Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Really disliking the plan for companion locks

I think one good argument for locking companions after Act 1, is that the game can be programmed to avoid giving you triggers for side quests requiring a companion who isn't in your current party.

I'm not a fan of finding quests in a game that strongly hint, or even require, that a certain companion has to be in your party to complete the quest. I don't want to be railroaded into my party makeup, even temporarily to complete one quest. If the party is locked after Act 1, the game can just not show those other companion side quests.

Of course a counter-argument is if you enjoy that sort of thing, and you want to see every possible side quest in a game rather than re-play with different companion selections. Even if it means frequently re-arranging your companion choices.

As a side note, I'm getting the horrible feeling that the way Act 1 will be companion-locked, is that the ones you don't choose will all turn into Mind Flayers. Or at least proto-Mind Flayers in the process of changing. And then you have to kill them in the camp before moving to Act 2. This is heavily foreshadowed in the camp dialog about how you'd prefer to be killed if you start changing, Laz'el vowing to kill everyone and then kill herself last, and so on. Maybe that won't happen and they'll all just wander off, but it would certainly fit the theme the game is developing.

I would be ok leaving someone behind if we had a party of six honestly, however commiting to 3 companions until the end of days feels too restrictive to me especially since we'll have at least 8 to choose from.

Seeing how I always drag my favourites along for the ride even in 100th playthrough (Minsc, Jaheira, Haer'Dalis, or Allistair, Morrigan and Zevran - yes this was a problem until mods) this could take a decade.

You are raising potential issues that gemes from 2004 dealt with. Ever since Knights of the old Republic, Bioware had a very specific way of doing companions side quests. If Larian really don't know how to handle this problem, why not look into these games for solutions? Is there a list of game mechanics Larian is allowed to copy from Bioware and a lost of mechanics they can't?

I don't necessarily say that Bioware did it best, but I think taking inspiration from them is better than Larian "solution" (which is plain lazy and borderline stupid)

I think a more interesting dynamic is already in place. If you choose to do certain things in the game, you can lose Astarion. Other things, you can lose Wyll. I believe Shadowheart will disappear too if you make certain decsions.


Rather than "arbitrarily lock the party", they could just do more to resolve the characters. I know there is a reputation system already in place, this is an easy goto method to get rid of characters by making them all conflict in interests... so eventually it will be inevitable and the player decides proggressively who stays and who goes by being good or bad (which works only if there is a recrutiment function later in the game that lets players subsidize any class they want with a generic NPC so if they lose all their Origin characters somehow they can just make all generics)

I really have to wonder WTF Larian means by "After the first act however you are going to have to commit, also just like in real life." How is that like real life? Do you stop making friends after the first grade? Do you swear to your friends that you'll never make another friend other than them? NO! Maybe it was something lost in translation or Belgians are a very sad people who don't make new friends later in life.

its a good point

This would force players to act in certain ways just to keep a preferred class in their party. If I really want a wizard in my group and there isn't a way to hire a mercenary for that role, then I'm basically forced to keep Gale happy. Or at least not mad enough to leave.

Maybe we'll be able to hire mercenaries after Act 1 to fill a needed slot in the party, like DoS. Until we know for sure, I'd like the option to keep any of these companions from leaving unless I do something really extreme. I don't want my actions forced in a certain direction just because I want a Wizard in the party.

Please, let them know that you want more than 3 characters per playthrough but there is another solution : increased party size

I don't really care about that lockdown and I absolutely HATE games in which you HAVE to swap companions to enjoy the whole game, but I'm not sure that's what you're talking about.
A system like... BG1/2... where companions still have "their own life" suits better to everyone according to me, but that's not how Larian manage things because of Origin characters...
They all have the same story and the same introduction so Larian have to find a way to bring a little bit variety... This way of doing things is bad for many players, even if in that case it's not really for me (because I'll never change my characters during a playtrough).

This is another reason why I hate Origin characters.

I hated DOS2 system with kicking parts of the party. If this is going to happen in BG3 again then chances are actually that I will create my own party as soon as possible and drop all origin characters.


Now, there is one idea I heard and actually it would save this from being a disaster for me the way DOS2 party system was - Origin characters are just that, but the real companions come in act 2. So basically you can keep your chosen 3 origin compainions if you want, but they are actually really just alternative background stories for the player. The real companions for BG3 are just NPCs that you will encounter later on and build a party and switch them out in camp the same way you did with origin characters in act 1.

Realistically this sounds like a lot of work that might be wasted for Larian so I don't expect it happen.


I have yet to finish the act 1, but I'm going to be honest - act 1 was not enough to make me care about any of them enough to chose any of them to follow me. If they are the party for the full game than I will give them more time to convince me. On the other hand if they are all just optional and I have to pick after act 1 then I most probably going to pick 3 custom characters because those origin characters have not convinced me to be interesting for me, they don't have interesting builds and their drama annoys me more than it entertains me. Sorry.

I'm in the minority on this one... I can't stand having characters standing around in camp doing nothing but waiting for you to return.
It always breaks immersion for me - "Off to fight a small army of goblins! I'll take you 3 and the rest of you lot - just keep on keeping on!"

