Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Gith Fight is Too Hard

Hopefully we will know and see when the true patchnotes get released.

I actually have an issue with that premise though, as for me that's not good design.

The issue though is the reason for starting the encounter surrounds Laezel and as others mentioned ( I think it was Tuco), it can happen at far too early a level. No if something more nuanced happened here instead of only black and white, get away with it vs get into a nasty fight, then that would/could be interesting. What if the commander took Laezel with him for example, that would at least warrant him flying off and leaving the pathetic grunts to the high and mighty Gith force and give us a choice to make as to whther we want to chase after her, or why not capture all of us and the story goes off on a separate tangent? However if one 80% of the time has to fight, then the game needs to give you more notice.

I lucked out as I did get Astarion up high and cheesed it, but all my other characters died super quickly and it was simply not an encounter that was in anyway rewarding. Now ok, a Dragon slaughtering the guards should be a dead give away I guess, but again Laezel (if in party) is assuring you to approach. IIRC there is no (or little) party suggestion that "this could go south", "maybe we should not all go but have some look for a more favourable position", something to make you the player go hmmm, ok, this reeks of a dangerous encounter. I.e. the game should give you some form of trigger or aid if this is the type of encounter that has little chance of not getting into a horrific fight if you are not prepared for it. To say it's a game you just reload is a cheap copout for me, because it means I needn't bother putting pre-thought with any encounter, but rather rush in, flick through options, die and reload and do it right the next time.

I know it would take away player control, but what if Astarion for example (assuming he was along for this) point blank refused to go near the Githyanki and his pet, he has a talent for survival, so him saying "no, I'm going to take up a position at range" and him auto moving to a given location steathfully might make thematic sense and not leaving a player in a mess. It would make the party members feel more alive and less like sheep.

Again, many of the other encounters give you more of an out, but this one makes little sense and is bloody hard to boot.

Oh, don't get me wrong. Again, I don't want them to remove the encounter. I love the dragon being in it and all.

A good DM presents situations like this which cause players to panic Oh my gosh! The DM just sat a dragon 20 feet away. We're so dead.

But then, good DMs provide a logical and fun way out. In my Afflicted story, Shadowheart wasn't in the party, so Qudenos and Voss, dragon and rider, flew off to find her because she had the weapon. Voss would not allow anyone to claim that victory but him. HE would be the one to have the glory of presenting it to Vlaakith.

And the fight is a good encounter, but with higher level PCs and/or larger party size. That's all I'm saying.

I agree, I am not sure anyone wants the encounter gone or totally re-written even, there's purely a frustration with it because if you stumble into it like the game (assuming you have Laezel with you) promotes, then you are nearly always launched in a really frustratingly hard fight without the perfect dialogue choices (and rolls? can't remember...). I don't know, I mean there's a murderous dragon, Laezel has hardly been queen nice etc... maybe there is enough here to warn you about strolling into this encounter, yet we want rid of this tadpole and the game seems to suggest this is a good path, so it should play out in such a ways so as you can back out. For example, if you choose to handle the conversation yourself and you are not Gith, it might be useful if Laezel (if present) interjects (sensing something is amiss) and gets you all out of the fight without you having to fumble through dialogue choices, all be it still offering you the player the chance to overrule her and initiate the fight (because choice is good), but then knowingly rather than unwittingly.

Plus the commander flying off in a "I'm too good for this fight" cliché just feels daft, yet obviously we can't handle a Dragon at this level so it has to be taken out of the equation, it's here that the writing (imho) could do with a tweak to make the encounter feel more like an opportunity gone wrong and into something dangerous and then a choice between trying to grovel out of it or fight, all whilst actually having a good reason for the dragon to fly off.

I dunno, maybe with the dialogue tweaks coming in Patch 5 this may feel different and I know a higher level would help, but honestly the game isn't linear so without knowing how much of an arse this encounter is, it would help if there was some form of clue the game gave the player before hand, think the skull icon for Witcher3, though I would perhaps prefer a dialogue trigger (not cinematic, just early enough to make you think twice about running forwards), even something as mundane such as "are you sure this is a wise course of action...?", just so you the player know this encounter might be better left until later on, but not gated off, in case you want to try your luck/skill anyway.

They can leave the dragon in, but there needs to be a trigger for the Kith'rak to take dragon and leave the fight to Baretha. So, for example, suddenly, drow spring up with goblins from the west path to "save the Absolute's Chosen, though the PCs have no idea why they attack the dragon, etc. They have a ton with them. Voss then says, "Baretha. Split their skulls open. Qudenos and I will handle these istiks." Then the dragon and rider fight off the Drow assault while you fight the Gith.

So I guess my concern is that if they weaken the encounter difficulty, but leave in the exploits, then the game will be extremely easy. I'm not opposed to balancing the game more around traditional combat/rpg elements (that actually sounds good to me), but if they make the fight easier but still leave in the overpowered Height Advantage/Hide combo, then it would feel silly to play the game traditionally when you know you could even more easily defeat the encounter with the more effective strategy.

It would be like only meleeing with your Wizard, sure you COULD do it to make the game harder, but why would you when you know you have spells that are so much better? It's not fun to know you are handicapping yourself, so if the game is going to be made more RPG friendly, the cheese would need to be nerfed. And that basically makes this the same thread as 90% of other threads; nerf the cheese lol.

No. Don't make it easier. Give players the ability to have 6bparty members OR put more roadblocks in the way so they level up to level 5 before the encounter. Use D&D 5e stats for Gith, that's fine, and remove height advantage and backstab and the encounter would be fine.

It's too hard because Gith can Mist Step to high ground and pummel you twice per round each while you are at level 3 or 4 and have like half their hit points. So they constantly have advantage and you usually don't unless you perch yourself super high before triggering the battle.

Not sure if strategy is the right word here ...
But i gues its all matter of midset ... to me it feels silly to play the game in the way i generaly dont enjoy ... as long as i dont enjoy my Wizard to cast Cleric spells, i do not and im having fun ... no matter what other options are there. O_o

//edit:
Also just look how it ends ...
For example i liked to start encounters from a distance ... i have seen phasespider, so i positioned my group and shot an arrow (usualy pin down, to get more time before it gets close) ... so before he get close enough to be actualy dangerous, i usualy get at least 1 or 2 additional attacks ...
But people discovered exploit ... when you attacked from distance, and immediatly hide, enemies did not follow you ... so they exploited every single fight by that ... was it fun? Dunno ... but i doubt that.
Larian decided to remove this exploit ... but sadly, instead of any other solution ... they decided to let enemies heal infinitely to full ... :-/
Personaly i dont find such "solution" to be good choice ... and im kinda worried about what "solution" they would invent next time for another exploits. :-/