Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Story & Character Discussion Does NOT eating tadpoles matter?

I'm at the start of act 3. Does it really not matter if you avoided to tadpole? Is there no advantage to taking the good path at all?

Actually, what interests me more is if there is a (narrative) downside to not consuming tadpoles. The game appears determined to goad me into being incredibly stupid for reasons I can't decipher. So is there any downside, apart from the obvious, ie not having access to psionic powers and maybe being locked out of a specific illithid-themed ending option? An acceptable ending, for me, is one where, if I do not invoke any alternative willingly and knowingly, my character can walk out of this story intact and in full control of their physical and mental capacities, while the world is more or less OK. Like for instance, the "stay mortal" ending option of Throne of Bhaal.

As for there being no advantage for the "good path": not consuming any tadpoles is not "the good path". It is morally neutral. You might feel tained and disgusted by it, but that's not the same as evil. Good or evil are determined by what you do with your psionic powers. What it is, however, is incredibly stupid. So the question is: should there be an advantage to acting with reasonable prudence, rather than with utterly reckless abandon? Well, unfortunately the universe does not always reward prudence, so not having this doesn't come across as a dissonance. What does come across as a dissonance, however, is the game goading you into consuming tadpoles, even suggesting that you might want what they have to offer in a totally non-neutral way, in form of a main quest, in spite of its very obvious stupidity. It feels like one of those conformism tests where they put you into a room with people who all make an obviously wrong decision, to see if you will go along with that in spite of knowing better.

Not acting as if I had INT 6 is its own reward IMO, and I'm fine as long as my character can walk out of the story with both them and the world intact. But as a gamer of course I want to explore all this stuff, and I have a hard time coming up with a character who would do this, even without any narrative consquences attached.

The tadpole/s feel like a big victim of a rewrite. In EA, you had a tadpole in your brain and that was it, and it was whether you were going to give into its influence. It wasn't a matter of consuming more tadpoles for personal power, it was a facet of the relationship you had with the 'dream visitor.' Did you believe that they wanted what was best for you? It felt like a violation because it was a violation -- you have a parasite in your brain! You spend time chatting with "Who you dream about a night?" Which is also a pretty dark, manipulative phrase. Are they a Mind Flayer? Are they the Absolute? Can you trust them?

Then, you hit the start of Act 3 and everything falls into place. Spoiler guarded to be sure.


As it is, it's just... odd. The moment I hit that reveal I was really wanting to see the original implementation of the dreamer and how that story was going to unfold. As it is, it just feels weird.

Yes. I'm in the start of act 3 but haven't finished the game. From the responses it sounds like there isn't a BG1 / ToB mechanism in the game where embracing evil led to one set of powers and resisting it led to another.

@leidra2. On taint and disgust. Mind flayers are evil just like vampires, werewolves and ghouls. If you get bitten by a ghoul or werewolf you have so much time to cure yourself or you are lost to the evil. To refuse to do so - to avoid and cure and lean into the disease and transform into a werewolf to embrace evil. Thus embracing the tadpole taint cannot be a good act.

I know that you are fond of social psychological theories of morality and I suspect that you are diagnosing me as someone who confuses disgust with morality but such theories don't apply in Faerun. Monsters are inherently evil and choosing to become a monster is an evil act. Or, you are wedded to that theory, then it's the case that basic psychological 'mistake' - conflating disgust with immoral acts - is built into DnD. The Larian artists really leaned into the disgust factor but mind flayers aren't just ick, they're evil. Always with exceptions if you want exceptions - apparently Omeleum changed alignment at some point . . .

( and yes, I'm annoyed we can't smite the necromancer in the circus - imagine if one of those funny dancing skeletons was someone you loved)

Most games implement some sort of measure of this - each evil act costs you a few points and if you reach zero you change alignment or die. I haven't looked at the new Ravenloft but I used to play with my old group in 2e Ravenloft - if you committed 3-5 evil acts the powers of Ravenloft would claim you and you would be granted a realm and a set of powers. (please roll a new character - your old one just become an end boss)

Bioware combined the ravenloft powers system and the Zharakia honor system to create the BG1-2 reputation system. But, if I am reading these posts correctly, not such system exists in BG3. Which is a significant departure from both BG2 and from EA.

You are right that it's also a stupid decision!

@KillerRabbit:
(1) If there are exceptions, then evil is not built into their nature. They're typically evil, not intrinsically evil. Which is also the only thing that makes any sense.
(2) Evil is not contagious. Whatever consequences your world imposes for it (as in your Ravenloft example), it requires actual evil actions. Eating some substance is not enough.

