Guide for Baldur's Gate 3 - Act 3 (2024)

Day 13

Welcome to Act 3! Here are the plans for today and brace yourself, we'll be doing a lot. We'll be attacking a circus, a powerful wizard, blowing up a factory, and more.

• Morning Buffs
  • Arfur Gregorio and bodyguards (x4)
  • Chult Alioramus' pack (x5)
  • Dribbles the Clown, Doppelganger (x2), Blink Dog, Displacer Beast, and Chult Alioramus
• Short Rest
  • Prison guards (x4)
  • Lorroakan, Elemental Myrmidons (x4), and guards (x2)
  • Cultists (x7)
• Short Rest
  
  • Factory guards (x2)
  • Factory guards (x3) and Gondians (x3)

We need to save a tier two spell slot on Tav to use Darkness at a specific point and a tier five spell slot on Gale for a Counterspell against a boss. Along with that, keep your eye out for both an Elixir of Vigilance (only need 1) and any Elixir of Cloud Giant Strengths. You may already have an Elixir of Vigilance stored away or can make one, hang on to that. As for the Cloud Giant elixirs, they increase your Strength up to 27.

Leave camp and do your morning buff routine of Mage Armor on Gale, Aid (tier 5), Elixir on Hill Giant Strength on both Karlach/Tav, Soul Coin on Karlach, and lastly Shield of Thralls on all your characters. If you were able to unlock "Freecast" on Shadowheart you can just use that to cast Aid at tier 5 and maintain the actual spell slot to use at your discretion. Walk down the path and towards the crowd gathering in front of a house. Instead of bothering to resolve the dispute, just immediately pick a fight by using the option in the dialogue menu. Pretty standard bodyguard type enemies, nothing to worry about. Loot the bodies and follow the path southeast. You should start going up a hill leading up to a secluded barn. If you have a means of speaking to animals, go in here to find the Strange Ox one last time. Agree to help it out and it will turn into an apple for you to pick up off the ground. All you have to do is transport it to the other area of the city.

Down the hill and to the north is a large wooden structure. Down at the very bottom outside, close to where you are, you'll find some of the Tiefling children from before. Speak to Mattis to see what new wares he has. Here you may come across the very impressive Elixir of Cloud Giant Strength which increases your strength to a massive 27 until your next Long Rest. We'll want a handful of these for Karlach. Buy any potions or other consumables you want.

Go back to the main road and start going north. To the left you should see a crowd gathering in front of gate for a circus. Talk to Klaus and use the [Intimidation] option to get in. Along the southern wall there will be a row of stalls, one of which has a Djinni named Akabi with a gambling wheel. Surprise, he's actually cheating. Split of Karlach from the group, get behind him and enter Hide Party mode. You'll want to pickpocket him and steal his ring. With our build you should only need to pass a DC of 3 to steal it. Equip it and interact with Akabi:

• YOU ARE VERY LOUD.
• I'd like to spin the wheel.
• I have no idea what you're talking about.

This will cause you to win and as a punishment Akabi will send your controlled character to a remote jungle filled with dinosaur-like creatures. With Karlach she should be able to tear through them without effort at all. Make your way through the jungle until you find the portal out. DO NOT GO THROUGH THE PORTAL BEFORE OPENING THE CHEST. In the chest is a Legendary item - Nyruha. This is a stronger version of the throwing spear we've been using until now and it has an area effect on wherever it is thrown. Suffice to say we want Karlach to hold onto this, but don't equip it. Also take off the ring you stole from Akabi and put back on what you had before.

Continue west and up a small set of stairs. Here you'll see a Mephit named Boney by a white and purple tent. Here is where you can pay 5,000g for a statue of whoever you use to talk to him. This is a one time deal, but it gives whoever the statue is of a permanent Bless buff for the rest of the game. Personally I chose Tav, but it's entirely up to you. If you have things to sell, you can actually get your money back from Boney here as that 5,000g is in his inventory (no, you can't steal it back or kill him for it). I'm unsure of it will be there on the following days, so I recommend just selling anything you don't want to hang on while you're here.

From here go to the northeastern section to find a crowd gathering around a clown on stage. Once you get close a cutscene will occur and you'll be prompted to send someone on stage. I recommend sending Tav up and then choosing the "Attack" option when given the opportunity. Otherwise you'll be ambushed and take extra damage. The biggest annoyance here will be the Displacer Beast in the cage as it will summon clones of itself outside of the cage. Take Karlach to picklock the gate, or punch through it, and let the attacks fly. After that enemy is dead, it's up to you on who to focus on next. The nearby NPCs may also get into the fray, either attacking or soaking attacks.

Loot the bodies if you'd like and use your first Short Rest here and go back to the main path to continue north. To the right you'll see the Rivington General Store (building right before the water well). Nothing of note to buy here, but pointing out the vendor to sell things to. Follow the main path until you reach a guarded checkpoint where you'll be confronted:

• I'm not a refugee.
• I can take care of myself. (200)
• My name is ____
• Can I go now?
• [Baldurian] I cam from Baldur's Gate - my old home is there... somewhere...
• Do as she says. Stand still.
• Consent to arrest.

Out of nowhere a gnome will appear and throw a bomb, stunning the guard patrol. To follow the gnome, take the eastern path right before the checkpoint and traverse down some rocks. You'll see some vines to climb down, leading you to a cave entrance. Go inside to find their hideout. Find Wulbren in one of the rooms and agree to help him blow up a factory. In one of the rooms will be Philomeen who you may remember from Act 1. Speak to her and use the option to trade with her and buy a Runepowder Vial, which we'll use later on. While here you can check out what both Bumpnagel and Barcus have for sale, buy all of there explosives as well. There is one last thing to do here and it is very important. There are two Runepowder Barrels that we can steal! In one of the side rooms there is a gnome patrolling around. When the gnome is away from the barrels, enter Turn-Based mode. Have Tav use Darkness (or if you have a Scroll of Darkness) and target it over the barrels. It is crucial that the gnome isn't hit by the cast as that will make everyone hostile. Once Darkness is active, just walk in and steal both barrels. If you got the one in Act 1 then you should be sitting on three of these nukes, which will come in very handy soon. Here is a video showing the order of operations:

At the end of the hideout is a lever next to a ladder, hit that and go up the ladder to appear in a building. Go outside and continue through the checkpoint. There are a lot of buildings stacked on top of one another here, making it a bit confusing. To right you'll discover the "South Span of Wyrm's Crossing" waypoint, you'll want to head inside the building it is attached to, Sharess' Caress. Go up the stairs in the back and follow the red carpet to go up another set of stairs. Go out the door to find a pathway leading over the main road. Walk along this until you see a door you can freely enter, which should have Kith'rak Voss and Raphael inside. Speak to Raphael to learn some things but DO NOT AGREE to his terms and walk away. Walk back to the second floor of Sharess' Caress to speak with Kith'rak Voss to learn some things from him as well. We want to keep helping him on his side, so agree to help. Go back outside and follow the path until you essentially reach the next checkpoint. To the left is a staircase and right next to the top of it is a door leading to the Danthelon's Dancing Axe store. Speak with the vendor and buy the Cloak of Displacement, which you should give to Gale to help protect him more. Follow the next set of stairs up to find a potion shop, buy whatever you would like.

Go back outside and don't bother with the second guard checkpoint as they'll try to get 20,000g out of you. Immediately to the right is a ladder you can climb down. Here will be a deck and we'll want to traverse the ravine and make it to the grassy ledges north of you. If you convinced your whole party to get the Illithid upgrade, everyone can just use the Fly ability to make it over. Otherwise you'll need some other transportation mechanism (Scrolls or Potions of Flight/Feather Fall). Follow the path east to find a hole in the wall. This will bring you into the prison. Go inside and jump across the gap. Karlach can punch her way through the crumbling wall. Don't bother picklocking the door as you can just break it down as well. Try to sneak up on the guards to land a surprise attack. There is one that patrols down the hallway with three in a guard's room. Loot them for a key to free Counsellor Florrick from being imprisoned in a nearby cell. Speak to her, choose the [Persuasion] option, and get her to follow you. Go out the prison door and find a guard asleep on duty, go ahead and get a super free kill. Go out the next door to be met with a short cutscene as you enter Wyrm's Rock fortress.

Go out into the hallway and step outside the northern exit. This will be enough for Florrick to reach safety. Continue north to trigger a short conversation with Mizora. Up ahead you'll soon you'll see an invisible wall that transports you to the other major portion of the city. Loading into here will complete the transportation quest we got from the Strange Ox. Follow the main path west and the first building along the road should be the Stormshore Tabernacle along the right side of the road. Go in and speak to the NPC here to check his wares. Buy The Reviving Hands gloves to give to Shadowheart, along with any consumables you want.

Go back outside and continue following the path west as it goes downhill and eventually you'll get to a courtyard with a magical performance happening. Just west of the fountain is a waypoint mark called the "Lower City Central Wall", grab that for convenience sake. There are two buildings adjacent to this fountain that are important. First up is "Bonecloak's Apothecary", which is north of the fountain. If you gave the mushroom to the dwarf trader back in Act 1, they were able to keep their business afloat. Here is where you can stock up on any potions or alchemy ingredients, so make trips here each day! Next up is the "Sorcerous Sundries" store just south of the fountain where you'll find Rolan being a receptionist. Chat with him and let him know you have information regarding the Nightsong.

Before leaving, check that Rolan's health is topped off as he'll be joining us in a fight soon and we need him to live for the Tiefling related achievement.

