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Originally Posted by Azarielle
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"Your honour! Yes, I did kill the two children, but in my defence, I was drunk!"


Try with: "your honour I was held captive with no food or drink, stoned, watched as they hacked my companion to pieces to roast on a spit, while they planned to feed me to dogs."

I for one think that's a pretty legit excuse to kill anything on your way out while escaping, but that's just me, you obviously don't hold grudges - very christian of you.


Not only am I not a Christian (or even live in a Christian country) confusing morality with Christianity is more than a little offensive.

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I honestly think the grove is better off without him, but I think the grove's problem are related to how druid hierarchy or chain of command works. I don't get how someone like kagha became his second and why the other druid didn't kick her out once they discovered what a bitch she is


Larian's Biggest Oversight, what to do about it, and My personal review of BG3 EA
"74.85% of you stood with the Tieflings, and 25.15% of you sided with Minthara. Good outweighs evil, it seems."
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Originally Posted by Tulkash01
Originally Posted by Callimachus
Originally Posted by rodeolifant
[quote=Callimachus]I still can't get over him slaughtering the goblin children. That is not the action of a good or even neutral person.


He's a Druid. Circle of life.




Personally I see no issue with Halsin reacting the way he does as the little sadists express delight at the suffering of other living beings.


It's not so simple. I talked with the goblin whelps and as annoying, to me and thus my character, as they actions were, they have reasons. The ones in the outside replied to my toon objections highlighting how the dead adventurer had killed their parents and rightfully ask if they parents deserved to be killed (and it's a vicious cicle: the goblins raid, the other species kill them, the goblin feel even more justified to raid and so on), the kids stoning Haslins's bear form had a similar background.

Larian simply stated that the kids behaviour was the result of the environment they grew up, that in itself was a result of the global environment.

As far as I get until the arrive of the Absolute no race, bugbear, drows, and other ones, did even thought of start a conversation with the goblins to find a way to resolve the conflict, that is in line and coherent with the low middleage set (those were times were prejudices were more deep rooted and influencial than they are in our times).

About the cicle of life, it can not be translated as it is from the animal kingdom (made of beings that don't have the complexity of thoughts, emotions, logic and so on that characterizes humans) to the sentient species of Fareun.

Maybe it could be applied to trolls, giants, gnolls and some of the more feral monster races.

Furthermore in nature there are a lot of behaviours that to our eyes are not ethic or moral (for example the acclaimed bonobo apes indeed use sex as form of comunication but they do it without any regard of age, dolphins isolate and force females to mate, male lions kill the pups to make the females enter heat, a female cat in heat does not choose the male to mate with, some species of ants raid another species kidnap the larvae and eggs to make them slaves, etc etc.. ...).

Haslin indeed killed the goblin kids but when you talk with him he doesn't suggest a massacre of the enclave, he instead is in favor of Wyll's plan of make the goblins disperse by killing their leaders.

[This post highlight one of the problems that can arise with a middleage, but it goes the same for any setting that is not modern days based, set: the moral values of those times were quite different than ours, there were no ideas like human rights, war regulations and so on, european history is full of massacres, without care for the children and so on.]

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Originally Posted by Bufotenina
Originally Posted by Tulkash01
Originally Posted by Callimachus
Originally Posted by rodeolifant
[quote=Callimachus]I still can't get over him slaughtering the goblin children. That is not the action of a good or even neutral person.


He's a Druid. Circle of life.




Personally I see no issue with Halsin reacting the way he does as the little sadists express delight at the suffering of other living beings.


It's not so simple. I talked with the goblin whelps and as annoying, to me and thus my character, as they actions were, they have reasons. The ones in the outside replied to my toon objections highlighting how the dead adventurer had killed their parents and rightfully ask if they parents deserved to be killed (and it's a vicious cicle: the goblins raid, the other species kill them, the goblin feel even more justified to raid and so on), the kids stoning Haslins's bear form had a similar background.

Larian simply stated that the kids behaviour was the result of the environment they grew up, that in itself was a result of the global environment.

As far as I get until the arrive of the Absolute no race, bugbear, drows, and other ones, did even thought of start a conversation with the goblins to find a way to resolve the conflict, that is in line and coherent with the low middleage set (those were times were prejudices were more deep rooted and influencial than they are in our times).

About the cicle of life, it can not be translated as it is from the animal kingdom (made of beings that don't have the complexity of thoughts, emotions, logic and so on that characterizes humans) to the sentient species of Fareun.

Maybe it could be applied to trolls, giants, gnolls and some of the more feral monster races.

Furthermore in nature there are a lot of behaviours that to our eyes are not ethic or moral (for example the acclaimed bonobo apes indeed use sex as form of comunication but they do it without any regard of age, dolphins isolate and force females to mate, male lions kill the pups to make the females enter heat, a female cat in heat does not choose the male to mate with, some species of ants raid another species kidnap the larvae and eggs to make them slaves, etc etc.. ...).

Haslin indeed killed the goblin kids but when you talk with him he doesn't suggest a massacre of the enclave, he instead is in favor of Wyll's plan of make the goblins disperse by killing their leaders.

