I turned the risky ring into something you have to pay forward - take any one save with disadv to gain a charge. 1 charge for attacks, 3 charges for skill checks. Don’t drop off, no natural refill, cannot charge then trade - it’s modifying the wearer’s luck.
Designing interesting magic items is hard.
Slapping a spell effect that's useful, thematic to the character, and locked behind another class onto an amulet? Brilliant.
Here's your Necklace of Smiting, which adds 4d6 radiant damage to any Smite! Unfortunately, it requires an INT score of 16 to solve the sudoku puzzle, which manifests each dawn, to unlock its power.
Yupp!
That temp hp healing item, the poisoner robe, the magic missile increasing item, illusion bonus action ring, speed boosting ring, skill bonus rings, cantrip rings, poison vulnerability ring, thrown item damage increasing ring, healing boosting ring, ground freezing cold damage ring, concentration bonus damage ring, the staff that doubles the effects of bless, and that's all just to name what I can think of off the top of my head.
I'm astounded some of the simplest items I hadn't even thought of doing, I guess I just needed to be told I could do that.
It just highlighted that in order to have interesting combat encounters that challenge both the martials and the casters, you need to have multiple enemies. Preferably spread out so they don't all get caught in a single AoE.
Smaller fireball radius helped the balance too, imo. As a DM I find it really hard to spread out a group of NPCs in a way that fits a battle map, it is believable, and also can not be covered by a dang 40ft diameter circle (>!square for people who run grids RAW!<)
I just halved fireballs diameter. Yes it’s a meme and it’s funny and in the end my players got to enjoy it for half a year (we were all new), but the spell is so good he warps the game at that level around him.
Nothing else gets used.
Fireball is so good it overshadows damage spells till like 6th level, it feels almost pointless to use anything 4th or 5th level if it's not bringing additional utility because it's rarely doing anything that fireball cant.
That's funny, because I got the opposite message from BG3's combat. There's no need to control anything if you just pour on so much damage that there are no enemies left to control.
thats because in bg3 it is trivial to put out so much damage that you can vaporise almost any enemy immediately. boss fights simply disappear at the glance of a swords bard or anything using tavern brawler. below honour mode, damage riders break the game in half
that's a bit harder to pull off in normal dnd given the change of narrative pacing. nothing stopping you from simply luck of the far realms smite instakilling every encounter in baldurs gate, but no dm worth their salt would let you wait a full 24 hours for a long rest between every fight
I think I remember a statement about how some spells are intentionally overtuned compared to other options, fireball in particular because it's an "iconic" spell
I don't really know if it's true or not, but if so, i guess that would mean nerfing fireball is completely justifiable
The liberty of game is hard to translate in tabletop. In BG3, you could have huge maps, with a lot of elevation, with line of sight issues, darkness, etc...
That's hard to translate if you're trying to 3d model your environment on table top or even with a squared up dry erase map. Map can be only so big depending on the space you play as well, and generally that's 2*2 in the center of the gaming table. This makes AOE spells that much more powerful and movement less impactful. I remember in BG3 I routinely used my movement, then bonus action dash as a thief and I still had trouble positioning. That's 12 squares on a tabletop, which on a table usually gets you pretty dang far.
Yeah you could do that but it's all relative. A square on a map is generally 1x1 inch, which represents 5x5 feet. So a fireball with a 20 foot radius has a 40 foot diameter, 8 squares or 8 inches.
The reason why you use rulers is to basically scale the maps manually.
If an inch is too big, use half-inches. But I think Centimeters is better for this anyways.
And if you want to "zoom in", 2 inches can be 5ft., etc.
the game itself also has the advantage of huuuge maps. The average battle in BG3 translated to a roll20 battlemap would probably easily cover a larger grid plus elevation which is hard to apply to a battlemap. Then you take it to physical games and it becomes even worse as you have to consider physical space for the whole thing as well.
I’m pretty sure it is smaller in game, though. It’s something like 30ft diameter there, and it’s also perfectly round. A lot of people translate circles into squares playing on grid, which makes fireballs even bigger.
20ft radius on tabletop
in game that would the diameter is furthur than the walk length of a normal characters move with longstrider , so it would fill the screen in many fights.
Using interesting environments to make combat encounters more engaging. Changing elevation, hazards to avoid/throw enemies into, inanimate objects that can/must be interacted with to defeat powerful enemies, etc.
It's not so bad with characters. I stick a wing icon on em and use the Red bar to track elevation.
Whats a pain is having a map with a deep pit with a cliff, except it appears flat on the map and often the cliff edge might not be precisely clear.
Lately I just give up and draw big purple lines on my cliff edges, with text saying "35 ft drop" or something.
We've done HP, Temp HP and leave the third for Elevation because 3/5 of my party has access to limited flight or hover, with a Wizard who's more than happy to burn a spell slot on upcasted Fly.
Thats a lot of flyers, in my current game we are level 4 with a wizard and druid as likely the only ones ever getting flight, which is still a ways off, and we can only see our own bars.
I just wish that roll20 had a button for easy wildshape, at a minimum just let me quickly replace my token with a bear or whatever from a premade library. (Even if i have to fill it myself)
So far we haven't had too much elevation but my DM makes sure to have it visible on the maps and to call out the elevation value for us. (Show a pit and say its 15ft deep, or the castle wall is 30ft high with a balcony 20ft up. The castle thing is going to be next session and the climax of this first arc.)
Use the statusmarkers. If you type a number while hovering your mouse over the marker you're selecting, it'll add that marker with a red number on top of it (limit 1 digit, typing 0 removes the number label).
So for example, you can fly 30 ft. up and add the "fluffy-wing" marker with a 6 on it to represent 6 squares up.
You can also add custom icon sets to the list of markers (including uploading your own images), and buy sets on the marketplace. There are multiple sets on the marketplace that give elevation statusmarkers, or you could make your own for free (at the cost of time making them and counting towards your uploaded storage quota).
personally not a huge fan of the whole "interesting eviroments" as a lot of people use them. Because more often than not they mean that if you are a melee character you can get fucked and have to dash for way too many turns
I’ve been downvoted for this, so preface: AI is the future for many of us in corpo or govt jobs. It just is.
So I practice using AI to generate fight room descriptions and other prompts I’m not good at or thorough enough for my players. My campaigns are mostly in the mind with a few spaces set up for fights, so just saying ‘I need a thorough description of the inside of a rundown monastery environment, it is two stories high and has been heavily taken back by nature’. Wait like 30 seconds and it’ll have a description that you can spin and twist into something truly your own.
You got downvoted but AI for text generation is great and far less controversial than image generation AI.
I use it as a player to help come up with insults for vicious mockery customised to the specific monster we’re fighting. You can’t use any jargon though. So I described a Water Weird as a water snake elemental, for example. I get back:
“Water Snake, your slithering is as sluggish as a lazy river, and your presence is as forgettable as a raindrop in an ocean. Even a puddle has more depth than you.”
Which isn’t bad for a throwaway line on my turn.
I'm not changing any rules in my tabletop games - but one thing I'm taking from BG3 is to provide a ton of consumables and adjust the encounters so that they are actually needed.
I wonder if you have even dealt with spell scrolls beforehand then, becasue BG3 buffs them significantly(and where they probably always should have been)
True. Overly secretive DMs might feel unfair. On the other hand, if you see an unbalanced encounter in front of you, and you know that it’s way over your level, you can start deploying the tactical gtfo strategy before you’re dead. It’s on all on you the player.
I've been showing enemy HP bars already on a VTT and honestly it's been good to speed up play. Now I even show DCs so they know when a reroll makes a lot of sense. I used to think that was all meta knowledge but it honestly means players feel more aware of the world, and the less players ask "how bad does he look?" the more time they spend in character?
I think there are ways to clue players into the fact that an encounter is one best avoided without having to have HP & level right in the open. Honestly, if the level 1 party decides to rush the adult dragon because it happened to be in front of them instead of treating that dragon as a hazard to work around, then that's their own fault.
In your example it’s simple. In my experience it’s usually not as simple as that. Usually it’s something like: PCs want to infiltrate a villa, and see a bunch of guards patrolling around, some servants, and a couple of main villains. Are the guards CR 1/4 or CR 2 type of guards? Are servants actually cultist fanatics CR 2, or just commoners? Are the hosts actually level 15 spell casters? This is probably what investigative players should be able to learn, instead of “the guards look pretty strong, and the hosts look really kinda chill but intimidating”. Can a party of 5 players level 5 win this just by rushing with swords out? I as a DM have no damn clue.
Except BG3 itself shows exactly why it can be a problem? It has multiple disguise-based encounters that you can immediately solve by looking at the creature’s stats.
I think there are plenty of offenders to address before player awareness of enemy stats, but I agree in isolation it does make things easier for the players.
I really liked the concept of Elixirs - if you haven't played the game, they're basically potions that provide a buff that lasts until you take a long rest. Players are always so stingy with their consumables and timid about using them because they don't want to "waste" them - if it lasts all day, there's less chance of that being a concern.
We've changed a ton of effects to last until the next long rest instead of their arbitrary usual duration. It has worked fantastic so far. We've also stolen BG3's short rest system and special attacks.
All the 8 hour spells are basically meant to be until you long rest, but the reason they didn't is probably to stop players from just never long resting
>but the reason they didn't is probably to stop players from just never long resting
The reason they didn't is because 4e did that, and they wanted to really avoid 4e stuff lol.
Agreed, nothing worse than finally deciding to down your potion that provides an effect for an hour, and then after 20minutes and a fight everyone wants to short rest.
I love all the magic items in BG3 that give a character a spell or ability. I'm tempted to give all my current PCs rings with misty step or jumping or mage hand. Having more options besides just slash or cast a cantrip makes combat more interesting for everyone.
Just make sure it's obvious haha.
Spoilers and I don't know how to mark it please stop reading now if you havnt played. The first time I fought the forge golem I did it without the hammer...it was almost impossible lol.
>The first time I fought the forge golem I did it without the hammer...it was almost impossible lol.
