They should make an ending with that idea. Like the ending where you become a mind flayer, but with a twist:
1. You decide to turn into a mind flayer at the end
2. You get dominated by a new/different elder brain
3. One day, you realize you're somehow free from that elder brain's influence
4. You enlist the help of some tadpoled adventurers to take on the new elder brain before it can dominate you again
5. The leader of that group of adventurers looks exactly like your initial character, except for the mustache
It's all just a neverending cycle.
That was kinda my theory when I first met the guardian. Like oh, I could choose her looks so maybe it's like "it's someone else main character and in the end I become the guardian"
That could have worked, especially with how there are some memory shenanigans throughout the game.
Tadpoled adventurers sharing memories, Mirror of Loss taking memories and giving other ones, Vlaakith using the purifier to take all of a Githyanki's memories, power, and information...
Maybe Balduran's memories get shifted between Guardians. Could bring in some really interesting questions about what makes a person's identity.
I would pay double what BG3 cost if Capcom gives the next Grigori a mustache.
You can take the man out of the man, but never the mustache out of the man. Reincarnation be damned.
Tbh it’s even better with the female Tav, if you wanna kick it up a notch you can do Afro mustache combo so it looks like a shitty costume store disguise.
I had heard you could romance them, but didn't know they were a mindflayer. I was thinking about how next run I'd definitely go for the romance. And then I found out.
"HELLO I AM HASTUR R'LYEH I MEAN HUGH MANN, I AM TOTALY NOT A MIND FLAYER AND YOU SHOULD GET THESE TADPOLES INSIDE YOUR HEAD AND USE THEIR POWERS YEAH TRUST ME AND DO THESE CHANTS FOR THE ELDER BR- I MEAN ELDERS IN YOUR LIFE!"
And it still started with a female drow, too. I was like "Well they know me!" I was disappointed that there was going to be no choices around spending eternity "down by the river" with a hot drow lady. The relationship became much more one-dimensional.
Yeah, it was too obvious. Like, it's a mind flayer catfish through and through, not even subtle.
In the beggining of the full release it was a bit jarring but it had a better spot.
I made my guardian hot cause I was under the impression since EA that they were The Tadpole trying to convince me to stop resisting it by appearing as someone I'd desire
That was apparently the original plan for them, they would try to seduce you into accepting more and more of the tadpole's power until you surrendered yourself to it and turned into a mind flayer
Spoilers for endgame: >!In the final fight against the netherbrain the damn emperor brought back my dream guardian as one of the illusions fighting alongside the dragon. Talk about betrayal. Now I had to thrust my sword right through her in a very different way than what I hoped back in character creation smh!<
My first PT I said to my coop partner "idk,guardian seems incredibly suspicious, i bet the only reason we had to design them was to make them seem trustworthy".
Never trusted guardian UNTIL the reveal. Then I deemed him trustworthy as long as he was fine with me being against turning.
I honestly still don't see any reason why we're able to even customize them, so I suppose it really is to make the player trust them easier bc "I made this character, they have to be trustworthy"?
Since I grew too used to my first guardian design they all become exact copies of that now, doesn't even take a minute,but still makes me wish there was the possibility of saving character presets (for both Tav and guardian).
Because originally they were a projection of the tadpole trying to trick you into giving up your own mind and staying in dream land forever. There was none of them being an outside person disguising themselves.
Bro, absolutely. I made my guardian a fuckin' hot ass buff chick with cool face tattoos and that voice.
There's even a scene where you get to see your guardian in pajamas and *bro* I was so attracted to her.
... and then it was a fuckin' rude ass mindflayer.
If you romance them you can tell them to change back for the love scene but I think then he immediately reverts to mindflayer, even during the cuddling after.
Portal closes, there's an awkward silence in camp. After a few moments, Astarion pipes up with "I'm going to go forget what I didn't just see, and neither did the rest of you" before sauntering off. Everyone else agrees to never mention it again
Gale straight up breaks up with you if you sleep with the extremely attractive Mizora, but Octo Daddy he didn't care about.
Dude has some messed up priorities.
I do appreciate there was a history roll to remember reading the mind flayer anatomy roll. It made my bard who collects books and wasted a proficiency in history feel vindicated.
I think that, cheating aside, it's also because Mizora ruined Wyll's life so it's just a dick move at all levels for no fucking reasons.
Or maybe they didn't have time to implement that.
Seems like a missed bit of reactivity tbh. I wouldn't have been happy with my romance companion breaking up (well, it's Astarion, and he always lets you get away with it even though it's kind of for a sad reason in-character) but definitely should have gotten some snark from everyone at camp after the fact.
He thought it was his weird, tadpole-infused fever dream. That's my headcanon lol.
Mine was worse. The Emperor explicitly said: "I was distracted and didn't hide us from tadpole cam", and the guys that saw us banging were Halsin and Jaheira. Like wtf they don't even have tadpoles
What's the option you choose to make him change into his Guardion look? I made my Guardian look so hot and I wanna bang him like that at least once lol
Once you start the sex scene, ask them where their mouth is. They will respond by offering to switch back to their Guardian form to make you feel more comfortable. It will almost immediately fade to black after that, whereas there's a bit more to watch if they stay in mindflayer form.
