Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Story & Character Discussion Patch 7 Closed Beta Discussion

Hello!

Dice are once again rolling, and the Patch 7 Closed Beta has gone live on Steam!

If you’re one of the randomly selected players to take part, you should now have an entry in your Steam Library called Baldur’s Gate 3 Playtest (with Gale’s handsome face staring at you).
If you haven’t, don’t worry! We will continue to add players throughout the Closed Beta, so keep an eye on your Steam Library.

❗Spoilers ❗
As not everyone will have the opportunity to participate in the Closed Beta, we would appreciate it if you could keep any spoilers about the new evil ending cinematics to a minimum, so players can enjoy these themselves once Patch 7 releases in September!

I have set up this thread for discussion of Patch 7 content and the Evil Endings. You are free to start your own threads but please make it clear on the title that they are about Patch 7 and spoiler text when necessary.

You can also find a Feedback thread on this link: https://forums.larian.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=945766&#Post945766

Thank you all!

[As stated above, please expect Patch 7 spoilers underneath this post]

If I may receive a simple yes or no response from anyone in the know, does the Emperor have any new content in the upcoming patch?

My overall reaction & feedback after seeing all the extended evil cutscene(s) for Dark Urge and Tav;

Naturally after the original lackluster 2 minute end-cutscene (where our main character merely sits on the throne before the game fades-to-black) it feels great to now have an extended 6 minute end-cutscene where they actually do something before it fades-to-black. The bar was already set so abysmally low that literally anything will look great compared to that, so sure it's nice to have it extended by 6 more minutes (which should've been in-game since launch, not a year later).

However these extended end-cutscenes for the evil playthrough are merely the equivalent of the good playthrough's end-cutscenes at the dock during launch ("yay the Absolute is dead, nice job everybody... GG, ROLL CREDITS!"). They were not satisfying conclusions for the good story back then and they certainly are not satisfying conclusions for the evil story today regardless of how visually impressive they are.

Where's our evil epilogue? Where's our actual evil aftermath? Where's our satisfying ending where we get to see what our power accomplishes on a grander scale? Where is our evil post-credit scene with the Dead Three taunting Withers instead?



As someone who became a mega fan of yours by blindly buying into BG3's Early Access due to your true artistic passion and immediately afterwards bought DOS2 and DOS1 as well because I wanted even more of your passion (all 3 becoming one of my favorite games ever); it is absolutely saddening to see how drastically your evil stories have degraded (both in writing and care) since Divinity Original Sin II, which as a kickstarter game with a far lesser budget had a satisfying evil story with fully developed endings that offered equal epilogue content and throughout the story had interesting evil choices with interesting outcomes spanning throughout all acts and especially the epilogue.



With characters like Lady Vengeance, Windego and the God-King, Voidwoken and Fane, Saheila and Sebille, Sadha and The Red Prince, Adramahlihk and Lohse. Even entire locations such as Fort Joy, Reaper's Coast, Arx and the entire world. We went from DOS2's long-spanning evil choices resulting in fates far worse than death with an epilogue showing just how miserable everyone and the entire world is, to BG3 comically mimicking Doctor Evil from Austin Powers every chance it gets with its evil choices immediately killing off any evil branching story in its infancy to preserve budget;

You die! He dies! They die! EVIL!


To properly conclude the evil story with proper epilogues you should've been drawing inspiration from the amazingly portrayed Vlaakith's throne room ending scene for Ascended Lae'zel or Cursed Dark Urge's epilogue ending, which splendidly shows just how evil truly ruins people and eternally condemns them to fates worse than death. And from that inspiration came up with an equally eerily, dark and messed up epilogue to properly conclude an evil playthrough by showing the miserable state of the world with our companions instead suffering dreadful fates worse than death as they're ruled by our main character who became a God (just like Divinity Original Sin 2 had its epilogue showing a dead miserable world and our companions if one sided with the God-King). Because when the evil journey is already the most unsatisfactory content-deprived experience where any potentially branching story immediately gets killed off in its infancy, at the very least ensure the ending is so fascinatingly well concluded to make all that waste of time and effort worth it.

This also could've been a chance to bring Gortash back; to have an actual ending with him, to surprise your audience who are investing their time into a significantly underdeveloped evil playthrough. "Hey remember Gortash, that amazing character voiced by Jason Isaacs? Yeah he now has an actual ending and Bane shows up in it. GO WILD GUYS!". But no... as always just frantically kill off everyone tied to the evil journey the instant they start to display any interesting branching story on the evil path. You had Gortash as a villain right till the very end and chose to kill him off. What a waste.

Was hoping for an actual quality conclusion to the evil story that respects player agency (like the good playthrough does with its revisions, an epilogue and a post-credit scene) and had these extended cutscenes been merely a part of more upcoming content updates to ensure the evil playthrough is brought up to par with the good playthrough then I would not be so critical. But intentionally ignoring the evil playthrough since Early Access and then years later merely extending its lackluster cliffhanger cutscene in such a poorly rushed way as the final content update... sorry.

Far too little and way too late.



These extended evil cutscenes as they stand are ultimately the final nail in a coffin that shows just how uncared-for and poorly thought-out the evil journey in BG3 is from start to finish where every potentially branching evil story is immediately killed off in its infancy in order to save budget, cutting off all its branches at every corner before they even had a chance to grow. I won't even bother amusing the idea that taking control of the Absolute could have been used for good. To rebuild or create a better world by getting rid of evils such as Vlaakith, Zariel or Lolth, something that Minthara implies with her own good ambitions on the good path. An actual pragmatic would use the Netherbrain as a tool to help or improve reality and we could have been the next Gortash.

And so at the journey's end the only thing I can truly praise is the visual quality and cinematography of these extended cutscenes as they've accomplished visual badassery of epic proportions with their unique outcomes, was incredibly impressed with them. Truly well done. It's just a shame it's nothing more than fancy cliffhanger eye candy to quickly wrap things up in the most uncaring way, which ironically completely killed my interest for a Patch 7 evil playthrough when it should've done the complete opposite.

