Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Mega-threads and Guides BG3 Party Movement Mechanic

I struggle to figure out what’s intended and what’s a skit.

Still, I won’t hold gaming on stage against anyone. It’s not a normal setup. Whenever I try to show a game to someone I play like crap - my mind just isn’t focused. I am more worried by what I saw in game, than how I have seen devs play.

Idk if anyone in the tread responded to you but for the stealth aspect at least there is a key bind for stealthing a whole party vs just your character.

Yeah, it was added over time, like the option to instantly group/ungroup the entire party with a button press.

They were discussed at lengths during the EA.

Both welcomed additions, don't get me wrong.
Both also insufficient at making the whole system any good.

so it seems larian still stubborningly barging their egoism dead set on the toilet chain. why is it so hard to just allow keyboard & mouse players to just drag and select?

+1

This is a really good question.

Or Shift + click for multiple selection from portraits. The two most intuitive selection methods used everywhere else.

But no, no no. Larian knows better because it was time the wheel got reinvented. It's better to have a clunky chain / unchain all system without the ability to easily select 1-4 PC's. Where members of the party often get inexplicably left behind when they got ungrouped for some reason. Where PC's run in circles through hazards like headless chicken after battle because 'follow' is always on.

I have been designing miniature, boardgames, rpg modules since the early 60's. I have to agree this movement system leaves much to be desired. It's amazing how quickly things go south trying to sneak up on an enemy party. I've had a party split and to the winds march, move up and change their marching order (weakest in front), walking into walls of flame when a path is open, move onto a trap while another party member is trying to disarm it. I've lost track of how many times I'll be moving the party and suddenly I only have one member moving. Takes forever to get them to group up again. In all party control is a sad implementation at best and deadly at it's worse. Took 30 mins to get through the intro because of the interface.

LongBeak

Just because I found it in almost equal parts hilarious and depressing... here's a guy I just crossed on another forum asking people for help after buying into Early Access just today and being absolutely baffled at how bad the game controls:


I'll also post a direct link here: https://www.resetera.com/threads/baldurs-gate-3-ot-trust-the-dice.748459/post-109833763

...so whoever is curious can see the following bunch of replies (four different people) who tried to explain to him in different ways that yeah, the system in place sucks, but you can get used to it with some adjustment.
What a striking first impression, eh.

That aside, in the various threads dedicated to the game that popped in the last weeks, a sizable chunk of the comments were about impatience to get controller support to not have to deal with the current controls (which is not going to be a complete solution, but let people dream).

Chain Movement needs something like a set follow distance. Or a longer radius for the chain.

Grouped movement needs a couple things which would make it a lot less frustrating to use under the current scheme since clearly this is what we're getting here. First we need to set the length of the chain between what we have currently and a long/short lead. This concerns movement outside of combat right, so the long lead would be like for scouting. Basically where the controlled PC can move to the distance of the edge pan say, and everyone else will remain in position at that remove. Then when the rest of the companions follow they should trace the scouting PCs steps, pathfinding along the PCs route rather than trying to close the shortest distance. Long lead chain would basically = single file pathing.

The other option we need is the shorter lead, where the PCs cluster together as closely as possible. Like a yank of the chain "rally to me" close distance, and then all the companions should do whatever it takes to get into a quick wedge, like jumping if they have to get right on PC. To me it's fine if there's some ambling when switching between these distances, basically the trade off between travelling in a loose or tight formation. I understand they need some level of companion movement chicanery otherwise you can't do hazardous terrain or do traps very well, but I think we need a following distance for companions that goes beyond simple grouped/ungrouped, since the latter can be pretty tedius. I know party movement got a lot of feedback in EA, but given what we have now I mean, I think something like that would be helpful. When combat ends the chain should automatically go to long lead. All characters stay in position until the controlled PC runs to the edgepan. This would prevent the player from always having to ungroup before combat to ensure that when combat resolves peeps don't run into dagger clouds or puddles of acid and such, which can be very frustrating especially if it was a long and hard fought battle. I think the base difficulty setting could also autosave on combat which would alleviate some of the frustrations, but mostly it could be handled by just having a longer chain which would probably cut down like half of the reloads from movement goofs.

The other thing we need is for the order of the portraits on the left to be relevant. So if we have to imagine it like a physical chain, the Portrait at the top is holding the chain and everyone else follows their lead, but like in that order. Right now trying to drag the portrait out and then back into the group is awkward, they'll drop position to the bottom, ungroup completely etc. It should be much sticker and the sort of thing you could keybind by position there.

Imagine how many of these problems would be solved at their source WITHOUT having a chain system entirely.

