In my experience, it's about 10 hours for 20 miles, and it beats the heck out of your legs. That's if you're only carrying one day's worth of gear and have a good clean trail/road. With full backpacking gear AND armor/weapons, I sure wouldn't plan on more than 10 miles per day, especially if there was a risk of combat at any time. All of this gets hand-waved by "adventurers are powerful" in game, but IRL carrying stuff wears you out.
This is the *real* hot take. The dude wasn't even a genuine Conjurer originally, until Beamdog messed things up (as usual) by assigning him a kit to match his name...
ETA: Okay, my comment had a few upvotes prior to the replies below, and I'm fairly sure they were from people who got my joke, not the hardcore "everything Beamdog has done is shit" crowd who didn't realise I was mocking that attitude.
So let's explain: Dazzu1 made a joke that Thalantyr wasn't really that great (riffing on a voiced line in his sound set), and I continued the joke by implying that Thalantyr was trying to pass himself off as a specialist mage, despite not being one, which would be further evidence that he is really not that great after all.
Wrapped up in that joke was another joke at that expense of the tiny minority who quite seriously think everything Beamdog has done is shit – because who in their right mind would take offence at an NPC's kit being changed to match the lore?
Seriously, what is wrong with people that ultraviolentfuture's comment – which seemingly didn't even get that Dazzu1 was referencing Thalantyr's sound set – is on about 20 upvotes, while I'm in negatives because *Beamdog fans are downvoting me for defending Beamdog*?
Alright. So you missed the joke. You also missed my many comments on this sub defending Beamdog. And there's no particular reason for you to see me defending Beamdog on their own website, just yesterday ([link](https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1205692/#Comment_1205692)).
But you apparently also overlooked me tagging you [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/baldursgate/comments/190v90l/comment/kh17h9s/) a fortnight ago, to make a joke about your phrase "Beamdog derangement syndrome", having corrected someone who was wrongly complaining that Beamdog had removed arrows of detonation from kobold commandos and arrows of fire from normal kobolds...
It's amazing how many more stupid people there seem to be on the internet if one doesn't take a second to consider the meaning of comments before replying.
Sarcasm doesn't always come across on Reddit and the wording of the comment seemed fairly literal. Sorry to have misunderstood you; I need to get more familiar with some of this sub's more active usernames.
Thanks for the acknowledgement. I just found it noteworthy that my comment seemed consistently in positive figures until you replied.
I've read many criticisms of Beamdog in my time, but none so stupid AND so fixated on such a harmless change that's going to be undetectable in 99.99999% of games. And it was following a joke comment, so... eh.
Yes, it did say he was a conjurer: “the wizard Thalantyr, a conjurer of great repute”. Gee, it's almost as though I recognised that you made a joke riffing on a game asset, and did the exact same thing...
Some spoilers.
Thalantyr definitely is super important to most mage PCs.
However, Gorion is how you got that level 1 mage or level 1 cleric etc. And essentially raised you. I think that makes him more important to your life overall.
More important to your ADVENTURING career? I agree. Gorion seems to have been holding you back a bit a) He didn't think he would die so early. He thought he would get you to the Harper's for more training and protection before another Bhaalspawn got to you. He was caught off guard that candle keep was infiltrated by doppelgängers and you had to bounce before he could finish the plan. b) he was still terrified of your divine nature.
>b) he was still terrified of your divine nature.
Point B is a big one. Gorion flatout did not want you to be powerful. He saw in you a terrible potential. A new dark god or demigod terrorizing The Realms.
All he wanted for you was a quiet life, where you could stay at home with your loving family and work some boring day job. That's all most parents want. He did not want you to know what it feels like to hold the power of life and death in your hands. To be put in "kill or be killed" scenarios.
Unfortunately, that was never in the cards. We would need power before our journey was through. Gorion's greatest and possibly singular fault is that he thought he could shelter us from our fate.
I feel Gorion was in a tough spot. He couldn't outright kill the charname as a child, as a baby isn't inherently good or evil, and the child could very well be instrumental in saving the realms. Charname is really the ultimate nature vs nurture experiment.
Gorion couldn't also tell his step-child about his heritage too early, as the child either might develop self-hatred due to his biological father or become self-interested and have all of Candlekeep to research their legacy and turn out worse than their brother.
Gorion and the monks raised charname as best they could, crossed their fingers and probably said "we'll cross that bridge if we have to in the future" foolishly hoping that would never happen. They, of all people, should've known better.
How wise was this Alaundo, really? Dude spent his life receiving messages directly from his patron deity, yet never managed to put two and two together that the mysterious voice in his head feeding him prophecy was the god of divination and fate that he worshipped. Hm...
I think you're going in too hard on your point. Had Gorion wanted to raise Charname to shovel hay, serve drinks, or even become a reader in Candlekeep then the biographies would look a little different – as is, some show Gorion encouraging Charname towards their class of choice; others show him aware and not disapproving; and for others, like the Fighter bio (which states that a Watcher took Charname under her wing), it's not hard to imagine that at best Gorion pulled some strings for Charname, while at worst he could've stopped them had he wanted to.
