WEREWOLF ISLAND Walkthrough Guide, Baldur's Gate

Werewolf Island Walkthrough Guide

Welcome to my Werewolf Island walkthrough for Baldur's Gate, a cRPG developed by BioWare in 1998-99. As with the legendary Durlag's Tower, Werewolf Island is a major side quest added into Baldur's Gate by the Tales of the Sword Coast expansion of 1999. This adventure, which can be kicked off upon the party's arrival in the northern town of Ulgoth's Beard, not only tells a tragic tale of lycanthropes, but it is also infused by Realmslore that pertains to the great seafaring explorer and founder of the city of Baldur's Gate, Balduran.

Most likely, through exploration of the city, we will have already located two fabled artifacts that once belonged to Balduran: Helm and Cloak.

As gnomish loremaster Dushai suggests, perhaps we shall discover the fate of the explorer himself on the island...

... and we wonder whether more Balduranic artifacts may be found there, too.

Mendas

First, though, we have to find a way to set sail. Enter Mendas:

Mendas, who claims to be a scholar and archaeologist hailing from Waterdeep, also claims that the Merchant League have discovered the wreckage of Balduran's ship - "The Wandering Eye". However, it was a stormy night and the sailors were forced to retreat or become shipwrecked themselves. 

Going on like Volo does, Mendas claims that the merchants are unjust, that they bully people with no power, and that they are now in possession of sea charts that pinpoint the island's location. The merchants want to utilize the island in order to cheaply restock and refit their ships, which in turn allows them to navigate the Trackless Sea all the way to Evermeet, without stopping at expensive ports such as those of Lantan and Sundrah. 

The "greedy merchants", Mendas goes on, want to plunder Balduran's 300 year-old wreckage for gold and jewels. In the process, he fears they will destroy the artifacts along with Balduran's logbook - both key to understanding the explorer's fate. 

Suspiciously well-informed of the goings-on of the island, lacking a Waterdeep accent, and known by locals for being an eccentric...

... Mendas is all-too-ready to charter a boat for us in the hope that we may beat the merchants back to the Balduran wreckage. In the meantime, he requests that we "retrieve" the sea charts from the Merchant League Counting House in the city of Baldur's Gate. We can of course disagree to this under-handed, clearly illegal act, but there is no other way to set sail to the island.

Get the Sea Charts

Counting House Location

Thus, we make our way to Baldur's Gate city. The Counting House is a newly-renovated building situated in the east.

(Pre-TotSC expansion, the Counting House was under renovation and did not contain much of interest.)

Now, there are two ways to acquire the sea charts: survive guard interrogation and follow that up with a simple FedEx quest, or just kick down the door, kill the guard, crewmen and captain, and then loot the charts from the captain's cold, dead hands. 

100% stealthy infiltration is unfortunately not supported as a solution because the charts cannot be pick-pocketed from the captain. This is a real pity.

Anyway, it actually does not matter how we go about the theft, but by way of dialogue is the most amusing. 

The easiest way in:

Or:

And then:

The other responses result in us being exposed for the imposters we are. And Ulf's idea of "arresting us" is to start poking us in the guts with the pointy end of his sword. In that case, we are forced to flee or fight. Disappointingly, aggro on the ground floor does not put the second floor on alert. Logic dictates that a ruckus downstairs would be heard upstairs, but no.

Captain Tollar Kieres

So, regardless of how we handled Ulf, the captain and his many guards are non-hostile upstairs. We end up interrupting the captain, who is busy making final preparations to set sail to the island in search of the wreckage:

Option two forces us to instigate aggro (force-attack) and option three invites aggro. Thus, it's option one if we don't want to kill anyone. 

However, we learn at the Blushing Mermaid that a hefty sum is needed in order to pay the tab racked up by the sailors' binge drinking. Having kindly footed the bill, Baalor Ale is our reward from the barkeep.

Back at the Counting House, the ale hits the captain like a ton of bricks, causing him to hand us the sea charts as he dozes off.

Candy from a baby...

It is unfortunate that the Ulf and Captain dialogues do not check for Reaction. Instead, the swashbuckling bluffs are just a matter of choosing the correct responses. But this is no doubt due to time limits of a dev cycle, so I won't mention lack of Reaction checks again in this series of posts, though I will mention any future employment of Reaction checks if they result in something tangible or extra-flavorsome.

