Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Qu: Are all the PC and NPCs a-holes in BG3?

Good question ...
Nobody knows.

I find BG3 companions to be interesting. In our daily lives we tend to surround ourselves by people we generally like, thats why a-holes stick with a-holes and good souls stick with good souls. What makes this game's dynamic interesting is that different personalities happen to group with other people not because of their general temper match but because of their common condition. Parties where there are internal personal conflicts are much more interesting to develop into something beautiful later, at least for me.

There is potential for that, but so far I think BG3 is failing to even hint at internal personal conflicts within the group. Thus far we only really have Lae'zel and Shadowheart having meaningful interactions with each other. Beyond that, there aren't actually interesting group dynamics unfolding, so nothing for later acts to build off of. Hopefully the full game changes that at least.

Also I came to a bit of a realization about the companions and people's reaction to them. I suspect that part of the reason for certain people's dislike of the companions is a matter of perspective. I think the people who dislike them the most don't see themselves as witnessing a story unfold from a distance. They come at it from a perspective of being a participant in the world, and so when they're faced with a bunch of characters they dislike, they take the same attitude they would in real life; not wanting to spend time that should be fun and enjoyable dealing with people they find unpleasant. @neprostoman, I think even your post hints at that divide, since you're talking about them in terms of the story they'll create, while I've seen people who dislike them talking in far more personal terms about their feelings and experiences, about who they want around them and want to go through the game with.

I've "overheard" Gale quizzing Lay'zael on her background - fits his scholarly background.

It’s an interesting hypothesis. Certainly my favourite game characters are ones I would very much not want to spend time with IRL. They tend to be awful in one way or another, usually a way that I find amusing or weirdly fascinating. So while I don’t feel that I’m watching a story unfold at a distance and do feel fully wrapped up in the adventure, I guess it’s true that I’m not responding to characters as I would if I personally were abducted by mindflayers. That is, I suppose, I’m responding to them as characters rather than people, though I do think the distinction between the two is complex and blurry.

But I guess the fact that I like some of the BG3 characters in game though I wouldn’t IRL, and am broadly positive about them overall, means my response to the characters, at least, is consistent with your theory!

I really like the idea of a party made up of friends you meet along the way. In Pillars of Eternity 1 in particular, a good chunk of companions are travelling with you because you're helping them and that eventually just turns into them sticking with you because they want to help and support you. Meanwhile one of the things that really stood out to me about DA2 in subsequent playthroughs is the fact that your party is literally justa group of friends. In both games, you're not really tied together by plot aside from a few instances, and I think that gives a good degree of freedom to the story and cultivates a unique atmosphere.

I don’t recall the details of PoE but I agree it works really well in DA2. For me, I think that’s because you’re based in one place and the companions all have lives outside your adventuring (which I *love*) and you’re not asking them to drop everything and relocate their lives to do whatever you want or need but usually just to pop out on a short jaunt. BG2 also has elements of this of course, and there are some companions (eg Keldorn and Cernd) who I most often help sort their lives out then leave them to it, and I didn’t mean to imply it doesn’t do a reasonable job of giving a rationale for joining. Just that it would be possible in my view to do better!

Regarding friendship as a motivation for working together more generally, for me really feeling like party members are friends tends to take a while, so it works best when there’s a strong motivation to stay together for an extended period while the relationship develops. And even after that, I’d probably still prefer the feel of a party working together for a (largely) common goal that they have their own reasons for pursuing, than folks who are just coming along to help my character. It just somehow makes the party feel more real to me, and I actually love moments of feeling that my character is just one member of a group working together - or against each other - for their own reasons rather than the hero.

I don’t think there are any hard and fast rules here, though, and it’s mainly a matter of degree given most cRPGs at least try to give each party some motivation for tagging along beyond “I like you, why not?”. Plus different approaches can work in different games and for different gamers!

Oh yeah, this is very true. It's all a matter of taste and what works for the particular game. I think part of what isn't working for me about the party currently (and bear in mind I overall like all the characters, except Astarion, I hate him as a character, which is bad because I don't think Larian wants us to hate him) is that for all people are talking about the clashing personalities and the rag tag group forced to work together possibilities, I think the game has entirely failed to deliver on that potential. Sure we get some snippets of dialogue on the road but that's hardly anything. It's pretty generic in my opinion. Aside from Lae'zel and Shadowheart, the game hasn't presented any interesting clashes of personality, no surprising rivalries or friendships. Honestly, the group ranges from being passively cohesive with each other to seeming like non-entities to each other. No one's all that bothered about Astarion being a vampire or Shadowheart being a cleric of Shar. It's only our character that they're really clashing with.

By internal conflict I meant interactions between MC and companions. I also find the chemistry between our group members rather stale, but I can live with it until each of them have their unique personality and way of seeing things in general. That helps to reflect on the idea that companions by chance are not just mirrors for your particular way of thinking or roleplaying. Thats my cup of tea.

Definitely agree that intraparty dynamics, and specifically a sense of the gang building relationships with each other, is sketchy at best in EA and it's an area I really, really hope Larian have been working hard on. It's something I think the game needs to really live up to its potential.

I really don't like it because frankly, it makes them feel more two-dimensional. To me the lack of interaction with each other makes them feel even more like they only exist for the main character. In DAO we got so many varied relationships within the party. Alistair's mistrust of Morrigan, his surrogate mother/son relationship with Wynn, Leliana's curiosity about Sten, Oghren's buddy-buddy relationship with Zevran, that made them feel so deep and real. They were people capable of existing when they weren't talking to us. DA2 took that to a whole other level. Fenris and Anders' seething hate for each other, Anders and Merill's contention relationship because of her blood magic. Merill and Isabella's fondness for each other, with Merill's admiration and Isabella's protectiveness. Varric being friends with everyone of course. Their party banter was even able to show off deeper layers of their relationships with one another and by extension, themselves. Pathfinder: Kingmaker? I can point you to Tristian and Regongar's unexpectedgood relationship, or Harrim's understandingand tolerance for everyone around him in spite of his doom and gloom attitude.

