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Minsc being a companion opens up another can of worms (or several, even). The obvious one is that he knew the Bhaalspawn, and depending on how Larian plays their cards, that could go very poorly for players of the Original Saga. I don't think many people actually er....enjoy the 'canon' ending for the Bhaalspawn - I for one don't particularly savor the idea of listening to Minsc talk about his adventures with 'Abdel Adrian' for forty+ hours, and I'm sure I'm not alone in wanting the details of the Bhaalspawn's saga to be as vague as possible so I can insert my own idea of how things occurred into the blanks. So far Larian has played that pretty well, even using gender-neutral pronouns to mask the identity of the Bhaalspawn, but it could be difficult to keep that going forward when Minsc, who knew the Bhaalspawn personally-is in the party.
Another concern is that he's a much loved character from the Original Saga. We know that Larian's planning to kill off the party members not in our active party at the end of act I. Now I for one don't want Minsc's blood on my hands-I was already a little miffed that WoTC killed off another Original Saga character in the comic tie-in, and Minsc meant a lot more to me than them. So am I going to feel forced to take him with me to avoid that fate? Party size is already small. I don't like the idea of being forced to take party members to avoid them being killed.
There's also the question of how well he'll end up being written. As mentioned above, he originally had brain damage. This is a tricky subject to write around, but add to the fact that his goofy demeanor revolved around that particular injury, and that his buffoonery is an aspect of his character that WoTC has really played up in marketing (to the point of flanderization IMO) Plus add to that the fact that he is a romance option, the fact that we have the ability to talk to animals, plus the fact that we can actually play as him....there's a lot that Larian could very easily 'get wrong' with the character.
Really, he seems to me a perfect example of a character who absolutely should not be playable, yet we know almost for certain that he will be in the release version.
Last edited by Leucrotta; 19/11/22 05:52 PM.
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old hand
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old hand
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We know that Larian's planning to kill off the party members not in our active party at the end of act I. Plus add to that the fact that he is a romance option Are those speculation or facts?
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old hand
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Thank you for the sources. After the first act however you are going to have to commit, also just like in real life. This has to be one of the most eyebrow raising sentence. What does committing means? What does real life have to do with anything? Is there a nautiloid coming for me and my friends right at this moment? I like to think this was early in development and even them don't really knew what the plan is.
Last edited by snowram; 19/11/22 07:15 PM.
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To add to what MelivySilverRoot already provided about getting a fixed party after act I, Minsc is a romance option according to the datamined stuff. There's even voice recorded lines for the post-grove battle party where other party members refer to it-this is in the Chubblott videos. Thank you for the sources.
like to think this was early in development and even them don't really knew what the plan is. Well, in DOS2, everyone you didn't choose just got killed off in a cutscene when the BBEG blasted them with a spell. I know folks have speculated that it might be ceremorphosis taking them over suddenly like we see with the woman on the nautaloid, and/or some sort of scenario where they get mind controlled and you have to fight them. Whatever the situation, a hard cutoff capping Act I does not sound so great for anyone you didn't pick considering the circumstances. I'd like to think they are reconsidering this too, considering how controversial it has been. But we have zero indication so far in regards that this position having changed, so it's still something hanging above the heads of the party members unless Larian Reverse-course and IMO something worthy of concern.
Last edited by Leucrotta; 19/11/22 07:07 PM.
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Could we please mark the datamined stuff as spoiler? I didn't want to learn that 
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old hand
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Could we please mark the datamined stuff as spoiler? I didn't want to learn that Now that you mention it, why would Larian even put such a big spoiler in a public Q&A? It really doesn't make sense. Were there gauging public reaction?
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Thank you for the sources. After the first act however you are going to have to commit, also just like in real life. This has to be one of the most eyebrow raising sentence. What does committing means? What does real life have to do with anything? Is there a nautiloid coming for me and my friends right at this moment? I like to think this was early in development and even them don't really knew what the plan is. I like the optimism, but this is exactly how they made DoS2, so I'm not sure why you would believe that THIS time it was just early in development. From everything we know, the party is limited. No 2 - 4 companions that aren't in your party just sitting around camp. Also, the real life comment is indeed odd, they might of well had said "potatoes are green because in life you need to use color" and it would have made as much sense. Unless they're talking about "choices have consequences" or something? not sure.
Last edited by Boblawblah; 19/11/22 07:24 PM.
