Renouncing quests in a good playthrough (SPOILERS)

I am trying to set up a list of quests that a good party (NG) would have to renounce to perform (in BG EE). The game seems to advantage the good players over the evil ones (particularly thanks to the reputation score). But to balance this, it seems to me that an evil party can almost do all the quests, whilst a good one would have to renounce to a certain number of quests, and of course to the associated loots.
I would be interested in receiving your reactions. I am not taking the point of view of a righteous character like a paladin, but more of a NG character, who is ready to break the law if this can help goodness to prevail.
- Opening locked doors in towns: does it make sense ? Can the party penetrate simply into a house and loot what is inside ? Does it make sense for a good party ? Could we argue that the party hears sometime screaming and decide to enter into the house ?
- Refuse the provocations of Sendai, Kiran, Meilum.
- Thieves guild in BG EE. In BG2 it makes sense but in BG EE, I am not sure that the character should accept. Or perhaps to avoid a bloodbath, the best thing is to accept but not perform the task asked. Is it possible ? What of Black Lily ? Can we have access to her without accepting the quests (or without doing them) ?
- Ramazith - does it make sense to enter into his house and slaughter him and his minions ? And what with Degrodel ? This means to renounce to the helm and the cap of Balduran ...
- Ragefast : perhaps the party heard screaming and decided to enter into the house ?
- Trying to spare your foes : Tranzig, Tamoko, Cynthridia. And even Mulahey, even if in the end he will be killed.
- The revenant and the dagger : should we give it to him ?
All this means a serious loss of XPs and of loots ... What do you think ? Does it make sense from a RPing point of view ?
I would be interested in receiving your reactions. I am not taking the point of view of a righteous character like a paladin, but more of a NG character, who is ready to break the law if this can help goodness to prevail.
- Opening locked doors in towns: does it make sense ? Can the party penetrate simply into a house and loot what is inside ? Does it make sense for a good party ? Could we argue that the party hears sometime screaming and decide to enter into the house ?
- Refuse the provocations of Sendai, Kiran, Meilum.
- Thieves guild in BG EE. In BG2 it makes sense but in BG EE, I am not sure that the character should accept. Or perhaps to avoid a bloodbath, the best thing is to accept but not perform the task asked. Is it possible ? What of Black Lily ? Can we have access to her without accepting the quests (or without doing them) ?
- Ramazith - does it make sense to enter into his house and slaughter him and his minions ? And what with Degrodel ? This means to renounce to the helm and the cap of Balduran ...
- Ragefast : perhaps the party heard screaming and decided to enter into the house ?
- Trying to spare your foes : Tranzig, Tamoko, Cynthridia. And even Mulahey, even if in the end he will be killed.
- The revenant and the dagger : should we give it to him ?
All this means a serious loss of XPs and of loots ... What do you think ? Does it make sense from a RPing point of view ?
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Comments
I usually save the nymph from Ragefast, because there's another npc that clues you in that he is doing something evil to an innocent in there, which I take to be probable cause for a search.
My advice? - Just miss out on all those quests.
Yes, you will miss out on XP, loot, etc. But what you lose in those tangibles, you will gain in enjoyment and satisfaction.
One of my most memorable and enjoyable moments playing BG1 came when my headstrong barbarian refused to bow down to Alatos' demands - I started a thread about it here, with screenshots included: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/35837/so-ive-just-whiped-out-alatos-entire-thieves-guild
Yes, I missed out on Narlen's quests, Husam's help, etc., but I came away with a unique and satisfying experience in their place.
As an addendum to the above:
If you are still dead-set on doing some of those unscrupulous quests with a good-aligned character, you may want to consider playing as a Grey Guard paladin (modded kit): https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/73908/kit-mod-grey-guard-paladin
This is the kind of character that would break open a locked chest and steal the Stupifier because he/she believes it is too useful in the fight against evil to just be left behind. In other words, they are "for the greater good"/"ends justify the means" type of characters.
You can easily have that mindset with a plain fighter. But unless your character is a lock-picking addict, they will probably not have any reason to open a random, unmarked chest. In theory, there are thousands upon thousands of locks to be found in the city of Baldur's Gate. Is your character really the type to undo them all just in case one of them is hiding something useful?
But here is where targeted roleplaying comes in. It is cheap, but when you are desperate for an excuse, it is the only thing you can fall back on:
Why do you need to enter this house?
Because the guards are after you. You are trying to hide from them. How could you have known that this would lead to your having to slaughter all the inhabitants?
The same excuse works for why you are working for the Thieves' Guild, if you do the quests later. Who else could hide you from the guards?
But you could even justify doing them earlier. After all, you are opposing one of the most powerful organizations of Baldur's Gate. Just pretend that you are working for them in order to acquire intelligence on the Iron Throne and Sarevok.
The dialogues with the provocateurs are a bit streamlined. They are missing the option to tell them to put up or shut up. While still unacceptable behavior for most paladins, that is certainly within reason for many other folks. But you can just pretend that the choice is there, and so select the dialog branch that will open hostilities (or, if you are actually roleplaying, pretend that they refrain from taking you up on the offer, and retreat while hurling more insults).
