Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback If "dice"(core D&D element) is optional, WHY hp bloat is not???

I don’t like the hit point bloat because of its impact on spell casters, but I do understand why Larian went this direction.

First, you have players that think a miss is boring. They don’t understand the math behind swinging and always hitting an opponent with a bunch of extra hit points vs one that you hit rarely but goes down quickly when you do hit. Also, this is a low level problem, which is there in part to provide you with a sense of character development. By the time you start to approach level 10, you hardly miss an enemy anyway, so the primary underlying reason for hit point bloat “should” go away.

Second, goblins are dangerous because of their numbers but because this is a turn based game, battles take forever. Each goblin gets a turn and it can be agonizing sitting there while the AI try’s to compute a move. I often find that the AI cannot figure out what to do and so it will just spend 30 seconds thinking only to grunt and do nothing. If Larian were to send a horde of weak goblins at us, it would probably crash the engine. At the very least it would make battles painfully long.

Third, they have bloated hit points to create the sense we are fighting a boss. I am sure this is why the spectator has the increased hit points. The concept of the “boss battle” is the most overused trope in video games.

If at some point rest gets adjusted such that it is not free, spell casting classes will be destroyed if this bloat continues. I would really hate to have all my spells used up as I grind through a dungeon, only to confront a boss that has been balanced against a full strength group and with a massive hit point boost to make sure it is suitably challenging. Already by level 4 my cantrips are increasingly useless. I get to watch Lzeal hit easier than me and produce massive DPS, while I am relegated to hurling fire bolts which rarely hit. My most important spells, such as sleep, maybe take down 2 dudes for a couple rounds. If they want to continue down the path of hit point bloat, they should buff spell casters or it will be better to just take 4 fighters.