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enthusiast
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As for the original topic/question: Personally, I prefer a smaller number of companions, with well-developed backstories and more interactions, to a larger number who are less detailed. So even if we would only get 8-10 companions on release, each as detailed as those we already have, it would be fine with me. I like how the game varies depending on who is currently in your group (and what you already know about them): even after 655 hours of playtime, there is still something new to discover with each new group constellation, and I like the dynamics between characters. It would be nice if we could have a companion for each PHB class (so 12 companions)- and dwarv, halfling, gnome, dragonborn, half-orc and tiefling companions are still missing. I´m very confident there will be more "good" companions, but I can not complain about the companions we already got. I think they are very interesting and nuanced, and if anything, I have a hard time deciding who to take along. I like the premise that a group of people, who would in some cases most likely not even talk to each other, has to find a way to work together, in order to survive. I'm curious if/how much the way our Tav interacts with the companions will have an influence on them, in one way or another. As for the dialogue cinematics: I like them a lot. The performance capture makes the characters come alive, with very lively facial expressions and body language; and to me, this is an important part of why I like this game as much as I do. I grew up with very text heavy crpgs, and I liked them, but I think animations can show more nuances than I think could be expressed only through text and voiced dialogues: you get additional nonverbal cues, and to me, there is also more interactivity when I have to interprete the character's expressions/gestures myself instead of reading "character xy looks sad". It gets me more invested in the game. I also like the use of cinematics for insight checks, for example (e.g. Auntie Ethel, Aradin). I would really like to write more on this forum, but it takes me a lot of time to phrase something in English
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Thank you for the sources. After the first act however you are going to have to commit, also just like in real life. This has to be one of the most eyebrow raising sentence. What does committing means? What does real life have to do with anything? Is there a nautiloid coming for me and my friends right at this moment? I like to think this was early in development and even them don't really knew what the plan is. Yes, it is from before the early access, so it is possible they would change their minds due to the feedback, but I don't know why would you say that they didn't know what the plan is. The plan was and still seems to be to build on D:OS2 framework. D:OS2 allowed to switch companions in act1 and then killed off spares at the end of act1. Whenever Larian will try exactly the same thing remains to be seen, but at the very least the comment suggest that the situation will somehow change after act1 restricting, if not outright removing, our access to other companions. Considering that there is more that they could do with the concept and that the game doesn't seem to be getting a better party management tools, the conclusion that it is still the plan seems reasonable to me. "real life" bit is weird (maybe a joke lost in translation?) but if you remove that part the comment is rather clear cut.
Last edited by Wormerine; 19/11/22 08:40 PM.
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old hand
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Man, the more I think about the possibility of Helia being scrapped, the more dire our options seem, as far as party compositions go on the caster side. The lack of a Druid, Paladin or Bard companion means that if your MC isn't either of those three classes or a Cleric themselves, your only source of divine magic is Shadowheart. Minsc or a Ranger MC would also be your only source of nature magic. Healing magic options would also be very limited, being restricted to Shadowheart and Minsc (the latter of which is nowhere near a good substitute). Though I suppose that the devs would also now balance skill checks around the assumption that most parties won't have a Bard in it.
I think at this point, I've finalized my main party comp to MC Bard/Shadowheart/Gale/Karlach. Though I suppose there's a hope in that we might get companions of the remaining classes in later acts that AREN'T origins.
Last edited by Saito Hikari; 19/11/22 09:26 PM.
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enthusiast
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The problem isn't the amount of characters, but the quality of their character. I don't really like any of the companions, and I downright loathe some of them. Shadowheart is interesting, but she doesn't exactly start off likeable. Astarion, Gale and La'ezel can all go take a hike.
I really miss likable friendly characters that I'd enjoy the company of; some which doesn't feel like a struggle to be friendly with or having to tolerate weird personality quirks. Where are Edér, Sagani, Garrus, HK47, Kreia, Morrigan, Allistair, Jan Jansen, Leliana, Varric, etc. etc. The RPG games are brimming with really good NPC's but I haven't seen anyone in BG3 I like. I think I'll come around to Shadowheart as we get further into the chapters, but it's definitively the lowest point about BG3 for me.
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I was writing up for the recent PFH at the time, when I interacted with it... but the impression I got was that Swen lives in a world where all but the friends that he keeps closest under his immediate thumb, leave him, and he is of the opinion that that's just how friendship works. A bit mean-spirited, perhaps, but he really came off as the worst kind of social bully, when I was reviewing his media persona, so that's where I landed, with that comment.
