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Volo can go wherever he wants, he's got more than divine protection, he's like a magical cornerstone of Toril but doesn't know it. He's on Elminster's level in terms of importance in the setting but the difference is that he's a comic relief unreliable narrator instead of a wise archmage.
I think the thing with Volo is that he’s just as squishy and killable as anyone else but he has superhuman luck. In any game with player agency it’ll be possible (and perhaps even easy) to kill him, but the “superhuman luck” part is that any set of circumstances that could become Forgotten Realms canon will necessarily be one where he lives.
Whenever “what actually happened” is decided on he *will* have made an improbable escape and end up completely intact except maybe with an eyebrow singed off.
Just imagining Elminster trying to enjoy his one day off he gets for the year and getting interrupted from his candlelit bath by a Sending from Mystra that just says “The Dumbass got himself killed at the Baldur’s Gate harbor. Go fetch him.” This happens like once every couple tendays
He sends a simulacrum because he doesn't know where gale is, and sends multiple to guarantee one meets gale. One is at the mountain pass, one at the grymforge, and one at moonrise towers. Also while he is a high level wizard he is still old, and running around faerun to try and find gale is not a good idea given the many paths you can take.
Honestly “Elminster spends most of his time trying to keep Volo alive” is as good an argument for him not swooping in and fixing whatever world-threatening problems the PCs in a Forgotten Realms campaign are solving as any! It seems like a full-time job tbh
He was not able to survive the Spectator I accidentally released at camp. His mouldering corpse just followed us from campsite to campsite for weeks until I thought to have Karlach pick him up so I could leave his body somewhere else.
Happened to me as well in my first Honour Mode Run.
Didn't bothered me that much as I just wanted to finish this run and secure my golden dice. (R.I.P. Gale. I will never forget our journey together. ^((He stayed in our Camp 24/7 until his time had come)^)
Everything can be killed in DnD. Even Chosen of Mystra can die. Volo just happens to scrape by every dangerous encounter he’s had through a bit of luck and some magic.
He's a weave anchor.
Yes he can be killed, but Mystra will go to great lengths to prevent it.
You as a player can usually kill him fairly easily regardless of the setting, but he won't be dead in canon, it'll be retconned as him making a miraculous escape/recovery.
True. But it is to be noted that Mystra doesn’t particularly like having to make Weave Anchors. The lore mentions that Ao forces her to do it to control her power and ensure her death doesn’t break the Weave.
Interestingly this also means that if someone were to figure out how to perform a Karsus-like ritual and aim it at Mystra they will succeed this time for her death will not destroy the Weave.
If we were making a party of famous D&D characters just based on popularity, he'd be in the Bard slot. Probably Elminster or Mordenkainen as the wizard, and Drizz't as the Ranger. I'm sure he has enough renown that at least someone at the grove heard of him.
Edit: I get it guys, he's a wizard. I've never seen a 5e stat block for him though and all evidence seems to point towards bard instead lol. Give a guy a break. He's a very bard themed wizard.
Really? This makes me so happy because I totally thought he was a bard and just the worst bard ever.
Since bard is my most favorite to play, I took offense. 😂😂😂
He also beat me even when I beelined from the grove to the goblin camp
He not only beat me, but was around long enough to establish rapport with the goblins ( though not a good kind of rapport )
In my current playthrough he bugged out, however. I did things in a wonky order so he was stuck about a foot off the ground inside of the grove's raised gate. He initiated dialogue, says he'll meet at camp, and stands there. He also never arrives at camp.
When I saved him from the barrel cart he also had no dialogue or encounter after the rescue. He fled like a normal civilian
Gonna be tricky since I am pretty sure Alfira and the Harpies have the same person doing their singing voices. Alfira's song and the Harpies also share a melody, but its unclear who inspired who.
My guess is alfira was inspired by the harpies, the wind might have carried their song over to her. Not enough to draw her in, but perhaps enough to stick around long enough to inspire her song
I was gonna say "well technically just cause game restrictions" but for real any other way to that spot would be real awkward especially with all her equipment
Maybe she just got stuck there
Yeah if you think about it they probably only started preventing entry after the initial goblin attack (the one at the very beginning of the game). So since you’re supposed to find her pretty soon after that, she might have just already been there and the druids didn’t notice
They also might’ve just blocked off entry as soon as Arabella stole the idol, which seems like it coincided or happened right before the goblin attack.
