My Favorite NPCs:
Raphael:
Raphael is my favorite character in the whole game, and I never hesitate to giggle when I see him. He is just the pinnacle of a character: he is involved in everyone's business, he's intimidating, and he's present over the course of the whole story. While he affects some characters more than others, his actions still hold weight over everyone. And he's super hot. Fight me.
Enver Gortash:
Moaning and groaning, Gort is definitely the hottest out of all the NPCs. Sorry! I also think he's a handsome young man! The moment when I realized I liked Gortash's character was when I came across his parent's shop to learn that he inserted tadpoles into their heads so that they would appear to actually be proud of him. And they sold him to Raphael? Peak, truly peak. Is he an awful person? Absolutely. Is he my second favorite character in the whole game? Absolutely.
Ketheric Thorm:
JK Simmons takes the third spot as the crux of the most emotional act: Act 2. Ketheric is so intimidating and yet you feel so bad for the guy. He just let grief consume him past the point of no return. What I love most about Ketheric (other than his overall presence) is his juxtaposition with Shadowheart. While Ketheric turned to Lady Shar out of a need to forget, Shadowheart was too young to make a decision on forgetting. While Ketheric's family dying made him turn to Lady Shar, Shadowheart's family had to die in order for her to break the chain. It's just such good storytelling!!
My Usual Party:
Me:
No surprise to anyone, but I usually play as a new character rather than an origin character. I'm usually a Paladin because I have an unhealthy relationship with Divine Smite. As for the race of my character, I usually choose half-elf although I really don't care about my race in the game because I think the story differences are really cool.
Karlach:
I know, hilarious of me to say my second favorite character in this game is Gortash and then follow it up with Karlach always being in my party. I am just a huge fan of melee fighting and Karlach always knows how to kick ass. Although, having her in my Dark Urge playthrough has proven to be really difficult for me.
Lae'zel:
A very new addition to the party, I usually swept Lae'zel to the side because I found her extremely annoying and I hated her personality. Then I learned that she is a beast on the battlefield and decided to keep her on the team. She has more than proved her worth, and I find her extremely funny.
Gale:
This is kind of the extra spot I have. I usually default to Gale, but if the story needs it to be Shadowheart or Astarion, I'll change it. Gale is actually my favorite PC and I genuinely enjoy romancing him (I'm in the minority, I fear). I think out of everyone, he's the funniest character and some of the things he says are so ridiculous. I implore you to try having both Gale and Astarion in your party at the same time. Whenever they talk, it is so funny.
Using Baldur's Gate 3 as Exposure Therapy:
I have played more than my fair share of Baldur's Gate 3, Genshin Impact, and Witcher Wild Hunt. I feel like the world is my oyster and I have this innate primal need to explore absolutely everything that the game has to offer. On the downside of that, it means I rack up lots of hours in each of these games respectively (over 130 in BG3, most likely over 200 in Genshin, and about 30 in the Witcher even though I haven't even made it halfway through or explored to the extent I want to). In the game, I feel almost this sense of decision-making anxiety on whether I'm following the right path, making the right decisions, or even having fun. Most of my time in these games is spent wandering around and deciding what to do, but not wanting to do any of it.
At worst, my decision-making anxiety forces me to stop playing the game because I can't decide what to do next. In Baldur's Gate 3, a new Tactician (the hardest mode) save file is being bogged down under the fear of failure and death. The main question in my mind is why do I feel like this? It's a video game and it should be incredibly fun for me to play! Is there a way to use open world video games and my anxiety surrounding them to my advantage?
So why am I playing these games in the first place if it's actively making me anxious to play them? Two words: Exposure Therapy.
Exposure therapy has been getting a lot of attention on social media platforms where people actively put themselves in the most uncomfortable situations possible in order to better themselves. I've seen these videos go one of two ways: either the person doesn't get rejected or the person bullies and harasses the people around them to not reject them. Fortunately for me, and all of you, I don't make videos of myself going out in public and embarrassing myself for clout. I embarrass myself by having a blog, and I embarrass myself by playing Baldur's Gate 3. I decided to do a little experiment to see if I could do exposure therapy in a video game, where my decisions don't affect me in the real world. My failures and my mistakes are between me and my save file, and no one has to see me fail. So, I put a series of plans in place to start my video game exposure therapy.
Step 1: Go down to Balanced.
I know I just said earlier that I was proud of myself for doing Tactician and that I wanted to see myself fail in order for this to work, but being Tactician put me in a catatonic state.
Step 2: Do what I love and fuck the rest.
I realized that I wanted so desperately to please my companions (who aren't even real people) even if it meant that I had to do things I didn't want to do. I would only do side quests that I was really interested in, and skip everything I didn't really care about. For this particular playthrough, I wanted to focus on things I had never done before (Spider Matriarch, Grym, Blood of Lathander, actively starting fights and being a menace, etc). I started to have a lot of fun when I didn't feel the need to complete every quest that was set before me, and I enjoyed my time much more.
After realizing this, I could easily see parallels to my own life. I figured that the root of all of my decision-making problems in these games where I'm allowed to do what I like is in my people-pleasing. I feel like I'm betraying the game if I skip quests, I feel like I'm disappointing my companions if I don't finish each of their quests to the fullest, and I feel like I'm disappointing myself when I rack up all of these hours in the game doing things that I didn't even want to do in the first place.
So did my exposure therapy work? I would say so. After starting to play Baldur's Gate with myself in mind, I started to be more confident in my ability to say both yes and no to people. When my grandma asked if I wanted to have lunch, I ended up actually saying yes (usually I would have said I was sick and then feigned illness for the next several months). When one of my friends simply said they couldn't make something I realized that I could say the same thing without making up some elaborate excuse on why I couldn't do something.
Life is way too short to be catering to the likes of everyone around you, and sometimes you just need to stick to your guns in telling people to fuck off. So I guess the moral of the story really is to "do what you love and fuck the rest."
My Favorite Quests:
Free Hope:
I'm calling the entirety of the House of Hope "Free Hope" because I just love it that much. Haarlep is a standout in this quest line (for... obvious reasons...) and I literally cannot recommend exploring the House of Hope enough. Enough said, because I just love it that much. Go see it for yourself.
Auntie Ethel:
Call me old fashioned, but I fucking love a good hag. Auntie Ethel is literally a girlboss and I love her so much. I think her character and the shenanigans her character gets up to are what makes this quest so great. The first time I saw her, my mouth dropped wide open. She's so terrifying, and I love the fact that she shows up again in Act 3. I recommend doing the Mayrina quest in the 3rd Act, because it is so much fun to see her again.
Malus Thorm:
Lowkey he's my favorite. I guess he's technically a part of the Wake Art Cullagh quest but I fucking hate that quest line with lifing the shadow curse so I'm counting Malus as his own entity. Literally chills when I talk to the guy. His design, the fact that you can make his students kill him or kill themselves... it's all fantastic storytelling. I love when you can avoid a fight through making someone kill themselves, I think it's such a unique way to get through the game.
Honorable Mention: The Iron Throne
I guess it's technically a part of Free the Gondians but who CARES. I stumbled across the Iron Throne on accident in my first playthrough (there's a back way to get into the underground storeroom through the sewers) and I had so much fun. It's probably not as much fun when you're on a higher difficulty, but I like having to strategize.
