Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Short Rest Poll

SR is SO pointless in BG3. The ONLY real benefit of it is that you don't have to teleport to camp and then click on a bedroll to acquire the benefits. In other words, it's 2 less clicks, and maybe 2 minor transitions, and the results of a LR are far more beneficial - full recovery as opposed to just HP recovery. And then, to top it all off, you only get 2 of them. Meanwhile, you can LR as much as you want without penalty or legit cost.

In D&D, the WHOLE point of SR is that, as a DM, you want to try to make it so that the players are doing as much as you can possibly get them to do in a single day. You want your players to feel like they are not sucky. You want them to feel like their characters are tough and skilled. You want them to adventure for hours and then end day at the end of a quest or objective. So you allow SRs so they take an hour break here or there when needed so that they can keep going.

The main issue I have is that in BG3, I feel like I'm constantly adventuring for 5 minutes and then my characters take the rest of the day off. They run around, talk to a few people, get into a fight, and then long rest. Sure, I don't HAVE to do this, but the game allows and even promotes it.

Besides what I mentioned above, meaning SR has no real purpose other than 1 click healing as opposed to 3, one of the worst parts for me is that if I don't long rest often, my party members start complaining about how spent they are and how they need a break, or MY character will make such a comment. And then, as if that isn't enough, if I don't LR often, I miss out on some fun dialogues with party members, like Gale's Mirror Image and Go To Hell dialogues, which I rather like. (Note: The SH dialogue about "Is this a good idea, we have tadpoles in our heads is appropriate ONLY if you LR before reaching the grove. So it makes sense to miss that one if you don't LR often. However, the others could happen at any point in time, but you miss them entirely if you don't LR often.)

In BG3, my issue is that you have multiple time-sensitive story elements, and it doesn't matter one bit how much you LR. The ritual in the grove will continue endlessly for weeks if you need it to, for absolutely no reason. The goblins never find the grove and attack it, even though you may have freed Sazza on the same day you came to the grove. She NEVER goes back to the camp and waits for you even if you spend days to rejoin her. The dragon appears in the telescope near Nadira on the hill, and it is STILL in the area and STILL near the bridge on Risen Road even if you spend weeks in the game to get there. Waukeen's Rest burns endlessly. The tadpole never gives you issues no matter how many Long Rests you use.

Stop. Right there. THAT'S what they could use to limit Long Rests. THAT would fix both long and short rests. They establish right from the beginning that you have tadpoles in your heads that could turn you into mind flayers. It could be within hours. You need to find a healer. So why not USE that to actually discourage long rests? THAT is what I mean by "timed events". Even after you find out that you may have some time, they could still use the tadpoles to discourage you.

How? Simple.

I try to Long Rest on the beach. Shadowheart stops me. "I'm not sure this is such a good idea," dialogue commences, but the end is rescripted. She explains that we could turn into mind flayers in HOURS. We could maybe take a break for about an hour, but she then refuses to rest any longer than that. "If you want to waste the rest of the day, that's up to you. I'm continuing on."

So, you can long rest, but you lose Shadowheart temporarily (able to reclaim her at the Grove) because you chose to do something stupid like Long Rest when you are supposed to try to find a healer and fast before you start to turn into a mind flayer. They establish almost immediately that you really want to find a healer fast, and her threatening to leave you if you long rest would certainly deter most people from actually doing it, especially if the game suggests (as it does currently) that a short rest is recommended. Even 2 Short Rests should be prevented by the game at this point, only allowing 1 because you're supposed to be urged to continue before ceremorphosis starts turning you (which it begins within HOURS of infection).

And here's the final part of this suggestion. They follow through with the threats. They warn you not to long rest too much, and then if you do, you start to have the Dream Lover dreams, or some other events happen that let you know that you shouldn't just long rest after every fight. You don't just have the dreams because you use your illithid powers. You start to have them because you are spamming long rest.

Bam! Right there, you have a consequence that is already in the game, mind you. They would just need to set different triggers for them.

THAT is all they'd need to do, and before I get people jumping all over time limits (AGAIN) and saying how they hate them, I'm not talking about you get only 1 week to complete EA or you turn into a mind flayer or something. I'm talking you get like X Long Rests before your first dream. Then you get another X Long Rests before someone appears at your camp and says that fortunately the ritual has been interrupted but unfortunately Rath is imprisoned (or something similar). Then X Long Rests later, Lae'zel gets frustrated and warns that you'd best go to the gith patrol and pay attention to her or she's leaving. Then you Long Rest again, and she follows through with leaving you (again, however, only temporary. You can pick her back up again once you go in that direction. As soon as you hit Waukeen's Rest, you find her in a bush. When the goblins/drow attacked, she was caught in the conflict and severely wounded. She never made it to the patrol). You Long Rest again after facing the gith patrol. That night, you have another tadpole dream.

THESE are the things I'm talking about. Timed Events that remind you that each day you take, stuff happens. Things happen. The world is changing with each passing day.

Notice, not a single one of the events I mentioned hard lock anything. You can still do Lae'zel's gith patrol quest. It's just that if you don't do it quick enough she temporarily leaves your party. She doesn't permanently leave. She just temporarily leaves.

Notice that you don't turn into a mind flayer. You have dreams that are letting you know that you are not on an endless timetable. You need to prioritize your missions.

Notice that the grove doesn't get sealed off. Something happens to warn you that you're running out of time to save the grove. You need to make it at least somewhat of a priority (if you care).

Upon clicking on LR, the game asks me to confirm that I want to go to camp and end the day. It tells me I don’t have enough food to rest and warns that I’ll only restore up to half hp, half spellslots and no SRs. (Put a pin in that). Already 1 more click for LR than SR (+1).

