Baldur's Gate 3 II: The Urge for a Second Playthrough

[Zevox]

Meanwhile, Timeline Questions

Spoiler

Show

Specifically, I'm wondering about the mind flayer colony under Moonrise.

The Emperor was Baldurian, and when he went to Moonrise, he encountered the Mind Flayer Colony, got Wormed, and Asuran managed to pull him out of the Elder Brain's control.

When exactly was that? My impression was that the war over Moonrise was a century or two ago, since Halsin fought in that conflict, and before that point Moonrise towers was the home of the well respected Thorme family which ruled over a prosperous and happy kingdom. But Balduran founded Baldur's Gate, which I always took to be much older than that?


The Emperor describes himself as checking out the ruins of Moonrise seeking treasure, standard adventurer stuff, implying that his visit was AFTER the shadowcurse. Did he found Baldur's gate, then just kind of wander off and keep adventuring for a few centuries until he got himself mindflayered? Was there a Mind Flayer colony under Moonrise towers when Ketheric Thorm first fell to Shar?

[/SPOILER]

Spoiler

Show

The implication is that there was a Mind Flayer colony under Moonrise well before Ketheric had anything to do with the tower, yes.

Question for those who beat the game.

Spoiler

Show

I guess my question is around the structure of the finale. Will my entire party get a chance to play, or do I just go through it all with my 4 favorites?

Spoiler

Show

You'll use a four person party as usual. The others are implied to be off fighting elsewhere in the city during the event, but never shown doing so.

[BRC]

Spoiler

Show

The implication is that there was a Mind Flayer colony under Moonrise well before Ketheric had anything to do with the tower, yes.

Spoiler

Show

You'll use a four person party as usual. The others are implied to be off fighting elsewhere in the city during the event, but never shown doing so.

Spoiler

Show

alright, good to know there's no point stressing about optimal gearing for my whole crew, just the 4 I'm using.

Now I need to stress about which 4 to use lol.

[Anonymouswizard]

So I've gone Duelling with a shield for the current portion of my run, but I've heard that Great Weapon fighting works on Smite damage dice as well as those from the weapon itself, so I'm wondering if it's worth switching.

The fact that both Lae'zel and Karlach are two handed fighters makes me suspect it's where the devs put all the really good weapons.

[LibraryOgre]

So I've gone Duelling with a shield for the current portion of my run, but I've heard that Great Weapon fighting works on Smite damage dice as well as those from the weapon itself, so I'm wondering if it's worth switching.

The fact that both Lae'zel and Karlach are two handed fighters makes me suspect it's where the devs put all the really good weapons.

My Wyll carries the Blood of Lathander. I figure he's not particularly monotheist, and wielding a relic of Lathander works well for him. Also makes him a great complement to Shadowheart when fighting undead.

[Psyren]

Meanwhile, Timeline Questions

Spoiler

Show

Specifically, I'm wondering about the mind flayer colony under Moonrise.

The Emperor was Baldurian, and when he went to Moonrise, he encountered the Mind Flayer Colony, got Wormed, and Asuran managed to pull him out of the Elder Brain's control.

Ansur didn't do that, he managed it on his own - potentially according to prophecy, if this is tied into the events described in the Illithiad.

Just like Alfira's neck.

***

Every time I multi-class Wyll into a Paladin, though, I wonder why he signed a contract instead of swore an oath.

I mean... Devils like to put things in writing

The fact that both Lae'zel and Karlach are two handed fighters makes me suspect it's where the devs put all the really good weapons.

Act 3 mostly.

Foebreaker / Corpsegrinder
Hellbeard
Nyluran
Lae'zel's Silver Sword
Balduran's Giantslayer
Sword of Chaos

There's some decent ones earlier in the game like Halberd of Vigilance, but the majority of the really hard-hitting two-handers are lategame.

Spoiler

Show

alright, good to know there's no point stressing about optimal gearing for my whole crew, just the 4 I'm using.

Now I need to stress about which 4 to use lol.

Note that you need to pick those four before the point of no return (i.e. the boat). It's pretty clearly signposted but still.

To maximize your endgame options, I recommend

Spoiler

Show

Gale and Karlach be on the list. In addition, Halsin and Jaheira can help out even if they're not in the party, so I recommend not taking them.

