Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous's Galfrey Should Be Romanceable by Azatas

Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous is awesome.  It’s a grandiose epic built around a great, involving story, which deftly and consistently highlights a theme of the capacity for people to ascend to greater heights than should be possible, to transcend the limitations of their nature.  It’s got a strong cast, good pacing, fun humor, and so much complexity and variety to its narrative beats and triggers that I’m convinced that without data-miners, it would have taken the collective whole of this game’s players years, maybe over a decade, to suss the secret, true ending out.*  Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous is an epic that does its predecessor Kingmaker proud, and that’s a high bar to meet.

So naturally the first rant I write about it is going to be a petty, nitpicking complaint.  Because I’m me, and I make that fact everyone else’s problem.

So here it is: Galfrey should be romanceable by a protagonist on the Azata Mystic Path.

Among the many love interests which one can pursue in PWotR, Queen Galfrey is an interesting case in being the only one who is not a party member, but rather a story-important NPC.**  Well, okay, she’ll join your party for the final dungeon if you’ve romanced her, but she’s in all meaningful ways an NPC.  And as a very enthusiastic paragon of her alignment of Lawful Good, she’ll only entertain a courtship from a suitor who falls comfortably close to her ideals--meaning that only a Protagonist on the path of the Angel (Lawful Good), Gold Dragon (Neutral Good), or Aeon (Lawful Neutral) are approved to acquire dat aristocratic ass.  Well, also the Legend path (Neutral Neutral), but presumably that’s mostly because Galfrey’s goddess herself endorses it, and the only Lawful characters who let heaven do more of their thinking for them than the D+D/Pathfinder crowd are the Shin Megami Tensei crowd.  Galfrey’s too good a woman to love someone evil (even in consideration of the fact that D+D/Pathfinder’s definition of “Evil” has enough interesting complexities in its take on the concept that we really wouldn’t view some of its Evil characters as truly bad people (cases in point, Daeran and Regill in this game)).  And she’s too dutiful an icon to allow herself to love a being, benevolent or not, who actively opposes the concept of order.  Galfrey’s open-minded enough to open her heart to those who are at least neutral on 1 or both parts of her moral spectrum--and good on her for that, seriously--but she’s not buying that “opposites attract” bullshit.

Okay, fine, you think.  That sounds quite reasonable, right?  Galfrey’s more than just some random hoodlum who got caught up in your party through conveniently unlikely cosmic circumstances, like the rest of the RPG party schmucks one tends to attract in these games.  She’s a fixture in the story meant to embody her role, and its virtues and flaws.  Why should she be an available love interest to a character who clearly is opposed to 1 of the 2 core tenets of her nature?

And you know, maybe, if that’s all there is to it, I might agree, stop typing here, and go work on a different rant.  I’d have to hope that I don’t later forget this is an abandoned rant draft that was never meant to be released.  Imagine if I accidentally published it without reading this last sentence and realizing it was left unfinished!





































But, you see, that’s not all there is to the matter of Galfrey as a love interest.  Because while they certainly and obviously are not unrelated, Galfrey the Woman is not the exact same person as Galfrey the Queen, and while the former still clearly holds her ideals of righteousness and order very dear, she is not personally defined by the Law thing nearly so much as Galfrey the Queen is.  In fact, when she is allowed to momentarily escape from behind her holy royal veneer, we see that Galfrey actually has an instinctive penchant for behaviors not in line with those of a strictly Law-oriented person.  In fact, honestly, just about everything we see of Galfrey’s actual, true personality implies Chaotic Good!

I mean, consider what we see of the Real Galfrey in the game--the decisions she makes outside of her role, the methods she uses for accomplishing Galfrey the Queen’s goals, and the emotions she expresses all along the way.  The first introduction we have to Galfrey is telling--she’s come to meet the woman/man who’s saved Kenabras, and get a measure of her/him, with the possibility of putting her/him in charge of the next crusade.  And to do this, Galfrey dresses down and secretly inserts herself into the revelries of the defenders, so that she can get a better, more honest impression of the protagonist, without being hampered by the pomp and circumstance of an arriving queen (and she’s good enough not to want to have her arrival ruin or lessen the festivities).

