#karlach is the character that needs more loving from the devs

[sailorgundam308]

Why the FUCK would Spawn Astarion be all into going with Karlach to Avernus in her Origin run, but that option simply doesn't exist in HIS Origin run? The timing excuse is invalid: Larian has changed the timing of her burning up in her Origin run so she can have a romanced companion go/not go choice with her. They could've EASILY done the same for Spawn Astarion Origin. (They even have the dialogue and animations for ASCENDED Astarion to forsake Baldur's Gate and go with her. So that's as ready as well.) That smells like another oversight regarding Karlach, her storyline and the options related to her character. It bothers me so much when there are these absurd gaps in the story when it comes to her character, like she was the last priority they had. Meh.

[bludermaus]

For a romance added so late in the game dev cycle, The Emperor is a great romance!

Now hear me out! I know everyone here loves the romances and me too! Lae'zel, Karlach, Wyll, Gale, Astarion, Shadowheart, everyone is great and fantastic BUT... slightly rushed IMO?

When I first played the game I almost didn't romance anybody because the game expects you to start it in Act 1 and like.... I don't know about you folks but I don't romance character in games just to check it out, I need some attachment to them, some emotional investment first, and asking me to do that in Act 1 - which is very early in the grand scheme of things - was a bit too soon for me.

So here I am, chastised by Withers for not romancing anybody, literally calling me maidenless, we finish Act 2 and all that and then we meet The Emperor. Okay, dude was actually a squid, that's a cooler reveal than I thought, let's be cordial and carry on following mission squiontrol.

The thing is... there was already some attachment to The Emperor by that point. Yes, we did only talk to him through the Dream Guardian illusion but... you've been with him for dozens and dozens of hours in a way, then you have some conversations with him. He opens up with you, you have the chance to be nice to him, maybe hold his hand in a conforting manner, give him a hug when he's the Dream Guardian shape.... there's a very real and amazing emotional buildup to the romance scene.

Yes, it is open to those that have been antagonistic to him (which I think is stupid, the romance scene shouldn't exist if you've been a dick to him, not just stab him in the creche) but like... if you've been nice to him, hugged him, listened to his venting and sadness about Stelmane's death (regardless of their true relationship, he is legit sad about her passing), held his hand, comforted him... like, it is a very very nice romance.

Also add to the fact that you can just show him that you like him for what and who he is, tentacles included. If you ask him to be the Dream Guardian during the romance scene he's way more forward and active with the kissing and all that... but if he is himself, the squiddie, he is... kinda shy? He's allowing you to go first and lead on, almost as if he wants to enjoy this, he misses someone to connect with but isn't used to doing that as himself, there always had to be a layer of deceit and protection for himself before... but now with you he can be himself.

And I think that's beautiful for such a late-included romance.

As much as I'd love Larian to include more Emperor content, I'm quite happy with what we have........ although maybe remove the "I will erase their memory of our night together" line from the game, it wasn't there before and it's kinda weird. It feells like a cop-out for not wanting to record Lae'zel roasting you for Fornicating With A Mind Flayer™️ and I'd have loved to have seen her do that!

[asharaks]

You don’t have to post this or anything, this is just something I’ve been thinking on and needed to rant about and your blog feels like a safe space for me.

I love Neil, he’s a great voice actor and has been so kind to his fans, but there’s something so hollow (if that’s the right word) about him talking about how good Baldur’s Gate 3 has been for representation when Larian has ignored Wyll to the point we’ve waited over a year for basic fixes meanwhile Astarion (who already has a disproportionate amount of content compared to the other companions) keeps getting new content. This newest trailer for Patch 7 is one of the first we’ve seen of Wyll and it’s him getting murdered. One of the official Larian Discord mods supported the White Wyll mod. The fandom (Astarion fans, in particular) has been so unbelievably racist to black creators and characters that there were whole graph and charts dedicated to how unsafe black people felt in the fandom. Karlach’s features were changed from more black-presenting because people would just kill her without recruiting her. Wyll and Karlach both had rewritten stories, but Wyll’s has been painfully neglected and a majority of it doesn’t even center him so much so that you can barely find any promo material of him without Mizora if he’s included at all. Not only that, but black people are attacked for rightfully criticizing and being uncomfortable with his storyline being a slave to a white woman who’s actions are excused because she’s attractive and he’s “a nice guy who knew what he was getting into.”

