Awesome / Baldur's Gate III

Warning: Spoilers Off applies to Awesome Moments pages.

General

• The game's intro cinematic. As a nautiloid ship launches a raid on Baldur's Gate, a trio of Kith'rak appear from a portal and go to town on the illithid's vessel, tearing a tentacle, causing fiery damage and forcing to hightail it out there, first into a cold ravine, then into Avernus itself. And the ship barely manages to fight back. It does unhorse a rider over Baldur's Gate, but their dragon partner catches them mid-fall and even the one who is caught by the crumbling cliff is implied to escape.
• Defeating the goblin scout party at the gates of the Emerald Grove without losing any allies is definitely one for the player, especially if they got a poor initiative order.
• An alternative good ending to the "Save the Emerald Grove" questline is to spill the location of the Grove to Minthara, then free Halsin so you and he can run back to the Grove to warn everyone, basically luring Minthara and her goons into a trap. The next day, as the goblins arrive to the newly fortified entrance, you blow the warhorn to signal it's battle time and Zevlor gives a Rousing Speech to everyone that's there ready to fight. Minthara then talks to you via Tadpole and tells you to kill Zevlor and open the gates, and you basically tell her to pound sand. What follows is an epic final battle between the Goblins and the Tieflings; the latter of which have lived in fear of the former long before you arrived. And with your help, they can not only get through this fight victorious, but deathless.
• Most of the background inspiration you get is for doing things in character (like discovering secrets as a sage). However, the soldier more often than not gives you inspiration simply for feats of extreme badassery.
  No one left behind: Ensure all grove defenders survive the first goblin assault.
  A headless horde: Kill every leader in the goblin camp.
  One for the ages: Survive a fight in which you kill ten or more enemies.
• Successfully freeing every prisoner in Moonrise Towers without alerting the guards. You sail back into Last Light with almost a dozen newly-freed tieflings and deep gnomes, reuniting loved ones and friends, with the Cult of the Absolute none the wiser to your involvement in the breakout.
• The Nightsong breaking free of her prison and subsequent Transformation Sequence
  Our Lady of Silver, Hear me!
  She Who Guides, the Moonmaiden Selûne -
  MOTHER OF THE SO-CALLED NIGHTSONG.
  THE NIGHTSONG IS NO MORE!
• In Act 3, after Raphael, the devil, who spends the whole game gloating and taunting you with the dark promise of salvation, you and the party finally has enough and confronts the devil in his lair in order to steal a MacGuffin, After summoning the hellgate that leads you to his lair, you and your party begin what is essentially a heist in Hell. Eventually, it all culminates in a climactic showdown between the party and a very pissed-off Raphael, who is incensed at the audacity of you invading his home to steal from him and finally outwitting him. After a battle where Raphael sings his own villain song, you emerge victorious. Comments made by your allies like Hope and The Emperor made it clear that this quest was a suicide mission. One that you succeeded in conquering against all odds.
• Successfully rescuing every prisoner held in the Iron Throne and getting all of them and your whole party past the constantly-spawning Sahuagins to the submersible before the prison self-destructs; which, going by standard D&D rules of 6 seconds per round, is all done in less than a minute. Bonus points if you rescued the Duke after having Wyll break his pact, making Mizora interfere with the rescue.
• You can encounter Sarevok, the Big Bad from the original game, and slay him in combat just like the heroes of the original games. In fact, if you bring Jaheira and/or Minsc, you are essentially recreating the epic battles of those games. Not that your other accomplishments up until this moment were for nothing, but defeating the original villain truly puts you shoulder-to-shoulder with the other heroic legends of the series.
• Speaking of villains, each of the Chosen of the Absolute get their moments.
  • General Ketheric Thorm is a terrifying presence throughout Act 2, with you having to weather the treacherous Shadow-curse that he wrought on the lands, meaning that you're literally spending hours of the game under his shadow. Then, of course, there's the moment where he's condemning the goblin forces for their failure, and one of them impales him in desperation...only for him to completely No-Sell the attack, hand the goblin her weapon, and tell her to try again. It becomes abundantly clear at that point that this man cannot be taken down by conventional means.
  • Orin the Red is a gleefully unhinged maniac who makes no secret of her desire to kill everyone and everything if given the chance, to the point that she terrifies both Ketheric and Gortash, and managed to usurp and utterly ruin the Dark Urge, who had been Bhaal's favorite child and among the most dangerous villains in the Sword Coast. She proves to be an adept Master of Disguise in Act 3, and will likely make a fool of first (or even second) time players many times over when she reveals herself after appearing as just another background NPC you chatted up. She also delivers a brutal humiliation to your party by successfully kidnapping one of your companions and impersonating them before revealing herself, showing that she's not to be taken lightly. One of her standout moments, however, has to be her final confrontation with the Dark Urge, where she takes their form, and cruelly recounts the moment that she backstabbed and mutilated Bhaal's favored child, all so she could prove herself the true inheritor of Bhaal's design. She definitely learned his lessons well.
