A list of the central villains in Baldur's Gate and Baldur's Gate II.

Warning: MASSIVE spoilers for the entire series ahead.

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Sarevok

Sarevok Anchev

I will be the last. And you will go first.

"If you have the arrogance of a god and can kill like a god, who's to say you are not a god?"

— Winski Perorate

Voiced by: Kevin Michael Richardson

Sarevok was one of the most powerful of Bhaal's children, and is the main antagonist for the first game. In Baldur's Gate, Sarevok is responsible for a plan to usurp the Dukes of Baldur's Gate by engineering instability in the region through the Iron Throne. In the end, the player character manages to slay him and his soul is sent to Hell, where your mutual father, Bhaal, resided.

11th-Hour Ranger: If you recruit him in Throne of Bhaal, he's the last recruitable companion to become available just in time for epic-level and the final leg of your quest.
Abusive Parents: Sarevok was fond of his foster mother, whom his foster father had strangled to death with a garrote (in front of him) as a punishment for her infidelity.
- In Sarevok's journal, he reveals Rieltar threatened him with this same fate should he ever be "unfaithful" to him like his mother was. When the time came to dispose of Rieltar, Sarevok arranged for his murderers to use a garrote.
Alignment-Based Endings: If he's evil, he all but orders you to seize your birthright and become an evil god, and is delighted with you should you accept it. If he becomes good, however, he suggests you do the exact opposite, reasoning that you've demonstrated to him Bhaal's taint is not an essential part of yourself and that your father's legacy is an evil best left forgotten.
All Girls Want Bad Boys: Cythandria plays it straight, as does Viconia in Throne of Bhaal, but Tamoko is a bit of a subversion; specifically, although she does love him, she thinks Sarevok is basically a good man who Used to Be a Sweet Kid until the taint of his father corrupted him, and doesn't realize that he really is evil.
Ambition Is Evil: It doesn't get much more ambitious or evil than setting out to become the god of murder.
The Atoner: He decides to try for this if he becomes Chaotic Good.
Back from the Dead: He swore he'd scratch and crawl his way back into the world of the living, and with your help and a piece of either your soul or Imoen's, he's done it!
Badass Boast: Dishes out plenty of them, though what he rounds off the final battle banter with stands out:
Sarevok: Face ME! FACE THE NEW LORD OF MURDER!
Badass Family: In Throne of Bhaal he can become this with his half-siblings CHARNAME and Imoen. One of his battle quotes is even "We children of Bhaal cannot be stopped!"
Badass Normal: After losing his Bhaalspawn powers.
Bad Boss: Callously used and abandoned the Iron Throne to its fate, sent Tamoko to die at the player's hands, and has no compunction about double-crossing and killing off any of his followers (unwitting or otherwise) if it furthers his goals. Just ask Winski about Sarevok's anger issues.
- On the other hand, one of his servants in the first game mentions that Sarevok is actually a rather decent boss to work under... provided one is safely below him in the chain of command and doesn't hold a position he desires.
Bald of Evil: He shaves his head and his in-universe alignment is Chaotic Evil.
Bastardly Speech: Twice during the first game:
- In Candlekeep, he approaches you on the guise of Koveras and offers you a ring of protection that you can use while confronting (and probably killing) the higher-ups of the Iron Throne. If you do as he says, you play right into his hands and get framed as a murderer. If you don't do as he says, he quickly gives up on convincing you and manages to frame you anyway.
- Sarevok's planning comes to fruition by the time you make it to Baldur's Gate, as he becomes anointed the Grand Duke of the city and has filled several key positions of the ruling class with his own puppets. During his coronation, he brings an army of dopplegangers disguised as noblemen to rig public opinion in his favor as he wastes no time in declaring war on Amn and taking command of the Flaming Fists. However, due to facing pushback from outgoing Grand Duke Belt and Duchess Liia Janneth, as well as the player character walking in with damning evidence of his culpability in the crimes he was trying to pin on Amn, he eventually drops all pretenses and just tries to kill everyone instead.
Bastard Understudy: To both his foster father and Winski. He betrayed and killed the former (either arranging it himself, or using CHARNAME to do the deed), though only turned on the latter in a fit of rage after Winski saved his life and teleported him out of a (granted, rather unfavorable) battle against CHARNAME, the dukes, and the Flaming Fist, instead of helping Sarevok to kill them all.
Batman Gambit: Manipulates Amn and Baldur's Gate to the brink of war with an iron shortage and pins his foster-father (who was just as responsible for the iron shortage, albeit for different reasons) as the reason. CHARNAME and company either kill said foster-father or take the fall for it, and Sarevok begins to manipulate the resulting paranoia in order to seize absolute control of Baldur's Gate.
Beard of Evil: A neat goatee, as seen in his Throne of Bhaal portrait.
BFS: Sarevok's Sword of Chaos, a +2 greatsword which drains 5 health to the wielder with every hit. You can find it in Irenicus's lab in II. If you hold onto it and give it back to Sarevok in Throne of Bhaal, it becomes a +4 greatsword.
Big Bad: Mastermind behind the Iron Crisis and eventual leader of the Iron Throne in the first game, as part of his bid to stoke a war across Faerun that will fuel his rise to godhood.
Black Knight: In dark red armor the color of blood, with Spikes of Villainy to match.
Blood Knight: When not feigning politeness in public, he's as bloodthirsty as his ambition to become the next god of murder would imply.
Brought Down to Normal: While he comes Back from the Dead in Throne of Bhaal he has still lost his Bhaalspawn nature and all associated supernatural qualities. Of course in his case "normal" means "very high level fighter."
Call-Back: At the start of the game, you can hear a group of sages outside Candlekeep's library chanting prophecies of Aluando. When you meet Sarevok inside said library six chapters later, he reciting them to himself.
Cain and Abel: As two Bhaalspawn, Sarevok says it is inevitable that you must kill each other, as There Can Be Only One. Sarevok is the Cain to a good or neutral Charname's Abel, but he tries to kill you and you'll end up foiling his plot even if you're evil.
The Caligula: Of the careless and capricious variety - his complete disinterest in maintaining the Iron Throne led it into infighting and bankruptcy by the time he's poised to ascend, at which point it had no further use to him.
The Cameo: Sarevok makes a return in Baldur's Gate III, after their Charname's actions brought Sarevok Back from the Dead and, despite his attempt at a Heel–Face Turn, ended up returning to Bhaal's service once more, but he now simply sits on the side from all the conflict as his granddaughter Orin takes lead as Bhaal's chosen and simply observes any who would wish to join Bhaal's service as he awaits the inevitable slaughter on the horizon.
Chaotic Evil: His In-Universe alignment, the same as your mutual sire, Bhaal, the god of murder. Unlike most depictions of Chaotic Evil characters, Sarevok is not insane or Stupid Evil. He is very intelligent, ambitious, and (mostly) lacking in empathy. Really, the only thing that separates him from Neutral Evil is the fact that he seems to prefer the idea of chaotic destruction and dislikes authority besides that of CHARNAME, who earned his respect.
- Chaotic Good: ~~In-Universe~~ In ToB, you can convince him that good is better than evil if you live the example yourself.
The Charmer: He had this reputation among the citizens of Baldur's Gate, some of whom looked to him as a savior.
The Chessmaster: He looks like a brute, but you have to remember that this is a man who very nearly ascended to godhood through a plot that began with industrial sabotage.
Chick Magnet: Somewhat, between Tamoko, Cythandria, and the abundance of Sarevok romance mods. Viconia also finds him highly attractive in ToB.
Chronic Backstabbing Disorder:
- He has a bad tendency to betray his allies. Even though he himself probably wouldn't think of those as betrayals, rather getting rid of the incompetent and weak, or flat-out revenge on those who wronged him.
- If you have Ascension installed, in the end of ToB he betrays you as well to Amelyssan if you fail to suitably impress him (whether that be by convincing him Good Feels Good or out-evilling her).
The Comically Serious: In ToB. Several of your teammates will grill him (Jan in particular enjoys getting a rise out of him), and Viconia will even proposition him for sex, which somewhat bewilders him.
Consummate Liar: As a duke of Baldur's Gate (and also as Koveras the scribe). He's very good at it and managed to largely convince the entire realm (minus CHARNAME and co) of his noble intentions.
Critical Hit: Anyone can crit, but Sarevok gets special mention due to his Deathbringer Assault, a critical hit that does 200 damage in a single blow. For a picture of how much damage this is, the dragons in the game have around 150-250 HP each. One of his other critical effects can stun an opponent for a round or two.
Cultured Badass: He read quite a lot when he wasn't busy brutally killing other people. He can quote Alaundo's prophecies with his eyes closed.
Dark and Troubled Past: Though you wouldn't know it.
Deadpan Snarker: He has his moments in ToB. While usually The Comically Serious, if you allowed Imoen to bring him back from the dead instead of doing it yourself, then she'll ask him what it feels like to have a bit of her soul inside him. Apparently, "aside from the resurgence of a few pimples" and a new "obsession with his weight," it feels just grand.
Defeat Means Friendship: Justified and a twisted version. Since he lost his essence, he's trying to be CHARNAME's right-hand man if/when CHARNAME ascends to godhood.
Determinator: As a deceased Bhaalspawn without his essence he shouldn't be capable of doing anything, but he still forces himself into a ghostly existence to bargain for his resurrection through sheer willpower.
Sarevok:: I Live! Flesh and blood and bone, I am alive! (Evil Laugh) I swore I would scratch and crawl my way back into the world of the living, and I HAVE DONE IT!
The Dragon: What he pretends to be, to his adoptive father Rieltar. After his second defeat at your hands at the beginning of TOB, he expresses his desires to become this to you, if you'll have him — with his Bhaalspawn taint gone, he can no longer ascend, so walking in your shadow is the best he can hope for. Depending on how you treat and interact with him, he can pretty much fulfil the role loyally; alternatively, he can turn over a new leaf and redeem himself, becoming the brother you never had.
Dragon with an Agenda: What he really is. Rieltar Anchev thinks his adoptive son is content as The Dragon right up until Sarevok tosses him to the wolves and takes over the Iron Throne for himself.
Escaped from Hell: It really says something that despite you having to shell out your soul to make it happen, he is the one holding all the cards.
Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas: Sarevok loved his foster mother, and this is part of the reason he has his adoptive father Rieltar killed, as evident by his choice of murder weapon — garroted, the same way Rieltar killed his wife.
Even Evil Has Loved Ones: He genuinely loved Tamoko and his foster mother, and seems to grow attached to CHARNAME and Imoen should you redeem him.
Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: If you try to redeem him in ToB, he'll start off completely confused by the trust you have in him. This goes double if you don't demand an oath from him. He comes around eventually if you're consistent in this behaviour.
Evil Laugh: Is very fond of these in Throne of Bhaal.
Evil Plan: He plots to provoke a bloody war between Baldur's Gate and Amn, which — after extensive research into the deceased Lord of Murder's portfolio and the prophecies surrounding his death — he believes will cause enough carnage to trigger his ascension to godhood. He puts this into effect by bankrolling bandits to raid local merchant caravans, poisoning the regional iron supply while privately mining ore from a secret mine in Cloakwood; then offing his co-conspirators, assassinating key politicians and replacing them with doppelgangers and his own lackeys, swooping in with the much-needed resources he's accrued to foster a heroic reputation and position himself as a grand duke of Baldur's Gate, and at last have the full authority and public backing necessary to begin his war. He gets right up to that last part before CHARNAME derails things.
- In Throne Of Bhaal, Jan Jansen actually mocks and criticises the more mundane aspects of his scheme and suggests it lacked the flair and audaciousness a real Evil Overlord's grand plan demands; a thoroughly annoyed Sarevok takes this honest feedback with very little grace.
Evil Sounds Deep: A deep, booming growl. When you're voiced by Kevin Michael Richardson, this is inevitable.
Exact Words: Sarevok can explain Bhaal's plan after meeting him in the Pocket Plane: How the essence from Bhaal is designed to return to his god after the Bhaalspawn is killed. Later rituals were supposed to revive him, however, Amelyssan is putting a stop to that by usurping the power. Since CHARNAME kills him, he loses his essence and not only loses the power that came with it, but his revived from is no longer technically a Bhaalspawn. So his presence cannot affect the ending.
Faux Affably Evil: In ToB if you don't redeem him.
Flunky Boss: In the final battle of the first game, he's got a party of high-level companions just like you do, some of whom were encountered as boss-level enemies in their own right earlier in the game. However, Sarevok is the most dangerous of them all by far.
Frame-Up: In the guise of Koveras during your return to Candlekeep, Sarevok tries to convince you that he was a friend of your father's, and urges you to kill the Iron Throne's leaders (whom Sarevok no longer has any use for). He gives you a "ring of protection" to help you do it, and even though it works fine as expected, it serves yet another purpose - it's actually a shadow thief signet ring, which Sarevok uses to incriminate you in their murders if you choose not to commit them, in which case Sarevok arranges them himself.
Genius Bruiser: This guy, who is still the strongest party member barring maybe CHARNAME in Throne of Bhaal even after his Redemption Demotion downpowering, orchestrated a plan that almost pit two countries against each other in a massive war. Statistically Speaking: Strength: 18/00, Constitution: 18, Intelligence: 17. In fact, if he had been trained as a mage instead of as a Deathbringer when he was a child, he'd still be just as dangerous.
Good Feels Good: Decides this if he becomes Chaotic Good.
Good Is Not Nice: In Throne of Bhaal even if he is turned good he is still a rather abrasive person with a taste for violence, he's just channelling it far more healthily.
Good Parents: Sarevok seems to remember his foster mother fondly, implying she was a better parent than Rieltar.
Glowing Eyes of Doom: His portrait in ToB.
Godhood Seeker: Sarevok's motivation and plan in BG1. After you kill him, he gets over it, though by setting his sights only very slightly lower.
Green-Eyed Monster:
- His girlfriend Tamoko implies as much in the first game. She tells CHARNAME that Sarevok hates them, which our hero, who at this point has done nothing but defend him or herself from Sarevok, finds perplexing. Her given explanation is that Sarevok is resentful of the boons CHARNAME enjoyed in life — in particular, the positive father figure in Gorion that Sarevok never had in Rieltar.
- CHARNAME can accuse Sarevok of this in ToB as well, given his tendency to stare at you (his face an "emotionless mask"), perhaps pondering What Could Have Been... He openly admits his envy if you ultimately choose to ascend to godhood, though he's still overjoyed at you having succeeded.