I understand a lot of people have felt represented by the game’s depictions of sexual assault victims, queer identities, trauma and healing, etc. but to watch Neil herald it as some kind of game that gives everyone a voice so they can feel represented when that’s only the case for people (and characters) that look like him feels ignorant at best and disingenuous at worst.

iiii do agree for sure - I'm not on twitter and as policy I don't pay attention to what the VAs say to the fans lmao but I definitely think. where the game does do a very good job in a lot of areas, the way it handles race and racism, both in-universe and metatextually, is NAWT one of its strong points (astarion's racism being played for a Bit, among other things), and there's certainly a reluctance to discuss that among the dev team (including the VAs) that feels Intentional at this point. fans have been saying this about wyll since release, and afaik no one on the team has really said anything?? again, not on twitter so I can't be sure but it is a disappointment at best, especially given the racist treatment theo solomon's received in the PR for the game.

obviously I don't know the devs - don't know what they are and aren't allowed to discuss with fans, don't know what oversight they receive or what their contracts are or what their personal opinions are, but I do try pretty hard not to take the things they say on twitter outside of formal press too seriously: I'm not one for parasocialising in that way, and the whole area makes me a but uncomfortable, especially when people take the things they say as canon and use it as an excuse to attack other fans. I know neil's been on the receiving end of some unacceptable behaviour from fans too, and I find it easier to pretend that whole arena just doesn't exist lmfao

[seldaryne]

"Wyll's quest regarding the Wyrmway is now a subquest instead of part of his main quest."

"Wyll's quest regarding Ravengard will now more reliably and frequently receive updates in Act III."

so mechanically speaking then, was the demotion of quest status in the first point required for them to implement the functionality of the second or??? because i genuinely don't understand why it became a subquest, especially when the game's structure already allows you to just ignore quests & move on to the next area if you want. most of the patch notes that directly mention wyll are bug-related or scripting flow, which i don't have a problem with (bug fixes are great, we love those). i'd love to hear any thoughts about this, though, because i really can't think of a reason why it had to become a subquest?

i also initially read that second point as planning for future updates to wyll's content but at a second glance i think it may just be referring to journal updates? i don't know, i'd like to believe my initial reaction was the correct one but... yknow. anyway i maintain that this is yet Another example of some really goddamn weird choices on the developmental end of things. if the companion quests exist on a sliding scale of 'most related to current main storyline to least,' wyll is very much at the top end of things. optimistic thought is that a lot of his scrapped content existed in the parts of act 3 that were cut, but i would think that as a studio you'd see that & make an effort to level things out with how much screentime the other companions have. at the bare minimum, your player base shouldn't be able to clock so many weird holes in his story arc where it's clear that something else was supposed to be offered.

i'm also not saying that the other companion arcs weren't clunky in some areas & didn't need a bit of help, but the disparity here makes deprioritizing those edits seem like a more logical course of action. like there's a difference between some slightly unpolished scenes vs. something that feels fundamentally lacking in a lot of structural ways, especially when you get into the finer points of the comparisons. act 3 imo is the one that feels the most bare-bones to me. like yes, there's Stuff there visually and quests too but it doesn't feel as lived-in as acts 1 & 2. i would say that the underdark to ketheric section feels the most dense, content-wise, and i don't think it's a coincidence that it's the bracket of the game i enjoy the most. i maintain that giving wyll's storyline the attention it needs would not only help with the character arc itself, but also pad out the quieter stretches of act 3. at this point i don't really see how they'd be able to add in the upper city without either completely changing the trajectory of the third act (so like, almost definitely something we Will Not See Happen & understandably so from a production standpoint. weird post-release editing aside, it is still a finished game.) & i'm also not sure what a DLC would look like here because the main story feels pretty complete too. off the top of my head, maybe one where you follow wyll & karlach into avernus would work, but that's worldstate dependent & probably wouldn't get made for that reason.

