Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Act 1 Goblins vs Druids conflict should have more options and interactions.

Maybe, but it just shows us that certain storylines need more work than the rest. No matter what, we won't end up with having the problem of having to rework/touch everything. After all, there is a limited amount of important characters and even less of them who do lack something in particular. And yes, it's the "bad guys", who are affected more by this (Kagha, Goblin camp leaders).
What I disagree here with, is that touching a few aspects of the game will instantly force us to basically change everything. I don't think that it's how it works.

Conflict about the grove is for now, one of bigger questlines there, could be said to be a main quest, so we got a reason why it should be touched. No matter what side do you pick, the siege is just a "murderhobo" moment, with not much of interactivity. If you decide to support the bad guys, the siege has clearly annoying parts, like the fight inside the camp, taking forever to complete without presenting any kind of challenge. Could be solved by removing the sequence and instead moving the characters to the walls.

I don't think that there is anyone who would disagree that there isn't much that can be done to even affect the invasion itself, besides the actual fight moment (which is too simple as well).
We can't turn the sides inside each of the camp against each other, we can't try to weaken them before (no, killing druids/tieflings before the siege doesn't count), we can't influence on how the attack will proceed, even with the existance of the secret tunnel; the exception being preparing the barrels with oil.

Besides, when it comes to causes of the famous 25%/75% evil vs good storyline:
- Most of the Absolute followers being comically evil. Only Minthara has any kind of redeemable character traits among them. (but this is shown only when siding with her). Evil characters do not have to be presented as being hostile and rude to everyone and everything.
- While druids are a mixed bag of characters, the tieflings are clearly presented as "stereotypical innocents in trouble", so "neutral" roleplaying gamers are more likely to help them than the opposite side
- Good side is more complex atm, when it comes to quests and interactions. It's also waaay let's buggy.
- Siege sequence is much more annoying and straightforward when you side with the Absolute. It's not great for the Tieflings side either and I wouldn't be suprised if players would try to skip it for the later replays just by killing the goblin leaders
- There are certain moments, during which it feels as if like game developers tries to convince us to side with Tieflings anyways; like when - Halsin having to die, if we do not help his friends

Showing both sides as more morally grey might be a solution to make more players side with the goblins. The Absolute should still be more evil than the other side though.

Oh, I would forget this as well. Goblin camp IIRC turns hostile after the battle, despite none of the attackers surviving. If some of them would flee, it would make sense why the camp is not "friendly" to us anymore.

Exactly that's why I think that characters not being able to surrender, or not even trying to, makes little sense.
+1 for having more consequences of your actions with the Gnoll
Agreed about more camp companions and interactions.

Not necesarily.

Do you know this video?


Its only a joke ofcourse, but the point is ... once you let people decide, they will allways demand more.

Maybe ... but that is more problem of unimplemented reactions for knock out, than anything else.

I know you want to see some disadvantage debuff for army without the leader, but i dont see why killing part of defending group should not count ...
The game should count with it to be sure, its kinda sad that if you manage to wipe out whole groove before you even talk to Minthara, there is no way to tell her.

After Patch 4 arive, i would certainly try redeem Kagha, or free Halsin just after start the siege, just to see if they will help defending the groove or not ...

Funny how many people quote those numbers ignoring the fact that:
- Usualy people tend to "good side" and common rate is 35/65
- When people choose wich side they join, they usualy dont know rest of the story, so at least part of those numbers was completely irelevant to concidering how well was whole quest line presented.
- In many cases dices decide for you, bcs you want to persuate, intimidate, or deceive someone ... and you simply fail.

It just depend on your point of View ...
Rightfull knight in shiny armor for people is horrible murderer for goblins.

It makes sence ...
And it even makes sence if you ignore (or simply dont know, bcs you kill her before she tells you) that part where Minthara confess to you that acording to plan, you were suppose to die today.
You leaved with one of their leaders, not as her equal (even if you are allowed to think that) but as usefull aset, nothing more, nothing less ... so if you return next day after battle without her, its quite clear that she didnt survive, but you did ... so you either betray her, or failed your duty to defend her with your life.
There is litteraly no way goblins keep friendly after battle.

That's why there should be a focus on more important npcs and quests.

To be fair, yes, but also a few things like the leader/morale mechanic and little bit of choice, when it comes how to plan the battle would not hurt.

