A dissertation about Zevlor that I've been meaning to write and post for some time…
Some of this is from my bio for him and some I will elaborate further upon than I do there, but here we go. // @thefaithbroken
Zevlor has been through hell, figurative and literal. A protector by nature, it was as obvious an action as breathing to become a paladin of Helm, to become a Hellrider. His strong sense of justice and his drive to defend those who could not defend themselves had him rise quickly in the ranks. It was not long before he earned the title Commander.
For a time, all was well. He was proud of his work, of his calling, of the good that he did.
You remember the shattered windows of Elturel's High Cathedral, the burning black sky of Avernus beyond.
In its horror, the Blood War unites you. Tiefling, dwarf, and elf alike huddle behind the shields of your paladin order, waiting for salvation. But when it comes… disunity.
The returned city casts you out, the devils who dragged them down to hell. In the end, it is not your paladin oath that is broken: It is your Faith itself.
Those of his order stood together, united in the face of possible enslavement or annihilation… until the danger had past and there was time for such ugly things as resentment, fear, hatred, and racism.
After all they had endured, after how they all had stood together and defended their home, after they had all placed their own lives in peril to defend those who needed their aid—just as Zevlor always had believed should be done—to be cast out… broke both his faith and, in many ways, him.
He was weary, wartorn, betrayed. But his people, the frightened Tiefling refugees also cast out, needed him, looked to him to guide them through the perils of the Wilds and to Baldur's Gate. He was the one with the most experience, the most authority of the lot. They looked to him and he set aside his own pain and brokenness in order to do what he could for them, so little as it might be. Older than most there, powerless with his faith left in shambles, a greater ruin even than Elturel, still he agreed to lead them. Who else was there to whom they might turn? Most of them had never held a sword, perhaps never even ventured outside of their city, in all of their lives.
Yet, even despite his knowledge and his experience, they lost many along the roads, to all manner of dangers and threats. Their numbers had substantially dwindled even before the gnoll attack… and he set each one like a mark against his very own soul, the burden of his failures, the reasons for the guilt that hunched once strong shoulders. He was not worthy to lead them. He had failed them at every turn. Without his abilities as a paladin, with his faith shattered as it was, what use has he been to them? If he has done anything at all worth note, he cannot see it. Yet, he does not ask for them to take up arms as well. Does not demand of these survivors to become soldiers. He assures the ones who wish to help, tries to encourage them even when he would have given up from the moment the order to leave was given if it hadn't been for this duty. He asks nothing of them, and takes everything upon himself, weary as he is.
That is where the story begins anew though, isn't it? Gnolls and goblins and brave, heroic adventurers, some small spark of hope rekindled at last… How surprised he is at every turn when the leader of the adventurers not only agrees to help, but even offers, does so without asking anything in return. It shocks him every time and you can hear it in the breathless, stunned quiet, particularly if the leader of the adventurers doesn't take the payment he collected from the refugees for their help in ridding them of the goblin threat. He even gives the leader his own Helm-blessed gauntlets if the player sorted Kagha. Every time he is met with kindness and aid, he is left stunned and perhaps even a bit verklempt because Elturel had shaken him so much, had broken him so much, had left him hopeless.
But these adventurers who owe them nothing had done everything in their power to help him and the other refugees, perfect strangers to them, simply because it was the right thing to do. It isn't much in the grand scheme of the world turning, but it means everything to him, which is exactly what Cerys says when you meet her at Last Light.
"The way Zevlor talked about you, I'd thought you would be ten feet tall." [ Potentially paraphrasing as I can't remember the exact wording, but that's the gist. ]
He hadn't stopped talking about the leader, about the one who returned at least some hope to him, not from the moment they left the Grove. It was the first time since Elturel fell that he felt a spark of something again that didn't feel like loss or suffering.
If only he had known how it would go from there…
What hope had been rekindled by the travelers was challenged by the Shadows as fear and uncertainty once more gripped him. Were these shadows not the same that Halsin had warned the travelers about? And yet, Cerys assured him it was only a quick detour to avoid an owlbear on the road. If his scout was so certain, then perhaps it was, in fact, the best path.
Not far from a place that could have been their safehaven from the shadows, it fell upon them: the might of the Absolute.
Enthralled and dominated by a being of god-like power, his brokenness, his vulnerability, his self-doubt and his guilt are what the Absolute sees and what it uses. What is it that captures him? The thought of having his power restored to him, not for his own gain… but that he might at last truly protect his people, might prevent the loss of any more lives, might at last be able to live up to all that they had asked of him when he, in his mind, had failed them so many times along this journey. The Absolute singled him out as the threat, as the one who would cause the most trouble if he was aware at the time of the ambush, and it made certain that it wouldn't be, showing him exactly what he wanted to see: him able to keep his people safe…
As they were slaughtered around him, or blindly fled into the darkness.
And by the time he can snap out of it, there's nothing he can do. It's too late. Asharak, Ikaron, Memnos, and others — dead. It's his fault. It's his fault that he was too weak. It was some personal failing of his that lead to this, clearly.
So he goes with the cultists. Lets them take him away to Moonrise.
So much for hope. So much for heroes. What a fool he had been.
There was only him and his weakness and his failure… and the dead…
Yet, upon being freed in the Mindflayer Colony by the leader of the adventurers, he fights like a madman, helps to clear the room of any and all threats, offering a glimpse at the warrior he was and still is beneath the grief. And then you can speak with him.
For this, I will use my paladin, Thraeya and the dialogue options she chose.
