Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Mega-threads and Guides Party Size Discussion

The whole point I was trying to make was that the game is already unbalanced because it is not using proper stats, and there are too many variables.

So an argument against a 6 person party centered around "because they have to rebalance the game is null and void because they already need to rebalance the game. And, I might add, how imbalanced do you think the game is going to be at the end of EA without level cap when characters can reach potentially level 6 (because in current stat, if they lift the level cap you'll likely be at level 6 or close to it if you do everything in EA). So they already have LOTS of rebalancing to do.

The person I quoted said that "arguing against the option of a party size of six based on encounter design is obviously an invalid argument", which is wrong, because while tutorial area can be completed with just one Lae'zel, if you try to kill every cambion it's much easier to do with a bigger party. Same goes for every encounter in the game. A party of 6 is much stronger than a party of 4, and not only in combat encounters, in social too, because you have access to more buffs, more skills, etc...


...and we can't ignore that, because an ability to bring 6 characters into an enviourment balanced for 4 will remove the challenge and without challenge many players will not find the game enjoyable. We all play videogames to get our dopamine hit, and for majority of the players overcoming obstacles is one of the ways to trigger that hit, unless you play just for story or something like that, then of course you don't care. Now if you play to overcome challenges, then these challenges must be properly balanced, because if the difficulty is too hard then it will cause frustration and if it is too easy it won't get you high on dopamine. You can already have a party of 6 by using mods, if you want Larian to make it official, they will have to rebalance the game for that party size because players will take a party of 6 even if they would've enjoyed playing with a party of 4 more. Why? Because a party of 6 is stronger and players want to maximize their power in any legal way possible. So if we allow players to become stronger we need to adjust teh difficulty so that those stronger players will still get adequate challenge and enjoy the game.

Btw, it's the reason why people critisize barrelmancy, because "just don't use it" argument is bad, players who hate barrelmancy will feel forced to use in an encounter they find sufficiently hard. They will hate it, but they will do it, and chances are they won't enjoy it that way.

And still, no one who wants 4 party members only has addressed the following:

For me, the bottom line is, what makes the most sense for this game? It all goes back to these things:

1. With a party of 6, you can have more characters in your party so you don't have to constantly switch characters out in order to trigger origin character story elements. I can have all the current origin characters in my single player party and not have to switch out one in order to get Shadowheart's full story, or switch out another to get Wyll's or switch out another to get Lae'zel's. All of them can just be in my party at once and we can trigger many more cutscenes without annoyingly having to switch characters out.

2. (And this is the BIG one) For 4-player multiplayer, I can still trigger origin story content by having at least 2 origin characters in the party. Thus, multiplayer is more enjoyable, and you can still experience the whole game the way D&D was meant to be played, with others. Right now, that's not possible. You cannot even have Lae'zel interrogate Zorru to find the githyanki patrol because your party is full up with 4. You can't complete Wyll's questline either. You can't complete ANY of their questlines.

3. A party of 6 allows players more variety for strategy and combat.


And the point about combat encounters needing revamping is that you all keep arguing that you don't want them to rebalance the game and they'd have to with a party of 6. Then the game wouldn't be balanced for a party of 4.

My point is that they have to rebalance everything anyway once they lift the level cap. It's not a valid argument because no matter what, they have to rebalance, and it's also not valid because they're going to implement difficulty settings - at least that's what they said - so if they balance the game for a party of 6 on Normal, you can set the game to Easy (or whatever they call it) if it is too hard for a party of 4. You'd then have your choice to play at 4 party members but it'd allow those who want 6 to play with 6.

OR, as we've said before, they could rebalance it using XP split, which they may do anyway so you aren't level 6 by the time you complete EA.

Seriously, these encounters should take you to level 6 by the end of EA easy. I played it out via tabletop WITH XP split and the party still leveled up to 6 after defeating all the EA missions BEFORE the Underdark because they're throwing high level XP enemies at you but nerfing them so you can still beat them capped at level 4.

This is a valid complaint (#2 in my earlier list of "valid complaints") and I emphasize with this. Honestly, I think I'd enjoy playing BG3 with a party of 4 way more than with a party of 6; 6 is just too many for me to have fun handling especially with current BG3 movement mechanics, UI, etc. And if the game by-default allows a party of 6, I will either have less fun controlling 6 characters or I'll play with a party of 4 but feel like I'm missing out on story/banter/companion reactions to the world. Neither is great.

