I'm starting a new thread for this, as the thread where the quote below was taken has started to lose focus quite a lot.
1) Racing against time vs taking all the time we want.To your issue about tadpole urgency, Piff, youre right that it's ultimately not AS urgent as it's initially presented. The problem I've found is that the way they present that revelation that it's not so urgent. It's given through little bits of context clues scattered throughout act one. Hints and things that you can find out. And the issue with this in my opinion is that given how the urgency was built up at the beginning, the game needs to give some kind of definitive moment of catharsis where we can actually feel the tension come to an end, as opposed to scattered hints that it's possible to not internalize, or to miss entirely.
a) I agree with the above. The game starts out pretty clear about the fact that we only have a few days left to live unless we find a cure (cf meetings with Shadowheart and Gale, and first night with Shadowheart and Lae'zel). Then we can gather that we may have a lot more time, but this happens slowly, by clues, and is very dependent on where we go and what we learn.
There is a U-turn from "ok players, this is a race against time scenario" to "actually players, you don't have to hurry : this is standard RPG gameplay, feel free to do all the side quests and explore all nooks and cranies". But the second message is far from being as well and clearly established as the first.
b) In my view, even once we've learned more about the tadpole and True Souls situation, it's far from clear that we should relax.
I mean, as far as I know, we know the following.
- Some people are manufacturing True Souls. This involves the implanting of a modified Illithid tadpole followed by a bit of memory-wipe (the latter of which we were not subjected to before our escape, so that we do remember being implanted with the tadpole).
- Individuals implanted with a modified tadpole will not turn into an Illithid automatically/naturally. But they can be turned instantly using a certain procedure, as we saw on the Nautiloid. We don't know if that procedure works remotely (e.g. by a ritual), at what range, and where the creators/operators are. So we don't know if running far far away is of any use.
- We don't know what the creators' plan for the True Souls is. Maybe they are never to be transformed, and instead just used as controllable/influenceable puppets in order for the creators to gain power through religious means. Maybe they are to all be turned into an Illithid simultaneously, when the time is ripe (which could be 3 years from now, or next week). Or anything else.
So I don't feel that there's a good and clear reason to believe we can lift the foot from the accelerator in our race for a cure. Sure, don't need to be stressed as much : we can relax a bit at night, hope we'll have enough time, and work on those knots in our stomachs. But I don't feel we have time to spare for tourism. Rather, I feel that the urgency has decreased a little bit, but not tremendously. Or is it just me ?
2) Companions staying in camp. This has been mentioned many times : having supernumerary companions stay in camp, doing nothing, makes basically no sense. It breaks immersion.
From the point of view of the game designers, I get it. It's a video game so there are UI constraints such as a max party size. The camp mechanism/system is used a hub where we can store the excess companions we recruit, and let swap them in and out of our adventuring party. (I'll leave aside the fact that it's very convenient, portable, pocket-dimension hub.)
From the point of view of the writers, and Larian's advertisement of the game, this is the story of a group of very different individuals. They don't always see eye to eye, and would have been quite unlikely to band together in normal circumstances. But they find themselves in the same desperate situation, and right now their goals are very much aligned : find a cure/a way to control the tadpole, and thus preserve their identity. So they will unite and search for a cure as allies.
At least that's the story up until the point where a companion tells you that he'll just stay in camp, idling away the hours, waiting for you to find a cure (and magic items to consume). Because, you know, desperate situation. And then there's the one who knows her people have a cure, but is happy to wait in camp while you try every other lead you hear about. It really screams of urgency.
I'm not sure whether this issue is a consequence of various teams (writers, game designers) having worked separately with little coordination and having come up with ideas that just don't mesh well together, or a consequence in Larian having little interest in immersion and being completely unfazed by what is a clear immersion-breaker to me.
And just like the player-only teleportation portals that Gale tells you about, or the totally-canon-in-the-world party size limit that Lae'zel points out, I think this issue could be alleviated if Larian removed the conversation cutscene where we ask people to stay at camp.
With a pure video game UI allowing us to manage party composition, we would not only save on the tediousness of swapping characters, we would also not have our attention drawn to "what happens to the companions not currently (visible) in the party ?".