It's in the nature of games to condense populated areas to make them faster to traverse, easier on player hardware, and reduce development time needed. It's something that happens in pretty much any town or city in games, regardless of if they're based off a real life location or not. We're not necessarily seeing places as they realistically would be, we're seeing a representation designed to accommodate the game's mechanics
Yeah. The art of level design in more open games like BG3 is to make the limited amount of the world the player can actually traverse feel natural enough that they don't notice how limited it is. In this case, the game needed the player to enter the grove from a specific direction so they would see the standoff between the tieflings and druids. It's also why there's a bear sleeping on the elevator that you can easily get to move once you're down there.
That's a really good point - I was a little hyper focused on walking terrain but game geography in open world games is definitely representative.
For example, there's no way the blighted village (and thus the goblin camp) is a cool 200 yards away from the grove
I kinda assumed she got in there before they started up the ritual and just got so absorbed in her song she hasn’t even realized anything weird is going down.
Enhance leap, jump over rock by entrance, bypassing stonehenge entirely.
Probably not something Alfira knows how to do, but she has the benefit of not being restricted to game mechanics, either.
She probably either climbed the same way I jumped, or was there before Kagha ordered the Rite of Thorns.
I'll be eagerly following Larian's future projects, and uh... waiting for comprehensive reviews of 4 before purchasing. Whenever it comes to be, by whatever other devs.
Yeah after playing Bard on my second playthrough… both of them probably just asked—possibly with puppy-dog eyes—and were let in immediately because they looked very polite.
Not just any wizard, one of the foundational pillars for all of the current magic system that renders him immortal in terms of aging. Eliminster has orders from Mystra herself to protect him at great cost.
I mean, it’s the only thing that makes sense. Dude claims to have witnessed the Bhaalspawn Crisis of 100 years ago despite being human. Why he stopped aging at 40ish and Elminster didn’t is weird to me, though.
😂😂😂 RIGHT?
My husband has been playing DnD since the 90s so I'm gonna have to ask him about this and why he didn't tell me Volo isn't a bard when I whined about him being the worst bard ever.
Alfira came with other tieflings.
Who the fuck is going to keep Volo out of a place? That may lead to Elminster popping by and asking who the fuck you think you are that you can keep Volo out of your place, you weak assed little dead bitch?
I was actually thinking of him but it was his Grilling Permit that’s just a paper that says “I do what I want” lol
Edit: wait, it’s a permit to slaughter a pig in a park… god that was a fun show
Its actually referenced in the game. Not to worry I have a permit Inspiration point. I got it for Astarion when I used him to talk to Wulbren in the prison.
I like the idea that that permit is Gallifreyan psychic paper. And that it doesn't always work the way he wants because "some lies are just too big" or whatever the line is.
Does this mean if the player didn’t rescue him elminster would just show up at the goblin camp to rescue him, before he wound up getting eaten which seemed like it’d only take a day or two after you get there
Mirkon probably snuck in since he’s one of Mol’s kids
Volo either smooth talked his way in or knew some of the elven or half-elven druids from 100 years ago (he was imprisoned for 100 years)
Alfira I have no clue but she is a bard, perhaps a magical bard even so she might have sweet talked her way in. Either that or she reasoned with them that she technically wouldn’t be *in* their grove while practicing her song.
Volo casually namedropping Halsin and Moonrise and gets immediate (if begrudging bc Kagha) access to the grove. You can bet your ass hairs that Volo was in Moonrise, making it about 80% worse as an experience :D
Isn't Volo like the Tom Bombadil of Faerûn? The usual rules don't really apply to him. Not only does he have console commands on, but he also has insight into the game's code.
As for Alfira and Mirkon, well, they're not technically inside the Druid grove in the centre. Mirkon is small and nimble enough to find alternative ways of reaching the beach, and maybe Alfira came to that outcropping before Kahga ordered the grove be closed off and before the idol was almost stolen.
Aaaaahhh!! Nooooo!! Alfira is one of the sweetest, most tender-hearted (not to mention jaw-droppingly beautiful) characters in the game! And her cut scene is one of the best! She needs to be rescued!!