Just a common drag & select plus the ability to select more than one character at once.

It is a bit irritating, yes, although they'd still need some kind of grouping solution for the console versions either way. Can't really drag-and-select with a gamepad. Although to be honest the only issue I have with the current system is how FIDDLY re-ordering the character portraits is with the mouse when there's more than two party members to a grouping.

Yeah I mean the point has been well made. It's pretty baffling

The Gauntlet of Shar was particularly annoying. You know trying to get 4 people to go up the elevator, but only 3 managed to get on and Gale got crushed to death when we tried to go back down to retrieve him. Having to reload and redo the Faith-Leap trial, forgetting to ungroup, dead again. Feels like the game was designed for a player to control 1 PC and 1 Follower at most, because anything beyond that and they're just ambling. Like I'm sure it works fine in Co-Op with a party of 4 being controlled by 2 players and grouped into 2 groups. But for SP controlling 4 it can be quite aggravating.

All I really want is a way to make my party walk in a line along the same path as the controlled character. I don't know how they rework it for a drag and select, because the cam and controls are locked onto the currently selected Character, rather than having the player control the group as a group. The fiddly portrait management just sorta highlights the annoyance factor further, cause it only works half the time and anyway the order of those portraits doesn't seem to matter, whereas I think it should be party position with the face/leader at the top. In the old BG games the Character would give a bark if they were chosen to lead, which would also be nice.

The exact same elevator thing happened to me. Roughly every few hours of gameplay I'd experience at least a mild annoyance relating to the toilet chain. The elevator thing, party re-arranging themselves to walk into traps, party (& Flaming Sphere) rushing over to me after combat ends and getting hurt by it, party running over fire surfaces, jump fests where some party members don't jump so I switch to them, which results in party members jumping back while I'm jumping forward, etc.

And yeah, the chain system is meant (or is at least less terrible) for a 2-4 person co op experience.

we already went over this so many times, but to reiterate: it's a fake issue because the solution used on a controller should have no bearing whatsoever in how one plays on mouse and keyboard.
Basically: allowing drag & select on M&KB would NOT prevent to use an auto-following system on consoles/controllers.

It takes like 20 button combo just to make everyone hide. Most games in the RPG genre use a "one hide - all hide" and though I appreciate the ability to hide individuals one at a time, it is not what I want 95% of the time. It could be there and I haven't found it. I'm only 20 hours in.

There are two buttons below the party portraits line to the left. One is to ungroup, i.e. move everyone individually, and the other is for group hide.

the movement system does need formations and a jump when I jump order. Following members default should be single file not a diamond as it is even worse with the no party limit as that turns into a triangle. Even hitting right click the party members do not always stop. controlled character moves a hair and I have party members running all over the place. Oh, main guy is looting let's follow his every move while maintaining a broken formation while moving twenty feet for every step he makes. Ungrouping is the only solution. Following on long movements puts the entire group way behind the main character or initiating combat when i am still out of sight range. or on some choke point. If I am going through a door everyone would continue through the door and not just stop or even have them roll not to knock each other down if surprise the front character stops because there is someone in the room.

Was in the rock and went to a door half my team went to the other door and tried to go through. I was stuck saying sorry didn't know not to go through there about two dozen time because it kept giving lead to another character causing the rest to start shifting and wanting to open the door. Or I am near the bank and somehow, I aggravated a npc on the inside of the bank. They kicked me out of the bank putting me in the front of the bank. I was outside not inside.

So yes, the formation system needs work and the auto follow even more so, hey there is a trap let's stomp on it has to go. Hey, a trap everyone should freeze. I would rather combat start to remove the trap them step on a trap. Click on disarm trap and set the trap off even if successful at disarming the trap and dying is annoying.

system telling me I can't get there and so I jump when the character moves, they go through the others that were blocking them from walking through to jump.

Single file formation would stop a lot of this as the controlled character stops the others would have to stop. If combat starts your squishes are not blocking the plate wearers who. Lead character moves as fast as the slowest person and not ten meters ahead of everyone.

I wish I could adequately describe how frustrating "jump" is for party movement in this game.

Since party members cannot "move through" friendly space, followers are constantly getting separated from the group, even when they aren't being manually grouped/ungrouped. Like why? Does Shadowheart really need the full 5 meters to make her takeoffs and landings? Can't the stragglers just teleport to catch up outside combat? Why can't we just move through friendly space, and have our companion just step aside temporarily while we pass?

It's maddening. Some tiny jump that anyone with 8 strength could easily make? This should not even require me to hit a button.

