#I like astarion for a lot of reasons but my pov as a player is also as a survivor of SA!

[forystr]

I like drawing hands on my pieces, this is something that I (hope) is something that carries across in my art in general, but when I'm drawing astarion and emyr I really think about where I'm putting their hands.

emyr and astarion don't have sex. this feels like a very natural part of their relationship to me. and personally the idea that sex is the ONLY intimacy that can exist in a relationship, or that it is something that "solidifies" a relationship / makes it "official " feels really... silly.

I really love drawing emyr and astarion because of the hand placements. when I'm drawing them, I'm imagining this like really deep trust between them - emyr touches astarions chest, astarion touches emyrs neck - - there is this understanding and security they both have that emyr will not ask astarion for sex. just, point blank. and that means there's like this atmosphere of "oh, okay, I can experience this kind of closeness or cuddling or human touch with an understanding thst nothing else is coming".

this is just my opinion and I wanted to share! but I just had thoughts about them, and I know it's a big topic right now with ascended/non-ascended astarion. play the game how you want, but I hope when you see my art of astarion and his bf, you can see the intimacy and love there and know that they both have a healthy and happy relationship without having sex with each other

#just some thoughts! feel free to ignore #I like astarion for a lot of reasons but my pov as a player is also as a survivor of SA! #even though my boundaries arent the same as astarions I really love his romance #bevause he's able to have that happy and fulfilling relationship with tav #regardless of his past and maybe in spite of it #I have a great partner who I can talk to about anything 👍 #and I think everyone deserves that #astarion #emyr hagseye #bg3

[rpgchoices]

Misdirection (Astarion romance route)

BG3 spoilers

I am obsessed with the misdirection in Astarion's romance. I said it before, I was absolutely tricked too. When you read a text or consume media every line is put there for a reason, it is a waste otherwise. By the party scene you kind of have a certain idea of what Astarion is. You know that he dislikes helping others, you know that he lies, he flirts a lot, he is vain, he is a killer, and he wants power (from the conversations about the tadpoles and Raphael).

At this point, if you chose him as a romance, it could also be that you enjoyed the idea of him being a vampire and all the tropes that come with it.

So when, after the first night together, you can ask him "It felt like you weren't fully there" there had to be a reason. From a writing pov, why was that line added?

As a player, you have to wonder. And by this point in the story it seems like a warning there is little that might convince you that what he answers with is not the truth, mainly because it falls right into the classic stereotypes of this kind of romance. Of course he is a danger, he did not want to lose control, be careful in the future - this is how it would sound to me if I romanced him without spoilers. I know because when I got his sex scene, I reloaded and romanced someone else because this kind of aggressive seduction vampire fantasy was not my thing.

If I had read this line, I would have been sure it was a small hint that romancing Astarion could end up very badly. Another small misdirection that could easily end up as a clue is in their second pre-sex scene together. Astarion is making sure the MC will stay with him, and he is very seductive. The funny thing is that if you choose the "yes" (1st option in the pictures just below) you don't get any other information or clue, but just flirting. You actually get even more of the fantasy, he talks about how he cannot stop thinking about you, he even presses on the word "dangerous", and his mannerism is all business

If instead you ask him to be better he goes on and on about his lines, he directly tells the player that these are all fake, basically. You can even ask him if these lines work on Cazador's targets, and he says "well, they worked on YOU".

So at this point as players we know that the player is being manipulated and teased up till a point. I definitely fell for it by immediately cutting the romance short, and never thinking about it again until I got the strenght potion scene. I got that scene as a friendship one, which has different options.

It is a bit different than the romance, he is much more direct in my opinion. He talks about his body as one of the few assets he has, and he is much more confused about why he was being "too precious" about the potion, he is actually surprised by himself.

And as I said, it is much more direct when he says that he never had a choice before (and he is specifically talking about sex). In the friendship version you can also convince him that he needs to use all of this that he has because he might, to protect himself and get advantage, which at least gives credit to our MC if we do romance him.

(TW!! for SA) In the romance scene instead you never get these options, you CANNOT convince him to keep using his body, and if you try to do so he will break up with you, as he should, he is much more confident.

And regarding the whole misdirection if you have not maximized his approval, you won't get his confession but you will find out the whole of his story after the drow potion scene. That is the scene where he thanks you for respecting his consent. I feel like it is such a monumental and surprising one, definitely not one I expected.

And the options are SO SO TELLING. The one sex option you get in this dialogue is the WRONG one. The game directly tells you that by choosing it you assaulted him and disregarded his consent.

