Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Patch #4 Feedback: Controller Inventory Management / MultiSelect

Patch #4 made a significant change to how multi-item selection works with controllers. The change was to eliminate the ability to hold Right Trigger to multi-select and instead you need to hold X/Square to enter multi-select mode and then use A/X to select items. Then you hit X/Square to bring up the action menu. This is a bit clunky and slow compared to the old method but most importantly removes the ability to bulk-transfer items into containers/bags that are open in the inventory as there is no transfer option. (There is a Move options but this is not the same, this is to place items around the world/on the ground.) It also makes it more difficult to multi-select readable items as the selection button doubles as the read button.

It would be really nice if this could be rolled back or somehow improved because the change as it is now makes it very time consuming and clunky to use bags/sacks/etc in inventory and impossible to perform some tasks.

I absolutely agree, not only is it taking away one of the primary features of multi select, it is also adding unnecessary time and steps, which in UI and UX is a big problem and adds up fast.

Honestly, since this change ive been far less eager to play, and I might end up taking a break until it's fixed.

I know this thread is specifically for the multi-select function for items in the inventory, but for some of these features like that or context/interact stuff, it would be very helpful if we could actually padmap our keybinds for controllers.

The way Multi-Select worked with inventory management was somewhat closer to what I was hoping they might do for a hotbar port on the controller layout, cause I'm not a huge fan of the radial scheme, and this seems like adding another layer of click click to the process.

Here's an example trying to transfer scrolls... In the previous patch this could be achieved with a more fluid click and drag type motion. Now it takes like a couple dozen clicks to get the same stuff selected...



OK I can feel a big digression about radials coming on, sorry in advance, but I do think it's somewhat related or at least on the Patch 4 controller feedback theme. I'm pretty sure the 'hot garbage' thread will draw more eyes, since the title is more provocative, but I already typed a bunch in this other thread too, so I'll link it as well...

https://forums.larian.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=890993

Had a few more thoughts on the controller layout though (I'm on PC not PS5)...

For me the whole purpose of using a radial display for a controller UI would be to avoid requiring a double click confirmation with a secondary or tertiary button (which seems to be the approach now for multi-select too.) Otherwise these menus might as well be a Grid or just the default Hotbar that we see when playing with a M&K on the PC right? Like there's really no advantage I can see to putting all this stuff arranged in a circle, if we can't easily drift to position with thumbstick and then release to make the quick selection. Without that, all the ergonomic upsides of having the UI layout design to match the circular motif of the thumbstick is basically lost. Instead it's currently handled with RB/LB taps and a secondary key to confirm.

The current Radial takes up a significant portion of the screen and obstructs almost the entire field of view. The center radial crowds out the Avatar for the selected player, and the side radials take up basically the rest of the screen real estate. If its going to dominate so much of our field of view why not just increase the size/diameter of the individual radials so they can house more icons?

Right now the Radial has 12 positions like a standard clock, but it could just as easily have 24 positions at twice the diameter. Then maybe the player could still see what's happening in their field view with their avatar being surrounded by a larger circle, instead of truncated by smaller circle that cuts across their knees or whatever. A radial design with 24 positions would mean fewer radials in total and allow for more flexibility to organize/arrange the icons in a way that makes sense to the individual player. Especially for grouping related actions/bonus actions/spells.

Otherwise, again, I don't see how a circular display is any better than a rectangular grid for this. Or you know, just using the thumbstick to navigate a standard PC hotbar up/down/left/right the same way the inventory screen works. Whatever the scheme, it would be nice (at least for PC players) if our hotbar and our radials would clearly indicate the positions of each icon, so we can parse where they will appear when switching back and forth. For example, if the Hotbar is organized in columns and rows, then labels for each position A-D and 1-12, and on the radials to match. Or something similar with a shift/click using the numpad keys so we can get 1-0 twice, just so it's easier for the player to see what the radial is keying off in the hotbar if they switch back and forth between M&K or Controller mode on the fly.

