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Baldur’s Gate 3 – Playthrough 13 – Wicked – Evil

This is part 5 in a series of 5 posts. Start from the first one if you want this post to make sense. Bear in mind that I’m Wiccan. When I talk about the Wicked Witch Sandalwood, it’s just a story.

This is not a SPOILER ALERT!

Sandalwood asked me not to issue any spoiler warnings. She likes the idea that something has been ruined for you.

I’m therefore compelled by her and her Dominate Person spell to say: There are no spoilers in what follows. None. None at all.

Keep scrolling. You are forbidden to stop reading. You shall permit any hints or clues about your fate to distort your enjoyment of the game.

You have not been warned, since there’s nothing to warn against.

Evil endings

It’s not so much that it’s evil, it’s that it puts a smile on Sandalwood’s face.

Now we get to Sandalwood’s favorite part of this saga.

Minthara enjoys evil endings as well.

What’s an “evil ending”?

Larian Studios has released some major content patches to Baldur’s Gate 3 over the past couple of years.

  • Patch 6 introduced new cinematics for kissing, customized for the individual characters. I’ve catalogued my observations of these scenes in previous posts.

  • Patch 8, introduced a couple of weeks ago as I write this, introduced new character sub-classes, a “photo mode”, and cross-play between consoles and desktops. I’ll have posts on the latter two changes eventually.

  • So let’s focus on Patch 7.

Patch 7 introduced mods. As first I was skeptical, but now I’ve embraced them whole-heartedly. They’ve added a new dimension to the gameplay, which makes my explorations of the game’s branching storylines more interesting.

This must be Larian’s motto.

Patch 7 also introduced “Evil Endings.”

At nearly the end of the game, your character has a choice: They can choose a final defeat of the Ultimate Evil, or they choose to side with it.

This choice applies no matter how you’ve played the game up to this point, though the details vary. You could have played a goody-goody character and choose to betray your ideals, or could have had a wicked playthrough (for example) and decide on the side of goodness after all.

Before patch 7, if you made the evil choice, all you saw was your character sitting on a throne.

From playthrough 3.

You’d declaim your mastery over the world, and that was it.

When I first saw Larian’s patch 7 pre-announcement for additional evil endings, they only showed clips from what turned out to be a cinematic for the Dark Urge. I wasn’t interested in playing the Dark Urge (at least, not at the time).

I knew that a lot of players like “Evil playthroughs” and pick the Dark Urge as a matter of course. I thought there’d only be a single new cinematic for the Dark Urge.

I’d made my usual mistake: I underestimated Larian Studios.

There are many evil endings to choose from.

  • There’s a “default” set of endings that any character can choose from. If you’re playing a Tav, those are your choices.

    From playthrough 3. Here is a shot from a cinematic that any player can choose.

  • If you played an Origin character, you’ll have an additional choice based on that specific character.

    From playthrough 8: For example, if you played as Wyll, you can choose an ending that includes this scene.

  • The Dark Urge has at least one special ending just for them. Since I haven’t played the Dark Urge in an appropriate direction yet, I don’t have a screenshot of my own to show you. Rest assured, it’s the bloodiest of the available evil endings.

Sandalwood’s good ending

The Ultimate Evil is destroyed. Good triumphs. Yay.

Sandalwood regretted choosing the side of good. It was dull and uninteresting.

Sandalwood attempts to rejoice in a good deed, but her heart isn’t in it.

Jaheira tries to cheer Sandalwood up by joking about evil.

Still, there are some compensations. For example, Sandalwood chose a destiny for Lae’zel that includes the githyanki’s destruction.

Sandalwood wakes up next to Minthara. The beauty of that face almost makes up for the fact that Sandalwood can hear no screams coming from the streets outside the bedroom.

During bedroom talk, Minthara proposes a plan for ruling Baldur’s Gate.

Though Sandalwood chose a path that doesn’t match Minthara’s ideals of power and domination, the two are able to reconcile and march forward to an unknown destiny.

Power from ruling behind the scenes? Sandalwood is disappointed that Minthara is content with so little.

There is some pleasure in creating new schemes of conquest.

That destiny includes a party at which almost no one shows up. The low attendance is because Sandalwood arranged for the deaths of most other potential attendees, but that’s of small comfort.

The knowledge that Raphael will wreak havoc among the planes is the only saving grace.

Sandalwood assures Raphael that he’ll be welcomed.

Sandalwood’s evil endings

Sandalwood shakes off thoughts of a bland, uninteresting life. The clear choice is power.

In other words, I restored the game from a save multiple times to explore evil alternatives.

Sandalwood is not alone. Minthara stands by her side, sharing the reins of power with Sandalwood.

Minthara urges Sandalwood to ever greater heights. This is Sandalwood’s true destiny: to wield ultimate control.

Sandalwood smiles evilly at Minthara, basking in glory and triumph.

Minthara smiles back. This is what true love is!

Shadowy schemes? Bedroom snuggles? Parties? Bah! This was always the correct choice for Sandalwood.

Sandalwood has the ultimate power, but Minthara always knows the right thing to say.

Such loyalty deserves a kiss.

And again… and again…

What shall Sandalwood do with her power? Perhaps a statue built in honor of her. It’s a beginning, now that Baldur’s Gate obeys her will.

“Narrator: Not Found”? It appears that there was a file defect in patch 7. For example:

This was fixed in patch 8. You won’t see this if your character chooses the path of evil.

Other evil choices

The narratives above are not your only choices. We can see other outcomes if we restore from the game save again.

For example, what if Sandalwood didn’t feel like sharing power? Kneel, Minthara!

What if Sandalwood tries to back out of the wicked choices she made? She might be forced to stab herself as a reward for her hubris.

There are other evil endings to consider. I’ll let you discover them on your own.

What’s next?

In terms of blog posts, I plan to write one on the new BG3 photo mode.

The next playthrough I’ll write up is for the joint one between me and Real Angela, playthrough 1/14.

As for what I’ll do in my next solo playthrough, I’m not sure. If I’m to explore more alternate storylines that I have not seen before, I may have to finally do a full-fledged Evil Dark Urge run. I haven’t decided yet.

Until the next playthrough write-up!

The saga of BG3 playthrough 13

My original post on playthrough 13 became long, so I split it into sections. Here are links to all of them.

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