Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Why not implement customizable difficulty options?

Many people have asked for a difficulty setting. Some games have Difficulty: Easy/Normal/Hard

I would argue that if such a setting is added, it should be perhaps a set of defaults for a much more complex system. There are many binary opinions in these forums as to what the game should or shouldn't be. For each, there are opinions in favor and against. Why not take the most popular options and make them a toggle so each person can customize their game to what they believe is the correct way? The biggest problem is "balance". But I would argue that the devs only have to balance the game around what they decide are the "Normal" options as opposed to worrying about how each individual option affects balance.


I would like to see a game settings page that includes the following options as Enabled/Disabled:
1) Dialog Dice Rolls (skill checks).
2) Barrels of oil, fire wine, nautiloid tanks, etc.
3) Mobs can create ground/surface effects.
4) Party members can create ground/surface effects.
5) Mobs can have Advantage/Disadvantage Based on height.
6) Party members can have Advantage/Disadvantage Based on height.
7) Disengage, Jump, Hide, Throw, Shove are actions unless performed by a Rogue.
8) Backstab/Position gives no bonus.
9) Companion Romances.
10) Limit Long Rests.
11) Increase the number of short rests from 1 to 3.
12) Eldritch Knights and Arcane Tricksters can learn spells.
13) Only Wizard spells can be learned.
14) Add Exhaustion.
15) Cantrips have no surface effects.
16) Mobs have correct stats, AC, and HP per DnD 5e.
17) Limit to maximum 1 spell + 1 cantrip per turn.
18) Interact with empty containers.
19) Allow a maximum of 1 offhand attack per round.
20) Pickpocketing has consequences.
21) All mobs will actively search for hidden characters.
22) Allow only potions to heal in combat.
23) Require food as a resource with hunger effects.
24) Mobs can use Magic Arrows.
25) Mobs can use potions and scrolls.
26) Mobs can use throwables (potions, vials, etc.)
27) Mobs cast sleep, hold person, and magic missile more.
28) Double the amount of leader/elite mobs in encounters.
29) Enemy archers and spell casters return to cover between attacks.

The next set IMO are not needed because the player can simply not use them even if available. Others have disagreed with my opinion so I present them as additional options here:
a) No food during battle
b) Only allow one swap of equipment per round
c) No throwing food/potions
d) No Dipping

Many people are tossing in +1's. I'd like to hop on-board, and toss in a -8,589,934,592.

This is a completely impractical idea. It only seems like a good idea to people who don't know anything at all about programming.

You have listed 33 options, each of which has two states, "on" or "off". That is 2 to the power of 33 combinations, or 8,589,934,592 possible combinations. [...]

Many people are tossing in +1's. I'd like to hop on-board, and toss in a -8,589,934,592.

This is a completely impractical idea. It only seems like a good idea to people who don't know anything at all about programming.

You have listed 33 options, each of which has two states, "on" or "off". That is 2 to the power of 33 combinations, or 8,589,934,592 possible combinations. Do you think that there somehow won't be glitches and bugs, locks and crashes with certain combinations of those 8.6 BILLION combinations? That's not likely. Diagnosing bugs created in a game with that system will be impossible. The QA department would quit en masse.

It would also be completely throwing balance out the window, because there will be certain combinations which are balance-breaking - for good and for bad. There would be no way for Larian to even decide what toggles are on and off, never mind for different difficulty levels. This would be giving up on the idea of balance completely and telling players "do whatever, change some toggles if you don't like it".

The fact is, no matter how many options get added, Larian is not going to be able to test the entire game with more than like, 10 combinations. They are going to need to make the default balance around specific settings anyway, and test to those. Which means when players play with different settings among the 8.6 BILLION than what Larian uses, they will inevitably hit some encounters which are too easy with those settings, or too hard with those settings, and then they'll complain about bad balance.

Too many cooks spoils the broth. Too many options breaks the game.

also would like to see the following options.

Fast travel ONLY from portal to portal.
Only long rest (Main camp) acess from a portal or town
Only short rest from a safe area
Short rest has the chance to get interrupted.
Push distance is STR based as pr 5E ruleset
Jump distance is STR based as pr 5E ruleset
Sneaking characters can be detected by noice (not really viable to sneak in full plate mail)

100% WRONG
Obviously you don't have have a clue about programming.
The game as is is totally unbalanced and simply broken in a lot of ways right now, putting in more options for customising your game is only a positive and won't take anything away from anyone.
Look at the Long war mod for X-com that was made by modders and it singlehandeldly made the game many times better. if Larian can't handle to put in a single switch for different options they shouldn't be making videogames.
If by your flawed logic turning stuff on/off will spin out of contol like you suggest, why do we then have options for putting all the different items we pick up on the hotbar or not? , theres 29 options turn turn things on/off allready in the gameplay options menu, by your logic that is an impossible task.

