Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Backgrounds Influencing Conversations

Yup I would be good with that. Would give a little more personality to my character. Also, I often do read my lines out loud lol.

Im really not sure i follow ...

You get to certain dialogue options ... pick one ... nothing happened ... you are in the same dialogue option ...

I dont understand meaning of this, sory. :-/

What I mean is the NPC's response wouldn't change based on your background-specific dialogue. For example, when Gale asks if you want to experience the weave, if you're a Sage you could say something like "I've studied the weave in books, but would like to experience it firsthand." Gale's response would still be "Then follow my lead." It doesn't change his response, just the way you interact with him. I believe this already happens with certain class-specific dialogue options.

Not exactly ...
When you get class-specific, or race-specific, or deity-specific, or origin-specific (Baldurian, Underdark, Planar ... or i dunno how Githyanki have it named if not planar) options ... you usualy bypass some diceroll and get straight to the positive result (as if the roll would be succesfull).

I’m pretty sure in that weave scene, if you’re a cleric you can say something like “Mystra usually talks to me through prayer but I don’t mind trying” and Gale replies with his regular “Then follow my lead.” Sometimes it does affect their response or bypasses something but not always and it certainly doesn’t HAVE to in the case of backgrounds. It seems like you’d prefer fewer dialogue options, which is fine. I’d prefer a bigger variety personally.

I dont see any contradiction here.

I would say i preffer meaningfull dialogue options ...
You know, when dialogue option says "yes i do" ... and my character dont talk (aka is not voiced) ... nothing, litteraly nothing in the universe can stop me from using the exact same option with every single character i create ... and yet let every single one of them will actualy say something else. :P

Honestly that is the reason why i was kinda sad when i find out that Larian step out from their original dialogue, since they were written in third person and quite vaguely ...
In the same situation you would get something like [CLERIC] "You accepted Gale offer ... this might be interesting experience."
And it would be up to you to fill the exact words your character would be using. I liked that.

While it would be cool to have reactivity for backgrounds, it just really isn't feasible with the sheer number of backgrounds available (13). They also already have reactivity for Race, Class, Origin characters, Subclass, and Deity Selection; adding in backgrounds would just be a little too much work. Like even BG3's competitors such as the owlcat pathfinder games don't have background reactivity because of how many possible permutations you would need.

IIRC though, there actually is a little bit of "background" reactivity as all custom characters are supposed to be from the city of Baldur's Gate and so they have the "Balduran" tag which lets them know things about the city. Other characters like Gale (who is from Waterdeep) don't have this tag. I think this and the unique background inspiration point quests are probably the most we're going to get in this area.

You are most likely in the fairly small minority who liked it. From what I can remember, the reaction to this was overwhelmingly negative.

This is somewhat of an older thread... But I suppose relevancy can be argued either way.

Personally, having backgrounds have an impact on the game would be neat. With only a couple of issues:

1) My own personal qualm is the way that DnD backgrounds tie in to skill proficiencies (As well as some other small boons like ability to use certain items, extra languages etc) which can create a divide between wanting to pick a background for the bonuses it gives and wanting to pick a background because that's what you want your character to be. In BG3 for me this is often the case where I pick Charlatan because Slight of Hand + Deception proficiencies are the most universally beneficial (Otherwise, Folk Hero is the easiest to farm inspirations because basically doing any quest, so long as it's not outright evil, essentially gives an inspiration)

2) Permutations are a limiting factor. This is most notable in DnD related games as there are a lot of backgrounds to choose from (Even BG3's 12 backgrounds is only a fraction of what exists in DnD). That said, BG3 does make a point of having the entire Inspiration system set up to try and promote the feeling of a background, which could have instead been dialogue options rather than shiny pop ups and the inspiration system itself tied purely to "Acts of heroism" (I.e. Quest completions and/or notable enemy kills)

So, while BG3 is not going to be getting any additional development into backgrounds. It can be a consideration for future games. Just keep permutations to an acceptable level for the work it entails and make the background more a roleplay thing rather than a character sheet bonus (In fact, actively avoiding the character sheet bonuses would more easily let you include a "Unknown" background to still incorporate players who wish to be blank slates without any pre-defined tendencies)

I agree that all of these are great ideas, especially because so many Tavs are Baldurian aka have a similar social/regional background. I love the idea of the criminal background and having to hide that character from the Fists when you get to the city. It would make for interesting gameplay (and additional pressure to tadpole up so you can fly from rooftop to rooftop. Heck, maybe the Fist wouldn't recognize you with the illithid markings.)