[SPOILERS/Moonsea] Is there anything you can find in Zhentil Keep or just an endless random dungeon?

chevalier

As per title. I know you can confront him, in which case you'll have to kill him (2 XP), or you can allow him to have his group killed (4500 XP), which will happen even if you previously clear the ruins of the Shadovar (oversight?).

So is there a way of out of the 'Thentia Resistance Army' situation without either having to kill its leader or allowing him to have the entire group killed?

Zaxares

If there is a way to save him, I certainly never found it. I found the two choices for that side-quest to be quite unsatisfactory too. It seems that the "Good" route is to stop Bale from leading the rest of the Resistance into the ruins, which naturally leads to his death. The "Evil" route is to allow them all to go to their deaths, as you know. But it seems there's no way to spare Bale despite the fact that he's essentially dominated and has no real choice in the matter.

chevalier

Well, I think it may be Good because you say 'dude, can't let ya', and then he ziks you, not you him. And you have no way of knowing what he'll do, though a combat outcome is a fair guess. It's a pity you can't knock him out the way Mr Onehand knocked the PC.

Letting them go isn't represented as Evil, it's more like failure to do good but without doing evil, hence some sort of general ambiguous act compatible with a wide range of alignments depending on the motive, e.g. respect for individual freedom and not wanting to cross blades with innocents, and such like. I would have compunctions in the PC's situation both on the point of Law and Good forcing the combat with Bale, though I could rationally justify the need.

It's a pity letting them go gives you 4500 XP, while confronting him does only the XP for killing him and not for diffusing the situation and dispersing the rest of the band, which is certainly worth some XP.

Gah. But the supreme pity is you can't save them even if you clear the ruins for them. And can't tell them you'll go there in their stead or even along with them, at least the latter of which I'm pretty sure they wouldn't refuse.

chevalier

As per modified title — didn't want to start a new thread.

Some NPCs say I can find something — notably Maganus's old home — in the ruins, but I can't seem to find anything. Will I eventually find something if I keep exploring or not?

Phantasma

The only real encounter of note is a Render related to the Wild Hunt quest. I'm not sure if you encounter that after a certain number of encounters or randomly, but I met it on the 4th or 5th time.

Zaxares

I believe I found that Render encounter on my 2nd map, so yeah, I believe it's random. Aside from that, I believe the Zhentil Keep ruins are just a randomly generated dungeon for you to farm XP and gold if you need it.