I hope when you select your party in this you run into the others where they should be in the game, even if it's working against you. Actually, I kind of hope you don't select your party and the members that align with you the most based on your actions stick around while the others leave on their own. It would be weird to help everyone out selflessly and have your selfish vampire and evil cleric friend stick around for the lolz. My favourite Final Fantasy was Final Fantasy 4, where your party would change because the people with you had their own things going on, and the PC game world needs more of that to make NPCs feel less flat.

Well truth be told you had to navigate around that in BG2 as well if your alignment strayed too much, but you did have at least one of each neccessary classes in each side of the Spectrum or one in the neutral. Ever tried dragging Aerie (my most hated character EVER) and Korgan along for the laughs?

If a companion leaving you is a direct result of clashing motivations, I guess I could live with it (for example no matter what Wyll says I guess he'd be pretty pissed if you actually got to kill Mizora)- if anything I'd say the story gets better for it.

I have no issues with companions leaving or dying because of my actions. I do have an issue with Larian's act 1 is done, now for 'replayability' kick half your party.

Pretty much every RPG with a party I've played found ways how to handle companion quests when the party member was at camp. Each of those was far better than DOS2 method. I don't have the time to replay a game 3-4 times just to see all companion stories. If the game is really great, I might do it, but not just to see a handfull of scenes hidden behind some mechanic like this party lock.

Yes this is very much my concern here as well. If the game came with multiple companions per class then it wouldn't be an issue. But we will have only one companion per class at MOST, and more likely no companions at all for some classes, so forcing us to play the game a certain way in order to keep the party we want would be aggravating to the extreme.

Would that really be so bad? Unless they reduce barrels/elemental arrows/healing food (which I hope they do) you don't really need a balanced party in this game so far.
And we don't know what the other characters will be yet, my hope is that there's a good/evil npc for each role. So your evil githyanki warrior leaves because you just can't stop doing helpful sidequests but you can replace her role with a tanky good natured paladin, or your kind-hearted wizard leaves but an evil sorcerer is down to kick puppies with you. Maybe it's not the exact class you were hoping for, but I'd be surprised if they left you completely without options.

Individual companions leaving on account of your actions is also nothing new in the genre. Even in the first Baldur's Gate you had it. It was much more basic than later games and was simply dependent on your reputation, but since than many RPGs had some form of mechanic like it. Larian the best approach would be to combine the approval system with something more scripted. Which means that if your approval rate with a certain companion reach a certain negative value, they will warn you they don't like the way you do things, and if it drops further they will leave.

Aside from that, you can make certain meaningful decisions in the game affect your companions. Example from DAO: if you defile the ashes of Andraste in her sample and you have Wynn and/or Leliana in your party, they will fight you to death.

All of the above methods for dealing with companions leaving the party are valid in my opinion, provided you have enough companions in the game to account for different playstyles. What is not valid is arbitrarily deciding to get rid of all your potential party members simply because they are not in your party at a certain moment. This is what I call a cheap game mechanic that its only reason to exist is to artificially increase the game replay value.

Yes this is what I'm saying as well, though you said it way better than me. I am all for in-game stories that push some companions to stick with me and others to revolt/leave. But the key is that there ought to be enough companions overall in the game for me to draw on as replacements, and not just random replacements but reasonably equivalent replacements.

I am sure there will be hirelings down the road. Can't imagine they would force people to play with a group setup they do not like. I would like to see new companions appear in other acts too, we shouldn't get them all at the start.

BG2 had what? 15 playable npcs? Adding the incredible modded npcs that actually blended with the storyline, bantered, romanced, maybe you had over 30? Plenty of personality that suits many tastes. Ask anyone who played BG2 whats their top 5 npcs...Huge variation.*love the PaintBG alternate artwork portraits

Does having a handful of movie like <cinemanic> companions justify this loss? Knowing fully well that you will never have a BG3 mod that adds/blends new companions to the storyline (this never happened in DOS2...).
HELL NO. I really hope Larian will pull out a surprise, and give us tons more playable NPCs...non cinematic is fine, give them text.

So uh, in BG3 whats your top 5 favorite npc ?...

I can get behind that. And I see why people are so concerned with number of companions. Again, I don't know for certain, but based on Larian's vague "you have to commit" statement and how it went in Dos2, I'm pretty sure the plan right now is to somehow make most companions unavailable after act 1, and if that's the case, it's hard for me to believe Larian will put the time and effort in more than 2-3 extra companions. But I think we already established that Larian made a very stupid choice here

People differ in how they like to set up an adventuring party. Some might like a party based on likeable characters, and class or balance be damned. Others (like me) enjoy using a certain combination of skills. It's not about balance, but the fun in using those skills in combination.

For example, in my current EA game I'm playing a Rogue/Thief main character along with Laz'el, Gale, and Shadowheart. That's basically the classic "Holy Trinity" of Tank, Mage, Priest + 1 Utility character. It's a trope, but I like playing it. If I lose one of them, I'd like a close replacement.

That's just me, but I suspect a fair number of other players will want a class-based party and not be railroaded into some odd combination based on companion personalities and who you can keep from staying or leaving.