I highly recommend checking what his wares are as there are several strong items that we want to get. If you have anything left to sell that you don't want as well, now would be a good time to offload it. You definitely want to buy the Birthright hat and Ring of Regeneration. In terms of scrolls buy any Scrolls of Haste for sure, along with a Scroll of Globe of Invulnerability. The latter will come in handy for a specific achievement. Give the hat to Gale and replace Shadowheart's Ring of Salving with the new one we bought. There's also another clerk in the back of this floor, behind the stairs, that doubles as a vendor. Remember her whenever you are scroll shopping. Make your way up the stairs a projection of Lorroakan will appear before you. Some portals will spawn and you want to make sure to take the far left one (blue). Up top we'll meet the man himself and we want to trick him into believing the Nightsong is dead:

• Not quite the enthusiastic welcome I was hoping for.
• What do you want with her?
• [Deception] I regret to inform you the Nightsong is no more - killed in the Sharran temple where she was held.
• She was a Selunite held by Sharrans. Her death was inevitable.

I would recommend doing the next traversal bit only if you have full Inspiration (you can check by pulling up the menu wheel and looking at the upper right corner, there is a max of 4 points). The reason for this is because we'll be trying to to get a Legendary weapon for Gale. Below the floor we're on, you'll see some floating furniture that we can jump down. This is another situation where everyone having access to Fly is helpful. Just target the floor below and everyone else should follow suit. Once on that floor there will be a barrier blocking your ability to delve deeper. Before finding our way around this, loot all the chests on this floor as one of them has an Elixer of Cloud Giant Strength. Bring the party to the northwest of the room to find a plaque labeled "Below". Interact with the nearby button to bring everyone down below. Here is a video showing the location/pathing from the top:

Here is where we hope luck is on our side. Take control of Gale as this requires an Arcana check. Two levers will be revealed and we want to interact with the one near the table with a staff on it. We need to pass a DC check of 20, which is why we want as many re-dos as possible via Inspiration. The other table has a armor piece that you can try to get after for some extra gold. Obviously you want to give this staff to Gale, so replace his Knife of the Undermountain King with it. There are two great perks from this new weapon. First one is we can get a free cast of any spell we know once per Long Rest. On top of that you can apply the Kereshka's Favor buff that bolsters an elemental damage type once every Short Rest. For example if you use the Lightning version, Gale will do increased Lightning damage while also getting a free use of Chain Lighting.

Take the button back up and go to the southeast and to find the one labelled vault. Have everyone push that button and loot the room. Loot everything you want and make your way into the next room to take the portal out. You'll appear in a locked room, but you can just teleport to the "Lower City Central Wall" waypoint. From there, go to camp and speak with Aylin:

• A wizard called Lorroakan is looking for you.
• All I know is that he's put out a contract for your capture.
• Let's take him down - together.

Leave your camp and head back up to where Lorroakan was for a cutscene.

Reminder! Rolan needs to live through this encounter.

Side with Aylin during this cutscene and Rolan will join your efforts as well. Protecting Rolan and Aylin are your priorities. As soon as you can, have Shadowheart cast Sanctuary on Rolan to protect him until some enemies are dead. This is the fight that we wanted to save a tier five spell slot on Gale. Lorroakan has a very nasty reaction spell called Elemental Retort that will trigger when he first takes damage. The damage roll on this is 12 - 96 across four elemental types. Using specifically a tier 5 Counterspell though completely negates it, thus saving you from potentially instantly downing yourself.

Once Lorroakan is dead, focus down the Myrmidons and the lingering guards. Talk with Rolan for him to take charge of the tower and ask for his assistance in the upcoming battle to decide everyone's fate. Leave the building and start following the main path to the southwest. You'll soon see a building erupt in an explosion with Araj Oblodra stumbling out. She'll beckon you inside, but wait for all the fire to go away. Inside she'll give you a potion and ask you to drink it. Do so away from your party as it will cause you to explode. Once that's done, see if there's anything you want to buy and then head back outside.

Continue following the path west and it'll eventually bend northwest. You'll reach a courtyard with a statue, which is a landmark we can use as a reference point. Just north of this is the "Baldur's Gate" waypoint, so grab that for future use. If you still have the Githyanki Egg from Act 1, you can sell it here for an extra 1,000g. There is a building directly south of this statue (entrance is a bit down the road to the southwest). Inside is a scholar named Havkelaag that you can sell the egg to. Follow the road to the southwest until you see a ramp going south into some docks. Down here you'll see a crowd of people gathering about. A group of Absolute cultists have Volo hostage and are about to blow him up. We should save him and attack them.

As soon as it's Gale's turn I recommend using Ray of Frost on the fire path leading the Volo tied to the explosive barrels to prevent him from going boom. Once the fight is over the only notable loot is a Mind Flayer Parasite Specimen, which you can use to unlock the "Psionic Dominance" perk on Tav. In total there are two Firewine Barrels and eight Smokepowder Barrels, make sure to grab all of them and send to camp. We'll be using ALL of our explosives soon. Speak to Volo and he'll run off. Now would be a good time to use your second Short Rest.

Go to the locked gate near where the crowd was gathered. When the coast is clear from the patrolling guard, picklock that fence and the door directly ahead. Once inside, make sure to close the door so the robotic guard doesn't see you. There are two guards off to the side, so enter Hide Party mode and ambush them. Make your way into the next room and choose the [Deception] option during the cutscene. Now you can stage your ambush on the enemies here and as a note this is the only group here that we'll actually be fighting here. Before attacking, grab the Oil Barrel in the middle walkway. Only thing of note is one of the cultists, Tamia Holzt, will drop a Motivator upon death. This will start a countdown that you can stop by interacting with it. At this point everyone should be level 10, so here are my recommendations:

Loot the bodies and make go into the backroom. Back here you'll see a remaining Gondian named Zanner Toobin. Split Karlach off from the group and pickpocket him to get the Property of Zanner Toobin book. Make sure to actually read this with Karlach as it helps us disarm the factory without having to use the bomb we were given, allowing us to save it for later. Give Karlach three Potions of Invisibility (or three means of turning invisible) and the Runepowder Bomb that we got from Wulbren. Technically we'll only need two rounds of invisibility, but having a third as a backup would be smart. We're also bringing the bomb as a backup. Make sure you bring just the bomb you got from Wulbren and not one of the barrels.

I recommend reading the next two paragraphs along with the video so you know how to pull this off. Turn Karlach invisible and go down the stairs into the doorway for the next section. Immediately head east, going down some stairs and then up another set. Go left and you'll see a raised section where a procedure is being done. Interact with the bookhself behind Gondian Gringo Biggs and read The Many Faces of Gond book. READ IT ONLY, DON'T PICK IT UP. Picking up the book will remove your invisibility. Continue north and go down the stairs to find Black Gauntlet Hahns Rives. A Hellfire Watcher may be walking by, so let it pass. Enter both Hide Party mode and Turn-Based mode. Make sure you're not in a detection zone and then pickpocket the key from him. You'll need to use the menu over him to select the option, otherwise you'll end up just attacking him. Make a break for the large door behind you to get to the next section. Video representation of this strategy that also covers the next section:

You can leave both Hide Party mode and Turn Base mode in this small room before progressing forward. Make Karlach invisible once more and make a break for the back of the room. With the steps we did before, we know the passcode to destroy the facility, allowing us to save the bomb for another use. That said, it does require passing a small DC roll, which is why we still brought the bomb as a backup. If you fail and only have one Inspiration point, just use the bomb option. Interact with the "Neural Switchboard" in the back and make the following choices:

• Recall the code Toobin shared with you.
• [Intelligence] Input code "Nebelun", and increase the Neurocitor's output to maximum.
  • This is only a DC roll of 7.

After the cutscene you'll be outside where Wulbren and Barcus confront one another. If possible, we want Barcus to take over the Ironhand gnomes, giving us an ally for the end game segment. If you fail this and are out of Inspiration, not a big deal. Unfortunately, since we did this with Karlach we don't have the Charisma benefits of Tav, so if you have Inspiration to use upon a failure, do so.

• Toobin is right. It's over.
• [Rogue][Persuasion] There's no honor among thieves, Barcus - and same goes for the Ironhands. Take Wulbren's place, lead them yourself!

Now is a great place to use your Long Rest. You want to make sure to Long Rest in this section of the city to set yourself up for the right night event trigger. When you first get to camp a cutscene will play of Vlaakith confronting the group. Unlike when we met her in Act 1, there are no death triggers here, so make whatever choices you want. Next up talk to Karlach. It's finally time to get her achievement!

With that, the achievement should finally be yours.

• Hot Date

  Went on a date with Karlach - now that's playing with fire.

  

  1 guide

Next up we should have a new guest visiting our camp, Yurgir. As we saved him back in Act 2, he's here to guide our way to Raphael's domain. Speak to him and make whatever choices you want. You're free to go to sleep to trigger the night event. You should be visited by the Emperor.

Day 14

Here are the plans for today. We'll be killing some civilians, Bhaal worshipers, and invading the House of Hope.

• Morning Buffs
  • Figaro "Facemaker" Pennygood (and possibly 8+ guards)
  • Cora Highberry (and possibly 10+ guards)
  • Dolor
• Short Rest
  • Sarevok Anchev and Blood Echoes (x4)
• Short Rest
  
  • Avery Sonshal and guards (x4)
  • Tomboldt the Pallid and guards (x5)
  • Githyanki (x6)
• Restoration Pool
  • Haarlep and Imps (x6)
  • Hell Sphere (x2) and Infernal Debtor (x6)
  • Infernal Debtor (x6)
  • Spectator (x2) and Imps (x5)

Save a tier 3 spell slot on Shadowheart to help kill 20 enemies while drunk for an achievement.

Leave the camp and before you do your buffs make a quick tour of vendors that sell potions. That would mean stopping by Mattis, Danthelon's Dancing Axe, Alchemy and Potion Shop (above previos store), Bonecloak's Apothecary, and Araj Oblodra. At this point I was at four Elixir of Cloud Giant Strength, so I started using them on Karlach every day from this point on. If you have at least two, you're safe to start using them, but only on Karlach. If you have any leftover Hill Giant elixirs, you can use them on Tav but we'll getting something for Tav soon that will trump those elixirs.

