Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Make changed/positive facial expressions for Ascendant Astarion kisses optional

I will agree that no dev notes have ever specified Tav's feelings to be negative, but if we're going that route- there are devnotes that don't favour the relationship at all, on Astarion's side, at least (the notes for Neil, I mean). So, by devnotes specifically, there is a basis for a more negative aspect to the relationship. There are other things more in-game than devnotes here I'd discuss in regards to that idea being present or not but I feel like the disagreements there would just be circular, so let's just agree to disagree.

You disagree people who enjoy angst have any business enjoying the route: fine, you can think there's no angst, but I also dislike the idea people can only enjoy stuff if it's presented in a self-indulgent positive way (which is what I think you're implying by that last sentence). I don't feel shot in the face by the idea that relationship might be less than ideal, because I'm not Tav, and I don't care about what happens to my Tav because he's not real (I don't support the inclusion of Tav's face in the kisses because their execution was very silly and nonsensical, but I'm addressing the sentiment in general, bear with me) I know a lot of people, the overwhelming majority, have felt very hurt by it and disagree with that narrative, but it is also a way too confident statement to say that any true AA fan should feel very hurt by this narrative. We are not a monolith. It'd be fair to say that the way we approach the character is so different we might as well be two different types of fans in how we approach and enjoy the content, but we enjoy the same character nonetheless, albeit in different way.

@AnnaMyrk & Every. I can understand the feelings and ideas coming from before patch 6. But there are also (which seems to be OP's case) people who, in the meantime, played only patch 6, probably oblivious to what existed before. I can also understand that they got to the romance still, and got attached to it. That now they might think (most of all with all the discourse) they'll lose that very special thing. They just have the possibility to think about it ahead of time, unlike others with the transition to patch 6. Their own experience with the romance, built from what they had to interact with, matters too.

I can, at least in my case, go on record saying my posts here talking about my interest in that storyline happened before that patch.


That is the implication/takeaway when you're assumed to be an impostor.

Everyone is ignoring it, but let's wait for patch 7 first)

Nevermind an impostor. A secret agent that actually hates AA and only wants the option preserved to destroy the patch 7 changes before they happen. The assumption was from multiple people that it's impossible to like the current AA route with the patch 6 kisses. Can't enjoy something the "wrong way" you supposedly hate. I hope there will be no more of this, but oh well.

I do want to at least make clear that in my case I don't really want to preserve the current kisses because the way they're implemented is extremely lackluster and illogical to me, but OP does and I don't think they're lying for that.

Not the case. I'm of the view this is a branching narrative. There are options to both play as enjoying AA and being fearful and loathing of him, where you can break up, and selecting kisses would be illogical, so kisses are likely not geared toward such a path. The game supports both. I do not think there is anything wrong with wanting to play the way that speaks to you.

What I find wrong is trying to artificially inflate the number of people asking for something by pretending to like something that they don't truly, just to 'own the AA fans'. Again, I will not say that is what's happening here. But, given no one exists in a vacuum, I also won't pretend that no one does that, and that this poster doesn't comes from an environment where many of these disingenuous posters gather.

It's a double edged sword. But I have no issue taking OP at face value, and just engage with their request, which I disagree with, unless we want to toggle UA sad expressions as well as the other companion changes.

Patch 6 dynamic was fleeting. And does not seem to align with what Larian wanted to put out, otherwise they would see no room for improvement. This patch was always going to happen. Seeing as other companion faces are going to be fixed. Larian is simply realigning their vision and I appreciate that.

At the end of the day, the patch has not even been released, and this feels like a knee jerk reaction. I will not presume why or where that is coming from. But at face value, that's what it is.

I agree with Anna. It was a mistake. Maybe someone liked the mistake and fit the interpretation, fanon, doesn't change the fact that it was a mistake about the context of the story, which had no atmosphere of fear, only consent and the choice to continue the romance.

I'm against the opiation of fear.
Neutral faces are more understandable.
The only thing that suggested Every, to all characters - so I can play different personalities, and assume different emotions.

Also, about the rewriting of the AA romance and the character. Yes, it is.
The AA romance was full agreement and the mood of it was appropriate. The fear, the sadness was a foreign thing.

Talking about the character

Stephen Rooney:
"The main thing with Astarion character I think was just trying to get a sense of fun into… He could… It would be very very easy to write a character that was very unlikable in Astarion and we absolutely didn't want to do that.
He's a bit terrible consistently throughout the game, he's awful in a whole lot of ways. But at the same time he needs to be charming and he needs to be someone that you actually want to have around.
Because you’re gonna be with this guy for hours and hours – it’s a long track through this game so…
You gotta make sure he’s engaging, he’s fun".
Stephen Rooney | Idle Insights | Idle Champions | D&D 21:51

Does the fear and sadness of intimacy fit idea of sense fun, engaging?
I wonder how at all in intimacy with AA the choice of -gentle and -rough at night where Tav\DU enjoys and agrees to an eternal bond could have changed to fear, ignoring most of Tav\Du's answers (and ignoring DU in general), February 14.