Heel–Face Turn: As a companion, you can convince him that, despite being born of Bhaal, he doesn't have to be evil. If you set a good enough example, his alignment can shift to ~~In-Universe~~Chaotic Good.
Hero Killer: He starts the game by killing your foster father Gorion, a wizard and Harper of no small renown.
Hero with an F in Good: If you have been evil all your life, being a hero is going to take some getting used to. Not to mention that bad reputation you built up...
I Did What I Had to Do: His rationale behind killing Gorion in the first game.
Implacable Man: Neither the utter destruction of his life's work nor death itself can stop him.
Jack of All Stats: Sarevok has the highest combined stat score of BG2's companions by a significant margin, being supplanted only by Hexxat in the Enhanced Edition.
Jumped at the Call: When he discovered his heritage, he jumped at the opportunity to fulfill what he thought was his destiny. TOB reveals that he researched the Bhaalspawn Prophecy extensively and his knowledge proves quite useful.
Kick the Dog: After learning of Tamoko's attempts to sabotage his ascension, he sends her to fight (and, implicitly, die) against you alone.
Lack of Empathy: He has a hard time feeling anything resembling pity or empathy, though the exact cause is not expanded upon.
Large Ham: He loves his evil speeches (or battle cries) as much as any spike-wearing evil warlord.
- "Death comes for you. Feel its icy breath!"
- In one humorous banter, his hamminess is actually brought up by Minsc. Minsc criticizes him for being not hammy enough for being an ex-evil warlord.
Lightning Bruiser: When you fight him at the end of the first game, he's a Made of Iron boss-level fighter who also starts the fight with an innate Haste spell effect on him. Unless you Dispel him immediately, he's faster than almost anything else in the game, and can gib anything short of an endgame-level hero in 1 hit. You can mimic the effect with a Haste spell of your own or Boots of Speed in TOB.
Magikarp Power: With Ascension installed, if you keep his Sword of Chaos, which can be found in the first dungeon of Shadows of Amn, he will be able to restore some of its original power and upgrade it to a +4 weapon with several nifty abilities.
Manipulative Bastard: Manipulated his foster father into thinking he was the one in charge, and convinced Baldur's Gate that the Iron Throne's intentions were wholly noble.
Might Makes Right: Subscribes wholeheartedly to this philosophy, and tries to pass it along to you and Imoen as a companion. You must defeat him twice to make him realize that you are more powerful than him, at which point he proposes to join your party as a loyal underling.
Not Quite Dead: You have to kill him twice before he can join your party. Yes, he is that badass.
"Not So Different" Remark: Several characters will say this regarding CHARNAME and Sarevok, albeit mostly if the player chooses the darker dialogue options.
Obviously Evil: Just look at him. One could downplay his blatantly sinister appearance as Gameplay and Story Segregation, as we do see him in regular attire on one occasion in the first game, though it is rather jarring to see him hanging out with the grand dukes of Baldur's Gate in his obviously evil suit of armour.
Omnicidal Maniac: Tamoko accuses him of wanting to "destroy everyone" in one of her discussions with CHARNAME. She's not wrong — he believes that engineering a brutal, protracted war will result in enough deaths that it will allow him to ascend to his father's godly throne all on its own.
Past Experience Nightmare: He had nightmares of his foster mother's death sometime after Rieltar killed her. Possibly these were caused by the manifestations of his Bhaalspawn essence, similarly to CHARNAME's nightmares.
Pay Evil unto Evil: Arranging for his foster father's death by garrote may be a cruel thing to do, but considering Rieltar killed Sarevok's foster mother in the same way over infidelity, among other transgressions, you're inclined to take your murderous brother's side.
Pet the Dog: The official ending for him makes him brutally rout a whole army of orcs, then conquer Waterdeep, then... go back to his true love's homeland to bury her.
- Another one occurs on-screen if you convert him to good. If you give him a portion of Imoen's soul, he experiences Imoen's memories of torture at Irenicus' hands, which causes him apparent pain just talking about; he'll tell Imoen she is stronger than she thinks, encouraging her to put it past her.
Promoted to Playable: Through the power of the Pocket Plane, a bastion of Bhaal's power, Sarevok can can be brought Back from the Dead and recruited as a party member in Throne of Bhaal.
Purposely Overpowered: As a teammate, he's about as powerful as one can get before crossing into sheer broken ridiculousness. Numerically, his stat total is 96, a fair bit higher than any other character. Justified, of course, by how powerful he is in the story.
Redemption Demotion: Downplayed. In BG1, Sarevok has a ton of magic resistance and non-standard powers. After he joins you, he loses it all; the game's justification for this is that he loses his Bhaalspawn essence as well as his special Bhaal-artifact sword and armor, though he acknowledges that without his Bhaalspawn essence both would be essentially worthless anyway. He's still the strongest fighter in the game.
Reformed, but Not Tamed: If he becomes Chaotic Good, he loses his thirst for power; however, he still enjoys a good fight and has no qualms about killing his enemies.
Reminiscing About Your Victims: His shade in Hell from Shadows of Amn boasts about killing Gorion in an attempt to rile you up. It can work if you let the stream of insults get the better of you and attack.
Scary Black Man: Though his race isn't readily apparent until Throne of Bhaal, owing to his being entirely covered in armor and his visor shading his face.
Scary Impractical Armor: In BG1 only. There's a certain point beyond which you simply have too many spikes.
Screw This, I'm Outta Here: If you're slow to trust him when he encounters you as Koveras, he calls you out on it and leaves, claiming he's washing his hands off whatever happens between you and the Iron Throne. It's subverted when he either murders the Iron Throne members himself and frames you for it, or if you did end up killing the Iron Throne members, he simply allows you to take the fall for it, and enacts his gambit to plunge Baldur's Gate into a war with Amn.
Sdrawkcab Alias: He travels incognito without his armor as the scribe Koveras in order to infiltrate Candlekeep. Some easily-missed dialogue by one of his minions indicates it is because Sarevok is a straight-forward character at heart, so he takes short-cuts like this when he has to be deceitful.
Separated at Birth: As it turns out, Sarevok was separated from the protagonist at birth, though they have different mothers.
Shadow Archetype: It's not really gone into in BG1, but in BG2 it's clear that both he and the gods viewed him as what Charname or various other Bhaalspawn might have become under different circumstances.
Sixth Ranger Traitor: He'll betray you in the final battle if Ascension is installed and you fail to impress him with your evilness or get him to Heel–Face Turn.
Soul Fragment: He needs a part of a Bhaalspawn's soul which ends up being yours or Imoen's in order to come back to life.
Spikes of Villainy: His armor is covered in them, so you know that the guy who just murdered your foster father is a bad guy.
The Starscream: You can tell he's the Big Bad from his appearances in the beginning of the story, but he doesn't visibly take the role until killing off his adopted father and taking over his organisation, and besides, you don't know he's that guy from the beginning at first.
Strike Me Down with All of Your Hatred!: He tries this on you when you first meet him in Hell.
There Can Be Only One: And as it eventually turns out, Sarevok is far from the only person with this plan.
Time-Shifted Actor: Kath Soucie plays him as a child.
Tin Tyrant: There's a man inside that suit of spiked plate mail, but until ToB you never see him outside of it.
Treacherous Quest Giver: As Koveras, depending on whether or not you decide to trust him.
True Companions: With you in Throne of Bhaal if he becomes Chaotic Good; he'll want to keep adventuring with his sibling.
Unstoppable Rage: Not in-game, but he is quite quick to anger.
- Technically in-game; it's why he killed Winski.
Upbringing Makes the Hero: Discussed. The games point out that while CHARNAME benefitted from Gorion's fatherly love and Imoen's sisterly friendship, Sarevok had to content himself with Rieltar Anchev and Winski Perorate. In Throne of Bhaal you learn that CHARNAME and Sarevok were Separated at Birth, and that Gorion, who rescued you, could easily have chosen to rescue him instead; there are hints that, had this been the case, Sarevok might well have been the one to overthrow the schemes of his power-hungry sibling and become the Hero of Baldur's Gate.
Villain Opening Scene: The very first scene, no less.
Villain with Good Publicity: In BG1. In ToB, if he makes is Heel–Face Turn, he becomes a Hero With Bad (and admittedly well-earned) Publicity.
Weaksauce Weakness: In BG1, he's immune to all types of energy, effectively making him immune to all direct damage and area-of-effect spells... except for the energy neutral Magic Missile, a level one spell. Now, what spell did Gorion successfully cast several times in a row and managed to hurt Sarevok with at the beginning of the game?
We Can Rule Together: In a humorous take on this, he asks for a place at your side rather than offering you one at his. Having sussed that you are the Bhaalspawn to beat all Bhaalspawn, he asks to join with you after your ascension, promising that you could become a great and terrible power in the realms, and that he would make a worthy right-hand man.
Worthy Opponent: Comes to consider CHARNAME this.
Sarevok: You are indeed family. No other could have lived to oppose me in person. Of course it will not matter in the end. Ultimately I will prevail, and a new era will be born onto the Realms.
Younger Than They Look: He's only in his early-to-mid twenties (around the same age as CHARNAME and Imoen), but his towering and muscular frame, shaved head, beard, scars, and deep voice make him come across as somewhat older and imposing.
You Remind Me of X
Sarevok: You remind me of myself, mage... before I was slaughtered and cast into the Abyss.

Irenicus

Jon Irenicus

You WILL accept the gifts offered to you.

"Ah, the child of Bhaal has awoken. It is time for more... experiments... The pain will only be passing, you should survive the process..."

Voiced by: David Warner

The villain of Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn, Irenicus is a cold and sadistic archmage who captures the player character and their party after the events of Baldur's Gate: Siege of Dragonspear. He performs cruel experiments on the player character and their party to unknown ends, and they only escape after his laboratory is destroyed in an invasion by hooded figures. At the height of the battle, the Cowled Wizards of Amn appear to arrest him for unlawful use of magic — a laughable proposition, but he surprisingly acquiesces when it becomes clear Imoen will be arrested as well. Thus is the player character forced to hunt for him to gain revenge and rescue Imoen.

Irenicus constantly cheats any attempt to learn his motivations: only his diaries and people you encounter that know him let you know what he's thinking. Jon and his sister Bodhi, each stripped of their immortality, reacted differently to their curse: Bodhi exposed herself to vampirism to counteract it (with mixed results), while Jon decided to find him and Bodhi new souls... divine souls.

Reinventing himself as "Jon Irenicus", he turned to the Bhaalspawn for a way to obtain this. His end goal is to become a god and gain ultimate magical power; in the short term, he just wants to overcome his now-human lifespan.

He also appears before the player several times in Siege of Dragonspear (which is before the events of the second game) as a hooded figure, trying to convince you to defy your destiny and embrace your power. After the final battle in Hell, he murders Skie Silvershield and traps her soul inside a dagger and frames you, thus making him directly responsible for your exile from Baldur's Gate.