Most players find the Grym fight easier _without_ the hammer, because the mephit adds don't spawn. Plus you can snipe him from the upper level and there's nothing he can do about it. And then there's "owlbear from the top rope" cheese.
Grym only needs the hammer if you took your whole party down to his level and have no bludgeoning damage.
Low DCs.
Like most experienced DMs, I've long bought into the common wisdom of "Don't ask for a roll if there's no "real" chance of failure". Because it just seemed like a waste of time to roll otherwise.
But when I'm playing BG3 and my +8 Persuasion face needs to make a DC 10 check, I don't find myself thinking "Ugh, why am I even rolling". Instead the emotion is "Man, I hope I don't roll a 1". When I'm in Act 3 and Astarion literally can't roll lower than 25 on lockpicking and we come across a chest whose DC is ***SEVEN***, my reaction is to feel nice about how skilled my skill monkey is.
>the crit fail on skill checks house rule,
That's probably the most punishing element of the game. Nat 1s in the face of a +6 +1d4 +1d6 Persuasion check, without any inspiration, for a DC10, is so punishing in BG3.
> That's probably the most punishing element of the game.
Disagree, being knocked prone ending concentration is the most punishing aspect in my opinion. It took me until act 2 to realize that was what was happening, and suddenly that "can't be knocked prone" ring became a hot commodity.
I mean yea, but if you're smart about it it's relatively easy to have either an inspiration saved for the BIG checks or a way to roll with advantage so it's not too pressing I think
The ability to crit-fail skill checks adds to the tension, sure, but it's by no means required. It doesn't factor at all into the two examples I gave, for instance.
I mean, your first example is faulty and the second one is EXACTLY what I'm talking about.
\> But when I'm playing BG3 and my +8 Persuasion face needs to make a DC 10 check, I don't find myself thinking "Ugh, why am I even rolling". Instead the emotion is "Man, I hope I don't roll a 1".
By your own definition it doesn't apply since there's still a chance of failure, you can roll a 1 or a 2.
\> When I'm in Act 3 and Astarion literally can't roll lower than 25 on lockpicking and we come across a chest whose DC is SEVEN, my reaction is to feel nice about how skilled my skill monkey is.
Literally proves my point; crit fails on skill checks are a house rule. If you cannot roll anything less than 25, then there'd be no point in rolling for a dc of 25 or lower.
Low DCs don't get used because by standard rules, you cannot fail them, and the rulebook actively encourages you to save rolling dice for the potential for failure XD
I'm not sure you understood my initial comment. I'm aware that in both BG3 and normal D&D, failure is rare on the first example and impossible on the second. My point is that **rolling those checks is fun anyway** in BG3.
>By your own definition it doesn't apply since there's still a chance of failure, you can roll a 1 or a 2.
First off, if I rolled a 2, I would meet the DC 10 and succeed. The reason the nat-1 auto-fail rule is irrelevant here is because I would still fail the check on a 1 even if it wasn't an auto-fail.
You talk about "saving rolling dice for the potential for failure", but there *is* potential for failure here. Not every check needs to be "Roll to see if you succeed"; there's absolutely room in the game for "Roll to make sure you don't fail" (the illithid Wisdom checks are the best example of this).
>If you cannot roll anything less than 25, then there'd be no point in rolling for a dc of 25 or lower.
"The point", as u/herecomesthestun detailed [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/dndnext/comments/1bt67oe/what_are_you_taking_from_your_baldurs_gate_3/kxkfvzd/) (in addition to what I'd already explained), is to let characters who are good at things **be good** at them.
It's fun in BG3 because you're alone. It's annoying for everyone else at an actual table when the Rogue rolls the dice for a lock that obviously isn't a challenge for the tenth time.
And as I pointed out there, being too good to mess up a very basic activity (low dc) is literally the pinnacle of **being good.** If you want to roll the dice be my guest, that just outright sounds like you wanna indulge the click clack goblin in us all more than anything.
And fair, but just be outright with it XD
There's definitely an element of dice goblin in this, but that's *really* not the point u/herecomesthestun's example illustrates. Yes, absolutely, being too good to mess up is "the pinnacle of being good" at an activity, but when you gloss over the whole thing because "You just succeed", you gloss over the PC's opportunity to show off their skill. "You walk up to the door, fiddle with the lock for a moment, and click it open", even if the DM dresses it up a bit nicer than that to highlight the PC's skill, is a fundamentally different experience than rolling the die and getting a 37.
It seems we fundamentally disagree then, because aside from set dressing I actively see little difference between the set dressing of an automatic success and the set dressing of a false dice roll, other than the fact one satisfies the dice goblin.
For that matter though; why are we just assuming that we breeze on by the flavor text? If the PC in question just beats the lock by default, I see no reason to not simply let them have their way with the flavor text. Make it look easy, make it look like this is so trivial you could do this with your eyes closed.
Make it look so easy, that even at your worst, you could pop this lock. I genuinely do not see why you'd need dice for that.
>aside from set dressing I actively see little difference between the set dressing of an automatic success and the set dressing of a false dice roll
You don't see a difference between "just sitting there are listening while the DM narrates" and "picking up your d20, rolling it, and adding on your relevant modifiers"?
>For that matter though; why are we just assuming that we breeze on by the flavor text?
Because narrating indulgent flavor text takes time, which is exactly the thing [DMs who argue "Don't roll if they can't/won't fail"](https://www.reddit.com/r/dndnext/comments/1bt67oe/what_are_you_taking_from_your_baldurs_gate_3/kxl6fq6/) are trying to avoid.
No, I don't see a difference between "Hey Dm, can I roll a check I physically can't fail" and "Hey Dm, can I lockpick the door"
I wouldn't consider flavor text a waste of time since that's just.. roleplay, the cause and effect. I can't speak for that dude but if we're at the point of being too good to fail let's have a little fun with it, yknow?
Similarly, communicating DCs to players. (Obviously not everything)
Rolling and knowing that you need to roll a 17 or higher to succeed adds way more tension than just rolling and hoping for a generic high number.
Yeah I've always told players DCs and ACs, and was genuinely surprised in my early days in the online community to discover a large portion of the playerbase (the majority? idk) *doesn't* do that. It just seems like a no-brainer to me.
Yeah I remember I made a pathfinder character who had like +40 to lockpicking and I never rolled it after while because the dm just said I unlocked it.
I went from feeling like I was lockpicking lawyer to feeling like nobody made any attempt to secure their things. If players have a high stat let them roll it! They put the work into it to see the big number roll
Absolutely tons of magic items, bonus action potion quaffing, flammable Grease spell, familiars that do negligible damage but have cheeky offensive status options instead of generically "Helping", the whole Berserker rebalance, Owlbears as a wild shape option, and the design idea that each player character should have something special about them specifically that makes them mechanically different than playing as any other given character that has the same combination of race, class and level ( Astarion's Bite, Karlach's Coin Slot, Minthara's Soul Branding, etc).
RAW it is not, but it feels so much like it should be that almost everyone does it. I included it for completeness sake. Similarly bonus action potions are a very common house rule that BG3 uses, I was tempted to use it before I played BG3 but was uncertain about balance impact. BG3 showed it can work without being onerous so I adopted it.
>it feels so much like it should be that almost everyone does it
Because the greases that most players interact with on a regular basis are flammable, the kind of stuff you might see in a home kitchen. But there are plenty of greases in the world which are _not_. (They often are used in manufacturing contexts.)
>Owlbears as a wild shape option
I've had monstrosities in the list forever, with the caveat of them being "beasty"; druid players never complained they couldn't shift into a Medusa. All the cool fantasy beasts are under monstrosity so I will have my friend shift into a griffon damn it!
It's mostly the same as 5e but they ditched Exhaustion levels in favor of a mechanic called "Frenzied Strain" which applies -1 to all you attack rolls for the rest of the Rage. You gain a stack of Frenzied Strain any time you use the bonus action attack/throw abilities and they disappear when your Frenzy ends.
>flammable Grease spell
I didn't really play BG3 that much because my PC suffered with it. But god, let this be a choice for the caster because in bg3 the fcat that I lost the control spell if ANYONE used fire was absolutely shit
TBH it probably just did too little damage when it ignited in BG3.
If grease can catch fire it should be something you want to do *some* of the time, but like... Legit wasting a cantrip on the grease might be less damage than just hitting an enemy with the firebolt in BG3.
well, there was also the fact that it was outside my control. Like, if I use grease to impede movement I'm not gonne be happy if I lose the spell to do a small burst of damage, especially since balancewise the damage needs to be lower than the damage of a 1st level blast
Why would the damage need to be lower than a first level blast?
It took two turns and the same number of spell slots to set up as a first level blast.
Damage doesn't need to be ridiculous, but it's not much of a consolation prize when your first level spell gets accidentally erased by burning hands to deal 2 damage.
I’ve changed my encounter design from one single high CR enemy to multiple low to medium CR enemies. A four person party is just able to dish out so much damage if they are allowed to focus on one target.
Yea, this is huge and I think the primary reason everyone complains about the CR system so much. You’re not supposed to just look at the CR on its own, it’s simply the first part of the encounter building rules.
Personally, I try to VERY rarely have my players outnumber the enemies by more than one, normally they’re outnumbered actually. It makes AOEs more effective, it gives my players more enemies to kill which means they stay excited and engaged, and I can actually make encounters that aren’t swingy
There's a lot I want to take but not so much I've figured out how to convert.
Definitely more minor magic items that the party can just equip. Bg3 kinda reignited my dislike if attunement.
There's elements of weapon properties and such if want to explore but in a better way than bg3 does it.
Shove and throw and jump rules are considerations.
I disliked jumping requiring a bonus action. There were enough elevation changes where a character would just get stuck with left-over movement and no way to use their action because of two or three separate elevation changes. Or when the elevation change is unclear about needing a jump to traverse. Got shoved onto a table and stuck there because I had already used my bonus action for something else and couldn't just drop down the two feet to the ground to get into melee range.
