Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition
any% current patch
detailed speedrun explanation by lintwurm
If you have any questions or feedback send me a message on discord (Baldur's Gate Speedruns server) or hit me up on twitch.
I apologize for any spelling mistakes as english is not my first language.

I will go over the route used in the current sub-20 minute runs as of april 2020, which works for Scar and steals from Slythe.
No gamebreaking bugs or skips are utilized, only game mechanics such as roundtimer savescumming and pause stealing.

1) Character Creation & Requirements
2) General things about BGEE
-2.1) Softlocks
3) The RNG of the run
4) The Route
-4.1) to Mulahey
-4.2) to Davaeorn
-4.3) to Dukes
-4.4) killing Sarevok

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1) Character Creation & Requirements
The Blade kit of the Bard is used for its innate "Offensive Spin" ability, granting massive movement speed. Only humans and half-elves can become Blades.
15+ Strength is required for an important dialogue option in the bandit camp.
18 Charisma for shopping prices is recommended, as this guide runs quite short on money, but less is possible as abundant money is accessible for a bit of time loss.
18 Dexterity and Constitution for the parts where we have to run through stuff.
Everything else is irrelevant.

The leaderboard rules dictate either normal or core rule difficulty. To my knowledge there's no difference for the purpose of the run. If core rules is used, the "Maximum HP on Level Up" setting is allowed and strongly recommended.

2) General things about BGEE
The game runs on Dungeon&Dragons style round timers. You cast a spell, you'll have to wait ~6 seconds before you can cast again. This applies to attacks, using items, everything. Loading a save resets this timer immediately, allowing us to rapid-fire actions via repeated quicksaving and quickloading.
The game runs on a "tickrate", where NPCs check their script at certain intervals. This means that if you, for example, run into the proximity of an NPC that wants to talk to you there is a variable time before that NPC actually activates, depending on when the timer rolls around. This can be slightly detrimental (Such as Imoen possibly intercepting you on the way to Gorion), but has great positive applications such as stealth stealing and shotgunning Mulahey.
Quicksaving, quickloading, pausing, resting, thieving, use item, quick item and special abilities are commonly and often rapidly used. I recommend setting up keybindings in a way that allows for comfortable reach, opposed to the F1-12 bindings the game uses by default.
Movement in this game is quite tricky. If you give movement commands at too long of a distance or too rapidly the character will pause for a moment as if to calculate the pathing. How this behaves depends on the map you're on and you'll just have to develop a feel on how to avoid this. Short distance commands going in a straight line and avoiding obstacles are generally the best.

-2.1) Softlocks
The game can softlock at four points during the run:
- The initial cutscene with Gorion
- When Tethtoril teleports you into the Candlekeep catacombs
These are cutscene softlocks and straight up freeze the game. You'll have to kill the baldur.exe process through taskmanager. These happen at complete random as far as I know.
- Mulahey's death doesn't spawn the bandit camp
My only conclusion is that this happens when you exit Mulaheys room at the same time the narrator text wants to trigger from time. Waiting for it to trigger, or even better leaving the room before that happens and manually triggering it that way, seems to avoid this.
- The Ducal Palace fight doesn't conclude
The fight can glitch out in various different ways, but from my testing the most common issue (Belt/Liina won't talk to you) relates to the Flaming Fist guard that tries to talk to you after you enter.
If you go too fast into the main hall and both the encounter and the guard trigger at the same time the game can't process the event actually ending. Avoid this by taking a second to mash through his dialogue.

3) The RNG of the run
This route allows for a sub-20 minute timer quite comfortably even with average luck, but to push past that and kill Sarevok in under 19 it becomes quite RNG dependant.
- Waylays during travel before Boots of Speed are acquired are RNG stacked on top of RNG. You generally don't want to see them, sometimes they'll only cost you about 6 seconds, sometimes they instantly kill you.
If you see archers (groups of orcs or skeletons) immediately load.
"dead end" hills that force you to run north are the biggest time loss. The path is the longest and they will either have a brown bear, a swarm of monsters that can bodyblock you, ghouls, or a frostwolf. If you see the frostwolf immediately load. Don't allow ghouls to hit you.
- Damage rolls in combat have massive variance. The Wand of Frost can hit anything between 10 and 35 damage. When the wand is utilized with loading resets it allows for fast kills even with bad RNG, but Drasus and especially the Dukes encounter, where we rely on the damage Belt and Liia dish out, can result in a massive timeloss if the game doesn't want to play along.
- Sometimes you'll just randomly die. That can be a crit from a skeleton archer in High Hedge, a trap in the nashkel mines rolling an 8, or Sarevok getting too excited on his way down the stairs. Crits mean death, but thankfully they rarily happen.
- The stealing sequence on Slythe can take between three seconds to over a minute, depending on both RNG and execution. He's got a ton of health and the opportunity of being done with him in just a few seconds at the cost of RNG outweights the much slower but reliable route to kill him.
- The door to Davaeorn. This thing can take anywhere from a second to a minute before it lets you through. Knowing when the game secretly rolls for detection and save/loading helps deal with this though.

