Dragon Age: Inquisition Bugs / Issues

I'll update as I find workarounds or bugs get found or fixed.
last update: April 4, 2015

Patches, and how to avoid them

See the Patches Page for details on the patches so far.

If you are on PC, there IS a way to avoid installing patches if you want to avoid all the trouble that they are causing a lot of people.
  1. Launch Origin
  2. Go into Application Settings > General Tab
  3. Clear the "Keep my games up to date" check box
    1. You can exit and restart Origin to verify the change sticks
  4. If an update has already started to download, pause it!
    1. If it has not started already, launch the game
    2. Origin will inform you that there is a required update to download. Click OK or Yes.
    3. The download will start. Pause it.
  5. Go offline (Origin > Go Offline)
  6. Relaunch the game. You will be able to play without downloading the update.
Keep the update paused for however long it takes them to clear up the current issues.

If you have already installed the patch and want to roll back:

Before doing the steps below, make a backup of your saves. Also note that any saves from a patched game won't be able to be played with a non-patched game (or any game version less than the one that the save was used in). So for example, if you have a save from an Inquisition with Patch 3, you won't be able to load that save in Inquisition with Patch 2 or less/prior.
  1. Do steps 1-3 above
  2. Uninstall the game (right click the game in Origin, click Uninstall, or go to Control Panel > Programs and uninstall from there)
  3. Use ccleaner to get rid of any last remnants including MFT free space (make sure you check the option. Make a restore point first.)
  4. Restart your computer
  5. Reinstall the game
  6. Launch Origin
  7. Do steps 4-6 above

I'm hearing that Origin has changed to update to the latest version it has of a game on its server so the roll back may not work, but there are conflicting reports. If you run into this then please let me know in the comments.

Bugs as of Patch 6

  • Some Amulets of Power are missing from the game (these may have been purposely removed because of a duping exploit. There are still some available from war table missions and quests.) Amulets still available: Cassandra's (Fallow Mire), Blackwall's (Adamant), Player Character (Crestwood)
  • Male Elf body still looks broken
  • Strange visual oddities like missing body parts on followers when certain armors are equipped
  • Some people are having issues loading their saves after the latest patch
  • The fix modders came up with after Patch 5 to re-enable any installed mods will keep the game from loading at all with Patch 6
  • Enemies are getting caught behind the closed door during Wave 5 of multiplayer
  • Do not use Ice Dragon Bone or Veil Quartz when crafting a shield - the shield will have no armor rating
  • If you have hit Inquisition max level and gained points over the max number, you will sometimes hear the "gain level" sound when closing menus and inventory, etc.
  • There has been an increase in NVidia errors which may be due to NVidia's recent driver upgrade. Try rolling your drivers back.
  • AMD is reporting "occasional crashes when using Mantle" for Dragon Age: Inquisition and recommends using DirectX.
  • Many reports of increased GPU errors and CTDs after Patch 6 from people who were not experiencing issues before the patch

Bugs from the Jaws of Hakkon DLC

Purchasing the Avvar heraldry for Skyhold makes it impossible to enter certain areas like Cullen's office because it hangs too low

Go back to a prior save and apply a different heraldry. You can try applying a different one to your current save and saving/reloading the game but this doesn't always work to unblock the areas.

General things to try first for troubleshooting

  • Play offline
  • Disable "Origin in game" (In Origin, Origin > Application Settings, Origin In Game tab)
  • Set graphics to "Low" across the board
  • Change the game to Full Screen Windowed mode
  • Disable any other program that will overlay your game such as Raptr, Overwolf, GeForce Experience, etc.
  • Try to only play one character at a time - move any other character saves into a backup folder. This might be tough to do since saves cannot be explicitly named, but having more than one character appears to cause many glitches which go away when the saves are moved out of the folder.
  • Try removing any overclock - you can even try under-clocking your RAM or GPU - this has helped quite a few people
  • Close all other programs in the background

Random crash to desktop, CTD, DirectX errors

AMD Radeon: 
Try AMD Catalyst 14.11.2 beta driver or the 14.12 Omega drivers with DirectX. The 15.3 beta has CTD's with Dragon Age: Inquisition listed as one of its known issues.

