How to speak to the dead in Baldur's Gate 3

Baldur's Gate 3 Speak with Dead - An entombed scribe

(Image credit: Larian)

Acquiring the ability to speak to the dead in Baldur's Gate 3 isn't exactly a massive priority, but, if like me, you struggle to resist your Necromantic tendencies, it's a fun one to have. There may not be a full Necromancer subclass in the game yet, but there is a school of Necromancy-related magics, including the ability to Animate Dead, and yes, even have a nice little chinwag.

Bards, Clerics, and Wizards can learn to do this, but if you aren't running those, you'll need to find an alternate method. Here, I'll explain how to get the Amulet of Lost Voices early on, which lets you speak to the dead, and how that whole process actually works.

Baldur's Gate 3 Amulet of Lost Voices location

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Baldur's Gate 3 Speak with Dead - Amulet of Lost Voices — You can find the Amulet of Lost Voices in the same room as Wither's sarcophagus(Image credit: Larian)

You can find the Amulet of Lost Voices in the Overgrown Ruins near the Ravaged Beach. This is close to where you start when the Mindflayer ship crashes. The easiest way to get here is to head east along the road from the Roadside Cliffs waypoint until you find the entrance. The ruins are pretty treacherous, filled with bandits, traps, and undead cultists.

If you want to skip over all that noise and have Thieves' Tools, you can keep heading east past the Chapel Entrance, down the vines, and unlock the hatch that leads straight down into the Dank Crypt. To do this you'll have to pass a level 20 check, so I'd recommend using Astarion and what buffs you can. If not, you'll have to fight your way through. The easiest way to do this is to shoot the hanging rock in the Chapel entrance and jump down through the hole in the floor it creates. You'll find a tonne of bandits inside, but you can just shoot the explosive barrel through the door to kill them all. After using the switch in the library, you can get through into the crypt itself.

In the north of the Dank Crypt, you'll find a room hidden behind a big statue with a sarcophagus containing Withers, a lich of sorts who can revive companions. Opening the door to his room will wake a bunch of Entombed Acolytes and Warriors you'll have to fight. However, once you've dealt with them, you can loot the chest in Wither's room for the Amulet of Lost Voices. Equip this to your character of choice and you're ready for a chat.

How to use Speak with Dead

Baldur's Gate 3 character speaking with dead — Simply cast Speak with Dead on a corpse you want to talk to. (Image credit: Larian)

Before you use the ability, it's worth noting that there are a few caveats:

You can only speak to one dead person per day and ask five questions when you do. Take a Long Rest to refresh your ability.
A corpse can be too badly damaged. If you blow someone up with an oil barrel—just as a totally theoretical example—their body will be too burned to revive.
Most corpses are plain old rude and won't talk to you.

Unlike Speak with Animals, which you can use on all sorts of furry friends, the Speak with Dead ability is more useful in particular situations and quests. Most bodies simply won't respond to you when you try using the spell, and it'll also consume your daily charge even when they don't speak to you.

Sean's first PC games were Full Throttle and Total Annihilation and his taste has stayed much the same since. When not scouring games for secrets or bashing his head against puzzles, you'll find him revisiting old Total War campaigns, agonizing over his Destiny 2 fit, or still trying to finish the Horus Heresy. Sean has also written for EDGE, Eurogamer, PCGamesN, Wireframe, EGMNOW, and Inverse.