Actor Allusion: An Evil Genius and Mad Scientist who blends magic and technology and is played by David Warner. They even look similar.
Aerith and Bob: Hello Jon, I'm Charname, have you met my friends Imoen, Minsc, and Jaheira, Dynaheir? Khalid is a real-world Arabic name, but the others are entirely fantastic. Jon turns out to be short for Joneleth, his elven name before he was banished.
Archenemy: Arguably the enemy Charname has the most personal beef with. Sarevok murdered their foster father, but later joins them and can be redeemed; Melissan is the final boss of Throne of Bhaal, but she's in the background for almost all the game; Bhaal drives the plot but is dead. Irenicus, on the other hand, is a persistent presence throughout Shadows of Amn, Siege of Dragonspear, and can even resurface in Throne of Bhaal with the Ascension mod. He kills several of Charname's friends, ruins their reputation in Baldur's Gate, tortures them and their little sister, and rips their soul out. He is so monumental an enemy that Charname's pursuit of him, first to rescue Imoen/take vengeance/get knowledge and later to save themselves, forms the main plot of Shadows of Amn and overshadows the Bhaalspawn conflict for the duration of that game.
Badass Boast: Spoken while annihilating several enemy mages.
Irenicus: I cannot be caged! I cannot be controlled! Understand this as you die, ever pathetic, ever fools!
Bad Boss: Even worse than Sarevok. He treats his followers like expendable tools far beneath him and is unconcerned when they die, casually confident that there's no shortage of cheap cutthroats willing to do the same job. He also forces some of them to undergo a geas, binding them to his will regardless of whether they come to question their loyalty, and missteps (like stepping into his clone mistress's bedroom) can have very bad ramifications for unwitting servants if caught. Bring Yoshimo to Spellhold and you get a taste of this.
- Not to mention his former servants in the first dungeon, several of whom he's used, mentally destroyed, tortured and abandoned as his morbid test subjects.
Bald of Evil: His portraits, in-game model and artwork depict him as hairless, though it looks less like his head has been shaved and more as if his skin has been stretched back from his face and stitched into place.
Big Bad: Kicks off Shadows of Amn by ambushing and abducting the canonical Player Party after they're forced to leave Baldur's Gate, and spends much of the game trying to make use of the Bhaalspawn's divine soul for his own ends. Catching up with him after he kidnaps Imoen and uncovering his true goals forms the background of much of the game.
Body Horror: Aside from all the torturous surgical experimentation he inflicts on his followers, suggested to be a test run for the procedures he later performed on himself, his portraits and close-ups of his character model suggest that the skin on his face has been pinned back underneath his skullcap, perhaps to preserve an illusion of the elven immortality he has lost. His face is also covered in veins and scars.
Card-Carrying Villain: Downplayed. He doesn't brag about being evil, Genre Savvy enough that he consciously refuses to gloat or monologue at the player's prompting, but is aware that many people view him as such and doesn't bother to deny it.
Chekhov's Gunman: Gets name-dropped by a very minor villainess in the first Baldur's Gate.
Chewing the Scenery: When you are voiced by David Warner, it's inevitable.
Irenicus: You dare to attack me here? Do you even KNOW whom you face? You will suffer! You will ALL suffer!
Clipped-Wing Angel: Downplayed, as when he takes the Slayer form for the second boss fight in the Pocket Plane he is still a significant threat (and certainly more impressive in melee) but he loses most of his spells, including his protection magic, instant death spells and the devastating Time Stop. As such, while it does depend somewhat on party balance, the second fight is likely to be noticeably easier.
Cold Ham: A great example of how one can be a Large Ham without raising one's voice.
Contrasting Sequel Antagonist: The soft-spoken, sadistic Mad Scientist to Sarevok's towering, roaring Tin Tyrant. Yet Sarevok is at the head of a deadly conspiracy and goes unseen through much of Baldur's Gate, while Irenicus spends most of Shadows of Amn achieving what he wants through overwhelming force of arcane might.
The Corruptor:
- Irenicus only employs this mindset when it serves a very direct purpose... like making Imoen intimately aware of the true darkness of Bhaal's taint. Aside from Bodhi, most of his allies are either chronic traitors (Saemon), geassed underlings (Yoshimo), allies of convenience, monsters, or demons. He does appear to Charname in your dreams, tempting you to embrace the power of your dark heritage. Subverted as this is not Irenicus but rather the essence of Bhaal within you wearing his face. When you confront him over these appearances at Spellhold, he has no idea what you're talking about.
  Irenicus: It will not end, you know. Not until you acknowledge what you are. You walk as a mortal, taking no advantage from your heritage, from your talents within. So many things of flesh are greater than you. Walk among them, these beasts that are less than you are. See their strength; see how easily you fall to their muscle and skill. Why do you stand for this? Why do you submit to the flesh, when death is bred in your bones? Do you realize the power you might hold? When the world of flesh is beneath you, even creatures mysterious and magical will fall!
- According to his mole Yoshimo, Irenicus forces his underlings to undergo a geas, binding them to his will whether they come to question their loyalty to him or not.
- Unlike your dreams in Shadows of Amn, the nightmarish visions in Siege of Dragonspear are the Hooded Man's work, as he admits in the final confrontation between him and Charname in the Flaming Fist compound — further stating that it will no longer work as the Bhaal essence is becoming too strong, eve as he allows Charname to see the truth of Skie's murder.
Crater Power: Often the aftermath Irenicus leaves behind. For such a meticulous man, he's oddly fond of making a mess.
- The heap of rubble in the middle of Waukeen's Promenade comes close to Person of Mass Destruction levels of destruction, and apparently he wasn't done before he decided the Cowled Wizards could serve his purpose.
- During the events of Siege of Dragonspear he ran into a group of elven spellblades sent to kill him. Charname can see how that went: a large crater in the ground.
Deader than Dead:
- First, you need to kill him. Like any mage worth his salt, that's not the end for him. Then you need to kill him in Hell. Then he dies in yet ANOTHER place in Hell, and dies for real.
- And even then, not necessarily... Following the logic train here, he's not really dead, just in another even lower abyssal plane. The Ascension mod even has him return for the final battle to team up with Melissan.
- Let's just say that in the ending of SoA, the developers had to put in the montage of his being thrown into low abyssal plane and getting tortured by demons to show that Irenicus is really dead this time.
- Even then he's thrown at you during one of the Pocket Plane trials in Throne of Bhaal, and it's never made clear if he's merely an illusion or the real Irenicus, perhaps being used as fodder as part of his punishment.
Defiant to the End: After dying, being sent to the Abyss, getting attacked by an entire horde of demons, and realizing that his magic has been stripped from him... he begins fighting the demons with his bare fists. He actually takes a couple down before their sheer numbers easily overwhelm him.
Dramatic Irony: Jon Irenicus' quest to become a god is something that would never have worked because the Seldarine would never accept him even if he ascended. The avatar of Rillifane says as much. However, he does have a divine spark of a Bhaalspawn in him and if he'd killed the others then he would have ascended to become a god anyway.
Empty Shell: He fears he's become this, writing in his journal that he can't really feel emotion anymore except in violent outburst. He even hired a trio of dryad concubines in an attempt to "instil emotion," but they concluded he was simply barren inside. On the other hand, one of them is certain that he still loves Ellesime.
Enemy Mine: Irenicus' alliance with the Drow is made possible by their mutual hatred of the elves.
Even Evil Has Standards: Zigzagged. He thinks very little of (post-vampirism) Bodhi's primal outlook on life, viewing her thirst for wanton violence as a simplification of her original motives. Even so, he approaches it with the same cold and detached outlook as he does everything else.
- He openly admits he doesn't trust Saemon Havarian as far as he can throw him. This clearly did not get in the way of his decision to employ him, though.
- He's also at least mildly offended when the now-insane Wanev accuses him of perverting Spellhold. Irenicus points out that the Cowled Wizards tortured Spellhold's inmates long before he ever arrived, and claims that unlike them his atrocities actually had a purpose.
Evil Brit: They brought in one of the all-time best sinister-sounding British actors specifically to invoke this.
Evil Gloating: Invoked and averted. Irenicus knows better.
Irenicus: No, you'll warrant no villain's exposition from me.
Evil Mentor: He fancies himself as this in Siege of Dragonspear, showing up at various points throughout the game to share his ideas about what being a Bhaalspawn entails.
Evil Plan: Steal your divine soul to counteract the curse of mortality wrought against him by the elves years before, then forcibly enter the elven pantheon and wreak havoc on Suldanessellar, the home he was exiled from.
Evil Sorcerer: Downplayed. His character sheet even makes him a sorcerer, even though in-game he's always referred to as a 'mage', and he leans more toward mad-science Magitek than mysticism as well.
Eviler than Thou:
- He's happy to demonstrate to the Cowled Wizards what a real evil wizard can do; he even says right to one's face, "You bore me, mageling."
- In Siege of Dragonspear he appears to see himself as this to Hephernaan and Belhifet, claiming not to bow to the demands of "some broken fiend's lickspittle".
Fate Worse than Death: What he suffers when you finally defeat him.
- Also what several of his test subjects suffer, most of whom he's forgotten about. This was also what he cursed Centeol with in the first game, as punishment for slaying his wife Tanova.
Final Boss Preview: He's fought three different times in the course of BG2, including in the final battle; the first is less than halfway through the game.
Foreshadowing: A very minor sidequest villain in the first game, a disgustingly obese woman named Centeol who's living in a cave surrounded by spiders, was cursed to such a fate by Irenicus himself for killing his wife. In the vanilla game, CHARNAME even writes in their diary that this incident seems rather irrelevant to their current quest but might come up again in a sequel; and in the enhanced edition, laughs that only a fool would incur the wrath of a mad mage...
- Early-Installment Weirdness: Irenicus' wife, identified by Centeol as Tanova, is actually a vampire met in the second game who's part of Bodhi's guild. This is consistent with Centeol's story of Irenicus resurrecting his dead wife before coming after her, but seems a bit bizarre considering his own backstory as an exiled elven mage whose lover was the elven queen, unable to feel emotion since losing his soul. Further, his name was misspelled as "Jon Icarus" in the original game, but tweaked in the enhanced edition.
Forgiveness: Ellesime invokes the notion of this against him at the end. It doesn't work. See Ignored Epiphany.
Friendly Enemy: To Imoen, and only Imoen; he addresses her as one might a helpless child and is generally quite patient with her. Averted with the PC, whom Irenicus grows increasingly frustrated with.
Genius Bruiser: Irenicus is the single greatest wizard the elves had ever produced, and is built like a pro wrestler. He also dresses as one, which adds a solid amount of poor drama.
Godhood Seeker: Irenicus' original, and ultimate, goal.
Hero Killer: He's responsible for the deaths of no less than four of Charname's friends and allies: he murders the haughty but forthright Dynaheir and the jittery but goodhearted Khalid offscreen as part of his Establishing Character Moment in the prologue of Shadows of Amn, the Geas he places on Yoshimo directly results in the latter's death, and he kills Skie and frames Charname for it in the closing chapter of Siege of Dragonspear.
Hidden Depths: Irenicus's prior relationship with Queen Ellesime, recalled fondly by his former lover. Though foreshadowed as early as the very first dungeon (in which Jon tries to recreate an unspecified woman, creating several clones of her), it's not until the last leg of the journey that the full picture is revealed, adding a layer of tragedy to an otherwise brutal and ruthless man.
- Irenicus keeping what the dryads refer to as "her room" off limits and in perfect condition also adds another layer to him... a disturbing one. It's safe to say that the elven queen Ellesime never resided in Jon's evil, goblin-staffed lair underneath a human city brimming with corruption, but when you consider the clones of her he was in the process of creating...
High Collar of Doom: His funnel-neck collar adds to his sinster air, as well as the steampunk aesthetic of his lab in Athkatla.
Hopeless Boss Fight: If you confront him in Spellhold without releasing the inmates on him first, he instantly kills your entire party.
I Have Many Names: Jonathan Irenicus. Also known as Joneleth, the Shattered One, the Hooded Man...
I Surrender, Suckers: He pulls a long-form version of this trope; he could easily have killed every Cowled Wizard in the city, but chose to go with them on the condition they take Imoen as well. The moment he decided to escape? He slaughtered the entire staff of Spellhold while mocking them for thinking they could hold him. No tears on our account.
Ignored Epiphany: At the end. Ellesime calls him out for his choices and damning actions, telling him that had he used his mortal years to earn his return back to Suldanessellar, she could have forgiven what he had done and come to love him anew, like the man he once was. For the first and last time in the game, Jon is at a complete loss for words... until he composes him for a Motive Rant and resolves to go ahead with his Evil Plan regardless.
Important Haircut: Extreme example. By the time we meet him, he's both shaved off his hair and removed his elven ears, giving him a decidedly more sinister and non-elven appearance.
Ink-Suit Actor: His in-game portrait's facial structure greatly resemble his voice actor, David Warner.
Ironic Name: See Non-Indicative Name.
Just Between You and Me: Defied. Irenicus may not realize how this sort of plot goes in its entirety (or he would not have left Bodhi with the job of dealing with you), but he flat out ignores any attempt to squeeze his plans out of him. He even refuses to gloat to an inquisitive player. You'll have to go the extra step of reading his diary or asking his underlings, but even those don't give you the complete picture.
Kick the Dog: Zigzagged. His nasty experiments are plain to see and he makes no apologies for anything he does. That said, he always has a purpose in mind no matter what he's doing, from the Cold-Blooded Torture he inflicts on you and Imoen off-camera to stealing your soul to sustain himself. He never does anything just to be evil.
Lack of Empathy: How he got to be like this is actually a major plot point. He is literally incapable of feeling any of his own emotions except for his ambition and hatred for the elves who cast him out of Suldanessellar, since, for all intents and purposes, he has no soul.
Late-Arrival Spoiler: His identity is never revealed in Siege of Dragonspear, but anyone who's played Baldur's Gate 2 will immediately recognize Warner's iconic voice.
Mad Scientist: Played with, with his Steampunk, Magitek lab leading the player to believe that this is the case, but it soon becomes apparent that it's only a means to an end. He's experimented on and tortured no shortage of people, including members of your party.

Motive Rant: Dishes one out to Ellesime at the end.
Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Late in the game, it is revealed that "Irenicus" is an Elvish word that translates to "The Shattered One".
Neutral Evil: His in-universe alignment.
Never My Fault: While the punishment he suffered for trying to enter the elven pantheon the first time was harrowing and severe, Irenicus never once accepts responsibility for why the elves had done it to him in the first place. Instead of using his mortal years to atone, he spent them plotting revenge and a reprise of his old goal.
Non-Indicative Name: Ironically, once you remove the Latinesque ending the name means "peace" in Greek; in Christian theology, an irenicist is someone who advocates using reason and peaceful methods to win arguments (as opposed to a polemicist).
Not Me This Time: Throughout the game, you're subjected to dream sequences wherein a figure — invariably taking on Irenicus' form — urges you to The Dark Side. When you're reunited with him at Spellhold, you can pick his brain about this, but he has no idea what you're talking about. With good reason: it's not him at all, but Bhaal's essence within you.
Not So Stoic: Really loses his composure when you confront him with the released inmates at Spellhold, and again prior to his reunion with Ellesime.
Oh, Crap!: The look on his face in the final cinematic, right when he realizes his magic no longer works, fits this trope to a T.
One-Winged Angel: Transforms into the Slayer in the last battle, thanks to absorbing Charname's Bhaalspawn soul.
Our Elves Are Different: Or rather, our former elves are worse, and they know it.
Our Souls Are Different: Your divine soul and Irenicus' mundane soul are literally different, so a key part of his plan is to steal yours.
Outside-Context Problem: In the context of the Bhaalspawn saga. Irenicus basically comes out of nowhere in the intro of the second game, captures you without any prior warning or explanation, and his plans have absolutely nothing to do with Bhaal at all: he targets you for your divine soul but literally any Bhaalspawn or half-god (which there are a lot of in the Realms) could have done the trick. Once defeated, he is forgotten entirely.
- Somewhat averted in Siege of Dragonspear, where he makes it very clear that he's watching your progress and seeing how you fare against Caelar, another being with divine blood he is investigating to see if her soul is the right fit for him. Only after you defeat her does Irenicus make his move, murdering Skie Silvershield and framing you, thus ensuring that you fall right into his hands as soon as you escape imprisonment.
Pay Evil unto Evil: His slaughter of the Cowled Wizards. Their reprehensibility speaks for itself and is demonstrated frequently, making his rampage the most sympathetic thing he does in the whole game. The fact is, Irenicus is the Big Bad of the game and a Torture Technician, and it's telling that the treatment of the inmates under his rule was better than what they got under the Cowled Wizards.
Pet the Dog: Played with in the first dungeon. What seems like a string of vicious dog-kicking is interrupted by the appearance of Rielev, another tortured experiment who's hinted to be an elf robbed of his immortality like Irenicus; Rielev describes himself as both Jon's faithful hound and an honest friend. He was placed on life support and promised eternal life, and Jon was apparently in the process of trying to save him, but became sidetracked with the PC and Imoen. By the time you meet him, he's fairly convinced that Jon has forgotten about him because, deep down, Irenicus wants no reminders of what he once was, and Rielev no longer wishes to continue living. While some of the other tortured experiments were placed in their tubes for punishments, others state that Jon, before forgetting about them too, originally put them there to save their lives and counteract what had been done to them beforehand. They were, presumably, elves like Irenicus (possibly his followers) who were also severed from their souls by their brethren.
Planet Heck: Irenicus didn't plan to fight you in Hell, but he has no problem with doing so once it happens.
Pragmatic Villainy: Often. He takes no joy in the despicable things he does and is never needlessly cruel. He even claims to regret doing to you what was done to him. He also isn't averse to throwing down his weapons and allowing himself to be taken to prison. Granted, he later escapes, kills all of his jailers, and turns said prison into his new evil lair, but still, it's a means to an end, not spite or destruction for its own sake.
Replacement Goldfish: He cloned a former lover (several of them, in fact) and even kept a well-furbished bedroom aside for its use, though it rebels against him and is killed in the first dungeon. Turns out it was a clone of Ellesime. As his emotions faded, he lost interest in the clones, but kept them in stasis for years, although his...attentions drove them mad.
The Reveal: He is eventually revealed to be a former elven archmage, once the lover of the elven queen, Ellesime. After attempting — and failing — to enter the elven pantheon, he was cast out of elven society for his sacrilege along with his sister, Bodhi. The elves, in a moment of absolute short-sightedness, stripped him of his elven soul and lifespan but not his magical powers, instead of y'know, KILLING him. Seeking a way to restore his lost soul and return home has given way, over the centuries, to a simpler desire for revenge, power, and godhood.
Revenge: Irenicus' other goal. He was lucky that becoming a god and killing a ton of elves were not only not mutually exclusive, but achieving the former was most easily accomplished by doing the latter.
Irenicus: Once my lust for power was everything. And now I hunger only for revenge. AND I! WILL! HAVE IT!
Roaring Rampage of Revenge: See above. He also goes on a literal one in one of the visions Queen Ellesime shows CHARNAME, tearing the fleeing elves apart one by one.
Silence, You Fool!:
Irenicus: Silence, dog! You have no purpose but to die by my hand.
- He delivers a silent one to the high ranking elves caught by Matron Mother Ardulace:
  Matron Mother Ardulace: Their presence sickens me. Kill them.
  Irenicus: Perhaps it would be better to interrogate them first.
  Elf: Joneleth! What are you doing with these monsters! You are one of—
  (Jon promptly obliterates him)
  Matron Mother Ardulace: An odd way to question, Irenicus...
The Sociopath: His curse has literally stripped away his capacity to feel much of anything in the way of emotion, and by the time you arrive in his torture dungeon he's already explored the implications of this and dismissed any importance they once had to him.
Strapped to an Operating Table: He does this to half of your canonical BG1 party. Imoen walks away. Khalid and Dynaheir do not.
That Man Is Dead: What Irenicus says about Joneleth when Ellesime confronts him at the end.
Villainous Valour: He displays some pretty impressive resolve in his last two fights, having to face off against all of his enemies (new and old) alone.
- Like CHARNAME, he also had to undertake the hell trials, minus the party to help.
We Are as Mayflies: Irenicus despises being a human (or the equivalent of a human) partially because of his limited lifespan.
Who Dares?: His reaction upon Charname disrupting his ritual at the end.
Why Won't You Die?: Irenicus has a scathing reply when he finds out that Charname has survived all the obstacles he has set in their way.
Irenicus: You... you live yet?! You have less than a fraction of your soul and yet somehow you continue to oppose me? The power... the power of the Tree is gone from me. You have been successful in your little scheme, insect, but now this ends! I will take great pleasure in eradicating such a nuisance as you. And then I shall... re-establish my link, join with the Tree once again... I shall find a way, I shall have the power—"
Would Hurt a Child: Implied. Dili, the little shape-changing girl in Spellhold, recalls suffering a severe punishment after Irenicus caught her stealing his face. Notably, though, she is the only inmate who isn't teleported to aid in CHARNAME's first battle with Irenicus; which is good, since he kills them all right before abandoning the fight.
Xanatos Speed Chess: He didn't intend for the Cowled Wizards to apprehend him and Imoen and take them to Spellhold, but he plays along (until killing them all) and quickly repurposes its facilities to achieve his own goals.
Zerg Rush: What finally does him in. Hell, the demons even look like zerglings.

