Brademante: Update 4

Published by

atcDave

June 1, 2026

We had some discussion about where to head next. The next good lead we had, a bandit chieftain was somehow behind the Iron Crisis, would take us a ways to the north, closer to Baldur’s Gate. But then Amyntor said we would be better off exploring the wilderness area along Amn’s northern border to work on our teamwork and coordination… and really just our overall experience and readiness. I think we all knew he spoke truth. Raiding a bandit encampment seemed way beyond where we were at.
Jaheira spoke up to agree with Amyntor and observed much of the land around the Sword Coast, from Nashkel all the way north to Friendly Arm Inn was essentially wilderness beyond a short distance from the main road. Beautiful country. But there was a lot dangerous and unsettled. We were sure to be attacked by xvarts, gibberlings, hobgoblins, gnolls and ogres. Not to mention bandits and robbers. These were places normal people feared to tread. We could do some good as we learned.

This seemed like an easy agreement. We decided to start by searching more thoroughly along the route we had taken to rescue Dyna a few days back.

*Bandits are not our best and brightest. This pair thought they could threaten the six of us with a claim of “fastest dart thrower in the Realms.”*

They will no longer be making that stupid threat.

Nearby we found a small boy looking for his lost dog. This was concerning, what was a child doing out here? I guess I’m quite naive, I immediately led us off in a quest for a dog. We found a dog that responded to the chew toy the child had given us. Quite a large black wolf. Well if this was the child’s dog it seemed likely he would need its protection. I was curious to see how this would go (knowing we could protect the child if the wolf was dangerous).

*A dryad begged our help from a pair of ruffians looking to cut her tree.*

I believe a dryad will die if her tree is felled? We agreed to help. I tried to talk them down, but they were convinced this great tree must hide a great treasure. They attacked us thinking we would steal the treasure if they didn’t. Killing the stupid never feels as righteous as slaying evil.

When we reached the coast we traveled north a ways.

*Ogres are the most fearsome of the common threats we’ve seen. My shield arm hurt for days after this fight.*

It is surprising to see ordinary folk out in this wilderness, but there were a few.

*One woman was in a panic that a small pack of wolves had separated her from her son, who was trapped at an abandoned light house. We reunited them easily enough.*

It seemed harmless, and we could pass a few coins her way for the reading. But it was odd, she looked at my palm for a moment, and gave a very accurate recital of my childhood, but then seemed to get very nervous. She said something about “not wanting any money from me” and ran off. Strange.

*Back towards the beach we ran into a small group of Sirens. They immediately tried to charm us.*

Fortunately I had a helmet on that protected me from such attacks, but Amyntor was briefly bewitched. That was terrifying, we all ran from him for a few minutes. It didn’t really last very long, but the fear of being skewered by my life’s partner is terrifying beyond words.
It was sad to have to fight the sirens, they made no effort to tell us what we’d done wrong. But I believe Sirens, and many of the spirit beings are often unpredictable in this way.

Our trip back towards civilization was less dramatic.

*Except for the xvart village. They all mindlessly came at us. I don’t know exactly why. But again, if they are this hostile it is good to clear them from this area.*

We finaly made it back to Beregost. We did some business with the many goods we had found. I feel good that we are learning and improving as we work together. A lot gained from just a few day’s travel. I’m feeling good that another trip or two like this and we’ll be ready to face bandits on their home turf.

*****

I still struggle to rate this group in some ways. We could argue Brademante is even weaker than Jill (from my mediocre run). They both have the same (lack of) combat bonuses, but as a single-class fighter Jill could get up to Grand Mastery in her weapons. Does Brademante’s marginal spell use make up for being capped at Specialization? For now I’d say no, except that Brademante is far smarter and wiser. That makes this narrative more cogent, even if its less fun in some ways!

They are all around 5th level now except Jaheira will be at 4th/4th for a while yet. Dyna will hit 5th very soon and Imoen will hit 6th soon after.

*A portrait of the warriors in Beregost.*

Minsc is by far the deadliest, although Brademante is very functional on point.

Imoen just got new armor! Dyna will take a huge leap with her next level, which is just around the corner…

*****

I am crazy busy this next week. I will try to have another post up by next Monday, but that is the soonest I might have something. I like this point in the team development, they are just getting more potent. But with this team a lot hinges on resource management and preparation. It pains me to have to slow down a little for a few days!

2 responses to “Brademante: Update 4”

Zeno

June 2, 2026

Those Sirens definitely look spooky. And I love the bug-eyed Xvarts! The gnolls are pretty great as well. Definitely a younger, more athletic looking Minsc than I’m used to – but the looks is quite consistent. Probably comes with the more realistic style – he can’t really be built like a comic book character in that medium.

I feel like I really have to get detailed describing transformation sequences to get what I want, and it costs so many credits to do it that it hardly feels worthwhile. Sometimes it gets it right the first go, and sometimes it just doesn’t get the concept. Particularly if you want “ripping clothes, extending snout” and the like. It seems to really like to go for very fast transformations as well – when sometimes I want a more drawn-out process.

Not sure if its affecting you – because in a lot of the comparative pictures above its unclear what the relative heights are supposed to be – but I’ve also had some difficulty getting consistency out of that. If there’s just two characters I can just say “paladin is taller than mage” or somesuch and it mostly works. Otherwise it gets dicey – especially with extreme differences like “half-ogre and dwarf”.

I have found that both OpenAI/GPT and Gemini are good at “take this game image, remove the characters and game overlays, and re-render as an impressionist painting” or the like. Which I can then use as a source for the render I actually want and get better fidelity to my chosen style than if I use the game image to start with.

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1. atcDave
  
  June 2, 2026
  
  I would agree with all of that. All of the recuring NPCs have somewhat different looks for me now, I think some of that is just GPT draws things differently than DALLE, even when “style” is listed the same and the whole description is identicle.
  
  For the video render, yeah its a pain. I did a backdrop, a little boy, and a demon. Then I put them all together… and got a total mess. But I did see what it wanted to do, so I repositioned the little boy and demon and got completely different starting and ending images. Then did it again. I think I went through four (maybe five?) videos before I got to the one I liked. Its a pain, but I think for the transformations it works well. Eventually.
  
  Size is an issue. Especially with short women warriors, which I think this is now my third in a row! It can help some to put a relative “tall” or “short” in front of key characters. Otherwise it will tend to make anyone in armor in large. So the one with Brademante and the gypsy woman was tough, it kept making Brad *big* because she’s the armored warrior. As the introduction said, Amyntor is 5’5″ and he is a fair bit bigger than Brad (I think her character sheet said 5’2″!). So I say “short woman warrior” before I describe anything else going on. Even then, it wants to rebel (what is going on with the hill!). Or the render with the dryad, what was it thinking about size there? Maybe the dryad was sitting down?
  I decided it was important for the whole group shot. So I used all my tricks, and just accepted I’d be doing several renders. I think Brad was described as “short” twice while Minsc was tall, large AND muscular. I did finally get that one that had relative sizes exactly where I wanted.
  
  Yeah I’ve had a lot of luck with game based renders and screen caps turned into renders. That’s very satisfying when it works. No doubt though, the more layers you do of a thing the more drift you get.
  
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