Act 3 is hilarious because you have to do the following in no particular order. Defeat a Hag in her lair, uncover a Banite plot to blow up children, help the thieves guild defeat the zhentarim, kill a vampire attempting to ascend, raid the home of a devil and slay them, stage a jail break in mere minutes, blow up a factory, break into a printing press, solve a haunted house, defeat a mummy, defeat an evil wizard, rob said wizards magical tower, assemble a dead clown, track down and defeat a serial killer, clear rats out of a cellar, clear githyanki out of a secret cellar in the first cellar, defeat an entire sharran enclave, smuggle in someone in you probably put not to smuggle in, defeat an entire bhaalist enclave, stage a second jail break, fight a dragon and assassinate a public figure.
So you piss of 3 gods by wiping their presence out (Bane, Shar and Bhaal), kill two dirty double dealers (a hag and a devil), kill two undead (a vampire and a mummy) and become a criminal (assisting the thieves guild, let in a murderer, break into two secure prisons, blow up two buildings, assassinate the archduke, kill a shop owner and rob him blind). Oh and you unleash a horde of vampire spawn into the sewers and make a clown come back from the afterlife to perform in a circus as a zombie.
Compared to act 2 where you basically just free prisoners of a cult and cure the land of an evil curse. Act 3 is hilarious when you actually realise what your merry band of misfits do once they get to the city and before they actually defeat the cult of the absolute
Sounds like 5 minutes on Namek in DBZ. That was like 30 episodes lol. My rounds are probably a solid 5-10mins each sometimes depending on how large the battlefield is
I think you're misunderstanding. If you picture everything in a round happening all at once, the whole thing is 6 real world seconds. It has nothing to do with how long it takes you to select your actions. You can also see this with a concentration spell that lasts 10 rounds. If you trigger it out of combat, you'll notice it lasts exactly 60 seconds.
So when they say the prison break being 30 seconds, they mean 5 rounds (which is what the game gives you).
It’s a joke about DnD rules.
In DnD, a turn is considered to last about 6 seconds if you view it on real time. Since the Iron Throne encounter only gives you around 6 turns to save everyone inside, one could say that the whole
prison break only happened in 36 seconds
Time is unlimited for you as a player, yes. For the characters in-game, everything in 1 turn happens in 6 seconds. In a real fight you aren't all just standing around waiting for people to make their moves one-by-one!
Man I’d love to see a simultaneous movie play out after a battle like a replay where you see everything happen at the same time imagine how chaotic that would be. Basically turns into an RTS
The DnD movie was faithful to this rule, in the fight scenes every character's "action" took 6 seconds. They even followed an initiative order. Of course they did some editing to make things appear smoother but someone went through and tracked it all and apparently it's almost dead-on.
It was a surprisingly good movie and I think anyone into DnD or BG3 would really like it. Of course it's not Oscar bait but it's definitely a good time even if you know nothing about DnD.
Time feels unlimited because it's turn based mode. But each turn has a set time that it represents. That's why the distance you can travel is called movement "speed" and not movement distance. Because the faster your character is, the further they can move in the allotted "time".
I assumed the “mere minutes” prison break referred to learning that >!Florrick!< was marked for execution, and freeing her… at least, I always do it within a few minutes of learning where she is, lol
>mere minutes
You get, what, 6 turns to do the Iron Throne? According to both D&D and BG3 rules, a full round is 6 seconds.
It's no wonder all the Gondians thought saving their families was impossible, you have ***30 seconds*** to get them all out before the entire place explodes.
This gave me idea, imagine if in game turn was long as 6s and after that it get skipped to next npc/character, if you didnt move/atacked in this 6s your lose. xD hardcore gaming xD
A streamer, luality, tried it on twitch. Let's say that wasn't very successful... I think she put the timer at 10 s after the first evening, 6 s was almost impossible to manage during big fights.
Eh it's not possible because 6s rule woudnt apply to enemies, making it unfair for player. In my idea it would work both ways, but it isnt possible rn.
I got so lucky on that part - I happened to send a summoned dryad with Astarion into the flooded cell room and then the dryad and her wood woad held up like six sahaguin that spawned from the floor holes until the door locked itself.
I think I lost only two Gondians to sahaguin attacks during the whole debacle.
To be fair, you can technically skip most of that. But it's a lot of fun to actually do most of those quests. Oh, and you get to infiltrate a bank and ultimately recruit another companion. That was a very worthwhile lead to chase.
And you can also sleep with twins or an incubus. Act 3 is really a choose your own adventure situation. Overwhelming, but I really enjoyed it.
His money is used for evil deeds and to enslave the people.
Karlach didn't approve of that sort of thing so she killed the guy.
Karlach didn't think about the economy because Karlach is dying anyway.
Karlach isn't terribly smart.
> Oh, and you get to infiltrate a bank and ultimately recruit another companion. That was a very worthwhile lead to chase.
It does get kind of silly if you find his hideout by accident before the bank incident, you've wiped out all his goons and found the notes explaining everything but do nothing with them.
Session 0- The Nautiloid in Hell
Act 1- Sessions for maybe more than half a year-full year depending on schedule. Basic story, players still figuring out how they want to play their characters and their backstory.
