pretty pixels

- In the first conversation you have (when he presents himself as the "dream visitor") he claims he wanted to be "free of this evil" for a long time, suggesting he means becoming a mindflayer, but later he says plainly that he never wanted to stop the process of becoming the mindflayer, because he WANTED to be ilithid. He believes it's a superior form.

- His friend (/lover) Ansur wanted to help him not become ilithid but he DIDN'T WANT THAT HELP. He wanted the power that being a mindflayer gives.

- If you confront him and don't fall for his manipulations (and only then): admits to pretending to have feelings and human emotions to manipulate you and basically tells you this is him being nice (but actually not, because he only does that cause he thinks you'd be more useful like that) because he could have treated you like his last "ally": Duke Stelmane, who he dominated and used as a puppet, destroying her brain and body in the process. But if you don't confront him he will claim that Stelmane was his friend, maybe something more, will make comments about how beautiful she was and recall how she hugged him when he needed it.

- We can learn something about his values even before he was a mindflayer from the Chamber of Insight, where he claims that prosperity of the city includes not really caring that citizens' rights erode and calling it "lesser issues" if you get more power thanks to that. Even the name of the chamber seems wrong: it should be called "Balduran's morality" if anything.

- He claims all he wants is survival when in fact he wants power: why would he create the Knights of the Shield and control a duke if he just wanted to live and be in peace?

- He claims manipulation and illusions are just his kind's language and you shouldn't hold it against him because it was the only way for you to trust him (i.e. do exactly as he says). If only there was another mindflayer with a mind of its own in the game that was honest and selfless and didn't try to manipulate you at all... (If Omeluum has 100 fans, I'm one of them. If Omeluum has 10 fans, I'm one of them. If Omeluum has 1 fan, I'm dead, it's Blurg.)

- He supports the alliance with Gortash, even though he is a slaver and a tyrant - doesn't really make him seem like someone who cares about the citizens of his own city wellbeing.

- The moment you do something he doesn't like, he rejoins the Netherbrain.

- It's not that big of a thing but when Vlaakith sends you to the Astral Prism to kill its occupant (Orpheus) he tells you not to and acts like it's him who you're supposed to kill. Vlaakith would literally kill you if you refused. And he still lies that she meant him, when he could've admitted that the power he uses to protect you comes from Vlaakith's enemy that's in the prism (but he claims HE has a unique power to do that)

While you are correct that he allows us to *think* that what he wants freedom from is a tadpole, “this evil” can also refer to the control of Absolute / The Elder brain. We do not have the context to assume he is referring to anything other than the tadpole, though. And he does not correct us. However, your assumption that “he never wanted to stop the process of becoming a mindflayer” is factually incorrect. Balduran never had the option of not becoming a mindflayer. He was caught, brought to the colony, and underwent ceramorphosis there. By the time he was saved, he had already been a mindflayer

- His friend (/lover) Ansur wanted to help him not become ilithid but he DIDN'T WANT THAT HELP. He wanted the power that being a mindflayer gives.

In continuation of the previous part, there was never an option of Balduran *not* becoming a mindflayer. He was already transformed when Ansur found him. What Ansur *tried* to search for, is a way to reverse the transformation. None were viable. At one point, Balduran (or Emperor, if you prefer) grew tired of the failed attempts and chose to be at peace with what he is, even growing to enjoy it. That is not something one would consider a crime. Unless you consider wanting to live being criminal

- If you confront him and don't fall for his manipulations (and only then): admits to pretending to have feelings and human emotions to manipulate you and basically tells you this is him being nice (but actually not, because he only does that cause he thinks you'd be more useful like that) because he could have treated you like his last "ally": Duke Stelmane, who he dominated and used as a puppet, destroying her brain and body in the process. But if you don't confront him he will claim that Stelmane was his friend, maybe something more, will make comments about how beautiful she was and recall how she hugged him when he needed it.

I love that despite us having next to zero context about the Stelmane/Emperor relationship prior to the game start, everyone brings her enthralling up as one of the vilest things the Emperor has done. We have no data on why the thrilling was done – if it was from get go, if it was done after fallout (and resulted in the stroke Stelmane experienced), or after Stelmane experienced the stroke (and it was one of things that allowed her to function in semi normal capacity). Morevoer, you seem to imply that every single interaction with the Emperor prior to the moment of rejection was a manipulation – but him showing you the scenes of enthrallment, is suddenly not part of that? That, is called cherrypicking.

