Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Story & Character Discussion Please Larian, Rewrite or Delete [ACT 3 SPOILERS] (very long with spoilers)

If you play the Goblin path to recruit Minthara, then you're already down 2 other Origin companions and 1 non tadpoled companion.

If you follow the beats as presented during the second part of Act II there's a good chance you lose Jaheira and 2 camp followers as well, unless you're trying to thread the needle through meta or want to deny Shadowheart what seems to be her whole character arc up to that point. Also requires the Tav or Durge to ignore a direct command from a major god in the Pantheon of the Realms. This during a point in the story where Shar is breaking with Myrkul (normally an ally) and speaks directly to the player and to Shadowheart. All the other gods are communicating via their Chosen or lesser representatives, whereas Shar tells us point blank what she wants us to do. This puts the player in a pretty awkward position of ignoring a major god in the pantheon to trust... Aylin? Aylin who nobody has ever heard of before, who wasn't strong enough to avoid being imprisoned by Balthazar, who (for an Aasimar) doesn't even look all that trustworthy... like ok who's a smart villain going to pick on that one? heheh

I actually liked how they set things up with Shar a lot. If you're playing as a villain or even a Durge, killing the Nightsong gives you a clear motivation and puts you on a team in the divine conflict. Sure it's all wrapped up with Shadowheart, but it works for everyone. Minthara approves, so maybe she's now a Paladin of Shar too? You know "By my oath!" like her bark says hehe. The whole team can rock the dark Justiciar armor and then it gives that pathline more purhcase. This would have been great material for a final showdown with Lolth too, Viconia running interference there, in classic fashion. The Spider queen's vengeance! Maybe we're all together in that fight, and Viconia has to die so that Shadowheart can surive, but that would be fitting and much a more cathartic send off.

Anyway, point being, the payoff for all this 'darkness' in the early game should be that we get Viconia and Sarevok as options to recruit in Act III, to makeup for all the stuff we lost out on in Acts I and II. I don't really care if Viconia is normally Evil, since that was the majority of my playthroughs in BG1/2, but I want her in the party so that she can be part of the reward along that path. This would make more sense to me, that along one path we get Jaheira and Minsc along the other we get Viconia and Sarevok. And if there's a needle to thread maybe it's for a way to get Jaheira and Viconia both back together along a more neutral-ish path. Perhaps if Shadowheart is blond we get another angle on it, sure, but I think that would have been a nice treatment. Anything that stops short of Viconia's recruitment into the party is going to feel like a tease and a bummer for me.

Ps. Even though I suggested the doppelganger option in the other thread as a way for the player to telegraph their displeasure and sidestep the issue, I don't think Larian can really delete stuff at this point. The game is already out. It exists in the world now. At this point they can only add, not subtract or change. Keep the default path, but include more options if they player pushes back on it. All this could probably be handled with a dialogue branch that actually branched, once the big reveal happens. Let the player tell the game what they're after via initial dialogue prompts, and then have the subsequent character presentation key off that, so we can get a thumb on the scale there.

This is still my favorite visualization for Viconia...


https://www.artstation.com/artwork/eawONX

But the BG3 default is pretty cool too... and I love the VA!





Just let us hold the reigns here, with a way to get her back into the fold again, and I'd be very happy. Then we can do our own mini-rewrites via gameplay and have the just deserts we're after. Let the player do the heavy lifting on that one, just add another branch or two.