Baldur's Gate Baldur's Gate 3 Early Access Thread [GAME RELEASED, GO TO NEW THREAD]

[Orud]

This guy seriously trying to temper expectations because BG3 is going to make everyone cum and shit at the same time. No RPG studio will ever make a marvel like BG3 ever again.

I'm basically just gonna spam this meme at this point.

When the bar is so low and things are so depressing that they go right back to being funny.

Well, the way I see it is that BG3's development got so bloated and unnecessarily complex, that I don't want people to think that THIS is how you need to develop RPG's or else you're worthless.

Jokes, we all know reddit will be on the case.

 

[Jackpot]

Lmao that thread is so funny.
It's so completely detached from the perspective of the audience.

you've created the expectations and conditions to ensure your favorite creators may never be able to give you the thing you love ever again

is the best part. As though we should care more about if the people who made our favorite games succeed than the quality of the games themselves.
It's not even really entirely untrue, but it's said in such an idiotic way, and didn't need to be said at all in the first place.

 

[Orud]

The Bafta nominated He/Him used a bunch of tweets to say nothing. How is BG3 development different than any other AAA game? The Witcher, Cyberpunk, Hogwarts, Elden Ring, Pokemon, Monster Hunter, etc... All spent millions and had hundreds of people working on them, were backed by big names, big ips, big companies, but does the fact that they exist and were successful stop smaller games from being successful? No, Vampire Survivor was one of the top selling games last year, and it was made for peanuts.

Well, isn't that what he's saying? Don't start thinking that you need to have this bloated development to make good games?

 

[rojay]

Who speaks German? https://mein-mmo.de/baldurs-gate-3-interview-swen-vincke-bosewicht/

Because it's beyond my skill to confirm this is an accurate translation:

Spoiler

Hardly any game manages to make you feel like the real villain. MeinMMO editor-in-chief Leya Jankowski believes that Baldur's Gate 3 can fulfill exactly this fantasy. She spoke to lead developer Swen Vincke about how to take the ultimate evil path in your RPG.

It's a hot day in Belgium (Gent) and I've just played the latest version of Baldur's Gate 3. I'm visiting Larian Studios, who are releasing one of the most anticipated RPGs in recent years in August. The game will be released for PC in August , a month ahead of schedule.

During my visit, the developers are announcing the newest "Origin" character. These are pre-made characters that you can play as an alternative to creating your own character. Origins have their own story, which you will discover as you progress through the game.

The Dark Urge is his name, which translates as "The Dark Desire". With him you play a mad, bloodthirsty murderer.

I'm starting to think about the ultimate villain and how Baldur's Gate 3 allows you to live out that very dark fantasy. There aren't many games out there that really allow you to do that.

As I'm led into my interview with Swen and he's sitting peacefully on a park bench with a friendly smile, it was the perfect moment for me to ask him about the ultimate evil guide for his game.

Always follow the dark instinct
MeinMMO: I think Baldur's Gate 3 is a really good game to play an extremely evil character. You did a lot of evil things in your presentation, like murdering a child or sacrificing parts of your group to some absurd plan. I think you are exactly the right person to give me tips on how to play the ultra evil character in Baldur's Gate 3.

Swen Vincke: If you want to be the ultimate evil character, I would recommend playing The Dark Urge and following his instincts. Every time you have the choice to follow his dark thoughts, you do just that. Then you become really evil.

MeinMMO: What do I have to consider when making decisions? What does it involve following a dark path?

Swen Vincke: You get great power when you follow the dark instinct. I don't want to give too much away, but your drive is connected to something very bad. You are often asked to do things that are very evil and if you do so your power will grow very quickly. But you get very lonely and end up alone.

MeinMMO: One of your colleagues told me that if you follow the dark path you will end up alone. Where did this idea come from?

Swen Vincke: When you deal with people who are evil and have a lot of power, everyone wants that power. At some point you have to get rid of them all.

MeinMMO: Aren't there any companions that are more on the evil side that you can take with you?

