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

Calm down, please. We're trying to get this thread back on track.

That harsh reality shouldn't have to be "Avernus or die". It should have the option to become "Avernus or <negative impact on life but at least remain on Faerun, alive>". Other companions with the exception of Gale (who has one positive outcome) all have tragic outcomes, but they all have the opportunity of healing. The closest you could headcanon for healing for Karlach is finding an infernal smith in Avernus who can fix her up, but it's never implied that'll happen.

This, pretty much. When I saw the room with Shadowheart's parents and the Mirror of Loss in the back, my heart sank pretty heavily. I thought the only two options I would get is let them rot and keep Shadowheart, or save them but have her use the Mirror of Loss to forget everything and thus lose her. If that were her endings, I'd have rioted until the internet ran out of bandwidth. Instead, the endings still have heavy impact on her, but at least you don't feel as defeated as you do with Karlach's current endings.

Cool, lets go back to repeating the same thing over and over again just like you have been doing for the past 2 months

Did we like. Try though? Was there a single dialogue option to ask a single Gondian? There's one line from a Steel Watcher about an old model and being dismantled, but do we, like, pursue that lead at all? Or do we take what a tin can said on face value? Sure, maybe they couldn't help, but how does our character know that? They can't ask ONCE. Like, respectfully, surely you can see the difference between "tried that option and it didn't work" (like with Dammon) and "didn't try at all".

Also, while I understand your general point in regards to the value of such stories, can we not pretend that V's "spent a whole game chasing leads, asked multiple different experts and organizations, got into multiple side-quests for the sheer promise of survival, and even so ended up with multiple endings, one of which sees them fleeing from their place of trauma permanently with a hopeful open ending and one of which now actually cures them, just with a heavy price to pay" is in any way comparable to "directly asked only one person and when he couldn't perform a miracle immediately just gave up, leaving only death and trauma central as options". That's like Cyberpunk being fixed into Arasaka and suicide endings only, regardless of what you did during the game.

There would be twice less complaints about Karlach if we could try like half as hard for her as V tries for themselves. (Obviously Karlach is not the main character and in that regard V's storyline is much more akin to Tav looking to get rid of the tadpole - now THAT'S where we ask multiple sources and try multiple approaches - so even a third of that effort for Karlach would be enough. But there's not even that).

Also, "a bit shorter" is an understatement. Is it a crime to point out that a great character got noticeably less content than other Origins? Her current questline in its length and player's input is more comparable to Halsin (kill goblins --> fetch a lute --> protect a portal --> find a kid vs. fetch iron --> fetch iron --> kill a guy) than any others. Maybe except Wyll, who also got the shorter end of the stick due to being rewritten and therefore developed less in this iteration than other EA peeps, but even with him we can still feel like we made a difference in the end. Accomplished something. Tried, you know?

(hell, to that end even Halsin by the end of the game ends up in a new place - not in the grove anymore, curse cured, new life awaiting. Karlach is still stuck in the same place between Avernus or death as when we first met her. Giving her touch back was a great thing, beautifully written thing, no notes, but it hardly feels like a whole quest done. Isn't this the genre where our choices should affect the outcome?)

It's not a bit shorter, it's a lot shorter. And it's not fleshed out because you don't get to do much throughout it. It's just two fetch quests and a boss fight. Everything else you can do with Karlach isn't part of it.

We don't know if the Gondians couldn't help because we could never ask them. That's just not an option.

It's also not an option to sign any pacts or ask any gods. We just can't ask anyone or do anything.

How many things should we be able to try? At least more than the one thing we try in the very beginning would be nice.

Her story is not a tragedy, it's just pointless bullying. She barely gets to live, gets no closure, and no chance to fight for herself. You try one thing, and then you're not allowed anything else. How is this a good tragedy?

She can't be convinced earlier. Every time you bring up going back to Avernus, she rejects that notion because she would rather die than go back. Except for the very end where she does an inexplicable 180 and agrees to do it anyway.

