#world vault

[sapphim]

NEW! Import Vault Fixes @ DA2 Nexus

I've rebuilt her from scratch, bigger and better than ever. I've rewritten the entire vault. I've rewritten the godawful vault debug. All of it. I have gone, quite frankly, mad with power.

Also you can edit your imported variables from within the game. No more pesky save game editing required!

[ID: A screenshot of Hawke from Dragon Age 2 with "New! Import Vault Fixes" superimposed. On screen is the text "World Vault Debug" along with a dialogue wheel with the options "View warden variables," "View main plot variables," "View landsmeet & climax," "View more," "World Vault Manager," and "Exit debug."]

[sapphim]

Trying to decide which of my worldstates to store as pre-built options in DA2 is harder than expected lmao

[sapphim]

I think Teagan's line "This had better not be another letter from Alistair about his Grey Warden toys." in MotA is supposed to only play after Warden Alistair is mentioned, which only happens in Act 1 (and only if Isolde is dead). But I'd like to think that six years later Alistair's still writing Teagan letters about his Grey Warden toys so I might just make it always play.

[sapphim]

HEY GUYS GUESS WHAT

[sapphim]

So as far as I can tell, if you import a save into DA2 where the warden requested independence for the circle as their boon for ending the blight, there are THREE mentions of it in the entire game

Corff, the bartender at the Hanged Man, will say: "After the Blight was defeated in Ferelden, the Circle of Magi was given its autonomy. That'll be a disaster."

In King Alistair's cameo in act 3, typically you walk in on Meredith saying: "Three mages have fled to Ferelden, and you have intervened to protect them as if it is your right to do so." Instead, if the circle was granted independence, she says: "You declare your Circle of Magi free, as if it were your right to do so, and thus stir up every mage outside of your kingdom."

And finally, during Leliana's cameo in act 3, in Sebastian's Faith quest, at the end of the conversation she says: "The whole world is watching Kirkwall. If it falls to magic, none of us are safe." If the circle was granted independence (and Anders is not in the party), she adds: "Especially after what happened in Ferelden."

Leliana that is so fucking cryptic and ominious what the fuck does that mean. What happened in Ferelden? Leliana? ...Leliana...? Where the fuck are you going—

[sapphim]

Here are (to the best of my knowledge) all the Queen Anora mentions (and related Prince-Consort Warden mentions) that appear (or should appear but don't) in DA2.

The "Hero of Ferelden" codex entry, obtained at the start of Act 1, will read, if the Warden married Anora: "After ending the Blight, the Hero of Ferelden was wed to Queen Anora—he now bears the title of prince-consort."

In Anders' Act 1 "Tranquility" quest, Lirene says of either Alistair or a ruling Cousland, when questioned: "Only Fereldan Grey Warden I've heard of is sitting on the throne." If you talk down the threatening refugees outside Lirene's, they will end the conversation with "Maker bless the rule of our King Alistair" if Alistair is king and "Maker bless the rule of our Queen Anora" otherwise.

In Aveline's Act 1 "A Friend in the Guard" cutscene, if Cousland married Anora, Aveline should say of him: "A good family name. I've heard very little about him. He'll find a voice or be left behind." However, the line preceding that, "I loved that life, but there's a new king for a new Ferelden," only plays if Alistair is king, so the line is inaccessible.

When questioned about his past association with the Hero of Ferelden, Bodahn will say, if Cousland married Anora: "I hear that the hero is married to the queen, now. Fancy that! A Grey Warden ruling Ferelden!"

If Anora is queen, the bartender at the Blooming Rose should say, "The queen of Ferelden just made a state visit to Rivain. Can't imagine why. Not like Rivain's buying dogs." The plot flag, however, is bugged.

Corff, the bartender at the Hanged Man, has some niche gossip: "I heard the Hero of Ferelden married Queen Anora, but is keeping an elven lover. Scandalous" and "You hear about King Alistair of Ferelden? He has an elven mistress. Hope his queen never finds out."

