♛ Profile

Dec 10, 2010 18:34

IC Information;
Character Name; Marian Hawke
Canon; Dragon Age 2 (wikipedia; tvtropes)
Canon Point; Act III, right after helping Orsino in Best Served Cold.
Age; Around 35-years-old. According to Gamlen, Leandra (Hawke's mother) ran away from Kirkwall with Malcolm (Hawke's father) while pregnant about 25 years ago, meaning that Hawke was in her mid-twenties when she fled Lothering. The game takes place over the course of 10 years (where you only control Hawke for 3 of those years), and the point from which I have taken her from is right at the very end of that decade.

House; Thor. Hawke is a very combat orientated person, and while perhaps she may be straddling the line between Thor and some other houses, like Odin thanks to her habit of gathering seemingly useless knowledge throughout her quests, I believe she fits here the best. As a rogue, she gives more importance to her stealth and agility in order to be efficient in combat, which I believe cause her to fit in Thor rather nicely. If the mods believe she fits somewhere else better, however, please state so!
Power; Since I will be playing Hawke as a rogue, and rogues depend greatly on their agility in order to be effective in combat, I have decided on Speed as her type of power.

Personality;
Upon first meeting the Champion of Kirkwall, there are two standard reactions people have. The first, and most pleasant, sums up to: "Ooh, messere Hawke, ooh! Please give us your aid in our earthshaking problem of great importance!" The second, and decidedly less pleasant reaction, is more along the lines of: "Do you want to punch her in the face? I want to punch her in the face. Let's kill her!" These two trains of thought sum up the daily, every day life of Marian Hawke--to the point where, if you examine her journal on her desk inside her estate, she'll say it was a "slow day" after reading through a list of numerous but still mundane tasks.

As the oldest sibling of the Hawke family, it is Hawke's job to look after her mother and siblings. After her father's death three years prior to the begining of the game, she took it upon herself to protect and take care of everyone, and this is something she does with surprising seriousness, considering her tendency to resort to sarcasm and wit in every given situation. When the Fifth Blight struck her homeland, Hawke decided to flee Lothering with her mother and her younger siblings, Bethany and Carver Hawke. With plans to go to Kirkwall (since Leandra had come from there before she eloped with Hawke's father), they encounter Aveline and her husband, Wesley, on the way. This first meeting with Aveline and her husbands are one of the opportunities Hawke gets to show just how overprotective she is over her younger siblings. Because Wesley, as a Templar (who are mage hunters), began to badmouth Bethany because of her using magic to help him out, Hawke basically tells him to stay away from her sister regardless of what option you pick. As long as Aveline kept her husband under a leash, they would cooperate nicely against the darkspawn horde.

When Hawke first arrived at Kirkwall, fresh from the death of Carver and Aveline's husband, she had no intentions of getting caught up in the inner workings of the city. Her first and utmost priority was providing some sort of comfortable living for her family, even if it meant living with her rather unpleasant uncle Gamlen for four years after finding out he gambled away the Amell state, and then working for mercenaries for a full year in order to pay off the debt they own for getting them into Kirkwall in the first place. Hawke's family is first and foremost to her, which is why, upon learning that her uncle had given away their family's estate to slavers of all things and left the Amell grandparents's back there, Hawke decided to go and retrieve it from the estate's basement. For her mother that had been depressed for years thinking that her parents hated her until their death because of her elopement with an apostate mage, Hawke broke into a building crawling with slavers and other dangerous folks just to find one tiny sheet of paper that would unravel the truth behind her uncle's defensive attitude every time the inheritance was brought up. As it turns out, nothing was left to Gamlen's name, except a small stipend stating that he was to be controlled by Leandra. This revelation relieves their family greatly (sans Gamlen himself, for obvious reasons), and even thought Hawke had every right to kick him in the nuts and any other deserving action you may think of, she didn't. Family is still family, and even though Gamlen never says anything good about anyone, they all still care about each other. Years down the line, even, you can let him reunite with his estranged daughter, which lightens his mood considerably from what can be gathered from clicking on him after completing Gamlen's Greatest Treasure.

Because of Bethany's status as an apostate mage, Hawke is also highly overprotective of her, despite all the snarky comments she can make about how Bethany is a "sanctimonious prig". Part of the purpose of going on the Deep Roads expedition was to gain some sort of status to hide behind or some coin to keep information about Bethany's magic from leaking and getting her carted off by the Templars. The purpose of this journey is achieved, somewhat, if not for the fact that Bethany contrived the darkspawn taint and had to become a Gray Warden in order to surivive via delaying the more fatal effects. Even if Bethany hates her for this decision up until the very end of the game, Hawke would still rather have her sister alive and capable of hating her than dead and incapable of anything at all. Losing the only sibling she has left to the darkspawn would be unbearable, and Hawke would rather not go through that experience again.

One of the perhaps most frustrating details about Marian Hawke, is the fact that sarcasm and wit are her immediate responses to every given situation. The most obviously apparent reason is because, well, she enjoys having a laugh at the expense of others and even at her own. Aveline horribly mocks up her courtship of Guardsman Donnic? Nope, never letting her live it down. Isabela runs off with the Qunari Relic and then comes back after having a change of heart? Bring it up at every single blackmail opportunity. She is a teaser. Someone who enjoys pushing little buttons here and there to get a rile out of someone, and is thoroughly amused when the most "refined" of people end up losing their patience due to her. However, even if this is the case, when dealing with a close companion she usually does know there are lines that simply should not be crossed--whether or not she follows on this knowledge purely depends on her mood and how much of an asshole she feels like being at the moment. In most cases, she refrains from crossing this line as long as others refrain from crossing the line for her. It is only common courtesy, naturally, for the people she (grudgingly as she might accept it) relies on and trusts.

