Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Help Tips & Tricks Companions and Origin Character

Just a question I'm not really sure about I hope someone can clarify.

Are there any companions in the game who are not also origin characters?

And/or are there any origin characters in the game who don't have tadpoles in them?

Are there any just normal ... companions, who are along for the story with you?

I know this wasn't the case in Larian's other games, but they've improved a lot of the narrative flaws they've had in those past games, so I wondered how far along they'd come here.

Nope ... nope ... aaaand also nope. :-/
Or at least not yet.

Even tho such companions are desired heavily ... especialy one Bear ...
And many other NPCs certainly have some potential for such companion ...
And Swen himself confrimmed that final release will include custom party members ... so we should eventualy be able to create non-origin companion(s), even tho they will be tadpoled ...
And Swen himself also confrimmed that final release will include mercenaries ... not quite sure what that would mean, especialy not since so far in EA we have seen no clues that any NPC would have even slightest desire to join us ... and i repetat, that potential is allready present ...
And finaly, we were told that our curent list of companions is far from the complete list we will get in final release ... but as it seems, Larian feels no desire from us to complain about another companion, so they would need to rewrite them as they did with Shadowheart. :-/

Sumarized ... no, but fingers crossed.

Still annoyed she got rewritten. I enjoyed how prickly she was.

you will be able to create custom mercenaries as for companions, and there will be origins, simple as that, current knowledge is 4 party members, i'm hoping for at least 5

well there is Glut... lets call him a Vegetable Companion

As far as we know it’s No, No and No. I think that Camp followers and reoccurring characters and temporary party members are the closest that we can expect to see.

Making a character an origin means that we need to be able to start a game as one, so I find it unlikely for one to not be tadpoled - a non-tadpoled character would require a different intro and tie to the story. So far it seems that tadpole is BG3 equivalent of source from D:OS2 - it is source of playable characters status as “the chosen one” and main driving force for the narrative. Tadpoles are also tied to games core features and many interactions.

Nothing was said about plans to add “normal” companions later in the game. There are likely to be “mercenaries” like in D:OS1&2 but not much more then that.

That doesn't mean every companion would need to be so, though. Most RPGs have companions that are not all identical to each other in ways like the tadpole - in fact the diversity of the party is driven by the diversity of the companions, rather than the main player character...

I also hope we’ll get some non-tadpoled companions and that it would feel more interesting if not all companions had exactly the same rationale for being there. There’s already a bunch of possible camp followers who have their own reasons to tag along and there’s at least a couple of these I wish could be companions, too.

Given the main character’s story is tadpole-related I also can’t see there being any origin characters without parasites. Having different protagonist origins in that way would add huge amounts of complexity that I’d not blame Larian for not taking on.

Seems unlikely ...
I mean just ask: "Why would anybody travel with tadpoled: vampire, ticking bomb, space nazi, sharite and Wyll."

Maybe if we (seemingly) resolve our tadpole problem at the end of Act 1 ... after that, i could imagine that.
But until that happen, the tadpole is actualy glue that stick our party together.

If normal companions existed, they would only have to travel with tadpoled me, since the other over the top edgelords would get kicked out of my camp(Unless they their manners improve significantly). And their reason for traveling with me would be that i am their best chance of finding the guy/gal that is running around putting tadpoles in peoples heads, so they can plant their boot in his/hers behind..
Like, you know a party of adventurers, that just want to quell the evil that has invaded the land(while getting some nice loot along the way of course).

I always thought it would be interesting to play as a sorcerer or wizard and hire Aradin's crew as muscle. Unbalanced party I know, probably just boredom setting in.

Current answers:
Yes
No
Yes

I would love to see Abdirak and a Loviatar Priest Companion. Way tooooo much potential in that masochist lol.

Let’s not forget Sazza, Anders, Minthara, and Grukkoh.

The game hints the two siblings of the True Soul you find dying after the fight with the owl bear (their names elude me).