Even before the fanfic, let’s get this disclaimer out of the way: This essay is a supplement to Real Angela‘s excellent essay on stuffed bear locations in Baldur’s Gate 3. It’s not a replacement. Read that article first.
Then come back here to learn why her count of stuffed animals was 50, while mine is closer to 80. You’ll also discover at least one that she missed.
We have about sixty more names to go. If you don’t think I’m going to share Karlach’s attempts at cleverness with you, then you don’t know me very well.
Before we go there, I’m to look at my own attempt at following Real Angela’s guide. I had some significant differences from her experience.
Stuffed toys I didn’t find
Since my count is about thirty higher than Real Angela’s, you may be surprised to learn that there are a couple of bears that didn’t show up in my own stuffed-animal hunt.
-
In Act 1, Real Angela reported finding a stuffed bear on Tracker Worm in the tunnels near the Druid Grove. She later amended that in a private communication with me: A Goblin Tracker somewhere would have a stuffed bear; if not on Tracker Worm specifically, then on one of the other Trackers in the Goblin Camp.
In two playthroughs, one of which was 19/10 with Real Angela, I found no Goblin Tracker with a stuffed bear.
-
In Act 3, Real Angela reported that Popper would sell a stuffed bear after the Dribbles fight. (This is addition to the one he has on a table in his shop.)
Again, in two playthroughs, and after multiple checks, I did not find a stuffed bear in Popper’s inventory, either for sale or via pickpocketing.
As we will shortly see, there are other characters who can supply more stuffed animals. In my case, that more than made up the difference.
Based on my experience, I think that both the Trackers and Popper have a relatively low random chance to have a stuffed bear in their inventories. Real Angela was lucky to have found them in her playthroughs.
Alternatively, it’s possible that the mods she uses or the difficulty levels she chose enhanced the odds she’d find stuffed animals in those locations.
Stuffed toys that may not count
Real Angela and I have a difference of opinion about which stuffed animals should “count.”
She feels that if a character offers a stuffed animal multiple times (e.g., a vendor), only the first instance of that item should be counted.
I feel that each occurrence of a stuffed animal should count, even if its presence is being controlled by a random-number generator.
Neither perspective is right or wrong. It’s a different way of looking at things. You’ll have to decide what suits you.
Let’s get specific.
Inventories
There are a couple of vendors who can sell stuffed bears: Mol (in Acts 1, 2, and 3) and Popper (in Act 3). Like all vendors, their inventories refresh after every Long Rest and when any character goes up a level. There’s a chance for a new stuffed animal to show up with every refresh.
Beyond vendors, there are characters who can have stuffed animals show up in their inventories:
- Goblin Trackers, as mentioned in Real Angela’s essay. I suppose it’s possible to retrieve them via pickpocketing, but it’s more likely that a player will find them by killing the Trackers.
- Arabella in Acts 1, 2, and 3. This is not mentioned in Real Angela’s article, so I assume she never tried to pickpocket Arabella. I, of course, am cruel and heartless, and will steal a toy from a little girl.
- Akabi in Act 3, also mentioned in Real Angela’s post. Once I found two stuffed bears in his inventory!
You can’t trade for those stuffed animals, but you can pickpocket them. I plan for a future review of pickpocketing, in which it will be shown that I aggressively pickpocket a good number of characters after every Long Rest, including potential toy-bearers such as Arabella and Akabi.
Roughly half the additional stuffed animals I found that are in excess of what Real Angela found come from repeated inspections of character inventories after Long Rests and level-ups.
I feel this is fair. After all, if I acquire multiple occurrences of any other item (e.g., a Scroll of Ice Storm), I don’t just take it once and then never again from that vendor. I purchase it every time I see it. If I’m asked how many such scrolls I have, I answer “Ten.” I don’t say “I’ve got ten duplicates of that scroll.”
Whether or not respawned stuffed animals “count” is up to you.
There’s a practical consequence of this decision. If you go with Real Angela, there’s a maximum number of stuffed toys that one can find in BG3. If you go with me, there is no limit. You can do Partial Rests (which consume no food) to reset character inventories as many times you like. I didn’t have to stop with eighty toys.
Clive
Real Angela has this to say about Clive:
Clive – this is probably the easiest bear for people to find. He’s in Karlach’s tent at camp! Don’t feel bad about borrowing him – she has a backup that she pulls out the next time you guys camp.