I just used the wrong word I believe, now I will correct myself. What did I mean, is that an additional way of altering the invasion, besides killing part of defenders, should be possible.
Oh yes, btw, the grove attack is absurdly bugged if you kill everyone and then go to cleric of the Absolute. They.. still try to initiate the siege, with noone being there. That's strange...

Interesting. I will try to do it myself as well.

So we still could try to fix the ratio. It's not that bad, if what you say is true, but could be better. Many people would side with Minthara if killing the Tieflings would not be required or if we could be introduced towards the goblins in a way, that would make them respect us more.
As for the side, yes, sadly until you join the drow lady and manage to finish the story, you really don't know what is going on. Giving the players a bit more of clues, could help with it.
There are few moments as well, when the game tries to tell us "how bad we are". This shouldn't be a thing.

If players will have such desire, they will be able to minimise the RNG aspect or even completely disable it in the future. Larian already considers a few solutions, source below.
https://screenrant.com/baldurs-gate-3-rng-frustrations-dnd-5e-die/

What did I mean, is that the goblin camp interaction could be a little more friendly towards the player. They should be still evil, but not so repulsive towards the PC. At this moment, only Minthara seems to have anything resembling friendly behavior, which helps a lot with humanising her. We don't get to know this though, until the very end of the quest.
Also it's pretty hard to get inside the camp as far as I know without Sazza/being drow or multiple dice rolls.
And this - "There are few moments as well, when the game tries to tell us "how bad we are". This shouldn't be a thing. ", still counts here.

That's actually pretty good explaination, made by you, about the camp going hostile post-invasion.

The problem is that, the end is clearly the best part of the entire quest-line. It gets really interesting basically during the party/talk in the camp, when we learn more about what was going and and about the drow priestess herself, with a clue of what might happen later.

Hope you mean knocking them out and using them in later conversation with Minthara about "what shall we do with prisoners" ...
Bcs that sounds like the only acceptable option IMHO.

Its an ENEMY MILLITARY CAMP ... you are not suppose to be welcomed here, you are barely tolerated, and you even should be happy about how tolerant they actualy are.

They cant welcome you with smiles, maybe except that vendor, but he welcome your coins, not you personaly.
And there is simple reason for that: If you can be any minute ordered to kill someone, you really dont want to friend him.
And if you give attention there, surely you noticed that Goblins were allready raiding whole zone around ... and their leaders plan to raid everything else soon, and whole army knows that.

I dunno what are you talking about, i knew what is going on. :-/

Its as friendly as it can get ... if anything they should be a little more suspicious.
Since once you pass the first gate, even if you passed it by killing everyone ... rest of the camp is treating you as friend, really odd. :-/

Not sure if i would use word "friendly" ...
I certainly like how Minthara is treating our character, as expendable asset she keep close as long as he stay usefull ... it nicely shows that our character happened to be here by accident, nobody was waiting for him and nobody really "need" him, but since he is allready here, there is no reason to use him to her advantage.

That is completely different situation.

Then im affraid you dont ...
- you can talk your way in (probably hardest one, especialy if you dont have Cha-based protagonist)
- you can tadpole your way in (automatic sucess)
- you can sneak around
- you can fight trough
- and as you mentioned, you can be lead inside with Sazza, or being allowed automaticly to enter if you are Drow.

Its not made by me ...
I simply quoted right words to right context, nothing more, nothing less.

I dont see either why or how is that suppose to be a problem ...
You talk, you may get info ... you dont, you dont. Simple consequences. O_o

We've listed the options above already.


They can be still acting decent enough towards potential allies, even if short-term ones. If you look at their leaders, they let you to talk to themselves (and they are mentioned to be smart), yet average goblin is somehow instantly very hostile? You could reason this as them simply being stupid, but their leaders would surerly discourage such behavior, as obtaining potential allies/recruits/followers is something that helps to win. Deciding to join the goblins during the first attack on grove could be the reason for them to treat us better, or simply having an interaction during the first dialog, when we enter the camp; that we simply show them who they should respect via strength (kinda like the Novice Crusher Goblin).





They should definitely get more "friendly" if you manage to show them, that you are stronger than they are, or just because you took their side during the conflict somehow (Sazza/first encounter)
As for being suspicious, not so sure, the average goblin is not that smart. Leaders think that you are a true soul, so again no reason for them to distrust you.
The interactions mentioned by you, are probably unfinished version of how it will be in final version. It's not logical for them to not ask for your identity multiple times (although only first time there should be a DC or we could recieve something that we show to others, that we can pass, like a ring with a signet/amulet/whatever) or to suddenly make everyone friends, because the guards at the front of the camp are dead.


