Dark Urge experience is kind of.... underwhelming, or is it just me?

[Niks]

Long story short... from perspective of role playing Dark Urge who is embracing his powers and legacy.
During storyline we have 4-5 scenes which are fine and suiting - no problem.
All the side activities are just "wtf!?".
Playing football with squirrel? Breaking birds wings? Biting goblins toes? Wtf even is the last one?
Am I the only one who feels that Dark Urge outside story activities is a psycho freak rather than murderer?
Additionally, don't know whether it was fixed already but it was strange to play Dark Urge murdering people, then to choose to align with goblins in order to get Minthara via vanilla approach and to find out that she is not really evil and she blames you for your deeds... so in order to get her you have to slaughter the Grove which means you have to play evil but if you're evil she is judging you... I didn't get what was the writers plan there :D

[DragonSoundxSG]

Yeah that part about Minthara ruined her for me. The writers seemed confused. BUT the Dark Urge playthrough becomes pretty awesome later on. I suggest sticking with it.

[Niks]

Originally posted by DragonSoundxSG:

Yeah that part about Minthara ruined her for me. The writers seemed confused. BUT the Dark Urge playthrough becomes pretty awesome later on. I suggest sticking with it.

I've done it many months ago :)
Started my 6th or 7th run right now and decided to try once more the Dark Urge (but current one will try to reject the Urge) however no quality changes so far at the end of Act 1. Previously I thought that bugs and technical issues might be involved... but seems like it's not the case.
I just remember that outside storyline which is ... fine (even though I expected a bit more after what I've seen in general, but it's not an issue) there is no "Urge is a murderer" staff. I mean like... harassing of tiny animals and biting filthy goblin's toes is disgusting and feels like a bit different mental issue. In other words it feels disturbing to role play Dark Urge outside story scenes of Dark Urge...

[gremlinbrat]

Well regarding Minthara, I think she plays like that because of the fact they patched her to be able to romance on a good run at some point...

However, it is a bit weird to me that on like an evil run like you said, where you raid the Grove that she still wants to be a good guy after. I think a lot of the confusion with that is that Larian didn't expect her to be as popular as she was so when they went back in and patched her, they weren't considering all of the different outcomes for her character depending on whether or not you raid the grove (they should keep her evil if you raid it IMO,) Which is a weird over-slight, but nothing that has bugged me too much about my durge playthrough.

As for durge in general, I'm not too far in yet so maybe I don't know but it hasn't been too boring for me but if you have to kill more small animals than people at some point, I definitely probably won't continue to enjoy it lol.

[Xan]

Dark Urge Act 1/2/3 spoilers don't read on if you haven't done a playthrough

.

It's heavily implied that you were a diabolical genius prior to Orin lobotomising you, with the entire Absolute plot having been crafted by you and Gortash. If you read the prequel story to the game, "Blood in Baldur's Gate" it also talks about how you're intelligent enough to cover up all of your murders and are essentially the most prolific serial killer in the history of Baldur's Gate. The elder brain is even willing to go along with your plan and impressed by its cleverness and cruelty, and this is a being of unfathomable intelligence. This is more the kind of murderer you were interested in I assume.

AFTER being lobotomised however, you still have the desire to harm but now also a mangled, dull brain. You're no longer capable of devilry or grand plots, just random acts of violence you can barely regulate.

[Taifun_Vash]

Outside of the bugs I had in my Durge run, I found it quite fun. Now I need to say I played him as a neutral evil character and had no real interest in Minthara so I let her attack the grove, betrayed her and killed her. But that also had to do with the group I had and that my durge was a warrior, I simply had no space, or real use for her.

[Niks]

Originally posted by gremlinbrat:

Well regarding Minthara, I think she plays like that because of the fact they patched her to be able to romance on a good run at some point...

However, it is a bit weird to me that on like an evil run like you said, where you raid the Grove that she still wants to be a good guy after. I think a lot of the confusion with that is that Larian didn't expect her to be as popular as she was so when they went back in and patched her, they weren't considering all of the different outcomes for her character depending on whether or not you raid the grove (they should keep her evil if you raid it IMO,) Which is a weird over-slight, but nothing that has bugged me too much about my durge playthrough.

As for durge in general, I'm not too far in yet so maybe I don't know but it hasn't been too boring for me but if you have to kill more small animals than people at some point, I definitely probably won't continue to enjoy it lol.

On my side situation is following with durge (no spoilers):
1. I've played on early access and very hardly cleaned everything on my first play through with custom character.
2. As a second attempt I decided to choose Dark Urge. I'm well aware of lore so the back story wasn't a surprise for me during whole campaign and I thought that I can try to switch "full evil role play mode ON" by making two rules, that "I will embrace my powers" and "I will kill all NPCs and companions but only via dialog or cutscenes options so choices would be justified by characters decisions". Also it was a nice opportunity to check vanilla Minthara hiring and betrayal of druids.
3. I've completed it avoiding some side quests just because after first run memory was fresh and it was boring for me to clear everything.
4. I tried 1st Act couple more times and right now decided to go once again with full completion of everything that I can as Dark Urge but rejecting it's nature cause outcomes are different here and there.
5. I've searched internet last months to check whether anything new was found among Dark Urge scenes and it seems that I didn't trigger only one minor scene on my first tryout.
Summary: if what I've seen so far is really "almost everything" - then it is not good. Problem for me was that on my first durge run I also knew which "bad actions" were available to me regarding of my character choice. Like killing tieflings which captured Laezel at the beginning (minor example to avoid spoilers). So, for those who are not aware what is a part of Dark Urge background and what's available to you no matter what - it feels like yeah. Outside story scenes durge hates tiny animals and goblin's toes. :(

[Niks]

Originally posted by Xan:

Dark Urge Act 1/2/3 spoilers don't read on if you haven't done a playthrough

.

