Hopes for Dragon Age III

[votemarvel]

Laidlaw already said combat will be fast (exact words were "not lardy style like Origins"), so seems like you should be happy.

Good, I'm glad. Laidlaw looks to be on the same page with that, because I wholly agree with his "lardy style" interpretation of Origins. I want my characters too look like they are fighting not slowly and playfully reenacting or cuddle fighting.

Here's the weird thing.

Both games use the same combat.

Now don't get me wrong. The combat in Dragon Age II looks a lot better, the animations and special effects are brilliant, but it is still the exact same dice roll combat system as in Origins.

The hammering of a button in the console versions makes no difference to the damage you do, just set it to auto-attack and you'll be playing as if you were playing the first game, with the exception you now have a recharge timer on potions.

 

[Bombastuss]

Laidlaw already said combat will be fast (exact words were "not lardy style like Origins"), so seems like you should be happy.

Good, I'm glad. Laidlaw looks to be on the same page with that, because I wholly agree with his "lardy style" interpretation of Origins. I want my characters too look like they are fighting not slowly and playfully reenacting or cuddle fighting.

Here's the weird thing.

Both games use the same combat.

Now don't get me wrong. The combat in Dragon Age II looks a lot better, the animations and special effects are brilliant, but it is still the exact same dice roll combat system as in Origins.

The hammering of a button in the console versions makes no difference to the damage you do, just set it to auto-attack and you'll be playing as if you were playing the first game, with the exception you now have a recharge timer on potions.

I hope we get some middle ground between the two games.
The first one just looks sooooo slow most of the times but the second one is a wee bit over the top. Though I guess DA II does have a fairly good reason for it since the game is basically just Varric telling a story and he likes to exaggerate things somewhat.

Edit: Oh, and as for the original topic...

Not really sure what my hopes are. I really look forward to playing it at the very least. I had no real problems with DA II and I actually feel it did a few things better than the first game.
It still has it's flaws and DA:O is still the better game of the two but I honestly don't get all the hate for it.
But then I was poor when the game was actually released and didn't pick it up until like a year later.

 

[Sonic Doctor]

snip

Here's the weird thing.

Both games use the same combat.

Now don't get me wrong. The combat in Dragon Age II looks a lot better, the animations and special effects are brilliant, but it is still the exact same dice roll combat system as in Origins.

The hammering of a button in the console versions makes no difference to the damage you do, just set it to auto-attack and you'll be playing as if you were playing the first game, with the exception you now have a recharge timer on potions.

I don't know, it definitely looked like enemies were taking damage faster because of my main/basic attack in DA2. If it is the same speed wise in Origins, then they did a down right horrible job on attack animations, because I played a warrior in Origins this is how fast he swung his sword, bear in mind that you have to say each period at normal speed to show how long it took:

Swing . . hit . . . swing . . hit . . . (you get the point or period I should say)

Granted it is nit-picky, but for as much as an in depth fantasy RPG that people boast DA: Origins to be, it certainly didn't look like I was fighting like some great hero. It looked like I was fighting worse than a normal person that had just picked up a sword for the first time. The crappy looking combat is just one of the things that threw me off with the game, though it wasn't the only reason I couldn't keep playing after the first 25 hours.

I've swung a few real and weighted one handed swords in my life, and I at normal speed could swing at least 3 times faster than those animations in Origins.

Just by making things look more fluid and of course streamlining(not dumbing down) the abilities/leveling system, and making characters more likable with actually different personalities, is why I loved DA2 and was able to finish it twice. Origins may be some amazing RPG story and all, but I couldn't put up with the crap design and crap story choices I had problems with to get through it.

 

[gamernerdtg2]

I played through ME2 and DA2, without having the desire to go back play through DA Origins or pick up ME3.
I have no desire to play DA3 if that happens because the gameplay isn't all that great, and it's really about the story. You play for the story. I can watch the stories on YouTube.

I prefer games that are more engaging with the gameplay. I was totally hooked until I found out that the stories/romances can all be seen online for free.

 

[Chris Tian]

snip

Here's the weird thing.

