Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Conversations should be tied to amount of Long Rests instead of Reputation.

Hi ...
I just tryed my patch 6 evil playthrough ... and since i played this game a lot and lot and lot ... i simply decided to left out parts that i "dont necesarily need" ...
So i basicaly skipped whole north part of surface map ... gnolls, gith, zhentarims, gith, tollhouse, ... but also spider cave, necromancer lair, ogres and windmill ...

It had most curious outcome.

Since i skipped most of serious battle encounters i didnt need to Long Rest too often ...
And i get to situation where i had complete Raid to the Grove, and whole Underdark ... i was standing inside the Grymforge, and my Tav had no idea that Astarion is a Vampire, or that Gale needs to consume magical Artefacts. :-/
Now, since i noticed, i try to Long Rest quite often (like unnecesary often, since i really wish Astarion to get that bite ) yet i allways just get burning fire, and no cutscene. :-/

I mean ... its nice to get different outcome for different characters, sure ... but this is kinda dull.

Therefore i would like to repeat one old request that i was unable to find ...
1) Tie cruicial Conversations to certain Long Rests
(like Gale needs to be ressurected within 3 days he say ... therefore 3 Long Rests should be his maximum)
2) Allow us to have more Cinematic conversation within single Long Rest ... i mean sure, we all will be shocked that Raphael meed us in the camp ... but there is nothing stoping Gale to also say "there is something else i need to talk about" and start his own story RIGHT afterwards ... also there is nothing stoping Astarion to try to drink our blood after that (and that allready happened to me few times)
3) SAVE Unused dialogues for next Long Rest (or even better, for next meeting in camp)
4) Optimaly ... all above.

Thank you for reading.

Isn't a current problem with BG3 that important conversations are already tied to long rests, and thus players who don't long rest won't see them?

I think the main problem of what happened to you, Rag, was conversation triggers overwriting each other. At some point Astarion's Bite cutscene flag was turned on, but then soon after Gale's Mystra scene flag was turned on and overwrote Astarion's scene. In my first playthrough, I remember never getting the scene where everyone feels tadpole-sick and Lae'zel tries to kill everyone to prevent transformations. Probably because I didn't long rest until after Nettie, so Rafael's scene replaced it.

I'd like to be able to see all the cutscenes without resting more frequently than I want to. So:
+1 for your suggestions #2 and #3, with heavy emphasis on #3.
-0.5 to your suggestion #1. Your specific example about Gale makes sense because it has a stated #-of-days timer. But for e.g., Astarion's Bite or Gale's artefacts, it should happen at X long rests OR after Y reputation OR after you reach a certain point in the story, whichever happens first.

I'll also add 4.) some cutscenes that don't require sleeping can also/instead take place in the overworld. E.g., most of the dialogues with Gale and Wyll. During a short rest or literally just talking to the companion while exploring.

Quite certainly.
I also forget to mention that i dont even have my Tadpole powers, and the only Long Rest cutscenes i get was Raphael and "Where are you".

Me too ...
But i suggested to allow us trigger those cutscenes any time we get to the camp, while companions should told us "we need to talk" as soon as they get some new conversation unlocked ... aproximately half year ago, and so far nothing.
So i dare to presume this "pseudosolution" was not concidered acceptable for some reason.

That sounds even better ... +1 to you too.

As long as its just about talking ... why not another +1.
I mean, i get why they dont want to let us trigger conversations "anywehere" since in some of those more important there are gest, or companions are walking ... etc. just things that would cause clipping problems. :-/

Plus they could split some parts to add some teasers in the road ...
Like (again using Gale) "I have a condition, different from the tadpole but just as dangerous ... i urge you, come to me next time we reach camp ... this is not time, nor place for such discusion."

a little bit related, I think every time a companion has an exclamation point above their head they should just go ahead and interrupt you to have a conversation.

Some people don't want to be stopped whenever a character has something to say. I can understand that.

However, I agree that something different should be done. I've missed the Exclamation Point a number of times because I didn't see it. It doesn't stay there forever.

So maybe they could just have the character say something like, "Hey, Listen!" lol. (in Navi's voice from Ocarina of Time).