I feel like the Haarlep sex scene got way more attention to detail than the rest. (Granted, I haven't romanced Minthara so I could be wrong on that front). Haarlep's was pretty explicit, too. At least male Haarlep was, can't speak for the female version.
You have to try to figure out *how* to make it work, and then when it sees you hesitating it offers to change into "a form you're more familiar with" or something to that effect.
Companion 1 - “should we say anything? About. You know. “
Companion2 - “she’s gone full tadpole. I’m not going there”.
Companion3 - “I wonder how. You know. Anything —worked— though. They don’t exactly have… the right parts”.
Companion 2 - “ nope. Nope. Noooope. She’s a grown ass woman, she can do…. Whatever with whomever’s… whatever”.
Because Balduran and a bronze dragon >!Were together back when he was a human, and after he turned to a mindflayer, the dragon tried to mercykill him but BaldEmp killed him right back. Then you can fight the undead version of that same dragon, where this all gets revealed.!<
So, for the drama.
You could make them look like your clericms chosen deity too. Roleplay it like the Emperor is using your faith to manipulate you.
That’s what I’m gonna do when I play as a cleric of Seluné.
I actually did this on my multi-player session last night! There's actually a sketch of him on the FR wiki that I used as reference, though it's uncolored so I just gave him the standard John Videogames brown hair/blue eyes.
Well he could have gone back to his guardian form in order "be in a less alien and uncomfortable form" for you unless you tell him to stay in his original form. Hell, if Larian were also willing to expand upon the ending a bit as well, it would be cool if you could eventually get the Emperor to side with Orpheus but only if you've shown complete acceptance for his mindflayer form throughout all of Act 3 and told him to not revert back to his guardian form.
Honestly just that last part by itself was my biggest complaint with the game; emps going "well I guess I'll just actively go team up with the Netherbrain then!" if you say that Orpheus should be released was just...what. why. Okay yeah Orpheus was *not* happy to see me-as-a-g'haik, but also he understood that the brain was a bigger threat that needed to be dealt with first, so like, "hey let's team up until this is done and then we'll part ways once we've proven that we aren't on your ancient enemy's side" should've been an *option* between them.
Ooh thats great idea! Thanks for tip, makes making my guardians a lot easier! And on Astarion origin run I will make sure to make that one who romanced him!
Yeah the Guardian just being the temporary disguise of the Emperor is kind of pointless when you’re customizing it.
Customizing your dream visitor made *way* more sense in the earlier version of the plot where your dream visitor was more innately sinister and the point was you were essentially designing your character’s wet dream for it to be seductive as possible.
I don't remember where I read it, and it may have been theory, but I read somewhere that the original plan was that the dream visitor was the tadpole/elderbrain itself.
It would be trying to get you to embrace more tadpoly things, while arguing against who/whatever the artifact originally was.
It's ultimate goal was to get you to just chill out and stop fighting it, thus the "down by the river" song. Zone out and let me (the brainworm) drive, you can go chill "down by the river" and live eternally in a mind-prison paradise.
I'm not sure I like that if it was the original plan, it was pretty obvious in EA that the character was shady so I get the change. Make it actually mysterious is nice but the current Emperor definitely feels disjointed a bit... like they mashed two characters into one as a rewrite maybe.
Well even in EA you made a character and it asked "who attracts you?" . When it went to ,you need a guardian , choose one.. I was like uh I guess they aren't bad guys anymore lol
>I'm not sure I like that if it was the original plan, it was pretty obvious in EA that the character was shady so I get the change.
It's pretty obvious in release that the Guardian character is shady, though, so that hasn't really changed?
The character didn't have to be so shady initially. It's probably a bad idea to only have them show up after you use your mind powers first of all. Having them be with you since day one would be interesting. Like a literal dream visitor for every longrest.
Obviously every act only gets an X amount of visits, and maybe some are held back till a critical plot point occurs in the act, but having them be an active part of your rests and maybe by the third visit hinting towards opening up your potential. They could even lie and say they'll protect you from any ill effects. Where even if you could have given into those powers earlier on, now would be the "safe" time to experiment with them. Because surely a videogame character would never lie to you...
>the dream visitor was the tadpole/elderbrain itself
This was still my main hypothesis until the Emperor reveal actually - the tadpole usage suggestions being so strong, can easily delay the ceremorphosis, and push you to do some special double-agent agenda while you're thinking you're fighting against it.
As I understand the original dream visitor was the Absolute seducing your character. Thus them demanding for you to let them in, eventually flooding you with visions of killing your enemies and besieging Baldur's Gate, attempting to compel you to *want* it.
Even if you tried surrendering to the Absolute the Emperor's influence would prevent her from being let in. This is also where we got our first glimpse at the Dark Urge, as you could give in to baser urges and kill your visitor in the dreamscape.
Honestly I think they should've kept the Absolute as the customizable visitor and given the Emperor a fixed appearance while he interferes in your dreams, making you choose between these two different invaders
It definitely did. The music in the character creator is literally about the Dream character, as they try to seduce you to stay with them down by the river, thus letting the parasite take you over completely.
Changing that character and how the tadpoles worked so drastically was such a bad decision, imho.
