So, where did Sarevok get all the doppelgangers from?
Dordledum
Member Posts: 243
Just wondering. Don't remember it getting explained.
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About doppelgangers, they could be related to Durlag's Tower, and checking the story of it you will find illithids again. Is everything connected?
There's a really good fanfic "A Fragment of Substance" that rewrites the whole doppleganger/Jhasso/Seven Suns Coster part of the story.
Genuinely horrific, you don't think about dopplegangers the same way ever again. They are monsters.
Well, is it, indeed ?
Which explains why they are only in BG city and Candlekeep. Both are critically important to Sarevok's plan. Baldur's Gate for rather obvious reasons - his ascension to Dukehood puts him in a position to command the Flaming Fist, which he can then use to his own ends. Had he pulled it off, it is likely that he would have done what a certain priestess did later in ToB. Candlekeep, however, is where the secrets are. As a former scholar, he is well aware of the full prophecy - as are the four chanters near the keep itself.
By subverting Candlekeep, he can subvert knowledge of the prophecy, or so he thinks. Also, he knows about at least one half-sibling guarded by Gorion, who could put a kink in his plans. Being familiar with the place, he knows a full-frontal assault isn't likely to work, so he uses more subtle methods. There are signs that he is doing precisely that in chapter 1 - how else did those two assassins get into a guarded complex?
However, neither Sarevok, nor the doppelgangers, are idiots. They are professionals, and they know that secrecy is of vital importance. As such, randomly attacking people is right out. This is one area the writers got spot on - there would be no good reasons, and many bad reasons, to have them show up outside of these two strategic locations.
Now, to Durlag's tower. I suspect that the same thing is in play, except that in this case, it was another group who hired them. It's never made entirely clear, but I think that his dungeon was about to get a bit too close to an illithid enclave in the the Underdark. Being intelligent, they knew that going up against his tower directly would be suicide, so they came up with a devious plan to attack it from within. The doppelgangers prize would be a nifty tower and the wealth within, which would have worked out great except that the demon knight came along and decided he liked the place too.
Or, IOW, doppelgangers aren't random monsters, they are highly intelligent, very specific monsters.
Yup true, but the main question remains: why did those illithids target Durlag and his tower in the first place ? I think it is somewhat explained but I can't remember the reason ^^
In the game it says that the opportunity was too good to pass up, since the clan was under Durlag's wing and they didnt suspect a thing.
The tower was built by Durlag, a great hero. During his glorious career, Durlag amassed an immense treasure (I guess this means he built the tower after his years of adventuring, as a place to keep his treasure).
With the help of dwarven builders, Durlag dug numerous chambers and passages below the hill, and upon it built the tower itself, to serve as a base for a dwarven community and grow old there in peace with his kin, happy and prosperous.
But then, doppelgangers, aided and led by illithids, replaced Durlag’s compagnons. Chaos basically ensued (Durlag, being the great dwarven badass hero he was cleared the place).
The illithids managed to flee, and Durlag decided to turn the place into the crazy trap it has become to prevent them from coming back (why would they though?). It stayed that way for a few centuries, Durlag growing old and crazier with time, holed up in his dungeon.
That’s a third party tale, might not be 100% accurate. And it still doesn’t answer the question of why the illithids attacked. Were they interested in Durlag’s treasure ? Did they want to use the tower and tunnels for themselves ? Was it revenge for Durlag’s past adventures ? Or did they feel threatened by Durlag’s plans ?
What if the Cambion and Gorion's ward were nothing but pawns in the illithid's great schemes ? With our explorations, the cambion's own plans, and our inevitable battle, the tower is now cleared and ready to be re-infiltrated by the illithids, should they want to.
We meet two groups of illithids.
The main and easy one is in the Underdark. They capture nearby groups and make them fight "for their entertainment". How is this entertainment ? I don't think it is the real reason (you don't play with food).
D&D lore teaches us that illithids are a very powerful alien race, who at some point in long past history dominated the universe and controled the minds of many sentient races. Their empire collapsed following the massive Gith revolt, and they retreated in underground lairs for a time, licking their wounds and conspiring whatever conspiracy they like to conspire in their idle time.
We can safely assume that the Illithid lair in the Underdark near Ust Natha is one such hideout. I don't think that the fights are just "entertainment", but more research and study. What exactly they are studying, is everyone's guess.
