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  • Face, Nod, Action: During "In Hushed Whispers," as you and Dorian try to return to the present, your other two companions will face each other and nod, silently agreeing to hold the armies of the Elder One back as long as possible.
  • Facepalm: Statues of Maferath the Betrayer all over the game seem to depict him doing this. In Val Royeaux's Avenue of Her Reflective Thought, a vandal has scrawled several humorous cutting remarks about the propensity of Maferath to be portrayed doing this on several statues' plaques.
    MAFERATH'S REMORSE
    (Beneath, scratched by a vandal) At meeting a low door frame.
  • Failed Attempt at Drama: While the Herald is stuck in the Envy Demon's mind-trap during "Champions of the Just," it will occasionally try to deliver a Breaking Speech. Cole will often interrupt by encouraging you, or telling you that the demon is weak. The Envy Demon can't do anything to him, so it's reduced to shouting at him, ruining any effect the speeches might have had.
  • Failed a Spot Check:
    • While Cassandra is talking to the Herald about the need for an Inquisitor to lead them, they're going up the steps of Skyhold's battlements... where the Herald is greeted by Leliana holding an ornate sword, prompting the Herald to look right and see the organized crowd below.
    • While you're meeting with Alexius and discussing his interest in your magical mark, the various Venatori warriors that are quite visibly lurking in the background getting ready to ambush you are murdered by your own Inquisition agents, and Alexius doesn't notice until he tries ordering the ambush to be sprung. In fairness to him, he turns his back on the room just before the agents creep in, and he has his attention on Felix when he turns again; it's only when he makes the order that the agents kill the Venatori.
  • Fallen Hero: Solas. He saved the world one thousand years ago from false gods by creating the Veil. Now he seeks to undo his "mistake" through genocide. To be fair, Solas woke up to a Thedas stuck in the dark ages for one thousand years, and rejoining reality with the Fade would ascend the current elves while killing all the other races. The Inquisitor disagrees, since they see these "Tranquil non-elves" as more than pitiful, lost souls - especially if they are a non-elf themselves and pay heed to certain Tranquils in the story who show initiative and acting without any prompting from others.
  • Fame Gate: By doing sidequests and exploring, you increase the influence of the Inquisition, unlocking main story missions upon reaching certain fame levels.
  • Fantastic Slurs: The Chargers apparently call Tevinters "Vints." Some humans continue to call elves "knife-ear" and Qunari "oxen," a few elves call humans "shems" (the derogatory variant of "shemlen), some Dalish elves refer to city elves as "flat-ear" (with some city elves viewing any elves who leave the alienage as "flat-ears"), and "rabbit" debuts as a derogatory pet name used for elves by humans in Orlais.
  • The Fellowship Has Ended:
    • The party is visibly heading this way immediately after the Final Battle. Several companions make plans to leave at some point, usually to patch things up back home, though if you have high enough approval, many others plan on staying and even being an active part of the Inquisition.
    • At the end of Trespasser, the Inquisitor can choose to permanently disband the Inquisition for various reasons. Even if the Inquisition is not disbanded, the organization is downsized from N.G.O. Superpower to an arm of the Chantry. Regardless of your choice, most of the party members go their separate ways, though it's implied that at least most of them will keep in touch with the Inquisitor and, in some cases, each other.
  • Felony Misdemeanor: Maddox, the Tranquil that made Samson's armor, was the victim of such a punishment; he was a Kirkwall mage charged with "corrupting the moral integrity of a Templar" by Knight-Commander Meredith: meaning, he was passing love letters back and forth with a female Templar. Cullen notes with disgust that Meredith wielded the Tranquil brand for far lesser offenses.
  • Fertility God: Rilla of the Fireside is the Avvar goddess of "making babies." They appeal to her specifically when they're trying to have children.
  • Fetch Quest: Loads and loads of them.
  • Fictional Constellations: This game introduces Thedas' constellations, which are partially based on the religious leanings of ancient Tevinter, which at one time ruled the majority of the continent. They're utilized in a series of in-universe puzzles which lead the heroes to hidden treasure caches.
  • Find the Cure!: The Hero of Ferelden is now on a quest to find a cure for the Blight (which is widely considered to be incurable), although it has yet to be seen how successful they will be, and the mission is mostly treated as a pipe dream.
  • Fighter, Mage, Thief: As in previous Dragon Age games, the three base classes are Warrior, Mage and Rogue. Your first three companions consist of one of each (Cassandra, Solas and Varric, respectively). The sub-class specializations are kind of a subset of Fighter, Mage, Thief within each discipline.
    • Rogues can double-down on their stealth and combat as Assassins (fighter), become a Trap Master as an Artificer to further confuse and take advantage of enemies' weaknesses (thief), or go nuts with elemental concoctions that provide enhancements as a Tempest (mage).
    • For Warriors, the choice between Reaver, Champion, and Templar specialization is that of pure damage, terrorizing opponents, and consuming HP from fallen opponents (thief), heavy defense and becoming an Implacable Man (fighter), or battlefield control using anti-magic and extra bonuses to enhance companions' combat capabilities (mage).
    • Mages become defensive warriors and healers as Knight-Enchanters (warrior), control the battlefield with debilitating spells as a Necromancer (thief), or just blow crap up even better as a Rift Mage (mage).
    • The choice of the new Divine comes down to Cassandra (warrior), Leliana (rogue), and Vivienne (mage).
  • Fighting Across Time and Space: The finale of Trespasser sees the Inquisitor's party chase after the Arc Villain Viddasala by hopping through multiple Eluvians, which are effectively ancient Elven teleportation devices scattered throughout the remotest corners of the world.
  • Finger Poke of Doom: If you take the Knight-Enchanter skill "Fade Cloak" and its augmentative Decloaking Blast, you can deal massive spirit damage... by walking inside someone and letting the effect wear out.
  • Flaming Sword: Like in the previous games, you can wield one.
  • Flash Step:
  • Flock of Wolves: One of the reasons given for breaking up or reforming the Inquisition in Trespasser. The DLC's plot is set in motion when one set of infiltrators stumbled over the plot of a completely unconnected second set of infiltrators, with the Inquisition's laughable internal security having missed both groups.
  • Foreshadowing:
    • From the beginning of the game, the alchemist's notes observe that the Inquisitor was muttering something about 'the grey' while they were recovering from their first trip in the Fade. This is because they encountered the mind-controlled Grey Wardens holding Divine Justinia for Corypheus.
    • Solas' personal quest's name, "All New, Faded for Her", is an anagram for Fen'Harel Dread Wolf, hinting at his true nature.
    • Several Grey Warden corpses are seen during the Bad Future of In Hushed Whispers main quest to recruit the mages. This underscores their involvement with Corypheus which will not be revealed until Here Lies the Abyss main quest.
    • There is plenty of foreshadowing concerning Blackwall's true identity, especially if the player is knowledgeable of what happened back in the first game, such as the fact that he's not affected by the Calling, becomes disproportionately aggressive when asked by Varric about his 'dark secret', and didn't know that there were only three Wardensnote  involved in the Battle of Denerim. In fact, a perceptive player may realize that his answers to any questions directed at him regarding the Grey Wardens are actually rather vague and evasive, even regarding things that practically every Grey Warden would know just by virtue of being a Grey Warden, hinting at the fact that he didn't even get to his Joining; this is disguised by the fact that real Wardens are just as secretive about those subjects.
