Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Patch 7 Ascended Astarion's kisses goes against his story as written

Rote90

It's funny, I've seen the dnd lore about true vampires applied to AA many times in the context that Ascended Astarion is incapable of love and that he has no soul because that's what the dnd lore says. Though the same applies to vampire spawn too. But generally speaking, the process of transformation into a vampire is described in the game itself, lor dnd aside, and it doesn't require blood to create a spawn. Tav's transformation is very atypical. It was just that even if Astarion shared his blood with Tav, it should have already spared her from being controlled by him. That's how it works - a vampire voluntarily shares his blood, and there's also dialog in the game where he says that Tav will drink his blood.


It's confirmed.
In the script it is also confirmed that:

1. Tav and AA love each other. It says so in plain text. They gaze lovingly at one another and enjoying.

Why does this story suddenly have to turn into a rape story? The canon is written in the script.


2. The kneeling / throat grabbing has a voluntary dynamic, not a violent one. If it wasn't for Tav's words,

I don't think he would have started grabbing by the throat at all. If Larian created the kisses based on these scenes, which is obvious since the actions are exactly the same as Tav's transformation scene, then a scared face is out of the question. Based on the script it's safe to say that frightened expressions are not canon.



In fact, nothing in the script or in the dev notes disproves the Tav Bride theory. And many of the circumstantial details even confirm it. «By lying to her or bending the truth, he can convince her that she must obey his every order or suffer horrible consequences.With time, and through experimentation, the bride might find out the true level of control her creator has over her - that is, none.» In the finale, Tav may just not know that she can leave and that there is no control. After all, we don't even see him magically forcing her to do anything. And the fact that Tav is free to leave with Karlach and Lae'zel, and again he doesn't force her back in any way, is pretty telling. If Larian wanted to show a cycle of abuse, why didn't they use the techniques I mentioned earlier?


By the way, another interesting technique for demonstrating mental control from the game Vampire:

The Masquerade:




The game has a clear demonstration of how a vampire controls his spawn. In the epilogue, we see nothing of the sort.




Though I suppose that's what the cycle of abuse is supposed to look like.


That's not true. I've seen many times people suggesting the kisses from patch 5 for AA as a fair alternative that not only fits your character, but also fits the original script.