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

Yet there are people who will claim how good the tragic ending is, despite having tons of ways to easly fix the issue. Good to have one more voice with us

Thanks! I really hope it gets the attention deserved.

All I can say to that is looking at their track record in the gaming industry they have shown that they do care, so like all of you I will still be calling for a better outcome/added content for karlach because they have shown in previous games that they take this feedback seriously.

now if definative edition releases and theres no change. Or if they announce they are done with karlachs story after no other changes are made. then ill say they didnt care. but until then JUSTICE FOR KARLACH

It kinda feels like they are ignoring us. They have yet to even address the fuck up with the tweet "She is getting the ending she deserves". Because that tweet just gives us the idea that they consider her true ending to be going back to hell forever. I know Larian is tight lip when talking about their next patches and stuff like that but they could have at least have addressed that fuck up. The community went into rage and even now there are groups that are meeting up on discord planning to take action if nothing changes and yet Larian does not say anything to calm all this rage.

Maybe they are still not sure, how they will rework her story, so they don't want to tell (promise) things via official channels. I do hope for DE in the future, especially because how they've updated DOS2 in DE according feedback from players. This could be our lead for the future, of course all of it are only our speculations.

The track record doesn't mean anything these days. Do I have to remind you what happened to Bioware? Plus, right now it's obvious they are doubling down on the "muh tragedy" ending and go out of their way to justify why we can't use any of the 20 ways of fixing her (in the worst possible way mind you)

I know that a lot of people have anxiety about them keeping Karlach's ending the way it is (I certainly do), but I really do feel like they're going to fix it. Let's for a moment take a look at what we know so far:

-Karlach was the last origin character to be added, and so naturally has the least developed story.

-Act 3 in general is kind of a mess even if you ignore Karlach's ending.

-Larian both has a history of incorporating player feedback, AND has gone back and improved character endings before based on player feedback in their previous game (Beast's questline and Fane's ending).

-Larian's incorporation of player feedback is the cornerstone of its business model, so suddenly ignoring it would be a strange move.

-Despite it being listed on the frequently requested feedback list, a new discord thread asking for a better Karlach ending pops up about once a day, and is usually one of the top upvoted posts of that day. In addition, this thread is the biggest on the site, and it's not even really close.

-Larian has straight up come out and said they aren't done with the game yet, and are currently working on epilogues for the other characters.

-We already know they called all of the VA's back in, according to both the VA's themselves and the company.

-There are numerous breadcrumbs in Act 3 that pretty clearly point to a possible good ending for Karlach, that for whatever reason didn't make it into the final game (enriched infernal iron, the Gondians existence and dialogue, Gortash being a major antagonist, the House of Hope, etc.).

-Larian has a history of being tight lipped about what they're working on, so it's not really surprising they haven't said anything about it.

-The only real evidence that we have of Larian "doubling down" is a vague PR statement that is open to interpretation, and a few lines of new dialogue.

-It's literally only been 42 days since launch, it hasn't even launched on Xbox or Macs yet, we're still pretty early in the development cycle.

Maybe I'm just huffing copium of am overly optimistic or whatever, but I feel like all of these things taken together add up to a happy ending for us. I'm certainly extremely anxious about it just like all of you (since I check this infernal website several times an hour), but I really do think it's all going to be okay.

Even if they dont want to announce anything, they could at least apologize for the way they worded that statement. Jesus it was just baiting at this point.

Were just going to have to agree to disagree my friend, im as frustrated as you are- trust me- but i just dont see patch 2 as them doubling down. I personally believe it was a bandaid solution that they did. With admitedly very poorly worded PR. With it being the ending * she deserves* a big hard pass from me Larian. But again i appcriate the effort they did to get that out as fast as they did.
And in regards to bioware (RIP) they were bought out by -they who shall not be named-

All we can do is stay active on this thread and other media accounts and let them know what we want to see in the near future

Full heartedly agree. Its to early to be doom and gloom, lots of possibilities and potential just keep reminding them.

