#astarion asks

[thelikesoffinn]

hi! Just found your blog, and your analysis of Astarion is so interesting and in depth, Iove it! I'm debating whether writing a story with a human monk Tav because I think that can be a fun play on opposites attract, where she's solemn and stoic, but weirdly funny and and ready to help those in trouble, so he warms to her slowly because where was she etc. now in my playthrough he got mind controlled by Nere, and attacked Tav. I can't put down how he would feel? My opinion is that he'd try to distance himself (approval was quite high by then) because he's reminded of cazador 's control and that he's more monster than man. Also, would it be realistic for him not to want tav to go to cazador because he's ashamed/afraid for her life at this point? Or is it too early in his healing for him to think like that? Sorry, long one, thank you!

Well hello there! Thank you so much, duck, I'm so so happy you enjoyed all my rambling! Really honestly, you chaps all have no idea how happy your enjoyment makes me ♥

First: Human Monk Tav x Astarion will definitely be glorious and I hope the muses bless your creative process! We all love a good slow burn opposite attracts romance, that's the good stuff. (And I'm so hyped someone else sees the humour in stoicism. That shit is genuinely funny and not enough people appreciate it, I'm calling it.)

Then, regarding the mind-control issue: Pew! That's really a pickle, because I think it definitely toes the line between what Astarion would want to do and what he is actually able to do.

Generally, I'd say Astarion is one to shy away from dealing with his problems head on - especially the problems he's caused himself because guilt is something our boy absolutely can't face. So I absolutely do believe there's some part of him that just wants to up and dust.

I don't think, however, that distancing himself is something Astarion would ever actually do for a multitude of reasons, really.

First off, and possibly most importantly: The nere-battle is still rather early in the story. That means Astarion is still very likely in survival mode, which means he is painfully aware of every dangerous thing around him.

So that means, he is acutely aware that he needs Tav and their group to survive which, in turn, means he needs Tav right there by his side because they're the only thing that stands between him and the rest of the group. He can be somewhat safe as long as Tav is there vouching for him, so he can't let anyone get in between them.

In order to achieve that, he has to stick close to Tav. Distance creates an opening that someone else could take and the minute someone else slides in, Astarion "knows" (i.e. believes) he's done for. So distancing himself is more dangerous than staying close to Tav, who may currently be miffed because he's attacked them.

Furthermore, Astarion is a master of minimsation. (Only where he is concearned, of course, he's all drama regarding everyone else.) And he's brilliant in blaming other people for things he does.

So instead of distancing himself, which could harm him more than it'd do good at this point, he's more likely to just shrug the whole thing off. He does so when he kills Tav while feeding and that was really entirely his fault, so in a situation like this? Where he can actually blame someone else, too??? Damn, that's easy pray for our pointy-toothed scoundrel. Time to down play the issue and turn up the sexy to make good old Tav forget he was a bad boy for a minute there!

I do agree, however, that being controlled like that is definitely difficult for Astarion because, as you said, it reminds him of how Cazador used him. The wounds are still extremely fresh at this point, to the point that even I as a social worker would hesitate to work on anything regarding that area of his life, because it could easily lead to a melt down. Sometimes people need to calm down and heal a bit before you can tackle specific topics in a good way, which is definitely the case here.

Regarding the last point: Difficult to say, to be honest, as I'm not 100% sure which time frame we're specifically looking at. If we're still around the same point in the story as before - the Nere part - I'd definitely say it's slightly too early for him to worry much about it. At this point he's only just getting more comfortable around Tav and it's still a while before anything close to a relationship happens. Right now, he wants to be free and he wants to be safe and that likely takes precedence.

The further we get in the story, the more likely it is that he'll have mixed feelings about bringing Tav anywhere near Cazador and his old "home". Facing down your abuser leaves you really vulnerable and, more importantly, there's a chance Tav might leave him after finding out about all of the things he's done. Of course he slowly learns to trust them, but I think we're all well aware that this will take time.

Before Tav, he was all alone for so so long. Nobody helped him, nobody stayed with him, nobody ever did anything for him. It will take a long time to unlearn that.

Puh, you said yours was long and here's me making it even longer! I'm sorry, duck, but I hope I answered all your questions! ♥

[meanbossart]

Midst a severe lapse of judgement, he has probably tried.

