I really don't understand the complaints that no matter your choices, the end is always the same! Because you've just described every single BioWare RPG and most of the rest of the genre.
You see, sometimes that makes sense, and sometimes it absolutely doesn't. There are many instances in DA2 where it simply does not make sense for things to unfold as they do no matter the choices that are made. For choice to be a factor, there must be branching storylines. They can converge more or less the same, but it's asinine to offer the illusion of choice that affects precisely nothing.
How to do it right: Witcher 2. You basically have a branching storyline where the bulk of the game is very different based on your choices down two major paths. Within those paths, the choices you make affect the ending and how you get there.
Otherwise just make an action game with upgradeable gear and abilities. Hell, Dynasty Warriors is a pretty fun game, imo.
But but but Fallout (especially pre-patch) and Fallout 2.
Fallout, Fallout 2, Fallout: New Vegas, Arcanum, Vampire: Bloodlines, Baldurs Gate 2 (with the expansion), Knights of the Old Republic, the Witcher, the Witcher 2, Baldurs Gate 2, Mass Effect 1/2 (many of your decisions take a couple of games to go into effect, but they are there: Unlike DA2 that decides to pretty much ignore anything that happens in DA) and even Dragon Age: Origins.
I think it's notable just how many of the games on that list were made by Bioware. I also feel during DA2 there are more than a few places where I *should* be able to impact what happens - even if I can't affect the ending. But the game doesn't even allow me to do that, making it feel like a giant railroad stuck firmly up my characters posterior. I honestly haven't even been paying attention to what I've been doing when I last played it. Just letting the game direct me to whatever scripted event I'll have no control over next. I find that really disappointing and the ending is really insult to injury. I had hoped that I could affect the ending at least, hence why I kept playing and then when I read I couldn't, well. Blah.
I really want to like this game, but I just can't and that frustrates me.
Fallout, Fallout 2, Fallout: New Vegas, Arcanum, Vampire: Bloodlines, Baldurs Gate 2 (with the expansion), Knights of the Old Republic, the Witcher, the Witcher 2, Baldurs Gate 2, Mass Effect 1/2 (many of your decisions take a couple of games to go into effect, but they are there: Unlike DA2 that decides to pretty much ignore anything that happens in DA) and even Dragon Age: Origins
In which of the bolded games do your actions change the final boss or the endgame? I don't know about the non-bolded because I haven't played them, but none of those games I bolded gave you any meaningful difference in the endgame at all mechanically. Nor, in the ones with sequels, did your actions change anything about the sequel beyond minor cosmetic things. Mass Effect 3 may buck the trend, but ME2 sure as hell didn't nor did KoTOR II or Baldur's Gate 2.
I mean, there were more unique cameos and callbacks in DA2 than in ME2 and unique quests. They just didn't usually involve former party members.
Where are specific places you would have liked to have more control over the outcome? The two big ones seem to be the ending and the family-related Act 2 quest. I think the latter especially was done extremely well, and having a "correct" way through it would undermine its emotional impact. Like in Mass Effect 2, I don't care about the risks of the suicide mission because nobody will die unless I want them to. Failure is not explored enough in games. Real failure, not you beat the boss in battle but he escapes in the next cutscene.
I really don't understand the complaints that no matter your choices, the end is always the same! Because you've just described every single BioWare RPG and most of the rest of the genre.
You see, sometimes that makes sense, and sometimes it absolutely doesn't. There are many instances in DA2 where it simply does not make sense for things to unfold as they do no matter the choices that are made. For choice to be a factor, there must be branching storylines. They can converge more or less the same, but it's asinine to offer the illusion of choice that affects precisely nothing.
How to do it right: Witcher 2. You basically have a branching storyline where the bulk of the game is very different based on your choices down two major paths. Within those paths, the choices you make affect the ending and how you get there.
Otherwise just make an action game with upgradeable gear and abilities. Hell, Dynasty Warriors is a pretty fun game, imo.
It's interesting that people say everything they do affects nothing, I've ran through the game, ooohhhh, a lot, with every known origin save, every class, doing every mission.
If you just main quest multiple times , It it'll be a little boring, as will being good/aggressive all the time.
There are lots of great little things you won't see unless you play through it multiple times, but what you do affects kirkwall but only to the individuals.
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AegeriTiny wee bacteriumsPlateau of LengRegistered Userregular
Fallout, Fallout 2, Fallout: New Vegas, Arcanum, Vampire: Bloodlines, Baldurs Gate 2 (with the expansion), Knights of the Old Republic, the Witcher, the Witcher 2, Baldurs Gate 2, Mass Effect 1/2 (many of your decisions take a couple of games to go into effect, but they are there: Unlike DA2 that decides to pretty much ignore anything that happens in DA) and even Dragon Age: Origins
In which of the bolded games do your actions change the final boss or the endgame?
It is the significance of having actual choices that impact the game. Bloodlines falls over at the end because of its terrible set up, but you can actually choose factions and have entirely different resolutions (that you dispute that is curious in itself). I don't need to have entirely different end battles, I need to have different resolutions based on the choices I made and how I played the game. Many of those games easily succeed at that, or at least succeed at giving me that feeling. Something that DA2 does not, due to a deliberate way the story was written and presented. The problem though is that DA2 is a sequel to a game that I felt was reasonably successful at giving me that impression I had some impact on what was going on. If DA2 had been its own "thing" and had nothing to do with the original game (EG it wasn't a sequel) I would be a lot more forgiving. Judging it in the context of what came before is what leaves me with such a negative impression of it - not on its own merits. Yes, I am aware of how tragically unfair to the game that actually is - which is why I've made such an attempt to enjoy the game on its own merits. Even there, there are enough problems with DA2 that I find they get in the way of my enjoyment as well (like the "Wave" based combat and reuse of environments every 5 seconds particularly).
But but but Fallout (especially pre-patch) and Fallout 2.
Fallout, Fallout 2, Fallout: New Vegas, Arcanum, Vampire: Bloodlines, Baldurs Gate 2 (with the expansion), Knights of the Old Republic, the Witcher, the Witcher 2, Baldurs Gate 2, Mass Effect 1/2 (many of your decisions take a couple of games to go into effect, but they are there: Unlike DA2 that decides to pretty much ignore anything that happens in DA) and even Dragon Age: Origins.
I think it's notable just how many of the games on that list were made by Bioware. I also feel during DA2 there are more than a few places where I *should* be able to impact what happens - even if I can't affect the ending. But the game doesn't even allow me to do that, making it feel like a giant railroad stuck firmly up my characters posterior. I honestly haven't even been paying attention to what I've been doing when I last played it. Just letting the game direct me to whatever scripted event I'll have no control over next. I find that really disappointing and the ending is really insult to injury. I had hoped that I could affect the ending at least, hence why I kept playing and then when I read I couldn't, well. Blah.
I really want to like this game, but I just can't and that frustrates me.
The funny thing about the limed games is that those games all got retconned with each new installment. All your choices are for naught. The devs wrote a "correct" Vault Dweller, Chosen One, Lone Wanderer, and will eventually write a correct Courier for New Vegas with a new sequel.
So while we could impact the wastes in multitudes of ways in game, the devs just dick slap you in the sequel by saying "this is cannon, all the other shit doesn't matter". That to me is far more disrupting than anything in DA2
I love Vampire to death, but the difference in its couple endings is pretty trivial, while KoTOR had binary endings (Jade Empire bumped up to 3! Private to Vsove: I will find a way to have your children if you convince your studio to make JE2).
Still, I think saying "the point is that your choices don't matter" is as compelling as Suda51 successfully demonstrating how dull pointless overworlds and minigames are. You made your point, but it became something other than what I was looking for.
Nonetheless, I like DA2, and I liked the thrust of the story much more than fending off the dreaded NotOrcs. I think it has a serious narrative pitfall at the end, along with a sense of emptiness in the world (I was always expecting that alchemy vendor to have something more to say since she was on friendly terms with Hawke, but never again), an awful inventory and some other problems (waves made every battle feel the same, but then every battle already felt the same in DA:O with a duller combat system to boot), but I think its flaws are particular to its incarnation while its virtues will reincarnate.
I need to have different resolutions based on the choices I made and how I played the game.
I really do feel there is a lot of this in Dragon Age 2.
apotheos on
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AegeriTiny wee bacteriumsPlateau of LengRegistered Userregular
edited May 2011
I don't really feel that way, for example in DA2 there is a point where you are defending a certain character.
The resolution works out something like this:
Regardless of the fact I seem to be able to slaughter the attackers with immense ease (brainless ease at that), he still goes nuts and attacks me for absolutely no reason. It's so contrived and stupid, that I actually haven't been able to play past that part of the game yet. It's almost like someone was like "We haven't had a random monster for no reason for a while. Oh I know! Let's have this guy go completely banana's and try to kill the people defending him for no reason!"
I mean I've reloaded and tried that a couple of different ways to see if I just made some mistake, but it doesn't seem I can have any impact on it whatsoever. It makes my choices irrelevant and leaves me feeling like the game is on a tight railroad. It doesn't even feel logical to me as I'm butchering down tons of the enemies with no effort required whatsoever. If that was perhaps difficult or I was clearly losing: Yeah, I could totally buy what happens. But while I'm easily handing the assholes of all the attackers back to them, THEN you decide to go nuts. Really? REALLY? It's just poor writing or design or something in between that. It's like if in DA:O when assaulting the final demon in the mage circle the only resolution was them being wiped out, regardless of what I chose to do. Sure you only get a difference between mages/templar in the final battle, but it's a difference and feels like I had an important effect (also Redcliff gets a mechanism of resolving that removed as well).
That's the sort of thing that really aggravates me. Choices don't have to be world shattering, they just have to feel significant within the context of their own game. Incidentally, I have no problem with another game assuming some kind of canon: So long as when I play the game initially it feels significant. I can accept that in a sequel X, Y and Z may be accepted as what happens - but during the original game I want to have choices and I want them to feel significant. Same in the sequel. DA2 I feel doesn't give me that feeling of having any impact on the story.
I don't really feel that way, for example in DA2 there is a point where you are defending a certain character.
The resolution works out something like this:
Regardless of the fact I seem to be able to slaughter the attackers with immense ease (brainless ease at that), he still goes nuts and attacks me for absolutely no reason. It's so contrived and stupid, that I actually haven't been able to play past that part of the game yet. It's almost like someone was like "We haven't had a random monster for no reason for a while. Oh I know! Let's have this guy go completely banana's and try to kill the people defending him for no reason!"
I mean I've reloaded and tried that a couple of different ways to see if I just made some mistake, but it doesn't seem I can have any impact on it whatsoever. It makes my choices irrelevant and leaves me feeling like the game is on a tight railroad. It doesn't even feel logical to me as I'm butchering down tons of the enemies with no effort required whatsoever. If that was perhaps difficult or I was clearly losing: Yeah, I could totally buy what happens. But while I'm easily handing the assholes of all the attackers back to them, THEN you decide to go nuts. Really? REALLY? It's just poor writing or design or something in between that. It's like if in DA:O when assaulting the final demon in the mage circle the only resolution was them being wiped out, regardless of what I chose to do. Sure you only get a difference between mages/templar in the final battle, but it's a difference and feels like I had an important effect (also Redcliff gets a mechanism of resolving that removed as well).
That's the sort of thing that really aggravates me. Choices don't have to be world shattering, they just have to feel significant within the context of their own game. Incidentally, I have no problem with another game assuming some kind of canon: So long as when I play the game initially it feels significant. I can accept that in a sequel X, Y and Z may be accepted as what happens - but during the original game I want to have choices and I want them to feel significant. Same in the sequel. DA2 I feel doesn't give me that feeling of having any impact on the story.
I think you're ignoring a lot about the scene you're talking about
You were locked in the room with half a dozen other mages. They all died. More Templars were pouring in despite how many you killed. Love him or hate him, I think Orsino really did care for the Mages under his charge and he's been seeing them slaughtered before his eyes even when he's there to save them. Remember thats the reason you go back in the first place, and you fail to save any of them. They're like his children, I don't think him snapping there is really that contrived or unrealistic. He doesn't give a flying fuck about Hawke or his party, he cared about the mages.
They're all dead and they're still coming to kill them. In his place I can't say I would do differently.
I seem to be able to slaughter the attackers with immense ease (brainless ease at that)
Story is here.
Gameplay is here
Never the twain shall meet.
Blackjack on
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AegeriTiny wee bacteriumsPlateau of LengRegistered Userregular
edited May 2011
That's why I said there is a problem with the writing or design. The fiction the game is trying to establish with how that resolves is divorced from the fiction that the game creates through its gameplay. Either there should have been another solution to that, or the enemies should actually have been more threatening than a horde of wet turnips.
I don't really feel that way, for example in DA2 there is a point where you are defending a certain character.
The resolution works out something like this:
Regardless of the fact I seem to be able to slaughter the attackers with immense ease (brainless ease at that), he still goes nuts and attacks me for absolutely no reason. It's so contrived and stupid, that I actually haven't been able to play past that part of the game yet. It's almost like someone was like "We haven't had a random monster for no reason for a while. Oh I know! Let's have this guy go completely banana's and try to kill the people defending him for no reason!"
I mean I've reloaded and tried that a couple of different ways to see if I just made some mistake, but it doesn't seem I can have any impact on it whatsoever. It makes my choices irrelevant and leaves me feeling like the game is on a tight railroad. It doesn't even feel logical to me as I'm butchering down tons of the enemies with no effort required whatsoever. If that was perhaps difficult or I was clearly losing: Yeah, I could totally buy what happens. But while I'm easily handing the assholes of all the attackers back to them, THEN you decide to go nuts. Really? REALLY? It's just poor writing or design or something in between that. It's like if in DA:O when assaulting the final demon in the mage circle the only resolution was them being wiped out, regardless of what I chose to do. Sure you only get a difference between mages/templar in the final battle, but it's a difference and feels like I had an important effect (also Redcliff gets a mechanism of resolving that removed as well).
That's the sort of thing that really aggravates me. Choices don't have to be world shattering, they just have to feel significant within the context of their own game. Incidentally, I have no problem with another game assuming some kind of canon: So long as when I play the game initially it feels significant. I can accept that in a sequel X, Y and Z may be accepted as what happens - but during the original game I want to have choices and I want them to feel significant. Same in the sequel. DA2 I feel doesn't give me that feeling of having any impact on the story.
It was poor writing and scene development. Even the devs said
Orsino
needed more screen time and that ending needed to have been fleshed out a bit. But the message is still present, though poorly represented.
All mages in Kirkwall, when their back are against the wall will resort to Blood Magic. Even the "nice ones".
I believe this horse has been killed, revived, beaten to death, reanimated in zombie form and we are now repeatedly shattering its limbs and failing to headshot it.
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AegeriTiny wee bacteriumsPlateau of LengRegistered Userregular
edited May 2011
I actually had no idea it was such a dead horse, without having read this thread for months until recently (the title got me curious I must admit) it was just something that stood out to me as being a particularly strong example of where DA2 went wrong for me. I actually feel more vindicated on this point knowing I'm not the only one to have a major issue with it (that it's a common enough complaint for the developers to specifically comment on). I'll leave it alone now I know that though, because I do imagine discussing this same thing again will just be tiresome.
But again, I've only played the game recently and haven't been following the thread that closely to really know. I only started reading the thread because I no longer cared about spoilers or having anything ruined (which just shows about how invested I am in the story now).
I actually had no idea it was such a dead horse, without having read this thread for months until recently (the title got me curious I must admit) it was just something that stood out to me as being a particularly strong example of where DA2 went wrong for me. I actually feel more vindicated on this point knowing I'm not the only one to have a major issue with it (that it's a common enough complaint for the developers to specifically comment on). I'll leave it alone now I know that though, because I do imagine discussing this same thing again will just be tiresome.
But again, I've only played the game recently and haven't been following the thread that closely to really know. I only started reading the thread because I no longer cared about spoilers or having anything ruined (which just shows about how invested I am in the story now).
I meant the horse analogy more that in DA2 the game keeps telling you via quests that
Mages will always bite you in the ass and go blood mage.
The Orsino example gets brought up a lot, but for good reason. Two rational people can watch it and sort of get what they were going for and not having a clue what is going on. Both are valid on a first viewing, because the scene really is rubbish from a technical perspective.
So, the new patch is suppose to come out this week, dolled out as soon as thier specific version is finished. Atm, only the PS3 Europe Version is live, but other than the trophy stuff, pretty much all of the patch is suppose to be the same for all platforms:
NOTE: Some fixes are retroactive, but not all. Players with plot-breaking bugs may need to revert to an earlier save, particularly a save prior to visiting the affected area during the current year in the game.
GAMEPLAY
- In many fights, enemies now move less quickly at the start of combat. This slower initial pace makes tactical positioning more useful and important.
- If the force of an enemy attack interrupts a party member's current action, the party member now resumes the action once he or she has recovered. This means, for example, that party members who have been instructed to consume a health potion will now do so as soon as they are able, and do not need to be told to consume a health potion again if they are interrupted.
- Enemies are now much less likely to explode into body parts upon death.
- Attacks that hit a stealthed assassin are now more likely to disrupt stealth.
- Abilities that apply a silence effect now also cancel the target's current action in addition to preventing the target from using further abilities.
- When an enemy wakes from a sleep effect due to suffering damage, other status effects that were applied by the same ability that caused the sleep effect are no longer removed at the same time.
