Used to be, if you skipped the DLC for a Dragon Age game you'd miss at least one important part of the story. The Awakening expansion for Dragon Age: Origins introduced Anders, who returned in Dragon Age 2 as a central character. Dragon Age 2's add-on Legacy introduced Corypheus, who returned as the main villain of Dragon Age: Inquisition. And heaven help you if you play Dragon Age: The Veilguard without first playing Inquisition's plot-critical expansion, Trespasser.
You don't have to worry about missing the one essential DLC for Dragon Age: The Veilguard, however, because apparently there won't be any. According to Rolling Stone, who interviewed creative director John Epler, "there are currently no plans for downloadable expansions" and the studio's "full attention has now shifted entirely to the next Mass Effect".
BioWare's last RPG, Mass Effect Andromeda, didn't get any DLC either. But in that case it sure seemed set up for some—presumably resolving whatever happened to the missing quarian Ark, for starters—and it was only after Andromeda's lackluster reception that plans changed. In this case, it seems like The Veilguard was intended to be a complete experience from the get-go, and that's probably for the best.
In the interview, Epler says that The Veilguard's design was definitely influenced by the mixed reception received by BioWare's two prior games, Anthem and Andromeda. "I do think Andromeda was a better game than its reception suggested," he said, "but on the flip side, I don't think the reception was unfair. At the time of launch, there were technical issues and things that didn’t work."
Compared to Dragon Age: Inquisition's open zones, The Veilguard has a much tighter narrative focus. That was apparently a direct response to how Andromeda's planetary exploration was received. "We had been doing Dragon Age pre-production on versions of Dragon Age 4," Epler said, "and we did have a version that was a lot more open-world. But again, we ran into the same problem of how do you make it compelling or narratively interesting? The reception to Andromeda definitely solidified that."
