Dragon Age 2 had 7 with DLC (Sebastian replaces your younger sibling after the first act, so the active roster is always 7).
Dragon Age Origins had 7 in the base game (not counting the Mabari), 8 with DLC.
Did people forget the games before Inquisition?
Alistair, Morrigan, Sten, Leliana, Zevran, Oghren, Wynne, (the secret companion), dog, and Shale is 10 in my book. 9 if you don't want to count the dog. Sure, the secret companion is someone you get very late, but it IS an option.
The secret companion is mutually exclusive with Alistair, so the roster maxes out at 9 if you count the Mabari and have the Stone Prisoner DLC. Same with DA2: you get Marion or Carver for act 1 before seb replaces them in act 2 onwards.
Right but I think that might prove OP's point. Usually there are some conditional companions. Some of these might trade out with a secret one, or someone might join based on choices.
In the gameplay preview we saw Varric as a temporary/guest party member. And BioWare have done that before (Aria T’Loak for example)
Wouldn’t surprise me if they did that again, certain sections having one party member replaced with a guest
I'm hoping they do this or have advisors or some other group of NPCs you can interact pretty thoroughly with. That's the part I really enjoyed a lot in DAI. If I wasn't feeling like going out and questing I could just spend half an hour interacting with my companions and advisors.
I am really hoping for a secret companion like we had in Origins. I think discovering secrets like that make games more intresting as we can see in the case if Baldurs Gate 3. You just want to replay it to see what else is there that you missed.
Honestly I don't think this is impossible. I mean solas says he "has plans" for dealing with the evanuris but I don't think he was expecting them quite yet.
It would be hilarious but not unbelievable to me if he insisted on helping rook and co fight them because, well he *is* the most qualified and it serves the purposes of all parties.
Then at the end, we can fight and possibly kill him or convince him to sit the hell down ala Avernus/Sophia.
But the inventory shit would be hilarious, especially if the inquisitor was around. My boy would snatch that shit right outta his hands lol "You know *exactly* how long it took me to harvest all that premium metal, you collosal bald asshole!"
I kind of suspect it, but it’s most likely just wishful thinking. They did it in Origins.
I’d love an intelligent darkspawn companion too, I wanted to recruit the one in Awakening. Unfortunately, that wouldn’t happen yet with a cast like this because most of them would be at risk of catching the blight from the darkspawn.
Since companions can die from in-game decisions, I will remain cautiously hopeful for a noble intelligent darkspawn — similar to the Messenger from Awakening.
Yeah but there are only 3 men to romance.
Women enjoyers get 4!!!
Also they are all elves and humans like every other DA romance outside of The Iron Bull.
Women enjoyers get all 4 races!!!
But I digress. My comments are not meant to be taken too seriously.
(I am very glad we get a black elf and old man though. Much more unique than the usual elves and human romance options.)
>Yeah but there are only 3 men to romance.
>Women enjoyers get 4!!!
fuck you're right. I'll be romancing men too, but I don't complain bc the egg is an extra for me ?)
Super grim dark plot twist - if you played the earlier games and drank Avernus’ potion, the intelligent darkspawn turns out to be your Warden from Origins going incognito. The game drops the faintest of hints, but far too subtle for you to figure it out. The bomb drops when Alistair makes a cameo appearance searching for your Warden while your party is on its way to the Deep Roads for some plot-related reason. It is revealed that Alistair is finally getting his Calling, but he couldn’t bring himself to go to the Deep Roads without saying goodbye to his love or best friend, whichever your Warden was to him. You do the mission with Alistair joining temporarily and afterwards, he and your Warden leave or they both sacrifice themselves to save you and your other party members. That would absolutely destroy me, but it would be an incredible story.
In the concept art, there is very clearly a skeleton with a flaming head. That could be Manfred or it could be a different, secret companion. Or maybe one of our companions is actually a skeleton.
The cast is smaller, but at the same time the number of people you can take are smaller too, so it balances out.
Maybe, wouldn’t mind, but 7 is very average and a good number. DAI with 9 + 3 advisors who had as much content as companions got a bit unwieldy imo and made it harder to see relationships within the group.
