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.

As if Act 3 Halsin isn't already a parody of who the character was in Acts 1 and 2. If they rewrote all that to at minimum be more sensitive to the subject matter they insisted on sloppily throwing on him then sure maybe there's a good case for going back to the very old idea that they scrapped. But as he is I would vastly prefer the ultimatum scene because it adds something meaningful to the game in its current rather than distant past state and adheres to the stance they'd been vocally keeping that they want the two to be mutually exclusive (and would conveniently solve the tent problem). Also by virtue of it already being written would be less work than working out a bunch of other interactions to make it make sense for Halsin to actively tolerate her. It probably would've made a lot of sense for him to tolerate her with the original plan when he considered himself the cause of the Shadow curse but with that massive change I don't see it anymore. It's also just kind of fun and on-brand for a Baldur's Gate game to have incompatible characters, though the old games were certainly more bold about how it worked.

And there's the worst case scenario if they did make brand new lines between him and Minthara where maybe they dive back into Halsin's experiences with drow again. No one wants even more of that except his most problematic stans. I certainly don't even want to risk that possibility.

Talking about tents ... how does that look in Elfsong when the tent is a bed? *coughs*

I am of a split mind. My biggest brothel issue doesn't revolve around Halsin but I could do without him propositioning. From a gameplay point of view I'd vastly prefer having a Minthara around for class variety. My druid of choice will always be Jaheira, so I really have no use for Halsin at all - apart from the endgame buff he offers perhaps. I did like having Halsin around during the epilogue though, the thing with the duck is cute.

Another Halsimp here, putting in my quick 2 cents. I came after a while of being inactive and Im surprised/unsurprised this is still a hot topic. I was pretty active in the other Halsin thread and once everyone okayed the epilogue I saw no reason to check back but I did now just to see whats going on. I choose to be mono so thats the perspective Im comming from. I would use the quote feature for some of this but Im on mobile and the things I wanted to respond to are across multiple pages. Gonna use memechan arrows for the quotes.

As much as I love Halsin, his act 3 personality and writing is really REALLY bad.

First of all:

>On top of that, he tells SH during the threesome while he's having sex with her, that seeing a woman flush with pleasure is a one of the most beautiful things for him to witness. He doesn't say things like this to Tav outside that very brief dialogue when Tav finally gets to sleep with him.

Holy crapola I nearly exploded reading this WHY COULDNT HE HAVE SAID THIS TO ME ;-;

>Also, Halsin is the definition of contradictory. He only wants you, but wants your partner to participate with the two of you in sexual activities. He doesn't want a relationship and tells you that you are free to roam as you please, yet you can define it as being a relationship by telling him your relationship with him is over, multiple times, to which he gets upset and says that loving you is difficult. He wants to join in on the threesome or orgy with the drow twins, even though you are all that he wants. And perhaps the most contradictory of all is the very fact that he is traumatized by what Ketheric Thorm and his dark justiciars did to him and the Harpers, causing him chronic PTSD and an obsession with ending them, yet, he lusts after SH almost more than Tav. Wtf!? He's an absolute mess.

It really feels like they diddnt take people who wanted Halsin added seriously. Even in all the fanart hes just a sex toy. In the game even if you go poly the others dont seem to consider him a real member of the relationship, just a side piece and nothing more. Theres one piece of fanart that is a short comic and Halsin refers to Astarion as the Tav's "bonded lover" and it really bothered me for some reason. Like he is clearly being used for just sex. In fact a lot of the sexual fan stuff is starting to feel gross. Its like all of the characters are just seen as sex objects by a lot of fans and it shouldnt bother me really but it does a little bit. Like when people put the dog collar on Astarion.

His contradictory behaviour deeply hurts us Halsin solomancers, which weve well established in the Halsin thread. It really feels like hes playing games. I dont care about wood elf "lore" as A) cultural norms arent hard fast rules, just look at Drizzt And B) him being poly isnt the same as throwing himself at anything and everything with a hole just because. Its like hes chasing some sort of high.

>The character seems to exist only to entertain polyamorous players and provide some practical benefit to the rest of us. Of course, there are Halsin fans out there, and they obviously hate this treatment of their favorite (Halsin fans, if anything, I'm sorry, I honestly don't want to hurt anyone's feelings).

