One of the four recruitment objectives that make up the seventh main quest of the Dragon Age: Origins video-game. The story follows the player and company after arriving at the underground fortress of Orzammar in order to recruit the dwarves into the new Ferelden army. However, it won't be so easy to recruit the dwarves due to the recent loss of Orzammar's king, which has resulted in infighting between two dwarven factions for control over the throne.
Frostback Mountain Pass
When it's decided to go out and recruit the dwarves, the player and their companions head off towards Orzammar, the dwarven underground kingdom within the Frostback Mountains. The player's group arrives at the Frostback Mountain Pass, which is a mountain passage that leads up to the gates of Orzammar in the northwest corner of Ferelden. Traveling along the pass, the player and company fight through a group of bounty hunters that were after the Grey Warden's head. Further along the passage, merchants are shown to have set up shop for travelers that are heading in Orzammar's direction. Eventually, the player's group arrives at the mountainside gate into Orzammar. However, it turns out that Orzammar is under lockdown for the time being, which the dwarves guarding the entrance refuse to let anyone through.
Entering Orzammar
As the player and company approach Orzammar's gate, they witness a group of three human soldiers led by a messenger loyal to Loghain named Imrek trying to convince one of the dwarf guards to grant him entry into the dwarf kingdom. Imrek explains how he's on a mission to form an alliance between King Loghain and the dwarves. However, the dwarf soldier makes it clear that no one's allowed in until their problem concerning Orzammar's empty throne is settled. When the player approaches the guard stating that they have need to speak to the king, the guard explains the current problem of how king Endrin Aeducan had passed away a few weeks ago as his heart couldn't take the loss of two of his sons. The eldest son, Prince Trian, was killed, and the the middle son, who was the Dwarf Noble Origin player, got exiled and sent off to die in the Deep Roads due to the youngest son, Prince Bhelen, framing him for killing Trian. The guard further explains that Orzammar is currently on the verge of civil war as the Assembly, the dwarves' central legislative political body, has been unable to decide on a successor to the throne.
The player informs the Orzammar gate guard of how they're a Grey Warden, and shows the recruitment treaty regarding the need for their dwarven allies to face the upcoming Blight. The dwarf guard agrees to look the treaty over only for Imrek to start complaining that the Grey Wardens killed King Cailan and doomed Ferelden. Thus, making them sworn enemies to King Loghain. Despite Imrek's complaint, the dwarf guard confirms that the Grey Wardens' treaty has the royal seal of Orzammar on it, which means that only their Assembly can look through it. As a result, the guard allows the player's group to enter Orzammar in order for them to meet with the Assembly regarding the treaty. However, Imrek refuses to allow this to happen, and orders for the dwarves to execute the player and company for the sake of King Loghain and Ferelden. Since Imrek won't listen to reason, a choice is then made to either intimidate Loghain's messenger into leaving, or a fight breaks out that results in the death of Imrek and his two bodyguards. After Imrek's removed, the guard appreciates the messenger being gone as he was hounding them to enter Orzammar for the past week. The dwarf guards then open Orzammar's mountainside entrance gate for the player and company to enter.
Orzammar
With the death of their king Endrin Aeducan, the dwarves of the city of Orzammar are in disarray as bitter infighting over who next takes the throne rages, while criminal elements in the city are taking advantage of the chaos to enrich themselves. The Warden finds themselves forced to side with one of the two candidates for the dwarven throne; either Lord Pyral Harrowmont, the late King's chief advisor, said to be a good man but one devoted to the conservative traditions of the dwarves, or Prince Bhelen Aeducan, King Endrin's last surviving son, who favours change and wants to advance Orzammar's society, but is regarded with suspicion due to rumors he arranged the assassination and disgrace of his elder siblings to advance up the line of succession.
After helping their chosen candidate amass political and popular support while restoring law and order to Orzammar, the Warden is asked to complete one final task to swing the balance completely in their candidate's favour: with the dwarven Assembly deadlocked, the only one who can sway the debate is a woman called Branka. A Paragon of the Dwarves, recognised for her genius and abilities so highly she is the closest thing the dwarves have to a living god, if Branka were to return and give her backing to one candidate or the other, the dwarves would be obliged to accept her choice. Unfortunately, Branka is gone from the city; two years earlier, she departed into the Deep Roads, a network of continent-spanning underground tunnels that once allowed the dwarves to traverse the length and breadth of Thedas, now long since abandoned and overrun with darkspawn, in search of some ancient dwarven artefact, and while most in Orzammar assume she's long dead, the stakes are now too high to simply take that as fact. The Warden, accompanied by Branka's ex-husband, the dwarven warrior Oghren, must journey through miles of hostile territory to find Branka and convince her to return and give her blessing to allow the dwarves a new king.
