The Mind Flayers, The Twisted Rune and everything inbetween

[HarbsNarbs]

Hi everyone, as I'm sure you're all aware there are many aspects to Baldur's Gate 2 that were left unfinished and although "Unfinished Business" completed a lot of this stuff, many aspects are still unsatisfying.

In three videos (sorry for the mic quality in the first, I bought a new one after the first video) I look at possible links between the Mind Flayers and the larger story line of Baldur's Gate 2. I look at the Mind Flayers (Hidden Conspiracy) link to the Guarded Compound in the Temple District, which in turn is linked to the slavers, Nalia's questline, the Jysstev family and the Twisted Rune. Looking at certain voice over lines and resource codes in the EE keeper, we can see that many of these aspects are linked in the game files as well as the story.

In the game screenshot, you can see that Maferan in the Guarded Compound has a Mind Flayer as a sprite in his inventory screen when we take control of him using the console (he's also the only one without some kind of dialogue). The resource codes for everyone in the guarded compound, the twisted rune and the non-mind flayer NPCs within the Mind Flayer Sewer base all begin with HL.

Anyway, if you don't have time to watch the videos then maybe these images will be enough to peak some people's curiosity.

Part 1 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-KcWb8HgjMU

 

Part 2 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TzM3l6JyqhI

 

Part 3 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFbw6CtewsY

I know that there are mods like Twisting with the Rune, but I feel like there may have been a lot more that the writers intended. Anyway, I thought I'd leave this here for a spot of inspiration.

[Bartimaeus]

My impression of the slavers network, Tazok, mind flayers, et al. was that there was an alien invasion going on. I once wrote about it in an unsolved gaming mysteries thread elsewhere:

In Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn, there is a shadowy cabal of villains collectively known as the Twisted Rune. You see them at the very end of the game after you defeat Irenicus, discussing and arguing amongst themselves as to what to do with Gorion's Ward (your character). You can actually meet and fight them during the game if you just happen to have one of the rare "rogue stone"-teleporting gems when trying to go through a random dead-end door in the game's main city. However, it seems like they were meant to have a proper questline involving a host of connections with all of the different slaver groups you meet throughout the game, as well as the literally alien mindflayers that were seemingly staging a slow and secret alien invasion/takeover of the government in the game (X-Files style). Unfortunately, the developers were pressed for time and a lot of content ended up being cut. Whatever the writers of the game had planned for this never quite came together as they probably imagined it, and so while there are a lot of different hints that all of these things are connected, the final encounter just ends up being yet another fight without any clear lore implications.

(e): I should also mention, that there hints of this even in the original Baldur's Gate. Deep in Durlag's Tower, you learn that the mindflayers are responsible for directing the doppelgangers to infiltrate Durlag's home and slay the heroic warrior-king and his family. Tazok is one of Sarevok's top lieutenants in Baldur's Gate 1, and he makes a return in Baldur's Gate 2, nominally in the service of the anti-Harper dragon Firkraag (coincidentally(?), Harpers themselves are, among other things, strong anti-slaver agents), and yet he mentions Firkraag not being his true master and he mysteriously holds the only key to the secret mindflayer lair underneath the city of Amn. The mindflayers employed doppelgangers in Durlag's Tower - Sarevok, your brother, employs doppelgangers to infiltrate and seize Baldur's Gate (and your home Candlekeep) as well, and Tazok would seem to be the bridge between the two and the mindflayers as a whole. Note that this wouldn't be the last time the mindflayers would use this sort of tactic in directing weaker monsters like doppelgangers for their dark purposes - the troll lord Tor'Gal also mentions being employed by the mindflayers for the purpose of murdering Lord de'Arnise, one of the major lords of Amn who is notoriously anti-slaver (and it's probably no coincidence that the rival family to the de'Arnises is the Roenall family, who have a bunch of slavers in their employ and whose heir, Isaea, is a slaver himself). It really is a shame that none of this ever really came together as was apparently planned.

A while back, I Googled to see if anybody else had noticed some of these things, and there is some more you can read about in this thread if you're interested, including additional oddities like Irenicus holding onto the blade of the Silver Sword of the Gith (the most holy of weapons to the Gith, essentially the original slave race of the mindflayers who finally broke free and now hunt down and slay mindflayers wherever they go, who you can actually see attempting to find the mindflayers in the city of Amn in Baldur's Gate 2 at a certain point...and who will also hunt you down for owning the blade when a certain Irenicus/Bodhi lackey "graciously" hands it off to you).

[HarbsNarbs]

On 6/12/2020 at 4:30 PM, Bartimaeus said:

My impression of the slavers network, Tazok, mind flayers, et al. was that there was an alien invasion going on. I once wrote about it in an unsolved gaming mysteries thread elsewhere:

 However, it seems like they were meant to have a proper questline involving a host of connections with all of the different slaver groups you meet throughout the game, as well as the literally alien mindflayers that were seemingly staging a slow and secret alien invasion/takeover of the government in the game (X-Files style).

(e): I should also mention, that there hints of this even in the original Baldur's Gate. Deep in Durlag's Tower, you learn that the mindflayers are responsible for directing the doppelgangers to infiltrate Durlag's home and slay the heroic warrior-king and his family.

A while back, I Googled to see if anybody else had noticed some of these things, and there is some more you can read about in this thread if you're interested, including additional oddities like Irenicus holding onto the blade of the Silver Sword of the Gith (the most holy of weapons to the Gith, essentially the original slave race of the mindflayers who finally broke free and now hunt down and slay mindflayers wherever they go, who you can actually see attempting to find the mindflayers in the city of Amn in Baldur's Gate 2 at a certain point...and who will also hunt you down for owning the blade when a certain Irenicus/Bodhi lackey "graciously" hands it off to you).

