Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Story & Character Discussion Fan club of Minthara

Yeah I am interested to know who exactly she appeals to. I'll never follow the evil path so I watched the romance scene on youtube. To me it was pretty meh -- some soft porn with some mild D/s elements. Liara's review said the D/s elements weren't 'filmed' correctly so it doesn't seem that her audience isn't lovers of kink. My guess is that her character specifically appeals to those who appreciate sex as reward fantasies.

The narrative tension in ST: TNG was "you have a set of principles, can you keep to them in the face of credible challenge"? Which, as you note, was worn down in subsequent Star Trek variations. My personal theory for the popularity of the Witcher type "grey morality" / "no alignment" is the U.S.' endless wars. Soldiers are fighting a war that started before they were born and no one seems to know what the greater principle is -- outside of some generalized sense of patriotism or the like. So a character like Geralt that just does the job they were given and who has a limited ability to influence the larger events taking place in the world resonates in a way that character that CHARNAME with their ability to bend the universe through the application of willpower does not.

You know, people just enjoy the character, there's nothing wrong with that.

Wait, wait, wait...

You thought the Baldur's Gate series were RPGs?

No. Bioware has long pioneered the genre of RPGs that are secretly actually dating sims!

(Also: Dude, chill. No one's forcing you to date women.)

People seem to forget that the Witcher's world is very Polish, Nilfgaard is the stand in for Sweden/Germany and most of the Kingdoms when they're not being Poland/Baltic States are Germany/Russia. The reason the Witchers world is so morally grey is because the only sympathetic actors are the people with no agency in their world. Even the ones who try to preserve their identity are tainted by the levels of violence they resort to. I didn't pick up on this in the first game too much, but after reading some of the books and then playing the later games with this in mind, there are a lot of anachronistic traits in the world that point to this kind of allegory, with it sometimes being the Deluge and sometimes being WWII.

It'd be really interesting to look into the parallels between Polish fiction and American fiction.

Then again, I'm one of those simpletons who doesn't always understand what people mean when they say that morality is a difficult question. The people that say they live in a morally grey world usually are saying more about themselves than the world. These are typically the same people who think Cersei is a capable leader and Ned Stark was a fool to be principled in politics. #lawfulstupid

This is an inaccurate understanding of his story. The point of Geralt's personality is that he is forced to deal with situations where he has a choice between two shades of grey (sometimes there is a hidden third option but sometimes there isn't). He tries to be a heartless mercenary, killing monsters only for the money and and staying out of human matters. However, while a job killing evil monsters is theoretically supposed to be simple, it isn't, because some "monsters" aren't evil. Meanwhile, on human matters, he regularly has to grapple with the consequences of failing to choose the lesser evil, until eventually he learns the importance of making the lesser evil choice (but carefully). Comparing it to US politics, thematically you can see it as essentially roasting anyone who sat out of the 2016 US election because "both sides are bad".

This arc is playing out in the TV series, but it's pretty much fully resolved before the events of The Witcher 3. By that stage, the idea that he's still trying to act like a neutral uncaring jerk is just used as a gag because all his friends know it's bullshit and in reality he's got a big heart.

(And yes, as Sozz said the political atmosphere The Witcher is largely based on early 20th century World War era.)

Only incels are allowed to enjoy romances in video games? The more you know.


I would like a clarification on what you dislike and what you think could be done better.


Some of us expressed very clearly why Minthara appeals to us, you can just read.


It's just more lifelike, nothing is black and white. When a game features alignment, me and the game disagree too often on what is good and what is evil, or if ''good'' is even diserable outcome in the first place.


Every character has their own principles that vary wildly, a game can't actually create a narative like that around a custom PC.

I actually don't have a problem with Minthara or with romances in games. I actually DO want to f**k/marry/kill *whoever* in games - WHEN DONE (written) WELL.

The current state of things in EA + this thread made me voice my opinion, as I genuinely fear for the "well written" part.

"Mature" does not have to mean just violence, sex and profanity, although it often means just (and only) that...

For inspiration, look no further than BG2 (+ToB) - although far from perfect, it was not _just_ a collection of campsite story progression-based dialogs rewarding you with fanficty dialogs/cutscenes if you collected enough "I like you" points. Or Planescape: Torment - romances do not have to be just between party chars.

EDIT: There already is a lot of feedback regarding the current state of the romances, especially the infamous after-battle celebration "If only you collected more "I like you" points, then we could have sex" dialogues.

So what is the problem?


Romances start without people liking each other? Why are you collecting points? Your character doesn't have an opinion? Are you not roleplaying?


Haven't romanced anyone in that game.

I think the problem is that often the evil path in games is just doing "evil" things for no reason, just so you can maintain your Team Evil membership card. It's bad roleplaying.

And that happens specifically in games that have objective morality.

Describe what that looks like, so I can be sure I know what we're talking about.

Not all, but a lot of dark side choices in kotor, renegade in mass effect, bad karma in fallout, karma in fable etc. As opposed to "evil" choices in something like Tyranny.

@Sozz, really great comments!


Exactly right. So this is a worldview, one with a name "political realism". And to your larger point the world of the Witcher is one designed with that worldview in mind. The protagonist isn't presented with a series of evil v lesser choices because the universe demanded that he be given those choices its a set of choices set up by authors who subscribe to said worldview. Which worldview -- ST or Witcher -- seems the more 'realistic' tells you volumes about the opinions of the person making the observations.

