D&D General BG3 Massive Spoiler Thread

[AdmundfortGeographer]

there are a whole bunch of timed events that can kick off without you having any real indication (particularly where you got into some degree of proximity but went in a different direction, and others which you can blunder into very easily.

I had some of this happen in my first play through. I was exploring down the Risen Road as part of zigzagging across the map filling in the map first as evasively as possible, heard some commotion to the side and kept on going down the road. Did some things … entered the goblin camp with Sazza’s help then spent a rest among the goblins then cleaned then out. When I returned to the Risen Road I found a burned out Waukeen’s Rest with basically nothing to do except get blinded by smoke and loot out the smokey ruins and find the Zhentarim Outpost. Second time through I went in right away and … well … there were people to save in that fire!

The fact that BG3 is not great at signposting them or noting them in the journal (BG3's adventure journal is very bad generally, one of the few inarguable weaknesses of the game) should not be papered over. By the time you've found a timed event exists, it's often too late for a long rest, and if you need one, you need to reload further back. Yet other timed events are only really long timers so it doesn't matter. It's very inconsistent.

That first playthrough experience with Waukeen’s Rest compared to the second made me wonder what else I missed first time through just because I was dinking around the map collecting sites to visit later, hex-crawlike. In the second, while among the goblins I spoke with Minthara right before planning to rest in the goblin camp (slots expended, low on potions), chatted with Minthara, rested, and when the long rest completed I got an alert that the enclave was under assault by the goblins. Seems that chatting with Minthara started a timed event? I think the first playthrough I musta spoke with her fully rested then cleared the goblin camp out right then and there.

One time I felt I got a time event that I felt was clear as possible was in the city with the negative headline being published the very next edition “tomorrow”.

 

[MarkB]

I had some of this happen in my first play through. I was exploring down the Risen Road as part of zigzagging across the map filling in the map first as evasively as possible, heard some commotion to the side and kept on going down the road. Did some things … entered the goblin camp with Sazza’s help then spent a rest among the goblins then cleaned then out. When I returned to the Risen Road I found a burned out Waukeen’s Rest with basically nothing to do except get blinded by smoke and loot out the smokey ruins and find the Zhentarim Outpost. Second time through I went in right away and … well … there were people to save in that fire!


That first playthrough experience with Waukeen’s Rest compared to the second made me wonder what else I missed first time through just because I was dinking around the map collecting sites to visit later, hex-crawlike. In the second, while among the goblins I spoke with Minthara right before planning to rest in the goblin camp (slots expended, low on potions), chatted with Minthara, rested, and when the long rest completed I got an alert that the enclave was under assault by the goblins. Seems that chatting with Minthara started a timed event? I think the first playthrough I musta spoke with her fully rested then cleared the goblin camp out right then and there.

One time I felt I got a time event that I felt was clear as possible was in the city with the negative headline being published the very next edition “tomorrow”.

First playthrough I never even went to Waukeen's Rest, and never knew what I was missing.

When I got to Grymforge and heard about Nere & co being trapped I still had things to sort out with the myconids so went back there. When I eventually got back to Grymforge the place was deserted, except that one gnome spontaneously appeared to warn me of the dangers ahead when I got to the elevator, and promptly disapparated once the conversation was over

 

[DarkCrisis]

Who knew teaching a child Necromancy would end up with tragic results?

 

[Seramus]

Disagree with the latter. Your descriptions of timed events are rather disingenuous - there are a whole bunch of timed events that can kick off without you having any real indication (particularly where you got into some degree of proximity but went in a different direction, and others which you can blunder into very easily.

Please do not acuse me of being dishonest or calculating when a far simpler explanation is that we had different experiences. The only timed event I found tricksy was Grymforge, since that seems to lock you in the moment you start exploring the zone with no indication there is a time issue until you either approach the cave in or sleep once. I found out the hard way there because I immediately started exploring the ruins and cliffs on either side instead of going straight in, and had no idea why I was dreaming about poisons and cave ins.

I found the rest of the timed events very obvious, in the sense that I would blunder into them, realize it was probably a timed scenario, then F8 and rest. And once I realized the way the game tended to handle timed event boundaries I learned to just rest before entering anywhere remotely interesting and that consuming areas one at a time is the best way to avoid accidentally tripping anything.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Please do not acuse me of being dishonest or calculating when a far simpler explanation is that we had different experiences.

If that's the case, you might want to avoid generalizations that don't mention this is merely your experience.

The reality is that a lot of timed events can in fact be kicked off without you noticing, because as noted, proximity to the place where the events occur is usually the trigger, and you often don't have to be very close - sometimes not even within sight of it - to trigger the timer. You only saw this with Grymforge, but it's very easy for similar things to occur with a lot of other events. With Grymforge I don't think the timer does usually start just on zone-in (if it does, it's very generous, and I don't think it's very generous), but like I said, a lot of these can trigger without you actually having gone particularly nearby. Adding to the problem are apparent bugs - some people had issues where, for example, Waukeen's Rest triggered when they'd barely left the Nautiloid. That specific one seems to be fixed but I couldn't say for sure, and Grymforge may have some similar issue where for some players, it just kicks off.

