Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Why I Want More D&D 5e Rules

In my defense, I already spoke to GM4HIM, who cleared up his view and I understand. The quotes that you posted are the ones I was referring to as asking for strict 5e rules because it seems that way. They sounds as they want no homebrew rules, it may not be their intention but that how that sounds like in their writing. Dexai accused me of being disingenuous and a strawman and I take offense to that because that is not what I'm doing, I'm sorry if people think that but I'm sincerely not doing that. The comments I have made are based on how I see things. I don't understand how that would make me a bad person to some.

^^

It is an illusion cantrip so shadow magic wont apply as it is not a 1st level spell or above. Some spells will be difficult to translate without an actual DM I agree but these spells will be esoteric in nature and probably wont be in the spell list anyway. I hope some of the fun spell variants will be included. Spells that effect the environemt in an illusionary manner like "tiny hut" will be pretty cool I think but I think that is an evocation ritual.

I don't know, honestly. Though I've wanted a full forum overhaul and update for an eternity! But I've helped people have their account or posts deleted under certain circumstances and private requests, so if anyone wants it, all they have to do is reach out. However we typically avoid deleting messages in standard moderation circumstances. Exceptions being severe cases that can't be left standing (such as scam, spam, etc) or ban evasions.

If possible and necessary, at least I personally prefer to remove a post with a replaced "[Removed by moderation.]" text in its place for a very specific reason. Way back when I wasn't moderating anything, a rising theme and topic people sometimes mentioned was a notion of that there was no moderation going on at the forums, being a wild, wild west sorta thing. So visible moderation presence for people to see became important to me, because I think it's on some level important to a lot of people. Anyway...

Can certainly raise the subject, it's a good question

I'm optimistic Larian will make additional adjustments to address some of the more unpopular homebrew/compromises based on feedback. No doubt there will be Mods produced after final release that will further fine tune the experience for those looking for more 5e authenticity.

I don't like mods, so I'm hoping they won't just trust the mod approach for things like this.

Haven't read every reply but I wanted to say that the OP is exactly right.

My suspicions at this point is that those of who were looking for a successor to BG2 will be disappointed. Larian seems to wedded to the mechanics that made DOS2 such a success and the CEO is 'slavishly' committed to his vision of 'fun'.

Hope to be proven wrong.

Same here. I quit DOS and DOS2 at mid way because both games were not for me. I bought BG3 in EA because of its name and because it was marketed as being based on 5e, and to (hopefully) be able to stir the game away from DOS2. I'm not too optimistic this will be the case, in part because of the complete lack of engagement from Larian.

After carefully reading this I'm going to defend Larian in this case, just because this game in part has similar animations to the Divinity series it bares no similarity so lets put a full stop to that.

It is absolutely impossible to make a full 5e game whilst engaging that will please everybody or turn out to be endless in it's options as how many times have you guys sat with your friends playing then come to the conclusion " Yeah, Fred you've won" otherwise it would go on forever and bore the pants off you, remember the record is 38 years and I haven't got that much time?

BG2 was not that great I completed it in a few days and the damn game glitched on me more times than my nans pacemaker has so stop pretending it was.

Conclusively I just rolled a 1 after drinking my last beer and I'm about to pass out.

That is not true. Problem is, they never gave people the chance. I find more people out here who have never tried 5e, and they say, "I'm glad they didn't do 5e because I hate 5e and it would never work in a video game.

Here's my stance:

I play Tabletop with others. We use an app on Google Play Store. It guides them in character creation. Super easy to do. Full 5e. All electronic.

We play a tabletop session. I use Tabletop simulator or an app that allows me to use digital maps and pawns. We run fights. Everything is via apps. They move their pawns, the app even says how far they move in feet. They use dice rolling app to roll for hits and damage. They get hit, their app records the HP loss.

Again, all electronic via apps and all using full blown D&D 5e stats and rules with a few homebrew like advantage flanking bonus because that makes sense to me.

So, if we can run tabletop using apps for everything, why can't they implement 5e more in BG3?

Yeah it's a good question. They clearly haven't even really tried it, cause they never wanted it.

