Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Please Rethink PC Origin Characters

First off, I really loved DOS2 and while I haven't played the original Baldur's Gate games I have played and enjoyed, other Bioware games. I love the RPG genre and I enjoy BG3. My problem however is that when origin characters become unlocked they will immediately have a much more impactful story than a custom character. This is what happened in DOS2, where a custom character has basically no story compared to the origin characters, and even then if you're not playing Ifan or Fane you have almost no connection to the main story.

My other problem is that I will always have a stronger connection to someone like Garrus or Morrigan far more than someone like Fane or The Red Prince, in part because while I can influence their character I am not playing as that character. I like Shadowheart and Gale, but I don't want to play as them, I want them to be my companions. That goes for all of the BG3 characters. Right now it feels like if my character didn't exist, nothing in the world would change. Unlike Mass Effect where the events are because the player character had direct involvement in the story.

Now I'm not asking Larian to add a game-long character quest for every backstory or anything, and their recent update that gives you inspiration for acting to your backstory is a good start. But I am asking them to let the other characters be companions and not playable characters. Let the custom characters have some actual weight added to the story and react to the world around them like in the old Baldur's Gate games. DND is a lot about making your character and having them be shaped by the world around you, not picking the characters made by the DM.

My last complaint is that letting the origin characters be playable forces one of two things to happen. Either they lose all of their personality because they are limited by what you can say, or you are encouraged to pick a specific dialogue choice because it had their name next to it. I would much rather be my character with them as good, well-written companions, who react to what I say and do rather than a husk of their former selves when I play as them.

Not gonna happen. No matter how bad or pointless people say they are, the origin characters are one of Larian's brainchilds that set their games apart. Too much time, work, and money have gone into this. Even if they start acknowledging that "yeah most of our players dislike this idea" I rather doubt they would "rethink" it. What you can hope for, instead, is that Larian will do something with the writing so that both playing an origin and playing a non-origin feel rewarding in their own way.

I'm not sure most BG3 players dislike the feature. I don't dislike it, I am just not interested in playing an origin character. And since not using his feature won't impact my games, I'd rather those who want to play as e.g. Wyll have that choice.

I do dislike it (more than anything I dislike how its cost is disproportionately larger than its benefits and the cascade effect this has on other aspects of the production) but let’s be real: it’s not going anywhere NOW that they already invested so much on the feature.

You could make the best argument in the world for why Origin characters are a terrible idea, convince half of the Larian employees it is, have them go to sleep every night tormented by remorse about how much time and money they wasted on them and STILL there would be zero chance at this point that they would throw away all the work they’ve done on it.

Plus, the gaming press loves the feature in principle and will give Larian free blowjobs for it.
Of course, it’s also the same gaming press that won’t ACTUALLY spend much time playing the game past the review time.

I feel that the effort that goes into making the origin system would be much better spent fleshing out backgrounds for custom characters instead.

There's a reason why DA:O's actual origin system (which is more of a background system), along with DA2's personality-based responses such as Sarcastic Hawke, were always far better received than DOS2's origin system. The only praise I've ever heard for it generally revolves around slightly backhanded complements that amount to seemingly being forced to use it in order to get the best experience out of the game. I'd go as far as to say that DOS2 was successful despite the origin system.

I mean there's a lot of people who think DOS2 was a brilliant game. In every conversation I've seen about people explaining why they love it, the Origin system never comes up.

Do we have any idea how fleshed out playable origin characters are for real atm? Because it *could* still be salvageable, if all the work they have done right now is for the things that happen if you have them as companions you still have the chance to stick with it.

But yeah I too think that the chances are slim. I like the companion characters as mysteries to "solve" much more. That was what I loved about games as kotor.

I mean, the “better flashed out” they are, the worse it gets, so I’m not even sure I want to know.

Especially since we had to give up on features that Larian deemed from the get go as “too frivolous and expensive “ like a day/night cycle (which has been a staple of the genre for decades and the lack of which I personally consider a complete immersion killer) to get “Tou can replay the game as one of your companions”, which I can confidently say it’s something I never found myself wishing for in a CRPG.

Well, as long as the only parts that are fleshed out are things that happen if you are not playing AS them but WITH them, that is not a problem.

I had a lot of fun in DOS2 as Fane, but that was DOS2 and not BG3. In a 5e game I want to be my own characters, in DOS2 it was fun and fine to play a nice origin story.

I agree with those, who don't want origin characters. I think, it's a waste of ressources, which could better be used anywhere else (like the mentioned day/night cycle).
I like to create my own character, especially in a D&D game, where you have so many possibilities.

Well it's sucks hard and if it has some redeeming qualities (not convinced but let's say) they aren't worth the damage this system does to the story and characters of the game.

But like Tuco said, no way it's going away.

Origin characters water out the narrative focus of the story, I feel. Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 were about a single person, Charname, Gorion's Ward, the Bhaalspawn. We could change the attributes of that person, but that person and only that person was the focal point of the story.

Origin characters water that out, turning the story into an unfocused mess where it's not about any particular person, but about whomever happens to randomly be at the right time and place. It could some wimp of a vampire spawn, it could be a brainwashed cleric of Shar, or it could be some Githyanky teenager with the usual teenager emotional issues.

And frankly it feels like rather than having any dedicated protagonist, the game might actually end up operating with "the group" as the protagonist, meaning all of the above could be the "special one" at the same time, meaning the "special one" in the story really isn't special at all. Frankly this sort of narrative approach feels more like an Icewind Dale sequel than something trying to be Baldur's Gate.

