Introduction

"I would carry the world for you if I could... but alas... I cannot."

Bioware's Baldur's Gate series of RPGs are some of the most beloved games in their genre. From the first game's release in 1998 to its vastly superior sequel's expansion in 2001 they quickly became favorites of CRPG fans around the globe. Its popularity re-surged after Beamdog released the Enhanced Editions in 2012 and 2013 respectively as well as Siege of Dragonspear, a new expansion to the original game that was released in 2016.

The games are also known for having a surprisingly large modding community and this Let's Play will focus on these mods most of all, or rather one mod in particular: Sandrah Saga. As a result this Let's Play will not focus too much on Baldur's Gate's original content aside from the main story beats. Players unfamiliar with Baldur's Gate will probably be better off reading a 'vanilla' LP in addition to this one if they want to follow along.

This LP will also be focusing more on dialogue/story instead of regular gameplay, in part because despite playing the games since their release I'm still a piss-poor player but also because that'd make the LP too damn long. Mod-specific areas as well as interesting new game mechanics (if any) will obviously receive a bit more attention in this regard. Please try to contain your inevitable frustration at my horrific way of playing. Constructive criticism however is of course more than welcome.

By this point you're probably asking yourself what the Sandrah Saga is all about. Allow me to answer that question at least somewhat:

quote:

"With the EET possibility to play the Baldur’s Gate once again as one continuous game, the Sandrah Saga tries to create a character with her very own storyline spanning the complete saga (and more) who can accompany the player throughout the game. Her story is connected in many ways to the Bhaalspawn’s own quests.

Sandrah is a young priestess of Mystra (fighter/cleric) from Waterdeep, the daughter of a famous character of the Realms, who steps out of her father’s mighty shadow to make herself an own name and also to discover the hidden part of her family history. This plot runs along the PC’s own discovery of who he/she is. Sandrah is a specialized healer, on the battlefield but also for those companions that suffer in heart and soul."

You might be thinking that this sounds like a slightly-larger-than-usual NPC mod but you'd be sorely mistaken. This mod is one of the more ambitious BG 'megamod' projects. It includes entire new areas, over a hundred new quests(!) and aims to rival the main character's story in scope. Sandrah is infamous for being an enormous Mary Sue whose story quickly eclipses anything else going on in the game right up until the end. The mod even includes content set after the end of Throne of Bhaal. Few megamods rival it in the amount of content it adds, in this Let's Play we'll see if said content is actually worthwhile.

The mod is rather infamous for its large amount of crossmod content, with dozens of mods having Sandrah-specific content added to them often without the permission of their respective modders. Some of these mods seem to be essential to Sandrah's story which is why I've decided to install pretty much all of them so that we can enjoy this trainwreck the way it was intended. The mod list can be found in the readme of the mod which you can find in the link above.

This will be a (mostly) blind playthrough. Some aspects of this LP are set in stone, I am planning on bringing certain NPCs with me and my attitude towards Sandrah will be as friendly as possible since the mod seems to be geared towards that attitude. Suggestions on pretty much everything else are not only welcome but in fact encouraged, especially if some of you have already played this mod before. These people are encouraged to use spoiler tags when discussing content that I haven't reached yet, however.