Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Story & Character Discussion Problems with Halsin's character, advances, LI and general character interactions, etc.

With Astarion they really didn't think this through. Everyone in camp seems to know everything that's going on with the others, which pre-Cazador makes Halsin basically a dude propositioning you for sex while fully knowing that you're not "getting it" in your current relationship. And it's so so stupid.

And with SH? literally 2 long rests after she refused to "share" with any other companion and not having it once with Tav yet, suddenly she feels safe and fine to share with Halsin and not threatened like with others. Because Halsin thing triggers before her scene. Basically you go through this slow burn romance and suddenly she is ok to share you with Halsin(despite not wanting to with any other. "In truth, I don't think I'd wanted to be your spare lover" is literally her quote) even before having her first time with the Tav. And since Halsin proposal occurs before her scene, you can obviously decline him before her scene. After this you get her scene and in the morning you get Halsin's banter with threesome proposal. It's just so XD

The constant demand to remove it? I read this here and I don't believe it. Players without a romance also use this option, why deprive these players of this option? Just leave Halsin outside, it's that simple and there's no need to exaggerate.

So make him less of a sex pest and let player invite him there and not the other way around? How that sound? Reasonable?
Make his current interaction with self invite play when romanced.

Also stop cherry-picking. We are not talking about his brothel behaviour, but his behaviour in general.

The entire Halsin-Astarion poly relationship leaves a bad taste in my mouth and it sours me on Halsin. The timing is terrible and it's very underdeveloped and badly written, especially with all the things Astarion is going through during the game.

Let's be honest here: Larian picked the wrong companions (Astarion and SH) for the whole pseudo-poly option, as several posts pointed out already. They removed important parts of their characterization as soon as Halsin became available to spend a night with and that's what you get if you come up with the idea of adding experimental stuff like bear sex, superficial polyamory and such late at night or whatever.
Right, its totally fine to change characters just for them to be willing to have sex with Halsin. I get it, sex sells and social media is happy about it.

Halsin was never meant to be part of the whole companion puzzle but more like a glass of wine beside it, kind of a treat you can enjoy after solving the puzzle - a broken glass that always pours wine on 2 pieces of the puzzle until they are soaked with it and you can't use them anymore.
I'm pretty sure that if they kept Halsins EA character (which was what people asked for) it would have worked out really well - even without the need of him being oversexualized or changing other characters, too.

@EdaLee: You totally remind me of Seto/Jenset, but I won't make any additional comment on that.

Should I repost every time a new page is made in this thread? That way I think it might be a lot easier to clear up the reason why we don't like what goes on in Sharess Caress for a newcomer who's genuinely curious.

I agree that the way the poly stuff and Halsin are implemented is very off-putting.


Astarion and Halsin polymance might have worked early in the game, when Astarion/Tav relationship is still developing, is sex oriented and he's unsure what he wants, but later on it feels very icky and precisely like a betrayal. During earlier stages of the game he even says he'd be ok with Karlach and Shadowheart poly if they weren't so sensitive and inexperienced respectively. Later on, when he actually really cares about Tav it's clear he doesn't want to share but agrees out of fear of losing them pre-Cazador, or is secure enough to agree but still not thrilled about it after his personal quest. But for some inexplicable reason he will also disapprove like Shadowheart if Halsin is not allowed to join in at the brothel, despite not even liking Halsin.


Ugh, exactly this. He's written as a total creep. I'm not sure why Larian thought it would be a good idea to write him this way after EA requests to make him a companion. Unless they wanted to teach us a lesson called 'careful what you ask for'.


And here I thought the way he tried to worm himself into the relationship between Tav and Astarion was bad, wow. This is just disgusting.

You know, I was actually imagining him as that one douchebag you may meet in a bar, but the more I think about it that's probably more accurate.

My only comment is that I don't think poly/Halsin would work well at any point with either Shadowheart, Astarion, or any other origin characters without some considerable rewrites to the main romance progressions.

Hence why I used the word 'might' have. What we have right now is tacked on and handled disrespectfully and repulsively.


This is the most logical explanation for why they were picked as poly-agreeable, even if it doesn't make sense considering their romance arcs.

That made me chuckle. Please do.

Yeah totally. He's Arch Druid, a position of high authority, a wise older man who gives counsel, compassion, and empathy. The classic authority figure who uses that to take advantage of their students, patients, colleagues, neighbors, family members, etc... Makes him seem as power hungry as Astarion, Gale, and Shadowheart.

Another thing I just thought of is that it seems like the writers acknowledge that Halsin is this groomer type, which makes me think this is all intentional. After things get serious with Astarion, and Tav asks him what he thinks about going poly with Halsin, even his reaction is subtly like *Uhh... Halsin is a creep who seduces everyone... But ok. You do you.* given the fact that Astarion already knew before Tav told him about Halsin wanting to get into Tav's pants, and makes a passive insult / mockery of Halsin's character by saying that the mighty nature loving bear "Would outlaw clothing if he could".

Every companion makes remarks about Halsin though. They all know, he is that "hot druid". Literally Wyll, Laezel, Lach, SH, Astarion, Mizora make comments about his "biceps" lmao and how hot he is. Drow twins call him famous Halsin, he is some sort of sex celebrity or smth idk. That's why ppl assume about him as self-insert. It's just funny.

John knows what he's doing considering he's been ignoring the feedback about the SH and Halsin thing. as I stated in the Halsin thread, this fetish sh*t is what he finds sexy. He completely destroyed Halsin's character the minute who wanted that bear scene in. The last character he created, the red prince from DOS2, had similar elements of SH and Halsin in his romance, instead though, the player was forced to go through with watching and reading the red prince have sex with another character. Any hopes of John removing this from SH, you can forget it, since similarly, people who romanced Red prince hoped that in the definite edition of the game, John would've reworked Red prince's romance. He did not. I'm on my new run of the game, I'll be romancing Astarion instead and will stay away from any future character that John will create in the future of larian

You know, we might get some rewrites if some anti-predatory organizations and mainstream media were to get wind of this writing...

It's pretty interesting that Astarion is seemingly against Halsin or at least he sees through Halsin's charming attitude and whats beneath it. So if that's written (and recorded) intentionally, it makes the writing (and the writers) even more questionable, because what'S the lesson to be learned here? Every groomer or creep can end up as a pretty normal LI who lives with you? Thats BS. Be careful not to fall for a charming guy? If so, why do we never really get to see a really bad ending to that? I don't know. What's obvious is, is that no one can defend Larian like "Yeah they didn't pay attention" or "Maybe it's just a mistake".

Also, if Halsin has been written like this to serve as an option to a poly relationship, why would you even come up with negativity towards him (like Astarion does)? It's the Tav who looks dumb in the end.
I will never even understand how people are celebrating a Halsin-Astarion poly, especially not if you see how it hurts Astarion. When I saw his line about him being worried if you want to f*ck Halsin just because Tav and Astarion havent had *it* for a while, I really felt how hurt he was.

Astarion's comment about Halsin sounded more like he wanted to use him as a meat shield to me, or a doorstopper, like Minsc.

He wrote the Red Prince and his questionable romance? Now it's all coming together.

I've read about John's problematic characters before and I still don't get why Larian is okay with that. I've never really seen anyone criticizing other writers, so there must be something obviously wrong with how John writes his characters - or it's just all the players who are not capable of seeing the genius behind it?