HOWEVER, a solution is to make a party of 6 an option in game settings: set to off by default and not advertised anywhere. Complete with a warning: "BG3 was created with a party of 4 in mind (or a party of 1 or 2 via Lone Wolf). Checking this box will allow you up to 6 party members but we make no promises about your experience." This'd be enough to convince my monkey brain that I'm not missing out by sticking with a party of 4.

And thus I still advocate for a party of 6 option, because - assuming it's implemented as above - it'd make a lot of people happy at ~minimal cost to myself. and also because a lot of people against a 6-person party are making bad arguments and I can't help but explain why said arguments are dumb

You know what is funny?
You both are saying the same thing, just focusing on different parts.

He say that no matter if you go into tutorial Final battle just by Youreself (I know you cant really deny Lae'zel joining you, but you can attack her before she even starts talking to you, kill her and never recruit her ... it require little metagaming i admit that, but it IS possible ... or you can easily simply left her in previous room i forgot her there once ) ... or with full party wil Lae'zel, Shadowheart and Us ... the encounter is still the same ... notice this: "same" not "same difficiulty".
And you say that if you go just by Youreself, the encounter is hard ... but you take the others, it become a lot easier, BECAUSE you have them to incerase your power.

But the point remain the same in both cases ...
Generals HP, AP, Statistics, damage, anount of enemies in that room, the fact that two others will come in later ... litteraly none of those things changes to reflect how many player characters just come in.

And that is litteraly why that person said its invalid argument
> when no ballancing is happening for smaller-than-expected size of party ... then no ballancing is happening for bigger-than-expected size of party.
> since encounter with Commander Zhalk remains exactly the same

That is the thing, we dont "ignore that" ... or at least i dont for sure ... we just dont believe that game needs to be redesigned from the scratch ...
That is why we (i) said that there should be toggable option to incerase your party limit WITH WARNING SIGN, that will tell you that doing this will affect ballance and will cause your game easier compared to what it was designed for. :P
See? Not ignoring, acknowledging and let others to acnowledge it too ... this is the way.

I realize its lazy solution, but you cant deny its effectivity.
I mean everyone who will toggle this option will be warned about lowering difficiulty ... therefore nobody can complain about that, since they all "agreed with terms of use", in other words we can expect everyone who will be using this option will be using it despite the fact that difficiulty will be lowered for him ... or maybe exactly for that reason (looking at you Githyanki patrol).

Also note that in the future, when there will be Difficiulty settings, 2 OPTIONAL party members can help us to adjust this even better ...
Do you wish Hardcore challenge? Use Hardcore difficiulty.
Do you wish Hardcore challenge, but Hardcore difficiulty is a little too Hardcore for your taste? (I know it sounds like oximoron, thats bcs it is, but w/e, not the point here) ... Allow another 2 party members and lower the difficiulty a little, while keeping everything else exactly the same.

Yes and i believe we should be able to adjust our challenge as we see fit, to suit our own needs.

I mean look at curent state of this game ...
Its ballanced for 4 people ...

Do you desire to have more challenging encounters? You go with 3 people ...
Do you desire to have even more challenging encounters? You go with 2 people ...
Do you desire to have even more challenging encounters? You go Lone Wolf style ... and there are people who did this and still managed to get through whole EA, and had their dopamine hit exactly as they wanted. :P

But do you desire to have a little less challenging encounters? You go with 5 people ... NAH YOU CANT, unless you download another software to altern your savegames and potentialy ruin your game whole (wich happened to me).
And there are people who did this and still managed to have fun going through whole EA and had their dopamine hit exactly as they wanted it. :P

This is the whole point here ... freedom of choices, and ofcourse suffering the consequences.

Well, right now we have situation just other way around ...
Players are forceed to take a party of 4 even if they would've enjoyed playing with a party of 6 more.

The whole point is allowing both sides to get the experience they want.

I mean i do understand what do you say ...
But it seems to me like set game to easiest difficiulty possible, and them complaining about that combat is not challenging enough. O_o

That is why its part of settings ...
That is why there is warning sign ...
That is why people who are toggling this need to agree with change they will cause ...

Difficiulty will be added in the future ...
So far the only way we can enjoy our 6 members party, is the save alterning software ... do you know what ballance changes it make with rest of the game? None.
And nobody is complaining about it.
Gues why.

And it will be entirely their own fault ...
If i stuck my hand inside fire, i cant complain about the fact im burning ... i simply should not stuck my hand into fire ... or at least should take it out.

