They totally are, but I’m personally glad they changed it back. A singularly non-aesthetic little creature demanding praise and admiration for its supposedly fabulous looks? And Astarion approves if you do?

Everything about it was so fitting that I never would have guessed it wasn’t intentional. There would be no real reason for him to especially like cats, and definitely none for him to enjoy watching you kowtow to a person, let alone a house pet. He hates that shit.

But he does like when you side with monsters and other things that people generally find dangerous or gross, and changing it to a regular persian actually makes the interaction make less sense. To say nothing of how amusing that level of misplaced pride from a talking ballsack was.