Both games use the same combat.

Now don't get me wrong. The combat in Dragon Age II looks a lot better, the animations and special effects are brilliant, but it is still the exact same dice roll combat system as in Origins.

The hammering of a button in the console versions makes no difference to the damage you do, just set it to auto-attack and you'll be playing as if you were playing the first game, with the exception you now have a recharge timer on potions.

I don't know, it definitely looked like enemies were taking damage faster because of my main/basic attack in DA2. If it is the same speed wise in Origins, then they did a down right horrible job on attack animations, because I played a warrior in Origins this is how fast he swung his sword, bear in mind that you have to say each period at normal speed to show how long it took:

Swing . . hit . . . swing . . hit . . . (you get the point or period I should say)

I don't think votemarvel meant the combat is exactly the same, they just use the same "number crunching/dice roll" principle. Of course the combat was a lot faster in DA2, but it was basically the same as in DA:O just speeded up and with better animations.

I've swung a few real and weighted one handed swords in my life, and I at normal speed could swing at least 3 times faster than those animations in Origins.

I have actually some training with bladed weapons too, and a "real" (as real as you can get in training i should say) swordfight consists of maybe three cuts and two parades so games should definitely not come to close to that or you could finish every fight in DA3 combined in under half an hour

Except the combat in DA2 WAS dumbed down, they replaced the tactics from DAO with more action and it turned into a clusterfuck.

People played DAO because it was "lardy," people wanted an RPG that was a throw back to the DnD style turn based combat that earlier Bioware games had.

Bioware wanted to hit a larger audience so they made it more "action"ish, and failed miserably. People who want RPGs don't want an action game, they want a damn RPG.

I for one don't really care if its "lardy" tactical or action-ish, as long as its entertaining and well made.

I think that the combat felt dumbed down (in DA2) was a balancing issue. In DA:O you needed a Tank, a Healer, and two Damage Dealer in your party. You had to manage each one to do his job right to keep you party alive and the enemies dying. That was what gave the combat its depth and tactical challange, for me at least.
In DA2 they fucked that up by making damage king and having the mobs literally droping out of the sky.
Tanks are useless because you have way to much trouble drawing all the hate when the mobs can just appear everywhere on the map without warning, and they never reach the survivability they had in DA:O.
And since the game is fast paced and favors damage, it is possible and you are best of by killing everything so fast that it can't even dish out damage. That eliminates the need for a Healer.
So in the end you will most likely have a party of four Damage Dealers, and thus only manage one job four times. And that eliminates most of what made the combat fun. That its faster and action richer saved it for me for one playthrough, but after that it got a bit boring.

So all they have to do to combine, what i think are the best parts of both games(combat wise), is balance the system, so that you need to have a more diverse party again.

 

[Uncle Comrade]

I don't know, it definitely looked like enemies were taking damage faster because of my main/basic attack in DA2. If it is the same speed wise in Origins, then they did a down right horrible job on attack animations, because I played a warrior in Origins this is how fast he swung his sword, bear in mind that you have to say each period at normal speed to show how long it took:

Swing . . hit . . . swing . . hit . . . (you get the point or period I should say)

Granted it is nit-picky, but for as much as an in depth fantasy RPG that people boast DA: Origins to be, it certainly didn't look like I was fighting like some great hero. It looked like I was fighting worse than a normal person that had just picked up a sword for the first time. The crappy looking combat is just one of the things that threw me off with the game, though it wasn't the only reason I couldn't keep playing after the first 25 hours.

I've swung a few real and weighted one handed swords in my life, and I at normal speed could swing at least 3 times faster than those animations in Origins.

For me it's the opposite. While I can't say I loved the combat in Origins, I much preferred it over DA:2, where everyone just stood in place repeating a series of jerky arm movements while they waited for their abilities to cool down. It's like military training in Kirkwall was someone saying "If you get attacked, just swing your sword up, across then down repeatedly and let them walk into it."

Combat may have been a slow in Origins, but it least I felt like my characters were fighting an enemy, not just practicing their Sword Gymnastics routine. Not to mention the way a mage's staff now requires some sort of baton-twirling movements in order to shoot magic.

