I think you guys haven't played the original BG1 in a while. You can get a diamond worth 800 gold, a ring of protection and a ring that doubles your first level mage spells before you have any real fights. A commoner in Beregost gives you a ring of protection for delivering a letter. You can steal a powerful wand of lightning in Beregost. You can get a +1 greatsword off an easy to beat half ogre just southeast of there. A +2 longsword (plus 1 cold damage) off a bounty hunter, a shortsword +2 off a bunch of hobgoblins and Thunderhammer smithy and Feldpost's sells a bunch of them .Ffs you find a plate of ankeg mail sitting around in a field in Nashkel! Not to mention a wizard in High Hedge. This is just the early levels. The wilderness is CRAWLING with magic.
This is Forgotten Realms, there's magic everywhere. I think they've got the magic items just right. If you're not going around stealing from everyone, it will take you time to kit out your party, just as it should.
oops also forgot the +2 warhammer with lightning damage off an easy to beat cleric beside Beregost!
I think you haven't played BG3 in a while.
You can get tons of magic items and tens of thousands of gold (approx 85k by level 4/end EA) in reality for free courtesy of pickpocketing without limitation or risk (when you know the technique and/or can savescum). You have access to a large amount of powerful exploding barrels. Every player can shove huge creatures to their deaths, roll twice on attacks due to guaranteed advantage, dip weapons for +1-4 damage, etc, etc.
Staff of Arcane Blessing is +1-4 attack/save and +2-8 spell attack roll. Something akin to a +5 weapon obtainable at level 2? Seems "balanced" in a way The Spiffing Brit would use the word.
Shattered Flail +2 heals wielder 1-6 hp each time you cause damage. If used in combination with another overpowered item Sapphire Spark that nearly doubles Magic Missile damage, you get healed for each missile. Brokenly OP, especially considering a Magic Missile-build is one of the top burst damage-dealers in 5e even without magic items doubling damage.
Warped Headband of Intellect sets intelligence to 18 and allows quick meta-gaming builds where intelligence can be made a dump stat.
Also, we are comparing level 4 magic item progress in BG3 vs level 8-10 in BG1.