all that to say, from where i'm standing it really seems like giving wyll the same respect other companions are offered would by extension fix some of the act 3 issues, without having to release an entirely new area of the game (i'd love it i just don't think it's realistic lmao). like i know why/what the factors are that led to wyll getting the short end of the stick, it's bullshit but it's not the first time we've seen black characters handled unfairly by devs (& fans), but beyond that it's literally just. so confusing to me on the basis of writing alone. why wouldn't you use the character with that many ties to the titular city of the game more? why isn't he more integral to the story when it really seems like he has every reason to take the spotlight in certain areas?? like that's a fantastic resource of a character to use to move the narrative along and Yet.

idk. this started off as just a reaction to patch notes but it's so unbelievably frustrating to watch it keep happening every patch.

[0rinthered]

I am so passionate about Orin, like no it isn't fair she doesn't ever get the chance and Durge doesn't help her or care after the fact. Ironically what Orin did saved everyone and got Durge freedom if they chose it. The fact that all you can really do is insult her or call her stupid besides the "you've been abused and used option" which is a high roll to even convince her is so sad. I don't like mocking her knowing the whole context and why she's doing what she is. It's not a choice really. It feels wrong to me. She's a victim of so much abuse and grooming from all these awful men. I mean Saravok is a creepy ass misogynist who r worded Orin's sister/mom and people mock her about that in way that's really messed up.

The only person who even seems to show a bit of empathy or at least understanding of her is Minthara when she is a big victim of her. Orin punishes people because she's punished by Bhaal, I saw people post the dev notes the tragic context they should have made clear in the game. That she would have even tried to resist Bhaal before and when she did she got killed for it. In a fucked up way Minthara is the closest thing to showing her "love" or at least care, like I know it's not love but just someone like not being horrible to her or looking down on her for existing. She even says they had similar situations and upbringings so you save her that kind of fate. She said she saw herself reflected in Orin broken too. Sad about all the content they didn't give us because I know they said they wanted more Orin/Minthara stuff but I think ti deserved more than a few lines.

Orin's father is literally a child r*pist and apparently has a line where he says he likes her the same way he does her mom? LIKE WTF? and wants her to make babies with durge? I don't know if it is confirmed if he assaulted her or not but he obviously would if he wanted. He shows a lot of hate like he didn't effect what happened if he's mad about what Orin did to Durge. Felt so horrible killing her in the scene after you tell her the truth because she's totally a slave in body then too. It broke my heart. I don't like that they didn't make her background more of the forefront and just let people see her as this crazy one unless you think about her or find tidbits. She felt like a throwaway to me when she's so tragic and she's just mocked and hated by everyone. I hate abused children/women being painted as "crazy psychos" to make fun of. She's severely mentally ill. Ketheric is not a more sympathetic character, he chose to do all he did. Gortash is given more dignity and choice than her. I think Ketheric and his performance are overrated honestly, he just got more screentime and got to be more fleshed out so they say he's better. That's why people go "orin is just an unhinged boring murderhobo" SHE AND AZULA DESERVED SO MUCH BETTER

Yeah it's pretty frustrating - a lot is implied with her but man you really have to look for it, which a lot of people don't bother to do. Orin in my opinion is the most interesting of the three.

I know the general opinion seems to sway to Ketheric, and I really like him, but I think it's pretty ah... shallow? For lack of a better word. Maybe surface level? Like it's very straight forward in my opinion, which doesn't mean it's any less than Orin or Gortash but I think it's easier to absorb if that makes sense?

