Larian,
I've played this game far more than is healthy for a pre-release, and I've really enjoyed it. There are a few design decisions you've made, though, that I think seriously detract from the game. Mostly, these center around ways you have "homebrewed" D&D 5e. However, rather than just making a "PLZ FOLLOW 5E GG NO RE" argument, I thought I'd give some reasoning as to why it's important in these cases:
I. Skill Rolls: Automatic Failures and Automatic SuccessesThese need to go. In
any worthwhile progression-style game, there are challenges that are either too hard for a character to currently complete, or so trivial that an advanced-enough character should automatically succeed. D&D 5e recognizes this. In 5e, there are only two times that a roll can be a guaranteed success or failure:
- Attack Rolls
- Save vs Death to avoid dying
That's it. And that's ok.
Consider a character with dexterity 8 and no slight-of-hand proficiency who is trying to lockpick a DC 25 door. Why should they automatically succeed on a natural 20? This character should either try to bash the door down, or they should find another character with the skillset required. At the same time, consider a character with 20 dex, guidance, and slight-of-hand proficiency wearing the smuggler's ring. Then they should never, ever fail the DC 5 lock picking check. They are too good. The roll is beneath them. It is extremely frustrating to see a failure when it neither mirrors the 5e rules nor what people experience in real life. Would the
Lockpicking Lawyer ever fail to open a consumer-grade masterlock padlock? No, he wouldn't. It's beneath his skill. As a player who raises a champion to be explicitly good at a specific task, it is extremely frustrating to see my <whatever>-skill-focused champion fail at a menial task. It is not fun. It makes me wish I had save scummed beforehand for the explicit purpose of bypassing this unavoidable failure. And make no mistake: A 1-in-20 chance, also known as 5%, is a
huge auto-failure/success chance. Most importantly, it completely removes agency from player decisions.
II. Ground EffectsI know Larian loves their puddles of death. It's a tradition. However, these puddles hurt the game right now more than they help. For example, let's examine the level 1 spell
Chromatic Orb. In 5e, it does a flat 3d8 damage + 1d8/spell slot level above 1st. The only difference between the orb types is the damage type. It's designed to get around resistances or trigger various effects if hitting an applicable target. However, Larian has changed it. Now, it only does 3d8 sonic damage. The other types are all 2d8 and leave a puddle. This does a few things:
- Reduces the up-front damage of the spell
- Makes it unusable (or less-wisely used) with allied party members in melee
- Greatly increases the power of the spell in certain circumstances
For example, compare the power of doing 3d8 damage to doing 2d8 damage and knocking a target prone. There is no comparison. In almost all cases that aren't "killing blow," prone is much more valuable because you provide advantage on melee attacks, reduce the enemy's movement speed on the following round, and remove the enemy's action. In fact, 2d8 damage and prone is more powerful than most second-level spells. 3d8 + prone certainly is.
On the same ticket, if a player wants to fire chromatic orb into a melee between friendly and enemy characters, they are forced to use the thunder orb. Otherwise, they risk burning, poisoning, knocking prone, reducing armor, or shocking all members of melee, not just enemies.
Additionally, puddles don't currently go away. As a general rule, if it's not burning (and even sometimes if it is), we have
De Beers puddles: They are forever.
If allowed to exist at all, a puddle should only last a few rounds. Maybe 1 round + 1/spell level. So a first level spell would have a 2-round puddle -- just enough to get some use, not enough to turn an entire section of the battlefield in a death pond.
There's also the problem of inconsistent and unpredictable puddle creation. For example,
Melf's Acid Arrow is a balanced spell in 5e. It has guaranteed damage to offset its attack roll. In this game, though, it also creates a
huge acid puddle giving -2 armor to all characters in the puddle. And again, the puddle never goes away. In some cases, this makes Melf's unusable since it might get Lae'zel or other party members killed in melee. In other cases, it makes Melf's extremely more powerful than it otherwise should be since all of your ranged attackers will probably not miss targets in that area. And unlike chromatic orb, Melf's baseline damage has not been adjusted to compensate for this buff.
In my opinion, if Larian wants spells that create surfaces, they should make a new line of spells that do reduced damage but create the desired surfaces. "Create Acid", et al. On the flip side, they should stop trying to "fix" the 5e spells which are quite balanced in 5e, but extremely broken in BG3. I mean, a cantrip that knocks opponents prone because there's blood underneath them? How is that ever a good idea?
ConclusionI really am enjoying this game. I made this post because I see things that could be, in my opinion, fixed to make it even better. I'm really excited to see what the full version has in store for us next year.
I just hope that fireball doesn't also create a giant burning flame puddle so that my evoker does damage to the party even though he has spell shaping.
