Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Mega-threads and Guides Party Size Discussion

One of my main draws to the BG series is experimenting with many companions so FORCING them to die or leave so we are locked into a specific party just doesn't sit right with me, as epic as the battle could become. It was my least favorite aspect of a former Larian title.

I am fine with them dying because of choices or such, but railroading us into them being removed just is ugh to me. I really hope they change their mind, and we can get a small army eventually of varied characters to play around with and eventually settle with.

I find that four characters is not much. Six was a good number. There are probably good reasons for reducing the number to four.
But instead of putting the companions in reserve at the camp, why not allow them to be sent on a mission somewhere?
- Search for information
- Escort missions
- Surveillance
- Walking around and scouting
- Shopping
Maybe even form a second group in parallel.

Why not consider that once a companion's quest is over, he is no longer too interested in our quest. But that he remains available to offer us his services punctually.

What you really want is an increased party size.
Don't be shy, we are a lot asking minimum 5 characters in the party

That I am fine with, and I am fine with individuals dying because of our decisions. Heck, I was fine with BG1 and 2 Party Conflicts cause it made them feel like they had some agency. But I am mostly not fine with them decided to wipe out any that we don't have with us at that exact time. It feels stifling and honestly a bit forced.|


I'd absolutely love for companions to be able to do things. I think elsewhere I suggested that each could have their own small RPing job in camp like hunting or cooking so they feel like a group that is working together.


I want increased party size as well, 6 is the perfect amount considering the previous games and the max party size for most 5e modules. It would allow us to really have a full dnd party and experience the world with a real variety in combinations considering Subclass and Character options.

I fully support this, personally for me I struggled a bit with just 4, I had to really use my brain to win, and I also had to be lucky, a party of 6 would make things a lot more fun, there would be more variety, more epicness having more companions around, more interactions, instead of them waiting on the camp, it would be also be cool to recruit extra people, that we don’t necessarily play with them, but they follow us around until they die or have to go somewhere else, like for me it would be amazing to have a full battle, an epic event, like a war where all the characters were part of.

It would also be better with your playing with friends, imagine being that friend being left out because there is no place for you 😅

I am just here to say that I also very much approve of the idea increasing the party size.

And here is why:

I DOS2 (which I assume is the reason Larian went with a 4man party) all of the characters were class fluid. Story-wise, some roles might fit them better than others - but anybody could do anything, meaning you could choose your characters freely while not sacrificing your team composition. This meant you could without an issue choose whatever 3 characters you wanted, no matter their "prefered" roles. The player could focus on the roleplaying perspective and let their imagination justify the reason why someone like Ifan would be a mage, or Fane would be a fighter.

In BG3, however, all companions are tied to their classes and some even to their subclasses. This forces the player to do one of two things: A) pick their own class to suit the companions they desire to bring along (which is dreadful) or B) pass up on a character they might have wanted just because they don't fill their current group needs. An example of our current followers would be the difficulties of bringing both Wyll and Gale together, unless the PC is a front-liner.


OBVIOUSLY there are ways to play around this. I am most certain that people would/could successfully make a run with a PC-made wizard while bringing both Gale and Wyll and then ... Idk, Astarion. But it would make the game significantly harder and that is really unfortunate from a roleplaying perspective since we *are* limited by game mechanics to only 3 companions.

I mean it was 5 in demo version... When they first showed game in demo version, they had 5 companions in group. So for now, I don't understand why they changed party size to 4.

Cool, thank you. I will check it out!

The old SWTOR party crafting thing basically. That definately sounds like a cool idea.

I feel increasing the size of the party has multiple benefits especially for this game

The main one for me is Story because it seems that many NPC actually has interactions with the world like at the start with zorro you need Lar'zel for that meeting it also allows for more interaction between you and other NPC within your party and that helps grow an attachment to them as well as some comedy moments.

And then there also the added benefit of making the game easier for other new players having more than on healing or tank could be priceless for non-experienced players this could be balanced by decreasing the amount of experience your party gets so more experienced player can get more levels faster.

I feel the party size should be at least 5

Another good feature would be group skill checks so depending on who is in your party can be used their skill in the checks as at the moment it seems to be whoever you have selected gets the check and for me that kinda breaks emersion as most people like to play there main as the main while NPC is supporting I feel for multiplayer this system is fine but for single player not so much so they should have 2 systems one for single player and one for multi.

