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Revamp Test of Selfishness - BG2 Hell Trial (spoilers on)

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  • kamuizinkamuizin Member Posts: 3,704
    The fear test doesn't even have an evil/good path in fact. Most of my evil reckless characters just tell the demon to shove the cloak in his ass, cos they're no weakling and they don't fear anything (roleplayed more or less like this).
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    StummvonBordwehr
  • kamuizinkamuizin Member Posts: 3,704
    Emmy19 said:

    The ally gets permakilled if you take the evil path? I had absolutely no idea of this (kinda makes me glad. The loss of dexterity and experience was a bummer, especially as my PC was a thief, but I solved that problem with gloves of dexterity and then I used a spoiler thing in Watcher's Keep to get my dexterity back for real - ha!).

    In core rules foward is perma kill, in easy difficult the character just die and you can revive him, in normal difficult i don't know.
    StummvonBordwehr
  • wubblewubble Member Posts: 3,156
    Normal is the same as easy i think.
  • JLeeJLee Member Posts: 650
    I always linked the test of selfishness with the arrival of Mr. ToB shortly after its completion. It's a convenient (and evil) way of freeing up a slot for the evil NPC.

    Fyi, @Jarrakul‌ The XP penalty for the good path is 75,000.
  • DarkcloudDarkcloud Member Posts: 302
    @JLee it would make sense but I don't know how much of that was planned. One of the loading tooltips in the original tells you that you will be able to import your char to NWN.
  • wubblewubble Member Posts: 3,156
    Darkcloud said:

    @JLee it would make sense but I don't know how much of that was planned. One of the loading tooltips in the original tells you that you will be able to import your char to NWN.

    that would have been a short game.
    Oh the waterdhavian creatures are escaping are they? *casts time stop kill all the nasty people and puts the animals back in their cages*
    Oh Desther, detect alignment shows you as evil, bye bye *casts disintegrate*
    Right who's next?
    Klauth didn't you have a brother called firkraag? or was that saladrex? it doesn't really matter they're both dead anyway.
    JLeeNimranThacoBellProont
  • the_sexteinthe_sextein Member Posts: 711
    edited December 2014
    As far as I am aware the character is sometimes perma killed and sometimes not. I play on insane difficulty every time and I have chosen the evil path many times without losing anyone. I always pick up a rod of resurrection from ribald at some point in the game. If my character is perma killed then I just reload.

    The choice for me is to improve my armor 2 points and lose nothing or gain 10% magic resistance and lose dex, HP, and xp.

    Maybe if my choice caused one of my companions to be tortured for a long time I would choose otherwise but it looks to me like they instantly die and are back up and running as if nothing happened within seconds of their death. They probably suffer more when they get hit in your average battle.

    If my character is a fighter type I choose the evil path for the armor class bonus. Otherwise I rely on magic armor so I don't really care. While armor class may not be all that useful in TOB I still try to build my fighter types up with the best HP, armor class and stats possible. Giving up 2 armor class and 1 dex plus some XP and HP is not going to happen if I am a fighter. You can use potions and spells to help insure that your character is not perma killed.

    The hell trials are one of the areas in the game where I decide to be greedy rather than get wrapped up in the ramifications of the role play. I never play good characters though so it's always been easier to justify for me. I almost always play neutral characters that end up evil after the hell trials. Considering the blood line of the main character it makes sense. Besides, the main character helps others the entire game and will have a heroic reputation at this point all the while helping himself to the best rewards in the game. It's a win/win situation for everyone while serving the purpose of the main characters goal and making sense with his heritage from a story standpoint as well.

    If one of my characters were actually perma killed I would never choose the evil path but even on the hardest difficulties a perma kill is simply a possibility not a certainty and with the ability to reload you don't have to worry about it. I don't always meta game but in this situation I usually cave in if I am playing a fighter class.
  • kamuizinkamuizin Member Posts: 3,704

    As far as I am aware the character is sometimes perma killed and sometimes not. I play on insane difficulty every time and I have chosen the evil path many times without losing anyone. I always pick up a rod of resurrection from ribald at some point in the game. If my character is perma killed then I just reload.