    • A throwaway comment from Sera, of all people, near the beginning of the game hints at revelations towards the end. When asked about elves, Sera says, among other things, that "the Dalish don't know. They say they do, but that's just stories." Then, towards endgame, you can potentially talk with Abelas and learn that the Dalish version of elven history and mythology is not accurate on certain issues; however, it turns out the Dalish were correct about Arlathan, the existence of the Creators and the Forgotten Ones, the war between the gods, magic being wielded by the ancients, Fen'Harel's treachery against the Creators, and the betrayal by Fen'Harel. Sera's very upset over the notion that the Creators may have been real, to the point where she will break up with a romanced Dalish Inquisitor unless she gives up her belief in the Creators.
    • In one of the earliest conversations you can have with Solas, he talks about how the artifact that created the Breach is unlike anything seen in this age, and that he refuses to believe it could be destroyed until he sees it shattered with his own eyes. He already makes a slip about revealing the detail about the thing that caused the Breach to materialize being an artifact, even if no one among the Inquisition knows it yet until Corypheus' appearance during his attack at Haven. He knows exactly what that artifact is and what it does, and at the end of the game, he does indeed see it shattered. To wrap it up, Solas is intimately connected to the plot's main conflict.
    • The fact that Solas is a Rift Mage also serves to foreshadow his true identity as the Dread Wolf, the creator of the Veil that separates the Fade from the waking world. Rift Magic simply did not exist before the Breach appeared. The discipline is so new that only a handful of people have even delved into studying it, only one of which appears to have succeeded at the cost of most of her mental health. That Solas is intimately familiar with it regardless while still having his wits together shows that he knows much, much more about the Fade and the Veil than a simple hedge mage like him should.
    • The visual foreshadowing during the finding Skyhold cutscene. Watch how Solas's expression hardens from a smile into something more enigmatic, after the Inquisitor walks past him. The shot afterwards carefully frames Solas as overlooking both the Inquisitor and Skyhold. This makes a lot more sense after playing the Trespasser DLC, when you learn how Solas has been manipulating you.
    • When reading the description for any of the Cleansing Runes or their crafting schematics, you may notice that it states it augments damage against darkspawn and Red Templars. An odd combination... until you learn from Varric's companion quest that Red Lyrium is Blight-tainted Lyrium. The rune causes greater harm to Red Templars because, in a way, they're Blighted ghouls now.
    • Corypheus' widespread use of Red Lyrium itself actually a pretty big hint that the Blight is involved; with Corypheus being one of the original Magisters that invaded the Golden City, he is Blighted, and yet unlike the Architect, who is also one of the original Magisters, he doesn't surround himself with the ranks of the Darkspawn. Instead, he uses Red Lyrium as his connection to the Blight, producing and experimenting on it to infect and augment those under his command into zealous, Blighted followers, much like the intelligent Darkspawn which served the Architect.
    • Cassandra muses early on that it's a shame more people can't take the initiation to join the Seekers, since that gives a person immunity to possession and mind control. She is not the first person to think that. The reason it was discovered that tranquility strips mages of their magic is because a mage had the exact same idea and tried to test it. In addition, those with a little knowledge of Dragon Age's lore (specifically, that "cured" Tranquil have shown to be implulsive and have difficulty controlling their emotions) may catch on that Cassandra has an impulsive and notably tactless personality, something that she herself admits, stating that when she knows what is right, she does it right away so not to waste time worrying about the consequences, alluding to the fact that the Vigil that she undertook to become a Seeker was actually a self-induced Rite of Tranquility which she was then cured of via being touched by a Spirit of Faith.
    • Some idle gossip around Haven about the structure of Haven can hint to what happens there. You can overhear one guard asking another why they need such huge trebuchets if they're not going to lay siege upon someone, to which the superior snaps they're there in case someone lays siege to them. Cue the Elder One and his army of mages/Red Templars, and the trebuchets needed to slow/stop them by making avalanches and rockslides. Others gossipers mention many unknown tunnels under Haven that lead into the mountains. Many people manage to escape the destruction of Haven by sneaking out through the tunnels, and the Herald narrowly escapes a rockslide they created to stop the Elder One by falling into a tunnel passage.
    • If a dwarven Inquisitor talks to Old God Kieran and jokes about trying to be taller, he responds, "But you can't be taller. Not without the Titans." Come The Descent and that little comment makes a lot more sense.
    • Likewise, Dagna can comment on an experiment she did that suddenly made her feel huge, and as if she was tapping into some manner of dwarven Hive Mind. Come The Descent...
    • And another one foreshadowing the big reveal in The Descent: When first asking Cole about Templars, he says they're "heavy with forgotten songs, like Varric." Despite being Stone-Senseless, Varric is still a Child of the Stone. Lyrium is the blood of the Titans and is used by Templars to give them their magic-nullifying powers. The Dwarves and the Titans that bleed Lyrium are closely linked. Further conversation with Cole on the subject only furthers the foreshadowing sense.
    • In the main game, Solas makes a seemingly offhand, dry remark about something being impossible unless "we collapse the Veil and bring the Fade here so (he) can casually reshape reality." Come the Trespasser DLC and... we learn that this wasn't an off-the-cuff joke — that's exactly what he intends to do.
    • In the Temple of Mythal, in addition to the dragon statues found throughout the place, there are also statues depicting a woman with dragon wings. Someone being both a woman and a dragon should seem very familiar to veteran players...
    • In one instance of party banter, Varric talks to Iron Bull about how he "like(s) the stories where the villain was the man beside you the whole time" and that "the best villains don't see themselves as evil. They're fighting for a good cause, willing to get their hands dirty." Sound like anyone in particular, Solas?
    • A promotional image for the game features the Inquisitor and their inner circle arranged around the war table in a homage to Leonardo's da Vinci's The Last Supper. Solas is the one in Judas Iscariot's position.
  • Foul Medicine: If the player takes the time to enjoy the scene with the Iron Bull and his Chargers. The group's medic, Stitches, makes something which can help with most any injury, but as Bull says, it tastes absolutely terrible. Stitches then points out that "It's a poultice, ser, you're not supposed to drink it." (It's a Creator In-Joke about the fact that in Dragon Age: Origins, all medical items were consumed by the characters even if they were identified as poultices.)
  • Freeze-Frame Bonus:
    • In the "Fires Above Trailer", Cassandra has Hard in Hightown 2 next to her maps.
    • In the background of Varric's character trailer, Solas can be seen sitting in the tavern in Haven.
    • Cole makes a few very brief appearances in "Champions of the Just" before he formally introduces himself to the Herald.
  • Freudian Excuse: Cole, being a spirit of Compassion who can literally feel other people's pain, is an expert at rooting these out; for example, in his own personal quest, he discovers that the Templar who killed the original Cole was forced to drown kittens by "Louis."
    • Subverted by Erimond: When Cassandra asks Cole if Erimond has a secret, hidden pain, Cole simply replies, "No. Erimond is an arsehole," much to Cassandra's amusement.
  • Fridge Brilliance: Invoked in conversations with Cole. After recruiting him, you will overhear people talk about strange events occurring across Skyhold, which you can correctly trace to Cole and tell him to stop doing it. However, if you instead let him carry on and continue listening, you will eventually figure out that his weird actions set in motion chains of seemingly random events that ultimately help people or make their lives easier, better, and/or happier.
