Age of Main Character problem.

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From the texts in the game, it looks like halfelf, halforc, human, and halfling are the best choices. Class can be anything, but I have a hard time justifying a barbarian.

 

Or a druid. Or a ranger...

 

wait wait....didnt bhaal create the bhaalspawn at his death? this being the time of troubles? i remember discussing it with someone (on the bioware forums? im not sure) and we concluded that the main character would have to be something of 12-13 years old, then someone from bioware admitted they made a small mistake there...

 

@Arianyr: do you realize that it means that Sarevok would be a teenager?

 

According to the Realms Novel Chronology (http://www.wizards.com/forgottenrealms/FR_Timeline.asp), Baldur's Gate takes place in 1368, ten years after the Time of Troubles.

I would just assume that most Bhaalspawn came from before the ToT, to keep logical consistentcy.

 

The Spanish version of Baldur's Gate, poor as the translation is sometimes, very conveniently omits the "your 20 years of life" from the introduction, which makes race selection easier from a RP point of view, as there are no known restrictions.

In any case, in the 'History of the Chosen of Mystra', a book that can be found adventuring in BG, one can read:

If this theory is correct, some gods knew of the Time of Troubles way before it happened (i.e. Elminster was quite older than Midnight when they met, and he had already been a Chosen of Mystra for many, many years).


Don't read ahead if you haven't played Throne of Bhaal yet.

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This specially makes sense when we consider a certain big-boned, blue-colored, winged Bhaalspawn met in ToB. Adults of his race are REALLY old by human standards, and yet he was mature enough to have its own child. This indicates that Bhaal had been on a fathering rampage for many centuries, while Mystra had been looking and caring for her Chosen.

Taking this into account, and ignoring BG's introduction, Bhaal could have had dwarven, elven, and gnomish children before the Time of Troubles, who could have reached the end of their race's childhood period (or be close enough) at the time their story in BG start.

 

That's the point.

 

It's easy to justify the existence of Bhaalspawn in longer-lived races if you take a looser view of the phrase "Bhaal walked the land before the Time of Troubles". If Bhaal's future sight works very far ahead, or if time passes differently from his point of view than from a human point of view (did anyone ever see that comedian with the song about God asking the man for a penny?), then it's possible.

Though I think for my own purposes that a high elf PC or, well, Abazigal, is pushing it just a little. I always play as a half-elf.

 

@caradhas; yes, that would mean that both the pc and sarevok would have to be teenagers...hance the 'small mistake'. i guess bioware just didnt notice it

 

Imoen sure looks young enough to fit in this "teenager" thing

 

This is my theory on the PC's age:

What could have happened is that 20 years of life really did pass for every Bhaalspawn out there, and effectively aged them to their respective maturity levels. It wouldn't be noticeable for Humans, Half-Elves, Orcs, Half-Orcs and even maybe Halflings because they mature at fairly similar ages, which would mean their appearances would be close to un-noticeable.

For long-lived races, they would be matured quicker thanks to their Bhaalblood, leaving them to be mature earlier, and most likely shunned and expelled from their respective communities (I really wouldn't think Elves would keep around a 20 year-old Elven baby with a thirst for blood.)

From what I can tell from the entire Baldur's Gate saga, I've noticed that the majority of Bhaalspawn out there were humans, with very few having been born into other races (I don't recall any Dwarven ones, or even Halfling ones) so no one would really notice all these super-mature races until the last minute, when Throne of Bhaal happens.

Of course, I know the downside to this is the part where Yaga Shura gets to control his Fire Giant army if he matured quicker than the others, but on this one there could be two thoughts: a) they took his maturedness as being a sign that he was a chosen one of one form or another, or b) Fire Giants mature similar to Humans.

I had another theory while writing this, but then I realized it wasn't going to work, because time technically does apply to the gods too...>_> So yeah! My theory!

 

@Koroth:
That's already been suggested (possibly in a different thread ) and it follows that if they matured quicker, they would also burn out quicker. And that's not exactly a bonus for a god to bestow upon his children.

EDIT: Although, thinking about it some more, maybe that's exactly what Bhaal intended. Maybe he wanted them all to come to maturity at the same time, maximizing the carnage within a specific time frame and making it that much harder for the regular people to gang up on an individual Bhaalspawn. That way, they would all be tested against each other at the same time; nobody gets a head-start, nobody gets left behind. And the only surviving Bhaalspawn would of course ascend to godhood, but if they didn't, then Bhaal gets revenge on his ungrateful child by having him die quicker!

[ August 07, 2005, 06:40: Message edited by: Felinoid ]

 

Drat, forgot to point that part out! Thanks Felinoid!

I forgot to put in that he could have made them mature quicker to the point where they're most capable, then they could age regularly. Think of it as trying to clone yourself into a whole plethora of races, then stopping their maturity at when you need them the most...

 

Elwyn De'Liam:

I disagree. Although these are less likely, I think you can learn a lot from books. It's a bit of a stretch for the Druid, but there was a suggestion in another thread that Rangers are justifiable by saying there was a retired Ranger living in Candlekeep who taught you the skills.

 

Very interesting ideas but my original contention when setting up this thread was that the PC could not look 20 years old human years. A 2o yr. old even in modern times is an adult.

Xzar refers to him/her as a child. Which to me indicates that the character looks at the most 14 human years.

 

Xzar doesn't know the character though. Maybe s/he just looks really young. For instance, I'll be 30 in a few months, but I still get carded when I want a beer.

 

Not only that, but wasn't Xzar a Necromancer? I can't remember off-hand (been a long time since I played the first), but if he was, and adding in that he wasn't exactly a saint, it could technically mean that he was extending his life. Could also explain his eccentricity, and his "need" of Monty to speak for both (I say need because I never really understood half of what he said, so I always spoke to Montaron instead >_>).

But yeah! Back to the original topic! With an extended life, it would explain why he refers to the PC as "child" because, compared to him, the PC is a child.