#durge headcanons

[preciouslittle-bhaalbabe]

Going feral over the idea that durge was made by Bhaal to be captivating. As beautiful as they are deadly. Like a poisonous flower. You're enchanted by their beauty only to find yourself subject to their bloodlust before you know it. I know in game and with default durge they're meant to just be murder and murder alone. But idk adding a siren type trope to it just seems so right.

[oliverr-gardenn]

canon/default Durge headcanons because im bored out of my mind (and im definitely not projecting onto him):

- He definitely has some sort of an anxiety disorder.

I mean his father is literally the GOD of murder and you're telling me he WOULDN'T be on fight or flight mode 24/7???

- Migraines. He sometimes would have to go find a dark and quiet place to rest in the forest when he got migraines because the camp was just too noisy. However I do think his headaches got more bearable when he was cured of his urges.

- Yeah he's got high charisma, but that doesn't mean he doesn't avoid social interactions like the plague. He knows how to get people to do what he wants (thanks to him being a former cult leader lol) but he would much rather not have to talk to people, especially strangers. Some jokes go completely over his head and he didn't even understand when some of his companions were hitting on him.

- He has a sweet tooth. I dont have any way to explain this one other than the fact that i just think he would really enjoy a good cheesecake.

- Since he's a white dragonborn he probably really enjoys sunbathing. He loves hugging his warmblooded friends both because of the intimacy and how good warmth feels on his cold scales.

- He's a sucker for terrible jokes. This man is NOT funny at all. Back when he was Bhaal's chosen he'd say these really edgy and corny things as a way to "intimidate" people and if he wasn't already scary looking, no one would take him seriously.

Gortash certainly didn't find his empty threats intimidating at all. "Oh you're going to cut me open, spill out my insides and make me watch as you make spaghetti out of my intestines? Very cute"

- Resting grumpy face. He can never really express his emotions. He would be having the time of his life and all you'd ever see is a straight face. He sometimes has to remind himself to do facial expressions. He's also quite embarrassed about his goofy smile.

His lack of expressions lead to a lot of problems with his companions back in the day.

- Insomnia. He literally can't fall asleep on his own and needs to be put to sleep via magic. He also suffers from nightmares and often wakes up multiple times at night. His past haunts him even after escaping from Bhaal's grip.

[wastelandbarbie]

Durge who doesn't care that much that one of his companions was kidnapped/killed by Orin bc he considers it an honorable death in a fucked up way. plus hes not killing Gortash before Orin. like a Durge who can't help but still follow Bhaal. ultimately it's one less person he has to kill...

Durge who breaks down after Orin's death, even if he looks weak to his father and suspect to everyone else. like do the companions understand that he lost his only sister or are they more like accusatory that Durge let their companion die? Durge and Orin only have so much sibling interaction in Act 3, but everytime they do meet, Durge can feel it's her and immediately matches her energy.

if Durge goes on to accept as Bhaal's chosen? Where he's going back to the original plan of Kill Everyone Then Gortash & Yourself. Durge who can't help but favor the past.

Alternatively, Durge who rejects Bhaal, but accepts Gortash as his master. Post-tadpole Durge who clings to the scraps of who he was/what happened. Who can't remember specific events, only how he felt. Like Durge doesn't remember his name, but he does know that everytime he hears Gortash's name he feels something. Seeing Gortash would short-circuit Durge; maybe before he was completely stoic, but now he's completely obvious in his expressions. Durge who goes feral at the sight of Gortash and immediately gives away how down bad he is. Gortash who is internally losing his mind bc his Durge rarely gave anything away facially and he's now eye fucking him in front of everyone and god. like ???? omfg. this is why Durge insisted on going to the inauguration alone (tho the party definitely snuck in after him)

[emberloreplays]

Headcannon about Persephone and Astarion:

She’s very aware he was just using her because she’s so damn good with her hands, but that was ok because the feeling was mutual.

They prefer each other covered in blood… ideally other people’s but in a pinch, each others will do.

Persephone prefers kissing to talking. Much to Astarion’s surprise, he finds himself purposely talking too much.

