#ourinquisitorialness

[raartblog]

OC Kiss week day 2! Dropping down a kiss for @ourinquisitorialness's lovely Aristide.

[lorspolairepeluche]

3 and/or 4 from the OC codex prompts? For anybody you like (:

3) a report written by your OC’s teacher or mentor

4) a letter from your OC to their love interest

oc codex prompts (with help from @nadas-dirthalen's veilguard codex tutorial)

[sketchyelvenasss]

🌱💐 for Azlo?? I need to know moar

Thank you so much for the ask! 💜

🌱 Was Rook involved romantically with anyone before Veilguard? What was their partner like? How did the relationship end?

Maybe it is a little cliche, but technically he was involved with many people and they all ended the same way, with him killing his “partner”. Even from a young age he was naturally charismatic so the crows honed it to be used as a weapon. It’s why he flits without thinking about it. Meet them, be charming, get in close, do what had to be done to get their trust, then at the best moment strike.

Fortunately he had never needed to sleep with a target before, he would have without a second thought, but I believe he'd be more messed up if he did. And for once I guess I’m being benevolent to one of my children.

Still his overall experience with relationships has been shallow and completely physical. The level of joy he gets when he experiences a relationship with emotional attachment and non-sexual intimacy—🤯

💐 What is the relationship Rook has with their faction mentor? What was the moment they sent Rook away like?

Definitely complicated. They are only 4 years apart, but Azlo still sees Viago as somewhat of a parental figure. He looked to him for anything he needed, and he wanted to please him. To make him proud.

But as in game Vi is bad at expressing exactly when he is in fact happy or proud, particularly when it comes to Rook. So Azlo has constantly felt gaining his favor as an uphill battle. An achievable goal.

From Viago’s perspective Azlo reminds him of a more impulsive version of himself. That's the reason he may be a bit unfairly hard on him. Azlo is actually one of his favorite agents. He has to play the stern Talon, but he’s never been truly upset with Rook’s work.

[leothelionsaysgrrrr]

3, 11, 12, and 24 from the Rook questions!

3. What was Rook’s life before their faction?

Rook’s story is, of course, that he was adopted as a baby by an Imperial Legion commander who found him on a battlefield near Ventus, moved around a lot, trained to fight and bothered everyone while doing it, worked as a bodyguard for Minrathous’s most elite courtesans in a high end pleasure house, then for a magister when one of the courtesans he protected inherited a Senate seat from an estranged uncle, and later joined the Shadow Dragons to make a difference. 

Which is, of course, complete and utter bullshit. Except for the bothering people, there's no version of this story where he isn't bothering people.

Now, Falx Verus Mercar was a guard at the Ivory Oasis for several years, and their most prominent courtesan, Silver, did through some inheritance fuckery from his maternal uncle become a magister around the time of the Exalted Council, and he did bring his dear and trusted friend Mercar with him as his personal bodyguard. But Falx Verus Mercar himself is a fiction, and didn’t exist at all until about a decade ago, when he needed a new name and cover story for what this snarky long-haired beardy guy was doing in Minrathous when noted scoundrel and infamous frumentarius - a spy, saboteur, fixer, thug, slave hunter, general doer of dirty work for the magister who employed him, basically his job was to make his boss's problems disappear and be a problem to everyone else - Rexus Leventis had long since been presumed dead. Coming back gave him a chance to start over, and the new name and new story let him do the real work he came back to do - use the skills and knowledge gained in his youth to help Silver help people escape slavery, and grow into a better person himself - unbothered. Mostly.

11. Does Rook keep up with current events? (How aware of the situation are they at the start of the game?)

He has a local ear to the ground, as one might expect, and is quite familiar with the Antaam invasions in the east since Silver's - sorry, Magister Sisenna's - holdings are near Carastes and he actually bothers taking care of the people he represents. Traveling with Varric got him up to speed on a lot of things going on outside Tevinter, but he usually has a pretty good idea of what's going on at any given time. He just likes to seem like he's completely oblivious because it annoys people.

12. Does Rook have any family? Do they keep in touch?

He's the firstborn son of a prominent Altus family, but his father disowned him when he failed to manifest magic. His mother hated his father, so she doted on him as best and as publicly as she could - it was at her suggestion that another magister (Rexus's father's best friend and his mother's longtime lover) agreed to employ Rexus as one of his frumentarii. He also has a golden child younger brother who everyone knows was born solely to replace him, and they've never liked each other. His father was among those assassinated when Rexus's last job went bad and ended with a lot of dead magisters, including his boss, and his mother went into hiding after that. He's not sure she's even still alive. His brother masterminded the whole thing to seize power in the Magisterium and remains there to this day. He's not Venatori, and does actively oppose them, but he's definitely not one of the good ones and would have Rexus killed on sight if he knew he'd survived.

