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Romances between good and evil characters don't always go so well

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  • shawneshawne Member Posts: 3,239
    edited October 2013
    @KidCarnival: I think it comes down to a matter of economy - ideally, you'd have one potential same-sex romance per gender for Good/Neutral characters and one each for Evil characters. I like to think that if Beamdog had had the freedom to modify existing content, other BG characters could have been expanded to accommodate a wider range (say, Shar-Teel and Branwen for women, Ajantis and Xzar for men).

    As matters stand, you can't really cover all the bases with three characters... but I think, with a game like this, allowances can be made for replay value. I mean, you're right, it doesn't make much sense for a Good-aligned PC to go along with Dorn's extreme behavior... but wouldn't the solution then be to romance someone else with that particular character, and create a new Evil one who could have Dorn without conflicting motivations? I mean, when I first heard about BG:EE, my plan was to replay it using my original NE female CHARNAME... but when the news broke about Dorn, I redesigned her as a man specifically because I wanted to see how the m/m romance worked.
  • KidCarnivalKidCarnival Member Posts: 3,747
    @shawne: Yeah, I realize it's impossible to cover all options with only 3 new characters. Neutral alignment would get the closest though, considering the restrictions on old content. I like realism, and it's simply a fact that most people are straight, statistically speaking. So making 25 % of all NPCs gay or bi would feel like overkill, too. If it was up to me, and modifying old NPCs was an option, I'd probably pick 2 neutral characters - let's say Xan or Garrick for m/m and Safana or Branwen for f/f. They would not be ideal for every charname, but - mechanically - not conflict with any party. "No rep management required for the sole purpose of keeping the romance around" is the smallest common denominator here.

    And speaking of evil romance options, I would play the hell out of actual evil romances. The kind of romance Eldoth would immortalize in songs and stories; possibly titled "Ode to Charname (aka the jerk who got me drunk, stole my heart and then dumped me in Cloakwood Mines)".
  • EudaemoniumEudaemonium Member Posts: 3,199

    And speaking of evil romance options, I would play the hell out of actual evil romances. The kind of romance Eldoth would immortalize in songs and stories; possibly titled "Ode to Charname (aka the jerk who got me drunk, stole my heart and then dumped me in Cloakwood Mines)".

    Did Charname run off with Yeslick or something? XD
  • KidCarnivalKidCarnival Member Posts: 3,747

    And speaking of evil romance options, I would play the hell out of actual evil romances. The kind of romance Eldoth would immortalize in songs and stories; possibly titled "Ode to Charname (aka the jerk who got me drunk, stole my heart and then dumped me in Cloakwood Mines)".

    Did Charname run off with Yeslick or something? XD
    As whirlwind-romantic as it would be, no, that's not what happened. Dorn's romance talk triggered and Eldoth is now on a makeshift raft with Yeslick, who tries to heal his broken heart. It's almost like Titanic.

  • onanonan Member Posts: 223

    It's almost like Titanic.

    The horror. I think this qualifies for the 'worst things you have done to a npc' thread.

  • BladeDancerBladeDancer Member Posts: 477


    If Hexxat and CHARNAME don't work out, then why not go with that and kill her off? Perhaps Davaeron kills her?

    It's not my charname's style to kill off people for no good reason. And there's no way Davaeorn can live to be in my BG2EE fanfic because my charname killed him both in game and in my fanfic at the Cloakwood mines, point blank longbow arrow fired at his face.

  • KidCarnivalKidCarnival Member Posts: 3,747
    It could have been a doppelganger posing as Davaeorn.
  • SchneidendSchneidend Member Posts: 3,190



    It's not my charname's style to kill off people for no good reason. And there's no way Davaeorn can live to be in my BG2EE fanfic because my charname killed him both in game and in my fanfic at the Cloakwood mines, point blank longbow arrow fired at his face.

    Oh, right, she's not in BG1. Maybe have her be Irenicus' geas'd spy instead of Yoshimo? Alternatively, Firkraag or Bodhi could kill her to piss CHARNAME off.
  • ChorazyGlusChorazyGlus Member Posts: 151
    You set your criteria too restrictively; only way I can see it working is either a friends with benefits route or just a strict professional relationship. If you are looking for a long lasting romantic relationship between Hexxat and your PC, well after skimming through your thread I'd say that it's impossible.

