The community of Baldur’s Gate 3 is hard at work improving the game with more and more useful, funny, or simply aesthetic mods. Recently, however, there is a mod that the community is warning against. We have the background information for you.
The modding scene for Baldur’s Gate 3 is extremely diverse: there is a graphic mod that simply gives Gale a man-bun. But like Skyrim, new weapons and armors can also be downloaded for the game. Currently, there is the Buster Sword from Cloud in Final Fantasy 7. Mods for new animal transformations are also popular. Of course, there are also additional and modified spells.
All these mods can be found on Nexusmods.com, one of the largest sites for game modifications.
Spoiler warning: The following contains light spoilers for the story of two characters from Act of Baldur’s Gate 3.
Which mod is the community warning about? The specific mod that the community warns about on reddit gives a female character a male gender. Lady Aylin, whom you meet in Act 2 of Baldur’s Gate 3, is thus a man.
Lady Aylin is the daughter of the goddess Selûne and is in a same-sex relationship. She is an immortal paladin who fearlessly opposes her mother’s enemies.
These are things that the mod adjusts, among other things: an AI-enhanced voice, new portraits, adjusted animations, and revised voice lines of other characters.
Additionally, Aylin is said to be now friendlier
: Lady Aylin is a very resolute personality who is also capable of biting at you in your own camp. With this mod, she no longer does that.
What is the core problem of the mod? It is part of a mod package that obviously contains misanthropic content and specifically targets minorities. However, to not appear misanthropic, the whole thing is explained under the pretext that one wants to create a “real medieval” status quo with the mod. The fantasy setting, in which there are fire-breathing dragons and talking mushrooms, immediately excludes this.
The whole thing is insidious because one does not necessarily think about it when using the seemingly harmless mod to change the gender of Lady Aylin.
We as a editorial team are against any form of discrimination and want to join the community’s warning on reddit.
Here are a few more changes that the modpack brings:
- The pack turns Nocturne, a friend of Shadowheart, into a man, as she is depicted as a boy in Shadowheart’s childhood memories.
- In Act 3, you meet Sebastian, who has a long history with Astarion. The mod pack turns him into a woman.
- The creator of the mods goes so far as to give a little girl with a deep voice via AI a higher pitch.
The goal of the mods, according to the developers, is that the gender and sexuality of the NPCs of the world correspond to the medieval status quo
. The mod erases almost all LGBTQIA+ characters or their mentions.
However, there are a few exceptions:
- The devil Raphael remains untouched, as his preferences are
really funny
. - The tiefling bard Alfira and her love Lakrissa remain untouched by the mods – they would
not announce their love
. - The members of the circus of the last days remain unchanged, as they are circus members.
How did the community react to the warning? The original reddit post comes from user SignificanceNo2411. In it, he explains the background of the mod and the associated mod pack. Among other things, it is pointed out that the same modder has also published repairs
for Wyll and his father: the mentioned mods turn the dark-skinned Ravengards white.
The comments take the situation seriously but also with a pinch of humor:
- petrovmendicant via reddit:
Octopus people from outer space? Alright. Talking mushroom people? Great. Dragon people? Wonderful. Giant skeleton death god? Nice. A genie that sends you to a dinosaur nest? Normal. Walking and talking robots? Cool. Miniature giant hamsters in space? Okay. Anyone who is not strictly white, heterosexual, and binary? Woke indoctrination.
- Flimsy_Tooth via reddit:
Ah yes, good. I hope they remove all the octopuses, flying ships, demons, elves, goblins, magic, and other things that also do not fit the medieval status quo. I would hate it if my fantasy game had historical inaccuracies.
If you are not eager for a medievally accurate
version of Baldur’s Gate 3, you might enjoy a very special companion romance. However, it is not so easy to unlock:
The most difficult romance in Baldur’s Gate 3 has an unexpected twist when you play a certain character