Swen Vincke: You can definitely take evil companions with you. But you have to give them something. So if you really want to play evil, you just have to get rid of any competition.

If you take a companion with you, you have to trust them up to a point. So I would kill them all. Then I would become an evil god, which is possible. I would kill anyone at the first opportunity so I don't have to deal with them.

MeinMMO: Wait, you can become an evil god?

Swen Vincke: Without giving too much away, yes, you get divine powers.

Few want to be the villain

MeinMMO: Why do you think there are so few games that let you be truly evil?

Swen Vincke: That's a lot of work. We have that in the game because it was important to us that you really got a choice. Every decision has to lead somewhere

Statistically, most people don't play evil anyway. If 95% of your target audience plays well and only 5% plays evil, then it's hardly worth the work. But even if it's few, I believe it's important to have a choice, because otherwise your choices mean nothing.

MeinMMO: Do you have data from early access, what your players did before?

Swen Vincke: I prefer not to look at this data because it would otherwise influence my decisions. We have things in there that are incredibly expensive and only 0.00001% will see them, but that's how I want the game to be.

MeinMMO: Why is it so difficult to implement an evil path? It also has to feel evil when you do something, and not many games can do that.

Swen Vincke: You need a motivation to be bad or good, you need a reason to be somewhere in between. We're on something like 170 hours of cinematics in the game just to serve up different choices. You'll never see all of it, that's impossible. We don't even want you to see all this.

A good villain story needs a reason
MeinMMO: What do you personally think makes a good villain story?

Swen Vincke: A reason to be a villain. So why are you on this path?

At the beginning of the game you meet a few refugees and you decide their fate. You can leave them behind or you can kill them to infiltrate an evil cult. If you take the murderous route you will meet a woman, a drow, her name is Minthara and you can sleep with her.

You meet her again later and she has fallen out of favor with the cult. Now you can choose to kill her again or you can save her by helping her escape. She will then become your companion.

She tells you that she did evil things because she was part of the cult and followed it. She then asks you why you did all those nasty things, what was your reason. Why did you kill all these people? I was controlled, you weren't. So why?

And now you can decide what your motivation was and say that. That's a really good moment when she asks you that. You will also get many interesting answers to choose from.

Money quote:

Spoiler

"If you take a companion with you, you have to trust them up to a point. So I would kill them all. Then I would become an evil god, which is possible. I would kill anyone at the first opportunity so I don't have to deal with them.

MeinMMO: Wait, you can become an evil god?

Swen Vincke: Without giving too much away, yes, you get divine powers."

 

[ArchAngel]

Didnt they make that shitty real time space game? Or was that before? I dunno. I don't pay attention to Obsidian anymore.


"I'd like to see the flip you do to justify why Owlcat gave up rtwp in favor of tb."

Doesn't change the fact they became famous and scucessful after making a rt with pause dnd rpg. You fukkin' retart.



"deadfire flopped you retard. All you had to do was type “deadfire financial performance”, but you would rather type your stupid shit out."

Part 1 wasn't. It was rt with pause. So.. maybe DOS2 was just shit? Afterall, manyt series get shittier the longer they go on.

Bottom line, Obsidian's most successful games are rt with pause. Not turn based. Aadding turn base modes certainly didn't make them money.

And, their newer games like that space shit wasn't tb.

And, it's Obsidian. Their games suck because they suck.

The first PoE sold only because it preyed on nostalgia, as you can see in the case of PoE2 it failed the second time (I wonder why).
Their new games are practically action RPGs.

Owlcat made money on a bunch of morons who like to masturbate to Excel. They eventually added TB modes to both games. Kingsmaker got it mainly because TB mod was very popular.
The popularity of TB meant that WoTR had this mode since launch, and I'd bet that if it wasn't for WoTR being far in development it would have been designed for TB.
Literally in their next game, they don't even care about the RTWP crowd, which evidently turned out to be too small.

RTWP is dead.

Modern RTwP is dead, but I am back to playing SoD once more with evil character on modified Insane difficulty and even with bad pathfinding it is good there.
Both Pillars and Pathfinder games RTwP was 3x more irritating that what IE games had.