Here's another example, showing how the radial display compares to the hotbar display for the same amount of visual information. If you change up your hotbar in the M&K layout, you can end up with a pretty haphazard look in the radial, or vice versa going from the reorganized radial to the hotbar display. As noted elsewhere the organization within a given radial or the order of the radials isn't saved, so everything can shift if you switch a weapon or use an item, leaving gaps. Some of the more common actions will require you to tap over through a number of radials to get at the ones you use most often. It's obviously much easier to get a quick survey glance with the hotbar display, since you can see all the information at once instead of having to cycle around.





You can see that the radial organization doesn't seem to be based on the Rows Columns of the hotbar, which seems less intuitive to me, especially since the radial display doesn't account for the slider break between the basic attacks/actions/item abilities section, and the spells/class ability section. The icons skip around run from one section of the main hotbar into the next when transitioning to the radial display.

It's weird because on the standard hotbar we have 16 positions (each row has 16 squares across the length of the hotbar) but the radial display only has 12. Meta magic and such is also treated like it's part of the normal rows/columns, even though in the hotbar display that stuff is separated out. If you create a custom hotbar then you can get an extra slot (since the sliders disappear) but the point is that they don't match up when switching from one display to the other, since there is a different number of slots for each. This makes it's hard to tell what's going on if you switch between controller and M&K.

Also, we still can't natively invert our camera pitch/yaw inside the game. Players using steam can at least switch this by going into Big-Picture mode, but it's not terribly convenient as you have to go deep into the settings. I doubt most invert players would even think to try launching the game in Big-Picture just for that. If playing on PS5 you don't even get that option, or at least that's my understanding. This would be a huge pain in the ass if you're an invert. BG3 is only pseudo-isometric, it still uses Camera Pitch for targeting anything above/below the sightline or anytime verticality is in play, which is quite often in this game. Even basic movement requires targeting of this sort when verticality is involved. For me the issue is Pitch, but I know for others it will be Yaw. These should be top line items in the Accessibility settings, you know, before "Camera Shake..."



Ideally it would be in the "Controller" settings, which currently doesn't allow any mapping at all (again I'm on PC so Xbox controller view there). I would literally change almost everything on this layout... It all feels backwards to me. I'd happily switch my buttons for triggers and reorder the D-pad if it was an option, but right now what you see is what you get... unless you want to mess with your config under the hood in a txt editor, but like seriously who's trying to do that?



For me the current controller layout uses odd combinations of LB/RB and the Triggers in conjunction with the thumbstick to do simple stuff like switch characters, but then uses the D-pad for stuff like Jump, which is pretty much the opposite of what I'd expect. It's just awkward to be using the top buttons so much. Default Right Trigger RT brings up the main menu, where we can access the Character Sheet, Spellbook, Map etc. which feels like something we should bring up with Select/Start. RB brings up the Radials, which we then cycle through using the RB/LB taps. Default Left Trigger LT brings up the select Portrait/Character, which then uses the thumbstick to switch between party members. To me that feels pretty backwards for a default layout, since Triggers are more ergonomic and should be used for the more click intensive things, which in this case would be navigating the radials for the various actions. The current controller layout reminds me of playing old games on a Super Nintendo or a PS1 controller, before things like thumbsticks and triggers were introduced/refined to the current standard.

Currently BG3 is unusable with any of the normal padmappers I've seen, because all the important keybinds are pre-configured here. I should be able to take the inputs from my M&K layout and graft those onto a controller layout 1:1. Like if I can do it for a game as ridiculous as SWTOR with hotbars that take up like 3 sides of the screen, I should be able to do it for something like BG3 which has relatively simple default controls by comparison. Typically you'd achieve this using one of the RB or LB button to toggle and cycle the keybinds, but you can't do that here since the top buttons are how we we're meant to navigate from one radial to the next. Just looking at the controller layout and comparing to virtually every other game, I don't understand why we can't set up some more standard conventions by noodling around in the settings. Using the D-pad to cycle targets, jump/hide etc. feels hella bizarre, since I feel like this would be way more ergonomic with a trigger, but maybe that's just me?