So, yeah. They don't keep in touch.

24. Does Rook have any nightly rituals before bed?

He’s very much a "fall into bed face down, arms and legs out, stay there until morning" kind of guy. He’s at least let Silver prevail upon him to use a silk pillowcase for the sake of his hair. The one hygiene thing he's always been really fastidious about is taking care of his teeth, though, so he'll do that before bed if nothing else to have an excuse to see how long he can gargle something. And how long it will take before someone tells him to stop.

50 questions for Rook!

[goingtoweather]

10 from all three categories (past/present/future) for Lawrence and Ezra pretty please!

Thank yoooou!

What did they dream of doing when they grew up? How and why did it change, if it did?

Lawrence always had a hunger for academia and wanted to get a formal education. He was the only one in his family to go to university, and with the lure of Dartmouth College nearby(ish…) had decided that he wanted to become a physician as a young teen. He wanted to help people, sure, but he also admittedly had a hunger for prestige and that was the greater lure for his pursuing an education. His dream didn’t so much change as…he feels like his whole life recently burned down so now he has…no plan or dream. A whaleship was his substitute for pistol and ball.

Ezra always wanted to be a captain. He grew up in view of all the whale ships and would watch them in the harbor whilst sitting in his father’s woodshop. And his father would tell him stories about Black captains, men who started like them. That’s what Ezra wanted and still wants. He wants his own ship and the stability that comes with it. He joined a whaler at age 13 and grew up fast. He’s spent half his life trying to achieve that dream, and he feels so close to it there’s no other option but to reach for it.

What do they always carry with them and why?

Re: the above issue, Lawrence doesn’t carry anything with him from his shore life. He’s very unsentimental about it. But he’s a big diarist. So while the journal isn’t always physically on his person, he always brings it with him. And in his spare time he’s always writing in it. Observations. Feelings. Silly little plays and poems.

in contrast to Lawrence, Ezra keeps little pieces of home. Particularly his sister’s letters, now that she can write, and drawings she sends him. He asks her to draw the things she sees in her day to day, so it doubles as a memory of his family but also of New Bedford. He’s extremely sentimental but also extremely private and doesn’t share them with anyone. Those aren’t physically on his person, though. For things he physically carries with him, he has a scrimshaw’d tie pin that has a heart on it that he made. When his sister was younger, while he was home between voyages, he asked her to whisper a little good luck charm on it. So he wears it when he feels like he needs its protection. So there’s a lil detail to look out for in past chapters or future ones. (;

How do they want to be remembered after they die?

Lawrence would like to be remembered as a good man, that is all. In his present moment he doesn’t feel like much of one and doesn’t think such remembrances are in his cards. But later on in life he thinks he has the potential of living up to it.

Ezra wants someone to tell their kids stories about him like his father did with him. Not because he wants fame or status, but because he wants to be hope for other people that one can build the life they want for themselves, against all odds.

[focsle]

I saw that I could buy someone dashboard crabs and thought of you. You're welcome <3

Oh thank you for these little guys haha!

[felassan]

Wow, that was a fun (and tantalizing) new teaser. Honestly I'm glad it wasn't something more substantial because my biggest worry is about Bioware rushing production. But it was just enough to give us some more juicy tidbits to speculate about! My question for you: Do you think Varric being the narrator should be taken as confirmation that he'll be either a companion or advisor in DA4?

Hello, I also found it really exciting/interesting, and it’s fun to have some new things to speculate about. I hope they don’t rush production or crunch or anything as an important priority should always be to look after the wellbeing of workers and ensure a good, safe work environment. The rest of this post is under a cut due to length.

As to Varric, I’d lean to it not being confirmation that he’s a companion or an advisor, despite loving him a lot. Not saying he won’t be in it, that people shouldn’t hope for him to be a companion or advisor, or that that is an incorrect takeaway, just that I’m unsure. Varric’s voice is familiar and easily identifiable, and while there are some who aren’t keen on him, he tends to go down well with fans (so there could be a marketing reason factoring into the choice to use him). Parts of the dialogue seemed to break the fourth wall a bit, as a message from BW to the viewer (like “Hi guys here’s where we’re at, and also, it’s a new hero, not the Inquisitor”), so I wonder how much of it is literal in-world beats if that makes sense. He’s also a storyteller who has narrated DA2 and the Keep, witnessed the story of DAI, and retroactively narrated/recapped some of the story of DAO when he was ‘opening' DA2. His voice in the trailer could be a narrative-framing device, possibly for the purposes of promotional material. It also seems like they’re not yet at a stage where they want to properly-show any of the new companions or other new prominent characters, so an old hat (alongside the obvious, Solas) makes sense. Will we even have advisors in DA4? That was a DAI thing, they could bring it back or they may not.

