Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General A thread about maximizing the strengths

Personally I've had enough already of reading all the whine about what BG3 is NOT (i.e. RTWP, for a start) and I'd rather have a discussion about how it can become the best of what it is trying to be.

So, please, if you are willing to talk about how to improve BG3 to its best shape possible, feel free to contribute here.
If you just want to complain about things BG3 at this point will never have (real time combat, D&D 2nd edition, etc) don't even bother here, use one of the other threads.

I'd start throwing a bunch of minor considerations that passed on my mind based on the demo:

- I have no particular issues with the current UI, but I'm guessing most of it is placeholder anyway. Personally I'd love to see it assume a more distinctive identity and rely a fair bit less on its resemblance with OS 2.

- Please, Larian, given how you went for highly detailed and somewhat photo-realistic character models in this game (a choice I have no complain about, at all), go for visual effects and animations that MATCH that style. I've already noticed a certain amount of vaguely "cartoony" choices that would have fitted OS 2 far more than this one. Examples include arrows that "curve" down massively at a three meters distance, characters that fall down almost floating horizontally rather than having a proper animation for it, jumping up and down that looks almost comedic in its cartoonish nature rather than a display of athleticism, etc.

- I'm not really feeling this choice to go for party-based initiative rather than having the queue fragmented on individual characters.Is there a significant reason for it?

- I've never been a fan of the "Move one character, the other will follow automatically" approach OS 1 and 2 had with party control. And that "pseudo-third person camera" shown live looked downright terrible, so I'd definitely stick with the distanced camera. Please, give us at least the option to have a more traditional "click and drag" control for selecting one or multiple party members at once as it used to be with BG and let us control their individual positions precisely, without having to resort to convoluted "chain and unchain" mechanics.

- I'm not sure if video compression played a part or what, but... Aren't some of these close-up animations surprisingly choppy? I know it's a work in progress and all, but at time they feel like they were literally skipping any attempt at interpolation, with some jarring effect on the viewer.

- Please, for the love of god, the devil or whatever other fictional character you love to speak to in your head, don't let the loot system become something unreasonably busy like it was in OS 1 and 2. You know, you can improve your inventory all you want, but there's no UI update that will ever be more effective to make inventory management a bit leaner than simply NOT burying your players in a mountain of trash items to begin with.

The loot is fixed they use the exact number from the DND books.

Well, I would hope so, but that's not what I was talking about in this case.

About the UI, can't agree more. It can be a bit more decorative and detailed to objectively look better to most people (albeit a bit more "busy"). I'd be partial to using inspiration from BG1/2 for the style as it could be a nice nod to the old fans (of which I'm one) but it's up to Larian with what art direction to go. Beautifying it would be great in any case, to influence the character/feel of the game.

The arrow trajectories - it would be cool if the characters could "aim" up and down, so it wouldn't happen, but I assume it would involve tons of extra animations. Unless the animators rig some automatic system for it (please :)).

I see the party based initiative as okish. Simplifies the AI, helps the multiplayer, helps do combos, makes combat easier (not a good thing in my book). I like individual one better, but this one is understandable.

I noticed choppy animations, too. Maybe while connecting one mocapped scene with another? This could be improved.

And I agree with the general sentiment about the loot. People can carry less stuff overall, rarely people need to carry much more than the equipment they use and money. Not everyone needs to carry in their pockets apples and sandwiches. People can hunt and buy food when they are hungry.

Hey.
About chaining toons. That's fine with me.

I was curious about group initiative. I know the DM can give the isame nitiative for the same enemies. But players init is typically rolled separately.
I can see tactical advantage of jumping between your characters for more effective use of actions. Eg one character throws oil Barrell. Then next casts fireball.
But if you are facing 10 enemies and they get to act first before your party members then initiative can have a massive impact on combat outcome.

Sooner the beta.. the sooner we can break..er... test it.

I share similar concerns about "group initiative".
I can see the advantages, for sure (I mean, I've been playing for more than two years at XCOM 2 - WotC, for a start. I'd need be blind to miss them), the problem is that I'm not sure they fit this sort of game and I worry they may be massively outweighted by balance issues (both in favor of and against your party)

I don't see the problem with group initiative. Most of the time a DM says roll initiative and the PC all go first and the Goblins go last because the DM is rolling one initiative for all the goblins.

well that depends
usually you roll one initiatve per enemy type.

So youve got all goblin archers acting on one initiatve, all goblin fighter acting on one inititve etc.

I certainly think that this is a change.
I just dont mind it
least i don tthink i do, ill have to see how it plays out in practice

I feel the same about the UI,but I really think and hope it's just a placeholder,I hope they make it more BG in time. Some little concesions like these ones don't hurt the overall vision they have of the game (I think

Same goes for the FX and SFX,they are too cartoony and overfantastic,I dont see the need of the ''air'' ''speed' or whatever you wanna call it when using dash or jump) D&D is of course fantasy but Faerûn has ''real'' pyshics like gravity and such if you know what I mean,it's hard to explain xD It's like the difference between watching a kids cartoon and an animated movie for ''grown ups'' with a darker theme, I can't feel that darker theme with cartoony effects and happy music.

Party based initiative...I think it can bring a lot of unbalance to the game but trying it will decide it. Getting a whole group of monster to act first and gang on your group will be a thing and that in D&D is a death sentence specially at low lvls when a mage have 6 or 8 hp points.
Also I noticed Intellect devourers were too weak and they didn't use multiatack nor damage resistances,I don't know what to think about that.

I would rather select all the party dragging the mouse with a click than manually unchaining and chaining characters over and over,yes. I've never seen any use for that thing

I must say I'm conflicted about the animations,some looks good-ish some would look better being a bit slower (a lot of time they are super fast and not very realistic), sometimes they're choppy as hell,but I think they're on the right tracks,they need to polish them and get them properly finished and I think they can look fantastic. Bottom line,they need work. (They already said on a recent interview they're already improving them tho)

Regarding loot I think they could use a hybrid system with random loot for the most ''filler'' stuff and limiting the amount of rubishh while manually placing the nice stuff.
Magic weapons and other items deserve love and care.

I don't even necessarily think the UI should match the old Baldur's Gate games, Just that (as I said) it should have a more distinctive identity/aesthetic compared to Orginal Sin.