(or maybe don't check it. I can't guarantee the comments won't have spoilers and some of them get pretty nasty over a review).
That's an interesting perspective to read. Folks should click and follow the link, even if they don't scroll to the comments.
However, I take a bunch of issues with his comparisons. I'll isolate one here, which has gotten alot of mileage on this forum: lack of NPC choice. I don't think the NPC choice early in BG1 or even BG2 is actually as great as he's remembering.
I don't think it's fair to include the EE companions in this comparison. Maybe when BG3 gets all its DLC or its own EE (like with OS) in a few years. So I'm going to compare to the base game.
An Early Access of BG1 probably might've been just enough to get you through the Nashkel mines. So I think that's a fair comparison point. What NPC's are generally available here, in a typical playthrough?
No good-aligned wizards for one. Xzar and Edwin. Dynaheir way far out of the way for a new, low-level party to get to safely imo. That seems beyond what we're getting in the EA here. Xan would be available only at the very tail end of this segment. Essentially not available for playing through the meat of the EA.
Your only cleric: Branwen. And acquired kind of late.
Your only druid: Jaheira.
Thieves: Montaron or Imoen.
Your only bard: Garrick -- and thus only non-evil arcane magic user.
Pretty good spread on the fighters: Khalid, Minsc, Kivan (maybe included), Kagain. No paladins though.
I know I'm excluding some higher level areas that veteran players know you can sneak into and snatch NPC's like Viconia or Ajantis from. But again, would those sections be fair to compare to this EA? I don't think so. Forgive me if I missed some here. Also this number has to be larger given the party size difference.
That is a big selection but keep in mind all these NPC's were made with little backstory, almost no personal quests among them, no bearing on the main plot. The problem in BG2 is actually imo quite comparable to what people are complaining about now in BG3 EA. Because both games focused on fewer but deeper NPC's. Want a good-aligned cleric, or an evil one? You have one option. Both of whom come off as arrogant and obnoxious on first joining imo. The thief NPC options for the full BG2 are notoriously limited in their breadth.
And further the review goes into favorably comparing PoE to BG on this point... which, seems flat out wrong to me. One NPC of every class, with several classes missing except in the DLC, is not great. Especially considering the combat prowess of certain classes in that game -- notably Cleric and Wizard. I will however agree with that reviewer that Kingmaker did a pretty good job on the NPC's.
Ya no. You missed the point about companions and are comparing a game made over 20 years ago to a modern game which should be learning from its predecessors mistakes. I will also say that I believe the Gnoll Fortress is suppose to be done before the Mines and why Minsc is on a timer.
His gripe about the companions is that their attitudes and motivations are all similar. "I haven't played far enough to be fair, but initial impressions are there is a lot of anger and bossy people in this world, and not enough fun and adventure seeker'"
I didn't make the initial comparison. The author of the Steam post did. Also flat out absurd to say that the gnoll fortress is done before the mines, considering the relative monster levels.
Although I know that wasn't the main point of the argument, I have to set that right. When I was playing for the first time, I took Minsc to Nashkel and then took the very long road to the Gnoll fortress, and on the way his timer went off and he attacked me.
So, nowadays I always rescue Dynaheir before the mines.
The brigading on this game is ridiculous and it's not just one group of very online brand loyalists it's multiple! I've sunk more hours into Baldur's Gate than any other game series and I WANT to love 3 too but it needs a LOT of work both technical and artistic and I fear the wrong voices will be listened to.
He starts by saying you only have 4 slots, so for party dynamics, the player is probably not going to use the one in which the PC fills the role. He then goes on and says their personalities are all the same.
You then go on to list all the NPCs your party can recruit in a game made two decades ago, but that game actually made a conscious game design decision about party mechanics....
I think you're just focused on a separate part of the review than I am. This is the section that stuck with me:
When we went from Baldur's Gate to Baldur's Gate 2, there was an emphasis on growing and expanding on what we could to give the player more choices and freedom. Adding subclasses, focusing on player choices in quests and the story, their companions and so on. There's not near enough choice in companions so far for me to be able to tell them to go to hell if I don't like them.
As I said in my summary of the first BG game, a player wanting certain tactical pieces in their party doesn't actually have a lot of freedom to tell some of the Chapter1-Chapter2 NPC's to "go to hell". Or, if they do, they will pay a heavy price by not having some key role adequately fulfilled. Perfect example is not having access to a decent arcane spellcaster that's good or neutral.
And to rebut people who want to focus on BG2, I get that in this passage he's also talking about BG2, but in that game my fact is also true. There are some harder to find NPCs like Cernd, Valygar, Mazzy, even slightly Keldorn. But your initial options from Irenicus' dungeon, Aerie and the Copper Coronet also do not give a ton of freedom to tell NPC's to "go to hell" if you don't like them. And of course, you have to complete a whole two-level dungeon with absolutely no options on NPC's.
His summary of the personalities also doesn't seem to match what several professional reviewers and what several members of this community have written. That seems like both a subjective point and one where it's crazy premature to judge. Again I didn't think every point in that review was wrongheaded. But I do think it's maybe unfairly comparing complete knowledge about NPC options and their arcs in one set of games with what we have now. As opposed to trying to imagine what a limited EA of BG1 or 2 would look like.
