#the da2 crew is smth that can be so personal

[broodwolf221]

i've been rotating that stability poll in my mind with the da2 crew a lot lately, so here are some of my thoughts/rare da2 meta from me 😂

order of most to least stable is roughly:

merrill or isabela

bethany

fenris

aveline

carver

varric

anders

no hawke bc that's variable and no sebastian bc i haven't personally played with him (altho i tend to think he'd be low on the list)

now, the whole thing about "stability" as a metric is... interesting. it allows for a wide range of interpretations. while things like reactivity and unpredictability factor in, i tend to prioritize self-awareness/being self-possessed/security in one's self over everything else

merrill and isabela - they both know themselves at a deep level. both are dealing with a Lot of shit throughout the course of the game, but i don't rly love the idea that understandable reactions to traumatic events = unstable. in fact, understandable reactions to traumatic events is a characteristic of stability. grief, mourning, fear, anger... all of these have a place. so out of everyone, these are the two i find the most self-possessed. i'd argue that isabela may be less emotionally healthy than merrill bc bela seems to be a bit more about repression whereas merrill is actually letting herself grieve, but they're still very close and i keep switching who is #1 so

by the same metric, bethany seems quite self possessed/self aware as well. she knows herself, and while it's ofc influenced by others, she is not dependent upon them for her sense of self

fenris is dealing with a ton, but his reactions are, again, ones i would define as stable, particularly given that he has outbursts but will apologize and make amends. he is actively and consciously learning and growing, and while he is fairly self-contained, he also has friends beyond the little group, has other jobs, jokes around... he's building a life for himself in the closest he's ever come to peace, and ofc there are growing pains with that, but they seem like reasonable ones

aveline is mid on the list bc despite the fact that she's very stalwart and loyal, i don't find her to be particularly self-aware. for everyone previously listed, they would still be who they are without the people in their life or the job they have - aveline doesn't feel that way to me. she seems to define herself by her duty and her sense of responsibility. while an argument could be made that such values are just as much a form of self-awareness and knowledge as the rest, i don't rly buy that personally, at least not in her case. she feels like she's doing what she thinks she ought to do. like she's been guided by smth into a role and accepted that as her lot in life and defined herself by it, even though she's not entirely that. and i feel like she doesn't know who she is beyond that. repressed! but unlike bela, who is consciously repressing some of her shit, aveline just doesn't seem to realize there's even other ways she can be

in a lot of ways, carver does know himself... but how he defines himself is so deeply roped into hawke. his self-definition seems to be in the form of a constant comparison. without hawke, he would be someone else, and i don't think the path to self-awareness/self-possession can be walked via comparisons

varric is so.... he will throw away his own moral code to follow hawke's. he's loyal to a fault, arguably with an obsessive quality to it, and although he does seem to know himself decently well, he's willing to subsume himself in service to someone else's priorities and being. now, again, an argument could be made here that willing subversion of one's own priorities to another is a conscious, deliberate act and thus a form of self-awareness, but it just doesn't feel like it rly holds up to me

now, anders... i love him so much, but the man is in a constant crisis state throughout the game. and, like fenris, he's discovering himself in freedom for the first time - but unlike fenris, this is the very beginning of his self-discovery. so he's kinda all over the place. he settles a bit over the course of the game, begins to discover who he is under the ongoing trauma of being in the circles and isolation and joining with justice (which, i love them, but i do suspect it was traumatic - for both of them!) and becoming a grey warden and just- everything! and at the start he's still in hiding, and you can't really know yourself when you're stuck in survival mode (speaking from experience)