Whereas with both Orin and Gortash you really need to sniff around, Orin especially. Minthara is the companion she is attached to, as Gortash is Karlach (While it seems like the only connection Ketheric has to the camp is Shadowheart, but that's through Dame Aylin and Isobel strangely enough. Someone correct me if I'm wrong. But he has an entire act to himself so...). But with Minthara, she is so so so easy to miss and thoughtlessly slaughter (ironically enough) so that's a whole bunch of Orin content absolutely nuked off of the bat.

So I suppose the bizarre pacing is to blame for Orin and Gortash kinda farting around, and Orin not being treated fairly compared to how the fandom treats durge. Again, quite "fitting" I guess. Orin doesn't get that privilege of pity and a chance at life whereas Durge gets two chances. The first being actually having a life outside of the temple, and the second being the tadpole. Why? Idk.

I don't even want a redemption for Orin. I think the choice should be there, and I think the choice should be made by her. Only her.

My ideal world would be Orin can escape, stay (what we currently have), or escape in her own little Orin way. To elaborate on that... I think Orin should be able to continue slaughtering people, but I think she should do it for herself. Not for Bhaal, not for the temple. But because SHE wants to. I do however think the ""novelty"" of that for her would vanish pretty quickly once there's no unholy purpose to it, but that's just part of the growth I guess. So she rejects Bhaal, and skitters away into the shadows. She isn't going to have a character arc in like a week and dye her hair white - despite Shadowheart and Orin's similarities - I unfortunately think it'll take a lot lot lot longer and might never happen.

Still, the main point is that she has a choice, something she has been devoid of her entire life. What she chooses to do with that is up to her and that's the beauty of it.

I could go on and on and on about it and how she should actually be given lots of choices but that would just be me rambling even more than I already am LMFAO

Anyway, Orin I love you pookie boobookeys, remember that there's more to life than pleasing someone who never seems to want to please you.

[faorism]

niche crossover of the day that im too lazy rn to clean up and post to ao3 but may in the future: alec hardison (leverage) plays bg3

hardison balances playtime with hacker hours well, which means he moves through hyperfixations but has learned through working with the crew how to prioritize when there's a friend's life on the line. (there will be no more repeats of his crew sitting on a bomb without him right next to them.) sometimes though his partners lose him for a week after a new release, but now that they live together at least parker can drag him to bed for cuddles (and to sleep) and eliot will kept him fed.

it should go without saying that hardison loves baulder's gate 3. he heard such good things about it during early access from his dnd buddies, but hardison refuses to play EA because he will end up encountering bugs and basically writing the code that the devs will end up doing anyway, so why waste his time.

he plays without any prior knowledge, doesn't even know the characters really except from glimpses at their promo pics. but he's excited. he downloads the game, kisses his partners """goodbye""" for the foreseeable future (as long as a job doesnt spring up, but even then it would be a quick one because eliot sprained his ankle and needed to rest it no matter how much he complained he was good).

he decides to play his chaotic good halfling wizard mendula from two campaigns back - fresh enough in his mind to remember the character, but not too recent so that he wont feel conflicted if the tav storyline doesnt allow for precise oc characterizations. hardison gets super into it, but he doesnt linger on side quests, not yet: he wants to get a feel of the game without mods and follow its arc. hardison doesnt usually romance on a first playthrough, but wyll!!!!! wyll was right there being perfect and beautiful and righteous and black and bi and yeah, hardison had to fan himself off during the dance sequence

his party is wizard tav, shadowheart, wyll, and lae'zel, and barely switches them out. when astarion drains him dry and kills him, hardison is so annoyed he kills astarion. he feels very proud of himself when he sniped wyll's devil karlach without much fuss. then he skips a lot of the companion sidequests because he just wants to rush to the end. he gets married to wyll, then starts right over and plays wyll origin, now able to take his time and understanding the mechanics of the game. he also downloads QOL mods that have already come out for EA, and he has notes about ones he will make if no one else does when he's ready for playthrough #3. he purposefully avoids any major ones (so no Polyam Mod for him, though he does eye it, but he wants to see how multiple romances play himself).

