Characters / Pillars of Eternity — Other Party Members

Recruitable party members and sidekicks from Pillars of Eternity and Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire. For the Watcher and party members who can be recruited in both games, see here. For the main index, see here.

Pillars of Eternity Party Members

Durance

Durance

"Have you seen a man branded by flame? He remembers it always — in every waking moment. It is a lesson writ in the only ink and vellum that matters — blood and flesh."
Voiced by: Dave B. Mitchell

A meadow folk priest of Magran, Durance preaches the word of his goddess to any who pass by her flaming statue in Magran's Fork. Upon meeting the Watcher, he takes a particular interest in them, and more or less dragoons himself into the party to follow the Watcher around and subject them to his trials. Beneath his very embittered, gruff exterior, however, it seems he might have deeper reasons for following the Watcher...

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• Abhorrent Admirer: Implied to be one for Aloth's female Split Personality, Iselmyr. Aloth warns him that he cannot be held responsible for what she does if Durance calls her a "whore."
• Activist-Fundamentalist Antics: As evidenced by his actions during the Purges. He is very quick to judge people, and wish to pass judgement upon them.
• Break the Haughty: Durance loves doing this. It's how he frames his work on the Godhammer, and seems to be a large part of his reason for traveling with the Watcher. Yet if you complete his personal quest, it turns out he was the one who was broken — not even by the Watcher, but long ago, by his own misplaced faith.
  Durance: It brought the Saint's War to an end... knocked a god from his perch. There are a few that would deny Eothas... overstepped. The Godhammer reminded Eothas of it.
• Broke Your Arm Punching Out Cthulhu: It's obvious, even early on, that being involved in the development of Eora's first ever weapon of mass destruction and said weapon's apparent killing of a god has not been especially kind to Durance's psyche. Especially since Magran seemed to stop speaking to him afterwards, despite the Godhammer seemingly being her will. It is finally confirmed that his soul was damaged and altered by his participation in the Godhammer, so Magran cannot regonize him anymore.
• The Cameo: He receives a couple of nods in Deadfire — Aloth and Eder (unsurprisingly) remember him less than fondly, and if he threw himself on a pyre in his ending for the first game, Xoti mentions visions of a flaming skeletal priest striding the land. Then, in Beast of Winter, one possible solution has the Watcher do their best Durance impression while underneath a disguise spell in order to dupe one of his disciples inside the memory of Waidwen himself at Evon Dewr bridge, at the very moment of when the Godhammer was set off. Eder, if present, points out that there's no reason to expect to see the real Durance in the memory — he was probably miles away at Halgot, gloating and cackling.
• Carry a Big Stick: Joins with a staff with good reach that deals fire damage. Said staff is also full of runes hiding a special meaning...
• Comic-Book Fantasy Casting: And Grigoriy Rasputin as Durance.
• Combat Medic: He is perfectly able to hold his ground on the frontlines once correctly equipped. As a Magran priest, his unique talent (if picked) gives him a major boost in accuracy when using swords or arquebuses, making him perfectly suited for both close and ranged combat, and his numerous healing and buffing spells make him an invaluable asset.
• Crisis of Faith: Other characters in your party have an internal struggle with their faith, but Durance's story takes the cake by far. Events prior to your meeting led him to have a rather strained relationship with his goddess (who doesn't speak to him anymore). He's trying desperately — fanatically — to reconnect with her, but his opinion of her has fallen so far that he habitually calls her a whore. He can eventually discover that he was being used by his goddess, and that she intended him to die along the rest of the Dozen after killing Eothas in order to hide her hand in his death. The only reason he's still alive is because she no longer recognizes his soul, which was damaged following the explosion of the Godhammer. This revelation leads him to abandon his faith in Magran, and he intends to find and kill her personally at the end of the story.
  Durance: Not many can claim to have killed a god. It is a less... heroic tale than you would think. And such a death, it changed our faith. All faiths, I expect. Doubt followed. And the world changed...
• Deadpan Snarker: Love him or hate him, you have to admit Durance can turn a phrase.
  Durance: If doubts and curiosity plague you, you're skinning your knuckles on the wrong door.
• Decomposite Character: In early development, the party member Cadegund was to be a female, heavily-armored rifle-wielding priest of Magran. The final release features the male Durance as the Magranite priest while Kana Rua got the heavy armor and gun.
• Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: He was one of the architects of the Godhammer Bomb, and was instrumental in its development, deployment and use against Waidwen. If he finds out the truth about why Magran no longer speaks to him, he makes it extremely clear that he is going to do it again or die trying.
• Dirty Old Man: Makes quite a few lewd comments towards female party members, especially at the Salty Mast.
• Doesn't Trust Those Guys: He thinks most — if not all — Eothas worshippers and people from Aedyr are secretly plotting the downfall of Dyrwood.
• Downer Ending: If you don't convince Durance that he was just a pawn of Magran, he'll still be discontent and decide to burn himself alive.
• Driven to Suicide: As mentioned in Downer Ending, if you don't convince Durance he was used and cast aside by Magran, his continued discontentment will result in him committing suicide by self-immolation.
• Even Evil Has Standards: For all his numerous flaws, finding out that Magran conspired with Woedica and helped kill Eothas to prevent him from stopping the Hollowborn curse enrages him. Even he understands how destructive and monstrous the curse is.
• Evil Laugh: A guttural chuckle when he scores a crit.
• Fantastic Racism: A tremendous bigot. He's openly racist against all nonhumans, but has a particular disdain of orlans. Naturally, an orlan Watcher can call him out on this. He's also dismissive of worshipers of gods other than Magran, with a special hatred for those who worshiped Eothas — he proudly admits to having taken part in the Purges, even if Edér is in the party, although oddly he doesn't have anything in particular to say to an Eothasian Watcher, or vice-versa. He's contemptuous of foreigners in general, especially Aedyrans. And for good measure, he implies that he's taken part in violence against animancers in the past, too.
• Foreshadowing: Durance tags along with the Watcher to see if the latter's a "field to be put to flame." It's as much a reference to the Watcher as his own fate in his Downer Ending.
• Four-Temperament Ensemble: Choleric (hot-tempered and mission-focused).
• The Friend Nobody Likes: Pretty much every other party member, even Grieving Mother, sees fit to make jokes and quips at his expense. Edér doesn't appreciate his virulent hatred of Eothasians, Hiravias isn't exactly happy with his racism against orlans, Aloth doesn't appreciate Durance shaming him for not being "manly" enough nor does Iselmyr appreciate his Abhorrent Admirer tendencies, none of the women are keen on his misogyny and lechery... The Devil of Caroc, who's a serial-murdering robot, has an easier time getting along with the rest of the group, and even Kana, who otherwise has a good word for everybody — he tries to get Devil to sing folk songs for him — washes his hands of Durance. And to top it all off, in Deadfire during the Beast of Winter DLC, at one point you can magically disguise yourself as Durace to get information out of a Magranite Priest, but you have an option to not go through with it as even the Watcher doesn't want to subject themselves to having to pretend to be him.
• The Fundamentalist: Thoroughly obsessed with the rightness of his faith... and the wrongness of others', even fellow believers of Magran.
• The Gadfly: He's constantly digging for a reaction. Like Kreia or Ravel, however, the only opinion he really cares about is the Player Character's.
• Game-Breaking Bug: His quest was rather hard to trigger. Patches have since made it easier to unlock it.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation:
  • Somewhat oddly given the usual robustness of the dialogue system, he never comments on it if the PC is a priest of Eothas. Being a Watcher may override that.
  • While he is a priest of Magran, his goddess no longer communicates with him, which makes one wonder how he is still able to use his priest powers. The Watcher can actually lampshade this during one of his conversation with Durance, who replies the following:
    Durance: Eothas burned, yet his worshippers still suck power from his smoldering cock... [...] If I give my goddess offense, then I serve her according to her aspects.
• Gonk: He is noted to be rather hideous, having a pox-marked face as well as having bulging bug-eyes and being generally filthy.
• Healer Signs On Early: Can be found on the road in Magran's Fork, directly south of Gilded Vale, and is the third (permanent) party member you're likely to happen across after Aloth and Edér. He also starts off with two pieces of magical equipment, as something of a consolation prize for the fact that he's the only priest companion you can recruit.
• Heroic Spirit: As a Dyrwoodan human, he gets a +2 bonus to Resolve, same as Edér. YMMV as to how heroic he is, but this contributes to his starting Resolve of 19, one of the things which makes him as tough, powerful, and fanatical as he is.
• Heroic BSoD: The Watcher themselves can induce one in Durance if they know exactly what to say. In addition, after losing the connection to Magran that once drove him, Durance, presumably a high-ranking priest at the time, walked out of Ashfall Citadel with his burnt robes and staff and never looked back, effectively turning the last fifteen years of his life into this.
• Holier Than Thou: Very much so, as highlighted by his opinion of the Magran's priest of Defiance Bay. He seems to think that he alone has the right to test others and judge them as failures by his own standards. He even judges the goddess to whom he's devoted.
• Howl of Sorrow: If the Watcher manages to convince him that Magran had conspired with Woedica and planned for him to die among the other creators of the Godhammer, he lets out one in response at the realization that the Watcher is right and that his god has essentially cast him aside.
• Hypocrite: What he despises above all else. It's part of why he's so vocal and loud — he needs to convince himself of his own convictions, to keep his nagging doubts from eating away at them. Which is why Magran abandoning him for doing what he thought she wanted completely shattered his sense of self, and why when it turns out Magran killed the other eleven builders of the Godhammer after having convinced them it was right to begin with, it breaks him all over again.
  Durance: Do I value [Magran]? Why, I hold value in all whores — for a whore, their motivations are honest. And if one such as I who truly seeks to embody trials and purification, one such as I who basks in war... why, if I do not even dare to take that fight to the principles of a goddess and her chosen fires... I would bleed to death on my own hypocrisy.
• It's All About Me: Durance comes off as rather pompous and full of himself quite frequently, acting as a holier-than-thou character who despises everything and everyone who doesn't share his point of view, and he goes to great lengths to rationalize his most abject words.
• Jack of All Trades: Back-row caster or front-line off-tank, robes or plate mail, gun or sword, Durance's stat line and the Magran-specific Inspired Flame talent let him work well at any range. His Resolve of 19 also gives him one of the best base Deflection scores in the game.
• Jerkass: Durance is an unpleasant person to just about everyone, and he doesn't care what other people think of him.
• Knight Templar: He's firmly of the belief that all Eothasians must be purged, and has a history of putting many to the stake after the Saints War.
• Kill It with Fire: He is a priest of Magran, the goddess of war and fire, and he can be a little enthusiastic about punishing people by fire (not to mention he burned himself quite a few Eothasians at the stake during the purges). The unique talent for Magranite priests, Inspired Flame, also unlocks a lesser version of Burst of Autumn Flame.
• Kill the God: One of the twelve priests tapped by Magran to build the Godhammer Bomb, channeling their will into it to craft a weapon that could kill Waidwen. It worked. A little too well, in fact, so Magran killed the other eleven builders, while Durance escaped her notice thanks to the damage the bomb caused to his living soul. Deadfire confirms that Waidwen really was Eothas' avatar — it also confirms that he did in fact march on the Dyrwood to stop the Leaden Key plot, with killing him making absolutely certain that the Legacy would come to pass.
• Large Ham: A hellfire and brimstone preacher who speaks in a dramatically overwrought, didactic manner.
• Mad Eye: One of his eyes is visibly wider and offset compared to the other. Presumably a disfigurement brought on by the pox.
• Mad Oracle: Everything about his initial appearance, from his cryptic manner of speech to his disheveled appearance to the flames that light up the monument to his goddess points to Durance being this. Only for it to turn out that Durance is, if anything, even more lost and cut off from the gods than anyone.
• Man on Fire: In addition to his preference for killing others with fire, a possible ending for him has him committing suicide via Self-Immolation out of his growing discontent.
• Meaningful Name: Durance is both an archaic form of "endurance" as well as a term meaning restraint or imprisonment, such as in the phrase durance vile, meaning a very long prison sentence. Durance as a character both physically and especially mentally enduring (with his base 18 in Resolve), and has also been in something of a self-inflicted prison for the last fifteen years, living as a wandering fanatic in a desperate attempt to regain the attentions of his goddess. Made even more meaningful when it turns out that all his trials were never going to regain Magran's attentions in the first place.
• Might Makes Right: Firmly believes this, being a dedicated priest of Magran, the Goddess of War. He'll even tell an orlan Watcher to their face that their people deserved to get conquered and enslaved because they were too weak to fight off their attackers. He also criticizes Kana's attempts to promote peace and diplomacy to his people, since Durance considers Rauatai's militant conquests to be the only worthwhile thing about their entire culture.
• My God, What Have I Done?: Upon realizing that he was played by Magran and Woedica, he considers that Eothas might have actually been doing the right thing.
• Mythology Gag:
  • Durance wishes to speak of flames and burning...
  • "Many marks may I make upon your flesh, but flame leaves marks that cannot heal." Or, as the Unbroken Circle of Zerthimon would have it, "Steel marks flesh, but flesh cannot mark steel." Right down to the very foundation of Durance's beliefs turning out to be based on a lie.
• Nay-Theist: Due to the aftermath of the Godhammer and Magran seeming to abandon him, he has started referring to Magran as "whore". He still follows her religion, and is able to draw power from his belief. If you manage to complete his personal quest, he forgoes Magran completely after the ending. He makes it clear that he is continuing to use his priest powers only because you need them for beating Thaos, and that he intends to suck Magran dry while he still can.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: In his creation of the Godhammer, he's basically the Eoran equivalent of Oppenheimer, except rather than becoming like unto a god by killing countless mortals, he and the other twelve became the first mortals to kill a god — gods in this setting being made up of the soul energy of countless mortals.
• Not So Stoic: As you learn more about his past, it turns out most of his sermonizing is just that: practiced speeches delivered for effect, and as much for his own benefit as yours. Everything he's done, the Eothasian Purges, attacks against animancers, it's all just to try and find a way to recapture the sense of purpose he had when he was creating the Godhammer in the name of Magran, to try and recapture her attention. When he says that in spite of all that, the world he created seemed worse for his actions, not better, it's rather plaintive, and the Watcher's response leaves him, for the first time, at a loss for words.
• Oh, No... Not Again!: If brought along to Cayron's Scar to defeat the Eyeless army at the climax of the White March DLC, Durance can make a comment that reeks of this trope.
  Once more I am called upon to set right the gods' transgressions. *Sighs* It has become a tiring refrain.
• Only Known by Their Nickname: Durance is a self-applied title than a name. His real name is never given.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: At the end of Sagani's quest, when she finds out that Persoq reincarnated as a white stag that was fatally wounded by Glanfathan hunters, the narration describes Durance preparing to spew out one of his long tirades about her hunt being a waste of time, but upon seeing the look of terror and sheer frustration in Sagani's face, deciding to remain silent.
• The Pig-Pen: He's worn the same burned robes for fifteen years and has obvious pox-scars. Combine that with his general disdain for personal hygiene and most of the party can't bear to be around him.
• Playing with Fire: Magran is the goddess of fire, and all priests gain access to various spells which invoke the power of holy flame, with the basic Holy Radiance power causing Burn damage to Vessels (with its upgrade talent Brilliant Radiance causing it to deal Burn damage to all enemies). These are presumably the same flames he and his fellow priests channeled into the Godhammer, which singed his robes all those years ago. There's also the way that statue of Magran bursts into flames when you first meet him — that one's never fully explained. There's no reason Magran herself would do it for him, so perhaps it was just a theatrical touch on Durance's part.
• Politically Incorrect Hero: He hates every country that isn't the Dyrwood, scorns the worshippers for most of the gods, thinks Eothasians deserve to be put to the flame, is racist against Orlans, has misogynistic attitudes...there are very few people he's not bigoted towards.
• Principles Zealot: Durance is a fairly horrible person, but he at least tries to stick to his principles rather than be a hypocrite. To the point where he wants to put others of similar faith — even his goddess herself — to the test, to see if they live up to what they preach.
• Rage Against the Heavens: If you complete his sidequest, he will go after his former goddess in order to make her face his judgement. Considering that he actually successfully killed a god before, Magran has serious reason to worry.
• Roaring Rampage of Revenge: In one of his endings, after learning he was used by Magran in a plot orchestrated by Woedica, he forgoes being a priest of Magran and begun to think on how best to put Woedica to judgement.
• The Scream: Lets out one full of anguish when he finally realizes that his goddess basically betrayed him, and that he was a fool all along.
• Shut Up, Hannibal!: If the Watcher has completed Durance's personal quest and made him understand why Magran no longer speaks to him, then Thaos is left with no way to shock him.
• "Shaggy Dog" Story: He built a god-killing bomb because he believed it was the will of Magran, only for her to turn away from him when it was finished. He then spent the last fifteen years trying to regain his goddess's favor only for it to turn out the only thing stopping her from killing him to cover her tracks was a disfigurement of the soul caused by the very same weapon he once created in her name.
• Sinister Minister: Wild-eyed and disheveled in a ragged, singed robe, preaching fire and brimstone and scorched earth.
• Sole Survivor: Of the twelve priests of Magran who created the Godhammer, only he survived the aftermath.
• Token Evil Teammate: More like Token Jerkass Teammate. He's not evil per se. However, he is also the party member who prefers to dispense violence immediately, making people suffer if he thinks they deserve it. He happily joined in the Purges against the Eothasians following the Saint's War, and suggests he also took part in Dyrwood's various witchhunts against animancers. He believed what he was doing was all for a higher good, but as is is often the case with such characters, unlike your other party members, it's possible to dismiss Durance from your party permanently even after recruiting him.
• Would Hurt a Child: Doesn't consider the Hollowborn children to be alive, to be less than the animal-souled wichts and basically admits to having killed a few of Hollowborn infants during the Purges.
• Ungrateful Bastard: Not him. Magran. The only reason he's still alive was because his soul was different from it was before.
• Unwitting Pawn: Magran helped him and the rest of the Dozen construct the Godhammer to kill Waidwen, believing he would die in the process. If you convince him his goddess was just using him, Durance is righteously pissed off and plans on getting his revenge.
• Villain of Another Story: As one of the masterminds behind the Godhammer which stopped the Readceran invasion in its tracks, and then as an active, enthusiastic participant in the Purges, in another time and place (and a different kind of game) Durance might have been an Arc Villain in his own right. Given what we learn about Eothas' intentions in Deadfire and about Durance's own doubts and regrets during his personal quest in the first game, it's not entirely surprising that Durance's quest ends on something of a Heel Realization, even if he ultimately foists most of the blame on Magran.
• You Know I'm Black, Right?: He does know. He does it on purpose.
  • During one of his Might Makes Right Holier Than Thou rants, he'll mention that the Orlans deserved to get enslaved for being too weak to fight off their attackers. An orlan Watcher can, naturally, point out that they're an orlan. Durance is entirely aware of what you are, is not at all concerned with how offended you might be, and even takes the time to rub salt in your people's wounds.
  • He's also quite aware Edér is a practicing Eothasian, even as he proudly goes on about taking part in the Purges.
• You Talk Too Much!: He doesn't speak quickly, but once he gets going, you can expect a nonstop torrent of adages and homilies all to simply cover up for the fact that he's trying just as hard to convince himself of what he's saying as he is everyone else. He actually has the fewest interparty banters because of this — most of the rest of the party gives up on him after exchanging a few words.

Grieving Mother

Grieving Mother

"You saw me where I hid. Whoever's hands have stilled the world... you shall see them, too."

Voiced by: Tara Platt

A meadow folk cipher found standing alone in Dyrford Village. Formerly a midwife at the remote settlement of Birthing Bell, she's devoted her life and cipher powers to ending the Hollowborn curse by any means necessary.

