Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General What do you think of Act 3?

Here are some of my thoughts.

Act 3 has left me a bit deflated and occasionally frustrated. There seems very little direction as to what to do next and, whilst this isn't entirely bad, I am left feeling spoiled for choice as to what to do next, and wondering will this adversely impact another quest line if I do it. In short, there seems too much going on in too small a space.

I also often feel my party is underpowered for a lot of the encounters (despite being Level 11). This leads you to wander around trying to find something to do next in order to level up. Some events seem to be virtually impossible unless you party is made up of characters of a specific class, with specific items and spells. This reduces the role play aspect of the game by railroading you into certain options/choices. Sometimes I feel I'm doing things in the wrong order and have to keep going back to earlier saves to try a different route or choices.

This brings me onto save scumming. You can't seem to get away without doing this at some points, especially the Iron Throne quest. It took me around three hours just to get to the point where I made it out with This just ruins the immersive feel.

Overall, I love the game. Acts 1 and 2 had a few minor issues but, overall, were brilliant. Act 3 just needs to be tweaked so as to keep the feel of the game and allow for more role play.

What do others think about Act 3?

Its bad. The story and narrative completely breaks down.

I'm currently in act 3 and pretty much only left with the main quest. Overall I can say that I liked act 1 the most ... by far. I feel the same as you with act 3, though I didn't have any trouble with the encounters so far. My companions don't have much to say anymore as well. Doesn't feel as immersive as it did in the beginning.

I liked Act 1 a lot despise the overwhelming sense of familiarity that came from 3 years of EA.
I liked most of what was there for Act 2 even if it felt a lot shorter than the other two and it would have benefitted from one or two extra areas (it's also worth noting that I initially rated it higher since I counted the mountain pass/creche as a part of it, when it's apparently considered still Act 1).

I... have very mixed feelings about Act 3 so far.
For one, performances and bugs were bad enough that they turned me off from playing the game entirely and I'm kinda sitting here waiting for further improvements at this point.

Also, it feels... Fairly monotone. With most of the action happening in the city streets and the sewers, there's a perceived lack of variety I can't shake off. I think I would prefer if the structure of this act was closer to something like "The city is your central hub, but you'll travel all around the province to visit different places in your quest". On top of it, I don't think that "putting everything in one area" benefitted it even remotely. Separate city quartiers would have probably paced the whole thing better and offered chances for greater cosmetic variety.

That aside, it's not the amount of content that disappoints me as much how ABRUPTLY most stories and questlines seem to end.
Cazador hyped up to the high heavens turning out to be a complete push-over you can just walk into AND bitchslap in one go.
The "coven of hags" not being a thing.
Most of the companions fading into the background with very little reactivity across the entire Act 3.

And so on.

I didn't like or enjoy most of the parts of Act 3 that I played (I stopped about halfway through Act 3 and began a new party). Much of Act 3 feels unpolished and unfocused, as if they tried to cram as much into it as they possibly could. I like that it seems to be more open though, but overall I prefer Act 1 & 2 by far.

Act 3 is like final season of cancelled tv show which tried to end its story the best way possible despite all the plans for at least 2 seasons.

Overall Act 3 isn't that bad, but some things make a terrible aftertaste.

So far, I like act 3, tehre are some intersting quests and I'm having fin, but I agree with Tuco that Cazador was underwhelming (and the voice actor sounded a bit like a bad parody of Bela Lugosi :-D) and as much as I liekd to meet again, I was looking forward to her

Holy shit if this isn't a good summary of what vibe it gives.

One thing I liked in act 3 that I forgot to mention:

I'm in act 3 now again and I really almost "fear" playing there because on my first playthrough, so many quests were broken (fireworks, Jaheira) that I'm scared that I may break something again by triggering bugs.

Actually gave up my first playthrough mid act 3 because of that and started over because I couldn't do many of the things because of bugs. I wonder if all of that is fixed now.

Hm.

I just get burned out playing the game in Act 3. It feels overwhelming with the sheer volume of sidequests, and it lacks a sense of meaningful progression since there's no epilogue. Considering most players are already at max level and giga-looted at this point, it seems unnecessary to pursue additional magic items and story threads that lead nowhere.

I wouldn't know, I can't play it until Larian fixes non-lethal damage to actually work.

Wut?

I think act 3 has loads of promise. I enjoyed it hugely despite all the bugs, but it would obviously be much better without them.

It was overwhelming on first reaching the city, but then I get that with other cRPGs too, and I found that if I just started chipping away at the quests it got manageable quickly enough. I thought that on the whole the quests were interesting and varied, rather than a whole bunch of fetch-quests, and exploring Baldur’s Gate was amazing.