    To be honest, I don't understand why you are so hellbent on this, just for the fact that almost nothing is known about Hexxat's mentality or attitude towards law and/or authority.
  • CoryNewbCoryNewb Member Posts: 1,330

    It could have been a doppelganger posing as Davaeorn.

    Dun dun dun dun! Would make for a great twist!
  • EudaemoniumEudaemonium Member Posts: 3,199

    It could have been a doppelganger posing as Davaeorn.

    Like the Imoen who joined your party, who isn't even the real Imoen. She was a single-class mage with largely terrible stats.
  • BladeDancerBladeDancer Member Posts: 477
    edited October 2013

    It could have been a doppelganger posing as Davaeorn.

    There's no logical explanation of why Sarevok would hire a doppelganger to portray Davaeorn. No one allied with Sarevok expected charname to ruin things at the Nashkel mines, or the Cloakwood mines. Charname caught them off guard at those moments.
  • BladeDancerBladeDancer Member Posts: 477
    edited October 2013

    It could have been a doppelganger posing as Davaeorn.

    Like the Imoen who joined your party, who isn't even the real Imoen. She was a single-class mage with largely terrible stats.
    Do ya mind giving me hard evidence, other than the fact that she will be dual-classed as a mage whether you choose to dual class her after leveling up in BG or not? After all, it's canonical that Imoen becomes a thief/mage, just like how Minsc, Dynaheir, Khalid and Jaheira are canonically your team.
  • KidCarnivalKidCarnival Member Posts: 3,747

    It could have been a doppelganger posing as Davaeorn.

    Like the Imoen who joined your party, who isn't even the real Imoen. She was a single-class mage with largely terrible stats.
    And all the doppelgangers you find in the cages! MY charname (who, as we all know, is the ONE TRUE CHARNAME) goes to Spellhold to find his real companions, Shar-Teel, Xzar, Monty (damn Irenicus even placed doppelgangers of them as a distraction!) and Eldoth. And tries to cure Edwin's tragic memory loss. The doppelganger problem is a much larger issue in Faerun than most people realize.
  • EudaemoniumEudaemonium Member Posts: 3,199

    It could have been a doppelganger posing as Davaeorn.

    Like the Imoen who joined your party, who isn't even the real Imoen. She was a single-class mage with largely terrible stats.
    Do ya mind giving me hard evidence, other than the fact that she will be dual-classed as a mage whether you choose to dual class her after leveling up in BG or not? After all, it's canonical that Imoen becomes a thief/mage, just like how Minsc, Dynaheir, Khalid and Jaheira are canonically your team.
    Activate cheats, start a new game and then Ctrl-Q the Imoen in Candlekeep into your party. The Imoen you speak to in Candlekeep is a single-classed Mage with stats in the 9-12 range, not the single-classed Thief who joins your party after Gorion dies (and has much better completely different stats).

    I don't think it means anything, and is likely an oversight, but I sometimes like to pretend that it means that the Imoen who joins you is really a doppleganger sent to spy on you.
  • CoryNewbCoryNewb Member Posts: 1,330

    It could have been a doppelganger posing as Davaeorn.

    Like the Imoen who joined your party, who isn't even the real Imoen. She was a single-class mage with largely terrible stats.
    And all the doppelgangers you find in the cages! MY charname (who, as we all know, is the ONE TRUE CHARNAME) goes to Spellhold to find his real companions, Shar-Teel, Xzar, Monty (damn Irenicus even placed doppelgangers of them as a distraction!) and Eldoth. And tries to cure Edwin's tragic memory loss. The doppelganger problem is a much larger issue in Faerun than most people realize.
    Refreshing.
  • KidCarnivalKidCarnival Member Posts: 3,747

    It could have been a doppelganger posing as Davaeorn.

    There's no logical explanation of why Sarevok would hire a doppelganger to portray Davaeorn. No one allied with Sarevok expected charname to ruin things at the Nashkel mines, or the Cloakwood mines. Charname caught them off guard at those moments.
    Except that the diviner from Lothander's quest secretly works for Sarevok and has predicted all charname would do. However, he could only answer one question, so Sarevok had to replace all his key players with doppelgangers for their own safety. He was a smart politican; he wouldn't just sacrifice loyal minions if there was a nearly unlimited supply of doppelgangers spawning in Durlag's Tower.
  • BladeDancerBladeDancer Member Posts: 477
    edited October 2013

    It could have been a doppelganger posing as Davaeorn.