I'd rather have a well written evil story with no cutscenes (like DOS2), than epic cutscenes with a poorly written evil story (like BG3). At least with the original cliffhanger I was able to headcanon a satisfying proper ending for my Dark Urge and Minthara.

I bow to you, that couldn't have been written better. You describe it really well. I've seen pretty much all possible endings and after a few conversations here, I'm very disappointed. I think the emotional bond we have with your companions after all this time is completely underestimated.

It is a very weird idea to analyze endings in a vacuum. Endings are a climatic moment for the whole campaign and it just feels wrong to separate them and butcher them in a wall of text based on your specific vision for an ideal ending. I've not seen the endings myself for this exact reason, so maybe you are even right. But I'll refrain from giving feedback until I actually experience them, which would definitely be done through playing a proper campaign, in game.

+1000. I give your post a standing ovation.

Thank you guys for the appreciative comments, it's warming to see other Dark Urge players just as passionate about the character and its unique romance with Minthara/Astarion who are supposed to fully accompany the character to the very end.

As an addition to my post above, I've also come up with this visualized 4th endgame choice concept that respects player agency and previously established character motives through incredibly minor additions yet significantly satisfactory results;

CHOSEN DARK URGE & MINTHARA/ASTARION 4th ENDGAME CHOICE;




That is what a Chosen Dark Urge player would expect a proper end with Minthara/Astarion to actually be, easily accomplished with incredibly minor additions and minimum amount of effort required to make the extended cliffhanger a satisfying proper conclusion.

And despite there being no evil epilogues I'd be happy with it because it would at least respect the player agency and especially the previously established character motives. Minthara and Astarion were literally made to be the only companions with us till the very end, wouldn't settle for anything less.

Thank you ... I have a little tear in my eye, not just because of Sceleritas' photobomb. But yes, that would be a simple ending that a lot of players would be happy with and it would be the simplest means. I think Minthy & Astarion deserve at least an ending where they can stand by our side and go with us to the end of days. As you say, as evil Durge only Minthy & Astarion will accompany you until the end of days.

You are unfortunately so right. I came across Gale's ending while browsing the youtubes recently (it has been delisted since) and I would love to comment on it, but my head tells me that without any context and not being in the test group, I shouldn't, at least not on the official channels. So I just hope that some of the play-testers notice the same things and point them out, while I sit on my fingers. ^^

Your post is so well written, Crimsonrider, that I feel the need to write a reply. I'm not a beta tester, so I don't think I should post much about the endings, that's why I'll simply agree with your review and emphasise the things you mentioned.


THESE especially!

Gortash is the biggest wasted potential in the game for me. I was quietly hoping for him to show up after all, but I guess that's it for him.

The endings are indeed just extra scenes with no proper aftermath. They're gimmicky and some of them are really fun, but it's just not enough to be a satisfying conclusion to such a long game.

That's how I was thinking of roleplaying my Seldarine Tav - to destroy Lolth and also Vlaakith for Lae'zel (and for my own satisfaction because she made things personal), then get rid of the untrustworthy and obnoxious brain and proceed to the normal good ending with Ascended Astarion.

I also felt emotional reading the description of your proposal for a fourth Durge ending. This would be such a wonderfully dark and powerful ending!


You've written so many extensive and insightful posts, pointing out plot shortcomings and have given so many great ideas how to improve the game for people who don't want to play as a heroic knight in shining armour and prefer to hang out with morally ambiguous characters, I applaud you. It's a shame you don't work for Larian.

Considering the sad news at today's final game event, I may as well finish my thoughts regarding these endings. Also thank you Ametris for your kind words.

Without any Patch #7 spoilers;

As the final addition to the original post I wished to express what an evil player would expect an actual proper conclusion for the evil story to be, through one of my favorite main characters - the Emperor.



When it comes to the Emperor for example; the motives and ambitions that drive his character are wonderfully established during a good playthrough. Unlike the other illithids he has no interest in fulfilling the Grand Design, his primary purpose in life is survival at any cost, even if it means giving up his freedom for it. Ultimately the only reason why he goes against the Absolute and helps us in return is because it threatens his very existence, which is why even at the end of the game although he considers taking control of the Absolute, he ultimately does not because then he'd be forced to go to war against the powerful Githyanki Empire. All he wants is to ensure his survival, be free and go back to the shadows in order to continue being the Emperor of the underworld, enjoying the intricacies of local diplomacy and the shadowy manipulations of its events.

During an evil playthrough on the other hand if the player convinces him to take control of the Absolute in order for them to rule together; neither the original cliffhanger nor the extended cutscene actually establish any character ambition to explain his motives for becoming the Absolute. The extended cutscene is intentionally as ambiguous as it can be of any further character development, failing to portray what he ultimately wants to accomplish beyond the cliffhanger, because the true purpose of these extended cutscenes isn't to conclude the story properly, but to cinematically portray our characters in the most comically cartoony mustache-twirling-smirking evil ways in order to just visually impress the audience; "You're evil! Evil I tell you! Pure evil! Do you see how evil you are?! Are you impressed yet?! Let me show you some more! More evil!"

That's why they're visually impressive cliffhangers, but terribly lackluster in substance and therefore not proper story conclusions. The good playthrough also had visually impressive cliffhangers at launch, yet despite that half of the story being significantly far more developed since it was prioritized throughout development, the community was not satisfied with mere cliffhangers. It took revisions, a proper epilogue and a post-credit scene to properly conclude the good journey in a satisfying way by actually showing character ambitions beyond the dock scene and what each of them ultimately accomplished.

An example of a proper evil story conclusion based on the Emperor's character ambitions;

The game fades to black after the visually impressive extended cliffhanger and then opens up with the cinematic mural of the Grand Design transforming into an actual in-game rendition of the Illithid Empire in full motion as its epilogue cutscene. Showing the ambitious Emperor having established a safe and thriving Illithid Empire with all kinds of races in absolute unity, and our main character at his side as his non-illithid Empress (if romanced), surrounded by our illithid companions as advisors before the credits ultimately roll.



