Baldur's Gate Baldur's Gate 3 Pre-Release Thread [EARLY ACCESS RELEASED, GO TO NEW THREAD]

[Quillon]

I don't think most people here played SoD(tbh they're missing out)

True & true.

I played SoD, was a mediocre zombie game.



:D

 

[BING XI LAO]

Just accept it. I'm the only Baldur's Gate commentator that publishes write-ups based on the original version of Baldur's Gate, as released and patched by BioWare. I'm the only one who has ever written in-depth commentary on this level in the history of the game and engine. Everything that came before is out of date, poorly written and error-filled.

You can trust no other source as they have all been tainted by the EEs (even the wiki). No other retrospective is based on the originals either. In fact, for the 20th anniversary of Baldur's Gate, the "journalists" based their "retrospectives" on the EEs, interviewed Beamdog employees (instead of say, corresponding with the leader writer of BG like I did long before), and barely said anything about BG. Instead, they talked mostly about BG2 of which it was not the anniversary. lol

So yes, my commentary for Baldur's Gate is as authoritative as it gets these days. More authoritative than PC Gamer and other mainstream newsites. Larian would avoid me like the plague because ERUDITION.

150 write-ups, son. 150 write-ups. At one point, it was 15 write-ups in 1 week. My readers could barely keep up. One of those write-ups is now THE Baldur's Gate write-up on the internet, and it was written in one sitting, over 2 hours, and mostly from memory. There are people on public venues that say my blog is like the BG Bible.

If all this causes you butthurt and headaches, I'm glad. And that goes for any other shitposter as well. You can't fight me on this, so just roll with it. I'll always self-cite because there are no sources I trust above my own, because I play the originals, and because I'm the most prolific and the most in-depth and thorough to the point of each write-up being appended with 20 footnotes that cite NUMBAZ and STATS.

Deal with it, son.

Is this actually Cleve's alt account?

 

[MajorMace]

I just remember casual d&d stuff like lich's lair, dragons & shit. I felt like it was a cool middle-ground between BG1 low level shenanigans like the joy of dying to a siren and the high-intensity nonsense of BG2 with beholders and mindflayers left and right.
Also it wasn't too long, which I appreciated. They didn't paste shitloads of mobs to virtually bloat the game's length iirc.

 

[Tuco Benedicto Pacifico]

You don't listen to a lot of rap do you, son?

The question wasn't for me, but... I try to avoid it as much as possible, admittedly.

 

[Black_Willow]

Every time Lilura uses the word "authoritative", I get a headache.

Just accept it. I'm the only Baldur's Gate commentator that publishes write-ups based on the original version of Baldur's Gate, as released and patched by BioWare. I'm the only one who has ever written in-depth commentary on this level in the history of the game and engine. Everything that came before is out of date, poorly written and error-filled.

You can trust no other source as they have all been tainted by the EEs (even the wiki). No other retrospective is based on the originals either. In fact, for the 20th anniversary of Baldur's Gate, the "journalists" based their "retrospectives" on the EEs, interviewed Beamdog employees (instead of say, corresponding with the leader writer of BG like I did long before), and barely said anything about BG. Instead, they talked mostly about BG2 of which it was not the anniversary. lol

So yes, my commentary for Baldur's Gate is as authoritative as it gets these days. More authoritative than PC Gamer and other mainstream newsites. Larian would avoid me like the plague because ERUDITION.

150 write-ups, son. 150 write-ups. At one point, it was 15 write-ups in 1 week. My readers could barely keep up. One of those write-ups is now THE Baldur's Gate write-up on the internet, and it was written in one sitting, over 2 hours, and mostly from memory. There are people on public venues that say my blog is like the BG Bible.

If all this causes you butthurt and headaches, I'm glad. And that goes for any other shitposter as well. You can't fight me on this, so just roll with it. I'll always self-cite because there are no sources I trust above my own, because I play the originals, and because I'm the most prolific and the most in-depth and thorough to the point of each write-up being appended with 20 footnotes that cite NUMBAZ and STATS.

Deal with it, son.

Nice copypasta.

 

[Sergiu64]

It's not really that russky-junky anymore. I fully expected that so didn't play it until after it had been out for more than a year, even though isometric Pathfinder is basically my dream game. And at least when I played it, jank was down to a minimum. It's actually impressive how well stuff works considering the insane wealth of stuff implemented.

In my mind PF's biggest problem is that they implemented things with too few changes, meaning high level encounters are either a complete walkover or use "cheap mechanics" that can only be overcome with great patience or using exploits yourself.

I dunno, felt like hordes of trash encounters over and over. And with power levels of encounters and player characters being all over the place they would be either super difficult or super easy and boring. My gameplay was buffing all the animal companions then running over everything with them. And it got so boring... doesn't make for a good game imo.

you sound like a guy who says drinking is not fun and can't understand why people do it because every time you drink you drink 8 bottles of boones apple flavored wine and feel like shit. Quit playing like an idiot.

That's an imperfect analogy since drinking is most fun in a social setting... Anyway, what IS the key to making this game fun then? Playing in moderation and limiting myself to 1-1.5 sessions at most? Ignoring obvious power builds because they make the game trivial? And then suffering when enemies switch to using touch attacks en masse?

 

[rusty_shackleford]

It's not really that russky-junky anymore. I fully expected that so didn't play it until after it had been out for more than a year, even though isometric Pathfinder is basically my dream game. And at least when I played it, jank was down to a minimum. It's actually impressive how well stuff works considering the insane wealth of stuff implemented.

In my mind PF's biggest problem is that they implemented things with too few changes, meaning high level encounters are either a complete walkover or use "cheap mechanics" that can only be overcome with great patience or using exploits yourself.