I think, that we should be able to read a little more via Wisdom/Intuition checks, about their intentions. It doesn't have to be obvious, just being easier for an average player to understand.
People start the quest on both sides, just to think that "the evil side sucks for now, so I will side with the druid grove" because at the beginning indeed the evil path isn't very interesting, although luckily it does change later.




None of those options are easy or without some kind of disadvantges, except being a drow or helping Sazza.
- Multiple dice rolls for talking your way in, aren't easy and are much more likely to fail than succeed.
- Tadpoling you way will have severe story consequences later, it's already hinted. Nothing is for free.
- Sneaking is going to be mega time-consuming, will have to be well planned and also potentially involves skill checks. It's not easy either.
- FIghting your way in resulted in the camp being hostile for me, although you have mentioned that it didn't happen to you. Might be bugged, even if you have to only defeat the front-side guards, it's still harder than just selecting few options to talk or beating beginner area enemies.


Because initial interactions, or just going straight for the "good" side, results in her being shown as generic villain. You learn nothing about her past,feelings, reasoning, logic, etc. Game basically tells you to kill the Goblin leaders, encouraging to not even bother to talk, even for strategic/tactical reasons.

We could for example pretend that we side with her, by doing some side quest, just to make the drow leader start to trust us, so that we can convince her to attack from the secret tunnel, straight into our trap.

The whole knockdown/capture mechanic would also fix this problem, if we join the good side. We could still learn more about the Cleric of Absolute, while playing on let's say our first playthrough on good side. If game would show it more, that she isn't shallow, people would see possibly more of a reason to stick with side other than tieflings/druids. Sadly, for now, only players who decided to play the "evil route" actually know that the drow leader isn't boring or cartoonishly evil.

Potentially interrogating the rest of the Goblin Leaders could tell us more as well, but Dror or Priestess Gut have little reason to appear in later acts as someone important. This isn't the case for Halsin or Minthara, who should have the most interactions, if we manage to capture them. We've listed the exact actions and choices above already.
Additionally Halsin, is since the beginning is shown to be someone interesting. Lots of characters tell us about him, his powers, abilities, skills etc. Even his initial dialogue reveals more about him, presenting him as someone worth of respect.

Edit: One good way to justify our player character gaining the respect of Goblins (enough respect to enter the camp and be treated a little better) could be, due to us obtaining the Symbol of Absolute, which the members of cult would carry with themselves. It could be looted in dead bodies of cultists, given during the first interaction between goblins and tieflings, obtained via persuasion at the gate, when talking with guards or we could simply force one of guards at the front gate to give it to us, via Intimidation check.

Seeing how big this thread has become (and full of long posts), finding the most valuable feedback has started to become a problem. After a little bit of further play-testing, reflections and reading through all the posts, I decided to make a summary of ideas given by all users in this thread (with added additional parts, for example bug reports), so that any future reader, dev or forum user, can easily read the most important parts of the thread, without spending half a day to read it all. After all, focused and well sorted feedback is the most valuable one. This will make further discussion easier as well, due to highlighting what parts of the game, related to the topic of this thread, were talked about the most.

1) The first fight with goblins upon reaching the druid grove.
Problem: As soon as we approach the druid grove, a fight breaks out between goblins and tieflings. We can't wait it out, we can't decide to join the goblins either.
Solution: Allowing the player to choose sides could create a good opportunity for the PC to initiate the "evil path" without requiring multiple dialogues + checks later (or saving Sazza/being drow), when entering the goblin camp. It would also lessen the feeling of players being directed by the game to side with Druids/Tieflings.
When siding with Goblins, during the fight, we should be still able to enter the Grove without a major fight happening. The only people who could recognize us, are Zevlor, Wyll and one of guards at the gate. Persuasion/Intimidation check should let us avoid the fight with those characters.

Problem: Wyll dies when jumping down during the encounter.
Solution: He can't die, instead he is reduced to 1 hp whenever someone deals the "finishing blow". A second hit, when he is unable to fight, only from player, can finish him off.

