Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Mega-threads and Guides Party Size Discussion

But the people that won't enjoy playing with 6 player wouldn't be forced to do so, they could play with 4 or 5 or 3 or whatever and enjoy the game anyway they want, just like we want to enjoy the game with 6, balance or no balance(Cheezus i hate that word, gamers are the most Yin/Yang Zen focused group outside of Daoism. ) .

Not exactly. If party size affects difficulty (no change to exp or combats), I (and the many other players who want a party of 6) can't play a Tactician-level difficulty game with the 6-person party. Because that difficulty would be balanced for a 4-person party (and thus would be too easy). Similarly, someone who wants to play an easy solo playthrough wouldn't be able to, because Story-mode difficulty would also be balanced for a 4-person party. We explicitly cannot enjoy the game anyway we want.

Whereas, if a given difficulty mode remains the same regardless of party size (scaling exp), players can separately select difficulty level and party size, fixing both of the examples I gave above.

Are you arguing for or against 6-party setup? Because the argument you used is used by those that want the game to maintain a 4-party setup.
"No! we can't let people play with 6 characters!! What about the precious balance! it will ruin my game if someone else is playing the game "unbalanced". BTW, Hyperbole, but still pretty close to their arguments.

Anyhow.
Yes! Of course it would be better if the game was built around your preferential party size, i am with you on that.
But that is going to take much more time and manpower rather than just implementing a warning at the beginning of the game stating that it will probably become easier and a little less balanced if you choose a 6-party setup.
Since 6 character party is already possible in the "tutorial", it just seems arbitrary and cruel against us that want to experince as many companions as possible to lock the party to 4.

Here's where we disagree. I highly doubt that it'd take "much more time and manpower" to implement scaling exp. It's likely only a few lines of code, especially since the game already tracks individual character exp.
- Exp granted per character = old exp * (4/party size).
Actually, splitting exp should be implemented even if Larian doesn't allow 5- or 6-person parties, so that players can play with 3 or fewer characters and gain exp faster.

If Larian made no changes to encounters or exp, sure I guess it strictly improves the game to include a setting: "allow 6-person parties." But that is the bare minimum, and Larian could easily do better. Personally, I probably wouldn't use the setting as it'd remove a lot of the challenge from the game.

What kind of XP system are you implying that they use now? I guess i never could never imagine anybody would use any other system than splitting xp among your party members?
If you are right then i agree with you that it needs to change ASAP, whether they implement 6 party members or not.

The full experience from an enemy (or exploration) is given to all party members, not divided between party members. At least, this is how earlier patches and DOS1&2 worked...it's possible that this was changed in a patch but I haven't heard anyone mention it being changed.

Wow, that is really not how it's supposed to be, i understand your qualms then. In Baldurs gate we split the bill.

Giving the option for 6 party members would be way too much work in my opinion.
You would need to add additional scaling difficulty, refine every fight in the game, so that it can be played fine with both 3, 4, 5, and 6 party members..

Also having 6 party members would neglect the need to chose your party members, you could just have everything in the party.
And all this would only introduce a lot of complications...

I actually feel, the game is much more interesting with a smaller party, and is designed already with 4 party members in mind.

I do not see any actual realistic reason to put in so much work into the game to change this.
Apart from: Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 had 6...

And so what?! - It also had a max resolution of 1024 by 768... Bring that back too, and 2D Sprite graphics?
Times change, my car was also quite different 23 years ago.

And that's what made it work so well! Solo-runs were difficult, but feasible because your character got more exp. Hopefully Larian decides to make experience work this way. Then all the people who hate most/all of the companions can feel free to kill them off without making the game ~impossible to complete.

NemethR, please. I literally just had a whole discussion with @williams85 about how encounters don't need to be remade to account for different party sizes. Just divide exp between participating party members, which is a single equation to code, and the game mostly balances itself. This also gives more exp to 1-3-person parties, which is already an option in the game.

Also, there are likely going to be 2-5 more companions added. So you would still have to choose your party members.

it's almost like we are doomed to go in circles forever in this discussion. Groundhog Day style.

Well, that's exactly the point. People keep throwing around the word "balance" even though it really doesn't mean anything. In any case, my point was exactly that the game being easier (or harder) is completely separate from and has nothing to do with "balance," whatever that means. And if, by choosing to go with a bigger party than Larian's default party size of 4, I end up with my game being easier, why does that bother anyone else? This is what I don't get, when people keep saying "well a party of six will make the game too easy." Easy for whom? For you? Because someone came over to your house and forced you to play with the bigger party? And if it becomes "too easy" for me because I chose to increase my party size, the only person for whom that matters is me!