[BRC]

Note that you need to pick those four before the point of no return (i.e. the boat). It's pretty clearly signposted but still.

To maximize your endgame options, I recommend

Spoiler

Show

Gale and Karlach be on the list. In addition, Halsin and Jaheira can help out even if they're not in the party, so I recommend not taking them.

Spoiler

Show

Worm Club members only, got it.

Currently thinking Karlach (love interest). Gale (so I have a caster), and Minsc (Minsc is always fun and I've barely used him)

[Cikomyr2]

Just like Alfira's neck.

***
.

I genuinely loled at that. Thank you

[LibraryOgre]

I genuinely loled at that. Thank you

What can I say? I like to crack jokes... and necks.

But my favorite of the two-handed weapons is skinburster. Throwing Karlach into the fray with that gives her some incredible resilience.

[Anonymouswizard]

apparently in BG3 Duelling doesn't work with Versatile weapons... Which is the vast majority of 'warrior' weapons. So I suppose it's back to the greatsword, the weapon of boring Paladins.

Side note: thrown weapons seem utterly ridiculous when properly specced, Larian really needs to nerf Tavern Brawler.

[Zevox]

apparently in BG3 Duelling doesn't work with Versatile weapons... Which is the vast majority of 'warrior' weapons.

A little googling tells me that's not true, despite the wording of the ability in-game. You only lose the effect if you wield a versatile weapon 2-handed, it works if you use it one-handed.

[Lord Raziere]

trying to make more of an effort to get through BG3 but its slow going. game is well made but its making me realize that what I liked about Bioware games was how well streamlined they were in retrospect. they introduced your party members really well and real quickly, they didn't make you travel around random wilderness aimlessly, cause I had to look up a guide to get Karlach faster, I know people like CRPGs now for some reason, but a lot of how it works just seems to be an unnecessary hassle and clunky design. the characters are good and I guess the combat's fine, I just wish it that it played.....faster? its a little too faithful to DnD 5e, and in my opinion it could've done more to strip out the unnecessary ttrpg mechanics. like I could honestly do without having to worry about camp supplies, there is a lot of instances where I just open the wiki for this or that because I'm unsure about a dialogue thing or where to find a party member, it just feels like its expecting things from me when I just want to like get to the meat of it, y'know?

I did get creative with like, getting some infernal iron for karlach, because the ladder blew up, so I had to blast open the chest with the iron in it with my eldritch blast then conjure a mage hand to throw it down at me. which good on the game for having a way to get that in a different way than usual. part of me is annoyed the made ladders destroyable in the first place though, but I guess it did lead to that creative moment.

[Errorname]

trying to make more of an effort to get through BG3 but its slow going. game is well made but its making me realize that what I liked about Bioware games was how well streamlined they were in retrospect. they introduced your party members really well and real quickly, they didn't make you travel around random wilderness aimlessly, cause I had to look up a guide to get Karlach faster

I'm not the biggest fan of the party member recruits here either, but I actually think they have the opposite problem, they're very fast. The game wants you to have a fully combat capable party as soon as possible, so the second you're out of the tutorial it's rapid-fire companion introductions in the crash site. I actually appreciated that Karlach has an actual recruitment quest and isn't just in the starting area of the map.

I know people like CRPGs now for some reason

It's because they're good.

[Zevox]

I still don't understand how anyone doesn't find Karlach quickly, unless they choose to ignore Wyll's request and pursue other quests first. They put a marker on the map exactly where she is once Wyll tells you about her. I found her quite quickly just by trying to go there in my very first run.

[Lord Raziere]

I still don't understand how anyone doesn't find Karlach quickly, unless they choose to ignore Wyll's request and pursue other quests first. They put a marker on the map exactly where she is once Wyll tells you about her. I found her quite quickly just by trying to go there in my very first run.

he didn't do that for me. I tried to talk to him to get the quest and he didn't even give me a marker or an option to talk about it even though he mentioned her name. I recruited him and everything and it didn't say where she was. had to look up an online map to get her location. I wouldn't have even known there was a place to jump across the river on if not for it. heck, I didn't even know where Wyll was and had to look him up first, I passed by the tiefling training are so many times and didn't notice him because I was trying to do other things and listening to them was the same repeating dialogue so I dismissed it as just this random ambient scene.

