PhoenixAdamu

As all of the others before me have said, Arcane Warrior mages are the absolute bomb in DA: O. I can't vouch for Awakening just yet, but I am looking at grabbing that very soon; however, my experience as an Arcane Warrior mage in DA: O has been absolutely phenominal. I ended up playing the wrong way the first time as well, and thought it was crap, but as soon as I started posting stuff on here and learned the right way, it was a piece of cake, and I've tinkered with supporting spells since, but the core of the AW is the same every time: Arcane Warrior Combat Magic -> Aura of Might -> Shimmering Shield -> Fade Shroud Mage Arcane Bolt -> Arcane Shield Primal Rock Armor Spirit Mind Blast -> Force Field -> Telekinetic Weapons -> Crushing Prison Entropy Weakness -> Paralyze -> Miasma NOTE: The Telekinesis tree in the Spirit school, in my opinion, is staple for all mages to have, therefore it's considered a core requirement for AWs. With this, Rock Armor and Shimmering Shield decrease the damage you take if you DO get hit, which is very unlikely with the other sustains and AW passive spells. Plus, with Aura of Might, some points in Combat Training skills and a main focus on your Magic attribute, your attack score should be pretty high up there, making sure that you do get nice hits in. Of course, when you're ready to go melee mode, ALWAYS MAKE SURE TO HAVE COMBAT MAGIC ACTIVE; without it active, your attack score won't totally reflect and your damage won't be as great. Follow this core, though, take the Blood Magic spec up to Blood Wound and throw in some other fun spells, like the Glyphs tree in the Creation school, the Death tree in the Spirit school, and the Cold tree in the Primal school, and you have a DPS/CC machine that can go for a long, long time. You can even grab some fun spell combos to use with your AW, if you're into that kind of thing; Paralysis Explosion offers a widespread Paralysis AoE, which definitely helps, and you can also go on a Shattering frenzy with Cone of Cold and (if you can pump it up that much) a melee crit or just cast Crushing Prison. Fun stuff, indeed.

I highly doubt we're gonna know the answer to that question until at least a couple more months from now, if they're pushing DA2 to 2/2011. Which... really? 2011?! Isn't that just a bit too SOON for a sequel? I mean, good lord, EA should let Bioware create the masterpieces they're KNOWN for if they're going to survive! If not, Bioware really needs to rethink their "relationship" with EA and perhaps go solo again, or find a publisher that will GIVE them the time to work. I mean, c'mon... 2011?!?!

Yeah, I'm curious about a mage build for Awakening as well. Hope someone puts up some good advice and suggest on here that soon Unfortunately, I don't have the luxury of providing anything for Awakening yet, as I don't have the game and probably won't for a while yet. 'S what happens when you have financial troubles... >< Fortunately, things should be looking up as far as spending goes, so as soon as I get my Pell grant refund in the mail, Awakening is MINE. :) And then, I can see if they nerfed Arcane Warriors any (which I kinda hope they don't ^^; ).

On an off-note before we start, I must say that the new forum skin definitely makes it look the "-ish." Don't change this one for a while. ;) Anyway, on the subject of Dragon Age, I'm hoping for two things: 1) That it, indeed, is NOT an MMO. As in Tikki's case, I'm a recovering WoW addict, and I really can't get back into the MMO schtick anymore. Just let me have my Dragon Age the way it is (just with improved graphics and animations, TYVM) and let me be! ... Well, except for checking out the mod community, of course. XD 2) That EA does indeed let Bioware alone and take their time actually crafting the second installment of DA. And no, I would not like to see another expansion pack, I want a full-fledged game like DA: O, but set in another country in Thedas, perhaps in a place such as Par Vollen or the Anderfels (especially the Anderfels, if they stick to the PC being a Grey Warden). Let them add even more awesome content and all, and just publish it as-is without rushing production. MASTERPIECES TAKE TIME, FOR CRYING OUT LOUD!! Okay, my semi-rant is done. Have fun interpreting my thoughts on this, guys. :3

Well, it'd be more realistic to not transfer a Warden that DIED in Origins to Awakening; after all, the Warden's DEAD, not knocked out or temporarily transported to another dimension.

I dunno, guys, but I installed patch 1.03 last night, and I haven't had any issues with it at all. All the mods I used prior are still working properly, and while it took me a while to get used to the changes on the first page of the level-up interface (I imagine they moved stuff around to make room for the new specializations), nothing else about the game has really changed. Well, except for the load-screen leak, which is a huge boon for me. ^^;

Believe it or not, the Song of Death rogue is probably the best route to take with patch 1.02. It's with this very patch that lets your dagger damage scale with Dexterity at the same rate as it would with Strength, and as soon as you get Lethality, your other dagger damage modifier will be your Cunning, anyway. The only drawback is that you're trading some of your early utility for better combat damage, but it usually pays off in spades, especially once you take the Bard spec and get up to Song of Courage; also, make sure to nab the Power of Blood talents out of Warden's Keep, if you have the DLC, as The Tainted Blade will increase your damage even more based on your Cunning.

