https://www.ign.com/articles/baldurs-gate-3-early-access-changes-player-data-feedback-larian
Yet another article based on an interview with Swen Vincke. There's a part that coincidentally feels like a follow-up to the part about dice rolls that he did in some other recent interview, although in this case he seems to be talking about dice rolls in dialogues rather than combat.
Vincke notes that one moment in particular, where players must navigate a tricky dialogue encounter to save some children, is one that has experienced heavy save scumming. “It's an emotionally laden moment, and people want the dice to go in a certain direction,” Vincke says. He recognises that the amount of players reloading to try to get a better outcome is something Larian can learn from. “We made [the dice rolls] hard, but maybe we can add extra role-playing options for players to get the same effect. It's one of those things that we can pick up from seeing those behaviors of players.”
It’s not just in this situation that players are becoming frustrated with Baldur’s Gate 3’s dice rolls. The system - based on tabletop Dungeons & Dragons’ use of D20-based skill checks - has proven divisive in the BG3 player base. Many players are not used to a dice roll governing their successes or failures; random number generation (RNG) disrupting a sneaky attempt to deceive someone or foiling a heroic deed can feel at odds with roleplay. “There are people who have had difficulties with that,” says Vincke. “They want to be able to manipulate it.”
“We opted to just go pure RNG for the initial release in early access just to see what was going to happen,” he explains. “We see the people that have really bad luck, and they are really, really angry over it. So, we're going to help them. We're going to add modes to the game that are going to go with things like a loaded die, and that's going to be a bit more manageable. We'll still keep the option of having full RNG in there. We'll experiment with that throughout early access, and see what we should make the default option. That's one of the things that will be driven by the analytics.”
First and foremost I'm glad to see that they apparently still stand by their vision of "creating success from failure" or whatever they called it. Players save scumming is a problem that
does affect everyone, even those who don't do it themselves, because RPG developers have an exceedingly bad habit of developing and designing dialogues and non-combat scenarios around save scummers. If their attempt to tackle this leads to more actual C&C, non-combat quest solutions and quests branches that don't become permanently inaccessible due to a bad roll, then I'm all for it.
High DC skill checks should be high DC in order to represent a difficult task, not high because the developers assume the players will have
n amount of skill modifiers by the point they reach the obstacle in question. The worst kind are the DCs that are high solely because they were made with the assumption that the item was important enough for players to continuously reload until they got their desired outcome.
In regards to combat dice rolls it does sound like it's only a matter of time before loaded dice become an actual option in the difficulty settings in the game. I still think that most of the complaints about missing are due to the game not explaining the D20 system properly to players unfamiliar with it. The combat log also still needs a bit of work, I guess it could do a better job at visualising the outcomes of the dice rolls. But then again I guess it's just simply easier to add a loaded dice option for those who can't or don't want to read.
and then there's this part...
RNG isn’t the only thing that Larian has realised needs to be adjusted. “Giving players things to do at the beginning is something that we've been struggling with,” admits Vincke, referring specifically to the limited collection of skills and abilities a low-level character has access to. Once again, this is due to the Dungeons & Dragons ruleset from which Baldur’s Gate 3 is adapted; low level characters on the tabletop have very few combat options compared to a low level character in most digital RPGs.
“We're coming up with some more answers,” Vincke teases. “We're certainly going to add a few things for the opening moments of classes like the fighter, for instance.”
It's no secret that some classes are rather limited at low levels, but I feel this is a slippery slope that's already leading dangerously close to them outright homebrewing what might as well be new classes.
Finally there's this:
Elsewhere, player concerns will be addressed by the introduction of numerous new companion characters. “There's been a group of people complaining about the fact that the companions are snarky and they have to have an opinion,” Vincke reveals. “But we’ve only put the ‘evil’ and the ‘neutral’ ones out there. We haven't put any of the ‘good’ characters in yet, so I think that will balance that.
“I didn't expect people to be that sensitive to how the companions thought of them, and the fact that we didn't put the ‘good’ characters in there,” he admits.
Whether intentional or not, this sounds like a little jab at the people who feel offended by NPCs disapproving of their actions.
