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There's a reddit thread on the BG3 sub where the user u/InklingRain posted a spreadsheet they made with all the companion approvals. Super useful in general both for playing the game and for fic, so I thought I'd post it on tumblr and play around a little!

There's a top row with the average approval by companion, but I didn't find that very useful, so I changed it to the count of approvals (i.e. count of approvals & disapproval total, how often a companion had a reaction to something). We all know Astarion gives a lot of disapprovals here and there, but they're only -1 at a time, so no big deal, right?

No. Minsc has the least at only 45 reactions, Halsin at 95, Minthara at 145, and of the main companions, Gale is pretty average at 198, Lae'zel at 224, and Shadowheart, rather opinionated at 258...

but that's nothing compared to Astarion's 406. That's almost 150 more than the next person!!! That's more than Minthara and Shadowheart combined! Babygirl really woke up one day and decided to get in a snit over everything that happens 😂

(Longer post about count of positive and negative opinions, sum of approvals and disapprovals, and some major outliers below. Picture with values at the very end.)

But that's a bit disingenuous. If we look at the ratio of positive to negative opinions (not taking value into account), Astarion's pretty average at 30% (negative count over sum count, so let's call that negativity). This is similar to Gale (31%), Karlach (30%), and Lae'zel (32%). In theory, getting Astarion's approval or disapproval is just as easy as any of theirs, with a 20% bias towards positive approvals. Later companions are weighted heavily towards the lower end of the spectrum, with Jaheira at 13% negativity and Minsc at 9%. As you only get them very late, it's pretty clear that the game gives you a lot of opportunities to get their approvals and thus open up more of their quests and dialogue.

However. We have an outlier. Wyll Ravenguard, clocking in at an indecent 38% negativity! Which really just goes to show, while Astarion is the most opinionated, Wyll has the most disapprovals, making him the judgiest companion of all 🤣

However, this really wouldn't be a good post if we didn't look at the value of approvals. Karlach, for instance, has the strongest disapproval value of -100 (given if you sleep with her and then call it a mistake). Ouch. This is clearly at outlier and doesn't say much about Karlach's changeability of opinion in general. If we look at the sum of positive and negative opinions, this is a very heavy swing, making up 100 points of her total 191 disapproval points possible to her 281 approvals total. Another outlier is Minsc, who currently possesses a 43% disapproval percentage (a heavy -50 disapproval given if you sacrifice him to Sarevok. Jaheira, by contrast, apparently doesn't give a damn, or her value might simply not be included in the dateset.)

Removing outliers is really a matter of opinion here, so I'll only remove the most extreme swings, such as the above mentioned disapprovals.

The otherwise strongest swings are Astarion (-15 for telling him it was a mistake preventing him from drinking Araj's blood, or saying you only wanted to sleep with him, not deal with his trauma) and Wyll (+20 for siding with Karlach during his confrontation with her, which really shows he didn't really want to kill her and is very grateful you stopped him). Halsin gives +40 for reuniting Oliver with Thaniel, which...lifting the shadow curse is sort of his life's mission, and a bit of a unique case, so while it makes sense, I think it's such a unique event that can't be topped by anything else and will remove it. Jaheira give +20 for extending the Emperor's protection to Minsc, and, for funsies, Minthara's heaviest disapproval is -5 for donating to Lolth at the Stormshore Tabernacle. (lol)

I only chose to remove the aforementioned Karlach, Minsc, and Halsin values, as they're all very large swings and rather character-defining or personal to the individuals mentioned, so I don't think it says much about them in a more general day-to-day sense.

Now, using the sums of our negative and positive values, Gale is our most Negative Nancy, clocking in at 37%, which goes to show that while he's pretty average for the amount of things he cares about, when he disapproves, it's a strong one. Next up is Astarion at 35%, and Wyll at 34%. Lowest are Jaheira and Minsc at 7% and 4% respectively, which makes an intuitive sort of sense: Jaheira is old and just over being upset by the players poor choices, and Minsc is an insanely positive person overall. The next most positive companion is Halsin at 13%, which also matches with his vibe pretty well, followed by Minthara at 17%, Karlach at 24%, Lae'zel at 26%, and Shadowheart at 28%.

Tl;dr: Astarion has many, many opinions, but Wyll is the most judgemental (most disapprovals compared to approvals possible). However, when it comes to the strength of those disapprovals, Gale reigns supreme, followed by Astarion.

If don't break Karlach's heart, help Halsin achieve his life's ambition, or sacrifice Minsc, then they're pretty positive overall. Later companions are heavily weighted to approve of your actions, and Minthara is comparatively judgemental, but overall far more easy to gain approval than disapproval from.

If you take the average of all these values and include the later companions to look at as a personality "baseline" of how judgy and how strong those disapprovals may be, then...the Act 1 companions are all dramatic af, which really should come to no ones' surprise, while Karlach is the most willing to give the benefit of the doubt imo.

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#bg3 #baldurs gate three #baldurs gate 3 #bg3 shitpost #shadowheart baldurs gate 3 #baldur’s gate shadowheart #bg3 shadowheart #shadowheart #jenevelle hallowleaf #bg3 jenevelle #dj shart

[bgthree]

Act One Astarion Thoughts:

Ok so I definitely think the reason Astarion asks really early on if anyone has someone waiting for them back home (it’s one of those passive dialogues while you’re traveling) is because he’s already worried about the truth of his vampirism coming out and he’s trying to figure out who would be more receptive to his advances and easier for him to seduce so he can protect himself.