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• Armor-Piercing Question: Her dialogue will often have the Watcher asking these of her, and her intent is to use this particular talent of the Watcher's to ensure they both find the answers behind Waidwen's Legacy. In doing this, she sees herself as midwiving both question and answer alike.
  Grieving Mother: Your mind comes bearing questions, Watcher.
• Brainwashing for the Greater Good: She's a proponent of using her cipher powers for this, accepting it as Dirty Business and, if permitted, can use it to Take a Third Option in a tricky situation^note Such as during the quest "Blood Legacy", where she can reverse the corrupting ritual performed on Aelys and preventing her from slaughtering her family. The Watcher can agree with her philosophy or push her away from it. She even asks the Watcher to do it to her, removing her traumatic memories so she can have peace.
• Clean, Pretty Childbirth: Averted. She's a midwife, and when sharing her memories the Watcher witnesses how messy childbirth gets.
• Creepy Good: She never reveals her name, uses her Psychic Powers questionably, is eerily pale, has a Dark and Troubled Past, and never drops the Perception Filter she hides behind. Despite her eerie and mysterious demeanor, she takes very strong (if sometimes dubious) moral stances, and will outright leave the party in disgust if the Watcher offers an infant as a sacrifice in Twin Elms or tricks a little girl into being eaten by a dargul in Heritage Hill.
• Cryptic Conversation: She talks in circles, weaving around the subject and arriving at deeper meanings in a portentous, roundabout manner. When she can muster a direct response, there's an almost childlike openness to it. A large part of this probably comes down to her Perception Filter keeping others from really seeing her, let alone speaking to her — she presumably hasn't had many meaningful conversations with others.
• Dark and Troubled Past: It's bad enough being a midwife during the Hollowborn epidemic, where the vast majority of children are born without souls. Using her cipher powers to convince the villagers that their children were born healthy, however, is darker still.
• Dark Is Not Evil: Her clothing colors are dark grey and black, she's an Eerie Pale-Skinned Brunette, and her past is full of tragedies and regrets. But she's one of the most reliably good and compassionate party members you'll find.
• Downer Ending: If you do as she asks and wipe her memories at the end of her personal quest, then she returns to the Birthing Bell as its sole resident, awaiting expectant mothers who would never come.
• Eerie Pale-Skinned Brunette: Almost as pale as the nigh-albino pale elves, and an enigmatic, tragic figure.
• The Empath: As a cipher whose Psychic Powers were never formally refined or trained, the Grieving Mother primarily perceives the raw, intense emotions emanating from kith souls and left behind on objects. Many of her comments are simply observations of whatever emotions, sensations or traces of essence she picks up from locations and people the Watcher is talking to. She often warns the Watcher when they're dealing with malicious or dishonest individuals.
• Four-Temperament Ensemble: Melancholic (introverted and task-oriented).
• Friend to All Children: She loves children dearly, and if she is in your party when you interact with them or pregnant mothers, she will always advocate dealing with them kindly (and will chew you out if you act Cruelly or Aggressively towards them). She'll flat-out leave the party if the Watcher chooses to sacrifice baby Vela in Twin Elms or trick Saeda into being devoured by a dargul in Heritage Hill.
• Gameplay and Story Integration: In a meta sense, her Perception Filter also plays with the concept of Nominal Importance that's almost omnipresent in every RPG (and Pillars of Eternity is not exception). Named NPCs in the game are expected to at least have a small part in a quest or tasks, while NPCs with generic titles can be safely ignored. She has the latter and, if it wasn't for the fact that she's marked on the Dyrford Village map as a point of interest, she would have very likely chances of being ignored by the player.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: Her caul has no in-game mechanics associated with it. Enemies and allies alike can target her normally, even though they should be ignoring her, forgetting she's there, or assuming she's someone else and underestimating the threat she represents.
• The Gift: She has no formal training as a cipher or a warrior, but has picked up enough on her own to be a a useful addition to the Watcher's party, and her Perception Filter is unique to her.
• Hidden in Plain Sight: Her Perception Filter allows her to easily blend in with the crowd. At first glance, her name makes her seem more like a random, ambient character than a potential party member — even the most minor Quest Givers in the game tend to have proper names.
• I Know Your True Name: Inverted in that she believes that names and titles applied to people, roles and nations often limits them, restricts them to an oversimplified caricature, and hems in their potential.
  Grieving Mother: Those titles are markings on a map, and channel people's minds... in violent directions. Such things are... a threadbare blanket cast over the world where men and women seek more importance than simply being.
  • If the Watcher tells her that there is a name for those with her abilities, she acknowledges the term "cipher" but refuses to let it define her.
  Grieving Mother: I see the word cipher in your mind, and see its meaning. Although I did not train in such things, and the title feels more of a cloak the world casts on me and judges me for.
  • It's definitely not the first time a Chris Avellone-written character has drawn power from being undefined and nameless.
• Lady of Black Magic: A female cipher in a dark grey dress of dubious morality and potent Psychic Powers. She never breaks her eerie serenity, save for when the Watcher hurts
• Loss of Identity: Her untrained cipher abilities lead her to fully absorbing and internalizing the most intense feelings around her and losing herself within them. She admits, with some horror, that she's forgotten a great deal of herself and her past by the time the Watcher meets her.
• Mistaken for Badass: Because of her cipher powers being able to read people's minds and sense their emotions, she was actually mistaken for a Watcher and, for a time, was respected more then she actually deserved. She even embraced the title, as it meant it would give comfort and hope to . Needless to say, when she meets the main character and finds out they really are a Watcher, she feels both incredibly intimidated and deeply guilty.
• Motherhood Is Superior: Deconstructed. The Grieving Mother certainly seems to place a greater weight on a mother's love when it comes to a child's future happiness, but she also seems deeply, personally familiar with motherly neglect. Part of her Brainwashing for the Greater Good always involved strengthening the bond between mother and child, particularly in cases where she could sense that the mother in question did not want the child.
  Grieving Mother: The pain of a mother's rage and disdain... it can be a powerful poison.
• My Greatest Failure: She's tortured by the memories of psychically tricking the villagers into thinking their Hollowborn children were healthy, which resulted in the death of a mother who put the welfare of her soulless child over her own health.
• Mythology Gag: A midwife, both literally and, figuratively, for the ideas and potential of others, something of a Creator Thumbprint for Chris Avellone.
• Namedar: Played with; initially, her lack of explicit name and unassuming appearance might make an inattentive player assume she's a generic village NPC (grieving over the Hollowborn children which are everywhere in the Dyrwood), at least until talking to her. (Except that she's clearly marked on the map with text, as only potential party members are.) Later, an option comes up in early conversations with her to ask her why she's known as Grieving Mother. She'll point out she never actually called herself that (or anything), but accepts it as an apt title.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: An unconventional and subtle example, but ominous nonetheless.
• The Needs of the Many: The safety of children always takes priority with Grieving Mother, and is certainly more important than free will or "truth" or any abstract principle or ideal.
  Grieving Mother: You will do as the world needs, as its children need. It is greater than you and your... twist of sight.
• Not So Stoic: Her companion quest has her break down, almost in tears, showing the grief in her title.
• Not So Above It All: She has very few moments, her quiet nature and perception filter keeping her out of even The Comically Serious, but there's still some:
  • Even she isn't above mocking Durance.
    Grieving Mother: [if Durance gets knocked out or killed in combat] A voice falls silent, at last.
  • During Zahua's quest, her response to Zahua cheerfully offering the party the ingredients to a Mushroom Samba is a wry "one must seek insight where one can". It's the tone that does it; she sounds like a put-upon babysitter reluctantly joining a child's game.
• Only Known by Their Nickname: No name is ever given for her other than the one the Watcher subconsciously applies to her, Grieving Mother. Given how her ability works, it's possible she doesn't even have a name, or has forgotten it.
• Perception Filter: Central to her character.
  • She appears to all who see her, save the Watcher and certain other perceptive individuals, to be nothing more than a forgettable peasant woman. She refers to it as her caul, a word that can mean both the amniotic membrane which surrounds a child in the womb and a cloth cap often worn by peasant women.
  • Her caul also affects party members. When they notice her at all, it's as "that strange peasant woman", and when she participates in dialogue and banters, characters continue on as if she hadn't spoken. Even Thaos outright ignores her when all your other companions get a Hannibal Lecture from him, and it would be hard to imagine he'd choose not to give her one too if he did know who she was. Iovara is the only one other than the Watcher who seems to actually see her as herself.
  • This doesn't carry over to combat or stealth, however. She can still be spotted and targeted by both allied party members and enemies like other companions, high Stealth skill aside.
• Phony Psychic: Played with; She has genuine psychic powers, able to read and manipulate minds and project blasts of telekinetic force, but she's not a Watcher. When the villagers of the Birthing Bell called her one, she didn't correct them — even though she couldn't see souls and had no particular insight into their past lives or the relative strength (or weakness) those souls might bestow upon them. Justified in that she lived in a remote, out-of-the-way village; several other characters such as Aloth note that many Dyrwoodans either can't tell or don't care about the differences between ciphers, Watchers, necromancers, animancers, and complete frauds.
• Pragmatic Hero: She wants to cure the Hollowborn plague, and protect the future of as many children as possible, but she can be a tad extreme in her methods.
• Psychic Powers: Like all ciphers, though her specific case is unique due to her unrefined, instinctual practice.
• The Quiet One: No one but the Watcher and occasionally Hiravias are even aware of her presence much of the time; if they do acknowledge her, they offhandedly mention her as "that peasant woman who's been following us around". She has no party banter aside from one instance of Hiravias almost bumping into her, and even then he quickly forgets she's there. Much of her dialogue tree is made up of descriptions of imagery, memories and sensations the Watcher is picking up from her rather than spoken conversation.
• The Scapegoat: She was afraid the villagers around the Birthing Bell would blame her for the children who were born Hollowborn. For that matter, because of her poor understanding of her own powers, she was afraid that she really had done something to cause them to be born soulless.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: If the Watcher's actions lead to the death of a child, such as offering infant Vela as a sacrifice in the quest "Sacrificial Bloodlines" or sending a little girl to be eaten by Aldhelm during "Undying Heritage", she'll leave the party. It's more surprising is that the others don't.
• Spell My Name with a "The": The narration sometimes does this, referring to her as the Grieving Mother.
• Stealth Expert: Her dialogue and Perception Filter tends to imply this, and as a cipher she starts out with a point each in the Stealth and Mechanics skills. She's commonly tasked with the sneak-and-disarm-traps duty that rogues usually take until or unless the Watcher manages to recruit an actual rogue companion — the somewhat difficult-to-reach Devil of Caroc in the White March, or simply a custom adventurer.
• The Stoic: Her Perception Filter typically keeps her out of the other party members' banter, and in a World of Snark, she stands out as making jokes very rarely and very dryly, which is occasionally used to set her up as The Comically Serious or The Straight Man.
  Edér: Look, I appreciate you taking the initiative, but I don't think there's much chance that this nice stranger lady happens to be a cipher.
• Tragic Keepsake: The chimes on her arms. In the Birthing Bell, she had a tradition of giving soothing chimes to every newborn she delivered as a
• Unskilled, but Strong: Despite never receiving formal cipher training, or even knowing what a cipher was before she met the Watcher, her high Intellect and Perception make her a potent crowd control caster.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Her suggestions to the mother of Hollowborn children resulted in a few wicht-induced fatalities.
• Vague Age: Even more so than the other companions. While her portrait shows her as relatively young, she's already got gray hairs (no doubt exacerbated by the immense stress and trauma she's suffered) and her tragic past has broken her to the point that in her first meeting with the Watcher, she's described as simply feeling old, "like a crumbling watchtower".
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: She prioritizes the well-being of children over everything else, certainly more than any abstract principles of free will or autonomy. Upon delivering the first Hollowborn in her village, she psychically forced the mother to believe it was a healthy baby and care for it as such. She went on to do the same with every Hollowborn infant born afterwards up until one of the mothers died because she prioritized caring for the child over eating, sleeping, or even drinking.

Hiravias

Hiravias

"Wael does not unravel, but he helps guide you to the path of learning for yourself. If he gave us answers, the resulting knowledge would be without value. And just once I'd like to meet a woman who goes into heat at the first whiff of stelgaer urine, but that's not going to happen either."

Voiced by: Christopher Corey Smith

A hearth orlan druid following Wael, Hiravias first meets the Watcher as he's happily feasting on venison at Stormwall Gorge. He joins the party so he has a group to travel with to visit the druids in Twin Elms.

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• All of the Other Reindeer: All of the other Fisher Cranes used to laugh and call him names — because he was small for his age, and because he had meadow plumage (a "hearth" orlan to other kith) and his bright orange fur didn't blend in with the treeline, then because he couldn't hunt (because the huntmaster wouldn't teach him), and when he became a druid, because he couldn't spiritshift (until a stelgaer tore off half his face). Finally, to add insult to injury — literally — he was cast out of his druid circle because his first spiritform, an orange-furred autumn stelgaer, was seen as herald of death and devourer of souls, and a very, very bad omen. He finally comes to terms with his life as a lone wanderer in both endings — after having trounced every elder in his old circle in ceremonial combat if he reconciled with Galawain.
• Ambiguously Bi: He expresses obvious interest in women, but will also admit to being aroused by Kana's singing voice.
  Hiravias: And between you and me... he has a better singing voice than the prettiest lasses I knew from my tribe. It's one part unsettling, two parts arousing... and it makes me wish I still had both ears.
• Babies Make Everything Better: He doesn't really think you needed to steal one if that's what you wanted, though.
  Hiravias: If you really want an angry orlan screaming and defecating in the middle of the night, you could just ask me.
• The Beastmaster: Thanks to his "Charm Beast" spell.
• Berserk Button: While he takes most jokes and insults in stride, Fantastic Racism against him being an orlan never fails to piss him off.
  • Eder trying to invoke You Are a Credit to Your Race or asking to pet him just infuriates him (but he forgives him eventually).
  • Maneha remarking that she's never encountered "his kind" before sets him into angry ranting about negative orlan stereotypes, until she reveals she meant a follower of Galawain/Wael.
• Cat Folk: "Catmen" is a slur for orlans, who have fur, pointed ears, and slitted pupils.
• Covert Pervert: The opposite of covert most of the time, but invoked when asking about his eyepatch: he figures perhaps Wael (the All-Seeing and Never-Seen God) will make use of it.
  Hiravias: So if you catch my gaze wandering to a chest or rump, it's Wael's doing. I swear!
• Crisis of Faith: Part of his sidequest involves his faith towards Galawain and Wael, and especially his waning trust in the former. You can help him reconcile with his view of Galawain, or make him embrace Wael's philosophy. The last arc's revelations hit him quite hard as a result.
• Deadpan Snarker: A much filthier one than Edér.
• Defensive "What?": "What? No!" could count as Hiravias' Catchphrase. The price of spending years alone with your own thoughts, and then suddenly sharing them at will with a bunch of strangers.
• The Drifter: His character background, because "Pariah" would be a little too on the nose. Ostracized by his tribe, he's spent years wandering the length and breadth of Eir Glanfath, and recently begun crossing into the Dyrwood by the time you meet him.
• Druid: His in-game class. He was initiated at a young age into the Celebrants of the Hawk and Ivy of the Fisher Crane Tribe.
• Elemental Powers: As a druid, Hiravias learns a great variety of nature-based spells
  • Blow You Away: Can conjure powerful winds to either push back enemies or heal his allies, with the Cleansing Wind spell doing both.
  • Green Thumb: As a druid, he naturally has access to a lot of spells granting power over plants.
  • An Ice Person: Has access to some very hard-hitting Freeze spells, such as Winter Wind and Hail Storm.
  • Making a Splash: Can use water spells to either knockback his targets or heal his allies.
• Erudite Stoner: A mild user (and teetotaler), but yes.
• Eyepatch of Power: Wears one on his right eye after being mauled by an autumn stelgaer.
• Eye Scream: On the receiving end of that trope after a fight with an autumn stelgaer.
• Fantastic Racism: Gets hit with this from all fronts. He was mistreated by his tribe even before his first spiritshift for looking like a hearth orlan (it being seen as a sign of weakness), and gets hit with it everywhere else due to Dyrwood's animosity against orlans.
• Fiery Redhead: A Hot-Blooded Lovable Sex Maniac with green eyes and a head of bright red curls.
• Four-Temperament Ensemble: Sanguine (friendly, cheerful, talkative, and people-oriented).
• From Bad to Worse: All of the other Fisher Cranes mocked and belittled him his whole life. When he was finally accepted into his tribe's druid circle, he was unable to spiritshift, so he prayed to Galawain for strength... and was promptly mauled by an autumn stelgaer, losing one eye and most of his ear, but changing into a stelgaer himself and mauling his attacker right back. So far, so good, right? ...Except that his tribe saw autumn stelgaers as accursed devourers of souls, which got him ostracized and outright banished. Needless to say, Hiravias was less than pleased with Galawain and gives him a piece of his mind when you commune with the gods at Teir Evron.
• Friendly Enemy: Technically he should be killing you, and himself, for all the trespassing in Engwithan ruins you're all doing. The gods don't seem to mind kith in the Builders' ruins nearly as much as the Glanfathans, however, and years of wandering alone in slow contemplation in the name of Wael have modulated his territorial upbringing.
• Handicapped Badass: He's missing an eye and ear, but he's still a capable fighter.
• Hobbits: Orlans take on something of this role in Eora, as short, slight humanoids, but they're also discriminated against as (supposedly) being thieving, savage, and animalistic.
• Hyper-Awareness: He is actually the only character who is capable of independently noticing Grieving Mother being in the party.
• I Just Want to Be Normal: He prayed to Galawain for strength, but his first spiritform saw him ostracized from his tribe and banished. The Galawain path for his sidequest involves pointing out that perhaps Galawain wasn't finished with him, that being outcast and disfigured were just more ways of forcing him to tap into his own inner strength — and that Hiravias did want this. Prayed for it, in fact.
  Hiravias: I asked to be a hunter — a regular hunter that gets invited to chase down dinner and eat its neck... I didn't ask for this!
• Insufferable Genius: He loudly voices his good opinion of himself, loves to talk, and having wandered extensively across the length and breadth of Eir Glanfath, provides a lot of commentary and advice about the eastern half of the world map if you bring him along.
• Insult Backfire: Insults tend to glance right off him, since many of his more annoying, vulgar, or otherwise offensive behaviors are entirely deliberate — either because of his unusual sensibilities, or simply to steer the conversation in directions he finds interesting. It makes him one of the few characters who can get one up on Durance, who's no prize himself. (That said, Fantastic Racism for being an orlan is a Berserk Button for him, as Eder and Maneha discover in party banter).
• Just Like Making Love:
  Hiravias: Maybe eating souls is like fucking — I just meet the right person, instinct will take over, and I'll feel ashamed yet smug the following morning.
• Large Ham: Has a dramatic way of speaking, to put it mildly.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: If the Watcher asks where he came from...
  Hiravias: [grinning] Why, from my mother's crotch, of course.
  Watcher: What a coincidence: I TOO came from your mother's crotch.
  Hiravias: For the record, only I'm allowed to insult my mother, but given your dedication to banter, I'll let it slide... this once.
• Lovable Sex Maniac:
  • Easily the dirtiest of the group, even daring to ask if Pallegina has feathers "everywhere" (and receiving a threat of evisceration for his trouble).
  • During one conversation with the player character, he also wonders if she has a cloaca.
  • If he's present when The Watcher first enters The Salty Mast, Hiravias response involves acting extremelly excited and immediately asking how much it would cost for hiring two ladies, while all the other companions are either embarrassed or non-chalant about going into a brothel.
  • If he's present when player earns a discount at The Salty Mast, Hiravias immediately starts rummaging through his pockets for loose coin, and offers to let anyone in the group watch if they want.
  • In one party banter, he tells Sagani about a time he got pinned by a female stelgaer. In heat. While he was spirit-shifted. So of course he was only too happy to satisfy her lust.
• Motor Mouth: Has a lot to say and frequently says things in a highly roundabout manner.
• The Napoleon: Short, loud, high opinion of himself, chip on his shoulder... Checks all the boxes.
• Never Accepted in His Hometown: His first spiritform, an orange-furred Autumn Stelgaer, is believed to devour souls by his home druid circle. Even though he can take other forms, and never actually did anything of the sort, they cast him out, never to return. In his Galawain ending, he returns home and humiliates all his tribal elders in combat, forcing them to recognize him as a member of the tribe... and then leaves on his wanderings all over again, having proven his point.
• Obfuscating Stupidity: Played with. He's not as dumb as he acts, but the act itself is being played so hard that it's obviously a big joke.
• Panthera Awesome: As a druid, his spiritshift allows him to turn into a humanoid werecat with Absurdly Sharp Claws.
• Pest Controller: Has some nasty spells allowing him to use insects against his enemies (such as "Insect Swarm" and "Plague of Insects").
• The Pig-Pen: A justified example. He's spent years deliberately making sure that he smells like part of the surrounding nature (not an interloper) so as not to scare off any downwind game.
  Durance: With your cat's nose, how is it you've failed to notice your rotten stench?
  Hiravias: Failed to notice? Hardly! I put work into smelling this way.
  Durance: [resignedly] I should have expected.
• Playing with Fire: Can directly channel the power of the sun ("Sunbeam" and "Sunlance") and cast other fire spells.
• Plucky Comic Relief:
  • Virtually nothing, not even facing down the chosen agent of an ancient and powerful god, can stop Hiravias from making quips and jokes. Often very dirty ones.
• Rugged Scar: Missing an eye and most of an ear after a run-in with a stelgaer the first time he shapeshifted.
• Sad Clown: Underneath the nonstop barrage of quips and his insistent perkiness, he's an outcast from his tribe and harbors some serious nagging doubts about his own worth.
• Shock and Awe: Able to call lightning with "Returning Storm" and "Relentless Storm", or channel it directly with "Dancing Bolts". Those spells have the advantage to only target foes.
• Sophisticated as Hell: Peppers his vulgarisms with three- and five-dollar words— they're used correctly but fit a little strangely into his speech patterns, which is probably intentional. Doesn't quite achieve total Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness but brushes up against it at times.
• The Stoner: Banter with Zahua and Edér mentions that he's a casual user of whiteleaf, with occasional forays into mushrooms.
• Trauma Conga Line: He's had it rough. Luckily he stays philosophical about it.
• Voluntary Shapeshifting: Can transform into a giant autumn stelgaer. However, the very nature of his preferred form of shapeshifting is actually a plot point in his sidequest, since many believe that autumn stelgaers eat and destroy souls, and shun him as a result. The truth behind this belief is a tad more complicated.
• Walking the Earth: His listed background is Drifter, having explored every corner of Eir Glanfath and some of the Dyrwoodan border after his village and druidic circle cast him out. Both of his endings involve him becoming a wanderer once again.
• You Are a Credit to Your Race: "Hearth" or meadow orlans like Hiravias have less fur and are considered less "wild" than their forest cousins. Edér makes the mistake of thinking that this is a compliment, though Hiravias does eventually forgive him for it.
• Your Mom: "Your mom" jokes are a part of his repertoire of snark, though if the Watcher tries to do the same to Hiravias in a conversation, he'll protest that only he is allowed to insult his own mother (but he does give the Watcher a pass, seeing as how the line was funny). He goes so far as to even pull one out against Thaos of all people:
  Hiravias: Ostracism? Is that the name for the groin rash your mother gave me?

