Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Shadowheart romance feedback

Hello, I just finished my first playtrough and the game is great.

I wanted to give you feedback, about my Shadowheart romance experience, which was underwhelming for me, because the final "pinnacle" romance scene in the beginning of act 3 did not play at all. I got to the point of stepping in the boat and going to face the Elder(Nether)brain and still nothing. So I got to resort to searching the Internet, which always feels bad in a kind of game, that is heavily story driven. I did all the weird things, that are suggested in Reddit threads (killing Shadowheart, ressurecting her, spamming long rests in Rivington). Nothing worked. Important note - this was after patch 4, so the previous scene conflict loading should be resolved by now.

Then i found, that i probably did not get the answer from her about not being able to swim and liking black orchids. So I did some backtracking, found that last point, when you actually can do that is in act 2, before enterning the Shadowfell. So I asked her the questin, got the reply, jumped to another waypoint a gave her the flower. I lowered the difficulty to easiest, "speedruned" Shadowfell (saved Nightsong), did only necessary fights in Moonrise Towers/Mindflayer colony, got to the beginning of act 3. Then first long rest in Rivington and I got the scene to play. Then I returned to my save from "main" timeline and finished the game, because otherwise I would have to replay whole act 3.

So to my point - Im now pretty certain, that finishing the romance is hard locked beyond the question about swimming and liking the orchids (not necessary giving the orchid itself - although that im unsure of). And that question is locked beyond you prying into Shadowhearts Shar whorship. Which is something I initially intently choose not to do, because you portrayed Shadowheart as someone, who values being discreet.

I get that you maybe wanted the game to have more of replay value with choosing the same romance, but this way it felt somewhat bad - like major punishment for minor mistake. Not to mention, that the game "behaves" like you are lovers even if the scene have not played, which is very confusing (for examaple - if you "slip" with Mizora, Shadowhart tells you, that she maybe was not "going" hard enough on you, when from your point of wiev she was not "going" on you at all.) It would be okay if that scene was only a bonus for those who asked the question, if in addition to that there was simillar baseline scene for those who did not ask, yet did all the "major" things regarding romance "correcty" (approval, romance at the party after saving the druid grove, standing by her afer saving Nightsong/defying Shar, finishing House of Grief).

In my opinion, in game, that is so heavily story/character/relationship based, your first playtrhough is your most valuable experience, and if you hard lock something so major, beyond something so minor and at the some time kind of unintuitive, it somewhat diminishes that unrepeatable first playtrough experience. Yes you can still experience it in some less ideal spoilery way - internet searching, backtracking what you did wrong, or even throwing all own effort from the window and simply watching it on Youtube a then simply put pieces togheder, but that feels way less statisfying, that when you get the experience on your first playtrough, when you are somewhat expecting it to happen, but do not know exactly how and when it will happen.

So why i write this at all? I would suggest, when you do your next game, please do not lock really imprtant things beyond something minor, or if you do, have alternative for the romance to fully play out, for those who skipped that minor thing.

Nice day to everyone.

This criticism makes a lot of sense and I agree for the most part. So much does hinge on whether you ask that specific question, for her to tell you something about herself besides Shar and tadpoles. It seems like they should make it something unavoidable instead, like something she talks about in her first romance scene.

You can be respectful of her boundaries and not pry, though, and this question still becomes available after she eventually (on her own time) reveals that she worships Shar. After a certain point, you only have to prod her a little bit (without a persuasion check), and she opens up about it.

I felt good about the Shadowheart romance until act three, which is where it got underwhelming for me. Sadly… because she’s amazing. Hugs anytime (as teased in new datamined dialogue from patch 4) would also be an awesome addition.

And of course any sort of end scene is sparse/unsatisfying since they didn’t put together an epilogue. And her Act 3 dialogue options cover irrelevant scenarios after patch 3 (like being able to comment on NOT being in a relationship when you ARE) and the kiss animation quality decreased with Patch 4.

Hello, thanks for your post. I had the same problem of not seeing the romance scene before. I continued to play and I hoped it would appear some time. But a few days ago I reached the point right before the finale and so I realized that I was going to miss it. And your post pointed me to the right direction to figure out the issue and eventually found a solution.