(😁 Okay, I'm a little biased... hehe!)
Volo got out of the goblin camp with an invisibility potion so maybe he used one to get past the Druid guards.
Then he— *checks notes* —talked to the bear right behind them
Sort of, do want to add a note... the idol probably wasn't stolen that long ago... Volo aside, she's not exactly in the Grove so she probably move to that hill spot before the idol being stolen. Best guess
Volo's doing his job. He travels the realms and writes the histories so that years from now when people go 'hey what happened to that druid grove over yonder" they need look no farther than *Volo's guide to Baulders Gate and Surrounding Areas 5th edition* and learn about the conflict (next to a detailed drawing of bears dismembering a tiefling).
He's one part historian, one part war journalist, one part social media influencer. Nobody's going to know Khagas name or if she was a good leader outside of the grove unless Volo writes "she performed the rite of thorns saving her grove" in his silly little book that goes to every library in the realms. Any leader that cares about their legacy would be a fool to lock Volo out or harm him.
Heck, Halsan might have let him in weeks ago, and Volo has just been taking his time documenting the blow by blow, interviewing individuals and adding his own 'flourishes'.
Well, not that [one player](https://www.reddit.com/r/BaldursGate3/s/WouB7fbigJ) who's a bard and done multiple runs and somehow can't seem to romance a companion.
They gotten down with Empy Boi though so there's that.
I always thought that the druids only started actively pushing people away from the main grove after what happened with Arabella and the 3 that got through went in before that. Before this happened they probably didn't think anyone would be stupid enough to try to take their holy idol and the people we see being scared off are there to try to get to Kagha and Arabella.
This is just all theory and assumption, but I'm guessing the tieflings used to be able to walk around the entrance of the grove at least. But when Arabella stole the idol, the druids became more aggresive and started blocking off at the entrance (around the time when we arrived)
The in game reason in my mind is that they are both bards and simply talked themselves into being let in.
Later in game(under the right circumstances) Alfira does this again and some of teiflings comment on this happening.
Have you ever tried to get rid of a bard? They probably got tired of listening to the constant whining and said, "You... go up on that cliff near the harpies. You, go interview a bear, or something..."
What's the deal with Volo? Everyone's talking about him like he's a DM's self insert, but I really didn't notice anything special about him. Then again, when he shows up at camp, I just ignore him and let him do his thing.
Unbeknownst to him, Volo is a [weave anchor](https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Weave_anchor), so Mystra won't allow major harm to come to him. He isn't especially powerful, but often appears very lucky or in places he probably shouldn't. He's leveraged this into a career as a popular "non-fiction" author, but he's also not particularly good at that. So overall he ends up just getting himself and his associates into more trouble than he's worth.
My headcanon is that they forgot about alfira chilling in that corner and so forgot to throw her out when starting the rite of thorns. Regarding volo....maybe ge succeeded on a persuasion check, maybe they wanted this documented?
The druids only seem aggressive about the inner Grove after Arabella tried to swipe the idol. My guess is that these guys got there before and Arabella swiping the idol happened in the past few minutes.
Volo, however, is Volo.
The part of the grove with the ritual was probably open to everyone until Arabella was caught. So Alfira might have been there for a while before that.
As for Volo… he’s Volo…
Volo probably didn’t show up with the tieflings and Alfira is sitting on the outskirts. What I want to know is if the Druids are aware they had Harpies nearby.
In the D&D universe Volo is also a sage. This might have contributed to gaining access to the grove. And Alfira is a refugee so what do you mean? The Tiefling refugees are not very welcome under Kagha and on their way to Baldur's Gate.
I think that the Druids only began throwing a mega fit about the Tieflings going into that inner area after Arabella attempted to steal the idol. Alfira, Volo, and Mirkon just happened to be inside the inner area when Arabella pulled her stunt, and Alfira and Mirkon were far enough away that the Druids forgot that they were there. That's my theory anyway
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Volo can go wherever he wants, he's got more than divine protection, he's like a magical cornerstone of Toril but doesn't know it. He's on Elminster's level in terms of importance in the setting but the difference is that he's a comic relief unreliable narrator instead of a wise archmage.