This is true tho, and doesnt hurt my feelings as much because I understand the reality of the writing. Im sure the original intent was to allow people to romance him while not having to give up on the romance they spent the last 2 acts building, which will most likely be SH and Astarion. It just so happens to also fill in a niche for the poly people and the people who are all "teehee isnt this hawt I has two boyfrens!" But in the end hes written as a sexual novelty and convinient Orin bait. It only hurts my feelings because I love the character (act 1 and 2 mainly, there are afew bits in act 3 but theyre overshadowed) but I cant deny his bad writing and understand where the haters are comming from.

One more critisism that I have thought of since I left the old Halsin thread a while ago is:

I kind of dont like how he hates on the city, but I also kind of get it because he worships Silvvanus and I dont have to 100% agree with someone I love (Im in the process of writing some fanfiction about this) But some of his reasonings are...strange and I dont think his writer understands how nature works, which is why he comes off as a very delusional nature idealist druid. Its like the writer just thinks druids are holier than thou hippies.

I still love him though, its easy enough for me to see when its just bad writing and retcon it in my headcannon, which Im doing via fanfiction.

He feels somewhat manipulative in his current writing as you pointed out.

I despise his interactions in brothel/banter with SH and it's kinda obvious "same writer problem". But seems like this topic anyway attracts new ppl as more ppl find out about this.

But what about Halsin when solo romanced? His ending is nice when he is solo LI, but what disgusts me is that AFAIK Halsin is the only romance partner that refuses to go with Avernus with Karlach origin when solo romanced(he even has phrase to "kill herself" if she doesn't want to go there alone).

I don't feel like he's playing games; to me "you're the only one I want" would be finished with "right now" for a true poly.

But certainly the use of the word "relationship" is all over the place; it's sloppy. And I am 100% in agreement with the rest of your post. Act 3 he just goes sideways instead of being a good continuation of his character.

I'm fairly irritated about the whole Minthara/Halsin thing. I know people pleaded for a good play-through Minthara recruitment, but it just violates the entire premise of actions having consequences. At a minimum, I hope the datamined confrontation/ultimatum dialogue makes it into the game. There is zero reason why Halsin would trust her enough to fight with her. Or Karlach or Wyll for that matter.

Something ive been wondering about the ultimatum thing: why is it that he's okay with traveling alongside Shart, a follower of Shar (you know the goddess who ravaged nature and all that for a century), but not Minthara?

Is there something I'm missing?

While I agree that would be easier to swallow, even tho I dont like it, for me it does feel like hes playing games. Mainly because he borderline pushes Tav to see others. Its like even if Tav doesnt initiate a poly relationship Halsin tries to get them to do it anyway, but he wants TAV to do it. He wont do it himself if you havent romanced anyone else. "I only want you, but I want others to find happiness with you" He doesnt care if you only want him back, and it hurts.

It just shows the team of writers doesn't really care about Halsin, this is what I see here (remember their interview? They didn't really talked about Halsin, felt like they avoid this topic).
Also, I remember that Halsin is not that friendly towards Shadowheart in Act 2. Yes, he travels with Tav and the gang but he is not fond of Shar, of course. He even had a dialogue with SH, in which he trolled her, said about her "bleating", but I have a feeling it is a piece of his EA personality.
So yes, this is one more reason why this ultimatum scene is bad and illogical.

To be honest I'd rather have the ultimatum so I can save the shadowlands and still justify my character as being "good" while getting rid of Halsin.

Excellent question.

My shot at an answer: Shadowheart is the untouchable princess. You either HAVE to have her for the artifact, or you have to kill her. She's the first one you meet on the beach with 3 other places where the game attempts to shoehorn you in your party.

It's hard to imagine a good player character not making an attempt to lift the shadowcurse. So you either lose a character that's basically been forced on you or don't lift the shadowcurse. OR they have to make an alternate route to lifting the curse.

It'd be much easier if people could say thanks-no-thanks to Halsin being a companion, like you can most companions. Halsin haters happy, Halsin simps unfazed.

That's not to say some of Halsin's Act 3 issues shouldn't be addressed.

I'd like the ultimatum to be there and to be able to convince him to stay in the party until the shadow curse is taken care of (in case you recruit Minthara first and want to leave act 2 with a heroic deed in your portfolio), and then the ability to boot him out after finishing his quest if Minthara is not there.

Maybe because Shart was part of the group that saved the Grove? That might have earned her some benefit of the doubt from Halsin.

