Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Mega-threads and Guides Reactions like Solasta!

The issue for me is more that Solasta's window is constantly popping up. Sorcerer spell cast, popup asking if I want to use metamagic. Barbarian, asks if I want to frenzy. Paladin, asks if I want to smite and at what level.

I do like what Fuji said. Maybe some sort of toggle so if I don't want the game to ask me if I want to use metamagic, I can toggle it off until I want to use it again or something.

Then all you would need to do is set all your reaction spells on "ask" ... and you would have full control.
People who would like to spend their reactions no matter what on first opourtunity, would set them "on" ...
And people who want anything in between would set it also to their prefferences.

That is the beauty of such system, everyone can set it EXACTLY as they want. ^_^

+1
however i would much prefer the "ask" as default instead. prefer a pop-up static decision (game paused until i click it). that's acceptable since game is in turn-based in my opinion.
currently playing solasta and i must say the game is truly awesome!. the only issue i have is that it lacks polish and the visuals are dated. now in caer calem and i kinda love the game already!. it feels like a faithful adaptation to dnd5e.

i hope larian will really do bg3 justice. playing solasta getting me learning some dnd5e.. however, not sure if it's just me. there's no high ground advantage in solasta? i don't seems to get advantage when firing arrows from elevation.

You don't have advantage if you're higher nor in Solasta, nor in BG3, nor in DnD5e.

You usually gain advantage or disadvantage through the use of special abilities, actions, or spells. [...] The DM can also decide that circumstances influence a roll in one direction or the other and grant advantage or impose disadvantage as a result. (PHB 173)

Consider granting advantage when: Circumstances not related to a creature's inherent capabilities provide it with an edge. Some aspect of the environment contributes to the character's chance of success. (DMG 239)

Performed a search and found this. "Some aspect of the environment contributes to the character's chance of success" perhaps i misunderstood this part for getting advantage. However, In BG3, they grant +2 to attack correct me if i'm wrong?

BG3 started with Advantage being given for high ground & Disadvantage if low ground, but changed it to +2 Att for higher and I think -2 Att lower(not 100% on the -2 Att for low ground). The +/- 2 Att BG3 applies has been said to be a reasonable compromise for kinda factoring the optional GM rules on cover into the game.
Personally I think Larian should remove even the +/- Att along with the overblown trajectories bows have and make them straighter like spells. Higher ground in Larian's game is advantageous enough without adding mechanical bonuses and negatives.

Edit: that was OT, so on topic +1 here too for optional full control. I'd play it, not trying to force it on all.

Having recently played Solasta for the first time, I've got to say their reaction implementation works flawlessy and doesn't interfere with the flow of combat at all in my experience. I truly hope Larian will make some real considerations on how to properly implement reactions. Whether my mage uses his reaction to attack a fleeing monster, or saves it for a potential shield cast later, has a very big impact. This is something that is highly unlikely to be fixable with mods, and needs proper support from the game itself.

i must really say.. i'm growing on solasta. bear in mind i honestly just completed bg3 EA for only once (since the launch) and really don't have much motivation in starting at all seeing what larian is really focusing are just cinematics and visuals. i was really surprised, solasta implementation of the dnd5e is close to flawless for me (however i read that they nerf the darkvision as due to that human is really on the losing end). i must say i truly didn't pick human at all.

reactions in solasta is really a game changer. not to mentioned the implementation of half-cover, 3 quarter and full cover. bear in mind.. before playing solasta.. i know NOTHING about dnd5e. and that game teaches me the rules.. i'm speechless.

Some classes, like paladin or bard, got their gameplay mainly based on reaction, so I'm really curious to see how Larian will implement it (and maybe that's why they didn't released those classes yet)
For example, about the paladin, Divine Smite can be cast AFTER you made your attack, and so only cast it on a critical roll, or choose a low level spell slot on a normal hit and a big one on a critical. It's why that ability is really powerfull and without that, paladin will be way weaker.
Right now, you only have the choice to cast Divine Smite before your attack is made, and the spell slot is used only on a hit, but it's not enough.

Wait and see...

i read that there's this help action but i can't find it in solasta. not sure why it's not included though. anyway i really hope that larian implement the reaction mechanics. without it, it's not dnd5e in my opinion.

The Help action is kinda squishy in tabletop, since it's got a fair amount of DM discretion built into it.

In simplest terms, you use your action to give another creature advantage on the next 'thing' they do against a particular creature. Usually that's an attack roll, but it's not hard defined.

Solasta has a few context-based help actions where you can just click on the creature needing help, but haven't implemented a full help action with its full flexibility. BG3 hasn't touched it yet, and I don't think they will, at this rate.

the latest solasta DLC lost valley has this new fighter archetypes called Commander. it provide a small aoe to allies by giving them advantage. also the new Paladin archetypes The Oath of Judgement channel divinity can restrain the target giving advantage to party. i believe they remove the help action to put it into classes/archetypes instead?