Kana

Kana Rua

"There is a wealth of knowledge just within the walls of the college. And beyond it, more than I could learn in ten lifetimes. But I can try, all the same."

Voiced by: Patrick Seitz

An island aumaua chanter hailing from Rauatai, Kana Rua can first be encountered right outside the ruined walls of Caed Nua. He has embarked on a quest to recover a deeply sacred book revered among Rauataian chanters: the Tanvii ora Toha, or Book of Virtues. Seeing as the Watcher is going to explore the ruins as well, he happily tags along.

---

• And the Adventure Continues: One possible ending for him has Kana briefly returning home to report his findings on the Tanvii ora Toha before setting sail on another expedition to find the answers to new questions.
• Annoying Younger Sibling: Is considered one by Maia. She finds him so insufferable that if he makes a cameo in Deadfire and she's in the party she exclaims that she moved halfway around the world to get away from his incessant prattle!
• Bad Powers, Good People: Being a Chanter, he can debuff opponents and potentially summon all kinds of undead, but he's a really sweet guy.
• The Bard: As a chanter, he sings magical songs and is familiar with a great deal of the lore and history of Eora.
• Became Their Own Antithesis: In one possible ending. Kana initially is an optimist who wants to discover knowledge abroad to dissuade the isolationist factions in Rauatai and convince them of the value of cooperating with other nations. If the Watcher dissuades him of this mentality, Kana ends up becoming solemn and jaded, preaches that searching for answers abroad will only sow discord among Rauatai, and joins the isolationists as one of their most respected proponents.
• The Big Guy: Subverted, as despite his size (about twice the size of any non-aumaua in the party), he's a cheerful scholar who tries to be The Heart of the group. He's quite intelligent as well, but his naivete and enthusiastic curiosity places him closer to being The Heart
• Black Sheep: His family are all artillery engineers and builders (with one sister, Maia, an officer in the Rauataian navy) and are quite proud of Rauatai's militaristic and isolationist traditions. Kana, on the other hand, is a scholar with seemingly endless curiosity about foreign culture and history; he instead wants to open their borders and have his people learn what they can from other nations through diplomacy, trade, and academic exchange.
• The Bore: Played with. While Kana is very spirited, friendly, and talkative, most companions find him boring just by virtue of the fact that he enjoys spirited debates and questions that go on for hours, and after a while they just get burned out listening to him (or talking to him) and tune him out.
• The Cameo: If he survives the events of Pillars of Eternity, the Watcher can meet up with him again in Deadfire. If they parted on good terms, he hasn't changed a bit.
• Casual Danger Dialogue: From the Watcher's very first meeting with him, he brings up the fact that he's being hunted by Leaden Key assassins without any fear during conversations.
• Chatterbox: Downplayed. While not a Motor Mouth as such, he tends to ask dozens of questions in rapid order, engage in thoughtful debates, and prattle on about random facts and trivia that he finds interesting. Most companions get tired of listening to him after a while, much as they like his easygoing and jovial demeanor.
• Combat Medic: As a chanter, he can take the Ancient Memory and Beloved Spirits talents, which passively regenerate the party's endurance as long as they're in range of his chanting. If auto-level is toggled, he'll gain the health-restoring Field Triage talent.
• Constantly Curious: Annoys the rest of the party with endless questions about their culture, heritage and local folklore and wants to stop and take notes roughly every two steps you take.
• Cynicism Catalyst: You can turn the end of his personal quest into this.
• Crisis of Faith: Sensing a pattern, here? Kana's quest centers around his search for the Tanvii ora Toha (or "Book of Virtues"), an ancient Engwithan text, the teachings of which are still revered by the people of Rauatai. Kana believes that the original tablet can bring together an increasingly warlike and isolationist Rauatai, perhaps even bringing about a Golden Age of education, philosophy, and trade with the outside world. Instead Kana and the Watcher find the tablet long since cracked into pieces, the scholar himself a mindless skeleton, leaving behind a lab full of cruel animantic experiments. It shakes Kana's faith in said teachings, and his ability to unite his people. The Watcher may then encourage him to see the teachings as worth sharing anyway even if the scholar was not, encourage him to find some other way to unite his people, or mock him for his naivete and send him home a broken man.
• Decomposite Character: In the original announcement, the party member Cadegund was to be a female, heavily-armored rifle-wielding priest of Magran. The (male) Durance became the Magranite priest while Kana Rua got the gun and heavy armor.
• Downer Ending: If you don't complete his quest or are extremely dismissive about it the whole way through, Kana may return home completely crushed and become a voice for isolationist factions, or wander back into the depths of the Endless Paths alone despite knowing how dangerous they are, effectively committing suicide.
• Earn Your Happy Ending: If the Watcher helps Kana by doing things like supporting his idealism, building up his confidence, and encouraging his search for knowledge from foreign cultures, when Kana returns to Rauatai, it's possible for him to encourage a new age of cultural growth for his homeland.
• Fish Person: A very mild example. While the aumaua aren't actually aquatic and don't have gills or fins, they do have sharklike teeth and skin tones resembling those of tropical fish.
• Four-Temperament Ensemble: Sanguine (friendly, cheerful, talkative, and people-oriented).
• Genius Bruiser: Comes with the territory of being an aumaua scholar. This is even reflected in his stats; his Might is 16 and his Intelligence is 17.
• Genre Savvy: While his wide-eyed idealism makes him something of a Naïve Newcomer, being a student of story and history lets him lampshade the various genre conventions of both games. From his cameo in Deadfire:
  Kana: I really did miss you, you know. All of our adventures. Which is why I knew you weren't dead. The Lord of Caed Nua, killed? Nonsense! After, what, escaping that collapsing ice cavern? Defeating a dragon hewn out of solid adra! Thwarting the gods themselves! Only for you to be squished by a giant foot? Absurd. That's not how the story goes.
• Gentle Giant: An aumaua who towers over every other companion save Maneha, and his shark-like teeth give him an intimidating appearance. However, he's really just a jolly fellow who gets along well with everyone.
• Hat of Power: Starts with a turban that improves his Intellect, as seen in his portrait.
• The Heart: He'd like to be this, and he does try to keep everyone in good spirits, but frequently finds it's not that easy given the Dark and Troubled Past of every teammate other than himself.
• Healer Signs On Early: The third or fourth companion you're likely to run across, and can take the Ancient Memory and Beloved Spirits talents to continuously heal allies within his chanting range. If auto-leveled, he'll also take the Field Triage talent, which restores some of an ally's (usually non-regenerating) Eealth.
• Heroic BSoD: He's devastated once he finally discovers the shattered remains of the Tanvii ora Toha, and that the esteemed scholar who wrote it was a madman who turned himself into an undead sorcerer.
• Incompatible Orientation: He forms an immediate crush on Maneha, but she tells him she prefers girls... so he tries to be her wingman instead.
• Irony: Despite being the tallest, largest, and deepest voiced of the group, he's also the youngest and most optimistic. He also looks the scariest (being a giant aumaua with markings that resemble tribal face paint and shark teeth), but he ties with Eder as one of the friendliest and most good-natured of the companions.
• It's the Journey That Counts: At the end of his quest, you have the option of reminding him that even though his quest for the Tanvii ora Toha was all for naught, it did give him quite an adventure that allowed him to learn plenty of new things along the way. That's enough to give Kana some peace of mind.
• Jack of All Stats: On account of being a chanter, a highly versatile class. Not his actual stats — his Consitution, Dexterity, and Resolve are only average, but his high Might, Perception, and Intellect mean he can fight at melee as well as at range, and his chants are equally effective at damaging and debuffing enemies, healing and buffing the party, or summoning a variety of critters. His Lore skill bonuses as a chanter and scholar also make him suited to using scrolls. He won't be the best at any of those roles, but his true strength comes from supporting the rest of the team with chants and invocations for any situation.
• Likes Older Women: He initially crushes on Maneha, who's decades older than him.
• Magic Music: He sings songs and verses which cause skeletons to erupt from the ground, among other things.
• Make Me Wanna Shout: His invocations, which range from stunning enemies, knocking them back, invigorating his allies and more.
• Massive Numbered Siblings: He has five siblings. According to him, his house never knew a moment's peace.
• Multiple Endings: Quite a few. If you finish his quest, he can become a highly visible proponent in favor of foreign influence, become a prominent voice against it, encourage Rauatai to look inward toward its own progress, or set sail in search of further answers to replace the ones he felt the Tanvii ora Toha could no longer give. If you don't finish his quest, he can descend back into the Endless Paths, only to disappear, never to be seen again, or return home in defeat to become a minor lore keeper, teaching students in obscurity, never to be seen again. All this depends on whether you encourage his quest or knowledge, as well as whether or not you agree with his views.
• The Musketeer: He starts off with an arquebus and an estoc as his weapons.
• My Species Doth Protest Too Much: Downplayed. He's a self-described patriot, but he doesn't approve of Rauatai's militant expansionism or the aumaua's in-universe reputation as warlike, conquering race.
• Naïve Newcomer: He's the second youngest, and is the most optimistic of your party.
• Nice Guy: Despite his large stature, he's very amiable, due in no small part to his enthusiasm for learning new things from everyone he meets. Only Edér is anywhere near him in niceness.
• Our Orcs Are Different: Still musclebound and sharp of tooth, but favoring a more civilized brand of warmongering, with multicolored skin patterns like those of a tropical fish. Contrary to being the token Proud Warrior Race Guy, Kana is easily the nicest and most innocent party member you can recruit.
• Quirky Bard: Downplayed. He's the Black Sheep of his family, and he's quite chipper and naive but still relatively down-to-earth.
• Rousseau Was Right: One possible quest outcome. The Watcher can encourage Kana to return home and spread the teachings of the tablet and scholar he was searching for anyway, even though the tablet was destroyed and the scholar hardly a role model after all, arguing that teachings themselves are still worthwhile and his people will be able to see the merit in them. It works, and brings about the closest thing to a Golden Age his warmongering people can muster.
• Scary Teeth: Well, he is Aumaua. While Aumaua aren't exactly shark people, they do have their teeth. Kana is no exception.
• "Shaggy Dog" Story: The tablet he's been looking for was destroyed a LONG time ago, and the scholar is now a skeletal vessel who spent his final years among the living torturing countless test subjects for research, hardly a role model for peace and tolerance that Kana hoped he would be.
• Silly Rabbit, Idealism Is for Kids!: A few party members have this reaction to Kana's persistent optimism, particularly Durance and (potentially) a Jerkass Watcher. Kana does an impressive job of fending them off and standing up for himself at least until the end of his personal quest.
• So Much for Stealth: He's huge and colorful, and when combat breaks out he bursts out in song and verse. Naturally, he's not great at this. Two of his quotes when entering stealth/scouting mode:
  Kana: I shall be as quiet as a calm sea! Which is... not... very quiet.
  Kana: [loudly] Hello? [even louder] ...Hello?!
• Summon Magic: He starts out with an invocation that summons three skeletons. As with all chanters, higher level invocations allow him to summon various spirits, drakes, and even ogres, among other things.
• Sympathy for the Devil: Out of the party, he's the only one who expresses pity over Thaos' death at the endgame, remarking that anyone else would've changed their opinion 500 years into this gambit. He also makes more of an effort to get to know the actual Devil (of Caroc) than the rest of the party.
• Wide-Eyed Idealist: Of all the party he is easily the most idealistic, which is why he takes it especially hard when you find out the tablet he hoped would unite his people has been destroyed, and the scholar who wrote it wasn't as philanthropic as he'd thought. A few party members find this annoying (especially Durance), and even the Watcher can frequently mock him for his naïveté.

Sagani & Itumaak

Sagani & Itumaak

"Short version? I'm looking for a very, very old friend. I'm not sure what skin he's wearing now, but I'll know him when I see him."

Voiced by: Cindy Robinson

A boreal dwarf ranger and her arctic fox companion from the remote southern island of Naasitaq. The Watcher meets the duo on the road at the Woodend Plains, between Defiance Bay and Dyrford Village. She is searching for the reincarnation of her village elder Persoq, to tell his soul how the tribe is coming along. The journey has taken her five years, and she has grown despondent over time; she finds herself tagging along with the Watcher so that she can finally finish her duty.

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• Absence Makes the Heart Go Yonder: Defied and played for laughs. Sagani is very much in love with her husband, and flatly rejects the idea that he might cheat on her with the remark that, aside from the strength of their relationship, she's the best shot in the village.
• Amazonian Beauty: Height notwithstanding, she is powerfully muscled and the concept art highlights it. She definitely has a certain charm.
• The Beastmaster: As a ranger, she is accompanied by an animal which helps in her fights. Hers is a snow fox, Itumaak.
• Beware the Cute Ones: Sagani then warns Edér that if he tries petting Itumaak, he's going to lose a hand. Edér tries anyway. He doesn't lose his hand, but he gets a painful gash for his trouble.
  Edér: If I'm not supposed to pet him, then why is he so soft!?
• Bittersweet Ending: A number of her endings turn out to be this, with Sagani finding parts of her quest or life unsatisfactory (like leaving her children for so long for a tradition that turned out to be pointless) but learning to find meaning and joy in others, such as her family or community.
• Crisis of Faith: Sagani is from a small arctic village where family and tradition are revered above all else. However, their tradition of sending one non-childless woman every generation to seek out the reincarnation of their previous elder, no matter how long it takes, has shaken her once iron-hard faith in her village's traditions. If the Watcher is a dick about it, or refuses to help her, her faith is shattered for good, and she returns home suicidally depressed. If the Watcher helps and encourages her, she may return home to find her faith in her village's traditions reaffirmed, or find joy in raising her family despite her long departure.
• Deadpan Snarker: It's a World of Snark and Sagani is no exception, though she's not as prone to this as, say, Hiravias. She tends to be one of your most straight-faced, driest, and most deadpan party members. See also Stepford Snarker.
• The Determinator: Sagani will finish her quest, no matter how long it takes. She's already been searching for five years by the time the Watcher meets her, and if you never finish her quest, she eventually finds Persoq's reincarnation on her own. Twenty years later.
• Downer Ending: If you are consistently dismissive of her quest and make her feel like it's all a waste of time, when she returns home she finds that nothing brings her joy anymore, and she goes on longer and longer hunts until the day she presses on into a blizzard, effectively committing suicide.
• Drawing Straws: Literally, how her village determines which of the non-childless women gets to go look for the reincarnation of the previous elder. Sagani drew the short straw.
• Dual Wielding: Her secondary weapon set is a dagger and a hatchet.
• Earn Your Happy Ending: Two of her quest's endings result in Sagani having a long and happy life. If you encourage her to tell Persoq about his impact on Massuk, she'll return home confident in her village's traditions and become a respected village elder. If you encourage her to tell Persoq about his family, she'll return home with a new appreciation for her own family, and she eventually passes away surrounded by five generations of people who love her.
• Exposed to the Elements: She finds the sub-freezing climate of the White March a lot more comfortable than the rest of the Dyrwood. In one possible banter, she suggests stripping down and going for a dip — and not necessarily in the hot springs.
• Four-Temperament Ensemble: Phlegmatic (reserved and easygoing).
• Guide Dang It!: Her sidequest isn't the only thing that affects her ending. It isn't even the most important, since it only ends one way. What actually determines most of her endings is your conversations with her, whether you tell her that returning home to her family is the most important thing, or tribal tradition — or that the whole journey is a pointless waste of time. You won't know this, of course, until finishing the game.
• Honor Before Reason: Technically, nothing is stopping her from going home and making up a story except her own sense of duty to her culture and her village. She will see this quest through no matter how long it takes, or how much her kids grow up and grow apart from her in her absence. Thus, her meeting with her elder just deflates her.
• Masculine Girl, Feminine Boy: She's the masculine girl to her husband, Kallu's feminine boy. At least, she's an Action Girl who spends most of her time tracking and hunting while Kallu is a builder, meaning he stays at home with the other men and kids while Sagani and the other women are out hunting.
• Missing Mom: Because the Tarneq-Ilitsaak^note soul-recovery tradition requires sending a huntress who has already had married and had children, she's been one to her kids for five years. She pointedly dislikes this and misses her husband and three surviving children^note She's had five, but two died of starvation over bad winters. intensely. She ruefully mentions that her youngest probably won't even know her when she gets back.
• Multiple Endings: And you might not realize which one you're getting until you're already locked in. She can return home and become a respected elder like Persoq, come home and rededicate herself to being a mother (and eventually, a beloved grandmother), return home disheartened and depressed to eventually go missing in a blizzard, or, if you didn't finish her quest at all, Persoq's trail goes cold and her search continues for another twenty years.
• Noble Savage: A conscious aversion — many other stories might have played this card and focused on Sagani as the exotic foreigner or worldly-wise hunter, but Sagani is more of a grounding influence and probably has the closest thing of any companion to a normal life to go home to (even if she hasn't seen her family or village in five years), and has the most "normal" reactions to the events of the game. Some things are universal.
• Non-Human Sidekick: Itumaak, her snow fox animal companion.
• Our Dwarves Are All the Same: Obsidian seems to be working overtime to avert dwarf stereotypes. Boreal dwarves ("Enutanik" in their own language) are an ethnic group that are equivalent to the Inuit people, living on the tundra and snowy forests of the far southern island of Naasitaq. She is also a ranger, a class not normally associated with dwarves, and carries a bow, possibly the least stereotypically dwarven weapon imaginable in a fantasy setting.
• Outliving One's Offspring: By the time the game starts, two of Sagani's five children have died of illness during the harsh, lean winters. If you never help her find Persoq, by the time she finishes it on her own, twenty years have passed and another one of her children have died before she returns.
• Pelts of the Barbarian: Wears furs and hunting leathers.
• Perfectly Arranged Marriage: She states that her mate was chosen for her by their parents when she was young, but she and Kallu eventually grew to see each other as friends and later as lovers.
• Ridiculously Cute Critter: Itumaak is so white and fluffy Edér can't help but want to pet him.
• Seen It All: And found it wanting, in her wanderings. It's a matter of perspective, though — she enjoyed the newness of it all at first, but she hasn't been free to enjoy it. Five years of not finding what she's looking for and she's started to question her purpose.
• "Shaggy Dog" Story: Sensing a pattern? The elder she's trying to find was reborn as a stag, which is why he's been wandering all over the damn place but never showing up in any of the actual settlements she's been through, and she gets there just in time for him to die of his wounds after being hunted by local Glanfathans. You can convince her to tell him what he meant to Massuk regardless of whether or not he'll understand.
• Sad Clown/Stepford Snarker: Her sardonic demeanor is almost certainly a coping mechanism to hide how much she misses her family and how much she just wants to get her quest over with and go home already.
• The Stoic: After five years on the road, she's not only seen a lot of what the Eastern Reach has to offer, but she's just plain worn out. Most of her reactions are wearily subdued. She does occasionally perk up when she gets to talk about hunting and, whether she's aware of it or not, things that remind her of her old life.
• Stranger in a Familiar Land: Two of her personal quest endings result in this.
  • If the Watcher is dismissive or apathetic towards her task and her people's traditions, returning to said village where everyone still reveres their traditions results in her feeling emotionally isolated from everyone.
  • If the Watcher never helps her finish her quest, she instead comes home after twenty years of more searching and finds herself in a Massuk that's greatly changed without her. She manages to find some comfort and reassurance in her surviving children and grandchildren, however.
• Terse Talker: Occasionally drops into this. She's not one for long speeches when a single word will do.
• Tribal Facepaint: Seen in all concept artworks of her released to date, along with paint or tattoos on her midriff in the one image where it is visible.

