SUNLIGHT SENSITIVITY is currently implemented in the game for NPCs only. PC characters should also have this if they select a race that has this attribute.

From a balance perspective, it is unfair that those with Superior Darkvision and other bonuses suffer no penalty in the open surface world. It skews the equality of the races and should be addressed.

From an RP perspective, there isn't even any explanation why those that SHOULD have Sunlight Sensitivity aren't affected.

LARGE/HEAVY WEAPONS are currently able to be wielded by Gnomes and Halflings with no penalty. This is also something that needs to be addressed in the game.

Removing these drawbacks from certain races makes the game feel too min-max. There's almost no reason not to choose Drow for most classes.

Also, Drow are way more accepted by society than maybe they should. It's only a few stringent lines of dialogue for this and it isn't convincing.

Thoughts?

I've been assuming, like Astarion, the tadpole is protecting us from such things.

Of course racial prejudices in the world is another matter

I would like to have Sunlight Sensitivity implemented ...
Would be kinda frustrating tho, many people are allready complaining that they dont hit as often as they want to ... also feel free to corect me, but this would mean no Sneak Attack for Drow Rogues on surface right? :-/ That would also be most likely huge source of criticism.
Maybe with some kind of eye patch, they would start with? Or find fairly short ... i mean, its basicaly just strip of fabric, hardly any super rare artefact.

As for the second rule with weapons ... personaly i would support it aswell ...
With same arguments against it ...

Maybe include both to difficiulty settings?
That seems reasonable to me.

Agreeed +1000 ...
This was allready mentioned several times ... it dont seem tho that Larian would make our experience any more special than "huh, so you are friendly *insert evil race here* ... interesting" followed by regular dialogue.

Explaining every plot hole as the tadpole, the tadpole, the tadpole gets so lazy and unimaginative after a certain point.

So much rests on this tadpole for the story. What happens when we inevitably remove it before the end of the game?

And yes, it would mean the Drow are gimp on the surface but the best underground. That's how it should be.

Humans are still penalized by lack of darkvision elsewhere with no option for something like the tadpole giving them darkvision. I don't understand how hard it is for them to pay attention to balance.

+1 I'd like racial traits to be more impactful

For example, I think making the Underdark lighter just because people who played races without Darkvision complained was a bad move (and people with Darkvision complained that it wasn't working properly). Fix Darkvision and Low-Light Vision instead of making the Underdark a 'sunset'-type place, with reds, purples, and orange hues that every surfacer can see in. And then, if you want to take your party with no Darkvision and no light sources and no light spells in the Underdark, you should deal with the penalties and if you die, you die. Similarly, if you want to roleplay a group of Llolth-Sworn Drow traipsing across the Sword Coast, deal with the penalty for your RP choices.

Indeed ...
But you must take under concideration all that people, who allready play for last 2years theyr perfectly OP Drows, wich would by this simple change quicly turn into quite useless in many scenarios. :-/
I dont think it would be bad, on the contrary ... but allready can imagine that wave of grudge it would inevidibly cause. :-/

So therefore i believe this should be optional in Difficiulty settings ... that way anyone who wants autentic Drow experience can have it.

@Neleothesze
+1

I agree. The UnderDARK should be DARK. Larian wants to put training wheels on everything to satisfy the lowest common denominator.

It's aggravating.

@OP: Gnomes and halflings should have disadvantage with heavy weapons.
Dwarfs are medium cretures and can use heave weapons without penalty.

About light sensitivity, well, Astarion the vampire can walk around in the sunlight.
But using the tadpole as excuse for everything is just lame.

Yes, the underdark should be dark.
Light sensitivity and darkvision would make much more sense if there was day/night shift.

Pretty much sums up BG3. But remember, the lowest common denominator finds EVERYTHING fun and great. And thats the overwhelming majority of modern gamers = $$$.

This word "balance" gets thrown around a lot. I feel like it's largely based in faith.

Curiously, what's the value of darkvision? Compared to the value of an extra point in charisma? Compared to the value of fey ancestory?

Can you put a numerical value to these things? Like, darkvision is worth ten points whereas superior darkvision is worth fifteen points. And so on with all the racial traits, thus proving some sort of balance?

Because I don't think you can. I think a lot of it is just arbitrary decisions, and the best you can get is that it isn't too out of whack.

Some folks might say the drow are OP. Others might think the half-elves are OP. What about the dwarf that gets a plus two in strength and constitution? Someone else might be impressed with the tieflings' resistance to fire. When you get right down to it, I haven't noticed that everyone is playing a drow because they're the undisputed best without sunlight sensitivity.

So, I guess I'm asking: where's the metric that says the drow aren't balanced just like they are in the game?

*

Regarding the matter of how folks react to drow, I agree completely. I want to see a lot more racial animosity in the game, across all the spectrums.

@JandK For each edition of DnD feedback is given: what works, what doesn't, what's obsolete - over months and years of people playing that edition. Eventually, a new edition comes out that is balanced around gaming trends, fun, and providing enough challenge. Arbitrarily deciding not to implement certain features of certain classes (either because they are too hard to implement with the engine you're using or because some people testing an incomplete product complained about it) will never be balanced, no matter how many points you assign to Darkvision, +2 Charisma or Sleep Immunity. The fact that the OP pointed out some issues and you noticed others, doesn't invalidate his argument... rather, both should be taken as examples of unnecessary rule changes.

