Do you suspect any of these NPC drive their wagons on the other side of the road?

SamuelVarg

This topic is purely for fun and not meant to take seriously.

(I have nothing against people who don't identify them self as straight and I strongly support gay marriage and equal rights)

Quartz

"This topic is purely for fun and not meant to take serious."

Let us vainly hope it stays that way.

-------

I dunno, possibly Shar-Teel. I mean if she's ACTUALLY as convicted of "men are pathetic" as she says, then unless she's asexual (very rare, and when it comes to a Chaotic character I kind of doubt it), then ... well, it's only logical. Either that, or she has some very repressed feelings about men. Which is probably more likely. I dunno, that's my interpretation of it anyway. She's a fairly flat character, so.

Garrick seems very metrosexual to me. In BG1 he's after Skie and in BGII, he runs off with one of the bridesmaids. Now that said, almost all of BGII's BG1NPC cameos are pretty out of character so that's probably not worth much.

Minsc yeah, he pretty much shoved Boo up his ass so ... yeah... Maybe I should've voted Minsc.

SamuelVarg

I don't know why but I always thought of Imoen as gay.

And that is a good thing.

CoryNewb

No way on Minsc, Garrick is at least bicurious.

shawne

Well, the novels established that Imoen was a lesbian, so in the spirit of utterly rejecting anything those unholy abominations claimed to be canon, let's say she's straight.

Overall, though? None of them, really. I mean, Xzar might have had a thing for Montaron if you take that one line of dialogue at face value, but he's completely insane, so... yeah. I'd say that's about it.

Corvino

@shawne - Now utterly rejecting the novels is logic I can agree with!

Shar-teel's a misandrist, but that doesn't necessarily mean anything. Given her nature she could take what she wants and leave a trail of broken men crying into their pillows. Anomen's pretty misogynistic and yet he's a romance option for women. Poor women.

Dorn aside, most of the BG1 characters were written in an age before Bioware started creating emotionally and romantically involved NPCs. Baldur's Gate 1 seems pretty innocent in a lot of ways.

recklessheart

I'm not going to get all preachy, don't worry. I do detest belligerent, cavalier homosexuality, but all the same I would like to point out that the "Garrick (No explanation needed)", whether intentionally or not, is fairly disparaging and stereotyping towards the gay community. It makes assumptions based on personality as to his sexuality. I'm not accusing you of anything a lot of other people don't do - including gay men - but all the same it is troubling that these kinds of perceptions filter so casually into even open-minded, liberal vocabularies.

Sorry: in hindsight, there was no way not to sound preachy when I just did this. Hope it didn't come across as too self-righteous, though. I can't pull off self-righteous nearly as well as Jahiera (who can?).

Aaaanyway, I'd probably say that ever since Viconia suggested it, I would find it quite plausible that Valygar may be gay. He rebukes her insinuations, yet I don't think he outright denies anything other than to say that by refraining from sex with a woman that does not by default make him gay. I imagine Haer'Dalis would be at least bisexual, too.
On the female side, Shar-Teel seems an obvious but appropriate choice. I haven't considered it the case for any of the other women in the saga though. Maybe Nalia? Even so, I wouldn't call any woman gay because they didn't want to marry Isaea Roenall, but all the same it seems like it would work for Nalia better than any of the other BG2 NPCs considering it would be another way in which she defies (intentionally or not) the typical noble attitudes of marrying well and copulating to sustain the family line.

shawne

Wasn't Haer'Dalis supposed to have an encounter with a male drow slave in Ust Natha?

CoryNewb

Shar just needs a man that can match her intensity to show her the ways of love. I pictured her and Dorn riding off in to the bloody sunset together.

ChildofBhaal599

oh I thought the topic was serious about the other side of the road as though there were road laws in faerun and they would most assuredly crash. yeah definitely shar teel considering her stance on men.

Awong124

When I read the thread title, I thought it was asking if we suspected any of the NPCs were British, Australian, or Japanese.