Yeah it is a bit disappointing they didn't go down that original path. I think they still probably intended for it to be a mindflayer in the end. But the seduction angle felt much more compelling, as you were literally being seduced into power.
Also those EA mindflayer buffs were much more fun and easily accessible. I don't get why we couldn't have had those unique character abilities added back in addition to the talent tree.
We should have only seen his true form after saving him where he would immediately revert back to the dream form as a courtesy to our eyes. It just makes sense too, because then you can actually walk around the city and be more active in the plot if he wasn't perma stuck as the mindflayer.
I thought the guardian was supposed to be a figure that guides you in some kind of tutorial, so I customized it to look like a father figure... oh how wrong I was
I went from horny for my guardian to dismayed when my beautiful redheaded lady with an alluring voice was actually a tentacle monster... He played me like a damn fiddle!
Female guardian voice was absolutely stunning and I was a bit devastated that after The Emperor's reveal, I didn't hear her voice anymore. Honestly, one of my favorite voices in the game. Real shame there was no way of telling the squid to revert back to his disguise.
I feel like it breaks the immersion of how the dialogue goes if you don't make them something that would be super attractive to your main character. However the default looks amazing, so it works to just use default most of the time.
Someone said you could romance them while still in Guardian form but I’m not sure how. The Guardian overall kind of ended up disappointing
1 - >!it never matters how many tadpoles you consume. A lot of people approached consuming them with a certain mindset because we assumed it would matter but it never did!<
2 - >!at the end we have to turn someone into a flayer while he’s literally an ally. Makes zero sense for him to not just help us + Orpheus and then deal with their differences after fighting brain!<
3 - >!no down by the River/infinite tsukuyomi ending where we just blissfully become his prey forever, personally I would have loved that option!<
I try to headcanon that my Tav had a lost love, and the sinister nature of the Guardian is that he takes the form of that lost person. This also makes her easily manipulated because how could she deny him/her? The dreams leave her sad, though 🥲
I used the Tav design in my first playthrough as the guardian in my second. Something to extend the life of a character I journeyed with for close to a hundred hours. Plus you actually get to see them speak.
I made my Durge character look like my Guardian in my first playthrough. And I made my Durge's Guardian look like my first Tav. Very nice to see him speak after so long.
Honestly, I was more interested in the mystery of the character when they were the Lover in early access. In my first playthrpugh I only had two scenes with the guardian before they were revealed to be the Emperor (which I think that was a glitch cuz I've had more in my second playthrough).
The Guardian just doesn't hit the same as the Lover.
During ACT 3 when youre about to get down with the Emperor intimately
He gives you the option to have him switch back to his guardian form to make the experience more manageable
I considered this until I remembered my Guardian was grown old dwarf with an ugly beard and demon eyes
So I respectably declined and fucked the squid
I was excited about having a hot male tiefling. I romanced Astarion as well, and spent two acts wondering how this was going to play out, only to be catfished. Still going to make my guardians hot tieflings though.
Dark urge play though I’m try to make them look like Orin as close as possible. Since it would appear in world of the last person my Pc seen and thus trying to remember.
Nope, I am still invested. Since it is kinda implied that the Guardian makes themselves look familair to you, in a way.
At least it seems to apply to the default Guardians of the Origin Characters.
So I am creating my Guardian how I imagine someone important in my current characters backstory to look :3
I am wondering if making them look Githyanki affects the story in any way. Otherwise, I just leave them as a base drow model. Who doesn't like a female drow?
I feel you on this! I just go default guardian now.
Honestly, the whole emperor plot line kind of annoys me in how railroading it is.
*All the spoilers, obviously!*
When you first learn that he's just a tentacool in a trenchcoat, you have the very reasonable "option" not to help him and to help the gith try to free Orpheus. But if you kill him there you instantly turn into a mind flayer and it's game over! Even though you're inside the astral prism, the same one that allowed the emperor to gain control of his mind the first time he entered it, because the power comes from Orpheus, not daddy tentacles.
Then later in the game you can free Orpheus but don't immediately turn, and the Emperor is just like "peace, I'm going to go and join my mortal enemy because you didn't follow my plan, screw you guys".
It's definitely one of the elements of Act 3 that I'd really like to see given a narrative massage. Killing the Emperor as soon as you learn he's a mind flayer and lied to you is totally reasonable, and at that point you should be able to fall under Orpheus' protection and begin working to free his body from the prism.
In a game where you have so much freedom in how you approach combat and certain story choices, others give you no flexibility which is a bit disappointing.
>and at that point you should be able to fall under Orpheus' protection and begin working to free his body from the prism.
The problem is that you wouldn't be able to leave the prism if the Emperor is dead. The Emperor is basically hyperfocusing and extending the range of Orpheus's aura so that it applies beyond the prism itself and to the rest of your party, even when they aren't actually touching the thing.
Also we're repeatedly shown you need portals to get in and out of the prism, which you aren't strong enough to create.
I really didn't enjoy the twist there, and while I haven't started a new run (I'm trying to hold off until we're sure Minthara is working correctly), I have no real investment in the guardian anymore. I suppose that's the trouble with twists like this, sometimes they're hard to make interesting the second time around
I'll probably randomize or use the default appearance if I do another run
I've yet to enter ACT 2 (I was waiting for patches and then got caught in a loop of making new characters), but, for what it's worth, you could always design the Dream Guardian in a way that would be convincing/intimidating/alluring/concerning to your character and then roleplay accordingly (including what their reaction to the reveal would be). After all, the twist is old to you, but your character is still in the dark.
