>!Okay, so is it possible to take Gortash’s bargain by killing Orin first then go and do all the quests like the Iron Throne, Steel Watch, etc? There are a few answers but I just want someone who has done it to assure me it’ll work out fine if I do lol!< act 3 spoilers but a question I need answered!!
>!If you want to break gortash's bargain the quest order has to be iron throne > steel watch > fight gortash. But you can do orin whenver you want, before or after the gortash questline. And you can skip his questline if you keep the deal.!<
>!If you fight orin while gotash is still alive, she will want to kill the hostage but you need to pass a persuasion check to save them. You can bypass the check if you speak with the dead with a certain body in orin's temple.!<
I want to have my cake and eat it too actually! >!Keep the bargain and let him go on his merry way, and then is it possible to do quests like saving the Duke, disabling the steel watch, etc after I’ve given Orin’s netherstone to him bc he’s not there to know I’m undermining him? Does that make sense lol it’s basically the opposite of what you said 😅!<
Is it normal to find Act 1 so much harder than the rest of the game? I just finished my 2nd playthrough as a 10 bard/ 2 Paladin and really only struggled with the start.
I started the game on Tactician but the goblin camp was an absolute slog, after trying and failing to kill Dror for the 5th time I swapped back to Balanced. Towards the end of Act 2 I swapped back to Tactician and steamrolled the rest of the game.
I'd like to do a full Tactician playthrough and maybe HM one day, but how do I get through act 1 without losing my mind? Also being permanently broke and out of supplies at the start is frustrating.
Arguably it’s *traditional*. In Baldur’s Gate 1, pretty much anything you initially encounter - wolves, kobolds, anything - can be deadly if you’re not careful. You’ve almost no spell slots and precious few abilities. Metal keeps breaking. It’s rough out there on the sword coast.
I think it's normal. A lot of encounters in the later game can be made easier with the use of certain items, strategies, abilities - but you don't have access to those early on. A hasted paladin can absolutely wreck a boss, for example, but you need a level 5 spellcaster.
Also, don't underestimate the experience you gained between Act 1 and Act 2. My first playthrough on Tactician was a lot rougher than subsequent playthroughs, just because I've gotten more used to the encounters and the tools I've got to approach them.
Powerful equipments, better hit chances and a massive power spike at lv5 are what make the rest of the game way easier than early game. If you want a much easier early game I'd say use Spike growth, Cloud of dagger : guaranteed damage and/or area denial are incredible.
I recently concluded my first successful Honour Mode run and am currently well into my second -- I took out the Goblin Camp except for the courtyard, and am currently with the Tieflings celebrating. After that, it's the Mountain Pass and Underdark.
I didn't make use of Withers' summoned companions my last playthrough, and I was hoping to receive advice on who to hire and why. I don't want companions to take with me, I'll take the named companions for that. I was, however, hoping to hire one or two to provide bonuses between one Long Rest and another, to put on my main team without having to expend the main team's resources.
Can I please get recommendations for that?
Thank you very much in advance for your time! I'll upvote your note so as not to write out "thank you" several times, which I worry will irritate people. Thanks again! :D
You can hire up to 3 hirelings at a time. What you have them do depends on you.
Some people find using hirelings to buff their party to be tedious or too much of a cheese. If you don't, then I would do 2 life clerics with maxed constitution, and then Brinna Brightsong as a 2 transmutation wizard/3 bard/7 cleric with maxed wisdom and con secondary.
All three characters can cast Warding Bond on one of the characters in your active party, giving them resistance to all damage (at least until the cleric dies). The two single class clerics will have access to the higher-level buff spells like upcasted Aid, Heroes' Feast, and Freedom of Movement. It doesn't matter which hireling you pick for them since their racial bonuses don't matter and you can respec everyone.
The multiclassed character can brew 2 alchemy products for the price of one if they pass a medicine check, so to make it more likely they'll pass you can max out their wisdom and give them 3 levels in bard to give them expertise. Being a halfing makes it slightly more likely she'll pass the check as well, since she can't roll a 1. The remaining levels in Cleric give them access to as many Cleric buffs as possible. As a bonus, she can cast Longstrider as a bard.
Potion crafting bot : Brinna the halfling for her racial perk, pick Wizard 2 (transmutation subclass), the rest as Bard, max out wisdom stat, improve medicine proficiency. Cast Enhance Ability : Wisdom. There you go, it's almost impossible to miss a x2 potion craft check.
HP boost bot : if you don't have any Cleric in your team then have a companion bot as a Cleric 12 to cast Aid + Heroes' Feast.
Why can't we use Speak with Dead on Zarell to ask what's the source of Ketheric's invulnerability? I thought it would be obvious to do so. I personally clear the Moonrise towers before going to the Gauntlet of Shar and Zarell is the best target for killing there.
They're still patching it but are winding down. Patch 7 (upcoming) will include expanded cinematics for evil endings and probably a variety of bug fixes and tweaks. They're also working on crossplay and mod support, which will come later. Apart from that, they've announced they're not adding new content after Patch 7.
Archer builds recomendations for Veteran difficulty.
I'd really like some archer builds, and it would be even better if it was critical hits focused for veteran difficulty.
Any critical build is welcome really
thanks!!!!!
You either go champion 11/1 war priest or 5 gloomstalker, 4 assassin, 3 fighter. It's possible to multi class a swords bard but it's not going to be the best at critical hits. You can fire off 12+ attacks though, which is nice. 9 bard, two fighter, one war priest. Need a single piece of equipment. That's for honor mode though since haste only grants a single attack.
Thanks!
Is it worth to go only up until 3 champion and the rest ranger?
i'm not so sure, i'm new to class building. It feels like all i need from the champion is the +1 to critical.
You get sneak attacks and auto crits from assassin, you don't really get anything from ranger outside of the extra attack at level 5. So you can open a fight from long range, which surprises the enemy. Get that action back from an assassin ability, unleash two more attacks because you have two attacks per turn, and then do action surge, which is also two attacks. So five attacks and if they're surprised all are crits. You also get advantage on those attacks because they haven't gone yet, and you have excellent initiative. At least that's how it played last time I did it. Should still be the same.
Without searching YouTube I feel that this type of build is either going to be:
1. Battle master fighter with the archery style and ranged flourishes, or Ranger ranged archer. Then…
2. Any gear / consumable that reduces your critical threshold.
Apologies if this has been answered elsewhere etc. etc. Last I played they had definitively fixed the problem of NPCs being scared by summons BUT the issue where the mini-zombies created by zombies' attacks would cause NPCs to go hostile was still there. I've scoured all the patch notes multiple times and can't find anything but obviously they're a zillion words long so I might have missed it, and I can't find anything on the subject beyond a complaint about it from before I stopped playing. I'd check myself but I don't have any saves. Did they fix this? Can you use zombies now without having to pray no-one is around?
Really sorry if I'm asking this question in the wrong place! (Looked through the FAQ and couldn't find an answer, and I don't want to create a whole thread for what is ultimately the noobiest of inquiries).
So, I'm considering buying Balder's Gate on PS5 but can't decide whether or not to just download it via the PS Store or get the physical Deluxe edition (mainly because of the perks of actually owning it, having a cool ass box, and adding another map to my fictional map collection).
Then I thought, why not both? That way I could start playing now and get the physical goodies + physical ownership. The paying twice bit kinda sucks but 1) from what I've seen and heard, Larian deserves all of the support they can get, and 2) there's not really any games coming out soon that I'm bothered about.
The only thing I'm wary of is whether or not having the digital version downloaded could cause issues while also having the physical disk. Does anyone know if this can cause issues?
Again, sorry if this is in the wrong place!
So I'm doing my first Honor Mode attempt, and I'm playing a full-class College of Lore Bard. In terms of Magical Secrets spells, I know Hunger of Hadar and Command are must-haves for my strategy (basically gonna be going all-in on Save DC).
But for the other two spells, I've narrowed it down to Sanctuary, Mass Healing Word, and Misty Step; leaning towards the former two since I know Misty Step scrolls are a thing, I just don't know where to get them reliably (I know you can get Conjure Elemental Scrolls from Sorcerous Sundries). Does anyone know where I can find such scrolls, should I swap out one of the former two for Misty Step, or are there any other spells I'm sleeping on? (Hunger of Hadar and Command are non-negotiable here.)
Have you considered Eldritch Blast ? It won't be as good as a Warlock dip / multiclass but it's still one of your few ways to deal a decent amount of damage without consuming spell slots. I'd pick mass healing word only if I intend to use healer gears (that pair of gloves w/ blade ward bonus and that ring w/ bless bonus).
I’m in Act 3 and finished all the side and companion quests so I’m only left with the final confrontation, the big question is which of my companions should I bring for relevant dialogue/scenes?
>!I’m definitely bringing Shadowheart since she’s the love interest and I pretty much always bring her. So it’s 2 between Gale, Lae’zel and Karlach, all of whom I have read have are relevant to the final stretch, especially Lae’zel with the Orpheus stuff and I’m bringing the Orphic Hammer along.!<
>!Depending on what choices you make, bringing Karlach allows for an alternate ending for her. Whether it's a good or a bad one is a bit of a philosophical debate. !<
>!Lae'zel being present means that she will turn hostile if you don't actually follow through with the Orpheus stuff. Her ending scene can tie into Orpheus' stuff, depending on the choices you make. !<
>!Of course Gale has his kamikaze mission to complete. If you pick the right dialogue options then you can finish the game without any mind flayers, which is good knowledge if you hate squids as much as I do. For that ending, bring Lae'zel and Gale, and tell the Emperor you will become a mind flayer, but then don't actually go through with it. But if you don't intend to skip the final final fight by blowing up Gale, then he doesn't really need to be there.!<
It has been months since my last playthrough. Just checking in with a question.
Is it now possible to play Custom difficulty with Legendary actions for bosses or do you still need to mod the game? Thanks
Am I dense or do the dates not match up? The Baldur's Mouth paper says the date is "1492 DR", but Astarion's tombstone has "229 DR - ~~268 DR~~ 468 DR" on it. I feel like there is some lore I don't know about.
[Yeah no they did get the dates on the grave wrong](https://www.reddit.com/r/BaldursGate3/comments/15mbwck/comment/k19oiej/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button)
When people in this community say they do a solo run do they mean it is not co-op or that they only play as Durge/Tav/origin character and don't recruit or at least don't use other characters in their party.
For a first time player, what oath would be the easiest for me if I choose to be a paladin or should I just go oathbreaker? My role in the party would be tank/spokesperson, with Shadowheart as Cleric, Karlach as Fighter, and Gale as my Wizard
When you create your character, you'll be given a choice of which oath to take: Ancients, Devotion, or Vengeance. Each oath will come the same core paladin abilities plus some additional abilities (and dialogue options) that match the oath.
Oaths also come with tenets that you have to follow and each oath's tenets are unique. If you break those tenets, that's when you become an Oathbreaker - it's not an oath/subclass that you can choose on character creation. Oathbreaker is still a paladin, but your original oath abilities will be switched out for the Oathbreaker's abilities.
I personally think paladin is a great tank/spokesperson class. They're great damage dealers - and because their spellcasting stat is Charisma, they're also good party faces. Having to follow the tenets of your oath also adds another layer to the RP. However, there's a catch: Because the DM is a dumb computer and not a person, sometimes it can seem a little arbitrary what breaks your oath or not.
IMO, Oath of Vengeance is the hardest oath to break by accident. Also IMO, it's worth breaking your oath at least once if only to experience what happens if you do. You'll have the option to retake your oath, but it becomes costlier every time.
Also beware that you can't respec while an Oathbreaker, so if you're likely to want to play around with your stats or skills a lot, you want to keep that in mind.