I'd understand if you're using the "Jump" spell or Feather Fall or Misty Step, but not when all the follower needs to do is clear a little half meter gap to reach an otherwise 'inaccessible' area.

"Can't reach" is a super frustrating message whenever it occurs as a result of these jump gaps.

After this, the next most frustrating thing for me is targeting. Or like anytime my PC is attempting to close the distance in order to cast a spell or make an attack. Why can't I tell the game that I want to keep my feet planted when casting or shooting an arrow, unless I confirm? This is already a pain for me, because I'm being forced to use a standard control scheme, rather than inverting the camera pitch for the Y axis like I'm used to.

This is very much a movement issue, not just a camera control issue, since basic movement in this game hinges on targeting. Unless you modded your scheme for WASD or are playing with a controller, every movement command issued in BG3 requires that you first target a spot on the ground plane, so these issue are inextricably linked in that way. Problems with the one compound into the other.

All my favorite areas in the game from an aesthetic and visual design standpoint, are also the most frustrating from a party movement and basic controls standpoint. I'm marveling at the gorgeous surroundings and admiring all these towering statues and cool architecture, then I have to interact with it or move around it, or find a sight line for targeting - and that just pulls me right out of the experience. Exploration should be pleasant and relaxing, instead I get vertigo and anxiety hehe.


Grymforge remains the worst for this, but the Gauntlet, the Monastery, pretty much any area which shows off the verticality, with all those platforms and puzzlers, shooting levers etc. These would seem to require nuanced party movement controls and a lot of aiming above/below the sightline. You know, the exact sort of situation where you'd want to be able to invert your Y axis and control your camera pitch to make that comfortable if that's your norm. Also, in these areas the game seems to be saying, 'why aren't you ungrouping and moving your 4 characters 1 at a time, at all times, in ISO?' Well, because that's annoying and inefficient for a party based game, especially in exploration. I'd rather have conventional party movement controls and a conventional camera. Like come on, just finish your skyboxes already, so we can have the camera we've been asking for since the literal first day of Early Access! lol

In my view the targeting in this game is currently backwards. We should confirm the target first and then the action/spell, not vice versa. Right now, the way they have it, just results in a lot of arrows and spells pointlessly hitting the floor right next to my intended target. Off by a millimeter. Or else someone moves in the way, or the camera shifted.

They should just hire the people on Nexus who made those native camera tweaks and WASD mods, so we can have that built into the base game. Then revisit the party movement once that's in order. Alas, I just don't understand why it has taken so long with no real progress on this front outside of modding the game. I can muddle along reasonably well for much of the campaign, but when it tries to really test us on this stuff in areas that platform everywhere, the wonky controls just make it so much more grueling than it needs to be.

Really hoping this somehow gets better with time. They've gotten so much feedback on this issue, I feel like we should be much further along at this point. I don't know, fingers crossed I guess, but still.

ps. Also to points made on the previous page regarding the desire for a more organic or non robotic presentation of these characters during party movement...

I feel like there has to be a way to achieve that without foregoing actual control of the party - as a party... I mean right?

Otherwise it seems like the only way they could figure out how to make things like traps or hazards actually hazardous, was to just kick the controller out of our hands at precisely the moment when we'd want to be fully in control. It's much more annoying than it is immersive, probably, depending on how recently you saved your game. I also enjoy a little chaos and the occasional random idle for flare. Our Party members don't have to stand at attention the whole time, or feel like lifeless automatons just to avoid breaking a general formation. We should be able to maintain some semblance of the 'god-mode' full party control, while still having naturalistic movements for the individual PCs.

That said, how many times do I have to watch 3 people jump across a gap and then immediately jump back, blocking the space for the 4th party member who for whatever reason couldn't find a spot to land? How realistic is that? Or why can't I make someone just look my direction occasionally without a bunch of cam snaps? Why can't I quickly issue a command for everyone to just stand still, while I do what needs doing with the selected character, without having to go through the tedium of ungrouping and regrouping constantly? Watching someone B-line into noxious fumes might be amusing if it only takes 20 seconds to reload from that same point, it's a bit different if you just lost 20 minutes of progress over some rando controls error or an AI pathing snafu. I think the biggest problem is not differentiating between Hostile and Friendly space for movement purposes, which forces jump actions or going the long way round, when it shouldn't really be necessary. Like maybe they could start there?

I have to stress again the targeting sequence issue and the camera pitch thing, since this will affect stuff that's happening both inside TB mode and outside of it. (Most of my issues with BG3s party movement concern stuff outside of combat, since inside TB combat there really isn't such a thing as party movement.) Targeting cam/controls are used in both situations though.

