's constant reiterations about how he heard that the Grey Wardens are "really, really good [at fighting]" take the wind out of his sails really quickly. You can even demand a donation from them to the Wardens. (You can demand too much, refuse to do anything but kill them, or decide to turn in any survivors to the Templars, at which point they figure they might as well fight to the death anyway.)
Alternatively, if you've chosen the mage class, you can inform them of this fact. The dull henchman's reaction this time? "I-I don't want to be a toad!"
Lampshaded in Dragon Age II. You can meet Zevran, the elf assassin from Dragon Age: Origins, assuming you didn't import a save from that game in which you chose to kill him for attempting to assassinate you. You are given a mission by some Antivan Crows (the order to which Zevran belonged) posing as nobles to take him out, but once Zevran tells you the truth about them, you can choose to team up with him against his hunters. Once the Crows attack you, Zevran will comment that he can't understand why mooks like them think they can defeat people like you and the Warden.
The premise of the game is based on this trope, if you are looking for a literal (undead) dragon.
But Thou Must: If you don't voluntarily become a Grey Warden, you'll be conscripted. The game lets you rail against this.
Uldred gives you a choice: death, or be willing host to a demon. With the power you've displayed, you would be, in his words, unstoppable. While most players obviously wouldn't choose the option that turns them into nightmarish demon-hybrids, the three replies available are paraphrased as follows: "Never!", "No", and "I'm alright, thank you."
While you can be a quiteanasshole as you go about it, you HAVE to stop the Blight, and complete a number of other typical RPG quests to do so — even if it's not something the type of character you want to play would be particularly interested in doing.
Well, no matter how evil you play your character, the whole "genocide" aspect of the Darkspawn's plan is rather negative towards them.
On the other hand, the game also gives you a surprising amount of leeway sometimes. Defending Redcliffe against the undead horde? You can absolutely tell the villagers to fuck off and die (the latter quite literally).
Can't Drop The Hero: Played straight except for one small part where party members rescue the PC (which is itself optional, as you can break yourself out) and another where your party members Hold the Line during the final battle.
Cat Fight: A male Warden daring or unlucky enough to romance both Leliana and Morrigan can expect to witness several examples of very tense moments between the two that end just short of actual violence.
If something happened during your origin story, rest assured you will have to deal with it later.
Uldred, the psychopathic mage behind the chaos that hits the Circle, makes a brief appearance at Ostagar. He only gets a single line before being shouted down by one of the Chantry's Revered Mothers.
You can also meet Wynne while at Ostagar, and have a pleasant conversation with her.
Childhood Friends: Jowan and the Warden mage. Presumably an attempt to make the player feel more inclined to go along with his dangerous plan. You can even try to defend him by invoking this.
Child Soldiers: The Antivan Crows prefer to recruit orphans for training, though it is unclear whether they are actually employed in assassinations. In any case, many of them die during training, and those that make it out alive are usually completely detached from their emotions or conventional morality.
Clingy Costume: Dwarves who are made into golems can't remove the armour they're given, at least not after the molten lyrium is poured in with them.
Combat Medic: While not required, mages can simultaneously become the best healers and damagers in the game.
Combat Pragmatist: Rogues. Rogues get skills like Below The Belt and Dirty Fighting. All of the specializations are examples, as well — Assassins are obvious, bards are the universe's spies, rangers are noted as being happy to use their environment to kill enemies for them, and duelists emphasize speed and defense and quick, lethal strikes.
Come with Me If You Want to Live: At the end of every Origin chapter version, the player character is rescued by Duncan from a threatening situation and more or less willingly joins the Grey Wardens. The situation is particularly life-threatening in the Human Noble and Dalish Elf origins.
Notably, the other origin stories happen regardless of the origin you choose: Duncan just isn't there to save them...
There is a possible exception in the Mage Origin: if you decided to snitch on Jowan and Lily to First Enchanter Irving, you will not be under any threat whatsoever at the end of the quest and Duncan will have to outright invoke the Right of Conscription to get you.
Comic Book Time: It's mentioned early by Wynne in a conversation if you're a Mage, that it's been a year since you were recruited by the Grey Wardens.
Alistair causes an example of this vicarious of the fact that you can woo him anytime you like, be it at the beginning of the game or practically before the end... that said, the rose from Lothering he will give you as a gift will still be fresh as the day he picked it... back in Lothering, which most players never go back to after the first go and it's destroyed by darkspawn after the player finishes one of their plot missions.
Common Place Rare: Inverted. Dragons are supposedly very rare in The Verse. The current Age was named the Dragon Age because it was preceded by the first sighting of a High Dragon in centuries. If you bring drake scales to Wade, he will tell you that most blacksmiths go their entire lives without ever seeing even one. And yet, by the end of the game, every piece of leather armor on the market will be made of drakeskin. Further, two out of three weapons and pieces of heavy or massive armor will be made out of dragonbone. And by the time you get to Awakening, it will be turned Up to Eleven: leather goods will be made out of dragon wing or even High Dragon hide (even if no one slew a High Dragon in Origins).
Compensating for Something: Either Morrigan or Sten can make a crack about this upon first encountering the Tower of Magi.
Conservation of Ninjutsu: The Darkspawn are, as a whole, pretty badass and dangerous opponents for the beginning, middle, and later parts of the game. However, once the massive horde assaults Denerim and the Warden's army arrives to fight them, the Warden and his/her team will be killing the various Darkspawn Mooks in one or two hits.
Played with. At least half the darkspawn you face in Denerim are labelled as Genlock/Hurlock Grunts… which apparently is synonymous with "One Hit Point Wonder".
Contract On The Hitman: Zevran will be targeted by the Crows if the Warden spares him. While Master Ignatio doesn't act against Zevran, declaring him to be dead in his eyes, Zevran's old comrade Taliesen will track him down and make him a final offer: rejoin the Crows or die. If Zevran's loyalty is high enough, he will fight against Taliesen at your side. How Zevran's battle with the Crows is resolved depends on whether or not the Warden sacrifices himself/herself. If the Warden lives, Zevran will continue to fight and evade the Crows as best he can while living his life which is apparently canon in Dragon Age II. If the Warden dies, Zevran will return to Antiva and singlehandedly take over the Crows and become their new Grand Master. His epilogue questions whether this counts as a victory or a defeat.
The Corps Is Mother: Anyone showing magical talent is taken away from their families and raised at the Circle of Magi. This is ostensibly because mages are vulnerable to demonic possession. The only other option is to become a Tranquil, where you have your connection to the source of your magical powers permanently severed, removing all your emotions in the process.
The Corruption: Grey Wardens drink darkspawn blood during their Joining ceremony, which (if they survive) dooms them to a slow death but gives them the power to sense darkspawn, among others.
The dwarven scavenger Ruck demonstrates the mental decay of someone living off of darkspawn flesh, and Oghren offers more details on their health decay. This does give them the ability to detect the taint of the darkspawn, including that of the Wardens, and the Warden can reflect on the disturbing implications of Ruck's description of it.
Done hilariously nonsensically if you choose to let the desire demon (Kitty) possess the girl in Honnleath. Whereas previously both the girl and Kitty had a proper, normal range of expressive intonation, after the possession, the possessed girl suddenly enters a Creepy Monotone.
Also touched upon by Shale when asked why it doesn't really act like other golems:
Shale: Should I talk in a monotone? Yes, master. I exist to serve the master. I shall kill for the master and only the master.
This is an identifying trait of the Tranquils, regularly Lampshaded.
The Sloth Demon has one.
Hespith. Especially her poem: "First day, they come and catch everyone. Second day, they beat us and eat some for meat. Third day..."
Cutscene Drop: So many times. Particularly annoying considering how much the game talks about tactics and carefully positioning your party members to set up ambushes, only to teleport your Squishy Wizard right into the fray before every major battle. This is highly disruptive of rogue/trapping tactics, as the cutscene trigger exposes hiding characters as all are teleported in from what could be half-way across the map from where the active character is scouting — for a rogue to expose themselves like this is equivalent to a cutscene throwing the sword-and-board warrior's shield away, and reflects a tactical stupidity that is never even lampshaded in the cutscenes.
Cycle of Revenge: The quest The Nature of the Beast requires you to either break or support one of these.
Due to Arl Howe's betrayal and brutal murder of most of the Couslands, the Human Noble Warden can decide whether or not to engage in one of these. Later in Awakening, the Warden can follow through on a threat to murder the members of Howe's family in retaliation by executing Nathaniel Howe when he is caught attempting to assassinate the Warden.
On the other hand, its entirely possible to avert this, playing the Warden as simply seeking revenge on just Arl Howe himself. In Awakening the Warden can decide to recruit Nathaniel into the Wardens instead of executing him, befriend him and inspire him to redeem his family's name after he realises the extent of his father's crimes. One possible epilogue reveals that Nathaniel even rescues the Warden's brother from bandits and the Howes are returned some of their lands, ending the bad blood between the families.
And if you do actually say something that's barely nice about Jowan ("Well, he's trying to be a better person, I guess?"), Arl Eamon will say this trope word for word.
Darker and Edgier: Origins is already very dark. Awakening darker still. Golems of Amgarrak even more so.
Which makes Witch Hunt a bit of Mood Whiplash, what with the return of lighthearted banter between your party members and the assorted Harry Potter references at the Tower of Magi. Also, if you didn't smile at being reunited with your Mabari hound, you have no soul.
Dwarven noble society ain't a very nice place. In fact, it almost qualifies as drow noble society, only reskinned with dwarves. Which, given the mythical origins of drow, is kind of appropriate.
Orlesian society is even worse. This seems to be the only purpose to their nobility in the first place. They call it "The Game."
Antivan society fits as well. Zevran pretty much spells it out for you.
Ferelden is a nobles' republic with elected kings (that have traditionally descended from a single bloodline nonetheless). Thus, under Loghain, to secure the throne requires a mix of intrigue, murder, and brute force.
Deadly Upgrade: Joining. Death will come immediately or thirty years later, depends at least partially on luck.
Dead Man Walking: All Grey Wardens, due to the Taint. Also, the entire purpose of the Legion of the Dead, to the point of holding a funeral for them when they join up.
"Since we're dead, we can give our all in the fight against the darkspawn. We have nothing to lose."
Deal with the Devil: Mage characters can negotiate with a demon for access to Blood Magic in return for allowing the demon to possess a child; though you can renege on your promise by bullying the demon afterwards. In addition, many other demons can be bargained with for various things. Not all of them betray you, either.
Incidentally, you can betray many of the demons you make a deal with, with no worse consequences than having to fight with them.
And those players who bargained with the demon for Blood Magic, only to feel bad about the cost and reload a previous save, found that Blood Magic was still unlocked, and they could go ahead and make the "good" choice anyway.
Death Of The Old Gods: The Old Gods of the Tevinter Imperium were struck down by the Maker. Most of the world now worships the Maker and his prophet Andraste, and the Old Gods slumber beneath the Earth until they're awoken, one at a time, to lead the corrupted darkspawn in a Blight. Though one imagines they are not too wild about this arrangement, given that "awoken" means being tainted by the Darkspawn and more or less forced into being their leader. It was the Tevinter Imperium searching for the Old Gods in the first place that caused the creation of the Darkspawn. This version of the story, primarily promoted by the Chantry is at least partly true: according to the former Tevinter Mage (now Darkspawn Emissary) Corypheus in Dragon Age II, he and a number of other Tevinter magisters did in fact enter the the mythical Golden City. However, his account differs from the Chantry's in that when they entered the City it it was already the twisted, blackened hell that can be seen from anywhere in the Fade.
Death Seeker: The Legion of the Dead are dwarves who all did something they feel must be atoned for with their lives. The moment they join the Legion. they are considered dead to the rest of dwarven society, and they spend the rest of their lives fighting darkspawn in the Deep Roads. When Grey Wardens sense that the taint will soon overcome them, they follow the Legion of the Dead's example and go into the Deep Roads to die while taking as many darkspawn with them as they can. Most of the Legion have at least some grudging respect for Wardens for this.
Deconstructor Fleet: The game heavily deconstructs the "fantasy hero" genre, adding realistic and unpleasant politics and bigotry to the fantasy setting, and making moral choices complicated and difficult. At several points, you have the option between doing what is good and doing what, ultimately, will best help save the world.
Deflector Shields: The Mage's Arcane Shield (boosts Defense) and the Arcane Warrior's Shimmering Shield (boosts damn near everything). And yes, you can have both on at the same time. Prior to a recent PC patch, the Shimmering Shield was bugged and didn't drain mana when in use. This was fixed with the patch, but it's still overpowered.
Degraded Boss: The very first boss you'll fight is an Ogre at the top of the tower in Ostagar, and it's going to take everything you have to slay him. Later, they'll become a somewhat more regular enemy (though still one of the rarer Darkspawn), especially in the Deep Roads and finale.
By about halfway through Awakening, Elite Ogres become an elaborate speed bump.
Deus Sex Machina: Morrigan's solution to the Someone Has to Die problem in the endgame involves having the male PC, Alistair, or Loghain impregnating her.
Did Not Do the Research: Most of the armor in the game grants extra protection along the left arm. In Real Life, armored swordsmen would more heavily armor the right arm; the left hand held the shield, which could be used to adequately defend the entire left side. The right arm, on the other hand, held the weapon, and using it deflect an incoming blow puts the swordsman on the defensive; hence, greater armor on the right arm.
If the Dwarven Noble makes certain choices in his/her Origin story, he/she can leave for Ostagar with nearly 30 sovereigns — a ridiculous amount of money that other characters won't have for a good chunk of the game. The Dwarven Noble also gets a huge discount and excellent resale value from a certain merchant (Gorim) in Denerim, which means even more money. This makes buying the best equipment in the game as soon as it becomes available much easier. The Dwarven Noble also receives a powerful shield from Gorim free of charge that no other character can obtain. The Dwarven Noble is effectively the "Easy" Mode, at least for non-mage characters.
Promo items often take the form of various disc one nukes, as they provide all sorts of silly bonuses that are excessively powerful for your character's level. (At least the Dragon Armor will take you a while to get to use due to Strength requirement and expense...)
Then there are gearing tricks that can get silly. Give your Mage 16 strength and you can run around Ostagar in a full medium armor set (12 for leather). Add a Stone Skin self-buff (and maybe Rock Salves for overkill) and you will want enemies to attack your mage.
This is more of an issue with the mage itself. Especially when choosing the Arcane Warrior specialization, going for heavy armor and adding a few defensive sustainables on top of that, a mage can become ridiculously hard to kill. They can get better defenses and resistances than anyone else in the game, including a sword and board warrior. They can even become quite capable melee fighters, all while having unbelievable defenses, high hit points, and the ability to throw around devastating spells and to heal.
Any area-of-effect spell, but in particular the third- and fourth-tier cold spell.
Completing Witch Hunt allows the player to bring both the Sorrows of Arlathan bow and Vestments of the Seer robes with them on subsequent playthroughs of the main game. The former is a massively-powerful bow but at least is limited by the dexterity requirements, while the latter is the best set of robes in the game, and has no requirements. A starting mage won't ever be changing clothes unless you opt for the Arcane Warrior specialization.
If you complete the Warden's Keep DLC as quickly as possible, then the Warden Commander's armor will be useless by the end of the game (it's Tier 4, when the best armor in the original game is Tier 7) unless a trick to upgrade by either leaving it in the party chest and leaving/reentering Soldier's Peak on console, or by selling it to Mikhail Dryden then leaving/reentering the Peak and buying it back if playing on PC. However, you will get an event in which you recover a meteorite, that you can then have forged into a one- or two-handed sword. Starfang is bar none the best sword in the game, occupying it's own tier (which eventually shows up as Tier 9 in Awakening), and you can get it as soon as you leave Lothering.
Getting the game's equivalent of the Cone of Cold, which can be obtained relatively early, gives the mage a power that can even freeze the Archdemon in place. One strategy involving the spell has the player keeping the big bosses and semi-bosses in place while the tank takes on the boss and the rest clean up after him.
Dissonant Serenity: Hespith. The result of being broken both by circumstances and Branka's obsession isn't pretty. And she speaks in a highly Creepy Monotone. There's also the fact that she's in the initial stage of turning into a Broodmother.
Distracted By The Shiny: The purpose of the Lure traps. Description of the Glamour Charm required to make them:
This minor magical charm captures the viewer's attention and distra... ooo, pretty...
In Awakening, there's a staff named Lamppost in Winter. The item description says that licking it would not be advisable.
Zevran employs this occasionally, when he's not being blatantly obvious.
Zevran: The thing I missed most about Antiva was its leather.
Warden: Is that some kind of euphemism?
In romancing Alistair, he will at one point give the Female PC a rose, stating that it reminds him of her. She can reply "Feeling thorny, are we?"
There's quite a bit of this in general if you're looking, obviously in Party Romances, but also particularly where the Warden can flirt with or seduce NPCs. (Example of the latter is Isabella in the Pearl. "Can we go back to your ship? I'd love to see what's below deck.")
Oghren gets a pretty good one early in Awakening, upon discovering a ghoul equipped with his stolen gear.
Oghren: No one touches Oghren's junk and lives!
Doing in the Wizard : If you take Oghren with you on the "Urn of Sacred Ashes" quest, he'll mention the high amounts of lyrium in the mountain and temple, and that the urn's healing properties might be from centuries of exposure. One of many arguments in the game (Morrigan makes a few) that the Maker might not be real.
Downer Ending: The overall ending to the main story arc is always bittersweet, but due to there being many smaller Multiple Endings, some specific places or people that you tried to help during the story usually only get this.
Drop the Hammer: Mauls are one subset of two-handed weapons, and not surprisingly, they have the best armor penetration ratings. The Chasind Great Maul is one of the most powerful (and expensive) weapons in the game.
Drunk on the Dark Side: Maleficars, mages who embraced demon magics, tend to go this route.
Dual Boss: Awakening has a few: the Lost and an Inferno Golem, two Dragon Thralls and a Skippable Boss against the Architect and Utha.
Dual Wielding: Rogues and Warriors can do this. Technically, so can a Mage, but it's only really worth doing with the right specialization.