The White March Party Members

Devil of Caroc

The Devil of Caroc

"Murder, tracking, and the best materials for kindling – those are more my area of expertise."

Voiced by: Debra Wilson

A bronze construct rogue, the Devil of Caroc was once a villager of Cold Morn who found her hometown on the bad end of the anti-Eothasian purges that raged across the Dyrwood in the wake of the Saint's War. She spent years murdering the perpetrators until she was caught in Stalwart and sentenced to death. Before her execution, the animancer Galvino arranges to have her transfered to him soul to a metallic body, and when the Watcher comes knocking on Galvino's door for his help opening the gates of Durgan's Battery, she offers to join their party with an offer of helping each other on their respective searches...

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• Affably Evil: Mildly so. She's clearly dangerous, shows no remorse over the innocents caught in her murders and some of the things she says are unnerving, but if you stay out of her way and don't go getting all judgmental on her, she doesn't go out of her way to pick fights. As opposed to, say, Durance.
• Alas, Poor Villain: She may be a crazy Serial Killer but it's hard not to pity her given how nightmarish her current state is. She's unable to feel anything, unable to die, and without even vengeance to look forward to there's nothing to distract her from how horrifying her condition really is. If you trick her into letting the man who killed her family go free, she keeps up the hunt as her body fails, and she's eventually ripped apart by a mob of villagers, screaming as she's destroyed yet unable to feel any of it.
• And I Must Scream: See Sense Loss Sadness. Thirteen years spent living in the middle of nowhere with Galvino can't have helped. In one of her endings, if you let her kill Harmke, with her mechanical body beginning to fail, she walks into the ocean and sinks to the bottom, unable to move — and finally content.
• Anti-Hero: The Devil is ruthless, relentless, and a convicted murderer but she is willing to fight at the Watcher's side.
• Asshole Victim: Most the people she killed took part in the Purges, which started with her hometown of Cold Morn. If you let her kill just the one more during her personal quest, it actually does bring her the closure she's looking for. Before you start getting too sympathetic, however, a few of the people she burned alive were children.
• Bittersweet Ending: If you let her take her revenge on Harmke, her desire for revenge will be replaced with a desire to feel anything new in her unfeeling body. She keeps traveling and her body continues to fail her, until she sees something a farmgirl like her had never seen before — the ocean. She walks into it and sinks to the bottom, now completely unable to move but finally at rest.
• Cycle of Revenge: The Purges killed her family, so she hunted them down and killed them. Then they gave her to Galvino and he turned her into a living construct. You have the option of trying to break the cycle, convincing her to spare Harmke but it doesn't go the way you might expect.
• Doomed Hometown: She's from Cold Morn, infamous after the Saint's War for allowing Readceran troops to march through their town unopposed. Almost immediately after Dyrwood's victory, Cold Morn was razed to the ground in retaliation, with the Devil barely surviving with horrific burns.
• Downer Ending: If you convince her to let Harmke go, she continues her Roaring Rampage of Revenge knowing full well how futile it is, until an angry mob catches up with her in Maiden Falls and tears her metal body apart piece by piece. If you load a save with this ending in Deadfire, a shop will have a breastplate made from her remains on sale as a final indignity. It's a pretty good piece of armor too.
• Deadpan Snarker: During her Establishing Character Moment, every other line out of her mouth is simply laden with sarcasm.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Even after at least a decade since the razing of Cold Morn, she still mourns her parents and siblings. She also admits she's glad they never lived to see what she's became.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Similar to Durance above, she sneers at Thaos for 'ripping the souls out of babies' with the Hollowborn curse. Considering she herself was a victim of her soul being tampered with against her will...
• Evil Laugh: In combat, often after killing an enemy or landing a Critical Hit.
• Expy: Of Frankenstein's monster. Inverted in that if anything she's probably calmed down a lot since before the experiment, but she still stirs up her share of angry mobs.
• Face of an Angel, Mind of a Demon: Galvino's workmanship is exquisite, and the Devil's filigreed bronze body bears none of the scars she picked up in life. She doesn't consider that any kind of favor, though, since those scars were just another part of her past she's lost.
• Farm Girl: Her mother was a trapper and her father was a tinker, but she's essentially a dark spin on this, right down to the Doomed Hometown. This also creeps into the way she speaks — she's at least as folksy as Edér, if not even more so.
• Golem: Her soul now inhabits a construct made from bronze.
• Good Scars, Evil Scars: She was badly burned when the Purges came to Cold Morn. It's implied that her appearance is part of what earned her her name.
• The Gunslinger: All footage of her in combat shows her wielding either a pistol or an arquebus. In the game proper, she starts out with a spear.
• Highly-Visible Ninja: Despite being bound to a construct body made of highly polished bronze, old habits die hard. She starts out with Back Stab, Shadowing Beyond, and a number of ranks in Stealth, which made sense in her old life as a trapper.
• Hunter Trapper: Her in-game background is listed as Trapper, which is how her mother earned her living. Devil of Caroc would put those same skills to use hunting down the men and women who put Cold Morn to the torch.
• Hunting the Most Dangerous Game: As a Serial Killer with a background as a Hunter Trapper.
• I Just Want to Be Normal: After killing the man who burned down her home, she no longer has anything else to distract her from thinking about how much it sucks to be an unfeeling golem. One of the reasons she is still traveling with you is because she hopes that the White Forge in Durgan's Battery has something that would allow her to be human again. You can point out that even if there was, her original body has likely rotted away long ago and the best-case scenario would be her turning into a fampyr (and being an undead is worse than becoming a golem).
• Kick The Son Of A Bitch: Her murders boil down to this: Her hometown was burned down for not trying to stop an army at least an order of magnitude bigger than the town. Everyone she went after was directly involved in the murder... although prompting can make her admit that while everyone she went after was directly involved in the murder, she didn't really have a problem with causing collateral damage while doing so.
• Mythology Gag: A riff on Vhailor, with her burnished metal body, hollow interior, and need to exact her own brand of "justice". She's got a little bit of Bishop in her too — a remorseless murderer from a burned hometown "rescued" from the consequences, but resentful about having no choice in it.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: The Devil of Caroc.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: In her ending, if you convince her to spare Harmke in the hopes of letting go of her quest for revenge, she's unable to find peace and picks up the hunt all over again, killing a lot more people before she's finally surrounded and torn to pieces, screaming all the while. Played With in that the Intended Audience Reaction is probably to assume that, in a game like this, sparing Harmke is the default correct/"good" choice. Harmke was a murderer who'd escaped justice for his crimes in his own right, however, and in killing him, Devil actually does find a kind of peace.
• One Last Job: Killing Harmke. If you let her go through with it, it really does turn out to be the last murder she commits in her ending.
  Kana: He wasn't my monster... Did it help?
  Devil of Caroc: No. But it needed doing.
• Only Known by Their Nickname: "The Devil of Caroc", which she picked up after burning over a dozen people to death in their homes in Caroc.
• Pyromaniac: She killed a dozen people in Caroc by burning their houses down with them inside, as poetic justice for burning down Cold Morn in the Purges.
• Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Her killing spree was one against the people who razed her home of Cold Morn, though she didn't care if there was collateral damage.
• Sense Loss Sadness: Once her vengeance is complete, she no longer has anything to distract her from her new body's inability to feel anything. If you point out that a golem body has its advantages, she retorts that she'd give them all up just to be able to feel the cold snow again.
• Serial Killer: Hunting and killing the men and women who burnt down her hometown and killed her family. She burned over a dozen people alive in Caroc — burned like her family burned.
• Stealth Expert: She was a trapper in life. Despite now being a metal golem whose body counts as (unremovable) heavy armor, she's a rogue whose initial abilities are geared toward backstabbing and stealth.
• The Stoic: She was a cold-blooded murderer in life. She's even colder now. It's part of what made her such an effective killer. She gets along especially well with a Watcher with the Cruel and Rational reputations.
• Token Evil Teammate: Her general lack of remorse, especially regarding the collateral damage she's caused, makes her this.
• Vengeance Feels Empty: Feels no satisfaction after tracking down the person who burned down her home. She thinks it's because of her golem body and its lack of feeling. Without the desire for revenge motivating her, she is no longer distracted from the full horror of her condition. Subverted, however, in that in killing him and realizing exactly how empty it feels, it allows her to finally let go. If you don't let her kill Harmke, she continues seeking her revenge, no matter how futile it might seem.
• Vigilante Man: The people she killed were the people who burned down her village, Cold Morn.
• Would Hurt a Child: She burned down her victims' houses in Caroc, along with their families. They did the same to hers. Tit for tat.
• You Killed My Father: She's out for revenge against the people who razed Cold Morn and murdered her family and friends. It's possible to help her track down and kill the one who personally burned down her home, but it doesn't make her feel any better.

Zahua

Zahua

"A scar is a wound that heals. A living reminder of our power over suffering. They cause no pain, only the echo of pain which cannot hurt you. Show me a scarred man and I will show you a man who can overcome."

Voiced by: Jamieson Price

A human Monk, Zahua is the greatest of the Nalpazca, the warrior-monks that serve as the army of the Tacan people. The Nalpazca seek to distinguish between the physical and imaginary world. Zahua seeks to pursue to ideals of the Nalpazca in the hopes that it will make him become an unstoppable combatant.

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• Bare-Fisted Monk: Monks are most powerful when they fight with their fists. And he is never depicted with any weapon in official artwork. In game, he uses a hatchet and saber as secondary weapons.
• The Chosen One: The Tacan high priestess forced the Nalpazca warriors to accept him because she had a vision—after tripping on malcacho and other drugs—that Zahua would be a chieftain who would lead them to victory over a rival tribe. Doing so would require becoming the anitlei, a perfect warrior free of worldly snares. This rival tribe instead ended up conquering his people and completely breaking them. Though Zahua's initial goal is to free them, he comes to accept that his tribe is truly gone.
• Clap Your Hands If You Believe: As the anitlei he became invincible so long as he believed he was invincible. The second doubt entered his mind when facing off against a rival chieftain, he lost this ability and was defeated.
• Combat Sadomasochist: He reveres pain to the point of masochism. Subverted in that it's not out of pleasure or titillation.
  Zahua: If I did not suffer, I would not aspire to free myself from it. I would wander from one unfulfilling goal to the next — more wealth, a better station. My soul would wither. But to search for a place beyond suffering's reach is to nurture the soul. To harden it against the elements.
• The Comically Serious: He's the source of a good deal of Comic Relief, while remaining almost entirely straight-faced.
• Commonality Connection: Not that they're friends, but Durance of all people is surprisingly sympathetic to Zahua on his spiritual journey... in his own way, of course. He's snide as always, but understands enough not to interfere.
  Zahua: Keep to your own trial, Durance, and I will keep to mine.
  Durance: Oh, I wouldn't dream of interfering. I await the sounds of broken bonds or a broken back. There is a music to both, if you listen for it.
• Covered with Scars: Zahua believes that suffering is the path to enlightenment and so he has wounded himself many times, leaving his body covered in nasty scars.
• Enlightenment Superpowers: Like all Eoran monks, he has unique magical powers derived from his own pain.
• Exposed to the Elements: Goes shirtless in the snowbound mountains of the White March.
• Erudite Stoner: He's a thoughtful man with a deep understanding of life and suffering. It's just that part of that understanding was attained on a variety of powerful hallucinogenics.
• Fantastic Drug: Takes a great deal of them.
• Gameplay and Story Integration: The warrior will become the Anitlei, invincible in battle, after they free themselves from all worldly snares. Becoming the Anitlei is itself a worldly snare, and when Zahua accepts that the knowledge is truly lost, he gains a bonus talent which grants him a 10% bonus to attack speed. That talent's name? Anitlei, implying that whatever the original knowledge entailed, it is only a word, and the Aanitlei will be whatever the Tacan need them to be — even if the Tacan are only Zahua himself.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: His banter indicates he's constantly taking more drugs, but they're not in his inventory and you still need to have him take them for him to gain the effects. Probably easier than the alternative of him taking whatever drugs he wanted without the player's input.
• Guide Dang It!: Fittingly, given the source of his wisdom, figuring out how to deal with Zahua can be a little obtuse.
  • You recruit him by finding him inside a seemingly innocuous barrel of fish on the Stalwart docks. There's a cutscene where a villager runs away from said barrel screaming, but still.
  • His sidequest is easy to trigger by accident and hard to trigger on purpose. Doing so involves exhausting his dialogue options and changing areas/reloading the game, but not in Whitestone Hollow.
  • Also, like Kana and Sagani, Zahua has many different ending states, influenced not only by his personal quest, but by what the Watcher says to him while traveling with him. Zahua has different endings depending on whether or not you finish his quest and two values, Legacy and Persistence. The former corresponds to telling him to value the Tacan's memory and teachings, the latter on himself and his own actions. The two aren't dependent on each other, and it's possible for both to be positive or negative. Softened in that the only truly bad ending he gets is if both are negative and you don't complete his quest.
• Hermit Guru: Walking the Earth variant.
• Higher Understanding Through Drugs: The Nalpazca believes that drug induced hallucinations convey wisdom, and Zahua is no exception. His sidequest has the entire party get high so they can share in his vision quest.
• It Was with You All Along: His sidequest ends with Zahua realizing that the secret of the Anitlei is lost forever, but this is subverted with the realization that all he needed to do to become stronger was to accept the past and move on from it. The secrets of the Anitlei may be lost, but lifting the psychological burden made him stronger anyway — and he gains a bonus talent saying as much.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Zahua's belief that all suffering is good makes him come off as callous, but he is a compassionate man.
• Master-Apprentice Chain: The Anitlei. The fact that Zahua's predecessor died without ever teaching him the Anitlei's secrets is actually the crux of Zahua's conflict.
• Multiple Endings: Depending on whether or not you finish his difficult-to-trigger personal quest and what you tell him about his life's goal of becoming the Anitlei and freeing his people. He can take over an abandoned monastery in the White March and found a new order (there are two ways this can happen, depending on whether or not you finished his quest) or rebuild the Nalpazca, return to Ixamitl and unite several small tribes under the beliefs of the Tacan, or head to Defiance Bay and either take an apprentice or tell all his secrets to a scrivener in the Hand Occult.
• Mushroom Samba: He's tripping on mushrooms (the malcachoa, known as whitecap in the Dyrwood) when you first meet him, is constantly taking other drugs while he's in the party, and on his personal quest he takes the rest of the party along for the trip.
• My Greatest Failure: Zahua holds himself responsible for the destruction of his tribe. As the anitlei he was meant to be the perfect warrior and free of world snares. He achieved it briefly, but eventually felt doubt when facing a rival chieftain, which led to the rival tribe to completely absorb and destroy his own. While he spent years planning on returning and liberating his people, he ultimately realizes it's impossible.
• No Sympathy: There's a few instances where Zahua's humorously enjoying the suffering some party members are going through or experienced, stemming from his reverence of suffering to lead to enlightenment. He's not actually being some kind of sadist over it though, trust us.
• Old Soldier: He may be an old man, but he's a powerful monk and the greatest of the Nalpazca.
• Prestige Class: Zahua didn't have one himself, since subclasses were only introduced in Deadfire, but one of the choices for monks is Nalpazca. Presumably the Watcher learned it from Zahua.
• Rule of Symbolism: Finds meaning and insight everywhere he looks, and spends most of his time trying to piece it all together. You get to follow his thought process during his sidequest.
• "Shaggy Dog" Story: Yep, another one. His vision quest reveals nothing except what he already knew all along: that the Tacan people and its culture are gone and there's nothing he can do about it. The vision is simply telling him that he needs to let go of the past.
• Sketchy Successor: Zahua sees himself as this, as he was unable to save the Tacan from the rival Quechmatl. Eventually he comes to realize that no one could have done more, and that believing that he had failed where he could have succeed, dwelling on it for years, was a greater failure than accepting his original failure and moving on as best he could.
• The Stoner: He abuses hallucinogenics as part of his training.
• Super-Toughness: As a monk, he's preternaturally durable thanks to his Enlightenment Superpowers.
• Third-Person Person: He frequently refers to himself with his own name.
• To Be a Master: Zahua believes pursuing the ideals of the Nalpazca will make him an unstoppable monk. While this initially seems to be the goal in itself, with The White March Part II installed it turns out Zahua mostly just wants to free the Tacan people from their subjugation to a rival tribe, and redeem himself for failing to lead them to victory as their chieftain — he just believes the only way that is possible is to become the archetypical unstoppable Nalpazca master.
• Wacky Guy: His antics make him sound sound like this, but in terms of personality he's The Comically Serious.
• Walking Shirtless Scene: His artwork and default clothing/armor has him just going around in pants and Shoalin-style leg wraps. Even during the time he was Forton. All the better to show off his scars.
• Walking the Earth: What he's doing when you meet him, searching for knowledge within and without. He's just been to the abandoned monastery of the order of the Thousand Dreams in nearby Coldflow Lake, but found it empty.
• Warrior Monk: A given. His ambition is to become the anitlei, the perfect warrior freed from all worldly snares who becomes invincible in the process.

Maneha

Maneha

"I've done my share of fighting these forty-odd years, but I've never drawn my blade just to watch someone bleed. And I've never drawn it on someone who didn't have his own in hand."

Voiced by: Valerie Arem

An aumaua barbarian who, like Kana, originally hails from Rauatai. Unlike Kana, however, Maneha is quite the experienced traveler who has seen much of the world and been through a lot. A member of the Giftbearer order, she is currently searching for the mysterious Abbey of the Fallen Moon; a hunt that causes her to cross paths with the Watcher in Stalwart Village.

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• Amazonian Beauty: Tall and muscular, with barbarian as her class.
• And the Adventure Continues: If you erase her Awakened memories, Maneha continues her life of thrill-seeking and adventure.
• Aroused by Their Voice: Part of her flirting with Pallegina involves complimenting her accent and asking her to speak in it.
• Bling of War: Her starting "armor" is mostly made up of jewelry — necklaces, bangles, and belts — she picked up during her years as a raider. Not only is this surprisingly effective as armor, she doesn't seem to care about the fact that she's walking around in the freezing mountains of the White March at all.
• Carry a Big Stick: Her secondary weapon is a morning star.
• Crush Blush: If the Watcher talks to her about her crush on Pallegina, she "turns a deeper shade of blue."
• Dual Wielding: She starts with a battle axe and a sword.
• Everyone Has Standards: She's a mercenary and a pirate, but she's not a bad person. She's never killed someone for the sake of killing and she doesn't start a fight with someone unprepared for one.
• Exposed to the Elements: She is a barbarian, after all. All her bling will keep her warm.
• Hired Guns: Her past as a mercenary involved fighting for and against pirates.
• I Hate Past Me: The reason she is searching for the Abbey. She Awakened past memories of one of her previous incarnations, one who committed terrible crimes. She has heard that the Abbey has a method of erasing memories and wants to use it. Whether or not she actually goes through with it is up to you.
• The Lad-ette: Maneha enjoys nothing more than fighting, drinking and sleeping around with pretty women.
• Laser-Guided Amnesia: Her true goal in seeking the Abbey of the Fallen Moon is to use its power to rid her of her painful memories of a past life. It depends on the Watcher whether she goes through with it or not.
• Luminescent Blush: She "turns a deeper shade of blue" if the Watcher asks point-blank what's her thing with Pallegina.
• Nice Girl: She's perky and friendly to just about everyone, even Durance. Though she's also clearly trolling him at certain points.
• Proud Warrior Race Gal: An aversion. Her class is barbarian, but she came from a peaceful village in Rauatai, and while she was a mercenary and raider for some forty years, she was in it for the adventure, not the bloodshed.
• Retired Badass: If you help her come to terms with her memory instead of erasing it, Maneha settles back down in Rauatai and starts building a life there.
• Rousseau Was Right: In a somewhat roundabout way. Maneha seems to come to the conclusion that people generally want to believe this is true, so the Engwithans crafted their false gods as a means to an end, to remove some of the internal obstacles people tend to build up in themselves over time.
  Maneha: If what you're saying is true, people made the gods because they needed forgiveness, guidance, grace. Things we're not so good at offering each other.
• Sad Clown: She's friendly and makes a lot of jokes, but she tries to hide just how much pain her Awakened memories are causing her.
• Ship Tease: Party banter and a direct question from the Watcher implies she has a crush on Pallegina. Pallegina implies that she might be receptive, though in the second game, it doesn't work out.
• Sorry, I'm Gay: Her reaction to Kana's attempts to flirt with her. After he finds out, he tries to be her wingman instead.
• Statuesque Stunner: Pretty much a given as an aumaua, a race who tends towards being tall and muscular.
• Warrior Monk: She is a Giftbearer of Ondra, and a barbarian/mercenary/pirate raider.