Once.

[thatratgo]

I love how they blindly trust the MC

[rookdaw]

[aleisters]

[lazylittledragon]

at the friday panel andrew wincott said raphael and astarion should go on holiday together and i can’t stop thinking about it

[ckot]

Q: Show me how you sort out the “inheritance” from Casador. His closet, for example.

So this is an answer for "Ask Baldurs Gate 3" fan project in vk app where i answer for Astarion :)

Added textless and one by one pics too just if you fancy 'em

[treevore]

i love u characters who are victims who don't show things in a way that's appealing i love u characters whos trauma leaves them with anger issues, with violence issues, with issues with connection and trust and being truthful i love you characters who don't get "better" in a way that's palatable, who don't find growth and meaning in their trauma

[awearywritersworld]

okay, what if the situation at moonrise towers was reversed?

the trader is a vampire and they offer you the potion to permanently increase your strength, but only if you let them feed from you.

astarion would try soooo hard not to let his emotions betray him. you haven't defined your relationship. the decision is yours to make. he's just using you, anyway...

but gods, does the thought of someone else's teeth in your neck make him sick to his stomach. no one else should be able to taste you, to hear the way your breath catches at the first draw of blood, to feel your hand grip their bicep if it gets to be too much.

you decline the offer, much to the pale elf's relief, and he finds himself in your tent that night. he joins you even before the other party members have gone to sleep for the evening.

his desperation quickly becomes apparent. he litters your neck with bites before moving to your chest, then your abdomen. he hardly even feeds, too busy marking what's his.

making his way back up your body, he laps at the blood he's spilled while the warmth of his breath fans across your delicate skin.

once he finds your lips, he leaves a lingering kiss there before pulling back. his expression is almost sheepish, though the sentiment is gone the very next moment.

he settles beside you wordlessly, opens a book, and pretends not to see the look on your face— knowing and amused.

bg3 masterlist

[anendtopursuit]

not to gush too much abt neil newbon's performance as astarion (and stephen rooney's writing for him) but like. he's discussed on streams before how conscious the decision to make him feel like he's constantly performing is (regardless of outcome; theatrical spawn astarion & operatic ascended astarion), and how stephen rooney leaned more into the whimsy and fun of the character based on things he saw in his portrayal (hence astarion progressively getting funnier and more charismatic through game development). but the thing that drives me absolutely mad tbh is the moments where all of it drops and he's suddenly so sincere, because it hits you like a truck to the face.

his voice going all soft and quiet and brittle when he describes cazador instructing his spawn to torture themselves. his mannerisms shifting from seductive and playful to a little more nervous. but the one that always gets me is in the graveyard romance scene, talking about what cazador has taken from him, how it was taken by force; "but he did take it," in this voice that's so full of sorrow that it almost sounds hollow, muffled by none of his usual pomp and theatricality, when even in cazador's palace his admissions of upset were sandwiched between attempts to brush it all off. dear god.

[thelikesoffinn]

no holding back you say alright. i shall try! and maybe i'll start with actually introducing my tav because. yeah. (spoiler, i absolutely did not hold back ☹️)

soooo my tav, let's name her vien because that's actually the name she introduces herself with is a simple, elven bard. on the surface she's nice to everyone, a great performer, singer, dancer, she's even quite good at archery! and she apparently can pick up a basic lock, but if you ask her why she can do that, she won't tell you, no. she gets excited over butterflies and pretty flowers! she adores weaving flowers into her long as hell twin braids. she's a high charisma girlie and yet sometimes she has her certified "1 charisma moment TM" and she just gets soo awkward it's embarrassing. and she likes giving gifts to people if she can. the more time you spend around her though, you'll notice that she can be kinda mean sometimes... or that her actions are sometimes fueled by "will it benefit me?", rather than "will it benefit everyone?" although yes, she can be persuaded! or that despite looking and (at times) acting like some noble lady, she actually has some survival instinct (don't let the vampire drink from your neck, touch the weird hand that sticks out of a weird portal with a long stick first in case it tries to drag you in...) and she knows how to hunt! in general, she really looks like this goody-two-shoes, all the honeyed words and literal poetry slipping past her lips because, of course she's a bard, oh wow, oh gods. and she's soo secretive about her past, the most she said that she came from a small, nice family and that her father is a monster hunter (monster hunter! really, can you believe that?) and... that's like, it. except vien and astarion actually share things in common!!