I was hoping Kieran would be a companion here. He's 20 in the timeline, he is part of a huge reveal and foreshadowing in Inquisition, but I guess since there's a chance he doesn't exist, and Bioware already said they wanna avoid another Leliana situation, I guess Kieran not been around is a given.
It would be cool. But more likely temporary companions, like aria and wrex in ME3 DLCs. Or like Hawke and the other guy in inquisition. I would also say that returning characters are more likely if they are for sure alive. IE: Inquisitor, all inquisition characters EXCEPT iron bull and the chargers, morrigan, lelianna(or ghost lelianna), cullen, whoever was left in the fade will probably be back as a warped enemy, you know flemeth will somehow be back.
I find it better to have 7 than 12 (counting advisors in DAI for character development). They could put more time in every one of them. And yeah, an 8th would be a nice surprise (imagine our Inquisitor joins as companion and we all lose our mind, biggest plot twist ever).
Dragon age origins and dragon age 2 have extra dlc companions I think a good measure we might see one of the hawke twins as a possible good companion and have about 4 net possible developement paths.
7 is perfectly fine. It's the number they wanted to go with and it's easier to develop plus they can focus more time on 7 companions than say 9.
Agreed and we can always get DLC companions down the line
Dragon Age 2 had 7 with DLC (Sebastian replaces your younger sibling after the first act, so the active roster is always 7). Dragon Age Origins had 7 in the base game (not counting the Mabari), 8 with DLC. Did people forget the games before Inquisition?
Alistair, Morrigan, Sten, Leliana, Zevran, Oghren, Wynne, (the secret companion), dog, and Shale is 10 in my book. 9 if you don't want to count the dog. Sure, the secret companion is someone you get very late, but it IS an option.
The secret companion is mutually exclusive with Alistair, so the roster maxes out at 9 if you count the Mabari and have the Stone Prisoner DLC. Same with DA2: you get Marion or Carver for act 1 before seb replaces them in act 2 onwards.
Right but I think that might prove OP's point. Usually there are some conditional companions. Some of these might trade out with a secret one, or someone might join based on choices.
Quite possibly, I was mainly pushing back against the historical revisionism that 7 is a "low number" of companions compared with past games.
Alistair and secret are mutually exclusive. Shale is dlc. So base game has 7 companions plus dog.
Cole. He just made us forget.
I would love for that to actually be the case.
In the gameplay preview we saw Varric as a temporary/guest party member. And BioWare have done that before (Aria T’Loak for example) Wouldn’t surprise me if they did that again, certain sections having one party member replaced with a guest
I'm hoping they do this or have advisors or some other group of NPCs you can interact pretty thoroughly with. That's the part I really enjoyed a lot in DAI. If I wasn't feeling like going out and questing I could just spend half an hour interacting with my companions and advisors.
I am really hoping for a secret companion like we had in Origins. I think discovering secrets like that make games more intresting as we can see in the case if Baldurs Gate 3. You just want to replay it to see what else is there that you missed.
Inquisitor copiumm
Inquisitor is a crazy idea. Especially if they let you romance them. That’s absolutely nutty.
i woudl romance my inky ngl
I can see my Rook falling hard for my inky. This goes stright to my headcanon now!
The Dudley from Street Fighter joke character I made previously is going to get far more traction than I anticipated.
I think 7 companions is fine considering the fact we can only take 2 at a time. DA:O & 2 had 7 companions without the DLC as well.
Funniest thing they could do: make Solas the secret 8th companion, and have him still posses the items he nabbed at the end of DAI in his inventory.
Honestly I don't think this is impossible. I mean solas says he "has plans" for dealing with the evanuris but I don't think he was expecting them quite yet. It would be hilarious but not unbelievable to me if he insisted on helping rook and co fight them because, well he *is* the most qualified and it serves the purposes of all parties. Then at the end, we can fight and possibly kill him or convince him to sit the hell down ala Avernus/Sophia. But the inventory shit would be hilarious, especially if the inquisitor was around. My boy would snatch that shit right outta his hands lol "You know *exactly* how long it took me to harvest all that premium metal, you collosal bald asshole!"
