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Bilirubin posted:Minsc broke his two handed sword. Is it better to temporarily equip him with a bastard sword two handed or give him an off hand blade with it as well? Not sure what you have his weapon proficiencies at. You'll probably want to find him another two handed sword asap as he won't be any good with weapons he doesn't have profs in.
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Sep 10, 2023 00:08
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I think I do most of bg2 in chapter 2. Yes, some guy needs 20k gold. Okay, fine I'll just adventure until I have 120k so I have some padding in the budget... Then I slam through all the actual plot.
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Sep 10, 2023 01:08
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Ginette Reno posted:Not sure what you have his weapon proficiencies at. You'll probably want to find him another two handed sword asap as he won't be any good with weapons he doesn't have profs in. Thanks. Have restored a two hander to him now. I have just about ran out of the Nashkell quests, just have Sendai and her two henchmen to kill in the Fire Leaf Forest (they wrecked me last time) and I guess kill that mage in the carnival. And find the sculptor around the mines. Happy to see the team leveling up to three though
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Sep 10, 2023 03:34
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Just freed stone statue cleric Branwen and killed the mage in the carnival. This time he only killed Imoen who I revived after. Nice drop of loop from him.
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Sep 10, 2023 04:12
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I have a conundrum. I've carried my Enchanter over to SoD and I don't know what to so with my party. Minsc is a death engine and Dynaheir does my blasting. Thief lady needs to stick around because gently caress traps. Archer lady is cool and I want to keep her around. Viconia is doing support. But Minsc is my one frontliner. Do I give my archer a sword and shield and heavy armour because she has somewhat okay strength and lose all her damage, switching her to a bow when there's less enemies? If I find an actual tank companion, who do I switch? Viconia and live without divine magic? Thief lady and just have the tank eat traps? Ugh.
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Sep 10, 2023 04:16
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If you've got to the part where Corwyn joins you as a party member, you may want to have another look around the camp. Or if you just want a straight answer: talk to Glint, who should be skulking around the campsite. He's a potential cleric/thief party member, so you can ditch Safana and Viconia and free up a party slot for someone cooler. Or if you like Viconia, letting her focus on buffing herself and being a frontliner while he handles the backline stuff.
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Sep 10, 2023 04:31
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Oh that's good new. I do like Viconia but the fact that she has such little strength is rough. I suppose if I put her in the frontline she wouldn't be doing much damage even with 18 strength though, so she'd just soak a bit of damage.
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Sep 10, 2023 05:42
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SirSamVimes posted:Oh that's good new. If you feed her a strength potion or cast a strength spell on her long enough for her to put full plate on Viconia she won't take it off when the effect expires.
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Sep 10, 2023 07:33
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Does SoD not have ankheg armour?
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Sep 10, 2023 07:35
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SoD is pretty cool, by the way. It loses the wonderful openness of the base game, but in exchange it gains polish and focus. Also the fact that companions are actual companions now. I've discovered a goblin shaman with the ability to detect traps, so I might just replace my thief with her and rely on Minsc to break open locked chests/doors.
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Sep 10, 2023 08:26
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I've never played SoD, but everything I've ever read about the goblin shaman makes me angry they didn't add them to BG2EE, even as a separate DLC.
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Sep 10, 2023 09:53
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I installed the gog version of icewind dale 2 last night and had trouble getting it to start correctly. It launched eventually but as a fixed 800x600 "window" on my 4k monitor with the rest of the screen becoming blank but my mouse still able to slide off into the void no problem. I looked around and I think I've found some things to try so it behaves better. Anyone else run into this? Seems to be direct draw related.
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Sep 10, 2023 10:03
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SirSamVimes posted:SoD is pretty cool, by the way. It loses the wonderful openness of the base game, but in exchange it gains polish and focus. Also the fact that companions are actual companions now. I loved it so much, it's like a small teaser of what could have been with new infinity engine stuff. They put so much effort into melding it with the other two games that I feel it integrates pretty much seamlessly. BG3 is great, but it seriously fails at being congruent with the previous titles in the series.
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Sep 10, 2023 11:01
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mitochondritom posted:BG3 is great, but it seriously fails at being congruent with the previous titles in the series. I'm in the last 3rd of BG3, and while I'm enjoying it a great deal and already planning replays, I can't overstate how little it owes to the originals. Some minor flavour text and a few plot references is about it. Let's put it this way, they didn't even have the door of Sorcerous Sundries oriented the same direction, and that would have cost literally nothing.
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Sep 10, 2023 11:19
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Jay Rust posted:Does SoD not have ankheg armour? It definitely imports if you have it in your inventory when you cross over to SoD:  Not sure if you can get a new set in the expansion itself.
