I got the dog and the Black Emporium, but I decided not to import any items. I just felt weird starting out with items that were better/more powerful than the items that the devs arguably wanted me to start with. Maybe I'll import on a second playthrough.
By the middle of the 2nd Act (at the latest), all of the DLC items will be replaced with discovered loot. Only thing I'm still using on Aveline is the Fadeshear, and that is only because I haven't put enough into her strength to let her wield any of the better swords.
Edit: Actually, I lied. I'm also still using the Hindsight belt, which might have helped my loot discoveries, as it makes mooks drop higher-leveled gear.
InkSplat on
Origin for Dragon Age: Inquisition Shenanigans: Inksplat776
0
ZarathustraEckUbermenschnow with stripes!Registered Userregular
I got the dog and the Black Emporium, but I decided not to import any items. I just felt weird starting out with items that were better/more powerful than the items that the devs arguably wanted me to start with. Maybe I'll import on a second playthrough.
Playing as a mage, the items weren't THAT much of a head start. There are a number of staves in the first Act that were comparable (or better) than that Staff of Parthalan. Granted, I just entered the Deep Roads and I am using it, but that's because my mage is specced for 25% extra fire damage and dammit... can't find any other fire staves.
Now, Hayder's Razor? That thing is sick and I haven't seen a comparable 2-hander until a Maul in the Deep Roads.
Anyone know whether the item mod that causes "better" gear to drop from enemies stacks? Do you benefit from having that on multiple pieces of gear?
Wait, people have... beaten this already? Am I reading things correctly?
Jesus, I only just got into Kirkwall. I've barely been able to play.
Maybe this is a good thing for me. I played the first one when I was unemployed.
I wouldn't be too worried with comparing playthrough times against other people. Some people rush through games by bee-lining to their next quest objective, skipping dialog, and not reading the any of the codex entries they find. Then they come to forums to proclaim the game was too short and are shocked that it took anyone longer to complete the game.
Decoy on
0
MorninglordI'm tired of being Batman,so today I'll be Owl.Registered Userregular
Ok so after weighing up options, and talking with Vsove, I'm Bioware QA so I've played the game to death, and ran every companion plot through multiple outcomes.
Any weird questions you have about plots or quests feel free to ask and I'll try to answer.
Angel177 on
0
Warlock82Never pet a burning dogRegistered Userregular
I apologize, as this has probably been asked far too often, but I can't seem to get my Black Emporium to work. As I understand it, you get that particular piece of DLC if you bought the game new or if you pre-ordered or some such wizardry.
I bought the game off Steam the day prior to release and I have Fadeshear and Lion of Orlais and a bunch of other DLC from playing the demo... but no Black Emporium.
Is there some code I'm missing, do I just need to discover it? Is this a Signature Edition only thing?
That was my name as well. Mostly because I couldn't think of a better one - figured I would use a PA homage :P
I usually name my dog Ookla. This time I named him Grunt.
I totally blanked when it came to naming my dog this time. In DAO it was Ogre. That weekend I had seen a poor cat at the local petstore adoption area. He had missing bones in his front legs so they were shorter then his back legs. His name was Hemmer. The little guy stuck with me....so now the dog's name is Hemmer.
I apologize, as this has probably been asked far too often, but I can't seem to get my Black Emporium to work. As I understand it, you get that particular piece of DLC if you bought the game new or if you pre-ordered or some such wizardry.
I bought the game off Steam the day prior to release and I have Fadeshear and Lion of Orlais and a bunch of other DLC from playing the demo... but no Black Emporium.
Is there some code I'm missing, do I just need to discover it? Is this a Signature Edition only thing?
Thanks!!
Did you go to the BioWare Social site and download it? For some reason you need to do this manually, I don't know why...
Ok so after weighing up options, and talking with Vsove, I'm Bioware QA so I've played the game to death, and ran every companion plot through multiple outcomes.
Any weird questions you have about plots or quests feel free to ask and I'll try to answer.
Just curious. Were you weighing up wether you really want to talk about something you've done to death? Or not sure if you would be allowed to?
