Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General hows everones druid playthroughs going?

haha yeah I haven't used barkskin much. If I see concentration in the spell description I'm always second guessing whether its even worth the ready slot for a buff, when mirror image seems to be more useful lol. I know its a 5e type deal now where you better be concentrating on everything at all times but still. Spell casting types are my usual class in D&D, but the spellbar hotbar all-in one is kinda maddening here, the way the gameplay is set up doing direct damage type stuff seems to pan out better. The rest scheme is also kinda overwrought for a BG1 playstyle of switching everything on the fly constantly. BG1/2 didn't have much in the way of a rest economy, anywhere you could rest you could rest and be back at it in like 2 seconds as a conceit of the gameplay design. But in BG3 each trek to camp is like a minute long affair with a 4 click minimum so much more involved I find. Maybe if the game autosaved at the start of each encounter that would help a bit? I wish there were more isolated lower level low pressure combats on the Nautiloid and the areas immediately around the beach to prime the player, esp for casting type players. There's basically nothing in the tutorial portion of the game about it. I think there should be an opportunity to run into a trainer type NPC for each class archetype, to run through the basics for everything in more detail. Tailored combats or exercises for whatever we're being given to work with initially. If I had never played a wizard or druid in 2e or 3e, I don't know that I'd have much clue what to be doing in 5e BG3. The game doesn't really teach that and assumes a pretty high level of familiarity with D&D systems.

In my current playthrough another thing I noted, was that if you follow the story beats and the advice you're given by your companions, it seems to encourage the player to skip out on the druid camp pretty quickly and head towards the Goblins or the Gith or otherwise to dive in over their heads pretty quickly. I wish there were a few minor league combat situations leading up to that stuff. The game goes from throwing 2 or 3 enemies at you on the Nautiloid and the Beach, then into a pretty large engagement that we are meant to win with the aid of a bunch of friendlies in a set piece fight at the gate... But then pretty quickly escalates that to complex battles vs enemy groups that match the party in terms of abilities and equipment and consumable type items. They need a couple more hack and slash zones for the early grunt fest, where the monster types are rather simpler (not dealing with monsters that use consumables and spells) so the novice player has more opportunities to learn what they're doing before TPK scenarios. People gripe about trash mobs in other games, but this one I think needs some more, especially in the the lvl 1-2 range areas. Goblin's might work like that in other campaigns (like BG1/2 kobolds), but here they are clearly designed more like the Party vs Enemy Party battles in BG1/2 (when you'd fight other Humans/Elves/Dwarves etc). You know where that game used PC models rather than monster models and gear visuals to let you know you where about to fight another party of adventurers with similar skills to your own. Our goblins in BG3 are more like that than standard trash mob goblins. Even the mini gobbo fights include warrior priest wizard and rogue versions of the monster. The imps and intellect devourers work better as trash mob types probably, but there are only a couple encounters on the nautiloid and the beach that qualify. I think the Druid grove needs a dungeon clearing type sub-quest that sends the lvl2 PCs to kill something slightly more mundane and predictable, just as a way to learn their more basic abilities. Sticking with Act 1 for EA probably has had most clamoring for more difficulty, but I think the first areas of this game would be pretty hard for the neophyte