Quite possibly - Since Solasta only has licence for the SRD, they have to homebrew the vast majority of their class archetypes. What's noteworthy is that in doing so they've demonstrated a very strong understanding of 5e design philosophy, and a degree of care and attention to it; they've created dozens of class archetypes that are their own new(ish) things, and yet still manage to quite strongly capture the feeling of legitimate D&D/5e class archetypes. Some of them are a little bit over-strong, and some of them under-perform a little, but on the whole they've done really well. It's by no means perfect, and some of them probably wouldn't pass the unearthed arcana muster post.... but I'm a harsh critic, and generally speaking, they're very much designed in the spirit of the system, and with respect towards it, even if they don't have the official license.

I have no idea if their engine can support this or not, but I think the flow of cinematics is important in their game but having a fuller, more correct interpretation of DnD5e is wanted by the player base.

One way to help resolve the differences between the two desired outcomes is to implement the reactions in such away that no animations are performed until all actions/reactions have been selected but the ruleset happens, doing all the actions/reactions of an actors current action. Once all completed, the game will play all the required animations needed to play out what happened in the rules. Example:

Paladin A, controlled by Player Z, wants to move and attack Goblin G. (Player Z clicks next to Goblin G)
- Game plays animation of Paladin A moving to Goblin G. -
Player Z chooses to attack Goblin G. (Player Z clicks attack on Goblin G)
[Game internally does a roll for the attack roll vs ac. It displays a 19 + 3, scoring a critical hit. This is shown in the combat window.]
Player Z receives a reaction window saying "Do you wish to use Divine Smite?". (Player Z clicks "Yes")
[Game internally does the damage roll and shows the current attack damage roll.]
- Game plays animation of the Paladin swinging their sword, flashing into a glow and smiting the goblin -

Basically, the game plays in the background in terms of mechanics and if reactions are needed, the game prompts the required actors (AI or player) for the needed inputs. Then, then all the needed inputs are done for the action being performed (and the reactions that will happen from the chain of events, like an action that allows a reaction that might set off another reaction), the game will play the animation based on the inputs. This allows the game to play the animations smoothly all in one go based on said action/reactions.

The other way to achieve this is to allow reactions to stay automatic like now, but allow the player to setup a FSM (finite state machine) for the various actions that you want automatic. If the reaction doesn't meet the requirement set, then the reaction won't trigger. This does mean reactions will be tedious to setup in the beginning and might need to be changed from time to time dependent on the fight, but would achieve the same outcome of not interrupting animations.

What does everyone else think?

Reaction Popup: No, Reaction Popup: NO, Reaction Popup: HELL NO.

Computers don't have intelligence, they will hard spam you with popups. Reaction is fine in Pen and Paper, as I can say do reaction and the human DM can handle it, but the other way around is messed up, you do not want the DM to ask you every time a reaction is possible.

You do not want to create a situation where you give players game stopping popups when one of the answers is DO NOTHING. This one of the worst design mistakes, because humans just doesn't have the capacity to endlessly respond to the same and enjoy it.

Yeah, actually, I do. That's what they're for - to tactically chose what and whether to use different things at opportune moments, usually outside of your own turn.


Actually, you do... because doing nothing sometimes is the essence of tactical decision-making. You want to be able to say "no, I don't want to use this ability *yet* - I could use it now, but I don't want to, not on this 2hp goblin." The ONLY way the game can get that information is by asking you.... otherwise it's making the decision for you, often the wrong one, or something you didn't want, and is cutting you out of tactical decision-making in the process.

To be frank, combat in BG3 has pushed the line of feeling repetitively mind-numbing and dull far more than any situation I've dealt with in Solasta so far, and the latter game shows that reactions can be handled smoothly, and in a way that is acceptably fluid and which doesn't interrupt combat flow in any notable way - have you played this game? What was your experience of it?

Cant quite imagine any example of such situation honestly ...

And what exactly is stoping the person in setting their reaction to either auto and have their resources spend in few seconds without any control just as they want ... or set it to off, and quite litteraly "do nothing" ?

All I want to say is that the new Solasta campaign is on such a higher tier of difficulty from the original campaign that I'm glad there's actually a fair amount of prompts there.

I've had situations where I didn't want to use the Shield spell to immediately block attacks directed at my Wizard because I needed their reaction available to Counterspell that enemy 5th level spell that I knew was coming later that turn. I would also purposefully try to bait an enemy counterspell so that they couldn't try to counter an even more important spell from my other spellcasters later that same turn. The idea of baiting enemies into wasting their reactions and resources is a concept that doesn't really exist in BG3 in any meaningful way at the moment. Though to be fair, that same concept didn't really exist in Solasta's original campaign because there weren't very many spellcasters or enemies even capable of utilizing reactions other than attacks of opportunities either.

Reactions probably aren't that important a thing in BG3's level 1-4 play right now. Once you hit 5+, you're going to WISH you had them. Not just for the ability to defend yourself during the enemy turn, but it's another avenue towards designing interesting combat scenarios too.

right now solasta already has a very successful reaction system.. larian only needs to follow. there isn't any shame in following.. isometric top down RPG wasn't designed by Larian. so just implement whatever that is awesome for your game.

There are some enemy spellcasters in Solasta's OC. Enough for me to have the same thoughts about reaction baiting that you describe. Although, you can probably achieve the same effect by having an expendable summon, or your Rogue to run through the enemies with Dodge activated, bleeding them out of their reactions.

Haven't tried the new campaign yet, people are telling weird things about random encounters, like a party level 4 stumbling upon a Green Dragon and some such.