Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback The EXPERIENCE CURVE

Ah, yes. The issue no one is talking about is how the expected curve will work in the full game and that it's make or break for Larian to get this right.

In DoS 1&2, the final boss was L20 and it was assumed that you'd be 19-20 if you did the main storyline. However, min-max or completionist could be 22+.

That worked in those games because leveling up was a simple matter of gaining more attribute points and stats.

Larian is capping the game at a certain level and adding no further spells or abilities thereafter, so reaching "max" level before the very end of the game will be a poor experience for players.

If, for example, the max is L12 and you reach this with 20% of the game left, you will not be able to make your character any stronger or gain new abilities but still play out the story. And you will likely be overleveled for enemies balanced around a lower level than your party.

This makes a steamroll effect and something Swen mentioned was a failure of DoS 2.

It already feels bad in EA to see Max Level Reached and know that additional experience is not counting toward making your character better. This will be worse in the full game for those who do additional quests and more content than the main storyline.

There has always been an issue with how Larian does transition in level and power spike between act transition. They have to guess what the average party level would be because the enemies do not adjust to PC's level.

For experienced players, it's easy to always be +1 over the AI due to sidequests. I hope Larian doesn't mess up the experience curve for Act 2&3.

Well, that's mostly because we have hardly any context to discuss this.

For instance, I think leveling feels already a bit too fast right now, but I've never been clued in by anyone from Larian about how the final game will be any different, so what can I really say about it?

That's true. I'm anticipating an issue that hasn't happened yet based on past experiences and knowing how Larian designs games.

They always leave a little room for players to go over the level of the final boss if you do all the content available, which won't really work when you're not putting in additional skills and abilities beyond a certain point.

I don't want to potentially have a lesser experience because my characters are leveling faster than they "should" so I feel bad about doing content in order to regulate myself.

For DoS 2, once you explode in Driftwood, you are overleveled for the rest of the game and they had a hidden formula that caused you to do more damage the higher level you were over the enemy. Very poor game design and it made over 50% of the game not challenging, even on Tactician.

I've suggested this on the other exp-related thread, but I'll repeat it here. Larian should allow players to level past the cap (presumably of 12) by one or both of the following:

1.) multi-classing. The Level 12 cap is class-based, so after reaching 12 in a single class you can always begin taking levels in other classes.
2.) feats. Level "13" fighter would be your level 12 Fighter plus appropriate HP Increase, Applicable Proficiency Bonus Increase, and you get a Feat to compensate for the lack of implemented actual level 13+ Fighter Abilities. Spellcasters would get new spell slots but no higher level spells, along with the stuff mentioned previously.

That would be a good idea. Many builds are optimized by taking 1-2 levels in a different class and this way you wouldn't be penalized overall for having to dip into another class.

It will not be a good experience for people to hit max level well before the end and not be able to improve their characters.

Ideally, the "level cap" your game systems should be capable of supporting should always go noticeably ABOVE what your players would be able to achieve with a "completionist run" (excluding console cheats and the like, obviously).

Meaning: if by the end of the game the player's party has a good chance to be anywhere between level 11 and 13, you should cap your system at 15 or above.
The idea of having your player hitting the level cap WAY before being through the content of the game is fairly bad.

P.S. For context, this IS something that could happen in BG1... And maybe in BG2 before the Throne of Bhaal expansion, too?
Not sure. I basically played it without ToB just once when it was a fresh release so I can't really remember.

The last thing I want to do is hit the maximum level right at the end. That would be terrible. I'd have no time to appreciate the level.

It's like getting an awesome magic weapon drop from the final boss only to go straight into end credits.

Ideally I wouldn't want "to hit" the maximum level" at all, which is my point.

It needs to be a theoretical ceiling, not something you just casually run into at some point still far from the ending.

I was replying to the original post. I didn't actually read what you wrote.

That doesn't really change a thing about the point made.

While it makes perfect sense and seems like good solution ...
I really hope Larian will not go this route. :-/

There is no real argument against it, just my personal prefferences ... since i really dislike multiclassing, and it seems to me that it is allready done wrong in many games (tabletop included) ...

Since, the whole idea of multiclassing (at least as i see it) is that you sacrifice some high-level features of your Class in order to get something else ... and this model is good and i really like it.

