#eligale

Cringefail moments:

So I gave Gale the frost quarterstaff, I forget the name of it, and the snowburst ring that makes it so you create a lil patch of ice on the ground after dealing cold damage or something? But the first set of boots I equipped Gale with were the ones that grant feather fall, and I just didn’t switch them out. So that meant for a while, Gale would deal melee damage with his staff and then occasionally knock himself prone on the ice that spread out under him, until I eventually remembered to dig my hoarfrost boots out of my camp inventory.

In that vein, I think there are absolutely some moments of just magic gone awry that bond them. They’re both wizards, after all, they have a specific understanding of the Weave that varies from that of their warlock or druid or cleric friends. And I also think Gale takes himself too seriously a lot of the time. So much of his character revolves around his image - he wants to project this persona of suave, cool, powerful wizard so badly that I imagine slipping on some ice and having the pretty half-elf giggle about it just burns him inside. Until he realizes she’s not really laughing AT him, because one day maybe she swaps out her night stalker boots for something else and that leaves her vulnerable to difficult terrain. And she knocks herself prone while leaving combat and she’s laughing about it and Gale gets to realize that oh, oh she’s not mocking him, she’s just genuinely bemused by making such a silly mistake.

It’s such a contrast in their upbringing, because Gale went to Blackstaff - he went to an actual academy, with professors and classes and rules. Eliana had a few tutors mostly before being isolated to her tower and for a brief time afterwards but she was largely self taught for nearly the last 20 years of her life. She didn’t have people chastising her for her mistakes, nor did she have the pressure of other students to compare her progress to and make her competitive. As a result, she has a much…freer? relationship with her magic. Like Gale is legitimately the first wizard she’s been around for long enough to negatively compare her skills to his. She's a lot more relaxed about her failures than he is. So I think by the nature of the game, there are just times when their magic backfires or they fail a roll and make dumb mistakes despite their skills and I’d like to think they either share their frustration or Gale slowly learns to let himself laugh at his imperfections, at least a little, and sharing an embarrassed little smile about it with Eliana.

Spider (+ bonus pain priest)

SO I DIDN’T COME ACROSS THE SPIDER OR IF I DID, I DIDN’T THINK TO APPROACH IT? SO A FRIEND HAD TO SEND ME A CLIP OF THE SPIDER AND THE REACTIONS AND I LOST IT AHDKLJAS but I’m sorry to say that while Eliana is incredibly curious, she’d be hard pressed to even pick up the spider carcass, let alone lick it.

TO COMPENSATE, LET ME TELL YOU ABOUT SOMETHING SHE DID DO WHILE GALE WAS OUT OF THE PARTY: GET WHIPPED BY THE PAIN PRIEST!!!

I’m somewhat loosely following a walkthrough, mostly because the “i need everyone to like me” and “i need to make the Right Choice” parts of my ocd hate the idea of picking a wrong dialogue option or missing an important quest or what have you. So the walkthrough mentioned doing the thing with the priest to get the buff - which admittedly HAS been lovely. Eliana has the vivacious cloak or whatever it’s called, the one that gives you temp hit points if you use a spell in melee range? But that means she gets wailed on quite a lot because she's so close to the action, so the loviatar blessing has been so nice.

In universe, however, I think her reasoning for accepting is a combination of foot in mouth syndrome and curiosity - lets her big mouth run about “I thought a follower of the pain goddess would like any sort of torture” or whatever the line is, and follows it all the way to the offer of penance, which she feels uncertain about but definitely curious. And in my run, Astarion was with her and he was incredibly encouraging lmao

My most used companions, or the dream team as I call them, are Gale, Astarion, and Shadowheart. I think I had recently swapped Astarion back in for dexterity checks and I had Wyll instead of Gale. So I’m imagining it being the dream team instead - Gale sitting by and throwing his hands up defensively like “I mean I wouldn’t but you do you, queen” and then just watching this girl he has a crush on be ritualistically whipped by a priest of the pain goddess while Astarion and Shadowheart cannot stop making horny or snarky comments about it. And then Eliana just goes “Well, uh. That sure was a thing that happened.” And honestly just kind of goes on with her day but I think it sits with Gale a little bit.

I really have no idea who has the most sexual experience between the two of them? Gale (or whoever she’s romancing) is certainly Eliana’s first romantic relationship but she’s had a handful of brief sexual partners since leaving her tower, as I generally give her at least a year or two of traveling down the Sword Coast prior to the events of the game. She’s easily taken in by pretty faces and prettier words and also fully pro-sex work. Very “you mean I can spend some gold and get to experience sensations I’ve only read about until now and the money is given to a marginalized person and makes their lives a little easier? This is marvelous!” And we have no idea what Gale’s body count is - we only know that Eliana is not the first mortal he’s been with and also the first since Mystra. So I think it would be absolutely hilarious if the confident, sexy Gale of Waterdeep persona drops a little bit as he tries to figure out if this woman, the first person since his weird emotionally unhealthy and sexually abstract relationship with Mystra, is into this stuff? Can he provide that? He doesn’t want to hurt her, but does she need that to be satisfied sexually?

