Feelings on the Emperor and thoughts on his character (Spoilers, obviously)

[Lil Larrikin]

How is everyone feeling about the Emperor as a character? Do you find his trustworthy and reliable, or do you distrust him and go against his advice?

Personally, for most of the game I was on his side even after finding out that he was an illithid, but many of the details you discover later on in the game made me reconsider my view,
He was an unwitting pawn of the Elder Brain for the entire game and whilst he does save your life on several occasion, he only does this to further his own end of gaining power over the brain/the crown.
If he consented to releasing Orpheus there would be no need to kill him, but instead of doing so he leaves to join your - and his, apparently - sworn enemy, demonstrating that his opposition to the Elder Brain was really just down to his desire to control it, once this is off the cards he willingly submits to it.
If you read into his backstory, he enthralled one of his closest friends and used her as a puppet to control Baldur's Gate and its people just because he liked being in control of "his" city.
Ansur tried desperately to heal him then decided to give him a merciful death. We are told that Ansur approached Balduran in his sleep and tried to kill him, which resulted in Balduran killing Ansur in self defense. The thing is, I'm not sure we can trust Balduran when he tells us this: it seems unlikely to me that an unconscious ilithid would be able to solo a grown dragon, if you directly compare their stats in game this more or less confirms this leading me to believe that Balduran actually assassinated Ansur. Either way, even if it was in self defense, he killed his best friend, covered it up and tried to dissuade you from learning the truth of the matter.
Ultimately he's manipulative an only concerned about power and I reveled in his death.

[Banelord]

my lord Bane dictated me, after i killed Enver Gortash, who is being tormented by Bane in teh afterlife, that He will consider me his new Champion if i release the mind flayer plague to the world by staying a non mind flayer. so that is my quest. all other Mindflayers that pose as rulers are to be killed.

[Tingly]

He is a somewhat more compelling take on that kind of manipulative character than we usually see. He's using enough of the truth without letting his mask slip that a player can plausibly fail to see through him. I was all about freeing Orpheus past a certain point, and was able to ask the Emperor if there was any way I could make him reconsider, and he said 'no' so we were at cross-purposes regardless of the Emperor's intentions.

[Lil Larrikin]

Originally posted by Ismael Clowndova:

my lord Bane dictated me, after i killed Enver Gortash, who is being tormented by Bane in teh afterlife, that He will consider me his new Champion if i release the mind flayer plague to the world by staying a non mind flayer. so that is my quest. all other Mindflayers that pose as rulers are to be killed.

Bane is cringe, praise Jergal

Originally posted by Tingly:

He is a somewhat more compelling take on that kind of manipulative character than we usually see. He's using enough of the truth without letting his mask slip that a player can plausibly fail to see through him. I was all about freeing Orpheus past a certain point, and was able to ask the Emperor if there was any way I could make him reconsider, and he said 'no' so we were at cross-purposes regardless of the Emperor's intentions.

His refusal to even consider the idea of freeing Orpheus is what seals the deal. He tells you that Orpheus would kill you as soon as he was freed (which turns out to be an obvious lie) but beyond that he has no good reason to insist on his imprisonment unless it is to control his power - he even admits as such, telling you that you can free Orpheus after he is "done" with him. But if you follow him, he always ends up killing Orpheus to absorb his power so it is obvious he never had any intention of freeing him.
I freed Orpheus for Lae'zel, so she can take the war to Vlakith and free her people. Rebelling against evil gods seems like a consistent character theme in the game and I was happy to lean into it,

[Ellie]

If you tell the emperor to piss off consistently, at some point you get a flashback about him and his girlfriend in the past, where it becomes strongly implied that he mindcontroller her into submitting to him. To me, he's one of the villains.

[Malaficus Shaikan]

I didnt know he was manipulating me until the last moment.

I spend most of the game thinking larian had ♥♥♥♥♥♥ up the lore.
I am not expert on mind flayer lore(Just read the wiki) but it shoudnt be possible the emperor is balgarian as mind flayers arent there host.
Likewise mind flayers do not have genitals or a sex drive.
So the whole emperor comming on to me only futured my believe that larian got the lore wrong.
It wasnt until i read the forums i noticed how clever the emperors lies where.

For me the part i am pratical.
I hold no grudges.
I only kill when people get in my way or are causing problems.

So one the one hand i praise larian for making a good manipulator.
On the other i think they didnt read the lore because mind flayers arent sexualy active nor do they suck at mind control.