So @Ayvah nails it:


Exactly right. It's a worldview in which one takes the world as it is and reacts to it instead of one that thinks of politics in terms of visions becoming concrete. Which view -- ST: TNG / Witcher -- seems the more nuanced and sophisticated depends on your familiarity with and adherence to the given worldview. We know our opinions best and as a result they seem more layered and more sophisticated than the views we oppose. "you need to vote for the lesser evil" is an expression of a commonly held worldview. For people who hold this worldview not choosing the lesser evil is a expression of naivete at best or stupidity at worst. The realists believe they see things that others do not and believe that their decisions are multi layered and complex. People who oppose that worldview likewise believe that the positions of the political realists are based in illusions and that they are blind to assumptions they have and how they deliberately limited their political visions. One side sees layers, the other side believes their opponents suffer from tunnel vision. Both believe their opinion to be the more sophisticated of the two and both believe the other to ignorant of some aspect of reality.

And I think this "lesser evil" world view is being promoted and maintained by videogames, movies and tv shows; I do think it has a political message leads us to accept 'morally grey' actions by powerful figures. I think Faerun is one of the last holdouts in popular media I want the FR to keep to a style of play where people adopt a moral vision and have it challenged.

(a priest of Bhaal who doesn't murder the grove should face consequences and same goes for any life cleric who does choose to murder everyone)


To me alignment and the gods give life to the realms and the realms suffer when they are removed. Of course removing alignment doesn't make Faerun into Westeros but it does slide a bit further down that continuum. I like both settings.

Did you ever see Troy? Great sword and sandals flick. I loved it -- I thought the 'realistic', gritty view of the Trojan war spoke to the current day because it was a story about a culture that had been at war for years on end and how that changed the people fighting the war. If anything I wanted them to more with Achilles as the war scarred man. But was it more lifelike or sophisticated than the original? I would say: no. Emphatically.

The original was more sophisticated * because the war was the instantiation of a battle between the gods. It just had elements to the story that the original cut out. For the Greeks the battle between Achilles and Hector was a divine battle. On one side you had the favored of Aries fighting to avenge his fallen lover and you had the favored of Aphrodite and Hera fighting for home and hearth. So equally matched are the two forces that Zeus himself need to show up at the end of day to decide the winner. Pederatic love and lust for battle are stronger forces than romantic love and the love of home; for the Greeks Zeus + Aries > Aphrodite + Hera.

Or to take another example -- the sword fight between Luke and Darth Vader in the Return of the Jedi is just a better sword fight than the one between Obi Wan and Vader in Episode III because of 'alignment'. In the first the battle is symbolic of the battle between the light and dark sides of the force. Our hero finds out that the emperor is right -- by striking out in anger, by giving into the dark side, Luke is able to best the better swordsman. Only to realize that he is becoming that which he opposes. So he turns back to the light, puts aside anger and desire for vengeance and suffers the consequences. Only to be saved by the redemptive power of paternal love. Here the moral of the Illiad is turned on its head. Home > Lust for power.

The Episode III fight is a visual treat but it's kinda forgettable because instead of a fight between dark and light we have a contemporary reading -- in a series of lore breaking lines Obi Wan states that the Sith are evil and Vader says that the Jedi are evil. Instead of a story about the battle between two very real cosmic forces we get a contemporary story about how warring forces tend to demonize the other. More familiar? Yes. More relevant to current politics? Perhaps. More lifelike? I say no. Emphatically.

Oh, sorry if I misrepresented your views on Mithara. I don't think I represented the views of every Minthara fan -- some have explicitly said they like the notion of reward. Not trying to shame -- one's kinks are one's kinks

Would you feel differently about those games if they didn't keep track of your "karma" with an abstract point system?

Ah, here we go, your opinion is not related to D&D at all, it's related to your real life political views and your views on perceived agendas.

And yours are separable? If so, I'm impressed you must have the gods on your side I don't think you -- or anyone -- can provide a definition of "lifelike" that doesn't reflect ones view of what life is like. Right?






(and I never use the word 'agenda'. Silly word)

Would you feel differently about those games if they didn't keep track of your "karma" with an abstract point system?[/quote]

A little bit, but it's still this kind of system that resulted in not enough meaningful contrasting choices. I believe that if the game was build from ground up without said abstract point system the choices would be different and better as a result, not that there is anything wrong with choices that allow the player to be a sadistic psychopath, but it wouldn't be the only contrast to heroic options.

Also, you needed to ignore my examples to force that square peg of a conclusion into the round hole of my post.

In both instances I concluded that the more sophisticated story was the less politically relevant. In each case I decided that the more fantastic was better.

The larger point is that "grey morality" is more lifelike is a political / philosophical position that doesn't like to acknowledge itself as such.

Femininity should never and does never mean damsel in distress. That is just a trope, I hope, we will get rid off soon.

As for Cassandra: she is not only a very feminine character, she is also imo one of the most interesting female companions in video games.

The way I want morality to be more like it is in the real world is the same I want gravity in the game to be more or less believable. Yes, we can have cartoony physics and allow everyone to jump like mario, that results in some level of goofiness, implementation of objective morality has the same effect, though I like magic in my games I still prefer the rest of the aspects, which exist in real life, to be more or less grounded in reality.

Objective morality does not exist in real life, same as there is no food that is objectively delicious, it varies from individual to individual. Yes you could create a fantasy world in which all foods would be on a hierarchy of taste, and EVERY SINGLE character would consider the same foods to be delicious, but why would you do that?