Probably because they think they know better. They think they know what is fun and what is not.

I put this in the party size threat, but I'm including it here because it is a perfect example of how D&D combat should go with proper stats and rules and a party size of 4 Players + Shadowheart (Party Size Max of 6; though in this case it is only a party size of 5 because you only have 1 additional companion).

Here. Example of how the Intellect Devourer battle should go on the beach with proper D&D 5e rules and stats, 4 Players + Shadowheart for a party of 5. All at level 1 still.

Initiative = Shadowheart rolled 20 total, then Lynari 18, Intellect Devourer 2 (ID2) 17, Diadell 16, Vel 13, Drogyn 3, ID1 3, and ID3 3.

Shadowheart keeps her distance and rolls a 20 with her Guiding Bolt. Hit. 15 Damage off of ID1. It had 22 HP total to begin with. It now has 7 HP remaining.

Lynari is a drow wizard and casts Magic Missile at ID1. Rolls 3d4, does 6 damage. ID1 has 1 HP left.

ID2 uses Dash and runs 80 feet, moving up to Drogyn who is towards the front.

Diadell, a wood elf Rogue, moves up and attacks ID2 with her two shortswords. Sneak Attack proper rules = Advantage is not necessary if an ally is within 5 feet of the target. Since Drogyn is there, she gets to use Sneak Attack if she hits. First roll 1. Critical Miss. Second roll 14+5=19. Hit. 1d6 damage = 4, but ID2 has Resistance to Piercing and Slashing weapons. Half damage. Diadell only does 2 points off. ID2 had 25 HP. It now has 23.

Vel is a half elf Druid. He casts Entangle and effects an area that captures both ID1 and ID3 in it. Both must make Strength checks against Vel's Spell DC or be ensnared/restrained for up to 10 rounds. Each round, a successful check could free them. Vel's DC is only 12. ID1 rolls a 1. ID3 rolls a 4. They both fail and are restrained.

Drogyn is a half-orc barbarian. He attacks ID2 with his greatsword and rolls a 4+5=9. Miss. He needed a 12.

ID1 rolls to break free of the Entangle spell. Rolls a Natural 20 and succeeds. That cost an Action. It can now only move 40, but because of difficult terrain (the Entangle spell area), it cannot move fast enough to get up to the adventurers.

ID3 rolls to break free of the Entangle spell. Rolls a 10-2=8. (Strength is only 6, which is a -2 bonus). It fails and can't move.

Round 2. Shadowheart casts Guiding Bolt again on ID2. She rolls a 9+3=12. Hit. She rolls 4d6 and does 10 damage. It still has 13 HP.

Lynari casts Magic Missile again. She hurls 1 at ID1 and the other 2 at ID2. She does 1 point of damage to ID1, killing it. She does 4 to ID2. It has 9 left.

ID2 attacks Drogyn. Here is how an Intellect Devourer should behave. First, attacks with claws. Rolls a 2+4=6. Miss. Has Multiattack, so it can attack with claws and Devour Intellect in the same turn. Uses Devour Intellect on Drogyn. He must make a DC 12 Intelligence saving throw or take 2d10 psychic damage. He rolls a 9+0=9. Failure. DM rolls 2d10 and only gets 3. He's lucky. He had 15. He now has 12 HP. But that's not all. The DM also rolls 3d6. If the total equals or exceeds Drogyn's Intelligence score of 10, that score is reduced to 0. The target is stunned until it regains at least 1 point of Intelligence. DM rolls a 12. Drogyn is out of the fight. His Intelligence is now 0.

Diadell's turn. She attacks twice, once with each shortsword. She rolls a 2 and 4. Miss both times. Vel runs up and attacks ID2 with his spear. He rolls 6+3=9. Miss.

ID3 rolls a 14-2=12 and finally breaks free of the Entangle spell. It moves through difficult terrain, unable to reach the heroes.

Round 3. Shadowheart has no spell slots left. She pulls out her crossbow as a free action and fires at ID2. 11+3=14. Hit. 1d8+1 damage, she rolls a 7+1=8, but ID2 has Resistance. Half damage. She only actually deals 4 HP off. It has 5 HP remaining.