OT: I'd like for DA:3 to be a happy medium between the best parts of Origins and 2. That's what I'd like. What we'll probably get is the unholy spawn of Mass Effect and Skyrim.

 

[Joccaren]

What do I want from Dragon Age 3?
1. Most importantly, a change in art style from 2. Dear god that was horrible. I remember the battle for Ostagar in Origins. Sure, it wasn't graphically amazing, it looked alright still at 1440p, but it wasn't OMFG GRAPHIX!!. It did, however, fit the tone of the game brilliantly. Dark, serious, gritty - to an extent of course. All things in moderation.
DA2... It felt like I was watching a really badly animated anime from some novice company in Japan. The undead were the worst offenders, basic Qunari second worst, Darkspawn third, Deep Roads 4th - ect. Undead... They looked like goofy ducks waddling into combat at a ridiculously accelerated speed. Basic Qunari just looked meh. Wow, fauns/satyrs. Never seen them before. And it didn't fit at all with the Origin's look of them. The Arishok looked badass, everything else was meh. Darkspawn... See complaints about undead, but not quite as bad. Deep Roads - they hurt my eyes to look at. It was just... No. With the Frostbyte 2 Engine they should be able to get high graphical fidelity, move away from the cel shaded DA2 style, and hopefully give a HD Origins style, 'cause that looked good.
2. a) Combat needs to be toned down from 2. No air dropped enemies. No bullshit combos with 8 ministun enemies and a general so your whole party is permastunned unless you run out the door and stand your tank still in it. Slow it down a bit, and have auto-attack on by default, and have it actually work. I don't mind the swirling mage staff so much, if its toned down a bit. Everything else just looks like amateur action swordfights in bad anime, where things are ridiculously over the top for no reason. More grounded would be nice.
2. b) Classes need to be better balanced so they're all useful, and you require different party makeups for different situations. Additionally rogues should not be your DPS assassin class straight off the bat. Utility class for checking traps, unlocking chests, setting traps and openning new areas - all of which there need to be more of too - with combat on the side, later specialising in more combat oriented classes. Also, more even party makeup. Not just one healer, for the love of god, give me some variety.
3. Level design needs to be largely improved. As said above, more traps, locked chests and hidden areas. Additionally no recycling areas, and more puzzles like at the Andraste place in Origins. Some more interactivity with the environment in general is needed really, and enemies need to be pre-placed in each level to be encountered by the party, rather than spawning in waves.
4. Customisation of party members. I get why they took it out - people didn't like having the character's default looks replaced with things that made them look odd. I don't care, it made the game a lot less interesting. A better crafting system would be nice too, and more interesting enchantments.
5. More dialogue options, and no dialogue wheel. The dialogue wheel was a stupid move, as was sacrificing dialogue choices for a voiced protagonist. We don't need Commander Shepard in the middle ages, we need an old school RPG character that we make, and if you need to sacrifice their voice for more lines of dialogue so be it. I'd rather have more options in what to say than have them all voiced. Additionally, telling me what each option will do is kinda cheating the roleplaying aspect. Seeing that one option is labelled good automatically colours my interpretation of how it will go down with the other person, whereas in Origins I made a joke with Alistair about being king and he was offended by it. In 2 that wouldn't have been possible as I would have seen it, and seen its negative connotation, and not been able to pick it. Also nice to be able to read exactly what I will say, rather than "Here's a general idea that is actually nothing like what you say".

More stuff I'd like, but I CBF typing it all up. I'll wait for this one to come through, likely skip it 'cause its crap [Knowing Bioware these days], and wait for Star Citizen to be released.

 

[Dendio]

After the one two punch of Dragon Age 2 and Mass Effect 3, I've kinda given up hope on Bioware as a whole. Maybe it'll be good. Hell, I WANT it to be good. But I'm not going to kid myself.

Mass effect 3 was great. Dragons age 2 had the skeleton of a great game. My main issue with DA2 was the underdeveloped romances, re-use of and overall lack of environments and the comparatively short overall game length/lack of re playability.