he plays will as accurately as possible, which means engaging heavily with the very companions hardison spent ignoring because wyll? wyll cares (and fuck, hardison loves him for that because yes yes, that's him too!). and......

ah. okay so. maybe hardison shouldn't have ignored the companions so much since they do add a lot to the game! and..... maybe, just maybe, hardison was too hasty killing astarion and karlach the first go around. maybe a lot. he thought they would be companions for evil tavs/origins only! he played kotor and [insert game references here, i dont play games like this usually...], so he thought he knew what was up.

anyway, he is drawn so much to these two out of the novelty of them that he puts them into his party (the fourth spot he switches around, thought once hardison gets him, halsin is a fun mainstay because BEAR. hardison gets up romancing both astarion and karlach (and a little halsin, HALSIN IS SO EASY TO FLIRT WITH, larian WANTS you to fuck him)

and....... okay. okay. maybe romancing them both at the same time was a mistake because. because he loves them both. so much. for very different reasons. hardison feels so deeply and then he's forced to make a decision, and hardison crumples a bit. considers downloading the polyam mod but opts out of it to suffer vanilla game logic to its very end.

when he breaks up with astarion, who plays it so damn cool, hardison had to walk away from the computer to mourn by burying himself in his nearest partner's arms (eliot, this time).

he finishes the game, makes wyll go to avernus with karlach (as he made them do during this tav playthrough) and... thinks about astarion.

hardison had carried over the breakup scene save this whole time, and he decides fuck it, and goes back and tries it the other way this time.

he didnt know karlach will just... die on the pier. wtf. wtf. or wyll will go and there wont be any interaction with astarion?? hardison is Distraught. he downloads the polyam mod and while it doesnt force the issue, he can just feel at the edges that nope, this isnt authentic

finds partner's arms again. parker this time. she asks whats wrong with his make believe people, and he pauses for so long that parker thinks he fell asleep or didnt hear her, and then he quietly says that wyll has a heart big enough for two, a romance can be fairytale when made for three, dont they know there's nothing more beautiful than being held between by both the people you love?

parker kisses his temple as tears legit well in his eyes (and he feels embarrassed) and she yells for eliot for emergency group hugs.

eliot, with hardison squished between his two partners, usually doesnt get involved with hardison's gaming but this time he's just like, okay what is it about these characters that's getting to you like this? and why them together? who are they?

and hardison had already talked about wyll a little because disney prince. so he reiterates some of that with a major case of projection. and then when he turns to talk about the companions, hardison stops. and just.

oh.

a black man who was forced to make impossible desperate choices when he was still a teen, which got him into trouble as a consequence, and then being alone and wandering for years until he ran into a pack of different people come together for a common purpose. trying to be good, the best he could be, and hiding behind a flashy name to hide some of the more raw parts underneath. ravenguard and nana have strikingly similar cheekbones.

then theres a rogue with a deeply traumatic past who can be selfish and kinda insensitive and likes shiny things. a pale thief who likes a little bit of chaos even when running good alignment, and who can't help sticky fingers reaching for unsuspecting belts and also... well, also is a top, through and through. a top who likes to bite. vicious when upset. also... also touch adverse and who at first laughs at sincerity and then basks in it but only once your commitment is fully and well established. the only bit of code hardison wrote as he played his wyll origin was to remove astarion saying dont touch me when you switch to him; hardison flinched every time, hearing the cadence of parker's voice scratching at him when she's triggered.

then, a barbarian who handed from one handler (who ended up being a totalitarian dick) down the road until being owned by the literal devil. body put through hell, scars littering a body that spells strength at a distance. once escaped from the nightmare, only wanted their own perseverance. their own life. wanting so desperately for a touch, to be loved, to be held in a way that didn't spell murder. "heartless" after years of working for, again, literal devils, but so full of life and kindness and (also eliot is more coy about it) a deep sense of joy for the world. kind to children. protective of children. wary of deals too good to be true. willing to die than return to a life they once lived. death feels imminent, despite the protestations of everyone around them. really good bedroom eyes.