My personal * reach for the stars* concept is we find a way to give her back a REAL heart. And oossibly get wyll back to his old self. So larian hope your reading this !

The problem is that they literally stated this is "new ending she deserves", called back voice actors, added a cutscene and new dialogues through act 2 and 3 ONLY to try to justify their dumb decision about not being able to fix her despite obvious clues that it should be possible. If they actually didn't double down and took the feedback, why not use all these resources to add one quest and dialogue about fixing her?

Look man, I've tried to explain it to you like 5 times now. It's been way too short of a timeframe for them to add what you want. If you want to be angry at Larian fine but I'm not having this argument anymore.

Another few things that bothers the shit out of me with Karlachs endings:

1) Her endings are decided by a dialog click in the last 30 seconds of the game

2) Her quests, aside from being shallow, literally don't matter to the ending. Die or go to hell.

3) Locking her out of a good ending locks me out of the endings I want if I don't romance her. I wanted to sacrifice myself as the Mindflayers and save everyone. That was my tragic endings but I can't HAVE that because if I die, Karlach fucking explodes.

Very frustrating.

Another few things that bother the shit out of me with Karlachs endings:

1) Her endings are decided by a dialog click in the last 30 seconds of the game

2) Her quests, aside from being shallow, literally don't matter to the ending. Die or go to hell.

3) Locking her out of a good ending lock me out of the endings I want if I don't romance her. I wanted to sacrifice myself as the Mindflayers and save everyone. That was my tragic endings, but I can't HAVE that because if I die, Karlach fucking explodes.

Very frustrating.

I’m playing as her right now, and another thing just I noticed is the lack of reactivity to her personal story.

For example, I just faced/met Gortash as Karlach, and though I could choose some dialogue options as her, ultimately, the story flow is the tav one. Which means that before entering the coronation hall Mizora is there to remind you about Wyll (and that this is a big moment for him), and after Karlach has to (very out of character-y) swallow Gortash’s deal and watch his ceremony in silence, Mizora is again outside to talk about how this affects Wyll.

The companions, if you talk to them afterwards, will have lines about Wyll and Mizora, and none about you/Karlach and the fact you just met your “nemesis” in the game.

It’s wild.

Also, the quest log updates you get after this “fateful meeting” are only about Wyll’s personal quest, completely overriding Karlach’s story.

I know this is likely due to production issues since she was added last, but DAMN, it feels like the game hates her. Everyone keeps ignoring her “big moments” in the story, then she either explodes and dies, or goes to hell to be hunted down for the rest of her days. Damn, Larian. What did Karlach ever do to you? Lol

I 100% agree with Nessius and couldn't have said it better myself. It's too early to draw conclusions, we have too little information about what's to come in the future, we end up borderline torturing ourselves. I also think that Karlach's new depressive lines shouldn't be used as evidence of Larian giving up on her story. She's not mentally unstable like some here claim (like when she's full of joy one minute and goes full doomer the minute after), it's her arc falling apart due to a band aid hotfix. This is why "adding just one simple quest" is not an option. If they were to add this "one simple fetch quest", her story will have even more inconsistencies and weird "unstable" moments and will completely fall apart. Give them time, jeez louise.

Also, dude, I don't think you are huffing copium. It's better to be optimistic while waiting for something than to be mad screaming into the abyss.

Yeah dude, it IS wild. I thought that playing as Karlach will "fill the void" because all my other playthroughs are on hold now but playing as Karlach Origin feels like playing as Tav with Karlach legendary skin. Stopped playing all together

Yes I totally agree they need time. To be honest if I see some official post from Larian about "we fixed Karlach" earlier than at least half year from now, I'm pretty sure it will be some quick easy solution and nobody here will be satisfied with it.

Yeah, that. Unless they've been working on said solution for a while now. It's a possibility too by the way. I mean they know that the game is not finished, maybe they had Karlach (and other stuff) in the works even before the release.

Exactly, game is not complete, this they know for sure, but of course they cannot say it directly one month after the official release and also with few platforms still unreleased.