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mahoushojo-chan · 6 months

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headcanons on the Cazador spawn family

because i had to write the family into my fanfiction, i spent a good hour in the szarr manor just scrounging for details.

additional credits to this redditor who helped get me started. i won't be going over the details that they already succinctly summarized, i'll only go over my extrapolations

tw: mentions of SA, ptsd, and all the gory details you'd expect from astarion's personal quest. and spoilers, of course.

Cazador Szarr:

in many ways, i want to write cazador as astarion's foil, and someone who has very similar views to an ascended astarion, even if he has a relatively different personality. i saw him as someone more introverted and calculated than our hedonistic, in-the-moment ally, but they are joined in the sense that both of them are intentionally cruel to others and possessive over what is theirs. i also wrote him as a necromancer wizard. just seemed to fit.

one thing that seemed to stump many is why there were only seven spawn that cazador kept, but seven thousand he could have chosen from. my theory is this: cazador was truly trying to build some semblance of family, as fcked up as it became. i also don't think that he ended up seeing them as family, and that his viewpoint constantly changed between seeing them as family, lovers, and slaves/tools for his own pleasure. astarion truly loved you before he ascended, and in the same vein, i imagine cazador had an innocent wish as a spawn, or even as a human: he wanted to be a father or a lover, apparently to a large family. this frames how i view the 'siblings'.

Leon Onufrio:

the only spawn with a last name, oddly enough. astarion says that he was 'one of (Cazador's) firsts', which led me to believe there must have been at least one before. i wrote leon to be his first. this makes sense for cazador's first spawn, since cazador seemingly has an affinity towards pretty men. it made sense to me that he could lure in a human with the false promise of eternity, and that he would choose one who seemed responsible and kind for his first 'son'. he is the only one with a daughter, and the only one with limited access to magic. he also seems to understand cazador well, being the first to realize that astarion is right to believe in cazador's cruelty over their false promise of freedom. i imagine cazador would have wanted him to play the role of a 'responsible older brother', and allow him the most independence. the first to have a child, the top hunter, the role model. amongst the spawn, he is the golden child, aka just had the most time to adapt to cazador's ways and go towards people pleasing. and due to his role, cazador allows him to play this.

i wrote him as a shadow magic sorcerer, because we know he is canonically a sorcerer and that he managed to place a necrotic curse on his daughter's blood, in case anyone would go after her. shadow magic seemed fitting for a vampire. it seemed like the type that would attract cazador.

I know that canonically there's a likelihood that he was the last spawn that cazador took in, and he had to take victoria with him and had to be in a position to actually mpregnate someone, but i just wrote it such that he managed to do so while he was a spawn... which is possible, astarion fans... it is possible...

Astarion Ancunin:

canonically astarion's one of cazador's firsts, and i chose to make him the second. i figured if i were an evil, narcissistic asshole playing 'house' with a son, artistically, a cain-and-abel dynamic with an 'ideal' older son and a resentful, evil younger brother. it is also known that astarion was rebellious, and cazador took specific glee in punishing him. that's right, according to this theory: astarion was always built to fail. he was always made to be punished in his role, regardless of what he did. he was meant to be broken over and over again, but not broken enough to stop rebelling entirely, because this would mean that he didn't fit his role well enough. he would be punished according to his role, because you could not be too rebellious, but then he could also be punished if he did not rebel enough, because then he wouldn't suit cazador's cruel playacting. he is the 'rebellious second-born'.

using the bg3 canon, astarion is an arcane trickster. i write him as a thief, never quite having enough time or wanting to put enough effort on honing his magical ability, moreso focusing on surviving.