@Milkfred:
I don't think these two changes are necessarily connected. I haven't seen Act 3 yet but if the dream presence was always meant to protect us, and had a goal that included engendering some trust, then appearing as that dream lover was always going to be counterproductive, as appealing to our desire was always going to come across as an appeal to throw caution to the wind. The old scenes were good and more impactful than what we have now, and I suspect those who made them were very sad to see them go, but they did not work as intended.

Meanwhile, the illithid powers feel like a last-minute addition that didn't go through enough response testing. This comes across as a typical Larian implementation, they tend to go overboard with both the whimsical and the horrific unless tempered by external responses. If that had been in the EA, I'm reasonably certain we would now have a way to attain those powers that does not involve this level of stupidity.

I've noticed this, hopefully all of the player feedback I've seen for the overall game gets factored in for a potential Definite edition, the tadpoles having no consequence is something I find bizarre.

I still think alien parasites in your brain is just disgusting.

Roleplay-wise 99% of sane characters would want that thing out of their head asap. And the game just won't let you. Larian decided you will use our fun powers. This is an RPG, not a platform game where you collect fun powers and story doesn't matter.

You don't need the tadpoles for plot device beyond Act I, after you have joined forces with unlikely allies and learned what's going on. After that, becoming a hero or a villain in the events of the game is motivation enough. They should have offered a way to extract the tadpole at this point.
So yeah, it does smell like gameplay devs calling the shots again and wanting those powers for all players, panicking last minute about late game not having enough progression.

Yeah, it is disgusting. However, if it were *just* that, I could envision a character swallowing their disgust and going through with it in order to gain psionic power. As it is, though, it also damages your brain and undermines your mental integrity, making you less you every step of the way. And to do that, you must be utterly mad.

As for not needing it beyond Act I....it is interesting that being in the middle of Act II, I don't recall a single dialog line in Act II where I can use the illithid power I got from my original tadpole. I don't think they were ever meant to be removed early though, and I'm ok with that. I find it a much greater dissonance that the sense of urgency you have in Act I conflicts with the desire - and the need - to explore the region before you go on with the plot.

About your last point: unfortunately, rule of cool conflicting with basic common sense isn't exactly rare in games. In the light of this, it is perhaps not so bad that there are no consequences attached. I can pretend it's all gameplay, pretend it does not exist. I just made a new Great Old One Warlock, the only kind of character I can envision who might conceivably be mad enough for this, but I doubt I'll be able to do it even with him.

I could have *sworn* at some point the devs said you'd have multiple paths to getting your mindflayer tadpole removed, and that keeping it was an *option*

Very disappointed that it just turned into a gimmick.

See this is an example of being hyperbolic. NONE of your choices matter? In the entire game? Or is "this choice has less consequence than you would have liked" a possibly more reasonable response?

Which is it? Because I can see plenty of situations where your choices 100% matter.

Does not agreeing with a design choice always result in "The game is ruined everyone go home" response?

I am playing a character that doesn't want a foreign entity in my head. I am going to not put more in there and I am going to continually look for ways to get rid of the thing and not use it. What other people do is not my concern, nor do I expect them to be "punished" in some way for those choices.

I don't expect any reward for what I am doing - because how could I do otherwise?

I am acting from the idea that "A character's actions must flow inexorably from his or her established traits." from the Dictates of Poetics by T'Hain of Vulcan.

However, I am mindful that subversion of self is a part of this game as well. So use of the tadpole may result in subversion that isn't immediately obvious until the game is fully explored.

Next time maybe I will play some character that has a fetish for putting alien organisms in his/her head or whatever...

You keep talking about reward as if people are asking for a pat on the head for being good. I'd be thrilled if the game simply said "You consistently rejected the tadpole, and therefore blah blah blah, etc". Is that too much to ask? Am I being entitled to want the narrative to "reward" me for acting a very specific way to a central plot point? Because as it is, the game is acting as if I already accepted the tadpole, and now am "ready" to evolve further because of my previous use of the tadpole (that NEVER happened).

There are a ton of narrative moments like this in the game, where they essentially decide how you feel and what you've already done. Your reaction to the guardian is a huge one. I won't spoil it here, but consistently rejecting them still leads to the narrator pretending as if the two of you have been allies before any sort of reveal on their real agenda.

I put a tadpole in my brain but didn't pick any powers yet because I want to look up a guide first to pick the right ones I want, will look into that now.

Isn't this railroading?

I truly cannot understand how anyone who believes in what an RPG is supposed to be about can look at all of this and still consider BG3 to have good RPG storytelling and writing.