[Errorname]

Well, when it's working properly it's quite intuitive, and I actually think it's one of the better paced companion introductions. It's not lightning fast like the rest of the origin companions and there isn't a frustrating disconnect between the point when you meet them and the point where you get to actually recruit them like some of the later companions.

(The non-origin companions were to my knowledge not originally planned and it really feels like it. They're paced very oddly and there's not very many of them)

[Eldan]

Okay, my game is definitely bugged. Cleared out Moonrise Towers, including the guests in the cellar, and Halsin is still waiting for me to get to Moonrise Tower.

Eh. I'll just continue without him.

[Anonymouswizard]

I still don't understand how anyone doesn't find Karlach quickly, unless they choose to ignore Wyll's request and pursue other quests first. They put a marker on the map exactly where she is once Wyll tells you about her. I found her quite quickly just by trying to go there in my very first run.

IIRC that maker is actually somewhat off, Karlach was just outside the highlighted area when I first played. Still not difficult to find.

There's also two potentially annoying gnoll encounters in the area, as well as a Raphael trigger. Those gnolls might be a pretty significant roadblock to new players, although there's routes to avoid them (even if the jumping on one always buggs out).

[InvisibleBison]

I still don't understand how anyone doesn't find Karlach quickly, unless they choose to ignore Wyll's request and pursue other quests first. They put a marker on the map exactly where she is once Wyll tells you about her. I found her quite quickly just by trying to go there in my very first run.

In my first game, I didn't recruit Wyll until after recruiting Karlach. Something about his introductory cutscene rubbed me the wrong way, so I didn't interact with him at all subsequently. I'm not sure I even realized he was a potential companion at first.

[Cikomyr2]

Eh. If you want to "rush to Karlach" then you are operating with meta knowledge of the game already.

Like, i dont understand the point of the critique here.

[Errorname]

Eh. If you want to "rush to Karlach" then you are operating with meta knowledge of the game already.

The game does give you the information that Karlach is a potential companion in the character creator.

[Zevox]

he didn't do that for me. I tried to talk to him to get the quest and he didn't even give me a marker or an option to talk about it even though he mentioned her name. I recruited him and everything and it didn't say where she was.

I wonder if there's some option that you've got turned off, then? Because I know every quest gets marked on the map automatically for me.

There's also two potentially annoying gnoll encounters in the area, as well as a Raphael trigger. Those gnolls might be a pretty significant roadblock to new players, although there's routes to avoid them (even if the jumping on one always buggs out).

Bugs out? You mean the rocks in the river you can jump across? I've always used those, and never encountered any bugs there. Unless you count allies not automatically following you, forcing me to manually tell them to jump across, but that's unfortunately common any time you're going through parts you can only traverse by jumping.

Eh. If you want to "rush to Karlach" then you are operating with meta knowledge of the game already.

Like, i dont understand the point of the critique here.

If you don't find her quickly because you don't know she's a companion and thus prioritize other things, that makes sense - and would be covered under what I said about just prioritizing other quests over Wyll's side-quest. But that's not her being hard to find.

[Psyren]

The game does give you the information that Karlach is a potential companion in the character creator.

^ This - she's an origin character, so even on my first playthrough I just assumed she'd be early in Act 1 somewhere if I explored the grove environs long enough, similar to how you run into all the Divinity origins in and around Fort Joy.

I did find the jump-accessible-only areas annoying at first, it's not a traversal method I was trained to think of in this genre. They could have at least had the characters automatically jump if there's a path instead of the "can't reach" error as though it's out of bounds. But by Act 2 I was double-checking every area I couldn't walk to just to be safe.

[Errorname]

I did find the jump-accessible-only areas annoying at first, it's not a traversal method I was trained to think of in this genre. They could have at least had the characters automatically jump if there's a path instead of the "can't reach" error as though it's out of bounds. But by Act 2 I was double-checking every area I couldn't walk to just to be safe.

