#Baldur's Gate 3

[mlarty]

The Devil's Garden 🌹 🩸 will he paint them red?

[inquissien]

A kitten at heart

[hell-alka]

"On your knees… darling" finally I can show my art for Astarion zine >///<

[sunsetagain]

RE8 X BG3 🦇Karlach Dimitrescu & 🐴Astarion Heisenberg

[ribbonentrails]

it's too dangerous to go alone take this~

[basketobread]

place your votes, chat

[bolognamayhem117]

Hot Take: Astarion does NOT hate flowers. You just missed a few subtle hints through Act 1 and early Act 3.

Astarion's negativity is directed toward just about anything remotely pleasant as you move through early act three, starting the moment you leave Wyrm's Rock. First thing after Gortash's coronation he marvels near tears at the colors of the city in daylight. If you ask if he's alright, it pisses him off.

There's other instances I can't quite remember but he's a straight crank throughout early Act 3 and it took me several hours of gameplay to have a lightbulb moment about his newly crappier attitude.

He just spent the last two hundred years seeing everything in the overwhelmingly warm dim tones of indoor lighting via sconces, rushlights, and braziers, or the dingy blue gray of moonlight outside. Daylight colors are something he had more than a lifetime to forget and now that he has a chance to remember that vibrancy in his own home town, he knows he's going to have to forget it all over again either by death or by remaining a vampire spawn forever. The worm isn't going to live rent free in his head forever, and killing Cazador to ascend in his place likely feels like an insurmountable and impossible fight against a literal titan who could stomp him flat without a corm of effort.

He doesn't hate flowers, he hates EVERYTHING right now because it's all going away very soon and if he convinces himself he hates everything then he won't miss it when it's all gone again. He was denied this for two hundred years and he's PISSED at what was stolen from him and PISSED it's all going away again.

He behaved similarly in Act 1 about anyone besides him enjoying physical intimacy. Some of this content was cut, to my best knowledge, but the overwhelming majority of his dialog addressing the PC romancing anyone but him are negative or backhanded. This is for two reasons, I think. A: his Simple Plan just dissolved right before his eyes when you chose someone else which in his mind means he has zero safety net, and EVERYONE gets to enjoy sex (key wording being ENJOY, not simply having) except him... And it pisses him off.

He also gleefully interrupts the bug bear and the ogress, I think for the same reason as the above paragraph, being: If he doesn't get to enjoy intimacy neither do they.

He reacts with anger and disgust at anything he's being unfairly denied. Which... That's fair. His feelings are valid, but his reaction to it is pretty shitty and meanspirited.

The other companions I tend to keep in my party, (that is Lae'zel, Halsin, Karlach, and Wyll) however, are actually appearing to behave pretty patiently with him in Act 3 which I find interesting.

In the instance with the flowers Karlach doesn't bother trying to convince him otherwise of his opinion, she just tells him how they make her feel instead and rather than getting snippy or doubling down he more or less agrees to disagree. I also don't recall anyone disagreeing with Astarion during Gale's last quest tasks when he mentioned that he quit praying to gods who wouldn't hear him a long time ago but to be fair, I think the gods did everybody in this crew dirty and they all know it. It seems like they're consciously giving him the space to be mad about things, is what I'm saying.

Everyone I know including myself who crawled out of a long-term hot garbage situation kinda went wild for a bit with freedom, spoke poorly, behaved strangely, had extreme emotional reactions to things, and made some particularly terrible choices. I think that's just a part of recalibrating yourself, healing and learning how to be okay again.

Point is, I wouldn't conflate too many of the turbo-negative things he says with how he actually feels about anything. We certainly know what he says and what he feels are two very different things.

[sketchingsparrow]

Nighttime Activities

[raynhoro]

The Moonmaiden's Embrace

[hammerikaika]

Love playing a wild magic sorcerer and romancing Gale. They're both annoying.

[annafitz]

❤️‍🔥

[pirpintine]

[spellbooking]

can I just say how heartbreaking it is that Halsin continuously doubts someone could love him? when he says "my heart does not stir lightly... but it does now" he actually has to take a moment to breathe and close his eyes. like he's scared to admit it. like once he opens his eyes, the PC will be gone. even during his romance scene, you have to encourage him that this was what you wanted and that when he goes into wildshape and back into his regular form, PC tells him "it's okay, now come here" like he's TERRIFIED of scaring the PC because he rambles and apologizes profusely.

and when you solo romance him/decide to leave with him post brain, he tells you in the epilogue:

"Yet you chose me", like he STILL can't believe pc could've picked him over ANYONE SIX MONTHS LATER. This man wants to be loved but STRUGGLES to believe it once someone actually loves him and it's so heartbreaking. He's just a gentle giant. (also thank you @autistichalsin bc you've encouraged me to start analyzing Halsin with your posts)

[wellen-katze]

Promises - bg3 comic Astarion, Sebastian

I hope you enjoyed!

[lunian]

this man is a FREAK (lovingly)

[avenananana]

I feel safe with you