So right off the bat, the very first impression we get of Galfrey makes it clear that she’s not so stodgy and stiff in her pursuit of her duty that she cannot adopt a distinctly less Lawful approach to accomplishing what she wants to.  I mean, by the strict code of Law that Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous displays throughout its course, Galfrey, if she were truly inflexible, would never have adopted any sort of subterfuge in this matter, insisting that all pomp and circumstance be followed appropriately, and accepting the respect and honor due to her from her subjects.  But instead, she is capable of recognizing that a less straightforward approach will accomplish what she needs better, and be most considerate of others’ needs.  There is no doubt that Galfrey is an entity of order, but she is not reasonlessly Lawful, and consideration of good people’s personal needs has respectable weight for her.

Also, frankly, she seems to enjoy the little bit of benevolent deception, and getting to momentarily take part in common festivities.

In spite of the commonly held wisdom, first impressions do not have to be defining ones.  But Galfrey’s is no incongruous anomaly to her personality.  Her next major roles in the story only support this initial perception of her penchant for kind mischief and open-mindedness.  She makes the decision to put the protagonist, a new and wholly unknown quantity, in charge of the next crusade, trusting her intuition that something new and unconventional may be the best way to break the stalemate that she herself has been unable to overcome.  While her goal of defeating the demons and preserving her world is at least partially an expression of Galfrey’s devotion to Law, there’s absolutely no debating that a gamble like that, a willingness to value the results for Good over the propriety of the methods to achieve them, is 100% an act of Chaos.  She’s right to do so, of course!***  But it’s a huge decision made at odds with half of her philosophical perspective, and a good chunk of her character development later on relates to her growing discomfort with the Chaotic nature of that decision.  Character development which, I'd like to point out, only underscores her personal nature having streaks of Chaos within it, as a truly Lawful individual almost surely would not struggle with feelings of jealousy at the Commander's success.  Inadequacy, certainly, that's a negative emotion that falls within the Lawful spectrum, but not jealousy.

Also, Galfrey amusingly outmaneuvers Daeran and politically tricks him into having to continue being a crusader.  And while that’s probably still an act more Lawful than anything (since she’s using established social protocols, both official and unspoken, to trap him), it’s hard to argue that the amusement she clearly (and justly) derives from finally getting one up on her blithely sardonic cousin is that of a satisfied trickster.  The action is Lawful, the cause for it (to assist the crusade) is Lawful, but the personal enjoyment, the part having to do with who Galfrey is instead of what, is definitely not.

She can (and must, for the romance) be convinced to actually take part in the march on Drezen, too.  Now, this isn’t necessarily a Chaotic decision, or even a Neutral one--it’s easy enough to argue that her place, as Iomedae’s Chosen and the woman entrusted by her church to protect Golarion from the Worldwound, is as a part of the crusade’s army, that her duty in those roles is higher than her duty as queen.  But it IS worth noting that she clearly appreciates the chance to be making a difference out in the field--her duty is to be a leader and a queen, but her preference and her comfort is to be doing good directly as a warrior.  Again, there’s a significant line between Galfrey as a figure, and Galfrey as a person.

And so it goes--further interactions with her as the story progresses continue to provide evidence to the idea that Galfrey, though a clear and outspoken proponent of Lawful Good, is not an orderly automaton, nor is she beyond recognizing when the Law part of her philosophy is not the best option to achieve Good, and when she can see that conflict, she prioritizes what’s Good over what’s Lawful.

Since a romance is a matter of the heart and thus inherently personal, considering the fact that Galfrey personally has a streak of practical Chaos to her, and that she’s able to recognize when a situation calls for an approach outside the strict parameters of regulation, and that she seems to care most about doing what’s Good and right first and foremost, it doesn’t make much sense for her to reject a protagonist on the Chaotic Good path of the Azata outright.****  Given who she shows herself to be in the game’s course, I think it’s hard to deny that, at the very least, Galfrey should be more open-minded about falling in love with a being of Chaotic Good like an Azata than with a truly Neutral being like the Legendary hero.

And beyond the fact that the true Galfrey clearly isn’t so stringent about Law...the direction that a romance with her goes in makes it all the less reasonable to exclude Chaotic Good routes.  Because regardless of what path you’re on, even if it’s as a Lawful Good Angel, Galfrey automatically views a courtship with the Commander as something not just outside of her duty, but in direct conflict with it.  That’s basically 1 of the 2 major parts of her romantic character arc--coming to terms with the fact that her feelings cannot be denied, and deciding to stop denying them and allowing her duty (or her perception of it, at least; I don’t really get why she’s so convinced that falling in love is something she’s not allowed to do) to dictate her future.  No matter what, a successful romance with Galfrey inherently involves her choosing to give up being queen for the sake of being with the protagonist after the war, because she cannot reconcile love with her duty.