  • Gortash stands out among the Chosen as the most shrewd and cunning of the bunch, meticulously manipulating events so that he'll come out on top as a Villain with Good Publicity and be seen as a savior of the people. Such is his capacity for restraint and pragmatism that he immediately extends an olive branch to the Player Character and offers them a piece of his pie if they just cooperate with him. And shockingly, he means every word. Not only does the Emperor vouch for him, you can read into his thoughts yourself by clearing a skill check, and Gortash really is a Skippable Boss you can work with right up to the end. He respects you and everything you've accomplished, and expects you to respect yourself in kind, as the one time he tries to pull one over on you, he wants you to stand your ground and refuse to cave. This can result in him standing beside you and your party as you finally confront the Absolute, all of you united in a common goal. If it wasn't for the Absolute outmaneuvering him, he could've succeeded in his plans without once making an enemy of you.
• The Absolute revealing how she'd manipulated the events of the game to her favor during the confrontation at the Morphic Pool. Her enslavement with the Crown of Karsus, the Emperor leveraging the artifact to free you from its enthrallment, the Cult's efforts to take the artifact back...all of it played right into her hands, and she's now gloating about how there's nothing you can do to stop her. And there really is nothing you can do...all the skill checks you're presented with won't amount to much, having Gortash by your side only results in him getting unceremoniously killed, and if it wasn't for the Emperor improvising a hasty rescue, your entire party would've been wiped out then and there.
• If you didn’t trust the Emperor, the confrontation with him in the Prism when you have the Orphic Hammer can qualify as this. You have the means to free Orpheus and finally have the chance to confront and free yourself from the mind flayer who manipulated you the whole time, watching as all his lies and manipulations come back to bite him in the ass. You get to confront him about every single one of his lies. You get to be more than the ‘puppet’ he called you earlier, avenge Ansur and Duke Stelmane and forge an alliance with Orpheus who treats you as a genuine ally, even after all he’s been through. Starting a chain of events that will destroy both Vlaakith and the Grand Design.
• The final confrontation against the Netherbrain lets you call on all the allies you've made during the entire story, complete with an epic speech.
• The various Talking the Monster to Death solutions where you can successfully outwit powerful beings just by being clever. Whether it be convincing a demon to kill himself in an attempt to get out of a contract, having an undead doctor be stabbed to death by his own nurses, or drinking a bloated corpse under the table until he explodes. Violence isn't always the answer and often the alternative is awesome, if not hilarious.
• At the beginning of Act 3, a mercenary attempts to threaten you with her ties to The Guild. you have the option to intimidate her by saying "I just killed an Avatar of Myrkul. I'm pretty sure I can take you." Provided the check succeeds, she realizes you're dead serious, says she'll forget this conversation ever happened, and immediately leaves.
• For those who've been using their Illithid Powers without complaint or hesitation, the option to truly become a Mind Flayer near the end of Act 3 would be one. Taking what should've been a curse, your immutable fate to become Illithid and lose your will, and turning it into the very thing that will allow you to both defeat (Or dominate) the Netherbrain and keep your will and sense of self all the while is truly awesome, taking Screw Destiny to another level.
• The conclusion of the quest "Gather Your Allies", if you've managed to recruit as many allies as you possibly could. Flaming Fist, City Watch, Harpers, Hellriders, Gur, Guild assassins and Ironhand gnomes will deploy in the field for the final battle at your command, both the fiery arsenal of Ramazith's Tower and Kith'rak Voss' dragonfire can be unleashed upon the illithid invaders, and you can be joined in battle by your fully-grown and now-armored owlbear cub, Dame Aylin, Yurgir and Mizora. Even Volo contributes through "Volo's Guide to Monsters", giving everyone bonuses to their attack, saving throw and ability check rolls.
• The game itself - a game where choices do matter. Even the smallest decisions can have cascading ramifications, such as saving Arabella from Kagha, or looking at something you noticed via perception checks and may have initially thought unimportant. That is not even including how your backgrounds, classes and races all matter. Beyond that, the world is truly interactive. When a player goes “why not?”, the game says “go for it”. The developers have made a game that truly captures the essence of a TTRPG.