And there's nothing hopeful about going to Avernus. It's practically a suicide mission.

Conrad, i get your point of view. i understand where you're coming from with the V from cyberpunk parallel. But just stating something doesn't make it true. we... didn't try anything with the gondians and the new tech we are nudged towards in the game. We simply didn't. I don't know why you're so adamant about the fact that WE TRIED EVERYTHING, because we really didn't... i'm not talking about DnD mental gymnastics, i'm talking about stuff already present in the game. We are redirected towards it, yet it's never used. Because it was likely cut due to time and money costraints. You can appreciate it what's there regardless, that much is obvious. Doesn't change the fact that part of what you're saying simply isn't true: we didn't try all we could. And Karlach was never written with only these endings in mind, i'll redirect you towards Frazer revealing by accident he indeed recorded scenes and dialogue for a fix dammon finally found:


Accidental reveal

i really think all the endings are valid, as long as also this one is allowed to exist. That wouldn't take away from you and your enjoyment of the character. It doesn't cheapen it, not by a long shot. It just makes the questline, the character, and the world make sense in the context they are in.

Also re:options and dealing with devils and such, I still find it funny (I understand WHY it is what it is, but like, from a narrative standpoint) that Raphael is talking about "When all hope runs out you'll come to me" and such, but when he tries to make a deal with us it's like. I am not that desperate for the tadpole cure by that point. We have the artefact, we have a plan, there's at least one Netherstone in our pocket. My Tav didn't eat a single tadpole so hers is rather meek still, and some other Tav who ate a lot of them might not even be that afraid anymore, cool powers and all. And the Hammer - well, not everyone might even want to help Orpheus, and my urchin was immediately of the mind to steal it when it was revealed where it is.

Depending on a Tav/Durge, that whole scene can come off not as a devil tempting us with a pact, but as a devil begging us for help instead of vise versa.

But there's this one glaring issue with a ticking timer, one my Tav has no plan for and is frankly terrified about, one laced with love and therefore desperation that could've been manipulated easily, one where hope indeed runs dry and they might be just one step away from doing something they regret about it... And our dramatic devil right there doesn't pull that thread? Doesn't catch me hook line and sinker? Raph, buddy, you're losing your bite.

(Again, I understand that it was clearly never planned for and the tadpole issue by design should be the most pressing one, but, like. In-character? It's funny. Such a lost opportunity for him. Could've had his crown of a silver platter in some playthroughs.)

Of course it would dimnish the whole narration. Her entire story is about making peace with inevetable end, so fixing it at the last moment kinda throws away the entire arc. The whole avernus ending is very anti climatic for me and I think it shouldn't be an option but I understand that Larian wanted to give her something hopeful. She's the perfect tragedy because sometimes there is no good ending but at least she can become mindflayer and be the hero of her beloved city. I just can't understand why you guys have problem with that, it's a great piece of narration.
The Gondians don't have the solution because her engine is too old, that's literally the line of the Steel Watcher and it's logical they can't fix her because they shouldn't be able to without some bullshit deus ex machinas. I'll also repeat myself, it were the demons that enslaved Karlach in the first place, why would she crawl back to them to likely be enslaved again and cheated by another contract?

My dude, you are clearly missing the point of a player choice driven game. Which this was marketed as. Cyberpunk is a natrative driven singular path game. As in you the player are just kind of along for the ride to the end. With some minor choices to get you to the end

This is a dnd inspired Crpg
Similer to dragon age origins in how choice and player infkuence on companions can impact the story. Having options is a strength and appeal to this style of game. Being pigeon hold into something is not. Espically when theres only one glaringly obvious pigeon hold in contrast to every other companion.
I get you like her endings thats fine.
And if an option to save her is implemented. I garentee you, you can still choosr to ignore it and send our girl back to hell, or bask in her explosion.
Ill just be able to have her stay and hug her cause I for one think she has suffered enough. And we will BOTH be happy. So not sure why your fighting so hard against it. For real.

