Side note at 3:22 : 15th day should be 15th year, see the replies below this comment for more examples. Also; I made a video comparing Origins to the other games in the Dragon Age series in anticipation for Dragon Age: Dreadwolf, it has quite a few spoilers though so it's more for people who have finished every game at least once, but still ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-mNHUXlxjYT0.html&ab_channel=RadicalEnergy
@@Druuj @gstrafkos84 No, Dragon Age's calander works incredibly funky (imo) but if you would write out an entire day, it would look like this: Let's say, the 9th century, the 40th year, the 3rd day of the 1st month, would be: 3rd of Verimensis 9:40 Dragon Age - 9th century is the age of the dragons - 40 means the year we're in - the 1st month of the year is called Verimensis A codex in Dragon Age Inquisition describes the following: " On the 8th day of Bloomingtide, the dam in Crestwood is broken in order to flood the invading darkspawn. " Bloomingtide = 5th month another codex example, but from Dragon Age Origins: "It is 9:30 Dragon Age, the thirtieth year of the ninth Age since the crowning of the Chantry's first Divine. " this one just didn't bother to mention a month Dragon Age does a lot with years and ages but almost never mentions months or holidays. They didn't even bother to name the weekdays, they just use monday, tuesday etc. lol I just threw it in there as all of the dates didn't make anything clear to me whatsoever during my first run, so took some time to figure it out and add it to the video. But as my pinned comment shows: I still managed to fuck it up 😂
One thing you missed on the armor vs stat points discussion - rogue armor does have dex requirements, but there's also a strength requirement. The best rogue armors in Origins require 20 strength, and in Awakening it's either 22 or 24, I forget which. Just something for rogue players to keep in mind as they progress. Also, on Normal, Morrigan is perfectly capable as your offensive mage, either through weather effects or by via curses and support. Because of that, I would actually suggest first-time players play a Dwarf Noble. It's far harder to gimp a warrior or rogue than a mage, and the Dwarf Noble has, IMO, hands-down the best Origin story, and one that really comes into play later on - it completely changes the feel of an entire section of the story, much more than the occasional person looking down on you because you're an elf. (Human Noble and Female City Elf are also some intense stories, I just don't think they're as good and as integrated as Dwarf Noble.)
You are correct, oops. And a fair point, perhaps my personal bias started showing too much as I just really like elves and mages and don't like dwarfs and warriors as much haha
I agree on the Dwarf origins. Both sides are pretty incredible storylines. Plus when you return to Orzammar as a Gray Warden. So epic... In regards to the Rogue... An early Rogue should always focus on Dex. Yes, some armors require a 20+ strength stat, but you won't have access to a lot of those armors until you are several hours in. So it's a balancing act. Go heavy on Dex so you do the most damage possible early game. Same happens to Alistair. A very common noob mistake is players will just focus on his strength and Dex early game. Again tunnel vision on gear and talents. Not realizing that a lot of that gear you can't attain, or afford early game. Or talents are locked away behind a level restriction. Get enough Strength to equip heavy armor (22 will suffice) and enough Dex to unlock shield wall (26) - his best defensive ability. Then split attributes into constitution and Dex on your way to level 9 when new talents become unlocked. This is how Alistair will stay alive early game. Constitution gets a bad rep in this game but if you put just 9 points into constitution, from levels 1-9 that's 45 extra hit points to your health pool. Or the difference between one dual handed critical hit in the early game. It makes a difference.
This is really well-produced. I appreciate all the edits and comedic inserts haha. You deserve a lot more views Thanks for the Constitution pointer. I was trying to raise Alistair's and my character's. However I did notice that armor made a huge difference when I switched Alistair to the Warden Commander set. Also I would've liked more tips regarding healing, damage types/resistances, and maybe storage as well. My own personal tip is to get a long-range AoE/DoT/debuff ability as soon as possible. E.g. Fireball+Grease, Earthquake, or the lightning storm one. This allows me to whittle down melee enemies as they come my way, or temporarily disable ranged enemies while taking them out slowly. I'd even go as far as say they're mandatory 😄
thank you, it's appreciated :) yes, looking back at it, I agree, it was all and all my first attempt at a guide, and even though I feel very "comfortable" with this game, it wasn't until I started typing out all of the things required for a guide that I realized how detailed you would have to get if you wanted to fit everything in there maybe dividing it into multiple videos would've been better, but I personally dislike it when I'm just trying to make a quickstart in a new game and every guide on forums/youtube are spread out over +10 articles or videos but who knows, I'm currently working on other stuff and video types but may come back to improve this guide and do some better explaning oh and what you said about the AOE attacks is a solid point, especially as crowd control is the name of the game but as they often, well.. " hit crowds " ( duh ) you tend to attract a lot of enemy attention, which can be pretty overwhelming, so would've been wise to mention it
This was one of the more useful beginner guide I could find. A lot of strong opinions in other videos but the game doesn’t have set metas and you explained that pretty well.
