It’s big patch time. But this time, not only are you going to feel the improvements, you’re also going to see them. As we’ve previously said, Early Access is about improving and iterating on every single facet of the game, and that includes all of the things you see and hear.

In this big patch, we’ve got general fixes for cinematics such as this one below. He was starting to get a crooked neck, and we’re pretty sure he doesn’t have health insurance so we helped him out a bit. See for yourself:



It’s not just about tweaks though. As many of you know, despite playing through the Early Access content sometimes for up to a hundred hours or more (wow!) you still haven’t seen all of the content, because incrementally new things are seeded into the game. In this case, a missing cinematic. Where once was darkness, there is now light!



See if you can spot the differences in the game for yourself, or continue to read this Community Update with attached patch notes for spoilers. You know you want to.



A certain song has also been ‘re-shot’ by our cinematics team, which gives you an excuse to check it out again. Did you need one? Side note: we’ve been watching your reactions to this song in your VODs and YouTube videos, as well as in various streams, and the reactions are beautiful. Watching you play the game as we improve it is very motivating for all of us.

On the topic of music and joy, last week saw the Symphony of Sin, which included the first ever live performance of some of the music from Baldur’s Gate 3, as well as some wonderful songs from Divinity: Original Sin 2. You can watch the VOD here, it’s well worth it: [previewyoutube=3duWZPJm-9s;full][/previewyoutube]
With that said, let’s look at some of the data that’s been making us smile over the week.

Everyone knows you can pet the dog in Baldur’s Gate 3, but did you know the dog has been petted 400k times? Such a good boy deserves that many pets.



Speaking of good boys, last update we discussed how Gale was ultimately attacked quite a lot. Check out last week’s update for the stats on that. Somewhat contradicturally, he’s the most “romanced” of the party. He’s been “romanced” by 33% of players. Shadowheart came second, falling in love with 31% of players, and in return 31% of players fell in love with Shadowheart.

1.37% of players chose to sleep alone. Which is cool too! We have the other stats, but thought it might be fun if you gave it a shot and guessed them. One thing we’re seeing is the stan memes aren’t correlating with the actual “romance data”. For sure, there’s enough tinder in the campfire to ignite some flames.

On a less romantic note (though this really depends on your tastes), 5.87% of players tried to steal the ring… but 26.3% of those players merely sucked a toe. If you haven’t got there yet, you’ll know when you see it. Since we’re talking about failure statistics, many people have made it to The Underdark. But 40.79% of players who jumped down a large, dark hole arrived dead, because they leapt without Feather Fall.

We’re saving perhaps the most interesting until last. Slight spoiler, so if you don’t want spoilers, don’t read this. You may know that at a point in the game, you may side with one of two factions: the Tieflings against the goblins, or with Minthara who demands the gates are opened for the goblins to attack the Druids Grove.

74.85% of you stood with the Tieflings, and 25.15% of you sided with Minthara. Good outweighs evil, it seems.

An optimistic note to end on.


Changelist:

Improvements:

• Optimized overall sound settings to improve performance on lower spec machines
• Added polish to several in-game cinematics
• Attack of Opportunity indicator is now correctly hidden for invisible enemies
• Improved timing of some tutorial messages
• Improved usability of skill selection in character creation
• Added new tutorial messages related to combat
• Listening to other players’ dialogs now correctly shows the other players’ dice rolls
• The reason for a waypoint being unavailable is now displayed on the map
• Party members now correctly cancel their spell prepare state when switching to another character

Fixes:

• Fixed a crash on startup for specific driver and hardware combinations
• Fixed a crash related to trading with Zevlor after the raid on the grove
• Fixed a crash in dialogs related to dynamically adding items
• Fixed a crash in combat AI
• Fixed a potential crash with moving platforms
• Fixed a crash related to loading savegames while in a dialogue
• Fixed a crash when destroying multiple familiars with a single spell
• Fixed a crash related to unloading resources (when loading a save or returning to main menu)
• Fixed a blocking issue when someone would join during level transition
• Fixed a blocking issue when starting a dialog just as someone leaves the game
• Fixed not being able to save anymore on the host when another player is stuck in “in dialog” state
• Fixed players getting stuck in the same dialog inside the camp after choosing to fight Minthara
• Fixed characters being stuck in animation if downed during precast spell
• Fixed characters not being at the correct position after loading
• Fixed not being able to talk to party members after talking with gale and summoning the weave
• Fixed not being able to use some spell scrolls when out of spell slots
• Fixed a rare issue for players that don’t have a profile on startup, requiring selection or a profile or creation of a new one
• Fixed quest markers not showing up correctly when multiple markers point at the same object or location
• Fixed the tieflings’ celebrations not proceeding correctly if the player had already done a long rest right before
• Fixed the physics of the door on the Nautiloid reappearing after saving and loading
• Fixed Ethel not triggering her ambush if she leaves her home during combat
• Fixed several minor bugs related to in-game cinematics
• Fixed zone spells not targeting invisible characters
• Fixed summons from items not having an owner, causing them not to join combat
• Fixed the goblins not using the war drum correctly
• Fixed issues with lockpick progress going out of sync
• Fixed savegame screenshots being too dark
• Fixed spell sounds not playing correctly in multiplayer
• Fixed a long black screen being displayed if a dialog was started just as another player was joining
• Fixed Zevlor initiating dialog during combat
• Fixed audio settings not resetting when switching profile
• Fixed not being able to correctly switch character in trade window
• Fixed not being able to click through scenery you can see through, improving navigation
• Fixed the Gith becoming hostile incorrectly if Lae’zel was never recruited
• Fixed additional reroll when using an inspiration point
• Fixed inspiration points not being able to go up after using an inspiration point or gaining another one
• Fixed an issue with the hidden vault entrance closing again after the puzzles are already solved
• Fixed marking an item as a ware not getting set correctly
• Fixed being able to select summons in the trade window
• Fixed Zariel Tiefling clerics not being able to level up to level 4
• Fixed character creation color tooltips
• Fixed characters sometimes falling off moving platforms
• Fixed several animation issues with torches
• Fixed being able to select invalid targets for Misty Step skill
• Fixed not being able to see other players’ hidden summons at all
• Fixed party members being rearranged when detaching and reattaching characters to the group
• Fixed certain equipment still generating sound after unequipping
• Fixed several texture and skinning issues
• Fixed several minor localization issues
• Fixed minor issues with the action log

Mac specific:

• Automatic crash reporter is now enabled for mac

https://forums.larian.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=718798&an=82#Post718798


No matter what, it seems we people playing CRPGs have a thing for the "Light Side", even if they ask us to go evil in the EA.

