Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Make "Strict 5e" Like a Difficulty Setting

Preamble:
After browsing the content both here and on reddit, I'm hearing a lot of similar comments: BG III should be less like DOS:II and should adhere more strictly to 5e rules. This ranges from critiques about surface control, whether or not bows should benefit from height, how abundant potions, scrolls and magic items should be, or letting you pick your starting gear because the handbook allows you to choose starting equipment. In each case, I'm hearing roughly the same criticism: wherever BGIII deviates from strict 5e rules is bad. And this makes sense. We all have had amazing experiences in 5e and bringing that into such a high-fideleity world be kickass.

Personally, I don't agree - I'm pretty happy with compromises where 5e rules would be too confusing or would bog down gameplay. As it is, I'm sometimes scratching my head trying to figure out how something works not because of the gameplay itself but because of how faithfully Larian's adapted the 5e ruleset ... and I've DM'd for a year and played for two. You could almost pull out the manual to help understand how to play BGIII better. Just think what it'd be like starting this game up with absolutely zero DnD pre-knowledge! I'd be lost. Furthermore, DnD rules were built for a pen and paper system, not a video game. Games like Magic the Gathering and Gloomhaven don't translate well to digital because they were made for a different mode. Instead, you have to kind of adapt them to the video game format to take advantage of some of the things you just can't do around a table or behind a DM screen. Any adaptation means you have to make some compromises with the source material for the new medium (in this case a video game).

The main idea:
The point isn't that I'm right and the 5e diehards are wrong. I love you guys. What if BGIII could serve both audiences by allowing you to spin up a "high fidelity" or a "creative liberty" version of the game at startup?
- High Fidelity: Strict 5e rules. No more achemist's fire, bows do normal damage always, etc. A perfect training ground for your inner DM.
- Creative Liberty: Make it feel like a DnD adventure, but feel free to loosen up the rules and cut some corners to improve UX. A great start for pen & paper virgins.

This way everyone wins!

I have been suggesting in several threads that we do get a "By the book" game mode. Options are always good and lets people play the way they want.

But I have to interject and say that MtG actually works quite well digitally. Magic the Gathering Arena is a good platform for the game. And I think Larian should steal some of its design ideas for reactions. Neither do I see a reason for why fifth edition combat should not translate well into a round based rpg. At the table we are moving minis around like we would 3d models.

As Ascorius said, MTG arena actually works really well as an adaptation of MTG.

DnD is harder I agree.. the freeform spells are a problem to implement, the dialogue does have to have some restrictions. But other than those things the game is pretty simple. Solasta really shows how you can implement 5e into a game and it works fine, though their demo is very short and limited. When their early access comes out in a couple of weeks people need to play that to see what I mean.

There is no conversion issue that excuses the changes made to cantrips. If the surface mechanics weren't already made in D:OS then they would actually have to spend a lot of extra effort to add them.

There is no conversion issue that means we need highground advantage, its just something else that they had sitting around from dos2 that they decided to bring in because they could.

I'm not asking for freeform spells to be added, or for us to do ridiculous things. Grappling and taking actions while prone is apparently a problem since it would require so much animation work.. so fine I wont push back on those. But things like numerical changes, changing whats an action and whats a bonus action, changing what requires concentration and what doesn't, adding surface effects, giving us easy advantage, adding game breakng class features.. these are all design decisions, there is no good reason for this.