Companion conversations definitely need a fix. I have yet to get Gale’s weave scene in any of my playthroughs. I often miss other scenes as well even though I rest plenty.

I agree. Lately, I've been resting *a lot* more, mostly because I've done the game without resting, and I want to try a different way. And there's so much food, I might as well.

I think the conversation triggers need some attention.

Getting the Gale romance path required a playthru where I basically had to long rest after every convo in the grove. That wizard just adored all my actions there and it screwed everything up with his convos being tied to approval.

Asterion’s bite was tied to finding the boar (I think). Yet Raphael scene is tied to Nettie. The whole Cazafor thing gets totally screwed up with the Raphael scene for me, causing lines to come too early if I wait too long after Rapheal to hit the boar. It is a mess.

Wyll has always been bugged for me in the Blighted Village. If you finish the windmill fight too early or he is unchained from u when it ends, it totally blows his convo cue.

They gotta fix all these flags. Some are tied to camp, some to in game events,some to approval, some to whether u have someone in your party or not. It is a bit of a catastrophe.

Supergiant’s Hades has similar problem to tackle - there a lot of narrative content is experience between runs (long rest so to speak) and a lot of story bits are triggered by actions. They had pretty nifty system to prioritise story bits, and make sure nothing important gets overwritten, missed or delayed for too long.

Hmmm. I very much get what problem you are hinting at - since that problem has been bugging a lot of people. But if anything, I believe that having these things tied to the amount of long rests would be really bad. Primarily because the amount of long-rests required during a playthrough depends a lot on the player and which difficulty the player is playing on.

As the game is right now, I long-rest about as frequently as people quick-save in RPGs. Often I just get the fire-scene, same as you, but every so often I get one of these scenes. And doing this tactic has made me not miss a single available scene (including the Weave Scene, Astarions reveal and anything else along the road). But the thing is - it is not fun, and not immersive at all.

I definitely think that your point 2 and 3 should be looked at by Larian - because I just don't believe this current system makes the cut at all.

On top of point 2 and 3, I'd suggest these things as well:

1) Many conversations should not require us to long rest. I get that DA:O set the bar on this one, but I sincerely believe that PoE's system would make more sense in many cases. This is ESPECIALLY true for when characters react to our actions, just as SH being mad at us for something or Gale praising us for something else. They can just bring it up on the spot - why would they wait? In many cases it just does not make any sense. MANY of the conversations that are tied to the camp could EASILY be done outside of camp. Do it PoE-style and have our companions "force" us into a conversation right after where they can speak their mind about the incident.

2) Please, please, please, please, for the love of Lathander - use a notification system. Yet again, my advice would be to look at PoE. Do it in or out of character, I do not really care which - but PLEASE let your players know when it is time to camp for story reasons. You have written an amazing story, Larian, help your players experience all of it! I personally see 2 options for this: option A would be to simply add a chat-icon somewhere in the meny whenever there is a dialogue available at camp. This is a out-of-character option that is ONLY meant to help the player. Option B would have characters either hint at us (something like "Wyll throws you some quick glances. Apparently he has something to say, perhaps I should speak to him when we reach camp", or directly tell us in-character "We should speak when we reach camp."

Just... Give us something. I really don't wanna miss out on anything, but pressing long rest every 10th step or even more often "just in case" is just incredibly dull and ruins the whole experience.

I get that some scenes don't make sense outside of camp and such. I've even come to terms with the Gale Mirror Image and Go to Hell dialogues because, if you think about it, they fit only if you long rest frequently before you meet Nettie. Same with SH saying, "I'm not sure this is such a good idea.

Why? Because if you don't long rest a lot before meeting Nettie, once you meet Nettie she explains that you're not changing as fast as you should. So Gale informing you that you aren't changing as fast as you should in those cutscenes seems out of place after you encounter Nettie. Same with SH saying she doesn't think it's a good idea.

BUT... Those cutscenes COULD be untied to long rest and occur during your journey. Maybe you click Short Rest and trigger one. After all, that fits. Every hour would matter when normal symptoms have a person losing their identity within hours of infection.

At least if cutscenes were tied to both long and short rest that would provide players who long rest as little as possible more of an opportunity to see those dialogues.