- Items that bear the property "100% of basic attack damage vs. enemies that attack in melee" no longer harm the user when equipped in conjunction with abilities like Blood Magic or Sacrificial Frenzy that reduce the user's health.
- The items known as Final Thought, Sataareth, Sundering, and Trepanner's Gift now have damage types that match their elemental damage bonuses.
- The items known as Allure's Crook, Corrupted Acolyte's Staff, Defender of the Wall, Void's Hammer, and Volcanic Shield can now only be equipped by the appropriate classes.
- The high dragon's fireballs no longer track moving targets.
- Pride demons can no longer be affected by their own Crushing Prison spells.
- The size of the area affected by an ability is now explicitly described as diameter or radius (usually diameter).
- When a party member's armor changes after consummating a romance, runes inscribed on his or her old armor now carry over to the new armor.
- Using the Maker's Sigh potion on an archer no longer alters inventory capacity.
- It is no longer possible to create more than one Elixir of Heroism.
- It is no longer possible to simultaneously enable sustained modes that are supposed to be mutually exclusive.
- In some cases, enemies would freeze while entering combat. This no longer
occurs.
- In some cases, saw traps or spike traps would throw party members back even
when the trap was not visible. This no longer occurs.
- The Special Deliveries chest can no longer get into a state where it contains items but cannot be opened.
- The storage chest is now present in the Hawke estate after completing the main campaign.
- If the Black Emporium premium content is installed, the mabari hound now follows his master more reliably.
- Various character-corruption issues now correct themselves automatically when you load your game.
- Various minor gameplay issues no longer occur.
QUESTS (SPOILER WARNING)
- "Who Needs Rescuing" can now be completed.
- "Friendly Concern" is now available after consummating a romance.
- In "Act of Mercy," Thrask can no longer die, which could block completion.
- In "A Murder of Crows," it is now always possible to fight the varterral.
- In "A New Path," Merrill no longer remains locked in the party after the quest.
- In "Bait and Switch," the chest in the abandoned house can now always be opened.
- In "Demands of the Qun," Aveline's guards no longer turn hostile if the player declines to enter the Qunari compound during the day and then returns at night.
- In "Dissent," it is no longer possible to loot Ser Alrik's body before the appropriate time. This ensures that the quest can always be completed.
- In "No Rest for the Wicked," Isabela now always begins the opening conversation at the appropriate time.
- In "The Captain's Condolences," it is now possible to ask Aveline about her father even if she is not currently in the party.
- In "The Last Straw," Anders now responds much differently if he is a rival.
- In "The Last Straw," Aveline no longer attacks Meredith when the party is supposed to be stunned. This prevents a subsequent issue where the game could freeze after loading the post-campaign save.
- In "Wayward Son," it is no longer possible to speak to Thrask after speaking to Samson. This ensures that the quest progresses correctly.
- If Merrill's clan members die, she no longer speaks as if they were alive.
- If Anders is a rival, giving him the Tevinter Chantry Amulet now results in rivalry points instead of friendship points.
- If the Black Emporium premium content is installed, a new conversation between Fenris and Hawke's dog is available during the fourth year in Kirkwall.
- Alternate Merrill/Aveline banter is now available if Merrill's clan is killed.
- Various references to the events of Dragon Age: Origins are now more accurate.
- Various minor story-scripting issues no longer occur.
FUNCTIONALITY
- Users with a large number of promotional items were timing out when attempting to log in. This no longer occurs.
- Combat audio has been rebalanced so that it is no longer louder than exploration and dialogue audio.
- The Epic achievement or trophy can now always be unlocked.
- The Supplier achievement or trophy now always unlocks after finding at least 66 resource varieties, including resources purchased from the Black Emporium.
- A codex entry that helps unlock the Archaeologist achievement or trophy is now easier to acquire in the Viscount's Keep during the first year in Kirkwall.
- In the tactics menu, actions that use Items no longer become blank.
- Various minor art issues no longer occur.
- Various technical changes should improve performance and limit crashes.
PS3-SPECIFIC FUNCTIONALITY
- The Epic trophy was not unlocking properly for some users. This no longer occurs.
- The Supplier trophy now always unlocks after finding at least 66 resource varieties, including resources purchased from the Black Emporium.
- A codex entry that helps unlock the Archaeologist trophy is now easier to acquire in the Viscount's Keep during the first year in Kirkwall.
BALANCE
NOTE: Patch 1.03 introduces significant changes to the overall balance of the game, improving the strategic elements and making combat and class progression more engaging and enjoyable for players. Here is a detailed summary of the balance-related improvements:
General Combat
- Enemies’ basic attacks now apply much less force, which means that party members’ actions are not interrupted as frequently.
- The secondary attribute requirement for equipping armor or shields (constitution for warriors, willpower for mages, and cunning for rogues) is now significantly smaller.
- The rate at which rogues regenerate stamina while performing basic attacks has been significantly increased.
- Traps no longer inflict injuries.
- Enemies now gain more health as the game progresses.
- Enemy assassins now have less health.
- Lieutenant-rank and boss-rank enemies now have less health.
- Lieutenant-rank enemies can no longer lose more than 40% of their health from a single hit, and boss-rank enemies cannot lose more than 20%.
- Enemy commanders now occasionally throw stun grenades while encouraging their troops to concentrate attacks against a single party member. Previously, this behavior was limited to nightmare difficulty.
- Values for armor and elemental resistances now cannot exceed 95%. The game displays values of up to 100%, but characters now suffer 5% damage from an attack even if they show 100% resistance.
- The DISORIENT effect now applies a 50% penalty to enemy defense, as described in the codex, instead of only 25%.
- The Rune of Valiance now provides a +2 bonus to all attributes instead of a variable bonus that could rise as high as +7. As well, equipping and unequipping multiple pieces of armor that each bear a Rune of Valiance no longer results in incorrect attribute scores.
- Items that improve the Blood Magic cost ratio now provide 0.25 mana per point of health instead of 1 mana.
- On hard and nightmare difficulties, status effects now persist on enemies for a slightly longer duration.
- On nightmare difficulty, enemies now inflict more damage than before.
- On nightmare difficulty, party members no longer suffer friendly-fire damage from warriors’ basic attacks.
- On nightmare difficulty, party members can no longer suffer more than 75% of their health in damage from a single friendly-fire attack.
Warrior Changes
- Aftershock upgrade to the Tremor talent now has a 30% chance to STAGGER normal enemies instead of 40%.
- Claymore upgrade to the Cleave talent now has a 10% chance to STAGGER normal enemies instead of 40%.
- Cleave talent now increases damage by 75% instead of 100%, while the cost has been increased from 20 stamina to 30 and cooldown from 20s to 25s.
- Shield Bash talent no longer automatically STAGGERS enemies within range of the attack who were not targeted directly. The primary target is still automatically STAGGERED, but other normal enemies within range have a 40% chance to STAGGER.
- Shield Defense talent now increases threat generation by 100%.
- Sunder talent now has a 20% chance to STAGGER enemies on a critical hit instead of 50%. As well, the talent now only STAGGERS enemies if the warrior is wielding a two-handed weapon, as originally intended.
- The Berserker's Berserk talent now calculates the damage bonus differently, substantially increasing the ability's effectiveness.
- The Reaver's Blood Frenzy talent and Fenris's Veneer of Calm talent now provide a maximum bonus of +50% damage instead of +100%.
Rogue Changes
- Rogues now regain 1% of their stamina per hit with dual weapons or 2% per hit with a bow.
- The Ambush talent now functions as described.
- The Burst Shot talent now inflicts approximately 50% more damage (and 3x physical force instead of 2x).
- Brand talent now provides a 25% bonus to warriors' and mages' critical chance instead of 10%.
- Disorienting Shot upgrade to the Pinning Shot talent now always DISORIENTS the victim, regardless of whether the victim was pinned in place.
- The Inconspicuous talent now extends the reduced threat generation to other rogues and mages within a 10m diameter.
- The Lacerate talent now provides a 10% chance to re-apply the damage from any ability over 5s, instead of a chance to apply a fixed amount of damage.
- The Merciless Strike upgrade to the Explosive Strike talent now applies 300% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 400%.
- The Pinning Shot talent now pins the victim for the correct duration.
- The Pinpoint Strikes talent now includes a 100% bonus to attack for the duration of the ability.
- The Assassin's Assassinate talent now has a 50s cooldown instead of 40s. The Annihilate upgrade now applies 200% damage vs. BRITTLE targets instead of 400%.
- The Shadow's Decoy talent and Sebastian's Guardian Angel talent now have a 45s cooldown instead of 30s.
- The Shadow's Disorienting Criticals talent now functions as described, and provides a 50% bonus to critical damage when obscured instead of 25%.
- The Shadow's Pinpoint Precision talent now provides a 50% bonus to critical damage instead of 25%.
Mage Changes
- Walking Bomb now inflicts damage equal to 50% of the victim's maximum health upon explosion, within a 4m radius, instead of 100%.
- Arcane Wall upgrade to the Arcane Shield spell now continues to provide a 20% defense bonus to the mage, as described. Previously, the upgrade reduced the bonus to 15%. Other party members receive a 5% bonus.
- The Chain Reaction upgrade to the Chain Lightning spell now applies 300% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 600%.
- Death Syphon spell now drains multiple corpses more quickly.
- Entropic Cloud spell now applies for 30s instead of 15s (against normal enemies), but the cost has been increased from 35 mana to 50 and the cooldown from 40s to 50s. The Death Cloud upgrade now applies damage every 2s instead of every 4s.
- Fireball and Firestorm spells now both inflict approximately 40% more damage and apply 3x elemental force instead of 2x.
- Misdirection Hex spell now applies for 15s instead of 10s (against normal enemies).
- Petrify spell now applies for 12s instead of 15s (against normal enemies).
- Sleep spell now applies for 15s instead of 10s (against normal enemies).
- Spirit Mastery skill now includes a 10% bonus to critical chance instead of 5%.
- The Spirit Strike upgrade to the Spirit Bolt spell now applies 300% damage vs. DISORIENTED targets instead of 200%.
- The Winter's Blast upgrade to the Winter's Grasp spell now notes that it affects nearby enemies.
- The Blood mage's Blood Magic spell and the spirit healer's Healing Aura spell are now mutually exclusive.
- The Blood mage's Blood Magic spell now reserves 70% of the mage's mana instead of 50%.
- The Blood mage's Blood Slave spell now enslaves the victim for a longer duration. As well, if the spell is ineffective, the victim's current action is now canceled. The Blood Spatter upgrade now inflicts damage equal to 75% of the victim's maximum health upon explosion instead of 100%, within a 4m radius. As well, the spell description now displays this information.
- The Blood mage's Grave Robber spell now affects a 12m diameter instead of 6m in order to make the ability more useful.
- The Blood mage's One Foot In upgrade now inflicts 100% of the mage’s maximum health in damage instead of 10%.
- The Blood mage's Paralyzing Hemorrhage upgrade to the Hemorrhage spell now applies 500% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 900%.
- The Force mage's Fist of the Maker spell now inflicts approximately 50% more damage. The Maker's Hammer upgrade now applies 600% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 900%.
- The Force mage's Unshakable spell now provides a +50 bonus to fortitude instead of +100.
- The Spirit healer's Group Heal spell and Anders's Aid Allies spell now restore 25% of party members' health instead of 30%. When upgraded, Group Heal restores 40% of health instead of 50%.
- The Spirit healer's Healing Aura spell and Anders's Panacea spell now provide a +100 bonus to health regeneration instead of +50, and a +200 bonus when upgraded instead of +100. As well, the diameter of the spell has been increased from 6m to 10m, and from 8m to 15m when upgraded. In addition, a rare case
in which the spell previously provided an abnormally high rate of health regeneration no longer occurs.
Companion Specific Skill Changes
- Anders's Swift Justice spell now reduces cooldowns to 90% of their normal duration instead of 80%.
- Aveline's Bodyguard talent no longer allows her to absorb the damage from Anders's Martyr spell.
- Aveline's Immovable talent now provides a stacking 8% bonus to damage resistance per hit instead of 2%.
- If Bethany or Carver rejoin the party near the end of the game, they now learn the Force Mage and Templar specializations, respectively. Existing save games from after the Deep Roads Expedition will not receive the benefit of this fix.
So, the new patch is suppose to come out this week, dolled out as soon as thier specific version is finished. Atm, only the PS3 Europe Version is live, but other than the trophy stuff, pretty much all of the patch is suppose to be the same for all platforms:
NOTE: Some fixes are retroactive, but not all. Players with plot-breaking bugs may need to revert to an earlier save, particularly a save prior to visiting the affected area during the current year in the game.
GAMEPLAY
- In many fights, enemies now move less quickly at the start of combat. This slower initial pace makes tactical positioning more useful and important.
- If the force of an enemy attack interrupts a party member's current action, the party member now resumes the action once he or she has recovered. This means, for example, that party members who have been instructed to consume a health potion will now do so as soon as they are able, and do not need to be told to consume a health potion again if they are interrupted.
- Enemies are now much less likely to explode into body parts upon death.
- Attacks that hit a stealthed assassin are now more likely to disrupt stealth.
- Abilities that apply a silence effect now also cancel the target's current action in addition to preventing the target from using further abilities.
- When an enemy wakes from a sleep effect due to suffering damage, other status effects that were applied by the same ability that caused the sleep effect are no longer removed at the same time.
- Items that bear the property "100% of basic attack damage vs. enemies that attack in melee" no longer harm the user when equipped in conjunction with abilities like Blood Magic or Sacrificial Frenzy that reduce the user's health.
- The items known as Final Thought, Sataareth, Sundering, and Trepanner's Gift now have damage types that match their elemental damage bonuses.
- The items known as Allure's Crook, Corrupted Acolyte's Staff, Defender of the Wall, Void's Hammer, and Volcanic Shield can now only be equipped by the appropriate classes.
- The high dragon's fireballs no longer track moving targets.
- Pride demons can no longer be affected by their own Crushing Prison spells.
- The size of the area affected by an ability is now explicitly described as diameter or radius (usually diameter).
- When a party member's armor changes after consummating a romance, runes inscribed on his or her old armor now carry over to the new armor.
- Using the Maker's Sigh potion on an archer no longer alters inventory capacity.
- It is no longer possible to create more than one Elixir of Heroism.
- It is no longer possible to simultaneously enable sustained modes that are supposed to be mutually exclusive.
- In some cases, enemies would freeze while entering combat. This no longer
occurs.
- In some cases, saw traps or spike traps would throw party members back even
when the trap was not visible. This no longer occurs.
- The Special Deliveries chest can no longer get into a state where it contains items but cannot be opened.
- The storage chest is now present in the Hawke estate after completing the main campaign.
- If the Black Emporium premium content is installed, the mabari hound now follows his master more reliably.
- Various character-corruption issues now correct themselves automatically when you load your game.
- Various minor gameplay issues no longer occur.
QUESTS (SPOILER WARNING)
- "Who Needs Rescuing" can now be completed.
- "Friendly Concern" is now available after consummating a romance.
- In "Act of Mercy," Thrask can no longer die, which could block completion.
- In "A Murder of Crows," it is now always possible to fight the varterral.
- In "A New Path," Merrill no longer remains locked in the party after the quest.
- In "Bait and Switch," the chest in the abandoned house can now always be opened.
- In "Demands of the Qun," Aveline's guards no longer turn hostile if the player declines to enter the Qunari compound during the day and then returns at night.
- In "Dissent," it is no longer possible to loot Ser Alrik's body before the appropriate time. This ensures that the quest can always be completed.
- In "No Rest for the Wicked," Isabela now always begins the opening conversation at the appropriate time.
- In "The Captain's Condolences," it is now possible to ask Aveline about her father even if she is not currently in the party.
- In "The Last Straw," Anders now responds much differently if he is a rival.
- In "The Last Straw," Aveline no longer attacks Meredith when the party is supposed to be stunned. This prevents a subsequent issue where the game could freeze after loading the post-campaign save.
- In "Wayward Son," it is no longer possible to speak to Thrask after speaking to Samson. This ensures that the quest progresses correctly.
- If Merrill's clan members die, she no longer speaks as if they were alive.
- If Anders is a rival, giving him the Tevinter Chantry Amulet now results in rivalry points instead of friendship points.
- If the Black Emporium premium content is installed, a new conversation between Fenris and Hawke's dog is available during the fourth year in Kirkwall.
- Alternate Merrill/Aveline banter is now available if Merrill's clan is killed.
- Various references to the events of Dragon Age: Origins are now more accurate.
- Various minor story-scripting issues no longer occur.
FUNCTIONALITY
- Users with a large number of promotional items were timing out when attempting to log in. This no longer occurs.
- Combat audio has been rebalanced so that it is no longer louder than exploration and dialogue audio.
- The Epic achievement or trophy can now always be unlocked.
- The Supplier achievement or trophy now always unlocks after finding at least 66 resource varieties, including resources purchased from the Black Emporium.
- A codex entry that helps unlock the Archaeologist achievement or trophy is now easier to acquire in the Viscount's Keep during the first year in Kirkwall.
- In the tactics menu, actions that use Items no longer become blank.
- Various minor art issues no longer occur.
- Various technical changes should improve performance and limit crashes.
PS3-SPECIFIC FUNCTIONALITY
- The Epic trophy was not unlocking properly for some users. This no longer occurs.
