Baldur's Gate The Baldur's Gate Series Thread

[BruceVC]

The ending doesn't just make no sense, it basically torpedoes the whole setting. Killing a high level devil on their own plane kills them permanently, rather than just returning them to their plane if they are killed on the prime material plane like happens to Demogorgon. Doing that should be an epic-level fight for late ToB, if it can be accomplished by a fucking level 9 party then we have to seriously ask why hell still exists since it could have been cleaned out long ago.

Hate to beat a dead horse but the whole game would have been far more appropriate as an IWD extension for level 25s+. Forget the cringe tie-ins with BG1/2 and the NPCs, just have the player's group of characters go "you know what? lets really fucking kill belhifet" and you'd have a much better expansion than the low bar set by the already existing IWD expansions. Maybe patch in HLAs from ToB even.

You make a good point here, I agree it was very unrealistic that a party of >level 10 could ever defeat Belhifet in Avernus

So what should have happened is he should have been summoned, and also weakened due to the summoning, in a battle on Toril and then >level 10 party could have defeated him. I think that would have made some of the valid criticism less

And the reason I am raising this is because now I have completed SoD, and I enjoyed it, I want to talk about the narrative flaws or inconsistencies that most of you guys have raised. Because I dont think SoD is as bad as you guys think and Im coming from a point of view of someone who played BG1 for the first time and then SoD

But the majority of people played BG1&2 at release and then played SoD which was released years later and of course some of its ostensible inconsistencies are more apparent. But Im not thinking of BG2 at all when I played SoD and Im imagining my party doesnt know how the narrative unfolds which is makes it more much " normal " from an overall believable perspective

 

[Jarpie]

I meant that the aftermath of the last battle was very rushed, like they had run out of money and time. After short celebration, you are found in the hallway with the dead body, and without murder weapon, and everyone instantly jumps to conclusion that you've killed her, the hero who has again saved everyone :D

 

[BruceVC]

I meant that the aftermath of the last battle was very rushed, like they had run out of money and time. After short celebration, you are found in the hallway with the dead body, and without murder weapon, and everyone instantly jumps to conclusion that you've killed her, the hero who has again saved everyone :D

Yes I agree, you save BG from this impending fanatical army and kill a greater Devil and yet they throw you under the bus, with very little evidence, the first chance they get

No loyalty there. That to me was the most unrealistic part of the whole narrative

 

[Chippy]

The ending doesn't just make no sense, it basically torpedoes the whole setting. Killing a high level devil on their own plane kills them permanently, rather than just returning them to their plane if they are killed on the prime material plane like happens to Demogorgon. Doing that should be an epic-level fight for late ToB, if it can be accomplished by a fucking level 9 party then we have to seriously ask why hell still exists since it could have been cleaned out long ago.

Hate to beat a dead horse but the whole game would have been far more appropriate as an IWD extension for level 25s+. Forget the cringe tie-ins with BG1/2 and the NPCs, just have the player's group of characters go "you know what? lets really fucking kill belhifet" and you'd have a much better expansion than the low bar set by the already existing IWD expansions. Maybe patch in HLAs from ToB even.

You make a good point here, I agree it was very unrealistic that a party of >level 10 could ever defeat Belhifet in Avernus

So what should have happened is he should have been summoned, and also weakened due to the summoning, in a battle on Toril and then >level 10 party could have defeated him. I think that would have made some of the valid criticism less

And the reason I am raising this is because now I have completed SoD, and I enjoyed it, I want to talk about the narrative flaws or inconsistencies that most of you guys have raised. Because I dont think SoD is as bad as you guys think and Im coming from a point of view of someone who played BG1 for the first time and then SoD

But the majority of people played BG1&2 at release and then played SoD which was released years later and of course some of its ostensible inconsistencies are more apparent. But Im not thinking of BG2 at all when I played SoD and Im imagining my party doesnt know how the narrative unfolds which is makes it more much " normal " from an overall believable perspective

Those of us that played BG when it first came out remember what the narrative was like, and then going into SOD was like Tolkien to the Rings of Power. I'm not saying BG was at Tolkien's level, just that it was that jarring.

