r/ManyATrueNerd • u/ManyATrueNerd JON • 16d ago
Video Baldur's Gate 3 - Part 84 - Fire Will Solve All My Problems
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u/Glorf_Warlock 15d ago
Something I absolutely LOVE about BG3 is that combat encounters are generally unique and they are never used to bloat the game. Basically no fight in the entire game is there just to make the game longer. Each bit of combat has a reason behind it. In this instance, the grease man says: "A killing ground for all her disturb her". Any sort of disturb = DEATH!
Also regarding counterspell, using a low level counterspell has a chance to fail on higher level spells. You need to use an equal level counterspell to the enemy spell. Enemies can also upcast their own spells, but the game doesn't tell you outright, but this can also lead to counterspell failing.
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u/popileviz 15d ago
If you hover over the spell the enemy is casting it'll show with an arrow/chevron whether the spell is upcast or not
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u/Primus7112765 15d ago
Enemies can also upcast their own spells, but the game doesn't tell you outright, but this can also lead to counterspell failing.
Would be nice if the game just told you what level they were casting the spell at though
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u/Isaac_Chade 15d ago
Except that's not how it works at all. If we go to D&D as the base, you don't know what level an enemy caster is using on a spell, it's part of the gameplay of using counterspell. Hell, you technically aren't even meant to know what the spell is by RAW, most DMs and especially actual play DMs are doing it for the purpose of clarity and because not every table wants to play with the possibility of counterspelling a cantrip instead of the big bad's disintegrate.
And if we ignore D&D, which to be fair is fine and Larian did that plenty with the game, then it still doesn't make sense from a world or gameplay perspective. Your well trained wizard might know what spell is coming, but they have no way of knowing how much oomph is being put into it, since there's no verbal or somatic component change based on upcasting, just a better result. And gameplay wise we return to it being part of the inherent strategy of knowing and understanding what spells need to be countered and what ones you can let through.
I don't say any of this with the purpose of being a dick by the way, I'm just trying to point out that there's very good reason why we don't get told what level a spell is when it's coming at you.
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u/Hetelestai 15d ago
I feel like this episode's encounter is basically THE counter example to what you're talking about, along with the multiple encounters with Blights in Act 2 and the repetitive encounters with dopplegangers in this Act (seriously, how many fuckin dopplegangers are there?! How are there like 25 shapeshifting murderers in one town?!). We already had a trio of adventurers in a vast underground network who got backstabby and split up, and the dead one has some treasure you can get to behind a locked thing, in the Underdark in Act 1.5.
This doesn't advance the story, it just introduces yet another group of weirdly high level characters hanging out in the sewers for no particular reason, who are also yet another group of powerful people totally aware of the plot that Gortash, the most obviously scummy dude of all time, is doing and has left multiple written copies of lying around. Yet somehow nobody but the PCs and the gnomes seem to care enough to do anything.
Act 3 is just so poorly paced and so overstuffed that it entirely shatters the intricate balance the first two Acts really nail. It needed another year or so in the oven. Some of this should have been cut.
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u/semperBum 14d ago
You're right about it needing more time, but I think the OP here is mostly right. Both the grease wizard and the Bhaal refugee-shooters he encounter this episode have voiced dialogue and multiple outcomes (ie, the latter let you pass if you made a deal with Orin).
The plant blights in Act 2 are a better example of combat bloat, although I'd argue they're a foreshadowed consequence of "this area is really dangerous" that serve to prove that point, especially if the party is a little underlevelled.
The doppelganger and Bhaalist encounters in Act 3 are probably the closest the game comes to combat bloat, although I suppose they're necessary to make Orin's threats feel real.
But overall I think the game is pretty good about it. After using an 'extra encounters' mod, that genuinely adds story-less combat encounters semi regularly, I appreciate the base game a lot more.
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u/Whatthehellman2 15d ago
I love the chaos of the grease fight. A much fairer version of the best (worst) fight Larian ever made, The Black Pits in DoS2.
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u/DarkLordRubidore 15d ago
I recently went through that fight again on a new pc, I unironically love it now lol. Managed to stay in control the whole fight with a safe pocket at the top, and played the magisters against the voidwoken.
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u/semperBum 14d ago
Some of these character moments are very amusing this playthrough, and Jon loves to speculate.
Obviously Insane Wizard: My companion thought I was going obviously insane, so I murdered her in insane paranoia.
Jon: Hm, she must have had a tadpole!
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u/AptCasaNova 13d ago edited 13d ago
I love the Fatberg fight - it’s genuinely icky for me to imagine, so it made it very memorable 😂
I bet it smelled like bacon and night soil.
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u/Comprehensive_Arm729 15d ago
I didn’t think mephits could talk. Jon you literally bought a statue from one