Appreciated it, looking back at it there are some things I would've done differently had I made the video today, but I'm still happy how it turned out and glad it helped you
@@RaffieFaffie was planning to do that yea, but I'm currently working on a new Dragon Age video, and wanted to wait until that one was uploaded, to then also use my pinned comment with a link towards that vid
I love making my warden a blood mage healer. This lets me take control of other party members and have fun playing the tank or stabby rogue etc. I even turn Wynne into a monster dps.
Blood Mage Arcane Warrior. Can do a bit of everything, if you carefully manage your talents. You can do the occasional mission without Wynne or without Alistair. Also you can divide the abundance of good one-handers between yourself and Alistair. Also: Mana Clash is hilarious fun on most minibosses.
@@JoshSweetvaleI found arcane warrior kinda useless tbh. Never used it. The point seems to be to equip massive armour and be a tank that equips a melee weapon, and draws aggro. Massive armour is worse than robes for a mage. However they miss a lot in melee and some spells require you to sheathe weapon. If you have a shield warrior they're probably just all round a better tank anyway However when you look at the other specialisations it probably comes in at 2nd marginally. Shapeshifter is a meme since it scales off strength and you can't use spells. Spirit Healer is only good for having multiple group heal and revival. If you don't run Wynne then I'd say it's #2. Having multiple group heals and revives is decent but probably overkill. So that leaves blood mage #1 of course. Blood Wound is a great CC spell but often times you can just end battles by just casting a damage spell anyway. Blood Sacrifice cast on a bear makes it so you dont even have to worry about the health loss too. It doesn't even do anything to the bear and fully heals you (0 points in con). Blood Control is also situational imo. It can be helpful to have an enemy on your side but it's temporary. It turns on you after a certain amount of time and essentially gets a pre emptive attack on you because you can't just kill it while it's controlled. I agree that BM/AW is the most versatile but its just situational with most of them after BM
I heard of this, but I chose Mass Effect over DA. Honestly, you couldn’t have gone wrong choosing either trilogy. Now I’m here playing it over a decade later 😅
@@darugdawg2453 DA2 and Inquisition have their faults for sure... but they're at least worth a single playthrough and can be fun as a momentary diversion game.
The difficulty curve of DA:O is comical at times. After a couple of play-thrus I completely destroy almost all the bosses in the game. Now that god forsaken blood mage in Denerim. My goodness that quest aged me in real life. Easily one of the hardest battles in the game, and other games of the genre.
haha, Origins is a typical " old RPG " when it comes down to difficulty; huge dragons and darkspawn demons who have been feeding of off people for decades? No problem But a random group of elfs in the woods or a handful of wolfs? Hardest fight you'll encounter I remember having to use some guides on Reddit to beat that bloodmage first time I encountered him, pretty sure I ended up respeccing my party and abusing the paralyze spell to beat him lol
In terms of party composition, back when I played Origins (at least during the main game and not the DLCs), I rolled with a Warrior, a Rogue, and 2 mages. I don't remember the exact builds, but I built the warrior to be a monstrous tank who aggro'd everything, the rogue went around flanking... and the two mages were spec'd out to be pure DPS monsters. The bulk of the damage was dealt by the dual mages raining destruction down upon the entire battlefield.