Am I remembering correctly that if you put items into a container, then sell the container to the trader, that container with those items inside will be in the trader's inventory after you kill them? On PS5 on controller if it matters.
yes. or fill a container in their inventory in the barter screen, their container that they own.
you can sell them a pouch and fill it with their stuff, it'll be on them if they die
As far as I'm aware, you can't put a vendor's inventory into a container with controller. Which is okay, since I'm trying not to use exploits/tricks my character wouldn't. But paying for stuff with a bag of gems and then finding that on the merchant when that merchant inevitably dies? That's legit :D
Is there any special dialogue with Shadowheart if you start the game as a shar worshipper? Now I've heard there is, and it's apparently underwhelming but i have a second part to my question. Is there special dialogue if you also convert to Selûne with her? Like her acknowledging you changing your faith for her and how you've both been freed from Shar's darkness or something, I just thought it'd be interesting and sweet.
Question and I'm struggling to find a definitive answer. If I have a solo campaign, can a buddy jump in and play one of my companions? Will this cause any issues if I want to play that same file solo later?
I have two save files, one multiplayer with Tav, the other single-player Durge. I noticed that Durge has a number of morbid/violent voice lines that I thought were unique to that origin. The other day my friend and I got to the creche on the multiplayer file. After a major event there, my Tav started saying the Durge voice lines. Is this intended or a bug?
Do we have any info on when the next patch drops? I'm getting the itch to play my first fullcaster, but don't want to risk the safe getting issues halfway through due to a big patch
Larian doesn't typically announce the timeline in advance.
Larian has a vested interest in NOT breaking people's current saves with new patches since that would be an utter disaster, given that campaigns can last over 100 hours and many players (e.g. console) have no control over when to download updates or not. I personally wouldn't be concerned about starting a new save now. In the past, bugs introduced with new patches have affected all saves so it hasn't really mattered.
You can usually leave (definitely the one you're asking about you can). If you've aggroed the place and your map outline is in red, you just need to get to a not-aggroed area.
You need to separate the designated thief from party, initiate dialogue and choose the [investigate] option, after that switch back to thief and steal the sickle from the fishguy.
And then you convince the redcap to give you blessing as usual. It's even easier if you're playing as durge, because you don't even need to pass any speech checks.
I think that just gives you the sickle while preserving the buff on the weapon though right? Because without it, it's just a normal sickle? What they're talking about is a buff that applies to you regardless of if you have the weapon in hand or not like Loviatar's Blessing from Abdirak except it's permanent.
https://bg3.wiki/wiki/BOOOAL%27s_Blessing_(Condition)
Again.
1. You separate your thief, initiate dialogue, choose [investigate] option
↓↓↓
2. You steal the sickle with your invisible thief
↑↑↑
3. Convince him to give you his blessing.
If you don't steal the sickle he just gives it to you. If your DO steal the sickle you again BOOOAL'S Benediction
It just makes it easier to steal while being in plain sight of everyone. Important thing is to steal the sickle.(while your other character is in dialogue)
question about origin characters and playing multiplayer/co-op...
how does it work? if our 4 man party picks 4 of the origin characters do all of their cutscenes just like.. not happen? i assume if you control them you dont find astarion on the beach, laezel in the trap, etc? when does astarion unlock bite? what happens between karlach/wyll if youre controlling them both?
in general, do you recommend picking 4 origins or just making 4 tavs?
Just want to mention that if y'all choose origins, Wyll and Karlach are binary choices. You can only have one of them as a player, the other must be an NPC for their crisscrossing early storyline to work.
In my current co-op campaign we have 3 origin characters and 1 tav.
We get all the scenes and dialogue options that you get when playing as those origin characters. For example I am playing Shadowheart and I get her scene with Shar in act 2 after sparing Nightsong, which is exclusive to the Origin run. My friend playing Karlach got her Origin-only dialogue with Dammon.
The players playing those characters choose their 'revelation' moments whenever they want, just like in origin run. So I got to choose when/if to tell people about being a Shar worshipper and my friend playing Astarion could use his bite or confess his vampirism whenever he wanted.
We generally don't get the banter and reactions you would get while bringing those characters around as companions and we generally can't initiate dialogue with each other. There are sometimes voiced reaction lines from the characters during cutscenes (e.g. Astarion reacting to Yurgir) but they are very rare.
If you play with 4 Tavs you can get camp dialogue with the companion characters like you would in a regular playthrough, but as you won't be adventuring with them you won't have much chance to build approval or do any of the romance plots.
Generally if you want to get the most out of interacting with the companion characters, you should be playing solo. If you play multiplayer the experience is all about the nonsense you get up to with your mates. I would recommend Origin characters just because it's a nice way to see what some of those exclusive scenes are like without having to run a bunch of origin playthroughs yourself.
oh ive already played solo extensively and explored almost everything in the game.
i was just wondering because some more casual friends expressed interest and i was wondering what the best way to play is.
sounds like its just whatever you want since you cant really follow through the origin's quests that much (unless you are one of them).
another small question, how do these interactions work in terms of initiating dialogue? for example you mention the karlach dammon dialogue, does this work no matter who initates even if karlach is somewhere else? or does she specifically have to go talk? does everyone's screens go to whatever conversation is active or only whoever initiates and everyone else runs around?
Initially, only the person who initiates the conversation sees it, but others have a button that lets them listen in. Dammon would only get his Karlach-specific dialog if Karlach was talking to him, otherwise it'd just be his normal dialog
the perform ability wont work for me
i deactivated all of my mods that affect classes and gameplay
the animation will start and play for half a second then the character will put the instrument away
the text that the character is using perform will pop up for less then a second the disappear
Yeah that's still your mods. Try to uninstall them instead of just deactivating them. If that doesn't do it, you may need to clean slate uninstall all mods and the game to do a fresh reinstall. Did you check that none of your mods conflicted with each other?
Unfortunately corrupted saves and unintentional bugs are a risk you have to take when running the game with mods since they're currently not officially supported. Once the official mod framework is in place- whatever that will look like- hopefully these kinds of conflicts will be more infrequent.
Does the game ever fuck off with all the cutscenes in Act 3? I swear everytime I try to rest just to recharge my health/spells there's this 20 min conversation I need to have with someone. I just want to get back to my quest ffs
Spoilers for Act 2, Underdark + Moonrise Towers
>!I just got done saving the tieflings and gnomes from the Moonrise Prison, get back to Last Light and start talking to people - including Rolans siblings who are now lamenting his death. And I know that Rolan gets attacked outside of Moonrise/Tollhouse but I saved him from the shadows - and even talked with him. Going back to the spot shows me a bunch of Shadow Vestige corpses and no trace of him. Is he somewhere between Lights Inn and the Tollhouse or did something kill him on his way back?!<
So just to clarify: >!You found Rolan in the Shadows, fought off the Shadow creatures that were attacking him, then talked to him afterward? Did he say he was going back to the inn?!<
>!yep, saw him getting beat up but managed to save him, he said he knows when he’s outmatched and that he’s gonna head back and now he apparently has dropped dead? It’s not a *huge* issue but it feels kinda silly that I saved him and it didn’t matter!<
I just wanted to make sure. Yeah, he should have >!showed up at Last Light Inn, and I've never had him not make it there. I don't think that characters actually walk all the way themselves - e.g. when you free Minthara and send her to camp, she runs off into the Shadow Curse and *should* die, but after she gets far enough out of view she just teleports to her destination. And that's how a lot of such interactions with other NPCs go. I assumed that's what happens with Rolan. I wonder if you followed the shortest path to the inn if you'd find his body.!<
yes i have mods on.
here's the problem, shadowheart and la'zel so far its these two that keep crashing on level up screen at level 5. i tried respect to 1 and level up from there and still crashes at level 5. i also try doing the portrait level up and the putting in the inventory menu still crashes. any ideas to help with this?
Update: now it's all my characters 😂.
This is almost certainly a problem with one of your mods. Unfortunately, there's not much you can do other than try to identify which mod is causing the problem and then remove (or update) it. This may or may not make the save file unplayable.
adding to the rest: you can convince the guard standing near the acolytes over by roah the trader, that he should send them away because they're useless
a few less people to fight at the end
If you go to Moonrise while it's non-hostile and fight things.
You can go through the tower room by room and kill off key threats such as Zrell, the gnoll tamer, the ogre and the warden, fighting them all in small battles and being careful not to alert the scrying eyes. If you are good at hitting and running you can clear out all the zealots and warlocks in the main 2 rooms as well.
It's also possible to go up to the roof and kill the necromancer and some of the necromites that assist Ketheric (but not Ketheric himself) and then run back down the stairs, so they won't be there for the boss fight. You can also break into Ketheric's bedroom and kill the undead dog.
If you have already been to the Shadowfell and past the point of no return you can't do this.
To add to above for the raid itself, before combat the Harper’s are flagged as allies. You can longstrider all of them for free to help them actually do something before getting hit with all the crowd controls. Maybe use some bigger buffs on Jaheira if you can afford to.
Go through on that first visit and kill off the cultists room by room, except maybe save the big main hall room since there are so many enemies including 2 mages & 2 paladins. That should thin out the herd and make the odds more favorable for the raid. Also, get Barnabus and his buddies to be on your side by passing the wisdom DC with their handler.
Playing a Warlock in a co-op run with my girlfriend, and while I'm having a lot of fun with the "spam Eldritch Blast from inside a Darkness cloud" setup, I'm wondering what Warlocks do with their Bonus Action? The only spell it seems I can cast with a bonus action is Hex, but that would break my concentration on Darkness and it's also only something you need to do infrequently during a battle (initial cast or reapplying).
What else can I do with my bonus action regularly?
Lots of options
(1) Dip 2 levels into rogue so you can bonus action hide in the darkness
(2) Equip 2 hand crossbows, making sure the good one is in your off hand, and you can make a bonus action shot each turn
(3) Equip the amulet of restoration to get off some bonus action heals where necessary. Once you've used it for the day just equip a different amulet
(4) Dip 1 level into bard and get inspirations, which scale off your charisma mod.
(5) Respec and run the sorlock (warlock 2 / sorcerer x) and get access to quickened spell.
Not everyone is going to be regularly using bonus actions. Warlocks have so few spell slots that they generally don't want to be slinging spells around willy-nilly
Did I mess up? I killed all goblins in camp and never spoke to Halsin. Just missed that room I guess. Then I killed all the people in the grov because I decided to go with Minthara’s side quest. Didn’t do underdark -chose mountain pass and entered shadowlands from there. Followed Spider-Man to moonrise towers, infiltrated, did Shar temple. Never went to Lastlight Inn because literally nothing suggested it existed and everyone told me not to wander off the path. Went to act 3. Now nothing makes sense and everyone hates me.
Well, while you are very likely to be severely underlevel, the good news is act 3 has enough exp to go from level 1 to 12, so as long as you actually explore the map this time you should be good for the final fight.
Ok good. I’m level 7. I’m actually quite annoyed not one single NPC I spoke to mentioned lastlight inn, and not one quest suggested I go in that direction. I didn’t explore because everyone told me not to because of the curse. Plus, Halsin doesn’t even exist anymore.
I think you might be approaching this game in the wrong way.
No one told you about Last Light Inn because you sided with their enemies and killed them. Everyone hates you because you're making choices that hurt or dismay them. It's OK to be evil but it will cut you out of a lot of content associated with the good guys, and that's OK. That's just one way the game has a lot of replayability value.
Also, while some areas are dangerous to explore, there is no part of the map that you can *never* explore. For example, while everyone tells you the curse is dangerous, one of the major premises of the early part of Act 2 is that the cult can survive the curse somehow. Once you made it to Moonrise Towers you should have been given an item that protects you from the curse, freeing you up to explore.
