Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback 10 Suggestions (Hotfix #11)

Below I have 10 thoughts/suggestions. The last one is simply a hopeful addition for the future.

1) Threaten Condition should only occur when your within the range of an enemy character's melee range. If your not using a 5ft grid system, then you should remove all D&D designs used around those 5' squares. This makes moving in combat with ranged and spellcasters complex. Without the grid, we do not see the non existent threaten range extend beyond the characters reach.
2) Jump as a bonus action creates problematic issues with balance around spells and good terrain usage. Especially giving the very important disengage action as a bonus action for all characters. This makes locking down ranged characters impossible and removes the need for wizards to take spells like Misty Step or dimension door.

3) Druid Shapeshifts and Ranger Beast companions don't line up with regards to 5e D&D. I don't understand the wide shift in stats and abilities around these creatures. The moon druid only gets a single form more than the Land druid. This is not the case in 5e. This design takes away from what makes the moon druid unique among druids. The Land druid should have several very weak forms but the moon druid adds tons of combat ready forms.
4) Why did you go is a different direction for the Ranger than Tasha's? This game diverges in so many areas in unnecessary ways. I had hoped this game would provide a bridge between 5e players and RPG video game players. But keep scratching my head with the way things are implemented away from 5e. I don't expect 5e purism because 5e requires DM interpretation. Just lost at where these changes are are made.

5) Fog cloud doesn't block line of sight between characters on opposite sides. This is really strange losing one of it primary uses form tabletop.
6) Many Illusion spells are weird. I feel for you but don't know what suggestions would make minor, silent, or major image even remotely functional. Fun tabletop spells but likely useless in BG3.

7) Not all ranged attack should be governed by Dex. Throwing some types of equipment should allow use of Str. Str characters cry for your help! Power throw random items seems fun before getting into melee.
8) The huge nerf to spell and ranged weapons ranges compared to pen and paper along with the nerfed size for many AoEs. These both have big impacts on the ability for ranged characters positions in open battlefields. While these are not super often, its important part of the weapon and spells functions.

9) The issue with randomness for many players isn't the "fairness". It is we don't see or experience the rolls clearly especially in combat. Don't know the best solution in combat beyond making the roll experience more dynamic in the combat chat. The conversation and interaction rolls are largely fine but should ADD your skill modifiers. Gamers like to see their big numbers and the value from their builds. Additionally, Party members should assist in conversations when they are better at certain skills. Or the option should be given. Very important for a party based game.
10) More important suggestion. Can the Cantrips Booming Blade and Green Flame Blade get added? These spells are important for several classes (fighter Eldritch Knight, Rogue Arcane Trickster, Wizards Bladesinger, Bards, Cleric Arcane, Warlock pact of the blade/Hexblades, and more.)

I agree with most of your feedback but I'll highlight a few things

1.) I am very confused why Larian set the "threatened" range different than the range that provokes AoO's. It seems to run contrary to Larian's philosophy of increasing chance-to-hit, since threatened imposes disadvantage to ranged attacks.

4.) BG3 was in development and released in EA before Tasha's released, so it makes some sense that BG3's ranger would be different. However, it would have been nice for WotC and Larian to coordinate on this...

5.) Not sure if you're saying that Fog Cloud should block line of sight but doesn't in BG3, or the opposite. There's some debate as to its function, given the somewhat contradictory definition of heavily obscured areas in D&D 5e.

10.) This point is especially important for a) re-creating PnP characters in BG3 and b) the (hopeful) DM mode in BG3, as more spells/abilities/etc will add so much to any user-created campaigns.

I read soo many forum posts that have players complaining about " Why isn't this spell in the game? or why isn't this domain in the game?, etc... " The player base seems to have forgotten that this is Early Access and there for nothing is complete. There are still more content, spells, classes, races, equipment, tweaks, etc.. still to be added. When all these things get added, fleshed out it will also quite possibly could fix a lot of balancing issues.... or it may not. We as players need to constantly remind ourselves that this is merely early access, not even alpha or beta. The tone of many of the thread posts speak as if this game were complete and polished.