[This post highlight one of the problems that can arise with a middleage, but it goes the same for any setting that is not modern days based, set: the moral values of those times were quite different than ours, there were no ideas like human rights, war regulations and so on, european history is full of massacres, without care for the children and so on.]




You raise some good points but let me remind you that when you talk with the goblin kids who are kicking the dead aventurer who killed their parents and you suggest that perhaps their parents deserved to be killed those same goblin kids agree with you and say they deserved to be killed because they were weak and therefore unworthy of life... hardly an endearing justification I'd say. Also the goblin kids throwing rocks at Halsin in bear for express delight when he flinches because he's been hit by a rock, akin to children who torture insects or little animals for fun.

D&D is changing and the developers are removing mandatory allignment for races yet as it is now some races are overwhelmingly evil. Goblins, Orcs, Drows and the like can be good on an individual basis but usually are not. The goblins presented in BG3 thus far are all evil if petty in their deeds. Doesn't mean they need to be killed on sight by good characters... but being evil those same goblins will probably try to kill you on sight which will give your characters justification to defend themselves.

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Originally Posted by Firesnakearies
I don't think a goblin HAS to be evil. Like, I don't think it's literally baked into their DNA. But a goblin who is raised among normal goblin society is almost certainly going to be evil. If some good and kind people raised a goblin in a loving, nurturing, moral environment, they could probably be just as good as anyone else.

But the goblins we see in BG3 are absolute shitlords, even the kids.


Nah. Goblins aren't just a result of their environment on anything like that (if anything their cruel environment is a result of their cruel nature). They're not humans, there's fundamental differences in what they are and how they think.

That's not to say *all* goblins are inherently like that. But nine in ten would be. If you raised those goblins in a nurturing and moral environment all you'd get are a bunch of cruel assholes who at best have learnt that loyalty to their community is important and channel their sadism at "acceptable" targets like unimportant outsiders, beggars, animals, and the like.

The last one in ten might grow up to be a good member of a good society. But they also don't fit into goblin society. If they grew up in gobville they'd likely be shunned, or stabbed in the back, or eaten.


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Originally Posted by Callimachus
Originally Posted by Azarielle
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"Your honour! Yes, I did kill the two children, but in my defence, I was drunk!"


Try with: "your honour I was held captive with no food or drink, stoned, watched as they hacked my companion to pieces to roast on a spit, while they planned to feed me to dogs."

I for one think that's a pretty legit excuse to kill anything on your way out while escaping, but that's just me, you obviously don't hold grudges - very christian of you.


Not only am I not a Christian (or even live in a Christian country) confusing morality with Christianity is more than a little offensive.


For the record I am deeply agnostic and while I do have certain respect of religion per se I profoundly despise it's institutionalization and anti-democratic dogmas. "Turn the other cheek" is just a moral construct rooted in my particular culture that applied to this specific situation and was in no way meant to be offensive to anyone's beliefs.

Now that we've cleared that up, how come someone so deeply amoral as Halsin (according to you) still suggested to only kill the leaders, hopefully disbanding the horde after everything he's been through and not burning the place to the ground?

Last edited by Azarielle; 02/11/20 07:58 AM.
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It's the easiest, most efficient way to achieve his goals.

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Halsin is cool. He seems more morally centered than any of our actual companions. In these circumstances, killing goblin children is not an evil act. Typically, we would see killing helpless noncombatants as evil. And in our world, children are usually helpless noncombatants. But these goblin children are not. They are dangerous, vicious, and either have already murdered, or will almost certainly do so soon.

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Originally Posted by Callimachus
It's the easiest, most efficient way to achieve his goals.


Now we're going in circles, let's just agree to disagree and call it a day.

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Halsin is cool. He seems more morally centered than any of our actual companions. In these circumstances, killing goblin children is not an evil act. Typically, we would see killing helpless noncombatants as evil. And in our world, children are usually helpless noncombatants. But these goblin children are not. They are dangerous, vicious, and either have already murdered, or will almost certainly do so soon.


Agree 100% He might be slightly reckless leaving the grove amidst it's refugee crisis and chasing off with random adventurers, but judging by his correspondence in the library he's tried to get outside help and is genuinely worried about them tadpoles (with a good reason too)

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Unless he secretly wants the Nightsong for some sinister reason we don't know about yet. But if that's the case, he's a very good actor.

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Halsin seems like a guy who sees the forest but misses the obvious trees. He's good about the big picture, and misses evil intent and weakness right in his own grove. Maybe he is very wise, but massively stupid? His character is really interesting and likeable, but I bet he would make a very frustrating leader. He desperately needs a good, smart, practical, 2nd in command in the worst way.

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Originally Posted by Balls
Halsin seems like a guy who sees the forest but misses the obvious trees. He's good about the big picture, and misses evil intent and weakness right in his own grove. Maybe he is very wise, but massively stupid? His character is really interesting and likeable, but I bet he would make a very frustrating leader. He desperately needs a good, smart, practical, 2nd in command in the worst way.

Hes actually a voe of the ancient's paladin dumping wis

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