Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Please let me be immersed

Hi, after a pause I am now trying out patch 7. I think the game has a lot of potential, and I am curious what will be revealed in the full game. But I do have some issues with EA, and I think most of them have to do with a lack of immersion, or a near constant disbelief that I find hard to suspend. This is a serious problem, especially for an RPG, where being submerged in an alternate reality accounts for the majority of enjoyment to be had.

Here are some immersion killers I have encountered so far, excluding graphic/sound glitches that are likely to be solved during further development:

1) When you drop from the airship and meet people immediately afterwards, some dialogue options will tell others to 'wait at my camp'. But that camp had not been established yet.
2) In the crypt with looters, at the start of the game: all the plaques use a forgotten script, but the books are all readable.
3) Weights are inconsistent: 5 jugs weigh the same as a letter.
4) Burning candles in rooms that have been abandoned for many years do not make sense.
5) Perishable food in rooms that have been abandoned for many years does not make sense.
6) Equipped weapons are carried very strangely, they seem to be attached to the back by some force field. How does that work? Also it is very impractical. Why not have swords in scabbards, arrows in quivers, and longer weapons carried in hands? The only one that carries a weapon in hand now is my Tav. She has acquired a flaming sword and insists on carrying the flaming end in her bare left hand.
7) The game is 3D, but highlighted characters or objects get a 2D outline. That destroys the illusion of a 3D world. Highlighting should be 3D too. For example using a spotlight from above, or by increasing the luminescence of models.
8) Characters that aren't present can approve or disapprove of actions. How does that work?
9) Characters carry an enormous volume of stuff that would need a full shipping container in reality. But no one even carries a small handbag.
10) Defeated enemies stay dead, but party members are very easily resurrected.
11) Enemies do not seem to use jump or push combat maneuvers.
12) The option to send items to camp is utterly ridiculous. Or at least some kind of explanation should be given. And the option should not be available when no camp has been established. And again the playing field is not level. Why don't enemies send stuff to their camp? For example, the goblins that have found the druid's grove could write a note and send that note to their camp.
13) The limitation of 4 per party does not make sense in the game. A fifth can not join, saying you're full. How does that make sense? I understand the need for gaming mechanics, but please try to make them sensible in the game world.
14) Short rests are very strange: how can you fully heal by standing still for less than a second?
15) Long rests are strange too. Never in the game is a camping spot established, but from any place the party is teleported to a permanent camp somewhere, and teleported back to the same spot where the long rest was initiated after sleeping.
16) When zoomed out, the camera is able to show a lot of the game world. Much more than the playable characters could see in reality. It would be nice to have a first person view during exploration, and switch to overhead view during combat. And maybe faraway landscapes and objects could be made more hazy? Also the mini map shows info on charcters that are not in the line of sight.
17) Given the various personalities of companions, and the urgency of the tadpole problem, it does not make sense for them to hang around the campsite doing nothing while a party of 4 goes exploring. Can they be performing other tasks somehow? Hunting and foraging perhaps? Or be recovering from wounds?

I think two immersion problems could be solved in a single stroke: Have the party travel with a cart that is pulled by horses for example. The cart can carry all equipment and it allows a camp to be set up at safe locations. Of course the cart can not enter dungeons, so it will not be possible to loot 20 goblin shields from a dungeon without some serious running back and forth. But I don't think I would miss that. It is entirely reasonable to loot only gold and jewels from a dungeon.
Stil, a more permanent camp would probably be needed for the inactive characters to reside.

I agree pretty much on everything, but want to expand in some points:

I think this is really a minor problem and purely mechanic i.e. not related to the IG lore and natural laws. Maybe you are right in saying that a 3D highlight would be better but I don't think is too much of a problem.

Oh, believe me, they do.

This is a whole thread in itself. Maybe a sensible explanation would be the need to guard the camp.
Still, I would prefer to be able to bring along every companion, even if this means having less of them. But, since the Focus is (sadly) on the multiplayer aspect of the game, I doubt they will increment the maximum number of characters in the party.

I think the long rest is fine, given that the background now changes depending on where you are. The only immersion-wise problem is the fact that you were adventuring with 4 characters and now in the camp, you have a dog, an owlbear, an undead priest and at least another companion who weren't with you in the dungeon you were exploring.

I don't think the 1st person camera is an ideal solution in this game, but I totally agree that both the camera and the minimap should have a fog of war system that impede you to see what your character isn't supposed to be able to see. Why send someone to explore if I can already see everything? Also, it's taking away a lot of surprise effects.


I don't think that having the cart physically present would be a good thing, but I will be happy if they tell us of its existence via a cutscene, so at least I'll know why two people who have the same urgency as me to solve the tadpole problem are doing nothing to help.

Some great points here. I can only assume the concept of player immersion has never been a factor, otherwise they would have most likely been implemented in the first place. In my opinion, other glaring examples of world breaking are the lack of day/night/weather/calendar and also the magical way portal teleportation system.

I think fundamentally immersion was sacrificed on the altar of player convenience, their interpretation of 'fun' and perhaps also a desire to reach a more casual audience who are maybe put off by the notion of learning a new and deep rule set.

They've sort of shot themselves in the foot with their story arc...a race against time to find a cure but there is no in-game clock. The notion of adventuring suggests camping where you stop, not tracking back/teleporting to some fixed base camp every evening no matter your partys current location.

I have had only one or two long rests so far, but the latest went like this: We were standing on on a rock peak, near the place where the sirens nested. The peak had just enough space for four people to stand on. The long rest button teleported us to a totally different place, which looked very much like the standard camping site from patch 5. After resting we were instantaneously back on the rock peak. So if the plan was to convey the idea of camping in situ, it failed.

Great post! I mostly agree with the points made, except for "enemies don't push". There are two immersion-breakers that I find particularly egregious.


This drives me absolutely nuts. To clarify, the people Tav invites to camp have 1 or 2 days left to live (as far as they know). Once in camp, they sit on their hands rather than making any attempt at prolonging their own existence, waiting all day for you to return so they can impart their unsollicited opinions. It makes the tadpole feel unimportant and your companions seem super petty.

I wonder if there is at least single point that dont have its own topic allready ... several in some cases.

None of those books is ancient ... except the locked one deep down in the crypt ...
Seems understandable that they were simply brought there "later".

Could you provide screenshot?
Or at least closer description of the place you are talking about?

Since the only abandoned place i know about is the crypt ... and candles were burning only in first half, that was occupied by looters ... and if it dont make sense that they would light them to see what are they even looting ... i dunno what would.

You can use toggle combat (or at least i think that is how they named it ... default Tab) for having weapons permanently unsheated, while runnig ... looks especialy good with staff ... and especialy bad wil daggers.

But i just have to ask, since i ask everytime someone bring this topic up ...
How is weapon on back less believable than several tons weight lizard being able to fly ... person being able to defile gravity by his pure power of mind ... or fire that burns without burning anything?

People talk ...
And since it would be quite confusing if you would just get 7 disaproovements from Shadowheart after Long Rest ... you get them imediatly. :P

Personaly i like this ... its much better, when they know what you have done and can react on it (even tho little later) ... than in some other games, where you are best buddy with Paladin, and if you went to do sidequest to burn orphanage, you just leave him chill in camp ... and then you are still best buddies.

I really hope backpacks will either remain for moders, or will be optional ...
Sure, it would "make sense" but it would also "look horrible".

Not just enemies ...
Some of us keep asking for option to ressurect NPCs that are not party members for quite some time ...

For example Kanon, or Arabella ... i just cant imagine my lawfull good Paladin to stand over dead child (or brave defender) holding litteraly 10 Scrolls of Revivify and 1 Scroll of True Ressurection ... saying "too bad we cant do anything" ... -_-

But i believe we should have option to torture Minthara by killing > ressurecting > killing > ressurecting > ... her, even if just for the fun of it.

Try to put some goblins asleep.

No, "some kind of explanation" certainly should NOT be given!
This is pure QoL game mechanic (so you can store some favorite item without needing to travel back to your camp), that have no place in the world and should not be recognizible by NPCs as something that is possible! Bcs from their perspective, you traveled to your camp, put something in the box, and traveled back!

Same as abowe ... this mechanic should never exists in mind of NPCs ...

If we have full party make option to tell others to join us gray ... with system message that our party is full ...
No NPC should ever talk about full party, there is nothing like full party, EVER!

Except this:

Thats the thing ... you dont "stant still for less than a second".
Sure you cant tell, for the lack of time in general ... but you dont.

I wonder where from people take that thing about teleportation ...
Your party could easily walk aswell, just of the screen ... sure it would make things a bit weird sometimes since you walked somewhere ... and then, when too exhausted to continue, you walked the same range back to rest ...

But puting that aside, since there are waypoint portals that DO make any walking much shorter ... only from the fact that when you engaged long rest, it was hardly a noon ... and when you are in your camp, its usualy at least evening, but more likely a night ... you could presume that some time passed. No?

ANYWAY ...
This is one of things that was sacrificed on altar of cinematic gods ...
Since Larian wants to create every single conversation between our characters as cutscene with dialogue options ... they simply cannot let us "sleep anywere in the world we want" ... bcs it would make problems with cliping, problems with lights, problems with obejcts ... etc. etc.
(Just for the record i still believe that "stage" space around every camp location would be perfectly fitting all desired outcomes ... but lately it seems like im the only one. :-/ )

I would love to have 1st person view for screenshot purposes ...
I would hate it as forced view. -_-

And im affraid it would not give you much immersive experience, since map we are walking on in Act 1 is not litteral transcription of the world (there is countless proofs all around).

Honestly ... no they cant.

And reason is exactly that variety of personalities and urgency of the tadpole problem ... the only thing they could do, that would make sense, would be to tell you "screw you Tav, either you go with me, or i go alone" ... anythng else would be just as ridiculous as sitting around the fire, just for different reasons.

I have seen some bad ideas around here ... but this one is the worse so far.
I dont even know where to start ...

+1 to everything you said.

I think I am fine with the portals. After all. they are magical, and magic does exist in the game world. But the fact that there are so many seemingly random portals everywhere does need some more explanation. Who made them? Why? How are they powered? Was this kind of portal everywhere in BG1 or BG2?