Cos if it's the first then extra respect!
Morninglord on
(PSN: Morninglord) (Steam: Morninglord) (WiiU: Morninglord22) I like to record and toss up a lot of random gaming videos here.
Has anybody else had a problem with the cutscene audio not synching up with the graphics? Right from the beginning, scenes like Varric being dragged into the interrogation room and the dragon roaring in Varric's BS version of the story have the audio more than a second behind the graphics. When it goes back to "in-engine", "real time" or whatever, that audio is fine, but the last bit of the cutscene audio is still playing.
Ok so after weighing up options, and talking with Vsove, I'm Bioware QA so I've played the game to death, and ran every companion plot through multiple outcomes.
Any weird questions you have about plots or quests feel free to ask and I'll try to answer.
Just curious. Were you weighing up wether you really want to talk about something you've done to death? Or not sure if you would be allowed to?
Cos if it's the first then extra respect!
Bit of both. But I figure I can be more use to folks if they want to know how to do something or find something in the world.
Has anybody else had a problem with the cutscene audio not synching up with the graphics? Right from the beginning, scenes like Varric being dragged into the interrogation room and the dragon roaring in Varric's BS version of the story have the audio more than a second behind the graphics. When it goes back to "in-engine", "real time" or whatever, that audio is fine, but the last bit of the cutscene audio is still playing.
(Physical PC copy, btw)
Not that specific problem between sound and visuals, but I have had a number of dialog scenes have visual hitches. Not graphical slow downs in terms of Frames Per Second, but more akin to the scene going from one response to the next.
A character will be talking about something, get to the end of their thought, pause for a brief moment and (without the camera moving) the character's body position, facial animations, and voice tone are all reset within the active frame and he begins another monologue.
Decoy on
0
ZarathustraEckUbermenschnow with stripes!Registered Userregular
edited March 2011
Not a plot/quest item, but if our friendly Bioware guys don't know, maybe someone in the next cubicle over does. Do items with mods like increased money from enemies or "better equipment" dropping stack?
So I preordered from Steam and I don't have the Black Emporium. What gives?
Derrick on
Steam and CFN: Enexemander
0
ZarathustraEckUbermenschnow with stripes!Registered Userregular
edited March 2011
Suggestion: Change the title to "See OP for Black Emporium Info" and explain to everyone that you need to download it. We've got plenty of people who didn't catch that (myself included).
Ok I just got Isabella, and I have Fenris in my party and the first thing she does is comment on his markings. Says something about a lot of the men she knows having tattoos involving breasts.
Fenris: I guess having lyrium breasts on my chest would make everything better
hahaha.
Vee on
0
HardtargetThere Are Four LightsVancouverRegistered Userregular
edited March 2011
so I started playing at 8pm last night and kept playing until 2am... game is excellent.
It just feels like a more modern version of Origins. You can really tell it's the same series, everything is very similar, it's just modernized.
1 thing I don't like though, you can't seem to hover your mouse over a spot on the minimap and get a tooltip to come up of what that spot it anymore, which is super annoying.
Also Angel177 maybe you can help me on this. The PC version seems to be incredibly dark. I've heard this from some other people as well.
The gamma starts already maxed out on 1.0. For some reason 1.0 appears to be in the middle of the slider but you can't bring it past that point. Is there a way to unlock the second half of the slider so that I can boost the gamma and now have everything so dark?
Suggestion: Change the title to "See OP for Black Emporium Info" and explain to everyone that you need to download it. We've got plenty of people who didn't catch that (myself included).
Yeah I don't know what's up. I entered my 2 codes and my CD key. I thought you got the emporium just for pre-ordering, but maybe it was just signature edition?
Derrick on
Steam and CFN: Enexemander
0
Warlock82Never pet a burning dogRegistered Userregular
so I started playing at 8pm last night and kept playing until 2am... game is excellent.
It just feels like a more modern version of Origins. You can really tell it's the same series, everything is very similar, it's just modernized.
