Originally Posted by Milkfred
Originally Posted by Dagless
Originally Posted by Milkfred
The Emperor took the place of a character referred to as "Daisy" in Early Access. Daisy was very likely to have been The Absolute and, seemingly, Orpheus in a sort of 'devil and angel on your shoulder' situation. Daisy came to each origin character as their own unique person (Vlaakith, Cazador, Mystra, etc.) and tempted them to take the tadpole powers. Therefore, it's likely that siding against the Absolute and facing your nightmares/beloved atop the Elder Brain was likely a big part of the climax from early in the development process. When Daisy was scrapped very late in development, and the Emperor put in their place with a drastically different motivation and storyline, Larian was still too married to the concept of a dream visitor and an epic confrontation with them.

What makes you think Daisy was scrapped very late in development? They could have rewritten all that years ago and just never removed her from the early access build so the Guardian would be something new for people who played EA. They may have never fully developed Daisy's role at all, she might just have been a placeholder for a rough idea they had. We just don't know when they decided on the Guardian/Emperor story, but I'd guess they didn't cobble together all the dialogues, plot points and cut scenes together at the last minute.

Everyone still has dream visits from the Guardian who probably appears to them differently, even if they were no longer Vlaakith, Mystra, etc.

The first point is that only Daisy appears, and is described, in the artbook. No Guardian, no Emperor.

The second is that the Guardian is basically incoherent and acts more as a plot device than character.

The third is that they composed music that only really functions with Daisy ("Down by the River") and has zero relevance to the Guardian/Emperor.

The fourth is that there's virtually no reactivity to the Guardian or the Emperor and what is there isn't well integrated (such as deciding to kill them for... Vlaakith...?)

The fifth is that the Guardian inherits a lot of baggage from the Daisy concept ("dream waifu") despite that baggage actively working against the new concept and role.

The sixth is that the Guardian does not appear differently. You can see this in the final battle where four identical Guardians appear and your companions will remark along the lines of "There! The person from my dreams."

The seventh is that there was extensive content datamined throughout EA that indicated a vastly different role for the dream visitor, none of which corresponds to the Guardian. This was being added, I believe, twelve months out from release.

The eighth is that the Emperor's actual role as Gortash's prime henchman and even the one who seemingly tadpoled the player is basically both convoluted and unimportant to the plot.

I suspect the change was made about twelve months out (or less!) and the Emperor was hastily shoved into the role occupied by Daisy.

OK, thanks.

The art book and datamined content certainly sound reasonable points, if they were actually adding more to the character. Some of the other ones a bit more debatable, but I’m not going to nitpick. Starting on the change about a year ago doesn’t sound unrealistic either.

Last edited by Dagless; 29/08/23 11:33 AM.