((By the way - I used equivocate deliberately, in the sense that I felt the language being used was creating a false link between the two things that did not actually exist, in a way that was deliberately misleading - I've since retracted that, since I understand it wasn't deliberate and likely a misread on my part. I'll admit it's a looser and more colloquial use of the definition than the formal one for an actual equivocation fallacy... my bad ^.^))
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enthusiast
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I was writing up for the recent PFH at the time, when I interacted with it... but the impression I got was that Swen lives in a world where all but the friends that he keeps closest under his immediate thumb, leave him, and he is of the opinion that that's just how friendship works. A bit mean-spirited, perhaps, but he really came off as the worst kind of social bully, when I was reviewing his media persona, so that's where I landed, with that comment.
((By the way - I used equivocate deliberately, in the sense that I felt the language being used was creating a false link between the two things that did not actually exist, in a way that was deliberately misleading - I've since retracted that, since I understand it wasn't deliberate and likely a misread on my part. I'll admit it's a looser and more colloquial use of the definition than the formal one for an actual equivocation fallacy... my bad ^.^)) what where the mean spirited media posts? I wasnt happy when it was announced in the beginning we could not return to acts, I used to love going back to old npcs in baldur's gate 1/2 and see the dialog change as the world changed around them , it added a lot of immersion for me, having some event that causes old acts to become unvisitable, ruins that for me, and deleting all other npcs in the process is also something I dont like, I Like switching out a few different characters. but I supposed if the rosta of choices is very small, they cant allow you to switch things out, otherwise the replay ability is reduced
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old hand
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old hand
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I was writing up for the recent PFH at the time, when I interacted with it... but the impression I got was that Swen lives in a world where all but the friends that he keeps closest under his immediate thumb, leave him, and he is of the opinion that that's just how friendship works. A bit mean-spirited, perhaps, but he really came off as the worst kind of social bully, when I was reviewing his media persona, so that's where I landed, with that comment.
((By the way - I used equivocate deliberately, in the sense that I felt the language being used was creating a false link between the two things that did not actually exist, in a way that was deliberately misleading - I've since retracted that, since I understand it wasn't deliberate and likely a misread on my part. I'll admit it's a looser and more colloquial use of the definition than the formal one for an actual equivocation fallacy... my bad ^.^)) What? Did you just called Swen the "worst kind of social bully"? This isn't a stretch at this point, you are building a bridge over an ocean.
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enthusiast
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I was writing up for the recent PFH at the time, when I interacted with it... but the impression I got was that Swen lives in a world where all but the friends that he keeps closest under his immediate thumb, leave him, and he is of the opinion that that's just how friendship works. A bit mean-spirited, perhaps, but he really came off as the worst kind of social bully, when I was reviewing his media persona, so that's where I landed, with that comment.
((By the way - I used equivocate deliberately, in the sense that I felt the language being used was creating a false link between the two things that did not actually exist, in a way that was deliberately misleading - I've since retracted that, since I understand it wasn't deliberate and likely a misread on my part. I'll admit it's a looser and more colloquial use of the definition than the formal one for an actual equivocation fallacy... my bad ^.^)) This post is weird. Really weird.
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As you please - The media persona the Swen projects, making no comment about the man himself of course but the 'persona' that he shows in media appearances - is a bully, plain and simple. I'm not going to go over it here and now, it's all discussed, and the red flags identified, in my other posts - have a read of the PFH synopsis posts, if you're actually interested in understanding where I'm coming from. It's not the point of this thread - just tangential to the comment about having to choose a small number of friends and lose the rest, 'just like in real life'.
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The problem isn't the amount of characters, but the quality of their character. I don't really like any of the companions, and I downright loathe some of them. Shadowheart is interesting, but she doesn't exactly start off likeable. Astarion, Gale and La'ezel can all go take a hike.
I really miss likable friendly characters that I'd enjoy the company of; some which doesn't feel like a struggle to be friendly with or having to tolerate weird personality quirks. Where are Edér, Sagani, Garrus, HK47, Kreia, Morrigan, Allistair, Jan Jansen, Leliana, Varric, etc. etc. The RPG games are brimming with really good NPC's but I haven't seen anyone in BG3 I like. I think I'll come around to Shadowheart as we get further into the chapters, but it's definitively the lowest point about BG3 for me. I find your list of companions here quite interesting. I'm not familiar with all of them, but Kreia and Morrigan at least seem to be cut from the same cloth as Shadowheart, or rather she's cut from the same cloth as them. Kreia is very critical of your character and Morrigan isn't exactly forthcoming early on either. Also Gale is actually very friendly out of the gate and he consistently approves of you helping people. Maybe he approves because he just thinks it means you'll help him, but he's generally agreeable. I also found Wyll to be someone that they at least think will beeasy to like. But I can definitely see his personality being a bit...much, for people.