I agree that Mage is Op in Origins(probably the entire series). However Morrigan is very good because she gets basically every early dmg spell , 2 cc spells and a self heal. If you boost her Magic she can solo most earlt enconters as long as you draw aggro with Alistar. She is started early enough that she can be used as a great support too(mostly Entropy but she can dip into every tree on her spells list). Rogues can be op too as long as you give them a lot of Dex, Warriors are not gonna miss once you give about 28 dex and that sustained skill that gives 10 bonus points. Nice to see content about this pretty old game.
aye true, it's also not that I disagree, but more so that I think she can be terrible if put into the hands of a player with 0 knowledge, making her an allround bad character. obviously the same could be said about any character, in every game, ever 💀 but I remember when I did my first Origins run, she was always dead or on the edge of dying as I just kept hurling AOE attacks towards enemies, who would then all start rushing towards her ignoring the other 3 party members. I can't help but chuckle at the dexterity part, cus even though you are correct, I remember when I started looking into how everything worked in Origins, I found countless arguments about the entire " do warriors need dex or not " topic, so can't blame them for oversimplifying it in DA2
@@REALVINERGY i agree, the game is easier after afew tries. I have played more times than I can remember. I know those revenant (elite or boss) enemies always gave me troubke at first but then I just learned their weakness
@@elvenatheart982 yeah, Origins is a very typical " 2000s RPG " when it comes down to enemy difficulty; fight a huge demon like dragon? it dies within 3min fight some street thugs who are being lead by a drunk dwarf? Die 20 times to them
You've managed to summarise so much tactical info into one section of this video (common mistakes), it's incredibly helpful! Even just the one sentence where you explain that it's about outlasting your enemies, not killing them the fastest. Seems obvious but I've never thought of battle in that way (**hangs up trusty battle axe**). Great video all around, and thank you!
very good video sir! As a new player of this franchise, surely helps ppl like me a lot. There is just so much info that we can achieve from this game, its truly rewarding understanding how it works.
For parties in the Dragon Age series I've always felt 2 warriors, a mage and a ranged rogue worked best. One warrior being a tank, the other dps/two hander, a mage using whatever AOE spell and buffs they have and the Rogue in the back getting crits and causing mayhem with debuffs. Never had an issue playing like this. I generally play the Warrior myself so I always got to pick two options. Always found Varric to be a solid Rogue option and the Mages all felt like the best love interests for me too so it really worked out best. I really do love this series and am now playing through it for a fourth time. Hopefully by the time I 100% Inquisition and it's DLC's the 4th game will have a release date. Trying to jog my memory though for how the other classes feel. This video was a nice refresher though. DA has a solid community still more then a decade later.
I've personally found 2handed warriors and rogues quite braindead if the AI controlled them. If you play them yourself though they're really fun, maybe even more fun than being a mage as they constantly get agro from every enemy in the vicinity lol
If you're still stuck there; the AI ( especially the 2 tower guards ) like to rush the enemies but they're all spread out across the room with range damage so before you even reach them, you're most likely already dead If you put your party on 'hold' and start attacking the Genlock emissary ( darkspawn mag ), you can afterwards remove the 'hold' and start attacking the archers, as the emissary is the primary damage dealer/AoE attacker in that room
Thanks for the video it was great! I’m replaying the entire series and I only beat dragon age origins on casual the first time because it was so difficult for me. I’m glad to say I am almost 50% through the game and have been doing so on normal haha
Nothing wrong with that though right, I'm currently playing Elden Ring and I already miss "easy" games like Dragon Age haha, I also still die plenty of times on normal, the only game in the series I can play " flawlessly " on nightmare is Inquisition 😂 Also, your drawing skills are mesmerizing, I'm currently half way through your morrigan one, and as someone who's mind is racing 24/7 it's very relaxing to watch
When I play as a mage in dragon age origins I prefer to play as an arcane warrior as when you take the first level of the perk the armour and weapons that you use are based on your magic instead of your strength and if you build the character right you can end up being able to wear high level Jugganaugt armour
A lot of people are saying they desperately want a remaster. Even though it would be nice, I still think it's not needed, as Origins still holds up very well in 2023 :)
First time I played this game was 10 years ago. I remember hauling my pc almost everywhere I went with my screen, just so I could continue playing this game. It's definitely a 10/10 game with my 2 major complaints being the janky combat animations and some of the armors looking dumb.
