Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Help to chose my first Playthrough character

I come to you as i need some help to make my choice for my first run.

Before last PFH; I had two planned runs. First will my good run with my boring but always a classic lawful good Paladin. My second one was my evil playtrough with a Ranger drow, dual wielding light swords and one hand crossbows.

I have also already a meme run planned with a bard RPing like a Jaskier in Faerun. (In clear, "romancing" all available women and creating intense drama about that)

But Durge changed all that. Because after reflexion, i think that Oathbreaker run will be the most suitable for me. But as my other evil run will go with Minthara, that is a bit too much paladins, even for me =D

So, I need a new idea for my first good run. I doubt to choose druid or cleric as Halsin, SH and Jaheira will be in, same problem for mage and Gale. I also prefer to play my main as frontliner, but not as barbarian as i think that class could be a bit "limited" for conversations. I want to play that sorcerer+cleric of Storm, but for what I read and expect from Larian about Sorcerer, I doubt that will fit for a lawful good run. I have to admit I have no interest in monks and that Laezel is enough for me to sometime play with a fighter.

With the new profiencies available for humans and Pact of blade, I thought about maybe play with Polearm Warlock but i have no idea if that could be a viable char on the long run.

So what are your idea about what i could play as first run?


Thanks in advance,

The second one is pretty much a Drizzt clone, there's no shame in it, as for class choices just multiclass, that way you can have your ideal character cake and eat it too.

Remember that Durge is most likely meant to be for those who want to solo the entire run, as it's BG3 version of lonewolf from dos2. They say the more you embrace your evil the stronger you get. This means no spellcasters, or classes that are squishy as you will need to hold out in combat all alone. With that said, some decent candidates.

1) *scaled Fist monk equivalent*: Monk can get high AC with both dex and wisdom feeding both your stats, and durge has /seems to have some kind of item from videos for monks. Monk has high mobility used to run away, or move around, it uses a quarter staff. KI also provides some healing and decent utility. Build idea: (monk 8 or 5)

Wizard(1): Mage Armour, False Life, Orb of fire, Ray of frost, Acid Splash (basically a free companion). These give more HP, and Ac, and gives you some way to down enemies that immune to blunt or slashing.

Druid (3): take beast shaper, as animals give you enough HP to move through traps, bombs, grenades without dying. You can change 3x a day, adds close to 90HP on top of yours. Mandatory for solo run. Spells take: entanglement (hard terrain), all touch heal spells, moon beam, hot iron (disarms weapons). If you take Druid to 5? You can get a eagle transform which is flight but with no chance of falling to death.



OPTION B)- this is what I will be doing... scuffed magus.

My °Magus° is going to be a gimped version of Pathfinders Magus. Picking DB, Sword Master (3) [long ranged disarm, push arrows], Warlock 3 (dumping strength for Charisma and Dex- rapier) for Hex + agonizing blast, Feat 1: +2 increase to charisma, and dex. All rest in oathbreaker Paladin. This way I have crazy disarm spells (hot iron, etc from feat druid magic), good weapon damage, and still do can buff using false life etc

IMO, classes that fit the "lawful good" RP perspective, other than Paladin and Monk, which you do not want:

- Cleric of a Good Deity
- Fighter
- Wizard (Abjuration or Divination)

That's it... Barbarians for sure can be good, but they're too chaotic, same for Rogues, Bards and Sorcerers. Druids and Rangers gravitate heavily towards balance and chaos, they have little care for laws of civilization.

Durge being paladin is made for multiple reasons. Strong char able to sustain enemies alone, a bit of necromancy, my love for paladin and maybe one of the easiest way to RP someone falling to doom (Dark Paladin). It is for that reason that i don't really want monk as Durge, i imagine them like the opposite of Durge (So maybe fit for a "Good" Durge)

I like the idea of mixing some Warlock levels in it, but i don't think i will ever create a char with more than two classes. Sadly the lvl limitation will prevent to do Fungi zombie army buffed by Oathbreaker aura.

So maybe i will jump into my Durge at first playthrough, or simply do my lawful good paladin as intended at first^^

I'm also tempted by a Durge paladin run, attempting to resist the urges. Like the OP I think there's real potential there for roleplaying the struggle between principles and something dark in one's nature. (And while everything's speculation at the moment, I don't think Durge is intended for solo runs specifically - obviously if we end up killing all our potential companions then we're going to end up alone, but I am expecting that we have considerable flexibility in how a Durge run shapes up just as we will for any other origin, though possibly less than Tav.) I'm definitely not going Durge for my first run though.

When it comes to lawful good, I agree with ladydub that the best bets outside of paladin are probably a good cleric, a fighter or some kinds of wizard. Though while I also see rangers as more neutral to chaotic, I do think they could be roleplayed as lawful good if we focused on, say, a Hunter serving a temple or some more temporal power. Warlocks I also struggle to see as lawful good, as it feels as though making a bargain for power with some being of questionable morality is in tension with that. But we could possibly come up with a story that makes it work, for that or practically any class. After all, the only person we need to convince in single player is ourself

I would definitely avoid the dark urge for your first playthrough, I think leaning heavily into that will deeply change the narrative, and you'll miss out on a LOT of content you would normally have access to (we're talking killing people VERY early in the game you'd normally interact with a lot).

I love ranger. I played all classes in early access, but the heavy armored Hunter ranger was my favorite by far(insane damage, a lot of proficiencies, and could be RP in a sort of Aragorn way). Of course i could play that, but the Gloomstalker seems to be a too good choice for my evil drow. So i don't see me playing same classes two times in a row.

Cleric is for sure a good choice, I imagined that Storm or War cleric seems interesting to play, but only problem i have is that i intended to romance SH within my good run. I could simply put SH aside and only take her with me during her specific quests, but that seems not too really RP for a romance choice.

Concerning Wizard, i'm not sure. I like them and Gale will for sure help me from time to time during good runs, and I see myself playing a Necromancer wizard if i ever play one. (I know, i'm becoming boring ^^)
But for sure, i'm a simple man, and i love to cast Fireball (But i don't have enough knowledge about the availables spells to made pre-building thinkings)

Yeah, that is sure. At the moment, Durge will be my second or third playthrough.

Roleplay-wise, a Durge that intends to embrace the power at any cost aspect would very much make sense as a warlock (because obviously), a sorcerer who's really into how very very special they are, or a wizard, because isn't it a rule that wizard are power-hungry and self-absorbed?

You are damn right. But my fear is that the "Urges" actions will be represented as raw violence (like what happened to Gale's hand) so i want a char that could produce that raw physical violence (avoiding caster and/or halfling/gnome). So i will wait to see if Melee Warlock are a thing.

One of my other idea is a Human Rogue assasin to play Durge, to represent my most hated evil character i met in books "Lijah Cuu". I guessed that a pathological murdered and psycho would fit really good for Durge, but at the moment i still have preference for Oathbreaker.

You can play as a dex based Warlock that uses malee, although it will be scuffed. Your main option.. knowing hex blade is not in game- although a hexblade Warlock mod already exists, first result on Google search.

1) (swords) take Rogue to level 3, take trickster , at level 4 use your feat for Warlock initate (hex spell, and eldrtich blast). At level 8 Rogue take Mage slayer, at level 12 Medium armor master or Warcaster

2) (ranged) take eldritch knight (3) and 1 Rogue. Dump strength for dex and charisma. Take Warlock at lvl 4 as a feat. Take eldritch knight until lvl 8. Take warcaster, Take spellsniper as a feet at lvl 12.