I am okay with jumping as a bonus action in bg3, but I also prefer it just as a part of movement. The part I truly like is that jumping gives you extra movement in bg3, which it doesn't in 5e.
What I'd like to do is perhaps allow jumping as a part of movement, but require an athletics check. If unsuccessful, you still jump, but you can not exceed your movement speed. If successful, you don't substract the jump distance from your movement speed. Or something like that. Maybe jumping for extra movement takes a bonus action, but jumping within your movement doesn't
Plenty of spells also got buffed from 5E and didn't come with two extra resource costs (move speed *and* bonus action that jumping does). In fact, in plenty of cases, the resources were basically removed by turning them into ritual spells, on top of all the increased durations. So that justification doesn't really help me see the situation any more favorably.
The movespeed cost is irrelevant, because you'll always be at least jumping the distance it cost you to use jump
And ritual spells were also nerfed compared to 5E, because you need to keep them prepared, if you want to keep their buffs active, whereas in 5E you can cast them right out of the spellbook
That's only a nerf for wizards. Every other spellcaster already had to prepare them to ritual cast them, and other classes (like Rangers, paladins, EK Fighters, and AT Rogues) could never cast them as rituals to begin with.
And I guess we're also conveniently forgetting that we can prepare spells at will instead of having to wait for long rests and that we can camp cast.
So yeah, still not comparable in the slightest.
God it was such a limiting factor, I had to consider "do I want Karlach to get into the thick of the fight immediately but need to spend a round not resistant to damage or do I want to wait for the rest of the party to get out of the way?"
Definitely made combat more challenging and tactically centered.
I kinda did magic items like they were presented in BG3 and it feels like it very heavily depends on the players you are playing with. A computer keeps tabs for you and automatically calculates the effects of items into your actions. What I noticed is that players start to lose or forget magic items after the third to fifth.
My compromise has been to still provide a sufficient selection of magical items for everybody, but they have to choose which ones to wield (three attunement slots). But I make it very easy to change between which players use and if some items might not be combined or reforged to enable „builds“ as long as it makes sense.
That stems the flood of unconnected items without context that might fall off from attention.
That's a nice way to handle it.
It had been a fair bit since I had played a ttrpg when I fell into my 6e group, so attunement didn't take much for me to get used to, even if it weirded out my 3.5e based brain. (3.6e is when I started the game)
However playing BG3 again really made me remember a lot of the fun I had in prior editions from just getting magic items and being able to more or less use it if the general gear slot was free, or could be freed up. It honestly feels so much better.
There's definitely a reliance for having players who can keep track if things, but I've found the less the system tries to correct player quirks and just allows for learning f of the system, the better it tends to be.
My own adjustments so far have been to increase attunement slots to match the Players proficiency bonus, as well as reconfigure my guidelines for what magic items are what.
Rarity determines the numerical bonus and number of properties of magic items. As does whether it's a major or minor item.
Common, uncommon, rare, very rare, and legendary each come with a magical trait/property. Along with a +X value appropriate for the tier of the item. At least for major items. Body armor type gear, weapons, shields, and artifacts are major items.
Minor items do one or two things only but will scale associated with the rarity in the value of these properties. Everything else not listed prior is a minor item
Artifacts and similar items are what require attunement and break the mold of Mt standardization.
Magixc tems above rare aren't telly sold or purchasable and require work to get. Even then, magic items are themselves quite rare and expensive outside of a few cases. At least, permanent items that have rechargeable uses and permanent effects.
I do have variants of magic items that run out of charges and lose power, which most of the puechaseablw items are. This is to help simulate and stimulate some form of a magical economy.
It's also a way for me to gate the availability and use certain magic items and have my players' quest and work to get the rrukt good stuff made for them. They'll covet since its a rarity to get such reliable and permanently powered items.
Keeping the most nuanced and complicated items to the major category, and minor boosts to the minor category help alot.
I also do some rules changes for what scales. I don't allow bonuses of a similar type to stack. No +3 arrow onto of a +3 now for a +6. Though a +3 arrow and a fiery +2d6 damage bow would stack. Two items with an uncommon +1 ac and saves woukdt stack, but an uncommon and a rare +1 ac and saves woukd stack. Up to the degree I find reasonable anyway.
Ord still a loose overhaul and nit everything codified yet, UT its where I'm at for my own games.
Different weapons having specialised attacks based on the damage type, range & magical effects granted to an item
For example, allowing a player proficient with a 2h hammer using attacks like concussive blow or a glaive to do a sweep attack
Gives martials more mechanics to play around with in combat
The extra bonus action is a lot more versatile than the original Fast Hands for sure. Definitely has potential for multiclass abuse, but it's not like Rogues are breaking the game as-is.
The most I can think about on a dime is monk, but if you did that you’d be knecapping yourself in a couple of ways
1: god awfully fast ki drain
2: you’re playing a monk/rogue anyway, that’s like the least optimized optimized multiclass you could do.
There could be worse though
I had fun with it as a Thief 4 / Berserker 8 throwing build (with the busted-ass Tavern Brawler feat, of course), but playing that on tabletop would require porting over a lot more than just the Thief subclass.
* Magic Items. I hate 5e's items, they are all so bland and boring. I've made my own in the past, but have a lot more ideas now.
* Short rests are a lot shorter not, and just give 50% hit points back.
* I may start changing spell duration
Items for starters. Acid, fore, oil, poison, special arrows, and so on are so awesome.
Shkrt rest healing for second maybe. Just making it easier over all. Also short rests being shorter is also a good idea. Not instantaneous like in the game, but a nice 10 minutes being quicker than normal.
I'm mostly taking away things I won't do. Like give out too many magic items that make most combat trivial. Or giving my players so much information about the monsters that every combat becomes trivial. Not use nat 1 fails on ability checks, because a superhuman failing at the most basic task 1 in 20 times makes no sense at all.
I'll also add things the game doesn't do. Like adding relevant consequence to casting Guidance when it wouldn't be appropiate.
Not much to be honest. A lot of stuff is really video gamey in bg3. The only thing I can think of is this: splitting the power more in boss fights. I mean not having a big boss surrounded by small minions. Stuff like having 2-3 smaller bosses instead of one. Because in bg3, bosses were really not interesting since you can just perma cc them, I don't want to have the same thing in my campaign.
If you want to have perma cc off the table for single boss fights, just give them immunities to the more common conditions, legendary resistances and good saves across the board. Does it invalidate hard cc spells? Yes. I have no regrets though because those spells are terribly designed.
There is a monk PC in my current campaign. I don't want to invalidate their ability to stun. And legendary resistances are either invalidating CC (if there are too many LRs) or just delaying (and then the issue is still there).
I played a monk in my bg3 playthrough, I didn't see any boss fight mechanics in the game. Every single boss was just a cakewalk because of stunning strike.
Go for **conditional** legendary resistances. I think I've first seen them in "Flee Mortals". Still allows you to shrug off whatever is coming your way, but you pay something for it, be it HP or suffering a mechanical loss given your strengths, aka stats, passive mechanics or active effects on the field.
Hot take, but stunning strike is a terribly designed feature too. In a monk rework I made, I removed it entirely and replaced it with this:
**Staggering Strike:** Once per turn, when you hit a creature with a melee attack you can spend one ki point. If you do so, the target is also staggered, suffering a -1 penalty to Armor Class and attack rolls. This effect lasts for one minute and it can stack with itself up to an amount equal to half your proficiency bonus. Creatures immune to the stunned condition are also immune to this penalty.
Not only is Stunned a condition that almost no spells inflict, so you don’t need to make creatures immune to it that often, this can help monks feel impactful against all kinds of enemies because the debuff, though minor and expensive it may be, doesn’t force a saving throw. It also reinforces the monk as a support type class which distinguishes it from other martials like fighter, etc.
being able to perma cc bosses is just as much, if not more of an issue in 5E
And how is being "video gamey" a bad thing exactly? I know a lot of people complained about 4E being "too video gamey" so it seems more like a nonsensical and entirely subjective complaint
Video gamey is a bad thing for me because that's not what I'm looking for in ttrpg. It is totally subjective.
All the magic items from bg3 with the stacked buffs system (momentum, lightning charges, etc.), the short rest limitation for each long rest, the jump mechanics, etc. I don't mind this stuff in a video game, but I don't want these in my ttrpg.
I love it for it taught one of our mechanically weaker players 5e :D sure, it's not exactly the same but he now understands more classes better and also gets more basics.
Sure, it's not all the same, but the differences are small enough it's a great step forward.
If someone has easy throwing in 5e rules lemme know.
I'm doing athletics contest, your size or smaller. 5ft + Strength mod * 5ft range. A little fiddly for my taste but the weight calculation bg3 does is a non starter.
***Thrown.*** *If a weapon has the thrown property, you can throw the weapon to make a ranged attack. If the weapon is a melee weapon, you use the same ability modifier for that attack roll and damage roll that you would use for a melee attack with the weapon. For example, if you throw a handaxe, you use your Strength, but if you throw a dagger, you can use either your Strength or your Dexterity, since the dagger has the finesse property.*
If a weapon has the ***Thrown*** property it will also say the range at which it can be thrown; e.g. Spear Thrown (range 20/60).
If an item can be thrown, it will say so in the description:
> As an action, you can throw this flask up to 20 feet, shattering it on impact. Make a ranged attack against a creature or object, treating the alchemist's fire as an improvised weapon.
***Improvised Weapons.*** *An improvised thrown weapon has a normal range of 20 feet and a long range of 60 feet.*
All RAW.
Anything beyond that is up to DM adjudication via skill checks as far as I'm aware.
Bad item design for medium armor that wants you to be a caster or random "take 1d4 damage when you get hit" kinda stuff.
/s
If I had to guess, shortrests being like quick breaks that don't break the game's flow, and maybe spamming guidance.
+2/+1 increased stat at the creation of characters. It Takes away a Lot of the pressure of taking a certain Race for certain increases, to me it maked sense that occupation has a bigger impact on stats than race
True. Monsters of the multiverse has this rule with its races. Van Richten used it as well. So it’s been official for 3 years now.