The original games had awesome companions, by the way, in no small part because they were designed to just be companions. That made them separate, it made them more unique, and it made Charname more unique. Partly because there was always just one charname, and partly because you could team up with people that weren't actually bhaalspawns raised by Gorion.

As for the origin story bit, I really hope they tone it way down relative to DOS2, because the idea that players should be pushed into playing pregens and essentially punished for making their own characters is ludicrous and the opposite of what I feel is the spirit of D&D. Can you imagine turning up to a session and then the DM just has a stack of characters ready, asking who wants who? Nobody wants these people? Fine, no backstories and cool nonsense for anyone, then!! That DM would not be popular, would he?

Lately there is many topics with this (cancel options for evenryone, since *I* dislike them and dont want to use them) kind of suggestions ... i wonder where they come from. O_o

I mean ...
Can you tell me why do you mind option to play as Gale?
You dont want to? Then simply dont ... and you should be happy. O_o

I don't understand why for the D:OS games people love playing the Origin characters there, and how the story feels richer playing one of them, but they hate the idea here in BG3. How is it any different? And why resist the idea so much in BG3 if it already worked well in D:OS?

I for one love the concept in both games, and can't wait for the OPTION to be available. Yes I plan to play as one of the companions, after playing my own character I love the concept of getting into my favourite companions' minds a little more, so to speak.
It is an option - people who don't want to try it, don't have to. Just like people who don't want to do the Evil Path, don't have to. Etc...

I don't think the companion stories will have that much depth, which is why I am not interested. If we could have someone like the Nameless One from PST, then I'd choose them over a self-created character.

Depends what you expect from a character-focused story. When it came to Gorion's ward, even if you changed attributes, class, even alignment - most of the time there was no difference, especially since there were no such things like ability checks in dialogues. In BG2 you got strongholds, and romantic interests. Other than this, you were playing "charname", a character with no distinguishable features. It was a bit disappointing, considering that a game built on the same engine - Icewind Dale - which was a linear monster-slaying adventure, had character reactivity. There were special dialogue options depending on a character's class, stats, even alignment.

Even if the story in BG3 isn't as focused on the main character as it was in the originals, my impression so far is that my characters already feel more unique in BG3 than they did in the original saga.

I really hope that would be the case ...
I mean, so far if you simply start conversation with your follower, you can easily propose dialogue options that are in direct contradiction with their believes. :-/
(As when you save Lae'zel ... you can offer her joining your party as Shadowheart)

?

I didn't particularly like it in DOS 2 either.
And "it is an option" is a bit of a disingenuous argument to make, since as already explained the addition of the option itself comes with its fair load of consequences and compromises.

The logic displayed in this post right here is why everyone questions how Larian is making use of their metrics.

Maybe the exact reason why people are so opposed to it here is precisely because people have already had a first hand experience in seeing how it negatively affected DOS2’s narrative and characters.

Here’s a hint. Go around the DOS2 communities looking for people telling new players to play as an origin character instead of a custom. Pay attention to their reasoning. 9 times out of 10, the exact reasoning is an observation that customs are heavily neutered compared to the origins and that you’re getting a suboptimal experience otherwise. Re-read your first sentence. Those statements about how the experience is richer as an origin were not meant to be praise for the system.

Just because a bunch of people used the system doesn’t mean the legitimately liked it.

Er, Well... for one thing... Initially, in the D:OS games, players weren't going to have a choice in the matter. The ability to play as a custom, non-origin, character was added, and was added by popular demand, not by Larian's own initiative.

Even then, playing as a custom character felt flat and dead, because half the story wasn't present, or simply didn't make any sense because you didn't get any of the extra material - it more or less failed to even BE a coherent story, if you didn't play as an origin. That's not a positive sale point for the origin system.

People 'Love' playing the origin characters in D:OS games because the alternative is a flat, unsatisfying mess, at least from a story perspective.

So, no, I didn't appreciate the origin system in any previous Larian game... and here, where the pretence is Dungeons and Dragons, a medium that is All About making your Own character, I appreciate it existing Even Less, for being here and sucking up development resources that could and should be use to make a more fleshed out game that will deliver a full and rich game experience to everyone... not just the people who play Larian's personal special star-children. Not interested, thanks. I'll enjoy some of them as companions, definitely... but companions is what they should be.

Those Origin Defender will never understand above.
This is Dnd, this is Baldur's Gate not d:os.

Was it loved, though? Or was it just that people disliked playing their own custom characters because of how much less they felt connected to the world? If you make two options and one option is "eat a pizza with pineable and ham" and the other is "get kicked in the balls", and it turns out that most people pick the pizza, then have we really found a convincing answer to the age old question of pineapple on pizza? I suspect not. For the record, since I brought it up, I'm actually on team pineapple, but you do have to add some black pepper or the ham might feel a bit hammy.

As far as playing as companion characters, there are scenarios where I don't mind the idea, but can you imagine going through BG1 and 2 as Minsc? What would your connection to the main storyline actually be, particularly in game 2? Irenicus wants my totally non-bhaal-tainted soul? Not really. Irenicus wants the soul of my friend, so what happens if I don't bring that dude? And then there's the whole turning into the slayer stuff and of course the ending of BG2 becomes really weird and the ToB expansion would make less than no sense. Now imagine playing as Jan or Nalie or Aerie. What, they don't deserve "origin" treatment and should be reduced to mercs with no story or plot or anything? Isn't Edwin way cooler and more fitting as a right hand in a Shadow Thief guild hall, something that wouldn't really be possible if he was a playable protagonist?