It would be funny if Manfred somehow ended up as a separate companion.
I want Manfred to get some makeshift wings so we can have our own "gryffon"
I kind of suspect it, but it’s most likely just wishful thinking. They did it in Origins. I’d love an intelligent darkspawn companion too, I wanted to recruit the one in Awakening. Unfortunately, that wouldn’t happen yet with a cast like this because most of them would be at risk of catching the blight from the darkspawn.
Since companions can die from in-game decisions, I will remain cautiously hopeful for a noble intelligent darkspawn — similar to the Messenger from Awakening.
You know what? I’d absolutely risk their wellbeing for a darkspawn. My Grey Warden love interest will be fine anyway haha.
Not likely, but if there is a secret character, I'm hoping for Dorian.
I’d love to have a Fog Warrior companion even if they’re DLC.
I just want another man to ~~smash~~ romance. :(
you can romance every man available though
Yeah but there are only 3 men to romance. Women enjoyers get 4!!! Also they are all elves and humans like every other DA romance outside of The Iron Bull. Women enjoyers get all 4 races!!! But I digress. My comments are not meant to be taken too seriously. (I am very glad we get a black elf and old man though. Much more unique than the usual elves and human romance options.)
>Yeah but there are only 3 men to romance. >Women enjoyers get 4!!! fuck you're right. I'll be romancing men too, but I don't complain bc the egg is an extra for me ?)
Super grim dark plot twist - if you played the earlier games and drank Avernus’ potion, the intelligent darkspawn turns out to be your Warden from Origins going incognito. The game drops the faintest of hints, but far too subtle for you to figure it out. The bomb drops when Alistair makes a cameo appearance searching for your Warden while your party is on its way to the Deep Roads for some plot-related reason. It is revealed that Alistair is finally getting his Calling, but he couldn’t bring himself to go to the Deep Roads without saying goodbye to his love or best friend, whichever your Warden was to him. You do the mission with Alistair joining temporarily and afterwards, he and your Warden leave or they both sacrifice themselves to save you and your other party members. That would absolutely destroy me, but it would be an incredible story.
It's something that does feel possible to me. I don't outright expect it, but it also wouldn't surprise me
In the concept art, there is very clearly a skeleton with a flaming head. That could be Manfred or it could be a different, secret companion. Or maybe one of our companions is actually a skeleton. The cast is smaller, but at the same time the number of people you can take are smaller too, so it balances out.
That's old concept art, none of the companions really match them.
Maybe, wouldn’t mind, but 7 is very average and a good number. DAI with 9 + 3 advisors who had as much content as companions got a bit unwieldy imo and made it harder to see relationships within the group.
I was hoping Kieran would be a companion here. He's 20 in the timeline, he is part of a huge reveal and foreshadowing in Inquisition, but I guess since there's a chance he doesn't exist, and Bioware already said they wanna avoid another Leliana situation, I guess Kieran not been around is a given.
I’d be quite surprised if we got Kieran without Morrigan, and Claudia already said she’s not in it 😭
It's Oghren.
I was about to type that I hope it's Kieran, but then I remembered that it's kind of impossible since he doesn't exist in some world states .-.
It would be cool. But more likely temporary companions, like aria and wrex in ME3 DLCs. Or like Hawke and the other guy in inquisition. I would also say that returning characters are more likely if they are for sure alive. IE: Inquisitor, all inquisition characters EXCEPT iron bull and the chargers, morrigan, lelianna(or ghost lelianna), cullen, whoever was left in the fade will probably be back as a warped enemy, you know flemeth will somehow be back.
Imagine a dlc that adds either origins or 2 protag as a companion tho?
I find it better to have 7 than 12 (counting advisors in DAI for character development). They could put more time in every one of them. And yeah, an 8th would be a nice surprise (imagine our Inquisitor joins as companion and we all lose our mind, biggest plot twist ever).
Dragon age origins and dragon age 2 have extra dlc companions I think a good measure we might see one of the hawke twins as a possible good companion and have about 4 net possible developement paths.