Who in their right mind...?
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So you wander through Athkatla and stumble into a derelict house. The door was rigged with a nefarious trap that drained your life force a bit, so you will have to go to a temple later to get that fixed. Odd that there would be such a nasty trap on the door to a house that only had a few minotaurs squatting in it (not sure where they came from). A brief search of the house reveals nothing of real interest, so you head to the basement. Suddenly you feel very uneasy as you appear to be in an ancient tomb with monolithic statues on each side. There is an aura of unease and the unnatural that seeps into your body and disturbs you to your very core. There is a giant sarcophagus in the middle of the room and the closer you get to it the more uncomfortable you feel. You open it.
As you open the sarcophagus your senses are assaulted by that horrible feeling and a golden skull starts talking to you and promising rewards beyond imagining if you help it find the rest of its body. You say no and the skull curses you out and mentions something about a coming reign of terror.
Later in your adventures you stumble upon two other tombs that are similar to the one with the golden skull. You are curious as to if these also have golden skulls in them so you open them as well. Opening both of these other tombs seemed to release some manner of lich guardian. They both spoke in tones that were both indignant an somewhat frightened. They spoke dire warnings about some "Kangaxx" that they did not want to get free. Before you could get a straight answer from them they both decided it would be better just to kill you. You survived the battles against these two liches by the skin of your teeth, only just barely defeating them.
You open the tombs again and see parts of a golden skeleton and when you reach out to touch the pieces you become overwhelmed with a horrifying sense of evil and pain. So you wrap the pieces in cloth so you can bring the pieces with you without touching them. Then, for whatever reason, you return to the golden skull and it politely asks you to change your mind about helping it. You have all the missing pieces of its skeleton so you figure "What the hell? Nothing bad could possibly happen." and put the skeleton back together.
So my question is this: Is Charname the dumbest person in existence or what? So many things wrong and so many warning signs... I don't even know where to start! How do you RPers ever justify doing this quest without RPing an insane or intensely stupid person?
As you open the sarcophagus your senses are assaulted by that horrible feeling and a golden skull starts talking to you and promising rewards beyond imagining if you help it find the rest of its body. You say no and the skull curses you out and mentions something about a coming reign of terror.
Later in your adventures you stumble upon two other tombs that are similar to the one with the golden skull. You are curious as to if these also have golden skulls in them so you open them as well. Opening both of these other tombs seemed to release some manner of lich guardian. They both spoke in tones that were both indignant an somewhat frightened. They spoke dire warnings about some "Kangaxx" that they did not want to get free. Before you could get a straight answer from them they both decided it would be better just to kill you. You survived the battles against these two liches by the skin of your teeth, only just barely defeating them.
You open the tombs again and see parts of a golden skeleton and when you reach out to touch the pieces you become overwhelmed with a horrifying sense of evil and pain. So you wrap the pieces in cloth so you can bring the pieces with you without touching them. Then, for whatever reason, you return to the golden skull and it politely asks you to change your mind about helping it. You have all the missing pieces of its skeleton so you figure "What the hell? Nothing bad could possibly happen." and put the skeleton back together.
So my question is this: Is Charname the dumbest person in existence or what? So many things wrong and so many warning signs... I don't even know where to start! How do you RPers ever justify doing this quest without RPing an insane or intensely stupid person?
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Comments
The Bhaalspawn, feeling a Slayer inside, can be ready to test herself against this Kangaxx. If it would be non-aggressive, alright, if it would be agressive, well, "we've killed more scary foes already".
If good - kill that thing to free the world from such an evil being;
if neutral - kill that thing because if free could broke balance;
if evil - kill that thing for power.
Assuming that CHARNAME relies really much on their abilities and they're sure to come out victorious.
That said, this specific situation is quite obviously ridiculous as no one in RL would go through the lengthy and obviously insanely dangerous process of say........developing an atomic bomb.
But if I'm just playing for the sake of enjoying the combat mechanics, then I don't care about any of that and meta-game my butt off.
But for Kangaax, given that it is a side-quest, it does depend on the main character's motivations. Obviously if it is an Undead Hunter then the character will have a clear one. Otherwise it is up to the player's imagination what might have them continue--or decide not to risk reconstituting such a powerful dark force.
Hmm, I wonder where this comes from...
If you find his skull first, ignoring the warnings not to open the sarcophagus, this supposedly mighty being is reduced to literally begging you for help. He is quite clearly harmless in his present state.
I agree with the OP. Only an insane person, good or evil, would proceed to free him. An evil person might want to control his power, but there is no indication that such can be done.
People just wanted to free him to see what would happen. He became one of those bonus side-boss challenges people like. Those who figure it out get rewarded with a nifty magic item that now everybody wants.
I never fight him though, because I think it requires breaking character to do so, and I like to stay in character when I play BG2.
They do not only play D&D in the office, they play it nearly every week!;) Also, they've played PoE in the office as well.
Indeed sounds like a fantasy:)
But back to the topic at hand. How hard/immersion breaking is too hard for roleplayers to justify their characters taking insane, possibly out of character risks in the name of playing through the game/story on offer? As a writer, this sort of thing haunts me.
It makes it easier when you don't read any of the dialog anymore.
If you are going to RP as if you actually believe his promises you'd better hope you're a big dumb oaf berserker who flies into a fit of rage immediately after realizing he has been lied to.
You've already defeated vampires, dragons, beholders, mind flayers, drow, demons, devils...and of course liches. So why not just destroy it before less scrupulous or capable adventurers screw things up?
You want a professional to come and remove the downed electrical wire before some idiot comes along and attempts it himself getting killed in the process.
Now the question remains, is your character the professional or the idiot?
Phat lootz
Besides for all his bragging, Kangaxx goes down pretty easy to anyone with some well enchanted weapons and a couple of protection from undead scrolls... I doubt he'd get far in Amn if he did escape.
But normally I just skip Kangaxx.