Every time Astarion kisses her neck she whispers “is it time to feed the vampire?

Persephone is afraid of the dark.

Every night she slips into his tent and curls up beside him. He grumbles, then pulls her closer.

He reads to her every night.

They haven’t been apart since the day they met.

| you can watch their romance unfold on my @emberloreplays youtube channel |

[parvulous-writings]

Could I request dating headcanons for Tiro with gn s/o?

Notes: Absolutely you can!! I'm splitting it into two sections because he may act slightly different depending on what path is being taken :p I tried to keep the above cut HCs as SFW as I could!

Warnings: Toxic behaviour/relationship under the cut. Mentions of death, both animal and humanoid (both above and below cut, mainly vague). General Dark Urge stuff, really. Feel free to skip over it, if you so wish!

Redemption Tiro

Tiro tries to be tender - he knows that his brutish impulses are not typically what people go for or want in a partner, and he tries his best to curb it as much as he is able to. He tries to keep his touches subtle, gentle - everything he was not, before this. Before he wanted to try.

He brings you little gifts - often of the more morbid kind - but he tries to make some more light-hearted ones too. He is much like a cat in what he brings to you - small kills, usually. A frog, a squirrel, an eagle. He knows that you're not always so keen for him to kill anything larger, so he keeps his remaining urges under wraps as best as he can.

He asks a lot of questions; what people like, what couples normally do - all of it, he wants to know, he wants to learn. He wants to be somewhat normal, to be able to do things with you that others do. He thinks about that kind of thing a lot, and tries to hold aspects of himself back, to keep you safe and appease to you.

He lets you take the lead most of the time, dating or courting is very new to him - he hardly remembers anything even close to it. But despite this, he enjoys himself. He's vulnerable - almost painfully so - but it's you, so it's... Bearable. Just about.

Non-redemption Tiro

Now this Tiro is a very different kettle of fish altogether. He's reserved at first, letting you show him your affections, giving you the upper hand at first - he wants you to feel as if you are taking the lead with the relationship, to have that security. But he knows what he wants, and he knows just how to manipulate you into place.

In front of others, he's quiet, reserved - he lets you initiate everything, and he happily takes what you give him, no questions asked. If anyone were to be asked about yours and Tiro's relationship, they'd most likely think that the big, quiet brute was subdued by you, but this is unfortunately far from the truth.

Behind closed doors, Tiro is domineering, taking the lead whenever he is able to. He is obssessive, and he has to know of every little thing that you do when you are not in his sight.

He will describe - in vivid detail - what he will do to your corpse once you've died. From playing with it and your innards, to much more heinous activities, he spares no small part of information; he wants you to know every little thought, every fantasy that he has had.

As the relationship evolves, in the so called comfort of your home/tent, Tiro starts unmasking more and more - not that there's much left underneath that mask anymore - and doesn't hide his violent tendencies or desires from you. Sometimes he even likes to toy with the idea he'll carry some of them out on you, rather than some stranger or animal.

// Tiro taglist

@rey-is-not-a-skywalker

[smallnico]

i'm in love with your durge

weird question, but do you believe that esper is technically immortal because of being crafted from bhaal's own flesh? i've seen the theory being thrown around before

WWWWWWWWWAAAUGGHHHhhh???

what the hell thank u so much i'm so happy,, i'm so happy you like my little guy.....

and oh my god not a weird question at all, i also think about this all the time. i have seen some of those theories and a lot of different fun takes on the concept of durge's mortality/divinity, and i do have my own esper mortality lore, so thank you so much for asking so i can talk about it!!

i don't think esper is immortal, but they are chronically unkillable. even before they were orin'd and tadpoled and had their guts all over the place in a necromancer den and eventually walked off that experience, bhaal's been keeping them alive and restarting their vital functions whenever they die somehow. it happened a Lot, especially when they were young, that esper would be burned alive or sacrificed to lolth or thrown off a cliff or otherwise keep going in spite of massive blood loss, and bhaal's divinity or interference would either prevent them from dying or bring them back from the dead. all this is flavoured on my part to comply with things like the last gasp of bhaal given to deathstalkers, or the boon of the unstoppable from bg3.

