Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Shadows of Amn/Throne of Bhaal continuity

I'm a big fan of Baldur's Gate II, I've played through Baldur's Gate more than once, but I play Shadows of Amn every year or so, like re-reading a good book (even if I don't have time for a complete play-through).

I've finished a first run through of the EA, I had a good time and I'm intrigued by the beginnings of the plot but what I'm really curious about is how connected this game will be with the characters and events of the first two games, and I was keeping my eye out for it.
Priestess of Shar? Is there a Viconia connection there? Harpers helping druids stop a shadow legion? Is Harper and druid battle-ax Jaheria involved? Zhentarim? What happened there? I'm looking for connections where they don't exist I'm sure, but what isn't up for conjecture is the connection this game has with Descent into Avernus.

Though set 100 years after Throne of Bhaal, the 'canon' events of the Forgotten Realms seem to have had more impact on the story than anything, I don't follow these things, but I understand a Spell Plague seems to have rebooted things, I'm not a huge fan of the cosmology in D&D; particularly the heaven and hells angle is a little too...mundane (Devils that have hearts which pump blood, mundane), and I've heard mixed things about this module so I don't know exactly what to expect there, but I can get on board with a story, made better in the retelling.

I always assumed the original games existed within their own continuity with regards to the Forgotten Realms lore, I don't know how officially anything was treated but it's a question they must have answered before they decided to make another sequel; then again is this game part of a series or an anthology, I don't know.

I know Larian isn't about to give away the plot to the game but I am curious of the question of continuity has had any serious answer.

P.S. not that you asked but yes, I'd take Athkatla over Baldur's Gate, every time.

Well from the EA is pretty clear we'll end up in Baldur's Gate at some point and since a lot of races are long lived I'm expecting to see a familiar face or two. We also know that we're going to hell at some point too and not just in the intro.

There is 1 table top campaign bridging the gap between the end of BG2 and BG3. I'm hoping someone makes a youtube video covering the events in the table top campaign.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c6h5wnoGN8Q&t=205s

This video covers some major events of Decent Into Avernus insofar as they relate to BG3.

Hey there, I've been playing Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 (the Enhanced Editions) since 2013, and I'd like to answer some of your questions.

I've been keeping an ear low to the ground for anything I hear or see about BG3 having some minor or major connections to BG2 SoA/ToB. Shadowheart being a priestess of Shar has nothing to do with Viconia, but that Lolth-sworn drow woman who leads the goblin hordes, Minthara, I just found out she is related to Jarlaxle, they were both born in House Baenre, the First House of Menzoberranzan (Viconia's House, House DeVir was the Fourth House of Menzoberranzan). You learn she is from House Baenre when you use your ability to speak to the dead after you kill her. If you don't know who Jarlaxle is from R.A. Salvatore's Drizzt books, you might remember meeting Jarlaxle in Ust Natha during Shadows of Amn. Harpers helping druids should not be out of the ordinary for you. Sadly, no sign or hint of Jaheira in the game yet. I don't think she is in the game because in Shadows of Amn, there is a possibility that she may quit the Harpers or stay with them, depending on how high or low your reputation is when she was forced to confront the fake Harpers trying to get promoted in Athkatla.

There is this tabletop game Murder in Baldur's Gate taking place a decade before Baldur's Gate 3 that reveals that Bhaal is alive again thanks to the last two Bhaalspawn that still had Bhaal's essence in their bodies who are human and lived for 100 years fighting each other (Gorion's Ward, the custom character hero of BG1 and 2 is not one of them, his/her portion of Bhaal's essence got locked away in Mt. Celestia along with Imoen's portion).

There is a comic book series about Minsc called Legends of Baldur's Gate and it reveals how Minsc and Boo are back 100 years after their lifetime, and Coran the womanizing elf is in the comic book series as a member of Baldur's Gate's Parliament of Peers, a group of noblemen and noblewomen who make laws for the city, and he has a son.

Actually it has been more than 100 years since Throne of Bhaal, Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 are set near the mid-late 14th century of the Forgotten Realms. Currently the 5th Edition's present day setting is very close to the 16th century of the Forgotten Realms. 4th Edition's present day setting was 1479. 3rd Edition was in 1372, the same year as the events of the Neverwinter Nights game happened. Yeah, the Spellplague happened in 1385 DR, approximately 16 or 15 years after Throne of Bhaal, 13 years after Neverwinter Nights, 11 years after Neverwinter Nights 2 and Baldur's Gate Dark Alliance 1 and 2. The changes it brought angered a lot of people, including authors like R.A. Salvatore and Ed Greenwood. 4th Edition's 100 year jump made them no happier because most of their characters that have short lifespans were left behind to die from old age without any closure.

