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

So let's not beat around the bush: Karlach is a member of a people who are constantly oppressed for their heritage, out of religiously-motivated racism, and are constantly driven from their homes and victimized as a result of that hate. Sven Vicke's studio created a storyline for them where they are depicted as leeches and criminals, lured into "refuges" where they are slaughtered en-masse, and where the man himself declared that a member of their group like Karlach deserves to burn in hell instead of salvation.

You're not going to get anything satisfactory for Karlach because Sven Vicke and his studio very much treat anyone who isn't a human or elf in their game as an undesirable.

Okay, Thelxiope. Let’s not start this up again. Spamming the forum with your own heated takes, personally attacking developers with accusations of racism that it’s hard to see as anything but intentionally provocative given the way they are stated, isn’t on.

The lack of future dlc or expansion is unfortunate, but kinda expected for me. Larian doesn't create dlcs, so I'm fine with it. In actual state we have "at least something we wanted", an offscreen engine fix based on our imagination that she and Tav found new engine in Avernus and save Karlach for good.

This is faaaaaaaar better than when I finished my gameplay when no patch was released so far. (I romancer her and I even was not able to go with her to Avernus). So this whole thread was successful at the end.

Maybe in the future after few more patches we will see a cutscene that she and Tav finished the Avernus mission and they are save and back in Faerun.

But in my opinion I'm almost sure, that according what is or was in the game, the original idea was that her engine was meant to be fixable.

Agreed. I was just really really hoping for atleast uppercity and a fixable engine in game

The avernus ending cutscene + mentions of a forge in the epilogue party are nice I guess, but I dont know if I'd go as far as to say this thread or other karlach related feedback could be counted as having been successful.

In the end, Karlach still has a really lackluster questline - a fetch quest that basically ends in act 2 already, whereafter the game proceeds to railroad us into accepting her fate, not letting us try finding other potential solutions. I could forgive a boring questline that isnt as intirguing or polished as astarions or shadowhearts quests, but the biggest offense with karlachs questline is how it makes the player/party look like the most uncaring clowns who wont put any effort into looking for potential cures for karlach ("we did everything we could for karlach" my goddamn ass lmao). Additonally, its really shallow writing to have the game treat her condition as some incurable condition that is not fixable in anyway, considering all the wild shit the party survives through or other characters as well (or the fact this is dnd, theres like countless spells that would fix her condition lol).When writing a tragic story, there has to be immense care put into it, and this was far from that - Karlachs story just feels super handwavy and only exists to present cheap drama.

For me personally, this really ruins karlachs character for me, and my overall enjoyment for this game. I mean cool, they find a forge in avernus during the 6 month period post-final fight, but I still have to put up with Karlach talking in act 3 like shes doomed/how she wishes she wasnt dying, and all my dumbass tav can say is ''maybe we can save you'' but then not... actually try anything. Suffice to say, its very frustrating and Im disheartened that larian is happy to leave karlach in this state, alongside with wyll and minthara who are also clearly really neglected characters.

Some companions are more prioritized than others. Devs usually have their favorites.

Yes you are right for sure. My post was mainly focused to the ending itself.

Her whole quest is incredibly empty and the "we did everything we could" sentence is the biggest joke in whole game, because we did nothing, ask nobody... But if they wanted to fix this, they had to do a huge changes in the game, and obviously they didn't want to...

It's very true that her questline is extremely barebones, basically two fetch quests. And it's very sad.

Id go as far as to say Karlachs questline is probably the worst quest I have ever seen in modern gaming (from what Ive played and watched on YT/Twitch & Co etc. )

Yep, I still love her dearly but her 'quest' is probably the worst one and the game rarely has bad quests which is sad and odd.

did we really get nothing after all this long time damnn larian really breaks my heart there so there is nothing that is in the work for karlach right?

It would seem so.

I'd say its pretty much Joever with the coping, especially with the recent news of Larian basically parting ways with BG3 and not adding new content (new karlach stuff would be new content, so theres that) and just bug fixes and already promised features such as modtools and transmorg system

Been a while huh?

I just completed my honor mode playthrough and earned my golden dice, completing the game 100% for the first time since I made this post originally (not to say I havent /started/ runs). I was definitely tentative before, with what we'd gotten. But I can honestly say that after all that's been fixed, added, changed. We did win.

While there isn't a whole big change to Karlach's questline, what was added to it and around it, as well as the epilogue are a more than satisfying ending, and new beginning. Its just that another adventure is starting, and while Larian are stepping away and dont plan to make any DLC/Expacs/DE, I still find myself happy with how it ended, and the hope and clear 'good' ending I was surprised as anyone that Larian stepped away from the IP, but I imagine WOTC is largely to blame for that.

At the end of the day, I'm satisfied, happy, and content with what we got. The ending is poignant, and becomes positive and hopeful during the epilogue.

Rejoice, be positive, play the game the whole way through, Romance Karlach, and enjoy the epilogue.

