Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback PLEASE disable NPC reaction to summons!

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1086940/discussions/1/3823047564749421746/

I'm playing a ranger and enjoying it, but NPCs will follow me around because they don't like my summon. Yes I know Raven doesn't cause a reaction but I don't like the raven. There's also wizard summons to consider like necromancy.

All this does is cause problems. Like if there's environmental hazards the NPCs won't avoid it and can die. some NPCs will flee, like Oskar and it's very annoying when I want to talk to him.

Please just disable their reaction, at least disable them following you or fleeing.

What doesn't make sense is you can have a imp or quasit summon from pact of the chain warlock and nobody cares, but have a cute wolf and everybody loses their minds.

I really want to play a necromancer wizard with summons but I better not until they fix this.

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1086940/discussions/0/3823047564755590947/

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1086940/discussions/0/3823047940153113010/

I am also hoping for this or at least they should implement it properly (e.g. automatic sending to camp, refunding of resources etc... Everything else is just majorly annoying).

Unfortunately, there won't be any reaction by Larian as this is an intended mechanic. And there will shortly be people in this thread that will defend it as super immersive, ignoring that it is not well thought-out at all (Yeah it's super immersive when npc just run into their death in act 2 or follow you around saying "shoo" ).

Probably one will have to rely on mods...

Was realy hoping larian would address this one. I get the immersion attempt but with how often it screws up, it breaks immersion more if anything.

+1

Honestly... I think it should be removed completely until fixed. It causes so many problems and bugs... somehow, the shopkeeper from the general store in Rivington ended up in the Carnival area because she apparently followed my elemental (to tell it to shoo). When the carnival left, she was just standing there all alone and I couldn't talk to her, so I just lost access to two merchants.

NPCs dying in Act 2 because they run into darkness to chase your summons, etc.

Also overall it's just not fun - we oftentimes switch from dungeon/wilderness to town/city as part of the regular flow of the game and having to unsummon things that we use spellslots for isn't great. It also unbalances the game because by controlling your summons you can lead NPCs away from merchants so you can pickpocket them with no witnesses

Another issue is druid shapeshift - yeah, we get it, you can't speak as a Bear. Larian, in its wisdom, saw how unfun it is to lose your wildshape as a Druid of the Moon just to have one conversation and they allow you to shift out of animal form just for the conversation and then shift back without spending charges. However this is unfortunately inconsistent. (Act 1 spoiler alert)

Yes, please for the love of god remove this mechanic. It's annoying, immersion breaking, and causes numerous issues. NPCs will follow you around and bark nonsense at your summons even when it makes zero sense and it makes me want to stop using summons altogether.

Super annoying, please please remove this "feature".

I remember a Facebook(?) post from Larian encouraging us to summon our animal companion in a tavern and see what happens. Is there any special moment like that anywhere? As in an actual cinematic / sidequest / dialogue?

It's the one thing keeping me from playing a spore druid when I was rolling my druid. Especially since you can't dismiss the fungal zombies as larian forgot to put a dismiss spell for them, so you have to actually attack and kill your own zombies one by one to dismiss them.

Is there no way to edit our original post? Well I'm constantly seeing people complain about this because it 100% ruins summons and adds NOTHING to the gameplay or immersion (it's actually very immersion breaking).

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1086940/discussions/0/3735205432024384915/

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1086940/discussions/3/3823047564757093175/

I don't know if it adds "nothing" to the summons. I bought a raven familiar into the druid camp, and I thought it was pretty cool how all the kid characters seemed to get fascinated by it and follow me around asking if they could pet it.

But this reaction also didn't seem so bad; because they'd go back to where they usually stood, eventually, and there seemed to be some sort of cooldown timer set where if they had followed me once, they wouldn't follow me again for a while.

Maybe the summon reaction to other things isn't working fully as intended; I did notice problems with a summoned elemental in last light's inn. I would say that maybe a horrified reaction is justified if you're touting around a bunch of undead....but then again there's a Circus in Baldur's Gate that has undead just hanging around on the streets smelling people's brains and nobody seems all that disturbed. Maybe limit the reaction just to having people make comments about your summons, and have them go back to their spots in a similar manner that the kids in the druid's grove do.

Exactly this. Reactions are fine but running into certain death and notoriously following around with "shoo shoo" is just stupid.

It's one thing to try and make the game as realistic as possible. It's another entirely to actively ruin the fun of playing certain characters. It also makes no sense at times. Wyll can walk around with a frigging Cambion and Imp just fine while Gale runs around with Shovel; but as soon as Jaheira summons an Azer (which is just a minor elemental); everybody flips out! That just makes no sense.

Also, NPC's in Baldur's Gate freak out about undead yet in Sorcerous Soundries there's an actual Necromancer selling zombie servants to customers! How does that make sense???

So please Larian, just give us an option in the Setting menu where we can turn it on or off. That way players can decide for themselves if they want it or not! I think that would be the best option.

It makes no sense: you can talk your way out of being caught stealing, but not even try to calm down people. Also people reactions aren't consistent: they flee from invocations, yet doesn't have any problem fighting way stronger and monstruous foes. And why should it only affect friendly NPCs? Why are hostile foes suddenly immune to fear?

So the way it is currently implemented, it is neither immersive (because of lacks of consistency) nor practical.

There are mods to disable this, but that's only on PC. Once the game hits consoles.. This issue needs to be addressed.

The only place people shouldn't react is Sorcerous Sundries because those are educated magic users. Everywhere else, regular people should react to you having a monster following you around. You have the option to unlink them and leave them elsewhere, or dismiss them.

Of course, some have built in invisibility, like the Imp and Quasit which is nice, and of course US who will disguise itself as a Cat (or make everyone think it's a cat...) when you are in a city.

But I am not in agreement that you should be able to wander into town with an army of zombies or whatever gross monsters.

Also, they are really useful for causing distractions. People use them to scare people away so they can loot everything not nailed down.

In the final battle in Act 3 I had an elemental. The entire area is hostile so you can’t just rest so I didn’t want to dismiss my elemental summon. But the survivors in High Hall would run away and I couldn’t trigger the cinematic or talk to one of them. It was very annoying.


I understand some summons would realistic freak some people out. But certain npcs (like mentioned Oskar, or the survivors in high hall) don’t have reason to react to the summons like this. Not only because it will break the story, but because they’ve seen some sh*t.

It's the same with shapeshifting... like I have Jaheira requently shift into an owlbear or myrmidons for fights and oh god NPCs go bonkers over it.

Exactly the same reaction as they have for summons, they either follow you telling you to "STAHP RIGHT THERE YOU SCUM" or they run away all terrified.

The mechanics of hostile terrain are crude, unfinished in many aspects. Summoning is not the only problem with this mechanics

Is there any way to get information whether Larian is aware of this and doesn't care or if they are working on a solution? I stopped my current run at the end of Act 1 in the hopes of an actual update, however, if this will never be officially targeted I might need to use the mod (always being afraid of game breaking incompatibility in the future...).

We only know what Larian chooses to tell us. Patch 3 comes out on the 21st, here's hoping we hear something.