Trackless Sea

Back in Ulgoth's Beard, Mendas rewards us with 2,000 GP for delivering the sea charts. He then requests that we meet him at the docks, at which point we can milk another 4,000 GP out of him before setting sail (Reaction check). Thus, our pockets are lined with gold as the voyage towards the Trackless Sea begins...

Note the versatility in the tone of the writing. The writer soundly handles swashbucklers, old crones, exotic accents, stern guards, drunkards, level-headed barkeeps and standard narration - all equally well. This is what happens when you have a naturally gifted lead writer who penned 70% of the game's text, as opposed to 20 writers and 10 "narrative designers" who learned how to write in a university.

What we are seeing in these dialogue screencaps - in all my BG write-ups - is a distinctively non-modern employment of syntax, vocab and tone which approximates that of AD&D 2nd Edition literature, and was all but lost in Shadows of Amn. Thus, the original BG sports an authenticity with which only Icewind Dale can compete.

Kaishas Gan, Dradeel, Karoug: Part II

Welcome to Part II of my Werewolf Island walkthrough for Baldur's Gate, a cRPG developed by BioWare in 1998-99.

The two main areas of Werewolf Island: Settlement and wilderness

We arrive on the island, shipwrecked. Just like Balduran did 300 years ago.

*Sniff Sniff* "I smell... outsider?"

Repeatedly uttered by the commoners, these are the first words heard upon our arrival. Yep, the island appears to be inhabited by humans. We notice farms, docks and several buildings. Clearly, the inhabitants have lived here for some time. If spoken to, the commoners refer us to Headwoman Kaishas Gan, who dwells in a hide-roofed hut located within a walled-in compound to the north.

Kaishas Gan

Speaking common in an accent exactly like Mendas, Kaishas seems open, kind and honest (Talias, who stands beside her, can't stand the sight of us). Kaishas and her people have dwelled on the island for time out of mind.

Kaishas claims not to have heard of Mendas or Balduran, and she claims that the leader of her people, her husband, Chieftain Selaad Gan, left for the mainland "some time ago". Kaisha knows of a wreckage located in the wilderness to the north, but her people have not explored there due to the "cursed beasts" that roam it. When pressed as to the nature of the beasts, she describes them as "animals that live as wolves and carrion-feeders" as well as "wolf-like, but not wolves" and "man-like, but not men." When asked about a way to deal with the beasts, and if there is a way to get off the island:

At this point, one may look for the following dialogue option: "Don't take this the wrong way, but en route to your hut your people were sniffing my behind, you mentioned the cliffs as having sharper points than your teeth, and your people fight tooth and nail with Karoug's kind. So, I have ask: Are you guys mangy mutts, too?"

At any rate, our quest is clear: we need to travel north, explore the wreckage, and take out Karoug. Only then will a natural harbor be available for shipbuilding.

There are a few side quests offered around the compound, but they are simple and/or plain FedEx (fetch doll, fetch cloak, fetch corpse, rescue baby, avenge wife), and so, with the exception of Dradeel's quest, I won't be covering them in this write-up. The flavor added by the lore dialogues are much more interesting.

For example, a salty seadog who once carried Sybarr spices out of Amn, boasts about adventures that rival Charname's...

... though "eating one's shoes" casts doubt on the whole story.

Now a fisherman, he gives us the lowdown from his perspective...

(The inhabitants of the island are descendents of Balduran's crew).

... though it is unclear as to what happened to Balduran:

The war leader also offers lore on wolf-beasts, and how to defeat them:

Ok. We journey to the northern wolfwere wilderness in search of the wreckage. There are a few encounters in which wolfweres in human form lure us into an ambush. These are true to the lore. Other than that, there are three main points of interest: Dradeel the elven mage, Kaisha's ship and Balduran's wreckage.

First up, Kaishas Gan's ship (which she was supposedly in the process of building) is spotted in the harbor, and looks already to be sea-worthy, but we cannot gain access to the harbor due to the sheer cliffs. We will find out later that the harbor may be accessed through secret tunnels in Kaisha's compound.

Dradeel

Next up, Dradeel. We find this elven mage hiding out in a dilapidated cabin not far from the cliff-face.

Dradeel is an interesting figure. He was the arcane advisor for Balduran during their voyage to Anchorome. While meeting Dradeel and helping him recover his spellbook is not necessary to plot-progression, his dialogues (which are some of the best in the game) give us the background on events that occured so long ago, and he aids in our escape from the island as the quest hits its crescendo.

Upon entering the mage's cabin, he comes running up to us:

He reveals that the lycanthropic infection is of Anchorome origin.

