Talk:Books

Nearly all book icons and images have now been uploaded, and previous 'game file' names simplified. All book image/icon names start with 'Book_'.

• For small icons (most/all the ones displayed on this page), you will want to find book images ending in '_Item_Icon.png'.
• For the larger 'faded' images, for use on book pages, using the 'Image=' field, you will want to find book images ending in '_Image.png'
• Searching for 'File:Book Icon.png' or 'File:Book Image.png' should find you all related book image uploads.
• The base names for each book's image and icon, should match. If you know the name for one, you should be able to infer the other.
• Book images can now also be found under Category:Book Images.
• Book icons can now also be found under Category:Book Icons.

- Many links/redirects for old book files are still in place. Will be corrected as links are updated. Llamageddon (talk) 13:55, 26 August 2023 (CEST)

Added icon link Addela (talk) 05:39, 13 October 2023 (CEST)

Book Spoilers

When updating existing book/note pages to the new | book spoiler parameter, remove the "yes" as well in most cases. Spoilers on books should be sparse. See Template_talk:MiscItemPage for more information. Addela (talk) 07:48, 6 December 2023 (CET)

book missing: Art Appraisal

[Art Appraisal by Gonner Maude begins with this:] My mother took me aside one morning and told me my father had gone crazy. I was seven at the time. In her defense she was pretty gentle about it. 'Your Dad's okay. He's just gone crazy is all.' When I asked her if crazy meant he'd locked himself in his study again to paint for three days, she told me no, he'd attacked her with a sharpened paintbrush. She said it just like that. Matter of fact. No tears in sight. They had been married six years, tying the knot one year after Mum pushed me out between her legs in a garden shed in the boonies outside Waterdeep. Art is a funny thing. Mitcher and Webson tell us in their excellent breakdown of the craft that good art replicates life whilst great art overcomes life. That morning, at seven years old with unlaced shoes and a friction burn on my butt from scooting too fast across the floor, I learned the truth of that, and its corollary: that while overcoming that strange thing called life, great art can gobble it up just as easily

This book can be found in Jannath's mansion when the artist wasn't rescued in act 1

Book missing: Secrets of the Talis

Found in Jannath's estate, it reads:

The best way to begin to interpret your talis deck is by getting to know it as you would a person - one exceptionally long-lived and wise. The more time you spend in close observation of your deck, the more its arcana will philter in and and out you like air.

it's not for the deck to reveal itself for you; it's for you to reveal to yourself through the powerful symbols and ancient wisdom portrayed in these seventy-eight cards.

Missing book: The Book of Suitors

Found in Jannath's estate, it reads:

[Within this plain diary are glued letters from suitors seeking Jannath's affection]

Madam,

Please, you mustn't leave me in suspense. Tell me you'll be mine, or tell me all is lost. One or the other, or I'll not sleep another tenday.

Jonah.

Milady,

I was dreadfully sorry to hear about your husband's demise and hoped you'd come calling sometime this tenday that I might convey my condolences to you in person. I've just received a lovely shipment of red from the south and thought it might be some consolation to you.

Lord Haventh

Dearest Madame,

Might I come visit you on the morrow and pay my respects to your great house? It's been so long since I've had the privilege to sup tea at your side.

Horatius

Missing book: When Love Fumbles

Found in Jannath's room, it reads:

[The book falls open to a page in the middle of this spine-broken print.]

Missing book: Masters of the Painterly Arts

Found in Jannath's estate, it reads:

[A catalogue of great painters, historically and contemporary. The spine is bent in a particular spot, and the book opens on the following page.]

OSKAR FEVRAS

Fevras may be best known for the calibre of his clientele, but should really be commended for his attention to detail.

Each portrait illustrating the oft-elusive Baldurian patriars is rendered with exquisite accuracy - the most minute of details from the curl of a smirk to the eye's knowing glints are present in his work. Though he has garnered the reputation of a flighty dilettante, he is a young master worthy of watching, to be sure.

Missing book: The Easy Life

Found outside, north of Jannath's estate, near the river. It reads:

What to wear. What to say to your spouse. Who to befriend. Why are you working at your job? Why do you care about taxes, what to cook, read, pay for, sell, you know, bullshit? Why is there no end to the bullshit? I have a secret for you. There is, brothers and sisters. There. Most certainly. IS!

I used to be neck-deep in bullshit. A shit buffet - an excrement parade - a crapstorm of meaninglessness. All those, you know, those little fucking decisions we have to make that aren't really there. That are basically devoid of purpose. In a shared community of thought and goal like, say, a cult (dirty word, I don't like it, but I had that decided FOR me, brothers and sisters), every day is new and exciting with none of the choices mildewing in your noggin.

People say cults are about conformity. I say they break it. I say they snap conformity's rotten, scrawny neck.

Missing book: Schematics for Subsurface Vessel

Found at the desk in the room with the submarine to the Iron Throne. It reads:

[A schematic drawing of a metallic passenger submersible spans the many folding pages within this book. The bottom-right of each page is watermarked with a representation of the Gondian House of Wonders.]

Missing book; Counting the Conchs

Found on the desk on the the first floor of the Water Queen's House. It reads:

For the first conch on your cord, remember the salt which cleanses, nourishes and stings.