To accomplish this ending, the player would have to;

• Romance the Emperor
• Persuade him to take control of the Absolute at the end

Through this his romance becomes elevated by having an actual satisfying endgame outcome (instead of just being a pointless hentai sexual kink with an achievement) and provides an ending in which the player gets to see the Emperor's ambition realized and their character ruling at his side (like Minthara/Astarion are supposed to rule by ours). This is what respecting player's time and effort actually looks like, and with just a tiny bit of imagination and care the evil story could've been beautifully salvaged and drastically improved.

Despite this outcome originating from an evil choice, it's not trying to cinematically portray the most cartoony mustache-twirling-smirking evil through our characters. Instead it's just an evil choice with a morally ambiguous outcome resulting in an interesting fate for our main character, our companions and the entire cosmos. Ultimately leaving it to the player to ponder just how negative or positive it may be. It's open to interpretation while providing an interesting conclusion.

Unfortunately we will never get to see these kind of proper endings. Evil players are unfortunately out of luck due to official announcements made months in advance stating no more content will be coming and to make matters even worse the community's feedback on these endings got drastically segregated with this Closed Beta (as is evident wasn't even publicly discussed until I kicked the hornet's nest).

These extended cliffhangers should've been in the game since launch and Update #7 should've been our proper evil epilogues where we get to see evil ambitions properly realized. This is a story rich RPG after all. As someone who plays both sides of the story, actually tries to enjoy its lackluster evil side and pays attention to all the lore with 1200 hours invested into the character of Dark Urge and a significant amount more into the evil side of it trying to improve it (as is also evident by my signature documenting all issues regarding Dark Urge & Minthara on an evil playthrough, which these endings are supposed to enrich)... I would expect a story rich RPG to provide equal content for the evil side of it and a proper conclusion when pouring 150+ hours into every single playthrough.

But alas, we ain't getting it anymore. That ship for us evil players has way in advance prematurely sailed in its very infancy without even giving us a chance to provide proper feedback on it. I was hoping for at least the Chosen Dark Urge ending with Minthara/Astarion romanced to properly be addressed, since that one is literally dismissing previously established character motives and completely disregarding player agency because it's too rushed trying to visually impress, rather than properly concluding the story in a respectful and satisfying manner.

It's too late now as the update arrives next week.

Crimsomrider, it is admirable how much work and effort you have put into giving Larian extensive feedback after all this time.

Personally, I have decided not to bother anymore, after watching some of the evil endings on yt. It is tiring to watch all the fan feeback go into a void. Minthara is basically getting the same treatment as Viconia, where her previously established characterization does not matter, she is just used as a prop character in the evil side of the story (or in Viconia's case propping Shadowheart's story). Wyll's evil ending is so disappointing and out of character for him. Karlach's evil ending is just ridiculous (so thanks to brain power she does not need a heart anymore?!).

BG3 has fun combat, I enjoyed honor mode and I am looking forward to fanmade mods, but I am done with Larian's storytelling.

Thanks for mentioning Wyll's ending, I managed to hunt it down to see it for myself and... yeah... devastating to see. I was not aware it was so bad even articles got written about it, it's even worse than the lore contradicting Dark Urge one. At least Dark Urge's can be salvaged with minor additions, but Wyll's I truly cannot salvage.

There's no evil story or character development here, this is just pure character butchering for epic visuals. No actual ambition nor reason to be doing what he's doing, completely out of character, an imbecilic psychopath just throwing a tantrum instead of having actual established ambitions and motives to ultimately accomplish something of worth on a grander scale. Because that's all these cutscenes aim to portray, just a very childish evil bully for the sake of shoving into the player's face how evil they've become.

Just like I said;


A few days ago I was joking with someone how I intentionally didn't include Wyll's potential evil epilogue ambitions into my original post because Wyll's just a nice guy. I truly have no idea what Wyll's evil ambition could be, other than probably becoming Karlach's ULTIMATE EVIL sidekick yet again as a joke. But in all seriousness I personally saw his ambition and motive as;

• Him becoming so fed up with Mizora he eternally imprisons her to torture her and then becomes so consumed by hate against devils he fully embraces becoming the actual vengeful Blade Of Frontiers from Early Access, paying a visit to the Hells and slaughtering the devils with such brutality he eventually fully evolves into an archdemon himself by the time he's done. Ultimately becoming the very thing he hates.
• Repulsed by his new form, but believing himself to be a hero doing the right thing, he establishes a fake utopia in Baldur's Gate by dominating the population to idolize him in order to cope with it.

It would've been beautifully poetic since he's a hero corrupted by power that just wants to do the right thing. A sort of bittersweet evil ending where he truly does the right thing on a grand scale, but ends up so corrupted by it he ends up a villain just trying to cope with the consequences, so demonically deformed even Mizora can't look at him out of sheer terror.

But after seeing his actual unique ending, it's truly devastating to see because Larian knows how to write captivating villains;

• Ketheric Thorm who is evil precisely because he loves, precisely because he cares, precisely because he has a family he wants to protect. A daughter he is so attached to he'll even tadpole her just to preserve the last essence of his family. He's a family man, a father, a husband trying to create a world where someone like him won't have to suffer the loss of a wife and child ever again.
• Gortash who is not evil for the sake of being evil, but because he was wronged as a child and sold to none other than Raphael of all people in order to pay the bills. He came from nothing and fought his way to the top in order to create a world in which he'll never again be used as a bargaining chip for others.
• Orin who as a child was born into a deranged family, with her own parents imagining best ways to murder her in order to please Bhaal. She had no way out, never stood a chance of a normal life, misery is all she's ever known and ultimately had to do the best she could with it. Someone who completely breaks down when she learns the truth she's merely a product of her environment, a child of incest merely created to be sacrificed.

But when it comes to our characters they're the ultimate cartoony and selfishly deranged evil psychopaths imaginable, more deranged than all 3 main villains combined. Makes Orin look like a completely sane woman that's just uppity in comparison.