Very intriguing theories! Do you mean an alien invasion in a sort of spelljammer context, where the mind flayers arrive on Nautiloids? Yes, I know of the theory around dopplegangers and mind flayers in Durlag's Tower, in fact I was going to put in a conversation that you can have with Finrus in Ulgoth's Beard regarding the dopplegangers, however, I cut it out as I thought it was too much information in what is already quite a convoluted video.

Coincidentally, I've actually been on that thread before, but thanks for sharing

 

Edit: Sorry, after re-reading your comment, I think you simply meant an invasion in the style of an X-Files episode. Where because these mind flayers are originally from a distant part of realm space, they are in fact aliens involved in a takeover?

Edited June 14, 2020 by HarbsNarbs

[Bartimaeus]

Yeah, in 2nd Edition, they're from some cosmic horror plane that's outside the normal cosmology called the Far Realm (...and should really qualify as being extraplanar but for some reason don't - I'm not sure at what point creatures stop qualifying as extraplanar after so much time on a plane, maybe they have to simply be born there?). So not native to Abeir-Toril, but have established multiple seemingly permanent bases on it. They're involved with various slaver groups and the Twisted Rune (who make it clear that they want you dead at the end of Shadows of Amn - Shadows of Amn, the title of the game, likely refers to all these groups like the illithid, the githyanki, the Twisted Rune, the Cowled Wizards, and Irenicus' faction, not just Irenicus himself), they have multiple instances of directing others to attack troublesome foes (Durlag and de'Arnise at the very least, but also possibly you through Firkraag and his lieutenant Tazok, and then you also remember that Gorion, a harper, had been a foe of Firkraag, was known to and killed by Sarevok, who was also connected with both doppelgangers and Tazok again), they're involved with government officials (see the Jysstevs, with Lady Jysstev being absolutely aware of them while her husband, Qar, is one of the Council of Six - the illithid compound in the sewers also has a note that makes it directly clear that "the Hidden" was starting to dominate them with possibly the entire Council of Six in mind).

There's also some other weird oddities like the planar slavers having captured a group of githyankis, the Hidden making you slay other investigating Githyankis, Irenicus holding a piece of the Silver Sword, Irenicus opposing the Cowled Wizards (obviously) while their apparent most powerful member is Zallanora Argentresses, aka Shoon VII, who attacks you if you resist Cowled Wizard arrest too many times (this gal-guy should really arguably be close to on the level of Kangaxx, as he's an ancient, thousand-year old demi-lich emperor that infiltrated Amn and seized control of the Cowled Wizards and is vying with the Twisted Rune for power, unfortunately severely underpowered in SoA). Probably other weird stuff I can't remember right now.

Edited June 14, 2020 by Bartimaeus

[lynx]

Quote

BTW: regarding this plot, originally, the plot was going to take you to the Library of Athkatla, where Jan would stumble upon a book that opened a portal into the realm of the Hidden. The Hidden's realm was going to be full of intellectual puzzles and riddles and one would have to prove one's intellect in order to gain audience with the Hidden.

As far as the Hidden goes, he has ties with the illithids and with an Illumnati-style organization that recruits in secret throughout Amn. The Hidden himself is being tracked by githyanki bounty hunters, although I never clarified exactly why this was for the player.

Didn't remember The Hidden, so after some googling came upon this quote from the original writer.

[Cahir]

There is a mod (exclusively for EET at the moment) called The Cowled Menace" which expands The Twisted Rune (and Qysar Shoon VII) plot. Didn't play it yet, but it looks very promising. 

[HarbsNarbs]

Guys, I  have recently discovered that the image of Maferan doesn't add anything to this theory as all minotaurs in the game have the Mind Flayer sprite! However, I believe the other theories still hold up

[Guest Cabhaal]

The thread was completed when TOB was released. He claimed to be a developer. Many so called bugs were fixed that disabled threads. Some content has been removed, NPC dialogue, alternative entry into Baldurs Gate, and many other tweaks have damaged the story for meta gaming purposes. The main thing with Durlags was solving the mystery. The skelly in the first chamber would ask if you're interested in doing that without being destructive. So you respect the locks by not breaking or picking them. You don't steal from Durlag. Obey the rules, be smart, listen and think, solve the mystery of betrayal and Durlag will unlock the chests and gives you the stuff in his room. Turning it down when it's offered you got the entire keep. At this point you are warned of bad things to come. You later find out Sarevok was a convenient distraction for an invasion of mindflayers. Factions of vampires, wolfweres, and devil's fighting throughout the area. Your actions and decisions culminating in allies and foes. You get called to Candle keep again for it's defense. This is linked to you being asked before not to disturb the catacombs by Tethoril. You had to listen to what was said. Everyone assuming they never came back. It was an unlockable event not guaranteed. That's why the Chapter8 bug is seen. That told me it was there but I didn't make the key decisions. You also had helper NPCs that would trigger to guide you. Some are still there in chapter 7. The lady telling you to go back to the iron throne because of some evil. The statue on the top floor is also throughout Durlags. She is talking about a devil . The dialogue reveals that he's been watching you the whole time. BTW why does the iron throne assassin's dialogue accuse you even if you don't have or go to the Nashkel mine quest. That didn't happen in 1998.

[Endarire]

I assumed Shadows of Amn meant the Shadow Thieves in Amn.