I got here after chasing a very different rabbit down its hole. I'd noticed that Gortash seems to have been throwing out a lot of his stuff (read: mostly employees).
Waldemar Prinski, a loyal banite, sold to a devil for a corn chip
Dark Breaker Antiope, sahuagin wrangler, A Negotiation
The Steel Watch Foundry, Orders to Black Gauntlet Rives
Scribe Yanthus, my beloved, sent on a wild bhaal chase
Vance Farnol, journalist, tho you could argue he had it coming
Goblin Worg handler at Flymm Cargo, plus the Worgs when they run out of Goblin to eat
And, of course, everyone at his Coronation
Was killing all of the patriars and their staff a grim necessity, Enver? Was it?
(Also, he's installed a giant portrait of Bane and a bust of Bane in the penthouse, but he doesn't have a single picture of himself, or any mirrors, for that matter. Food for thought.)
My initial diagnosis was macabre, but obviously I’ve moved away from that line of thinking. He's just way too happy to brag about how much danger he's put himself, us, and the entire world in. It freaked me out the first time I met him (as a Tav). Like I see him glancing at the ground and smiling coyly while saying, "If we're lucky, we'll become slaves," on the back of my eyelids when I go to bed at night.
For the love of all that is holy, could you please turn it down a notch?
I've been obsessed with The Ultimate State since I first read it. It's absolutely absurd nonsense. The item description says it's, "the philosophical ramblings of Enver Gortash." and I feel like it's worth noting that he doesn't write his own propaganda; he has the banites do it for him. But I mean, it really does read like he's twisting himself in knots to connect "unity" and "progress" together, but babe, those jigsaw pieces do not go together like that. Anyway, while thinking about this subject it dawned on me:
They're the same picture.
You know what other line of thinking these two have in common?
They both look so sad when they say this. I'm sorry. I'm sorry I abandoned you.
I know we all love to joke about Durge or Gortash feeding the Brain the "Handsome, Younger Man" line, but what if that was just a smokescreen and it's been the other way around this whole time?
Netherbrain: You think you know why you are here. You think you can atone for giving me my power, child of Bhaal, by destroying me with the Netherstones. You are wrong.
The Emperor: It’s messing with your mind. Don’t listen to it. Use the stones.
Netherbrain: By eliminating Ketheric and Orin, you have simply unbound me. Exactly as I intended. The Crown is now mine to command - mine alone.
The Emperor: Don’t listen to it! Focus on the Crown!
Netherbrain: You placed the Crown upon me in the depths of Moonrise Towers, and there I was born. The Crown is not my weakness - it is what made me what I am.
Gortash: You are delusional - the Crown is how we controlled you!
Netherbrain: I respected Bhaal’s child once, but not you, Gortash. I allowed you to control me as long as it suited my purposes. You have played your part. The next order to be given is mine and it is this - die.
Gortash: (crumples like a piece of parchment)
Netherbrain: When the parasite entered your ruined mind - you became a pawn in my design. Who do you think told the Chosen about the Astral Prism? Who do you think planted the knowledge of Orpheus’ power, and the fear of what it could do? When the Chosen sent my thralls to retrieve the Prism - who do you think let the ‘Emperor’ slip its leash, knowing it would be the one to bring you to me?
The Emperor: We were part of its plan…
Netherbrain: I only needed one Netherstone loosened from the Chosen’s grasp to guarantee my freedom. You brought all three back to me. In doing so, you have liberated me. This was your role - and it is complete. Now you will witness the Grand Design.
The face of a man who has 20 INT and 16 WIS and is definitely not the brainwashed pawn of a giant brain that's been manipulating him in his sleep.
You think his puny +7 WIS save is gonna beat the Netherbrain when it's been working on his ass every time he goes to sleep for the last nine months? I say thee nay.
Also, and this is probably oversharing, but my dad, who I used to think of as a really smart guy is now a huge Trump supporter. He's an atheist but he'll parrot conservative christian talking points that I've seen clipped from Nazi talking heads. The words that come out of his mouth and the way he smiles when he says completely insane things is haunting.
What all of this means at the end of the day isn't much in the grand scheme of things, but it's kind of sad, and it definitely says something about his characterization. This man is floundering in a soup of his own making. A tragic puppet. A poor little meow meow.
There's an interesting line of demarcation between the various writings that he dictated to Scribe Yanthus, the things he wrote himself, and the things he says to us in the game.
Elder Brain Domination (from Ketheric, but about Gortash)
Suspended Ceremorphosis
The Grand Design
Studies of the Elder Brains
Accelerated Grand Design
Memoir Notes With Recent Addenda
Journal of Enver Gortash
He's so much more motivated and insightful early on, epitomized in Ketheric's entry, "Gortash fears that, energised by the dark energies of the Crown, the brain we now call the Absolute will eventually metamorphose into something new and more difficult to control." And he was right! But that guy's nowhere to be found by the time we meet him.
This one makes me particularly sad, "No weakness but the unexpected. It seems I shall need unexpected allies," because, again, he's right, and we could've saved him if the game had given us the opportunity to say, "No, there is another way. Let's not walk into this obvious trap." He wrote us a roadmap; left a trail of breadcrumbs; and we weren't given the option to follow them.
bg music is: hell - clown core. i picked up some scrap fabric recently so i'll be printing bg3 linocut patches & giving them away at emerald city comic con next monh !
This is a fictional religious newspaper I created, imagining a world where the faith of the Absolute has spread even further.
It’s set in the D&D universe and was first “published” when the city of Luskan fell—celebrating that event from the perspective of the fictional religion.
Please note: this is purely a creative work and not intended to promote any real-world beliefs.
While making it, I actually started to feel a little unwell—it’s intense material!
Someday, if I feel like it, I might also make an English version and a D&D Common version written in Thorass script.