I find the jumping is often frustrating, it feels like a bit of a bodge and it's probably the mechanical element I think this game's successors would benefit most from iterating on and refining, but the moments of organically realizing that "oh, that's something I can do?" were really something, honestly. Like I've found the monastery pretty tedious on repeats because of how much 3d navigation there is, but that first run through was genuinely kind of magical, I never would have expected a CRPG's navigation to feel like Dishonoured

[Psyren]

I like it if there are multiple ways to get somewhere and the most straightforward (but not necessarily the most optimal) doesn't require jumping. The monastery I found annoying because I had to alt-tab out to a guide to realize that jumping was the intended way to get basically everywhere. Compare to House of Hope, the Goblin Camp, or Moonrise - places where jumping is useful (especially if you're trying to be sneaky) but not mandatory. I much prefer the latter design.

[Errorname]

I like it if there are multiple ways to get somewhere and the most straightforward (but not necessarily the most optimal) doesn't require jumping. The monastery I found annoying because I had to alt-tab out to a guide to realize that jumping was the intended way to get basically everywhere. Compare to House of Hope, the Goblin Camp, or Moonrise - places where jumping is useful (especially if you're trying to be sneaky) but not mandatory. I much prefer the latter design.

It's hit by the fact that jumping can be a little tedious? I've mostly been playing on Steam Deck, which is usually extremely natural (maybe too much so, I'm having trouble going back to mouse/keyboard CRPGs actually) but jumping is a major exception to that.

In a setting that manages to make the navigation as fluid as say, jumping and climbing and blinking in Dishonoured, I think mandatory jumps and climbing would be a lot easier to swallow.

[Eldan]

Also, whenever my main character jumps an even slightly tricky gap, at least one or two party members would always refuse to follow. Meaning I'd have to go into turn-based mode and jump them all across the gap one by one. Made the Underdark incredibly annoying.

Maybe they patched, because I've been having hte problem less in the second act.

[Anonymouswizard]

It's hit by the fact that jumping can be a little tedious? I've mostly been playing on Steam Deck, which is usually extremely natural (maybe too much so, I'm having trouble going back to mouse/keyboard CRPGs actually) but jumping is a major exception to that.

In a setting that manages to make the navigation as fluid as say, jumping and climbing and blinking in Dishonoured, I think mandatory jumps and climbing would be a lot easier to swallow.

BG3 weirdly has the same issue that early Devil May Cry does, the jump feels really good in combat, but pretty terrible outside of it. I think it would have felt much better if noncombat jumps were contextual.

I also think the targeting is a big factor, if I'm just walking around in controller mode it's perfectly fluid but as soon as you need to jump you have to stop, target where you want to jump, and wait for two seconds for the animation. Then you have to spend the next ten seconds making sure Shadowheart isn't still waiting on the other side like a lemon. Then another twenty five jumping everyone else across because you forgot to activate turn based mode. THEN you realize that for some reason Gale's still hanging out at the last light inn while you're exploring the bowels of Moonrise Towers...

[Zevox]

I was wondering to myself why I didn't have this experience of jumping seeming unintuitive in exploration, but perhaps it's because I'm playing on console? I'm not experiencing it as a point-and-click game, I'm manually moving my character like in any other game, so jumping feels like a natural thing to be doing and looking for places to do (albeit with an unnatural way to access it, since it's bound to up on the d-pad).

Also, whenever my main character jumps an even slightly tricky gap, at least one or two party members would always refuse to follow. Meaning I'd have to go into turn-based mode and jump them all across the gap one by one. Made the Underdark incredibly annoying.

Maybe they patched, because I've been having hte problem less in the second act.

No, that's normal, I encountered that all the time all throughout the game. Though my solution was to ungroup people before switching to give them the command rather than go into turn-based mode.

[BRC]

For me, jumping was awkward because it was so many steps

Rather than "Click and walk" it was

Select Jump, Select jump location, see if my whole party follows, if NOT ungroup party, position everybody who DID jump such that there is room for the person who DIDN'T jump, make the straggler jump to join, regroup party. If you screw up and click the straggler without ungrouping, people jump back.


It was an awkward break in the mechanical flow of the game. Yeah it can be fairly smooth if it works, but there's enough time it doesn't QUITE work, especially since a decent chunk of your party are 8 strength, it can be easy to leave somebody behind, or need to play with it a bit because the pathfinding won't quite pick up that they can make the jump.