Because Amber Scott had no interest in the tone of the original game - which was by the estimation of most fans - more important than her politics. But as another poster said, even removing the politics, there was just no comparing the quality of writing to Lucas Kristjanson.

 

[Jarpie]

I meant that the aftermath of the last battle was very rushed, like they had run out of money and time. After short celebration, you are found in the hallway with the dead body, and without murder weapon, and everyone instantly jumps to conclusion that you've killed her, the hero who has again saved everyone :D

Yes I agree, you save BG from this impending fanatical army and kill a greater Devil and yet they throw you under the bus, with very little evidence, the first chance they get

No loyalty there. That to me was the unrealistic part of the whole narrative

I think they also thought that it must be explained why you left Baldur's Gate, and how you were ambushed, which doesn't really need any explanation, and wasn't explained in BG2 either, and IIRC it's not even said how much time passed between BG1 and 2 in BG2. It's so fucking retarded.

 

[Sarathiour]

I meant that the aftermath of the last battle was very rushed, like they had run out of money and time. After short celebration, you are found in the hallway with the dead body, and without murder weapon, and everyone instantly jumps to conclusion that you've killed her, the hero who has again saved everyone :D

Yes I agree, you save BG from this impending fanatical army and kill a greater Devil and yet they throw you under the bus, with very little evidence, the first chance they get

No loyalty there. That to me was the unrealistic part of the whole narrative

I think they also thought that it must be explained why you left Baldur's Gate, and how you were ambushed, which doesn't really need any explanation, and wasn't explained in BG2 either, and IIRC it's not even said how much time passed between BG1 and 2 in BG2. It's so fucking retarded.

According to the start of viconia romance in bg2, it's implied a couple of years at least passed since the defeat of sarevok.

 

[Gargaune]

Yeah, SoD had some lovely dungeons, but they were let down by the writing. Beyond the odd plot pacing and the inconsistent tone, both of which I believe were blamed on the project's shifting scope, there are some aspects that sound good on paper but don't fit well in a middle episode, e.g. hearing Warner as Irenicus again is great, but he features so much that he's no longer a stranger to Charname in BG2's intro, or how visiting Avernus undercuts SoA's hellish finale.

I think they also thought that it must be explained why you left Baldur's Gate, and how you were ambushed, which doesn't really need any explanation, and wasn't explained in BG2 either, and IIRC it's not even said how much time passed between BG1 and 2 in BG2.

Agreed, one of my biggest bugbears is how SoD completely fills the gap between the two main games. I preferred the older approach, where some downtime was implied for the protagonist and it was left up to the player's imagination, whereas stringing all these explicit, major adventures one after the other makes things feel cramped and the people less relatable.

According to the start of viconia romance in bg2, it's implied a couple of years at least passed since the defeat of sarevok.

Probably an oversight on BioWare's part, BG and BG2's journals begin on the 2nd of Mirtul 1368 and 1369 DR respectively.

Yeah, this would have been better. A low-level side story that happens between BG1&2 with a different protagonist and party would have been interesting. It could have been loosely connected (like hearing about <Charname> and his party going missing), but as is, I feel it taints the main story and ruins things like the mystery surrounding Irenicus.

This got me thinking, you could've had a plot from the opposite perspective, playing a party tasked by Irenicus to capture the Bhaalspawn some time after the original's finale, later, when they eventually get booted from Baldur's Gate. And you could still feature Irenicus and some BG1 companions who don't rejoin you in BG2, but you wouldn't complicate Charname's story.

Could've been fun but, right or wrong, there seems to be a prevailing belief in the industry that RPG players prefer coming back to the same protagonist in new episodes. Dunno, I prefer rolling new characters.