    Core rules or hard is always perma dead. If you didn't get the perma dead, that's because of a mod or bug. Yes, you can reduce the difficult to avoid this, but as it's choose which trials to be good or evil based on rewards, that's metagaming, what i would want is freedom to play my alignment without having to resort to knowledge of previous game plays.
  • the_sexteinthe_sextein Member Posts: 711
    edited December 2014
    I have never reduced the difficulty nor have I ever modded the game outside of ascension and SCS. I usually send minsc with a helmet and he is fine. I am not trying to be contradictive but I have beaten the game on core or higher every time for the last 15 years and I have never had a problem. I can't explain why that is but I just beat the EE edition not long ago and while I experienced a bug where the armor class bonus did not work correctly minsc was not perma killed and it was on insane difficulty with no mods.

    EDIT:
    lol, now that I think about it I really don't know how I have got around it for all this time. I am sure it will come back to me the next time I am in the trial but I don't remember. I am pretty sure there is something you can do to get around this. I always have a party of 6 and I know minsc is the one I send in but I always find away to keep him from being chunked. I don't lower the difficutly, that's not my style. Maybe I have him drink a potion of poison which kills him before he can be chunked by the demon? I don't remember. Either way, I get what you are saying. Personally I always play neutral characters so I always found it unrealistic that I had to choose all good or become evil. A neutral path would have been great.
    Post edited by the_sextein on
  • ChildofBhaal599ChildofBhaal599 Member Posts: 1,781
    @the_sextein there is a part of SCS that reduce the chance of chunking. or maybe it completely gets rid of chunking, I forget. still, it could be the cause if you have that active.
  • OlvynChuruOlvynChuru Member Posts: 3,075
    Here's an idea. How about if instead of taking one of your party members, the demon always spawns a commoner like it does when you are soloing. That would solve the whole issue, I think. There wouldn't be the problem of the good path being the more profitable path.
  • the_sexteinthe_sextein Member Posts: 711
    I have not played Baldur's Gate 2 EE version with mods yet. I have a FMT that I ran through the first game and I am waiting for the patch before I play BG2EE with SCS and Ascension. The last time I beat BG2EE was on insane difficulty with no mods and I still managed to get around it somehow. I think maybe a ring of free action and boots of speed combined with something that kills the character naturally like poison. I think I may have had to open one of the doors from the good path as well. It's been a while and I can't remember but I know I didn't lower the difficulty or use mods. Been doing it for years and I have never lost a character here. Seems common sense at the time when I am there and I always manage but I can't remember it thinking back on it now.
  • pentanorlpentanorl Member Posts: 10
    for the selfishness trial you can get the evil bonus (+2 ac) without losing the abducted companion... just cast imprisonment on that character before the demon speech, open the three doors and cast freedom when the demon leave. This is how I saved my dear Hexxat following the evil path. B)
  • the_sexteinthe_sextein Member Posts: 711
    edited January 2017
    You can simply remove the character that the demon kills and then ask them to rejoin the party after the trial. If the party member that he kills is not in the party he will summon in a character to kill. It is certainly evil to let an innocent be killed but from a role play perspective, I can see it being a choice worth taking. You are trying to save the sword coast from the resurrection of the lord of murder. I think killing off a single innocent of the demons choosing in order to improve your chances of saving the sword coast makes sense to me. It's like the atomic bomb in WW2.

    Of course you wouldn't know to remove the party member or cast imprisonment unless you have already played the game and have meta knowledge. This trail has always been a bit odd. I almost always choose at least one evil path in the hell trials. I have a hard time giving up the CON bonus and I really dislike loosing dexterity as well.
  • ObjulenObjulen Member Posts: 93
    Keep in mind that you're being tempted by the essence of Bhaal, which is part of your soul, a soul that is being contested. The tests in Hell aren't simply personal trials, they're attacks from Bhaal to try and shape and mold you more to his liking.
    NoobaccaThacoBellProont
  • HarpyProductionsHarpyProductions Member Posts: 20
    elminster said:

    "is the selfishness test really selfishness?"

    Yes it is selfish because your character is sacrificing someone else for their own benefit (and on top of that they have no way of knowing what the reward for sacrificing that person will be).

    you are not sacrificing anyone when you can just ressurrect him at the spot. at most you will feel a little sting. as i remember the death was pretty quickly. so you dont feel pain and is restored to life in no time.

    there is sacrifice only on the "good" route, on the "evil" there is no consequence what so ever.
    if you want me to lose part of my powers in order to you have nothing at all avoided from happening to you then you are the evil. by wishing me bad in enhance for nothing

    its the npc who got capture that should have his alignment switched to evil if he cares if you go to the "evil route" or call you dumb if you go to the good route.

    anyway anyone know what is the file that does this stupidid? i want to mod this out of my game when i go play this again.
  • the_sexteinthe_sextein Member Posts: 711
    edited February 2018
    Objulen said:

    Keep in mind that you're being tempted by the essence of Bhaal, which is part of your soul, a soul that is being contested. The tests in Hell aren't simply personal trials, they're attacks from Bhaal to try and shape and mold you more to his liking.