You’ve probably already guessed that I treat each occurrence of Clive as a separate stuffed animal.
There are seventeen campsites in BG3. There’s a separate instance of Clive in all but one of them (he’s not present in the Elfsong Tavern Suite).
Therefore, I say there are sixteen Clives. Real Angela says there’s just one.
Again, it’s up to you decide which you prefer.
Types of stuffed animals
There are still a few individual stuffed animals I’ve yet to mention. Before I go over them, let’s review the types of stuffed animal I’ve found.
The last bears
There are four more bears I’d like to mention.
Eddy
This one Real Angela mentioned her essay.
Tiefling Hideout
This is the cave in which Mol and her team hang out in Act 1. I found a stuffed bear there, among the piles of goods (all legitimately acquired, I’m sure), near where Mirkon stands if you rescued him.
Although Real Angela didn’t mention this one in her essay, I have a fuzzy memory that she told me she found it later a subsequent playthrough after she wrote that article.
It’s possible that particular bear may only be present if the player is unable to trade with Mol before she leaves with the rest of the Tieflings.
“It’s not Clive!”
This next one is debatable. You can only see this stuffed bear if you play as Origin Karlach. You see it briefly, at the start of a cutscene that plays if she makes it to the end of the game.
Setting aside my cutsie re-captioning, this bear is not Clive. Clive is not a “corduroy” bear.
My guess? The real-world explanation is that a designer intended it to be Clive. However, as I’ve shown above, there are so many stuff-toy models that they put the wrong one into the scene.
Or, if you look at the icon in all the tooltips I’ve shown, they all show a corduroy bear no matter what type of bear model they actually use. In the screenshot below, you an see several categories of bears, all of which use the corduroy bear icon even though the actual type is different. Perhaps this led a designer to make an honest mistake.
The in-world explanation? It’s up to us fans and the fanfic!
Should this count? Well, I’m counting it, but as is clear from the rest of this essay, I’m aggressive in defining what counts as a stuffed toy in the game. I leave it to you to decide for yourself.
The one Real Angela missed
Unlike the other potentially-questionable stuffed toys I’ve mentioned earlier in this essay, this one absolutely counts. It fulfills all of Real Angela’s criteria, and therefore matches mine.
In deference to Real Angela, who might want to search for it herself, I’ve hidden the details. She can choose to reveal the spoiler if she wishes.
Click to see a toy she missed.
Real Angela searched the top floor of Beehive General Goods and found a stuffed owlbear toy there. However, she never searched the basement of Beehive Goods, accessed via a hatch near where the shop’s proprietor, Oliver Telasco, stands. There’s another stuffed owlbear toy there.
What’s next
Have Real Angela and I exhausted all possibilities?
Of course not!
- There many nooks and crannies within the game. Who knows where another stuffed toy might be found? Any place with children nearby, or where children may have been, is a likely spot.
- Neither Real Angela nor I attempted to trade or pickpocket with every character in the game. If someone tried to pickpocket every child repeatedly, would they find a stuffed toy after every few Long Rests?
- Real Angela and I stuck with stuffed animal toys. There are other children’s toys in the game: balls, blocks, etc. Could there be variations in those models as well? What about other objects?
-
No matter how many toys you choose to gather, there’s the separate issue of virtual photography. Can you take better pictures than I did?
I already know the answer to that question: Yes. I look forward to seeing your work.
For what it’s worth, it took me over two hours to position those crates and carefully place eighty-odd stuffed animals for the photos in this essay. I learned quite a bit about rotating objects and avoiding the automatic snapping of those objects to the tops of crates. Be prepared to be patient!
Overall, I must acknowledge the skill of the environment designers for BG3. I’m sure they didn’t spend too much time thinking about stuffed toys and their models, and yet they created a whole mini-game that Real Angela discovered. Kudos to them, and thanks!
And, of course, thanks to Real Angela for introducing us to this challenge!
Afterword
As I prepared this essay, I remembered that I had this stuffed doll sitting on a shelf. It was made by my mother out of an old sock over six decades ago. Somehow it survived the purges of childhood to be present in my life as I pursue a childish whimsy.
I think Karlach would have liked this toy.
I’m certain my mother would have made one for her. Then she would have asked Karlach if she were Jewish.