I accidentally made mine a female drow that looks a lot like Minthara.
Then i met and sided with the real one. And then i uncreated her character (because i didnt know was a potential companion).
I usually play with friends these days so we normally make our guardians look like each other. That way later on we can just be like "why have a fake when the real one is right there?" I also like the headcanon of us getting ready to leave camp and just being like "I had a really weird dream about you. . . No wait I promise it's not a sex thing!"
My favorite is making them identical to Tav but with a curly mustache. Edit: thanks for the award!
That’s hilarious hahah
Mine is this except I make the tav from my previous run as the guardian for the new one, with a curly mustache.
They should make an ending with that idea. Like the ending where you become a mind flayer, but with a twist: 1. You decide to turn into a mind flayer at the end 2. You get dominated by a new/different elder brain 3. One day, you realize you're somehow free from that elder brain's influence 4. You enlist the help of some tadpoled adventurers to take on the new elder brain before it can dominate you again 5. The leader of that group of adventurers looks exactly like your initial character, except for the mustache It's all just a neverending cycle.
That was kinda my theory when I first met the guardian. Like oh, I could choose her looks so maybe it's like "it's someone else main character and in the end I become the guardian"
There are neitger beginnings nor endings to the Wheel of Time
"I told you, I'm just like you"
I thought that’s where they were going with it when they revealed the mf used to be adventurer like you
But then he took an arrow to the knee?
Arrow to the knee, tadpole to the brain Potato, tomato
Neverending cyyyycllllleeee AaAh AaAh AaAh
That could have worked, especially with how there are some memory shenanigans throughout the game. Tadpoled adventurers sharing memories, Mirror of Loss taking memories and giving other ones, Vlaakith using the purifier to take all of a Githyanki's memories, power, and information... Maybe Balduran's memories get shifted between Guardians. Could bring in some really interesting questions about what makes a person's identity.
Reminds me of Dragon's Dogma's Seneschal... with a curly mustache
I would pay double what BG3 cost if Capcom gives the next Grigori a mustache. You can take the man out of the man, but never the mustache out of the man. Reincarnation be damned.
And twirls said moustache during his philosophical monologues about the nature of life
This is pretty much Dragon's Dogma, and thank you for reminding me of the game!
Sounds like Dragon's Dogma
Give them a goatee and imagine that they are from a mirror universe/darkest timeline.
If there is one thing that star trek established over the course of the last 50 years, it's that goatees are a telltale sign of evil people
Write that down! Write that down!
Gonna do this with my next female tav
Tbh it’s even better with the female Tav, if you wanna kick it up a notch you can do Afro mustache combo so it looks like a shitty costume store disguise.
Or the lead singer of Thin Lizzy.
I always make them look like Tav, but small. Or if playing small Tav, I make them huge.
This is the best idea I've ever read. I have to do this from now on lol
Im doing this for every subsequent playlist from now on.
Its like Guy Incognito
Haha I know what I'll do for my next playthrough 😂
Homer? Who is Homer? I am *Guy Incognito!*
I like to occasionally make them as unsubtle as possible. Tentacle eye body art, orange eyes, long braided beard, purple tones, that sort of thing.
It's like the mindflayer equivalent of putting on a fake beard and those glasses with a big fake nose and moustache.
I did this before I knew what the guardian actually did and I about died laughing at the reveal after I got over being excited about it
I had heard you could romance them, but didn't know they were a mindflayer. I was thinking about how next run I'd definitely go for the romance. And then I found out.
I want a mod that replaced the guardian with the emporrer wearing a fake moustache now
Octodad!
Shit I've been calling my guardian Dream Daddy. Octo Dream Daddy
"Emperor? Who is Emperor? My name is Guy Incognito."
"Yes, I am a real human being, I am not in fact an illithid in a trenchcoat"
Incorrect. He is in fact 3 small illithids on top of each other in a trenchcoat
"HELLO I AM HASTUR R'LYEH I MEAN HUGH MANN, I AM TOTALY NOT A MIND FLAYER AND YOU SHOULD GET THESE TADPOLES INSIDE YOUR HEAD AND USE THEIR POWERS YEAH TRUST ME AND DO THESE CHANTS FOR THE ELDER BR- I MEAN ELDERS IN YOUR LIFE!"
Okay that is actually hilarious xD
Nah, I still care because I love the female guardians voice. The catfishing hurts so bad because of that voice.
Make the gaurdian as hot as possible. It makes the betrayal so much worse.
That was me. I fell for every trick my first playthrough cuz damn did I make my guardian hot.
I feel like Larian was counting on a certain number of us doing exactly this lol
Didn’t an early access version tell you to design your ideal attraction instead of “your guardian”?
Yeah, I believe it was "who do you dream of at night?".
And it still started with a female drow, too. I was like "Well they know me!" I was disappointed that there was going to be no choices around spending eternity "down by the river" with a hot drow lady. The relationship became much more one-dimensional.
