Now as to the other 2...
Viconia's entire redemption arc hinges on Gorion's ward romancing her. You didn't romance her? She remains a neutral evil Sharran, if somehow softened a little bit. And yes, i took her on my neutral aligned BG1/2 runs. If I decide to replay BG1/2 one of these days I should finally swallow my pride (just like I did with Morrigan's romance in DAO) and make a male Gorion's ward to actually experience the romance everyone raves about. Also, iirc if you played an elf Viconia would automatically reject your advances, no? She only accepted humans and half-elves in the originals iirc.
In regards to the first of those two:
I don't think it really does hinge on romance. I always took Vic with me with my female Bhaalspawn playthroughs, and her character trajectory doesn't change much. She never struck me much as an actively cruel, vengeful, malicious etc character, unlike what you could say with characters like Korgan. Her faith was also very personal to her-she'll call you out for 'foolish' actions or advise you on certain courses of actions, but she never *preaches* her faith to you. I always got the feeling that her faith in Shar is more akin to the people who flock to Shar for solace and to forget their suffering rather than the fanatical sort of cult activitywe see it portrayed as in BG III.
Her unromanced ending has her doing good stuff as well. She adventures with Drizzt and fights a cult/criminal organization. She helps the surface elves of Suldanasser (sp)- and the queen (irenicus's ex from the second game) and her people honor her and accepts her among them as one of their own. It's true she starts and enclave in waterdeep, but it's clear she doesn't belong among them since they turn on her and it seems like it's left an open question whether she belongs among Shar's faithful at all, since she loses her favor in the goddess's eyes for killing herfollowers that turned on her.
But again, I don't know who's more to blame for these problems, WotC or Larian?
My feeling is that WoTC gave them a lot of leeway with the 'canon' of the game. There was even a statement back when WoTC had that whole 'canon' controversy where they called out the novels, video games, and IIRC BG III specifically as not being beholden to sticking to the same canon. I don't think WOTC particularly cared about those characters or gave specific dictates that required them to be written so.....poorly.
Much the same applies to Vicky, but if nothing else, her faith in Shar isn't without foundation and the player can at least choose to spare her. (Why they'd ever do so when she comes off as such a shallow, cruel, and abusive monster is another matter, but the chance to evade literal character assassination is greater grace than Sarevok got.) His was a fundamental mischaracterisation so staggering that I, like you, expected him to morph into a doppelganger upon death. But no, I guess that's just the sum of his character in this new canon: wasted potential, a stain on the floor. A massive disservice to what was, by ToB's end, a nuanced and engaging character who'd have been awesome to revisit in a story more faithful to what came before.[/spoiler]
Honestly, I think the scene where you
spare/kill her was setup with the writing on purpose to make vic as dislikeable as possible deliberately to make the option to kill her more cathartic and appealing even to good characters. Think about it-she's just gone on and on with her evil monologue wallowing in just how much she is devoted to evil and child abuse...shadowheart here may very well be your Love interest...it's set up to be more than a subtle nudge to take revenge on the lifelong tormentor of their loved one ( or close ally you have been playing alongside the entire game with, at the very least)
As for the second character
I'm hearing from some people they made Sarevok's granddaughter Orin the product of incest. That is so messed up. COmbined with how they rewrote his ending to be a one-note fanatic whose every other word is 'blood' or 'slaughter' and is described multiple times by both good and evil characters in terms of being a 'failure' and I'm finding it actively hard to believe that someone or someones in charge of the writing actively hated these two characters.