Janky animations never bothered me before now until you mentioned it, and coming to think of it, it feels like everybody swings a sword as if they've never held one before lol
@REALVINERGY exactly, but then again, I only noticed it when I witnessed DA2 attack animations (which, in my opinion, are more fluid though exaggerated but I mostly prefer the DAI attack animations overall) Otherwise another complaint I have, but this tracks against all major Bioware games, is the somewhat unbalanced party role dynamic where in each of the games you will always have at least one party member you never use because there is someone else (usually the player character) that is just a carbon copy but better. (Oghren-Sten, Cassandra-Blackwall etc)
@@the_cringe_nerd Fair point, there's always 1 class predominant in every game, Origins had a ton of warriors, Inquisition had like 4 mages and 2 actually had a decent balance to it ( might also be the only well balanced thing about that game )
Too be fair. Although Oghren is better than Sten in Two handed weapons. You get Sten early enough to change how you play him. I use sten as a dual wielder or with a crossbow to keep his frail ass away from the main fighting. @@the_cringe_nerd
@RK-cj4oc I get you, but it's more a complaint on the series as a whole. Like I never used some of the companions because there were just always "better" versions of them in their own style. Not to mention of your character basically copies them unintentionly. I even have the same problem with Mass Effect. The saving grace is that I love the characters.
You can start steamrolling on any build. Mage just is more op before lothering because of access to all the CC and aoe like mind blast and walking bomb. Once you get Allistair Leliana Morrigan/Wynne, though, it doesn't really matter (if you start as mage thats your warrior rogue 2 mage party which I agree is the most balanced). Any build is viable though tbh. I took 3 mages and Shale for a laugh
Nice video - thanks! Recently took this up again as I caught a YT run-through and felt all nostalgic (I've done a bunch of plays, and I think I've covered all the starting campaigns), but the Origin servers are no more, so all my past achievements have been lost 😞 If I may request a topic - The mods that you mentioned are a dark art to me - there's soooo many that I'm not sure what is worth installing and which aren't compatible. Anyways, cheers for the video, and have a Sub :-)
Thank you :D I noticed the same thing, I hope it's temporarily though, and that they will rework the servers and the DA keep when Dreadwolf releases, but I somehow doubt it. Another thorn in our side when it comes to live service gaming. As for the mods. I've discussed them with a few people here in the comments, but it's come to the point where I'm almost copy and pasting the same stuff over and over again, so if people ( like yourself ) would like me to make a video on it, I'd be happy to do so. In the meanwhile, may I recommend another RU-vidr who I watched quite a lot when it comes down to modding Dragon Age? this is her channel: www.youtube.com/@FoodThenGames
Modding DA:O is notoriously difficult, but if you can get any to work it can really change the game. Dalish mage mod can be very rewarding story-wise, or Death Knight mod for a unique style of gameplay as the story truly fits an Arthas arc. Almost above all, get the mod that allows the mabari hound to not take up a party slot.
Youre never gonna be "so rich that it doesn't matter anymore" if you hoard stuff you think you might need. You can barely even buy 1-2 of the expensive items over 100 gold if you do sell everything
I always use the double sell exploit, idc about honor, I need the best loot 😅 the same left click, right click, then right release left release technique to sell items twice also works for enchanting runes, you can make double of all of them once you have weapons with multiple slots
@@REALVINERGY Fingers crossed buddy 🙏 Like you said atleast we got the trilogy, I'm currently waiting for black Friday to pick up all the dlcs from the Microsoft store for 1 and 2
@@REALVINERGY Lol you still have loads of time perfect timing really... Do you think Lohgain will make an appearance in dread wolf? I can see it.. And iv just noticed your rolling with a party of 4 + Mabari, that a mod?