NVidia:
NVidia has a hotfix driver now available: 350.05. It is NOT yet listed in GeForce Experience but you can find it at nvidia.com here.

Set Post Processing Effects to LOW or OFF in the game graphics options, and in the NVidia control panel: Set it to Single Display mode, set Vsync to adaptive, and turn off Post-Processing Anti-aliasing. You can also try changing screen scaling while you're in there.
Disable the NVIDIA HD Audio drivers and reduce the clock speed - this has stopped the "Device Hung" errors for quite a few people.

If that doesn't work..
Reinstall the game from scratch with no antivirus/firewall running. If you don't want to update to patch 2, turn off Origin updates and follow the steps in the above section after re-installing. Your saves will not be compatible if they were saved using Patch 2, but perhaps you have some prior ones from before the patch.

Uninstall your graphics drivers completely and reinstall from scratch. Installer isn't always working 100%.
source

Install the VC redistributable 2012 from the following folder*:
C:\Program Files (x86)\Origin Games\Dragon Age Inquisition\__Installer\VC\vc2012\

and/or

Download Visual C++ Redistributable for Visual Studio 2012 Update 4: http://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/download/details.aspx?id=30679

Disable these 3 processes in the graphics options
  1. Ambient Occlusion
  2. Post Processing antialiasing
  3. Multisampling antialiasing
and switch post-process quality from high to medium.

Run the DXSETUP.exe file in the following folder:
C:\Program Files (x86)\Origin Games\Dragon Age Inquisition\__Installer\directx\redist

Try rolling back to DirectX 9 (from 11)

Also try:
  • Play offline
  • Disable "Origin in game" (In Origin, Origin > Application Settings, Origin In Game tab)
  • Set graphics to "Low" across the board
  • Change the game to Full Screen Windowed mode

To launch the game in Windowed mode:

  • Edit the ProfileOptions_profile file in the following location:
    • My Documents\BioWare\Dragon Age Inquisition\Save or
    • C:\Users\[your username]\Documents\BioWare\Dragon Age Inquisition\Save
    • (Please note that you need to edit this file in WordPad or Notepad++, not Notepad)
  • Set the following variables:
    • GstRender.FullscreenEnabled 0
    • GstRender.FullscreenMode 1
    • GstRender.FullscreenScreen 0

Remember that clearing your Save folder as other fixes may ask you to do will clear the Windowed mode settings. If you have not been able to launch the game at all and so do not have the file in your Save folder, create the file as named above and copy & paste those settings into it. Make sure there are no spaces before the setting names.

If you're using WordPad to create the file, name the file ProfileOptions_profile.txt when you save it. Then go into File Explorer, right click > Rename and take off the .txt extension.

*This is wherever your games are installed. For instance, mine would be in C:\Program Files (x86)\Electronic Arts\Dragon Age Inquisition

Character Creator

Symbols appear for the name of your character instead of the name
Name your character again. If you don't, your character will be named those symbols during the game.

Missing scars or tattoos
Stuck after character creator in a fade-ish mountainous area instead of going to the first cut scene with Cassandra

Visual appearance bugs

Missing scars or more aged appearance
If you have installed Patch 2, you will need to set your meshes on at least "High" in order to see scars. Aged appearances will also blend better at "High" or higher.

To achieve the same visuals as pre-patch (patch 2), users on lower settings will need to change their settings to Ultra, which should likewise be used in conjunction with Ultra mesh quality. Mismatching the mesh and shader settings will result in other visual artifacts like overly shiny hair.*

*This has been changed as of Patch 5 - According to the patch 5 notes "Removed the connection between mesh quality and shader quality and added a Shader Quality setting to the Graphics options." So shiny hair is now only linked to Shader quality. Set it to Ultra and you won't have shiny hair - may even look ok on High.