As a general point I broadly agree that the easiest way to deal with them is to Long Rest before exploring any new area. This has the unfortunate side-effect, however, of making the game terminally easy on Normal, and not particularly hard on Tactician, because if you're continually/frequently Long Rest'd, you can really blast through stuff.

Hopefully Larian keep working on this - by the time they get to any enhanced edition or whatever maybe they can make it so none of this stuff triggers without a clear addition to your quest journal. The quest journal remains probably the weakest part of the BG3 package.

 

[Seramus]

If that's the case, you might want to avoid generalizations that don't mention this is merely your experience.

Alternatively, you can be kind and encourage a welcoming environment for new and old posters alike. I always find your posts clever and informative so I can only ask you to stay positive. Please don't attack, discredit, or disparage others outside of jest.

The last two paragraphs I agree with wholeheartedly, and I'm genuinely curious if they might include a higher difficulty in the enhanced edition. I can't hold my breath because it didnt happen with DOS2 and the completion numbers for BG3 are still rather low, but it would be quite nice. And yeah, a clear journal entry including on-screen pop-up would be a great way to alert players about timed events so players are not forced to intuit the system from trial and error accidentally triggering them.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Alternatively, you can be kind and encourage a welcoming environment for new and old posters alike. I always find your posts clever and informative so I can only ask you to stay positive. Please don't attack, discredit, or disparage others outside of jest.

That's a fair response - I may be excessively cynical because I have a seen a lot of people trying to play down real issues that BG3 has on various forums, discords, reddits etc., and so tend to interpret anything I see as obscuring those issues rather negatively, which was unfair in your case. BG3 is an amazing game to be clear, but it has irked me how a significant number of people (not so much here, and I see you weren't intending to) on the internet feel the need cover up flaws/issues rather than to allow that they exist in an otherwise-amazing game. Witcher 3 got very similar treatment for a couple of years after it came out, I note, it seems to be "a thing" with whatever game is currently "top dog". Skyrim got it for a few years too but I note Starfield has not, which has left some BGS fans feeling rather embittered because suddenly their defences and dismissals of criticism aren't working like they used to.

(The inverse can happen too if a game has significant flaws at launch - c.f. Dragon Age 2, Mass Effect Andromeda, and Cyberpunk 2077, all of which got negative reputations wildly outsized to the problems with them, and which took years to clear.)

 

[AdmundfortGeographer]

It’s good to know that I wasn’t just imagining things with regards to resting consequences. My stretching rests out was just myself making things challenging, and all the “hurry up get these things out of our heads!” didnt have a game consequence for malingering.

Honestly the game could have a counter of how many long rests you have done, even if it has no game effect, just because that along would feel like an achievement to keep it as low a count as possible.

I’ll just meet the game where it is. Slow down.

 

[Dausuul]

I have had a long habit of pushing off resting as long as possible to the point of continuing to explore and even go into combats depleted of spell slots and casters having to rely on cantrips, potions, thrown grenades.

Has anyone found there were issue by casually taking abundant long rests? In my first play through I am certain I didn’t take nearly enough because there were some cut scenes that never happened but were seemingly implied to be coming up at an evening rest but never did, while a backlog of other story advancing occurred.

In the first play through when I would hear a character gripe about needing to rest, I pushed on until every character’s slots were out. But now when I hear a character looking forward to a rest asap, I’m prioritizing getting a rest in.

I encountered the same thing. I tried to be economical in my use of resources and push on hard, until I discovered that the game expects you to take a lot of long rests and you miss out on story if you don't. Now I take a long rest pretty much any time something important happens. For instance, as soon as I've recruited Gale and Astarion, I stop to rest even though I don't remotely need it at that point.

It's frustrating, because the story pushes a narrative of intense urgency -- the clock is ticking! the tadpoles will turn us into mind flayers if we don't find a cure right away! -- but if you try to respect that narrative and play as if time were running out, you muck up the very story you're trying to roleplay.

But then, as you discovered, there are scenarios where you actually do have to accomplish a task before resting, and you fail the quest otherwise. And there is no clear indication of when time counts and when it doesn't. So just about the time you get used to the idea of taking frequent long rests, suddenly it jumps up and bites you.

I wish there were an option to allow multiple story events per long rest.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I wish there were an option to allow multiple story events per long rest.

What's kind of annoying is that Larian explicitly said they were changing the game, in the last Panel from Hell before release, to make it so you could have multiple story events per long rest.

This appears to have been a half-truth, at most, because it seems like most events still block each other.