You are absolutely right. The problem is due to . I agree that the dialogue option is quite easy to miss.

It’s pretty wild that this little thing is all it takes to lock you out of her Act 3 romance scene. If you select the first dialogue option, asking her how she came to worship Shar, then the option to ask her about herself as a person disappears! I feel like the problem could be solved simply by allowing the player character to ask both questions. As it is, it really sucks to miss her Act 3 romance scene because you didn’t follow her dialogue stream exactly the way that the writers wanted you to. I’ve never had that experience, thank goodness, but it would be extremely frustrating.

Hi,

I've been running into this issue in both my current and previous playthrough where I am romancing Shadowheart. The first time, I just used the Script Extender console and entered this arcane console command into it, then long rested in Rivington to trigger the quest marker / scene.

In my current playthrough, I am really trying to avoid using the console at all, in case I discover any bugs late in the game and would like to report them (and have them taken seriously).

I did all the things with Shadowheart leading up to act 3:
- got the wine/kiss scene in Act 1
- asked her about swimming and night orchids
- gave her a night orchid
- gave her the idol of shar
- she asks me to promise myself to her after finishing gauntlet of shar

I get to act 3 and start tearing through Rivington. My Tav is built to not rely so much on abilities that require short- or long-rest to recharge, so I only took a long rest just before leaving Rivington because I had an inkling that getting too far into act 3 without this scene would cause it to bug.

Scene still didn't trigger. Instead I got the Vlaakith visit on entering camp, and then the Emperor interrupting my sleep to go on about Stelmane. No Shadowheart quest marker over her head during the evening or morning. There was also the dialogue option commenting about how we never really pursued a romance where she says maybe in another life. I'm starting to think that dialogue option is a "game over" of sorts for Shadowheart's romance, rather than the gentle reminder that I thought it might be.

-> Reloaded an earlier save from just after entering Rivington, then immediately camped, and got the quest marker and the skinny dipping scene.

So, I think there may also be some sensitivity to something that happens in Rivington.

Some thoughts:
- Perhaps the bit about Stelmane's murder (near the gate to Wyrm's Crossing) triggers the Emperor dream scene, which in turn bumps out Shadowheart's skinny dipping scene and replaces it with the "game over" dialogue option?
- In the pre-skinny-dipping dialogue, she's talking about feeling dirty about the whole Shar thing, and that seems to be what predicates the skinny dipping idea. Could the skinny dipping dialogue/scene be pre-empted somehow by her talking to the Sharran guy in Rivington?
- Three hours of game time (and my life) lost to go back to this point and get to this scene without having to use the Script Extender console to fudge it, I should add. I would consider this a *worse* problem than the game crashing to desktop, because my time is has been well and truly wasted by having to go back and replay a full three hours worth of the game, and in the sort of hurried, yes-yes-get-on-with-it-already pacing through all of the dialogues that I had sat and gave my rapt attention to before. This hurried manner in retracing my steps through Rivington also led to Arfur getting murdered in his front yard along with all of his thugs and me not giving a single hoot about it, whereas otherwise I would have probably tried that interaction again to get a less violent outcome.
- Having to Long Rest immediately after entering Rivington is extremely unintuitive. I would not have done this if I did not know I needed to in order to trigger this particular scene or else it would never happen. The player's party is *fresh* on entering Rivington, and not a whole lot happens in Rivington that can really tire out my party enough to need to long rest before moving on to Wyrm's Crossing. The *only* reason to long rest at this point is to trigger this one specific dialogue and scene for Shadowheart's romance, and there is zero indication in-game that you would need to do this. The only way I knew about this was from searching the internet and finding what other people who've run into this issue did to try and resolve it. So, I would consider this a pretty serious bug, because if this is the intended design, it's a pretty terrible game design.

That weird dialogue option is always there. The one where you say you two never pursued a romance, or whatever. It’s not a “game over” for the relationship… It’s a straight-up bug. There are dialogue options available that simply aren’t relevant. So I wouldn’t read too much into that.

I also wouldn’t overthink getting the scene to trigger. For what it’s worth, I have triggered the scene without ever talking to the Sharran lookout. You just need to long rest. More than once before you leave Rivington/Wyrm’s Crossing. You two do go “down by the river” after all.