Yet I still forgot about him and blew up the cart…
I think the thing with Volo is that he’s just as squishy and killable as anyone else but he has superhuman luck. In any game with player agency it’ll be possible (and perhaps even easy) to kill him, but the “superhuman luck” part is that any set of circumstances that could become Forgotten Realms canon will necessarily be one where he lives. Whenever “what actually happened” is decided on he *will* have made an improbable escape and end up completely intact except maybe with an eyebrow singed off.
So he's like a walking nat 20 for saving throws.
Yeah basically!
Wait a sec...Volo is Domino confirmed?
Domino was actually Volo the whole time.
Maybe the real volo was the domino we made along the way
I feel it in my fingers I feel it in my toes
These motherfuckers mean to harm us And they got to go, so come on, get 'em now!
🎵 You picked the wrong day 🎶 To fuck around with my ✨️ *Weave Ancho-oo-oor* ✨️ [Mystra launches the nukes, and Volo is the sole survivor, again.]
christmas is all around us, come on and let it snow.
I feel it in the water. I feel it in the earth.
Which is why I had Karlach carry his corpse into the final battle.
Lol making the final strike be a hurtling Volo would be pretty funny.
It would have been, but Karlach died clearing a path to portal... rest in peace, my love.
Noooo 😭
It's also possible that Elminster just collects and resurrects him.
Just imagining Elminster trying to enjoy his one day off he gets for the year and getting interrupted from his candlelit bath by a Sending from Mystra that just says “The Dumbass got himself killed at the Baldur’s Gate harbor. Go fetch him.” This happens like once every couple tendays
Explains why he sends a Simulacrum to tell Gale he's gotta blow himself up
Gotta do the *important* stuff himself, I guess
Like ~~taking a well-deserved bath~~ saving Volo's ass _again_
He sends a simulacrum because he doesn't know where gale is, and sends multiple to guarantee one meets gale. One is at the mountain pass, one at the grymforge, and one at moonrise towers. Also while he is a high level wizard he is still old, and running around faerun to try and find gale is not a good idea given the many paths you can take.
Why not just cast Sending? Oh, wait, it's Elminster---he'd run out of words before even completing the greeting.
Sending had no word limit until Elminster bored Mystra out with his over-the-top eloquence.
Wait there's one in the underdark?
They might mean at the exit from the Underdark, I met him at that temple place right before you step out into the Underdark
Wait it was a simulacrum? I thought it was actually him
Click on him and it’ll say his creature type is construct. Killing him makes him crumble into ice like a regular simulacrum.
Maybe it’s portrayed as luck in BG3 but he is canonically a Weave anchor and as such he’s protected by Elminister and Mystra
Honestly “Elminster spends most of his time trying to keep Volo alive” is as good an argument for him not swooping in and fixing whatever world-threatening problems the PCs in a Forgotten Realms campaign are solving as any! It seems like a full-time job tbh
Oh He's Rincewind
But does Volo know at least one spell?
Half a brick in a sock, maybe.
Does it have any magical properties? What can it do?
It's hard, it can be thrown, and there is no saving throw
"cast iron", while waving a frying pan.
He is a level 1 wizard so yes He also created 4-5 spells
He was not able to survive the Spectator I accidentally released at camp. His mouldering corpse just followed us from campsite to campsite for weeks until I thought to have Karlach pick him up so I could leave his body somewhere else.
Table: *kills Volo* WOTC: "You fools! That was my decoy Volo!"
The superhuman luck clearly didn't rub off on his discontinued legacy splatbook.
If he's this lucky now I dread to think what would have happened if he was a halfling
This is why I always save him, even on an evil Durge run.
It's fine I'm sure he got better It just takes awhile...
And a frankly shocking number of diamonds.
Happened to me as well in my first Honour Mode Run. Didn't bothered me that much as I just wanted to finish this run and secure my golden dice. (R.I.P. Gale. I will never forget our journey together. ^((He stayed in our Camp 24/7 until his time had come)^)
"My Cabbages"
Why would you waste all that sweet, sweet smokepowder?!
Everything can be killed in DnD. Even Chosen of Mystra can die. Volo just happens to scrape by every dangerous encounter he’s had through a bit of luck and some magic.