4) The Route
For the purpose of speedrunning there are four fights we need to beat. For the initial goal while learning I recommend aiming towards six minutes for each of them, and three minutes for the last part.
Due to the risk of RNG encounters it is important to always quicksave before resting and traveling. When getting a bad outcome immediately load and try again.
Constant resting is required to refresh Offensive Spin. I recommend resting before traveling rather than after to have Offensive Spin in case of a waylay. Travels where you're unable to rest beforehand (due to NPC interaction or combat) are therefor more dangerous.

-4.1) To Mulahey
Pop spin and run straight to Gorion. Press 1 and mash ESC.
The first section of the run is spent unlocking the map, we need to prepare fast travel for later.
After the cutscene unlock the travel south, hit ESC and talk to Imoen (1). Put all her items on the Blade.
Rest, spin, run along the road to the northeast, avoid Kolssed and talk to Xzar (2,3). Take the potions from Montaron. All healing potions are technically optional, you'll rarily use all of them and sometimes even none at all.
Run east to the edge, pause, go to character record and reform party. Kick everyone out. Don't unpause so your salty partymembers can't talk to you, save and rest. Travel northeast.
Pop spin, go north to Friendly Arm Inn.
Spin, run east along the edge, hold TAB to highlight an item on a rock and pick it up. Exit east to Peldvale.
Spin, exit south. Larswood should be unlocked, but don't go there. Go to High hedge.
Go south and enter the keep, talk to Talanthyr twice and shop.
Sell the wand to have enough gold to identify the ring. Sell the ring and buy:
- Potion of Explosions x 3 (optional as a backup if fights go poorly, pointless if aiming for <18 minute where good RNG is a requirement)
- Potion of Magic Blocking
- Protection from Magic
- Identify
- Shield (optional but recommended)
- Mirror Image (optional but recommended)
- Invisibility x 3
leave to the south. Only one place to go.
Spin, exit to the west. Go to the place east of Seawatcher.
Spin, unlock the exit east but hit ESC, run west until you see a crashed caravan. If Laryssa talks to you mash out of her dialogue, you want to talk to Brage. The answer to his riddle is 4,1. He gives you a sword and teleports you to Nashkel.
Mash out of the ensuing dialogue, leave and ESC out of the cutscene. Berrun will forcefully talk to you. Exit Nashkel to the east towards Nashkel Mines. If you did this properly your spin lasts all the way.
At the mines pop your first Oil of Speed and head northwest to the corner and hold TAB to find the Wand of Frost. Identify the Wand and equip invisibility + shield + mirror image. Cast shield and mirror image either while running or through loading.
Go down towards the mine entrance and talk to Emerson. Then talk to the guard in front of the entrance and go in.
Cast your first invisibility to avoid pesky NPCs and monsters along the way.
In the first room go straight south and take an east turn. https://imgur.com/a/0VXql0V
Second room all the way northeast and then straight south. https://imgur.com/4xT1dui
Third room is massive. First go south east towards the bridge. https://imgur.com/so2rHxa
This is where you want Mirror Image up, just in case. The trap can potentially kill you.
If you get hit, drink a healing potion and equip your Wand and explosive potions while you're at it.
Move southwest and east across the bridge. https://imgur.com/1ljg6gZ
Another trap can hit you at this spot, make sure your health is full. If you get hit again use another healing potion, have to be healthy for what's coming.
Go straight and across the bridge to enter Mulaheys room. Go southeast and stand across the room from him. If you haven't yet, equip Wand and explosive potions.
Use wand on Mulahey and immediately save, load, and wand again before he has an opportunity to aproach you. Go and loot the chest from the first item up to the scrolls. If he's still alive conserve wand charges and instead throw an explosive potion at him on your way out but make sure you don't hit yourself with it.
Go to character record and level up. Archers and possibly slimes will shoot at you on your way out, this is where you want the Shield spell active.
Go north and follow the way east, leave the mines and exit north towards the carnival.