Do your buff routine of Mage Armor on Gale, Aid (tier 5), Elixirs on both Karlach/Tav, Soul Coin on Karlach, and lastly Shield of Thralls on all your characters. We're going to head back to the "South Span of Wyrm's Crossing" waypoint and head across the street into "Fraygo's Flophouse". Go up the stairs and then up the ladder in the room with all the beds. On this top floor is a hidden door behind the Wardrobe that you can picklock with Karlach. Succeed and use the Wardrobe to enter a secret room. In here you want to grab the Bloodstained Parchment sitting on the table. Time to kill some innocent people!

Teleport over to the "Baldur's Gate" waypoint and go directly across the street into the "Facemaker's Boutique" shop. In the back room will be Figaro "Facemaker" Pennygood. Make sure the door is closed behind you and kill him. Loot him to pick up the Figaro's Hand item. If the other NPCs see you and reports you to the guards, just kill them. Everyone here is expendable, so kill anyone that tries to stop you from looting that hand. After that, teleport over to the "Lower City Central Wall" waypoint and a man named Olfaith Olumssdottir will approach you. Chat with him and he'll say you need to kill one more person. Follow the road east and once you're past the "Sorcerous Sundries" building, there should be a wine party on a patio to your left. Here will be our second target - Cora Highberry. Run up and kill her. If you don't outright attack her off the bat, another assassin will lay claim to our quarry. Try to loot her body to take the Cora's Hand item. Some people may take issue with this and start a fight or call a guard, just kill anyone that stands in your way like the other target. The same man from before will approach and give you a passphrase to a hideout.

From here continue following the path east and once it splits, go north. You should see a marker up ahead to guide you, but you should find the "Candulhallow's Tombstones" building that the man gave you the key for. Head into the last room, take the painting to reveal a button, and push it to reveal a secret door. Interact with it and say the passphrase to gain entry. Go down the corridor and enter the Tribunal Antechamber to see a cutscene. Choose the dialogue option that attacks the dwarf. He does pack a punch, so he may down someone before you take him out. You can use your first Short Rest here before going forward. Recover as needed and proceed into the main room to meet Sarevok Anchev.

After doing so you'll get:

• Murder in Baldur's Gate

  Coated the streets of Baldur's Gate in blood - became an Unholy Assassin of Bhaal.

  

  2 guides

This will also grant you the Amulet of Bhaal. Make sure not to lose this as it will come in handy later! Saverok will go back to his throne, but we aren't done with him. You can attack him however you want, but you can try leading with a Hold Person spell on Saverok. If it doesn't go through you won't be forced into combat. You could also use a Chain Lighting on the three blood phantoms in the lower chairs. Either way, focus down Saverok and either use Psionic Dominance or Counterspell to make sure the other enemy doesn't succeed in casting Slow as that is a pain to deal with. If you do land that Hold Person via Shdowheart you could make really short work of Saverok. Especially if you use the tried and true Twinned Haste combo on Tav/Karlach. Each of the echoes will do specific things:

• Echo of Amelyssan - Heals/Sanctuary
• Echo of Illasera - Haste
• Echo of Sendal - Slow
• Echo of Abazigal - Melee attacks

That said, you can ultimately handle this fight however you want as there is also an advantage to taking down some of the peskier echoes first. Once the fight is over, loot the Sword of Chaos and Saverok's Horned Helmet off of Saverok and give them both to Tav. The guards outside the room also have some loot if you'd like it. Once you're back outside, teleport to the "Basilisk Gate" waypoint and use your second Short Rest. We'll soon be getting to the point where we'll use all of our remaining explosive barrels at once, but in case you used more than I did, or you missed some, we can make a pitstop to get a lot of explosives. Travel southwest, following the path as it goes down. This place can be a bit confusing, so to help we are trying to get to the "Felogyr's Fireworks" shop, which is directly south of "Sorcerous Sundries". Here's an image of the map to help:

There are two sets of enemies that we'll be dealing with, first of which is on the ground floor. Bring your party behind the counter and attack the shop owner, Avery Sonshal. We want everyone back here to prevent spell attacks from Clerk Tamara above and we want to kill the shop owner fast to prevent him from setting off all the fireworks on this floor. The two enemies on the above floor will make their way down to you if you stay in the back behind the counter. Clerk Tamara still poses a threat on setting off the explosives here, so what I did was use Knock on Gale to immediately unlock the door leading to the second floor and then have Karlach obliterate her after she ended her turn in the stairwell. If these explosives do go off, there are still plenty to get here.

You can save the looting for later, for now go up to the second floor and then creep one character up to the very top floor. Enough to trigger combat and have them rush back down to the second floor. We want to avoid fighting on the third floor as it's littered with Smokepowder Barrels, so it's safer to funnel the enemies down to us. Nothing major to note on this second group of enemies. From the top floor, start looting and making your way down. Pick up all the Smokepowder Barrels and Boxes of Fireworks on the first three floors, along with any other handheld explosives or fireworks. When looting on the ground floor, guards may notice from outside the windows. If they confront you and run inside, just attack and kill them for some easy extra experience. On the ground floor you should see a hatch leading to the basem*nt. If the outside NPCs are barring you from entering due to their sightlines, you can tuck into that alcove, enter Hide Party mode, and then you'd should be able to enter just fine. Be careful down here as there's a trip wire in the middle of the room. There's a lever behind some crates opening a side room which also has a trip wire. Setting off either of these will cause everything down here to explode. In total, this is the grand haul you can walk away with:

• Basem*nt - 10 Smokepowder Barrels and 11 Boxes of Fireworks (12 if you can get the hard to reach one)
• First floor - 9 Boxes of Fireworks
• Second Floor - Box of Fireworks
• Third floor - 10 Smokepowder Barrels

We're going to make one more detour before taking the fight to Raphael. Teleport back to the "Basilisk Gate" waypoint. Travel west down the road to the second building on your right, this should be the "Elfsong Tavern". If it helps, there should be a quest marker on your map telling you to investigate the basem*nt. Go inside and speak to the bartender, Alan Alyth. We need a full rest worth of alcohol supplies, so either 40 or 80 camp supplies of alcohol, depending on your difficulty. This is related to an achievement, but also get a few extra alcoholic drinks as we'll be using some momentarily.

Go into the kitchen and down to the basem*nt to meet a hoard of rats, which is a perfect setup for an achievement. Have Shadowheart drink one of the acholic drinks and use Spirit Guardians to kill 20 rats while drunk. This can be done across multiple turns, but to be safe we want to do this with the same character in one encounter. There are more than 20 rats here though and they should come running to you. Without much fuss this will net you:

• Punch Drunk

  Defeated twenty opponents while drunk - downed them.

  

  2 guides

Loot the Firewine Barrels if any survived. There are two doors in the back, take the one on the left. This should be a narrow room with a button on the wall. Hit it to open a secret passage in the other room.

This will start leading us to the Emperor's hidden base, which after completing this side quest will open the way for another achievement.

Follow this passageway into another room where a group of Githyanki will be searching the Emperor's hideout here. Enter Hide Party mode and land a surprise attack. On each side you should see a purple portal. These are being created by the respective Gate Master that is near it. Focus them first to prevent reinforcements and then whittle down the remaining enemies. Loot the room and grab some more Firewine Barrels. Go to the back and behind the statue you should discover a button on the wall, opening up another secret passageway. Loot and interact with everything in this main room until the quest marker goes away. Lastly, go through the next exit in the side room and this side quest will be complete. This will lead you out to the sewers where you will be met by someone. Who you see can vary from person to person.

With that, let's take the fight to Raphael who has 666hp and a posse of demons accompanying him. Unfortunately for him we can set up a massive trap with all of our explosive barrels. We'll do this today as in his domain there's actually a healing pool that fully heals and regenerates all spell slots, so don't worry if you're running super low on abilities or spells at this point in the day. To get to his domain known as the "House of Hope" we first need to teleport to the "Lower City Central Wall" waypoint. Follow the path north and the first building you see should be "Devil's Fee". Head inside and speak to Helsik behind the counter. Choose the [Persuasion] option to gain her assistance at the cost of stealing an item from Raphael (we'll actually be keeping the item for ourselves).

Dark Urge players: She'll give you the Gibus of the Worshipful Servant hat after the conversation. Your choice on using that on Tav or keeping the one you got from killing Saverok.

I also recommend buying the Cloak of the Weave from her to give to Shadowheart. Make your way upstairs to find a ritual circle written in blood. Go into the side room and picklock the Gilded Chest to get the Mask of Soul Perception, which is a great item for Karlach. Helsik should have given you a ritual pouch that holds all five items needed to open the portal. Starting from the western arrow pointing at the table, you want to place the items on the following arrow points going in a clockwise fashion.

• Skull
• Coin of Mammon
• Nothing
• Diamond
• Incense
• Nothing
• Nothing
• Then place the Infernal Marble in the middle

You'll know things have been placed in the proper location if they glow orange and can't be picked up. Before heading in we want to grab some stuff from camp. We want to grab ALL of our explosive barrels and put them on one character to smuggle them into Rapahel's domain. In order to do that, start selecting by holding and then select every barrel you want with . Then once you have everything you want highlighted, hit over one of the selected barrels and send them all to one character. Specifically just all the barrel-type items. All of the throwable bombs, or grenade type items, DO NOT USE. We are saving them for a dragon later on. For context, this is what my haul was at this point:

• 22 Boxes of Fireworks
• 3 Brine Barrels
• 30 Firewine Barrels
• 6 Nautiloid Tanks
• 2 Oil Barrels
• 3 Runepowder Barrels
• 37 Smokepowder Barrels

Ideally you'll want to bring an Elixir of Vigilance so we can make sure we go first on Karlach. Also make sure Karlach has some means of starting a fire. Either with an Alchemist's Fire or from the Gloves of Cinder and Sizzle that we equipped on her in Act 1. This way we can make sure she goes first and can set off the barrels. If you for some reason don't have that elixir, this is why we also got the Alert feat on her as a precaution. Go into the portal and the room where you appear is actually where Raphael will confront us. Because of that, we can preemptively place all our barrels to ambush him! Here is a screenshot showing where he'll spawn so you can build around that.

