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

[agris]

This may warrant a nomination as worst post on the codex in 2019.

I really hope this is a thing and I've just missed it all these years.

edit: PST's combat was tolerable for me :X

 

[DeepOcean]

I only see a win win scenario here:

1 - if it is an irredeemable shit game like Dragon Age Inquisition, we will have a gold mine of memes and Larian will be our new Bioware and supply us with delicious memes for years to come.

2 - If it is a popamole game that isn't entirely complete shit, I will have fun taking a dump on popamolers while finishing the game 7 times only to be sure it is as bad as I was thinking, just to be sure, you know.

3 - To make things better, maybe there will be a flaming war between newfags coming from the RPG watch saying BG 3 is the best thing evah, betrayed DOS fans and Infinite engine grognards, providing delicious forum drama.

You know guise, we need to find something to do until Colony Ship and Kingmaker 2 comes out on 2077.

 

[Viata]

Funny. ToEE, KoTC and also Goldbox have great cRPG combat and any game that used any of them as inspiration is a must play for me. Sadly, this is rare as fuck to happens.

Why is this rare?

It takes time to make a good combat mechanics and you got more storyfags than combatfags(even in here), so why would you waste your time to please a minority when you already had made many choices to fuck your fanbase so you could get more money from normies?

 

[Parabalus]

Funny. ToEE, KoTC and also Goldbox have great cRPG combat and any game that used any of them as inspiration is a must play for me. Sadly, this is rare as fuck to happens.

Why is this rare?

It takes time to make a good combat mechanics and you got more storyfags than combatfags(even in here), so why would you waste your time to please a minority when you already had made many choices to fuck your fanbase so you could get more money from normies?

Makes even less sense when you consider that there exist dedicated strategy and tactical games for when you want (hard) combat challenges, with which RPG combat can't really compete.

 

[Chippy]

Of course BG3 will be the avatar of decline if you expect Temple of Elemental Evil 2, you backward, washed out morons. It's a game with a huge budget, this sort of investment will not be profitable if it's ToEE2, they NEED to make it something else to actually log any profit from it. Why can't you accept that once and for all and just enjoy those new titles that roll out as best you can, if they do contain some artistic, mechanical or narrative high points?

This would be true if they were making Faerun: Shadows of Baldurs Gate, but they're not. They're making a 'sequel' and calling it BG3 - just like Bethstarda did.

 

[Mortmal]

How dare they want the best combat in a DnD RPG to be replicated or at least somewhat used as inspiration :O
I don't think many people worship ToEE for anything but combat.

Yeah,the game that nobody outside of the codex have even heard about.

If you read mainstream forums, no one speak of BG3 anymore nor have it in the after E3 wish list. Even on steam forums people seems to ask about classic d&d mechanics. So if they betray the grognards, it will flop and wont get the mainstream audience, it will be the next sword coast legend. If they do a true D&d game, they still risk to not make enough money to pay for such a large team, hope they do, else they will soon join their obsidian and inxile pals at Microsoft shovelware department.

Yeah,because betraying the grognards did a real number on Bethesda and fallout3 barely sold 1000 copies. It is all about reading the market and decent marketing.

Also betraying the grognards in this case means switching from rtwp and dumbing down the game. Tho i do believe that they will go with tb and it will sell well. There is a lot of larian sheep out there that will buy it because they bought dos2.

Yeah,the game that nobody outside of the codex have even heard about.

Co8 community are not 'Dexers (though Sitra Achara, Pug and that IWD guy are registered here).

But yeah, I don't think there is any commentary outside of the 'Dex except for my stuff.

Is wrote it more as a joke,but yeah it is pretty dead out there. There is no other place to talk about grognard RPG stuff. Gamebanshee is pretty good for walks and news and few obscure games do have a hardcore communities of a hundred dudes. But for general dialogue about all kind of rpgs there is no better place,or at least i don't know. As amusing your blog is,it is still you talking about X,not ,still kudos for doing it . Lets hope that the day when DarkUnderlord goes raptor hunting and never comes back,is not close.

