Larian Studios Forums Divinity General Discussion A mistake to avoid in Fantasy setting since BG3

I'm glad to see the announcement of Divinity! I've played DOS, DOS2, Divine Divinity a lot and know the lore well, as well as BG3.
There was a big problem in BG3 for Fantasy settings that should be avoided in the next game Divinity. The Absence of Cultures of Fantasy races, their traditions, their differenсe in lifestyles, their homelands. If we replace all the main characters, minor and background characters with just humans - nothing will change in BG3, except few names.

Since Divinity Original Sin 2 we have much more lore and details about each race of Rivellon, which were first appeared in Divine Divinity(2002). DOS2 gives us more "saplings" of lore about Rivellon' Fantasy races. We could see the Elven structures, traditions, completely different manner of speech, how they stick together in the hard times. Some of Dwarven culture, the dwarven queen Justinia, different material culture. We could see some of Lizard culture and structures(a bit in the dream ActIV), the lore about their Ancient Empire and the different material culture, their language. Arx - human city, Driftwood, braindead reds & whites zealots of Divine Order(most of them), Black Ring - demon worshippers, jumping from chaos demons to void monsters.
ACTII Driftwood - human small trading town on the coast, there are no Elven or Lizard citizens at all, only dwarven emigrants, mostly because of their special operaions here.
ACTIV Arx - human big city with religious significance. Mostly humans and pilligrims. A very few citizens of other races(elves, dwarves, lizards), only because of religious significance and trade.
Lets say, DOS2 gives each of Rivellon's main races a distinct personality, culture features. And the main thing - everyone on their places! The same can not be said about BG3 at all, where everyone(fantasy races) was thrown into a plate and mixed like salad...
The Druid's Grove(BG3 ActI) - Created by Elves, but we see only 1 or 2 elves here. All fantasy races are mixed in salad.
Baldur's Gate City(ActIII) - The big trading city. We do not see the racial quarters here. Everyone are mixed again.
This really ruins the Fantasy atmosphere of the game, the atmosphere of Fantasy Setting!

Even in Divine Divinity(2002) we could see the Dwarven Halls under the mountains, dwarven king, dwarven small trading settlement. Elven trading outpost and archers guild. In the human cities elves, lizards or dwarves were mostly like guests - strangers , traders, because everyone have their own kin and their own homeland. The Fantasy atmosphere was way better than in BG3.

Divinity announcement trailer showed exactly the same mistake, all of the Fantasy races are mixed in the salad again around small human city... I understand, the point of the announcement trailer is to show the major lore concept without any details, to show the playble races - elves, dwarves, lizards, humans, orcs. The "Salad" should(Must!) be avoided in the actual game and story!







Hope to see the continuation and evolution of concepts and ideas from DivinityOS2! And more careful and accurate way of showing the Fantasy World(than BG3), Fantasy Races, their homelands, traditions, difference in their cultures, languages, manners of speech, etc.
And as a fan of elves, it would be nice to see the evolution of elven concepts/ideas in Divinity from DOS2, the living armor/weapons, the possibility of using "Vegetal Tank" as an elf and many other. Very interesting ideas & concepts!

I wish you success with developing Divinity, Larian Team! 3rd person view rpg like DivinityII:Dragon Saga or turn-based DOS2 like. No doubts, it will be successful . You're the saviors of Fantasy genre these days in game industry!

To be fair, Baldur's Gate is set in (And around) the city of Baldur's Gate. Which much like how real life cities such as New York are a melting pot of many cultures, is likely to end up having its own culture form as a result that is somewhat different to all the original cultures that emmigrated to it.

That combined with the rarity of travel/relocation means that many Baldur's Gate citizens would have lived in Baldur's Gate for their whole lives and likely many generations.

As such, the lack of diversity is somewhat expected. Since if everyone has the culture, traditions and lifestyle associated with Baldur's Gate, then it would be reflected by everyone acting very similarly - With a few minor predjudices here and there because racism...