DA2 was still better than 80 percent of the industry imo, but other rpgs like witcher 2, mass effect 3 and even deus ex human revolution blow it out of the water

 

[Chris Tian]

4. Customisation of party members. I get why they took it out - people didn't like having the character's default looks replaced with things that made them look odd. I don't care, it made the game a lot less interesting.

I saw a video (dont have a link sorry) where they (some Bioware guy at some con) talked about this and it seemed like they will solve that pretty well, by making pieces of armor look different on each party member. So you have both customisation and distinct looks.

5. More dialogue options, and no dialogue wheel. The dialogue wheel was a stupid move, as was sacrificing dialogue choices for a voiced protagonist.

I think it's EXTREMLY unlikely that they will go back on that

and wait for Star Citizen to be released.

What is that? Haven't heard of it yet and if its your substitute for DA3 it might be interesting.

After the one two punch of Dragon Age 2 and Mass Effect 3, I've kinda given up hope on Bioware as a whole. Maybe it'll be good. Hell, I WANT it to be good. But I'm not going to kid myself.

Mass effect 3 was great. Dragons age 2 had the skeleton of a great game. My main issue with DA2 was the underdeveloped romances, re-use of and overall lack of environments and the comparatively short overall game length/lack of re playability.

DA2 was still better than 80 percent of the industry imo, but other rpgs like witcher 2, mass effect 3 and even deus ex human revolution blow it out of the water

I agree with your points that ME3 and DA2 were not bad games. And definitively not that bad as it would make me loose all faith in Bioware's abilities. I think they are still perfectly capable of producing great games. The question is will they use their capabilities to the fullest and create a great game with what their great at, or try to hit as many focus tested hot buttons as possible and most likely fail at that.

 

[CloudAtlas]

1. Most importantly, a change in art style from 2. Dear god that was horrible. I remember the battle for Ostagar in Origins. Sure, it wasn't graphically amazing, it looked alright still at 1440p, but it wasn't OMFG GRAPHIX!!. It did, however, fit the tone of the game brilliantly. Dark, serious, gritty - to an extent of course. All things in moderation.

Could you describe what you liked about the art style so much? I found the style to be very bland and generic, and I have been genuinely puzzled why so few reviews agreed with my sentiment, why so many people liked it so much. Was there something I just didn't see?
Lothering with its few green pastures looked like any other "starting village". Orzimmar looked like WoW's Ironforge, just cut in half. The outfits of the Dalish Elves were just plain ugly, even by the low standard of the general "wood elf look", and their forest... that's supposed to be a deep, mysterious, menacing forest? Redcliffe was just a village with a castle, just like any other village with a castle. The mage tower was just a library with tons of books, nothing mysterious or anything about it. The elven slums were, I don't know, I guess they looked a bit shabbier than the rest of Denerim, but not like an actual slums. Denerim, or what little you could see of it, was just a "medieval" city like any other city, nothing remotely interesting about it. To be honest, I thought Kirkwall was a big improvement... or what little you could see of it.
And that's just the locations. The characters, their look, their hairstyles, their clothing, were no different. As for armor and weapons, there wasn't much that looked really distinct. The enemies, well, with the darkspawn I was fighting some kind of zombie orcs with funny names that were commanded by a demon that looks like a dragon... hm...

Almost everything I saw in Dragon Age: Origins, I have seen before, or after, just better, stylistically. And I haven't consumed that much fantasy.

Again, I want to emphasize that I don't say your view is bullshit or something like that, I'm genuinely wondering about what there was that so many many people seem to like. Because it's not that I just didn't like the art style of the game, I felt like that there was little style at all... it all just looked, well, bland.

 

[TheRookie8]

Dragon Age 3 needs more connections to the unanswered questions of the original story.

Dragon Age 3 needs less endless mobs and more strategic combat.

Dragon Age 3 needs companions who are a little more relevant to the plot.

Dragon Age 3 needs some kick-ass specializations.

Dragon Age 3 needs a singular, focused narrative.