so.

yeah.

maybe... maybe

hardison couldnt get the words out to say all of that. all he says is, they're a lot like us. (like with astarion, if hardison spelled out the exact overlaps of the characters.)

the games dumb then, parker says. or at least broken. if the game isnt right, just go fix it?

and hardison has protests about the limits of what is possible within someone else's game and...

parker is like, you made a guy hold up a bank in like, 10 min? on a laptop with spotty internet and without a mouse or any preparation?

and this takes some time between other projects he really has to get to, but.... he does it. codes like a motherfucker and bribes eliot & parker into mocap and also genuinely pays the VAs to voice lines for him. shit hardison does for the love of his ot3:

script out unique banter for karlach and astarion in your party that hints of their attraction to one another

code in an extra option when astarion or karlach confront you for to prompt them to consider their own feelings for the other (different from the current but i want to be with you both! line)

a short nighttime cutscene that with dialogue that implies the three have just finished talking and have agreed to be together. they are all holding hands

include astarion and karlach in each other's act iii scenes (they arent the most chatty, admittedly, but they are there and integrated)

outside of camp, if you three are standing near each other, you can cast a spell that cuts to astarion and karlach kissing either of wyll's checks (this is admittedly somewhat buggy but!

edits out astarion cowering on the pier from the sun, just rushes the three to avernus which hardison doesnt have to edit; just uses astarion origin version for wyll.

nexusmods community begs desperately for him to do this for some other ot3s and he is willing to hear them out for shadowheart/lae'zel/tav, he absolutely refuses to break up karwyllstarion and only offers wyll pov. will not even allow for edits being made for a tav/karlach/astarion mod. he deeply pisses off some people, but overall this mod is downloaded a fuckton as the only truly viable polyam romance option in the game. people start writing fanfic specifically for this one mod and eventually it is just integrated into canon lore that karwyllstarion exists as an option

[lemonsrosesandlavender]

🌪️☔️☃️

(Honey, you got a big storm coming!)

🌪️ Is there a nugget of game lore you want to explore but haven’t yet?

Hmmm! Not much comes to mind, truthfully. I’m a character-first plot person really; I like hearing about other people’s interesting little lore nuggets but most of the time unless it’s deeply connected to a character I don’t feel a strong drive to explore it!

☔️ Do you think about wider DnD canon?

Only when it suits me, ahahah. I pick my favourite chocolates out of that box and ignore the rest 🤣 For instance, I’ve read a bunch of Eilistraee lore for In Service of Magic, but some of it doesn’t fit with being a Queen (hard to run your kingdom if you disappear off on a “run” once EVERY year) or the kind of domme I want Phaere to be. (Eilistraeens are rather allergic to clothes, lol. Phaere, meanwhile, likes to be fully dressed while the court men parade around in very little. I’m ignoring that bit of lore, lol).

Similarly for Elturel. I find reading DnD sourcebooks pretty tedious. We’re going with the FR Wiki summary. Occasionally I find a nice titbit (like having Rolan remark upon the night sky because Elturel had the Companion that made it always light), but mostly I take the broad strokes and then we’re off. It’s funny because I *love* researching IRL stuff like medicine, but I guess because DnD is a load of cobbled together nonsense anyway I don’t feel much desire to research the lore more widely. (I also like making the setting more medieval/renaissance. More distinct from our time, basically.)