  • Full-Frontal Assault: The Avvar warriors encountered in the Fallow Mire appear to be wearing body paint rather than shirts. This includes the women. This armor is available as DLC, so now the Inquisitor and company can do it too.
  • Fungus Humongous: The Arbor Wilds sport some quite large shelf mushrooms.

    G 
  • Game-Breaking Bug:
    • Dorian's personal quest has a known issue where it may not trigger for some players. While this may be a minor one for most players, those that want to pursue a romance with him are less than thrilled.
    • One of Sera's subquests involves playing pranks on the members of the advisory council. This quest places a random soldier in Cullen's office and removes Cullen himself (so that the prank can be set up). Sometimes, Cullen never comes back, locking the player out of any of his sidequests or romance dialogue.
    • There is a cave entrance in the Western Approach that should open after killing the High Dragon there, but it often doesn't. Fortunately, a Warrior can break the block with Grappling Chain, and can do so without ever fighting the dragon at all.
    • One of Solas' quests, "Measuring the Veil," has a nasty habit of not triggering the end of the quest, even after previous requirements have been met.
    • From the multiplayer, there are several issues that result in enemies either stuck outside the players reach or a kill not registering properly. Neither would be that bothersome if it weren't for the fact that you have to kill all enemies in each section to advance. The only way to continue is for the hosting player to leave the match, which resets the current stage... assuming a new host can be found.
    • The initial release of the game featured a weird bug in which the Inquisitor was treated by the game as both a male and a female simultaneously, and as both their class and another class simultaneously (e.g. a mage and a rogue). This bug had at least two game-breaking consequences. The first (arguably beneficial) consequence was allowing the player to romance NPCs who were only interested in the other gender. For example, a male Inquisitor was able to romance Sera, who is only interested in females. However, since the male actors did not record the lines for the female-only romances (and vice versa), these lines would only appear as subtitles, although they were still lip-synced. The second game-breaking consequence was that the Inquisitor received the trainers for another class upon arriving at Skyhold, thereby preventing specialization in their own class. The bug was fixed in Patch 2.
    • Also in the initial release, two of the mosaic tiles in the Hinterlands never appeared in the game, meaning that the mosaic could not be completed. This was also fixed in patches.
    • The game has a persistent habit of spawning loot containers in inaccessible places, like deep inside of walls or rocks. You can highlight them with the Search action, but they can't be interacted with due to being unreachable. This is annoying but harmless when it's just random chests or sacks, but it can also happen to plot-critical loot dropped by enemies, most often keys that open the path forwards. The only way to work around this is to load an earlier savegame, assuming you have one. Unlike most bugs on this list, this one has never been addressed.
  • Gameplay and Story Integration:
    • The map of the valley between Haven and the Temple of Sacred Ashes is blank except for one small circle right at the Temple's entrance — the spot where the Herald walked out of the Fade before passing out.
    • Scout Harding's welcome when the Inquisitor first visits the Forbidden Oasis depends on whether it happens before or after the move to Skyhold. Before the move, the Venatori have not yet reached the Oasis and there's no giant present, so she gives more information about the area. If the Inquisitor doesn't go there until after the move, she warns about the Venatori and advises the Inquisitor to avoid getting stepped on by the giant.
    • Going to the Winter Palace in one of the main quest will have the nobles judge you based on your race and class. If you are a human warrior or rogue, the Orlesian nobles will approve that the Herald of Andraste is a noble, even if you are a Free Marcher and will gain an automatic increase towards court approval. Conversely, human mages as well as elves and dwarves of any class will take a drop because mages are looked down with suspicion, Orlesians are especially racist towards elves, and a dwarf being a devoted Andrastian is almost unheard of. Qunari Inquisitors have an even worse drop because the nobles see them as little better than beasts.
  • Gameplay and Story Segregation:
    • Cassandra brings up her ability to set lyrium on fire... including the lyrium that's in the blood of templars and mages. Not once does she display this power, even when it would be really, really handy.
    • And on a further note, Cassandra asserts that Seekers are not Templars, giving her a completely different power set without their specific Anti-Magic capabilities. And yet, her in-game class is... Templar. Her specialization description explains that her Seeker training essentially grants her the same powers as a Templar without the need for lyrium, contradicting what she tells the Inquisitor in conversation.
    • The impetus for allying with the mages or Templars is that the dozen or so of each already in the Inquisition aren't enough to close the Breach. When you actually do it, you use... five.
    • Cole has no supernatural abilities whatsoever outside of cutscenes. He does get a more effective version of the stealth skill tree, though.
    • The Herald gets access to the missions in the war room, and decides which advisor will complete them, long before they have any actual power in the Inquisition. This is handwaved by their status as the Herald of Andraste, however, since as Cullen puts it, "None of this means anything without your mark, after all."
    • As usual, issues of lyrium addiction, demon possession, darkspawn taint, etc. are brought up, but never actually become a threat to the party. With one exception - Cullen's personal quest "Perseverance" deals with the issue of his lyrium addiction, and if it's not handled correctly, Trespasser reveals that he ends up a crazed homeless beggar.
    • "In Hushed Whispers" has a bunch of problems. Your two non-Dorian companions have been held prisoner for a year when you rescue them, yet they instantly equip their regular armor and weapons out of nowhere the moment they rejoin your team. They've also been infected with red lyrium, a substance known to massively increase the host's strength and overall physical capabilities, but it provides absolutely no benefit to the very obviously tainted companions. And why is Leliana still wearing her trademark chainmail coat and armored greaves after a whole year of Cold-Blooded Torture?
    • Even if your Qunari inquisitor has no horns, they will be prevented from wearing helmets as if they had them.
    • If you complete "In Hushed Whispers" and choose to give the Mages a full alliance rather than conscript them, then when you next talk to Cassandra in Haven, she assures you that she doesn't disapprove of your decision despite her frustration with the Mages' demands... except that she's hardcoded to Greatly Disapprove if the Mages are given a full alliance.
    • Related to the above, if you do "Champions of the Just" (the equivalent quest for the Templars), Cassandra's dialogue and behavior in the subsequent cutscene will always contradict the approval/disapproval message you get.
    • The Sadistic Choice in Iron Bull's personal quest is rather undermined by the fact that the enemy force that will kill either the Chargers or the Qunari ship they're defending is near enough and small enough that you could have easily run over and wiped it out yourself in normal gameplay in less time than you spend arguing about it. In fact, you face more powerful groups earlier in the same level.
    • When you finish a side quest, you will sometimes have to talk to one of your companions. This has to be done back at base, even if they are in the active party, because you cannot talk to party members in the field.
    • The alleged menace of red lyrium. At least one camp in the Emprise du Lion is located in the middle of the stuff. Also, even though it's supposed to be dangerous to so much as touch, Varric has a quest (triggered by asking him about red lyrium) in which you have to destroy ten instances of it... which naturally requires you to interact with it to an extent.
    • During In Hushed Whispers, you are sent forward in time a year and by the end of the quest you are sent back, negating the new timeline you found yourself in. However, you still retain all the items and experience points you and your companions acquired during your time in the future. This is the first time that time travel has featured in the series so maybe it works differently in Thedas.