I don't think more immersion would necessarily lead to more difficult or deeper rules. It seems to be that what is mostly needed is some more creative thinking and more consistent world building. And in my thinking, fun is highly dependent on immersion.


True. Altough I do rember Lae'zel commenting that taking a nap was highly innapropriate behaviour. That was it.

But also this inconsistency should be resolvable with some more creative thinking on the part of the developers.

I would miss it! I would like the opposite: The option to remove encumbrance so that I can carry all my loot!

C'mon mate, you can justify anything from this point of view.

II mean, if we have magic how is this:
so improbable?

This is a fantasy world where a lot of things are possible (such as a giant lizard flying) but other things are just meant to be mundane, such as a pointy stick you use to poke your enemies.
It's a stick, it is not meant to be able to stay glued to your back, nor it is practical in any way.

There are *magical weapons* that can fluctuate or magically anchor themselves to you, but this is not the case for ordinary objects.
And it's not like it's a technology problem either, since in DOS weapons were sheathed on the hips of the characters.

I can understand why it can be fun to hoard stuff and maximize the amount of gold on your savings account. It is basic human psychology. But on the other hand, dealing with limitations, serious setbacks and difficult choices can also be very rewarding in a computer game. The bigger the losses you sometimes have to take (for example: not being able to drag heavy valuables out of a dungeon before it collapses), the more rewarding your successes will feel. That's also basic human psychology, I think.

I have fond memories of playing XCOM games in iron man mode, where party members would remain dead if they died and you had no option to load a saved game to bring them back to life. Those setbacks and defeats really hurt, but made the victory in the end all the sweeter, and the experience more memorable.

When it floats six inches away from your back but remains stuck to you, and this happens for everyone and every weapon... it is.

I'll field this one, though it's a take-it or leave-it answer; I'm very confident that this is the dissonance that so many people experience about this and which you apparently don't, but here it is as best as I can explain:

Notice how everything you compared this to are intrinsically magical creatures or literal magic? As in, defined, quantified forces written into the world lore as part of tangible elements greater than themselves? Magic is a part of this realm, and it makes sense within the space of the realm it's written for - it has structure, form and rules that have been built up and defined. Most magical fire, because it is magical fire fuelled by the weave for its effect, generally does not remain around after the spell has been cast? In some cases, it can be maintained through concentration, and in some cases the initial spell burst of fire can ignite mundane objects in live, non-magical fire... but the magical fire itself doesn't stick around. This is part of the deep and wide-spread system of magic that permeates the world. So... when someone USES magic in this realm space, and they are a spellcaster with the capabilities to do so, this not only does NOT require ANY suspension of disbelief at all - it actually helps to deepen immersion for the viewer.

Now... comparatively... When the barbarian slings their axe over their shoulder and leaves it floating in mid-air behind them, glued by invisible force and distance to them... that's just silly and destroys immersion. There IS no magic involved here, and no other in-world tangible explanation. If you cast detect magic on this barbarian you will not detect anything - and this can be tested! The barbarian didn't cast a spell, and they could not do so anyway; they have no enchantment upon them, and no enchantment exists upon the weapon to explain this - it is a direct "You're actually playing a video game" world-break that pulls a player out of their immersion in the space to see it and notice it. It's a visible game mechanical element/limitation that's waving itself in your face while you're trying to play the game... and it's doing so constantly.

In short... you're comparing apples and elephants and asking why some people say that one of them fits in the freezer but the other doesn't; it's obvious to the people who point it out, and the only intelligible reason why you aren't seeing the difference seems to be that you personally have never actually put anything in the freezer at all - not really. This may not be the case, and I don't want to presume it is, but it is all I can think of to understand how you came to stand in a position that leads you to even ask a question like that in the first place.

Larian have always struggled with the concept of immersion in space. In comments made in interviews about their previous games and in the early days of BG3's development, it seemed almost like they legitimately didn't understand the concept, or why people would find it to be important. They came to grasp that this was something that people wanted and valued, when working on BG3 but still don't actually really seem to understand what it is, what preserves it, and what shatters it... and they also don't really seem to grasp why repeatedly breaking immersion for the sake of 'doing a funny' doesn't leave general immersion intact the rest of the time - it just doesn't, when that's a regular occurrence. They don't understand why being able to "burrow" into a cage that's hanging twenty feet above you in open air is a problem, or why it breaks immersion, or why you should not be able to do that. That's the problem.

All of this is subject to change of course; communication has been precious thin from beginning to end and it's always possible that they've taken time to learn and really begin understanding this concept since their last commentary on the matter... we can but hope.

Thanks for putting together this little list. Some points have been discussed a lot, some sound newer to me. Some points are fairly minor and easy to ignore, some are much bigger problems. But overall I agree with most of the diagnostic.

Etruscan kind of said it all already, but yeah, ... Larian probably never cared much for immersion in the first place. (In the same way that combat rules and balance are not high on their list of priorities either. And same for UI/playability, however fundamental this aspect of a video game is.)

Which is very sad, because story and immersion are important to me, in a 100-hour CRPG.



I agree that making the game more immersive does not have to involve additional rules.

But regarding creative thinking and ideas, I kind of disagree, or I wouldn't formulate the situation this way. I think Larian has more than enough writers and designers that they could have very easily imagined solutions*. The various immersion issue don't strike me as being hard, requiring breakthrough ideas and intense work. The problem is mostly just that they probably don't care much and have no will to work too much on this.

(* : In fact some immersion mistakes, like in-world Lae'zel mentioning the video-game-only party size limit, or in-world Gale mentioning the players-only teleportation portals, only require removal. No brainstorming, new ideas, and creativity required.)

That could be the case, as also stated by Niara. Well, I hope this thread can serve as a reminder for Larian that immersion is important to at least some people that would like to play their game.

They could add iron man mode for you, and dragon mode for me.

I can agree with some or many of these complaints. But not all.



This problem has been with videogames from the beginning and it's not going to be solved in this one either - not when you have a ton of actions you need to peform while wearing a ton of weapons which you also need to mesh with a ton of different body types AND with a ton of different possible armors and clothing including underwear. It is simply impossible for the modellers to make the amount of possible permutations all look right.



True to the tabletop version as well. Weight and inventory space is an abstraction in games. Even Solasta, which has pretty stringent limits on the amount you can carry allows for you to stash a ridiculous amount. The game would be less fun if you had "realistic" weight limits.



Game.



Have you heard of the idea of "Anti-Frustration Features"? Lots of games do little things which are not realistic, but are done because this is a freaking game and games are supposed to be fun. The less tedious busywork you have to do which adds no interest in a game, the better.



I would like at least 5 people in the party as well, but that's not likely to happen. What is your suggestion for "make them sensible in the game world"?



Game. Time doesn't pass in the game. Do you want to wait around a real-time hour for the rest to complete? I doubt it.



That will still mean needing to add a lot more stuff to the map for those "hazy, faraway landscapes", or expanding the map sizes to accamodate the far-away stuff. Maps can only be of a certain size to avoid causing performance problems. Lag isn't very immersive either.



Not a terrible idea to make use of other companions for foraging and such, but what wounds? Even if wounds were a thing - which they aren't, not even in the tabletop - there's no guarantee that they'll have wounds?


You talk about immersion, but where did the party get a horse and cart from? Would they have it on the beach at the start? Do we need to watch the horse and cart move all the time? Will monsters be able to kill the horse?

There is a limit to how much realism can be put into game, and much of what you're asking for would add tedium for no gameplay benefit.

I will say that Solasta did have its own way of discouraging "20 goblin shields" by having strict weight limits and long travel - with random encounters - between places. But even that game did acknowledge players urge to maximize their income by collecting everything not nailed down, and they introduced a "Scavengers" faction which picks up all the loot you didn't take from dungeons you cleared and giving you the option to take any interesting bits you want from what was collected, and take a portion of the rest as income. That obviously won't work for BG 3, but the fact that they felt the need to put in that system acknowledges players will want to take it all.



It does not make a lick of sense to bring up XCOM in this context, that's a completely different type of game with a completely different type of mindset behind it.

Not everyone likes playing one-shot, die-and-restart-from-the-beginning games. The Rogue-like/Rogue-lite genre tends to have short simple gameplay loop. Not a 100+ hour long game. Not a lot of people want to get to hour 89, have a party wipe and need to go back to the start, seeing 89 hours of the same content again just to get back to the 11 hours of new stuff.

If it was not possible to grab so much stuff, there also would not be a need to send stuff to camp. I think the game could even be more fun to play if you had to make choices based on your ability to carry things with you.

It is not about the actual number, its is about having a reasonable explanation for the limit. For example, in a space sim the planetary landing craft could have a capacity of 4, meaning that only 4 at a time can go adventuring. It is up to Larian to think of something for BG3, but it should not be impossible. Maybe there are only four teleportation crystals available? And everyone agrees that teleportation crystals are indispensible for the exploration party?


Of course not. It had not realised yet that time does not pass in the game. But then I don´t understand the need to have two different kinds of resting, with one of them having cinematics and the other not.


In general, too much is shown. Reducing visual information should not lead to lag. On the contrary. When you are hidden, the game demonstrates it can determine lines of sight. Perhaps a solution could be to just not display things to which the active character has no line of sight, and increase blur/haze for faraway objects.

Well, people needing time to recover could be an incentive to rotate people in your party. But if there is no flow of time...

You would need to earn your bagage train through a quest. Before you find a bag or more serious means of transporting goods you can not carry so much. I think that would actually improve gameplay. Guarding the horse and cart could be a task for those that are not allowed in the party, possible solving that other immersion problem.

I am just offering some suggestions from the top of my head. The game developers should be much better at coming up with solutions that increase immersion and do not hamper other aspects of gameplay.

I brought it up as an example of how hurting the player can improve enjoyment of a game. If everything is easily achieved, your sense of accomplishment will suffer. In terms of BG3, maybe not being able to own every magical weapon there is will increase your satisfaction of having the one magical weapon that you were able to obtain and keep.

+1 to the overall point of immersion taking a beating in BG3 (and I would agree with most of the OP's points). I would also extend this issue to lack of consistency and accuracy relative to decades of FR lore and history, and to how the environment in the game looks and feels.

