Originally Posted by Filia
If they decide to add an ultimatum (which is fine if they need to), then Halsin has to be more strictly on other cases, too.

I still see no way he could sleep with SH if she stays on the Shar path, he hates this goddess and then he just forgets all of that because of sex? Come on, he isn't a teenager.
Also, he sleeps with the Drow twins (we don't know which god they worship) just to tell us about his "youthful misadventures" afterwards. So again, he doesn't like (Lolth) Drows and still he ignores that fact because of sex? Yeah, no.

A guy who could forgive Kagha and who also seems to be forgiving towards Ketheric draws the line on someone who was been under mind control? Sorry, that doesn't make sense.

All of these cases are different than Minthara, for one reason.

Halsin has been very clear that his one and only redline is DO NOT FUCK WITH THE GROVE. If you do not fuck with the Grove, he can put up with a LOT. If you do fuck with the Grove, he will hunt you down and kill you.

Shadowheart is a Sharran (and there actually is a way to have a discussion about this if you do an SH Origin run). HOWEVER, the first time Halsin met her, she rescued him and the Grove. Therefore, he was able to see her capacity for good- by protecting the thing that mattered to him most.

Having casual sex with someone is a lot different than trusting someone who tried to murder you and everyone you cared about not to do so again. We also know the twins' affiliations. The woman was never Lolth-sworn as she has no red eyes. The man had them but likely switched allegiances when they defected from the Underdark. Also, they did not ever try to fuck with the Grove.

Kagha admittedly imperiled the Grove (in a deeply wrong attempt to help it)- but demoting her instead of exiling her (which even then, he will do it if she causes Arabella's death with Arabella's parents being dead, and in the path where her parents live but Arabella doesn't, there's very subtle implications he knew they wanted to poison her) punished her even worse since she couldn't make herself a martyr, couldn't contact the Shadow Druids again, and had to face shame/social stigma as a punishment. Also, he knew Kagha before she went crazy, so he knew she was capable of doing better.

Ketheric, Halsin lowkey blames himself for (even with the removal of the EA plot thread where Halsin killed Isobel); in full release thinking it was his fault for not being able to stop him sooner. He knew that before the Shadow Curse, Ketheric was a loving husband and worshipper of Selune. There was at one point a capacity for good in him.

Minthara? Halsin's first introduction to her is her having him tortured in bear form while trying to track down his Grove and murder everyone there. AND this ultimatum only happens when the Rite of Thorns is carried out, meaning that Halsin lost his home and loved ones forever because of Minthara. "But she was brainwashed!" Okay.

Halsin is 350 and was a sex slave as a "young Druid." Minthara's exact age isn't know, but she's somewhere between 225-300, because she was alive for the fall of House DeVir and was old enough to understand it but young enough that it left "quite an impression" on her. Halsin VERY likely was kidnapped while Minthara was a young adult from the most prominent Lolth-sworn house in the Underdark. He would have heard about the evil deeds she committed all the way back then. (Such as, you know... owning slaves. Something he barely escaped himself.) And notice that in the ultimatum, never once does Minthara actually apologize for what happened to him (because that's not who Minthara is). She doesn't even explicitly say she won't harm him; she says she "has no quarrel with" him. She turned from Lolth because Lolth rejected her first, not because she disagrees with literally anything Lolth says (she still supports slavery and the subjugation of men).

Do I think there are better alternatives than the ultimatum? Sure! I think in that case Halsin should just leave- you don't get to pick who stays. But if they really need there to be a player choice here, why not just have Halsin start to pack up his things, and then the player either has an option of saying they'll have Minthara leave instead if he'll just stay, or say "farewell, stay safe out there" to Halsin so that the ultimatum is strictly in the meta sense?

Halsin isn't doing this to punish Minthara; it's not out of spite/hatred/malice. It's fear. He says he feels he "has to weigh her freedom against [the player]'s." If the player chooses Minthara, he doesn't try to persuade them, and even says he HOPES he's wrong but can't stick around to find out. He is terrified that if he stays, he'll be murdered, and possibly his loved ones at the Grove too. Remember- Halsin has no tadpole. He can't found out Minthara's true intentions.

I get that sometimes, things get lost because it's a video game and we have meta-knowledge that can't be forgotten. That colors how we approach it. But while we know Minthara means Halsin no further harm, Halsin has no reason to think she has no intention of harming him, a surface elf she has already caused harm to before. Why is there no hate for Lae'zel and Shadowheart trying to murder each other in cold blood in the camp?

I will concede one point here, which is that yes, it isn't great that Halsin lets Minthara go, knowing she'll become a thrall for the Absolute. I think it would be cool if choosing to keep Halsin caused Minthara to aggro the player in sheer rage/desperation/possible suicide by cop- both because it would add more stakes in Halsin's* favor, which is needed, and because it would eliminate that issue.

*Keep in mind, again, that this ultimatum will only trigger if the Rite of Thorns is completed. Those are definitely stakes- but most people, even those who know about the ultimatum, don't seem to have connected those dots yet.

Sorry for the essay but I definitely have thoughts here.