Dude, Where's My Respect?: In Awakening, while your position of Commander of the Grey gives you plenty of respect and influence, being possibly queen or prince consort of Ferelden changes surprisingly little in the way you are treated.
Duel Boss: Teyrn Loghain at the Landsmeet. Also, a knight challenges you to this when you arrive in Denerim. If you decide to fight him one on one, his underlings will compliment your honor.
Dug Too Deep: Inverted / parody: hidden at the very far end of the ruins in the Dalish origin is a small statue. Clicking on it give the message "A strange statue commemorating the emergence of — and short-lived trading relationship with — dwarves, who dug too high and too frugal and struck elves" clicking on it also spawns some skeletons to attack you.
Dummied Out: The Human Commoner origin. It was cut sometime during mid-late development, but many bits and pieces from it, including fully voice recorded but unused dialogue, can be found within the game and in the toolset. A Human Barbarian origin was also cut, much earlier.
Dump Stat: Magic for non-mage, although potions and the Reaver's Devour ability do get some bonuses from it. Strength, and to a lesser extent Dexterity, for Mages. Constitution and Willpower are sorta dump stats thanks to all the potions you can chug (though Stamina restoration potions don't show up until the expansion for some reason).
Mage origin: When you need to get the form signed, just ask Senior Enchanter Sweeney instead and you won't need to clear out the spiders. (If you do it afterwards anyway, you get potions instead.)
Redcliffe: You can just choose to not rescue the village.
Redcliffe castle: Kill Connor and you skip a Fade sequence. Although said Fade sequence is actually easier than killing him, and certainly not as annoying as the other one from the Broken Circle quest.
Dying Moment of Awesome: Whoever kills the Archdemon gets one, if you refuse the dark ritual.
Even if you are a clueless idiot, the part where Sten returns home (If you have enough respect with him) really drives it home. When asked by his people if he met anyone worthy of respect on his travels, he replies "One."
Dysfunction Junction: Pretty much every party member you can recruit in this game has a major psychological trauma or three in their past (or in some cases their present). This is how you can tell that Mhairi is a Mauve Shirt: she's not dysfunctional.
Earn Your Happy Ending: if you work very hard, you'll be able to get one of these. However, there's many other... not that happy outcomes.
Easily Forgiven: Rampant throughout the main quest storyline. Count the number of times that, after you have slaughtered your way throughout an entire dungeon of a particular enemy race or group, the leader of that race or group will come out and offer to team up with you. You can even call Father Kolgrim on it when he offers to proclaim you Andraste's champion after you've slaughtered about two-thirds of his followers.
Easing Into The Adventure: The point of the origin stories, except for the Mage Origin, which begins with a short dungeon.
Easy Mode Mockery: Averted, notable for the reasons: The developers have said that 'Hard' mode was the intended base difficulty for gamers, but that's never suggested in the game or game materials. There are no benefits or penalties for playing any difficulty mode, nor any Achievements related to them, except for in the Golems of Amgarrak and Witch Hunt DLC, which have acheivements for beating their final bosses on 'Hard' or 'Nightmare' modes.
Zevran: Hello my stocky little friend! Oghren: Huh. You got small breasts for a gal. Zevran: Ah. This is where we begin the typical dwarven/elven rivalry, is it? Oghren: Nahhh.
Oghren goes as far as admitting that he thinks Zevran is all right. The elf promptly deadpans that he's got to be drunk.
Dwarves might not be rivals with elves in DA, but an elf Warden walking around Orzammar will get a lot of odd comments from its citizens.
Also seen in the conflict between the high and mighty cultured Orlesians (described as "painted fops" by Fereldans) and the honorable, salt-of-the-earth freedom-loving Fereldans (described as "one bad day away from barbarism" by the Orlesians).
Of course once you realise that Orzammar is in Ferelden, and the Dales were in Orlais...
Empathy Doll Shot: There's a doll in the Elven alienage apartments, and its description makes sure to emphasize how well-worn and loved it is.
The Tevinter Imperium was once this before the first Blight wiped most of their territory out. This is mirrored by what happened to the dwarves.
The Orlesian Empire fits this trope the best in the backstory, as it is the biggest and most powerful nation on Thedas and had no qualms with invading and pretty much enslaving Ferelden. They've (mostly) mellowed out by the time of the events of the game, but relations with Ferelden are still a bit rocky. It's his paranoia about King Cailin requesting aid from Orlais that drives Loghain's madness.
Empty Shell: The Tranquil are one of the more pleasant versions. Cursed to never feel emotion, the Tranquil themselves do not express any discontent with their condition. They also do not express any other feeling about any other subject. They are conscious and rational, but not capable of "feeling" as emoting beings understand it. If you accuse them of not being people, they merely provide a polite counter-argument.
Ending Theme: "This Is War", by 30 Seconds to Mars. Maybe they should have saved this song for Dragon Age 3, considering that the second sequel will most likely deal with the fallout of the war that the Champion inadvertently caused.
The End... Or Is It?: The last shot of The Golems of Amgarrak is dozens — maybe hundreds — of Harvesters escaping the thaig's destruction and scuttling off into the Deep Roads.
Enslaved Elves: The elves used to have a highly advanced society and culture, complete with immortality. Then humans showed up, and everything went to hell. Modern elves rank just above slaves in society (and are slaves in some parts of the world), and most don't even know they used to be a powerful race. Even the Grey Warden can do only a little to improve their lot.
Entendre Failure: Occurs between Alistair and Zevran during a conversation with Shale.
Zevran: Here, take that templar fellow. Rugged good looks, quick wit, manly shoulders. Just getting him to hop borders is a challenge worthy of the great heroes.
Alistair: A challenge? I'd happily hop borders, given the chance. I've never even been close to leaving Ferelden.
There's also this little gem possible for either male or female wardens:
Leliana: But now it's getting late. I think I might... turn in early. I can't help thinking about how soft and warm my bedroll is. Warden: You don't want to talk to me anymore? Leliana: Of course I do. You know I enjoy your company. But... it's getting a little chilly, and I prefer to be in my bedroll. Warden: Well, I shan't keep you. Leliana: You know, it'd be nice if you came with me. Warden: What for? Leliana: So I can show you my collection of pressed flowers... obviously. Warden: I didn't know you collected pressed flowers. Leliana: I... don't. Stop pretending you don't know what I want! Warden: I have no idea what's going on. Leliana: Ah, the games you play. Listen, I want to spend the night with you. There. I said it.
There's also the option to say (in reply to her turning early):
Warden: I'm going to stay up and write in my journal. Leliana: Oh, maybe you could come into my tent and I could watch you write? "Dear Journal... Leliana has shown much affection for me. Even asked me to come to bed with her, but alas, subtlety is lost on me." Warden: Wait, what?
Evil Detecting Dog: The codex on werewolves states that mabari became popular in Ferelden due to their ability to sense werewolves, a necessity in an age where packs of werewolves roamed freely across the landscape and anyone you invited into your home could be afflicted with the curse. Dog demonstrates this ability a few times in-game, and not just with werewolves.
Evil Empire: Once again, the old Tevinter Imperium had all the brutality of the Romans (that's saying a lot) plusBlood Magic. (The modern Tevinter Empire isn't much better.)
Evilutionary Biologist: Suprisingly common for a fantasy setting. Avernus, The Archetect, Zathrian, The Dwarf/Tevinter Mage partnership who built Amgarrak ...suffice to say that once you hear of someone "experimenting" with magic, you know it won't end well.
Enemy Civil War: Awakening centers around one between two surprisingly well-organized bands of darkspawn, both of which are attacking the people and Wardens of Amaranthine.
Escort Mission: There are several missions where you have to keep NPCs alive to get good rewards.
Eternally Pearly-White Teeth: Subverted — almost everyone, peasants and royalty alike, seem to have yellowed teeth; fairly realistic considering the equivalent technology level.
Even Evil Has Standards: Zevran mentions that the Antivan Crows were reluctant to take a contract on the Grey Wardens; even in Antiva, the killing of Wardens is considered 'impolitic'. Ignacio later tells a PC who has completed several contracts for the Crows that the only reason they took the job is because they thought Loghain had a better chance of defeating the darkspawn.
Everyone Calls Him Barkeep: Everyone in the game calls you "Warden" and refers to you solely as "the Warden", with few exceptions. Nobody ever addresses you by your first name. (Probably because you get to pick your name yourself, when first setting up your character.) The notable exception being the noble human and dwarf being called by their surname.
Lampshaded in Dragon Age II during Alistair's cameo. Bann Teagan says that they should be getting back to Denerim to see the Warden, and as they are leaving, Alistair responds, "You're always so formal. She/He has a name, you know.
Everything Fades: Halfway played straight. All bodies fade away into low-polygon bones and junk, which remain when you return. Averted when your return to Ostagar to find the king's body perfectly intact, but that is given a codex explanation: evidently, the Darkspawn taint is so fatal to living things that it kills the parasites that would normally break down dead tissue. (And of course, when you return, it's winter, which would further stave off decomposition.)
Everything's Cooler With Lava: The underground realm of the Deep Roads has a lot of lava, to the point that the dwarves have lava fountains and lava waterfalls as decorations in the same way surfacers might use water.
Everything's Worse with Bears: Bears in the game come in two flavors: black bears and great bears. Considering that there is nothing supernatural about them and that they are not sentient, bears are some of the toughest enemies in the game. This is to your advantage if you play as a rogue and get the Ranger specialization, as you'll be able to summon first a black bear and eventually a great bear. Oh the joys of slaughtering mooks with a bear at your side.
Executive Meddling: This and time restraints are the reason Shale's only available via DLC instead of being in the vanilla game.
Expressive Mask: Normally, when characters are in a cutscene or sharing dialogue, any headgear they're wearing comes off. Sometimes, this does not happen, but the game renders a character's facial expressions anyway by moving or warping parts of their full-face helmets.
Fantastic Caste System: Dwarves have a very rigid system consisting of eight castes. The appearance of honor must be upheld at all times. Elevation is nigh impossible, happening only with the achievement of Paragonhood or noble-hunting. The dwarves are slowly dying out because of the caste system's restrictions, coupled with the constant attacks by the darkspawn. It doesn't work well at all.
Even lampshaded by one of the dwarven nobles:
Warden: How does the caste system work, anyway? Lord Helmi: Badly.
Fantastic Honorifics: Both the gender-neutral "ser" version and a few more unique variants among the elves and the qunari. Unfortunately, we don't have very much detail on the latter two.
Humans look down on elves. The Dalish are believed to be nothing but gypsy troublemakers, while the Alienage elves are treated as second-class citizens at best.
Subverted from the usual styles of the trope, however, in that most humans merely don't like elves and/or are ignorant of their ways. If told of the true plight of the elven alienage, most humans react with utter horror at the conditions there. This comes to a head if the Warden reveals that Loghain's been selling elves into slavery — though this is partly due to Fereldan pride that they have abolished slavery in their nation — which leads to open outrage against him, and depending on player choices, they or another elf can even be raised to nobility.
Dalish elves themselves pity the Alienage elves and are mystified why they remain in the human cities. Meanwhile, the Alienage elves also look down on "flat-ears", elves who have left their walled ghettos and attempt to integrate themselves further within the human settlements, believing they are abandoning their community.
The higher castes of Orzammar treat the casteless as lower than dirt.
Dwarves also look down on humans and elves, considering themselves to be superior. And they also hate "surface dwarves", fellow dwarves who have left Orzammar for the surface world, who are officially considered casteless and exiles.
In Awakening, the Orlesian Warden is often on the recieving end of this, as many nobles don't trust that they're now swearing fealty of their lands to the Grey Warden order... and even least of all to an Orlesian.
You also get the trifecta in the scorn department if the Orlesian Warden also happens to be an Elf.
In the Origin's campaign itself, if the Warden is a Female Elf Mage, it creates some funny situations where people, who were just scorning you for being one of the three, learn that you are a Warden as well. Of course, it also means that, Congratulations!, you have created the most hated character in the game!
Featuring fantasy counterpart personages, too. Leliana –- a French-accented young cleric who firmly believes that The Maker told her to aid you. Can we say "Joan of Arc"? (Which is weird, given Andraste...)
Notable is that during one conversation with her, she will talk about her "unique" beliefs about the Maker: While most clerics of the Chantry believe that they are "chosen" by the Maker, and only they will achieve salvation, she thinks that the Maker loves everyone. Sounds a lot like Martin Luther (no, not that one) to me.
Speaking of Andraste: she's the legendary saint who inspired the major religion of Ferelden, so she fits even better. Having been spoken to directly by The Maker, she raised an army and led a holy crusade against the Tevinter empire. In the end, she was captured, and burned at the stake.
Aside from being the Maker's prophet, Andraste was put to death by Rome — err, the Tevinter Empire for her teachings. Her mortal remains (in this case, her ashes), are contained in an urn, which is a sacred relic rumored to have miraculous powers. Sound like anyone you know?
Also, Andraste is captured by the Empire thanks to her backstabbing husband, Maferath. Like Judas, Maferath's name has become synonymous with betrayal. There are also apocryphal holy books which imply that the Maker made Maferath betray her, and so he should be revered for enabling her transcendence.
She also seems to be a partial expy of Mohammed: a mortal chosen to reveal the teachings of the Maker and the only (or at least the final) person who will ever be spoken to, according to the Chantry; warrior prophet leading an outmatched army against a pagan Empire and picking up an army of converts; the Chant (in its origins, at least) is essentially a counterpart to the Qu'ran, and there is a similar impetus for it to be heard at all corners of the globe. Of course, the key difference that separates her from Mohammed is that she is worshipped, but, even then, excessive devotion to Andraste rather than The Maker is shown to be a bad thing.
Orlais was originally going to be called Arles, which was the name of an actual city in France. Orleans is a French city associated with Joan of Arc.
At one point, one of the Dalish refers to the Chantry's "Exalted Marches" as crusades...
Ferelden is basically "Scotland/Anglo-Saxon England" as a foil to the whole high medieval "Plantagenet England/France" thing Orlais has going. Ferelden also has Irish influences, mostly in the names.
The Free Marches represent the mess of micro-states that Germany was until the 19th century.
Somewhat confusingly, the Anderfels have German parallels as well, although more along the lines of the Teutonic Order and Prussia, with some Mongolian influences (their territory consists mainly of large, sparsely populated steppes) thrown in.
The Dragon Agewiki says that Nevarra was originally just one of the larger Free Marches before becoming a major power. So... Austria?
The Pentaghast clan, who united the Free Marches under Nevarran leadership in a loose confederation, are very similar to the Habsburg dynasty, similarly suggesting that Nevarra is based on Austria.
Antiva is "a fictionalized version of a medieval Italian city-state like Venice"... where everyone has a Spanish accent for some reason.
Fridge Brilliance: The Borgias, whose purported methods appears to be popular in Antiva, lived in Valencia, which was part of the Crown of Aragon and later of Spain itself, which at the time included many parts of Italy (like Naples).
Word Of God says that the Tevinter Imperium is based off the Byzantine Empire, complete with a schismatic version of the Chantry. (Ancient Tevinter was clearly Rome, without a doubt. Modern Tevinter is much smaller, and has converted to Andrastism, but is in religious schism with the other Andrastian nations, and thus...)
The schism itself takes on other flavors, too, with the White and Black Divines resembling rival popes in Catholic history.
The Qunari philosophy resembles militant Confucianism; they have been described in Word Of God as, societally, resembling "militant Islamic Borg".
The "Islamic" part is because they clearly play the role the Caliphates did in early medieval Europe: an expansionist, advanced civilization with an evangelical religion pressing on the borders of the Andrastian nations/Christian Europe, particularly Tevinter/Byzantium.
To the extent that they are a technologically advanced people who left their home continent for religious purposes and proceeded to attempt to conquer the indigenous folk of their new home, they could also be compared to the early English settlers of the Americas.
The Chasind Wilders are clearly based on Celtic tribes from Pre-Roman Britian.
The Dwarves, despite the fact that their armor, weapons, fighting style, and art style all have an Anglo-Saxon/Viking feel, (like most dwarves) have a social structure and political system that is actually quite Roman. The assembly, like the Roman Senate, isn't elected but inherited, and only the wealthy nobility can hold office. Their kings are elected by the assembly, as was the case during the Pre-Rebublic era. The Caste system brings to mind the Patrican/Plebeian divide, the Paragons are similar to when the Roman Senate would vote to have men raised to the position of living god, and of course, they practice gladitorial combat in the form of the provings. On the other hand, their buildings actually look Ethiopian, believe it or not. An understandable choice, as both carve their buildings directly out of stone rather then using brick.
City Elves are based on pre-World-War European Jewish culture. Once a powerful nation, they were overpowered, their homeland destroyed, and forced into slavery by the Tevinter imperium. (cf. Roman Empire). Eventually, they were freed, and built up a new culture, only to be again overpowered, this time by Fereldans and the Chantry. They now live in walled-off Ghettoes, try to keep up as many of their old customs as possible, can only find menial works among the humans, and are treated as second-class citizens. They have arranged marriages ("Matchmaker, Matchmaker..."), and even the ambient soundtrack for the elven "Alienage" (ghetto) has a distinct Klezmer/Schindler's List style, complete with mournful clarinet solo à la Giora Feidman.
The custom of having a great tree in the center of a village is a Basque tradition; for example, the Oak of Guernica.
Some inspiration might also be Native American, as they struggle to keep their old culture and language which is slipping away, and were the original people of Thedas before humans came.
Last but not least is the comparison with blacks in the United States, pre-Civil Rights but post-Civil War.
The nation of Rivain is a place where the Qunari (Muslims) and the Elves (Jews) live in peace and general equality with the humans. Sounds a lot like Moorish Spain. The fact that the only person we ever meet from there is a pirate named Isabela makes this comparison even more apt. (Piracy being the other thing the Moors were known for after religious tolerance and being a center of learning.)
Fantasy Gun Control: Dragon Age's society has the engineering capacity to produce smokeless coal or build entire cities underground, but only the Qunari have invented gunpowder. Dwarves know a little about explosives, but Qunari assassins have been known to hunt down and kill anyone who looks like they might give the secret of controlled explosions to those not of the Qun.