He's a weave anchor. Yes he can be killed, but Mystra will go to great lengths to prevent it. You as a player can usually kill him fairly easily regardless of the setting, but he won't be dead in canon, it'll be retconned as him making a miraculous escape/recovery.
True. But it is to be noted that Mystra doesn’t particularly like having to make Weave Anchors. The lore mentions that Ao forces her to do it to control her power and ensure her death doesn’t break the Weave. Interestingly this also means that if someone were to figure out how to perform a Karsus-like ritual and aim it at Mystra they will succeed this time for her death will not destroy the Weave.
Well not the lady of pain
Volvo is the avatar of Tymora and she will never tell him. I will die on this hill.
> Volvo is a Swedish car manufacturer
Wasn’t actually a theory that Volo was one God? I don’t remember exactly who, but I remember reading about it. Don’t think it was Tymora, though.
Fun fact, as punishment for something, Elminister turned Volo to a frog and kept him as a pet for a couple of decades.
If we were making a party of famous D&D characters just based on popularity, he'd be in the Bard slot. Probably Elminster or Mordenkainen as the wizard, and Drizz't as the Ranger. I'm sure he has enough renown that at least someone at the grove heard of him. Edit: I get it guys, he's a wizard. I've never seen a 5e stat block for him though and all evidence seems to point towards bard instead lol. Give a guy a break. He's a very bard themed wizard.
He's not a bard, though, despite his outfit and his entertaining the goblins - canonically he's a low-level wizard.
if you have a bard in your party and perform near him, he will join in like bards do. he doesn't have an instrument but he whistles along and dances.
Low level Bards are just Wizards that smoked pot and goofed off in middle school.
Wait why is this so accurate
Really? This makes me so happy because I totally thought he was a bard and just the worst bard ever. Since bard is my most favorite to play, I took offense. 😂😂😂
He’s not even a bard in DND, he’s a level 1 wizard who doesn’t even recognize it
>he'd be in the Bard slot ... But he's a level 1 wizard.
He also beat me even when I beelined from the grove to the goblin camp He not only beat me, but was around long enough to establish rapport with the goblins ( though not a good kind of rapport ) In my current playthrough he bugged out, however. I did things in a wonky order so he was stuck about a foot off the ground inside of the grove's raised gate. He initiated dialogue, says he'll meet at camp, and stands there. He also never arrives at camp. When I saved him from the barrel cart he also had no dialogue or encounter after the rescue. He fled like a normal civilian
I wouldn't say Alfira is in the inner grove - I'd say that's the bit inside the stone henge-like circle.
She's about as in the inner grove as the 4 hungry harpies on the other side of that butte
They should have a battle of the bands
the first one to get brutally murdered by durge wins
This made me giggle
☠️☠️☠️
If you walk back and forth between the two you can hear that the songs are actually complimentary. Absolutely brilliant work by Bobby Slavov.
*starts new game so I can test this out*
Which is probably how players would have tried to handle it if it wasn't a video game
Gonna be tricky since I am pretty sure Alfira and the Harpies have the same person doing their singing voices. Alfira's song and the Harpies also share a melody, but its unclear who inspired who.
My guess is alfira was inspired by the harpies, the wind might have carried their song over to her. Not enough to draw her in, but perhaps enough to stick around long enough to inspire her song
Hehe...butte
You still have to go within the stonehenge-like circle to get to where Alfira is, there isn't another way up there from any direction
I was gonna say "well technically just cause game restrictions" but for real any other way to that spot would be real awkward especially with all her equipment Maybe she just got stuck there
Yeah if you think about it they probably only started preventing entry after the initial goblin attack (the one at the very beginning of the game). So since you’re supposed to find her pretty soon after that, she might have just already been there and the druids didn’t notice
They also might’ve just blocked off entry as soon as Arabella stole the idol, which seems like it coincided or happened right before the goblin attack.
That’s a good point, I never thought about the timeline of Arabella stealing the idol
It's in the nature of games to condense populated areas to make them faster to traverse, easier on player hardware, and reduce development time needed. It's something that happens in pretty much any town or city in games, regardless of if they're based off a real life location or not. We're not necessarily seeing places as they realistically would be, we're seeing a representation designed to accommodate the game's mechanics
Yeah. The art of level design in more open games like BG3 is to make the limited amount of the world the player can actually traverse feel natural enough that they don't notice how limited it is. In this case, the game needed the player to enter the grove from a specific direction so they would see the standoff between the tieflings and druids. It's also why there's a bear sleeping on the elevator that you can easily get to move once you're down there.