Lynari casts Firebolt. Natural 20. 2d10 damage (using extra d10 because of Critical Hit). She rolls a 9 total. ID2 dies in a fiery ball of death.

Diadell sheaths her swords and falls back 30 feet. She pulls out her bow and fires. This is all 1 Free Action. She hits with a Natural 20. 2d6 damage. 6+3=9. No Sneak Attack because no advantage. Resistance means half damage. ID3 loses 5 HP. It had 20. It now has 15.

Vel has no attack to use that won't bring the creature closer to him and the others, so he falls back.

ID3 uses Dash to move 80 feet, but is unable to get close to the remaining heroes because they moved further away.

Round 4. Shadowheart fires her crossbow again. 11+3=14. Hit. 3+1=4 divided by 2 (Resistance) = 2. It has 13 remaining.

Lynari casts Firebolt again. She only rolls a 4 to hit. Miss.

Diadell rolls for her bow and misses with a 2.

Each of them moved 30 feet further away to escape.

Vel risks his life to keep ID3 away from the others. He runs 30 feet and uses Thorn Whip. He rolls a 1. Critical Miss.

ID3 takes the bait and charges him. It attacks with claws. 4+4=8. Miss. It uses Devour Intellect. Vel rolls an 18+1=19 to resist and succeeds. He only needed a 12. He takes no damage.

Round 5. Shadowheart fires again with 11+3=14. She does 6+1=7 damage divided by 2 = 4. It has 9 remaining. She moves another 30 feet away to hopefully keep it at a distance.

Lynari casts Firebolt. 16+4=20. Hit. 8 damage. ID3 only has 1 HP remaining.

Diadell fires her bow. Natural 20. 2d6. She rolls a 6. Resistance reduces it to 3. That is enough to kill it.

Party gains 270 XP each. From the Imp fights during the Prologue, they received 600 XP during the first fight divided by 5 (including Lae'zel) = 120 XP each. After meeting Shadowheart, they had a party of 6. They faced another group of 2 Imps and a Hellsboar on the bridge. Each imp was 200 XP and Hellsboar was 100. So that was 300 XP total. Then they faced a second group of the same for another 300 XP total. Divided by 6, that was another 100 XP each. So, by the end of the Prologue, they had 120+100=220 XP. The DM then awarded them 50 XP for completing the Prologue for a total of 270 XP. They needed 300 XP to level up.

So, they were able to level up after the Intellect Devourer fight, having a total of 540 XP.

Notice how this fight was not so tough with a party of 4 + Shadowheart. They still lost a man who would now only recover during a Long Rest; thus the Long Rest would be suggested by the game at that point because you have a fallen companion who wouldn't recover until after the Long Rest from Devour Intellect. Thus, it makes sense to do a Long Rest Tutorial at that point especially if that battle didn't go as well as this one did.

First, what part of this fight here couldn't be done in a video game? Anything?

Second, THAT is how Intellect Devourers should act and how tough they really are.

Third, tell me that the game wasn't designed with a party size of 5+ based on this scenario above. The ONLY reason it works for a Party Size 4 at all (and ESPECIALLY for just 1 MC and Shadowheart) is because they not only reduced each of the ID's to like 10-12 HP, but they removed Resistance and Multiattack and took away their Devour Intellect and Body Thief abilities.

This is why I'm suggesting:

1. Option for Party Size 6. This Option allows 4 Player Multiplayer games to have their 4 Custom Characters and Shadowheart, thus giving them a better chance of surviving this fight.
2. Option for Core D&D 5e Rules Difficulty so that when you play 4 Player Multiplayer + Shadowheart, it is a challenging and rewarding experience instead of an absolute breeze that is lame and almost pointless. It also gives the Intellect Devourers their proper stats and signature attacks so that they are actual Intellect Devourers.
3. Option for Players to be able to create up to 4 Custom Characters even in Single Player Mode so that they could play with the Core D&D 5e Rules Difficulty from the beginning of the game and not be totally wiped out by fighting 3 Intellect Devourers with only 1 MC and Shadowheart.