The Five

The Five are five particularly powerful Bhaalspawn who join forces in an odd Enemy Mine situation for the dual purposes of taking over the world and becoming more powerful as they kill their siblings... or so they think. Though this is true for Illasera, Yaga-Shura, Sendai, and Abazigal, Balthazar planned to betray them all along for the forces of righteousness, to snuff out the line of Bhaal before it destroyed Faerun. On the whole, little is known of their backgrounds and personal experiences compared to those of the player; all the player is told is that each of them shares a single common goal: the eradication of all the other Bhaalspawn in Faerun.

Ambition Is Evil: Those among the Five looking to ascend are totally evil villains with no redeeming features. The only one who doesn't is still a Knight Templar and has to be stopped.
Big Bad Ensemble: An alliance of five villains, all Bhaalspawn like the PC, out to hunt down all other Bhaalspawn, including Charname, so that their only remaining competition for the titular Throne of Bhaal is each other. You will be the last... but they'll have to go first.
Big Bad Wannabe: They can't all be the Big Bad, and surely the series that gave us Sarevok and Irenicus isn't going to end on these five? It isn't. Melissan has been playing you and the Five right from the start.
Disc-One Final Boss: Defeat all five — Balthazar is always the last — and you've still got the true Big Bad to deal with.
Equal-Opportunity Evil: Balthazar employs only humans, which in the case of his monks is because only humans can be monks. The rest use anyone willing to work for them/that they can enslave.
Flat Character: There's little depth to most of them, and their pasts are never explored in great detail — only Yaga-Shura's background is known, and even then, only partially so. Their evilness is similarly two-dimensional.
Hunter of His Own Kind: While all the Bhaalspawn are driven towards finding and killing each other, these five made a career out of it. Subverted in that it's not out of any altruistic motive, but rather a pact to eliminate all their other competition, leaving each other for last, so that one of them can ascend to godhood. Double-subverted with Balthazar, who is in fact working to wipe out his tainted siblings — and plans to destroy himself once his work is done, thwarting Bhaal's plans to regain his immortality.
Rank Scales with Asskicking: The only thing they all have in common is that there's a damn good reason they lead armies.
There Can Be Only One: They all knew they'd eventually betray the others.

Illasera the Quick

"I may yet mount your head on the wall with all the other Bhaalspawn I've killed... I haven't decided."

Voiced by: Grey Delisle

An elven Bhaalspawn who finds the player character while they're seeking information about the future from some stone heads in a wooded area. She vaguely foreshadows what lies ahead of you before engaging you in battle and losing.

Flunky Boss: If you import your game rather than starting a new one, she'll have a few "Black Reavers" with her to help out.
Improbable Power Discrepancy: She's leagues weaker than the rest of the Five, but gets equal billing. About the only possible explanation is that for people dropping into it fresh off on their own, a proper boss fight would be very difficult to solo.
Kicking Ass in All Her Finery: She's only wearing a mage's basic clothes when she attacks.
Magic Knight: Illasera is a mage/fighter multiclass.
The Magnificent: The Quick.
Master of Illusion: What she claims to be. In practice this amounts to casting the second level spell Mirror Image.
Nerf: It was revealed that Illasera was originally supposed to be much stronger, but she's fought five minutes into ToB, so the possibility of encountering her as a newbie sorcerer or something forced them to depower her to hilariously weak levels. An optional add-on makes them all much tougher.
- With Ascension's upgraded version installed, she shows up with a number of powerful underlings and is much stronger herself: to the point that the fight is tougher than the final battle of BG2.
Smug Snake: She's awfully mouthy for someone who dies scarcely seconds into the expansion.
Suicidal Overconfidence: Enough of your Bhaalspawn siblings that you meet are just ordinary people with a few unusual powers and odd dreams, so you can see where she gets it. Still, she knows you're the one who killed Sarevok.
Walking the Earth: It seems like she just wanders around killing any Bhaalspawn she comes across and is more of a Wake-Up Call Boss
You Don't Look Like You: She uses a human sprite because it better matches her rounded haircut. You'd never guess she was supposed to be an elf.

Yaga-Shura

"Figured I was stronger than the rest of them, maybe. But not all of them together."

Voiced by: Kevin Michael Richardson

A fire giant raised in the Forest of Mir by the former Bhaalist priestess Nyalee, Yaga-Shura is the general of the armed forces invading Saradush, which he has been attacking because Melissan took as many civilian Bhaalspawn as she could to reach safety there. Thanks to his adoptive mother's efforts, he has had his heart removed and turned into a Soul Jar, making him invulnerable to damage. After the player travels to his home in the Marching Mountains and destroys it, they arrive just in time to see him succeed in destroying the city and killing all the Bhaalspawn taking refuge there. Declaring he should have been the one sent after them at the beginning and backed up by his army and fire giant kin, Yaga-Shura engages the player in a climactic battle that ends in the giant's death.

Big Damn Heroes: Averted. The party shows up just as he completes his assault on Saradush. They do kill him, but the city is destroyed anyway.
The Brute: Subverted. While more than willing to make use of the raw physical strength his giant size provides, Melissan says that despite his brutish appearance, his long siege on Saradush has shown considerable skill as a strategist.
Chaotic Evil: His in-universe alignment, as often the case with Bhaalspawn who embrace their wicked heritage.
Enemy Mine: Of a sort. His spirit isn't too happy with being summoned to aid the player (his killer), but tells CHARNAME what they need to know and admits that he was biding his time to end the Five too.
Equal-Opportunity Evil: Seems to employ this, as his army is quite diverse and even "lesser races" like humans and orcs are shown to have positions of power within its hierarchy as officers. Sendai and Balthazar are explicitly biased towards their own higher Underdark denizens and inner circle of monks, respectively, and the former is a murderous Bad Boss besides who keeps most of her followers as slaves; likewise, Abazigal employs Fantastic Racism against anything that's not a dragon, and Gromnir's force of common mercenaries and bullies doesn't last long enough to go one way or another.
Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas: But not this bad man. It seems that Yaga-Shura had no strong feelings for his adoptive mother Nyalee, though he may have when he was a child. She, one the other hand, immediately regrets helping the player to undo Yaga-Shura's invincibility and attempts to kill the party to protect her precious boy.
Evil Army: Until he dies, he leads the one attacking Saradush.
Evil Versus Evil: Gromnir Il-Khan, who leads the armed forces defending Saradush, is shown to be no less evil than Yaga-Shura, bringing this into effect.
Fairytale Motifs: Yaga-Shura's backstory heavily references Slavic Mythology and German/Scandinavian fairy tales. Yaga-Shura is the Heartless Giant or the Giant Who Had No Heart In His Body, both of whom in turn were likely based on Koschei the Deathless. The name Yaga and the hermit-like habits of his adoptive mother also suggest something of Slavic folklore's most infamous Wicked Witch, Baba Yaga.
Genius Bruiser: Don't let his Simpleton Voice and third-person references fool you; Yaga-Shura is a cunning strategist as well as a powerful warrior. This is common among fire giants, who revere cunning and artistry along with brute strength.
The Horde: His army of fire giants are simply driven to kill whoever they come across.
Hot Skitty-on-Wailord Action: He planned to breed with a captive human woman. If possible that's even weirder than what Bhaal did. At least a god could be expected to shapeshift to match his mate, even if it is a chinchilla, and have magical adapting DNA, but a fire giant can't help being about eighteen feet tall.
I'm a Humanitarian: He enjoys eating the hearts of his enemies, in particular other Bhaalspawn he's killed. On the other hand, they aren't his own species.
Mr. Exposition: As part of CHARNAME's tests and to further the storyline, it's Yaga-Shura who details the formation of the Five from his point-of-view.
Nigh-Invulnerable: A full quarter of ToB is getting around this, which is annoying considering that all things considered he's a minion. The Ascension mod has him lose this trait slowly, rather than instantly, and he starts his battle with you with a staggering amount of resistance to physical damage.
Our Giants Are Bigger: He's a fire giant, and has several fire giants under his command as well.
Pragmatic Villainy: He allied with his siblings because he figured he could take them all on individually but not all at the same time, see his quote above.
Religion of Evil: He has the support of the destructive church of Talos.
Soul Jar: A variation of this is the explanation for his Nigh Invulnerability.
Third-Person Person: Yaga-Shura announces himself by name with nearly every phrase he utters.
This Cannot Be!: Word for word, when you defeat him. If he weren't so ignorant, he'd realize that rendering himself invulnerable by putting his essence into his heart and keeping it in a secret location hardly makes him invincible.
You Are Too Late: The whole portion of ToB that deals with him is a bit of a "Shaggy Dog" Story. The heroes go to great lengths to help people in the besieged city of Saradush, then to even greater lengths to defeat Yaga-Shura and lift the siege, and succeed in doing both, only for his army to succeed in razing the city and killing almost everyone inside anyway. But then again, the heroes were playing into Amelyssan's scheme to kill all Bhaalspawn in the city and Yaga-Shura himself.

Sendai

"Know this even as I die... the return of our father is inevitable. Though I fall, the others will ensure Bhaal is reborn!"

Voiced by: Vanessa Marshall

A drow cleric/mage, Sendai rules over an enclave located in a cavernous network beneath a small forested area. In addition to the expected army of drow, she has derro and duergar slaves, spider pets and the support of some Beholders and Illithid, who've brought a few pet umber hulks with them. She appears to be a little fragile mentally, as she gets more and more unhinged as the player fights through her army, but is also cunning enough to cast an unusual magic spell which creates multiple versions of herself which she uses to fight the player. With her dying breath, she declares the player has not won and that Bhaal will be reborn.

Big "NO!": Right as she dies she lets out a massive one.
Dude, Where's My Respect?: Averted. Once she realises who exactly it is that's trashing her base, she flips out and starts reaching deep into her bag of tricks to try to come up with some way to stop you.
Epic Flail: It's her main weapon, though her statues are capable of using other weapons as well.
Equal-Opportunity Evil: Her assembled army includes not only drow, but also other Underdark races depicted as at war with the drow in Shadows of Amn, including beholders and mind flayers. It's abundantly clear they only joined with her as a result of Enemy Mine or to share the spoils of war, but most drow would never work with such creatures.
Evil Is Hammy: More than almost any other, Sendai gnaws and claws on the scenery in almost all her appearances.
Improbable Age: As with Abazigal, she seems too young for someone of her species to be as powerful as she is.
- Unless Bhaal had been planning this for a ''very'' long time, that is.
My Rules Are Not Your Rules: Like Aerie, she uses the cleric/mage multiclass normally unavailable to elves.
My Species Doth Protest Too Much: Zigzagged. She's got plenty of drow traits and her army is mostly drow, but she also works with Underdark races the drow are at war with, and seems to identify herself more as a Bhaalspawn than a drow.
Neutral Evil: Her In-Universe alignment.
Oh, Crap!: When she realizes you're a Bhaalspawn and not just a regular dude. Doubles down when she further realizes: just a Bhaalspawn? Nope. Gorion's ward!
Our Elves Are Different: Sendai is one of the wicked dark elves of the Underdark, and for that matter, one with great ambitions even for a drow.
Puzzle Boss: She uses a few class-shifting animated statues of herself when the player finally confronts her.
Villainous Breakdown: In tandem with the Mook Horror Show of Charname and company trashing her fortress's defenses.
You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: She quickly disposes of her guard captain when he fails to inform her about how big of a threat they face (see Oh Crap!).

Abazigal

"Those insolent words will be your last!"

Voiced by: Jim Cummings

The son of Bhaal and a blue dragon, Abazigal is the second-most powerful member of the Five, and is apparently served by dragons, wyverns and other monsters, his token Mad Scientist human lackey aside. Abazigal is proud of his draconic lineage and believes only dragons are worthy of carrying Bhaal's divine blood. His lair is more of a cave than a proper fortress, and the player is forced to collect a large number of McGuffins to navigate its caverns. Before his death, he reveals Balthazar's involvement with him and the others.

