@Blackheifer
Looks like we have a very different play style.
I play games on the default difficulty and I expect to progress unless I make a big mistake or it is a very hard boss.
For me a role playing game is about experiancing a great story. Lots of reloading is bad for my immersion.
I do not play games to seek the ultimate challenge and I have no problem to lower the difficulty if I hit a hard wall.
Yes, Solasta is easy but I do not complain about it.
It is a good game for new players to learn the 5E rules.
I like the big freedom of BG3. There are several ways to aproach most quests and often you can avoid combat.
But combat often feels unfair because it is labeled as DnD 5E game but it changed so many rules.
Maybe I would feel better if the devs change the game description to: "The game is losely based on DnD 5E with many homebrew changes to please D:OS2 fans."
Listen, to be fair, Solasta has its own significant number of homebrew changes that make players OP. The Concentration Feat for Wizards, the Twin Blade Defense Feat, and the Follow Through feat which grants players another full attack (Polarm master is NOT the same as it only allows 1d4). Then there is the Mage subclass that gives you an automatic upgrade on all your spells so they are cast at 1 level higher. That shit is straight OP.
The difference is that this all buffs the Players and not the monsters/villains.
In BG3 they throw around Advantage a lot but it affects everyone. Enemies will run up ladders to get advantage when shooting at you. Enemies will go after players who run away and leave their flank exposed because of advantage. Enemies can disengage as a bonus action just like players.
The truth is most people don't really want an even playing field against the enemy (except me and my friends) - they want an easy win - but that is against the spirit of D&D where you are supposed to make sure you are balancing encounters to make sure they present enough of an obstacle to players that they have to deal with. The irony is not lost that Solasta gets the rules right but fails at the spirit. Where Larian says "to hell with the rules" and goes for the spirit of the game.
I am not talking about the broken stuff or exploits. Throwing people, barrlmancy, tossing potions to heal people, abusing the hide mechanic, healing food all needs to go.
I would like to respectfully and mildly disagree with you you. I don't think it's just a matter of people wanting difficulty, and I don't think it's a matter of Solasta being easy and Baldurs Gate 3 being hard. I haven't played the full version of Solasta yet, I'm in the process of playing another game and want to complete that first, but I played through most of the early access stuff. If they made any significant changes for full release, let me know if they seriously alter the experience. From the first proper mission I was challenged and I died repeatedly, a trend which remained the case throughout the playthrough, with me often barely pulling through several of the tougher encounters, and me feeling really triumphant during the times when I won a fight handily. And I'm not exactly a beginner with crpgs. I've played D:OS (dipped into the sequel but just never clicked with it and so never left fort joy), I've played both Pillars of Eternity games, I've played Dragon Age: Origins, Tyranny, Pathfinder: Kingmaker, have Pathfinder: WotR pre-ordered, I've always been more interested in narrative than combat challenge, but I've got at least a modestly broad range of experience with the genre. And I really loved Solasta and I've found BG3 to be...kinda meh in a lot of ways. Not just combat, but the combat definitely feels weird and off to me, while Solasta's combat was always super satisfying. I probably died more often in BG3, but part of that I put down to being limited to level 4 and not being able to meet the really tough fights at an appropriate level.
I will say that there have been a lot of times when I've been in a position where several of my party have been downed and it's a constant struggle to try and get them back up only for enemies to down them again, which is always frustrating. Some fights, like the Hag (which I'm not even gonna bother touching again until I can get to level 5 at least, haven't won and don't expect to) and the phase spider (I eventually beat that but again don't want to fight it again until higher level) feel frustrating and gimmicky. Other fights like the Githyanki patrol (same situation as the Hag) are just waaaaay too difficult. At the same time, I've seen loads of people on this forum claim they find the game and these fights really easy for one reason or another. I consider myself a pretty average player, while a lot of you here are clearly very skilled to a degree that I'm genuinely not interested in becoming, but remembering that average players who aren't hardcore and aren't especially good, nor especially bad at these games and find them legitimately challenging all the same, is gonna be instructive and useful, I think.
