Karlach:
>fist fucks you in the ass in her second sex scene
>have to go to the hells with her if you wish to save her
It's a hard pass. Only an okay romance option if you're playing as Gale. Even then you have to deal with the pegging

Shadowheart:
>starts off worse than Lae'zel with her cunt, hypocritical attitude (yet Lae'zel got the most flak when the game released for some stupid reason)
>softens up a lot more, just like Lae'zel, inordinately more if you turn her away from Shar
>her gameplay sucks ass though, and all of her unique armor/weapon options she can acquire in Act 2 and 3 are seemingly at odds with both her class and innate play style (Spears are STR-based, yet Larian REALLY wants you to put medium armor on her whilst keeping her stealth-focused). It's fucking retarded. Even if you respec her into Death Cleric, she still comes out looking like boudoir vomited on her in terms of aesthetics if you so much as think about min/maxing her.
>She really is the cuck option. If you push her towards Shar, she cucks you with a deity. If you push her towards Selune but kill her parents, she kind of cucks you out of a happy relationship, because she's always bitching about her dead parents. But even if you keep her parents alive, she cucks you out of marriage regardless, (that's reserved for Wyll Origin players, because of course it is). Also, she is very open to an open relationship in general.
3/5 Could have been so much better, but too many cooks in her kitchen.

Minthara:
>Starts off strong in Act 1, but it's like Larian completely forgot about continuity and reset her character in Act 2 a la The Matrix Revelations and she forgets everything that happened, and it's stupid as shit.
>has the best sex scene in the game
>most loyal, but also the most evil, which may or may not be a good thing for you
>her class doesn't make a damn whit of sense considering her evil nature. And no, I don't give a shit about whatever changes WotC has made to Paladin either

>>719838365
Unfortunately, thanks to either cuts, budget/time constraints, or just straight wokeism, she suffers the most from that obnoxious trope of
>Romance reaches climax, so now character hard resets to being boring as shit
And even if that wasn't the case, she is also inconsistently/poorly written. Not "Karlach" poorly written, but still sort of...off.
>Has hot, sweaty, passionate sex with you in Act 1
>Cure her of Absolute AIDS in Act 2
>Suddenly her personality shifts, and shes acts like you two never fucked (which I guess sort of makes sense with the lore, but is still a shitty way of progressing a character arc, as it makes everything really bipolar and boring in how she interacts with Dyrge)
>Act 3 arrives, and she barely has ZERO content.
Lae'zel has the shit with Githyanki attacking her in the Emperor's hideout and Orpheus, Shadowheart has the secret Shar temple and Viconia, Jaheira and Minsc have all of that shit going on with each other, Astarion has Cazador and an entire mansion and underground lair to explore, Gale has Mystra, Wyll has the underwater prison and his daddy issues, with Karlach at least having her burning desire to kill Gortash and a potential second date to fill in the boring completionist shit.
The most Minthara has is some dialogue mentioning her trepidation with the inexorable confrontation of Orin and some fun but otherwise throwaway lines concerning Baldur's Gate itself. She may as well be window dressing. The crux of Minthara's problems as a character is that she is the most interesting in Act 1, but becomes boring as shit as soon as she is free from the Absolute's brainwashing. Which is just asinine.

I think more games should have chainsmoking drow wives