Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback skill check dice rolls, a really shit idea (turned savescumming into a core game mechanic)

Yeah, and real relationships are very much based on intentions. If you're in some kind of trouble and a friend steps in to help you, but he ultimately ends up unsuccessful, you'd still appreciate the fact that he tried to help you, and not be disdainful of him for trying and failing. As you say, you'd go, "Thanks, anyway. At least you tried." It's the thought that counts, as the saying goes. Larian's way is just so video-gamey.

Ok. I can agree with that, though it depends on the people. 😁

Some people only like you if you succeed. Some are not so shallow. So I guess it depends on the types of people these characters really are. Lae'zel, for example, strikes me very much as a gal who is only impressed by results. Astarion as well and even Wyll, though he hides behind his hero mask. Not sure about Shadowheart and Gale. They all hide deep, dark secrets, so Im not sure any of them are truly good people who care much at all about intentions.

Honestly, I view all the party, even Lae'zel, as redeemable people who are all not good but also not evil. I view them as various shades of neutral. Some may have some good intentions, like Wyll, but deep down there is an evil that lurks that makes them all rather selfish and self-centered. Your decisions and successes may win them over to be more good or more evil, and that is part of the point of the game. The more you impress them, the more you persuade them to either become better people or more evil. The more you succeed, the more you impress them.

But, if Larian is not going for the shallow approach to these characters, then I totally agree. A not shallow character would be persuaded by intentions, not successes. But keep in mind, not one of them calls you friend in the beginning. You have to win their friendship. Until then, they are all judging you based sometimes on intentions and sometimes on shallow successes or failures. So IMO, I do think it is pretty well balanced and shows they are all a bit shallow at times.

I agree, that the trying part should get approval. It's not fun to do the right thing and the companions still disapprove. It is not always fun to have to succeed a role to get approval.

What about you get minor approval for trying and failing but more approval foe succeeding and disapproval for not trying and more disapproval for doing the opposite of trying.

Depends on the companion. E. g. I doubt the githyanki society rewards intentions; you either fail or you succeed. So I don't think Lae'zel would care about you trying, same for Astarion. Shadowheart on the other hand remarks on it if you try to free her from the pod, even though you fail.

Right. That's what I was saying earlier too. I actually think it is just fine as is. Lae'zel is, for the most part, a person who requires results or she's not impressed. This is especially clear when she propositions you at camp after you kill the gobbo leaders. But even still, there are many dialogue events that she approves simply by making the right choice without a roll. Same with all the characters. Some dialogue options give you approval or disapproval. Some are based on whether you succeed or not. And we have no idea how much approval/disapproval points we get each time either. So maybe Gale disapproves when you fail a roll, or whatever, but it obviously isn't much since you can pretty easily increase your Gale approval rating just by making choices in the game that are towards helping people. Same with Wyll.

So if you really examine the game closely, some choices gain influence or lose it and some dice rolls. This is not a bad way of doing it for a CRPG. If I'm a DM and I have complete strangers all meet and thrown into this scenario and they don't know each other and don't know whether they can trust one another, passing Persuade dice rolls and so forth would impact characters' overall impressions of one another. Good intentions only go so far with complete strangers.

Yep. But I'd still like an option to hide the messages, because they get annoying quickly (and also sometimes are immersion breaking, since Shadowheart can disapprove even if dead). I don't pay attention to the approval metrics anyway.

I totally agree. You shouldn't really know how they view you. You should only know whether they like you or not based on how they respond to you during dialogues and whether or not you trigger certain dialogues at all. Although I might WANT to know how best to appeal to certain characters to make them like me more or whatever, this is not something I SHOULD know.

Maybe they could make it another option in the Settings. Turn off approval acknowledgements, etc. or something like that.

I think they are staying true to D&D. And I love it. It's second nature to fail in D&D. If you are use to playing D&D then you would know. I mean I know it's not for EVERYONE. But a good portion of people enjoy that. Maybe implement it as a "Hardcore" thing.

Thank you. I agree. The game gets more boring when everything is based on your intentions. The replayability goes way down when dice rolls are taken out, and you lose a lot of excitement.

If every time you play the game you know you will always save Arabella by selecting a certain option, there is no excitement at all when I replay. I just pick the path I want and that's it. Done.

This way, with dice rolls, no two playthroughs are the same. I've remade my Half-Drow Cleric like 10 times and each time Ibplay through with him it's different because some rolls he makes and some fail, leading to so many different experiences.

Man, it absolutelly not interesting when your charisma is 18, but you fail persuation again and again. It's stupid.

In my opinion, it would be a pretty good compromise to increase the x2 modifiers.
It would be an extremely simple solution that would make a character who specializes in something less often fail.
There would still be a possibility of failure but I think the game would be generally more fun for more players.
Thanks to this, the player would feel that character building really matters, not just rng.

What does it mean to succeed when you can't fail?

The thing with Arabella is, there are multiple story trees whether she dies or not. If you're not a fan of digital children dying, then sure, reload, but if you're not fussed either way, the richness of gameplay remains both in the event of death and life (you just get the dancing lights amulet sooner if she lives).

What I don't like is when failing a die roll totally closes off one avenue of play (eg Lae'zel coming to kill you in the night), If something important can be decided on a die roll, there should always be a harder route to the same outcome. Good example: if everyone fails their perception check on the lever in Selune's Temple that opens the way to the Underdark, you can still solve the puzzle and get through. Annoying, but at least that option isn't completely gone. So even if you've sworn, for whatever reason, never to reload, you can still gain the experience and find the route ahead.

Well in regards to the UD, there are multiple ways to get down there. So in effect, what you are saying is already there. Not disagreeing with you, just wasn't sure if you knew that.

I've found four ways into the UD so far. The Selune Temple route seems to be the easiest, and the earliest one you'll come across if you play the way the game is designed to push you (ie you don't know all its secrets inside out). I was talking more about multiple options for solving *immediate* problems, so if you're in the temple, you have at least two ways to progress.

I do agree it can be a bit frustrating when dice rolls lock you out of certain events or keep you from getting certain items or something, but that is kinda the way life can be, right? Sometimes if you aren't lucky enough, you just miss out on something.

One thing I love about this game is that you never play the same game twice. Sometimes you make rolls and trigger events and sometimes you don't. Take away dice rolling triggering things or locking you out of things and the game loses a lot of edge and flavor. Next time I play, same game. No variations.

What I honestly think would be easiest and work best is 5e Hard Core rules, take away back stab, etc., but give players the option to go into settings and set for themselves their own preference on how many Inspiration points they have to start with. These points could be used in combat and dialogue both so if they want to cheese battles they could spend inspiration. So if players want easy mode, they can set themselves to have 100 inspiration points to start.

The first entrance I've found on my first playthrough was the spider cave, but I didn't use it because I was afraid it would be a one-way trip. But once I've learned that flying creatures don't take fall damage, I've sent a raven familiar down the cave. If you have an imp you could have it go invisible and won't even have to fight the spiders. And then you can just use it to find a waypoint in the Underdark, so I find it easier than the temple.

I think failed perception checks should not be revealed, though. It's a bit immersion breaking: you as the player know there is something there, even though the party doesn't. And also the reverse: I think for quest items like the soul coins there should be a perception check, because as it is now, it is the player that has to spot them.

Using inspiration point in combat would probably require a proper reaction system