Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Favorite Origin Companion Poll

I couldn't find stats on most recruited, most killed, most used, most spoken to, or most romanced ORIGIN companions, so I'm just putting out a general poll on people's favorites. Maybe clarify your response to the aforementioned traits.

Favorite Origin Companion single choice
	Wyll
	Shadowheart
	Astarion
	Gale
	Lae'zel
Votes accepted starting: 05/02/23 06:11 PM You must vote before you can view the results of this poll.

Voted for Gale! I love his barks and that he is a caster as well as his interactions with a sorcerer Tav. He also approves of doing good things. I don’t like his romance, though.

Gale's insights into what's going on are the most interesting. I'd miss them if I chose to play as him. But I went with Shadowheart because I'm most interested in her personal story.

Gah! I was actually thinking just yesterday of creating a similar poll but as multiple choice as I have a tied first choice. I actually don’t think I can pick between Gale, Astarion and Shadowheart, all of whom I rate equally, though in different ways and for different reasons. Lae’zel and Wyll are probably tied fourth for me, Wyll because he’s not quite working for me as discussed in the recent separate thread about him, whereas Lae’zel I’ve enjoyed what I’ve seen of her but somehow rarely take her along and have never tried her “romance” so don’t feel I can judge.

But because I don’t feel like I can vote for one favourite character without skewing the poll, I can’t see the results as that requires me to vote first .

@Zerubbabel, perhaps you can summarise the results once the poll has been up a few days?

Shadowheart, hands down.

I voted Astarion but, honestly :

Pretty much all of this…except, I'll rate Astarion slightly higher (but only slightly!).

This character is the spice of my every playthrough. He's a fun character, but also, I like his drive to live, his confidence, his mannerism and his fun theoretical questions. I'll always play non-evil characters (tried evil playthrough once, not for me), yet, I'll most likely (based on EA content) always have him in my party.

That being said, I'll have a hard time not having Gale and SH in my party as well 😅 Like I said, they are pretty much on the same level as Astarion.
I like what they bring to the table and how well they complete my character(s), in terms of things like decision-making and friendships.

Lae'zel is great, I love how blunt/straightforward she is. She is fun in her own way (including, funny comments and hilarious reactions/facial expressions). That being said, I don't trust that we won't get our head chopped-off at the Crèche so I mostly have her with me early on, until learning more about the Crèche.

When it comes to Wyll, it's pretty much the same as @The_Red_Queen. In some playthrough, I don't even recruit him. I can be sympathetic to his situation but he's all over the place. Also, I don't respond well to peer-pressure 😅 and he keeps on telling/yelling at me what to do (like "Do something!" or "Kill him!").

I structure the poll in such a way to force people you pick an absolute favorite. YOU HAVE TO CHOOSE!!!1!!1!! :P If you want to do another poll but multiple choice, be my guest.
Anyway, as of 12 votes, the results are not surprising. I kinda already knew that Shadowheart, Gale, and Astarion are fan favorites, with a small minority liking Lae'zel. I'll wait for more votes to come in, as I don't want people that haven't voted to let the results influence for whom people are voting. But... there is by far one clear fan favorite so far, and it's not even close.

Yeah, unfortunately saying any one of my top three was my favourite would just feel like a lie! Abstaining feels more representative of my true opinion than choosing. Though I do think I might have different favourites on specific playthroughs depending on how they interact with my main character, there’s not one of them that consistently comes out on top.

I won’t do a splitter poll though, as that just seems ungracious .

Y’all remember Annah in Planescape Torment? I expect Shadowheart to betray us in a similar fashion. Still my favorite. Also,it’s kinda humorous how she was the most hated at the start of EA and a few tweaks later she appears to be the most liked…

I'm not sure I ever understood the hate early Shadowheart got. I thought it made a lot of sense for a Cleric of Shar with no memories who was (at the time) abandoned on a Nautilloid to be hostile, dismissive, and deeply cynical.

Personally, I don’t think how much I like her has changed but only because I assume the change is only on the surface. I really enjoyed her earlier snarkiness, and kind of miss it. But yes, I take it that her later version is just her better hiding her true contempt, in a way that is more consistent with being a Sharran mistress of deception, and that we’ll still get to see her true colours later in the game. I do think I’d like this new, “nicer” Shadowheart heart less, though, if I hadn’t seen her nastier version first and so wasn’t as easily able to imagine what she’s probably actually still thinking behind her more pleasant mask.

