#i bought the game for halsin i will die for halsin actually

[pinacoladamatata]

me reading through larian's community update #20 seeing all the things i wanted like

[missygoesmeow]

missy's tips for honour mode :) (it's very long I'm sorry) (oh and here be many spoilers) (but pictures too!)

please note I am not a pro gamer or anything. I sucked so bad when I first started this game (I had no idea wtf I was doing). Like seriously. I didn't know what an action was. what a bonus action was. "No movement left". WHAT DO YOU MEAN NO MOVEMENT LEFT. I had played DnD once before.

I literally bought this game because of Astarion.

I usually play one game and that is Overwatch. the only other time I stopped playing OW was to play Resident Evil: Village because of Lady D. vampire marketing works on me. specifically evil vampire. damn u Neil and Maggie.

if you have any questions about a specific boss or something feel free to ask! I didn't fight everyone though - like I did not do House of Grief because I didn't need to and also it's hard :)

I think a lot of it just came on down to...

ANYWAY. letsa go! this is very rambling!

Like I said in my reply to anon, the best tip is to do tactician FIRST. You’ll get destroyed otherwise. I didn’t finish my tactician run but I did get to act 3 and I did most boss fights (Gortash, Raphael, Cazador). Bosses have legendary actions in tactician and it’s fucking annoying. All the homies hate radiant retort….

Another tip is fucking collect everything. It’s hard to get gold and certain potion ingredients later on. Potion of Speed (you need hyena ears for this) is the BEST. I used them for my Ketheric fight (second phase) and killed him in three turns. I also used them for the final fight and used one or two with Raphael and Orin.

Smokepowder Barrels. I think people call this Barrelmancy? I didn't use them much. I hoarded them for one reason and one reason only.

To blow Raphael.

His soul pillar towers that is. To blow up his pillars. His big long pillars.

Okay I'm done.

(also I did use three in my last fight against the brain - popped them next to it and blew 'em up) Elixir of Bloodlust - sooooo handy with Astarion!

Invisibility Potion is a must - I used this to escape fights when three people were deaded (this happened a few times😅) and get my good friend Withers to bring them back.

bonus tip: don't go into a fight with half your spell slots because you think "she'll be right". she won't be...as seen above

HOLY FUCK WITHERS. You can pickpocket Withers. I used Astarion to get our money back anytime I resurrected, changed class or got a hireling - he doesn’t care if you fail either, just keep trying.

DON'T BE DUMB LIKE MISSY Don't be like me, don't half pay attention in cut scenes and accidentally press the wrong dialogue option. Or else your good friend Lae'zel will turn on you and you will have A Bad Time.

Gale has a stressful day💗

The githyanki are scary and actually now that I think about it, those were usually the fights I had to run away from like a leetle biatch.

Halsin has a stressful day 💗

I forgot that Psionic Backlash is like a thing that does damage and that if your entire worm filled party does it and the person you are casting is at like...say 19 health...they will die because that is not Passive Damage.

And then Jaheira will leave because you murdered her friend.

Oopsie.

(I lost Shart, Lae'Zel and Jaheira in this run) GENERAL STUFF

Always surprise the enemy if you can, it’s a massive advantage!

Get the eye from Volo. This run was not about looking pretty, it was about getting any advantage I could get. Let that man poke out your eyeball. And make sure it’s your Tav, you will mostly likely swap companions and it’s just better if it’s you. It's helpful in a lot of fights but especially Auntie Ethel

Become half illithid. I did this with my Tav, Gale and Minthara. Astarion was a little bitch about it so I didn’t give it to him but I wish I had made him do it.

She looks Not Great but she can fly (sorry Astarion but Z'hera only likes pussy)

Being able to fly is just SO helpful and cull the weak is OP! Also mmmmm worms :)

MY BUILD/PARTY

A Giant Woman (my tiefling) as a Paladin - Oath of Vengeance.

I broke my oath when I ascended Astarion but you can just get it back. Oathbreaker is still good (that’s what I was in my tactician run) but I wanted my channel divinity charges. I started with the Everburn Blade from the cambion Commander Zhalk on the Nautaloid (when you get Shart, give her the Command Spell and use “Drop” so you can just yoink it off him and save a fight). My final weapon was the Nyrulna which you can get in Act 3 at the Circus. To get this you must pickpocket the genie to take his ring and then play his game. He will accuse you of cheating and send you somewher. The prize at the end is this weapon. I love it. I just went invisible and walked through, I didn’t fight the creatures there.

Astarion - the classic gloomstalker/assasin. I had one level assasin and then did 6 levels ranger before going back to assassin. So he was 6 levels in each. With him ascended, he does INSANE damage. I never swap out that vamp, he’s too useful.

