Baldur’s Gate 3‘s Patch 7 has added so much that players can be forgiven for thinking that they should be paying for the content given the modern market, but miraculously aren’t. Mod support and the new batch of evil endings are taking up most players’ attention, as they rightfully should, but there are also a whole host of new pieces of dialogue lovingly added by Larian Studios. Despite the scale of this new patch, the Belgium-based studio has not forgotten the little details, and these details show why the developer has become an industry darling among fans.
It likely helps that the talented cast from Baldur’s Gate 3 love playing their characters and are comfortable jumping back into the role. Neil Newbon (Astarion’s VA) and Samantha Béart (Karlach’s VA), in particular, have been a part of a few televised Dungeons & Dragons games in which they play their BG3 characters, and it shows that if Larian calls the cast in to record more lines, they tend to be up for it. A character that has got some special treatment, in terms of added dialogue and depth, in the new patch is Minthara, everyone’s favorite drow.
BG3 Patch 7 Dialogue Proves Minthara Has Emotional Depth
She Isn’t Just A Cold-Blooded Killer
Minthara isn’t the most kind member of Tav’s crew. She quite accurately represents the attitude of many drow in DnD‘s world, the Forgotten Realms, but does it in an oddly charming way that many have fallen in love with. Thanks to her appeal, she was eventually made recruitable even in a good playthrough, despite originally being made to be a companion for a more evil Tav or Durge. This doesn’t mean that Minthara herself is evil. Dalkay on YouTube has discovered a rare and kind interaction between Minthara and Gale, which is one of the least expected things Larian could have added.
Should players use Gale as their avatar and make it all the way to Withers’ party at the end of the game, they can talk to Minthara, who will refer to Gale as “Wizard.” She has always done this, and it perhaps used to show her contempt for Gale, but she reveals that this isn’t the case. She states, in a long-winded, poetic, and quite complementary way, that Gale is an emotional man that she knows well, which is why she enjoys teasing him so much. She has no contempt for him at all. In fact, she enjoys his company.
After this, Gale can give the usually cold drow a hug, which she willingly accepts in a heart-warming animation. Of course, she returns to the Minthara everyone loves by stating that if he tells anyone about her affection for him, she will clip Tara, Gale’s tressym friend’s wings. She doesn’t mean anything by this, admitting that Gale is terrible with secrets and will probably tell everyone anyway, but she’ll be gone by the morning and won’t be around for the possible teasing that she may end up receiving.
Minthara Actually Likes Tav’s Party
Although She Rarely Admits it
In this dialogue, she admits that she enjoys spending time with the others in the group and that Withers’ party is ending too soon for her liking. She even says that she would like to meet Gale again and is quite open about her positive feelings towards the wizard. He gets a compliment about his dashing beard too, which is not something most would expect Minthara to commend, given that elves in DnD usually can’t grow any form of facial hair.
In the 5e
Player’s Handbook,
elves can’t grow beards and have very little body hair, which was carried over in
BG3.
Minthara is quite secretive about how affectionate she is. She states that she wouldn’t want the others to know that she actually likes Gale, and it takes until Withers’ party for her to admit this, a full six months after the main story has ended. Interestingly, this interaction only takes place if Gale has not romanced Minthara, showing that these feelings are purely platonic. It shows how much the journey has softened Minthara from her beginning as a massacring servant of the Absolute to a genuine hero who can make friends, in good endings, at least.
Baldur’s Gate 3‘s Patch 7 has helped to add depth that didn’t necessarily need to be there but has certainly improved the game’s quality as a whole. Although very few will ever see this interaction, since getting to Withers’ party is hard enough, let alone doing it with Gale, it still exists to give Minthara more to her character. It seals her arc and ends it more strongly as someone who has come around to being more kind after rejecting the cruel ways of both her people (the Lolth-sworn drow) and the Absolute.
Source: Dalkay/YouTube
