After completing the tutorial quest in Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 and selecting your clan, one of your first tasks will be to introduce yourself to Lou Graham. The former Duke of Seattle, Lou, is a occasional relative ruler who has voluntarily left his position, handing control of the city to his child.
Now living in seclusion in his penthouse suite at the Glacier Hotel, Lou nevertheless remains an extremely influential figure in Seattle’s kin politics, and someone Nomad would do well to impress. Lou’s chat may be enough to lead her to introduce the novel Prince of Seattle, Ryong, which will certainly make Phyre’s life a little easier.
This is one of the first major conversations in the game, and you may be wondering how significant your choices are – not to mention how badly you can screw things up if you choose the wrong dialogue options. To ease your worries and facilitate you, we have outlined it below every dialogue choice and consequence in the conversation with Lou during the Chains of Lead and Gold quest in VTMB2.
Prince Lou’s dialogue choices in VTMB2
Below are all the main branches and optional dialogue options when talking to Lou during In Chains of Lead and Gold. Each of Lou’s statements that you can respond to is bolded, along with the options and outcomes for choosing each one.
“Well? Or would you rather wash yourself first? You stink, my dear.”
It’s best to start with what you’re going to continue and show Lou respect. She will be satisfied with any of the following Nomad dialogue options:
- “I am new to your place and time.”
- “I am known as Nomad.”
You can also have fun with a cheeky response “If washing is an option…” – this will get a snarky response from Lou, but won’t actually change her opinion of you at all, and you’ll then be asked to try again and choose one of the other three.
Just don’t choose “Don’t insult me”unless you are determined to play Nomad as an antisocial jerk who won’t make any basic alliances in this game.
“What an honor.”
Again, common sense tells us: the best choice is choice “The pleasure was all mine”although Lou will be elated too “You flatter me”. Both options work well, so unless you want to play Nomad as a total fool, choosing the latter option is an acceptable amount of harmless opposition to Lou’s self-aggrandizement.
On the other hand, – Are you always so moody? Or “I wish I could say the same.” clearly you won’t win any points with Lou.
“You’re an interesting person, after all. And this is the most interesting time.”
This third and final dialogue choice opens up a whole tree of options if you choose correctly, so it’s worth tackling it step by step.
To start with, you have three options:
- “Interesting times?”
- – I would meet your prince.
- “I’m ‘interesting’? How disrespectful.”
Calling Lou disrespectful is obviously not an art, and demanding a meeting with Prince Ryong without further preamble is less obnoxious, but still not entirely diplomatic. Instead, select “Interesting times?” if you want to start working on getting Lou on the side – at least as much as she gets.
This selection unlocks two follow-up questions: – What happened to Campbell? AND – You mentioned the killing spree?
- Asking about Campbell unlocks two more questions: “Who killed Campbell?” AND “Tell me about Ryong”.
- Asking about the killing spree unlocks another question: – Did mortals notice the murders?
- Asking any question unlocks the option to end the conversation early “I need to see the prince“
Just don’t choose the third option! Instead, exhaust the questions about Campbell and the killing spree to unlock a novel, more polite way to end this conversation: – Will you introduce me to your child? This is obviously the best choice, as it will grant you Lou’s formal blessing to introduce herself to Ryong and order her to assign more bodyguards to protect Lou.
Follow-up questions
If Lou likes you at this point, before you leave, you’ll have the opportunity to ask her some general follow-up questions that may fill in some of the gaps in your Code.
You can ask everything or refrain from broaching risky topics, though as you’ll see, exhausting every dialogue option will pay off, even if your relationship with Lou takes a few minor bumps along the way.
- “What is the political landscape like?”: Exploring this branch will unlock an optional follow-up question, – Were you the one who branded me then? Asking this will slightly disappoint Lou. Not surprisingly, she denies being responsible for Nomad’s branded hand, and although she is probably telling the truth, this information is not entirely reliable.
- “Tell me about yourself”: Asking this will please Lou and unlock an optional follow-up question “Why aren’t you a prince anymore?” Asking this will annoy Lou, but it will unlock another option: “You had a sister”which irritates Lou. However, by following this branch you gain some valuable information.
- “Which Clans Call Seattle Home?”: By asking this question you will receive useful information about the Camarilla, Thinblood and Anarch factions in Seattle. You’ll learn that Ventrue, Toreador, Nosferatu, and Brujah are the dominant clans in the city; that the Malkavians are in a challenging situation due to Lou’s dislike of them; and that Tremere are such a occasional sight that there is no order in the city.
- Once you have exhausted one line of questions, you will unlock one more question: “What can you tell me about Seattle itself?” It doesn’t add much, but Lou will give you a surprisingly truthful guide to the city, along with the hint that she has cleared out the werewolf population from the surrounding forests.
At any point in this conversation, you can decide what to say “I’ll leave” to end it. However, if you exhaust every dialogue, you will unlock the more polite one “Thank you for your leniency” which pleases Lou, essentially offsetting the negative approval you’ve accumulated by getting there.
Want to dive deeper into what BL2 has to offer? Be sure to check out our guide to the best skills in Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines 2.