Shart/Minthara - I lost Shart in the Shadowfell - wouldn't let her murder Dame Aylin.

a simpler time. before I killed my beloved and my brain was full of worms.

I had to fight her (it was very sad). I changed her class to Life of Domain Cleric. I then made Minthara my cleric when Shart died (same build). She replaced my lover and my cleric <3

i love my new evil girlfriend

Gale - Evocation Wizard so I didn’t change him at all!

he's so hopeful. and Z'hera is very gay.

TIPS FOR POTIONS

If it’s throwable (like invisibility) group the gang together to throw one on the ground to get you all - saves using multiple.

Potion of Speed has an effect called lethargic that is active for one round after the potion ends. This means you miss a turn. HOWEVER! If you drink another one on the last active round of the potion, your Tav will become lethargic immediately and next round you’ll be fine :) I did this for the Ketheric fight.

It’s also helpful (because of lethargic) to not have all characters take the potion in the same round (if you give it to everyone). I never did, I usually gave them to Gale and my Tav.

I hoarded so many scrolls. I had so many dimension door scrolls at the end.

I did get the Necromancy of Thay and did all the things. And then I never used it :)

BIGGEST TIP ONCE YOU'VE UNLOCKING LEVEL 6 SPELL SLOT WITH CLERIC (ALSO AVAILABLE WITH DRUID)

I saw this on reddit! Pretty much what I did was get a hireling - Cleric - and have that Cleric cast Heroes' Feast on my party.

The affected entity is immune to Diseases, Poisons, and being Frightened, it makes all Wisdom Saving throws with Advantage, and its maximum Hit Points are increased by 12

Lasts until long rest!! I also then cast Freedom of Movement on everyone in the party. I then cast Warding Bond on someone - usually Gale because he's a squishy boy :) If I knew it was a BIG FIGHT! I got another Cleric to cast Warding Bond on another party member.

you can see Heroes' Feast (the condition is called Thoroughly Stuffed) and Freedom of Movement. These all last until long rest!

Pretty much any other companions were respeced as Cleric (though I made Jaheira a Wizard same as Gale so I could use her). I did this so that I could use Divine Intervention multiple times within the game!

I used Opulent Revival and nothing else

KEEP IN MIND.

anything can kill you in honour mode. even an elevator.

it crushed me. somehow.

thanks Larian

(if you want proper guides definitely go to Reddit!)

[infimace-blog]

Okay I have to say it. I have to say it because it passes my mind every single time I see anything remotely related to Baldur's Gate 3.

So there's the first quest, right? There's an idyllic druid glen and you have to rescue the head druid Halsin because the vice head druid is racist against tieflings. And he got captured by goblins so you go to the goblin camp in the ancient ruins, where the goblins are all completely and utterly unsympathetic. And that's racial essentialist horsefeathers but it's a DnD game and you can't rely on Wizards to actually commit to being less racist rather than just saying they will. We knew what we were getting into when we bought the game.

And then you find the head druid and he's stuck in bear form and getting tormented by three kids and their babysitter, and to free him you have to murder every single goblin in the room?? Including the children??? Who are not combatants?????? You can go out of your way to not kill the children, which makes the fight harder because they inevitably call more goblins who can actually fight, but then the noble and progressive head druid you came to save will just murder the children himself.

I'm not trying to turn this into 'every person who's fantasized about a Shadowheart/Astarion three-way thinks goblin children deserve to die'. Disco Elysium is one of my favorite games and I love talking about Tequila Sunset and Kim, the World's Most Perfect Man, but also Measurehead exists and I hate him and everything about his writing. But also I bring up Measurehead more than I normally would when I talk about Disco Elysium because the weird way his race is handled in the game compels me, and no one does that with the goblin children murder? It's not an obscure part that no one sees. Rescuing Halsim is one of the easier routes in the first major story quest, he can become a recruitable companion, and the first I heard about the game was 'hey, there's a druid companion and you can bang them while they're turned into a bear'. The game pointedly glosses over the fact that you murdered three children for the crime of being jerks to an animal, and I guess that means the playerbase did too? Even I had to do a double-take because I initially assumed that I screwed up the encounter and that the correct way would have let the goblin children live (and probably give me an easier fight to boot). But no, unless you're handling the quest in some really unintuitive way (maybe you can knock them out?????), you gotta kill the kids to get the bear sex.

I guess some players just agree that there's nothing wrong with killing children as long as they're goblins and categorically evil. But I feel like the overlap between that kind of DnD player and the kind I occasionally see posting shipping art of BG3 isn't that large. Hopefully.