So it is not the actions. It is your justifications. See this double page from DM of The Ring for a great example.
By the way, the helm of Balduran requires none of the above. It is available without you doing any side quests at all.
There's so much of the game hidden behind locked doors that I think you just have to accept it as part of the game and ignore the fact that your party has no reason to be picking the locks of random houses.
Generally I see nothing wrong with fighting the groups who threaten your party - Sendai for instance will threaten to kill you if you ask what she wants. A good party can legitimately respond by drawing their swords. Meilum, if I recall correctly, is a nutjob who approaches complete strangers in the wilderness to tell them how dangerous he is. That's not normal behaviour and being good doesn't mean having to tolerate someone who is trying to intimidate you for no reason.
Kirian is the exception as her party is just having a laugh at charname's expense and it relies upon charname to start acting like a psycho in order to cause a fight so I think a good party should walk away from this one.
* In the case of Razimuth, the wizard did slaughter the barkeep and patrons of Ye Olde Inn without provocation. If you find this out, then meting out punishment through whatever method can probably be justified.
* If you subscribe to the idea that Imoen's curiosity gets the better of her, she sneaks inside Degrodel's house, gets chased by his minions, and after the party dispatches them, agrees to assist the wizard. After completing the quest, Degrodel then sets his minions upon you once more, in essence betraying you. At that point, you're probably within your rights, even as a good character to exact revenge against the wizard.
After discovering the EEs last year after at least 15 years without BG, I realised I want to be a paladin because it better reflects my values in real life, and suddenly I felt it was so WRONG to walk into a house and empty all their wardrobes. Or do the Mae'Var quest in BG2, or wear (or even acquire) the Ring of Gaxx. If that means less XP, less money and less items, so be it. Bigger challenge.
You don't choose to be a Good person (especially a LG holy warrior) because of the cool abilities and then break all the rules to keep on playing as before. If the material rewards are better, it's not difficult to be Good. Doing the right thing IS the reward.
It's so satisfying if you finish the game without some of the power stuff and with lower XP but knowing you did it RIGHT.
But maybe that's just me.
And btw
@BelgarathMTH if my paladin ever met your character in a game she would ask to join your party immediately and be loyal to the nine hells and back [insert respectful bow]
I think the way the game is played depends on the individual. just like a knife, The protection or killing depends on the person who holds the knife, not the maker.
I think it's good to keep the game open and diverse. It's a channel for emotional venting, because I can't be a Batman in reality, but I can be a Paladin in Baldur's Gate.
Or... If I had been stolen $100 by a burglar in real life, I would have stolen it back in Baldur's Gate, haha
I hope that the computer translation of Chinglish will not confuse you
I prefer BG2 also because of much more interaction and quest choices... And my favourite paladin kit, Undead Hunter, is so much more satisfying in Bg2.
At this point, I have enough meta knowledge I generally know the various quests and consequences/rewards. A few thoughts…
A good aligned character/party should certainly favor non-violent encounters when possible. Being easily provoked is seriously uncool!
It is an engine limitation that there is no “knock on the door and see who answers” function in the game. And I’m okay with knowing which houses with locked doors, actually have a resident who would love to have a ring returned, a letter delivered, an amulet delivered to a wandering child…
It just so happens that sometimes you get 17 exp for ringing the doorbell!
Many side quests, like the thieves guild in Baldur’s Gate, or Mae Var’s Guildhall in BG2 simply have no appropriate motivation for a good aligned party and will need to be skipped. Small loss.
In many cases, your paladin or neutral-good cleric, or generally moral decent hero, may be superseded by other characters in the party taking their own action. I often think, in the first game especially, that Imoen is curious and a bit of an imp. And she will stick her nose in places it doesn’t belong. She *is* NG, and she won’t be randomly killing people. Or even burgling the homes of innocent townspeople. For players who really want an escape clause for some questionable adventures, Neera or other “friendly” neutrals may provide a justification. Just don’t take it too far, I don’t see a strongly good PC going along with anything too vile!
Sorry if some of this is a bit random, I’m just having fun reading through some old threads. And the “moral” dimension is one of my very favorite things about role playing!
Some burglaries are a lesser evil to have support against a group replacing nobles with doppelgangers.
I would agree completely about working with the thieves in BG2, it’s an obvious “lesser of two evils” sort of thing. But in BG1 there’s no real need for it, and you flat out steal from someone you don’t know for someone who’s unsavory. I think I’ll stick with the idea a “good” party shouldn’t touch that one.
There are, however, a lot of occasions where I do things that I feel I shouldn't. Killing Meilum for his Gauntlets of Weapon Expertise is something I always do (they really are great gauntlets) but it always feels like committing murder. Okay, so the guy is a neutral evil nutter, but he is wandering the wilderness in rags and doesn't appear to be hurting anyone. To make myself feel less guilty I have tried to fight him one-on-one in a proper duel but the guy does insane amounts of damage and I have discovered that if my character is capable of beating him I really don't need the gauntlets in the first place.
Trouveur I agree with that too. Sendai, and a few others, you have to get provocative to force a fight. I think on a very good run those should be avoided. Others may go off on a hair trigger, I don’t worry quite so much about them!
But I want her armour . . .