Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Technical & Gameplay Problems I was never given the opportunity to save the Duke

My partner and I just took out Gortash last night as part of us finishing up the last story quests before ending this playthrough. Sadly, Duke Ravenguard was nowhere to be found, despite the market for the quest being in the middle of the keep and Mizora telling us he'd be at the coronation.

We also looked for him at the Iron Throne but he wasn't there and that, I think, is part of the problem and what caused him to essentially die off-screen.

You see, we tend to complete every quest outside of what we consider the mandatory main story quests before continuing on with the story. As such, we didn't go back and attend the coronation with Wyll after Mizora mentioned the Duke would be there, mostly because it didn't appear as a time-restrictive event.

So, we ran around, doing every single side quest we came across in the Lower City (except the ghosts because that was so buggy and un-fun that I just refused to play it), including completing the Iron Throne. We managed to open all of the cells and free all but one of the prisoners (a Gondite who sadly just got unlucky) and the Duke was nowhere to be found.

Then, with all of the side quests behind us, we went to the keep to confront Gortash, disrupt the coronation, and save Duke Ravenguard...except the Duke wasn't there.

We left the keep to talk to Mizora and she started lamenting the fact that Wyll's father was dead and we freaked out. We had no opportunity at all to save him. I can't tell if this just bugged out and we got screwed but it really feels like we were robbed of our opportunity to save him and get the best ending for Wyll because the story logic triggers couldn't handle us doing something out of order with no warnings that we needed to do something in a specific order.

To be completely fair to the game you are literally told like 10 times to attend the coronation the moment you enter. All those watchers repeating the same stuff and talking directly with Gortash is kinda hard to ignore. You don't confront Gortash at the coronation the same way you don't confront Ketheric in that room with the goblins. Or, well, you could but it would most likely go badly. Nothing appears as a timed event even if it is cause why would it? Coronations don't tend to last for days :P

It's an unfortunate situation you created. You never met the Duke or spoke to Gortash for some lore so he wasn't sent to the Iron Throne and instead killed off-screen. Not to mention you assaulted the Iron Throne which, with a big warning from Gortash, turned him instantly hostile.

Sure, however unlike other actually time-restrictive moments (such as with True Soul Nere), there was no warning that resting or doing other stuff would prevent us from participating. If we needed to go to the coronation in order to save the Duke, then the game should never have allowed us to even leave the area or warned that things would progress if we did. Additionally, the waypoint to save the Duke consistently showed up in the keep and was there even after we killed everyone and the Journal entry never said we failed to save him. Like, if he's going to be killed off-screen, then maybe communicate that when we hit the story moment where Gortash would kill him (like the game does if you free Nightsong without going to save the Tieflings in Moonrise Tower first).

The game gives you the player the ability to choose how events can play out. You failed or decided to ignore the warnings or requests or events within the game world, your decision/s have consequences. Just roll with it, the game isn't designed around or meant to be a series of sterile check boxes that you tick as you progress. It will not hold your hand and say you must do this or this will happen... but you can mitigate the possibility of poor outcomes by reviewing your quest log.

I think it may have been bugged for you. For what it's worth, I never attended the Coronation either (mainly because I was metagaming figuring it would be the catalyst for a forced chain of events within a certain time limit and I wanted to take my time). Even with never seeing the Coronation, I was able to rescue the Duke from the Iron Throne.

I'm with Calibur on this one, not least because that is how I play RPGs - finish off side quests before moving the main quest on; finish one map before moving on to the next one.
In Act 1 we are constantly reminded about the urgency of finding a cure for the tadpole yet in Act 2 it hardly gets a mention. On the other hand the Nere episode we are told about his predicament several times and even view the situation through his eyes.
With the entering the Shadowfell warning message it is not at all clear what exactly the warning is referring to - on the face of it there is no direction connection between Shar, Nightsong on one hand and the Halsin on the other.