FWIW, by my count, the possible companions in BG2 from Irenicus' dungeon, Waukeens Promenade and the Copper Coronet are 8, thus meaning 9 playable characters. Or a full party plus 50%. Five companions is also a full party plus 50% with a player created sixth character in BG3.
I think the point about BG 1 is not accurate. Either you rush through the Mines in which case you get to Xan quite early or you take your time and explore, in which case you may well pick up Garrick or Dynaheir. In 2nd edition a Bard is a perfectly viable arcane spellcaster at low levels due to the lower XP requirements, trading slightly less spell slots for a higher caster level.
So I don't really agree that there is no choice in arcane spellcasters if you are playing a good or neutral party. Of course, in the EE running into Neera in Beregost completely settles the argument.
Secondly, in the early game not having a decent arcane spellcaster does not qualify as a "heavy price". In the long run you need one - at low levels they are quite useful for the 1-2 sleep spells they can cast per day, but hardly necessary.
If anything it is harder to get an evil divine caster, but you can get a neutral one. And again, if you bring healing potions a low level divine caster is also not really necessary.
I am more inclined to agree about BG 2. Having less choice is the price the developer had to pay for having much more developed NPCs and romances. Still, after Chateau Irenicus it is fairly easy to pick up spellcasters of either alignment and fighters. I feel the following companions are easy to find, even without having played the game:
Aerie, Jan, Jaheira, Minsc, Yoshimo, Korgan, Nalia, Viconia and Anomen. With the EE add Neera and Dorn. For other members you need to progress a bit into certain quests. So it can be a bit tight for an evil party, but it is decent for a good party.
From what I've been seeing in streams, and also comments on other forums including Larian's own forum, we critics were right about the combat in BG3. Unlike how fans of the game and in some instances Larian themselves have tried to portray things, there are a LOT of combat encounters in the game including several trash mob fights (there is a goblin fight in which one stream shows no less than 17 enemies in the fight), these fights take a LONG time to resolve, excessive elemental surface interactions are what these combats are often all about, when an opportunity is presented to avoid the fight the check roll is extremely high and often requires multiple very high checks be passed in a row for ultimate success, and if you somehow (through a lot of save-scumming) manage to avoid the combat you are punished with significantly lower XPs and loot.
He starts by saying you only have 4 slots, so for party dynamics, the player is probably not going to use the one in which the PC fills the role. He then goes on and says their personalities are all the same.
You then go on to list all the NPCs your party can recruit in a game made two decades ago, but that game actually made a conscious game design decision about party mechanics....
I think you're just focused on a separate part of the review than I am. This is the section that stuck with me:
When we went from Baldur's Gate to Baldur's Gate 2, there was an emphasis on growing and expanding on what we could to give the player more choices and freedom. Adding subclasses, focusing on player choices in quests and the story, their companions and so on. There's not near enough choice in companions so far for me to be able to tell them to go to hell if I don't like them.
As I said in my summary of the first BG game, a player wanting certain tactical pieces in their party doesn't actually have a lot of freedom to tell some of the Chapter1-Chapter2 NPC's to "go to hell". Or, if they do, they will pay a heavy price by not having some key role adequately fulfilled. Perfect example is not having access to a decent arcane spellcaster that's good or neutral.
And to rebut people who want to focus on BG2, I get that in this passage he's also talking about BG2, but in that game my fact is also true. There are some harder to find NPCs like Cernd, Valygar, Mazzy, even slightly Keldorn. But your initial options from Irenicus' dungeon, Aerie and the Copper Coronet also do not give a ton of freedom to tell NPC's to "go to hell" if you don't like them. And of course, you have to complete a whole two-level dungeon with absolutely no options on NPC's.
His summary of the personalities also doesn't seem to match what several professional reviewers and what several members of this community have written. That seems like both a subjective point and one where it's crazy premature to judge. Again I didn't think every point in that review was wrongheaded. But I do think it's maybe unfairly comparing complete knowledge about NPC options and their arcs in one set of games with what we have now. As opposed to trying to imagine what a limited EA of BG1 or 2 would look like.
FWIW, by my count, the possible companions in BG2 from Irenicus' dungeon, Waukeens Promenade and the Copper Coronet are 8, thus meaning 9 playable characters. Or a full party plus 50%. Five companions is also a full party plus 50% with a player created sixth character in BG3.
Ahh, we are looking at two different points of the review. I will I dismissed that one because it’s early access and they have said that they will be adding more. They key point there was about him talking about player choice.
That’s actually going into the whole 4 person party vs 6 person party argument when you are talking about dynamics and that’s another entirely different discussion on a game design choice.
The only player you truly can’t replace right away in BG2 is Yoshimo, and that is a design decision to make sure his plot line hits the player hard the first time a person plays through.
Out of Ic’s dungeon, a player will have a healer, a thief, a tank and their mage is taken away. Assuming after getting through the dungeon, a player doesn’t like one the companions they have, the player has choice to replace them. The healer can be replaced by 2 companions (Anomen, Aerie). The mage can be replaced by two companions (Aerie, Nalia) with one of those companions being forceful. The player can replace the tank with 1.5 companions (Kagain or Anomen being the .5) all before leaving the Copper Cornet.
You have options or choices to tell either Minsc or Jah to go to hell, if you don’t like them. Yoshimo, not so much because of story.
So at this point in time, if The vampire is your only thief, or Shadowheart is your only cleric, you can’t tell them off because there is no replacement at the moment. Once again, I am dismissing that as Larian said there are more companions on the way. I just hope they listen to feedback and make these new characters as unique as possible from a first impressions stand point that the choice will matter in the finished product.
