Spell caster classes (wiz/cler/druid) feel extremely limited and gimped with the limitation of spell tiers to 6.
If i compare BG3 spell repertoire to the old Neverwinter Nights the BG3 caster classes feel like they are missing half the spells, and most of those missing being the actually fun & cool ones.
I am not saying these classes are weak in BG3, just that its like the best half of the spell arsenal is missing due to this cap of character lvl 12.
BG3 is overall a fun game but missing these high tier spells really killed any incentive i had to play a spellcaster class, which are usually by far my favorite in these kinds of games.
Higher teir spells ate 'too hard' to make properly in 2023. But, in 2000, they were made beautifully.
This is not true. Let's not act like BG2 was anywhere near as good as BG3, let alone better. The wish spell in BG2 especially was absolutely butchered, worked like a slot machine without downsides...which is NOT how it works in D&D at all. Not to mention that game didn't have nearly the amount of spells and abilities of BG3.
Higher teir spells ate 'too hard' to make properly in 2023. But, in 2000, they were made beautifully.
This is not true. Let's not act like BG2 was anywhere near as good as BG3, let alone better. The wish spell in BG2 especially was absolutely butchered, worked like a slot machine without downsides...which is NOT how it works in D&D at all. Not to mention that game didn't have nearly the amount of spells and abilities of BG3.
And no other DnD game has ever again contained the Wish spells. Larian could have done the same and left that one out if it was too hard.
Also in that case, why have wild magic sorcs in BG3 if it doesn't even function to a fraction of its power in PnP?
One of the rolls is meant to be that you teleport to and take control over a wizard tower, ok so where's my wizard tower if I play a wild magic sorc in BG3?
And yes no I'll say it, BG2 absolutely was better than BG3, best DnD game to this day with no contest.
And yes no I'll say it, BG2 absolutely was better than BG3, best DnD game to this day with no contest.
I don't even know where to start with that entire take. Your argument amounts to "well they could have done it the really terrible way BG2 did so therefore BG2 better". Possibly the single worst Baldur's Gate related take I have ever seen. BG3 does infinitely more and infinitely better than BG2. Would I like to be able to go to level 20 and experience those kinds of power levels, sure, but the way BG2 did is absolutely NOT the way. It's fair to say BG1 and 2 were good videogames as long as long as you don't consider them D&D games, because they failed horribly at doing D&D...but they were not even close to being as good as BG3 both in terms of videogames and D&D.
Please dont compare the 1960's music with the 1980's music next... yes it was much better in the 60's
I have played online games since 1991 when Never Winter Nights was released on AOL... I KNOW my games... and I have known many many games since. So don't question my gaming experience it's longer then most of you have been alive.
And yes no I'll say it, BG2 absolutely was better than BG3, best DnD game to this day with no contest.
I don't even know where to start with that entire take. Your argument amounts to "well they could have done it the really terrible way BG2 did so therefore BG2 better". Possibly the single worst Baldur's Gate related take I have ever seen. BG3 does infinitely more and infinitely better than BG2. Would I like to be able to go to level 20 and experience those kinds of power levels, sure, but the way BG2 did is absolutely NOT the way. It's fair to say BG1 and 2 were good videogames as long as long as you don't consider them D&D games, because they failed horribly at doing D&D...but they were not even close to being as good as BG3 both in terms of videogames and D&D.
BG3 doesn't even have half of the spell options BG2 had. Most enchantment and illusion spells in BG3 are useless. Theres no polymorph self. Theres only 1 contingency not 3. You literally cannot replicate the mage combat in BG2 in any of the DnD games that came after it.
And limited wish / wish weren't terrible at all in BG2, I never claimed as such, you did.
And not to mention sheer amount of OP class combinations you could do with the BG2 level cap. No other DnD game has ever come close to BG2's scale of offering as much of the DnD experience as possible.
BG3 doesn't even have half of the spell options BG2 had. Most enchantment and illusion spells in BG3 are useless. Theres no polymorph self. Theres only 1 contingency not 3. You literally cannot replicate the mage combat in BG2 in any of the DnD games that came after it.
