Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Story & Character Discussion Shadowheart Romance and the Hidden Fetish - (Spoilers inside)

Good lord.

Truth be told I've only read 4 or 5 posts. I kept waiting for this thread to die but it seems to resurrect itself more often than Manshoon.

1. It's good that Larian listened to the fans. People wanted Halsin, they wanted Halsin to be romanceable and they got it. If just want Halsin to be a camp follower don't talk to him.

2. There are an infinite number of ways to approach polyamory. I have my own approach others have theirs. Poly is not a "fetish" approach to relationships. Some poly people are kinksters, some are not.

3. If you are dissatisfied with Halsin either ignore him or ask for more companions. I don't want to see him rewritten.

I can see Mizora being so full of herself that the idea of you not wanting her hasn't crossed her mind.

The Emperor should really know better, though.

Saying no to her was pretty satisfying not gonna lie

To me it's as simple as this: every character should be severely disappointed by any type of cheating. They've established this for all of them with the exception of Halsin and Halsin should be rewritten to have his romance start after he frees Thaniel and you convinced Oliver.

Mizora, drows, Emperor, Haarlep all should lead to a -50 approval at best, breakup at worst. You get a pleasurable scene (or some text in the case of drows), your love interest is pissed, what's not to be expected, they've all written to be mono by act 2 and by act 3 are very much yours and you theirs. Personal story choices determine the outcome of the romance otherwise, not these optional scenes, they should just anger them or cause them to break up with you.

I still don't really understand how all of this got a pass when the writing otherwise has been done so wonderfully.

My thoughts exactly. Now we just need wait until more people find out about this and get bummed out about it like us.

If you don't mind inconsistent writing that's fine, but others do. The knowledge that all of that is there is enough to ruin immersion and it's even worse for people who don't want Halsin to be a camp follower, but want to actually bring him along.

I mean this topic is more of a SH's inconsistency regarding Halsin, so. The main issue ppl have in this thread is Halsin/SH banter post skinny dip scene that would make sense when you romance both. Also weird Drow scene, which again would make sense if you romance both, but not solo SH.

Forgive but this must have been said already. How is she inconsistent? She's happy to either be poly or mono.

You can hint at a poly relationship at the wine sharing moment. From memory

Tav: "not wanting to share with others?"
Shadowheart: "Not right away"

Drow twins:

"I don't want our first time to be with others"

And the refusals make sense. "Wyll is a from a very traditional Baldurian family, I doubt they would be okay being introduced to their lover's lover"

"Something tells me that Lae'zel will not be willing to share"

She is willing to be a poly relationship with another poly person but the only other poly person Halsin so . . .

Don't talk to Halsin, don't hire the twins and it's not an issue

The problem is:

1. They didn't get someone romanceable, they got a fuck buddy instead.

2. Polyamory isn't explored much in media, so if all they show is ppl who are polyamorous as kinksters and nothing more, that's all ppl will see them as.

3. We literally can't tell Halsin to fuck off at the end of act 2. And ignoring problems doesn't solve them. I can never have Halsin in my party because he's too busy trying to sleep with my partner, which means I'll never get to know him further than that, because his horniness overshadows the rest of his character. I would have liked to be friends with Halsin, but most ppl won't tolerate someone trying to fuck their girlfriend. So that means his character is useless or outright antagonistic, for a lot of ppl. Why did they even bother spending money on creating him then?

So you read the line where she justifies it to herself, then ignore the followup line where she speaks the truth? She doesn't want to be your spare lover. That's the reason. She wants you all to herself. She's very happy if you tell her you'll break up with Wyll. Same idea with Lae'zel and all other companions. It's all her trying to be kind, because she wants you all for herself.

Nothing, and I repeat nothing, changes regarding Halsin.

The issue for people is that although they can avoid this on their playthrough, it is still a part of their characterisation. And in this case, if taken seriously, this characterisation shows that under certain circumstances Shadowheart would show great disrespect towards her romantic partner, her true love. In case of Halsin and twins for example, she would push for including Halsin and voice her fantasies about him, without making sure that her partner approves of it.