That said, it was quite noticeable with the Tieflings. As they are specifically mentioned to have come from Avernus. But they don't act any different to anyone else. Which is pretty disappointing and made me miss Woljif from WotR, where he had a tangible reason for being so heavily discriminated against (He was born to human parents. But came out as a Tiefling due to his grandmother getting it on with a devil. He was subsequently abandoned by his parents and forced to live with his grandmother who despised him, leading to him running away and living a life of crime on the streets). Meanwhile, you can't even tell the Tieflings came from Avernus, let alone understand why people are so heavily predjudiced against Tieflings.


I don't think it should be completely avoided. It's only natural that eventually mixing will occur between races. It's unrealistic to expect every single race to be vehemently traditionalist forever. Especially when there will be major trading cities that will thus become a melting pot of cultures just like Baldur's Gate and many real life cities (Which don't always have segregated areas specifically for different cultures)

Having some places still holding on to tradition, especially towards the centre of a race's territory, makes sense and would remain largely populated by that race (Of course, travellers, guests, traders etc. Will be mixed in). But towards the fringes you'd start to see more mixing as major trade occurs, as well as things like alliances, embassies and other political endeavours (Unless races are actively at war with one another)

The main goal would be to have players visit a selection of locations. Some deeper in a race's territory and so more traditionalist and thus more insightful into their racial heritage, some more towards the fringes where cultures have melded and you now see something unique that is shared among all the inhabitants of the city regardless of race.

Hopefully their quote for this new game being "Larger and deeper in breadth and depth than ever before" will mean that we do get to visit a variety of locations. Meaning we can get a much wider and deeper look at each races unique culture deeper into their territory, whilst also getting to visit large trading cities where cultures have mixed.

That was not really Larians doing. D&D itself tries its best to suck all identity out of other races and make them pretty much interchangeable, both to not possibly offend anyone in any way and also to make all races equally good at everything so that no one complains that they "can" only play X with race Y....

Trailer raises some concern in regards to racial identity. Elfs do not look as alien as in dos 2 and seem more like humans with ears. Lizards look less like chameleon-like type with prolonged necks and more humanoid. Concerning, but not critical.

I think this is sadly because of people are demanding conventional attractive romanceable characters and player characters ( as is already the case here, someone even made a whole thread about it) and elves are the most popular alongside humans.
The characters in the trailer look more like humans with little extras to. I do hope, that the trailer doesn't show the final look, but was a quick draft, because I actually like the alien look of DOS elves and lizzards.

Good point.
Put it on the pile of all the "compromises" and downsides of a romance/sex focus.

Yep, shield dwarves even only getting close to something obviously magical without a major tantrum didn't happen until TSR sold the license. WotC completely broke the continuity on the Forgotten Realms' elven sub-races by simply using the Greyhawk ones. No explanation given, except 'Vecna broke the multiverse'. However, it's pretty much the same in my AD&D home campaign that elves or any other races who live in or around Baldur's Gate (or Waterdeep, Neverwinter, Luskan,...) aren't usually typical examples of their people as they live in a predominantly human area and usually have a good reason for that. If I had one complaint, I'd say Larian did the other species maybe a bit too human in looks and behaviour. An elf from my campaign would hardly pass as human on the metro, even with ears tucked under a hat.

There was actually a huge thread on this board during early access about "Elves are not Elven" about how the elves in BG3 looked too human like, especially compared to D&D 3E sources.

Larian obviously did not listen.

They listened, they just didn't agree.

This is just an announcement trailer, i think. But yes, humanizing of Fantasy races' appearance is a problem, that will ruin the big part of Fantasy World atmosphere. Divinity game series was never about different nations of human race, scattered in all corners of the world. It is a Fantasy world with completely different races, not only in their appearance, but in their lifestyles, history and cultures. So yes, humanizing the appearance of the Fantasy races should be completely avoided, their unique features should be emphasized.
I'm for continuation of DOS2 concepts with improved visuals. A better faces and long hairstyles for Elves, tall and thin with a great affinity to nature and the skills to control it. And better beards for Dwarves - should be long beards, such as Tolkien's or Warhammer Fantasy dwarves. "Beards in belts!"

I think, all the problems with BG3 "Salad" or lack of adequate customization for fantasy races(such as elves or dwarves) was caused by Wizards of the Coast, who owns the rights of DnD. And this also affected ActIII in BG3, it is very compressed i would say. But the new game Divinity is Larian's project only, Previous Divinity games have been impressive, as Divine Divinity, Dragon Commander, DOS, DOS2. Thus, we have all the chances to see the right "Successor" to all the ideas of the Divinity game series.

The mix of fantasy races can not be widely spreaded at all. Previous games, Divine Divinity & DOS2, have shown the right things, the relationship and diplomacy between different races, their own lands, and how everyone united before the great world dangers.
If an elf lives in the forest kingdom with a great affinity to nature and calling the human cities as Stone Jungle, with kin's memory and knowledge directly transferred via eating flesh during the burial ceremony(since DOS2). If the dwarf lives in the great halls under the mountains with specific structures, loves smithcraft, and has great respect and dedication to the family & folk. If the lizard lives as a part of great House in Ancient Empire in the southlands and likes the hot weather more, or swamps(Divine Divinity). What's the point to live in human city for other races? Temporally for trade? - Yes. Specific place, such as Arx with religious significance? - Possibly. Embassy? - Yes. Stranger, assassin, spy? - Yes. Provide an assistance during some cataclysm? - Possibly.
I wanted to say, A small amount of mixing is possible, but this is very rare for fantasy world with different races. Even in our "golden" medieval times, people had very closed society, and the big cities had the national quarters. In the fantasy setting we're talking about completely different races, not about nations of human race.

Imagine the Tolkien' or Warhammer Fantasy elves/dwarves will go to live in the first dirty puddle in human' town... This is awful to even think about. The Divinity races are based on classic fantasy, and the previous Divinity games showed the fantasy races in the right way.
I'm only for the right presentation of Fantasy world with different races.

Not when you factor in trade.

So long as races are trading with each other, there will be major trading ports. Where people from multiple races will reside in to oversee the large trade flow.

This is inevitable, because even fantasy settings are based around capitalism. Every race wants to ensure trade, for money and resources which confers power.


You say that like it wasn't frequently a thing in Tolkien's universe. Heck even the Dwarves and Elves where BFF's for a time (Which is why the door to Moria, the biggest Dwarven city, is made using Elven magic - With specifically the password being the elvish word for "Friend") and even post-LotR they got back to being on good terms with each other thanks to the friendship between Gimli and Legolas.

There's also plenty of examples of elves giving up their immortality to go live with humans (Notably, Aragorn himself is a decendant of half-elves (Which are themselves evidence of human and elf partnership) and his wife Arwen is an elf who gave up her mortality to be his queen).

To say nothing about the whole thing of many people post-LotR going different places. Elves all left their cities (That were no longer being bolstered by the rings of power due to them being disabled with the destruction of The One Ring), some went back west to The Undying Lands, while others remained in Middle Earth and thus had to go live in human or dwarven cities.

Yes, this is the very basis of all modern fantasy, Tolkien's work, where it is very frequently shown that races mix together even without anything like actual trade cities (Which would further create melting pots of culture within them)

I have to think of Bree, a small town at the outskirts of the Shire where we find hobbits and humans living together, in adapted housing. Even some shady half-human/goblins are rumoured to be lurking around. And it"s a transit route for wizards, elves, rangers ,and the occasional dwarf company looking for a rogue in the Shire.

Imagine what a BIG city along a trade route or main road (in peace time) would look like.

I actually think this may have more to do with being able to use the same animations for all or most npcs and pcs, especially the facial ones.

Elves & Dwarves lived close to each other in Eregion and Khazad-Dum(Moria), The two elder races developed crafts together and passed on their knowledge to each other. The spirit of God-Creator Aule is strong in both races. The door to Moria, you mentioned, was built by Narvi & Celembrimbor as a symbol of frienship and the road between realms. We see here the naturally looking friendship and collaboration, not the salad of BG3 or Divinity announcement trailer. And something tells me that elves and dwarves always remembered their home, their own folk, and certainly did not create interracial families with each other...

"Plenty of examples?" I remember the direct quote from Tolkien' about "...Only three times in whole history". it's a Big Exceptions. And only the 1st time was "pure one". Two other times, including Arwen and Aragorn, were about half-elven bloodlines.

After War of the Ring most of Elves sailed to Valinor, to the God land. Grey Havens & Imladris(Rivendell) became empty with time. We've lack of info about Woodland Realm in the 4th AGE. Woodland Realm grew and flourished after War of the Ring under the rule of Thranduil. But perhaps, over time in the 4th Age, all the Woodland elves also left the Middle-earth, as did Thranduil following his son Legolas.
I haven't seen even one sentence in Tolkien's literature about "...thus had to go live in human or dwarven cities." I think, its your vision of fantasy, influenced by modern DnD ideas about whole world salad .



I never said, that some mix of citizens is impossible in the fantasy setting like Divinity. In reverse, there should be Some natural mixing to give the fantasy world a broader overview. But the new game, in my opinion, shoudn't be like BG3, where all the races are just reskinned humans... It will ruin the Fantasy world atmosphere of Divinity completely, because in BG3 only the player can properly role-play fantasy race member, using the custom character. As i wrote above, just look at Divine Divinity + DOS2, then compare with BG3 or anouncement trailer of Divinity.

The new Divinity should take the best parts of previous games - lore, some natural humor, the appearance of races, a way of presenting the fantasy world, relations with companions. And from BG3 - only the graphics, visuals, animations, face animations, gameplay ideas.

"...shady half-human/goblins are rumoured to be lurking around." - The expreriments of Saruman closer to War of the Ring events, all Tolkien' orcs(goblins) are just a bio-robots, i would say. Their only purpoes is to destroy and kill.

Hobbits and Humans - lands very close to each other, potential exchange and small trade. Naturally looking relationship.
The same can not be said about BG3, i do not feel the "healthy" fantasy world through this game. The behavior of different races(characters) in BG3 is no different from each other, just a humans with the ears, noses, beards or fangs. Except goblins and some giths maybe.


By the way, The quest "Charmed, I'm Sure" from DOS and the ideas from the previous divinity games about orcs. A clear example of the contact between different races and their cultures, where noone wants to live with orcs together. We don't see orcs in any city at all, one exception in DOS and one instance in Divine Divinity(friendly orc exile, later chosen to council). Most of the orcs have always chosen the side of the demons, Blackring(demon worshippers), the side of evil, due to their warlike nature. Accordingly, we cannot see them in the cities in any Divinity game, and During the events of DOS2 the orcs completely abandoned civilized lands(lore in game).
Yes, other races are more loyal to each other, but they also have Completely different(since DOS2) cultures and lifestyles in Divinity. Especially after the events of DOS2, some problems should arise in the relations between the races, caused by the "Holy Deeds" of Divine Order, no doubts.

I really hope, this was just an announcement trailer showing off the different playable races. Hope, that BG3 experience hasn't affected Larian's vision of Fantasy. I do not want to see the reskinned humans, mixed in the salad in the new Fantasy game.
Yes! More complex relationships with companions, depending on the player's chosen race.
Can you recall a single moment in BG3 when someone reminded your hero of the race, and it played a significant role? Very "raceless" game for Fantasy, i would say. But the gameplay, action, and animation are all top-notch. ActI and II offer good atmosphere of Fantasy Adventure!
Anyway, Looks more like a testing phase between DOS2 and the next Divinity.
Hope for that too.

