Dragon Age: Inquisition - Trespasser Q&A Panel (Part 1)

On Sunday morning, Bioware held a Question and Answer panel to complement Dragon Age: Inquisition - Trespasser's reveal from Saturday night. Many things, especially on Solas and romances, were mentioned. While there are many questions about Dragon Age from this panel, here's what the developers had to say specifically on Trespasser.

Is Trespasser an expansion pack?

No. Mike Laidlaw confesses he misspoke when he mentioned it as an expansion pack. Instead, the best way to look at Trespasser is its an epilogue DLC that has a different focus. In the same line as Descent, the DLC pushes a more cinematic kind of storytelling. 

The Qunari Threat

The female Qunari at the beginning of the trailer is "super angry" and the Qunari are up to something which threatens stability in the south. As they won't "shy away from an opportunity," the Inquisition must challenge the threat. In order to face this problem, characters who left for a reason, such as the Divine (Leliana/Cassandra/Vivienne) may rejoin. Whether you made The Iron Bull Tal-vashoth or loyal to the Qunari will also be related to the story. But for more details on that, you'll need to play the game. 

Epilogues from Dragon Age: Inquisition

I asked a question regarding the relevance and accuracy of Inquisition's epilogues, in comparison to Origins' epilogues that ended up either speculative or not happening at all. Laidlaw says that they are relevant; Inquisition's epilogues were written with more consideration. As Origins' epilogues dealt more with the races and absolutes, Inquisition was more about the direction things took and the feel of where things were going. These epilogues will "certainly come into play," especially on who is the Divine. Trespasser is more about pulling the results of different decisions you made throughout your game, "definitely not to contravene them, but what you're doing in Trespasser may put some English on how that goes."

Mark Out Of Control

A running theme of Trespasser is the idea of control: losing it and the incapability of keeping it "under wraps in perpetuity." The Inquisitor's mark is a part of that, as it undergoes "a bit of an evolution" in Trespasser. The Inquisitor may also gain some "new tricks," accompanied with a few changes in the ability trees.

Will they affect your core game? "Maybe, we'll see".

"What has two years done to your love?"

Your romance with your companions or advisors depends on what choices you made. Relationships will vary in general; for instance, Cole may not return if you did not complete his "Human versus Spirit" quest line. If you did do his personal quest, however, the results of making him more of a spirit will definitely show compared to an Inquisitor who promoted being human. No further spoilers are mentioned, in the exception of Solas which we'll mention later, but Mike Laidlaw states that "If a character is potentially romanced or potentially friend, then those will vary quite distinctly. [...] Cause we wanted to make sure a little bit of extra sauce was poured onto the romanced characters, right? Because you want that to feel special..."

What Solas Had Wrought

Solas left. Yes, but now what? When you meet Solas, you realize that his role isn't integral to the events of Trespasser, however, you will have an opportunity for an "extensive discussion" with the "convoluted" companion. Mike Laidlaw states that "you may not walk away completely satisfied, but you should walk away utterly intrigued." That's the goal. While Bioware knows that players want to "A) see him and B) bang him," he's in an "interesting scenario" where players will see "threads being woven into a bigger tapestry." 

"His situation in a lot of ways has a parallel with that of Mythal, right? I mean he's almost of another time. And I wouldn't say that he is of the same nature...character-wise? That's something that you'll learn some more about him in Trespasser."

A last point: Mike Laidlaw does warn that this is a Patrick Weekes' character and to brace yourselves. 

Cameos, or Lack Thereof

Odds are pretty low about characters from Origins and DA2 returning in Inquisition. The focus is to concentrate on the major cast of characters in Inquisition, and cameos would have been challenging. That content would have undercut the rest, and Bioware wanted to stay focused with the characters present.

Eluvians, Eluvians, and Eluvians

Trespasser is a good indicator of what you are doing. Through the Eluvians, you are migrating through the Elven space, "where people haven't been and maybe shouldn't be." Bioware feels that having the Eluvians involved was a great DLC to talk about it. "Expect to learn more about the elves - in general. Expect to learn quite a bit about Eluvians." And that's all you get for now.