There are way too many elemental surfaces to start. Low level DnD wasn't designed with arbitrary floor damage being tossed around every round. Within the first few rounds of combat it is like the entire battlefield, and party, is covered in fire and acid. Very Larian, not very DnD. I expect them to tone this down in the earlier levels since so many seem to see it as a negative.
I just can't get over the blanket of campiness that covers this game. It's just like Divinity: nothing is believable. Everything is such a hamfisted stereotype. Larian have a serious problem with subtlety and realism in their games, and while I had hoped that they could move beyond this with BG3, they clearly haven't. It's like they can't do anything without doing it 150%. The tacky, campy, over-the-top nature of every aspect of their writing is just so unbecoming of Baldur's Gate where, despite isolated pockets of levity, the setting as a whole was relatively grounded and felt believable as a whole instead of a cavalcade of caricatures and painfully trite stereotypes. Everything in BG3 is just so fantasy-generic.
I am more inclined to agree about BG 2. Having less choice is the price the developer had to pay for having much more developed NPCs and romances. Still, after Chateau Irenicus it is fairly easy to pick up spellcasters of either alignment and fighters. I feel the following companions are easy to find, even without having played the game:
Aerie, Jan, Jaheira, Minsc, Yoshimo, Korgan, Nalia, Viconia and Anomen. With the EE add Neera and Dorn. For other members you need to progress a bit into certain quests. So it can be a bit tight for an evil party, but it is decent for a good party.
As I said in my post: " I do think it's maybe unfairly comparing complete knowledge about NPC options and their arcs in one set of games with what we have now. As opposed to trying to imagine what a limited EA of BG1 or 2 would look like."
And you're now even tossing in EE characters. This is what I think might have even generated some strong pushback against the initial Steam post. It's simply an unfair comparison. I do think a fair review would be instead imagining what a limited content look at BG1 or 2 would contain and then comparing that against what we're seeing now. Whether or not the writer was a developer on the original games, I still think this is an important point to make about reviews.
And -- imo -- a reasonable imagining of that might be merely the NPC's from Irenicus' dungeon, Aerie and the Copper Coronet. That's not all that diverse of a set.
I am more inclined to agree about BG 2. Having less choice is the price the developer had to pay for having much more developed NPCs and romances. Still, after Chateau Irenicus it is fairly easy to pick up spellcasters of either alignment and fighters. I feel the following companions are easy to find, even without having played the game:
Aerie, Jan, Jaheira, Minsc, Yoshimo, Korgan, Nalia, Viconia and Anomen. With the EE add Neera and Dorn. For other members you need to progress a bit into certain quests. So it can be a bit tight for an evil party, but it is decent for a good party.
As I said in my post: " I do think it's maybe unfairly comparing complete knowledge about NPC options and their arcs in one set of games with what we have now. As opposed to trying to imagine what a limited EA of BG1 or 2 would look like."
And you're now even tossing in EE characters. This is what I think might have even generated some strong pushback against the initial Steam post. It's simply an unfair comparison. I do think a fair review would be instead imagining what a limited content look at BG1 or 2 would contain and then comparing that against what we're seeing now. Whether or not the writer was a developer on the original games, I still think this is an important point to make about reviews.
And -- imo -- a reasonable imagining of that might be merely the NPC's from Irenicus' dungeon, Aerie and the Copper Coronet. That's not all that diverse of a set.
I would look at it like chateaux Irenicus and all the quests obtainable in the Copper Cornet if we’re talking about Early Access builds and content. That’s be the first dungeon, Nalia’s stronghold, Korgan’s Crypt Crawl, the Slavers and Windspear Hills.
Aerie’s would be added in a later build with other city districts (like the Bridge) opening up as they progressed.
That said, this isn’t how BioWare released the game and wasn’t how the first impressions of that game were made.
This whole “wait and see” mentality isn’t becoming IMO when people like myself are still looking for impressions on the game. I’m a patient guy though. I can wait years for to play this game.
i watched veriax's stream [ he is a huge bg 2 fan and he was the one that got me into the games] and his main issue is everything feels more like a divinity game then it does baldurs gate from map design to combat. he even said himself he would have been more fine with it had larian just done their own dnd adventure and was not just slapping the baldurs gate name on something that isnt really baldurs gate.
I just can't get over the blanket of campiness that covers this game. It's just like Divinity: nothing is believable. Everything is such a hamfisted stereotype. Larian have a serious problem with subtlety and realism in their games, and while I had hoped that they could move beyond this with BG3, they clearly haven't. It's like they can't do anything without doing it 150%. The tacky, campy, over-the-top nature of every aspect of their writing is just so unbecoming of Baldur's Gate where, despite isolated pockets of levity, the setting as a whole was relatively grounded and felt believable as a whole instead of a cavalcade of caricatures and painfully trite stereotypes. Everything in BG3 is just so fantasy-generic.
I can only speculate but I think it has a lot to do with the priorities of humor between Belgium vs Canada. I'm warming up to BG3 in certain respects but boy howdy the fundamental disconnect in tone, style, messaging, jokes between old and new was a shock to the synapses. EE's and Siege got the Canadianness down pat.
i watched veriax's stream [ he is a huge bg 2 fan and he was the one that got me into the games] and his main issue is everything feels more like a divinity game then it does baldurs gate from map design to combat. he even said himself he would have been more fine with it had larian just done their own dnd adventure and was not just slapping the baldurs gate name on something that isnt really baldurs gate.
