Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Default vault dweller

I bought the game on GOG, so I might be a little late on this one but I still wanted to comment on it.

First off I think there's an obvious argument for people not investing much thought into character creation when you know it's not one that you'll play for the actual entire game, it's just a portion of it, one you probably already played through it a few times as well.

Now I'm not a D&D guy myself, I've been mostly playing the races that give +2 to my character's main attribute (wood elves, half-elfs, tieflings, etc...), but I hear humans are OP - so that might be a factor as well.

That portion of the argument aside, I'd question the angle of criticizing, or at least being disappointed, in what your consumers are deciding to do with the product you offered them - especially when you're so obviously committed to giving as much player choice as you possibly can! Even IF people actually wanted to legitimately play what would likely be a self-insert of the average person playing BG3 for the final release of the game, so what? Is that choice bad? As someone who has been dabbling in the character creation section to make unique characters and play around with the customization, something I personally value, I seriously think that's an unwarranted comment that goes directly against the player choice theme Swen so passionately defended when explaining how complex it is to allow players not to do what you hope them to with the artifact, for example.

Lastly - and I wish this wouldn't be necessary, but I'm not the one making the rules, only abiding by the ones other people put in place -, in this day and age you can't expect to make a comment on how 'basic' a white guy with short hair is (again, south american dude with long hair here) and not remind those of us who are politically active that this wouldn't fly if instead the average character were a dark-skinned woman - and since you are working with WotC *spits on the floor* ... sh*t, I have to clean that now ... anyway, since you are working with them, who're notorious social justice virtue-signaling fan-hating bigots, my fear of that kind of pernicious influence in the game increases. I bought this game despite of wizards, because I think Larian makes wonderful products, so I'd hate to see it tarnished by the (potential) bad influence.

But yeah, I love the game so far and am exited for the full release whenever it is ready, because I know you care and want to deliver a product worthy of your catalog. I hope this doesn't sound like harsh criticism, and I realize the last portion might sound a bit outlandish to some, but believe it or not, it's important to me. Cheers!

Actualy ... if there is anyone who knows how much time people spend creating their first characters, its Larian since they are gathering our data.
And BTW ot was an hour and half for me.

OR!
It was just a joke.

At first i didnt want to coment on this since its rarely healthy topic ...
But one question i must ask. :-/

From rest of that post you seem like one of those people who is bothered by this trend ... have you ever concidered that seeing it behind every mention of simmilar topic is part of the problem?

or maybe... just maayyyybee...... it was a joke and had absolutely no political intentions behind it whatsoever.

There is a lot to your post that could be addressed, but I'm going to just ignore that stuff for my own sake. I'll stick to the meat of your post based on the title of this thread. Not only did this happen a year or more ago, it was so clearly meant to be a tongue in cheek joke. I am baffled at how many people took that comment seriously. Larian was just trying to engage in some good-natured teasing. A bit of "haha, we gave you so many weird options but the most popular thing was super basic and normal, isn't that ironic?" There's no genuine criticism to be found. It was a one-off joke that I don't believe they've brought up again since. Was it a good joke? Eh. I would argue that it's so basic and simple that there really isn't enough to it that it could be good, but it's not really bad by that measure either. Humor is subjective obviously, and if you didn't like the joke, you didn't like the joke, but let's be on the same page over the fact that it is indeed a joke. You can argue that Larian hasn't earned the kind of comraderie from the fanbase that such a joke typically requires, but they aren't actually disappointed and I do not believe they actually care. I'd be shocked if anyone involved even remembers that was said. In a very real sense, the comment doesn't matter. It has not impcated their design philosophy in any way we can identify. They aren't stopping anyone from making more "default vault dwellers" are they?

Not sure if it even is a criticism. Sven isn't the first or only to point that out. Similar stats were released by Josh S. during PoE2 development.

If it's a criticism, I don't think it's a criticism of players and more of games themselves. As a roleplaying game it is about creating a fun character using options provided - if players opt to go for generic white dude then it could point to game's failure in encouraging players to roleplay and fully take an advantage of options provided.

Or maybe it's a maturity of the audience. I definitely go for more roleplayee characters these days, then when I started playing cRPGs. I defintely inserted myself in BG2 back in the day, even using my pic as a portrait. These days I would find that dull.

With traditional archetypes in media being white dudes it is not shocking that when creating a roleplayee protagonist players would still lean toward that option. With Origins BG3 does have opportunity to provide some compelling alternative protagonists and companions, though quality writing will be the deciding factor. An unusual companion or protagonist won't really sell anyone on the idea of they are not compelling characters.

fair enough, but they never said quickly created characters were filtered out


Oh I don't disagree it was put in a jokingly manner, that is quite obvious - I too do this to soften the blow when I have criticism of something to someone I'm not comfortable enough to be straightforward with. The way the whole thing is written sounds like that, a cheerful way of saying "really guys?", or something along those lines (at least the way I interpret it). Because it makes sense! They worked hard on a character creator that is way more in-depth than your average CRPG, hell, probably more so than most games period... I would probably also be deflated if people weren't appreciating it as much - but again, it's ok if that's how people chose to play.


