Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Bhaal's essence

Good news, the games can be considered canon, as long as they don't contradict any D&D lore from sourcebooks and such. Unfortunately for the Baldur's Gate novel, they have so many lore contradictions that they have no right to be considered canon. I've read the novels, and I can point out several reasons why the novelizations disrespect not only the games they are based on, but also the overall D&D lore.

Baldur's Gate novel major lore errors:

Not far into the beginning of the novel, Abdel finds a note in Gorion's body and the note states that during the Avatar Crisis, The Black Lord will spread his progeny all over Faerun. First and foremost, "The Black Lord" is not Bhaal's title, it is Bane's. And there is no way in hell Bhaal spread the Bhaalspawn around Faerun in 1358, ten years before the Baldur's Gate game and novel happens, otherwise Abdel and every other Bhaalspawn would be ten years old. The Baldur's Gate game stated clearly that many years before 1358, he somehow foresaw his death and started sleeping with many women all over Faerun a decade or more before the Avatar Crisis, which explains the tabletop adventure game "Murder In Baldur's Gate" revealing the official year of Abdel's birthday is 1343.

Korax, the "friendly" ghoul appears in this novel, and Abdel knew him as a friend of his that used to live in Candlekeep with him before he died. This may not sound major, but it bites the canonicity of the novels in the butt during Shadows of Amn when Imoen in introduced. Why wasn't Imoen mentioned?

The novel claims that the Iron Throne used to be part of the Zhentarim, but that is not true at all. They were never connected to the Zhentarim. D&D sourcebooks claim that the Iron Throne was founded 11 years before the Time Of Troubles by a tiefling woman named Sfena who wanted to make the Iron Throne the richest and most powerful mercantile organization so that she can sell the organization off to a devil in exchange for a cure for her "illness". This is why she greenlighted Sarevok's foster father's plan to taint the iron supply in the Sword Coast and get rich quickly from selling pure iron.

Sarevok runs the Iron Throne all by himself in the novel. His foster father and the other bosses of the Iron Throne do not make an appearance in the novel. The games make it clear that Sarevok is not a business savvy man. If Sarevok had complete control of the Iron Throne in Baldur's Gate, the business would quickly collapse just like in the final parts of the game because Sarevok cares nothing about business practices.

In the novel, Tethtoril is the Keeper of Tomes in Candlekeep instead of Ulraunt (Ulraunt does not appear in the novel), but the games are more in line with the sourcebooks, which state Ulraunt is the Keeper of Tomes, and Tethtoril is the First Reader of Candlekeep, and visitors of Candlekeep find Tethtoril more tolerable than Ulraunt, and because of his intelligent, regal, and sensitive nature, he is often mistaken as the Keeper of the Tomes. This also explains why in one part of the game when you are... "jailed" in Candlekeep, Tethtoril trusts you more than Ulraunt does and gives you an opportunity to escape and clear your name; Ulraunt is a proud, haughty wizard, while Tethtoril is wise and soft-spoken, he knows there is more going on that what it seems. But in the novel, he isn't portrayed that way, and that is seriously wrong.

In the novel, Angelo is not one of the bad guys, much to my confusion, and he is not a high ranking corrupt Flaming Fist mercenary. He a half-elf and one of the Grand Dukes of Baldur's Gate. Big problem there. The Grand Dukes of Baldur's Gate are also known as the "Council of Four" for a reason (Two of the Grand Dukes, Liia and Belt don't appear in the novel). If there was officially a half-elven Grand Duke, then sourcebooks like Volo's Guide to the Sword Coast, which reveals lore details in the Sword Coast two to one year before the events of the Baldur's Gate game and novel, then Angelo should have been mentioned beforehand.


Baldur's Gate 2 SoA novel major lore errors

The novel doesn't explain how Irenicus captured Abdel, and why he took Imoen, Minsc and Jaheira too. Imoen never appeared or was mentioned in the Baldur's Gate novel. Minsc is described as having red hair and a beard. WRONG! WRONG! It is pretty obvious that 5th edition considers the game version of Minsc to be canon over the novel version.

The drow of Ust Natha eat spiders as one of their delicacies. Lolth would smite them for that. Nuff said.

The Copper Coronet gets destroyed in one part of the novel when Bodhi gets killed by Abdel. Destroying a major location in D&D is not an ideal thing to do, because the Lands of Intrigue sourcebooks which tells the lore of Amn and Tethyr in 1370, one year after or during the Shadows of Amn that the Copper Coronet is still standing.


Baldur's Gate 2 ToB novel major lore errors

The prologue is set in 1368, the same year as the first Baldur's Gate game and novel, but the rest of the chapters don't make it clear that they take place in the present day, making the novelization of Throne of Bhaal take place after Baldur's Gate and before Baldur's Gate 2 SoA which does not make sense because the continuity of the novel version Baldur's Gate series is seriously thrown out of order. In the novelization of Throne of Bhaal, Jaheira gets killed by Abazigal, and Imoen gets killed by Sendai, and in SoA, Jaheira and Imoen are both alive, except for Jaheira, she had been recently revived from getting killed by Sarevok towards the end of the first Baldur's Gate novel.


All these reasons are why the games are, and should be canon over the novels, they are more faithful to the D&D lore than the novels.