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Dragon Age: Inquisition Roundtable Q&A
10.02.2014

EMANUEL MERINO
COLUMNIST
MICHAEL CUNNINGHAM
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF


Dragon Age: Inquisition

During a roundtable discussion with EA and BioWare, RPGamer learned much more about many of the customization options available for Dragon Age: Inquisition. The team answered question about character customization in terms of appearance and skills as well as crafting and armor customization. Here's a look at some of the highlights from this discussion.

Character appearance is an important aspect in many RPGs and the development team was able to share some information about what's available in Inquisition. As stated before, there will be male and female options for the inquisitor along with four races to pick from, each with their own unique voice. New to this release is the Qunari, the largest race of the four. As such, no height or body type options are available, only facial customization. That said, there are a lot of options for crafting the face you want.

Players also have three classes to choose from, complete with their own specializations. There are three optional speciality classes for each class choice, allowing a great deal of variety in class customization. Character appearance will also vary a little based on the race and class combination. Skill trees do not cross between classes, so picking a specialization locks your character into that path. There are respec items that will wipe your talents clean, but since gaining a specialization is part of the story the item only cleans the talent tree within, not the specialization itself.

As is typical of RPGs, there will be crafting and as such players can create potions, grenades, and tonics. All of these can be upgraded permanently to make them stronger or more effective through the use of schematics found throughout the world. Some of these upgrades can be bought, others are found through quests or fighting enemies. Players will still have to gather materials on their own, but thankfully there's nothing like a pickaxe animation to slow things down. One example of an item that can be created is a Jar of Bees. Players will complete a war table operation quest to gain access to bees and then they will be able to gather herbs to prime the jar. In battle, players can throw the Jar of Bees into a group of foes for expectedly chaotic results.

As for equipment, there are plenty of customization options for weapons and armor. Players can gather different metals to change the strength and look of a weapon. For example, iron will give a weapon its own unique sheen when compared to other metals. Equipment will have primary and secondary slots for upgrades and stats will vary based on which materials go in which slot. The color of the armor and the visual design will depend completely on the type of upgrade. If you don't like a particular sword’s hilt or the pants on a given set of armor, you can change these out for ones that suit your tastes more. These armor sets will also look different on characters of different races and gender. You can also completely customize the gear of your companions with each individual armor piece tailored to that companion's style and personality.

The crafting system is a powerful tool that players can dive into almost immediately. From the very start of the game, you can craft or modify your armor, and even the lowest level equipment can be upgraded to remain relevant throughout your adventure, though it might not be worth the effort. For those who prefer not to worry about such things, there will be enough loot found normally throughout the game that players can ignore crafting if they don't want to dedicate the time to fine-tune their equipment.

In closing, the crew from EA and BioWare wanted to share how much they've been enjoying working on Dragon Age: Inquisition for the past four years. The team is huge and there's still so much to see that even some of the team hasn't seen it all. There is also a promise of more details about the Inquisitor’s Keep in the near future. We look forward to more details soon.



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