Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Dial back the romance.

To you, others may disagree. In fact, others will invariably disagree. The aspiration of any role playing game is to make a shared experience as attainable to as many different people as possible without diluting the content and bring them as much joy as possible in it. Sexuality is a matter of preference not importance. Whether someone is attracted to their own gender or the opposite has no bearing on their qualities as a human being, it is no more significant than any other matter of taste and appetite, whether it be a question of music, food, or fashion.

These are personal expressions but it is ultimately the person that matters

That is very ignorant, trying to force alphabet propoganda on others.
It is not that the world moved on without me, it's that people that try to force this on others have stopped moving and created a traffic jam.

It will be cleared out, it will be label for a generation, like flower children, or gen X, we will move on and laugh, and realize how dumb everyone was.

Every hardcore lesbian I have met, has figured out at some point they were wrong after meeting me, moved on, married men, and had children.

But I will admit it is opinion, and has little place here.

I dunno. I remember turning up to a RL party just as it was ending because I'd stupidly decided I needed to go and see some concert (by myself) and late evening when it'd ended I had to find my car in the middle of London and drive across several counties to get there.

All that was left was a bunch of smelly drunken bastards who were in various states of unconsciousness and who would periodically wake up demanding to know if I'd brought more booze, mumbling something incoherently and laughing loudly and would then fall asleep and piss their pants. Were I as drunk as them I'd've probably thought it was the most awesome time ever. I wandered off and went to sleep.

No, this isn't a game to make one character and have them experience everything.

fighters are not rangers are not clerics are not rogues.

You want the fighter dialogue unlocked, you roll a fighter.

Shadowheart already has githyanki specific options.

The experience, if you wan the other locked options, is to make a new character, and play with it.

You want a movie to just show whatever romance you want?

go watch porn.

The first question I had when I read this is... did you have more booze?

Then I saw that you said you wandered off and went to sleep.

But that would make for a great story in game as well!

This is like judging a feast by what was found in the waste bin.

I'd like to comment to second this point here - actually a lot of the game's social interactions feel more like high-school drama jockeying, rather than the interactions of adults.

On the core topic: I can understand some people's objections to player-sexual characters, and how it takes 'something' away from characters by removing some of their personal definition... However...

However... Player-sexuality is not to be confused with "Everyone is bi"; that's not what it is. It's a statement that IF a player finds that their personal character is attracted to and wants to pursue a particular NPC that they have grown to like and would like to feel a rapport with, then that desire will be able to be met, and the game will define itself to accommodate that.

Yes; characters in games like kingmaker have that slightly more intricate definition, because those details are defined and become a part of who they are... however, it also causes problems; suppose you are a male-preferring male, in Kingmaker, for example.... What are your options? Who can you pursue attraction to? One character, and one character *Only*, and *only* if you're okay with breaking him up with his current partner first.... Is that satisfying? No, it's not. It's not feasible to cater to all player preferences as well as character type attractions, with hard-defined characters: you'd need a homosexual male academic scholar type, a homosexual female academic scholar type, a heterosexual male academic scholar type, a heterosexual female academic scholar type, a homosexual male roguish fortune-player... etc., etc.,... it's not feasible.

Making romanaceable characters player-sexual doesn't mean they don't *Have* that same definition that can be a part of who they are - it just means that it's not determined until *you* determine what it needs to be - it is and becomes a tangible truth, as needed. Those exact same characters can still have a 'default' written preference to follow if they aren't pursued by the player, but the player's needs, for the characters they feel that they want to pursue, need to override that. That may sound crass to some, but we have to remember that it's a fictional story being built with fictional characters; no-one's personal will or freedom is being taken away or denied by doing this.

Ultimately, it's about asking who the game is for: is it for the players, or is it for the world-authors? As a DM, your game world should be for your players - not the other way around. In tabletop, even if you hard define a character's preferences as part of your world, it's softer, since you can still supply alternatives and other options for your players... in a video game, that isn't as feasible at all; we have a limited selection of options, and that's all we have. They *Must* be able to be what players need them to be, because they are our only options. That means that, in a social romance setting, players need to be able to create the character they want, and then, to pursue the *type* of character personality they want to pursue, and know that they stand a chance of being reciprocated; anything less is shutting players down to a greater extent and loss of satisfaction than you could ever hope to gain by hard defining those specific details of the character. This doesn't mean that those NPCs can't have individual quirks or preferences alongside this - they most certainly can, and it can make for cute or amusing discussions! But overall, the player has to come first, and they need to know that, overarching whatever individual quirks or eccentricities an NPC has, inside the bedroom or out of it, that their efforts stand a chance of being reciprocated when they direct them towards the character they want to share that relationship with.

If a character's personal sexuality makes up such a large part of their personality and character depiction that it cannot change on different play-throughs as needed, then you have a bigger problem by far already. It shouldn't have much of an impact on the presentation of the character and development of their personality - it can afford to be what each individual player feels they want it to be, without detracting from the character, the world, or each person's individual experience of it.

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That said, and returning to the "everything feels way too 'high-school teen'" complaint: yes, the romance feels very rushed and forced, and it's baffling that we get the overwhelming pressure of nearly every camp companion either actively trying to get into our pants, or going out of their way to talk about how we can't get into theirs now... it just feels ham-fisted and unbelievable in the extreme.

+1

I like the idea of characters' sexuality being influenced by the players' willingness to pursue them. I'm gonna be a little shit, though, and say it's 2020. People apparentely got into an uproar over female Mandalorian armor. Strong independent lesbian character turning straight because male would attract all kinds of crazies.