The Dark Urge

• The fact that by fighting your way through the game, you are proving that you are every bit as powerful as you were before your ‘bloody disgrace’.
• When confronting Orin, Bhaal will demand a duel, the truest 1v1 in the game. Orin is not the boss. YOU are.
• If playing as a Dark Urge who has successfully resisted their murderous impulses, then towards the end of the game Bhaal himself will confront you, clearly furious that you've been defying his will as one of his children. He gives you one final chance to embrace being a Bhaalspawn and entering his service once more, but you can tell him to screw off, proving once and for all that you are not a slave to your impulses. This in turn leads to another awesome moment for Withers of all people. Enraged by your defiance, Bhaal strips you of his divine blood, killing you in the process. After he leaves, Withers proceeds to resurrect you because he was simply that impressed by your determination to fight against your murderous urges. Keep in mind, resurrecting a Bhaalspawn is supposed to be impossible due to their souls going to Bhaal upon death, but Withers is able to do so effortlessly.
  • It gets better. Withers is all but confirmed to be an Avatar of Jergal, the god who initially ascended the Dead Three to godhood. You as the Dark Urge tell your father, who is a literal god, to fuck off and thus ruin all of his plans for world domination after having destroyed his entire worship base in Baldur’s Gate. Bhaal has a temper tantrum and reclaims his blood, only for Jergal himself, the deity equivalent of your grandfather in essence, to resurrect you as his Chosen instead, in the heart of Bhaal’s own temple.
  • The reason you’re able to be resurrected? Because you’ve built a life away from Bhaal over the course of your travels. Bhaal literally created your character as a killing machine, but your character said screw destiny and defied him, and Bhaal couldn’t anything about it.
    • It gets even better still when you realise that your character is implied to be researching ways to prevent Bhaal ever coming back in the epilogue. Bhaal tried to create the ultimate destroyer but ended up making his greatest mortal enemy, a warrior who has bested gods, burned away the taint in their blood with their own courage and conviction and has an intimate knowledge of how Bhaal operates. His ultimate Foil.
  • Your new title after defying your Urge and redeeming yourself? Challenger of Gods. You have become strong enough to defy and defeat gods throughout the course of your playthrough. Ask Bhaal, Myrkul and Shar.
• The ending when you reject Bhaal, keep your humanity and destroy the Netherbrain. You’re free of the tadpole, free of Bhaal and the Dark Urge, able to forge a new life with the companion you grew to love over the course of your travels. Truly redeemed, having saved the world from the Grand Design and The Dead Three. Able to live the life you want to lead after so long suffering.