I agree that there were some quest lines that I’d liked more of, especially the hags, though admittedly
And I definitely agree that the epilogue was a let down, and I really wanted all my party and key NPCs to get a look in.

But if bugs are fixed and epilogues expanded, I’ll probably think Act 3 is great. And if, on top of that, some of the quests/storylines that feel like they might have been truncated were fully developed and the quest design tweaked in a few places where I did find it frustrating, I reckon it would be a triumph.

Act 3 is exactly what I feared it would be, given Larian's history of tripping up in the final leg of their games. It is not merely that the environment and story itself feels rushed; the combat also begins to fall apart.

Act 1 was definitely my favorite. Act 2 was overall pretty good; though I did begin noticing more bugs, the overarching plot of the area seemed to have strange, confusing gaps at times, and by the end of the act I was feeling the fatigue of not having had much of a combat challenge for basically all of act 2. Act 3 was disappointing enough that I seriously considered quitting halfway through and am now putting down the game until I hear it's significantly better. Or maybe it will never be, and I'll have to research some mods to fix it.

That wont happen.
Too much effort to add so many branching paths to account for all possibilities.

At best some of the worst examples like
will get a nonlethal story path.

I stopped 2/3 of the way through Act 3. I really like it. I like the urban environment, I like the character moments, I like the combat encounters, I like the banter, I like the quest structure, I like the density of activity and the feeling of a city waiting to be discovered.

What I don’t like is how strangely paced it feels with respect to the rest of the game. NPCs we’ve been developing for the whole game are dismissed with a flick of the wrist. Quests feel incomplete or conclude in places that feel odd. Once you’ve explored the whole city, a lot of quests have you going to places you’ve already been when there’s not actually new stuff in those locations.

I think Act 3 could potentially be the best Act, if given a bit more attention.

I still haven't beaten act 3 .

I liked act1 the most - it is easily the most content rich, and polished of the three

Didnt' like act2 aside from .

As such act3 seems like a step up for me. Couple issues:

There is multitude of issues with reactivity - that's started for me as soon as I left EA area, and haven't stopped. Act3 might be worse, as there is more story content there, but it hasn't been worse than act2 for me. Most quests, seem fairly straightforward - that said, I thought there was only one truly complex quest in act1 (goblins vs grove), so the rest of the game being rather straightforward doesnt' surprise me. A lot of magic has evaporated for me after act1 - with skills like speak to dead/animals becoming underutilised.

A lot of combat encounters in BG3 do come down to gimmicks. I don't think they are bad, but I think some of them are poorly set up. . Fortunately, my bard is crowd control oriented, and Hypnotic Pattern seems to be a solution to almost every late game problem.

I really like the feel of the city, but I am not a fan of being contained to it. To me, the city work best as hubs, the way they were done in BG2/Deadfire. However, considering Larian's structure, I am impressed by Baldur's Gate. However, they have a lot of work to do, to improve the reactivity as it falls apart big time in act2&3. Individual quests feel underwhelming. The game peaks in act1 and the rest of the game lives in its shadow. Still, it could be much much worse. It probably will be - I hear things about the finale of act3 which don't sound great.

I slogged through Act 3 completionist style, bugs and all.

Oh boy!

There were gems: Raphael's finale, Shadowheart's finale, various buffs from allies made throughout the game.

There were trials:
Torture: final battle(s)!!

Impossible decisions:
Stealth missions: And after playing through, so many places can be shortened by stealth.

Let downs: No Cloakwood. No Ulgoth's Beard. No Upper city.

Confusion: Couldn't find hideout to progress main quest for hours of searching; answer was right there all along of course.

And bugs: forget save-scumming, I had to reload anyway.

I tell you what, I won't go completionist in Act 3 again. Pick and choose and progress. I was absolutely laden down with legendary and very rare magic loot. My second choice items were in some ways better than first picks. Had no illithid powers but OP anyway. Nonetheless, final battle was tough!

In Act 3 The House of Hope, The House of Grief and The Iron Throne were highlights for me.

But I just could not relate to The Emperor and didn't understand the story arc around him. Do I trust him? No. Do I want to romance him? No. Do I want to know his favorite cereals for breakfast by searching some basement? Absolutely not (and at that point the writers completely lost me, I hope I just didn't get the joke.) Then the original identity of The Emperor is revealed and I'm sitting there literally just shrugging.

Finally I was looking forward to the liberation of Orpheus, but how disappointing that turned out. I'd love to have a way of setting Orpheus free sooner and see him play a bigger role (opposing The Emperor as well as Vlaakith).

Waiting with my 2nd play through until some kind of overhaul. Anyway, even in the current state, easily the game I enjoyed most since Witcher 3.