Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Mega-threads and Guides BG3 Party Movement Mechanic

+1 to the OP. Larian, I love your games

This.

I think a lot of this issues that have been brought up are valid, but I don't think they require a radical overhaul of the system, but PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, can we at least get this?

I'm sure the pathing issues are things they are already working on, as well as some tweaks, but I really hate the chaining/unchaining mechanic, and if they want to keep it, a single button toggle to chain/unchain all nearby party members would alleviate so much of the frustration (at least for me)

I still think this would be just a weak workaround circumventing the real issue (making a bad system vaguely more bearable instead of replacing it with a better one) but yeah, I've already said more than once that this would be already a significant quality of life improvement.



I'm honestly not that exceedingly concerned with "pathing issues". I'm not sure how you other people play, but personally I'm rarely sending my characters particularly far away with a single click.
I'd trade "perfect automated pathing" with simple controls that just make me giving orders pleasant and efficient enough any day.

On a side note, I'm kicking myself for not realizing this first, but if you are like me here's a tip that can be a lifechanger in the current build: you can burn vine traps with the firebolt cantrip instead of trying to walk on eggshells around those fuckers.

+1 game needs party formation at least

Yeah, I absolutley hate when that happens. And the fact that you have to "unchain" your characters or even switch to turned based mode simply to manage and avoid something trivial like that only highlight how truly messed up and ass-backwards the controls are.

That's just how old fasion crpg hand party controls, bg2, iwd, dao and etc. and +1

Propably the reason party control is done in such an annoying way is the console and playing via controler there. I see no easy way to make the old (and way better ) controls handled by the controlers. At least there should be a possibility for the PC version to work as the way more comfortable party control as in most other games.

I don't think planning for controller support here is the issue. Recent games like Pillars of Eternity and Pathfinder Kingmaker have controller support and they do not have the issues that BG3 does. Diablo 3 on consoles works even better than mouse and keyboard, IMO. Plus the enhanced editions of the Infinity Engine games added controller support on console and they play wonderfully (even the touch screen support on tablets is pretty good).

I think it's a Larian problem where they created a control scheme that simply does not work as well as other established CRPGs and they're sticking to it just because it's the system they created. They need to learn to "kill their darlings" for the good of the game.

I don't think any game designers good enough to make CRPGs as loved as DoS1 and 2 are would ever look at those games' weird jank-*** controls and think, "Yes, this is a better solution than the system almost every CRPG has used for the last 20 years. We've reinvented the wheel."

I think it has to be a technical limitation of their engine that only one character can ever be selected at a time, and Larian designed the controls around it.
If that IS the case, all I've got to say is that Larian told us BG3 was a AAA game, with a AAA budget, and they hired up to build it. A AAA game dev would update their tech so it didn't cause problems that could only be solved with bad game design.

Implementing a send everything to camp button and item multiselection must also be insanely hard and "experimental" for a 2020 PC game. Don't forget this is a game that can't even pause in ESC menu screen. Definitely AAA vibes.

I don't buy the "engine limitation" excuse for a single second.
And since I started this thread I even took my time to replay across the entire early access build specifically to check where terrain conformation would make the use of RTS-like controls a problem (at least, more a problem than it already is) and found virtually none.
There are of course occasional "choke points" where the player will be required to do some minor micro management instead of just moving the full party in formation... But then again that's true even with the current system, which is also far less suited to that purpose.

Quite frankly I think that if Larian won't address this issue is because they just don't want to, because they are too stubborn about the alleged merit of their own Frankenstein creature and, as KingNothing said, they don't want to "kill their own darling".
Not because they are facing any meaningful technical limitation.

True... one might think that, at some point, the "limitations" of their engine might have reached a point where they though: We just can't do this title justice with our tech... but apparently not. The game is definitely worse of for that. Clunky party movement, no formations, no day/night cycle, no optional RTWP, maybe even the horrendous inventory,... all those seam to be due to what the engine is capable of.

I'm still playing the game and this mecanic is really really boring.

There are plenty of undesired movement. Sometimes it's only annoying or visually immersion breaking... But sometimes it's really a problem.

The chain/unchain mecanic is slow, your portraits are always moving, sometimes it didn't work, and it's really hard to control your characters.

I'd like being able to play unchained all the time but it's obviously not confortable atm. So I'm playing with chained characters, and it's not really better.

I really really hope they'll change their mind about that. I don't think a single person would miss this system.

Since you mention it, funny sidenote: I posted a recap of this entire discussion on reddit (credit to our user Isaac Springsong for writing down the summary, that I imagine he will soon post even here in the new section):
https://old.reddit.com/r/BaldursGat..._control_is_a_mess_and_what_can_be_done/

Guess what? The feature is every bit as popular there as it is on this forum.
It seems also to be almost universally loathed on the Steam discussion boards.

I know they absolutely refrain from posting on their own forum, but Jesus Christ if I wouldn't be curious to listen with what reasoning the developers defend this system, no matter how overwhelmingly unpopular it is regardless of who you ask.

But that's not DnD. There's no "send everything to camp" option in 5e rules. It's amazing how fast you'll sweep that argument under the carpet, isn't it?

Oh please, straw is flying everywhere now... that has nothing to do with the rules system that governs character/world interactions, we're talking modern day video game conveniences, that's like complaining the game's UI doesn't adhere to pen an paper rules. If you wanna go at it like that, then the whole camp machanic is BS to begin with... and it wouldn't be the only one.

I've been reading all your posts and all you do is try and deflect any criticism to the game like a Good Larian Boy. So i don't really bother addressing anything you say since it's completely pointless. At least you try. I don't know how that mechanic would affect anyone at all tbh when it could also be just a toggable. But i can't really remove all the surface stuff and other gimmicky larian features just like that right, when the core gameplay is built around it?

I still hope they will add WASD control with a third person camera like in DA.

Uh, I mean, if they can do it decently that's fine, but personally I don't really give a shit about a third person camera.
I'd take decent "isometric" controls and an improved top down camera everyday, given a choice.

This should fix camera issues especially when you enter to place with more than 1 floor.