Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Patch 6 Destroyed Player Agency with Astarion

Let me correct you.

This character is a noble from the upper city of Baldur's Gate, Magistrate, who is 80% power-hungry and used his position for personal power and didn't believe in mercy, for which he was probably killed. I don't applaud this moral issue being left out, oh well.
Is a narcissist who thanks to vampirism is quite twisted as a vampire spawn, as he feels alive when he kills.
200 years of torturing him and Tav is the first person who care and help him, literally gave him everything.
Lord Astarion would never consider Tav "as mere property" because he is too arrogant and proud to use "we" for it.
Generally Lords Vampires can love in DnD, especially with the "feelings of mortals" that give the ritual all the more. A price well paid.
Lord Astarion is by all accounts experiencing a narcissistic obsession where he's the leader. So yes he loves Tav. Not catholic and abnormal, but only in the way Lord Astarion could.
I really don't think Lord Astarion, who wants to drink from golden goblets and take power in Baldur's Gate is going to hell, he says so himself. But he's doing it for Karlach, who is Tav in this romance.

If your applause is directed at the "unloving heartless abuser vampire monster and frightened victim" story they have no point.
Too much needs to be rewritten, cut and added to make it work.

Great! What kind of evil? Answer: the kind of evil that doesn't care about consent.



Nicely said!

But you lose me here:


Why not? Why not build someone up and tear them down again? Why not revel in your power over your precious?

AA is a different beast. Remember what Raphael said about the ritual? No only does he enjoy the things that vampire lords enjoy, he also enjoys mortal pleasures like sex and the taste of food. Spawn always enjoyed being cruel but now AA also enjoys being cruel to his precious. Power has set him free and enjoys his pleasure at your expense.



I think JandK has addressed this well. That's a feature of all the romances. Durge is also upset when Shadowheart turns on him. Vlaakith loyalist Tav is upset when she realizes that she about to lose her soul:





I think that's been answered multiple times but it's a few pages back. "Do whatever you like and it will all turn out well feels . . . trite? Saccharine?" The right word will come to me eventually.

Of course you can maintain your head cannon

I've already addressed the issue of triggering and don't feel like rewriting it.

It impacts the overall integrity of your head canon. No one here can speak directly for Larian.

Yes if you study the companion's brain when Tav is MF

Narrator: *And besides - the hypothalamus in this brain before you is secreting.* ORI_State_PartneredCompanionIncluded
Narrator: *The hormone of love is swelling somewhere in this skull.*

If you were in a romantic relationship - love. Works for Astarion's Ascended smooth brains.
Because at least one romance with an evil man has to be in play. You know, like Minthara, but a man.
Maybe this was of course done accidentally and will be cut in the next patch for Lord Astarion, who knows, no one knows.

To be fair, we do have /some/ idea what the intent was. You don't need to agree with their intent or think it was properly executed, of course, (and I think there could be an interesting discussion regarding intent vs execution or death of the author theory! Especially with some of the limits the writers had to work with where the execution couldn't be 100% their intent, because gameplay or budget was the priority) but here's an Imgur I compiled a while back with devnotes from the script (devnotes are instructions the writers leave for Neil for his line deliveries). I also included a brief description of the context below.

https://imgur.com/a/fwJDUJq

Note that not all of these pictures are relevant to the discussion being had right now, the context for my original compilation was a bit different.

EDIT: Kind of on topic, LiryFire brought up the illithid line- That is a default line that happens for all /currently/ romanced companions, and seems to be the product of the break-up flag not properly triggering for that scenario. Regarding author's intent, one of the devnotes in the link I provided specifically says Lord Astarion hasn't thought about (Illithid) Tav for the past 6 months.
Also worth noting, however, that in the scrapped original epilogues, if Lord Astarion had been broken up with, Withers said something along the lines of "He does think of inviting his ex-lover back, but deemeth it beneath a lord". So there's also that.

You give an example of the outcome of a game choice, the end result. The Vlaakit supporter does not strangle or insult her companion along the way.
We in the epilogue cannot leave AA. That's the outcome of the choice. I don't see anything offensive in dealing with Lazael Vlaakita or Sheduharta Sharr. I mean, it's their "evil way". Why is their kissing cute?
Is the god of Gail and Mintar offensive? No.

Animating a face, will not change the characters story, it will only change your TAB's interaction with that character.

You've already made the point that you absolutely agree with all the changes. This is Good. You don't need to repeat that.
I think there is no point in further arguments, because everyone will remain in their own opinion. With all due respect to your opinion.

Very valuable, thank you. The authors explicitly asked the voice actor to deliver the lines as "abusively" and "disingenuous"

It's interesting in terms of how feelings work in Ascended Vampires. Since this is a homebrew, the rules of Vampire Lords DnD may not apply to them.
Certainly didn't think so, Ilithids don't have souls - that's certainly in the lore, unlike Ascended Vampires. Tav isn't Tav anymore, lost Tav-self.
And ugly.

JandK, how does it makes sense for a Dark Urge, who likes pain, to show displeasure over AAstarion biting their lip? This Dark Urge not only likes pain, but they defied Bhaal so they can rule the world on their own, and they ascended Astarion for his power. The closer they keep AA, the more that power is theirs. The Dark Urge is very much a character that would be into what AAstarion is putting down. How does it make sense that they have a scared or horrified expression? Especially since the tadpole interferes with control over spawn and Dark Urge could just kill him if he oversteps?