People nowdays don't seem play RPGs to get immersed in the world. RPGs have turned into what I call Arcade MMORPGs : Loot, fight, loot, quick travel, quick quest, loot, quick travel, fight, loot, quick rest, quick dialogue, fight etc etc...meanwhile world immersion, UI design and slow gradual story pacing goes down the drain.
I've been told to try out this modern <old school> indie RPG game called Atom RPG/Trudograd: Really loving it and getting this Fallout 2 vibe. Its actually quite brilliant.

My dear, dear elf ... my question is "how" ... not "is it?".
You are answering me "its not" ... i thank you for your opinion, but its not what i asked.

Also, as for the practical part ...
Again ... how? The only reason its inpractical to draw your weapon from sheet on your back, is the sheet.
Theese weapons have no sheets ... in what lays that inpracticality? And please focus on practicality ... not your own estetic feeling about it.

---

And since im quite sure some smartypants would tell me, instead of answering the question ... i obviously know the answer: "Its a fucking game!"
And that is exactly the point ... is a fucking game full of fucking nonsences ... but for some unknown reason we are willing to ignore eeeeeeeeeeeeeverything else, or simply say "its a magic dude" ( as if that would explain anything ) ... and yet things we simply dont like "horribly ruins our immersion" ...

And my question gentleman and ladies ... is: H-O-W ?

Seriously if at least one of you had the balls (or w/e body part womans use to measure their bravery) to admit that there is no actual reason and this was for him/her specificly just covenient excuse to get the game more to his own liking ... i think i would finaly believe at least somebody.

I believe i would be able to find some examples that are unmagical ...

For example im not quite sure what is magical about Dragons to be honest ... yes, they dont exist in our world ... but if there is any connection to weave, i was not aware of it. O_o

I could question reproduction of Githyanki ... since their bodies seems hardly capable to contain one large meal, not even mention an egg. O_o

And if i would want to se joker, i would ask how is that possible that my Halfling character was just DIRECTLY HIT with an Axe, twice his own size ... and yet he lost only 1hp ... instead of being cut in half, again no magic involved.

And im too lazy to search futher.


Ehm ...
https://roll20.net/compendium/dnd5e/Produce%20Flame#content

10 minues, no concentration, fire stick around, cantrip (therefore nothing even unusual), and while the fire is hold its not even hot (since the hand dont get burned).
This is the one im talking about.


Its fascinating how much are you focused on the fact that there is no magic involved ... as if that would be the only way.

I repeat, i didnt asked if there is any magic used ... i asked how is fact that this "just happened" anyhow less believable than anything else, that commonly happens in this world.
Just as that hitpoints ... just as that constant ressurections after the fight ... just as healing by having a meal and go to sleep ... just as everything else.

In our world, if you swing an axe against someone and you hit ... the person falls, usualy with heavy wound that incapacitates him, sometimes just dead, we all know that ... nobody ever questioned it.
In their world, if you swing an axe against someone and you hit ... the person count damage, subtract it from some imaginary number, and keep fighting as if nothing happened, no matter where he was hit, until that imaginary number falls to 0, then he falls to the ground gasping his has breath, and after three subsequent failed rolls he die ... nobody ever questioned it.

In our world, if you put an axe on your back ... it falls, we all know that ... nobody ever questioned it.
In their world, if you put and axe on your back ... it stays there ... why are we questioning it?

The answer is obvious and simple my dears, you "dont like it" ... why even pretend that there is something deeper behind it?


I just want to understand you people.
I know your opinions, even tho i disagree with them ... but i dont get them and that triggers my curiocity.


This would be my case aswell.


Or ... just providing an alternative from my own point of view ... they simply dont care.

You see "immersion", aswell as "fun" is incredibly subjective matter ...

While one person would love to drag a vaggon with horses with you through the whole adventure (i wonder how tho) ...
Another person would like to have option to stash whole city into her purse (but honestly ... that would be immersive, i allways get amazed by how so many items can be stashed in those things) ...

Fun fact tho ... if you take those two persons, and switch their games, they would be both discuised ... even tho each for different reason.

For this very reason Larian is simply forced to go middle ground ... sometimes immersion, sometimes fun, and most of the time little bit of both.
It dont seem so hard to me as a concept to grasp. :-/


Is it? O_o

I know you dislike this attitude but still:
If its a problem, and its so "immersive breaking", and immersion is "so important" ... why would you do that?


This apply to me aswell.

With regard to the whole weapons floating on backs thing, I think the reason people have issues with it is a kind of immersion uncanny valley effect. A lot of the stuff you mentioned Rag, are big, obvious diversions from our real world. Dragons as they appear in the forgotten realm don't exist in any capacity in our world, nor do Githyanki, or other stuff like that. They're so far removed from reality that they bear only the slimmest relation to reality, so it's easy to just shrug it off as simply functioning under rules that don't apply in our world. Specifically, magic. Meanwhile with the floating weapons, those are adjacent to our world. It's something that's not even trying to explain itself as a rule of the world, but it's a thing close enough to reality that it's easier for people to notice that it's a deviation. People register it as TRYING to immitate our world and failing to. At that point though, people need to accept that it's just an abstraction. It's not an in-universe thing that's occuring. In universe the characters are sheathing their weapons in real sheaths and scabbards, but technological limitations keep that from being portrayed on screen. Just like hitpoints are an abstraction that's not reflecting the reality of the world. So Rag, I disagree with you suggesting that it's an in-world thing that's actually happening and it shouldn't be treated as such, because I am certain that in the game people will say things about sheathing swords, etc, which shows that those things exist and are used. But I agree that it's ultimately not something that should be treated as an issue. As has been said before, this is down to a technical limitation, one that bigger studios than Larian have tried to address.


I will say that there is a reason why in this specific example your argument doesn't hold water. Because for a lot of people, even if you don't actually choose to do it, if you KNOW that it's possible, know that the reality of the game allows for it, then even if you don't do it, the knowledge that the game allows for that will break immersion. Because unlike some other things, it's not an out of world choice that we the player are making to engage in an abstraction, it's a thing we are conscious is possible within the rules of the world even though it breaks the otherwise established rules of the world. I can get why people would be bothered by that and they aren't wrong to be, even though I personally am not bothered by it.

Lucky you ... i dont.

What technical or technological limitations are u talking about ? Many games do it well even if it's an "abstraction" but BG3 isn't doing it well at all. The best exemple is probably shields and the second set (ranged weapons) that simply dissapear.

The Forgotten Realms have their own reality and Larian fails to translate basic things into a video game despite obvious "abstraction" requirement on some points.
We have great cinematics but about weapons, they're just doing the same as 20 years old games did.

I don’t think immersion works that way. It’s an all or nothing proposition.

The verb “to immerse” has two meanings. Literally, it’s synonymous with submerge or plunge. Metaphorically, it means absorb or engross. Either way, immersion is total or doesn’t exist.

If you’re not entirely underwater, you’re not submerged. If your attention is pulled away for a moment, you’re not engrossed. If you’re ever thinking about game elements as what they actually are rather than what they represent, you’re not immersed.

I’ll use mid-air burrowing as an example:

That’s a great question, Rag. Why would a player ever do anything to break their own immersion if it’s important to them?

Here’s a hypothetical. You’ve built your first druid and you’re going through the wildshapes to try them out. The raven flies. The wolf howls. The bear is a terrifying death machine. So far so good, everything works as expected.

The badger can burrow. It can even burrow under walls, which is exciting! So you start walking around as a badger, looking to see what secrets you can uncover by burrowing. While swinging your cursor around to see which spots are valid targets, you notice something strange.

The cursor says you can burrow to a seemingly impossible spot. Wouldn’t you try it out of sheer curiosity? And if you did, how would you react when the badger appears on the far side of a chasm or in a suspended cage?

That moment shines a light on the fact that you’re not controlling a badger. You’re controlling something that looks like a badger and teleports in a way that evokes burrowing but definitely isn’t burrowing. With that shift in perspective, the immersion is broken.

If you wanted to stay immersed, what could or should you have done differently? Is there any way for you to predict these inconsistencies before they happen?

I wrote three pages trying to explain this to people in Rag's position, realised that it's just not going to get anywhere or achieve anything of value to do so, and am deciding not to bother.

Let me say this:

Rag; I've met people in your position before - people who don't understand why something like weapon floating above your back when you put it away, for everyone, all the time, is problematic for immersion in this space, while dragons and magic are not. They have generally been people who legitimately struggle with the concept of imagination, but struggle so without realising that it's something they struggle with - like colour-blind people who don't realise that they are, or sociopaths who learn all of the rules for what emotions are and how to read them and display them, and how to respond to others, but underneath that don't actually understand what it is to feel them.

This fictional space is different from ours, and it operates on a different set of rules. Those rules allow for things like dragons to exist, and for wizards to conjure fireballs and for mortals to attain sparks of divinity and ascent to higher beings if they are capable enough. This world that we are imagining, however, operates with a measure of internal consistency with itself - things play by rules, even though they aren't the same rules that our world plays by.

In imagining this space, and immersing ourselves in it, we accept the rules by which that world is governed - things that operate within those rules do not require any suspension of disbelief, because there is nothing wrong with them; they're part of that world. Things that do not play by those rules, and which step outside of that, or draw attention to the fact that the medium we're using to envision this world is flawed or imperfect, create immersion dissonance; too much of it, or too consistent causes of it, make it difficult or even impossible to really settle into the world space and feel like you're in it.

Because the world plays by internally consistent rules, everything that happens in it can still be traced to a how and a why, if it is understood; there are hows and whys for dragons and for magic, and for gods - magic and gods are themselves the hows and whys for many other smaller things within the world (the flame conjured by produce flame doesn't burn us, because it's magical fire that we conjured. It's that simple) - but even those, magic and gods, play by certain consistent rules that help form the world and preserve our immersion in it.

Things like 'putting the weapon away and having it float six inches behind your back' does not fit in with the structure of the world - it doesn't have a how and a why that you can trace - so it is a source of immersion dissonance in a way that a literal dragon is not. Things like 'short resting in a second because I clicked the button and numbers came up' is also a source of dissonance for the same reason - that one would be easily smoothed over if the medium we're engaging with the world through (the game), offered something to indicate or imply that we are actually taking an hour to rest and recuperate, but right now it doesn't, and even creates situations where it's actively showing or implying that we don't, and that it is instant and without any kind of movement or rest... so that's why it's a problem in the present state.