Also recently we had that awesome RTwP Aliens game that showed us that well implemented RTwP is still good.

 

[MerchantKing]

Josh Sawyer: "Great thread"

Is that Rusty's Twitter account? I didn't know he was a Hamite.

 

[ArchAngel]

Who speaks German? https://mein-mmo.de/baldurs-gate-3-interview-swen-vincke-bosewicht/

Because it's beyond my skill to confirm this is an accurate translation:

Spoiler

Hardly any game manages to make you feel like the real villain. MeinMMO editor-in-chief Leya Jankowski believes that Baldur's Gate 3 can fulfill exactly this fantasy. She spoke to lead developer Swen Vincke about how to take the ultimate evil path in your RPG.

It's a hot day in Belgium (Gent) and I've just played the latest version of Baldur's Gate 3. I'm visiting Larian Studios, who are releasing one of the most anticipated RPGs in recent years in August. The game will be released for PC in August , a month ahead of schedule.

During my visit, the developers are announcing the newest "Origin" character. These are pre-made characters that you can play as an alternative to creating your own character. Origins have their own story, which you will discover as you progress through the game.

The Dark Urge is his name, which translates as "The Dark Desire". With him you play a mad, bloodthirsty murderer.

I'm starting to think about the ultimate villain and how Baldur's Gate 3 allows you to live out that very dark fantasy. There aren't many games out there that really allow you to do that.

As I'm led into my interview with Swen and he's sitting peacefully on a park bench with a friendly smile, it was the perfect moment for me to ask him about the ultimate evil guide for his game.

Always follow the dark instinct
MeinMMO: I think Baldur's Gate 3 is a really good game to play an extremely evil character. You did a lot of evil things in your presentation, like murdering a child or sacrificing parts of your group to some absurd plan. I think you are exactly the right person to give me tips on how to play the ultra evil character in Baldur's Gate 3.

Swen Vincke: If you want to be the ultimate evil character, I would recommend playing The Dark Urge and following his instincts. Every time you have the choice to follow his dark thoughts, you do just that. Then you become really evil.

MeinMMO: What do I have to consider when making decisions? What does it involve following a dark path?

Swen Vincke: You get great power when you follow the dark instinct. I don't want to give too much away, but your drive is connected to something very bad. You are often asked to do things that are very evil and if you do so your power will grow very quickly. But you get very lonely and end up alone.

MeinMMO: One of your colleagues told me that if you follow the dark path you will end up alone. Where did this idea come from?

Swen Vincke: When you deal with people who are evil and have a lot of power, everyone wants that power. At some point you have to get rid of them all.

MeinMMO: Aren't there any companions that are more on the evil side that you can take with you?

Swen Vincke: You can definitely take evil companions with you. But you have to give them something. So if you really want to play evil, you just have to get rid of any competition.

If you take a companion with you, you have to trust them up to a point. So I would kill them all. Then I would become an evil god, which is possible. I would kill anyone at the first opportunity so I don't have to deal with them.

MeinMMO: Wait, you can become an evil god?

Swen Vincke: Without giving too much away, yes, you get divine powers.

Few want to be the villain

MeinMMO: Why do you think there are so few games that let you be truly evil?

Swen Vincke: That's a lot of work. We have that in the game because it was important to us that you really got a choice. Every decision has to lead somewhere

Statistically, most people don't play evil anyway. If 95% of your target audience plays well and only 5% plays evil, then it's hardly worth the work. But even if it's few, I believe it's important to have a choice, because otherwise your choices mean nothing.

MeinMMO: Do you have data from early access, what your players did before?

Swen Vincke: I prefer not to look at this data because it would otherwise influence my decisions. We have things in there that are incredibly expensive and only 0.00001% will see them, but that's how I want the game to be.

MeinMMO: Why is it so difficult to implement an evil path? It also has to feel evil when you do something, and not many games can do that.

