#rainier (posts)

[orofeaiel]

Towering Trees

[exhausted-archivist]

Concepts that I didn’t want to think about but my brain won’t shut off:

1) Cullen should have been a companion vs advisor. The man likes to be active and do things. He’s not a papers guy. Plus while popular most people (statistically) do not know his whole story so he is really easy to explore for both new and old players.

2) We could explore his trauma from dao-da2 while also seeing him work on his recovery - his story would continue to NOT be about redemption, but about working on his sobriety and de-radicalization.

3) By having Cullen as a companion and exploring his story, it would have really brought forward the previously established nuance of the Templars. It would have put the humanization of the Templars front and center - the stuff that’s been buried in codices and ambient dialogue and banter for the past two games. One of those “shouldn’t be the cheese is under the sauce” topics to be honest.

4) Blackwall would have been better suited for the Commander role. He’s led troops before, he “has” wings of valor. As a grey warden it would have still fit his role as remaining non-political because the Wardens are still Andrastian and most of Thedas doesn’t count that as a reason to bar people. Would further push the “Chantry is overstepping their bounds” while also pushing the claim that the Inquisition is NOT Chantry affiliated. Would have made the reveal much juicier.

5) If you did swap Cassandra with Cullen, Cassandra would still pop up in the field. It is weird for a commander to not travel where they’re needed for the army. Plus Cassandra likes to physically handle problems. She’d help establish new keeps, strengthen the Inquisition’s hold else where, investigate the missing seekers, ect. It would also stop the conflict of her only having Templar abilities which as a Seeker she shouldn’t have the same abilities. Similar but different.

6) Even if Cullen stayed as commander we should have seen him in the field more. He is a strategist, a leader, and used to being hands on. Plus he’s too afraid of not having control because he’s never been in control so he’d be traveling just to make sure he was giving his all to the Inquisition like he did the Chantry but also not being like Meredith.

[animezinglife]

Dragon Age: Inquisition + Tumblr text posts Part 2/? (Part 1)

[emmavakarian-theirin]

ah yes i do love these bad ideas

[breadedsinner]

"Blackwall just kept lying, zero fucks given," actually the crux of Blackwall's character is that he had many fucks to give.

[abyssal-ilk]

vivienne: "how ironic that i thought you were irrelevant as a grey warden, and you weren't even that."

blackwall: "ah, the lady finds me funny! i have some use after all."

vivienne: "from warden to jester! what a tremendous journey."

blackwall: "indeed, i count myself quite lucky."

blackwall: "few of us have the privilege of setting aside our masks, don't you think?"

there's something wrong with the both of them and it's so great, truly

[biancadavri]

Hey, was the scene where a romanced Blackwall, still in shackles, slowly climbs the few steps in front of the Inquisitor's throne and declaring he's "just a man with his heart laid bare" supposed to drill a hole in my skull when it played out with Cadash (one murderer begging another to see him as anything else, the camera framing Cadash as above them all, as he always sees them, no matter how alike their past actions could be) or do i Need to contact my doctor immediately

[nenyc]

RESIDENT ALIEN | 03x02 - The Upper Hand

[wardenss]

[ladysansa]

for your consideration:

Great Smokey Mountains

Grand Teton

Yellowstone

Acadia

Olympic

Mount Rainier

Yosemite

Grand Canyon

[wolfsong-the-bloody-beast]

I'm kind of obsessed with Blackwall's idealized ideas about the Wardens. He was once picked up by a Warden and lulled by the promise of atoning for his crimes and turning his life around, only for that opportunity to slip away when the Warden not only saved him, but sacrificed his own life to do it. This whole experience makes our Blackwall become a Warden in heart, if not in blood, but with his own ideas of what a Grey Warden should be - noble, brave, inspiring, heroic, self-sacrificial. Everything he now wants to embody. He knows well that he's not there, but he wants nothing more than to start from scratch and be that.

In his beliefs, he reminds me a bit of Wynne in Origins who tells the Warden at some point that the Grey Wardens are supposed to be more than killing machines and weapons against the blight.

