Ruin Explorer
Legend
Worth noting this lore seems to have been played down in literally every DA post DAO, and possibly actually decanonized in Veilguard, presumably because it was very misogynistic (Gaider made some defensive comment about the two women on the writing team when he came up with it thinking it was cool, as if women can't be part of misogyny). Veilguard presents a more direct individual corruption, which is actually more interesting in the context of your post - the old approach "broke the link" because humans could only become ghouls - not darkspawn - darkspawn were born not made. But in Veilguard (and possibly this also happened at least in bit in DA2 and DAI), people can directly become darkspawn from infection/taint, and not just ghouls, but the more frightening forms.
I think this actually ties in a lot better with the "chipping away at your humanity" angle.
I would respectfully disagree for what I think are the same reasons you like them - because I think the complete lack of limitations in what they can subsume and complete hivemind and so on make them feel cheap and almost overpowered, and not like something that's been carefully considered. To me that makes them a kind of lazy implementation of the trope - not interesting. I may be biased because I find nanites in a fantasy setting to be a fairly annoying trope though! Just call magic magic! Don't bring nanites into it!
