Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback We need a Bestiary.

I had suggested this in another thread and a few people seem to reply positively. I believe their really should be a Bestiary of sorts like they do with many other games. Their is such a wide breadth of creatures and lore inherent to the forgotten realms setting that could be better be taken advantage of.

What is a Bestiary?
The Bestiary is a collection of all creatures, both from the mundane to the fantastical which provides you with game statistics (AC/HP,etc) and lore.

How could it work?
This Bestiary would unlock new creatures when you first find them or hear of them, such as from an NPC. Their stats would be revealed via various methods, examples include.

• As you explore, finding books containing lore about the creature.
• When you first encounter them, a automatic skill check (Arcana, History, Nature or Religion) may reveal some information to you.
• After you kill a creature and examine its remains. (Skills as above or perhaps skills such as Medicine, Investigation, Perception, Survival and or Insight)
• Talking to an NPC who knows of the creature or has seen it them self. This could be the quest NPC or a witness to the creature in question
• Another example when you ask an NPC about monster X terrorizing the town. The dialogue could give you the option to roll a (Arcana, History, Nature or Religion). On success some of the lore or stats of the creature is revealed.

Taking a page from older dnd editions, the skills used could be tied to certain creature types as below.

Now their could be some overlap on the creatures depending on the situation, or if say your a necromancer you may be able to use Arcana instead of Religion for undead.

How would it effect the Current state of the game going forward?
We may not know what Larian has in the works for Baldur's Gate 3, but here are some things I can see would be improved or changed based on access to a Bestiary.

• Any components for crafting that creatures drop could be tracked though the Bestiary, likewise any notable recurring loot.
• Since with the examine option you can already view all creatures the groundwork for the Bestiary is already in place. It would involve changing how it functions but I believe overall it would be a more fulfilling experience. Likewise, lower difficulties could bypass the need to learn creature stats and simple have them available for newer players which would give access to the percent to hit.
• Since the Bestiary lists keeps track of all creatures you have seen.When polymorph/summon spells become accessible I believe a Bestiary would allow for the need discover a creatures you want to summon/turn into before you can do so. Likewise once you summon said creature all of its stats (except lore perhaps) would be unlocked.
• The current system uses a percentage to hit display. I believe if it was changed to the suggestion requested by some where it would just display the bonus to hit, advantage, etc. The current percentage system would be only unlocked once you discover a creatures AC, Saving throw, etc. You could then turn off the option to display the percent to hit if you so choose. Or have it automatically show percentages in earlier difficulty's for newer players.
  
  Example Image:
  
  
  
  End Note:
  Would love to hear others feedback or suggestions. While their may be some things I have overlooked I believe this really could add a lot of depth to an otherwise promising game.
  
  Thank you

A Bestiary sounds like a great idea, it feels pretty cheesy that I can just right click a creature and find out it's AC, weaknesses and resistances, and tons of other info on it right in the middle of a battle without even having to make a check to do it.

Something like Pillars 1/2 where the more you fight them and learn about them the more info you have on each creature is a wonderful idea. I did plan on creating a thread about it too but got distracted, whoops! lol. Either get info through fighting and ofc as you said, from books and such.

In the same vain, an encyclopedia. All the lore about deities, locations, etc that you come across gets added on that.

Or we could just stuff Volo into our backpack once we save him -

Hang his head from your belt like Mimir

I would love a beastariy I keep all the books and currently there is little reward for it. I would love an encyclopedia that stores all the acquired lore and information

+1

This is a great idea and well thought out. I agree with pretty much everything you wrote. I'd just add that it would be great to have painted art (as I've seen suggested somewhere else). So you could switch between the default painted image and an in-game model.

I think a proper bestiary would be nice, and having rolls to examine the creatures you are fighting as well. The later was a feature in DOS2, so I think it would be nice to have here as well.

Maybe give some pre-set class knowledge about creatures as well. Like, I am sure a paladin would know at least something about undead/demons, compared to a rogue.

In terms of learning more after killing - I think that may be a bit too much. Just give all the info after you are done killing, similar to what was in Withcer 3, making a minigame out of it will just take away dev time from other aspects of the game.

As someone who DMs DnD 5e:
Um. No, you are not allowed to look in the Moster Manual!

I get the idea though, and I guess if it's tied to some form of skill check, then it could be cool.

The reason most DMs don't allow people looking up the monsters, is so the players won't power game the heck out of encounters.
On the other hand: Wouldn't most people know at least something about Goblins? They are everywhere.

I have changed things up due to this. I have one veteran player who played AD&D/2nd a LOT. When I started doing 5e recently
he didnt realise some things had changed, and metagamed to the party. I told him off and pointed out his flawed thinking.
Of D&D not life in general(to clarify). Though he is a good friend and we can have 'those' debates too.

Love this!!

+1

I think the entry appearing when you kill a creature or read about it is the way to go.

Nice to hear all the positive feedback . Hope its something which is honestly considered by Larian.

With 3D Models or Special Art?

I feel like 3D Models would be cool, plus they're already in the game so it would make adding a Bestiary a bit easier if they just used assets already in the game. Besides, I personally keep finding myself right clicking and examining whenever I encounter a new creature just to get that cool 3D model view of it lol

I like games where I can play the highest difficulty if I know all the rules without meta gaming (e.g. knowing which enemies are where). In my opinion a game which is not beatable on highest difficulty without luck and meta-gaming (knowing encounters beforehand) is a bad designed one. Since in DnD 5e there is a great amount of luck involved you need to have a tactic against enemies if you play your first playthrough on ironman/hard difficulty to increase your chances against bad rolls as much as possible.

There was one comment earlier stating in a typical DnD session a DM would never allow you to see enemy stats. Well yes but the typical DM is also not a machine who would simply kill you with bad rolls. At least the DMs I know always gave my party a chance to escape a bad situation if it was mostly bad luck (and not stupidity) that put us in there. I also would offer a compromise in that case. Don't show the exact stats but show it in words like "Str: Low" or "Dex: Very High" since someone with at least a bit of knowledge (e.g. nature skill or survival skill) should know that a goblin has high Dex. So we know at least what spells or skills to use against them.

And what is most important: List their skills and abilities in the bestiary with the damage they do and status effects they inflict. Again you can do this by using words like "Skill xyz: Damage deadly; target will get prone status; Dex Save". If I have multiple targets and see a skill with damage output deadly then I know exactly that's a fight I shouldn't start (yet).

If I have information about enemies I am going to encounter I can actually make tactical decisions even if it is my first playthrough and that is something I would consider very fair to the player.

A bestiary that updates the more you fight the same monsters. Giving you updated stats, types of attacks, etc. Not to mention lore on a specific monster. You can also get info from books, giving books a gameplay mechanic. Same with an encyclopedia. Locations, Deities, NPC's, etc. Anything you learn about either from interactions, lore objects in the world or books. Updates and keeps tracks. Don't need to remember in a 80+ game, not to mention not everyone knows about everything.

Yeah the player might not have anything to do with a specific deity or location but that doesn't mean it's not worth reading about it because lore is always cool.

+1 to this and i keep having to bring this up, but Solasta have a bestiary that gets update the more you fight with the creature.

They could also implement Nature, Perception, Arcana, and/or History checks in combat when you encounter a new creature.

If you pass, your bestiary could update when you first encounter a creature and reward high intelligence/proficiency in these skills. Or, if you fail, your bestiary updates when you defeat the creature (representing learning its weaknesses through combat/studying the corpse)

A bestiary maintained and updated by Volo could be a lot of fun!