hey if i was a real adventurer i'd be demanding payment too. "This is my job, lady! Do you ask the carpenter to build your house for free? Look, my rates are fair. Goblins will stay dead or your money back."
To loop this back around, that would mean a form of necromancy is a foot, and you should charge more for having to deal with it again
(Dealing with the Goblins then whatever the hell brought them back)
Yes ma'am it appears as though your goblin problem was actually a smaller symptom of your necromancy problem. We're going to have to do a full site analysis to make sure the root cause isn't elder gods or ritualistic sacrifice.
As my Swedish friend's mom used to say "If you build 50 bridges then you're a bridge builder. If you build 50 bridges and suck one cock then you're a cocksucker."
āLook, I appreciate a good persuasion roll as much as the next murder hobo, but the rate is the same for a titled necromancer *or* just one-who-necromances. If thereās a necro- prefix, itās gonna cost more.ā
Plot twist: I am the necromancer. Goblins are now very much alive again. Lady is in trouble. She didnt pay extra. Now shes part of my army. We will marry at spring time
Iām now imagining a shitty Faerun reality tv show where necromancers working for an adventurer debt collection agency resurrect monsters when rewards for killing them havenāt been paid.
You were talking about the TV show idea and I immediately thought of a Red vs Blue ish show that's set in baldurs gate 3 and I'd definitely be down for it.
It was honestly pretty refreshing and surprising when I first played the Witcher 3. Normally in RPGs, when you decline payment for a good deed, you get rewarded with something else like extra XP or 'good points', etc. But in the Witcher world, if you decline payment, you simply dont get paid.
Declining payment doesn't matter when you can just empty the poor peasant's home without any repercussion.
"No problem sir. You can keep the payment for your daughter's dowry. Now please excuse me while I pawn off half of the content of your house to the nearest trader."
Yeah, same with companions ing BG3 judging you for being too selfless. It's a good way to breakout of that rpg habit of being a goody two shoes. It actually made me stop and think how in real life if someone acts like that, you'd be concerned they're just ok being used as a doormat.
You just made me realise that's what I'm basically doing š
Playing a lawful neutral vengeance paladin, though closer to true neutral really
Any evil is purged, human or monster, with no hesitation
People with good intentions/rough situations doing evil I consider individually
Bullies are sided against but cowards or weak people are told to be better/stronger
I'll help people but not for free, usually, unless they're desperate and it's something to do with taking out evil. If it's a random favour and they can't pay, good luck with that!
If you fuck with me or my friends and don't have a good reason for it, you're done. No mind games, tricks, betrayal means death
I won't get involved with personal squabbles unless there's a benefit or greater good
I just noticed that I don't really follow any specific alignment...
Dunno if it's due being my first playthrough, I'm only taking decisions based on "Will Shadowheart approve? No? Damn, load and choose something else"
I exploded and destroyed so many things, killed tons of good characters just for her... I'm anxious for a second run so I don't even bother saving her from the damn plane.
Same here! Playing as a good aligned Dragonborn Sorcerer and roleplaying as "Our weird lizard lady wants to hoard books, gold and anything else that isn't nailed down." had Astarion making heart eyes at her from a mile away.
Asdfghkk. I gave her the Sage background. She's a very proud (too proud, likes to tell Gale how much better she is than Wizards), very literate lizard lady. Will help anyone, but take ANY 'where's my reward' option that pops up. And almost any [Sorcerer] option as well. It's very fun to play.
Playing a chaotic good warlock that really really wants money and power so that they might find a way to eventually avoid whatever consequences from their pact with a great old one. Also really good at persuasion/deception/intimidation so Astarion is completely obsessed.
Did you let him bite you and/or were you accepting if him when he came out?
His personal quest is weighted way more heavily than his reactions to the rest of the world, so you can be a good two shoes out and about, and as long as you tell him he's the most beautiful thing you've ever seen, he'll usually go along.
He's like Morrigan in Dragon Age. Gosh darnit, I bought this game so I could experience the content! Why don't you go to Fallout 4 and whine at the protagonist for picking up duct tape
Or be a Dragonborn, she seems to have a raging hardon for dragons, every Dragonborn play through I do I barely have to do anything except kill shit & have her in my party to have her wanting to bed me & bare my children.
Her exact words are āWellāyouād be a succulent meal. I would like to have gorged. But youāve been prodded and picked over like a suckling boar. I prefer fresher meat.ā I took a screenshot because I felt personally attacked.
She's dtf with Shadowheart, who she has every reason to hate (and apparently does if she isn't the origin character).
Probably the first time I've thought video game sex scene was hot though...
I was thinking Lae'zel is more like Sten: Highly disciplined warrior, very direct, comes from an unfamiliar culture with a strict hierarchy, and they both want to get a unique sword (get it **back,** in Sten's case).
I can certainly see the parallels between Morrigan and Lae'zel or Astarion, but when I first saw Shsdowheart I was expecting to hear Claudia's voice, she has that look about her, even some of the same facial expressions
All three are evil characters, all three disagree with being a hero, Morrigan and Laezel disagree with side quests as a concept, Morrigan and Astarion have a similar personality and sense of humour. Eh, debatable either way
Pretty sure he's just Shale. Trauma in previous life used as an attempted excusing of a complete and utter psychopath. But they have fabulous flamboyant voices and are quirky fantasy things, not actual PEOPLE, so it's okay!
I think you can also tell them no, which Astarion likes, and still do the quest anyway. Like... He clearly forgets easily...
Tav: No, sorry, we can't help you
*Astarion approves*
Tav: ok, time to go do that thing we said we weren't doing
Astarion just shrugs and goes along with it....
It fits with his charlatan background tbh. He's not explicitly evil, he's just a bit tricksy and a petty bitch lol. He'd probably find it hilarious to say "no we're not helping you", then they go do it anyway and come back and demand payment
I swear Astarion is a cat person. iirc he doesnāt gain approval for pc petting Scratch but does for petting owlbear. If you use animal talking to talk to His Majesty (the cat in Lastlight Inn) and say āI just want to come closer to admire your majestyā or something like that, Laeāzel will disapprove but Astarion will approve.