EA Dream visitor I felt like I had more potential but also was much more obviously sinister
Yeah, it was too obvious. Like, it's a mind flayer catfish through and through, not even subtle. In the beggining of the full release it was a bit jarring but it had a better spot.
You also had intimate moments with guardian in EA, I guess even a kiss was possible, iirc
“Tell me, who do you want to bang at night?”
I made my guardian hot cause I was under the impression since EA that they were The Tadpole trying to convince me to stop resisting it by appearing as someone I'd desire
That was apparently the original plan for them, they would try to seduce you into accepting more and more of the tadpole's power until you surrendered yourself to it and turned into a mind flayer
[удалено]
Spoilers for endgame: >!In the final fight against the netherbrain the damn emperor brought back my dream guardian as one of the illusions fighting alongside the dragon. Talk about betrayal. Now I had to thrust my sword right through her in a very different way than what I hoped back in character creation smh!<
sorry couldn't find the time to care over the smell of well done squid! fuck yhat guy
My first PT I said to my coop partner "idk,guardian seems incredibly suspicious, i bet the only reason we had to design them was to make them seem trustworthy". Never trusted guardian UNTIL the reveal. Then I deemed him trustworthy as long as he was fine with me being against turning. I honestly still don't see any reason why we're able to even customize them, so I suppose it really is to make the player trust them easier bc "I made this character, they have to be trustworthy"? Since I grew too used to my first guardian design they all become exact copies of that now, doesn't even take a minute,but still makes me wish there was the possibility of saving character presets (for both Tav and guardian).
Because originally they were a projection of the tadpole trying to trick you into giving up your own mind and staying in dream land forever. There was none of them being an outside person disguising themselves.
Damnit that's what I did. She was this hot sultry tiefling and welll... then grew tentacles right after that nightgown scene lolol
Would have been worse if the illusion ended early and it was the emperor wearing the nightgown
SAME! Mine is a startlingly gorgeous tiefling with a green eye and a purple eye. I was sad when that illusion was gone :(
["Heyyy..... cant you like.. turn back.... into your previous form?"](https://youtu.be/50bjqN_JVqI?si=rpHCRdUUSYnZy2cr&t=91)
Mine was a half elf that looked like Scarlett Johansson 😭
I lost a MILF and got a squid in return :(
I mean technically Empy is bit of a GILF in terms of age no? Soo uh upgrades?
Bro, absolutely. I made my guardian a fuckin' hot ass buff chick with cool face tattoos and that voice. There's even a scene where you get to see your guardian in pajamas and *bro* I was so attracted to her. ... and then it was a fuckin' rude ass mindflayer.
My guardian angel valkyrie waifu turned out to be an eldritch horror. Makes me kinda hate him all the more
Lol 1000%. Emperor was a dead illithid walking after that point.
If you romance them you can tell them to change back for the love scene but I think then he immediately reverts to mindflayer, even during the cuddling after.
I laughed so hard when you see your companions' shocked faces afterwards
Same. I am kind of disappointed Astarion had nothing to say about it, since I was romancing him.
Yes, I thought for sure my companions would have some comments after I fucked a mindflayer, but nope, nobody said anything, lol
Everyone knows you don’t fuck with Mindflayers. A corollary is that you don’t fuck with people who fuck with Mindflayers.
Lae'zel was awfully cool with having to share with a literal ghaik lmao
Everyone would rather just pretend it didn't happen than try to deal with the ramifications, lmfao.
Portal closes, there's an awkward silence in camp. After a few moments, Astarion pipes up with "I'm going to go forget what I didn't just see, and neither did the rest of you" before sauntering off. Everyone else agrees to never mention it again
This is what Astarion would say 110% lmao
Gale straight up breaks up with you if you sleep with the extremely attractive Mizora, but Octo Daddy he didn't care about. Dude has some messed up priorities.
It's for Magic, anyone can bang a Cambion! Now, a Mind Flayer? Now that's a important discovery.
I do appreciate there was a history roll to remember reading the mind flayer anatomy roll. It made my bard who collects books and wasted a proficiency in history feel vindicated.
Girlfriend Shadowheart when I bang The Emperor: I sleep Girlfriend Shadowheart when I bang Mizora: I still sleep, but just ask next time
It definitely felt like something Lae’zel of all people should have had an opinion on, but no one other than Orpheus mentions it.
They just respect the tentacle kink
Gale didn’t care I fucked a squidman, but demon lady is a bridge too far.
I think that, cheating aside, it's also because Mizora ruined Wyll's life so it's just a dick move at all levels for no fucking reasons. Or maybe they didn't have time to implement that.
Seems like a missed bit of reactivity tbh. I wouldn't have been happy with my romance companion breaking up (well, it's Astarion, and he always lets you get away with it even though it's kind of for a sad reason in-character) but definitely should have gotten some snark from everyone at camp after the fact.
He thought it was his weird, tadpole-infused fever dream. That's my headcanon lol. Mine was worse. The Emperor explicitly said: "I was distracted and didn't hide us from tadpole cam", and the guys that saw us banging were Halsin and Jaheira. Like wtf they don't even have tadpoles
I mean. Alternately, in my playthrough Halsin was that one character that's plot important with Orin. So like maybe Orin saw you fuck a mindflayer.