like i said, she's an elf and she was actually born in an elven village but one unfortunate day, her family got assaulted, her mother was killed and vien herself was kidnapped by some. asshole and kept as his... private entertainment for the guests, oh just sit prettily and play some music for us, maybe sing, maybe dance, say goodbye to your self-worth, sooorry. people were genuinely terrible to her at that time and she really was treated as just some entertaiment and nothing more than that, aaand she was stuck in this terrible situation for 25 years, hope to get out of it being killed every day, any disobedience punished and just ohhhh. it was very bad. but one day she... actually succeeded and ran away!! she knew that failure would probably end with her saying goodbye to the living, but luckily she didn't fail. this was her third try and the previous two obviously ended with um. failure. anyways. even though she was free, she was still a very young elf, in a place she basically didn't know, alone and on the run.

so for the three years she was just singing around in taverns for money or a place to sleep, flirting around with people because, well, she was taught that the greatest value was in her perfomances and body so.. that's what she stuck to. but she never slept with anyone because, well again, she was scared of it and after just soooo many years of hearing weird and creepy comments about herself, her view on intimacy and desire was just... ruined. but in the end she was found by some nice human couple that decided to help the poor girl, let her stay and they even started treating her like her daughter!! she finally found a safe place to relax and heal, no longer having to worry about whether she will survive the night or not. she started to genuinely enjoy singing, dancing and performing after she started doing it with the audience of no one, just for herself and it felt good! felt great! but she was still stuck with this mindset "oh, let people flirt with me and say whatever, i'll flirt back, promise them something to dream of tonight even though i completely hate it, i can't find it in myself to say no" but... hey, she was going somewhere with healing anyway! at least this much. and then two years later she got yoinked, tadpole'd and now stuck with a group of random weirdos in the middle of nowhere. how can you not love life.

AND WE'RE DONE WITH THE INTRODUCTION AUHGHGD i'm sorry it's so stupidly long </3 but i figured it would be better to... actually know what kind of character we are talking about, especially since she has some layers and just skimming over her backstory would do vien no justice. yeah! so yes, miss vien and astarion. she was the daughter of the village chief, he was a magistrate, both were held captive for many years as just simple slaves with no control over their own persons whatsoever, but vien– she actually got her freedom back, she was actually helped few times even durning those three years of wandering around! and she slowly got to re-learn how to enjoy life. steps, steps, i think she still got plenty of steps to do but it's alright, she got the time. and astarion didn't get any help unfortunately. i think she would actually be heartbroken to hear about cazador, i mean?? those 25 years were hell for her, she can hardly imagine 200 years! she wasn't even alive for half of it! but, oh, she obviously stays quiet about her own experiences because she founds... it embarrassing. to admit that for so long, she was treated as nothing but cheap intertaiment.

but i was thinking about how their relationship would go, right? i think the beginning would be a little rough honestly... i did say that she's nice, but at the very beginning i think she would be rather... nice enough to have people like her. she would put some distance, some safety net in case things go south, than nice-nice. though, vien isn't above witty or sassy comebacks if someone says something, and she's especially not above laughing to herself at people's comments, so maybe they would kinda get along... after some time. but also i absolutely still can see her flirting with astarion sometimes, not even realizing. a little messy. the party gets it only messier i can imagine!! the scene where astarion asks tav to sleep with him… vien wouldn't find it in herself to say yes so she, yes, will flirt with him for the next ten minutes with bad wine as her companion and, "yes i am refusing but it's not because i'm not into you, just… really in a forest 🥺 and after such terrible wine? 🥺 surely we can do better 🥺 obviously i am not saying no, don't take it like this, please. now excuse me as i go to my tent and silently panic because i disliked it, but also now i need a way to keep you interested in me because i actually started to genuinely enjoy your companionship 🥺", fast foward to now sticking around astarion, but also obviously flirting with him, but also being nice enough combined with actually falling for him, much to vien's absolute horror.