I´m eager to mewt the good guys in BG3. Right now with Gale and Wyll it´s not enough for a good-hearted party =P.
Kinda like the girls, but they´re pretty pissed off at me all the time when I try to... well, not even help people, but just not leave anyone for themselves and go find a cure. I think in my current run i´m going for a record. Our relationship numbers are so negative I´ll have to use the kelvin degrees scale to make it readable.





LOL that I believe.

I tried to do an evil playthrough, I really did. I can’t go through with it. I like being heroic.

The only character I’ve had proposition me is Astarion. I gave him the old, “ no thanks, bro. Maybe next time.” 😂

would have been helpful if there were an evil path. not just mmorpg quest with sex scene

Shadow Heart is predictably the most popular female character and has been well written and designed. Moreover, it is universal for both good and evil heroes. But Gail was a surprise.
Hmm, we have 35% on Astarion, Minthara, Laezel and Will.

I won't tell you the exact percentages, but I'm pretty sure they are:
1. Astarion has the highest percentage (very charismatic character)
2. Next comes Minthara - 25% minus most of the female characters who helped the goblins, male characters who helped the goblins share a bed with her in 80-90% of cases.
I'm sure that her rating would have been higher if it was easier to get her / there was more motivation to help goblins. Many people did not even know that the goblins could be helped. Or they simply did not understand why they should do it. The percentages could have leveled off almost 50-50 who help tieflings and goblins if the path of evil had been better written. In this case, Minthara statistics would be much better. She could be the second most popular female character after Shadow Heart, easy.
3. Laezel - few people love her, but she definitely cannot be the last place. This is a good character, and I can see that Larian put his bet on him.
4. Will - guys won't romance him, girls are jealous of Mizora or just doesn't like him compared to others (theory). Since he loses to Gale and Astarion. I don't even take Will to the party, but kill on the spot almost at the first meeting

Only 1.37% of players chose to sleep alone? I didn't realize I was part of such a small crowd! Although Shadowheart and Gale in subsequent playthroughs. 😊

Oh yay more focus on romance and a bunch of stuff that's bare bones for development.

When will they address some serious issues instead of dangling this carrot on a stick?

yeah, the game funnels you to the grove and gives you the Tiefling's sob story so it's really difficult not to side with them first, which makes siding with Minthara doubly difficult because you're betraying people who were looking to you for help. so you really have to go out of your way to go evil. 75/25 makes sense

I don't want to turn this post into an Evil Path discussion, there are several of those in the suggestion forum. I'll just say that what I meant is that IMO evil path has NO STORY. any story would be better than NO STORY.

to the evil path's credit, the goblin camp is a lot of fun. unfortunately for the evil path, you don't have to choose the evil path to experience most of the goblin camp's attractions

I'm pretty certain there is a lot more goodness to come and this patch like every other improvement to the game is most welcome. I do agree with getting the really core issues resolved over the eye candy but it all helps make the game better and that for me at least is key. Thanks Devs.

No response at all to the entire community complaining about game breaking design mistakes, but you care about how many people pet the dog. This patch does nothing but fix a few crashes and some minor bugs. The action economy and stealth systems in this game are beyond broken but you don't even mention them. Nothing about when we might see more classes or races either. Just a little bit of a response to our concerns would be appreciated.

As its a computer game the only stat that counts is how many men are playing female characters....

I just hope to feel some performance improvements and I'll be satisfied honestly.

I wanted to emphasis these two points and hope Larian takes note.

The "evil" path is so badly written that you can't really blame people for not taking it or even knowing about it. I do find it mildly insulting that Larian takes such a massive difference as people just prefer to play good guys rather than acknowledge their own poor writing might be cause. In my opinion, the whole thing needs a complete overhaul.

As for Lae'zel, I personally like her a lot, but I feel like she's the hardest to gain reputation with. There are far more instances where you can lose reputation with her than gain them. I feel like Larian need to either lighten up on her reputation decreases or add more ways to gain it with her that don't involve just murdering everything in sight.

You should realize that the priority is to fix all the technical issues the game currently has. Only and I say only then will they develop/deploy fixes to current gameplay issues.
They have full year (as Swen stated) to fix gameplay issues.

+1.

It's a perennial problem with most CRPG's that try to offer both Good and Evil paths. They're always chock-filled with "Help the NPC" quests, and if you ignore them or try to finesse an Evil outcome, you end up with less XP gain and less loot. Since the implicit goal for both Good and Evil playthroughs is to level up and get cool loot, the Evil side just doesn't pay off.

Evil really only pays off when the entire game is built around it. I remember one very good user-made module for Neverwinter Nights where the MC was an Evil necromancer. All the dialog and interactions were built around that theme. It really worked, and I had a great time playing it, even though I normally take a default Good path in most of these games for the reasons mentioned above.

Thank you for the update

Agreed, there is barely anything there on the evil route. As with Lae'zel it's quite hard to get approval if you don't decide to murder hobo everyone.

That and there is a general lack of story/roleplay incentive to be evil in most of these games.
When I played my own drow character and met Minthara, only to learn that she seemingly abandoned Lolth for servitude of this 'absolute'... sorry darling, that is a stabbing. One could argue that a drow could see the benefit of manipulating the situation, use it to kick the asses of the druids, then stab Minthara to death for abandoning the goddess, and be totally happy.

/shrug

Why would a tiefling realistically care for the aid of the goblins?
Why would a githyanki care?
Why would anyone trust the goblins over the druids?

Maybe if you have a character that is just a simple murder-hobo.
Or if you have a character that is all about the tad-poliness and all over "the absolute"

I appreciate the patch and update but was hoping for some response to our feedback. Particularly in areas that would need to be decided sooner rather than later to allow balance changes to be made - things like party size, over abundance of elemental surfaces, changes to 5e mechanice/rules that don't appear to be necessary to fit them into a computer game to list some of the ones brought up in the forums.

