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i do think the ancient arlathan outfits could be 200% sluttier

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I love his hands. All the ways. The Professor really knows how to put his anatomy lessons to practical use. A personal grievance with Ficbook: this drawing didn’t make it past moderation because of its “sexual content.”

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whatever, go my undead horde 👉👉👉👉

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ain't this how veilguard kinda started

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Solavellassan ❖ Ancient Arlathan AU ❖ Slow Burn ❖ 2.2k

He is tired of being underground. 

There is no amount of sand or incense that can keep the days from blurring into sludge, one bleeding into the next into an endless parade of featureless darkness. Even the scouts’ reports blend into a single refrain: it is dark. It is empty. There is nothing to see.

like the love that discovered the sin - ch 9 | from the beginning

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listen, i've joked about wisps being basically spirit-infants but i just want my twilight reference and for solas to scream at emmrich the top of his fucking lungs, ok?

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i saw a solavellan-lover hater talk about how solavellans are delulu who think solas is a perfect princess angel. and like. no. we don't. we know he's a massive bastard. we just don't care. pookie. that's the thing. we love his dastardly ways. his villainous behavior. his evil deeds. it's part of a character we love because we love pain and tragedy. lmfao. delulu? we are very grounded in the reality that solas is a massive asshole. there is actually a lot of conflict among the more thoughtful solavellan-lovers about the fact that he's such an irredeemable fuckass but such a lush in love. solavellan-lovers are just Romantics with a capital R.

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Well this fucked my shit up.

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The Dread Wolf is a figure in Fae Lore!

I did NOT know this! And google completely failed me!

Please help! I desperately need to know ALL the details!

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i'm always gazing into the distance thinking about city elves bc, despite bioware forgetting them entirely, there's stuff like this dagger from the tabris origin in dao:

elves are not allowed to own weapons in denerim to begin with. so this means that they went to SIGNIFICANT effort to keep this thing at all.

it survived hundreds of years from the dales collapsing to the present day thedas, with the name and story attached, despite the various displacements and woes the elves went through in between then.

the fact that it's named after fen'harel, and yet has this positive connotation of defending a home rather than betraying allies, is huge actually! like that's wild. not only did the city elves remember fen'harel at all As A Concept despite their forced conversion to andrastianism, they ended up with a very different view of it than the dalish.

i would argue that given how the city elves are always struggling under corrupt and brutal nobility, they might have retained a stronger cultural memory of the arlathan rebellion as a positive thing in their stories. and the dalish clans are technically descended from dales nobility too, so that would also have an effect on their ideology?

FURTHERMORE. if we assume there were multiple felassan-style immortal elves running around, with varying loyalties and agendas, then... i am once more on my "the dalish Historical Misinformation Nightmare has been fomented intentionally by immortal elf agents to keep them worshiping the evanuris" ted talk.

which also explains why the city elves didn't get affected by that! bc... the type of immortal elf who would be an evanuris partisan, would also see the city elves as hopeless and not even worth the trouble to influence.

THIS is how the city elves can still win-

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Me: Aw, he's so cute, trying to deny his soft side. I adore him. 🥰

Davrin: *bedroom voice* Hunting, being hunted... which do you have in mind?

Me: ABORT!

As an asexual, I was very much into Davrin's reluctant-dad troupe. But then his romance turns into hunter/prey dynamic, and I hard 180 noped out of that and into Bellara.😅

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Just adding my two cents, but I didn't personally read Solas's visceral, curling in on himself reaction to be due to Mythal.

When he first sees Mythal, he looks like a sad wet cat man, but that's it. (And this the first time he's seen her since he killed her, so this seems perfectly accurate, imo.)

They have a whole back and forth with each other before we get to the curling in on himself reaction. and he's relatively composed.

Mythal: I pulled you from the Fade you loved and sent you into war. I used your wisdom as a weapon... and it broke you.

Even Solas's "The things that I have done", he doesn't seem broken down yet.

Mythal: Are not for you to bear alone my friend. The many wrongs we did, we did together.

We don't see him breaking down until the "We did together" part, and she's so far away from him at this point.

To me, this whole scene is about getting Solas to let go of the pain of regrets, and that's never been something he's been able to do. Mythal's words are telling him: You are not alone in this. All this pain isn't yours to carry. And that's so incredibly difficult for him to process.

He's been carrying all of this and blaming no one but himself for thousands of years. Of course, he's going to have a visceral reaction to having someone who was there, who participated in those regrets, who he himself killed, telling him that pain isn't deserved and to let it go.