There definitely is some railroading, dialogue choices that are basically all implying that you're working together (although that can get walked back later), etc, some forced cutscenes even when you specifically say "yea, i'm out of here" (Act 3), but there's also an extreme amount of choice as well. You're able to simply end your game when you want with one choice, purposely choose to ignore an obvious "this isn't a good idea" moment and go ahead with a certain choice (the game warns you three times), etc. Oh, one more thing, the game basically forces you to use the tadpole for companion quests as well if you want to know what's up with them. There are moments where "they want you to see this memory" and the tadpole is obviously the medium through which you're able to share that, so using the tadpole in that way is considered just part of normal gameplay, and using the extra tadpoles is something more, etc.

Honestly, it's very similar to Cyberpunk 2077, there are certain plot points that the game simply needs to have, and so you're forced down that path to some degree.

I haven't finished the game completely yet, so maybe there is an ending where the person that didn't use the tadpole a single time is able to get a separate ending, but from where I see everything going, and Act 3 reveals, it's just not a thing. I mean, in a way, I get it. They didn't want to lock people out of a specific ending based on a single decisions to save SH in the tutorial. Can you imagine? "Uh, so I'm locked out of the real ending because I saved her?" Wrath of the Righteous has a secret ending that has stuff like that, it's basically impossible to find it without a guide. Maybe that sort of ending is here as well, but knowing Larian? It's not.

That is not true or we would all be dead now.

The world does REWARD you by letting you live, that is why history developed as it has. The GLOBAL collective of humanity does not want to die...

So joining pagan religions help with not dying, but then pagan's kill pagans. So we invent bigger religions and say you mostly can't kill others of our religion, but that still left us with killing other religions, so now the world is again evolving into one without religion as a major factor.

We created kingdoms because it was better than not having kingdoms in preventing death, we killed those kings when they stopped being useful or the smart ones gave up their one person rule, so we get democracies.

It's always about not DYING.. This is the voice of the many that control the flow of history. Your REWARDED for supporting the less people killed philosophies, by not getting killed. The only reason you get bad people is if that person is broken, because it's just not an EVOLUTIONARY survival strategy to be bad.

While this information obviously won't make any difference to you now, in case anyone else is reading this thread - if you never consume tadpoles, those dialogue popups to try and convince the others to use powers don't pop up. Beyond trying out what the Illithid powers were the very first time they popped up in conversation, i haven't used them or eaten any tadpoles, and I've not had any conversations options with allies regarding tadpoles except for us all to commiserate that having parasites in our brain isn't fun.
And if you use Lae'zel in the Creche area you described, you can choose to
I started playing this after the first patch, so I don't know if those story points were added in with that and were actually missing when you played

It may also make a difference that I'm playing Lae'zel as my main, not sure if there are subtle changes based on who you pick

I get your position on this but it is not looking at the lore or the characters. A Wizard, bent on gathering as much power as he can would embrace the Tadpole and seek to bend it to his will. As might others. However a Cleric or a Paladin with a "good" bend would resist it at all costs. The Tadpole is part of a plan to create a new (false) God and this would be opposed. BTW this little tibit is revealed EARLY in Act 1 before the pressure to strengthen the worm comes into play.

Further consider that the purpose of the worm is the rape you of your body and mind, forcibly take away your freewill. There is more that disgust at plan for many people.

I do agree with some of the comments here, the worm changes feel like they are last minute. There is no alternative, it feels forced, almost on rails to a specific direction. If they had given you options to cure yourself, or consequences to using the power or not, then I would say it was a solid plot tool. As it stands, when you reach end game, the entire mechanic feels contrived and forced in at the last minute.

I'll say this, not only did intimidating
But you can gorge yourself on every tadpole and never violate your Paladin Oath.

Late into the party but yea, it doesnt matter whatsoever.
The only instance where there is an acknowledgement to this is at the begining of act 3 when Emperror offers you the astral tadpole, if you have used the tadpole powers to a certain extent (not sure how many or how much) you have to pass a wisdom check to not turn into half mindflayer. Not really sure why that would make it harder to refuse him but regardless, thats it. At one point if you piss Emperror off he goes on a rant telling you how we are his puppets and he can make us do anything, but nothing ever comes of it and its never acknowledged again so I guess he was bsing.

Honestly as much as I love the game, it has its flaws and upon further replay a lot of the story and character motivation is very wobly and iffy. Its mentioned in other threads that this is likely due to the rewrites with Daisy and Emperror but how knows, in either case its clear that the tadpole powers gameplay feature was put to the forefront so that players can engage it freely without any fear of reprocussions, gameplay or storywise, which is imo just a bad call from Larian, it should be a roleplay decision, not a gameplay one and players should just be able to chose if they wish to make it harder on themselves and stick to their moral high ground, or take any advantage they can get and take the powers.