Also, I beat the game this weekend! Yay! Thoughts

Spoiler

Show

So I WAY overthought the prep work and spent a lot of time buffing myself after the point of no return only to then get the forced long rest. The only potion that was super neccessary was the Cloud Giant Strength potion on Karlach. I had everybody else with Psychic Resistance potions, but there wasn't too much psychic damage going on.

I DID have to replay the astral brain a few times, once because the owlbear died, and once because I didn't understand what the "Orb of Negation" meant and lost have my party when a platform vanished.

I betrayed the emperor and let Orpheus become a mind flayer, then killed him as he requested. That was pretty fun.

As for the finale itself

1: The Smuggler Tunnels felt weirdly overbuilt. Like, you get to explore, find out about the smugglers, and you get ambushed by intellect devourers, but there isn't really anything to DO down there. It feels like they had a plan for that to be a proper part of the Finale, but you just wander around until you reach the Netherbrain, at which point you get a forced longrest.

I did like the confrontation with the Netherbrain itself where you learn you can't dominate it.

Phase 2: The Upper City. FINALLY, a clash with the Armies of the Absolute! Calling in your allies! This felt really cool and I liked it a lot. I wish there had been more of this? We end Act 2 with the Armies of the Absolute marching on the city, and a lot of act 3 has this shadow hanging over it of "There is an army marching this way". I kind of wish that battle had been more of a focus, instead of just the mind flayers.

Phase 3: Reach the Elder Brain. I can't say I loved this bit. I think I would have preferred a "break through the enemy lines before the Nautaloid gets here" event rather than "Dodge nautaloid bombardments", since the bombardments themselves were pretty easy to dodge just by positioning yourself carefully. Was more tedious than tactically interesting.

Phase 4: Fight on the elder brain! I wanted to play with calling in my allies, which unfortunately meant a lot of the fight was "My characters do nothing while NPC's take actions", but whatever, it was still fun. I'm curious how that goes if you side with the emperor, since he provides a bunch of the mooks for that fight. Personally, the Emperor went down laughably easily in my run after I called in the bombardments on him. Oddly, I didn't feel like the brain itself was much of a presence here. It spawned some tentacles against me, but the biggest threat by far was the mind controlled red dragon and the wizards spamming magic missile.

The STAGING of this as the "Final boss fight" worked quite well, I just wish the big centerpiece monster was actually something more connected to the Netherbrain or the Absolute, rather than just being "Oh BTW we dominated one of the Githyanki's Dragons". It certainly had the energy of "The DM plops down the coolest model they own", but narratively I would have preferred if the final battle featured a centerpiece monster that was a little more connected to the Absolute, rather than just "Here's a random big dragon to fight". Like, I know and can appreciate that the goal of the fight is to get your Mind Flayer to the crown to dominate it, but part of me was craving a proper Boss Fight, and the closest thing I got was Random Big Dragon and The Emperor, and the Emperor didn't have the staying power to survive my turn.

Phase 5: Battle in the Elder Brain's Psyche. This felt like something that depends a LOT on if you know it's coming. My first time doing the battle half my party was across the map and had to sprint for the portal. The second time I knew to get people into position, and it was a cakewalk. It's mostly an annoying movement puzzle+beating on a pinata, but I think it worked decently well.

More thoughts to come

[Errorname]

Spoiler

Show

The STAGING of this as the "Final boss fight" worked quite well, I just wish the big centerpiece monster was actually something more connected to the Netherbrain or the Absolute, rather than just being "Oh BTW we dominated one of the Githyanki's Dragons". It certainly had the energy of "The DM plops down the coolest model they own", but narratively I would have preferred if the final battle featured a centerpiece monster that was a little more connected to the Absolute, rather than just "Here's a random big dragon to fight". Like, I know and can appreciate that the goal of the fight is to get your Mind Flayer to the crown to dominate it, but part of me was craving a proper Boss Fight, and the closest thing I got was Random Big Dragon and The Emperor, and the Emperor didn't have the staying power to survive my turn.

Spoiler

Show

See, it felt to me like "I need to have an asset that works for whichever path my players end up taking" and that if I had sided with the Emperor I would have had to fight Voss and Qudenos instead. Apparently that's not what happens, but it might have been the intent.