Another great write up by Niara here. +1 as often. Also, Niara, I really really hope that you have a way to make use of your wonderful verbal and analytical skills that shine trough your posts here IRL. Always enjoy reading your posts so put that talent to good use !

Exactly my thoughts on the matter. +100.
People don't expect...or just don't care?? to be immersed in RPGs anymore? What happened?

My theory.... Nowdays Diablo/action shooters are RPGs, huge open world 3D games are RPGs, card games are RPGs, MMOs are RPGs, pay to win mobile apps are RPGs..... its so damm EVERYTHING; the audience that comes with all that does not expect to be immersed. Or...they just don't understand the point of immersion?
expectation #1 : LOOT
expectation #2 : easy and convenient gameplay
expectation #3 : pretty graphics
Not saying all of this is bad, its just the main expectations of a Modern RPG.

Oh, on a side note I also completely despise having floating weapons on your back...Why this? While Larian spends MILLIONS on facial cinematics...which....uh...sorta works?? they can't even add a little basic equipment immersion? At this point who needs a walking animations anyways then? Just make everyone float to their destinations. Its so incredibly ironic that they want to have REALISTIC faces but ignore BASIC immersive stuff.

In the end that begs the question I would love to ask Swen : "For yourself, what constitutes a video game RPG experience?"

There are plenty of reasons, you are just ignoring them, nitpicking the paragraphs that you want to attack without their full context.

I'm going to make it easy: everything has to do with the suspension of disbelief.

Even in a fantasy world, some things are meant to be magical and capable of defying the laws of our world, while others are meant to be mundane and governed by the same reality we are subjected to.
This is not "my liking", this is how the setting is built.

This is the reason why a magical sword flying doesn't bother anyone, while a non-magical sword locked 10cm away from a non-magical guy's back does.

We can sit here arguing for years about whether some things break immersion more than others, but if you refuse to accept this basic assumption then you are just arguing for the sake of it.




This.

I have two coments for this:

1) Nice one ... but miles away from what i was talking about.
Since my point was: While Person-A wants total immersion ... and Person-B wants total fun ... (and i want Total Recall ) ... Larian is in position when they have to (at least try) satisfy them both.

Sure there would be people complaining about that the game is "not immersive enough" ...
But the point is that the more it would be immersive the more would the other people complaining that the game is "not fun enough".

2) Its an ongoing process (dont get mad at me, it was your example) ...
I presume you dont dematerialize abowe the water, and then reamaterialize under its surface.

Yes, you are not submerged "entirely" ... but you are 5,10,25,30,50,75,90% submerged, depending on state of that proces ...
And that should be enough ...

---

Quite honestly it seems to me that "immersion" become easy argument for people who just dislike something, and "just wants it gone" no matter what.

You are trying to explain to me what does it mean to "not being immersed" ... im aware, it may come as surprise, but i also played the game.
The problem (or the difference, scratch what dont aply) is that none of those things people are complaining about around here breaks the immersion for me not even once in my 796,5h ... so i ask those people why, or how does it work ... instead they start to explaining me what is immersion, or what does it mean to break it. :-/
Either im unable to put my question understandably, or they are simply unable to answer me ... chances are 50/50.

I mean so far i discovered that i have quite unique mindset around here, since i dont really care about things that i either dont need, or choose not to use ... i dunno, maybe im simply exceptionaly good in ignoring things that would bother me otherwise ... rather than geting mad over their bare existence.

I would really love to hear at least one good reason ...
But all i get so far can easily by reduced to "i simply dont like it" ... and that would be fine too, we dont need to like same things.

Thats a trick question!

Sure i would!
And yet i would not.

I burrowed several times to the other side of a chasm to get that lootbox in "Dragon's Lair" (that cave where Thieving Tiefling kids are living) ...
And quite honestly it never felt unimersive ... no matter the distance, its still the ground and the ground end somewhere ... sure, its a little unconsistent, since sometimes you can borrow just few feets, and sometimes you can borrow few miles (imagining you borrowed all the way down and all the way up the chasm) ... but that dont bother me.
Also im quite used that most distances in this game are actualy measured in 2D (there is no high ... or depth ... Z axis i mean) ... you can easily see that in Goblin camp, when you are attacking from the timbers in the ceiling ... many attacks (especialy spells) should not even reach their targets.

As for the cage example, nope i would not ... first of all i cant even imagine single argument for doing it ...
For one, it would be a nonsence and i dislike nonsences, so why would i ... exactly as you said.
And for two ... what would be the point? I mean does "borrowint inside hanged cage" offers you litteraly anything except just ruining your experience? I dont think it do.


I never even get there ...

For me, there are two layers when i "immerge" myself to the virtual space:

There is first layer and that are engine limitations ... ranges, rules, resources, limitations, stuff like that ... things game "allows" me to do ...
And that would be burrowing through the time and space.

And then there is second layer and that is actual immersion ... what my characters know, that they would do, what they would think ... things that would "make sense in this world" ...
And that would be that my Badger will never burrow through time and space, since i ... and in that extend the badger ... know that i can burrow through the ground ... but not through the solid stone, not through empty air between cage and ground, not through i dunno ... lava for example.
Those are things my characters would never even imagine, since they are uterly nonsences.

Thats why i never do them, thats why i never even check if i can do them, since i would not care anyway ... and thats how i keep myself immerged, no matter what game "allows me to".
And the best part is that if there is anybody who would enjoy burrowing throung lava river, to the top of statue that is hanging in middle of air, and is made from solid adamantine ... they can and i still dont care, and my immersion is still unaffected.

And we are both happy. :P
Final confession i have for this would be the reason i want us both to be happy ... its simply bcs sometimes (its not often tho, but it happens) i am the second person. Sometimes i just dont desire serious story and full roleplay experience ... sometimes i just want to go in and wreak havoc, go wild, do shitty things, whack logic in the face and then fuck it ... why? Bcs i can! Bcs i want to! And bcs fuck it, thats why.
And in those moments, i dont care about immersion ... what i want is fun.
So yes, in those crazy times i go with things like full custom party of Wizards where each have their own elements, and one of them is actualy a Cleric. My badger party is burrowing to the roofs, just to use their pushing attack, and burrow some place else. Last time i tryed to expand my party to 8 and play with every single class that was aviable in the time ... (this one was not as fun as i expected, quite dissapointing really)

And Larian provides me option for both, so im glad they do ... there is nothing deeper in it.

I explained the technological limitation on the previous page. The game has multiple different body types, multiple different combinations of attire, from butt-nekid to robes to full-plate, and there are a lot of different weapons from daggers to torches to two-handed greataxes. It's not immersive when those things clip through everything else.

Just the combination of body type, and attire, and weapon is already an enormous number to take into account. Now you have to consider animations, climbing, walking, running, falling prone, jumping, falling, attacking, blocking, taking hits, casting spells, and then there's the cutscenes and dialogue on top of all that. The actors aren't going to be motion-captured for every combination of weapons and clothing and action. The actors aren't motion captured with armor at all. Even if it was possible, it's completely cost-prohibitive. Because of that, it's never going to fully look perfect.

Yup ...
My point exactly ... fictional space comes with different set of rules, and that is how things works there ...

The only difference is that for myself, it includes sheating weapons on back.
(If i want to ... note that i repeately asked for making it both optional, never had any problem with sheating on hips.)

But not weapons being sheated on back.

Any other "odd" thing is fine, since the world "operates on a different set of rules" ... but this one? NEVER!
And that is exactly what i find so funny.

Except you dont ... you pick every single one of them and decide if that one is good enough for you to accept or not.

This is the core of the problem ...
It dont really "not play by those rules" ... it "dont play by rules you want" ...

What rule does sheating weapons on back break? Gravity?
Yes, that would be understandable ...
Huge flying lizard breaks the same rule ... but you dont mind.
So that would probably not be the case. O_o

So ... can you track "how and why" for me for party limits, or hitpoints, or that dragon?
Or could you provide me "how and why" for why people can easily walk just few feets from river of lava, without any physical discomfort except sweating?

There is many rules in this would that "does not fit with the structure" ... you just pick those you like (or are used to), and those you dont. :-/

---

Okey, this is good argument actualy ...
Question tho ... who decides what is suppose to follow what?

Hint: https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/102507/what-is-rule-zero

Yes ... we can.
Even tho im not quite sure why would we.

My question was quite simple i believed (foolishly as it seems) ...
All i wanted to know is how exactly things are breaking immersion for you.

Instead, to use your own words to describe i get "whether some things break immersion more than others", and multiple quite thorough descriptions of what is immersion, or where is it broken ... is that even related to the question?
I dont think it is. :-/

You of all people should know that i dont take away people opinions ...
Yes, i keep asking if i find something that feels contradictory ... and yes, i defend my own stand, once somebody starts to lecture me how i should see something ... but with one hand on heart and second on Bible (or any other holy symbol of your choosing) i can swear that my intention was never ever arguing about someone opinion!
And im quite sure that if you seen me doing that anywhere, you missread it.

You seem to be assuming that immersion and enjoyment are opposites, that inceasing immersion will somehow decrease possible enjoyment of the game. I think that is a false presumption. For example, how would the game be less enjoyable if weapons were carried realistically, or if there was a passage of time?

I think that in general, if done right, improving immersion will improve enjoyment. I think that everyone playing the game, perhaps some more than others, is in need of believing the illusions that the game offers: that there is a real world with real people trying to solve real problems.

I will give you that in some cases improvement of immersion versus enjoyment is debatable. For instance, personally I could do without the enormous amount of junk (and accompanying inventory management) that you can carry. (seriously: why are the people in the game so keen on having crates and chests everywhere when everyone can shove five cheese wheels, ten barrels and twenty sets of full armour in their back pocket without it even bulging a little bit?). But Larian should be clever and creative enough to not let immersion stand in the way of enjoyment. Whether they are willing remains to be seen...

OK, but in combat everyone is holding their weapons, right? And in combat they are climbing, walking, running, falling prone, jumping, falling, attacking, blocking, taking hits, casting spells. So the animations are already there. It would just be a matter of having people hold on to their weapons outside of combat.

