No Portão de Baldur III trailer de anúncio, podemos ver o que parece ser humano ser transformado em um Esfolador de Mentes.
O que está acontecendo lá? Estão Mind Flayers criado transformando outras criaturas? Eu pensei que os Mind Flayers apenas criaram Devoradores de Intelecto, como está escrito na descrição do D&D 5E, mas não outros Mind Flayers.
A menos que seja mais basicamente um feitiço de polimorfismo em mãos?
Vários artigos sobre o Portão de Baldur III trailer indica que o processo descrito é de fato ceremorfose.
Rock Paper Shotgun toca nele:
They call it Ceremorphosis. The excruciating seven day process by which a humanoid might transform into a Mind Flayer. Stick one illithid tadpole in the brain and one week later you’ve got an octopus for a head and a craving for more grey matter. [...]
Before we chat specifics: that reveal! Blimey. Ceremorphosis might be the inspiration, but when crafting a 90 second teaser trailer you’ve got step on the gas a bit, so the process is accelerated. A week of suffering becomes a frankly horrendous slice of Cronenbergian body-shattering that is so gnarly the uncut version of the teaser was not shown at today’s Stadia announcement. I know Google want us to give their streaming tech a thumbs up, but not when that thumb is being snapped 90 degrees by a mind maggot.
É confirmado pelos próprios desenvolvedores em este artigo da GameSpot, em entrevista ao chefe da Larian Studios, Swen Vincke:
For anyone who's not familiar with Baldur's Gate, as you said before there are people that are new to this franchise, can you kind of break down what we're seeing in the teaser that will catch us up and get us ready for Baldur's Gate 3?
[...] There's dead bodies everywhere and then something's happening to this knight and he's actually undergoing a version of what we would call accelerated ceremorphosis, which is basically a way of reproduction that these creatures called the mind flayers have.
They stick a tadpole in people's heads, that tadpole grows, and then it turns a human being or any humanoid being into a mind flayers and these are the guys you may know from Stranger Things, maybe. They're these psyonic creatures with tentacles and very intelligent but they're hive creatures. They have elder brains that command them.
They used to have an incredible empire called the Mind Flayer Empire but things went wrong, so they've been in hiding ever since in a place called The Underdark, which is like the deep underground of this world of Forgotten Realms. Somehow, they've managed to get people into Baldur's Gate that are turning into mind flayers and you see some shots where they're flying in the distance, so it's an invasion of mind flayers, too.
Você pode encontrar mais informações sobre o processo em o artigo wiki Forgotten Realms sobre ceremorfose, que cita livros de edições anteriores e também Guia de Monstros de Volo.
O co-fundador da Larian Studios, Swen Vincke, também recria brincando a reunião com Mike Mearls e Nathan Stewart em o primeiro vídeo de atualização da comunidade dos Larian Studios para Baldur's Gate 3. Nele, eles discutem o processo de ceremorfose.
O princípio básico de como funciona a reprodução do Mind Flayer (aka Illithid) é o seguinte:
Os Mind Flayers produzem lotes de girinos que vivem na piscina de salmoura de um cérebro mais velho - sendo alimentados com cérebros, comendo um ao outro e sendo comidos pelo cérebro mais velho por cerca de dez anos. Aqueles que sobrevivem são removidos da piscina de salmoura e submetidos à cerimônia de Ceremorfose.
Mind flayers don’t reproduce in the traditional sense. Instead, they lay eggs from which hatch tadpole-like creatures that are used to make more of their kind through a process called ceremorphosis. First, a captured humanoid is rendered docile by a blast of psionic power. A newly hatched tadpole is inserted into the victim’s cranium, usually through a nostril or ear canal. The tadpole grows as it devours the humanoid’s brain, attaching to the victim’s brain stem and becoming its new brain. Over the course of a week, the humanoid body changes form, and a new mind flayer comes into being.
Então, enquanto o processo parece ser acelerado no videoclipe ... é isso que você está vendo.
A aventura
Waterdeep Dungeon of the Mad Mage
tem uma (muito) breve passagem sobre o que está acontecendo no clipe (localizado na
level 19
) tem essa passagem, sugerindo o que vemos:
Before he was transformed into an illithid by the process known as ceremorphosis, Captain N'ghathrod was a spacefaring elf. [...]
Além disso, as outras peças de conhecimento que temos sobre o processo de transformar uma criatura em parentes illithid, dos livros publicados, estão em
Guia de Monstros de Volo:
Ceremorphosis
Mind flayers don’t reproduce in the traditional sense. Instead, they lay eggs from which hatch tadpole-like creatures that are used to make more of their kind through a process called ceremorphosis. First, a captured humanoid is rendered docile by a blast of psionic power. A newly hatched tadpole is inserted into the victim’s cranium, usually through a nostril or ear canal. The tadpole grows as it devours the humanoid’s brain, attaching to the victim’s brain stem and becoming its new brain. Over the course of a week, the humanoid body changes form, and a new mind flayer comes into being. [...]
a entrada do Manual do Monstro para uma testemunha mental:
If the beholder can be stunned and brought safely to the brine pool of the elder brain it can be converted through ceremorphosis into a mindwitness. [...]