Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback It's Not Me It's You...

Please just give me mercenary type characters or allow me to create my own party.. I have no interest in these companions or their hateful personalities. I have enough hate in my life i don't need more in my video gaming.

Thanks.

I kinda like that they dont do a big deal about sex ...

Much more than Mass Effect for example: "Since day one we know we are on suicide mission, and anyone of us could die thousand times every single planet we met ... yet we will wait til the end, to have strictly one romantic moment."
Rly? Who does this? :-/

Small excerpt taken from an interview wit Swen at https://www.techradar.com/uk/news/h...he-definitive-dungeons-and-dragons-video-game

It seems that many people did not get the message that they were releasing these companions first with all the complaining about their attitudes that goes on in this forum.

I've seen the same hints, and I really do hope that the writers would make Lae'zel malleable to a degree, she is practical anyway, and if she sees that "the good approach" works sometimes much better, that would be a good start for her character to get rid of tunnel world view she got due to her upbringing.

I don't have nothing against sex and romances, just don't want to hold corpse at the end for sake of making it more dramatic. It is dramatic already, with tadpoles and if hells want to succ BG as they did with Elturel I would like my PC having at least one quiet bay.

To play the devil's advocate I don't think you should expect all of your players to also have read all the interviews, news articles and pre-release blogs/news posts before they start playing the game.
I don't really have a problem with the current companions' personalities, but I can see why they might turn some people off.

They seem like a bunch of goodie 2 shoes to me - one of them already abandoned me after 1 action he disapproved of.

Got to say:



Sorry, Larian, but no. That's not an excuse.

Evil and neutral characters do not have to be utterly unlikable - you chose to make them that way.

There is a Very Strong reason why, in the vast majority of video games like this that involve companions of variable moral stances and alignments, the games almost invariably introduce you to the good characters first, and the pink-to-red aligned ones later. There's a reason they all do this (or present you with all of them at the same time, ala NW1); it's not arbitrary.

Players who are coming into a game intending to play a red-aligned play through as a dark, evil or selfish character generally come into it expecting to meet resistance from theri companions; to a certain extent, it helps validate and lend credibility to their character's evil. By meeting the goodly companions first, they gain this immediate counterpoint, and for evil playthroughs, that resistance is a good thing (experientially speaking). They can then meet the more morally similar characters later, when they feel established in their personal set up - and if they swiftly backstab their former good companions in favour of these other like-minded individuals, then that's further playing into their character and affirming it.

If a player comes into a game intending to play an evil character, and all they meet initially are other evil characters, it either deflates their sense of initial character development, or it forces them to feel like they need to act supremely cartoonishly, game-destructively evil just to top them.

On the other hand, if a player comes into a game intending to play a more or less good or heroic character, and they meet the like-minded characters first, this has the opposite effect; it reaffirms and reinforces their choice to be good and sets them up with allies they feel they can trust and who will support them, which are usually important things for good character playthroughs. Meeting the darker characters after this is easier and smoother because the darker characters are more clearly outliers - being met after the good characters generally enhances their darker character traits, so they don't need to act like completely unlikable arseholes and rub everyone the wrong way just to assert their character.

If, however, a player comes into a game intending to play a more or less good or heroic character, and they meet all of the evil bastards first, they're put in a position where everyone that surrounds them reacts negatively to their efforts, right from the get-go, and risks making the characters feel like they're being treated as the bad guy, for no legitimate reason - which for someone aiming to play a more or less goodly aligned character is less likely to be enjoyed, and may even be discouraging or disheartening.

There is a reason that you generally are presented with the opportunity to hook up with the good characters earlier than the dark ones. It's actually a fairly nuanced thing, and Larian are shooting themselves in several vital organs by arbitrarily bucking that practice, when they don't appear to understand it in the first place.

This is true but I thought we are supposed to be testers first and players second.


I disagree that they are unlikable, they just need the player to have an open mind.

When the game is released, it will have all the companions. Maybe they should have made the Early Access part more clear?

Are the other companions going to be available simultaneously or prior to these ones? No? Then the comment stands.

Let me rephrase: they didn't have to make a character literally do nothing at all in conversations for the first *long* stretch of your time knowing them, except condescend, insult, belittle, demean and insinuate inferiority upon the player character, just to illustrate that she was an evil aligned character. If they felt they needed to do that to show she was evil, well that's just abominably bad writing. They chose to do that on their own. They said "Hey, let's make this character insult abuse and belittle the character just for talking to them, and make them ramp it up if they try to learn anything about them", and then they said "Let's make it even better, by setting them up to be the first character you run into after the intro, that's sure to leave players feeling good about playing our game".

Does that make her unlikable, okay, perhaps not: if you secretly enjoy or get off on being abused and belittled by people you're supposed to be relying on in dangerous situations, then by all means. Most people don't. It doesn't *matter* how deep or compelling her story supposedly is, or how much reason and motivation she supposedly has for acting that way; I've no interest in putting myself through that kind of behaviour to find out, because when I do, it still won't justify or excuse the behaviour.

That pretty much sums up my impression, and it was very surprising too because I loved the writing in the previous Larian games. Yes, I saw the interviews beforehand about the "evil" companions coming in first, but I wasn't expecting this. Companions being stressed out doesn't count as an excuse either because heck, my main character also was abducted and had a tadpole shoved into her skull, and nobody is cutting her any slack. These people need me as much as I need them, and so far I have very little incentive to take them along. There is no real reason why I should trust any of them - Astarion even murdered me one night in camp, so why would I bother with him?