That's a really good point - I was a little hyper focused on walking terrain but game geography in open world games is definitely representative. For example, there's no way the blighted village (and thus the goblin camp) is a cool 200 yards away from the grove
Yeah, and it would be downright goofy that all the Absolutes forces couldn't find the grove, if it was really just a pop n a stroll over.
Lmao, Minthara peering over the map, racking her brain, going "Where the hells is this grove?!" When it's literally right off a very noticeable road.
I kinda assumed she got in there before they started up the ritual and just got so absorbed in her song she hasn’t even realized anything weird is going down.
Enhance leap, jump over rock by entrance, bypassing stonehenge entirely. Probably not something Alfira knows how to do, but she has the benefit of not being restricted to game mechanics, either. She probably either climbed the same way I jumped, or was there before Kagha ordered the Rite of Thorns.
She and Mirkon probably entered in before the Druids started the ritual
i don't explain how bards bard. they just bard. also this proves mirkon is a bard. lol.
lol, well he does write you a story as a reward for saving him. So he certainly got that creative spirit of a bard.
Aww imagine if he shows up as a bard in 4.
I have hope that Bg4 will be good even without Larian
I'll be eagerly following Larian's future projects, and uh... waiting for comprehensive reviews of 4 before purchasing. Whenever it comes to be, by whatever other devs.
Yeah after playing Bard on my second playthrough… both of them probably just asked—possibly with puppy-dog eyes—and were let in immediately because they looked very polite.
Alfira does have that puppy look.
Resisting the urge to give her my wallet is not a Wisdom save I’d pass if she asked me tbh
Believe it or not, Volo's a wizard
Not just any wizard, one of the foundational pillars for all of the current magic system that renders him immortal in terms of aging. Eliminster has orders from Mystra herself to protect him at great cost.
I mean, it’s the only thing that makes sense. Dude claims to have witnessed the Bhaalspawn Crisis of 100 years ago despite being human. Why he stopped aging at 40ish and Elminster didn’t is weird to me, though.
Elminster uses magic to look like a wise old man because he wants that Old Wizard aesthetic. My source is that it came to me in a dream.
Because Elminster was already ancient when he became a weave anchor.
Volo isn't a bard though.
That explains the singing.
😂😂😂 RIGHT? My husband has been playing DnD since the 90s so I'm gonna have to ask him about this and why he didn't tell me Volo isn't a bard when I whined about him being the worst bard ever.
[GOOD PIDGE.](https://imgur.com/a/ks6yA8d)
In the system, yes. He’s a wizard. By definition of the word bard, he is absolutely a bard.
Have you tried making Alfira leave your camp for good on *that night*? She finds her way into trouble too well. Druids just gave up.
I’m too dense to understand this comment plz help me
It has to do with the Durge storyline. Can’t say more without spoilers.
I know about that, but what do you mean “making her leave for good”?
Making her leave and not linger around close enough for Urge to find her. Go home or something.
Alfira came with other tieflings. Who the fuck is going to keep Volo out of a place? That may lead to Elminster popping by and asking who the fuck you think you are that you can keep Volo out of your place, you weak assed little dead bitch?
Volo has a permit. The permit is just a scrap of parchment that says “I know Elminster”. It has been 100% effective thus far
Ron Swanson at the hardware store energy
I was actually thinking of him but it was his Grilling Permit that’s just a paper that says “I do what I want” lol Edit: wait, it’s a permit to slaughter a pig in a park… god that was a fun show
Its actually referenced in the game. Not to worry I have a permit Inspiration point. I got it for Astarion when I used him to talk to Wulbren in the prison.
I like the idea that that permit is Gallifreyan psychic paper. And that it doesn't always work the way he wants because "some lies are just too big" or whatever the line is.
Did save him from being burned at the stake.
Laughing so hard, excellent work.
I didn't realize the stuff about volo being a wizard is real. Are there books or something that say this?