- We can learn something about his values even before he was a mindflayer from the Chamber of Insight, where he claims that prosperity of the city includes not really caring that citizens' rights erode and calling it "lesser issues" if you get more power thanks to that. Even the name of the chamber seems wrong: it should be called "Balduran's morality" if anything.

*You mean the room where we have to strike down the one whose books contain the most harmful approach to rulling*? Where *Suelto*, who argued for genocide as preemptive action, is the correct choice to remove?? And the other two choices are 1) one who argues that smaller kingdoms should join stronger ones to become part of their protectorate and 2) one who passed anti-discrimination and labor protection laws?

- He claims all he wants is survival when in fact he wants power: why would he create the Knights of the Shield and control a duke if he just wanted to live and be in peace?

….This one is so absurd in its premise that I offer you a screen from Forgotten Realms Wiki:

*Balduran* was born around 1000DR. The Emperor became one of the leaders of the Knights in between 1100 and 1400 DR. Closer to the tail end, since most of the time he operates within the organization is at the same time he deals with Stelmane. None of the lore we find around the HQ is malicious. We have lore, found in Basilisk Gate Fists’ offices that state they cannot find signs of ill intent when it comes to The Emperor. But sure. The Emperor found it. What’s a bit of time travel and devil worshipping when it comes to DND, eh?

And to reiterate previous points: we have no data on his relationship with Stelmane except for what he shares with us and a few lore items that are not showing any definite conclusion, either

- He claims manipulation and illusions are just his kind's language and you shouldn't hold it against him because it was the only way for you to trust him (i.e. do exactly as he says). If only there was another mindflayer with a mind of its own in the game that was honest and selfless and didn't try to manipulate you at all... (If Omeluum has 100 fans, I'm one of them. If Omeluum has 10 fans, I'm one of them. If Omeluum has 1 fan, I'm dead, it's Blurg.)

Player: gets kidnapped by mindflayers, kills the first one they can post-nautoloid. Is definitely the best person to reveal oneself as an illithid, truly

Speaking of Omeluum – I love it, I really do. But why does everyone seems to omit that, prior to joining society, it worked with a litch to gets its food, and now still subsides on brains – but those that come from enemies of Society? Omeluum is no illithid vegan. And it does lie to you – the ring it gives you… Is worthless for the purpose he states it is. Omeluum confirms so in the Gate. Just a bit of placebo to make us feel better

- He supports the alliance with Gortash, even though he is a slaver and a tyrant - doesn't really make him seem like someone who cares about the citizens of his own city wellbeing.

So do half your companions. Except for what – Wyll and Karlach?

- The moment you do something he doesn't like, he rejoins the Netherbrain brain.

Yeah, this one Larian didn’t do too well with. But you are also releasing a guy whom is very likely to kill Emperor the moment they are free, or at least would remove the ability to resist the brain from it. So you can get why thy the guy scampers

- It's not that big of a thing but when Vlaakith sends you to the Astral Prism to kill its occupant (Orpheus) he tells you not to and acts like it's him who you're supposed to kill. Vlaakith would literally kill you if you refused. And he still lies that she meant him, when he could've admitted that the power he uses to protect you comes from Vlaakith's enemy that's in the prism (but he claims HE has a unique power to do that)

….Emperor outright states that he stole the power that he uses to protect you in the ceramorphosis dream

The Prism scene is where he also reveals that it’s part of the secret Vlaakith is hiding

Speaking of: you had every chance to leave the Creche before even meeting with Vlaakith. The Emperor warns you more than once you shouldn’t go there. Heck you can leave after using the zaith’isk.  But you don’t. Hello, consequences of our actions, thy name is Vlaakith

- With all those lies and manipulations he still has the audacity to say "I never lied to you." Depends on how you define lies.

It's not that big of a thing but when Vlaakith sends you to the Astral Prism to kill its occupant (Orpheus) he tells you not to and acts like it's him who you're supposed to kill. Vlaakith would literally kill you if you refused. And he still lies that she meant him, when he could've admitted that the power he uses to protect you comes from Vlaakith's enemy that's in the prism (but he claims HE has a unique power to do that)

What is he supposed to do? You've been sent in to the prism on Vlaakith's orders to kill the occupant. The occupant, who is Orpheus, whose power is the only thing that keeps you from turning into mind flayers. He offers himself as the 'occupant' to stab, because that's the safe thing to do. Players who would've followed Vlaakith's orders and killed Orpheus would have gotten a game over. It's not safe for anyone for him to reveal Orpheus at that point, in that situation. And he gets a good measure of you when he tests you this way - remember, he has no reason to believe you wouldn't kill an illithid on sight. It's for everyone's safety for him to stay hidden behind his dream guardian illusion.