The codex entry "A Study of the Fifth Blight, Vol. 2," which can be obtained in Act 2, is bugged to not fill out properly, and is missing at least one possible landsmeet outcome (Alistair kills Loghain, Anora and Cousland wed). If it did work, then depending on the worldstate, it would read: "Furthermore, the Landsmeet bore witness to the betrothal of Queen Anora to Alistair Theirin, the lost son of Maric," "Furthermore, the Landsmeet bore witness to the betrothal of Queen Anora to Teyrn Bryce Cousland's youngest son, who was one of the two Grey Wardens to survive Ostagar," or "Furthermore, the Landsmeet granted the vacant throne to Anora, widow of King Cailan."

If Alistair is a Grey Warden, you will receive his codex entry after meeting him in the Act 2 climax, which contains the line: "Rumor has it that he is an heir to the Fereldan throne, but that he turned it down in deference to Queen Anora, daughter to the traitorous Teyrn Loghain."

In Aveline's Act 3 "Questioning Beliefs" cutscene, she says of a Cousland married to Anora: "If the current king is wrong for the position, well, he's a Warden. They don't live long." If Alistair is on the throne and in an active romance with a Warden he is not married to, she says: "I understand King Alistair has proven adequate, although the queen seems to allow him certain… liberties in his company." This plays even if he is not married to Anora, although it shouldn't.

In Sebastian's Act 3 "Faith" quest, Leliana says of the Hero of Ferelden, if he married Anora and doesn't have an active romance with her: "He is a good king."

In King Alistair's Act 3 cameo, if Alistair is married to Anora and the Warden is his mistress, in response to Teagan's "You-know-who should already have returned from her mission," Alistair says, "Is she? Well! Let's not tell the queen, then." If he is married to Anora then this version of his codex entry, which you receive after the meeting, reads: "Few Wardens have ever left the secretive order, and he is the only of those who went on to rule a nation; Queen Anora, daughter of the legendary Teyrn Loghain, rules at his side."

[sapphim]

hey. q. if the landsmeet confirms Alistair as king, with an engagement to Cousland, and then Alistair performs the ultimate sacrifice and dies, and Cousland survives...

does Cousland remain queen alone, despite the Landsmeet only affirming Alistair's right to rule, or does Anora become queen in Alistair's absence, despite Cousland being right there and presumably pretty salty about the whole thing

like it's Anora, right? it's always either Alistair or Anora, right?

[sapphim]

Is there a reason Secret Rendevous and The Conspirators are mutually exclusive?

The former, you get from saving Amaranthine in Awakening. The latter, you get from saving Vigil's Keep. I've not had a playthrough so far where I saved Vigil's Keep instead of Amaranthine, but one could save both by upgrading the Keep's walls.

Does The Conspirators have dialogue referencing a destroyed Amaranthine or something? Was there a reference to a saved Amaranthine that I missed in Secret Rendevous?

See, this is why wording is important and why I had to check every single import flag used in the game and then rewrite the entire vault debug to reflect their actual use case. A lot of people (including myself, in the old version of the mod) get caught up on the idea of ~saving Vigil's Keep~, but the game very much doesn't care what happened to Vigil's Keep. You receive The Conspirators quest for abandoning the City of Amaranthine. That's explicitly the reason the Amaranthine nobles are (still) hacked off about the Warden-Commander.

As for why they're mutually exclusive, well, mainly it's so you would have one little sidequest that namedrops Amaranthine regardless of what you did in the Awakening climax, but they paint very different pictures about the current state of the arling. Secret Rendezvous isn't explicit about anything that happened to Amaranthine (because it's tbh kind of a little nothing quest that's not explicit about anything) but the implication is that Amaranthine is strong, because why else would Kirkwall find it threatening? It just doesn't hold up if the city was literally just sacked by darkspawn two seconds ago.