No problem, man. I was so glad to find it, myself; I thought, FINALLY, a way to give Alistair Shield Wall right off the bat! It also makes respeccing all the other characters interesting, though Sten, Zevran, and Oghren are pretty straightforward as far as talents; attributes, however, usually end up a different story. ^^; Plus, setting your own skills up from the get-go = UBER-WIN. As far as other mods go, if you like playing with Arcane Warrior mages, I'd highly recommend getting the "Cast with Weapons" mod; this allows you to ignore any sheathing effects on the spells that would normally force it to happen, allowing the AW to play a lot more smoothly. Also, grab Advanced Tactics period, as it really does open up the tactics for your companions. Finally, No Sustain CD! :D

It could be how her tactics are set up, such as who/what she targets, what abilities she uses on certain targets, which sustains she has up... there are a fair amount of variables in how damage is calculated. Plus, keep in mind that if you're not using the Advanced Party mod, her attributes are set for her up to level 7; therefore, she'll wind up with a higher Cunning focus than she does Dexterity (which scales your arrow damage and half your bow damage). However, with both characters, you can (and SHOULD) play this to your advantage by speccing into Lethality, as it'll put Cunning in the place of Strength for the other bow modifier and add additional crit chance (if you don't use Rapid Shot as your main sustain, anyway). With Archery rogues, though, due to the fact that, by nature, their optimal spec is Ranger/Bard, you probably want your Cun only a few points lower than your Dex, but still at a pretty high number.

Well, y'know, there is always the... creature... toward the end of the Deep Roads during the Orzammar arc... the Blight would've probably turned Leliana into one of those, right? ^^; (I don't think I gave anything away with that, did I?)

I can tell you that whenever I start to cast Arcane Bolt, then move my mage and make him stop casting it, I do get that bluish mist around him, as well. It seems to go away after a load screen or if I change armor, though, so I don't know if that has any bearing on it.

Well, that's the funny thing about Miasma; it's actually a close-range AoE sustain, so it would stay in effect until the caster's dead. What you're probably talking about is Weakness, and that should be able to be removed via Dispel Magic from a mage. Other than that, it should wear off after a while. I do believe its duration is determined by the caster's Magic score in comparison to your mental resistance score.

Hence why Dual-Dagger Dexterity is the highest DPS build for a Dual Weapons warrior; you can easily make it so that you're almost like a Dex rogue with the ability to wear much heavier armor. Now, granted, Dual Weapon Strength warriors are still viable in the means of close-range AoEing down mobs. It all depends on what you really want to do with your build, I guess. However, the best weapon setup for Dual Weapon Strength is definitely the Veshialle and Starfang (Longsword). Hands. Down.

I agree with rebalious that the Arcane Warrior/Blood Mage setup is quite formidable; Arcane Warriors in themselves, when built right, are nigh indestructible, and with Blood Wound, it's easy to CC large crowds while you take on smaller ones face-to-face. Many who solo with AW/BM mages will take the Frost chain in Primal up to Cone of Cold, and no matter what I play, I usually like to take the full Telekinesis line in Spirit, as Mind Blast, Force Field, and Crushing Prison are more CC tools to keep you alive. I've also experimented with the Glyph chain in Creation, and if you can pick the targets just right, Glyph of Paralysis makes things much easier (you can also turn this into Paralysis Explosion by comboing GoP with Glyph of Repulsion to lock up a bunch of mobs at the same time). Other than that, take some high-damage spells and you'll be on your way (my major recommendation is Virulent Walking Bomb). Warriors do have the chance to do some soloing by building mainly into the Two-Handed Weapons tree, which provides utility at the same time that you get to wear that pretty massive armor (such as the Warden Commander Armor Set). In this case, people will often spec Reaver/Champion or Reaver/Templar, depending on if mages are their bane or they want that very nice AoE knockdown out of War Cry (and additional attack out of Rally).

You are right in saying that 16 Cunning's all you really need for certain skills (such as Master Coercion),and that the Lost in Dreams subarc in the Circle Tower will get you there, but if I do recall, 16 Cunning + Master Coercion still may not be enough for the toughest of persuasive dialogue; I could be wrong on this, but I think I remember reading somewhere about that. For Dexterity, that is also true, but being able to access some nice daggers for dual-wielding purposes never hurts; plus, it increases your attack a bit more, which is never bad. However, the one thing to remember is that, while you may be planning to spec AW/BM, you STILL start off a vanilla mage right off the bat, so while you're trying to get your sustains at the start, you'll still need some mana to cast the spells you have at your disposal to actually deal damage until you hit the point where you hit your Arcane Warrior spec. Putting points in Willpower at the beginning has never hurt my leveling, and it also allows for a bit more flexibility with your spells before you have to start casting from your health. I say this as an AW/BM player that doesn't play as a tank, but as a DPS/CC machine that lays waste to everything because I can. I'm still indestructible (as all Arcane Warriors should be), but I play in a different fashion than normal, and it works just fine for me. *nod* As far as the skills go, yes, I have seen now that there are mods that let you do that, but I have no problem working through the game with the horrible stuff mages start off with. And the spells, I usually end up making sure I get the staple stuff such as the sustainables and Crushing Prison ASAP, which makes it that much easier for me. After that, you can really take your AW in any direction you want, which is one of the very cool things about Dragon Age as far as customization goes. :3