Companions

Astarion

• Astarion has a chance to confront his former master in Cazador, and free himself from the Vampire Lord's grip once and for all.
  • Depending on what you do, Astarion can get Cazador Hoist by His Own Petard. What Cazador aims to do is use his multiple victims and the runes carved into their backs to become a Vampire Ascendant. Lucky for Astarion, using the mind tadpoles he and Tav both have, he can see the runes on his back and carve them into Cazador's flesh with a knife, setting the Vampire Lord up to be used in his own sacrifice.
  • Even if Astarion doesn't go through with the ritual, a Persuasion check allows him to get some Extreme Mêlée Revenge by stabbing Cazador over and over with the knife, to the point that not even a vampire's healing lets him come back from that.
  • Astarion violently yanking Cazador from the coffin and throwing him to the floor.
• Doubles as Heartwarming but the fact that with a relatively easy 18 Persuasion check, Astarion will give up ultimate power in favor of finding the good in himself and being better than Cazador. His adventures, and the friendship or love he had with you are enough to overshadow 200 years of pure misery, proving without any doubt that he always is far more than what Cazador made him to be.

Gale

• Gale is the only tadpoled companion with whom the player doesn't have an immediate, involuntary mental link — and if the player tries to force one, he can No-Sell it almost immediately because his mental defenses are just that good.
• As penance for his hubris, Gale can choose to use the orb in his chest to blow up the Absolute in a heroic example of Taking You with Me. This path is both a Heroic Sacrifice and Senseless Sacrifice if done too early, but it's clear Gale is willing to die if it means stopping the Absolute from wreaking more havoc in Baldur's Gate.
  Gale: One last gust of Weave. One last gale to end them all.
  • If Gale is convinced to sacrifice himself in Act 3, he scales up to the Netherbrain and introduces himself.
    The Netherbrain: Come to die? Come to kneel? Surrender and live - THRALL.
    Gale: Thrall? No, I think you're mistaken. The name's Gale of Waterdeep. A pleasure to make your acquaintaince. Though our time together will be exceptionally brief. Farewell, and happy landing.
• One puzzle in the Wyrmway is a lanceboard (chess) game you must win in two moves in order to progress. If long-established lanceboard player Gale is in your party, he solves it immediately and will tell you exactly what pieces to move where.

Karlach

• Should she be romanced, Karlach and Tav or the Dark Urge will return to Avernus to cool her Engine down with the knowledge they won't be returning to the Material Plane soon, if ever. Karlach realizes Zariel is going to throw everything at them, having time for a last smoke and happily reaffirms her feelings for her lover. She proceeds to draw her axe, say that this time she's not alone and with a last smile, charges into battle with the hero as a metal reprise of "By The River" plays.
• Karlach decides to test out a Cleric Interrogation Spell on your character, something that will allow her to see the truth behind intentions and words she describes. When you agree, and she casts it, the spell is such a success she gets the truth alright. She discovers that this isn't a failed casting, this was the spell being cast successfully for the very first time. She sees the world for what it truly is, and manages to commune with you. Not your character, You, the player. What follows is an awed yet excited conversation between her, and from her perspective, this entity of unfathomable existence that she's managed to claim the rarest of honors of interacting with by pure chance.
  Karlach: You speak like you know...but you don't know. They know. And I think I know now, too. I want to know what's coming. I want to know how this will end. Have you done this before?
  You: Well, I've journeyed to Baldur's Gate once or twice, if that's what you mean.
  • And it speaks volumes about the unbreakability of her willpower how Karlach witnesses this complete shattering of her perception of the entire world as she previously knew it, and somehow completely averts a case of Go Mad from the Revelation, if anything she seems to have become even stronger mentally from the revelation, especially if you tell her that you're having fun after she asks if you are.
  • Just to reiterate- Breaking the Fourth Wall in more serious games tends to cause serious mental problems- just look at Monica as a recent modern example. Yet Karlach views it with awe, and wonder, instead of shock and horror. It's hard to overstate what a magnificent response this is; no wonder Hell couldn't break her!

