Tuco :
" Solution 3 - We have a day/night cycle AND the option to alter its speed (wait/rest) like in most games of this type, but ONE player, presumably the host of the multiplayer session, needs to be in charge of it and everyone else willing to accept what he decides about resting or skipping time."
Right now anyone can request a rest and other players have to accept. Theoratically it doesn't change much but it's a huge QoL in MP. MP is the only way i played dos 2 and bg3 so after a couple of hundred of hours i can tell you it's quite important that any player can start the process. The time management being built around the host or not really is a technical question only Larian can answer. The QoL doesn't need to be dropped due to this cycle from our perspective. Or at least shouldn't after me.
Putting aside the argument around immersion, gameplay wise:
1) It could change a lot with different possible approaches to quests[Some enemies being setup differently at night, maybe you can discover something during the night that you couldn't during the day and vice verse.
2) More content from replayability perspective due to the above possibility.
3) Sneaking could be impacted by it too unless you're fighting enemies with infravision in which case your approach would need to be different. More spells usage and combinations during fights.
Issues with it?
Immersion breaking+you might be missing on content.
1) You need to speak with someone at night and it's one of the last quests you have to do in this zone so you ....wait. For a whole day. Only to speak with this one guy.
2) If you need to do some quests at night and you have a timed quest to do on the same time you will have to drop one of them sometimes. In the above example for instance you won't be able to wait for the guy if you have to hurry somewhere else. (Like the tadpole, we don't know how it will play out in the end. NO SPOILERS but I've seen things I can't unsee in the data mining thread.
Right now a day passes every time you go to sleep( night visible at camp). The benefit of it is the player controls how time moves onward. It's a way more controllable environment from story building perspective. Otherwise the main quest has to be detached from how time elapses OR you end up with" Pathfinder".
As many on the forum I love the idea of Day/night cycle and I think any D&D and RPG fan can list how night can impact the gameplay for hours. BUT on the very same time how it impacts the credibility of a story where " Every minute count!". Yeah it does, let me wait a couple of days until the merchant gets new items to buy. First things first. My point is in BG3 we don't have a couple of things I considered silly in every single game with dynamic day/night system.
Do the few simple gameplay mechanics listed above or in other posts here outweights how Larian solved this in BG3? Based on EA 100% after me.
BG3 in it's current form, even with NPC's acting in the exact same way during the day as during the night would simply look better. But it would mean the whole " tadpole " thing would need to be solved differently. Otherwise the main quest wants you to hurry, you want to wait a couple more hours to see your merchant. If you can see him anyway during the night then why did we implement the cycle to begin with?
I think my last paragraph here is one of the reasons we won't see day/night cycle in BG3 tbh^^ They already made a choice and designed the game around no day/night cycle. Right now a day night cycle could impact combat and visuals. Is it enought to justify it? Well... Only Larian will tell