I say wait 'till they butcher verticality when you won't be able to target a fireball above ground, when swimming speeds and flying speeds get involved, exploration becomes cluster**** of obselete right mouse or when most of the utility spells become a tedious mess or outright useless. If it takes 2/3 of the EA to still have butchered combat and technical difficulties prominent at this point, oh boy w8 for 3rd level spells......

Well said, as always.

The fact that the GM has the last word doesn't mean that word is right. The world is full of bad Game Masters.
In the end, we will all accept what Larian is going to choose (we have no power to change things if not through mods) but still, we are here to give feedback on what we think should be improved.


I'm sorry mate, maybe my mastery of English isn't good enough but I really don't know how to describe it better than I already did.

Question:
What breaks my immersion?

Answer:
Everything that doesn't look and/or work the way it is supposed to be in the setting.

Example:
Mundane weapons with no magical properties floating close to my character's back.

Question:
How these things break my immersion?

Answer:
Because, due to the quite understandable fact ("or at least I believed, foolishly as it seems..." semi cit.) that the human brain tends to notice and focus on things that don't make sense with the laws of nature.
The player/reader/spectator is able to suspend its disbelief and pretend that things that usually don't make any sense now are justified, since the setting explains them, but this suspension is broken when something that doesn't make any sense in the real world, doesn't make any sense also in the setting in which the story takes place.

Example:
Mundane weapons with no magical properties floating close to my character's back.

I really have no idea how to explain this concept better than this, I'm sorry.



EDIT: Of course, I understand that something must be sacrificed in order for a game to work/be enjoyable but this is not the case for a lot of things, this one included.
When something doesn't bring anything that improves the game and just subtracts from it (in this case, immersion) it's an unequivocally bad feature.

Fiction space doesn't mean that it doesn't need to feel authentic - it is still bound by the same general rules of story telling, including suspension of disbelief.

Just taking this one example, it is not that BG3 decided for weapons to be carried on the back (like it is for Geralt in Witchers) - it is just that they don't want to create seperate animations and sheaths for different weapons. But then why does the game has shiething in the first place. It doesn't have practical purpuse, it is purely a cosmetic feature which aim should be to make the world more believable. The fact shiething works in a distractingly illogical and physically impossible way - it is better to not do something at all, then half-ass it.

And coming back to the previous point of yours - no, the experience can't be occasionally immersive. When film/game is described as immersive that usually means that it doesn't draw unnecessary attention to its artificiality and makes it world feel authentic.

Not at all, not in general, i asure you ...

I see it more like a seesaw ... immersion on one side ... fun on the other ... enjoyment would be amount of happyness you have on that seesaw.
If you dislike the word feel free to either switch "immersion" to "immersive fun" and "fun" for "unimmersive fun", "nonsence just for the sake of fun", "crazy stuff", "havoc", or anything else that brings people fun WHILE it dont also brings immersion (that is important part, not the fun word).

The more seesaw is tilt to the "immersive" side ... the less "unimmersive fun" you have ... so *full* immersion would be one option ... you would need to manualy walk everywhere, you would need to eat, sleep, drink, pee, poo, rest after certain amount of traveling, reading would take real time, weapons and armors would need to take care of, otherwise they would broke ... i hope you get the picture, the closer to reality the better.
Such game would be quite a drag for people like me, or Icelyn (i dare to presume, pardon me if i presume incorectly) ... but that doesnt mean nobody can enjoy it, i know many people who enjoy incredibly thorough survival simulators, im simply not one of them.

Second option would be seesaw on the "unimmersive" side ... that would basicaly mean no immersion at all ... i cant quite imagine such game to be honest, but i believe things like Fortnite would be quite close ... and (even tho i dont quite understand it) they are also popular and some people enjoy them.

Of course from elementary geometry we know that there is infinite amounts of settings "in between" those extremes ... i hope we can agree on this.

But the third common would be 50/50 ... or more like "somewhere close" around that.
In general you could say that rules are not utterly nonsence but also arent exactly real world simulator ... or my personal favourite description: Game provides healthy amount of rules to make sence, while not being overwhelming by them.

Yes im aware that some people would have that "perfect experience" in 20/80 ... 80/20 (yes, there is difference) ... or litteraly anywhere else, once we include decimal numbers, we are heading to that infinite amount of options.

And there are ALLWAYS people who would enjoy the game, no matter in what position the seesaw is ...
So, coming back to that original statement ... in some point of wiev ... it may seem that way:
Yes, you could say that incerasing immersion beyond certain point starts to drain away the enjoyment for certain people ... on the other hand decerasing the immersion beyond that same point starts to drain away the enjoyment for other people ... and keeping it on the same point will piss off everyone who dont have set his own prefferences exactly on that spot.
Basicaly Larian provided their balls, and now we are only deciding who shall stomp on them.

Good question!
(i say it bcs i would probably give it too, if i would be on your side of this baricade oh wait ... i did, just other way around. )

I shall take it in backwards order, since time is easy one.
Even tho ... it depends on what are you meaning by "passage of time" ...

- It can be interpreted as timed events ... you take the quest and since *now* you have *XY* days to deal with the problem.
Some people (and i say some people just bcs i dont want to name Icelyn again) allready expressed they disliking for this, and i kinda understand her ... i mean them ... since you can easily get lost in sidequests and exploring and forget about that there is only *XY* days to save the Grove.
If that happen to you, it certainly can be source of frustration ... specificly the grove can be quite harsh pusnishment, since you loose a LOT of quests, at least one (but up to 3) vendor, and other stuffs (like loot, lore, etc.).
Frustration allways sucks ... i hope we can agree on that.

Even tho, just for the record ... personaly i would welcome timed events, since i belong on the other side of spectrum ... i dont mind loose single quest, bcs i get to fulfill another, since i would replay this game several times anyway ... so this way i would at least have even more distinguished experience for each play.

- It can also be interpreted as regular time flow ...
The way we know from Elder Scrolls, or Fallout series ... time flow, and the world reacts ... during the day all works as usualy ... in the night, people are sleeping, shops are closed, city feels empty until you enter some house and if you do, you are usualy attacked on sight. That kind of stuff ...
That sounds immersive as fuck and i believe that many people would welcome such thing.

Not myself tho.
While idea of night attack while people are sleeping and murdering everyone rather than battle them is tempting ...
I hated it in both Elder Scrolls, and Fallout games ... i come to town to trade, gain or finish my quests, there is not much other reasons for me to get there really ... and every single freaking time i fast traveled to the city ... i emerged there in the middle of the night, when of course none of it is possible. -_-
And the idea of need to spend valuable rest resources just to make this freaking city to work as a city ... seems horrible to me.

- It can also be interpreted as purely cosmetical time flow ...
Much less immersive than the one abowe ... on the other hand, much easier to enjoy im my personal opinion.

So thats my "how" for time passage ...

As for weapon carrying ...
This isnt really matter of any enjoyment since i believe it should be called estetical prefferences.
The more you like visual of something, the more you enjoy it ... i hope we can agree on that one.

My personal opinion is that we should get options.
Just as we do with helmets ... option to hide helmet is also "unimmersive" ... and yet it was well received, i dont recall even single person mentioning it ruined his game. O_o
I cant honestly say anythng much deeper about how would "realisticaly carried weapons make my game less enjoyable" than simply say that i would like the look to my characters less ... thats just it.

What i can say tho, is that it would make the game MUCH more enjoyable for me ... if my Paladin could wield his sword on his hip ... while my Ranger would have there quiver with arrows, or bolts (same reasons as you are using for meele weapons) ... while my Rogue would have no visible weapon on himself, since his daggers are actualy hidden inside his sleeves ... while my Wizard would be allways leaning on his staff.

Oh that would be a very nice sight for myself indeed, and i would enjoy looking at such party much, much, more ... than the same that just "realisticaly carry their weapons".

Thats bcs "if done right" is basicaly a condition that fulfills itself. :-/
You could aswell say "it would be better to do better" ...

And of course you think that ...
You want more immersion in the first place, its quite logical that you presume it would improve enjoyment ... why would anyone "want" something that would make his enjoyment worse?

Glad we can agree on this.

//Edit:
Im affraid not ...
I dont say im sure right now, but i believe that our characters sheat their weapons for some of those animations ... climbing and jumping im quite sure they do ... not so much about the others.

I believe i allready mentioned it here ...
You can keep your weapons unsheated all the time by pressing Tab (default ... i believe the hotkey is named "toggle combat")

You're just contradicting yourself here with opening like that, then proceeding to write 6 strawmen paragraphs equating very specific non tedious changes to having to shit, nurture, and take care of equipment, then flactuating between defending hypotheticals you yourself brings forth and nobody has presented as arguments. That's just dishonest...






Bruh srsly? Again making hypotheticals that nobody has requested nor has presented as arguments. You seem to be loving to argue with yourself, then projecting said arguments upon other people without having to address their original arguments, aka strawmaning the heck out of it.

Aswell as bad players ...
And lots and lots other bad persons, and things.

Didnt we allready talked about this?

You provide your feedback, i shall add mine ... this is how forum works.

Then mr.planetscapist come and post his picture of some character while demanding that nobody should talk to me ever again, now and prefferably even before ... this is how this forum works, lately.

Yes ... this is perfectly logical and undersandable ...

Except that "is supposed to be" part.
Since your GM is the one who call how thigs "are supposed to be" ... and yet you dismiss that, since he "is not right" or "is a bad GM" ...

So ... since you said: "This is not "my liking", this is how the setting is built."

Im not quire sure where do you take how things "are supposed to be" ...
Bcs unless i understand it incorectly, you dont use your own opinions, nor opinions of your bad GM. O_o

Wich are butchered on every single step, or corner, and yet some things "we are used to" are fine ... and others that "does not please our eye" are concidered horrible crimes against normality.

I presume that is the main problem i have with this topic ...
I, when immersing to some setting, aply same approach to everything, if one thing breaks some "law of nature" and i accept it, i never question that "law of nature" ever again in the setting* ... bcs it was allready broken and it would be odd to accept it for one thing, but complain on it for another ... ... usualy it means that im willing to accept a lot, from GM ... not everything, true, but a lot ...
It seems to me that you are either just willing to accept less than me, or you are selective. :-/ There is nothing bad about it, just to point out ... we just dont think the same way ... wich is i presume not a surprise by now.

