Lae’zel is one of the first characters players meet in Baldur’s Gate 3, joining up with her through circumstance alone. However, after the game’s opening events, players have the chance to kill or free Lae’zel, and it’s tough to know what to do.
Killing or saving a key character is usually a turning point in many ways, locking off romance options and sometimes even quests. This guide explains what will happen if players kill or free Lae’zel in Baldur’s Gate 3, so they don’t need to create multiple save files to find out.
Related: Baldur’s Gate 3: How to Prepare Spells in BG3
Should You Kill or Free Lae’zel in Baldur’s Gate 3
When players first encounter Lae’zel after crashing the Nautiloid ship, they’ll see she’s been caught by a pair of Tieflings in a cage. Thanks to the brain worms working their way around both her and the player character’s brains, it’s possible to converse with her.
Players can then choose to try to deceive the Tieflings and get them to leave, or persuade them to kill Lae’zel. Below, we’ve outlined the outcomes for what happens if you kill or free Lae’zel in Baldur’s Gate 3. While it’s possible to go on with the main story either way, there are some pretty big differences based on players’ choices.
What Happens if You Free Lae’zel in Baldur’s Gate 3
If players choose to free Lae’zel, they’ll need to defend her from the Tieflings that captured her. After killing them or convincing them to leave, players can get Lae’zel to join their party. Many consider her essential because she’s a Fighter and can mix up the party’s composition quite a lot. Her base stats when players first met her are as follows.
- Background: Soldier
- Initiative: +1
- Movement Speed: 9 Meters
- Darkvision Range: 2 Meters
- Strength: 17
- Dexterity: 13
- Constitution: 15
- Intelligence: 10
- Wisdom: 12
- Charisma: 8
By freeing Lae’zel, players can work towards romancing her if they want to. By playing with her in the party and making an effort to get to know her, players can even unlock a Companion quest specifically linked to her: The Githyanki Warrior. This quest was quite restricted in Baldur’s Gate 3’s early access but is now fully playable since the game’s official release.
Lae’zel’s Githyanki Warrior quest will span the entirety of the game and show Lae’zel go through a deep character arc. Many players don’t love Lae’zel’s attitude at the start of the game, but if you play through her companion quest, she’ll go through quite a transformative change. Naturally, Lae’zel will remain pretty abrasive throughout the game regardless, but her world view will certainly open up.
You also don’t need need to have Lae’zel in your party should you choose to free her from the Tieflings. You can have Lae’zel go to your camp and remain there for the entirety of the game if you don’t love what she brings to the table, although you will likely have to interact with her every now and then.
Alternatively, you can also choose to just abandon Lae’zel where she is. There are no lasting consequences to this choice other than not having Lae’zel around and being able to access her character-specific quests and actions. And if you do choose to abandon her, you’ll have a few more opportunities to recruit Lae’zel as you progress through first Act of the game and encounter other Githyanki.
What Happens if You Kill Lae’zel in Baldur’s Gate 3
If you choose to kill Lae’zel, you’ll need to persuade the Tieflings to release her from her cage with a DC5 Persuasion check and prepare for a fight. Players will again have the chance to side with her, but they can reject her and side with her captors as everyone rolls Initiative. The fight is pretty easy because the Tieflings are incredibly powerful. In our playthrough, they killed Lae’zel in a single hit.
If Lae’zel dies here, the Tieflings in Baldur’s Gate 3 will chat with the player after the battle is over, and players are free to loot Lae’zel’s corpse for all of her gear if they fancy it. She’s got armor with slightly better stats than what some classes start with, but the real benefit is the value of that gear, giving players a nice boost once they reach a store to sell it at.
Note that if you kill Lae’zel here, you won’t be able to revive her with a Scroll of Revivify. Lae’zel will be dead for good with no chance of joining up with you later.
Obviously, by killing Lae’zel, players prevent her from being a romance option for the rest of their playthrough. It’s also impossible to play through her Companion quest later in Act 1 because she’s no longer around to trigger it.
There’s far fewer benefits from killing Lae’zel than freeing her. The pocket change you can get from selling her gear isn’t substantial enough of a sum to be worth it in the long run, and her absence only limits some encounters you would otherwise normally have.
What Happens if You Kill Lae’zel Aboard the Nautiloid
The Tiefling cage isn’t the first place you meet Lae’zel nor is it the first place she can die. You can actually kill Lae’zel while attempting to escape the Nautiloid during the Prologue. Should this happen, Lae’zel’s body will appear on the Ravaged Beach when starting the first Act.
You can then use a Scroll of Revivify on Lae’zel’s corpse to bring her back to life for the opportunity to recruit her into your party. You can also just move on with the game, ignoring Lae’zel’s dead body. This will have the same limitations as it would if you were to kill her during the encounter with the Tieflings.
Where to Find Lae’zel in Baldur’s Gate 3
Lae’zel is located in the opening area of Baldur’s Gate 3, where the Nautiloid crashes, to the north of where players awaken after the opening scene. It’s just a little ways up the hill from the Roadside Cliffs waypoint (coordinates X: 242 Y: 370). Players will know they’re getting close to the area because there are two Tieflings close by talking about what to do with Lae’zel. See above for a map reference for the exact location.