    • 'Collectables' like the oculara and landmarks never have different interactions depending on your character background or story revelations... even when you're an elf grabbing landmarks that are tributes to the Exalted March (against elves) or if you've optionally found the information that oculara are the skulls of Tranquil recently and expressly killed for the purpose of finding the keystones. Even when you're a human mage and probably knew some of them. For that matter, there's no explanation of why there are oculara in the Frostback Basin, since it's unlikely they were the original intended method of finding the keystones. Just new DLC area = more collectibles.
    • The bard in the tavern will occasionally sing songs about your companions, either singularly or as a group, even the ones you haven't recruited.
    • Varric hates red lyrium, and makes a big deal about destroying it. The player can chose to augment his crossbow with very obviously made from red lyrium enchantments, and Varric has no reaction at all to it. You can use it yourself, and yet nobody comments on it, and acts like it is actively being avoided.
  • Gargle Blaster:
    • Inquisition introduces the concept of "Grey Warden Conscription Ale." A Warden takes whatever liquor they can get, and just adds it to a mixture in their own personal bottle. Each bottle's taste is unique for each Warden. The "vintage" of each isn't a year, but the owner of the bottle, accompanied by a short phrase. You might even come across the conscription ales of Hawke's sibling if they became a Warden; Carver's is "Toast Them All!", while Bethany's is "Princess Piss."
    • One of the Iron Bull's friendship cutscenes (the one you get after killing your first High Dragon with him in the party, specifically) revolves around Bull inviting the Inquisitor to a round of drinks to toast an awesome battle. The Qunari liquor he serves seems to be one of these as even a Qunari Inquisitor immediately goes into a coughing fit upon drinking it. The next rounds are only marginally less bad. As Bull puts it, it gets easier after the first cup because by then the nerves in your throat are mostly dead already.
  • Gateless Ghetto: Despite how large the city is said to be, only a small market area is available for visits in Val Royeaux, save for a side mission or two.
  • Genius Loci: Titans are massive creatures that resemble living cave systems, with lyrium for blood.
  • Ghibli Hills: The Emerald Graves fit this nearly to a tee. Everywhere you look, you see giant verdant trees, with most of the artifacts being ancient elven ruins and statues.
  • Giant Spiders: Mainly come in two flavors: the regular fantasy/slightly cartoonish look and a smaller, poisonous version (smaller comparatively, they're about the size of a large nug and resemble a bulky huntsman.) Then we get Fearlings and the Fear Demon who resemble spiders and make themselves look like more accurate arachnids, one the size of a car that feeds on humans, and another albino spider named Snowball the size of a small truck that does a Jump Scare on you.
  • Gladiator Subquest: Present in Jaws Of Hakkon.
  • Glowing Eyes of Doom: The "Enemy of Thedas" trailer features a Dalish mage with glowing purple eyes whose magic is strong enough to knock both Morrigan and the Inquisitor back.
  • Godzilla Threshold: Exploited by the Big Bad when he makes the Grey Wardens think that they are all hearing the Calling. Their belief that they are all going to die soon leads to them using Blood Magic and performing Human Sacrifice to summon a demon army to help them wipe out the last two Old Gods before they are all gone.
    • There's a second, more subtle example in the game. The Qunari, who are the Scary Dogmatic Aliens of the setting, are so concerned by the Breach and resulting rifts that they approach you looking to form an alliance to combat the menace. According to Iron Bull, this is the first time in recorded history that the Qunari have ever voluntarily considered an alliance with anyone not of the Qun for any reason.
  • Gonk: Aside from your ability to make the Inquisitor into such an abomination that they would make the Maker turn from Thedas again, this is the best way to describe some of the NPCs, such as the inept mage who runs afoul of Solas during his personal quest.
  • Good Pays Better: Taking merciful options when you judge a prisoner pays off most of the time, usually in additional War Table missions where the prisoner renders a service to the Inquisition. The only exception is Denam, who leads troops into an ambush; even then, Cullen can turn the situation to the Inquisition's benefit.
  • Great Offscreen War:
    • Currently in-progress: Orlais has suffered a civil war that's mostly all over except for the crying. You just have to show up at a party and pull a few strings to control who gets what afterwards. If you visit the actual battlefields in the Exalted Plains, you find out that both sides are so bogged down fighting the demonic invasion, a major undead outbreak, and a rebel faction of deserters from both sides, they wouldn't be interested in fighting each other even if there hadn't been a truce called.
    • Party banter between Solas and Cole has Cole ramble about how a "war in the Fade" would be a terrible thing to see. In Solas's backstory in his true identity as Fen'Harel, he is infamous for ending a war between the Elvhen Pantheon and the Forgotten Ones. The game also reveals that the Elvhen gods can enter the Fade physically at will, and banter with Dorian has Solas acknowledge that physically entering the Fade has only become stigmatized in human history.
  • Ground Punch: Brute-type enemies love to do this with their friggin' huge two-handed mauls whenever they don't feel like performing their equally devastating Spin Attack. A basic smash at whoever's standing in front of them is dangerous enough already, but they also have an advanced version where they flail around wildly, pounding everything around them with repeated strikes that deal massive damage. Unsurprisingly, this is the bane of any squishy rogue caught in the process of backstabbing the raging brute.
    • This is also an ability for two-handed warriors; it literally splits the ground open with a blaze of fire, burning any attacking baddies who happen to run into the flames.
  • The Guards Must Be Crazy: The chevalier guards at the Winter Palace ball react to absolutely nothing that's going on around them. The fabled Inquisitor is stuffing coins, strange statues, and top-secret documents into their pockets by the truckload? No problem. The same Inquisitor climbs up a flower lattice to sneak into off-limits areas of the palace? Sure, why not? Duchess Florianne comes running out of the Grand Ballroom after just having stabbed the empress In the Back? Move Along, Nothing to See Here. It's possible that they're under orders from Grand Duke Gaspard to stay out of whatever might be happening this evening, but it's still a strange sight.
  • Guest-Star Party Member: In a number of major battles, one or more non-companion characters may fight beside your party. These may include, but are by no means limited to, Hawke, Alistair, Stroud, Loghain, Morrigan, Cullen, and Leliana.
  • Guide Dang It!:
    • The solution to the Orlesian civil war can be altered by bad dialogue choices to your companions before what seems to be the choice point. Ironically, this actually isn't explained in the guide.
    • Celene, Gaspard and Briala can be forced to set aside their differences and work together... provided you found every single Halla statuette and opened exactly the right doors with them, which is unlikely to happen without a strategy guide in your hand.
    • The reconciliation between Celene and Briala as friends and lovers requires that you find the aforementioned Halla statues, use them to open one specific door, talk to Celene's assistants, then Celene, and then Briala with the correct dialogue choices, and then make the correct choices again at the end of the quest. Oh, and maintain at least 85 Court Approval at the same time.
    • The exact factors that determine whom the Conclave elects as the new Divine in the epilogue were a major mystery until someone actually hacked into the game files; even since then, some conditions are still ambiguous.
    • Most of the time it doesn't really matter who you pick for a War Table mission except for gameplay factors like who is the fastest or the flavor text for the plan/outcome, but sometimes you need to pick one specific advisor to continue to the next stage of the chain. Often, there is no way of knowing which outcome is the correct one. For example, choosing Josephine to ask local nobility to help protect the Dalish Inquisitor's clan from bandits results in a total massacre, even though the previous mission had Josephine's suggestion to be the generally better of the three to pick. Likewise, taking Cullen's advice to flip off people upset about Blackwall's fake Grey Warden treaties turns out to be the "correct" choice,rewards-wise, despite it on paper seeming to be illogical to just piss people off about your choice.