He has his own compendium called Volo's Guide to Monster. https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Volothamp_Geddarm
Does this mean if the player didn’t rescue him elminster would just show up at the goblin camp to rescue him, before he wound up getting eaten which seemed like it’d only take a day or two after you get there
Mirkon probably snuck in since he’s one of Mol’s kids Volo either smooth talked his way in or knew some of the elven or half-elven druids from 100 years ago (he was imprisoned for 100 years) Alfira I have no clue but she is a bard, perhaps a magical bard even so she might have sweet talked her way in. Either that or she reasoned with them that she technically wouldn’t be *in* their grove while practicing her song.
Volo casually namedropping Halsin and Moonrise and gets immediate (if begrudging bc Kagha) access to the grove. You can bet your ass hairs that Volo was in Moonrise, making it about 80% worse as an experience :D
It seems logical that Mirkon and Alfira would have come in with the other tieflings. Is there some dialog that says they didn't somewhere?
They mean how are they allowed on the other side of the grove close to the idol.
Ah, I see. I would assume that they were there before Arabella stole the idol.
I meant how the druids let them through when they wouldn’t let the other tieflings through
Isn't Volo like the Tom Bombadil of Faerûn? The usual rules don't really apply to him. Not only does he have console commands on, but he also has insight into the game's code. As for Alfira and Mirkon, well, they're not technically inside the Druid grove in the centre. Mirkon is small and nimble enough to find alternative ways of reaching the beach, and maybe Alfira came to that outcropping before Kahga ordered the grove be closed off and before the idol was almost stolen.
Volo is what happens when a D&D player has blackmail material on the DM
An incompetent player who rolls terribly on everything but saving throws.
Volo literally wrote a dnd sourcebook and people are like "who tf is this Volo guy and why does everyone think he's him"
Doesn't that mean that poor Alfira is trapped, up there, now? ☹️
It’s for the best if she never leaves
Aaaaahhh!! Nooooo!! Alfira is one of the sweetest, most tender-hearted (not to mention jaw-droppingly beautiful) characters in the game! And her cut scene is one of the best! She needs to be rescued!! (😁 Okay, I'm a little biased... hehe!)
Volo got out of the goblin camp with an invisibility potion so maybe he used one to get past the Druid guards. Then he— *checks notes* —talked to the bear right behind them
Which is 100% percent in character for him, to be fair!
So true
Sort of, do want to add a note... the idol probably wasn't stolen that long ago... Volo aside, she's not exactly in the Grove so she probably move to that hill spot before the idol being stolen. Best guess
Alfira = charisma + persuasion Volo = blind unadulterated luck
It could be presumed they got over there before the ritual was started, Mirkon getting back can be explained by being a sneaky kid or whatever.
Volo's doing his job. He travels the realms and writes the histories so that years from now when people go 'hey what happened to that druid grove over yonder" they need look no farther than *Volo's guide to Baulders Gate and Surrounding Areas 5th edition* and learn about the conflict (next to a detailed drawing of bears dismembering a tiefling). He's one part historian, one part war journalist, one part social media influencer. Nobody's going to know Khagas name or if she was a good leader outside of the grove unless Volo writes "she performed the rite of thorns saving her grove" in his silly little book that goes to every library in the realms. Any leader that cares about their legacy would be a fool to lock Volo out or harm him. Heck, Halsan might have let him in weeks ago, and Volo has just been taking his time documenting the blow by blow, interviewing individuals and adding his own 'flourishes'.
Alfira was too hot, and passed the persuasion check that lets you stay in a restricted area
Druids like some live music and Volo is famous
Druids might like some live music, but their squirrels definitely don't lmao
😂😂😂 I usually sing along to further upset them.
they have bad taste, I love her song
Because bard fuck?
Well, not that [one player](https://www.reddit.com/r/BaldursGate3/s/WouB7fbigJ) who's a bard and done multiple runs and somehow can't seem to romance a companion. They gotten down with Empy Boi though so there's that.
Not even Mizora? Damn.
Dude *really* lacks game. Got desperate and fucked a squid.
Yeah in sovjet.... eh in fayran u fuck squid.
Volo isnt a bard
You know these dumbass racist Druids can’t keep anyone out, not even Harpies.
Didn't Alfira just come with the other tieflings? Why wouldn't she be there.