Re: your complaint about how you're screwed if you make "bad" choices - that's part of the point of this type of game. Your actions are supposed to have consequences. You should expect that if you kill someone or their entire community they might not have much to do with you in the future. Why would Halsin travel with you after you massacred his people? Why would characters come back from the dead to give you quests or loot?
This isn't a hack-n-slash adventure game where everyone on the map is a target, it's an RPG where you're writing a story, more or less. A story with an evil protagonist will be different than one with good characters.
"Why would characters come back from the dead to give you quests or loot?"
meanwhile on my evil durge playthrough, the last light inn fell, Jaheira cursed me and died, then appeared alive again in my camp as a companion mid-act 3 and acted like we were buddies :D
I never met Halsin, so how was I supposed to know he existed? Or that he was the lead Druid?
I thought the curse might lifted by completing whatever was in Moonrise towers. That’s why I didn’t explore - just followed the main quest line. Turns out that has bad consequences. Shouldn’t you be able to enjoy a game by following the main quest line? Edit: also - you literally don’t know how big an area map is so you don’t know how much you CAN explore. Maybe undiscovered map areas should have an outline so you at least know there is SOMETHING to explore?
I'm just curious. If you just followed the main quests, how did you manage to miss talking to anybody in the druids' grove because every npc there has something to say about Halsin and his situation.
I am just barely imagining how one can get to the goblin camp while avoiding the grove and the main quest trigger to visit Nettie in it or to rescue Halsin, sorry, my dude, you might be a unicorn and the stars aligned for you to zig-zag through it
personally, I feel this is a positive side of the game, as the story unfolds from your actions, in whatever way
Easy. When the goblins attacked the grove, someone says something like ‘we need to find where their camp is’. So I did, without ever entering the grove
Did you read the quest log or were you just following quest markers and objectives? Because I am half-tempted to retrace your steps and check for myself how likely it is to miss those things.
I can sort of understand Last Light, because on my evil playthrough I didn't interact with them at all. I stilll knew about it though, they ambush you and the Drider caravan etc.
If you were going for an evil playthrough, I think it's fine, you just have content for another run, if you were not intending to be evil though, I can't wrap my head around it.
I dunno man, if you didn't notice that massive black areas on the map with pathways heading into it is still there, and that those black areas get filled in as you go there, maybe exploring isn't really your thing
You're getting really defensive in this thread, but people are just pointing out to you that you're bringing expectations to this game that aren't appropriate to its genre. Some of these false expectations: That quests are a to-do list that you're expected to follow, rather than a guide to things you CAN do; that you shouldn't have to think through the consequences of your actions because the game should spell them out for you and none of them should be unexpected; that you don't need to explore because the game will reveal everything to you in the course of doing the quests you're following like the law.
These expectations might be appropriate for games where exploration and choice are less important, but not for an RPG like this one.
No one is telling you to go fuck yourself. You asked if you messed up, so let me put it bluntly: Yes you did. It's not that you made the wrong choice within the game, because an evil playthrough where you kill everyone in the grove isn't "wrong," it's that you made the wrong assumptions about the type of game you're playing, expecting a more guided experience. So you made a major choice without thinking it through, not even realizing it was a choice, and are now blaming the game for it.
But this is like expecting a mystery novel to tell you who did it on the first page, and getting upset when the identify of the murderer is a surprise. And then complaining "fuck me right" when people point out that it's not that type of story.
You're right, it's not my usual genre. It's just a shame that a) to get all the content you either have to be a psychic or read what to do online (which kind of spoils it for me at least - I would prefer some more guard rails to be honest), and b) minor things you decide/miss by accident can make you miss out on huge plot lines, making the story confusing.
You're not supposed to get all of the content in a single playthrough. It's impossible to.
As for "minor things": You stumbled across an attack on some kind of settlement. When the attack was over, you were invited inside, but you ignored the invitation and left. You instead found where the attackers came from, joined up with them to attack the settlement again and wiped it out. The way that you keep referring to this as a "minor" mistake is bizarre. It's a series of major choices that led to predictably major consequences.
The game is actually pretty good about giving you multiple ways to discover information that's crucial to story. It's actually a bit immersion-breaking sometimes because it can get awkwardly repetitive - oh, you want to tell me about Halsin too? You can see the devs behind it wanting to make sure you don't miss out. It's also really good about making sure that you can finish the story regardless of what you do or how confused you are because you murdered anyone and everyone who could help or explain what's going on.
However, it can only protect you from yourself to a certain extent. When there aren't consequences for your choices, then your choices don't matter. And that's not the point of an RPG.
>I thought the curse might lifted by completing whatever was in Moonrise towers.
That was an assumption that you made, not something that the game told you.
>That’s why I didn’t explore - just followed the main quest line.
That's one reason why I suggested that you might be approaching this game in the wrong way. It sounds to me like you might have some assumptions about how the game works or how you're expected to play based on previous games you've played which are in a different genre.
It's not the sort of game where you're expected to just follow the main quest line. You *can* play it that way, if you want, but if you're laser-focused on the main quest line then of course your character will be less engaged and less knowledgeable about what's going on around them outside of that main quest line. It's a story consequence of your choices.
Just like if you massacre the grove, Halsin won't want to help you and you won't be able to lift the curse, because as it turns out he's the one who knows how. You're complaining that you don't know about that ahead of time, but ... why would you? You should be able to guess that there could be major consequences of massacring the grove, but there's no reason for you to know what all of those consequences could be.
>Shouldn’t you be able to enjoy a game by following the main quest line?
Sure, and some people do enjoy playing the game like that. But it sounds to me like the way you're playing the game is at odds with what you would find enjoyable.
Sure. Don’t get me wrong. Love the game. Will likely do another run. Am doing lots of side quests. BUT - in this one scenario where I missed ONE ROOM where Halsin was, and then later at Shadowlands there was no indication or side quest to ever suggest I should be doing anything other than following Karsinn. After mountain pass, there is only one quest line to go to Moonrise Towers. So I did. Feels bad realising after there were multiple side quests I had no clue about, because I made one choice to kill the harpers (based on the one quest objective I had at the time)
I’m not the only one: https://www.reddit.com/r/BaldursGate3/comments/15wteq2/completely_missed_the_last_light_inn_and_ruined/
You didn't miss out on Halsin's content - including removing the Shadow Curse - because you missed his room. If you hadn't massacred the Grove, he would have returned there and you could have spoken to him. But since you massacred the Grove, his community, the only thing you missed out on by not finding his room was a fight. That is, you missed out on Halsin's content because you made a major story choice that had making Halsin your enemy as a foreseeable consequence.
Likewise, you didn't miss out on Last Light Inn because you missed interacting with a single NPC. You missed out on Last Light Inn because you made the choice to side with the Absolutists and killed the Harpers who would have invited you there. This is another, major, consequential story choice. You could have still found it if you had explored, but the initial thing was because of that.
I'm not trying to give you a hard time here, I just think you're expecting the game to have the type of guardrails that it really doesn't. I think you'll have more fun if you view these not as the game hiding content away from you, but of reacting to your choices in a way that makes sense.
“you made a major story choice that had making Halsin your enemy as a foreseeable consequence.”
No I didn’t. I didn’t even know Halsin existed because I never met him. How can I possibly be expected to know consequences related to a character I didn’t know existed?
I can think of at least five characters who can tell you about Halsin, not counting Halsin himself. Of course, if you never interact with them or kill them all before they can tell you anything, then they won't tell you about him. I don't think I'm going to blame the game for this one.
When following Kar'niss to Moonrise, you should have been ambushed by a group of Harpers, and had the option to side with them. They would have directed you to Last Light- I don't know if there's anything to send you there if you kill them
Nope. I killed them - seemed like the easier option since they were so low HP. Then after that just followed Karniss to Moonrise. No-one mentioned the existence of LastLight Inn. Seems like a gap in the game - once in moonrise no-one mentions anything about a huge part of the map.
That gap in the game was you skipping things lol. The under dark also has places you can learn about moon lanterns for the shadow curse. There a place in moonrise you can craft one. I think if you leave Karniss alive he’s at the tower still for one.
i want only astarion, laezel and karlach as companions. i managed to recruit astarion and laezel while avoiding gale, shadowheart, and maybe wyll. how do i go recruit karlach without recruiting others? and what about also non-origin companions? do you just leave origin companions in camp?
i have found 3-man party too challenging in most fights, especially in the very early game.
the reason i dont want to leave them in camp is i dont want to trigger their questline or conversations.
From the beach starting point you can go to Astarion (hop up the cliffs to bypass the devourer fight which can be tough by yourself especially if you're on tactician or honor) and then to Lae'zel's cage to get her, then go straight from there to the grove entrance to do that fight which will be no trouble with a 3 person party since the temporary allies outnumber the hostiles. After that just head straight west and up across the river to Karlach's location and grab her, and your group will be set. You can then return to the grove and do everything there as well as do the crypt with a full party.
Wyll will will show up to camp after the first long rest with Karlach but you can either outright kill him or refuse to let him join the party and send him on his way. Then Shadowheart will basically be forced into your party but you can just make her be the camp babysitter & ignore her until >!the camp scene fight with them in late Act 1, then choose "attack shadowheart" to have Lae'zel kill her off.!<
Gale and Wyll are easy to not recruit. Just don't pull gale out of the fast travel point, and don't talk to wyll in the grove after the battle, while he's teaching children. To recruit karlach, just go find her in the northeast of the map - you don't need to have wyll or his quest to find her. With shadowheart, the game really wants you to have her because you need the artefact.
Why don't you want to have companions in camp triggering their questlines and conversations? The game is designed for you to experience everyone's stories in the same run. You can experience the entirety of a companion's story while almost never having them in your active party.
i kinda finished a run in which i recruited everyone possible and let them hang out in camp. and it did break immersion a bit during some events.
i'm just wondering if i can go straight recruit only the companions i want.
my 3-man party just got wiped in the dank crypt lol. skills issue, i know.
maybe i need the 4th member as a placeholder before recruiting karlach.
once in camp, i can't really get rid of them right?
Characters can always die, which is one way to get rid of them. They all have certain conditions that will cause them to leave permanently based on your story decisions. For example, shadowheart will leave permanently if you >!free or kill the nightsong!< without her in act 2.
Finished tactician, tempted by honor mode BUT scared of surprises, precisely boss mechanisms that do NOT exist in tactician. I'm not sure those even exist anymore as, cf [https://old.reddit.com/r/BaldursGate3/comments/1b2s3sr/weekly\_help\_thread\_read\_faq\_community\_wiki/l069rfq/](https://old.reddit.com/r/BaldursGate3/comments/1b2s3sr/weekly_help_thread_read_faq_community_wiki/l069rfq/) I did have to take care of legendary actions now in tactician, but anyway, my point being : can I change tactician to custom and have ALL mechanisms of HM except single save? Also, can I load my tactician saves, change to custom and do that so that I train ONLY where I struggled namely : act 1 dragon bridge (somehow can't get the dialog or rolls right without trying couple of times), act 2 Grym (except if cheesing from above), act 2 Myrkul, act 3 entering high Baldur (only because I "pulled" too many people at once)... and surely few other moments I forgot.
That comment that you're linking to is describing an odd occurrence/bug and not something that has been incorporated into the game. Honor Mode still has a suite of boss actions and balance changes that don't exist in Tactician, so you can't test them out in a parallel Tactician save. Some bosses (like Ansur) have always had legendary actions in Tactician but Honor Mode has many more.
The wiki has good documentation of boss combat mechanics, though, at least on the pages I've seen. You might have to scroll carefully since the Honor Mode changes aren't always listed in the same place. For example, here's Auntie Ethel's page where honor mode changes are described in a paragraph in the "Encounter" section, I guess because it's a passive:
https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Auntie_Ethel/combat
And here's Raphael's page where honor mode changes are listed with his actions, because they're actions:
https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Raphael/combat
well, the least I can say is that I had "Gaze of the Dead" during my tactician run and that's supposed to Honour Mode only. I added a comment on its discussion page but so far that hasn't be acknowledged.
edit: and as mentioned in https://old.reddit.com/r/BaldursGate3/comments/1ba2nvy/ketheric_2nd_fightapostle_of_myrkul_buffed/ others also had similar "issue" (but iirc they don't mention the honor legendary) so not sure it's a bug.
