Hey guys. 
 
So I picked up DA:O (360) on release and didn't look at any guides, thinking my cold hard logic would win out over pouring time over on GameFAQs like it's so easy to do now with any remotely hard single player game. I started as a Dalish Elf, thinking "That looks cool! Archer Rogue!" and promptly died many times within the first hour. Started again with a City Elf Rogue, thinking "Let's try that archer thing again!" before getting 12 hours into the game and abandoning all ye faith due to getting brutally killed over and over and generally not having a clue as to what to do. 
 
At the beginning of this summer, I vowed to come back to it and I started with a Human Warrior (2her) and proceeded to look at guides online, with my laptop on right next to me, it's battery life determining how much I usually played for (exaggeration, I could get through most parts without help!) particularly for a talent guide. I dunno, it looked a lot harder than it should have been I guess. The part I had most difficulty with was The Fade, which took forever on my second Rogue run, where I died so many times and probably put me off. I pulled through it with exclusive use of GameFAQs and then got through the game, barely making through the final fight. 
 
With it being as dull a summer as I thought, I started a Mage. Holy bajeesus power-house of a game! It's just a lesson in staying alive! I'm so unbelievably powerful, compared to any of my previous characters, even the warrior who I knew I had some semblance of a clue with, that I keep pulling the enemies over to me! Not that I don't mind, it's satisfying to be dying due to uncontrollable amounts of damage flying around, but the game has become a lot more entertaining now. I play on normal difficulty for one main reason alone - I just don't think the game can really work well on the harder difficulties. I'm not saying it can't be done and absolutely full credit to those who do it because unlike Insanity on ME2, this I don't feel like taking on. What I mean to say is, it's mostly to do with how much you need to do with what you have. Yes, I can control all my characters and make specific tactics that work well, but I feel as if I need to be controlling all 4 of them at the same time to the degree that I do with one - positioning, spells to use etc. There simply aren't enough buttons to use and I rue the fact that I have no intention on investing in a PC to get it on this. I'm looking forward to DA2. I know a lot of people aren't as excited about it because of some of the changes, but it's the combat controls I'm explicitly looking forward to. 
 
So, what I'm saying is - Mage's kick an unruly amount of ass. 
 
And while I'm here, Warden's Keep and Return to Ostagar - are they worth getting? Considering the sale on at the mo on XBL, I'm tempted to pick them up, but am aware that just because there's a sale on doesn't justify buying stuff, especially if it isn't any good.

I just started a mage on DA:O myself and i agree they are awesomeness incarnate. my first character was a rouge archer and i had the same problem until i read a guide and found out how to allocate my skill properly (felt like i cheated) but imo rouges dish out the most single target damage (in my case around like 900dmg to a singe dude)  while mages are more area effect oriented and can tangle with more baddies at once, as well as buffing, debuffing healing and whatever else you think you can do.
(also liked how you can combine spells)

i feel like im going to actually run through the game enough times to do most of the achievements legit but i think the warrior build will piss me off  idk why. 
 
i was also wondering if i should get some of the DLC. i live cut off from the world so it is a must that i do research b4 i get anything that i am going to be stuck with for a while. 
 
let me know  if   you find anything out, thanks.
 

IMO both of those two DLC are decent, but they are both extremely short compared to most quests in this game.  Are they worth the price?  Certainly not if you judge solely on the dollar-to-gameplay-time ratio of the original game (but then again, that's the case for almost any Bioware DLC sadly). I would say Return to Ostagar isn't too much of a gamble at only 240 points, but Warden's Keep at 400 is still a bit pricey for what it offers -- although I should add that Warden's Keep gives you a chest to store items in which is very useful IMO.  Both of these DLC offer some nice loot too, especially Ostagar.
 
I don't know how they stack up against any of the other DLC, though, since I've only purchased the Deal of the Week ones so far and haven't gotten around to trying Awakening yet.

  @moocow21:
I didn't think buying Awakenings would be worth it because it seems to be buyable at least for second hand at an okay rate at retail. Or on sale. Both of those work. Why didn't they include a storage chest from the get go? So much random crap that I don't know if I need it until the final battle. I'm a bit of a hoarder in that I don't use potions or stuff  unless it's A) Absolutely necessary B) I know I've got plenty. You never know when you might need them and sometimes you can rationalise that a High Dragon doesn't count!  
 
If the DLC is still on sale, I'll take up Ostagar, but I can't remember if it is. Thanks though! I factor in the time spent with the base game as well for DLC, so like ME2 before it (although I don't have all of that) the 100+ hours I've spent can justify a little bit more, I hope. 
  

@SpenceKratos:

" ...And while I'm here, Warden's Keep and Return to Ostagar - are they worth getting? Considering the sale on at the mo on XBL, I'm tempted to pick them up, but am aware that just because there's a sale on doesn't justify buying stuff, especially if it isn't any good. "

Ah, well my mage I specced into healer and blood mage, mostly for the stats you get when selecting them. I didn't use any of the blood mage stuff because my constitution was lower than my willpower by quite a bit and whilst after a few moves with Spell Might on I'd run out of mana pretty quickly, I tended to find that most of the enemies were already very dead. Seriously, having the conal lightning, ice and fire attacks was a bit of a joke for dealing with enemies. 
 