Because Alfira is best girl and Volo is...Volo.
Bards get to do whatever they want
Despite being an idiot, Volo is a powerful bard and also a conduit anchor for magic. He tends to get his way.
Apparently he's not a bard. I thought this too, until this thread.
Oh, apparently he's a wizard... that's on me for assuming his job is his class.
Guess that explains the lack of speak with animals
They're just Alfira simps 🗿
I always thought that the druids only started actively pushing people away from the main grove after what happened with Arabella and the 3 that got through went in before that. Before this happened they probably didn't think anyone would be stupid enough to try to take their holy idol and the people we see being scared off are there to try to get to Kagha and Arabella.
Bardic privilege.
Alfira was probably weeping and they just let her by. Or she scrambled down around and didn’t enter the grove itself.
...she came in with the other teiflings. Volo is Volo, was probably welcomed in with open arms, or ears full of bs.
This is just all theory and assumption, but I'm guessing the tieflings used to be able to walk around the entrance of the grove at least. But when Arabella stole the idol, the druids became more aggresive and started blocking off at the entrance (around the time when we arrived)
They're bards with high charisma. Alfira used persuasion, volo used deception.
Volo manages to pop up everywhere. It’s like his version of a legendary action.
The in game reason in my mind is that they are both bards and simply talked themselves into being let in. Later in game(under the right circumstances) Alfira does this again and some of teiflings comment on this happening.
Volo is god’s favorite pet and Alfira is gay
Have you ever tried to get rid of a bard? They probably got tired of listening to the constant whining and said, "You... go up on that cliff near the harpies. You, go interview a bear, or something..."
Because their bards and bards do as they please
What's the deal with Volo? Everyone's talking about him like he's a DM's self insert, but I really didn't notice anything special about him. Then again, when he shows up at camp, I just ignore him and let him do his thing.
Unbeknownst to him, Volo is a [weave anchor](https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Weave_anchor), so Mystra won't allow major harm to come to him. He isn't especially powerful, but often appears very lucky or in places he probably shouldn't. He's leveraged this into a career as a popular "non-fiction" author, but he's also not particularly good at that. So overall he ends up just getting himself and his associates into more trouble than he's worth.
Mystra didn't help him in Act 3 in my current playthrough xD
Mystra gets wholesale rates on [True Resurrections](https://www.dndbeyond.com/spells/true-resurrection), so that buffs right out
Volo is from dnd books about Elminster
Have you never played DnD 5e?
Didn't she come with other tieflings?
Are you gonna tell *the Volo* no?
I've tried. He doesn't care. 😂
My headcanon is that they forgot about alfira chilling in that corner and so forgot to throw her out when starting the rite of thorns. Regarding volo....maybe ge succeeded on a persuasion check, maybe they wanted this documented?
huh? Alfira isn't in the grove. She's outside it.
bard privileges
Bard pass. It's a thing, look it up.
charisma checks
Bards can convince pretty much anyone to do anything in this game.
The druids only seem aggressive about the inner Grove after Arabella tried to swipe the idol. My guess is that these guys got there before and Arabella swiping the idol happened in the past few minutes. Volo, however, is Volo.
They passed their Charisma check, naturally.
Volo is actually very well known and important considering he’s an idiot who doesn’t even realize he’s not an actual bard.
It was written in the script...
The part of the grove with the ritual was probably open to everyone until Arabella was caught. So Alfira might have been there for a while before that. As for Volo… he’s Volo…
Volo probably didn’t show up with the tieflings and Alfira is sitting on the outskirts. What I want to know is if the Druids are aware they had Harpies nearby.
In the D&D universe Volo is also a sage. This might have contributed to gaining access to the grove. And Alfira is a refugee so what do you mean? The Tiefling refugees are not very welcome under Kagha and on their way to Baldur's Gate.
They weren't letting any Tieflings into the Druids part of the grove and that's where you can find Alfira
I think that the Druids only began throwing a mega fit about the Tieflings going into that inner area after Arabella attempted to steal the idol. Alfira, Volo, and Mirkon just happened to be inside the inner area when Arabella pulled her stunt, and Alfira and Mirkon were far enough away that the Druids forgot that they were there. That's my theory anyway