    Like the Imoen who joined your party, who isn't even the real Imoen. She was a single-class mage with largely terrible stats.
    Do ya mind giving me hard evidence, other than the fact that she will be dual-classed as a mage whether you choose to dual class her after leveling up in BG or not? After all, it's canonical that Imoen becomes a thief/mage, just like how Minsc, Dynaheir, Khalid and Jaheira are canonically your team.
    Activate cheats, start a new game and then Ctrl-Q the Imoen in Candlekeep into your party. The Imoen you speak to in Candlekeep is a single-classed Mage with stats in the 9-12 range, not the single-classed Thief who joins your party after Gorion dies (and has much better completely different stats).
    Try not to view Baldur's Gate as a game for once and imagine it as a novel instead. Give me an explanation without game based terms like "start new game" and "Ctrl-Q". Give me an explanation that you can only get from the story itself, not game cheats and such.
  • BladeDancerBladeDancer Member Posts: 477
    edited October 2013

    It could have been a doppelganger posing as Davaeorn.

    There's no logical explanation of why Sarevok would hire a doppelganger to portray Davaeorn. No one allied with Sarevok expected charname to ruin things at the Nashkel mines, or the Cloakwood mines. Charname caught them off guard at those moments.
    Except that the diviner from Lothander's quest secretly works for Sarevok and has predicted all charname would do. However, he could only answer one question, so Sarevok had to replace all his key players with doppelgangers for their own safety. He was a smart politican; he wouldn't just sacrifice loyal minions if there was a nearly unlimited supply of doppelgangers spawning in Durlag's Tower.
    Hmmm... I always wondered why he would only offer one question. I remember in the official novelization of Baldur's Gate, Sarevok executed his key players, including Tazok and Tranzig, and had doppelgangers disguised as them, the only problem is the benefits of replacing his key players of the iron crisis with doppelgangers is never shown, not in the novel, and not in your explanation.

    Another thing, Sarevok is no politician, he's just knows how to plan ahead to get what he wants.
  • KidCarnivalKidCarnival Member Posts: 3,747


    Another thing, Sarevok is no politician, he's just knows how to plan ahead to get what he wants.

    That describes a basic ability of politicians. I didn't mean he's the foreign affairs minister. And what exactly he does while charname is still in Candlekeep isn't shown either, but he must have done something - like recruit his network, as it exists well before charname starts the journey. If you only describe exactly the events of the game, what's the point of writing the story? It's already been written by the game.

  • EudaemoniumEudaemonium Member Posts: 3,199

    It could have been a doppelganger posing as Davaeorn.

    Like the Imoen who joined your party, who isn't even the real Imoen. She was a single-class mage with largely terrible stats.
    Do ya mind giving me hard evidence, other than the fact that she will be dual-classed as a mage whether you choose to dual class her after leveling up in BG or not? After all, it's canonical that Imoen becomes a thief/mage, just like how Minsc, Dynaheir, Khalid and Jaheira are canonically your team.
    Activate cheats, start a new game and then Ctrl-Q the Imoen in Candlekeep into your party. The Imoen you speak to in Candlekeep is a single-classed Mage with stats in the 9-12 range, not the single-classed Thief who joins your party after Gorion dies (and has much better completely different stats).
    Try not to view Baldur's Gate as a game for once and imagine it as a novel instead. Give me an explanation without game based terms like "start new game" and "Ctrl-Q". Give me an explanation that you can only get from the story itself, not game cheats and such.
    Okay firstly, I was just being humorous. I was making a joke based on the fact that Imoen you meet in Candlekeep, and thus presumably the Imoen you grew up with, is actually *a different Imoen to the one that joins your party*, which is a fact that be ascertained by the game's files. Extrapolating from this fact, I made a joke that Imoen was really a doppleganger, since dopplegangers are a large, large part of the narrative of the first game. Obviously, narrative-wise it doesn't really make sense for Imoen to be a doppleganger. This is primarily because Sarevok wants you dead, not watched.

