Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Mega-threads and Guides The Turn-Based/Real Time with Pause topic

Im watching the live stream now, combat is turn based, not both. Out of combat you can move out of turn based for travel purposes, Combat is turn based.

Turn-based is not a deal-breaker for me but I implore the devs to keep a few things in mind:
1) More camera angles please, I want it to pan and zoom in on the character when they're launching an attack etc. The kill shots were all bugged in the preview but I liked the concept nonetheless. Combat doesn't feel fluent/seamless right now. Sometimes it's like watching paint dry.
2) More variety in the soundtrack. If regular battles are going to take several minutes each looping one and the same track over and over will give me (and probably not just me) a headache.
3) The characters ought to have (more) battle cries and taunt the enemy occasionally (vice-versa as well), stuff in that vein will make fighting less boring.
Can't think of anything else right now but to me combat seems to be the weakest link in the chain at the moment. I was rather impressed with everything else.

All excellent points. A template for a custom soundset (combat only at least) would be welcome.

Listen to Larian prattle dishonestly like manipulative con-men:



Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 are also played in rounds. Being played in rounds has no bearing on whether something makes sense to be TB or RTwP.



Literally, all of that is possible in RTwP, and without wasting any movement. Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 feature an auto-pause option that pauses the game after each character round so that not a single inch of movement is wasted. But playing in a way that doesn't waste any movement actually takes more time than playing in real-time. So, there's nothing "harder" about RTwP - and previously people have even been trying to argue that BG3 ought to be TB because it makes the game harder. So, it really appears that dishonest people will flip-flop any which way to rationalize what they want, rather than basing their proposals on understanding and reason.

And it seems clear that Larian are sellouts and con-men, as well as hack developers if they went with TB because "we know turn-based". The probable reality is that they simply calculated that they could exploit Baldur's Gate's fans and D:OS fans by making BG3 a reskin and clone of D:OS while using the BG name.

Dont have much time to go in details just now but , for me :

For this kind of game, turn based combat is perfectly fine. My worries on BG3 is not here at all.

Could you please elaborate on your second statement?

Tomorrow yes. Just now going to sleep. 5 hours left until i wake up for my job !
But to resume it : when i play on a game like this i personnaly dont mind about having nervous fights.

In the DoS games, for exemples, turn based combat never was a immersion-breaking thing. I was deeply involved in the story and the characters...
So if it s like DoS 2 , yes, i m ok because i love DoS type of games.

If a want nervous fight on RPG , i play to anothers games ( bethesda games for exemples ).
I dont expect intense fights from a larian game.

If they give me a wonderfull story, well written characters and a GM mode... i ll be happy.

It s my personnal view of course.

As a BG fan and somewhat of a Divinity fan I would prefer to have either options or real time with pause. I would also prefer if there was an option to play with classic ruleset instead of Larian's idea of good for cRPG (no offense, they are very much right in regard of mainstream audience that is not familiar with cRPG at all).

I just don't want to play Divinity spinoff with all same gameplay. I love Divinity for what it is, but I also love BG for what it is. I would not want one to replace the other.

Also I really do hope there will be no crafting and randomly rolled stats like in Divinity. I really would prefer loot to be the way it was in BG, also hopefully no "leveled" loot. Or at least an option to not have any of that.

I'm hoping it will be as faithful to the original games as possible.

Yeah, BG 3 definitely needs to be able to be played in RTwP.

This reveal is so incredibly disappointing. Larian gave off an impression that they were a studio of integrity and talent, but here they've sold-out and are proving themselves to be a one-trick pony that doesn't have confidence in themselves to do anything other than their D:OS formula. I guess that the mask has come off. They had a one-hit wonder and don't believe in themselves enough to do right by another series' needs.

Buying a license for Baldur's Gate was pointless for Larian. They're just doing fan-service to D:OS fans with it. This means they'll be losing money due to WotC taking a big cut from their profits, while they aren't serving the fans of BG and will just have people upset with them. They would have had just as much attention if they'd made another D:OS game - which is precisely what it appears they have been doing.

Calling this game Baldur's Gate 3 is a lie. And Larian is hereby shown to be without integrity or courage, showing that they believe themselves to be a one-trick pony studio without the talent to do something different.

I still cannot understand why people are so bent in saying that the gameplay showed that it is a DoS2 clone if they are clearly using the D&D5e ruleset and spells. I mean, no cooldowns, dice rolls, misses, critical misses, spell slots, the dying 5e mechanics, skills like shove, the mage hand...

