Approval

[Paxan_1]

Hi all,

 

i have a question about this approval thing.

At the moment i have Allistair, Morrigan and Stan as my companions. I was a little surprised that they have negative (Morrigan and Stan) approval to me, only Allistair has +4. Is this the normal way how it is working?

I'm still at the beginning of the game, i think. At the moment i'm a lvl 6 rouge after finishing the Lothering quests.

Is there something i keep in mind, and do i need the approval?

 

thanks

Paxan

[Kamajii]

Its all dependent on your playing style. The choices you make, how you talk to your companions, any gifts you may give them... these all affect and change how much they approve of you. If the disapproval gets too low they may outright leave you. If you want to keep them all happy then pay attention to their personality style and talk to them accordingly, take actions you think they would approve of, etc.

[Thandal]

Paxan;

 

[No SPOILERS] Basically, as in RL, the characters you meet start with essentially neutral feelings toward you. Things you say and do *may* change that -- in either direction. And the same actions of which one person approves, another might not. The various companion NPCs have distinctly differing views as to what constitutes "right behavior". One may be highly altruistic, another completely Darwinian, and another... inscrutable. For many of us, figuring out who responds in which way to what type of behavior is part of (maybe a BIG part of) the fun of the game. Certainly something that makes it different from most other CRPGs, and takes me, personally, back to my friend's-basement-with-eight-sided-dice DnD days when earning (and keeping) your team's support was essential. 'Course then they were the real poeple in the room with you, even if the Dungeon was only on graph paper!

 

One thing to keep in mind, DA:O is a looooong game. Plenty of time to learn what makes the most sense in accomplishing your own goals, and the degree to which you want to spend time helping others achieve theirs.

 

[Minor SPOILER ALERT 1] I never did figure out one NPC's motivation on my first play-through. My son had to explain something to me before I could even stand to have that NPC in my party. On subsequent runs (with different PCs) I became rather fond of 'em. [/Minor SPOILER ALERT 1]

 

[Minor SPOILER ALERT 2] There are some actions (side quests) you are (probably) about to encounter in Redcliffe Village that you will think are no-brainer/PC-obviously-accepts-the-mission ones. But doing so will result in the approval of a certain party member plumetting repeatedly and rather steeply. Not the end of the world, for a variety of reasons, including that you just don't care. But if you do, here's a game-tip. You can swap which NPCs are members of your party when you ACCEPT the quest so that anyone who might be offended isn't present, then have anybody you want with you when you COMPLETE it. The impact on Approval is only applied when you say "Yes" or "No" to the request. [/Minor SPOILER ALERT 2]

 

Hope this helps your enjoyment of the adventure!

[Thandal]

[continuation of above]

 

Almost forgot: "Talk, talk talk!" You only discover what your companions like/want/need by talking to them. The "plot-essential" conversations will eventually get triggered by the game itself, (initiated by the NPC involved) but the other ones only occur if you talk to them. (NOTE: This is, however, what lead me to dislike a particular NPC during my first play-through, as discussed above. So don't get too discouraged if the response isn't what you expect. Come to think of it, that might be good advice for RL as well!)

[DarkeWolf]

Short answer- yes, approval is essential. In some cases if it's too low they will leave the party eventually.

In other cases, such as Zev, if his approval is below 50 towards the last 3/4 of the game, he will backstab and turn against you.

 

 

 

Approval also activates flags for the npc's sidequests. you have to have their approval at a certain level (I think it's around 30-ish) for them to bring up some of their first sidequests.

 

As was mentioned, spend time in conversation with them. Savegame before talking to them, so that if you really end up ticking them off, you can f9 and reload. I wouldnt spend a lot of effort on giftgiving at the start, since in some cases if you raise their approval too fast, it causes bugs later on. Also because each time you give them a gift, the bonus from gifts drops by -1.

[Thandal]

Short answer- yes, approval is essential. In some cases if it's too low they will leave the party eventually. In other cases, such as [snip], if [snip] approval is below 50 towards the last 3/4 of the game, [snip] ... [/snip].

 

Comeon, at least give warning before revealing plot points! :pinch:

 

Paxan obviously has no idea what's coming, which is as it should be!

[DarkeWolf]

Ok, edited for spoilers.

[Paxan_1]

Thanks all,

 

it is more complex i thought...

I wasn't aware of all that stuff, played it like Fallout 3.

 

So i need to think about how to talk to all other npc's and don't do all possible ways.

I talked to Allistair about his history, but nothing happens. Maybe i'm to low in approval for this.

 

 

That gifts are not usable on all companions, right?

 

I tried to give Alistair a bracelet and nothing happened, for an ale i got +1. Yeah, okay he is a man...

 

 

Does have actions like breaking a lock or stealing having an influence to it too?

 

okay, thanks for all the answers, i will try to play more emotional.

Paxan

[DarkeWolf]

do a search on google for dragon age gifts guide

that will help you to know which gifts are better for which companion :wink:

from the sounds of it tho, with Al you're at the lowest bonus for him, unless you give him one of the "special" gifts. Also, if they seem like they don't want to take it, that means that it would have a higher value to a different companion.

 

Ok, in their dialogs, there are certain lines that are worth say... +4. Sometimes, there are lines in there that they dont like, so that line is -1 thru -4 Some of them, they do really like, so those have extra +'s. If you got a 0 on it, you used some lines that they didnt like.

Yeah, basically, you can do the dialogs where you hit every question that you can...with random NPC's. You cant do that with people in your party tho.