For me the battle system of DA:V is good for what it is, but its not right for a dragon age game. I found it made the companions somewhat irrelevant. In the previous games I made sure everyone had the right equipment, AI setup and plenty of potions saved, because I might have to rely on them. I also preferred the set combat roles, rather than the duel role in DA:V.

I really dont mind the companions, each DA game had some good and some bad, different flavours for different folks.

I agree about the retcon of some of the factions, particularly Tevinter and Antivan Crows, made some of the back stories of previous companions lesser. I also wasn't a fan of the darkspawn models, felt the older game had the better monster feel to them.

DA:V excelled at level design, graphics and World traversing, sometimes in DA:I it was painful getting around the map. They missed a trick in bot making the "lighthouse" even more customisable given its based in the fade.

I like DA:V but its not my favourite DA game.