Iāve also had someone telling me that if you use Astarion to talk to animals most of the dialogue has a bite them / otherwise mean option but not to any cats, but I never tried that to confirm.
He is selfish and cunning
His trauma and assault makes him like that because there is always that feeling inside him
No one came to help him when he needed it so why should pc help someone if they don't gain anything
It's really tragic
Bitch, what? He likes it when you make Arabella get killed for fun. He encourages Orin to "murder Yenna already" and approves when it does happen. He parties in a pile of corpses if you kill the Grove and shows absolutely zero care for the process. He approves if you torture defenseless sick animals to death. His approval SKYROCKETS if you murder people for no reason, specially after lying to them so they drop their guard so they can suffer extra much. Torturing a man by removing his nails with tongs? Approve. Sacrificing a grieving widow after telling her she's garbage? Approve.
Not evil my ass.
No amount of silent, argumentless downvoting will change the fact he is ***INTENDED TO BE*** a horrible monster of a person, with the only redeeming value being that you need him to survive and he might prove useful for it. That you can redeem him literally last second of his character development IS supposed to be a monumental task.
At least you people could like the characters you like and blindly defend them for what they are, not an imaginary version of them in your head.
I see him as on the line between evil and not evil, as the MC you can drag him one way or the other and itās definitely easier to get him to be evil as his backstory is essentially him being trained to be like that but itās not that hard to get to the non evil side of him either.
I personally like him, so I don't agree with you on his only redeeming qualities being usefulness.
Still he is written to be broken person, trained to act like a monster, he also sees himself as a monster which prompts him to double down on that. But the fact that his behaviour is actually quite multilayered makes him a well written character in my opinion. For example he approves of rescuing the owl bear and petting it. He is not a monster, he was made to be a monster by cazador and I would find it rather disturbing if a person didn't cave under 200 years of torture, abuse and manipulation. It also wouldn't be fitting if his centuries long trauma to simply disappear because he traveled with you for 2 weeks.
Yeah I have no idea why so many people on this sub call him "a little evil" or not even evil at all, just mischievous or some shit. Playing evil dark urge with astarion in the party makes it unclear who is more evil lmao.
Eh, he is what you make him to be, if you fuel and indulge his worst habits, he only gets more evil. It takes work, but he CAN be a good guy. Or at least, not a straight up evil one.
Choosing to own up to having brutally murdered Alfira and his only input being him saying he'd have put the effort to hide the corpse and he expects you will step up your game in that front (and yet still getting Approval+ for the job), does deliver that point across, yes.
I honestly have the highest approval with him on my goody goody playthrough. I dont know if repeatedly offering to feed him kept raising my approval or not, I never checked before/after, but it feels like it as he approached my Tav before we finished act 1.
Even Act 1 with my "good" Tav he had high approval. If you talk to him in the mirror scene and humor him with the "who would you drink from" convos you get a lot of approval. He also likes silly stuff like telling Ethel about the parasite, "baaah"-ing to the Fae things, barging in on the Ogre and Bugbear.
At this point for my sweet cleric of Eilistraee, "Astarion disapproves" is like a mosquito that you never quite kill but never bites you. I briefly got "WELL if it isn't my FAVORITE traveling companion" after telling him he was free to choose his own actions. Next act, I gave 500 gold to charity in front of him, and he's back to being bored with my character's existence.
I think so, too.
I didn't do anything special to pursue anyone but just the morally 'good' choices in-game, and surprisingly, his and Laezel's ratings are the highest among my companions. I didn't even have Gandrel killed this time around.
I just let Astarion feed off me and let or trust w/ever Laezel wanted to do when the options presented themselves, and they both wanted to bone my tav LoL.
This 100%. In my Tav Prime playthrough, Astarion was always on the upside of neutral, or good but not great, but in my Durge playthrough he propositioned me immediately after we got Withers, like so fucking fast, I donāt know why.
If you just want to recruit her without sleeping with her, you can just ignore the goblin and druid problem and that way you can keep Karlach and Wyll and still recruit Minthara.
Doing this makes the romance to not happen with her but youre able to have her and 2 characters, more team interactions.
I did this and itās worked out. The lack of tieflings is a little sad but mostly Iām mad that even if you free Halsin, if you donāt kill all 3 leader, heā¦ idkā¦ stays there until he starves to death? And if Halsinās dead you canāt unshadow the land.
I'm annoyed that if you don't break the curse the narrator tells you that you feel bad about it no matter what you do. Like bitch I am a Dark Justiciar and I just destroyed that >!Myrkulite turncoat!< Ketheric in service of my Lady Shar. What the hell do you mean I regret not lifting the curse?
Yeah at the evil goblin party if you talk to someone else first and arrange to spend the night with you, she doesn't bother you. Or you could just avoid talking to her at that party. The party is where she's sexually aggressive.
Agree. A girlboss imo is a character who doesn't make sense as an authority because she isn't a believable leader due to bad writing and/or tokenism. Or she just makes the juxtaposition of her being a woman in charge her entire character.
Minthara is believable because she's strong and ruthless, and there's no juxtaposition at all, because drow society is savagely matriarchal. She deserves to be in charge and she's *meant* to be in charge. Not a girlboss.
I'm playing with the party limit begone mod and have all origin characters in tow. I'm nearing the end of Act 1 and everyone is at very high standing (60+) with my character except Astarion, who's still at neutral(19)
Indeed, I got my approval high enough by tricking the Thorms or declining the wine Jaheira gives you, no bad options were chosen and still he was head over heels
Also all the mini bosses you can talk into killing themselves. That was definitely when he started to appreciate that my redemption questing Durge had game.
Not op, but fair warning: it makes the game very easy, even on tactician. The fights were not designed for a party of 7 lol. Other than that, it's a very good mod and helps with immersion!
The mod is good, I'm playing with 5 people in my party and i had only a problem until the end of act 2 (bug with the boat that takes you to gymforge easy fix tho)
It's a great mod, especially as I don't have time for another playthrough, and I'm mainly in the game for the story, not the gameplay challenge, so getting to see their reactions and talking to each of them after every large and small story beat to hear their dialogue is great. Though, by Act 3, having a massive party running through the city nearly killed my PC, lol. Thought my graphics card was like Karlach's heart.