And it bugs the hell out of me because the biggest game of the year, based on one of the most popular TRPGs of all time, just goes 'yeah, we're going to put child murder in one of the good routes to complete this quest, but it's fine because they're the wrong race and they're kind of dicks' and it's not news. Wizards has spent years trying to do a soft rollback on all the racial essentialism in its worldbuilding, up to and including retroactively making a type of good drow so they can get off the hook about making an entire race of dark-skinned fantasy creatures evil. Sure, Wizards cares about fixing the obsession DnD has about race performatively half the time, but it does try. And now Wizards knows that it doesn't even need to care performatively anymore. If the product's good enough and the racism is subtle enough, it just goes forgotten.

I don't even, like. Need this to be universally condemned by the fanbase. But at least talked about more? I'd have preferred it if I knew about the goblin children murder *before* I bought the game and played enough of it that Steam won't refund me.

[bg3-brainwormed]

more details on "Tav" please

Anon, I don't know who you are, but you have MADE MY DAY.

First off, you may already know this, but for those who don't - My Tav is from my fic "How to Save the World (one companion at a time)" on ao3.

This does, unfortunately, mean that some things shouldn't be revealed just yet. Which has me gnawing on the bars of my enclosure but alas, such is life. But! There is plenty of non-plot relevant information that I can share, only some of which has been revealed in the fic thus far. (As of chapter 8.)

The Basics

Pre-Nautiloid, "Tav" was also known as The Dark Urge, chosen of Bhaal. Yes, my Tav is just a Durge in disguise.

Tav, short for Tavern, short for Tavernus. ...It's a long story. (See white text/first paragraph in "History" and white text/last paragraph in "Present Day" for details.)

Lawful Evil pre-Nautiloid, Chaotic Neutral after

Chosen of Bhaal -> Chosen of Jergal -> Currently ???

Wild Magic Sorcerer

...has always had an interest in music (eventual Bard dual-class)

He/They, transmasc build 3

Not a dragonborn, not a drow, but a secret third thing. They are more drow than anything else, though. (see: Appearance)

Demi-aroace, eventual QPR with the companions. Loves all their companions equally.

However, did have a situationship with Halsin in another life and used to be closest to Gale (see: fic context/present day).

Past Durgetash (future ??? due to ~spoilers~)

Uncanny valley but cute about it. More creature than "human" in actions and somewhat in appearance. Has vocal mimicry skills. Can change sex and minor physical characteristics at will.

Still a cannibal

Hates the majority of the gods and general divinity. Jergal is one of the few who gets a pass.

Honorable mentions include Eilistraee and Loviatar.

Trust, Self-worth, and Abandonment issues. Tries to do the right thing, but their version of the right thing can be... interesting. Also quick to give up on doing the "right thing," especially when someone they care about is in danger.

And most importantly: Ride or die personified

I haven’t been able to find the right mods to make their appearance accurate in-game, but scroll to the end for a wip sketch of what they actually look like.

Now, a read-more. Because oh, is there more.

History/Pre-Nautiloid

They only ever went by "The Dark Urge" before meeting Gortash. Their Unholy Father forbid them from using any other name. It was Gortash who suggested their other names:

Durge (pet name/teasing)

Dark (The Dark Urge, just... without The Urge. Only Gortash was allowed to call them this, though Orin, Ketheric, and Sceleritas all learned it in time. Their 'truest' name.)

Tav (an alias for the outside world)

Keeping in mind that they age like a drow -

Their very early childhood is a blur, spent wandering the planes, fae wild, and Underdak as more creature than thinking being. Eventually, they were found and captured by a group of drow at age 13. They were brought back to Menzoberranzan to serve the group's House.

They were treated less like a person and more like a pet/weapon due to their... abnormalities (see Appearance) and the way they grew up. Was taught language, the lyre, and various fighting styles as part of their role as entertainment. Learned magic on their own. Their only saving grace was having a "female" body and thus some measure of worth. They also hated every moment of it. Hated being the Matron's "tamed beast," hated having to stick to one form/being seen as female, hated the whole society.

When they turned 24, Sceleritas appeared to them the first time and began telling them of Bhaal, promising them freedom and bloody vengeance, etc. The ability to do whatever they wanted whenever they wanted forever.

They resisted only because they had several friends among the fellow servants, but they eventually disappeared one by one. Some were sacrificed, some killed or sold, others bought into the society and religion that Tav hated.

Eventually, the person they were closest to betrayed their trust and revealed to the Matron that they were learning magic in secret. The Matron planned to have their magic sealed and threatened with further punishments, etc.

At the betrayal of one of the few they had left, they snapped and slaughtered the whole House. They have no memory of that night and don't know what happened to their former friend, but don't regret it.

Sceleritas then guided them to Baldur's Gate, where they took up their role as Chosen of Bhaal and began leading the cult age 30. They also learned how to shift sexes and minor characteristics (hair color, etc.) at will, though that was the extent of their ability. Have since spent ??? years loyally following Bhaal and growing the cult.

