Re: How can one improve weapons and equipment in Dragon age inquisition?

To mckrackin5324

Appreciate the tip  regarding varieties of silverite. Have lots of it, having worked much in the Emprise. However, among scores of recipes for armor creation there is not a single one that comes close in armor rating to the "found" armor that my characters use. Perhaps with a silverite masterwork armor even of a lesser degree, I might still be better off. I'll try it . And along these lines I have all sorts of armor legs, arms and whatnot in inventory -- but none of them are visible or available to modify any armor with. Another cause of my frustration with the crafting process. I have managed to attach a few runes and minor items to some things, but nothing to brag about.

Interesting tidbit about the storage bin exploit, But I suspect that one is a console-only ability because with a keyboard and mouse simultaneous "pushing" of two nonexistent buttons is a bit of a problem. I do not own or plan to acquire a console, having used custom-built high end PCs for all of my computing -- games included. Another drawback of using a PC that benchmarks off the charts is that I have never been able to read any of the hints during scene changes -- they disappear in less than a second and I have not found a way of pausing things to read the "card clues.". May or may not be something where I might have learned something. The frustration of "having to play by the rules!"

A.

@Sotetkriss; Not sure what you're on about with the "frustration of having to play be the rules".  I craft and equip some amazing armour and weapons all the time, even at fairly low levels (once reaching Skyhold, obviously.) 

It took me until my third-or-fourth playthough to understand the crafting system, (which I think is incredibly over complicated as far as the actual *process* is concerned) which allow players to significantly improve their gear in a fairly consistent manner.

The keys are:

a.  Gathering the right supplies (lots of exploring of the regions helps), and;

b.  Acquiring the necessary schematics (using the Golden Nug after multiple playthroughs, or visiting the Black Emporium with lots of gold, helps.)

For example, even at the single-digit level I routinely equip my team with 200+ armour and 100+ dps staves.

And this without any cheats or mods to make it easier.

[EDIT:  Full Disclosure; I use the "Quicker Looting" mod to so I don't have to wait through the bend-down-and-count-to-five  animation sequence every time I gather supplies.]

Dear Thandal,

I am suitably grateful for all attempts to help, and must admit I never expected to be a "Hero magnet." I have already noted elsewhere that I have yet to complete the game even once -- which is why I was looking for advice -- and therefore I do not have the advantages that apparently accrue from multiple playthroughs. I also have no DLCs and no desire for cheats or mods. As for the Black Emporium, that was on a previous installment of the series. One that actually made sense and bamboozled me into getting the third installment. Little did I know...

Forgive me for declaring that even if I were to finish the current playthrough (which is very much in doubt), the idea of doing another sounds to me like offering your other hand to someone who has just pulled off all your fingernails on the first one. Masochism. Not into it. I am suitably amazed at those of you who do it. Gluttons for punishment? Furthermore I have better things to do than waste my time -- again -- on a game I find exceedingly annoying. Still. I like to finish a game at least once. There have been a few I have discarded for sheer insults to my intelligence -- and this one may well join that elite group.

Also, even if things actually worked for me in this game, the enormous amount of boredom is mind-numbing. The endless plucking of spindle weed  and all the rest of the "farming." Strictly for the under 80 IQ set. I understand why you chose a mod which make that a wee bit less annoying.  And there is no better example of boredom than crafting. Basket-weaving seems exciting in comparison.

As for your first question kindly read my previous post again. "By the rules" refers to the storage crate cheat that I was told about. I do not cheat. I do not mod. I do not use a console.

Incidentally, as a Hero you might know what is wrong with this forum's word processing function. Spontaneous alteration of words into typos, run-on characters make it a challenge to create posts.

Thank you for your Heroic attempt to educate me. Although it did not work, never doubt that I appreciate the time and effort in writing your post. Not enough to mark it as the solution or to award  bragging points (which is the job of the "Dark Cabal anyway. I have commented on this to another Hero whose totally useless and unhelpful post was so marked and awarded. Not by me, of course), but I am commensurately grateful.