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Sep 10, 2023 11:25
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Torquemada posted:I'm in the last 3rd of BG3, and while I'm enjoying it a great deal and already planning replays, I can't overstate how little it owes to the originals. Some minor flavour text and a few plot references is about it. Let's put it this way, they didn't even have the door of Sorcerous Sundries oriented the same direction, and that would have cost literally nothing. Now that I have been through the city in Baldur's Gate 1, I really love the way that BG3 called back to it without being beholden to it. Things like Ramazith's Tower or Sorcerous Sundries were fantastic.
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Sep 10, 2023 11:36
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Molybdenum posted:I installed the gog version of icewind dale 2 last night and had trouble getting it to start correctly. It launched eventually but as a fixed 800x600 "window" on my 4k monitor with the rest of the screen becoming blank but my mouse still able to slide off into the void no problem. When you're ready to fiddle there are ddraw wrappers with configurations and such that will give cursor lock etc. Here are my notes from the last time I used one. zedprime posted:Well this discussion made me reinstall IWD2 which is something I was convinced I had sworn off in the past.
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Sep 10, 2023 14:01
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When I get to BG 3, my reaction might be interesting, since I'll have played them before, but only recently, so I should get the references, but I won't be beholden to the nostalgia. (BG 1) Durlag's Tower is conquered. I actually left a lot of the gems and gold coins behind, as well as many magic items and scrolls I had no use for. Now I just have the Ulgoth's Beard Demon fight in the basement and the final maze and boss of the first campaign.
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Sep 10, 2023 14:17
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Air Skwirl posted:I've never played She rules. My favorite interaction is in a quest where you're infiltrating the enemy camp, and there's a troll handler who asks you to help them get the shackles back on a troll that broke loose. If you offer to help, she'll interject "why?" and that made me pause long enough to just abandon the questline right there. I thought most of the moral choices in SoD were overwrought and/or underbaked, but M'Khiin managed to cut me down with a single word.
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Sep 10, 2023 14:59
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just want to thank the thread for your help and putting up with my early player questions and excited first time playthrough live blogging. Now that I am back into it I am enjoying the hell out of myself
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Sep 10, 2023 16:32
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SirSamVimes posted:Now that I have been through the city in Baldur's Gate 1, I really love the way that BG3 called back to it without being beholden to it. Things like Ramazith's Tower or Sorcerous Sundries were fantastic.
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Sep 10, 2023 16:37
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I've played about 30 hours of BG3 and it feels like they set it a hundred years later specifically so they could pretend the earlier games don't exist. I know a couple characters from BG 1/2 will be showing up but aside from that I haven't seen much in the way of references, either direct or oblique. Which is fine, I figure most people playing it never have and never will play the first games. But I would have liked if it cared a little more about its predecessors beyond the setting.
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Sep 10, 2023 17:17
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Wicked Them Beats posted:I've played about 30 hours of BG3 and it feels like they set it a hundred years later specifically so they could pretend the earlier games don't exist. I know a couple characters from BG 1/2 will be showing up but aside from that I haven't seen much in the way of references, either direct or oblique. No, it's just when 5th edition Forgotten Realms is set. Here's a hint if you want to see references to the original games: do a Dark Urge playthrough.
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Sep 10, 2023 17:56
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Got a couple short BG2 questions if you all don’t mind. I can’t seem to get the poison head added to the Flail of Ages (+3). I went back to D’Arnise home and the forge there doesn’t work (says it’s already completed) and went to Cromwell but he doesn’t recognize it as able to be forged. Is this because I did Watcher’s Keep before being done with SoA? Can I forge it before ToB? I’m not sure since Watcher’s keep is new content for me (I am on chapter 3) but does the game think it’s ToB content? Second, without too many specifics I remember what happens with Yoshimo. However I don’t remember when it happens - I forget most of the details and would like to see how it all plays out. When should I add him back into the party? I have left him behind mostly until now and I am off to Spellhold in Ch. 3.
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Sep 10, 2023 18:09
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I think since Watcher's Keep is technically ToB content you need an NPC in ToB to forge it for you, unless you use a mod to make Cromwell able to do that as well. Add Yoshimo to your party before you go to Spellhold.
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Sep 10, 2023 18:17
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You need to be in ToB proper to upgrade the Flail of ages past +3. Very early on you get a new home base and there's a character there that upgrades ToB items. e:f;b but I believe the tweak anthology has an option that let's you use Cromwell to upgrade ToB items if you want to go the modding route. You don't really need it, +3 Flail of Ages is a top tier weapon for SoA aside from the very small amount of enemies that need a +4 or +5 weapon to hit. Air Skwirl fucked around with this message at 18:21 on Sep 10, 2023 |
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Sep 10, 2023 18:18
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sweet geek swag posted:No, it's just when 5th edition Forgotten Realms is set. Here's a hint if you want to see references to the original games: do a Dark Urge playthrough. Nice to hear there's some references somewhere, but I probably won't play it again. Not sure what it is exactly, but I don't really like Larian's writing style. Bounced off of Original Sin 2 for the same reason.