Anyhow just one of those things I noticed. Once I get used to doing things one way, but then it's tweaked, it'd be nice if we could just pick and choose for some of this stuff or revert, or maybe have a couple default layout options like the old Golden Eye, where they each had codenames and were sort of designed to follow a series of standard conventions. Not to knock the current default too hard, but maybe if there were a few more schemes to choose from I could get something going that's more my speed. Right now I just revert to M&K.

Oh yeah and another thing...there is no way to put a corpse in a barrel or similar using controller. I have to fire up saves on my macbook just to move corpses around.

100% this post. I've put hundreds of hours into this game, had a blast and was still having a blast. Was getting ready to start my first multi-player campaign. But I have no interest in playing when I think about how much more tedious this change makes inventory management.

Legitimately, I would love to know what they were thinking. It's such a nonsensical downgrade that I can't help but think not a single person involved with the decision has ever played with a controller.

Please rollback the controller inventory multiselect to R2 trigger! As a player who has been playing this game for more than 150 hrs on PS5, here's my findings on the Patch #4 change:

1. It's much more time-consuming to use the current multiselect system. As a PS5 player, I have to long press Square button first, then press X button to actually multiselect, then perhaps another press of Square button for more operations. For the R2 trigger It's just R2 trigger itself to select. I can save at least 1-2 seconds on this. It will be accumulated into a massive amount of time later.

2. In the big camp chest if you multiselect the books, there will be Reading and Picking Up sharing the same X button. Not sure if that's a bug or something. And organising books in the big camp chest is a mess now.

3. This change makes the big camp chest organising a impossible job. Because now the X button is only for select after you long press the Square botton. Therefore, we can't transfer stuffs in R1 individual character's bag page to the big camp chest. If we press Square botton, there will only be a 'Move' option. But that's not for moving the things back to the big camp chest. So we have to manually transfer the things in our bag to the camp chest one by one.

Here you can find more discussion on this Reddit thread: https://www.reddit.com/r/BaldursGate3/s/IQY2eZTmEn
I can see lots of people are hating the change and thinking it becomes hurdle for continuing play.

I made an account just so I could agree with the OP here, and BEG for the old way to be restored.

I genuinely don't understand what was wrong with the way it was - it was such a smooth system, and now it's so clunky and time-consuming. I'm at a point in the game where inventory management is everything, and it's so frustrating and annoying to use now. I'm not really excited about playing anymore (and certainly not about starting a new run) and I think I'm just gonna stand back and wait to see if it gets fixed.

Begging here. On my hands and knees, Larian!

I really like this game, and for being a "little thing", this change has sucked an impressive amount of satisfaction out of it.

This change to multiselect is horrible! It's so sluggish and infuriating to use after getting so used to the simple and quick R2 based system after hundreds of hours of playtime. And the inability to put multiple things into containers at once is nearly deal breaking by itself. That all, combined with the blatant miss for the readable items not working because it uses 'x' for two functions at once seems to me that they really didn't think this one through at all.

I tried to play the game with it but as something you have to interact with every minute it makes the game unplayable for me and for the first time in a while I actually played something else despite really enjoying the game otherwise and wanting to finish the story. It's so sad to me that they made all these other awesome changes but completely ruined the entire game for me with such a stupid and minor but crazy impactful change. Not even dating Karlach is worth this! I Even spent a while trying to find a way to downgrade the game on PS5 but that looks to be infeasible so now instead of actually playing the game I'm suck here angrily complaining about it haha...

But it appears there are lots of people who dislike this change, I collected all of the reddit threads I've seen on this and listed them below just in case there's any doubt how widespread it is. In all of the hundreds of comments on the posts below virtually every single player agrees this is a huge downgrade.