And limited wish / wish weren't terrible at all in BG2, I never claimed as such, you did
This is purely and objectively false. BG2 had 185 spells with 12 added by Throne of Bhaal in total, BG3 has over 200 and they all work a lot better and far closer to 5e. Also wish was objectively terrible in BG2 because that was literally NOT the Wish spell...not even remotely close to how the actual Wish spell works. They literally invented total nonsense for BG2 that had nothing to do with D&D. Not to mention in BG2 you don't even have a fraction of the freedom you do in BG3. Just because BG3 doesn't inflate the level higher with trash spells that don't work like they're supposed to at all doesn't make it a worse game.
Look at that. Personal insults start, because you can't handle the truth. Bg3 is good, but BG2 is one of the best games ever. It says a lot you use an insult pushed by a guy who lives off if leaching off the bg creators' sloppy seconds while praising bg3 which wouldn't exist without bg2. There's a reason why bg3 is named bg3 and not some other title- to leech of the legendary name if BG. And, I mean the game, not the city, which was pretty much irrelevant before '98.
Look at that. Personal insults start, because you can't handle the truth. Bg3 is good, but BG2 is one of the best games ever. It says a lot you use an insult pushed by a guy who lives off if leaching off the bg creators' sloppy seconds while praising bg3 which wouldn't exist without bg2. There's a reason why bg3 is named bg3 and not some other title- to leech of the legendary name if BG. And, I mean the game, not the city, which was pretty much irrelevant before '98.
LONG LIVE BG!!!
You believe grognard to be an insult? You might wish to look up the meaning.
Your arguments are however spurious. By your "logic" Pong is the greatest game of all time because it was the first computer game and computer games wouldn't exist without the first.
The Babbage Difference Engine is not the greatest computer of all time even though it was the first and modern computers wouldn't exist without it.
BG3 is superior to its predecessors by any measure.
I do agree with you that, thanks to Larian, the BG franchise will live long and prosper.
BG3 doesn't even have half of the spell options BG2 had. Most enchantment and illusion spells in BG3 are useless. Theres no polymorph self. Theres only 1 contingency not 3. You literally cannot replicate the mage combat in BG2 in any of the DnD games that came after it.
And limited wish / wish weren't terrible at all in BG2, I never claimed as such, you did
This is purely and objectively false. BG2 had 185 spells with 12 added by Throne of Bhaal in total, BG3 has over 200 and they all work a lot better and far closer to 5e. Also wish was objectively terrible in BG2 because that was literally NOT the Wish spell...not even remotely close to how the actual Wish spell works. They literally invented total nonsense for BG2 that had nothing to do with D&D. Not to mention in BG2 you don't even have a fraction of the freedom you do in BG3. Just because BG3 doesn't inflate the level higher with trash spells that don't work like they're supposed to at all doesn't make it a worse game.
Theres literally like 5 threads all complaining that every spell other than fireball in bg3 is trash.
Over 200 spell and 150+ of those will never get used because they are useless, either concentrations based or only last 1-2 turns.
And yea the main issue is that every edition of DnD past 2.0, DnD get worse and worse and increasingly simplified and dumbed down. BG3 while a good game is still to BG2 what Dragone Age 2 & 3 were to Dragon Age 1.
Oh and gas form can't even pass through iron gates lol. All these nifty spells and none work. Hold person 20% chance on most targets. Improved Invisibly first save to maintain it is 15+. Sleep / hypnotic pattern only last 2 turns, command lasts 1 turn.
No finger of death or any instakill mechanics anymore, why is phantasamal killer still called as such if it no longer has a death effect? Where are my favourite bg2 spells polymorph self and simulacrum? Summon Nishruu / Efreet, in fact every summon spell in BG3 is completely weak and useless.
Or how about 'Tell me you never even played bg2 without telling me you never even played bg2'. It seems to me like Larian have never played it either, beyond simply copying the spell icons not one thing in bg3 comes close to how great bg2 was, and no game ever will.
Wish in BG2 didnt have no downsides, so clearly you never played the game. Success of the wish spell was based on your Wisdom score, if it was too low your wishes could backfire with a worse effect, granted that there were only 2 effects per individual wish, one good one bad.
Another perk in BG2 - any party member could have max CHA and you could benefit from it. In BG3 CHA only works on MC and not if a companion has it when MC enters dialogue. I'm entirely sure thats not how PnP works, you get to use your groups highest perception rolla when looking for traps, im quite sure you get to use your highest speech skill roll as well.
BG3 doesn't even have half of the spell options BG2 had. Most enchantment and illusion spells in BG3 are useless. Theres no polymorph self. Theres only 1 contingency not 3. You literally cannot replicate the mage combat in BG2 in any of the DnD games that came after it.