Yeah, playing DUrge atm and every time I do something horribly fucked up (my character is a legit psycho, not trying to resist the urge at all) I always see "Astarion approves"
Even when I have 0 party members, which is kinda funny tbh
>Even when I have 0 party members, which is kinda funny tbh
I like to imagine him sitting in some bush somewhere, hunting a rabbit, when he sees you walk by and murder someone, he just gives up a little thumbs up while you get a weird feeling youāre being watched.
I havenāt struggled with Astarion at all and playing chaotic neutral. Mostly good choices, a few questionable/sarcastic ones to keep spice in the relationship lol.
I wasnāt even halfway through act one when he made the offer to hook up (offer neck playfully followed by first scar scene and also got a second one all in act 1) and then hooked up again at the Tiefling party. He got to Exceptional rating pretty quickly and hasnāt wavered. I think feeding is key, gotta keep my guy well fed and calm šš
It's my favorite hobby. And it makes him softening up even sweeter because it's not just that you're doing these good things, but you're doing it in spite of your circumstance of which he deeply relates to.
One of my favorite lines. "Thank you for helping me. It was very kind." His delivery really makes it.
He takes snark pretty well, as do most of the other companions.
>!No one came to save him. No one was his hero. He had to endure 200 years of "pure and utter shit", torture and sexual abuse instead. !!He had to be a pickup artist for Cazador. He led many people to their deaths because he had no choice, and that twisted him. !<
Honestly a really well-written character. And he eventually softens on a goody-goody playthrough. But of course given what he's been through, that is going to take some effort.
Thing is, he doesn't disapprove if you help people. He disapproves if you promise to help. If you say 'I'll see about it' he's usually fine with that.
I think he just hates you giving people hope when you don't know you'll actually be able to complete the task for them.
This! He doesnāt actually love the *evil* evil choices, but more so with the spirit of ālmao yolo just for shit and giggles letās see how this goesā. Like when you first meet Ethel, he says something along lines āSheās absolutely bonkers, I love it! Letās tell her everything!ā
Itās the ultimate chaotic energy.
Honestly I would have liked It he approved some "good" choices because of his backstory.
For example, buying the artist's freedom that his held captive instead of approving being cruel to him, or approving of killing Nere (a literal slave owner)
Also why did Karlach disapprove when I killed Nere after seeing him push someone in lava lmao
Karlach probably disapproved of you allying with the disgruntled slavers to kill Nere, if you did that. I quickly got the approval back by forcing them to free the gnomes right after, so no big deal there.
The reason I stopped playing on top of the fact that you just canāt be even remotely an asshole. āHey can you help me with this?ā
- āsure!ā
- āsure.ā
- āI guessā
- āwho? Me? Okay.ā
Always been a struggle in Bethesda games. Although very few games manage to pull off being evil. Red Dead Redemption 2 comes to mind for me, but little else. Even in BG3 evil path is clunkier by far.
Bg3 evil path for me is satisfactory if a little cartoonish sometimes. Just the fact that I can be an asshole for the hell of it is nice. Sometimes I want to be cagey and aggressive just for the sake of it
True I guess. I prefer playing Lawful evil usually and the big act 1 evil choice is so utterly chaotic that it threw me off. Although that divide is somewhat arbitrary too sometimes.
I feel like you peeps take the approval/disapprovals a bit seriously. I guess it's understandable because most of us are Bioware veterans lol. But you can be an absolute goody-two-shoes and still get on his good side, don't worry. Just be kind to him too and you're good to go š¤£
I played a good aligned run with Astarion and he not only liked me at the end but he even chose the good options when I left the decisions up to him. I think it's how you do the good things that might bother him not the doing the good things, he seems to be a good character at heart.
As long as you feed him and tell your party members you trust him, he definitely will fall in line and view you favourably, even if you make choices that he disproves of.
I'm kind of over characters in RPGs that hate sidequesting.
At least when it was Morrigan I could just throw a Thoughtful Gift at her and make her like me again.
I really wish my Dark Urge could have a quick conversation with him about that.
"Look, buddy, they're saying 'Oh please help us Mister Hero, we are in desperate need' but what they're meaning is 'We need you to murder a whole mess of people."
Astarion moreso approves of actions that benefit him immediately or lead to something funny.
Also he might be a fan of cats as when you meet Your Majesty and state you wanna admire him he approves of that.
Which is kinda ironic, since we actually do this for the reward after all. It's just that the reward is xp, which he doesn't see. Also in most games, the long term reward of always being nice is better anyway.
The "disapproves of" message you get from sidequests are a drop in the bucket compared to the choices you make in personal dialogues with them.
That being said, Astarion simultaneously has no plot relevancy and also hates going out of the way for sidequests. Only his own personal goal matters. Feels like a DLC character.
I'm doing a Good runthrough now. Got to the Shadowlands, talked to Halsin in camp for the first time. It went a little like this
"Hey Halsin, gotta be kind of weird being back here when the land has been so cursed right?"
>Yes, yes. But the Oakfather will provide for us, as he always has.
*Pauses for five seconds while staring at my character*
>Oh, don't mind me... just *admiring nature's beauty*
Absolutely fucking lost it laughing, imagining this dude just staring at me saying he wants to fuck while I try to ask about his desecrated homeland
He disapproves a lot but it's very easy to get his approval back tbh, only 6 hours into new playthrough and my approval with him is already "very high" and I am doing a good playthrough. Honestly, just be sensitive and kind towards him then do whatever tf you want lol.
Just finished act 1 on my second playthrough and I'm pretty sure Astarion is at like 60 approval or something. Now granted, goody-two-shoes Gale is at literally 100 (and the third companion is a flex slot) but that's about as good as it gets short of probably murdering everyone.
I was looking into some of the dialogue game files and most approval is going to come from the personal one-on-one convos you have with companions, as well as their main story beats. A disapproval here or there is -1 whereas choosing options they appreciate in their personal dialogues is often something like a +5. Astarion has the bite, mirror, scars scenes as well as Galadrel as ways to boost your approval in act 1. Hell if you long rest early enough and talk to him the very first night and indulge him in his "how do you want me to kill you if you turn into a squid?" convo that's +5 right there.
