Originally Posted by Ceci
Originally Posted by Zenith
The worst part is
how easily he joins the Netherbrain as a willing slave out of nowhere, it's nonsensical. Throughout the entire story his main prerogative is always to manipulate others to assure his freedom and continued evolution. He is even horrified when the elder brain reveals she purposely freed him so he could bait us to bring the stones to her. And then instead of seizing the opportunity to wield Orpheus against the brain if we choose to free him, since Orpheus knows an illithid is require to use the stones against it, he decides he's going to become a thrall to the brain and die fighting you instead.

The endings are so bad because it's obvious they ran out of time and had to cut so much content out of the last Act and cobble together an ending to get for release. All the talk of agency and working up factions and defeating the Chosen only to get the Mass Effect 3 treatment of pick your three colors of the same outcome, someone has to become Illithid in the end when you could have just gotten the Emperor to use the stones while Orpheus protects you from the brain's mental assault.

I'm not too far in Act 3, but I figured that the Emperor
sided with the Netherbrain because if you free Orpheus was freed, he'd no longer have the ability to resist becoming a thrall again. So he wouldn't have a choice.
I'm probably too new to Act 3 to be anything other than naďve though. Right now, I'm getting pretty turned around with plot twists and accidentally triggering major events that I don't think my team is ready to handle.
Orin kidnaps someone and we have to rescue them. I have a feeling we're not quite ready to Orin yet because I literally *just* found Shares's caress and elfsong tavern and got the option to accept Raphael's deal.

Emperor


Orpheus still needs an Illithid for the stones, and letting the Emperor wield them would spare him having to become an Illithid himself, allowing him to go fight Vlaakith with his kin. So he would protect the Emperor from Thralldom.

Orin and Raphael


As for Orin kidnapping an ally, as long as you don't approach the temple of bhaal or the murder tribunal, your ally is safe. In fact, Orin is a far easier fight then Gortash, which is puzzling because the game really wants to push you to kill Gortash first but he's a way harder fight due to his gadget mechanics. I actually had an easier time killing a 666 HP Raphael in House of Hope than I did 220 HP Gortash because the Gortash area places you in permanent turn based combat even after you clear the Bainites in the main hall, you have to just use up turns to walk to his room on the second floor. What's worse, the mine launchers are bugged and will throw mines that when exploding do 70-120 damage, and these mines are thrown even during your character's turn, so you can end up using an action, then a mine launcher tosses a grenade on you but you can't pick it up and throw it back as you just used an action, so the next turn is for the mine and it one shots your character.

Gortash's abilities are also really strong, he gains a reflective shield, magic resistance, incredibly high AC so you miss a lot of attacks, some of these buffs are tied to gadgets on the walls you need to destroy, but they placed the Sturdy condition on them so you can't use cantrips or normal autoattacks, only lightning spells or throwing a mine to really kill them. Meanwhile Gortash is doing multiattacks for 20-30 damage and line aoes for 20-30 damage while his gadgets are pelting you with mines. His gadgets and auras also give him 40 HP temporary hitpoints frequently.

Last edited by Zenith; 28/08/23 06:32 PM.