Back to Barrowholm

Grim Dawn General Discussion
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Okay, I get this is a topic that has been debated many times and I read a few before posting. There was this one Post from a very verbose fellow, a true master of speechcraft. The topic was about the Barrowholm moral dilemma and the inability for the player to make an informed decision and being unable to reset the initial choice. I laughed myself to tears reading through that post, and like many before him he was trolled endlessly with arguments “you gotta live with the choices you make.” or “R u daft? They were clearly sketchy.” The reason I read through these posts, is because I myself just started playing AoM content, and I knew about the plot “twist” having played it before, but wanted to see the pro’s and con’s gameplay wise, before commiting my choice this time around, since it’s been a while.

But I can’t but want to play the devil’s advocate here. Putting aside the whole grim reality of the world of Cairn, and the enemy of my enemy arguments for a minute, this quest line is kind of poorly implemented isn’t it?
Imagine If you will, you just got married to a beautiful loving girl (assuming you’re a heterosexual male in this particular example), and on your honey-moon she says playfully “I got a surprise for you.”, you smile with poorly veiled anticipation, and she then adds “I’m not realy a girl. winks But now we’re married…no backsies!!”, to which you answer “Doh!!! stupid doofus, you got owned again! facepalms”. How believable is such a scenario realy? Because the barrowholm scenario is somewhat similar in it’s execution. If there is to be a “Holy Sh.t!” plot-twist moment, which nobody even saw coming :O, shouldn’t there be an option to realistically decide to gun everyone down? Euh in this example I’m talking about barrowholm, not the honeymoon situation!!! just to clarify…
I mean, even on my first playthrough I said to myself “This stinks! I don’t want your food and I don’t want to be your friend, I’m gonna look around first…”. But Crate was going for a plot-twist moment to some extent… not giving you a way out feels like a Di.k move…

I hereby formally apologize to the internet comedy & humor committee, for the aforementioned “pun” and vow to never again make a joke on the sacred web of the internet, where only the very best jokes are allowed. Mea Culpa…

Anyway, all arguments of the “don’t be so daft next time” or “pick other choice next time”-variety, feel a little hypocritical, and just a good excuse to point out that I’m smart and figured the obvious thing out and didn’t make the same mistake that the dumb kid made… Gameplay wise I also get why the quest was made this way. I’m not raging, and certainly not hoping for the quest to be changed in the future, but since all other threads were old, and I didn’t want to necro-post I figured I’d make my own ^^.

Oh and I don’t think I need to specify this, but I will, just in case; I’m in no way against tr…s g…ders or any other orientations… As a matter of fact, I believe that If was sufficiently in love with this girl to marry her in the first place… I might consider going through with the marriage, even despite the surprise…Maybe… But I’d still have to make the choice. in the same way, If I help a group of sketchy guys, I’m gonna walk away very fast from the moment one of them casually mentions he enjoys eating severed feet for desert… even if I pinky-sweared to be his best friend a bit earlier.

I’ve been annoyed by this quest from the very first time I played it, in which I decided to murder everyone gleefully. I read through what content I would miss, on google, after the massacre, and while satisfied with my choice, I still found it a very poorly implemented quest. This time I joined them though… because I want to fight the ravager, sue me! But when i rescued the civilians in the bog, and they were going to rest for a while in the cellar with the bloodstains in front… I mean, It annoys me that I can’t just murder everyone if I suddenly had a moral epiphany moment, even if I wouldn’t… cause I really want to fight the ravager. Did I mention that already?

Anywho, thoughts?

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Other than in e.g. Dark Souls you cannot attack NPCs, and fighting units cannot talk. This is actually a technical limitation. When it seems to happen (e.g. when you encounter Darius Cronley, or when Ulgrim fights in Crown Hill) the NPC unit is replaced.

So, what would be the alternative? Having lots of exit points in this quest line? Should only Scorv offer them, or can you become hostile with them at any quest NPC? Can you do this anytime or only before accepting a new quest? Even if this moves you immediately into the other quest line, and there are no extra story elements to bridge the narrative, this would have been a pain to test (and I was playtesting AoM).