And limited wish / wish weren't terrible at all in BG2, I never claimed as such, you did
This is purely and objectively false. BG2 had 185 spells with 12 added by Throne of Bhaal in total, BG3 has over 200 and they all work a lot better and far closer to 5e. Also wish was objectively terrible in BG2 because that was literally NOT the Wish spell...not even remotely close to how the actual Wish spell works. They literally invented total nonsense for BG2 that had nothing to do with D&D. Not to mention in BG2 you don't even have a fraction of the freedom you do in BG3. Just because BG3 doesn't inflate the level higher with trash spells that don't work like they're supposed to at all doesn't make it a worse game.
Theres literally like 5 threads all complaining that every spell other than fireball in bg3 is trash.
Over 200 spell and 150+ of those will never get used because they are useless, either concentrations based or only last 1-2 turns.
And yea the main issue is that every edition of DnD past 2.0, DnD get worse and worse and increasingly simplified and dumbed down. BG3 while a good game is still to BG2 what Dragone Age 2 & 3 were to Dragon Age 1.
Oh and gas form can't even pass through iron gates lol. All these nifty spells and none work. Hold person 20% chance on most targets. Improved Invisibly first save to maintain it is 15+. Sleep / hypnotic pattern only last 2 turns, command lasts 1 turn.
No finger of death or any instakill mechanics anymore, why is phantasamal killer still called as such if it no longer has a death effect? Where are my favourite bg2 spells polymorph self and simulacrum? Summon Nishruu / Efreet, in fact every summon spell in BG3 is completely weak and useless.
Or how about 'Tell me you never even played bg2 without telling me you never even played bg2'. It seems to me like Larian have never played it either, beyond simply copying the spell icons not one thing in bg3 comes close to how great bg2 was, and no game ever will.
Wish in BG2 didnt have no downsides, so clearly you never played the game. Success of the wish spell was based on your Wisdom score, if it was too low your wishes could backfire with a worse effect, granted that there were only 2 effects per individual wish, one good one bad.
Another perk in BG2 - any party member could have max CHA and you could benefit from it. In BG3 CHA only works on MC and not if a companion has it when MC enters dialogue. I'm entirely sure thats not how PnP works, you get to use your groups highest perception rolla when looking for traps, im quite sure you get to use your highest speech skill roll as well.
Yeah, most of BG3 spells are pretty awful, especially the controlling effects. But, Greater Invisibility really takes the cake, its awfulness is on a scale all its own. So, you spend a 4th level spell slot and your concentration, and there after every non-concentration spell you cast requires a DC 15 stealth check or you lose your invisibility. It's hilarious, what were they even thinking? So, good luck using your high level class features, a spell in this case, as you're very unlikely to have stealth proficiency or a more than a decent dexterity. Could they not just give enemy units disadvantage to attack you and give you advantage on attacks? That's the spell's real function at its most basic level.
Insta-kill spells were never a good mechanic in older D&D. Let's not pretend having that much RNG is a good thing in any system.
Disintegrate doing 75 or Finger of Death doing 62 damage (+reanimate) in 5e is essentially the same thing, except balanced. They're still really powerful. High level characters and boss enemies have some form of protection at least. And it's cool you have to whittle down a boss a little bit before those spells go "online".
What messes up BG3 is the Long Rest spam and how Larian have beefed up the encounters to fight full strength parties. Inflated stats, saving throws and HP make heavy hitting spells feel weak. Gamey mechanics like Unstoppable on regular enemies make everything feel lackluster. And Larian's hate for control effects has reduced all spellcasters into brainless Magic Missile and Fireball machines.
Insta-kill spells were never a good mechanic in older D&D. Let's not pretend having that much RNG is a good thing in any system.
Disintegrate doing 75 or Finger of Death doing 62 damage (+reanimate) in 5e is essentially the same thing, except balanced. They're still really powerful. High level characters and boss enemies have some form of protection at least. And it's cool you have to whittle down a boss a little bit before those spells go "online".
What messes up BG3 is the Long Rest spam and how Larian have beefed up the encounters to fight full strength parties. Inflated stats, saving throws and HP make heavy hitting spells feel weak. Gamey mechanics like Unstoppable on regular enemies make everything feel lackluster. And Larian's hate for control effects has reduced all spellcasters into brainless Magic Missile and Fireball machines.
