Baldur’s Gate 3 offers players a wide variety of methods of customizing their character, from its thorough character creation tool to its diverse class and subclass systems. There also exist a variety of character modifications that can be performed via completion of certain in-game tasks and quests which can temporarily or permanently affect your character.
One such customization is available through completion of a side quest involving a comical and unfortunate storyteller named Volo. He is one of a handful of NPCs the player will encounter who offers their aid in removing the parasite from their head. However, perhaps trusting such a task to a man clearly fond of exaggeration and weaving tales may not be the best decision. Here’s everything you players need to know about Volo and his Ersatz Eye effect in Baldur’s Gate 3.
Where to Find Volo in Baldur's Gate 3
The player can first encounter the bard Volo at the Druid Grove, where he can be found interrogating a bear and taking notes about recent goblin activity in the area. When the player speaks with him, he mentions the goblins and their obsession with the Absolute. He finds this behavior strange and decides to investigate the goblin camp for himself to learn more for his story.
The player does not need to have first met Volo in the Druid Grove to start his quest. They will be able to speak with Volo in the Goblin Camp instead upon their arrival and will still be able to rescue the bard from the goblins.
How to Start and Complete the Quest “Rescue Volo”
The next time the player can find Volo is upon reaching the Goblin Camp in BG3, which is located west of the Blighted Village. Here the player can speak with Volo, who is being held captive in the middle of the courtyard and being forced to entertain the goblins with some questionable poetry. Volo implores the player to rescue them from the goblins as they drag him away, which starts the quest “Rescue Volo.”
The player should then proceed north and enter the Shattered Sanctum. The player will have a brief conversation with a goblin named Warrior Trinzas. If the party is being escorted by the goblin Sazza, they'll be able to pass after a short cutscene between the two goblins. Otherwise, the player will need to persuade Trinzas to let them pass. As usual, it is possible to choose violence instead and the player will be faced with a challenging fight versus Trinzas and her guards.
Once the player has either persuaded or defeated Trinzas, they can proceed into the Sanctum where they'll find True Soul Gut lecturing to followers. The party should head up the stairs located immediately to the right upon entering the room (not the staircase past Gut), where they'll find goblin torture chambers. Upstairs, they’ll find Volo in the third chamber on the right, trapped in a cage being guarded by another goblin, Gribbo.
The player can either persuade Gribbo to hand over the key to Volo’s cage, or they can instead choose to fight and kill Gribbo and loot the key from her body. Either way, once the player has obtained the Cage Key they can free Volo from his wooden confines. The player should speak with him and tell him to come to their camp, where they can speak with him regarding their resident mind flayer parasite.
Volo may not appear at the player’s camp right away, so it may be necessary to take multiple Long Rests before he shows up.
Speak With Volo at The Party’s Camp
At their camp, the player can speak with Volo, who will take up residency in the camp and offer to investigate their little mind flayer parasite problem. He will first need to do some research, requiring the player will to take another Long Rest before they can proceed.
Once Volo has finished his research, the player can speak with him and will be given the option to allow Volo to attempt to remove the parasite. This is an entirely optional and extremely important decision that will permanently alter the appearance of the character the player chooses to undertake this surgery.
Should You Let Volo Operate?
The player is given the choice to allow Volo to perform surgery to remove the parasite from their head by way of their right eye. His approach is both questionable and violent, as his procedure involves stabbing multiple picks directly into the player’s eye. Understandably, this will result in significant damage and the removal of said eye.
Unsurprisingly, the action of Volo piercing the player's eye with his pick is a bit unpleasant features audio that may disturb some players. Therefore, some players may wish to avoid the event's cutscene.
The player has opportunities to change their mind during the surgery and have Volo back off, and the player will be left with a Bleeding Eye debuff that will quickly heal. The player can speak with Volo again, and he will offer to perform the surgery. Volo will operate on any member of the player’s party, but will perform the surgery only once. The player will just need to speak with him with the party member of their choosing.
Volo’s Ersatz Eye: Pros and Cons
Expectedly, Volo will fail in his efforts to remove the parasite from the player’s eye, as he is a bard, not a doctor. However, his failure will leave the affected player with an empty eye socket he rectifies by handing over Volo’s Ersatz Eye.
This new-and-improved eye will completely replace the player’s right eye, permanently changing its appearance. This appearance alteration cannot be toggled like hiding a character's helm, so the player should consider this if they are concerned with keeping their character looking exactly as they originally choose.
Volo’s Ersatz Eye grants the player a fairly powerful passive effect: the ability to see invisible creatures within a nine-meter range, with no downside besides the change in appearance of the player’s eye. The effect is the same offered by the Level 2 Divination spell See Invisibility, only it’s permanently active at no cost to the affected player. Enemies will still make a saving throw to determine whether they were seen, but it is overall a very helpful passive buff that the player may find worth the aesthetic sacrifice.
It's worth noting that the same character cannot have both Volo’s Ersatz Eye and the Hag’s Eye from Auntie Ethel. This shouldn’t be a huge issue, as the Hag’s Eye effect is not worth its disadvantages, it's just something to consider if the character has already given her their eye.
Also, it is possible to receive Volo’s Ersatz Eye by killing Volo in the Camp, but the player absolutely should not do this. Regardless of whether the player chooses to partake in his surgery, Volo will stick around in the Camp and offer Merchant services, which is a very valuable convenience. Therefore, it’s best to simply let the bard stick around.
Baldur's Gate 3 is available now for PC. A PS5 version is set to release on September 6, 2023, and a version for Xbox Series X/S is currently in development.