What I personally would do for Wyll is toss this unique ending into the trashcan and make Tav's Baldur's Gate generic ending his actual ending. It wouldn't be as impressive, but it would entirely fit his character. The hero who saved Baldur's Gate, by conquering it.

Seeing how patch 7 is coming out within a week already, I'm a bit more encouraged to post some things. About Wyll:

His evil ending is terrible, the worst of them all!


Paraphrasing Crimsonrider: "He's evil! Evil I tell you! Pure evil! Do you see how evil he is?! Are you impressed yet?! Let me show you some more! More evil!"

If you compare his ending to Ascended Astarion's it turns out that AA (who was branded as evil incarnate, the monstrous tyrant) is actually a much nicer guy than the preaching hero Wyll.

As someone who almost never had Wyll in my party, was half-asleep during conversations with him because they bored me so much, didn't bother to take him with me to do his personal quests (only to meet Karlach), didn't save his dad and didn't kill Ansur, because I preferred to ally with Gortash, it seems I still have a better understanding of the character than the people who wrote his new ending.

There used to be an easy answer to this in early access. Lean into his self-indulgence. At the end of the journey he decides that's who he really was the whole time and the heroism was a convenience of his bestowed abilities that affords him the luxury. He didn't even particularly hate Mizora, the past he shared with us was remembered fondly not just because of the indulgence but because he was actually getting shit done and she enabled that. This would put it a lot more in line with Ascended Astarion and Justiciar Shadowheart at the least. Rather than a cartoonish bully you get something more like a "Good Tyrant."

But with how they ripped the central pillar of his personality out of his backstory they wrote themselves into a corner. What does someone with imposter syndrome and low self-confidence (the WORST choice they made about his rewrite) do when they embrace evil? idk go full megalomaniac I guess.

What is this discussion even? Wyll is only destined for an evil ending if you play as him and lead his character there. The game provides a wide plethora of interesring situations and meaningful dialogue options, a lot of which can be interpreted as plot turning points for any desired transition. If you fail to develop a character properly in order to be satisfied with the given state of affairs in the end, thats on you... we are talking a role-playing game here, not a scripted dialogue simulator where every story bit and decision is interpreted for you, in great detail. You need to do some RP between the lines to make the things feel right and organic. If you do some actual role play you'll never get into a situation when a goody-to-shoes suddenly enslaved the world or any other absurd situation.

I don't care much for the inconsistencies Sceleritas may have brought with his comment, but I do think the evil endings are clearly phoned in and written without any interest in them, just trying to get them out of the way. It makes me wonder if the general ending was so bad not because they were running out of time and resources but because they just didn't care about the game anymore and wanted to get it over with. But some of the cinematics I've seen for the evil endings also look kind of bad and rushed so idk maybe it's because they only have a small team working on BG3 now.

I want to add that it's not even just comments that Sceleritas made, but also dialogues you share with your romantic partner as Chosen Dark Urge, and the prophecy made by the Bhaal priestess if you're romancing AA

You can roleplay your chara any way you want of course, but in this case they decided to create origin specific endings that they seem to think fit the characters best. There are no other alternatives other than the generic Tav options. There are no options to be a pragmatist using the power for the greater good, which is something one could expect from Wyll in particular. That's how I'd play his origin after seeing how he behaves as a companion.

I believe that can happen regardless of if you're the DU or not, as long as you become the Unholy Assassin. And then, even as the DU (if you don't embrace Bhaal) you could also just choose /not/ to conquer the brain, thus having the prophecy be possible.

EDIT: My bad, while you do need to become the assassin, her question is locked behind the flag that you're the DU. But you could still choose not to embrace Bhaal afterwards, I think? I believe the choice to become the assassin predates the encounter with Orin, but it's been a hot minute since I played full blown evil durge. Also, to be fair, you can already as the player take steps to break her prophecy after the fact, if you wanted to (of course it feels a bit different for the player if they chose it or the game chose it for them) by, for example, becoming a squid. It's not set in stone. Alaundo also predicted Aylin's revenge, but that can also not happen at all if you so choose.

Well, all that's to say: I don't find such inconsistencies all that important when there's a bigger, glaring issue with these endings, in my opinion. A lot of this stuff you can handwave away pretty easily "Sceleritas was lying" "Her prophecy was just poetry" etc etc. It doesn't seem the craziest thing to me that a Chosen of Bhaal wouldn't want to create more life (as Sceleritas so... succintly describes) rather than ending it for everyone.

Luckily the concept solution I've provided to address the Chosen Dark Urge ending does not require them to call Emma Gregory (Minthara), Neil Newbon (Astarion) nor Amelia Tyler (Narrator) back to the recording booth. Everything is in place as is, they just have to put the 4th dialogue option in and have the love interest remain at Dark Urge's side throughout the ending. Easily done.

The quoted inconsistencies are merely evidence to put the point across that the request to address the botched ending isn't coming from just a random fan demanding their waifu be included, instead it's actual solid undeniable proof they're truly dismissing established lore, character motives and disregarding player agency. Because throughout the entire game all the player keeps hearing is Dark Urge x Minthara/Astarion together forever in the crimson apocalypse, but then the ending does a complete 180, not even giving the player the option to roleplay properly because they're so poorly rushed.

I can forgive writing inconsistencies, but I cannot forgive sloppily rushed endings that don't even allow me to roleplay the character properly, especially after making us wait over half a year for... this. I also was going to include the full dialogue of the prophecy with the Echo of [Whichever] from the Tribunal, but unfortunately all my saves are after I killed Orin or in ACT II's Shadowfell. Just didn't have the motivation to go through it, but I might go torture myself even more if it gets Chosen Dark Urge players their proper ending

I can agree the endings are sloppy and rushed, and that Larian tends to forget both previously established lore, either by 5e or the previous BG games. I unfortunately highly doubt they will change the endings at this point, though. Look how long it took them to just implement these. They're clearly done with the game, and honestly, at this point, maybe they should just stop, because the stuff they keep adding just keeps getting worse.