      • The quest chain with Sutherland and his mini-adventuring company is a quadruple whammy in this regard. First, if you don't take Cullen's advice for the first mission (sending Sutherland to help fight off the bandits), the quest chain terminates immediately. Second, if you don't go back and talk to Sutherland after every mission, you won't unlock the next one. Third, if the wrong advisor (anyone but Leliana) is chosen in third operation for them (A Test of Mettle and Crew), no further operations are offered. Fourth, due to a bug that was never patched, if the player completes a main quest "What Pride Had Wrought" before the seventh operation ("Sutherland and Company Missing"), the chain will not advance and Sutherland's company will be killed by darkspawn since the player is unable to rescue them.
      • If you recruit the Wardens, you can send them out on War Table missions. However, choosing the wrong advisors can lead to the entire Orlesian branch of the order being wiped out and end a line of missions. It's also incredibly hard to predict, since it involves your main ally in the chain betraying you for no reason.
      • The Dalish Inquisitor's Clan quest chain is perhaps the worst offender. It has the longest chain of personal quests from any Inquisitor's background, and every step of the way it is far too easy to make a "wrong" choice gets the Dalish Inquisitor's clan massacred. What's worse, the choices with the "good" outcomes can seem counter-productive to the ones with the tragic outcomes, and sending the same advisor twice in a row often gets a tragic outcome even though said advisor did good work in the previous attempt. Patrick Weekes actually apologized for this quest chain on Twitter, saying that they didn't realize just how difficult it was going to be.
    • It's possible for Lord Abernache to survive the fighting at Therinfal Redoubt, but only if you refuse to do the Lord Seeker's ritual. This is never hinted in the game, nor is there any explanation offered for why the Red Templars don't kill Abernache if you refuse to do the ritual.
    • Finding the unique Evanura sword requires finding a codex in one region, then visiting a landmark in another region. Even worse, due to a bug(?), the instant you mark the landmark, you must use the search command and immediately loot the sword, or it vanishes for good. It's made easier if you've marked the landmark before finding the codex entry, but if you don't know that the two are connected, it likely won't even cross your mind to head back there.Solution 
    • It might not occur to some that one can thin the demons' numbers before the next wave at a Fade tear by using some manner of magic-dispelling skill on the spawn points before the demons spawn. Warriors and rogues can also attack the spawn points for the same effect, although they can usually only defeat one in the time allotted.
    • At the Emerald Graves, most players run into a bunch of torches that don't stay lit in the Lion's Pavilion. This is actually one in a series of puzzles in that region that leads to a prize at the end. There is no journal entry for this, and unless you know exactly what to look for, it is unlikely you'll reach the end of the quest.
    • Making the wrong dialogue choice with Leliana ( telling her to kill the traitor OR not saying anything towards the beginning of the game hardens her and prevents certain outcomes in her personal quest, which occurs towards the end of the game. The game gives no indication that this is an important choice. And just because you choose this first time don't think Leliana will let you off the hook that easily: she will remained hardened if certain choices are made, clearly, but to save her soul you have to pick specific dialogue during her personal mission (that is, not tell her sacrifices have to be made, and hiding that ruthless streak is generally a good idea as well).
    • The specialization quests require extremely rare items with no indication of where to look, and are not tracked on the map.
    • Trespasser adds a slew of high-level schematics. Many of the weapons one can craft from these schematics have inbuilt abilities even without filling the masterwork slot, a unique trait that no base game schematics share. The Elgar'nan Enaste bow for instance shoots explosive arrows, and the Encore staff randomly casts one of three powerful buffs every now and then. This is mentioned absolutely nowhere in the crafting menu.
    • Several Judgement options are locked behind specific things that are never given indication for existing. For example: Alexius can be made Tranquil if you are playing as a Mage, but if not, you have to purchase a specific Inquisitor perk to unlock it. Another is with Movran, who can become an agent of the Inquisition, but only if you picked the Templars over the Mages. Probably the worst example is with Ser Ruth; the best outcome for her is to basically use religion as a way to forgive her, but you can only pick this if you have consistently chosen religious dialogue options through out the game, making it one of the only times in the game where your characters religious views effect the gameplay, and as expected, the game never tells or hints this is a thing.
    • Recruiting Agents is another area the game is really bad at making clear how to do so. Some Agents are gained by doing sidequests, than picking an option to convince them to join the Inquisition, but several require things like specific Inquisition Perks or characters present to convince them to join, or need specific options from a list of several picked. Some even require specific main story choices, such as Movran not becoming an actual Agent unless on a Templar chosen playthrough. An infamous example is Jana in Crestwood, who has to be talked to at two specific moments before leaving to do the main story or sidequest to take care of the undead, or else she vanishes. Even then, you either have to have taken a specific Inquisition Perk to allow a new choice when speaking to her, or bring Solas to do the same. If not, you are unable to recruit her even if you have all the right details there to do so.
  • Guilt-Based Gaming:
    • A Bioware tradition. The first gameplay demo shows the Inquisitor deciding whether their soldiers should stay with the wounded, protect the nearby village of Crestwood, or push an assault on the attacking Red Templars. The Inquisitor picks the last one - and Crestwood is burned to the ground by the time they return.
    • Averted in the game proper, where this choice never actually happens. The closest would be which faction the Inquisition will approach to ask for help; but at the time they make this decision, the player doesn't know something bad will happen to the faction they don't pick.

    H 
  • Handwave: One of the things from Varric's book on Hawke that you can ask about is the fate of Orsino and how/why he turned into a giant monster for seemingly no reason. Varric is unable to give the Inquisitor a good answer, telling them that he doesn't know anything about Blood Magic and that the only reason he could come up with is that the First Enchanter was just really desperate. (Notably, bringing up Orsino's fate is the only question the Inquisitor can ask about the book that will result in disapproval from Varric.)
    • This is actually a minor running joke, since everyone has read Varric's book. Quite a few unpopular elements of the second game are explained away as part of his over-the-top writing style. For instance, Iron Bull asks about all the bad guys who drop from the ceiling as a second wave every single fight.
  • Healing Shiv: "Healing Mist," a fairly potent health potion which at its strongest can even revive unconscious party members, is actually a grenade.
  • Healthy Green, Harmful Red: Unlike the previous two games in the series which used a red health bar throughout, the health bar in this game starts out as green when full then reveals a blood-red backing as it depletes. The characters' portraits also turn red and blooded when they're in critical condition.
  • Hell Gate: The Breach: a tear in the Veil that separates the Fade and the mundane realm, opens in the sky, allowing demons and other monstrosities to invade. Solas indicates it makes demons even more of a threat than they'd usually be, since it drives them mad to be thrust into the physical world. Intellectual demons are few and far between now; even the sinister and manipulative Pride demons are just big ugly monsters who want to bash your head in. The event that caused the Breach also caused numerous smaller miniature hell gates to form; these are the Rifts you find everywhere and have to seal.
