I just came across a video by Pointy Hat on youtube with the same title. It also sums up the problems with Paladin in BG3 surprisingly well.
TLDW:
The alignment lock to LG for paladins makes all roleplay predictable and tedious. A lot of TT veterans don't play Paladin because of this. But 5e removed this restriction on purpose. What remains is just the Oath, so in essence if you believe in something hard enough, the belief itself grants you powers.
The way Paladin is implemented in BG3, we are going back in dnd-editions to the goody-two-shoes with no creative freedom on what the player might want for the Paladin to matter. So while the oath breaking after doing something "evil" is a creative, surprising way to discover that subclass, it takes the fun away from any non-Oathbreaker Paladin. On a side note here, I hope the 2000g to regain your powers is a placeholder for some minor quest. Otherwise that's a complete joke.
Someone even wrote on this forum they found it impossible to complete the EA without breaking their oath at least once. If you are in multiplayer and one of the players wants to roleplay a bit of evil or chaos into his character, the Paladin loses any chance he had to retain his oath because the party as a whole committed the act. Admittedly I have no immediate solution to this without oath breaker either becoming a regular subclass or an Easter egg most players will not find. But I am really hoping for some changes here, because I do not want every single Paladin me or my friends play to be an oath breaker.
The Oathbreaker System needs fine tuning, that's true.
-The EA is more of a Frankenstein monster composed of different parts of the actual game stitched together. The fact that it works as well as it does, and in fact runs better than some fully released games from other AAA studios is a testament to the QC and skill of the devs at Larian.
The Oathbreaker system is ambitious and risky - not everyone will like it and that is fine.
I am very interested in how Larian implements Oath of Vengeance. I am thinking it may be like Ranger where they get to dictate a "sworn enemy" monster type which allows them to attack that type without risk of breaking their oath. Also additional sworn enemies can be added through RP dialogue - which would clear certain tags for not requiring dialogue before engaging - provided they are not already hostile.
BUT - that still means if a non-sworn enemy asks for mercy then you have to grant it.
I have not seen something like this since Ultima IV and frankly I am very excited about it.
Finally, everyone acts like Oathbreaker is this terrible thing but it's an awesome class to play because you can be as morally grey as you want and you are still wicked powerful. I think because the way it's presented feels like a type of failure. Also because there are some glitchy bits with certain encounters - although switching to non-lethal damage negates all that. It's an easy work-around.
Also, If we were going back to "old editions" of how paladin is played you would have just become a Fighter until you atoned.