(On a completely different note- I also really like the new icon- Orin is lovely! Do you happen to know the artist?)

EDIT: Forgot to say, in case you reload that save for the prophecy: you won't be able to trigger it unless you're romancing AA specifically.

That's ok if you think so. For me it's a huge problem regarding player agency as Crimsomrider already described very well. I strongly feel there should be at least one option where you can still be together with your partner. Instead we get 3 options where you're pigeonholed into not being allowed that, no matter your roleplay choices beforehand.
Not to mention other things which seem pretty illogical, like why kill the illithids right away if you want to have an illithid army, and why kill your partner immediately as they're also a very strong asset who would help you with your conquest. Not saying the option can't be there, but then the other option (to remain together) should also be available.


Thank you again for your dedication and all the amazing work that you do!! If you need the video you can PM me and I'll record it from my save.

The prophecy is dependent on AA as he grants you immortality, and this choice is only available as a Dark Urge as it specifically targets how you want to die as a Bhaalspawn. I don't think you have to be an assassin to do that. Only talk to the priestess.

If you play the Origins as your Avatar, the basic turmoils and conflicts that drive their character arcs are still the same as when they are your companions. Unless you choose to go completely wild, the story gives you reflection-points to consider your character's motivations that are specific to them. If you decide that their story leads them down a dark road, it is still their dark road. For example for Avatar-Gale his personal story is still driven by the conflict between seeking Mystra's forgiveness and seeking power so he might not need it. A brain-grabbing ending in his case should play on these themes to feel fitting. So an evil ending for Wyll should also feel like an especially twisted version of himself, in which he deemed taking control of the brain was the best choice to achieve his goal.

Exactly. And the player is perfectly equiped to make his ending feel fitting. For example, Wyll was never in control of his life since Mizora/Tiamat happened. He did best with the cards he had, but it wasn't enough, not even close. He got used and killed Karlach. He failed to protect the Last Light In, even with warlock powers, a lot of people died to the curse, as he thinks, on his behalf. Then he immediately got abused by Mizora once more, pulled into the resque mission against his will. He failed to save Yenna from Orin, he failed to rescue his father, Gortash controls him. He had enough of being weak and the promise of power seems real, he goes for the Astral-Touched Tadpole. His circuits rewire, he becomes more calculating, more pragmatic. With the newfound powers, he sues for peace with Gortash, eradicates Orin. Drunk on success he schemes to sabotage his truce with Gortash and overthrow him as well, sides with the Ironhand terrorists. By that point, Wyll is accustomed with the concept of collateral damage, he is not a fairy tale hero, nothing comes without a price. Sides with the Ironhand terrorists, destroys the foundry, let's them kill the gondians. By this point Wyll can be considered a neutral evil character, who fights for control over his own life and power to take it. The further developments could lead to control over others as easily. This is just a single example.

That is a great idea! I think (though I am not quite sure if I remember correctly, would have to replay the scene) this is even one of his magic door answers in act one: to humiliate Mizora. And Wyll becoming a sort of vengeful antihero would be amazing, because: whoever fights monsters...

Frankly, considering Mizora gets the sort of plot armor protection in act three not even main story characters get, I believe she is the writer' 'pet favourite'. So neither the player or Wyll are allowed to get revenge on her, not even after obtaining the ultimate power.

@neprostoman, what you are doing in your explanation (and I am sorry if I understood you wrong) is knowing and end and then tailoring the play-through to suit it. The argument here in general seems to be that Wyll's current evil ending isn't one that you couldn't organically reach without knowing it in advance.

In my case, yes. I am not 100% sure about the first playthrough, since I played as a custom character. I believe the developer had exactly this in mind. Sven, in one of the pre-release interviews, recommended to play the game as follows: firstly, as a custom character, then as each of the companions and only then as The Dark Urge.

However, this is the same approach I used when playing as a custom main, just going with the flow and seeing where it leads you. I can totally envision this as applicable to any first playthrough, not just the custom one, even especially so. Consider this - while you experience the game first hand as an origin, you actually avoid railroading the plot, since you don't know the baseline choice for any scenario ('good' choice, in Wyll's case). You are even more free to make your own decisions that can result to a polar opposite of what's been in store for the character originally.

The main reason why I heavily oppose any of Crimsomrider's ending ideas is thus: this is a game about our unique stories, about OUR stories. Not only Crimsomrider's. His choice of endings is too closed, too specific. This might be his story, but it is certainly not mine. I'd rather prefer an open ending with a possibility to interpret, rather than 4 fleshed out endings I get sucked into every time.

P.S. Of course, with an open ending there comes a chore of interpreting it for yourself based on your ability, but it is a toll of any RPG worth playing, especially the one related to DnD.

If you don't mind @neprostoman, I'll come back to you in a week or so, when we have all had a chance to actually see these endings and had a moment to simmer about them. At the moment I feel like I am talking in general terms about something very specific and I don't feel quite comfortable doing this.

I definitely have some things that I would expect from some of the endings too, simply based on the characters' stories and on how their origins play out.

Sure thing Anska, I am waiting for the patch myself, but it'll be a while till I get to the endings.. am a bit slow in my playstyle, it usually takes me several month to complete a full pt.

These are dark times for the game indeed.

I'm mostly curious to see if they'll even bother to address anything about these extended cutscenes, because if we disregard for a moment how obviously they were rushed just to wrap up the game as quickly as possible in the cheapest way imaginable;

• Shadowheart's evil actions fit the character. However haven't seen the romance aspect of it.
• Lae'zel's evil actions fit the character. However haven't seen the romance aspect of it.
• Gale's evil actions fit the character. However haven't seen the romance aspect of it.
• Ascended Astarion's evil actions fit the character. However haven't seen the romance aspect of it.
• Chosen Dark Urge's evil actions fit the character, however the romance aspect contradicts the character. The romance aspect requires a 4th love interest option to address this.
• The Emperor's evil actions fit the overall main story, but don't develop the character any further beyond the original cliffhanger. Best way I'd describe it is if the game ever got an evil main story expansion, his extended cutscene is exactly how an expansion would start, a direct 6 minute continuation of what was already happening in the city since it's pretty grounded, overall uneventful and overly ambiguous. As it stands it should've further developed his character by establishing an actual character ambition, to show what he plans to ultimately do as the Absolute after Baldur's Gate.
• Wyll's evil actions contradict the character. Unsalvageable in its current form (11k dislikes, 700 comments).
• Karlach's evil actions contradict the character. Unsalvageable in its current form ("The hells was that!" - Karlach.)

