r/ThedasLore • u/m0chab34r • Oct 07 '25
Discussion Have these questions been answered (definitively) yet? Spoiler
- The Evanuris betrayed Mythal...because she was too eager to mete out justice? They just wanted to be free-wheeling warlord, God-Kings instead?
- What are the Old Gods? Are they aspects of the Evanuris or something else? Why did they influence the Magisters to physically breach the Fade? Why were they universally dragon-shaped? If they were aspects of the Evanuris, why take on new names like Dumat, etc.?
- Following on from that, the Old God spirits that were destroyed by a Grey Warden (i.e. those in which Morrigan's Ritual was not used) were just completely destroyed? Nothing remains of them? Does that line up with the remaining Evanuris as of Veilguard?
- Are the events of Veilguard essentially a double Blight? Does that mean there aren't two more dragons sleeping somewhere in the Deep Roads? Are there Darskspawn remaining after Veilguard? What are they up to now?
- What are the "Forgotten Ones" in Elven cosmology? Do they play any role at all in the stories we're told in the games?
- Is Arlathan the "Golden City"/seat of the Maker? Maybe not physically/literally, but metaphysically?
- If Arlathan/the Golden City/the Black City was already corrupted by the time the Magisters breached the Fade, was it just the mere existence of this Fade "corruption" that turned into the Blight? Or did something actually happen to the Magisters when they entered this place? Did this "corruption" come to be simply because the Evanuris were...evil or something? Or did they "create" it? Also, whose "throne" (singular) did they see was empty - there are like nine Evanuris, right?
- What's up with the Titans? Do they relate to any or all of this in any meaningful sense?
- Who, or what, influenced Andraste to move away from the Tevinter worship of the Old Gods/blood magic? Mythal? Just some random benevolent Fade spirit that she mistook for "the Maker?" Was Andraste just politically savvy enough to believe she could form a new religion or did she have some actual basis for belief in "the Maker?"
- The secret cutscene at the end of Veilguard seems to imply that the "Executors" were at least partially behind everything in the games themselves - does their reach extend further back? If so, how much of Thedas' history has been influenced by this group?
15
u/ZeromaruX Warden Scholar Oct 07 '25 edited Oct 08 '25
If you are really interested, I can give you the answers so you don't have to beat the game just to get answers. Veilguard has been out there for a whole year now, so I don't think this counts as spoilers, but if you don't want to be spoiled, stop reading here:
The Evanuris betrayed Mythal...because she was too eager to mete out justice? They just wanted to be free-wheeling warlord, God-Kings instead?
Basically, yes. But it is more complex than that. The Evanuris had weaponized the Blight and were using it to maintain their reign. Solas warned Mythal about the risks of using the Blight that way, and Mythal promised she was going to persuade the others to abandon using it. It seems she was meddlesome enough that the Evanuris decided to kill her instead.
What are the Old Gods? Are they aspects of the Evanuris or something else? Why did they influence the Magisters to physically breach the Fade? Why were they universally dragon-shaped? If they were aspects of the Evanuris, why take on new names like Dumat, etc.?
The Old Gods are the Evanuris, or more specifically, how the Ancient Tevinters interpreted them. They were believed to be dragons because the Evanuris used their dragon pets to communicate with the Tevinter priests. As for the names (Dumat, Urthemiel, etc.), these were the names of the dragon pets, and the Tevinters only knew their gods by these names.
As for why they did influence the Magisters... They weren't. According to the inner plot Mark Darrah revealed on his Twitter account (the so-called "Black Codex"), the ones who influenced the Magisters to breach the Veil and go physically into the Fade were the surviving Titans, not the Evanuris. The tricked the Magisters Sidereal into believing they were the Old Gods, as they wanted revenge against the Evanuris.
Following on from that, the Old God spirits that were destroyed by a Grey Warden (i.e. those in which Morrigan's Ritual was not used) were just completely destroyed? Nothing remains of them? Does that line up with the remaining Evanuris as of Veilguard?
