Astarion's Book of Hungers is finally here... And it's suprisingly decent!
TW: Spoilers I guess
So as the one who put a Hermaeus Mora on her pfp (with a reason!) I of course ran to check the book and swallow it in one take read it ASAP, and what I can tell you, it provides some enriching lore for our lovely bloodthirsty vampire.
And by the way, Stephen Rooney is listed in credits as text designer!
I will very shorlty write important snippets from it (related mostly to Astarion).
Cons of the book: - Unfortunately, the book focuses mainly on pre-BG3 timeline and custom campaign in that particular timeline, so there are zero addittions for post-BG3 canon and lore.
Pros of the book - everything else! Which is: - Lots of vampires: it was shown that vampires are indeed super common among the nobles in the High Society. They attend balls and dance among the mortals. - Astarion's timeline: we finally have the proper dates. 1261 DR. Astarion Ancunín is born in Baldur’s Gate. 1300 DR. The vampire Cazador Szarr turns Astarion into a vampire spawn. 1492 DR. The events of Baldur’s Gate 3 occur. - Introduction of Rat's Run: Astarion's favourite tavern where he was "hunting" the most. Rat's Run is a tavern with bad reputation - the laws of city don't work there, the tavern's master is a disguised rakshasa, it's a place sailors and smugglers and any other criminal of all kinds loves to visit, it's their own little haven. We remember Astarion's words from the game that on most part his victims were all like this, now we also have more info on that. - A bit more of the information about Cazador and his other six spawns. I think this won my attention for good, because there is a lot to uncover. 1. Cazador Szarr is listed as vampire mage infernalist who worship Mephistopheles, and because of that Harvester devils were regulartly visiting him. (to prevent any argument I think it's worth to point out: It was Cazador Szarr who sold his own soul to the Archdevil, thinking that the consequences won't reach him because of his vampirism. Mephistopheles loves to prove such arrogant individuals wrong. Ascended Astarion does not sell his own soul by performing the ritual, because just performing the ritual does not create/sign a contract, and AA never signs anything, as the "selling one's soul" performs only with the name's sign, paper and ink with the devil witness, as we saw in Mizora's scene with breaking Wyll's contract). (upd: It is not written in this precise book, I forgot to warn, but rather as a conclusion of all the canon information I gathered. I will write sometime later a proper post about it!) 2. An illustration of spawn Violet flirting with a Harvester Devil (with Astarion, exasperated, standing behind). Proper introductions of other spawns with interesting details, such as: 1.1 Astarion wasn't the first spawn of Cazador, but actually his second one. 1.2 First spawn was Aurelia, a tiefling. Third - Pale Petras, was human. Fourth - Violet, was an elf, ''She relishes tormenting her siblings and strives to please her master''. Others listed as "recent spawns": Leon, Dalyria and Yousen. 1.3 Confirmed that Astarion indeed was once an elf magistrate.
(also, noticed how in this book DnD alignments are still used all over the stats, everybody is evil lmao)
There is also an illustration of Aurelia and Violet who lured a victim specifically for Cazador to feed upon, them all smiling. - Little insight into the relationship between Cazador's spawns. Honestly, I've been thinking about writing a big post about them and now I have even more material for that. Because if you ever imagined them all being friendly or at least tolerating each other's existence, or all "being victims in one dire situation"... forget about it lol. One of the scenarios for custom campaign in Rat's Run is that Astarion can hire some vampire hunters to kill Violet, but her revealing this plan and turning them back on Astarion. Or it is Violet from the starters plans to kill Astarion by the reason of "her jealosy", according to Astarion himself. Astarion says "she thinks I want to humiliate her at every turn". Just like I imagined - you cannot expect rainbows and sunshines blooming between them all. We had bits of proof in game too, and again, even more info now. - Astarion is friendly with one of the Rat's Run tavern patrons, a kenku agent of the Guild named Roka. "The vampire spawn occasionally hunts individuals Roka has designated for elimination." - And just bunch of Astarion's quotes I think many will find funny or just enjoyable lol So, that's somehow it. Overall I think it's quite good addittion to what we already have. And I will run preparing a post about other six Cazador's spawns with more lore now presented.