You may well still be considering these but it would be nice to know what is set in stone and what isn't because there's little point people feeding back about things you are not going to change.

Really disappointed. I understand that you fix the bugs, but you should also listen to the community with the changes that we request.

I don't know how much I care, the percentage of players who petted a dog.
But I do care if the game is more like Baldurs than Divinity by following the rules and lore of D&D5

+1
The evil path currently isn't compelling.

+1 this update makes it sound like they're not listening. Even if major changes can't be put in place in a few weeks, acknowledging the feedback would have helped.

Dear Larian, I hope this is just an opinion of a person who wrote this post. The statement is just false. In the current state of the game plot, any intelligent evil characters will side with Tieflings. Evil is not equal to a "murder hobo". I wish Larian representatives went to check the feedback forum here and read the discussion threads about your implementation of the evil path.

Thanks for the patch.

This is what I am afraid of, I'm in Pathfinder wrath of the righteous Alpha, you have so many ways to roleplay your character in that game. You have various ways to act lawful, good, evil or you can just be a murder hobo. There needs to be more substance to an evil route, at the moment it's just not there. I agreed with the vampire that we should learn how to control the tadpole, issue is? There are no npcs who can teach you how to use the tadpole or learn about it's purpose. Minthara would of been a great evil hub quest npc, but Ironically, the person who has the most information on the tadpole is a certain Archdruid, which means I'm going to murder the goblins every time.

This is why there is so much Minthara on the forum and memes, but so little of that choice in the game. I would like more people to know that this is the sexiest and most powerful drow of all, for this you need a complete and motivated path of evil and a complete companion Minthara.
Larian don't even give a chance if, in order to get Shadow Heart, you had to arrange genocide without motivation, and with an open question whether she would be a companion, she would not have 33%, maximum 10%. There is nothing strange about this.

Whether the goblins will become non-aggressive again after the Absolute test? Larian they also made more content (!) For a good journey, we don't get into the Underdark if we help goblins. Our journey ends at the search for a drider on the way to the Moonrise Towers. They didn't even put a video from the developers for evil players, only a map ...I want a cake with Minthara!
Also they didn't even do a charisma check or an ilytid ability to explain to the goblins guards that we were going to the absolute test. The location is very close to the goblin camp, it upset me

What other questions can there be? The game motivates to play for a good character in all possible ways.

Thanks for all the fixes and updates to bring act 1 to a proper level of quality. To those who are complaining about what was fixed vs what wasn't: there is more than complaints to fix and develop. Give it time, and eventually, before 1.0 launch, it should be fixed.

Exactly. I mean sex with drow is very tempting, but not as tempting as Larian apparently thinks

I think there might be a missing aspect to the "Absolute Route", not just an unwritten one. I've been wondering how the Creche quest will either lead to the Moonrise Towers act or loop back to the grove-goblin quests. Currently it seems like such a divergent story-line that seemingly bypasses everything going on with the EA map. But if it somehow is the missing half of a 'Evil' run that might change things around.

Lae'zel is more or less the most actively evil character so it would make sense if having her leads into it too.

Quote "74.85% of you stood with the Tieflings, and 25.15% of you sided with Minthara. Good outweighs evil, it seems. "

Minthara is evil BUT has unknown motives and worships a fictitious deity. Supporting Minthara isn't as much "evil" as stupid. Evil characters are by definition self serving so evil characters are more likely to kill threats and eliminate competition given the opportunity. Manipulating druids to for selfish need while robbing the Tieflings blind to supply you with resources enough to eliminate the "greater threat" isn't "good"......IMO. The greatest villians hide in plain sight under the guise of "paragon of", seriously look at "insert any politician".

So in conclusion the motive + methodology = allignment

Mmm what would be pretty cool would be a questionnaire to determine your allignment.

This may be an unpopular comment, but I think we can save ourselves a lot of effort by just extrapolating from what Larian would need to do, in order to satisfy some of these forum requests. For example, if you know anything at all about game design, you can imagine how much work it would take to redesign the game to support a larger party (and larger enemy numbers). I would be very surprised if this was a possibility.

Same thing with some of the combat mechanics involving terrain advantage and surface effects. It's built into the game engine and it works fine in terms of the design intent. It may not work the way everyone likes it, but it works and I don't think they'll change it.

Personally, I'm trying to focus on feedback where I think there's a chance they could actually do the work to improve it. Like including more explanations in-game, and UI changes like making the hot bar less frustrating to manage.

Any rough ETA on cross platform play?

That's why i said about the things fixed in stone - if some things are just design decisions they made and won't be changing that's fine (although not necessarily what I would have hoped for) but if that's the case just be up front about it so we can focus on feedback about other stuff they will possibly listen to.

I agree that some things would be harder to change than others (like party size) but stuff like going overboard with elemental surfaces is more about small changes - like not having so many explosive barrels laying around, reverting some of the spells to what they are supposed to do as per the handbook, things like that don't require major changes. Now following some of those changes there might need to be rebalancing, or possibly not as whilst we won't get so many opportunities to use surfaces neither will our opponents so it may simply balance itself out.

. Creo que deben esperar tanto sacar sus conclusiones primero deben pensar que van reparar los errores luego editar el contenido seguramente deben estar analizando las ideas de los jugadores, recuerden muchas las propuestas que ofrecemos debe hacer grandes cambios en el juego seguramente un programador les puede comentar de eso no tan fácil cambiar lo que pedimos capas principio del mes o mediados podamos ver algún cambio que pedimos den un poco más de tiempo si ven implementaron mas tutoriales y en el foro había gente pidiendo mas tutorial
Correccion ya leí dos cosas pidieron en el foro que se puedan ver los dados en multijugador entre los jugadores y arreglaron las voces algo escuchan parece tiene poco personal mirando el foro pero es entendible les recuerdo no estamos tiempos normales estamos en pandemia.

Any news on when the "under construction" screens will be no longer? Hell how I'm impatient to see what's behind them

Is the cinematic where Olodan and the shadow druids appear fixed/finished?

I just good boy and try help everyone😐

As a lot of thing can happen in one year, I think that's they won't close (or enforce) any door.

They would probably not say, "no chance for some specific point". First because it would be rude, second because some could interpret these "no" as a "yes" for all other thing.

And as long I press F5, not because I'm afraid to die but because I'm afraid of a game crash, I'm waiting for technical fixes.

You do realize they probably didn't do it on purpose? There's a bug causing it. Or rather a glitch.
If you activate Feather fall on your whole party and activate TURN MODE to be able to jump in one by one you should have time to do it.

But if the 1st guy that jumped in gets engaged in a fight with the minotaurs combat mode is activated. Which means turn mode is deactivated for those who didn't jump yet.

The 2nd player can't enable TURN MODE again easily, it won't respond to input since... you're already in turn base mode in the Underdark. But you're not on the surface.

If they jump they get the cinematic again. You can't pass the cinematic. Feather fall deactivates before you fall down. BAM you lost your mage.

can anyone please tell me what their game version is now after installing the latest patch? thank you

+1. If we get carolled into the tiefling camp and get their quest shoved in our face, most people will follow through with it because we think "I guess this is how the game plays, let's see where this goes". Since no other option has been revealed. Later you can "switch sides", but you ARE siding with the tieflings by default in the game right now. It's kinda telling that the goblins in the first battle are ENEMIES and the tieflings are FRIENDS and you have to partake in that battle as an ally of the tieflings.

You also have to join a cult to something nobody will tell you anything about , with zero chance of getting something out of it as it appears up front. An evil character would probably think "what's in it for me" and right now there is Zero incentive up front for an evil character to join the "Evil" side. What does an evil character want? STATUS, POWER, INFLUENCE, and stuff that empowers them or solves their problems. As it happens the player HAS a personal problem - tadpole related - and if it seems the gobbos are a smooth solution to that, how bad is killing a few kids for an evil character?

The evil side seems like scientologists when you think about it. If you don't know shit about what the goblins are about, then why the fuck would you join? Just to slay the tieflings would be suitable for a chaotic evil demon that feeds on chaos, but you aint that.

Other suggestion for incentive: Minthara makes it clear that you get a personal goblin servant if you choose to join her, as it would befit someone of your grandiose status and power (goblin would be npc in your camp that worhips you, they would basically be like the goblins at the party, choose male or female goblin). She also promises to explain the deal with the tadpole and the absolute and all the questions burning in your mind (she can lie about this, would be fine if she lies), but only if you aid them in slaughtering the tieflings and druids. Then the evil character can be like "oh shit, I can get tangible benefits AND the answers to my important questions?! And all I have to do is kill some kids?! Good deal!"

Maybe I'm talking shit but my mission is to speak my mind since that's what Larian told me to do.

Relax - as you can see this is update are only fixes! We will see a lot of changes during EA - but I think that they need more time.
Remember that EA will be for more than 1 year - we could expect 3 updates with changes - but this is a guess.

It's EA, they should first fix bugs not haul new features on top of a bug ridden game, its programming basics.

Also, saying "plz follow rules and lore" doesn't offer anything to anyone, be specific or calm down.

I didn't like this moment either. There is no choice - I wanted to help goblins from the very beginning of the game, and the game seemed to say "goblins can only be enemies, don't even think about it." And then we are proudly shown statistics 75 to 25.
Seriously, why not ask the player if he wants to help the goblins in the first battle? Some kind of call from a goblin, they say, "True Soul, help us". The result would be completely different. And more information, more rewards, perspectives solutions to our tadpole problem, an honest quest to "join the absolute" and get Minthara to the party as a drow companion and romance. With the opportunity to figure out together what the absolute really is and whether it is worth serving it, or we can play our own game. (Minthara does not know that she has a tadpole, most likely, and perhaps the truth will make her be more pragmatic, and find an ally in our person)

If she knows that there is a tadpole, and can explain to us that there is nothing to be afraid of transformation a mind flayer. Then this is a double problem why NOT A WORD is said about it in the current version of the game.

Why can't we just tell her everything that happened to us, and say that we are on her side anyway?

This is exactly what 90% of the players who write feedback about the evil walkthrough wanted. Give people what we want please

I have done this to loot dead spider.

I hope future updates let us in on how you're utilizing feedback to improve the game (controls, camera, UI, balance, etc.) and big changes coming down the pipeline. These statistics are kinda shallow and uninteresting. How does knowing how many times a dog has been pet improve the game?

So when is Stadia getting this update? The version number is still the same as before this announcement. v4.1.84.2021

That scene is super bugged. they tried to give us some cool cinematic but it works so bad right now, and don't forget that you must make each party member jump separately.

If a person went a good way because you made more content to help tieflings (the bad hero does not get into the Underdark and goes to the Moonrise Towers in a different way) and did not make a normal motivated passage of the path of evil, many people did not even know that there was such an option, then does it make sense to publish stats 75% / 25%? It's a shame. If there was no charismatic Minthara, and people who were SPECIALLY looking for an opportunity to make friends with her no matter what, it would be 97/3% (3% just for lovers of chaotic evil)
Larian can easily reach 50-50 if they listen to their players who write feedback and hope to be heard. A lot of people who love to play evil complained that the game forces them to help tieflings

Then make it more compelling to side with Minthara. My main evil playthrough sided with Halsin because he seems the better choice to remove the tadpole. Minthara and the Absolute could not be trusted, there needs to be more with them to make this decision a better one. Not everyone will be thinking with only the little brain when it comes to her.

There have been great discussions of this quote in other threads ...

https://forums.larian.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=718905&page=5

https://forums.larian.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=715499&page=5

and not only there ...

Larian, can't you just say that everything is okay and that you will spend more time working on the content for an evil run? People are really worried. This choice of players is not because everyone wants to play for good, but because evil is poorly spelled out now. Don't make the wrong conclusions on statistics! Listen to your fans on this forum and in Reddit. We explained in detail why such statistics arose, and it is very bad for the game that the evil passage is poorly worked out. You wanted our EA feedback to make the game better, we write it very clearly and unanimously. You don't need any enthusiasm and joy from such statistics, it says that there is a problem, not a reason for joy. Now this is easy to fix, but if it is in release it will be an epic file.

