Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General BG3 at Summer Game Fest!

I mean you have to remember that the people who pay attention to data mining are a small portion of the potential fanbase, and even then, we don't actually KNOW anything about Karlach. We thought we knew about Helia but as you say, she seems to have been replaced (and I'm glad, because a werewolf in the group really would have been too much) so yeah, until Larian announces anything, we don't actually know anything. Assuming otherwise is unwise.

Karlach seems for sure, but other than her, I don’t know who or how many more companions there will be! Companions are one of my favorite things in party-based games, and so they are at the top of my list of things I would like to know about the game!

While we don’t know much about Karlach, we can deduce that she is more on the good alignment spectrum since Sven said that the companions that are in the game are the evil and neutral ones, and that the good ones were being saved for later.

Anyway, point being, I don’t think there will be any more companions aside from the 8 we know of. I’d love to be wrong, but Minsc and Jaheira felt very much to me like something they were saving to reveal last.

I knew about the datamining, but I don't know who in this forum wants to know about datamined content. Some people don't want to be "spoilered" by datamining, so I linked this interview instead, as an official source.

There is another, more recent interview with Swen Vincke in a german gaming magazine, where he confirms that Minsc and Jaheira can be recruited as companions, but can not be played as origin characters. They can also become antagonists of our player character.

Source (in German):
https://www.pcgames.de/Baldurs-Gate...Edition-Patch-9-Panel-from-Hell-1409094/

Heh. A rare agreement with you.

I hope Barcus Wroot will be a companion, I like him. He is very loyal to his friend Wulbren, and very brave to initially try to reach Moonrise Towers by himself - I think he could definitely be one of the "good" companions.

Barcus describes himself as an alchemist and tinkerer, so arteficer was the first class that came to my mind.
I know this is not a class from the PHB, but it would be nice to have one in BG3.

That would actually be pretty cool.

Hopefully!

Barcus would be a cool companion, but I question whether the necessary response to 'the evil companions are too snarky' is that we need three new companions exclusive to good players, because Barcus is already unavailable as a camp companion/dies if you side with Minthara or Nere, and Sven implied that Minsc and Jaheria would only aid good players, plus the stuff with Wyll, Shadowheart and Gale. The evil party members might be abrasive, but they don't ditch you if you choose to play nice.

I cant imagine any better response. O_o

I agree with you, having Barcus as a companion should not be exclusive to "good" players. It would even make sense for him to join our party even if he disagrees with our character's actions, since his primary goal is to free Wulbren, and he could definitely use some support to get to Moonrise Towers.

I wonder what kind of "evil" players would save him ... twice. O_o

They'd have to change it a bit, so that is not necessary to free him from the windmill. A narrative explanation could be that the goblins got bored at one point, and he manages to escape.

I haven't sided with Nere yet, so I don't know what's happening then. But I think it would make sense if he didn't kill all gnomes, as they might still be of use for him. I severely doubt he is the kind of guy who likes to get his hands dirty and does all the chores by himself 😄

But yes, a lot of changes would be necessary for this to work.

It's more a question of 'why would Larian keep writing characters that won't stay in an evil player's party when none of the evil party members have any conflicts with a good player?

There's this weird conception that there's been an imbalance in party members towards evil, even though it's been public knowledge pretty much since day one that we'd be getting additional good party members later, and from datamining that we'd be getting at least three. But people didn't read datamines cause they didn't want to be spoiled and missed the initial announcement about the additional good companions. So we got complaints about how the party was 'too evil'. And Larian jumped right on that despite it being largely based on miscommunication. But the other side of the coin? Yeah, IDK what's going on with Larian, the complaints about the evil side of the campaign being lackluster were at least as loud as those complaining about Shadowheart's attitude, but from the looks of it at release we'll have conflicts with the following companions abandon you if you side with the forces of evil, potentially or automatically resulting them leaving your party for good:

Wyll (automatically)
Gale (possibly)
Minsc
Jaheria

And it also conflicts with a Shadowheart as a romance option, as well as Gale, even if you convince him to stay.

Even if Minthara ends up as an evil-exclusive companion, which some indications point towards the possibility, that's woefully unbalanced and the math's right there to prove it.

Thats kinda my point ...

If basicaly whole story of a companion needs to be rewritten ... in order to make them aviable for certain kind of party ... since his joining dont make any sense otherwise ...
It just feels to be better, more fitting, and impactfull to simply leave him unaviable for that kind of party. :-/

Oh ... well ... this sounds like completely different question tho.