I send all my food to camp and usually eat supply packs. I need to open the traveller’s chest (+2) and look for the supply packs because they aren’t at the top of the list of random junk that found their way there over 41h37min of gameplay (+3).

I then split the supply pack stack (right click, split stack, confirm split) (+6). It’s noteworthy that the default split is equal stacks, so if I’ve got four or more supply packs that’s another click to split only one from the rest (+7). I’ve only three packs left, but this is a “finished” savegame, where I did everything I set out to do. (Put a pin in that, too). During every LR that mattered, that extra click counted.

I pick the pack up and hit escape (+9), then go to the bedroll, hit auto-select and finally full rest (+12). There’s a short cinematic, then the game brings me back to a completely empty Grymforge (tee hee ^^).

I suppose the takeaway here is that this part of the game badly needs some streamlining. But the clicks aren’t over yet. Now comes the morning routine.

I’m playing Wyll, who starts his day by summoning his imp (select him, find familiar, select imp, select spot) (+16) and making it invisible (select it, select invisibility, click to cast) (+19). I’m also playing Gale, who breakfasts with a tall glass of Mage Armor (select him, select the spell, choose first level, click on Gale) (+23).

But wait! I don’t always end there. There’s more power to be squeezed out of the morning routine, which can come in handy depending on the day ahead.

If Wyll can profitably spend both of his spell slots, then a quick SR can bring him back to full power. I usually go with Armour of Agathys (+25) and I like to Hex the imp (+28) and resummon it (+31), which turns Hex into a bonus action, before short resting (+32).

Gale can do something similar with Arcane Recovery. The way I use a second spell slot veers into cheese territory, which I’ll address in a moment, but there are fair ways to do this so please bear with me. I cast Shield of Faith on the barbarian (+35) and recover two level one slots (+38). To maximise prepared spells, I switch back and forth between preparing Shield of Faith and Mage Armor (+44).

That’s the loadout I went with for boss fights and I thoroughly enjoyed it. It’s over the top but it’s not an everyday occurence nor is it the absolute cheese limit. Most days, I stick to invisible imp plus Mage Armor and look to pick an easy fight in order to spend the relevant spell slots and use rest & recovery to fully power up the party. (Put a final pin here). Conversely, I added the invisibilty ring to the morning routine for the massive Nere fight (+46). In fact, that ring is hella broken. You can pass it around the party to make everyone invisible, which involves opening and closing the party panel three times (+64).

Sixty five clicks per LR is a ridiculous number. To be sure, it’s fueled by UI inefficiencies, strategic decisions, heavy cheese and my own incompetence (I’ve never been able to use hotkeys and when Gale turned invisible he broke concentration on Shield of Faith…) but it shows the steep admin cost of LR compared to SR. As a reminder, my basic LR takes twenty four clicks.

GM4Him, I understand that you wouldn’t use half the tricks I did. I know how you feel about Wizards’ exploits. Maybe Wyll hexing his imp crosses a line for you (though, to me, summoning a creature to sacrifice it for power feels very flavorful for a warlock). Maybe you use no PC that has any use for morning buffs. I believe you when you say you go very quickly through long rests.

For my patch 7 playthrough, I took a page out of RagnarokCzD’s playbook and set my own rules. I allowed myself some amount of cheese, but there were also restrictions. No shoving or hiding during combat; no barrelmancy; limited looting; supply packs only, except when roleplaying victory feasts.

More relevantly, the day didn’t end until I felt the party couldn’t take any more of a beating. A day’s worth of punishment might be trying to clear the spider lair, or casting jump on the barbarian and teleporting the party into the hostile goblin camp, or just running around Grymforge, looking for the ancient forge by triggering every trap and ambush.

In this respect, I’m taking on the role of the DM as you’ve described it in this thread. I’m playing the game my way and it’s a blast! Yeah, I’ve been insta-lava-shove-killed more than once, but I gave every bit as good as I got and victory felt all the sweeter because I followed my own code.

I know it’s not the same. When the game imposes restrictions, the player placed in tight corners, which is where things get interesting. If you have to head into the corner yourself, you’ll always have the path to safety in the back of your mind. But for now the resting system is what it is. While we wait for its next iteration, I have a challenge for you, GM4Him.

I think that challenge will make you appreciate the short rest. Remember all those pins we planted ten thousand words ago? Firstly, there are real consequences to having no supplies, which include being deprived of SRs. You might miss them if you need them.

Secondly, supply packs aren’t that plentyful. I finished a 40 hour run with only three supply packs left! Notably, I ate actual food once or twice, bought at least one supply pack and have so far ignored the hag’s swamp, the risen road and most of the underdark. (I just realized that my score’s not doing great, also that I didn’t look all that hard for packs, so maybe there are more than I think.) Supply packs are also strategically placed throughout the maps, giving an indication of how many days each area should take to clear.

Thirdly, the desire to stretch out the day permeates every decision in the game. It’s fun in a cerebral way if you know what lies ahead and can plan your day accordingly. In unknown territory, the fun becomes visceral. Because you don’t know what might be coming around the corner, you start taking more risks to preserve stamina, like using a level 1 Magic Missile though level 2 would clinch it or trying to get through an entire fight without using the barbarian’s rage.

That’s when you have to think about whether to SR early to power Wyll because doing that wastes a bunch of hp and object actions but not doing it could expose him during the first encounter, because he’d be pretty much locked into casting Hex. You start really valuing those SRs, like when you’ve decided to head into the hallway of fire for the third time that day and you still haven’t figured out how not to trigger the traps, which is fine because potions of fire resistance last all day but still a little worrisome because the barbarian had to tank the hallway twice already because you only had three of those potions, and by the way, guys, we’re also down to one potion of greater healing, so let’s SR one last time to heal the barb and try to find the real exit for real, OK?