Hopefully, the next community update will be devoted entirely to the problems that are in the evil root. Say there will be more content, more explanation, more motivation, announce Minthara as a companion and all questions will disappear. Everyone will be happy and will love you even more. It now seems that Larian is deaf to his community that discusses the dark side of power.

I think it's really hilarious that a few people are complaining about the 75:25 split between good v. evil under their assumption that it is only because the evil side of the game is not rewarding enough or something. How about the possibility that the overwhelming majority of people playing the game (so NOT just the tiny, non-representative sample in this forum) actually believe playing good is how one ought to play the game? As someone for whom there is no possible reward that could convince me to play evil, I am extremely happy to see that the preference for good significantly outweighs the preference for evil.

Well obviously the amount of people who play only as they would in real life and cannot understand why some would be drawn to evil will outweigh those who like to take different paths. Many people can't become anyone other than themselves for any reason. There is no one way people "ought" to play a game. It is a game, not a reflection of real life. Some of us welcome the opportunity to be someone else for a bit. For me, I do not need the evil path to be rewarding, I just want it to make sense.

Also, remember they wanted us to test the evil path. There will be some people who do not treat this as early access and play however they want to, but maybe most people tried to do as requested. With these numbers it is clear they need to work on this evil path.

I understand. I just want to say that you have nothing to worry about, with playing the good guy in this game, everything is in order, the only thing missing in a good playthrough is a "good" companion, lawful good or chaotic good. But it will obviously be added in the future, plus Shadow Heart can optionally be good (there is such a theory).
In terms of quests, choices, motivation, a good passage has clear advantages at the moment.

In the evil passage, there are problems due to which we lost 10-20% of those who would have chosen the evil root if it had been better worked out. Plus there are obvious problems faced by players who have chosen this path, despite the fact that it is more difficult and incomprehensible. We also want full immersion in the role and pleasure from the game, and we do not want the game to discriminate against our decisions in comparison with a good passage, to give less content, less understanding, and fewer opportunities.

Even one opportunity to choose a side on which to fight during the first attack of the goblins on the grove of druids (first visit) would give the evil root additional interest, and now it is some kind of secret root. Which players are looking for specifically without motivation in the game to see what will happen. The player is not given the slightest hint that it is generally possible to play this way, this root can only be found on purpose.

Not to mention that there are a lot of bugs on the way of evil when attacking the druid grove. This battle may not happen at all if someone important from the grove died earlier, or if we decided to wait until evening at the camp, and so on.

At the same time, the POTENTIAL of the evil (and neutral) root is very large, and I madly want the full realization of this potential. So many interesting things and shared adventures can be thought of between our character and Minthara for the all next acts, but now we see even in the first act of the problem on her side, I don't want this to become a trend.

I'm wondering what percentage of 75% went through this way, because in addition to motivation, rewards and rationale of this method, they have Undredark, and congratulations from the developers? And those who passed on the side of Mintara have nothing at the end of their passage, except for the feeling that the player is a fool. Will goblins become non-aggressive again in the future, information about tadpoles, the cult of the absolute, when we see Minthara next time and will she go with us? ... The list goes on. No answers, no congratulations, a feeling of complete understatement. As if Larian was forgotten us

It was very strange considering that Larian wanted to show us exactly the evil root that they talked about earlier. I don't understand why it was so difficult to make it better, I repeat that there is a huge potential. This could be the best RPG ever

Thanks Larian - keep up the good work.

On another note - chill out people its only about a month after release & you're frothing at the bit because huge gameplay changes/upgrades are not already implemented ? cmon.....

Yep, this is the answer.

Suggestions should be posted in the suggestion forum. This is a bug fixing post.

Where is the count for petting the good owlbear boy?

I truly appreciate your very fair-minded words. However, the point I was trying to make is that it should not be surprising to anyone in any way that the numbers were 75:25 in favor of playing good. If anything, I would expect the numbers to be 90:10, and feel the only reason it is 75:25 is because some people who would normally never play evil decided to help out Larian's testing needs by giving the evil side a shot.

Furthermore, it is not at all realistic to expect that in a BG game the "good" side and the "evil" side will be or can be equivalent. The Forgotten Realms is a very decidedly good-aligned setting. The setting itself is good, and evil is restricted to pockets within it. Those pockets of evil, from time to time, try to break out of their pockets and spread out into the good parts of the setting, but eventually get driven back. Decades of FR lore makes it very clear that in the FR the good side ALWAYS wins in the end, and any gains by the evil side are at most LOCAL and temporary. So how is Larian supposed to make a story-driven RPG where somehow the evil side bucks all of that FR lore and the overall nature of the FR setting and ends up winning in the end? To put it more bluntly, if you as the protagonist somehow manage to "win" playing evil, at some point therein all of the many, many very powerful good-aligned NPC characters in the setting should/will rally against you and surely defeat you. Heck, the game should just have Elminster show up at your door and turn you into a smear on the ground.

Sure, but in that case Larian should have told us there is only a good path in BG3 and remove the Lolth Drow and evil aligned companions from the game entirely. And they should not have requested us to come try out the evil path in EA. And finally, they should also refund my 60e. I bought the game expecting to be able to play the role of evil in a roleplaying game. *shrugs*

There is a game "Fable - The Lost Chapters", a classic Action / RPG genre. Yes, it is completely linear in terms of the main quest. and she is almost 20 years old. But in decision making and side quests, the path of evil and the path of good are equally popular, equally balanced in terms of content. All players play the game at least twice as a good and evil hero, and both times they enjoy playing the role. Baldurs Gate 3 is a much more replayable game anyway, there is much more freedom in it, but more attention is paid to a good passage

After an evil passage, I will most likely try good, and people who pass for good will most likely try evil in the second passage. Yes, not all, but many. I rightly believe that the amount of content and work expended should be equal to both a good passage and an evil one, especially considering that the announcements promised dark fantasy and a focus on the "evil path". Many came here for this. About the path of evil ... now it is 100% chaotic evil, and I want to be Lawful Evil together with Minthara.

