Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Exhaustion system?

Let's talk about exhaustion in dnd

There are six exhaustion levels in dnd 5e. Each of them stack with another and each is worse than previous. When you reach 6 level, you just die. SO

1. Larian didn't implement exhaustion levels in the berserker barbarian sub class(after rage ends you get an exhaustion level - movement is halved, attacks have disadvantage and so on) - so without its main flaw berserker is pretty OP, as it's the only sub class which receives extra attack before level 5. Funny thing is that in the rules exhaustion disappears after long rest
2. Exhaustion in general. My suggestion is to make long rest more meaningful. So if you got knocked out, but didn't die, you get an exhaustion level(i think DAO and WoTR have similar systems). 5e has vague description that you can be exhausted if you travel long enough, so i suggest to adapt this rule in BG3

This will bring more balance to the classes - clerics will be more valuable, berserkers as it should be and classes that have spellslots restored after short rest stronger(now, for me, warlock looks weaker than sorcerer). And also taking a long rest will be more important and more rewarding because now you can spam it whenever you like just for fun. If food system will be tweaked this combined will make you think and plan on when to take a long rest, when to encounter in combat(so scout and infiltration will become more valuable => rogues will) and so on

What do you think

I think Larian made a good call with deleting this flaw ... exhaustion allways felt too punishing to me (maybe if first level of exhaustion would be tweaked a little aswell) ...
Also, as you said we can Long Rest any time we want, so this would only encourage people to Rest after every single combat ... wich is something some people around here allready are complaining about.

I dont quite understand the last part tho, what would "make people think and plan on when to take a long rest" ? O_o

Not if they manage to tweak/change camp supplies system

Dunno ... since they created food limitation few patches back (2 or 3? not sure now) ... and no change happened so far, i presume they seems satisfied with this design.

Just paste this here so we all know what the thread is about.

Levels of exhaustion
1 Disadvantage on Ability Checks
2 Speed halved
3 Disadvantage on Attack rolls and Saving Throws
4 Hit point maximum halved
5 Speed reduced to 0
6 Death

I have mixed feeling about exhaustion. In one hand I think it could be very cool especially because the resting mechanic is currently uninterresting as hell and because, as OP said it makes the barbarian particularly powerfull. It could also help a lot to balance weapons special attacks.

On the other hand, I don't really see how they could implement that to the game to create an interresting system.
I'm not sure I want the game to tell me when I HAVE to sleep.

I mean if you decide to go into a hard battle, you'll need to be prepared that one or more of your party members will be exhausted after => so you'll need to consider if you have enough supplies/food to take a long rest. I believe that more strategy and planning is always good when it's not boring

Or, you siply search for more food after the fight ...
This was all allready said in Long Rest topic ... like it or not, food is the best compromise.

I agree that the Berserker is particularly powerful if exhaustion is not a thing. I also think the idea of getting a level of exhaustion after going down could be an interesting addition (I even use it as a homebrew rule in tabletop D&D), and like you said, could add more use to clerics.
I also understand that at the moment, there is so much food in the game that you can basically rest as often as you like, so this would need to be tweaked in order to make sense in tandem with an exhaustion system.

Maybe we don't need all 6 levels of exhaustion implemented - maybe one effect that covers exhaustion is enough to balance the Berserker. It would need to be tested, of course.

2 points of clarification+opinion here
1.) Long Resting only reduces a creature's exhaustion by 1 level.

2.) Because of ^, Berserker Barbarian is widely regarded as a terrible subclass specifically because of how punishing getting levels of exhaustion is. Before level ~9 (when the party gains access to Greater Restoration), a barbarian can effectively only Frenzy 1x per day, barring the DM allowing entire days of downtime somewhat regularly. I very much agree with Larian's decision to change this, if not necessarily their exact solution.

As for my general opinion on exhaustion
I think Larian should add Exhaustion to BG3, but only as specific story- or monster- or item-given effects. E.g.,
- After you rescue Lae'zel and/or explore the crypt (importantly, BEFORE you arrive at the grove), the game gives you 1-3 levels of exhaustion. This encourages players to rest before they enter the grove and talk to Nettie, which will ensure that they get the *incredibly important* cutscene that reveals you're not actually transforming into mindflayers according to normal ceremorphosis.
- Items can have abilities that, when activated, give a level of exhaustion. Certain monsters can drain your vitality by giving you levels of exhaustion, possibly multiple in a single fight.