Fantasy Kitchen Sink: Averted, mostly. While there are plenty of standard fantasy creatures about, the writers did a decent job in coming up with alternatebackstoriesforeachofthem that explain coherently how they can all exist in the same setting.
Fictionary: Played with. Dalish elves often seem to sprinkle their dialogue with "elvish" phrases, even when a scene consists of just elves (such as the origin opening). This isn't just breaking Translation Convention, though, as the whole point is that the Dalish aren't speaking "elvish"; the elvish language has all but forgotten. Many Dalish use as much gratuitous elvish as they can as a way to hold on to their heritage.
Finishing Move: Occasionally, a character will get one when killing an enemy, ranging from a simple beheading animation when killing a Mook to a more involved lunge and coup de grace when slaying an Ogre. The most elaborate (which actually pause the gameplay for as much as 20 seconds) come with the deaths of the High Dragon, the Broodmother, and the Archdemon.
You can Subvert this, correct class builds and specializations turn the first two into Lightning Bruiser's and the third into Kung-Fu Wizard's
Final Battle: What you spend most of the game preparing for.
Finish Him: A choice the player can make after dueling Loghain.
Fireballs: A bread 'n butter spell for Mages. Does pretty hefty damage, has an area effect, does lingering damage, and bowls over any who fail a physical resistance check. Just don't shoot at your teammates.
Foreshadowing: Gameplay-wise. Jowan is one of only two Guest Star Party Members (in the PC version) with a colored background in his potrait. He was initially intended to be a permanent party member. Although the plan to make him a party member was scrapped, he still played a pretty important role in the plot, so...
Play the Human Noble origin a second time, then try not to cringe when Fergus assures Oren that he'll bring a nice sword home.
Fergus: Don't worry son, you'll get to see a sword up close real soon! Now, imagine how he feels when he learns of the attack on Highever, and realise that those were some of the last words he ever spoke to his boy...
Oghren can give you one if you cause him to leave the party through negative relationship: "I hope you succeed [in killing the archdemon], Warden, but I hope it kills you!" Which it can, even if you do.
In Redcliffe, there is a codex titled "Cautionary tales for the Adventurous" which tells about evil spirits inhabiting camp sites that drain the life force from those who rest there. Eventually, you'll find yourself in the Brecillian forest. You find yourself in a very inviting... campsite...
If you accept Morrigan's loophole to avoid killing the archdemon also killing you, one of the dialogue options before you part is, "Just don't make me come after you." Guess what the plot of the Witch Hunt DLC revolves around?
In the Mage's Origin story, it's possible to stumble upon a talking statue in the Tower basement. It does surprisingly little...until it comes up again in Witch Hunt.
Forest Ranger: Subverted; not quite a Friend to All Living Things. Rangers are specialized Rogues described to "exploit every advantage of their environment". In this case, summoning battle beasties, making them more of a Minion Master.
For Want of a Nail: The existence of a few other Origin player characters are alluded to in game (or in some of the DLC's), suggesting that you're the main character only because Duncan was in the right place at the right time. And then there's the DLC quest Darkspawn Chronicles, where it shows to some extent what would have happened if the Grey Warden candidate from any of the origins never survived the Joining ritual.
"Hey, everyone needs daddy issues. Just trying to help."
Friendly Fireproof: With regard to spells that affect an area. On Easy, this trope is in operation. On the other difficulties, it isn't, although Normal dials down the damage inflicted.
It's the nature of all fire spells in particular to avert this. Avernus combines his aversion with Stop Helping Me!, as his assistance is highly likely to wipe out all your melee fighters.
Played jarringly straight in the Warden's Keep DLC, where Levi Dryden is curiously immune to the chaotic battles around him. Justified, as otherwise most of the DLC would be an Escort Mission.
Friends with Benefits: Both Morrigan and Zevran say that they want this relationship with the Warden if romanced, though Morrigan instantly becomes a Clingy Jealous Girl whenever the Warden shows a romantic or sexual interest in anyone else (Zevran, being an Ethical Slut, is much more easy going, even if he does eventually develop feelings for the Warden).
Fridge Brilliance: For a while after the Joining, Grey Wardens apparently experience ravenous hunger when it comes time to eat... so do the Darkspawn.
From Nobody to Nightmare: Played with in regards to Loghain, a commoner who ends up being a hero to Ferelden during the Orlesian Wars and later takes the throne. He clearly thinks he's this in regards to how he acts during Origins, threatening the Bannorn into inciting Civil War and believing he can outmaneuver the Darkspawn like he does more conventional enemies.
Arguably, the Grey Warden if you started as a Elf or Dwarven Commoner, or a Mage — this is how you appear to your enemies. The sheer number of assassins they send after you is a indicator of how much you're putting the fear of the Maker into them.
The Guard in the Elf commoner lampshades this, in disbelief that the Arl's son lies in a river of blood that runs throughout the castle due to one Elf. When you step forward to take the blame, the Guardsman actually seems somewhat impressed.
Functional Magic: A person has to be born with the ability to use magic. Magic is performed by drawing power from the Fade. Device magic is also present in enchanted items created by the Tranquil as well as most of the items you create with higher-tier poison-making and trap-making.
Fun with Acronyms: The name of the game's world, Thedas, comes from the general working name "THE Dragon Age Setting".
Fur and Loathing: All mage robes manufactured by the Tevinter Imperium prominently feature fur (except for one from the Witch Hunt DLC).
Although Wynne strongly disapproves of Blood Magic like other Circle Mages, there is absolutely nothing preventing you from making Blood Mage her second specialization after unlocking it. If you are a Blood Mage, Wynne won't even bat an eyelash if you use Blood Magicright in front of her during battle. Likewise, there is nothing stopping you from making all-around good guy Alistair a Reaver.
Rangers can call wolves and bears in areas where there shouldn't be any to call on, like the Deep Roads.
Alistair comments that Zevran is no master of straight-up combat. When built right, he's the best melee fighter in the party, especially with the Duelist second specialization.
When Zevran asks to join your party, he claims he is good at lockpicking (besides other qualities IYKWIM...). Yet, he doesn't come with any lockpicking talents at that point. Of course, he might just be lying.
Lyrium potions are supposed to have an addictive quality, but none of your characters will ever suffer that no matter how many bottles they chug.
And lyrium ore is supposed to be lethally toxic to non-dwarves, and potentially brain damaging even to experienced dwarvish miners. Non-dwarven characters can touch exposed veins of the substance to heal themselves, and dwarven characters receive no effects at all.
Darkspawn corruption. Darkspawn blood is toxic, and getting it inside the body, either through ingestion or through a wound, can lead to death or ghoulification, and is one of several reasons the Grey Wardens intentionally taint themselves. However, your non-Warden companions will never once have to worry about that as they cut a bloody swath through entire hordes of the fiends. (There was an intent to make Grey Wardens out of the rest of your companions near the end of the game, but they had to abandon it.)
Anders (in Awakening) makes his spectacular appearance spewing fire from his hands. He has no fire spells at the time, and won't unless the player chooses to develop them. (Though if you start Awakening higher than level 18 or so, you'll have at least one spell point to spend for him.)
Likewise, Wynne is first shown (if you don't talk to her at Ostagar) defeating a fire demon with a cold spell, but doesn't have any when she joins the party.
It is perfectly possible for any member of your party to kill the Archdemon in gameplay. There will be no mistaking it when it happens, for the character in question will perform an elaborate Finishing Move. There will then be a Cut Scene showing whichever Grey Warden was designated by the story to strike the killing blow doing so.
In the Return to Ostagar DLC, you can find and claim a longsword and shield set supposedly wielded by King Cailan during the Battle of Ostagar. Scrutiny of cutscenes featuring Cailan before and during the battle will show that he uses neither: he wears no shield and favors a two-handed greatsword instead.
Gargle Blaster: Just read the description of any of the heavy liquor "gifts." And then picture Oghren chugging that stuff.
And in Awakening, Oghren treats The Joining as this.
Gender Bender: In the Darkspawn Chronicles DLC, cornering Wade and Herren in an alley results in the latter transforming into a Desire Demon and teleporting the two of them away.
Getting Crap Past the Radar: In the Brecilian Ruins, the player can find "A Love Letter" to "Miss Ambrose" from a butcher, which mentions a three-pound sausage. Yikes.
Girl on Girl Is Hot / But Not Too Gay: Played straight and subverted. Origins is the first AAA game to really depict passionate male gay sex, on the same level as the lesbian sex.
In-game, of course, Oghren definitely believes the former. He remarks that he'd wish he'd known Branka preferred girls to him - just before stating he has A Date with Rosie Palms.
Give Me Your Inventory Item: Lots of these, actually. One sidequest for the Blackstone Irregulars is just the player giving them 20 health potions. The Mages Collective wants 10 Deep Mushrooms, 10 Lyrium potions. The Chantry wants 5-10 Corpse Galls, and the Interested Parties want Toxin Extracts and pieces of Garnet. Lothering villagers want potions, poisons, traps...
Gondor Calls for Aid: The majority of the game is spent securing help from the Dalish elves, the dwarves of Orzammar, the Circle of Magi, and Arl Eamon's knights.
Groin Attack: The "Below the Belt" talent is described as a "swift and unsportsmanlike kick" to the target, which causes normal damage and movement penalties, and if you're lucky can be a critical hit. This makes it entirely possible to finish off enemies with an especially potent kick to the jewels.
Guest Star Party Member: The PC gets one or more of these during the origin stories. They vary based on said origin.
Also, in the Arl of Redcliffe story, you can send to the Fade Jowan or even First Encahnter Irwin.
God: The Maker has a lot of similarities with the Abrahamic God. Even comes with his own Jesus, who also doubles as Mohammed.
Going Through the Motions: It's not really noticeable unless you're really playing close attention, but if you watch long enough, you'll notice that a lot of characters use the same gestures, or tend to cross and uncross their arms a lot.
Gold Digger: Noble-hunting — practically a profession amongst the casteless dwarves, as children inherit the caste of the parent of the same sex. Such a child is a valuable commodity which benefits both parents. The casteless family is adopted into the noble house and the nobles receive another heir, which due to low fertility rates and casualties from the darkspawn and political backstabbing, are in rather short supply.
Here There Were Dragons: Griffons have died off, the elves have been subjugated and lost their immortality and most of their cultural heritage, magic is rare, dragons were thoguht to be extinct until a very few were seen at the start of the age, the Tevinter Imperium fell in all but name long ago and its gods were turned into Archdemons, and perhaps the most fantastic thing is the advent of an apocalyptic horde led by said Archdemons and hellbent on destruction. Oh yeah, it's the sticks all right. Of course, main characters being what they are, they'll uncover plenty of special things that are still in the world.
The Magic Comes Back: The game is actually called "Dragon Age" because that's the age the story takes place in. Each age is named at the end of the previous one based on portents and signs. It's called the Dragon Age because dragons just recently started reappearing after being nearly hunted to extinction. Hell, one of the endings has Morrigan setting up an old god to be reborn, uncorrupted, as a human. However, no griffons... yet.
Gory Discretion Shot: The killing of Connor is shown off-screen. Presumably because showing the deliberate murder of a young boy, even a possessed one, even in an M-rated game, would have upset the Media Watchdogs.
Grave Humor: In Haven, after you've gone through it the first time.
The Greatest Story Never Told: A series of Codex entries found in the Deep Roads gives the first-person accounts of a group of dwarven miners searching for treasure at the direction of their leader, who thought they were getting directions from the Stone itself. Instead of treasure, they found a darkspawn-dug tunnel that was about to break into Orzammar. The miners pulled an Heroic Sacrifice by collapsing the tunnel, and no one in Orzammar would ever know that they owed their continued existence to a small group that were considered losers and misfits when they were there.
There's a similar story in Awakening about the Casteless dwarves who fought and died defending Kal'Hirol. In that case, however, there is a sidequest allowing the PC to ensure that the story does eventually get told.
Green Rocks: As if the green-blueish veins of Lyrium itself weren't enough, Dragon Age also has lifestones, a rare rock that has existed in close proximity to lyrium ore, and as such, they have absorbed some of its traits. Crushing a lifestone gives the user a small bonus to nature resistance for a short time — reasonable enough. But in addition, lifestones enhance the natural properties of other materials used in item creation, and how! These magic rocks are used as natural property 'enhancers' in all sorts of antidotes, salves, poisons, and grease traps, of all things, conveniently making things more healing, more deadly, more acidic, or more greasy just by mere presence, it seems.
The succession arc in Orzammar. Harrowmont is an honorable man but believes in preserving dwarven traditions, most notably the oppressive caste system. On the other hand, Bhelen may be a scheming bastard (and if he wins, he immediately executes Harrowmont), but he wants to abolish the caste system and end Orzammar's policy of isolationism. According to the "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue, if Harrowmont becomes King, the dwarven kingdom becomes isolationist and cuts itself off from human contact (and keeps the caste system), whereas if Bhelen becomes King, he becomes a benevolent dictator who does indeed end the caste system as well as open the kingdom up to the rest of the world.
Bhelen is actually following in his Paragon ancestor's footsteps. While the Deshyrs bickered amongst themselves on whose Thaigs to save in the First Blight, Aeducan seized control, cut off Orzammar from the other dwarven settlements, and was Paragon'd for saving the dwarves. It's entirely likely that the Deshyr were livid with him though.
This applies to quite a few situations in the game — e.g., the conflicts between the Dalish elves and the werewolves and the Templars and the mages, not to mention the motivations of primary antagonist Loghain. That being said, there is usually an acceptable middle ground solution for most of the quests — and Orzammar isn't really one of them, given the epilogue.
Guide Dang It: Similar to Mass Effect 2, saving both Amaranthine and Vigil's Keep in Awakening requires a lot of work.
Origins also contains quests that don't appear in your journal.
In Awakening, there is a sidequest involving a set of Tevinter standing stones in the Wending Woods. You will probably need the guide to even figure out what you're supposed to do with them, let alone how to do it. (Hint: you need to connect every stone with a single, unbroken line.) There's a similar puzzle in the Fade, but the desired solution there is a bit more obvious.
The gifts can come off as very unintuitive and require a bit of poking around. A little moreso in Awakening because you have less opportunities to talk to the characters. But on the plus side, some are highly obvious.
Also, seemingly innocuous actions can have severe consequences, such as attempting to enter Arl Eamon's bedroom for the first time leading to Conner's death, and choosing Alistair as your champion at the Landsmeet leading to him executing Loghain immediately, preventing you from recruiting him and Alistair from marrying Anora.
Guilt-Based Gaming: Oh boy. Yes, being a creep generally nets you a lot of goodies, but certain members of your party are not going to let you forget it. And just try breaking up with someone without feeling like a scumbag (Hint: watch your dialogue choices, or you may end up with some hapless character on your romantic radar without meaning to).
Have You Seen My God?: The existence of the Maker that the Chantry speaks of is never given irrefutable proof in-game. For that matter, the elven Creators aren't obviously real, either. The Chantry preaches that the Maker did, in fact, abandon Thedas because of humankind's crimes, and that only their extreme penitence can make Him come back. Consequently, quite a few people in Ferelden are atheist or agnostic.
Helmets Are Hardly Heroic: In-engine cutscenes show the characters in their currently equipped gear, except for their helmets. Not for all cutscenes, however. Generally, if the scene is the prelude to the appearance of some monster, the helmet stays on. And, of course, helmets are generally removed for conversations, but this only makes sense.
Plot-significant characters take their helmets off for cutscenes. People who don't have names (or who are going to die shortly) will not. In that way, the spirit of the trope still holds.
Heroic Sacrifice: The Warden, Alistair, or Loghain can have one by killing the Archdemon without performing the dark ritual.
Heroes Love Dogs: No matter what kind of character you're playing, you can always count on the unquestioning love and loyalty of the Mabari Hound. Human Noble Wardens start with one, and Wardens of other backgrounds can get one by completing an easy-to-finish sidequest at Ostegar. Once the Hound has joined you, it's not possible to make him leave, even if you deliberately try to drive everyone else from your side; his approval starts at maximum, and without a silly bit of DLC, you cannot lower it for any reason. You may engage the Hound in dialogue to literally Pet the Dog.
Hidden Depths: Behind the deadpan snarking, party banter between Morrigan and Leliana actually makes her raise some highly intelligent philosophical questions, pointing out to Leliana who compares belief in Magic to belief in the Maker, that it's not the same, as she can see magic and uses magic, whereas there is no proof for the Maker at all. She also theorises that if the Maker does exist, he may have simply moved onto another creation entirely, which given her later discovering that the Eluvian leads to an entirely different realm altogether, may not be too far from the truth.
Zevran also demonstrates that he's not just the mere assassin he seems, seemingly picking up on Morrigan having plans for the Warden fairly early on.
Oghren, the smelly, drunk, womanizing, ever belching dwarf looks like quite a superficial person. But take him to talk to the Guardian of Andraste's Sacred Ashes and...
Hidden Elf Village: One of the reasons suggested why the Dalish kingdom was invaded and destroyed is they kept watching their neighbors getting beaten to a pulp... so the neighbors got pissed and now there is no more Elven kingdom.
High Fantasy: What the game wound up being. Sure, magic is restricted in this setting, but it's still everywhere.
High Fantasy is not synonymous with "high-magic setting." How high Dragon Age is on the scale is debatable, since the ultimate Big Bad is so corrupting and evil it makes the Gray and Gray Morality of ordinary folks look like cupcakes and roses. But until the final battle, the typical Warden will have killed a lot more neutral types, or humans (or Dwarves, or Elves, or even werewolves) just following orders, than bad guys. Checking your kill stats can be quite surprising in this regard.
High Pressure Blood: Defeated enemies sometimes lose parts, resulting in a pretty blood fountain. Arguably applies to all melee combat, considering how much gore characters get on them. (It even goes on their back!)
Hollywood Tactics: Justified. The Darkspawn rushing at the fortifications at Ostagar is somewhat plausible since they are mostly mindless beasts and have virtually unlimited troops. However, the Ferelden soldiers break their ranks and charge out of their defensive positions before the Darkspawn have come even close. Even if Loghain had charged the Darkspawn horde from the side, it wouldn't have helped the King and Duncan in any way, as they were already getting swamped by darkspawn at the other side of the battlefield. The justification? King Cailan is an Idiot Hero who was deadset on winning the battle in an epic, storybook-style fashion. Also, the main strategist, Loghain, was a traitor trying to get King Cailan killed.