I see no problem with Larian writing characters exclusive for "a path" ... no matter if its good, or evil one ...
On the contrary!
I believe that exclusivity of companions can only add to depth felt behind our actions and decisions!

The fact that scales should be ballanced i finded so obvious, i didnt felt any need to mention it specificaly tho.

It was said countless times that picking either side in this conflict should have impact on our party members ... to me, it makes no sense that:
1) Lae'zel is completely fine with us "helping theese pathetic teethlings, and serching false hope in help from this druid" ... and i think she hould leave, without a debate ... just as Wyll do, if you join Goblins ...
Also, even if you join Goblins, she should want to leave ... just as Gale do ... in my opinion, bcs no matter the side we pick, this is just delay that should annoy her ... but Minthara is at least close to her mindset, to it would make sense to me that she would at least approve side we picked.
2) Astarion is completely fine with us "wasting time with theese pathetic civilians" ... in my honest opininion, he should want to leave ... just as Gale do ... but should be easily persuated to stay and enjoy killing some Goblins.

And even afterwards, i feel like there should be a way to refill our party with fresh blood after (or rather shortly after) our party members leaves us.
Prefferably with new companions ofc ... but in worst case scenario, with mercenaries of classes we just lost.

But it important here to keep in mind that story after the battle of the Grove (if we ally with Goblins) leads to location that is not part of EA ... so we dont really know what it will bring.

Wich seems perfectly reasonable ...
Since sadistic, psychopatic, homicidal ... but also kinda hot ... maniac just claimed you for the night.

Also, all that blood and violence feels like mood killer, doesnt it?

Oh yes, certainly ...
Even if ... we just lost a Warlock in order to gain a Paladin ... not exactly ballanced deal either.
(It seemed even worse, back in the days when Minthara was a Cleric.)

But as mentioned abowe ... and in multiple other threats:
Just bcs we dont know about any other companions, it doesnt mean they wont exist.

Larian "had to" speak about Jaheira and Minsc ... bcs those are big names, names that ensure that people will be talking about Baldur's Gate III ... i see that as purely marketing move.
Also, those two was basically allready spoiled about a year and half ago, so why bother to hide it?

But im quite sure (feel free to read as: i hope very much) there will be Evil companions for us to obtain.
I for one really hope we get option to recruit Dror Ragzlin, Nere, or some of those Half-Orcs we have seen in last few cinematics aswell ...
But lets be honest, if they would leave out such anouncement, it wouldnt have nearly even half as big effect ... if any in the first place.
I mean, im sure there are some famous Evil companions from previous games that "could have" appear here ... but statistic suggest that Good companions are just more popular ... and hardly anyone can compare with Minsc and Jaheira, in matter of fame.

So in short, fingers crossed!

I agree with Leucrotta that, unless there’s a significant overhaul to elements of the plot or characters or more planned companions than feels likely,it doesn’t seem practical for Larian to include more arcane caster characters (eg artificer) who are incompatible with the grove-attack path when we might already lose the two EA ones we have (Wyll and Gale) if we go that route.

But any further detailed discussion of this point should perhaps be moved to a more relevant thread, such as https://forums.larian.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=849965&page=5.

Regarding Summer Game Fest, I’m hoping for new info too, but would think any announcements there will be focused more on marketing and attracting new players to the game, so perhaps an XBox announcement and a new trailer for us to pick over and try to draw conclusions from.

I’m also very much hoping for more info on companions, mechanics, classes and races in the run-up to release, but would expect things like that to come from PfHs/community updates rather than content showcased at industry events.

I guess we will have to wait until full release to get a full overview which companions will be in the game and what their classes will be, but I think we can be quite confident that there will be more companions, for different paths/with different alignments.
Personally, I am happy with the ones we have so far, and most likely, they will form my party in the first games.

Back on topic: I hope we will get a glimpse of the monk class, and maybe Dragonborn and Half-Orcs as player characters?

I would like if we'd get another PfH before release, but I thought the Patch 9 panel was to be the last before release, or have I misunderstood this?

Oh, and sorry for derailing the thread. Sometimes it's easy for me to get lost in off-topic musings.

Usually new trailers have some new info even if they are meant to attract new players! 😊

At some point they might also update their website to include all companions like on the DA:I site: https://www.ea.com/games/dragon-age/dragon-age-inquisition/characters.

It would also be great if they did another AMA now that they know what will be in the game!