Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Story & Character Discussion Aftermath of the Evil Ending

After having picked the evil ending of controlling the Netherbrain, followed by the immeasurable disappointment of discovering that Larian decided to treat the only alternative ending in their entire game like a piece of cut content with zero epilogue and a single scene containing the phrase 'In my name', I wanted to get everyone's opinion on what might happen afterwards. Personally, these would be some of the main hypotheticals I wonder about:

1. With Orpheus out of the picture, does Illithi-Tav stand any real chance of 'threatening all of Faerun' with world domination as the game seems to imply, or do you just get immediately curbstomped by Elminster, The Lord's Alliance and a coalition of powerful nations and beings as soon as Baldur's Gate falls?

2. Following up on the above, it would appear that Tav's only hope of not getting their ass kicked very swiftly by a Faerunian coalition and ending up like every BBEG ever would be to unify the entire Illithid race and effectively carry out The Grand Design. However, this actually opens up a whole new batch of questions with unclear answers:

2a. The Netherbrain seems to be able to call upon Astral reinforcements of a considerable number of Nautiloids, but are those Nautiloids and their occupants already part of the Netherbrain's own colonial forces back when it was still just a standard Elder Brain, or are they being summoned from several different Illithid outposts or fleets which are the domain of other Elder Brains?

2b. Would other Elder Brains willingly assist the Netherbrain, a clearly anomalous entity which is visibly being manipulated by a magical artifact steered by Tav, under the philosophy that restoring the Illithid Empire is too tempting a prospect to ignore even if it comes at the cost of rallying behind an independent tyrant with their own personal desires? Or does the Netherbrain have to forcefully dominant every Illithid asset that they wish to 'conscript' as it were?

2c. If the other Elder Brains oppose the authority of Tav and the Netherbrain, does the Netherbrain have the capacity to dominate another Elder Brain? And is there a limit on how many Elder Brains at once it could directly puppeteer before imploding?

All pertinent speculations, as it seems to me like Tav would need either the support or the subservience of every other Elder Brain, and by extension Illithid in the universe to stand a shot of actually achieving something.

I assumed the brain-overthrowing crew (plus brain) would optimistically get to wreak havoc for about 3 months... before being utterly annihalted by anyone with a stake in the proceedings, and then some. There's still that whole army marching towards Baldur's Gate. Made out of figures that paint it as threat to all neighbouring countries, nevermind revenge.

If you're roleplaying someone smart and evil, it doesn't seem like an appealing ending. The crimes involved are much too high profile.

Jergal will rally a new team to overthrow you.

That is practically the only feasible outcome should you decide to linger around with the forces you have available on the Sword Coast and wait for the inevitable, yes. As stated though, it's also definitely not what someone smart and evil, much less an Illithid overlord of a Netherbrain 'forseeing an infinity of possibilities' would do.

You first order of business after decimating Baldur's Gate and sacking it for all its worth in brains and resources is to immediately GTFO the Prime Material with a 'tactical retreat' back into Illithid-controlled space, where you will have to take the role of the figurative Illithid-Caesar and attempt to consolidate the Illithid species itself under your rule - a process which may take years, decades or even centuries prior to executing a true strategic invasion of the Prime ( Which may also be preceded by even more decades of covert subversion and infiltration )

Should you succeed, then the stakeholders will now be forced to contend with potentially millions or more of Illithids, and all of their thralls, under the leadership of the Netherbrain, as opposed to just the Netherbrain, not to mention any alliances you might be able to wrangle out of the Far Realm.

Therefore once again, the real question is whether or not the rest of the Elder Brains would ever agree to support the Netherbrain and its usurpers in order to fulfill the Grand Design more swiftly, and if the Netherbrain could possibly be strong enough to dominate all of them at once should they refuse.

I haven't done the evil ending, but it did look like a really bad idea. After learning how those three who'd prepared for years had failed to control the elder brain, what sort of person is going to go "do you know, I reckon I could control it"?

So, yeah, the nether brain probably just regains control when the Emperor runs out of energy or something, and tries to implement the Grand Design.

Eh, that's just how I saw it. Orin, Gortash and Ketheric already struggled to keep the Netherbrain under control pre-powerup, I didn't really get the impression Tav, become illithid or not, has it permanently in the bag. Hence the 3 months before it all just falls apart, starting from the most tangible threat: the army.

Someone's going to come and murder their way up the chain of command, just like we did it. Tav will probably die before the Netherbrain. It could escape, but I wager some bullshit plot device won't let it.

Orin, Gortash and Ketheric still had to deal with Orpheus and the artefact. A thing which does not needs to bother Tav. But Jergal, Mystra and other Gods. Shar, for example, who must feel a bit offended, are unlikely to let you do your thing.

Imagine, Jergal struck your name from the archives during the adventure, but could then just as easily undo that, and boom. You're dead.

Well the game relentlessly implies that the Three's downfall was firstly their constant backstabbing and mismatched coordination, which you are not afflicted by as the Netherbrain's sole master, and secondly their lack of foresight into the Elder Brain's behavior as humanoids, another aspect which is presumably remedied by your transformation, so at least if we take the game's narrative at face value, then your reign over the Netherbrain should last considerably longer, if not permanently.