Hopeless Boss Fight: Bioware probably intended the (optional) fight with Ser Cauthrien in the Arl of Denerim's estate to be this, though they also doubtlessly realized that they had to provide a possibility for someone to beat Cauthrien or else it would feel like a cop-out if she suddenly turned invincible and wiped the party at 1 hp. You have the option to surrender without fighting, and if you fight and get killed (very likely) you're "captured" instead of getting a game-over. Cauthrien is beatable; just very, very hard. Possibly the hardest boss of the game, level to level. Definitely the hardest if you don't draw her out of the room with all her lackeys (the two warriors will follow you as well, but the horde of archers and the mage will stay put). Even then, she can still kill even a tank with only one or two hits. Inexplicably becomes a Degraded Boss when you meet her again at the Landsmeet if you took the "go to prison route".
The Horde: The darkspawn. They especially like to leave people completely burned, hanging on display, or stuck in the ground with a large object lodged in the body.
Horned Humanoid: Desire demons. The qunari also have horns — although the rare ones without horns are actually considered special in their society.
Horny Devils: Desire demons, whose idle animations during conversation include acts such as feeling themselves up.
Humanoids Are White: The number of dark-skinned characters you meet can be counted on one hand, including one black elf. (Gets especially jarring if the player gives the Grey Warden a very dark skin tone — in the origins with the Grey Warden's parents, like the human noble origin, said parents are very fair-skinned in contrast to their son/daughter. No one in the game mentions the Grey Warden's skin tone as being in any way unusual if this is done.) However, the Dalish elves are somewhat tannish. (They seem to be a little like Romanis/Gypsies).
Human Resources: Golems are made using Dwarven lives. Also, Blood Magic drains the caster's (or others'...) blood and health points.
I Call It Vera: In the Witch Hunt DLC, Finn's default staff is literally called Vera.
I Did What I Had to Do: Will probably be inscribed on the Warden's tombstone. Can be invoked by name if the Warden kills Conner to eliminate the demon. Also claimed by Loghain, Avernus, and Zathrian.
I Drank What?: One can only wonder where Oghren's home-brewed ale comes from, as hinted by him and Zevran in their party banter.
Immortality: The Archdemon has Type IV, which is why it can only be killed by a Grey Warden. Flemeth has Type IX, but also seems to have a way back without Morrigan's involvement.
Awakening, the expansion, is less odd. A Warden importing his or her level-capped character will quickly face ordinary highwaymen so powerful a handful of them could have defeated the Archdemon and taken over the Tevinter Imperium. (Though even they probably couldn't have taken out Ser Cauthrian without a good strategy.) You'll also find the local militia in Amaranthine could wipe the floor with any group of adversaries in the original game. No wonder Howe's men overcame Highever so easily! That being said, the Warden's own power will soon catapult into the stratosphere, to the point where you could probably beat the Archdemon by spitting on it if one showed up again.
Inescapable Ambush: A number of random encounters throughout the game as you travel, but special mention to how you meet Zevran.
Inevitable Tournament: The Provings during the Orzammar treaty quest line, although you only have to enter the Provings if you side with Harrowmont.
In an odd twist, many of the best-in-slot weapons and pieces of equipment can simply be bought from merchants. They each cost a small fortune, however, so unless you're extremely compulsive about hoarding treasure and running sidequests (or extorting NPCs for favors), odds are you won't be able to afford many such indulgences.
Some of the DLC equipment — whether pre-order, collector's edition, or achievement awards — also counts.
Worth mentioning is the Reaper's Cudgel in the Golems of Amgarrak DLC. Statwise, it's an impressive, but otherwise ordinary mace. Its real value comes when, as DLC content, it is spread to your inventory in every game you have on file, and can be sold for insanely high amounts of money, even from the start of a new game. The only drawback is that to get it, you have to defeat The Harvester, a creature that spawns Elite Mooks as Goddamned Bats and is far and away the hardest boss in the game, easily outstripping the Archdemon or The Mother. And you have to do it on Hard or Nightmare mode, for the entire battle (no changing the difficulty when he's down to a sliver of health for you).
Vigilance in Awakening. It's meant to be so powerful, it will even get mentioned in the epilogue... unfortunately, its actual statistics, while certainly good, are nothing to get too excited about compared to other end-game weapons.
Insistent Terminology: When Morrigan refers to Zathrian as a "sorcerer" instead of a "keeper," he flips out.
Insurmountable Waist High Fence / Invisible Wall: A veritable cornucopia of them. Rather egregiously, you can climb to just below the top of a hill but you have to walk around the peak.
Even unobstructed roads and trails can be impassible. A Wide Open Sandbox this ain't.
Interspecies Romance: None of the love interests care what race the player is. Anora does, and Alistair cuts off a non-noble PC if he gets the throne unless you pass a difficult skill check, and even if you do, you don't marry him, you just become his bit on the side, and then you'll have to have made him a bit more selfish through dialogue options in the game... but at least with him it's mainly politics.
Come, come, bonny Lynne; tell us, tell us where you've been
Were you up, were you down
Chasing rabbits 'round the town
Come, come, bonny Lynne; tell us, tell us where you've been
Come, come, bonny Lynne; we've a bed to put you in
It is soft, it is warm
It will shelter from the storm
Come, come, bonny Lynne; we've a bed to put you in
Dear, Dear bonny Lynne sleeps the peaceful crib within
A mossy stone, a finger bone/No one knows but Lynne alone
Dear, Dear bonny Lynne sleeps the peaceful crib within...
There's also a couple of which can be overheard in the Alienage orphanage.
It Got Worse: Redcliffe Village is beyond screwed in general, what with the entire populace almost wiped out by undead which attack every night, dragging away the living to be devoured and turned, but The Warden has a few chances for finishing sidequests here which adds a few extra helpings of salt to the wounds. These include: informing one wife that her husband has died in the army and another that both her husband and son were killed in the Wilds; letting one of the few survivors of the massacre know that he was drafted by a mercenary company he'd signed up with (or inform him before the attack goes down, resulting in one less defender); and taking one of the party members' weapons back from a dwarf who'd purchased it fair and square.
It's Not You, It's Me: What you can say to Leliana to break up with her. She'll get mad and try to fight to save the relationship.
The Chantry treats the Maker with absolute reverence and makes the quest for His forgiveness of mankind's sins its primary goal, even though their canon makes the Almighty sound like a fickle, rather short-fused deity with a penchant for Disproportionate Retribution, lack of any actual love (or even vague sense of parental responsibility) for His creations, and no problem playing favourites for a girl in ways even Zeus might have called out of line. The Chantry preaches that He is God, but doesn't really make a very good job of painting Him as a good god. Ironically, it's the less orthodox if not borderline-blasphemous interpretations like Leliana's that attempt to paint the Maker as a God who someone may actually want to revere.
If the Old Gods of the Tevinter Imperium didn't fit this trope before, they definitely do after they become insane Archdemons that lead the Darkspawn in a bid to kill everything.
Jerk with a Heart of Gold: The Warden/Orlesian Warden in Awakening sometimes appears to be this to other characters, but justified as he is stuck being one making the tough decisions, barely keeping the lands of Amaranthine together, on top of dealing with his entire contingent of Wardens at Vigil's Keep being wiped out before he even arrived.
Best exemplified in the utter disbelief when you recruit Nathaniel, who outright refuses and protests he would rather die. You then can point out that he may die anyway during the Joining. Although seeing as Nathaniel took 4 Grey Wardens to subdue him and snuck into the Keep in the first place in order to kill you, the Warden clearly recognises his value if he joined the Order, and is kindly offering him a chance at redemption for the disgrace his father brought on his family in Origins. Nathaniel eventually cottons on to why you did this.
Justified Criminal: The casteless dwarves of Orzammar. Marked as outcasts and criminals from birth, they are not legally permitted to gain any legitimate work or housing. As such, they're forced into either begging or criminality for survival.
Karma Houdini: If Bhelen becomes the King of Orzammar when you're the Dwarf Noble. He gets away completely with his actions in the Origin, where he framed the Warden for the murder of their brother Trian, poisoned your father the King, and bribed the Assembly to unperson the Warden.
Karma Meter: Removed entirely, and replaced with a system of consequences for individual choices, along with personal reactions to various actions from your party members. Two characters actually can be "hardened", which makes them much less likely to complain about evil decisions (and more likely to accept a threesome or foursome).
Keep The Reward: An option for a few quests. Notable for the fact that it doesn't earn you karma or anything, since there is no karma. You just miss out on a reward when you do this. Instead, it's usually better to grub for rewards... and that's why it's so much more satisfying in Dragon Age when you do refuse the reward.
Kill Them All: In the Darkspawn Chronicles DLC, you can do this to a lot of named NPCs that would be in Denerim. Yes, including Alistair's sister. (Too bad you can't get Herren, though...)
If you've been recruited and Refuse The Call, you're killed to maintain the Grey Wardens' secrets, especially the details of the unsavory Joining as well as the 30-year Dead Man Walking curse.
You have this option with Brother Genitivi, who wants to show off Andraste's Ashes to the world.
Knight In Shining Armour: Averted. Nelaros from the Female City Elf Origin so desperately sees himself as this, attempting to protect you from Vaughn and later organising a rescue attempt with Soris to rescue his bride. What he doesn't realise is you are already planning your own escape, which luckily coincides with Soris arriving to slide you a sword, and within minutes you're heavily armed and taking down guards left, right, and centre. Sadly, you arrive too late to be able to rescue him.
Knight Templar: Unsurprisingly, the Templars themselves fit this trope perfectly. While they do hunt down bad mages, many of them have a hard time differentiating a bad mage from a perfectly good one, and are all too willing to completely purge the Circle if anything goes wrong. This has happened at least once per century for the last seven hundred years. According to the Codex, candidates for the order are chosen first and foremost for religious conviction and martial aptitude. They're administered lyrium in order to assist them in fighting evil mages — but a conversation with Alistair implies that the entire purpose of the lyrium is to get them addicted, ensuring their loyalty. They track and destroy dangerous rogue mages — but a conversation with Wynne implies that many mage-hunters take a sadistic pleasure in their work. Whether the templars are necessary is a matter of debate in-game as well as among the fandom.
In the Human Noble origin, your first fight is against a bunch of giant rats that have invaded your castle's pantry. After you're done, your party mate says it looks like "the start of every bad adventure tale [his] grandfather used to tell".
Zevran asks Oghren if they should now engage in some stereotypical elf-to-dwarf banter/rivalry. Oghren's response? "Nah."
Morrigan's response to stopping the merchant in Lothering from setting high prices. "Must we solve every little problem in this town?"
Similarly, if you ask the Ostagar merchant about his AWOL servants, he'll say he's sure someone like you has more important things to do than worry about his inane personal problems.
During one random encounter, you sneak up on a few bandits planning a sloppy ambush. One of the actions you can take is "Rush them and spring your own ambush for a change!"
If you romance Zevran, and either turn down or ask too many questions about the gift he offers you, he will eventually exclaim, "We pick up every other bit of treasure we come across, but not this? You don't want the earring, you don't get the earring. Very simple."
Large Ham: If no one else, Father Kolgrim of the Cult of Andraste. Also Wade.
...Cailan, Uldred, even Loghain, Bhelen, and Teagan at times.
Last Kiss: At the end for a female who romanced Alistair, if you stayed together and you didn't take the third option, since one of you has to die to finish off the Archdemon. What happens next is... well...
Warden: I can't let you do this, it's insane!
Alistair: Sanest thing I've ever done.
Last of His Kind: After Ostagar, the Warden and Alistair are the only two Grey Wardens left in Ferelden.
Several Wardens leave them as the last members of their family.
The Human Noble is the last of the Couslands after their family is betrayed and murdered by Arl Howe in the Origin. Your brother Fergus, however, is revealed near the end-game to have survived Ostagar.
The Dalish Elf's father was killed by human bandits, which left the Dalish Warden's mother so grief-struck, she simply disappeared into the moonlight to die of grief, shortly after the Warden's birth. Their mother's friend Ashalle and the rest of the clan therefore raised them.
Alistair is revealed to be the illegitimate son of King Maric, thus making them the last living member of the royal house of Theirin.
Late Arrival Spoiler: The advertising for the Return to Ostagar DLC spoils the outcome of the battle that took place there.
Law of Conservation of Detail : Exhaustingly averted. The majority of Codexes are nothing but fluff that flesh out the world but are ultimately irrelevant from a gameplay standpoint. There are a number of named NPCs who, likewise, serve no purpose other than elaborating the setting. YMMV on whether this is a bad thing.
Leaked Experience: Party members are never more than one level lower than the main character.
Leaning on the Fourth Wall: At the landing that leads to the Mage Tower, if you completed the Broken Circle quest, there are a pair of NPC's beyond a fence that are discussing how they could be merely "in a play", prompting one to dismiss the idea that they're being watched by "enlightened cosmic beings" for amusement by pointing out that he has a boil on his big toe that proves the theory wrong — at which point he claims that anyone doing so are simply sick, twisted bastards.
Leeroy Jenkins: If you don't use the right tactics, your party members will often act like this in combat, rushing headlong into the fray even when they're poorlysuited to close combat. Of course, there's a reason why you have the "Hold" option that keeps the party from blindly charging, and there are several behavioral routines (Ranged, for example) that will have AI-controlled party members keep their distance.
Left Hanging/Sequel Hook: The Witch Hunt DLC, the last material relased for the game and chronologically set after the rest, ends with Morrigan making some cryptic references to upcoming threats and new plans from Flemeth, then disappearing through a mysterious portal.
Legion Of Lost Souls: The Dwarven Legion of the Dead, who will accept anyone into their ranks no matter their background and hold a funeral for the new recruit upon their induction.
Legitimate Businessmen's Social Club: The Antivan Crows' contact in Denerim talks almost completely in innuendo in order to disguise what business he is actually discussing, nevermind that the only eavesdropper his verbiage could fool would be a deaf one. You, as the player, can lampshade this very fact and he'll simply explain that he has no idea who's listening in and just wants an out in case he's questioned. If you keep ignoring his attempts at innuendo, he snaps at you. It's worth it. After you complete the questline, he's willing to speak more openly.
Leitmotif: The darkspawn have a main theme, and several remixes of that theme for special encounters. The elves also have their own leitmotif, with various remixes of In Uthenera.
Leliana's song - no, not the DLC - is in the menu music, the romance theme, and during some of the more tender moments. Keep in mind, the song is about mortality and sacrifice.
Let Us Never Speak of This Again: The foursome/threesome option. Subverted when Zevran notes that he doesn't mind not speaking of it, as long as they can do it again.
Level Scaling: each area has an upper and lower limit to the level of enemies you'll face, and in the areas that have enemeies that are around your level, those enemies will level up with you.
Level Up At Intimacy 5: Your party members get boosts in their primary stat proportional to how much they like you.
In Zevran's case, sleeping with him and making kinky suggestions directly result in dexterity bonuses.
Female Wardens romancing Alistair can enjoy his Massive Constitution.
Light Feminine and Dark Feminine: Leliana is the Light Feminine, while Morrigan is the Dark Feminine. As their character arcs progress, standard BioWare deconstruction occurs, especially on Leliana's side.
Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards: If you take full advantage of specializations and area effect attacks. Warriors and rogues are hardly slouches by comparison even at high levels, but it still doesn't keep people from referring to the game as "Dragon Mage: Origins". You should take a look at the Dragon Age entry on the trope page.
Consider it also a case of Gameplay and Story Integration. Everyone in the setting is scared of magic for a reason.
Usually, Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards has mages kind of sucking at low levels; it's worth pointing out that this isn't true for Dragon Age. Low level casters in DA are squishy, but still powerful and useful compared to rogues or warriors. They just become very strong at high levels, and completely, ridiculously overpowered if intentionally twinked.
Subverted hard in Awakening. At higher ends, mages are only the best if you use the auto-level options and wear whatever equipment comes in the prettiest colors. The most mind-bogglingly powerful builds are all rogues and (even more so) warriors. It is possible to make a spirit warrior archer who does three thousand damage with an arrow of slaying, a rogue who does more than three hundred damage per second backstabbing, or an nigh-invincibly murder machine warrior who has 100% resistance to magic AND normal attacks, clad in armor of invulnerability, regenerating 8 health per second and still dealing a good 150 damage per second.
Oghren in particular, when dual-wielding a Tier 7 weapon, berserking, and using Peon's Plight, will regularly deal almost 450 damage to a single target. It only gets more ridiculous as his weapons get more powerful. And god help the bad guys if you start screwing with his specializations...
Literally Shattered Lives: Freeze an enemy solid, or petrify them, then land a critical on them. They break.
Or Rocket Punch them with a stone, or cast Crushing Prison on them.
Load-Bearing Boss: Defeating The Harvester causes Amgarrak's forge area to collapse.
Loads and Loads of Loading: Especially on the PC version, where thanks to a memory leak these stretch into epic lengths if you play long enough at a time.
The console versions are not better: the longer you play, the longer it will take save games to save and load. And if you get all the downloadable content, you have to wait almost five minutes for the game to check your save game data, then downloadable content, at the beginning of the game.
Longest Prologue Ever: There are 6 origin stories and they can take an hour or longer to complete. And then that prologue is followed by another prologue in Ostagar, which will probably run between one and two hours, depending on one's thoroughness and efficiency. And if you want to get technical, you can also include Lothering, which will take at least fifteen minutes and can stretch to over an hour if you're thorough, since you have to get through that town if you want to go anywhere else in the game.
Lost Forever: If you talk to the smuggler in Dust Town and don't accept his quest (for instance, if you don't have the money), he'll be gone the next time you enter Dust Town, denying you the opportunity to make 65 gold plus a tier 7 item in a single quest.
Any item or other goodie located in a one time only area, such as Lothering (destroyed after completing one of the main quests) and The Fade.