Deadfire Party Members

Maia

Maia Rua

"Captain, I just wanted to say I enjoy these little moments where we negotiate with things that can eat us."

Voiced by: Marisha Ray

Maia Rua is an island aumaua ranger whose animal companion, Ishiza, is a bird of prey that can scout outdoor environments both in and out of combat. Like Kana, her brother, she's a loyal Rauataian of Huana ancestry. Her boldness and dedication have earned her an enviable position as a ship captain, which in turn has brought her to Deadfire as part of her country's mission to "civilize" the wild archipelago.

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• Affectionate Nickname: She calls Xoti 'Firefly'. The two of them can end up as a couple depending on your choices.
• Badass Boast: Made on her behalf by the hazanui (admiral) of the RTC fleet in Deadfire:
  Hazanui Karu: Maia's an expert sailor and a better sharpshooter — the best the Brass Citadel has to offer. Whatever comes your way, she'll see it first.
• Boomerang Bigot: She's an island aumaua, but considers herself a Rauataian to her core, and is condescending and dismissive of the Huana.
• Character Class: Her options are Ranger, Ranger/Rogue (Scout), or Ranger/Wizard (Geomancer).
• Cold Sniper: She's a soldier. She follows orders. Including assassinating a Huana chieftain — who was only calling for greater unity among the tribes — on the RTC's behalf during her personal quest.
• Deadpan Snarker: Emphasis on the deadpan. She's got a dry, cynical soldier's wit, and snarks constantly to her superiors. That includes the Watcher.
• Dual Wielding: Her melee backup weapons are a pair of swords. Generally speaking they won't see a lot of use.
• Early-Bird Cameo: Kana mentions his siblings in one of his dialogue trees and recalls Maia fondly.
• Feathered Fiend: Ishiza. He bites... and that's just his allies.
• Fire-Forged Friends: Despite their conflicting loyalties, she and Tekehu due warm up to each other over time.
• Forest Ranger: Her character class always all include Ranger, either as a single class or multiclassed with either Rogue or Wizard.
• Friendly Sniper: Sort of. She's a deadly sharpshooter who likes cracking jokes to break up the tension in between missions, but she can be harsh as well. The mission comes first.
• Gallows Humor: Part of the job description, and a means of dealing with the stress that comes with it.
• Guide Dang It!: You might have already guessed, but those missives you're handing out with Maia? Those are coded assassination orders, which is spelled out for you at the end of the quest. You can't do anything about it but wait for the ending crawl once the deed is done, of course. R.I.P., Governor Clario, Storm Speaker Ikawha, and Ranga Ruānu. If you back the RDC, their assasinations are followed up by the RDC providing relief and support to win over support in the islands, staving off further war. Going by what she says, Maia's target wasn't any of the three, but those were still three of the most decent NPCs you meet across the course of the game.
• Icy Blue Eyes: They stand out all the more against the black sclerae that all aumaua have.
• "Just Joking" Justification: The Watcher can attempt to defend her anti-Huana bias as just trying to get a reaction, but Tekēhu's not buying it. She's saying it because she likes stirring the pot, but that doesn't mean she doesn't mean it on some level. She does realize she's gone too far when she jokes that Eothas might have stepped on Tekēhu's village — he's not a soldier, he's very young, and that is in fact a very real possibility at this point.
• Kick the Dog: Maia despises rendering any support to the Huana whatsoever, which includes giving a funeral to a bunch of murdered Huana you can come across in a world event instead of looting them for valuables. Yes, she thinks less of you because you're a decent person and treated murder victims with the respect they deserve, just because she's a racist.
• Knuckle Cracking: Her idle animation has her doing the fingers laced, palms out variant of this.
• Loyal Animal Companion: She trained as what Rauataians call a gunhawk, an arquebus marksman bonded with an attack hawk. Her ranger companion is Ishiza, a bird of prey with bright red-and-blue plumage. If you get close to Maia, Ishi takes a shine to you, as well.
  Maia: [as the Watcher wakes from several days spent unconscious] Welcome back, captain. If you were wondering about the taste... Ishi was trying to feed you bugs while you were asleep.
• Mage Marksman: As a geomancer (ranger/wizard), much like the name implies, she can use the wizard's control effects to set up her own killzones. Of course you don't have to play the class combination that way, but the synergy makes it particularly effective.
• The Mole: Maia comes right and tells you that she wouldn't blame you for thinking she was a spy, and is entirely open about sending reports back to the Brass Citadel. Not only is she a spy, she's an assassin, and it wouldn't matter if you did read her missives because they're all in code anyway.
• Moral Myopia: She's usually the first person to call out the other factions' shady tactics, but the last to acknowledge such methods when they're used by her own country.
• My Country, Right or Wrong: She's aware of some of Rauatai's more questionable actions in the Deadfire, but she's a soldier and a patriot, and believes that they serve a higher purpose. Depending on her interactions with the Watcher, she can become dissatisfied with what she was ordered to do, and raise enough of a fuss back in Rauatai during the ending that the Ranga Nui, the Emperor of Rauatai, rebukes his admirals and reminds them that victory at all costs is not acceptable, especially when it sets precedents for underhanded tactics.
• Noble Bigot with a Badge: She's a soldier and a patriot, and tends to take a dim view of anyone who isn't willing to get in line behind Rauatai. She doesn't hate the Huana as people (after all, she's an island aumaua herself), but her contempt for the culture is palpable.
• Noble Bird of Prey: Deliberately mocked with Ishiza, who Maia calls "Captain Stinkfeathers". When the Watcher finds Hylea is watching the two of them through Ishiza's eyes, the goddess calls Ishiza a "noble creature", and the Watcher has the option of expressing some disbelief.
• Non-Human Sidekick: Ishiza, a bird of prey that looks to be orlan-sized in the concept art. He's considerably smaller in the game proper.
• Realpolitik: She doesn't always like it, but she accepts that the RTC is doing things that need to be done to bring order (as they see it) to the region.
  • Depending on the Watcher's reaction, she may speak out against the RTC's actions in the Deadfire, causing the Ranga Nui to rebuke his admirals for their shady tactics.
• Prestige Class: Her subclass, unique to her, is Gunhawk, a kind of specialized Rauataian ranger. This enhances her range and reload time with arquebuses, crossbows, and arbalests, and as a flying companion Ishi can ignore difficult terrain, among other benefits.
• Punch-Clock Villain: She's followed some more questionable orders because that's what the job requires, and she believes it's in the name of the greater good, not just for Rauatai but for the Huana as well. She also draws a sharp line between her work and her personal life. This can mean continuing to follow a Watcher who sacrificed her brother Kana to the Skaenite blood pool in Dyrford, and carrying out the assassination of an innocent man so that RDC could take advantage of the power vacuum left in his wake.
• Shipper on Deck: For Konstanten and Fassina.
• Sibling Yin-Yang: She dislikes poetry, she's very sardonic, a Deadpan Snarker who is often very blunt, with both feet planted firmly on the ground, unlike her brother. Even more unlike Kana, a peace-loving academic who wanted a more open Rauatai, she's a dedicated career soldier who's fully clued in to the nastier side of Rauatai's operations in the Deadfire.
  Maia: I do with bullets what Kana did with words. Just in case you were wondering, the comparison ends there.
• Statuesque Stunner: She's aumaua, meaning she's a head or two taller than Edér. She's proportionately relatively slender for an aumaua, however.
• The Stoic: In contrast to Kana, she's deeply reserved and extremely deadpan. Not that she doesn't have strong opinions, but she can and will tamp them down in the name of getting the job done.
• Sugar-and-Ice Personality: Maia is generally a warm, laid-back gal with a love for animals and a good sense of humor. Other times, however, she can be a rude, surly bully who doesn't shy away from kicking her targets while they're down.
• Token Evil Teammate: Downplayed. She's working for The Empire and fully supports its imperialistic endeavors. She's also aware of its shadier tactics, including the murder of civilians, and does nothing to stop them. In fact, she even assists with them from time to time. Despite this, however, Maia herself is an otherwise decent person whose duties to her nation are treated more as Punch-Clock Villainy than anything else. Furthermore, she can be influenced into rethinking her stance on Rauatai's policies and become an advocate for change within her homeland.
• Tranquil Fury: As part of being The Stoic. Even if the Watcher sacrificed Kana to the Skaenite blood pool in Dyrford, her response is to level her rifle at you and count to three before acknowledging that she can't shoot you without disobeying her orders. But she won't talk to you again for the rest of the game.
• Video Game Cruelty Potential: If you sacrificed her brother in previous game, you can tell it straight to her face. With copious details. If Aloth, Edér, and Pallegina are in party they are shocked as the truth is finally known to them. Maia's first reaction is to shoot you, but in the end she contends to put duty first. She however promises to save a bullet for you. Subsequent attempts to talk to her will just lead to float text: "Maia simply glares at you."
  The Watcher: I sacrificed Kana to a living pool of Skaenite blood... he bled out like an aurochs for slaughter, and the dead accepted his flesh greedily.
• Worthy Opponent: She and Serafen become fast friends seemingly because they've faced each other down ship-to-ship across the water before joining up with the Watcher.
• You Are What You Hate: It's heavily implied that the root of her resentment towards the Huana stems from the prejudice that she had to deal with as an island-born aumaua living in Rauatai.

Serafen

Serafen

"You been at sea a while, your mind starts playing tricks on you, aye? Well, mine plays tricks on others, too."

Voiced by: Liam O'Brien

Serafen is an orlan cipher/barbarian and a member of the Príncipi sen Patrena, the dominant pirate organization in the region. He was born into slavery and put to work as a rigger and powder monkey since his small size made him ideal for scurrying around ships. During those years, he discovered his talents as a cipher and used them to lure his masters' ship into the path of the Príncipi. Impressed, the pirates offered him a position as one of their infamous "ship hunters", and he in turn found acceptance and freedom among his new comrades. He worries, however, that the growing schism in the Príncipi will destroy the community he has come to love.

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• Arch-Enemy: Malnaj, the orlan cipher who taught him his craft, but is now hunting down his father figure Remaro.
• Barbarian Hero: He comes from a "Wild" Orlan tribe and was taken as a slave as a child. In-game, however, his barbarian class represents his ferocious pirate fighting style.
• Born into Slavery: Though he was eventually freed by the Príncipi, earning them his loyalty.
• Braids of Barbarism: Puts braids in his beard, not unlike a certain real world pirate.
• Broken Pedestal: His personal quest involves seeking out the man who raised him, a Principi pirate now being hunted down for mutiny. Who further reveals that neither the Principi nor their former captain hold the ban against slaving anywhere near as sacred as Serafen.
• Character Class: When you first recruit him, you can choose between Cipher, Barbarian, or Cipher/Barbarian (Witch).
• Deadpan Snarker: Almost everything he says is a joke, insult, boast, or some combination of the three, even in his most serious moments.
• Friends with Benefits: His romance, such as it is, begins and ends at this. He says he's not the marrying type, and that "there ain't no fix for what's broken in him". He's game for a lot, but nothing deeper or longer-term, which he's completely upfront about.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: It's possible to make him into a single-class barbarian, but his cipher abilities still come up in non-combat scenes even if you do. His Psychic Powers figure heavily into his backstory, are part of what makes him such a good shiphunter, and he uses them on the Watcher in his very first scene.
• Guns Akimbo: His default backup weapon: two pistols, because you can do that in this game. When you finish his personal quest, he gets an additional hand mortar called Fire In The Hole, which means he can dual wield mini-grenade launchers.
• Hand Cannon: Rather than using a standard pistol, Serafen comes equipped with a hand mortar; a unique pistol-sized grenade launcher capable of dispatching multiple foes.
• Informed Attribute: Dialogue seems to imply that Serafen is fat (Maia says in banter that she mistook him for "a hairy powder barrel", and the descriptive text makes frequent references to his belly). His in-game model... isn't.
• Mage Marksman: Heightened abilities and pistols akimbo, Matrix-style.
• Magic Knight: Psychic pirate, but same general idea. His psychic abilities are written into his introduction, but you can opt to make him a pure barbarian as well as a pure cipher, or just multiclass the two together.
• Mentor Archetype: Serafen tries to act as one for Vela if she's present on the Watcher's ship, giving the young Orlan a range of life advice.
• Mildly Military: He salutes you left and right and won't commit to a real relationship out of a sense of shipboard professionalism, but he swears up a storm and calls you "cap". Of course, the only vessels he's ever served on were pirate ones, so he has a different sense of duty and tradition from, say, Maia. Enough of one that they can still find common ground, though.
• Mind Probe: He's prone to doing it to people, often being asked. He tries it on the player when they first meet, which the player can resist or allow, and denounce or not.
• Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: Blue-furred halfling psychic freed slave barbarian pirate.
• Odd Friendship: With Maia. Soldiers and sailors, with similarly dark, vulgar senses of humor. There's a bit of Worthy Opponent going on, as well, since they're pretty sure they've been on ships which met on opposite sides of battle before. Pallegina, meanwhile, is taken a bit off-guard by just how impressed and respectful Serafen is towards her.
• The Pig-Pen: The rest of the party often brings up Serafen's lacking hygiene.
• Prestige Class: His cipher subclass is Wild Mind.
• Pstandard Psychic Pstance: Part of his Idle Animation as of 1.1 — hand up, palm out, other hand against his temple.
• Psychic Powers: He's a cipher, meaning he can read minds, create illusions, and blast enemies with psychic force.
• Sir Swears-a-Lot: Waxes lyrically profane at every occasion, the most of any character in the game.
• Sophisticated as Hell: Talks in a somewhat flowery manner while also swearing every second sentence or so.
  Serafen: Unrefined? Begging your pardon, captain, but I be the high fucking model of the gentleman of fortune!
• Stroke the Beard: Strokes his braided beard while deep in thought. Part of his Idle Animation when it was added in after launch.
• Sword and Gun: In true pirate fashion — a handheld mortar in one hand and a battle axe in the other.
• Talk Like a Pirate: Well, somebody had to.
• Vocal Dissonance: Has a deep, gravelly voice, rather than the high-pitched, hyperactive Plucky Comic Relief sidekick sort of voice you might be expecting at first glance.
• Wild Magic: His cipher subclass, Wild Mind. Because he was never formally trained in how to use his Psychic Powers, they have a small chance of misfiring in certain... interesting ways.
• Worthy Opponent: He and Maia get along remarkably well despite having clashed in ship battles in the past mostly because she can respect him as a sailor and, after a fashion, loyal soldier of the Principi.

Tekēhu

Tekēhu

"For as long as there have been Huana there have been watershapers. But only since Tekēhu has watershaping been art."

Voiced by: Travis Willingham

Tekēhu is the 7th and final companion, a aumaua marine godlike chanter/druid. He is one of the Huana, the native people of Deadfire and is a master of manipulating water for art.