*There is exception for this rule by the way ...
And its the case when i get the feeling that "law of nature" i allready concidered broken in some past time, seem to be "even more broken" (if you get what i mean, its not easy expression) by some futher event ... for example if my GM would claim that in this world there are Flying rocks, that defile gravity with their very existence, but dont have any own source of power that would provide it (aka magic) ... i would not question flying sword (since there obviously are things that defile gravity and sword is comparable, or smaller items when compared to stone ... like matter, potentialy material, size, weight, etc.) ...
But if we would later find flying mountain (just an example of exaggerated breaking of the same law) ... i would probably have some questions.

Well, we cant agree on everything ... thank you for trying tho.

---

Did i say occasionaly?
I believe i dont but maybe i misspoken (misswritten?) myself. :-/

Nah, whatever i said (since i really dont want to spend even more time searching here for something that might be simply missinterpreted) ...
I didnt mean that game should be immersive for a while ... then more crazy for a while, while screwing the immersion ... and then start to build immersion again ... just to screw it a moment later again.
That would be PURE madness.

My example (whatever it was) was about constant amount during the whole time.
I dont need this game to become Faerun life simulator ... and quite honestly, i dont believe you want that either ...
I believe we all simply defend our preffered possition of seesaw ... i want it a little more to the right side ... you want it a little more to the left side ... the best way Larian can satisfy us both is give us either both, or none. :P

Some wise man once said:
Democracy only works if none of the involved groups are satisfied.
Shame i dont remember who was he.

Yes ... this is perfectly logical and undersandable ...


See you always seem to not be in for a productive conversation. If we're talking about Faerun, which we are, there is countless content as to how the world works. Tons of lore inside books from every edition as well as novels, which you seems oblivious to their existence and try to equate your lack of knowledge in said setting by strawmanning and gaslighting people into your own obliviousness. Dragons can fly because they are magic energy incarnate, they fly due to their magical nature, not the strength of their wings. Devils are always Lawful Evil because Alignments in the Forgotten realms are primordial energies that have brought the universe together, and they are the representatives of said alignment, therefore if a Devil stops being Lawful Evil he stops being a Devil. ALMOST EVERYTHING in the Forgotten Realms makes sense because Mr. Ed Greenwood is a great world builder. If you go over to his Twitter you can see how ground to our own perception of reality the Realms actually are, set and self contained into their own laws of both magical and natural nature. To keep arguing that there's this huge chasm of understanding and whataboutism in regards to the "realism" and "immersion" of the Setting just shows how little knowledge you own on the subject and how little willingness you have into having honest conversations on the topic.

EDIT: Dragons are speculated to be able to manauver and fly due to their magical nature, yet in the Draconomicon 3.5E there's tons of info on their anatomy and biology explaining the whole thing.

Okay, be honest Rag. Do you actually believe that when the characters stow their swords floating on their backs, that that is a literal representation of what's happening? Do you believe that the weapons are literally floating there within the reality of the game? Because I do not. What I see is the game transparently using a shortcut that many, MANY games like it have used in the past. I think it's perfectly fair for them to use it, but the game isn't even attempting to claim that it's happening in-universe. Sure, we can SEE it happening, but as you've pointed out with the map, just becaues we see something doesn't mean it's not an abstraction.

As others have pointed out, this game is taking place in the setting of Faerun, a setting that has a lot of stuff already written about it. So it is not only reasonable but logical for people coming in to assume that Larian, being the GM, will stick to the established setting until stated otherwise. Larian has made no attempt to fold the floating weapons into lore in any way. And given the fact that this is a video game, and the approach they're using for the weapons is one used in many other games over the years, the logical assumption is that what we're seeing is an abstraction. Because what reason do we have to think otherwise?

Thanks, man! I'm no Niara, but I still try.
Darn...

Thanks for clarifying what you meant. I agree that Larian need to balance the needs of different players but I disagree that they can do that by providing 20% to 80% immersion for players who want 100%. Let's leave it at that, especially since it's my subjective opinion.

Speaking of which:
Yes. People in general are much better at knowing what they feel than knowing why they feel that way. Players in particular are great at identifying what they dislike in a game, but not so great at fixing problems.

Maybe I'm not giving other forum-members enough credit, so I'll just speak for myself. I know what I found jarring, then I pulled an explanation as to why from where the sun don't shine. So the salient information here is "I don't like floating swords, teleporting badgers or pocket-dimension camps" not "my delicate sense of immersion is shattered which indicates malicious intent from the developers."

Now that I've shown you my gonads in all of their glorious honesty, I'd like to take a peek at yours. I've read your post several times and it seems to answer all of its own questions. Let me show you what I mean by editing your own words. Let me know if I misunderstood anything.
If I've faithfully summarized your position, there are some inconsistencies that you ignore and you avoid nonsensical events during your serious runs. This indicates to me that you understand why players who come accross these inconsistent or nonsensical events during their serious runs might feel a little upset. Wasn't that your question in the first place?

What kind of an answer is that? Let's ignore bad decisions from a particular party because the other one makes bad decisions too?

"I don't think green water is healthy"
"Well yeah, but leaves are green too!"



Nonono, wait a second. There is a way on how "things are supposed to be" when we are talking about a setting, which is all the documentation (manuals, novels etc.) that form the canon of that setting.
In the FR setting, non-magical weapons don't float mid-air in normal circumstances, where "normal"=no magic involved.

The fact that a GM choose to take parts of the established setting and change them is a legitimate action, but also a highly criticisable one.
And, in this instance, I criticize it as a bad decision, for all the explanations provided in the other posts.

Besides, let's face it, weapons are not floating mid-air because is a "unique take of the GM on the setting"; weapons are floating mid-air for a technical shortcut, and it shows. It's this more than anything that causes the narrative dissonance and suspends the disbelief, because, unlike the beautifully crafted cinematics, it's a feature screaming "YOU ARE IN A VIDEOGAME, THIS IS NOT REAL, WEAPONS ARE STICK ON THE BACK BECAUSE WE DIDN'T BOTHER TO PUT A PROPER ANIMATION (THAT WE HAD IN OUR PREVIOUS GAMES BTW)" in your face.


Exactly, the problem is that in the FR mundane weapons don't fly on your back


Honestly mate, I may not like the excessive sarcasm you put in every single one of your posts, but I have found merits to your arguments on different occasions, even if my stance was different. Now seems to me you are just arguing for the sake of it.
You are the one who was complaining about people wanting to change the game to their liking to the detriment of your own experience (e.g. fast travel) while they could have "just ignored" those features they were complaining about. And now? Now you are defending a clearly bad feature, that doesn't make any logical sense not in-game nor in the real world and from which NO ONE would suffer if it was corrected.

Honestly Rag, without malice, name a single negative aspect if the weapons in this game were properly sheeted.



Exactly, thank you.

Exactly again.
"Floating weapons" are just a case study. Of course they didn't put them there because they are trying to change the setting of the FR, it's just a (bad) technical choice which should be corrected.

All this topic has became more hot of what it really should have.

The matter is simple: this game, at its current state, has some features that are really detrimental to an immersive experience, because they are breaking the disbelief of the players to be in a coherent, even if fantastical, world.
Some features are necessary for the game to function with some degree of enjoyment (minimap, fast travel etc), while others offer nothing than breaking your immersion (weapons glued to your back).

Im allways honest.
Sometimes not unnecesarily harsh kind of honest, but i try my best to never lie.
(Except jokes, they dont count since you state it was not a truth right after.)

No i dont ...
Did you get the feeling that i do? O_o

I wonder where it came from, since as far as i know the only (or at least first one, i cant shake the feeling that somebody mentioned it afterwards) person who expressed herself as if she would believe it ... was Niara. O_o

As for Sharet, i didnt quote that example for purpose (again ... was it also with you last time?) since i get the feeling that he simply grabed the last used words to describe his example, rather than believing that this is the litteral representation of Faerun. O_o

---

^_^

Im glad somebody understands me.

As for the rest (of the whole post) i cant say much more than:
Exactly ... egg ( ) freaking zactly!

Whatever zactly is ... cool name tho, i should write is somewhere ... i presume his favourite food will be eggs.

Hmm ... yes that sounds about right.

Except that part with ending ground ... but i checked and i really said it so poorly.
I meaned the chasm ofcourse ... as when you burron on one side of chasm ... and you burrow deep enough, you get to the point, where you are under it ... then you just move a bit to the side and start burrowing up ... yes im aware, it would mean you just moved 6000f instead of 60 (or how much you can, dont remember) ... but that is the part im willing to ignore.

As for the question ... not exactly.
I *know* what would bother me in such situation ... while i know it never bothered me enough to concider it gamebreaking, or even just immersion breaking ...
I could asume, sure ... but concidering how often i and other people around here agree on something ... i decided otherwise.
Also there is allways chance that somebody would give you the point of view you never even concidered youreself.

The amount of effort required to fix weapons "floating by characters backs" is not worth the time and energy cost for such an extremely minor thing. Just get over it, and save your energy for more important things.




Your thinking is incorrect, because not everyone enjoys the same things, and some things people find to be immersive can be frustrating for others.

For instance, it could be considered more immersive if instead of having fast-travel points, you just have to walk everywhere. But the more you travel back-and-forth across empty, cleared areas, the more it feels like a waste of time.



That is an approach, one that Solasta takes (outside of cutscenes - but in those characters just stand still), but the question is whether it would be immersive to be in a peaceful village running around with weapons out ready to attack at a moment's notice, and in cutscenes, not reacting naturally, but holding out weapons no matter what is going on in the cutscene. That does not sound like an improvement in immersion compared to "weapons on people's backs".

DOS1&2 boh have weapon sheeting on the hips

Honestly, I just think they have other priorities, but I'll be really surprised if they don't fix this problem before the final release.

Games with a fraction of the budget managed it just fine. Like the two Pathfinder.

It doesn't really take rocket science to add scabbards, quivers and shit.

Filling the missing options ...

Yup, bad GM can make a bad decision ...
And also good (or at least not horrible) decision can be made by any GM ... but concidered bad decision by bad player.