For example pure Barbarian gets feature that allows him to boost his Strength and Constitution up to 24 both ... and that is AWESOME ... therefore there is a question if sacrificing this, in order to get for example Second Breath and Action Surge from fighter is worth the cost ...
Sadly, most games (tabletop included) dont reach level 20 ... meaning this Barbarian would never reach this bonus anyway ...
So if the game ends in level 13 ... all you would loose is one Ability Score upgrade, and one Dice for Criticals ... still kinda good bonuses, but in my honest opinion not nearly so shiny and tempting as +4 to your two most important scores and raising their cap.

And thats what i dislike, its this "all benefits, no drawback" that seems wrong. :-/
And if we would get up to level 12 per class, but the game would allow our characters to reach level 15 ... we only get even deeper in that. :-/

In Tabletop, the DM can adjust encounters if characters go above a certain level. Add a few more minions or something to correct. But, honestly, D&D is built so that even if you are a level higher or lower than expected, it shouldn't be game over.

That's not true so much for BG3. Facing the Gith at level 2 or 3 is suicide because the encounter is Deadly CR for level 4. Level 5 would still be a high CR. This also true for the Spider Matriarch and many of the late surface game encounters - like fighting 30 enemies in the goblin camp after you kill their leaders. Weren't they supposed to scatter once the leaders are dead? Great plan, Wyll.

Anyway, I'm not sure what the solution should be, really. Larian loves Deadly CR encounters, so that makes it difficult.

I do too like to hit level cap some time before the end - have one or two final option dungeons to test my party etc. For some players, though, reward of gaining XP is core incentive for doing content. With no furthere lvls to gain, they loose interest in the title.

I would say adjust encounters to your level, but that would potentially add overhead to the game. Everything gets preloaded.

Switching difficulty settings is probably the better option...slight delay as the game recalculates the area (Creature levels all rise).


...Although each area should check your current level the first time you enter (if it wants to stay challenging).

this is not BG2, in that game the rules were followed and a npc you park at level 2 would still be only level 2 when you collect them again half a game later = you could easy hit the level cap by simply playing the game solo

this is more like Neverwinter nights 2 were only the main character matters = does all the talking and Shadowheart just gets the same experience as a gift every time you pick her to come back into your party... its apples and oranges

I agree with Tuco:
The level cap should be above the number we get when playing the game normally.
His example with normal playing gets you lv12, completeonists get lv 13 or even 14, level cap is 15 sounds very good.
There were several games where my fun got less when I reached max level long before the game was over.
Until then you had the feeling everything you do makes you a little bit stronger. From then on only a few epic items could make you stronger.
I also have the impression that levelling up goes very fast, maybe too fast.

I really liked BG1. You levelled up slowly, magig items were rare and every small step felt like a big improvement.
BG2 (especially ToB) was too epic for me. If you find a powerful artifact around every corner it does not feel importent anymore.
In both games you could easily reach max lv long before the end of the game.

DOS2 had the problem of extreme number inflation. Both for characters and for items.
A regular item of one level was way better than a magic item one level below and stat bonusses started to go through the roof later.
So fighting an enemy one level above you was hard while fighting an enemy one lv below you was easy.
Sometimes it felt like you were forced to explore the "open map" in a specific order or to do quests in a specific way.
And kill everyone before going to the next area.

One thing I like about DnD (compared to DOS) is that it keeps the numbers low.
Sure, many players (often rightfully) complain about inflated numbers in computer game versions of PnP games.
In WotR some regular enemies have stats that would allow them to easily slaughter an army of domon lords.
But this is nothing compared to what DOS2 did.

Dont forget how strong aspect of our characters power is their equipment ...
Its huge difference between naked lvl 4 Wizard, and lvl 4 Wizard with best artefacts for his curent build ... even now in EA.

Therefore i dont think level cap at, or just slightly abowe the level we would reach regulary wont be a problem ...
And i mean really slightly, like level 11 in regular game and level 12 for completionist ... wich would also bring slight benefit for Larian, since they wouldnt need to create superstrong spells for final level.

Bcs we can still futher tune, or empower, our character with items.

Why can't they make the cap 20 like in older NWN or KotOR. Besides, sometimes I do want to steamroll enemies and play power fantasy

I believe its more like they dont want to ... rather than they cant.
The stronger your character is, the bigger threat they should be dealing with ... Larian probably didnt want to take this to cosmic-threat level.

Also im quite sure that there was no level cap in KotOR. O_o

First KotOR has 20 level cap, second - 50. About threat - you were abducted by cthulhu aliens, I think threat is dimension level 😁 it all can be fixed by having adjustment to difficulty level, like what level cap you want and difficulty of enemy encounters, experience multiplier, that sort of staff