- The Supplier trophy now always unlocks after finding at least 66 resource varieties, including resources purchased from the Black Emporium.
- A codex entry that helps unlock the Archaeologist trophy is now easier to acquire in the Viscount's Keep during the first year in Kirkwall.
BALANCE
NOTE: Patch 1.03 introduces significant changes to the overall balance of the game, improving the strategic elements and making combat and class progression more engaging and enjoyable for players. Here is a detailed summary of the balance-related improvements:
General Combat
- Enemies’ basic attacks now apply much less force, which means that party members’ actions are not interrupted as frequently.
- The secondary attribute requirement for equipping armor or shields (constitution for warriors, willpower for mages, and cunning for rogues) is now significantly smaller.
- The rate at which rogues regenerate stamina while performing basic attacks has been significantly increased.
- Traps no longer inflict injuries.
- Enemies now gain more health as the game progresses.
- Enemy assassins now have less health.
- Lieutenant-rank and boss-rank enemies now have less health.
- Lieutenant-rank enemies can no longer lose more than 40% of their health from a single hit, and boss-rank enemies cannot lose more than 20%.
- Enemy commanders now occasionally throw stun grenades while encouraging their troops to concentrate attacks against a single party member. Previously, this behavior was limited to nightmare difficulty.
- Values for armor and elemental resistances now cannot exceed 95%. The game displays values of up to 100%, but characters now suffer 5% damage from an attack even if they show 100% resistance.
- The DISORIENT effect now applies a 50% penalty to enemy defense, as described in the codex, instead of only 25%.
- The Rune of Valiance now provides a +2 bonus to all attributes instead of a variable bonus that could rise as high as +7. As well, equipping and unequipping multiple pieces of armor that each bear a Rune of Valiance no longer results in incorrect attribute scores.
- Items that improve the Blood Magic cost ratio now provide 0.25 mana per point of health instead of 1 mana.
- On hard and nightmare difficulties, status effects now persist on enemies for a slightly longer duration.
- On nightmare difficulty, enemies now inflict more damage than before.
- On nightmare difficulty, party members no longer suffer friendly-fire damage from warriors’ basic attacks.
- On nightmare difficulty, party members can no longer suffer more than 75% of their health in damage from a single friendly-fire attack.
Warrior Changes
- Aftershock upgrade to the Tremor talent now has a 30% chance to STAGGER normal enemies instead of 40%.
- Claymore upgrade to the Cleave talent now has a 10% chance to STAGGER normal enemies instead of 40%.
- Cleave talent now increases damage by 75% instead of 100%, while the cost has been increased from 20 stamina to 30 and cooldown from 20s to 25s.
- Shield Bash talent no longer automatically STAGGERS enemies within range of the attack who were not targeted directly. The primary target is still automatically STAGGERED, but other normal enemies within range have a 40% chance to STAGGER.
- Shield Defense talent now increases threat generation by 100%.
- Sunder talent now has a 20% chance to STAGGER enemies on a critical hit instead of 50%. As well, the talent now only STAGGERS enemies if the warrior is wielding a two-handed weapon, as originally intended.
- The Berserker's Berserk talent now calculates the damage bonus differently, substantially increasing the ability's effectiveness.
- The Reaver's Blood Frenzy talent and Fenris's Veneer of Calm talent now provide a maximum bonus of +50% damage instead of +100%.
Rogue Changes
- Rogues now regain 1% of their stamina per hit with dual weapons or 2% per hit with a bow.
- The Ambush talent now functions as described.
- The Burst Shot talent now inflicts approximately 50% more damage (and 3x physical force instead of 2x).
- Brand talent now provides a 25% bonus to warriors' and mages' critical chance instead of 10%.
- Disorienting Shot upgrade to the Pinning Shot talent now always DISORIENTS the victim, regardless of whether the victim was pinned in place.
- The Inconspicuous talent now extends the reduced threat generation to other rogues and mages within a 10m diameter.
- The Lacerate talent now provides a 10% chance to re-apply the damage from any ability over 5s, instead of a chance to apply a fixed amount of damage.
- The Merciless Strike upgrade to the Explosive Strike talent now applies 300% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 400%.
- The Pinning Shot talent now pins the victim for the correct duration.
- The Pinpoint Strikes talent now includes a 100% bonus to attack for the duration of the ability.
- The Assassin's Assassinate talent now has a 50s cooldown instead of 40s. The Annihilate upgrade now applies 200% damage vs. BRITTLE targets instead of 400%.
- The Shadow's Decoy talent and Sebastian's Guardian Angel talent now have a 45s cooldown instead of 30s.
- The Shadow's Disorienting Criticals talent now functions as described, and provides a 50% bonus to critical damage when obscured instead of 25%.
- The Shadow's Pinpoint Precision talent now provides a 50% bonus to critical damage instead of 25%.
Mage Changes
- Walking Bomb now inflicts damage equal to 50% of the victim's maximum health upon explosion, within a 4m radius, instead of 100%.
- Arcane Wall upgrade to the Arcane Shield spell now continues to provide a 20% defense bonus to the mage, as described. Previously, the upgrade reduced the bonus to 15%. Other party members receive a 5% bonus.
- The Chain Reaction upgrade to the Chain Lightning spell now applies 300% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 600%.
- Death Syphon spell now drains multiple corpses more quickly.
- Entropic Cloud spell now applies for 30s instead of 15s (against normal enemies), but the cost has been increased from 35 mana to 50 and the cooldown from 40s to 50s. The Death Cloud upgrade now applies damage every 2s instead of every 4s.
- Fireball and Firestorm spells now both inflict approximately 40% more damage and apply 3x elemental force instead of 2x.
- Misdirection Hex spell now applies for 15s instead of 10s (against normal enemies).
- Petrify spell now applies for 12s instead of 15s (against normal enemies).
- Sleep spell now applies for 15s instead of 10s (against normal enemies).
- Spirit Mastery skill now includes a 10% bonus to critical chance instead of 5%.
- The Spirit Strike upgrade to the Spirit Bolt spell now applies 300% damage vs. DISORIENTED targets instead of 200%.
- The Winter's Blast upgrade to the Winter's Grasp spell now notes that it affects nearby enemies.
- The Blood mage's Blood Magic spell and the spirit healer's Healing Aura spell are now mutually exclusive.
- The Blood mage's Blood Magic spell now reserves 70% of the mage's mana instead of 50%.
- The Blood mage's Blood Slave spell now enslaves the victim for a longer duration. As well, if the spell is ineffective, the victim's current action is now canceled. The Blood Spatter upgrade now inflicts damage equal to 75% of the victim's maximum health upon explosion instead of 100%, within a 4m radius. As well, the spell description now displays this information.
- The Blood mage's Grave Robber spell now affects a 12m diameter instead of 6m in order to make the ability more useful.
- The Blood mage's One Foot In upgrade now inflicts 100% of the mage’s maximum health in damage instead of 10%.
- The Blood mage's Paralyzing Hemorrhage upgrade to the Hemorrhage spell now applies 500% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 900%.
- The Force mage's Fist of the Maker spell now inflicts approximately 50% more damage. The Maker's Hammer upgrade now applies 600% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 900%.
- The Force mage's Unshakable spell now provides a +50 bonus to fortitude instead of +100.
- The Spirit healer's Group Heal spell and Anders's Aid Allies spell now restore 25% of party members' health instead of 30%. When upgraded, Group Heal restores 40% of health instead of 50%.
- The Spirit healer's Healing Aura spell and Anders's Panacea spell now provide a +100 bonus to health regeneration instead of +50, and a +200 bonus when upgraded instead of +100. As well, the diameter of the spell has been increased from 6m to 10m, and from 8m to 15m when upgraded. In addition, a rare case
in which the spell previously provided an abnormally high rate of health regeneration no longer occurs.
Companion Specific Skill Changes
- Anders's Swift Justice spell now reduces cooldowns to 90% of their normal duration instead of 80%.
- Aveline's Bodyguard talent no longer allows her to absorb the damage from Anders's Martyr spell.
- Aveline's Immovable talent now provides a stacking 8% bonus to damage resistance per hit instead of 2%.
- If Bethany or Carver rejoin the party near the end of the game, they now learn the Force Mage and Templar specializations, respectively. Existing save games from after the Deep Roads Expedition will not receive the benefit of this fix.
I wonder if the Nathaniel import bug has been fixed? "More reliable" DAO save imports seems a bit vague.
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surrealitychecklonely, but not unloveddreaming of faulty keys and latchesRegistered Userregular
edited May 2011
The secret to remember about dragon age 2 is that a very large number of the criticisms are post hoc rationalisations that have no bearing on why the person actually did or didn't enjoy it.
My suspicion is that 90% of the problems really stem from the game being, despite protests to the contrary, produced far too quickly. This necessitated the asset reuse and fairly repetitive encounter design, which is probably the most obvious thing that would ruin most people's enjoyment.
The Anders fix for The Last Straw, if it is what I think it is, it will mean that a Rivalry with Anders lets you convince him to come with you and side with The Templars. Which, IMO, is a crueler fate than simply killing hm (which is what he wants/expects anyway)
I do see an across the board change to damage values. I'm gonna miss popping Cleave with my Warrior and clearing half the mobs with just a Chain Lightning Cast. Oh and one hitting some bosses too with my Rogue.
The Anders fix for The Last Straw, if it is what I think it is, it will mean that a Rivalry with Anders lets you convince him to come with you and side with The Templars. Which, IMO, is a crueler fate than simply killing hm (which is what he wants/expects anyway)
Agreed. It will now give me an incentive to have Anders as a rival.
Still don't get the gist of this game after resuming after a month or so. At the beginning of the battle my tank gets swarmed by enemies, keeping them together as long as she survives which is about a minute or so. While this happens, my two rogues and my healing mage get targeted by assassins/boss enemies and fall one after another. Keeping these enemies away is possible but useless nonetheless due to other monsters now focusing on my healing mage which gets stun-raped. Mindblast can keep them away for all of two seconds which doesn't help either. Cone of cold is usefull but not that much since 1. my rogue is busy getting stun-raped himself and 2.not dealing that much damage despite having all points in dexterity/cunning, a DLC top tier bow and using mark of death/assassination and other passive bonuses, meaning it takes about two minutes of kiting to kill a leader-enemy. Before this I tried to give my second rogue some control abilities like miasmic flask or the ability to confuse enemies, hail of arrows for slowing etc. - the only problem being that they do jack against assassins/bosses. I can't even get them to focus on my tank with that one ability, for that they'd have to be inside a radius around the tank - rendering it completely useless since the latter already has taunt. Well, guess that means reading up some strategies and just copying these, shame there's no freedom to explore in this game - or world, since all you do in school to get good grades is memorizing instead of actually understanding or learning for yourself. Yeah, the gameplay annoyed me so much it made me think if school, something I don't wanna do when playing fictional video games.
So, the new patch is suppose to come out this week, dolled out as soon as thier specific version is finished. Atm, only the PS3 Europe Version is live, but other than the trophy stuff, pretty much all of the patch is suppose to be the same for all platforms:
NOTE: Some fixes are retroactive, but not all. Players with plot-breaking bugs may need to revert to an earlier save, particularly a save prior to visiting the affected area during the current year in the game.
GAMEPLAY
- In many fights, enemies now move less quickly at the start of combat. This slower initial pace makes tactical positioning more useful and important.
- If the force of an enemy attack interrupts a party member's current action, the party member now resumes the action once he or she has recovered. This means, for example, that party members who have been instructed to consume a health potion will now do so as soon as they are able, and do not need to be told to consume a health potion again if they are interrupted.
- Enemies are now much less likely to explode into body parts upon death.
- Attacks that hit a stealthed assassin are now more likely to disrupt stealth.
- Abilities that apply a silence effect now also cancel the target's current action in addition to preventing the target from using further abilities.
- When an enemy wakes from a sleep effect due to suffering damage, other status effects that were applied by the same ability that caused the sleep effect are no longer removed at the same time.
- Items that bear the property "100% of basic attack damage vs. enemies that attack in melee" no longer harm the user when equipped in conjunction with abilities like Blood Magic or Sacrificial Frenzy that reduce the user's health.
- The items known as Final Thought, Sataareth, Sundering, and Trepanner's Gift now have damage types that match their elemental damage bonuses.
- The items known as Allure's Crook, Corrupted Acolyte's Staff, Defender of the Wall, Void's Hammer, and Volcanic Shield can now only be equipped by the appropriate classes.
- The high dragon's fireballs no longer track moving targets.
- Pride demons can no longer be affected by their own Crushing Prison spells.
- The size of the area affected by an ability is now explicitly described as diameter or radius (usually diameter).
- When a party member's armor changes after consummating a romance, runes inscribed on his or her old armor now carry over to the new armor.
- Using the Maker's Sigh potion on an archer no longer alters inventory capacity.
- It is no longer possible to create more than one Elixir of Heroism.
- It is no longer possible to simultaneously enable sustained modes that are supposed to be mutually exclusive.
- In some cases, enemies would freeze while entering combat. This no longer
occurs.
- In some cases, saw traps or spike traps would throw party members back even
when the trap was not visible. This no longer occurs.
- The Special Deliveries chest can no longer get into a state where it contains items but cannot be opened.
- The storage chest is now present in the Hawke estate after completing the main campaign.
- If the Black Emporium premium content is installed, the mabari hound now follows his master more reliably.
- Various character-corruption issues now correct themselves automatically when you load your game.
- Various minor gameplay issues no longer occur.
QUESTS (SPOILER WARNING)
- "Who Needs Rescuing" can now be completed.
- "Friendly Concern" is now available after consummating a romance.
- In "Act of Mercy," Thrask can no longer die, which could block completion.
- In "A Murder of Crows," it is now always possible to fight the varterral.
- In "A New Path," Merrill no longer remains locked in the party after the quest.
- In "Bait and Switch," the chest in the abandoned house can now always be opened.
- In "Demands of the Qun," Aveline's guards no longer turn hostile if the player declines to enter the Qunari compound during the day and then returns at night.
- In "Dissent," it is no longer possible to loot Ser Alrik's body before the appropriate time. This ensures that the quest can always be completed.
- In "No Rest for the Wicked," Isabela now always begins the opening conversation at the appropriate time.
- In "The Captain's Condolences," it is now possible to ask Aveline about her father even if she is not currently in the party.
- In "The Last Straw," Anders now responds much differently if he is a rival.
- In "The Last Straw," Aveline no longer attacks Meredith when the party is supposed to be stunned. This prevents a subsequent issue where the game could freeze after loading the post-campaign save.
- In "Wayward Son," it is no longer possible to speak to Thrask after speaking to Samson. This ensures that the quest progresses correctly.
- If Merrill's clan members die, she no longer speaks as if they were alive.
- If Anders is a rival, giving him the Tevinter Chantry Amulet now results in rivalry points instead of friendship points.
- If the Black Emporium premium content is installed, a new conversation between Fenris and Hawke's dog is available during the fourth year in Kirkwall.
- Alternate Merrill/Aveline banter is now available if Merrill's clan is killed.
- Various references to the events of Dragon Age: Origins are now more accurate.
- Various minor story-scripting issues no longer occur.
FUNCTIONALITY
- Users with a large number of promotional items were timing out when attempting to log in. This no longer occurs.
- Combat audio has been rebalanced so that it is no longer louder than exploration and dialogue audio.
- The Epic achievement or trophy can now always be unlocked.
- The Supplier achievement or trophy now always unlocks after finding at least 66 resource varieties, including resources purchased from the Black Emporium.
- A codex entry that helps unlock the Archaeologist achievement or trophy is now easier to acquire in the Viscount's Keep during the first year in Kirkwall.
- In the tactics menu, actions that use Items no longer become blank.
- Various minor art issues no longer occur.
- Various technical changes should improve performance and limit crashes.
PS3-SPECIFIC FUNCTIONALITY
- The Epic trophy was not unlocking properly for some users. This no longer occurs.
- The Supplier trophy now always unlocks after finding at least 66 resource varieties, including resources purchased from the Black Emporium.
- A codex entry that helps unlock the Archaeologist trophy is now easier to acquire in the Viscount's Keep during the first year in Kirkwall.
BALANCE
NOTE: Patch 1.03 introduces significant changes to the overall balance of the game, improving the strategic elements and making combat and class progression more engaging and enjoyable for players. Here is a detailed summary of the balance-related improvements:
General Combat
- Enemies’ basic attacks now apply much less force, which means that party members’ actions are not interrupted as frequently.
- The secondary attribute requirement for equipping armor or shields (constitution for warriors, willpower for mages, and cunning for rogues) is now significantly smaller.
- The rate at which rogues regenerate stamina while performing basic attacks has been significantly increased.
- Traps no longer inflict injuries.
- Enemies now gain more health as the game progresses.
- Enemy assassins now have less health.
- Lieutenant-rank and boss-rank enemies now have less health.
- Lieutenant-rank enemies can no longer lose more than 40% of their health from a single hit, and boss-rank enemies cannot lose more than 20%.
- Enemy commanders now occasionally throw stun grenades while encouraging their troops to concentrate attacks against a single party member. Previously, this behavior was limited to nightmare difficulty.
- Values for armor and elemental resistances now cannot exceed 95%. The game displays values of up to 100%, but characters now suffer 5% damage from an attack even if they show 100% resistance.
- The DISORIENT effect now applies a 50% penalty to enemy defense, as described in the codex, instead of only 25%.