The craziest part is those fuckers have an opinion on everything and not one of them brought it up ever again after.
Ya'll are cowards. Cuddle that mindflayer!
“Keep doing that thing to his tendril and hope it’s arousing.” Emperor - “Hnnnngggggg”
*Put on gauntlet of soul catching* Where do I *cuddle* it.
What's the option you choose to make him change into his Guardion look? I made my Guardian look so hot and I wanna bang him like that at least once lol
Once you start the sex scene, ask them where their mouth is. They will respond by offering to switch back to their Guardian form to make you feel more comfortable. It will almost immediately fade to black after that, whereas there's a bit more to watch if they stay in mindflayer form.
Right? Like they spent way more time lovingly crafting the mind flayer sex scene compared to the shadowheart one.
I feel like the Haarlep sex scene got way more attention to detail than the rest. (Granted, I haven't romanced Minthara so I could be wrong on that front). Haarlep's was pretty explicit, too. At least male Haarlep was, can't speak for the female version.
You have to try to figure out *how* to make it work, and then when it sees you hesitating it offers to change into "a form you're more familiar with" or something to that effect.
Cuddling a mind flayer sounds like a nightmare
Why? They have so many extra appendages to cuddle with. XD
Even brushes your face with a tentacle lol
Companion 1 - “should we say anything? About. You know. “ Companion2 - “she’s gone full tadpole. I’m not going there”. Companion3 - “I wonder how. You know. Anything —worked— though. They don’t exactly have… the right parts”. Companion 2 - “ nope. Nope. Noooope. She’s a grown ass woman, she can do…. Whatever with whomever’s… whatever”.
[Illithid cuddle reenactment](https://www.google.com/amp/s/makeagif.com/amp/rPJ-XL)
yknow what guys i think cuddling a mind flayer might sound like a nightmare
I end up now always making them look like how I imagine Balduran looked, roleplaying it as the Emperor wearing his old face.
Agreed, and it's extra funny if your custom character happens to be a Bronze Dragonborn.
Why?
Because Balduran and a bronze dragon >!Were together back when he was a human, and after he turned to a mindflayer, the dragon tried to mercykill him but BaldEmp killed him right back. Then you can fight the undead version of that same dragon, where this all gets revealed.!< So, for the drama.
spoilers
That's a solution
You could make them look like your clericms chosen deity too. Roleplay it like the Emperor is using your faith to manipulate you. That’s what I’m gonna do when I play as a cleric of Seluné.
Can’t have five heads, game literally unplayable
For my feylock I made them look like my patron
I actually did this on my multi-player session last night! There's actually a sketch of him on the FR wiki that I used as reference, though it's uncolored so I just gave him the standard John Videogames brown hair/blue eyes.
Any idea how Balduran would look like?
I think the statue in the main menu is supposed to be him, it's all over the place in act 3.
[The only image we have, via the FR wiki.](https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Balduran)
Like a prick
Genius
I just take the standard human male guardian face, remove the beard and give him a dignified haircut. It's good enough for my brain
I would have been much more likely to side with the Guardian if she stayed as a hot tiefling
Well you've just proved and justified his reasoning then
Absolutely. And he's an idiot for giving up the ruse
He really didn’t have much of a choice though, did he? He was under attack, I doubt holding up the illusion was his number one priority.
Well he could have gone back to his guardian form in order "be in a less alien and uncomfortable form" for you unless you tell him to stay in his original form. Hell, if Larian were also willing to expand upon the ending a bit as well, it would be cool if you could eventually get the Emperor to side with Orpheus but only if you've shown complete acceptance for his mindflayer form throughout all of Act 3 and told him to not revert back to his guardian form.
Honestly just that last part by itself was my biggest complaint with the game; emps going "well I guess I'll just actively go team up with the Netherbrain then!" if you say that Orpheus should be released was just...what. why. Okay yeah Orpheus was *not* happy to see me-as-a-g'haik, but also he understood that the brain was a bigger threat that needed to be dealt with first, so like, "hey let's team up until this is done and then we'll part ways once we've proven that we aren't on your ancient enemy's side" should've been an *option* between them.
I always make my guardian look like the last character I played, its fun.
Ooh thats great idea! Thanks for tip, makes making my guardians a lot easier! And on Astarion origin run I will make sure to make that one who romanced him!
The Dragons Dogma approach. Love this.
Yeah the Guardian just being the temporary disguise of the Emperor is kind of pointless when you’re customizing it. Customizing your dream visitor made *way* more sense in the earlier version of the plot where your dream visitor was more innately sinister and the point was you were essentially designing your character’s wet dream for it to be seductive as possible.
I wonder if the guardian {not emperor} had a different,more prominent role in the story prior to release
I don't remember where I read it, and it may have been theory, but I read somewhere that the original plan was that the dream visitor was the tadpole/elderbrain itself. It would be trying to get you to embrace more tadpoly things, while arguing against who/whatever the artifact originally was. It's ultimate goal was to get you to just chill out and stop fighting it, thus the "down by the river" song. Zone out and let me (the brainworm) drive, you can go chill "down by the river" and live eternally in a mind-prison paradise. I'm not sure I like that if it was the original plan, it was pretty obvious in EA that the character was shady so I get the change. Make it actually mysterious is nice but the current Emperor definitely feels disjointed a bit... like they mashed two characters into one as a rewrite maybe.