I dunno how to say this ... not everything you say is pure gold, just bcs you like it?
Something like that ... and yes, i know it apply to me aswell.

Im confused right now ...

Maybe i read it wrong ...
But the first sentence is "i dont like weapons floating" ... and second is "weapons dont float" ... so ... ???

Can you please clearly state wich side you stand for? O_o

Its certainly one possible way to see it. :-/
I allways thought it just say "we (as Larian) find this looking better".

Case in point ... or point in case? I never know ...
This is exactly what i was talking about up in the beginning ...

Either someone can make a bad decision (stupid rule, arguing just for the fun, w/e)
Or people can falsely judge it as such (dont follow big picutre, missinterpret, w/e)

I still do.

I know you concider it a "bad feature" ... even tho right now im not exactly sure what about it you mind honestly ... but that doesnt make it bad. :-/
Bad for you (and some others) maaaaybe ... but hardly anything more.

What kind of "logical sense" you want?

Personaly i believe that NO ONE (if you insist on caps lock) would suffer if option to sheat weapons on hips would be simply added to the curent state ... as far as i know, daggers are sheating there (even tho it is some time i used them, so maybe i just have outdated info) ...
So the only thing that would hold Larian back (the animation) is allready implemented.

And for the record, this option would be the only ting i would call "correction" in this particular case ... and this is something i keep asking from since the first day "sheat on back stupid" topic was bring up for the first time. :-/
So ... im not against corection at all, mine is dust different from others.

For example GM4Him was strictly against this option ... wonder why to be honest. O_o
But doubt he would ever tell me. :-/

I would not like it ...

Now you!
Name a single negative aspect if the weapons in this game would have option to sheet both on the hip or on back, whenever and for whatever reason you choose to ...

And just in case you would like to also turn the game into positive matters:
Note that options could include stuff like: Vissible shields (since back slot would be possibly opened), vissible bows while vielding meele, vissible meele while wielding bow, quivers on back or hips, prefferably option to hide daggers ... etc.

I'm pretty sure that Sharet is making a distinction between the fact that we see the weapons floating on the screen and that even though we see that, in the reality of the game the weapons aren't actually floating. She's basically saying that the weapons are entirely normal in the fiction of the game despite how they appear to we the players.

Also this ties into why I thought you thought that the floating weapons were really floating in the fiction of the game. In your past answers you give a lot of reasons to justify why people shouldn't have a problem with the floating blades when things like dragons and githyanki exist. When ultimately, none of those reasons hold water because the floating swords aren't an in-universe feature, but an out of universe abstraction.

I'm just hurting myself at this point, but still.


Never claimed everything I say is right because it is I who says it. I have admitted my mistakes on more than one topic.



This is not correct on your part and perfectly shows why you are just arguing in bad faith, only partially quoting what other people say to fit your argument.

This quote:


portrays me as an idiot contradicting himself, while the following (the complete one)


has the full, coherent meaning of my point.



To sum up and respond to the rest of your last post:
1) It's the first time I heard you arguing for an option to have different animations for sheeting and un-sheeting weapons in this thread. Maybe it just passed over me but until now I just saw you arguing about how inconceivable is for people to have their immersion broken from this and not from flying lizards.
2) I'll be more than happy for the game to have an infinite amount of options for an infinite amount of playstyles but this is all but realistic. And even if it was possible, the standard (or "vanilla") version of the game should be the one more faithful to its genre, in this case the RPG one, the one which places the top priority on immersion and roleplaying.
3) I know I'm not an omniscient god and that point 2 is just my personal opinion, but I think is a considerate one. If I order a pizza Margherita, advertised as a pizza Margherita, with a series of pizzas Margherita before it, I expect to receive a pizza Margherita. The waitress gives me the option to put asparagus on it? All the better, but the standard version is still a pizza Margherita.


I think I have spent more than enough time on the topic. People who genuinely wanted to understand my argument have understood it at this point and, even if they have not, I reached the limit on how clear I can be in my exposition.
To the others, it seems like I'm not eloquent enough to make you change your mind, it doesn't matter, it's not in my interest nor it's my responsibility.

I just hope the good people at Larian can see the constructive points I was trying to make. I really like this game and badly want it to realise its full potential.

Peace.

Rag, what is the POINT of you being in these forums?
All you mainly do is criticize people making constructed arguments on aspects of the game...whatsmore stuff that are god damm valid RPG related elements...not pointless crap....being like a lawyer and over analyzing sentences and nit picking pointless crap.

And no-thanks to THAT Larian is probably ignoring the entire thread...get a life.
Your not the dev. Wether you like it or not let people comment and shut up. Dont agree? Fine. Quickly mention it and keep it at that.

Watch to about 2:05



This was such a great acknowledgment of the issue (Solasta). The only developers to balance immersion and convenience. I am good with paying "porters".

Sometimes I have the feeling that he's Swen himself (or another head at Larian) defending his baby, trying to explain the inexplicable and trying by all means to dismantle valid arguments to prove that he is right even if he's factually wrong.

I can't see other explanations for his attitude.

Man do I want to play Solasta again. My gaming PC just completely died on me so I am left with the mac...trying to figure how to play it with Wine...

Lol, I have had the exact same idea. I've also imagined how annoying it must be if your boss keeps going on these kind of irrational, fallacious, bad faith, and straw man reasoning rants in formal business meetings where everyone has to shut up because they learned long ago that resisting openly is pointless.

For Gray Ghost:
---

For Sharet:
---

For mr_planescapist:

---

For Maximuuus:

That's not a valid explanation to nitpick about every sentences and to make every thread become uninterresting and unreadable.

You're spotted !

/shrug ...
We all have our own ways of comunication.

This is a little bit off the main topic, but it's a personal perspective on the back and forth that I've read here, mainly between Ragnarok and others, about experience and immersion in space. I want to stress, it's just an impression that I personally am struck with through reading this, and it's not intended to insult, hurt or offend. I don't want to cast a judgement on anyone - just explain a perspective that I find myself ending up at as I read the exchanges.

I'm a weak man, I can't resist keeping posting.


This.

"God is dead and we killed him" - Friedrich Nietzsche.

There are no more supremely right or correct takes on anything, just subjective experience; everything comes down to personal liking, it is, as Niara said, an automatic part of the conversation.
Every single criticism in this entire forum, constructive or not, can be traced down to some people not "liking" a particular feature.

That said, even if there's nothing sacred and univocal anymore, an RPG is a genre with a well defined and accepted set of rules and features that put roleplaying and immersion as their top priority, the same way an RTS puts strategy as its top priority and an FPS puts shooting phases as its top one.

Ok then, what is immersion?

To quote the Oxford University:

If we accept this definition, then it is sensible to say that every feature or mechanic that creates a dissonance between what we are experiencing and its internal coherency is going to be detrimental to the player immersion.

Now, why do we accept some "immersion-breaking" features, like the turn-based combat that freezes time, and not weapons glued to our backs or the ability to teleport from anywhere?

Because this is a game and not a movie, it must be interactable and fun to play. Still, some are necessary in order for a game to be interactable and fun to play, while others are not.
What is the boundary between what is necessary and what is not? It is purely subjective.

And yes, Larian is the master of the game they are producing and they are more than legitimate to make it their version of fun. But I, the customer, want a product that I enjoy, not a game the provider enjoys (if we enjoy the same thing all the better). This is why I, we, everyone are advocating for features they like but, even if everything is subjective, given the context some requests have more weight and are more reasonable than others.


Let us assume that the game will have no tweakable options except for graphical ones such as the resolution of FPS cap.
In this case, when deciding whether to insert or remove a particular feature the golden rule (here as when developing any product) is to put said feature on one scale plate, while on the other the core value of the product must be put.

Is this immersion-breaking feature (and in a videogame, 90% of features are intrinsically immersion-breaking) bringing more benefit to the enjoyment of the game than the immersion that it is taking away from it?

Again, the balance of the scale is subjective, but it is possible to have an honest and down to ground conversation on some features which are, in my opinion, pretty easily discerned.

For example:
- Are weapons glued to the backs of our characters bringing more fun and enjoyment than the visual annoyance they bring to some people?
- Is the fact that a badger can borrow itself on the top of a cage bringing more enjoyment than the suspension of disbelief it causes?
- Is the possibility to instant disappear from a camp full of hostile goblins without likewise explanations, even if there are no portals around, something fun or something detrimental to the core value of the game?

I think that all the above features are bad, for the simple fact that the game claims to be a roleplaying game (core value = immersion). If it was advertised as a turn-based strategy game I would have no problem with it.


Will taking away these features bring more harm than good? Again, it's subjective but no, I don't think so.
I honestly think the most harm would be to take away a little chuckle from people who don't particularly care about immersion, versus the more enjoyable experience for all the others, which I think are the majority since they are buying an RPG.

Again, under the assumption that no options except for graphical ones are going to be available.

--------------------------


Which was exactly the same sentiment I have with unlimited fast travel:


-------------------------

To end on some positive notes:
1) Larian's people, on the off chance that you are reading, I love your game and what you are doing. In this forum, you are going to read 90% negative things just because no one wants to change the dozens of them that are already super good. People, me included, are arguing only because they want the game to be the best version of what it can be.
2) People in this thread, let's not antagonise and stigmatise anyone, even if we profoundly disagree with one another.

I suggest people play Planescape : Torment for a crash course on <Immersion> Not to mention good writing.
Whatsmore the Enhanced Edition version of the game didn't butcher it too bad...very playable. Though I still prefer the classic (picture). Better smoother colors.

Actualy i believe that i understad it ... it still feels a little alien (is that corect word? Anyway i believe the feeling is mutual.) since my approach to same is quite different, and i must admit that i dont agree with almost anything you said.
But my goal was not to accept your ways, but to understand them ... and i believe i gathered and processed enough data to do now.
(Still can be wrong tho.)

Its the same as my way to build a sentence ...
Some may sound weird in english, and sometimes i can focus on wrong parts and get wrong impression of soemthing ... but that is just extended effect of that my brain will allways work in my language, no matter what i try to translate to.


Speaking about "out-of-context manner" ...