So, Fallout 4-NV and Mass effect are a Call of duty clone because they are both 3rd person FPS?
And I suppose Skyrim and Witcher 3 are a clone of Assassins creed because they are Action RPGs too...

The combat ruleset is very diferent, as it is the combat mechanics in DOS games and the ones you use in 5e. If you say that the graphics are similar... well they are using an improved version of the game engine of Larian so...

Neverwinter nights 2 and the first witcher game both use the Aurora engine and nobody that played those games will say that they are both clones because the games have very different mechanics even if they look similar.

I am not going to say that I´m thrilled with the idea but Sven Vincke from Larian and Mike Mearls from WoTC keep on saying that the videogame is based in D&D5e, sword coast setting, and the Baldur´s gate Adventures MiBG and DiA; not in the first games. They were very forthright even from the first interview so I kinda expected that.

Just 3 simple exemple that are exactly the same in DoS :

1) The way they move the rocks and other items.
2) The way they can throw grease and flame it.. (same for the barrel)
3) The line appearing for you to target ennemies...

I'm not saying this is bad, I llove BG1 and 2 and I like D:OS... But open your eyes if you don't understand "why people say it's the same".

Changing the background ruleset can be subtle thing that doesn't ultimately change the experience of playing a game. Or, it could change the experience quite a bit, for good or bad. But unless either the old or new system was particularly bad, I think it will hardly make a difference to the experience of playing the game. Playing D:OS 2 with its original TB combat and playing D:OS 2 with its combat replaced with D&D 5e rules is likely just about identical experience. It certainly won't be like playing the game with RTwP, or even better, playing an entirely different game with RTwP.

Basically, the underlying ruleset doesn't mean nearly as much as some people are making it out to be. The large majority of players probably couldn't even tell the difference. In either situation, they're choosing actions per turn, and those actions they choose per turn either succeed or fail. That's what they experience. You don't directly experience the background rulesets, you experience your actions succeeding or failing.

RTwP vs TB isn't as subtle a change as that, it changes the direct experience of the combat, and it shapes how environments are designed.

Ultimately, it's appearing as though Larian have sold-out and consider themselves a one-trick pony. I thought Larian had more confidence in themselves and also more integrity than what they're showing here. This is a very disappointing move by Larian. And their claims of wanting to be accurate to D&D is just a cop-out, making them even more disappointing.

Larian could have made a D&D game without using the Baldur's Gate series. They could have made a D&D game that includes the city Baldur's Gate, without claiming it's Baldur's Gate 3. They could even have made a D&D game that includes the city Baldur's Gate while including the name Baldur's Gate in the game title without claiming that the game is the third entry in the original Baldur's Gate series. But what Larian have chosen to do is to cash-in on the original Baldur's Gate series' name and the goodwill it has from its fans while being unfaithful to the series and betraying its fans. It's a sell-out move. This game that Larian has shown is not a Baldur's Gate 3, and it appears to instead be a D:OS 2.5 or a D:OS 3.

So, since I can move a rock in Assasins creed and in Teltale´s The walking dead game, they are clones. Thanks for enlighten me.

I´m pretty sure that if you change the game mechanics, story and stuff you change the way you play the game, even if you use the same engine. Or you are trying to say that the first Witcher game and NWN2 are the same game because they use the same engine?. Or Disco Elysium and Pillars of eternity? Mass Effect, Last of us Metal gear solid and Halo are the same game because you use firearms to shoot stuff?

There are so many differences between D&D5e rules in character creation, skills and combat mechanics and the ones that are used in DoS games that I could be here until tomorrow. You do not have cooldowns for starters, you have to rest to regain abilities so you have a limited number of spells you can use in combat. You do not do more damage from above, like in dos games, you can sneak everywhere in dos games, not in shadows or places with cover, You do not have character classes so your character can learn any ability or spell, you do not have to roll to see if you make it, you do it or not in dos....etc, etc, To be honest, the only thing they have in common is that they are both turn-based games.

Verdict: In.

Larian: Incredibly, amazingly, and yes... predictably, Stupid.

*Sooooo* much money they will lose. I'll be surprised if they are still around in a few years.

That cgi was incredible. But once Sven started talking and you saw the dated graphics, re-used color palettes, and that utterly BORING TB gameplay as he fumbled through a clearly not ready for reveal build of the game... it becomes clear how much of a mistake this has been.