And while I appreciate that some pretty cool items can be gained from the DLCs, I'd rather play them because they're fun to play over what they offer. So far, it seems like the aesthetic gain overrides, which is a shame.

A lot of people with a history in pc gaming probably didn't find this game to be that difficult.  I can understand the perceived difficulty but after beating the game on normal with little trouble (before there were guides) I sat down and spent an hour just looking at how all the systems in the game fit together and from those observations and conversations with a friend of mine who thinks similarly to me we were able to break the game by simplifying everything down to a matter of dps. 
 
We found that a lot of things you are supposed to accept at face value simply don't apply in this game. 
 
For example, shields don't really increase a warriors survivability very much.  The shield talent tree is just like the other talent trees... provides a couple passive benefits, a couple buffs, and a couple active attacks.  Basically the shield was just a weapon style and the only great ability in the whole tree is improved shield wall.  We discovered that Shale was a superior tank because he can't be knocked down or picked up so his defenses are never actually negated. 
 
We discovered that all items have the same maximum number of rune slots.  A dagger with three rune slots that swings once per second is superior than a 2h sword that swings once per two seconds for 20 damage because it does the same damage over time but deals twice as much damage from the runes... factor in dual wielding with two daggers and you're doing nearly 4x the damage as someone with an equal 2h weapons can pull. 
 
We learned that for all melee classes the most effective dps stat is strength.  No other stat increases your damage and chance to hit which means if you're not going strength you have to send two stat points to maintain hit and damage per one point you could put into str.  We learned that heavy armor is far superior to leather armor in virtually every possibly situation so pumping str not only increased damage and hit, but also survivability for melee classes. 
 
We learned that while a mage can be a damage powerhouse, the role a mage most excels in is tanking.  Combining spirit healer with arcane warrior and boosting only magic (because magic gets all the benefits of str) we ended up with a character that was nearly unhittable by enemies including dragons on the nightmare/insanity difficulty and on top of this when dual wielding daggers the mage actually hit like a truck back because he or she could have a much higher magic (read str) than anyone else in the party... add miasma to that mix and most enemies would ignore the rest of the party and exclusively attack the mage.  
 
Since I got Dragon Age I've put about 300 hours into it.  The guides out there are alright, good if you're stuck on a quest, but most of them try to work with the characters bioware gave you rather than telling you how to build a legit game breaking group.  A lot of people don't realize but it takes only three talent points in the dual wield tree to trivialize the difficulty of the game on all difficulty levels.  I love dragon age a lot despite massive flaws in game balance though.  If you're still having trouble I'd suggest just sitting down and giving the game systems a thorough look see... you can play and succeed at this game in the way you wish rather than in the way Bioware seems to wish you would... unless you want to be an archer.  I haven't experimented with it much but archery seems irredeemably bad... :)

I don't know why I did find it so difficult initially. I think I was trying to rush into it like an action game and forget to slow things down. By the end of my warrior run through, I had every warrior (so myself, Oghren and Sten) who used a 2her having the same button alignments just to make things easier. I think you're right though - the game has a veil of difficulty and I by no means doubt that the harder difficulties are not doable. I reckon with my mage I could've easily gone up a level or two because she just obliterated everything, a far cry from my initial rogue attempts where the only obliteration was my body. Over and over! The fact I tried to make them into archers probably didn't help. I've kept thinking about what I could've done right, and I fail to see where I could've gone more wrong. Doing the Fade sections was quite disturbing having to go between being an archer and then instantly change to my daggers because I needed an extra stun or what not. 
 
Ironically, having played KOTOR on the PC and completing that fine, not to mention playing WoW where clearly a lot of inspiration was drawn from (and I'd say in a mostly positive way) I struggle understanding why I did so badly initially. I don't consider my self  an amazing gamer, but I'd say above average. I really think the console version just suffered from being on a console too much. The lack of buttons with my mage, whilst never frustrating, was always a little bit irksome. I want to do one move, but there's no space because I have 6 other more important ones. I rue the PC players for having a nice long list to select them from. Don't get me wrong though, I'm glad Bioware brought DA to the consoles, but part of the reason I'm so looking forward to DA2 is because it'll play better. Call it an issue of control - I have a controller, but rarely did I ever feel like I'm in complete control of what's going on! 
 
I had thought about the 2her tank. Given enough health, I saw no reason why they couldn't. It'd be cool if they gained moves, like being able to parry, using their weapon. These are strong people here. I mean Sten isn't going to use a shield, but like hell he'd die in a fight simply because he didn't have one. Whilst I won't try it in DA, it'll be something on my mind for DA2. I had also considered the raw power of dual-wielders with enchantments. I guess the 2hers advantage is the heavier hitting moves, but even then.  
 
The part about the Arcane Warrior is something I'd considered, the the risk/reward element of it is what attracts me to it like a moth to a flame. Should I will to go through it more, it'd be something I'd desperately take to...as for the dual-wielding breaking, I'm a sucker for trying these things out. Pray tell those 3 talents? 
 
Edited from here: 
 
I also noticed on my mage-through a certain reference by Sten during the epilogue that refers to a certain item in a certain game. It's actually done pretty cleverly because we know he likes sweet food. He says: