Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Story & Character Discussion Alternate classes for companions

What are some classes, you like to respec companions into, that make sense for you personally and why?

A stable I have is, that I level Wyll from a certain story point on in a different class. At the point, he decides, he wants out of the pact at the beginning of act 2, I start levelling him in another class from there on. Mostly paladin, since I think, he fits that class pretty well. I can see him as a bard too, since he likes music and dancing.

Shadowheart I sometimes level as a paladin too (when I don't take that route with Wyll) since that fits with her wish to become a dark justiciar (even though, she always ends up Selunite in my games)

Minsc makes more sense as a berserker or fighter and I always change his stat, since being very strong was always kind of his thing.

Jaheira is a fighter/druid in the old games and I normally give her at least two fighter levels here too.

Astarion is mostly the classical assassin/gloomstalker, but I did made him a monk a few times. Mostly to learn that class a bit, since I never really got into monk. And Astarion is the companion, that is the least tied to a class. Barbarian would be a bit out of character, wizard and cleric too, since I can't see Cazador sending his spawns to mage college and Astarion is one of two companions (the otehr is Wyll) openly saying he doesn't pray to any god.

Karlach starts as a barbarian, but I often give her a few fighter levels too.

Lae'zel and Gale are just perfect they way they are and I leave them. I like playing Gale as Divination wizard though. Lae is nearly always battlemaster.

I only use Halsin for his quest with Thaniel/Oliver and then he stays in camp as Orin bait. I mostly just keep him default Moon druid.

Minthara I only have managed to get twice on a good run (I don't like to play evil in this game, you loose too many nice npcs), but she stayed paladin.


I don't use the tadpoles on my characters, but I give them to Astarion or Minthara, since those two seems to be pretty eager, so who am I to keep my companions from making potential stupid decisions.

What are your goto classes for the companions? Maybe I get some ideas.

Mind you, this is not a build guide, it's more that I'm interested in what people do with the companions and what roleplay reasons are behind it.

I currently have Wyll as a Gloomstalker/Bladelock, inspired by his class change in the epilogue and it's quite fun. On Tactician you can benefit from the special extra attack blade pact gives you, which is nice.

Minth gets a few levels of Great Old One, to represent all the tadpoles in her head, and I found a Barbarian/Ranger/Fighter build for Minsc, that I really enjoy, so I mostly stick to that.

For Astarion, I like Thief/Swordbard, a small, distant rebellion against Caz's ban on whistling. In my headcanon, he decided to give music a try after resurrecting Gale during his quest and refused to give the little bamboo flute back, which remains his instrument throughout the game. Some whistling moments aside.

I do like wizard as a class, but think it's a bit frustrating that it gives you very little to do with your bonus action, so I like to add two levels of another class. For Avatar-Gale, two levels of Wild Magic work well, as they also supply you with a couple of dialogue choices in which you can threaten explosion. Currently he has two levels of Cleric of Mystra, which gave me some nice dialogue options at the Open Hand temple. (I let Gale solve the murder even if he is my companion because I feel that he's the only one from the lot who'd actually enjoy playing detective.)

Karlach does a great druid, i mean please change into a bear and charge them hun = fuck yer!
Mithara screams pallock or lockpal as selling her soul for power to kill Orin is very much in keeping with her revenge jibe she has going on
i switch Shadowheart to light cleric instead of Shadow, unless of course she does the deed for Shar
Gale makes a solid Bard as long as you can put up with his terrible poetry reciting

i agree Halsin is just pretty arms

In terms of what would suit them personality wise instead of builds (I'm not that interested in builds) I liked Minthara as a cleric honestly.

I do think that Astarion makes for a good rogue, although I know this is not necessarily a popular opinion and that some people see him more as a bard (I disagree), funnily enough they recently talked about the character design process and the two characters who had a set class very early on were SH (for obvious reasons) and Astarion.

Minsc is better as a barbarian for sure.

Btw, I like the new icon fylimar

Thank you - that was the one, I wanted to use the whole time, but couldn't find in my picture chaos

I like a lot of the ideas - Minthara as pallock is certainly wort ha thought. (btw, she was a cleric in early access and Lolth is still available as godess to select)


Ussnorway: Never though of Karlach as druid, but I can see it. She could learn it at the grove and from Jaheira, who is her big idol anyway.

I know a lot of people make Astarion bard, but since I more often than not play bard, I never did that. And when I don't play a bard and make a companion one, I just get envious. I don't think, there is anything wrong with letting him stay rogue all way through, I even don't find Arcane Trickster all that bad, but I do prefer multiclassing rogues personally.

My personal changes are always Shadowheart, Lae'zel and Minthara.

• Shadowheart into a Life Cleric since she abandons Shar and doesn't really embrace Selune either, so for me it's a nice middle-ground to roleplay her inner conflict.
• Lae'zel into one or two levels of Barbarian to enrich her fiery battle-spirit even further with rage since she gets angry a lot (really love listening to her battle-screams).
• Minthara into a Champion Fighter to make sense of her overall character after her messy development history.
  
  Loved her as a Cleric of Lolth during Early Access, but the class no longer suits her at all after she's freed. Her Paladin class never suited her either due to how lazily she got shoehorned into it at the end of Early Access. So after lots of pondering I eventually settled with her being a Champion Fighter to fit her newfound self-beliefs after being abandoned by all the higher powers. This way she remains an extremely deadly noble Drow still maintaining her own oath made to Dark Urge, just without the higher power implications.