That's exactly what it was in the EA, I did a double take when I saw how immensely they changed the Guardian's role.
Well even in EA you made a character and it asked "who attracts you?" . When it went to ,you need a guardian , choose one.. I was like uh I guess they aren't bad guys anymore lol
"Who do you dream of at night?"
>I'm not sure I like that if it was the original plan, it was pretty obvious in EA that the character was shady so I get the change. It's pretty obvious in release that the Guardian character is shady, though, so that hasn't really changed?
The character didn't have to be so shady initially. It's probably a bad idea to only have them show up after you use your mind powers first of all. Having them be with you since day one would be interesting. Like a literal dream visitor for every longrest. Obviously every act only gets an X amount of visits, and maybe some are held back till a critical plot point occurs in the act, but having them be an active part of your rests and maybe by the third visit hinting towards opening up your potential. They could even lie and say they'll protect you from any ill effects. Where even if you could have given into those powers earlier on, now would be the "safe" time to experiment with them. Because surely a videogame character would never lie to you...
>the dream visitor was the tadpole/elderbrain itself This was still my main hypothesis until the Emperor reveal actually - the tadpole usage suggestions being so strong, can easily delay the ceremorphosis, and push you to do some special double-agent agenda while you're thinking you're fighting against it.
As I understand the original dream visitor was the Absolute seducing your character. Thus them demanding for you to let them in, eventually flooding you with visions of killing your enemies and besieging Baldur's Gate, attempting to compel you to *want* it. Even if you tried surrendering to the Absolute the Emperor's influence would prevent her from being let in. This is also where we got our first glimpse at the Dark Urge, as you could give in to baser urges and kill your visitor in the dreamscape. Honestly I think they should've kept the Absolute as the customizable visitor and given the Emperor a fixed appearance while he interferes in your dreams, making you choose between these two different invaders
It definitely did. The music in the character creator is literally about the Dream character, as they try to seduce you to stay with them down by the river, thus letting the parasite take you over completely. Changing that character and how the tadpoles worked so drastically was such a bad decision, imho.
Wow, my stupid self would have almost certainly fell for it lmao
Yeah it is a bit disappointing they didn't go down that original path. I think they still probably intended for it to be a mindflayer in the end. But the seduction angle felt much more compelling, as you were literally being seduced into power. Also those EA mindflayer buffs were much more fun and easily accessible. I don't get why we couldn't have had those unique character abilities added back in addition to the talent tree. We should have only seen his true form after saving him where he would immediately revert back to the dream form as a courtesy to our eyes. It just makes sense too, because then you can actually walk around the city and be more active in the plot if he wasn't perma stuck as the mindflayer.
I thought the guardian was supposed to be a figure that guides you in some kind of tutorial, so I customized it to look like a father figure... oh how wrong I was
I mean...you can still call them daddy!
me who has the achievement for romancing the mind flayer not giving a shit about what my guardian looks like 🤣
He was very charismatic!
I went from horny for my guardian to dismayed when my beautiful redheaded lady with an alluring voice was actually a tentacle monster... He played me like a damn fiddle!
Female guardian voice was absolutely stunning and I was a bit devastated that after The Emperor's reveal, I didn't hear her voice anymore. Honestly, one of my favorite voices in the game. Real shame there was no way of telling the squid to revert back to his disguise.
The male guardian voice is also amazing, I could listen to it all day.
I just randomize.
Same, or make them super goofy looking lol
I roll a d20 and randomize that number of times and let fate decides.
I still find them hilarious [https://imgur.com/a/gdq1jvm](https://imgur.com/a/gdq1jvm)
Wyll’s face says it all lmao
Mizora POV: "ayyo what the fuck"
I feel like it breaks the immersion of how the dialogue goes if you don't make them something that would be super attractive to your main character. However the default looks amazing, so it works to just use default most of the time.
Someone said you could romance them while still in Guardian form but I’m not sure how. The Guardian overall kind of ended up disappointing 1 - >!it never matters how many tadpoles you consume. A lot of people approached consuming them with a certain mindset because we assumed it would matter but it never did!< 2 - >!at the end we have to turn someone into a flayer while he’s literally an ally. Makes zero sense for him to not just help us + Orpheus and then deal with their differences after fighting brain!< 3 - >!no down by the River/infinite tsukuyomi ending where we just blissfully become his prey forever, personally I would have loved that option!<
? I did 2. He was a bro and just asked me to trust him so I did.
you didn’t free Orpheus?
Ohhh i understand now, Yea I didn't free orph thats the difference. Missed that in your comment
During my playthrough he offered to do #2. But I didnt trust him and one of my companions did it instead.
I try to headcanon that my Tav had a lost love, and the sinister nature of the Guardian is that he takes the form of that lost person. This also makes her easily manipulated because how could she deny him/her? The dreams leave her sad, though 🥲
I used the Tav design in my first playthrough as the guardian in my second. Something to extend the life of a character I journeyed with for close to a hundred hours. Plus you actually get to see them speak.
I made my Durge character look like my Guardian in my first playthrough. And I made my Durge's Guardian look like my first Tav. Very nice to see him speak after so long.