 

[Non-Edgy Gamer]

This got me thinking, you could've had a plot from the opposite perspective, playing a party tasked by Irenicus to capture the Bhaalspawn some time after the original's finale, later, when they eventually get booted from Baldur's Gate. And you could still feature Irenicus and some BG1 companions who don't rejoin you in BG2, but you wouldn't complicate Charname's story.

The problem I have is including Irenicus at all.

One of the coolest things about him was that you had no idea who he was or why he was doing what he was doing. The idea that some heretofore invisible enemy somehow abducted you for reasons unknown was probably the most interesting thing about the start of BG2.

Dragonspear basically ruined that. Now it's "oh, this is that one big bad guy that's been babbling cryptic things at me for the past 20 hours."

The small bit of foreshadowing in the BG1 spider cave quest was more than enough. The more you ruin the mystery, the more you ruin Irenicus. They also misinterpreted why the Spellhold scenes with Irenicus wandering around in a robe worked (because you already knew who Irenicus was) and basically copied it up until their forced failure ending.

No, if there had to be something, I would want it in no way connected to either CHARNAME or Irenicus. The most I would tolerate is some kind of foreshadowing like the spider cave. But other than that, I would want it to be a self-contained adventure.

 

[Non-Edgy Gamer]

I think they also thought that it must be explained why you left Baldur's Gate, and how you were ambushed, which doesn't really need any explanation, and wasn't explained in BG2 either, and IIRC it's not even said how much time passed between BG1 and 2 in BG2. It's so fucking retarded.

I think it's sort of implied by some NPCs that you had more adventures after BG, but I'm not sure if that's meant to be the Tales of the Sword Coast expansion stuff or not. But yeah, it was totally unneeded.

Really, the only continuity thing that needed to be done was to edit Jaheira and Minsc's dialog to reflect whether or not the PC had brought them along. Which they still didn't do btw.

 

[perfectslumbers]

Just finished my second playthrough of Baldur's Gate. On my first playthrough I didn't do Tales of the Sword Coast since it seemed to be placed at a really awkward phase of the game (being intended to be done after Candlekeep seemingly.) So this time I decided to do it, I didn't wanna do it right at the games dramatic peak so I ended up doing it at level 6 and ended at level 7/8. Isle of Balduran was a lot of fun at level 6, I had no idea what to expect going into it so I was truly forced to use all of my resources and wands and potions. The greater werewolf boss took two entire wands of heaven and two entire wands of frost to take down. There were some weird parts though, like one of the npcs who I could either flirt with or tell to go fuck himself. Felt real awkward when he started "m'ladying," me. And the sheer amount of fights that pop you into a room right next to enemies with no way to maneuver.

Shandalars quest was cool. Durlags Tower was pretty frustrating at first, I found the first level really boring. It didn't really have much of a puzzle to it, you just had to pixel hunt for the right place to click on to get the item you need 3 times over. Past that though it was an amazing dungeon, it was grueling and difficult and atmospheric. The maze of doors scared me of accidentally creating a fail state at first but it was pretty cleverly designed to avoid that (although there were a few confusing points where I had to google how to open the next fucking door.) Level 3 was great, just a bunch of enjoyable and unique combat encounters. Level 4 was pretty plain but the riddles were interesting and difficult, and I liked the final boss gimmick where I had to fight a much more powerful version of my own party. Then I went back to Ulgoth's Beard and got ambushed by the cult. Fuck Aec'Letec, his attack that dooms a character to die is a pain in the ass, and the way he revives by consuming cultists is quite frustrating since the cultists were tanky and you had to beat their asses to death while a demon chases you around.

Overall TOTSC was pretty great. Baldur's Gate didn't have the same magic it has when I first played it a few years ago but I still had a lot of fun. I guess half of that is because the fun of the game is exploring the wilderness and running into things, but I've already run into everything. I guess the other half is that it was my first CRPG and while it's definitely a good CRPG, I've played lots of other good CRPGs since then.

Anyway I'm going to try Siege of Dragonspear for the first time. Last time I tried playing it I alt f4'd before I finished the first dialogue exchange since it sent me so deep into the uncanny valley, hopefully it's not too terrible.