They tended to give into the Urge very easily but was also very loyal to their people. This led them to gain better control over The Urge, as they had to learn how to direct it away from "their people," much to Bhaal's ire. However, it also put them at odds with Orin after Sarevok began influencing her, as she would just as easily sacrifice a cultist as a stranger.

They also had a soft spot for animals and was often punished for sparing them, feeding the stray cats, etc. Was always a bit sad when The Urge took over and killed them, but followed their Father unquestioningly nonetheless.

Joined forces with Gortash and eventually Ketheric to enact the Absolute Plan. Their own motivations? Their relationship with Gortash? Etc.? To be revealed later, I'm afraid.

They did, however, have fun breaking into Mephistopheles' palace. Absolutely vandalized the fuck out of it on the way out, unknowingly gaining Raphael's regard. They also have plans to kick a certain gnome into either Cania or Menzoberranzan.

And then Orin happened.

Fic Context/Present Day

The first time around after waking up on the nautiloid, everything went to shit. All of their companions (except Halsin, Jaheira, and Minthara) got 'bad endings.' They had been closest to Gale due to their shared curiosity and distrust of the gods, but had not romanced anyone. Had, however, shared a night or two with Halsin, and were in a situationship with him.

The loss that hurts them the most are Gale and Karlach, partially because he thought he could save both of them.

With Karlach, he had thought they had more time, had tried to convince her they could go to Avernus together. In the end, she died too soon for either option.

With Gale, they had grown concerned about the Crown after watching everyone else become corrupted or die and begged Gale to leave it be. He agreed... only to go around behind their back and fix the Crown for himself, disappearing one day without a word. Tara was the one who broke the news to them and thereby pushed them off the edge into a downward spiral.

Before Everything Went to Shit, they also got rather close to "Withers," becoming his Chosen after rejecting Bhaal and taking on a role similar to Arabella's with him. At the 6-month reunion, Withers finds them near the river, mourning the version of their friends they once knew. He gives them the chance for a second try, but only at a "cost."

Tav doesn't know what the cost is, partially because Withers - of course - didn't explain shit, and partially because they're an amnesiac twice over now.

They woke up on the nautiloid with no memories of either past. Additionally, Withers made some... modifications... when he sent them back. On the bright side, they still have access to some of their powers and subconscious manipulation of the tadpole. On the downside, ???

All they have are half-forgotten instincts and faded memories to guide them. They don't know their own name, who they are, or what happened to them, but they do know that these strangers they keep meeting, these broken companions they've gathered? They're worth everything, and they'll do anything - become anything - to protect them. They have also adopted Us and will beat the ass of anyone who even thinks about hurting their creepy little Friend.

I'm sure none of this will have any consequences whatsoever.

Meanwhile, regarding names -

Of the memories Withers yoinked, he also took Tav's names - besides The Dark Urge, that is. However, they have an instinctive hatred of that name - especially after it tried to convince them to kill Gale and Astarion - so they decided to drive me mad by going nameless for the first 8 chapters. Astarion has been internally calling them "Horns" (see: Appearance).

Eventually, the companions came together to try and help them pick a name. One of the ones Gale offered was "Tav." Shadowheart jokingly asked if it was short for "Tavern," and Astarion, who is half-convinced Tav is a demon and just doesn't remember it, replied that "Tavernus" was more likely. Lae'zel approved of a powerful name inspired by the hells, and the group devolved into teasing and debating about it.

Tav found the situation so funny that they decided to keep all three names as a reminder of their companions and new purpose.

Appearance

Unlike the Default Durge we all know and love, Tav is not Dragonborn. ...Not entirely, at least.

I am of the firm belief that nothing created from the flesh of the murdergod will be a plain or straightforward anything. Bhaal has too many doppelgangers and Slayer-shifters and just straight up shapeshifters in his bloodline for me to believe Durge would JUST be a dragonborn, etc.

For this Urge, that manifested a couple ways. First, as mentioned previously, they can change genders and minor things like hair color at will. However, unlike Orin who can shapeshift into anything, they were "born" puzzle-pieced together and permanently stuck that way.

Tav is a dragon/tiefling/drow chimaera, created by Bhaal getting a little too over-eager in unmodded character creation. Their base is a drow, but they also have dragon horns and scale patches from default durge. Their tail is scaled and overall shaped like a dragonborns, but also tipped like a tiefling's. Their eyes are tiefling's and they have natural fire resistance.

Along with these come claws and fangs/sharpened teeth, though both can be changed to "regular" form at will. Tav doesn't actually know this one yet and has only subconsciously activated them once.

Since I haven't been able to find mods that can give them horns, fangs, and/or a tail in drow form, their screenshots only have their base form + transmasc mod. I do have a WIP character sheet for them, but have only had time for a quick sketch so far.