The second group of illithids dwelves in Athkatla:
There is definitely a conspiracy in making here:
- the leader laments, when you attack his lair, that his army is not ready yet
- the illithid correspondance confirms that "the base is established, and the infiltration continues"
- during Jan Jansen's quest, we meet "the Hidden" who asks us to kill 2 Giths and reveals himself to be an illithid (the illithid correspondance actually refers to him gathering followers)
We can safely assume that illithids were trying to infiltrate and take control of Athkatla through this group (although note that it was led by an Alhoon, who are generally outcast lich-like illithids going against the elder-brain-dominated society).
Lastly, we have Siege of Dragonspear: here we have again the standart illithid conspiracy in the Temple of Bhaal, where a mindflayer is slowly but surely taking control of the minds of the cultists, trying to get a foothold in the temple to serve as a future base of operations. We don't know though what the purpose is.
Now, these three groups of illithids can make one feel like they are not only "gathering data" and licking their wounds anymore, but on the contrary actively preparing a large-scale invasion, gathering armies and thralls.
If only there was an upcoming project about illithid invasion of the sword coast...............
@monico I dont know if you were being ironic, but isnt BG3's plot about an Illithid's plan on the sword coast?
However, beyond that, it makes sense that the illithids would be studying their cattle, as they tend to be very squishy once the cattle figure out how to defend against their psionics. It is probably similar to the way we study snakes in order to make better anti-venom. Or, more directly, it would be if we didn't know how to pen cows very well, and the cows could gore us once they realize they were being raised as food.
That said, it will be awesome if BG3 brings up some of these illithid encounters as part of its backstory.
My whole post was being ironic and complotist just to relate our bloved BG games to the upcoming BG3
Obviously, the illithids capturing and controlling "lesser" races (in their eyes) is just normal illithid behavior, I don’t think any of the colonies we meet have any master plan behind their actions. Well, unless you call world domination a master plan, but we know how that usually ends up in novels, movies or games
in fact, there was a bit of an "easter egg" in ulgoth's beard where there was actually another one locked up in a chest ( beamdog has since changed it so now its just a bastard sword +1 )
but when it comes to the story line of durlag's tower, we have to remember why players are even going there in the first place; the soultaker dagger which supposedly houses a fiend
it could be very possible that the reason why there was a huge invasion to durlag's tower is because the illithid scum wanted that dagger, but failed to do so
and then afterwards when durlag died the demonkight came along ( that is even more of a mystery why he is there ) and im assuming he is trying to do the same thing because he has the dagger on his person, although perhaps no means to unleash whats his pickle
the demonknight does mention that it is pleased that they party cleared the keep of traps and monsters so maybe the demonknight actually wanted to use this tower for base himself but needed it to be "cleaned up" first?
with all this being said, perhaps its a mystery on purpose, perhaps all the lose ends and unsolved stuff in the bg series is supposed to be that way so then we, ourselves can come up with our own conclusions on how these things were or are suppose to plan out
and one more thing, my thoughts on bg2, i was under the impression that there was a fight for power in athkatla ( by the looks of it, this city seems to be a major powerhouse in terms of political and economic power in faerun perhaps ) so the illithid chums and the twisted rune chaps were actually at war with one another and they were fighting each other in the back ground to not cause the city alarm
the manual says something about athkatla being lead by the council of six and the shadow thieves and neither of them like the arrangement, so there seems to be a lot of gotham city corruption type stuff going on here
but this is the sort of thing that helps make adventures and i think in bg2's case it was more "easter eggy" to "accidentally" stumble upon all this sort of stuff
We don't know, however, if all of these individual goals is something the Elder Brains decide to do by consensus, or whether they all just go their own way, confident in the knowledge that their empire WILL arise someday. It is inevitable.
With regards to the illithid group in SOA that's led by the Hidden, however, I very much doubt that that group was one that was associated with an illithid colony. Alhoons are universally reviled by "normal" illithids (because by becoming undead, the alhoons have given up all hope of ever joining the Elder Brain upon their death), so it stands to reason that that particular group is a splinter group working towards their own nefarious purposes.
Yeah, that's called "plot armor"
I fully agree. I think that Hidden and his group are independant with other illithid groups, since they are led by an Alhoon.