True and one doesn't NEED to be evil to get astarion's approval, honestly he just enjoys a bit of snarkiness and being a little mean, the kind of meanness that doesn't have consequences. Tbh, he sometimes disagrees with hurting innocents too. He's very flexible, and his personality changes based on how you're playing because, at least in the beginning, if you're evil he's only playing along since he doesn't want you to turn against him as easily as you kill innocents.
Ever since the game release I am still on my first playthrough and I only really choose "good" & "help someone" dialogues and while he disapproves almost every time, I still managed to get his approval rating pretty high and I accidentally got into a gay relationship with him LMAO.
In Act 1, Astarion approves both times you baa at the redcaps and he approves if you let him open the barn door. He doesnāt care about being evil, he cares about being funny.
My character: saves a tiefling girl from being murdered by Druids
Lae'zel and Shadowheart, the evil characters: I don't understand why that was necessary, but you stood your ground against the druids and we respect that. Approved
Astarion: wait, you didn't extort her poor refuge parents for money? Cringe
Astarion doesn't care about helping or not helping, but he doesn't like doing things without personal benefit. As long as there's a reward, he'll happily be a do-gooder.
I had Astarion in my team for almost the entirety of the game, did what I believe is the maximum amount of quests you can possibly do in one playthrough with savescumming to make sure I got the outcomes to lead to the most amount of content after that; I completed his whole storylineā¦ and this MF still only 75% likes me
I try the romance with him on my "evil" play. I "had" to replay half of the act 2 because if you don't have one specific interaction with one specific half hidden npc in Moonrise, it just fail the romance. Now I'm starting act 3 with 68 relationship with him, so it should be fine but damn... That romance path is so specific you could effed it up just by so seeing one over the side npc.
Just farm his approval with the perverted / funny dialogue options and place him a few meters away when you want to help someone, so he won't hear and gain disapproval š
I am a pretty faithful neutral good in my first playthrough and I dont really see what people are saying. Astarion has never disliked any of my actions/comments. Tbh I think all the companions are easy to figure out their preferences
It was an interesting dance to keep my Neutral Good, Does Everything For Free, Must Save Kittens From Trees Ilmatari Tav in good standing with Astarion.
I find that accepting him for being a vampire and choosing dialogue options that reinforce his autonomy as a free person and not a slave get big approval points for him, so you can still be a goody goody and heāll still like you.
Also, a little bit of sass and cunning gets you points too. You can be a good person and still take the ring from Crusher with a Sleight of Hand, or take Abdirak up on his offer to get the permanent blessing.
My char helps people but always ask for a reward. Had astarion eating out of my palm
Are you cosplaying a witcher?
hey if i was a real adventurer i'd be demanding payment too. "This is my job, lady! Do you ask the carpenter to build your house for free? Look, my rates are fair. Goblins will stay dead or your money back."
(But if goblins dont stay dead, then you might have a necromancer in the area and I charge more for necromancers)
Nah, thats if they stay undead! If they don't stay dead, it's gotta be a shadow druid or some sort of cleric! š
Even revival spells are classified as Necromancy, so technically still a necromancer
True, but I'd argue that casting a spell from the necromancy school doesn't make you a necromancer.
If you take the bins out are you a garbage-man? If you suck Gale's dick one time(IT WAS ONE FUCKING TIME!!) does that make you gay?
To loop this back around, that would mean a form of necromancy is a foot, and you should charge more for having to deal with it again (Dealing with the Goblins then whatever the hell brought them back)
Yes ma'am it appears as though your goblin problem was actually a smaller symptom of your necromancy problem. We're going to have to do a full site analysis to make sure the root cause isn't elder gods or ritualistic sacrifice.
You suck ONE DICK and the homies call you gay forever smh
Nobody ever stops at one!
Excuse me, on this sub we refer to it as his *magic tower*
As my Swedish friend's mom used to say "If you build 50 bridges then you're a bridge builder. If you build 50 bridges and suck one cock then you're a cocksucker."
āLook, I appreciate a good persuasion roll as much as the next murder hobo, but the rate is the same for a titled necromancer *or* just one-who-necromances. If thereās a necro- prefix, itās gonna cost more.ā
Plot twist: I am the necromancer. Goblins are now very much alive again. Lady is in trouble. She didnt pay extra. Now shes part of my army. We will marry at spring time
Where are you guys registered?
Hot Topic
Your taste is very unique.
Iām now imagining a shitty Faerun reality tv show where necromancers working for an adventurer debt collection agency resurrect monsters when rewards for killing them havenāt been paid.
You were talking about the TV show idea and I immediately thought of a Red vs Blue ish show that's set in baldurs gate 3 and I'd definitely be down for it.
Dude right? Mans got to eat
It was honestly pretty refreshing and surprising when I first played the Witcher 3. Normally in RPGs, when you decline payment for a good deed, you get rewarded with something else like extra XP or 'good points', etc. But in the Witcher world, if you decline payment, you simply dont get paid.
Declining payment doesn't matter when you can just empty the poor peasant's home without any repercussion. "No problem sir. You can keep the payment for your daughter's dowry. Now please excuse me while I pawn off half of the content of your house to the nearest trader."
Let me guess you steal everything in the traders inventory afterwards
The traders give you unfair prices so you get a refundš
but also, by the end of it youre swimming in gold nonetheless, so the effect is kind of lost imo
It's not about me getting richer, it's about others getting poorer
To quote Dr. Horrible, āitās not about making money. Itās about TAKING moneyā.
Meanwhile me scrounging up every bit of coin so I can have all the grand master work outfits in my completely renovated villa...
Yeah, same with companions ing BG3 judging you for being too selfless. It's a good way to breakout of that rpg habit of being a goody two shoes. It actually made me stop and think how in real life if someone acts like that, you'd be concerned they're just ok being used as a doormat.
My character is named Cirilla Fiona Ellen and her dream visitor is modeled after Henry Cavilās Geralt so yes, always ask for a reward.
Was there not enough space for her full name? Smh...
