Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Why the nerfs were made (speculation? or fact)

Then you might want to reevaluate what attributes mean to you.

Funny I would have thought that the rules in the book trump whatever flavor text they shove into every revamp, but maybe I'm showing my regard for the canon. If you can't understand why races in fantasy settings are created differently then there's really not much middle ground in this discussion. I get the feeling it's more that you don't agree with it though, and when you change the rules for no other reason than personal taste, you impugn anyone's ability to immerse themselves in the world.

Okay, folks, I am going to be travelling for most of today so won't be around and need your help to self-moderate.

I'm a bit worried about some of the heated language in this thread already, and by a comment that implied the original video shared might be coming from a political angle that wouldn't be appropriate here. I don't have time to watch it myself right now, but can I ask people not to share videos here if all their content wouldn't be something we should be saying ourselves on these forums?

Similarly, I don't want to log in later and find out that this debate has been unnecessarily politicised. If you don't accept that WotC are simply (even if in some cases misguidedly) trying to increase flexibility and choice for players, and must attribute the changes to them (possibly misguidedly again) looking to decrease stereotyping and increase diversity and representation in the game, please bear in mind there will be plenty of people here who are in favour of diversity and representation and against stereotyping (even if they don't think that what WotC are doing is related to that or helps with it) and refrain from being dismissive. Personally, I'd recommend just sticking to the pros and cons of the changes and leave theories about WotC's reasons for them to one side, but if the latter are discussed respectfully, civilly and calmly then that would be fine.

And the standard reminder to recognise when you've made your position clear and not to keep repeating it, and when it is time to agree to disagree.

And my apologies for the perhaps premature moderation here, as we don't seem to have fallen off the rails yet, and I hope you can understand that it's only because I don't want things to kick off while I'm unavailable!

They did make sense and you can browse through the thread in the suggestions/feedback section called 'please remove racial ASI' to garner hundreds of valid arguments on that topic. 'To make sense' in the context of a PnP game means to compromise between the world building/lore and gameplay/balance. The rules are generalized, because if they were not, there would be no balance in the game. And balance plays a significant part in the enjoyment.

Personally I don't think there's really a lot of value in arguing too much about whether this is good or bad and talking about potential intent here and so on. This is the game we are getting...and it's coming in 11 days or so. And there is especially no reason to be mean to Larian about it because whether by choice or WotC demand this is still an official D&D mechanic that will be in the next year's PHB. No amount complaining will change this now and I really don't think it's that big of an issue to most people. I wish humans were better in this new system but I'm also happy that each race isn't as rigidly cast into a couple of classes as before. You know, I want to make a Githyanki warlock and I'm glad I can have the +2 in charisma rather than strength. It would be so much more productive to talk about where the new system shines and how to shift playstyles for BG3.

I’m cool with them removing the “half” from the name etc., but what bothers me is erasing distinctions between races.

That’s the whole point and appeal of playing certain races, which fit certain classes better.

They’re trying to make everything purely cosmetic… isn’t THAT insulting to this “certain community”? They bring irl politics in it, but irl peoples from around the world are vastly different and excel at different things. It’s not only cosmetic lol 😂

Let’s skip the fact that i don’t understand why the majority has to appeal to “certain community” minority , but I also srsly don’t understand the logic behind erasing distinctions.

I would agree with you on that point, if not for the fact that Swen himself stated in one of his interviews, that Larian had full autonomy during the development of BG3 and WoTC didn't force them to change anything. Now, if Swen spoke the truth, is a completely different matter. Personally, I find it extremely unlikely, that WoTC didn't at least try to meddle with their corpo-autoritharian ways.

Even so they are following official D&D rules made by WotC here. Larian didn't invent this system. And besides, this is the system we'll be getting in the game which is coming out in less than two weeks. There is no use in complaining about it now...we're past the point of early access feedback. So make the best of it.

I think that WotC could not have *forced* Larian to include it. But if Larian has an interest in continuing the Baldurs Gate series, they will still need WotC approval for it. So I assume they got the info that WotC wants that change and then considered going along with it.
Agreeing with the floating ASIs but not with changing the way the hybrid-races work.

But that is just my interpretation of the informations.

I'd honestly want Larian to make DOS3 afterwards rather than BG4. I think with the new experience they can make their own IP a real banger.

It's likely, yes, but it's also a possibility that we may get an option to use the good old system. Admittedly, it's not likely but it's possible nonetheless. After all the presentation build was not the final release version.

Also, it's not the same system the upcoming D&D edition uses (or even the one that used in the playtest). The new new system ties the ASI to the background, not the class.
BG3 ties it to the class and while it may still be possible to simulate the true 5E ASI, it is a) not possible for all races and b) not even certain that we can truly do that.