Windows "Out of Memory" errors

Reboot the machine and turn Mantle off [AMD Radeon cards]

Problems after installing the game itself or the latest patch from Origin

Sometimes Origin gets "stuck" or doesn’t recognize the changes made by an install or update. Do the following in order - Very Important: Make a restore point before running ccleaner and having it clean up your registry! If you run into trouble after ccleaner, you can do a restore.
  1. Run ccleaner on your PC: http://help.ea.com/en/article/how-to-use-ccleaner-to-fix-pc-issues/ as many times as needed, until ccleaner no longer finds any registry issues.
  2. Clear Origin cache:
    1. Completely exit Origin (Origin > Exit)
    2. Find and delete the "Origin" folders found in each of the following:
      1. These folders are hidden by default, so you'll need to un-hide them by Showing Hidden Files to be able to delete them.
      2. ​Open each folder by finding then double-clicking it.
        1. C:\ProgramData\
          1. ​​On Windows XP, the ProgramData folder is located in
          • C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application data\Electronic Arts\.
        2. C:\Users\[your username]\AppData\Local\
        3. C:\Users\[your username]\AppData\Roaming\
  3. Empty your Recycle Bin
  4. Perform a clean boot: http://help.ea.com/en/article/how-to-clean-boot-your-pc/
  5. Re-launch Origin, Right click the game and install any updates
  6. Right click the game in Origin and click Repair
If the above does not work, try disabling Intel Rapid Storage Technology in Task Manager > services ("IAStorDataMgrSvc.exe")

Problems with Multiplayer

When attempting to create a lobby, there is an error that one or more of you do not have the same downloadable content as the others, or if you are experiencing rubberbanding:
  1. Take out any command line arguments in the game shortcut (see how)

Problems with key drops: This is an ongoing problem that has had a few fix attempts in the patches.

Advisor Missions

In case you find an advisor on a mission with some really huge time remaining, it's possible your system clock reset
source

Dropping to 30fps or lower in cutscenes or conversations

Please note that as of Patch 3 this workaround will not work correctly.

Add the 60fps "fix" / command line argument. This will cause problems with Multiplayer and will cause the bug where your character is unable to progress past character creation (character ends up loading into a mountainous / fade-ish / rocky area with no escape after the cutscene). See below for how to avoid this, and see this page for fixes for that bug.

To add to your desktop shortcut:
  1. Go to where you installed Dragon Age: Inquisition and right click on the main exe (DragonAgeInquisition.exe), go to Send To > Desktop (create Shortcut)
  2. Right click on desktop shortcut & select Properties
  3. In the Target directory input box, click at the very end, press space, copy the following line and paste it into the input field:

-GameTime.MaxSimFps 60 -GameTime.ForceSimRate 60+

  1. Click Apply, then OK, and launch the game from that shortcut.
To add to your Origin game shortcut:
  1. Launch Origin
  2. Right click on Dragon Age: Inquisition and select Game Properties
  3. Copy the following line and paste it into the field:
-GameTime.MaxSimFps 60 -GameTime.ForceSimRate 60+
  1. Click OK, then Click Play
Make sure you have the latest drivers installed for your graphics card.

To avoid issues with this fix, you could make yourself 2 desktop shortcuts: one with and one without the command line argument. Use the one without it whenever you want to create a new character or play multiplayer.

Also note this change does not play well with the walk/run toggle introduced in Patch 3.

Graphics card issues (stuttering, freezing, hitching, crashing, DXGI_ERROR_DEVICE_HUNG message / error, bad / terrible FPS)

Also see the Random crash to desktop, CTD, DirectX errors section

All
  • Try the latest graphics card drivers.
  • Try the beta graphics card drivers
  • Set graphics lower than they are set currently
  • Turn off "Origin in game" (In Origin, this is in Origin > Application Settings, Origin In Game tab) and any other program that has a game overlay such as Raptr.
  • Play offline
Extremely shiny hair
See Visual Appearance Bugs.

Nvidia
If you are using 344.75, try .65

If you have a series 500 card and suspect overheating, try increasing the fan speed to prevent this: http://help.ea.com/en/article/titanfall-crash-fix-for-nvidia-pc-players/

AMD Radeon
Try AMD Catalyst 14.11.2 beta driver

Last resort
1. In the game's installation directory run /_Installer/directx/redist/DXSETUP.exe
2. In the game's installation directory run every visual c distribution package at /_Installer/vc/
3. Right-click on the Dragon Age game shortcut and select Properties > Advanced > Choose "Run As Administrator"

Mantle: Unable to take screenshots
Try pressing the tilde ~ key to bring up the console, and type the following console command:
Screenshot.Render

Sound issues

Constant drumming in Skyhold
Enter and then leave the war room.
Bioware is looking into the problem.