Berserk Button: Just quote his indentured doorwoman and call him a "mongrel half-breed" and the battle begins.
BFS: When he's in human form.
Breath Weapon: When he's in dragon form.
Dragon with an Agenda: He's the only member of the Five clever enough to see through Balthazar, but he never gets an opportunity to put that knowledge to use.
Even Evil Has Loved Ones: If you taunt him about killing his son, Draconis, he will immediately skip to the end of the conversation and start attacking you.
Fantastic Racism: He is as about as arrogant towards you and your party as you'd expect from a dragon in this setting and believes only dragons are worthy of being Bhaal's children. His own divine heritage, on the other hand, seems to bring him mixed levels of approval: his son Draconis (and presumably the rest of his family) think highly of him for it; other dragons, such as the green dragon bound to him guarding his door, look down on him for it, considering him a "mongrel half-breed".
Geas: Uses one to bind a green dragon into guarding the door to his room. She's so upset about it that she offers to give you the key to the door if you release her from his service, content to get away and let the well-armed mortals who just set her free take him down.
Giant Flyer: Like all dragons in D&D.
Improbable Age: He's old enough to have a fully grown son, which as a dragon would put him as at least a few centuries old. Of course, being the son of a god himself, divine magic on the part of either Abazigal or Bhaal himself could account for either rapid aging or advance planning by the Lord of Murder and his "son" is presumably adopted, as he is a different species of dragon.
Large Ham: He's even voiced by the same voice actor as Minsc.
Lawful Evil: in-universe As most blue dragons are, and revealed in his character sheet.
One-Winged Angel: He starts out appearing near-human, but with blue skin. Then he turns into a dragon.
Our Dragons Are Different: He's the son of a blue dragon.
Shock and Awe: Blue dragons breathe lightning breath.
This Cannot Be!: Word for word, upon his defeat.
Weaksauce Weakness: The only Bhaalspawn boss that can potentially be instantly killed by Vorpal weapons, dragon-form only.
Worthy Opponent: He plays this up, but despises you for not being a dragon (despite his ironically half-dragon status, since his father was a god).

Balthazar

"Your part in this ends here... I shall see to that."

Voiced by: Jeff Osterhage

A monk who serves as the leader of a monastery in the small desert-town of Amkethran. The monastery has always been a group of benevolent rulers, but under Balthazar they have been aggressively collecting money from the townsfolk, which he has been spending on mercenary soldiers and wizards for the sake of gathering an army. Balthazar actually seeks to prevent the return of Bhaal and rid the realms of the Bhaalspawn taint, but he has chosen to do so in the most aggressive manner possible, which puts him at odds with the player.

Anti-Debuff: Contrary to popular belief, he isn't passively immune to Time Stop. He has a reactive counter move that allows him to ignore it. However, it is possible to catch him if the spell goes off while he's in the middle of another of his special attacks.
Anti-Villain: He actually wants to prevent Bhaal's resurrection and his in-game alignment is Lawful Good. Too bad he's such a Well-Intentioned Extremist about it.
Bare-Fisted Monk: Puts 3rd Edition's shiny new monk class to good use.
Bald of Evil: He's actually good, Statistically Speaking, but on the surface his actions don't give this impression at all. And then there's his membership of the Five.
Calling Your Attacks Lunar Stance! Shadowless Kick!
The Chessmaster: Subverted. You can accuse him of pitting you against the other members of the Five, but he only wishes he could take credit for such a "brilliant ruse". That was someone else's work.
The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard: He gets a huge amount of non-standard abilities, including Invisibility, Magic Missile (?!), Sunfire, and a teleport ability. Of course, one could say these are manifestations of his unique Bhaalspawn powers, similar to those used by the player.

Good Is Not Nice: Statistically, he is good, and his goal is noble. His methods, however, are not.
Heroic Sacrifice: He plans to kill himself after all the other Bhaalspawn are dead, which is, ironically, exactly what Bhaal would have him do. You can point this out to him. Balthazar's response is that he would kill himself using a special ritual that would keep the Bhaal essence from coalescing into Bhaal, though whether this would work is not made clear.
Lawful Good: In-universe, as part of The Reveal Also proof of the trope Good Is Not Nice.

Sixth Ranger Traitor: Notably, in the Ascension mod, if the main character is good and you make some sensible dialogue choices, you can convert him into a Sixth Ranger for the final battle. Which is very handy because the Ascension mod turns the final battle into something to behold.
Teleport Spam: Flash Steps all over the place during your battle with him. While monks can't teleport, and he's not a spellcaster, this presumably comes from the powers granted by his Bhaalspawn taint. After all, CHARNAME has a pocket dimension that can bypass a magic barrier that prevents normal means of teleportation.
Token Good Teammate: Of the Five. Not that the others realize it, though.
What a Senseless Waste of Human Life: He refuses to see reason about the whole killing-all-my-siblings-but-for-a-good-cause issue unless the player uses the Ascension mod.
What the Hell, Hero?: A possible dialogue option with him. Protest all you like, but he'll kill you anyway. However, if you're playing Ascension and Charname is Good with either high reputation, wisdom, or charisma, you get to ream him out much more thoroughly, to the point where he'll possibly fight by your side instead. The most effective way to do this, by the way, is to call him out on his unjust rulership of Amkethran.
Well-Intentioned Extremist: His methods of preventing Bhaal's resurrection are questionable, and he admits it if you call him out. He also wants you killed because you're a Bhaalspawn and you won't be able to convince him that you want the same as him, even if you're Lawful Good with 20 Reputation, unless you play with the Ascension Mod. He will, however, admit that you're as much as a victim in this conflict as he is.
You Can't Thwart Stage One: A late example, but still. You can walk in as a Lawful Good Reputaton 20 CHARNAME and insist you aren't evil and can keep the taint of Bhaal under control, even channel your powers for the good, but Balthazar rejects that notion. Imoen, whose innocence and good nature kept her Bhaalspawn taint hidden for years, and a reformed Sarevok, who's turned away from his murderous path, can be right there with you and he still won't think there's anything to what you say.

Throne of Bhaal's Big Bad (spoilers)

Amelyssan the Blackhearted

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Mellissan_5157.JPG

To his greatest priestess did he come for succor.

"Remain dust, my foolish god."

Voiced by: Heidi Shannon

The true Big Bad of Throne of Bhaal. The former High Priestess of Bhaal, Bhaal himself entrusted Amelyssan with the ritual that would use the essences of the dead Bhaalspawn to bring him back to life. However, she completely betrays him in favor of using the essences to ascend to godhood herself, and by the time you actually kill her she has stolen the lion's share of Bhaal's essence.

Anti-Debuff: One of three enemies immune to Time Stop, though she herself doesn't use it. Unless you're playing with the aforementioned Ascension mod.
Big Bad: Of Throne of Bhaal, manipulating you and the Five into killing each other so that she can do away with the winner and seize the power of her dead god Bhaal for herself.
Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Her Melissan persona is that of a good-hearted, well-intentioned but somewhat inept woman who just wants to help the Bhaalspawn get through the Crisis without everyone killing each other. As you can see, Amelyssan is not so benevolent after all.
Boss Rush: In the Ascension mod, she first summons Irenicus and Bodhi. If possible she'll also turn Imoen into the Slayer, forcing you to either put her down or play keep-away until she snaps out of it. When you defeat them, she then summons all of the Five at once to attack you. Then, once two of the Five get finished off, she steps into the battle, summoning demons to aid her as her health goes down.
Cessation of Existence: No matter what you choose to do with Bhaal's power, this is her fate once you defeat her. She had Bhaal's taint welded into her soul so she could use it more directly. In order to release or get rid of the taint, her soul must be destroyed.
Chaotic Evil In-universe. Unlike the other Big Bads and a few other villains from the games, she lacks any real motivation for her villainy, except simply wanting more power.

The Chessmaster: One wonders why the other members of the Five, who are smart and ruthless enough not to trust each other, arbitrarily trust her.
- They don't; they are too busy fighting each other and causing destruction to pay any attention to her, which is probably why her scheme even works to begin with. Of course, even with her scheme working properly, it had the unintended side effect of singling out and even training for herself an opponent more powerful than all the others (which happened to be CHARNAME).
Devil in Plain Sight: She takes on an altogether less-than-convincing civilian disguise to manipulate you. Downplayed somewhat by giving no direct (only implied) indications she may not have your best interests at heart, and her main accusers are all quite paranoid, not to mention hostile towards you to begin with (looking at you, Gromnir).
- Fridge Brilliance: You're supposed to be suspicious of her. Previous experience should have taught the player that no one (knowingly) involves themselves with Bhaalspawn out of pure altruism. Even the Dialogue reflects this; Charname remains weary of her in all of their interactions, regardless of alignment.
Charname: So you are just another person meddling in the affairs of Bhaal's children."
Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: Sarevok was just a man, and Irenicus merely had his own power and a divine tree's power he stole. Melissan, however, had nearly all the strength of the god of murder but still goes down if you stab her a lot.
Dragon with an Agenda: To Bhaal, as she'd rather supplant him than resurrect him, as well as to both Charname and the Five.
Easily Forgiven: Despite her attempt to usurp him, 3 reveals that Bhaal has allowed her spirit a place in his Court of Murder, presumably out of respect for the sheer audacity of her plan.
Evil Is Hammy: Once it's "revealed" she was evil all along, she becomes hammy enough to match Sarevok.
Evil Redhead: Although she keeps her hair covered by a snazzy feathered helmet when she's not using her Melissan persona.
A God Am I: Throughout her boss fight, she'll keep insisting she is, too, even after Charname's beaten her to a pulp. At that point, the Solar slaps her down.
Solar: You are no god, priestess of Bhaal. You play with stolen energies that make you immortal, that give you great power...but that does not make you a god.
Hair-Trigger Temper: When she's summoned by Solar to discuss the last piece of your backstory, she's incredibly rude and abrasive, and with minimal goading attempts to kill you on the spot.
I Can Rule Alone: Bhaal really ought to have found someone more trustworthy to oversee the plan to resurrect himself.
- We Can Rule Together: If you have Ascension installed, she tries to tempt Sarevok to her side with this. Whether it works or not depends on your alignment, his alignment, and your relationship with him.
Just Eat Gilligan: You would, but the game won't let you.
Manipulative Bastard: Plays the Five against the other Bhaalspawn, and then you against them, to release the maximum number of essence for her to steal.
Marathon Boss: You first fight against her, then some air elementals, then her along with some demons, then the Elemental prince, then her along with some slayer shadows, then some powerful demons including the fallen solar, and then finally her. And the real kicker? You have to do this in one go, meaning you cannot rest or regain spells throughout this battle unless you use the Wish spell. And in the Ascension mod, it's even worse.
- Mercifully, all of the creatures she summons vanish each time you bring her down to low health and she teleports away to recharge, so in each fight the party should make inflicting damage on her their #1 priority. The third fight against her is arguably the toughest, as she will move far away from the party and keep on summoning monsters to attack them. In the fourth and final fight she abandons that strategy and tries to melee you to death with only a couple of summoned creatures as backup, making it significantly easier than what came before.
Never a Self-Made Woman: Her entire rise to power is mainly because she was the high priestess of Bhaal, who was once a man.
Older Than They Look: Melissan must be, at the very, impossibly youngest, 35, and is likely 40-50, but she looks like she's in her mid-to-late twenties. The Solar states that she is immortal.
Planet Heck: A strange example. As she gains the power of Bhaal, she warps Hell to her liking, so that by the point you actually fight her you're still technically in Hell but it's really rather pleasant.
The Reveal: Not that it comes as much of a surprise.
Red and Black and Evil All Over: Goes from Melissan the Red, who wears green but has red hair, to Amelyssan the Blackhearted, who wears black armor with a red sash.
Smug Super: And how. It seems absorbing the Bhaalspawn essences amplified her ego as well as her power. It's not until the final phase of her boss fight that she acknowledges you as a Worthy Opponent.
The Starscream: To the Five, to Charname, and finally to Bhaal himself. Pitting her enemies against each other is her MO throughout Throne of Bhaal.
Villainous Breakdown: Has a massive one when she is defeated by CHARNAME.
Amelyssan the Blackhearted: Noooooo! I am a GOD! This is not over until I say it is! [...] No... the Bhaalspawn has not won! I refuse to believe it! Oh, I would die first! [...] No... no! I... I will kill... you... all!
Wolverine Claws: Wears a clawed Freddy Krueger-style gauntlet after revealing herself as the Big Bad.

Caelar

Caelar Argent

"Your father was the Lord of Murder. Countless lives were stolen in his name. What if you could restore that balance — bring back those unjustly taken? Would you? Or is the call of your sire's blood too strong?"

Voiced by: Cissy Jones

Also known as "The Shining Lady", she suddenly appeared shortly after Sarevok's death, backed by a massive army known as the Crusade. She is leading the Crusade on a destructive campaign to conquer the Sword Coast, claiming that the region is hers "by right". Due to the cult-like reverence afforded her by the Crusade, some suspect that, like Charname, she may be the child of a god.