Dragon Age 3 needs to forget about re-using environments.

Dragon Age 3 needs to forget about being able to sleep with everyone.

Dragon Age 3 needs no underwear during sex.

Dragon Age 3 needs more bosses and more diverse enemies.

Dragon Age 3 needs a more open world.

Dragon Age 3 needs customized armor.

Dragon Age 3 needs Nevarra, Antiva and Tevinter.

But most importantly...Dragon Age 3 needs Varric, Oghren & Sigrun.

 

[Chris Tian]

Almost everything I saw in Dragon Age: Origins, I have seen before, or after, just better, stylistically. And I haven't consumed that much fantasy.

Did you like the DA2 style a lot better? In my opinion both did their job but are nothing to write home about, DA:O is just generic fantasy and in DA2 it seems someone spilled some anime in the generic fantasy mush.

Dragon Age 3 needs more connections to the unanswered questions of the original story.

A big HELL YES! to that.

Dragon Age 3 needs no underwear during sex.

This on the other hand i couldn't care less about, i like to keep my porn seperated from my games anyway.

But most importantly...Dragon Age 3 needs Varric, Oghren & Sigrun.

You seem to have a type there

 

[Joccaren]

I think it's EXTREMLY unlikely that they will go back on that

Oh, I agree, but I can dream.

What is that? Haven't heard of it yet and if its your substitute for DA3 it might be interesting.

Will depend on what you're into. If you're looking for an old school RPG, its not going to do the trick. Is something that looks interesting at the least, and is the main thing my friends and I are waiting to be fully released, seeing as sadly only the Single Player Campaign and probably the MMO alpha/beta are likely to release next year.
Basic run down; PC Space Sim that presently looks like it'll be amazing. Trusted too often on that before for me to have complete faith in that, but W/E.
Website for more info; https://robertsspaceindustries.com/star-citizen/

Could you describe what you liked about the art style so much?

Mostly that it fit what it was trying to be, and whilst it was generic it worked well. I like walking into a medieval town and having it be a medieval town, having a school be a school, a forest a forest. Most of what I didn't like about DA2's style was that it was overly stylised to the point of looking silly. You could not take any of the game seriously after seeing an undead walk. Its like some guy coming on stage to talk about depression in youth how to contact support groups, and starting by making a series of black jokes. The city itself I didn't mind too much, but stylisation for the sake of it is something I'm not a fan of. DA:O tried to be somewhat serious, and its art style reflected that. Its been done before, but sometimes that's good. A lot of its issues in the art department, beyond being a retread of what's already been done, came from the lack of overall attention to detail like you see in games like the new Deus Ex - where you can walk into an office, look at a table, and see hundreds of individual items that make the world feel alive. Could be that they didn't have time for that, could be hardware limitations. I don't mind a style being retread so long as it fits the game though.
Characters I'll agree on though. The clothes were the most different they looked fairly often, and apart from things like Morrigan's signature clothes they weren't too different from each other. Definitely prefered characters like Isabella's design in the second, she looked more like a pirate and less like a non-descript NPC, and that's something that should be taken to DA3. Just not the ridiculously comedic walk and look of the undead, or the really abused accent that all the elves have...

 

[Sp3ratus]

I for one don't really care if its "lardy" tactical or action-ish, as long as its entertaining and well made.

I think that the combat felt dumbed down (in DA2) was a balancing issue. In DA:O you needed a Tank, a Healer, and two Damage Dealer in your party. You had to manage each one to do his job right to keep you party alive and the enemies dying. That was what gave the combat its depth and tactical challange, for me at least.
In DA2 they fucked that up by making damage king and having the mobs literally droping out of the sky.
Tanks are useless because you have way to much trouble drawing all the hate when the mobs can just appear everywhere on the map without warning, and they never reach the survivability they had in DA:O.
And since the game is fast paced and favors damage, it is possible and you are best of by killing everything so fast that it can't even dish out damage. That eliminates the need for a Healer.
So in the end you will most likely have a party of four Damage Dealers, and thus only manage one job four times. And that eliminates most of what made the combat fun. That its faster and action richer saved it for me for one playthrough, but after that it got a bit boring.