And Eliana is just like, “Well, that was an interesting experience, I do not need a repeat of that, anyway, back to killing goblins–” ASDHSAKJLD

Sweet moments:

SO THE THING ABOUT ELIANA IS, SHE ADORES GALE’S CORNY ASS LINES

I’ve thought about my air genasi bard stereotype oc Winlynn, and my tiefling ranger work in progress oc Nerissa and I genuinely think Gale is in the bottom 4, if they had to list companions by how much they’re interested in pursuing them. I think they both think he’s kind of cringe (affectionate) which he IS, he’s a goofy lil guy! But Eliana adores him, she will melt at whatever bullshit line he throws out

Gale is kind of like Sylvain fire emblem to me, in that he both has a heavily crafted persona to deal with his less appealing emotions / self loathing, and is still just Like That even beneath the facade. Like yes, he absolutely postures as this cool magic man but also he's literally a lit major - he's dramatic and he has flourish and he does talk Like That even when at his most down to earth. And the thing is Eliana flushes so happily at both his try-hard lines and his naturally verbose praise.

The post meeting Tara scene exemplifies this really well, imo. Eliana picked the option to inquire more about his last name and when asked, he openly admits he hasn't used it in so long - damn near sneers out "Gale Dekarios" and then puts on that deep, "I'm trying to be funny and charming and impressive" voice when he goes "Gale of Waterdeep." One is his actual voice, the other is an act. And it makes her giggle, it absolutely does! But voice and the act drop when Eliana chooses to go "Gale Dekarios...I think I like him more." And then she's equally charmed by his more subdued and sincere "Gale Dekarios likes you too. Very, very much." and the more showman-y, cool hero guy tone of "Now that that's settled, I think it's time we went and saved the world, don't you?" at the end of the scene and the flirty "I'm an open book, requiring only your gentle hands to turn my pages" if you continue the conversation about other matters like asking him to go back to camp. Like anytime that I, Christina/Vox, would put my head in my hands and go "bruh are you fr", Eliana is giggling like a school girl in the back of my head. Absolutely smitten fool of a Took, smh

Meanwhile, Gale gives me "I need to be on top to prove that I'm good enough, strong enough, sexy enough, passionate enough, pls give me an A+ in sex" vibes and idk how much of that desperate need to prove himself is due to his trauma and how much was always innate but got worse during and after dating Mystra. So while I think it's incredibly important that Eliana does let him show off, does let him teach her magic and show her he's Best Wizard Boy Please Give Me A Gold Star, I think the moments that really sweep him off his feet and knock the wind out of him are the moments where Eliana assures him that that stuff isn't nearly as important as he thinks it is.

"Gale Dekarios...I think I like him more," "You don't need to impress me, Gale. I'm no goddess." "I don't need the stars, Gale. I have you." "You're already everything I need you to be."

Just the constant, constant reassurance that she loves him as he is, flaws and all.

It's a really interesting contrast because Gale is Eliana's first love, first real relationship and after growing up the way she did, purposefully isolated from the rest of her family, she is more than content with his professor ending - she gets to live in a tower by CHOICE for once, with the man she loves and his tressym, reading books and drinking wine and making out all the time???? That's more than enough for her.

Meanwhile, Gale was scouted as young as 8 for his magical prowess, told he was special and made damn sure to prove it, going up against bigger and bigger challenges and coming out on top, catching the eye of the goddess of magic herself (though my feelings about Mystra's tendency to manipulate her chosen into romantic entanglements is a story for another day). He has never been satisfied so why should he be content now, happy as he is with his situation in many ways? It's a huge shift from his first love - a literal goddess and a relationship with a strong power imbalance - to his second love - a mortal who will live longer than him, yes, but a mortal nonetheless who trusts him and believes in him and likes him for his dumb jokes and his poetry and his strong moral compass and not merely because of his talent. When Gale talks about Mystra denying him the chance to access the Weave deeper than most mortals, it feels more like...idk. An indulgent pet owner or a parent. There's a condescension in her words when telling him to be content. (Of course, we're getting this second hand from Gale so he could be an unreliable narrator about her tone tbf.) The difference is Eliana not only questions his more foolhardy ambitions but reminds him, unprompted, that he's loved just as he is. I think those moments make the normally verbose wizard speechless for a minute and they're so fucking important to his personal growth, imho.

ALSO TBH, I THINK THE FIRST TIME SHE YELLS AT HIM HITS HIM IN SOME TYPE OF WAY. Like, he gets real pissy when Tav offers to take care of the dark magic circle in that lil back room in Moonrise, even if Tav is a magic based class. And you can see more of my thoughts on Eliana's POV of that scene here on my roleplay blog but I think her snapping at him that she's also a good wizard, Gale, even if she didn't bone the mother of magic, is incredibly important. He needs to learn that relationships don't always have to be worshipper x worshipped. This is the dude who can become the god of ambition, this is a dude who always thinks there can be more, that HE can be more, that he needs to be more SPECIFICALLY to be worthy to his partner. And while it's nice when Eliana DOES feed his ego a bit because she DOES genuinely think he's incredibly talented at their craft, I think her telling him off is a bit of a come down to earth moment. A bit of "Oh. Oh, right, we're peers, we're equals, we're a team. I'm not her superior and she isn't mine, there is no hierarchy in this relationship."