Patch 4 multi select on PS5 controller
Patch 4 broke multiselect on pouches when on a
Patch 4 PS5 multiselect in inventory
New multiselect is worse
Multiselecting change after update 40
Multiselect change in controller
I absolutely hate the new multiselect
Selecting multiple items PS5
The multi select item change has to be the worst
Patch 4 bugs on PS5
Postlaunch feedback
PS5 post patch interface changes are straight QOL
Patch 4 lands with over 1000 fixes/updates
Anybody else tired of patches
I hate the new PS5 inventory system
Patch 4 v4113882084

Please bring back the R2 system as quickly as possible so we can keep playing! Even with the occasional buggy items that had to be picked up twice it was still infinitely better.

I came here because my gf is sitting on the couch, fuming about this new change. I guess we hadn’t played since the patch. I don’t like it either. I’m glad I’m not alone. Hope they change it. It’s so clunky.

Please, bring back the old R2 multiselect!!! This new one is broken. You can't multiselect books, because they share the same button with the read action, also it doesn't work when you want to move items from your backpack to your inventory.

I too created this account solely because I had to voice my discontent over the change that was made regarding multiselect on PS5.
Holding R2 was a quick, easy and intuitive way of selecting multiple items. Holding the square button then pressing or holding X to select items just feels clunky, extremely time-consuming and unintuitive (another comment I read perfectly put it like it feels like you're holding one hand behind your back). It's hideously slow if you just want to quickly move around two or three items at a time.
Like others pointed out there's also the issue of not being able to bulk transfer selected items into a container nor can you multiselect books, because X is already in use when multiselecting so you have to do it one by one (this can't be right, can it?).

While using R2 to manage my inventory it never crossed my mind that I would want to open the radial menu at the same time that's also assigned to R2 (where you can find tabs like Character Sheet, Spellbook, Alchemy etc.) in case that was one of the reasons why it was changed. In my mind those two functions were clearly separated and never did I mix them up.

I feel stupid for complaining about such a seemingly miniscule thing, but inventory management is a huge part of the game so I use multiselect all the time. I never would've imagined that a button change could affect the overall fun of the game so much for me that for the first time in 400+ hrs (pls don't judge me) of absolutely adoring the game since release I need to put it down until this gets fixed.
In general I'd highly appreciate it if button changes would not be forced upon us without the option of us choosing which button we want to have assigned (like it was done with the 'Hold To End Turn' option you can now switch on/off in the settings).
I'm desperately begging them to change it back or to give us a choice at least.

You're doing exceptional work, Larian! Thank you for this extraordinary experience that is BG3! Keep it up <3

Please rollback the controller inventory multiselect to R2 trigger [used from steam deck]
Great job anyway

I registered here just to support this topic (sorry for further mistakes, I'm not an English native speaker). I will shorten multiselect as MS in my text.

I'have played more than 180 hours on Steam Deck. Not a single time did I need to go back to the radial menu from the inventory. Even if I need to, there is no problem in going back to game and clicking R2 again - it is a rare occasion and I'm ok to make a few additional clicks.

But as other people stated here, Inventory Management is a HUGE part of the game, and a very time consuming process. I can spend half an hour organizing stuff in my character's backpack. I can list the following use case scenarious (from my subjective experience):

1) "Vacuum-cleaning" the area
I press A to quickly highlight objects I can interact with and then I go from crate to crate, looking inside each of them. I want to spend as less time in each crate / barrel / sack as possible: just quickly loot the area and move on.
Usually when I open a crate there are things that I want to put in my inventory right away (potions, magic necklaces etc) and stuff I want to send directly to the camp (I either don't need them now or they will encumber me) - weapons, armour etc. I used to spend mere seconds to multiselect things from the second category and go to the next crate.
Now I have to wait about 3 seconds in EACH crate (and there might be 10 of them) just to enter the multiselect menu and THEN send 3-4 objects to the camp. Honeslty, now it it easier not to use MS at all and just use "send to camp" on each object individually.