1 thing I don't like though, you can't seem to hover your mouse over a spot on the minimap and get a tooltip to come up of what that spot it anymore, which is super annoying.
Also Angel177 maybe you can help me on this. The PC version seems to be incredibly dark. I've heard this from some other people as well.
The gamma starts already maxed out on 1.0. For some reason 1.0 appears to be in the middle of the slider but you can't bring it past that point. Is there a way to unlock the second half of the slider so that I can boost the gamma and now have everything so dark?
I noticed that too about the gamma. I went into the config file (Documents and Settings/BioWare/Dragon Age II/something-else-I-forget/ and it's one of the ini files in there) and manually turned on "Use desktop gamma" (change from 0 to 1) which seems to have helped a little.
Suggestion: Change the title to "See OP for Black Emporium Info" and explain to everyone that you need to download it. We've got plenty of people who didn't catch that (myself included).
Yeah I don't know what's up. I entered my 2 codes and my CD key. I thought you got the emporium just for pre-ordering, but maybe it was just signature edition?
If you're playing on the PC, you also need to actually download the thing from social.bioware.com in the section that lists all your ingame promotions.
Suggestion: Change the title to "See OP for Black Emporium Info" and explain to everyone that you need to download it. We've got plenty of people who didn't catch that (myself included).
Yeah I don't know what's up. I entered my 2 codes and my CD key. I thought you got the emporium just for pre-ordering, but maybe it was just signature edition?
If you're playing on the PC, you also need to actually download the thing from social.bioware.com in the section that lists all your ingame promotions.
Suggestion: Change the title to "See OP for Black Emporium Info" and explain to everyone that you need to download it. We've got plenty of people who didn't catch that (myself included).
Yeah I don't know what's up. I entered my 2 codes and my CD key. I thought you got the emporium just for pre-ordering, but maybe it was just signature edition?
you need to go to social.bioware.com and actually download the black emporium.
we really need to add this to the OP
Hardtarget on
0
HardtargetThere Are Four LightsVancouverRegistered Userregular
Also Angel177 maybe you can help me on this. The PC version seems to be incredibly dark. I've heard this from some other people as well.
The gamma starts already maxed out on 1.0. For some reason 1.0 appears to be in the middle of the slider but you can't bring it past that point. Is there a way to unlock the second half of the slider so that I can boost the gamma and now have everything so dark?
I noticed that too about the gamma. I went into the config file (Documents and Settings/BioWare/Dragon Age II/something-else-I-forget/ and it's one of the ini files in there) and manually turned on "Use desktop gamma" (change from 0 to 1) which seems to have helped a little.
ugh I'll try that but that's definitely not going to help enough
so weird the slider doesn't go past 1.0, there must be a way to fix that.
Hardtarget on
0
Warlock82Never pet a burning dogRegistered Userregular
Also Angel177 maybe you can help me on this. The PC version seems to be incredibly dark. I've heard this from some other people as well.
The gamma starts already maxed out on 1.0. For some reason 1.0 appears to be in the middle of the slider but you can't bring it past that point. Is there a way to unlock the second half of the slider so that I can boost the gamma and now have everything so dark?
I noticed that too about the gamma. I went into the config file (Documents and Settings/BioWare/Dragon Age II/something-else-I-forget/ and it's one of the ini files in there) and manually turned on "Use desktop gamma" (change from 0 to 1) which seems to have helped a little.
ugh I'll try that but that's definitely not going to help enough
so weird the slider doesn't go past 1.0, there must be a way to fix that.
I know, the video settings in general for the PC version are completely fucked up. I hope they patch that. You can't adjust ANYTHING if you don't have DirectX11 which just seems absolutely stupid to me. It still annoys me that the game is locked at Medium and runs smooth as hell (even with HD textures), proving that it's running well below what my video card can actually handle.
Also Angel177 maybe you can help me on this. The PC version seems to be incredibly dark. I've heard this from some other people as well.
The gamma starts already maxed out on 1.0. For some reason 1.0 appears to be in the middle of the slider but you can't bring it past that point. Is there a way to unlock the second half of the slider so that I can boost the gamma and now have everything so dark?