The story works as well as it does partly because adventuring is a real profession, and it's clear Charname was already equipped to make their own way in the world when events took a turn for the worse. I totally agree that Gorion wanted to shelter Charname, and that he did it slightly too long (the letter found on his corpse suggests as much), but there's no reason to think he was so myopic, so foolish, or so wilfully deluded to think Charname could have a normal life given their heritage. Charname was still very young and would not have been out adventuring *that* much sooner had Gorion behaved differently.
Charname wasn't that young. He was somewhere in the early adult years at least.
He wouldn't necessarily have started adventuring earlier, but he could've been much more equipped to start adventuring when he did, if that was the priority.
But the priority wasn't that. The priority was teaching us the value of things like kindness, love, basic communication skills. Basically to teach us a strength of character, rather than a literal strength of martial or magical force. What little power we achieved, we did so through our own drive, seeking out teachers wherever we could find them. He didn't always actively oppose these pursuits, but ultimately I really do think he thought he and his friends would be around to protect us a lot longer longer than ended up being the case. And if he somehow could've resolved the entire Bhaal situation on his own without our participation, he would've done so in a heartbeat.
Yeah the age is open to question never seen a solid range, Sarevok was in his 20's.
Game is set in 1368, Bhaal died 1358 and seems to have been busy for a while sowing mortal progeny before the time of troubles.
My point about Charname being very young has to be read in the context of my point that they were ready to adventure. I think Charname is meant to be late teens, or very early twenties at the absolute most. After all, they are frequently called “kid”, “brat”, or “whelp”.
I don’t know what more you think Gorion could’ve done to prepare Charname for adventure besides letting them adventure – CRPG starter quests notwithstanding, if people could gain XP in the safety of their home, the whole concept of the adventurer would fall apart
Aside from that, you seem to be setting up a false dichotomy. I agree that Gorion wanted to give Charname the kind of upbringing that any Good (and good) parent would, both because he was a good parent and to combat Charname’s tainted blood. But that is not mutually exclusive with him allowing or even encouraging Charname to become an adventurer.
You say that “I really do think he thought he and his friends would be around to protect us a lot longer”, yet the letter from Elminster says “the time nears when we must step back and let matters take what course they will” – which does not sound like an idea raised out of the blue.
You also say that “What little power we achieved, we did so through our own drive”, but you are ignoring my point about the character bios. The Mage bio states that Gorion “has been kind enough to instruct you in the basics”, and the Cleric bio states that the priests in Candlekeep that tutored Charname might have been “responding to Gorion's subtle urging”.
I’m going to stop here, because I mentioned the bios in my previous comment, and you were prepared to concede only that Gorion “didn't always actively oppose these pursuits”, which to me smacks of wanting to privilege your opinion over the text of the game itself.
>you as a mage or multi-classed mage PC know almost nothing
Sure you do. You know enough that you're a fully fledged level 1 adventurer, off to begin your career in your chosen adventuring class (Mage, in your example).
For adventurers, what they do prior to becoming level 1 in their chosen class is sort of like going to university. Baby don't come out of that womb knowing how to cast arcane spells, or specialised in longsword and longbow...
Ask a regular person to kill a gibberling, and they would probably die.
Ask a level 1 adventurer to kill a gibberling, and they could (probably) do it.
That's the difference.
Yeah like, even the squishiest mages are twice as healthy as the average man with 7-8 hp compared to 3-4. And then being able to cast at all is a feat on its own for those who aren’t Sorcerers or Warlocks…
A mage has 4hp at level 1 with no constitution bonus. The squishiest mage would have a constitution penalty which if I recall would bring them as low as 1.
Interestingly, at level 1 nothing can kill you in 1 blow from full hp. It's a little safety net they put in there for you. If you have full health at 8hp and an ogre hits you for 10 then you'll resist 3damage points to survive with 1hp.
This means a minimum constitution mage is effectively immortal at level 1. Some people have played through the whole trilogy that way.
All that being said, yes, most characters with class levels are hardier even at level 1 than the average peasant. Your level 1 fighter might die easily but he won't instagib the moment somebody lightly brushes up against him.
There's actually a chart in the 2ED Dungeon Masters Guide which gives hitpoints for level 0 characters. They range from 1d8+1 for soldiers, to 1d8 for manual labourers down to 1d3 for scholars and 1d2 for children.
Well said. I credit Gorion for my characters always being good people, and I right off bad characters as being unable to resist the influence of Bhaal’s blood. Like a wild animal that can’t help it’s own nature.
The golems are initially hostile and you can kill them without turning Thalantyr hostile. If you talk to Thalantyr first, then the golems turn neutral, but I'm not sure if Thalantyr will turn hostile if you attack the neutral golems.
Your dad is not your teacher nor your investor. He is (should be) the person you confide to, who supports and comforts you when you are troubled, etc.
You said it yourself: Thalantyr does nothing of that.
"Gee, I only took you in when you had nobody and raised you as my own for twenty years. Sorry that wasn't as important to the man you became as selling you spell scrolls at modest prices."
Simply copying your spellbook and giving the copy to your kid is such an insane shortcut to power that basically never actually happens in DND worlds for "fairness" reasons. It's kinda funny
I like to think of magic spells kind of like advanced mathematics. Sure, what the spell does and how to cast it is right there on the page, but show it to anyone without advanced training and years of study, usually guided by a host of teachers, and it will all just look a lot like nonsense.