I like playing Shadowheart as a tempest cleric. I'll admit, it's purely, because I love that subclass the most. I don't like the trickery domain much for her and mostly don't need her for healing, do I like the subclasses, that give a bit more nice spells, like light or tempest.

I always respecify Karlach as a Fighter.
Otherwise I'm all over the place with adding classes to the companions

I don't like to respec the initial stats (game becomes too easy and restrictions help to find creative solutions), therefore for spicing things up I spec the companions into the multiclass that has the most feats.

For Laezel I like to go 4 War Cleric/8 FIghter Champion, this allows to pump her wisdom up to 16 while rounding up the other odd ability numbers. Amulet of devotee helps with spell save DC later on so she becomes useful with scroll casting and throwing an occasional guiding bolt here and there.

For Astarion I usually go for a barbarian dip, just 2 levels for the reckless attack and dexterity ST advantage. 10 assasin rogue/2 barb, 2 ASI feats and great weapon master. High level assasin is meh, but sneak attack improvement is worth it with auto crits from the ambush perk. I set sneak attack on auto and just slam big hits with finesse two-handers, I like my Astarion with a bit of raw power.

Sometimes as Astarion I go druid 5 (land circle, swamp - for WIS based vampiric touch). Other levels go into 3 Thief Rogue/4 Life Cleric. I like an ability to shapeshift into a Wolf or a Spider as him, while vampiric touch fits the theme and works great with disciple of life from the light cleric. Thorn whip is also great on a mobile character who can position himself well and pull enemies from the cliffs.

I like Shadowheart as a FeyLock for a "Sharran" build - I headcanon that she still gets her power from Shar though. Since FeyLock simply fits the whole Shar theme (As well as working wonderfully with Dark Justicar items), with accessing spells like Darkness and Hunger of Hadar to create shadows to lurk in, Invisibility, various spells to alter minds and trick others.

For a Selunite Shadowheart, I tend to mix in some Druid due to her parents and of course accessing MOONBEAM. What self respecting MOON GODDESS won't give her diciples MOONBEAM?

Lae'zel I like as a 4 Elements Monk - The combination of magic and martial seems intrinsic of Gith and I like to equate her to the elite of Orpheus' Honour Guard (Which are mostly 4 Elements Monks)

Karlach I sometimes like as Vengeance Paladin as it seems to fit her overall personality, she's very much about righting wrongs.

Wyll I can see having levels in Fighter, since he was trained in weapon usage. With it being more prominent post Act 2.

You can also get Moonbeam from Paladin Oath of the Ancients if you want a bit more of that Aylin flair.

Moonbeam for a Selunite is pretty strong, I agree.
Sadly Selunes domain, Twilight, isn't in the game.

I think rogue is pretty much perfect for Astarion too, I just don't really like how full rogue plays. So mixing in swords bard gives his combat a little more variety (I am currently trying the assassin/gloomstalker thing and it's so dreadfully efficient, it's hardly fun.) along with a bit of "charm is just another spell we cast" for crowd control. Which I find is very fitting for him.

Gloom stalker/assassin is a typical companion class. Astarion is perfect for that. His job is to kill things in combat,I do the talking. It's a one trick pony - kill things quickly and maybe o en locks.

I'm usually bard, I just love that class and I think, it's a good main character class.

Maybe I should have added that Astarion more often than not is my main character. XD He's not my favourite character but he is my favourite main character.

Currently he's Shadowheart-Avatar's companion and maybe I'll enjoy the gloom assassin more once we reach higher levels. As it is, I am having most fun with Gale and Shart who are both storm-based and share water puddles like bestis should, while Astarion and Lae'zel are mostly efficient killing machines.

I haven't played an Origin other than Durge so far. While I think playing as the origins can give new insight, I prefer making my own characters in DnD. But I might try it someday. I would go probably with Astarion too, since I don't use him too much as a companion. I had him more in my party in the resisting Durge run, where I romanced him, but otherwise, he often stays at camp. So he would make sense. And I could make him a sword bard, because then he is my main an allowed to be a bard

@fykimar Gale is a good origin to start with as that gives more story that you can't get any other way
[need to reach at least act 2]

Yeah and you get Tara in camp, which is a plus. Still, my little role player DnD heart loves coming up with my own characters.
I think Karlach is supposed to be really good as origin playthrough. She narrates her adventures as an inner monologue according to people who played as her.

And Wyll has big main character energy, he probably would fit the most being the main, since his story is so rushed and he then could finally make his own decisions.

For me it depends. In free roaming settings (think Elder Scrolls) that give you a vague plot but otherwise live mostly from your ability to move around and explore, I am good with blank slate characters. In settings that have a tighter story, I much prefer a character that is part of the story and I would have loved it if they made the origins more felt, if you play them as avatars. I know Durge is somehow the happy union of both approaches, but I didn't vibe with the atmosphere at all.

Does anyone have smth in mind for Laezel beyond her initial class? I am looking for some help before starting TDU playthrough in September. I am willing to keep her Ability scores and a single level in fighter unchanged, because I always play with an added restriction and do not respec via Withers. Was thinking about 1 fighter / 11 ranger but it feels like she needs more than 2 feats to become a half decent half caster.