So all they have to do to combine, what i think are the best parts of both games(combat wise), is balance the system, so that you need to have a more diverse party again.

DA2 had much, much better balance than DA:O. Your best bet in DA:O was to go 4 mages, because they were so ridicously overpowered and you almost didn't need any of those 4 to be a healer, since you could just potion spam the 5 or so different potions, since they all had different cooldowns. DA2 balances out the classes much better to make it much more viable to pick different setups.

Furthermore, having a pure damage setup, at least while playing on nightmare, is a sure-fire to get you killed, faster than you can say "DA2 has no tactical elements whatsoever". Tanks aren't useless in DA2, if you spec them properly and play them correctly/configure the tactics screen well enough. My latest playthrough had my Hawke as a tank and I ended up with about with something like 85% magic resistance and also having 100% resistance in both fire and frost schools. Threat really isn't a problem, since you have taunt and presences to help you with drawing mobs toward the tank and not the damage dealers and healer. I've had this discussion many times before on this site and while I can understand disliking the faster combat, I still can't wrap my head around people saying that the game doesn't feature tactical combat.

Mobs dropping from the sky I understand why some might dislike it, but the way I see it, it adds an extra consideration to the combat situation, namely that of repositioning. DA:O had none of that. Repositioning forces you to have to think about where your companions are at all times and not just let them stand in a corner. Waves also force you to not just go all out at the beginning, but to think about conserving cooldowns, since you might have to burn a very dangerous enemy down, as soon as it enters the battlefield, which might come in wave 3 or 4. And to that point, having mobs that actually require immediate attention, lest they wipe out your entire party quickly is not something I remember there being in DA:O, at least not something you commonly ran into. Immunities are also way more common in DA2 than in DA:O, with there being 11 for DA:O and 28 for DA2.

I get a lot of the criticism towards DA2, I really do and agree with a lot of it as well, like the recycled dungeons for instance and would like it, if they address those criticism in DA3, but I really don't get the accusation of DA2 not having tactical/"dumbed down" combat. To my mind, DA2 features tactical combat, just as much as DA:O does as well as having even more challenging encounters than DA:O.

What I hope for DA3 is that they keep the combat interesting, maybe tone down the waves a bit and not use them for every encounter(the DLC gives a good indication that that might be the case), more varied locations, a good voice actress for female version(I'm thinking Laura Bailey) and even more challenging encounters than in DA2.

 

[Chris Tian]

DA2 had much, much better balance than DA:O.

That's probably more a opinion than a fact, i hoped to have clarified that for me/in my opinion, DA2 has balancing issues.

Your best bet in DA:O was to go 4 mages, because they were so ridicously overpowered

If your talking about the Arcane Mage, thats completly true. But if you don't use him thats sort of fixed. I know thats still a fault but more easily ignored, than the problems i had with DA2's combat.

Furthermore, having a pure damage setup, at least while playing on nightmare, is a sure-fire to get you killed, faster than you can say "DA2 has no tactical elements whatsoever".

Thats just not true, i played through DA2 on NM now multiple times and my glass canon team (Merril, Anders, Varric FM/BM, Hawke all speced for dmg) nukes everything out of existence so hard and fast that i can't say "DA2 has no tactical elements whatsoever" before the last enemy rains down in pieces.

Tanks aren't useless in DA2, if you spec them properly and play them correctly/configure the tactics screen well enough. My latest playthrough had my Hawke as a tank and I ended up with about with something like 85% magic resistance and also having 100% resistance in both fire and frost schools. Threat really isn't a problem, since you have taunt and presences to help you with drawing mobs toward the tank and not the damage dealers and healer. I've had this discussion many times before on this site and while I can understand disliking the faster combat, I still can't wrap my head around people saying that the game doesn't feature tactical combat.

