Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Technical & Gameplay Problems Aunty Ethel bugged Act 1

So my coop mate and I are going through our second playthrough, and we've encountered a bug where Auntie Ethel is just frozen.

When we first confront her in the Teahouse, she transforms and does nothing. We can actually kill her there and then (but she doesn't loot the hair).

We can flee the battle, and she will disappear. Going down into her lair, she talks to us halfway through same as always, then when the final confrontation comes she's bugged again. Doesn't move, doesn't do a single thing. We can kill her, but again no hair.

Reporting it as a bug, but has anyone ever encountered this? And if so, what's the solution?

We've tried going back to an autosave very early in our game, and she's still bugged out.

Encountered the same issue just now. Tried multiple saves. She always transforms and just stands there not moving to the lair. No hair. Didn'T find a solution yet. If someone knows, please share. Also reported to Devs. I invested extra in a second play through cuz I had the Bug not getting the hair down in the lair due to Ethel beeing silenced (didn'T know back then, that the hair reward is available). Invested now again in a new Playthrough and the same thing is bugged and not accessible again. In this case even worse cuz of the Act 3 progression... Hope this gets fixed quick or at least a information when this can be fixed... very annoying.

I just got this bug on my first Patch 7 playthrough... 27 hours in oof.
All the results googling this are from threads like yours A YEAR OLD lol.

Just chiming in to say that this bug is still around as of April 2025. Even reverting to a previous save didn't help.

I've seen reports of this bug from as early as 2021. And it still not fixed. As far as I can tell it may be connected to going through the illusory fire in the hut and then going back. After that attacking Ethel there transforms her, but after that she just stands there not attacking (but taking a long time doing nothing during her turn). You can kill her there and she'll just take it. Going down the stairs moves her inside and the dialogue goes as normal until you get down to the cage where she shows up but still does nothing (also nothing happens to the cage). Getting her down to the hp threshold starts the dialogue about the deal and you can bargain with her. After that she disappears, but I have no idea if her ai is still going to be broken later when you meet her again.