  • Helmets Are Hardly Heroic: Like in the previous game, there's an option to make the headgear worn by the Inquisitor invisible to better show off the player's personal face customization. Played with similarly to the last game in that the helmet's stats and defense still apply, meaning the player will still want to wear a helmet at all times. In addition, any cutscene always shows the player and party without helmets.
  • Herbivores Are Friendly: Generally averted with the larger creatures. While gurns, brontos, and druffalo won't attack you if they aren't provoked, they'll snarl menacingly if approached and will try to stomp your ass into the ground if they are wounded, even if you weren't the one who attacked them. This can be an added hazard in some areas: you can be battling giants in the Emerald Graves and suddenly have to deal with an angry bronto who got hit by an errant arrow or magic blast. The one guaranteed exception to this rule is Druffy, the lost druffalo in the Hinterlands who must be guided back to her pen; she will not turn hostile even if you have to fight something on the way, and will actually help fight the demons at the rift in the river if it hasn't already been closed.
    • More amusingly, nugs and fennecs can also be made hostile if they're injured while the party fights actual monsters. This causes them to show up on the radar as red (enemy) targets, and while you can tell the party to disengage, you won't be able to fast travel while they're nearby because the game thinks you're being attacked.
  • Here We Go Again!: If you play Jaws of Hakkon after completing the main quest, the Inquisitor can have this reaction after learning the Hakkonites' true plans:
    Inquisitor: They wanted to send a god to destroy us? I just finished killing a god who wanted to destroy us!
  • Heroic Sacrifice: During the quest "In Hushed Whispers", the Inquisitor and Dorian will be thrown one year into a horrific Bad Future while the rest of the party is left behind. They are found imprisoned together with Leliana, mentioning that they are stuck with a Fate Worse than Death. At the end of the quest, your party members and Liliana agree on performing a Last Stand to keep you safe just long enough to get back into your time and save them and the world from the Ancient One.
  • Hero of Another Story:
    • Through the War Table operations, you are able to send agents, members, and allies of the Inquisition on their own adventures in your name. This includes, but not limited to: the Bull's Chargers, Sutherland and Company, Ser Barris, the Grey Wardens, and so forth.
    • The Hero of Ferelden, if they live after Origins, disappeared a few years ago without any reason. note  The Inquisitor learns later that the Warden is in a mission to cure the Calling that all Grey Wardens suffer.
    • In the Jaws of Hakkon DLC, you meet the First Inquisitor and your predecessor, Ameridan. Throughout the questline, you see the echoes of his adventures that linger to this day.
  • Hero-Worshipper:
    • The people of Thedas become an almost completely literal example, coming to look upon the Inquisitor as the Maker's chosen and calling them "The Herald of Andraste" and "Your Worship."
    • Depending on the choices made in the world state imported, many characters returning from previous games may also feel this way about the Hero of Ferelden, and can be asked about their connection to that individual.
  • Hidden Villain: The Inquisitor has a single, equal adversary working against them from the shadows.
  • His Name Really Is "Barkeep": The Rift Mage specialization trainer is Your Trainer. Who is she? She is Your Trainer. (Apparently she absorbed so much knowledge that keeping it all straight upstairs is difficult, and so she just clings to the fact she's supposed to train you.)
    • In the Emprise du Lion, the text for one of the landmarks consists of a proclamation by the mayor of the nearby town of Sahrnia. This individual's name is Mayor Mayer.
  • Hitler Ate Sugar: A weird case when talking to Dorian after allying with the mages. He actually "greatly approves" of this choice, but it's a little hard to tell when he lectures the Inquisitor that by giving them freedom, they've also been given permission to act like mages in Tevinter, and you mustn't forget that Tevinter is Bad.
  • Hobbling the Giant: Taking down Giants usually involves damaging their feet until they fall to their knees, then quickly finishing them off with massive damage to their upper body.
  • Hollow World: Possibly. In The Descent, you end up traveling below the Deep Roads and discover what appears to be a well-lit land with mountains rising from clouds below you. Inside a Titan.
  • Honor Before Reason: Averted by Svarah Sun-Hair, the thane of the Stone-Bear Avvar in the Jaws of Hakkon DLC, to the clear surprise of the Inquisitor. The Stone-Bears have an oath of peace with the Hakkonites, but she says that oaths only last until they're broken and she's willing to aid you because the Hakkonites are short-sighted warmongers who make lousy allies. Rather than requesting that you find some proof of treachery that would justify turning on the Hakkonites, she just wants you to demonstrate that the Inquisition would make a better ally. (You actually do both.)
  • Hopeless War: The Mage-Templar has become this, particularly on the side of the Mages, who lost a lot of their leadership, rank and file to the Breach, and left with the reserves in Redcliffe, who split between honest rebels, terrorists, and Tevinter infiltrators. By the time the Inquisitor reaches Redcliffe, the situation has deteriorated so far (due largely to Alexius meddling with time travel) that Fiona enters into a desperate alliance with the Imperium. On the Templar side, the true Templars are fighting a losing battle against the Red Templars under Knight-Captain Denam. Whichever side the Inquisitor chooses is saved only by their intervention.
  • Horseback Heroism: Inquisition features mounts for the first time in the series.
  • Huge Guy, Tiny Girl: A female Dwarf Inquisitor who romances the Iron Bull. A female Elf counts for different reasons - while taller, she's thin and waifish, whereas the dwarves are short and stout all around.
  • Human Resources: A codex entry, found in a locked house in Redcliffe, reveals a terrible truth. You know those Oculara you use to find shards? Each is made out of a Tranquil skull.
  • Humans Are Cthulhu: Revealed as the reason why most summonings turn out demonic: Spirits who are summoned from their regular plane of existence into the alien world of Thedas and forced to follow a specific and unyielding set of instructions tend to act the same way that humans summoned into the Fade do: go completely insane and mutate into homicidal monsters from their own broken minds.
  • Hurricane of Puns: In the Jaws of Hakkon DLC, you actually have the opportunity to recruit Storvacker, the Hold-Beast of Stone-Bear Hold. This "agent" is basically a grizzly bear housing a spirit. During the judgment of the bear, the Inquisitor has an option to make some puns about it right from the start. If you recruit the bear, an operation opens up. Upon completion, Leliana asks Cullen if he thinks this mission was a roaring success to which Cullen just replies with a flat no.
  • Hurt Foot Hop: The Giants hop on one foot if you do enough damage to the other. If you then do enough damage to the second leg, they fall down on their knees, allowing you to target their upper body and head.

    I 
  • I Shall Taunt You: The "Vanguard" tree for Warriors focuses on various ways to verbally assault their foes and to exploit their being "taunted". At the very minimum, taunting keeps the enemy heat on the warrior instead of their group-mates.
  • Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: All of the main story quests are named after phrases from the Chant of Light.
  • Idiot Ball: Perhaps it's due to all the lyrium they snorted, but the Sha-Brytol in the Unknown Abyss apply some spectacularly dumb strategies to defend their territory. They've set up a couple of magical barriers that only their proprietary Earthshaker weapons can destroy. Do they keep these things (and the eponymous warriors wielding them) as far away from the fighting as possible when the Inquisition starts rampaging through their lines? Of course not, they're basically in the first wave and continue to participate in every major battle from there on, making a mockery of their own fortifications in the process. If they'd just told the Earthshakers to sit tight in their barracks, the Inquisition assault would've been stopped dead in its tracks before it got anywhere near something important.