How so? Please explain, because I only see extremely minimal additional work for Larian. Larian themselves have already confirmed that their UI screens are already set to accommodate up to six characters in the party. People are already cheating the game to play with parties of 6. So all they'd have to do is create the optional toggle in the difficulty settings screen to increase party size and that's it, because from a systems standpoint that fifth or sixth party member will not be any different from the fourth.

And how should they increase the difficoulty?

Monsters should deal more damage, or have more HP, or just be more of them...

All the re-tweaking and testing, and further tweaking and testing of the already existing content (also act 2-3-...) for 3, 5, 6 party members would be a lot of time.
And if they implement it, then people would start complaining about how they implemented it, and why it should be done differently...

Not sure it is for us to determine how labour intensive it would or wouldn't be in terms of implementation and balance, I am pretty sure Larian themselves can determine that.

If enough people clamour for 5-6 party members, then there is appetite there for the change to be a valid one. Now Larian might feel the game is better with 4 PC's and they'll allow 5-6 purely as NPC types (limited interaction / story), because it is easier to manage the game if people like Halsin can join a 4 person party rather than joining a 6 person party, where either someone has to temporarily leave, OR suddenly the party grows to 7+.
For me that seems to be the crux, in that story elements are designed for people to join you in specific quests / missions and perhaps at larger party sizes it get's too hard to balance or the system starts having a GPU meltdown, I don't know. Either way Larian will I am sure. There are ways round that, such as you choosing to meet the NPC at a set location vs integrating them into the party for example, depends how much exposition is needed.

The only thing that bugs me is that Larian have stayed pretty quiet on this topic despite it, for all intents and purposes, being quite a big topic at least on this forum. Many here, myself included would like to see larger party sizes being a legit option (i.e. not just through mods) and are keen to at least understand the reasoning behind the decision should it stay as is, or better convince Larian otherwise.

Would that mean something else wouldn't get implemented? Maybe, but other than Day/Night or RTwP, what other large topics are there? Until Larian starts giving us a poll saying you can have Day/Night OR Dragonborn, you can have 5-6 Party size OR 10 extra quests, blah, discussions on how much work for Larian it is or isn't, is an irrelevant discussion. More pertinent is only how do we feel about thow the game plays vs how we want it to play and our reasons for and against. Leave the rest to Larian.

I actually did not yet see any real argument why a party of 6 would be more fun.

The only reason I can imagine is that then you can have 1 of everything in the party.
But that for me personally would ruin the fun of having to choose whom I bring with myself onto a quest, and also lower the replay value of the game.

And most arguments are like: BG1 had 6...

The argument is that as long as the game balances (like through XP sharing), what is the issue of you playing with 4 and me with 6? BG1 & 2 were with 6, so yes nostalgia plays a part, but also for more choice in party composition. Whatever your pick, there are enough arguments in here for. Other than "it's too much effort for Larian", I have yet to see a good argument against. Surely it's no skin off anyone's nose if people want to play with more characters in the party?

Of course should the party lock mechanic rear it's head at the end of Act1, then yes, it could be interesting what happens if you select only 3 extra characters vs my 5... Do you actually have to selecct 5 and keep 2 in camp? Is there a camp? But that is the same discussion for those who choose to play Solo.

I think something like the below could be interesting, and fit both our desires.

Act 1:
You meet 5-7 potential followers, from whom 3 stay with you later in the game. The others either dies, or wander off based on your choices you make through act 1.
(Party of 4)


Act 2:
You start with the 3 you finished act 1, and meet a further 3-4 potential characters that could join you.
Based on your previous deeds, some might not want to join up with you, and some meet their faith through act 2.
At the end of act 2 you end up with 4 followers in your party. (Party of 5)

Act 3:
You start with the 4 from act 2, and meet another 2-3 potential allies.
And you get (the option to have) 5 followers now. (party of 6)

I think that way it would actually add to replay value of the game, you still have to make decisions, and the idea of slowly growing your party is also nice one.

This way maybe everyone gets what they desire.

Please no wiping companions like that, it would be wholly unsatisfying and I will spare you my rant on it. Just my opinion is with the limitations presented that would be bad, even as the acts expand the party size. I don't mind acts expanding party size but honestly, I'd prefer a party of 6 being able to be done at the start and the game to be fun whether you go four or six.


It is our curse. We are in a loop until Larian decides to weigh in and even then the circle may remain unbroken.

This discusion only? You wish.

Ironically, D&D actually has a sytem for doing exactly this. It's called challenge rating, and if Larian hadn't tweaked abilities and combat stuff so much, they would be able to use that to very easily figure out how to tweak fights. The folks at Larian are significantly smarter than your average DM, I'm stating this as a given. If they'd left themselves in a position where they could lean on the given CR for encounters then they absolutely could have figured out how to make minor tweaks to make encounters suit their purposes no matter how many enemies are in play at the time.