Quartz

Someone is going to dispute @recklessheart 's post and it's all gonna go downhill from there. Just wait for it.

Corvino said:

most of the BG1 characters were written in an age before Bioware started creating emotionally and romantically involved NPCs. Baldur's Gate 1 seems pretty innocent in a lot of ways.

This is definitely how I feel about it as well. BG1 kept it simple.

SpiffyMcBang

Quartz said:

Someone is going to dispute @recklessheart 's post and it's all gonna go downhill from there. Just wait for it.

Not quite, but I will make the point that Dan Savage has made time and again- if you meet a guy who matches up with several of the flamboyantly gay stereotypes, that guy is damn near always going to be gay. I've never run with Garrick, so I have no idea how true this is about him, but there it is. Of all the stereotypes I've heard in my life, this is the only one that's ever seemed to stick in basically every case.

Anyway, Imoen seems too young (at least in BG1) to have a clearly defined sexuality. Yeah, BG1 is relatively innocent in general, but she's on another level with that. She just seems like someone who could go in any direction and you wouldn't have any idea what to expect until you saw her act.

I have a hard time seeing Shar-Teel as a lesbian. (That's stereotyping which actually doesn't work in a lot of cases.) She'll only respect the strong; that's pretty common. The only difference is her perspective on strength.

Come to think, give Shar-Teel a major brain injury and her and Minsc might be a great couple...

onan

Well, the other side of the road is all relative to which side you are on. And consequently,...oooh what's this?

The new BG2EE trailer! Ooh shiny.

recklessheart

@Quartz I wouldn't want it to descend into a huge dispute. Frankly nobody is going to win when everyone starts throwing retorts at one another. Just doing my Alora-esque bit to try and bring the whole world round to happy-happy-joy-joy. @SpiffyMcBang while I appreciate that often the stereotype-fulfilling folk are indeed gay, it would certainly set a bad precedent if game developers and designers decided to run with this as an acceptable portrayal, similarly to how we would react negatively to stereotypical portrayals of Asians in film etc. etc. And that'll be my final word on the matter, because if we start drawing swords and prepping magic missiles, the only person who will be right about the whole thing will be @Quartz lol

Yeah, I would certainly agree that the BG1 cast was a bit too innocent and niche-fulfilling, as well at times as comedic, to actually be taken seriously as political, sexual, or racial reflections. BG2 is much more suitable for looking at character portrayal, though Mass Effect is certainly at the height of this (in my opinion) as it does portray humans of all walks of life in a reality not especially removed from ours in terms of human culture or politics.

Lateralus

Dude Xan. He needs a STRONG hug.

And what was Mulahay doing with a captive elf? And he wasnt chained up, did he WANT to be there?

meagloth

Lateralus said:

Dude Xan. He needs a STRONG hug.

And what was Mulahay doing with a captive elf? And he wasnt chained up, did he WANT to be there?

That's weird. Only the first line shows up in your post, but when I press the quote button, I see "And what was Mulahay doing with a captive elf? And he wasnt chained up, did he WANT to be there"

But anyway, I don't know about xan. He doesn't really fit any stereotypes I can think of, and to be fair, ALL the mages in that game wear dresses, not just him. Even Edwin.

KidCarnival

Other, because I still hope for a chance with Travel Encounter Ogre Mage.

TJ_Hooker

meagloth said:

Lateralus said:

Dude Xan. He needs a STRONG hug.

And what was Mulahay doing with a captive elf? And he wasnt chained up, did he WANT to be there?

That's weird. Only the first line shows up in your post, but when I press the quote button, I see "And what was Mulahay doing with a captive elf? And he wasnt chained up, did he WANT to be there"

That's what happens if someone's made an edit since you loaded the page. You only see the original content, but when you click the quote button it grabs the updated comment.

ajwz

Shar-teel is a maybe.
Garrick is definitely a no. (His story in bg2 disproves it)
Imoen doesn't exist
Minsc is fairly Asexual

If I had to select the most likely candidate for a gay playable npc in bg1, it would probably be Eldoth

In bg2 however Haer Dalis is definitely bisexual.