And I really think they need to take away the 2 limit short rest and do the hit die thing or require a food cost so people can short rest more and then trigger these kinds of things. Plus, it makes fighters more important, and Warlocks, because their abilities reset on short rests.

This is one of the most annoying things right now in EA.
I'm a big story fan, but I'm also very much a D&D mindset player, meaning I'm saving my resources and go as long as I can before long resting. I'm super conservative with spell slots and only use abilities for when I really need them, as I never know when that big bad will show up for a boss fight.

I've missed so many of the cut scenes, broken conversations (having Astarion discuss Cazador without revealing he's a vampire, just talking about being turned etc.) and just missed a lot of the character development. And why did I do this? Because I approached the game with a D&D mindset - save your resources.

I did notice an improvement in last patch that it seems you can now actively talk to all your companions in camp to exhaust their options and trigger some conversations even if only one of them get's the ! to talk to them.
I've yet to see Gale's weave scene however.

Because his weave scene is tied to approval (ugggggg), not resting number. It is VERY badly done, and is almost impossible to get if you do druid grove early…unless you metagame and rest waaaaaay more than you need to.

I too like to conserve resources and only rest when I need to replenish spells. My first playthru, I missed all kinds of things by approaching this like a challenging game. But ye gods…between all the scrolls lying around and (before they fixed it) food as a healing potion? I did not need to rest for a loooooooong time.

Now, even tho I do not need to, I just rest as often as I can to make sure I don’t miss things. It is stupid and totally takes me out of the game because it is metagaming to get known dialogue scenes. Total Bummer.

I do hope they fix this.

Exactly my point!
Since talking is tied to reputation level only ... you can (and with Gale often do) get to sitation where you are:

Approval > congratulation you just unlocked new cinematic conversation, but we will never tell you.
Approval > congratulation you just owerwrited your previously unlocked conversation with new cinematic conversation, but we will never tell you.
Disapproval > congratulation you just lost your unlocked cinematic conversation ... of course you dont get back that previous one.

In my honest opinion best way would be:
You click long rest ...
Event that should be happening is happening (sick night, raphael visit, surprisingly handsome elf ambush, ...)
You come talk to companion ... reactions for event happens ...
Then IF there is no reaction on event (or is event that dont require futher comentary ... i mean it would be odd if our companions stopped "feling sick" ... but not so odd, when attack of surprisingly handsome elf is done)
> Game checks what was your last cinematic conversation with curent companion ...
> Game checks if your aproval is high enough for the very next in line (they would need to be coded in specific order)
> Next conversation is happening, or regular generic "how can i help" starts.

That way we would not skip cruicial parts of your relationship development ... and we would be able to talk with multiple companions within single night.

I've found this to be one of my biggest issues having played through many times as well.

I haven't finished Gale or Wyll's routes, and that's primarily because of the reliance on long rests. Couple reasons why the long rest reliance is so frustrating IMO:
a) If you don't go looking for the information, there's no way to know that you have to rest a certain number of times for certain relationship items to advance. I've romanced every other character but Wyll and Gale because they didn't have as much reliance on this.
b) It's easy to go without resting as much as needed to trigger these events via natural playthrough. If left to my own devices (no reliance on long rests for dialogue), I'd only long rest 3-5 times during the current early access playthrough. I mean, the very basis of the story discourages you from long resting, since normally you'd become an Illithid within 7 days.
c) Needing to long rest actually detracts from the fun of the game if you like some difficulty. I am not used to D&D being a game where I get all my spell slots and special moves back after EVERY fight in a super dangerous situation. It makes the combat very easy and boring for a seasoned player.

I love the idea of tying the dialogue to short and long rests.
It would really incentivize players to care about the short rests, and not find them as just boring easy heals for the majority of classes that don't benefit greatly from them. I think it would also give more gravitas and appeal to the sense of time in the game.
A short rest in 5e is supposed to take an hour, it's not supposed to be so brief as to be worth ignoring completely. If a short rest could trigger a "freeze" or something to the rest of the world, so you don't get interrupted with battles or outside dialogue for a few minutes while you do the short rest, that would work.