Ultimately leaving Wyll players, Chosen Dark Urge romance players, Karlach players and potentially Astarion/Minthara romance players very unhappy... so what they gonna do now. They closed the production lines, worked silently for over half a year, intentionally limited feedback with this Closed Beta and now they get to hear the other half of the community that's been left in the dark for years. No epilogues even, nothing.

Curious to see how they respond to community feedback now. I really hope those 'Community Support Award(s)' aren't just for show, but we'll see what happens I suppose.

Also Orin's artist is Shade Of Stars.

I'd also add to the list that Lae'zel's ending fits the character.

It's already disappointing that the only way to keep the romance going with AA/Minthara is to choose option 1, which is also not 100% clear. Otherwise you see them kneel where the scaffold is, dead or mysteriously missing.

Thank you Ametris for coming to the rescue with the two cutscenes! Having seen Lae'zel's extended cutscene; now that's an amazingly badass 10/10 cliffhanger that fully respects her character motives, properly sets up her evil ambitions and sets up for the aftermath. Happy to have predicted it with the original post because that's exactly what she'd do. Naturally it's still a cliffhanger, but it's a truly badass one. My favorite of them all.

Karlach's on the other hand... dear Lolth preserve me, she received the same treatment as Wyll. Everything I said about Wyll stands for Karlach too. There's no evil story or character development here, this is just pure character butchering for epic visuals. No actual ambition nor reason to be doing what she's doing, completely out of character, an imbecilic psychopath just throwing a tantrum instead of having actual established ambitions and motives to ultimately accomplish something of worth on a grander scale. A shame. I did love she's actually voiced though, that was nice.

It's funny having predicted her ending too, but the way she accomplishes it is just so awfully executed. It screams to me; "Hey guys, we don't have the budget to make all this visually happen in Avernus, so lets instead have it happen in Baldur's Gate to save time and resources.". It's so cheap to cut corners like this and as is evident ends up destroying the character and the story.

That's what I have been pondering about for a bit. I can't say much about Durge, because I lost interest in that very quickly, but for the neutral/good Origins who end up with Ascended Astarion and then make a grab for the ultimate power, it is very hard to not read Astarion as at least part of the driving force behind this shift.

I can only say it with certainty for Avatar-Gale, in who's case Astarion is written as the devil on your shoulder, who encourages you to consider your own will over Mystra's, who's word about controlling the artefact at the heart of the cult run through your head before going to sleep and who praises you oh so prettily for every power-grab you make. It's a shame that they simply had the romance drop for Avatar-God-Gale (especially if said god is also a vampire lord's spawn) but not having him (romanced Ascended Astarion that is) feature prominently in the Absolute ending, would be giving up the subplot that started in act 2 and could now be realised. (Maybe even with some back-stabby action by Astarion if you didn't control him but also didn't become his spawn akin to the House of Hope ending, or some allusion to him planning to puppet-master the newly minted Absolute.)

Once again, I'll point out for the sake of your average passerby, that there is no such character as 'evil Wyll' or 'evil Karlach'. There is a way to play those characters as evil avatars, and the way of play is only contradictory if you make it so. I feel I need to point that out for anyone who might fall for the flashy presentation of a fundamentally flawed idea. Evil actions require evil motives, evil motives can be justified by role playing.


Again, what a fundamental misunderstanding of 'roleplay' concept. Role playing happens in the moment and what you describe is not role playing, but asking for some fan fiction of yours to become a universal truth set in stone for every player. I'd like an ending that is written by a professional writer who understands the material they are working with. It is not a book, not a written story and not a script, it requires interactivity, reactivity, sometimes ambiguity, painting with big strokes. No good... ta-ta! No fan fiction for me, please..

Maybe because I am an older BG player, but frankly I don't care about the distinction between fanfiction or proffesional writing, because I have played and enjoyed a lot of BG mods made by fans. Example: BG1 project, which I have enjoyed more than some of Bioware's professional writing, like Minsc, who continues to be the same old joke of a character over decades. Also, when you play a premade character, you are already playing with someone elses creation.

And so I don't care for making up a story to fill in where the writers should have done their job. This is how the dark urge run was for me and it was not fun. Larian planned from the beginning for Wyll and Karlach to be origin characters, so they knew they could be played on an evil run, so they could have come up with something. Like they had for EA Wyll.

Trying to dictate what "correct" roleplaying is to another player is not going to be a constructive discussion. Especially when you start projecting that word of god from the author is more valuable than the roleplay itself, doubly so in this case when the word of god has no consistency.

Equating a desire for the quality of writing to be better with fanfiction as a derogatory remark is intentionally insulting.

And I care, therefore I advocate for something that benefits me, because surely I care about myself more than about you. The distinction though is in the details, while a railroaded plot might suit your tastes better, it limits players in roleplaying, because roleplaying is about, let me remind you, dear @Auric, playing your character as you see fit and the world reacting to it. Pushing specific endings can be perfect for your playstyle, but it would not hold against thousands of different playstyles. Creating thousands of endings for Wyll is surely out of question, therefore a middle ground is needed, a type of an open ending that will be coherent with the rest of the story yet not too specific to ruin someone's idea of fun.

The way to talk about the current state of affairs in a borderline contemptuous manner (using words like 'butchering', 'joke', 'awful', 'imbecilic' etc...) is as pointless as correcting other players on how they should play. Which I didn't do, I corrected the misunderstanding of a concept of roleplaying, not the way they roleplay.

