Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Mega-threads and Guides Party Size Discussion

As someone that has already gone on record as wanting a party of 5 or 6, I'd be completely fine if they kept the game balanced around a party of 4.

With a party size mod, I'm assuming that the game already wouldn't be balanced for what I was doing since I don't see modders adding in enemies. But, I'd have a far easier time getting to play how I wanted without having to toy with files and wait for people far smarter than me coming up with fixes if a patch breaks the mod. Large red font at the start of the game saying "Hey, loser, you're gonna make the game super easy for yourself. Proceed at your own risk!" would be enough for me. I'm claiming the responsibility for my actions & choices at that point as I've been thoroughly warned.

If they're worried about people using larger parties for an easier time getting the achievement of beating the game on the hardest difficulty (if they do that), they can keep it specifically for completing it with parties of 4. But then, I've never been an achievement hunter so your mileage may vary.

Yes and we have been over this time and time again. Just let the game be as it is now, but let me choose to have 2 more companions. They don't need to rebalance the game. just a disclaimer that let's you know that the core experience is balanced around 4.

Newcomers to the forums understandably want the opportunity to give their views, and might want a chat about options and pros and cons that doesn't involve them reading through 109 pages of feedback. So from my perspective it's perfectly okay to talk about this again as a new conversation with new people, but I'd recommend just giving it a miss if you feel you're saying the same thing over and over again and aren't getting anything new from the discussion.


But while it can make sense to have a chat about whether a four person limit is desirable, it seems unproductive to debate whether it's stupid. Particularly as someone could easily think it's not stupid but is undesirable, but the other way around is unlikely. So two people who both wanted six person parties could still disagree about whether a four person limit was stupid! Personally, I'd rather have a nice, friendly chat about whether it's desirable to increase the party limit without chucking around potentially emotive terms like "stupid" that can just lead us down pointless rabbit holes.

Well, the person @williams85 is responding to is not a newcomer, and rather is someone who keeps bringing up balance while ignoring what many of us have repeatedly said about being completely fine with the game being balanced for a party of four only.

You could view it like that, but as i said. One choice gives one side what they want, the other choice gives both sides what they want. If not stupid then what? Evil?

It's been enough pages that I feel the need to re-mention my preferred solution: Split XP.

Larian balances BG3 for a party size of 4, allows for an increased party size, and the XP each character gets from encounters depends on party size. Larger party? Each party member levels up more slowly, auto-balancing the game (at least partly). Similarly, party sizes of 1, 2, and 3 will level up faster.

Importantly, the toggle to allow for a 6-person party should be located in Game Settings and come with a warning: "BG3's intended experience is for a party of 4!" If there's 2 extra party slots by default, then people (myself) will feel obligated to play with a party of 6.

Too simple, logical and obvious. It will never fly with Larian.

Splitting XP isn't a solution for balancing more party members, as XP is a very small component in the balancing act. You have to account for a lot of things, like spells interactions, enemy power, placement and number, loot quantity and quality, and combat duration. There really are no easy way to allow for an arbitrary amount of party members and keep the game enjoyable for all settings.

Or you don't have to account for any of that and just warn people that it is not intended to be played with 6 party members.

"Thing I want that isn't intended and you'd need to warn people before they select the option"

... that sounds exactly like the kind of problem mods are for

It's definitely a solution, just not necessarily a perfect one. It's easy to do, simple to understand, doesn't affect 4-person parties, and will have a significant effect on party strength as 5e character strength is strongly tied to level. There's a reason 5e encounter-building rules, terrible as they are, suggest increasing/decreasing encounter strength depending on the # of PCs.

Also, there does exist some XP equation that is perfect for all practical purposes. It will be more complicated than simply dividing XP by # of participating characters, but not impossible to figure out. For a rough guess, Larian could load up one of their late-game encounters that they've balanced for 4 level 11 characters, add 2 PCs to the party, and do a couple tests at different PC levels to see what level produces an equally difficult encounter. Then simply scale XP such that a party of 6 reaches that level at that point in the game.

And ... what exactly is it supposed to solve? O_o

Bcs during EA i tryed several times mod for 6-member party ... wich as we know keeps the ballance intact.
And thanks to that i was quite easily able to take down Githyanki patrol, or whole Grymforge (meaning Nere and Duergars), even on level 3. :-/
So ... pardon me if im not convinced that reaching "a level" a little later would solve ... well anything really. :-/

The "problem" of:
Although in all honesty, there is no "problem." If a 6-person party is an option hidden under settings with a big flashing "NOT INTENDED EXPERIENCE" warning, then it's fine if it's not balanced.

But if I ever chose to play with that option, I'd enjoy it more if the game remained at least somewhat balanced instead of becoming trivial. Ideally the combo of less XP + harder difficulty mode would be sufficient for that.

And i'm not sure what mod you're talking about; how was this mod balanced? By definition, if you had an easier time with a 6-person party then it has failed keep the balance intact. Give out even less XP for larger parties!!!

Here we are at the same impasse we were at several pages ago. Even if there is an official Larian made party of 6 option incorporated into the game, there is absolutely no obligation or necessity for those who only want a 4 member party to use it. The key word here is option.
You no likey, you no usey.

Nah ...
I mean it remain unchanged.

Without wading through 100 pages of this, are people really suggesting that Larian include a basically untested option?

Many games have various gameplay options that can make it harder or easier, but I’d expect them all to to be fully tested to ensure each one gives the player the intended experience (even if the intended experience changes with the options). Flashing up a warning that it might turn out to be a bit shit is a possibility I guess, but doesn’t that seem a bit odd for a major release like this that’s had such an enormous amount of work put into it?

Having more party members would be a very tempting option for a lot of people, even with the game warning it’s “not the intended experience”. I’d be very tempted by it myself, unless I happened to know from reading these forums that they only did it to appease a bunch of old BG fans insisting they couldn’t enjoy the game without that option.

Yes.

Not to mention it was originally suggested when there was all the time in the world to even test it, if they wanted.

All the time in the world? Ah, of course. I’d forgotten that video game developers are famously never under any time pressure. LOL.

+1

What part of the initial "Yes" did you miss, anyway?
Or do you plan to keep moving the goalposts?