Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Story & Character Discussion Are custom characters flat and pointless compared to Origin ones? [Spoilers]

To be fair, the Durge is technically an origin character you can customise to look different. Larian published their statistics and when they said 93% of the players played a custom character they included the DU in that.

I will have to try the Durge on my next playtrough if I have one.

EA implied that the origin characters would get unique dream visitors, but I think that was all cut as part of the Guardian rewrite. I honestly never had much intention to play an origin (beyond Dark Urge who I want to play next) but I feel like the origins may have also depended on things like the unique narration remaining in. As it is, I don't really see why I'd play as them.

No, it wasn't cut...the dream visitor is still there, but it was changed and appears a bit later on now. But the dream visitor is there for everyone though, it's not unique origin or custom character content.

Absolutely not. The custom characters have some tags that Origin characters do not have access to. We do not have a Wild Mage or Monk in the party.

Playing as one of the party members is interesting, but there will always be more distance between player and character. Like with the Witcher, Geralt. We're always playing his story, I never actually see myself as him. I do with Baldur's Gate avatars.

Bard unlocks quite a few options, as does Drow

This is why I decided on playing the dark urge for my first playthrough. Have a benefit of being an origin character, with the benefit to look however you like. win-win. I will still never understand why they just didn't let all origins be backstories like they did with urge. The statistics prove most people don't play them anyway.

I think majority did play them in D:OS2? so were probably expecting the same to repeating not expecting the D&D create your own character aspect to take over so much?

I play a halfling bardlock and have tons of dialogue options for each of those. I was surprised, how much dialogue halflings get mostly about solving stuff peacefully, which suits my little one fine, since Larian mostly makes fun about the small races in interviews and their PfH.

That's great to hear, I was thinking Halfling or Halforc for my good side run. I was just wondering how there are no dwarf/halfling/gnome/small ancrestry companions

But the Durge's "tendencies," both in their past history and in the present, are such that I would never even consider playing the Durge. Not even out of some morbid curiosity. So Larian making the Durge to be Tav+ is effectively giving the finger to people like me who will only ever play strictly good-oriented characters.

You misread what I said. In early access, the origin characters were visited by the dream visitor/Daisy who showed up as someone from their past, unique to each origin character. Astarion was visited by Cazador, for example, and Lae'zel was visited by Vlaakith. All the characters are visited by the same person now, and they say as such.

About as flat and pointless as your original bhaalspawn

/Thread

Yeah, I find it sad too - RIP Helia.


As I and others pointed out, you have a lot of interactions based on your race and class. I'm not keen on playing evil characters, but I don't think, I miss out by playing Tav instead of Durge or an origin. Durge just has different interactions and - since I was spoilered there - a connection to something specific in the old games, which I think, might even be presented better here, since I never felt like I in the old games. So in fact the Durge does do that better imo

Riiiight… So I just started a new playthrough with Durge today and I just got to the scene with Alfira… so, Tav+ is technically is an uncontrollable murder-hobo with detailed gory scenes. Cheers Larian!

Ok, the game is rated M and I knew it so I am not complaining… I guess I will just reload and go back to being my companions (unhappy) vanilla sidekick. Maybe I can push Lae’zel in chasm now and then when I am too fed up with her…

But seriously, the Durge story is intriguing so far, but maybe let’s remember that Bg1 and 2 had isometric graphics (pretty goreless) and Charname had full control. This version is interesting, but I saw more guts and vicera in a single day on the screen than I ever wished to.

Yep, the whole Tav+ thing is completely wrong. Swen tried to warn people against it. It's a very different experience compared to just Tav.

Urge Being Tav+ and Urge having irritating story beats that might steer you in a narrative direction you don't like aren't mutually exclusive. Like there is no doubt whatsoever that Durge gets more unique content than Tav. Is there *any* scene that's Tav exclusive that can't be had by either Durge or one of the Origins? There's your answer.

But Durge is obviously not for everyone, and a big part of that is that it's essentially the Bhaalspawn's story except dialed up to eleven with shock gore and edginess.... and with hidden character details not revealed to you from the start of the game that might not mesh with your character creation choices narratively.
Could Durge be written in a way that it was a better fit for more varieties of custom characters? Yes.

Could Larian have written more Durge-like origins that supported more varieties of playstyles while preserving their unique narrative perspective and story? Yes

Does Tav have a unique expriences anywhere near on par with the Origins or Durge? Hell No.

Hell, Lae'zel is enough of a blank slate already that with the ability to change her gender and customize her appearance and class, you'd basically have another Durge character. But compare to the experience of playing a custom Tav Gith though, and you see where all the writing for the 'Gith experience' went.

The whole Orgins/Durge/Tav system was just so very poorly thought out from the get-go.

Fair enough. I was commenting on the notion that Durge was effectively Tav+. But it is certainly possible that this is not true, and that playing Tav and playing Durge are of roughly equally good game-playing experiences. I'm not convinced of this yet, but I certainly concede that it is possible.

This is how I see things as well.

As I've said before, the quality of a person's game-playing experience is: Durge > Origins > Tav, when it surely ought to have been Tav > Durge > Origins.

Believe me, the Durge is a totally different character from Tav. And Tav gets a lot if tags. I don't feel, like my halfling bardlock is an afterthought, she is the hero of her own story with some colorful companions.

Well, it also matters what those "tage" are. Tags that are based on the demographics of the custom Tav (race, class, and so on) are to me rather superficial. I'm not at all saying they shouldn't be present; of course they should. But playing Tav should be special in ways that have nothing to do with basic demographics such as race or class. It should be special based on Tav's centrality and relevance to the main story.