I was also wondering about the cost of mocap when races physique differ largely from that of the actor. I would guess that tweaking these specialised technologies can drive the production cost up very rapidly.

You use short people for mocap scenes involving short people. Something which also provides job opportunities for actors who belong to that minority group. Which is just another reason to include it.

Yes, that is a good point.

Which helps for one specific size of short race. Which is not necessarily the same as all short fantasy races. Little people in real life don't have a physiology the same as the standard fantasy Dwarf whom are traditionally very stocky and wide.

Even with other races like Imps, Goblins and Halflings there are (Or may be in the case of Halflings which have never made an appearance), overall body proportions are different to what little people have.

To say nothing of races of different biology? Elves that have more elongated proportions? Lizard people (Especially when it comes to facial animations)? Orcs that have wildly different proportions to humans?

Homogenizing races is sadly an ongoing trend in entertainment for various reasons.

1. Some people started to virtue signal by accusing WotC that D&D race X represent ethnicity Y (they could not even agree on which one) and that them being different is racist. Sadly instead of ignoring them WotC caved and thats the reason why suddenly everything in D&D is a multicultural utopia.

2. After WotC drove away all their old role player customers they only survived because Stranger Things attracted a lot of casuals to the game. But they were far less interested in storytelling and role playing and instead only wanted combat and "numbers go up". So they build their characters to be good in combat and nothing else. I literally have been told by them that it is impossible to play an orc archer because they can't get a 16+ Dex at level 1 when races still had fixed ASI.
So with the primary target group of D&D being people who never in their life would play something not optimized WotC caved again and removed all differences between races.

For video games there are additional factors.

3. Motion capturing is expensive, but can easily be reused as long as the skeletal structure remains the same. So for cost cutting the number of races with different skeletons get reused. And its not only animation, also all the equipment and clothes would have to be remade to fit a new skeleton.
That the reason why halflings in BG3 are just scaled down humans with the same proportions or why Blizzard invented a new humanoid dragon race for playable dragons for which they used the elf skeleton instead of making the long existing dragon race playable.

4. Thirst. As mentioned Larian worked hard to attract the Romfantasy crowd and thirsters as that brings the money as the success of the Hojoverse and BG3 shows.
But while some people are ok with romacing something alien or furry, most want conventional pretty human and (tolkien/anime hybrid) elven waifus. And as BG3 made Lariant into the gooning studio as far as all the new players BG3 attracted are concerned, this is what Larian will likely deliver to not disappoint them.

That is true, but I hope that rather than letting technical challenges reduce everything to human-like, that they see it as something worthwhile to invest resources towards overcoming.

In the end I'd rather see a unique lizard race which may have some issues with clipping and animations than less variety just so everything can be perfect for cinematics.

Following minorities in fantasy genre never leads to anything positive. It was really sad to see fantasy race NPCs with afro/asian faces in bg3(In Fantasy World!). For any developer this is like shooting yourself in the foot. We speaking here about PC game, where the players do not have the real freedom of actions, you had no chance to skip all afro/asian faces in bg3. It is not a tabletop rpg with GM and players, where people creates the story, where the presence of modern extremely stupid trend lies on the shoulders of the players/GM.
This is the only correct way to overcome and create better animations for each race to highlight their differences. A real progress from part to part, Players will no longer be impressed by simply new spells/abilities. The story, lore, true fantasy atmosphere, cool fantasy characters(NOT reskinned humans), better animations than bg3 - the only way!
Romfantasy or not, this is not an excuse for creating an absolutely stupid mess from reskinned humans and call them as Fantasy Races.
I've wrote much already about "Salad", mix of fantasy races(just reskinned humans). Each fantasy race is an independent entity with its own culture, physiology, history, and global goals/not global. The small amount of mixing is possible in fantasy setting like Divinity, where we can see different fantasy race members living in specific place together. It should be clear why this phenomenon is present here, shown competently to not ruin Fantasy Atmosphere, not induce vomiting by extremely stupid and merciless modern diversity.
And in this regard, BG3 completely failed the fantasy genre.