-4.2) to Davaeorn
At the carnival, rest and spin. Run southwest until you reach three tents, enter the middle one, talk to the merchant (2) and buy The One Gift Lost, the first necklace on the list.
Exit south (go more towards the southeast to avoid NPCs and sneak a rest in) and head to Larswood in the far north. This is a long travel and possibly waylay hell.
Rest, spin, head east and engage the Bandits. (2,3) [This is where the 15+ strength is required]
Skip cutscene, answer Tazok with 3,2 and run slightly southwest to get him off the screen quickly so you can rest.
Rest, spin, run east towards Tazoks house where Credus wants to talk to you. Before you get near Credus, rest, spin, save, load, drink potion of absorbtion you looted from Mulaheys chest. Mash out of Credus and enter.
Inside, run west immediately. If Raemon gets to talk to you you'll have to load. Loot the chest: gold, 2 letters, gauntlets.
Exit the house in a way that avoids Raemon, generally running a clockwise circle around the center table.
Exit the map north. Go to the forest under Friendly Arm Inn and immediately exit again. Now head to Cloakwood.
Spin, exit south. Head to second Cloakwood.
Spin, save, load, drink potion of magic blocking. Run west and exit north past the monsters, enter third Cloakwood.
Spin, exit east to fourth Cloakwood.
Spin, run a short distance east and exit south and enter the mines. Be quick or the Hamadryad can instantly kill you with her spell.
Drink your second Oil of Speed. Save, load, cast invisibility. Run south and cross the bridge, go into the horse stable and hide behind the left horse out of line of sight from the bridge guards. Equip The One Gift lost and use it near the eastern edge of the grass patch east of the stable. If done properly you'll hit Drasus. Save before every shot and load if the damage roll is too low. He'll die in three shots if you roll perfectly, loading until you need four shots is reasonable. Don't keep super bad rolls as you'll have to sit through 6 or 7 shots.
Loot his Boots of Haste, equip immediately. These make Offensive Spin obsolete, but stack with Oil of Speed. Now you're running.
Go northeast on the bridge and cast your third invisibility. Keep going and enter the house, inside take the stairs and the following elevator.
Head east and straight south. https://imgur.com/s5latqi
Head to the southwest stairs. https://imgur.com/n4iSxYB
Go straight and wait at the wall for a hidden door to show up. Save before you run through.
Due to detection roll RNG, it's possible for the door not to show up for a very long time as the game will only check for it roughly every six seconds if left alone.
After loading, the check will happen after about two seconds already, so it's possible to progress it more quickly by saving in front of the door, loading, counting to two, loading and repeating this until it shows up.
- Using items inside the mines messes with this detection rate timer and can set it to 6 seconds even when loading, do NOT drink a healing potion until you're past that door.
Once you're in, the traps in front of his room are very likely to instantly kill you.
My advice is to outrun the projectiles by running counter-clockwise through the northwestern tunnel, cutting a sharp corner so they detonate against the wall, and approach Davaeorn from the opposite side instead.
Wand Davaeorn, run around the corner, save, load, repeat. He'll die in two good rolls, three is reasonable if you load super bad rolls, the more wand charges you can conserve the better.
Run southwest, take elevators and leave the map from where you came. You're so fast you shouldn't have to care about the guards outside, but they can possibly block you at the bridge if you used invisibility too late.