Perhaps it is about faith, in the sense that, a lot of the Baldur's Gate playerbase put their 'faith' in the DnD ruleset to provide a balanced experience that is both fun and challenging and seeing Larian mess with that is worrying or disappointing.

Well, tadpole is used as an excuse in this specific scenario which is specific for Astarion because he happens to be a vampire spawn. What is so lame about it?

+1

I think you misunderstand me.

I've played DnD since the original box version, back when playing an elf was your class. I've been involved in more discussions about game balance than I can remember to count.

I'm not pointing out issues I've noticed that take away from the balance: I'm saying that the "balance" of the game is not so delicate, not by half. Removing sensitivity to sunlight does not break the balance of the game.

And the development of the various editions is not based in some grand science. There are plenty of arbitrary decisions. "This *feels* about right, so let's go with it." And it results in a system where some classes are universally considered more powerful than others.

It's just the way it is. It's always been the way it is. So appeals to explicitly follow 5e because of balance don't move me. In time, there'll be a 6e and advocates for that system will be certain in their faith that it's delicately balanced. And playing around with this or that still won't break it, anymore than BG3 is broken because of a lack of sunlight sensitivity.

100% agree. I not one on for lore dictating gameplay, but in this case I agree because there needs to be a reason for not taking dark vision. Otherwise the balance is bricked

If this was true, there would be no need to cater to them.

I am not sure that the superior darkvision is even going to matter in the game, considering ranges on practically everything (except the stupid shove distance) have been nerfed. There isn't much distance viewing either with the camera not having the z axis. I have not yet noticed any difference in combat between playing a Drow or another race with regular Darkvision.

Also without having actual nighttime gameplay, light sensitivity could get completely ridiculous unless they added an item to counter it, and I am of the opinion that we have too many items already. If we had day/night cycle then I wouldn't mind having the sunlight sensitivity, since Drow could do things at night to avoid the issue, much like those without darkvision can carry a light source to avoid theirs.


Large and heavy weapons should probably not be able to be used by certain races, but they did leave out some racial characteristics from what I can find, like Brave and Nimble for halflings. Perhaps it would be fair to just make it a strength requirement or have specific versions of those weapons that those races can use.


There should definitely be more hostility to certain races depending on where and what they are doing (Drow pretty much everywhere, Tieflings in a city and around shops for instance.)

IMO there should be some kind of disguise system for races like drow or gith. It will add unique gameplay and can be interesting for 2nd playthrough

Also Variant human can be better than a race with darkvision

Agree with the above. Larian have made a decent start at adding different dialogue options and responsiveness to different races, but it needs a lot more depth to be truly satisfying.


I’ve been impressed with the implementation of the Disguise Self spell so far. Maybe we’ll also get disguise kits in the game in future that can have the same effect, though I suppose it’s less plausible that a drow could disguise themselves as, say, a gnome without magical help!

I complained about that in the past... It is not even about balance... It is about being in line with the lore

Drow are hated/feared and they are light sensitive. They are not simply a dark skinned variant of elves...

Simply please focus more on being close to the source material and less into creating new problem: so the tadpole is making me see in daylight but it still affects true souls? But if it protects me from the environment then why not allowing me to breath underwater ?

To give a flavour of this without it being really frustrating (or needing a day/night cycle), it could be that drow only get disadvantage when standing in full sunlight out of doors. The game is already calculating the amount of light for stealth checks. It might be thrown by, e.g. torches and fires outside in daylight, but I don’t think that would be too noticeable. I think it would even add to the gameplay experience of a drow, actively looking out for shadows to lurk in. Though the game would need to give you better visual cues about what spots were shadowy without going into stealth, that would be desirable anyway.

EDIT 12/08: Well, after playing this game more hours than I care to admit, I have just realised that it's possible to press <left shift> and hover the mouse over an area to find out whether it's in full light, partial light or shadow, as well as to see vision cones while not in stealth, so the game is already doing more than I thought it was

By the way, is there a 5e spell that would counteract the disadvantage? Darkness affects darkvision doesn’t it, so unless you’re a drow warlock with Devil’s Sight that’s not going to help you.

IIRC Elves don't have darkvision the same way a natural race does, but it's tied to their magical heritage where they can see part of the weave, so technically elves should lose darkvision if they're silenced, though I don't think this has ever been represented in game rules. I could be completely wrong though. I'm having trouble finding any info but I remember reading it once.

Edit: Elvish Darkvision is brought up in this video at 8:50 by MrRhexx

Hmm, just got to the blighted village with my Lolth-sworn drow ranger, and the goblin leader specifically says the fact you’re a drow in the sun means you have a touch of the Absolute about you. Not that this is a reason to completely ignore normal race rules, but nice touches like this goblin automatically assuming that you’re on their side would need to be reworked, at least to some extent.

And that's an incorrect comment. Somehow I feel larian are putting drows and vampires in the same bag. Vampire soawns are hurt by the Sun. Drows simply found it inconvenient and will need a long time to readjust to it (it took Drizzt a couple of month in canon novels). A drow being on the surface would be a rare sight, but the more likely explanation would be that he/she would work with minthara and standing in the sun would be irrelevant