In October 2024 a science fiction author, Matthew Kelsey Martineau, launched a lawsuit against Bungie focused on a Destiny 2 enemy faction: Martineau alleged that the game's Red Legion faction, the Red War storyline, and various other narrative beats were based on his stories from 2013-14, which had been published on a Wordpress blog.

Perhaps the most interesting thing about it, though, was that Bungie had since "vaulted" all of the Red Legion content in question, which is its term for removing stuff from the game. So after an attempt to have the case dismissed fell flat, Bungie's lawyers had to rely on submitting old fan videos from YouTube and Wiki links to make its case.

For his part, Martineau responded by expanding his claims, pulling in the Curse of Osiris expansion and recently trying to add the Destiny Grimoire Anthology books, arguing these contained even more ideas lifted from his original work.

Both sides have now agreed to settle the case, with a new court filing (obtained by The Game Post) citing a settlement conference held in front of Magistrate Judge North on November 12, 2025. The filing reads:

"A settlement conference was conducted on this date before the undersigned Magistrate Judge. Negotiations were successful and resulted in the settlement of all claims. The Court thanks counsel and the parties for their efforts in bringing this matter to an amicable resolution."

This was shortly followed by another filing, with Judge Susie Morgan ordering that "this action be and is hereby dismissed as to all parties" in the matter, with no costs awarded. There is a 60-day window for the settlement to be implemented, during which either side can reopen the case if things fall apart. The full legalese:

"The court having been advised that all parties have firmly agreed upon a compromise in this matter; it is ordered that this action be and is hereby dismissed as to all parties, without costs and without prejudice to the right, upon good cause shown, within sixty days, to reopen the action if the settlement is not consummated. In addition, the court specifically retains jurisdiction to enforce the settlement agreement if settlement is not consummated within sixty days."

This should be the end of the matter, though with no details of the settlement, no admissions of wrongdoing by either side, and no costs awarded… it is an unsatisfying one for outside observers. It seems absurd that Bungie's writers would have ripped off a random Wordpress blog for Destiny 2's blowout launch campaign. But it's not the first plagiarism scandal the studio has faced and Bungie, god love it, has enough problems without fire-fighting on these kinds of fronts. Not least digging Destiny 2 out of the doldrums after the disaster that has been the Edge of Fate expansion.

The idea of "canonicity" in RPGs is an odd one, given the whole point of both videogame and tabletop RPGs is that the players decide what the main characters do. But sequels, spin-offs, and sourcebooks have a habit of choosing particular outcomes as the "real" ones—unless it's the Elder Scrolls, where every ending of Morrowind happened at once.

Baldur's Gate 3 had to deal with characters from Baldur's Gate 2 having canonical events happen to them between games, like Minsc and Boo being turned to stone or Viconia and Saarevok backsliding into evil, and now the cast of Baldur's Gate 3 are in the same boat. The latest Forgotten Realms supplements, Adventures in Faerûn and Heroes of Faerûn, move the timeline on from 1492—when BG3 happens—to 1501, and hint at the fates of its cast.

Quotes from Karlach crop up throughout Adventures in Faerûn and she appears more than once in the art for both books alongside Astarion, Shadowheart, and Minsc. And in none of those illustrations is she a mind flayer or a pile of ash—two of the potential outcomes for her in Baldur's Gate 3.

The best ending for Karlach is that she returns to Avernus with the Infernal Engine still burning away inside her chest, which a lot of players weren't happy about, and in the epilogue Larian added post-launch she mentions finding blueprints for something that could prevent the timebomb in her chest from blowing up. Seeing her run around the streets of Baldur's Gate, fight a remorhaz with Astarion and Shadowheart, and generally be a heroic adventurer who doesn't have a gaping hole in her torso, makes it plain that Karlach's canonical ending is the good one.

Funnily enough, the same pictures depict Shadowheart with dark hair and bangs, which isn't how she looks in her best outcome in BG3, where she dyes her hair white and parts her hair in a way that makes it look like she didn't just go through a messy breakup. But hair color isn't proof that canonically she never gave up on worshipping Shar, and it's entirely possible she just changed her mind about being a silver fox.

Although if you helped Shadowheart achieve her redemption arc it's entirely possible that in act three you told Dame Aylin about the jerk wizard Lorroakan who wants to steal her immortality, and she wrecked the dude as he so richly deserves. According to Adventures in Faerûn that didn't happen, and Lorroakan is still alive and holed up in Ramazith's Tower. However, it's mentioned that he was "Humbled by a recent failed bid to achieve immortality through undisclosed means," so at least he didn't succeed. Presumably the canonical PCs lied to both him and Dame Aylin, preventing the conflict from ever happening.

Astarion gets his own supplement in a digital add-on called Astarion's Book of Hungers, which includes rules for playing a half-vampire dhampir as well as a string of adventure outlines where you get to hang out with everyone's favorite vampire spawn, although these are noted as being set before the events of the videogame. No canon conflict there.

It's not all videogame characters in these books, of course. The heroes of the D&D cartoon make another appearance, just like they did in the movie Honor Among Thieves, looking slightly older and perhaps a bit more competent. Elminster rates a mention too, though he's said to have been missing for a few years, which conveniently explains why he's not around to solve whatever problem your own players are involved in.