I noticed that too about the gamma. I went into the config file (Documents and Settings/BioWare/Dragon Age II/something-else-I-forget/ and it's one of the ini files in there) and manually turned on "Use desktop gamma" (change from 0 to 1) which seems to have helped a little.
ugh I'll try that but that's definitely not going to help enough
so weird the slider doesn't go past 1.0, there must be a way to fix that.
I know, the video settings in general for the PC version are completely fucked up. I hope they patch that. You can't adjust ANYTHING if you don't have DirectX11 which just seems absolutely stupid to me. It still annoys me that the game is locked at Medium and runs smooth as hell (even with HD textures), proving that it's running well below what my video card can actually handle.
Oh my god this. All of this.
The game is so dark that it's annoying... to the point where I've tried to use the Nvidia Control Panel to force more brightness (to little effect). I will definitely try changing the gamma setting in the config file as well, as hopefully that'll brighten things up a bit more... but really having it locked at 1.0, which is the max, is just stupid.
As well, not being able to change most of the video settings is absurdely retardedly stupid, Bioware. I still run Windows XP because it's awesome, and there is no excuse for not allowing me to adjust common graphics settings for DX9. I'm thinking I might, once more, use the Nvidia Control Panel and try forcing some things to see if I can make the game a bit shinier... not that I think the graphics are bad as they are, but like Warlock said I can tell that this game isn't even putting a strain on my video card (GTX 260).
While I get most of the niggles about PC stuff, I'm not that involved with it, PC rigs present so many unique issues I tend not to comment on them, sorry.
However the ini file fix sounds solid. also make sure to have the most up to date drivers for everything (beta or sneak build for DX11 is a good idea).
Angel177 on
0
Warlock82Never pet a burning dogRegistered Userregular
Also Angel177 maybe you can help me on this. The PC version seems to be incredibly dark. I've heard this from some other people as well.
The gamma starts already maxed out on 1.0. For some reason 1.0 appears to be in the middle of the slider but you can't bring it past that point. Is there a way to unlock the second half of the slider so that I can boost the gamma and now have everything so dark?
I noticed that too about the gamma. I went into the config file (Documents and Settings/BioWare/Dragon Age II/something-else-I-forget/ and it's one of the ini files in there) and manually turned on "Use desktop gamma" (change from 0 to 1) which seems to have helped a little.
ugh I'll try that but that's definitely not going to help enough
so weird the slider doesn't go past 1.0, there must be a way to fix that.
I know, the video settings in general for the PC version are completely fucked up. I hope they patch that. You can't adjust ANYTHING if you don't have DirectX11 which just seems absolutely stupid to me. It still annoys me that the game is locked at Medium and runs smooth as hell (even with HD textures), proving that it's running well below what my video card can actually handle.
Oh my god this. All of this.
The game is so dark that it's annoying... to the point where I've tried to use the Nvidia Control Panel to force more brightness (to little effect). I will definitely try changing the gamma setting in the config file as well, as hopefully that'll brighten things up a bit more... but really having it locked at 1.0, which is the max, is just stupid.
As well, not being able to change most of the video settings is absurdely retardedly stupid, Bioware. I still run Windows XP because it's awesome, and there is no excuse for not allowing me to adjust common graphics settings for DX9. I'm thinking I might, once more, use the Nvidia Control Panel and try forcing some things to see if I can make the game a bit shinier... not that I think the graphics are bad as they are, but like Warlock said I can tell that this game isn't even putting a strain on my video card (GTX 260).
Yeah. That same ini file has a handful of settings you can turn on as well (bilinear filtering and all that kind of crap). As far as I can tell, it picks these up and accepts them (unlike, say, if I lie to it and say to use DX11 mode, it will print an error in the startup log stored somewhere nearby and then revert it back to 0).
Overall though, I'm not sure these do much.
Also, watch out if you go into the config menu in-game (and that is any config menu, even audio and such). I think it likes to overwrite your changes if you modify anything.