    Off the top of my head:

    If one ignores the fact that Sarevok wants you dead, you could potentially spin a plot that he actually (through the suggestion of Doppleganger!Imoen) guided Charname through the destruction of the Iron Throne operations. In this scenario, the hero's defeat of Mulahey and Davaeorn were actually all ultimately part of Sarevok's plan to destabilise the Iron Throne, allowing him to ultimately frame you for the murder of his adoptive father Rieltar Anchev and the other leaders and propel himself to the leadership of both the Iron Throne and ultimately Baldur's Gate itself, thus allowing him to accomplish his ultimate aim of full-scale international war. Doppleganger!Imoen would obviously thus be revealed in Candlekeep's catacombs as a last nail in the sanity of the hero as they realise they've actually been a pawn since the morning after Gorion's death.
  • KidCarnivalKidCarnival Member Posts: 3,747
    @Eudaemonium: Can't you write that fanfic? Your plot sounds more interesting than "rigidly romancing Hexxat".
  • BladeDancerBladeDancer Member Posts: 477
    edited October 2013



    Doppleganger!Imoen would obviously thus be revealed in Candlekeep's catacombs as a last nail in the sanity of the hero as they realise they've actually been a pawn since the morning after Gorion's death.

    Jeez! I should have thought of this twist before! But I wouldn't know what to do with the real Imoen, and I would have no idea how charname would know that doppelgangerImoen is doppelgangerImoen if he has traveled with her all this time instead of the real Imoen. It would nullify the way of finding out which Imoen is real and the other a fake. To me, it makes no sense why the doppelgangers disguised as Pyladia, Winthrop and the others all the sudden reveal themselves in the catacombs even though they could have fooled charname without jinxing themselves.
  • EudaemoniumEudaemonium Member Posts: 3,199
    edited October 2013
    I mean, you'd probably have to rely on a combination of flashbacks/memories and slight incongruities in behaviour to pull it off well. You have to remember that the Doppleganger thing only really starts to come to the fore in Chapter 5 with that Merchant Guild, so it would be easy for Charname to dismiss incongruities in Imoen's persona through the hardships of the road and the radical change in lifestyle. Its not hard to do in a game where you don't get much reflection on Charname and Imoen's past together, but in a novel you'd have to foreshadow it and go into their relationship in a fair bit of detail. That would make it harder to do convincingly. Also, presumably real!Imoen would have been dead all along, so you'd basically have to write her entirely out of BG2, which in my opinion would be no great loss but it would require some heavy rejigging of the plot and Charname's motives for chasing after Irenicus.

    I kind of thought they revealed themselves in the catacombs largely to screw with your head. I mean, yeah it doesn't make much sense, but its mainly done for emotional impact rather than any kind of sound tactical plan on the part of the Dopplegangers.

    @Eudaemonium: Can't you write that fanfic? Your plot sounds more interesting than "rigidly romancing Hexxat".

    Always a possibility!
  • SchneidendSchneidend Member Posts: 3,190


    Jeez! I should have thought of this twist before! But I wouldn't know what to do with the real Imoen, and I would have no idea how charname would know that doppelgangerImoen is doppelgangerImoen if he has traveled with her all this time instead of the real Imoen. It would nullify the way of finding out which Imoen is real and the other a fake. To me, it makes no sense why the doppelgangers disguised as Pyladia, Winthrop and the others all the sudden reveal themselves in the catacombs even though they could have fooled charname without jinxing themselves.

    The dopplegangers are getting tired of their disguises.
  • onanonan Member Posts: 223
    edited November 2013

    It could have been a doppelganger posing as Davaeorn.

    Like the Imoen who joined your party, who isn't even the real Imoen. She was a single-class mage with largely terrible stats.
    And all the doppelgangers you find in the cages! MY charname (who, as we all know, is the ONE TRUE CHARNAME) goes to Spellhold to find his real companions, Shar-Teel, Xzar, Monty (damn Irenicus even placed doppelgangers of them as a distraction!) and Eldoth. And tries to cure Edwin's tragic memory loss. The doppelganger problem is a much larger issue in Faerun than most people realize.
    It's a bloody infestation. Even the dopplegangers are not sure who is a doppleganger and who is not anymore.

    Post edited by onan on
  • shawneshawne Member Posts: 3,239

    Also, presumably real!Imoen would have been dead all along, so you'd basically have to write her entirely out of BG2, which in my opinion would be no great loss but it would require some heavy rejigging of the plot and Charname's motives for chasing after Irenicus.

    Not if the doppelganger became the mask and Charname accepted her as such...
  • SchneidendSchneidend Member Posts: 3,190
    shawne said:



    Not if the doppelganger became the mask and Charname accepted her as such...

    Becoming the Mask so thoroughly as to actually gain a divine spark would be pretty awesome, actually.
  • EudaemoniumEudaemonium Member Posts: 3,199
    Doppelgänger!Imoen was the real Bhaalspawn all along.
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