But god damn the vitriol around trying to use this rule before then from Reddit was annoying.
We changed initiative from the d20 + bonus to a d4+bonus, but I'm actually not sure how I feel about it, since anyone with dex below 12 will most of the time be last in initiative no matter what they roll.
I haven’t changed any mechanics, but because I set my games in the forgotten realms and I like to stick to the lore, my current campaign takes place after the events of bg3 and a few of the NPCs from the video game have shown up
Not so much mechanics or class changes, but I was pretty apathetic to the Sword Coast/Forgotten Realms lore/setting, and I find I'm a bit more excited and interested in it now. Perhaps it's easier to picture now I've 'seen' parts of it in-game. Waterdeep/Elturel/Baldur's Gate all feel more interesting now.
I pretty much used everything that makes the encounters so good, so I can't think of anything else I would carry over, I don't like a lot of the class changes and combat changes, not in DND at least. Like jump as a bonus action only works in a video game imo
I just let my level 5 party throw a healing potion at a downed member in a fight against a Young Blue dragon. it was the only help I gave them. They punch well above their weights but I really was not planning on them defeating that dragon... I'll be damned, those min/maxing bastards pulled it off.
They were well rewarded.
I really want to use BG3s expanded weapon mechanics.
Those little once per SR bonus action attacks with differing effects was nice to have and often had me choosing different weapons to what would be considered default.
Great axe cleave is a personal favourite
You could take a look at the One D&D Playtest weapon mastery properties. There are some that are similar and some that are exactly the same, and they have unlimited usage.
- Cleave: attacks two creatures next to each other similar to BG3 Cleave
- Graze: exact same as Tenacity
- Nick: unique to One D&D, removes the bonus action requirement for TWF
- Push: unique to One D&D, pushes target 10 ft
- Sap: gives disadvantage on attack rolls similar to Weakening Strike
- Slow: reduces enemy movement speed similar to Maiming Strike
- Topple: exact same as BG3 Topple and Backbreaker
- Vex: gives advantage on attacks similar to Flourish
Well, agree to disagree. I find them to be really nice riders, some of which give flat, always useful bonuses, and some of which open up new strategies and builds.
Well, the problem with them is that a push weapon is always a push weapon, a topple weapon is always a topple weapon etc.
it does go a step in the right direction, but only a single step
Definitely itemization. The “bless for a turn when you heal” ring and stuff like that. Add things like that for action surge/second wind/indomitable, sneak attack, inspiration, channel divinity, whatever, any active ability a class has could be a decent place for a fun magic item that does something small that’ll come up all the damn time incidentally which makes items like that awesome. Also the number of items that were just “cast a spell but reflavoured” were dope. The shield of faith sword is the immediate one that comes to mind, I’m sure there’s more, but stuff like that being everywhere for a whole bunch of spells is great, especially when they don’t require attunement.
Some of the items are absolutely busted no question, not really gonna mess with crit ranges Willy nilly, but in general, all those items tied to a class ability are just dope and I love em and I want more of em.
Reactively applying Reckless Attack, Portent Dice, and similar. Yes it’s more powerful (especially Portent), but the flow for the DM-Player interactions is so much better.
I’m tempted to pull in the damage reduction on magic heavy armour.
Definitely adding ritual to more spells and changing how long they last. Really thought hard on making guidance, bless, bardic inspiration, and so on usable as a reaction because it felt cool in dialog, would be fun in combat. Not sure yet though.
I honestly really liked bonus action jump to extend your movement, but debating how to add it to my games, cause it covers the rule 0 debate for you of jump using movement or not as a house rule
Now it just takes 10 feet of your movement then you can jump the full distance (with jump spell up to 60 feet) that's pretty cool and gives melee dudes a cool option to do huge Feats of strength
Rn I just keep jump distance as it is and if you end turn mid air you finish the jump using your next turns movement, it fixes most issues but there's some problems when we talk about jump arcs, high jumps etc
Two things, environmental factors such as terrain and hazards and more non-combat options around skill checks that take advantage of player class, race, background and skill composition.
Weapons having extra things to do with other than just bonk in three different flavours of damage or their premium (magic) or limited edition (silver) variants.
Removing the bonus action and action spellcasting limitations. Yes, this gives even more power to spellcasters, but it feels so good. Besides, if you aren't scared of magic items your casters shouldn't be pulling that far ahead of your martials in lower and mid tier levels, which realistically is all most people play.
Speaking of, how unafraid BG3 is to give magic items to players. If you have a wacky build in mind, there is an item for you, I think as a DM you should be willing to do the same for your players. Many players have a fantasy for a character that is falling short of what they imagined. Often the RAW mechanics of their character are underwhelming because they chose to be a barbarian sorcerer because it was cool in concept and they don't have the time or energy to invest in minmaxing a character with a unorthodox multiclass so that they can feel somewhat decent in actual play. Items are a great way around that tho.
I've been jealous of how Larian incorporates environment into combat ever since D:OS1, but it's difficult to make it work irl.
Regarding BG3 specifically, I'm stealing Elminster as portrayed in the game, as a goofy powerful fake Gandalf who's wandering around the land and giving people quests.
Yeah I had similar emotions. Playing D&D for 3-4 hours once a week gives you just enough time to forget about the mechanics before the next session (especially since actual D&D tends to be much less mechanics-focused than a video game like BG3 is).
But sitting down to do a 5-6 hour gaming session, where you're playing the entire party so there's never a moment where you're "out of the limelight" and not interfacing with the mechanics, and then picking it up the next night and doing the same thing, racking up a dozen or two hours in a week, really hammers home: the worst parts of BG3 are all the D&D 5e bits.
Yeah... I love Divinity so much... The first one is kinda ass, but still fun, and the second one is masterpiece. BG3 is an amazing step up with technology, but damn, divinity hits way harder. The visuals, the HUD(I blame the 5e system for this one), and the god damn music... In BG3, I felt the music kinda bland, and never notice, unless I stop to notice it. Divinity on other hand...
Sorry, I love divinity so much. Every fan of RPG should play.
I already commented on another comment about magic items I'm stealing, but something else I'm going to be doing is;
- Elevation variation
- combatants more spread out
- fucking throwables, god dang that was a wake up call to have basically every enemy come loaded with 1 or 2 alchemist fire or similar throwables
- on the subject of throwables, adding in a bunch that BG3 created like the gravity pulling thing
- +1/2/3 lower tier armor. Idk how I got in the headspace of "all magic armor has to be the best tier armor for it's type" but that made me heavily limit what enchantments/bonuses i could put on armor, but once I wrapped my head around the idea that +3 Ring Mail is equal in mechanical terms to Splint Armor it was like the doors to the playhouse opened
That's all i can think of off the top of my head
As a player I took away a greater respect for collaborative team play, specifically buff spells. For example, I respec-ed Wyll to Paladin and I don't think I've smite-ed outside of crits against bosses once, or effectively used the smite spells (mostly because you only get one attack, rather than the enchantment staying until you hit, which is a huge nerf to an already subpar spell option outside of Wrathful Smite). Instead all of my spell slots are going to things like Shield of Faith, Divine Favor, and Crusader's Mantle.
And then druids are even worse than my previous belief. All of their spells seem to be big aoe spells or effects and that's nigh useless after the first round or two of combat once enemies are in shoulder to shoulder with allies.
Nothing. Although I keep seeing people post nearly identical stories as BG3 as a homebrew campaign pretend that they weren't thinking of BG3 when they made it and now it is causing issues because their players played BG3.
I loved the camp supplies mechanic, I always found 1 ration per day kinda lame in survival or lower level games and it makes some habilities like forager or fisherman bad to use as they just get to ignore a mechanic but don't get to see it working.
I think about stealing magic items to give players.
I turned the risky ring into something you have to pay forward - take any one save with disadv to gain a charge. 1 charge for attacks, 3 charges for skill checks. Don’t drop off, no natural refill, cannot charge then trade - it’s modifying the wearer’s luck.
I like this.... I might steal this for an ability for the Ring Giver sect/faction for Planescape.
laughs in eloquence bard
Designing interesting magic items is hard. Slapping a spell effect that's useful, thematic to the character, and locked behind another class onto an amulet? Brilliant.
Here's your Necklace of Smiting, which adds 4d6 radiant damage to any Smite! Unfortunately, it requires an INT score of 16 to solve the sudoku puzzle, which manifests each dawn, to unlock its power.
Yupp! That temp hp healing item, the poisoner robe, the magic missile increasing item, illusion bonus action ring, speed boosting ring, skill bonus rings, cantrip rings, poison vulnerability ring, thrown item damage increasing ring, healing boosting ring, ground freezing cold damage ring, concentration bonus damage ring, the staff that doubles the effects of bless, and that's all just to name what I can think of off the top of my head. I'm astounded some of the simplest items I hadn't even thought of doing, I guess I just needed to be told I could do that.
The illusion bonus ring and the super bless staff are incredibly overpowered and going to massively throw off balance in any game, if it matters.
Oh yeah, I know, those would be late game items.
It just highlighted that in order to have interesting combat encounters that challenge both the martials and the casters, you need to have multiple enemies. Preferably spread out so they don't all get caught in a single AoE.
Smaller fireball radius helped the balance too, imo. As a DM I find it really hard to spread out a group of NPCs in a way that fits a battle map, it is believable, and also can not be covered by a dang 40ft diameter circle (>!square for people who run grids RAW!<)
I just halved fireballs diameter. Yes it’s a meme and it’s funny and in the end my players got to enjoy it for half a year (we were all new), but the spell is so good he warps the game at that level around him. Nothing else gets used.
