Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Mega-threads and Guides Party Size Discussion

Fair enough, but a party of six is less tactical than 4. In most games I play with a party of 6, I tend to find the sweet spot with my characters and I just go through the whole campaign only with one group. Having only 4 characters forces me into thinking ahead of combat encounters to decide whether I go more with a melee focused group, a ranged one or a magic centric build. It enforces decision making rather than getting the player lazy about choices. And I prefer that personally.

I think we can all safely bet that there will be a mod that remove the 4-man party restriction. Whats more of an issue is the scaling of combat, as you point out. Ideally there would be scaling within the game that factors in party size and party level (just like in pnp). If you create a mod that allow you to have 6 members but dont scale the encounters it will suck and its alot to ask from a modder to re-balance every encounters in the game.

Let's say Xcom is less tactical than DoS ?
Less choices is not more tactical... You can imagine way more things in a team of 6 and have more options.
Restrein team number to force "specialized team build" is not equal to "tactical" to me. It's just another constraint you can create yourself.





A mod is not always the best to balance the game as you said.
It would be cool we have the option on the base game so we can feel the true BG3 experience.

It's even more so the case in xcom because as it doesn't have so much variety in terms of classes and styles of gameplay compared to a fantasy setting, it is just a matter of adjusting encounters according to the number of characters. Adding more characters to the team doesn't change anything at all. And so if you can do fine with more, you can do fine with less.

In DOS or BG3 it's totally different because the classes are so hugely diverse that it makes a world of difference whether you bring mages, rogues, clerics or fighters into the fray, each role being so specific. Then again, by reducing the number of slots available, you force the player into making tactical decisions he or she would have never made by always bringing the same group and always cheesing the same tactics refined after each encounter.

And yeah I agree. Modding the game into a 6 slots team will be a disaster in term of balance. The best way to make the game boring as f.

What hyperole? If traps are weak enough that a fighter can literally walk through an entire dungeon setting them all off without the fighter dying and without the traps being a threat to the party then why bother with traps at all? That's why I grew to hate coop play with other players doing D&D online. After more than a dozen attempts I gave up on the game because exactly the same thing happened every time - people had zero interest in teamwork or even a hint of roleplaying. Every time the other players just threw caution to the wind and zergged through setting off ever trap and killing everything in sight and opening every treasure chest before I could cautiously advance more than few rooms.

You do understand that a good rogue is useful for more than only finding and disarming traps, right? They can also be very effective in a scout/sniper/pathfinder role to do recon for the party to help develop a sound tactical plan, they can do flanking and backstabbing, they can snipe mages to interrupt spell casting. A mage that can never get off a spell is not a threat. A mage that dies from a backstab is not a threat. If rogues are not necessary then why bother with traps? Another way to effectively use a rogue after it has done enough Recon is to get aggro on the enemy can then draw them back to the party waiting in over-watch to ambush the attackers with enfilading fire before the fighters at point engage in melee. If rogues are not necessary for scouting and recon and flanking and backstabbing then it seems as though a lot of tactical nuance is not necessary, and that seems a lot like mind numbing hack and slash.

The party of four you describe has no redundancy to make up for losses/casualties during encounters. One fighter? I always had two because after getting above L6 or L7 losing at least one fighter to a spell becomes the norm. Losing both fighters isn't the norm, but even that happens some time. Then the pure cleric is the tank. One cleric? I always have a dual class C/M because losing the cleric to a spell gets common at the middle levels so the party needs the dual class character to maybe keep the party alive. One mage? Again, I always have that dual class C/M as backup for when the mage gets taken out of the fight.

My goal in every dungeon/encounter is to always use proper recon and tactics to survive without ever having to do a reload. If I have to reload then I've failed. I hate having to rely upon the save and reload copout. I prefer to have save & reload as the rare exception rather than the norm.

20-30? How about at least three or four or five? And you have the gall to accuse me of hyperbole. If its easy enough and tactics lite enough for four I don't have much confidence that replaying will be likely. Granted, a party of four makes that more likely than a "party" of one or two. That's why I never finished Morrowind, and never replayed Neverwinter Nights or Daggerdale - no party so not much use for tactics.

Amen.

So far I didn't like RPGs with only 4 companions. That said if the map and quest design is good enough... What if paths will be varied enough to not require "trap and picklock" guy? What if we won't HAVE to have priest for buffs and 100% protection from things that are bound to kill us otherwise? If those things that you usually HAVE to have will become optional boons opening new paths... that could be interesting.