Swen Vincke: You need a motivation to be bad or good, you need a reason to be somewhere in between. We're on something like 170 hours of cinematics in the game just to serve up different choices. You'll never see all of it, that's impossible. We don't even want you to see all this.

A good villain story needs a reason
MeinMMO: What do you personally think makes a good villain story?

Swen Vincke: A reason to be a villain. So why are you on this path?

At the beginning of the game you meet a few refugees and you decide their fate. You can leave them behind or you can kill them to infiltrate an evil cult. If you take the murderous route you will meet a woman, a drow, her name is Minthara and you can sleep with her.

You meet her again later and she has fallen out of favor with the cult. Now you can choose to kill her again or you can save her by helping her escape. She will then become your companion.

She tells you that she did evil things because she was part of the cult and followed it. She then asks you why you did all those nasty things, what was your reason. Why did you kill all these people? I was controlled, you weren't. So why?

And now you can decide what your motivation was and say that. That's a really good moment when she asks you that. You will also get many interesting answers to choose from.

Money quote:

Spoiler

"If you take a companion with you, you have to trust them up to a point. So I would kill them all. Then I would become an evil god, which is possible. I would kill anyone at the first opportunity so I don't have to deal with them.

MeinMMO: Wait, you can become an evil god?

Swen Vincke: Without giving too much away, yes, you get divine powers."

Evil God at lvl 12, WTF?

 

[Rhobar121]

Who speaks German? https://mein-mmo.de/baldurs-gate-3-interview-swen-vincke-bosewicht/

Because it's beyond my skill to confirm this is an accurate translation:

Spoiler

Hardly any game manages to make you feel like the real villain. MeinMMO editor-in-chief Leya Jankowski believes that Baldur's Gate 3 can fulfill exactly this fantasy. She spoke to lead developer Swen Vincke about how to take the ultimate evil path in your RPG.

It's a hot day in Belgium (Gent) and I've just played the latest version of Baldur's Gate 3. I'm visiting Larian Studios, who are releasing one of the most anticipated RPGs in recent years in August. The game will be released for PC in August , a month ahead of schedule.

During my visit, the developers are announcing the newest "Origin" character. These are pre-made characters that you can play as an alternative to creating your own character. Origins have their own story, which you will discover as you progress through the game.

The Dark Urge is his name, which translates as "The Dark Desire". With him you play a mad, bloodthirsty murderer.

I'm starting to think about the ultimate villain and how Baldur's Gate 3 allows you to live out that very dark fantasy. There aren't many games out there that really allow you to do that.

As I'm led into my interview with Swen and he's sitting peacefully on a park bench with a friendly smile, it was the perfect moment for me to ask him about the ultimate evil guide for his game.

Always follow the dark instinct
MeinMMO: I think Baldur's Gate 3 is a really good game to play an extremely evil character. You did a lot of evil things in your presentation, like murdering a child or sacrificing parts of your group to some absurd plan. I think you are exactly the right person to give me tips on how to play the ultra evil character in Baldur's Gate 3.

Swen Vincke: If you want to be the ultimate evil character, I would recommend playing The Dark Urge and following his instincts. Every time you have the choice to follow his dark thoughts, you do just that. Then you become really evil.

MeinMMO: What do I have to consider when making decisions? What does it involve following a dark path?

Swen Vincke: You get great power when you follow the dark instinct. I don't want to give too much away, but your drive is connected to something very bad. You are often asked to do things that are very evil and if you do so your power will grow very quickly. But you get very lonely and end up alone.

MeinMMO: One of your colleagues told me that if you follow the dark path you will end up alone. Where did this idea come from?

Swen Vincke: When you deal with people who are evil and have a lot of power, everyone wants that power. At some point you have to get rid of them all.

MeinMMO: Aren't there any companions that are more on the evil side that you can take with you?

Swen Vincke: You can definitely take evil companions with you. But you have to give them something. So if you really want to play evil, you just have to get rid of any competition.

If you take a companion with you, you have to trust them up to a point. So I would kill them all. Then I would become an evil god, which is possible. I would kill anyone at the first opportunity so I don't have to deal with them.