Nope instakill spells are fantastic and amazing fun. Go and spend 10 years playing dungeons and dragons online to make a viable DC caster - you need 12+ past life feats, 6+ epic past life feats, difficult to obtain gear and then you can finger / wail / mass hold high difficulty content. Otherwise you can still be viable on lower difficulties, but good luck finding low difficulty groups in such an old game where everyone still playing has sunk in the time and effort to make uber characters.
The content can scale to match the difficulty. Ok so if FOD / Wail fail its a wasted spell? This is also addressed in DDO - on a save against wail enemies still take negative levels if they are susceptible to level drain. On a fail against FoD, it becomes the second most powerful negative damage spell second to necrotic ray. Based on the game being an MMO with hit point inflation a saved FoD can still deal over 1500 nectrotic damage on a correctly specced pale master, necrotic ray can crit for over 3000, which doesnt matter much when normal enemies eventually scale to over 15k HP and bosses to over 100k.
But the DC spells work and are incredibly fun to use. So do damage specced sorcs - draconic sorcerers can hit for like 50k damage with their specialised elements, but good luck with fire which happens to be the most resisted element in the game, though this is also manageable on a fire specced sorc by also having some acid or electric spells on the side as well.
Character building is where the fun is with DnD - a level cap of 12 doesn't really offer much character building options.
Some finger of death / wail of the banshee footage here, bearing in mind this is also a 14 year old video and just in a basic explorer area of the game:
Oh a 12 year old video of my own of farming some epic level mobs in the first 5% of a raid for whatever it was that they dropped, epic scrolls or something:
Wail / FOD / Circle of Death / Flesh to Stone / Mass hold / and much level draining to get them to work utilized, it might not look great but it was incredible fun to play.
Eh also pudding summoning rogue / monk of some kind cos why not:
BG3 is great. But. BG2 is on a whole other DIMENSION in epic-ness compared to BG3. It has MORE OF EVERYTHING. Except for SEX, CINEMATICS and a pretty fun turn base system.
More involving story. More creatures. More companions, banters and interesting romances and FRIENDSHIPS. More quests. More useful spells and ABILITIES. Over half of BG3's spells are annoying or pointless. More interesting items. More unique areas. More dialogue content and choices. (in the end , BG3 choices don't matter a bit it seems, so ill take BG2's detailed non cinematic dialogues). More IMMERSION. Day/night, atmospheric effects, world feels alive, and quests based on these immersion aspects. and.... More MODS that add EVEN MORE companions, dialogues and stories. Something that BG3 will never ever be able to do due to its "cinematic" centric design.
Last edited by Count Turnipsome; 15/08/2310:12 AM.
It just reminded me of the bowl of goat's milk that old Winthrop used to put outside his door every evening for the dust demons. He said the dust demons could never resist goat's milk, and that they would always drink themselves into a stupor and then be too tired to enter his room..
200+ spells and only 5-10 are viable. Why even bother with wizards when fireball and lightning bolt on a sorc is all you need?
I was curious about sorcs not getting acid arrow so I looked up 5e PnP rules and yes its a wizard only spell, yet it also states in the guidelines on the site I checked that acid arrow is a useless spell at all levels because magic missile does the same amount of damage and always hits, like with all spells in 5e it seems, acid arrow will also fail a lot.
The uselessness of many of the spells isn't just a BG3 issue, its a 5e issue in general. Just nerf everything to the point that magic missile and fireball are the only spells you'll ever need, boring.
Also no other game to this game has matched how epic mage vs mage combat was in BG2. In one of my playthroughs I made a full anti mage spell sorcerer, breach, spell thrust, pierce spell etc.
Later DnD editions decided that was all too much and now its all dumbed down to just counterspell. Mages can only maintain 1 buff thanks to concentration. Everything is completely gimped and ruined compared to BG2 / 2nd edition ruleset.
Did people even know how good level 4 polymorph self even was in BG2?
When they were making the enhanced editions, I was the person that pointed this out and the fact you could solo the entirety of BG1 as a sword spider and it needed nerfing for BG1 but not 2, leading to the polymorphs being nerfed in BG1 EE but retained in BG2EE. And the BG1 community conversion mods that simply added BG2 classes and spells to the game all had this same issue.
So what if spells are powerful if they are fun and players enjoy using them? Try out a solo run as a sword spider some time, its awesome though broken.
Prof. Dr. Dr. Mad S. Tist 
