Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Story & Character Discussion [END SPOILS WARNING] Addressing Karlach (PLEASE PUT SPOILERS IN TAGS)

I bought this game because of Karlach specifically. Was so excited to go on an adventure with her and come out of it swinging. But I can never get that chance because the game won't let me.

In a game that was advertised as one where you craft your own fate through your own actions, I should be able to find some way out of her predicament.

This idea that only having a "tragic ending" for her is fine as a narrative vision makes no sense.

Her goal in the story is to escape enslavement, yet that is not possible while that engine is still inside her, because it is constantly anchoring her to her slavers. Her arc can never be completed because of it. That's not up for debate, and it's not a matter of "vision". That's just the logical sequence of her story.

If you wish to tell the story of a slave who seeks to escape enslavement but fails, there needs to be a different setup for that. You'd need plenty of hints throughout her story that escape is futile -- that every avenue that should be open to her somehow isn't. And those justifications need to be good and convincing.

However, I fail to see how doing that is even plausible given all of what the other characters have been able to pull off in their stories.

I truly hope you host D&D campaigns, because dayumn! You should've been on the writing staff for this game!

I do have one campaign going on with a couple of friends, but we're all novices.

The writers of the game are clearly talented people who know what needs to be done much better than I do. For all we know, this was out of their hands.

I just hope the developers understand the importance of rectifying this situation.

As someone with cardiac issues, I identified a lot with Karlach.

I don't need Larian to tell me my only two options are death or living hell. I already know, thank you.

I do not host anything, I just tried to expand her story upon general theme of this game of Personality VS Power, which Larians themselves forgot about in Act 3. It starts with Illithid abilities, usage of which shoud "take something of you". You surrender your sense of self and your higher need such as love, recognition and social links for more power to fuel your basic needs such as hunger and survival. You can refuse this power and remain what you are and stay true to your dreams OR you can surrender yourself and become something greater, an apex predator among intelligent speciec though forever chained to your bottomless urge to consume others mind and slowly lose yourself to this hunger. This is what being Illithid means.

(well, actually you do not transform into one, you just die and larvae takes over your body and memories. That's why the soul isn't there - it leaves the body with the death of a host, larvae just thinks of itself as the person it just ate because it starts its life with host's memories)

Astarion can ascend but complete lose himself, drunk in the sea of new possibilities and his cravings for domination. SH is already lost herself, you can help her recover. Laezel doesn't have a sense of self until she denies her supposed goddess, until then she bootlicks her society's hierarchy for a chance of recognition and power. Minthara lost herself in the cult and can be recovered, but her questline is even more barebones than Karlach's. Gale and Wyll are just 'sinners' that now reap what they saw, I dont see this theme in their story. But they still have much more agency in the events of the game than Karlach. What I'm saying is that Karlach doesn't gain any transformation of character, she doesn't evolve nor learns anything other than accepting her fate which is not a theme suitable for full fledged companion I think. I can be there, but there should be more for a character then, otherwise its bland.

Thank you for your input. This isn't about you.

Yeah, the Forums are always bursting at the seams. This thread alone exploded since more people reached the end, the new epilogue and PS5 release.

The impotent part is you made time to think of me ??

Why is this guy still in here trying his hardest to defend the current endings? Its so incredible selfish trying to block 1 EXTRA endings from anyone else that wants it just because you like the "bittersweet tragedy".

"Not everyone gets a happy ending in real life too" Yea, not shit sherlock. We dont have magic power and gods in real life too, so how does this logic even transfer? First you say "its just a game bro" but then you compare it with real life stuff as well?

How about you make up your mind, I mean I already know you're just here for the trolling, but I'm still curious

I think we might need moderators in here to deal with this Raz415 person. His behavior is a recurring problem.

They are already in here, but apparently its only 1 side getting warnings from the mods, I guess being an obvious troll is fair play

Troll or no, he kind of has a point though, in general that is.

Its really sad and I feel for anyone having heart issues, Trauma, or who gets stung by seeing certain events which might remind one of a bad memory, experience etc. I have a couple myself.

BUT, blaming a game and its developer set in a fantasy d&d setting for you reliving that, just isn't fair, period.

If every movie, game, book, play, comedian etc. had to cater to every persons health issues, trauma, personal beliefs, identity, experiences and so on, we would live in a really boring world, and very few interesting story arcs, villains, heroes, stories overcoming/coming to terms with adversity, conflict, character progression etc etc etc. would remain to us.