  • Ignorant of Their Own Ignorance: The Kirkwall Circle mages that bound Solas's wisdom spirit friend. They talk down to Solas as if he knows nothing of spirits when they are the ones who corrupted it into a pride demon with their fumbling ignorance. The spirit dies either way, whether you kill it as a demon or make a last-ditch attempt to unbind it. Solas is so furious with them that he'll kill them remorselessly if you choose not to stop him.
  • Implacable Man: In true warden fashion, Warden-Commander Clarel strides ominously toward Erimond at one point, effortlessly shrugging off his fire attacks.
  • Implausible Deniability: In party banter, Vivienne notes that Solas set his own coattails on fire. Solas tries suggesting it was "a figment of the Fade."
  • In Medias Res: The intro for the game is hitting the start button and watching everything on the screen explode. Shortly afterwards you're massacring demons and sealing Rifts.
  • Incendiary Exponent: The Tempest subclass of Rogues is all about smashing a flask of some elemental concoction over yourself and charging into battle. Setting yourself on fire is just one of the several flasks you can use.
  • Inciting Incident: Driven home by the Menu screen, which depicts the moments just before the explosion that caused the Breach. The moment that the player presses New Game, you get to see it happen, complete with a Templar shield flying at the screen.
  • Incompatible Orientation: While the Inquisitor can flirt with at least six of the eight romance options, at least two are guaranteed to turn them down.
    • A female Inquisitor cannot romance Cassandra or Dorian due to them being heterosexual and gay, respectively. However, still flirting with Cassandra can boost her approval, provided it's handled delicately. Dorian flirts back with a female just for laughs, noting if his approval is high that he would gladly pursue her "in another life."
    • Sera will emphatically turn down a male Inquisitor due to being gay, but will be a bit gentler a second time with high approval.
    • A male Inquisitor, or a female dwarf or qunari, can flirt with Cullen twice. He'll write the first one off as kindness, but figures it out the second time and states his desire to be Just Friends. He can only be won over by a female elf or human.
    • Only a female can flirt with Blackwall, and only a female elf can flirt with Solas.
    • Averted with Josephine; the Inquisitor can win her heart regardless of race or gender, and she is not dependent on approval. Iron Bull can also be romanced by any Inquisitor, provided his approval is sufficient.
    • This also applies among companions. Sera is attracted to Cassandra, who finds her rather annoying as well as of the wrong gender. Dorian displays some attraction to Cullen, though he understands that Cullen's uninterested, and it doesn't in the least seem to hinder a friendship between them. Iron Bull may flirt with Blackwall if both are in your party, though he will not respond to Bull's advances.
  • Incredibly Durable Enemies: Enemies roughly on par with your party's level require absurd amounts of damage to kill even on Casual difficulty, and it only gets worse on higher difficulties or if they outrank you. Unleashing combo detonations as often as possible is borderline mandatory instead of the helpful but ultimately optional feature it was in Origins and DA II. Otherwise it's disturbingly common for the entire party to hack, stab and blast away at a single humanoid enemy for multiple cooldown rounds before the guy finally bites the dirt and you can repeat the process with the dozen or so buddies he brought along. DLC-exclusive regions like the Frostback Basin or the Deep Roads are downright ridiculous because the enemies there scale with the player, with the Unknown Abyss deserving special mention since the resident Sha-Brytol are also clad in the heaviest armor the game has to offer.
  • Infinity -1 Sword: The Masterwork Engraved Greatsword is both this and a Disk One Nuke for two-handed warriors. The schematic for it can be found in one of the first areas the player is likely to visit, it isn't locked behind a door or secret boss or anything, and it has the stats of a Tier 3 weapon. As such, two-handed warriors will often end up using it for most of the early game and probably a large part of the midgame as well.
  • Informed Ability: Characters in Inquisition just won't shut up about the Grey Wardens' legendary combat prowess, yet the ones you fight aren't any stronger than the other types of human foot soldiers in the game. They even suffer from Cutscene Incompetence: when the Inquisition lays siege to Adamant Fortress, the defending Wardens get curbstomped by bog-standard Inquisition soldiers in one-on-one combat, with only their summoned demons putting up any resistance worth mentioning.
    • If you have an antagonistic relationship with Solas, and choose to argue with him about whether he should be doing more to help people, he will refute you by saying that you could give the elves Halamshiral back, but you haven't. At no point in the game, before or after this conversation, is there an option to make such a choice about Halamshiral.
  • Instant Messenger Pigeon: Leliana maintains a virtual fleet of extremely reliable, competent messenger ravens. They adore her, and some of them will obey only her. Ambient dialogue indicates she also gives one to Cullen later in the game.
  • Instant Runes: The Ice Mine and Fire Mine spells conjure these instead of physical devices; any enemy that steps on them will learn to regret it. Other mage abilities, like Energy Barrage for instance, have similarly elaborate runes as part of their casting animations.
  • Insult Backfire: Any banter between Sera and Vivienne will usually start with the former trying to take down the latter, only to have Vivienne be either complimented or turn the prank back around at Sera.
    • Sera attempts to goad Varric into a fight (or a possibly start a game of 'Your People Are Shit'), only for him to agree without hesitation that dwarves are weird.
  • Interface Spoiler:
    • The Player Character is not crowned Inquisitor until a certain section in the game, so before that all NPCs and party members refer to them as “Herald of Andraste” or just “Herald” in greetings and combat shouts. The game slips up a few times, though, with one of Vivienne’s greetings, a banter between her and Cole, a few minor NPCs calling you by the wrong title too early.
    • The PC-only talent tree of the same name is also unlocked before that point.
    • The War Table operation to gain access to the Black Emporium is available as soon as you unlock the war table in Haven, but it refers to the player character as "Inquisitor" and mentions the Big Bad's name. You don't become the Inquisitor or learn the Big Bad's name until much later in the game.
    • Loading screens seen just after the destruction of Haven show the exterior of Skyhold, even though the Inquisition hasn't gotten there yet.
    • In the quest journal, major quests have unique art pieces attached to them. If the player looks closely at the accompanying art for "In Your Heart Shall Burn," they'll realize that it's a picture of Cassandra, Solas, Varric, and the Inquisitor fleeing from the burning village of Haven. This is difficult to see, especially on smaller screens, but the art can be found online and in official books and it's not hard to compare them and realize which picture is being shown.
  • An Interior Decorator Is You: Most of the customization items you can acquire for Skyhold are purely cosmetic, although some of the decorating schemes do have codex entries attached to them.
  • Iron Lady: In addition to Vivienne (detailed on the character page), there's apparently Varric's editor. She runs half of the Kirkwall Coterie and once killed a man over a semicolon.
  • Irony:
    • If a Dalish Inquisitor wears a pattern of vallaslin honoring Mythal and then drinks from the Well of Sorrows, thus actually becoming bound to Mythal.
    • The Grey Wardens, an order founded to destroy the darkspawn, become the pawns of one of the oldest and strongest darkspawn of all - precisely because of the measures they took to become able to end Blights.
    • Blackwall lampshades the irony that he joined the Inquisition because they thought he was a Warden and would therefore be useful, and turned out to be useful to them only because he's not really a Warden - he wasn't affected by Corypheus's scheme.