But that's why for the Origins, you have character specific endings (talking about the currently existing ones) and dialogue choices as well as the generic ones every Tav has. So you can choose an option unique to your character if you like or the generic ones if they feel more appropriate to you. For example during Gale's magic lesson, when prompted to picture the concept of harmony, Shadowheart can picture the perfect darkness, while Astarion can equate it with the feeling of sunshine or the memory of being alive, but everyone can think of the current moment or hum a tune.

Surely, they have their 'core' choice, yet they still have the other 'generic' options available. That means they can still be chosen, their stories tailored to the playthrough here and now. In the game where outcome is determined by the roll fo the dice, playthroughs won't be the same and choices also don't need to. For me a generic line that perfectly falls in place with the origin character's development is always preferable to an origin specific tag that feels out of place within the narrative.

Thanks for actually bringing that up Anska. That's why having these discussions is important.

Until you mentioned it yourself it completely slipped my mind (due to some of these unique Origin ending issues) that Minthara/Astarion as love interests are actually supposed to be present in every other character's Origin ending too (if they were romanced). And because of that every ending has to properly account for having them as their love interest, especially if the avatar Origin ends up becoming a vampire consort under Ascended Astarion.

But after seeing how the love interest was treated in Chosen Dark Urge's ending, I'm now even drastically more concerned how they're portrayed in other character's Origin endings. What does the love interest do if Lae'zel becomes the Absolute? What do they do if Gale becomes the Absolute? I cannot even begin to imagine Wyll or Karlach's love interest in their ending. Does the game just miserably push Ascended Astarion to the side so the Origin character can have their evil moment? Or does he interfere and say; "No, we're doing this my way precious."

I truly am curious how the romance aspect of each unique Origin ending is treated, because Minthara and Astarion are supposed to be by every Origin character's side till the very end. Had Larian spent more time and effort into these endings I would've loved if there was an actual power dynamic going on between Ascended Astarion and an avatar Origin becoming the Absolute. That would be so fun!

Because the Emperor can fully dominate the player, so I would hope Ascended Astarion can too. Would be very interesting roleplay, imagine how awesome it would be if the player romanced Ascended Astarion till the very end with a Chosen Dark Urge and then Astarion took control of him, ultimately using him as a sanguine weapon to butcher the world but deny him from fully fulfilling his purpose.

Now something like that would be awesome

You are not playing your own character when you play an origin. You are playing someone elses creation. If you want generic, you can still use the generic evil endings, at least that is my impression after watching them on yt. I'd like origin content to be consistent with their characterization as a companion, including their specific evil ending. Tailoring a playthrough to make Larian's ending make sense, like in your Wyll example, is to me closer to metagaming than roleplaying. Might be fun to you, not to me.

On an afterthought, my question would be why even play an origin character, if you are looking for generic content that fits as manyas possible options? That is what the custom characters are for. When I have played Gale, the only generic choice at the end was 'dominate the brain'. The other available choices were specific to Gale: what to do with the orb, the crown and Mystra. Origin characters already play in a more limited way than custom Tav, that is their point.

You see the vision, Crimsomrider. ^^ I have my own thoughts on what I would really love for an evil romance ending with Avatar-Gale but let's see what the game makes of it first. At the very least, I would like the scene for for romanced Astarion or Minthara to be a reflection of the Morning-after scene of the good ending. So that when the time to choose the path forward comes, you make a suggestion to your LI, "Shall we ... , my love?" instead of simply making a choice for yourself. That would at least make the romance feel present in some form.

For the first part of your post: if they keep the interpretive endings AND add the specific ones that ARE tied to specific actions/choices, thats a good thing for sure.

As for the second part, I've already explained it. Why would all your origin playthroughs lead to a singular end in a game with so many variables? It is akin to watching a movie with an inconsistent plot, where main character acts with poor recognition of the world around them. There are certain story points for origin characters that only include specific options. Let's call those 'big story puzzles', yet story won't be complete until the whole puzzle is complete, the smaller pieces are as vital. And those smaller pieces need to fit with the bigger ones. There might be three specific options to choose at the crossroads, but their interpretation and meaning can shift from one pt to another, based on other, non-origin narrative/choices.

I am sorry if I missed it in the conversation but have you played one of the Origin characters? Because it somehow feels like you have not and a lot of the confusion or disagreement might stem from this. Nobody was at any point talking about one singular outcome.

I have to second Anska here: have you played an origin character? Because your answer confuses me. The discussion was whether the origin evil ending fits their character, not whether they only get one ending. The generic evil endings I have seen on yt were from Astarion's origin run, so I assume the other companions get access to these as well. Dark urge might not, depend on the choices you make at the temple, but this is already so in the game.

Yes, I finished the game as Gale and stopped mid act 2 as Shadowheart. Can you elaborate on why you would suspect me on not playing an Origin character? It wasn't quite clear.

What I meant by 'a singular end' was a specific ending for characters that dictate their motivations, overriding other possible vision for the character and their story. Like Wyll going ham torturing demons in avernus because of *insert trauma*. I don't want a couple of 'evil' choices at the turning points to railroad the plot into a particular scenario like this.

What makes 'God Gale' ending good, for example, is that you can interprete 'Ambition' very broadly. This ending can tickle the evil box or can be perfectly suitable for a good character who just advocates for change in the world, or can be seen as falling for the 'godhood' trap and losing humanity. Thats what makes good writing, in my opinion.

I didn't say 'generic endings', I said 'interpretive endings'. If this does not clear the confusion, please feel free to repeat your question and I'll elaborate.

P.S. I didn't mean that origins have one ending, maybe I phrased that poorly. I opposed a way too specific idea for Wyll's ending. I don't like the idea of an ending that explains every tad bit of where the character went and what did he do and why it was so. This takes away player character's agency and makes it a cinematic cutscene, not an interactive gameplay element.

P.P.S. That said, I always welcome extra options on top of the existing ones. But I don't welcome when someone wants to scrap an ending because they can't fit their story into it and write it off like its the universal case scenario.

