Baldur's Gate Baldur's Gate 3 RELEASE THREAD

[0sacred]

bathroom stalls should be divided into elf and dwarf

 

[Swen]

Selling like hotcakes on PS5...



Like I said much earlier pre release, this game will EASILY sell 15 mil. Probably more

 

[Tuco Benedicto Pacifico]

That's great.
Maybe in your next game you'll be able to afford a day/night cycle too, Swen.

 

[MerchantKing]

That's great.
Maybe in your next game you'll be able to afford a day/night cycle too, Swen.

You'd think he would've had the money for that in this game too.

 

[Cat Headed Eagle]

There is no day/night cycle because the sun never sets in Larian's empire.

 

[AlwaysBrotoMen]

lol looks like there is a discussion on which is the greatest trilogy of all time in the resetera forums . https://www.resetera.com/threads/so...the-greatest-trilogy-in-the-rpg-genre.761571/

 

[Raghar]

I start to understand why they added possibilty to hire new party members. I lost 2 of them, and nearly butchered Drow. And the wizard need some serious seducing.
And considering L and S have problems with each other...

 

[Hagashager]

The hirelings don't feel right to me. I get Larian giving them backstory, but they ultimately come off as "bootleg" companions that are just...there.

It reminds me a bit of Dragon's Dogma's pawns, which I also felt were a bit uncanny. At least the Pawns are very expressly described as "Ersatz People". The hirelings feel more like Larian going, "if we had more resources these guys would be companions".

 

[notpl]

I start to understand why they added possibilty to hire new party members. I lost 2 of them, and nearly butchered Drow. And the wizard need some serious seducing.
And considering L and S have problems with each other...

If you let L and S settle things violently, can you just walk over to Withers and resurrect the other one?

 

[Cat Headed Eagle]

Well, Calarts slop will fit right in with a portion of D&D's audience.

When it comes to official parodies, Elden Ring did it best

 

[Infinitron]

https://www.thegamer.com/baldurs-gate-3-narrator-mean-amelia-tyler-early-access/

Baldur's Gate 3's Narrator Was Almost Really, Really Mean​

The Baldur's Gate 3 narrator can be a little judgemental, but she was almost downright cruel.

Baldur's Gate 3 does all it can to capture the feeling of playing Dungeons & Dragons, and much of that is thanks to its narration. Whatever choice you make, Amelia Tyler's voice is there to guide you through every nat 20 and critical failure. And while there's a lot of emotion in her voice, she's - for the most part - a fairly neutral onlooker. Aside from a few instances, of course.

However, that could have been very different. Speaking with TheGamer's lead features editor, Jade King, Tyler admits that her earlier take on the narrator was a lot meaner. Describing the old narrator as "enjoying watching you fuck up", Tyler says this interpretation was based on Scar from The Lion King, before being dropped in early access.

"The early access version was more like an outside view, dungeon master," says Tyler. "The direction I was given was Scar from The Lion King, Like, 'I'm enjoying watching you fuck up. This is gonna be great.'"

As fun as this sounds, it was decided that the cruelty would have been just too much over an entire campaign. Tyler feels this would have been too "exhausting" for players too, taking away from their enjoyment.

“After early access, we sort of re-assessed and were like we want the DM to feel, we want it to feel like it’s not another person challenging the player, it’s their voice," explains Tyler. "I’ve been a voice in their heads their entire life and I know how they think and am totally on board with whatever choices they make."

Yet there are still limits to this tone: "Apart from when they roll ones, in which case I’ll rip the piss out of them mercilessly."

In the final game, Tyler's voice certainly can't be described as emotionless, so she's definitely there on the journey with us. Sometimes, there's even a bit of judgment creeping in there, but usually when we deserve it. Which is most of the time, let's be honest.

Keep an eye out for Jade's full chat with Amelia Tyler tomorrow, as she breaks down her incredibly intensive performance as Baldur's Gate 3's narrator.

However, despite Tyler's occasional judgmental tone, not every disaster in Baldur's Gate 3 is our fault, especially if it's of the romantic variety. Larian boss Swen Vincke admitted that characters were way too horny at launch because of a bug, meaning their romance paths would trigger without the player meaning to pursue them. This was particularly problematic for Gale, who would fall head over heels for players who so much as breathed in his general direction. Poor guy.

 

[Spectacle]

I overheard a conversation on a bus the other day:

Man: I've started playing Baldur's Gate 3
Girl: Hear hear! An intellectual man!
Girl: It's such an insanely good game
Girl: You can have sex with anyone.
Girl: People are doing speedruns to have sex as fast as possible

Did he succeed on his Persuasion roll after that to bang her in the back of the bus?

I stepped off the bus not long after so I didn't see how things played out, but I believe it was the girl who was actively rolling this time..

 

[Infinitron]

https://codenameentertainment.com/?page=idle_champions&post_id=1565

 

[sebas]

The only problem with RTwP is that no one really does anything new with it most of the time. Then there's always the fallacy where people blame bad or boring encounter design on RTwP when there are plenty of turn-based games with just as many of the same kinds of encounters. Maybe PoE for example is boring because Sawyer and Obsidian are just bad developers rather than a problem with RTwP.

The problem is that you can't just slap RTwP in any RPG and expect it to work. It's actually significantly harder to pull off: the game needs to be economical with spell effects, it needs to be paced at a casual player's APM, it needs better AI and pathfinding and most of all it needs balancing around the system itself. Just look at Owlcat's games and how so so much differently they play in RTwP and TB.

 

[Cat Headed Eagle]

IE games worked just fine, but PST's animations were a bit weird so finding your way around combat was messy sometimes. Pathfinder are a big mess any way you slice it, but it's a bit more comfortable to me in TB. PoE2 just felt weird in both modes.

 

[MerchantKing]

The only problem with RTwP is that no one really does anything new with it most of the time. Then there's always the fallacy where people blame bad or boring encounter design on RTwP when there are plenty of turn-based games with just as many of the same kinds of encounters. Maybe PoE for example is boring because Sawyer and Obsidian are just bad developers rather than a problem with RTwP.

the game needs to be economical with spell effects,

So it's a graphics problem not an rtwp problem.

it needs to be paced at a casual player's APM,

That's where the pause button comes in. One action to pause, then you can issue orders at your own pace.

it needs better AI

Turn-based games also benefit from better AI. Every single-player game can benefit from better AI.

and pathfinding

Good pathfinding is good. Yes.

and most of all it needs balancing around the system itself.

How exactly would a game need different balancing? When this criticism is usually made, it's usually referring to trash mobs or something like that. But trash mobs and trash fights are not exclusive to RTwP games. Something like the D&D or pathfinder system being "designed for turn-based" is kinda odd when they work fine in RTwP. It's often a cope argument for some people who are bad at the game. The good argument is that you're pausing so much in complex fights that it might as well be turn-based instead.

 

[Cat Headed Eagle]

The thing with pauses is that you pause, but the actions still take rounds (in IE, 6 seconds, iirc) to complete themselves. You can pause faster than that. Oddly enough you can set up the autopause to make IE games practically turn based.

Balancing issues come into play when abilities take x rounds/x turns to complete, or how and when you're supposed to cast spells, buffs or whatever. You can program an ability to last "until the next fight" in tb, but in real time it's mmore difficult. In TB , physical progress stops in the game, so you can plan some sort of arena for your guys to fight in, while in rtwp you can program more, smaller, ambush-like encounters. That's why a lot of encounters in rtwp games are a blur sometimes, while in tb they are much more memorable.

at least imo.

 

[sebas]

The first big pain point is initiative: in RTwP winning the initiative means acting first, but in TB it means both moving and acting first, and on top of that this advange it locked down throughout the fight. This completely alters the ranged/melee balance, for eg. in RTwP the Barbarian can easily intercept a casting wizard whereas in TB if he lost the initiative he will have to eat a Grease before he can do anything about it. Then I mentioned better AI and pathfinding because in RTwP it's so easy to bait the AI into trigerring your AOO.

 

[Zariusz]

Can you still get natural regeneration at 20 constitution or that was only in older rulesets?

 

[MerchantKing]

The first big pain point is initiative: in RTwP winning the initiative means acting first, but in TB it means both moving and acting first, and on top of that this advange it locked down throughout the fight.

No. It means actions resolving first. However you can move freely all RTwP games. Initiative sequences only action in RTwP. With multiple apr, then if one follows the 2e rules, initiative sequences first attacks then provides the sequence for second attacks, then third attacks, and so on.

This completely alters the ranged/melee balance, for eg. in RTwP the Barbarian can easily intercept a casting wizard whereas in TB if he lost the initiative he will have to eat a Grease before he can do anything about it.

As a ranged character with enough movement speed, you can kite melee enemies around. Likewise, the mage can move away from the approaching barbarian while a melee character can approach the barbarian to intersect it. In Kingmaker once during the Armag fight, Armag when to chase down Tartuccio so in response I decided to move Tartuccio away instead of completing his action. Meanwhile, I had my melees and Ekun attack him while the dumbass ignored them in his berserker rage against the Gnome. An easy win thanks to his single-minded antinanatism.

Balancing issues come into play when abilities take x rounds/x turns to complete,

I've seen no RTwP games where there are actions you'd want to use in combat that take x rounds. There was something like restoration in Pathfinder that took a complete round to cast. But that was it.

or how and when you're supposed to cast spells, buffs or whatever.

In order:

hour/level
10 minutes/level
1 minute/level or 10 minute fixed duration
1 minute fixed duration or 1 round/level

Often round/level is best cast as needed.

You can program an ability to last "until the next fight" in tb,

Or you can just program the ability to last until rest or for x minutes/level.

but in real time it's mmore difficult.

How exactly? Saving for example is often blocked in combat meaning there's a trigger that enables a piece of code that prevents saving. Likewise saving is enabled after combat ends. The same trigger can hence be applied at the end of combat.

In TB , physical progress stops in the game, so you can plan some sort of arena for your guys to fight in,

You can plan an arena for your guys to fight in in RTwP. You only have to b8 the enemies into the area.

while in rtwp you can program more, smaller, ambush-like encounters.

You can do that in turn-based too. In fact, the vast majority of turn-based games are JRPGs with 99% of fights being random encounters with what would be the equivalent of small ambush-like encounters.

That's why a lot of encounters in rtwp games are a blur sometimes, while in tb they are much more memorable.

It's more like the encounters in RTwP games were often just copy/pasted encounters because the developers chose to copy/paste encounters everywhere and put a lot of encounters. As far as being a blur however, it's simply the fact that it's harder to remember something when there's a lot going on at once. Whereas it is impossible to miss anything in a turn-based game because everything happens one at a time in a fixed order.

 

[EdgyRightWinger]

Surely he is one of us.

 

[MerchantKing]

Surely he is one of us.

Why does he think Owlcat wouldn't butcher Baldur's Gate seeing how many trannies and sodomite romances were in Wrath?

 

[Raghar]

I saw a person who is doing single character, pacifist means playthrough.
Also I saw a person who is doing single character Shadowheart. It's also bloody.

 

[Raghar]

Can you still get natural regeneration at 20 constitution or that was only in older rulesets?

That was only in PST.

 

[skaraher]

There was high CON regen in BG1, the evil Dwarf companion Kaghain could even get it with a manual.