I don't think the Larian gameplay design team understand RPG's, or gets why the class system, item system or resting system of D&D is great. They want to give you a familiar fast food gaming experience full of modern tropes like itemization, constant gear upgrades, instant gratification in the form of free respeccing, puzzle combat and flood you with micro-progress. They just don't get how the "videogamey" parts or meme combat moves undermine the storytelling of a serious story-driven RPG, or how less could ever be more.
The biggest flaw of BG3 imo is the dissonance between gameplay and storytelling, like they are making two different games. Writers want to present Nere as a Darth Vader type sinister and serious villain, and gameplay team wants you to be able to hilariously slap him into lava in an exaggerated arc when dialogue ends. Writers want to go deep with characters like Wyll and really explore what making a pact with a devil means, while gameplay team wants you to be able to respec him into a Bard because Bards have fun abilities. Writers want to craft a serious story about giving in to dark temptations and murder but gameplay team wants inconsequential death and incinerated PC's teleported back to camp for a cheap rez.
I get the feeling they have been fighting the D&D system until the very end of development and never truly embraced it. That would explain the late changes to major features. They don't believe in D&D or understand why it would be such a breath of fresh air with 99% of games still suffering from MMO PTSD and trying to become them even when they are not massively multiplayer.
I also fear I will be completely let down by the gameplay of BG3 and that it will kill all replayability value the game might otherwise have.
What you said about the story and gameplay creating disjointed atmosphere does make me worry too because even from the gameplays they showed I do not feel like it is a story I will be able to take 100% seriously. The same problem I had in DOS2 where the overall atmosphere of the game just made me take the story far less seriously and overall made my experience worse. They can make a very good story here, I can tell, but I wish they were able to hold themselves back so I can take it seriously and feel that it's great. WOTR to me did that well with paths like Lich and Swarm that Walks, you do feel this very dark atmosphere in those both from gameplay and story standpoint. You feel the darkness surrounding you. How everyone is afraid of you. How more powerful you become and this power slowly becoming addicting with how convenient everything becomes. A slow burn of your cause becoming an undead army. In here I can tell they try that, but the overall atmosphere of the game and how it is made can really be a detriment to that. It will be hard to enjoy this story if I will be constantly taken out of the experience.