She wouldn't crawl back to them, but Tav should. Can he? No. And Gondians have newer engine, so they could give her a new one. Can you even ask? No

And I understand your deus ex machina issue, we spoke about this before on this forum, that they are "engineers", but we need "surgeon". I thing the game just cannot cover everything.

NO. No hugs. You already got one. Not fair if you get two until other non-Astarion companions get at least one first!

And don't get me wrong I like actual endings, of course they are very emotional and strong, but the feel that the fix was possible in the past is too obvious in whole act 3.

Lol my bad sorry,
#freehugsforeveryone

I think the most honest answer here is "Not everyone agrees that 'no good ending' tragedies - especially the ones that happen by default without an explicit failure on the player's part - are fitting or needed in a fantasy choose-your-own-adventure setting where you can influence everyone else's fate".

People die in D&D, sure, but that usually involves stuff like "explicitly gave themselves up for the others to live", or "another character had to choose between saving this and that", or "the rest of the gang tried resurrection and failed" or at the very least "players failed to pick up any related missions which DM tried to give them or screwed the quest up and this is the consequence of that". A somber no-escape tragedy that passively happens to a character works amazingly in other settings (that's also why V works, no happy endings is the cyberpunk genre's whole thing), but to place a doomed character in a D&D and not even make an adventure out of trying to undoom them? Some people will have problems, yes. If that was my DM I would definitely let them hear that as well.

Sure, a videogame will always be more limited than literal human imagination, but as other characters in the game demonstrate - that's not the obstacle here.


I think you're misunderstanding that point a bit. Karlach wouldn't, there's no doubt about that. Tav, however, or whatever character we're playing, might, depending on the player's choices (IF there were such choices presented).

Her entire story is about finding a cure for her problem, she doesn't start making peace with it until after Gortash. That's when her quest line ends. Up until then she still held onto hope.

So fixing the engine is very much in line with her arc -- you tried once, you failed. Dammon came up with nothing. She loses all hope for a solution after Gortash. But we don't. Through hard work and some heavy sacrifices, we do it. There's likely a big catch to her newfound situation, but at least there's hope now.

Avernus perhaps feels anticlimactic to you because we didn't ease into it. If we could actually slowly nudge her throughout the game, it would've felt more natural. But the two options -- dying or going back -- are totally valid. Her going back to Avernus is the story facing her with her biggest fear.

As for this idea that "sometimes there is no good ending" -- there has to be a good reason for any bad ending. It can't just be bad for its own sake. What is the narrator trying to impart to the player with her story? That's the most important question. Right now I'm struggling to find a good answer.

...

Her engine is a prototype. The Gondians could replace it with the new version that can exist in this plane. But we can't know if they can or can't do that, because we're never given the chance to talk to them about it.

The Steel Watcher told her she was defective and needed to go back to the foundry to get fixed up. We can't pursue that line, either.

I get your point and even agree, I wish they had not bothered with Halsin personally. However this is a lot of arm chair quarterbacking on the part of the community. Developers look at various aspects of the game and make decisions at those moments based on what they think should or should not be in the game. After the game is done as a single player it is easy to say they did it wrong but did they?

I understand the passion, I have whole sections of the game and story I personally think was poorly done and even outright hate. Those feelings are cool. It is testiement to how good the writing and character acting is that people have as much passion as they do about many of the NPCs.

Solidarity, brother/sister. #freehugsforeveryone and #justiceforkarlach!

It honestly boils down to the combination of both of the above. It's a D&D CRPG so the choices should be there, it doesn't have to be a perfect outcome but it shouldn't only be doom and gloom either unless that makes sense. But the hints are all there that it can be solved, and it's certainly not the easiest mission to come to either since saving all the suicidal Gondians while keeping Dammon and the Ironhand Gnomes (mainly Barcus) alive in your playthrough isn't something everyone will come across.

