Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Custom character and their story.

Did Larian mention anything about adding a character creation option for "ambitions / aspirations"? I think there could be so much potential with something like this. Imagine a list of, say, 5 general goals you can select from whilest creating your character, such as "seeking an artifact of great power", or "looking for a long lost sibling", or "becoming a renowned hero". The actual plotline stemming from these aspirations can be canned and filled in as Larian desires, with the typical twists and turns we come to expect from Larian's plots. Whatever they feel would make an interesting narrative.

This would add so much life to the custom characters, putting them on the same level as the origin characters and increasing the replayability exponentially.

It seems extremely unlikely. As far as I know, they aren't doing dialogue tags for the Background because that would be too much additional stuff to do, so ambitions/aspirations are certainly also too much.

The issue is they've spent so many resources on making the origin characters playable, that, once again, the custom character is lack luster.

It's a philosophy I fundamentally disagree with. If you're playing DnD, it should be your pc...not one created for you

A big part of the problem with the Origin characters, one that DoS2 didn't have, is that their personalities are directly tied to their class. In Divinity 2, if I want to play as Fane but would rather be a heavily-armored warrior than a squishy wizard, that's no problem at all. But if I want Wynn to be a cleric of Ilmater, well... the dude's a warlock. It's fundamental to who he is.

I love playing paladins and bards in tabletop D&D. But unless Larian adds Origin characters who are paladins or bards, I'm gonna have to make a custom dude if I want to play one. Even then, what happens if the Origin character is a paladin of Bane or something because they thought that would be more interesting than the goody-two-shoes paladin of Torm I'm wanting to be? In a setting with so many aspects to every character choice, it seems kinda... selfish, maybe? Kinda selfish to tell your players, "You can pick from one of these concepts that we think are cool, or have a less fleshed-out experience so you can do something you think is cool. Nerd."

There are 13 backgrounds, so it would not be practical to give dialogue to each of these. HOWEVER, there is a different way to approach this. Mass Effect 1 did an excellent job of giving your character a backstory based around a single event and how your character handled it. Basically it was a famous battle that people knew about and you picked if you were the hero or tyrant of that battle.

Doing something like this for BG3 would allow Larian to create only 1 background for custom characters involving some kind of event. "Oh, you were the person at Baldur's Gate when X happened." That gives one story for a custom origin. You then answer questions (such as telling things to the tadpole like suggested earlier) to define how YOUR custom character interacted with that event.

So, 1 origin for all custom characters that you then define for yourself. Even with multiplayer, these can make characters somewhat individual. Each define for themselves how their character responded to the famous event, and the world responds to them in kind. Otherwise all the unique interaction goes to the gith and drow (or Origin characters).

I want my custom Drow character to be the runaway survivor of her house, who got captured by the illithids and is now seeking to amass followers and power so she can return and crush the rivals who tried to kill her, establishing her own personal Noble house in the process.

Currently, watching as she gets horrified by the slow, agonizing death of a tiefling child, or looks sad/like she pities something, rather than reveling in their misery or outright laughing or anything else like that, is kind of immersion breaking for me, to the point that I felt absolutely no regrets about putting a helmet/mask on my characters face, just so I wouldn't have to see the nonsensical expressions judging how she should be responding *for* me.

Larian says they want people to play evil characters, and put in 'all the evil companions' first, but if this is all they have so far, then it's practically nothing, as even though the companions mostly pushed me towards doing evil things, just for their approval ratings, the game's storyline, quest distribution, and character interactions/dialogue all push you towards playing a good character in spite of that. Even Shadowheart, the devout cleric of an Evil goddess, was disapproving of a number of actions I took, despite playing evil to the best of my logic/abilities, and was approving towards random good-aligned actions.

The custom characters need more than just a [Noble] tag to outline their backstory, which I'm pretty sure would be how Larian would prefer to do it. Just adding in one reply in select conversations that only appear if you have X 'origin' that you select when making your character, in addition to the proficiencies you get currently. They can still add in sections of the game that happen before the current EA starts though, they did with OS2, after all, even if I personally have low faith on that ever happening because of how disappointing game companies can be (And yes, I know game development is really hard, and there's an impossible number of things I don't know about the processes, but I can still be disappointed with the results when I'm not delivered what was promised).

They keep talking about how they want it to be 'As true to Tabletop as possible' so why can't they have individualized segments for going over the background of your custom character for each origin, race, and class, in varying degrees of combination? As has been said previously, Dragon Age: Origins already did something kind of like that, and it's a game over a decade old, so if you're telling me technology hasn't advanced to the point we can get even more detailed backgrounds for our characters than just a singular tag that *might* add a single line of dialogue every hundred-thousand conversations, then I call shenanigans on that.