For me, I honestly have no interest in the romance portion as of yet. I think our characters have a bit more to be concerned with than just getting laid, but that's just me. :P I really don't care whether they like what I say or not. It's apparent that I am the party leader. If you don't like what I do, then you are more than welcome to leave and find your own way. My characters main concern is getting the tadpole out/controlled/destroyed, whichever of those 3 seems the most appropriate. Keeping options opened. Now after this is taken care of... Then we'll see who might have has been the most supportive and helpful under that dire situation. :P

Well, I'm afraid I'm gonna have to disagree with . . . pretty much this whole post.

Larian don't need an "excuse". The game is not out yet, this is an unfinished preview. They don't owe the customers anything yet.

The companions currently in the game are not "unlikable". YOU just don't like them. Tons of people do, though, which is why the subreddit is flooded with piles of fan art for these companions already.

A character doesn't have to be nice to my character, for me to like that character. These characters are acting appropriately for their backgrounds and roles in the world. Lae'zel acts like a Githyanki. Shadowheart acts like a Priest of Shar. Astarion acts like a Vampire.

I don't think that "in the vast majority of video games like this that involve companions of variable moral stances and alignments, the games almost invariably introduce you to the good characters first" is even factually accurate. In Baldur's Gate, other than the companion that you start with because she's your sister, the first two companions you meet, on the first map, are both hella evil. In Tyranny, the first companion you meet is a bloodthirsty murder-bandit. In Kingmaker, the second companion you meet is literally one of the main villains of the game, and the third is a bloodthirsty berserker who despises the weak. In Dragon Age Origins, the first companion you meet besides the automatic mandatory Grey Warden is Morrigan, a witch who is decidedly not good. There's no "vast majority" here.

And this moral ambiguity is what makes them interesting. Well, beside being well written.

Well, until I saw this post I did not know we only got the neutral / evil companions. I see this as a breakdown in communication. If Larian does not tell us stuff, how the heck are we suppose to know if this is how they expect things to be working. When I have alpha tested software in the past, there are expectation notes given to the testers. I would love that and a known bug list that you could check.

It sure doesn't seem one sided with Lae'zel, especially when about an hour ago she approached my guy out of no where and tried to proposition him. Also the thing is this I went out of my way to show zero interest in her and I also went out of my way not to get approval from her. Yet as I mentioned she approached my character out of no where and tried to proposition him, so I would say that for her it is not one sided.

Githyanki approach sex and relationships differently from other races. They are oviparous and grow up in hidden creches without much knowledge of other races as they are Gith supremacist. They have no father, and their "mother" is Lich Vlaakith. So Laezel's behavior is nothing strange from the point of view of her species that does not form a romantic bond. Your approval with her means nothing (for the beginning at least).

She is not like this because she is "evil". She is like this because this is how she was raised, also because she is thrown in an unfamiliar situation and doesn't know how to deal with it. The game maybe should do a better job of explaining this.

Just like in real life, different cultures come across strangely to someone not exposed to them, once you take the time to understand that culture then everything makes sense. Stressed out people will snap at others and act in much more negative ways, this is expected considering most people do not have experience in regulating or suppressing their emotions.

Certainly - They've already got my money, after all. I do, however, expect them to show signs of delivering on what they've promised, and I'm offering feedback to that extent, same as you are. I'm going to be nonplussed if they make commentary that shows signs of them willfully misrepresenting their audience along with very little sign of feedback being taken on board.

Notice how in each of your examples except one, you had to put a caveat or an exclusion on them? How you had to first discount a prior companion before you could reference the dark one(s)? It more illustrates my point than counters it, overall.

As a case in point - Tartucio (who joins you, surprise surprise, AFTER Linzi, the brightest beacon of good in the whole game) is almost comically evil. He's a selfish bastard, twisted by many unpleasant and unfair details in his past, and once you know the full picture there is something to be pitied there... And you get to that point because despite all of that, he actually isn't intolerable to work with, during the short time you do so... Shadow, on the other side, is only tolerable if you never speak to her. Otherwise she's just downright unpleasant.

That aside, I don't need you to agree with me... I'm just pointing out a convention based in tested psychology. They can buck it if they want to, at their peril. Some games can do that well, sure, if the characters are presented well enough to not cause the negative effects I mentioned. So far, these ones are not, and do not.



Yeah, art... they sure are *pretty*. Not a lot of fan-fiction yet though. Funny that. I've seen lots of people fawn over Shadow's visuals... haven't seen much in the way of people talking about what they like about Shadow herself though.



Agreed. Shadow just really goes that extra unnecessary mile of insult, abuse and belittlement... What about her do you like, if I might ask? Sell me on a good reason why I should voluntarily subject myself to several hours and multiple conversations filled with nothing but abuse, condescension, belittlement and insults; that's not something I enjoy, personally, so sell it to me: what is it about her that makes that a rewarding, enjoyable experience for you? (I am, in all honesty, curious here, with no ill intention or raised ire)




They do. Funny thing is, I tried that... I tried to take the time to understand her, multiple times, as I progressed through the act. All it ever got me was abuse, insults and threats. Conversely, I can easily count the number of times she tried to understand me, in any way at all, during that time. It's zero. Zero times.