#estryd 2.0

[tuxedo-rabbit]

DU Questions (for the AU version please)

How does your Dark Urge feel about the city?

How does your Dark Urge feel about love?

How does your Dark Urge feel about what others think of them?

How good of a liar is your Dark Urge? How do they feel about lying?

How does your Dark Urge feel about the city?

Baldur’s Gate was home for Estryd. The Temple of Bhaal was the one safe haven she had, no matter how often she ran away they always welcomed her inevitable return. Her family, as dysfunctional as the are, were there. Estryd knew the ins and outs of Baldur’s Gate. She loved her city, even if she was known as a terror by the people living there.

That all changes when she discovers Orin tried to kill her, and now agents of Bhaal are attacking her on site. Estryd now associates Baldur’s Gate with betrayal and loss. She won’t be returning after the events of the game.

How does your Dark Urge feel about love?

Intense yearning mixed with shame. Estryd wants to be loved so much, and she feels love deeply, despite telling herself otherwise. But Bhaal has made it clear that love is not part of who she is supposed to be. She doesn’t want to be forced to kill people she loves so she tries to suppress those feelings. And she truly believes that no one can love her, monster that she is.

Gale gets a glimpse of the depth of her feelings during the Weave scene. It’s platonic at that moment, but she has this strong desire for friendship that overwhelms him. It’s his first glimpse of who she is under the Dark Urge mask. (and she is ridiculously sappy towards him once they are in a committed relationship)

How does your Dark Urge feel about what others think of them?

I think Estryd does a lot of lying to herself. She tells herself she doesn’t care, and in most cases this is true. Being a monster of the night for decades numbs you to people’s opinions. But when she starts to care about someone, she wants them to care for her just as much, and this leads to a lot of self-loathing because she feels she is someone incapable of love or being loved. So she tries to cover up her hurt by pretending not to care.

How good of a liar is your Dark Urge? How do they feel about lying?

Estryd is very good at lying (even mechanically she has a high charisma score and is good at deception)! She’s had to use lying as a survival skill for most of her life. She feels neutral about it. If lying helps turn things in her favor, she lies.

[tuxedo-rabbit]

For the Dark Urge ask game!

1, 12 and 20 for estryd with her memory intact(I want to know her story 👀)

Also 21 if you already have any songs for her

What circumstances led to your Dark Urge becoming their Class/Subclass?

Mechanically speaking, Estryd is a warlock/war domain cleric. Her magic comes from her father. When Estryd was a child, on the run after killing her foster parents, Bhaal spoke to her in dreams and offered her the power to protect herself in exchange for her having a place in the world. He did not explain who he was or that he was her real father. Estryd was about 12 at the time and just wanted to go back to having a real home. This dream visitor was the only person who had showed care toward her in a long time. She agreed and gained her powers. I’m mixing the lore here for how warlock and cleric powers work, but in the beginning it was less about devotion and more about making a deal. It wasn’t until later that she realized “having a place in the world” meant being the harbinger of the apocalypse, or that Bhaal didn’t need her consent to force her to live out her destiny.

The more cleric-y abilities happened after she gave up escaping and started devoting herself to her destiny and started taking part in temple duties regularly. She loses both warlock & cleric powers permanently at the start of Act 3 when Bhaal gets fed up with her rebellion.

How does your Dark Urge feel about being a bhaalspawn?

After many years thinking of it as a curse she could cure, Estryd is now at peace with being a bhaalspawn. It is part of her identity. At one point she has an argument with Gale about how she can no more stop being a bhaalspawn then he can stop being a human. She will always want to kill, it’s in her nature. When Bhaal rips everything of himself out of her it feels like she has a hole in her soul she can’t fill. She mourns the loss. But there’s a strange irony that her younger, hopeful self, the creature she struggled the most to kill, got what she wanted in the end.

Is your Dark Urge open about their Urge or do they try to hide it? Why?

Estryd is careful about who she tells and when she tells them. She has learned over the years that most people will not accept The Urge. In the past, people have either tried to kill her over it, or save her from it. Estryd doesn’t want to have to deal with either of those things if she can help it. She secretly, and successfully, hides Alfira’s body. It isn’t until act 2, when the Urge commands her to kill Isobel and her relationship with Gale blossoms, that she finally confides in her new friends. And only because it might get in the way of the party’s needs.

What are 2-3 songs that your Dark Urge would relate to?

Oh gosh, this is a mix of songs I think she’d relate to & songs that just make me think of her:

“I Can’t Decide” by Scissor Sisters (makes me think of Estryd’s relationship to both Orin and Gortash)

“Cutting Stone” by The Decemberists

“The Wanting Comes in Waves” by The Decemberists (makes me think of the dynamic between Estryd and Bhaal, it's always about bartering. Great Durge song in general tbh)

[tuxedo-rabbit]

Also.

Estryd is not happy with the results of what happened at the temple.

The Urge was a part of her. She was fine with it, it was part of her identity. It has now been forcibly cut out of her body.

Her father killed her, another powerful being resurrected her with unclear motives, and now there's a giant hole in her soul that isn't ever going to go away.

I mean, honestly, how would that work? To have everything of your father ripped out of you? It sounds horrific. To go through that kind of identity fracture.

She enjoyed killing before, Bhaal made it euphoric. Now it feels like nothing. But that doesn't change the fact that she still has to do it to survive.

Are there other joys that are missing? How long would it take to notice them? The Urge influenced how she thought about morality and the nature of Gods. When she thinks about those topics now, would her previous opinions make as much sense?

Who even is she without the Urge?

Everyone is acting like this is amazing news, but for Estryd, this is devastating.

[tuxedo-rabbit]

I can't tell if its a glitch or if its because I didn't get the Slayer form this time, but Jaheira...never learned that I was a Bhaalspawn this time??

I never got the cutscene where she confronts durge about it, and I never got an option to tell her (though I did get the option to tell everyone else this time).

If that's a cutscene you only get in Slayer runs I feel really bad for the majority of redemption durges. Because I know most people don't kill Isobel.

It's a great scene that really sets the tone for the durge and Jaheira dynamic!

[tuxedo-rabbit]

Currently struggling because Estryd looks SO COOL in Ketheric's armor but Bhaal has nerfed her cleric/warlock skills and now she's no longer proficient in heavy armor.

None of the light armor has the right vibe 😭

[tuxedo-rabbit]

Just a couple more shots of Estryd's new look

[tuxedo-rabbit]

I added onto the astral tadpole's visual effects by giving Estryd graying hair & skin, and now she looks like she's on her way to becoming the bbeg of a D&D campaign.

[tuxedo-rabbit]

no amnesia Estryd vs amnesiac Estryd at the end of act 2 is also killing me.

Amnesiac Estryd saved the Shadowlands, but failed to save Isobel and had the Slayer form forced onto her. Her friends reacted as though she was a monster. She's in the pits of despair, trying to resist the Urge but feeling like it's inevitable she'll become the monster everyone is afraid of. (And she hasn't even hit her lowest point yet!)

No Amnesia Estryd is feeling manic optimism. She resisted killing Isobel. She resisted killing Gale. There have been no consequences for her defying Bhaal, and he hasn't even taken away her powers yet (which means he must need her for something still--she has the upper hand here). None of her friend's (and boy, what a novelty that word is) reactions towards her being bhaalspawn were as bad as she had imagined. Gale didn't even try to kill her! Seeing Gortash again, being in the mindflayer colony, those things hit hard. But she killed one of the people who betrayed her, she'll get her revenge on Gortash and Orin too. She hasn't quite figured out what to do after that point, but still. No matter.