The Cohhilition

Does anyone know if your saves and actions transfer to DAI from DA2 or DA?

To answer your question about actions/ choices in the series they do make a difference in the story line and history. You need to make sure your games are syncing to the Bioware server.

https://dragonagekeep.com/en_US/ - this link, is like a tapestry of the series from DA, DA:2 and DA:Inquisition. It is also where you input your choices, from DA, DA:2, DA: Inquisition just in case you had issues from the game not syncing your choices during the game play.
Also the Dragon Age Keep can export the choices in the tapestry to DA: Inquisition.

Sadly the choices you can make in the keep or import to the game doesn't really affect the game in a meaningful way.
I started DA:I with like 3-4 different saves from DA 1+2 and i noticed only a few differences.

I guess the reason why I ask is because I plan on going backwards with the games. The changes DAI had initially killed my desire to play at the time. I loved DA and it's expansion while enjoying DA2 but not really gelling with the combat.

Having done my first playthrough with no imported tapestry and then my second with the imported tapestry I meant to use the first time, I can confidently say that it's worth having your decisions imported.