Yeah as I said, we don't get those updates on GOG (I think the platform doesn't have that sort of dev posts available, like steam) so I only learned of this yesterday.


Yup, I'm glad I can agree with you there! But as I said, it sure made me fear that it ~could~, and that's why I came here.


I agree that you can only see it if you have been exposed to it enough, but I don't think engaging in the game that has been set for us to play is worst than not playing, as much as I wish I didn't have to. If everybody was on board that it's ok to joke about any group of people, it'd be fine - but that's not the case. It becomes unhealthy when it is only socially acceptable to publicly criticize/joke about one group of people, there are spooky historical precedents for that kind of thing, so it falls to people like me to be the guy who has to point that out. Ideally we wouldn't be in this position, but I sure didn't have a say on that and all I can do is play with the cards I've been given.

But again, thankfully I haven't seen any of that seep into the game, I just would really like for it to stay like that.

It was a lighthearted jab. If you look at the 'default character' of any number of crpgs with character creators, they often have similarities. Give people a million customization options and a dozen exotic aliens/fantasy races to choose from and like 70% of them will make a character that looks like them every time. It's a not-infrequent observation within crpg fanbases, often with a joking undertone.

It wasn't political. Although considering how we have had like two of these posts withing 1 day from different posters I wonder if ome of the usual youtube demagogues made Larian their current target of opportunity. The 'controversy' over this died out ages ago. It's odd to see it pop up all of a sudden again.

Your suspicions are correct, I learned of the post from a youtube video. He was mostly commenting on other aspects, but what caught my attention was the message itself and how antithetical to the Larian I've been watching on pannels from hell and interviews it felt.

Btw I appreciate you guys not agreeing to the political stuff but still remaining polite! At one point I thought it was best not to comment on it, but that didn't help improving the situation and I've lost beloved hobbies *cough cough MtG* because of the unwelcoming environment people created in recent years, so now I am vocal about it.

I will say again, fuck influencer culture with a pineapple. Of course they didn’t disclose that we already went through this shit two years ago when it originally happened.

That said, of all the recent cRPGs (defined as since Pillars 2), BG3 pretty much doesn’t lie anywhere on any political spectrum unless you’re trying really hard to find something that isn’t there (compared to say WotR having a married lesbian couple, which you also wouldn’t really learn about unless you read about their background in the original tabletop campaign since I don’t think they ever explicitly mention this in the cRPG).

BG3 is probably the least ‘woke’ of them all. All onlookers should not make the mistake of assuming every character is made with a political message in mind.

Or ... simply ... dont.
Especialy not two years late.

I mean ... just look at the reactions here. :-/
Okey, you did your civic duty, pat pat, here is a cookie.

Now what? Did at least single person appreciated your actions? As far as i see, nope.
How does that makes you feel?
I mean ... dont you think that could be potentialy indicator that you maaaaybe missunderstanded something, or slightly overeacted? O_o Just think about that option, k?

And please, dont take this any any atempt to ridicule you ...
We all (or most of us i was told) are human beings, and as such we are fallible by design ... there is no shame in making a misstake ... only in making a misstake and dont learn from it.

I find this type of discussion so amusing.

Quest about freeing slaves: Not Political
Quest about whether demons are like humans as opposed to being inherently evil and can overcome their "true nature": Not Political
General themes involving religion/faith, governing, nobility, etc : Not Political
Gay couple happens to exist: POLITICAL! WOKE! SCANDELOUS EVEN!

Yeah, the inconsistency is why I find these topics rather stupid. Again we already went through this two years ago. The fool who tweeted about this yesterday was just doing it for outrage clout, and roped in a video response which then spawned this thread.

And between those, you have people declaring they won’t buy this game because of this two year old thing. Their loss for being so easily manipulated by influencer culture, I guess.

No, I agree. Even with the druid grove plot and the ritual of thorns Khaga (was that her name?) deal, it was done very sensibly. That plot point could've been easily ruined by a sanctimonious activist wanting to hammer down a point, completely breaking the immersion - and I'm so glad it wasn't.


that's the thing, it depends on how it's done. It's obvious that games will (and should) touch on political topics, it's only natural. The thing is that when it's done in a preachy, one-sided, void of nuance manner it becomes more of a propaganda piece and less of a game, more of a political statement than a story that is believable, intricate and relatable. Let me give you an example from Pathfinder tabletop I've heard being discussed about a year ago. They decided to do away with all mentions of slavery in the game... because slavery is obviously bad... but it's literally a game in which "bad" is almost a necessity so that there can be a plot in the first place. So, in the name of advancing a political message (one that will hardly find anyone in opposition pretty much anywhere) they're willing to compromise the game. See what I'm saying?


No, I think I will. You're free to disagree with my takes, but I'm not here for cookies nor for your approval. I learned of something I feel strongly about and wanted to voice my opinion, and by doing so and discussing it with you guys it reassured me that my concerns were exaggerated. That's what a forum is for, exchanging experiences, no?