It's heavily implied that you were a diabolical genius prior to Orin lobotomising you, with the entire Absolute plot having been crafted by you and Gortash. If you read the prequel story to the game, "Blood in Baldur's Gate" it also talks about how you're intelligent enough to cover up all of your murders and are essentially the most prolific serial killer in the history of Baldur's Gate. The elder brain is even willing to go along with your plan and impressed by its cleverness and cruelty, and this is a being of unfathomable intelligence. This is more the kind of murderer you were interested in I assume.

AFTER being lobotomised however, you still have the desire to harm but now also a mangled, dull brain. You're no longer capable of devilry or grand plots, just random acts of violence you can barely regulate.

Agreed. I simply felt lacking at least one or couple scenes during the whole campaign to be related to "random act of violence towards non-furry little things". I mean, simply. There are NPCs which are there just for decoration. If player embraces Urge X times - spawn the body of one non-important NPC from visited location somewhere in the corner. Add narrator which tells you that it was murdered last night and you feel like it could've been you. Or even without narrator - use the same bloody texture on the ground as with bard in a camp.
Some dialogs even giving similar feeling like you can do a bo-bo but nothing happens:
A girl in a tiefling camp got a scratch from goblins attack and Dark Urge can stare at her blood. It could've been extended. Yes, it will draw attention and might put you in jail, but with durge you are able to lose Gale by cutting his arm in the very beginning, lose lover, lose Alfira, etc and all of this very impactful so going into jail and even losing reputation among druids doesn't seems to be big of a deal in comparison :)

[artemisone]

SPOILERS

I liked the DU for the content but exactly what you are supposed to do to be successful as the DU is not entirely clear to me. I think that could be improved.
I found that somehow I failed at being the Dark Urge even though
I killed Orin. I resisted all the murders except the one you can't resist, but Orin seems to be the key to "winning". The butler shows up outside the Bhaal Temple and says kill Orin, and I did. But on the way out the butler seemed to not realize I killed Orin and he cursed me. I killed everyone at the reunion as a result. When I reported this to Larian they asked "how" I killed Orin -- seems odd, but I gather you have to do it in a special way, maybe with a special dialogue and a "duel". I just initiated combat as soon as I could to save Laezel.
I wish it was more clear, but at this point I don't want any more spoilers and will try to figure it out on another DU run.

[Taifun_Vash]

Originally posted by artemisone:

SPOILERS

I liked the DU for the content but exactly what you are supposed to do to be successful as the DU is not entirely clear to me. I think that could be improved.
I found that somehow I failed at being the Dark Urge even though
I killed Orin. I resisted all the murders except the one you can't resist, but Orin seems to be the key to "winning". The butler shows up outside the Bhaal Temple and says kill Orin, and I did. But on the way out the butler seemed to not realize I killed Orin and he cursed me. I killed everyone at the reunion as a result. When I reported this to Larian they asked "how" I killed Orin -- seems odd, but I gather you have to do it in a special way, maybe with a special dialogue and a "duel". I just initiated combat as soon as I could to save Laezel.
I wish it was more clear, but at this point I don't want any more spoilers and will try to figure it out on another DU run.

You need to initiate the cutscene dialog, in which you can still save your captured companion through dialog choices, which then starts the duel.

[Waifuhunter]

Minthara won't judge you if you'll hug her after snu-snu

[Harukage]

You really missed the part where Bhaal was a rando murderhobbo/assasin as a mortal. He was and is really sadistic psycho. So yes, his offsprings are no better. Unless you decide to go against your blood.

[AnonymousWizard]

It's pretty clearly that the game was primarily written for a Dark Urge Resist run, to the point I'm somewhat surprised there's the option to go for a boring run. Embracing the Urge gives a little bit of extra content but not the extra power it implicitly promises in exchange for your actions.

Note that Durge by default has quite a bit of personality that's implied to carry over from before their memory loss, particularly having always been a bit of a doofus despite their genius. Nothing says you have to pick those options, but it builds up a picture of how Durge differred from both Gorion's Ward and Orin (mostly by walking a path of restrained indulgence).

[Niks]

Originally posted by Harukage:

You really missed the part where Bhaal was a rando murderhobbo/assasin as a mortal. He was and is really sadistic psycho. So yes, his offsprings are no better. Unless you decide to go against your blood.

My only concern is that "murderhobbo should be like this not only towards tiny animals". Almost all unique durge scenes apart couple story related are about harassing of little fury things and such :D
So, spending dozens of hours on durge for me feels like he is rather a coward and psycho who tends to occasionally rip off butterfly wings and kicking little kitties rather than being a threat to BG or Sword Coast. It could've work if durge would've been 12 years old so birds and squirrels are the only safe targets... but adventurer whos dealing with all that staff from BG3 story showing of his legacy in open world by acts like this? Come on...

[⋋Parad0x⋌]

Originally posted by Harukage:

You really missed the part where Bhaal was a rando murderhobbo/assasin as a mortal. He was and is really sadistic psycho. So yes, his offsprings are no better. Unless you decide to go against your blood.

Okay but he wasn’t though.. BG3 drops the ball on this and the incoherent nature of the Dark Urge/Bhaal.

Sarevok and yourself though letters claim that Orin doesn’t understand Bhaal, yet the dialogue from your Butler and your inner Urge monologues imply very much that Bhaal isn’t just “Death”, it’s creativity too, or else why would Sceleritas praise your handiwork and certain styles etc

[Harukage]

This game can write whtever its scenario writers want. That does not change the fact that Bhaal as a mortal was a sick backalley psycho killer who worked as an assassin to not die from starvation.