Dradeel gives a harrowing account of the initial breakout and bloody attack that followed:

... and tells us how he managed to survive alone for so long:

We of course agree to his request to retrieve his spellbook:

The protection item given is the Wolfsbane Charm (amulet, THAC0 +2, dmg +2 vs. lycanthropes, usable by all).

Optionally, it is possible to ignore Dradeel's plight or simply attack him outright. If attacked, he unleashes the power of his Goddess (Selûne's Curse) and erroneously drops two Wolfsbane Charms (along with Robe of the Neutral Archmagi) upon being vanquished (his war cry is funny and his death cry is drawn-out and funny, too).

Dradeel is actually found imprisoned in Spellhold in Shadows of Amn. Judging by his rationality, kindness and worship of a Goddess in the above dialogue segment (along with another which is covered in Part III, screep-capped here), it is difficult to believe that he would end up being committed to such an institution, only to become a gibbering lunatic.

Yeah, I just don't buy it. The journal describes Dradeel as "a bit insane" and one of Balduran's logbook entries describes him as "addled in the head" -- yet his adventuring advice to Balduran was right on the money, and he shows no sign of madness until the sequel.

Anyway, our next stop is the Balduran wreckage; a stone's throw from the cabin and partially concealed by the trees.

The Wandering Eye wreckage

Karoug

Inside, we must take out wolves of all kinds (wolfweres are accompanied by and empower other wolves) as we make our way up three levels to the captain's quarters, where Karoug - a Greater Wolfwere - is waiting for us.

As you can see, there is a hint at another way to complete the quest...

... but we are blocked off in the end from following through:

Thus, an inevitable battle ensues against a pack of wolfweres!

Cramped quarters: a potentially difficult combat encounter

Greater Wolfweres (and the Loup Garou werewolves encountered later) are immune to non-silver weapons and weapons with less than +4 enchantment (though there are various exceptions). Two such weapons are found in the wreckage itself; one of which is a Balduranic artifact: the Sword of Balduran.

Balduran's quarters also holds the logbook and butterknife of Balduran, along with Dradeel's spellbook locked in a lightning-trapped trunk. The time-worn logbook holds many entries, but they don't reveal anything more than what Dradeel already told us. Here are fragmentary entries that are relevant to the infection:

...the crew, but a larger share for the remaining will keep them well and truly happy. I shall conscript replacements from the local populace this night, and we shall set our sails at dawn...

...delays, but with one hundred and fifty new hands, one must expect the going to be slow at the start. They seem quite calm and orderly, not at all as I expected...

...weather unseasonable, and the moode does worsen. As well, beetles have beset the foode stores, and we shall surely be hungry long before reaching the coast of home...

...set aground to forage. It is a small isle, but will yield what we need. Perhaps I shall...on my own while the crew...time on land will do them goode...

...original men seem quite shallow in the face, quite different from the pallor of the new recruits, but all are most definitely ill...

So the origin of the infection lies with the 150 new hands conscripted from Anchorome. As we will soon experience for ourselves, the incubation time is two days, so it is conceivable that the infected would not have been detected upon boarding.

Having delivered the spellbook to Dradeel, he Dimension Doors away without so much as a thank you (though he will return to offer help soon).

Loup Garou, Selaad Gan, Ice Island: Part III

Welcome to Part III of my Werewolf Island walkthrough for Baldur's Gate, a cRPG developed by BioWare in 1998-99.

Kaishas Gan

Having taken out Karoug and the wolfwere faction, we return to the compound for a shocking revelation with Kaishas Gan; one which has potentially devastating consequences for the party.

Kaishas goes on:

So you ARE mangy mutts! We knew it!

Tailas now interjects to protest our inclusion among them. We are not deserving of membership, for we are mongrels.

As Kaishas leaves for her ship (possible now that we took out Karoug), Talias polymorphs to werewolf and starts wailing away on us. In fact, each and every settler of the compound and its outer grounds do the same. 

Werewolf Timer

However, there is another problem the consequences of which are not known until we report back to Mendas in Ulgoth's Beard. You see, as of this point, a timer of two days has been set that simulates the incubation period of lycanthropy. When it expires, all party members, with the notable exception of Charname (Belladonna flower in possession or not), will be chunked from the portrait bar and polymorphed into hostile Greater Wolfweres! 

Many players won't live with this kind of impacting time-based reactivity (they will just reload), but it is possible to fight through or flee from our companions in order to continue the quest.

cf. Inconsistency [1].