Because shes part of the group, he kind of has to tolerate her. The group is his ticket to possibly lifting the curse from his homeland. That and Shart clearly had nothing to do with the actual curse so theres a little bit of distance there.

I do kind of wish he was iffy on Shart and Astarion at first, and it slowly dissipates as they travel together, and cements itself when the curse is lifted. Tav can slowly show him their good traits. It would be good character development for Halsin to see people he SHOULD hate due to his druidry but learns to see their humanity through the eyes of a mutual friend/ally. It would also help build up any polymance the players persue. I diddnt take him into the Sharran temple so I havent experienced it, but people say he and Shart kinda beef a little there and I really think its narratively appropriate; again more content they COULD have added for him in between acts 1 and 2.

I believe the ultimatum scene makes sense because it's pretty absurd that Halsin and Minthara are sharing a tent and not saying anything to each other, knowing they are mortal enemies. The game could give you the option to stay with Minthara and have Halsin leave, or stay with Halsin and have Minthara leave, and a persuasion option to keep both (this option wasn't in the dialogues that were found, but Larian could add it). I would indeed like them to add this, and at the same time, fix Halsin's disgusting behavior in Act 3.

P.S: I have to say, though, that this discussion between Halsin and Minthara seems more in favor of Minthara, as they portray Halsin as the bad guy in the discussion and as an imbecile (oh, what a surprise)... I mean, I understand that if Minthara leaves the camp at Halsin's request, she dies, whereas nothing happens to Halsin.

Well, this thread, unlike the previous one that only talked about Halsin, came about because a player who had SH and Halsin in their party at the brothel accidentally stumbled upon that famous scene where Halsin invites himself with the drow twins and where Shadowheart admits she always wanted to fuck Halsin from the start. Obviously, that hurt and they came here to vent. Since fans of Astarion also arrived complaining about Halsin's behavior, and Halsin's own fans, the thread's name was decided to be changed.

I'm glad that Halsin's own fans (or at least those who have commented) also dislike his behavior. It's obvious that it's painful for some people to want a monogamous romance with their favorite character but then to see on YouTube your character wanting to fuck someone else and even enjoying it (it ends up ruining the monogamous experience). In the end, all these orgy scenes seem more like Halsin fucking your romance option and Tav enjoying the show in a corner.

It's a pity that you can't tell Shadowheart, Astarion, or Halsin "hey, you know what, I want us to stay exclusive, I don't want to share you" or something, just to see how they react.

I was advocating for this dialogue option(SH/Ast) at the beginning. This would help so much.
Or/and just polish Halsin's act3 mess, yknow

The worst part is you kind of can with Shadowheart. You can bring up Halsin's proposal with her and then tell her you're not going to accept and instead of being happy that you would choose to only be with her she makes a snarky comment about not blaming her for denying yourself. Once again out of character for how you would expect her to react.

It's not exactly it, isn't that something like "I've changed my mind" or something like that? I would like a normal option, something like "yo, I was never going to accept this, just wanted to tell you that I prefer to stay exclusive" or something like that and have her to react to this(I don't think she would disagree considering her general story and, most importantly, epilogue).

Lol, you're right, although it's not exactly what I was referring to, it's closer to what Netav said. In any case, yes, when you go with Shadowheart, you never mention Halsin, you just say "I want to talk about the exclusivity of our relationship". Then you tell her that you're going to say no, and she seems to want to keep pushing for you to accept (or rather the writer wanting you to accept), pff honestly, the more I analyze it, the more disappointed I am with Shadowheart's romance,i think i chose the wrong waifu ;c. I mean, not even Astarion, who is another one that accepts Halsin's poly proposal, shows as much enthusiasm. I don't like it because ascended Astarion and normal Astarion have different dialogues, but SH tells you the same shit haha.

Her options are just different in dialogue regarding Halsin. There is no "turning back" option if that makes sense(kinda same thing on reaction regarding Mizora cheat, like for some characters you get an option "I wish you were there" or something like that, I think that option is available for Halsin/Astarion, but not for SH). But yes, I would like an option to just set boundaries and nature of your relationship. Also, again, why the hell her Shar/Selune path reactions are not separated? She his literally identical scenes/reactions on Shar/Selune path with way different personalities/goals. Yes, for those who say that Halsin is not ok with Shar worship etc., Halsin is more than happy to do orgy with DJ SH(scene is identical, except for dialogue options for Tav).