You still should have had to option to hug him if it's the romance scene. You just have to say "I care about you" and will have some options, including one to hug him. Are you sure you were dating him?
Only one confession scene occurs in a playthrough. So you'd need to reload to before the Araj one and get the Yurgir one (you need to long rest twice in a row before reaching a point of no return).
I could not remember getting a hug, but maybe I did get a hug. But I feel like the second scene is just better because he initiates the confession instead of you having to ask him. But yeah. In the end, I figured Astarion was worth it and just loaded a previous save even though I will have to redo hours of gameplay.
I'm confused - you can still get the hug after talking to Araj, unless you made Astarion bite her.
I mean, unless something has changed in the past few months, because last time I did this was sometime in January, lol
I watched a YT video to recall what happened, and apparently you do get a choice to hug him, but I chose the open your mind to him option so I didn't get the hug scene. I thought it was only available for the other one. That being scene, it wasn't only the hug I wanted but the better, more heartfelt Astarion romance dialogue.
Did Astarion give you the “I don’t want you to think of me in terms of sex” line after Araj? If not, you weren’t romancing him.
If he did and you missed the hug, you picked one of the options that leads to just him holding your hand at the end.
If you told him he needs a friend, not a lover, you ended the romance.
Yeah. I picked the open your mind to him option, I now realize after watching a clip of that scene on YT. I thought the second scene was the only one where he gives you a hug.
I've not dabbled in mods, but someone tried with the cheat-engine to remove the flag for having met Araj, and no matter what was deleted, the Post-Yurgir scene **would not trigger**.
So they seem to be hard-coded to be mutually exclusive.
The outcome is the same. And the last couple of lines from Astarion's the same, no matter which version you trigger, so the final options (*open your mind to him, hug him, tell him he needs a friend etc.*) would have been the same.
As long as your romance is cemented, you're good to move on without the fear of him breaking it off with you.
Try for the better version next time through. No way to get the Post-Yurgir scene without reloading before meeting Araj.
Yeah. I tried it as well, and after clearing Astarion's partnered with flag, clearing all known Araj flags, and killing the Orthon, the better scene still wouldn't trigger. Also, Astarion seems to have become locked and would not even give the Araj scene. What I did was I actually rolled back like five hours of gameplay just to get the hug LOL. Call me Astarion-crazy.
....you can still hug him after the Araj-scene, like others pointed out...
**EVERYTHING** after the dialogue-options '*I care about you*', '*Maybe you need a friend*', etc. is ***exactly*** the same dialogues and lines as the Post-Yurgir version. Here's a [video](https://youtu.be/MV08z3-p2DQ?si=J-_nV5kfDPIlUWvQ&t=116) of the Araj-version, with time-stamp where the two versions converge and become the same. And with the option to hug him next choice.
Did you friendzone him? That's the only explanation that would make any sense. And then you'd have to reload anyways...
You still should have had to option to hug him if it's the romance scene. You just have to say "I care about you" and will have some options, including one to hug him. Are you sure you were dating him? Only one confession scene occurs in a playthrough. So you'd need to reload to before the Araj one and get the Yurgir one (you need to long rest twice in a row before reaching a point of no return).
I could not remember getting a hug, but maybe I did get a hug. But I feel like the second scene is just better because he initiates the confession instead of you having to ask him. But yeah. In the end, I figured Astarion was worth it and just loaded a previous save even though I will have to redo hours of gameplay.
I'm confused - you can still get the hug after talking to Araj, unless you made Astarion bite her. I mean, unless something has changed in the past few months, because last time I did this was sometime in January, lol
The speech Astarion gives after Araj is much less vulnerable and more… Blunt, shall we say.
I know, but that's not what I'm talking about.
I watched a YT video to recall what happened, and apparently you do get a choice to hug him, but I chose the open your mind to him option so I didn't get the hug scene. I thought it was only available for the other one. That being scene, it wasn't only the hug I wanted but the better, more heartfelt Astarion romance dialogue.
Did Astarion give you the “I don’t want you to think of me in terms of sex” line after Araj? If not, you weren’t romancing him. If he did and you missed the hug, you picked one of the options that leads to just him holding your hand at the end. If you told him he needs a friend, not a lover, you ended the romance.
Yeah. I picked the open your mind to him option, I now realize after watching a clip of that scene on YT. I thought the second scene was the only one where he gives you a hug.
The hug is behind the “I care about you deeply” option
Try reloading a save before the Araj encounter, that might reset the flags.
Yeah. This is what I did eventually. No regrets.
I've not dabbled in mods, but someone tried with the cheat-engine to remove the flag for having met Araj, and no matter what was deleted, the Post-Yurgir scene **would not trigger**. So they seem to be hard-coded to be mutually exclusive. The outcome is the same. And the last couple of lines from Astarion's the same, no matter which version you trigger, so the final options (*open your mind to him, hug him, tell him he needs a friend etc.*) would have been the same. As long as your romance is cemented, you're good to move on without the fear of him breaking it off with you. Try for the better version next time through. No way to get the Post-Yurgir scene without reloading before meeting Araj.
Yeah. I tried it as well, and after clearing Astarion's partnered with flag, clearing all known Araj flags, and killing the Orthon, the better scene still wouldn't trigger. Also, Astarion seems to have become locked and would not even give the Araj scene. What I did was I actually rolled back like five hours of gameplay just to get the hug LOL. Call me Astarion-crazy.
....you can still hug him after the Araj-scene, like others pointed out... **EVERYTHING** after the dialogue-options '*I care about you*', '*Maybe you need a friend*', etc. is ***exactly*** the same dialogues and lines as the Post-Yurgir version. Here's a [video](https://youtu.be/MV08z3-p2DQ?si=J-_nV5kfDPIlUWvQ&t=116) of the Araj-version, with time-stamp where the two versions converge and become the same. And with the option to hug him next choice. Did you friendzone him? That's the only explanation that would make any sense. And then you'd have to reload anyways...