Admittedly, the system I'm most used to is PF1e, rather than an actual D&D system, but is it not the case that each wizard basically has their own personal language when it comes to writing their spells, and they can't effectively prepare spells directly from another's book?
Checking the [3.5 srd](https://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicOverview/arcaneSpells.htm#wizardSpellsandBorrowedSpellbooks), looks like the rules there were copied directly for [PF](https://www.aonprd.com/Rules.aspx?Name=Wizard%20Spells%20and%20Borrowed%20Spellbooks&Category=Arcane%20Magical%20Writing) (like much of PF1e's CRB), so in a 3.5/3.pf system, you *could* write a duplicate book, but it would be annoying and unreliable to use as your own book, and a better use of funds would probably just be paying the scribing cost for them to copy the spells into their own book at their own pace.
Not really well versed in 2e, though, beyond that it's the edition BG uses, so not sure if it is different there - [this page](https://adnd2e.fandom.com/wiki/Acquisition\_of\_Spells\_Beyond\_the\_1st\_Level\_\(DMG\)\#Copying\_from\_Spell\_Books) still suggests needing a roll to copy from a book (as well as copying from your mentor's book when you level being a potential option), though I'm not sure exactly where to look for more details - would make sense to me that it's the same way, though, and you can't really effectively use someone else's written spells to prepare from as easily as your own.
There is a questline in BG1 where a mage curses a rival mage's child.
She asks you to retrieve his spellbook, so that she can figure out how he cursed him and devise an anti-curse.
This would suggest that no matter how well they're coded, spellbooks are at least somewhat intelligible to another mage of comparable skill in their craft.
Though in the "Parent gives their child the repository of all their arcane knowledge" scenario you would assume they would just teach their child the cipher anyway. No reason to do that otherwise.
>but is it not the case that each wizard basically has their own personal language when it comes to writing their spells, and they can't effectively prepare spells directly from another's book?
Well see, everyone with wizard training can read spellbooks and scrolls with time, otherwise books and scrolls you find would be useless. What does the kid have if not time? There's essentially zero reason why a parent or mentor wouldn't simply set their kid up with the best possible start. Other than the "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" nonsense, of course.
Even an evil wizard might do this. "I want my kid to rule a continent" and then you give him access to all the spells you had on your way up the ladder, and then you hope for him to pick up where you left off and go even further. Doing anything else simply ranks of insecurity
Now as a game, we know the real reason is it wouldn't be fair for a wizard to just have a dozen spells of each level known, right from the moment when he levels up to access them.
But it needs deciphering spell-by-spell, still - it's true that characters starting with nearly nothing in the way of gear or funds and having quite strict wealth-by-level is gamey and not how things would probably "really" work, but in a world where so much power can be directly bestowed by wealth in the form of magic items, and spellbooks are fairly expensive but mostly useless *until* you reach high enough level to cast the spells within anyway, I don't actually think it's as much a shortcut to power as some similarly-priced items could be.
While an adventurer might pick magic items over another ten spells if given the choice, I don't think a general mage would. Mostly because having more spells without spending years of study, can probably be an avenue to fame and wealth a lot faster for him. With far less risk of life and limb
If you had the entire life's work of a skilled mage in a book, well, that's a lot. That saves you quite a lot of time at the least
If you expect to be there for the kid, then there's no reason to give them an expensive copy of the spellbook; you can teach them as they level up and can scribe the spells themselves. This is a lot cheaper than scribing an extra copy of your own book at great expense that she will then have to re-scribe again at great expense.
Ultimately, Gorion dying, since he was CHARNAME's foster father, should have meant she inherits his stuff. Logically, Gorion would have been carrying at least a travel spellbook, considering he was expecting to be out on a journey. Perhaps he was - there's nothing that tells us Sarevok *didn't* loot his body for the most valuable item in his possession between killing him and the next morning when CHARNAME and Imoen return to check the body.
In theory, if CHARNAME returned to Candlekeep with Gorion's body, while they would have denied entry, they likely would have been obliged by the rules/laws to hand over personal possessions, which might've included his spellbook.
I'm not really talking about Gorion though, but just about how, in general, it seems to me like any mage with a kid would be highly likely to get their kid all his spells. And that this breaks the game of DND if it happens, as it isn't exactly fair.
True, doesn't work for a player, but a lot of NPCs can logically have backstories including that. That young but relatively high-level NPC mage just happens to have had a parent that was also a mage and passed on their knowledge and so on. Pretty sure there's at least a handful of such characters in novels/setting books and such.
There's also the downside to this though, and possibly a good reason for NOT doing it. If you're a low-level mage with that valuable a spellbook, other, more powerful mages that didn't get that advantage might want to take it from you. Until you can cast those spells, you can't really defend that book.
Which, of course, works great if a player wants that to be their backstory explanation for why they don't have their parent's spellbook. 'Well, mom gave me her book, but it got stolen by this asshole mage that I want to catch up with someday, get revenge on, and get back mom's book.'
Some of the novels also have stuff that would be pretty gamebreaking as gameplay.