If you have roughly the same amount of barrels as I do, I recommend having all of the Runepowder Barrels a bit behind where Raphael spawns as they are our heaviest hitting ones and could nearly kill your party if you place them too forward. Around where Raphael spawns do a few layers of Smokepowder Barrels and on the lower level a few layers of Firewine Barrels. With the remaining you should have branch towards the two side areas to deal with other enemies that spawn. Here is a video showing my final placement of things:

Is this overkill? Possibly. Is it going to be rewarding as all hell to blow that smug smirk off Raphael's face? Yes. Before progressing, double check you have something on Karlach to set off the barrels along with that Elixir of Vigilance if you were able to obtain one. You can freely leave this place before kicking the hornets nest, so do so now if needed. Depending on how many extra guards you had to dealt with throughout today, you may or may not be level 11 at this point. If you are level 11, here are my recommendations:

Heroes' Feast will be something else we'll do every day, so go ahead and use that on the party now. When you're ready to proceed, get close to the door and you'll be greeted by Hope, who is held captive by Raphael. Go through the door and you'll see that there are two exits, one to the left and right. Go out the right door as that is unlocked. Follow the path as it loops all the way around to the left, looting as you please. Once you make it to where that left door was, there is a lever that opens it. Go into the nearby western room to speak to the Archivist.

• I just want to explore the Archive.
• Are there any highlights in the collection?
• I've come for the Hammer.
• [Intimidation] How about I break bits of you until you change your mind?

If you don't succeed in that check, you can use Invisibility to help pickpocket the Boudoir Invitation from him. With that in hand, go to the northern room that is blocked by a barrier, which you can now go through. Go into the pool directly ahead of you and interact with the Restoration Faucet. This will fully replenish your health and all abilities/spell slots. Best part is this can be used multiple times, so don't be shy about replenishing here as we fight through the demons in this area. Go towards the back of this room to meet an incubus named Haarlep. Pick the option to fight him and get ready for an annoying ability.

Whenever Haarlep takes damage he'll become untargetable to attacks until his next turn, so you'll want to focus your hardest hitting abilities on him. Personally I used a tier 3 Divine Smite while everyone else dealt with the six Imps that spawn.

Once the fight is over, loot the Key From Raphael's Safe from Haarlep. On the west side of the back area there will be a button beneath a portrait. Hit it to reveal a safe that has the password to get the Orphic Hammer as well as five Soul Coins. Top yourself up at the restoration pool. Across the hallway from the boudoir room is a locked door you have to pass two checks to get into. Swap to Gale and have him try to open it. If you fail, you'll just get knocked back, but you can try again so don't waste your Inspiration here. Inside will be a few things, but the notables ones are the Staff of Spellpower and Contract: Mol.

The Contract: Mol item is neccessary to save Mol as she made a deal with Raphael to survive that ambush in Act 2.

Give that new staff to Gale and replace the Knife of the Undermountain King. Between Gale's two staves and necklace, he can now use any tier 6 spell three times without burning a spell slot per Long Rest. Go back to the Archivist and kill him. On two pedestals in this room we can steal the Amulet of Greater Health and Gauntlets of Hill Giant Strength, give both of which to Tav. The gloves are what Helsik wants us to give to her, but... we just won't do that and instead will just keep it for ourselves. It's not really worth giving Tav any strength based elixirs anymore because of these gloves. Lastly go up to the Orphic Hammer and speak the magic words to obtain it. Walk out to find the first set of enemies - a Hell Sphere and a Debtor. The Sphere is tanky, but you can chip away at it. Meanwhile when the Debtor dies it will transform into another enemy, so don't let that catch you off guard. Follow the hallway northward to run into a another small group of enemies.

Start following the hallway east fighting past debtors and another hell Sphere. Once you're at the end of the hallway turn your attention to the central room where a group of six enemies will await you. There's a handful of imps and debtors, nothing to be too concerned about. DO NOT GO BACK TO THE VERY FIRST ROOM YET. You could trigger the Raphael fight prematurely. Quickly stop by the boudoir to heal yourself back up and go into the eastern end of the main hallway once more. Here you should see a hatch leading down to the prison.

In the next room down here is where Hope has been imprisoned, but she is guarded by two Spectators and some Imps. The imps are actually the biggest threat as this jail is made up of several platforms and the imps use Eldrtich Blast, which has a knock back. Meaning with one attack someone in your party could get knocked off to their death. I recommend entering Hide Party mode and when there's an opening, have someone jump to the middle platform. Then quickly enter Turn-Based mode to land a surprise attack on one of the imps. Focus as many of them down as possible. To help I recommend focusing on the ones earlier in the turn order and worst case you can use a Counterspell to negate an Eldritch Blast attack if you aren't able to kill them all fast enough. Deal with the spectators next and to free Hope you need to break the two crystals she is linked to. Have Tav break them with the Orphic Hammer equipped. After Hope is freed, swap back to your actual weapon. Head back upstairs and make one last pitstop at the healing baths. Make your way back to the room with the portal, but don't interact with the portal just yet. Take control of Karlach and have the rest of the party wait just inside the room near the door.

One playthrough players - I highly recommend forcing a cloud save before starting this fight. Due to some RNG elements of the explosion damage, your results may vary when you set off this trap. It's perfectly fine if Raphael survives. But if you barrel placement different from mine, especially with the Runepowder Barrels, you may accidentally kill your party. Better to be safe than sorry at this point.

Karlach has the best chance of starting first, so let's have her interact with the portal to get Raphael to appear. Interact with the portal, get to safety, and let the explosions fly. Chances are Raphael may live with some health and the other enemies may survive as well, but since we're fully rested up you should be able to mop things up without too much of a hassle. After the fight Hope will give you the Gloves of Soul Catching that you can give to Karlach and looting Raphael's body will give you the Helldusk Armor that you can give to Shadowheart. Leave through the portal to get back to the Devil's Fee. The Emperor won't be thrilled with us getting the hammer, so make these dialogue choices:

• I do trust you. I just like to have insurance.
• I promise I won't use the hammer.

Even though we probably could do more, travel to the South Span of Wyrm's Crossing waypoint. Once there, let's end the day with the Long Rest. The main reason why I recommended moving away was so you don't accidentally walk downstairs and talk to Helsik, potentially losing Tav's gloves. We're about to get two achievements with how we set things up.

When you go to rest, make sure to only use camping supplies that are an alcoholic drink. You should have bought plenty when at the bar earlier.

As for the actual night event, things are about to get a little interesting. Just remember, this is for an achievement.

This will net you:

• Mind Blown

  Romanced the Emperor.

  

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After some closing dialogue the night will properly end and this achievement should unlock as well:

• Bottoms Up

  Long Rested using only alcohol - a time-honoured dwarfish tradition.

  

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Day 15

Here are the plans for today. A shorter day, only taking on Gortash and paving the way to confront Orin.

• Morning Buffs
  • Guild thugs (x6)
  • Gortash and guards (x4)
• Short Rest
  • Flaming Fist Quartermaster and guards (x4)
  • Blaze Savora and Flaming Fist guards (x7)
• Short Rest
  • Farslayer of Bhaal Ghislev

You really want to save your "Luck of the Far Realm" attacks for when you're directly attacking Gortash later today. The sooner that fight is over, the better.

Leave the camp and do another potion pass on the same vendors that we did at the start of Day 14. Taking what we learned yesterday, do your buff routine of Mage Armor on Gale, Heroe's Feast and Aid (tier 5), Elixir of Cloud Giant Strength on Karlach, Soul Coin on Karlach, and lastly Shield of Thralls on all your characters. Teleport over to the "Basilisk Gate" waypoint and start to head down to "Felogyr's Fireworks" once more. Right before the last bit of stairs leading down to the shop, instead head east and down to find a Orc named Tusgront. Speak to him and pick a fight. This is just a group of six standard criminal type enemies, so just focus them down one by one.

Loot the Guild Ring from Tusgront and insert it into the nearby wall slot to reveal a hidden entrance. Go inside and follow the path. After you go up and down some stairs, Mol should be right in front of you before you turn the corner. I recommend checking what she's selling as she may have an Elixir of Cloud Giant Strength for you to buy.

It's time to deal with Gortash and his annoying achievement. We have to kill him without setting off any of the traps that litter Wyrm's Rock. Travel to the "South Span of Wyrm's Crossing" waypoint and go back to where you flew across the ravine. Instead of going right, go left this time. After you round the corner go up the ladder and vines to make it to a side portion of the fortress. Break down or picklock through this first door to be in a side room right next to the throne.

In this throne room are some enemies that we don't want to get into a fight with as this could trigger traps, voiding the achievement. I recommend reading the next few portions and watching the videos to understand how we'll be pulling off this achievement.

To get around this you can do the following. Move the entire party to the northern part of the side room that you're in. Enter Turn-Based mode, swap to Karlach, and use an Invisibility Potion on her. Have her go through the door to the throne room (door leading east) and have her immediately go north to find another door. You'll likely have to use your Dash ability, but open that door and click on the stairs to move up to the roof. Since the party is still grouped together, everyone else should appear up here with you. Here's a video showing the method:

Stick along the outer wall to avoid floor traps in the middle of the path. If you want to be safe, stay in Turn-Based mode and control everyone individually. You want to make it to the eastern edge of the roof where you'll be standing next to some stone blocks, with a door to the upper keep being right in front of you. This right here is actually where we'll fight Gortash, but we have to lure him out here. Split Karlach off from the party and have Gale use the Twinned Haste combo on her and Tav. Then swap to Karlach and run into the keep via the nearby doorway. Stick to the middle of the path and go up to the second room until you enter combat. Immediately swap to your group of three and put them into Turn-Based mode. This way the Haste buff won't run out on Tav while you do the kiting.