If the targeting preceded the action/spell confirmation, then we could do what many games have done, and allow the player to quickly cycle between available/visible targets in range (PC remains stationary). A hotkey could then switch to the visible targets in-range if the PC uses their full movement. Click again to cycle interactables or to lock coordinates on a ground plane. Double click or hold confirmations for actions/spells to avoid misfires. Also, for confirmations we really need to be able to do this from the status portraits, though currently this is unreliable. Many actions/spells require us to click into the field of view on an avatar, even when a portrait is hovering above or to the side. Both should highlight (the avatar and the status portrait) if that character is being targeted currently.

Overall I have a pretty positive impression of BG3 and there are many things about this game that I absolutely love, but the party movement mechanic is not one of them. I don't begrudge anyone who finds this current scheme sufficient, and I'm glad it's working well enough for some, but this is one of the main things that gets under my skin with BG3. It hasn't stopped me from clocking another 500 hours since the full release dropped, but I swear, every time I hit the "quit game" button, it's because of a party movement type kink.

Virtually every session ends that way for me. Not because I'm bored, or satisfied, like "this is a great place to stop, camp and unwind." Instead it'll be because someone just casually walked into lava, or misfired a spell, or accidentally aggro'd the whole village by mis-clicking some random red chest that popped into view at the last second. This is rarely followed by a chuckle and a slap on the knee for me, instead it just leaves a sour taste. It's not hyperbole, this is what goes down most nights to prompt the log off. Otherwise I'd probably never sleeep lol. They're always rage quits though, like pretty much every time. Then I have to come grumble about it here instead of thinking about Portraits or cool builds, or other actually 'fun' stuff that might have me preoccupied with the warm and fuzzies. If they had nailed the controls from the get-go I might never even have signed up for these boards, cause I'd be way too busy just enjoying the game. Hence, feedback... lol

Here are a few screens to illustrate this issue mentioned above.

These are from the vanilla game, sans mods...



Then an about-face, to see the situation from the other side of the doorway, after advancing as far was we could...





In this instance Astarion is being completely blocked by other party members.

He has 7.5 meters of movement still available but can't advance an inch without jumping, despite the fairly large gap that would seem to be indicated by the visual on the circular marquees.

Basically the characters all take up more space on the ground plane than should be required. I don't mind if this happens with Hostile space or Neutral Space, but it's just baffling to have the party behave that way in Friendly space. It looks like Astarion could easily slide right through, without even having to tweak his shoulders or anything. Part of the problem is that the information we should have is not being communicated to the player effectively.

Our movement vector is depicted by a single doted line when it should probably be something like 2 dotted lines right? I mean if they're going to do it this way.

Then the player would at least know how much space is actually needed to get from point A to point B before committing to the movement. Or something similar to the way sight-lines are depicted while hidden. In this situation I thought, ok well maybe if I just advance a little bit, then a new path will open up once I get past the threshold, but nope, just stuck. Now is it a huge deal here? Sure not really, but the problem presents everywhere and all the time, anytime the party members get bunched up.

Also, if they wanted to play with this idea, they could perhaps have the movement path/space/width tied to things like Dex as well as creature size. So maybe a lumbering hulk in full plate would have a slightly larger reticle than a lithe Astarion roguish type who can turn his shoulders and skate by ya know. But before we can even get to something like that, first they need to free up the friendly space right? Our characters take up this giant area on the ground plane relative to what should be required. Two people fighting back to back is something that's not really possible here currently.

I feel like they should do some shuffling/tumbling type mocap and totally rework how friendly space is handled for the party.

In Tactician perhaps the enemies can move through their own friendly (to them) space, which would make crowd controlling them more challenging, whereas in the Explorer setting Hostiles might be restricted the way they are currently. That could also be interesting. I should have just left Astarion at camp lol. I knew it was going to be trouble when his lvl up and hotbar was a complete afterthought lol, but I was pretty sure I'd have to bust a lock to make it out of there with the Boon. Alas. Just kinda annoying, the same way jump is annoying when there appears to be room to make a landing but isn't. They give us a dotted line, and we can see how large the circles are when stationary, but we're also in forced perspective most the time, meaning the farther away you are trying to move the harder it will be to parse the available space. If you're using dash and such, it's worse, since the further away you are from the destination the smaller stuff gets. Unless you want to hit O, which is the most vertigo inducing view of all for me. I just wish it didn't have to be so cumbersome.

I could understand if Lae'zels circle was taking up the entire space, but you can see how tiny the overlap is that's blocking the movement. Like can't he just step over her toes, or step on her toes as she lets out an irritated bark, but still the movement can be completed?

It needs more attention. All this stuff.