Romance: Viconia or Jaheria?
inkblowout
Member Posts: 49
Well I'm on chapter 3 and I have kept both Viconia and Jaheria (dumb I know, but both romances are too good so I kept them both.)
But I hit the dialogue where Viccy wants to talk about the underdark and now I'm legit forced to choose between 2 romances. Thing is... I have zero clue who to choose, simply because I really like both characters and both romances interested me greatly, And since I'm a lawful paladin I was edging toward Jaheria but Viccy is showing her soft side which made me in awe with her development. so which romance is in your opinion better?
But I hit the dialogue where Viccy wants to talk about the underdark and now I'm legit forced to choose between 2 romances. Thing is... I have zero clue who to choose, simply because I really like both characters and both romances interested me greatly, And since I'm a lawful paladin I was edging toward Jaheria but Viccy is showing her soft side which made me in awe with her development. so which romance is in your opinion better?
- Romance: Viconia or Jaheria?67 votes
- Viconia53.73%
- Jaheria46.27%
2
Comments
Ewww.
I suppose there's one positive with Jaheira. If you don't make it and end up dead, you'll never have to worry about leaving a grieving widow. She'll be after Anomen or some other randomer you've met before you're cold.
Voted Viconia because you are a paladin. You noticed her softer side and may want to redeem her and free her from her ghosts of the Underdark. The contrast makes it interesting, especially when you get into ToB. Jaheira is maybe too much of the ideal choice but on the other hand more realistic for a paladin.
None is a mistake.
If charname was female and V and J male, would there be the same dilemma?
In that circumstance, pretty sure most women friends would be telling Charname that it was bloody weird going after the stand in Dad. And so quickly.
They might warn you off the dangerous, "hot dark elf" as being dangerous, but I think they'd be very understanding.
I can somewhat understand the reluctance of some who think of Jaheira as a mother figure to enter into a romantic relationship with her. “Icky” and all that. But the truth is she was never the protagonist’s mother. She didn’t even have a hand in raising him.
She was a “family friend”, Gorion’s friend. But the protagonist never knew her at all growing up. Lots of people meet their lifemates among family friends.
If your protagonist traveled through BGI with both Jaheira and Khalid at his side, perhaps he feels guilty for falling in love with his old friends wife. But that is your story. Another might feel that Khalid never deserved her, or he might feel obligated to take care of his friends wife after his death. Or he simply might have always loved her from afar. There are so many ways to think of and role-play this.
The one objection that I really can’t understand though, is that she is somehow being disrespectful to Khalid by falling in love again. I can only assume that most people that feel this way have never lost their lifemate. It takes strength to go on after such a loss. To me, she is to be admired for making that choice. And no one can decide for another how long to grieve, or how much time should pass before seeking love again.
The many conversations reveal her as a woman with a rich life already lived. That doesn't mean that cannot have an equally rich future with the protagonist before her still. With her elven blood she appears ageless and attractive to a young man. Some parts of the romance have a bitter sweet touch that makes it unique. But once she opens up and accepts her feelings for the protagonist she is a passionate woman, very much different from Viconia's far more *animal* passion.
I voted for Viconia in this poll because of the paladin setting. But Jaheira's is a wonderful romance. In addition it shows a development of her character, or rather that she is not following the initial impression she may give in early BG1 in some stereotype way, but shows more facettes the longer you know her.
It would not be easy to justify lawful good paladin have neutral evil character in party, yet alone going as far as starting romantic relationship with that person. Abusive relationship at that. True, Viconia mellows down a bit after some time, but that's in regard to PC and pretty much no one else. She's still mean and sometimes even cruel to others.
Don't give her a "Draco in a leather pants" treatment.
And yes, I realize that she can be redeemed. But to neutral alingment, as far as I know. Problem is, it happens pretty much at the end of the game, and even Sarevok's change is more notable than hers. Sarevok's, out of all people.
But there is one thing I was missing that I was thinking about the other day. With Viconia being Neutral Evil atm, won't she leave if I have a high reputation? Because if so, I'll be ditching her for Jaheria, seeing how I won't do evil deeds to impress my lover.
Ya it really doesn't make sense that she'd leave because she sticks around, she questions PC on his choices throughout quests but she's usually like "it's your choice" like she doesn't really care what you do. And plus she's honestly not that bad when you question her actions in her stories she's always like "it's the drow way" or "I'm drow, I'm raised like that".
She enjoys PC's company but unfortunately she's evil and she's just like any other evil character and so rep can make her leave. It doesn't make sense in a storytelling kinda way, but it makes sense in a game mechanic.
For voting purposes and OP as paladin I just picked J.
Hard for me to do the Viccy romance, just am not that masochistic enough to put up with her crap. Only way I MIGHT, would be a Dirgesinger CHARNAME , with both of them worshipping Shar, and him looking up to her as a priestess.
The Jaheria romance is a tough one but seems to be fit well, esp, the way Khalid is worked into her dreams, having her even question her own thoughts, after a loss, with CHARNAME, at least to me. She seems to develop more as a good friend first, not only from previous BG, but into the romance also, and then goes on from there.
Poll is a tie rip
The poll tells you that its equality at a high quality level, so whatever you do, you make no big mistake.
As you mentioned that you are liking both of them, up to this point, perhaps you could let your protagonist choose. Yes, I see all those eyes rolling.
The good news is that the other one will be waiting for you in your next play-through.
I choose viccy because simply because viccy is redeemable and I see good in her unlike others. Sure she's kinda mean but she does apologize for her harsh comments. And I've posted before (in my "questions about paladins" post) that I try to purge all evil not by violence but by redeeming them into not being evil again. And she's not bad compared to some evil NPCs.
But thanks everyone for helping me out... I'll go for jaheria on my next playthrough.
I've had discussions about this in the past, but I've never really bought the idea of Jahiera as a mother-figure. *Gorion* might have intended for her to watch over you like that, but Gorion died and he never had any say in it, and Jahiera obviously had very different ideas from the get-go.
In her very first conversation with you, she basically says "Gorion wanted us to look out for you, but you're a grown adult and I think you can make your own choices." If you dawdled too long in helping her with her quest, she would leave you on the side of the road. She always treated you as a peer and not a ward.
Perhaps they'd be tailing you behind the scenes if you said no to joining?
Oh, and I went with Jaheira to preserve the Balance.
But also because yeah, I don't see her as a mother figure, she's canonically somewhere between 5 and 15 years older. Nor does she just fall right for CHARNAME straight out of Irenicus' dungeon, there's self-flagellation and forgiveness for moving on from Khalid.
Plus it's got a nice long complicated plot about her+Harpers+you.
It's not the only WTF moment in Jaheira's lines, of course. Every time I pass Khalid body I have to really pay attention and do not click on the very logical question "why don't we simply resurrect him?", because her answer makes no sense what so ever considering previous adventures (thankfully, there is a weak but passable option "he's body is probably too deformed for resurrection"). And combined with an instant romance with CHARNAME it looks like she could not get rid of Khalid fast enough, which is nonsense, obviously. She was an "older" (much, MUCH older) family friend and a mentor for the duration of BG1 (and SoD). Not sure many widows marry again children of their friends.
It does not mean, that boys can not fall for elder mature women, that also happen to be their teachers - happens all the time. But it can give some uncomfortable feelings to some too. All reasonable explanations and perfect RP. Still, timing from her side sucks. The romance is well written, but that detail ruined it for me.