Dragon Age in D&D terms.

[FenAseph]

I have been browsing a bit on reddit and I found this discussion: https://www.reddit.com/r/dragonage/comments/6kabn9/spoilers_all_dd_stats_for_the_architect_and/.
Because I'm rather obsessed with D&D, that caught my attention and I'm now very curious about dragon age (never played it but I have read a bit about it and watched a few gameplays on youtube). If somebody here is versed in both d&d and dragon age, I would like to ask about this analysis:


OK, here goes some basic stats (picking out spells, feats and skills would be too much work). Like I said, been a while and it was 3E back then so if I say any nonsense, do correct :) (also wow did the stats for some enemies go up)

First, I rolled two human characters and levelled them up to 20 (back in my DM'ing days that was usually what I'd give to leaders, high priests or heroes of renown, you can add a few Archmage levels if needed). I went with Wizard class only, because of Tevinter's methodical approach to magic, and no cleric levels because there's no concept of divine magic in DA. Depending on your headcanons about Ancient Tevinter, you can bump the alignment of either or both to Evil.

Human!Architect

Level 20 Human Wizard

True Neutral (art and science are pretty neutral)

STR 9 (does not care for it)
CON 10 (reasonably healthy, but that's about it)
DEX 16 (high priest of the god of art would have to be graceful)
INT 20 (high priest of the god of science would likely be genius-level smart)
WIS 15 (minimum for politics)
CHA 20 (because ~Beauty~)

Sethius of House Amladaris (aka human!Corypheus)

Level 20 Human Wizard(Evocation or Battlemage spec)

Lawful Neutral (Dumat as "silence that conquers all" is a god of death, which means LN...or LE given the active nature implied by "conquers"...but the memory of Sethius's slave states Sethius himself was not evil)

STR 15 (has remnants of medium-to-heavy armor in the game so should be able to wear it)
CON 15 (same)
DEX 10 (that's not an agility-concerned armor he's wearing)
INT 18 (of the hardworking and persistent kind)
WIS 17 (Dumat's priests were likely more involved in politics than Urthemiel's)
CHA 18 (the High Priest of Death would by definition be intimidating AF and actively work on it)

Now the Darkspawn Emissary template for the Architect:

Type changes to Aberration
HD changes to d8
+6 bonus to STR and CON, +3 to WIS, -4 penalty to CHA (because your influence on people takes a nose dive when you're a monster). Why on Earth a WIS bonus to mindless monsters, you may ask? Purely gameplay reason of it being a measure of keen senses and mental resistance. Conventional human meaning of the word does not apply.
Chaotic Evil alignment (optional)
Gains 2 claw attacks (1d10+STR bonus plus moderate chance of infecting with Blight disease)
Darkvision 60ft
Can cast spells with CON if it's higher than INT (blood magic)
Can only cast spells that would fit Primal and Entropy schools from DA
Breathes, but does not have to eat or sleep (Gaider said this about darkspawn; also they can drown so I assume they breathe)
Blight Aura (low chance of infecting with Blight disease by presence alone)
Commands other Blighted creatures
Immune to Fear

Greater Darkspawn Emissary template for Corypheus - standard emissary plus:

Large size
+15 STR and CON, +10 DEX (based on creature of similar size and disposition that I remember, namely the tanar'ri balor, and adjusted for relatively skeletal appearance of Corypheus). This thing has been fighting for centuries and it shows.
Claw attacks can knock enemies down

...and finally...

The Architect

Medium-sized (at least he was last time we met him) Aberration

Alignment: Neutral (or CE if you headcanon he's just a clever Blight beast)

STR 15
CON 16
DEX 16
INT 27 (as a sentient being digging up lost lore in the Deep Roads for at least decades, he would learn a lot)
WIS 20 (improved senses and mental resistance; despite being a borderline incomprehensible eldritch horror, he still learns from his mistakes)
CHA 16 (still pretty persuasive if allowed to talk; not bad to look at either, in my twisted personal opinion)

Special Ability: Infect with Blight disease (he does this in the book). May be reluctant to use on unwilling creatures.

Corypheus

Large Aberration

Alignment: Chaotic Evil

STR 30 (throws a full grown qunari around with one hand like it's nothing)
CON 30 (large creature and quite the damage-sponge boss)
DEX 20 (as far as creatures in DA go, his physical attacks are pretty fast)
INT 18 (is fairly cunning and his plans are actually pretty sound...if sabotaged by his own indifference to whether his followers succeed or die)
WIS 20 (as measure of keen senses and mental resistance only, for humanlike purposes it's abysmal)
CHA 14

Special abilities:

respawn
if there is Red Lyrium around, whatever penalties/damages it inflicts on creatures in your setting give equal bonuses to Corypheus

Is this analysis correct?

[Ellrin]

Well the main point of contention I've got here is that nothing in Dragon Age even comes close to approaching the power level of a level 20 character. I'd say the biggest threats in DA are probably around CR 10-12.

The other thing is that most abilities are pretty much at will--though some have a cooldown measured in multiple rounds. That in mind, classes like Binder, Warlock, and Crusader might approximate that feel better than a Vancian caster--though that may or may not be especially important to you, and even if it is you'd definitely need to reflavor it.

As for creature types, I guess aberration's not bad for darkspawn, but I always kind of saw Hurlocks as essentially reflavored orcs. I think pretty much everything in DA--besides animals, demons, and a precious few monsters--are functionally humanoid or monstrous humanoid, though the societal reactions to things that are different are more extreme than in D&D--so non-human humanoids are treated more like we'd expect half-trolls and orcs to be treated in a typical D&D setting, and monstrous humanoids are treated more like we're used to aberrations being treated.