Do a 180 on Karlach and run back to the doorway leading outside, not going too far out of it until Gortash catches up. If you get too far ahead of him it could take you out of combat. Gortash and his guards will give chase. Fire off a ranged attack or two if your Karlach has a bow or can borrow Tav's. You don't want to use your spear here or any other AoE type damage as it could interact with the traps. Once Gortash has been kited back to the group, let the attacks fly. Solely focus on killing him as soon as possible. Use your hardest hitting single target attacks and cash in your "Luck of the Far Realm" critical hits. As soon as Gortash is dead, the achievement is yours. Here is a video showing off the kiting strategy:

• Fancy Footwork

  Defeated Gortash in Wyrm's Rock without activating any traps.

  

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Now with that annoying achievement out of the way, clean up the remaining enemies and loot Gortash's body to progress the story. Go inside his personal chamber for some loot. Most notably is in the back right corner will be a Gilded Chest that has Helldusk Boots that you can give to Tav. Now would be a good time to use your first Short Rest. Once you're done here you can now teleport to the "Wyrm's Rock" waypoint (this previously got blocked off when we blew up the factory). You'll be immediately thrown into combat with the Flaming Fist Quartermaster and four guards. Easy work at this point. There is a bunch of loot in the armory behind the counters if you want some extra gold for later. Go out into the hallway to get into another fight. There will initially be a group of four guards, but as you make your way north another group of four from the barracks room will join the fray. Take care of them and go across the drawbridge leading north to find Mizora.

Speak to her and choose what you want. She'll mention seeing you at camp, setting up a night event for us. After this we can start going down the path of confronting Orin without actually fighting her yet. Teleport to the "Baldur's Gate" waypoint and walk down the street eastward to a manhole cover to enter the sewers. There are several entrances to this, but here is a screenshot of where we want to go:

Follow the path to the west and when you see a wooden bridge to the south, enter it to trigger a cutscene if you haven't gotten put into it yet. Resolve it with the [Intimidation] option and this should put you at level 12, which is the max level for the game.

After that, go through the door to the north. Continue in this direction and you'll see the "Undercity Ruins" waypoint. Before proceeding, just in case things get messy ahead, use your second Short Rest. Next to that is a door you can interact with. Choose whatever options you want and progress forward. Next up is a really dangerous ambush point. A lot of blood phantoms will appear as you traverse the area that fire off many ranged attacks. On top of that, if the main enemy isn't interrupted, it will complete a ritual that instantly kills some of your party. To safely defuse this, we are going to do something simple. Use two Potions of Invisibility, one on Tav and one on Karlach. Also use the Twinned Haste combo on them. Enter Turn-Based Mode and we'll send Tav/Karlach up to the main enemy while everyone else stays back. I recommend reading the next paragraph and watching the video as this encounter could turn sour very fast.

Have both Karlach and Tav go across the stone pillar that acts as a bridge. Meanwhile don't let Gale or Shadowheart leave the wall cover yet as that will trigger the ambush. Have either Tav or Karlach go up the ladder right after the bridge and then up another one, but keep the other on the ground a bit after the bridge. Whoever you sent up the ladder will be next to Farslayer of Bhaal Ghislev, but don't attack yet. Have Gale or Shadowheart now walk out to trigger the ambush and swap back to Karlach/Tav to put them back into Turn-Based mode. With whoever you sent up, now attack the Farslayer. You have to get through five stacks of Unstoppable, which means they can soak five attacks before they start to take full damage. The reason why we split up Karlach and Tav is because down where we left the other character is where this enemy can potentially teleport to. As soon as the Farslayer dies all the other blood phantoms will start to despawn. This is a much easier method to getting past this ambush. To help, here is a video showing the strategy:

Go through the door to enter the next area which is a giant cavern. Follow the stairs downward as you head east and you may set off a few traps, which is perfectly fine. Once you reach a long bridge, you'll find yet another waypoint - "Temple of Bhaal". As we're about to end the day, you can traverse the bridge and get rid of all the traps so you don't set them off later.

DON'T GO INTO THE ROOM AFTER THE BRIDGE. That's where Orin's fight is located and we don't want to deal with her yet.

Go ahead and use your Long Rest. Upon getting to camp you'll immediately be thrown into a cutscene that we can get an achievement from.

• Loophole

  Broke Wyll's Pact with Mizora.

  

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After that, Mizora will remain in the camp. She can be found next to Wyll, go over and speak to her to set something up for the final fight:

• Wyll's not a child. You need to start treating him with respect.
• If you're going to be staying, I need something in return.
• Leave.

Day 16

Here are the plans for today. It'll be rather short as all we'll be doing is fighting Ansur, one of two dragons we need for achievements.

• Morning Buffs
  • Fallen Champion and Undead (x16)
• Short Rest
  • Ansur

We're getting close to the end of the game! The remaining days will be on the short side. Before leaving camp there's actually an achievement we can easily get now. Dismiss someone from the party and its times to recruit a Hireling again. Speak to Withers and this time we want to recruit the Bard - Brinna Brightsong. Go through all of her level ups, but add a new class each time. The goal being for her to be level 1 in every class, netting you this achievement:

• Jack-of-all-Trades

  Multiclassed into every class in one playthrough without asking Withers to change your character.

  

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We aren't done with Brinna yet though. With her speak to Withers and reset her class. This time we want to fully level her up to a level 12 Bard. A majority of your choices don't matter, but to help out with what we're about to do, make the following choices:

• Buff your Performance skill whenever possible by adding additional proficiency modifiers.
• At level 4 choose the Actor feat.
• At level 8 choose the Ability Improvement feat and raise your Charisma to 20.

Now teleport over to the "Rivington" waypoint. With Brinna you want to go group to group using your Perform ability. The song selected doesn't matter, but if you pass the Performance check, you'll be awarded with some coins thrown by onlookers. Once the skill check is processed, you're clear to stop performing. There's a bit of a range to this, so you can position yourself in the middle of a few groups to attract them all. Continue down the road and once you make it to the raised drawbridge, teleport back to the "Rivington" waypoint and do the route again. Depending on your luck, after two or so passes of this pathing, you should then get this achievement.

• Busker

  Earned a hundred gold from playing sweet, sweet music.

  

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Go back to camp, dismiss the Hireling, and bring back whoever you asked to leave. Leave camp, but make sure it's back to that Rivington/South Span area. Going deeper into the city could cause a cutscene we don't want to happen yet. Being level 12 we can do an altered buff routine to take full advantage of the tier 6 spells Shadowheart has. In this order you want Shadowheart to use Planar Ally: Deva, Freecast + Heroes' Feast, and then Aid (tier 5). This will give you an ally to fight alongside you for the whole day that also gets buffed by those two support spells. This also works on "Us" if you did the right things to save it. Do the rest of your buffs with Mage Armor on Gale and an Elixir of Cloud Giant Strength/Soul Coin on Karlach.

Now to trigger the cutscene that we didn't want to blindly walk into. First split off Tav from the party and take control of Gale. We're leaving Tav behind so the game doesn't override our selection and make Tav be the talker. We want to take advantage of Gale's History proficiency. Head over to the "Lower City Central Wall" waypoint and walk towards "Socerous Sundries". You should be confronted by Florrick. It's okay to burn your Inspiration here if need be, as we'd like to maintain her as an end-fight ally:

• [History] A relevant thread of knowledge pokes at your mind. Explore it.
• Zariel's stunt destroyed countless lives. Mizora is her minions - you can't trust her.
• A wyrm? Are you saying there's a dragon living under the city?
• Your faith is well-founded. I will take your message to Wyll.

Now you're safe to bring Tav on over. Do your vendor pass and make sure to bring all of your Dragonslayer Arrows and at least one Scroll of Globe of Invulnerability. That scroll will be very helpful for an upcoming achievement. One of the two vendors in "Sorcerous Sundries" should have one if you're missing it. Once you're ready to fight a dragon, head over to the "Wyrm's Rock" waypoint. Take the stairs down back into the prison and when you can, go into the dead end on the left. Here you'll see two dragon shaped torches facing one another. Have Gale use his Shocking Grasp on them, which will turn them blue and reveal a hidden passage.

Follow the path and enter the next area through the doorway. You'll soon get to a door guarded by a statue. Tell it that you're worthy and you can go on through. Up ahead will be a set of trials we need to pass to progress forward, but we're aren't going to do that. If you fail a trial, while it will spawn a horde of undead, the door barring your way will still open. Take the eastern path and it will lead you up to a statue telling you to take a torch. Have the whole group start to run back to the central area and once the torchbearer gets close to the exit, the trial will fail. This will spawn a group of weak undead immediately around you with a Fallen Champion in the center. Take care of these immediate enemies and as you get to the middle another batch of eight undead will spawn. You can either kill them and the other ones that notice you from the adjacent room, or you can just have everyone dash towards the exit that leads to the next area. Once everyone is in the next room, regroup the party, use a Short Rest, and have Karlach picklock the door ahead of you.

Not only are we about to fight our first dragon, but it has a peculiar achievement where you have to kill it when it is flying in the air. It will be very clear when it is doing this as it's charging up a very powerful Lightning attack. There is a way to trick the boss into doing this without you having to cycle through turns involving the Scroll of Globe of Invulnerability that you should have bought.

There won't be any other planned encounters for today, so don't be stingy with your attacks. This dragon is resistant to Lighting attacks, so be mindful of that when attacking on Gale. Looting the dragon's corpse will start the fight, so hold off on doing that. Have Gale use the Twinned Haste combo on Karlach and Tav and do whatever other preparations you want.

If you're playing on Honor mode, be mindful of Ansur's Legendary Action - Draconic Fury. This will let him counterattack with a lightning breath on whoever first attacks it that round, so whoever attacks first try to get them angled away from the party.

Loot the body when you're good to start. A cutscene will play and your dialogue choices don't matter. Once Ansur is down to enough health that you're confident your party can take him out in one turn, have Shadowheart use the Scroll of Globe of Invulnerability and get your party inside. This should bait Ansur into doing his charged up attack, setting you up for the achievement. Kill him while he's flying and you're one achievement closer to your completion!