And I'm still interested in the possibility of a neutral path. For example, helping Kaga in the grove of the druids (clearly a neutral path), or killing the leaders of the goblins but sparing Minthara, who is forced to swear allegiance to you and join the party. Educate her about the tadpole in her head, and get a chance to befriend her in search of power and answers

If Larian has enough desire to do everything cool (money and resources are not a problem with such sales), then we will be happy to buy DLS with the continuation of the adventures of our favorite heroes and pre-order BG4 immediately after the release of the third part. There are very few high-quality RPGs, the last one was released 10 years ago and was called Dragon Age Origin. BG3 has every chance of becoming an even greater game than DA:O and the Witcher 3 combined

Obviously it is not up to me to tell you or anyone else how you should feel about anything. That's just not something I have any wish to ever do. However, I think you are being a little extreme in your reaction (no judgment). I think there's a big difference between playing your character as an evil-oriented person (which I completely support in terms of the game--any game--allowing this), versus expecting that your evil-oriented character is going to be able to reshape the world around in evil ways to any significant way. So yes, you can, and should be able to, play your character your way. But this should be with the understanding that the setting for this game is a generally good-aligned setting, and your personally evil playthrough cannot fundamentally change the world into an evil place where evil outcomes prevail. I don't know if I'm explaining this particularly well. May be someone else will be able to better explain it.

Sure. But I think the difference is in the particular setting being used for a game. In this case the FR setting just doesn't allow for outcomes where evil "wins" in a big way. That would just go against the setting's established lore. Settings like FR which have so much history and lore are great for an RPG because the devs have so much raw material already developed from which to draw for their story and characters. But the flip side of that is all that rich lore also serves to limit how far you can take things with your game in a way that an "open canvas" setting does not.

Let's all remember this is EARLY ACCESS. The game is literally still in development. Launch is realistically at least a year away, and there could be absolutely massive changes and additions to the game in that time. So, no point on getting upset about anything at this point.

In other words, please do not be entitled, whiney pricks.

@kanisatha I have a suspicion that you just don't understand what being evil actually means. The argument people have hare, that in the current state evil characters, if they are not idiots (I mean in-game characters, not players), will side with tieflings too. Therefore, the claim that siding with tieflings is an indicator of roleplaying a good character is just false.

No I do understand very well.

In the case of this example of yours, I can agree with you that Larian shouldn't label the action of siding with the tieflings as good or evil. But at the same time, players can label it any way they want. And I am very certain the overwhelming majority of players who like playing good will surely label it as the "good" path, whether those of you playing "evil" agree or not.

Siding with the Tieflings is most likely supposed to be the good path. The issue is that this is happening because the current evil path is for stupid evil not intelligent evil. There needs to be a better reason to not kill the goblins. Many playing evil may not even care about the Tieflings, they got saved by accident.

I played an evil party. I killed all the Tieflings and the all the goblins. I sided with the evil drow (because I was playing one), but then turned on Minathra because she turned from Lloth. So I don’t know where I stand in this 75/25 split.

Also, I slept with no one (possibly because Shadowheart is a gimp and wasn’t in my group, and Lae’zel looks like the Grinch). We’ll see on subsequent playthroughs.

This is really the whole point of Early Access. So Larian can see what's working and what isn't. Not just bug but storylines. If most people are generally disappointed with the 'evil' path then I expect Larian to make modifications to it. The expectation going into Early Access should be that many things aren't going to be working or fleshed out well.

Now if Larian spends the next year and doesn't improve the game, then I will be disappointed. But at the moment I'm super impressed with what we currently have. The game looks better than I expected, the game play is mostly fun, and there is more interactivity then in most games.

At this stage, I'm disappointed with the evil side.

I'm not interested in a romantic scene with Mintara. Tieflings after save talk about future support. What does evil side give us? Nothing, as if we didn't do anything and didn't affect the situation in any way. I really like that most of our companions are evil. But I also didn't see much support for them in this situation. Only Will had a reaction, and again, cuz he was a good one, so he leave.

Just think about it. Or make it in another way, so that when we choosing evil, we get approval from our companions. Then anyone who wants Astarion will think three times what to do. Many people change their minds for romance. It works.

Right now they don’t care, you don’t get refused if you choose good, only if evil, I rly don’t like it.

(btw sorry bad eng ;<)

I knew I recognized that face! Too funny!

On the contrary, I really liked the opportunity to romance Minthara, in the corrected evil root this will still be my main goal, and I hope for interesting adventures in her company. But in general, yes, we need other incentives so that it is not tied only to this. There are those who romance SH, or there are heterosexual female players who like to play on the dark side of power. The game cannot offer them anything on the evil path.

Excuse me? They asked us to come play the evil path. They asked for feedback. We give it and they draw the wrong conclusions out of raw metrics. So yes, we give feedback on that too.

Entitled, whiney pricks? Condescending much?

Damn. I hooked-up with the Grinch's sister. Hopefully I'll only see him on Thanksgiving and Easter.

Well I don’t think its bad! Mintara cool! I just love my vampire duck, so I don’t care.

I just don't want main reason for choosing evil to be only romance with Mintara. And she can't be denied, she immediately regards this as an relationship, it would be good to have a choice.

And again If we choose evil, we lose Will. I'm not he's fan, but let the good side lose some companions, too? Or something other maybe? Idk. Make harder to choose. It's not fair. I lose part of he’s history just because of my path, but they don't lose anything. This is why they can choose good and don’t care about it. It's not cuz 'more ppl want play good'. Cuz it’s rly more ez.

I just want people to lose their companions when they make good choices. Let Astarion or Lae'zel leave them as Wyll leaves evil. It would be fair to deprive them of something important...

Interesting comments.. some parts more about 'playing evil', some about fun, some about balance (why should you lose companions only if you play 'evil).
I understand that 5e is less about alignments and BG3 is more about consequences of your actions (which sounds very reasonable).
In part the team is a bunch of strangers thrown together in a difficult situation and choosing to work together.
On the continuum between you look at the companion the wrong way and they kill you in your sleep and you need to reload.... to they leave... to they just go along with the team (with losing romantic options), i prefer the later more than the former. Ive played games where the characters can just leave your party (or suddenly sides and kill you in a middle of a fight!), but isn't this about 'gather your party' not get some randoms who will kill you later.
And if they are avatars (in your starting team) will they/ can they leave?

And about balance.. well "good" characters tend not to steal from friendly/ ally merchants.. they don't murder-hobo for exp and equipment. Stealing and killing helps your party alot so is playing "good" the hardest option?