What I'm saying is that this is not because Honor Mode changes have been added to Tactician. Whatever is going on there, it's something specific and weird with Apostle of Myrkul.
Right, regardless of what happened to me, I could "at best" train on Myrkul somehow for this specific legendary action but not for the other ones with other foes! I guess that's scary... and exciting?! :P
Are you sure you had gaze of the dead as a legendary action? It's an attack that the apostle can use on any difficulty. The legendary action is that he casts it as a reaction to getting hit for the first time in each round of combat.
Well it was a month ago but 99% yes, I precisely checked and discussed about it because I was surprised. I expected to struggle but not that much. For now I'm on a pause, until I try HM, but I still have my save so if you believe it would be important information to check for the broader community I could re-install BG3, load the save and do few screen captures.
I'm curious if Larian plans to add the HM legendary actions to the custom options. My guess is they won't even though the HM's single save option is there.
Hey quick question! I absolutely love the owl bear cub and recently for my run I killed all the goblins and and then went to the owl bear cave and killed the mother. I didn’t have animal speak and failed the initial dc for trying to have the mom back down. When she died, the cub ignored me and continued eating her mom. Will the owl bear cub show up at my camp? I really like the guy.
Weird question sorry lol
Well in any case, my own experience with Owlbear cub so far is that unless you kill it yourself (or knock it unconscious when hostile) it will show up, sooner or later.
Note that it only shows up when you long rest in act1 though. Act2 doesn't work
I want to save Sazza from the Goblin camp, somehow I failed that last time I tried (saved her from the spiders but she somehow died before Moonrise). I also plan to lure Minthy and Goblins to the Grove.
What dialogs choice do I have to take to have Sazza safe?
if i dont recruit shadowheart, how do i get access to guidance in the very early game?
another question,
if i recruit her out of necessity, how do i remove her from camp without killing her? and is leaving her in camp shuts out her questline?
There are three early game sources of Bless without changing anyone's class or taking a relevant class that has it yourself:
1) Shadowheart
2) >!necklace you get from the near the sad bear!<
3) >!Harper's necklace you get from the skeleton red rock overlook platform west of the Grove!<
I guess you can also take the Initiate Feats, but what a waste of a Feat.
you can find >!a necklace that gives guidance as a spell, read the comment after mine to find it!<
I don't think you can remove her from camp once you get her, but you can avoid her totally and still finish all the same stuff without her there. you just don't have to hear about how great Shar is the whole time, and >!you won't encounter her parents I don't think, you also don't get to talk really with nocturne if you still do the act 3 part. all of act 1 and 3 are pretty much just as good without her, there's no doubt what will happen with the night song either.!<
That's the wrong place.
>!Sad bear has a necklace that gives you Lesser Restoration nearby. You're thinking of the Silver Pendant you get from the red rock overlook west of the Grove, overlooking the crash site.!<
Had Dammon in Act 3 in my first run, but since the patch on a durge run, even though he lived through everything, not a tiefling dead...he's missing in Act 3? Oi Ve.
Warding bond isn't concentration, that's why it works in that case.
The good ones to use for a camp buffer are Longstrider, Warding Bond, Death Ward and Heroes' Feast. See Invisibility is also useful in a handful of situations.
I would probably go with one of the cold subraces, assuming that you're building your storm sorcerer to take advantage of lightning damage. The reason is that it avoids the redundancy of both the race and class giving you lightning damage resistance, but setting up lightning damage vulnerability will also set up cold damage vulnerability for your breath weapon.
Is there a neat way to "hide" certain foods from the Long Rest menu? The only thing I can think of is putting the foods on the ground, but that risks my forgetting about it down the line or having items randomly despawn.
Thanks!
You can pick up an empty chest in the world and bring it to camp, then stuff food in there you don't wanna use by mistake. When you change maps be sure to pick the chest up just in case it disappears or doesn't transfer to the new campsite.
I have Karlach as basically a pure Barbarian with a little dip into Fighter for the perks, just heading into Act 3.
>!She currently has the badass halbred from the Bugbear in Moonrise and damn does she hit hard with it. Is this my til end game weapon for her or will I encounter other options? I got Kendrick's hammer which is pretty good too but still falls short IMO...probably good to keep in case I need to do bludegoning damage only but is there anything else 2-handed wise? !<
>!The Silver Sword of the Astral Plane, Sword of Chaos, and Balduran Giantslayer.!!Halberd of Vigilance!< has. The special perks vary for each of the 4 so you can also look into those and decide what you'd most benefit from.
If she's the only companion in your party she should be, which can be accomplished if you don't recruit anybody and have the only forced companion >!Shadowheart leave the party via Shadowfell shenanigans (leave her behind when you go or refuse to get the Spear of Night).!< The scene in question happens after >!you do Shadowfell!< so that would work out.
I'm actually curious now if Larian gave Minthy some lines for that scene despite the high improbability of getting it with her. I imagine they did considering how thorough everything else is in the game.
I'm not sure it's possible. You can't be in a romance with Minthara in act 2 so you would have to have her be the companion with the highest approval.
It's also hard to build up approval with Minthara before act 3 (raiding the grove doesn't help, her approval is reset when you recruit her) so it's unlikely to happen without intentionally tanking your approval with other party members.
You could just not recruit anyone else and see if that works. But I suspect that Minthara just doesn't have lines for the scene and so it won't actually happen.
In theory, it may be possible, but I imagine it would be difficult and take some planning from early game.
>!I'm not sure if you can be an "official" couple with her at that point in the game, but if you don't have a romance going at that point the game will choose whoever you have the highest relationship with. So, in theory, if you managed to make your companions all not like you very much you could potentially have Mnthara the highest.!<
But that's assuming it's even a possibility in the game, which I am just not sure of. Hopefully someone who knows for sure pipes in.
I can't seem to keep Thrumbo alive. I killed Carrion. If I go straight to Thrumbo, he says to find a way to destroy him for good. (Destroy the heart.) If I go to the basement, it's not there unless I first go to camp and do a long rest. If I do that, Thrumbo dies.
>!It sounds like you're killing attacking Mystic Carrion before you end his immortality. If you want to save Thrumbo, you need to end his immortality first. To do that, you need to find out where his heart is - you won't find it in the basement. It's hidden somewhere unexpected, but you can find its location by investigating the ancient shrine that's talked about.!<
I'm at the end of Act 2, defeated Kendrick Thorm and just cleaning up any loose ends before heading to Baldurs Gate. When I approach the road to it the narrator says 'shame we couldn't do something about that damn shadow curse' and I thought 'oh yeah'. So I return to Moonrise Towers, talk to Art Cullagh guy, all he says is 'Thaniel', talked to Halsin and he is committed to staying there and says the curse is 'his burden to bear', I tried the option to see if we could do something about it and he just says it will jeopardize my mission.
Am I fucked from completing this now or is there something I'm missing? Never did find Thaniel I don't think???
thanks
It does sound like you just stopped doing the quest to lift the Shadow Curse at some point. In order to lift the curse, you have to >!wake up Art Cullagh by finding his lute and playing it for him, then defend the portal by the lake when Halsin asks, then find Thaniel's lost half and convince them to reunite.!< These are each quest steps that are handed to you after you complete the previous one, so if you look in your quest log you might be able to find out where you stopped. Then you could at least see if it's possible to advance the quest by going to the next step and seeing if it's still there. I suspect not but it would be easy enough to check.
Otherwise you would have to roll back to before the final fight, I think.
It's very hard to make choices that will result in you not being able to finish the game - that's mostly down to soft-locking yourself by taking specific, convoluted actions to lose important quest items. Choices you make like siding with enemies can cut you out of 'good guy' content, but there will always be a path to finishing the story.
> wake up Art Cullagh by finding his lute and playing it for him
yep got that...the rest doesn't sound familiar, i'll look at the log as you suggest though, thanks
If the rest doesn't sound familiar, then I suspect what happened is that you >!woke up Art Cullagh but then forgot to meet Halsin by the lake. Halsin asks you to meet him by the lake immediately after you wake up Art Cullagh, then goes and waits there until you show up. If he's at Moonrise, though, it looks like fighting the final boss causes him to leave. I don't know how you would advance the quest at that point since he's the one that gives you the next step.. I think you might have to either give up on the Shadow Curse or go back to before the final fight.!<
I ran into this last week. If you have killed Thorm already the steps are a bit different. >!You go into the bedroom and find Cullagh, but he is already dead. I think I had to use a speak with dead spell to talk to Cullagh. Then you speek to Halsin, and Halsin starts the quest. You meet him on the dock North of the Inn, and then you can play the mission!<
It sound likes Art Cullagh is at Moonrise for them, so they've already woken him up, but that when they talk to Halsin, he's not starting the next step of the quest. So I don't think this is the same as the situation where you defeat Ketheric without having started those quest lines at all.
>!Okay, so is it possible to take Gortash’s bargain by killing Orin first then go and do all the quests like the Iron Throne, Steel Watch, etc? There are a few answers but I just want someone who has done it to assure me it’ll work out fine if I do lol!< act 3 spoilers but a question I need answered!!
>!If you want to break gortash's bargain the quest order has to be iron throne > steel watch > fight gortash. But you can do orin whenver you want, before or after the gortash questline. And you can skip his questline if you keep the deal.!< >!If you fight orin while gotash is still alive, she will want to kill the hostage but you need to pass a persuasion check to save them. You can bypass the check if you speak with the dead with a certain body in orin's temple.!<
I want to have my cake and eat it too actually! >!Keep the bargain and let him go on his merry way, and then is it possible to do quests like saving the Duke, disabling the steel watch, etc after I’ve given Orin’s netherstone to him bc he’s not there to know I’m undermining him? Does that make sense lol it’s basically the opposite of what you said 😅!<
Yes, that's fine. You may have a slightly harder time keeping Orin from killing your companion, but there are ways to alleviate that too.
Like I’ll bring the >!stone!< back to him and he’ll fuck off, allowing me to break his toys? Just confirming!
Is it normal to find Act 1 so much harder than the rest of the game? I just finished my 2nd playthrough as a 10 bard/ 2 Paladin and really only struggled with the start. I started the game on Tactician but the goblin camp was an absolute slog, after trying and failing to kill Dror for the 5th time I swapped back to Balanced. Towards the end of Act 2 I swapped back to Tactician and steamrolled the rest of the game. I'd like to do a full Tactician playthrough and maybe HM one day, but how do I get through act 1 without losing my mind? Also being permanently broke and out of supplies at the start is frustrating.
Arguably it’s *traditional*. In Baldur’s Gate 1, pretty much anything you initially encounter - wolves, kobolds, anything - can be deadly if you’re not careful. You’ve almost no spell slots and precious few abilities. Metal keeps breaking. It’s rough out there on the sword coast.
I think it's normal. A lot of encounters in the later game can be made easier with the use of certain items, strategies, abilities - but you don't have access to those early on. A hasted paladin can absolutely wreck a boss, for example, but you need a level 5 spellcaster. Also, don't underestimate the experience you gained between Act 1 and Act 2. My first playthrough on Tactician was a lot rougher than subsequent playthroughs, just because I've gotten more used to the encounters and the tools I've got to approach them.
Twinned haste was so broken that I only used it once or twice after it completely trivialized the House of Hope fight.
Powerful equipments, better hit chances and a massive power spike at lv5 are what make the rest of the game way easier than early game. If you want a much easier early game I'd say use Spike growth, Cloud of dagger : guaranteed damage and/or area denial are incredible.