    That's fine by me. My character isn't perfect and I would think that he would stumble along the journey many times. In the end he defeats the 5 and the priestess. He is given the option of obtaining the ultimate power and chooses to let it go. I always preferred this type of neutral character from the get go. It's just that his trial doesn't have a neutral path. Having an evil label does absolutely nothing in the game anyway. It's pointless to even care what your alignment is and if you let pointless stuff like this bother you....EE keeper will change your alignment back. I don't see the point in exploits or the alignment system for what amounts to a few hours of gameplay before you make the ultimate choice that decides what you really were about. From a personal standpoint outside of roleplay, I like to build characters and find it fun to push them to the limit. That doesn't mean that I don't roleplay anymore. It's just that I am willing to ignore it during the hell trials because I am interested in pushing my character stats for the fun of it in the real world.

    I would never sacrifice one of my party members in game roleplay or in the real world. Sacrificing a random NPC that has no effect on my game and aids me in stopping the resurrection of Bhaal is fine with me as a gamer.

    In the real world it's impossible to say. Sacrificing someone's life to save millions sounds ok with me but people will always question if you could have saved the millions without the sacrifice or if it would be better to not give into judgement and let the fates deal what they will. (This usually results in terrible bloodshed.) Like I was saying about the atomic bomb in WWII. People still question it's use to this day. When it comes to war and life sacrifices I am in no position to say what is correct or wrong. I do believe that many people who are judgmental and cry really loud about morals are completely devoid of any reality and live in an idealistic make believe mental state. Compare a soldier who understands what is at risk vs a media crybaby and I'll choose the soldier's side of the argument every time. It's easy to make moral judgments when you are safe and protected and never have to defend yourself. I find that I am the opposite when it comes to morality involving personal decisions that effect me. Like doing drugs or sleeping around. I hold myself to high standards and don't agree with corrupting the body or making decisions that will cause you to fail in your environment(society)/ That being said, In a video game if I were playing for the first time and it was all about the roleplay then yes I would stick with the "good" choices in the hell trials for the principle of it. I do find neutral characters that make imperfect decisions morally to be more realistic and enjoyable on my average replay of BGT.
    Post edited by the_sextein on
  • ThacoBellThacoBell Member Posts: 12,235
    @HarpyProductions That is some HEAVY justification. Its not a quick death. Every door you open, the demon hurts the npc. They are being TORTURED for you. And you are going to call them selfish for expecting you to give something of yourself up for NOTHING? Apparently the life of someone who fights and bleeds for you is worth nothing. That is some textbook chaotic evil there.
  • HarpyProductionsHarpyProductions Member Posts: 20
    edited February 2018
    ThacoBell said:

    @HarpyProductions That is some HEAVY justification. Its not a quick death. Every door you open, the demon hurts the npc. They are being TORTURED for you. And you are going to call them selfish for expecting you to give something of yourself up for NOTHING? Apparently the life of someone who fights and bleeds for you is worth nothing. That is some textbook chaotic evil there.

    what life? he does not dies. for good. we just ressurect it instantly. did you forgot. in other words it is nothing because he does not lose his life
    you are chaotic evil if you want me to lose power in enhance for nothing at all you lose nothing.
    the torture and death is temporary the stat loss is permanent the only one who loses something its me
  • ThacoBellThacoBell Member Posts: 12,235
    You are reinforcing my point.
    [Deleted User]
  • the_sexteinthe_sextein Member Posts: 711
    edited February 2018
    Too bad it doesn't kill your character if you choose yourself. The only reason it doesn't is probably because Bioware felt that they would be forcing it and so you would have no choice if that were the case. I guarantee if you had a choice between loosing 1 dex and 2 HP on Minsc you would choose Minsc everytime because he has gauntlets of dex anyway. You have no way to know what is going to happen to your character unless you try it and find out that it doesn't kill you like it killed your party member. It pretty much forces you into a decision that is "the way the devs designed it" or take the loss of a party member. It's certainly slanted that way.