2) Organizing character's inventory
My character carries a few backpacks and pouches with her to store stuff in the inventory by categories. A backpack for scrolls, a pouch for arrows etc. I reorganize her stuff from time to time not to be overwhelmed with the amount of stuff she has. It is not a fun part, but I have to do it, otherwise it is diffcult to navigate in the inventory ("sort by type" function doesn't help much).
Now I cannot use MS mode for that purpose at all - I cannot move several things in a backpack opened from the inventory.

3) Going through the camp chest
Usually I multiselect things here to sell to traders. Previously I used to take a few things, than go back and forth thinking whether I want to sell more stuff. Now I think twice if I'm morally ready to deal with the new MS mode
______________________

To sum it up:
- MS is a very important and popular feature while accessing the radial menu from the inventory is not
- MS main purpose is to save time. But now it feels like more time-consuming option than even selecting object individually
- Somehow it is morally SO HARD to sit through these 3 seconds of pressing X to enter the MS mode. I want to scream everytime, I don't now why. It is like I want to get it done I return to actually fun stuff but I'm forced to sit through this loading thing. UGH, sorry
- New MS mode replaced some features that were used together with it (eg moving things to backpacks in inventory)

Generally I share the feeling that I am much less eager to play now. I used to play 5 hours a day now I can sit only through 1 because whether I like it or not I just have to interact with this new MS mode. It is a small detail but it made some gameplay processes unbearable. Please, return the previous R2 behaviour, I'm begging you!

Right? I've played literally every day since I bought the game, the only exceptions when I was out of town. Now, I haven't opened it up since the change was made.

I was on my 2nd playthrough, had just hit Act 3. And was looking forward to my 3rd playthrough as well as my first multi-player campaign.

This change has put a huge dent in my desire to play. So annoying.

I have joined this forum with the sole purpose of crusading for the return of the O so superior R2 for multi-selecting. While I cannot say it as eloquently as most of the others before me, I can say without a shadow of a doubt that the inventory management post patch 4 completey and unequivocally sucks. I used to spend hours managing my inventory without even noticing because of how smooth that delicious R2 button used to be. Now though, my inventory is in complete and utter disarray. The early game is now a nightmare from which I cannot wake; for I cannot shove every spoon, cup and rotten carrot into my camp chest instantaneously for later consumption. I feel my tadpole squirm violently everytime I have to deal with this dreck as I cannot fathom why this change was considered, let alone greenlit. I unfortunately must halt the slaying of goblin and illithid alike and return to camp to deal with this new and dire threat to the realm. I hope and pray that Larian will hear the cries of the many inconvenienced bulk item moving enthusiasts harmed by the decision to add multiple steps to an otherwise simple process. I hope they will see the light and rollback this unjust tragedy foisted upon us at their earliest convenience. Until then I will continue to question the wisdom of that decision but so be it. I will be at the camp, idling away the hours.

Just adding my 2 cents. this is a massive step back on the ps5, i hate it.

Today I played a bit more and found a couple more bugs/issues with controller mode.

1) UI freezing while sorting still happens! (though seems less frequent)
It seems to happen slightly later than before because the sort UI overlay goes away before it freezes whereas before it froze before that UI vanished 100% of the time.

2) Take all items no longer closes the open container.
On PC when hitting Y to take all items from a container you are left with an open container and must manually close it. Previously take all items would close the container.

Looking at that Xbox controller with all the different mapped convoluted buttons/actions...
Why? WHY?? Just why do people thing its any easier than a mouse and keyboard lol. People go for the most complicated , weird, unnatural UI...

Some of us don't have the option of using a mouse and keyboard. We play on a PS5.

Please, bring back the old R2 multiselect, or at least give us the option to decide which multiselect method to use. This new method is much slower.