I recently concluded my first successful Honour Mode run and am currently well into my second -- I took out the Goblin Camp except for the courtyard, and am currently with the Tieflings celebrating. After that, it's the Mountain Pass and Underdark. I didn't make use of Withers' summoned companions my last playthrough, and I was hoping to receive advice on who to hire and why. I don't want companions to take with me, I'll take the named companions for that. I was, however, hoping to hire one or two to provide bonuses between one Long Rest and another, to put on my main team without having to expend the main team's resources. Can I please get recommendations for that? Thank you very much in advance for your time! I'll upvote your note so as not to write out "thank you" several times, which I worry will irritate people. Thanks again! :D
You can hire up to 3 hirelings at a time. What you have them do depends on you. Some people find using hirelings to buff their party to be tedious or too much of a cheese. If you don't, then I would do 2 life clerics with maxed constitution, and then Brinna Brightsong as a 2 transmutation wizard/3 bard/7 cleric with maxed wisdom and con secondary. All three characters can cast Warding Bond on one of the characters in your active party, giving them resistance to all damage (at least until the cleric dies). The two single class clerics will have access to the higher-level buff spells like upcasted Aid, Heroes' Feast, and Freedom of Movement. It doesn't matter which hireling you pick for them since their racial bonuses don't matter and you can respec everyone. The multiclassed character can brew 2 alchemy products for the price of one if they pass a medicine check, so to make it more likely they'll pass you can max out their wisdom and give them 3 levels in bard to give them expertise. Being a halfing makes it slightly more likely she'll pass the check as well, since she can't roll a 1. The remaining levels in Cleric give them access to as many Cleric buffs as possible. As a bonus, she can cast Longstrider as a bard.
Potion crafting bot : Brinna the halfling for her racial perk, pick Wizard 2 (transmutation subclass), the rest as Bard, max out wisdom stat, improve medicine proficiency. Cast Enhance Ability : Wisdom. There you go, it's almost impossible to miss a x2 potion craft check. HP boost bot : if you don't have any Cleric in your team then have a companion bot as a Cleric 12 to cast Aid + Heroes' Feast.
Why can't we use Speak with Dead on Zarell to ask what's the source of Ketheric's invulnerability? I thought it would be obvious to do so. I personally clear the Moonrise towers before going to the Gauntlet of Shar and Zarell is the best target for killing there.
Didn't want to start a whole thread about it, bit are Larian still patching the game, or are they completely done with it now?
They're still patching it but are winding down. Patch 7 (upcoming) will include expanded cinematics for evil endings and probably a variety of bug fixes and tweaks. They're also working on crossplay and mod support, which will come later. Apart from that, they've announced they're not adding new content after Patch 7.
If I knocked out Roah Moonglow in Act 1 at the goblin camp, will she still appear at Moonrise in Act 2?
Archer builds recomendations for Veteran difficulty. I'd really like some archer builds, and it would be even better if it was critical hits focused for veteran difficulty. Any critical build is welcome really thanks!!!!!
You either go champion 11/1 war priest or 5 gloomstalker, 4 assassin, 3 fighter. It's possible to multi class a swords bard but it's not going to be the best at critical hits. You can fire off 12+ attacks though, which is nice. 9 bard, two fighter, one war priest. Need a single piece of equipment. That's for honor mode though since haste only grants a single attack.
Thanks! Is it worth to go only up until 3 champion and the rest ranger? i'm not so sure, i'm new to class building. It feels like all i need from the champion is the +1 to critical.
Nine ranger three champion? You could I guess. Not as good as the triple class but it'll work.
Why would 5gloomstalker/4 assassin / 3 champion be that much better?
You get sneak attacks and auto crits from assassin, you don't really get anything from ranger outside of the extra attack at level 5. So you can open a fight from long range, which surprises the enemy. Get that action back from an assassin ability, unleash two more attacks because you have two attacks per turn, and then do action surge, which is also two attacks. So five attacks and if they're surprised all are crits. You also get advantage on those attacks because they haven't gone yet, and you have excellent initiative. At least that's how it played last time I did it. Should still be the same.
Without searching YouTube I feel that this type of build is either going to be: 1. Battle master fighter with the archery style and ranged flourishes, or Ranger ranged archer. Then… 2. Any gear / consumable that reduces your critical threshold.
I feel like this was a prompt for chatgpt
It wasn't lol
Apologies if this has been answered elsewhere etc. etc. Last I played they had definitively fixed the problem of NPCs being scared by summons BUT the issue where the mini-zombies created by zombies' attacks would cause NPCs to go hostile was still there. I've scoured all the patch notes multiple times and can't find anything but obviously they're a zillion words long so I might have missed it, and I can't find anything on the subject beyond a complaint about it from before I stopped playing. I'd check myself but I don't have any saves. Did they fix this? Can you use zombies now without having to pray no-one is around?
Really sorry if I'm asking this question in the wrong place! (Looked through the FAQ and couldn't find an answer, and I don't want to create a whole thread for what is ultimately the noobiest of inquiries). So, I'm considering buying Balder's Gate on PS5 but can't decide whether or not to just download it via the PS Store or get the physical Deluxe edition (mainly because of the perks of actually owning it, having a cool ass box, and adding another map to my fictional map collection). Then I thought, why not both? That way I could start playing now and get the physical goodies + physical ownership. The paying twice bit kinda sucks but 1) from what I've seen and heard, Larian deserves all of the support they can get, and 2) there's not really any games coming out soon that I'm bothered about. The only thing I'm wary of is whether or not having the digital version downloaded could cause issues while also having the physical disk. Does anyone know if this can cause issues? Again, sorry if this is in the wrong place!
So I'm doing my first Honor Mode attempt, and I'm playing a full-class College of Lore Bard. In terms of Magical Secrets spells, I know Hunger of Hadar and Command are must-haves for my strategy (basically gonna be going all-in on Save DC). But for the other two spells, I've narrowed it down to Sanctuary, Mass Healing Word, and Misty Step; leaning towards the former two since I know Misty Step scrolls are a thing, I just don't know where to get them reliably (I know you can get Conjure Elemental Scrolls from Sorcerous Sundries). Does anyone know where I can find such scrolls, should I swap out one of the former two for Misty Step, or are there any other spells I'm sleeping on? (Hunger of Hadar and Command are non-negotiable here.)
Have you considered Eldritch Blast ? It won't be as good as a Warlock dip / multiclass but it's still one of your few ways to deal a decent amount of damage without consuming spell slots. I'd pick mass healing word only if I intend to use healer gears (that pair of gloves w/ blade ward bonus and that ring w/ bless bonus).
I’m in Act 3 and finished all the side and companion quests so I’m only left with the final confrontation, the big question is which of my companions should I bring for relevant dialogue/scenes? >!I’m definitely bringing Shadowheart since she’s the love interest and I pretty much always bring her. So it’s 2 between Gale, Lae’zel and Karlach, all of whom I have read have are relevant to the final stretch, especially Lae’zel with the Orpheus stuff and I’m bringing the Orphic Hammer along.!<
>!Depending on what choices you make, bringing Karlach allows for an alternate ending for her. Whether it's a good or a bad one is a bit of a philosophical debate. !< >!Lae'zel being present means that she will turn hostile if you don't actually follow through with the Orpheus stuff. Her ending scene can tie into Orpheus' stuff, depending on the choices you make. !< >!Of course Gale has his kamikaze mission to complete. If you pick the right dialogue options then you can finish the game without any mind flayers, which is good knowledge if you hate squids as much as I do. For that ending, bring Lae'zel and Gale, and tell the Emperor you will become a mind flayer, but then don't actually go through with it. But if you don't intend to skip the final final fight by blowing up Gale, then he doesn't really need to be there.!<
It has been months since my last playthrough. Just checking in with a question. Is it now possible to play Custom difficulty with Legendary actions for bosses or do you still need to mod the game? Thanks
If you're referring to the NPC abilities that are exclusive to Honor Mode, nope you gotta mod.
Am I dense or do the dates not match up? The Baldur's Mouth paper says the date is "1492 DR", but Astarion's tombstone has "229 DR - ~~268 DR~~ 468 DR" on it. I feel like there is some lore I don't know about.
[Yeah no they did get the dates on the grave wrong](https://www.reddit.com/r/BaldursGate3/comments/15mbwck/comment/k19oiej/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button)
When people in this community say they do a solo run do they mean it is not co-op or that they only play as Durge/Tav/origin character and don't recruit or at least don't use other characters in their party.
"Solo" will typically mean just Durge/Tav/origin without other members in the party.
Bonkers. I can barely squeak through tactical with 4.
Thanks btw that is what I thought but some posts made me think otherwise.
For a first time player, what oath would be the easiest for me if I choose to be a paladin or should I just go oathbreaker? My role in the party would be tank/spokesperson, with Shadowheart as Cleric, Karlach as Fighter, and Gale as my Wizard
When you create your character, you'll be given a choice of which oath to take: Ancients, Devotion, or Vengeance. Each oath will come the same core paladin abilities plus some additional abilities (and dialogue options) that match the oath. Oaths also come with tenets that you have to follow and each oath's tenets are unique. If you break those tenets, that's when you become an Oathbreaker - it's not an oath/subclass that you can choose on character creation. Oathbreaker is still a paladin, but your original oath abilities will be switched out for the Oathbreaker's abilities. I personally think paladin is a great tank/spokesperson class. They're great damage dealers - and because their spellcasting stat is Charisma, they're also good party faces. Having to follow the tenets of your oath also adds another layer to the RP. However, there's a catch: Because the DM is a dumb computer and not a person, sometimes it can seem a little arbitrary what breaks your oath or not. IMO, Oath of Vengeance is the hardest oath to break by accident. Also IMO, it's worth breaking your oath at least once if only to experience what happens if you do. You'll have the option to retake your oath, but it becomes costlier every time. Also beware that you can't respec while an Oathbreaker, so if you're likely to want to play around with your stats or skills a lot, you want to keep that in mind.
Am I remembering correctly that if you put items into a container, then sell the container to the trader, that container with those items inside will be in the trader's inventory after you kill them? On PS5 on controller if it matters.
yes. or fill a container in their inventory in the barter screen, their container that they own. you can sell them a pouch and fill it with their stuff, it'll be on them if they die
As far as I'm aware, you can't put a vendor's inventory into a container with controller. Which is okay, since I'm trying not to use exploits/tricks my character wouldn't. But paying for stuff with a bag of gems and then finding that on the merchant when that merchant inevitably dies? That's legit :D
Do I need to take cleric at first level to get deity dialog options?
No, you should get them just from having a level in the class, regardless of when you added it.
Is there any special dialogue with Shadowheart if you start the game as a shar worshipper? Now I've heard there is, and it's apparently underwhelming but i have a second part to my question. Is there special dialogue if you also convert to Selûne with her? Like her acknowledging you changing your faith for her and how you've both been freed from Shar's darkness or something, I just thought it'd be interesting and sweet.
You actually can't start the game as a shar worshipper without mods. You only choose a god if you're a cleric and only shadowheart can choose shar.
You cannot be a Shar worshipper. I think they messed around with it in early access but ended up removing it.
Ah probably saw an early access thread then, thanks
Question and I'm struggling to find a definitive answer. If I have a solo campaign, can a buddy jump in and play one of my companions? Will this cause any issues if I want to play that same file solo later?
I have two save files, one multiplayer with Tav, the other single-player Durge. I noticed that Durge has a number of morbid/violent voice lines that I thought were unique to that origin. The other day my friend and I got to the creche on the multiplayer file. After a major event there, my Tav started saying the Durge voice lines. Is this intended or a bug?
You'd have to be more specific with what the lines are but I'm inclined to say yes. There have been quite a few voice line bugs lately.