Assuming you decide to become hostile with Barrowholm after retrieving the witches’s fetish, should you get access to their Underground lair? Or what to do with anything you purchased from the quartermaster? And once you support one direction, will you also offer to ally with them if you initially became hostile with them?

Sure you can find solutions for any of these questions, but would it be worth the extra work and risk of creating bugs? I believe even larger studios with a higher budget put you often on rails and only allow for a few major choices, so that the complexity stays manageable.

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technically the ravager might actually gets weaker and its presence less imposing on the physical realm of cairn, when you choose to destroy barrowholm residents straightly to the point. because the celestials and beings like it in the grim dawnverse need worshipping from its followers to sustain their presence on the physical plane.

so the choices are boiled down to:
1.destroy barrowholm residents. they are the primary cult of ravager (there are other feral cultists of ravager in ugdenbog though). this makes the ravager’s presence in carin so weak that ravager might have to spent lots of time rebuilding his cult base. you don’t get better goodies from this path, but you also save many other travellers of ugdenbog from being used as fuel to empower ravager by the cannibals. this is morally better. with less loots.

2.join the barrowholm cult. then embrace your dark side as cannibal ascendant thingy with blessing from ravager. this is morally the worst choices. you get some better loot though.

3.pretend to join the barrowholm cult. reluctantly do evil cannibal stuff to summon ravager with your favorite choice of cultist (which ravager you like? chocolate? strawberry? things like that), then proceed to cannibalize ravager in an epic fight (with mogdrogen secretly cheering from thousand miles away), eat its power, then get the best loot from its corpse. the ravager got banished hard like korvaak, the ugdenbog probably become safer in the future, but with some morally damning method what with you sacrificing those poor travellers to summon ravey. and who knows what ravager’s power will do to you in the future. this is morally the grayest choices, but the most fun with best climax.

i for one prefer to watch mogdrogen and ravager do kaiju duel to the death (or more shatter-y like chthon?), like watching fabulous and moosilauke doing unintentional nemesis duel due to players shenanigans. while snacking my mashed up dinner of untouched meal, food rations, vitality essence and rock soup.

also btw, with all the untouched meal (really funny name) and vitality essences our taken has consume through their joyful vacations across cairn, we might as well be already playing an (un)intentional vampiric cannibalistic human ascendant nephalem aetherial.

i wish we had the options to slaughter everyone in barrowholm but keep scorv alive and chained in devil’s crossing just as trophy, or due to his memelord-y face expression.

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Zantai has confirmed Reaper of the Lost is just a weaker version of the Ravager (Barrowholm still manages to summon him but in a much weaker state).

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@eisprinzessin I get what you say, and as I stated I understand the technical reasons crate made the quest-line this way. To answer your “main” question though, yes, I believe they should have coded in a “change of heart” once Scorv blatently comfirms he worships Wendigo, or like when you ask where the survivors went you could confront Scorv about it (ea. One NPC can turn faction hostile). Besides I saw there is a dialogue option once you ask Scorv about “the master?” right before he asks you to off the witch. You can even reply “I will stop you” or something similar… haven’t selected that dialogue option yet, but I assume it won’t make me hostile with them anyway.
And if indeed the technical limitation is too great, or it’s too much of a hassle to suddely turn everyone hostile (wich they do anyway, when you open hostilities, might I add) then the narrative choice of the developers is puzzling.

Tl;dr If you can’t tailor the gameplay around the narrative correctly, then tailor the narrative around the gameplay, I would say.

@kukuhimanpr Yes, I tend to also roleplay my way through hoops, in order to make-believe, that everything goes according to my intentions. This is one of the reasons I don’t rage about this quest, like some do, I’m perfectly capable of going through content that bothers me to a certain degree before moving on.

Still, I wish I could see how development went on this particular questline. I assume devs tried to implement what writers wrote, and had to get creative to make it work, maybe?
I myself play games for the lore and story, even ARPG’s, which some might find very silly of me, and yet the lore of grim dawn is fantastic, same can be said of other ARPG’s like PoE and diablo, so I try to immerse myself in it. To me, a game without immersion is not a game worth playing, this quest-line just breaks my immersion for a minute, and so I decided to put it out there ^^.