If you fight all of the battles that are available, you can certainly long rest multiple times while you’re in this area. If you don’t long rest, you really can’t complain about missing scenes.

The Dialogue its actually a Bug.. (start to show up after patch 3)
that dialogue was only supposed to show up when yu dumped her for another romance..
and that dosent affect actually the scene to Play( the romance one) it somehow fix her romance conversations showing up two options for Kiss, how she is feeling.
(as far as i Understood show two options becouse somehow the game dosent fully make yu a couple something like that..)

The Skip with Vlakith stuff.. i Had two times..
But was always coused somehow by Karlach was in my Game as companion..
(were the only two times i try to bring her in a Full run.)
after that never again.. i gave up on her becouse the amount of Problems i Had with shadow and the other Companions with her in my runs.

BTW i Alwyas almost get the Beach romance scene or the other inside the City..
Maybe becouse i only Bring Shadow, Astarion, Lae'zel and Jaheira when i get to act 3 i normally dont Get that Much of events anymore..
So when i Rush Rivinton and Dracos Pass.. almost all the times i get her scene after the Emperor Trying to Lay down with me..
First Vlakith, Emperor Trying bad Stuff then i get her Romance..

Even with the three-to-four-ish battles in Rivington, there is almost no need for me to even short rest there. Not with a well-equipped GloomRanger/FastHands/Sorc Tav and a healthy bit of companion cycling, at least. If it were a no-fast-travel area, that would be different, but then you wouldn't be able to long rest there anyway.

What happened earlier was that I simply plowed through all of those battles taking barely any damage in each one, because I'm all about using stealth and high initiative in this playthrough to maximize tactical advantage. I needed to short rest after fighting both the Rats and the Stone Lord thugs at the same time. All the other battles in Rivington are like 3-4 enemies and, with a bit of up-front planning and the right people/equipment available, easily beaten without breaking a sweat. Even so, much of what combat is there can be avoided with the right dialogue choices, a bit of stealth, or simply ignoring the interaction altogether. Not to mention the fact that Rivington is literally set up to allow you to just skip right through it and go straight on into Wyrm's Crossing. (which i unwittingly did on my first time of Act 3)

I long rested just before the checkpoint into Wyrm's Crossing - got the emperor dream where he's moping about Stelmane. No Shadowheart romance dialogue.
Tried long resting again after that, still nothing from Shadowheart. That led me to suspect that it will probably never happen if I were to just keep going through Act 3 hoping it would eventually come up.

In a previous playthrough, I did just that - I had gone all the way through most of Wyrm's Crossing before needing to long rest. Did not get any skinny dipping with Shadowheart despite having a solid "No Notes - exceeded every expectation" relationship with her. Nothing during the Lower City, either, despite having more than a few nights where nothing else was happening. Just went straight to her grieving scene after clearing the House of Grief. Eventually just fudged it by installing the Script Extender mod and entering in a console command to force the scene to trigger.

In my current playthrough, all I did to get the scene to trigger after seeing it definitely not triggering when AFAIK it should have was to reload an earlier save from the very start of Rivington, and then immediately long-rested. That triggered the scene. Hence, my conclusion that some event in Rivington appears to be pre-empting this trigger somehow.

I really don't like Larian's quest design. I don't like it when in several quests there is no clue where to find the next stage (like in the murder or Shar quest), I don't like when important stuff is hidden behind high dice numbers or perception checks. I was about to throw the game from my harddrive and never again buy from Larian when it forced on me to look like an ugly Illithid, although I used the tadpole extremely scarcely (two times), because you have to get a 21 to succeed. Only a mod which restored my look saved me in this case. I never hated a game designer for anything they did in my 20 years of gaming, but that was near.

My idea of a story driven game is not that I have to speak to every person, that I have to click every clickable thing to progress (in very important quests) and look behind every flower I can see for a hidden goody. The Shadowheart relation is a bit of the same. I got busy with her in my first playthrough (I did not give her a night orchid but I mentioned it), but only with luck. Luck should not be a major factor in major game aspects. Her being such an important part, a good designer would have constructed several "repair options" in the relation.