Our poor traumatized baby boy.

He’s so confused and overwhelmed by the whole tadpole business and his first reaction, the only thing he can think to do, is prepare to lay down on his back for someone.

Because in his mind, that’s the only worth he has.

#bg3 #baldurs gate three #baldurs gate 3 #baldurs gate 3 astarion #baldurs gate three astarion #astarion #astarion x tav #astarion ancunin #astarion headcanon

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gale pondering the forked tongue thinking "this better not awaken anything in me...."

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a time ago someone suggested the idea of rolan having a forked tongue bcus hes a tiefling and my life has not known peace since

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I like hurting people with my headcanons. So like what if the female high elf (Lug) on the bridge near the House of Grief is Astarion's mother, and okay hear me out hear me out. You catch her on the bridge, her memories purged from the Sharrans, and all she can recall in that moment is a elven lullaby. She says she isn't sure where she learned it, since her own parents never sang to her when she was a child- but the lullaby is with her still, clear as day.

And it's with her because she sang it to her own child. And elven fertility is not great, so she likely only ever had just the one- a child that died before his hundredth name day, a child that never came home. And the loss of that child was far too great to bear, so she found herself turning to the House of Grief. They took from her the memories of her son, her little star, so that there was nothing left to grieve. And still she sings his lullaby.

Hush little elfling thou need'st not look far

To feel the light of Corellon's bright star

Darkness shan't find thee - the shadows despair.

They will not touch 'pon locke of your hair.

Trust the Elf-Father and grip my hand tight

We shall walk with you into that pitch night

Once we see sunlight, the dawn of the day

That's when we know we've been kept by the Fey.

#tjjhhgjjgfgj #what the fuck #my eyes are sweating

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love this stupid fucking line like my love. you are a lawyer . what does this even MEAN

#I HOPE Astarion was a nepo baby #otherwise I am very concerned about the state of Faerûn’s justice system #the reason he passed the bar better be because his daddy bribed somebody I stg

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hey… can we talk abt when Gale off-handedly asks astarion if he’s ever tried worshipping/praying to a god, and he basically says “oh yes, all of them, and none answered.” Excuse me, I just need a minute to gather myself.

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Me every time I'm down by that fucking river

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(write about it in the comments too!)

#bg3 #baldurs gate three #baldurs gate 3 #bg3 shitpost #tav #baldurs gate 3 astarion #baldurs gate three astarion #astarion #astarion x tav #tav x astarion #astarion ancunin #Shadowheart #karlach #gale dekarios #lae'zel #wyll ravengard #halsin #jaheira #minthara

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plzz op this was too good to hide it in the tags

help he must have been the shittiest magistrate

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Stumbled across a little tiefling boy and his murdered parents in an alley 😭 that’s Faerûn’s Bruce Wayne right there

#bg3 #baldurs gate three #baldurs gate 3 #bg3 shitpost

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Can someone much smarter than me make a face mod that looks like Keira Knightley in Pirates plz and thank

👉🏼👈🏼🥺

#bg3 #baldurs gate three #baldurs gate 3 #bg3 mods

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Shadowheart, unblinking, staring at Tav across the campfire because everyone knows they snuck off with Astarion after the tiefling party last night: does fucking a vampire count as necrophilia?

Everyone: *freezes*

Gale: *drops his big spoon into the breakfast pot, spattering some on Lae’zel*

Wyll: *startled coughing fit*

Halsin: *genuinely considering the question*

Karlach: *whispering to Wyll* what is necrophilia? does that mean, like, a thing about necks, or, what…?

Tav: I…I think I need to go lie down.

Astarion, returning from his morning hunt a few moments later, emerging from the woods and taking in the strained camp-mosphere: why is everyone being weird? who died?

Lae’zel, still angrily cleaning herself off: you

Gale: *drops his spoon again, seconds after successfully fishing it out the first time*

#this is the worst thing I’ve ever written #bg3 crack treated seriously #astarion x tav #bg3 #baldurs gate three #baldurs gate 3 #bg3 shitpost #tav #Astarion #Shadowheart #Gale #Lae’zel #Wyll #Halsin #Karlach #tiefling party

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Sex in a bed:

Boring, predictable, you might need to sleep in the wet spot.

Sex on your undead lovers grave:

Goth, silly, is some sort of symbolism about claiming your own life back, the leg thing.

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I do headcanon that the more Astarion feels accepted by his partner, his grins and laughs become more "fangy". He doesn't have to hide the fangs as he's accepted just the way he is. He stops seeing himself as a monster.

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your pregnancy posts got my brain going crazy and hear me out. what if Astarion noticed that tav smelled different one day and it drove him mad for weeks because he couldn't figure out why, but then one day he heard another heartbeat coming from tavs body 🥹

First off, thank you so much!! I'm so glad to hear it - I love when my thoughts fuck people up <3

"What if", pookie, this is CANON to me ☝☝☝ !!! I have thought about this an absurd amount of times, and I absolutely agree that he'd be able to smell some sort of change once she's pregnant - but would have no idea what it was. All he knew was that it was an intoxicating scent - and it probably makes his pupils dilate a little every time he smells it.