If it turned out in the full game that Larian have made her actually nicer, rather than simply made her appear nicer to begin with, then she’d definitely drop behind Gale and Astarion for me!

Can't wait for the new sitcom "Everybody Hates Wyll"

just a bit of rephrasing to make it clearer

Seriously though, first impressions are important. I still remember having to roll a series of ridiculously hard skill checks just for her to state the obvious "I'm a cleric of Sharr.". And if you fail a single one, the "bonus content" you get is "eff off, don't talk to me", so I simply stopped trying to talk to her. I don't care that she has a 'good' reason to be snarky, I care that she's snarky.

I still think that Larian doesn't know how to make characters without making them cynical and sarcastic. I think it's just baked into who they are. They're trying though, having SH say a simple, "hey, thanks for saving me, no really, thanks". was quite a nice change compared to her earlier nastiness.

I'm waiting to meet his better half to pass final judgment.

And also need to remind, that as someone not immersed in D&D lore “Sharr” meant nothing to me. Not a great impression, but she got better (and I got used to “Sharr” reveal).

Okay, I do realise that there’s no point relitigating a change that’s already been made, so please forgive me for just saying that I didn’t find early Shadowheart overly snarky if you just gave her a bit of time to get to know you, and let her spill her secrets once they became more relevant to events in the world. I just remember feeling that she very, very much disliked being pressured before she was ready, which I found fair enough especially as iirc she did tell me as much.

Still, I think she’s still great now so am not going to complain about the update if it helps reduce the frustration other folk clearly felt with the fact that the game gave us the opportunity to keep pestering Shadowheart to the point she got really pissed off.

Gale. The only thing bigger than his ego is his forehead, and I love both. He has depth, snark, and enough of a conscience not to be a sociopath. I enjoy his input on missions (trying ever so hard not to make a filthsome “missionary input” joke). His voice actor is the best in the game imho.

I also am interested where his personal quest will lead us. Lotsa magical lore and potential for for tragedy. Interested to see where it goes, especially because I think there is more to his story than what he has told us (ie…still think he speaks in half truths).

Second is Shadowheart, purely based on the potential for her story to be good.

Gale because he is useful, funny and his story seems interesting. I would never romance him even he is really looking for it. (What an old pervert)
Laezel in second because she is a very efficient fighter and I think there is a chance that she can become a trustfull ally that if she may be disappointed by the way of Vlaakith.

I hate vampires so bad luck with Astarion. I generally kill him directly.
I generally kill Shadowheart on the beach to get the artefact. It is quite obvious she is a Shar priestess (by the armour, by the fact this is indicated into the character sheet ...) so letting a powerful artifact with a neutral evil agent, no way.
Wyll is so weak at low level and entrust a devil so even if neutral good, I will not use him.

In a general way, from I have seen so far, it is difficult to build different efficient packs due to directions taken by the origins characters. The best so far was Gale, Laezel & Wyll...

I am currently trying a pack with Gale, Shadowheart & Astarion + my character as priest oh Shar and it is really not working well. Laezel + Shadowheart is too much complicated to manage.

I hope to be able to create my own party easily and I will perhaps take either Gale or Laezel. It is a pity because I am pretty sure a lot of work has been done on others origins characters but it just doesn't match with me.

Alright, so I am going to summarize the results of this poll, Sozz's poll, and the subreddit poll in a tier list.

S-Tier (Near-universally loved, almost completely unhated, no major dislikes in Rank Poll): Shadowheart
A-Tier (Mostly, if not overwhelmingly, well-liked, with small minority of detractors): Gale
B-Tier (Either middling responses or polarizing, with similar numbers of lovers and haters): Lae'zel, Astarion (Astarion is either absolutely loved or hated)
C-Tier (Mostly disliked, 0 votes in Favorite Companion poll): Wyll

I'm not sure I would even say Wyll is disliked. I don't have anything against him, it's just the way he's introduced a bit later than the others, and how he just doesn't seem to have a lot of personality makes me 'ehh' towards him. I have a feeling I'm not alone in that apathy.