Bethesda did not betray anyone, it sold fallout 3 to the same crowd who bought oblivion, who expected anything else than oblivion with guns ? Larian going from TB to xbox controller action rpg, now that would be betrayal

 

[Curratum]

Another thing that has been eating me - in EVERY SINGLE INTERVIEW, Vincke gives the same example about "interactivity" and "freedom of player actions" in BG3 - "so we get in a bar fight and I want to hit you with this chair and use it as a weapon, but I also want to set it on fire!"

This comes through as the most pointless, most needless sort of interactivity that's usually a huge dent on a game's budget and comes through, contrary to designer intent, as the most forced and artificial.

 

[hexer]

Lots of BG: Descent into Avernus spoilers from a podcast with Adam Lee, campaign's author.
The interview starts at 18:55

https://dnd.wizards.com/articles/features/dratalk_schoonover​

 

[Lacrymas]

Another thing that has been eating me - in EVERY SINGLE INTERVIEW, Vincke gives the same example about "interactivity" and "freedom of player actions" in BG3 - "so we get in a bar fight and I want to hit you with this chair and use it as a weapon, but I also want to set it on fire!"

This comes through as the most pointless, most needless sort of interactivity that's usually a huge dent on a game's budget and comes through, contrary to designer intent, as the most forced and artificial.

I was complaining about that sort of gimmick 40 pages ago, get with the times, grandpa.

 

[Reinhardt]

What if i want to hit you with this elf and use him as a weapon? But also i want to set him on fire.

 

[Shrimp]

Another thing that has been eating me - in EVERY SINGLE INTERVIEW, Vincke gives the same example about "interactivity" and "freedom of player actions" in BG3 - "so we get in a bar fight and I want to hit you with this chair and use it as a weapon, but I also want to set it on fire!"

This comes through as the most pointless, most needless sort of interactivity that's usually a huge dent on a game's budget and comes through, contrary to designer intent, as the most forced and artificial.

I think it's obvious that at this point of time they've only got a handful of details that they want to reveal or mention in the interviews. It's hardly a surprise they managed to run their own interviews into the ground when all 60 or 80 of them contained the exact same stuff.
But yes, I agree that if that statement should be considered a hint at the players being able to pick up and use furniture as weapons easily can end up feeling forcibly placed for the sake of 'player freedom' - not unlike conveniently placed red barrels of gas (or in Original Sin 1 and 2's case, barrels of oil or ooze)
Sure, using a table or chair in a bar brawl would be thematically fitting and could actually be a nice optional addition if implemented tastefully and in a scarce amount, but I really don't hope this means every major fight is going to be in an area with at least two sets of dining tables solely so some random person has the possibility of doing a 'furniture only' type of playthrough.

 

[Shrimp]

Now the real question is if they'll add the option to toss or use smaller party members as improvised weapons. It's all about player freedom, isn't it?

 

[smaug]

Another thing that has been eating me - in EVERY SINGLE INTERVIEW, Vincke gives the same example about "interactivity" and "freedom of player actions" in BG3 - "so we get in a bar fight and I want to hit you with this chair and use it as a weapon, but I also want to set it on fire!"

This comes through as the most pointless, most needless sort of interactivity that's usually a huge dent on a game's budget and comes through, contrary to designer intent, as the most forced and artificial.

I think it's obvious that at this point of time they've only got a handful of details that they want to reveal or mention in the interviews. It's hardly a surprise they managed to run their own interviews into the ground when all 60 or 80 of them contained the exact same stuff.
But yes, I agree that if that statement should be considered a hint at the players being able to pick up and use furniture as weapons easily can end up feeling forcibly placed for the sake of 'player freedom' - not unlike conveniently placed red barrels of gas (or in Original Sin 1 and 2's case, barrels of oil or ooze)
Sure, using a table or chair in a bar brawl would be thematically fitting and could actually be a nice optional addition if implemented tastefully and in a scarce amount, but I really don't hope this means every major fight is going to be in an area with at least two sets of dining tables solely so some random person has the possibility of doing a 'furniture only' type of playthrough.