In D&D 5e roles overlap a lot. A ranger can be a capable healer, a fighter or a cleric could disable traps, druids are excellent scouts, bards could... well could be anything from healing to diplomatic duties to thievery, etc.

I'm hoping this game is not just a great successor to the BG series, but the best D&D game ever made and THE gold standard 5e game. I just don't know very many DM's that cap their party size at 4, and I would be hesitant to play at their table if they forbid it. DnD is a shared storytelling experience. The interactions between characters and the richness of their stories is a major element of that tabletop experience - and was a quality of BG that helped evoke that feeling of tabletop DnD's depth and breadth within the game.

I want to play with a bunch of different character/class combos. Page 83 of the DMG says that the ideal party size is 3-5 players. Most of the official adventure modules are written for 4-5 or 4-6 players.

Why restrict us to the low end of the standard WotC DnD party size? The only answer seems to be additional effort (and time) on Larian's side, both to create the characters/dialogue and to update the Divinity framework to allow it. I hope this is revisited during Early Access and beyond, because it feels like a Larian-imposed restriction not found in the sources they're building on top of.

Sure, but they don't do those things very well. That's the problem you get when everyone can do (a little of) everything. Nobody does anything particularly well.

That's what AD&D 2nd edition was for: nobody fought like a fighter, nobody healed like a cleric, nobody stole like a thief, or made things explode like a wizard, or...spoke to plants...like a druid, or whatever it is druids do. The roles were way more defined back then.

Nah, that was in previous versions of D&D. Bards could master any skill, only some rogues could rival them. They also could fulfill any role you can think of if you build them accordingly.

Rangers have healing spirit, something that even clerics do not have, so they are fantastic healers. They only lack mass healing. Even celestial warlocks, bards or some sorcerers have buff and healing capabilities.

Druids have pass without a trace and could turn into animals ( even animals with swimming, flying or burrowing capacities later on), and also have several spells at their disposal to detect enemies. They are one of the top scout class of the game by far. Wizards and Bards excel at it using their familiar to scout ahead.
There are several hybrid subclasses that allow fighters or rogues to have access to wizard spells, so they could provide arcane support.

Any character with enough dexterity could use thieving tools to open locks/disable traps, etc. And since there are weapons that use dex for attack and damage, there are fighters, monks or rangers that could be excellent trapspringers.

Paladins, bards or sorcerers could be great faces for the group, due to his high carisma, but any character could learn the dialogue skills.
etc etc

I don't buy this. But for the sake of argument, if you are right, then what exactly is the point of having classes? Effectively, every class is considerably the same as at least one other class and maybe more, and all the classes significantly overlap each other. So in truth you have a classless system with fake classes to give the illusion of a class-based system. Nope. Don't buy it at all. A cornerstone of D&D has always been its distinctive class-based system, and although 5e has weakened the distinctiveness of classes it has not erased their distinctiveness the way you describe it.

There are differences between classes and the roles that you can have in a party. In 5e the different classes are very flexible, many classes could fulfill different roles. So usually it´s not needed to have 6 different characters to take care of 6 different roles in the party.
Already gave you lots of examples, if you don´t buy it and think I do not describe it accurately I hope you have any facts that back your claims because yours sounds a baseless and prejudiced opinion from my viewpoint.

I don't know 5e well enough at all, so I can't comment oh who is right. But I can say I do hope classes mean more. It's ironic, though, since I used to bemoan the rigidity of 'classes' for so long. But maybe because there seems to have been so little of the old school class system recently I am actually looking forward to more of it (e.g no other class can match a rogue in lockpicking).

While some roles can be done, in different ways, by multiple classes, every class is still unique due to the class-specific skills and abilities that are, IMO, enough to keep classes unique. That's at the class level, not the subclass level. Subclass has less uniqueness, IMO, in some cases. Fighter for example, battle master has way more flexibility and uniqueness than the champion due to all the combat abilities they get. No other class can mimic a battle master enough to be considered an alternative for that 'role'.

Yeah I don't buy this either. All the things you listed _Vic_ are unique abilities to each classes, it doesn't make them better.

A bard was a master of skill, yes, and it was ITS strength. Fullfilling any role ADEQUATELY if build accordingly? Yeah I can see that. Being better in said role than the class it emulates? Nah man, just nah.

