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

So after a month of not touching my main playthrough I finally gathered enough courage to load it up and go try the final Gortash mission. "How bad can it be?" I thought, naively. Was so distraught, I couldn't remember how to get to Orin so I just exited the game. Larian PLEASE I beg you, I can take this. I WANT to finish the game and see the grand finale but I can't. I was so hype for the final showdown but now I don't even care and it's killing me. I love this game and I want to enjoy it's ending the way it deserves but I just don't. It feels empty. There is no good ending for Karlach and therefore no good ending for my Tav so why even bother? I don't have enough will to live to soldier trough this heartbreak and then be left with the feeling of hollow nothingness.

(we're spoilering a post-killing-Gortash scene if anyone needs an indication to click or not to click)

I mean, how does she upgrade the engine right now? She just stands there and presses the iron to her chest, lol. Technicalities like that don't need explanations in a fantasy world (especially one as ridiculous as D&D's). But if they do want to explain it, there are a million ways to do it because it's a fantasy world with very few rules.

There is no need for acceptance in the world of D&D. Literally anything is possible.

Fucking for real. We just casually walk into the most powerful wizard in the universe on some random road but Larian is like "Yeah, Karlachs engine is like... Old or something i dunno rofl time to die"

Yes, these are examples of ways to explain the process, what it could look like and what challenges are involved during a potential questline addition. They need to be present, it gives substance to the questline itself. Her problem is addressed as critical and cannot be easily fixed after the two upgrades, so it could be parts other than external to the engine and rather internal.

No plug and play option like the first two upgrades. Her questline starting with two fetch quests should end with something more engaging. Her overall story comes off as neglected, adding content to fix her by sticking to the current theme she's been subjected seems like a waste.

Yeah she's facing imminent death and nobody bothers to even try to do something. Wow peak writing, so much drama

Let me remind you that if she’s the main character she either Again, completely ALONE.

What the actual f*ck. I heard she’d get more time to say farewell to the companions or something before the end as main character but I haven’t seen any of that.

I am shocked and horrified. Wth, Larian?

They just rushed the release. We still do not know the reason for the postponement from August 31 to August 3. And our beloved Karlach, alas, became a victim of this haste. Perhaps they just didn’t think that she would become so popular and that her story, even in unfinished form, would touch our hearts so much. I would like to hope that Larian will pay attention to us in the community update before Patch 3. If they truly listen to the community.

I'm gonna be honest. I'm doomering hard right now.

I think the writers just fell in love with the devil-cancer tragic story and are just choosing to willfully ignore any potholes or possible solutions.

The have author brain and just going to refuse to change it because they think copy pasting the fault in our stars was actually a good idea.

I'm also starting to lean towards this option. It is possible that the main writer Larian thought that taking away any opportunity to get a good ending for the most cheerful and pleasant character in the game is a good idea and that this is a “good tragedy” and the very “hope that kills”. In my opinion, this is simply selfishness and disrespect for the people who constantly kept Karlach close to them and were ready to do everything to ensure that her story ended well

It's too early to be despairing about this. Larian has rewritten past character stories after fan outcry, they can (and I believe they will) do it again.

You're gonna want to temper this hope a little bit. It's fully worth hoping that they listen and update at least the Act 3 portion of her personal questline considering how you find experts other than Dammon and the next tier of Infernal metal already in the game that is obviously supposed to be the next step in the quest that never happens which would logically lead to a better outcome. However before Patch 3 is just way too soon. It's clear the quest is in this state because they didn't finish making the content for it so they'd need the time to write it, voice it, program it, all that. If we're lucky the soonest I'd hope for it is before spring next year.

I still don't understand why people are talking about writers and that they like "tragic stories" and so on. Please understand one thing. Her story is not completely implemented into the game (probably combination of major bugs, plot holes, narrative issues) and basically her "Infernal engine" questline is completely empty in act3. Writers can write everything they want, but if it is not implemented into the game, they cannot do anything with it. Patch 2 hotfix uses the easiest way how to improve things in such a short time and without much work. One added cutscene and few added lines of text in every act didn't bring new ending or new quest, just polished a little bit the "best possible ending" we currently have available. Writers could already have a masterpiece story with good ending prepared, but there was no way, how this could be implemented in such a short time period after release.

I'm gonna take a step back and be baffled how bg3 recieved such high scores based on act 1 alone despite the frustration the community suffers because of pathetic state of Mithara, Karlach, act 3 coherency and ME3 style ending. This is EA 2.0, I'm gonna step away until they actually finish their story in a year or two, given if they actually bother at all since there are no announcements about eventual Karlach story refactoring nor roadmap.

I stand by my previous point that current Karlach content is boring sobby shit, she has the potential to walk the "upgrade her engine to the moon and decide what to do with newfound power (vengeance/adventure)" path which correlates with general power vs personality theme of the game. If they stand by their cringe sob story which seems to be the case given their late additions to her dialogue after release then I can safely conclude that they successfully emulated the most unpleasant and fun-hating DM I ever met.

Very well said my friend! But you know... I've been following the story and development of Larian for a long time, and since Divinity 2, as a rule, they ALWAYS release a release version with a huge amount of cut or simply unfinished content. But in the case of Divinity 2, they were rushed by the publisher and were forced to cut content in order to meet the scheduled release date. It was the same story with Original Shin 1 and 2, they constantly cut out some content to bring it back in the Definitive Edition. But I don’t quite understand why they were in a hurry in the case of Baldur’s Gate 3... Perhaps they really didn’t want to compete with Starfield.

But I would also be very glad to see the development roadmap for Baldurs Gate 3. Definitely with the development and completion of Act 3 and the Karlach quest line or just simple adding a NEW ending for her.

Sorry about that!

Don't cry, don't beg, don't drown yourself in the despair. Prayers to the soulless corporation won't help anyone, we have to do it yourselves

I feel like if a real 'doing it yourself' effort is happening then you'll have better luck with finding it on some modding server, not on a discussion-centered thread...

But I also think it's better to wait till definitive edition or some other indicator of "this is how it's gonna be, no more changes ever" before taking on some big story-changing projects. That's a lot of work, would be a shame to waste time figuring it all out only to have official changes come. (Not to mention, do modders even HAVE tools that powerful as of now, for BG3 in particular? Current selection of mods and struggles with implementing story-related stuff tells me they probably don't.)

Can't understand people already burning bridges less than two months in just because developers aren't willing to share a roadmap (good damn practice if they don't want to produce rushed content). Door to Bhaal's Temple mistook my Tav for a Dark Urge couple of days ago, there's plenty of stuff for them to fix and iron out besides adding new content.

(plus, tbh, seeing how wildly some of us differ in WHAT we want to see done in particular and what is or isn't ooc - good damn luck just winging that 'perfect fix')