So if, in Galfrey’s eyes, loving the Commander is in contention with fulfilling her Lawful responsibilities, even when the Commander is Lawful herself/himself...then what sense does it make in barring an Azata Commander from pursuing Galfrey?  To fall in love with the Commander is already, automatically a rejection of her Lawful duty, in Galfrey’s (inexplicable) judgment, so as long as the Commander is someone that she can love on a personal level--and as I’ve said, all prior evidence indicates that Galfrey has the capacity to accept and appreciate and even lightly be someone who’s Chaotic Good--there shouldn’t be anything holding this particular love story back.

I mean, hell, courting Galfrey ultimately causes her to choose, once the war is won, to relinquish her position in favor of the love and joy she finds with her beloved.  This is a romance whose destination is Galfrey turning her back, or at the very least significantly easing up, on her Lawful dedication (albeit once her greatest responsibility has been accomplished) for the sake of valuing what she herself needs.  That sounds exactly like the goal that a Chaotic Good person would have for Galfrey, a benevolent desire to free her from the miserable shackles of a position she doesn’t feel personally suited for so she can pursue the joys that an unrestrained life of Good can give her.  I contend that not only should Galfrey be a romance option for an Azata Mythic Path, a Chaotic Good protagonist is the BEST suited to be the catalyst of her love story!

Also, not for nothing, but this is a game whose major theme is the ability to transcend one’s limitations and ascend to greater heights than could have been imagined.  Galfrey’s romance is already a story of ascending above the bonds of obligation to achieve a personal, individual happiness she’d forgotten herself capable of, so it wouldn’t exactly have been out of character to Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous if that story had also incorporated an element of transcending the limitations of alignment in love so long as her lover’s heart was in the right place.

Now, look, don’t get the wrong idea.  In spite of how much time and effort I’ve put into arguing about this, I know that this is a pretty small complaint.  Why, compared to the issues with 1 of the romances of the previous game, Galfrey telling an Azata path Commander that no Persuasion check on Golarion is gonna get these royal gams to open up is completely insignificant.  And hell, it’s not even like the Azata path is really missing all that much here; Galfrey’s romance may be well-intentioned, but it’s really just not compelling.  You want a compelling love story in Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous, go hit up Arueshelae.  Or Daeran.  Sosiel or Wenduag, maybe.  Hell, even Lann’s bland ass is a better option.  So this isn’t a major problem; it’s barely even a minor one, and to spend so much time whining about it in the face of such a grand, satisfying, and thoughtfully wrought work as Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous probably makes me look petty more than it does anything else.

Nonetheless, the facts of Galfrey’s character, the nature of her romantic subplot, and the very theme of the game are all there.  Even if it doesn’t really matter, even if I don’t even really care to do so, the decision to make Galfrey reject the advances of an Azata Commander is the wrong call.  Her character and the progression of her romantic story are, if anything, best suited for a Chaotic Good lover.

















* Admittedly not every layer of the secret ending’s complex requirements is laudable.  Making an unavoidable hinging point the act of finding Hepzamirah’s ghost in the Ineluctable Prison is such an obscure, counter-instinctive task that it’s honestly just kind of a dick move.  Seriously,  “Palm trees...and 8” is more fair than that.


** Well, the only romanceable NPC of any real substance, at least.  A protagonist on the Demon path can score, like, 2 lines of dialogue about getting to be Nocticula’s plaything.  And you can flirt a bit with some individuals like Vellexia and...the Fulsome Queen, for Tricksters who want their greatest and most cruel prank to be against themselves...but Galfrey’s the only non-party member love interest of substance.


*** Assuming you don’t go down an evil route for the game, but since we’re specifically talking within the context of an Azata Mythic Path run, that’s a given here.


**** Granted, it’s possible on the Azata path to lean much harder into the Chaos than the Good (and even to go rogue and start being pretty Evil), but at the very least, Galfrey could be designed to check to see where the protagonist sits, alignment-wise, on her/his Azata path.