Signing off once and for all on this thread with love to all of you for making this like.. One of the biggest posts ever on the Larian Forums to the point where change was actually made,

G4riik

Wish I could share that positive outlook, but I still think karlachs story feels too convoluted and unsatisfying for me to not be bitter about it forever. The epilogue giving a wishy washy ''hey we have a lead to finding a cure in the hells'' makes it less bitter, but it still doesn't negate the fact that we really did not get enough exposition on karlachs engine problem, nor were we given any opportunities as the player to try and find solutions, instead of just giving up after a twat weapons smith told us shes doomed lol. Her and wyll are the only origin companions who dont have a proper quest line that focuses just on Them, instead of just a fetch quest and an ultimatum with a villain character we were gonna fight anyway, or in Wyll's case being sidelined by other charcaters during quests that should be focused on him (even halsin has a questline in act 2 that revolves around him, like cmon.).

If we just got dialogue for karlach to let HER make the decision to go to avernus at least, that'd improve her story - maybe a scene where wyll and/or the player can convince her that theyd go with her and she wouldnt be alone. Just anything to give her more agency in that decision since it feels offputting to just MAKE her go to avernus right at the end when shes dying despite all her protests of returning there. It would also give a more hopeful outlook for karlach in act 3 since majority of her dialogue right now is so doomer-y that just feels incredibly cynical. I doubt we'll get that, though, so I can only hope that for any future projects larian works on, they put more care into writing tragic characters lest we get another "we did everything we could for karlach" situation.

I really cant remember the pre-requisites for it but it is there in the game at certain permutation when you can
Just really a shame that there was not enough time to add hell zone, don't know if it was going to be Avernus or just some other portion of hell but it was going to be about Vlaakith's temple area of sort, is really a pity it ended up getting cut out would have had a chance to get Karlach's story more fleshed out for sure.

I never bookmakered it but it was when people were talking with Sven Vincke and there was a lot of talk about stuff, places, visions they wanted to add into the game but didn't make for various reasons such as lack of tech to support it properly or just slowing down the flow of gameplay too much or simply just lack of enough time for it, another example was having more places to see inbetween the transistion from Act 2 to Act 3.

So it really shows how lacking Karlach, Wyll (too many rewrites) and Minthara suffers from, what I find most odd is why is Karlach still not added onto the official banner/poster as part of the beloved origin team?

The quicker Larian releases the Mod Instrument the better, with AI voice anything is possible including Fixing Engine Mod for the Tiefling Waifu.

Maybe it was in previous patches, but i've tested few scenarios in 1.6 and the dialogues at the docks are always the same. Tav romancing Karlach as only chance to save her (Wyrmway not completed so Wyll not BoA) with 100, -10 and -40 approval before entering the morphic pool the dialogue outcomes dont change. When Wyll is BoA and you are only a friend its also indentical regardless of the approval 100, -10 doesnt make any difference.


The engine quest going nowhere in Act3 despite all the leads to Gondians, heaps of enriched iron that somehow allow Steel Watchers to not overheat etc. will always look bad and unfinished (even regardless if it would be possible to fix the engine or not) compared to the 4 EA origins quests.

Regarding convincing her earlier it's difficult since it could totally change the endings, i mean i would love the have the possibility hidden under some dialogues or triggered by books (ie Disorders of the Nerves and Mind: A Treatise Edition 2: Experiencing Hells), but it would require rewriting. In the game MC Tav is a 6 INT in terms of understanding trauma and all you can do is to ask Karlach to go back to Avernus on her own...3 times...(after second upgrade in Act2 and twice in Act3 during/post Gortash), while she constantly points out how loneliness was eating her alive there. It's doomery in act3 but kinda consequential to the type of response she received from Tav. Her lines at the dock's are kinda extension to what she's been expecting "I thought i knew, but you..." "You can't, you..." .But i agree its a cheap approach especially when you romance and have the 'lets play pretend' date, even steorotypical 6 INT would be able to understand and communicate will to go and fight for her life even in the hells, without waiting until the dramatic end, also considering the whole game story takes few months rather than few weeks.

Yeah, all good points the epilogue softened the blow and gave some hope in regards to a dlc or more content from larian. But then that hopium got shut down pretty quick.
The engine questline into act3 will jist be a really hard blemish for me to ignore, my final thoughts are i hope that larian learns from this going into their next games writing. Cause my biggest hang up going forward now is i wanna support larians new games but i really dont wanna experience this sudden *gotcha* that karlachs story left me with. Espcially with all the obvious ways of it to be fixable in plain sight.

It's so good to return after all these months and see that everything I warned you about happened exactly as I said would happen. When I told you weeping on some god forsaken forum was not enough - you called me toxic. When I told Larian never planned to give her good ending - you called me a troll. And now I can say that it was very long time since I was this happy because you and Karlach got exactly what you deserve.