Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Fewer rounds to reach the transponder

Currently, the characters have 15 rounds to reach the transponder on the nautiloid. This is regardless of what they do before they arrive at the helm.

I suggest that everything the character does removes one round from the timer. Stop to get Us? 14 rounds. Free Shadowheart? 13 rounds. Kill the comatose cultists or wake them up then kill them? 12 rounds. Go into the room with the victim who can be transformed into a mind flayer? 11 rounds. Transform her? 10 rounds.

And so on.

Ah well those CAMBION are a massive motivator to speed things up, so you don’t truly have 15 rounds anyway. More like 6 before they come to devour you

Some people stick around to kill the cambions.

That would be kind of a killer for the first gameplay, as you want to explore and don't know that this is coming.

I don't think so. It doesn't take anywhere near ten turns to get to the transponder. The only people it would affect would be the ones trying their hand at the commander, mind flayer, and cambions.

I would have never understood that my first playthrough. It's a tutorial; I was learning to interact with objects and use the UI. It it had been some sort of race, I would have left the tutorial without learning much.

You've obviously not seen my rolls against the darn imps and piggies...

Anywho, this deterioration of the timer for pre-fight actions could make sense for like an optional thing for Custom Mode and/or built into Honour Mode. But by default it won't make sense. As it's the tutorial area, people who are new to the game will be figuring out the games systems. Maybe they get bad rolls in the fight. Maybe the accidentally knock down some of the caustic pods and create a massive fire they can't get past for several turns. Maybe they get AoO'd by Lord Firesword. Etc.

There's plenty of reasons why a new player might not reach the transponder in 10 turns at which point they're being actively punished for doing what the game promotes... Which is exploring and interacting with things.

It would also set an unreasonable precedent for expecting time to be a factor while playing the game (Which it's not, you can spam long rests to your heart's content and it doesn't impact very much, I think only Nere is actually affected by passage of time from resting)

Wait, you’re supposed to interact with things? All I do in that scene pretty much is kill all the little beasts, get the giant fiery dude to drop his blade by way of Shadowheart using “command,” snag it ASAP, and then get outta there haha! I didn’t realize there was anything else worth exploring in there.

I have to pick up the all void bulbs and stash them for later. Those suckers are so good in Act 2 and 3.

I think you're exaggerating about your rolls.

That aside, why 15 rounds instead of an infinite number of rounds? It's not like 15 is the scientifically exact number of rounds necessary for something something words something. If it were already ten and I were arguing for five, I suspect your argument would remain the same, as opposed to you suddenly declaring a need for five more rounds. See what I mean?

There's a limit to create a sense of urgency. To make the player sweat and feel the heat of the moment. This suggestion just expands on that concept, making it a bit more immersive and noticeable for folks who replay the game. Otherwise, it probably wouldn't even be noticed by a first/only-time player.

Anyway. I would add the following two things:

1. It's highly unlikely Larian would ever take this suggestion. I'm putting it forward as an idea because I think the game would be better for it, but I'm level headed enough to understand there's very little benefit to do this for Larian. I mean, i think it's a good suggestion, but I don't think it's *that* good of a suggestion. It's not like the game would suddenly be ten times better for the effort.

2. I did put forward the suggestion thinking about Honour Mode. I have less interest in Story or Balanced play, and, as such, I don't think I'm necessarily qualified to give feedback for those difficulty settings.

I wholeheartedly disagree. I personally found time-limited mechanics to be anti-fun, stress-inducing and just incentivizee a lot of savescumming overall.

Yes, right, I agree with that. We live in a fast-paced, disposable society (always buying the latest cell phone, etc. pp.) and are often constantly available and accountable. We don't need even more stress-inducing mechanisms in hobbies and games, whose function should remain to offer us relaxation from our everyday working lives.

Maybe the explorer mode should be used for a more chill session?

This is why there are different modes to play in.

I was also wondering, why you had so much time for that segment. It felt more like an introduction to the mechanic than the mechanic being of actual relevance at the moment. Which is odd as well, since there are only two more examples of timed fights - unless I am forgetting one - both of which are in act 3.

Implementing a mechanic like this in the very tutorial level would probably send the wrong message: "DO NOT STOP EXPLORING!!! HURRY!!!"

"You stopped to help this woman stuck in the pod? Now you made things harder for yourself!"

The game already creates a false and unnecessary sense of urgency with the tadpole storyline. Some people are even skipping long rests to avoid being turned into mindflayers when an invisible timer reaches a limit. There is no need to create such stressful measures. Why not let players explore things at their own preferred pace? The only reason I was more chill about it, because I've already played a few dozen games that start with "Hurry, the apocalypse is imminent!!!", but you actually have all the time in the world to play some cards in the local tavern.

Maybe the explorer mode would be good for that mentality?

Personally, I was hoping a harder difficulty would be harder.

I didn't let the nautiloid crash yet. Is it game over when it does ? or do you somehow wake up on the beach anyway ?

As long as you reach (and activate) the transponder in time, you are GTG -- it's how it is supposed to go.


Annoyances are not a good reason to make the rest of the game too easy. Balanced is the default mode, and that mode needs to work for new players.

Adding it to tactician or custom? I could go with that.

So a hidden counter to give a penalty to players who dare explore.

Great asshole move to limit the success of the game.

Something in Honour Mode to make the game harder, yes. That's another way of saying "give a penalty to players..." Heaven forbid a game provide a challenge. My goodness.

As for limiting the success of the game, I hear your words, but it just sounds like negativity and huffing and puffing without substance. What about providing more of a challenge is limiting the game's success or even close to being considered an "a-hole move?"

Seriously, your comment comes across as nothing more than bad tempered and curmudgeonly. It's impossible to have a discussion this way. This is more spit and judgement than discussion and consideration.