I was never a big fanfiction person until recently, despite being a huge fan of many nerd things that have tons of fanfic out there (Trek, Scape, Buffy, Firefly, nerd, geek, nerd, nerd). Conceptually, I loved the idea of it and I certainly have the brain spasms that must inspire it; I've spent many hours with friends fanwanking story inconsistencies and imagining what ifs for tertiary characters. I've happily read many fic recommendations from trusted friends. But there were too many bad stories and stories not to my personal taste to wade through for me to really take the effort to do it myself.

Then I played Dragon Age. Dag nabbit.

I'm just a reader but since writing was always my first love and, again, fanwanks are entertaining, I do have some ideas I wouldn't mind exploring. I may try my hand eventually. But for now I'm content to read the wonderful authors and stories I've found here. My thanks to them for the entertainment and to the creators of the various canons for the inspiration.

Also, I think Twilight is an abomination against good storytelling (amongst other things) and I will not read FF from that universe. Please stop asking.

Random Thedas Thoughts (SPOILERS for all DA content)

Just a handful of things that keeping crossing my mind when thinking about Thedas. I may poke at some of these myself but if anything strikes your fancy, feel free to write it up. If you do write about or know of a story addressing something on my list, let me know. I'd love to give it a gander.

It suddenly occurred to me while reading the interesting DA2 AU fic, "Tranquility" by Theodur, that the ship of slaves that Isabela rescues could very well be the not-so-sick elves shipped out of the Alienage in Origins. Which means that Tabris (if not the Warden) and any number of characters from that origin story could be kicking around Kirkwall and its surrounding environs. Given the above, and since Pol, from the Dalish origin and Merrill's clan, is also originally from the Denerim alienage, I wonder if he ever runs into any of them...

If you play a female City Elf, your cousin, Soris, says that your fiance, Nelaros, "fought like a demon". There are so many AU story ideas there I don't know what to do with it all. Nelaros as Warden while Kallian Tabris ends up shipped off to Tevinter... Combined with the above thoughts on Isabela's ship... Brain is exploding.

Depending on how things go down between Origins and DA2, the entire Dalish Warden's clan (the Sebrae Clan) may be gone by the end of both games, with the exception of Merrill. Which leads me to... I'm not the first person to note that the Dalish Warden's origin is not the most well done. But the more I think about it, the more I realize it has a subtle but far reaching impact across the various canon content that is kind of fascinating. It's all about that frelling mirror...

So what would happen if Hawke's sibling dies in the Deep Roads and Hawke finds out later that, had Anders been there, he might have been able to help? Awkward conversation is awkward.

It's a shame that in the Mage origin you can't actually make a bargain with Mouse the Demon. I'd love to see how that would turn out over the course of the Blight.

Given DA2's game mechanics, I can't shake this idea of a mage Hawke that becomes Viscount. There's a lot of potential angles to take (power hungry and wanting other mages eliminated being the obvious) but I love the idea that Hawke does it to help keep an eye on Kirkwall as a patriotic Ferelden (per the conversation with Alistair in Act 3).

Gender politics in Thedas are kind of funny. On the one hand you have women in fighting roles and leading the churches in ways that are not common in our own history, particularly during the eras the game draws the most inspiration from. On the other hand, you see at least hints of sexist attitudes on behalf of some characters that are familiar in real world terms. Given that our own patriarchal religions have had such a hand in maintaining sexist attitudes, one wonders why the Devine puts up with it. Or does she?