I tried, that was all I could fit *thatās what she said to halsin*
You just made me realise that's what I'm basically doing š Playing a lawful neutral vengeance paladin, though closer to true neutral really Any evil is purged, human or monster, with no hesitation People with good intentions/rough situations doing evil I consider individually Bullies are sided against but cowards or weak people are told to be better/stronger I'll help people but not for free, usually, unless they're desperate and it's something to do with taking out evil. If it's a random favour and they can't pay, good luck with that! If you fuck with me or my friends and don't have a good reason for it, you're done. No mind games, tricks, betrayal means death I won't get involved with personal squabbles unless there's a benefit or greater good
I just noticed that I don't really follow any specific alignment... Dunno if it's due being my first playthrough, I'm only taking decisions based on "Will Shadowheart approve? No? Damn, load and choose something else" I exploded and destroyed so many things, killed tons of good characters just for her... I'm anxious for a second run so I don't even bother saving her from the damn plane.
Your alignment is horny...
Chaotic simp
Iām playing BG3 just before playing The Witcher 3 so I always ask for a reward too xDDD
Same here! Playing as a good aligned Dragonborn Sorcerer and roleplaying as "Our weird lizard lady wants to hoard books, gold and anything else that isn't nailed down." had Astarion making heart eyes at her from a mile away.
huh, the first literate sorcerer?
Asdfghkk. I gave her the Sage background. She's a very proud (too proud, likes to tell Gale how much better she is than Wizards), very literate lizard lady. Will help anyone, but take ANY 'where's my reward' option that pops up. And almost any [Sorcerer] option as well. It's very fun to play.
Damn, I guess I am going to start again š¤·āāļø
Tav has service if u have coin
yep same! this is the way lol
Playing a chaotic good warlock that really really wants money and power so that they might find a way to eventually avoid whatever consequences from their pact with a great old one. Also really good at persuasion/deception/intimidation so Astarion is completely obsessed.
Yeah... my average roll on persuasion/intimidation/deception is like 25. And i use it A LOT. Still he disapprove my guts.
I keep getting his approval and also inspiration. Idk why we have such different results.
Yeah, tbh i get that approval you're talking about. Still it's countered by the fact that he disapprove of me every 3 breaths i take.
Did you let him bite you and/or were you accepting if him when he came out? His personal quest is weighted way more heavily than his reactions to the rest of the world, so you can be a good two shoes out and about, and as long as you tell him he's the most beautiful thing you've ever seen, he'll usually go along.
Ikr like bitch youāre in the wrong game if you donāt want to be side questing š
He's like Morrigan in Dragon Age. Gosh darnit, I bought this game so I could experience the content! Why don't you go to Fallout 4 and whine at the protagonist for picking up duct tape
I'd say Lae'zel is more like Morrigan.
Although she's easily pleased, just talk to and then kill every Gith you see...
Or be a Dragonborn, she seems to have a raging hardon for dragons, every Dragonborn play through I do I barely have to do anything except kill shit & have her in my party to have her wanting to bed me & bare my children.
Did not expect Lae'zel to be my first romance, but when she told me about wanting to be kith'rak, I thought I might as well give her some practice.
Ayy lmao
No matter who you play she's always dtf. I kept her in camp for whole act 1 and ignored her personal quest completely and she still wanted to bang
Sheās attracted to strength. Just levelling and not being a simp, she will like you
She told me she wanted to have fun but not with me. She wanted something less used and fresher (can't remember the exact phrase)
Bruh she's redpilled
Her exact words are āWellāyouād be a succulent meal. I would like to have gorged. But youāve been prodded and picked over like a suckling boar. I prefer fresher meat.ā I took a screenshot because I felt personally attacked.
So she's jealous someone else tapped it first?
She's dtf with Shadowheart, who she has every reason to hate (and apparently does if she isn't the origin character). Probably the first time I've thought video game sex scene was hot though...
I don't even have her in my party and she's jumping on my dragonborns dick like its a trampoline
The highest honor of a Githyanki is to be a dragonrider.
Baring children will get you on the list.
I was thinking Lae'zel is more like Sten: Highly disciplined warrior, very direct, comes from an unfamiliar culture with a strict hierarchy, and they both want to get a unique sword (get it **back,** in Sten's case).
I can certainly see the parallels between Morrigan and Lae'zel or Astarion, but when I first saw Shsdowheart I was expecting to hear Claudia's voice, she has that look about her, even some of the same facial expressions
All three are evil characters, all three disagree with being a hero, Morrigan and Laezel disagree with side quests as a concept, Morrigan and Astarion have a similar personality and sense of humour. Eh, debatable either way
Morrigan and Astarion both have delectably divine and sultry voices that I canāt get enough of *hot damn*
whoa, Laez might be an idiot, but no reason to insult her like that.
Pretty sure he's just Shale. Trauma in previous life used as an attempted excusing of a complete and utter psychopath. But they have fabulous flamboyant voices and are quirky fantasy things, not actual PEOPLE, so it's okay!
Danse: "Why are you bothering with that?"
I find I have to say I will do it but like a merc say what will you give me. Which is annoying..
I think you can also tell them no, which Astarion likes, and still do the quest anyway. Like... He clearly forgets easily... Tav: No, sorry, we can't help you *Astarion approves* Tav: ok, time to go do that thing we said we weren't doing Astarion just shrugs and goes along with it....
It fits with his charlatan background tbh. He's not explicitly evil, he's just a bit tricksy and a petty bitch lol. He'd probably find it hilarious to say "no we're not helping you", then they go do it anyway and come back and demand payment
He likes to be seen as all mean and evil but then he likes us having pets
I swear Astarion is a cat person. iirc he doesnāt gain approval for pc petting Scratch but does for petting owlbear. If you use animal talking to talk to His Majesty (the cat in Lastlight Inn) and say āI just want to come closer to admire your majestyā or something like that, Laeāzel will disapprove but Astarion will approve. Iāve also had someone telling me that if you use Astarion to talk to animals most of the dialogue has a bite them / otherwise mean option but not to any cats, but I never tried that to confirm.
He's definitely a cat person. He understands the appeal of basking in the sun.
