Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Yeah, I'm out.

I understand there is a lot of effort in this game, however they are not addressing the main criticism which is the fundamental mechanics being changed: Classes that lack core features, core features working differently from tabletop, core mechanics that are not and will not be implemented, pretty much everything that is implemented in the game does not work as in the tabletop.
Is this good? Solasta has shown that it is possible to implement features as in the tabletop, and it plays good.

Larian is listening.


Changes that have been made in response to the requests of the community:

• Surfaces caused by cantrips were removed as they unbalanced combat,
• The number of short rests allowed per long rest were increased
• How NPCs calculated approval ratings was adjusted
• Group jump was added
• The upcasting UI was changed in order to streamline the quick bar
• XP rewards for peaceful solutions was added.
• Extra inspiration points were added
• Cross saves were added

There are other QOL changes if you care to check the patch notes.



In the new patch we will be getting the following things that the community has been asking for:

• A new class
• New spells
• The ability to click on portraits to target party members with spells
• The option to choose loaded dice to alleviate RNG frustration
• The option to flee combat
• A streamlined lit torch interface
• Inventory UI tweaks
• Improved cinematics
• Improved lighting

And those are just the ones that were announced, there will be more in the new patch notes.


Larian is listening to its million plus member community and making changes with each and every patch.

Well in PFH2 Larian DID go to the trouble of getting a PnP designer to explain that video games and tabletop are different things. They're at least hearing y'all. Maybe not listening, though.

... and this explanation still falls short though, as Solasta is implementing the core mechanics pretty much RAW, and the combat specially is fantastic and not subject to the criticism that BG3 is facing.
Larian said they can't implement, this is not true. Which means they can, but don't want to.

Indeed, that's the moment when we had to understand that if we do not like the current direction, it's time to walk away and throw our money away, or begin modding to fix as much as we can.

LOL. Sad but true.

Won't any rebalance mod have to rejig every encounter in the game too? And wouldn't monster AI still be using these exploits?

That's why I don't see this being a real solution. It's the one that I will stick to, since I've wasted my money on this game and I'm utterly disappointed by the gameplay, but it's not a good one. Also such mods tend to break with every patch that touches gameplay. It's a lot of hassle to get just a game that work as the one they announced to be making.





I guess I've to be thankful for BG3 because it got me to play Pathfinder Kingmaker, so I at least got some fun out of it...

The Demo actually make me enjoy Solasta even more. But I really would like to see a cross-breed of them both .

Solasta was lacking a bit in the story department but repliactes an actualy table top rpg really well. But the characters are generic - no charname there.
Bgate 3 seems to be good in that your charname is unique but the mechanics seem to be lacking. And it really looks like DOS (which I did not like).


So, mechanics of Solasta and approach to story+characters/NPC's like in Bgate3.

That's assuming that balance is a current goal.

I find that extremely questionable as a position considering one can already solo every encounter.

Larian may not be able to because it could mean substantial rework of their engine. They are probably "just bending" their DOS mechanics so much around that it might break like an overdrawn bow ..

Well, now that you've mentioned, I realized that Larian is building BG3 on a modified DOS engine, and they don't use Unity like most RPGs.
Damn, might it be that their engine cannot adapt 5e rules? As simple as they are?

That has forever been the case in most single player RPGs. It was the case in BG 1 and 2, even with SCS and Tactics installed. It was the case in NWN 1 and NWN 2. It was the case in IWD 1 and IWD 2. It was the case in the Dragon Age games. It has been the case in Pillars of Eternity 1 and 2 and in Pathfinder: Kingmaker. It was also the case in D:OS 1 and D:OS 2. I could list even more RPGs, going back into the 80's, but I think you get the idea. RPGs are not and never have been balanced around outliers, people who want to challenge themselves and play solo. Combat is not designed to be truly challenging. Combat is designed to provide the illusion of difficulty to players who are casually playing the game. If you care about difficulty or balance then you are in the minority.

Games are designed so that people "struggle" and then they overcome that difficulty, when in reality there was never any difficulty at all. Its all an elaborately orchestrated trick. I cannot think of a single RPG I have played that could not be soloed, provided the game did not force party members onto you.

I so fucking don't.
It boils down to the good old "You're just a niche minority" you see thrown around on any dedicated community.
Except the minority is once again the one with familiarity with the topic being discussed and the direct experience on what they are commenting about.

Nope. That definitely not an issue. They could do the changes if they want to. Its not an Unity vs whatever their engine is called issue. Them re-using DOS2 material is convience not limitations of an engine - and none of the gameplay stuff is probably really re-used beyond the underlying concept. The code adjustment to make it work in their pseudo-5e-framework is probably as much work doing the 5e from scratch. So beyond some convience stuff like inventory and gui and backend stuff, most of the rendering, the 5e rules are not affected by the engine at all.

The only rules that are really hard to get into a video game are dynamic stuff like the wish spell. None of the gameplay changes Larian made falls in this cathegory. Its convictions in their own style and nothing else.

Welcome back. I hope you are feeling better again.

Exactly. So truly, if I am able to, I'll just remove everything I can and get closer to what I want, but my point is, Larian is no more 'balancing' around their mechanical uhhh unique system, than they are a pure 5e implementation.

This isn't a competitive esport.

Just to toss some information into this discussion -

According to the BG3 Steam Store Page, there have been a total of ~32,000 reviews and ~1200 recent reviews. Of those reviews, enough are considered positive by the Steam metrics to warrant being labeled as Very Positive.

In conclusion, I'm not sure that the anecdotal accusations or confirmation bias is warranted to claim any one is part of a vocal minority or majority.

I looked up Solesta, and it has its own problems as well. Such as pre-determined rolls etc. It is not some "God" standard to compare too.

Indeed, find a perfect game. Solasta appears to respond to its forum community however, so that must be nice.