• Crash Landing

  In the Wyrmway, knocked the dragon out of the sky mid-flight - KAPOW.

  

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Day 17

This is the second to last day! We'll just be dealing with Orin and doing a final check before passing the point of no return for the finale of the game.

• Morning Buffs
  • Orin and Bhaal Cultists (x8)

Before we actually go underway I think it would be prudent to do a bit of a status check. If you want to wrap up any other quests or companion stories, now would be the time to deviate from the guide and complete those. Specifically this means Shadowheart's, Astarion's, Gale's, Jaheira's, and recruiting Minsc. We'll soon be hitting the point of no return, so I wanted to make sure to call that out. Along with that, I want to go over the required and recommended consumables items to have, as well as a comparison of my own inventory at this point. I'll break this down into necessary items, explosive count, and scroll count. The explosive and scrolls being very relevant to two boss fights.

Necessary items:

• Potions of Invisibility (at least x2)
• Elixirs of Cloud Giant Strength (at least x2)
• Elixir of Vigilance (x1)
• Orphic Hammer

Of course having more potions and elixirs wouldn't hurt as this is the final stretch of the game, but these are the bare minimum for our upcoming strategies. Next up we have the handheld explosives. These are specifically relevant towards the second dragon that we will be fighting. This will be explained more later, but the gist of it is we'll take all of these explosives on Karlach, have her drop them at the foot of the dragon, run away, and blown them up with a meteor strike. The goal being we one shot the dragon so we can focus on the surrounding enemies. By no means do you need this many as it is very likely overkill. The dragon's HP threshold is 400/520 between Balanced/Honor mode. You can ballpark how much damage your explosives could do with some damage variance and assumed resistance. I broke down the explosives into the likely largest sources of your damage if you kept up with buying/looting them, more obscure ones you may have, and things that might add to damage when blown up via this method, but I'm not 100% certain.

Next up we have our lists of scrolls. This is relevant to the very final boss, the Elder brain. On Honor Mode it has a specific mechanic where it will become immune to damage types that attacked it in the turn prior. If we stock up on various damage scrolls though, every character can still attack even if their main damage type is currently ineffective. This is not relevant to players playing on Balanced, but it doesn't hurt to have all the spells at your fingertips. Like the above caveat, this is very much overkill, but at this point you can liquidate all your gold so there's no harm in being over prepared. You should aim to have as many spell types as possible (Force, Lighting, Fire, ect.) If possible, having two Scrolls of Haste for the final back to back fight would be fantastic, but it's not absolutely necessary. Scrolls of Mirror Image and Scrolls of Globe of Invulnerability are there as a safety precaution in case of an emergencies to help you recover.

Now that we have all of those items covered, there is one last disclaimer to tackle. At this point, this is where the paths diverge between people completing this game in two playthroughs and those trying to complete this in one. As explained at the start of the walkthrough there are three ending achievements, but you only have two choices at the final segment. One of these achievements specifically requires being the Dark Urge origin and locking in a choice made after the Orin fight. That ending then overrides one of the default choices, which is why attempting to 100% this in one playthrough isn't the default stance of this guide, but is is choice that I'm letting you as a player make which was mentioned at the introductory section.

PLAYERS DOING TWO PLAYTHROUGHS TO 100% BALDUR'S GATE 3

That was a lot to go over, but let's take this fight to Orin! Teleport to the "Temple of Bhaal" waypoint and do your buff routine. Use Planar Ally: Deva, Freecast + Heroes' Feast, Aid (tier 5), Mage Armor on Gale and an Elixir of Cloud Giant Strength/Soul Coin on Karlach. Make your way across the bridge and hold up your Amulet of Bhaal to the door to head inside. Down below you'll see Orin in the middle of a ritual involving the companion that she took hostage. Similar to Gortash, there is an achievement here related to the fight.

We need to kill Orin while her cultists are in the middle of chanting. Essentially what this boils down to is we need to kill her fast.

Enter Hide Party mode and walk partially down the stairs. Split your party up into two groups - Tav/Shadowheart and Karlach/Gale. Tav and Shadowheart will get close to the detection range and serve as a shield of sorts. Have Gale use the Twinned Haste combo on Tav/Karlach. You'll also want to use the Elixir of Vigilance on Gale specifically to increase his Initiative.

Orin will have 6 stacks of Unstoppable and it recovers every turn. Similar to the blood phantom you fought prior. This means is she needs to be attacked that many times until she can be really be damaged. The natural enemy to Unstoppable stacks is Magic Missile, as every missile hit eats a stack of that buff. So a tier 5 Magic Missile (or two lower tiers using Metamagic: Quickened Spell) and Orin is wide open to Karlach and Tav. This is why we want to get Gale as high up the turn order as possible. Orin also has a pounce attack that can leave your party prone, which is why we left Tav/Shadowheart to be the shield to hopefully soak that as we don't want Gale's concentration to be broken. Here is a video showing the setup and killing of Orin:

Once you're ready, have Shadowheart fire off a ranged attack to lure Orin over to the group. Hopefully Gale is near the top of the turn order so he can use Magic Missile, but if not adjust as needed. With Haste on both Karlach and Tav, along with everyone having their "Luck of the Far Realms" critical hits stored up, you should be able to melt through Orin. With her death, you should get the following achievement:

• First Blood

  Killed Orin while her cultists were performing their ritual chant.

  

  1 guide

After she's dead, you now have to deal with her cultists. They'll resort to ranged attacks with one trying to cast Slow, so keep Counterspelling that. The cultists will spawn with Sanctuary, so you can't target them until they attack. After that, they're likely to make themselves invisible after attacking. We have a few options to tackle this. In either case, they won't move from their spots and can be damaged by area attacks like Fireball or Chain Lighting. You could use Blackhole to group a lot of them closer together and use an area attack. The Chain Lighting arc will also hit invisible enemies. Either way, deal with them however you want and upon looting Orin's body (just a pile of flesh) a cutscene will trigger.

Make your way back outside to the waypoint and start to make your way up the stairs. When you can, take a entrance to the north, leading you to the final portion of the game. There's also a marker on your map to help guide you. Once you get near a bunch of rats and are can enter a boat, this is truly the point of no return. PAUSE AND READ.

Depending on what you used, you may have expended utilities that only recharge after a long rest. While our spell slots will regenerate similar to the healing pool in the House of Hope, not everything will be regenerated. Go ahead and quickly Long Rest here to fully freshen your party up. The reason why we did this here and you were prompted to do all your shopping before confronting Orin is now that both her and Gortash are dead, the Elder Brain will start transforming people in the city into Illithids. Just a whole mess we don't really need to deal with. So go to sleep and see you in the final day.

Day 18

This is the final day! Get ready to fight a dragon, some mind flayers, and the elder brain.

• BEFORE morning buffs
  
  • Intellect Devourers (x22)
• AFTER morning buffs
  • Dominated Red Dragon, The Emperor, Dream Guardian (x4), and Mind Flayer (x4)
  • Elder Brain

Leave camp and DO NOT DO ANY BUFFING. They'll disappear after just one encounter with Intellect Devourers. We want to wait until we get to the final section of the city. If you have an more than one elixir for Karlach, use that and that is it. Do one final check that your party has everything they need:

• You have the potions and elixirs that you want.
• Someone is holding all of the spell scrolls.
• Tav has the Orphic Hammer.
• Karlach is holding onto all of the handheld explosives that you'll be dropping near the dragon.

Once you're all set, interact with the boat and let the cutscene play. Once you get to shore, follow the path north. Once you get to a place with some small green pools you'll be ambushed by around twenty or so Intellect Devourers. They'll come in waves, but they don't pose any threat at all, especially with Shadowheart's Spirit Guardians. Follow the path and eventually you'll confront the Elder Brain. There will be a series of dialogue skill checks, but they don't really matter. If you managed to succeed one, then when you actually fight the Elder Brain it will be slightly weakened. Definitely not worth burning an Inspiration over though. You'll soon get swept away to the Astral Plane. Follow the path until you get to where The Emperor and Orpheus are. This is where things may get a little awkward as we're actually going to betray the Emperor and free Orpheus. Mostly so it's easy to keep Kithrak Voss on our side. Make these dialogue choices:

• There is another way, we will free Orpheus.
• Enough. I have the Hammer - I will free Orpheus.

Equip the Orphic Hammer and attack the red crystals like you did when freeing Hope. Now another dialogue sequence will play with an achievement at stake.

Go through the portal to be brought to the final section of the city. Here is the time for you to properly buff up. Use Planar Ally: Deva, Freecast + Heroes' Feast, Aid (tier 5), Mage Armor on Gale and an Elixir of Cloud Giant Strength/Soul Coin on Karlach. Use whatever extra elixirs on your other party members if you'd like. Since I had these on hand I used an Elixir of Peerless Wisdom on Tav, an Elixir of Battlemage's Prowess on Gale, and lastly an Elixir of Heroism on Shadowheart. These aren't necessary at all, but I used them for the sake of having an elixir on everyone.

Start following the path and soon enough Kithrak Voss will appear before you. This is why we sided with Orpheus as we'd either have to pass a DC 30 roll without him or fight Kithrak himself. Better to have him on our side than against us as you'll see when we use his ability later. Continue forward until you come to a little inn-type building where a cutscene will happen. Here will be the rallying cry where all of the allies you've made will come to your aid. This will be either in the form of a summonable companion to aid you in battle, permanent status buff, or a heavy hitting attack. Speaking of which, there is a very important disclaimer.

DO NOT, I REPEAT, DO NOT SUMMON ZEVLOR DURING THE FINAL FIGHTS. He will be summoned to the battlefield and if he dies there, it will void the achievement to save all the Tieflings. While you can technically summon him and as long as he lives, you'll be fine, a lot can happen. DO NOT RISK IT. I won't even include him in the upcoming list of allies, don't even look at him.

If you followed this guide and everything worked out, this should be your spread of benefits for the upcoming fight.

