Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Does getting the brand give other "true souls" influence over you?

I have, to date, never gotten the brand, not even when I sided with the Cult. My observation has been that the MC has more access to the minds of Minthara and Dror Ragzlin than vice versa. Dror Ragzlin aside, Minthara is a cleric with presumably a good wisdom and a trained mind - I don't think she really needed the tadpole to decide whether or not you're attracted to her, so there isn't much evidence she gets into your head with any depth at all - she recognizes when she's been probed past a certain point (a major improvement over Ragzlin), but she doesn't seem to get any other useful information. Is this asymmetry a result of the brand, or a result of whatever is so special you're the MC? Gale and Shadowheart are harder to "access" than Lae'zel and Wyll (I don't know the difficulties with Astarion as I never seem to progress much past getting him to admit he's a vampire) - this has me wondering if it's the brand, and whether people who get the brand so they can use cult magic items are setting themselves up for trouble when they meet higher ranking cultists at Moonrise Towers. Alternately Minthara isn't a very good cleric (she wears ring mail for heaven's sake?! Lae'zel's medium armor is superior in all respects, even cosmetically, so vanity can't even explain it) and it's just a question of strength of mind and training (in which case a wis 8 barbarian ought to have an interesting time on meeting future true souls).

I got the brand once.... but reloaded after...

She offers to do that regardless of if you get the brand or not. You can also get the brand and not engage with that line of dialogue.

From datamining it seems that

So far no negatives about the brand outside of party disapproval, I assume there will be consequences good and or bad down the road though.

In virtually all my SOLO playthroughs, I have taken the mark of the Absolute from Priestess Gut so as to allow me to use Gloves of Power, etc.
Never had an issue. Never became 'influenced' by anything in Act 1.
Will receiving the mark become an issue in a future Act 2 or 3? Dunno. But there is currently no downside to getting the mark of the Absolute in the current EA Act 1, none.

Well than I think that I'll take the brand this time through and just go with the flow and see what happens. I usually avoid the mark. is it just one point of disapproval or is it like when the Warlock summons his imp

Thanks for the replies. Possibly the issue with Minthara and Ragzlin is that they've had the tadpoles a lot longer so their tadpoles are trying to network with yours to create a hive mind but yours isn't big enough yet to dominate you so you can take advantage.