Lothering is a prime example. It's still in the early stages of the game, so the player is inclined to think of it as a recurring location. But if you leave without looking around, you miss out on not one, but twoparty members, Leliana and Sten, both of which are never seen again once the village is lost.
The Ancient Elven Armor set can certainly be this. One of the pieces is in the aforementioned Lothering, while the second is in the possession of an NPC who will stop speaking to you after you complete "The Nature of the Beast." That's 50% of a very nice armor set that you can easily miss if you don't know to look for it.
Lotus-Eater Machine: When you're trapped in the Fade in the Tower Of Magi, the demon of sloth tries do do this trick on you and your party. It doesn't work only on you, and you have to save them. In a subversion, some party members are trapped in painful visions/memories (such as Wynne and Zevran) in comparison to the idyllic illusions (Alistair). It should be noted that Morrigan and Sten are also immune to the illusions, but can't or don't leave.
Love Hurts: Any attempt at a romance during one of the Origin stories ends badly.
Practically a theme of the expansion, as several sidequests, including two companion quests, centre around a love story that ends horribly. Oghren joins the Grey Wardens after having split with Felsi, with whom he had a child, after failing to reconcile his Blood Knight nature. In one sidequest, the Warden can track down a young man who hanged himself after failing to provide a dream home for his wife; the Warden must then deliver the horrible news. Another man’s attempt at a Wacky Marriage Proposal resulted in his would-be fiancée misunderstanding it and leaving him; he then poisoned himself. In the Silverite Mine, a dying Grey Warden begs the main character to bring his wife his ring, but when the Warden tracks her down, it turns out that she’s cheating on him. Finally, a young woman named Aura discovers that her husband, a Grey Warden named Kristoff, has died in the worst possible way: by encountering his animated corpse, which is possessed by a Spirit of Justice.
If the female PC is romancing Alistair, the only way the two of you can survive the ending to be with each other is to make him sleep with Morrigan so he can sire her child. The game makes you watch.
If the male PC is romancing Morrigan, there is no way to get a traditionally happy ending, no matter what you do. If you don't take her up on her offer at the end, she leaves the party immediately. If you do comply with her plan, she vanishes anyway after the final battle. The Witch Hunt DLC does allow the Warden to travel with her, though.
Low Fantasy: According to Bioware, anyway. This is a little questionable, however, when you consider that it has rampant magic, a classic Good Vs Evil conflict against a great evil, an epic scale, The Quest, and plenty of heroics.
Luck-Based Mission: Oddly common considering the focus on strategy and tactics the game is supposed to have.
Most prevalent anytime you encounter mages, especially if the fight started immediately after opening a door or after dialogue. Enemy mages generally cast a spell at random. They have so many different damage types that buffing the right elemental resistance is random. If 2 or more mages happen to cast the right spells at the same time, it will virtually always kill off any character outside those with extreme resistances (most likely Templar or Arcane Warriors, but potentially any Human, Elf, or Dwarf character with the right stats or spells).
Needless to say, the game's difficulty is rather inconsistent. Some trash mob encounters may utterly curb-stomp you, while boss battles you can just walk right past, especially later in the game.
One of the game's hardest battles is a random pack of wolves met on the road. The difficulty of the battle depends entirely on how often the wolves use their 'Overwhelm' ability.
Lured Into A Trap: As the Warden and party are travelling, a woman will run up to them and ask for help. Going along with her will lead to a trap sprung by Zevran and his fellow assassins.
Made of Explodium: Abominations will explode a few seconds after being killed.
Mage Tower: The Circle of Magi is housed in one. First Enchanter Irving lampshades the trope when he grumbles about all the stairs that it necessitates. (Unusually, the tower itself predates the Circle.)
Magical Society: The Circle of Magi, naturally. Unlike some instances, not all mages are happy to belong to it.
The Reaver (a soul-devouring warrior specialization)
The Templar (anti-magic focused DPS/tank warrior sub-class)
The Spirit Warrior (warrior with magic powers)
The Battlemage (a mage that actually benefits from being in the thick of battle)
Magic Versus Science: After their conquests, the Qunari were repelled by the Chantry-led forces in good measure thanks to the advantage given to them by the use of Magic applied to warfare. In the Qunari culture, magic, albeit known, was regarded nearly as an abomination, and their warfare relied heavily on their superior technology (like cannons) which proved to be no match for the Chantry-controlled mages. The Qunari have also been unable to conquer the remnant of the Tevinter Imperium.
That's selling them a little short. The qunari war lasted over a hundred years, and only ended when the Chantry declared an Exalted March (fantasy Crusade) which itself lasted more than fifty years. And the war ended with Thedas suing for peace. And numerous people who have been to Par Vollen have said the qunari are not so much fighting the Tevinter Imperium as fending off the occasional attack.
Fenris: When the qunari want war, we will all know it.
Magic Wand: Mage staffs. According to the Witch Hunt DLC, mages find the idea of using actual wands to be silly.
Magikarp Power: Archery. When you start out, it deals mediocre damage (generally lower than you'd get from pulling a sword or a mace and hitting the target). But then you get to the fourth-tier talents and you get Arrow of Slaying (which can dish out damage that rivals or exceeds anything the party mages have to offer) and Scattershot (which can both injure and stun an entire crowd of foes). And then you get to Awakening, at which point an archer with high dexterity and decent armor basically becomes a One-Man Army.
Malaproper: Sister Theohild in the Denerim Chantry, much to Mother Perpetua's consternation.
Sister Theohild: The Veal holds no uncertainty for her, and she will know no fear of death, for the Maker shall be her bacon and her shield, her foundation and her- Mother Perpetua: There is no veal in the Chant! You're doing this on purpose, aren't you?
Mana Shield: Spell Shield. Only works against spells, though. Forcefield also works, but renders the enclosed person immobile and unable to do damage to anyone outside it.
Mate or Die: The Archdemon can only be slain by a Grey Warden, who then dies. Morrigan has a plan that involves getting a male player character or Alistair (or Loghain) to impregnate her, so none of you will die when you kill it.
Meat Moss: Shows up in the Circle of Magi tower as a symptom of the abominations' presence. One can hear wet, squelching noises in the background as it continues to grow and expand. Some rooms are just filled with it. The Deep Roads are filled with this, presumably due to the darkspawn taint.
As explained here, magic pretty much prevents progress, while the Qunari, who are squeamish at best with regard to magic, have access to gunpowder. The dwarves, completely unable to use magic, are advancing too, but slowly. The smokeless fuel they use was invented within living memory, and the ancestral Shield Of Aeducan is pretty much identical to early-game junk shields.
Medium Awareness: The Warden responds to player input, but the Violent voice gets personal:
The Grey Warden': Can I get you a ladder, so you can get off my back?
Mêlée à Trois: The final dungeon in the Awakening questline is a slog a dragon graveyard which the Mother territory while the Architect's forces are also trying to invade for the same reason. So you have the Grey Wardens trying to plow through two factions of warring darkspawn, and just in case you were getting bored, a High Dragon drops out of the sky in the middle of a fight and begins attacking everything indiscriminately.
Men Are the Expendable Gender: During the main quest, the player can choose to help the villagers of Redcliffe defend from an undead attack. The women remain in the chantry along with the elderly and children, while the men (militia) fight (this is stated by Murdock and Mother Hannah). While helping the villagers prepare for the attack, you can persuade (or intimidate) a few more men into joining the militia, but no mention is made of arming the women. Quite the opposite — a dialogue option with a village woman is "Shouldn't you be in the chantry?", whereas with the man she works for it is something like "Why aren't you with the militia?". Considering that you can play as a female warrior, there are women in the army (including many fighting at Ostagar, who were doubtless slaughtered with the men), there are female party members, there are female enemies, and character creation states that men and women are generally considered to be equal, it is odd that the women were portrayed as defenseless and did not fight to defend their village from certain destruction.
Arguably justified in that the town has been under siege for a while at this point and people are being dragged off left and right. Counting, there aren't as many women left as the men, and while most of the villagers aren't optimistic about their chances, there might still be somebody in charge thinking about the future of the village should all or most of the remaining women be killed. Or it could simply be that just because women are generally considered equal across Ferelden doesn't mean that they're considered as equal everywhere. The initial reaction to a female warden from at least one NPC seems to support that Redcliffe Village is probably one of those places.
A Million is a Statistic: Can be used as a threat at one point. "Hundreds have died in my wake, you're just a number."
Mistaken For Granite: Whenever you see a deactivated but otherwise intact golem, rest assured that it will start attacking as soon as you do something important.
Money Spider: Played perfectly literally with the spiders themselves, but mostly averted elsewhere.
Childer Larva and Hatchlings seem to have a pretty big allowance for being a week old. They can drop over 2 sovereigns.
Monty Haul: All of Awakening throws more loot at you than you'll ever need. The sticker shock of the building upgrade and dream items in shops fades pretty quickly when you notice how quickly your purse is refilling.
Moral Myopia: The Dragon to the Tevinter slavers in the Denerim Alienage will demand to know your reasons for attacking her soldiers, then piously announce her intention to "halt your slaughter" as she attacks you.
More than Mind Control: Those tempted into deals with demons of Pride, Sloth, and especially Desire become to some degree a willing party to their own possession.
Desire Demon: Happiness is bewitching.
Motifs: You could make a drinking game out of how many times blood becomes a subject of importance in this game, to say nothing of how much of it gets splattered around.
Muggle and Magical Love Triangle: It's entirely possible for a male Warden to end up in a love triangle with Leliana (Muggle) and Morrigan (Mage).
Mutant Draft Board: The Circle of Magi. Unlike most examples of the trope, the Circle don't control themselves; the Chantry keeps legal magi as virtual slaves and kills the whole Circle off and starts over whenever they become too much to handle accidentally let a demon into the world.
Mutual Kill: Happens whenever a Grey Warden kills an archdemon.
My God, You Are Serious: Alistair's reaction to being told he has to sleep with Morrigan to keep one of you from dying.
In the Circle Tower, you run into a Desire Demon who claims to truly love her Templar "captive". It's up to you whether to give her a chance or kill her (and the Templar).
There's also a Sylvan (a demon-possessed tree) in the Brecilian forest called the Grand Oak, who unlike all the others, will not attack the party if approached. It speaks in rhyme (complete with Ye Olde Butcherede Englishe), and is more interested in simply living in peace than anything else, and will offer assistance in return for a favor. Since it's possible for other, more benevolent Fade creatures to possess people, probably it makes sense that a more benevolent one might possess a tree.
Justice, a spirit who was forced by magical mishap into the body of a newly-dead Grey Warden, explains in Awakening that most benevolent spirits have no interest in the material world, especially since all those who go there never return.
Mythology Gag: Bioware has made a lot of RPGs, and they won't stop telling you about it.
In a tavern in Denerim is a bitter, bitter serving wench by the name of Edwina.
You can summon one Arl Foreshadow in the Circle of Magi.
There is an obscenely powerful optional boss, a lich expy called Gaxkang who drops one of the best items in the game. Suspiciously similar to the obscenely powerful optional boss lich Kangaxx who drops one of the best items in that game.
When going to the world map after leaving Lothering — as well as some other times, which seem to be triggered when you click on an area exit and then click on a point on the ground within the area—you're asked if you would like to "Gather your party and venture forth". Very similar to the "You must gather your party before venturing forth" that every Baldur's Gate player still has ringing in their ears.
The game shares a minor plot point with Jade Empire: Golems are made from people.
Your dog can bring you a pair of dirty abandoned pantaloons that according to the description seem to have been "either gold or silver in colour" at one time.
You can find a note in the Deep Roads saying "Mass will have an effect," and wondering about a dwarf named Shepard.
Mystical Plague: The Blight disease spread by the Darkspawn is said to be a curse by the Maker upon the Tevinter Magisters, who turned into the first Darkspawn themselves under its influence.
Never Trust a Trailer: The CGI trailers, which were done by Blur instead of Bioware, place a heavier emphasis on action than actually appears in game, in addition to the characters looking much different.
The trailers for Awakening, which touted The Architect as the Big Bad. In reality, he only appears a couple times throughout the expansion and has very few lines. You don't even have to fight him.
New Game Plus: Each specialization, such as Arcane Warrior or Berserker, has to be unlocked once in the game. However, as soon as it is unlocked, it can be freely used not just by the character who unlocked it, but also by any character of the same account or profile. Unlike a true new game plus, you do not get to reuse your character from the last game (levels, gear, and all). However, by completing DLC campaigns like Witch Hunt, you can get new items — often extremely powerful, or at least good to sell for some coin.
Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: In some of the origins, the PC's actions end up making life (either for themselves or others) difficult later on.
In the Magi origin, the Mage assists Jowan into escaping from the Circle. He then proceeds to poison Arl Eamon at Loghain's behest, and set off a chain of events that nearly destroy Redcliffe.
In the Dwarven Noble origin, it's possible for the Player Character to fall for Bhelen's deception and kill the eldest brother, bringing their subsequent exile upon him/herself, leading to King Aeducan's grief-induced death, and the following deadlock on the new king candidates.
In the City Elf origin, the Player Character effectively sparks a riot that prompts the Alienage to be purged.
Meanwhile, completing some quests can lead to disastrous consequences in the epilogue. Helping to construct a Chantry in Orzammar might lead to a religious conflict between the dwarves, concluding in an Exalted March.
Completing a sidequest in the Circle Tower called "Summoning Sciences" will result in the escape of a Fade spirit that will then begin slaughtering innocent people on the road between the Tower and Redcliffe.
Nintendo Hard: Higher difficulties will strongly punish players who don't properly use tactics. The game also gives a very minimal introduction to the combat, causing a Difficulty Spike when players get into battles designed to be won with strategy.
Given the focus the game has on tactics, there are a few design decisions that are a bit odd, almost to the point of being Fake Difficulty. The game makes some fights significantly harder by porting the entire party directly in front of the bad guys for a mandatory conversation before the fight starts; in extreme cases, this means the party walks directly into an ambush/crossfire/killzone.
Noble Male Roguish Male: Alistair and Zevran, the two male love interests, with Alistair being the Noble aspect and Zevran the Roguish.
No Campaign for the Wicked: The Darkspawn Chronicles DLC averts this by allowing you to play as as a Hurlock Vanguard during the Battle of Denerim in an alternate universe where the Warden failed the Joining.
No Fair Cheating: There was a glitch to raise your levels to the cap in Ostagar. Using it makes the game unwinnable; the Dynamic Difficulty means that while your party levels up, without matching equipment for your level, you'll be far outgunned by the enemy. It can be averted while playing a warrior, since low level enemies will start immediately dropping silverite and dragonbone equipment and leveling up early means early access to the bonus items (blood dragon armor, etc.)
Wonderfully lampshaded when the PC reaches the paranoid hermit in the Brecillian Forest and has a mage in the party, who immediately points out this isn't just your average old loon. "No fair, bringing mages to a guessing game!"
No Hero Discount: Mostly played straight — despite the fact that the Warden goes around saving the bacon of pretty much everyone in Ferelden, most of the merchants you encounter won't offer you so much as a minor discount in return, and the game even goes out of its way to rub this in the player's face by having one of the few who claims to be doing so (Bodahn) charge you some of the highest prices of anyone for his goods.
Gorim is an exception to this rule, but only if you play as a Dwarf Noble. If you did then he does give you a discount and buys your items for higher prices too.
If you suggest to Alistair a threesome with Isabela and he is not hardened.
If you suggest that Alistair resolve the dispute over the succession by marrying Anora, the current queen; hardened or not, he'll go along with it, but he's against at it first.
Nominal Importance: If they have a name, or even an unusual description, they most certainly have important, or at least interesting, things to say — if not worthy of a side quest. Some temporary party members with no particular dialogue of their own are named "Circle Mage" and "Tower Guard". They die.
Also works in battle; most named NPCs on your side are literally invincible.
No Ontological Inertia: Subverted with Zathrian and Witherfang. Killing Witherfang will not end the werewolf curse. It would only provide Zathrian with a cure for his Dalish kin, allowing the humans afflicted to continue suffering. Killing Zathrian will not end the curse either. If Zathrian willingly removes the curse, however, it will kill both him and Witherfang. Also with Flemeth (stays a dragon after you kill her), mind-controlled templars, some spells who survive the casters (the swarm of insects one, for example), and so on. The dev team like subverting this one, apparently.
No Such Thing As Wizard Jesus: Averted. Everything from Andraste to the origins of the darkspawn have alternate explanations suggested that go against the Chantry's canon in favor of non-divine explanations suggested in codex entries. Sten and Morrigan (a follower of the Qun philosophy and an atheist witch, respectively) occasionally bring these up as well.
No Sympathy: You can play your character as this if you're feeling heartless. The game provides you with cold or cruel responses, which may gain favour with the pragmatists (Sten), but are more likely to hurt your relationships with characters — even Morrigan demands a certain level of respect for her beliefs and upbringing. More significantly, your group generally dismisses or ignores your character's woes. Occasionally, however, the game will surprise you by averting the trope when least expected — it's possible to be cheered up by amoral Zevran, or receive approval for your romance from sharp-tongued Morrigan.
Non-indicative Name: As Sten can note about the Crows in a conversation with Zevran.
Sten: Why do you call yourselves "Crows"? Crows are scavengers, not killers.
Zevran: I heard that at one time they considered calling us the Kestrels. But you know. It didn't sing. It didn't dance.
Non-Lethal K.O.: Unless your whole party gets wiped out, a downed character is only unconscious, though with an injury that needs treatment. They'll haul themselves upright (usually with a one-liner) when the battle is over.
Noodle Incident: Bann Teagan instantly recognizes Alistair when Alistair tells him he was covered in mud last time they met. No further details are given.
Leliana: I once drank a thimble of dwarven ale. Woke up a week later in Jader wearing nothing but my shoes and a towel.
Alistair: What? Lead? Me? No, no, no. No leading. Bad things happen when I lead. We get lost, people die, and the next thing you know I'm stranded somewhere without any pants.
Not so Different: Prince Bhelen and Lord Harrowmont. Both hire criers to spread lies and slander about their opponents, both are willing to use deceit and fraud to win the support of the deshyrs, both have armed bands of supporters roaming the streets and assaulting their opponents, both hire mercenaries to assassinate the Warden if he/she sides with the other...