Sincerely,

A.

Sotekris;

As I noted in my first reply, I didn't even bother with crafting until after my first few times through the game.  As you observed, crafting can be very confusing.  Because I don't play games like this to be frustrated (except by my own mistakes) I ignored that part and just used the items I found or purchased.

Something I've learned about DAI is that it's almost too big. The one piece of advice I wish I'd had before my first go at the game was: "Get OUT of the Hinterlands!"  I had no idea that there was no point in trying to "finish" a region as if it were a level in a dungeon, or that there would be plenty of opportunities to come back, or that there could be encounters that the Party was nowhere near ready to win until much later in the game.  Plus, I'm a "Completionist" and yet it's literally impossible to "complete" DAI because some of the requisition quests re-occur endlessly.

My take-away:  Do the side-quests and missions that interest you... and ignore the rest.  When in doubt simply check your Journal and if nothing else appeals, continue with the "Inquisitor's Path".  😎

[EDIT:  The Black Emporium is a free  DLC for DAI.  Read about it here.  (And yes, the Mirror of Transformation is still there.) Log-on to EA/Origins, right-click on the game title and choose "Show Game Details", then "Extra Content".  Scroll down and you'll find it!  🤓]

Yep.

I'm level 15 now with maxed out everything in my gear and I haven't even started the main quest yet.

Here lies the abyss and Wicked eyes wicked hearts are still glowing on the war table. lol

Excellent points! Thanks!

A.

Wicked Eyes would have driven me to drink -- except I am allergic to alcohol and hence a teetotaler.

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@Sotetkriss wrote:

Wicked Eyes would have driven me to drink -- except I am allergic to alcohol and hence a teetotaler.

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I don't even remember how the game starts....Is that the quest in the Winter Palace Court?

If so...I hated that goddamn quest the first few times until I watched a perfect playthrough of it on Youtube and copied them.lol...

Still sucks though.

I hate it almost as bad as snow storms in any game.

What exactly does the developers think is fun about taking away the graphics and slowing the player to 5% speed?

That's every game ever to include snow. It's actually hard on your graphics card even though you're looking at nothing but swirling white. Just plain stupid....Just like the childish hide and seek quest at the Winter Palace.

mckrackin5324:

Yes, Wicked Eyes,,, is the Winter Palace episode, but it does not come early in the "Inquisitor's Path" and the characters need to  be in the mid-teen levels before you have much of a chance to get through it if you try it early. It contains just about every unpleasant feature that DAI has to offer. The nonsense about court approval -- which you lose in "forbidden areas," for one. There is an area called "Servants Quarters" where wikis and videos claim that you lose approval points only inside buildings, but not in the garden where there are a lot of things to do. Surprise: you keep losing points in the garden too. And then there is the fact that you need to find statuettes to open some doors. Surprise: there are far fewer statuettes to be found than are needed to open all the doors. And to boot, it is very hard to identify which are the doors that you actually WANT to open. I had to save the game, open the door, see what is inside, and if it was a dud, reload the game and skip that door. I could go on, but what's the use. The bottom line is that while each area has some  really infuriating feature -- such as those locations or tasks that either do not have a way to get to them, or can only by accident find access to. I keep getting the feeling that the developers sat around in conferences coming up with ways of making the player angry instead of satisfied. And as I have said elsewhere, I would rather have my fingernails ripped out than replay this thing -- and I doubt that I will get through it even once. I have gotten a lot of well-meaning suggestions, but the fact is, I have long ago found and done the things they suggest -- yet my game does not do the things that are claimed would happen. I have even "repaired the game" which actually ended up me losing some progress even though EA claimed that it would have no effect on my progress.

As for the graphics, I am fortunate that I have three extremely high end PCs to use, and I have never encountered any graphics problems. If I did, that would definitely mean rubbish bin time.

By the way, have you noticed that the word processing feature of this forum creates constant typographical errors and word salad? Reminds me of some phone keyboards that insert nonsense words you never intended. I spend more time correcting errors than composing my posts.