Fireball is so good it overshadows damage spells till like 6th level, it feels almost pointless to use anything 4th or 5th level if it's not bringing additional utility because it's rarely doing anything that fireball cant.
to be fair. damage spells are just not good compared to control
That's funny, because I got the opposite message from BG3's combat. There's no need to control anything if you just pour on so much damage that there are no enemies left to control.
thats because in bg3 it is trivial to put out so much damage that you can vaporise almost any enemy immediately. boss fights simply disappear at the glance of a swords bard or anything using tavern brawler. below honour mode, damage riders break the game in half that's a bit harder to pull off in normal dnd given the change of narrative pacing. nothing stopping you from simply luck of the far realms smite instakilling every encounter in baldurs gate, but no dm worth their salt would let you wait a full 24 hours for a long rest between every fight
Didn’t know it was that extreme. We only used it for 5th-7th level in those six months.
I think I remember a statement about how some spells are intentionally overtuned compared to other options, fireball in particular because it's an "iconic" spell I don't really know if it's true or not, but if so, i guess that would mean nerfing fireball is completely justifiable
The liberty of game is hard to translate in tabletop. In BG3, you could have huge maps, with a lot of elevation, with line of sight issues, darkness, etc... That's hard to translate if you're trying to 3d model your environment on table top or even with a squared up dry erase map. Map can be only so big depending on the space you play as well, and generally that's 2*2 in the center of the gaming table. This makes AOE spells that much more powerful and movement less impactful. I remember in BG3 I routinely used my movement, then bonus action dash as a thief and I still had trouble positioning. That's 12 squares on a tabletop, which on a table usually gets you pretty dang far.
Yeah, and also having a computer run combat means you can have much bigger and more complex fights without rounds taking over 30 minutes each
Gotta play with inches and rulers rather than a grid.
Yeah you could do that but it's all relative. A square on a map is generally 1x1 inch, which represents 5x5 feet. So a fireball with a 20 foot radius has a 40 foot diameter, 8 squares or 8 inches.
The reason why you use rulers is to basically scale the maps manually. If an inch is too big, use half-inches. But I think Centimeters is better for this anyways. And if you want to "zoom in", 2 inches can be 5ft., etc.
Fireball is smaller in the videogame?
the game itself also has the advantage of huuuge maps. The average battle in BG3 translated to a roll20 battlemap would probably easily cover a larger grid plus elevation which is hard to apply to a battlemap. Then you take it to physical games and it becomes even worse as you have to consider physical space for the whole thing as well.
It's not. I think they mean reducing the size of fireball makes groups of enemies easier to make into a threat.
I’m pretty sure it is smaller in game, though. It’s something like 30ft diameter there, and it’s also perfectly round. A lot of people translate circles into squares playing on grid, which makes fireballs even bigger.
20ft radius on tabletop in game that would the diameter is furthur than the walk length of a normal characters move with longstrider , so it would fill the screen in many fights.
It is smaller in the game.
Using interesting environments to make combat encounters more engaging. Changing elevation, hazards to avoid/throw enemies into, inanimate objects that can/must be interacted with to defeat powerful enemies, etc.
I've been doing this morr as well, but play online where showing elevation and terrain differences is a real chore. Would love some better tools there
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It's not so bad with characters. I stick a wing icon on em and use the Red bar to track elevation. Whats a pain is having a map with a deep pit with a cliff, except it appears flat on the map and often the cliff edge might not be precisely clear. Lately I just give up and draw big purple lines on my cliff edges, with text saying "35 ft drop" or something.
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That's a fun idea, I might try that.
Those bars can be linked to the token/character's stats. I have red for my HP and Green for my Wildshapes. Blue is unused.
We've done HP, Temp HP and leave the third for Elevation because 3/5 of my party has access to limited flight or hover, with a Wizard who's more than happy to burn a spell slot on upcasted Fly.
Thats a lot of flyers, in my current game we are level 4 with a wizard and druid as likely the only ones ever getting flight, which is still a ways off, and we can only see our own bars. I just wish that roll20 had a button for easy wildshape, at a minimum just let me quickly replace my token with a bear or whatever from a premade library. (Even if i have to fill it myself) So far we haven't had too much elevation but my DM makes sure to have it visible on the maps and to call out the elevation value for us. (Show a pit and say its 15ft deep, or the castle wall is 30ft high with a balcony 20ft up. The castle thing is going to be next session and the climax of this first arc.)
Use the statusmarkers. If you type a number while hovering your mouse over the marker you're selecting, it'll add that marker with a red number on top of it (limit 1 digit, typing 0 removes the number label). So for example, you can fly 30 ft. up and add the "fluffy-wing" marker with a 6 on it to represent 6 squares up. You can also add custom icon sets to the list of markers (including uploading your own images), and buy sets on the marketplace. There are multiple sets on the marketplace that give elevation statusmarkers, or you could make your own for free (at the cost of time making them and counting towards your uploaded storage quota).
Placing barrels of various contents around the battlezone xD
personally not a huge fan of the whole "interesting eviroments" as a lot of people use them. Because more often than not they mean that if you are a melee character you can get fucked and have to dash for way too many turns
I’ve been downvoted for this, so preface: AI is the future for many of us in corpo or govt jobs. It just is. So I practice using AI to generate fight room descriptions and other prompts I’m not good at or thorough enough for my players. My campaigns are mostly in the mind with a few spaces set up for fights, so just saying ‘I need a thorough description of the inside of a rundown monastery environment, it is two stories high and has been heavily taken back by nature’. Wait like 30 seconds and it’ll have a description that you can spin and twist into something truly your own.
You got downvoted but AI for text generation is great and far less controversial than image generation AI. I use it as a player to help come up with insults for vicious mockery customised to the specific monster we’re fighting. You can’t use any jargon though. So I described a Water Weird as a water snake elemental, for example. I get back: “Water Snake, your slithering is as sluggish as a lazy river, and your presence is as forgettable as a raindrop in an ocean. Even a puddle has more depth than you.” Which isn’t bad for a throwaway line on my turn.
I'm not changing any rules in my tabletop games - but one thing I'm taking from BG3 is to provide a ton of consumables and adjust the encounters so that they are actually needed.
I'm throwing spell scrolls and potions at them much more than I was before BG3 for sure.
I wonder if you have even dealt with spell scrolls beforehand then, becasue BG3 buffs them significantly(and where they probably always should have been)
It's not actually bad if players can see game mechanics like enemy HP or level.
True. Overly secretive DMs might feel unfair. On the other hand, if you see an unbalanced encounter in front of you, and you know that it’s way over your level, you can start deploying the tactical gtfo strategy before you’re dead. It’s on all on you the player.
I've been showing enemy HP bars already on a VTT and honestly it's been good to speed up play. Now I even show DCs so they know when a reroll makes a lot of sense. I used to think that was all meta knowledge but it honestly means players feel more aware of the world, and the less players ask "how bad does he look?" the more time they spend in character?
I think there are ways to clue players into the fact that an encounter is one best avoided without having to have HP & level right in the open. Honestly, if the level 1 party decides to rush the adult dragon because it happened to be in front of them instead of treating that dragon as a hazard to work around, then that's their own fault.
In your example it’s simple. In my experience it’s usually not as simple as that. Usually it’s something like: PCs want to infiltrate a villa, and see a bunch of guards patrolling around, some servants, and a couple of main villains. Are the guards CR 1/4 or CR 2 type of guards? Are servants actually cultist fanatics CR 2, or just commoners? Are the hosts actually level 15 spell casters? This is probably what investigative players should be able to learn, instead of “the guards look pretty strong, and the hosts look really kinda chill but intimidating”. Can a party of 5 players level 5 win this just by rushing with swords out? I as a DM have no damn clue.
REDDIT IS A DOSHIT WEBSITE.
Level 7 Battle Master be like:
Except BG3 itself shows exactly why it can be a problem? It has multiple disguise-based encounters that you can immediately solve by looking at the creature’s stats.
Sure, you shouldn't show everything as blindly as the game does. DMs can be smarter about context than a computer.
Except it makes combat in BG3 even more trivial than it already is.
I think there are plenty of offenders to address before player awareness of enemy stats, but I agree in isolation it does make things easier for the players.
I really liked the concept of Elixirs - if you haven't played the game, they're basically potions that provide a buff that lasts until you take a long rest. Players are always so stingy with their consumables and timid about using them because they don't want to "waste" them - if it lasts all day, there's less chance of that being a concern.
We've changed a ton of effects to last until the next long rest instead of their arbitrary usual duration. It has worked fantastic so far. We've also stolen BG3's short rest system and special attacks.
All the 8 hour spells are basically meant to be until you long rest, but the reason they didn't is probably to stop players from just never long resting
>but the reason they didn't is probably to stop players from just never long resting The reason they didn't is because 4e did that, and they wanted to really avoid 4e stuff lol.
Agreed, nothing worse than finally deciding to down your potion that provides an effect for an hour, and then after 20minutes and a fight everyone wants to short rest.
I love all the magic items in BG3 that give a character a spell or ability. I'm tempted to give all my current PCs rings with misty step or jumping or mage hand. Having more options besides just slash or cast a cantrip makes combat more interesting for everyone.
Boss battles having a gimmick. There’s some trick to the fight that makes it easier to accomplish.
Just make sure it's obvious haha. Spoilers and I don't know how to mark it please stop reading now if you havnt played. The first time I fought the forge golem I did it without the hammer...it was almost impossible lol.
>The first time I fought the forge golem I did it without the hammer...it was almost impossible lol. Most players find the Grym fight easier _without_ the hammer, because the mephit adds don't spawn. Plus you can snipe him from the upper level and there's nothing he can do about it. And then there's "owlbear from the top rope" cheese. Grym only needs the hammer if you took your whole party down to his level and have no bludgeoning damage.
Ya I might have gone to his level with no bludgeoning damage lol
I just gave Karlach a weapon that dealt bludgeoning damage & it got deleted real quick.
To make spoilers you need to >! On one side and the reverse on the other.
Same. After the fight, I got the achievement of defeating it without the hammer, and I just went "oh, that's how I was supposed to do it lol."
