Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Why should I be 'evil'?

The problem is that the ONLY way to be evil in this RPG is to be a bipolar schizo murder hobo. Murdering for no reason whatsoever.

Well I only Infiltrated the Goblin army because it gives me a advantage and I can scout out the place before striking. Its what smart people do. Its terrible that you get approval and disapproval while you do something not for playing the long game.

I did my evil playthrough knowing that there was an option to join the True Souls at the goblin camp and the premise still felt really weak. It was basically "Hey random minion, I need you to go torture a guy and then go kill a bunch of refugees and druids for absolutely no explained reason other than we are Team Evil, k thx bye!"

I can acknowledge that lore-wise that might be more or less how a Drow priestess is going to treat you but from a game experience standpoint it felt rather underdeveloped, with very little in way or explanation or reasoning as for WHY you'd want to do that. Especially when you're arguably in a hurry to get healed by one of said Druids. The game basically presents you with the option to, completely unprompted, ask for a job murdering the guys that are your only way of survival, and you don't even get a promise of reward of any kind for it. Ridiculous

As for Goblins trying to kill you, well they're Goblins, they don't have a lot of motivational depth to them really. As I see it an Evil character would probably recognize that yes, Goblins will attempt to kill you and whatnot, but you're not let that hurt your feelings and get in the way of a shot at power or whatever floats your boat. Of course, if they do it AFTER you've joined Team Evil it gets a bit weird (assuming that your association is public knowledge)

Playing a Lolth-sworn Drow I actually sided with the "good guys" because Drow hate mindflayers and would never work with them, so despite not caring about the tieflings at all finding the healer was a priority.

Also the definition of evile by the writers is as childish as it gets.

Murder death hobo = bad
Pacifist life hobo = good

Its as binary as it gets, no middle ground nothing. Its stupid as the system that is used for tracking it. simply 0 or 1 kill = bad heal =good.

They should rethink what good and evile is first.

Baldurs Gate is much better than Fallout 3 in this respect. Instead of a LOGICAL desire to side with the Enclave, there was an opportunity to just kill everyone without any sense. It's zero freedom

I hope the developers will listen to us, and this will not happen in Baldurs Gate. The potential for an evil role is very large, we just need to be heard - we want such content, and we want it to be no less developed and justified than the good side (not to the detriment of good, almost everyone will play the game many times to make all possible decisions)

Well, there are also more neutral options, where what is "good" and what is "evil" the player decides for himself

But the druids are explicitly not your only means of survival, or even a guaranteed one. You've got Raphael, you've got the githyanki crèche, if you talk to the goblin in the druid camp, you'll have information on the goblin healer there... I haven't tried going evil yet because I have a hard time bringing myself to do that, but part of me wishes it were possible to evacuate the tieflings and the one or two actually sympathetic druids, then let the goblins go play.

your right your playing a loth sworn Drow. rest of your statement is about Gith

Just how exactly? They want to dominate the Underdark and Illithids are one of the main competitors.

- Alright, there's the Cambion who makes vague promises about healing in exchange for your soul. That is a bad deal (and for some reason my Warlock couldn't even go "already spoken for I'm afraid"), especially since you've already been told that there is a Druid healer who can fix you without any soul selling. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying this isn't an option but as an alternative to a straight rescue mission this is pretty far down the list of "viable solutions".

- The creché seems a bit of a vague promise too but it's true that if you believe in Lae'zel and ignore the insight checks the game makes when you talk about the creché, that is supposedly an option.

- As for Princess Gut (the goblin healer), she does seem to be an option. I didn't actually try out her healing option because she did such a lovely setup of letting me assassinate her that I couldn't let go to waste. I'm guessing she's not actually able to heal you, like the Hag, but I'll have to try it out.

I guess I'll rephrase my point a bit:
The game flow directs you straight to the Druid Grove where multiple sources strongly indicate that Halsin, an Archdruid, can fix you up, no problem. It's the closest thing you have to a guarantee that someone can prevent you from losing your self and turning into a Mind Flayer without selling your soul and as far as adventuring jobs go, it doesn't really seem like that big a thing: "Go to goblin camp, rescue guy, come back and get fixed, done".
I'd say that mostly anyone not-crazy and non-suicidal needs some pretty strong motivation to discard that option, certainly a lot stronger than "hey I sense you're also a True Soul, go fuck up the Druids"

My argument isn't that "there are no evil options", its that the evil options seem estremely vague and underdeveloped compared to what is obviously the default questline of "go save Halsin"

I agree on that. I was rather disappointed that the hidden final boss, the drow priestess, didn't give any special infos. Plus, the fight and her outfit was rather underwhelming.

