#since at the end of the day this pertains exclusively to headcanon stuff

[haldenlith]

More random thoughts, this time brought on by me working more on the Baldur's Gate timeskip campaign nonsense.

There's a lot of worldbuilding I'm doing, since it's set in Industrial Revolution era Faerun and, well, Baldur's Gate specifically, and Astarion is centered as the main NPC players would get their main quest and such from, meaning he needs a decent bit of worldbuilding, too. In that, part of me went "Hmm, am I making him too scheming and smart?"

And the conclusion I came to: No, I'm not. I like to headcanon that Astarion aged like... 700 (approx) would, at that point, have to have some fuckin wrinkles in that smooth ass brain of his.

Not to mention honestly, I see Spawnstarion being infinitely smarter and more dangerous than Ascendstarion.

Sure, Ascended he has raw power and a leg up physically (huzzah no more vampire drawbacks), but with going full evil, I imagine he's... honestly not much different than a vampire El Muskrat. I know, I just ruined a lot of fantasies by saying that. But seriously, he's just an abusive actual dumbass with way too much power, probably a sensitive ego, and will most likely want to be surrounded by yes-men. I mean, hell, this is an idiot cartoon villain that thinks he's so untouchable he can drink the liquid magma that is Karlach's blood.

Spawn Astarion? Seems to learn and grow, and has enough sense to listen to outside counsel, including when he doesn't necessarily agree with said advice. Hell, he's learned first hand that maybe other people are worth listening to, at least sometimes, because he's standing there a free and very alive vampire spawn, which he didn't think was possible prior to meeting Tav. And I like to imagine he keeps the capacity to learn and grow. Not being drunk on power (though probably a little drunk on freedom), and still being very killable would force him to have to learn to be shrewd, cautious, and strategic about everything.

So, yeah, I think I'm okay with my brain going "make that man a slippery businessman with more going on than meets the eye and totally working the turn-of-the-century system to his benefit." (Example: in this world I'm writing, he uses his newfound wealth via a different accidentally lucrative partnership to fund the building of a Temple of Sune in Baldur's Gate -- not because he gives a fuck about Sune, but because it's good PR for his image as a "totally just a slightly eccentric and rich high elf noble" and his perfume business...)