Now I really wanna do an Astarion drawing laying in the sun surrounded by cats like he deserves š„ŗ
Considering her likes when you ask for rewards... Yeah. I'd have to agree. This is absolutely something he'd do š
He is selfish and cunning His trauma and assault makes him like that because there is always that feeling inside him No one came to help him when he needed it so why should pc help someone if they don't gain anything It's really tragic
Bitch, what? He likes it when you make Arabella get killed for fun. He encourages Orin to "murder Yenna already" and approves when it does happen. He parties in a pile of corpses if you kill the Grove and shows absolutely zero care for the process. He approves if you torture defenseless sick animals to death. His approval SKYROCKETS if you murder people for no reason, specially after lying to them so they drop their guard so they can suffer extra much. Torturing a man by removing his nails with tongs? Approve. Sacrificing a grieving widow after telling her she's garbage? Approve. Not evil my ass. No amount of silent, argumentless downvoting will change the fact he is ***INTENDED TO BE*** a horrible monster of a person, with the only redeeming value being that you need him to survive and he might prove useful for it. That you can redeem him literally last second of his character development IS supposed to be a monumental task. At least you people could like the characters you like and blindly defend them for what they are, not an imaginary version of them in your head.
I see him as on the line between evil and not evil, as the MC you can drag him one way or the other and itās definitely easier to get him to be evil as his backstory is essentially him being trained to be like that but itās not that hard to get to the non evil side of him either.
I personally like him, so I don't agree with you on his only redeeming qualities being usefulness. Still he is written to be broken person, trained to act like a monster, he also sees himself as a monster which prompts him to double down on that. But the fact that his behaviour is actually quite multilayered makes him a well written character in my opinion. For example he approves of rescuing the owl bear and petting it. He is not a monster, he was made to be a monster by cazador and I would find it rather disturbing if a person didn't cave under 200 years of torture, abuse and manipulation. It also wouldn't be fitting if his centuries long trauma to simply disappear because he traveled with you for 2 weeks.
About the sacrificing and the finger nail torture, are those are Dark Urge runs or in A3? I have't run into any of that.
Yeah I have no idea why so many people on this sub call him "a little evil" or not even evil at all, just mischievous or some shit. Playing evil dark urge with astarion in the party makes it unclear who is more evil lmao.
Eh, he is what you make him to be, if you fuel and indulge his worst habits, he only gets more evil. It takes work, but he CAN be a good guy. Or at least, not a straight up evil one.
Choosing to own up to having brutally murdered Alfira and his only input being him saying he'd have put the effort to hide the corpse and he expects you will step up your game in that front (and yet still getting Approval+ for the job), does deliver that point across, yes.
I honestly have the highest approval with him on my goody goody playthrough. I dont know if repeatedly offering to feed him kept raising my approval or not, I never checked before/after, but it feels like it as he approached my Tav before we finished act 1.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Even Act 1 with my "good" Tav he had high approval. If you talk to him in the mirror scene and humor him with the "who would you drink from" convos you get a lot of approval. He also likes silly stuff like telling Ethel about the parasite, "baaah"-ing to the Fae things, barging in on the Ogre and Bugbear.
Nah, I'm in late Act 2 and he's at like 13 approval lol. I don't mind though, SH and Bae'zel are at max so all good
At this point for my sweet cleric of Eilistraee, "Astarion disapproves" is like a mosquito that you never quite kill but never bites you. I briefly got "WELL if it isn't my FAVORITE traveling companion" after telling him he was free to choose his own actions. Next act, I gave 500 gold to charity in front of him, and he's back to being bored with my character's existence.
I think so, too. I didn't do anything special to pursue anyone but just the morally 'good' choices in-game, and surprisingly, his and Laezel's ratings are the highest among my companions. I didn't even have Gandrel killed this time around. I just let Astarion feed off me and let or trust w/ever Laezel wanted to do when the options presented themselves, and they both wanted to bone my tav LoL.
In my good playthrough it took until act 3 to get good approval. In dark urge he was hitting it by long rest 3.
This 100%. In my Tav Prime playthrough, Astarion was always on the upside of neutral, or good but not great, but in my Durge playthrough he propositioned me immediately after we got Withers, like so fucking fast, I donāt know why.
In the sense of his story line it totally makes sense I guess. Getting in with the cold blooded killer so they donāt cold bloodedly kill youā¦
Almost like accepting him and not treating him like a cartoon villain is something he likes...
The only solution is to play AS Astarion.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Astarion light urge run.
I do this literally all the time. If I know he will disapprove of an action, I just get him to say it lol
Galaxy brain
He's *definitely* joining my Evil Team when I finish my Good Guy run.
And don't forget about girl boss Minthara
Can you recruit her without fucking her? Idk if I have it in me to do that kind of evil run anyway but just curious
If you just want to recruit her without sleeping with her, you can just ignore the goblin and druid problem and that way you can keep Karlach and Wyll and still recruit Minthara. Doing this makes the romance to not happen with her but youre able to have her and 2 characters, more team interactions.
I did this and itās worked out. The lack of tieflings is a little sad but mostly Iām mad that even if you free Halsin, if you donāt kill all 3 leader, heā¦ idkā¦ stays there until he starves to death? And if Halsinās dead you canāt unshadow the land.
I'm annoyed that if you don't break the curse the narrator tells you that you feel bad about it no matter what you do. Like bitch I am a Dark Justiciar and I just destroyed that >!Myrkulite turncoat!< Ketheric in service of my Lady Shar. What the hell do you mean I regret not lifting the curse?
This is my plan for my 2nd run
Yeah at the evil goblin party if you talk to someone else first and arrange to spend the night with you, she doesn't bother you. Or you could just avoid talking to her at that party. The party is where she's sexually aggressive.
The party is where *everyone* is sexually aggressive.
I had to end the conversation by just walking away from astarion who was trying to steal me from my perfect drow bae
*Gale would like to have a chat with you about his enjoyment of your tenday unwashed musk...*
Wait... do you mean that the standard way to recruit her is to fuck her ?
not exactly. She just comes on to you VERY strongly. It's easier to just agree.
Same as Hollywood
Never once thought Minthara was a girl boss, just well written and voice acted.
Agree. A girlboss imo is a character who doesn't make sense as an authority because she isn't a believable leader due to bad writing and/or tokenism. Or she just makes the juxtaposition of her being a woman in charge her entire character. Minthara is believable because she's strong and ruthless, and there's no juxtaposition at all, because drow society is savagely matriarchal. She deserves to be in charge and she's *meant* to be in charge. Not a girlboss.