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Sep 10, 2023 18:22
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Ah ok, that makes sense then. Thank you both! Also a quick aside, I never knew how much damage the skull trap spell does. In the past I either overlooked it or only had Aerie as a mage. But drat stacking those things up enables some trap cheese I thought I needed a thief to do.
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Sep 10, 2023 18:24
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rio posted:Ah ok, that makes sense then. Thank you both! It's low key better than fireball because IIRC it doesn't have a level limit on the damage either.
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Sep 10, 2023 18:38
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Wicked Them Beats posted:I've played about 30 hours of BG3 and it feels like they set it a hundred years later specifically so they could pretend the earlier games don't exist. I know a couple characters from BG 1/2 will be showing up but aside from that I haven't seen much in the way of references, either direct or oblique. From the very first announcement that Larian were making BG3 they heavily emphasized making a game play like PnP DnD, which they have done (and by all accounts done incredibly well). But, I would argue that many people (myself included) played BG1 and 2 with no experience of Pen and Paper DND and so the nostalgia for those games comes from the games themselves and not the emulation of a real life experience into a cRPG. I remember reading a lot of prerelease stuff and getting the impression that Larian were almost deliberately not mentioning the previous two games. I think, because it's so different to them. It doesn't feel like a sequel at all. BG3 is also, transparently, an iteration of Larians own series, which I think also adds to this weird vibe I get playing it. The music, for example, is by the same composer as the Divinity series and feels similar to the OS2 soundtrack. I realize making a sequel to BG2, as I may want it in my head is dumb, it's 20 year old game now. SoD showed there's no mass market appeal for infinity engine stuff anymore. It's amazing that Larian got to make BG3, it's such a good game so far, I just feel a bit like they could have pulled it off as a new Forgotten Realms thing, in a different place. It didn't need to be BG3 (except for the marketing potential as a sequel to one of the best cRPGs of all time). I'd guess Larian, as a studio, would've maybe wanted to do that too. Start their own forgotten realms series, not make a sequel to a former competitor? After all they were making Divinity games around the same time.
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Sep 10, 2023 18:40
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Act 3 of BG3 is where it very overtly connects to the first two games, even if you’re not doing a Dark Urge run of the game.
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Sep 10, 2023 18:50
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It actually makes a lot of changes to tabletop, but they are all for the better.
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Sep 10, 2023 18:51
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I don’t know what this says about me or BG3, but after I put about 12 hours into it I stopped and started a fresh game of BG2. It helps that it’s been so long I feel like some things are almost like new, but I was just remembering as I played BG3 how much fun BG2 was, and somehow BG3 wasn’t as appealing. I can’t even put my finger on why that is. After spending like 100+ (in game) days in BG2 again it really doesn’t feel like BG3. It makes me wish there were a BG3 that was a modern version of BG2 (graphics, more character interactions, more freedom in mechanics/player choice etc) and that Larian’s BG3 was a different title altogether. I mean personally I would love that to just be another infinity engine game but I know that wouldn’t happen. It could just be nostalgia, but putting some modern polish on the BG2 formula, I think it could have had the same kind of appeal as BG3 since really it appears its success is having a full, fun game without a bunch of IAP while seeming novel compared to Legend of Assassin’s Creed of the Wild or whatever formula it is that people are currently tired of.
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Sep 10, 2023 19:28
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rio posted:I don’t know what this says about me or BG3, but after I put about 12 hours into it I stopped and started a fresh game of BG2. It helps that it’s been so long I feel like some things are almost like new, but I was just remembering as I played BG3 how much fun BG2 was, and somehow BG3 wasn’t as appealing. I can’t even put my finger on why that is. That's sorta what the Pillars of Eternity games attempt. So you might look into them.
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Sep 10, 2023 19:36
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BG1 - gently caress Aec'Letec, and this whole Soultaker questline. I've literally had to long rest to heal after every single fight in this quest. I don't know whether I should either buff myself like crazy with the rare, expensive "Magic Blocking" potions, or whether to skip all buffing and use Dispel Magic on myself to clear away the Hold Person and the very crippling "Silence" effects. Does Dispel Magic actually remove Hold Person or Silence? I don't trust that spell at all because it never seems to be useful at actually removing debilitating debuffs on your characters, and only removes positive ones (and also it probably doesn't work to remove buffs from enemy mages).