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Crimson,
First off, I'm a bit sad that you elected to ignore the main point where I was reaching out to you for understanding; since you expressed that you feel the PC in BG3 doesn't suffer in the same way that the custom PC in D:OS2 did... I really do want to understand what differences you're seeing, and how the experience has differed for you in that regard, because I cannot see it myself; I'd like to. I tried to, but it's complicated to answer as there are so many things to mention, explain and connect to, since I cannot just rip apart certain pieces of the game and story. It comes as a whole package because it's a coherent and cohesive immersive experience, not just bits and pieces. Simply not fitting for this thread. The rest aside, I mainly commented at first because it felt as though you were saying, specifically, that having a smaller list of companions was necessary for close and personal story links – that you supported Larian in making such a restricted companion list for that reason, and wanted them to keep it that way, because it was some objective truth that one necessarily entailed and required the other... I was saying that having a smaller party does not intrinsically mean a more intimate and personal story, nor a larger one, less so; That's false. It's factually incorrect, and the two should not be equivocated, because doing so is misleading.
With more clarity, I can see that it wasn't your intention to say that; you were speaking purely subjectively, about what was necessary for you, and you alone; perhaps my fault for misinterpreting your words in the first place. I was overly reactionary, and I apologise.
It does sound, however, as though they could still make a larger character companion roster, and it wouldn't detriment your experience at all, because you could simply choose the ~6 that you liked the feel of the most and wanted to engage with for the story, and so your personal experience would be just as satisfying... unless just having the knowledge that there were other potential companions you weren't focusing on would detract from the experience for you? ...I honestly shouldn't think that it would, given the way you describe your compartmentalising of games and isolating their experiences from one another.
On that note, unfortunately... Larian have suggested in interviews that they do, indeed, intend to do the same thing again, as they did with D:OS2, and forcefully remove the companions you don't specifically choose to have with you, at the end of the first act. There's been wide-spread and almost unanimous resistance to this, but they've not released any further comment. Well that sucks and settles the whole quantity for me. A terrible decision. I actually love the idea of 8 companions (balanced between 4 males, 4 females) and it would have been awesome to have all of them in my camp and interacting with each one, as I absolutely love and treasure such moments in the game. So taking that away is quite a huge kick in the heart for me. I hated it in DOS2, I will hate it in BG3 too. Especially because through the entire ACT 1 there's so many camp conversations and connections to be made, so I just cannot imagine not having them in ACT 2. Absolutely terrible decision that contradicts the massive content in ACT 1. Why would Gale acknowledge the things we do outside of the camp, if they're just gonna kill him for not being an active party member. Why do I have an intimate weave moment with him, why do I talk to him if they will just take him away from me just because he's not in the party. Why do I have an option to warn Astarion about Gandrel and tell him that I will watch his back and make sure Cazador pays, just to kill him off later. Why do I get to know Wyll and his stories, just for him to die because party size is 4. What an absolute wargs**t decision if they do that. I'll preface by saying that I think we are operating on different definitions of what we mean by 'marketing'; I'm not sure what your definition is, but I'm using the general one – everything by which information about the game is pushed, shared or presented with the goal of generating interest that could potentially lead to sales, is advertising and marketing. I feel as though you are using the word 'just' to refer to the extreme end of sensationalist splash media? That may be our disconnect. At any rate... It's a nice and fluffy-sounding ideal, to say that you are unaffected by marketing.... but it's false. It's unequivocally false, and if you believe otherwise then you are deceiving yourself. You do not buy games with your eyes closed, picking them up blindly and at random off shelves; however you inform your decision, it is through the game's extended advertising and marketing that you do so. Otherwise you do not know that it exists at all. I looked at it and went; "Wow, this game looks amazing. I want to play it". Congratulations, you were affected by advertising and marketing. That is the very definition of being so. How do you come by the gameplay footage that you review before deciding whether to play a game or not? How do you decide which games to check or view gameplay footage of in the first place? Doesn't matter what your answer is – it's a result of marketing and advertisement of the product. What I said is actually true of myself because you yourself asked me about a specific hypothetical situation where I buy games based on the way it's marketed; "So... if you purchased a game based on it being advertised as a particular type of product, and something you thought you might enjoy..."It simply does not happen. Which is why I said that marketing does not affect me, because I don't buy games based on marketing no matter what so it has no influence on my decision whatsoever. The only thing it does is makes me aware there's a game out there, just like commercials tell me there are sprays and shirts out there, but it generates absolutely no interest as its unreliable. That is why I only care about raw unedited gameplay from other unaffiliated sources, not the company's, to see if it might interest me, because then I can see both the intended