I agree with the OP.
It seems to me that NPCs shouldn't be accommodating, otherwise they really turn into sex dolls.
In the original games of the series, each of the companions had their own requirements for the novel regarding the race and gender of Charname and then everyone was fine.
I don't think all companions should have strict gender and race requirements for the PC, but I don't think everything should flock to absolute bisexuality.

I remember a lot of people getting angry because you couldn't do that with e.g. Sera in Inquisition and suspect that was the likely source of a lot of the hate for her, which was often excused as not liking her "stubborn" attitude. I don't really see the point of influencing a character's sexuality though: that's not really any different to the playersexual stuff we have already. I'm slightly on the fence about the subject; using DA as an example, I preferred Inquisition to DA2 but I suspect I would've had a very different opinion if the only characters I liked were unavailable because it wasn't a thing.

The term is playersexuality or you are gender assigning, and my gender is a apache helicopter tiger bear. So yes, I am allowed in the womens rest room. jokes.

The thought would be this for example.

Shadowheart, I will assign as a self righteous lesbian.

So, DC to romance, as a female, is 6. DC as female gith is 17. DC to romance as male is 15. DC to romance as male gith is 20.

But if you are male, and her core character is lesbian, and you romance her.... it changes her character drasticaly, so dialogues with her suddenly change and are way different.
She is no longer the same person.

She suddenly stops being secretrative, and is suddenly super open because she was just broken from one major self desctructive habit, for example... and she is no longer the same person for it.

Before I get all the gay pride defenders, it is a example. The same can be applied for a heterosexual person as well, in this case we will say wyll, who suddenly becomes gay (DC 20 romance check as male character)

It is just such a drastic shift that they are not the same after it.

This whole walk on eggshells, make everyone playersexual just to appeal to the alphabet community is just straight out dumb and boring and disinteresting in my opinion.

Why ruin a good game for a fad?

I think many people here are mistaken when they call what happens at a party "romance". This is not a romance start... In DOS2, you could also sleep with Fane "for the sake of science", there were no problems, it was not start romance or a BIG relationship. I think problem is not characters, but how people perceive this night. If I have 3 bed scenes in 3 acts, I'm all for it. I don't see this as a problem, and behavior of Astarion and Lae looks normal to me for their personalities. The only "sex doll" right now is Shadow, haha, even without an intimate scene. Because people wanted her to be nicer... Disgusting. Changing personalities of companions for tastes of player, this is much more dangerous than what you are talking about here.

What about the romances in BG 2?

I loved working to get Viconia. And she made you work for it, and, honestly, she really wasn't worth it.

Or the romances in KOTR2?

Where i am going is this. The characters you had romances with were made with a background, and were not altered to be playersexual, but kept as their core beliefs.

Now, I will go back to KOTR2 again, in this respect. in dialogue with NPC companions, you could open up hidden classes for them.

So you had two ways to play the game... either let them level up in their base class, or through relationship points, open up jedi classes for level up.

It basically meant a drastic change in the characters in some cases. But it was rewarding.

That is where I am going with this.

Lock the options if you are not the right class/gender/race for it, or if your stats aren't right... or make it a SUPER high DC to achieve, and it is something that is completely shattering to the core NPC companion, but open up the option if Larian feels that strongly option should be there.

Don't just make it a given.

This also opens up the replay value. Roll a new toon for new options. THAT is the core replayablity from BG1 and BG 2. "What happens if I am this thing , at that place there, doing this thing?"

Didn't even know/remember Sera was romanceable, to be honest, she was such a little sister character than it never occured to me. Also, there's Cassandra in that game.

I think it's a good idea if the preferred sexuality of the character, and how they go 'against' that, gets actually addressed. Like, staying with Inquisition, the idea of a female character managing to romance Cassandra without disregarding her previous relationship and her history as a heterosexual person is intriguing. If it's just 'we'll bang, ok', then yeah, no real difference.

((to be clear, to Vometia, I was just illustrating what it is, to me, for characters to be 'playersexual'; I wasn't trying to suggest an alternative. I also feel it's something that does need to be handled with tact and skill, or else it comes off crass.))



To be honest, I'm far more concerned that you just decided to describe being a lesbian as a major self-destructive habit... and that you thought that was a good thing to do as your example.

This would not work in Inquisition simply because there characters personal quests are literally tied to their orientation, as if orientation is most important part of their personality. This is why I don't like lock on orientation, it not only cuts off some of content for you, but also often makes characters more boring. This is fine only with Solas, and only because He is something more than your companion... But Dorian's quests are a real cringe. In DA2, you could only think about Anders, because he had a "friend". But everyone else looked pretty normal, and it was better because their stories didn't cling to their orientations, they were focused on their personalities.

In BG3, I see problem only in races, I hardly believe that Astarion sleeps with a gnome after he called them animals.

Again, I agree with you.
In general, Dragon Age: Inquisition is an example of reasonable limits for romance with companions. The game certainly isn't the best example for an RPG, but the limitations of romance are one of the few things this game does well.
But we live in a time when such changes can unleash a barrage of criticism on the game. I think there is no need to hope that something will change in this.

Racial restrictions on romance would be a pretty good solution. I think this is the best we can hope for.

She is not a lesbian. Her daisy (dream lover) is male whom she's very attracted to. SH serves Shar, this is the reason to be secretive in the first place. She's just bad at keeping it in the secret because she mocks Selune at every occasion taken, not to mention gazillion Shar's markings on her gear.