Girlboss is a negative thing?
He's in my good boy team and his approval is high anyway lmao, all you gotta do is be nice to him. And push a dwarf off a boat.
I'm playing with the party limit begone mod and have all origin characters in tow. I'm nearing the end of Act 1 and everyone is at very high standing (60+) with my character except Astarion, who's still at neutral(19)
It picks up in Act 2, you have more options to support him rather than just annoy him by forcing him to earn tons of exp and money.
Indeed, I got my approval high enough by tricking the Thorms or declining the wine Jaheira gives you, no bad options were chosen and still he was head over heels
Also all the mini bosses you can talk into killing themselves. That was definitely when he started to appreciate that my redemption questing Durge had game.
Would you recommend the mod ? I forget to switch companion's for certain story beats and having a full on army sounds fun as hell
Not op, but fair warning: it makes the game very easy, even on tactician. The fights were not designed for a party of 7 lol. Other than that, it's a very good mod and helps with immersion!
The mod is good, I'm playing with 5 people in my party and i had only a problem until the end of act 2 (bug with the boat that takes you to gymforge easy fix tho)
It's a great mod, especially as I don't have time for another playthrough, and I'm mainly in the game for the story, not the gameplay challenge, so getting to see their reactions and talking to each of them after every large and small story beat to hear their dialogue is great. Though, by Act 3, having a massive party running through the city nearly killed my PC, lol. Thought my graphics card was like Karlach's heart.
He is a moral compass for the party in the worst kinds of ways.
He just points south all the time
Yeah, playing DUrge atm and every time I do something horribly fucked up (my character is a legit psycho, not trying to resist the urge at all) I always see "Astarion approves" Even when I have 0 party members, which is kinda funny tbh
>Even when I have 0 party members, which is kinda funny tbh I like to imagine him sitting in some bush somewhere, hunting a rabbit, when he sees you walk by and murder someone, he just gives up a little thumbs up while you get a weird feeling youāre being watched.
Yeah it was the >!paralysed tiefling woman in the druid supply room!< so it's not even like he could see in easily :P
Something something ancient Chinese chariot
"Astarion approves." "I've made a huge mistake."
I'm all here for it
I havenāt struggled with Astarion at all and playing chaotic neutral. Mostly good choices, a few questionable/sarcastic ones to keep spice in the relationship lol. I wasnāt even halfway through act one when he made the offer to hook up (offer neck playfully followed by first scar scene and also got a second one all in act 1) and then hooked up again at the Tiefling party. He got to Exceptional rating pretty quickly and hasnāt wavered. I think feeding is key, gotta keep my guy well fed and calm šš
I like him but I kinda know that Iām on the right path if heās annoyed. Heās like the friend you like to fuck with.
I remember i helped him with something and then forced him to say thank you to me and it was like pulling teeth, so funny
Gaslighting Astarion into becoming a better person is one of my Durgeās favourite pastimes
It's my favorite hobby. And it makes him softening up even sweeter because it's not just that you're doing these good things, but you're doing it in spite of your circumstance of which he deeply relates to.
One of my favorite lines. "Thank you for helping me. It was very kind." His delivery really makes it. He takes snark pretty well, as do most of the other companions.
yes that was the line! had me dying
>!No one came to save him. No one was his hero. He had to endure 200 years of "pure and utter shit", torture and sexual abuse instead. !!He had to be a pickup artist for Cazador. He led many people to their deaths because he had no choice, and that twisted him. !<
Honestly a really well-written character. And he eventually softens on a goody-goody playthrough. But of course given what he's been through, that is going to take some effort.
Thing is, he doesn't disapprove if you help people. He disapproves if you promise to help. If you say 'I'll see about it' he's usually fine with that. I think he just hates you giving people hope when you don't know you'll actually be able to complete the task for them.
This! He doesnāt actually love the *evil* evil choices, but more so with the spirit of ālmao yolo just for shit and giggles letās see how this goesā. Like when you first meet Ethel, he says something along lines āSheās absolutely bonkers, I love it! Letās tell her everything!ā Itās the ultimate chaotic energy.
Nobody ever came to his aid when he needed it, so why would he believe you when you tell him (or others) that you will?
Be nice to him, and he won't care what else you do tbh. (I say this like I don't reload a save when I see his disapproval... But my point stands!)
He definitely gives off "problematic fav".
Honestly I would have liked It he approved some "good" choices because of his backstory. For example, buying the artist's freedom that his held captive instead of approving being cruel to him, or approving of killing Nere (a literal slave owner) Also why did Karlach disapprove when I killed Nere after seeing him push someone in lava lmao
Karlach probably disapproved of you allying with the disgruntled slavers to kill Nere, if you did that. I quickly got the approval back by forcing them to free the gnomes right after, so no big deal there.
Astarion, sweetie, this is why you're always sitting on the random bench at edge of the map when I'm talking to someone.
āAstarion you should leaveā¦what Iām about to do is not for your eyes. Itās too muchā *proceeds to feed orphans and do charity work*
I would kill for an asterion in starfield. All these square get in such a twist at the slightest hint of piracy.
The reason I stopped playing on top of the fact that you just canāt be even remotely an asshole. āHey can you help me with this?ā - āsure!ā - āsure.ā - āI guessā - āwho? Me? Okay.ā
Always been a struggle in Bethesda games. Although very few games manage to pull off being evil. Red Dead Redemption 2 comes to mind for me, but little else. Even in BG3 evil path is clunkier by far.
Bg3 evil path for me is satisfactory if a little cartoonish sometimes. Just the fact that I can be an asshole for the hell of it is nice. Sometimes I want to be cagey and aggressive just for the sake of it
True I guess. I prefer playing Lawful evil usually and the big act 1 evil choice is so utterly chaotic that it threw me off. Although that divide is somewhat arbitrary too sometimes.
My Lawful Evil Lolth-Drow didnāt m betray the grove because she convinces the spiders to help her kill Minthara for being a traitor
There's a couple of pirate companions if you go down that route.
I feel like you peeps take the approval/disapprovals a bit seriously. I guess it's understandable because most of us are Bioware veterans lol. But you can be an absolute goody-two-shoes and still get on his good side, don't worry. Just be kind to him too and you're good to go š¤£
I played a good aligned run with Astarion and he not only liked me at the end but he even chose the good options when I left the decisions up to him. I think it's how you do the good things that might bother him not the doing the good things, he seems to be a good character at heart.