this is my headcanon for The Esper Timeline: the bhaalspawn of the crisis were created the old fashioned way, and because they were still mortal at the end of the day, they had some trouble holding the essence of the divine without dying -- enough to bring bhaal back and channel him, but not enough for him to stay there long. so durge (esper, in this case) was created to be a more perfect vessel, more divine, more robust. the way i've set up the circumstances of esper's birth is that they are bhaal's flesh, but they still needed to incubate for a little while in a mortal body in order to be born on the material plane. this is also the reason they're half-drow and have biological family in the underdark.

esper's physiology is, in my mind, similar in some ways to dame aylin's. that said, because bhaal is only a quasi-deity, he can't really Do an aasimar on his own. so esper isn't totally divine, but they are closer to the concept of a demigod or an aasimar than other bhaalspawn, and their innate divinity, like with aylin, prevents them from dying until they fulfil their purpose (kill the whole world, last one alive, sacrifice themself on the altar, yada yada). they have no idea if they have a normal half-elf lifespan, or if they physically could die of old age if they did, but they're only 38 years old (half-elf equivalent of ~28?) so they have a while before they get to find out. they heal relatively quickly compared to a normal person, and they have access to some healing magic, but they are still partly mortal, so in spite of being more or less not allowed to die -- brought back at 1hp just like if you lose the orin fight -- they still have to do a lot of the actual healing on their own. and like... they didn't really care to take care of themself in recovery, as long as their body was still physically functional. and all this is why they look Like That, lmao.

so yeah -- maybe not immortal, but not not immortal. they're doing better, though. they don't really remember all of the different ways their bhaalist existence was fundamentally exhausting and agonizing. they have friends and a support network now.

thank u for liking my fucked up little guy... have a bonus doodle. esper is also happy to hear people like them and they definitely will not exploit that fact for personal gain.

they need money for the museum gift shop i mean for therapy. please will you give them 1000 gold pieces

[misschizuchi]

spewing headcanons about Durga

Never felt anything real before establishing friendship with Gortash, always was an actress showing fake feelings.

Durga and Gortash as Chosen ones never had sex, but that doesn't mean neither of them thought about it, their close relationship lead to all kinds of interests in each other.

Pre-tadpole Durga was a semi-well known bard, good with her voice and words, had quite a few fans, whom she turned into her lovers and then killed except for one.

Gortash too got to know about Durga as bard at first. They did not express each other any sympathy.

"Forgive me, father" letter was written at the highest point of stress and self doubt, and later, when Durga was quite ready to tell about what she wrote to Gortash personally, Orin took Enver's appearance to trick Durga into confessing (just for shits and giggles) then mauled the bhaalspawn, laughing at sister's feelings.

Resurrected Durga's loss of memory included her forgetting about ever having sex at all (though she never was a fan anyway), so when Astarion offers her to spend the night together to celebrate saving of the grove, Durga believes she might be a virgin.

Durga's care for others is more of a reflex than a genuine wish to help and protect, though not understanding herself she does not understand her own desire to care for others either and does it just because (she used this model of behavior before the tadpole to win people's trust and then use them for her own purposes).

With every new truths that bhaalspawn came to knew about herself, she became happier and more self-confident. Though it happened because she understood herself more, knowing those truths, some of her companions misinterpreted Durga's good mood, thinking that she is just happy finding out she is a child of an evil God. Which of course didn't sit right with Durga. Being so misunderstood hurt her quite a bit.

Before telling her companions about her origin however, Durga received Halsin's confession of his warm feelings toward her, but expecting to be rejected by druid right after she reveals the truth about her nature of being the bhaalspawn, Durga asked him not to waste his time on someone like her (with a very sad face), even though she actually liked him back.

Helping Astarion to ascend. The sudden jealousy towards Sebastian became one of the least reasonable reasons for this.