I mostly feel bad for the hard core BG and IE fans who were excited about the game but were unaware of the possibility of this change until now. Just lots of angry gamers about to let Larian and WOTC know they done ****** up.

...

lol.

There are a lot of TB and D&D fans out there, I´m sure they are not worried about sales.

I dunno, I wouldn't say I'll be angry if it turns out to be more Divinity and less BG. I'll just be disappointed and will very likely just skip. Can always go for another BG1-2 playthrough, or play smth like Pathfinder - which is not the same universe, but delivers on similar cRPG real-time combat.

To be honest I didn't have high hopes when it was announced, because I definitely saw the probability that they will be too afraid to deviate from DOS formula, or that they will not have manpower to make something that would really be next level. And that's not even on them - industry proved time after time that resurrecting old titles usually turns out bad either to shoddy quality and lack of effort, or due to new developers not understanding what "faithful to the series" means.

I'm cautiously looking forward to the new Vampires: The masquerade, but I won't be too surprised if some stuff like this comes up closer to the release (aka "we are toning down on rpg element, it will feature 1 skill tree and action gameplay").

I hope the build they shown was old and they do have real time combat planned and more strict PnP ruleset. But if it's not there I won't mind just skipping another IP resurrection attempt.

Is it feasible to have RTwP and Turn Based as options? I've played most of the D&D games that have been made, and I'd love to play BG3, but turned based is not something I'm going to play because, aside from being a colossal waste of time, it breaks the illusion to see these guys just kind of standing around shifting their weight from side to side or running in place while one person/monster attacks. Maybe they step forward to make their attack and step back. Then the next person steps up and does their little dance and goes back to their designated spot. I'm sure it works well for RTS but it's unsuited to Dungeons & Dragons. And no, even after Temple of Elemental Evil was patched, it still sucked precisely because it was turn based. Even games like Eye of the Beholder 2 had real time combat (without pause), which was still better than turn based.

I see all this rage and I'm reminded of a year 2008 when a little game called Fallout 3 came and blew everyone away. Sure it's different, but that doesn't mean it's automatically a bad thing. In fact the situation is very similar.

Does no one remember how bad RTwP pause is? Can anyone name an RPG that has this system, where the combat is actually good?

None, of the Infinity Engine games had good combat in my opinion. In fact it is generally the only thing people agreed was a negative aspect of those games.

PoE and Tyranny suffer because of RTwP. POEII is better with TB due to being actually able to chain abilities and use support skills/spell effectively. Sure this is subjective, but the fact that all skills and abilities can now be used properly confirms that in terms of being able to play the character(s) you created TB is the only viable option.

Dragon Age is one of the best examples of the RTwP system being ok, but its filled with trash mob fights, and only works because of the almost TB implementation. You can't play that game effectively with RT, you need to constantly pause, making it essentially a TB game in all but name.

Fallout 3... well as much fun as VATS was, it is a compromise and it make real time useless, and there lead to playing it as TB almost required. FO4 proves how bad VATS is when you cant stop it, and 76 nails the point home.

KoTOR. Maybe the best RTwP combat system ever made. And again its because it leans of TB roots, and combat sequencing that is essentially TB in execution.

RTwP is inferior in any party based game. You limit control, reduce the ability to use your skills, spells, and abilities, and rely on automation which weakens agency.

The only reason to want RTwP is if you want to speed up the game. And if that's the case then play an aRPG like The Witcher series, or Skyrim. These are also great games, and seem more in line with the experience people want to complain about the lack of RTwP.

The Gold Box games (Pool of Radiance, Curse of the Azure Bonds, Secret of the Silver Blades, Champions of Krynn, etc) clearly demonstrate how much better DnD combat is when it uses rounds/turns.

For DnD TB is the only logical option. As much as I love BG (as you can see below), the move to TB is the most welcome change, even more than the graphical upgrade.

If you like RTwP, I get it and I am sorry that you're unhappy. But it's been 20 years and much has changed. Complaining about it not being in the game, would be akin to complaining that thac0 is no longer in the game. It's just not relevant anymore.



Also don't dare make statements about old school BG/IE fans. You speak for yourself, not anyone else. I am one of the most loyal and longtime fans of the BG games, and I do not consider RTwP to be even remotely important to the identity of the franchise. If you do, then in my opinion you've missed the point of what the games are actually about.