I dunno, felt like hordes of trash encounters over and over. And with power levels of encounters and player characters being all over the place they would be either super difficult or super easy and boring. My gameplay was buffing all the animal companions then running over everything with them. And it got so boring... doesn't make for a good game imo.

you sound like a guy who says drinking is not fun and can't understand why people do it because every time you drink you drink 8 bottles of boones apple flavored wine and feel like shit. Quit playing like an idiot.

That's an imperfect analogy since drinking is most fun in a social setting... Anyway, what IS the key to making this game fun then? Playing in moderation and limiting myself to 1-1.5 sessions at most? Ignoring obvious power builds because they make the game trivial? And then suffering when enemies switch to using touch attacks en masse?

quit abusing OP as shit animal companions

 

[AwesomeButton]

Lol, newbies actually don't know who is Lilura

 

[Lutte]

Two scenarios:
The enemy you're attacking is wearing Chain Mail +1 and a shield for an AC adjustment of 3. Which column do you pick from the Armor Class Adjustment?
The enemy you're attacking is a monster with a natural adjustment of AC to 5. Which column do you pick from the Armor Class Adjustment?

Here's the chart you need:

Something tells me there is a near complete overlap of people who claim to "like" THAC0 and people whose only experience with it involves computer games.

Linking to an AD&D1 to hit table is very honest is it? this isn't even THAC0. THAC0 doesn't require constantly looking up a to-hit table.

In AD&D2 :

And here's for the table of an OPTIONAL rule you may need to look up if you use it

THAC0 - AC. Attack roll the result or higher for a hit. Anything less is a miss. natural roll 1 is always a miss and natural 20 is always a hit no matter what your THAC0 and AC calculations are. This is incredibly hard and high IQ stuff.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

It was simplified and made optional because it was shit.

this isn't even THAC0

It's a single part of calculating it you paste eater.

Keep defending a system designed for naval wargames where armor & attack values are completely static and never change though.

 

[Lilura]

The authoritative source explains it more succinctly and in the context of BG:

See also: THAC0 Lords - The Armor Piercers. Warning: High Level Write-up. Veterans Only.

 

[turkishronin]

You can trust no other source as they have all been tainted by the EEs

How much is EE different from the original?!

 

[Chippy]

don't know what DUHM is

What's DUHM?

Pretty sure it's 'draw upon holy might'.

 

[smaug]

You can trust no other source as they have all been tainted by the EEs

How much is EE different from the original?!

Lilura

 

[agris]

The easiest way to conceptualize it is Lilura's post: THAC0 - enemy AC = d20 roll needed to hit. That's it.

Yes, it changes when you change your gear - but that's true in all editions, no? Whereas THAC0 changes w/ level and items in 2nd ED, effective-thac0 changes with strength/dex (and thus levels/items) and items in all subsequent editions, no?

So, similar to all editions of D&D, you have to change your 'to hit' periodically when something significant happens to your character - levels and items.

edit: and keeping track of what your AC is, modified by slash/attack/pierce, is also no great challenge. again, you're not changing armor constantly so you know your baseline AC, you ask what kind of weapon you're attacked with, and you give the DM your AC mod respective of your armor type.

I can see from that AD&D 1st ed table that it used to be worse, that does look way overly complicated.

 

[turkishronin]

Man I never knew game mechanics could be this complicated. I used to just send fighters to beat mobs with a stick until they die and if they failed I would try a bigger stick.

 

[Lilura]

How much is EE different from the original?!

I could just self-cite certain write-ups but I'll give someone else the opportunity to nail it. *friendly*

 

[turkishronin]

please don't self-cite

 

[smaug]

How much is EE different from the original?!

I could just self-cite certain write-ups but I'll give someone else the opportunity to nail it. *friendly*

If someone had a comprehensive guide to all their differences in dept, feel free to provide a link.

 

[J_C]

Man I never knew game mechanics could be this complicated. I used to just send fighters to beat mobs with a stick until they die and if they failed I would try a bigger stick.

Exactly. To this day I don't know how to interpret the resistance values in BG and IWD. It was shown something like this: 60/30/20. But I don't care, you can play the game without it. :D

 

[Lutte]

I can see from that AD&D 1st ed table that it used to be worse, that does look way overly complicated.

That's because it isn't fucking THAC0. People had house rules for doing THAC0 but THAC0 wasn't a part of the official guide book of 1E. People came up with house ruled THAC0 systems but those systems were not AD&D1 rules.
1E's system is pure table lookup. There is no table to look up in AD&D2, it's not a part of the calculation, the table doesn't exist, the system is THAC0 period.
It was historically noted that THAC0 didn't match up with all of AD&D1's rules :

>It won't work, of course, if you use the different hit prob for different weapons vs different AC
If you're doing THAC0 you're not doing table lookup. Except for that really tiny table in the optional rules for blunt/slash/pierce. What the rusty burger mentioned is not something you'd do if you used THAC0 to begin with.

Fat burgers gonna burger.

 

[agris]

Good insights Lutte ; rusty_shackleford why mislead us about thac0 - what's to gain?

 

[Lilura]

Behead anyone who insults THAC0, and mount their head on a pike for the crows to peck at.

Yesterday the 'tards were trying to insult and distort the glorious Vancian magic system. Today it's THAC0. Stay tuned for tomorrow, when the 'tards try to insult and distort another sacred legacy, and get suppressed yet again.

 

[turkishronin]

What is Vatican magic system

 

[Black_Willow]

Of course THAC0 is better than hit/AC value from D&D 3ed, just like using the length of 1650763.73 wavelengths in a vacuum of the radiation corresponding to the transition between the 2p10 and 5d5 quantum levels of the krypton-86 atom is better than using 1 meter for measuring things.