No / low amounts of banter
  • Play with the audio settings. The game's default is set to "Home Theater" and that could be an issue if you are using a TV, as Home Theater sends dialogue through the center channel.
  • Turn on subtitles. You may be getting banter and just not hearing it - you'll see the words on your screen and then can figure out why it's not audible.
  • Set graphics to auto
  • Fast travel from the war table instead of your map
Bioware BSN threads about the issue here and here.
Bioware is trying to reproduce the bug.
How banter works: via Bioware blog

The Inquisitor's voice switching when customizing Hawke
This was addressed in Patch 2, but the fix is not retroactive. This means if you already have the bug in your game, it will not fix it. It will apply to new games only. For games in progress, there should hopefully be a way to change the Inquisitor's voice via the mirror in the upcoming Black Emporium DLC.

Lengthy pauses in conversations / dialogue wheel does not appear / unable to click dialogue wheel
  1. Wait about a minute (sometimes they seem to just forget their lines, seriously)
  2. Press ESC to skip
  3. Alt-tab out of the game and back in
  4. On consoles, "suspend" the game by going out to another app then back in
  5. Right click anywhere on the screen
Bioware is aware of the issue and is working on a fix.

Armor sounds are intermittent
The creak of leather or clanking of armor will sometimes disappear until a cut scene or the war table is activated. After a while it will disappear again.
No known fix.

Companions

A couple of plot gifts (Varric's and Dorian's amulets for example) disappear upon equip
Check to see if they add a talent point when they disappear. For me, Varric's would disappear upon equip, there would be no talent point, and the amulet would reappear in inventory later and would disappear (with no talent point) upon equip again.

Dorian’s quest not firing
Update: This was supposedly fixed in Patch 3 (have not yet seen verification)

 Leave the area. If that doesn’t make it inactive, explicitly make it inactive by marking a different one active. Have Dorian re-enter the door to the quest area.

The Verchiel March (Sera companion quest) bug: Cannot find mercenary boss to speak to after fight
Update: This was supposedly fixed in Patch 3 (have not yet seen verification)

Sometimes you can see the dialogue he speaks in the on-screen subtitles but you can't see him. Sera will reply to him, but there is nobody there to talk to.

To get him to show up:
  • Only take Sera with you.
  • Choose the middle dialogue option after you arrive
  • Take out any command line arguments you have in your Dragon Age: Inquisition shortcut such as the FPS fix (see how)
One of, or a combination of the above should get the boss of the mercenaries to spawn. Click on him quickly after the fight before he de-spawns and you can have & finish the conversation, and the game should then take you back to Skyhold.

Solas' quest will not activate
Update: This was supposedly fixed in Patch 3 (have not yet seen verification) and another of his quests was fixed in Patch 6.

No matter what direction you approach the area from, the quest will sometimes not activate.
No known fix.

Quests

The Mercy amulet has to be equipped when meeting the leader of the group you're going to meet.

There has been a couple of reports of a crash to desktop (CTD) when siding with the mages in the mage/templar dispute.

Plot-breaking bug after fighting Alexius - covered in this news post but also posting in here:




Aimo has a note on a bug in the later part of the Therinfal Redoubt mission, when siding with the templars in "In Hushed Whispers". In the quest after that, many things are broken.

Achievements

The Dragon's Bane achievement (killing 10 dragons) will not fire upon the killing of the tenth. Reload any save (even on another character) and kill any other dragon again except the one in the Hinterlands and the achievement should come in.
Update: They've narrowed the problem down to definitely being the Hinterlands dragon. Continue to use the fix above until they can patch in a fix.

Other Bugs

Broken animations (stuck in fall animation)

Save/Quick Save and reload.

Can't choose a conversation option and the battle GUI remains up

Try using the potion wheel via your appropriate platform button
Try alt-tabbing out then back in

Mouse does not work when choosing your party or using war table

  1. Right click on the screen
  2. Alt-tab out then back in
  3. On consoles, "suspend" the game by going out to another app then back in
To try to keep this from happening, disable Origin in-game and Origin notifications.
Also try playing offline.