Dalyria:

the rest of the spawn get a little more difficult, as less and less of them are known. we know dalyria was a physician, she cares about astarion, and she killed leon's daughter to try and discover a 'cure' to their vampirism. i just wanted to write her in relation to the others as a "mature and elegant older sister". one who genuinely has other people's best interests at heart. i also wanted to keep in mind the doctor's hippocratic oath and how that may have degraded and suffered from cognitive dissonance under years of abject torture, especially with what she ended up doing to victoria.

as it stands, there actually is a 'physician's touch' feat in dungeons and dragons, under the monk: way of mercy subclass.

Aurelia:

personally, i thought aurelia was really cute. she's also the only tiefling in cazador's coterie. continuing with the pattern, i thought perhaps cazador could also think so: she plays the role of the 'cute, anxious younger sister' that needs to be coddled a bit. she allows the hope of freedom to be dangled in her face.

in my hypothetical, she was innocent and it was probably easy for cazador to lure her in. perhaps she was already treated poorly by the world as a tiefling, and cazador pretended to be a kind, caring, gentle figure. whether as a father, or a lover. she seems to be the most aware of cazador's schemes and easy to control.

because she was captured while she was still innocent, and i made it so that after capture, none of cazador's spawn could really 'grow' as people while under his control (hence why astarion is level 1 when we meet him), i don't have a class for her yet, other than the charisma-based inclination based off her tiefling nature. i do have two little plot hooks for her though, so i'll see which direction she decides to go in.

Petras:

what we mainly know is that petras is a bit of an idiot, according to astarion. while this would normally hold very little juice, since astarion thinks all acts of good are idiotic, we also see that petras is regarded this way in general, such as looking for a meal when he finally is allowed his freedom. his role was "dumb younger brother".

i imagined him as a bit of a jock. not exactly ill-intentioned, but definitely ignorant. he also looked shorter and stouter than astarion--even though i know they most likely use the same model, i wanted to incorporate this. i wanted to make him a idiot-good paladin at first, and keep him as someone resilient and protective, but none of the oaths really seemed to suit him. i knew none of them could be a religious class, mainly for the reasons astarion brought up, and the oaths themselves didn't really serve him well. i settled on barbarian and flavour him with dhampir. yes, even though all of them are technically vampires and petras specifically was a human in life, i just used character sheets to make things easier.

Violet:

Violet was at least a little interesting--mostly because of her diary. she constantly writes about playing pranks on other people and overall being a menace. she's also the only other person to be in the 'favoured spawn' room in recent history. while leon constantly tried to shoehorn his way in there for his daughter, she had no such attachment. i figured she just was a little cruel, and enjoyed the suffering of others so much that she may have actually enjoyed the killing a vampire would do.

i also had cazador enforce this behaviour, because in this hierarchy, she is the 'bratty younger sister'. the favoured youngest spawn. i made her a gloom stalker ranger. i wanted her to be ruthless in the way that she got her kills, attacking others while she had the advantage, and still having some skill. i also wanted an overlap where she and astarion could reconnect so that she wouldn't be completely lost and evil, what with both of them being sneaky and such. plus helps with the pranks role, and gives her some capacity for wisdom

Yousen:

the final sibling. the only thing i think we ever find out about this guy is that violet played a prank on him once. i imagine that cazador saw him as a joke. his stature doesn't fit his team, he's not particularly their type, and he doesn't seem to be treated very well. i think of him as the 'black sheep' of the family. the 'runt of the litter'. this is the role he is meant to play.

however, even though this is the role he plays, i didn't make him this way at all. i headcanon this is the 'character' cazador cared least about. i don't think he took much time carefully picking it out, since yousen would also be the last spawn chosen for the ritual, and at this point, cazador figures they're all going to die anyways--he just needs to complete the family. there was a lot i could do here, with so little known about him. i made him reclusive and resentful, which makes him seem to fit the role, but deep down it's mostly because he's hardened and jaded. i made his backstory as a soldier--perhaps one that cazador found drunk at a bar one day and figured he would make a good joke, a runt, and effectively the most misunderstood.

he is a battle master fighter. or, well, formerly was. i had him lose a significant amount of skill during the years that he became a spawn. also during cazador's ritual, if you examine everyone, he and leon are the only ones with blood on their mouths. i felt that this meant they were the only two who attempted to fight cazador before becoming sacrifical lambs. (note: they also have it at the camp when they attack astarion, but this could still be valid and also i don't trust the texture mapping they did with the spawn, what with their red bodies) i thought a sorcerer and fighter could make a badass combo. also, there are a lot of people who sleep on the halfling fighter builds.