No, that's the shortcut Good path that actually doesn't have the best outcome.

If you take the detective route to finding out Kagha's motivations and pass a few dialog checks, you can prevent a battle at the Druid grove and deal with the goblins separately, however you like.

This reminds me of something Peter Molyneux said for Fable II, pre release; very few, if any, players took the 'evil' options in Fable I apparently, and the same was with Fable II apparently. Fable III had 'evil' choices but it was more 'needs of the many' stuff since you were a king/queen.

This is not true, Fable - The Lost Chapters each went through at least twice in different ways. I do not know no one Fable player who has passed only for good and all over these twenty years.
First playthrough ... after so many years does it matter who did what on the first playthrough?

No romance numbers for Wyll or Lae'zel? What about Astareon? I think if fewer people are responding to Wyll, it's because his interactions are the most bugged. We all know he's the most attractive of the NPC's.

I built my last character as a life domain cleric of Bhaal so I could do without having Shadowheart and Gale in the party at all. I find Gale creepy and Shadowheart's incessant "Oh wouldn't you like to know" type interjections are as annoying as they are pointless. **Not Really a Spoiler Alert** She's a cleric of Shar, the goddess whose holy symbol is literally painted on her chest, there's no way that takes a DC 18 Persuasion check to get her to admit that so we can move on with the story. Especially when seemingly everyone knows my cleric is dedicated to Bhaal, the god of murder.

Also, any word on making "Us" the intellect devourer a more permanent party member? A rescue quest would be awesome. If Us could have psionic powers that mimicked either the cleric or wizard (maybe either as "subclass" builds) that would be even better (yes, I want better options for excluding Shadowheart and Gale, can you blame me?).

I don't play good or bad ways. There is no such thing. It is a decision and a matter of opinion of the individual individual whether something is good or bad. I consider stealing to be completely normal and vital for me, it's a good option, but it's bad for me to buy overpriced because I see it as a rip off. So bad in my eyes that's why I steal everything and everyone. And if two parties are in a row I kill both arguments eliminated. So I did that with the Tyrs trailers and the devil's head I threw my head into the river finished the quest.



The same when an NPC comes to me in an outrageously insulting way. Then I hit him he dies he's unlucky, he wants my help so he should guard his tongue or die that's how easy it is for me. In the military I let people do push-ups when they were disobedient. Demand respect but don't have any of these druids themselves. Shout at me that should be respectful but insult me ​​on every corner and want my help. The result is probably clear. I react to such actions in my sense of doing well for myself.

The problem is too often in regards to good and evil, too many companies fail to consider the idea of rewards being a way to entice them either direction. They think that good should be rewarded and evil should be punished immediately. By separating rewards into types, you can better recognize the drawbacks and benefits of being good OR evil.

Rewards, in general, fall into these two categories.

Physical Rewards (Gold, Gear, Spells)

Social Rewards (access to areas, people willing to work with you, specific vendors)

Since Good characters aren't expecting rewards, you grant them more social rewards early on, then physical rewards later on. This can of course make things difficult, but you also have a lot of doors (pun fully intended) that are opened to you. So it should hopefully balance out as a result.

Since Evil characters are expecting rewards for what they do, you give it to them. If they want access to special services or the like, they have to do more to gain access to them. This lack of specialized services early on will also make things harder for them as they don't have any doors opened for them. They want a door opened, they have to find a key, steal a key, bribe or intimidate their way through. Again, this should hopefully balance out in the long run.

GOOD: Earlier Social Rewards, Delayed Physical Rewards
EVIL: Earlier Physical Rewards, Delayed Social Rewards

That way you're being rewarded no matter how you play, but both sides come with challenges due to your choices. Your choices should of course have consequences. Access to rewards (and the type of rewards) should be affected by what you're doing. Good characters won't be getting gear more inclined to do evil actions. Evil characters won't be getting gear more inclined to good actions. There are lots of ways to make both sides rewarding and punishing at the same time.

We're still probably early enough they could use this for ways to make both sides rewarding, just in different ways.

I think they track all sorts of things, even things that don't really impact the story. The pet the dog came across as more of a side note than anything. Just something cute. I didn't take the stats they listed as bragging or anything, just more of an interesting sort of thing. Especially with their comments about "everyone seems to want to kill Gale."

They just want us to see early on that our testing is providing results, some being interesting and amusing, others being actually vital.

"Evil" playthroughs are difficult when the storylines usually offered don't allow for a perception or tone to be at least implied that going to extreme measures for the player character is more about pragmatism or doing what is necessary to achieve desired goals at the expense of "friendlier" possibilities?

For example, in the earlyiest encounters with both Lae'zel and Shadowheart each stress that time is a-wastin' to find a means to get purged of the tadpole. Given the dire change that is impending, bypassing social norms and just getting that done seems like a pretty good reason to not be everyones pal to me.

This is evil play. You can try to spin it however you want, but this is evil. And in the Forgotten Realms setting, if the game accurately follows the setting's long-established lore, you should be called for and be made to bear responsibility for your evil actions.

It's funny that you say "I don't play good or bad ways", and then proceed to describe perfectly a character with the Chaotic Evil - Stupid alignment. That's not a personal dig at you, just noting that your first sentence is disproven by the rest of your post.

kanisatha, I was tempted to comment on how he was just trying to provide excuses. But yeah, his view was straight up "you piss me off, its your poor luck, because I'll kill you."

I've known drill sergeants, and they don't just give push ups and the like because someone offended them. Or its more accurate to say the best ones don't do that. Because if you assign PT based on your mood, what you'll quickly get is trainees that HATE you and will do what they can to make YOUR life miserable. That's not conducive to healthy training. A drill sergeant is there to improve their physical conditioning, not to be a petty tyrant for every perceived wrong.

I was trying to avoid discussing specifics about what actions are good and what are evil. Because that just simply opens up a can of worms I don't think any of us want to go down really.

I was focused more on how they view rewards. IE Good characters tend not to expect rewards while Evil characters expect compensation. Thus my comment on how to handle a rewards system where being Evil AND being Good is rewarding, just in different ways.

A good character wouldn't consider an Angel-Slaying Sword a reward. They'd see it more as a quest item to see about destroying. An Evil character would drool over receiving such a sword on the other hand.

