I voted for 3.
The idea for the poll came from something GM4Him said in the Short Rest Poll thread.
The main issue with BG3 has to do with what also makes it so awesome. Freedom.
He’s right, and that statement neatly encapsulates my journey with BG3.
Baldur’s Gate 3 has two learning curves. The first one is learning about the game rules and world. The second is learning how to use those things to have fun.
Some of it was ignoring tedious systems. For example, looting, inventory and merchants. My initial thought was, “if the game lets me click on anything, it must expect me to click on everything”. The game hints at what’s important with chests, but will also let players discover the hard way that every vase is empty.
That’s easily ignored, but doing so isn’t always possible. When the enemy doesn’t know where the arrow came from and I start getting free attacks, I’ve learned to stand that PC in the open until initiative gets rolled. I also hate being bonus action shoved, so I’ve learned to vent about it in the forum.
The resting system is where the game discourages my playstyle. As far as signals go, it scolds the player for resting early on and makes it clear doing so costs food while providng virtually no in-world penalty for dawdling, skipping some dialogue should resting be posponed and providing so much food that the cost is meaningless. In the end, the player learns to rest as much or as little as they like, which robs the tension out the resource management at the heart of DnD 5e.
None of this is going away. The resting system may be reworked but Larian’s publicly stated philosophy of letting players break the game will remain. They will give their players every tool to destroy their own fun and trust that players won’t. Larian should at least help new players handle their freedom by keeping the incentives consistent.
All of this makes me glad to have played in early access. I’ve learned how to get the most out of BG3 despite the disincentives, which will make discovering the full game all the better.