I would like to remind you that i said that people use "immersion" as an argument against things they just simply "dont like" ... in topic about sheating weapons on their back.
Wich is something that in my quite honest opinion is matter of PURE aestetic prefferences, especialy if we can agree (and some of us did) on that those weapons *dont* "float behind our back", it is just the way this game shows it, wich isnt perfect for immersion, true, but also its not quite important if the topic is hip or back ... also especialy (as i showed in previous post with ingame screenshot) when we concider size of weapons in this game, wich would as people used to use in that topic "logicaly" make sheating on hip just as impossible as on back.

So, to put it simply: There is no "whatever they are".
This was said in hip/back sheating topic ... and it belongs there and only there.


I belive this is the core difference between our approach to our immersion ...

I understand that you as a player cannot "unsee" the fact that game allows you to burrow into the cage.
What i was trying to say, when we were talking about this particular example ... is that i would most likely never even get to this situation, since i usualy see exactly the spot where i want to burrow when i choose that i will burrow, since im immersed so i try to think as that character ... and the only way i can think of you as a player, can find out that you can actualy burrow into that hanging cage ... is that you choose to burrow and for some reason move your cursor into that cage, or simply start moving it over the screen to find out on wich places you can burrow.
And for me, THAT is the point, when you broke your immersion ... not when you find out that the engine allows you this, but when you were searching where you can burrow ... since you no longer work with your character information, you are checking all possibilities that engine gives you ... and that is simply not immersive for me.

We may never agree on this, you have your ways to play, i have mine ... and i believe that both is fine.
Best i can hope for is that we understand each other.


This is good argument!
Examples we were using in this topic dont quite apply, i would dare to say (sheating weaspons on back can quite be abused in any way i would imagine ... and i dont believe that any engine would concider teleporting to cage as good tactical choice, since you either dont have line of sight to anyone bcs cage is in your way, or everyone have clear line of sight on you without any chance to run ).

But still, its a good argument for immersion problems in general.

I totally understand that argument "just dont do it" cant be applied for situations where even if you choose not to do something, NPCs wont. :-/

I was going to stay out of this whole discussion because it honestly exhausts me, but I'd like you have have an actual situation that happened to me about a week ago:
I was playing a turn based crpg and got into a fight with a bunch of creepy crawly cave bugs. I started the fight on the ground, at least two of the bugs were above me on some scaffolding. Before I did anything (their turns were before mine), the two bugs on the scaffold burrowed into the scaffold, I could literally see their models handing in thin air, vanished, then unburrowed out of the ground inside my group.

And I believe my next words were "that's fucking bullshit".

Lets have another example, this one from many years ago:
I'm walking around in an rpg, having a lovely walk. I don't remember where I was going, just that I chose to do so on foot so I could admire the landscape. Clouds come over and it starts to rain, I spy a nearby structure that might offer me shelter from the rain so I run and go stand under it. About a second later I notice that the rain is coming right through the structure, because weather can't actually be blocked by structures in external cells, it was a limitation of the game engine at the time, and this realisation leaves me feeling intensely disappointed. I did not find any joy in the following run to my destination.

I don't know why people seem to be assuming that the players break their own immersion in the game world. That's never been my experience, it's always been the other way around, where I am playing the game normally, and then the game or AI does something bullshit, because the game works by mechanical code, and does not care about player immersion. That's been my experience in BG3 too.

To get back on track

Floaty weapons isn't actually something that is overly breaking for me, perhaps it's that I've spent too long playing crpgs where floaty weapons are a commonly used shortcut and it's become normalised in my mind, but I understand why it's breaking for others. It would be nice if our armour incorporated extra straps or hooks to at least try and make it look like our aren't just velcroed on. I'm also torn on the issue of backpacks, I've played older rpgs that managed to do them, but I also feel like they would cause clipping issues in BG3 and ultimately make things worse.

Short rests are a little bland right now, that's just a fact. It needs something other than people just standing there like a pack of idiots. But it's important to note that a short rest only takes an hour to complete, at least mechanically, and is literally just having a break to sit or snack or do something else that doesn't require exerting yourself.

As for the tadpole urgency issue, I'm not entirely sure it's actually urgent at all. We've been told it's an urgent matter, but it's obvious that people are working on information that is either bad or not relevant to us specifically.

Some of these issues are things that are present in tabletop as well, and there's no real explanation for them there either (eg, why players make death saves but a bandit does not), so that's not on Larian to solve that problem.

Lastly:
!!!! This shit makes me so unreasonably angry every time it pops up, and I really do wish Larian would stop it.

To your issue about tadpole urgency, Piff, youre right that it's ultimately not AS urgent as it's initially presented. The problem I've found is that the way they present that revelation that it's not so urgent. It's given through little bits of context clues scattered throughout act one. Hints and things that you can find out. And the issue with this in my opinion is that given how the urgency was built up at the beginning, the game needs to give some kind of definitive moment of catharsis where we can actually feel the tension come to an end, as opposed to scattered hints that it's possible to not internalize, or to miss entirely.

With the fact that characters not present at an event can approve or disapprove, I think that's just a matter of abstracting the fact that characters woul hear about stuff when the group meets up in camp again. Otherwise you get a situation where you can do a bunch of evil things and still have good characters be totally okay with you just because they weren't there. It's not perfect, but I don't know what would actually be a better approach.

There is a singular moment of catharsis - the early party long rest cutscene, where everyone feels sick and Lae'zel wants to kill us because she thinks we're turning. But then we wake up feeling perfectly fine, conclusive evidence that our tadpole is different from normal ceremorphosis.

However, it is (was? Not sure if fixed in later patches...) incredibly easy to entirely miss this cutscene if you don't rest early enough. If you, reasonably, think that you're on a time limit and push as far as you can, other cutscene triggers can overwrite this one. Basically, Larian needs to adjust things so that we're forced to rest and see this cutscene. I suggest exhaustion; after finding Lae'zel, our party immediately gains a level of exhaustion (prompt cutscene where party members say they need to rest). If we continue to adventure, in another minute we get another level of exhaustion. And then another. And then another. At 4 or 5 levels of exhaustion we get more party dialogue saying they need to rest, and disapproval by most (approval by Lae'zel) if we continue on. So player's aren't completely forced to rest, but they're heavily encouraged.

As for party approval/disapproval, it's reasonable to me that the party members talk to each other in camp. But I think non-present party members should only approve/disapprove of the BIG decisions. Not small dialogue choices. Things that it's reasonable for them to hear about.

There is more discusions about this ...

In first (or second not sure) long rest Gale, and Lae'zel both tells you that you should be turning by now, so your case is certainly "unusual".

It is not something that needs abstracting, I think. Back at the camp there is time for talking things through. It is a perfectly good opportunity for characters to make their opinions on things they heard about known. Such moments can also be used to expand on the reasons for approval/disapproval.

Or your companions not being aware of your evil deeds could also be OK. Keeping your evil ways secret will make them extra evil! Isn´t it just like real life?

Since most companions aren't really the best of friends, why would they run around gossiping to eachother about something i said or did, and even if they did tell eachother, the offended companion should confront me and ask if it's true, or ask why i did what i did, maybe i would get a speech check to convince them it was the right decision during those circumstances or something like that, just getting an automatic disapproval from someone through hearsay isn't really fair.

From an immersion point of view: some adventurers go out exploring while the rest stay at the camp, doing nothing. After some time, the explorers return to camp, covered in blood and mud, carrying large amounts of cheese. Wouldn´t the people who stayed at camp want to hear what happened?


Yes, that would make more sense and be more interesting.

This is already a statement that breaks the immersion in itself... Why would someone who has clear objectives to achieve quickly stay in the camp and do nothing while waiting to hear from others what they have seen?

See, I don't think that's truly conclusive though. All it does is confirm that things are strange. It's another mystery, one that potentially can happen early enough in the game that you lack any information to really extrapolate from it. Sure we can guess that what we felt was ceremorphosis being interrupted, but I don't think you get the effect if there's still uncertainty floating around. Also, just because it's different than normal doesn't mean anything firmly. It's all just adding a layer of mystery and uncertainty. My problem is that they seem to be trying to have it both ways and failing. Either keep up the sense of tension and uncertainty and design the game with that in mind, or firmly and definitively relieve the tension. Based on what they seem to want to be doing, Larian should find a way to firmly establish "we don't need to worry about changing anytime soon, we can take our time" and then postioning it so that the mystery of why is truly front and centre.

At the end of the camp scene you talk about, everyone assumes that it was just them having had a bad meal, no one knows what happened and the idea that it had to do with ceremorphosis isn't even brought up again. We as the audience can guess, and that's great for keeping us tense and wondering what's going on. But that's not catharsis. That's not a big, emotional release. That's building up the tension. Oh, we thought the big moment was here but instead it was nothing. Now we know less than we thought we did. The tension of this plotline doesn't rise to a crescendo. It rises and then fizzles out.

Thats exactly the reason party limist should never ever, ever be mentioned in roleplay ... and should have ben kept as pure mechanical limitation.

There will never be reason good enough for others to stay in camp. :-/

Well, there are in other games. Or at least it "make sense" that they stay where they are if not with the player.

But not in BG3, I agree.

That's all fair. It's conclusive evidence that our tadpoles aren't proceeding us down the "normal" ceremorphosis path, but that's about it. We could still be transforming but more slowly, or still at risk of suddenly transforming.

And I agree that our characters should be more worried about the tadpole. At least until more conclusive evidence is presented that we're all safe from transforming permanently.

It is pretty normal for me too, almost every game I play that shows weapons, even the most immersive and realistic one, has floaty weapons on the back. Backpacks in that game however, they have done very well with barely any clipping, even showing if they are heavy with stuff or mostly empty. I think in this game, an option for sheathing on the back or the hip would be nice for those who want it but there will probably be clipping no matter where things are located. Backpacks if added should come with an option to show or hide.

If someone was to go and do things another would have issues with, the only reason to tell them is to get the negative reaction. Otherwise most people would keep it to themselves. I think the tadpole, while a rather silly reason for everyone to know everything, is probably the best excuse for what they currently have going on. It also explains how everyone knows what choices you make with the creepy dream person. Not sure if it happens in multiplayer as well like that, if one person goes for the tadpole powers and the rest do not, does everyone know?

This.