I need to look him up. Of the streamers I follow/watch regularly only one is playing BG3 right now, and he has never played the original games, nor even has any knowledge of DnD. Good guy good streamer, but I need to watch someone just a little closer to my own situation.
Maybe i'll do a BG stream eventually. Just go through the whole trilogy trying to roleplay a single character. Maybe get some curious people into the first two who have never tried em. I haven't touched BG in about a year or two at this point, long stretch for me, but every time I turn on BG3 it makes me want to start BG1 again.
Maybe i'll do a BG stream eventually. Just go through the whole trilogy trying to roleplay a single character. Maybe get some curious people into the first two who have never tried em. I haven't touched BG in about a year or two at this point, long stretch for me, but every time I turn on BG3 it makes me want to start BG1 again.
I'd watch that. But I'm still not ready to call it a trilogy, yet.
Maybe i'll do a BG stream eventually. Just go through the whole trilogy trying to roleplay a single character. Maybe get some curious people into the first two who have never tried em. I haven't touched BG in about a year or two at this point, long stretch for me, but every time I turn on BG3 it makes me want to start BG1 again.
I'd watch that. But I'm still not ready to call it a trilogy, yet.
There seems to be some interest, so I will likely do it in the near future. I will announce it before I do though.
And by trilogy I mean BG1-SOD-BG2. I'm sure there is no shortage of BG3 streams atm.
Hey @WarChiefZeke, as the rare individual who is not in the "BG3 is amazing" box but who is playing the EA, I want to specifically ask you about some issues that have received particularly strong discussion over in the Larian forum:
Romances/sex - What are your thoughts on how romances are being initiated between the PC and companions, and also among the companions, and specifically the criticism about companions who spent their time disliking you all of a sudden wanting to have sex with you?
Food - Is food really overpowered in the game? Seems to me that having food provide an alternative means to keep the party healed would be a very good thing given we only have three party slots available for companions and it would be nice to not necessarily have to include a dedicated healer in the party.
Custom PC - A lot of discussion is on the feeling in your camp as you get further into Act 1 that everyone in the camp, your companions and even followers, are all special in some way and have some meaningful connection and relevance to the story and the world, and the only person in the camp who is does NOT matter much is yourself as a custom PC. Your thoughts?
Combat - Just how much combat is there in this first bit of the game? It would be especially awesome if you could roughly quantify: 20%, 30%? And relatedly, how much of that combat can you REASONABLY avoid?
More questions to follow if you are amenable to answering. Thanks!
The ones i've seen so far give off Viconia vibes. One minute they are threatening your life and the next minute they are suddenly interested in intimacy. Sometimes this happens when you don't expect it. I don't want to reveal the story because this isn't a spoiler thread.
Gale seems more reasonable and well adjusted, including the flirting and everything else you can do as a female character. His seems more normal and I expect the later good PCs to be added will be like this as well.
Custom PC
That's pretty much true, everyone has the same issue you do but also something extra that ties them deeper into the plot. I guess this is to be expected since they are playable origin characters who can also be the PC, but there it is. You are the least special of the lot.
I am personally okay with this and don't need to be special in any way, in fact we need less special folk in the party, period.
Combat
True to BG, you can be a murderhobo in every situation and fight your way out. If you do that, you have a ton of fighting and a few large battles.
But in nearly every situation where you have to fight a difficult battle, you can talk your way out of it. The amount of combat really depends on how you approach the game, and what rolls you happen to succeed or fail in.
I tried to avoid battles a good character wouldn't want to fight, so I didn't feel overly swamped in battles. I'd say about 30% was fighting if I had to quantify it.
Food
Right now, this can be overpowered, yes. I don't know if they patched it out, or if they ever intend to, but you can perpetually take fish from a bear who continues replenishing them, and he doesn't react. Just fill your whole inventory with em and why rest?
My problem is just that this doesn't exist in DnD. Food doesn't have magical vidya game healing powers like in other games, that can only be accomplished by skill in first aid or magic.
The ones i've seen so far give off Viconia vibes. One minute they are threatening your life and the next minute they are suddenly interested in intimacy. Sometimes this happens when you don't expect it. I don't want to reveal the story because this isn't a spoiler thread.
Gale seems more reasonable and well adjusted, including the flirting and everything else you can do as a female character. His seems more normal and I expect the later good PCs to be added will be like this as well.
Custom PC
That's pretty much true, everyone has the same issue you do but also something extra that ties them deeper into the plot. I guess this is to be expected since they are playable origin characters who can also be the PC, but there it is. You are the least special of the lot.
I am personally okay with this and don't need to be special in any way, in fact we need less special folk in the party, period.
Combat
True to BG, you can be a murderhobo in every situation and fight your way out. If you do that, you have a ton of fighting and a few large battles.
But in nearly every situation where you have to fight a difficult battle, you can talk your way out of it. The amount of combat really depends on how you approach the game, and what rolls you happen to succeed or fail in.
I tried to avoid battles a good character wouldn't want to fight, so I didn't feel overly swamped in battles. I'd say about 30% was fighting if I had to quantify it.