All for Nothing: She can remark on this if she fails to live up to her ideals. As such, she'll swear herself into Belhifet's service, given that she could never be good and do it correctly. So then, she might as well be evil.
Big Bad: Of Siege of Dragonspear. Until Belhifet of all people shows up and takes over in Chapter 12.
Contrasting Sequel Antagonist: To Sarevok, and recursively to Irenicus and Amellysan as well. Not only is she not a child or follower of Bhaal, she has no interest in becoming a god and isn't Obviously Evil or even particularly malevolent; she's just colossally misguided, has poor taste in followers and is too stubborn to realise how off-kilter her plan is almost right from the off. Fittingly, she has a very distinctive armour set and weapon like Sarevok, but while he wears Scary Impractical Armour covered in Spikes of Villainy and specialises in two-handed swords, while Caelar's is bright and angelic in appearance and she specialises in longswords.
Despair Event Horizon: If you don't convince her to join you in Chapter 12, she abandons the last of her hopes and morals and offers to pledge herself to Belhifet because having worn the guise of a hero while not living up to her own ideals, if she must be a villain she would rather wear it as a badge and be honest about it.
Enemy Mine: A rare example in which this trope works two ways: in the final battle, you can convince her to fight with you against Belhifet and she'll readily accept, but the devil will also try to break down her walls through dialogue and she'll offer him her aid against you if you don't get through to her.
Et Tu, Brute?: She loses it when Hephernaan reveals his true allegiance, and if she sides with Belhifet in the final battle, she asks the devil to give her former adviser a fiery death.
Flaming Sword: Her sword gives off a pale blue fire. Naturally, it does extra fire damage. If she becomes a Blackguard in the final battle, her fiery sword will blaze crimson instead.
Half-Human Hybrid: She's an aasimar, a being descended from celestials. In her case it's not an Interspecies Romance, though; her family line was blessed by a Solar generations ago.
Hero Antagonist: Wants to storm the Hells to bring back the people who died in the first Dragonspear war, writes letters of condolence to families of her soldiers who died in battle, and is a freaking aasimar (a planetouched human descended from angels). She doesn't even want to kill the player, and if it weren't for the fact that Hephernaan needed divine blood for his own nefarious purposes, they probably wouldn't be enemies to begin with.
Heroic Sacrifice: Potentially. If prevented from falling in Avernus she will instead stay behind to close the portal. She will die, no-one can survive long alone in Avernus. Whether her soul stays and is damned or moves on elsewhere is hard to say.
Horrible Judge of Character: When Hephernaan came to her in her moment of self-doubt, she saw him as a "good and gentle soul", even as others questioned if the priest really served her interests.
It's All About Me: As a precocious child, she summoned an actual devil to grant her heart's desire, and her beloved uncle Aun paid the price on her behalf. After this hard lesson, she dedicated herself to becoming a paladin, as was tradition for the Argents. Played with in that all the good she did as a paladin ultimately meant nothing to her if she couldn't free her uncle from Belhifet — and even that is less about doing the right thing than about assuaging her own guilt, as it means the entire Shining Crusade is a fraud, getting hundreds of people killed for a quest that has no chance of saving their loved ones, only Caelar's. Subverted if you convince her to join you, though, as when it's clear someone has to stay behind in the Hells to close the portal to Faerun, she elects to do it herself, deciding that she deserves to die there as punishment for her crimes, and wishing only for her uncle to work to redeem the Argent name from what she has turned it into.
Jack of All Stats: She has an impressive set of physical stats, with the lowest being a 16, and a very high Charisma of 18. And while her other mental scores are less impressive, neither is especially low at 12 each.
Knight Templar: She left the Order of the Aster because her ideas of purging evil and spreading righteousness were too great for them. Subverted in that while her methods are indeed extreme, she's not nearly as concerned with order and justice as she presents herself to be.
Light Is Not Good: Well, that's the question, isn't it? Her stated goal of rescuing everyone who was Dragged Off to Hell during the previous Siege of Dragonspear would be noble, if she didn't know for a fact that it's impossible, at least by the means she's going about it. Her actual goal, rescuing her uncle Aun from Belhifet's clutches, would also be noble, if she weren't leading a futile crusade based on a lie and getting her followers killed in the process. She's ultimately just as selfish in the present as she was when she summoned Belhifet as a child, the act which Aun Argent sacrificed himself to protect her from in the first place, having learned nothing but how to cloak her actions behind pretty words. Not selfish enough to not accept that she betrayed her own principles, though.
Meaningful Name: "Argent" comes from the Latin word for silver, a metal notable for its shine. Although the title "Shining Lady" is most likely attributed to the appearance her celestial blood gives her. Additionally, silver has traditionally been used to ward off evil and disease, which correlates with Caelar's ultimate good nature.
A Mother to Her Men: She takes the gentle approach when one of her soldiers slips up, and inspires camaraderie (or at least tolerance) among those who would otherwise be enemies.
The Paladin: Similar to Mazzy in the second game, Caelar cannot be a paladin because she's an aasimar, and only humans can be paladins. But she is one in all but name.
Pet the Dog:
- When one of her followers destroys the bridge at Coast Way Crossing in a fit of panic, she forgives him and says she should have warned him this was a possibility.
- Once the player moves on to Chapter 9, she is seen dictating letters of condolences to the families of her followers who die in her service.
Private Military Contractors: She isn't above hiring mercenaries to bolster her numbers.
Red Herring: After all the time the game spent building her up to be a charismatic leader and powerful fighter, she's revealed to be a pawn to her supposed right-hand man Hephernaan in a bid to unleash his master on the Prime.
Then Let Me Be Evil: Caelar tries very hard to do good and act in a noble, righteous way. However, her arrogance as a child led to her uncle being imprisoned in Avernus, her overbearing nature caused others to view her as a destructive force, and constantly getting led around by her evil advisor ended up having her do far more harm then good. If she is not convinced to help out, she will declare that since she is awful at being good, she might as well be evil, because she's at least competent at being evil.
Tragic Villain: She has a sad backstory which she set in motion herself at a young age when she made a Tragic Mistake. To say any more would involve significant spoilers. One way or another she may end up damned to the Hells for all eternity, and unless you convince her to join you all her efforts will be All for Nothing on top of that.
Unwitting Pawn: To Hephernaan, and she is not pleased to discover it.

The Iron Throne

Rieltar

Rieltar Anchev

"The right people can afford to be rude, but this is not you."

Voiced by: Gregg Berger

Sarevok's foster father and the regional head of the Iron Throne. He was privy to his son's scheme to cause chaos in the south and divert profit to the Iron Throne, though not the true extent or purpose of said plan.

Abusive Parents: Had Sarevok's foster mother strangled in front of him when he was a child, and threatened his son with this same fate about twenty years later. When his son had grown into a towering Scary Black Man and a ruthless, lucid Blood Knight. Clever.
Asshole Victim: He may stand as Sarevok's most unsympathetic victim in any of the games. Aside from his treatment of Yeslick mentioned below, telling your son, who's Eviler than Thou, that you'll have him killed in the same you murdered his mother if he's "unfaithful" guarantees that no one is likely going to miss you when you're gone.
Big Bad: He serves as this on paper as the regional head of the Iron Throne, though it's clear from early on that the armoured figure (his foster son, Sarevok) is the true villain.
Death by Irony: If you don't agree to kill him, Sarevok will have Rieltar strangled with a garrote... the exact same way Rieltar murdered Sarevok's foster mom.
Disproportionate Retribution: Strangled to death for infidelity? That's just ridiculous.
Even Evil Has Standards: He didn't want to be responsible for a full-blown war, and engaged in damage control to establish peace. It's at this point that Sarevok betrays him.
- Though this is motivated at least partly by a full-blown war being bad for the Throne's profits.
Evil Is Petty: Killing your wife over infidelity in front of your adopted son? That's pretty petty.
Evil Mentor: To Sarevok. Apparently. Turns out he's not; Winski was Sarevok's true mentor, coaching him in dark rituals and Bhaalspawn knowledge.
Hate Sink: It isn't hard to hate him, as the other tropes on this page will clarify. While Sarevok is badass and Woobie-ish enough to earn respect and sympathy from fans, Rieltar is simply a grade-A asshole, and no one mourns his passing. The only thing that upsets them is that his death plays right into Sarevok's hands — and even then...
Jerkass: He helped the dwarven warrior Yeslick to reclaim his clan's mines, only to betray him, slap him in a dungeon, and take the mines over for the Iron Throne.
Rieltar (written): Remember to ask Yeslick if he enjoys his new accommodations.
Karmic Death: Rieltar strangled Sarevok's foster mother to death with a garrote and threatened his foster son with the same fate. Three guesses for how Sarevok decides to off him.
Sarevok (written): I shall be sure to instruct the doppelgangers in the exact way Rieltar should die. I think a garrote would be perfect for the task.
Mr. Exposition: Against his will: If you cast Charm Person on him at Candlekeep, he will outline the entirety of his Evil Plan for you in great detail.
Oh, Crap!: Subverted. If you let slip that Koveras spurred you on the path to killing Reiltar, he'll put two and two together and calmly realize that there's more to his son than he thought.
Only in It for the Money: His entire motivation.
Underestimating Badassery: Or intellect. He severely underestimates his foster son's extraordinary intelligence and ambition, using him more as a brute beforehand, and pays dearly for it. Even he acknowledges his miscalcuation before Sarevok has him killed.

You Can't Thwart Stage One: Sarevok either tricks you into killing Rieltar, or does the deed himself using doppelgangers taking on your party's form.
You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: What compels Sarevok to have him killed.

Tamoko

"Loyalty to one's lord is all that can be expected."

Voiced by: Diane Pershing

Tamoko is Sarevok's loyal concubine and advisor. Unlike most of his underlings, she's not apparently very evil and is truly in love with him, but can nevertheless see what evils he's sunk to and, realizing she can't help him on her own, asks CHARNAME to not kill him. Whether or not CHARNAME agrees is up to you, but if you do, Sarevok learns of it and orders her to fight you (implicitly, he orders her execution, since she's obviously no match for you alone). You can persuade her to leave peacefully if sternly refuse to attack her (“if you already decided to end your life, you don't need me to do it”), making her finally realize that Sarevok's evil is his own doing and not his blood's.

The Cameo: She shows up in a vision in ToB alongside a hypothetical version of yourself, gone down Sarevok's path.
Conflicting Loyalty: Between Sarevok, the man she loves, and what Sarevok seeks to become — a god.
Cynicism Catalyst: Her death is what compels her brother to travel west to find her, and eventually set out in revenge.

Death Seeker: Some of her dialogue when she confronts you for the last time implies this.
Tamoko: You must fre...you must fight me!
Early-Bird Cameo: She's the spellcaster who accompanied Sarevok to confront Gorion at the start of the game, and fired a (conspicuously weak) fire arrow at you before dispelling Gorion's buffs, allowing Sarevok to strike the killing blow.
Enemy Mine: With CHARNAME, but it doesn't last.
Even Evil Has Loved Ones: She genuinely loves Sarevok, despite all his faults, and it's made clear he feels the same way. The results are less than ideal, but still. Also, as it turns out, she has a little brother: Yoshimo. David Gaider confirmed that Tamoko is Yoshimo's older sister. He came west to look for her after her death, only to get caught up with a villain of his own.
Even Evil Has Standards: She's been Sarevok's lover for a long time before he became obsessed with ascension, and by all accounts, he was never a morally straight individual. It was after he began delving into the Bhaalspawn prophecies that she noticed him sinking to new lows, and only began subverting his plans when it became apparent that she'd lose him if they succeeded.
Far East: She's from Kara-tur, BG's analogue to Asia. She apparently had some trouble learning the common tongue, and has a prevalent accent.
Foreshadowing: If you agree to let Sarevok live for her, she'll tell you that Sarevok can be redeemed. This is very much true in Throne of Bhaal, though Tamoko doesn't live to see it.
Huge Guy, Tiny Girl: According to her bio, she's barely five feet tall. Sarevok looks to be around six or seven feet, not counting his Spikes of Villainy.
Infinity +1 Sword: Not a blade, but she has the best piece of armor in the game: Full Plate Mail + 1.
Irony: When the player confronts Cythandria and demands her compliance, she says that she'll fight to the end for Sarevok and would never betray him, derisively offering up Tamoko as someone the PC would have better luck converting as The Mole. After a brief fight, Cythandria surrenders and begs you not to kill her, selling out Sarevok's secrets in return for her life. On the other hand, despite Tamoko already helping you, she fights you to the death if you can't convince her to see sense.
- Ironic Echo: She quotes one of Alaundo's prophecies about sewing destruction through the land before she fights you.
Love Makes You Evil: Of the My Master, Right or Wrong variety, though you can make her change her mind with some sensible dialogue choices.
Love Martyr: Though she can be talked out of it.
The Mole: Sort of; she doesn't have any intentions of joining you, but she is willing to give you information about Sarevok so long as you promise to try to save him.
Murder the Hypotenuse: She has you kill Cythandria, another of Sarevok's consorts.
Neutral Evil: In-universe. Her character file says she is, though she gets little time to showcase it.
"Not So Different" Remark: If you choose not to accept her request to leave Sarevok alive, she'll come to this conclusion about the two of you.

Only Sane Man: In Sarevok's inner circle.

Road Cone: Canonically, she dies at some point during the story: Whether or not you killed her is unclear. The epilogue of Sarevok's unmodded ending has him burying Tamoko back in Kara-Tur.
Rousseau Was Right: She's convinced you can redeem Sarevok, and that underneath his admittedly unfortunate heritage he's basically a good man with a bad attitude. While that simply isn't true, the game does allow you to redeem Sarevok during ToB.

Take a Third Option: CHARNAME can offer her this in their final encounter.

Villain Has a Point: Her take on strength is pretty accurate to some.
Tamoko: There are three things that are strength incarnate: there is love of life, there is fear of death, and there is family. A family that loves death would have a strong pull indeed.
Villainous Lineage: She thinks Sarevok is actually a good man, corrupted by his heritage. If you prove to her that you're a good person, she'll realize she was wrong, and that whatever evil Sarevok is guilty of is his own doing.

Other Members

Angelo Dosan

A corrupt Flaming Fist officer in Sarevok's pocket. He became its figurehead after Scar was murdered and Duke Eltan was incapacitated. He's also Shar-Teel's father, which considerably changes an event later in the game if she's with the party.

Back for the Finale: Flees to the Undercity with Sarevok and joins him in his Last Villain Stand.
Co-Dragons: Ends up being this with Tazok.
Corrupt Cop: A high-ranking member of the mercenary company which acts as Baldur's Gate's guards in the region who's also a prominent member of the Iron Throne conspiracy.
Evil Counterpart: To Scar, another captain in the Flaming Fist.
Forced to Watch: When he's about to throw you in the jail, insult him. He'll have one of your companions killed.
Kangaroo Court: Presides over one in the first game if you're tried for Rieltar's murder. He capriciously throws the party in jail and slates them for death, though if Shar-Teel is in the party, he'll rescue them and let them go instead.
Kick the Dog: He manages to do this and Pet the Dog at the same time with just one action. If his daughter is in your party, then he'll free you all from captivity. At the same time, he says it's only because of what they shared in the past, and that he never wants to see her again.
Pet the Dog: Will free you and your party from captivity if his daughter is part of said party... and then tell his daughter that he never wants to see her again.
The Reveal: Chaotic Evil companion Shar-Teel is his daughter, which provides some explanation for her burning hatred of men.
Screw This, I'm Outta Here: If you (by some miracle) manage to kill Sarevok first in the final battle, Angelo and Tazok stop fighting and run for the door.
Villainous Rescue: Kills his own guards to save the group if his daughter, Shar-Teel, is in the party. Otherwise, he's happy to see you hang.

Winski Perorate

"If he were to succeed there is no doubt I would be among the dead, but my name would live on in his wake. There are things beyond death if you die in the right fashion, and how could there not be a place in history for the architect that shaped the actions of the ascending Lord of Murder? You would not understand; you were born to affect the Realms. The rest of us must carve our own place by whatever means necessary."

Winski is Sarevok's Evil Mentor. He was well aware of his understudy's dark heritage, and aimed to aid in his ascension whatever the cost. He saved Sarevok from a rather unfavorable battle near to the game's climax, though Sarevok, incensed that Winski had saved him rather than helped him to kill CHARNAME, the Flaming Fist and the dukes, cut him down and left him for dead.

Evil Mentor: It turns out he was the one guiding Sarevok down the garden path of villainy this whole time.
Evil Sorcerer: He's said to be a mage, and he sought to guide Sarevok to reclaim his divine father's mantle of god of murder.
Mr. Exposition: He comes clean to CHARNAME about his part in Sarevok's plot when he's bleeding out, left for dead.
Small Role, Big Impact: His tutoring was the reason Sarevok got as far as he did, but is bleeding to death by the time you meet him.
Uncertain Doom: His death is implied by Sarevok, but left unconfirmed onscreen.
The Unfought: He's been aiding Sarevok for years, but is never fought by Charname and the party. Probably a good thing, since as Sarevok's mentor, he's presumably of a higher level than the party.

Tazok

"YOU DON'T THINK! I THINK! I question them, and if they not as you say, you die too!"

Voiced by: Jim Cummings

One of Sarevok's underlings from the first game. An ogre, he is the leader of a group of bandits who are in league with the Iron Throne. If the player character attempts to infiltrate this group, they will be required to fight him (although not to the death). He later shows up during the final showdown with Sarevok and makes a surprise reappearance in Firkraag's lair to, once again, fight the hero.

