Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback NPC's are too wary of certain spells

I believe npc's shouldn't be too wary of spells like Guidance or friendship. It didn't seem like a thing anyone would really be worried about and I found it annoying when I finished , I decided to talk to someone and immediately found my guidance as suspicious. Got a prompt, saying a fight was inevitable and started a fight. After it was over, it caused . Thoughts?

Yes peolle go hostile when Friwnds wore off them ...
Its in the tooltip ... and it males perfect sense ... even tho straight attack is a little too excessive.

I never had any repercussion using Guidance. And I'm using it constantly. So I'm a bit perplexe here.

But yes, people reacting badly to Friend is more than understandable and fits the rules for this cantrip (like mentioned by RagnarokCzD).

Rule in Baldur's Gate 3

Rule in the DND 5th Edition (main reference for this game)

I admit "might accuse the spellcaster" is a bit vague. But no one likes being manipulated, having their agency removed, being mind-controlled. Those things can easily be seen as evil.

Same here. I’ve never had anyone react badly to Guidance or any other spell that boosts my character rather than affects the NPC directly.

I think the game gives you fair warning about Friends and Charm Person, and I’ve not used them on NPCs not prone to hostility as a result. So I’m not sure whether Friends is always noticed by NPCs or only sometimes, eg if they failed an insight check. I would prefer the latter to actually make the cantrip more usable, though from the 5e rules Melivy quotes it sounds as though the NPC would always realise they’d be influenced so that’s fair enough. Charm is stronger so it makes sense they’d notice that.

And I definitely don’t think NPCs should turn hostile if they notice the spell, unless they’re on the edge of doing so anyway. Rather, an attitude reduction and refusing to speak further with the party would make more sense in most contexts.

In my experience, not every NPC turns to violence. It usually starts a dialogue the same way you would have after robbing someone and being caught.

That does make sense, good to hear it’s implemented that way.

Perhaps I’ll actually try it next time I’m playing a character who would feasibly try to manipulate NPCs that way!

Like how characters are too wary of AoE hazards like fire, web, entangle and others!?
They will do a standing long jump out of it, making the whole thing more or less useless if you don't have AoO on the targets.

On the other side it's broken ops and it cheeze AI because you can just cage them in corners, caves and other places.

Characters just don't know what to do with entangle blocking there path and the long way around it is just to complicated for them at this point so they just stand there doing nothing.

Guidance doesn't currently get you into trouble, though I'd argue it maybe should when it comes to diplomatic checks if you cast it mid conversation. Guidance is a prayer to your god/source of divine power that your next action will be a success and it has a verbal component, which means every time it is used the caster is saying a small prayer out loud while invoking their divine powers.

While not as overt as Friends or Charm I feel like I'd be fairly suspicious if I were talking to someone and one of their friends started praying to God right when they began asking me if I'd do something for them. At least in a world where I know gods are tangible and frequently answer prayers.

At the same time though you could argue Guidance doesn't influence the NPC, it makes the target more persuasive. Though I dunno how much that distinction would matter to me if I were the one being manipulated with it.

When you use Friends in the Bard option to hype up the guards to knock down the door waukeen's Rest they go hostile. I mean, really? If there was a situation where the recipient would be ok with it that's it.

If the default behaviour is make the recipient hostile the spell is near useless.