The biggest risk I perceive in that regard is actually not simply you randomly and sponatenously losing your grip over the Netherbrain for unspecified entropic reasons, but rather an alliance of several Elder Brains succeeding in exerting enough psionic power to disrupt your control in a bid to restore the Netherbrain's autonomy as opposed to striking deals with you.

I don't think a mindflayer is on par with an elder brain, or a netherbrain, in scheming capacity. That seems deeply counter intuitive. Illithid are extremely arrogant, even if you're allied, it would despise you too much for being a less evolved lifeform, yet top dog.

I'm pretty sure that straight-up eliminating mortal, material creatures, even extremely powerful ones, is a pretty big no-no in the divine playbook with different explanations as to why in any given setting or campaign, otherwise you'd just get entire races, civilizations and power-hungry beings simply getting deleted non-stop perpetually and eventually a second Divine War as they run out of minions to slay and confront each other openly.

In some settings, deities don't do that becase Ao will bitchslap them if they do. In others, they simply don't have the ability to exert such direct influence outside of their own domain, especially into the Prime Material. In yet other settings, there is a treaty between most Deities to keep their hands off Prime affairs, sort of like the divine version of mutually assured destruction, as to not get into an apocalyptic divine war.

Neither Jergal or Shar should be able to touch you while outside their personal domains, only send their followers to do so. And if you can escape into Illithid-space, then their followers shouldn't be able to do much about it either, or else the Illithids would've been destroyed long ago.

It isn't, but an elder brain whose mind is dominated by a top-notch Netherese artifact is also not on par in scheming capacity against its own master as a free elder brain would be. An Illithid with all three netherstones combined into one like the infinity gauntlet may very well be what it takes to completely subdue it until such point at which an outside force manages to steal your netherstones or employ greater divine/magical/psionic energy than even the Crown itself can field.

According to the Netherbrain, the three's scheme of fragmented command has never *really* worked, the brain just pretended it did to bide its time. The game does relay however that Illtihi-Tav, holding the combined stones, has well and truly subjugated the brain, and the mental fortitude of retaining that status could be viable for an Illithid.

The biggest danger is once again, in my opinion, an outside force interfering with the bond as opposed to Netherbrain rebellion.

Nevertheless, Shar, Jergal and Mystra intervened in the adventure. Shar maybe even most prominent, by kidnapping Shadowheart, assigning her to find the artefact, which she did, and thus, saving the party in the first place; and prepping it to defeat the dead gods.
Jergal, well he resurrects, reclasses, gets you hirelings. If that's not influencing things....

IF you're upsetting "the balance".... The Gods will find a way to reset it. The dead 3 tried it indirectly, using mortals and netherese magic. The other Gods undid it, also using mortals. Voluntary or involuntary (Shar) They will do so again if you think you can "upset the balance". Maybe it's AO themselve who is the puppeteer of this show.

So, you'll actually notice that none of them have utilized the scope of divine power to affect the Prime or its inhabitants in a direct fashion, least of all as drastically as killing a mortal outside of their domain.

Shar - Did not use any of her own power in the slightest to kidnap Shadowheart, but instructed Viconia and her church to do so, and subsequently to retrieve the artifact. Only personally messes with Shadowheart when Shadowheart intrudes on her own divine domain and defies her within it. Cannot directly mess with any Selunite or other mortals she dislikes who are outside her domain except through other mortal worshippers.

Mystra - Cannot directly mess with Prime affairs, must send her mortal pet, Elminster, to convey her wishes. Only directly interfaces with Gale when he accepts an invitation into her own domain, and doesn't even stop him from trying to claim the Karsite Weave right until the moment where he attempts to directly usurp her

Jergal - Withers is never actually confirmed to be Jergal, and if he is, then his divine portfolio has been severely reduced enough thanks to the Three that, at least in his form on the Prime, he is no longer a 'true' deity, more like a powerful lich with abilities akin to True Resurrection and some soul tampering.

I agree with the second part, the Gods will definitely try to stop you from upsetting the balance using their mortal instruments, but if that was so easy, then there would've never been a multiversal Illithid Empire which lasted for aeons in the first place, nor vast swathes of Illithid-controlled space and colonies in the present. If you get back to the Illithid strongholds and manage to unify the Illithid species, it would take a truly momentous feat to reach and stop you, and you'd stand a real chance of winning.

Even if the gods can't inetrfere directly, Faerun is pretty crowded with legendary heroes. So it should beeasy to find a new group stoppong Tav/Durge imo.

And I thought it was made pretty clear that Witehrs is Jergal, when he adresses the three stooges in the epilogue.

The original illithid empire was destroyed after mother Gith made a pact with Tiamat, so also via indirect divine intervention. Vlaakith doesn't know how they did it, but (some of) the Gods will have this knowledge still and might be able to reuse it, to prevent a new grand design from swallowing up too much of their domain. (IMO)

Ao also specifically put the gods in charge of souls. And as Larian invented that ilithids don't have souls it would mean Ao would turn a blind eye to the Netherbrain getting blown up by the gods.

