Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Latest News Community Update #7 - Romance & Companionship

Yes, everyone gets their own opinion and what they want out of the game. But if sexual content is a "significant element to the overall appeal of the game" to someone then I'm sure someone could refer them to other games where that is supposed to be a bigger part of the game. IMO, this is Dungeons & Dragons and sexual content shouldn't even be on the list of things to put in the game. Playing P&P it's easy and quick to allude to explicit content and be done with it. This, however, is a video game and Larian has opted to put significant resources towards creating sexual content that adds nothing to the game that the classic fade-out didn't also add. Now if I buy the game, i'm really only getting a % of the total content because I don't care for watching sex scenes.

People play differently. One of the groups I played with was entirely made up of couples. At one point the DM decided to replace the lovers with doppelgangers to see if we could spot the difference between the character and the double. "I'm going to try and seduce the guard!" was a frequent ploy that usually produced lots of laughter and blushing. Yeah, we 'faded to black' and didn't require details but that group did have romances in pen and paper version of D&D.

Hey, I agree that this stuff really doesn't seem like it belongs in D&D. I think it's overdone in movies and TV as well. Just doesn't seem necessary, and is often boring. But Larian doesn't seem to me like the sort of company who would willy-nilly decide to throw so much time into something that they haven't vetted. If they didn't and it continues to be received the way it has in this thread, they'll lose more than any of us.

I like a good relationship system in an RPG (I wish they would say more n how it is to work), don't care for romance itself (prove me wrong Larian! - not by making a digital porn video though) but I couldn't peeled my eyes from the video hoping for another look at this magnificent beauty:

It's interesting how reactions to this update seem to be the opposite of how people have reacted to this game thus far.

For me as a strong critic, this was a good update, maybe even an awesome update. Just to get the sex issue out of the way, my attitude on romances in cRPGs is very absolute: either go all the way and include everything (so NO CHEESY fade to black) or else leave romances out altogether. I greatly value realism even in my games.

But this update had so much more. It was a great update about decisions, choices, and consequences. And that stuff is the heart and soul of the RPG experience for me. I LOVE that they phrased this entire discussion as being about RELATIONSHIPS, with romances being just one part of it all. Relationships is what it ought to be all about, including a great variety of different types of relationships, both between your PC and NPCs as well as among NPCs with each other. And, there was a lot in there about how your custom character will not be shortchanged relative to the Origin characters in this department. This means a lot to me as someone who will not ever play an Origin character. Heck they even revealed that at some point one of your companions may not survive because of reactions between you and that companion, as in you kill them. Awesome! The evil companions must DIE!! For someone like me who very strongly favors the outside-of-combat roleplaying parts of a cRPG, this was a hugely meaningful update.

The one thing that left me a bit confused/concerned was this from the Q&A:
Will companions be interchangeable during long rest?
Yes, at the start of your adventure your recruited companions will be at camp when not in the adventuring party, and can be swapped in and out at camp. Just like friends in real life! After the first act however you are going to have to commit, also just like in real life.

That very last sentence is what has me concerned.

It means that like in DOS2, after Act 1 your party is fixed and cannot be changed.

But hey, "it's not DOS3!" ...

It just means that the story will be fixed and linear like in DOS. You will basically be on rails through the acts with "large" maps that you can explore, but not return to after you complete each act.

Seriously?! Because if this is the case, that would be awful.

+1


Why does it concern you? Personally, I dislike the Get-them-all feel of most modern RPGs - while BG1&2 didn't exactly block companions you did adventure with the party, I did generally stick to certain party composition. I still do so in modern RPGs (PoEs Kingmaker) with other guys only joining for quests. I find it somewhat cheap that one can experience "everything" while not actually not using companions. I didn't really know Kana, Hiravias or Takehu until I traveled with them for the majority of the game. I don't mind having to commit more.

That's one of the things I liked in D:OS2, though they could have done something more interesting with it. It sounds good to me on paper - we have one chapter to explore companions available to us and form the party for the adventure. And if companions are good enough then subsequent playthrough would feel more different, then "you got everyone" approach. It would be cool though, if non picked comanions would still be in the game in some form - perhaps join enemies or get turned into mindflayers and such.

Sure, but if Swen didn't tell me I would be thinking they were all good from what we've seen so far.

If I had to hazard a guess, I’d say that it means that only 4 of the total x characters are going to successfully extract their tadpoles.

my thoughts exactly. pure contrivance, just like the source collars.

this game is pound for pound turning in to an upgraded DOS2.

It does resemble, but the plot here is far better.

My concern is the camp for now. Are we gonna be teleported from the Underdark or a cavern everytime you take a long rest? Or you will not be able to take long rests in Underdark?

we actually don't know if the plot is better. it's the setting that's better, and all of that is pre-written for them.

I can see where you're coming from on this, but I just don't like it. I see it as a limit on my roleplaying, and I don't care for anything that limits my roleplaying. I think it ultimately comes down to whether you are big into replaying this game. People who expect they will replay this game a lot will probably not care. But those gamers who typically don't replay a game a lot, or at all, will likely not be happy. For my part, I also value greatly the notion of being able to tailor my squad for the mission at hand.

If this ends up being how the game is set up, the importance of being able to increase party size to six becomes even more huge.

I imagine that there must be different camp “biomes,” so I’m not too worried about that.

And the whole pet companions travel with you to a new biome? Guess we will find out soon.

Fair enough. I for one prefer for the mission to be tailored to my squad - I am fine with certain quests or paths becoming unavailable.

Hi people,

I just watched the Romance community update. It seems that Larian do take a lot of care to implement romance as a narrative and cinematic feature.
They want players to care about the characters and impact that such relations have on the story.

But I want to suggest something that could take that impact to the next level - gameplay.
What if characters who are in love could gain a treat that would enable them to react to things that happen in the fight? Perhaps even automatically?
For example, Shadowheart could have a chance to cover the player with a shield from an attack, or the player character could immediately counterattack the monster who hurt their love interest. Rule-wise it could work based on the reaction rules similar to some spells to stay true to the DND source.

The closest I have seen to this was either the new unique skills in Tyranny, permanent buff to the stats in NWN:Mask of the Betrayer, or the friendship system in the XCOM series.
Of course, it may be seen as an imbalance, but imagine the impact such system could have on the player. We would spend 60 to 80% of our time in combat, and having romance change something about how characters behave in combat and not just in dialogue would be precious and previously unseen in RPGs.

What do you think?

Lol, how did you manage to analyze all that based on seing a few sketches? Anyway since you somehow know how many hours Larian has spent on each different section of the game could you share some of this insight and where you learned it from? Id be greatly interested in such info.

To continue following up on my take of this update, I think it is stuff like this that Larian should've led with following the February announcement, rather than focusing on combat as the first thing we were exposed to. Decisions and choices and consequences and relationships and storytelling and roleplaying: this is what is most important in a ROLEPLAYING game. For people like me, it is as I learn now, belatedly, more about these aspects of the game that I have a more positive reaction to the game. But unfortunately, I have already soured on the game quite a bit from all that I had been exposed to in the first few months after the reveal, because that was all about combat which is always a very divisive and controversial area in games like this one. And that's too bad.