- The Rune of Valiance now provides a +2 bonus to all attributes instead of a variable bonus that could rise as high as +7. As well, equipping and unequipping multiple pieces of armor that each bear a Rune of Valiance no longer results in incorrect attribute scores.
- Items that improve the Blood Magic cost ratio now provide 0.25 mana per point of health instead of 1 mana.
- On hard and nightmare difficulties, status effects now persist on enemies for a slightly longer duration.
- On nightmare difficulty, enemies now inflict more damage than before.
- On nightmare difficulty, party members no longer suffer friendly-fire damage from warriors’ basic attacks.
- On nightmare difficulty, party members can no longer suffer more than 75% of their health in damage from a single friendly-fire attack.
Warrior Changes
- Aftershock upgrade to the Tremor talent now has a 30% chance to STAGGER normal enemies instead of 40%.
- Claymore upgrade to the Cleave talent now has a 10% chance to STAGGER normal enemies instead of 40%.
- Cleave talent now increases damage by 75% instead of 100%, while the cost has been increased from 20 stamina to 30 and cooldown from 20s to 25s.
- Shield Bash talent no longer automatically STAGGERS enemies within range of the attack who were not targeted directly. The primary target is still automatically STAGGERED, but other normal enemies within range have a 40% chance to STAGGER.
- Shield Defense talent now increases threat generation by 100%.
- Sunder talent now has a 20% chance to STAGGER enemies on a critical hit instead of 50%. As well, the talent now only STAGGERS enemies if the warrior is wielding a two-handed weapon, as originally intended.
- The Berserker's Berserk talent now calculates the damage bonus differently, substantially increasing the ability's effectiveness.
- The Reaver's Blood Frenzy talent and Fenris's Veneer of Calm talent now provide a maximum bonus of +50% damage instead of +100%.
Rogue Changes
- Rogues now regain 1% of their stamina per hit with dual weapons or 2% per hit with a bow.
- The Ambush talent now functions as described.
- The Burst Shot talent now inflicts approximately 50% more damage (and 3x physical force instead of 2x).
- Brand talent now provides a 25% bonus to warriors' and mages' critical chance instead of 10%.
- Disorienting Shot upgrade to the Pinning Shot talent now always DISORIENTS the victim, regardless of whether the victim was pinned in place.
- The Inconspicuous talent now extends the reduced threat generation to other rogues and mages within a 10m diameter.
- The Lacerate talent now provides a 10% chance to re-apply the damage from any ability over 5s, instead of a chance to apply a fixed amount of damage.
- The Merciless Strike upgrade to the Explosive Strike talent now applies 300% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 400%.
- The Pinning Shot talent now pins the victim for the correct duration.
- The Pinpoint Strikes talent now includes a 100% bonus to attack for the duration of the ability.
- The Assassin's Assassinate talent now has a 50s cooldown instead of 40s. The Annihilate upgrade now applies 200% damage vs. BRITTLE targets instead of 400%.
- The Shadow's Decoy talent and Sebastian's Guardian Angel talent now have a 45s cooldown instead of 30s.
- The Shadow's Disorienting Criticals talent now functions as described, and provides a 50% bonus to critical damage when obscured instead of 25%.
- The Shadow's Pinpoint Precision talent now provides a 50% bonus to critical damage instead of 25%.
Mage Changes
- Walking Bomb now inflicts damage equal to 50% of the victim's maximum health upon explosion, within a 4m radius, instead of 100%.
- Arcane Wall upgrade to the Arcane Shield spell now continues to provide a 20% defense bonus to the mage, as described. Previously, the upgrade reduced the bonus to 15%. Other party members receive a 5% bonus.
- The Chain Reaction upgrade to the Chain Lightning spell now applies 300% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 600%.
- Death Syphon spell now drains multiple corpses more quickly.
- Entropic Cloud spell now applies for 30s instead of 15s (against normal enemies), but the cost has been increased from 35 mana to 50 and the cooldown from 40s to 50s. The Death Cloud upgrade now applies damage every 2s instead of every 4s.
- Fireball and Firestorm spells now both inflict approximately 40% more damage and apply 3x elemental force instead of 2x.
- Misdirection Hex spell now applies for 15s instead of 10s (against normal enemies).
- Petrify spell now applies for 12s instead of 15s (against normal enemies).
- Sleep spell now applies for 15s instead of 10s (against normal enemies).
- Spirit Mastery skill now includes a 10% bonus to critical chance instead of 5%.
- The Spirit Strike upgrade to the Spirit Bolt spell now applies 300% damage vs. DISORIENTED targets instead of 200%.
- The Winter's Blast upgrade to the Winter's Grasp spell now notes that it affects nearby enemies.
- The Blood mage's Blood Magic spell and the spirit healer's Healing Aura spell are now mutually exclusive.
- The Blood mage's Blood Magic spell now reserves 70% of the mage's mana instead of 50%.
- The Blood mage's Blood Slave spell now enslaves the victim for a longer duration. As well, if the spell is ineffective, the victim's current action is now canceled. The Blood Spatter upgrade now inflicts damage equal to 75% of the victim's maximum health upon explosion instead of 100%, within a 4m radius. As well, the spell description now displays this information.
- The Blood mage's Grave Robber spell now affects a 12m diameter instead of 6m in order to make the ability more useful.
- The Blood mage's One Foot In upgrade now inflicts 100% of the mage’s maximum health in damage instead of 10%.
- The Blood mage's Paralyzing Hemorrhage upgrade to the Hemorrhage spell now applies 500% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 900%.
- The Force mage's Fist of the Maker spell now inflicts approximately 50% more damage. The Maker's Hammer upgrade now applies 600% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 900%.
- The Force mage's Unshakable spell now provides a +50 bonus to fortitude instead of +100.
- The Spirit healer's Group Heal spell and Anders's Aid Allies spell now restore 25% of party members' health instead of 30%. When upgraded, Group Heal restores 40% of health instead of 50%.
- The Spirit healer's Healing Aura spell and Anders's Panacea spell now provide a +100 bonus to health regeneration instead of +50, and a +200 bonus when upgraded instead of +100. As well, the diameter of the spell has been increased from 6m to 10m, and from 8m to 15m when upgraded. In addition, a rare case
in which the spell previously provided an abnormally high rate of health regeneration no longer occurs.
Companion Specific Skill Changes
- Anders's Swift Justice spell now reduces cooldowns to 90% of their normal duration instead of 80%.
- Aveline's Bodyguard talent no longer allows her to absorb the damage from Anders's Martyr spell.
- Aveline's Immovable talent now provides a stacking 8% bonus to damage resistance per hit instead of 2%.
- If Bethany or Carver rejoin the party near the end of the game, they now learn the Force Mage and Templar specializations, respectively. Existing save games from after the Deep Roads Expedition will not receive the benefit of this fix.
I wonder if the Nathaniel import bug has been fixed? "More reliable" DAO save imports seems a bit vague.
I thought that that was bugged on the export marking all the party members you didn't take with you to the endgame in awakening as dead
I'm glad to see the changes to Shadow and some of the nightmare changes they made. Specifically Warrior friendly fire. Also, the changes made to the Blood Mages health dependent spell make me so very very happy.
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ElixirSaving Your AssAlchemists and Belts EverywhereRegistered Userregular
So, the new patch is suppose to come out this week, dolled out as soon as thier specific version is finished. Atm, only the PS3 Europe Version is live, but other than the trophy stuff, pretty much all of the patch is suppose to be the same for all platforms:
NOTE: Some fixes are retroactive, but not all. Players with plot-breaking bugs may need to revert to an earlier save, particularly a save prior to visiting the affected area during the current year in the game.
GAMEPLAY
- In many fights, enemies now move less quickly at the start of combat. This slower initial pace makes tactical positioning more useful and important.
- If the force of an enemy attack interrupts a party member's current action, the party member now resumes the action once he or she has recovered. This means, for example, that party members who have been instructed to consume a health potion will now do so as soon as they are able, and do not need to be told to consume a health potion again if they are interrupted.
- Enemies are now much less likely to explode into body parts upon death.
- Attacks that hit a stealthed assassin are now more likely to disrupt stealth.
- Abilities that apply a silence effect now also cancel the target's current action in addition to preventing the target from using further abilities.
- When an enemy wakes from a sleep effect due to suffering damage, other status effects that were applied by the same ability that caused the sleep effect are no longer removed at the same time.
- Items that bear the property "100% of basic attack damage vs. enemies that attack in melee" no longer harm the user when equipped in conjunction with abilities like Blood Magic or Sacrificial Frenzy that reduce the user's health.
- The items known as Final Thought, Sataareth, Sundering, and Trepanner's Gift now have damage types that match their elemental damage bonuses.
- The items known as Allure's Crook, Corrupted Acolyte's Staff, Defender of the Wall, Void's Hammer, and Volcanic Shield can now only be equipped by the appropriate classes.
- The high dragon's fireballs no longer track moving targets.
- Pride demons can no longer be affected by their own Crushing Prison spells.
- The size of the area affected by an ability is now explicitly described as diameter or radius (usually diameter).
- When a party member's armor changes after consummating a romance, runes inscribed on his or her old armor now carry over to the new armor.
- Using the Maker's Sigh potion on an archer no longer alters inventory capacity.
- It is no longer possible to create more than one Elixir of Heroism.
- It is no longer possible to simultaneously enable sustained modes that are supposed to be mutually exclusive.
- In some cases, enemies would freeze while entering combat. This no longer
occurs.
- In some cases, saw traps or spike traps would throw party members back even
when the trap was not visible. This no longer occurs.
- The Special Deliveries chest can no longer get into a state where it contains items but cannot be opened.
- The storage chest is now present in the Hawke estate after completing the main campaign.
- If the Black Emporium premium content is installed, the mabari hound now follows his master more reliably.
- Various character-corruption issues now correct themselves automatically when you load your game.
- Various minor gameplay issues no longer occur.
QUESTS (SPOILER WARNING)
- "Who Needs Rescuing" can now be completed.
- "Friendly Concern" is now available after consummating a romance.
- In "Act of Mercy," Thrask can no longer die, which could block completion.
- In "A Murder of Crows," it is now always possible to fight the varterral.
- In "A New Path," Merrill no longer remains locked in the party after the quest.
- In "Bait and Switch," the chest in the abandoned house can now always be opened.
- In "Demands of the Qun," Aveline's guards no longer turn hostile if the player declines to enter the Qunari compound during the day and then returns at night.
- In "Dissent," it is no longer possible to loot Ser Alrik's body before the appropriate time. This ensures that the quest can always be completed.
- In "No Rest for the Wicked," Isabela now always begins the opening conversation at the appropriate time.
- In "The Captain's Condolences," it is now possible to ask Aveline about her father even if she is not currently in the party.
- In "The Last Straw," Anders now responds much differently if he is a rival.
- In "The Last Straw," Aveline no longer attacks Meredith when the party is supposed to be stunned. This prevents a subsequent issue where the game could freeze after loading the post-campaign save.
- In "Wayward Son," it is no longer possible to speak to Thrask after speaking to Samson. This ensures that the quest progresses correctly.
- If Merrill's clan members die, she no longer speaks as if they were alive.
- If Anders is a rival, giving him the Tevinter Chantry Amulet now results in rivalry points instead of friendship points.
- If the Black Emporium premium content is installed, a new conversation between Fenris and Hawke's dog is available during the fourth year in Kirkwall.
- Alternate Merrill/Aveline banter is now available if Merrill's clan is killed.
- Various references to the events of Dragon Age: Origins are now more accurate.
- Various minor story-scripting issues no longer occur.
FUNCTIONALITY
- Users with a large number of promotional items were timing out when attempting to log in. This no longer occurs.
- Combat audio has been rebalanced so that it is no longer louder than exploration and dialogue audio.
- The Epic achievement or trophy can now always be unlocked.
- The Supplier achievement or trophy now always unlocks after finding at least 66 resource varieties, including resources purchased from the Black Emporium.
- A codex entry that helps unlock the Archaeologist achievement or trophy is now easier to acquire in the Viscount's Keep during the first year in Kirkwall.
- In the tactics menu, actions that use Items no longer become blank.
- Various minor art issues no longer occur.
- Various technical changes should improve performance and limit crashes.
PS3-SPECIFIC FUNCTIONALITY
- The Epic trophy was not unlocking properly for some users. This no longer occurs.
- The Supplier trophy now always unlocks after finding at least 66 resource varieties, including resources purchased from the Black Emporium.
- A codex entry that helps unlock the Archaeologist trophy is now easier to acquire in the Viscount's Keep during the first year in Kirkwall.
BALANCE
NOTE: Patch 1.03 introduces significant changes to the overall balance of the game, improving the strategic elements and making combat and class progression more engaging and enjoyable for players. Here is a detailed summary of the balance-related improvements:
General Combat
- Enemies’ basic attacks now apply much less force, which means that party members’ actions are not interrupted as frequently.
- The secondary attribute requirement for equipping armor or shields (constitution for warriors, willpower for mages, and cunning for rogues) is now significantly smaller.
- The rate at which rogues regenerate stamina while performing basic attacks has been significantly increased.
- Traps no longer inflict injuries.
- Enemies now gain more health as the game progresses.
- Enemy assassins now have less health.
- Lieutenant-rank and boss-rank enemies now have less health.
- Lieutenant-rank enemies can no longer lose more than 40% of their health from a single hit, and boss-rank enemies cannot lose more than 20%.
- Enemy commanders now occasionally throw stun grenades while encouraging their troops to concentrate attacks against a single party member. Previously, this behavior was limited to nightmare difficulty.
- Values for armor and elemental resistances now cannot exceed 95%. The game displays values of up to 100%, but characters now suffer 5% damage from an attack even if they show 100% resistance.
- The DISORIENT effect now applies a 50% penalty to enemy defense, as described in the codex, instead of only 25%.
- The Rune of Valiance now provides a +2 bonus to all attributes instead of a variable bonus that could rise as high as +7. As well, equipping and unequipping multiple pieces of armor that each bear a Rune of Valiance no longer results in incorrect attribute scores.
- Items that improve the Blood Magic cost ratio now provide 0.25 mana per point of health instead of 1 mana.
- On hard and nightmare difficulties, status effects now persist on enemies for a slightly longer duration.
- On nightmare difficulty, enemies now inflict more damage than before.
- On nightmare difficulty, party members no longer suffer friendly-fire damage from warriors’ basic attacks.
- On nightmare difficulty, party members can no longer suffer more than 75% of their health in damage from a single friendly-fire attack.
Warrior Changes
- Aftershock upgrade to the Tremor talent now has a 30% chance to STAGGER normal enemies instead of 40%.
- Claymore upgrade to the Cleave talent now has a 10% chance to STAGGER normal enemies instead of 40%.
- Cleave talent now increases damage by 75% instead of 100%, while the cost has been increased from 20 stamina to 30 and cooldown from 20s to 25s.
- Shield Bash talent no longer automatically STAGGERS enemies within range of the attack who were not targeted directly. The primary target is still automatically STAGGERED, but other normal enemies within range have a 40% chance to STAGGER.
- Shield Defense talent now increases threat generation by 100%.
- Sunder talent now has a 20% chance to STAGGER enemies on a critical hit instead of 50%. As well, the talent now only STAGGERS enemies if the warrior is wielding a two-handed weapon, as originally intended.
- The Berserker's Berserk talent now calculates the damage bonus differently, substantially increasing the ability's effectiveness.
- The Reaver's Blood Frenzy talent and Fenris's Veneer of Calm talent now provide a maximum bonus of +50% damage instead of +100%.
Rogue Changes
- Rogues now regain 1% of their stamina per hit with dual weapons or 2% per hit with a bow.
- The Ambush talent now functions as described.
- The Burst Shot talent now inflicts approximately 50% more damage (and 3x physical force instead of 2x).
- Brand talent now provides a 25% bonus to warriors' and mages' critical chance instead of 10%.
- Disorienting Shot upgrade to the Pinning Shot talent now always DISORIENTS the victim, regardless of whether the victim was pinned in place.
- The Inconspicuous talent now extends the reduced threat generation to other rogues and mages within a 10m diameter.
- The Lacerate talent now provides a 10% chance to re-apply the damage from any ability over 5s, instead of a chance to apply a fixed amount of damage.
- The Merciless Strike upgrade to the Explosive Strike talent now applies 300% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 400%.
- The Pinning Shot talent now pins the victim for the correct duration.
- The Pinpoint Strikes talent now includes a 100% bonus to attack for the duration of the ability.
- The Assassin's Assassinate talent now has a 50s cooldown instead of 40s. The Annihilate upgrade now applies 200% damage vs. BRITTLE targets instead of 400%.
- The Shadow's Decoy talent and Sebastian's Guardian Angel talent now have a 45s cooldown instead of 30s.
- The Shadow's Disorienting Criticals talent now functions as described, and provides a 50% bonus to critical damage when obscured instead of 25%.
- The Shadow's Pinpoint Precision talent now provides a 50% bonus to critical damage instead of 25%.
Mage Changes
- Walking Bomb now inflicts damage equal to 50% of the victim's maximum health upon explosion, within a 4m radius, instead of 100%.
- Arcane Wall upgrade to the Arcane Shield spell now continues to provide a 20% defense bonus to the mage, as described. Previously, the upgrade reduced the bonus to 15%. Other party members receive a 5% bonus.