You could treat the blight as either a template or as separate races entirely--I think the mechanics of a template fits the flavor more, but you'll probably get more accurate flavor match by making new creatures (or refluffing similar D&D monsters that have no immediate representation in DA). The differences between the "good" humanoid races also seem way less extreme than in D&D--you may want to give elves, dwarves, and qunari human stats with maybe a couple of homebrew alternate racial traits a la Pathfinder instead of making them correspond to their D&D counterparts.

[FenAseph]

Thanks for the reply. Yeah, I never played Dragon Age, but I intend to install Dragon Age:Origins on my system to see how it is. The post I quoted made me curious because I thought that the game would be like an epic level adventure.

[Keltest]

Frankly, I think the big bad wizard type people in the setting would be in the mid teens at the most. They simply cannot alter reality under their own power the way that level 20 D&D wizards can. Demonic possession, ancient elven artifacts, legions of followers, whatever your poison is, its almost never entirely a result of their own power.

[Ellrin]

Frankly, I think the big bad wizard type people in the setting would be in the mid teens at the most. They simply cannot alter reality under their own power the way that level 20 D&D wizards can. Demonic possession, ancient elven artifacts, legions of followers, whatever your poison is, its almost never entirely a result of their own power.

Not to mention that magic types tend to have TERRIBLE Will saves in DA. Even decently high level mages tend to fail Will saves versus low-CR demons attempting to possess them.

[Keltest]

Not to mention that magic types tend to have TERRIBLE Will saves in DA. Even decently high level mages tend to fail Will saves versus low-CR demons attempting to possess them.

I'm given to understand that demons forcing their way into the heads of fully trained and certified wizards unassisted is fairly rare. Most of the time they trick a desperate mage into accepting a deal which bypasses their normal defenses and allows for possession. Sometimes the mage does it legitimately willingly. But brute forcing their way into a mage is rare, difficult, and far more damaging to the mage.

[Ellrin]

I'm given to understand that demons forcing their way into the heads of fully trained and certified wizards unassisted is fairly rare. Most of the time they trick a desperate mage into accepting a deal which bypasses their normal defenses and allows for possession. Sometimes the mage does it legitimately willingly. But brute forcing their way into a mage is rare, difficult, and far more damaging to the mage.

To be fair I've only played the first game, so my awareness of series lore is probably slim, but my impression was that the hardest thing was actually getting access to the mage. Then again, it did seem like most of the possession going on in that game was probably after the victims had been tortured to the point of their wills breaking, so you may be right. It's hard to keep a level perspective on it in DAO since there are a lot of cases of it happening, but those cases are probably unusual, in hindsight.

[Keltest]

To be fair I've only played the first game, so my awareness of series lore is probably slim, but my impression was that the hardest thing was actually getting access to the mage. Then again, it did seem like most of the possession going on in that game was probably after the victims had been tortured to the point of their wills breaking, so you may be right. It's hard to keep a level perspective on it in DAO since there are a lot of cases of it happening, but those cases are probably unusual, in hindsight.

getting access to the mage is actually the easiest part. Mages wander around the realm of demons (called the Fade) when theyre asleep. Others do too, but only mages are able to actually direct themselves to any degree while there. Demons can, theoretically, possess non-mages this way as well, but they have to brute force their way in since the dreamer cant give consent or make a deal, so they almost never do.

If you play as a mage in origins, your opening sequence is actually a test by the mages guild to see if you can resist demons from possessing you or tricking you into allowing them to do so. Mages who fail that test are executed, and if you choose not to take it, you are forcibly cut off from the Fade altogether, which renders you emotionless.

[Scots Dragon]

You could probably represent this by way of having all mages have the same base class, with circle mages gaining a prestige class that boosts will saves and having the harrowing be part of the overall set of requirements for taking it. Actually making a decent set of Dragon Age specific classes and prestige classes shouldn't be too difficult given that some of this groundwork has already been done thanks to Green Ronin. Generally speaking for Thedasian natives the barbarian, fighter, and rogue should be the only available classes from core D&D 3.5E rules, with classes that are similarly mundane from other sources like the knight, also being available.

Making a mage class wouldn't be too hard. It should be a spontaneous caster, gaining spells per day and spells known similar to a bard's progression, and its spells should likely be counted as arcane spells, but shouldn't require the same verbal or somatic components. It shouldn't be able to cast any summoning or teleportation spells, but can cast healing spells. Like a bard it should have medium base attack bonus, given that it's capable of becoming a front-line fighter without too much problem after taking the right options.

Prestige classes outside of the circle mage should probably include the arcane warrior (or knight enchanter), the blood mage, the rift mage, etc. based on common specialisations.

[AlanBruce]

Frankly, I think the big bad wizard type people in the setting would be in the mid teens at the most. They simply cannot alter reality under their own power the way that level 20 D&D wizards can. Demonic possession, ancient elven artifacts, legions of followers, whatever your poison is, its almost never entirely a result of their own power.

It's been years since I played Dragon Age: Origins, but I think you come across a text in the mage scenario that explicitly states that there is no such thing as teleporting and that if a mage wishes to go somewhere, they have to do it like everybody else- one step at a time.

Oddly enough, in the werewolf part of the game, you do come across a mage hermit in the woods that does a short term teleport (think Abrupt Jaunt), causing Morrigan to state that "that wasn't an illusion: he actually teleported!", or something along those lines.

So yes, Mages in DAO are not as powerful as the ones in D&D if we go gauge it by those examples.