Food
Right now, this can be overpowered, yes. I don't know if they patched it out, or if they ever intend to, but you can perpetually take fish from a bear who continues replenishing them, and he doesn't react. Just fill your whole inventory with em and why rest?
My problem is just that this doesn't exist in DnD. Food doesn't have magical vidya game healing powers like in other games, that can only be accomplished by skill in first aid or magic.
Thank you! I may have some follow-ups and some other questions tomorrow.
The ones i've seen so far give off Viconia vibes. One minute they are threatening your life and the next minute they are suddenly interested in intimacy. Sometimes this happens when you don't expect it. I don't want to reveal the story because this isn't a spoiler thread.
Gale seems more reasonable and well adjusted, including the flirting and everything else you can do as a female character. His seems more normal and I expect the later good PCs to be added will be like this as well.
Custom PC
That's pretty much true, everyone has the same issue you do but also something extra that ties them deeper into the plot. I guess this is to be expected since they are playable origin characters who can also be the PC, but there it is. You are the least special of the lot.
I am personally okay with this and don't need to be special in any way, in fact we need less special folk in the party, period.
Combat
True to BG, you can be a murderhobo in every situation and fight your way out. If you do that, you have a ton of fighting and a few large battles.
But in nearly every situation where you have to fight a difficult battle, you can talk your way out of it. The amount of combat really depends on how you approach the game, and what rolls you happen to succeed or fail in.
I tried to avoid battles a good character wouldn't want to fight, so I didn't feel overly swamped in battles. I'd say about 30% was fighting if I had to quantify it.
Food
Right now, this can be overpowered, yes. I don't know if they patched it out, or if they ever intend to, but you can perpetually take fish from a bear who continues replenishing them, and he doesn't react. Just fill your whole inventory with em and why rest?
My problem is just that this doesn't exist in DnD. Food doesn't have magical vidya game healing powers like in other games, that can only be accomplished by skill in first aid or magic.
Thank you! I may have some follow-ups and some other questions tomorrow.
I haven't seen romances yet, but here is my take regarding Food, Combat and Custom PC.
Custom PC
I think there is a lot to your character story-wise but you just don't see it yet in Act 1. NPCs you meet in the game, during exploration and quests, refer to you in a very special way, as if they know something about you and you don't-- and that doesn't refer to the mind flayer in you. Everything else is heavy spoilers, I don't want to spoil it even under spoiler, just play the game. It starts with the character creation screen, actually.
This has been the most intriguing part of the game for me.
Combat
My main conclusion is that it feels as if there are much more exploration and dialogues in this game than combat if compared to D:OS 2. I'd say the overall percentage decrease of combat compared to everything else from D:OS 2 is 30%.
Food
You know the main plot, right? That you don't have time? Well, I'm RPing it the only way I see fit - I try not to rest as much as I can. Which sometimes means I don't rest at all for LONG periods. The only way this is possible here is food. Thank gods for food.
For me, the game feels like Irenicus Dungeon with SCS installed - I rested only once, other than that I continue without any sleep. I don't think food is OP. If you use the bear trick you're using an exploit - it's up to you. I buy food, find food -- don't think that is bad design.
Does food make you heal extremely fast in FR Lore? No.
Does it heal you fast according to D&D 5th Edition? No.
Is it realistic? No.
I think it devalues healing potion and magical healing. And to claim it supports RPing it surprising to me - I think if I am trying to RPing my character behaving realistic by not resting much with a tadpole in the head then RPing I would also prefer to avoid RPing a glutton who can heal a sword wound in the leg in minutes by eating potatoes.
Just have the NPC vendors sell a decent supply of healing potions at a reasonable cost instead.
Haven't checked it here yet, but the "eat food for a little" health thing that has been done in other games, also tends to be a pain from an UI perspective, since you have to repeatedly use the same item which takes multiple clicks per item. To be fair, I did not check yet whether Larian found a better solution from an UI perspective here, I only played a bit on the mindlflayer ship so far.
I also question whether trying to negate the good items mentioned in the "positive only" thread in the same way as people negating criticism here would be tolerated - but then again, I am not a fan of splitting those anyway.
I also question whether trying to negate the good items mentioned in the "positive only" thread in the same way as people negating criticism here would be tolerated - but then again, I am not a fan of splitting those anyway.
An excellent question.
I do owe @Rik_Kirtaniya my thanks for creating this thread, which has become my sanctuary within this subforum.
(or maybe don't check it. I can't guarantee the comments won't have spoilers and some of them get pretty nasty over a review).
That's an interesting perspective to read. Folks should click and follow the link, even if they don't scroll to the comments.
However, I take a bunch of issues with his comparisons. I'll isolate one here, which has gotten alot of mileage on this forum: lack of NPC choice. I don't think the NPC choice early in BG1 or even BG2 is actually as great as he's remembering.
I don't think it's fair to include the EE companions in this comparison. Maybe when BG3 gets all its DLC or its own EE (like with OS) in a few years. So I'm going to compare to the base game.
An Early Access of BG1 probably might've been just enough to get you through the Nashkel mines. So I think that's a fair comparison point. What NPC's are generally available here, in a typical playthrough?
No good-aligned wizards for one. Xzar and Edwin. Dynaheir way far out of the way for a new, low-level party to get to safely imo. That seems beyond what we're getting in the EA here. Xan would be available only at the very tail end of this segment. Essentially not available for playing through the meat of the EA.
Your only cleric: Branwen. And acquired kind of late.