“There’s more to being a Grey Warden than killing darkspawn and saving the world from the Blight. Ultimately, being a Grey Warden is about serving others, about serving all people, whether elves or dwarves or men. As a Grey Warden, you are a guardian of men. And you guard them because their continued existence is more important than you are.”

However, we know that's not exactly how it works. That's what they want the Wardens to be. The light against darkness. The shield against monsters.

Although it's not entirely wrong, either, I suppose, all things considered. The more darkspawn they obliterate and push back, the more people are protected from them. Of course, sacrificing their lives to fight literal monsters, which means those same monsters don't eat everybody's kids, ultimately is heroic, and it's something that must have been born out of the need to protect the world and its inhabitants (from the Blight). But to have idealized opinions of the Wardens to this degree, you have to ignore all the other shady stuff and the mentality we, as players, also know the Wardens for. The fact that the Wardens are primarily weapons to slay darkspawn, prevent and end Blights, by any means necessary. The last part is important. After all, they are the Grey Wardens, not the White Wardens. They recruit from all walks of life and are famous for taking in criminals. Not to redeem themselves and get a second chance at life, but because they usually have nowhere to go and nothing left to lose. It's not a coincidence that each of the Origins gets chosen by Duncan, not only because he sees them as capable, but also because they are in a situation they can't escape from. Either they join the Wardens, or they're done for.

We know the Wardens from a few games now, but does the public in the setting even know? Does the average person have any idea how far the Wardens are willing to go? Besides grand stories of slaying monsters in the dark and preventing the end of the world? Probably not. The order is very secretive. And it explains a lot. The Wardens end up sounding almost romantic, when being a Warden is anything but. Is it ignorance talking out of these characters? Perhaps.

It once again shows us this aspect of Dragon Age where you can't take everything a character says as a fact, because the setting is full of people who have no idea what they're talking about, but who are absolutely convinced that they do.

And yet, I can't help but also like Wynne's and Blackwall's romantic ideas about what the Wardens are or should be, almost knights in shining armour and all that. They're fairy tales, but they're beautiful fairy tales. And I can't fault the characters for wanting to believe it or even live it. Especially in case of Blackwall, who sees it as a way to make up for the crimes he committed, somewhat. In the end, this might actually be a bigger draw to join the Wardens than, "Got nowhere to go? Come suffer horribly and probably die gruesomely with us!" It all sounds great on paper, though. I can't fault Davrin for trying to find purpose in life by becoming a monster hunter, either.

And maybe a little bit of idealism doesn't hurt. Not only it's good motivation, but in the end, doing things by "any means necessary" doesn't always pay off, either. It led the Wardens into all kinds of trouble, like getting tricked into employing dangerous forms of blood magic and demon summoning, basically into doing their enemy's work for them. In their determination to win at any cost, they helped trigger a cataclysmic event. Maybe having some principles isn't so bad after all.

In the end, I can appreciate that we get to see the clash of the old and new blood in Veilguard, where there's hope for the order to transform into an organization that's less secretive, less exclusive, and hopefully less prone to letting corruption spread through its ranks and make other devastating mistakes. Duncan once said that letting people join the Wardens isn't an "act of charity", and I like how Evka and Antoine go, "Yeah, you know what? Fuck that." And that likely inspires more loyalty. I imagine Blackwall would like that.

[orofeaiel]

Pika, Mount Rainier National Park

[thatwavephenomenon]

My top 1 "If those two Dragon Age characters ever met it would be a whole mess" is not Merrill and Sera tho. It's not Anders and Vivienne either.

It's Sebastian Vael and Blackwall/Thom Rainier.

[jaegervega]

Baby Rook was part of the Inquisition

I’ve had my character planned for some years now so I’m very excited to see how he’s gonna fit into the Veilguard

[daisyssousa]

Enver Gjokaj as Joseph the Grey Alien (Joseph Rainier) | “Resident Alien” Episode 03x02 | “The Upper Hand”

[ogreismic]

vro why is joseph so hard to draw

all i think of is superman when drawing bro i have to have the little spiral