The BG3 companions have none of this. They're not people, they're stories for you to interact with. Their party banter is entirely predictable. I think that the fact our Tav is the only one they end up clashing with makes their abrasive personalities worse on reflection, because we end up feeling like their sounding board. They don't exist as mirrors for us, but they exist just to tell us about themselves. This is amplified by the factthey're all very self-involved and selfish in their quests. Even Wyll, who I do think is good at his core, his quest is a selfish one. So there's the disconnect where they exist only to interact with us, and get reactions out of us, but at the same time they're all entirely self-involved. And I think for some people that leads to a wrong balance, where it feels not like they exist to give us their stories, but that we, our Tavs exist to recieve their stories. That they're the most important things and we're just there to interact with them.

This is further exacerbated by the situation where, in my opinion, our Tavs aren't really able to exert a lot of personality in response to them. If we don't want to be rude jerks to them then our only option is to be kind of meek and passive and to sit there while they give us their stories. And I think that is without question the worst thing this game does, and as far as I'm concerned, that lack of flexible player personality - especially compared to other rpgs - is why this game kind of fails as a roleplay experience and is in my eyes, a middling experience overall.

I don't disagree with you, Gray Ghost, except perhaps in the vehemence of my opinion and my optimism that what we have in EA is provisional and that Larian will have taken on board feedback like this and improved the full release experience.

But it strikes me that we've now drifted quite a bit from the initial question about whether or not the NPCs are generally decent people into the quality of companion writing. Which is one that's also been well rehearsed before.

I know I'm as guilty as anyone, but I'd suggest any further discussion on this point resurrects one of the threads specifically talking about that, or perhaps starts a new thread on that topic given when I tried to look for an old one I found chat about our opinions of the companions scattered here there and everywhere.

My take on it is that Larian most likely planned for the party to have some of its members leave the group depending on the path you choose (just like one particular member in early access). The way to trigger that is to force wildly antithetical characters to collaborate, therefore there will always be some of them that will look like total jerk and you are forced to take sides. It probably will makes more sense when we will get the bigger picture, aka BG3 release.

Okay, so as not to have to give folks - myself included - a warning for having drifted too far off topic, I’ve split out the reflections on BG2 companions and how they compare to BG3 that took over this thread so we can discuss to our hearts’ content.

The new thread can be found at https://forums.larian.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=852104.

Oh gods, I hadn't noticed until you guys pointed it out, but these are all the same character, just slightly different flavours, aren't they?
And worse, as pointed out, it's the same "trick" they pulled in DOS2.

I really hope there's an option in the final game to run with a completely custom party.

Compared to Dragon Age, Pillars 1 & 2 and the Pathfinder games, this is really bad.
I think the only one I actually like is Astarion, because comparably, he wears his heart on his sleeve, and his "secret" is revealed relatively quickly ( if you hadn't already guessed it from the obvious promotional character art).

Is this done for the same reason it was done in DoS2? To create conflicting goals among co-op players?

Why do you consider those characters being "the same"? They have wildly different origins and goals, their personality aren't the same and it evolves differently for most of them. Sure the current cast of companions is small, but I feel like they are quite distinct and that you could easily only take the "good" ones if it is your thing (Wyll, Gale and Shadowheart to a lesser extent). Hopefully more will be added like Halsin and Minsc.
I think that what really bother people is that every companion has the role of a protagonist, which is needed for origins. Other RPGs companions can have a more subdued presence and temperament since their are just here to complement the player character, who is the main figure of the whole game. Personally I like it since it elevates them more as character than just mere story and gameplay tools for the god PC.
Also I think you are looking at Astarion through rose tinted glasses, he is monster who used his charm to lure victims for his blood thirsty master. He is far from friendly.

What I am saying is that they all follow the exact same formula. They all follow the exact same trope; it doesn't matter that their goals are all different; it's that they are all written to have a hidden agenda that conflicts with other party members' goals, with possibly the exception of Laz'Ael, who's just boringly angry at everything all the time.

And I like the character of Astarion; I don't necessarily like him on a personal level; it's just that so far, he is written SO much better than all of the others.

On top of which, they all appear to be written with only their relationship to the PC in mind. There's nothing so far like Minsc/Dynaheir or Octavia/Regongar or Edér/Xoti.

I agree that they are all similar in that regard (except maybe Laezel), having a hidden secret is a blatant similarity between companions. At this point I am pretty sure that it is the case for a particular reason that will be revealed later in the game.
For Astarion, I agree that his character arc is pretty well developed in early access. I would argue that Shadowheart is too since she gradually opens up to you during the course of the game. Hopefully other companions will have similar treatments (looking at you Wyll, I barely know you).
I also agree that CRPG, and BG3 in particular are quite horny. This is what people want apparently, every time there is a new character there are also hundreds of people talking about romanticizing it...

The Pathfinder games disagree with you. Yes there is romance but nothing what I would call horny.
In general the companions in Wrath and especially Kingmaker all look vastly superior to the BG3 ones.

I think snowram misinterpreted me. I meant relationship as in its more broad definition , not romance.
I was saying that aside from banter, there is currently no meaningful interaction between characters, and they only exist to have meaningful interactions with the PC.

Even Wrath's character that's closest to the BG3 "hidden background" trope, Camellia, is more interesting than almost all of the BG3 companions.