Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General I never played D&D 5ed and my knowledge stopped with D&D 3rd. What can I expect from BG3?

Hey, do you have any reasonable link with text or video that explains D&D 5ed because my love started with Neverwinter Nights and although I played BG games, I never played tabletop. What can I expect from points of difference or classes?

It will be an alien experience.

they have a free pdf of the core rules for 5e via there website. I don't have time to link it right now though. maybe someone can give me a hand

5e is somewhat of a merge between 2E (i.e. BG1/2) and 3.5E, with a bit of its own innovations.

The progression level-by-level is closer to 2E with a touch of 3.5E - you're not fidgeting with skill points and other things every level like in 3.5E. But like in 3.5E, once in a while, you're given a Feat or Attribute increase (unlike 3.5E, you have to choose between the two, you're not given both). Because of this, player stats don't bloat as much in 5E as it did in 3.5E. The multiclassing system, however, is very similar to 3.5E where each level is like a lego block and you can basically configure however you wanted (as long as you meet requirements).

Weapon profiicienies, choices and statistics have been simplified (though Larian is bringing some extra diversity back in BG3). On one level, it's less diversity. On another level, you don't have clear imbalances like in 3.5E where some weapons simply have way better crit-ranges than others.

Spellcasting now has a concentration mechanic - so some spells can no longer stack, and physical damage can disrupt them (instead of needing another caster to counter them). It balances martial vs. casters a little bit, and it makes the caster's spell choices a bit more strategic. Probably my favorite innovation for 5E.

I done googling for D&D 5ed, but I'm not sure what website are you referring to.

Very simply put, 5e has about the same core as 3.5e, but is considerably simpler.

No skill points, so INT can be a dump stat again. Instead, you have skill proficiencies, which generally can only be selected during character's creation, or by taking a Feat.
No free Feats every 3 levels. Most of the classes, if they want a Feat, have to sacrifice an ASI (ability score improvement) to get it.
ASI comes every 4 levels, just like in 3e, but gives you 2 points that you can put into your primary attributes instead of 1. No stat can be improved above 20 this way.
Many spells (esp. those of Cleric, Druid, etc.) have Concentration that can be easily disrupted. You can only concentrate on a single spell at any given time, so boosting your entire party with Bull's Strength or Cat's Grace is no longer an option.

That's the most noticeable differences, off the top of my head.

Basic Rules for 5e

There's a lot of changes between 3e and 5e. That being said, if you're familiar with the math of 3e, it shouldn't be too difficult to learn 5e. It doesn't really have anything weird like negative AC like in ADnD.

Here's a couple notable differences that I can think of:

AC works slightly differently as you can no longer target a lower value if you're using touch attacks or your target is flatfooted. In 5e AC (alongside attack bonuses and values in general) tends to scale much lower than 3e due to the concept of bounded accuracy.

Proficiency replaces BAB and is used in multiple different mechanics such as skills and saving throws. Your proficiency bonus is a value that scales with character level (not class levels) and goes from +2 to +6. You don't gain any iterative attacks from this bonus like you would from BAB. Instead you gain more attacks from the Extra Attack class feature. On the flip side, extra attacks no longer suffer a stacking -5 penalty (they're all made at the same attack bonus) and you can move before, between, and after making your attacks.

As touch AC no longer exists, touch attacks (and ranged touch attacks) don't either. Instead these spells now work as Spell Attacks which are calculated with Spellcasting Ability Modifier (INT/WIS/CHA) + Proficiency vs target AC.

Spell Save DCs are calculated differently than in 3e. Instead of being 10 + spell level + casting ability it's now 8 + proficiency + casting ability. There's 6 types of saving throws now (one for each ability score) instead of 3.

Casters get access to cantrips. These are at-will spells that can be used an unlimited number of times and scale with character level.

Skills work very differently from 3e. You no longer put ranks into a skill but instead choose a number of skills to be proficient at (you add your PB to the roll alongside the relevant ability score modifier). You can increase this value even further if you have expertise in that skill, which you can gain from the expertise class feature or the skill expert feat.

Feats are not nearly as common anymore. Instead you now have to choose between Ability Score increases and feats. Most of your power increases comes from your class features rather than feats.

BG3 is based loosely on 5e. Expect a Larian DOS 2 blended with 5e, and lots of gimmicks and extremes. Shove/Throw should be 5 feet, but it can be 30+ feet. Jump should be more normal. Expect to jump over people, and expect some enemies to Hulk Stomp you... Not 5e, by the way.

Remember the Intellect Devourer in Neverwinter Nights? The ones in BG3 will not act like that did. No devour intellect or body thief.

That's the kind of stuff you can expect. Kinda D&D in many ways, but not really. We're fighting for a more 5e experience.