- The Chain Reaction upgrade to the Chain Lightning spell now applies 300% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 600%.
- Death Syphon spell now drains multiple corpses more quickly.
- Entropic Cloud spell now applies for 30s instead of 15s (against normal enemies), but the cost has been increased from 35 mana to 50 and the cooldown from 40s to 50s. The Death Cloud upgrade now applies damage every 2s instead of every 4s.
- Fireball and Firestorm spells now both inflict approximately 40% more damage and apply 3x elemental force instead of 2x.
- Misdirection Hex spell now applies for 15s instead of 10s (against normal enemies).
- Petrify spell now applies for 12s instead of 15s (against normal enemies).
- Sleep spell now applies for 15s instead of 10s (against normal enemies).
- Spirit Mastery skill now includes a 10% bonus to critical chance instead of 5%.
- The Spirit Strike upgrade to the Spirit Bolt spell now applies 300% damage vs. DISORIENTED targets instead of 200%.
- The Winter's Blast upgrade to the Winter's Grasp spell now notes that it affects nearby enemies.
- The Blood mage's Blood Magic spell and the spirit healer's Healing Aura spell are now mutually exclusive.
- The Blood mage's Blood Magic spell now reserves 70% of the mage's mana instead of 50%.
- The Blood mage's Blood Slave spell now enslaves the victim for a longer duration. As well, if the spell is ineffective, the victim's current action is now canceled. The Blood Spatter upgrade now inflicts damage equal to 75% of the victim's maximum health upon explosion instead of 100%, within a 4m radius. As well, the spell description now displays this information.
- The Blood mage's Grave Robber spell now affects a 12m diameter instead of 6m in order to make the ability more useful.
- The Blood mage's One Foot In upgrade now inflicts 100% of the mage’s maximum health in damage instead of 10%.
- The Blood mage's Paralyzing Hemorrhage upgrade to the Hemorrhage spell now applies 500% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 900%.
- The Force mage's Fist of the Maker spell now inflicts approximately 50% more damage. The Maker's Hammer upgrade now applies 600% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 900%.
- The Force mage's Unshakable spell now provides a +50 bonus to fortitude instead of +100.
- The Spirit healer's Group Heal spell and Anders's Aid Allies spell now restore 25% of party members' health instead of 30%. When upgraded, Group Heal restores 40% of health instead of 50%.
- The Spirit healer's Healing Aura spell and Anders's Panacea spell now provide a +100 bonus to health regeneration instead of +50, and a +200 bonus when upgraded instead of +100. As well, the diameter of the spell has been increased from 6m to 10m, and from 8m to 15m when upgraded. In addition, a rare case
in which the spell previously provided an abnormally high rate of health regeneration no longer occurs.
Companion Specific Skill Changes
- Anders's Swift Justice spell now reduces cooldowns to 90% of their normal duration instead of 80%.
- Aveline's Bodyguard talent no longer allows her to absorb the damage from Anders's Martyr spell.
- Aveline's Immovable talent now provides a stacking 8% bonus to damage resistance per hit instead of 2%.
- If Bethany or Carver rejoin the party near the end of the game, they now learn the Force Mage and Templar specializations, respectively. Existing save games from after the Deep Roads Expedition will not receive the benefit of this fix.
I wonder if the Nathaniel import bug has been fixed? "More reliable" DAO save imports seems a bit vague.
I thought that that was bugged on the export marking all the party members you didn't take with you to the endgame in awakening as dead
Yeah, that is correct. But the Nathaniel quest is suppose to show up if only 3 criteria were met 1) he was recruited into the Wardens and 2) he lived 3) the Architect lived. Now, assuming Vigil's Keep was fully upgraded, Nathaniel always lives in DA:A (he lives via you taking him to fight or you leaving him). I was under the impression they were going to try to get the quest to trigger off of info in the import save about the status of Vigil's Keep's upgrades, as the Architect flag and the Warden recruitment flag seems to be working fine.
Fingers crossed, the Vigil's Keep flag info is where I'd look to get that quest to trigger properly (hint hint Bioware)
I'm glad to see the changes to Shadow and some of the nightmare changes they made. Specifically Warrior friendly fire. Also, the changes made to the Blood Mages health dependent spell make me so very very happy.
Blood Mages also got a bit of a buff with the lower willpower/cunning/constitution requirements for armor; spending less Willpower to wear the best robes means more constitution to fuel your spells.
I'm glad to see the changes to Shadow and some of the nightmare changes they made. Specifically Warrior friendly fire. Also, the changes made to the Blood Mages health dependent spell make me so very very happy.
Blood Mages also got a bit of a buff with the lower willpower/cunning/constitution requirements for armor; spending less Willpower to wear the best robes means more constitution to fuel your spells.
Yes, and more hit points also means more damage. It is delicious.
I'm glad to see the changes to Shadow and some of the nightmare changes they made. Specifically Warrior friendly fire. Also, the changes made to the Blood Mages health dependent spell make me so very very happy.
Blood Mages also got a bit of a buff with the lower willpower/cunning/constitution requirements for armor; spending less Willpower to wear the best robes means more constitution to fuel your spells.
Yes, and more hit points also means more damage. It is delicious.
You did also notice they nerfed all the +1 health to magic right? Every single one of those now provides .25 more points instead of 1.
So, the new patch is suppose to come out this week, dolled out as soon as thier specific version is finished. Atm, only the PS3 Europe Version is live, but other than the trophy stuff, pretty much all of the patch is suppose to be the same for all platforms:
NOTE: Some fixes are retroactive, but not all. Players with plot-breaking bugs may need to revert to an earlier save, particularly a save prior to visiting the affected area during the current year in the game.
GAMEPLAY
- In many fights, enemies now move less quickly at the start of combat. This slower initial pace makes tactical positioning more useful and important.
- If the force of an enemy attack interrupts a party member's current action, the party member now resumes the action once he or she has recovered. This means, for example, that party members who have been instructed to consume a health potion will now do so as soon as they are able, and do not need to be told to consume a health potion again if they are interrupted.
- Enemies are now much less likely to explode into body parts upon death.
- Attacks that hit a stealthed assassin are now more likely to disrupt stealth.
- Abilities that apply a silence effect now also cancel the target's current action in addition to preventing the target from using further abilities.
- When an enemy wakes from a sleep effect due to suffering damage, other status effects that were applied by the same ability that caused the sleep effect are no longer removed at the same time.
- Items that bear the property "100% of basic attack damage vs. enemies that attack in melee" no longer harm the user when equipped in conjunction with abilities like Blood Magic or Sacrificial Frenzy that reduce the user's health.
- The items known as Final Thought, Sataareth, Sundering, and Trepanner's Gift now have damage types that match their elemental damage bonuses.
- The items known as Allure's Crook, Corrupted Acolyte's Staff, Defender of the Wall, Void's Hammer, and Volcanic Shield can now only be equipped by the appropriate classes.
- The high dragon's fireballs no longer track moving targets.
- Pride demons can no longer be affected by their own Crushing Prison spells.
- The size of the area affected by an ability is now explicitly described as diameter or radius (usually diameter).
- When a party member's armor changes after consummating a romance, runes inscribed on his or her old armor now carry over to the new armor.
- Using the Maker's Sigh potion on an archer no longer alters inventory capacity.
- It is no longer possible to create more than one Elixir of Heroism.
- It is no longer possible to simultaneously enable sustained modes that are supposed to be mutually exclusive.
- In some cases, enemies would freeze while entering combat. This no longer
occurs.
- In some cases, saw traps or spike traps would throw party members back even
when the trap was not visible. This no longer occurs.
- The Special Deliveries chest can no longer get into a state where it contains items but cannot be opened.
- The storage chest is now present in the Hawke estate after completing the main campaign.
- If the Black Emporium premium content is installed, the mabari hound now follows his master more reliably.
- Various character-corruption issues now correct themselves automatically when you load your game.
- Various minor gameplay issues no longer occur.
QUESTS (SPOILER WARNING)
- "Who Needs Rescuing" can now be completed.
- "Friendly Concern" is now available after consummating a romance.
- In "Act of Mercy," Thrask can no longer die, which could block completion.
- In "A Murder of Crows," it is now always possible to fight the varterral.
- In "A New Path," Merrill no longer remains locked in the party after the quest.
- In "Bait and Switch," the chest in the abandoned house can now always be opened.
- In "Demands of the Qun," Aveline's guards no longer turn hostile if the player declines to enter the Qunari compound during the day and then returns at night.
- In "Dissent," it is no longer possible to loot Ser Alrik's body before the appropriate time. This ensures that the quest can always be completed.
- In "No Rest for the Wicked," Isabela now always begins the opening conversation at the appropriate time.
- In "The Captain's Condolences," it is now possible to ask Aveline about her father even if she is not currently in the party.
- In "The Last Straw," Anders now responds much differently if he is a rival.
- In "The Last Straw," Aveline no longer attacks Meredith when the party is supposed to be stunned. This prevents a subsequent issue where the game could freeze after loading the post-campaign save.
- In "Wayward Son," it is no longer possible to speak to Thrask after speaking to Samson. This ensures that the quest progresses correctly.
- If Merrill's clan members die, she no longer speaks as if they were alive.
- If Anders is a rival, giving him the Tevinter Chantry Amulet now results in rivalry points instead of friendship points.
- If the Black Emporium premium content is installed, a new conversation between Fenris and Hawke's dog is available during the fourth year in Kirkwall.
- Alternate Merrill/Aveline banter is now available if Merrill's clan is killed.
- Various references to the events of Dragon Age: Origins are now more accurate.
- Various minor story-scripting issues no longer occur.
FUNCTIONALITY
- Users with a large number of promotional items were timing out when attempting to log in. This no longer occurs.
- Combat audio has been rebalanced so that it is no longer louder than exploration and dialogue audio.
- The Epic achievement or trophy can now always be unlocked.
- The Supplier achievement or trophy now always unlocks after finding at least 66 resource varieties, including resources purchased from the Black Emporium.
- A codex entry that helps unlock the Archaeologist achievement or trophy is now easier to acquire in the Viscount's Keep during the first year in Kirkwall.
- In the tactics menu, actions that use Items no longer become blank.
- Various minor art issues no longer occur.
- Various technical changes should improve performance and limit crashes.
PS3-SPECIFIC FUNCTIONALITY
- The Epic trophy was not unlocking properly for some users. This no longer occurs.
- The Supplier trophy now always unlocks after finding at least 66 resource varieties, including resources purchased from the Black Emporium.
- A codex entry that helps unlock the Archaeologist trophy is now easier to acquire in the Viscount's Keep during the first year in Kirkwall.
BALANCE
NOTE: Patch 1.03 introduces significant changes to the overall balance of the game, improving the strategic elements and making combat and class progression more engaging and enjoyable for players. Here is a detailed summary of the balance-related improvements:
General Combat
- Enemies’ basic attacks now apply much less force, which means that party members’ actions are not interrupted as frequently.
- The secondary attribute requirement for equipping armor or shields (constitution for warriors, willpower for mages, and cunning for rogues) is now significantly smaller.
- The rate at which rogues regenerate stamina while performing basic attacks has been significantly increased.
- Traps no longer inflict injuries.
- Enemies now gain more health as the game progresses.
- Enemy assassins now have less health.
- Lieutenant-rank and boss-rank enemies now have less health.
- Lieutenant-rank enemies can no longer lose more than 40% of their health from a single hit, and boss-rank enemies cannot lose more than 20%.
- Enemy commanders now occasionally throw stun grenades while encouraging their troops to concentrate attacks against a single party member. Previously, this behavior was limited to nightmare difficulty.
- Values for armor and elemental resistances now cannot exceed 95%. The game displays values of up to 100%, but characters now suffer 5% damage from an attack even if they show 100% resistance.
- The DISORIENT effect now applies a 50% penalty to enemy defense, as described in the codex, instead of only 25%.
- The Rune of Valiance now provides a +2 bonus to all attributes instead of a variable bonus that could rise as high as +7. As well, equipping and unequipping multiple pieces of armor that each bear a Rune of Valiance no longer results in incorrect attribute scores.
- Items that improve the Blood Magic cost ratio now provide 0.25 mana per point of health instead of 1 mana.
- On hard and nightmare difficulties, status effects now persist on enemies for a slightly longer duration.
- On nightmare difficulty, enemies now inflict more damage than before.
- On nightmare difficulty, party members no longer suffer friendly-fire damage from warriors’ basic attacks.
- On nightmare difficulty, party members can no longer suffer more than 75% of their health in damage from a single friendly-fire attack.
Warrior Changes
- Aftershock upgrade to the Tremor talent now has a 30% chance to STAGGER normal enemies instead of 40%.
- Claymore upgrade to the Cleave talent now has a 10% chance to STAGGER normal enemies instead of 40%.
- Cleave talent now increases damage by 75% instead of 100%, while the cost has been increased from 20 stamina to 30 and cooldown from 20s to 25s.
- Shield Bash talent no longer automatically STAGGERS enemies within range of the attack who were not targeted directly. The primary target is still automatically STAGGERED, but other normal enemies within range have a 40% chance to STAGGER.
- Shield Defense talent now increases threat generation by 100%.
- Sunder talent now has a 20% chance to STAGGER enemies on a critical hit instead of 50%. As well, the talent now only STAGGERS enemies if the warrior is wielding a two-handed weapon, as originally intended.
- The Berserker's Berserk talent now calculates the damage bonus differently, substantially increasing the ability's effectiveness.
- The Reaver's Blood Frenzy talent and Fenris's Veneer of Calm talent now provide a maximum bonus of +50% damage instead of +100%.
Rogue Changes
- Rogues now regain 1% of their stamina per hit with dual weapons or 2% per hit with a bow.
- The Ambush talent now functions as described.
- The Burst Shot talent now inflicts approximately 50% more damage (and 3x physical force instead of 2x).
- Brand talent now provides a 25% bonus to warriors' and mages' critical chance instead of 10%.
- Disorienting Shot upgrade to the Pinning Shot talent now always DISORIENTS the victim, regardless of whether the victim was pinned in place.
- The Inconspicuous talent now extends the reduced threat generation to other rogues and mages within a 10m diameter.
- The Lacerate talent now provides a 10% chance to re-apply the damage from any ability over 5s, instead of a chance to apply a fixed amount of damage.
- The Merciless Strike upgrade to the Explosive Strike talent now applies 300% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 400%.
- The Pinning Shot talent now pins the victim for the correct duration.
- The Pinpoint Strikes talent now includes a 100% bonus to attack for the duration of the ability.
- The Assassin's Assassinate talent now has a 50s cooldown instead of 40s. The Annihilate upgrade now applies 200% damage vs. BRITTLE targets instead of 400%.
- The Shadow's Decoy talent and Sebastian's Guardian Angel talent now have a 45s cooldown instead of 30s.
- The Shadow's Disorienting Criticals talent now functions as described, and provides a 50% bonus to critical damage when obscured instead of 25%.
- The Shadow's Pinpoint Precision talent now provides a 50% bonus to critical damage instead of 25%.
Mage Changes
- Walking Bomb now inflicts damage equal to 50% of the victim's maximum health upon explosion, within a 4m radius, instead of 100%.
- Arcane Wall upgrade to the Arcane Shield spell now continues to provide a 20% defense bonus to the mage, as described. Previously, the upgrade reduced the bonus to 15%. Other party members receive a 5% bonus.
- The Chain Reaction upgrade to the Chain Lightning spell now applies 300% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 600%.
- Death Syphon spell now drains multiple corpses more quickly.
- Entropic Cloud spell now applies for 30s instead of 15s (against normal enemies), but the cost has been increased from 35 mana to 50 and the cooldown from 40s to 50s. The Death Cloud upgrade now applies damage every 2s instead of every 4s.
- Fireball and Firestorm spells now both inflict approximately 40% more damage and apply 3x elemental force instead of 2x.
- Misdirection Hex spell now applies for 15s instead of 10s (against normal enemies).
- Petrify spell now applies for 12s instead of 15s (against normal enemies).
- Sleep spell now applies for 15s instead of 10s (against normal enemies).
- Spirit Mastery skill now includes a 10% bonus to critical chance instead of 5%.
- The Spirit Strike upgrade to the Spirit Bolt spell now applies 300% damage vs. DISORIENTED targets instead of 200%.
- The Winter's Blast upgrade to the Winter's Grasp spell now notes that it affects nearby enemies.
- The Blood mage's Blood Magic spell and the spirit healer's Healing Aura spell are now mutually exclusive.
- The Blood mage's Blood Magic spell now reserves 70% of the mage's mana instead of 50%.
- The Blood mage's Blood Slave spell now enslaves the victim for a longer duration. As well, if the spell is ineffective, the victim's current action is now canceled. The Blood Spatter upgrade now inflicts damage equal to 75% of the victim's maximum health upon explosion instead of 100%, within a 4m radius. As well, the spell description now displays this information.
- The Blood mage's Grave Robber spell now affects a 12m diameter instead of 6m in order to make the ability more useful.
- The Blood mage's One Foot In upgrade now inflicts 100% of the mage’s maximum health in damage instead of 10%.
- The Blood mage's Paralyzing Hemorrhage upgrade to the Hemorrhage spell now applies 500% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 900%.
- The Force mage's Fist of the Maker spell now inflicts approximately 50% more damage. The Maker's Hammer upgrade now applies 600% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 900%.
- The Force mage's Unshakable spell now provides a +50 bonus to fortitude instead of +100.