The ranger's healing spirit, the druid's pass without trace, the thief and fighter's sub classes that allow them to use wizard spells, the paladin's healing abilities...all of these things you mention are abilities that DEFINE a class, allows it to have a certain flavor and be able to cover more ground inside a party and to be able to help where needed. However they will never equal the class whose primary abilities it copies. I wouldn't trust a ranger to support the healing needs of a party like a cleric could. No class comes close to a fighter's close quarter capabilities and sheer number of feats. The wizard remains the absolute master of magic even if bards can cast some arcane spells ans even if every class can pick an odd lock, the thief is still the master backstabber and has access to feats that makes a thief, well, a real thief.

I still think AD&D 2nd was where the classes were the most defined. However, the classes are still really well defined in 5E.

As I said before, I´ve never said that the classes are less unique, I said that a class could fulfill a lot of roles, so it doesn´t matter if you do not have a cleric, a warrior of a rogue in the party, for example, because there are many other classes that could do their job, even more than in previous editions. Also never said I liked it that way, I was exposing bare facts.

You do not seem to understand that the skills, saves and attack rolls in 5e are calculated by 2 things: Proficiency and stat. And ANY CHARACTER has the SAME proficiency number at the same level with their trained skills. And the background, some subclasses and feats allow you to train in skills outside your class.

A wizard or cleric trained in survival or animal handling(ie. outlander or folk hero background) with wisdom enough would be as skilled as a ranger living in the wild. They will have EXACTLY the same skill number: With 14 wis your wizard or cleric will have +4 at level 1 +5 at level 5 +6 at level 9 . etc Same as your Ranger. Possibly even better than your ranger in the long run because clerics usually have more wisdom.

That means that a fighter or a rogue trained in medicine with the same wisdom stat would treat wounds, stabilize your fallen party member and identify diseases as well as your cleric or your druid.

A wizard with high investigation could be better than some rogues at detecting traps because they possibly have higher int and could be trained in thieve´s tools as any other character with the criminal background, for example.

Any wizard or artificer are potentially better than any cleric or druid at knowledge nature and religion because the main stat is INT, not WIS (and those classes usually have much more) so they could take care of the tasks that require it without a divine spellcaster.

A barbarian trained in arcana (just pick the sage background) with 14 int would have the same number in arcana as a sorcerer with the same int of the same level.

Your sorcerer, warlock or paladin could be much more intimidating or charming than your fighter or your barbarian or rogue because those classes usually do not need CHA.
Your barbarian, wizard or rogue could be as skilled as your bard at performing because there are several backgrounds and feats that allow you to be trained in performance or a particular instrument of your choice.

The only difference could be rogues and bards that could get specialization in some skills so they could be better than average at several skills.

Anyone could take a look at how character creation and classes/subclasses work at 5e and take a look for himself. That´s the jam now in 5e.
Heck, even now with the Tasha´s new book you´re not even restrained by the races` and you could pick your own: ¿You want a half-orc with +2 dex and the stealthy feature? you can.

That also means that a sorcerer has the same hit% that a Barbarian or a fighter if they have the same weapon and the same Dex/STR. There are even lots of subclasses that allows bards, warlocks or clerics to have armor proficiences and the same attacks/turn as a barbarian, paladin or a ranger, so you may forfeit your frontine warrior and use one bard, warlock or cleric build instead without even multiclassing.


If you do not have a rogue or a ranger, your druid or your wizard could be your scout and use the thieve´s tools. If you do not have a cleric or a druid your ranger or your celestial warlock or sorcerer could do the healing, your rogue or barbarian could be your diplomat, your bard your melee fighter, your cleric could be as good at tame animals, using survival skills and spot creatures(still retaining their healer role), etc etc.
You may tell me that a warrior would do warrior stuff, a healer would heal or a rogue would do trickery stuff at 100% efficiency, but there are many other classes that could do that at a 90% efficiency. So yeah, you win, there´s a difference, there are classes better suited for a particular role, but that does not mean that plenty other builds that could cover for it if you do not have/want that class in your party in 5e.


Played lots of games without a cleric, a rogue or a warrior and find that the party could do fine without them because other classes could cover it without much of a fuss.When you are playing you do not notice the difference that much, unless for very situational roles ( i.e. A cleric in a tomb full of undead would be useful to turn them, a bard, ranger, druid or a Firbolg if you want to talk with some plants or forest inhabitants, etc)

Um, gotta disagree with you there. For most of the skill based examples you give, sure, yeah, not gonna debate you on that. 5e leveled out a great deal of the skills, experience and made a lot of stuff flexible or same in that regard. However, you lost me at the "there are many other classes that could do that at 90% efficiency." Nope. Just not true for a great many things.