Best solution : party of 5.

No, you're the one who's wrong. And in being wrong you are making my argument for me by admitting the game already can be played with varying party sizes from 1 to 4. So if the game allows us to play with party size 1, as you yourself say here that it does, AND not a single person anywhere is demanding that the game should be balanced for party size 1, then why not also allow party sizes of 5 or 6 in exactly that same way? There is zero difference between the game allowing us to play with party size 1 versus party size 6, even while being balanced for party size 4.

And AGAIN... Difficulty settings will allow all players the ability to rebalance the game however they want.

Amen.

I honestly don't expect difficulty settings.

I mean we already have stuff like loaded dice as a base option. I actually like the way other games have it though, where, for example, you have core rules, easy/story mode, and hard or unfair weighted in favor of the AI. This is how Wrath of the Righteous and Kingmaker did it.

As for party size, it's probably limited because of multiplayer. They likely don't want groups of six players in the same game. Why? Who knows. But multiplayer is the primary reason for a lot of design choices in games.

Nah, summons are just broken. lol

They already confirmed the intent to include difficulty settings in the future.
The question is more about what shape they may take.

I'm gonna put this here because it applies to party size as well.

Encounters right now are all jacked up. A single Imp is 200 XP. If I faced an imp at level 1 with 1 other character in the party, I should earn 100 XP. Fight 3 and level up. So, the first fight alone should level you up.

But they've severely nerfed the imps, and they only give you like 25 XP or something for each imp fight. Intellect devourers are supposed to be 450 XP each. So if you fight 3 with just Shadowheart, which is utterly ridiculous because 1 is a serious challenge for 4-6 level 2 characters, you should be easily level 3 or even 4 by the end of the first encounter on the beach.

In short, the enemies you face actually should drive you very quickly to level 4, but they are so severely nerfed that it throws the whole system out of whack.

The whole game, however, works much better from a multiplayer perspective. If you have 4 PCs+1 or 2 (Lae'zel and/or Shadowheart), the encounters are more appropriate, and if you split XP, also more appropriate for a slower increase in levels.

The point, if they did this game right, the encounters are already balanced, with proper enemy stats, for party size 5-6 right from the very beginning. The imbalance comes from allowing any party size less than that, so they have to nerf every encounter to fit less than 5 or 6.

OK. This is going to create a stir, but it's been something I've been thinking for some time. So, whether you like it or not, this is the truth:

This game, from start to finish, was created with a 5-6 member party size in mind. In truth, all they'd have to do to fix imbalance issues is to use proper D&D stats and to allow 5-6 party members. That would literally be the easiest fix. Stop nerfing the enemies and make them proper stat-wise and then allow 5-6 party members and use XP split to award experience points. Make players create 4 custom characters in single player mode or 1 each in multiplayer. The first character created (the host) is the default party leader.

That said, the Custom Characters could each have a default template: Cleric, Rogue, Fighter, Wizard. Each with a default race. Cleric is Tav, an elf. This is the default Custom Character as party leader. Then there could be Vim the (just throwing names out) the halfling rogue, Dorian the human wizard and Bogan the dwarf fighter. Customize them if you want or just accept and venture forth. Your choice. Either way, you have a base party of 4 and then can add up to 2 origin characters like Lae'zel and Shadowheart.

Make this the standard, use proper D&D stats, make it so you can switch out all the custom characters; even Tav in case you just like all the origin characters or whatever. Then the game would be perfectly balanced with very little work because every encounter is already built based on a 5-6 character party. Nerfing wouldn't be necessary, XP split would cause characters to level up at a more appropriate speed, and the game would function smoothly. If you want to party with less than 5, that's up to you. The encounters might be more challenging, but then you could set the difficulty to easier to balance it out.

Anyway, that's what I think would be easiest for Larian and more appropriate for this game, whether you think so or not.

Well ... i dont. :P
(Just for the record: I dont like xp split idea ... rest is fine)

Why? If you face 3 imps, your first battle, and you don't do XP split, everyone in your party, all 5 characters, would gain 600 XP and level up. Using XP split would divide the 600 XP between your custom party of 5 and grant only 120 XP to each. This is more appropriate so that most of the prologue you stay at level 1 instead of being at level 3 by the end of the prologue.

See, it's already built for a party of 5 or 6 if you use proper stats and XP split. Otherwise, it's broken.

Why? Bcs your theory is based on wrong presumption ...

