Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Hardcore Mode

Can we expect a "Hardcore mode" where your decisions and bad rolls can't be reloaded to achieve optimal success?

Core rules would be nice too.

Well, DoS:2 had Tactician & Honour (iron man) mode, I think it's semi-safe to assume BG3 will end up with something similar.

They have said BG3 will have more difficulty settings. The Early Access is locked on normal. Probably minimum one easy mode and then at least 2 difficulty modes above Normal is my guess. The difficulty settings will be available on full release, but Larian has said nothing about that will also be included in Early Access. I believe full release for BG3 is between October-December 2022 or between January-December 2023 that is my best guess. In addition I do not know how many setings this game will have for difficulty and I told my guess.

Hell yes!

We were discussing this the other day and I would love to see it. Not a fan of save scumming personally anyway - as I have observed that people become somewhat compulsive about what they think is the "perfect playthrough" and thus deny themselves the experience of seeing how interesting a game can be (not to mention faster) when you let things take their own course.

Although it should NOT be forced on people playing regular difficulty but it would be a nice option for the higher difficulty settings for the more hardcore players that the game remembers all rolls made before you reload.

Also would LOVE a core-rules mode and tactician as well. I believe the original games also did this and it made the game so much more satisfying.

I am not a fan o SCumming too, and even so, some times I do. After that I just hate myself for doing... (Like eating that cake you know you not suppose to)
So yeah, I would LOVE an option to help me avoid falling for the temptation.

And about "Core-Rules mode", what is this?

I personaly hope not ...
I mean, if that will be optional part of settings, i see no problem since i never turn it on.
But i really dont want to have blocked out higher dificiulty, just bcs someone was unable to resist hiting "quick load" button, and therefore it had to be disabled by dificiulty settings. -_-

Honestly, this is just another example of situation that will never ocur, if you had at least some self moderation. :-/

Yeah, but again optional.

In 30 years of gaming/and raid leading I have found that self-moderation is the exception rather than the rule. People will always seek the path of least resistance unless they are the few special enlightened mutants that realize that they are just cheating themselves.

If you read "The WoW Diary: A journal of computer game development" - by John Staatz you will see that they tried to design the original Vanilla WoW around that unfortunate tendency but long term they fell short.

Never underestimate how much work people will do to avoid any sort of real challenge.

How would such a "no reloading" mode work in reallity? I mean, you can't really disable the option to load an older save unless you are absolutely certain there is not a single bug left in the game.

Well, the problem here Blackheifer is that you are talking about masses ...
Im only talking to those people who are proclaiming here that they DO want that challenge ...

And i only tells them that the challenge is allready there.
If you dont want to quick load, simply unbind the button (or set mouse trap abowe it w/e ) and you have exactly the challenge you claimed you want.

I know and realize that *many* (and imho it dont even matter how many) people would never surrender their Quick Load (im one of them) bcs its just covenient solution for situation drags you to corner.

We were allready talking about it in context of saving Arabella ...
You have to sucess in two rolls in a row to help the girl ... i know that those rolls are not "incredibly hard" but once you fail, all you can possibly do is stand there and helpess watch child die. :-/
Unacceptable outcome for some of my planned characters ... for example when i create my Paladin, i plan to play him as almost stupidly good and honorable character ... that honorable so he would despise even things like seting a trap, or ambushing and simmilar stuff (hope that is enough to draw a picture) ... so when he would not talk Kagha to let the child go, he would simply jump between kid and snake and possibly get bitten himself ... or cast cure poison once the child is bitten ... or heal wounds ... or use revivify scroll on her ... or potion ... the options are litteraly endless, but he would NEVER just stand there and let child die (wich is curently the only thing game allows you to do)!
Curently game dont allow any ofthis (but i would love it, each and every option), so my only option is either betray my character ... or betray my game integrity and reload.

There has been a mention once or twice that different difficulty modes and variants are being considered (and planned) for full release. An example being mentions of an Ironman mode similar to Honour Mode from Dos2. Leaving feedback and ideas about other variants or additions to said challenge modes is absolutely worth it in my opinion, if anything to showcase a demand for such a thing to begin with.

All these then.

No, you can also accept failure and the consequences that go with it. You are not betraying yourself, or the game integrity. IMHO this is the braver and more difficult option. Back straight, stiff upper lip. Lets see how this plays out. Could be fun.