There is also a vendor here named Koll the Red for you to grab any last goodies that you want. Head out the back door and climb up some stairs leading east. A short cutscene will play and you'll spot one of those glowing blue Illithid restoration stations nearby. Interact with it to get back the spell slots Shadowheart used to buff the party. Up ahead you'll see an entryway into a large courtyard, this is where a lot of fighting happens. Coincidentally we can just stroll on by with one character, which is why some Invisibility Potions were a necessity to bring.

Split Karlach off of the group and make her invisible. Starting running east, past all the enemies. You'll eventually reach a large door you can go through. The path will bend north and as you go up some stairs you'll be thrown into Turn-Based mode as an artillery ship starts to bombard the area. End your turn near the door, do not try interacting with it until your next turn. Picklock the door and doing so will remove your invisibility, putting you into combat with this group of enemies. Just use another Invisibility Potion and Dash past them. Avoid ending your turn in any glowing circles on the ground as that's where artillery strikes will land. You may get discovered still, but just focus on reaching the top of this section. Once you get to the door and make it through, you're in the clear. Here is a video showing this strategy:

Karlach will be alone in this room, but that is perfectly fine. Interact with the "Brain Stem" to take you up to the boss area and conveniently even though the rest of our party is way back at the start, they get brought with us. You'll get a dialogue choice with Gale and we want to choose this:

• I'm ready. Let's get you that crown.

The reason why I call this out specifically is because you can actually get Gale to blow up the orb within him, instantly defeating the Elder Brain. The catch is, this prevents us from getting certain achievements and in this playthrough it doesn't really help our goals. That said if you continue using this guide for Honor mode, we will be using this mechanic there. Once you're in the final arena at the top of the tower, take Karlach and use her Step of the Wind: Disengage ability. Jump as from where you're standing to land near the dragon. This will spawn several tentacles from the ground. These will spawn all over the brain matter floor and walking past them causes them to attempt to grapple you. Fortunately since we used Karlach's disengage ability, we don't need to worry about that with her while we do this strategy. Go into your inventory and highlight all the bombs and consumables that you want to drop on the floor to blow up. Holding until it highlights an item and then using will allow you to select everything that you want. Then over a selected item, hit and choose the "Place in the World" option to allow you to drop all these items at once. Have Karlach jump away to the nearby ledge path and hold to pull up the "Call Forth Allies" menu. We want to use "Rolan's Firestorm" and highlight the bombs, dragon, and if possible The Emperor as well. Don't worry, this is an artillery strike and Rolan won't appear here at all. Depending on the explosive payload, you very well could one-shot the dragon, netting you the achievement for killing it. Here is a video showing the strategy:

• Interfectorem Draconis

  Killed the Red Dragon in the Upper City.

  

  1 guide

This should also take care of The Emperor and a majority of the Dream Guardians. At this point have Gale use Twinned Haste on himself and Tav. If you have additional Scrolls of Haste, have Shadowheart and Karlach use them on themselves. The reason why we didn't do this before is because that "bomb the dragon" strategy could damage your party depending on placement, potentially immediately breaking your concentration. Time to assess what you have left in this arena. If the dragon or Emperor survived, you can call in your heavy hitting summons to deal with them. That being the Dame Aylin, Battle-Ready Owlbear, Mizora, and Zlorb (aka Strange Ox") summons. Zlorb can transform into multiple creatures. My personal favorite is the Minotaur form.

You should notice two side platforms that lead up to the Elder Brain's crown, our goal is to get up there. You'll see that there are two sets of Mind Flayers, one on the left and one on the right. Get a character within range and you can use the "Kith'raki Inferno" summon to lay down a line of fire across one of these sets of two. For the other set I recommend calling in the smaller NPCs as they can navigate the ledge platform better. Between "Florrick's Cohorts", "Ironhand Grenadiers", and the "Silver Harp Squad" the choice is yours. Personally I summoned them all to overwhelm those two remaining Mind Flayers.

Fight your way up to the top and have Tav use a new ability on the crown - Karsus' Compulsion. This will be a channeled ability and you need to protect Tav from any interruptions until their next turn. Depending on how long this process takes you, an Illithid ship may appear to bombard the area and bring in reinforcements. Once the channeling is over a portal will open and Tav will be brought into an astral plane to fight the elder brain. Whoever attacks the brain first each turn will get stunned as a reaction, so be mindful of who attacks first. Letting Orpheus be the sacrificial lamb would be ideal if your turn order allows it. The brain will also spawn these floating white clusters that will destroy nearby platforms on their next turn. You can tell which platforms are being targeted as they'll have a slight red highlight/glow to them. All said and done the brain really doesn't pose much of a threat at this point. Pause once the brain is almost dead.

MAKE A MANUAL SAVE HERE. You will need to reload the save to get both choice endings. Technically one of these will be available with the strategy being used in the Honor mode playthrough, but best get it now so there's one less achievement to get.

When the final blow is dealt to the Elder Brain you'll have one of two choices. Go ahead and choose the first option:

• Command the brain to destroy the tadpoles and then itself.

After this a bunch of cutscenes will play to show various narrative resolutions. None of your remaining decisions impact achievements, so the choices are all yours. Once the credits roll you should get four achievements:

• Leave No One Behind

  Saved every tiefling refugee you can throughout the game.

  

  1 guide

• Ceremorphosis

  Made the ultimate sacrifice: became a mindflayer to defeat the Netherbrain.

  

  1 guide

• Hero of the Forgotten Realms

  Saved the realms: destroyed the Absolute once and for all.

  

  1 guide

• All's Well That Ends Well

  Finished the game (with a heartfelt "thank you!" from Larian Studios).

  

  

Now reload that save and pick the other option:

• Dominate the brain. Become the Absolute. Conquer the world.

The credits should immediately rolling, granting this achievement.

• Absolute Power Corrupts

  Reigned with terror: took control of the Netherbrain and bent the world to your will.

  

  2 guides

PLAYERS ATTEMPTING TO 100% BALDUR'S GATE 3 IN ONE PLAYTHROUGH

That was a lot to go over, but let's take this fight to Orin. Teleport to the "Temple of Bhaal" waypoint and do your buff routine. Use Planar Ally: Deva, Freecast + Heroes' Feast, Aid (tier 5), Mage Armor on Gale and an Elixir of Cloud Giant Strength/Soul Coin on Karlach. Make your way across the bridge and your little servant will open the way. Down below you'll see Orin in the middle of a ritual involving the companion that she took hostage. Similar to Gortash, there is an achievement here related to the fight.

Enter Hide Party mode and walk partially down the stairs. Split your party up into two groups - Tav/Shadowheart and Karlach/Gale. Tav and Shadowheart will get close to the detection range and serve as a shield of sorts. Have Gale use the Twinned Haste combo on Tav/Karlach. You'll also want to use the Elixir of Vigilance on Gale specifically to increase his Initiative.

Orin will have 12 stacks of Unstoppable and it recovers every turn. Similar to the blood phantom you fought prior, this means is she needs to be attacked that many times until she can be really be damaged. The natural enemy to Unstoppable stacks is Magic Missile, as every missile hit eats a stack of that buff. Gale's Metamagic: Quickened Magic comes in very handy here. This will allow him to fire off two back to back tier 4 or higher Magic Missile attacks, leaving Orin is wide open to Karlach and Tav. This is why we want to get Gale as high up the turn order as possible. Orin also has a pounce attack that can leave your party prone, which is why we left Tav/Shadowheart to be the shield to hopefully soak that as we don't want Gale's concentration to be broken. Here is a video showing the setup and killing of Orin:

Once you're ready, have Shadowheart fire off a ranged attack to lure Orin over to the group. Hopefully Gale is near the top of the turn order so he can use Magic Missile, but if not adjust as needed. With Haste on both Karlach and Tav, along with everyone having their "Luck of the Far Realms" critical hit stored up, you should be able to melt through Orin. With her death, you should get the following achievement:

• First Blood

  Killed Orin while her cultists were performing their ritual chant.

  

  1 guide

After she's dead, you now have to deal with her cultists. They'll resort to ranged attacks with one trying to cast Slow, so keep Counterspelling that. The cultists will spawn with Sanctuary, so you can't target them until they attack. After that, they're likely to make themselves invisible after attacking. We have a few options to tackle this. In either case, they won't move from their spots and can be damaged by area attacks like Fireball or Chain Lighting. You could use Blackhole to group a lot of them closer together and use an area attack. The Chain Lighting arc will also hit invisible enemies. Either way, deal with them however you want and upon looting Orin's body (just a pile of flesh) a cutscene will trigger.

This will net you another achievement.

• Embrace Your Urge

  Became Bhaal's ultimate weapon - became his Slayer.

  

  1 guide

Make your way back outside to the waypoint and you may be met by some familiar faces. If Jaheira followed you into Act 3, then she and a group of Harpers will ambush you. Funny enough if you never leveled her up, she'll be only Level 1. Launch a surprise attack of your own and mop the floor with them. Start to make your way up the stairs. When you can, take a entrance to the north, leading you to the final portion of the game. There's also a marker on your map to help guide you. Once you get near a bunch of rats and are can enter a boat, this is truly the point of no return. PAUSE AND READ.

Depending on what you used, you may have expended utilities that only recharge after a long rest. While our spell slots will regenerate similar to the healing pool in the House of Hope, not everything will be regenerated. Go ahead and quickly Long Rest here to fully freshen your party up. The reason why we did this here and you were prompted to do all your shopping before confronting Orin is now that both her and Gortash are dead, the Elder Brain will start transforming people in Baldur's Gate into Illithids. Just a whole mess we don't really need to deal with. So Long Rest and see you in the final day.

Day 17

This is the final day! Get ready to fight a dragon, some mind flayers, and the elder brain.