Sorry if I'm not convinced, but I've seen that said by many people when challenged, but they rarely stick to it in practice.

In fact, the source of that video is a great example of the problem I have with "anti-woke" sentiment in general. Half of his videos are complaining about the existence of minorities, gay people and women in media being woke and pandering. He(and many others who express your sentiment) don't care if the characters are nuanced or believable. On the first page alone, there are 4 different videos about shows that aren't even out yet! How the heck could he know if the characters are well written?

Maybe you aren't as absurd as he is, but that doesn't really vibe with general sentiment I see from most people.

Actually, can you give me an example of a few shows or movies that is definitely not woke and handles characters well? I have a feeling they're more "woke" than you think.

Oh don't focus on the messenger, I was just giving a clear example of how a sanctimonious political message can detract from a game - it just happened to be something he covered. I disagree with your portrayal of him too, yet even I feel this would be a bit too far off topic, but feel free to DM me if you're interested in discussing this.

I actually haven't watched much of anything produced in the west for quite a few years now... uhhh, The Office was great? Haha. Even shows like South Park now feel way less anti-establishment than they once were, Simpsons is a soulless husk at this point. I've been watching more anime, actually I even got into manga. Thankfully the Japanese, through all of their... weird faults, have resisted well against the censorious puritanical trends emanating from the west, and in my opinion that directly relates to the better quality of entertainment you get from their products compared to the average show on any given tv channel or streaming platform.

But like... for example games like Dishonored 1/2/DotO, Thronebreaker: the Witcher Tales and The Witcher 3 are examples of games I played that handle strong female characters in a relatable manner, not in the "here's a female superman character" (I've always thought superman was a dumb character). DOS and DOS2 as well, the characters are... relatable, it feels right, they're flawed, there's no 'in your face' we're making a point out of saying that *insert fanatical political point*, you know?

I happen to make interesting characters in the creator with horns and demon eyes and tails, unlike the rest of you...

But I also wonder if I would be invested at all during character creation knowing that if I don't choose an Origin character, I'm losing out on the game. Hard to get excited about creating a character if you know you won't be able to create as much on full release if you want to enjoy the full game content.

As far as I’m concerned, LotusPetal, you’re the only one coming into this waving a banner for a political ideology. It’s fine, if a bit belated, to question the specific joke made by Larian. But then you make derogatory and provocative use of a phrase like


that is used within certain political movements to belittle and undermine people who believe … well, a lot of things I believe. That to me shows a lack of respect for the fact that people here will have a variety of political views and nonetheless all deserve a safe space to debate aspects of Larian games without feeling that their whole worldview is under attack and they therefore need to defend it. And I would expect the woke social justice warriors like myself to extend the same courtesy by keeping discussion points specific and relevant to the game.

The political fight you refer to is an important one and I don’t duck away from it in other contexts, but this is not the place.

I hope this thread is closed before it further poisons the atmosphere on this forum.

+1 to the thread-closing idea. I think LotusPetal has made the point they wanted to make, and we can move on. Any further discussion here has little to do with character creation, and more to do with Larian's presentation as a company and political arguments, which are not within the scope of the forum. I have added spoiler tags to my tangent point above.

Edit: Having said that, I do feel like I missed out on shitposting in the other "how dare you joke about white male two years ago" thread in General, so maybe don't close this one so we can get some good shitposting action in. (Joking, in case it wasn't abundantly clear)

Yeah, since we already established that none of this really applies to BG3 (and that again this is ultimately the result of a tweet bringing up something from 2 years ago), I question the value of even having this conversation here to begin with. Feels like preaching to the void and trying to create a battlefield where there shouldn’t be one beyond that.

You're actually proving my point about why this is all so absurd. Stories have ALWAYS discussed contemporary issues of their time. Whether it was women's suffrage, racism, slavery, etc. And they were all criticized for it by people who didn't like the idea of change. I don't really care the rationale of uncritically opposing any discussion of modern issues.

Additionally, none of these issues are really modern are they? They're just the modern version of existing issues that have always existed. The satirical critique of gender roles and patriarchy Lysistrata was written almost 2500 years ago. After roe was overturned people floated the idea of women doing a "sex strike" in protest. The same thing that's in this 2500 year old greek story! People looking to improve the lives of those with less power have ALWAYS been "woke." And people in power who don't want anything to change have always complained.

Also, you call mine a strawman, but your example of political is killing a stand in for a contemporary politician as if that's happening in every other story.

Lastly, I'm happy with people calling media political. Nearly all media is inherently. The problem is it being used as a pejorative as if media is somehow worse for it. Or that it's any different from how it was in the past. As the while praising political media that supports their narrative, claiming it is actually non-political. If you have an issue with a piece of media, by all means criticize it on its merits. But many will just call it too woke or political and call that sufficient criticism. If you genuinely think that isn't the more common occurrence or that most anti-woke criticism is nuanced or thought out, you must be living under a rock, mate.

Edit: Bruh, he deleted his post?