Aren't you all glad you are explaining the differences between 3e and 5e rather than 2e? like imagine trying to explain the loss of thaco tables :P

Don't worry, no real knowledge of 5e is required as this game is not really a D&D game in any meaningful way. It's using the IP, and it's got a D&D-like coat of paint over its mechanics, but it's not even remotely adhering to the 5e system at all, so, your best bet is to take what you know from previous games like neverwinter nights, etc., then play Divinity: Original Sin 2, which was larian's last game, and imagine them making Divinity 3, but under the 'guise' of calling it a D&D game, so they can get more exposure and more brand recognition.

5e as a system is a refinement of what Wizards learned about the over-complexity of 3/3.5, filtered through learning about what went wrong with their dramatic over-simplification of 4e. Picking up the system is quick and easy, and most elements of it all work in easy to remember ways. The system is designed around what is referred to in house as bounded accuracy - it's a way of stopping the exponentially climbing stat arms race that other editions suffered from. The maximum for your ability scores is 20, there are fewer flat bonuses to effects, and generally speaking the number scales of everything that goes on exists within relatively simplified boundaries, and it helps smooth play considerably. Your modifiers will exist within a tighter range, but so will enemies, and you won't ever have to worry about drowning on a clam lake on a sunny day just because you didn't have the spare skill points to put into swimming -

I like how no one mentioned the pachyderm in the washroom (i.e., attunement). Especially artificial game balance for the win.

Honestly, because it's not an issue and no-one yet really thought about it, most likely. Attunement is related to the reduced brackets as well - and it's not as big an issue as detractors make it out to be, not by a long shot. It limits simultaneous access to certain things, but doesn't prevent the greater majority of what most folks like and want in their magic item system from earlier games, where it doesn't cause problems for the reduced bracket design.

The most common complaint you hear about it is:
"in 5e they've made magic items a lot more limited, and you're meant to have fewer of them" - Not true, not even remotely. You can absolutely trek around in your circlet of blasting, night-eye goggles, gloves of thievery, dwarven plate (+2, force move protection), +3 shield, boots of elvenkind, cape of mountebank, ring of animal influence on one hand, ring of wishes (last resort...) on the other, bag of holding at your hip, holding your box of marvellous pigments, while you fly towards the dragon on your carpet of flying, full in the knowledge that if it knocks you off you've still got your broom of flying strapped to your back as a back-up, but you're still deciding whether you want to get its attention with your wand of missiles first, or whether you're just going to fly straight at it and have a goo with your dragon-slayer long-sword in one hand and your +3 dagger in the other... or maybe if you want to just hang back and pepper it with enchanted arrows fired from your +3 longbow... and you know that even if it all goes wrong you've still got your rod of security in your belt, for a quick escape. And all this time you haven't actually used up ANY of your attunement slots yet - so you could still actually attune three more potent attunement items if you wanted, provided you can find somewhere on your person to hang them.

The availability, or scarcity, of magic items is, as it has always been, in the hands of your DM and the world space you're playing in.

"clam lake" ?

This reminds me of an awesome feature of 5E, which is Druid specialties. I am looking forward to my Beach Druid. I am not sure about how Larian will do animal companions, however. I want my animal companion to be a chariot-riding clam named Spartucus. His chariot is pulled by magic mice, and he attacks furiously with his tiny spear. He has a great natural armor class, of course, as all clams do, but he is a little wary of octopuses. He can breathe air, although he prefers to be put into a glass of water for sleeping at night ... no problem, Spartucus!

Yep, this is it, thanks.

You've got to be careful of those clams... they're fickle, tricksy things sometimes. Many a brave adventurer has fallen afoul of a salacious, seductive and temptingly slippery clam, only to find it spelling the doom of their adventuring career...

The extra bookkeeping it presents shouldn't exist, period; notions/implementations of scarcity and (inordinate?) empowerment are for the DM and the DM alone to decide.

OP see what you've done... you have started a nerd argument... :P

It's really no book-keeping at all... and compared to the book-keeping of working our which bonuses from which items stacked or did not stack with various bonuses from other items, that was the staple of 3.5, it's laughable that anyone would actually complain about it in good faith ^.^

Its different for sure, but has been well flushed out in "table Top" sessions in Roll20 and Fantasy grounds for years now.

If you want a near perfect recreation, then play through Solasta to get an understanding of the mechanics. They have a lesser license than Larian so they often have to make nearly identical "Homebrew names", but its amazingly faithful.

Larian is faithful to the lore, but to date, has radically changed the mechanics by making all ranged combat a fixed range (magic, arrows, and spears...Oh my).
There are other changes too, but it does help to know the classes (as intended) and adjust your play-style.

Rule #1: just have fun. Bg3 has amazing depth in its story boarding and world design.