Thx Mad for this thread. And thx The Composer for trying to keep it clean.
I agree with most of your points (not that Solasta is ugly^^)
- The user interface in Solasta is very friendly user and new player friendly. You instantly know if you still have something to do or not.
You instantly know where things are. You instantly understand how things works and you can plan your turns and strategize way more easily.
It may not be pleasant for everyone's eyes but the UI do it's job perfectly well : make the user's experience easy and intuitive, requiring minimum effort on the user's part.
- The verticality is also interresting. TBH after I saw what verticality can mean, I don't really find it that great in BG3.
In BG3 the mechanics related to verticality is only shove and highground for bonuses. It's more rigid in Solasta but the game brings interresting things.
Shoving and going in a safer position / have bonuses like in BG3 of course... but flying and walking on the wall is really interresting.
I just closed the game 10 minutes ago. I have been attacked by spider that were camping (ranged poison attack) on top of trees. My solutions was to use ranged attacks with everyone or cast fly/spider climb on my melee characters.
This combat was extremely challenging and the possibilities brought by fly and spider climb were really enjoyable. I really hope Larian will make verticality a bit more deep like it can be in DnD.
- Same about the action economy and the free advantages. Baldur's Gate 3 really unbalanced the rules it's using and drastically reduce the interrests of many combinations / synergies between characters.
Having an advantage in Solasta is really rewarding. A character has entangled or dazzled (? not sure aboutthe word) an ennemy so your companions now have advantage on him. You succeed to push and prone your target so your companions have advantage.
There are so many possibilities and this is so rewardfull. In BG3 it's way too easy to have advantages and you don't feel rewarded when you have one through other mechanic than highround and bactstab...
In the end you're not rewarded at all because you have the same results but with more efforts... meaning that combats are harder and not easier (wasted spellslots and actions)
- About the character creation, I really think that Larian is working on it. Solasta makes a very good job to teach how the game works both for new players and for players that want to plan their character. This is something that is necessary and I'm confident Larian will work on it.
- About combats that should start for everyone at the same time... I agree that it should but I heard that it's very interresting and fun in multiplayer. This is probably something that could easily become an option (I personnaly would enable it but I'm a solo player).
- About reaction. I'm also confident Larian will work on that even if they have to create two mechanics to suit all kind of players. I cannot imagine that a studio that have brought so many things in the genre won't take the opportunity to create a new standard of TB games with the help of DnD.
Even if some don't like the idea of a popup, reactions in Solasta work very well. Being able to make so many different things during our ennemie's turn is very enjoyable. Combats are definitely not slower and they are way more dynamic... which is something that lacks by nature in a turn based system.
- I'm less sonfident about the fast travel and the resting mechanic. I agree that it feels completely wrong in BG3 and simple things like "fast travel trough their beautifull worldmap" would totally solve the terrible instant teleport (works the same but the feeling is totally different).
But what would happen when I'll have to travel back to where I was ? Exemple : I need to rest. Wherever I am I'm opening the worldmap. I click on the camp, time is going on and I'm fast travelling to camp (that really need to be somewhere...).
Then I'm fast travelling back, but where ? Dungeons are not so big but if the game is designed for us to camp after 1 or 2 combats, it will become boring to walk back and forth (It's not a problem to me but I think a lot of players would agree with Icelyn's answer).
It works well in Solasta, the maps are amazing, so is the fast travel mechanic and so is the resting system but their maps are closed and linear while BG3 works with some kind of open world map.
The system wouldn't work in BG3 according to me and resting spots are not possible because the camp is where our character are talking together/where story things happen (i.e Raphael). This is set in stone according to me so the solution for a better fast travelling / resting mechanic is not easy at all for BG3.
(talking about long rest, it's not gonna be hard to make things better about short rests).
Not to mention that average players will probably have to rest more often in BG3 than in Solasta. in this game you never really have to go back at camp. You're waiting for the next one. If Larian's "vision" is to allow 1 or 2 combats between resting, with a long rest point that is not on your road... It will definitely be "complicated".
This is related to the game's balance and difficulty, to the action economy, to the developpers vision of combats design... So the question is really not that easy.
Anyway just like you I really think that BG3 has a huge potential. Way more than Solasta. But Solasta feels way more satisfying to me too for now...
After all... combat (and related mechanics) account for more than half of our playing time.
Last edited by Maximuuus; 12/06/21 09:13 PM.
