I have to admit that my first impressions of Neve weren’t great. In fact, I kind of hated her.

The former Tevinter mage turned private detective came across as dry and critical. I wasn’t a fan of his tone or his cheesy outfit, and I was afraid I’d have to spend the next 50 hours in the company of this huge buzzkill.

“OK, fine,” I thought. “One companion downstairs, let’s see how I fare with the other six.” Turns out I didn’t like most of them either.

Bellara, the archeology-obsessed tinkerer, was annoying at first, the complete opposite of Neve in her exuberant but equally aggravating bubbliness, and burly dragon slayer Taash seemed too stubborn to hold a conversation.

At this point, I’m running out of companions I actually want to know. For hours, I was automatically selecting Davrin because he has a cool Gryphon, and Lucanis because he’s a master assassin who reminds me of Ezio. But picking the same audience over and over again is a reductive way to play Dragon Age.

Learn more: Every Dragon Age: The Veilguard companion, ranked from worst to best

For starters, these two characters’ skills don’t match. Lucanis applies a status effect that Davrin cannot explode. Best practice is to ride with a duo that interacts with the same effect. For example, applying the effect with one character and then detonating it with another will deal huge damage. Codependency is embedded in every aspect of Dragon Age: The Veilkeeper.

You cannot win alone. Blindly selecting your favorites prevents you from building relationships with others. So, I decided to do Taash’s companion questline, and that’s when I realized how wrong I was to hold back the fire.

It involves venturing to exotic locations and slaying vicious dragons, which in itself is automatically a winning concept. Along the way, however, Taash reveals more of his multi-layered personality. They struggle with their identity, their heritage, and their place in the world, and the broken relationship with their narrow-minded mother doesn’t help.

This explains Taash’s severity towards you at first. They don’t trust you, and for good reason. They are not rude, that’s how they learned to protect themselves from strangers. When you get to know them, they open up, even going so far as to ask for advice on their non-binary journey.

After that, I decide to pause companion quests for the people I like and tackle the ones I don’t like. Dwarven scout Harding first appears as a wet blanket, but his personal history hints at much beneath the surface.

You support her as she discovers something called The Eternal Hymn – the power to move stones using her mind. When she receives a message from a mysterious faction of dwarves, you accompany her to the magnificent underground stronghold of Kal-Sharok. It’s a revelation. That’s what was on his mind as you traveled the country.

In its depths, the climatic boss fight sees her face off against a version of herself, which is a much more impactful moment than pitting you against a random nameless ghoul or demon.

Learn more: Dragon Age: Tips and Tricks for Beginners The Veilguard

Outside of companion quests, I like to get a glimpse of my party’s personality through their interactions with each other. Each of them seemingly has countless unique lines of dialogue that they’ll use when you travel with them, depending on where you are in the world and how far you’ve progressed through the story.

Harding and Taash have a special repartee where the former offers to ride on the latter’s shoulders into combat. Taash questions the idea at first, then slowly comes back to it.

Bellara and Davrin, meanwhile, share stories from their pasts, with the more sheltered Bellara demanding to know how Davrin lived a life of liberation in the wild.

If you really want to know someone, observe how they behave around others. My favorite moments are the trivial ones, like Taash asking Emmrich what he had for breakfast (“toast with jam”) or Harding asking Lucanis if he gets angry with someone for the way he behaved in a dream.

Even if you wander aimlessly through Treviso or Arlathan Forest, you’ll regularly hear dialogue that paints a more complete picture of your party.

Learn more: Dragon Age: The Veilguard FAQ – Everything You Need to Know

My first impressions were wrong about literally every character in Dragon Age: The Veilguard. People I thought were rude turned out to be rightly guarded. Those I thought were involved were interested in the experiences of others.

After an awkward introductory period, the characters grew on me and all revealed their complex and unique personalities. It is a mistake to write them off.

That said, I still think Neve’s outfit is tacky.