For the second conch on your cord, remember the drowned.

For the third conch on your cord, remember the tempests that whip her.

For the fourth conch on your cord, remember the breath which fills your lungs, but that she might press out of you according to her will.

For the fifth conch on your cord, remember the bounty of her body, the queen, the sea.

Missing book: Acquisitions

Found in the Water Queen's House. It reads:

By year's end, we'll have sufficient resources to acquire Nurthammas' shipping yard.

For years now, the duties paid at docks across the city have been far too low - the temple all but subsidises local trade. This will be rectified once we are able to acquire enough docks to force a rise in tariffs. We may even be able to regild the nave in Waterdeep with the profits.

Missing book: Iron Throne - Windup and Shutdown

Found in the Iron Throne (i think, not 100% sure, sorry). it reads:

Orders from Lord Gortash

As the Steel Watch project reaches quota fulfilment and completion, preparations should be started for expected retooling of the Foundry and complete shutdown of the Iron throne.

Conversion of the Iron Throne from research facility to was hastily executed, and substantial material in the form of prototypes and experiment logs remains in the side chambers. Schedule a sweep to collect or dispose of this material to be completed by the end of the next tenday.

Shortly thereafter the Gondian hostages will have reached the end of their usefulness, so prepare to dispose of them as well.

Black Gauntlet Hahns Rives

Missing book: Manipulations and Motivations: Sacrifice

Found in the south-west of the iron throne, the room with the tadpole. it reads:

How far might one individual go to save another? Where is the threshold of sacrifice? We separated twelve offspring of various species from their parents and established them in adjacent cells. The offspring were subjected to steadily increasing levels of physical and psychological torment. The parents were told that by pulling a lever, the torment would cease, but would result in their own deaths. All twelve pulled the lever, with test case five lasting the longest - he died around midday.

Missing book: U.R.: For the Absolute's Glory

Found in the south-west of the iron throne, the room with the tadpole.

Mouse-over tooltip text:

Grand Duke Ravengard's personal reflections

Content of the book:

[This journal was penned by Grand Duke Ravengard after his illithid infection. Early entries thrill in the wonder of the Absolute's voice, praising the truth of Her message and the resplendent future for whish Baldur's Gate is destined. The most recent entries, recorded after Ravengard was brought to the Iron Throne, reflect a different mind: one fighting for the release from the Absolute's grip.}

Absolute, my goddess, how you fill me with the joy and peace of believing, how I abound in your glNO NO DAMNED VOICE SHAKE IT OFF SHAKE ITory. I was bound by lies, but in you did I seeHELLS STOP ITthe error of m...

• • note that the mismatched brackets [ } and the typo "whish" are part of the book itself

Missing book: Memoirs of My Death

Found in the Small Gilded Chest near the pool of blood where one becomes the Unholy Assassin 81.82.46.46 23:24, 5 March 2024 (CET)

Missing book: Wealth Offering to Bhaal

Found in the gilded chest in the south east of the temple of bhaal, you need to fly/jump to get to its platform. It reads:

Lord Bhaal, the poison that quack sold me was not effective diluted in the ale. Writhing failure of a slave that I am, I offer all of the gouted landlord's gold, grifted from deviants in their excess. I pray only it can fund a mighty homicide, and one day my corpse may sip on gall-goblets with you, in your domain. 81.82.46.46 16:37, 7 March 2024 (CET)

Missing book: Our Enemies' Fate

Found in a skeleton in an alcove in the northern part of bhaal's temple. It reads:

Here lies Flaming Fist Manip Antyra Thorpe, who thought to interfere with an unholy ritual murder in Harbourview Park. Her body will lie here until every scrap of flesh has been picked clean by corpse beetles. Thus shall we serve all who meddle in the bloody business of Bhaal. 81.82.46.46 16:53, 7 March 2024 (CET)

Missing book: Blood-Envy for the Unworthy

Found in the locked chest in orin's bedroom. It reads:

Oh, my stupid slaughter kin. How many thousands will you mutilate before you learn to make their blood spill worthy of Father's altar? You deceive your god with these mindless flayings, and our temple, no my temple, decays because of it.

It can't be so. It mustn't be so. The favourite of Bhaal must be one worthy of his name. One who serves him, and only him.

If you insist on shouldering the yoke of these other so-called Chosen, then I will craft you a better one. A worm, to make you mindless as the altar-meat you butcher. And I will restore this temple in Bhaal's true image. A glorious vision, built atop your festering corpse. 81.82.46.46 17:16, 7 March 2024 (CET)

Missing book: Manifesto

Found on the desk in orin's bedroom, it reads:

[Written on leathery parchment, the document has a fetid, metallic odour...]

MANIFESTO: 13 Uktar 1482. I, Orin, called the Red by the Shallar, daughter of Helena, granddaughter of Sarevok Anchev, do vow in the name of Bhaal my Lord of Murder to serve his unholy will. I shall become an Incarnation of Slaughter, and the pain and humiliation inflicted upon his temple by the ignorant masses of Baldur's Gate shall be REPAID A THOUSANDFOLD. This do I swear and attest with my own heart's blood. 81.82.46.46 17:29, 7 March 2024 (CET)