Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Four is a party. Six is the crowd.

+1



And as someone said, most of CRPG could be done with one character. In BG2, I finished the game with one mage, another time I went to amelyssanne with 1 archer alone, and I know people that did it with 1 knight.
Because of experience share, your one character would become more powerful quicker, which would compensate for the lack of party member. The end game was significantly more difficult, but manageable with proper gear.

The same could be said with reduced party of 3 or 4 btw : Experience being divided equally among party member means that fewer party member = more powerful party member, and so the game is somehow balanced for any party size.

Hard pass.

Restricting the party to four players may allow for a more "balanced" experience from a design perspective, but it makes the game feel less like Dungeons & Dragons and more like Gauntlet. With only four characters, the party composition will almost be locked to Tank, Healer, Thief & Mage. Classes may vary in those roles, but it limits a lot of the creativity and flexibility that D&D has always offered.

What’s also funny is that despite disagreeing with you on this topic, I generally only play Xcom with the long war mods. And part of what I like about is having bigger squads, bigger fights (although you can try to stealth your way through with small squads in long war 2) and a much bigger roster with more unit types. Plus a vastly more in depth strategy layer. It’s a long slog to get through a campaign, but if you haven’t tried it, you probably should.

However, that’s a different game. I’m not sure a direct comparison really works.

No worries. I probably over emoted in my writing because conveying weight to particular parts of a sentence is hard in text.

I will absolutely give room to there being a vastly different experience should they normalize the ruleset implementation to be more 5E rules as written. Even so, I do legitimately prefer 6 characters over 4 for mechanics reasons as I explained. Then for story reasons, I was thinking about that after my first run where my camp started getting full. It was a huge bummer to have these clearly very well fleshed characters on one hand. The one time I did change someone out I immediately regretted it because I had internalized their abilities into how I ran the group. What with Larian saying that we'll "have to commit" after act 1 means they're getting cut off anyway. So my reasons break down roughly like so:

• Mechanical freedom
• Enjoying more companion goodness
• Not feeling like I'm "losing out" on one companion that I forgot to re-include before the cutoff and lose any valuable gear or customization that I put into one of them

Pillars got the number right but this game is so easy atm that it can be beaten with 1 char and mad cheese.

I'm sorry but....did you just say that the popularity and longevity of the game is better with a lower party size?

You do know that the only reason this game is being made, at all, is because Baldur's Gate 1 & 2 are probably the most popular (and highest reviewed) cRPGs of all time, despite being made in the 1990s/early 2000s? And both those games had party sizes of 6? That is proof alone that your argument is wrong. In terms of party composition, bigger party = easier to take risks/try new things. There's a reason BG 1&2 had *so much* replayability, to the point where they still have healthy communities 2 *decades* later.

Again, for the dozen+ time, the most people are made the most happy with a party of 6. If developers could balance encounters 20 years ago with a party of 6 (and *significantly stronger* player abilities in the old edition rules) I trust they can figure it out now in the simplified world of 5e. That's the only argument against 6 players that doesn't fall flat, because if you don't want a party of 6, just make yours smaller. We who want bigger parties don't have that option when you limit the size to 4.

Do we really count cheesing something in a discussion against if something is easy or hard? I certainly don't.

Can we start by agreeing with 5 first? lots of people think 6 is too many, but how many people think 5 is too many? With 5 you have at least one flexible option on top of the traditional "mandatory" roles being filled (Tank, Healer, lockpicks, Damage).

Personally I dont feel like I "need" 6 but I do need more than 4. I can see 6 being too many. I just want a lil more room for Monk/Bard/Druid anmd to feel slightly less like the computer is the only one taking turns.

I would want 5. If I do six it would just be from a mod or something, but 5 is optimal for me.

Leaves me with my character and 3 other to be a good comp and the next one for some exotic type class, or pursuing that companions quest, etc. 5 is a good number for me.

Whether the game gives me six or I am forced to use a mod, six is the correct number for me.

Only wimps cheer for four.

at least give us the OPTION of having 6 (even 5 would be okay) like in the original Baldur's gate. this isn't DOS. Baldur's gate historically has had a max party of 6. never have you HAD to use all 6. I dont understand why people cant understand this.

Four is a party. Six is the crowd. Five is a ideal party )

6 is better, but 5 is a good compromise for everyone's whish

Not too hard for those that want to play with only 4, not too unbalanced for those that want to mod the game for one more companion slot.
And probably a number the vast majority of us would deal with and enjoy.

I'm asking for 6 for a long time but I can reconsider 5 if that suits better to everyone.

So true. Right now I can't ever recruit Wyll, because not having a wizard feels too limiting. And using wizard or cleric scrolls with non wizards kills my immersion. So I need to recruit Shadowheart and Gale ALWAYS. Unless I roll a wiz or cleric. Can't not have a melee tank, either, and Shadowheart has too low AC, so... all this pretty much means that I can't play with a warlock. I need someone to pick locks and disarm traps, and I don't want to kill immersion by using wyll or gale for that. 4 people isn't enough to fill all roles and still get space for experiments, and Larian knows that. THAT'S WHY they allowed fighters to disarm traps and resurrect partymembers. I disagree with that reasoning, because it destroys immersion and makes everything just not serious about role playing. Solution? 5 or 6 party slots.

Nah, six is better.
But five would be a decent compromise.

6 man would be ideal !

my current party:
Me human dual wield with double maces, one from drow in the goblin city other from the gnoll leader
Lazael with two handed sword of Tyr
Shadowheart who still doesnt want to have sex
And Gale he is the man!! sleep spell alone makes him awesome plus some magic missiles and also before i found out that he wants to eat my epic artifacts i thought he was the best guy in the party.

Have you noticed im missing something?? yea its the thief, and everytime i find some chest i have to go to camp and switch to Astarian and come back etc... really stupid...

Yeah. I'd rather see a six character party. But if a compromise has to be made then i guess I can settle with five. At least that gives you one character to try out a more "exotic" build with,
As so many people have stated already, a four player party will almost always be locked to the Tank, Healer, Thief and Mage setup.

I would go for six, but if its seems to overwhelming for people 5 would be okay as well. I mean, 4 is okay too but I'd like one or two more.

I don't see why we need to compromise on this. A party of up to 6 could have a party size of 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6. Let the player decide if they need the extra companions or not. Settling on 5 as a "compromise" seems arbitrary to me. 🤷