Okay that are my opinions again, but i found fights to be over ALOT faster and easier if i speced my Warriors for damage with a Vanguard/Berserker/Reaver setup and only having two tank-y abilities (taunt, to use in the rare tight spots, and shield defence, to never use and get the other parts of the tree).
The resistances just meant i had to change my mages staff every now and again.
An the parachuting enemies, oh my god for f*cks sake i hated them. I see your point, and why you liked the challange they might add to a fight. But nothing annoyed me more as when i cleard a room behind me and out of nowhere a group of mobs would spawn there, even if they all exploded into little pieces in seconds. If they would have come running from somewhere off screen okay but literally dropping out of the sky, that stinks of lazy development.

 

[Sp3ratus]

Thats just not true, i played through DA2 on NM now multiple times and my glass canon team (Merril, Anders, Varric FM/BM, Hawke all speced for dmg) nukes everything out of existence so hard and fast that i can't say "DA2 has no tactical elements whatsoever" before the last enemy rains down in pieces.

Really? Even in fights like Xebenkeck, Beacon/Gifre/Bysmor, the High Dragon, Hybris or the fights before the Nexus Golem? I'm not doubting it's entirely possible to nuke down the regular fights, like the gangs at night and the like, that come up every so often, but I'd be a bit surprised if it was possible to do the same on some of the more challenging encounters. I don't want it to seem like I'm accusing you of lying, I'm really just surprised to hear that, if that is indeed the case, because I can't really imagine it myself, without cheesing the encounters(like running away).

Okay that are my opinions again, but i found fights to be over ALOT faster and easier if i speced my Warriors for damage with a Vanguard/Berserker/Reaver setup and only having two tank-y abilities (taunt, to use in the rare tight spots, and shield defence, to never use and get the other parts of the tree).

I don't really have much of a response to this, since that's your personal experience with it. The way I experienced it, was that without a proper tank, it was easy to get overwhelmed, with lots of damage coming in from different sources. I am curious, however, as to how the above worked out in the encounters I mentioned earlier.

An the parachuting enemies, oh my god for f*cks sake i hated them. I see your point, and why you liked the challange they might add to a fight. But nothing annoyed me more as when i cleard a room behind me and out of nowhere a group of mobs would spawn there, even if they all exploded into little pieces in seconds. If they would have come running from somewhere off screen okay but literally dropping out of the sky, that stinks of lazy development.

I agree, it's lazy design to just have them rain out of the sky and could and indeed should've been handled better. I like the system as you've probably picked up from my previous post, but yes, it could've been handled better. The DLC doesn't make use of the waves system to the same extent as DA2 proper does, but when the waves system is in place, it makes much more sense than enemies just dropping from the sky.

 

[Chris Tian]

Thats just not true, i played through DA2 on NM now multiple times and my glass canon team (Merril, Anders, Varric FM/BM, Hawke all speced for dmg) nukes everything out of existence so hard and fast that i can't say "DA2 has no tactical elements whatsoever" before the last enemy rains down in pieces.

Really? Even in fights like Xebenkeck, Beacon/Gifre/Bysmor, the High Dragon, Hybris or the fights before the Nexus Golem? I'm not doubting it's entirely possible to nuke down the regular fights, like the gangs at night and the like, that come up every so often, but I'd be a bit surprised if it was possible to do the same on some of the more challenging encounters. I don't want it to seem like I'm accusing you of lying, I'm really surprised to hear that, if that is indeed the case, because I can't really imagine it myself, without cheesing the encounters(like running away).

The whole nexus golem thing can be cleared in under three minutes, i think the hardest fight is that thing with the evil books in act 2 i don't remember the name. But even that is not so bad.
You can aviod most of the damage in the big boss battles with crowd control and not standing right in front of them. They do alot of these big special moves, and those are mostly easily evaded. CC-abilities can render hybris for example completly incapable of anything for the most part of the 2 1/2 minutes it takes to kill him.
The big Dragon has one very annoying spell that always hits one of your guys if i remember correctly, but doesn't use it too often so you can deal with that with potions and/or Anders one healing spell.
Now i have to admit that i am not sure if i killed ALL of the bosses you mentioned with the glass canon team or swaped some teammates around at some point, but i definitly built all my Hawkes and their companions for maximum damage every time.
I'm not trying to come across as if im super awesome at DA2 or anything, its just what a full damage party setup is capable of.