Dual core Intel systems crash / freeze before the menu or a black screen

Dragon Age: Inquisition does not support dual core machines. However, you can try these Intel drivers: https://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Desc.aspx?DwnldID=24329. They have helped quite a few people be able to play.
wolfman2k found this one!

Comments by companions or others do not reflect the imported world state

  1. It's possible that the incorrect world state was exported in the Keep prior to importing to the game. You can go into the Keep and see which one is exported for game use in the lower right corner of the screen. You can also go into your playthrough states, copy it into your editable states, then bring it into the tapestry for editing to verify the current playthrough's flags.
  2. There is currently a bug where Morrigan refers to the Warden as "her love" if she was stabbed at the mirror during Witch Hunt
  3. Morrigan's words sometimes do not reflect the relationship between her and the Warden, if the Warden did the DR, if they were friends, and also in the case where the Warden is female.
  4. Zevran has shown up in war table missions even when he is supposed to be dead
  5. Some of Varric's banter sounds like Anders is alive when he is supposed to be dead
  6. There was a bug where Leliana stated she was with the Warden during the Archdemon fight when she was supposed to have died in that playthrough - this was fixed in Patch 5.
  7. There is some confusion over Morrigan having a baby - please note Morrigan ALWAYS has a baby with a male Warden if he romances her. If he does the DR with her, it is an Old God Baby - if he does not do the DR then it is a normal child. But either way, if that Warden romanced Morrigan, she gets pregnant and has a child. Congratulations :)

PS4 issues

Update to firmware 2.02

Clicking in the Journal freezes the game

Workaround: Don't go into the Journal. You can change your active quest by clicking one on the map.
No known fix.
Update: Try updating to Patch 6. There have been multiple Journal fixes through the patch history.

Using the respec necklace freezes the game if used in Skyhold

Fixed in Patch 5 (see patch notes).

Walk/run toggle introduced in Patch 3 does not work

Take out the command line argument fix for the 30fps cut scenes (see below on how to do this). The fix breaks the walk toggle.

To take out any command line arguments you have previously added

If you added it through Origin:
  1. Right click on the Dragon Age Inquisition title
  2. Go to game properties
  3. Delete the command line parameter in the Command Line Properties box.
If you added it through the desktop shortcut:
  1. Right Click Shortcut
  2. Go to Properties
  3. Under target go to the end of the field and delete everything past DragonAgeInquisition.exe" (keep the last quote there and make sure there are no spaces after)

Tips

On the PC, you are limited to 250 saves for all characters. Save slots on PS3: 30 (after Patch 2), PS4 is 50 (after Patch 2).

At the end-of-game credits, press to skip if you don't want to see them. You do want to see post-credits cutscene.

If you miss codex entries in areas you can't get back to, they show up at a shop in Val Royeaux, and there is another vendor who shows up at Skyhold beside the shop that has tier 2 crafting recipes.

If you take the Rare Stocks Inquisition Perk, you can buy the items needed for specializations. Go to Val Royeaux and check out the merchants. Apparently their stock is slightly randomized so if you don't see what you need, reload until you do.

To get your mount(s), go to the war table and do the missions for them. They don't take any time. After that, go to the stable (in Haven it is right next to the blacksmith), right click and choose which one you want to use the next time you go out adventuring. Some mounts are better equipped to keep their rider in the saddle if attacked.

To get the rest of your pre-order items - like the weapons and armor - look for a "Special Deliveries" crate in Skyhold or Haven.

You can remove class restrictions on any armour set by crafting it with a specific "rare" material in the main slot (source):
  • silverite (found in emprise du lion) as the main metal - heavy armour
  • snouffleur leather (found in the exalted plains/emprise du lion) - medium armour
  • dales wool (emprise du lion) - light armour
How to respec

In Haven and then at Skyhold, there is a hanging rack of golden objects near the forge that you can buy and sell at. One of the things you can buy is a necklace that will respec your character. The first purchase will cost 1 gold, after that it is 345 each. There are an infinite number of them available, so you can respec as many times as you have gold available. Just equip the necklace on the character you want to respec (you can use it for the Inquisitor or for companions).

Let me know in the comments if you've seen any others, or know of any more work-arounds!


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