As a long time DM, this game makes me furious. Not because I don't like a good challenge, but because it feels like the game is actively being inconsistent with 5e rules, punishing players and all-in-all making an environment hostile to players, especially those who want to play a heroic character.
- every. damn. NPC. hates you. Why? Why does this have to be so damn oppressive? Where is the levity, the gratitude, the derring-do? Why is everyone such a dick? It doesn't make me want to solve quests because the people who give them to me are such c- well, you know.
Compared to many of the companions in BG 1 and BG 2, I see them as an improvement. Aerie and Minsc get killed the moment I run into them, I absolutely loathed those companions from the prior games. Some of us prefer darker companions although they could definitely be written better than they are. This is definitely a personal taste thing and ideally there would be different companions for different tastes. Considering Larian has said they wanted data on the evil stuff, I would not be surprised if the good stuff does exist but its not included for the sake of early access testing.
- goblins have triple their MM health, loads of alchemists fire. It feels like the DM is cheating for no good reason.
The game is already fairly easy. I am playing it solo atm with a warlock to keep combat interesting. If they were to go with the default values, it would go from "fairly easy" to "I can fall asleep on the keyboard and still win the encounter." I feel like a lot of the complaining about these changes are from people who expect to be able to run head on into a fight and expect to win, instead of positioning tactically and taking advantage of terrain obstructions, bottle-necking enemies in tight corridors or differences in height.
- surfaces. surfaces everywhere. go away.
I like surfaces, they add an additional tactical layer to the game, however they could probably do with some additional balancing factors to make them better fit in the game.
- the game wastes my time with big 'set piece' battles like the one at the gates of the druid grove. Lots of NPCs fighting lots of NPCs. I can't ambush or anything because a cutscene forces me into combat so far away from the action I spend most moves running. Just use a cutscene, please.
There are only 2 large set piece battles in the EA. Either you attack the Goblin Camp, or you Attack/Defend the Grove (or you do both if you enjoy combat). Set piece battles, when used sparsely are imo fine and Larian has definitely used them sparsely.
- most fights are so difficult that you need party optimisation, which means you'll need to be a cleric or have shadowheart and that's that.
Demonstrably false, considering I am playing through the game with a single character. Take advantage of height differences, break line of sight, take stock of the environment and see what you can use to your advantage. Stand in dimly lit areas to lower your enemies chance to hit. The list goes on.
- picking on low-armor backline targets or knocked out ones. Seriously, I get that in real life monsters will probably do this, but in gameplay the reality is people are going to just give up trying to have low armored casters in their party at all.
I would rather have a good AI, which prioritizes targets in an intelligent manner, than a poor AI which does not. Right now the AI has a lot of flaws and the fact that the targets it picks are predictable is 1 of them. You know who they will go after? Well, take advantage of that. Put that target in hard to reach places, where enemies will need to take several attacks of opportunity to get to them. Make them bleed. There are many ways you can use that piece of information to your advantage.
- and after all this, theres... nothing. no loot. no helpful items. everything seems empty.
This game has great potential but right now it feels like it is a great adventure in the hands of a shitty neckbeard DM who hates you.
It is good that powerful items are rare and hard to come by. A rose in a rose garden does not stand out as much as a rose in a bed of weeds. By having powerful items being rare, it makes them that much more rewarding when you do actually get them.
