Most of the content of Dragon Age Central has been developer posts to the official Dragon Age forums, first opened in May 2004. But all things must come to an end, and these forums were shut down on 2nd November 2009, the day before the game’s release in North America.
Since I haven’t had time to add much other content to the site for most of 2009, I’ve decided to also shut down Dragon Age Central as it was, leaving it here as an archive.
The new Dragon Age Central is now a much simpler (and fully automated) website dedicated to making developer posts to the new official forum (on Bioware’s social site) easier to find and search through.
It’s been interesting running this site, and in a way I’ll miss it... but hopefully I’ll be too busy finally playing the actual game to care :)
Dragon Age Central
Updated: Monday, 02 November 2009 02:07PM | Synced: 447729 mins ago
Forum posts were made by game developers. Please do not take posts out of context. While these individuals will have special insight into certain game-related questions, they are by no means the final authority. Please read the full topic and all its replies before forming an opinion. Remember, all things are subject to change.
-{ 2009 }-
Forum Post
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Chris Priestly ~ Community Coordinator Categories: Quality:
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Thread: Mages: Dresses or Armor? [+1]
Date: Thursday, 04 June 2009 08:56PM
Correct. 
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Georg Zoeller ~ Senior Technical Designer Categories:
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Thread: European Press Event - Collected preview links [+21]
Date: Tuesday, 12 May 2009 08:42PM
No.
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Georg Zoeller ~ Senior Technical Designer Categories: Quality:
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Thread: More Screenshots at Worth Playing [+4]
Date: Tuesday, 12 May 2009 05:25PM
Not just a conincidence. Templar armor is only available to characters with the templar specialization. Let's just say it has some interesting properties... |
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Georg Zoeller ~ Senior Technical Designer Categories: Quality:
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Thread: Specialization classes [+1]
Date: Sunday, 10 May 2009 02:20AM
Your actions speak for you. You don't carry a sign "Blood Mage" around your neck just because you picked a specialization.
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Georg Zoeller ~ Senior Technical Designer Categories:
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Thread: how does PC mage deal with a hostile templar? [+12]
Date: Tuesday, 05 May 2009 04:21PM
Rogues play their own role in combat.
They thrive in situations where enemies don't focus on them - but if things get bad, a rogue has a variety of class specific combat abilities ... If a rogue manages to get close to a mage, the mage is going to be in a lot of trouble. |
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Georg Zoeller ~ Senior Technical Designer Categories: Quality:
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Thread: how does PC mage deal with a hostile templar? [+12]
Date: Saturday, 02 May 2009 01:13AM
Actually, the templar's most fearsome anti mage ability has range: long
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Chris Priestly ~ Community Coordinator Categories: Quality:
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Thread: Thrown Weapons [+3]
Date: Thursday, 30 April 2009 11:06PM If you want to, sure.
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Georg Zoeller ~ Senior Technical Designer Categories: Quality:
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Thread: how does PC mage deal with a hostile templar? [+12]
Date: Tuesday, 28 April 2009 09:40PM
Well, everyone has their nemesis, and for mages, a templar certainly fills that role. In a 1:1 contfrontation, the outcome is certainly somewhat tilted towards the templar, given how all their training evolves around how to deal with those pesky mages.
A brutish fighter with low mental resistance running into a mage is a similar situation. But then again, your character is hardly traveling alone and, as Chris already said, mages have a formidable array of options to deal with almost any threat. All that said - yes, playing a mage heavy party that manages to somehow get itself into trouble with a bunch of templars (getting morrigan to shut up is harder than you think  ) will pose some interesting challenge - but that's fine - challenges are what makes games like these fun.
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Chris Priestly ~ Community Coordinator Categories:
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Thread: how does PC mage deal with a hostile templar? [+12]
Date: Tuesday, 28 April 2009 02:29PM
You seem to think that mages are made of glass when they come up against a templar. A mage facing a templar is not an automatic win for the templar.
Mongoose are made to fight cobras. Still if a mongoose isn't careful, cobras are still very dangerous. Just sayin' |
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David Gaider ~ Lead Writer Categories: Quality:
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Thread: Is it true that you can get a dog party member? [+2]
Date: Tuesday, 28 April 2009 02:20AM Sure, except that he is a Dog class as opposed to, say, a Mage or a Warrior or what have you. Like any other party member. I have my suspicions that Dog may, in fact, be one of the best party members you can have. |
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Chris Priestly ~ Community Coordinator Categories: Quality:
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Mages do not have a stamina bar the same way that warriors and rogues do not have a mana bar.
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Chris Priestly ~ Community Coordinator Categories: Quality:
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Stamina is to rogues and warriors what mana is to mages. It is the "power" that lets them perform their special attacks (like shield bash for example).
You will always be able to attack (swing your sword, fire an arrow, etc), but without stamina you will not be able to use your special attacks. You do slowly regain stamina during combat (depending on your class and abilities, etc) and you may be able to find potions or similar to help you "recharge" as needed.
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Georg Zoeller ~ Senior Technical Designer Categories: Quality:
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Thread: New Mage Video and screenshots [+5]
Date: Sunday, 19 April 2009 11:47PM There's a few methods of 'countering' in the game, but we don't have a concept of counter spell. Faced with a mage conjuring up some powerful spell, some of my options are: - Freeze, Paralyze or otherwise immobilize him in motion. - Send a stonefist his way, hoping to successfully knock him over. - Use a spell to empty his mana supply. - Wait for the spell to manifest and clear it as soon as it hits (templars can do this, so can some mages). Non mages could - Deal a lot of damage, which may interrupt casting. - Use weapon abilities that always interrupt casting unless resisted (such as shield bash) - Use class powers (such as a templar's ability to burn mages with their own mana supply). Finally, there's a bunch of mitigation options built into the combo systems (we already demonstrated putting out flames using cold based spells). |
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Georg Zoeller ~ Senior Technical Designer Categories: Quality:
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n for starters, 1 more per level and x more through other means. So yea, plenty fo spells, but still a single mage won't be able to get even close to 'most' of the spells in the game. We have a lot
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Chris Priestly ~ Community Coordinator Categories: Quality:
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Thread: Combos for Fighter and Rogues? [+0]
Date: Saturday, 11 April 2009 09:44PM
Warriors and rogues get special attacks, such as shield bash which has been shown and many more. They do not get "combos" in the sense that mages can combine 2 spells to get a greater or different effect, but they can string together different special attacks to devastating effect.
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