Yes and they will work with mindflayers and everything else the have to achieve that goal. Even Rival Houses. I mean to edit it to add in that correctness of Drow hating mind flayers. Had to do dishes and smoke. Drow hate everything, including other Drow. Yet they will work with whoever is the most likely to help them achieve their goals. Including mind flayers, as is written in several Forgotten Realms books and are canon. House Beanre is the most known to do so, with Matron Beanre, and her daughter later doing so, as does the ArchWizard of Menzoberean. Drow society is chaotic ever changing, the lowest wants to rise up, the highest wants everyone else under their heel. In order to do that they will resort to any method, and make any temporary alliance.

Gith on the other hand will not work with Mind Flayers, they don't even let them speak before trying to kill them. Note there may be a few that will, but overall highly unlikely. And those that do are probably found and killed.

As for this whole evil thing, vs. good. You all are not playing evil characters, your playing neutral characters. Ones that are looking for reward, vs difficulty. That is not evil thats just lazy greed, which is neither good nor evil. You just want to better yourself and take the path with the least amount of hassle. Evil characters won't help goody goods on principal, oh sure they'd cut a deal to help the travelers then butcher every one of them in there sleep. Thats part of being evil, killing innocents, trying to take over, help a powerful ArchDruid who is a force in the area your in. Nope, cause now I have an opponent who's views counter mine, and I just made him stronger. Better to let him rot with the goblins, whose goals do align even if in small part with mine. What are your goals as an evil character to spread evil, either yours (much preferrred), or others. Because good will always come looking for you, fellow evil though you can make deals with, you can manipulate, control far easier then goody goods with their moral codes, and wanting to protect the innocent, blah.

I think your idea of what 'evil' is, is rather narrow and superficial...very cartoony.. Evil isn't about murdering people just because they're good and you don't like good. That would maybe be the case for a small group of people.. but not most.
People go down the path of 'evil' because it is enticing: there's promise of power, of riches, of getting to your goals faster..... everyone else be damned.
It is about manipulating betraying, backstabbing, deceiving , using and abusing people, be they good or evil, be they your best friend or foe so long as there is something to be gained.
It is about about cooperating with people so long as it furthers YOUR goal.
Or if you want a pragmatic character, it is about being ruthless, making the hard decision, like..idk killing a small group of innocent people to save the many.

D&D definitely also contain the kind of evil that murder good people just because they're good, but then we're talking like Cyricists and Malar worshippers and generally the kind of people (and typically more monsters than people) that are Philosophically Evil and committed to the cause of Evil as an objective philosophy. I think that's outside of the scope of the game

Ah, yes, i suppose i am looking at it from the point of real life psychology c': ... And again, not saying people can't be evil for the sake of being evil, it's just usually there's.. a better reason for that.

I completely agree with the rest of your point though, that kind of evil is mostly reserved for Villains and Monsters in my opinion, or potentially as some end-of-story-arch stuff where you've done all your evil stuff so much that now you have All The Power and Have Become Death, Destroyer of Worlds, that sort of thing.

Well, it seems I need to read more lore. Thanks for the explanation.

Though I still think a Drow that really worships Lolth wouldn't stand to became a Mindflayer, and making the Druid owe me for saving his cult was the better option in this mindset.

This is why they got rid of alignment. You say it is narrow minded and superficial, incorrect. neutral people can lean any way they don't care about right or wrong, good or bad. They care about themselves, and if helping good achieves this then great, if helping evil achieve it great. If doing nothing achieves it great again.

Good characters have moral fiber, they care about right or wrong, they are more then likely to hunt down evil and won't help evil unless they are being manipulated in some way. Yet once that manipulation ends, they will again be your enemy, and therefore they are a time bomb waiting to go off. When will they go off? Will it be at the worst time? Will they ever go off?