Actually they don't exist in their own continuity, trust me. Everything is connected like the Marvel Cinematic Universe in minor or major ways. And sometimes in ways we never expected. For example, I learned that Drizzt Do'Urden's cameo appearances in Baldur's Gate 1 and Shadows of Amn is not fan service after all. A few years ago, I read one of R.A. Salvatore's books, "Sea of Swords", and I learned something very interesting. In the book, Drizzt just recently arrived in Icewind Dale. In the first Baldur's Gate game, when you meet him and don't attack himnafter helping him get rid of the gnolls harassing him, he tells you that he is on a journey to Icewind Dale. Baldur's Gate is set in the year 1368. R.A. Salvatore's novel Sea of Swords starts in the Spring of 1369, the exact same year as Shadows of Amn, just a month before Chapter 1 of Shadows of Amn starts. But Sea of Swords story ends on the Winter of 1370, which means Drizzt and his friends appearing in Chapter 6 of Shadows of Amn cannot really happen unless Gorion's Ward has spent the whole year of 1369 trying to complete Chapter 2, collecting gold for Gaelan Bayle so that Chapter 3 and so on can be from the Winter to Spring of 1370 right after Sea of Swords ends and before the Hunter's Blades Trilogy novels start.

Larian wants to surprise us. I respect their decision, but like you, it kills me not knowing the answers to my questions.

Athkatla is a much bigger city than Baldur's Gate, so I don't blame you. It has a lot more districts than the game shows, to be honest. For example, there is the Scepter District, the Gem District, Wave District. I don't remember the names of the other districts.

They've said before that Descent into Avernus was a 'prequel' to BG3 but there was also something called Murder in Baldur's Gate which I know almost nothing about, that supposedly deals with "Gorion's Ward" and his death. Descent into Avernus on the other hand I haven't played but know about it from Justin Alexander's blog thealexandrian, who says it has some lazy design choices and is rife with continuity errors, which is why I'm expecting Larian to change it a lot.

As for the companions, I'm right with you, they've all but confirmed Minsc will be returning, I hope it's more than just fanservice, and 100 years is not very long for elves and gnomes, so I'm hoping for some involvement there. Not to mention Imoen.

I'm a little worried how central the city Baldur's Gate has become to a series of games that it previously only appeared in the last half of one game. I'm probably not the only one that when thinking of a city in the Baldur's Gate games, thinks of Athkatla.

I'm honestly leery on Minsc (and Boo!) reappearing. Larian's shown they have the chops for good rpgs but if the past decade's shown, digging up old characters can just utterly ruin them (especially in films). I'd much rather there be the odd reference to them and that being It.

Thanks for the info dump. It's never very good story-telling when you reboot things, I'm sorry to hear they needed to do it with 4th edition, especially considering what a blip it would turn out to be.

That's very interesting about working around the Drizzt's continuity, it reminds me a lot of the debates that go on in Star Wars circles as to how long Luke trained on Dagobah. I like the idea of that chapter taking a year to complete. sometimes for me it does

As for what is and isn't continuity, I'm a fan of comic books, the only thing that really matters in continuity is how often it's referenced by other authors, so whatever happened in the interim of these two games I would consider fair game depending on how popular they were and what authors pick to include in their stories, so there's some hope there, maybe.

You're welcome. Some reboots aren't bad, it all depends on how it is handled. The Forgotten Realms' reboot was executed poorly, no one wanted to play the tabletop games using 4th edition rules, not even me.

I remember that debate, but I never put much thought into it. I used to believe Luke trained on Dagobah for five days or less, depending on how long it took for Han, Leia, Chewie, C-3P0 and R2 to evade the Empire from Hoth to Bespin because as I recall, Hoth and Bespin are in neighboring solar systems.

In relation to your Shadows of Amn/Throne of Bhaal continuity thread, I got an interesting link to show you.

http://forums.larian.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=675526#Post675526

Minsc and Boo can't feasibly still be alive 100 years later, that'd be insane. I'd be happier seeing some of the lesser heralded characters making reappearances. (Xan would fit right in...what better setting than Hell with a worm in your brain for a "we're all doomed?") Not sure how long halflings are supposed to live, but Mazzy Fenton is my favorite character of all, so I'm pulling for her. Somehow I know Drizzt and company will make another cameo, for continuity's sake.

Minsc and Boo are still alive. They were petrified some time after the events of BG2 and unpetrified a few years before the start of BG3, so they are almost certainly going to show up.

Halflings lives about 250 years, so Mazzy could still be alive if she was under 100 in BG2.

Minsc and Boo had magical help, or unhelp depending how you look at it, to survive that long.

I'm not sure about a Drizzt cameo, he just got a baby girl with his wife.

The game is set 100 years leter, I dont think humans can get that old in DnD universe and boo, well its giant miniature space hamster I think he returned to his people and told them about the bravery and good heart of the humans and prevented a invasion.

Clearly I used the term 'info dump' a little prematurely, I can only applaud the time and effort you put into this compendium, annotations and all.

I'll admit I skipped around to the most interesting material a little, but...

The confusion between "Gorion's Ward" and this Abdel fellow seems pretty pertinent, especially if after Throne of Bhaal the next chronological entry in the Bhaalspawn canon coming from WotC is "Murder in Baldur's Gate". Viekang didn't seem like such a bad sort but I suppose a hundred years can wear a man down, but more to the point, I'm still unsure if the confusion with Abdel is WotC trying to retcon a few things into a new 'canon' character, possibly in preparation for Baldur's Gate 3, or if indeed this guys is just a totally new character (possible Candlekeep cameo aside).