    Personally, if you actually made an intelligent decision instead of an idealistic choice that only works in Hollywood movies and games, most non sheep would choose a party member instead. The only reason your team is involved in the story is because of you. Your character is the one that can make a difference and choose to keep Bhaals taint from re ascending to godhood. Why would you risk having your main character killed? What would Minsc do if he was forced to fight a Bhaalspawn that had all of the essence and turned into a god? Absolutely nothing. Saying that Bhaal wants to corrupt you is fine but what does Bhaal want? If you want to take his place then maybe he wants to weaken you. If you want to refuse his essence and let it die then he would probably want to weaken you so you have less of a chance of surviving vs the other Bhaalspawn.

    The only reason someone would choose to sacrifice themselves is because they know that is the idealistic "good" thing to do and they figure the developers will reward them for it or they know that they won't die because of meta knowledge so they choose the option that leaves them with a stronger party and reaffirms their moral integrity. The choice isn't really a moral choice at all. It comes down to making the most informed decision or not. The right choice leads to disastrous circumstances sometimes but that is life. In the real world the more intelligent choice is going to lead you away from disaster much more often than the idealistically good option. Which means the smart choice is actually the good option for everyone involved most of the time. If you choose yourself and it killed you and you saw a game over screen and a short clip of Irenicus as a Bhaalspawn torturing the whole sword coast with his god power you wouldn't be so morally smug about it I am betting. Then it would be down to making the smarter decision and moving on.
    HarpyProductions
  • ThacoBellThacoBell Member Posts: 12,235
    Fun fact: It doesn't take meta knowledge to be a good person.
    ProontStummvonBordwehrHarpyProductions
  • the_sexteinthe_sextein Member Posts: 711
    True, you can choose to be a good person but the option is either you or someone else and you don't know what will ultimately happen. Choosing to sacrifice yourself for your friends is admirable but you are a very rare and powerful Bhaalspawn that wants to keep Bhaal from being reborn. While others like Serevok want to be the reincarnation of him. Can you imagine if Serevok was given the opportunities and power that your character has? He would have caused more than the single death of an NPC that is for sure. In the end I think it is not only the smart choice but it will save far more lives if you succeed in being the last Bhaalspawn. If you died your team would be helpless to fend off the final Bhaalspawn who would probably reign in tyranny.

    Ultimatly what I describe is simply one way of looking at it. It's fun to roleplay the clichéd night in shining armor who makes all of the heartwarming choices and everything turns out ok. That is how the story was written after all. I just think it could be looked at and roleplayed from multiple different perspectives and they would all have merit. Some people might want to become a god and swear to be a god of good in the realms. Some might find the good choices you made in the hell trials left your soul untainted and that is the reason you had the strength to turn down the power of a god. You could imagine and justify the actions of all types of characters and alignments. :)
  • PantalionPantalion Member Posts: 2,137
    ThacoBell said:

    Fun fact: It doesn't take meta knowledge to be a good person.

    From a karmic perspective, both choices are neutral. You are also a person, and must be treated with compassion. Mindless generosity to others at your own expense is defined as idiot compassion, and is ultimately harmful behaviour overall.

    The more virtuous choice, therefore, would be to split the burden between both partymate and the player, alternating between doors so that neither faces the full, deadly, burden of the trial.
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 0
    edited February 2018
    The user and all related content has been deleted.
    Post edited by [Deleted User] on
    ThacoBellProontHarpyProductions
  • the_sexteinthe_sextein Member Posts: 711
    edited February 2018
    The Genie in the first dungeon of BG2 asks you if you push the button. It wants you to throw your life away "like a hero". What it fails to ask is if your sibling is Imoen or Serevok. IT MAKES A DIFFERANCE. Suicidally throwing your life away for the sake of idealism is stupid, evil and results in more suffering and death. Bioware made it so that you would take a loss if you chose yourself but letting your party member die is actually way more damaging to you and your team. What's funny is that in the real world there is no special result for choosing the idealistic path. In the real world the consequences would not differ based on who you pick. It's all fine and good in a game but trying to judge peoples morality based on game decisions is silly.

    Who is more selfish? The man who gives himself to save his friend and throws the entire sword coast into oblivion because he selfishly can't let go of his friend or the man who deals with the anguish of losing a close friend and still has the strength to end the threat to the sword coast that only he can do? The only reason why the idealistic choice is correct is because that is the way the writers wanted it. Seems a bit immature if you ask me but it's a game and I enjoy it all the same.