Evil Characters - don't care whats right right is for the morally good people, they want to be bad. yes they can be manipulating, betraying, backstabbing, other things they put. Yet smart ones understand that at heart a good person isn't going to side with you. That Good is against everything you stand for, they will hunt you down and kill you. Why because your bad, you do things thats against their moral code. A smart evil person won't take a chance with the good guy, who is weakened. Wont stand and monlogue will instead simply remove the threat. In the game many of the good people are weak currently, Halsin being captured means he is weakend. Giving him access to his grove (a source that makes druids stronger) is like handing a good king a bigger more fortified castle. which in this case the Grove is also fortified as is commented upon by someone, either you or a companion. Right now he is weak, but it won't be the case why let an enemy. One who has a moral code and can not only hunt you down, but send others after you and supply forces of good like the Harpers live to do these things?

narrow minded cartoony, killing for the sake of killing? Nope it's planning for the future, removing a potentially serious threat when they're weak. Which is why you get the steroetyped murder hobos they don't stop to think why an evil character is doing something, they simply see them killing innocents and think oh yeah thats fun, and evil!

If I went for narrow minded, superficial, or cartoony I'd of problem mentioned that before you stab the good guy monologue, or yell something really cool, or kaaaamaaaahaaaamaaa AAAAAAH!!
Instead I put my partial thought up and let people take it as they wish, in this way I learn about their thought process, views on the matter, to which I can then respond with other questions, or comments keeping the discussion open, and letting others add to it.

I may not let you know all my thoughts, but they go far deeper then murder hobos, and killing for the sake of killing. Each and every one is a plan with alternate plans. Most times I'm merely outlining something letting others take it from there. Some are better at it then others you simply failed, in the thought process you took to arrive at your conclussion. try asking questions next time.

This game does not know the difference between evil and "chaotic stupid"/"murder hobo". Evil is not just "lol kill everyone and just be a jerk" except for the most basic of players

sorry for text wall


True it would be different if you were showing symptoms but your not. Any creature other then those fantically loyal to Mindflayers would not want to turn into one, and have themselves wiped from existance. The not wanting to isn't good or evil, it's simply survival. As for helping the druid vs. goblins I've posted alot about it on another subtopic I'll post my response to why it makes more sense from an rp perspective, vs. helping the druid in an edit

edit not sure if it will quote correctly. I've already posted the link to this subtopic in this one before. Since both are essentially the same thing.



Ya'll playing neutral characters. Your letting reward decide what to do, not swayed either way by good or evil. So stop kidding yourself.

A: Halsin is kidnapped by goblins, meaning he may not be very powerful. This combined with fact you, yourself can kill the goblins would lead your character to believe he's not all that. So he's not sure thing. After all if he was this powerful why'd he let himself get caught in the first place? As an evil character why would you help someone to weak to defend themselves against goblins, you need someone strong enough powerful enough to remove this thing from your head, not be captured by goblins. If he is that powerful, then that means the goblins are even stronger, or their leaders are. So they're more likely to be able to help you. Plus fact he is a goody two shoes, who will help other goody two shoes, including heros that are annoying, and a threat. Plus can't be manipulated, or controlled do to their boring moral code. Unless you get stronger! Since your not changing yet.... and can use new ability.. hmmm.

B: You don't know this when you go to ask them for help, why are you telling them this, better to find out their plans first. (again in character) You are evil everyone is either 1. fodder 2. potential slave 3. useful ally to be later discarded. 4. A threat to your power 5. able to help you grow more powerful then be discarded. in the end as an evil person when they are no longer a use they're discarded. Dscarded more then likely killed, tortured, maimed, most of it for fun, first one so they don't try to usurp your power.

C. Why haven't they changed into mindflayers? Why haven't you showed any symptoms? Why can you use the tadpole, to do things and not change? (A new source of power for you to exploit? These people know lets use them, help them, get in good with them, learn their ways and then discard them.)

D. They offer you a way to utilize a new power per C. by fully understanding what is going on. Your so bent on getting rid of this tadpole (a thing a good person would want to do, or one who is fanatically against mind flayers.) why if it's not turning you into a mindflayer, then it's a source of power. A source these leaders seem to understand, so you can use them to find out about it. Then of course they have to go once they are no longer useful.

Your supposed to be evil, why are you looking at short term all the time? Why do you want the enemy to be stupid evil? Does a wizard/necromancer want to turn into a Lich for the extra power simply find what they need. No they have to work for it. So by fact it's not an immediate reward why would they bother? They're evil it will grant them power, but they have to work for it. It's a long road, which they have to follow to it's end. A thing your denying your characters because your interested in right now, give me, give me, give me. I must have things now, it must all be mine, right now.

stupid evil = allowing an unknow to waltz into your camp, give them rewards before they prove themselves, and their uses to you. Allow them free run of the camp, without knowing their intentions? Allowing them to live when they are going against what you want. (telling them you killed the mindflayer, and want tadpole gone.)

sorry for wall of text.