Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Story & Character Discussion [No spoilers] Wyll rewrite

So during the last Panel from Hell Larian mentioned the character of wyll was re-written to better show what kind of character he is.
And damn, so far it was awesome. I didn't have him in my active party, as I play in coop so we have karlach, shadowheart, my custom dark urge+ gale but his intro at the druid grove where he jumps in the fight with the rapier and all? Very cool.

His dialogues seem to be quite interesting too so amazing job!

The initial part of his quest line is much improved, but I'm reaching the end of it now and things feel a bit... off. As if they couldn't quite decide what to do after moving his Big Scene forward so much. I'm also now very confused about whether selling your soul to a devil is 100% a Horrible Terrible Idea (which is what I always thought) or just a rather unpleasant thing for the person involved.

He seems a bit better, but the 'conflict' with Karlach is so shallow and lacking in any bite, I question why even include it. You pretty much have to go deliberately out of your way to end it with Karlach dead. Don't need a skill check, both characters don't want to do it, and a bunch of the dialogue options are some variations of 'don't do it wyll, you read her mind, she's a goodie'

And ending the conflict with Karlach alive and Wyll dead even moreseo. Even Karlach says some variant of 'please don't do this' if you try to escalate it and go after Wyll, and it gives you a second chance to back out.

Have to disagree, unfortunately. I wasn't a big fan of Wyll in EA but it didn't have anything to do with his character -- he was just the straight guy in a team of wacky characters. I liked him and was interested in seeing where Larian was going to go with his arc and development, especially with how he was a hypocrite and a fraud.

In release, though... He's just bland. The new VA is less interesting and he's less interesting overall. They brought all of his 'interesting' plot beats forward, it feels like. To such an extent that you learn his whole deal as soon as you meet him, and then there's just nothing else. I'm into Act 3 and he's absolutely the character I find least interesting, and his drama with the Duke is falling flat (and his big choice is really flat compared to, say, Lae'zel or Shadowheart.) It's like they brought all of the interesting stuff forward, and had nothing to replace it with.

Tying him into Karlach was an interesting choice, sure, but Wyll isn't nearly compelling enough to make the 'Kill Karlach' option anything other than a gimmick. It's probably a good thing that he's not so 'important' in the goblin village and camp, as you don't feel like you need to bring him along... but that's about the only thing I'd say is better. What they did to Wyll feels like if they had some of the mid-late character development stuff for, say, Gale or Lae'zel take place soon after you meet them because they got spooked that people thought either of them were jerks or whatever.

I gather that Larian did it because people were engaging less with Wyll than the other characters, and they have metrics to back it up, but I don't think that is because he was written badly. I think that was because of the aforementioned 'straight guy' role, the fact he was a sub-par build, that he can just die in his opening scene, that he's the last character you can recruit in EA, and... uh, what we might call the Jacob Effect.

I genuinely think it was a mistake to rewrite him as they did, and I feel like the 'Daisy' rewrite is similar. As I've been getting into Act 3, I'm really not sure why they did that, either. I think both of them demonstrate why you might want to stand by the original vision.

Mizora seems to be full on comedy relief now. The popular b from high school. She pops up here and there and no one seems to mind a devil from hell on the streets, or in your camp. All she does it talk talk talk ta-ta, and give Wyll some horns which no one anywhere notices. Pacts with devils and selling your soul is a bit of an inconvenience, nothing more. She's just a mundane little side note like Withers.

Just one scene early on where she would actually do something horrible and evil, would redeem her value a lot.

The reason I disliked Wyll in the EA was mostly because of his initial appearance as someone so full of himself in their heroic persona that he couldn't stop bragging about it even in the middle of a battle. The rewrite mitigated that quite a bit. Apart from that, I don't find him compelling in Act I but he has a few interactions in Act 2 I really like. His story so far stands in the shadow of others' but is interesting enough to be engaging.

As for Mizora, she's fine. Devils don't do the horrible stuff every day, they cajole and threaten for you to do the horrible stuff and damn your soul, and so far she's been spot on with that. That alpha b*tch persona fits perfectly IMO. And Wyll's pact definitely comes across as much more than an inconvenience.

All this means that I remain curious about where his story will go. Not my favorite character and character story so far, but even so better written than in most other CRPGs, with some impactful events that make me retain my interest. Considering that I disliked him in the EA enough to keep him out of my party, I'm really OK with things as they are. I'm in the middle of Act 2, we'll see how things go.

I kind of agree. I actually think most of the story change they made were for the worse. I still remember the days shadowheart was actually a dick and at least then she was interesting and it felt like a challenge to earn her trust.

Wyll never was a particularly interesting character but at least he had this whole fraud thing going on for him. I think the original "goblin beat the shit out of me and took me eye" was a bit silly and lame, but other than that I felt like a more grey character that wants to be a hero but is actually very concerned about how people see him is cool. And I think that if they have kept these aspects it would have been better

I think Wyll originally was in need of a rewrite as his character felt all over the place and lacked clear consistency. The result qe have is... fine, I think. I prefer his old VA but this one does a decent job. They seem to have made him a more straight forwardly heroic archetype, a more definitely good character, which the game did sort of need I think. But I think if they'd kept his concern over reputation and appearances, his change of appearance would feel more personally significant.

As for the dream figure, I suspect that part of the reason for the rewrite is about what happens at the creche. Since she clearly was always involved in the githyanki situation. Imagine if we had Daisy instead of the guardian and the creche situation remained otherwise the same. It Daisy was so obviously ill intentioned that good characters could feel justified in killing her because she was probably up to no good while evil characters would easily not believe her if she said killing her would harm them. That whole scene only works because she seems so sympathetic and genuine.