I don't want to see companions break (yet). That's fine if we get the 17 NPCs like we had in BG2 but with only a handful of companions, a companion going their own way means a broken game.
Something needs to make Tav McBlanderson * a compelling character. Perhaps instead of everyone being freed because of damage to the ship perhaps Tav could flip a lever that opens all the cells at once? Then everyone we meet would start with "wait, you're the reason I got free"
*( I stole that)
That thing that's supposed to make your custom character compelling is called imagination. If we're going to call for Larian to write them for us, we may as well just petition to remove custom characters, because that's essentially what you're asking for when you want someone else to define them for you.
You sound angry. Let's see if we can have a different kind of conversation. The point is have just enough of a background to let the imagination stick. When you really want glue to work you first rough up the surface and then apply the adhesive. I'm asking for something similar -- Larian needs to better prepare the surface. BG got it right -- there are thousands of different Bhaalspawn stories, Biowere was able to give just enough detail to let people flesh out their own stories. Compare this to DOS2 where I really just playing Fane's story.
Now in 5th edition there are a number of role play characteristics that ever PC bring to the table -- background, bond, flaw etc. So far Larian has put in background but it doesn't really do much -- much less than backgrounds in PoE1.
Also, we could / should have background creation option and some compelling reason for the NPCs to follow our lead. We had it BG -- child of destiny. Now in BG3 we have a blank slate. "savior of the imprisoned would be one such 'bond' "
Some of what you're asking for may already be on the table, such as backgrounds having some significance. I can't say, I haven't seen their documentation of features that they left out, or weren't ready for EA. Some of it is already available, or, more accurately, will be, when the Origin characters become available for play. I want a blank slate for a Custom character, and I'm not alone. I have read literally thousands of posts, from SP game forums to MMO forums expressing the desire to just let the player define the character. I've seen literally thousands of posts about how "I'm playing (insert developer here)'s character, instead of my own, and this thread follows a path that is counter to that. I want the least amount of information about a custom character handed to me as is possible. Getting the background to matter, look at Mass Effect for something like that, would be great, but I want as much freedom as possible.
