Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Story & Character Discussion Are you dissapointed with companions variety?

I didn't play BG 1 and 2, was it possible to romance her both times?

No; only BG2 had romances (although the Enhanced Edition introduced some in BG1 but not with original characters). Besides she was married to Khalid; he had to be, er, gotten rid of...

The other companions are very well written too, with the exception of Halsin - some of their stories had me moved to tears actually.
I would argue, that it is even harder to take an established character and make something new with them without changing their personality - and that, they did well with Jaheira - and Minsc for that matter. I would even go so far, that I like BG3 Minsc more than BG 1&2 MInsc.

Don't say that - I liked Khalid, I was very sad, that he got killed off in BG2 - and offscreen no less.

For variety of companions for future games I hope they have a better balance of good and evil companions available at the start of the game! I would like more good companions available near the start.

Jaheira is great, but you don’t get her until the end of Act 2. Halsin you also don’t get until Act 2, although a bit earlier than Jaheira. Halsin was my favorite character in EA but in my opinion is a bit disappointing in the full release. I wish they had done better with him!

Yeah. Seeing her in BG3 actually made me kind of sad because I remembered Khalid was still dead. Wish he was still with us, I could always use another Fighter. Granted it has been 23 years since Bioware killed him off, but seeing her there in BG3 just reminded me.

But it was nice to see the nod to Khalid in the game - that was a nice touch.

Fair enough, but this is one subject where we'll just have to agree to disagree. I consider the writing in BG3 to be its worst weakness, and a pretty bad one at that.

Yeah me too. In BG1 I always recruited Khalid and Jeheira right away, and have always been happy with Khalid as a fighter character in my party despite many others always complaining about him. Then in BG2 I always feel bad about romancing Jaheira exactly because I liked Khalid and was sad to see him killed off, but at the same time never could really come to care about any of the other romance options available.

Sort answer to the op.
NO
But i am disappointed with the male interactions. I don't like to be harassed by Gale Will and Astarion.
The Bear and Minsc aren't so aggressive.
I dont understand why can't I have a regular friendship?
Something is wrong here. I mean I have a friend who is my friend for almost 30 now. He never wanted to fk me.
Why isn't an option in bg3.

I feel you. Apparently there are aphrodisiacs in the water in Faerun.

One character I made is evil only because everyone wants her and, in her mind, none of them are good enough for her.

Gale is the worst, he offers to show you a magic trick and tries to use that to hit on you, its like dude this isn't what you offered, I like you Gale, but not in that way, plus he's a toxic "Nice Guy" who ate Shadow Weave to get back with his Ex-GF, everything Gale does is a huge Red Flag, that's not mentioning the fact that we're forced to enable his Drug Magic Addiction or he'll kill everyone like a pyscho.

The Weave scene is totally unromantic if you don't enable it. And Gale doesn't want to eat magic aka using drugs, he literally needs it to survive. He doesn't want to kill anyone, he literally can't control it without using those magic items - did he bring himself in this situation out of some kind of stupidity? Yeah, don't dabble with magic, you don't understand, not even for your ex lover. Does it make him a psycho? No, not more than anyone else in our dysfunctional little group. And at least, he knows that he fucked up big time.

^ I don't like Gale because he feels shoehorned in to being ex-sex buddies with Mystra. I'm new to DnD but I felt like this was some bs. This Rando with Mystra?! Pssh I'd sooner see her with another woman than some Ego maniac who thought he could do something.

As for companions, Alfira for sure, If we can't have Ketheric redemption, then let's go all in for the craziest of them all, Orin.
Xeph I've said before; will think of others later.

I mean, that is personal taste, but it is not unusual for Mystra to take human lover. If you think, Gale doesn't deserve that, that's up to you, but it isn't really unheard of.

Gale is just a unoriginal copy of Elminster which was also a powerful wizard, chosen and sex buddy with the previous incarnation of Mystra with a side order from Simbul, another chosen of Mystra who needed to eat magic to stay sane and not kill everyone.

0 Original content from Larian.

And I disagree that any of the companions is well written.
Karlach is just there, the little content she has is nice although the main word here is little.
Astarion just mopes and reacts without much payoff before act 3
Shadowheart does a spontaneous 180 forsaking her god and her dream because someone she has no reason to trust cried wolf.
Wyll has at least story content which is ok although he remains rather calm about what happens which seems strange.
Laezel is ok for how she is set up.
Jaheira and Minsc are mainly just late.
Halsins stiry ends before he becomes a companion and just flops around after that.
And Minthara says so little that people are unsure if she is still bugged or not.

None of the companions I consider especially well written. Some are average, some are worse. And my impression is that compared to for example Pathfinder no companion gets much content.
And in general Larian reuses plots a lot.
Ticking clock -> Gale, Karlach
Stuck in abusive relationship -> Wyll, Astarion, partially Shadowheart
Being exploited by a parental figure -> Shadowheart, Laezel, maybe also Gale a bit.

I'm mostly disappointed in how the extra mercenaries work. I wanted them to stay in camp after you dismiss them, not vanish and needing to be bought again.

Well I guess in the long run we will get character editors and then I can make any character into whatever I want anyway.

Answering the OP:

Basically no. That is because, unlike the old games, there are no alignment/reputation pitfalls and everyone gets along with everyone else at least well enough to be in the same party. Because of these issues, the old games were much more limited than the number of possible companions would suggest.

What I do dislike much more is being limited to four characters in your active party. There are four roles in a versatile party, and being limited to four slots means you have no slot to take someone along just for fun or roleplaying. There are mods for that, but I think they mess with the balance and the interface is designed for four characters, so that's not really satisfactory. I've heard to you take Jaheira along in a summons slot for the fight for Moonrise Towers (in order to prevent her untimely death by stupid game AI), and I'd like to have that opportunity more often, and for all companions and camp followers. I wouldn't need to manage them as regular party members while they're in the summons slot, just take them along as they are and let them interact within the party and as party member with NPCs.

I am happy with the availible companions. Quality beats quantity for me.

The only thing I consider a bit underwhelming are too few interactions between your party members. I wish that they would comment more, bicker a bit among themselves, form bonds with each other. I would not mind more companion quests too, some of them are pretty short.

I will not spoiler the old BG2 for anybody here, but I can tell you, there were some instances of massive drama within party there and they were awesome.