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fangsandfeels · 5 months

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Got hit with more thoughts about spawns and Cazador...

...and naturally, I'm posting it here because I'm no longer a functional human being.

I remember the lingering question that Astarion seemingly being only one of the spawns using seduction to lure victims in. At least, there is no menition of other’s doing so, except for Petras. So, why is that? Why Astarion was the only one?

In my opinion, it stems from Cazador’s very particular choice of victims. In all these years, he acquired only seven spawns (except for the thousands of Turned nobody knew about), and almost all of them used to be accomplished or talented people:

- Violet, a beloved and talented songbird from Reithwin;

- Dalyria, a respected doctor working in the Parliament;

- Leon, a sorcerer (a spell modifiaction he came up with shows how good he is at his magic);

- Astarion, a magistrate with a promising future, centuries of life ahead of him, and a beauty worthy of a thousand paintings.

Following this tendency, we can assume that Yousen, Aurelia, and Petras also were similarly talented or good at something enough to attract Cazador’s attention and make him envious.

The bastard thinks very highly of himself. He calls himself the most intelligent and beautiful creature out there, and spends hours writing letters to other vampire lords, trying to convince them of his grandeur. He attempts to inflate his ego, making it finally big enough to overcompensate for his miserable inferiority complex, in any way he can: so, whenever he spies someone with a talent or potential, someone who might be better than him at anything, he snuffs them away, adds to his collection, and then breaks them over and over, making them believe that they’re nothing. He is the father who gives them purpose; they are his spawn who owe him everything; and everything they have belongs to him.

And maybe, aside from tortures, and humiliation, and gaslighting, and forcing “siblings” to hurt each other, he came up with one more way to break them - when he forces them to hunt, he forces them to use everything that made them special, loved, respected, and admired for the most gruesome things.

- Violet, previously a talented singer whose voice was fondly remembered up to Reithwin’s fall, using her voice to catch attention; using her image and charm to lure people into the palace to their death.

- Dalyria, picking her victims around apothecaries and temples that responded to the people's suffering by closing doors in their faces, seeking out refugees and ailing citizens low on coin, offering to help them, kindly inviting them to “her place” (if we take Karlach’s family as an example, finding a healer who would agree to help a less-than-wealthy family is quite a problem at the city).

- Leon, using his talents and magic to nab people from the street, to drag them to Cazador without a fight while knowing that he will never be able to use the same power against the bastard himself.

- Astarion, a previously sophisticated, proud, and beautiful elf, stripped of his dignity and pride, using his body to either seduce poor young and inexperienced souls (fulfilling their image of an ethereal and caring lover) or let himself be pawed at by drunkards and brothel-goers.

I don’t think any of Cazador’s choices were accidental. I don't think he had to roam the streets at night, looking for potential candidates; that he ever Turned any of them by chance.

They all caught his eye at some point, became an object of his obsession, and then fell victim to a scenario where they were confronted by a promise of salvation - and each time, it made Cazador giddy with excitement and a sense of self-importance. He took them away from the world because he could. He will twist and shape them to his whim because he can. And then, he will take everything from them, reducing them to miserable wretches because this is who they should be, compared to him.

They will belong under his heel, scared, helpless, and obedient, worshipping him and fearing him. Forever.

#baldur's gate 3 #astarion #bg3 astarion #bg3 dalyria #bg3 leon #bg3 aurelia #bg3 yousen #bg3 petras #bg3 violet #shit-hunter the diva

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