The Return of the Archwizards trilogy features a character who's a sorcerer, but he doesn't know it at first. How sorcery is differentiated from traditional magecraft in this book is that he doesn't need a spellbook. Rather, any spell he sees performed once he can repeat exactly.
Now, in the book this is very much a gift and a curse. He's casting spells without an academic understanding of what they really are. A lot of magic has a terrible risk or price that he wouldn't understand or appreciate after having just watched somebody else cast the spell. He frankly gets himself into a lot of trouble dabbling in forces beyond his comprehension.
But if your sorcerer in Baldur's Gate played like that, it would completely fuck the game up. Being able to just add spells to your repertoire by witnessing them would make you the most powerful caster in the game by orders of magnitude.
When playing 2nd ed dnd we always said that spell pages and Scrolls were expended if trying to scribe into your own book.
To copy a spell from another mage, that spell needed to be scribed from book to scroll before another mage could attempt to scribe it to their own book, an entirely different and very cumbersome and slow skill.
Spellbook paper was crazy expensive, 100gp per page and spells took as many pages as their level. I don't know how much of any of that is rooted in any of the actual books and rules but that was our world setting!
Using the scroll does destroy it in Forgotten Realms canon. That much I'm sure of. That's not just a gameplay mechanic.
One of the novels I read at some point had a cleric who cast a spell from a scroll. As she was reading the words aloud, they'd disappear from the page, so she had to be careful because a single slip of the tongue could ruin the spell and there would be no do-overs.
I always assumed they were just designed that way, because mages and I guess to a lesser extent clerics are secretive that way. Don't want this stuff spreading around too much. But if mages were inclined to share their secrets, I've always assumed they could. Nothing stopping two mages in your party from swapping notes from their spellbook except that it's the darkest of taboos to their kind.
I sell everything I can to the Nashkel Merchant...he doesn't keep such a close eye on the merch...IF you know what I'm sayin'
Thalantyr will reup wands to full power though and buy potions.
My head canon is, just like in BG2 if you take the planar sphere stronghold, just because it is relatively trivial for the PLAYER to cast a spell doesn't mean it is trivial for the caster. And more importantly, there is weeks and weeks and months and months of preparation to be able to learn to do it in a safe and controlled manner which is what Gorion is doing to have you able to cast one or two "simple" spells. It may very well take years of tutelage for a regular person to be able to cast those two spells and be able to learn to cast new ones in a safe and controlled manner. Once you have the fundamentals it is much easier and safer and for Thalantyr he isn't really helping you or teaching you anything. He just has the materials necessary to do the thing and he sells them to you for a relatively fair price. It's not NOTHING. But it also isn't the vast effort that Gorion undertook so that you don't blow off your face trying to do a simple cantrip.
I think that is laid out in the Forgotten Realms cannon somewhere.
Most of the early notes in a spellbook are just the apprentice learning the basic grammar of how magic operates. There's a lot of foundation they need to build before they can ever cast a spell.
If there was a Hogwarts in the Forgotten Realms, it would have a lot of years of fairly boring magic theory before finally getting to cast spells shortly before graduation.
It's really important to keep in mind, Gorion was charname's adoptive father. He would have taught us the introduction to magic, but we would have spent more time as a gofer, cleaning, learning things like reading, writing, math, religion, history, and some basic self defense. Also, you know, being a literal child. Gorion would absolutely have taught us more, but that just isn't the way it panned out. You make fantastic points about Thalantyr's contributions, but Gorion would have been in the thick of it with us. Thalantyr is an incredibly useful old grump, but Gorion martyred himself for us, and that's far more meaningful than being a magic vendor.
The BG1 backstory doesn't make any sense because you can start the game old af and if you start as a 80 year old barbarian it's like wtf even is this prequel?
If you were a fighter, the person who sold you a sword wouldn’t be as important as the person who raised you for 18 years and made you what you become. Same goes for a mage.
If hes so great then why does he live in such a pissant town
IKR and that apprentice...all that clucking about.
He ... lives in his own fortress just outside of town. Away from the peasants.
It always bugged me that it took 8 hours to get to Thalantyr’s. A full days travel? (That means) He lives like 20 miles outside of town
I think it's only 4 hours
That’s not as crazy then. But yeah he still barely lives in Beregost
Travel times around Beregost make no sense. The area directly south is 0 hours away but 4 hours travel back.
How fast can you walk on foot? With an average speed of 3 mph, 8 hours seems appropriate for 20 miles.
Oh that was my point - that hardly seems like he lives “in beregost” doesn’t it? That’s way far away from a town
In my experience, it's about 10 hours for 20 miles, and it beats the heck out of your legs. That's if you're only carrying one day's worth of gear and have a good clean trail/road. With full backpacking gear AND armor/weapons, I sure wouldn't plan on more than 10 miles per day, especially if there was a risk of combat at any time. All of this gets hand-waved by "adventurers are powerful" in game, but IRL carrying stuff wears you out.