Althouh I definitely think we should be 5 or 6 in the party, I do agree that this sounds cool.

I did not read every page in this giant thread, but I'm going to give my opinion on party size.

Ok, I'm fine with 4 in the main party, but I really enjoyed the extra followers, like Sazza and Glut. From what I've read on other threads, they're talking about later having mercenaries in the game. I'm not sure if this is just to give the player the option to have a fully customized party in single player, or to replace fully dead companions or ones who get mad and leave (or leave for any other reason).

I think that a customizable "throw-away" follower or multiples of them would be awesome. Ones that actually stuck around. Maybe even ones I could train. Say I had to take a group of recruits later on and train them with my party who later help in large battles, I don't know. There's a lot of options here. They're not infected and might not even have a major role in the storyline.

I'd also like to see multiple long-term summons like familiars and ranger pets. Having them customizable would be cool, too. Say we got to name them and possibly give them equipment, even if it were limited like a necklace and a ring or something. I should be able to summon both a familiar and my animal companion as a ranger, and everyone in the group should be able to summon at the same time.

So in total, it'd be 4 companions, 3 mercenaries, and up to 4 familiars and 4 animal companions (if they were all rangers). I know that's a lot, but the game is already starting off with very large fights and I'm expecting even bigger ones later. Imagine fighting a gargantuan monster or even several huge ones like a fire giant camp without having a ton of bodies to throw at it.

https://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/5e_Gargantuan_Monsters

I doubt we'd reach this level as that size includes creatures like ancient dragons and titans, but there are even larger sizes than that. There already are some pretty large "boss" fights in the game.

Noooo
I know.
Larian only has bridge tables to meet at! More than four players is not possible
OK OK I'm out

I've played with a six member party with a mod. It's not cumbersome at all. It does obviously trivialize the current encounters even more though. That means, Larian would have to rebalance everything again.

It won't happen. The game's bones/core is essentially done at this point. Larian wouldn't market Early Access where core game features can be altered. They have built this game for a party of four and that's what we are getting.

OR, since this is Act 1 it can be allowed to be a bit easier and they only need to balance content beyond Act 1? And I think the point of this EA is so they can modify core features, they have been trying to fix the RNG system for example which is a core game feature.

Possible but I highly doubt it. I have a feeling all the Acts are pretty much done now and are being tested internally. The good news is, since it's still internal, yes there is some chance Larian can modify it to accommodate six members. But it's not just turn based combat. It's also world design. Frankly, I'd be pretty surprised if a lot of their assets haven't been built yet.

I said it's not cumbersome to fight with six. But with the world being so small and compact, I can see it being an issue further on. If the environments have already been built with four members in mind, like Act 1, things can get really tight and crowded adding more and more bodies.

Very sadly, I have to agree. And it's not just that they have essentially finished core development of the game. It is also Larian's/Swen's "vision" for the game. That vision is something they very firmly believe to be awesome, so why would they change any part of it? I, and some others like me, however, consider that vision to be utterly stupid and ridiculous. But Larian is not going to give us the game we want. They couldn't care less about the game we want. And over time I have degectedly come to accept this reality. The only possible salvation of this game for me is if there exists a modder out there with the skills, time, and willingness to literally take an axe to the game, and remake the game as a true D&D and BG game by rebuilding many of its systems. Then and only then will this game be a halfway decent game for me.

Now that is curious, to say the least... I cannot think of even one good argument to scale it down from 5 companions to 3 if they even had 5 as a base concept. I wonder if this 4-man squad thing is a thing limited to act 1 then? Time will tell.

They have actually stated that the UI was possible to extend to a 6 person party out the gate no complaints either way but i wouldnt mind seeing them actually adapt it and it is possible they said that with mods it would be possible to do so regardless. So it isnt exactly impossible to see the game change to seat a 6 person party with multiplayer you can even achieve this in the opening of the game going as high as a 6 person party however limitations in multiplayer prevent you from taking out characters who have joined after the intro. But it is possible to get a party of 6 characters even if it is for a short period so the option does exist as a possibility to do so.