• BEFORE morning buffs
  
  • Intellect Devourers (x22)
• AFTER morning buffs
  • Dominated Red Dragon, The Emperor, Dream Guardian (x4), and Mind Flayer (x4)
  • Elder Brain

Leave camp and DO NOT DO ANY BUFFING. They'll disappear after just one encounter with Intellect Devourers. We want to wait until we get to the final section of the city. If you have an more than one elixir for Karlach, use that and that is it. Do one final check that your party has everything they need:

• You have the potions and elixirs that you want.
• Someone is holding all of the spell scrolls.
• Tav has the Orphic Hammer.
• Karlach is holding onto all of the handheld explosives that you'll be dropping near the dragon.

Once you're all set, interact with the boat and let the cutscene play. Once you get to shore, follow the path north. Once you get to a place with some small green pools you'll be ambushed by around twenty or so Intellect Devourers. They'll come in waves, but they don't pose any threat at all, especially with Shadowheart's Spirit Guardians. Follow the path and eventually you'll confront the Elder Brain. There will be aa series of dialogue skill checks, but they don't really matter. If you managed to succeed one, then when you actually fight the Elder Brain it will be slightly weakened. Definitely not worth burning an Inspiration over though. You'll soo get swept away to the Astral Plane. Follow the path until you get to where The Emperor and Orpheus are. This is where things may get a little awkward as we're actually going to betray the Emperor and free Orpheus. Mostly so it's easy to keep Kithrak Voss on our side. Make these dialogue choices:

• There is another way, we will free Orpheus.
• Enough. I have the Hammer - I will free Orpheus.

Equip the Orphic Hammer and attack the red crystals like you did when freeing Hope. Now another dialogue sequence will play with an achievement at stake.

Go through the portal to be brought to the final section of the city. Here is the time for you to properly buff up. Use Planar Ally: Deva, Freecast + Heroes' Feast, Aid (tier 5), Mage Armor on Gale and an Elixir of Cloud Giant Strength/Soul Coin on Karlach. Use whatever extra elixirs on your other party members if you'd like. Since I had these on hand I used an Elixir of Peerless Wisdom on Tav, an Elixir of Battlemage's Prowess on Gale, and lastly an Elixir of Heroism on Shadowheart. These aren't necessary at all, but I used them for the sake of having an elixir on everyone.

Start following the path and soon enough Kithrak Voss will appear before you. This is why we sided with Orpheus as we'd either have to pass a DC 30 roll without him or fight Kithrak himself. Better to have him on our side than against us as you'll see when we use his ability later. Continue forward until you come to a little inn-type building where a cutscene will happen. Here will be the rallying cry where all of the allies you've made will come to your aid. This will be either in the form of a summonable companion to aid you in battle, permanent status buff, or a heavy hitting attack. Speaking of which, there is a very important disclaimer.

DO NOT, I REPEAT, DO NOT SUMMON ZEVLOR DURING THE FINAL FIGHTS. He will be summoned to the battlefield and if he dies there, it will void the achievement to save all the Tieflings. While you can technically summon him and as long as he lives, you'll be fine. A lot can happen. DO NOT RISK IT. I won't even include him in the upcoming list of allies, don't even look at him.

If you followed this guide and everything worked out, this should be your spread of benefits for the upcoming fight.

There is also a vendor here named Koll the Red for you to grab any last goodies that you want. Head out the back door and climb up some stairs leading east. A short cutscene will play and you'll spot one of those glowing blue Illithid restoration stations nearby. Interact with it to get back the spell slots Shadowheart used to buff the party. Up ahead you'll see an entryway into a large courtyard, this is where a lot of fighting happens. Coincidentally we can just stroll on by with one character, which is why some Invisibility Potions were a necessity to bring.

Split Karlach off of the group and make her invisible. Starting running east, past all the enemies. You'll eventually reach a large door you can go through. The path will bend north and as you go up some stairs you'll be thrown into Turn-Based mode as an artillery ship starts to bombard the area. End your turn near the door, do not try interacting with it until your next turn. Picklock the door and doing so will remove your invisibility, putting you into combat with this group of enemies. Just use another Invisibility Potion and Dash past them. Avoid ending your turn in any glowing circles on the ground as that's where artillery strikes will land. You may get discovered still, but just focus on reaching the top of this section. Once you get to the door and make it through, you're in the clear. Here is a video showing this strategy:

Karlach will be alone in this room, but that is perfectly fine. Interacting with the "Brain Stem" will take you up to the boss area and conveniently even though the rest of our party is way back at the start, they get brought with us. BEFORE PROGRESSING, PLEASE READ THE FOLLOWING NOTE.

If you chose you blow up Gale, repeat the previous process to get back up to this point. If you chose the time efficient option, carry on. Once you're in the final arena at the top of the tower, take Karlach and use her Step of the Wind: Disengage ability. Jump as from where you're standing to land near the dragon. This will spawn several tentacles from the ground. This will happen all over the brain matter floor and walking past them causes them to attempt to grapple you. Fortunately since we used Karlach's disengage ability, we don't need to worry about that with her while we do this strategy. Go into your inventory and highlight all the bombs and consumables that you want to drop on the floor to blow up. Holding until it highlights an item and then using will allow you to select everything that you want. Then over a selected item, hit and choose the "Place in the World" option to allow you to drop all these items at once. Have Karlach jump away to the nearby ledge path and hold to pull up the "Call Forth Allies" menu. We want to use "Rolan's Firestorm" and highlight the bombs, dragon, and if possible The Emperor as well. Don't worry, this is an artillery strike and Rolan won't appear here at all. Depending on the explosive payload you very well could one-shot the dragon, netting you the achievement for killing it. Here is a video showing the strategy:

• Interfectorem Draconis

  Killed the Red Dragon in the Upper City.

  

  1 guide

This should also take care of The Emperor and a majority of the Dream Guardians. At this point have Gale use Twinned Haste on himself and Tav. If you have additional Scrolls of Haste, have Shadowheart and Karlach use them on themselves. The reason why we didn't do this before is because that "bomb the dragon" strategy could damage your party depending on placement, potentially immediately breaking your concentration. Time to assess what you have left in this arena. If the dragon or Emperor survived, you can call in your heavy hitting summons to deal with them. That being the Dame Aylin, Battle-Ready Owlbear, Mizora, and Zlorb (aka Strange Ox") summons. Zlorb can transform into multiple creatures. My personal favorite is the Minotaur form.

You should notice two side platforms that lead up to the Elder Brain's crown, our goal is to get up there. You'll see that there are two sets of Mind Flayers, one on the left and one on the right. Get a character within ranged and you can use the "Kith'raki Inferno" summon to lay down a line of fire across one of these sets of two. For the other set I recommend calling in the smaller NPCs as they can navigate the ledge platform better. Between the "Florrick's Cohorts" and "Ironhand Grenadiers" you should be able to deal with them with a quick attack or two from your other characters. They may run off and do something super random though, their AI isn't the best.

Fight your way up to the top and have Tav use a new ability on the crown - Karsus' Compulsion. This will be a channeled ability and you need to protect Tav from any interruptions until their next turn. Depending on how long this process takes you, and Illithid ship may appear to bombard the area and bring in reinforcements. Once the channeling is over a portal will open and Tav will be brought into an astral plane to fight the elder brain.

I recommend not attacking the brain until the very start of the turn order. The Honor Mode mechanic for this enemy is that it becomes immune to all damage types that hurt it in the previous turn. This is why we stocked up on various elemental scrolls.

Whoever attacks the brain first each turn will get stunned as a reaction, so be mindful of who attacks first. Letting Orpheus be the sacrificial lamb would be ideal if your turn order allows it. The brain will also spawn these floating white clusters that will destroy nearby platforms on their next turn. You can tell which platforms are being targeted as they'll have a slight red highlight/glow to them. All said and done the brain really doesn't pose much of a threat at this point as long as you're mindful where you're standing.

Once you make the Bhaal choice and the credits roll, you should have these six achievements whether you did the safety or time efficient route:

• Leave No One Behind

  Saved every tiefling refugee you can throughout the game.

  

  1 guide

• Ceremorphosis

  Made the ultimate sacrifice: became a mindflayer to defeat the Netherbrain.

  

  1 guide

• Sins of the Father

  Claimed your Throne of Blood: take control of the Netherbrain for Bhaal and break the world.

  

  1 guide

• All's Well That Ends Well

  Finished the game (with a heartfelt "thank you!" from Larian Studios).

  

  

• Critical Hit

  Complete the game in Tactician mode.

  

  

• Foehammer

  Completed the game in Honour mode.

  

  2 guides

Reload your Cloud save

With the Honor mode achievement safely yours, you can reload your cloud save and just let Orin completely kill your party. This will put up the Honor mode failure prompt.

MAKE SURE TO CHOSE THE OPTION TO KEEPING PLAYING YOUR PLAYTHROUGH.

Now you can freely save! Go through the Orin fight same as before, but once the fight is over make sure to reject Bhaal. You can do that with the following choices:

• I refuse. I will be free of you.
• I don't need any of this. The only family I know are those who fight by my side.

With this you also shouldn't get ambushed by Jaheira and the Harpers if they were present for your playthrough. At this point you can just follow the entire route you did prior up until the final ending choice:

• Long Rest
• Fight through the Intellect Devourers
• Sneak past the Illithid army
• Blow up the red dragon
• Break into the astral plane

Once you're fighting the the Elder Brain itself, get ready to make a manual save. When given the two choices, pick this one first:

• Dominate the brain. Become the Absolute. Conquer the world.

The credits should immediately rolling, granting this achievement.

• Absolute Power Corrupts

  Reigned with terror: took control of the Netherbrain and bent the world to your will.

  

  2 guides

Reload your manual save and pick the other option:

• Command the brain to destroy the tadpoles and then itself.

After this a bunch of cutscenes will play to show various narrative resolutions. None of these choices from here on impact achievements, so the choice is all yours. Once the credits roll you should get your final achievement:

• Hero of the Forgotten Realms

  Saved the realms: destroyed the Absolute once and for all.

  

  1 guide

If you successfully pulled this off then my hat's off to you. A very impressive feat of both task management and general game skill. A lot of time has gone into this walkthrough, so I hope it served you well!

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