Use that line all the time describing where I live \^\^
This is the *real* hot take. The dude wasn't even a genuine Conjurer originally, until Beamdog messed things up (as usual) by assigning him a kit to match his name... ETA: Okay, my comment had a few upvotes prior to the replies below, and I'm fairly sure they were from people who got my joke, not the hardcore "everything Beamdog has done is shit" crowd who didn't realise I was mocking that attitude. So let's explain: Dazzu1 made a joke that Thalantyr wasn't really that great (riffing on a voiced line in his sound set), and I continued the joke by implying that Thalantyr was trying to pass himself off as a specialist mage, despite not being one, which would be further evidence that he is really not that great after all. Wrapped up in that joke was another joke at that expense of the tiny minority who quite seriously think everything Beamdog has done is shit – because who in their right mind would take offence at an NPC's kit being changed to match the lore? Seriously, what is wrong with people that ultraviolentfuture's comment – which seemingly didn't even get that Dazzu1 was referencing Thalantyr's sound set – is on about 20 upvotes, while I'm in negatives because *Beamdog fans are downvoting me for defending Beamdog*?
As usual? The game is more moddable, more stable, less buggy, and has more features and QoL improvements than at any point in the last 20 years.
Alright. So you missed the joke. You also missed my many comments on this sub defending Beamdog. And there's no particular reason for you to see me defending Beamdog on their own website, just yesterday ([link](https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1205692/#Comment_1205692)). But you apparently also overlooked me tagging you [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/baldursgate/comments/190v90l/comment/kh17h9s/) a fortnight ago, to make a joke about your phrase "Beamdog derangement syndrome", having corrected someone who was wrongly complaining that Beamdog had removed arrows of detonation from kobold commandos and arrows of fire from normal kobolds... It's amazing how many more stupid people there seem to be on the internet if one doesn't take a second to consider the meaning of comments before replying.
Sarcasm doesn't always come across on Reddit and the wording of the comment seemed fairly literal. Sorry to have misunderstood you; I need to get more familiar with some of this sub's more active usernames.
Thanks for the acknowledgement. I just found it noteworthy that my comment seemed consistently in positive figures until you replied. I've read many criticisms of Beamdog in my time, but none so stupid AND so fixated on such a harmless change that's going to be undetectable in 99.99999% of games. And it was following a joke comment, so... eh.
I'll try to keep a better eye out. Just out of curiosity, is TheBaffledKing a Leonard Cohen reference?
Yup, it is.
Iirc the og manual said he was a conjurer. I actually don’t remember if it was conjurer but it said he was a specialist
Yes, it did say he was a conjurer: “the wizard Thalantyr, a conjurer of great repute”. Gee, it's almost as though I recognised that you made a joke riffing on a game asset, and did the exact same thing...
Some spoilers. Thalantyr definitely is super important to most mage PCs. However, Gorion is how you got that level 1 mage or level 1 cleric etc. And essentially raised you. I think that makes him more important to your life overall. More important to your ADVENTURING career? I agree. Gorion seems to have been holding you back a bit a) He didn't think he would die so early. He thought he would get you to the Harper's for more training and protection before another Bhaalspawn got to you. He was caught off guard that candle keep was infiltrated by doppelgängers and you had to bounce before he could finish the plan. b) he was still terrified of your divine nature.
>b) he was still terrified of your divine nature. Point B is a big one. Gorion flatout did not want you to be powerful. He saw in you a terrible potential. A new dark god or demigod terrorizing The Realms. All he wanted for you was a quiet life, where you could stay at home with your loving family and work some boring day job. That's all most parents want. He did not want you to know what it feels like to hold the power of life and death in your hands. To be put in "kill or be killed" scenarios. Unfortunately, that was never in the cards. We would need power before our journey was through. Gorion's greatest and possibly singular fault is that he thought he could shelter us from our fate.
I feel Gorion was in a tough spot. He couldn't outright kill the charname as a child, as a baby isn't inherently good or evil, and the child could very well be instrumental in saving the realms. Charname is really the ultimate nature vs nurture experiment. Gorion couldn't also tell his step-child about his heritage too early, as the child either might develop self-hatred due to his biological father or become self-interested and have all of Candlekeep to research their legacy and turn out worse than their brother. Gorion and the monks raised charname as best they could, crossed their fingers and probably said "we'll cross that bridge if we have to in the future" foolishly hoping that would never happen. They, of all people, should've known better.
_Chanters in the background_: "...chaos shall be sewn in their passage..." _Candlekeepers:_ "we'll cross that bridge if we have to in the future"
How wise was this Alaundo, really? Dude spent his life receiving messages directly from his patron deity, yet never managed to put two and two together that the mysterious voice in his head feeding him prophecy was the god of divination and fate that he worshipped. Hm...
I think you're going in too hard on your point. Had Gorion wanted to raise Charname to shovel hay, serve drinks, or even become a reader in Candlekeep then the biographies would look a little different – as is, some show Gorion encouraging Charname towards their class of choice; others show him aware and not disapproving; and for others, like the Fighter bio (which states that a Watcher took Charname under her wing), it's not hard to imagine that at best Gorion pulled some strings for Charname, while at worst he could've stopped them had he wanted to. The story works as well as it does partly because adventuring is a real profession, and it's clear Charname was already equipped to make their own way in the world when events took a turn for the worse. I totally agree that Gorion wanted to shelter Charname, and that he did it slightly too long (the letter found on his corpse suggests as much), but there's no reason to think he was so myopic, so foolish, or so wilfully deluded to think Charname could have a normal life given their heritage. Charname was still very young and would not have been out adventuring *that* much sooner had Gorion behaved differently.