@@danielcrawlson1174 Highly doubt it, I personally think Dragon Age will go the same route as Mass Effect; there are so many choices and options throughout the 3 games, making all of them relevant or significant is gonna be a huge pain in the ass for them as for the mod: www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/664
ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-JL1oFoOaNwk.html I know this one is " old " but it's still the most detailed and comprehensive one imo, all of the most relevant mods were released ( and last updated ) before this video released anyways, so everything is still up2date
Hey thank you for your mind you answers how you deal with crashes i used 4gb patch and i AM playing on all graphic settings low because changing it makes my game crash quickly, so using mods is probably bad idea for me. Do you have any tip how to fix this? Thanks in advance , im playing on win 11
I honestly think windows 11 coud be the issue, as Origins really does not like new hardware. You could try to go to your .exe file in your harddrive ( where you have Origins installed ), right click, properties and run the game in compatibility mode for windows 7. If that doesn't work, try asking around on the Dragon Age server from Reddit. I know that Reddit tends to suck but this server is still very active and helpful. discord.com/invite/DragonAge Last but not last: if I play Origins via steam, I get frequent crashes, also with the 4GB patch and on low graphics settings But when I switched to EA Origin it never happened again, even with +50 mods installed. You could try the same, or vice versa
At 15:20 it appears to me that in the top left at the wardens icon the dog is there as a sub icon...am i seeing this correctly? If so how do you have a party of 4 with the dog?
@@REALVINERGY excellent, thanks for the reply. I'm currently raw dogging the series now, can't wait to go back and do great mods like this for a better quality playthrough
@@wildcrow6250 I think that all 3 games still hold up really well even without mods, but once you've gone through them once or twice mods do indeed make a huge difference. I mostly use aesthetic stuff but especially Origins benefits a lot from gameplay changes. Enjoy!
@@REALVINERGY I have in the past knocked out so many plays of Origins. Siding with different groups (werewolves are dope) and so on. I have only done a couple of DA2 plays and I'm working on my first inquisition play currently. I agree that without mods the games still hold up well. The mods I'm planning on using are cosmetic in nature or bug fixes that were never addressed. Thanks for the advice watching your dreadwolf video atm.
@@wildcrow6250 I still go back to Origins from time to time, haven't touched it in a while now though as I'm fairly convinced I've done everything there is to be done in that game, but I might make a dedicated video about it once ( my style of videos has changed a bit since I made this tutorial ). I really liked that Dreadwolf video though, it was the first one that got a lot of views and comments and I spend literal days going through all of them, discussing things with people and hearing people's different opinions about the games
I rush in and play it without pausing. Its fine. I prefer the faster pace. The combat is already pretty slow so slowing it down every game is tedious and pointless. I only pause to use a potion
This is beyond false about Dalish elves. In fact, Merril is one of the elves. As well as Keeper Marethari. I have played all backgrounds, and this is the one I use whenever playing through this game. Claiming characters that don't return despite these being some of the most significant returning characters.
If you are referring to the Dalish part where I say the characters in that prologue barely show up in the game anymore, you are correct, Merril and the keeper do indeed show up again in Dragon Age 2. But this is not Dragon Age 2 so I have no clue which point you are trying to make exactly
Too many to all link, but the most relevant ones were all appearance changing, armor sets, new hair styles, stuff like that things like these: - www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/435 - www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/392 - www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/3553 " Unfortunately " though, the older a game gets, the more creative modders get, which somehow always ends up with characters losing clothing and increasing body shape size.. 😂 , so the first two pages of armor and clothing sets are almost always useless to look at for the gameplay, the biggest changers are: - www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/664 - www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/2577 ( this one is slightly broken, the fixed version is here www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/5000/ ) - www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/816 And on top of that a lot of quality of life things: restoration packs, patches, annoyance removers, etc. Was at one point considering to make a modding guide, but Origins isn't like Skyrim or Fallout, where every new playthrough can look completely different due to mods. On top of that, there already are pretty clear guides and people still making mod videos about the game, so didn't really see the need, but might still do it one day, maybe when Dreadwolf is close to releasing
Im an idiot that played on xbox. Went with a full warrior party with a single rogue because I had no idea what the fuck I was doing. Struggled like the stubborn bastard I am up to slaying the wyverns then the dragon. Then looked up shit to see where I was going wrong proceeded to back the fuck out of the game and play fable. Till today.
can I leave the forest and level my characters in another area? I ve chosen to go lothering, Red Cliff, and then werewolf and I cant beat the dragon. i am trying party members armors and weapons, but still cant kill it.