-4.3) to Dukes
Go to Peldvale and immediately leave again.
Head towards the farms in the northwest.
Exit North.
Go to the bridge, run across and pay the guard (5).
Talk to Scar (2,1).
Go west and enter Baldur's Gate.
Go west past the people and head southwest towards the magic shop.
Talk to the wizard. Identify and sell the magic items in your inventory. Buy the folllowing items:
- Oil of Speed x 3
- Potion of Invisibility x3
- Potion of Master Thievery x3
- Clairvoyance
- Minor Globe of Invulnerability (optional, redundant if you're fast enough at the Sarevok fight)
leave, pop Oil of Speed, exit to the west. Head to the center district.
Exit south immediately. Go to southern district.
Run southwest quickly so the guy can't talk to you, head towards the west exit and enter the large mansion on the side of the street. Leave immediately. Exit west, enter southwestern district.
Go southwest down the street and head northwest. Talk to Scar in front of the Barracks (2), he will teleport you to Duke Eltan.
In the following sequence answer Scar (2,2,1) and talk to Eltan (3), he'll teleport you to Candlekeep.
Pop Oil of Speed, talk to the guard (2) and run inside Candlekeep, the entrance where you first talked to Gorion.
Head upstairs and go northeast, mash through Koveras' short dialogue, go back and keep going upstairs all the way. Talk to the sole NPC (2) and mash through the following cutscenes and dialogues.
Loot the two shelves for Shadow Door and Globe of Minor Invulnerability.
Pop invisibility and make a run for it. Run down the hallway and exit east.
Head northwest past the group of mages, make a left turn and exit northwest to the caves.
At the caves, go south along the water (west path is shorter), cross the bridge, run past the basilisks and exit to the southwest.
Head east and exit Candlekeep back to Baldur's Gate east district.
Pop your third oil of speed and run north towards the sewer grate. Pop your potion of invisibility and head down and west into the 10 o'clock tunnel into the undercellar.
Run a short distance into the tunnel, pop potion of master thievery and save load. Repeat until you used all your thievery potions and save.
Keep going and stand next to Slythe, save and pause.
During the pause, queue up thieving (F5) on him and try to unpause for a single frame and re-pause, and repeat. If done too slow he will turn hostile and you have to load.
You can steal 4 possible items from Slythe:
- crossbow
- potion of master thievery
- invitation to ducal palace
- sarevoks orders
You need both the invitation and the orders to progress. After 2 successes check your inventory and keep going if necessary.
When you have both letters run southeast, try to avoid the bouncer and go upstairs. Try to avoid the NPCs upstairs that want to approach you, especially the orc. Exit the map west and head towards the south district.
Exit north and go to north district.
Go east and talk to the guard (2) to let you into Duncal Palace.
Mash 1 on the flaming fist guard talking to you.
Head into the main hall and mash through the massive dialogue.
Run southeast and hide behind the stairs, save after all the guards have run offscreen.
Use your amulet around the inner, golden edge of the carpet. You want to hit as high up as possible (to hit as many things as possible) without hitting Belt. Check your combat text and load immediately if you hit Belt.
Repeat and try to save-load after every shot. Use your remaining explosive potions if you run out of amulet charges.
If you stop hitting a lot of things with the explosions run up and clear out the remaining enemies. Drag enemies that attack you next to Belt so he can kill them more quickly. You can utilize saving and loading in one of the side rooms if you need to reset your wand timer to kill things quicker, but try not to interrupt Liia during a Magic Missile cast.
The goal is to kill all of the Doppelgangers; even if the Flaming Fist guards become aggressive to you, essentially they don't matter so just kite them around when finishing off the fight.
When everything is done talk to either Belt or Liia (1) and then kite around Sarevok for a while. After he's done talk to Belt or Liia again (2) and get teleported away.
Beware! Any aggressive Flaming Fists can still hit and kill you while locked into the teleporter cutscene, make sure you're not low health.

-4.4) kill Sarevok
Mash out of dialogue and equip Shadow Door, Clairvoyance and Minor globe.
Cast Shadow Door, save load (strongly recommended as duration of Shadow Door is a concern), cast Minor globe and head downstairs. Cast Clairvoyance. Equip Protection from Magic and potion of invisibility.
Run towards the exit in the northwest. A single movement command is enough, this is why we used Clairvoyance as the maze would be hell to navigate with limited line of sight.
Once outside, run far west and enter the church.
At the Sarevok fight, you have two ways to go about it, safe or fast.
- Safe, with a second scroll of minor globe:
Cast Protection from Magic, save load cast minor globe. Run up to Sarevok and mash out of his dialogue.
Run straight down on top of the platform and pop your last potion of Invisibility when he's on top of the platform.
You're not in too big of a hurry to go invisible because your double bubbles will protect you from the spells his two allies throw at you, so you're free to position Sarevok however you want before going invisible.
Don't give him too many chances at critting you though.
- Fast, with only protection from magic:
After the dialogue you need to run to the platform and pop invisibility immediately before his allies get a chance to even target you with their spells, otherwise you run the risk of getting charmed or dispelled.
If you don't move after going invisible, Sarevok will run at you and get stuck, wait a second or two for his position to "lock in". Position yourself properly ahead of time somewhere on the edge of the platform so he's not in the way of trap triggers.
If you move immediately after going invisible, Sarevok will re-calculate his pathing and he might run off somewhere completely else where he's out of range of the traps.

Whichever way you choose to do this fight, run between the eyes and the mouth of the Symbol of Bhaal.
If your rhytm is good you will get double activations for every repetition, Sarevok should be dead in less than ten seconds if done perfectly. Hit timer the moment you lose control of your character.