A

It can actually be done ahead of everything else if you complete enough war table missions. Not quests...just those stupid things you send others to do. lol...

It is available to me now and I haven't done a single quest in skyhold yet.

Agree that WEWH is one of the least enjoyable "Inquisitor's Path" quests.  Far too complex with far too little guidance as to what and where things are, or even what needs to be done.  I tend to blitz through it as quickly as possible, only varying which faction I decide to support and whether I choose to kill the assassin myself or pass judgement back in Skyhold.

But as for using the Repair function, it is literally impossible to "lose progress" because of that.  Saves are completely independent of the game code.  It is possible to select the incorrect location, "Cloud" or "Local", as the save repository to use after the repair, and that could wipe the correct one irretrievably (unless you had your own backup of the local saves and that was the set you wanted.)  But otherwise, the Repair does not, and cannot, directly effect where you are in the game.

mckcrackin5324:

It seems clear that you are a master of subterfuge and workarounds – something I will never be. And since I will under no circumstances replay this game, clever ploys are wasted on me. While several posters submitted what they clearly believed would be helpful ideas, it has turned out that none of them were unknown to me already, and none of them even marginally answered my original questions. While I appreciate and have enjoyed the interchanges, especially with you, the fact is that the discussion has gone off the rail and my conclusion is that either no one has an answer, or that possibly my game copy is in some way defective. It just does not behave in the way that it should, based on the posters’ repeated suggestions -- which do not work. Therefore I remain unable to upgrade my equipment – all the creation and modification options result in items which are far, far inferior to the “found” items I am equipped with. And by now I* have "found" hundreds of the same useless weapons, armor and they are just things to get rid of at a merchant stand. And of course everything the merchants sell -- sometimes for thousands of coins -- are also useless junk. I have boatloads of coin which is, as far as I have found, good for nothing too -- there being not a thing worth buying. So the hoard just keeps growing. Which leads right back to the original question concerning my inability to upgrade my equipment, and which has not had an answer that can help. You clearly enjoy the game, and especially the “gotchas” you have come up with. As for me, I am utterly bored by chasing after diamond-shaped symbols, by fighting the same enemies hundreds of times, and being unable to circumvent the rocks, mountains, chasms, picking weeds and stones, and the rest of the frustration techniques. In fact this game has entirely changed my sleep pattern. After perhaps one hour of doing these incredibly boring things, I fall asleep at my desk and need to take a two hour nap! You obviously are stimulated by the game. I am glad for you. Enjoy!

A.

Thandal:

Thanks as usual. Understand your explanation of “repair” since I was told the same thing by the EA advisors. And I was not asked to choose local versus cloud saves at the time. That has happened only once, following one of the frequent disconnections of the game from the Origin client, and I kept playing. Later, reconnected, I chose my own saves because they were well ahead of the cloud saves. The business of losing things had no relation to any of that. At one point I found that items I had previously done were showing as things waiting to be done – again. Why? I have no idea. As I mentioned to another correspondent, I am leaning toward the theory that my game program is somehow defective, given that none of the procedures you and others have suggested (and which I already knew in every case) have worked in my game. I think the subject of my original post has not had any usable  or new  information, and that this entire line of inquiry has failed. In fine I agree with you wholeheartedly about the WEWH quest. The Fates be praised, inasmuch as I would rather be castrated than replay this game, I will never see that abomination again. And I seriously doubt that I will be tempted to try another Origin product anytime soon – if ever.

Tschüss,

A.

You need at least the Black Emporium. 

If you really want some cool stuff...get The Jaws of Hakkon.

Be warned though...The Jaws of Hakkon will kick your butt from the start. Even on the easiest setting.

But the loot is so crazy powerful and will make your second playthrough so much more enjoyable.

I'ma unsubscribe on that note because I don't think you're going to get what you want from the base game.

PM me if you decide to go with a DLC.

DLCs and other additions to a game I don't like make no sense to me. Thanks and goodbye!