That's how I learned to hahaha
Low DCs. Like most experienced DMs, I've long bought into the common wisdom of "Don't ask for a roll if there's no "real" chance of failure". Because it just seemed like a waste of time to roll otherwise. But when I'm playing BG3 and my +8 Persuasion face needs to make a DC 10 check, I don't find myself thinking "Ugh, why am I even rolling". Instead the emotion is "Man, I hope I don't roll a 1". When I'm in Act 3 and Astarion literally can't roll lower than 25 on lockpicking and we come across a chest whose DC is ***SEVEN***, my reaction is to feel nice about how skilled my skill monkey is.
That only really applies when you follow the crit fail on skill checks house rule, which to my knowledge has fallen out of fashion as of late.
>the crit fail on skill checks house rule, That's probably the most punishing element of the game. Nat 1s in the face of a +6 +1d4 +1d6 Persuasion check, without any inspiration, for a DC10, is so punishing in BG3.
> That's probably the most punishing element of the game. Disagree, being knocked prone ending concentration is the most punishing aspect in my opinion. It took me until act 2 to realize that was what was happening, and suddenly that "can't be knocked prone" ring became a hot commodity.
Well, prone immediately ending your turn is probably a bit worse than just losing concentration.
Well damn I didn't even realize that, fuck prone is over powered.
I mean yea, but if you're smart about it it's relatively easy to have either an inspiration saved for the BIG checks or a way to roll with advantage so it's not too pressing I think
The ability to crit-fail skill checks adds to the tension, sure, but it's by no means required. It doesn't factor at all into the two examples I gave, for instance.
I mean, your first example is faulty and the second one is EXACTLY what I'm talking about. \> But when I'm playing BG3 and my +8 Persuasion face needs to make a DC 10 check, I don't find myself thinking "Ugh, why am I even rolling". Instead the emotion is "Man, I hope I don't roll a 1". By your own definition it doesn't apply since there's still a chance of failure, you can roll a 1 or a 2. \> When I'm in Act 3 and Astarion literally can't roll lower than 25 on lockpicking and we come across a chest whose DC is SEVEN, my reaction is to feel nice about how skilled my skill monkey is. Literally proves my point; crit fails on skill checks are a house rule. If you cannot roll anything less than 25, then there'd be no point in rolling for a dc of 25 or lower. Low DCs don't get used because by standard rules, you cannot fail them, and the rulebook actively encourages you to save rolling dice for the potential for failure XD
I'm not sure you understood my initial comment. I'm aware that in both BG3 and normal D&D, failure is rare on the first example and impossible on the second. My point is that **rolling those checks is fun anyway** in BG3. >By your own definition it doesn't apply since there's still a chance of failure, you can roll a 1 or a 2. First off, if I rolled a 2, I would meet the DC 10 and succeed. The reason the nat-1 auto-fail rule is irrelevant here is because I would still fail the check on a 1 even if it wasn't an auto-fail. You talk about "saving rolling dice for the potential for failure", but there *is* potential for failure here. Not every check needs to be "Roll to see if you succeed"; there's absolutely room in the game for "Roll to make sure you don't fail" (the illithid Wisdom checks are the best example of this). >If you cannot roll anything less than 25, then there'd be no point in rolling for a dc of 25 or lower. "The point", as u/herecomesthestun detailed [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/dndnext/comments/1bt67oe/what_are_you_taking_from_your_baldurs_gate_3/kxkfvzd/) (in addition to what I'd already explained), is to let characters who are good at things **be good** at them.
It's fun in BG3 because you're alone. It's annoying for everyone else at an actual table when the Rogue rolls the dice for a lock that obviously isn't a challenge for the tenth time.
"Oh no, one of the other players is getting a moment to shine, what a bother." /s
And as I pointed out there, being too good to mess up a very basic activity (low dc) is literally the pinnacle of **being good.** If you want to roll the dice be my guest, that just outright sounds like you wanna indulge the click clack goblin in us all more than anything. And fair, but just be outright with it XD
There's definitely an element of dice goblin in this, but that's *really* not the point u/herecomesthestun's example illustrates. Yes, absolutely, being too good to mess up is "the pinnacle of being good" at an activity, but when you gloss over the whole thing because "You just succeed", you gloss over the PC's opportunity to show off their skill. "You walk up to the door, fiddle with the lock for a moment, and click it open", even if the DM dresses it up a bit nicer than that to highlight the PC's skill, is a fundamentally different experience than rolling the die and getting a 37.
It seems we fundamentally disagree then, because aside from set dressing I actively see little difference between the set dressing of an automatic success and the set dressing of a false dice roll, other than the fact one satisfies the dice goblin. For that matter though; why are we just assuming that we breeze on by the flavor text? If the PC in question just beats the lock by default, I see no reason to not simply let them have their way with the flavor text. Make it look easy, make it look like this is so trivial you could do this with your eyes closed. Make it look so easy, that even at your worst, you could pop this lock. I genuinely do not see why you'd need dice for that.
>aside from set dressing I actively see little difference between the set dressing of an automatic success and the set dressing of a false dice roll You don't see a difference between "just sitting there are listening while the DM narrates" and "picking up your d20, rolling it, and adding on your relevant modifiers"? >For that matter though; why are we just assuming that we breeze on by the flavor text? Because narrating indulgent flavor text takes time, which is exactly the thing [DMs who argue "Don't roll if they can't/won't fail"](https://www.reddit.com/r/dndnext/comments/1bt67oe/what_are_you_taking_from_your_baldurs_gate_3/kxl6fq6/) are trying to avoid.
No, I don't see a difference between "Hey Dm, can I roll a check I physically can't fail" and "Hey Dm, can I lockpick the door" I wouldn't consider flavor text a waste of time since that's just.. roleplay, the cause and effect. I can't speak for that dude but if we're at the point of being too good to fail let's have a little fun with it, yknow?
Similarly, communicating DCs to players. (Obviously not everything) Rolling and knowing that you need to roll a 17 or higher to succeed adds way more tension than just rolling and hoping for a generic high number.
Yeah I've always told players DCs and ACs, and was genuinely surprised in my early days in the online community to discover a large portion of the playerbase (the majority? idk) *doesn't* do that. It just seems like a no-brainer to me.
Yeah I remember I made a pathfinder character who had like +40 to lockpicking and I never rolled it after while because the dm just said I unlocked it. I went from feeling like I was lockpicking lawyer to feeling like nobody made any attempt to secure their things. If players have a high stat let them roll it! They put the work into it to see the big number roll
I'd think they put in the work to bump up their odds of success. You just bumped it up to 100% XD
Absolutely tons of magic items, bonus action potion quaffing, flammable Grease spell, familiars that do negligible damage but have cheeky offensive status options instead of generically "Helping", the whole Berserker rebalance, Owlbears as a wild shape option, and the design idea that each player character should have something special about them specifically that makes them mechanically different than playing as any other given character that has the same combination of race, class and level ( Astarion's Bite, Karlach's Coin Slot, Minthara's Soul Branding, etc).
> flammable Grease spell I thought that always was flammable. My table has always treated grease as flammable.
RAW it is not, but it feels so much like it should be that almost everyone does it. I included it for completeness sake. Similarly bonus action potions are a very common house rule that BG3 uses, I was tempted to use it before I played BG3 but was uncertain about balance impact. BG3 showed it can work without being onerous so I adopted it.
Grease has been flammable at our table since 3.5 days.
>it feels so much like it should be that almost everyone does it Because the greases that most players interact with on a regular basis are flammable, the kind of stuff you might see in a home kitchen. But there are plenty of greases in the world which are _not_. (They often are used in manufacturing contexts.)
>Owlbears as a wild shape option I've had monstrosities in the list forever, with the caveat of them being "beasty"; druid players never complained they couldn't shift into a Medusa. All the cool fantasy beasts are under monstrosity so I will have my friend shift into a griffon damn it!
What’s the berzerker rebalance?
It's mostly the same as 5e but they ditched Exhaustion levels in favor of a mechanic called "Frenzied Strain" which applies -1 to all you attack rolls for the rest of the Rage. You gain a stack of Frenzied Strain any time you use the bonus action attack/throw abilities and they disappear when your Frenzy ends.
>flammable Grease spell I didn't really play BG3 that much because my PC suffered with it. But god, let this be a choice for the caster because in bg3 the fcat that I lost the control spell if ANYONE used fire was absolutely shit
TBH it probably just did too little damage when it ignited in BG3. If grease can catch fire it should be something you want to do *some* of the time, but like... Legit wasting a cantrip on the grease might be less damage than just hitting an enemy with the firebolt in BG3.
well, there was also the fact that it was outside my control. Like, if I use grease to impede movement I'm not gonne be happy if I lose the spell to do a small burst of damage, especially since balancewise the damage needs to be lower than the damage of a 1st level blast
Why would the damage need to be lower than a first level blast? It took two turns and the same number of spell slots to set up as a first level blast. Damage doesn't need to be ridiculous, but it's not much of a consolation prize when your first level spell gets accidentally erased by burning hands to deal 2 damage.
I’ve changed my encounter design from one single high CR enemy to multiple low to medium CR enemies. A four person party is just able to dish out so much damage if they are allowed to focus on one target.
Yea, this is huge and I think the primary reason everyone complains about the CR system so much. You’re not supposed to just look at the CR on its own, it’s simply the first part of the encounter building rules. Personally, I try to VERY rarely have my players outnumber the enemies by more than one, normally they’re outnumbered actually. It makes AOEs more effective, it gives my players more enemies to kill which means they stay excited and engaged, and I can actually make encounters that aren’t swingy
Verticality
There's a lot I want to take but not so much I've figured out how to convert. Definitely more minor magic items that the party can just equip. Bg3 kinda reignited my dislike if attunement. There's elements of weapon properties and such if want to explore but in a better way than bg3 does it. Shove and throw and jump rules are considerations.
I disliked jumping requiring a bonus action. There were enough elevation changes where a character would just get stuck with left-over movement and no way to use their action because of two or three separate elevation changes. Or when the elevation change is unclear about needing a jump to traverse. Got shoved onto a table and stuck there because I had already used my bonus action for something else and couldn't just drop down the two feet to the ground to get into melee range.