I guess I read it differently. The first being the truth and the second the balm for her heart.

It often causes conflict in a poly relationship when someone develops an interest in someone who is mono only and it's not unusual for someone to want to be the primary in a poly relationship. Yes, "spare lover" is a pretty dismissive way to refer someone who is a secondary in a relationship . . . Shadowheart has some rough edges.

https://www.lovingmorenonprofit.org/poly/hierarchy-in-polyamorous/

The whole poly thing should have been centered around Tav, not Halsin. The fact that its a Halsin thing is the entire problem, it screws up not only his character but other characters too. The companions should only be poly when Tav is poly.

Do you have a youtube link to that moment? I'll respond when I've viewed the scene.

And this is why it's all bad. Poly isn't simple. It requires serious consideration and a lot of dialogue to set up correctly. They did none of that. What they did is write every origin companion as mono, wrote dialogue to explain why they're mono, and that's where it ends.

That's why none of them are okay with having a poly relationship with each other. Or open relationship, for that matter. You don't get the choice to even ask for a compromise, it's mono or nothing. That, to me, in addition to the dialogue itself, is more than clear enough to prove that they're all mono.

Starts from 3:51. All of this can happen even if player rejected Halsin outright.

^- slap that link into a spoiler so it doesn't cover the entire screen.

Thanks!

Gosh. It seems a little silly but I don't think it's big change in her character.

Tav has to suggest hiring sex workers and then SH response is "well if we are going to involve others let's involve Halsin".


Again, she expressed openness to involving others at during the wine dialogue and if anything it seems consistent with a desire to be the primary in a poly relationship. She's happy to be with people who don't threaten her position at the top of the relationship hierarchy.

Thanks!

I'm quoting you more as a jumping point, most of this isn't directed at you. While that's generally become true of the topic there are definitely a couple people that have been very frequently vocal about how they they don't accept Shadowheart being read as anything but monogamous (I saw one person repeat that "we determined she's just monogamous and the rest isn't canon" several times even in other threads). The interactivity IS there and should remain there though, and I see a lot more fetishizing of that interactivity from the people calling it pornographic who can simply choose not to make the choices that trigger that content than I do from the game itself (barring Halsin's totally inappropriate interjections and the general state of his content in Act 3 which most people seem to all agree is very bad). The closest the game gets to pornographic is the Minthara goblin camp scene and that has entire other types of gratuitous fantasy fulfillment and moral problems tied into it (which is referring to a lot more than the grove stuff you have to do to get the scene). A scene being very sexual, or a character opening up about their sexual interests is simply not the same thing as being fetishistic or pornographic. This is true of movies too, lots of sexual content can be depicted without it being pornographic.

Being poly and sex involving more than two people in general are only fantasy fulfillment or a fetish for people that fantasize about it or fetishize it. They're otherwise kinda just normal things that can and do happen in real relationships and it's actually truly a nice thing that a game like this somewhat allows people to express that instead of the greater industry constantly shying away from that aspect of human life. It absolutely could have been better developed but the dev cycle ended up being what it is, so that's unfortunate. I've said before I don't read any inconsistency with Shadowheart's character and more specifically I think triggering some of those lines later in the game because you genuinely want your Tav to make those choices can and should change the context of how you understood things she's said prior the same way you'd do in real life when you learn more about a person you become close with, but specifically for that Tav. After all if you don't make those choices you don't learn those things so your read of the characterization won't have a reason to change, and simply knowing the content exists also should not change your read of the character, especially if you're never going to make those choices anyway. Sure, Shadowheart can absolutely be monogamous. But she can also be open to poly pending your choices and how an individual reads the results. There's a more involved discussion about characters being a little too malleable based on player choice and "show don't tell" (the game does show if you pursue it far enough so I don't understand that particular thing as an argument against it) but most of the time this stuff just won't be perfect and we have to be able to deal with that.

But nah Halsin in Act 3 absolutely needs a revamp, I just don't talk about it in this thread beyond that basic acknowledgement cuz the greater conversation about that already has its own thread.