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Sep 10, 2023 19:37
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Stabbey_the_Clown posted:BG1 - gently caress Aec'Letec, and this whole Soultaker questline. I've literally had to long rest to heal after every single fight in this quest. I don't know whether I should either buff myself like crazy with the rare, expensive "Magic Blocking" potions, or whether to skip all buffing and use Dispel Magic on myself to clear away the Hold Person and the very crippling "Silence" effects. It sorta does, but the math on it is fucky because enemy mages tend to be a higher level than you, so you're more likely to remove you're own buffs than remove an enemies debuff. Remove magic only targets enemies, so is a better option, but the real killer is have an inquisitor in your party with their dispel magic ability, it cast at double level and thus annihilates anything.
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Sep 10, 2023 19:40
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 f,bStabbey_the_Clown posted:Does Dispel Magic actually remove Hold Person or Silence? I don't trust that spell at all because it never seems to be useful at actually removing debilitating debuffs on your characters, and only removes positive ones (and also it probably doesn't work to remove buffs from enemy mages). Dispel magic pits the caster (of the dispel spell) level against the caster level of the person/creature that cast the spells you're trying to remove. quote:The base chance of successfully dispelling is 50%. For every level that the caster of the Dispel Magic is above the original caster, his chance of success increases by 5%. For every level that the caster of Dispel Magic is below the original caster, his chance of success decreases by 10%. However, despite the difference in levels, there is always at least a 1% chance of success or failure. Thus, if a caster is 10 levels higher than the magic he is trying to dispel, there is only a 1% chance of failure. Similarly if the caster is 4 levels lower than the magic he is trying to dispel, there is only a 10% chance of success. Intuitively, this spell is almost useless if the target is 5 or more levels higher than the caster.
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Sep 10, 2023 19:43
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Stabbey_the_Clown posted:BG1 - gently caress Aec'Letec, and this whole Soultaker questline. I've literally had to long rest to heal after every single fight in this quest. I don't know whether I should either buff myself like crazy with the rare, expensive "Magic Blocking" potions, or whether to skip all buffing and use Dispel Magic on myself to clear away the Hold Person and the very crippling "Silence" effects. the final fight in the basement is indeed the moment you've been saving your magic blocking potions for
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Sep 10, 2023 19:43
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As Rappaport pointed out, Dispel magic is terrible because most enemy spellcasters are higher level than you so it rarely works. And it also removes your own buffs half the time. The only time it's worth casting really is if you're an Inquisitor. Bards end up being the best dispellers in the game (outside of Inquisitors) because they level very fast so they're the class that gets closest to enemy levels and most likely to succeed with dispels. But as Air Skwirl said, you want to use remove magic not dispel magic.
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Sep 10, 2023 20:14
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sweet geek swag posted:No, it's just when 5th edition Forgotten Realms is set. Here's a hint if you want to see references to the original games: do a Dark Urge playthrough. But yeah people who think 3 is not strongly related to 1 and 2 mystify me, given there are constant references in dialogue, lore books, even item descriptions or mechanics, companions, et cetera. I suppose it might pick up more as the game goes along and that is why people playing the game do not see them as much at first? Also like no spoilers, again, but there is a huge semi-secret area in the game (you will find it if you do not skip the companion storyline it seemingly is built into, even though I found it before realizing this) where Larian loving killed me dead with emotion and storytelling/lore revelations/et cetera all tying into the previous games and it is a beautiful thing mitochondritom posted:From the very first announcement that Larian were making BG3 they heavily emphasized making a game play like PnP DnD, which they have done (and by all accounts done incredibly well). But, I would argue that many people (myself included) played BG1 and 2 with no experience of Pen and Paper DND and so the nostalgia for those games comes from the games themselves and not the emulation of a real life experience into a cRPG. mitochondritom posted:I realize making a sequel to BG2, as I may want it in my head is dumb, it's 20 year old game now. SoD showed there's no mass market appeal for infinity engine stuff anymore. It's amazing that Larian got to make BG3, it's such a good game so far, I just feel a bit like they could have pulled it off as a new Forgotten Realms thing, in a different place. It didn't need to be BG3 (except for the marketing potential as a sequel to one of the best cRPGs of all time). I'd guess Larian, as a studio, would've maybe wanted to do that too. Start their own forgotten realms series, not make a sequel to a former competitor? After all they were making Divinity games around the same time. Well except the drat Tieflings. It really does change the vibe of the game to have dozens of horned devilkin milling about casually in the opening area, spoken again as someone for whom Baldur's Gate 3 is now his favorite game ever
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Sep 10, 2023 20:38
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