At some point, though, I’ve got to wonder how much this game is doing it for me if I have to write all the rules myself.
It seems to me you are overthinking ...
I never prepared any rules for myself, so i believe its not necesary, just follow your heart.
Which is why the game won’t let me play the way I wish it could be played.
You tempter!
I wont say it, but i bet you know very well what i would like to say.
I do, Rag
For context, Ragnarok’s comment is part of a long debate we’ve had, (of which this thread is an offshoot) so it doesn’t feel like nitpicking to me. His stance: why blame the game if your own behaviour is what’s unfun; my stance: why is the game encouraging unfun behavior?
Again, fun is subjective. When my heart is telling me to loot and rest as little as possible, to never use the camp chest or the ability to throw potions, to skip common bonus actions, to refrain from abusing real time stealth when enemies are stuck in combat, to avoid casting cleric spells with the wizard and to forget about bards altogether, when my heart is telling me all of this, maybe it’s just saying BG3 isn’t for me.
@Wormerine: It’s nice to find a kindred spirit. Let’s agree to agree!
Common bonus actions hold a very strange spot in the gameplay loop. The tutorial doesn’t explain them (aside from jump, and only outside combat), the AI doesn’t use them (*cough* except shove *cough*), and you can finish the game without ever using them in combat Yet they’re on every PC’s hotbar (always visible on the left) from the word go and they’re powerful enough to merit consideration every turn.
@Saito Hikari: if I understand correctly, in the table top version of my Cutting Words story, the DM would tell me that the ogre crit before I use Cutting Words, at which point I’d choose not to use it because CW doesn’t work on crits. I agree that video games need some allowances; I disagree that the allowances afforded BG3’s CW are convenient.
I enjoy killing things, having a good story, getting good loot, exploring and learning about the world, all without having to min/max my characters.
All of those things sound great to me for a first playthrough. But I change as a gamer the second playthrough onward. What brings me back to a game is a desire to explore its mechanics. (Gone are the days of Pierre, the coast-dwelling hermit druid who’d rather cast Shillelagh on his salami than turn into a bear). Usually, further playtime means I engage with more systems more efficiently. In BG3’s case, it means deciding, for each system, whether its impact is a net positive for my fun.
What you describe with WotR is the reason I don’t usually play CRPGs, though I’m quite tempted to try Solasta. Fingers crossed for good mods!