 

[Sarathiour]

Fuck Aec'Letec, his attack that dooms a character to die is a pain in the ass

Potion of retrovision work against that, though I'm not sure if it's an SCS addition or if it was already like that in the base game. Best way to deal with him is to pile on summon while you are clearing cultist anyway.

 

[Gargaune]

The problem I have is including Irenicus at all.

One of the coolest things about him was that you had no idea who he was or why he was doing what he was doing. The idea that some heretofore invisible enemy somehow abducted you for reasons unknown was probably the most interesting thing about the start of BG2.

Dragonspear basically ruined that. Now it's "oh, this is that one big bad guy that's been babbling cryptic things at me for the past 20 hours."

The small bit of foreshadowing in the BG1 spider cave quest was more than enough. The more you ruin the mystery, the more you ruin Irenicus. They also misinterpreted why the Spellhold scenes with Irenicus wandering around in a robe worked (because you already knew who Irenicus was) and basically copied it up until their forced failure ending.

No, if there had to be something, I would want it in no way connected to either CHARNAME or Irenicus. The most I would tolerate is some kind of foreshadowing like the spider cave. But other than that, I would want it to be a self-contained adventure.

I agree, I'd have also preferred a standalone storyline that let Charname be and kept Irenicus a stranger coming into BG2. I'm just saying that if you had to fit it into the Bhaalspawn's plot (and I suspect there was that pressure for commercial reasons), it'd have been better to roll a new protagonist/party involved with the mainline events, but keeping Irenicus and Charname apart. Thus Irenicus would become familiar to the player, at a metagaming level, but not to the PC. And importing your savegame to have a fight against your own PC & Co. might've made for a cool finale.

 

[Chippy]

Just finished my second playthrough of Baldur's Gate. On my first playthrough I didn't do Tales of the Sword Coast since it seemed to be placed at a really awkward phase of the game (being intended to be done after Candlekeep seemingly.) So this time I decided to do it, I didn't wanna do it right at the games dramatic peak so I ended up doing it at level 6 and ended at level 7/8. Isle of Balduran was a lot of fun at level 6, I had no idea what to expect going into it so I was truly forced to use all of my resources and wands and potions. The greater werewolf boss took two entire wands of heaven and two entire wands of frost to take down. There were some weird parts though, like one of the npcs who I could either flirt with or tell to go fuck himself. Felt real awkward when he started "m'ladying," me. And the sheer amount of fights that pop you into a room right next to enemies with no way to maneuver.

Shandalars quest was cool. Durlags Tower was pretty frustrating at first, I found the first level really boring. It didn't really have much of a puzzle to it, you just had to pixel hunt for the right place to click on to get the item you need 3 times over. Past that though it was an amazing dungeon, it was grueling and difficult and atmospheric. The maze of doors scared me of accidentally creating a fail state at first but it was pretty cleverly designed to avoid that (although there were a few confusing points where I had to google how to open the next fucking door.) Level 3 was great, just a bunch of enjoyable and unique combat encounters. Level 4 was pretty plain but the riddles were interesting and difficult, and I liked the final boss gimmick where I had to fight a much more powerful version of my own party. Then I went back to Ulgoth's Beard and got ambushed by the cult. Fuck Aec'Letec, his attack that dooms a character to die is a pain in the ass, and the way he revives by consuming cultists is quite frustrating since the cultists were tanky and you had to beat their asses to death while a demon chases you around.

Overall TOTSC was pretty great. Baldur's Gate didn't have the same magic it has when I first played it a few years ago but I still had a lot of fun. I guess half of that is because the fun of the game is exploring the wilderness and running into things, but I've already run into everything. I guess the other half is that it was my first CRPG and while it's definitely a good CRPG, I've played lots of other good CRPGs since then.

Anyway I'm going to try Siege of Dragonspear for the first time. Last time I tried playing it I alt f4'd before I finished the first dialogue exchange since it sent me so deep into the uncanny valley, hopefully it's not too terrible.