Finally, it occurred to me that a lot of DnD lore felt frustrating to me because it’s tuned for fun *games*. Get-out-of-jail passes abound; ways to deal with almost every problem. Ways to do almost anything you want, with DM’s discretion of course. The problem is that outside the tabletop arena, that does not make for satisfying stories. Narratives need consequences and stakes. This is actually why I find a lot of “Karlach should have lived” takes really annoying. “But in tabletop you could have solved it with X, Y and Z!!” well ok, but this is NOT tabletop DnD. The devs told a beautiful story about living when you know you’re about to die, and without real amends made for the things you’ve been through. And Sam Béart acted it beautifully. Fuck the lore, lmao. That story was worth any lore conflict.

(On the flip side, spells have to be discretised and limited in their uses in a way that a non-game system wouldn’t need them to be, and it’s nice to make them more flexible and organic-feeling in a story).

☃️ answered here!

[tomsawyee]

I think bouncing so hard off so much of bg3 the way I did has made me realize why I can't get into popular RPGs that incorporate social sim elements.

Romance options in games like this always fall so, so flat for me. A custom character can never have a rich and unique voice because they need to be enough of a blank slate that they can bend to whatever shape the player projects. On top of this, there's nothing interesting to me about a cast of NPCs who are all scripted to want to fuck me if I push the right buttons.

Hades was the first game I ever played that incorporated romance building as a mechanic that didn't frustrate and bore me, and I think that was specifically because Zagreus Maincharacter had an immutable personality and history, and his relationships were written from this perspective. Disco Elysium also comes to mind, in which the player can shape pieces of Harry, but Harry is still going to be Harry no matter how palatable or banal a player tries to be in all of his personal interactions. Kim isn't Maybe Kinda Down for any idealized slab of Main Character I make to fulfill a power fantasy. He's Maybe Kinda Down for Harrier DuBois. That's fun!! Even when I played The Witcher 3, I developed a strong sense of how much I didn't want to see this old man fuck, which is still so much more of an emotion than I've ever managed for a custom character's love life.

Big RPGs that follow, for lack of better term, The Bioware Relationship Model are limited by the illusion of infinite choice. The nature of game development is such that time and resources are precious, and it isn't possible to achieve nuance and intrigue in every single potential characterization direction comparable to a smaller game with an immutable, non-custom main character.

So, I wish bg3's relationship cutscenes were like. Hit the gym with Lae'zel. Fence with Wyll. Bake cookies with Karlach. But there's no demand for that, compared to how well received More Romance Stuff always is. It makes sense that dev time goes there, and I don't fault anyone for liking it, but when you have no interest in it, the dearth of other kinds of character content makes the whole package feel hollow.

[snikt111]

like im not gonna say that there arent fans or devs or wtv that treat astarion badly, but is that the argument that should be made, when that sort of treatment is NOTHING on how wyll, karlach and gale are treated? like idk…

i love astarion and i think his story is awesome and his VA did great, but astarion fans need to CHILL OUT. its totally fine for people to not like him, and have “harsher opinions” about the bias regarding him (and shadowheart). i understand the anxiety of feeling like youre gonna get a bad reaction for liking him (ive had the same bc im overly paranoid lmao), but thats almost certain to not happen with the giant fanbase he has!! so many astarion fans are just… overly hypocritical and weirdly aggressive about him and its so… odd. like please, youre not gonna gain approval points from him by being dickish irl LMAO.

anyway. the companions that arent astarion and shadowheart ARENT boring and they have stories, if you just look into them more. yes, they have less content and thats fucked, but you can still grasp them and their personality and story through whats there. if you can come up with shit for characters who only have CRUMBS (zevlor, rolan, alfira, isobel, etc etc etc) compared to the origins, i think you can realize that wyll also has soooo much interesting shit abt him, even in canon.

these thoughts arent perfectly concise ik, just me thinking outloud lmao

the way so many bg3 fans treat the companions and criticism is so fucking telling. the way LARIAN treats the companions and criticism is so fucking telling.

like genuinely how can you not acknowledge the racism and clear bias. how can you mot acknowledge the double standards and overly aggressive response to people having valid dislike of the game, aspects of the game, the studio, the devs and writers and the characters