Zevlor: Hells, I didn't think I was going to make it… Thank you. I… I owe you an explanation. Much more than that. But first, please… The others. The ambush — tell me they survived.
Thraeya: They found refuge. But what the hells happened out there, Zevlor?
Zevlor: You've heard some of it, I'm sure. That I froze, or broke, or some other lie that is kinder than the truth. We were ambushed by cultists, yes. And then I heard… her. Their false god, whispering promises in my mind. I would be a paladin again — with a god's purpose, a god's power. Everything I needed to protect my people. And all the while, the cult tortured them. They fought, and ran, and died around me, while I imagined myself their saviour. By the time I regained my sense, it was too late. I did not just surrender to the Absolute. For a moment, I welcomed it.
Thraeya: It sounds like you were being enthralled. It's not your fault.
Zevlor: It would be nice to think so. But whatever these monsters twist us into… I believe that it begins in us. I won't make excuses. I can't make amends. But I know something of what you came to do — I want to help, i- if you'll let me. Ketheric is below. He thinks you are no longer a menace. Descend and show him how wrong he is. If there are any more survivors to be found, I'll find them and lead them out of this place.
Thraeya: Find your people. They need you.
Zevlor: They have you… Go, my friend. Please. Let me do this much.
As an aside, most of the responses you can choose are less than understanding. Several of them are outright condemning, much as the tone I dislike that has been taken with the writing in answers to Gale. And, honestly, the way Zevlor talks about himself also reminds me quite a bit of how Gale talks about himself. As though he has no worth or value beyond what he can do for others—right from when you first meet him in the Grove and he says that he'll repay your kindness—as well as for feeling that there is no way he can redeem himself, no way to make amends, no way to atone. There is something inherently wrong with him.
It frustrates me to no end that the game and its writing team have chosen to treat a character like Zevlor in this manner, as though the very narrative condemns him for something utterly beyond his control. As many times as certain adventurers get charmed by harpies and Tasha's Hideous Laughter and Otto's Irresistible Dance cast by just regular, ordinary opponents, I find it a bit hypocritical to hold it against Zevlor that he gets dominated by a literal deity-level being.
We give Minthara a second chance when we recruit her despite how many deaths she's either responsible for under orders of the Absolute or would have been responsible for under the Absolute, nevermind anything she might have done or been part of as a Lolth-sworn drow.
We don't hold all of Astarion's past against him, despite all the lives it affected forever.
We don't condemn Shadowheart for being part of Shar's cult despite all of the destruction wrought.
We don't blame Lae'zel for her people literally being willing to go wipeout whoever stands in their way — including an entire monastery as well as the Flaming Fist and the tiefling scout.
We don't fault Karlach for not helping the people of Elturel while she was in the hells because she was focused on doing whatever it took to survive.
We don't hold it against Wyll that he made a bad decision because he wanted to save his city.
We don't blame Halsin for the Curse falling and for his inability to fix it all this time, or even to keep the Grove in order and Kagha, his own student, on the right path.
We don't blame or condemn or ostracize any of them for their worst act or worst failing or worst decision or worst moment.
Yet the game seems to slant towards immediately writing off characters like:
Zevlor [ who was literally in the worst mental state possible while still trying to help others and was taken advantage of because of it and then subsequently blamed by the very people he strove to protect and had protected until that point even when he was struggling, to the extent of Cerys basically saying 'fuck him' despite the fact that SHE is the whole reason they ended up in the Curse anyway even if you explained to her what happened, and Zorru — who has exactly no right since he took off and abandoned the Tiefling who the Githyanki kill — basically says he better not see Zevlor or else. ]
Nere [ who is arguably in the same boat as Minthara, if not worse for having been a drow male in Lolth-sworn society, and if you converse with him after you convince him to free the gnomes, you can even actually see the shift in his demeanor and tone, to the extreme of going from talking in third person to talking in first, as well as him seeming almost addled and confused ]
Gale [ who much of the fandom makes no secret of saying that somehow Mystra was the real victim and Gale was the problem — thanks, Larian — despite the fact that even Minsc says that where he comes from, they teach their wizard boys to be silent lest Mystra steal them away, nevermind all of her canon behavior and atrocities outside of the game ].
On the whole, the fandom pardons almost all of the team characters in some manner or other, while condemning some of the very others whose stories are quite similar. Why is that? This game literally revolves around the concept of trauma and the fallout from it, and yet… apparently the effects of trauma should hold weight only for some characters? Is that the takeaway?
Zevlor should be condemned and ostracized because he was suffering, Nere should be killed and his head taken to the Myconids despite being a puppet under the Absolute, and Gale's best ending — according to some of the very people at Larian in charge of the stories — is to kill himself for the greater good because he wasn't ready before but he can do it now.
But, I digress, Zevlor is a good person who has been through literal and metaphorical hell while trying to help people who needed help, despite the fact that he didn't even feel like he could help himself. In a moment of weakness, he was taken advantage of and enthralled, and he blames himself for all that followed — and the narrative itself seems to blame him in turn.
Instead of pointing fingers, throwing blame, and directing venom at a man who already thinks he isn't worth the space he takes up, you should be able to sit him down in camp with a warm blanket and some food beside the campfire and reassure him — just as you do with all of your companions, each in turn — that he did what he could, that he isn't defined by his worst moment, and that the world is still better for him in it. What's the most important is what he does next. And you would see him absolutely crumble.
Zevlor deserves the world, and no one will ever convince me otherwise.