Your only druid: Jaheira.
Thieves: Montaron or Imoen.
Your only bard: Garrick -- and thus only non-evil arcane magic user.
Pretty good spread on the fighters: Khalid, Minsc, Kivan (maybe included), Kagain. No paladins though.
I know I'm excluding some higher level areas that veteran players know you can sneak into and snatch NPC's like Viconia or Ajantis from. But again, would those sections be fair to compare to this EA? I don't think so. Forgive me if I missed some here. Also this number has to be larger given the party size difference.
That is a big selection but keep in mind all these NPC's were made with little backstory, almost no personal quests among them, no bearing on the main plot. The problem in BG2 is actually imo quite comparable to what people are complaining about now in BG3 EA. Because both games focused on fewer but deeper NPC's. Want a good-aligned cleric, or an evil one? You have one option. Both of whom come off as arrogant and obnoxious on first joining imo. The thief NPC options for the full BG2 are notoriously limited in their breadth.
And further the review goes into favorably comparing PoE to BG on this point... which, seems flat out wrong to me. One NPC of every class, with several classes missing except in the DLC, is not great. Especially considering the combat prowess of certain classes in that game -- notably Cleric and Wizard. I will however agree with that reviewer that Kingmaker did a pretty good job on the NPC's.
Humbly disagree, when you continue a legacy, you build on top of it's best and not it's least. My honest opinion.
@Ammar Don't want to discourage criticism. Maybe by answering my arguments you will be able to criticize the game even more. But I feel I need to voice my counter-argument when I feel strongly about something.
So, Food. How is that any different to drinking a few potions? You can go from 10% health to 100% just by drinking some red potions. Is it realistic? Is it more realistic than eating some food instead? When did BG games were about realism?
@JuliusBorisov "Don't want to discourage criticism. Maybe by answering my arguments you will be able to criticize the game even more. But I feel I need to voice my counter-argument when I feel strongly about something."
Does this mean we can post criticism in the other threads?
@Ammar Don't want to discourage criticism. Maybe by answering my arguments you will be able to criticize the game even more. But I feel I need to voice my counter-argument when I feel strongly about something.
So, Food. How is that any different to drinking a few potions? You can go from 10% health to 100% just by drinking some red potions. Is it realistic? Is it more realistic than eating some food instead? When did BG games were about realism?
Potions are magic. They cost a more reasonable amount of money and require special expertise to create.
And the games are not supposed to be realistic argument is incredibly tired, that I hate having to debate it again. Of course - Baldur's Gate is not realistic. But in every aspect it does not deviate per lore from our world it should function the same way.
Like, if the setting is not saying anything differently, we should be able to expect that nights are cooler than days, that mosquito stings hurt a bit, that diseases are contagious - and yes, that people do not get magically healed by eating food.
It's about coherence between world, story and gameplay. Let's imagine the party meets a terribly wounded man, lying by the wayside, and you get the following dialogue options:
1) Kill him to put him out of his misery (if no other options are available)
2) Ignore him
3) Give him a healing potion
4) Have your cleric cast a healing spell
5) Try to fetch help from the nearest village
6) Feed him some potatoes
Which one looks out of place and wouldn't be there?
You could certainly create an RPG with a setting where people have a super-metabolism and get healed by food, or where people can use food to fuel their magic like Lift in the Stormlight Archives. But healing food is incoherent with the 5th edition ruleset and with FR as a setting, so it does not belong.
I am also looking forward to counterarguments people feel strongly about on the positive things only topic then.
@JuliusBorisov "Don't want to discourage criticism. Maybe by answering my arguments you will be able to criticize the game even more. But I feel I need to voice my counter-argument when I feel strongly about something."
Does this mean we can post criticism in the other threads?
It wasn't the mod team here who created these 3 threads. I only asked to share criticism on things you really tried in the game, not based on YT videos or internet sites, or we'd have a SoD situation all over again.
You can always decide not to use food as you're not obliged to do so, that's SP game. And in MP, you can decide with other members of the same run to use or not to use certain items.
@JuliusBorisov "Don't want to discourage criticism. Maybe by answering my arguments you will be able to criticize the game even more. But I feel I need to voice my counter-argument when I feel strongly about something."
Does this mean we can post criticism in the other threads?
It wasn't the mod team here who created these 3 threads. I only asked to share criticism on things you really tried in the game, not based on YT videos or internet sites, or we'd have a SoD situation all over again.
You can always decide not to use food as you're not obliged to do so, that's SP game. And in MP, you can decide with other members of the same run to use or not to use certain items.
That's true, and it's definitely no major issue. The Gothic series had readily available healing food (with similar downsides of having to click a lot to eat enough) and was great. So I don't think it's exactly great design, especially in a party-based RPG, but it ranks very low on my list of issues.
I just felt it odd to call it a good idea because it allows you to avoid resting for RP purposes (which I read as behave realistically given the situation your character is in), when it is basically substituting one unrealistic course of action with another one. But then I never felt rest-scumming was a thing that had to be stopped either.
Comments
Although I know that wasn't the main point of the argument, I have to set that right. When I was playing for the first time, I took Minsc to Nashkel and then took the very long road to the Gnoll fortress, and on the way his timer went off and he attacked me.
So, nowadays I always rescue Dynaheir before the mines.