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You can find all the clues to Barrhowholm’s true nature before talking with Scorv by getting the two lore notes and going near the entrance of the cellar and hear people screaming. Then you can bring it up to Scorv.

Plus, it’s so obvious that Barrowholm is a den for cannibals. This untouched “paradise” in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by a bunch of cannibals, grass bears and poison plants is so suspicious that i don’t think Scorv is even attempting to hide its true nature. His shit eating grin doesn’t help. The entire thing is basically a trap to lure unsuspecting people.

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Never heard the noises before… will have to check this out.

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Don’t worry, Scorv just installed a home cinema in the cellar and those people were watching a horror film! :scorv:

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Technically this quest line is like any other. But the story that is being told clashes with what some people want from roleplaying. I like the Barrowholm story, but I enjoy becoming my char and see the world from their perspective. I was thrilled when I went through that part the first time and lauded Crate for telling such a daring story. Whereas others (like you I assume) want their char to be a fantasy version of themselves. And then they (and you) have to stick with such a despicable misconception of themselves for so long.

Could the story have been told better? In the current version you run their errands despite your better knowledge and to add insult to injury get mocked and threatened by them.

Maybe our dialog choices (after becoming their ally) should make it more clear that we do all the small evils for the greater good, and that we think things need to get worse before they can start to become better again. But there is this part of the audience that will probably complain then, their char is not enough of a blank slate and they cannot identify with them anymore.

Or Crate could have made it less obvious, that they are evil cannibals, and delayed the big reveal as plot twist until the end of the quest line. But as Shaman’s Wendigo Totem and the Wendigo constellation already established in the base game, that Wendigo is an evil spirit, Barrowholm would have to come up with a convincing cover story to fool the player into trusting them. Like, yes, Ravager has gone mad, but we have devoted ourselves to heal him. The bloodlust has not always been his mark. With proper discipline you can worship him without risk and benefit from his true blessings. Will you help us on our mission?

In the end an ARPG isn’t a story-focussed RPG - at least I have been told so (not by Crate). I do not agree with that statement, but gameplay was their priority, not the story. However, they were bold enough to add this sinister chapter, which was a positive surprise to me.

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@eisprinzessin compelling arguments with which I agree for the most part. And yes I am that kind of player that plays an avatar of himself in some regard. Ultimately though the game is amazing, and I enjoy the time spent playing it (which is considerable, might I add).

in the end, I don’t mean to bring this topic to a grand conclusion. I essentially relived a long-standing feeling, and wished to discuss it now, since I didn’t do it 2 years ago. I also heard statements that “ARPG’s don’t need a good story anyway, because nobody plays them for the story.” I am living proof that this is not true, and I have in my personal social circle at least 7 people who would disagree far more strongly than even I would.

So in essence; It is blatantly obvious what is going on in barrowholm, and all clues can be found beforehand… but I’m sorry eating fallen enemies during times of hardship (like the turned, cannibals and even wendigos) is one thing, making me capture travelers and casually trying to shove them down my throat… i’d say that’s a different shade of “gray” entirely. I knew every quest beforehand. Even knew to complete the mine-quest before turning in the fetish because there apparently is a bug. But I can see how someone could be caught off guard and be pissed about this quests’ resolution.
The clues point out the villagers are sketchy, that they are cannibals, that they keep people in the basement and that they worship the wendigo. But still, you could still think that these people do whatever it takes to survive during these very very hard times. Thinking to yourself “I’ll try not to judge” and deciding not to slaughter everyone in open warfare, does not mean you should logically expect that they will casually ask you to abduct people in order to slaughter them for meat… and that you won’t be able to emit the slightest objection. Oh sorry, you can, but it is of no consequence.

I ofcourse don’t mind realy… I want to fight ravager. I even learned to like cannibals… nay… love cannibals. I love the way they look, the way they talk, the way they act, the way they die, all of it! Cannibals are great. And their stupid dog-god that will protect them from harm… somehow. he’s pretty cool too.