KidCarnival

ajwz said:

If I had to select the most likely candidate for a gay playable npc in bg1, it would probably be Eldoth

Not according to his bio. I hadn't read it in ages until I decided to play as Eldoth. However, since I am Eldoth now... he'll totally romance Dorn in BG2.

Agreed about Haer'Dalis. I think he was supposed to be a romance option for any sex and it was cut due to deadlines.

DrHappyAngry

I don't think Minsc is even on the road.

As for Garrick, I think a lot of people are projecting a lot of their own cultural bias onto him. Think about how a lot of trends and styles were very garish among male nobility in the medieval to renaissance eras.

Then again, this is coming from a straight guy with a pink pony for his avatar

CoryNewb

@KidCarnival your immersion in to Eldoth makes me smile. Changing your avatar may be in order.

Markos

From the choices given I'm gonna go with Shar-Teel. Minsc or Imoen I wouldn't say so. Other than these, maybe Xzar?

Tieoken

Imoen, because she's the thief of every curious girls' heart. "Hey ya!"

Also, I seriously vote for Ajantis, just because that would be awesomelarious.

SCARY_WIZARD

Imoen, because it fits my ship.

Nalia stahp
stahp kissin Imoen Nalia
ur brakeing my hart

meagloth

TJ_Hooker said:

meagloth said:

Lateralus said:

Dude Xan. He needs a STRONG hug.

And what was Mulahay doing with a captive elf? And he wasnt chained up, did he WANT to be there?

That's weird. Only the first line shows up in your post, but when I press the quote button, I see "And what was Mulahay doing with a captive elf? And he wasnt chained up, did he WANT to be there"

That's what happens if someone's made an edit since you loaded the page. You only see the original content, but when you click the quote button it grabs the updated comment.

I thought as much. When I posted it showed up.

Mortianna

Winthrop and Firebead Elvenhair. I need say no more.

TJ_Hooker

Mortianna said:

Winthrop and Firebead Elvenhair. I need say no more.

A wink's as good as a nod to blind bat, eh?

DarkDogg

ajwz said:

If I had to select the most likely candidate for a gay playable npc in bg1, it would probably be Eldoth

Hey!!! And what about his girlfriend Skie?
Or do you just hate Eldoth calling him a gay in an insulting meaning?

KidCarnival

CoryNewb said:

@KidCarnival your immersion in to Eldoth makes me smile. Changing your avatar may be in order.

Na, @rdarken uses Eldoth's portrait here, we'd just get mixed up. A҉n͝d̸ deep҉ insi̡de, ҉I ̛àm̢ s̷t́ill the All͠s͡ee̷i͝n͜g ͝Ey̵e ̢of̨ Hèl͝m.

@DarkDogg: Without the bio and Skie, I can see why Eldoth would be "most likely" out of the male BG1 NPCs. He has most of of the "positive" gay stereotypes (good looks, a bit superficial, well dressed, condescending toward ugly/unattractive people, attracts women; voiceset and lines support all of that). Basically, if he was gay - not bi - he would be the dream wingman of every self-proclaimed "non homophobic, open minded" straight guy who has issues to meet women - a friend who will draw attention from women, but definitely not be any competition; which is the one and only quality the straight shy guy is interested in. Based mainly on the idea that "all women want a gay best friend" (who fits the same criteria as the wingman; neither side wants the Average Gay Joe) and finally end up with his straight, very available buddy. (That would also go for Garrick or any bard, due to the class description of being charismatic and drawing attention.)

I don't see it neccessarily as insulting to say "probably gay" and mean "better dressed, better looking, more charming/attractive than the average guy". It's just quite unrealistic because there are just as many gay guys who are none of these things - and many straight guys who are. Hence, stereotypes, just the "popular" ones and not the "gay biker daddy" image.