If the player recruits the PC Kivan in the first game, it will be revealed that Tazok tortured Kivan and tortured, then murdered, Kivan's wife.

Back for the Finale: If you fought him at the bandit camp, he disappears for most of the game, only to finally reappear at Sarevok's side.
Back from the Dead: Assuming you actually killed him in the first game. You get the option to lampshade it, but he just shrugs it off and immediately attacks your party.

Cold-Blooded Torture: Dished this out in the past. The rotting bodies decorating his tent don't speak too highly of him either.
Defeat Equals Friendship: Downplayed. Defeat equals temporary tolerance.
Demoted to Extra: He reappears in the second game, now working for Firkraag.
Co-Dragons: With Angelo Dosan and Tamoko, serving Sarevok in the first game. Tazok was responsible for coordinating the bandit attacks in the region. May have been this to Jierdan in the second, but he's rather unceremoniously killed moments after you meet him again.
Enemy Mine: The bandit alliance he's formed were previously in competition. Tazok has united them against the Flaming Fist, as well as the people of the Sword Coast in general.
Gameplay and Story Segregation: He's apparently an ogre, despite using the smaller half-ogre sprite.
Genius Bruiser: Downplayed. He fancies himself an Evil Genius, but he's only smart by comparison to his rather dull-witted men. That said, Sarevok does trust him to command a sizable army of bandits, and being an ogre means he is very strong.
Hair-Trigger Temper: Can swing from calculating to enraged at the drop of a hat.
Half-Human Hybrid: Depending on the edition, he's either half- or a full-blooded ogre. The Enhanced Edition fixed the references, but left him with the sprite of a half-ogre.
Horrible Judge of Character: If he'd gone with his first instinct about the PC, things might have gone better for him. Interestingly enough, some cut content from the first game would have had this with a healthy dose of Idiot Ball as well. Taking Kivan to the bandit camp was supposed to trigger a speech when Tazok attacks the party in which Kivan tells Tazok that he is there to take Tazok's head for killing Kivan's wife. Tazok continues the fight anyway, then stops it and tells CHARNAME the party can join the bandits despite just hearing what Kivan said. The developers must have realized that keeping Kivan silent made more sense, so the speech was cut. The Unfinished Business mod puts it back in, but at least the user can decide whether to install that portion or not.
Might Makes Right: Subscribes to this theory. He'll even let you wander around his bandit camp if you prove strong enough to tangle with him, even if you gave the game away that you know more than you should about his operations.
Offstage Villainy: His murder of Kivan's wife and torture of her and Kivan alike.
Our Ogres Are Different: He's rather intelligent and somewhat small for an ogre, using the half-ogre sprite.
Pragmatic Villainy: In some of his letters, he displays irritation at the senseless murder of innocent miners. Not because he objects on any moral ground, but because it's attracting unwanted attention.
Recurring Boss: He can be fought at the bandit camp, he's part of Sarevok's backup during the Final Boss battle of the first game, and he recurs yet again as one of the minions of Firkraag in BG2.
Riddle for the Ages: When killed in BG2 he drops a key to a door in the sewers beneath the Temple District in Athkatla. Beyond the door is a hidden Mind Flayer enclave engaged in some sort of plan to undermine the city. Why Tazok had this key and what connection he had to the Mind Flayers is never remotely explained. Hell, the player would only know where to use the key from the fact that it's called Sewer Key in the inventory.
Screw This, I'm Outta Here: If you (by some miracle) manage to kill Sarevok first in the final battle, Angelo and Tazok stop fighting and run for the door.
Smarter Than You Look: Surprisingly. He comes across as somewhat brutish and bloodthirsty when encountered in person, but his letters and correspondence to his underlings paint him as fairly devious and sensible.
Surrounded by Idiots: His opinion of the Black Talon mercenaries.
You No Take Candle: Downplayed, but he occasionally drops his auxiliary verbs (be, do) in spoken conversation. Not the case in his written correspondence, in which he is much more erudite, oddly enough.

Mulahey

Voiced by: Jim Cummings

Sarevok's pawn in northern Amn, tasked with taking over the Nashkel Mines and corrupting the iron supply. He's the first real Climax Boss fought in the game, at least as far as the plot is concerned.

Also shows up in your dreams as a ghostly visage after his death.

Alignment-Based Endings: His spirit receives one posthumously. CHARNAME will either be coaxed by the dark voice in their head to smash Mulahey's spirit, or resist the taint and allow their fallen foe to pass peacefully into whatever afterlife awaits him.
Ax-Crazy: Displays hints of this. Given he serves the god of madness and lies...
Death Equals Redemption: Kind of, though it's not until after he's been killed and a good-aligned CHARNAME relents from inflicting any further pain upon him in a dream sequence. In it, he summons a "dagger of bone" which Mulahey's apparition presumes you'll maul him with; when it doesn't happen, he thanks you and peacefully leaves to whatever fate awaits him.
Dirty Coward: Begs for his life, but immediately attacks you again afterwards. And he'll try to kill you even if you claim to be a representative from his own boss (who, to be fair, already threatened him in letters to replace him for dragging too much attention to the mines).

Fate Worse than Death: Subverted. His dream apparition thought CHARNAME would inflict this upon him, but you walk away.
Ghostly Goals: He reappears as a bloodied apparition in one of CHARNAME's dream sequences, though whatever his purpose was he makes some small peace with his killer and leaves for the afterlife.
A God Am I: Managed to convince the kobolds that he was their god.
Half-Human Hybrid: The narrator mentions that he's half-orc. His thick accent and heavy speech gives it away otherwise.
Mook Maker: Summons hordes of kobolds and skeletons in his boss fight.
Properly Paranoid: He was living in fear of assassins being sent after him, not by Amn but by his own displeased superiors.
I Surrender, Suckers: You certainly won't choose to spare him if you've already fought with him before.
Spanner in the Works: He turned out to be this to Sarevok. Tazok explicitly told him to make sure his kobolds didn't attract too much attention, yet they ended up murdering a swathe of miners and drawing attention to the lower levels.
Starter Villain: The first member of the Iron Throne you'll fight, deep in the Nashkel Mines. Then it turns out stopping the Iron Crisis is just the beginning.
Violence is the Only Option: The dialogue choices when he encounters you indicate that it may be possible to intimidate him into submission. But he'll try to kill you regardless of your choices.

You Monster!: Reacts in this way if you don't accept his surrender. Given that he would've tried to kill you anyway, it sorta rings hollow.

Davaeorn

"So. The stoic adventurers have found their way down to my lair..."

Voiced by: Gregg Berger

The overseer of the Iron Throne's hidden Cloakwood iron mine, who serves as the Climax Boss of the chapter involving storming the mine and putting it out of business.

Cain and Abel: His good brother, The Surgeon, can be found wandering the coastline healing people in an attempt to make up for the harm Davaeorn has wrought.
The Dragon: To Rieltar, being the one who coordinates the entire iron shortage plan from the field.
Evil Sorcerer: He is a level 11 mage, and the highest-level foe you've met up until that point. He also remains in that position for most of the game.
"Get Back Here!" Boss: His fight involves him teleporting between the rooms of his lair and bombarding you with spells while you try to catch up (he's immune to regular missiles) and run into the myriad traps he's planted in the corridors. He's not immune to magically charged missiles, however, and the game's Bizarre and Improbable Ballistics certainly help.
Neutral Evil: His In-Universe alignment.
Not So Stoic: Through his various combat taunts, Davaeorn quickly abandons his stoicism once the battle starts.
Self-Made Orphan: According to his brother, Daveorn killed their father.
Teleport Spam: He frequently uses the Dimension Door spell to move around his lair.
The Stoic: His comment upon first encountering you sounds downright bored.

Korlasz

"Everything was going to be different. Sarevok was going to change the world. I gave everything to his cause, and YOU destroyed it all."

A necromancer who worked for Sarevok and offered him her family's tomb as a hideout. She leads the remnants of his followers after he falls at the hands of Charname.

Know When to Fold Them: If you rough her up enough, she surrenders. Although then you'll have to fight her again in the Duchal palace.
Necromancer: Her minions include all kinds of undead.
Out Of Context Villain: She only appears after Sarevok is dead, but she has nothing to do with the current threat of Caelar and the Crusade.
The Remnant: Refuses to give up fighting even though Sarevok is dead.
Starter Villain: Of the Siege of Dragonspear campaign, although she works for Sarevok and the Iron Throne, not Caelar and the Crusade.

The Shining Crusade

Hephernaan

Caelar's right-hand man and chief of her clergy. From the start, it's pretty clear that compared to The Shining Lady, he's not so pure of heart.

The Dragon: To Caelar. Or so she thinks. He's actually Belhifet's Dragon, and a fanatically devoted one at that.
Evil Is Hammy: Usually speaks in a calm, icy tone, but he starts hamming it up after the reveal that he's a devoted servant to a moderately powerful devil.
Foreshadowing: That spans two different series. His character model is a recolored version of Revered Brother Poquelin from BG's sister game franchise, Icewind Dale. Poquelin's true form is a devil named Belhifet, who is incidentally Hephernaan's master. Even though not many people foresaw that twist, it should at least hint that there is something off about Caelar's adviser if you've played IWD.
Hate Sink: They say that Caelar Argent is a decent woman, so maybe her advisers are evil. It's immediately obvious that Hephernaan is co-opting the Shining Crusade to his own ends, while generally being cruel, sinister and doing things Caelar would never approve of if she knew about them. Even with the grim reveals about her true character, she is ultimately portrayed as a self-aware Tragic Villain who takes responsibility for her actions and accepts the damnation she deserves, while all Hephernaan does is gloat, mock her and you, and ultimately die a Karmic Death no matter which path you take.
Karmic Death: If you don't convince Caelar to join you during the final battle, he dies at the hands of his master at the request of the woman he manipulated and ultimately betrayed. If you do, he either dies at her hands or those of the Bhaalspawn whose blood he used to open the portal to Avernus in the first place.
Lawful Evil: In service to the high-ranking baatezu lord Belhifet, this is his in-universe alignment.
Obviously Evil: At every possible opportunity, the game drops hints that Hephernaan is not to be trusted. Just look at his character page!
Rewarded as a Traitor Deserves: Becomes the victim of this courtesy of Caelar, but only if you are unable to redeem her. Her condition is that Belhifet kill him in exchange for her service as a blackguard. Belhifet, of course, accepts with absolutely no hesitation.
Smug Snake: If you had any doubts about whether or not the Shining Crusade was too good to be true, here's Hephernaan to remove all doubt the instant he opens his mouth.
Treacherous Advisor: Caelar was but a pawn in his plan to use divine blood to literally unleash hell on Toril. After Caelar's blood, several generations removed, proves not to be strong enough to open the portal, Hephernaan turns his attention to the Bhaalspawn.
Villainous Breakdown: "Master! No! You cannot just cast me aside!"

Irenicus's Allies

Bodhi

Definitely a good guy.

"You are becoming an impressive pest, one I am finding difficult to ignore!"

Voiced by: B. J. Ward

Bodhi is the vampire guildmaster of a rival thieves' guild in Amn that has arisen to challenge the Shadow Thieves' stranglehold on the local underworld, leading to open warfare in the streets at night. She's also the absolutely evil sister of Jon Irenicus. When she lost her soul to the elves like her brother, she tried to compensate by intentionally getting inflicted with vampirism, which didn't work perfectly but did give her a certain edge in undeath. Unlike Irenicus, who despises his shortened lifespan (or "death sentence," as he calls it), Bodhi has come to revel in her newfound mortality, delighting in its urgency.

Her brother believes the elf within Bodhi has come to despise the creature she has become, but nonetheless she proves a formidable opponent for Charname.

