Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Technical & Gameplay Problems Consistent Crash entering Act 3

First, I want to acknowledge there are a thousand threads scattered across the internet of folks sharing frustrations with random client crashes, blue screens, and PC reboots. I deal with them too.

I love this game, and I deal with that. I mash F5 to autosave every 5 minutes, and I deal with it. I'm asking for help with a very specific problem, and I haven't found anyone else reporting it - When I click on the Road to Baldur's Gate to end Act 2, I get the three-part cinematic that moves you into Act 3. At what I understand to be the conclusion, with my party standing on the ramparts of some old fort overlooking the city, the game simply stops.

I'm asking for any help I can get from the community. I have provided this information in a bug report to Larian, and will also be posting this on the Reddit forums as well. I love this game, I love my characters, and I'm hoping I'm missing something simple. If I discover the cause of my problem in any other forum I will share the outcome here so that others may benefit. Here are the details:

There is no record of an error in any of the following locations:

Windows Event Viewer (Application or System)
C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Baldurs Gate 3\bin\gold log
C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Baldurs Gate 3\bin\network log
There is no CrashDump in C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Baldurs Gate 3\bin

When launched from the launcher, I do not get prompted to send a crash report. When I restart any configuration options I've set in the Settings -> Video section have been reset, but I do not get prompted to configure my HDR settings (nor the nudity setting) as it would in the event of most random crashes.

I've tried a great deal of the tactics shared in the megathreads to deal with random crashes, and while they have certainly helped me with those random crashes, none of the actions I have taken have any affect on the problem I am reporting here.

Here are the steps I've taken. Each of these were attempted on their own using both the DX11 and Vulcan executables:

1.) Using the --skip-launcher flag to skip the Larian Launcher
2.) Stepping VSync down from Triple to double
3.) Disabling Vsync
4.) Selecting "Windowed" mode, throttling frame rate to 59 or 60, utilizing the lowest performance settings.
5.) Downgrading from the current NVidia drivers to v536.99
6.) Running the respective BG3 executable in Windows 8 compatibility mode
7.) Running the respective BG3 executable as administrator
8.) Running the respective BG3 executable with High DPI scaling overrride (though I don't use high DPI)
9.) Running the respective BG3 executable with all of the settings in #6, 7, and 8 combined
10.) Upgrading from Windows 10 to a freshly formatted Windows 11
11.) Replacing my Samsung EVO560 drive with a Samsung EVO570

Some other information about actions I've taken based on community suggestions:

I launch Windows with a very limited start up process. Nothing is running on this machine other than Steam, Larian, and Windows core applications.
Both the Larian Program Files and AppData folders are excluded from Windows Defender AV scans.
Steam cloud sync and cross-play are disabled.
While I do have Nvidia drivers installed I do not have the Nvidia GeForce Experience installed. Nvida nor any other products that offer "overlays" are running with the exception of Steam, and even that overlay is disabled when I launch using the --skip-launcher flag.
I have attempted to load older save files stepping back to the end of the Act 2 boss fight and all save files behave as reported.

System Specs:
AMD Ryzen 9 5950X 16 core processor
ASUS Strix RTX 3090
32GB (4x8GB) G.Skill Trident Z Neo Series DDR4 3,600MT/s (CL 16-19-19-39 1.35V)
ASUS ROG X570 Crosshair VIII Hero (Wi-Fi) Motherboard
AOC AGON AG493UCX 49" 120Hz Ultrawide monitor
Samsung EVO970 M.2 2TB

Adding an update here; I was able to replicate the problem on my MacBook Pro, so there's something wrong with my save state. Fingers crossed Larian has a solution for me at some point.

Another update, this issue persists on PC, Mac, and PS5 after hotfix / patch #7

Larian has replied back stating this is a known issue and will be addressed in a future update.

Same here.

I did all the above.

I did narrow it down to finishing the Githyanki Creche quest.
Once I go through the Camp scene to go back to shadowfell - I can no longer load a game if I am already in.
I also crash 100% on act 2 to 3 transition.

My 80hr file is toast until the next update, which i hope fixes this.

Another update, this issue persists after major update #4. Larian had replied to my ticket indicating the fix would be included in this update, and I do see a patch note indicating that there had been a blocker moving from act II into act III with criteria my game file matches (no spoilers.) I have replied to let them know the issue persists and will continue to update this thread.

Spoiler alert: they're not gonna fix it. It's still broken as of today, November 11th.