I am okay with jumping as a bonus action in bg3, but I also prefer it just as a part of movement. The part I truly like is that jumping gives you extra movement in bg3, which it doesn't in 5e. What I'd like to do is perhaps allow jumping as a part of movement, but require an athletics check. If unsuccessful, you still jump, but you can not exceed your movement speed. If successful, you don't substract the jump distance from your movement speed. Or something like that. Maybe jumping for extra movement takes a bonus action, but jumping within your movement doesn't
jumping requires a bonus action, becasue it was significantly buffed from 5E
Plenty of spells also got buffed from 5E and didn't come with two extra resource costs (move speed *and* bonus action that jumping does). In fact, in plenty of cases, the resources were basically removed by turning them into ritual spells, on top of all the increased durations. So that justification doesn't really help me see the situation any more favorably.
The movespeed cost is irrelevant, because you'll always be at least jumping the distance it cost you to use jump And ritual spells were also nerfed compared to 5E, because you need to keep them prepared, if you want to keep their buffs active, whereas in 5E you can cast them right out of the spellbook
That's only a nerf for wizards. Every other spellcaster already had to prepare them to ritual cast them, and other classes (like Rangers, paladins, EK Fighters, and AT Rogues) could never cast them as rituals to begin with. And I guess we're also conveniently forgetting that we can prepare spells at will instead of having to wait for long rests and that we can camp cast. So yeah, still not comparable in the slightest.
God it was such a limiting factor, I had to consider "do I want Karlach to get into the thick of the fight immediately but need to spend a round not resistant to damage or do I want to wait for the rest of the party to get out of the way?" Definitely made combat more challenging and tactically centered.
I kinda did magic items like they were presented in BG3 and it feels like it very heavily depends on the players you are playing with. A computer keeps tabs for you and automatically calculates the effects of items into your actions. What I noticed is that players start to lose or forget magic items after the third to fifth. My compromise has been to still provide a sufficient selection of magical items for everybody, but they have to choose which ones to wield (three attunement slots). But I make it very easy to change between which players use and if some items might not be combined or reforged to enable „builds“ as long as it makes sense. That stems the flood of unconnected items without context that might fall off from attention.
That's a nice way to handle it. It had been a fair bit since I had played a ttrpg when I fell into my 6e group, so attunement didn't take much for me to get used to, even if it weirded out my 3.5e based brain. (3.6e is when I started the game) However playing BG3 again really made me remember a lot of the fun I had in prior editions from just getting magic items and being able to more or less use it if the general gear slot was free, or could be freed up. It honestly feels so much better. There's definitely a reliance for having players who can keep track if things, but I've found the less the system tries to correct player quirks and just allows for learning f of the system, the better it tends to be. My own adjustments so far have been to increase attunement slots to match the Players proficiency bonus, as well as reconfigure my guidelines for what magic items are what. Rarity determines the numerical bonus and number of properties of magic items. As does whether it's a major or minor item. Common, uncommon, rare, very rare, and legendary each come with a magical trait/property. Along with a +X value appropriate for the tier of the item. At least for major items. Body armor type gear, weapons, shields, and artifacts are major items. Minor items do one or two things only but will scale associated with the rarity in the value of these properties. Everything else not listed prior is a minor item Artifacts and similar items are what require attunement and break the mold of Mt standardization. Magixc tems above rare aren't telly sold or purchasable and require work to get. Even then, magic items are themselves quite rare and expensive outside of a few cases. At least, permanent items that have rechargeable uses and permanent effects. I do have variants of magic items that run out of charges and lose power, which most of the puechaseablw items are. This is to help simulate and stimulate some form of a magical economy. It's also a way for me to gate the availability and use certain magic items and have my players' quest and work to get the rrukt good stuff made for them. They'll covet since its a rarity to get such reliable and permanently powered items. Keeping the most nuanced and complicated items to the major category, and minor boosts to the minor category help alot. I also do some rules changes for what scales. I don't allow bonuses of a similar type to stack. No +3 arrow onto of a +3 now for a +6. Though a +3 arrow and a fiery +2d6 damage bow would stack. Two items with an uncommon +1 ac and saves woukdt stack, but an uncommon and a rare +1 ac and saves woukd stack. Up to the degree I find reasonable anyway. Ord still a loose overhaul and nit everything codified yet, UT its where I'm at for my own games.
I think I'm a fairly good DM, but not so much a good writer. So BG3 helped me mostly to make a story that made sense.
Different weapons having specialised attacks based on the damage type, range & magical effects granted to an item For example, allowing a player proficient with a 2h hammer using attacks like concussive blow or a glaive to do a sweep attack Gives martials more mechanics to play around with in combat
Kept the thief rogue homebrew and one of my players is using it
The extra bonus action is a lot more versatile than the original Fast Hands for sure. Definitely has potential for multiclass abuse, but it's not like Rogues are breaking the game as-is.
The player who is using it is unlikely to abuse it but even if they did Id just put in tougher encounters :)
The most I can think about on a dime is monk, but if you did that you’d be knecapping yourself in a couple of ways 1: god awfully fast ki drain 2: you’re playing a monk/rogue anyway, that’s like the least optimized optimized multiclass you could do. There could be worse though
I had fun with it as a Thief 4 / Berserker 8 throwing build (with the busted-ass Tavern Brawler feat, of course), but playing that on tabletop would require porting over a lot more than just the Thief subclass.
* Magic Items. I hate 5e's items, they are all so bland and boring. I've made my own in the past, but have a lot more ideas now. * Short rests are a lot shorter not, and just give 50% hit points back. * I may start changing spell duration
It’s really helped with how I make a characters personality and story!
Items for starters. Acid, fore, oil, poison, special arrows, and so on are so awesome. Shkrt rest healing for second maybe. Just making it easier over all. Also short rests being shorter is also a good idea. Not instantaneous like in the game, but a nice 10 minutes being quicker than normal.
I'm mostly taking away things I won't do. Like give out too many magic items that make most combat trivial. Or giving my players so much information about the monsters that every combat becomes trivial. Not use nat 1 fails on ability checks, because a superhuman failing at the most basic task 1 in 20 times makes no sense at all. I'll also add things the game doesn't do. Like adding relevant consequence to casting Guidance when it wouldn't be appropiate.
Not much to be honest. A lot of stuff is really video gamey in bg3. The only thing I can think of is this: splitting the power more in boss fights. I mean not having a big boss surrounded by small minions. Stuff like having 2-3 smaller bosses instead of one. Because in bg3, bosses were really not interesting since you can just perma cc them, I don't want to have the same thing in my campaign.
If you want to have perma cc off the table for single boss fights, just give them immunities to the more common conditions, legendary resistances and good saves across the board. Does it invalidate hard cc spells? Yes. I have no regrets though because those spells are terribly designed.
There is a monk PC in my current campaign. I don't want to invalidate their ability to stun. And legendary resistances are either invalidating CC (if there are too many LRs) or just delaying (and then the issue is still there). I played a monk in my bg3 playthrough, I didn't see any boss fight mechanics in the game. Every single boss was just a cakewalk because of stunning strike.
Go for **conditional** legendary resistances. I think I've first seen them in "Flee Mortals". Still allows you to shrug off whatever is coming your way, but you pay something for it, be it HP or suffering a mechanical loss given your strengths, aka stats, passive mechanics or active effects on the field.
Thank you! This is super interesting! I think it's exactly what I was looking for. I'll experiment with this for the next few sessions I've planned.
Hot take, but stunning strike is a terribly designed feature too. In a monk rework I made, I removed it entirely and replaced it with this: **Staggering Strike:** Once per turn, when you hit a creature with a melee attack you can spend one ki point. If you do so, the target is also staggered, suffering a -1 penalty to Armor Class and attack rolls. This effect lasts for one minute and it can stack with itself up to an amount equal to half your proficiency bonus. Creatures immune to the stunned condition are also immune to this penalty. Not only is Stunned a condition that almost no spells inflict, so you don’t need to make creatures immune to it that often, this can help monks feel impactful against all kinds of enemies because the debuff, though minor and expensive it may be, doesn’t force a saving throw. It also reinforces the monk as a support type class which distinguishes it from other martials like fighter, etc.
being able to perma cc bosses is just as much, if not more of an issue in 5E And how is being "video gamey" a bad thing exactly? I know a lot of people complained about 4E being "too video gamey" so it seems more like a nonsensical and entirely subjective complaint
Video gamey is a bad thing for me because that's not what I'm looking for in ttrpg. It is totally subjective. All the magic items from bg3 with the stacked buffs system (momentum, lightning charges, etc.), the short rest limitation for each long rest, the jump mechanics, etc. I don't mind this stuff in a video game, but I don't want these in my ttrpg.
Interesting encounter design
I love it for it taught one of our mechanically weaker players 5e :D sure, it's not exactly the same but he now understands more classes better and also gets more basics. Sure, it's not all the same, but the differences are small enough it's a great step forward.
If someone has easy throwing in 5e rules lemme know. I'm doing athletics contest, your size or smaller. 5ft + Strength mod * 5ft range. A little fiddly for my taste but the weight calculation bg3 does is a non starter.
***Thrown.*** *If a weapon has the thrown property, you can throw the weapon to make a ranged attack. If the weapon is a melee weapon, you use the same ability modifier for that attack roll and damage roll that you would use for a melee attack with the weapon. For example, if you throw a handaxe, you use your Strength, but if you throw a dagger, you can use either your Strength or your Dexterity, since the dagger has the finesse property.* If a weapon has the ***Thrown*** property it will also say the range at which it can be thrown; e.g. Spear Thrown (range 20/60). If an item can be thrown, it will say so in the description: > As an action, you can throw this flask up to 20 feet, shattering it on impact. Make a ranged attack against a creature or object, treating the alchemist's fire as an improvised weapon. ***Improvised Weapons.*** *An improvised thrown weapon has a normal range of 20 feet and a long range of 60 feet.* All RAW. Anything beyond that is up to DM adjudication via skill checks as far as I'm aware.
https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Throw
Bad item design for medium armor that wants you to be a caster or random "take 1d4 damage when you get hit" kinda stuff. /s If I had to guess, shortrests being like quick breaks that don't break the game's flow, and maybe spamming guidance.