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• Abhorrent Admirer: He flirts with Pallegina if she's in the party when you first meet him. She's clearly displeased and annoyed with his attention and makes it very clear she wants to hear none of it. He then tries to bond with her over their shared experience as godlike, which only aggravates her further — she wasn't revered as a demigod back in the Republics, certainly. Eventually they do bury the hatchet, however, with Tekēhu gifting her a tiny intricate water sculpture of a ship — not as a token of affection, simply as a peace offering.
• Alien Hair: His "hair" is made of semi-autonomus prehensile blue tentacles.
• Amazing Technicolor Population: He has white skin with blue markings.
• Bizarre Human Biology: Bizarre Aumaua Biology, rather. Besides the tentacle hair (which move on their own), he can also start dripping ink from said tentacles when particularly distressed. It happens during a rather aggressive interaction with a fellow party member.
  Tekēhu: I admit to having glands which I do not discuss, but I always keep them clean.
• Broken Pedestal: A few times, when he finds out that the watershapers are using their powers to aid in the Undercroft's smuggling operation — partly so that the Roparu can eat, admittedly — and again when he discovers that the reason the watershapers are so powerful is because they're drawing on the powerful soul of a dragon their founder, Periki, has had chained underneath the guild for centuries. And his mentor, Guildmaster Mairu, is killed by naga summoned by said dragon's attempts to free himself.
  • If you side with the Royal Deadfire Company when they ask you to assassinate the queen, Tekehu is horrified and will leave your party on the spot. Later you will receive a letter condemning what you've done that the narration notes is blurry from what seems to be tears.
• Character Class: Can choose between Druid, Chanter, and Druid/Chanter (Theurge).
• Character Development: He's got some growing up to do. His ending will see him embrace his duty to the tribes, or embrace his art. Neither one is treated as the "right" answer.
• Character Tic: Touching his hair (and his hair touching him back) and rubbing the white spot on his forehead self-consciously,
• The Chosen One: He is chosen by Ondra, It makes him feel insecure, that he's only exceptional because she chose him. Ondra however tells the player she chose Tekēhu because he's exceptional, not the other way around. She doesn't care what he choses to do with his life; in her eyes, whatever he does will be excellent.
• Desperately Looking for a Purpose in Life: He's extremely reluctant to take on the power, responsibility, and fame being Godlike bestows upon him in Huana society. His "mother", the sea goddess Ondra, takes a surprisingly direct hand in seeing that you ensure he lives up to his potential.
  Ondra: A life without friction or challenge has left the boy in need of guidance.
• Dreadlock Warrior: His tentacled hair resembles this, bound up in a bunch behind his head.
• Fish Person: As a Marine Godlike and an aumaua, he has traits in common with fish, sharks, squid, and more besides: scaled skin, tentacled hair with glowing tips like an anenome which secretes black ink when he's stressed out, sharp, shark-like teeth, and black eyes. His skin pattern, rather than the tropical fish pattern of most auamaua is a mottled orca-like blue and pale blue-white.
• Friendly Fireproof: All of his druid water/ice spells and many of his lightning spells for both classes only hit enemies.
• Gentle Giant: Easy to lose sight of in light of his openness and sensitivity, but Tekēhu is massive, much more heavily muscled than player auamaua, and the way he carries himself means he would have to be fairly physically strong, too. Not that his stats reflect this (Might 12, Con 10), but then again a bodybuilder or swimmer's strength does not necessarily translate well into fighting or general labor, despite what superhero comics would have you believe.
• A Girl in Every Port: In pretty much every Huana settlement you go to, you'll meet at least one woman who had a fling with him. Most of them aren't all that happy to see him again.
• I Just Want to Be Normal: He doesn't seem to dislike himself so much as the status his unique birth affords him. He doesn't so much want to be like everyone else as he wants some of their anonymity.
• An Ice Person: Both his subclasses grant him a number of bonus ice spells.
• I'm a Doctor, Not a Placeholder: More of an admission than a denial, however — he knows he's not the experienced adventurer the rest of your party might be.
  Tekēhu: I say I am no sailor and I know even less about death. I am an artist.
• Inferiority Superiority Complex: For all his swagger, he's extremely insecure, due to the expectations fostered on him by his people and his goddess, Ondra. Ondra outright tells the player she hopes being exposed to the Watcher will make Tekēhu get over his own issues.
• Jumped at the Call: Only too happy to see the world from outside the guild if you ask.
  Tekēhu: If it untangles me from the guild's apron strings, then you can mount me as the figurehead of your fair ship. Our quarters may smell of fish before long, but your crew will be more beautiful by association, I say.
• Ladykiller in Love: Is a shameless flirt and has slept with quite a few minor characters around the Archipelago, but he commits fully to the Watcher if romanced.
• Making a Splash: He's one of the Huana's watershapers, druids with powerful control over water. He receives a number of unique water-element versions of summons and other attacks. He can also create huge, long-lasting sculptures, as well as tiny, intricate ones, out of living water.
• Momma's Boy: Played With. The "momma" in question is his goddess, Ngati (Ondra), not his mortal mother.
• My Species Doth Protest Too Much: Technically speaking, he's a member of the Mataru, the Huana's warrior/hunter caste. He is decidedly less than warlike, and the closest he's come to hunting is pearl-diving, at least before joining the Watcher.
• Mythology Gag: A blue-skinned, charming and handsome young man well aware of these facts, who also happens to be an artist with a troubled relationship with his non-mortal mother - all of these recall Gannayev-of-Dreams. Except that rather than being left in the wilderness, raised by spirits and ostracised by others, Tekēhu was pampered and sheltered.
• Naïve Newcomer: He's spent most of his sheltered young life as a pampered watershaping prodigy, creating the huge sculptures of molded water you see throughout Neketaka. He's powerful enough watershaper to stand alongside your returning companions, however. His reaction to the Gullet is eye-opening, and kicks off his Character Development in earnest.
• Open Mouth, Insert Foot: He seems to mean well, but he can't seem to start a conversation with any of the female party members without offending them. Pallegina resents his assumption that they're alike, Maia has an inborn dislike of the Huana, and while he and Xoti get along when they're just talking and on the subject of faith, her opinion of him drops precipitously when he starts talking about his carousing lifestyle.
• Prehensile Hair: Has undulating tendrils for hair, with glowing tips like certain kinds of anemone.
• Prestige Class: His unique subclasses are Watershaper as a druid, and Storm Speaker as a chanter.
  • Watershaper grants bonus spells, like all Druid subclasses, and blocks friendly fire with water and frost spells. It blocks access to fire abilities and creature (but not spirit) Summon Magic.
  • Stormspeaker grants bonus invocations, the only revealed chanter subclass to do so thus far, but blocks access to all of the chanter's Summon invocations.
• Romanticism Versus Enlightenment: A lot of his party banter with Aloth verges on this, with Tekehu firmly on the side of tradition, emotion, beauty, passion, and art, while Aloth is very firmly on the side of reform, logic, reason, books, and education. In combat, Tekehu also sings his chants from the heart, while Aloth studies his spells from his grimoire. Tekehu also tries in vain to get Aloth to stop burying his head in books and revel in the beauty and passion of life. (Which Aloth can — just in a quieter way.)
• Semi-Divine: Unlike in the Republics or the Dyrwood, the Huana revere the godlike as children of the gods. Tekēhu is Mataru, the Huana's noble/warrior caste, even though from the way he describes them it sounds like his parents were likely Kuaru (craftsmen).
• Shark Man: All auamaua have aspects of this. Tekēhu takes it further, with his druid spiritshift allowing him to turn into a humanoid hammerhead shark.
• Shock and Awe: As a chanter, he's a Storm Speaker, giving him power over winds, rain, and lightning.
• Small Name, Big Ego: He can seem pretty full of himself at times. Given his appearance and abilities, this is actually sort of understandable, and he actually seems more resigned to the attention he receives, playing up expectations rather than actually thinking of himself as inherently better.
• Summon Magic: Both his subclasses heavily restrict their normal summon options, but Watershaper grants him a 1st-level summon in the form of Ondra's Whip, a weaker, water-based version of the 4th-level wizard spell Maura's Writhing Tentacles, summoning only one tentacle instead of three.
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: A physically massive, deep-voiced chanter and naive young idealist out seeing the world first-hand, torn between his people's traditions and his own wish for progress? No, it's not Kana this time, and Tekēhu is considerably more naive, Kana being very well-read and having done some traveling even before he met the Watcher.
• Swords to Plowshares: He's spent most of his life using his watershaping powers for sculpting purposes rather than to fight, and believes that using them for expression is nobler than using them for war.
• Too Much Information: Aloth and Pallegina certainly think so, Tekēhu being very open and enthusiastic about his sex life.
• Touched by Vorlons: Like all godlike, he was born of two normal parents but chosen by Ondra while in the womb. Unlike Pallegina, he takes this as a great honor.
• Verbal Tic: The usual Huana ones: "What say?" as a way of opening conversation or turning a general statement into a request for an opinion; "I say," as a way of ending a sentence or emphasizing a point; and "ekera", for agreement or emphasis, just about all the time. He also has a habit of referring to teammates as "Friend" followed by their name, as in "Friend Xoti" or "Friend Konstanten".
• Voluntary Shapeshifter: His spiritform as a druid is a wereshark. A hammerhead wereshark.
• Weather Manipulation: As a Storm Speaker, his chanter subclass, he has considerable powers over storms at sea.
• What Measure Is a Non-Human?: A rather bizarre variant with his undulating tentacle hair. Some dialogue implies they're semi-sentient and territorial, yet he thinks nothing of having them trimmed (and speaks of them not trusting him afterwards pretty casually), and at one point he accidentally yanks one clean off and flicks it away like a piece of seaweed.
• Wide-Eyed Idealist: He's clearly heartbroken at the suffering he sees in the Gullet. Even more clearly, he had absolutely no idea such suffering existed among his people, which, knowing Prince Aruihi, might be the reason he asked you to bring him along.

Xoti

Xoti

"This here's a final call for all souls! Last stop for the lost! Gather around now — I'll cut you loose and haul you into the light."

Voiced by: Laura Bailey

A savannah/meadow folk priest/monk and member of the children of the Dawnstars. When Xoti was a young girl, she was one of thousands of Readcerans who came to Deadfire fleeing the devastation that followed the vorlas blight and the Saint's War. Her family, like many others, established themselves as farmers, and she fell in love with the lush jungles and bright beaches of her adopted homeland. She is intrigued by the rumors of Eothas' manifestation, but she fears what that will mean for her fellow expatriates, many of whom followed his previous incarnation into war and defeat.

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• Abhorrent Admirer: A more skeptical Edér can't get past his misgivings about her faith, which reminds him uncomfortably both of the Saint's War and his own lost faith.
• Affectionate Nickname: Maia calls her Firefly, because of the lantern.
• Badass Boast: Tends to make a lot of these, on behalf of Gaun, the Watcher, and herself via association. Her confidence is the source of some unspoken friction between her and other party members.
  Xoti: Get ready to witness the feat of a lifetime, Watcher! I'm about to do gods' good work — to single-handedly shepherd a multitude of souls straight into the depths of Hel!
• Bad Powers, Good People: As a Harvester of Gaun, a priest of Eothas in his aspect of the Grim Reaper, her priestly powers revolve around death, reaping, and darkness — specifically, reaping the souls of those who've passed, lighting the darkness in which they find themselves, and easing their passage into the Beyond. As a monk, she's a Sister of the Reaping Moon, meaning she's empowered by Wounds, both by taking damage and by killing enemies. Though it eventually gets subverted if the player should allow her indulge too much in this. If she is not discouraged from harvesting every spirit she comes across, Xoti will gradually start losing her grasp on reality, and get increasingly obsessed with the experience of reaping spirits, and by the time of the epilogue, she eventually cracks completely, and starts targeting living subjects to reap their spirits, beginning with secretly killing animals in gruesome ways, before eventually becoming a fully fledged Serial Killer.
• Because Destiny Says So: A big believer in divine providence and the gods moving In Mysterious Ways, a source of considerable self-confidence for her. It helps that her prophetic dreams really do come true, though whether the gods are really as infallible as Xoti seems to believe is another matter.
• Better as Friends: If Xoti tries to start a romantic relationship with Edér (provided he is friendly inclined towards her to begin with), it ends up like this. The ending slide for this scenario notices that Edér, though not rejecting of her, simply isn't interested in a romantic relationship and therefore continues to find her flirting with him to be somewhat uncomfortable, and eventually her interactions with him turns less amorous and more companionable, and the two instead become life-long friends.
• Bare-Fisted Monk: If you pick the monk class, she can do this, though her sickle and lantern are good enough to keep using.
• Casual Kink: The impression Xoti gives to her companions and the player is one of naivete and innocence. And yet, if romanced, an offhand comment reveals that she's into sexual roleplay.
  Xoti: Watcher, you know I only play pretend beneath the sheets.
• Character Class: Her class options are Priest, Monk, and Priest/Monk (Contemplative).
• Character Tic: Biting her lower lip, which is heavily chapped as a result. When she's particularly upset, she bites down hard enough to draw blood.
• Combat Medic: As a member of the healing/buff-centric priest class, she's also handy with a sickle, uses her lantern as a shield, and worships the god of healing and rebirth. Her monk powers and high spike damage against low-health enemies make her pretty deadly in battle, too.
• Contrasting Replacement Character: To Durance from the first game, not least of all because he killed her god. They never meet, but she's the eager, cheerful, (mostly) innocent priestess to his bitter old man. She has actual visions of the future and can eventually gain an opportunity to speak to her god directly, while Durance is desperately trying to reconnect with the goddess who abandoned him. Both also show the darker sides of faith — Durance, the dangers of going along with the mob, and the destructive power of fanaticism, while Xoti can sink further and further into the solitary, obsessive madness of a religious Serial Killer.
• Corrupt the Cutie: From lovable Genki Girl to haggard Mad Oracle to (potentially) Serial Killer harvesting souls from the living instead of the dead in one of her endings.
• The Corruption: Holding onto all those lost souls, many of whom aren't as nice as Xoti, can take her from merely seeing the horrors in her dreams to seeing them while she's awake, until she finally snaps and starts trying to act them out herself.
• Deep South: Fits a lot of the stereotypes. She's from Readceras, which means she has a southern accent, and she's a Farm Girl who's an enthusiastic missionary of her church — the Children of the Dawnstars, who worship Messianic Archetype Eothas, with congregations that closely resemble Christian revivalist gatherings.
• Don't Make Me Take My Belt Off!: Her Uncle Angbert used to whoop her with a quarterstaff when she misbehaved, which, from the sounds of things, was pretty often.
• The Dreaded: Her bad ending sees her losing her grip on reality and entirely stopping to distinguish between the souls of the living and the dead, becoming an insane Serial Killer who haunts the southeastern Deadfire islands, leaving behind disturbing rumours and hushed whispers of a "Harvester" who inflicts a terrible and grisly fate on anyone unfortunate enough to cross their path wherever she goes.
• Dreaming of Things to Come: She has nightmarish visions of the future. Eventually, as her lantern gets heavier, she starts dreaming while she's awake, too.
• Druidic Sickle: As a follower of Gaun, the aspect of Eothas associated with harvests and death, she wields a sickle. Many of her unique abilities involve "reaping" foes, gaining bonus damage and extra monk resources for killing with melee attacks, with her unique 1st level priest spell Blessed Harvest dealing massive damage to targets that are bloodied or near death.
• Don't Fear the Reaper: Central to faith in Gaun, who appears as a hooded man wielding a scythe. Gaun, however, is an aspect of Eothas, who is the god of light, forgiveness, and rebirth.
• Due to the Dead: As a priestess of Gaun, the aspect of Eothas as the god of death, she puts a lot of emphasis on overseeing the passing of the dead.
• Eerie Pale-Skinned Brunette: After her personal quest, depending on how you resolve it. If you tell her to hold onto the souls, and all the darkness they represent, she's described as losing some color — and a lot of sleep — and starts rambling unprovoked about her increasingly nightmarish visions, while admitting she's starting to like them.
• Farm Girl: She grew up on a farm with her aunt and uncle Angbert. Her in-game background is listed as Farmer, another thing she has in common with Edér.
• Foreshadowing: She can see the future. And why is that hideous Soul Collector you fight in Rymrgand's realm carrying a lantern...?
• The Fundamentalist: Mostly only comes out with Pallegina, who isn't even bothering to hide her Nay Theism this time around. This can eventually become a wedge between her and an increasingly doubting Edér, as well, however. He has bad memories of the Readcerans' particular brand of Eothas worship.
• Genki Girl: She's bright, cheerful, and forceful when she wants to be.
• Gosh Dang It to Heck!: Zigzagged. She uses "darn" instead of "damn", but will use other curse words, and because the colloquial name for the In-Between (the purgatory between death and reincarnation) is Hel, she has no problem at all saying that.
• Guide Dang It!: There are three possible ends to Xoti quest. One restores her sanity, the other does not, while the third is based on whether or not you were inconsistent with your decisions. There are three instances where the Watcher's input affects her ending. In order to get the best ending, the Watcher must always pick options always associated with light, while picking options with darkness will obviously not. The third, "neutral" ending is activated if the Watcher had picked both types of answers at either point or tried to change her mind at the last moment. The bad ending for her quest will be also picked regardless if you were not only inconsistent but told her to release the souls, where she will proceed to do the opposite.
• Healer Signs On Early: She's the game's first priest, available as soon as you reach Port Maje.
• In the Hood: Wears the vivid green hood of the Dawnstars by default, as seen in her portrait above. Other than the color, it fits her worship of Gaun nicely.
• Jumped at the Call: If you let her join your party:
  Xoti: I know an offer rare as hens' teeth when I see it. Yeah, I'm taking it.
• Mad Oracle: Starts going downhill after the Watcher encourages her to embrace the darkness rather than offloading the souls she's collected back into the cycle.
• The Missionary: Though the Readcerans came to the Deadfire as refugees, fleeing the vorlas blight and the Saint's War, the Dawnstars now travel the islands, spreading their particular rites and rituals for worshipping Eothas and Gaun.
• Mundane Utility: Her magical soul-gathering lantern also acts as an actual lantern, making it a torch and a shield in one. Very convenient for dark caves.
• Nephewism: Raised by her aunt and uncle after something bad (she doesn't talk about it) happened to her parents.
• My Parents Are Dead: She doesn't like to talk about them. One of the questions the Watcher can ask is if she killed them.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Well, what did you expect when you told her to "embrace the darkness"?
• Nightmare Fuel Station Attendant: Gains a new appreciation for the darkness if you convince her to hold onto the wayward souls in her lantern rather than releasing them back into the cycle.
• Oh, My Gods!: Uses "my god" (meaning Eothas) and homonyms and near-homonyms like "for gods' sake" or "for Gaun's sake" instead of "for God's sake", as part of the parallel between her Readceran roots and the real world Deep South.
• Older Than They Look: A mild case. She acts a lot like a teenager, but she's actually twenty-seven.
• The Ophelia: If she goes all the way mad. Of the Ax-Crazy variety, too. Made worse because if it happens, you'll know it was the result of your advice.
• Our Souls Are Different: Her lantern pulls the souls of the dead inside of it, "reaping" them for Gaun, for passage into the next life. As a Watcher, you can actually see it happening.
• The Pig-Pen: She's always got mud on her boots and smudges of dirt on her face. She also makes frequent mention of bathing — specifically whether or not she needs to, and of not having done so recently.
• Poke in the Third Eye: When Serafen tries to read Xoti's thoughts after she begins hoarding the souls she reaps, he finds himself trapped in a Year Inside, Hour Outside situtation where what feels like days pass in a matter of seconds, seeing a vision of the entire party lying dead on the deck of her ship. He tells her he just "bounced off", though the Watcher can convince him to tell her the truth.
• Prestige Class: Her Priest subclass, Harvester of Gaun, gives her a darker take on the Priest of Eothas's spell list. Her Monk subclass, Sister of the Reaping Moon, grants her bonus Wounds when she kills an enemy; in exchange, all of her Monk abilities cost one extra Wound to activate.
• The Sacred Darkness: Her belief in night, death, and abscission (the process by which plants shed their leaves or drop fruit or nuts) is that these are simply a natural part of the cycle of life, and holy in their own right. The danger seems to be in lingering, holding on to things which are past — like, say, clinging to life as one of the undead — or perhaps refusing to give up the cargo of a lantern weighted down with countless collected souls?
• Ship Tease: She's rather taken with Edér, and he with her, at least at first. Maia also drops a few hints of her own later on, not the least of which is her Affectionate Nickname for her: Firefly.
• Sir Swears-a-Lot: Not as much as Serafen, but she's prone to the occasional curse, which stands out when coming from a priest.
• Talkative Loon: One possible outcome of her personal quest. The game makes it pretty clear that holding onto those souls is the source of her nightmares, and they're only going to get worse as she collects more and more of them. This doesn't happen if you convince her to regularly offload them at one of the various adra pillars you discover over the course of the game.
• Talks Like a Simile: Uses countrified comparisons and idioms, being as she's a good country girl from Readceras, which is something of a Deep South analog in this game.
• Vigilante Man: If you hold off on recruiting her in Port Maje, after returning from the Engwithan Digsite she's gone on to Neketaka, where she's become this on behalf of the city's Roparu, and you get hints of the darkness under her bright exterior a lot sooner than you otherwise might.
• Waif Prophet: She's a young woman with prophetic dreams who becomes progressively sicker as she reaps more souls, wracked with pain and hallucinations.
  Xoti: Sometimes I hear them like a whisper in the back of my mind. All those souls wandering the darkness.
• War Refugees: Her family fled to the Deadfire from Readceras during the Saint's War, along with thousands of others. Like most Readcerans, they're devout Eothasians and brought their faith along with them.
• Warrior Monk: Even as a pure priest, her sickle, lantern, and various Gaun-granted spells all lend to her spending most of her time on the front lines.
• Your Soul Is Mine!: Subverted — Xoti collects the souls of the dead in her lantern, which does grant her certain powers (like prophetic dreams), but her goal in doing so is to shepherd them back onto the Wheel and into the next life.

Deadfire Sidekicks

Fassina

Fassina

"Madiccho. I fought so hard to get here, but I won't miss a splinter of this place."

Voiced by: Julia Innocenti

An ocean folk wizard (who may multiclass as a chanter or druid), originally from the Vailian Republics, and the severely disgruntled apprentice of the legendary wizard Arkemyr, currently relegated to keeping the storefront of the Dark Cupboard, his magic shop in Neketaka.