2)Siege of the grove and camp celebration

BOTH SIDES

Problem: Currently, the siege on both sides isn't the most interesting combat in the game, because:
a) It's long due to big amount of combatants
b) We can't influence it much
c) Little outcomes exist except wiping out the enemies

Solution:
- Possibility of convincing the leader of Goblins to use the secret tunnel, resulting in different scenario of attack. Cutscene should appear at the start, with PC deciding which side to take. The attackers should divide into 2 groups, one coming from the tunnels and one from the side of the gate.
- Leader of the opposing force dying/being knocked out/incapitated should affect their soldiers negatively.
- Killing enough enemies should not only affect the combat effectivness of the particular side, but also if enough combatants die, the rest should flee.
- During the fight, Minthara and Zevlor should be brought down to 1 hp first, instead of being outright killed. Only player should be able to finish them off for good. Scroll of revieve/resurrection should still be able to bring them back though.

SIDE OF THE ABSOLUTE - SIEGE

Problem: Bugs
a) Escorting Sazza to Minthara and letting her die afterwards, can completely block the quest from progressing. None of usual methods of initiating the fight work. (no cutscene at gate triggers, Zevlor says nothing, using the horn doesn't work)
b) Betraying Wyll during the interaction with the drow, results in him fleeing to the druids to warn them. Homever, this causes the attack to be completely bugged:
- TIeflings in hideout are not affected by the fear effect and fight us normally. There is no help from Minthara and goblins either.
- After the battle on the walls and inside the camp is over, Drow warlord is stuck in the camp area, refusing to go anywhere and repeating the same voiceline when talked to.
- Druids hide inside the caves, with the normal entrance being locked. We can still go around and arrive from the library via secret tunnel, but even if all druids die, the questlog fails to update and the leader of Goblins still insists that there is someone left.
- Wyll is missing in the grove and even if you kill all the Tieflings and Druids, quest is still stuck, with the drow still saying that someone is left alive.
This might be caused by Wyll being counted among defenders, but not being there.

Problem:Not enough options are present
Solution:
a)Another quest from Minthara before attacking should be present. The questline ends too quickly compared to the "good" side.
b)There aren't enough possible outcomes for tieflings. Solutions mentioned in this thread include:
- Sell them to slavery ... either to Zhentarim, or to Underdark
- Sacrifice them for the Absolute ... either right there, or send them to Moonrise Towers
- Give them to goblins
- Let them go, to spread word of what happened here ... with possibility to send goblins after them.
c)We should be able to weaken the druid grove by playing on the conflict between Druid Kagha and Zevlor. A way to make them fight between each other should exist, like showing the tieflings that Kagha works for Shadow druids, which would result in her + few of druids (not all) fighting against Zevlor, us and tieflings + druids loyal to Halsin.
d)Zevlor, Kagha, Halsin should be possible to capture.
e) Fight in the camp is too long, because of amount of fighters and distances. Some of the combatants cause next to no damage (goblins with barrels) while still pro-longing the turn time.
This could be solved by moving all the tiefling defenders from this area, to the walls and completely skipping this part.

SIDE OF THE ABSOLUTE - CAMP CELEBRATION

Problem:Bugs/Unintended behavior
Talking to Minthara after the battle, still at the grove and knocking her out glitches the whole final part of the quest. If we return back from the camp, after a long rest, she talks to us as if nothing happened, telling us that she will visit our camp. Homever, returning to camp doesn't start the celebrations. Nothing happens, except for Halsin attacking us.

If we happen to fight the drow lady, after the camp celebration and knock her out, no matter the previous treatment (if we were nice to her, or not) and we return to camp after the long rest, she is initiating the fight with 1 hp. Even if we knock her out again + come back after another long rest. It makes no sense.
We should be able to capture her afterwards or decide to patch her up. (if we treated her well and failed the 5 DC persuasion check)
Both could happen as well at same time.

Exact same problem happens with Halsin, when he attacks us. We can cause infinite amount of fights with him being 1 hp at the start.
Could be easily solved by a dialog happening between him and us, with a possibility to not kill him and via persuasion still gain the help (although the degree should be lesser, compared to the "good side"). He should be possible to capture here as well, if fight happens.

SIDE OF THE TIEFLINGS - SIEGE

Problem: Same as above, not enough interactions.
Solution:
a) When Minthara talks to us about the Gate, we could report this to Zevlor, to use it as a trap. When the attack starts, we should "open the gate", although this time to help the defenders. What happens after is that goblins charge inside and then, gate gets closed, cutting them off from the rest of attackers (for some time at least) resulting in tactical advantage.
b) If we happen to capture the Minthara during the battle inside the tunnels, we could bring her as a prisoner straight to the walls to make the Goblins flee.

