Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Some combats too long? (MP)

Has anyone else had this issue?

I've been playing around with some people on MP. I understand why this game is TB rather than RTwP, but it feels like Larian hasn't struck the right balance on some of the larger fights. It's easy to throw a ton of enemies at the player in RTwP, and craft these epic, prolonged engagements (it's something I think DA:O does very well on its final level). The problem with TB is that each of these enemies needs a turn.

I've had several encounters run up to 45 mins due to poor RNG, snowballing aggro, enemy reinforcements, or environmental factors (one time our Fighter got pushed off a ledge, and had to spend 3 turns of double movement just to get back into the fight).

This issue isn't quite as exacerbated in single-player because the player controls 4 characters. On 4 player though, it really can get arduous. We had one encounter with about 12 enemies. That means that per player, the turn ratio boils down to 1:15, which means most of the player's time is spent sitting there, not playing the game.

I get this is a faithful representation of PnP rules, but this is where a DM can step in and maximise fun and engagement for the players. If an encounter is dragging because it was poorly conceived, poorly balanced, or the RNG gods have decided to smite your players, you can intervene. Maybe that Clay Golem moves and provokes an attack-of-opportunity. Maybe its maximum health is now 70 instead of 90. Maybe that NPC you helped out earlier joins the fray and tips the battle in your favour. Or maybe all the enemies run away when your Fighter dispatches that enemy he's been wailing on for 7 turns. You can't really do that in a video game.

Personally, I think some of the larger encounters need some rebalancing? I'd rather face a smaller group of slightly higher tier enemies in MP. I don't feel like an encounter should be 45mins, unless its a boss with dynamic stages to mix up gameplay/tactics. I don't necessarily think tighter, more focused encounters would necessarily harm the single-player experience either.

Any thoughts?

I think that part of it is bugs and glitches.

In DOS, the enemy turns just whipped through... here though....sometimes it takes longer for an enemy turn than it does for me - and I am a paranoid slowpoke.

A recent glitchy fight in the swap, we had enemies taking a turn, "planning a move" (or something similar) and they would take 30-40 seconds in real time to do it. Something just ain't right there.

I posted something about it this morning. The main reason why combat is taking so long, I think, it's because the AI is really bad at planning their next move and hangs where they stand until they do something, if they do anything at all. Cause sometimes, they say a line and do literally nothing.

Just a (related) tip. If you see a set of drums in combat, DESTROY that MF asap. Then they can't summon help. Took me a couple of
fights til I realised I could do this.

Not long enough, occasionally, but we haven't seen the most epic fights yet, have we?

I think the combat is absolutely fantastic, and the fact you positioned yourself without thinking what might happen, will probably teach you a lesson for the future You think the combat takes too long? Have you ever sat at a D&D table and fought a large battle - you'd probably be there 3 weekends running, LOL. Obviously there will be tweaking, but the basic premise of the game is awesome. Great job, Larian!

It's probably too late to say this, but I hope there is an option for switching combats to RTwP mode.

I'm not a fan of turn-based combats and I think it's less realistic because combats in real life never are turn-based. It serves no purpose other than making you feel like it's a tabletop game and slowering down the pace of combats. While tabletop games undoubtedly need it, computer games are well-capable of handling RTwP combats and do not need to stick to turn-based combats.

I have to agree that it gets too long. Even without the war drums, everyone everywhere from far away joins in the battle and sometimes the AI enemies stand there for a good minute before doing anything. I'd like it if only a small portion of the visual vicinity were agree at a time to let the fights move along smoothly. When you have 12+ enemies and only 4 players with crappy limited movement the combat feels so taxing. And I usually try to avoid combat with diplomacy but unless you're a Drow that does NOT always fly well.

In single player there are also some real long battles. I think i even surpassed your 45 min because of party dead. I think it took me about an hour of 2 and all my scrolls and potions to beat the enemy.

Ofcourse when you finally come out as victor that feels rewarding.

Then i came back to that place to notice that another fight with 1 to 5 ratio for enemies was waiting. As all my scrolls, rezz scrolls, and potions were allready used, i just gave up and started anew with a healing cleric as main char....

I actually really like long battles, both in tabletop and in BG3. But I can see how it could get real obnoxious in multiplayer.

Long battles doesn't bother me. The excessive animation during my turns bothers me though. I remember it in Divinity OS 2 as well. It sounds absurd, but it takes too much time just to use a skill sometimes. Click skill, triggers animation, click again, fires second animation. There's plenty of abilities where this is reasonable, but for stuff like Guidance or Thaumaturgy? Oh my god please cast faster.

Seconded. One recent encounter lasted several hours and meant nothing in the grand scheme of things. I had a quiet and constructive word with the GM about that one.

Mind you, it was nothing to the combats we had using Hero System. Now there was a system that cost the players as much fatigue as the characters.

Getting this a LOT. I really hope its a bug

As a DM, I run some big, long, complicated encounters. I warn players before they even agree to join my game, "Combats in this game will often be very long. Sometimes several hours long. Sometimes lasting a full session. Sometimes carrying over until the next session. There will be very few quick, easy, simple fights. I am telling you this now so that you can choose to opt out of the game if this sounds dreadful to you."

Honestly. I have no problem with long combats. And i'm so glad its not RTwP. Which ultimately takes all the strategy/tactics out of the game by the time you are past the first few levels. It just feels a bit like real DnD, where sometimes combats take a while because of misses/adds etc. But IMHO it makes the end of them so rewarding. You feel like you really solved something epic.

Its possible the ai is struggling with their options. I notice this with the phase spiders for example. But overall, i find the combats pretty fluid. My only frustration is that there is not a function for holding and action, which helps players in real DnD work together/around initiative borks. But overall, I like the fact that you can draw adds and have these huge hard battles that actually make you use all the items you have, the scrolls you have etc. My only wish was that we could have maybe 1 additional short rest per long rest.

Yes. Or two. I would prefer two more.

Enemies getting stuck on 'planning a move' for ages an then still not doing anything needs to be fixed.

I had one large battle that took about 4 sessions. I don't think it turned out that great though, and I was the one DMing!

It's something that I think I'd like to avoid in future, or come up with more creative solutions for. It's hard because our group has so many responsibilities (kids, partners, jobs) that when we get time to play together, it can feel really trying when all you've accomplished is a few more turns of the same combat. It's the same with a video game.

I'm down with the game's premise, but this is the place for feedback

Funny how the main defense of TB combat as overly long and tedious has typically been: It doesn't have to be long if it's designed right. Now all of a sudden it's: Hey it's okay if it's long. Nothing wrong with long battles.

Sorry but no. Long battles are stupid, painful, and aggravating. I hate them in TT gaming itself, but especially in a video game because it *IS* a video game and *NOT* a TT game. Any combat encounter that takes longer than 10 minutes, 15 minutes max in rare "big" battle cases, is poorly designed.

I think there is a definite difference between "Turn based takes longer than Twitch style fights" and the "NPC bad guys taking 30-40 sec to 'plan a move' and not doing much"

I think the former is a difference in approach.

The latter seems to be a bug/glitch of some kind.