D&D General Baldur's Gate 3 will now be releasing August 3rd on PC and September 6th on PS5, increased level cap, race & class details and more

[MarkB]

It would be great if they made a DM toolkit part of the game (like Solasta) so fans could create module conversions.

Divinity Original Sin 2 had a DM mode, so it's possible.

 

[Burnside]

Their answer on the DM thing has been that they'd like to do it if there is a demand for it, but right now their focus is on completing the game and they haven't thought about how it would work.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Divinity Original Sin 2 had a DM mode, so it's possible.

Yeah but guess what?

Basically nobody used it except for shenanigans, and there were next-to-no modules made for it.

Their answer on the DM thing has been that they'd like to do it if there is a demand for it, but right now their focus is on completing the game and they haven't thought about how it would work.

Bolded the killer bit here.

DM mode and the ability to make your own adventures are two things, historically, fans constantly ask for, even get very het up about, and then don't actually use. Larian themselves have essentially been tricked into investing in those features before (particularly in DOS2), only to see the very audience which demanded them, which said they'd be amazing and heavily-used, largely ignore them.

And the pattern is repeated over and over and over with any kind of RPG content creator - people claim that they'll use the hell out of it, then they realize how much actual work is involved in making anything that feels good (dozens or hundreds of hours of hard graft), and thus almost no-one actually does it.

So if I was Larian I would be extremely skeptical when assessing people's requests about adding such modes.

Eventually there will probably be a way of doing it (perhaps AI assisted, most likely just using an AI to interpret commands to build stuff and speed up scripting) where it doesn't require the same level of effort, but that's still probably a decade or more out.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

The Solasta builder gets some use, but that is because it's a much simpler game. The more sophisticated the game, the more time, effort and skill is required to make anything that looks remotely passible, even if you have the tools.

 

[Burnside]

Yeah but guess what?

Basically nobody used it except for shenanigans, and there were next-to-no modules made for it.

Bolded the killer bit here.

DM mode and the ability to make your own adventures are two things, historically, fans constantly ask for, even get very het up about, and then don't actually use. Larian themselves have essentially been tricked into investing in those features before (particularly in DOS2), only to see the very audience which demanded them, which said they'd be amazing and heavily-used, largely ignore them.

And the pattern is repeated over and over and over with any kind of RPG content creator - people claim that they'll use the hell out of it, then they realize how much actual work is involved in making anything that feels good (dozens or hundreds of hours of hard graft), and thus almost no-one actually does it.

So if I was Larian I would be extremely skeptical when assessing people's requests about adding such modes.

Eventually there will probably be a way of doing it (perhaps AI assisted, most likely just using an AI to interpret commands to build stuff and speed up scripting) where it doesn't require the same level of effort, but that's still probably a decade or more out.

TBF there is a HELL of a lot of fan-created content for Skyrim and Fallouts 3 & 4. Solasta has pretty robust fan-generated content as well.

I think there is a difference between the game having a "DM mode" a la Bioware's Neverwinter Nights, and making a toolset available for creators and modders. The former really did flop with DOS2 (and I'd argue Larian didn't support it very well) and I agree is more trouble than it's worth, but the latter is definitely viable and Bethesda even found a way to monetize it.

That said, if I'm Larian it definitely goes on the "nice to have" list and I prioritize plenty of other stuff first.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

TBF there is a HELL of a lot of fan-created content for Skyrim and Fallouts 3 & 4

Adventures though?

Not really. There's a real paucity of fan-created adventure stuff for those that isn't either:

A) A big conversion mod with a whole team trying to bring an older TES game (or similar) into a more modern engine and which is still unfinished.

B) A big conversion mod with a whole team that turned into a paid project which is it's own game and not a mod anymore (Enderal, for example).

C) An "adventure" which is like 90% dialogue/open-world travel, with barely any locations or the like, and maybe is of an "erotic" or borderline nature.

I think there is a difference between the game having a "DM mode" a la Bioware's Neverwinter Nights, and making a toolset available for creators and modders.

Both fail pretty reliably. Both failed with DOS2. The trouble is that the toolsets that are used are incredibly powerful, but also incredibly hard work to use.

Bethesda even found a way to monetize it.

Nah. The monetization was brief and incompetent (and that's ignoring the totally abortive first attempt which nearly destroyed modding for their games entirely), and further, the monetization didn't even include any actual adventures, just a moderate amount of fairly middling-quality items/houses/horse armour and some sort of "lifestyle" mods.

You can see a complete list here - they're all included for free in the "Anniversary edition", which is itself free for anyone who had the Special Edition, which was itself free for anyone who bought the original game and most (all?) of the DLC.

EDIT - Also Creation Engine games have been getting harder and harder to make content for. One famous modder (I forget who) stated that it was "ten times" harder to script anything involving NPCs (so any adventure) for FO4 than it was for Skyrim, which was itself vastly harder to do that stuff in than Oblivion. One dreads to think how hard serious modding will be for Starfield, though it won't matter until the mod tools come out, if they come out (you can only do very superficial stuff before then).

 

[Burnside]

Adventures though?

Not really. There's a real paucity of fan-created adventure stuff for those that isn't either:
A) A big conversion mod with a whole team trying to bring an older TES game (or similar) into a more modern engine.

B) A big conversion mod with a whole team that turned into a paid project.

C) An "adventure" which is like 90% dialogue, with barely any locations or the like, and maybe of an "erotic" or borderline nature.


Both fail pretty reliably. Both failed with DOS2.


Nah. The monetization was brief and incompetent (and that's ignoring the totally abortive first attempt which nearly destroyed modding for their games entirely), and further, the monetization didn't even include any actual adventures, just a moderate amount of fairly middling-quality items/houses/horse armour and some sort of "lifestyle" mods.

You can see a complete list here - they're all included for free in the "Anniversary edition", which is itself free for anyone who had the Special Edition, which was itself free for anyone who bought the original game and most (all?) of the DLC.

If your argument is now pivoting from your original "there isn't any fan-generated content for CRPGs" to "fan content for CRPGs is mostly bad" or "fan content that's made by a team of fans instead of one fan somehow doesn't count as fan content"...okay, I guess? You're kinda spinning out, though.

Of course there is a ton of crap. But there is a TON of fan content for Fallout and Skyrim, including many adventures. Many are bad, some are very good. The fan-generated adventures for Bioware's Neverwinter Nights were, of course, much better than the official campaign it shipped with.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

If your argument is now pivoting from your original "there isn't any fan-generated content for CRPGs" to "fan content for CRPGs is mostly bad" or "fan content that's made by a team of fans instead of one fan somehow doesn't count as fan content"...okay, I guess? You're kinda spinning out, though.

No, it is not.

Please read more carefully.

Let me boil it down for you, because apparently I typed too many words, I'll bold it too to help out comprehension:

Very little fan-generated content for CRPGs is adventures.

That simple enough? So elaborate tools to generate adventure/module-type materials are pretty pointless. Yet fans ask for them endlessly - I guess all apparently either naive to how hard it is to make adventures, or thinking "Someone else will do it!".

Virtually all fan-generated content for CRPGs falls into the following categories:

1) Cheat modes/trainers/overpowered stuff etc.

2) Items. Because they're actually pretty easy to do, and a good way to learn 3D modelling.

3) Magic/gameplay mods (including survival, combat, and so on - many fall under 1 as well).

4) Appearance improvers/changers.

5) Quasi-porn/sexy dolly-dress-up.

But there is a TON of fan content for Fallout and Skyrim, including many adventures.

I defy you to point me to "many adventures" for FO4 and Skyrim. Especially the former. I'm pretty familiar with what's available - I used to be a keen user of Skyrim mods. There is a ton of fan content, yes, but it falls into the five categories I outlined above, and adventures are rare as hen's teeth, especially for FO4.

 

[Burnside]

Well, I’ve made the dumb mistake of trying to win a meaningless argument on the internet. And you, @Ruin Explorer, have failed to “keep it civil.”

We’ve probably both broken the TOS here so I’m gonna leave it.

 

[Seramus]

No, the will probably be several DLC which increase the level cap gradually, but a hypothetical BG4 will reset to level 1 (and use the OneD&D rules), not "import your saved 12th level character".

Larian has never been big on DLC like Obsidian or Owlcat, unless you include EE.

I have my bets on them immediately and silently jumping into BG4 and having it be a direct sequel like BG2.