There are instead 5 good options. I checked and they all seem to have the same amount of approval.

They are:

1. Showing him that your feelings are real so he can trust them. 2. Showing him intimacy without sex (hug). 3. Confirming that you want to be with him even with his burdens (he often mentions them in other dialogues, especially when you choose between him and Gale). 4. Saying you can be together without sex. And my favourite: 5. ASKING him what he wants, CARING about what he wants.

So yeah, I admit I absolutely fell for it, I was convinced this would take such a wildly different road. Glad to see it did not.

#baldur's gate 3 #astarion #meta #astarion romance #baldur''s gate 3 spoilers

[gloryinthunder]

about your Astarion post, to be fair, in the same scene where: “The PC can even tell him in Act 2 that they don't have to have sex for as long as he needs. (Which I take to mean possibly forever.),” you can ALSO tell Astarion to suck it up and have sex that he doesn’t want (i.e., rape) where he says he’ll do it for you if that’s what you really want, but he’s super upset about it. Like, the game does allow you to pressure that man into having sex a lot. It doesn’t shy away from SA, and even allows you to SA Astarion.

So tbh I don’t think Larian would not pull its punches when it comes to Astarion/Tav/Halsin. I think it’s a cute pairing, but Astarion seems really insecure and begrudging about the whole thing and the game does allow you to even SA Astarion so idk man. I don’t think Astarion’s fully into the whole polyamorous thing. In general though Astarion/Tav/Halsin is really cute and could work out well

That's fair enough. The post, and all my posts, are for sure from my POV and my interactions with the game. (They are hot takes for a reason. XD) There are things I've never come across or don't know about and everyone has their own experiences.

I watched this amazing interview with Scott Joseph, the VA for The Emperor, where they asked him if they thought his character was meant to be just a straight up evil manipulator or if there was more of a grey middle ground to him. He basically said the devs built the game in a way that either could be valid based on the dialogue choices the player makes in relation to trusting The Emperor throughout the game.

I feel like that can be applied here as well, to a degree. Both versions of Astarion can be true and I don't think that necessarily invalidates one persons POV over another. If the person playing chooses not to also romance Halsin because they feel like Astarion is uncomfortable with it, that's 100% okay. Far be it from me to tell anyone how they should feel about or interact with the game. :)

#astarion #bg3

[delta-lethonomia]

11! Absolutely love your fic and the characterisation (please don't hurt the babies I want them to be happy ❤️❤️❤️)

#11. Was there a scene that you hadn't originally planned to include? Why did you decide to fit it in?

Oh tons of scenes! Recently, the whole mini-eldritch arc, with Tav contacting her patron. GOOlocks get a rare interaction with the absolute at Moonrise towers, so I knew I wanted to write about that, but then it organically flourished into a whole thing. I wanted to try writing some horror and play with the themes of the fic while amplifying Tav's darkness and the similarities between her and Astarion, but also show the growing bond between them: he trusts her now, and is sensitive enough towards her that he realizes something is wrong, and doesn't immediately attribute her actions to malice or selfishness like he would have before the romance scenes.

More specifically, the tadpole-POV sharing scene was completely new. My original plan had been for during the conversation with Raphael (where he strips Astarion), Tav wouldn't have reacted at all, merely casually using Astarion's back to point out the bits she cared about, but ending on a casual note. Astarion, while not "surprised" per se by this behaviour, would have noticed it was off compared to the very heartfelt conversation they'd had the night before, and alerted Shadowheart that there really was something wrong with Tav, and her radiant magic would force the purge that happens. But while I was writing the scene, Tav was a lot more sensitive to Raphael than I realized, and considerate of Astarion - while Astarion wouldn't reach out to Shadowheart to ask for help. Instead, the damage the great old one left behind on Tav's mental barriers - the reason she keeps thinking Astarion is reading her mind - suck both him and Shadowheart in for a strange POV sharing, bringing them all closer, and breaking that barrier between Tav and Shadowheart especially, which is important for some Act 3 things later on. Also the plot doesn't rely on Astarion asking for help, because then we'd still be waiting ;)

The quickie little sex scene recently was a new addition too, as the romance confession scene wasn't really explicit enough regarding Astarion's issues with sex. Tav was going to make some dumb decisions if he wasn't clearer about wanting some time, as she never offers to have a sexless relationship with him like the player can.

#wrong reasons fic #ask delta #fic asks