There's a difference between gameplay and UI. 20-30 different settings for gameplay and balance which change different things and can interact in intertwining ways is different and more complex than an "add to hotbar" flag. It is not "a simple switch"; anyone who ACTUALLY programs should be able to understand the difference.

Larian has to make their balance based around a certain set of gameplay features. They cannot test that many combinations of gameplay-affecting options. So yes, asking that they spend their time and resources trying to manage eight billion different combinations instead of finding a solid base balance does take away from other people.

Many people are tossing in +1's. I'd like to hop on-board, and toss in a -8,589,934,592.

This is a completely impractical idea. It only seems like a good idea to people who don't know anything at all about programming.

You have listed 33 options, each of which has two states, "on" or "off". That is 2 to the power of 33 combinations, or 8,589,934,592 possible combinations. Do you think that there somehow won't be glitches and bugs, locks and crashes with certain combinations of those 8.6 BILLION combinations? That's not likely. Diagnosing bugs created in a game with that system will be impossible. The QA department would quit en masse.

It would also be completely throwing balance out the window, because there will be certain combinations which are balance-breaking - for good and for bad. There would be no way for Larian to even decide what toggles are on and off, never mind for different difficulty levels. This would be giving up on the idea of balance completely and telling players "do whatever, change some toggles if you don't like it".

The fact is, no matter how many options get added, Larian is not going to be able to test the entire game with more than like, 10 combinations. They are going to need to make the default balance around specific settings anyway, and test to those. Which means when players play with different settings among the 8.6 BILLION than what Larian uses, they will inevitably hit some encounters which are too easy with those settings, or too hard with those settings, and then they'll complain about bad balance.

Too many cooks spoils the broth. Too many options breaks the game.

The solution is to balance the game for a standard set of these options (maybe 2-4 permutations), but then allow players to freely adjust these toggles with a warning that "Doing so is not recommended if you want a balanced game." This addresses your balance argument.

As to bugs, you don't actually have to consider each permutation.
E.g. dipping: The toggle option just removes the "dip" button from your actionbar. No need to consider how the "lack of a dip button" will introduce bugs/glitches/etc. (At least I would hope so)
This won't reduce the number of combinations to 33 (the # of toggles), but it will probably be much much much closer to 33 than 8,589,934,592

its about ME

Many people are tossing in +1's. I'd like to hop on-board, and toss in a -8,589,934,592.

This is a completely impractical idea. It only seems like a good idea to people who don't know anything at all about programming.

You have listed 33 options, each of which has two states, "on" or "off". That is 2 to the power of 33 combinations, or 8,589,934,592 possible combinations. Do you think that there somehow won't be glitches and bugs, locks and crashes with certain combinations of those 8.6 BILLION combinations? That's not likely. Diagnosing bugs created in a game with that system will be impossible. The QA department would quit en masse.

It would also be completely throwing balance out the window, because there will be certain combinations which are balance-breaking - for good and for bad. There would be no way for Larian to even decide what toggles are on and off, never mind for different difficulty levels. This would be giving up on the idea of balance completely and telling players "do whatever, change some toggles if you don't like it".

The fact is, no matter how many options get added, Larian is not going to be able to test the entire game with more than like, 10 combinations. They are going to need to make the default balance around specific settings anyway, and test to those. Which means when players play with different settings among the 8.6 BILLION than what Larian uses, they will inevitably hit some encounters which are too easy with those settings, or too hard with those settings, and then they'll complain about bad balance.

Too many cooks spoils the broth. Too many options breaks the game.

Many people are tossing in +1's. I'd like to hop on-board, and toss in a -8,589,934,592.

This is a completely impractical idea. It only seems like a good idea to people who don't know anything at all about programming.

I have been advocating this approach for the last 3 weeks, its defiantly the way to go, if Larian won't include an options page to customise the game im pretty sure some modders could do it.
Its basicly giving the player the option of a GM thats more suited for his/her playstyle.

also would like to see the following options.


Only short rest from a safe area
Short rest has the chance to get interrupted.
Push distance is STR based as pr 5E ruleset
Jump distance is STR based as pr 5E ruleset
Sneaking characters can be detected by noice (not really viable to sneak in full plate mail)

I hope there will also be a "different and more enemies" to mix up encounters. Regular gnolls for normal and heavily armored with magical backup on the very hardest.
Otherwise, since mostly everything is tied to rolling, having a +4 +2 +0 -2 -4 to rolls for 5 difficulties would already be neat