DA2 loose ends (contains spoilers)

[Aelia Jusa]

Hello lovely helpful people,

I have played through DA2 three times now and have enjoyed it - loved my dual-wielding rogue - assassinate is absurdly powerful! But I was reading a walkthrough and realised that some things that are supposed to have happened did not! For example, at the end of act 2 (where you fight the qunari), and Isabela leaves to take her book, in the walkthrough it said that Isabela reappears at the final qunari fight, but in none of my games did this happen. I did different things each time - first time I immediately said we would help her and gave her the book, in the other games I resisted a bit but eventually helped her but said she couldn't have the book which she obviously stole anyway. So then I just lost Isabela for the rest of the game entirely! Is there something you're supposed to do to make her reappear (e.g., have a higher friendship with her? Although we were okay friends)? Or perhaps a bug?

Also, and this is really unimportant but I would like to know for completeness, there is an achievement listed that is "earned the respect of an important adversary" - who is the adversary? I have played through both sides of the ending and I think I earned the arishok's respect (although I didn't duel him as it was too hard) but haven't got this achievement.

[Cloudbringer]

I think you have to have friendship up fairly high with Isabella for her to come back and have to offer to get the relic for her (as opposed to telling her no, she can't have it when you do the quest), not just have her take it.

I've had her come back once under those circumstances.

[CerebroDragon]

Yes - like Cloudy says, maximise your relationship with Isabella by ensuring the marker is blue and all the way to the left on the counter before the end of Act II. She should then make a return.

You can obtain Arishok's respect by telling him that Isabella is the one that had the book(relic). You've also got to be honest with him at every chance you have when interacting with him. There's good run-down of the responses needed to get the achievement on the dragon age wiki page. http://dragonage.wikia.com/wiki/Arishok

Incidentally, the book is actually the very basis for the Qunari honour code - the Tome of Koslun.

The duel with Arishok is tough - but doable, if you come prepared with many potions and attack him at the right moments, preferably after he charges. It does take awhile, but eventually he'll fall.

Anyway, hope that helps.

[Aelia Jusa]

Thank you both very much! I thought my little question had been forsaken... Anyway I have managed to segue to chapter three with Isabella intact, so yay me

[Jorath Calar]

Does anyone else think that the story in DA 2 is extremely lame and uninteresting? I am playing it for the first time now, and am at a point of giving up. I was hoping something fun would happen when I got to the Deep Roads but nope... just a short quest and an short fight with a dragon and then back to the city.

I swear just the Ashes of Andraste side quest in Origins was more epic nad interesting than the whole story in DA 2.

Whats happening to Bioware?

[Fljotsdale]

You are really putting me off DA 2! I have Origins, Awakening and DA2; but so far have only had a brief look at Awakening and 2 cos I'm still having lots of fun with Origins - and yeah, Andraste's Ashes was a really good quest. In fact. all the quests in Origins are good. Nice and long. The bit of Awakening I did didn't impress, and ditto the bit of 2.

[robertthebard]

Originally Posted by Jorath Calar Does anyone else think that the story in DA 2 is extremely lame and uninteresting? I am playing it for the first time now, and am at a point of giving up. I was hoping something fun would happen when I got to the Deep Roads but nope... just a short quest and an short fight with a dragon and then back to the city. I swear just the Ashes of Andraste side quest in Origins was more epic nad interesting than the whole story in DA 2. Whats happening to Bioware?

Mass Effect, and trying to make all their games like Mass Effect. They are also probably quite distracted with the imminent release of their Star Wars MMO. For all that, I'd probably buy the MMO, even though I won't play it, because of all the people putting out games these days, BioWare is still top. Only time will tell how successful their MMO will be, but frankly, if they support it half as well as they did NWN's, it's going to be better than some of the games out now.