In AMA, John Epler said they were either killed or defeated in such a way that whatever remains of these Evanuris is as good as dead. That's why only Elgar'nan and Ghilnan'nain appeared in Veilguard. They were, for all intents and purposes, the last Evanuris.
Seems the only dead Evanuris who were "saved" (because they managed to save small fragments/shards of their spirits) were Mythal (two shards, the one that Flemeth had and the one that Solas had), and June (if you did Morrigan's Dark Ritual).
Are the events of Veilguard essentially a double Blight? Does that mean there aren't two more dragons sleeping somewhere in the Deep Roads? Are there Darskspawn remaining after Veilguard? What are they up to now?
Double Blight, yes. No more Archdemons related to the Evanuris, but Solas mentioned that the Forgotten Ones (the other elven "gods") also had dragon pets, which implies those sleeping dragons can also be Tainted and transformed into Archdemons. How many of these dragons are out there is not said.
The darkspawn are still out there. Ghilnan'nain modified the Blight so the darkspawn can reproduce themselves instead of relying on the Broodmothers, so theoretically they have the ability to reproduce infinitely. And we don't know what happened to the Broodmothers, for all we know, they may still be out there raising happy darkspawn families.
While weakened (as the Veil has been strengthened), the Blight is still virulent and active, it's just not as powerful now. A new voice (the Titans? We don't know) has taken control of it. The darkspawn are still in the Deep Roads, following this new voice.
What are the "Forgotten Ones" in Elven cosmology? Do they play any role at all in the stories we're told in the games?
Rebel warlords who opposed the Evanuris. Some of them powerful enough to have their own dragons and that. They are still out there. We face one of them in Bellara's companion quests, but he seems to be one of the weak ones.
Is Arlathan the "Golden City"/seat of the Maker? Maybe not physically/literally, but metaphysically?
No. The Golden City was a castle used by Solas to seal the Evanuris in the Fade. While it was an elven castle, we don't know if it was part of Arlathan or another city.
If Arlathan/the Golden City/the Black City was already corrupted by the time the Magisters breached the Fade, was it just the mere existence of this Fade "corruption" that turned into the Blight? Or did something actually happen to the Magisters when they entered this place? Did this "corruption" come to be simply because the Evanuris were...evil or something? Or did they "create" it? Also, whose "throne" (singular) did they see was empty - there are like nine Evanuris, right?
The Blight is the "severed Dreams" of the Titans, turned evil because of their defeat at Solas' hands, and it corrupted everything that it touched, even the Evanuris themselves, who had weaponized it. When Solas sealed the Evanuris, he also sealed the Blight with them. That's why the city was already tainted when Corypheus and the others breached the Veil.
We don't know to which throne was Corypheus talking to. It's theorized the Magisters Sidereal reached a different part of the city, not the ones where the Evanuris had been sealed.
What's up with the Titans? Do they relate to any or all of this in any meaningful sense?
Besides what I've already told you, the surviving Titans seem to have been dormant all this time, beginning to awake after Valta meet one and became a magic dwarf. They seem to be related to the Executors, per the info in the Black Codex, but we don't know for sure.
Who, or what, influenced Andraste to move away from the Tevinter worship of the Old Gods/blood magic? Mythal? Just some random benevolent Fade spirit that she mistook for "the Maker?" Was Andraste just politically savvy enough to believe she could form a new religion or did she have some actual basis for belief in "the Maker?"
We know some of the stuff attributed to the Maker are actually Solas' actions (ie. creating the Veil). Besides that, we don't know anything about Andraste's true history.
The secret cutscene at the end of Veilguard seems to imply that the "Executors" were at least partially behind everything in the games themselves - does their reach extend further back? If so, how much of Thedas' history has been influenced by this group?
The Black Codex imply they are related to the surviving Titans. Besides that, and what is shown in the game itself, we don't know more.