And as others already said, Faerun is swarming with high level characters.
We are stopping that entire plot at lvl 12, imagine what lvl 20+ characters can do.
Mind blank, teleport, start throwing around wishes and meteor swarms.

The crux of the matter is that I'm not convinced the netherbrain with a past history of fooling people is really properly enslaved, I suppose. There's also the aspect that we don't actually understand the artefact -- it could be simply running out of energy. No grand plans of anyone required.

What the gods would or would not do is a bit questionable with Larian's current lore and them already decimating the Illithid empire once. It does look like they could just do it again, with the proper preparations in place. Then there's the swarm of level 15+ figures incoming, for one reason or another.

Taking over the brain for Bhaal is a rather "reasonable" thing to do -- plentiful carnage for the sake of carnage, the favour of a god, etc. The slaughter is the "reward" in and of itself. If you're in it with the goal to *survive* the whole scheme, though...

They made a pact with Tiamat, sure, but once again it was certainly not Tiamat herself who fought the Illithids, she only lended the red dragons, who are essentially her flesh-and-blood mortal followers to the Gith, same as any other deity's modus operandi. Ao will absolutely not turn a blind eye to deities going out of control against something or someone just because it's 'soulless', there are plenty of monsters, constructs, and even sentient beings in DND who canonically don't have a soul and that never gave Gods the carte blanche to just delete them from existence as they please.

Ao is much more than an appointer of soul caretakers, if you really want to dissect Ao's theoretical personality from the lore we know, then he would more or less be the personification of the DM - an arbiter of fairness ensuring that certain beings like Gods aren't too 'OP' and don't pull off too many 'Deus Ex Machina' stunts in the realms.

As for the whole 'hero' thing, it's pretty much a moot discussion, already said everything there is to say about it and everybody ignores the existence of Illithid-controlled space for some reason. Why didn't 'high-level heroes' just kill off all the Illithids agaes ago? Why do heroes have the ability to lose in the game? Why do heroes have the possibility of TP'ing in campaigns and playing through a dark timeline where bad guys took over instead of new heroes doing the job instead?

Yes, there will be heroes. But it's going to take much, much more than even your average high-level party or lore folk hero to defeat the Netherbrain IF the netherbrain actually unifies the Illithid race behind it and pulls back to the Far Realm/Illithid-controlled space to execute The Grand Design.

I think the netherbrain already dominates other elder brains in the multiverse. Where else would all these nautiloids come from in the end ? Certainly not from the colony under moonrise towers. And Omeluum said the knowledge to build them was lost, so these must be very old, precious artefacts coming from wide and far and not easily turned over by their owner brains..... Although the easy answer would be, another inconsistency in Larian's storybook.

The Spelljammer setting, which is where the Nautiloids and Illithid Empire lore crossover into Faerun from, the multiverse is absolutely massive. Toril is just 1 of like 9 inhabited planets in its own solar system, with one of those being an entire artificial planet serving exclusively as an Illithid forward base in Realmspace. There are potentially even more inhabited planets across all of the FR universe outside its solar system, and as many in all the parallel universes of the other settings like Eberron and Greyhawk, and there are hypothesized to be an infinity of such universes. And on top of that, add all the Illithid forces who are roaming around the endless Astral Sea.

So yes, they are quite precious and rare, but Spelljammer's definition of 'rare' is something altogether different than the quaint little bubble of FR. If there are only 4 docked Nautiloids across all the continent of Faerun that adventurers can find while still on Toril's Prime, that would be a few grain of sands in the grander multiverse. Granted, I don't know if Larian adopted the canonical Spelljammer scope when they added Nautiloids to their campaign, many campaigns don't because it's too vast to handle or rarely comes into effect.

Also, when Balduran is captured by the mind-flayer colony, he is seen held in some underground chamber surrounded by Illithids. However, when he is dominated by the Elder Brain, he is floating around with a bunch of other Illithids who are all spaced pretty far from each other and gazing up at the Elder Brain against a background of the Astral Sea. Which means it's either a mental image of their connection, although when Tav gets that mental representation it's usually a giant illithid face or a much more unrealistic environment, or the brain also maintains a presence in the Astral Sea where Nautiloids might be cruising around, since Illithid colonies are essentially just outposts in Spelljammer.

Lastly though, it would be virtually impossible for the Absolute to dominate every other elder brain in the multiverse, since its influence only barely extends to Baldur's Gate and its environs as it is. Maybe if there was some innate connection between all Elder Brains which allowed it to corrupt the whole system instantly, but their telepathy and psionic connection doesn't extend nearly that far, certainly not between planes and universes, which are much stronger barriers against all arcane and psionic abilities than a trillion Orpheus's would be able to muster.

It could've already swayed or even dominated some other Elder Brains to its cause, that I don't know. Hard to imagine it being every single one in the multiverse though, otherwise what was happening in Baldur's Gate should've been at minimum happening across all of Toril.