It's not every day you come across a game like Baldur's Gate 3, and it's even rarer to find a guy like Howard. The most remarkable thing about him? He's actually totally normal. You might find his face model on a few random NPCs, but you'd never peg them for the heroes. Howard is a short and stocky gold dwarf bard, still sporting an eyebrow piercing despite looking well into his 50s, and BG3 fans on Facebook are eating him up.
The strange phenomena happened very suddenly. "They adopted him so quickly that I got whiplash," says Howard's creator Lisa D'Ambrosio, and you can tell as much by simply looking at the clamoring on his 750-strong Facebook page. Have a quick scan of any online group or forum dedicated to the game, and you're bound to find many a pretty tiefling setting out on a perilous journey toward Astarion's belt buckle. But by creating the most extraordinarily ordinary man in Faerûn, D'Ambrosio has answered a question none of us knew we had in the first place: what if the fantasy hero wasn't some hot young thing, but a bewildered middle-aged ornithologist who wants nothing more than to put his feet up, have a snooze, and give you unwanted yet well-meaning life advice? Well, the moment she found out was "actually pure accident."
A star is born
Emulating Howard's bardic talents, we tried creating a musical out of BG3.
Howard is so incredibly average by real life standards that he's the height of unique in Baldur's Gate 3. Everything about Howard, from his sparse head of gray hair to the soft, majestic jowls beneath his chin, feel like novel concepts in Larian's epic tale of goblins, devils, and mindflayer parasites – and that novelty isn't lost on his creator.
"My usual go-to is that I want to go into a fantasy world and I want to look nothing like myself. I want to look like what I feel is the ideal standard of beauty in this realm, but I had just done that in my first playthrough and I wanted to do something different," D'Ambrosio says of Howard's origins. She, too, was one of the many beautiful tiefling Tavs with a penchant for sassy blonde vampire men.
Having spent ages making her main character, D'Ambrosio says she quickly lost inspiration when the time came to create her Guardian. "I knew how the game would play out, and that it doesn't really matter, story-wise, what the Guardian looks like. And then I saw the random generator button and decided to see what happens." After a few clicks, lo and behold: the first iteration of Howard appeared before her. "I called my husband down. I was like, 'Alright, you gotta come see this guy.'"
After taking multiple screenshots of her protagonist's first interactions with Howard, D'Ambrosio was feeling contemplative. "I was like, 'You know, the [Facebook] community would probably really like to see Howard. He's really, really cool. So I thought 'Sure, let's just make someone's day a little better, hopefully.' But I never expected the fandom to just latch on."
D'Ambrosio's first post introducing Howard reads like a Craigslist dating ad. "I just posted some pictures of him and asked who my boy Howard should romance, along with highlights of him. So many people commented, and I got a range of replies from 'Oh, romance Wyll, he's so pure and would treat Howard right,' to 'Date Minthara, you can fix her.' But a lot of them said Karlach because she is the tall queen and he is the short king, and they just wanted to see Karlach pick Howard up."
An unexpected journey
In order to date any of the companions, though, D'Ambrosio would have to recreate Howard from scratch as a main character. So began the chronicles of Howard, starting with how some nice bloke from down the pub came to find himself infected with brain worms.
"The community, as a collaborative thing, came up with his backstory," she says when I ask her who Howard was before the events of the game. "From just the bits and pieces that I've strung together into his narrative, he's just your average guy. He might have a wife and kids but you know, he might have separated from them, or maybe never had kids. But the important part is that he is just a guy, and all he wants to do is go have a pint with his mates at the pub. And he just happens to be British, because everyone was using British terminology."
His astonishingly familiar face does scream pub-going London geezer with two ex-wives and a slight gambling problem, but there's a kindness to his eyes that has me convinced he's one of the good guys. The best guy in town, in fact.
Howard's pre-BG3 story is simple: he was headed to the pub to watch the football one day, walking his pet emu all the while – "He's an avid bird lover. He likes to watch birds," one community member decided – when all of a sudden he got magicked away onto the mindflayer ship. Now, it's just a matter of survival. "He's flying by the seat of his pants. He has no idea what is going on. He's supposed to be at the pub watching the game, but now he's surrounded by tentacles and doesn't know why." His relatability as a totally normal dude has turned him into something of a local legend in certain Facebook groups, so much so that D'Ambrosio had to make a discussion group especially for him since the Howard posts were getting out of hand on more general pages.
The Howard community hasn't just been instrumental in coming up with a backstory for the big guy, but they've influenced how D'Ambrosio roleplays. "I usually go with the evil kind of options [in RPGS]," she says, having chosen a BG3 Dark Urge character for her very first playthrough. "But with Howard, I have to pause a lot and think, 'Okay, what would Howard do?'"
WWHD?
He's just a bunch of pixels in a video game, but I hope that he can give people the inspiration or peace of mind they need.
Lisa D'Ambrosio
From the sounds of it, Howard's credo is to be a decent fellow and keep the peace. "I usually pick the options where I get people to talk more, and I try to avoid combat as much as I can, unless Howard would think 'no, this has got to stop', or if we're at a dead end. I also pick the options that I feel inspire people, where Howard's like 'You're doing great, good job' or, 'Hey, I think you should follow your dreams - but don't follow that dream, that one's not great.'"
Howard's positive energy and supportive, fatherly presence hasn't always been enough to please everyone he's met. Now nearing the end of Act 2, Howard has been stung by the abrupt departure of resident goth girl cleric, Shadowheart, all because he decided not to bring her to the Gauntlet of Shar. Shadowheart saw it as the only way she can become a Dark Justiciar and show her true allegiance to her cruel goddess, but Howard thought he knew best.
D'Ambrosio walked me through his rationale. "Howard wouldn't want to drag so many people into this mess. He also thinks that Shar's a bad influence, that Shadowheart can do better, and he really thought that she'd thank him afterwards. She did not appreciate it."
The loss of Shadowheart aside, it seems Howard is doing perfectly fine, thank you very much. I know this because D'Ambrosio keeps Howard's biggest fans updated on his outings, posting regular written updates, bardic inspirational quotes, and a few memes here and there to spread his encouraging message far and wide. It's definitely one of the most wholesome Baldur's Gate 3 fan groups I've ever been a part of, and it's a pleasure that his creator has seen fit to share Howard's journey with us.
With Howard's first audience-interactive Twitch stream locked in for January 12th, D'Ambrosio is hopeful and full of gratitude. "I just hope that everyone continues to love Howard," she says of her plans going forward. "I love doing this. I actually suffer from anxiety and depression, so having Howard as this way to connect with people has been really good for me. And it's been awesome to see how people have also felt touched and empowered by Howard. It seems so simple – he's just a bunch of pixels in a video game – but I hope that he can give people the inspiration or peace of mind they need."
Howard's not the only one who lost a friend – I never found Lae'zel in BG3 and it turned me into a bad guy.