THIS is what I'm talking about. Imagine if Vel had failed his roll. ID3 would have taken him down as well, leaving only Lynari, Diadell and Shadowheart. They would have to keep running and shooting, keeping it at a distance and slowly dwindling it down to kill it off.

I, the DM, would not have allowed it to use Body Thief. I would have had ID3 try to use Body Thief on Vel and then announced, "The creature tries to use its Body Thief ability, which allows it to consume the target's brain and teleport into the target's skull. It can then possess the body and control the body of its target. However, SOMEthing seems to be preventing it. A strange glow appears around your companion's head, shielding them from the monster's power."

Now THAT would be awesome, and THAT would make total sense from a story perspective. It would then let the player(s) know that Intellect Devourers are normally vicious, terrible, and evil creatures that can actually take over a person's body like Invasion of the Body Snatchers, and they can use that body against their own allies. Best not to underestimate them in the future. PLUS, it lends even more evidence to the player that their tadpoles are NOT normal.

THIS is the kind of thing I'm looking for in BG3 that I think would make it better.

And it's not just combat I'm talking about.

Here's another example of what I'm trying to get across here.

Imagine this. Day/Night Cycle. You crash on the beach. It's early morning. We know this because it's night when the nautiloid crashes. So, when we wake up, it's morning. We fight Intellect Devourers. We long rest. End of Day 1. You make camp on the beach just outside the Dank Crypt entrance.

Next morning, we set out, meet Astarion, the fishermen, and Gale. We go through the entire dank crypt. We come out, and the party needs a short rest. You short rest once, the sun moves in the sky and it's afternoon. But they need to short rest again because they lost a lot of HP. The afternoon turns to evening. The sun has set. Now, the entire landscape is dark.

The party moves away from the dank crypt, and suddenly, they spot something moving in the shadows on the path ahead. Stealth mode. Astarion is sent ahead to investigate. Whatever it is has both hearing and sight cones. Astarion enters the broader hearing radius. He has Stealth Expertise. The creature's passive Perception is 12. Astarion rolls a 7. Now, in current game, he would get a 7+4 for Proficiency for Stealth skill which is a failure because he doesn't have Expertise. However, in this version of the game which is more true to D&D 5e, he has Expertise, so his skill is +6 for a total of 13. He succeeds. He creeps up close enough to see a giant badger. Player is a druid and approaches in animal form. Creatures spots the druid MC and immediately attacks. Druid MC uses Animal Friendship and succeeds. Animal calms down. Text box pops up (because we don't need voice acting for every little thing we encounter). "You frightened me. I thought you were going to try to kill me. How can I help you, Friend?"

You converse with the animal, and it tells you about the grove to the north. Then it hops off.

You continue along in the darkness. Quiet music is playing that's a bit spooky but not too much. You encounter the tieflings with Lae'zel. You get a +2 to Intimidate because you are a group of adventurers moving about in the dark and encountering them in the night. If you had encountered them by day, you'd get no Intimidate bonus. Ah, but your MC doesn't have Intimidate. So, you switch mid-conversation, to Astarion to use Deception. You chose Deception for his other Expertise. He doesn't get the +2 bonus for night because he's going to try to trick them into leaving. So, instead of your MC who has no bonuses attempting to make the roll, Astarion who has a +6 to Deception, gets to make the roll.

He succeeds and they run off, thinking a group of mind flayers is coming from the crashed ship. You free Lae'zel and she joins the party. Now you have 6 party members. Take your pick. 4 Custom Characters, Astarion, Gale, Shadowheart and Lae'zel. You can even boot your Custom Characters and only take the origin characters if you want. Your MC is the only one you have to take.

You approach the grove gate. Aradin and his team are shouting up at... nothing. There is no one anywhere atop the rocks. It looks just like sheer mountain walls because Silvanus' power is cloaking the entire grove so it cannot be seen or detected. The gate blends into the rock walls with vines so that you can't even see the faintest outline of it.