Tav goes to Raphael, who asks for a deal to get the Orphic Hammer. Tav makes a deal to solve Karlach's issue instead, Raphael accepts. Lae'zel and Voss get angry you didn't make a deal for the Orphic Hammer, Karlach gets happy-angry you signed your soul away for her. Proceed to raid the House of Hope, take the Hammer and your contract, and slap Raphael about. Zariel won't be happy and will keep hunting Karlach, who lost a lot of her power without the engine, so it's not a purely positive outcome. Done.

They set up some relatively easy solutions themselves, all they have to do is implement them. It is of course up to the DM (the writers) to decide not to add them after all. But why hint at the options and set up these perfect solutions then?

I get what your saying to a degree, i do think the developers did the best they could with the time an resources available, i wont bash larian or its writers because of this, i think releasing the game a month early was honestly a smart thing on their part based on starfield coming out in sept. But if it looks like armchairing critque, were just pointing at the things clearly in the game and the signs all show karlachs story was meant to have her be able to be fixed.
Full stop. Now it wasnt implemented. Either due to time restriant funding or last minute desicion making i dont know.
What this thread is for is showing there is a big desire and hope for larian to please take some time and implement said fix.

And honestly were 3 BIG patchs in and they still havnt removed the ungodly amount of enriched infernal iron in act 3.
Which gives me hope its still on the table as an option later down the line. And im willing to wait. But as i wait i am going to still going to actively promote the fixing of her engine cause thats the most i can do *shrug*

Well, I mean, yeah! In the end that's entire point, I think. We all here liked the character so much that not being able to give her at least a happy-ish ending (granted, you can interpret the Avernus option differently, but clearly not everyone saw it as hopeful - I think the fact that all of us see fiction through the prism of our own experiences and convictions plays a big role here for sure) was unbearable enough to start looking for signs that we missed something. And as things stand now, we didn't - but that's where the short quest and the gap in content compared to other origins becomes glaring, 'cause that's the only thing we find when looking for solutions.

In some way all such criticism is "arm chair quarterbacking", I think, especially since none of us (I think?) are devs ourselves. I worked in another similar story-creating industry, I've sat through my fair share of seeing people on social media rage about a plot twist I knew my colleagues put a lot of thought and work into. I've also, however, seen stuff getting rushed because of deadlines or other factors, in which case the blowback was even more frustrating, because we all knew it's correct in some regards, but couldn't just come out and say "yyyeah we agree actually" (no one does that). Sometimes stuff got left as is, because creators stand firmly by their choices, sometimes stuff got corrected 'cause we all knew it wasn't right and were itching to fix it as well, sometimes stuff got changed for sheer fanservice because it became obvious that such change could be profited on (not the best approach, but could be done well depending on the writer responsible).

I don't know what the case is with Larian and Karlach, obviously. Could be an adamant choice they'll stand by, could be a case of some rushed content due to her being added the last, could be something else. I also can't know if they're going to do anything with her further down the line.

But I did love the character, and believe it or not I loved the story, but for me the ability to actually consistently fight for her felt lacking enough that it unfortunately underlined the faults in her questline gameplay-wise, so all I can do now is sit in my chair and talk smack like I know what I'm talking about. (I do try to do it constructively though!)

The devs have already done a phenomenal job. We wouldn't be here if they hadn't. I'm fully confident that they know how her story could've gone differently, especially after the recent slip-up by Dammon's voice actor.

I appreciate where you're coming from. The current story is an emotional rollercoaster. The Avernus ending is the better one out of the two at the pier. Not because she gets to live, but because she now faces her biggest fear -- the one thing she's been figuratively and literally running away from. But as you said, this time she's not alone. Her most traumatic experience down there was crippling loneliness. Now things are different.

But I want you to consider a player who's lost someone dear to them in real life, now faced with the same situation in-game. And they're powerless to stop it. There have been more than a few posters on here that relayed those feelings -- of hopelessness and emptiness -- and lamented the cruelty of it all. Those of us who believe Karlach is a woman worth saving should be allowed to at least give it an earnest try. Our feelings are valid, too.