This didn't happen that long before BG:3 and the politics of Baldur's Gate will no doubt play more than an ancillary role in the new game so this shouldn't be inconsequential and it will certainly make people ask a lot of questions about what became of 'their' hero.

Abdel was ALWAYS the "Default" Bhaalspawn character name.

It wasn’t in the original BG release. It first showed up in the Tales of the Sword Coast expansion, as that was developed while the novelization was being written.

I don't know what you mean by 'default', but if you mean the novelizations I can believe that, but I'd hope they would do a little more groundwork before making us swallow that pill, considering the type of game Baldur's Gate is. You understand what I'm saying right?

I hope that there are references to our Bhaalspawn without ever any specific details. Screw Abdel. My Bhaalspawn was a half-elf berserker named Alumyr, and I’ll be annoyed if the fame disavows that. Hopefully Larian is smarter than that.

I wouldn't be surprised if they tiptoe around it. It's possible to have multiple continuities, it's something that happens a lot especially with games and novelizations.

My personal preference would be an amalgamation of all the possible playthrough outcomes to make something unique that you couldn't get playing the game (like what would happen in Dragon Age with origins you didn't take part in), I'd still like the particulars of the main character to be unspecified though, unless they let us do it ourselves in dialogue like Knights of the Old Republic II and The Witcher 3.

Also, even though it would be awesome to meet or see a reference on previous characters like Minsc etc. is Larian even allowed to put that character in their game without asking Bioware permission first? Wotc owns the D&D IP but do they also own every particular story/lore/character published within the OGL/DMG?

WotC owns all of it, BioWare own nothing. Wizards already has used Minsc in other products, including comic books and some time waster game named Idle Champions or something.

And there was an NPC named Abdel in the large warehouse where the gatewarden of Candlekeep trains you if you let him.

The Neverwinter MMORPG eventually got Minsc and Boo. Why is it impossible?

Well. just because they've used doesn't mean the IP of that character automatically belongs to them, they could simply have agreed with BioWare first. And I find it disturbing if a game studio will be allowed to use the D&D setting and trademark but that all their intellectual property such characters and story line, things they created and designed themselves would afterwards fall into ownership of WoTC. But I guess that's a plausible contract clause put in to secure WoTC's possibilty to expand or use that IP in future products.

Abdel is hated as much as Abby from The Last Of Us 2. WotC just used him and Viekang to bring Bhaal back from the dead. Canonically there's no way that would work if Abdel was the Bhaalspawn who defeated Amelyssan, because in order to remain mortal, he would have to allow the Solar to take his portion of Bhaal's essence to Mt. Celestia. I heard that even though Bhaal is back, he is not at full strength. Maybe it is because Gorion's Ward and Imoen's portions of his essence are still in Mt Celestia.

Minor spoiler: Minsc and Boo got turned into stone statues and they stayed that way until 1488 DR.

If it isn’t contradicted in the game, I’m going to headcanon that Alumyr died peacefully in his sleep, and even though he had given up the taint, his soul was acting as a lock that barred Bhaal from returning. After he died, Bhaal just remanifested in the world.

Don’t mess with my headcanon, Larian!

Murder in Baldur's Gate essentially finishes the story of BG1+2, with the final Baal spawn being killed off (no, it's not Abdel/Gorion's Ward ;)), and the God of Murder being reborn... it's an ok module, all things considered... a bit low level for the supposed gravitas of the subject matter.

Descent into Avernus I haven't played either, but judging for the EA alone, Larian is at least changing some of it...

I understand that this adventure module from 4e deals with the 'canon' Ward, Abdel Adrian, and Bhaal continuity, but I don't know how closely they (Larian/WotC) plan to cleave to the little known Abdel canon, similarly to how the novelizations for the games never influenced the games themselves. This is more or less the question I was asking with this thread. How many of these continuity questions have they really broached, answered or evaded?

I haven't played Descent into Avernus either, but Justin Alexander does a pretty deep dive into the module, and the print continuity around such things as Elturgard, Avernus and Zariel etc. which might as well make anyone who reads it an expert, but it seems pretty typical of what you would expect from a story by committee trying to make a easy-to-play campaign. Which is why I think it will be pretty different in BG:3, likely roping in the Mind-Flayers and the Githyanki.

There is a problem with your headcanon. Bhaal remanifested after the death of Viekang and Abdel, and the murders conducted by Entar Silvershield's great grandson Torlin Silvershield, who was the herald of Bhaal's return. Viekang and Abdel were the last two children of Bhaal who still had his essence in their bodies. There is no way your Alumyr, or my human Fighter Ralis, or any other player's custom Gorion's Ward can act as a lock that keeps Bhaal from returning. Every children of Bhaal were used as a vessel to hold Bhaal's essence. Generally when they die, their bodies quickly turn into ash because of Bhaal's essence leaving them.

That will only contradict my headcanon if any of it is actually mentioned in BG3. If it isn’t, I’m in the clear.