    You choose yourself and instead of getting the padded result you die just like Minsc would. Irenicus gets your soul and wakes up. He kills Misnc right away, making both you and Minsc's lives pointless. Then he kills the rest of your party. Corrupts the tree of life and murders Ellisme before resurrecting the evil lord of murder. All because you wanted to do what's good instead of using your head and actually choosing what is correct. In the end, the correct choice is the good choice. Your heart might be in the right place and you might have an heroic mindset but the end result is nothing but anguish and waste when you let idealism rule over reason. . Life isn't fair, oh well. If you pushed the button for the hypothetical genie question you would die 100% of the time. At the end of the game in the hell trials if you choose to sacrifice yourself in the same way you don't die. That is because evil would triumph and you would realize how hypocritical the game is.
    Post edited by the_sextein on
    HarpyProductionsgorgonzola
  • PantalionPantalion Member Posts: 2,137

    This is ridiculous. The sacrifice you make for the good path is meaningless. It has no effect on your ultimate triumph or failure. It is a merely notional sacrifice. Twisting yourself into ethical knots to justify grabbing more power is silly. Just admit you want more power and would prefer that someone else suffer and die - temporarily! - than making a notional sacrifice yourself. And deal with the fact that some people (like the artificial DM coded into the game engine) see that as evil.

    "You are chaotic evil if you want me to lose power" ... I mean, srsly?

    Point being, it's role-playing. Role-play power-hungry or role-play self-sacrificing.

    Generally I preferred to roleplay "clever" by tricking the various demons and spirits and bypassing their schemes through cunning and trickery to gain power without falling into their traps.

    Unfortunately this seems to exactly the type of role-play that the developers stamp out where possible, railroading the whole thing into a tedious binary.
    the_sexteingorgonzola
  • the_sexteinthe_sextein Member Posts: 711
    edited February 2018
    Personally, I find it pointless to role play the part of the game because it is stacked as you say. I like the heart of the story though and I really don't enjoy losing a party member. That is why I simply choose to use meta knowledge to reduce the loss for the sake of having fun. I kick Minsc out of the party and let a random NPC take the loss. It doesn't effect me or my team at all. The morals of it are in my opinion too idealistic and not realistic enough. There are no less dramatic, neutral options so I don't get tied up in them. I have to give BG2 credit for even attempting something like this though. It was enjoyable even if it's presentation was flawed. All things said and done, if I had to make a choice without using exploits, knowing what I do, I would choose the "good" path that the developers want me to choose because I'm not a hero and I couldn't stomach loosing my bud Minsc.
    Post edited by the_sextein on
  • the_sexteinthe_sextein Member Posts: 711
    edited February 2018

    This is ridiculous. The sacrifice you make for the good path is meaningless. It has no effect on your ultimate triumph or failure. It is a merely notional sacrifice. Twisting yourself into ethical knots to justify grabbing more power is silly. Just admit you want more power and would prefer that someone else suffer and die - temporarily! - than making a notional sacrifice yourself. And deal with the fact that some people (like the artificial DM coded into the game engine) see that as evil.

    "You are chaotic evil if you want me to lose power" ... I mean, srsly?

    Point being, it's role-playing. Role-play power-hungry or role-play self-sacrificing.

    You say that because you have meta knowledge that the sacrifice means nothing and has no effect on the outcome of the game. Anyone with a brain would not choose self sacrifice in this situation. The souls of all of your companions are tied to yours and have been drug into hell itself. If you die they all die. Your party would not risk you dieing. Someone would step up to the plate and sacrifice themselves to save the entire group. That self sacrifice would be meaningful and powerful. Unlike the insane decision to risk your whole group and the sword coast for no reason other than to be idealistic. Gaining power is fine if you don't want to roleplay the situation. What I am saying is even if you do want to roleplay it, that choice isn't heroic, it's stupid in my opinion. I wouldn't choose to sacrifice myself in that situation for power or any other reason. I believe sacrificing someone's life even temporarily for power is evil in nature. I do it when I am not roleplaying and I choose not to roleplay because the non evil path is utterly stupid. So I would rather just have fun which is what the game is about. My point is that the stacked nature of this trial makes it pointless and has no moral implications for the player or the character because of it's broken nature. People who like to stroke their egos and feel like they have a moral highground for acting like a fool that would result in the deaths of countless others if the game wasn't stacked completely blows my mind. Heroic? no, good intentioned? Sure.
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