- The Spirit healer's Group Heal spell and Anders's Aid Allies spell now restore 25% of party members' health instead of 30%. When upgraded, Group Heal restores 40% of health instead of 50%.
- The Spirit healer's Healing Aura spell and Anders's Panacea spell now provide a +100 bonus to health regeneration instead of +50, and a +200 bonus when upgraded instead of +100. As well, the diameter of the spell has been increased from 6m to 10m, and from 8m to 15m when upgraded. In addition, a rare case
in which the spell previously provided an abnormally high rate of health regeneration no longer occurs.
Companion Specific Skill Changes
- Anders's Swift Justice spell now reduces cooldowns to 90% of their normal duration instead of 80%.
- Aveline's Bodyguard talent no longer allows her to absorb the damage from Anders's Martyr spell.
- Aveline's Immovable talent now provides a stacking 8% bonus to damage resistance per hit instead of 2%.
- If Bethany or Carver rejoin the party near the end of the game, they now learn the Force Mage and Templar specializations, respectively. Existing save games from after the Deep Roads Expedition will not receive the benefit of this fix.
I wonder if the Nathaniel import bug has been fixed? "More reliable" DAO save imports seems a bit vague.
I thought that that was bugged on the export marking all the party members you didn't take with you to the endgame in awakening as dead
Yeah, that is correct. But the Nathaniel quest is suppose to show up if only 3 criteria were met 1) he was recruited into the Wardens and 2) he lived 3) the Architect lived. Now, assuming Vigil's Keep was fully upgraded, Nathaniel always lives in DA:A (he lives via you taking him to fight or you leaving him). I was under the impression they were going to try to get the quest to trigger off of info in the import save about the status of Vigil's Keep's upgrades, as the Architect flag and the Warden recruitment flag seems to be working fine.
Fingers crossed, the Vigil's Keep flag info is where I'd look to get that quest to trigger properly (hint hint Bioware)
Nope, I killed the Architect and he still showed up.
I'm glad to see the changes to Shadow and some of the nightmare changes they made. Specifically Warrior friendly fire. Also, the changes made to the Blood Mages health dependent spell make me so very very happy.
Blood Mages also got a bit of a buff with the lower willpower/cunning/constitution requirements for armor; spending less Willpower to wear the best robes means more constitution to fuel your spells.
Yes, and more hit points also means more damage. It is delicious.
You did also notice they nerfed all the +1 health to magic right? Every single one of those now provides .25 more points instead of 1.
Doesn't bother me in the least. It's ridiculously easy to get five mana for one health ratio as things stand right now. You're talking about spending six hit points for a thirty mana spell. When you can have hundreds of health as a blood mage. It's stupid silly how broken that is. Patched that will equate to two mana for one health, making it cost fifteen health for a thirty mana spell. Which is still pretty stupid powerful.
I'm more concerned about blood magic taking 75% of mana opposed to 50%. That doesn't leave you a lot of pool to load with sustained effects. It's a far bigger hit.
Also, I feel the need to clarify something I said earlier. When I said I was happy with the changes to Shadow, what I meant was I'm glad it's going to be completely broken now. The massive amount of damage boost it just got is absurd. Two specific talents just went from boosting critical damage by 25% to 50%! I really enjoy the freedom playing a shadow archer allows the player, being able to completely fall off the enemies radar at any damn time and get a huge damage boost for doing so is enjoyable.
So, the new patch is suppose to come out this week, dolled out as soon as thier specific version is finished. Atm, only the PS3 Europe Version is live, but other than the trophy stuff, pretty much all of the patch is suppose to be the same for all platforms:
NOTE: Some fixes are retroactive, but not all. Players with plot-breaking bugs may need to revert to an earlier save, particularly a save prior to visiting the affected area during the current year in the game.
GAMEPLAY
- In many fights, enemies now move less quickly at the start of combat. This slower initial pace makes tactical positioning more useful and important.
- If the force of an enemy attack interrupts a party member's current action, the party member now resumes the action once he or she has recovered. This means, for example, that party members who have been instructed to consume a health potion will now do so as soon as they are able, and do not need to be told to consume a health potion again if they are interrupted.
- Enemies are now much less likely to explode into body parts upon death.
- Attacks that hit a stealthed assassin are now more likely to disrupt stealth.
- Abilities that apply a silence effect now also cancel the target's current action in addition to preventing the target from using further abilities.
- When an enemy wakes from a sleep effect due to suffering damage, other status effects that were applied by the same ability that caused the sleep effect are no longer removed at the same time.
- Items that bear the property "100% of basic attack damage vs. enemies that attack in melee" no longer harm the user when equipped in conjunction with abilities like Blood Magic or Sacrificial Frenzy that reduce the user's health.
- The items known as Final Thought, Sataareth, Sundering, and Trepanner's Gift now have damage types that match their elemental damage bonuses.
- The items known as Allure's Crook, Corrupted Acolyte's Staff, Defender of the Wall, Void's Hammer, and Volcanic Shield can now only be equipped by the appropriate classes.
- The high dragon's fireballs no longer track moving targets.
- Pride demons can no longer be affected by their own Crushing Prison spells.
- The size of the area affected by an ability is now explicitly described as diameter or radius (usually diameter).
- When a party member's armor changes after consummating a romance, runes inscribed on his or her old armor now carry over to the new armor.
- Using the Maker's Sigh potion on an archer no longer alters inventory capacity.
- It is no longer possible to create more than one Elixir of Heroism.
- It is no longer possible to simultaneously enable sustained modes that are supposed to be mutually exclusive.
- In some cases, enemies would freeze while entering combat. This no longer
occurs.
- In some cases, saw traps or spike traps would throw party members back even
when the trap was not visible. This no longer occurs.
- The Special Deliveries chest can no longer get into a state where it contains items but cannot be opened.
- The storage chest is now present in the Hawke estate after completing the main campaign.
- If the Black Emporium premium content is installed, the mabari hound now follows his master more reliably.
- Various character-corruption issues now correct themselves automatically when you load your game.
- Various minor gameplay issues no longer occur.
QUESTS (SPOILER WARNING)
- "Who Needs Rescuing" can now be completed.
- "Friendly Concern" is now available after consummating a romance.
- In "Act of Mercy," Thrask can no longer die, which could block completion.
- In "A Murder of Crows," it is now always possible to fight the varterral.
- In "A New Path," Merrill no longer remains locked in the party after the quest.
- In "Bait and Switch," the chest in the abandoned house can now always be opened.
- In "Demands of the Qun," Aveline's guards no longer turn hostile if the player declines to enter the Qunari compound during the day and then returns at night.
- In "Dissent," it is no longer possible to loot Ser Alrik's body before the appropriate time. This ensures that the quest can always be completed.
- In "No Rest for the Wicked," Isabela now always begins the opening conversation at the appropriate time.
- In "The Captain's Condolences," it is now possible to ask Aveline about her father even if she is not currently in the party.
- In "The Last Straw," Anders now responds much differently if he is a rival.
- In "The Last Straw," Aveline no longer attacks Meredith when the party is supposed to be stunned. This prevents a subsequent issue where the game could freeze after loading the post-campaign save.
- In "Wayward Son," it is no longer possible to speak to Thrask after speaking to Samson. This ensures that the quest progresses correctly.
- If Merrill's clan members die, she no longer speaks as if they were alive.
- If Anders is a rival, giving him the Tevinter Chantry Amulet now results in rivalry points instead of friendship points.
- If the Black Emporium premium content is installed, a new conversation between Fenris and Hawke's dog is available during the fourth year in Kirkwall.
- Alternate Merrill/Aveline banter is now available if Merrill's clan is killed.
- Various references to the events of Dragon Age: Origins are now more accurate.
- Various minor story-scripting issues no longer occur.
FUNCTIONALITY
- Users with a large number of promotional items were timing out when attempting to log in. This no longer occurs.
- Combat audio has been rebalanced so that it is no longer louder than exploration and dialogue audio.
- The Epic achievement or trophy can now always be unlocked.
- The Supplier achievement or trophy now always unlocks after finding at least 66 resource varieties, including resources purchased from the Black Emporium.
- A codex entry that helps unlock the Archaeologist achievement or trophy is now easier to acquire in the Viscount's Keep during the first year in Kirkwall.
- In the tactics menu, actions that use Items no longer become blank.
- Various minor art issues no longer occur.
- Various technical changes should improve performance and limit crashes.
PS3-SPECIFIC FUNCTIONALITY
- The Epic trophy was not unlocking properly for some users. This no longer occurs.
- The Supplier trophy now always unlocks after finding at least 66 resource varieties, including resources purchased from the Black Emporium.
- A codex entry that helps unlock the Archaeologist trophy is now easier to acquire in the Viscount's Keep during the first year in Kirkwall.
BALANCE
NOTE: Patch 1.03 introduces significant changes to the overall balance of the game, improving the strategic elements and making combat and class progression more engaging and enjoyable for players. Here is a detailed summary of the balance-related improvements:
General Combat
- Enemies’ basic attacks now apply much less force, which means that party members’ actions are not interrupted as frequently.
- The secondary attribute requirement for equipping armor or shields (constitution for warriors, willpower for mages, and cunning for rogues) is now significantly smaller.
- The rate at which rogues regenerate stamina while performing basic attacks has been significantly increased.
- Traps no longer inflict injuries.
- Enemies now gain more health as the game progresses.
- Enemy assassins now have less health.
- Lieutenant-rank and boss-rank enemies now have less health.
- Lieutenant-rank enemies can no longer lose more than 40% of their health from a single hit, and boss-rank enemies cannot lose more than 20%.
- Enemy commanders now occasionally throw stun grenades while encouraging their troops to concentrate attacks against a single party member. Previously, this behavior was limited to nightmare difficulty.
- Values for armor and elemental resistances now cannot exceed 95%. The game displays values of up to 100%, but characters now suffer 5% damage from an attack even if they show 100% resistance.
- The DISORIENT effect now applies a 50% penalty to enemy defense, as described in the codex, instead of only 25%.
- The Rune of Valiance now provides a +2 bonus to all attributes instead of a variable bonus that could rise as high as +7. As well, equipping and unequipping multiple pieces of armor that each bear a Rune of Valiance no longer results in incorrect attribute scores.
- Items that improve the Blood Magic cost ratio now provide 0.25 mana per point of health instead of 1 mana.
- On hard and nightmare difficulties, status effects now persist on enemies for a slightly longer duration.
- On nightmare difficulty, enemies now inflict more damage than before.
- On nightmare difficulty, party members no longer suffer friendly-fire damage from warriors’ basic attacks.
- On nightmare difficulty, party members can no longer suffer more than 75% of their health in damage from a single friendly-fire attack.
Warrior Changes
- Aftershock upgrade to the Tremor talent now has a 30% chance to STAGGER normal enemies instead of 40%.
- Claymore upgrade to the Cleave talent now has a 10% chance to STAGGER normal enemies instead of 40%.
- Cleave talent now increases damage by 75% instead of 100%, while the cost has been increased from 20 stamina to 30 and cooldown from 20s to 25s.
- Shield Bash talent no longer automatically STAGGERS enemies within range of the attack who were not targeted directly. The primary target is still automatically STAGGERED, but other normal enemies within range have a 40% chance to STAGGER.
- Shield Defense talent now increases threat generation by 100%.
- Sunder talent now has a 20% chance to STAGGER enemies on a critical hit instead of 50%. As well, the talent now only STAGGERS enemies if the warrior is wielding a two-handed weapon, as originally intended.
- The Berserker's Berserk talent now calculates the damage bonus differently, substantially increasing the ability's effectiveness.
- The Reaver's Blood Frenzy talent and Fenris's Veneer of Calm talent now provide a maximum bonus of +50% damage instead of +100%.
Rogue Changes
- Rogues now regain 1% of their stamina per hit with dual weapons or 2% per hit with a bow.
- The Ambush talent now functions as described.
- The Burst Shot talent now inflicts approximately 50% more damage (and 3x physical force instead of 2x).
- Brand talent now provides a 25% bonus to warriors' and mages' critical chance instead of 10%.
- Disorienting Shot upgrade to the Pinning Shot talent now always DISORIENTS the victim, regardless of whether the victim was pinned in place.
- The Inconspicuous talent now extends the reduced threat generation to other rogues and mages within a 10m diameter.
- The Lacerate talent now provides a 10% chance to re-apply the damage from any ability over 5s, instead of a chance to apply a fixed amount of damage.
- The Merciless Strike upgrade to the Explosive Strike talent now applies 300% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 400%.
- The Pinning Shot talent now pins the victim for the correct duration.
- The Pinpoint Strikes talent now includes a 100% bonus to attack for the duration of the ability.
- The Assassin's Assassinate talent now has a 50s cooldown instead of 40s. The Annihilate upgrade now applies 200% damage vs. BRITTLE targets instead of 400%.
- The Shadow's Decoy talent and Sebastian's Guardian Angel talent now have a 45s cooldown instead of 30s.
- The Shadow's Disorienting Criticals talent now functions as described, and provides a 50% bonus to critical damage when obscured instead of 25%.
- The Shadow's Pinpoint Precision talent now provides a 50% bonus to critical damage instead of 25%.
Mage Changes
- Walking Bomb now inflicts damage equal to 50% of the victim's maximum health upon explosion, within a 4m radius, instead of 100%.
- Arcane Wall upgrade to the Arcane Shield spell now continues to provide a 20% defense bonus to the mage, as described. Previously, the upgrade reduced the bonus to 15%. Other party members receive a 5% bonus.
- The Chain Reaction upgrade to the Chain Lightning spell now applies 300% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 600%.
- Death Syphon spell now drains multiple corpses more quickly.
- Entropic Cloud spell now applies for 30s instead of 15s (against normal enemies), but the cost has been increased from 35 mana to 50 and the cooldown from 40s to 50s. The Death Cloud upgrade now applies damage every 2s instead of every 4s.
- Fireball and Firestorm spells now both inflict approximately 40% more damage and apply 3x elemental force instead of 2x.
- Misdirection Hex spell now applies for 15s instead of 10s (against normal enemies).
- Petrify spell now applies for 12s instead of 15s (against normal enemies).
- Sleep spell now applies for 15s instead of 10s (against normal enemies).
- Spirit Mastery skill now includes a 10% bonus to critical chance instead of 5%.
- The Spirit Strike upgrade to the Spirit Bolt spell now applies 300% damage vs. DISORIENTED targets instead of 200%.
- The Winter's Blast upgrade to the Winter's Grasp spell now notes that it affects nearby enemies.
- The Blood mage's Blood Magic spell and the spirit healer's Healing Aura spell are now mutually exclusive.
- The Blood mage's Blood Magic spell now reserves 70% of the mage's mana instead of 50%.
- The Blood mage's Blood Slave spell now enslaves the victim for a longer duration. As well, if the spell is ineffective, the victim's current action is now canceled. The Blood Spatter upgrade now inflicts damage equal to 75% of the victim's maximum health upon explosion instead of 100%, within a 4m radius. As well, the spell description now displays this information.
- The Blood mage's Grave Robber spell now affects a 12m diameter instead of 6m in order to make the ability more useful.
- The Blood mage's One Foot In upgrade now inflicts 100% of the mage’s maximum health in damage instead of 10%.
- The Blood mage's Paralyzing Hemorrhage upgrade to the Hemorrhage spell now applies 500% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 900%.
- The Force mage's Fist of the Maker spell now inflicts approximately 50% more damage. The Maker's Hammer upgrade now applies 600% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 900%.
- The Force mage's Unshakable spell now provides a +50 bonus to fortitude instead of +100.
- The Spirit healer's Group Heal spell and Anders's Aid Allies spell now restore 25% of party members' health instead of 30%. When upgraded, Group Heal restores 40% of health instead of 50%.
- The Spirit healer's Healing Aura spell and Anders's Panacea spell now provide a +100 bonus to health regeneration instead of +50, and a +200 bonus when upgraded instead of +100. As well, the diameter of the spell has been increased from 6m to 10m, and from 8m to 15m when upgraded. In addition, a rare case
in which the spell previously provided an abnormally high rate of health regeneration no longer occurs.
Companion Specific Skill Changes
- Anders's Swift Justice spell now reduces cooldowns to 90% of their normal duration instead of 80%.
- Aveline's Bodyguard talent no longer allows her to absorb the damage from Anders's Martyr spell.
- Aveline's Immovable talent now provides a stacking 8% bonus to damage resistance per hit instead of 2%.
- If Bethany or Carver rejoin the party near the end of the game, they now learn the Force Mage and Templar specializations, respectively. Existing save games from after the Deep Roads Expedition will not receive the benefit of this fix.
I wonder if the Nathaniel import bug has been fixed? "More reliable" DAO save imports seems a bit vague.
I thought that that was bugged on the export marking all the party members you didn't take with you to the endgame in awakening as dead
Yeah, that is correct. But the Nathaniel quest is suppose to show up if only 3 criteria were met 1) he was recruited into the Wardens and 2) he lived 3) the Architect lived. Now, assuming Vigil's Keep was fully upgraded, Nathaniel always lives in DA:A (he lives via you taking him to fight or you leaving him). I was under the impression they were going to try to get the quest to trigger off of info in the import save about the status of Vigil's Keep's upgrades, as the Architect flag and the Warden recruitment flag seems to be working fine.
