#there was no escaping the cult of Bhaal she had no chance to choose anything else

[selunesfavouriteprincess]

Orin’s reaction when you tell her that Sarevok is her father is so fucking tragic

and the way Bhaal rips her autonomy from her, forcibly transforms her into the Slayer, it’s just horrifying. from the moment she was born Orin never stood a chance

[avelera]

I finally made a good Dark Urge run that I found narratively convincing instead of just sort of "meh". All my other good Durge attempts have just sort of been hodgepodges of whatever class or story choices I felt I hadn't yet seen in the game.

This time I went full Paladin with a backstory that's sort of Shadowheart/Karlach blend, ie, was raised in the Bhaalist cult and spent most of their life wishing they could get out of it, but being the Chosen meant she had pretty much no choice, no hope of getting out.

(Just a bit of rambling about a BG3 run I'm doing, writing about it mostly for my own sake.)

Also for flavor decided to name her Brienelle after Drizzt and Catti-brie's canonical daughter and decided my Durge convinced herself she actually "is" Drizzt's daughter. Is she actually? Absolutely not, the math does not line up. But it's a fairytale she told herself about how her "real" parents are heroes, that they're out there somewhere and miss her, that Bhaal isn't actually her father, that she was "Chosen" because she's a hero's daughter (much like Shadowheart was chosen for being Selunite). As a result, she aspired to heroism but frankly every pressure in her life, her entire upbringing, was channeled to her being the cult's Chosen so she eventually, reluctantly, fell in line. A bit like Astarion in this respect, Bhaal like Cazador was simply too powerful and too able to destroy her if she tried to escape, never mind being able to literally take her body over with the Urges. But now she's conveniently "lost".

I think what finally worked was having someone who wasn't just "good" but who was wholeheartedly dedicated to doing good after never having the chance before. So every rescued person, every kind word, every grateful companion and new friend is positive reinforcement that it is possible for her to lead the life she chooses, to be a hero. So Paladin fits that very well.

My one regret so far--as I try to balance RP with not just making the same choices in every playthrough-- is romancing Shadowheart at the party. Mostly I chose her because 2/3 of my favorite romances, Karlach and Gale, don't have anything that evening and so I've got multiple playthroughs with Astarion as the Act 1 romance before pivoting to friendship with him or romancing all the way through. Gale is the romance I keep defaulting to, I can't help it, I just love that nerd so much. So I really wanted to at least see Shadowheart's romance for once. (For the record, she was my least favorite character for a long time, I've only grudgingly started to warm to her.)

But then the day after they shared a glass of wine and slept together, Shadowheart started talking about her aspirations to be a Dark Justiciar and Brienelle's stomach just... dropped.

I don't know if I just hadn't exhausted the dialogue options for her yet or what but Brienelle... Brienelle is like the mirror opposite of Shadowheart. She was raised to be special in the Bhaalist cult and has been trying to escape it her whole life. Conversely, Shadowheart thinks she's just one of many Shar cultists and is fighting to be someone special within the cult.

Brienelle would have felt a certain kinship to Shadowheart over both of them having amnesia, but when Shadowheart began to speak so fondly of life in the cult of an evil deity, Brienelle just felt... pity. And sadness. She felt old. She could see Shadowheart working her way towards the realization that what she suffered in Shar's cult was abuse. She knows that someone, anyone outside it extending a hand to help could help pull Shadowheart free. But Shadowheart doesn't even want to be free yet.

So both in and out of game it feels like Brienelle just... regrets sleeping with Shadowheart. The intimacy was nice. And she cares for Shadowheart. But it feels like she doesn't have anyone she can lean on, no one she can be herself with or seek support from, because Shadowheart is so naive and yet had such a similar journey to her. Like she can't be open about her fight to escape Bhaal because Shadowheart just wouldn't understand, Shadowheart wanted the opposite.

Astarion doesn't appeal to Brienelle either. He's unabashedly evil and while she feels for what he went through and identifies with his suffering, she really just isn't in a place where she wants to be mocked as if being good and caring for others is somehow the weak option when it's actually the hardest but most rewarding thing she's ever been lucky enough to do. How can you have freedom, finally, and not want to be free to not have to be a monster anymore? She loves him but their morals are just too diametrically opposed for more than friendship.

Lae'zel obviously doesn't have good-aligned morals either and wouldn't begin to understand what Brienelle went through.

Wyll is the son of a Duke. He might perhaps understand the weight of privilege, but for him doing good was always an option. He's only just begun to see what evil can do. And if he ever hit her with a platitude about the importance of being a hero or how she should have just fought harder to escape Bhaal, she might actually give in to the Urge right there and stab him.

And Karlach and Gale were off the table because of their two different flavors of, "I might explode if you touch me."

Thing is, I think she might pivot to Gale over Karlach. It's repetitive for me, sure, but I think Karlach's tragedy is just too similar to her own and Karlach going through a similar hellish experience and then choosing death is just... too much. It's not something Brienelle is strong enough to bear once Karlach resolves to choose death.

Conversely, Gale is a mature adult. He has his own life. His morals are good, he always encourages heroism. And he wants to live. He can be talked pretty easily out of sacrificing himself at Mystra's command. He wants to come out on the other side of this. He resents being a god's Chosen, something Brienelle can sincerely relate to.

Their stories don't overlap much beyond that, but that's a good thing actually. They can just be two people, two heroes doing the right thing where they can and being their own people after having their younger years fucked over by being the Chosen of a god. And ultimately, that's what Brienelle wants. Not a life entirely without drama but a life where she can be her own person, with other adults, and pursue her own calling without being chained to the past.