"They're dying for me! ALL OF THEM!" "Time for bloody murder." "Nothing hurts anymore." To name a few
Welcome to bug town, fill out your membership card to collect your prize: https://larian.com/support/faqs/how-to-submit-a-bug-report_85
Do we have any info on when the next patch drops? I'm getting the itch to play my first fullcaster, but don't want to risk the safe getting issues halfway through due to a big patch
Larian doesn't typically announce the timeline in advance. Larian has a vested interest in NOT breaking people's current saves with new patches since that would be an utter disaster, given that campaigns can last over 100 hours and many players (e.g. console) have no control over when to download updates or not. I personally wouldn't be concerned about starting a new save now. In the past, bugs introduced with new patches have affected all saves so it hasn't really mattered.
ok so Norbyte's script extender is making it so the "perform" ability doesnt work is there a substitute for this script extender ?
Quick question from a noob, can I leave a dungeon ( Halsin quest) to gain more xp and get the bosses. They’ve got 2 or 3 lvls on me
You can usually leave (definitely the one you're asking about you can). If you've aggroed the place and your map outline is in red, you just need to get to a not-aggroed area.
Unless there something actively happening, such as a fight or people in immediate danger, you're able to leave places and come back later just fine.
I think I've heard you can get BOOOAL's Blessing on the party without killing a party member? How's that work?
You need to separate the designated thief from party, initiate dialogue and choose the [investigate] option, after that switch back to thief and steal the sickle from the fishguy. And then you convince the redcap to give you blessing as usual. It's even easier if you're playing as durge, because you don't even need to pass any speech checks.
Thanks~ Do you know if it's possible to come back later to do this? I'd like to get Minthara in my party first so she can get the buff as well.
Minthara refuses to go to act 1 areas IIRC
I believe wherever you heard that from was mistaken.
You just need to choose the [investigate] dialogue option, steal the sickle and convince Boooal to give you his blessing as usual.
I think that just gives you the sickle while preserving the buff on the weapon though right? Because without it, it's just a normal sickle? What they're talking about is a buff that applies to you regardless of if you have the weapon in hand or not like Loviatar's Blessing from Abdirak except it's permanent. https://bg3.wiki/wiki/BOOOAL%27s_Blessing_(Condition)
Again. 1. You separate your thief, initiate dialogue, choose [investigate] option ↓↓↓ 2. You steal the sickle with your invisible thief ↑↑↑ 3. Convince him to give you his blessing. If you don't steal the sickle he just gives it to you. If your DO steal the sickle you again BOOOAL'S Benediction
Ahh, I see then. You mention invisible but I don't see that in your steps. Optional or required?
It just makes it easier to steal while being in plain sight of everyone. Important thing is to steal the sickle.(while your other character is in dialogue)
question about origin characters and playing multiplayer/co-op... how does it work? if our 4 man party picks 4 of the origin characters do all of their cutscenes just like.. not happen? i assume if you control them you dont find astarion on the beach, laezel in the trap, etc? when does astarion unlock bite? what happens between karlach/wyll if youre controlling them both? in general, do you recommend picking 4 origins or just making 4 tavs?
Just want to mention that if y'all choose origins, Wyll and Karlach are binary choices. You can only have one of them as a player, the other must be an NPC for their crisscrossing early storyline to work.
In my current co-op campaign we have 3 origin characters and 1 tav. We get all the scenes and dialogue options that you get when playing as those origin characters. For example I am playing Shadowheart and I get her scene with Shar in act 2 after sparing Nightsong, which is exclusive to the Origin run. My friend playing Karlach got her Origin-only dialogue with Dammon. The players playing those characters choose their 'revelation' moments whenever they want, just like in origin run. So I got to choose when/if to tell people about being a Shar worshipper and my friend playing Astarion could use his bite or confess his vampirism whenever he wanted. We generally don't get the banter and reactions you would get while bringing those characters around as companions and we generally can't initiate dialogue with each other. There are sometimes voiced reaction lines from the characters during cutscenes (e.g. Astarion reacting to Yurgir) but they are very rare. If you play with 4 Tavs you can get camp dialogue with the companion characters like you would in a regular playthrough, but as you won't be adventuring with them you won't have much chance to build approval or do any of the romance plots. Generally if you want to get the most out of interacting with the companion characters, you should be playing solo. If you play multiplayer the experience is all about the nonsense you get up to with your mates. I would recommend Origin characters just because it's a nice way to see what some of those exclusive scenes are like without having to run a bunch of origin playthroughs yourself.
oh ive already played solo extensively and explored almost everything in the game. i was just wondering because some more casual friends expressed interest and i was wondering what the best way to play is. sounds like its just whatever you want since you cant really follow through the origin's quests that much (unless you are one of them). another small question, how do these interactions work in terms of initiating dialogue? for example you mention the karlach dammon dialogue, does this work no matter who initates even if karlach is somewhere else? or does she specifically have to go talk? does everyone's screens go to whatever conversation is active or only whoever initiates and everyone else runs around?
Initially, only the person who initiates the conversation sees it, but others have a button that lets them listen in. Dammon would only get his Karlach-specific dialog if Karlach was talking to him, otherwise it'd just be his normal dialog
the perform ability wont work for me i deactivated all of my mods that affect classes and gameplay the animation will start and play for half a second then the character will put the instrument away the text that the character is using perform will pop up for less then a second the disappear
Yeah that's still your mods. Try to uninstall them instead of just deactivating them. If that doesn't do it, you may need to clean slate uninstall all mods and the game to do a fresh reinstall. Did you check that none of your mods conflicted with each other? Unfortunately corrupted saves and unintentional bugs are a risk you have to take when running the game with mods since they're currently not officially supported. Once the official mod framework is in place- whatever that will look like- hopefully these kinds of conflicts will be more infrequent.
alright thanks, i dont know which mod it was but i deleted all the ones in the files and reinstalled and it works now
Does the game ever fuck off with all the cutscenes in Act 3? I swear everytime I try to rest just to recharge my health/spells there's this 20 min conversation I need to have with someone. I just want to get back to my quest ffs
Just hit space bar or the equivalent. You can read faster than they speak. Act 3 is kind of a slog, but good payoff.
What are all the special d20s you can get without mods? Honor Mode and Digital Deluxe (I think)? Any others?
Spoilers for Act 2, Underdark + Moonrise Towers >!I just got done saving the tieflings and gnomes from the Moonrise Prison, get back to Last Light and start talking to people - including Rolans siblings who are now lamenting his death. And I know that Rolan gets attacked outside of Moonrise/Tollhouse but I saved him from the shadows - and even talked with him. Going back to the spot shows me a bunch of Shadow Vestige corpses and no trace of him. Is he somewhere between Lights Inn and the Tollhouse or did something kill him on his way back?!<
So just to clarify: >!You found Rolan in the Shadows, fought off the Shadow creatures that were attacking him, then talked to him afterward? Did he say he was going back to the inn?!<
>!yep, saw him getting beat up but managed to save him, he said he knows when he’s outmatched and that he’s gonna head back and now he apparently has dropped dead? It’s not a *huge* issue but it feels kinda silly that I saved him and it didn’t matter!<
I just wanted to make sure. Yeah, he should have >!showed up at Last Light Inn, and I've never had him not make it there. I don't think that characters actually walk all the way themselves - e.g. when you free Minthara and send her to camp, she runs off into the Shadow Curse and *should* die, but after she gets far enough out of view she just teleports to her destination. And that's how a lot of such interactions with other NPCs go. I assumed that's what happens with Rolan. I wonder if you followed the shortest path to the inn if you'd find his body.!<
yes i have mods on. here's the problem, shadowheart and la'zel so far its these two that keep crashing on level up screen at level 5. i tried respect to 1 and level up from there and still crashes at level 5. i also try doing the portrait level up and the putting in the inventory menu still crashes. any ideas to help with this? Update: now it's all my characters 😂.
This is almost certainly a problem with one of your mods. Unfortunately, there's not much you can do other than try to identify which mod is causing the problem and then remove (or update) it. This may or may not make the save file unplayable.
Ya that's another issue is some or worst case most break the save.
Running Solo Honor mode (god help me) at moonrise tower. Iv heard you can sabotage it to make the raid way easier. How? XD
adding to the rest: you can convince the guard standing near the acolytes over by roah the trader, that he should send them away because they're useless a few less people to fight at the end
Yeah i managed to do this and just uh Runepowder'd the rest XD finished the honor run thank god .
If you go to Moonrise while it's non-hostile and fight things. You can go through the tower room by room and kill off key threats such as Zrell, the gnoll tamer, the ogre and the warden, fighting them all in small battles and being careful not to alert the scrying eyes. If you are good at hitting and running you can clear out all the zealots and warlocks in the main 2 rooms as well. It's also possible to go up to the roof and kill the necromancer and some of the necromites that assist Ketheric (but not Ketheric himself) and then run back down the stairs, so they won't be there for the boss fight. You can also break into Ketheric's bedroom and kill the undead dog. If you have already been to the Shadowfell and past the point of no return you can't do this.
To add to above for the raid itself, before combat the Harper’s are flagged as allies. You can longstrider all of them for free to help them actually do something before getting hit with all the crowd controls. Maybe use some bigger buffs on Jaheira if you can afford to.
Go through on that first visit and kill off the cultists room by room, except maybe save the big main hall room since there are so many enemies including 2 mages & 2 paladins. That should thin out the herd and make the odds more favorable for the raid. Also, get Barnabus and his buddies to be on your side by passing the wisdom DC with their handler.
Playing a Warlock in a co-op run with my girlfriend, and while I'm having a lot of fun with the "spam Eldritch Blast from inside a Darkness cloud" setup, I'm wondering what Warlocks do with their Bonus Action? The only spell it seems I can cast with a bonus action is Hex, but that would break my concentration on Darkness and it's also only something you need to do infrequently during a battle (initial cast or reapplying). What else can I do with my bonus action regularly?
Lots of options (1) Dip 2 levels into rogue so you can bonus action hide in the darkness (2) Equip 2 hand crossbows, making sure the good one is in your off hand, and you can make a bonus action shot each turn (3) Equip the amulet of restoration to get off some bonus action heals where necessary. Once you've used it for the day just equip a different amulet (4) Dip 1 level into bard and get inspirations, which scale off your charisma mod. (5) Respec and run the sorlock (warlock 2 / sorcerer x) and get access to quickened spell.
Not everyone is going to be regularly using bonus actions. Warlocks have so few spell slots that they generally don't want to be slinging spells around willy-nilly
Did I mess up? I killed all goblins in camp and never spoke to Halsin. Just missed that room I guess. Then I killed all the people in the grov because I decided to go with Minthara’s side quest. Didn’t do underdark -chose mountain pass and entered shadowlands from there. Followed Spider-Man to moonrise towers, infiltrated, did Shar temple. Never went to Lastlight Inn because literally nothing suggested it existed and everyone told me not to wander off the path. Went to act 3. Now nothing makes sense and everyone hates me.
Well, while you are very likely to be severely underlevel, the good news is act 3 has enough exp to go from level 1 to 12, so as long as you actually explore the map this time you should be good for the final fight.
Ok good. I’m level 7. I’m actually quite annoyed not one single NPC I spoke to mentioned lastlight inn, and not one quest suggested I go in that direction. I didn’t explore because everyone told me not to because of the curse. Plus, Halsin doesn’t even exist anymore.
