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As some of you may be aware, there was an exclusive level created by BioWare for PC Gamer magazine called A Tale of Orzammar. I bought the magazine thinking that the level would integrate with the main game and would be fun. No such luck. It is actually a separate campaign, which requires you to make a whole new character that is then immediately upleveled to level 5 or 6. You get one companion and then have to troll around in the Deep Road looking for some trinket. I was curious if anyone has played this mod and, if so, if they know where this trinket might actually be.

In my opinion, the whole thing is shocking lame for something being promoted by a major gaming magazine. The first problem was that they goofed the install, which then requires you to do some arcane things to get the game to play. Fortunately I had a 3rd party installer for DA:O mods which worked like a charm.

You go into this "adventure" with no real supplies and some drunk dwarf you meet at a bar as your companion. There is no voice acting and your companion is mute except to exhort you to kill things and drink their blood. The chests and enemies drop disappointing items (like ones you already have) or potion components that are useless. Enemies are scattered in a random fashion and fighting a difficult opponent like a Stone Golem nets you nothing better than fighting a normal enemy. The layout feels similarly haphard with no real sense of integration, progression, or anticipation.

I should have known something was up when the dwarf noble that hired me told me that the trinket was protected by a puzzle, but I could ignore that since I was hired on as "brawn." Huh?

To be honest, the alpha version of the Enigma Battle Arena was more fun than this "exclusive level." Be warned, however, that the author acknowledges the mod is not completely polished. If you are a power gamer, you will love this campaign because you can uplevel your experience by 10,000 points, respec your characters, and get a lot of high end gear at the end for not a lot of effort. You also get the option of adding two new companions to your line up, one of which is Ser Cautherine's sister. Be aware that the Arena is in two parts - once you finish the first part you then need to move to the second arena to meet the ultimate boss. The mod is here: Enigma Battle Arena

I thought I should post a warning that the Enigma Battle Arena majorly messes up your ending sequence if you decide to take one of the two additional "companions" that they offer. The game attempts to rotate the new companion in apparently, which plays havoc with the choices of team members you make. I did eventually work this out but I wouldn't want anyone else to go through that. So I wouldn't recommend selecting to add the new companions - just go in with your own team.

The additional gear you get does not seem to cause any problems but I have no idea what impact it will have on the expansion pack. I did uninstall the mod to see what would happen, and the game allowed me to force install the saved game. All the Enigma gear was gone after this, of course.

I had considered picking this mod up, but after seeing your post I thought it might be something better to avoid, cheers for that.
So I grabbed Warden's Keep instead, relatively short, but fun and well done in my view.

The problem with mods for this game is that there aren't really any good content mods. I suspect this may be because of the voice acting requirement and the 3D engine. Or maybe it's just because the game hasn't actually been out that long, and decent mods are still in the WIP stage.. let's hope!

Glad to be of service.

The other thing about the Enigma mod is that the author has clearly communicated that it was a learning experience for him and he is not going to do any bug fixes or updates on it. So it is pretty much take as is. If you are going to do it, I would certainly create a save game before you install the mod.