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

I feel like if nothing else, it would be nice to have Karalch's quest line either fleshed out a bit more so you be like "oh we tried multiple avenues but couldn't find a cure" instead of "well one blacksmith said no so oh well", or have an option to fix the engine but its very difficult from a game play/RP perspective (for that extra drama). I think others have said it better than me but you can have a tragic character have a good ending without it feeling cheap. Also as someone who has over 100 hours in and has not yet actually completed a campaign, I would love even more content with these characters lol.

It's also in every single weekly reddit feedback post, usually more than once.

Sounds really promising. Fingers crossed.

Karlach is amazing, i literally keep her in my camp only to turn her into a mindflayer end game. Cannon fodder.

The problem being that in some stories some characters were never in the party or got killed in the beginning.

I think the way BG3 implemented Jaheira and Minsc is a good way to acknowledge a past adventure without making anything "canon" about it (although I will admit I didn't play BG or BG2, was it possible to end those campaigns with them dead?). "Legends" indeed. You can ask, but they won't tell you any details apart from the general who fought who. (Definitely won't gossip with you about romances in their old party!)

If I'm correct you could finish BG2 with Jaheira or Minsk dead without any issues.

Sounds like it can be done. You just pick one plotline as your canon, as Larian did, and go with it. Some might send Karlach to Avernus, others might have her as an illithid on the surface, and others still could have her burn up and die but still serve a key role.

Question that's slightly unrelated to this. How does it work, when certain souls return to the Hells after they're killed? Imps, cambions, you name it. Would Karlach burning up and dying be at risk of just ending up serving Zariel in the "afterworld" or whatever one would like to even call it? Given she's basically tapped herself out from Avernus and up onto the Material Plane, with Zariel's prototype toy.

Well, she wasn't born in Hell, and I don't think her soul was sold to Zariel (otherwise that would've definitely come up), only she herself physically. Devil blood also doesn't seem to curse tieflings to be reborn in Hell (again, would've likely been mentioned)?

I think the automatic rebirth in Hells only refers to pure devils and fiends and likely those who sold their soul to one.

And for all of Karlach's habits to run from her problems, I believe she'd consider this possibility in her adamant desire to get away from Zariel and Avernus... :"D

And that's another reason why Karlach's engine isn't really a big problem in this setting. If it was her soul that was sold or tied to Zariel, it'd be a different matter, but as things stand, Karlach still has her soul as it has to be sold willingly.

Look, I've written a couple of shipped games, and there is no way that would not have been discussed during writer/narrative meetings. The only logical explanation is that something major was cut late in the development and stuff was already locked in, forcing the writers to compromise. I am quite sure they're frustrated how this all turned out, but it is, for the most part, out of their hands. I just don't know why they did not remove the dangling threads and plot points that would indicate there's a way to fix it. They added more infernal iron, which makes absolutely no sense, unless it's just set dressing.

But if this was truly what they intended from the beginning, I have no words.

A bit off topic qiestion but does anyone here kmow when patch 4 is dropping? Have we heard anything recently since it was first announced its *coming*?

Hopefully soon, I don't really want to set foot in act 3 again until it drops. I wouldn't expect any epilogue changes though, that's going to take a lot more than a month to make. Or rather, something we'd be happy with will take a lot more than a month to make.

Yeah i hear yah. Im just curious what it have story wise if anything. Or if its just fixes (which of course i appricate )
But im probably gonna hold off on any new play through til atleast epilogues are added and i wont be going hard again until KARLACH GETS JUSTICE

Oh yeah, definitely not expecting anything big. But I have very recently discovered that one of Karlach's romance scenes (the non-sexual ending for the date) is very much de-synched in animation for the third (big buff feminine) body type. Which my Tav happens to have. At least in my game it is so, anyway. So as far as current patches go in relation to Karlach, I'll settle for my girl's forehead being where the forehead smooch goes!

Granted, I think by the time I reported it patch 4 was already incoming, but what are we doing here if not hoping for the future.

(An early Halloween scare for you: the patch drops and all infernal iron vanishes from act 3) (sorry I'll knock on wood)

I did the romance act 3 date scene with my buff tief Tav last night and if you chose to come right back tl Karlach before setting off (I wanted to throw some water on the poor fucker cause girl was DIRTY) the scene cut off and buggedly finished as Karlach raised her hand to order food.

Doesn't happen if you say yes to hwading straight out tho so all was well. Tho Dammon isn't anywhere to be found in Act 3 for me, not even the forge. Could look the entire place and nothing happened. He didn't die by the Ox bug in Act 2 but he did vanish suddenly. So can't even talk to him.

But decided to play some of early Act 3 again to screenshot all the dialogue lines and man. It's all so laid out to hint you to go to the forge, to talk down the Gondians, to broker peace with the Ironhands, to talk to Dammon and to finally find some coolant to keep this overheated PC of a girl running. Like yes, the Steel Watcher says it's better if she is dismantled since her engine is so old that updating would be messy and hard. But the whole story is about Karlach being sold off to act as a prototype bearer and test subject for Zariel and Gortash profiting off of it to employ the Gondians to build the new version, the Steel Watcher type. And with everything else it just makes NO SENSE AT ALL to why we would be fully helpless in this situation. Like fuuuck, Larian...

Thank you for this comment.

I do mean that, so take a moment to bask. This type of insight is very reassuring to those of us who don’t work in the industry.

And if your assessment is accurate - and there’s no reason to doubt it - then I still have hope that, down the line, we might get that hoped for “save Karlach for real” DLC many fans are pining for.

Lol the date scene is so cute, i hope they do fix the buff female animation, im over here as the buff male and hoping they give me the option to switch the sex scene animations cause it just feels very odd to have what looks like 300 pounds of muscle be picked up and twirled around and laid on the bed. Like its sweet id just like the option for my tav to twirl her instead *shrug*

Bit of a different but still related subject, I discovered mods today and I’m guessing that this issue must be far beyond the abilities of modders? And the game’s so complex that anything meaningfully different with Karlach couldn’t come from modders but only from the developers themselves? Just curious about this! I’ve written an event mod for Stardew Valley, but that’s like a super simple game in comparison haha.

Almost certainly but I'm sure some modders will still try lol

I don't follow BG3 modding scene super closely, but from what I've seen and understand I think for now modders are lacking the tools (or are still in the process of discovering them, either or) for, like, big plot-changing mods. The closest stuff is the good-playthrough-Minthara-recruitment mod and maybe the polyamory mod, and from what I understand even those come with certain limitations and bugs still. Maybe down the line creating something more substantial (like Mass Effect 3 modders who created whole new endings) will be possible, but it doesn't look like we're there yet.

I personally am also against using AI to recreate actors' voices without their consent (and from what I've seen most in the industry are generally against giving said consent), so I wouldn't want anyone doing that to Sam even for a better ending, that's for sure. Non-AI methods are tricky and sound weird, and a new plotline and ending without any additional voice lines is... unlikely!

(And then there's also the matter of whom do we trust to write it without fear of the result being OOC or not-what-I-personally-wanted and such and such! The amount of opinions in this thread alone is interesting for sure!)

In theory, however, I think it's not impossible. But the right tools would be needed first, that's for sure, and this game seems to love reacting with bugs to any changes (hell, even to official patches...)