Does this mean I’ll be able to make a build around throwing chairs?

 

[Curratum]

Doesn't even need to be chairs to be complete decline. Trying to simulate player freedom by always having "environmental kill / damage" options in every scene is just UGH. I didn't play DOS but friends have been telling me that especially in 2, you need to rely on world props and placeables and setups a lot for some harder fights, which is absolute decline to me.

 

[hexer]

Why? That shit leads to hilarious situations in PnP DnD sessions

 

[Generic-Giant-Spider]

Can a Rogue break a bottle and use it as a shank?

The true question.

 

[volklore]

Doesn't even need to be chairs to be complete decline. Trying to simulate player freedom by always having "environmental kill / damage" options in every scene is just UGH. I didn't play DOS but friends have been telling me that especially in 2, you need to rely on world props and placeables and setups a lot for some harder fights, which is absolute decline to me.

DoS2 is actually the opposite. You stack damage on every char and blast through everything. The armor system negates any effect of the environmental interactions and that's the real decline.
I don't find the idea (which is close to PnP) to have certain skills/stats be checked in combat for something else that swinging your sword so alien. LIke athletics check to jumpp the gap between two roofs, or push somebody off, STR check to throw a chair etc... Of course it needs good layering and needs to not be available in every single fight, the effect of such things need to be balanced carefully, so that doing it isn't the only way to beat the encounter. But overall I find the idea appealing - it might end up as a distaster, but for a PnP based game, it's worth trying imo.

 

[Shrimp]

Why? That shit leads to hilarious situations in PnP DnD sessions

Which is exactly why I believe Larian has to tread carefully if they wish to implement it. In the interviews we've seen so far, Swen has been giving the impression that BG3 seeks to imitate the same levels of possibilities for emergent gameplay that tabletop DnD can offer.
As I said before, I can easily believe that you'd be able to pick up a chair and throw it at whoever you're fighting inside a building, especially if it fits thematically like a bar brawl against a bunch of drunkards (who would also have the opportunity to throw the other chairs back at you)
But I'll have to draw the line if the game starts placing furniture and various types of decorative art in unlikely locations just so the player has the opportunity to lob them at their foes. You expect me to believe there's an intact mahogany table with accompanying chairs placed at the scene of every major fight, even if they take place in the middle of the forest, at a riverbed or any other outdoors location away from civilisation? Nah

 

[Sergiu64]

What I have a problem with is the fact that only an idiotic fighter would be bothering with the mahogany table when they have a perfectly good weapon to start with in whatever sword they're already using.

 

[Generic-Giant-Spider]

Minsc is a great example of what happens when you repeat the same joke within the span of twenty minutes and what began as an amused smile becomes a lust for murder.

 

[Elwro]

so is the bar chair the next Fargoth's ring

 

[hexer]

Adam Lee is the moron who thought that Myrkul and Bane are mortals, and that Bhaal is the god of hate and anger, amongst his other pearls of wisdom. Could someone give me a rundown? I can't listen to this retard.

He's mostly talking about soulcoins, Nine Hells war machines, Zariel, Bel, and occasionally reveals some interesting things about baatezu in general.

 

[Generic-Giant-Spider]

Actually, they do develop his character later on, and humanise him in a way that even the games do not. For example, he is shown to actually be broken down by failure to actually extinguish evil: he is very hard to knock down when it comes to morale, but once he is, it gets to him.

lmao what a pussy

u dont hear xzar whining

 

[Viata]

Does this mean I’ll be able to make a build around throwing chairs?

Not gonna lie, finally this game is getting interesting.

 

[Generic-Giant-Spider]

Cause he's dead.

I once did the quest for BG2 that would lead to his eventual, inevitable doom. Only part way through it I got hit by the "This NPC appears busy" bug that plagued the early versions of the game. Confused by what the fuck was happening, I looked up what was going on and stumbled upon what happens to Xzar as a result. I had to consult the old Sorcerers IRC chat and some random guy popped in with, "Is this the Xzar gets killed quest?"

So I never completed it. In my timeline, Xzar doesn't die because I never go through the steps to kill him.