Look at how TOTSC stands up to the test of time. Just a few pointers (since you've only played it twice I doubt they're spoilers, and not as a criticism) but just to illustrate the point in general:

• If you explore, you can access Ulgoth's beard at any time.
• The werewolf island forced the party into proper resource management, and notified them in advance.
• The fights on the deck forced tactical battles and prevented players from just nuking everything with AOE spells.
• They expected players to actually read the backstory to the dungeon to answer the riddles. You could savespam the questions, but take some damage and potentially die, or, alternatively use up some resources defending against the trap.
• The final boss had two outcomes - if you did it the other way, you wouldn't have to fight yourself, but could turn the mirror against the demonknight and make him do so.
• There was a way out from the gaze attack. Arrows of dispelling or spells like Yeslick's dispel if memory serves. That and the werewolf curse also showed how it furthered the plot - after all, you left the werewolf island and couldn't just go and resupply outside of the town.

And all of that just from an expansion. That's what I call game design. Compared to SOD where I remember baying autists on the Beamdog forums screeching at each other because the poison breath of a green Dragon got past a scroll of protect vs poison. And the hacks who made the game said it wasn't real poison, so they bypassed the scroll on purpose.

 

[Non-Edgy Gamer]

If you explore, you can access Ulgoth's beard at any time.

Same with basically any part of the BG1 map. One of the things BG2 sacrificed in order to cover more distance and have a wider variety of environments. Kind of glad BG3 seems to be returning to form a bit on that though.

The werewolf island forced the party into proper resource management, and notified them in advance.

The forced teleport at the start of it didn't though. But it wasn't that hard, provided you didn't rush to the expansion content before leveling.

There was a way out from the gaze attack. Arrows of dispelling or spells like Yeslick's dispel if memory serves.

I *think* there may have been a cloak to deal with the real final boss back in town.

And the hacks who made the game said it wasn't real poison, so they bypassed the scroll on purpose.

Amazing.

The worst thing about Dragonspear is that it could have been so much more. You see they had the know-how to mod the game, and the resources to do it well. But with people like Amber Scott at the helm, there was no place for it to go but into the ground.

 

[Chippy]

*Snip*

The worst thing about Dragonspear is that it could have been so much more. You see they had the know-how to mod the game, and the resources to do it well. But with people like Amber Scott at the helm, there was no place for it to go but into the ground.

If I had to make an assumption, I'd assume that Trent Oster got screwed. He made a comment about people hijacking a developer's game, and then walked it back. But he also hired that guy who wrote 'Cowboys and Aliens' to write SOD. Which was kinda crap, but at least the guy was a functioning adult. Maybe the idea was that he would counter-balance the wokery so that it was tolerable?.

Then as everyone knows he got Chris Avellone to say the writing was fantastic. Don't know what happened there. And I dimly remember Trent Oster also saying that James Ohlen (additional writer to BG, Lucas Kritjanson was the lead writer) said SOD was shit. I could be wrong there, but I know he said they ran a copy by one of the BG1 or BG2 writers and they weren't impressed.

I also remember watching a playthrough when David Gaider appeared on the scene and Amber Scott made a comment that it was a shame it was too late he couldn't write anything for it, and there was awkward looks all round, but I might just be looking for trouble.

Ultimately, even years later, I think someone should have their head crushed in a vice. To me it's just the butchering of a classic into something I don't understand. Like this:

 

[Orud]

This got me thinking, you could've had a plot from the opposite perspective, playing a party tasked by Irenicus to capture the Bhaalspawn some time after the original's finale, later, when they eventually get booted from Baldur's Gate. And you could still feature Irenicus and some BG1 companions who don't rejoin you in BG2, but you wouldn't complicate Charname's story.

The problem I have is including Irenicus at all.

One of the coolest things about him was that you had no idea who he was or why he was doing what he was doing. The idea that some heretofore invisible enemy somehow abducted you for reasons unknown was probably the most interesting thing about the start of BG2.