Certainly, since you can currently freely Long Rest in BG3, there is ~no point to exhaustion unless multiple levels of it can occur in a single fight.

Story-driven exhaustion is an interesting thought! Hard to implement throughout the game though

As for berserker, if you're not giving him exhaustion after rage, then it still needs to be something, because it becomes too powerful compared to totem warrior or even other classes

How about Lethargy?
As we have from swiftness potion? Or something simmilar.

Lethargy if a Frenzied Rage drops does sound like a good possible drawback.

Other than that, the only thing I can think of to substitute for exhaustion would be like a -2 or -3 to AC while in a Frenzied Rage, because their defenses are even less when they're in the mindless fury of a frenzy. That at least is easier to do in a computer game than in pen and paper because the computer can do it instead of the player needing to remember.

As you can see from the quality of responses here, the kiddies don't like anything involving balance, planning, or choices. Many great features of 5E have been omitted to please the toddlers. The kiddies expect infinite free long rests, so there is no way exhaustion will be included.

Lethargy probably isn't powerful enough imo, given that it's very unlikely for a barbarian to drop out of Frenzy while still in combat. And after combat, lethargy ~doesn't matter.

Disadvantage on Wis STs is kicking the puppy when it's down; barbarians are already bad enough at Wis STs as it is.

I like the -2 AC, especially as it pairs well with Reckless Attack (you're probably already going to be hit anyway, who cares about an additional -2 AC?) and Barbarians' HP+Damage resistance (Barbarians are built around getting hit, so -2 AC is kind of playing to their strengths).

It'd be cool if the AC penalty grew over time, to represent getting more and more lost in your rage and abandoning your defenses. First turn is no penalty, 2nd turn is -1, 3rd turn is -2, etc. As @Stabbey mentions, since it's a video game that'd be super easy to do. Maybe also with the lethargy penalty when you come out of rage...? That might be an interesting cost-benefit analysis..."I'm at a -5 AC, but I'd lose a turn if I ended my rage. Is it worth it?"

At least there is an agreement upon berseker

I just can't get into the barbarian. Part of it is the character models are too skinny, but another big issue I'm having is that the rage/frenzy scream gets to be too much.

Rawr! Rawr! Rawr!!! Every combat, rawr!!! My goodness. Keep it down, buddy, you're waking up the neighbors.

I feel the urge to say that i dont like AC penalisation basically at all ...
Cant say it doesnt seem kinda logical tho, but not very appealing from game perspective. :-/

I mean i spend my precious stats to make my Barbarian as tough as possible ...
Just to loose part of that bonus once i activate his class-specific ability? :-/ Ugh.

Also note that in BG-3 we dont have option to "just rage instead of fury" with Berserker ... wich i would definietly want in such case, since in some tough bossfight i would like to have option to keep my high AC, for obvious reasons.
But then i would basicaly completely loss my main sub-class feature. :-/ Still not exactly appealing deal.

Its true its much easier to keep rage up in BG-3 since ranged attacks count aswell (funny enough, ranged throw attacks dont, but bow and crossbow do ... so i presume its a bug)

But i believe in more Raw way (so only meele attacks would count) it would be quite fair.

Thank you ...
For some reason i believed that first level of exhaustion are all first 3 together.
This actualy dont seem so bad ...

The only problem with implementation of this would be that there is no point in stacking exhaustions, since we would long-rest all 5 of them away in mere seconds.

So maybe the compromise is that it stacks levels of exhaustion, but instead of reducing one level at a time, it takes all levels away after long rest

I'm not married to the idea of an AC penalty for frenzied raging, it's just comes to mind easily because it thematically fits with the idea of a frenzy: you're so focused on attacking that your defense is lower. It does cover the same terrain as Reckless Attack, so I'm open to a better idea. I just don't know if exhaustion is the best option considering that the encounter design favors a lot of deadly encounters.

I mean, there could be a Barbarian-only version of Frenzy-exhaustion, but that would be a homebrew, and trying to balance that might not produce positive results.

***

RAW, Rage does in fact maintain if you make a ranged attack:


Nothing in there about the attack only being a melee attack. Why do you think Barbarians get Javelins in their starting equipment?