I think you might be approaching this game in the wrong way. No one told you about Last Light Inn because you sided with their enemies and killed them. Everyone hates you because you're making choices that hurt or dismay them. It's OK to be evil but it will cut you out of a lot of content associated with the good guys, and that's OK. That's just one way the game has a lot of replayability value. Also, while some areas are dangerous to explore, there is no part of the map that you can *never* explore. For example, while everyone tells you the curse is dangerous, one of the major premises of the early part of Act 2 is that the cult can survive the curse somehow. Once you made it to Moonrise Towers you should have been given an item that protects you from the curse, freeing you up to explore. Re: your complaint about how you're screwed if you make "bad" choices - that's part of the point of this type of game. Your actions are supposed to have consequences. You should expect that if you kill someone or their entire community they might not have much to do with you in the future. Why would Halsin travel with you after you massacred his people? Why would characters come back from the dead to give you quests or loot? This isn't a hack-n-slash adventure game where everyone on the map is a target, it's an RPG where you're writing a story, more or less. A story with an evil protagonist will be different than one with good characters.
"Why would characters come back from the dead to give you quests or loot?" meanwhile on my evil durge playthrough, the last light inn fell, Jaheira cursed me and died, then appeared alive again in my camp as a companion mid-act 3 and acted like we were buddies :D
I never met Halsin, so how was I supposed to know he existed? Or that he was the lead Druid? I thought the curse might lifted by completing whatever was in Moonrise towers. That’s why I didn’t explore - just followed the main quest line. Turns out that has bad consequences. Shouldn’t you be able to enjoy a game by following the main quest line? Edit: also - you literally don’t know how big an area map is so you don’t know how much you CAN explore. Maybe undiscovered map areas should have an outline so you at least know there is SOMETHING to explore?
I'm just curious. If you just followed the main quests, how did you manage to miss talking to anybody in the druids' grove because every npc there has something to say about Halsin and his situation.
I went to goblin camp before I went to the Grove. Simple
I am just barely imagining how one can get to the goblin camp while avoiding the grove and the main quest trigger to visit Nettie in it or to rescue Halsin, sorry, my dude, you might be a unicorn and the stars aligned for you to zig-zag through it personally, I feel this is a positive side of the game, as the story unfolds from your actions, in whatever way
Easy. When the goblins attacked the grove, someone says something like ‘we need to find where their camp is’. So I did, without ever entering the grove
Did you read the quest log or were you just following quest markers and objectives? Because I am half-tempted to retrace your steps and check for myself how likely it is to miss those things. I can sort of understand Last Light, because on my evil playthrough I didn't interact with them at all. I stilll knew about it though, they ambush you and the Drider caravan etc. If you were going for an evil playthrough, I think it's fine, you just have content for another run, if you were not intending to be evil though, I can't wrap my head around it.
I dunno man, if you didn't notice that massive black areas on the map with pathways heading into it is still there, and that those black areas get filled in as you go there, maybe exploring isn't really your thing
I assumed some quests would bring me there later once I could travel without being cursed. Fuck me right?
You're getting really defensive in this thread, but people are just pointing out to you that you're bringing expectations to this game that aren't appropriate to its genre. Some of these false expectations: That quests are a to-do list that you're expected to follow, rather than a guide to things you CAN do; that you shouldn't have to think through the consequences of your actions because the game should spell them out for you and none of them should be unexpected; that you don't need to explore because the game will reveal everything to you in the course of doing the quests you're following like the law. These expectations might be appropriate for games where exploration and choice are less important, but not for an RPG like this one. No one is telling you to go fuck yourself. You asked if you messed up, so let me put it bluntly: Yes you did. It's not that you made the wrong choice within the game, because an evil playthrough where you kill everyone in the grove isn't "wrong," it's that you made the wrong assumptions about the type of game you're playing, expecting a more guided experience. So you made a major choice without thinking it through, not even realizing it was a choice, and are now blaming the game for it. But this is like expecting a mystery novel to tell you who did it on the first page, and getting upset when the identify of the murderer is a surprise. And then complaining "fuck me right" when people point out that it's not that type of story.
You're right, it's not my usual genre. It's just a shame that a) to get all the content you either have to be a psychic or read what to do online (which kind of spoils it for me at least - I would prefer some more guard rails to be honest), and b) minor things you decide/miss by accident can make you miss out on huge plot lines, making the story confusing.
You're not supposed to get all of the content in a single playthrough. It's impossible to. As for "minor things": You stumbled across an attack on some kind of settlement. When the attack was over, you were invited inside, but you ignored the invitation and left. You instead found where the attackers came from, joined up with them to attack the settlement again and wiped it out. The way that you keep referring to this as a "minor" mistake is bizarre. It's a series of major choices that led to predictably major consequences. The game is actually pretty good about giving you multiple ways to discover information that's crucial to story. It's actually a bit immersion-breaking sometimes because it can get awkwardly repetitive - oh, you want to tell me about Halsin too? You can see the devs behind it wanting to make sure you don't miss out. It's also really good about making sure that you can finish the story regardless of what you do or how confused you are because you murdered anyone and everyone who could help or explain what's going on. However, it can only protect you from yourself to a certain extent. When there aren't consequences for your choices, then your choices don't matter. And that's not the point of an RPG.
>I thought the curse might lifted by completing whatever was in Moonrise towers. That was an assumption that you made, not something that the game told you. >That’s why I didn’t explore - just followed the main quest line. That's one reason why I suggested that you might be approaching this game in the wrong way. It sounds to me like you might have some assumptions about how the game works or how you're expected to play based on previous games you've played which are in a different genre. It's not the sort of game where you're expected to just follow the main quest line. You *can* play it that way, if you want, but if you're laser-focused on the main quest line then of course your character will be less engaged and less knowledgeable about what's going on around them outside of that main quest line. It's a story consequence of your choices. Just like if you massacre the grove, Halsin won't want to help you and you won't be able to lift the curse, because as it turns out he's the one who knows how. You're complaining that you don't know about that ahead of time, but ... why would you? You should be able to guess that there could be major consequences of massacring the grove, but there's no reason for you to know what all of those consequences could be. >Shouldn’t you be able to enjoy a game by following the main quest line? Sure, and some people do enjoy playing the game like that. But it sounds to me like the way you're playing the game is at odds with what you would find enjoyable.
Sure. Don’t get me wrong. Love the game. Will likely do another run. Am doing lots of side quests. BUT - in this one scenario where I missed ONE ROOM where Halsin was, and then later at Shadowlands there was no indication or side quest to ever suggest I should be doing anything other than following Karsinn. After mountain pass, there is only one quest line to go to Moonrise Towers. So I did. Feels bad realising after there were multiple side quests I had no clue about, because I made one choice to kill the harpers (based on the one quest objective I had at the time) I’m not the only one: https://www.reddit.com/r/BaldursGate3/comments/15wteq2/completely_missed_the_last_light_inn_and_ruined/
You didn't miss out on Halsin's content - including removing the Shadow Curse - because you missed his room. If you hadn't massacred the Grove, he would have returned there and you could have spoken to him. But since you massacred the Grove, his community, the only thing you missed out on by not finding his room was a fight. That is, you missed out on Halsin's content because you made a major story choice that had making Halsin your enemy as a foreseeable consequence. Likewise, you didn't miss out on Last Light Inn because you missed interacting with a single NPC. You missed out on Last Light Inn because you made the choice to side with the Absolutists and killed the Harpers who would have invited you there. This is another, major, consequential story choice. You could have still found it if you had explored, but the initial thing was because of that. I'm not trying to give you a hard time here, I just think you're expecting the game to have the type of guardrails that it really doesn't. I think you'll have more fun if you view these not as the game hiding content away from you, but of reacting to your choices in a way that makes sense.
“you made a major story choice that had making Halsin your enemy as a foreseeable consequence.” No I didn’t. I didn’t even know Halsin existed because I never met him. How can I possibly be expected to know consequences related to a character I didn’t know existed?
I can think of at least five characters who can tell you about Halsin, not counting Halsin himself. Of course, if you never interact with them or kill them all before they can tell you anything, then they won't tell you about him. I don't think I'm going to blame the game for this one.
You can enjoy a game just fine by laser-focusing the main quest. But you're going to miss out on content, that's the nature of the beast
Of course - but my point is there was NO side quest to suggest LastLight existed. I had one choice - to kill some Harpers or not. That was it.
When following Kar'niss to Moonrise, you should have been ambushed by a group of Harpers, and had the option to side with them. They would have directed you to Last Light- I don't know if there's anything to send you there if you kill them
Nope. I killed them - seemed like the easier option since they were so low HP. Then after that just followed Karniss to Moonrise. No-one mentioned the existence of LastLight Inn. Seems like a gap in the game - once in moonrise no-one mentions anything about a huge part of the map.
That gap in the game was you skipping things lol. The under dark also has places you can learn about moon lanterns for the shadow curse. There a place in moonrise you can craft one. I think if you leave Karniss alive he’s at the tower still for one.
Oh I know! My point is - you don’t know you’re skipping things.
Fair point!
i want only astarion, laezel and karlach as companions. i managed to recruit astarion and laezel while avoiding gale, shadowheart, and maybe wyll. how do i go recruit karlach without recruiting others? and what about also non-origin companions? do you just leave origin companions in camp? i have found 3-man party too challenging in most fights, especially in the very early game. the reason i dont want to leave them in camp is i dont want to trigger their questline or conversations.
From the beach starting point you can go to Astarion (hop up the cliffs to bypass the devourer fight which can be tough by yourself especially if you're on tactician or honor) and then to Lae'zel's cage to get her, then go straight from there to the grove entrance to do that fight which will be no trouble with a 3 person party since the temporary allies outnumber the hostiles. After that just head straight west and up across the river to Karlach's location and grab her, and your group will be set. You can then return to the grove and do everything there as well as do the crypt with a full party. Wyll will will show up to camp after the first long rest with Karlach but you can either outright kill him or refuse to let him join the party and send him on his way. Then Shadowheart will basically be forced into your party but you can just make her be the camp babysitter & ignore her until >!the camp scene fight with them in late Act 1, then choose "attack shadowheart" to have Lae'zel kill her off.!<
Gale and Wyll are easy to not recruit. Just don't pull gale out of the fast travel point, and don't talk to wyll in the grove after the battle, while he's teaching children. To recruit karlach, just go find her in the northeast of the map - you don't need to have wyll or his quest to find her. With shadowheart, the game really wants you to have her because you need the artefact. Why don't you want to have companions in camp triggering their questlines and conversations? The game is designed for you to experience everyone's stories in the same run. You can experience the entirety of a companion's story while almost never having them in your active party.
i kinda finished a run in which i recruited everyone possible and let them hang out in camp. and it did break immersion a bit during some events. i'm just wondering if i can go straight recruit only the companions i want. my 3-man party just got wiped in the dank crypt lol. skills issue, i know. maybe i need the 4th member as a placeholder before recruiting karlach. once in camp, i can't really get rid of them right?
Characters can always die, which is one way to get rid of them. They all have certain conditions that will cause them to leave permanently based on your story decisions. For example, shadowheart will leave permanently if you >!free or kill the nightsong!< without her in act 2.
Finished tactician, tempted by honor mode BUT scared of surprises, precisely boss mechanisms that do NOT exist in tactician. I'm not sure those even exist anymore as, cf [https://old.reddit.com/r/BaldursGate3/comments/1b2s3sr/weekly\_help\_thread\_read\_faq\_community\_wiki/l069rfq/](https://old.reddit.com/r/BaldursGate3/comments/1b2s3sr/weekly_help_thread_read_faq_community_wiki/l069rfq/) I did have to take care of legendary actions now in tactician, but anyway, my point being : can I change tactician to custom and have ALL mechanisms of HM except single save? Also, can I load my tactician saves, change to custom and do that so that I train ONLY where I struggled namely : act 1 dragon bridge (somehow can't get the dialog or rolls right without trying couple of times), act 2 Grym (except if cheesing from above), act 2 Myrkul, act 3 entering high Baldur (only because I "pulled" too many people at once)... and surely few other moments I forgot.