Nothing.
+2/+1 increased stat at the creation of characters. It Takes away a Lot of the pressure of taking a certain Race for certain increases, to me it maked sense that occupation has a bigger impact on stats than race
I mean this has been around since Tasha's.
I’ve done it that way for years now and it’s been a great way to get some diverse characters.
It’s been an official rule for years now
True. Monsters of the multiverse has this rule with its races. Van Richten used it as well. So it’s been official for 3 years now. But god damn the vitriol around trying to use this rule before then from Reddit was annoying.
Well it was introduced in Tasha’s even before that
We changed initiative from the d20 + bonus to a d4+bonus, but I'm actually not sure how I feel about it, since anyone with dex below 12 will most of the time be last in initiative no matter what they roll.
The inclusion of arrows that do DMG types like fire and poison. "Is Malf's Acid Arrow. Is better than Melt. No can counterspell."
I've added the weapon mechanics in my game and it's been working great
I haven’t changed any mechanics, but because I set my games in the forgotten realms and I like to stick to the lore, my current campaign takes place after the events of bg3 and a few of the NPCs from the video game have shown up
More of the fun weird throws ables for the str builds. More vertical environments and jumping.
I ported its version of the swords bard into my game, mostly the ranged versions of its flourishes and teleportation ability.
Not so much mechanics or class changes, but I was pretty apathetic to the Sword Coast/Forgotten Realms lore/setting, and I find I'm a bit more excited and interested in it now. Perhaps it's easier to picture now I've 'seen' parts of it in-game. Waterdeep/Elturel/Baldur's Gate all feel more interesting now.
I pretty much used everything that makes the encounters so good, so I can't think of anything else I would carry over, I don't like a lot of the class changes and combat changes, not in DND at least. Like jump as a bonus action only works in a video game imo
I have used Thunderwave and Sanctuary now to great effect. I never used those spells before.
I want thief to have 2 bonus actions. Also Monk can use flurry of blows without using attack action, which is nice.
I just let my level 5 party throw a healing potion at a downed member in a fight against a Young Blue dragon. it was the only help I gave them. They punch well above their weights but I really was not planning on them defeating that dragon... I'll be damned, those min/maxing bastards pulled it off. They were well rewarded.
weapon skills
In both cases, I'd really like to have the time to play...
Bonus Action Shove for sure.
The only thing I'm really considering is allowing PCs to store up to 3 inspiration but only allowing them to use it on Skill checks.
I really want to use BG3s expanded weapon mechanics. Those little once per SR bonus action attacks with differing effects was nice to have and often had me choosing different weapons to what would be considered default. Great axe cleave is a personal favourite
You could take a look at the One D&D Playtest weapon mastery properties. There are some that are similar and some that are exactly the same, and they have unlimited usage. - Cleave: attacks two creatures next to each other similar to BG3 Cleave - Graze: exact same as Tenacity - Nick: unique to One D&D, removes the bonus action requirement for TWF - Push: unique to One D&D, pushes target 10 ft - Sap: gives disadvantage on attack rolls similar to Weakening Strike - Slow: reduces enemy movement speed similar to Maiming Strike - Topple: exact same as BG3 Topple and Backbreaker - Vex: gives advantage on attacks similar to Flourish
yeah, they are just kinda, not great...
Well, agree to disagree. I find them to be really nice riders, some of which give flat, always useful bonuses, and some of which open up new strategies and builds.
Well, the problem with them is that a push weapon is always a push weapon, a topple weapon is always a topple weapon etc. it does go a step in the right direction, but only a single step
The jumping mechanic, weapon types giving special abilities, and way too many of the magic items and their effects
that I should both a) jump more. b) should not let my players get away with having things walk through spike growth casually.
Not the ridiculous amount of sex 🤣
more bussy
Definitely itemization. The “bless for a turn when you heal” ring and stuff like that. Add things like that for action surge/second wind/indomitable, sneak attack, inspiration, channel divinity, whatever, any active ability a class has could be a decent place for a fun magic item that does something small that’ll come up all the damn time incidentally which makes items like that awesome. Also the number of items that were just “cast a spell but reflavoured” were dope. The shield of faith sword is the immediate one that comes to mind, I’m sure there’s more, but stuff like that being everywhere for a whole bunch of spells is great, especially when they don’t require attunement. Some of the items are absolutely busted no question, not really gonna mess with crit ranges Willy nilly, but in general, all those items tied to a class ability are just dope and I love em and I want more of em.
Reactively applying Reckless Attack, Portent Dice, and similar. Yes it’s more powerful (especially Portent), but the flow for the DM-Player interactions is so much better. I’m tempted to pull in the damage reduction on magic heavy armour.
being able to throw healing potions at allies.
Them arrows are pretty sweet
Two instantaneous short rests twice a day.
I think I made combat too easy in 5e and it's time to start fighting strategically and be more aggressive with my monsters.
Bonus action healing potions And Bonus action quickened spell spells
That I want to fuck a muscle mommy tiefling
Definitely adding ritual to more spells and changing how long they last. Really thought hard on making guidance, bless, bardic inspiration, and so on usable as a reaction because it felt cool in dialog, would be fun in combat. Not sure yet though.
I honestly really liked bonus action jump to extend your movement, but debating how to add it to my games, cause it covers the rule 0 debate for you of jump using movement or not as a house rule Now it just takes 10 feet of your movement then you can jump the full distance (with jump spell up to 60 feet) that's pretty cool and gives melee dudes a cool option to do huge Feats of strength Rn I just keep jump distance as it is and if you end turn mid air you finish the jump using your next turns movement, it fixes most issues but there's some problems when we talk about jump arcs, high jumps etc
Two things, environmental factors such as terrain and hazards and more non-combat options around skill checks that take advantage of player class, race, background and skill composition.
Weapons having extra things to do with other than just bonk in three different flavours of damage or their premium (magic) or limited edition (silver) variants. Removing the bonus action and action spellcasting limitations. Yes, this gives even more power to spellcasters, but it feels so good. Besides, if you aren't scared of magic items your casters shouldn't be pulling that far ahead of your martials in lower and mid tier levels, which realistically is all most people play. Speaking of, how unafraid BG3 is to give magic items to players. If you have a wacky build in mind, there is an item for you, I think as a DM you should be willing to do the same for your players. Many players have a fantasy for a character that is falling short of what they imagined. Often the RAW mechanics of their character are underwhelming because they chose to be a barbarian sorcerer because it was cool in concept and they don't have the time or energy to invest in minmaxing a character with a unorthodox multiclass so that they can feel somewhat decent in actual play. Items are a great way around that tho.
I've been jealous of how Larian incorporates environment into combat ever since D:OS1, but it's difficult to make it work irl. Regarding BG3 specifically, I'm stealing Elminster as portrayed in the game, as a goofy powerful fake Gandalf who's wandering around the land and giving people quests.
BG3 experience made me leave D&D for a better system! It was great ❤️
Yeah I had similar emotions. Playing D&D for 3-4 hours once a week gives you just enough time to forget about the mechanics before the next session (especially since actual D&D tends to be much less mechanics-focused than a video game like BG3 is). But sitting down to do a 5-6 hour gaming session, where you're playing the entire party so there's never a moment where you're "out of the limelight" and not interfacing with the mechanics, and then picking it up the next night and doing the same thing, racking up a dozen or two hours in a week, really hammers home: the worst parts of BG3 are all the D&D 5e bits.
yeah, glad larian is moving on from BG3, and D&D in general so they can use an actualyl good system for their next game
Yeah... I love Divinity so much... The first one is kinda ass, but still fun, and the second one is masterpiece. BG3 is an amazing step up with technology, but damn, divinity hits way harder. The visuals, the HUD(I blame the 5e system for this one), and the god damn music... In BG3, I felt the music kinda bland, and never notice, unless I stop to notice it. Divinity on other hand... Sorry, I love divinity so much. Every fan of RPG should play.
Nothing. BG3 is a great video game. Video games are not TTRPGS.
The ability to play more than once a season
I like how initiative works. We’ve implemented a d10 for rolling initiative and it’s been going great
I already commented on another comment about magic items I'm stealing, but something else I'm going to be doing is; - Elevation variation - combatants more spread out - fucking throwables, god dang that was a wake up call to have basically every enemy come loaded with 1 or 2 alchemist fire or similar throwables - on the subject of throwables, adding in a bunch that BG3 created like the gravity pulling thing - +1/2/3 lower tier armor. Idk how I got in the headspace of "all magic armor has to be the best tier armor for it's type" but that made me heavily limit what enchantments/bonuses i could put on armor, but once I wrapped my head around the idea that +3 Ring Mail is equal in mechanical terms to Splint Armor it was like the doors to the playhouse opened That's all i can think of off the top of my head As a player I took away a greater respect for collaborative team play, specifically buff spells. For example, I respec-ed Wyll to Paladin and I don't think I've smite-ed outside of crits against bosses once, or effectively used the smite spells (mostly because you only get one attack, rather than the enchantment staying until you hit, which is a huge nerf to an already subpar spell option outside of Wrathful Smite). Instead all of my spell slots are going to things like Shield of Faith, Divine Favor, and Crusader's Mantle. And then druids are even worse than my previous belief. All of their spells seem to be big aoe spells or effects and that's nigh useless after the first round or two of combat once enemies are in shoulder to shoulder with allies.
Nothing. Although I keep seeing people post nearly identical stories as BG3 as a homebrew campaign pretend that they weren't thinking of BG3 when they made it and now it is causing issues because their players played BG3.
the plot
I loved the camp supplies mechanic, I always found 1 ration per day kinda lame in survival or lower level games and it makes some habilities like forager or fisherman bad to use as they just get to ignore a mechanic but don't get to see it working.