The entire compound and its outer grounds are on high alert and teeming with werewolves. Dradeel can be found outside one of the huts of the mutts. Everything he tells us is already known except for that fact that a trapdoor in one of the huts lead to warrens which take us out to the harbor and Kaishas' ship.

Well, I guess he sort of did pay us back in the end (see Shadows of Amn remark, Part II).

The warrens are unremarkable but for their sprawling size and werewolf infestation. This is just a generic hack n slash area with nothing of interest to offer.

We take the eastern exit to arrive at the harbor where Kaishas' ship awaits.

She stands alone on deck.

Loup Garou

Regardless of dialogue choice, Kaishas shifts into a powerful variety of werewolf known as a Loup Garou.

We loot the sea charts from her cold, dead claws and set sail back to the mainland.

Selaad Gan

Now back in Ulgoth's Beard, we are confronted on the docks by Baresh, from whom we learn that Mendas is Selaad Gan, chieftain of the werewolves and husband of Headwoman Kaishas.

Butthurt as hell, Baresh storms off to inform Mendas aka Selaad Gan - whom we now confront in his home.

He is not Mendas, scholar and archaeologist from Waterdeep, and he never cared about Balduran's artifacts and logbook. He only wanted us to slay Karoug and bring Kaishas and their pack to the mainland, so that the werewolves could spread their curse among the mainlanders, and propagate.

We also learn that slaying Selaad is our cure for lycanthropy.

And so we slay the Loup Garou on the spot. *chunk*

Eat that, you mangy mutt!

Loup Garous - which include Selaad, Kaishas and Baresh - sport ApR 3, MR 45%, Regen 2 HPs/sec, and immunity to non-silver/less than +4 enchantment. They are capable of critting for 40 dmg.

And so the journey ends.

The werewolf threat is ended, and our quest yielded a few more Balduranic artifacts, but the ultimate fate of Balduran remains unknown...

Overall, Werewolf Island is a solid quest with examples of good writing, area design and artwork, but Durlag's Tower beats it hands-down. WI is lacking in depth, difficulty, emotional punch and allegory. Presumably it was time limits in the dev cycle that prevented WI (and Ice Island) from being fleshed out better and having their kinks ironed out - par for the course in commercial RPG development.

Ice Island

Ice Island is just a mini-adventure consisting of only one dungeon (the lower dungeon was cut out of the game), one quest and several dialogues/combat encounters against arcane spellcasters, none of whom can be bargained with or reasoned with.

We are sent to Ice Island by Shandalar in Ulgoth's Beard. All we need to do is get Shandalar's Cloak from Dezkiel.

Anyway, here is the message we receive when all TotSC content is complete:

Ok, now we can go and finish off Baldur's Gate if we haven't already.

***

[1] Now, there is an inconsistency afoot here. On the one hand Charname protests being infected with lycanthropy by Kaishas (this is the correct origin of the infection upheld in the journal, though how she infected us unbeknownst to us is not known). On the other, Kaishas states matter-of-factly that the wolfweres have given us "the gift" (of lycanthropy) - bitten us - in our battles with them. And this is supported when Charname's companions shift into Greater Wolfweres, not werewolves or their thugged-out variant, Loup Garous. But the AD&D 2nd Edition Monstrous Manual states the following: "... there are creatures like the wolfwere ... which can assume human form. These creatures ("antherions'' for lack of a better term) pass on their condition genetically (that is, by having offspring), not by biting and infecting other creatures. Antherions hate lycanthropes, and always attack their counterparts (wolfweres attack werewolves, etc.). Likewise, most lycanthropes feel enmity for antherions, and attack on sight as well".

Thus, we can't be infected with lycanthropy as a result of being bitten by a wolfwere, because wolfweres are not lycanthropes: they are antherions. They are wolves that turn into humans in order to lure humans into ambushes. Werewolves are lycanthropes: "humans that change into wolf-like beasts". (And Kaishas and Tailas are true/bred lycanthropes as opposed to merely induced/bitten ones.) Not to put too finer point on it, but werewolves and wolfweres are completely different creatures. They do not represent "two strains" of lycanthrope, as the quest affirms.

There is also the problem of Dradeel referring to the wolfweres as lycanthropes, and +4 weapons vs. lycanthropes should not grant THAC0/dmg bonuses against Karoug and his kind. And, as per the Rules, cold iron is the bane of the latter, not silver.

Return to Baldur's Gate 1 (Index to all Baldur's Gate content).