Morrigan narrated The Fires Above, also talking about the things she’d seen (“I have seen more of this war than you can imagine”) and while she had a prominent role, she was neither companion nor advisor. Claudia Black and Brian Bloom’s voice work is very DA. 🐉 (We never ended up being able to “lead this world to its bitter end” as Inquisitor either, which was also said with emphasis in that video, so there’s an element of maybe not everything said in early-days trailers can be taken completely literally too. The DA4 trailer in particular had a conceptual feel to it, like moving concept art almost, as opposed to being more story-substantial like TFA, so it also makes me think of the concept art caveat).

That said! This tweet from the DA Twitter account references the return of Solas “and an old friend”, a comment made while posting the trailer which features known quantities Solas and Varric. Varric is most probably the old friend, from the context. It’s interesting, there’s a lot of ways he could have our backs, there’s a lot of ways to have someone’s back - directly, indirectly, combat, support, from near, from afar, etc. He’s Maevaris’ cousin through marriage, and they have a good relationship. He basically runs his own spy network and has contacts all over. He’s a Viscount, giving him access to funds and resources. He’s been connected to and involved in the ongoing comic plot (which involves red lyrium and Tevinter). And by the time of TN he is still clearly involved in some manner with the Shadow Inquisition and their plans: Gatt and the Ben-Hassrath are allies with a “dwarf in Kirkwall” who will want to hear what Irian and Vadis have to say about the enemy, and he’ll have work for them that would allow them to strike back at Fen’Harel followers. Meanwhile, the underground expedition send their report to him and it was him iirc who maneuvered to get the Carta dwarf to attend the meeting in Dread Wolf Take You. I’d guess at his involvement being a Morrigan-type role, not a companion or advisor but still prominent. Maybe he could be the new PC’s contact/interface with the Shadow Inquisition (Dorian’s potential role feels more Tevinter-plot-focused?), maybe he’s the one that seeks them out and recruits them (some mentoring?) as he’s clearly doing some recruiting, maybe he crops up part-way through for a key plotline (Morrigan or the Warden contact in DAI etc), maybe he has the new PC’s back from a mostly supporting role like resources, connections, advice, and what would functionally be like quest-giving? (Does “we” refer to the Shadow Inquisition or the new cast of companions and supporting characters? Both?) Pure speculation ofc.

[domirine]

Hello! I LOVE your Pride month arts and especially the ones of Bioware characters. I was wondering if there was a rationale behind giving Zevran a pan flag but giving Josephine a bi flag, when in both cases as far as I know their sexuality comes from being romanceable by characters regardless of gender? (Please note I love both characters and both identities are valid and awesome! Just curious if it was based on some specific evidence or a headcanon. More pan rep is always great!)

hi! thank you for sweet words and the question, this is gonna be a lil long and personal on account of me not wanting to say something carelessly, and because a lot in this case comes down to how i perceive bisexuality and pansexuality. since it's my pride project i can’t escape bringing subjectivity into it, as much as i try to stick to what's canon and such. (because some things are also not up for debate, of course.)

as far as my bi self subscribes to it: the "bi" in bisexuality means "two" not in "just men and women" sense, but "mine and other genders". this is a sentiment shared by a large amount of bi people i've spoken to personally as well (not all, obv, we’re not a hive mind). to me personally it also goes against the wack stereotype that bisexual people are interested only in the binary genders, not dating trans and non-binary people, etc.; 

so! unless a fictional character states themselves which label they subscribe to, and the choice is either bisexual or pansexual, i’m letting either my experience with the medium or perception of the character dictate it. 

both isabela and josie are sporting bi colours, because i identified with them as a bisexual woman on a personal level, words “pansexual” were never used, so i was not given a reason to think otherwise. meanwhile bull and zevran were sporting pan colours because - as far as i remember correctly? - “pansexual” is used for bull (by devs iirc, not certain about canon, but it latched onto my brain regardless), and with zev, it was more subjective and headcanon-y, as i think he would subscribe to the /pan/ part of identity.

before someone misconstrues: i’m not saying it’s open season unless someone states if they’re pan or bi. but i am saying it’s sometimes a personal call if i wanna include which flag. i'm sure someone out there disagrees with me, and that's fine. 

additionally, there’s enough of a “debate” on bisexuality and pansexuality as it is, and this is not an invitation to have it with me here. but that’s the train of thought i followed when giving those characters their flags. i hope it makes sense!

woof thanks for reading that whole ass wall of text!