The dagger represents Solas's regrets. He created it to sunder the titans, Mythal was killed with it, he drew her essence from it and then never spoke to that essence again, he used it to create the Veil, he killed Varric with it - all of Solas's mistakes are tied up in this thing and he's trying to give it to Mythal. He's begging her to take this pain and these regrets from him. He doesn't want them anymore!

And then she does exactly what he's asking.

Mythal: I release you from my service.

So many of the things Solas did and regrets, he did at Mythal's behest. And in the final moment, she takes responsibility for those things. She takes those regrets and lets him go.

Finally, he is free.

This scene is about Solas healing. Mythal helps him to do that.

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Davrin: *angry* He doesn't the deserve the honor-!

Me: *at the First Warden*

First Warden: I should be the one to die killing the archdemon!

Me:

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Tagged: Peter Cushing, you whores behold the glory, he ran at those curtains and tore them down by his own choice, I may be thin but you’ll break first.

Dayum!

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I've seen so many posts about how Varric's death is cheap, a poor twist, disrespectful to his character, etc. But I can't disagree harder.

First off, there seems to be an idea in Fandom that characters can only die in ways that matter or are effective in order for a death to be "respectful." And it's such a shallow way of looking at death. I get the idea of Varric dying for "nothing" being upsetting. But that doesn't make the manner of his death "disrespectful" to who he is.

Varric 100% walks into the situation with Solas knowing he could die and deciding that the risk is worth it. He cares about Solas. He has to try to help him. And if he plays with his life, then he's willing to do that. Varric would happily pay that cost for the sake of a friend.

The fact that his death happens in a manner that he chooses and is 100% in line with his character... I don't know how you get more respectful than that. Varric has always been willing to bend over backwards for his friends - secretly paying off the Carta to keep Anders and Merrill safe during DA2, admitting to Inky in DAI that he's a terrible spy master because he has to make sure everyone's families are okay. Varric cares SO MUCH. Of course, he'd willingly give his life trying to sway Solas. It doesn't matter that he wasn't successful in that attempt. What matters is that he tried. He's willing to risk it all and pays the price, and he still tells Rook to try to talk Solas down. Because that's who Varric is.

Varric's death is fucking perfect. I'm sorry.

As far as the "twist" of Varric's death, I agree the twist of "he's been dead the whole time" in and of itself rings hollow. But I don't believe that's why the devs wanted Rook believing Varric is still alive.

The point is that Rook needs Varric. There's so many times that they go to him for advice and support. And there's dialogue options between them that show Rook wasn't ready for the responsibility of leading the team. In the Fade, they tell him they couldn't have done all this without him (to which Varric replies they already did). Even when they believe Varric is in the infirmary, they tell Varric they're only taking over until he gets better. At other talks, they'll mention needing him out in the field. The point of Varric being secretly dead the whole time allows Rook an outlet for voicing their insecurities.

Rook believing Varric is alive also enables them to push forward and lead the team because they believe they're only doing so temporarily. And they aren't dealing with the grief of Varric's passing like Harding is. They think Varric will get back up and take over soon, and that enables them to step up in a way that no one else could have.

Varric's death is 100% true to character

Rook thinking Varric is alive allows them to (1) go to him with their doubts; (2) tackle their fear of being in charge, believing it will only be temporary; and (3) be on task without needing to grieve first.

Rook believing Varric is alive allows a first-time player of Dragon Age to connect with Varric rather than having someone they don't know die at the beginning with no emotional pay out.

I personally think the way Varric's death is handled is hecking brilliant.

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No wonder the man is f*cking thirsty. He's been deprived of affection for a thousand x a thousand years.

We all like to poke affectionate fun at Solas's first flirt line being "I'll protect you" from Lavellan. And yeah, it's pretty cute. But also, in light of Veilguard...

The guy had to deal with ass-hats for a millennia who I'm sure not even once bothered to ask him how his day was going. Solas was used at worst and ignored at best FOR. A. MILLENNIA.

Then he waged war against the ass-hats - not because he wanted to - but because someone freaking had to.

And then here comes along sweet, naive, Dalish-girl Lavellan who doesn't have a clue who she's talking to, and she promises to protect him against the ass-hats of the world.

My guy hasn't had one decent thing said to him in his entire physical existence, and she swears she'll fight the whole f*cking Chantry for him. My dude is wrecked. His soul is shattered.

And he gets away with a soft little "thank you" and just manages not to give away how deeply touched he is.

*I AM GNAWING AT THE BARS OF MY ENCLOSURE!*

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Cole: It's not abuse if I ask. Solas: Not always true.

This conversation and the fact that they cut dialogue of Solas calming the Inquisitor's panic attack (I think after facing Envy?) just rattles me.

Like... have you actually been to therapy, my dude? Where did you learn this?