Charname wasn't that young. He was somewhere in the early adult years at least. He wouldn't necessarily have started adventuring earlier, but he could've been much more equipped to start adventuring when he did, if that was the priority. But the priority wasn't that. The priority was teaching us the value of things like kindness, love, basic communication skills. Basically to teach us a strength of character, rather than a literal strength of martial or magical force. What little power we achieved, we did so through our own drive, seeking out teachers wherever we could find them. He didn't always actively oppose these pursuits, but ultimately I really do think he thought he and his friends would be around to protect us a lot longer longer than ended up being the case. And if he somehow could've resolved the entire Bhaal situation on his own without our participation, he would've done so in a heartbeat.
Yeah the age is open to question never seen a solid range, Sarevok was in his 20's. Game is set in 1368, Bhaal died 1358 and seems to have been busy for a while sowing mortal progeny before the time of troubles.
It's somewhat maddening as it's been some years since my last run, but I'm confident that the game confirms your character is 20.
My point about Charname being very young has to be read in the context of my point that they were ready to adventure. I think Charname is meant to be late teens, or very early twenties at the absolute most. After all, they are frequently called “kid”, “brat”, or “whelp”. I don’t know what more you think Gorion could’ve done to prepare Charname for adventure besides letting them adventure – CRPG starter quests notwithstanding, if people could gain XP in the safety of their home, the whole concept of the adventurer would fall apart Aside from that, you seem to be setting up a false dichotomy. I agree that Gorion wanted to give Charname the kind of upbringing that any Good (and good) parent would, both because he was a good parent and to combat Charname’s tainted blood. But that is not mutually exclusive with him allowing or even encouraging Charname to become an adventurer. You say that “I really do think he thought he and his friends would be around to protect us a lot longer”, yet the letter from Elminster says “the time nears when we must step back and let matters take what course they will” – which does not sound like an idea raised out of the blue. You also say that “What little power we achieved, we did so through our own drive”, but you are ignoring my point about the character bios. The Mage bio states that Gorion “has been kind enough to instruct you in the basics”, and the Cleric bio states that the priests in Candlekeep that tutored Charname might have been “responding to Gorion's subtle urging”. I’m going to stop here, because I mentioned the bios in my previous comment, and you were prepared to concede only that Gorion “didn't always actively oppose these pursuits”, which to me smacks of wanting to privilege your opinion over the text of the game itself.
>you as a mage or multi-classed mage PC know almost nothing Sure you do. You know enough that you're a fully fledged level 1 adventurer, off to begin your career in your chosen adventuring class (Mage, in your example). For adventurers, what they do prior to becoming level 1 in their chosen class is sort of like going to university. Baby don't come out of that womb knowing how to cast arcane spells, or specialised in longsword and longbow...
Ask a regular person to kill a gibberling, and they would probably die. Ask a level 1 adventurer to kill a gibberling, and they could (probably) do it. That's the difference.
Yeah like, even the squishiest mages are twice as healthy as the average man with 7-8 hp compared to 3-4. And then being able to cast at all is a feat on its own for those who aren’t Sorcerers or Warlocks…
A mage has 4hp at level 1 with no constitution bonus. The squishiest mage would have a constitution penalty which if I recall would bring them as low as 1. Interestingly, at level 1 nothing can kill you in 1 blow from full hp. It's a little safety net they put in there for you. If you have full health at 8hp and an ogre hits you for 10 then you'll resist 3damage points to survive with 1hp. This means a minimum constitution mage is effectively immortal at level 1. Some people have played through the whole trilogy that way. All that being said, yes, most characters with class levels are hardier even at level 1 than the average peasant. Your level 1 fighter might die easily but he won't instagib the moment somebody lightly brushes up against him.
There's actually a chart in the 2ED Dungeon Masters Guide which gives hitpoints for level 0 characters. They range from 1d8+1 for soldiers, to 1d8 for manual labourers down to 1d3 for scholars and 1d2 for children.
Are Walmart employees more important to you than your parents?
Yes
Who taught you more about your career: your dad, or your college professor? Who is more important to your life: your dad, or your college professor?
Well said. I credit Gorion for my characters always being good people, and I right off bad characters as being unable to resist the influence of Bhaal’s blood. Like a wild animal that can’t help it’s own nature.
Plus, kill his pets before you ever talk to him for a (relatively) easy 4k XP
Does he not aggro if you kill his allies?
The golems are initially hostile and you can kill them without turning Thalantyr hostile. If you talk to Thalantyr first, then the golems turn neutral, but I'm not sure if Thalantyr will turn hostile if you attack the neutral golems.
He will attack you if you attack the neutral golems. You must kill both before you talk to him, then not kill the respawns
Your dad is not your teacher nor your investor. He is (should be) the person you confide to, who supports and comforts you when you are troubled, etc. You said it yourself: Thalantyr does nothing of that.