positives and the unintended negatives in their truest form. So the point is to completely bypass the company's marketing. So if I'm interested, I'll go try it out. Only by trying out the game and liking it is what makes me ultimately buy it. An example of someone being influenced by marketing would be someone who saw the advertisements, descriptions, promises or whatever and got the game based on that. I personally never buy games like that as to me that source of info is unreliable. Sometimes it meets expectations, sometimes it doesn't. That is why I prefer to clearly see for myself what I am getting before I make my decision. That's not being influenced by marketing, that is being a smart consumer by knowing what I want. Hopefully that clears up what I meant. The more problematic question that this led me to, and I apologise for going as far off track as I am right now... is this: Is it the case that, because you use a very specific narrow lens to base your decisions upon (direct gameplay footage), you literally do not care if developers and companies use the breadth of their other advertising tools (which you personally do not look at) to claim that their product is or will be a number of things which it ultimately is not, and in some cases never intended to be? Are you saying that you don't care, would still support the company if they made a game you found fun, and would think that that behaviour is completely acceptable, just because it didn't happen to affect you – that is, because they didn't lie to your lens of decision-making. What about if they advertise 'raw gameplay footage' that grabs your attention and you like the way it looks, and so buy the game... but when you get it home and start it up, it's actually nothing like that at all, and the 'gameplay footage' they showed you before isn't even in the game... this has happened in a couple of large cases not too long ago, in fact. Lots of folks were very unhappy, to say the least. Such a circumstance would put you in with the other folks who look at more than one metric when deciding whether to buy a game; would you still think that fair and acceptable? Would you still be happy and content with the game, if they lied to your lens of decision-making, as well as the ones others use to inform themselves? It comes across, the way you worded much of what you said, as though you feel that it's perfectly okay for developers to misrepresent, mislead, deceive or over-exaggerate what they are producing and selling, to other people's lenses of decision-making... as long as they don't do it with yours. I do not look at Baldur's Gate 3 and go; "Oh... Baldur's Gate cRPG. Well that must mean 20 companions, no chain system, no surface attacks, every choice matters, grim serious atmosphere, no talking squirrels, real time with pause, day/night cycle, unlimited party size, proper reactions, proper DnD systems, math calculations, no origin characters and so on whatever is promised or not promised.". Nor do I, but: When they say: “We're making the a game using the 5e D&D rules” - I expect them to make a game using the 5e D&D rules. When they say: “This is going to be the definitive example of 5e D&D in a video game!” - I expect them to make a game that uses the 5e D&D rules to a reasonable level of fidelity and faithfulness, without large scale or excessive deviations to the core system, and I expect that system to be as feature complete as is reasonable. I'm a simple woman: when I hear a game developer tell me what sort of game they are making, and what will be in it, I have a tendency to take them at their word and assume that they are not deliberately lying or misleading me – that they intend to do as they say. I grow dissatisfied and unhappy when they don't, because I do not appreciate being lied to or misled, especially when it results in a product that I might not have chosen to spend money on, had they spoken more honestly. That's not what I mean. As I said before, this binary way of viewing personal opinions is not a good thing. If I say one thing, it does not mean I am automatically for or against another. Just because I say that I personally do not care about marketing and that it does not affect me in my decision to buy or enjoy games, does not automatically mean I am okay when marketing is used as a weapon against consumers in order to increase profits. Of course it's bad and it's not okay. I'm against anti-consumerism. But I have no control over anything else other than my own wallet. I know what I want and how to get it. How people spend their money and for what reasons and for what expectations, that is their business. I do not question it nor do I respond to it nor am I affected by it because ultimately at the end of the day, my opinion does not matter. Nor do I for that matter.
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As you please - The media persona the Swen projects, making no comment about the man himself of course
(…)
It's not the point of this thread - just tangential to the comment about having to choose a small number of friends and lose the rest, 'just like in real life'. “Swen persona” is an important distinction worth making, I think for clarity purposes. Especially that the answer is unlikely to be delivered by Swen as it is from community update no 7, and I assume he wasn’t the one to personally write it. https://baldursgate3.game/news/community-update-7-romance-companionship_6Original comment is even longer and more confusing: Will companions be interchangeable during long rest?
Yes, at the start of your adventure your recruited companions will be at camp when not in the adventuring party, and can be swapped in and out at camp. Just like friends in real life! After the first act however you are going to have to commit, also just like in real life. If I had to interpret the joke, I would say it refers how as life progresses and gets more busy one can’t able to stay in touch with everyone. But that’s irrelevant. The point is: is act1 we can swap companions freely in the camp and after act1 we will not be able to do that.
Last edited by Wormerine; 20/11/22 10:38 AM.
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