Not So Stoic: A minor example, but if you bug the calm-speaking Master Ignacio about his innuendo of stating what he wants you to do and where your payment will be, he gets annoyed by your lack of subtlety and bursts out: "All right, yes. You kill them, look in the bleeding chest."
Not That There's Anything Wrong with That: If a male Warden is romancing Leliana and Zevran simultaneously, Leliana will be quick to say this to clarify that it's the cheating she has a problem with, not the Warden liking other men.
Nothing Personal: Said by a group of desperate refugees who ambush you in Lothering, and invoked by Zevran after his failed assassination attempt, who says that he has no issues with you personally and was just fulfilling a contract.
Notice This: The game uses sparkles to point out containers and lootable enemies.
The Nudifier: Dragon Age: Origins Awakening can start an imported character save from the previous game in their underwear if they were wearing DLC armor.
There is also a prominent glitch that destroys the player character's equipment in the same expansion.
Nuke 'Em: The Grey Wardens have no problem with burning down entire villages if they believe this would help defeat the Blight.
Oblivious Guilt Slinging: In the Human Noble Origin, you can pull Arl Howe aside to wish him well. This makes him very embarrassed for some reason. He's planning to murder you, your whole family, And Your Little Dog Too.
Obvious Beta: The critically bugged and broken endgame sequence.
As well as various less polite variations such as "Andraste's Ass" and "Andraste's Knicker-Weasels".
Dalish Elves have suspiciously Christian blessings and creeds where "Creators" is hastily substituted for "God" — "Creators speed/guide you on your way", "It seems the will of the Creators", "Gods bless you", etc.
Omnicidal Neutral: "Soldier's Peak" can end with the Warden slaying Avernus on behalf of the demon, then turning around and killing the demon, too. Or the other way around. Similarly, the "A Paragon of Her Kind" quest can end with the Warden killing Caridin, then talking Branka into committing suicide.
One Stat to Rule Them All: For Mages, it's obviously the Magic stat. You don't even need the stats that give hit points or mana because hey, Magic improves your health and mana potions. And if you pick the Arcane Warrior specilization, you really don't have a use for Strength.
One Hit Point Wonder: Any Darkspawn with "Grunt" in their name. Grunts are suspiciously weaker than other Darkspawn, which is strange because they only appear in the endgame, when you're at your most powerful.
Only One Female Mold: Putting Wynne (60-ish with all gray hair) next to Morrigan (early 20s with a figure that's lampshaded by Liara) and having them wear the same outfit (as long as it's not a formless robe) is...disturbing, to say the least.
Only Smart People May Pass: The Gauntlet from the Urn of Sacred Ashes questline. Lampshaded by Alistair: "Andraste only favored the clever, it seems."
Only The Worthy May Pass: When doing the last part of the Urn of Sacred Ashes quest line, the Guardian practically states this word for word and puts you through tests of faith. And by faith, he means logic.
The Order: The Grey Wardens, the Templars, the Circle of Magi, the Legion of the Dead...
Order Reborn: The Grey Wardens of Ferelden are wiped out near the beginning of the game, and rebuilding them remains a concern even after the defeat of the Blight. (The start of Awakening doesn't help matters...)
Organ Drops: Demonic ichor, spider toxin extract, corpse galls (the latter of which the Chantry collects after an apparent outbreak of zombism).
Our Demons Are Different: They've got a few of the standard traits and tactics, but rather than being diabolic monsters, they're merely the evil half of the population of spirits inhabiting the Fade, the setting's Spirit World.
Our Dragons Are Different: Dragons in Dragon Age are quite a rare sight overall, having only recently reappeared after they were long believed to be extinct -– heck, the present Dragon Age was only named as such because of the dragons' reappearance! Most of them are fairly small juveniles and drakes; only impregnated female dragons get huge like the beasts of legend and grow wings, and are extremely rare. (In Origins, there's a single true dragon, in the classical fantasy sense, in the game; there are at least two other winged females, but they're much younger and smaller.)
There's one in Awakening, or two if you reawaken the Queen of the Blackmarsh.
Our Dwarves Are All the Same: Subverted. Although they still possess a few of the standard traits, their rigid caste society and customs make them very different from Tolkien-esque dwarves. One of the classics is completely avoided: dwarven beer is horrible because it is brewed from lichen. The human king acts like that isn't true, but he's kind of a moron. The dwarves also have American accents, as opposed to the traditonal Scottish ones. Only a third of them have huge beards as well.
They also seem to be quite sexual for standard fantasy dwarves. "Noble hunting", which is a nice way of saying "gold digging", is openly encouraged in dwarven society. There are as many dwarven prostitutes at the Pearl as there are elven prostitutes. And tellingly, the PC can get shagged in only two of the six origin stories, but only one of them -— the Dwarf Noble origin —- lets the main character have a three-way with two noble hunters. Oh, and it produces an heir. So good luck with that...
Our Elves Are Better: Brutally subverted. Elves are discriminated against, have lost their immortality (according to elvish folklore), and were enslaved for a thousand years. The slavery may have ended, but the discrimination, segregation, and second-class citizenry certainly didn't.
Our Orcs Are Different: Darkspawn fit the classic Tolkein orc criteria enough to fit and look enough like Orcs as well. Indeed, they're closer to Tolkien Orcs than most of the Proud Warrior Race Orcs now in fantasy. The Deep Roads is Moria, and the Broodmother hints at the idea in the Silmarillion that orcs are corrupted elves. Due to the very real threat they pose to entire nations, they're closer to Tolkien's orcs than most standard fantasy orcs you find these days. They get a whole lot worse when you meet the first Broodmother. And it manages to get even worse when you meet The Mother in Awakening, who is different from broodmothers in that she is 1) fully sentient, 2) capable of commanding other darkspawn, including broodmothers, and 3) cacklingly insane.
Our Vampires Are Different: They're people possessed by hunger demons. Since hunger demons are barely sentient, they're not as cunning as traditional vampires.
Not Using the Z Word — they're never referred to in-game as vampires. Indeed, they're counted more as walking corpses, rather than their own kind of undead, though they are among the most powerful of the walking dead.
Out-of-Clothes Experience: How a player could start off playing Dragon Age: Origins Awakening if they imported a character save from the previous game who's wearing DLC armor that doesn't transfer.
The Paladin: Templars are this game's Church MilitantMagic Knights (or Anti-Magic Knights, as the case may be). If you want a classic Paladin (magic knight with mostly healing spells), you could give your mage the Spirit Healer spec along with Arcane Warrior and/or Battlemage.
The lost child in Lothering who can be heard crying out for his mother (who is likely the woman that you find dead in the fields during a certain sidequest).
Poor, poor Amethyne. When you meet her in the Denerim Alienage, she is completely unaware of the events that occurred in Highever (during which her mother was murdered), and the fact that she is now an orphan. And no matter your relationship with her mother, you can't do jack for her.
Every single mage who gets sent to the Circle Tower is affected by this trope. Mainly because mages generally have to live out pretty much the rest of their whole lives locked away in that tower. And besides that, most of them are utterly rejected by their families anyway when their magical powers surface in childhood, since magic is so feared and despised in Ferelden.
Party Scattering: In the Fade section, the Warden's active party is scattered across a demon's otherworldly realm and s/he has to find and free them before they can fight the demon.
Path of Inspiration: The Disciples of Andraste used to be a peaceful cult dedicated to protecting the Urn of Sacred Ashes from the unfaithful, but eventually became an Axe Crazy Dragon Cult.
Perfectly Cromulent Word: Averted most of the time. Chantry? Apostate? Maleficar? All real words. Well, except maleficar, but you can call that a modernization of maleficus.
Player Headquarters: The party's campsites in Origins, and Vigil's Keep in Awakening.
Polyamory: If the Warden is romancing Morrigan and another companion simultaneously, the Warden can suggest this to her when she calls him out on it. As it turns out, Morrigan disapproves.
Powered by a Forsaken Child: Literally.The third option to destroy the archdemon involves impregnating Morrigan to use her child as a conduit for the archdemon's soul, transferring the soul into the child and leaving the Warden who slays it alive. Morrigan claims that the archdemon's soul is purified in this process and the child will not be hurt. She does refuse to elaborate and scrams with the child later.
Practical Taunt: Taunt is a generic Warrior class skill used to instantly boost all nearby enemies' aggro, making them attack the tank instead of weaker party members.
Pragmatic Villainy: Though the villain part is debatable for both of them, Morrigan and Flemeth qualify. Well, Morrigan tries, anyway, but ends up coming across as Stupid Evil as, for example, she'll complain about you helping the villagers of Redcliff with their undead problem despite it being the most direct, not to mention safest, way to the castle. Flemeth, on the other hand, despite her Grand Theft Me plot with all of her daughters, fits to a T as she couldn't care less about the Grey Wardens except for the fact that they're the only ones capable of stopping the Darkspawn, plus there's her Xanatos Gambit involving getting Morrigan pregnant with a Reborn Old God. So naturally she gives them as much help as possible on their quest, including saving the player's and Alistair's lives as she can afford, since even she would succumb to a Darkspawn horde.
All right, who ordered death?Is that death you're wearing? It really suits you!
Pre-Order Bonus: Rather ridiculously, every major vendor had a pre-order bonus for Origins that's exclusive to them. Amazon.com had The Lion's Paw boots, Direct2Drive had the Dalish Ring, EA Store had the Fire Band, Game Crazy had the Guildmaster's Belt, GameStop and Play.com had the Feral Wolf Charm,Steam had The Wicked Oath... Those who pre-ordered were forced to pick one and miss out on all the other items. Some items, however, have been made available for manual installation.
Promoted Fangirl: Aimo, whose deviantART work caught the attention of David Gaider, who worked with her to create Dragon Age: The Revelation, depicting a cutscene Gaider wrote for Origins but which didn't make it into the game.
Proud Warrior Race: The qunari, to a lesser extent the Warrior and Noble Caste Dwarves.
Although we've only seen the qunari invasion vanguard and rogue qunari mercenaries in game. It's strongly suggested qunari who fulfill a non-warrior role in qunari society according to the Qun are also respected... except mages.
Puberty Superpower: Though not a hard and fast rule, mages generally come into their powers at the onset of puberty.
The Punishment: According to the Chantry, the mages who tried to usurp heaven were turned into the first darkspawn by the Maker and that the darkspawn taint is the physical embodiment of their sin. Considering everything that happened afterwards, it makes one wonder why the Maker simply didn't smite them with lightning instead.
Because he wanted their punishment to be all of humanity's punishment as well. One thing the Chantry's lore (if accurate) makes perfectly clear about the Maker: he's a real bastard.
Purely Aesthetic Gender: The gender of your character has no effect whatsoever on your stats. Gender is not completely aesthetic, but it mostly affects some conversation options.
Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: Your party has the possibility of being composed of an ex-templar royal bastard, an illegal mage, an ex-bard turned Chantry sister from fantasy-France, a stern soldier giant (who likes swords), a Spanish elf assassin, an elderly Dead All Along mage, a drunken dwarf soldier who lost his honor and his wife, a golem, and a dog. Not to mention the possibility of the man who condemned most of your order and the last king to death at the hands of the darkspawn.
In Orzammar, one dwarf lampshades it when you ask how he knew who you were. He responds that it's not hard to spot the Warden and his "...eclectic entourage."
The entire Grey Warden order appears to fit this, to some extent, looking at the list of names during the Warden's Keep DLC. Makes you wonder if any of the Archdemons ever really had any sort of chance to begin with.
And Awakening tries its hardest to follow suit. There's an apostate mage with an obsessive Templar out for his blood, a murderous elven hippie mage, a thief whose father is the noble who killed the Human Noble's family, a member of the Dwarven Legion of the Dead, a Fade spirit of Justice trapped in the body of a dead man, and a very nice Grey Warden recruit who dies the second she takes her Joining. Oh, and the drunk dwarf soldier from Origins returns as well.
Random Encounter: You are likely to have one, and only one, whenever traveling between major locations on the World Map. Some of them are beneficial or even tied to the main plot.
Randomly Drops: Certain enemies like Gaxkang have a chance of dropping unique items; if you fail to get it, you just need to reload before fighting them and keep beating them until you get it. The game also has a rather sadistic variation; certain chests have a chance of holding pieces of certain armor sets the Chevalier and Commander's Plate sets. This is set when you enter the area. If you fail to get it after fighting your way through whatever enemies are in your way –- tough luck. You have to reload outside of the area and try again. Adding insult to injury, the sets aren't even that great.
Rated M for Manly: True, you can play as a woman, but the trailers (among other things) seem to indicate this is BioWare's approach to marketing the game. And yet, the endgame seems to be most developed/complex for a female PC, if you romance Alistair. Actually somewhat subverted. Bioware games (particularly Mass Effect and Dragon Age) have been some of the most popular among female gamers. There are female characters who can kick every bit as much ass as the male characters, including in the trailers.
Real Is Brown: The most colorful thing in the game is the box art and Vanity Plates. And the blood. Especially when considering early screenshots:
Relationship Values: Referred to as "approval" and necessary to master to maximize party efficiency. Less of a Guide Dang It than most examples of the trope.
Rape Discretion Shot: In the City Elf origin story, you don't see Shianni being raped but you do see her on the floor next to Vaughn, and dialog after the fact makes it pretty clear that this is what happened.
Religion is Magic: Averted. Although the dwarves, the elves, and the humans all have their own faiths, none of these faiths are actualized with their own magics. The Chantry's templars, for instance, merely wield anti-magics. While the Urn of Sacred Ashes is capable of performing miracles, Oghren suggests the possibility that the large, unusually pure Lyrium vein not too far away inside the rock may be responsible for its powers.
Right Through His Pants: Characters don't take their underwear off for sex scenes. Most of the scenes aren't completely unrealistic in that you can't really see what goes on below the belt — at least, not when it matters. The only really odd thing would be how Morrigan seems to cover up a bit more...
Right Through the Wall: Being as the "walls" are tents, it's no surprise how quickly other party members catch on to your romantic adventures.
If the warden is romancing Alistair, Zevran can make Alistair uncomfortable by offering advice on how to improve, based on what he has overheard.
If the warden is romancing Zevran, Wynne can tell him/her that she almost wishes she was unaware of their relationship, because it's difficult to sleep with "the way you two carry on all night".
Also, one of the party dialogues while out on adventures will feature Oghren asking Zevran to confirm he's having a relationship with "the boss," then requesting that he try to keep it down.
Leliana can also comment on the fact that Morrigan's shrieking, sounds like a genlock being murdered. She then says they should try harder next time, the Anderfels(a nation FAR northwest of Ferelden, home to Grey Warden HQ) didn't hear.
Also, storming Arl Howe's estate as a Human Noble is really cathartic. Or even as a City Elf, given what Loghain and Arl Howe have been getting up to in the Alienage...
As is picking Harrowmont if you're a dwarf noble. Not that it's a great idea.
Robe and Wizard Hat: Wizard hats are especially notable for how absolutely ridiculous they look.
The Couslands, who are descendants of kings and command only slightly less respect than Ferelden's actual royal family, send troops to fight the Blight. Said troops include their heir and would have included their patriarch, had he not been murdered by his supposed best friend.
Subverted with the dwarven nobility, who spend far too much time bickering among themselves to actually do something about the Blight before the Warden arrives. The first Blight nearly destroyed Orzammar because they were all too busy fighting over whose thaig was more important! Paragon Aeducan pretty much had to launch a coup!
In their defense, the reason why they're currently not doing anything is that, when the darkspawn aren't on the surface during a Blight, they're fighting the dwarves in the Deep Roads. As far as the dwarves are concerned, a Blight is like a brief armistice from their 900-year-long war.
Running Gag: A variation: in every Dragon Age game so far, someone dies by taking an ogre to the face. Cailan in Origins and Varel in Awakening.
Another gag is foreign characters commenting that Ferelden "Smells like wet dog", to which the player character can respond in variants of "It does not smell like dog!"
The Warden: And garbage!
Sten: Yes, I was trying to forget that.
The Savage South: The Kocari Wilds in Dragon Age, which is full of barbarians. Ferelden is in southern Thedas and is considered the south border of the civilized world. But all the other northern countries, specially Orlais, think Fereldans are only one step above savages and only a bad day away from reverting to barbarism.
Ferelden might be in the south of Thedas, but in practice, it is Grim Up North, since Thedas is basically Fantasy Europe flipped upside-down. Conversely, the Anderfels, located in the north, are a land of ravaged steppes and forests, and are close to a region called the Donarks, which are also filled with jungles.
The endgame of Awakening has a very nasty one: You have to choose between saving Amaranthine or saving Vigil's Keep. If you choose the former, the companions you left at the keep may die.
This fate can be averted!As long as you do certain steps, you can save the keep and Amaranthine.The game ''will'' make you earn it. In order to save them both, you must first clear out the Vigil's Keep basement, which turns into a fairly large dungeon connecting to the Deep Roads, in order to seal off the tunnels from further Darkspawn threats. Next, pay the dwarf stonemason in the courtyard a truly absurd amount of money to hire laborers to repair the walls. Find a granite quarry to supply him with raw materials, and make absolutely sure you assign guards to the laborers to go and fetch it. Finally, find all of the ore deposits in the game and bring them to Wade to forge weapons and armor for your troops. It'll take quite a bit of work to take care of everything, but it'll be worth it when you read the Epilogue about the heroic defense. You'll know you've gotten it right if it's your first time playing it and you get the Enduring Vigil achievement.
Despite all your efforts, however, Sigrun (definitely) and Velanna and Justice (supposedly) will die if you leave them at the Keep and save Amaranthine, no matter if you got the Enduring Vigil achievement.
Scary Dogmatic Aliens: The Qunari have a very strict caste system and don't really understand or like the idea that there might be other, equally viable, social organizations.
Sten: I don't understand your people. Your smiths want to be merchants, your merchants want to be nobles, and your nobles want to be royalty. Why is no one happy in their station?