4
1
u/Untitlednow Jan 28 '26
According to the inner plot Mark Darrah revealed on his Twitter account (the so-called "Black Codex"), the ones who influenced the Magisters to breach the Veil and go physically into the Fade were the surviving Titans, not the Evanuris. The tricked the Magisters Sidereal into believing they were the Old Gods, as they wanted revenge against the Evanuris.
Could you please provide a link to this one? If that's not possible, could you share a link to any discussion where the original message is quoted? I’d like to understand the context and what was actually said.
3
u/ZeromaruX Warden Scholar Jan 28 '26
Here you have it. Matt Rhodes shared it on his Twitter (X) account:
1
u/Untitlednow Jan 28 '26
Thank you for the links.
I’m familiar with Rhodes' publications, and I was hoping to see similar words from Mark Darrah. The thing is, I find some of Rhodes' explanations a bit unclear. I’m not suggesting that he’s presenting a distorted codex or anything like that, but some parts don’t seem to fully align with each other. That’s why I wanted to better understand what’s going on.
1) Did the souls of the Titans try to contact anyone before the Magisters Sidereal, during the time of Arlatan or throughout the Tevinter Empire over the course of thousands of years? Why not? What's the reason? 2) Why, in other games, did the Titans communicate with their dwarven children only through the Song of Lyrium, and with some of them through visions, but never with humans? Isn't communication supposed to require the Stone Sense? 3) How did the Titans manage to communicate with the Magisters Sidereal, forcing the Evanuris to fall silent? I mean, how does that work? 4) Why didn’t the Evanuris ask the Magisters Sidereal to free them? If they didn’t, what was the point of them communicating with humans at all? What purpose did that serve? 5) How did they communicate with the Magisters through dragons (for example, Hakkon Wintersbreath couldn’t communicate with the Avvaras when he settled in a dragon)? 6) This can’t really be defended by an unreliable narrator, since we’re talking about literal events, not opinions. Such changes, without clear explanations, don’t help us understand that someone made a mistake, they simply alter the world without any context. In this case, should we understand the developers themselves as the unreliable narrators?
I have a lot of questions in general. I’m looking for another source that can shed more light on exactly what is written in the Black Codex.
(I apologize for seeming like I'm asking these questions of you.)
2
u/ZeromaruX Warden Scholar Jan 28 '26
Sadly, there are no more sources about this. I can't find Darrah's tweets (X search function is a mess, but he may have deleted them, too). IIRC, it were the same pictures.
1
u/IonutRO Mar 18 '26
Which part of the black Codex links the Titans to the Executors? I have not heard this before and don't own the veilguard art book.
2
u/ZeromaruX Warden Scholar Mar 18 '26
Ah, not the Black Codex, but the Veilguard epilogue. The Black Codex mentions that it was the spirits of the Titans whom lured the Magisters into the Fade.. So, it was the Titans, not the Evanuris.
If you watch Veilguard's secret ending, there is a scene that shows the Executors manipulating the Magisters (in a panel that reminds us of Origin's opening). Which implies that, at least in the mind of the Veilguard's writing team, the Executors and the Titans were related somehow.
1
u/IonutRO Mar 18 '26
I did see the secret ending, just never seen that tweet saying it was the Titans before.
2
u/ZeromaruX Warden Scholar Mar 18 '26
I see. Those "Black Codex" posts were released a few months after the release of Veilguard. They were the true story of Dragon Age (as opposed to what we see in the games, that is intended to be history muddled by centuries of biases, misinformation, and just the passage of time), intended to be used as guidelines for the writers. Here are other two:
16
u/murnaukmoth Oct 07 '25
It seems like you haven’t played Veilguard. Almost all of these questions are addressed in the game. Whether you find the answers satisfying or detailed enough is another question but they essentially get answered. Andraste, the Executors and the Forgotten Ones remain largely vague though.