i think astarion would find it kinda frustrating… i mean, sure, it does seem like he's on her good side and stuff, but is he really? the moment they get too close, she runs away with a laugh like a wounded animal from its hunter, and yet she comes back anyway (it's because she's going through ten different inside conflicts at the same time, astarion, let the woman be!). his nice simple plan both worked and got kinda messed up. actually, i feel like astarion would be smart enough to sooner or later notice that there's something off about vien… sure, she has her way with words and knows how to act, how to perform but i feel like there's only this long a person can keep up a believable act while also dealing with the entire tadpole problem and with everything else. a matter of time, probably… really, under all this charisma and pretty words she's just a scared, young girl navigating through this mess of her own feelings, problems and whatever relationship it is.

also, a bit on a side note, but i do believe that vien would tell him about all the things she went through in the past! and i even know when! because i planned it but shhhh in my storyline there is a scene where the party gets ambushed by, surprise surprise, people of the man that kidnapped her years ago because, wow, turns out he still wanted her back, he was still very angry that she ran away and all the stuff. the companions emerge victorious, kinda bloodied but still. vien emerges bloodied and about to break down. and i feel like this would be the moment she tells him about it– because, well, it's not really like she has any other choices. she cries and only tells him about any details and it's a rather sad moment, obviously </3 this entire scene would probably be set sometime after his confession i think. mhm. but i also dunno exactly how astarion would react at this because i have yet to think of it :') although i do always accept any thoughts

anyways i just hit 1,6k words and. so sorry it got so long 😭😭😭 i actually didn't thought i'll write this much but here we are. i will end this here but… since i have some more thoughts about whatever these two have, i don't mind sending them later if you'd want to obv 🙏 i also sure hope things do make sense, there's quite a chance i forgot a detail or two or explained something not how i actually see it in my mind because i'm terrible at explaining!! but. yes. once again very sorry for the wall of text and if you have anything to say about it, then please do 🙏 and really don't feel pressured into replying to this mhm yeah. i shall now leave! have a good day/night <3

Hello there duck! Sorry for keeping you waiting for so long, it took me a while to get to this one.

First off: Your Tav sounds lovely! But I do see why you'd say that their relationship will be difficult at first and I do agree with you.

The thing is: Given her nature, she'll be hard to make sense of for anyone that isn't in her head. It will be hard to know where you stand with her, because of her tendency to be rather skittish and that is something that will likely not only frustrate Astarion, but scare him.

Astarion needs Tav. He needs Tav on his side to be safe. And to be safe, he needs to know where they stand.

He doesn't get that with Vien. So it will likely take him a lot longer to actually start to trust her, and he might keep giving her the good old side eye because, gods, what exactly is that woman scheming? Is there a hidden agenda he has yet to uncover? Why is she so skittish?

As for how he'd react to her story...well, once again entirely dependent on the setting.

Since it's after his confession, we know he's already somewhat mellowed towards her, so now we need to know if they're alone or if the others are with them. He'd likely not be soft if someone was watching since, as Sceleritas mentions, Tav is about the only one he trusts, the only one he isn't scared of.

If they're alone, however, he'd likely be a lot softer, warmer. But not a "let me hug your pain away, love" type of soft but rather a...I'll sit here and listen without judgement or force, because I get it.

I think I mentioned it in another ask, but shared trauma can create a sense of understanding where not everything needs to be discussed.

Not everything needs to be said. Sometimes, it is enough to just sit and listen and sometimes it's okay to plainly just sit.

He gets it. Vien gets it. They'll be fine either way.

I think that's already about all I can say, duck! You already seem to have put a metric fuck ton of thought into things, haha.

Have a lovely day! ❤️

[meanbossart]

Does Astarion like Drow better with the hair down or man bunned?

Sophie's freaking choice over here

[cheekylittlepupp]

So I got this little gift of my oc and Astarion together by @egooppidum and she allowed me to post it.. and all I can say is… ITS SO DAMN PRECIOUS 😭🤍

[ssalballoon]

would he wear silly bandz. discuss 🦕🌟🦋

[dumptruck]

tired of being edges so i said FINE, ill do it MYSELF 😤

[asspinkie]

durge accidentally double-booked the boys