MeinMMO: Wait, you can become an evil god?

Swen Vincke: Without giving too much away, yes, you get divine powers.

Few want to be the villain

MeinMMO: Why do you think there are so few games that let you be truly evil?

Swen Vincke: That's a lot of work. We have that in the game because it was important to us that you really got a choice. Every decision has to lead somewhere

Statistically, most people don't play evil anyway. If 95% of your target audience plays well and only 5% plays evil, then it's hardly worth the work. But even if it's few, I believe it's important to have a choice, because otherwise your choices mean nothing.

MeinMMO: Do you have data from early access, what your players did before?

Swen Vincke: I prefer not to look at this data because it would otherwise influence my decisions. We have things in there that are incredibly expensive and only 0.00001% will see them, but that's how I want the game to be.

MeinMMO: Why is it so difficult to implement an evil path? It also has to feel evil when you do something, and not many games can do that.

Swen Vincke: You need a motivation to be bad or good, you need a reason to be somewhere in between. We're on something like 170 hours of cinematics in the game just to serve up different choices. You'll never see all of it, that's impossible. We don't even want you to see all this.

A good villain story needs a reason
MeinMMO: What do you personally think makes a good villain story?

Swen Vincke: A reason to be a villain. So why are you on this path?

At the beginning of the game you meet a few refugees and you decide their fate. You can leave them behind or you can kill them to infiltrate an evil cult. If you take the murderous route you will meet a woman, a drow, her name is Minthara and you can sleep with her.

You meet her again later and she has fallen out of favor with the cult. Now you can choose to kill her again or you can save her by helping her escape. She will then become your companion.

She tells you that she did evil things because she was part of the cult and followed it. She then asks you why you did all those nasty things, what was your reason. Why did you kill all these people? I was controlled, you weren't. So why?

And now you can decide what your motivation was and say that. That's a really good moment when she asks you that. You will also get many interesting answers to choose from.

Money quote:

Spoiler

"If you take a companion with you, you have to trust them up to a point. So I would kill them all. Then I would become an evil god, which is possible. I would kill anyone at the first opportunity so I don't have to deal with them.

MeinMMO: Wait, you can become an evil god?

Swen Vincke: Without giving too much away, yes, you get divine powers."

Evil God at lvl 12, WTF?

I bet that the final reward will be unlocking the Slayer form.

 

[Tuco Benedicto Pacifico]

.

"Please, lower your expectations."

I mean, he may even make some good point about how not many studios could do what Larian is doing, but the over-defensive attitude he's going for is annoying in itself.

Not to mention that the whole verbal deluge seems to imply that Larian somehow happened to find itself in a privileged position, with a fanbase, a good engine, a budget and a license... Except none of these things is there by accident and they had to build their way up there.
What about studios like Bioware and (to a lesser degree) Obsidian, then? Competitors that started WAY ahead of Larian and managed to squander all their initial advantage?

 

[Orud]

How many studio's did Larian stomp out of the ground during the development of this game? 5-6? What are they going to put these studio's of hundreds of people to work on once this has gone live?

This isn't an MMO or anything, they can't just keep this huge of a development studio afloat without new cashflow.

 

[Rhobar121]

How many studio's did Larian stomp out of the ground during the development of this game? 5-6? What are they going to put these studio's of hundreds of people to work on once this has gone live?

This isn't an MMO or anything, they can't just keep this huge of a development studio afloat without new cashflow.

I don't know, maybe they'll start working on a new game?
It's unlikely that all employees are sitting on BG3 at this point when the game is practically ready.

 

[Alienman]

How many studio's did Larian stomp out of the ground during the development of this game? 5-6? What are they going to put these studio's of hundreds of people to work on once this has gone live?

This isn't an MMO or anything, they can't just keep this huge of a development studio afloat without new cashflow.

DLCs forever and ever, Paradox style. Or maybe something less extreme, Owlcat style.

