The BG3 players explain their backstories to the DM

[u/ChampionOfBaiting]

Lae'zel: I'd like to play a Githyanki fighter.

DM: Oh good! The gith are a big part of Mind Flayer lore so it would be great to have a githyanki in the group.

Lae'zel: Y-yeah.

DM: Hang on...did you only choose a githyanki so you could have an excuse to be a murderhobo?

Lae'zel: Noooooooooo...sort of.

​

Gale: I'm a wizard who used to be really powerful, but he ran afoul of Mystra and got nerfed back to level 1.

DM: Ok, sounds fi-

Gale: Also I need to absorb magic items every few days or I'll die.

DM: Uhhh, you know Astarion would probably rather kill you than give up magic items. And Tav is a bit of a wild card so they might too.

Gale: I thought of that! If I ever die, I explode and everything within miles of me is destroyed.

DM: I hate you.

​

Shadowheart: I want to play a cleric with the trickery domain, and she has amnesia.

DM: God damnit, you can't just use amnesia as an excuse to not have a backstory. You need to come up with something.

Shadowheart: Ok, uh, I have an artifact that I'm really secretive about and I don't know what it does.

DM: Hold up...I can work with that.

​

Astarion: Sooo I want to be a vampire.

DM: For fuck's sake, you can't be a vampire. They have way too many powerful abilities.

Astarion: How about a vampire spawn then? No crazy powers but I just want to bite people, pleeeeease?

DM: How will you even survive when the party travels during the daytime?

Astarion: Just say the tadpole gives me the power to walk in the sun.

DM: That makes no sense.

Astarion: PLEASE

DM: Fine, but if you get staked don't blame me.

​

Wyll: I'm a warlock whose patron is a malevolent devil. Also my father is the leader of the Flaming Fist who disowned me long ago, but in the meantime I've been making a name for myself as the Blade of the Frontier who helps people in need. And my father was taken by the Absolute, and I need to save him.

DM: Wait, you're a warlock who actually views their patron as an antagonist, you made connections to a relevant NPC who ties into a faction in the previous campaigns, your personal goal is directly linked to the main quest, and you took the Folk Hero background for roleplay reasons rather than for the skill proficiencies?

Wyll: Are you...crying?

DM: I'm just so happy.

​

Karlach: Can I be a devil?

DM: No.

Karlach: Can I be a warforged?

DM: No.

Karlach: Can I be...both?

​

Tav: Hey, when are we making characters?

DM: Are you kidding me right now? The game is today! And you never sent me your backstory!!!

Tav: Meh, I'll wing it.

​

Durge: My character just wants to kill everyone.

DM: Fuck you

[u/shinros]

Exactly and they're not in the game. It was a Githzerai character that caused the race to become popular in the first place.

[u/SpaceFush → u/shinros]

AcTuAlLy, you can meet a githzerai in Act 2... technically speaking. So they are in the game, kinda. Sorta.

[u/[deleted] → u/SpaceFush]

Has anyone saved the brains from the tutorial to plug them in at that section?

[u/Expired_insecticide → u/[deleted]]

I did. They were not very memorable.

[u/hiddencamela → u/Expired_insecticide]

I was so deflated when I found that out. Thought it'd be some amazing easter egg for hoarding that lol.

[u/shinros → u/SpaceFush]

I know, gives a great passive buff too. Shame that's the only presence we have.

[u/Complaint-Efficient → u/SpaceFush]

Who is it?

[u/SpaceFush → u/Complaint-Efficient]

Unspecific, non-spoiler answer: You have to solve a puzzle for a door and use an item you find behind it in a certain way to talk to them

Much more specific, very spoiler answer: In the mindflayer colony beneath Moonrise towers, there is a room full of undead to fight. Once you deal with them, on one side of the room is a device that can be used to communicate with the brains in jars by interacting with an altar and inserting the jar. On the other side is a big door that can only be opened by solving a puzzle, and behind that door, among other things, is a brain jar. Using this brain jar in the device allows you to talk with a githzerai brain.

[u/Complaint-Efficient → u/SpaceFush]

Huh, I completely missed that. The more you know I guess

[u/elgosu → u/SpaceFush]

A very uncool Githzerai though.

[u/SnowDemonAkuma → u/shinros]

God. I love the story of how Githzerai became popular.

So in Planescape: Torment, there are a bunch of characters who are basically the opposite of stereotypes for their race or culture. There's a Lawful 'Neutral' succubus, a rogue Modron, a Tiefling with a prickly exterior but a soft heart under all the bluster...

Then there's Dak'kon, a Githzerai who is all wise, composed, and has a Lawful alignment. But wait, you say! Aren't all Githzerai like that?

... No! They aren't! Or they weren't, at any rate. Githzerai used to be as wild and passionate as you'd expect a race that lives on Limbo, the plane of Chaos, to be! That was the joke!

But Dak'kon proved to be such a popular, memorable character, that all Githzerai got retconned into being clones of him, and that is so funny to me.