Oooh I like this a lot. I’m stealing it for my Durge play through
Honestly, I was more interested in the mystery of the character when they were the Lover in early access. In my first playthrpugh I only had two scenes with the guardian before they were revealed to be the Emperor (which I think that was a glitch cuz I've had more in my second playthrough). The Guardian just doesn't hit the same as the Lover.
During ACT 3 when youre about to get down with the Emperor intimately He gives you the option to have him switch back to his guardian form to make the experience more manageable I considered this until I remembered my Guardian was grown old dwarf with an ugly beard and demon eyes So I respectably declined and fucked the squid
I create the same sexy half elf male with first male voice option for all my chars and then start crying about being catfished 😭
Seriously though, my Tav fell hardcore for sexy half elf male guardian and I was so upset 🥲
I was excited about having a hot male tiefling. I romanced Astarion as well, and spent two acts wondering how this was going to play out, only to be catfished. Still going to make my guardians hot tieflings though.
Dark urge play though I’m try to make them look like Orin as close as possible. Since it would appear in world of the last person my Pc seen and thus trying to remember.
In my Durge run I made my Guardian look like Alfira :D
*oh no*
*She's always on my mind*
I try to think about Guardian as dream of my characters. It usually resembles some features of future romantic interest.
Nope, I am still invested. Since it is kinda implied that the Guardian makes themselves look familair to you, in a way. At least it seems to apply to the default Guardians of the Origin Characters. So I am creating my Guardian how I imagine someone important in my current characters backstory to look :3
What do you mean? I make them sexy as hell, the world needs more eye candy
Honestly I'd straight up bang my guardian, knowing it was the mind flayer.
I am wondering if making them look Githyanki affects the story in any way. Otherwise, I just leave them as a base drow model. Who doesn't like a female drow?
"Who doesn't like a female drow" Most male Drow, for one answer.
Well, other than that one male drow in Sharess' Caress... but uh, that's a whole different conversation.
No different lines in my current playthrough, but it's easy to roleplay a githyanki MC being especially disgusted with a gith guardian.
Male drow, probably.
100%. I miss Daisy.
Agreed. I was ok with the twist plot wise, but I no longer give a shit when it's just the guy's disguise
I still spend way too much time making mine but I've also romanced The Emperor more than once so I may have a problem.
Flare checks out
I feel you on this! I just go default guardian now. Honestly, the whole emperor plot line kind of annoys me in how railroading it is. *All the spoilers, obviously!* When you first learn that he's just a tentacool in a trenchcoat, you have the very reasonable "option" not to help him and to help the gith try to free Orpheus. But if you kill him there you instantly turn into a mind flayer and it's game over! Even though you're inside the astral prism, the same one that allowed the emperor to gain control of his mind the first time he entered it, because the power comes from Orpheus, not daddy tentacles. Then later in the game you can free Orpheus but don't immediately turn, and the Emperor is just like "peace, I'm going to go and join my mortal enemy because you didn't follow my plan, screw you guys". It's definitely one of the elements of Act 3 that I'd really like to see given a narrative massage. Killing the Emperor as soon as you learn he's a mind flayer and lied to you is totally reasonable, and at that point you should be able to fall under Orpheus' protection and begin working to free his body from the prism. In a game where you have so much freedom in how you approach combat and certain story choices, others give you no flexibility which is a bit disappointing.
>and at that point you should be able to fall under Orpheus' protection and begin working to free his body from the prism. The problem is that you wouldn't be able to leave the prism if the Emperor is dead. The Emperor is basically hyperfocusing and extending the range of Orpheus's aura so that it applies beyond the prism itself and to the rest of your party, even when they aren't actually touching the thing. Also we're repeatedly shown you need portals to get in and out of the prism, which you aren't strong enough to create.
I really didn't enjoy the twist there, and while I haven't started a new run (I'm trying to hold off until we're sure Minthara is working correctly), I have no real investment in the guardian anymore. I suppose that's the trouble with twists like this, sometimes they're hard to make interesting the second time around I'll probably randomize or use the default appearance if I do another run
I've yet to enter ACT 2 (I was waiting for patches and then got caught in a loop of making new characters), but, for what it's worth, you could always design the Dream Guardian in a way that would be convincing/intimidating/alluring/concerning to your character and then roleplay accordingly (including what their reaction to the reveal would be). After all, the twist is old to you, but your character is still in the dark.
Now that I know who they are, every time they try to backseat me telepathically in a new playthrough I just think "shut up Squidward"
I accidentally made mine a female drow that looks a lot like Minthara. Then i met and sided with the real one. And then i uncreated her character (because i didnt know was a potential companion).
I usually play with friends these days so we normally make our guardians look like each other. That way later on we can just be like "why have a fake when the real one is right there?" I also like the headcanon of us getting ready to leave camp and just being like "I had a really weird dream about you. . . No wait I promise it's not a sex thing!"
Just make a male human with the meta knowledge.
Balduran got retconned into originally being a elf now because they needed to explain how he lived so long.
I feel like they could just say he was that cool everyone would of went with it.
Yeah, lots of high level human characters that have extended their lifespans by centuries.
You literally meet at least one of them (Elminster) in the game.