While I get most of the niggles about PC stuff, I'm not that involved with it, PC rigs present so many unique issues I tend not to comment on them, sorry.
However the ini file fix sounds solid. also make sure to have the most up to date drivers for everything (beta or sneak build for DX11 is a good idea).
so what you are saying is you can't help us at all.
WELL THANKS!
heh
(but ya the Beta drivers nvidia and amd both put out are crucial if you have a dx11 card)
Hardtarget on
0
HardtargetThere Are Four LightsVancouverRegistered Userregular
Go to your documents folder and look for the Dragon Age 2 Demo folder. In the settings folder, edit DragonAge.ini gamma setting. I used 1.35 myself.
real dumb that there isn't a way to go past 1.0 in the gui....
Ah see yeah, I didn't try editing gamma directly. As a flat text file I wasn't sure if it'd accept values over 1 or not :P (I was kind of assuming "1 = 100%"). The gamma setting is like right above the desktop gamma thing in the file I mentioned.
I don't have a list, but it seems to be 29 tracks. The ZIP file is 725 MB....Seems crazy big. I wonder how they compressed this on to the game disc and why they chose to release them in such a huge format.
And since they are all WAV files they don't have any track/author/album info. What a hassle. I should have waited for some pirate to code to MP3 and do all the other grunt work.
Posts
By the middle of the 2nd Act (at the latest), all of the DLC items will be replaced with discovered loot. Only thing I'm still using on Aveline is the Fadeshear, and that is only because I haven't put enough into her strength to let her wield any of the better swords.
Edit: Actually, I lied. I'm also still using the Hindsight belt, which might have helped my loot discoveries, as it makes mooks drop higher-leveled gear.
Playing as a mage, the items weren't THAT much of a head start. There are a number of staves in the first Act that were comparable (or better) than that Staff of Parthalan. Granted, I just entered the Deep Roads and I am using it, but that's because my mage is specced for 25% extra fire damage and dammit... can't find any other fire staves.
Now, Hayder's Razor? That thing is sick and I haven't seen a comparable 2-hander until a Maul in the Deep Roads.
Anyone know whether the item mod that causes "better" gear to drop from enemies stacks? Do you benefit from having that on multiple pieces of gear?
-Z
I wouldn't be too worried with comparing playthrough times against other people. Some people rush through games by bee-lining to their next quest objective, skipping dialog, and not reading the any of the codex entries they find. Then they come to forums to proclaim the game was too short and are shocked that it took anyone longer to complete the game.
Highlight of my morning.
That was my name as well. Mostly because I couldn't think of a better one - figured I would use a PA homage :P
I usually name my dog Ookla. This time I named him Grunt.
Any weird questions you have about plots or quests feel free to ask and I'll try to answer.
I almost named him Andraste - because god damn screw the Chantry... now I'm wondering why I didn't...
I bought the game off Steam the day prior to release and I have Fadeshear and Lion of Orlais and a bunch of other DLC from playing the demo... but no Black Emporium.
Is there some code I'm missing, do I just need to discover it? Is this a Signature Edition only thing?
Thanks!!
get your own starcraft 2 signature at sc2sig.com
I totally blanked when it came to naming my dog this time. In DAO it was Ogre. That weekend I had seen a poor cat at the local petstore adoption area. He had missing bones in his front legs so they were shorter then his back legs. His name was Hemmer. The little guy stuck with me....so now the dog's name is Hemmer.
Comics, Games, Booze
Now not just one, but all of my saves are corrupted.
What the hell.
Did you go to the BioWare Social site and download it? For some reason you need to do this manually, I don't know why...
Just curious. Were you weighing up wether you really want to talk about something you've done to death? Or not sure if you would be allowed to?
Cos if it's the first then extra respect!
(Physical PC copy, btw)
Bit of both.
Shhhh, don't tell bioware.
Not that specific problem between sound and visuals, but I have had a number of dialog scenes have visual hitches. Not graphical slow downs in terms of Frames Per Second, but more akin to the scene going from one response to the next.
A character will be talking about something, get to the end of their thought, pause for a brief moment and (without the camera moving) the character's body position, facial animations, and voice tone are all reset within the active frame and he begins another monologue.