Its ok feeling hurt, and I can sympathize. However playing the victim card as one among the 0.0001% of the audience, isn't imo. Theres far too much of it going around.

Im not targeting anyone in particular with this, just a bit tired of these stabs at Larian from people who play the victim card, when its pretty obvious there are no bad intentions from Larian.
This goes for society at large as well.

PS: Karlach isnt going to Hell in the same sense as in religious RL, her soul has not been bought nor is it owned. If/when she dies, she will go through the same process every person in D&D Forgotten Realms go through. Having fought Devils and Demons and basically helped save the sword coast, she would easily be picked up by one of the "Good aligned deities. Im sure Tyr would like her, she got rid of impostor Paladins of Tyr. . Mystra might even take her, Lathander the broken god would sympathize with her. She certainly fits with Helm, and I could go on...

Still, in a game where basically everyone can have happy ending or at least semi happy, only one character being locked out of it (despite her problem being quite easy to fix lorewise with many different options to do so) is a very poor and distasteful writing. Plus "real life" argument. Yeah, I always like to be listen about realism and real life in a game where I try to get Cthulhu out of my head, take part in a space war and literal divine interventions happen on daily basis. Very realistic all of that. And it's not like the premise of d&d is having fun and bending the rules as much as GM allows you, we totally need grimderp forced tragedy for ONLY one companion

Okay so since I just joined, let's list obvious problems current ending has, and why it's a terrible tragedy.
Dammon - he promised to figure something out, turns out he just can't, wow peak story telling. Why can't enriched infernal iron do the trick?
Gondians - why aren't we allowed to at least try?
Steel Watch - again, why aren't we allowed to at least try?
Divine intervention - how many gods can we ask for a favor? Does gods hate tiefliengs or something?
Mizora - they know each other and she kinda... Oh I don't know is known for making pacts with people? Why can't I make a pact to save Karlach? Also it would add some edge to the good ending.

Saying all that, people should realize this is NOT a good tragedy. There's this really old anime Chrno Crusade, and from the start you're told the main character has a pocketwatch that basically gives power at the cost of her life. That's it, no chances, no ways to restore her life, no way of getting the power differently. And she's desperate to save her brother, so you know this won't end well. With Karlach we get cheap hope baiting through the entire game, only to never be allowed to even try when solution is right in front of us.

If you follow D&D lore you should be happy you didn't end up have to chase down soul coins to even keep Karlach function at all. Imagine she would need one for each long rest or end up shut down.

If they would help at the end, why not? If we got an ending when she doesn't have to go back to hell but needs help with finding soul coins, and you would just go into the world to search for them, why not? Also I listed many arguments why the potential soul coin ending is not good either. And what's sad, it still would make more sense than the current one

Infernal engines is fueled by the souls of mortals. Like, lets take BitterSchizo, we squeeze out his soul and transform him into a soul coin... Now we put this soul coin into Karlach like a slot machine, and she work for another day... So lorewise, if you convince Karlach to have her return to Avernus, her life would be dependant on keep be fueled by souls of mortals. You can have her turn into a squid and crave brains in stead. ;p

Or you can use one of the billions ways I listed, and you didn't even care to read to fix or remove the damn thing.

Finally I was able to register here...
First of all, I want to say that I understand people who liked this "ending that it deserves". Ignoring the fact that this scene should have been in the game from the very beginning... Karlach's last words in Baldur's Gate 3 before patch 2 were "Okay. okay. But we need to leave. Immediately!" which most likely was not pleasant to all those who really liked Karlach and, moreover, built a romantic relationship with her.
But at the moment, the main problem is that for some reason, EXACTLY Karlach is the ONLY one who DOES NOT HAVE a good ending. It seems to me very dishonest to people who really got into the character and were willing to do ALL THE POSSIBLE to help her fulfill her simple human dream - to live in her hometown with her friends and the person she loves. I REALLY want to believe that Larian is REALLY listening to her fans (and Karlach's fans are definitely no less than Minthara's already) and will give us the opportunity to REALLY HELP Karlach in Act 3. Because at the moment we are doing ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to help her in Act 3 ...Like Dammon.
That's why we Karlach fans are still fighting for her happiness.
JUSTICE 4 KARLACH!

How about that? We can accept the avernus ending if they address why every other way of saving her doesn't work. And I mean EVERY single one of them. If I have to choose the worst outcome I want to know why. How does that sound? Tell us why we can't do anything else and we will accept this. But let's be honest, at this point this would be no explanation, but mental flips about why certain character can't have a good ending. Come on it's DnD there's no such a thing as "impossible", that's the point