    • If the Inquisitor romances Solas, in Trespasser he will reference the old Dalish curse "May the Dread Wolf take you," to which the romanced Inquisitor - a Dalish elf - can reply bitterly, "And so he did." The Dalish vilify Fen'Harel, and he became the Inquisitor's close confidant. It's doubly ironic if the Inquisitor is a mage; as their clan's First they were being trained to guard against the Dread Wolf. Solas hastens to qualify that he helped (and loved, however one defines it) the Inquisitor honestly, not through trickery.
  • Ironic Echo: During the Grey Warden arc, your first encounter with Erimond sees him give the Grey Wardens' creed a sinister twist by using "In death, sacrifice," to refer to blood sacrifice. And in the end of that arc, Clarel turns it around again as she's mortally wounded, reciting it before she blasts the pseudo-Archdemon with lightning. She falls to her death before she can recite the final third of the creed - but her actions bring the sentiment across.
  • Isometric Projection: Not technically isometric, but definitely a throwback to the isometric view in Baldur's Gate, the (PC-only) tactical overhead view from Origins returns in Inquisition for all platforms.
  • It Has Been an Honor:
    • Delivered to or by the Inquisitor and some companions before going to finish the Big Bad.
    • Said by Stroud if you choose to leave him behind in the Fade.
    • If Hawke is Diplomatic and is not left behind in the Fade, this is their farewell statement to the Inquisitor.
  • "It" Is Dehumanizing: Sera and Vivienne consider Cole to be an "it" and refuse to speak to "it."
  • It's Quiet… Too Quiet:
    • Parodied if you ask the dwarven barman what he thinks of current events.
      Barman: Quiet. Too quiet. No, wait. Just quiet enough.
    • Played completely straight by Cassandra if she's brought to the Shrine of Dumat. To the surprise of no one, extreme un-quietness ensues.
    • The Inquisitor is unsettled by the empty Chantry at Valence when they visit with Leliana. There is indeed something sinister waiting there.
    • In Trespasser, the active party members may start listing all the things that Varric complains about hating; according to Blackwall, "quiet" is one of them.
    • Several companions quote some version of this line when your party enters Chateau d'Onterre in the Emerald Graves, one of the creepiest levels in the game. Their worries are well-founded.

    J 
  • Jerkass Gods: The more the story reveals about the elven pantheon, the more it seems like only Mythal wasn't either terrible or useless. The youngest goddess, Ghilan'nain, filled the world with monsters, impressing everyone. Andruil went demon hunting until she started to become one herself and cause calamity and Mythal had to stop her. Elgar'nan almost destroyed the world because of a grudge until Mythal talked him out of it. Even Falon'din, who seems to be well loved, nearly wrecked the world out of sheer vanity and desire for more followers until, once again, Mythal stopped him. And then Mythal was betrayed and murdered and Fen'harel got blamed for locking away all the gods. There were a few gods who didn't cause much trouble, June the Craftsmaster being perhaps the most-mentioned example; but then again, it's explicitly stated that very few stories are told about him, implying that he didn't really do much at all (or that his stories were destroyed by the Tevinter Imperium because they had no use for them). Small wonder that Solas wants to keep anyone from being bound to the gods, though he seems somewhat more positive towards the Maker since the Maker doesn't do anything, assuming He even exists.
    • Trespasser sheds a bit more light on the situation. Suffice it to say that Fen'Harel did in fact lock away the gods in retaliation for Mythal's betrayal and death, by creating the Veil between the physical world and the Fade. And now he wants to pull it down.
  • Jerkass Has a Point: Aggressive jerk he may be, but Bann Teagan brings up many reasonable points regarding the problems actively caused by the Inquisition and the danger of private army that has no oversight which interferes with the inner workings of Orlais and Ferelden. His fears that the Inquisition is susceptible to corruption prove to be well-founded when it's shown that both the Qunari and Solas have completely infiltrated the organization with their spies and use them to further their goals while using the Inquisition as cover.
  • Joke Item: The "Victim of Fashion" amulet, which is your reward (using the term loosely) for completing the unlisted side quest "A Fragment of Inadequate Chain Mail." It gives one point to Cunning, and -100 to three forms of defense. It's virtually worthless, even as Shop Fodder, but the circumstances under which it's acquired are amusing enough to make it this trope.

    K 
  • Karma Houdini: Cole's personal quest involves confronting a Templar who was responsible for the original Cole starving to death through his negligence. Cole is ready to "kill him back"; the Inquisitor can promptly promise to help with the killing, but Solas and Varric agree that this is out of the question and dismiss the possibility out of hand. The worst that can happen to him is being shot at with an unloaded crossbow in order to teach Cole a valuable lesson about how revenge doesn't make you feel better. The other option is he gets spirit amnesia therapy, so he doesn't even remember what he did; admittedly, this is the path in which his contrition and remorse are verified and we're shown his Freudian Excuse.
  • Karma Meter: Your dialogue options and actions, such as asking for their input to a situation, will have your companions approve or disapprove. This also applies to your advisors, though it is hidden. Unlike other examples, choices that would gain disapproval are treated as equally viable, and some will be pleased with what you choose and others will be upset over the same thing. If their opinion of you drops too low, some of your companions will leave.
  • Kill on Sight: This is what happens to Hawke's secret informant within the Grey Wardens (depending on the world state, Stroud, Alistair, or Loghain). After he publicly challenges the Orlesian Warden-Commander Clarel's new policies, he is branded a traitor to be killed on sight by other Wardens. This forces him into hiding, where the Inquisition has to find him in order to discover the nature of said policies.
  • Killer Rabbit:
    • A farmer in the Hinterlands asks the Inquisitor to retrieve his colorful pet ram, Lord Woolsley, who has given the farmer's family good advice for generations. Attacking Lord Woolsley causes him to turn into a rage demon. Based on what we learn from Solas, about how demons are created when benevolent spirits become twisted, this would suggest that Lord Woolsley is the host of a spirit of valor.
    • To many players, the druffalo. Although they only attack when provoked, their charge attack (coupled with their hefty guard) has led to many deaths in both the single-player campaign and multiplayer. In some areas, such as Crestwood, it's very easy for them to wander into a conflict and become aggressive.
  • Kingmaker Scenario: The ball at the Winter Palace allows the Inquisitor to resolve the Orlesian civil war however they choose. Unlike previous scenarios in the series, there is no clear Golden Ending to work toward. The one that take the most effort lets the Inquisitor reveal that they have career-ending dirt on all parties and force them to work together, with the full knowledge that they remain in power only by the Inquisition's good graces; this only leads to them falling back into the same schemes once the game is over. Supporting Celene may or may not lead to stability, better rights for elves, and/or her continued support of the Inquisition, depending on how things are handled. In an unusual twist for this scenario, while Briala cannot rule Orlais herself, she can rule as a puppeteer ruler through Gaspard. However, Gaspard is still Emperor, and has a history of belligerently antagonizing rival nations like Nevarra and Ferelden.
  • Kneel Before Zod: The Elder One caps off his first big speech with this, and does it again before the final battle.
    The Elder One: Bow before your new God, and be spared.
  • Kukris Are Kool: Some daggers have a kukri model. Artistic License ensues, however, because they're thrusting daggers, while real-life kukris are better suited for chopping strokes (as kukris are essentially "knives that think they're hatchets").

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