-Z
-Z
Fenris: I guess having lyrium breasts on my chest would make everything better
hahaha.
It just feels like a more modern version of Origins. You can really tell it's the same series, everything is very similar, it's just modernized.
1 thing I don't like though, you can't seem to hover your mouse over a spot on the minimap and get a tooltip to come up of what that spot it anymore, which is super annoying.
Also Angel177 maybe you can help me on this. The PC version seems to be incredibly dark. I've heard this from some other people as well.
The gamma starts already maxed out on 1.0. For some reason 1.0 appears to be in the middle of the slider but you can't bring it past that point. Is there a way to unlock the second half of the slider so that I can boost the gamma and now have everything so dark?
Yeah I don't know what's up. I entered my 2 codes and my CD key. I thought you got the emporium just for pre-ordering, but maybe it was just signature edition?
I noticed that too about the gamma. I went into the config file (Documents and Settings/BioWare/Dragon Age II/something-else-I-forget/ and it's one of the ini files in there) and manually turned on "Use desktop gamma" (change from 0 to 1) which seems to have helped a little.
If you're playing on the PC, you also need to actually download the thing from social.bioware.com in the section that lists all your ingame promotions.
-Z
I'm not seeing any download link.
Oh I see it. http://social.bioware.com/user_entitlements.php
They really could have done a better job with this.
you need to go to social.bioware.com and actually download the black emporium.
we really need to add this to the OP
so weird the slider doesn't go past 1.0, there must be a way to fix that.
I know, the video settings in general for the PC version are completely fucked up. I hope they patch that. You can't adjust ANYTHING if you don't have DirectX11 which just seems absolutely stupid to me. It still annoys me that the game is locked at Medium and runs smooth as hell (even with HD textures), proving that it's running well below what my video card can actually handle.
Oh my god this. All of this.
The game is so dark that it's annoying... to the point where I've tried to use the Nvidia Control Panel to force more brightness (to little effect). I will definitely try changing the gamma setting in the config file as well, as hopefully that'll brighten things up a bit more... but really having it locked at 1.0, which is the max, is just stupid.
As well, not being able to change most of the video settings is absurdely retardedly stupid, Bioware. I still run Windows XP because it's awesome, and there is no excuse for not allowing me to adjust common graphics settings for DX9. I'm thinking I might, once more, use the Nvidia Control Panel and try forcing some things to see if I can make the game a bit shinier... not that I think the graphics are bad as they are, but like Warlock said I can tell that this game isn't even putting a strain on my video card (GTX 260).
However the ini file fix sounds solid. also make sure to have the most up to date drivers for everything (beta or sneak build for DX11 is a good idea).
Yeah. That same ini file has a handful of settings you can turn on as well (bilinear filtering and all that kind of crap). As far as I can tell, it picks these up and accepts them (unlike, say, if I lie to it and say to use DX11 mode, it will print an error in the startup log stored somewhere nearby and then revert it back to 0).
Overall though, I'm not sure these do much.
Also, watch out if you go into the config menu in-game (and that is any config menu, even audio and such). I think it likes to overwrite your changes if you modify anything.
WELL THANKS!
(but ya the Beta drivers nvidia and amd both put out are crucial if you have a dx11 card)
http://social.bioware.com/%252525252520http:/social.bioware.com/forum/1/topic/294/index/6155091/1 real dumb that there isn't a way to go past 1.0 in the gui....
Ah see yeah, I didn't try editing gamma directly. As a flat text file I wasn't sure if it'd accept values over 1 or not :P (I was kind of assuming "1 = 100%"). The gamma setting is like right above the desktop gamma thing in the file I mentioned.
I don't have a list, but it seems to be 29 tracks. The ZIP file is 725 MB....Seems crazy big. I wonder how they compressed this on to the game disc and why they chose to release them in such a huge format.
And since they are all WAV files they don't have any track/author/album info. What a hassle. I should have waited for some pirate to code to MP3 and do all the other grunt work.