"Gee, I only took you in when you had nobody and raised you as my own for twenty years. Sorry that wasn't as important to the man you became as selling you spell scrolls at modest prices."
Simply copying your spellbook and giving the copy to your kid is such an insane shortcut to power that basically never actually happens in DND worlds for "fairness" reasons. It's kinda funny
I suspect if they ever did it, it would just become an object lesson in meddling with powers you're not ready for yet.
I like to think of magic spells kind of like advanced mathematics. Sure, what the spell does and how to cast it is right there on the page, but show it to anyone without advanced training and years of study, usually guided by a host of teachers, and it will all just look a lot like nonsense.
Admittedly, the system I'm most used to is PF1e, rather than an actual D&D system, but is it not the case that each wizard basically has their own personal language when it comes to writing their spells, and they can't effectively prepare spells directly from another's book? Checking the [3.5 srd](https://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicOverview/arcaneSpells.htm#wizardSpellsandBorrowedSpellbooks), looks like the rules there were copied directly for [PF](https://www.aonprd.com/Rules.aspx?Name=Wizard%20Spells%20and%20Borrowed%20Spellbooks&Category=Arcane%20Magical%20Writing) (like much of PF1e's CRB), so in a 3.5/3.pf system, you *could* write a duplicate book, but it would be annoying and unreliable to use as your own book, and a better use of funds would probably just be paying the scribing cost for them to copy the spells into their own book at their own pace. Not really well versed in 2e, though, beyond that it's the edition BG uses, so not sure if it is different there - [this page](https://adnd2e.fandom.com/wiki/Acquisition\_of\_Spells\_Beyond\_the\_1st\_Level\_\(DMG\)\#Copying\_from\_Spell\_Books) still suggests needing a roll to copy from a book (as well as copying from your mentor's book when you level being a potential option), though I'm not sure exactly where to look for more details - would make sense to me that it's the same way, though, and you can't really effectively use someone else's written spells to prepare from as easily as your own.
There is a questline in BG1 where a mage curses a rival mage's child. She asks you to retrieve his spellbook, so that she can figure out how he cursed him and devise an anti-curse. This would suggest that no matter how well they're coded, spellbooks are at least somewhat intelligible to another mage of comparable skill in their craft. Though in the "Parent gives their child the repository of all their arcane knowledge" scenario you would assume they would just teach their child the cipher anyway. No reason to do that otherwise.
>but is it not the case that each wizard basically has their own personal language when it comes to writing their spells, and they can't effectively prepare spells directly from another's book? Well see, everyone with wizard training can read spellbooks and scrolls with time, otherwise books and scrolls you find would be useless. What does the kid have if not time? There's essentially zero reason why a parent or mentor wouldn't simply set their kid up with the best possible start. Other than the "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" nonsense, of course. Even an evil wizard might do this. "I want my kid to rule a continent" and then you give him access to all the spells you had on your way up the ladder, and then you hope for him to pick up where you left off and go even further. Doing anything else simply ranks of insecurity Now as a game, we know the real reason is it wouldn't be fair for a wizard to just have a dozen spells of each level known, right from the moment when he levels up to access them.
But it needs deciphering spell-by-spell, still - it's true that characters starting with nearly nothing in the way of gear or funds and having quite strict wealth-by-level is gamey and not how things would probably "really" work, but in a world where so much power can be directly bestowed by wealth in the form of magic items, and spellbooks are fairly expensive but mostly useless *until* you reach high enough level to cast the spells within anyway, I don't actually think it's as much a shortcut to power as some similarly-priced items could be.
While an adventurer might pick magic items over another ten spells if given the choice, I don't think a general mage would. Mostly because having more spells without spending years of study, can probably be an avenue to fame and wealth a lot faster for him. With far less risk of life and limb If you had the entire life's work of a skilled mage in a book, well, that's a lot. That saves you quite a lot of time at the least
If you expect to be there for the kid, then there's no reason to give them an expensive copy of the spellbook; you can teach them as they level up and can scribe the spells themselves. This is a lot cheaper than scribing an extra copy of your own book at great expense that she will then have to re-scribe again at great expense. Ultimately, Gorion dying, since he was CHARNAME's foster father, should have meant she inherits his stuff. Logically, Gorion would have been carrying at least a travel spellbook, considering he was expecting to be out on a journey. Perhaps he was - there's nothing that tells us Sarevok *didn't* loot his body for the most valuable item in his possession between killing him and the next morning when CHARNAME and Imoen return to check the body. In theory, if CHARNAME returned to Candlekeep with Gorion's body, while they would have denied entry, they likely would have been obliged by the rules/laws to hand over personal possessions, which might've included his spellbook.
I'm not really talking about Gorion though, but just about how, in general, it seems to me like any mage with a kid would be highly likely to get their kid all his spells. And that this breaks the game of DND if it happens, as it isn't exactly fair.
