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LAVELLAN LOVE

@lavellanlove / lavellanlove.tumblr.com

Hey! I'm Evuna: I'm a maker of mods, writer of words, lover of lore, and aspiring artist. This blog is dedicated to all things Dragon Age. ♠ Icon by @laskulls, banner by @niklisson
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reblogged
eeblingtheshade
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corseque
gatheringbones asked:

u gotta think that solas who utterly loathes the inquisitor has to feel happy as a clam and really really not that torn up about his plan. TRA LA LA THESE PEOPLE DON'T MATTER AND MOST OF THEM ARE ASSHOLES I'M JUST GONNA PUT IT TO RIGHTS.

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corseque answered:

This is the most interesting (terrifying, wonderful, thematically relevant) thing in that game, right?? Like, how different Solas feels about the world, about his situation, if you’ve never, ever, once made the effort to reach out to him. How hard and closed his heart is. And what changes and blooms if you just effing empathize with and speak to and listen to a person who needs it. If you show love for a person who is obviously crying out for help.

Patrick Weekes always spoke about Solas with such gentle tender compassion, and now I understand why.

And yeah, exactly like you were saying, the game, it turns out, is about empathy!!! which shocks me only because I didn’t realize it before, during Inquisition. When the main game ended, I thought, “this game is about religious faith and about people lying” - when Trespasser ended, it became so much clearer, so much more meaningful. It really made the main game so much better. “this game is about empathy, about repairing physical and emotional breaches, about compassion and healing and letting go of the past and the pieces of yourself you can’t keep.”

What shocked me coming into the final stretch of Trespasser was that, FORGET about the flea distraction that is the Saarebas, the conversation you have with Solas is the Last Boss Fight of Inquisition. And, in a first that I’ve encountered in a video game, it’s a final confrontation lost or won purely through empathy. Solas is desperately asking the Inquisitor to listen to him, to help him, to stop him. He would never have told you anything if he didn’t want you to stop him. It’s a quiet conversation, full of pain, and it’s more climactic than all the fighting in the last 10 hours of gameplay put together, including Corypheus. This conversation is the most climactic final boss I can remember playing in years. And the game rewards you for your patience and empathy, your friendship. The connections you made opens up options, gives leeway for peace and healing.

(the game that lets you let the tortured, enslaved dragon go free rather than killing it)

(the game where cole, compassion incarnate, greatly approves when you say you will save Solas)

It’s probably not going to happen, but in the next game I would hope that, in world states where the Inquisitor cut Solas off or physically abused him, that it’s fully 6 times harder to beat the game. I hope that helping Solas come to terms is a genuine method of beating DA4. The information the Inquisitor has access to if they stop to listen to Solas is like 150 times as useful as one who always told him to shut up. And Solas wants you to use that information. In the good ending of this game, he’s so desperate that you do so. In the bad ending, he’s an island.

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sulahnenasalin

This is beautiful. How could I not have noticed this theme of empathy and/or compassion when I’ve been playing to it the whole time?

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teenyturtle

This applies to many of the other characters in your party as well. 

So much hangs on your Inquisitor’s actions. Solas implies as much when he says you’ve surprised him and that he respects you. The only way that really happens in a relationship is when someone is observing your actions. After all, actions speak louder than words, right?

The Inquisitor’s empathy or lack thereof has a HUGE effect upon the game. Look at Blackwall and his demons. Look at Cullen and his addiction. Look at Sera’s past, symbolized with cookies. Look at Vivienne (generally seen as unsympathetic and cold) and her loss of Bastien. Look at Dorian’s past with his father. Look at your choices with LELIANNA, for pete’s sake. Lelianna has been a pillar of FAITH in these games. Yet in Inquisition, she wavers. She doubts. And YOUR ACTIONS can greatly affect whether or not her heart remains hardened or if she becomes, in my opinion, one of the best Divine’s in Thedas’ history.    Hell, look at Alexius and his son. While there are choices for your Inquisitor that show NO empathy whatsoever (tell Cullen to take lyrium, leave Blackwall to die, punch Solas in the face, don’t help Vivienne with her lover, etc) which certainly have their consequences, Alexius’ choice falls in a morally black area because he allowed his concern for his son to lead to corrupt choices out of desperation. Alexius care for his son is unparalleled but it lead him to make the absolute WRONG choice. In that way, Alexius is a beautiful foil to the choices of empathy that you can make within the game. In my opinion, he’s also a foreshadow for Solas, whose empathy and passion for his people has caused him to make very drastic choices. In my opinion, how you look at Alexius and his actions (Alexius, who ALTERED THE STATE OF THE WORLD to save his son…) will impact (or at least foreshadow) your dealings with Solas. And even in your Judgement of Alexius, Solas is watching you. If you choose to execute Alexius or make him tranquil, Solas will disapprove/greatly disapprove (even while Cole approves his execution). HOWEVER, if you choose to make Alexius a researcher for the Inquisition, you will gain approval with Solas. You are telling him there is HOPE for mercy. Hope for change.  Make no mistake, unlike Solas, Alexius is a villain but you can at least sympathize with his feelings and how trapped he feels. Hell, after he fails to incapacitate the Inquisitor and his son tells him to stop, he pretty much loses the will to do anything else. 

To sum it up, Inquisition is about so much more than politics.  If you are a person of faith, it is about putting the LOVE that guides your faith into action. It’s about empathy.  And I absolutely LOVE how one of the last posters described this game -  “this game is about empathy, about repairing physical and emotional breaches, about compassion and healing and letting go of the past and the pieces of yourself you can’t keep.”

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teenyturtle

I was morbidly curious and tweeted this discussion to Patrick Weekes and…

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lavellanlove
#solas#trespasser dlc#da:i#weekes#meta#lavellan love q
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reblogged
cyran9
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kreebby

 I was curious about whether Solas looks at Lavellan differently from an inquisitor he is friends with, so I watched both cutscenes simultaneously. The differences are subtle, but present. These were taken during the same pauses after the same lines. He looks much sadder talking to you when you are in a romance with him.

When asked “What about the future?” his expression is hardened, bitter, and focused around the romanced inquisitor throughout the entirety of his next line. The conversation is difficult for him. He is neutral with a high approval inquisitor.

 Interestingly enough, his expressions are almost exactly the same when answering the questions about his plans. It does not deviate again (save for the few special lines only romanced Lavellans can say) until you bring up the mark (right before he removes it), but that one involves different camera angles and completely different actions on his part.

“It’s getting worse.”
 High Approval Inquisitor response: *pause* Yes. I’m sorry. And we are almost out of time.  Romanced Lavellan response: I know, vhenan. And we are running out of time.

 It looks like he had to prepare himself much more for a conversation with a romanced inquisitor vs a friendly one. He is hardening himself, shutting her out, almost the entire time. The only time his guard drops are in the beginning when he first sees her, and when he has to make physical contact with her to remove the mark.  

If anyone wants, I’ll make a gif version of this.

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kreebby

Somebody tweeted Patrick Weekes about this and he had a vague answer. Oh no.

How is that a vague answer at all?

#weekes#was my last offering of tears not sufficient?#trespasser spoilers#trespasser dlc
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