Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Mega-threads and Guides BG3 Party Movement Mechanic

you're right.
that's another issue. Not sure we already talked about this.

For what its worth, I agree that the chain mechanics is clunky as hell and should be refined, so should the entire grouping mechanics be simplified. But as for party size, I disagree. Who knows, maybe they will change it. I wouldn't hold my breath though with Larian's history.

A new feedback data point, a new voice saying that the party controls are dreadful. Shocking !

Gassygunslinger, I would have suggested you to go add a "+1, really bad system, frustrating" in the mega-thread for this topic. I doubt that the existence of that thread will will change anything, but hey. I was thinking, if Larian runs a sentiment analysis algorithm on some given threads, players adding posts with easily interpretable keywords could help Larian see that most players dislike the current control scheme. But Maximuus has not only already directed you to the mega-thread, he has also produced manually this kind of analysis I was just thinking of. So 75% are clearly not happy, and if we assume that people who discussed issues and made suggestions would rather see changes, 97% of voices in that thread are not quite satisfied with the current controls.

Will that mean anything ? I can't exactly say that I very hopeful.

First, it's just the opinion of a vocal minority, and thus can easily be dismissed. (Of course, the opinion of a vocal, self-selected minority can be non-representative of the view of the majority ... just like it can. It's the way statistics work.)

Second, players have been complaining about this since week 1. It has now been 5 months of Early Access, and the party controls are still horrible. Granted, Patch 3 introduced a much need feature (companions now follow on jump). But when you're coming from astronomically far behind, and have a long list of problems, even completely solving one still leaves you astronomically far behind.

Larian's communication on this topic has been essentially non-existent. I'm really curious of what the feeling and state of mind is at Larian Studios. Maybe they really like their system the way it is. Maybe they know it's "a problem", but who cares ? Apparently DOS2 had the same control scheme, sold well, got good reviews. BG3 will probably sell even better. Even if the text of most reviews points to the same issue, in the end all that matter is the final score. If Steam/Metacritic say it's a critical success, and sales say it's a commercial success, then it's a success. Then controls are not a problem. And if there's no problem, there's no need for a solution. Anyway, pure speculation. I doubt we'll hear Larian communicate on this before release.



You are not imagining it. The issue of clicks not being always registered properly, or the sensitivity being too low, has been there since the start, and reported several times. I'm not going to start a search on this right now, but if it never had a dedicated thread, maybe I'll open one. Or someone will. Whatever.

Great job Maximuuus. I've always thought this mega-thread could be described as "yeah, almost everyone agrees that party controls are dreadful". Now we know that more quantitatively.

THREAD STATISTICS

201 different players answered this thread from P1 to P29 (included)
I think I didn't forget anyone and I think no one is listed twice.
I also include people that just discussed in the thread without giving a strong +1 or -1. Usually those also have issues with the system.


RESULTS

- 147 (73%) of them gave a feedback that you can't missunderstood : they don't like this system
- 6 (less than 3%) said that they're pretty ok to deal with the system but they have issues with it
- 1 (less than 1%) seems to like it.
- 47 (23%) disccussed issues related to this system or give related feedbacks, suggestions, specific issues etc... but didn't clearly wrote "I like it" or "I don't like it".

CONCLUSIONS

After re-reading ALL messages, looks like nearly 100% of players think that the system is far from being good.
Improvement are needed even if they won't solve every issues.

I guess that 100% of players would be fine with a classic control scheme but if Larian wants to keep this unpopular chain system, they should improve it.
A few suggestions from this thread :

- Add formations
- Add a group all / ungroup all button
- Fix the auto jump / auto follow
- Add a hide all button
- Add a "don't move" button
- Fix the pathfinding
- Fix the latency / missclick / missdrag while chaining / unchaining / clicking on portrait

This won't solve all issues - the biggest one is probably that you CAN'T select more than 1 character at the same time - but it would be good QoL improvement.
This system would still be bad both in solo and multiplayer, both on console and on pc - your characters would still move like chickens everywhere - select more than 1 / less than 4 companions would still gonna be tedious - you'll still have more click to do in comparison with a classic systems - but it would be "less bad".

Edit : the list has been updated in the previous message.
Edit 2 : I didn't saw any PROS for the chain from players who tried both systems in SP/MP or on Console/PC. That's why I assume in the conclusion that the chain is not better whatever the situation.

Those are BRILLIANT suggestions! =)

Absolutely +1.

Examples of the current system: in the tiefling camp if you unlock the door with the woman with the bad legs in stealth and try to read the book on the barrel by the door your companion will run in and the cutscene will trigger. Usually it's the one without speech proficiency too.

In the blighted village if you sneak in the side way and hide behind the wall to ambush the goblins, one party member will usually sneak out in the open. Usually the one with no proficiency in stealth.

Party members on a ledge sometimes don't jump down automatically, but when you change members to jump down the others will actually jump UP to join you! You end up having to manually unchain everyone or they all die of falling damage.

The chain system works fine as far as I can tell.

My only issue is that my click and drag doesn't always register. Like it's a sensitivity issue.

Seems like this is what Larian are clinging to. "DOS2 sold well so people must love the movement mechanics"
Yeah... no Larian, DOS2 sold well in spite of it's movement mechanics.

This was an excellent summary.
We more or less knew what the general stance on the topic was, but it's good to see it put in raw numbers.

Thanks for the (probably pointless) effort you put into it.

Oh wow. I had seen the page 1--10 analysis but I had missed the full-thread update. Thanks Tuco for upping the thread, but mostly thanks to Maximuuus for the analysis. This post is a gold nugget.

As I wrote previously, I had the feeling (probably like most people who saw this thread) that "yeah, most people agree that the controls are bad". Now it's no longer a feeling. The overwhelming majority of players who expressed their view here think it's bad.

And I'm also fully in agreement with the mentality of the suggestions. Sadly, it might well be that not being able to select more than 1 character at a time will not go away. In view of this, all we can hope for is that the rest of the party controls are made as little bad as possible.

I'll just add two things :
- Add a keyboard shortcut for the Group All / Ungroup All button.
- Add a keyboard shortcut for Ungroup This Character (from its current group). And one for Add Character To Group with character X. It's a pain that I cannot simply select Character 4 and start going somewhere with Character 4 (alone). If I could press 4 (to select) followed by U (to ungroup) and start going somewhere, it would still be one more input than necessary, but a lot more manageable.

There is not much to add. I especially would love to see a group all/ungroup all button. Right now, it is often clunky.

Seems all has been said already. I will just chime in with an "I concur" =)

I don't like the chain systems.
I like the more established method formations and single selecting party members

This one is probably my biggest frustration:
- Fix the latency / missclick / missdrag while chaining / unchaining / clicking on portrait

But yea, agree with all of the above!

+1 for 'current system is bad' , good suggestions, nice work doing this little summary forum stats maximuus. I guess you do realize we have a bit of a distorted sample issue due to self-reporting here - but great work anyway !

Yeah, pretty much.
I won't speak for everyone else but I'll take my chance to stress that I never stopped caring about this issue.
The only reason I'm not posting anymore in the thread is that there are only so many combinations of words you can use to reiterate the same concept and I'm starting to feel pretty damn close to have exhausted most of the viable ones.

+1 op current dos system is just pain

The chaining system post-combat is the worst. They cannot seem to separate pathing logic for AI vs. the party.

Let me say again, the chain system/party mechanic is so bad, I have absolutely no desire to play and test BG3. It’s that annoying.

The only reason I run BG3 is to mess around with the character creator after I’ve added mods. Other than that I haven’t bothered to play because the controls are so irritating.