On the Warrior:

with lots of damage coming in from different sources

There is never really such a thing, everything short of bosses or really tough elites explodes into red mist as soon as it drops on the battlefield and even the elites go down fast with the CCC-damage you can pile on them.
And i must say i never noticed that much difference in terms of pure survivability between a Warrior who is speced for tanking and thoughness and a Warrior who is speced for making red mist. Maybe the former can take more, but the later takes less because the mobs don't live long enough do do much damage.

For me the hardest time in the game is the time in act 1 before you are able to deal the kinds of damage you need to obliterate everything that looks at you funny and their immidiate family.

So in conclusion there are two main points that make me think "unbalanced" when i think of DA2's combat:
1. The game is a lot more chalanging in the first few hours than for the complete remaining game.
2. In my experience a full on damage dealer party is fastly superior to everything else i tried.

 

[CloudAtlas]

Did you like the DA2 style a lot better? In my opinion both did their job but are nothing to write home about, DA:O is just generic fantasy and in DA2 it seems someone spilled some anime in the generic fantasy mush.

Yes, I liked it better overall, although not everything was great. The "watercolor style" they tried to use here gives the game a somewhat lighter, softer look. The result looks still quite basic (compared to Guild Wars 2's Divinity's Reach, for example), but it's something. Kirkwall has some character, with its history as slave city, in particular in the Gallows. The city is sort of white, light, so its at least not your generic medieval middle European city. There are some somewhat scenic views outside the city. Nothing like, say, Skyrim, or even BioWare's own Mass Effect 3, but still more than in DA:O. The Qunari don't just look like big humans anymore, and the elves like small humans with pointy ears. And the Dalish armors aren't that ugly anymore either.

However, the endless recycling is really an issue here that runs through everything. It's hard to like the exact same view you have already seen countless times before, if you have been in the same damn cave/warehouse/etc countless times before. All the Qunari of one "type" look identical, same as all elven workers. I know other games are no different here, but the more lifelike, the more detailed characters get, the more this hurts. All these tormented statues in the gallows are identical (I believe). And so on. And if Lowtown and Darktown are supposed to be the bad quarters of the city, why are they so clean and spacious? Why are the ceilings of many buildings there like 4-5 meters high? And where are all the refugees who were the reason why Hawke wasn't allowed to enter the city in the first place? How different Mass Effect 3 felt in this regard. And this elven guy with white hair looks like he came right from Final Fantasy or something. And speaking of elves, why the hell are all elves barefoot now? Apparently they see the need for clothing to protect other body parts (hell, Merrill is a mage and wears chainmail, where do you see that), so why are their feet bare?
I also thought that style of the menues with their highly stylized buttons in popping colors doesn't fit to a fantasy game. A simple and clean look is totally fine (I like my interfaces as unintrusive as possible), but it should be appropriate for the genre, not like Zelda. Rather like Skyrim, for instance.

But yea, overall I liked DA2's style more than its predecessor's. A lot of what I didn't like about DA2 can be attributed to lazy or rushed development, so that makes me mildly hopeful for DA3 in this department. I'm not expecting visual orgasms, but with some reasonable improvements, it would be okay for me.

 

[CloudAtlas]

Dragon Age 3 needs to forget about being able to sleep with everyone.

I preferred ME3's approach as well - some straight, some bisexual, some gay/lesbian. To my mind, this gives the characters a better defined personality. Although I understand, and applaud, the reason why BioWare did this in DA2 - only few potential love interest, so at least make them accessible to anyone.

Dragon Age 3 needs no underwear during sex.

I found removing my underwear to be quite helpful for, uhm, performing the act, but perhaps the peoples of Ferelden are built differently down there?

But seriously. They just need better romance scenes in general. However much BioWare will decide to show, what they do show should be, well, at least not creepy. I never understood why they didn't apply more care here, be it in the Dragon Age or the Mass Effect franchise. I mean, getting laid is a goal that probably does not rank much lower than saving the world for a fair share of players.