I think the point about BG 1 is not accurate. Either you rush through the Mines in which case you get to Xan quite early or you take your time and explore, in which case you may well pick up Garrick or Dynaheir. In 2nd edition a Bard is a perfectly viable arcane spellcaster at low levels due to the lower XP requirements, trading slightly less spell slots for a higher caster level.
So I don't really agree that there is no choice in arcane spellcasters if you are playing a good or neutral party. Of course, in the EE running into Neera in Beregost completely settles the argument.
Secondly, in the early game not having a decent arcane spellcaster does not qualify as a "heavy price". In the long run you need one - at low levels they are quite useful for the 1-2 sleep spells they can cast per day, but hardly necessary.
If anything it is harder to get an evil divine caster, but you can get a neutral one. And again, if you bring healing potions a low level divine caster is also not really necessary.
I am more inclined to agree about BG 2. Having less choice is the price the developer had to pay for having much more developed NPCs and romances. Still, after Chateau Irenicus it is fairly easy to pick up spellcasters of either alignment and fighters. I feel the following companions are easy to find, even without having played the game:
Aerie, Jan, Jaheira, Minsc, Yoshimo, Korgan, Nalia, Viconia and Anomen. With the EE add Neera and Dorn. For other members you need to progress a bit into certain quests. So it can be a bit tight for an evil party, but it is decent for a good party.
Ahh, we are looking at two different points of the review. I will I dismissed that one because it’s early access and they have said that they will be adding more. They key point there was about him talking about player choice.
That’s actually going into the whole 4 person party vs 6 person party argument when you are talking about dynamics and that’s another entirely different discussion on a game design choice.
The only player you truly can’t replace right away in BG2 is Yoshimo, and that is a design decision to make sure his plot line hits the player hard the first time a person plays through.
Out of Ic’s dungeon, a player will have a healer, a thief, a tank and their mage is taken away. Assuming after getting through the dungeon, a player doesn’t like one the companions they have, the player has choice to replace them. The healer can be replaced by 2 companions (Anomen, Aerie). The mage can be replaced by two companions (Aerie, Nalia) with one of those companions being forceful. The player can replace the tank with 1.5 companions (Kagain or Anomen being the .5) all before leaving the Copper Cornet.
You have options or choices to tell either Minsc or Jah to go to hell, if you don’t like them. Yoshimo, not so much because of story.
So at this point in time, if The vampire is your only thief, or Shadowheart is your only cleric, you can’t tell them off because there is no replacement at the moment. Once again, I am dismissing that as Larian said there are more companions on the way. I just hope they listen to feedback and make these new characters as unique as possible from a first impressions stand point that the choice will matter in the finished product.
https://www.reddit.com/r/BaldursGate3/comments/j8qutl/feedbackbalance_dont_bend_existing_5e_mechanics/
As I said in my post: " I do think it's maybe unfairly comparing complete knowledge about NPC options and their arcs in one set of games with what we have now. As opposed to trying to imagine what a limited EA of BG1 or 2 would look like."
And you're now even tossing in EE characters. This is what I think might have even generated some strong pushback against the initial Steam post. It's simply an unfair comparison. I do think a fair review would be instead imagining what a limited content look at BG1 or 2 would contain and then comparing that against what we're seeing now. Whether or not the writer was a developer on the original games, I still think this is an important point to make about reviews.
And -- imo -- a reasonable imagining of that might be merely the NPC's from Irenicus' dungeon, Aerie and the Copper Coronet. That's not all that diverse of a set.
I would look at it like chateaux Irenicus and all the quests obtainable in the Copper Cornet if we’re talking about Early Access builds and content. That’s be the first dungeon, Nalia’s stronghold, Korgan’s Crypt Crawl, the Slavers and Windspear Hills.
Aerie’s would be added in a later build with other city districts (like the Bridge) opening up as they progressed.
That said, this isn’t how BioWare released the game and wasn’t how the first impressions of that game were made.
This whole “wait and see” mentality isn’t becoming IMO when people like myself are still looking for impressions on the game. I’m a patient guy though. I can wait years for to play this game.
I can only speculate but I think it has a lot to do with the priorities of humor between Belgium vs Canada. I'm warming up to BG3 in certain respects but boy howdy the fundamental disconnect in tone, style, messaging, jokes between old and new was a shock to the synapses. EE's and Siege got the Canadianness down pat.
I need to look him up. Of the streamers I follow/watch regularly only one is playing BG3 right now, and he has never played the original games, nor even has any knowledge of DnD. Good guy good streamer, but I need to watch someone just a little closer to my own situation.
I'd watch that.
There seems to be some interest, so I will likely do it in the near future. I will announce it before I do though.
And by trilogy I mean BG1-SOD-BG2. I'm sure there is no shortage of BG3 streams atm.
Romances/sex - What are your thoughts on how romances are being initiated between the PC and companions, and also among the companions, and specifically the criticism about companions who spent their time disliking you all of a sudden wanting to have sex with you?
Food - Is food really overpowered in the game? Seems to me that having food provide an alternative means to keep the party healed would be a very good thing given we only have three party slots available for companions and it would be nice to not necessarily have to include a dedicated healer in the party.
Custom PC - A lot of discussion is on the feeling in your camp as you get further into Act 1 that everyone in the camp, your companions and even followers, are all special in some way and have some meaningful connection and relevance to the story and the world, and the only person in the camp who is does NOT matter much is yourself as a custom PC. Your thoughts?