Dragonspear basically ruined that. Now it's "oh, this is that one big bad guy that's been babbling cryptic things at me for the past 20 hours."

The small bit of foreshadowing in the BG1 spider cave quest was more than enough. The more you ruin the mystery, the more you ruin Irenicus. They also misinterpreted why the Spellhold scenes with Irenicus wandering around in a robe worked (because you already knew who Irenicus was) and basically copied it up until their forced failure ending.

No, if there had to be something, I would want it in no way connected to either CHARNAME or Irenicus. The most I would tolerate is some kind of foreshadowing like the spider cave. But other than that, I would want it to be a self-contained adventure.

It's the hallmark of a poor writer; EVERYTHING needs to be connected.

 

[Non-Edgy Gamer]

It's the hallmark of a poor writer; EVERYTHING needs to be connected.

 

[Sarathiour]

the poison breath of a green Dragon got past a scroll of protect vs poison. And the hacks who made the game said it wasn't real poison, so they bypassed the scroll on purpose.

Yeah, I also had vicky under sleep state to some spider or BS, I guess again because it's not "real sleep".
Peak design and coding.

 

[Chippy]

the poison breath of a green Dragon got past a scroll of protect vs poison. And the hacks who made the game said it wasn't real poison, so they bypassed the scroll on purpose.

Yeah, I also had vicky under sleep state to some spider or BS, I guess again because it's not "real sleep".
Peak design and coding.

Similiar thing with me. I had Viconia go up against a sirine and she got charmed. So I asked why it said "magic resistance" but she still got charmed? As even if they coded in the 90% elven resistance and it got through on the 10% it still said "magic resistance" as the game tends to do when a spell fails against MR.

So they got angry and said I just didn't know how to play the game.

 

[Sarathiour]

As far as I know, the 90% is just a leftover of copy-pasted contemtped from the rulebook, in-game elves got outright immunity. I know because SCS AI was really keen on targetting xan with power word sleep because of his low hp, but the result was always "target is immune".

 

[ga♥]

Wtf is potion of retrovision Sarathiour.
Last time I played TOSC is several years ago, as I really find it hard to justify it as I generally reach XP cap much before it (especially with SCS as it adds enemies) or probably I would remember what potion you mean here.

 

[Sarathiour]

My bad, it's called mirrored eyes potion in english. And after checking, it's a SCS modification, base game potion give immunity to petrification, not gaze attack.

 

[perfectslumbers]

Wtf is potion of retrovision @Sarathiour.

Potion of mirrored eyes is the name I believe, at least in the english version. That's what I used vs Aec'Letec to deal with the gaze

• The final boss had two outcomes - if you did it the other way, you wouldn't have to fight yourself, but could turn the mirror against the demonknight and make him do so.

I think you're incorrect about this. Either you can fight the demon knight straight up without the mirror, or you use the mirror and the demon knights reflection 1v1's him while you fight the reflections of your own party.

I started Siege of Dragonspear and I thought I accidentally downloaded the Imoen romance mod for a minute "I don't know what I'd do if I lost you Imoen." Seriously? Up to this point our relationship consists of her calling me a queer fellow hundreds of times. It's not as bad as I thought it would be but it's a massive step down from BG 1 and 2 in every way. (The encounter design is very disappointing especially.) But it's still better than the kind of shit modern Bioware or Bethesda are making, although I guess that's not saying much.

 

[NecroLord]

My bad, it's called mirrored eyes potion in english. And after checking, it's a SCS modification, base game potion give immunity to petrification, not gaze attack.

Really? I remember that those potions were supposed to protect against Aec'Letec's gaze attack even in the base and unmodded game. Having archers equipped with lots of Arrows of Dispelling also works,as does quickly summoning lots of skeletons or other cannon fodder.

 

[Sarathiour]

Well, it'saccording to the wiki, so maybe it's just bollocks. I will try to test this a bit later on.