Problem: Outcomes of the battle being different, instead of just killing all the enemies.
a) Minthara is knocked out, battle ends. Zevlor talks to us, what to do with new prisoner.
The options should include:
- Giving her to druids/tieflings
- Finishing her off
- Taking her as a prisoner
b) Minthara is dead, battle is over. Current version of cutscene is started.
c) Minthara is unable to fight, due to being too wounded and exhausted, but still conscious + fight is over. First, we can approach her, to ask a few questions and possibly foreshadow our intentions, then cutscene with Zevlor discussing with us about what to do with drow starts. Or we just finish her off.
d) Attackers flee, the Drow warlord is at full health. Tries to escape, ends up being captured. Altered cutscene with Zevlor plays.
e) The Cleric of Absolute is surrounded by the enemies and the rest of her soldiers flee. She tries to make the last stand. Player should be given the possiblity to persuade her to surrender, promising no harm etc. Otherwise she fights until the moment of not being able to fight anymore (1 hp). PC gets to decide to do with warlord afterwards.

3) Kagha and Shadow druids
Possibility to side with her, beyond just sealing the grove should be a thing. Like doing a quest or two. Expanding the questline would be great.

4)Goblin Camp and evil path
Problem: It's very hard to get inside without being a drow or helping Sazza.
Solution:
Siding with goblins during the first grove fight should let us obtain Symbol of the Absolute, carried by all of the cultists, essentially acting as a proof that we are one of them. Same symbol should be possible to loot from one of Goblins, obtained via persuasion/intimidation from the guards at first gate, or we could just force the guards to give it to us via strength, simliar to how we convince the Novice Crusher to listen to us.
This would solve the need for multiple DC due to numerous guards asking for our identity.

Problem: Even though it is expected that the leaders compete for power inside the camp, this isn't clearly shown.
Solution: A possiblity to make a little civil war among the Goblin Leaders.

Problem: The evil questline is too short and we are told too little about it, until the very end.
Solution: Adding a bit of mind-reading checks here and there, adding a few quests in the Goblin Camp area, with some being restricted only to evil path.
This is especially visible when looking at how often we are told, almost straight from the start, how powerful Halsin is, who is he, what abilities he has etc. The lack of simliar narration for the "bad guys" is a little disappointing.

Problem: Game puts a pressure on us, to side with tieflings, or straight tells us "how bad we are now", like what happens with Volo in the camp during the celebration, or the fact that we are handed down the broken lute belonging to Alfira previously. This results in deterring effect towards undecided players.

On top of this, both Priestess Gut and the Dror should be possible to capture, giving us more information about the Absolute.

5) Important characters (Kagha, Zevlor, Halsin, Dror, Priestess Gut, Minthara) should feature additional possibilites, such as:
a) resurrecting, either as an ally (if for example Halsin dies during the escape fight), or just so that we can capture them afterwards
b) capture for interrogation and in case of Minthara and Halsin, convincing them to join our side (not instantly obviously)
Our interactions with prisoners should be varied, in terms of how well we treat them. Especially the 2 most important npcs in act 1, who show a good potential for next acts - Minthara and Halsin.
A good treatment (such as being given a bedroll inside the prison cage, normal food instead of bread and water, etc.) could give an opportunity to recruit them later as a companions (and if player wishes to) even romance. It would be interesting too, seeing how we can either redeem/drag them towards the darkness.

6) Various other improvements
- Knockout and resurrection being properly registered by the game in the journal. Currently game thinks that characters are dead, or doesn't register that they were defeated via knockout.

After introducing the solutions above, a few common player complaints/issues would be solved:
- Evil side is too short/not fleshed out enough/chaotic evil only/"murderhobo"/makes no sense
- There would be no requirement for the Halsin or Minthara to be dead, if siding with the opposing side. Both are very popular and well liked characters and lots of people asked for them to be companions. They can still behave differently in later acts, depending on what side did we take and how did we treat them.
- The replayability would increase by a huge degree. You could roleplay as basically every alignment thanks to those adjustements.
- Siege would be more interesting and also slightly faster.
- NPC dying due to unfortunate consequences wouldn't force a quick-load anymore.
- Being forced to kill tieflings no matter what won't be a thing

Big thanks for everyone who decided to contribute by posting here, especially RagnarokCzD.

We can hope that someone at Larian will read this and hopefully consider implementing some of the ideas, given by forum users here. (Especially considering that we have the knockout and resurrection mechanic already present in game, same goes for the prisoner cage in our camp).

