Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General New players and the problem with Shar

The only option that would really make sense for someone who doesn't know about Shar is, "I don't even know who Shar is" maybe with an option to ask "What's so bad about her?".
However, those options don't exist.

Now, if Larian decides that it doesn't make sense for a character to not know about Shar, and that it's out of character for Shadowheart to preach about her, that's fine, but there should be a good way for the player to learn more without having to look through every bookshelf and book pile hoping to find the book they need (if I'm correct, none of the books in the ruins are about Selune and Shar, and instead, there's only books about a Cleric of Shar).
Not only that, but most players likely won't even know that they should find a book before getting Shadowheart to say that she follows Shar.

Whether the Narrator mentions why Shar isn't liked, or a link in the dialogue explains, the game should try to get players up to speed before the event with Shadowheart.

the "that's okay, i don't judge people on their religions" line.

this would help at lot. Instead, you can tell that we're supposed to know who Shar is from the "that's okay, i don't judge people on their religions" line. Does anyone remember what all the options for dialogue are from the player character when SH reveals her secret? I'd be interested to see if most of them seem to have insider knowledge on who Shar is or not.

The options all seem to imply that the player's character knows about Shar, since they would be overreactions otherwise.

Side note, i had to laugh when SH says "this type of headpiece is worn by my brothers and sisters". Kind of blows the whole "it's just a circle" out of the water lol

NARRATOR: You've freed her from the pod, and now you notice that she wears onyx jewelry. There are also black circles on the shoulders of her armor. This can only mean one thing. She is a cleric of evil incarnate, a follower of Shar, the terrible goddess who is bent on destroying all things throughout the multiverse. This person is worse than the mind flayers who abducted you.

1. [Attack]
2. I also think all things should be destroyed. Hi, I'm Tav.

*

There you go, Larian, fixed it for you. It's sure to be a great game now.

Yeah, sure. The only way to do anything is in the worst way possible. Tell me, did you take a class in arguing in bad faith or does it just come naturally to you?

thoughtful post

And the troll is back. I'd advise everyone, on both sides of this arguments, to simply not engage him.

Well I'm sorry to have to cut out a line again but I'm going to need you to explain why that option changes anything. That's not the player saying "I don't care" or an option for players who do not care about the lore. That's the character saying "I don't care". In the scenario of the OP, it doesn't change a single thing because OP still doesn't have the understanding to know whether his character cares about it or not. Choosing the "I don't care" option is just an as uninformed choice at that point as choosing any of the other options because they're all dependant on the same context -- knowing about Shar -- and that context has not been given to you.

And no, narration is not going to be considered worse than the status quo, and that thread existing (that despite it's name is not about the removal of the narrator but bringing back the ability to silence the narrator's voice) isn't an argument against the lack of set up being provided for this scene. I'm not even sure why you bothered to bring that thread up, do you think everyone on the internet except you is a single person? I'm not against narration -- in fact I consider the feature of a narrator to be one of the main pros of modern games like BG3 and the Pathfinder games over, say, the old BG games specifically because it enables a greater ability to deliver information and contextual clues to the player.

And again, the information existing in some book or other somewhere within the game is not enough setup for this scene. Even a player that reads every books they pick up might overlook those few, and this isn't some random fact about the setting that you don't need to know -- this is central to Shadowheart's plot, this scene is presented as a big act one moment, in fact the scene is, very much in contrast to how easily said book could be overlooked, decidedly hard to miss out on -- there are dozen of paths set up to lead to that reveal. And in order for the player to be able to react to that reveal, they need knowledge of who Shar is. Therefore, it is to me obvious that the establishment of who Shar is should be just as hard to miss out on as that scene itself -- the context of a story should be delivered inside that story's narrative and not be dependant on the player having happened to have opened an ingame book or not (especially a book in a sidequest location!). It's just storytelling 101 to me -- that moment is presented as far too momentous for what we have now to be adequate.

Compare for example with how well the game establishes the Mindflayers and the tadpole as evil. First you have the intro cinematic with the tadpoling and the abducting of people and the obvious evilousity of the design of it all, then you have the ship you start the actual game on and all the obvious evilousities on it establishing the transformations and also the mind control and, then you have all the other characters from party members to NPCs going on about it and being ready to kill you over it, and so on. The game really, really wants to make sure that you understand this. And of course, this is the central plot of the game. It deserves more set up than the central element to a single companion's plot, I'm not saying anything else. But the lack of establishing who Shar is very similar to if we had gotten no establishment as Mindflayers and tadpoles as being bad, and then were expected by the game to somehow already have this information in a later scene. And "but there is a book about that ingame" wouldn't have satisfied me then either because the game has to actively provide you with what it wants you to know. And it absolutely does expect you to already know who Shar is, that's why the "narrative dissonance" that the OP is describing comes to the forefront in that scene.

This is still just your opinion of how you want your games to be played and what the purpose of those books are.

The PHB doesn't go into much detail about Shar. There are all of two lines about her:
Aside from the lack of information, particularly about lore & history regarding Shar, it's unreasonable to expect all players in all games to completely memorize every single line in the PHB. It's even more unreasonable to expect players to have read and memorized every single D&D book on the off chance lore topic X is relevant to the game.

If you DM a game, it's ~fine for you to assign specific books as homework for your players to read, but it's wrong to generalize your preferred DM & gaming style to everyone and treat it like the only correct way to play.

Am I missing something? Who's asking for a dissertation on Shar?

From what I'm seeing, all anyone's asking for on this thread is a simple dice roll and a brief explanation of who she is. At some point prior to Shadowheart's reveal, when you encounter something related to Shar for the first time, a Religion roll is made. If you succeed, you learn, "Shar is an evil goddess of darkness and loss. Her followers often torture and kill those who oppose them."

I think the Shadowheart first meet on the beach should go something like this:

You meet Shadowheart in armor similar to what she has now but without the black onyx stones (note: play Grymforge and note the Sharran armor you see there. Notice the giant onyx stones in the pauldrons and on many of their chests and abdomens and such).
You ask her who her god/goddess is, AS AN OPTION IF YOU DESIRE TO KNOW. If you ask, she lies to you and says, "My goddess is," just throwing a bogus one out there, "Melira Taralen."

Religion roll is made. If you fail, you don't know the goddess she mentions. If you succeed, you learn, "Melira Taralen is a minor elven goddess of bards and minstrels. She's a Chaotic Good goddess of knowledge, life and trickery."

Insight roll is made. If you fail, the matter drops. If you succeed, you have the OPTION to ask her if she's lying because you think she is. If you call her on it, she can either get hostile towards you and say she'll leave if you don't drop the matter, or whatever.

Then, the first time you encounter something with Shar or Selune, another Religion roll is made and you get the brief description I mentioned above about Shar and a similar brief description about Selune.

We're not talking huge, in depth, lengthy Wiki-posts with giant personality trait sections and histories and so forth. Just something basic and simple to let players know something about who these two goddess are and a very basic understanding of what people think of them.

Not to mention that Larian devs themselves, and including Swen Vincke, have repeatedly promised that the game will respect and reflect existing FR lore.

And for me, the main reason by far to even be interested in this game is because it is a game set in the Forgotten Realms.