Your theory is only working with the idea of this game having 6 characters, bcs right now there is only 5 Origin characters + Tav ... once Origin characters will become playable base of yout theory that "its's already build for a party of 5 or 6" starts to fall ... but not even close as much as how it starts to crumble once they start to implement other Origin characters ...
I mean we kinda "know" there should be at least 3 more (Karlach, Minsc and Helia) ... that would mean that the same XP that by yout theory "was ment to 6" is sudently "ment for 9"?
Just bcs you still cant accept the fact that we get theese Origins just bcs they were first done, not bcs they are only one, or somehow most important. -_-

Also how would you like to level your inactive party members once you would drag them for their quest?
I mean you will have Tav + Gale + Shadow + Lae'zel + Astarion + Minsc ... all of them being level 5/6 ... and then Wyll (who you never used before) wants to join you, not for some Goblin party ...
How is that enjoyable model to drag useless lvl 1 with you just bcs you wish to do his own quest?
Or would you need to switch them regulary so they all have aproximately simmilar power?

And finaly and most importantly ...
What benefit exactly would this system bring? I cant find any ... yes, your "main party" would be exping a little faster (presuming you will still split the same amount of XP, wich i also doubt) ... but your "off party members" would be next to useless. :-/

No. Ragzlin... can I call you Ragzlin? Thanks. It's much shorter and easier to type.

Ragzlin, I'm basing it purely on what BG3 was supposed to be based on. It was meant to be based on D&D 5e. If you take the way the game is CURRENTLY designed, it really fits more for a party of 5-6 characters. It has nothing to do with what I'm wanting or presuming.

A party of 5-6 Level 1 characters could defeat 3 Imps at a time. A party of 1-2 could not. Period. That's the logistics of it. If Larian used proper Imp stats instead of their nerfed down homebrew stats, there is very little possibility that a party of 1-2 (MC + Lae'zel) could beat 3 Imps. Period.

And IF you only had a party of 1-2, then by the end of the very first encounter, even IF you managed to somehow beat 3 imps, you would gain, using XP Split, enough experience to level up to Level 2. So it is clear that:

A. They are not using proper D&D stats but have nerfed the enemies considerably because they know you will likely (in single player mode) only have 1-2 characters on average to face 3 imps, and

B. That if you only face said 3 imps you'd gain enough XP to gain a level up after your first encounter. So they severely nerfed how many XP's you should get from that encounter so you don't level up right away.

So, what I'm trying to say is that the encounters are already based on the expectation that you will start with a party of 4 (single or multiplayer) and you'll add at least Lae'zel (and possibly Us) to your party to make a party of 5 or 6 by the time you face your first Imp encounter. Again, however, that would only be IF they used actual D&D 5e stats. My point is that the way the encounters were initially constructed, it had to be assumed you'd have 5 or 6 in your party in order to defeat 3 Imps. Then they realized that "Oh dang! There might only be 1-2 characters in single player mode. We'd best nerf everything because most people are going to be playing this with only 1-2 characters in the party by this point."

So, what I'm saying is, make it so players start with 4 Customized Characters whether single or multiplayer, increase party size to 6, and use proper D&D stats, and the entire game would be perfect for a legit D&D 5e experience with proper XP gain per encounter and proper challenge ratings and so forth.

Then use Difficulty settings to allow players to adjust to their own desired number of characters. If you want 4, adjust Difficulty to make encounters easier (nerfed) like it is now.

But for the love of all that is holy, give players the option to have up to 6 and make that the norm. Then make options to allow players to balance it more for their preference.

You always start big and then work down to small. You never start small and work big or it never works right.

If they were to balance the game right now based on 1-4 party size, they'd need to nix every encounter in the prologue and almost every encounter in the game if they were to use proper D&D stats, and that's what I'm trying to say. The game is actually, literally built for 5-6 party size. I've tested it via Tabletop. I know what I'm talking about. It is WAY to hard with a party size of 4 unless you severely nerf EVERYTHING, which is the current state of the entire game.

No ...

Oh really ...

I see some presumption here ...
Like presumption that Larian will use some 5e monters that are, again presumed, totally unfitting as enemies for level 1 character ... ​O_o

Since Logistics represents the organization, planning, management and implementation of goods flows ...
I dare to presume here you wanted to say logic ... yet its not logic, its just your presumptions.

Indeed ...
So why would they use them in such case? O_o
And probably more importantly, why would they even bother with creating weaker version, and nerf it even futher a little later ... since if you remember, Imps in previous patches had Fire and i believe even Poison Resistances.