Ranger never gets access to a wide range of spells the cleric does. Need remove curse? Best of luck to ya. Need a raise dead? Never gonna happen. The ranger literally caps at spell level 5 with a far more limited spell list, compared to a huge spell list for clerics and top out at of course level 9 spells. How does the ranger then fulfill the role of "healer" at 90% efficiency? About one of the only class relations I would agree with that statement remotely is bard, wizard, sorcerer, warlock, but those are all magic focused classes anyway with variations. But can any other non magic class cover the role of a "wizard" at 90% efficiency? Again, it's a no. Not gonna happen. No class that doesn't max out at lvl 9 spells is going to even hold a candle to a class that does. A paladin may be able to heal but again, not like a cleric. A spell sword might be able to cast magic but not like a wizard or sorcerer. Anyway, the point I wanted to make was already made. Skills, yes that's one thing (except I still want a rogue for the specializations for rogue like things.) But saying one class can be adapted to be 90% as good as another class at something I simply see as just not true. Conflating various mostly non class skills & backgrounds with actual class skills and progression which is NOT the same. And I'm not here to argue and you clearly know your stuff regarding the game but I feel that was a pretty generous over exaggeration.

And as far as what works in a table top game, I don't really see that as incredibly relevant because most DMs that aren't shooting for a TPK are going to be nice and adjust for some of the weaknesses in the party where as hard code is unlikely to do that. Don't have the speak with animals? Well I guess you aren't doing that then hmm. Want to get through this door? Oh well, you're going to need a rogue with specialization for this best item in the game...

To me though all of this back and forth about CAN you do this or that with a smaller party is moot though because clearly there are lots or even more people that would love to at the very least have the option of a 6 character party, which has been the standard in basically all of the previous games from Icewind Dale to BG to Neverwinter and some of the games that have come after like Pillars, Kingmaker etc as well. If it ain't broke don't fix it, and certainly don't take away 2 characters and say, well its fine, you can just try to squeeze all that down into 4 characters instead. Ok but, lets make that an option. 6 SHOULD be the STANDARD, not 4. And everybody who is ok with 4 can rationalize it in their own way but I'm just going to keep disagreeing and pointing at the boxes of all the originals, and the fact that they have.... 6. And lastly I'll say it again, personally I'm sick of 4 player max co op games anyway honestly. Which this isn't just any game, it's a D&D game that shares the name with the game that started it all, the original 2D isometric classic. Some things are bound to change but party size being capped at 4 shouldn't be one of them. Swear to goodness if it's capped at 4 it's going to feel like some kind of D&D divinity to me and not actual BG like it should be imo. I guess we need options to make everyone happy as it seems relatively 50/50 or if this thread has any bearing like actually more people would prefer 6 over 4.

Side note: My favorite trilogy of books is the Dragonlance - Tales of the Lance. Wouldn't have been such a great trilogy if they couldn't have ever assembled more than 4 heroes at a time... >.>

Uh We were talking about a game with a level cap of 10 (at least I was) like Bg3 but yeah, for high-levels a full caster will always be superior to dabblers like rangers as you said, of course. Warlocks, bards or sorcerers could make them work for their money, but ultimately specialists would be better at what they do, if only because they could reach the heavenly 9th spells. You are absolutely correct, nothing to say against.
PD: maybe rangers do not have raise dead or remove curse, but pallys and bards can warlocks could cast remove curse too. And to be honest, I´m in love with healing spirit and goodberies, something that clerics lack but I concede a druid would make better use of it than a ranger. Other classes will offer interesting variants that clerics or wizs cannot do, like metamagic or warlock casting.

In regard of spells I concur.

I will add to your statements that a bard (even more lore bard), an artificer or a rogue over level 11 would run in circles around any other character if we measure only skills and tools`competence; in quality and quantity.

First I have to point out yet again that I didn´t mean a class could do the same as the other, I said they could make the same role that other traditional class usually did in previous editions: healer, scout, face, sage, etc. And many of those do not rely on the number and quality of spells you can cast.

In the matter of skills and physical combat all classes are more capable than in previous editions and the difference in competence is not that much. At least in comparison. Many characters could be built to fit the role of frontline fighter, marksman, trap disabler, scout, diplomat, thief, survivalist, know-it-all, etc using classes that were simply not fit in previous editions.(see all the examples above)

Heck, after 5e you have to pick a rogue, artificer or have a cleric and a wiz with a bunch of scrolls of lock if you wanted to deal with traps & locks, now any character could be trained to do it; and some of the best combat and tank builds in 5e use moon druids and warlocks as a base, the most popular without a single level of a traditional warrior class.