I've noticed that I'm currently having a hard time finishing the EA after being hyped about it for months. The reasons are all the broken balance issues in fights due to Larian's homebrewing. Last night I had the fight with the Kua Toa and watching another race to the top and those multi-attack archers (out of all freaking attacks - you give ranged weapons exploiting height to get advantage additional attacks??), overall it just reminded me I need to play more cheese - even though I had already placed 3 party memebers concealed behind enemies on high ground to even start the fight (by the way, why can they still move freely while others are stuck in combat 2 feet from them? go cheese-fest)...
I honestly hate the combat at this point. It got worse the longer I've played and I'm not sure I will do a second playthrough before it gets closer to 5e. I won't use mods during EA because that's not the point of EA. But if the final version of the game looks like this then I will only play it with a 5e mod or regret buying it (I would not have bought a full price DOS3 - I like Larian a lot, but not DOS2-combat). You can have your environmental effects and shoves, but the way they are implemented in 5e not by breaking the balance. Make them special and memorable in specific situation, not your standard go-tos. At least twice I've lost party members shoved into the abyss because its just your run-of-the-mill-go-to-move. I hated DOS2's combat system and now in BG3 its even worse because its all about surfaces and unbalanced bonus actions. The whole action economy is f*** up. Monsters are unbalanced (those minotaurs are just an unbalanced joke and yet cheesing the fight you don't even notice them).
So yeah, I agree with the OP except for the alignments (because to me those were ridicolous ever since).
I think BG3 has a the potential to be a truley great game - even among the best role playing games in history - but the combat needs to fall closer in line with 5e and not this unbalanced hybrid. You sold me a D&D 5e game, but you didn't deliver it. Coming from someone who isn't a die-hard 5e-fan.