I wrote a big message detailing what players most often ask to fix in an evil way, I collected everything in one place. You can read my open letter to Larian and discuss at the link:

https://forums.larian.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=722417#Post722417

Right on.

I was playing a female lolth drow, i was going to side with the drow/goblins.

Then a worm , a slave, a hobgoblin boss order me to do something !! meee !!! a female drow!!!

I told him to do it himself

He goes all angry what have you saiiiddd?

I say, you dont order me , do it yourself !!

He called me an enemy of the absolute and I had to kill everyone

I was playing in character, the npcs were playing stupid.

You stood with the Tieflings. Good outweighs evil, it seems.

An optimistic note...

The big issue at hand is how WotC decided to throw alignments out, without thinking about how intrinsic alignment is to the cosmic lore of Forgotten Realms.

It's like removing the ability for Mario to power up a "crouch jump" despite being able to do so in every Mario since Super Mario 2, with the excuse that "it doesn't really affect any game play".

Alignment isn't just a set of guidelines for how to pretend to be your character, alignment is the metaphysical construction of the FR universe.

Everyone chooses their own destiny, the player's decisions cannot be predicted. In any case, the Alignment will most likely change during the game. If you make this line in the description of companions and neutral characters, they will lose their mystery.

You take that back you.....!

(There, there Gale, it's alright my sexy stud. The mean person was just kidding.)

Alignments are coming back, but they won't have a lot of mechanics associated to them.

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/763351879

• 24:05: Why no Alignment system? Because WotC is moving away from Alignment as a constraint on dialogue choices.
• 25:07: Alignment will be added to character creation, because some people want it, but don't expect a lot of mechanics attached to it.

Hello? Anybody at Larian here? Weeks without updates does not bode well. I keep hoping they'll fix the atrocious controls and camera, but so far it's silence. You guys aren't very good at communicating and keeping your community in the loop.

Well, Belgium went back to a strict lockdown so it might not help much to set up community updates.

I rolled a Drow expecting the Minthara would be more interactive...like Hey another drow for the Absolute! Tadpole mind touch giving insight into the plan. Nope. All I found with the drow was the better vision in the dark, no better stealth.. sigh.

The writer who should write Evil root (Larian's opinion):


The writer who should write Evil root (players opinion):

Whatever, the main question (to me) is when is larian to give us more material. I'm playing my second run but already getting bored (at the moment I'm doing a lot of metaplay because i already know all the stuff). I get is an early access but a year before early acess seems to be a bit eccessive to my taste.

We Demand More Sexy Community Update: Need more cakes and cosplayers

I'm on the umpteenth play through and there are some things I just avoid now because there is no point.. cleaned out the goblins - killed the other gith but we can't find the cresh can't really do much in the underdark except fight a few mobs and talk to the mushroom guys or the duergars the tower is kinda anticlimactic. Been a couple months I'd like to see more than "under construction" maybe open up some of the next chapter?

I note that both the female tadpole romance and the female party option are less detailed than the male player gets. the female player tadpole romance scenes are so bad you can't even tell body parts. Rolled a male drow to check it out the flip side.

In both my first and second runthrough, both male toons, the tadpole romance sequence was really bad. Gotta try a female character to test it and to evaluate the quality od dialogues.

And again, I know it's a complex work but at least they could add other quests or open new classes.

Hype

Does this game need group sex? One of them must be the main romantic interest, otherwise it will be strange.
I mean, one of the two you can sleep with at the same time.

I initially had 2 specific companions in mind for my silly joke, but making it more open-ended allows for everyone to envision the possibilities based or their own fetish. Who knows maybe someone would want the hooded skeleton at camp to participate.

...

There are many things I would hope are a priority over these 'romance' items.

Is there a release roadmap? Race updates? Class and Subclass updates?

Making combat a bit tighter, and fixing some of the issues around buffs and debuffs?

to be honest with you I didn't buy the game so that I could watch sex scenes between a couple of toons. I bought the game because I enjoy RPGs and dnd. I'm not even trying to do what is needed to be done to be in a relationship with any of them.

Amen. Each to their own I guess but I would have hoped that romances were not a huge priority given some of the feedback in these forums which has not yet been addressed or acknowledged by Larian.

I mean have them, thats fine, the branching needed in dialogue in Game 2 for these things was at times impressive.

But...to burn a bunch of dev time when there are fundamental issues with the gameplay on it? Nah.

Mhm. What Scribe said. Agreed.

Yep, iron out the kinks in the game before putting more kinks in the game ;-)

Yes i LOVE the two FEMALE sex scenes!!!

You’d think reading these forums a huge portion of the players want a relationship and Barbie simulator. Both those things are important and should be fixed if there are problems but ultimately BG3 is a game that deals with a ton of combat which is severely lacking right now.

Exactly. Game isn't even close to ready.

I totally agree with you there are still lots of bugs even with the Feats that should have already been taken care of long ago.

I totally agree.

Pretty sure it would be different teams working on these.

Pretty sure it isn't the entire community. Why do people have to try and legitimize themselves by claiming to speak for the entire community? You speak for yourself, other people that have issues speak for themselves, just like people that like the game speak for THEMSELVES. Pretty sure Larian knows what percentage of the community is what. Considering that they just tweaked the advantage numbers on height advantage, it does show they are working on this stuff.

I think the critical path for getting the game out is primarily artistic. You need the story and its potential dialog paths to be solid, the art assets ( environment/props/creatures ) created, along with animation/voice acting and soundscape/soundtrack creation, before you have any hope of a playable game.

Sequencing the production/acquisition of these assets determines the minimum time to release, as they are needed to be able to create levels/scenes, as well as script and test encounters and activities that comprise the game.

Certainly the game engine needs to be reasonably solid, with minimal crashes and functioning systems before you can put out EA, but refining the engine behaviour, the game appearance, and individual area balance are probably weighted to later in the cycle, particularly as there systems still being built to support classes/races/spells/creatures that are not yet available.

I would certainly prefer that Larian manage their resources to most efficiently complete the game, to minimise the likelihood that content is cut or story quality/options diminished. If this means fixing animations and other options, changes and tweaks are pushed back to later in the EA, then that is fine as far as I am concerned.