Baldur’s Gate 3 has many different companions that you can recruit to your camp and include in your party composition, depending on the choices you make during your playthrough. Nightwarden Minthara is one of these potential companion characters, and the only Paladin companion in the game, so she is a valuable asset to have on your side. If you’re looking to recruit Minthara to your own party in BG3, we’ve got all the information you’ll need, so follow along below.
Prerequisites For Recruiting Minthara As a Companion, Explained
To recruit Nightwarden Minthara in Baldur’s Gate 3, you have to follow a very specific path of the game, leaning heavily on an evil route (at least during Act 1 of the game). To achieve this, you’ll need to side with Minthara and the Goblin Camp during the Druid Gove ark, infiltrate Druid Grove, let Minthara and her army inside for the ambush, and slaughter the Tieflings and Druids.
While taking this route will lock you out of recruiting certain comrades such as Wyll, Halsin, and potentially Karlach, this is the only option to follow if you have your heart set on recruiting Minthara. If you side with the Tieflings or Druids and fight against Minthara when she ambushes Druid Grove, there is nothing you can do to preserve her storyline and trigger the events in Act 2 that allow you to recruit her. Even if you knock her out to 1HP, technically leaving her ‘alive’, the game recognizes her as dead and cuts off her involvement in the second Act of the game.
After completing the Ambush with Minthara against Druid Grove and celebrating at your camp, you will have completed everything needed to set up Minthara’s recruitment in Act 2. You can now wrap up the rest of your Act 1 events and Quests, before progressing on through the Mountain Pass and heading to Moonrise Towers, where the next steps for recruiting Minthara take place.
How to Recruit Minthara As a Companion in Baldur’s Gate 3
Once you arrive at Moonrise Towers, walk inside the building and head straight toward the first set of doors that you can see – they will swing open for you as you approach. However, take a moment and pause here, as there are a couple of steps you can do to ensure the process for recruiting Minthara goes as smoothly as possible.
First of all, I’d recommend saving at this exact point, as you’ll be able to return in case things go wrong and Minthara somehow perishes. Now, once you’ve saved you’ll need to choose the character best-suited to the upcoming conversation you’ll be tasked with. This will require some WIS checks, so if your player character isn’t attuned to this stat, then I highly recommend switching over to Shadowheart’s point of view, and initiating the conversation with her.
Once you’re switched over to Shadowheart or any other Wisdom-suited character, walk through these doors and you’ll find a scene unravelling featuring Nightwarden Minthara, who is facing the wrath of an unhappy Ketheric and Z’rell.
As you initiate this conversation, you will eventually need to make a decision for your dialogue response. The choices consist of:
- 1: Stay silent, simply watching
- 2: Force yourself into Minthara’s mind, make her scream her own damnation. [WIS]
- 3: Calm Z’rell’s mind – make her treat Minthara with mercy. [WIS]
- 4: Try to force your will on Ketheric – push him to declare Minthara innocent. [WIS]
To rescue Minthara, you will need to select either option 3 or 4. However, option 3 (calming Z’rell’s mind) is the easiest option due to the number you need to meet with your check, so I highly recommend going for that option. Once you succeed in this check, the guards will drag Minthara away to a prison cell, and you’ll be left to discard the Goblins as you please.
Once you make your choice with the Goblins, it’s time to track Minthara down and rescue her with a good old-fashioned prison break. From where you are standing in the main throne room, turn to your right and you will notice a door.
Walk through this door, and you will enter another room with some stairs. Click on these stairs to walk down them and into the lower level of Moonrise Towers, where the prisoners are kept.
Now that you’re in the lower level of Moonrise Towers, follow the trail of bloodstains on the floor. They will lead you to the open door of another room, so go ahead and enter.
As you enter this room, you will be able to notice a very clearly distressed Minthara inside, accompanied by two questioners. Now walk up to Minthara and click on her to initiate a conversation.
Upon doing so, you will trigger a conversation between your party, Minthara, and the two questioners, who reveal that they’re tearing Minthara’s mind apart as part of her torture upon Ketheric’s command for her death, which will prompt another choice for you.
At this point, you need to select the fifth choice – This ends now – and so do you. This will throw you right into battle with the two questioners, but as long as you contain the fight to the space of the room, you should have no problems overpowering them both, as you have an advantage in numbers during this 2v5 situation.
After killing both questioners, Minthara will reveal that up until now, she had been manipulated and used as a personal mind-controlled puppet by the Absolute. Because of this tragedy and how it had caused her to become obsessed with blood and slaughter, Minthara gives a genuine thanks to your party and admits that she didn’t expect anyone would come to aid her.
In response, select option 2 – We need to get out of here. This will convince Minthara to join your group and escape her fate as a prisoner in Moonrise Towers. After selecting this option, you can choose to have Minthara wait in her cell while you explore the rest of Moorise Towers and complete other missions, or join your party immediately. Once you’re ready to break Minthara out, confirm your choice, and she will join your party, linked to your character on the UI in the same section you’d find the portrait for a Familiar or Mage hand.
Don’t forget to save your game again at this point in case things go bad from here! This way, you’ll be able to return and start your jailbreak again without having to go through the whole conversation with Kethric and Z’rell or fight the questioners.
You now need to find a way to sneak Minthara out without disrupting the guards or causing a scene. The first, and easiest method for achieving this is with the use of Invisibility. If one of your party members has the Invisibility Spell, simply cast it on Minthara, and walk out of the towers unnoticed. However, if you lack this Spell, you can still cast it through a Scroll or Potion.
If you require one of these, then you can purchase a Potion of Invisibility from Araj Oblodra on the main floor of Moonrise Towers. To do this, un-group your party, and send a character that Minthara isn’t attached to away to buy the item, then return and have Minthara consume the potion. Now you’re good to go.
If you choose not to use this method, then you will have to bargain your way out by convincing multiple sets of guards that Minthara is still mind-broken and that you will keep her in line, which requires making and succeeding several Charisma checks. This can be a bit of a struggle if you don’t have someone with a good CHA stat making the rolls, so I recommend having someone like Astarion lead the party if your character is lacking this trait.
If you fail one of these checks at any point or choose an aggressive approach, you can also attempt to fight your way out of Moonrise Towers. However, this right can be very tough, and Minthara may die as a result, so this is a bit of a risky choice to make.
By using one of these methods, navigate your way back to the main throne room of Moonrise Towers with Minthara in tow, and then head straight for the exit, approaching the Cursed Shadowlands once again. As you finally step into the Cursed Shadowlands, Minthara will once again genuinely thank you for your efforts in saving your life, and express interest in speaking further once she reaches safety. At this point, you want to select the first option – Tell her where to find your camp.
At this point, Minthara will speed away to your camp. When you return for a Long Rest, you will be able to speak to Minthara and officially switch someone else in your party out to include her for the next part of your adventure.
That’s everything you need to know about how to recruit Minthara as a companion in Baldur’s Gate 3. Now that you’ve got her added to your party, why not look to enhance the abilities of her and your other comrades? We have plenty of topics that can help you in doing so, such as our guide for the best Astarion build, so feel free to check them out if you need extra pointers.
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