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• All Girls Want Bad Boys: Averted. Fassina washes her hands of her ex-lover Bertenno after the latest of his Get Rich Quick Schemes gets him into hot water with a Royal Deadfire Company loan shark. It doesn't help that he steals a pair of magic gloves from the Dark Cupboard's display case.
• The Apprentice: Her whole life up to the point when the Watcher recruits her. She hates Arkemyr enough that she's happy to throw in the towel, however — he has a reputation for never having graduated an apprentice, ever, after all.
• Bad Boss: Taking a page from her master's book, it seems. All of Arkemyr's imps are terrified of her.
  Imp: NASTY FASSINA NO HURT!
• Battle Couple: With Konstanten if you encourage him to act on his crush on her.
• Black Mage: If selected, her Sorcerer (Wizard/Druid) multiclass combination of Wizard (Conjurer) and Druid (Animist) gives her access to both the wizard's most powerful crowd control spells and the druid's AOE damage spells. Being a Loremaster (Wizard/Chanter) gives her access to Summon Magic instead. Both can still be built in more of a support/healing/melee combat capacity, of course.
• Character Class: Her class options are Wizard, Wizard/Druid (Sorcerer), or Wizard/Chanter (Loremaster).
• A Day in the Limelight: The Forgotten Sanctum gives her a chance to observe the archmages' feet of clay firsthand, providing ample commentary on events as well as gaining a new dialogue tree that, among other things, expands considerably on her apprenticeship with Arkemyr.
• Deadpan Snarker: She has a certain bitter wit, which she mostly uses to insult people.
• Death Glare: Has an impressive one which she levels at Arkemyr when she terminates her apprenticeship with him. He seems pleased.
• He Is Not My Boyfriend: Protests a bit too much, not just over whether or not Konstanten is her boyfriend, but about whether she has the Watcher's permission to have a boyfriend, whether she deserves a boyfriend, or whether she's even capable of loosening up and aenjoying herself in the first place. Bad habits of second-guessing herself carried over from her apprenticeship, mostly.
• In Case You Forgot Who Wrote It: Arcane magic in Eora runs on modified Vancian Magic rules, which includes the naming convention of "Insert Wizard Name Here's Spell of Something". Fassina muses over a few possibilities for her own future legacy:
  Fassina: Fassina's Mirthless Laugh. Fassina's Prickling Pox. No, I have it — Fassina's Withering Glare! Ac, I like the sound of that.
• Insufferable Genius: She knows how smart she is, and she has little time for you or your other companions.
• Jumped at the Call: Arkemyr is such an demanding employer that Fassina has no problem giving up her apprenticeship to him to join the Watcher, even though it means giving up training at the hands of one of the greatest living mages on Eora.
• Magic Music: As a chanter, one of her options for multiclassing. The singing doesn't have much bearing on her in-game characterization, although the chanter's implied knowledge of lore and ritual magic could have been as much a part of her magical studies as anything else.
• Mistreatment-Induced Betrayal: Arkemyr again. It takes very little to get Fassina to help you bypass his mansion's security and rob him. She hates him that much.
• Opposites Attract: If the Watcher pushes Konstanten to just tell her how he really feels, the cheerful chanter and the sharp-tongued sorceress can end up becoming an official couple in Seeker, Slayer, Survivor, with accompanying changes to their voice sets if you do.
• Prestige Class: Her wizard school is conjuration, meaning she focuses on Spontaneous Weapon Creation and summoning elemental walls and barriers, and can summon a familiar to grant her passive bonuses in battle.
• Red Mage: She's always a wizard, and her multiclass options are chanter and druid.
• Single Woman Seeks Good Man: When listing the reasons why any woman might, in fact, be lucky to find a man like Konstanten, the fact that he's a decent, caring man is what stops her in mid-sentence.
• Spontaneous Weapon Creation: Many Conjuration (her wizard subclass) spells allow this, whether launched as single-use projectiles or temporarily replacing her equipped weapons.
• Tiny Tyrannical Girl: Haughty, arrogant, and prone to lashing out — verbally or physically — when she doesn't get her way. She beats and insults her "co-worker" Shop Imp at the Dark Cupboard at every opportunity (to be fair, he smears feces on the shop's inventory), but if you talk to Shop Imp about it... it turns out he kind of likes it (and her), and asks her to be careful out there if you recruit her.
• Uptight Loves Wild: She's an acid-tongued wizard's apprentice — he's a singing barbarian. Downplayed in that Konstanten is a mellow older man, but next to Fassina he's a party animal.
• Voluntary Shapeshifting: When spiritshifting as a druid, she transforms into a huge humanoid wolf.

Konstanten

Konstanten

"The voice tricks people. They hear power in it, want to follow."

Voiced by: Bentley Kalu

A mountain dwarf chanter/barbarian working as a masseur at the Wild Mare in Nekataka, bored of his job and craving excitement.

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• Barbarian Hero: Mostly averted. Despite having barbarian as one of his class options, he doesn't fit the rest of the trope all that well.
• The Bard: As a single-class chanter. Like Fassina and Pallegina, it's just sort of there as one of his class options. In Konstanten's case, at least the focus on pure volume and battle cries carries across all his class options.
• Battle Couple: Can become one of these with Fassina.
• Battle Cry: His best spell selections as a skald are made up of magically empowered shouts. His in-game quote upon rushing into battle is a big, boisterous laugh.
• Boisterous Bruiser: He seems to be having a pretty great time wading into the fray.
• Bruiser with a Soft Center: A barbarian warrior... working as a masseur.
• Character Class: His class options are Barbarian, Chanter, or Barbarian/Chanter (Howler).
• Cool Old Guy: He often mentions his age, and looking or feeling old. It doesn't stop him from being one of your toughest frontliners, with a multiclass combination that encourages wading into the fray and holding off waves of mooks all at once.
• Cowardly Lion: Some of his selection dialogue sounds a bit... hesitant, and suggests that he's not really used to a life of adventure. Subverted in Seeker, Slayer, Survivor, when it turns out he used to lead a crew of gladiators in the Monster Arena of the Crucible on Kazuwari, and was just taking a long break when the Watcher happened upon him in the Wild Mare. He's not a Cowardly Lion, he's more of a Shellshocked Veteran
• A Day in the Limelight: Like the other sidekicks, Konstanten gets considerably more development in the DLC. He pipes up when the Watcher receives their invitation to the Crucible in Seeker, Slayer, Survivor, after which the Watcher can open up an actual dialogue with him. It turns out he and his estranged sister were gladiators in the Crucible.
• Dissonant Laughter: He's having a really good time in battle, but not quite so much as to qualify for Laughing Mad.
• Dreadlock Warrior: A dreadlock mohawk.
• The Drifter: His background, which is probably why it doesn't take much convincing at all to pull him out of his job as a masseur at the Wild Mare.
• Facial Markings: He has tattoos along the shaved sides of his head, curving around his ears; seemingly runes or writing of some kind. He got them when he was a Magranite temple guard.
• Fake Ultimate Hero: Overlapping with Reluctant Ruler — he never really wanted to lead, and doesn't think he's cut out for it, but circumstance kept putting him in charge. Including of his gladiator crew on Kazuwari.
• Good Parents: He had these, apparently. One of his basic quotes when you talk to him has him wondering what his Pa is up to.
• Happy-Ending Massage: Despite working in a brothel, these aren't the kind of massages he gives.
• Jumped at the Call: All the Watcher has to do to recruit Konstanten is ask him, as pursing a rogue God is a lot more interesting than his mundane job. If you don't ask him to come along, he'll ask if he can join you himself.
• Magic Music: Since chanters are the Eoran equivalent of bards. His subclass means he focuses on offensive invocations, as opposed to the buffs and summons that player chanters tend to be drawn to.
• Major Injury Underreaction: Upon being critted:
  Konstanten: Now that's just rude!
• Make Me Wanna Shout: He starts out with the Barbaric Yell ability as a barbarian, and gains access to the various thunder and sound-based chanter AoEs, which have a reduced cost for him thanks to his subclass.
• May–December Romance: In Seeker, Slayer, Survivor he will admit to being attracted to Fassina who looks quite a few years his junior. If Fassina is in the party at the same time he admits this, she will confront him on whether he is the one secretly doing nice things for her like leaving scented candles on her desk. Her reaction implies that she's not too averse to the idea of a relationship.
• Nice Guy: Just a friendly guy in general. This turns out to be what Fassina likes about him.
• No Indoor Voice: Especially when he laughs.
• Opposites Attract: He's a Nice Guy who is attracted to grumpy Fassina. Amusingly, it's implied that Fassina isn't completely against the idea, and if you push Konstanten into pursuing it, additional voice clips where they call out to each other by name in battle seem to confirm it.
  Konstanten: There's something about her that gets me all twisted up. Maybe it's that attitude, or the way she hurls those spells like they're spears aimed right at her old boss's head.
• Our Dwarves Are All the Same: Other than the beard and possibly wielding an axe or hammer if you so choose, not so much. As with Barbarian Hero, Konstanten seems like he was designed to deliberately avert this trope.
• Prestige Class: His chanter subclass of Skald means that offensive invocations have a reduced cost of -1 phrase (the chanter ability resource), while all other invocations have their costs increased by +1. In addition, his weapon crits have a 50% chance of granting him a free phrase.
• The Reliable One: The reason he's taken a job that doesn't really interest him is because someone has to send money back to his Pa, and it isn't going to be his sister.
• Retired Badass: In Seeker, Slayer, Survivor, he's revealed to have been a former temple guard of Magran, goddess of war — in the Dyrwood, where they take war and Magran seriously. He also fought in the arena of Kazuwari and came out of alive, convincing his sister Roza that they would only end up dead if they stayed. The stress and burnout, and his disdain of the pointless killing, are why he started working at the Wild Mare, as far from blood and battle as he could get.
• Screaming Warrior: Subverted. Despite his powerful voice, he spends most of combat laughing.
• Tension-Cutting Laughter: He just seems so relieved to have something to hit.
• Videogame Cruelty Potential: You can offer him up to take the place of the Slayer. Konstanten is justifiably angry if you do this, his last words to you being a Precision F-Strike.

Mirke

Mirke

"Drink up, tars! To our better friendship!"

Voiced by: Bethanie Monroe

A perpetually-soused orlan raider, Mirke is wary of the growing factionalism in the Principi, and decides to join the Watcher's crew to get out from under it. She's a monk who can be dual-classed as either a fighter or a rogue. Turned into a sidekick after the initial release as part of the free Rum Runner DLC.

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• The Alcoholic: Is never seen sober. Her associated (free) DLC is themed around getting all liquored up, and sprinkles powerful new alcoholic drinks throughout the game, as well as adding a new drunk idle animation — used by Mirke, naturally, but it can also be selected for the Watcher.
• Amazing Technicolor Population: Like Serafen, she's bright green. Unlike Serafen, she's a hearth orlan, so that's her skin tone, not her fur color. Her fur and hair are blonde.
• Ascended Extra: In the base game she's a minor NPC at Fort Deadlight involved in the quest you get when recruiting Serafen. See also Promoted to Playable.
• Bare-Fisted Monk: Her main class, which can be multiclassed with fighter or rogue.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: She's a skilled combatant despite (or possibly because of) her constant drinking.
• Character Class: Monk, Monk/Fighter (Brawler), or Monk/Rogue (Shadowdancer).
• Drunken Master: She's like a small green Zahua, except instead of using hallucinogens, she just gets smashed.
• Glacier Waif: Her highest stat is her Constitution of 16, which means her hit points are roughly on par with Eder's. Her Might of 13 also means she's stronger than party members many times her size.
• Hobbits: She's an orlan.
• Pint Sized Power House: Both a Bare-Fisted Monk and an orlan.
• Promoted to Playable: She was a minor character in Fort Deadlight with a surprisingly extensive dialogue tree, before being promoted to a recruitable sidekick in the Rum Runner DLC.
• The Unintelligible: Much of her dialogue is so garbled and slurred that it hardly even sounds like words.

Rekke

Rekke

"Lap pile kiku? Lakaris? Ke zilas tahun?"

Voiced by: Sam Riegel

A warrior from across the sea, he does not speak any language known in the Eastern Reach or the Archipelago. He's one of the storm folk, a race of humans never before seen. His multiclass options are fighter, fighter/monk (brawler), and fighter/barbarian (brute).

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• Beauty Is Never Tarnished: Averted. He's got quite a scar on his face.
• Character Class: Can be a Fighter, Fighter/Monk (Brawler), or Fighter/Barbarian (Brute).
• Fiery Redhead: Long, dark red hair. He's pretty cheerful for someone shipwrecked in an entirely foreign land, and his multiclass options suggest a brash, Boisterous Bruiser.
• Foreign Cuss Word: Edér teaches Rekke some Vailian curse words (and probably all the Vailian Edér himself knows, by extension).
• Funny Foreigner: He shows up out of nowhere, speaks an unknown language, and most of his antics are Played for Laughs.
• Guide Dang It!: The hardest part about recruiting him is actually finding him, verging on Hidden Character.
• Hidden Character: Almost. He's not in any of the major ports. He's not even near any of the islands the major faction quests will point you toward. Instead, he's floating in a bunch of crates in the middle of the open ocean at the eastern edge of the map.
• Lost at Sea: His ship was destroyed by storms and/or sea monsters while crossing the storms, which no one had ever done before.
• The Missionary: This is his stated background on his character sheet, but of course it's not easy to tell with him. Yezuha doesn't worship the traditional Eoran pantheon, however — they worship God, in the singular. His mutterings in the Forgotten Sanctum DLC also hint that said position is more a pretext for his exile than anything else.
• Mysterious Past: You can't actually understand him, so this is a given. Even once he starts speaking Aedyran, he's very vague. All you get is something about buildings being set on fire, but no context. It’s clarified a bit more in the Forgotten Sanctum DLC: during a drug trip he tells his father that his attempt to prank someone with a spark bomb was only meant to scare them but instead they caught fire. He begs his father not to exile him, which presumably fails given where he’s found.
• Polyglot: Once you can understand him, he says they speak many languages in the land where he comes from. He says this after having picked up Aedyran almost supernaturally quickly.
• The Prankster: He amuses himself by playing pranks on other members of the party. Many of the things he does seem to be related to getting back at others, making them "even," based on his somewhat skewed view of what that means. It also led to his exile since one prank gone wrong led to him setting someone on fire and being banished as punishment by his own father.
• Pyromaniac: Maybe. Some buildings "went on fire" back in his homeland, which is part of why he was put on the ship. He doesn't elaborate, and you're not given the option of prying further. Forgotten Sanctum clarifies that he set someone on fire and that it led to his exile. He claims it was an accident - it was just meant to be a prank to scare them - but he was exiled nonetheless.
• Religious Bruiser: Though it's a little hard to believe Rekke was anyone's first choice as a missionary. Though he admits that he was not the one who was to be the teacher, but merely a crew member of the ship. He does seem religious though.
• Rugged Scar: A long, jagged scar along his left cheek and jaw, which pulls up the side of his mouth into a slight grimace.
• Sequel Hook: The existence of an entire civilization where the gods of the Engwithans are unknown.
  Rekke: You do not know Yezuha. I hope you do not have to. But I fear you will.
• Shout-Out: Seems like there's a little inversion of John Blackthorne/William Adams in there, as a man from the west who washes up in the east. His class options even suggest something of the interplay between samurai (fighter/monk) and western warrior (fighter, fighter/barbarian).
• The Exile: Forgotten Sanctum reveals he’s this rather than just a missionary.
• There's No Place Like Home: He'd go back right now, if he could. Whether he’d be welcome back is another thing entirely...
• The Unintelligible: No one in the party has any idea what language he's speaking — though an obscure hint suggests it might be a very distant relative of Ixamitl — but that doesn't stop Rekke from speaking his mind regardless. Quickly averted once he learns Aedyran, however, as he's the only sidekick who has a full, surprisingly extensive dialogue tree.
• Verbal Tic: He uses "ta" in much the same way Huana use "ekera" and Vailians use "ac."
• You No Take Candle: Downplayed, but he speaks in broken Aedyran while trying to make himself understood. He quickly becomes quite fluent, barring the occasional slip-up — enough that he snarks that his Aedyran has to at least be better than Serafen's, right?

Ydwin

Ydwin

"I'd not experiment upon myself without relative certainty it would be a success."

Voiced by: Ashley Johnson

Ydwin is a pale elf fampyr mindstalker (rogue/cipher) with extensive training as an animancer. She was born in a remote, lawless settlement in the White that Wends, where she witnessed the cruelest extremes of both kith and nature. Her observations fueled a fascination with animancy, and she eventually made her way to the Vailian Republics to study. She's since become an accomplished master in the field, and advances with luminous adra in the Deadfire have drawn her to the archipelago. Originally a potential 8th companion, Ydwin is one of the potential recruitable sidekicks in Deadfire.

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• Apologetic Attacker: After a crit:
  Ydwin: [fretfully] Did I do that?
• Badass Longcoat: Starts out wearing one of the 17th Century-style Vailian frock coats available in the game.
• Boyish Short Hair: Along with a frock coat and spectacles.
• Broken Pedestal: After your experiences in the White Void, Ydwin pulls back from her previous admiration for the efficiency of Rymrgand's grand design.
• Call-Back: Ydwin unwittingly invokes the Arc Words of the first game when she needs to rest:
  Ydwin: I heard they're prone to nightmares, but do Watchers never sleep?
• Character Class: She can be a Cipher, Rogue, or Cipher/Rogue (Mindstalker).
• Cultural Rebel: Ydwin's cold, clinical, standoffish demeanor? That's not a cultural trait. Despite living in the incredibly unforgiving White that Wends and worshipping Rymrgand, god of death and entropy, her fellow Wending natives the Harbingers of Dusk are quite open and cheerful — occasionally unnervingly so, for an Apocalypse Cult. Along similar lines, she really can't stand Vatnir, considering him a manipulative hypocrite, which is hard to deny, who pretty much represents the worst of what she hated about the Land.
• A Day in the Limelight: Ydwin has a greatly expanded role in The Beast of Winter, where she provides background and commentary on her fellow Glamfellen (pale elves), their frozen homeland of the White that Wends, and Rymrgand, their patron god. She's also more than a little interested in the process by which the Messenger gained her immortality, and the means by which souls are removed from the Great Wheel in the White Void. She changes her tune on the latter after seeing the reality for herself.
• Deadpan Snarker: She gets to show off her wit in The Beast of Winter, and manages to snark with the best of them.
• Enraged by Idiocy: She can barely keep herself composed when listening to the mad ramblings of the people from Harbinger's Watch.
• Expy: Ydwin seems to be a (gender-flipped) take on Percival Fredrickstein Von Musel Klossowski de Rolo III^note but you can call him Percy. Like Percy, she is a rationally-thinking, glasses-wearing, scientific-minded companion which has no qualms on experimenting on herself. Her hobby of tailoring her own fashion mirrors Percy's own hobby of tinkering and making jewelry. Her pale elf background (and her homeland of the White that Wends) also bears similarity to Percy who grew up in Whitestone, a colder city in the north of Tal'dorei. They even look similar, being a glasses-clad, white-haired, pale companion. Bonus point for being voiced by Ashley Johnson, another nerdy-ass voice actor who plays Pike in the Tal'dorei Campaign who has a crush on Percy early on the campaign.
• The Fashionista: She's a skilled seamstress who tailors her own clothes, who has unique dialogue with a particularly well-dressed principo on a beach near Amira's Roost and the Vailian tailor aboard the Deck of Many Things.
• For Science!: Almost pure science — she's dedicated to pursuing her studies in animancy, the science of the soul, not with any overarching goal in mind, but because she believes the possibilities will present themselves as they learn more. She's mildly resentful of the adra trade in Deadfire grinding up any and all luminous adra they can get their hands on before it can be properly studied. If the Watcher asks her what she believes the purpose of her work might be:
  Ydwin: You set the sled before the dogs. Before making decisions regarding what should be done, we must first understand what is. Anything else is a dream in the dark.
• Foreshadowing: Potentially twice over. In the possible category is that she's a pale elf, and has unique dialogue when you visit Rymrgand's realm in "A Glimpse Beyond." In the definitely category, the experiment she did was meant to disconnect her soul from Berath's Wheel to keep from reincarnating... and Eothas' goal turns out be destroying the Wheel so that no-one is connected to it.
• Friendly Neighborhood Vampire: Rather than skulking in a crypt or behind closed curtains somewhere, she's still actively working as an animancer in Neketaka.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: Mechanically, Ydwin is considered an ordinary kith, with all the benefits and weaknesses this implies, while NPC fampyrs are considered vessels and get hypnotic powers. (Though as a cipher, Ydwin can imitate the latter.)
• High-Class Glass: She wears a pair of delicate wire-framed spectacles.
• Hollywood Atheist: Subverted. She believes in the gods and is devoted to Rymrgand in her own way, but she disdains the rites and traditions of her people, putting her faith in science. She also occasionally has trouble reconciling this particular faith with the inscrutable nature of the gods. Downplayed in that her natural reserve holds her arrogance in check.
  The Watcher: [Diplomatic] Let's keep things civil, Ydwin. Everyone's entitled to their beliefs.
  Ydwin: They are not. Rationale must bolster beliefs, or they are naught but castles built of mist on the surface of the sea. [sighs, waves her hand] But civil I shall remain. I've too few words to waste them on the obstinate.
• Horror Hunger: She requires a steady source of soul energy in order to stave off her the decay of her body and the degeneration of her mind, the most concentrated supply of which being the flesh, and especially blood, of animals... or kith. Downplayed, however — this hardly ever comes up after you recruit her.
• Mad Scientist: Downplayed or even averted depending on how you feel about animancy, but in-universe the Watcher can be dismissive or even horrified by her experiments.
• One-Steve Limit: Averted. She shares a name with the Dyrwoodan paladin St. Ydwen, of fampyr-slaying St. Ydwen's Redeemer fame.
• The One Who Made It Out: The lack of resources and need for every community member to pull their weight means that Wending natives rarely leave. Vatnir asks her how she managed to pay for passage aboard a ship; Ydwin says she took the money from a dead man, but refuses to elaborate any further. She seems particularly disdainful of Vatnir for trying to make it out, but then falling back hard into their people's traditions.
• Our Elves Are Different: She's a pale elf (not just an elf who's pale, but one of the two subspecies of elves in the game), most of whom inhabit the White That Wends, with a culture that seems to resemble Scandinavia in a climate that is the Eoran equivalent of Antarctica. She has the same +5 (would've been +10 in the first game) armor bonus against Burn and Freeze damage as all pale elves.
• Our Souls Are Different: As an animancer, her specific object of study is exactly how different they are and why.
• Our Vampires Are Different: They're called fampyrs, and are more or less souls which continue to inhabit dead bodies, which will rot unless they can feed on a steady diet of the living — or any other source of soul energy, for that matter. Animals will suffice, but once the process of decay begins, the hunger tends to overtake the fampyr's sanity, causing them to decay further into guls, darguls, and eventually mindless skeletons.
• Psychic Powers: As with all ciphers, one of her in-game classes.
• Professor Guinea Pig: She experimented on her own soul to see if it was possible to separate a soul from Berath's Wheel, preventing it from ever reincarnating. She succeeded.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: Carmine eyes, and she's a fampyr. A Friendly Neighborhood Fampyr as far as has been seen, but many a Death Guard and fampyr has started out with good intentions.
• Royal Rapier: Part of a concerted effort to appear as sophisticated and cultured as possible, to leave behind whatever terrible things she apparently saw growing up in the far reaches of White that Wends.
• Shout-Out: To Alice in Wonderland, upon detecting a hidden object. Given her high Perception stat, you can expect to hear this a lot.
  Ydwin: Curiouser and curiouser...
• Ship Tease: A little, with fellow cipher Serafen. She appreciates his wit and sense of humor, and mentions to the Watcher that it's a shame that he "wants so badly to be loved, yet is afraid to let anyone care for him."
• Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: With Vatnir. While he never says anything much about her it's clear that she despises him, considering him a coward and a hypocrite who pretends to be a flock leader when in reality he just wanted to escape his life and is now trapped in his role. She even points out that he could have simply saved up enough coins to charter a ship like she did rather than doing his religious leader charade. If the player lets him join at the DLC's end she sighs and makes it clear she's not a fan.
• The Undead: She prevented her soul from passing on to the Berath's Wheel, and her body from dying. In game terms, that makes her this.
• Van Helsing Hate Crimes: The Watcher can attack her on sight for no other reason than being visibly a member of the living dead. Admittedly most of the undead the Watcher has met have tried to eat them, hack them to pieces, or steal their powers, but Ydwin is never anything but a loyal companion, at worst somewhat aloof.
• Verbal Tic: "This one," "that one," "these ones" and "those ones." Other Glamfellen do it too, but not quite as much.
• Video Game Cruelty Potential: During Beast of Winter, while in the White Void, one possible means of escaping the Maw itself without pledging yourself to Rymrgand or battling his avatar is to offer Ydwin herself in trade. Exactly what Rymrgand gets out of this isn't clear — once again, it seems likea betrayal of one of his devoted followers. Whatever the reason, your other party members are, understandably, upset. It's the Skaenite Blood Pool all over again, except this time they all know exactly what's happening.
  Ydwin: I expected better of you. Of both of you.
• Waistcoat of Style: She starts out wearing a frock coat with a waistcoat underneath. She basically looks like a female version of Alucard with shorter hair. Sadly it's not unique armor so it'll be quickly tossed aside.
• What the Hell Is That Accent?: Asked in-universe, though it's not really noticeable in her voice acting. It's presumably a Wending accent, which is probably meant to sound mildly Scandinavian, like the other Glamfellen the player encounters in BOW, modulated by years spent in the Republics and Dyrwood. It does come through at least a little in her slightly stilted diction.

