Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Underdark Mysteries

Okay. I think I figured it out. I think the timeline goes something like this:

1358 - 1371, Sharrans and the gnome Yali built the great forge. Like you said, it was just a forge. It was not a strong hold. Yali made Grym the guardian, his favorite creation. However, it is clear that he guided the building of the forge, it's initial creation. The text says so.

Shar's influence during this time began to spread across the western heartlands. Silvanus Then gifted the Emerald Grove to Roa and Halsin and other druids of their circle. This was the first mural in the Grove. They were to help root out the darkness in the area.

All this drew Selune's attention also. So she sent her own followers to the area. They established the temple and moonhaven. Ketheric was probably their leader and champion, a paladin of Selune. He was probably a moon elf and had a moon blade, since there were at some point references that alluded to this. He was likely a resident of moonhaven and may have taken a human wife as well. There is some data mining that indicates that he had a daughter. Could this be Shadow heart?

Anyway, in 1371, dark Justiciars attacked the town. This was after Roa had caused the dark Justiciars some issues. I'm thinking that during this first raid, tragedy happened to Ketheric. Either his wife or daughter was killed or they were captured or both. Some documents that were removed from the game indicated that Halsin killed his daughter. Whatever the case, documents in the game support that he was good but then because of his grief he turned evil. He became the leader of the dark Justiciars.

So I think after that first raid, he left Moon Haven and went to Moonrise towers. He then learned about the forge and went there and led the building of the fortifications and the Temple. He quickly became their leader, and he planned on using the forge location as a tactical staging ground to attack from both the underdark and the surface.

A little less than a month later, he leads the final attacks on moon Haven. The final raid is the one that finally destroys the village and kills The necromancer. During this month Selene and other Harper's join The druids which is the fulfillment of the the mural about the Concord being made.

In reply to moonhaven's destruction, The druids and Harper's and clerics from the temple march on moonrise towers and defeat Ketheric. Roa kills him but also loses his life before escaping. His glaive is corrupted by shadow, but Halsin later retrieves it and stores it in the vault in the Grove.

During the assault on moonrise towers, The druids and clerics and Harper's learn about the forge, but with the death of the dark Justiciars, no one really knows where it is.

Word spreads about the forge. It reaches menzoberranzan. They send three mages to find it. Dhourn, Xargrim, and Filro. At the same time, High initiate Jarrus leads his fellow clerics into the underdark on a crusade to bring light to the darkness. My guess is, since he was one of the founding clerics, and he probably fought at moonrise towers, he learned about the forge and was attempting to lead the clerics on an expedition to find it and destroy it.

The three drow found it and learned about its defenses and how to operate it, but each had different pieces of information, and in their pride, they refused to work together. They fought with each other, one summoned The spectator, one was frozen in stone, because it was a unique spectator, which is noted in one of the documents from one of the clerics, that it shouldn't be able to do that, one was killed, and I never found out what happened to the other. Either way, the forge was never found.

What it seems like to me, is that the Drow founded the decrepit Village, because there are cleric notes that mention that the lived in the area somewhere near the Outpost. So my guess is, the clerics pushed too far into the underdark, ran into the Drow who saw them as a threat to finding the forge and completing their mission, especially after their leaders died, and they retaliated by attacking The Outpost and butchering every last one. The surviving clerics retreated into the temple and sealed off the entrance. Shortly after that, with the clerics having lost so many including their leaders, and without a flock to Shepherd because the village was destroyed, the clerics eventually abandoned the temple and probably returned to Baldur's Gate.

As for the Drow, they couldn't find the forge, so they also returned to Menzoberranzan.

Years prior to the game, the iron hand gnomes send some of their kind to Baldur's Gate to be artificers there. This includes Barcus. Within the last year before the game, a blood feud breaks out in the city. The gnomes in the city call out to their clansman in the underdark, and tell them about it. They set up an expedition to the underdark of the western heartlands, and begin searching for the forge. Their hope is that the adamantine will give them an edge in the marketplace in the city.

There is evidence that Decrepit Village was not their main base of operations. The main proof was a note warning those at the village about duergar prowling the shores. So the author was warning what I believe was Expedition 42 to watch out for duergar. Thulla and Philomena and Wulbren were part of the main camp looking for the forge near Glut's Grotto. Duergar found Glut first, wiped out his circle because they were in the way, and then captured the main gnome camp. Shortly after, they found Grymforge.

We know Wulbren was in the main camp because his amulet was taken from him, and eventually somehow wound up in the Lower City where Barcus finds it on a thug. So Wulbren must have been at Decrepit Village at one point and left his journal, which was burnt up somehow.

Months later, Thula escapes to Decrepit Village, probably to get their help, lures Gekh there, the rest of the gnomes are killed or captured, and viola.