Fingers crossed, the Vigil's Keep flag info is where I'd look to get that quest to trigger properly (hint hint Bioware)
Nope, I killed the Architect and he still showed up.
Actually now that I think about it, yeah, I had him in my party and killed the architect and he showed up
So, the new patch is suppose to come out this week, dolled out as soon as thier specific version is finished. Atm, only the PS3 Europe Version is live, but other than the trophy stuff, pretty much all of the patch is suppose to be the same for all platforms:
NOTE: Some fixes are retroactive, but not all. Players with plot-breaking bugs may need to revert to an earlier save, particularly a save prior to visiting the affected area during the current year in the game.
GAMEPLAY
- In many fights, enemies now move less quickly at the start of combat. This slower initial pace makes tactical positioning more useful and important.
- If the force of an enemy attack interrupts a party member's current action, the party member now resumes the action once he or she has recovered. This means, for example, that party members who have been instructed to consume a health potion will now do so as soon as they are able, and do not need to be told to consume a health potion again if they are interrupted.
- Enemies are now much less likely to explode into body parts upon death.
- Attacks that hit a stealthed assassin are now more likely to disrupt stealth.
- Abilities that apply a silence effect now also cancel the target's current action in addition to preventing the target from using further abilities.
- When an enemy wakes from a sleep effect due to suffering damage, other status effects that were applied by the same ability that caused the sleep effect are no longer removed at the same time.
- Items that bear the property "100% of basic attack damage vs. enemies that attack in melee" no longer harm the user when equipped in conjunction with abilities like Blood Magic or Sacrificial Frenzy that reduce the user's health.
- The items known as Final Thought, Sataareth, Sundering, and Trepanner's Gift now have damage types that match their elemental damage bonuses.
- The items known as Allure's Crook, Corrupted Acolyte's Staff, Defender of the Wall, Void's Hammer, and Volcanic Shield can now only be equipped by the appropriate classes.
- The high dragon's fireballs no longer track moving targets.
- Pride demons can no longer be affected by their own Crushing Prison spells.
- The size of the area affected by an ability is now explicitly described as diameter or radius (usually diameter).
- When a party member's armor changes after consummating a romance, runes inscribed on his or her old armor now carry over to the new armor.
- Using the Maker's Sigh potion on an archer no longer alters inventory capacity.
- It is no longer possible to create more than one Elixir of Heroism.
- It is no longer possible to simultaneously enable sustained modes that are supposed to be mutually exclusive.
- In some cases, enemies would freeze while entering combat. This no longer
occurs.
- In some cases, saw traps or spike traps would throw party members back even
when the trap was not visible. This no longer occurs.
- The Special Deliveries chest can no longer get into a state where it contains items but cannot be opened.
- The storage chest is now present in the Hawke estate after completing the main campaign.
- If the Black Emporium premium content is installed, the mabari hound now follows his master more reliably.
- Various character-corruption issues now correct themselves automatically when you load your game.
- Various minor gameplay issues no longer occur.
QUESTS (SPOILER WARNING)
- "Who Needs Rescuing" can now be completed.
- "Friendly Concern" is now available after consummating a romance.
- In "Act of Mercy," Thrask can no longer die, which could block completion.
- In "A Murder of Crows," it is now always possible to fight the varterral.
- In "A New Path," Merrill no longer remains locked in the party after the quest.
- In "Bait and Switch," the chest in the abandoned house can now always be opened.
- In "Demands of the Qun," Aveline's guards no longer turn hostile if the player declines to enter the Qunari compound during the day and then returns at night.
- In "Dissent," it is no longer possible to loot Ser Alrik's body before the appropriate time. This ensures that the quest can always be completed.
- In "No Rest for the Wicked," Isabela now always begins the opening conversation at the appropriate time.
- In "The Captain's Condolences," it is now possible to ask Aveline about her father even if she is not currently in the party.
- In "The Last Straw," Anders now responds much differently if he is a rival.
- In "The Last Straw," Aveline no longer attacks Meredith when the party is supposed to be stunned. This prevents a subsequent issue where the game could freeze after loading the post-campaign save.
- In "Wayward Son," it is no longer possible to speak to Thrask after speaking to Samson. This ensures that the quest progresses correctly.
- If Merrill's clan members die, she no longer speaks as if they were alive.
- If Anders is a rival, giving him the Tevinter Chantry Amulet now results in rivalry points instead of friendship points.
- If the Black Emporium premium content is installed, a new conversation between Fenris and Hawke's dog is available during the fourth year in Kirkwall.
- Alternate Merrill/Aveline banter is now available if Merrill's clan is killed.
- Various references to the events of Dragon Age: Origins are now more accurate.
- Various minor story-scripting issues no longer occur.
FUNCTIONALITY
- Users with a large number of promotional items were timing out when attempting to log in. This no longer occurs.
- Combat audio has been rebalanced so that it is no longer louder than exploration and dialogue audio.
- The Epic achievement or trophy can now always be unlocked.
- The Supplier achievement or trophy now always unlocks after finding at least 66 resource varieties, including resources purchased from the Black Emporium.
- A codex entry that helps unlock the Archaeologist achievement or trophy is now easier to acquire in the Viscount's Keep during the first year in Kirkwall.
- In the tactics menu, actions that use Items no longer become blank.
- Various minor art issues no longer occur.
- Various technical changes should improve performance and limit crashes.
PS3-SPECIFIC FUNCTIONALITY
- The Epic trophy was not unlocking properly for some users. This no longer occurs.
- The Supplier trophy now always unlocks after finding at least 66 resource varieties, including resources purchased from the Black Emporium.
- A codex entry that helps unlock the Archaeologist trophy is now easier to acquire in the Viscount's Keep during the first year in Kirkwall.
BALANCE
NOTE: Patch 1.03 introduces significant changes to the overall balance of the game, improving the strategic elements and making combat and class progression more engaging and enjoyable for players. Here is a detailed summary of the balance-related improvements:
General Combat
- Enemies’ basic attacks now apply much less force, which means that party members’ actions are not interrupted as frequently.
- The secondary attribute requirement for equipping armor or shields (constitution for warriors, willpower for mages, and cunning for rogues) is now significantly smaller.
- The rate at which rogues regenerate stamina while performing basic attacks has been significantly increased.
- Traps no longer inflict injuries.
- Enemies now gain more health as the game progresses.
- Enemy assassins now have less health.
- Lieutenant-rank and boss-rank enemies now have less health.
- Lieutenant-rank enemies can no longer lose more than 40% of their health from a single hit, and boss-rank enemies cannot lose more than 20%.
- Enemy commanders now occasionally throw stun grenades while encouraging their troops to concentrate attacks against a single party member. Previously, this behavior was limited to nightmare difficulty.
- Values for armor and elemental resistances now cannot exceed 95%. The game displays values of up to 100%, but characters now suffer 5% damage from an attack even if they show 100% resistance.
- The DISORIENT effect now applies a 50% penalty to enemy defense, as described in the codex, instead of only 25%.
- The Rune of Valiance now provides a +2 bonus to all attributes instead of a variable bonus that could rise as high as +7. As well, equipping and unequipping multiple pieces of armor that each bear a Rune of Valiance no longer results in incorrect attribute scores.
- Items that improve the Blood Magic cost ratio now provide 0.25 mana per point of health instead of 1 mana.
- On hard and nightmare difficulties, status effects now persist on enemies for a slightly longer duration.
- On nightmare difficulty, enemies now inflict more damage than before.
- On nightmare difficulty, party members no longer suffer friendly-fire damage from warriors’ basic attacks.
- On nightmare difficulty, party members can no longer suffer more than 75% of their health in damage from a single friendly-fire attack.
Warrior Changes
- Aftershock upgrade to the Tremor talent now has a 30% chance to STAGGER normal enemies instead of 40%.
- Claymore upgrade to the Cleave talent now has a 10% chance to STAGGER normal enemies instead of 40%.
- Cleave talent now increases damage by 75% instead of 100%, while the cost has been increased from 20 stamina to 30 and cooldown from 20s to 25s.
- Shield Bash talent no longer automatically STAGGERS enemies within range of the attack who were not targeted directly. The primary target is still automatically STAGGERED, but other normal enemies within range have a 40% chance to STAGGER.
- Shield Defense talent now increases threat generation by 100%.
- Sunder talent now has a 20% chance to STAGGER enemies on a critical hit instead of 50%. As well, the talent now only STAGGERS enemies if the warrior is wielding a two-handed weapon, as originally intended.
- The Berserker's Berserk talent now calculates the damage bonus differently, substantially increasing the ability's effectiveness.
- The Reaver's Blood Frenzy talent and Fenris's Veneer of Calm talent now provide a maximum bonus of +50% damage instead of +100%.
Rogue Changes
- Rogues now regain 1% of their stamina per hit with dual weapons or 2% per hit with a bow.
- The Ambush talent now functions as described.
- The Burst Shot talent now inflicts approximately 50% more damage (and 3x physical force instead of 2x).
- Brand talent now provides a 25% bonus to warriors' and mages' critical chance instead of 10%.
- Disorienting Shot upgrade to the Pinning Shot talent now always DISORIENTS the victim, regardless of whether the victim was pinned in place.
- The Inconspicuous talent now extends the reduced threat generation to other rogues and mages within a 10m diameter.
- The Lacerate talent now provides a 10% chance to re-apply the damage from any ability over 5s, instead of a chance to apply a fixed amount of damage.
- The Merciless Strike upgrade to the Explosive Strike talent now applies 300% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 400%.
- The Pinning Shot talent now pins the victim for the correct duration.
- The Pinpoint Strikes talent now includes a 100% bonus to attack for the duration of the ability.
- The Assassin's Assassinate talent now has a 50s cooldown instead of 40s. The Annihilate upgrade now applies 200% damage vs. BRITTLE targets instead of 400%.
- The Shadow's Decoy talent and Sebastian's Guardian Angel talent now have a 45s cooldown instead of 30s.
- The Shadow's Disorienting Criticals talent now functions as described, and provides a 50% bonus to critical damage when obscured instead of 25%.
- The Shadow's Pinpoint Precision talent now provides a 50% bonus to critical damage instead of 25%.
Mage Changes
- Walking Bomb now inflicts damage equal to 50% of the victim's maximum health upon explosion, within a 4m radius, instead of 100%.
- Arcane Wall upgrade to the Arcane Shield spell now continues to provide a 20% defense bonus to the mage, as described. Previously, the upgrade reduced the bonus to 15%. Other party members receive a 5% bonus.
- The Chain Reaction upgrade to the Chain Lightning spell now applies 300% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 600%.
- Death Syphon spell now drains multiple corpses more quickly.
- Entropic Cloud spell now applies for 30s instead of 15s (against normal enemies), but the cost has been increased from 35 mana to 50 and the cooldown from 40s to 50s. The Death Cloud upgrade now applies damage every 2s instead of every 4s.
- Fireball and Firestorm spells now both inflict approximately 40% more damage and apply 3x elemental force instead of 2x.
- Misdirection Hex spell now applies for 15s instead of 10s (against normal enemies).
- Petrify spell now applies for 12s instead of 15s (against normal enemies).
- Sleep spell now applies for 15s instead of 10s (against normal enemies).
- Spirit Mastery skill now includes a 10% bonus to critical chance instead of 5%.
- The Spirit Strike upgrade to the Spirit Bolt spell now applies 300% damage vs. DISORIENTED targets instead of 200%.
- The Winter's Blast upgrade to the Winter's Grasp spell now notes that it affects nearby enemies.
- The Blood mage's Blood Magic spell and the spirit healer's Healing Aura spell are now mutually exclusive.
- The Blood mage's Blood Magic spell now reserves 70% of the mage's mana instead of 50%.
- The Blood mage's Blood Slave spell now enslaves the victim for a longer duration. As well, if the spell is ineffective, the victim's current action is now canceled. The Blood Spatter upgrade now inflicts damage equal to 75% of the victim's maximum health upon explosion instead of 100%, within a 4m radius. As well, the spell description now displays this information.
- The Blood mage's Grave Robber spell now affects a 12m diameter instead of 6m in order to make the ability more useful.
- The Blood mage's One Foot In upgrade now inflicts 100% of the mage’s maximum health in damage instead of 10%.
- The Blood mage's Paralyzing Hemorrhage upgrade to the Hemorrhage spell now applies 500% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 900%.
- The Force mage's Fist of the Maker spell now inflicts approximately 50% more damage. The Maker's Hammer upgrade now applies 600% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 900%.
- The Force mage's Unshakable spell now provides a +50 bonus to fortitude instead of +100.
- The Spirit healer's Group Heal spell and Anders's Aid Allies spell now restore 25% of party members' health instead of 30%. When upgraded, Group Heal restores 40% of health instead of 50%.
- The Spirit healer's Healing Aura spell and Anders's Panacea spell now provide a +100 bonus to health regeneration instead of +50, and a +200 bonus when upgraded instead of +100. As well, the diameter of the spell has been increased from 6m to 10m, and from 8m to 15m when upgraded. In addition, a rare case
in which the spell previously provided an abnormally high rate of health regeneration no longer occurs.
Companion Specific Skill Changes
- Anders's Swift Justice spell now reduces cooldowns to 90% of their normal duration instead of 80%.
- Aveline's Bodyguard talent no longer allows her to absorb the damage from Anders's Martyr spell.
- Aveline's Immovable talent now provides a stacking 8% bonus to damage resistance per hit instead of 2%.
- If Bethany or Carver rejoin the party near the end of the game, they now learn the Force Mage and Templar specializations, respectively. Existing save games from after the Deep Roads Expedition will not receive the benefit of this fix.
Those nerfs. Wow. I think I'll finish my Hard runs before patching, thanks. Those Rogue nerfs would just make my life harder.
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Shadow the Hedgehog
You see, sometimes that makes sense, and sometimes it absolutely doesn't. There are many instances in DA2 where it simply does not make sense for things to unfold as they do no matter the choices that are made. For choice to be a factor, there must be branching storylines. They can converge more or less the same, but it's asinine to offer the illusion of choice that affects precisely nothing.
How to do it right: Witcher 2. You basically have a branching storyline where the bulk of the game is very different based on your choices down two major paths. Within those paths, the choices you make affect the ending and how you get there.
Otherwise just make an action game with upgradeable gear and abilities. Hell, Dynasty Warriors is a pretty fun game, imo.
Fallout, Fallout 2, Fallout: New Vegas, Arcanum, Vampire: Bloodlines, Baldurs Gate 2 (with the expansion), Knights of the Old Republic, the Witcher, the Witcher 2, Baldurs Gate 2, Mass Effect 1/2 (many of your decisions take a couple of games to go into effect, but they are there: Unlike DA2 that decides to pretty much ignore anything that happens in DA) and even Dragon Age: Origins.
I think it's notable just how many of the games on that list were made by Bioware. I also feel during DA2 there are more than a few places where I *should* be able to impact what happens - even if I can't affect the ending. But the game doesn't even allow me to do that, making it feel like a giant railroad stuck firmly up my characters posterior. I honestly haven't even been paying attention to what I've been doing when I last played it. Just letting the game direct me to whatever scripted event I'll have no control over next. I find that really disappointing and the ending is really insult to injury. I had hoped that I could affect the ending at least, hence why I kept playing and then when I read I couldn't, well. Blah.
I really want to like this game, but I just can't and that frustrates me.
In which of the bolded games do your actions change the final boss or the endgame? I don't know about the non-bolded because I haven't played them, but none of those games I bolded gave you any meaningful difference in the endgame at all mechanically. Nor, in the ones with sequels, did your actions change anything about the sequel beyond minor cosmetic things. Mass Effect 3 may buck the trend, but ME2 sure as hell didn't nor did KoTOR II or Baldur's Gate 2.
I mean, there were more unique cameos and callbacks in DA2 than in ME2 and unique quests. They just didn't usually involve former party members.
It's interesting that people say everything they do affects nothing, I've ran through the game, ooohhhh, a lot, with every known origin save, every class, doing every mission.
If you just main quest multiple times , It it'll be a little boring, as will being good/aggressive all the time.
There are lots of great little things you won't see unless you play through it multiple times, but what you do affects kirkwall but only to the individuals.
The funny thing about the limed games is that those games all got retconned with each new installment. All your choices are for naught. The devs wrote a "correct" Vault Dweller, Chosen One, Lone Wanderer, and will eventually write a correct Courier for New Vegas with a new sequel.
So while we could impact the wastes in multitudes of ways in game, the devs just dick slap you in the sequel by saying "this is cannon, all the other shit doesn't matter". That to me is far more disrupting than anything in DA2
Still, I think saying "the point is that your choices don't matter" is as compelling as Suda51 successfully demonstrating how dull pointless overworlds and minigames are. You made your point, but it became something other than what I was looking for.
Nonetheless, I like DA2, and I liked the thrust of the story much more than fending off the dreaded NotOrcs. I think it has a serious narrative pitfall at the end, along with a sense of emptiness in the world (I was always expecting that alchemy vendor to have something more to say since she was on friendly terms with Hawke, but never again), an awful inventory and some other problems (waves made every battle feel the same, but then every battle already felt the same in DA:O with a duller combat system to boot), but I think its flaws are particular to its incarnation while its virtues will reincarnate.
I really do feel there is a lot of this in Dragon Age 2.