Shadowheart

• Shadowheart can defy Shar by choosing not to murder the Nightsong, who is actually an imprisoned Aasimar and daughter of Selûne.
• There's a puzzle in the Shadow Cursed Lands where you have to make saving throws against a few statues of Shar in order to unlock some goodies and get temporary (until Long Rest) stat boosts, and it's entirely possible to send Shadowheart to do this after Shar abandoned her. If you do, the narration notes that it's foolish to think you're entitled to her blessings after being cast out, and every saving throw is made with disadvantage as a result. If Shadowheart passes those saving throws anyway, the goddess she defied still gives those same rewards, as if giving credit where its due.
  Pass Wisdom Save: The strength of your conviction seems to confuse the statue. Incredibly, you are deemed worthy.
  Pass Intelligence Save: You feel a small pulse of energy race up your spine. Though out of favor with this place, your intellect has won you something.
  Pass Charisma Save: Confidence surges through you. You feel like there is nothing you can't do, no one you can't win over. Even this statue of your former goddess is temporarily swayed.
• At the end of her Selûnite arc, when Shadowheart finds her parents, Shar appears to taunt Shadowheart about how much of her suffering was the result of her own defiance. Shadowheart is having none of it.
  Shadowheart: Enough! I'm taking my parents away from here! I'm taking them away from you!
• She's then told that breaking Shar's curse on her and rescuing her parents are mutually exclusive; if she rescues her parents, she'll have to live with the agony of the wound on her hand for the rest of her life. If you pass a Persuasion Check^note or let her choose on her own after triggering a specific set of memories throughout the city prior to this, she decides that it's Worth It. Given that grief and loss are major parts of Shar's bailiwick, choosing to bear that pain to avoid the grief of losing her parents feels a lot like a final "Screw you" to Shar.
• The fact that the wound flaring up on Shadowheart’s hand after freeing her parents is basically Shar having a huge temper tantrum over all the ways Shadowheart made a fool of her throughout the game - freeing Nightsong, lifting the Shadow Curse, killing her cloister, freeing her parents, and finding her way back to Selûne in a fraction of the time Shar and her followers spent trying to corrupt her. That wound is basically the only bit of power Shar has left over Shadowheart, and she barely even has that, as the epilogue party makes it clear that Shadowheart refuses to let Shar have that satisfaction.
• The Dark Justiciar route also has a potential moment as Shadowheart enters the House of Grief to give her former Mother Superior the boot, as Viconia proves to be too self-absorbed and power-hungry to actually follow Shar's will and allow Shadowheart to succeed her. Shadowheart rallies the Sharrans against Viconia's trumped-up lies, and if you clear the appropriate speech checks, you can turn half of the entire room against her before the battle even begins. Viconia makes one last stand of defiance by belligerently claiming that she's killed her own followers once and can do it again...only to end up humiliated and at your mercy. In contrast to the Selunite path, this time Shadowheart decides on her own that Viconia is Not Worth Killing, and casually leaves her fate for you to decide.

Wyll

• Wyll can choose not to kill Karlach despite Mizora's orders, resulting in him being punished with a Forced Transformation - but making Mizora look like an utter fool in doing so.
• Being able to put Mizora through an epic Humiliation Conga - after being freed from Moonrise, Mizora will try to make Wyll sign his soul away for eternity to save his father. Wyll can break his pact in exchange for his father’s death - only for Wyll to save his father from the Iron Throne anyway and leave Mizora with nothing.

Halsin

• When he returns to the Emerald Grove, Halsin completely chews out Kagha over the Rite of Thorns and her treatment of the tiefling refugees if she's still alive, ranging from simply demoting her to a novice to outright exiling her depending on whether she killed Arabella or not.

Lae'zel

• Lae’Zel’s The Reason You Suck speech to Vlaakith when she learns about Orpheus’ existence. Vlaakith promises her everything she ever wanted yet she stands her ground and completely chews out Vlaakith for all her actions, pledging herself to Orpheus’ cause.

