Prologue: Introductions, Candlekeep.
Gorion has provided me gold, and informed me I’m to purchase equipment and supplies for a journey spontaneous. Outside Candlekeep.
I’ve not seen him troubled so, not as today, a distant darkness inhering in his features, a heavy slant across his grey brow. Imminence. Looming. Dread. Like thooming, oceanic depths behind the eyes. It’s true he has been aloof. For several months, a change, a distance. What does this portend? My questions have been in vain. Even Imoen, sneaking about, eavesdropping as is her wont, hasn’t a clue. Time will tell – in short order, perhaps.
– Xelia Blackmoon
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Welcome to My Pen!’s Baldur’s Gate playthrough. In the wake of Baldur’s Gate 3 being the big hit it is, and talk of interest – if somewhat fearful interest – in the original games, I’ve decided to play through the original Baldur’s Gate and document that. Maybe it’ll inspire you to take the plunge into this nearly 30-year old, brilliant game.
I am playing on Core Difficulty, mostly unmodded. The mods I am using are a mod which resituates several NPCs to different parts of the map; in the original Baldur’s Gate, a number of NPCs are only recruitable far, far into the game, rendering them worthless (or less-worthwhile) as you won’t’ve been able to customize or grow with them – to learn to love them – so much as NPCs like Imoen, Jaheria, or Xzar. Additionally, I’m using a few tweaks from the Gibberlings Three tweakpack, namely one allowing all races to be all classes, and all races to dual-class. In the original games, only humans could dual-class, and humans couldn’t multi-class; that sucks.
I’ll be mostly documenting the game’s story, but I’ll also do my best to include any especially notable – or beloved-by-me – sidequests and areas. As of this first post, I have not decided if I’ll use the ‘canon’ BG party: PC, Imoen, Jaheria, Khalid, Minsc, and Dynaheir.
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The first and most-beloved part of Baldur’s Gate is building your character. I used a random number generator to determine my gender and race, ending up with a female elf. I decided on a Fighter as my main class, and a Wizard Slayer as my kit. Kits were not a thing in the original Baldur’s Gate, having been introduced in Baldur’s Gate 2; but the Enhanced Edition available now includes all the BG2 kits. Wizard Slayer’s are, in fact, the only Fighter class I’ve never played; they grow powerful later in the game, but the drawbacks are substantial as there is relatively little magic in BG1, and the max level attainable is 7 or 8, meaning a measly 7 or 8% inherent magic resistance, but I wanted to make it harder for myself as I’ve played the game so much.
After only 3 minutes’ work, I rolled a cumulative 90 stat roll, and ended up with this spread. Got myself a custom portrait. Ready to rock.
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After entering the Candlekeep in and speaking with Winthrop, who’s greeting will ring eternally throughout the annals of history, I spoke to a garishly-dressed nobleman and woman staying at the inn. They didn’t appreciate my dry humour. I suppose I could say the same of the monks, though. Only Winthrop (and Imoen) understands me.
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As the gold Gorion afforded me wasn’t enough to fully equip myself, I set off around Candlekeep’s alabaster walls searching for tasks to do, help I might, in exchange for some reward, offer. I need a full set of splint mail, and two longswords. Something in Gorion’s words portended danger, and I should like to be prepared.
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Entering a building adjacent the stables, I was confronted by a hooded, dagger-wielding half-elven man. He asked after my identity, if I was Gorion’s ward, which I affirmed, prompting him to attack me. Years of sparring I’d done with Hull payed off; I easily dispatched the man, with a single stroke slew him after dodging his overbalanced strike. The enormity of what I’d done only struck me once I’d staggered back out into the sunlight, once Parda, a tutor of mine, approached me, noting my unease, surely the haunted look I wore, of guilt, of confusion a grievous mask.
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Shaken, I purchased a second sword and made my way to Gorion, only to be interrupted by Imoen steps from where my foster father awaited me. She couldn’t know what I’d just been through. Cold blood. Ragged breath. Reeking innards like boiled birthday party streamers. I hadn’t any patience for her, felt bad for it, but something was creeping in, some oppression, inevitability – tautening me, pressing. I was being swallowed. Candlekeep’s circular walls were closing around me, a stone noose.
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Chapter 1, part 1: Nighttime ambush; The Sword Coast.
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Gorion is dead, and we have no destination save the Friendly Arm Inn, where the friends he mentioned, Khalid and Jaheria, are supposedly staying. Imoen is with me, the day is young, warm, bitterly contradicting, magnifying those chill hands, pressing helplessnesses, curling about my bones. It isn’t possible to enter Candlekeep again without donating a text of significant value, an item of which we aren’t in possession. The Sword Coast’s foreboding Summertime swathe stretches before us, yawns, a lolling, lazy mouth, a cave with teeth prepared to swallow whole.
– Xelia Blackmoon
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For the sake of brevity, I didn’t record or do the prologue in its entirety. There is an area in Candlekeep you can learn to control a party, and there are a pair of additional things to collect – a healing potion and, potentially, a gem (though you need, I believe, an 18/00 strength or 60 Lockpicking to get the chest open). None of these are important longterm.
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Rule Crashcourse
Baldur’s Gate uses the 2nd Edition Advanced D&D System. Looks like a lot of numbers, but there’s a way to simplify it: Armour Class: lower = better; Hit Points: higher = better; Thac0: lower = better; Damage: higher = better; Resistances: higher = better; Saving Throws: lower = better. Stick with that, you’re golden. You don’t need to know all the ins and outs, just this stuff, and you can get through the game fine. Pause a lot during combat. Do not be afraid to run away or kite enemies early on using ranged weapons.
Congratulations, you’ve beaten Baldur’s Gate’s prologue! Join me next time for Chapter 1!