Astarion and Gortash's encouragement (with help of friends who stood on the moral high ground) made quite an influence on Durga, leading her to make a decision towards being a ruler of a cult instead of a hero, who would save the city from it.

She is able to have children from any men, though not being a regular mortal of known race, she barely gives children any genes that would affect appearance. All of her children are mostly looking like their fathers and don't resemble a deep gnome unless they have a gnome father.

enough for now

[faerieboyfixations]

Of course resist Durge would want to get railed by wild shape Halsin. His boyfriend is a vampire, a predator, as well. Maybe he only feels safe getting intimate with someone capable of ripping his throat out if he loses control.

[plaidpyjamas]

thinking about durge w/ subtle self-harm habits. small things that went unnoticed their entire life

stuff like chewing/biting their own lips until they bleed, sinking their nails into their own hands/arms

thinking about gortash noticing these little things and doing what he can to help them (a first for durge)

[redseeker]

Durge surrendering to ascended Astarion's control because it feels safer than her father's. It's not healthy, but she doesn't trust herself not to hurt the ones she loves. She feels safe with Astarion because if she ever tries to kill him he can compel her not to, and to obey him instead of Bhaal.

[preciouslittle-bhaalbabe]

I wanna know what the player tastes like to Astarion SO badly. He describes how he thinks everyone else would taste and it sounds so interesting but all we get is that we were delectable??? I want details sir!

Anyways I think Cirrus tastes like blueberry mead and cinnamon and Tempest tastes like grape soda.

[erme-aeterna-arts]

started a playthrough as a githyanki bard durge, and multiclassed them into a wild magic sorcerer, and now i really like this combination for narrative reasons

like the specificity of bardic magic is that it needs an instrument as a conduit, and i thought what if pre-orinlobotomy durge was a sorcerer, but now they don’t remember how to control and channel their magic properly + maybe they can’t really do that anymore due to brain injury, so now they are using music to concentrate on their old magic and direct, um, the tides of chaos in the right direction

but getting wild magic surges in the most unexpected moments in battle also always sends a wave of panic through them, because it reminds them how much they don’t remember, know or control their own body

[deathvalleyqueen]

Let me tell you about my DnD character - I have turned into my Durge OC... (yes it's the same character - i change her hair a lot)

Her name is T'alice - it rhymes with Malice. (because I too, like Neil on this High Rollers oneshot - am a Drizzt stan and in the DnD game I play her original version she may have some connection to Drizzt or a Drizzt like character in my friend's world we are still mid-campaign and I genuinely don't know who her father is yet - only her mother is a goddess.)

She is a Lolth Sworn Drow (or rather thinks she is)

She has black hair over the typical White/Silver of Drow cuz of Bhaal babe things.

Durge/Gortash is very much a real thing in my HC for her.

She is a Hexblade Warlock/Phantom Rogue multiclass - both modded in- in my DnD game she was going to be a Hexblade/Rogue multiclass but my DM/friend begged me not to subject him to a Hexblade so she is a Barbarian/Rogue with a homebrew Rogue subclass that lets me use heavy weapons for sneak and she used the Kobold Press subclass for Path of Herald Barb - there aren't equivalent mods for either and while I am learning to mod subclasses in I haven't yet managed to make one work. Which is why I went back to the original concept of her being a Hexblade/Rogue build for BG3.

Her Hexblade weapon is the Stillmaker - yes... with all the implications that Gortash gave her it etc.

She tries to fight the urges - somewhat. Still very stabby.

Used to braid Orin's hair.... (I gave her very similar hair to Orin and like this is just some little HC I have about why they look the same)

There are 3 people that call her "Tali" - Gortash, Astarion and Gale... all men she may or may not have romantic entanglements with. Anyone else who dares - will promptly stabbed in the face.

She and Gortash have known each other a very long time, I would say since their teen years - I picture them being very close in age.

If either of them (T'alice or Gortash) are actually capable of feeling love for another being - the only real person they have love for is each other.

The real idea behind enslaving the elder brain was for T'alice to amass enough power for her to ascend to Godhood so she would break free of the Urge. This explains why she tries to fight her Urges.