The Beast of Winter Sidekicks

Vatnir

Vatnir

"Whether or not you mean to cause chaos, chaos follows in your wake. You're chosen, whether or not you choose to be."

Voiced By: Atli Gunnarsson

An endings godlike and priest of Rymrgand, and leader of the Harbingers of the Dusk. Vatnir was born to Glamfellen (pale elf) parents in the White that Wends, and grew up knowing it was his duty to shepherd and safeguard the clans. Now the High Harbinger, his small congregation encamped among the drifting icebergs known as the Dead Floe, he sends the Watcher an invitation to come feast with the Harbingers believe to be the Duskspeaker who will usher in the end of the world. First appears in The Beast of Winter.

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• Bandage Mummy: He's swathed in bandages, but not enough to hide his many visible sores and wounds.
• Blessed with Suck: As a endings godlike, Vatnir is prone to suffering from life threatening diseases, but the pale elves of the White that Wends see his condition as a blessing and appointed him as High Harbinger because of it. Too bad that's not a life Vatnir ever wanted for himself.
• Body Horror: As an Endings godlike, he catches every disease he possibly can from his environment. None of it will kill him, mind, but that hasn't stopped him from racking up a number of horrific injuries from his infections, including (at least) the loss of his lower lip, half of his six eyes, and numerous bleeding sores barely covered by his swathes of bandages.
• But Now I Must Go: At the end of The Beast of Winter, if he joins your crew, this is how he breaks the news to the other Harbingers, saying that he can better serve Rymrgand by traveling with the Watcher. Really he's just glad for any excuse to shed his old life.
• Calling the Old Man Out: Not unlike Pallegina with Hylea, regarding the "mercy" Rymrgand's oblivion provides:
  Rymrgand: I'm an elf! Your mercy's a long way off!
• Character Class: He's a priest of Rymrgand by default, but players have the option of multiclassing him into either a Priest/Chanter (Celebrant) or Priest/Rogue (Zealot).
• The Chosen One: An omen of Rymrgand himself, and thus singled-out to lead among the Glamfellen.
• Combat Medic: As a priest, and especially as a priest/rogue. Downplayed in that by default he's geared more toward disease-based debuffs and cold spells, with gear and talents that buff his weapon damage.
• Contrasting Replacement Character: To Durance, as a priest of ice rather than fire who expresses an interest in the tests the world has in store for the Watcher. That's pretty much where the similarities begin and end — Vatnir is just saying what he thinks someone like him is supposed to say, and what someone like the Watcher would expect to hear. Rather than having Durance's iron certainty and unshakable belief in the design and greater purpose of the gods, Vatnir barely knows what he's doing, wants nothing more than to escape the burden of his responsibilities, and is a stammering Cowardly Lion. Of course, despite all that and very much in spite of his best efforts, Vatnir has a whole village of followers, while Durance would be lucky if he can even get the Watcher to keep him around.
• Cool Mask: A rugged metal plate.
• Cowardly Lion: He's a powerful priest and a skilled fighter, but all things considered he'd prefer to leave the fighting to someone else.
• Cult: Leader of the Harbingers, a splinter sect of Rymrgand worshippers originally from the White that Wends, who followed Vatnir to the Dead Floe and the temple within.
• Cultural Rebel: Like Ydwin, he grew up wanting to escape the White that Wends. Unlike Ydwin, he could never put together the coin to book passage, and instead became the High Priest of an entire community. A life he's still trying to escape.
• Death Seeker: The leader of the surprisingly cheerful Harbingers, who believe the end of the world is nigh and that Rymrgand will claim them soon, bringing an end to their suffering on the Great Wheel. Except that Vatnir doesn't believe any of that — he still prays to Rymrgand, but he doesn't want his suffering to end that much.
• Dirty Coward: Depending on how the player feels about him, he's either this or a Lovable Coward — the game does give you the option of calling him out on this and his hypocrisy.
• Extra Eyes: From what can be seen through his mask, he has three small, Creepy Blue Eyes in a cluster on the right side of his head, much like how Rymrgand manifests to the Watcher in the game's cutscenes. The other side of his head is covered by bandages.
  • Concept art shown by Obsidian devs at Pax West 2018 reveals that he also had three eyes on the left side of his face; however, due to an infection, he lost two of them completely and was blinded in the third.
• Eyepatch of Power: Has bandages covering the spot where his left eye would be. He makes up for it by having three eyes on the right side of his face.
• Fake Ultimate Hero: The rest of his flock adore him and think that he's Rymrand's chosen to lead them to their death. In reality he just wanted to get away and they followed along without his want or consent.
• Good Lips, Evil Jaws: His mask doesn't quite cover the fact that he's missing his lower lip.
• The Grotesque: He wears a metal mask, but from what can be seen of the face underneath, he's got it rough even by godlike standards.
• Horned Humanoid: Like many godlike. In Vatnir's case, he has Rymrgand's curved aurochs horns, a rack of six in total.
• High Priest: The High Harbinger himself.
• Hypocrite: Funny how his followers are out dying in the snow while Vatnir remains in his chapel. Not that there's anything sinister about it — they want to do it, and if you actually listen to what he's telling them during his sermon, he's walking a line between his duty, trying to tell them to lead good lives, and telling them what they want to hear, since he has no real way of knowing what Rymrgand actually wants. In the end, it turns out that the "Messenger" is an ancient foe of the gods, Rymrgand wants her dead, and the aurochs god certainly didn't send her to claim the lives of a bunch of cultists he couldn't care less about.
• An Ice Person: As a priest — and godlike — of the god of cold.
• Idle Animation: A great big sneeze.
• Incurable Cough of Death: A wet cough, voiced in dialogue, which probably won't kill him, since it's one of the signs of Rymrgand's "favor": Vatnir is always sick.
• Lovable Coward: He has a hidden room in his quarters where he runs and hides during the Messenger's attack on Harbinger's Watch, even as his followers run outside and beg for the Messenger to kill them. Not exactly courageous, but in his favor, he's perfectly capable in combat and entertainingly thinks his fellow Harbingers are just as crazy as the Watcher probably does.
• Made of Iron: Despite his apparent frailty, wearing robes rather than armor, and his low Constitution score, his hit points are quite high (the default build for him takes the Tough talent), and as an endings godlike he's resistant to afflictions — all of them.
• Magic Music: If multiclassed as a chanter.
• The Nothing After Death: A somewhat rhetorical sermon, based on what Rymrgand's followers believe — death is to be feared when it brings only reincarnation, the inescapable cycle. Except that Vatnir is afraid of oblivion just as much if not more than reincarnation, yet his current life as a godlike isn't exactly easy, either. No matter where he looks, he's trapped.
  Vatnir: And why shouldn't we fear death? What offers death save erasure? A return to life cleansed of experience and understanding. Ignorant. Set to suffer again. To repeat our mistakes. Endlessly. To fail.
• No Sympathy: Due to his experiences and horrible life he tends not to be all too sympathetic when seeing the suffering of others. When he sees the horrors in the Forgotten Sanctum he, unlike other party members, just urges the Watcher to leave and/or ignore what's happening while the rest express varying degrees of horror or fear.
• Only Sane Man: Literally the only Harbinger who doesn't actually want to die and thinks the rest of his flock are idiots for committing suicide by dragon whenever the Messenger shows up.
• Prestige Class: His Priest of Rymrgand subclass is unique to him.
• Remember When You Blew Up a Sun?: He recounts the Watcher's great and terrible deeds for the other Harbingers upon your arrival, which will either be misunderstood, like "causing" the riots in Defiance Bay, or else a reminder of your more questionable decisions.
• Semi-Divine: One of the previously unseen endings godlike, chosen of Rymrgand.
• Sure, Let's Go with That: If you tell Pilgrim Ehrys that the Harbingers could benefit from the lesson of her asceticism, then nudge Vatnir, the high priest of the Harbingers into giving his opinion, he's taken off guard but tries to go along with it. This sums up most of his interactions with his flock — he just says whatever sounds good and nods sagely, since he doesn't share their Death Seeker tendencies at all.
• Sword and Gun: Battleaxe and magic wand.
• Technically-Living Zombie: Obsidian has a history with these, and Vatnir certainly looks the part.
• Touched by Vorlons: As one of the godlike. Rymrgand's godlike suffer more than most, wracked with constant illness their whole lives.
• Underrated and Overleveled: While all companions can fall into this or the opposite Vatnir gets this the most. The suggested level for tackling the DLC is level 14-16 and if he joins your party he'll go up to an equal level. Meaning that the cowardly, hypocritical guy who constantly shies away from danger will very well be the one with the highest level when he shows up.
• Unwanted False Faith: It's expected among the Glamfellen that endings godlike will provide leadership and wisdom, not unlike how the Huana view godlike of Ondra and Hylea. Vatnir grew up trying to fill this role, always doubting himself, even as the Harbingers sprung up around him. It was based on a lie — Vatnir wanted to escape his responsibilities and the hardship of life in the White that Wends, so he invented a pilgrimage so that he could leave... except then others decided that sounded like a great idea, and invited themselves along, electing Vatnir the High Harbinger.
• Video Game Cruelty Potential: He's reluctant to join you at first, and you can threaten, guilt, or blackmail him into joining the party, though by the end of the DLC he'll go with the party just to get away from his responsibilities as High Harbinger. You can also offer him up to Rymrgand in lieu of pledging allegiance, same as with Ydwin, but Rymrgand refuses in Vatnir's case, saying he could already take him any time he wanted.
• Waif Prophet: He's a sickly priest of Rymrgand, and was able to accurately describe the Watcher to his followers based on a vision he'd had. In all likelihood, he simply heard a secondhand description in the five years since the Watcher's encounter with Glasvahl at Noonfrost.
• Who Wants to Live Forever?: Elves don't live forever, but it might seem that way if your pain and disfigurements are only going to continue, and possibly get worse, during the three-hundred-odd years a pale elf can expect to live.
• Younger Than He Looks: Based on what he says about Rymrgand's mercy being a long way off, he's not a particularly old elf, and elves in Eora can live to be up to 300.

Temporary Party Members

Calisca

Calisca

Voiced by: Cindy Robinson

A mercenary originally from the Dyrwood who has been hired on as a guide and guard for the caravan the Watcher is travelling with in the intro. She is headed to Gilded Vale out of worry for the safety of her sister, Aufra, who is a resident of the village.

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• The Lad-ette: The Masculine Girl to Heodan's Feminine Boy.
• Masculine Girl, Feminine Boy: A gruff mercenary frontierswoman and guide through the hinterlands of the Dyrwood, in contrast to the quiet, nervous, put-upon Heodan.
• Mauve Shirt: Calisca has a sister in Gilded Vale, and spends some time getting to know the Watcher, allowing you to flesh out your background, which does actually come up a few times during the later game. Calisca, on the other hand? Dies in the bîaŵac churned up by the Engwithan engine just as you make it out of the first dungeon.
• Outdoorsy Gal: She works as a wilderness guide from the Dyrwood to the Ixamitl Plains.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: If you choose to accept Heodan's request to rest, she steals the party's water and abandons you.
• We Hardly Knew Ye: Calisca dies at the end of the introductory dungeon. (It is possible to have her die a plot-related death before this point, but the trigger for that death is nowhere near as obvious as in Heodan's case.)

Heodan

Heodan

Voiced by: Sam Riegel

A merchant from the the Aedyr Empire who is travelling with the same caravan as the Watcher in the intro. Heodan has left home in the hopes of helping to expand his family's mercantile enterprise, which has been taken over by his brothers.

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• Cowardly Lion: He's a Naïve Newcomer with a slight stammer who's badly out of his element, but he's still a rogue, which means he can deal some hefty damage, provided you can find anything for him to hit in the starter dungeon.
• Masculine Girl, Feminine Boy: The Feminine Boy to Calisca's Masculine Girl. Not that they had much to do with each other before meeting up with the Watcher.
• Mauve Shirt: Like Calisca, Heodan gets some characterization, and even a couple of possible plot hooks, but no matter what — if he even makes it that far — he still dies at the end of Cilant Lîs.
• Intrepid Merchant: The youngest of his brothers, out trying his luck in the frontier in the hopes of expanding the family business.
• We Hardly Knew Ye: He has the potential to get it much worse than Calisca, since he can die even earlier than she can if the player doesn't pass a couple of fairly high (for Level 1) skill/ability checks.
• Youngest Child Wins: Not in Pillars of Eternity. It's that kind of game.

Talking Weapons

Modwyr

Modwyr

Voiced By: Allegra Clark

A sentient sword that the Watcher finds in the Old City beneath Neketaka. Modwyr is waiting for her owner - a great swordswoman - to return. With some convincing, she can be talked into soulbinding with the Watcher so they might use her until they find her mistress.

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• Blood Knight: Boy, does she love killing things. Three of her four upgrade conditions require the Watcher to kill a certain number of kith or at least deal large amounts of damage with her. Considering what she is, it's entirely justified.
• Cargo Ship: Invoked. The questline and dialogue with Modwyr is deliberately written to have romantic subtext between the Tsundere sword and the Watcher— only their romance revolves around stabbing monsters instead of mutual sexual attraction.
  Watcher: Stabbing people just wouldn't be the same without you!
  • Iselmyr also shows some interest in her.
• Clingy Jealous Girl: She has the trait "Jealous," and won't let anyone but the Watcher use her. After her quest is completed, she'll let others use her as well. Another trait of hers, "Emotional", converts some of her damage to fire or ice, depending on her wielder's health.
• Cool Sword: She's a rune-encrusted Living Weapon with a glowing blade and the personality of a snarky Tsundere Blood Knight. Modwyr oozes cool.
• Deadpan Snarker: She's rather mouthy and sarcastic.
• Disc-One Nuke: Modwyr is a powerful weapon with numerous very helpful upgrades that can be acquired as soon as you reach Neketaka and are strong enough to survive the Old City (level 6+). She also basically upgrades herself as you wield her in battle, giving very little incentive to switch her out for another sword.
• Empathic Weapon: She soulbinds with the Watcher, and gets stronger the more they bond.
• Evil Laugh: Of the psychotic variety, usually triggered by scoring a crit or at least a particularly good hit.
• Grail in the Garbage: You find her lodged in a corpse in the Old City beneath Neketaka, where she's been for years.
• Hates Being Alone: Years of involuntary solitude in a crumbling ruin after her original owner dumped her have left Modwyr with serious abandonment issues. Reading her evolving item description reveals her fear of her current company abandoning her as well if they find out more about her, and the standoffish side of her personality always gives way to her seeking the Watcher's proximity one way or another.
• In Love with Your Carnage: There's just nothing better than when the two of you are both covered in blood.
• Interplay of Sex and Violence: Since violence is her only way of interacting with the world, being used for violence in the hands of the Watcher takes on a comically sexual subtext.
• Lampshade Hanging: She calls the (probably) second soulbound weapon you come across "dumb. Really, really dumb", lampshading how none of the other soulbound items have any apparent personality.
• Laughing Mad: Practically shrieks with laughter when you kill or crit with her.
• Living Weapon: She's a soul in a sword.
• Mysterious Past: Like most soulbound weapons, Modwyr doesn't remember who she was before her soul was put into the sword she's inhabiting now. Finishing her personal quest (so to speak) doesn't change this.
• Mythology Gag: An expy of Lilarcor ("Larry") the greatsword from Baldur's Gate II, another obnoxious talking sword found in the bowels of the city.
• No-Sell: Her final upgrade makes her wielder immune to various mind-affecting afflictions.
• Orgasmic Combat: If she doesn't laugh maniacally when her wielder scores a crit, she moans with pleasure instead. Giving her to a Critical Hit Class character can make combat encounters sound like an adult movie.
• Talking Weapon: You have to address her first except for your initial conversation with her, but then she gets pretty talkative. She'll also interject on her own accord at various points of the story, usually to dispense lethal doses of snark.
• Tsundere: Very much so. Especially at first before her original owner is found, she's extremely critical, and borderline verbally abusive to the Watcher, but at the same time is fully dependant on them to get used to stab things and not rust in a dungeon somewhere. A lot of her dialogue begins with her being very snarky and taunting before mellowing out at the Watcher's words.
• Unique Item: Although other soulbound items can be found in the game and its expansions, Modwyr is the only one you can talk to, and also the only one with a personal quest of sorts. The others are just weapons and armor pieces with some special traits and upgrade conditions.
• Was Once a Man: The soul in the sword was evidently kith at some point, but Modwyr doesn't remember anything of her past life. The Watcher can release the soul from the blade if they so desire.
• Who Wants to Live Forever?: She's pretty torn about being practically immortal. On one hand, she thoroughly enjoys doing what a sword is meant to do. On the other, she knows she's cut off from the Wheel and is a bit anxious of the prospect of tiring of her life one day without having a way to end it. You can offer to let Xoti release her soul from the sword after she confesses her worries, but she'll be happy to continue killing things in the Watcher's hand just as well.

Cut Party Members

Cadegund

Cadegund

A priestess of Magran, goddess of war. Wields an arquebus and hammer, and wears Magran's emblem, a bomb, on her breastplate.

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• Chainmail Bikini: Averted. She wears full plate armor that is pretty but functional. An early design emphasized her buxom significantly, however.
• Church Militant: She carries an arquebus and a warhammer, and her deity's holy symbol is a bomb.
• The Musketeer: Arquebus and warhammer.

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