[Sultar]

From the moment he shows himself as a mind flayer I always thought that the ancestral brain had sent him (if somehow the brain managed to get rid of the crown for a moment) to find a way to kill the death three chosens and release the brain. I thought that was his mission.

He was always telling half-truths, and saying all the time that he was the one to help and save us, almost as if it were altruism, when it's clear that it was for his own convenience. He was very insistent that we use the powers of the tadpoles. Added to the fact that he killed Ansur and did mind control on the Duchess, plus Jergal assuring that mind flayers have no soul; It led me to end up freeing Orpheus.

[Mizu]

I feel like they were pretty well done, they did a great job at pretending to be a person. And it was genuinely chilling when it revealed its true colors if your character kept calling BS on its act. My only problem with them is that it makes very little sense for them to go and openly side with the Absolute if we free Orpheus and the game really needs to give some explanation on why he thinks slavery to it is a better idea then running the hell away to somewhere beyond its reach while it is distracted fighting us.

[Pan Darius Cassandra]

Daisy > Emperor.

[GrandMajora]

Originally posted by Big Bottom Frag:

Ansur tried desperately to heal him then decided to give him a merciful death. We are told that Ansur approached Balduran in his sleep and tried to kill him, which resulted in Balduran killing Ansur in self defense. The thing is, I'm not sure we can trust Balduran when he tells us this: it seems unlikely to me that an unconscious ilithid would be able to solo a grown dragon, if you directly compare their stats in game this more or less confirms this leading me to believe that Balduran actually assassinated Ansur. Either way, even if it was in self defense, he killed his best friend, covered it up and tried to dissuade you from learning the truth of the matter.
Ultimately he's manipulative an only concerned about power and I reveled in his death.

You absolutely can not trust Balduran. The game tells us from at least two, if not three sources that illithids do not possess souls, nor can they feel emotions. The Emperor is only saying exactly what he thinks you want to hear in order to get you to go along with his machinations. After playing through the game multiple times, you start to recognize his behavior and the information he shares with you are incredibly cliche. Almost as if he's reading from a script and going through the motions.

If you flat out refuse to believe a word of his BS and continue to resist him, this is pretty much outright confirmed. He drops the act and reveals his true feelings about you. Which is to say that you are nothing more than a pawn to him, and he is disgusted with your 'puerile' attachment to your current form. He tells you directly that you are going to follow his orders and do exactly what he tells you to, and that if he has to force you to become an illithid, he will do so.

[guppy]

He is a creepy mind rapist with plot armour that will not take no for an answer no matter how often I tell him he f... disgusts me and that I will kill him first chance I get.

[GrandMajora]

Originally posted by Mizu:

I feel like they were pretty well done, they did a great job at pretending to be a person. And it was genuinely chilling when it revealed its true colors if your character kept calling BS on its act. My only problem with them is that it makes very little sense for them to go and openly side with the Absolute if we free Orpheus and the game really needs to give some explanation on why he thinks slavery to it is a better idea then running the hell away to somewhere beyond its reach while it is distracted fighting us.

The Netherbrain is giving off psychic tremors powerful enough to cause earthquakes throughout the city. Where exactly do you suggest he flee to?

Also, Mystra (or at least Elminster) tells us that The Absolute is a threat not just to Faerun, but to all the planes and possibly even the gods too. It's wearing the Crown of Karsus, an artifact that was used in a 12th level spell designed to usurp the position of a god.

[retsam1]

Originally posted by Big Bottom Frag:

How is everyone feeling about the Emperor as a character? Do you find his trustworthy and reliable, or do you distrust him and go against his advice?

Personally, for most of the game I was on his side even after finding out that he was an illithid, but many of the details you discover later on in the game made me reconsider my view,
He was an unwitting pawn of the Elder Brain for the entire game and whilst he does save your life on several occasion, he only does this to further his own end of gaining power over the brain/the crown.
If he consented to releasing Orpheus there would be no need to kill him, but instead of doing so he leaves to join your - and his, apparently - sworn enemy, demonstrating that his opposition to the Elder Brain was really just down to his desire to control it, once this is off the cards he willingly submits to it.
If you read into his backstory, he enthralled one of his closest friends and used her as a puppet to control Baldur's Gate and its people just because he liked being in control of "his" city.
Ansur tried desperately to heal him then decided to give him a merciful death. We are told that Ansur approached Balduran in his sleep and tried to kill him, which resulted in Balduran killing Ansur in self defense. The thing is, I'm not sure we can trust Balduran when he tells us this: it seems unlikely to me that an unconscious ilithid would be able to solo a grown dragon, if you directly compare their stats in game this more or less confirms this leading me to believe that Balduran actually assassinated Ansur. Either way, even if it was in self defense, he killed his best friend, covered it up and tried to dissuade you from learning the truth of the matter.
Ultimately he's manipulative an only concerned about power and I reveled in his death.