Schmuck Bait: Loads of these: six black vials and three ominous gravestones (Soul Jars for nine boss-level Revenants); a deserted, inviting, and suspiciously pristine campsite in the Brecilian Forest (an illusion cast by a Shade to lure in prey); the gong atop the ancient temple of Andraste (summons the High Dragon for battle); and the stories of Gaxkang the Unbound (temptations to lure traveling the adventures into the clutches of a litch).
Schrödinger's Player Character: Averted hard. It's made clear that regardless of who you play as, most of the different origins' characters (the exception arguably being one of the City Elves, where it's questionable if Cyrion had two children who were both due to be married and were both heroes to Soris) do exist within the story, and that the events of all five of the other origins happen regardless of whichever one you choose to play as. The only difference between them is where Duncan happened to be at the time, implying that the PC was saved from their fate and recruited into the Wardens only because he happened to be in the right place at the right time.
Dwarf Commoner: During the Dwarf Noble origin, when the player converses with the Proving master, he/she will be asked if they came to watch the Provings; if the player replies "Wouldn't miss it", a proving trainer appears by the door. If conversed with, the proving trainer will talk about a huge scandal that happened at the last week's Proving, about some "casteless bruiser" impersonating Everd and winning the Provings, only to be busted by the semi-sober Everd. Also, upon coming/returning to Orzammar and exploring the carta hideout, The Warden (if they are not a Dwarf Commoner) finds Leske locked up in a cell. In the next cell over (the very same one the Dwarf Commoner player is imprisoned in during the origin story), there lies a dead dwarf. Leske says that the other dwarf stopped eating one day and died of starvation "all for a stupid bet", in an obvious reference to the Dwarf Commoner origin.
Dwarf Noble: Bhelen's plot and betrayal of his older siblings, and subsequently the succession crisis that occurs in the wake of King Endrin's death, happen whether or not the Dwarf Noble origin is played. If a Dwarf Commoner player eavesdrops on some NPC's conversations, King Endrin's "middle child" is mentioned a couple of times, since it takes place one week prior to the Dwarf Noble's origin story. Also, Gorim is always a merchant in Denerim, which implies that the events of the Dwarf Noble story that led to his exile happened anyway. During Orzammar, at least one of the Dwarf NPCs will mention Endrin's favorite as having been murdered, implying that the exiled Dwarf Noble eventually died in the Deep Roads without Duncan present to rescue them.
Human Noble: Arl Howe is always referred to as the "Teyrn of Highever" when his part comes up later in the story, so he usurps the Highever Teyrnir regardless of which origin is played. You can also learn about the Cousland family massacre from overheard NPC dialogue. If you are not a Human Noble, the houndsmaster will mention that Dog's previous owner was a young noble who got killed.
City Elf: Upon arrival at Denerim, the Warden learns that there is unrest in the Alienage, so it seems that the events of that origin story occurred anyway, leaving authorities to scour the Alienage. As Vaughan is always found alive in the dungeon of his estate, he was not killed during the uprising. Shianni is in the Alienage during the Battle of Denerim and the unrest, and based on her anger and agitation, she was probably still abducted and raped by Vaughan along with the other women at the would-be Warden's wedding. When the Arl of Denerim's estate is visited later in the game, some guards mention a group of elves that broke into the palace earlier, apparently in reference to the City Elf origin.
Magi: Regardless of which origin you play, you run into Jowan in the dungeons of Castle Redcliffe, and find out that he had poisoned Arl Eamon, which would mean that he escaped from the Circle either way. Presumably, the Mage gets punished in some other way — either sent to Aeonar with Lily or turned into an abomination during the initial invasion.
Interestingly, the Mage origin is the only one in which the player could survive without Duncan's involvement, if he/she goes to Irving and tells him Jowan's plan before actually carrying it out. If you do this, Irving will intervene for you after Jowan escapes, explaining to Gregoir that he wanted to catch both Jowan and the Chantry initiate helping him red-handed. Gregoir splutters a bit on realizing he can't take action against you or Irving without revealing the corruption in the Chantry's ranks as well, and drops the matter... and then Duncan simply demands that the player join the Wardens, invoking the Right of Conscription if you force him to. The Grey Wardens do what they must.
The Witch Hunt DLC reveals that without Duncan's intervention, the Dalish Elf PC died from the sickness and Tamlen remained missing.
Screw Destiny: You are free to weasel out of your Heroic Sacrifice by engaging in some hanky-panky with Morrigan. Opinions vary.
Sealed Evil in a Can: The black vial revenants and the "Asunder" pride demon. Bonus for the demon, which is cut up into pieces and "sealed" in separate containers, a la The Judge.
There's also a dragon magically sealed inside the throne room of the Orzammar Royal Palace, although finding it is a bit of a Guide Dang It.
Second Coming: Mostly within the lore of the game series itself: The Maker is prophesied to return and make his world a paradise once the Chant of Light has been sung from all the corners of the world.
Sequel Hook: The "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue is pretty blatant about this. It makes it very clear that your character's adventures are not over, and even the scenes before that leave plot threads just open enough to expand. Especially if you got the ending where the resident Dark Magic Girl goes off into the wilderness to raise your child the god with presumably interesting results in a decade or two. A conversation with Sten reveals that the Qunari are planning to invade Ferelden, which he implies will occur in the player character's lifetime. A more blatant example is the cards released with Dragon Age: Awakening; it has a picture of a dragon in the blood paint style and the numbers 2-01-11. The sequel (whose cover has a similar looking dragon on it) will come out in March 2011. This is subverted by the expansion game itself, which left sequel hooks hanging and distanced itself from all of the previous game's events and settings. Appearances of previous characters were in brief cameos, with vague references to their own role in the first game.
The Golems of Amgarrak contains a blatant sequel hook with a horde of Harvesters escaping from the thaig. One such creature appears in the trailer of DA 2. And the final scene in Witch Hunt DLC seems a bit like an ad for the sequel.
Bioware declared that the story of "The Hero of Ferelden" (the protagonist of Origins, and possibly Awakening, Go A, and WH too) is over. Surprising to some, who interpreted the ending of Origins and Witch Hunt as an opening for the Warden's return.
Seven Deadly Sins: Condensed into the main five types of demons encountered in the Fade: Rage (wrath), Hunger (gluttony), Sloth (also, according to the codex, envy), Desire (greed and lust), and Pride. Just as in real-life Christianity, Pride is considered the most evil of all by the Chantry because they are the most likely to gain full sentience and therefore more freely amass power.
Sex Equals Love: Averted within the gameplay, but played straight when it comes to unlocking the romance sidequest achievements: no matter how good your character's relationship with a companion is, he or she is not considered to have begun a romance with them until they have sex.
Shrug of God: The answer to why the player can import a character to Awakening even if he chose to sacrifice him/herself at the end of Origins.
"Shut Up" Kiss: One of many touching dialog options during a Romance Sidequest, as Leliana blabbers about how you let her go on and on about how much she likes you without telling her you like her back.
Single Woman Seeks Good Man: Counts for plenty of the appeal in both Alistair's and Leliana's Romance Sidequests. Alistair because, if female, YOU fall into this trope, and Leliana because, regardless of gender, she'll only like you if you're exceptionally sweet and considerate towards her and others.
Sketchy Successor: Regardless of who the player picks as King Endrin Aeducan's successor for Orzammar's throne in Dragon Age: Origins, he will be a considerably worse ruler than Endrin. Also, Maric Theirin is remembered as a lot better King of Ferelden than his son Cailan. Subverted with Alistair if you "harden" his personality and make him King: in that case, he becomes a ruler much better than everyone expected, perhaps on par with his dad.
During the Sacred Urn quest, you can completely avoid fighting Kolgrim by agreeing to help him. Also, one of the toughest bosses in the game, the High Dragon who resides on the mountaintop, can be avoided by... just not waking it up.
If your Warden is a mage and you choose to go into the Fade yourself to save Connor, you can avoid fighting the Desire Demon at the end by agreeing to converse with it instead.
In the Brecilian Forest, the Grand Oak and the Mad Hermit will each try to get you to kill the other to settle their dispute over the Grand Oak's acorn. You could kill one of them...or you could just trade the Hermit one of the items you picked up from various sidequests earlier in the level for the acorn.
The Tevinter mage Caladrius will offer to leave quietly (and even provide you with a key piece of evidence for the Landsmeet)...as long as you let him keep the elves he's abducted to turn into slaves.
Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism: Pretty cynical, although the player character can be "the light in the darkness" if so desired. Leliana is pretty idealistic, though.
Slow Clap: Loghain indulges this in answer to accusations against him in the Landsmeet.
Socketed Equipment: The game's enchantment systems works by "binding" runes to equipment.
So Long, and Thanks for All the Gear: Alistair, Morrigan, Zevran, Wynne, Shale, and Leliana will leave your party with whatever gear they've got if you make certain decisions with them in the party; the first two will leave depending on decisions you make towards the endgame. Averted with some temporary companions (Teyrna Eleanor Cousland, Lily, Jowan, Ser Jory, Daveth, possibly others) who drop their gear into your inventory, possibly because they either don't die when they leave the party or when they died, you remained conscious).
Solo Class: A few examples. First is the Arcane Warrior, a heavily armored mage who gets abilities that allow them to seriously reduce or totally nullify all damage and they also have access to heals and powerful offensive spells. Then there's the rogue. Properly built, a rogue can become essentially immune to melee damage, and resist all but the most powerful spells.
The Soulless: The darkspawn. Except for the archdemon, since it was formerly an Old God, and "essence" is apparently synonymous with "soul", since there's no room for both in one body.
Spider-Sense: Once a person becomes a Grey Warden, they can sense the darkspawn — and vice versa. Your character even says, "Warden senses tingling!"
Mages all have the ability to detect disruptions in the Veil that can, with practice, allow them to detect spirits and especially powerful spells.
Spikes of Doom: All the armor that the darkspawn wear is adorned with lots of these.
The Warden, Morrigan, and Sten successfully invoke this trope.
The Warden's first clue something isn't right and that he/she's in the Fade is that Duncan is still alive despite getting mauled by an Ogre and getting an axe to the face.
Morrigan's first hint that she's trapped in the Fade is that the Sloth demon attempts to copy Flemeth... badly. The Flemeth in the Fade seems to be hurt by the barbs slung by Morrigan. Which is an immediate giveaway if you have even seen them talk to each other for more than five seconds.
Sten finds himself in a nightmare with demons impersonating two of the Qunari soliders he came to Ferelden with. He informs the Warden that he knows none of this is real, adding that he remembers seeing one of the men get his head torn off by darkspawn. Despite this realization, he didn't try to leave because his life is such crap. "I know it's a dream, Warden... but it's a good dream."
If you pay attention in the Mage Origin, you'll notice that your companion, who is claiming to be a Circle apprentice lost to the Fade, isn't wearing the apprentice robes... He's wearing senior enchanter's robes. Well, he is a Pride demon, after all.
To start the Urn of Sacred Ashes quest, you have to seek out Brother Genitivi in Denerim. He isn't there, but his assistant, Weylon, is. Weylon is actually an impostor, however, and if the player has high enough Cunning, they can call him on the inconsistencies in his claims, forcing him to out himself and attack.
Squishy Wizard: Bioware avowed that they would stop tank mages (a mage with the power of a mage and the survivability of the warrior) before the release, but evidently they were lying, as you can subvert it HARD with two specializations: Blood Mage (which lets you use hitpoints to cast spells, encouraging you to dump stat points into health instead of mana) and Arcane Warrior (which lets you use your Magic stat to equip armor, weapons, and shields). A lot of people like to just grab both. And then there's Battlemage in Awakening, where aside from a few ridiculously powerful spells you can get a passive ability that gives you mana when you take damage... including casting while Blood Magic is active...
Dwarves/Elves/Humans — other races are present, but these are the provided player character options.
Our Monsters Are Different — Thedas's demons and werewolves are different. Dragons seem to occupy the same role in Origins, but backstory reveals more and more differences.
Star-Crossed Lovers: Every female Origin story has a Love Interest (although not necessarily — romances depend on your dialogue choices). None of them end well. As follows:
In the Human Noble origin, you can choose to have a sexual encounter with one of two certain characters. Regardless of which one of them you choose, they will be brutally slaughtered when the castle is ambushed that same night, though you don't see the one you didn't bed down with.
If you ask Iona about her daughter while chatting with her, said daughter will appear in the Alienage later in the game, regardless of whether you slept with Iona or not. She will be sitting on a pile of refuse and wondering plaintively when Mommy is coming back from Highever. Seeing as how this scene will play out at least a few months (and possibly as long as a year) after your origin story, it doesn't look good for Iona either way.
In the Dwarf Noble origin, as a female PC, it is explicitly shown that she and Gorim are romantically involved (unless the player chooses otherwise in dialogue), though it is also made clear that they are forbidden to marry because he is socially beneath her. Later in the game, the player can find him in Denerim, only to be informed that he has already married another woman and is expecting a child with her, and he breaks off the relationship for good. A male Dwarf Noble, on the other hand, has the option of having a sexual encounter with two "noble hunting" women during the origin story; but it's quite clear that these ladies only want to sleep with him because of his status, and for their own personal gain, because they want to get knocked up and have his kid so they can live in the palace. Gets even more star-crossed by the fact that if the player does choose to sleep with them, one of them does end up catching and bearing him a child, but because he got himself exiled literally the day after he slept with her, the child is casteless and when the player encounters her again later in the game, she bitches at him and blames him for her misery and accuses him of ruining her life and all that. Go figure.
The City Elf origin starts with the arrival of your arranged match, but then a human noble lord comes and ruins your wedding and kidnaps the women for his "party". If your character is female, then your fiance ends up being murdered by the lord's men trying to rescue you (you can even loot your wedding ring off his body). If your character is male and you manage to rescue your fiancee, she breaks off your engagement and essentially dumps you, saying "Grey Warden can't have wives or families". She notes rather sorrowfully that "I guess we'll never know what might have been."
In the Mage origin, it is quite obvious that the templar Cullen is infatuated with the female player character, although if the player tries to proposition him for sex, he'll get incredibly nervous and run away. Later in the game, when the templars are overthrown and the tower is taken over by rebellious blood mages, the player will find that Cullen is the only templar on the upper floors who has not been slaughtered — when the female mage player finds him again, he will outright reveal his infatuation for her, but because of the psychological torture he has endured, he has developed a burning, immense hatred for all mages and pretty much rejects the player because he doesn't care for her anymore, whether or not you side with him.
In the Dalish Elf Origin, female PCs can suggest you're romantically interested in your hunting partner, Tamlen. After encountering a taint-infecting mirror, Tamlen disappears and you leave your clan. You encounter him half-turned into a Shriek, the elf version of a darkspawn, and unable to resist the "song" of the Archdemon. He confesses he always loved you, then attacks.
Even Leske of the Dwarf Commoner Origin gets a reference as having tried to sleep with you (and failed the attempt) earlier. He later betrays you to Jarvia, and you are forced to kill him.
Another example: If Alistair is made king, he will break off his relationship with the PC. Only a Human Noble has a chance of persuading Alistair to marry her due to Thedas's extreme Fantastic Racism. If Alistair's personality has been hardened, the other Origins can convince him to keep the PC as his mistress, but the option will only come up if the correct dialogue path is chosen. If Anora is chosen as solo queen, the romance continues unimpeded... unless Alistair performs a Heroic Sacrificeto save you.
Jowan and Lily in the mage origin. The origin story ends with Jowan attempting to protect Lily from the templars by using blood magic, which causes her to reject him. He escapes to become a fugitive mage, while Lily is taken away to the mage's prison, after which nothing is ever heard of her again. You will encounter Jowan again later in the game, and if your PC is of the Mage origin, he will ask you if you know what has become of Lily. The only option of telling him about it is saying that you don't know, much to his dismay.
Seems to be the entire point of the Morrigan romance.
Prince Bhelen and Rica, arguably, depending on your choices. Though she is only his concubine, it's heavily implied that they have genuine feelings of strong affection for each other (or, at least, she certainly does for him). If you side with Harrowmont during the Orzammar quest and make him king, Bhelen attacks you in a rage and you are forced to kill him, which leaves Rica heartbroken and her life in tatters.
Stealth Pun: The Denerim Alleyway encounter where Taliesen attacks you has a couple of crows hopping about on the ground.
Sticks to the Back: All shields and weaponry. Apparently the sword belt was never invented in Ferelden. Well, at least an actual sword belt: there is a "sword belt" item in the game but it's just a + strength belt.
Stop Poking Me: Clicking on Ariane in the Witch Hunt DLC too often will lead her to offhandedly remark that when she was young she would break the fingers of those who poked her.
Stripperiffic: Largely averted. While a handful of female mooks have revealing clothing, and there are moderately Stripperiffic options for a female Warden, most of the named female NPCs are dressed quite sensibly. The exception, of course, is Morrigan — one can only assume that her shapeshifting powers allow her to secrete Krazy Glue, because there's no other way that outfit should stay on in combat. Amusingly, her scanty garb is often lampshaded by the other NPCs in background conversations.
Morrigan: So are you going to continue staring at me as if I am covered in eels? Sten: Eels would be something.
The Chasind Robes you can find at the end of the "Signs of the Chasind" sidequest, but, oddly, only if equipped on a woman, in which case they suddenly have a big Cleavage Window and what looks like fishnet stockings.
Stupidity Is the Only Option / Failure Is the Only Option: Whether the Dwarf Noble PC is Too Dumb to Live and catches the Idiot Ball to readily trust that Bhelen has no underhanded motive in helping them or a Genre Savvy politician who decides to wait and see how things develop, Trian ends up dead, everyone testifies against them, and the PC gets exiled into the Deep Roads. Becoming a Grey Warden is mandatory, after all. The 'everybody' includes a guy you could have fought in an honorable fight in a Proving, and even given the reward for his valor in battle.
Also a random encounter with Zevran. There is no way to avoid an ambush (which is pretty obvious, even if you play the first time). If you try to flank your enemies, the cutscene kicks in and your team walks straight into it, like a band of total morons...
A major plot driver in Awakening: The opening involves a darkspawn attack on Vigil's keep using a tunnel network, and a quest chain is dedicated to closing off their access. Absolutely no-one thinks the smuggler tunnel leading from outside Amaranthine into the heart of the city poses any further problem than posed by the smugglers themselves. Guess how the Darkspawn get in at the end.