Very interesting. But everything what's there, you already heard in Neils great voice acting. So there is nothing new for me. Alas. I hoped someone could convince me otherwisee. I am glad, to get reassured, that Astarion isn't into illithids

I could say the same thing about you not trying to understand my point of view and that of many others who are writing in this post.
The improvement is from your point of view because you believe these changes give more credibility to your headcanon, your way to interpret the story.
For many this is not the case, in fact, these changes have worsened the gaming experience so much that they have stopped playing. And they didn't stop playing because the changes no longer supported their view of the story or AAstarion, but because the expression on the TAV aroused negative feelings, enough to make them feel sick. And this prevents them from playing again.
I believe that psychological well-being and enjoyment of a game takes priority over one's headcanon.

Another analysis that says the Evil Man is evil. We have a completely different approach to romance with an evil character. It's a fact that most AA fans are fine with and for their Tav: Freedom < Lord Astarion.
No one ever ignored his evil, just looking for complexity. And there is complexity. They're not a walking evil blob. Which is why he genuinely misses Tav.

Complexity:

The complexity and versatility that Larian is probably writing for a romance with Lord Astarion.

And other things, his evil qualities shouldn't devalue and distort the positive ones. Then the whole Astarion romance wouldn't work.

I think you misinterpreted me, I didn't give any opinions or mean to, I only provided screenshots of devnotes that back up the idea that AA displaying abusive tendencies seems to be part of the author's intent (most notoriously in the one devnote that does straight up say "slightly abusivey"). This was prompted by someone else saying that we don't know what Larian planned and that that reading is just headcanon, and well, I thought that we do have an inkling what their intent was.
I also gave credence to the original scrapped epilogues indicating that AA misses Tav, I don't understand this reply. I do believe he does love them, although it's become twisted/unhealthy. I don't see anything in my reply indicating the opposite.

EDIT: I will also say I don't think Origin Karlach is the best example for this point: her Act 3 AA romance scene is actually triggering for me, he's quite brutal there and in the aftermath. And the situation where you can get that epilogue dialogue is quite contrived, as it requires no long rest from the ritual to the endgame, and I think plays into that whole thing Larian does (which is why I say that they usually value player agency a bit too much) where characters bow to the player character's whims even when it seems a bit strange for them to do so, ala Lae'zel dating a mindflayer.

Keep in mind that AA is mainly outright abusive when the player argues with him and says things he doesn't like. It is possible to avoid outright abuse from him. There are still red flags, but for the most part he prefers manipulation. He might even be happy if he doesn't have to be manipulative. If you're on the same page with AA, he can seem content for the rest of the game, with no abuse other than some red flags. The red flags being that he objectifies the player and control from him is mandatory. I do not like the idea that AA willingly goes to Avernus when he would break up with Karlach after failing to turn her. But they seem to break his character to make it possible... so why not other scenarios?

It's important to note that my stance here is that Tav's face should be changed, and I only came here to be a nerd and say that we do know a bit about the writer's input for AA's characterisation, since it was being said that we don't know anything about Larian's take on it, and I thought "well, I do have some info regarding that actually!". It wasn't meant to support a specific opinion in the whole "to change or not to change face" debate. (Unless you're talking about something else)

That being said: I don't think an abusive personality is conditional, but I get the point that that side of him can be invisible to Tav for an indeterminate amount of time depending on their personality.

I'm not at all sure what this means. Of course people should take care of their mental health. But I don't think a game has anything to do with that.

I certainly don't want every bit of media and entertainment that I enjoy to be changed because someone else says it makes them uncomfortable. Different things for different people. Personally, I enjoy it.

At no point did I not take your opinion at face value. I made that comment because you were the one telling me what I had and had not complained about before, as if I were just making up my current position.

I figured you wanted to show his evil and what he was capable of.
To which I responded by pointing out that for a character like Astarion it's important to have the balance that Larian does.

My main grievances I think you know.
Larian could add more trigger phrases for Lord Astarion to show abuse. There are many possibilities, kissing is not one of them. But to make it fit his complex evil character.
Not like with Minthara, when she says: 1 - "We don't need gods, we make our own power". 2 - No, Du, bye, you haven't taken the power of a god.
Kisses are made for the very complexity of romance.

In this case I wasn't trying to say anything about AA's character, just talk about the clues we have regarding authorial intent.

Regarding giving AA more opportunities to display abusive behaviours to make it feel "coherent": Honestly, I don't think that's necessary. I think they did a good job. Abusive people are more complex than "I hit you and demean you" and they balanced it pretty well with him, for what he is. If they make it really blatant it's probably going to end up cartoony, like a bad TV show depiction of abusers. It's often much more complicated than that, and I've brought this up before but I like how they implemented one abusive tactic that isn't talked about often in media, lovebombing: basically, showering someone with affection to make them easier to control, as they start relying on that love (I guess the sincerity of AA's lines can be put into question here, I will say that in my opinion Neil's delivery of those lines is really fake, as the devnotes put it for one of his lines, "overly sincere"). I think when people ask for more evidence of him being abusive they want stuff like those lines being removed because they think they're genuine and thus a "good sign", when to me it's quite interesting that they're there and an authentic depiction of abusive individuals.

@jinetemoranco: How can I see the whole script with the devnotes? Where do I find these files?

Overall, I wanted more exploration of evil in romance. I'm not sure how much it should be called abusive, not always.
I assume different things that Ascended Astarion wants, but I don't absolutely want my Tav to be locked into the role of victim, unable to play ally and lover.