See there is another presumption ...
XP split, something nobody except you (and i believe one or two other people i have seen) never mentioned previously, like ever ... and game curently dont even show any hits that they would like to implement it in the future ...
Quite the contrary since they were fixing that tiny detail, that Shadowheart was 30xp late, compared to rest of our group.


And C. they either nerfed it both ... or never even cared about what stats or XP reward monster with same name should give.
Imps were simply chosen bcs they are fitting best Tutorial atmosphere ... and XP was chosen so it fits their game.
Nothing deeper there.

In other words ... if your presumption has ben corect.

In other words ... change litteraly everything you builded so far.
I mean come on ... you change stats, you change party size, you change starting party (even tho i believe it was confrimmed in the past that we will be able to create multiple custom characters in Single player), you change xp reward system ... whats left? O_o

This is first pure suggestion without any asumptions ...
And i totally disagree with that ...
As we said multiple times before (and you were agreeing with that too) simply allow party of 6, warn people who allow it that game was not ballanced for that amount of characters and everyone should be happy ... there is litteraly no reason to create double amount of Difficiulty settings based on party members number. -_-

Yes, this is the right way ...
Allowing 5th and 6th party member AS PART OF DIFFICIULTY SETTINGS!

And that is why you are wrong ...
We keep telling you this for last 3/4 year and you still dont get it. :-/
You are using different set of rules (yes many of them are same, and many of them are based on your rules... but they are NOT SAME) ... therefore your simulation are false. -_-

No, Ragnarok (I was only kidding about the Ragzlin thing). You are wrong, and let me tell you why you are wrong. You are wrong because you are wrong. You are always wrong. No matter what you say, you are wrong. Always. I am right, and you are wrong. My rightness only shows how wrong your wrongness is.

Do me a favor, Ragnarok. Take a step back and try to stop telling people they are wrong or that they presume things or assume things.

BG3 is based on D&D 5e. Yes?

If it is, then what I'm saying is that if you use D&D 5e tabletop rules as the game was initially designed, all the encounters in BG3 are based on a party size of 5-6. This is not a presumption. This is based on me taking the actual encounters and attempting to play through them with a party of 5-6 characters via tabletop. Why is tabletop valid? Because I'm comparing the rules that BG3 is supposed to be based on with the actual video game and the point I'm trying to make is that the original BG3 encounters were obviously built based on a party size of 5-6. How do I know this? Because that is the ONLY way, using original D&D 5e rules, that anyone could possibly ever beat 3 imps at level 1. You would have to roll exceptionally well and your enemies roll exceptionally poorly, every round, in order to defeat 3 imps at level 1 with only 2 level 1 characters (3 at most with Us).

How do I also know? Because in original versions of the game, several patches ago, Imps DID have resistance, but they were still nerfed. The original battles were still too tough, so they had to nerf the imps even more so they wouldn't frustrate the players during the tutorial. If they made it so that the game started with 4 custom characters in your party, they could use proper stats (again, I've tested it with tabletop) and the imps wouldn't be impossible for 4-6 level 1 characters.

And again, I've also tested it with tabletop, and I've discovered that 3 intellect devourers is not impossible for a party of 4 + Shadowheart. It can be done. So, again, my point is that it is clear that the initial design and build of every encounter was a party size of 5-6. Then they severely dumbed down the entire thing so that you could do it with far less numbers in your party.

So, I could be wrong, Ragnarok, but I don't think so. All the evidence seems to point to the likelihood that they first developed this game as a 6 party max (including early screenshots, mind you) and they decided to try to nerf everything to make it doable for 4.

All this is to say that encounters wouldn't have to be rebalanced at all if they moved to a party size of 6. They'd simply have to use original D&D 5e stats for monsters for a party size of 6 max and then allow players to use an Easy difficulty setting if they only want a party of 4. In both cases, they wouldn't have to rework anything. They could simply create a difficulty setting that puts all monsters with proper stats based on D&D 5e tabletop rules, and a party of 6 would work just fine. Or, they could have a difficulty setting that keeps all monsters with the stats they have right now, and a 1-4 party size works just fine.

That is the entirety of my point. Difficulty setting to True D&D Core Ruleset and Stats for a 6 character party and Nerfed Difficulty Setting for 1-4 party size. Then they'd neither have to rebalance a party of 1-4 nor rebalance a party of 6.