So, I was playing the demo for Dragon Age 2, and it was pretty fun. Too easy, but the demo is forced on normal difficulty, can turn it up in the full version.
 
There was one thing that really bothered me though, early game spoilers ahead:
 

That's pretty common knowledge to anyone who's kept up to date with the game, but as for how it works, I think it's a pretty cool feature. It inspires replay value since not only are they both different classes, but they're naturally completely different characters to go along with it. From the outset for example, Bethany is more a friend towards you while Carver upholds the archetypal sibling rivalry shtick.
 
It's a shame there's no way to to save both of them, but it's just one of the few set in stone happenings that can't be rectified. Like how Hawke will always be stuck as a human from Lothering.

It sucks but you can see why they do it for balance reasons. I guess I dont care about either of them as characters so it doesn't bother me.

I can't really see why they did it for balance reasons. There's going to be multiple mage characters and multiple warrior  characters, regardless of who dies. It's not going to change your options for party config drastically.

It makes sense to me. It encourages replaying the game, which for a game with no multiplayer, is what Bioware and EA hope for.

" I can't really see why they did it for balance reasons. There's going to be multiple mage characters and multiple warrior  characters, regardless of who dies. It's not going to change your options for party config drastically. "

I don't mean to seem like this is a huge major game breaking deal to me, I just want to clarify that before anyone attacks me for being rabid about this or something, I'm not, I just think it's an interesting conversation point.
 
 
There'd be just as much replayability if there deaths were somehow caused by a player descision indirectly. It doesn't have to be as heavy handed as in Mass Effect 1, but it can be something subtle like just the way you respond to some casual conversation peace makes one of them more reckless and likely to charge the ogre.

" I can't really see why they did it for balance reasons. There's going to be multiple mage characters and multiple warrior  characters, regardless of who dies. It's not going to change your options for party config drastically. "

Considering you get like... 2 other mages in addition to Bethany, I don't think it's a huge deal if you want to ever double up your mage power. It's probably partially for early game balance reasons, and partially to create replay value. Of course, neither of your siblings seem like especially interesting characters, especially when compared to crazy possessed Anders or that Dwarf guy who tells your story so I don't consider it an especially damning design choice.

Sort of torn between 'I get it' and 'They could have found a better way.'
 
Maybe the other dies a little later though, who knows?

I don't know I think it is pretty cool. It is going to give me a excuse to finally play a game as a mage. For some reason in these sort of games I always go with the warrior.

" That's pretty common knowledge to anyone who's kept up to date with the game, but as for how it works, I think it's a pretty cool feature. It inspires replay value since not only are they both different classes, but they're naturally completely different characters to go along with it. From the outset for example, Bethany is more a friend towards you while Carver upholds the archetypal sibling rivalry shtick. It's a shame there's no way to to save both of them, but it's just one of the few set in stone happenings that can't be rectified. Like how Hawke will always be stuck as a human from Lothering. "

" @Abyssfull said:

" That's pretty common knowledge to anyone who's kept up to date with the game, but as for how it works, I think it's a pretty cool feature. It inspires replay value since not only are they both different classes, but they're naturally completely different characters to go along with it. From the outset for example, Bethany is more a friend towards you while Carver upholds the archetypal sibling rivalry shtick. It's a shame there's no way to to save both of them, but it's just one of the few set in stone happenings that can't be rectified. Like how Hawke will always be stuck as a human from Lothering. "

True but why tie it to class. Why not tie it to your decisions. Seems odd like how they tied weapon augmentation according to class in ME2 which made zero sense to me.  "

is 4 mages still over powered when you're playing on a difficulty with aoe damage?

" is 4 mages still over powered when you're playing on a difficulty with aoe damage? "

I had another thought, no where near worth it's own thread so I figured I'd just post it here.
 
Did anyone else notice that there were several skill tree's you couldn't access in the demo, but instead of just setting them to locked or something, they set them to "requires level 99". It's functionally the exact same thing ofcourse, but it seemed really odd to me.

" @LlamaLlama:   That still kind of falls back to what I was saying earlier. It could be an idirect descision. Something you say makes one of them want to proove themselves, whoever you make want to proove  themselves get's more reckless, charges the ogre etc.  There's ways for player choices to effect things without the player knowing they're making the descision, that don't involve arbitrarilly tying it to class, you know? "

You can double mage it up when you team up with another mage. I can see why they'd even out the classes you have early on in the game.

It isn't really arbitrary and I think it's pretty cool. 

"@LlamaLlama:   I actually agree with you on that, the player not allways being in control is good. I wanted to post a major spoiler from infamous one here, anyone who played through infamous twice probably knows the moment I'm talking about, but I actually thought that was a pretty good moment on my second playthrough. The thing is, in this case the player is actually in full control over who lives or dies, but they're in control in a really silly way. "

I think one of the reasons I don't like it being tied to class is that it can actually take away from replayability depending on how someone wanted to play.
Say you're only going to do two play throughs, one as a warrior and one as a rogue, either way you get stuck with Bethany when maybe if the player could control it in some way, you'd have switched it up for variety.
 
There's also going to be people who only really like playing as mages, but they're going to do two very different styles of mage, and they want to make completly different story descisions to experience the variety in terms of story telling, while they might not be interested in the class variety.

They just want to make sure you have a mage if you are not one and have a warrior if you aren't one. I don't mind it, it just means I will replay it and I like the thought that I will actually do that for once.

You actually have a warrior either way. I forget her name but you get some orange haired warrior woman before the moment where someone dies even happens.
 
 
Edit: also did anyone notice there was no auto level up in the demo? I never use auto level up in the full version, but since it was just the demo i kindof wanted to just quick level my party members and move on and there didn't seem to be a button to do that.

" They just want to make sure you have a mage if you are not one and have a warrior if you aren't one. I don't mind it, it just means I will replay it and I like the thought that I will actually do that for once. "

I thought it was great! An awesome little twist that inspires multiple playthroughs.

" @Abyssfull: But not right away to start your party (except Aveline) it is to make sure at the onset you are ok.  "