猿も木から落ちる
The resolution works out something like this:
I mean I've reloaded and tried that a couple of different ways to see if I just made some mistake, but it doesn't seem I can have any impact on it whatsoever. It makes my choices irrelevant and leaves me feeling like the game is on a tight railroad. It doesn't even feel logical to me as I'm butchering down tons of the enemies with no effort required whatsoever. If that was perhaps difficult or I was clearly losing: Yeah, I could totally buy what happens. But while I'm easily handing the assholes of all the attackers back to them, THEN you decide to go nuts. Really? REALLY? It's just poor writing or design or something in between that. It's like if in DA:O when assaulting the final demon in the mage circle the only resolution was them being wiped out, regardless of what I chose to do. Sure you only get a difference between mages/templar in the final battle, but it's a difference and feels like I had an important effect (also Redcliff gets a mechanism of resolving that removed as well).
That's the sort of thing that really aggravates me. Choices don't have to be world shattering, they just have to feel significant within the context of their own game. Incidentally, I have no problem with another game assuming some kind of canon: So long as when I play the game initially it feels significant. I can accept that in a sequel X, Y and Z may be accepted as what happens - but during the original game I want to have choices and I want them to feel significant. Same in the sequel. DA2 I feel doesn't give me that feeling of having any impact on the story.
I think you're ignoring a lot about the scene you're talking about
They're all dead and they're still coming to kill them. In his place I can't say I would do differently.
Gameplay is here
Never the twain shall meet.
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It was poor writing and scene development. Even the devs said
But again, I've only played the game recently and haven't been following the thread that closely to really know. I only started reading the thread because I no longer cared about spoilers or having anything ruined (which just shows about how invested I am in the story now).
I meant the horse analogy more that in DA2 the game keeps telling you via quests that
The Orsino example gets brought up a lot, but for good reason. Two rational people can watch it and sort of get what they were going for and not having a clue what is going on. Both are valid on a first viewing, because the scene really is rubbish from a technical perspective.
GAMEPLAY
- In many fights, enemies now move less quickly at the start of combat. This slower initial pace makes tactical positioning more useful and important.
- If the force of an enemy attack interrupts a party member's current action, the party member now resumes the action once he or she has recovered. This means, for example, that party members who have been instructed to consume a health potion will now do so as soon as they are able, and do not need to be told to consume a health potion again if they are interrupted.
- Enemies are now much less likely to explode into body parts upon death.
- Attacks that hit a stealthed assassin are now more likely to disrupt stealth.
- Abilities that apply a silence effect now also cancel the target's current action in addition to preventing the target from using further abilities.
- When an enemy wakes from a sleep effect due to suffering damage, other status effects that were applied by the same ability that caused the sleep effect are no longer removed at the same time.
- Items that bear the property "100% of basic attack damage vs. enemies that attack in melee" no longer harm the user when equipped in conjunction with abilities like Blood Magic or Sacrificial Frenzy that reduce the user's health.
- The items known as Final Thought, Sataareth, Sundering, and Trepanner's Gift now have damage types that match their elemental damage bonuses.
- The items known as Allure's Crook, Corrupted Acolyte's Staff, Defender of the Wall, Void's Hammer, and Volcanic Shield can now only be equipped by the appropriate classes.
- The high dragon's fireballs no longer track moving targets.
- Pride demons can no longer be affected by their own Crushing Prison spells.
- The size of the area affected by an ability is now explicitly described as diameter or radius (usually diameter).
- When a party member's armor changes after consummating a romance, runes inscribed on his or her old armor now carry over to the new armor.
- Using the Maker's Sigh potion on an archer no longer alters inventory capacity.
- It is no longer possible to create more than one Elixir of Heroism.
- It is no longer possible to simultaneously enable sustained modes that are supposed to be mutually exclusive.
- In some cases, enemies would freeze while entering combat. This no longer
occurs.
- In some cases, saw traps or spike traps would throw party members back even
when the trap was not visible. This no longer occurs.
- The Special Deliveries chest can no longer get into a state where it contains items but cannot be opened.
- The storage chest is now present in the Hawke estate after completing the main campaign.
- If the Black Emporium premium content is installed, the mabari hound now follows his master more reliably.
- Various character-corruption issues now correct themselves automatically when you load your game.
- Various minor gameplay issues no longer occur.
QUESTS (SPOILER WARNING)
- "Who Needs Rescuing" can now be completed.
- "Friendly Concern" is now available after consummating a romance.
- In "Act of Mercy," Thrask can no longer die, which could block completion.
- In "A Murder of Crows," it is now always possible to fight the varterral.
- In "A New Path," Merrill no longer remains locked in the party after the quest.
- In "Bait and Switch," the chest in the abandoned house can now always be opened.
- In "Demands of the Qun," Aveline's guards no longer turn hostile if the player declines to enter the Qunari compound during the day and then returns at night.
- In "Dissent," it is no longer possible to loot Ser Alrik's body before the appropriate time. This ensures that the quest can always be completed.
- In "No Rest for the Wicked," Isabela now always begins the opening conversation at the appropriate time.
- In "The Captain's Condolences," it is now possible to ask Aveline about her father even if she is not currently in the party.
- In "The Last Straw," Anders now responds much differently if he is a rival.
- In "The Last Straw," Aveline no longer attacks Meredith when the party is supposed to be stunned. This prevents a subsequent issue where the game could freeze after loading the post-campaign save.
- In "Wayward Son," it is no longer possible to speak to Thrask after speaking to Samson. This ensures that the quest progresses correctly.
- If Merrill's clan members die, she no longer speaks as if they were alive.
- If Anders is a rival, giving him the Tevinter Chantry Amulet now results in rivalry points instead of friendship points.
- If the Black Emporium premium content is installed, a new conversation between Fenris and Hawke's dog is available during the fourth year in Kirkwall.
- Alternate Merrill/Aveline banter is now available if Merrill's clan is killed.
- Various references to the events of Dragon Age: Origins are now more accurate.
- Various minor story-scripting issues no longer occur.
FUNCTIONALITY
- Users with a large number of promotional items were timing out when attempting to log in. This no longer occurs.
- Combat audio has been rebalanced so that it is no longer louder than exploration and dialogue audio.
- The Epic achievement or trophy can now always be unlocked.
- The Supplier achievement or trophy now always unlocks after finding at least 66 resource varieties, including resources purchased from the Black Emporium.
- A codex entry that helps unlock the Archaeologist achievement or trophy is now easier to acquire in the Viscount's Keep during the first year in Kirkwall.
- In the tactics menu, actions that use Items no longer become blank.
- Various minor art issues no longer occur.
- Various technical changes should improve performance and limit crashes.
PS3-SPECIFIC FUNCTIONALITY
- The Epic trophy was not unlocking properly for some users. This no longer occurs.
- The Supplier trophy now always unlocks after finding at least 66 resource varieties, including resources purchased from the Black Emporium.
- A codex entry that helps unlock the Archaeologist trophy is now easier to acquire in the Viscount's Keep during the first year in Kirkwall.
BALANCE
NOTE: Patch 1.03 introduces significant changes to the overall balance of the game, improving the strategic elements and making combat and class progression more engaging and enjoyable for players. Here is a detailed summary of the balance-related improvements:
General Combat
- Enemies’ basic attacks now apply much less force, which means that party members’ actions are not interrupted as frequently.
- The secondary attribute requirement for equipping armor or shields (constitution for warriors, willpower for mages, and cunning for rogues) is now significantly smaller.
- The rate at which rogues regenerate stamina while performing basic attacks has been significantly increased.
- Traps no longer inflict injuries.
- Enemies now gain more health as the game progresses.
- Enemy assassins now have less health.
- Lieutenant-rank and boss-rank enemies now have less health.
- Lieutenant-rank enemies can no longer lose more than 40% of their health from a single hit, and boss-rank enemies cannot lose more than 20%.
- Enemy commanders now occasionally throw stun grenades while encouraging their troops to concentrate attacks against a single party member. Previously, this behavior was limited to nightmare difficulty.
- Values for armor and elemental resistances now cannot exceed 95%. The game displays values of up to 100%, but characters now suffer 5% damage from an attack even if they show 100% resistance.
- The DISORIENT effect now applies a 50% penalty to enemy defense, as described in the codex, instead of only 25%.
- The Rune of Valiance now provides a +2 bonus to all attributes instead of a variable bonus that could rise as high as +7. As well, equipping and unequipping multiple pieces of armor that each bear a Rune of Valiance no longer results in incorrect attribute scores.
- Items that improve the Blood Magic cost ratio now provide 0.25 mana per point of health instead of 1 mana.
- On hard and nightmare difficulties, status effects now persist on enemies for a slightly longer duration.
- On nightmare difficulty, enemies now inflict more damage than before.
- On nightmare difficulty, party members no longer suffer friendly-fire damage from warriors’ basic attacks.
- On nightmare difficulty, party members can no longer suffer more than 75% of their health in damage from a single friendly-fire attack.
Warrior Changes
- Aftershock upgrade to the Tremor talent now has a 30% chance to STAGGER normal enemies instead of 40%.
- Claymore upgrade to the Cleave talent now has a 10% chance to STAGGER normal enemies instead of 40%.
- Cleave talent now increases damage by 75% instead of 100%, while the cost has been increased from 20 stamina to 30 and cooldown from 20s to 25s.
- Shield Bash talent no longer automatically STAGGERS enemies within range of the attack who were not targeted directly. The primary target is still automatically STAGGERED, but other normal enemies within range have a 40% chance to STAGGER.
- Shield Defense talent now increases threat generation by 100%.
- Sunder talent now has a 20% chance to STAGGER enemies on a critical hit instead of 50%. As well, the talent now only STAGGERS enemies if the warrior is wielding a two-handed weapon, as originally intended.
- The Berserker's Berserk talent now calculates the damage bonus differently, substantially increasing the ability's effectiveness.
- The Reaver's Blood Frenzy talent and Fenris's Veneer of Calm talent now provide a maximum bonus of +50% damage instead of +100%.
Rogue Changes
- Rogues now regain 1% of their stamina per hit with dual weapons or 2% per hit with a bow.
- The Ambush talent now functions as described.
- The Burst Shot talent now inflicts approximately 50% more damage (and 3x physical force instead of 2x).
- Brand talent now provides a 25% bonus to warriors' and mages' critical chance instead of 10%.
- Disorienting Shot upgrade to the Pinning Shot talent now always DISORIENTS the victim, regardless of whether the victim was pinned in place.
- The Inconspicuous talent now extends the reduced threat generation to other rogues and mages within a 10m diameter.
- The Lacerate talent now provides a 10% chance to re-apply the damage from any ability over 5s, instead of a chance to apply a fixed amount of damage.
- The Merciless Strike upgrade to the Explosive Strike talent now applies 300% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 400%.
- The Pinning Shot talent now pins the victim for the correct duration.
- The Pinpoint Strikes talent now includes a 100% bonus to attack for the duration of the ability.
- The Assassin's Assassinate talent now has a 50s cooldown instead of 40s. The Annihilate upgrade now applies 200% damage vs. BRITTLE targets instead of 400%.
- The Shadow's Decoy talent and Sebastian's Guardian Angel talent now have a 45s cooldown instead of 30s.
- The Shadow's Disorienting Criticals talent now functions as described, and provides a 50% bonus to critical damage when obscured instead of 25%.
- The Shadow's Pinpoint Precision talent now provides a 50% bonus to critical damage instead of 25%.
Mage Changes
- Walking Bomb now inflicts damage equal to 50% of the victim's maximum health upon explosion, within a 4m radius, instead of 100%.
- Arcane Wall upgrade to the Arcane Shield spell now continues to provide a 20% defense bonus to the mage, as described. Previously, the upgrade reduced the bonus to 15%. Other party members receive a 5% bonus.
- The Chain Reaction upgrade to the Chain Lightning spell now applies 300% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 600%.
- Death Syphon spell now drains multiple corpses more quickly.
- Entropic Cloud spell now applies for 30s instead of 15s (against normal enemies), but the cost has been increased from 35 mana to 50 and the cooldown from 40s to 50s. The Death Cloud upgrade now applies damage every 2s instead of every 4s.
- Fireball and Firestorm spells now both inflict approximately 40% more damage and apply 3x elemental force instead of 2x.
- Misdirection Hex spell now applies for 15s instead of 10s (against normal enemies).
- Petrify spell now applies for 12s instead of 15s (against normal enemies).
- Sleep spell now applies for 15s instead of 10s (against normal enemies).
- Spirit Mastery skill now includes a 10% bonus to critical chance instead of 5%.
- The Spirit Strike upgrade to the Spirit Bolt spell now applies 300% damage vs. DISORIENTED targets instead of 200%.
- The Winter's Blast upgrade to the Winter's Grasp spell now notes that it affects nearby enemies.
- The Blood mage's Blood Magic spell and the spirit healer's Healing Aura spell are now mutually exclusive.
- The Blood mage's Blood Magic spell now reserves 70% of the mage's mana instead of 50%.
- The Blood mage's Blood Slave spell now enslaves the victim for a longer duration. As well, if the spell is ineffective, the victim's current action is now canceled. The Blood Spatter upgrade now inflicts damage equal to 75% of the victim's maximum health upon explosion instead of 100%, within a 4m radius. As well, the spell description now displays this information.
- The Blood mage's Grave Robber spell now affects a 12m diameter instead of 6m in order to make the ability more useful.
- The Blood mage's One Foot In upgrade now inflicts 100% of the mage’s maximum health in damage instead of 10%.
- The Blood mage's Paralyzing Hemorrhage upgrade to the Hemorrhage spell now applies 500% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 900%.
- The Force mage's Fist of the Maker spell now inflicts approximately 50% more damage. The Maker's Hammer upgrade now applies 600% damage vs. STAGGERED targets instead of 900%.
- The Force mage's Unshakable spell now provides a +50 bonus to fortitude instead of +100.
- The Spirit healer's Group Heal spell and Anders's Aid Allies spell now restore 25% of party members' health instead of 30%. When upgraded, Group Heal restores 40% of health instead of 50%.
- The Spirit healer's Healing Aura spell and Anders's Panacea spell now provide a +100 bonus to health regeneration instead of +50, and a +200 bonus when upgraded instead of +100. As well, the diameter of the spell has been increased from 6m to 10m, and from 8m to 15m when upgraded. In addition, a rare case
in which the spell previously provided an abnormally high rate of health regeneration no longer occurs.
Companion Specific Skill Changes
- Anders's Swift Justice spell now reduces cooldowns to 90% of their normal duration instead of 80%.
- Aveline's Bodyguard talent no longer allows her to absorb the damage from Anders's Martyr spell.
- Aveline's Immovable talent now provides a stacking 8% bonus to damage resistance per hit instead of 2%.
- If Bethany or Carver rejoin the party near the end of the game, they now learn the Force Mage and Templar specializations, respectively. Existing save games from after the Deep Roads Expedition will not receive the benefit of this fix.
I wonder if the Nathaniel import bug has been fixed? "More reliable" DAO save imports seems a bit vague.
My suspicion is that 90% of the problems really stem from the game being, despite protests to the contrary, produced far too quickly. This necessitated the asset reuse and fairly repetitive encounter design, which is probably the most obvious thing that would ruin most people's enjoyment.
The one fix I'm most excited about is
Agreed. It will now give me an incentive to have Anders as a rival.
Steam ID: 76561198021298113
Origin ID: SR71C_Blackbird
I thought that that was bugged on the export marking all the party members you didn't take with you to the endgame in awakening as dead
Yeah, that is correct. But the Nathaniel quest is suppose to show up if only 3 criteria were met 1) he was recruited into the Wardens and 2) he lived 3) the Architect lived. Now, assuming Vigil's Keep was fully upgraded, Nathaniel always lives in DA:A (he lives via you taking him to fight or you leaving him). I was under the impression they were going to try to get the quest to trigger off of info in the import save about the status of Vigil's Keep's upgrades, as the Architect flag and the Warden recruitment flag seems to be working fine.
Fingers crossed, the Vigil's Keep flag info is where I'd look to get that quest to trigger properly (hint hint Bioware)
Blood Mages also got a bit of a buff with the lower willpower/cunning/constitution requirements for armor; spending less Willpower to wear the best robes means more constitution to fuel your spells.
Yes, and more hit points also means more damage. It is delicious.
You did also notice they nerfed all the +1 health to magic right? Every single one of those now provides .25 more points instead of 1.
Nope, I killed the Architect and he still showed up.
Doesn't bother me in the least. It's ridiculously easy to get five mana for one health ratio as things stand right now. You're talking about spending six hit points for a thirty mana spell. When you can have hundreds of health as a blood mage. It's stupid silly how broken that is. Patched that will equate to two mana for one health, making it cost fifteen health for a thirty mana spell. Which is still pretty stupid powerful.
I'm more concerned about blood magic taking 75% of mana opposed to 50%. That doesn't leave you a lot of pool to load with sustained effects. It's a far bigger hit.
Also, I feel the need to clarify something I said earlier. When I said I was happy with the changes to Shadow, what I meant was I'm glad it's going to be completely broken now. The massive amount of damage boost it just got is absurd. Two specific talents just went from boosting critical damage by 25% to 50%! I really enjoy the freedom playing a shadow archer allows the player, being able to completely fall off the enemies radar at any damn time and get a huge damage boost for doing so is enjoyable.
Actually now that I think about it, yeah, I had him in my party and killed the architect and he showed up
Those nerfs. Wow. I think I'll finish my Hard runs before patching, thanks. Those Rogue nerfs would just make my life harder.
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