However, Hawke's tendency to snark at every given situation is not purely for her own enjoyment. In fact, there are many moments in the game where you're given the opportunity to say otherwise lighthearted retorts at the worst of moments, or at least try to. When the Viscount's son is murdered and he's cradling the corpse, obviously in despair, instead of offering comfort Hawke tries to make light of the situation. She tells the Viscount that it can't get worst today, and only because it's pretty late already. If Aveline is in your party, she calls you out on this when you exit the Chantry, and Hawke just replies that it "may as well end as tense as it started." It's not that Hawke is trying to purposely be an ass in this situation, it's just that she doesn't know how not to be an ass in these kind of situations without getting all sorts of depressed herself. Unfortunately, it also extends to situations that are much more personal than seeing an acquaintance mourning their son's death.

When Hawke's mother is horribly butchered and sewn up together by a blood mage to recreate his dead wife, Hawke doesn't cry when holding her dying body. Even though she had been terrified when following the blood trail that lead her to Leandra's location (regardless of what personality stack you have Hawke set on), she just puts on a brave act when faced with her mother dying right in front of her, making some unenthusiastic comment about how she's here to save the day again like always. She does the same when her younger brother dies six years prior to this, staying strong even while her mother tells her it's all her fault, and then quipping that at least her father won't be lonely anymore. Hawke only allows herself to mourn in private, and this may be a factor as to why, three years after her mother's death, she still can't even bring herself to go into her room and touch anything.

As a rogue, Hawke's greatest asset is her agility. Sneaking around and surprising enemies is her forte, and it shows. She is a master at flanking her enemies in combat and has nothing against playing cheap tricks and literally backstabbing others. In fact, several of her abilities give her bonuses for doing such things. As a rogue, Hawke is also given several in game choices that allow her to be a showoff. Someone threatens to kill a hostage if she takes one more step closer? Oh, well. Good thing she's close enough already. With a quick flick of the wrist, all she has to do is throw a knife in the poor sod of a kidnapper's direction and he's dead. The hostage in this situation even calls her out on it, but Hawke simply shrugs and snarks her way through the situation.

Naturally, being who she is, Hawke can also be a bit...ridiculous and over the top, as well as an absolutely terrible liar on some occasions.

Now, as previously mentioned, Hawke had no intention of becoming involved with the inner workings of Kirkwall--it was just that everything around her seemed so determined to make it so. Even when she first arrived, she ended up saving a group of guards that were being attacked by a pack of aggressive refuges trying to force their way into the city. The number of times she inadvertently stumbles upon some event of earthshaking importance is so big, that Cassandra doesn't believe Varric at first when he tells her that every single event that led to Hawke's rise to the title of Champion was only one big contrived coincidence. Even Hawke herself participates in making some wry comments about her own luck with these things, stating that she would like to go just one week without meeting some crazy mage, and pondering on how she'd to "visit a place with no ancient evils, horrors, devouring plagues, or insanity" and conclude that the perfect place to go is a beach. If Varric is in your party during this particular comment, he'll snark right back at you, saying that the day Hawke goes to a beach is the day an armada of angry demon pirates shows up.

Her own family history gets in on the action, too. During Legacy, after Hawke discovers that her deceased father is responsible for locking up an ancient evil inside a Gray Warden prison, she shakes her head and bemoans the fact that her family anecdotes can never involve embarrassing vacations in Antiva. It just seems physically impossible for Hawke to go one day without bumping into some horrible conspiracy involving Templars, mages or ancient evils of the soul devouring mwahahaha kind.

As far as the Mage vs. Templar conflict goes, as the sister and daughter of apostates, Hawke is very sympathetic to the plight of mages. However, at the same time she can see where the Templars are coming from, despite believing they are horrendously wrong in the way they go on about it the further the story progresses. She attempts to remain a neutral party in the whole situation, seeing both the pros and cons of each side and only supporting one or the other when their actions aren't completely crossing the line between what's acceptable and what is just completely batshit insane. It is not rare to see the Champion of Kirkwall help apostate mages (who are, of course, under no threat of becoming abominations or hurting themselves) escape the Circle, just like it isn't rare to see her handing in mages who pose a threat to themselves and others to the Templars. She does not wholly agree with either factions, but she does not wholly disagree with them neither of them. There are good mages just as there are bad Templars, and the inverse is also true. She gives both sides the occasional proverbial pat on the back once in a while, at one point allowing a Templar who had been used for experiments to rejoin, and later on allowing a mage who had never been in the outside world the opportunity to lose his virginity before ushering him back to the Circle.

Following this, Hawke is also a surprising charitable person. When faced with people who are in obvious need, she can usually loosen up her coin purse enough to spare one or two sovereigns for them. During one of Fenris's companions quests, A Bitter Pill, you also encounter an elven slave, named Orana, who just watched her father get murdered and was now lost and wondering around an abandoned slaver's den. You get the option to tell her to go to Kirkwall where you'll pay her to work for you and give her lodging, and Hawke does so, knowing that any other action would just end up with her getting mugged on the streets due to pure naivety.

All in all, Hawke is a good person--really. It just so happens to be that she's also a highly infuriating person who enjoys getting a rise out of others. Whether or not she desired it, she ended up being the catalyst for an impending war between the mages and Templars and, well, she's certainly not going to be the type to sit around twiddling her thumbs and saying oh noooo. She will get things done, and she will get them done right.

(important)

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