@Theonlyrealtav Excellent points and I fully agree with you on them

Just wanted to add another suggestion for more opportunities:

When druids become available as characters, provide them the opportunity to challenge Kagha for leadership and take over the druid grove.
As tradition allows, any druid may challenge a higher ranking member of the druidship for their position.
This is, for example, the tradional way becoming an archdruid.

So, we could get some benefits later in the story from this, such as let's say being able to request the help of druids, in case of need? Like with ogres? Or we meet some of them later during the adventure?
What would be the reaction of Halsin and what would PC have to do with him afterwards?
Interesting idea still; I'm not sure how it could be implemented though.
I would like to hear more from you, about how the entire interaction would play out.

Thanks! I honestly did not expect that this thread could actually become pretty big. I still forgot to write the reasoning for each of the points in full detail, like why Goblins should flee at specific point of the Siege or why Minthara wouldn't really risk her life. I will do it later, at some point, no time for it right now .

Now, after having tested some things in Patch 4, strange behavior with the camp interactions still continues.
After finishing the siege; I decided to knock out Minthara just to check what is going to happen.

When we return to the camp, Halsin attacks us, I knocked him out too just to see what happens then.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2413327238

As we go to the camp and rest, Drow regains the awarness. She doesn't want to talk without us compensating for what has happened in some way:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2413329115

After improving our reputation, we are talking as if nothing happened. Usual cutscene happens, with party gaining 200 xp for completed quest.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2413327040

We are invited to the camp party, problem is that... nothing happens.
But one thing did change - Halsin is missing now.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2413326921

View from different angle:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2413327609

But when we return back, after the night Minthara is still sitting in the same spot as before, still talking about the celebration that is supposed to happen.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2413332383

As we can see, the whole interaction is still bugged and inconsistent.
While it makes sense (somehow) that we can be "forgiven" for the whole knockout thing, if we compensate for it and for Halsin to just go away (the bug with infinite fight is not happening anymore)
It absolutely makes no sense for the camp celebration to not happen and for the quest to get stuck like that.
After the fight with Halsin is done and he is knocked out, we should be given an option to capture him, because as PC we might be interested in learning what does he know, he is a powerful healer after all, right? It does make sense though that if we do nothing, he just leaves. I hope that we can meet him later during the game, just to have the consequences of our choices.
I'm pretty sure too that Minthara would want a few words at least, besides compensation in gold/items for our mis-behavior.

Now, what happens if you knock out Minthara after the party celebration fight?
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2413346041

Journal says that she is dead...
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2413346146

And yes, she is still in your camp, ready to fight. This can repeat every night if we spam knockout.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2413346254

There should be option to either capture her, or actually treat her well, if we want to, for example by patching her wounds, since the fight can happen if we fail the ridiculously easy persuasion check, even if PC doesn't want to harm the Absolute Cleric. (not that those 2 things are in total opposition to each other, after all you don't have to mistreat your prisoners). She does have a good knowledge about the Absolute and that could be useful for PC.

Now, I was wondering if we can persuade/intimidate (we destroyed the grove so we can handle him as well?) Halsin (with a tough check) or even use tadpole power to calm him down, after destroying the grove.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2413336110
He fights still no matter what option do we choose and the 2 options mentioned above are sadly not present in the game.
And that doesn't make sense because we can almost completely wipe out the grove while siding with tieflings, leave barerly anyone alive, kill the druids and IIRC (please correct me If I remember it wrong) Halsin says that it's still okay.

Certainly, it does make sense to have 2 of those characters to be possible prisoners of the PC, just based on the information that they can tell us. They feature a good potential as a Companions in future acts and limiting them only to 1 side makes little sense.

I've explained above why in my opinion it makes little sense to be forced to kill Halsin. Now, as for Minthara:
Taken from:
https://forums.larian.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Main=91336&Number=755091#Post755091

That is why she certainly should surrender if given the choice. It's strange that she fights to death, when what she does and says in other parts of the game rather tell us that she isn't going to do this.

She has tadpole just like the PC and our companions, but is completely unaware of it. That could lead to a interesting questline where the drow is actually wanting to take revenge on the Absolute for betraying her (by omitting the fact of having the tadpole), it could happen either if we spare her on the good playthrough or we take the side of Goblins in Act 1.

There is a lot of potential for Roleplaying here, I hope that it won't be wasted. Plenty of options for it to be improved were said in this thread before.

Edit: I've missed this before - I'm so glad that finally Goblins with Barrels do not engage in the battle inside the grove!
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2413336816
It certainly was one of more annoying parts of it to see them constantly miss with their fists and if even they hit someone, the damage was mega low.