It seems we disagree on what makes an ending open, then. Gale's ambition ending already dictates the character's motivation: to become a god. I disagree that this is an open ending that fits all alignments, or even suitable for good characters. Because Gale's choice is the same gamble Karsus faced. And Karsus' gamble led to many innocent deaths. A good character advocating for a change would not risk the lives of many. Sure, you can say nothing bad happens in Gale's story, he did not destroy the weave; but that is only after playing that ending. To repeat myself, your way of roleplaying is more like metagaming to me.

What puzzled me, and I assume Saeran, was that when we talk about "Wyll's evil ending" or any of the other suggestions Crimsom made, you seemed to think those would or should be the only evil endings for the character. While the understanding of everyone else chatting here is that the character specific endings are something the characters get in addition to the unspecific ones.

Gale's Origin is - apart from being very very buggy in Gale's personal quest - probably the origin with among the least unique interactions, which I think is a shame because these unique interactions are what helps making the runs unique by adding flavour and versatility. Avatar-Astarion being able to intimidate people by showing his fangs for example, or the moment when Lae'zel tells him that controlling the tadpole isn't an option and you suddenly get a sneaky line telling you that the gith smells very tasty and you are peckish (That's how Lae'zel died in my first run.) are unique moments that add a lot to the idea of playing this specific character. And, if you flip it around, Gale as a companion is probably the character who has the most unique interactions for the other origins. Even if it's just little things like how he finds a similarity between Tara and each Origin-Avatar.

PS: I also don't think the Avatar-God ending is very open to interpretation. I found it sad under a coating of fun. The narrator tells you how you still care about your friends, but your way of interacting with them is heavily focused on asking them to worship you - and they aren't buying what you are selling. The letter God-Gale gets from Elminster as well as Tara's dialogue are also not very open to interpretation.

I can understand this perception, but aren't we all metagaming in the consequent runs? It is hard for me to pretend that I don't know what's coming, when I do. In a custom run a huge chunk of endings for origin companions is immediately spoiled. Can you please share your idea of role-playing, that is not metagaming? So that we have an anchoring point for further discussion.

Tbh, I went for the evil route in my campaign (I played Gale as a wild magic barbarian, Mystra forgive me), so that comment was spot on. If its the same for every instance, then its not ideal, but still understandable, since godhood takes a toll in terms of emotion and general perception of things. Which seems logical and narratively beautiful, if you think of it. The saddest part is Gale never knew till he tried, and I doubt there is a way back. Gale is a tricky example since there is a radical metamorphosis going on there, same as for an Ascended Astarion.

Also, narrator comments are not interpretation of the events, they are hard truths. We are still free to imagine the character as we see fit: still human at heart or on the contrary - an emotionally distant, godlike being. Maybe I misunderstood Crimsom's idea, but from what I've gathered, he portrayed some scenarios where little is left unexplained. In this route, Wyll's motivations are thus, therefore he is a torturing maniac mad on revenge and keen on making the devils suffer. Not a way to go, at least for me.

For me it is the question of whether I use my point of view vs. imaging the point of view of the protagonist character, who is not so knowledgeable, when making choices in the game. An example is letting Alfira die on the dark urge run, even though I knew of a way to save her, because my dark urge did not. That is not to say I don't metagame at all, I actually did on the run where I have tried to recruit Minthara, because I've had zero interest in destroying the grove.

I'd add at this point is that Larian has changed endings before. When I have played as Gale, it was even before they patched in the epilogue. At that point, if you chose to use the crown to obtain godhood, Gale would get obliterated by Mystra.

I tend to use the mix of both, as well, though a bit differently. I don't have a clear goal set from the start, but the general idea/direction is there. I started Gale as a wild magic barbarian to narratively distant him from the Weave in a general 'wizardy' sense and aimed at opposing Mystra, though with no clear path in front of me. At some point I decided not to absorb the tainted Weave from the Thorms because tainting the Weave with shadow was a crime against my Gale's principles (as I imagined them), not against Mystra's. Yet she reached out, and I softened my attitude. This is an example of roleplaying where I had absolute control. Now throw in some quest that gets botched by the critical miss and the course gets reversed once more. Another example is character development I imagine 'between the lines' when choosing seemingly unimportant line in a not-so-important dialogue, but the line that can drive change within the character, or at least plant an idea. I then start making choices based on that idea, slowly developing it aka stretching the Overton window. Thats ton of fun for me and makes the game hella replayable, I am almost past the 3k hours point. I still have a lot of companions to finish the game with and I hope the feeling is still there if they patch in some new endings or other plot changes further down the road.

It's the same for every Avatar-God-Gale, I just did a last minute face-heel turn to see the ending and draw my observations from that. What impressed me most about ... no, let me rephrase that: I think that Gale's endings are overall tremendously well written in the sense that they are incredibly reactive and both thoughtful as well as fun (or deeply sad or disturbing in some cases). A point the impressed me a lot was when I had to make the choice on how to continue his and Spawn-Astarion's life together. I thought that Gale would probably love to return home to Tara and his mom, but that this might not be Astarion's first choice. So I chose to help Astarion walk in the sun again. When during the epilogue I opened Elminster's letter, the old sage commented on how unusual this new lifestyle was for Gale. The game had recognised my choice as character development. This is fantastic but only makes sense if you keep the basic personality of your character in mind.

As for the metagaming, from my perspective there are different types of it. There is the metagaming that is a vague plan, like whom you want to romance and which ending you are gunning for. (I am currently playing Shadowheart and wanted to romance Lae'zel. I have no idea which ending we'll end up with, I'll see where it goes.) And there is metagaming which is meticulously planning the outcome of every possible major and a few minor events to achieve a certain ending with a specific interpretation, which is how your version of evil Wyll sounded. I find the latter very unattractive to play because that for me would be like watching a movie or following a script - that is more what I would write fanfiction about.

Crimsom, to my understanding, mostly made an sort of elevator pitch, painting an exciting picture to inspire the imagination in a certain direction.