Having 5 custom origins takes the same resources as having 5 "origin" characters. It is not impossible. People are already offering ways it can be implemented like adding tags for those stories. It is a choice of what do you want to develop, choices for custom characters or more "origin characters" that cater to Larian's tastes instead of player's.

Now, Larian said that custom characters won't be penalized as opossed to the origins, so I would hope that they are looking for ways to make playing a custom character as good as it is to play one of the origins. You should be penalized for liking custom characters over the origin characters. And right now it feels as if the story is about the origin characters, not the custom ones.

On the other hand, it is possible that you are only allowed to play custom characters right now because they are gathering info that would be used to create the custom tags. I hope this is what happen.

To be honest i don't even understand why they would make the Origin characters a thing. Like, i pick Astarion and then what? Become group leader based on his pissy nature and pretend it makes sense? Pick Lae'zel and refuse every sidequest? Maybe Gale or Shadowheart would work, but after playing EA it seems like this is a story that pretty much requires the classic main char formula

Yes I really think they need to do something there with non-origin characters. It would be great if on character creation in addition to background we could maybe have an option to select some sort of generic background storyline.

Not full blown origin companion story, but at least some sort of semi-custom story built by Larian with some unique questlines.

Or heck maybe you could get special quests based on your selected background like if you select Entertainer then maybe a bunch of quests here and there where you get to perform before audience.

+1
I also feel the custom character needs more background, relevance and purpose.

I loathe the fact that Larian have wasted resources on Origin characters.

It's fantastic that they are proud of their characters, but let us enjoy them through their side quests, dialogue and how they interface with our characters and their decisions.

As much as I'd love DA:O style origin stories, I realise it's probably an unrealistic expectation. A much simpler approach that I'd prefer is to see considerably more class, race and (particularly) background specific dialogue options. I played a Hermit in my first playthrough and don't remember a single Hermit specific dialogue option. More background dialogue options will make your character feel so much more alive and grounded in the universe, whilst still leaving players room to make up their own origins/backstories. It could also introduce considerable replayability, exhibiting how different NPCs react to different backgrounds through different playthroughs.

The difference between a Drow and non-Drow playthrough really highlights the potential character-specific tags have in creating a reactive and replayable experience, and I want to see more of it.

Origin characters are not inkeeping with the spirit of either D&D or Baldur's Gate, and the fact is, their existence will be constraining the depth of our custom characters.

I played a Half-Elf Ranger and did have a surprising amount of RANGER specific dialogue options. These mosty revolved around animal interaction, or at the Grove, but at least it makde me feel a little like a Ranger. Although sometimes the Ranger options didn't seem as enticing as some of the other rolled options... I can't remeber the specific example, but there was definitely a moment (possibly with the Owl-Bear) where I didn't feel as though the Ranger option was the best one, and that felt odd given that my knowledge as a Ranger should have given me a better option.

Minor quibble on Ranger dialogue aside... it is a little grating that my silent & oddly eanimated custom character is so wooden in comparison to the Origin characters. I feel worse than generic because the Origin characters have an abundance of whacky backstories and flamboyant speeches, that make me feel like irrelevant Joe Average. Worse, I am trying to figure them out, but no one gives a toss about me (as is to be fair, usual in these games). Even during the scene with Shadowheart I felt it iwas a fleeting one liner, yeahhhh 3/10 for effort on that front. I mean you are trying to make a "getting to know you over a bottle" conversation seem organi, but I am being the perfect date by essentially saying F all and allowing Shadowheart to say the lot. Oh what a good listener I am.

Now I appreciate it is a real chore to give background options within dialogue and story quests, but this for me is fundamental for making me want to play a custom character and I most certainly do. Usually you get round the issue by being the "Chosen One", so that dominates ,but if you want a more tabletop experience where everyone is kinda just in the same boa and equally relevant, then it stands out that much more.

I would rather it stays like it is now, this is a DnD based game. You are supposed to fill in the blanks on your custom character for more freedom to rp. Other games like DA and the ME series had limited types of backgrounds and you were essentially told who your character was. There are way too many options in DnD for this to possibly be covered in this game. I would find it extremely unimmersive to be told to play within some limited selection of stuff.
Most likely there are more dialogue options later on, we have only seen a small area of the game.

This is my opinion as well.

There's no reason a custom character can't be as cool as an origin. Through dialogue options, we could pick an aspect of our background that is not class or race specific. For instance, you have a mission to to hunt down X item or person. Or maybe you want to redeem the name of your family/organization. Those are two easy examples that could have custom origin quests and stories that would fit any race/class combo.

Let the player choose from 2 or 3 possible backgrounds/motivations, then write some story and quests that tie into that.

P.S. Give a reason why the PC is the group leader. Currently the companions all have compelling reasons to be the party leader, but they follow you instead because the game told them to. This needs to be addressed, and custom origins would be a great place to insert that.