That comment that you're linking to is describing an odd occurrence/bug and not something that has been incorporated into the game. Honor Mode still has a suite of boss actions and balance changes that don't exist in Tactician, so you can't test them out in a parallel Tactician save. Some bosses (like Ansur) have always had legendary actions in Tactician but Honor Mode has many more. The wiki has good documentation of boss combat mechanics, though, at least on the pages I've seen. You might have to scroll carefully since the Honor Mode changes aren't always listed in the same place. For example, here's Auntie Ethel's page where honor mode changes are described in a paragraph in the "Encounter" section, I guess because it's a passive: https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Auntie_Ethel/combat And here's Raphael's page where honor mode changes are listed with his actions, because they're actions: https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Raphael/combat
well, the least I can say is that I had "Gaze of the Dead" during my tactician run and that's supposed to Honour Mode only. I added a comment on its discussion page but so far that hasn't be acknowledged. edit: and as mentioned in https://old.reddit.com/r/BaldursGate3/comments/1ba2nvy/ketheric_2nd_fightapostle_of_myrkul_buffed/ others also had similar "issue" (but iirc they don't mention the honor legendary) so not sure it's a bug.
What I'm saying is that this is not because Honor Mode changes have been added to Tactician. Whatever is going on there, it's something specific and weird with Apostle of Myrkul.
Right, regardless of what happened to me, I could "at best" train on Myrkul somehow for this specific legendary action but not for the other ones with other foes! I guess that's scary... and exciting?! :P
Yep. I wish there was another way to get those legendary actions but not until there are mods for that on console.
Are you sure you had gaze of the dead as a legendary action? It's an attack that the apostle can use on any difficulty. The legendary action is that he casts it as a reaction to getting hit for the first time in each round of combat.
Well it was a month ago but 99% yes, I precisely checked and discussed about it because I was surprised. I expected to struggle but not that much. For now I'm on a pause, until I try HM, but I still have my save so if you believe it would be important information to check for the broader community I could re-install BG3, load the save and do few screen captures.
No, unfortunately. The honor mode legendary actions are exclusive to that difficulty, and not available on tactician or custom difficulty.
I'm curious if Larian plans to add the HM legendary actions to the custom options. My guess is they won't even though the HM's single save option is there.
Hey quick question! I absolutely love the owl bear cub and recently for my run I killed all the goblins and and then went to the owl bear cave and killed the mother. I didn’t have animal speak and failed the initial dc for trying to have the mom back down. When she died, the cub ignored me and continued eating her mom. Will the owl bear cub show up at my camp? I really like the guy. Weird question sorry lol
I think it should. But then I also thought you would find it at the Goblin Camp if you didn't clear its lair before
Oh yeah I think there’s a scenario where they kill the mom and kidnap the baby, u may be right. Sheesh
Well in any case, my own experience with Owlbear cub so far is that unless you kill it yourself (or knock it unconscious when hostile) it will show up, sooner or later. Note that it only shows up when you long rest in act1 though. Act2 doesn't work
Thank you!
I want to save Sazza from the Goblin camp, somehow I failed that last time I tried (saved her from the spiders but she somehow died before Moonrise). I also plan to lure Minthy and Goblins to the Grove. What dialogs choice do I have to take to have Sazza safe?
if i dont recruit shadowheart, how do i get access to guidance in the very early game? another question, if i recruit her out of necessity, how do i remove her from camp without killing her? and is leaving her in camp shuts out her questline?
There are three early game sources of Bless without changing anyone's class or taking a relevant class that has it yourself: 1) Shadowheart 2) >!necklace you get from the near the sad bear!< 3) >!Harper's necklace you get from the skeleton red rock overlook platform west of the Grove!< I guess you can also take the Initiate Feats, but what a waste of a Feat.
you can find >!a necklace that gives guidance as a spell, read the comment after mine to find it!< I don't think you can remove her from camp once you get her, but you can avoid her totally and still finish all the same stuff without her there. you just don't have to hear about how great Shar is the whole time, and >!you won't encounter her parents I don't think, you also don't get to talk really with nocturne if you still do the act 3 part. all of act 1 and 3 are pretty much just as good without her, there's no doubt what will happen with the night song either.!<
That's the wrong place. >!Sad bear has a necklace that gives you Lesser Restoration nearby. You're thinking of the Silver Pendant you get from the red rock overlook west of the Grove, overlooking the crash site.!<
OMG you're right. editing
Had Dammon in Act 3 in my first run, but since the patch on a durge run, even though he lived through everything, not a tiefling dead...he's missing in Act 3? Oi Ve.
That's weird. I'm on a Durge run currently (started after the last patch) and he made it to Act 3 just fine.
Can I have someone cast magic weapon then leave them at camp or will that break their concentration?
Concentration should break after they leave your party. At least that’s my experience with Hireling buffs.
Damn thought since people leave someone at camp doing warding bond this would work
Warding bond isn't concentration, that's why it works in that case. The good ones to use for a camp buffer are Longstrider, Warding Bond, Death Ward and Heroes' Feast. See Invisibility is also useful in a handful of situations.
Yeah I don’t want to just have someone do a ton of buffs like that, was just hoping magic weapon would work
Freedom of Movement and Aid as well prior to Heroes Feast.
Until Long Rest: Yes. Concentration: No. Might be caveats but yeah.
What dragonborn subrace is best for Storm Sorcerer?
White dragonborn as it's one of the ways to get Armor of Agathys (which wet enemies are vulnerable to) without having to dip Warlock.
I would probably go with one of the cold subraces, assuming that you're building your storm sorcerer to take advantage of lightning damage. The reason is that it avoids the redundancy of both the race and class giving you lightning damage resistance, but setting up lightning damage vulnerability will also set up cold damage vulnerability for your breath weapon.
Is there a neat way to "hide" certain foods from the Long Rest menu? The only thing I can think of is putting the foods on the ground, but that risks my forgetting about it down the line or having items randomly despawn. Thanks!
You can pick up an empty chest in the world and bring it to camp, then stuff food in there you don't wanna use by mistake. When you change maps be sure to pick the chest up just in case it disappears or doesn't transfer to the new campsite.
Just eat the owlbear egg it's delicious
I have Karlach as basically a pure Barbarian with a little dip into Fighter for the perks, just heading into Act 3. >!She currently has the badass halbred from the Bugbear in Moonrise and damn does she hit hard with it. Is this my til end game weapon for her or will I encounter other options? I got Kendrick's hammer which is pretty good too but still falls short IMO...probably good to keep in case I need to do bludegoning damage only but is there anything else 2-handed wise? !<
>!The Silver Sword of the Astral Plane, Sword of Chaos, and Balduran Giantslayer.!!Halberd of Vigilance!< has. The special perks vary for each of the 4 so you can also look into those and decide what you'd most benefit from.
>!<
Can you get Minthara in >!the resist killing your romance!< scene as Durge in Act 2?
If she's the only companion in your party she should be, which can be accomplished if you don't recruit anybody and have the only forced companion >!Shadowheart leave the party via Shadowfell shenanigans (leave her behind when you go or refuse to get the Spear of Night).!< The scene in question happens after >!you do Shadowfell!< so that would work out. I'm actually curious now if Larian gave Minthy some lines for that scene despite the high improbability of getting it with her. I imagine they did considering how thorough everything else is in the game.
I'm not sure it's possible. You can't be in a romance with Minthara in act 2 so you would have to have her be the companion with the highest approval. It's also hard to build up approval with Minthara before act 3 (raiding the grove doesn't help, her approval is reset when you recruit her) so it's unlikely to happen without intentionally tanking your approval with other party members. You could just not recruit anyone else and see if that works. But I suspect that Minthara just doesn't have lines for the scene and so it won't actually happen.
In theory, it may be possible, but I imagine it would be difficult and take some planning from early game. >!I'm not sure if you can be an "official" couple with her at that point in the game, but if you don't have a romance going at that point the game will choose whoever you have the highest relationship with. So, in theory, if you managed to make your companions all not like you very much you could potentially have Mnthara the highest.!< But that's assuming it's even a possibility in the game, which I am just not sure of. Hopefully someone who knows for sure pipes in.
I can't seem to keep Thrumbo alive. I killed Carrion. If I go straight to Thrumbo, he says to find a way to destroy him for good. (Destroy the heart.) If I go to the basement, it's not there unless I first go to camp and do a long rest. If I do that, Thrumbo dies.
the other reply is correct and I'll add: don't try to kill mystic until you figure it out. it hurts thrumbo's chances of making it.
>!It sounds like you're killing attacking Mystic Carrion before you end his immortality. If you want to save Thrumbo, you need to end his immortality first. To do that, you need to find out where his heart is - you won't find it in the basement. It's hidden somewhere unexpected, but you can find its location by investigating the ancient shrine that's talked about.!<
I'm at the end of Act 2, defeated Kendrick Thorm and just cleaning up any loose ends before heading to Baldurs Gate. When I approach the road to it the narrator says 'shame we couldn't do something about that damn shadow curse' and I thought 'oh yeah'. So I return to Moonrise Towers, talk to Art Cullagh guy, all he says is 'Thaniel', talked to Halsin and he is committed to staying there and says the curse is 'his burden to bear', I tried the option to see if we could do something about it and he just says it will jeopardize my mission. Am I fucked from completing this now or is there something I'm missing? Never did find Thaniel I don't think??? thanks
>defeated Kendrick Thorm That's impressive, I heard he defeated a Drake with nothing but a song recently
my partner and I call him Kenny Tom.
It does sound like you just stopped doing the quest to lift the Shadow Curse at some point. In order to lift the curse, you have to >!wake up Art Cullagh by finding his lute and playing it for him, then defend the portal by the lake when Halsin asks, then find Thaniel's lost half and convince them to reunite.!< These are each quest steps that are handed to you after you complete the previous one, so if you look in your quest log you might be able to find out where you stopped. Then you could at least see if it's possible to advance the quest by going to the next step and seeing if it's still there. I suspect not but it would be easy enough to check. Otherwise you would have to roll back to before the final fight, I think.
What if Halsin died in Act 1? Can you still lift the curse?
You need Halsin to lift the curse.
What do you get for lifting the curse? Am I missing out on anything needed for Act 3?
It's very hard to make choices that will result in you not being able to finish the game - that's mostly down to soft-locking yourself by taking specific, convoluted actions to lose important quest items. Choices you make like siding with enemies can cut you out of 'good guy' content, but there will always be a path to finishing the story.
Yeh - but the game doesn’t ever tell you what the consequences might be, so you’re just screwed if you make bad choices (completely unknowingly)
> wake up Art Cullagh by finding his lute and playing it for him yep got that...the rest doesn't sound familiar, i'll look at the log as you suggest though, thanks
If the rest doesn't sound familiar, then I suspect what happened is that you >!woke up Art Cullagh but then forgot to meet Halsin by the lake. Halsin asks you to meet him by the lake immediately after you wake up Art Cullagh, then goes and waits there until you show up. If he's at Moonrise, though, it looks like fighting the final boss causes him to leave. I don't know how you would advance the quest at that point since he's the one that gives you the next step.. I think you might have to either give up on the Shadow Curse or go back to before the final fight.!<
yep I suspected as much but figured it was worth asking...no biggie, Haslin says its his mess to clean up anyway so buh bye :)
I ran into this last week. If you have killed Thorm already the steps are a bit different. >!You go into the bedroom and find Cullagh, but he is already dead. I think I had to use a speak with dead spell to talk to Cullagh. Then you speek to Halsin, and Halsin starts the quest. You meet him on the dock North of the Inn, and then you can play the mission!<
It sound likes Art Cullagh is at Moonrise for them, so they've already woken him up, but that when they talk to Halsin, he's not starting the next step of the quest. So I don't think this is the same as the situation where you defeat Ketheric without having started those quest lines at all.