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Again, heed the spoiler warning. This basically ruins everything you learn from Gorion at the end of Baldur's Gate I and Throne of Bhaal.

The only reason I bring this inconsistancy up is because I'm brainstorming for one of my projects that I've been neglecting down in the Fan Fiction forum, and I'd like some outside input.

So, I finished up the Original Saga today. As the main plot dictates the main character must return to Candlekeep to track down the Iron Throne leaders. Normally I just encounter Rieltar in the Library and get arrested not long afterwards, but for once actually ascended the Library floors and up to Gorion's room.

Gorion, in case of his death, left a letter in his room explaining your heritage and history with him. You're officially revealed as a Child, and Gorion explains that he took you from your mother whom was forced upon by Bhaal. He had been romantically involved with your mother and felt obligated to raise you as his child when she died in childbirth.


In Throne of Bhaal, however, the Solar tells us that our mother was actually a priestess of Bhaal whom Gorion slayed just before you were slaughtered to ressurect the dead god. The Harpers were forced back, and Gorion took you and fled from the scene before you came to any harm.


So, what do we think? Was Gorion, even in death, lying to you in his first letter? Maybe a simple mistake by the writers, or just that the story was changed around to add some drama before the end of the saga? And which way do you think it should have been?

Well, remember the story of Valygar. His dad tried to kill the mum until they both went evil, and then he killed him. So there is no reason he couldn't be romantically involved.

Now, the second part of childbirth. She gave birth, and then Gorion and everyone rushed them and killed them immediately after, so it was childbirth that killed her, because if she didn't give birth, she wouldn't have been killed.

So even though it seems a lie, it can be made to seem the truth.

If anyone disagrees, feel free to respond and I'll defend Gorion. After all, he did protect me, and help me, it's the least I could do.

It smells like revisionism to me, but I don't know the creators' intent.

The idea that Gorion could have been intimately involved with any mother a player could choose (by selection of the character's race) seems a bit farfetched to me. An elf? A gnome? A dwarf? An orc? It doesn't add up. Maybe that had something to do with the change.

The "real" story also brings your character (and Gorion) closer than ever to Sarevok. Gorion had time to save your character, but he couldn't save Sarevok, so Sarevok was left to fend for himself. That gives him a reason to hold a grudge against Gorion: "It didn't matter. I killed Gorion in the end." It also gives you a chance to reflect on your own character's life: if Gorion hadn't nurtured and protected your character, how would he or she have turned out?

Kind of dramatic, eh? (Yawn.)

I think it's a retcon. ToB came out some four or so years after BG1, and it was in the latter games that the storytelling got really good. Maybe they hired new writers.

@VonDondu, haha unless you chose to be this chaotic evil char more insane/destructive than Sarevok... (eh too bad the game doesnt really allow it much)

While it is certainly possible that they simply revised that part of the story, I had always simply reasoned that Gorion didn't want you to know that your mother was an evil preistess of Bhaal. So he simply made up the part about her being his lover and Bhaal forcing himself onto her.

So yes, in my reasoning, I guess he did lie. But it wasn't a harmful lie, it was a lie to make it seem like the mother you never knew was a decent person, and not an evil cultist.

Well I'm pretty sure MY CHARACTER (a pally) would forgive him, if it was a little lie meant to confort you or something, but *I* got angry at him! Seriously, I got angry at someone who isn't real... does that maybe say just how darn good BG is? Anyway, I prefer to believe that Gorion lied to you, but it does seem likely that it was a mistake on the writers' part.

And I agree with Koveras, there isn't much room for being evil in BG... it's really a shame, since I can just imagine what subtle elements and stunning twist could take place if someone REALLY good wrote an evil side of BG... I'd do it myself, but I'm too lazy to make very much... I DID once try to do it, a comic actually, of "the evil side of BG".. but I scrapped the idea