In any case modders will most likely be able to fix this mess.

I disagree. As good as DOS 1 and 2 were and as bad as some of these new weird D&D mechanics are I still think D&D is better. And BG3 is still close enough to 5e. Maybe if Larian were to create a whole new game type of their own that is a lot closer to D&D 5e maybe it might be as good but I don't know how close can they get without potential copyright problems. But I don't think there is going back without feeling like a massive leap backwards.

I think they may switch between those two worlds. But there is a polish interview with Sven coursing around where he actually gives a neutral answer to the question of more stuff for BG3. So it is possible that, after their vacation, they will create an expansion for it.

the source:
https://www.reddit.com/r/BaldursGat...sven_vicke_interview_with_polish_gaming/




Or they let our characters find a spelljammer ship that brings us to Rivellon. =D

Their own IP does not need to appeal to the source material thats why they can express creativity more. There will be not much controversy and pressure from the outside like we have now with the new changes. I honestly want them to make a product of their own passion while not being tied by some external factors and conservative opinions. Stability kills creativity, as we've seen with a lot of Ubisoft titles for example. With DOS2 Larian proved that are willing to experiment by shaking the core mechanics of crowd control with the new armor system (which I find not at all perfect), as well as the origin. characters system and verticality.

It would arguably makes things easier but it would not lead to a better game. Less arguments about rule sets or rule changes and so on but D&D is still the best...at least for the time being. Although I think that if left to their own devices WotC will run D&D into the ground so in 5 or 10 years there may well be no D&D worth speaking of. Though it is worth noting that what I said previously was wrong...the rules of D&D 5e are published under an open game license...meaning anyone can use them as they wish, they just can't call it D&D. The first edition of Pathfinder is basically a slightly modified D&D 3.5. This may be the lease on life Larian need here. Use the rules of 5e as allowed by OGL, maybe with minor tweaks and run away as fast and as far as possible from WotC before they ruin D&D forever.

One DnD is actually increasing the distinctions between races. The ASIs are tied to background now, but to compensate for this all the PHB races are being given new racial features or having subrace features combined to make each race more distinct from each other.

Dwarves now all get Dwarven Toughness and Dwarven Resilience, which makes them the heartiest race in the game. But they're also now getting an innate affinity for stone and metalwork that gives them proficiency with certain tools of the player's choice and limited uses of Tremorsense to represent their uncanny connection to the earth and stone around them.

Because Half-Orcs now just choose a parent race to take the racials of they can get the full orcish list, which gives Powerful Build, Relentless Endurance, and Adrenalin Rush, which means Half-Orcs are tied for physically strongest PHB race alongside Goliath, who is getting moved to the PHB too.

Goliath itself is also getting a bunch of new variants for the different types of giants you can be descended from, similar to how Dragonborn work.

And Tiefling is being given a big boost in variety with options for Tieflings descended from devils, demons, or beings from the Underworld.



Also, Larian's way of handling racials so far is NOTHING LIKE OneDnD. 1DnD's human has nothing to do with polearms. It's basically Variant Human but tweaked to fit the new Feat system and given a unique racial that gives Inspiration on every Long Rest.

It is a positive for me as well because I can make an elf sorcerer and have the +2 in charisma instead of dexterity.😊 I like being able to have an increase in the stat that is best for my class. It makes class selection more flexible.

I mean, obviously it's highly subjective, but D&D is not the best and never has been. It's just the most famous, it's the Justin Bieber of rpgs, and this comes from someone who really really likes 5e.

EDIT: I do partially agree thought with the idea of D&D crumbling in the next years. I don't really trust Jeremy Crawford, and I'm worried that under his direction the game with go back to being a dungeon crawler designed for lawyers more than humans.

This I cannot in good conscience agree with. 5e has been the gold standard for tabletop RPGs. It's not perfect, but nothing else gets even close, forget about better.

So a 40 lbs gnome is not generally as strong as a dragonborn or an orc in One D&D?

As I understand it, some of the racial features are decent enough but those are really the only distinctions between the races and they're all trying to operate within a similar power budget. Thus I would hardly argue that OneD&D is actually increasing racial distinction and uniqueness.

Also, the Dwarf signature role is that of a fighter, but what racial synergy do they have? +1 health and resistance vs poison? Is that even a bigger boon for fighters than it is for squishier classes?

World of Darkness? I believe it has always been a better system. In the past few years the powered by the apocalypse clones are domming the indie industry. I never played it but I heard that, from the dungeon crawling point of view, even Shadow of the demon lord is better than 5e. I think that the great strenght of 5e are the official modules, I personally started DMing it because of BG3, because I wanted to make my friends play descent into avernus before BG3, and after that I dmed another official module. Sadly it's not that easy to find ready campaign for other systems because they are not as much famous.