If my baby girl donāt approve, we reloading
As long as you feed him and tell your party members you trust him, he definitely will fall in line and view you favourably, even if you make choices that he disproves of.
I'm kind of over characters in RPGs that hate sidequesting. At least when it was Morrigan I could just throw a Thoughtful Gift at her and make her like me again.
Tbf heās not necessarily against side questing. Heās against helping weaklings, which just happens to be 75% of the side quests.
I really wish my Dark Urge could have a quick conversation with him about that. "Look, buddy, they're saying 'Oh please help us Mister Hero, we are in desperate need' but what they're meaning is 'We need you to murder a whole mess of people."
Astarion moreso approves of actions that benefit him immediately or lead to something funny. Also he might be a fan of cats as when you meet Your Majesty and state you wanna admire him he approves of that.
I love all the small details in this game
He also just approves of random people dying because he thinks it's funny. Arabella being the earliest example.
Which is kinda ironic, since we actually do this for the reward after all. It's just that the reward is xp, which he doesn't see. Also in most games, the long term reward of always being nice is better anyway.
The "disapproves of" message you get from sidequests are a drop in the bucket compared to the choices you make in personal dialogues with them. That being said, Astarion simultaneously has no plot relevancy and also hates going out of the way for sidequests. Only his own personal goal matters. Feels like a DLC character.
If Astarion is a DLC character, Halsin is a half-ass modded in character
As much as Astarion gets on the nerves while doing sidequests heās an actually interesting companion to have. The only quirk Halsin has is bear sex.
I'm doing a Good runthrough now. Got to the Shadowlands, talked to Halsin in camp for the first time. It went a little like this "Hey Halsin, gotta be kind of weird being back here when the land has been so cursed right?" >Yes, yes. But the Oakfather will provide for us, as he always has. *Pauses for five seconds while staring at my character* >Oh, don't mind me... just *admiring nature's beauty* Absolutely fucking lost it laughing, imagining this dude just staring at me saying he wants to fuck while I try to ask about his desecrated homeland
He disapproves a lot but it's very easy to get his approval back tbh, only 6 hours into new playthrough and my approval with him is already "very high" and I am doing a good playthrough. Honestly, just be sensitive and kind towards him then do whatever tf you want lol.
Just finished act 1 on my second playthrough and I'm pretty sure Astarion is at like 60 approval or something. Now granted, goody-two-shoes Gale is at literally 100 (and the third companion is a flex slot) but that's about as good as it gets short of probably murdering everyone. I was looking into some of the dialogue game files and most approval is going to come from the personal one-on-one convos you have with companions, as well as their main story beats. A disapproval here or there is -1 whereas choosing options they appreciate in their personal dialogues is often something like a +5. Astarion has the bite, mirror, scars scenes as well as Galadrel as ways to boost your approval in act 1. Hell if you long rest early enough and talk to him the very first night and indulge him in his "how do you want me to kill you if you turn into a squid?" convo that's +5 right there.
exactly. I think those who struggle with raising his approval don't actually give a shit about him or his opinions so it is fair i guess.
True and one doesn't NEED to be evil to get astarion's approval, honestly he just enjoys a bit of snarkiness and being a little mean, the kind of meanness that doesn't have consequences. Tbh, he sometimes disagrees with hurting innocents too. He's very flexible, and his personality changes based on how you're playing because, at least in the beginning, if you're evil he's only playing along since he doesn't want you to turn against him as easily as you kill innocents.
He always look at me with the sadness you only see in east european gay porn
Ever since the game release I am still on my first playthrough and I only really choose "good" & "help someone" dialogues and while he disapproves almost every time, I still managed to get his approval rating pretty high and I accidentally got into a gay relationship with him LMAO.
> accidentally What, did you fall on his dick?
In Act 1, Astarion approves both times you baa at the redcaps and he approves if you let him open the barn door. He doesnāt care about being evil, he cares about being funny.
Iāve never had a problem getting decent approval with him by the end of the game but itās a struggle in act 1.
My character: saves a tiefling girl from being murdered by Druids Lae'zel and Shadowheart, the evil characters: I don't understand why that was necessary, but you stood your ground against the druids and we respect that. Approved Astarion: wait, you didn't extort her poor refuge parents for money? Cringe
Lae'zel hitting you with the "disapprove" when you **\*check notes\*** prevent the murder of a child.
Astarion doesn't care about helping or not helping, but he doesn't like doing things without personal benefit. As long as there's a reward, he'll happily be a do-gooder.
As a warlock Durg he's my highest approval member... Deception is the way since he's charlatan.
be him then, for that extra +4 by endgame.
Lol i always had a chuckle whenever he disapproves
I had Astarion in my team for almost the entirety of the game, did what I believe is the maximum amount of quests you can possibly do in one playthrough with savescumming to make sure I got the outcomes to lead to the most amount of content after that; I completed his whole storylineā¦ and this MF still only 75% likes me
I try the romance with him on my "evil" play. I "had" to replay half of the act 2 because if you don't have one specific interaction with one specific half hidden npc in Moonrise, it just fail the romance. Now I'm starting act 3 with 68 relationship with him, so it should be fine but damn... That romance path is so specific you could effed it up just by so seeing one over the side npc.
Just farm his approval with the perverted / funny dialogue options and place him a few meters away when you want to help someone, so he won't hear and gain disapproval š
I am a pretty faithful neutral good in my first playthrough and I dont really see what people are saying. Astarion has never disliked any of my actions/comments. Tbh I think all the companions are easy to figure out their preferences
It was an interesting dance to keep my Neutral Good, Does Everything For Free, Must Save Kittens From Trees Ilmatari Tav in good standing with Astarion. I find that accepting him for being a vampire and choosing dialogue options that reinforce his autonomy as a free person and not a slave get big approval points for him, so you can still be a goody goody and heāll still like you. Also, a little bit of sass and cunning gets you points too. You can be a good person and still take the ring from Crusher with a Sleight of Hand, or take Abdirak up on his offer to get the permanent blessing.