Suddenly, Kanon's head appears as if popping out of the rock walls. The illusion ripples as he does so. He shouts down at Aradin saying that he can't let anyone in. It's Zevlor's orders. Aradin shouts back that goblins are right behind. Kanon steps further out of the illusion, onto the very edge of the rocky ledge. Zevlor then appears and joins him. He and Aradin have their little exchange. Zevlor orders the gates to be opened. Goblins appear in the darkness, along with the worg. The light of some of their torches illuminates the forested area. Several archers fire. Kanon is raising the gate. The archers, however, are firing volleys at the wall where Zevlor is standing. Zevlor manages to take cover, but Kanon is hit by stray fire. You can suddenly see the gate because it was lifting. Otherwise, it still looks invisible. It descends, and the fight begins... at night.

Your party is on the hill. You can't be detected at first because of the cover of night and you aren't moving. Even if you aren't stealthing it, you are still not detected at first because of the fact that it is night and you are more than 60 feet beyond their line of sight. During the combat, you get +2 bonus to Stealth every time you try to hide. As soon as you are detected, the goblins fall back away from the main gate of the grove and focus on you. After all, they know they'll get pummeled by defenders on the wall, and their only hope is to kill you first. Suddenly, the battle becomes much harder. Same number of enemies, but they are now focusing their attention on you and not on Aradin and his crew and the defenders on the wall. However, you have a party of potentially 5-6. So, the fight isn't too overwhelming. Besides, you get a +2 for high ground up on the hill and you can have Astarion use cover of night to help him hide and do Sneak Attacks on his enemies. Whatever your strategy, the point is that even if you only took a party of 4, you'd still have Aradin and his group to help you, AND the defenders on the walls could help as well, including Wyll.

This would then also explain why Zevlor and everyone else acts like you saved the grove. If you were the ones to take the brunt of the attack upon yourselves, it makes sense that everyone would hail you as the heroes.

You enter the grove. It is night. The beauty of the grove by star and moonlight with torches lit. It's not late night. It's evening, so everyone is where they normally are. Still makes sense for nothing to have changed. You go about talking to people. You have Astarion rob a few people, gaining a +2 bonus for darkness of night AND his +6 Stealth Expertise. So, he's sneaking around and pickpocketing all over the place, but not suits of armor. Just little things like potions and gold and other small trinkets he can then sell to vendors and earn enough gold to buy armor and weapons and such.

You decide to sneak Sazza out. Ah! Cover of night will help with that. You have the choice of going through the secret tunnels OR sneaking her right out through the camp. Since you have cover of night +2 bonus for Stealth, she has a better chance of sneaking out with you especially if you have some of your characters engage different characters in the grove in conversation, causing them to turn their backs on Sazza.

Finally, you go meet Kagha and Rath and you make a Perception roll in the central chamber. All of your party does. One succeeds and points out the murals on the wall. You look at them and get the story of the grove. If Shadowheart is with you, she explains to you who Shar is and gives you a very basic background about her. Since she is your companion, and a Sharran, she WANTS you to approve of Shar and thus her, so she tells you a bit of the story and puts her own spin on it so that you'll like Shar. However, Gale refutes the tale, or maybe Wyll or Astarion or Lae'zel, or you make a Religion roll of 10 or higher and know that most people view Shar as evil and nasty and she doesn't even glow in the dark. Now, you know something about Shar.

Finally, you Long Rest. Day 2 ends. You make camp in the grove because that is the safest place you could possibly camp in the entire EA. It becomes your main camp. All other camps, even the one on the beach for Day 1 earlier, are mini-camps. A little cutscene is given at the end of Day 2 here when you first camp in the grove showing one of the druids guiding you to a quiet spot in the grove where you can make camp just at the edge of the river.

Skip ahead. You are roaming the forest at night. You are nearing Bogrot. Suddenly, you hear the screams of something in the night sky. It sounds like it's coming from the town. Slowly, you make your way in. You see goblins running west towards the goblin camp. They are fleeing from something. Is it you? You make your way into the town. AMBUSH! Phase spiders Ethereal Jaunt into the Material Plane right next to your party; 3 of them. Perception rolls are made to determine if you are surprised. You fail. They surprise attack you. During first round of combat that isn't the surprise round, they attack and phase back into the Ethereal Plane. Battle ends. They were only attacking you to soften you up and test you out. They can see you aren't goblins. They're just messing with you.

