Art & Stuff

- After the destruction of the grove, only Wyll leaves, Karlach stays behind and, when she meets Gortash, gives you an ultimatum: it's either him or her. Gortash's taunts don't help the cause, but in theory you can convince her to just leave without attacking. Afterwards, Gortash joins the party, as he needs to deal with Orin personally.

- You can go to him from any LI, you don't have to be a loner for the whole game.

- The personal quest is tied to the House of Hope. Maybe it's about the contract with the sale of Gortash, not sure yet. If you take him there, you can get unique interactions with almost everyone on the location, when you meet the man who used to be the jailer you have to pass a persuasion/intimidation check so he doesn't raise the alarm and shear everyone at you

- There's unique dialog with Raphael too, even at the deal-making stage (Gortash won't approve it). He mocks Gortash by suggesting him go back "home", calls him by his real last name, and says that he became like that solely because of his upbringing from Rafael. After the deal, you can talk to Gortash about it, he'll snap at you and won't let the subject develop. Full dialog will be after Raphael's death, then the start of the romance can also be...?

- Additional unique dialog when meeting Gortash's parents. In the romance, Gortash will laugh that he invited MC specifically to introduce his dear parents to beloved of their lovely son. At the same time, he will disapprove for trying to contact them by tadpole, and if you do try to talk about it, he will emphasize that they got what they deserved.

- Alternate quest options with the factory and the prison. On both we instead of releasing prisoners on the contrary more oppress them + the opportunity to personally chat with Gortash's subordinates (they will snort that he told them about you all the time, they're sorry for Bhaalites, if you are the same), in addition, if Wyll previously left the party, it's Gortash who gives a quest about the dragon. He also is the main fan of dragons here and with all the polite impossibility to refuse asking to be in a party to go to look at the dragon

- Because of dragons, here are banters with Laezel, where he tries to ask more about them and sighs that he wanted a dragon when he was a kid, but even Bane didn't give him one, and someone in this world talks about justice.

- There's no good route with him. Like at all. Just no. Just like Wyll and Karlach have no evil and they argue and angry when the MC tries to move in that direction, so it is with good and Gortash. If you try to draw an analogy between his slavery and what he does to those around him, he disapprove on 30 points and warns you that okay, you don't remember, but bring it up again and blame yourself. If you try to continue, he gets angry and either attacks or leaves the party, saying that Urge has really changed too much.

- If you come to Sarevok with him, a free dose of grandfatherly grumbling is assured. If there is romance, he can also start mentioning how much Urge admired Gortash, which will give Gortash a satisfied grin. With Orin, if Gortash is in the party, it will be much harder to save the hostage (checks 30+-) and after the duel, your father will additionally condemn your choice of the chosen one (but I would like this with all romances, not just with the Gortash personally).

- The butler doesn't call him by name, but keeps telling that his lord/lady deserves much better than this. Gortash finds it funny

- He doesn't die at the brain like stupid, instead he can meet Emperor again. Thinks that becoming illythid is stupid if there's already a squid here, and after all it would be easy to betray him. Also in the finale gives the ability to summon a squad of Steel Guardians. Of course, will agitate to become an Absolute

personally, i would choose gortash over ascended astarion any time for my evil playthrough (which I've never had before yet) IF WE HAD A ROMANCE OPTION... this is such a mistake for larian not giving us THIS... im gonna be forever crying over this tbh.

the way he doesn't make durge to like turn to bane (don't mind me if it's impossible) or degrade them if the durge rejects bhaal's legacy. he is straightforward that he was testing us and glad to let us keep the stones. gortash says we're his equal no matter what. bro you have the respect for that from my (next playthrough) evil durge.

I think the thing about the durge/gortash ship that just gets me is the trope of "we both know this isn't going to end well but I still want you regardless". No matter how you play the game, these two are doomed and destined to be each other's downfall. The durge lost everything because they were too distracted by Gortash to notice Orin's scheming. If the player doesn't play as the dark urge, it costs them their life. Whereas if they are the player character, either the durge ends up killing Gortash or the durge's meddling (by killing Orin and Ketheric) leads to the brain rebelling, leading to Gortash's death.

Like these two make me think of Ketheric saying:

I am just obsessed with the idea of Faerun’s antichrist being swayed not to begin a fucking APOCALYPSE out of sheer admiration for a certain tyrant.

And I love that tyrant becoming worse when he realizes that the Scion of Bhaal himself will kill for him. Anyone he wants. He has but to say the word.

That would go to Gortash’s head SO fast, I can feel it.

Especially when he realized that, more than killing, he could convince Durge NOT to kill.

TELL ME that man would not get a big ego when he told the SCION OF BHAAL “Don’t kill this person, the plan works best with them alive” AND THE DARK URGE STAYS THEIR HAND.

He would KNOW that their oath not to harm him is in direct opposition to Bhaal’s plan.

At the end of the day, Gortash is worse for having known Durge because of the INTENSE ego boost of having Bhaal’s Scion love him.

And at the end of that same day, The Dark Urge, Bhaal’s Chosen World Ender, chose Gortash over the apocalypse.