Combat - Just how much combat is there in this first bit of the game? It would be especially awesome if you could roughly quantify: 20%, 30%? And relatedly, how much of that combat can you REASONABLY avoid?
More questions to follow if you are amenable to answering. Thanks!
This is how I see it.
Romances
Gale seems more reasonable and well adjusted, including the flirting and everything else you can do as a female character. His seems more normal and I expect the later good PCs to be added will be like this as well.
Custom PC
I am personally okay with this and don't need to be special in any way, in fact we need less special folk in the party, period.
Combat
But in nearly every situation where you have to fight a difficult battle, you can talk your way out of it. The amount of combat really depends on how you approach the game, and what rolls you happen to succeed or fail in.
I tried to avoid battles a good character wouldn't want to fight, so I didn't feel overly swamped in battles. I'd say about 30% was fighting if I had to quantify it.
Food
My problem is just that this doesn't exist in DnD. Food doesn't have magical vidya game healing powers like in other games, that can only be accomplished by skill in first aid or magic.
No problem, happy to help.
Custom PC
I think there is a lot to your character story-wise but you just don't see it yet in Act 1. NPCs you meet in the game, during exploration and quests, refer to you in a very special way, as if they know something about you and you don't-- and that doesn't refer to the mind flayer in you. Everything else is heavy spoilers, I don't want to spoil it even under spoiler, just play the game. It starts with the character creation screen, actually.
This has been the most intriguing part of the game for me.
Combat
My main conclusion is that it feels as if there are much more exploration and dialogues in this game than combat if compared to D:OS 2. I'd say the overall percentage decrease of combat compared to everything else from D:OS 2 is 30%.
Food
You know the main plot, right? That you don't have time? Well, I'm RPing it the only way I see fit - I try not to rest as much as I can. Which sometimes means I don't rest at all for LONG periods. The only way this is possible here is food. Thank gods for food.
For me, the game feels like Irenicus Dungeon with SCS installed - I rested only once, other than that I continue without any sleep. I don't think food is OP. If you use the bear trick you're using an exploit - it's up to you. I buy food, find food -- don't think that is bad design.
Does food make you heal extremely fast in FR Lore? No.
Does it heal you fast according to D&D 5th Edition? No.
Is it realistic? No.
I think it devalues healing potion and magical healing. And to claim it supports RPing it surprising to me - I think if I am trying to RPing my character behaving realistic by not resting much with a tadpole in the head then RPing I would also prefer to avoid RPing a glutton who can heal a sword wound in the leg in minutes by eating potatoes.
Just have the NPC vendors sell a decent supply of healing potions at a reasonable cost instead.
Haven't checked it here yet, but the "eat food for a little" health thing that has been done in other games, also tends to be a pain from an UI perspective, since you have to repeatedly use the same item which takes multiple clicks per item. To be fair, I did not check yet whether Larian found a better solution from an UI perspective here, I only played a bit on the mindlflayer ship so far.
I also question whether trying to negate the good items mentioned in the "positive only" thread in the same way as people negating criticism here would be tolerated - but then again, I am not a fan of splitting those anyway.
I do owe @Rik_Kirtaniya my thanks for creating this thread, which has become my sanctuary within this subforum.
So, Food. How is that any different to drinking a few potions? You can go from 10% health to 100% just by drinking some red potions. Is it realistic? Is it more realistic than eating some food instead? When did BG games were about realism?
Does this mean we can post criticism in the other threads?
Potions are magic. They cost a more reasonable amount of money and require special expertise to create.
And the games are not supposed to be realistic argument is incredibly tired, that I hate having to debate it again. Of course - Baldur's Gate is not realistic. But in every aspect it does not deviate per lore from our world it should function the same way.
Like, if the setting is not saying anything differently, we should be able to expect that nights are cooler than days, that mosquito stings hurt a bit, that diseases are contagious - and yes, that people do not get magically healed by eating food.
It's about coherence between world, story and gameplay. Let's imagine the party meets a terribly wounded man, lying by the wayside, and you get the following dialogue options:
1) Kill him to put him out of his misery (if no other options are available)
2) Ignore him
3) Give him a healing potion
4) Have your cleric cast a healing spell
5) Try to fetch help from the nearest village
6) Feed him some potatoes
Which one looks out of place and wouldn't be there?
You could certainly create an RPG with a setting where people have a super-metabolism and get healed by food, or where people can use food to fuel their magic like Lift in the Stormlight Archives. But healing food is incoherent with the 5th edition ruleset and with FR as a setting, so it does not belong.
I am also looking forward to counterarguments people feel strongly about on the positive things only topic then.
It wasn't the mod team here who created these 3 threads. I only asked to share criticism on things you really tried in the game, not based on YT videos or internet sites, or we'd have a SoD situation all over again.
@Ammar Thanks.
You can always decide not to use food as you're not obliged to do so, that's SP game. And in MP, you can decide with other members of the same run to use or not to use certain items.
That's true, and it's definitely no major issue. The Gothic series had readily available healing food (with similar downsides of having to click a lot to eat enough) and was great. So I don't think it's exactly great design, especially in a party-based RPG, but it ranks very low on my list of issues.
I just felt it odd to call it a good idea because it allows you to avoid resting for RP purposes (which I read as behave realistically given the situation your character is in), when it is basically substituting one unrealistic course of action with another one. But then I never felt rest-scumming was a thing that had to be stopped either.