It's a very mild take that I've been thinking how to articulate for a while, but whenever I browse the Emperor tag against my better judgement lol I get an impression that, for a character to be embraced by fandom, they can either look monstrous OR be morally dubious, but never both. If a character is conventionally attractive, their moral ambiguity will be taken apart, analysed, recognised as the thing that makes them interesting, and praised. But if a character looks monstrous, they better be an upstanding citizen, always nice, never do wrong, and be ready to sacrifice their life and safety for the heroes for good measure

(Listen, I love Omeluum too, but I take at least 1d6 psychic damage every time I see it brought up in conversations about the Emperor as an example of the "real good mind flayer". Yes, they're both renegade illithids, but their circumstances couldn't be more different. I think it could actually be fun to speculate about how they would've fared if their roles were reversed (someone should write that fic), or what would happen if you put them in a room together (someone should definitely write that fic), but reducing it all to "well, Omeluum is the good mind flayer, so the Emperor must be the bad one" is... well, reductive)

If a character is monstrous on the outside, any darkness inside them will be taken as proof that they are, in fact, an irredeemable, evil monster. And I think it’s fun how, in a sort of metatextual way, the Emperor is aware of that, that’s why it chooses to first appear to us in disguise. And no, I’m not saying that the Emperor did nothing wrong. I am saying that I keep seeing the same arguments over and over again that interpret its actions in the most bad faith ways possible and I’m tired:

“The Emperor killed Ansur!” In self-defence. No, it didn’t lie about that, Ansur confirms it: he couldn’t find a cure for ceremorphosis, decided that a mercy-killing is the second best option, the Emperor disagreed. If you think that it should’ve accepted death over life as a mind flayer, then we can agree to disagree. But I wish we could all at least agree on what actually happened in the text, rather than making up stuff like “The Emperor was becoming power-hungry and Ansur was trying to stop it!” or “It was actually the Emperor who killed Ansur in his sleep!”

“The Emperor wants to turn you into an illithid!” A half-illithid. It gives your character a significant power boost in exchange for a slight change in appearance (which, if I’m not mistaken, is reversed once the Brain and all the tadpoles are destroyed). Yes, the Emperor bringing it up over and over again can be annoying, but dismantling the Absolute is a difficult task and the Emperor wants you to succeed, because all of your lives depend on it. It’s nothing more than a means to an end, and yet people talk about it as if the Emperor is some evil schemer trying to recruit you for its own Grand Design or something. Also, the Emperor doesn’t force you to use the astral tadpole, the wisdom save is only necessary if your character has already indulged in tadpoling themself.

“The Emperor catfished me!” Because it thought you’d kill it otherwise. That’s it. Apologies for bringing real life parallels into my bitchy blorbo post, but really, you’d think people on the queer autistic website would be more sympathetic towards a character who feels like they have to keep some aspects of their identity hidden for their own safety. “But Omeluum…” has the support of the Society of Brilliance and its good friend Blurg. The Emperor has you. Its former best friend (and more) tried to murder it in its sleep for what it is. Is it really that unreasonable for it to have some serious trust issues?

Yes, it enthralled Stelmane, and that’s fucked up. It also threatens to do the same to your character if they’re being a dick to it, but what I find interesting is that it never actually tries to do that? Even when your character is about to do something incredibly risky that could jeopardise the whole mission and put all of their lives in danger (like going to the Githyanki crèche or the House of Hope), the most it ever does is strongly suggest that they maybe do not. And I’m not the biggest fan of how the whole Orpheus vs the Emperor setup is structured (it feels like a forced binary choice, if it was a tabletop campaign the players could’ve easily come up with several ways to resolve it without having to pick a side, just saying), but I think it’s curious that if you choose to free Orpheus, the Emperor doesn’t try to stop you, it just leaves and joins the Absolute. People have been pointing out that this makes no sense, that it’s out of character because the Emperor values freedom so why would it willingly go back to being enthralled after all this effort, but hey, let’s analyse that!