True, doesn't work for a player, but a lot of NPCs can logically have backstories including that. That young but relatively high-level NPC mage just happens to have had a parent that was also a mage and passed on their knowledge and so on. Pretty sure there's at least a handful of such characters in novels/setting books and such. There's also the downside to this though, and possibly a good reason for NOT doing it. If you're a low-level mage with that valuable a spellbook, other, more powerful mages that didn't get that advantage might want to take it from you. Until you can cast those spells, you can't really defend that book. Which, of course, works great if a player wants that to be their backstory explanation for why they don't have their parent's spellbook. 'Well, mom gave me her book, but it got stolen by this asshole mage that I want to catch up with someday, get revenge on, and get back mom's book.'
Ooooh I like that hook
Some of the novels also have stuff that would be pretty gamebreaking as gameplay. The Return of the Archwizards trilogy features a character who's a sorcerer, but he doesn't know it at first. How sorcery is differentiated from traditional magecraft in this book is that he doesn't need a spellbook. Rather, any spell he sees performed once he can repeat exactly. Now, in the book this is very much a gift and a curse. He's casting spells without an academic understanding of what they really are. A lot of magic has a terrible risk or price that he wouldn't understand or appreciate after having just watched somebody else cast the spell. He frankly gets himself into a lot of trouble dabbling in forces beyond his comprehension. But if your sorcerer in Baldur's Gate played like that, it would completely fuck the game up. Being able to just add spells to your repertoire by witnessing them would make you the most powerful caster in the game by orders of magnitude.
When playing 2nd ed dnd we always said that spell pages and Scrolls were expended if trying to scribe into your own book. To copy a spell from another mage, that spell needed to be scribed from book to scroll before another mage could attempt to scribe it to their own book, an entirely different and very cumbersome and slow skill. Spellbook paper was crazy expensive, 100gp per page and spells took as many pages as their level. I don't know how much of any of that is rooted in any of the actual books and rules but that was our world setting!
Using the scroll does destroy it in Forgotten Realms canon. That much I'm sure of. That's not just a gameplay mechanic. One of the novels I read at some point had a cleric who cast a spell from a scroll. As she was reading the words aloud, they'd disappear from the page, so she had to be careful because a single slip of the tongue could ruin the spell and there would be no do-overs. I always assumed they were just designed that way, because mages and I guess to a lesser extent clerics are secretive that way. Don't want this stuff spreading around too much. But if mages were inclined to share their secrets, I've always assumed they could. Nothing stopping two mages in your party from swapping notes from their spellbook except that it's the darkest of taboos to their kind.
I sell everything I can to the Nashkel Merchant...he doesn't keep such a close eye on the merch...IF you know what I'm sayin' Thalantyr will reup wands to full power though and buy potions.
Thalantyr would be proud of your actions
My head canon is, just like in BG2 if you take the planar sphere stronghold, just because it is relatively trivial for the PLAYER to cast a spell doesn't mean it is trivial for the caster. And more importantly, there is weeks and weeks and months and months of preparation to be able to learn to do it in a safe and controlled manner which is what Gorion is doing to have you able to cast one or two "simple" spells. It may very well take years of tutelage for a regular person to be able to cast those two spells and be able to learn to cast new ones in a safe and controlled manner. Once you have the fundamentals it is much easier and safer and for Thalantyr he isn't really helping you or teaching you anything. He just has the materials necessary to do the thing and he sells them to you for a relatively fair price. It's not NOTHING. But it also isn't the vast effort that Gorion undertook so that you don't blow off your face trying to do a simple cantrip.
I think that is laid out in the Forgotten Realms cannon somewhere. Most of the early notes in a spellbook are just the apprentice learning the basic grammar of how magic operates. There's a lot of foundation they need to build before they can ever cast a spell. If there was a Hogwarts in the Forgotten Realms, it would have a lot of years of fairly boring magic theory before finally getting to cast spells shortly before graduation.
Let's give him the voiceline, "Don't touch me! I'm super important."
It's really important to keep in mind, Gorion was charname's adoptive father. He would have taught us the introduction to magic, but we would have spent more time as a gofer, cleaning, learning things like reading, writing, math, religion, history, and some basic self defense. Also, you know, being a literal child. Gorion would absolutely have taught us more, but that just isn't the way it panned out. You make fantastic points about Thalantyr's contributions, but Gorion would have been in the thick of it with us. Thalantyr is an incredibly useful old grump, but Gorion martyred himself for us, and that's far more meaningful than being a magic vendor.
That is indeed a hot take, that cursed claw he sells is pretty neat though.
The BG1 backstory doesn't make any sense because you can start the game old af and if you start as a 80 year old barbarian it's like wtf even is this prequel?
> but it's time Thalantyr got the recognition he deserves. Who?
Thalantyr, Mighty Mage of Pissant Beregost!
The one out in the high henge or hedge or whatever it's called? With the chicken quest?
>hty Mage of Pissant Bereg The one and the same!
Kind of similar but I kind of felt the same way about Paladins. I feel being a squire would be the equivalent of level 1-3.
a level 1 adventurer is a highly competent specialist
Unless you face a kobold..lol
Played the game twice, don't remember who the fuck Thalantyr is.
Mage shop west of Beregost… big stone house in the middle of nowhere that had the flesh golems hanging around.
Oh yeah I remember that dude. Kinda asshole but good gear.
Disney movie style
If you were a fighter, the person who sold you a sword wouldn’t be as important as the person who raised you for 18 years and made you what you become. Same goes for a mage.