You continue through the village, exploring a few buildings and expecting spiders again at any moment. Bam! Three jump out at you again and attack. This time, Perception rolls are made and your party succeeds, or at least a few of them do. Phase spiders attack and flee again. Battle ends.

Because not every encounter in D&D has to be fought to the absolute death. That's not even realistic. Enemies will often surrender or flee if they are losing a fight. This speeds up combat and doesn't bog the game down with having to kill absolutely everything. And sometimes, enemies will do hit and fade tactics, ESPECIALLY phase spiders.

Finally, after softening you up a bit here and there, the phase spiders make their full assault. They appear again as you're in the street. They phase in and attack. Next round, they attack and phase out. Next round, they attack and phase in. You weaken them to quarter health. They flee into the Ethereal Plane and leave you alone for the remainder of your surface exploration.

You long rest, because they beat the crap out of you. You return by day. NOW the goblins are there and the ogres and everything that is currently there in the game. Whole new experience because it's by day.

Now THAT kind of stuff would REALLY take this game up a ton of notches.

Easy. Have you seen how Wish was implemented in BG2? The cast initiated a dialogue, and you chose one of the options provided. The list of options was influenced by current circumstances (for example, if a party member was dead, you could get a chance to resurrect them), and the total amount, usefulness and degree of benefit / harm the choices provide depended directly on the caster's INT. Sure, it's pretty simplistic (on the surface; the actual implementation must have been fiendishly difficult), but it's probably the best Bioware could do, considering the circumstances. I'm pretty sure many "purists" would shirk at such a limited implementation, but when ToB was released, for many people this was just "Wow!".

There are many ways to go with such things:

• Simply skip the spell entirely;
• Make it situational, tied to particular locations, and implemented via cutscenes. For example, we might not have the spell in the game per se, but we might have a magickal item that allows us to cast it, with limited charges. Then, as your party comes to a place for which a suitable cutscene exists and they have said item in the inventory, either one of the party members can make a remark about the item's potential usefulness here, or the item itself might start "wriggling in your backpack" (the latter was used in Dark Souls, for example).
• Go the Bioware's way and implement a dialog / cutscene for every time you cast it. Development wise, this will be the most challenging one.

I'm pretty sure Larian would have their own ideas, if / when they ever come to implement something as heavily dependent on player's imagination as your example.
Oh, please, don't be ridiculous: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_chess

Those are some great write ups for possible play by plays. I enjoyed reading them and seeing how various continuity and timing issues were addressed in the encounter design. Also how important basic abilities are tutorialized in a way that makes sense given the context with deference to pacing. I can tell from the presentation that you've thought a lot on how this campaign would feel with somewhat more TT style guided narrative. Makes me pine for the night game, and for a larger party, and some exposition that builds on the character archetypes for the current companions.

I think it's because that is not Larian's vision. Like I mentioned before in this thread, Larian has said multiple times that BG3 is "first and foremost" a video game. That right there tells you they are not trying to implement too much 5e or tabletop mechanics. I can understand the need to for more 5e rules or mechanics but it seems Larian has been trying to create a hybrid game, a cross between regular rpg and tabletop. Another problem in BG3 is that it has a lot of similarities with DOS2. Just the opening sequence alone is almost the same but in a different setting. BG3 to an extend is not original when it comes to writing the story as they seem to have taken bits and pieces from DOS2.

Regular RPG??? I don't understand. D&D tabletop IS the original RPG. It is the RPG EVERY RPG is based on. How can you cross regular RPG with it?

I meant in terms of video game rpgs like Dragon Age, Fallout, Skyrim. Those types of mechanics. That’s what I meant about hybrid of video game rpg and tabletop. Those have different mechanics. One example of tabletop turned video game rpg is Cyberpunk.

This should be all that needs to be said ...