Larian has stated that they're focusing on PHB, DMG, and MM material over later stuff, so it's very useful feedback to argue for implementing certain things from other books.

Early access isn't a separate thing from alpha or beta. Alpha or beta are measures of the completeness/bugginess of the game, while Early Access only means that consumers can buy the game early to play/test it. I'd characterize BG3 as currently in alpha and EA, as there are significant features missing but it is still playable and mostly in working condition. Us EA players will probably never see the beta version of BG3 because Larian is saving Acts 2+ for full release.

First, thanks for replying to my thread. These conversations are what will propel BG3 forward into the best game it can be.

For Clarity, There is only one of the 10 points discusses adding any new spells or powers but more to your point. The game is in early access though Larian has clearly stated the DM, PHB, and MM would be nearly 100% included into BG3. The problem is Booming Blade and Green Flame Blade exist in other books. If we consider small parts of other books extremely important for the games balance and diversity, we should point them out. The inclusion of two additional cantrips isn't as complex as a whole class or subclass. But both these spells are extremely important for many different melee hybrid builds.

Furthermore Larian wants our feedback over what is in the game and what is not. Its Larian's whole design philosophy surrounding Early Access. They get huge data from players early enough for important changes in design and direction. There will only ever be Early Access as the game will near seamlessly enter into the full game on release. This is how Larian handled DOS2.

Thanks for providing your thoughts! I agree its strange AoO's and threatened are completely disjointed. It make planning movement for your actions far more difficult when you must consider a large invisible automatic debuff for ranged and spellcasting characters.



Your absolutely correct with the timeline but even with this information here is my problems.
1) The stated openly they were working with WoTC in fixing the ranger. But ended up with something completely different?
2) Larian decided ranger should be released with the first group of classes. They could have waited for near Tasha's release as cross promotion.
3) Tasha's has been out for months. So the ranger can be changed to match.



Let me clarify:
BG3 Fog Cloud |
1) It blocks sight with the blind condition for those inside the cloud.
2) Those outside the cloud can't target those inside the cloud.

Tabletop Fog Cloud |
1) Those in the cloud can't see in or out of the cloud
2) Those outside the cloud can't see those in the cloud
3) You can not see through the cloud to those on the opposite side.

BG3 fog cloud is missing the third piece. I can give my attempted use of the third option in BG3 and it failing.
Near game start after getting most of the companion, the first ruins area you enter from the door (the entry above where you meet shadowheart). This room has only one door going further in where most of the enemies are located. So I cast fog cloud with the intention to force them closer disabling their range by placing it in the doorway. But they keep shoot me as if the cloud didn't exist. They didn't even have disadvantage.

I do agree there is enough grayness around fog cloud. You technically should have the option to shot an aimless arrow guessing the enemies location. But implementing this makes it hard when they have other characters giving the players or AI line of sight. Taking the guessing away only leaving possibly disadvantage.


Completely agree and Larian went through the effort to get a main stream dnd franchise game title. The game is a D&D brand but they can't seem to leave DOS2 behind.
BG, Neverwinter, Icewind, and such all were able to implement nearly core rules for their respective D&D versions. Don't understand why Larian think they can't.
They have competitors that are doing a better job implementing 5e rules into their games. And those games are limited to only uses the SDR forcing them to create additional new spells and classes since they lack the rights. Its really a strange situation.

I'm not sure what to make of that first point.
You absolutely do NOT need to have an explicit grid when "vectors" can play the exact same role in a 3D environment.

The threaten condition is given within a certain distance from an enemy. Appears to use the 5e placeholder of 5 Feet. The problems are thus.
1) The game does not give you vector information for how far enemies are from a position your planning to move too. This requires eye balling it to avoid the status.
2) The 5ft range for this status is a holdover from a grid based system used in 5e. The rules intention is you are in range of enemies melee attacks thus must fire more carefully. 5 foot range is universal reach for nearly all melee weapons even daggers using a grid system. When you start breaking movement down beyond 5 feet squares and giving real weapon ranges, the simplified grid based rule doesn't work well.
3) It easier to eye the rough range of the weapons. But still be threatened by them when outside that range. This isn't intuitive.

Disadvantage isn't a weak status condition either.