"But I wasn't supposed to fail" - But you did, what are you the Time Variance Authority? :P


Finally, I leave you with one of my favorite quotes by Philip K Dick - one the greatest Sci Fi writers of the 20th century that almost no one has heard of, but whose work almost everyone has seen. Wrote a ton of contemporary sci-fi, died in an Asylum.

"It's easy to win. Anybody can win. It's losing that's hard."

A Scanner Darkly - Philip K Dick.

I’m glad the picture already highlights the only option that matters.
The Legacy of Bhaal mode is atrocious bullshit.
Wanting a challenge doesn’t mean I want to kill rats with 90 HP in the tutorial.

…Is this sarcasm?

If the EA is considered "normal" I think they should simultaneously let us test a "core rules" difficulty. That's the only difficulty I'm interested in, and potentially "hard".

For harder difficulties, enemies dealing 50% more damage or having 50% more HP i.e. breaking the rules is lazy nonsense. I want more and tougher enemy types instead. Add some hobgoblins in a goblin encounter. Instead of an ogre bodyguard, have two ogres. That would be a lot cooler and more rewarding to overcome than just beating the same monsters who have +50% this and that.

Legacy of Bhaal was not meant for a first time playthrough. It's really more equivalent to New Game+ where you export characters that are geared up and 8th level already. Although they really should explain this to people when selecting that difficulty, otherwise its just an unbalanced shit-show.

I would say pass on that one but the 4 we need to have are Story Mode, Normal, Core Rules, and Hard.

I believe you dont understand the concept ...

I have no problem accepting failure, but this particular situation is not about failure, its about game allow you to use only limited options since it would make too many other permutations (read as: additional work) for developers.

If you read, and i mean ACTUALY read that previous post ... you can see there i suggested additional option for good characters, who simply cant let the child die ... jump in front of her, and take that snakebite instead of her ... that in my eyes is "accepting failure and consequences that go with it" ...
I believe that Kagha would not be happy if you actualy heal/ressurect the child, since her sentence would be annuled by that ... i would expect concequences there, and i would accept them happily ...
But just "stand there and watch child die, bcs random number generator decided to spit low number this time" simply dont seem like good play. Sorry. :-/

I know, that is why i said my "character" instead of "self" ... there is quite important difference.

As i tryed (and failed as it seems) explain abowe, the problem here are limitations of game engine ...
What explanation is there that your character is unable to use healing spell, or poison curing spell, or ressurection spell ... that you are using every second turn in combat?
I know what, ofcourse, its the fact that Larian simply "didnt allow us" to use any of that. Nothing more, nothing less.
From roleplay perspective this limitation is just paradox.

And how can we solve paradox? We cant, but we can prevent it. :P

With another character it will be ... not for this one.
That is my reason for replay.

I never said "I wasn't supposed to fail" ...
I say in this case there are missing options ... and that either should be fixed, or prevented.

As i stated countless times, i really hope this will not be the case ...
I know it was standard in older games, but i really hope we get past "single button that will set everything in the world" ... to "single button that sets your profile ... and then you can adjust certain things, as you like".
Could you imagine that graphic settings would have only "low" "fair" "good" and "ultra" settings, without option to adjust anything? Bleh ...

If you add more rules and want one to read "Core Rules" it should be the "Normal" setting. Unless you want a difficulty which basically says "We assumed you all are too bad for the real rules". I mean, the main difference is saving, to be honest.
Even the rest-abuse is possible in real P&P, you just need to spend most of your day reading a book or something like that.

I honestly dislike the Story Mode difficulty as well. It is immortality + max strength, that is not a difficulty setting that is an inbuild godmode.

So you are looking for a Dexterity check for jumping in front of the snake to take the hit? And if you fail that do you accept the consequences? or do you Save Scum?

Or do we loop back to "The game didn't give me enough options to not fail"?

So do you know what happens when Arabella dies?

With regards to the Arabella situation, I do agree that there should be more options involved. At the moment even a character with high charisma and persuasion skill has a fairly high chance of failure. This would be easier to swallow if some or all of the following modifications were made:

1. Note that Arabella's death occurs when she moves suddenly at the end of the conversation. Give here a "willpower" roll to not do this (success means that she remains in captivity but does not die).

2. Give player a passive insight or perception roll to notice that Arabella is stressed and likely to do something foolish. If successful then give player a couple of extra conversation options (A: calm down, I'll help you through this B: neutral, C: get away child!) where A would give her a significant bonus to her willpower roll, and C would give her a penalty to it.

3. If Arabella survives the interaction but remains in captivity provide a suite of options that the player can follow to get her out again.