If you have the DLC, Stone Prisoner and Warden's keep are fairly easy and both throw a handful of enemies and a lot of XP your way Also the mage tower is probably the easiest from all main areas and you're gonna spend like an entire day fighting there, that might be an even better bet than the DLC
@@REALVINERGY Right now i am trying to kill the dragon and talk to the forest lady, can I go to the mage tower and come back to the forest when I become stronger? I make the question because the NPC didnt let me leave the town at RedCliff. I will try changing to frozen weapons this weekend and if i still cant kill it, i will go to the mage tower. Thank you .
Dragon age origins to get to even run on Windows now takes patch 1.4 or it will constantly crash. Obviously it's the best game in the franchise. Dragon age 2 was still decent to replay 12 times unlike beating origins over 21 times. DAI i beat it one time that was it each time i get to the palace i get bored. The newest game changed the name to The Veil Guard sounds like they do not want to do the dark arts this time around. Considering you could be one evil fucker in the 1st 2 games. All the origins are great stories with Human my favorite followed by Dwarf Noble then Commoner. City Elf can get 100 gold by letting the Human have his way with your sister. See evil! You cannot do that in Dragon age inquisition. Rogues did not need any strength until the DLC came out. And needed none in Dragon age 2.
yea, you can kinda go wherever you please after the prologue has ended ( even though certain areas are recommended and others are the complete opposite ) but I've only used random combat and inventory gameplay from like the first 5 to 10ish hours of the playthrough(s) used in this video
@@re.liable sure np, was working on a new video so had YT opened up anyways and coincidentally, that was kinda what I was leaning towards, so lucky you haha. Orzammar is considered to be the most difficult, with the Brecillian forrest and the mage tower considered to be the two easiest
@@REALVINERGY Interestingly, my preferred order is Circle, Redcliffe, Brecilian Forest, Orzammar. I just wish the game would log where you find Master chests, though, since there's always backtracking that needs to be done once you can FINALLY unlock them.
@@Taliesyn42 I think you can get away with plenty of things, even ignoring the circle for a while, as long as you don't head straight to Orzammar lol I also recently learned that that group of mercenaries/bandits you meet before the entrance there, were intentionally overpowered, as the developers wanted to show people to head back and come back later
The Steam version has always been trash for me, constant crashing no matter what. For once in their lives, EA actually managed to do something well, as the game runs flawlessly on Origin and EA Play. I always use the 4gb patch and if after that things still fail, I would run the game in compatibility window for windows 7, as Origins hates windows 10 and 11. But once again, that last part was only needed on Steam, on EA play I never had that issue whatsoever. From what I've gathered it's also a "luck" thing, Origins just doesn't work well together with certain hardware, guess I got lucky with the parts I've used to build my PC
I'm so sorry. I can't imagine starting with Inquisition, it's so _bad_ . Dragon Age II is also really bad. They're both a total embarassment compared to what DA:O did for the entire genre. Baldur's Gate 3 is honestly the closest to the spirit and quality of the original game, especially in the aspects of Grand Adventure and companion stories.
In hindsight, I'm kinda glad it turned out this way, because now I atleast have some sort of nostalgic love for Inquisition. If I had tried it after Origins I would've never finished it 💀 and yeah, BG3 is amazing
@@REALVINERGY I guess it is better to start low and end on a high note. I remember how dejected I was after waiting for years only to have DA II be a bottle episode in Kirkwall with weird retcons. And then Inquisition many years after that which had too many things to even get into in a RU-vid comment. :[ I still haven't found an RPG that can have as fully developed story arcs and as satisfying a resolution as the original. That game made an entirely new fantasy world from scratch with beloved characters and was so complete it did not need any sequels.
@@Troopertroll In case you missed it, I made an entire video about this subject, essentially "comparing" all 3 games and taking the good and bad from all of them and combining it into a wishlist for DA: Dreadwolf. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-mNHUXlxjYT0.html&ab_channel=VINERGY I also have a video idea on the backburner of just making an entire appreciation video for DA Origins, as I feel the same way. I don't believe in perfect games but man, does Origins come close. I've found some games that at least satisfied my role-playing urge ( New Vegas, PoE Deadfire ) but the stories in those games were pretty "meh." Origins was one of the few, if not the only, game that managed to combine both flawlessly. All of that, while doing it in an absolutely stunning world with crazy lore as well