Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Low pool of EA testers worries me

I just noticed that this was originaly not even topic about high ground ... but i gues it is now.

Im sorry how is that safer? O_o
I mean except that you cannot get meele attack when you are far ... but you dont need high ground for that. O_o

That was a suggestion.
It's fine if you consider that going higher is not safer.

I personnaly think it's a good strategy to be safe a turn or more from melee or range (i.e if you can break the line of sight), depending the situation.

What benefits do high ground currently give? I see that attack rolls were mentioned, which logically make some sense, but mechanically would suck in a game.

If anything it should increase line of sight and give a small buff to range, but it shouldn't give a better chance to hit and damage. It's not a Wasteland-type game where cover is necessity.

Maximuuus also makes a good point in that simply being safer for a round or so from melee is a good bonus in itself. I know I stacked my range uptop at the Goblin camp and placed a tank and melee at the top of the ladder. The safety to slowly pick everyone off is a good enough bonus.

- Advantage if you attack when you're higher (drasticaly increase your %to hit)
- Disadvantage if you attack someone higher (drasticaly decrease your %to hit)
- Various bonuses depending the situation (easier to break the line of sight, safer position, better visibility and line of sight,...)

I dont concider anything ... im ASKING ... HOW will go to high ground make you safer.

Depending on the availability of climbing spots, it could take the enemy a lot of turns to reach you.

And here is one of the obvious answer Rag was waiting for.... Thx Moradin's !

Sigh ...
Sometimes i have the feeling that i unconsciously speak Swahili ...

Let me ask a little simplier then:
Is part of your suggestion to implement any other mechanic to make your character safer as you claim ... or are you make common asumption that you will be safer, just bcs of your location ... and therefore ignoring litteraly everything enemies could theoreticaly do to turn high ground against you?

Really, you're speaking Swahili....

Icelyn could still use misty step to highground, in exemple to have a safer position.
You know... Because some higher position are safer depending the situations.

Is that ok ? Do you finally have the point ?

I won't answer your "ignoring blablabla", that's exactly why I wrote "depending the situations" more than once - obviously you won't be safer higher if you're fighting the githyanki.

Except fixing the range would require a much less compressed map, so that's probably not happening. So assuming the range is what it is, what exactly can be done to keep ranged characters feasible, since dashing into melee is possible in a single turn?

As I recall, the Giths only have one teleport each. So if you can make them burn that one and *then* push them over the nearest ledge then being very high is absolutely a safer option.

Also, the AI has big problems pathfinding to some high grounds and those paths may take it through some excellent choke points. The gobbo camp interior is much easier if you climb up into the rafters, in my experience. There's a lot that enemies could theoretically do about it but not a whole lot that they actually will do.

What other mechanics would need to be added? In some higher elevated positions there's only one of a few ways to reach the ranged characters. I haven't played since like patch 2 or 3, but even now I can think of several such locations.

In the Goblin camp exterior there's a ladder to a high elevation where basically everyone was hostile and IIRC the only way to reach it was the very tall ladder. Positioning ranged up there was basically a guaranteed win because they would all have to rush the ladder where they'd be subsequently pushed off and killed off by arrows or spells. Outside the cave is a similar situation. They need to climb the cliff face or flank around, either way an area control spell blocks the area while ranged kills them off. The first battle after getting off the ship with the Intellect Devourers forces them to climb the side where melee pushes them off and ranged picks them off. Same thing for when the Grove is attacked initially.

You don't need any other advantage than that and nothing mechanically would be needed. I have no idea what you're asking for beyond that. It's an instant win without the advantage/disadvantage in many cases.

I'm not sure about that.
I can think about a few situations where an increase ranged could really work with the same map.

I.e the goblins camp inside / outside and the harpies or the fight at the grove.

Then there are many situations where it could work - in exemple to better ambush our ennemies and/or increase the value of ranged attacks :

- attack the goblin's at the mill from the village's roofs.
- attack the duergar from another part of the village in the underdark
- attack the minotaurs outside the range of their jump (maybe, because it's insane)

I really think ranged characters could be usefull with better range in the actual map. But not in "close" area obviously.

Congrats, Larian. The community has so little to talk about that we're re-treading the high ground arguments again.

They'd better release the patch, because if it goes on like this, we'll come back to the rtwp vs tb discussion in a moment

Bows should probly have a longer range.
Oh and im not on steam, instead using GOG (i like NOT having heavy kernel(?) kidnapping software that paralyzes the computer.)

And right now not really playing. Having 154hrs (last play a month ago). Waiting for new areas to explore after dunno.. 6+ playthruus.


oh and psst.. seems the only way i can save the kid from harpies is having my dwarf mage jump down from the cliff above onto the harpy cliff. While everyone else stays up. Lnding takes damage but hes made of muscle, good looks and hitpoints (con 16, str 17 -> with heavy armor, absolute hammer from bror 2-handed.. eventually anyway...).

Oh and had one pretty hilarious gobbo fight. I stole a load of smokepowder and sneaked into the big gobbo room. Then placed smokepowder behind their backs while sneaking. Could even move them infront of the people without them noticing. Withdraw and fire up. Most everyond on the "left half" wiped out. Concentrating fire on Bror and the rest a mopup.


Githyankie can be fought in a lot of ways, pushing, hiding, sniping etc from the upper flat level is one. So high strength & pushing warlocks welcome. But on the ground is far from impossible as well. you could even try figuring out how to keep tripping the boss, grease etc entangle/web..

It is, but its not possible to dash and attack at once, since it both costs Action.
That would still mean one safe turn ...

Good question, thank you for that ... cover for example.
Bcs high ground itself provides no defense against Magic Missile, Mage's Hand shove (this is not implemented ... yet i presume), enemies jumping (as Minotaurs, or Bulette), or using Misty Step, Arrow of Roaring Thunder ... etc.

Thankfully NPCs dont use Void Bulbs right now.

As others have said, I'm holding off so I don't get burned out. I've played a half a dozen times. But I've only done The Druid's Grove, Blighted Village, and the High Road. With that I've always reached 4th level. Since buying BG3 ea on day 1, I've discovered Interstellar Space Genesis. Solasta, Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous and Humankind have released, and Galactic Civilization 4 has hit Alpha. With a heavy work load, family, and now the NFL; I'm just going to hold off. I still have hopes that this will be my "game of this decade", like NWN2, it's expansions, and player made mods were for me.

Now if they give us proper reactions, or the Paladin, or the School of Enchantment; then I'll be back in a heartbeat.

Action surge, cunning action dash, double cunning action dash potentially, and eventually we'll probably have multiclass fighter-rogues with cunning dashes and action surges. Dash and attack is very possible. Or dash and push, as it happens.

Also, it doesn't really matter if the dash is followed by an attack or not, because simply having some darn melee thing standing right next to your ranged character forces you to respond to that, which means the ranged character isn't using its optimal action on the optimal target.

Fundamentally, having maybe a single turn to shoot an enemy, particularly if we take away the high ground advantage, is just not enough to justify how squishy ranged characters are in melee. Do consider that 5E PHB contains the Eldricht Spear invocation for warlocks that gives Eldricth Blast a 300 foot range (~90 meters) rather than standard 120 foot range (~36 meters). Longbows have a normal range of 150 feet and a long range (attack with disadvantage) of 600 feet. Heavy crossbows are 100 / 400.