If it is really necessary to implement the "tolerance" content, then make a customization for human race only in the next Divinity game. Here we can still "fit a square peg into a round hole" with great effort and grinding noise, that the humans of the southern lands have black or swarthy skin in fantasy world. And only because we know it from the real world.
Under no circumstances should fantasy races be changed or distorted to suit the destructive desires of minorities! This is the path to destruction!
Keep the standarts of Divine Divinity & Divinity OS2 in Fantasy Setting, Larian Team!

I find it odd to reference the adaptations in humans based on geographical locations. While outright refusing its potential existance in other races.

Especially if you want to compare to real world, where many species of animals have differences based on geographical location. Both in terms of colour and other physical traits (For example, the Tazmanian Platypus is much larger than the Austrailian Platypus. They're the same species, but geographical differences change how they develop)

It would make sense to have "Black" fantasy races. Since the colouration is based on melanin content in the skin, an evolutionary development to protect skin from the deadly laser in the sky known as the sun. Animals don't always have this pigment because their skin is under their fur so its not in direct sunlight (Though some still do have it), but fantasy races are based on humanoids and thus lack fur and as such would also evolve to develop melanin pigmentation to protect their skin.

With the evolution of lighter skin colours being due to humans moving to northern regions where there was less sunlight meaning that protection was less important and absorbtion of light was more beneficial (Since, yes, white skin is the evolutionary divergence from early hominids) - Then of course the "Asian" traits are further adaptation to the particular climates of the region.

Well... It makes sense depending on how much impact evolution is supposed to have occurred since their creation (Of course, you can never discount the possibility that when the race was created, they were created with such differences included). But if you accept humans changing based on geographical location, then there would also be similar evolutionary adaptations in fantasy races too. Of course, keeping in mind the inhabited locations of each race, as fantasy settings having multiple sentient races it's not like the real world where humans populated everywhere, there would be territorial disputes from early on limiting the places where races reside in the world.

As such, I wouldn't necessarily call ethnic options for fantasy races "Tolerance content", but more so including a pretty basic tenet of life that is often overlooked in fantasy settings.

If humans in the setting have "Black" or "Asian" adaptations thanks to evolutionary pressure. Then the same would be true of all fantasy races unless explained otherwise (Such as the race living in a very small region where there are no geographical differences for any members of the race, or if a race had other practices to cover such environmental pressures to mitigate the need to evolve such traits - For example, covering oneself in mud to protect against the sun)

Of course, there's always the possibility to use "Fantasy BS" to make up alterations to the normal processes (I.e. Build up of melanin, causing a dark brown colouration) in order to make fantasy races have different presentations of ethnicity. Such as how Drow/Dark Elves have a blue/purple skin tone thanks to "Fantasy BS" reasons. (Or better yet, actually provide in universe explainations for things... Like how Warhammer's Orks and Goblins have green skin because of the presence of chlorophyl due to their origin being plant based)

Do not start with the "they are not white" nonsense.

The problem I mentioned has nothing to do with humans of different ethnicies, but for example some influencers started with "Orcs represent black (or asian, as I said they never agreed on which one) people so them being evil is racist!!!!" back when such statements gave lots of clicks and likes.
Thats why orcs are now just humans with a bit of paint and live in multicultural cities now or why there suddenly are udadrow who are all nice (forcing Larian to have Lolthsworn drow as separate race choice to use the classic drow culture) or why in the new version there are no half elves or half orcs anymore as "being half of something" is racist.

And that leads to everyone and everything becoming more and more human.

Um.

No.

That was Larians doing, not WotC.

Larian did not implement the races much as they are defined in the PHB.