Originally Posted by Saito Hikari
Originally Posted by Abits
But that's the main flaw of this system ever since its inception. This is one of the reasons this always seemed to me like a gimmick which is more trouble than its worth

Considering we've had no recent word on the state of their progress in regards to the origin system, I wouldn't be surprised if it ultimately gets scrapped. It would be welcome news to me at least, because it would mean that the developers have decided to redirect their efforts towards fleshing out each companion in general AND making Tav feel like less of a random bystander, instead of having to essentially design two versions of each origin companion and all of the potential writing/programming troubles that goes along with it. The origin system only really worked in DOS2 because literally everyone has the same dialogue options when you are the one controlling them outside of very infrequent unique options, there was literally ZERO party banter outside of everyone offering their input before the leader makes a big choice, and no one called out Larian for that back then because good writing isn't exactly the main draw of that game.

BG3 forcing the same thing would be nothing but awkward, among an audience with much higher expectations in regards to the writing, and one of the most immersive-breaking things in a game that people are expecting to be immersive.

For example, we already know from datamines that...

Shadowheart and Lae'zel are eventually going to confront each other in camp and try to kill each other, and one of them dies unless you pass a difficult persuasion check.

Exactly how is that supposed to play out if you're playing as one of them? Do you have to make a different skill check that's an automatic game over if you fail? Or would you have options to avoid it entirely, which is basically even more extra development resources being expended for that right there?

From the Pre-EA footage where they always played as an Origin character to the old narration style, I don't think there's ANY chance they would scrap the Origin system. I think it's very much integral to their vision of the game. There's a reason why the promotional art of the game has all of them and no "default" character among them.

I'm not really concerned with the ability to play Nice'zel or Evil Wyll being farfetched. One of the most fascinating things I like about BG3 is that depending on what scenes you get and how you respond to the companions as Tav, you will have a different experience with them than other players or even your own previous or later playthroughs. Imagine a playthrough never learning Shadowheart's secret and never opening up to the player (many of us experienced this pre-patch 3). Or for a more interesting example, compare people's opinions of Gale for those who play good and distrust him and those who play evil and don't suspect anything from him. And for me, after prioritizing Lae'zel's dialogue over all others, she's already pretty nice for a gith and pretty restrained all things considering.

My point is, we are already intended to have a certain range of interpretations of the characters. Being allowed to play them with options within that range as Origin characters is no different to me. I do think the options offered will be within reason of course. "Nice'zel" might always be narcissistic and still always want whatever it is she might want, but might have a range in how domineering she can be to get it. There's an example of this already in the Origin Unlocker mod in how you go about the Zorru scene pictured below:
[Linked Image from i.imgur.com]
So I assume Minsc would also have options within a certain believable range as well.

In response to the datamine spoiler text:
In Chubblots datamining vid, it looks like if you play as either Lae'zel or Shadowheart, you have a much easier time settling the matter. It is between them after all, so it makes sense they'd have an easier time settling it. As with all datamining tho it might be subject to change, but it's interesting to see how all this stuff is already there somewhat and already considered. The files for many of the scenes in the game have at least two versions depending on if they are a companion or origin character which is probably why the Origin Unlocker mod works at all in some cases.