Succession Crisis: Occurs twice. It happens after King Cailan meets with death at the beginning of the game, and serves as a Chekhov's Gun. This trope is also the entire plot of the Orzammar part of quest, where the nobles are unable to decide on a successor to the late king and the Warden has to help resolve the situation in order to get the dwarves' help, because it's such a massive problem for them that it's causing everyone to slaughter each other.
Suicidal Overconfidence: Occasionally lampshaded (even provides a page quote for this trope), but mostly played straight.
Not very suspicious: you already know the Archdemon's waiting for you on the roof.
In the Tower of Ishal, you will find a suspicious number of Lesser Injury Kits in unlocked containers on the third floor. The Wake Up Call Boss is on the fourth floor.
Talking Is a Free Action: It's awfully nice of the final boss to sit there on the brink of death while you and Alistair have a long chatabout who will make the Ultimate Sacrifice. (Of course, it is on the brink of death.) It's also possible in some cases to accidentally select a comrade in battle and end up having a conversation about local legends or liking swords while the darkspawn or bandits you were just fighting presumably stand around waiting for you to finish.
Most prevalent in the Arl of Redcliffe quest. It's set up as a fairly straightforward Sadistic Choice, wherein you must either kill the demonic Connor or sacrifice his mother in order to save Connor by killing the demon directly in the Fade. However, you can demand that somebody come up with another way, leading to the suggestion of seeking the Circle of Magi's help.
Taken for Granite: The oracle Eleni Zinovia, who was turned to stone for foretelling the fall of the House of Valerius.
The Brothers of Stone from Awakening, who were turned into statues after they sacrificed a Tevinter magister to the god of the Wending Wood.
Take Your Time: Played straight, but some party members will complain if they think you're getting distracted.
"Some party members" including the player character. "Perhaps I should begin reading, since we've stopped?"
Most important with Sten, whose stress point is asking you whether there is any point in assing around Ferelden the way you have. Depending on whether you've completed his loyalty mission, he may either voice his concerns or attempt a coup.
You could take a round-trip tour of the nation out of Orzammar and back, and the momentous, plot-critical tournament is still "this afternoon!"
On some maps, NPCs hostile to each other can be seen arranged in the next room. They'll stand peacefully by as long as your characters remain out of range.
The only exception — the battle in Redcliffe. If you leave, you will come back to a ghost town.
A Tankard of Moose Urine: Awakening's Dragon Piss gift for Oghren: "The name is probably figurative, but no one knows for sure."
Tattooed Crook: Casteless dwarves are marked so that everyone can recognize them as "thieves & beggars". This, however, results in them becoming crooks, because they can't do anything else legally. Society really is to blame in their case.
Tautological Templar: The Templars will execute anyone who is a mage but not a member of the Circle of Magi because there is a chance that they may know forbidden magic. However, they are revered as heroes since they are the militant wing of the setting's dominant religion.
Technical Pacifist: The Dalish are nomadic and never stay in one place too long to avoid conflict. The Keeper even says that they could destroy a nearby Human village who are rallying a mob to drive them out, if they so wished, but that would only cause King Cailan to send soliders next time, thus it is wiser to simply move on.
Thunderbolt Iron: A random encounter shows a meteor crater, where a couple of farmers finds a young boy and adopts him. The player can take the remains of the meteor and give it to the blacksmith at Soldier's Peak to be made into one of the most powerful swords in the game (either a longsword or a greatsword) — Starfang. The weapon has an exotic look and appears to glow.
Too Dumb to Live: Occasionally, someone will try to cut a deal with you, then attack you when you say "no dice". Most of the time, this is excusable, but there's a few times where they really ought to know better. The bad guy in the City Elf origin, for example, notes that you're covered in the blood of the guards you just killed and tries to reason with you to weasel out of your vengeance, then attacks if you say "screw you, human!" And then there's Sgt. Kylon's famous quote...
Arl Howe. Because when you're confronted by the Human Noble whose entire family you brutally had murdered, who's survived waves of assassins you yourself have sent after them, countless legions of Darkspawn, Dragons, Ogres, Demons, and the biggest and most brutal creatures Thedas can muster... do you really think it's wise to taunt them about how you killed their parents?
Tragic Monster: When you encounter the elven woman Danyla, she has completed her transformation into a werewolf and will insist that the player kill her — if not voluntarily, she attacks to force your hand. However, there is a possible way to achieve a happy ending for her; if you avoid her on the way into the Lady's lair and then convince the werewolves you'll help them attack the elves, her husband goes to find her and convinces her to infect him so they can remain together as fellow wolf-creatures. And don't think you can simply ignore her and then go on to get Zathrian to end the werewolf curse. Danyla will just vanish afterwards.
Although the codex entry and dialouge afterwards indicates that with the curse ended, she would have returned to being an elf. You never see her, but he does run off to look for her.
Transformation Is a Free Action: Before attacking Connor and Flemeth, your party will patiently wait for them to transform into a more powerful form. Unfortunately, your enemies are not so stupid polite, and they will attack your shapeshifter, possibly interrupting the transformation.
Trailers Always Spoil: Including the killing of Ser Jory, Cailan's death, and Loghain as a bad guy.
Trickster Mentor: Mouse, aka the Pride Demon the mage Player Character encounters in the Fade, has a few shades of this. Had you failed the test, you would most certainly have died while unleashing a demon upon Ferelden, but having passed it, he seems to have no ill will against you. Despite the fact that he could easily have killed you at that point, he not only lets you live, but he gives your character some good advice as well.
Actually, depending on the dialogue options you take, the game heavily implies that Mouse was the test, as agreeing to help the spirit gain a foothold in the real world meant possession and therefore the fate you were trying to avoid.
Troperiffic: All of the usual WRPG tropes are in place. Indeed, this game could be shown as an example as to the proper use of Tropes in games. There is plenty of Lampshade Hanging on everything from Ser Gilmore's snarky attitude to the giant rats in the cellar in the Human Noble origin. Indeed, the Human Noble origin is the most concentrated pile of RPG and fantasy cliches in the game, and it's almost certainly deliberate — the above-mentioned rats, the Doomed Hometown (well, castle), and even a chance to comment that "I've got a bad feeling about this...", among others.
True Companions: Get your party members' affection high enough, and it'll trigger dialogue which affirms the strength of the relationship.
Turn The Other Cheek: In possibly one of gaming's most interesting dilemmas, Teyrn Loghain causes the deaths of your mentor and king, poisons Arl Eamon, allows Elves to be sold into slavery, lets Arl Howe get away with mass murder, and spends the majority if the main quest line framing you for crimes he committed and trying to kill you to maintain the cover-up. And despite all that, you can choose to forgive him, or at least sentence him to recruitment into the Grey Wardens, losing Alistair in the process after he'd been your loyal traveling companion since the start of the game. And due to the the game's Grey and Gray Morality, this isn't treated as evil as one might think, as Loghain, once he comes to his senses, actually proves to be a decent and honorable person who just wanted what was best for the country he loved so much.
Twenty Bear Asses: A Chantry board quest demands corpse gall for research purposes. You can give them a smaller amount — just about what you'll get from fighting your way up to Connor in Castle Redcliffe, or a larger amount for more gold. Without carefully combing the map for corpses, it's impossible to get all of the galls before the climax.
Twincest: Alluded to, not so subtly, between brother and sister fighting team Myaja and Lucjan:
Lucjan: The ancestors gave us one soul, but two bodies. Everything we do, we do together.
Grey Warden: Everything? You mean even...?
Lucjan: That's a little personal, don't you think?
Ultimate Blacksmith: Wade, a stuffy artistic diva of an armorer in the city of Denerim. Perfectly accessible in his shop at almost any time, he only does his best work when "inspired" by the Warden bringing him rare materials, and is almost intolerable otherwise. When you're holding Vigilance in your hands, though, you will want to have his children. Mikhail Dryden, once you've completed Soldier's Peak, will also make one of the finest swords in the original game.
Un Equal Rites: A long time ago, a powerful nation called the Tevinter Imperium once conquered nearly all of the known world by using an extremely dangerous sorcery called Blood Magic which allowed them to broker deals with and summon demons as well as use a powerful form of Mind Control. Eventually, their reign was toppled by the appearance of The Blight, which struck the Empire from nowhere and left them crippled. Most of the world's nations were formed by barbarian clans that rebelled against the weakened Empire, and the followers of those early rebels quickly formed a religion called The Chantry. The Blight continues to plague the world to this day, and the Chantry teachings blame magic for unleashing it. Because of this, mages in general are treated as worse than dirt, and any mage that is not under the direct control of the Chantry is labeled as an apostate which is to be killed on sight. Worse than them are the "Maleficar", which are simply apostates which use the hated Blood Magic which unleashes demons and once enslaved the world.
Un Entendre: A gem of banter between Alistair and Oghren where Oghren advises Alistair to relieve his stress by "Polishing the Old weapon, Eh." Alistair is disgusted, but as the conversation goes on, it turns out Oghren is talking about polishing a weapon. Maybe.
And between Oghren and Wynne, about Alistair's pike-twirling hobby. Mind you, it is exactly what it sounds like — twirling a pike of the sort used to stick charging horses and such. Though, where Alistair found a pike...
Unfamiliar Ceiling: This happens to The Warden after the slaughter at Ostagar, right down to the questions and the shirtlessness.
The Unintelligible: Most darkspawn can only communicate in guttural growls and roars. The appearance of darkspawn that CAN talk is treated as incredibly dangerous in Awakening, and indeed it is: the darkspawn are an exceptionally deadly threat when the Archdemon organizes them into a Blight, but they're generally easy to deal with otherwise. If the darkspawn can suddenly reason enough to lead themselves without an Archdemon, it would mean an unending Blight.
Orzammar is divided into the Merchant Quarter, where most dwarves live, the Diamond Quarter, where the nobility and royalty live, and Dust Town, which is where the Casteless live.
Denerim has an Elven Alienage, which is basically a ghetto for City Elves.
Traps actually are a very effective way to kill one Bonus Boss because Flemeth is non-aggressive. You can easily use this time to surround the combat area, and when the boss becomes hostile...they all go off on her.
Useless Useful Spell: Curse of Mortality is probably the perfect example of a spell that, despite the fact that it works exactly the same way for players and enemies, is obscenely powerful in enemy hands, and mostly useless (or at least underpowered) for the player. Getting hit with it results in the target being unable to have their health, stamina, or mana restored by any means for thirty seconds, on top of doing damage over time. Used in combat, it is essentially an unavoidable death sentence on any creature upon which it is cast, barring quick use of a dispel magic effect, and it's not even a top-ranked spell, so you can get it fairly early in the game (and nearly every magic-wielding opponent from mid-game onward will be able to cast it). Unfortunately, your opponents seldom bother to heal themselves anyhow, relying instead on armor and massive amounts of health to stay alive long enough to pose a threat, not to mention the fact that they can die by the dozens and keep sending in more troops, whereas you get a game over if you lose four party members in one fight.
The Usual Adversaries: Goddamn darkspawn. Goddamn Qunari are also a problem once in a while.
Vendor Trash: Blank vellum, certain gems, and things like fancy vases and carpets.
Vestigial Empire: The Tevinter Imperium, which never recovered from the First Blight, Andraste's rebellion, and the Qunari invasion.
The Dwarven empire is even worse. It's down to two city-states that hate each other, and the Darkspawn are slowly but surely encroaching on their territory. Fortunately, if you're playing a Dwarf Warden, in the epilogue you can convince the ruler of Ferelden to send military aid to Orzammar, and they begin reclaiming a lot of lost territory. Even a non-dwarf Warden can put Bhelen on the throne, who militarizes the casteless and lets the dwarves begin to push the Darkspawn back.
Victor Gains Loser's Powers: There's a portion of the Broken Circle quest that plays like a massive homage to Mega Man. The hero must defeat (or aid) 5 individuals to gain their powers, then use said powers to track down and defeat a sub-boss for each of the 5 areas. The end-boss of the sequence completes the Mega Man homage with a Boss Rush consisting of all the previous sub-bosses before you can fight his "true form".
Video Game Caring Potential: The relationships with your allies. Depending on the player, you'll probably find yourself liking at least one of your party members and going to great lengths to work up to 100% affection, because they're just that awesome/sweet/nerdy/snarky/badass. Often subverted with many NPCs; doing a good deed with no expectation of reward results in — no reward. For blatantly shaking people down for their rescues, the game rewards you, without punishment. You're free to insult them or hurt their feelings or otherwise be a complete Jerk Ass while doing your duty; the results are pretty much the same for not caring.
Walking bomb. God, those wet thuds are satisfying. Even gets its own Shout Out in the trailer. Better yet, the upgraded version; virulent walking bomb. Combined with Waking Nightmare, it's probably the most brutally hilarious crowd control technique in the game.
Good old Blood Wound. Ripping out the blood of your enemies: brutal and practical.
The expansion lets you do a Leonidas impression, right after confiscating the belongings of a would-be Treasure Hunter. Before the patch, it used to net you +100 approval from a companion that you just met.
It is entirely possible during one of the side-quests to go up to certain women, steal all of their coin, and then callously tell them that their husbands are dead. Then you watch them run off in tears, utterly heartbroken, with their money now weighing down your purse.
If playing as a Human Noble, it's possible to taunt Arl Howe (who killed your parents, sister-in-law, and nephew) just before fighting him, telling him that after he's dead, you're going to hunt down and murder his wife and children. However, he laughs off your taunt, and in response he "shows you how it's done", giving a spiteful description how he killed your parents.
And if that wasn't enough, The Darkspawn Chronicles is essentially an entire DLC dedicated to this. Smash, decapitate, and all-around massacre your way through a ton of the original campaign's characters!
Viking Funeral: Standard in at least Ferelden to prevent demons from possessing the bodies.
The Virus: The Blight. A taint carried by the darkspawn that poisons the lands they inhabit. People tainted by this go crazy and die, or become decaying ghouls in the thrall of the archdemon — or worse, if they're women, become broodmothers.
Voluntary Shapeshifting: The shapeshifting specializtion. If you talk to Morrigan about it, she explains that shapeshifting merely requires detailed study of the animal in question. When asked if she could shapeshift into another human's form, she states that since she's already human, studying other humans wouldn't be of any benefit and is thus not worth the effort.
The Ogre at the top of the tower will be a huge kick in the teeth to players who insist on playing this game like Diablo. Tip: Shield bash the ogre whenever he grabs someone and he lets go. Just remember to take Bash off of tactics so it's ready when you need to use it.
Actually, you can set a shield-using character to use Shield Bash like this automatically.
The first floor of the beacon tower at Ostagar. Mages using Fireball and archers behind barricades will slaughter you if you don't know how to get out of the firing line.
According to David Gaider, the game's lead writer, Jowan was originally supposed to be a joinable party member after the events in Redcliffe ,as the main character could have invoked the Right of Conscription when speaking to Arl Eamon in order to recruit him. However, they didn't have room to add another character, so the idea was scrapped.
Originally, there was the possibility that some of your party members could become infected with the darkspawn taint and they would participate in The Joining ritual in Denerim after the Landsmeet. However, the idea was dropped and your companions' immunity to the taint is purely due to gameplay necessity.
There were originally going to be two more origin stories: a human commoner story (you would have been a farmer's son from Redcliffe, owed Dwyn a lot of money, and had your sister Brigid engaged to him to take care of the debt), and a human Avvar barbarian story. The concept art and fluff for these origins made it into the tabletop RPG, though.
What Measure Is A Redshirt?: Just before The Very Definitely Final Dungeon, the game takes time to show an average man bidding farewell to his wife and child, possibly for the last time, before setting off for war. The image will stay with you.
Alistair serves you a textbook example of this trope if you kill Connor or Isolde during the Redcliffe quest. If you spare Loghain at the Landsmeet, he even leaves the party. Unless, of course, you execute him.
What You Are in the Dark: If the Grey Warden is a mage, he or she can travel into the Fade to slay the demon possessing Connor Guerrin. When you confront the demon, it will offer to cut a deal with you instead, and will explicitly point out that, if you agree, no one but the two of you will ever know.
"Where Are They Now?" Epilogue: Although it only mentions what happened to the party members if you died during the ending, preventing you from asking the party members what they intend to do now.
Where It All Began: In Witch Hunt, a Dalish Warden will return to the mirror (now known as an Eluvian) that he and Tamlen were tainted by.
A City Elf Warden will return to the Alienage in the midst of the final battle.
Whoring: Potions just beg to be whored, considering how they instantly heal you on a 5 second cooldown that's specific to the potion (ie. a lesser healing potion, normal healing potion, and greater healing potion all have separate 5 second cooldowns). Heals are convenient to whore as well. Proper whoring of Force Field allows you to keep enemy Mooks and bosses attacking the invulnerable guy while you pick off the enemies one by one.
Worthy Opponent: Strongly implied to be the relationship between Greagoir and Irving. Irving is the highest authority in the Circle Tower, but Greagoir has the authority to issue a kill order on any of its residents.
Ye Olde Butcherede Englishe: Largely averted, as most of the cast speak in remarkably contemporary fashion. Morrigan occasionally uses archaic English, and a few minor characters (such as the Grand Oak) speak nothing but, but it's nothing more than 'thee', 'thou' and the occasional 'tis'.
You Kill It, You Bought It: In Awakening, the Warden is given Arl Howe's title of Arl of Amaranthine. You may also be awarded the teyrnir of Gwaren, depending on the boon you ask at the end of the game. Meaning you can be the King/Queen of Ferelden, teyrn/a of Gwaren, Arl/essa of Amaranthine, and heir to the teyrnir of Highever. When you go for your Calling, there's gonna be significant political upheaval...
Although the latter might not entirely be the case, given that your older brother actually survives Ostagar in the end.
You Lose At Zero Trust: Effects range from negative combat modifiers to the character leaving the party to the character siding against the party.
Ultimate Blacksmith: Issue #2 starts with Gleam using her magic to help her forge a sword. The result is a sword which cuts through pretty much anything.
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