The reason she ends up with either Gale and/or Astarion - is they both are very ambitious men. I am very torn of if she is poly or not. Probably because I can't resist Astarion's charm.

The only bits of her old life she remembers - revolve around Gortash.

Karlach thinks T'alice is familiar but she can't place where she knows her from till act 3 when she sees T'alice and Gortash standing next to each other.

[krembruleed]

Height comparison chart based on the in-game models

Dragonborn Durge is 6'8" or 204cm. Halsin and Minsc are 6'7" or 200cm. Karlach is 6'4" or 192cm. Devil form Wyll is 6'1" or 185cm (the horns net him ~2 in / ~5cm!) Human form Wyll, Astarion, and Gale are 5'11" or 180 cm. Jaheira, Shadowheart, Minthara, and Lae'zel are 5'7" or 170cm.

The models are a little bigger in Blender than they would be in the real world. Devil Wyll was 6'7" going by his model in blender, which is just...Not Correct.

This could be because my extracts scaled slightly wrong when i imported them into blender, or the in-game scale is slightly larger than the real world, or they're just modeled a little taller than they're meant to be to make them look biggg. (my vote is that i fucked the scale. rip y'all's estimation of my intelligence.)

Whatever the reason, I knew that they were all scaled wrong in the same way. This means that instead of giving up a futile pursuit, I could do math to figure out something more reasonable.

We happen to know that Astarion is "approximately 5'11"."

I used that as a baseline. So, with our scale established, we get something like this:

Other notes:

Shadowheart/Jahiera/Minthara, Minsc/Halsin, and Gale/Astarion/Wyll share the same heights because they use the same body model.

I'm decently certain that githyanki share an armature with elves/half-elves/drow/humans, so even though the gith body model looks different, Lae'zel is the same height as the other gals to line up with their armature's bones.

I didn't include hair or head accessories (like Shadowheart's) in the total height (that's cheating).

I did include Durge's and Karlach's horns in their overall height, but Karlach's really don't add much (maybe a cm or 2).

Average height worldwide (on Earth) for men is 5'9"/ 175 cm, and for women is 5'4" / 161 cm, so they're all quite tall, but mostly still within a standard deviation of the average.

Except for Karlach, Halsin, and Minsc, who are in the 99.9th percentile for height! They're not tall, they're huge.

[rissi-chan]

Gale: So, Bhaal created you from his own, dead flesh . . .

Durge: So I'm told.

Gale: So, presumably you look nothing like him - as a child might a parent.

Durge: Correct.

Gale: So, then, what made him decide to make you so attractive?

Durge: Perhaps he thought it would arouse less suspicion.

Gale: Yes, well, it aroused something else entirely, didn't it.

[zoneofsmites]

Im of the full (possibly delusional) belief that Durge is not the species that they physically appear to be.

You’re telling me this being crafted from nothing but bhaal’s flesh and his blood - this demigod - is actually a dragonborn/tiefling/human/elf/etc.

No. This thing is bhaal’s flesh and it just happens to look like that. They’re an imitation of a species, they’re not truly a (full)mortal being, they have no heritage aside from bhaal.

As a result I’m sure there’s some…oddities.

For example, a demigod child, not fully mortal. I doubt they adhere to the lifespan of whatever species they look like. Looking younger than they should. (less so perhaps with long lived races like elfs and half-elves where that is par for the course).

A dragonborn durge that by all accounts looks like a blue dragonborn but their breathweapon is acid. A tiefling durge that seems to be a Mephistopheles tiefling but they cannot cast mage hand, instead smiting like a zariel bloodline tiefling.

An elf or tiefling durge that doesn’t read as fey or infernal trough identification spells. Because they aren’t either of those things. Perhaps they could read as divine but not quite.

Members of a race that durge is supposed to be looking at them and sometimes when making eye contact they read as wrong. And some kind of uncanny effect triggers in their brain.

Give me more freaky durge who isn’t really what they appear to be at all. Just a little murder demigod crafted from dead god flesh to be the shape of something else.