So in patch 7, hopefully there will be a return to the original idea and this mistake will be a thing of the past and in the mods.

Is there enough valid plot basis for fear mood in kissing in this story?
What could narrative of fear for which an opition should be made be based on in the story, OP?

Saying that you dislike something, that it makes you feel bad and why you'd like it to be changed is perfectly fine. That's what forums and feedback posts are for. But coming up with theories that the company wants to punish or educating you, that a second/new writer wants to force their narrative on you and that special people were hired just to hurt you stops being simple feedback. And there have been some hurtful things said both about Astarion's and Halsin's writer that I hope they didn't have to read.


Ehm, you assume a lot there, I am mostly a Gale person. So I get told how much my favourite character sucks on a regular basis, thank you very much, sometimes accompanied by images of a severed hand if the platform supports it. Also I don't get the feeling the OP wants to stir any pots. As Jinetemoranco wrote, not everyone enjoys romantic arcs in video games as pure wish-fulfillment, enjoying it as a tragedy is also a valid option. I use enjoy in broader sense here, not as in enjoying something that is purely pleasurable but as something that might move you to tears and break your heart a little. (And still, because this has apparently has to be said as a disclaimer every time, I thought the kisses were ill advised.)

Aaand we're back to the secret agent who wants to destroy patch 7 story, great. At least OP isn't openly lumped into it by default anymore

Yes, in the article I cited ("How the Baldur's Gate 3 bear sex scene came to be, and why it's "a watershed moment in game history") this author is mentioned as "former Larian writer Baudelaire Welch". You can also see their start and end dates at Larian on LinkedIn (I don't think I'm allowed to link to it as it might be considered personal information, but you can find it if you want to check). I myself used to think that I would never buy a new Larian game, but now it seems to me that there is no need to worry about our companions in the next game. So the new Larian game I will now buy, and hopefully enjoy it, Larian themselves have always made good games, and I like everything about BG3 itself except some of the romance aspects. It's very good that at least the most traumatizing content will finally be removed from the game, and in the next Larian game I hope the romance will be cleaner and better.

Sure. It's valid to like dead dove and non-con. I like dead dove dark fic when I can see the tags and consent to engage. But asking for dead dove and non-con because a fleeting patch that caused a lot of damage is not going to be popular. Such things are best left to mods. Even if it's a toggle, there will be people who stumble into it unwittingly. There is no content warning. It isn't a good idea.

However saying fans were "making up theories" over a writer is incorrect. The writer in question themselves did a conference on the things people were discussing, after they departed Larian. I will not go into details, given it's not on topic, though you can find the conference easily on YouTube.


Acting like people who vocally harass AA players, only to turn around and ask Larian for harsher abuse and murder content so we will finally "get it" because they just love AA so much don't exist is willfully ignorant. Larian's discord had to shut down AA requests over it. Swen deleted an announcement tweet over it.

I will acknowledge my bias given my consistent unpleasant experiences with where OP is coming from. And still request Larian stay consistent with pleasant kisses that we have had for 5 patches, and to leave the dead dove for modders. No need for a toggle.

Yeah, I saw both sites. Except, I just saw their last week's post where they resigned to work on their own games, and I guess they havn't been gotten around to updating their website/twitter yet.
I guess it's a bit suprising, especially when they apparently had big ideas/plans for further video game romances.

Okay folks, let’s keep this constructive and please not relitigate previous controversies.

It’s fine to share our preferences about the game, but let’s avoid expressing negative opinions about other fans and please also steer clear of discussing writers rather than writing.

I’ve just spotted a number of reports about this thread that I don’t have time to review right now, so I’m going to lock it to allow tempers to cool. I will review tomorrow.

EDIT: After reviewing this thread I have issued warnings to a few participants, and am intending to contact a few more who, though we’ve judged their posts don’t quite deserve warnings, have come closer to that than we’d like.

With apologies to the OP, whose post was reasonable and did not deserve to attract the bad tempered discussion and derailment that followed, I am going to leave this thread locked. They have made their position clear, and from the level of repetition in the following discussion it doesn’t seem as though there’s much mileage in further discussion.

I only hope they’ll not be put off from engaging here on other topics, and assure them and anyone else reading that we will always step in when threads degenerate and those who contribute to that will find themselves suspended or banned if they continue with that behaviour.

Let’s draw a line.