The Emperor believes that the moment Orpheus is free, his protection will be gone and you will all immediately get enthralled by the Netherbrain, turn into mind flayers, and join the Absolute. Or that Orpheus will turn hostile, you’ll be forced to kill him, and then you will all turn into mind flayers and join the Absolute. I don’t think it’s lying about this, its actions wouldn’t make sense if it didn’t genuinely believe that. We, as players, know that it doesn’t happen if you free Orpheus once the Emperor leaves, but the characters can’t be sure until that moment (and to be fair, it absolutely does happen if you kill the Emperor at the end of Act 2). And I guess we’ll never know what would happen if Orpheus was freed while the Emperor was still there (unless Larian makes some huge changes to the end of the game in the next patch, but I somehow doubt it), but while Orpheus will begrudgingly agree to work with a bunch of tadpoled-but-not-yet-transformed humanoids, we don’t know if the same could be said for a full illithid who’s been keeping him subdued and syphoning his powers for its own use. The Emperor is fully justified in thinking that this might go poorly.

So, the Emperor sees that the protagonist is about to fuck up its whole plan and get them all enthralled at best, killed at worst, so you’d expect that to be the perfect moment to make good on its threats and enthrall them to make them go with the plan, right? But no. Instead, it just leaves, and willingly joins the Netherbrain, probably in hopes of surviving until the next opportunity to free itself comes along. This character who, by its own admission, has always valued freedom above all else, chooses its own enslavement over forcing another into submission. Which I think is compelling to consider, even if it might be a bit of a reach.

I guess all that officially makes me an Emperor Apologist™. Maybe not in a “the Emperor did nothing wrong ever” way, but certainly in a “the Emperor is a complex and nuanced character, and it’s frustrating to see people throw all that nuance out the window and grossly misinterpret its actions to paint it as more evil than it actually is and justify their own discomfort with it, while they do the exact opposite with other morally ambiguous characters” sort of way. And to be clear, I’m not saying that you have to like the Emperor. If you find it annoying, if it gives you the heebie-jeebies, or if you just can’t look past some of the things it did, that’s totally fair. I guess I’m just saying that I’m tired of going into the Emperor tag to look at some nice fanart and instead seeing the same arguments rehashed over and over again, so many of which are either completely made up, or have about the same weight as “Gale ate my boots!” or “Lae’zel was mean to me!”, and yet they're treated as "undeniable proof that the Emperor is absolutely totally evil actually". And I’m especially tired of being told that me and my fellow squid enjoyers lack reading comprehension because we “fail to see the Emperor for the evil abuser it actually is” when

(To be clear, I think it’s perfectly fine to like a character who is an evil abuser, it’s all fiction and those kinds of characters can be fun too. But this whole post is about how I don’t think the Emperor is one.)

Besides!

Time to add to the Emperor/Tav ship content. This is Lilowyn, in-game she's a silver dragonborn, silver dragon draconic bloodline sorcerer, an ice build that is surprisingly fun. Technically, Lilowyn is an OC, not just a Tav, since I gave her a backstory and lore set before the game for the fanfic I want to write, however since she plays the role of group leader in her story and in-game she's a Tav, I count her as being a Tav for the sake of the ship tag.

The first image is a shitty little concept art I drew in MS Paint, this what I envision her head and tail to actually look like, since I imagined her with more frills than just the ones on the sides of her head.

The second is her canon camp outfit, elegant robes and gladiatorial sandals dyed boreal blue (please ignore the half-illithid features, I always use tadpoles on my run because 1. they fun, and 2. I am an Emperor fan, of course I'm gonna use the tadpoles).

The third image is the closest I could get to how I wanted her to look in-game when I first started a run dedicated to an ice build.

And fourth is just a screenshot of her and her squid husband, because they look cute together and I took way too many screenshots of that scene lol. (again, please ignore Lilowyn's use of the astral tadpole)

All screenshots were taken on the PS5, and transferred to the laptop. I am a console player trying my hardest to interact with what might be a primarily PC fanbase so...

I'm currently working on a fanfic for her, and I have a lore doc written up for her backstory. My plan is to get most of (hopefully all of) the fanfic done, post it on AO3, then do a post here on tumblr that is the lore for Lilowyn.

The Emperor: Do you want to have sex?

Tav: Do I? Do I?

Tav: Do you know how badly I want your tentacles?!

Tav: Your teeth?!

Tav: How much I have been aching for you every night?!

Tav: Let me make this absolutely clear

Tav: I want you so badly that you should be afraid of me