Not a small number of characters in this story are technically villains that one may think arent. The emperor is just one of them. But the real manipulation in many ways is jergal first and foremost.

[Mizu]

Originally posted by GrandMajora:

Originally posted by Mizu:

I feel like they were pretty well done, they did a great job at pretending to be a person. And it was genuinely chilling when it revealed its true colors if your character kept calling BS on its act. My only problem with them is that it makes very little sense for them to go and openly side with the Absolute if we free Orpheus and the game really needs to give some explanation on why he thinks slavery to it is a better idea then running the hell away to somewhere beyond its reach while it is distracted fighting us.

The Netherbrain is giving off psychic tremors powerful enough to cause earthquakes throughout the city. Where exactly do you suggest he flee to?

Also, Mystra (or at least Elminster) tells us that The Absolute is a threat not just to Faerun, but to all the planes and possibly even the gods too. It's wearing the Crown of Karsus, an artifact that was used in a 12th level spell designed to usurp the position of a god.

He still seemed to be in control of himself when he tried to pick a fight with me and got his ass kicked. The Netherbrain isn't omnipotent or omniscient, it was too focused on us and our attempt to use the crown to defeat it to have attention to spare for him. Finding a place to hide from it would have been hard, but not impossible. Certainly he had a better chance of doing so then successfully walking right up to and saying 'pinky promise to not enslave me again if I help you fight off the guys coming to gank you?'.

Also, what part of that argument you just made lends itself towards The Emperor deciding to openly oppose the only people who had a shot at stopping the Netherbrain and helping it when it tries to fend us off from defeating it? There is no possible good outcome for him if he helps the brain defeat us.

[Lil Larrikin]

Interesting to see that the consensus is he's a manipulative phallus, I expected there to be at least one simp for him.

Originally posted by Mizu:

My only problem with them is that it makes very little sense for them to go and openly side with the Absolute if we free Orpheus and the game really needs to give some explanation on why he thinks slavery to it is a better idea then running the hell away to somewhere beyond its reach while it is distracted fighting us.

If you can't beat them, join them right? He probably figured that he would be better off coming back to the Absolute as a willing subject rather than continuing to fight for a seeming losing cause he no longer has control over, either that or he's really just doing it to spite you for undermining his authority.

[MASTERCHIEF]

there are so many plot-holes.
1) if he was manipulating us. then where is the big betrayal. or maybe he just wanted to use us and had no reason to harm us, but to be frank, we were depending on him lol.

2) If he could just eat the brain of Orpheus, why didn't he just do it at the start?

3) he just leaves when you support Orpheus. like "WHAT" why. It just does not make sense.

some points to support the emperor:-

1) He is a mind flayer so he has every reason to hide his true identity.

2) he becomes aggressive only when dont cooperate (and gives a lot of chances) ( not cooperating is basically we being stupid ).

3) he killed his friend because his friend wanted to kill him first.

4) It seems he mind controlled his past partner. i did not find it in my play-through. and what was the reason to do it basically? ( the reason is more important ).

5) Orpheus would have killed us, if he had no use for us. i mean he literally says we should have just killed ourselves before. so i can understand why the emperor does not want Orpheus removed. ( i actually support Orpheus statement here, it makes sense )

some points against the emperor.

1) Well he is a mind flayer. they are bad in lore. but the game itself contradicts by showing us osmium ( sorry for the spelling ).

2) Mind flayers don't have a sole it seems. so is he who is he is or is he just a computer with programmed emotions?

3) Well he mind controlled his previous partner it seems. and says to us that he loved
her. i can't, attest to this myself because I did not find it.

I can't think of much else

Conclusion:-
I believe the emperor was a very late addition. My theory is that Daisy was actually supposed to be the tadpole talking to us. and Orpheus was to play the role of the emperor. thinking like this a lot of potholes add up for me.