Minsc

• His introduction. Just as Glitterbeard finishes his cynical spiel that it's not legends, but those with gold and influence who truly have power, does Minsc burst from the mimic the dwarf trapped him in, and proceeds to toss it away, mid-sentence. It's as if the world itself wanted to demonstrate to the banker that, indeed, legends do have power, and he's standing in the presence of one. Notably, the mimic is rattling throughout the entire conversation up to the point where Minsc bursts out, making one of Glitterbeard's associates, who knows about the stories, increasingly nervous as the ranger within is clearly not succumbing to the trap specifically tailored by Nine-Fingers and the Guild to kill him.
  Glitterbeard: Stories. Tall tales and big names, lad - don't let them fool you. Elminster the archmage. Drizzt the drow exile. Heroes have power, aye - but not half so much as we do. A little coin into the right purse. A soft word in the right ear. It's not glory that spins these planes, lad - it's gold. See? Now-
  The mimic starts to shake, before Minsc's arm punches out and starts ripping it open to free himself.
  Glitterbeard: Moradin's cracked clay...
  • As one YouTube commenter put it:
  Glitterbeard's speech about the way the world works is true. The corrupt and the rich hold more power than most people can ever hope to grasp. Greed and money and foul play grease the cogs of every aspect of life. It's what makes normal life what it is.
  But Minsc isn't normal. Minsc is a hero. Minsc is a legend of the Forgotten Realms. His fist breaking through that mimic's jaws was like the beam of hope that illuminates darkness. The stories are real, heroes are real, and it takes far more than the mundane evils of the world to extinguish that.
• Before the final confrontation with the netherbrain, the party has an opportunity to give a rallying speech to their assembled allies. It's possible to let Minsc make the speech, which is surprisingly inspiring.
  Minsc: There was a time when my hamster counted every bootprint that I left behind me, whether it was in snow, mud, or evil's backside. Boo did this, because he knows the heart of Minsc, and he knew that a part of it was all those many steps behind us. In Rashemen. At home. Minsc could never count as high as Boo, so the number of steps became too large for him to hold in his head. Too large and too sad. But now Minsc knows the number. The number is none, because Baldur's Gate is my home, and it will not fall while Minsc and Boo still stand.

Epilogue

The Playable Epilogue in Patch 5 features some awesome moments, depending on how various characters' storylines were resolved.

• If she rejected Shar, Shadowheart is aware that as a high-profile apostate she is a prime target for Sharran assassins. She follows this up with an epic Blasé Boast that she knows every single one of their tactics and that they're welcome to Bring It. Her quiet self-assurance is a far cry from the rigid, terrified cleric originally met on the Nautiloid.
• If Wyll loses his warlock powers, it only renders him Brought Down to Badass, as he's still gleefully tangling with dragons, lich, and dinosaurs as an adventuring hero.
• After six months in Avernus, Wyll and Karlach (and potentially Tav/the Dark Urge) have found blueprints for a way of restoring Karlach's engine. If their plan goes well, they could return from the Hells after less than a year. Not bad, given how bittersweet an ending this was in the original release.
• Withers gets one if you attack the others at the party. A cutscene plays and he calls you out for attacking them, and creates a green portal to gods know where that drags Tav through it. Gale's not any safer if he is the God of Ambition, either.
  Withers: I shall not permit you to destroy one another, after all thou accomplished. Begone!
• While it is terrible for him personally, it is nonetheless impressive that Gale manages to ascend to godhood as the new God of Ambition, and already has shrines and temples across Faerun. He can even send Raphael running, if the party took him up on his deal for the Crown while still encouraging Gale to become God of Ambition.
• If Shadowheart chose to spare her parents at the cost of living with the wound on her hand for the rest of her life, the epilogue makes it clear just how small of a cost that was to her, despite describing the pain as excruciating earlier in the game; at least one of her passive dialog lines during the party has her react to the wound flaring up with "I'm going to enjoy myself, and you can't stop me. Back to the shadows with you." In fact, one exchange with a romanced Shadowheart implies that Shar has begun to realize that this torment is futile, as it's possible to comment that the flare-ups are becoming less common.