Affably Evil: She's always polite and (seemingly) honest, speaking with a calm and pleasant voice even when sentencing you to death for her own amusement or abducting your lover with her vampire posse before your eyes. When you do finally go to confront her, she seems more weary of having to cross paths with you than anything else, and attempts to engage in casual conversation with you right 'til the end. Just how much of it is faked, if any, is unclear.
Black-and-Grey Morality: The black to the Shadow Thieves' grey. Worth mentioning that even Bodhi's tasks during the guild war often give you an "evil" and "less evil" option.
Blood Knight: She revels in primal bloodshed, indulging fully in her vampiric appetites.
Bond Villain Stupidity: Her desire to "hunt" the Bhaalspawn results in your Superpowered Evil Side being released and you escaping. Whoops.
Chaotic Evil: Her in-universe alignment.
Dark Action Girl: Most bosses in this series rely on magic or powerful special abilities, but not Bodhi. She's just a very powerful physical combatant who can kill even the strongest characters with a few normal attacks.
The Dragon: Irenicus's longest-serving, most trusted ally... which isn't saying much on his part, but she does seeem to want to help him, even if their priorities no longer match.
Dragon with an Agenda: She's loyal to Irenicus, but unlike her brother she still derives some pleasure from life — or rather unlife, as her solution to the problem of Age Without Youth was to become a vampire. In her case, this manifests as a desire to commit acts of wanton cruelty that Irenicus doesn't condone out of expedience, and causes Bodhi to screw with the party in elaborately lethal ways simply for her own personal amusement.
Despair Gambit: Bodhi's attempt to kidnap and turn Charname's love interest is this, since by then Charname has plowed through the Underdark and the loss of their soul to find her. She even refers to Charname as an "impressive pest" and hopes to break their spirit by harming their love interest instead. The gambit fails, either because the love interest (if an EE character) fends off the attack or Charname goes after Bodhi and takes her and her guild out.
Enemy to All Living Things: Most other vampires in the story can pass rather easily for human, but everyone who encounters Bodhi is deeply unnerved by her unnatural air.
Exploring the Evil Lair: You can explore hers in peace if you take her side in the guild war. And not so peacefully if you don't.
Flat Character: Irenicus believes her original motives have been simplified, citing her vampirism and overwhelming taste for blood as the cause.
For the Evulz: Irenicus is motivated by ambition and a desire for revenge. Bodhi, on the other hand, just revels in killing and maiming. Irenicus lampshades her lack of complexity as a character at one point by saying that her hunger for blood has overwhelmed even her desire for vengeance.
Half-Truth: If you take her side in the guild war, she admits up front that Irenicus is her brother and that her immediate goals include reuniting with him. She just leaves out the part about being on his side and luring you in to be captured, implicitly making it seem as though she and Jon are enemies.
- She also takes this approach in Spellhold's insanity dungeon. She tells you that she'll spare your life and give you a chance to fight for it if you run the gauntlet, which is true... but she tries to kill you anyway once you reach the exit, saying that she had no intention of letting you leave alive.
Hunting the Most Dangerous Game: Bodhi enjoys stalking and killing mortals, which leads directly to the lapse into Bond Villain Stupidity mentioned above.
Ignored Enamored Underling: She, of all people, is implied to have one in her personal Dragon, Cohn Ta'Glaen.
I Have Your Wife: Bodhi kidnaps whoever you're having a romance with to demoralise you and turns them into a vampire. This happens to all original love interests (Aerie, Anomen, Jaheira and Viconia) and some mod writers also included this in their romance mods as well. The Enhanced Edition characters (Dorn, Hexxat, Neera and Rasaad) all evade capture in their own unique way. Dorn will either shrug off the attack with his class abilities or be protected by his patron Ur-Gothoz, Hexxat is a vampire already, so no luck there, Neera initially tries to invoke He Is Not My Boyfriend before wild surging away temporarily and Rasaad puts his Sun Soul skills to proper use, driving the vampires off.
Lady Macbeth: In her backstory. It's suggested that Bodhi was the one who encouraged Irenicus' move to The Dark Side, in what was probably (and hopefully) a non-romantic way.
Large Ham: Good thing she has fangs, because she certainly likes to chew the scenery.
Like Brother and Sister: She and Irenicus constantly refer to themselves as siblings, but it's never made clear whether this is literally true or not.
Bodhi: Irenicus is the only remnant of family that I have. We have survived through different means, but he is, for all intents and purposes, my brother.
Mercy Lead: Sorta. When Bodhi releases the party into the Spellhold maze so that she can hunt them, she declares she'll come after them after a certain unspecified amount of time. In an unmodded game, she doesn't decide time's up until the party reaches a certain specific area of the dungeon, which could be quickly or after quite a long while.
Motive Decay: Her backstory suggests fairly complex goals and motivations, but as noted above by the time of the games she comes across as pretty much a standard Murder!Death!Kill! villain who's in it purely For the Evulz.
- Irenicus's journal notes that this is a direct result of her becoming a vampire, and he thinks less of her for it, saying that she used to be a lot more complicated.
Obviously Evil: Obvious at a glance (some of the good-aligned party members will outright leave the group if you choose to side with her), though if you take her side in the guild war it's even beyond that. Joining her means you get to use her hideout as a result; its denizens are brusque, rude, and dismissive towards you, with spellbound mortal thralls wandering around in a pitiable trance. There's blood pumping into the room's fountains and baths from its lower levels, and that small matter of a massive torture chamber bathed in drained blood Bodhi makes no effort to hide from you. Probably justified in that picking her side is taking the greater of two evils anyway.
Our Souls Are Different: Like Irenicus, she's missing hers.
Our Vampires Are Different: At her core, Bodhi is a Dark Action Girl with impressive manipulative abilities and a literal lust for blood; that's it. Despite what her outfit and voice might suggest, she is not seductive, nor is she interested in sex at all.
Recurring Boss: Depending on the player's choices you'll have to fight her either twice or three times over the course of the game; she's only really a serious threat in the third encounter however as the first two are scripted to end after a few rounds.
The Starscream: Subverted. She doesn't hide her relation to Irenicus from you, but she does imply that she intends to betray him while he's weakened for her own purposes. It's bullshit, however; she's fully loyal to her brother and playing you for a fool.
Stripperific: Has a thing for revealing black leather.
Torture Cellar: She's got one in her hideout.
Underestimating Badassery: She does it to CHARNAME in Spellhold, and it comes back to bite her. A lot of the fandom does it to her, too. She's often decried as stupid and/or Too Dumb to Live, yet Bodhi is established as a pretty capable chessmaster the first time you meet her, making good (and surprisingly accurate) points and observations about your current employer; she reveals just enough to get you on side, but never enough to compromise her agenda. Regardless of whether you pick her side in the guild war (which, for all intents and purposes, she wins if you do), she ends up terrorizing the vastly more copious Shadow Thieves with her machinations.
The Vamp: Became one in the novels. In the game, despite her choice of clothes and status as a vampire, Bodhi never displays attraction towards the player (or anyone else for that matter) and shows no interest in sex; indeed, she never even brings the idea up, nor are you given the opportunity to ask about it. Another thing the novels got wrong.
Villainous Breakdown: Has one after she's defeated and realizes that Imoen's soul won't be hers for much longer. She abandons the fight and retreats into her nearby coffin to regenerate, though is staked and killed for good, losing her stolen soul in the process.
No! NO! It's mine! This life is mine!

Other Foes

Saemon Havarian

See Baldur's Gate "Friends".

Gods and Demons

Bhaal

Perhaps you lose yourself in the end, but you will go to greater reward than you can know...

"YOU CANNOT RUN FROM ME! YOU CANNOT RUN FROM YOURSELF! I AM THE BLOOD! I AM THE INSTINCT!"

Voiced by: Michael Dorn (Shadows of Amn), Kevin Michael Richardson (Throne of Bhaal) and Doug Cockle (Baldur's Gate III)

The former (now deceased) god of murder and assassins, Bhaal is the main character's (and Imoen's, Sarevok's, and a load of others) father. An unapologetically evil deity, he had premonitions of his death and created a plan: he'd invest his essence into his half-mortal children, let them grow up and die, and their essences, combined with his high priestess' efforts, would resurrect him. Bhaal spends most of the games as an Enemy Within and never enters the stage directly, but both the first game and Throne of Bhaal involve cleaning up pieces of his legacy.

Abusive Parent: He regards the lives of his children as without any meaning; they were only conceived so that after his death, Bhaal's essence within them could be released in order to return him to life. Because of this, he ordered his cultists to sacrifice them all shortly after they were born.
Archnemesis Dad: To all the Bhaalspawn, even the evil ones. He hated them all with equal measure.
An Arm and a Leg: The vision of his death in Siege of Dragonspear shows him missing an arm, likely a result of his ongoing fight with Cyric and his party.
Black Eyes of Evil: His human appearance in Siege of Dragonspear possess these, as can be seen above. He otherwise only appears in the form of a Raven (which has black eyes by default), Imoen (which has normal-looking eyes), or The Slayer (whose eyes are never shown to the player) during the main game.
The Corrupter: He is behind the player's dreams in the first game (and the second). It's implied by Sarevok's journal that he attempted to drive all his children down a dark path in this manner, and enough listened to create a genuine crisis.
Disappeared Dad: He only stuck around in the lives of his children's mothers long enough to conceive, then slunk off to make more.
Dropped a Bridge on Him: Though he's set up as a huge force to be reckoned with throughout the series, and his long-sewn plots and machinations drive a lot of the story, his high priestess summarily betrays him and usurps his place as the ultimate Big Bad. Bhaal himself remains largely dormant throughout the entire series, showing up only in your dreams.
Enemy Within: In the second game. First game, too, but less explicitly.
Extreme Omnisexual: Humans, elves, dwarves, halflings, and gnomes? He'll make no distinction. Orcs? Giants? Dragons? You bet. Goblins, kobolds, chinchillas? Without hesitation.
God Is Evil: The in-game Fictional Document "The Dead Three" tells the story on how the Dead Three — Bane, Myrkul and Bhaal — divided the portfolio of the old god Jergal between them. Bane chose to become the ultimate tyrant of the living, becoming the God of Tyranny, Strife, Fear and Hatred, which Jergal treated as merely inevitable parts of life but Bane leveraged as brutally as possible. Myrkul became the God of the Dead, which Jergal had, again, treated as a neutral portfolio but Myrkul chose to be a dick about it. Finally, Bhaal chose Death itself as his portfolio, but only took direct stewardship over Murder, the only interpretation that is explicitly evil in all its aspects, becoming the patron god of assassins and murderers.
God Of Human Origin: A member of the Dead Three with Myrkul and Bane (also dead at the time of the game). A book found in the first game details their apotheosis, framing it in a way that made Bhaal seem like the most cunning of the three (as opposed to his canonical role as subservient to the other two).
Greater-Scope Villain: He's the ultimate source and cause of the games' main conflict, but posthumously so. His more prominent "children" and villains with an interest in Bhaal's power are what drive most of the plot, and he's usurped by his high priestess on the cusp of making his return in Throne of Bhaal. And, while not the direct force at play in the progression of the plot, he is still very much present in Baldur's Gate 3 through both Orin and the Dark Urge as new Bhaalspawn who both play a role in his plans to re-emerge once more and can potentially invoke a hijacking of the plot if allowed to by the player.
Guinea Pig Family: Bhaal doesn't view his children as much more as Soul Jars.
Karmic Death: The god of murder and assassins was... Stabbed in the back.
Kick the Dog: Played for Laughs. He once dropped an enchanted hammer on his toe, spent the next week jumping around and swearing, and kicked his imp butler Cespenar all the way to Baator. Said butler recalls it as a pretty bad week, all in all.
Lawful Evil:invoked His canonical alignment.
Legacy Immortality: Literally. His children hold his essence that will allow him to resurrect. It's essentially the same gambit as Bane used, except Bane put all his stock in one vessel. Bane eventually came back. Bhaal... had a bit more trouble with it.
Let's You and Him Fight: It's Bhaal's influence that drives his children to kill each other.
O.O.C. Is Serious Business: In III, there's one Bhaalspawn running around that Bhaal adores. Said child is the Dark Urge, who was so cruel and violent and bloodthirsty Bhaal considers them his favorite child, even naming them his heir and telling them to wage bloody conquest in his name.
Parental Favoritism: According to Orin, the Dark Urge was Bhaal's favorite child. This is also why she wiped their memories and shoved a mind-flayer tadpole into their head. Given how the Dark Urge was a feared serial killer before losing their memories and Bhaal's bad habit of killing off his kids, they must have been extraordinarily fucked up and murder happy, even by normal Bhaalspawn standards.
Physical God: Sort of. Bhaal had been a nonphysical god, but during the pre-game Time of Troubles was forced to create a physical avatar like the rest of the pantheon, in which he died.
- And prior to the time of troubles as well, in order to father some of his more long-lived offspring like dragons and giants (and to a lesser extent, dwarves, gnomes, and elves).
Pet the Dog: No, you are not reading this wrong. In Baldur's Gate 3, he's noted to have Parental Favoritism toward the Dark Urge and even proclaims them as his champion toward the end of the game if they prove to be just as batshit insane as the rest of their siblings. Keep in mind that Bhaal has absolutely no problem in killing off his progeny, so the fact that he considers the Dark Urge his favorite child at all speaks volumes, albeit not in a good way.
Professional Killer: He was an assassin in life, and became the god of assassins.
Posthumous Character: He died twenty years before the start of the first game.
Voluntary Shapeshifting: He has no set appearance, and his form changes depending on the situation. In your dreams he appears as Imoen, Sarevok and Irenicus; in the Solar's exposition in your pocket plane, he appears as the Slayer. While creating the Bhaalspawn he had no set form either, and shifted shape multiple times as he impregnated female humans, dwarves, gnomes, halflings, orcs, giants, dragons and many other species in a massive Thanatos Gambit. As a descended mortal during the Time of Troubles he was stuck as an unkempt but intimidating human (possibly a copy of his human form before he became a god).

Belhifet

See the characters page for Icewind Dale for more details.

The Imprisoned One

Demogorgon, the Prince of Demons

"DEMOGORGON IS FREE! DEATH MY SCEPTER AND PAIN MY CROWN! THE PRINCE OF DEMONS WILL LOOSE SWEET DESTRUCTION!"

Voiced by: Jim Cummings

A demon prince locked away by Helm, god of duty, in Watcher's Keep. Demogorgon serves as the series' ultimate boss, in a shared dungeon which can be accessed from both Shadows of Amn and Throne of Bhaal.

Tropes associated with Demogorgon include the following:

Chaotic Evil: As a demon, this is his In-Universe alignment.
Demon Lords and Archdevils: As a demon prince, he's very nearly a god.
Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: You can fight and defeat him, but the Watcher makes clear it will just make him reform in the Abyss.
Early-Bird Cameo: Appears as a statue in the Underdark in Shadows of Amn, where the player can sacrifice a summon to him and awaken his "children" (demon knights).
Evil Is Hammy: The quote above gives you a pretty good idea of what his idea of being a demon lord entails.
He Who Must Not Be Named: Until (and unless) you meet him face to face, he is only ever referred to as the Imprisoned One, never Demogorgon. Considering that demon lords can often hear their names when they are spoken, it is well justified.
Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Throughout the bonus dungeon, everyone refers to him as "The Imprisoned One"; nobody speaks his actual name up till the very end.
No Indoor Voice: His few lines are in ALL CAPS.
Optional Boss: Killing him actually releases him from his prison and sends him back to the Abyss, so reinforcing his prison and avoiding a fight is the optimal solution. You can still kill him if you want.
Our Demons Are Different: Always Chaotic Evil, and supernatural exemplars of both chaos and evil, they inhabit the infinite, many-layered plane of the Abyss and are locked in an endless war with the Lawful Evil devils of the Nine Hells. Demons can look like almost anything — Demogorgon has two mandrill-like heads and multiple tentacle-like arms.
Pragmatic Villainy: When you reach him, he doesn't attack. He in fact tries reasoning with you instead, explaining that you just walked into a trap set by the Knights of the Vigil. Even if you proceed to cast the spell to reinforce his bonds, trapping you inside the keep with him, the Imprisoned One still won't turn hostile, and will in fact use his power to help you escape. He doesn't do either out of any generosity; he's just hoping you'll either lead to his release or at least seek vengeance on the knights who imprisoned him, and killing you gets Demogorgon nothing.
Sealed Evil in a Can: Watcher's Keep being that can. It's notable in that both Helm and his worshippers want to keep the Imprisoned One imprisoned, since killing him only means he'll just reform in the Abyss and be free to continue his reign of evil in there.
Villains Never Lie: He doesn't attack immediately; instead, he tells you what's really going on in Watcher's Keep and points out you've been manipulated by the Knights of Vigil from the start. As it turns out, he's telling the complete truth.

Characters / Baldur's Gate: Foes

Big Bads

Sarevok Anchev

Jon Irenicus

The Five

Illasera the Quick

Yaga-Shura

Sendai

Abazigal

Balthazar

Amelyssan the Blackhearted

Caelar Argent

The Iron Throne

Rieltar Anchev

Tamoko

Angelo Dosan

Winski Perorate

Tazok

Mulahey

Davaeorn

Korlasz

The Shining Crusade

Hephernaan

Irenicus's Allies

Bodhi

Other Foes

Gods and Demons

Bhaal

Demogorgon, the Prince of Demons

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Index

Next

Characters / Baldur's Gate: Foes

Edit Locked

Big Bads

Sarevok Anchev

Jon Irenicus

The Five

Illasera the Quick

Yaga-Shura

Sendai

Abazigal

Balthazar

Amelyssan the Blackhearted

Caelar Argent

The Iron Throne

Rieltar Anchev

Tamoko

Angelo Dosan

Winski Perorate

Tazok

Mulahey

Davaeorn

Korlasz

The Shining Crusade

Hephernaan

Irenicus's Allies

Bodhi

Other Foes

Gods and Demons

Bhaal

Demogorgon, the Prince of Demons

Previous

Index

Next