 

[Tuco Benedicto Pacifico]

Competent studios usually start to pre-plan their next big thing WAY before approaching the release of what they are working on at any given moment.

 

[Jermu]

bg3 enhanced edition of course
and Larian is not too big on dlcs

https://attractmo.de/will-baldurs-gate-3-get-dlc/

According to a recent AMA with Creative Director Swen Vincke, Larian Studios currently has no plans for DLC for Baldur’s Gate 3. This is in line with their previous approach with DOS 1 and 2. Instead, Larian focuses on content and feature updates, such as the ability to change the appearance and class of Origin characters in the full game. While there is no official word on whether weapons from previous games will return, Swen did ask fans which weapons they would like to see again. It remains to be seen if Baldur’s Gate 3 will receive any expansions or DLC in the future.

 

[Efe]

did they fix the party chain system?

 

[Alienman]

bg3 enhanced edition of course
and Larian is not too big on dlcs

According to a recent AMA with Creative Director Swen Vincke, Larian Studios currently has no plans for DLC for Baldur’s Gate 3. This is in line with their previous approach with DOS 1 and 2. Instead, Larian focuses on content and feature updates, such as the ability to change the appearance and class of Origin characters in the full game. While there is no official word on whether weapons from previous games will return, Swen did ask fans which weapons they would like to see again. It remains to be seen if Baldur’s Gate 3 will receive any expansions or DLC in the future.

Interesting. It seems the setting is perfect for DLCs otherwise, much more so than Divinity.

 

[ArchAngel]

How many studio's did Larian stomp out of the ground during the development of this game? 5-6? What are they going to put these studio's of hundreds of people to work on once this has gone live?

This isn't an MMO or anything, they can't just keep this huge of a development studio afloat without new cashflow.

I heard they are going to make a SW RPG next, there is a huge market of people that want to fuck Twilleks and Bantas in their games.
Also can you imagine how fun it will be to throw your lightsaber to cut a piece of stone above your enemy and it falls and squishes them. Or you can use your Force Lighting to light everyone on fire.

Spoiler

 

[Larianshill]

Still wondering if flails will make it into the game. They've been datamined, but might be too tricky to animate, and the one weapon called a flail in the game is still actually a club.

 

[Nerevar]

Who cares about flails? All the weapons are the same on 5e they are all the same but some have different dice. What will a flail do?

There is no critrange or anything just 5Etardation.

 

[jaekl]

You can use them like anal beads with all of your hunky adventuring pals

 

[Jermu]

so how many fireballs you can cast with 1 character in 1 turn
basic action 1
haste 1
quickened Spell 1
action surge
basic action 1
quickened spell 1
= 5 4?
edit actually maybe 5 since if you dip thief for second bonus action

seems like bg3 don't have restrictions with how many spells u can cast in 1 turn

 

[Orud]

Who cares about flails? All the weapons are the same on 5e they are all the same but some have different dice. What will a flail do?

There is no critrange or anything just 5Etardation.

Not entirely true: weapons still have different damage types. Just like in 3E, you still have resistances based on damage types.

 

[Tyranicon]

so how many fireballs you can cast with 1 character in 1 turn
basic action 1
haste 1
quickened Spell 1
action surge
basic action 1
quickened spell 1
= 5 4?
edit actually maybe 5 since if you dip thief for second bonus action

seems like bg3 don't have restrictions with how many spells u can cast in 1 turn

As you already noted, you generally can't use two quickened spells in one turn. Haste doesn't let you cast two spells by its wording.

gains an additional action on each of its turns. That action can be used only to take the Attack (one weapon attack only), Dash, Disengage, Hide, or Use an Object action.

Also bonus action spells must be cantrips.

Casting multiple spells isn't as OP as you think it is due to having to dip fighter and waste an action surge on a spell. I don't think any of the popular OP builds revolve around casting 3+ spells per turn, which isn't really good anyways.

 

[Volourn]

" huge market of people that want to fuck Twilleks"

Until you make them ugly which you know they will.

 

[MerchantKing]

I think Larian and the rest of the rpg developers need a purge.