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Oh, that probably means Ravager lost so much of his worshippers, that he most likely only got scatterbrained ugdenbog maniacal cannibals left, that they didn’t know or couldn’t know his real name weakens him even further. well, that settles it. unless i want ravey’s specific drops, i’ll just destroy all of barrowholm. little burden on me & my character’s conscience (unless i’m playing a cannibal character).

still, it would be interesting to see how embracing the ravager’s power will forcefully affect the taken’s dialogue with others (taken: you’re kinda delicious. random story essential character: stop it. get some help. i’ll let that slide. this world needs you anyway…). but i understand the technical limitations for grim dawn. perhaps grim dawn 2 can learn from this lesson, and have our characters’ choices impact their behaviour more significantly.

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hehe, quite right. But in this particular instance of content it feels like crate specifically and forcefully wants to deprive you of any meaningful impact. You learn they worship wendigo and/or that you’ve been tricked into sending them juicy travelers… they give you the option to actually say to to Scorv.
Taken: “I’m not okay with this! You maniacal monsters!!! I’ll end you all!”
Scorv: “Pfft nonsense, you restored our wards, send us diner, secured supplies from the mines… we’re super badass now, all thanks to YOU! now be a good lackey and go kill that witch in the swamp.”
Taken: “Fine… since i’ve done three quests allready, I guess I’ll just keep going. I can’t turn you guys hostile, and kill you all, anyway.”
This feels like a thinly veiled “F U, u just got pwnd” moment from the devs. And to add salt on top of it, if you go about the witch quest, and decide to get smart and let her live… the devs just go dev-mode on you, kill the witch anyway and u get a steam-achievement “NO! we said no backsies, u WILL be barrowholm’s lil’ b…ch!!”

Well okay, maybe there’s no achievement… but u get what I meant despite being overly dramatic. it realy feels like they went out of their way with this. It actually made me smile while saying in a hushed tone “damn you, crate…”. :stuck_out_tongue:

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this feels like the weird faction switcheroo of not choosing necro class, joining vigil, then joining kymon’s in next difficulty, then choosing necro as 2nd class while still in kymon’s. the level of plot twists in that is absurd.

anasteria seems to be the only character that aware of this faction switcheroo thingy that feels like an inside joke from crate. then again, you can trust-betray-trust anasteria in different difficulties which was kinda derpy but amusing. until anasteria reveal her complete backstory and i feel so bad for her that i’ll never betray her again (at least in grim dawn main stories. i don’t like lokarr’s nonsensical crucible (especially when we’re forced to fight anasteria there at some point), but shattered realm is okay since were just fighting phantom images from that realm there)).

imagine if ravager is also aware of our faction switcheroo shenanigans. ravey would straight up jump at us with every cannibals in ugh dem bogs the next time we enter barrowholm in new difficulty.

yeah, crate could have handled the barrowholm immersion better. but most grim dawn players are more concerned about the combat number crunching and lootz anyway.

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He may not be aware, but the almighty Scorv did say “Tell me are we still friends?” Or something like that once we met him in a new difficulty.

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ouch. maybe anasteria and scorv will haunt the taken’s dream sometime in the future like clones of john bourbon. criticizing the taken’s derpy decisions but being understanding about it because the taken’s brain was probably already shattered unconsciously due to the aetherial snob that possessed them from the beginning.

also, both anasteria and scorv are old people. coincidences? beware of boomers.

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Scorv sees through your lying (his shit eating grin gets even wider) and sends someone else to do it. It’s much less a “devs just go dev-mode on you” and more “a character saw through your bullshit” moment.

Scorv’s entire thing is being able to convince people of pretty much anything, so he can easily tell when someone is lying because he knows how to lie very well.

Plus, you think he’s just gonna take your word for it? You just met very recently, of course he’s gonna send one of his zealots to make sure she’s dead.

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But when You actually killed her he says “you must have chased her far”.

I don’t get it :stuck_out_tongue:

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:scorv: being :scorv: as usual.

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But can someone explain that to me like to simple moron. My Asperger’s doesn’t allow me to simplify it.
Thanks in advance