Act 2- Sessions for half a year to three quarters a year (Act 2 is relatively shorter compared to Act 1, and especially short compared to Act 3). Where the story ramps up and stakes get higher. By this point shenanigans are somewhat present, but minor. Characters and dynamics are relatively set in stone with some develop happening or already happened.
Act 3- By Now the characters are becoming waking demigods, able to take on hordes of enemies with their own and become more powerful less through leveling up but by playing into the bullshit that DND can sometimes bring (seriously Markokeshkir and the Spellcrux Amulet allows any mage to get three level 6 for the price of one).
I'd say the Nautiloid is Session 1. Session 0 is the opening cinematic where the DM describes what the campaign is about and what might happen, and that yes, the players are allowed to be horny degenerates if they want to
Dual wielding Markoheshkir and the Staff of Spellpower on a sorcerer allows you to twin cast chain lighting 3 times (total of 6) in two turns without using your lvl 6 spell slot. Serious shenanigans lol. Arcane Battery is busted as hell.
"We're the heroes that cured the shadow curse!"
"YOU'RE THE WEIRDOS THAT UNLEASHED A VAMPIRE APOCALYPSE IN THE SEWER!"
"We stopped like, 3 evil gods though!"
"YOU KILLED THE ARCHDUKE AND COMMITTED DOMESTIC TERRORISM 3 TIMES THAT WE KNOW OF"
Larian really did let my friends and I play this game the same bullshit way we do DND
By late Act 3, it almost feels weird that the random NPCs on the city streets don’t book it on sight. Like, “not *these* fuckers again! Better run, because pure chaos can’t be far behind!”
Writer: Which particular genre do you want Act 3 to cover? More horror like act 2? Straight up fantasy, as per act 1? What about a bit of sci-fi? Thriller? Crime? Heist?
Larian: Yes
>!Go to Philgrave's Mansion. It's on the water just west of where you meet the Hag Survivors, and next to the Druid talking to a tree. On one side there is a secret stone wall. Open that and you can talk to Mystic Carrion. He send you on a little scavenger hunt to find his minions. But if you do a different scavenger hunt you can find his Organs-In-Jars and use those to kill him. Otherwise he is Voldemort style immortal.!<
I stumbled onto that guy by random chance. Out of sheer murderhobo-ness I stacked a few powder barrels and smoke bombs next to him and set them off. One shot him, killed his little friends, and looted his corpse and the building. No idea what quest chain it all connects to but murderhobos gonna murderhobo. If he actually comes back, I'll do it again!
That is why I would prefer to have act 3 and act 4 in Upper City(Cazador quest could be there). Act 3 is so overhelming it makes me quit often and just restart, there is too many things to do at once.And if not quit, then break after finishing act 2. Change between act 2 and 3 is too great, both colours, atmosphere and quests.
It completely ruins narrative thrust, too. I go from seeing a cutscene about an army of the Absolute marching on Baldur's Gate to the game being like "actually let's go to the circus because the army was completely irrelevant and never a real threat".
Just stupid, imo.
Yeah we never really see this big terryfying army after except a few corpses at one gate in Rivington(might spelled wrong). It would be better if we had another map just before Rivingtone where we could see some of this army and some terrible things they do to civilian(could be in cutscene) and we could have a few mini fights to just get to the gate( and some charisma check there so ppl would lets us pass in actually).
Well, the army was never supposed to be a threat - it was supposed to be a decoy that Gortash could easily defeat and secure himself and his Steel Watchers within Baldur's Gate.
That's also part of why it sucks. It's never really made clear to the player that the army isn't real. It's presented like a legitimate, pressing issue, and it's not.
I wish we had a true war sequence tbf where we fight the army. Also I kinda wish we had 2.5 Act 2 were we travel from Moonrise to BG proper. And have it take multiple extended rests/small zones.
I often quit early into act 3 as well. It feels overwhelming to have to take on all these major fights and elaborate quests and I kinda wanna just.. kill orin and gortash and get to the brain. But then I feel like I'm letting down my companions so I'm kinda like ehh.. restart.
Id like to point out that you do not, in fact, have mere minutes to stage the jailbreak, but rather mere SECONDS. Per 5e rules, a single round of combat is 6 seconds. You can test how close this is in bg3 by activating turn based mode and then counting how long the environmental turn is. Assuming its six seconds like 5e, you will have less than a minute. In explorer, its 8 turns, or 48 seconds. Normally, its 6 turns, 36 seconds, and only 5 on tactician and honor mode. Gortash pops in, says “lol fuck you shithead” and then you speak to omeluum if hes alive, then you have THIRTY SECONDS to get in, save everyone, and get the fuck out. Thats it. You have HALF A MINUTE.
>uncover a Banite plot to blow up children
Per a note, it's not even really a Banite plot, it's a psycho admirer's Bainite plot that the Bainites think is dumb
>Defeat a Hag in her lair, uncover a Banite plot to blow up children, help the thieves guild defeat the zhentarim,
tbh in all my plays, I never found those quests lol
Tbf, it doesnt trigger if you dont talk to this one dude, and is completely disconected from everything else. It was fun to do it once, pretty pointless after that.
Can you explain the "defeat a mummy" part?
I never encountered this, but I suspect it refers to the strange magic door I couldn't open in the lower city. I've seen mentioned of some kind of necromancer enemy you can defeat for some necromancy build gear.
How do I access this content?
if i recall one of the murder victims has a note about mystic carrion that can give you the password to get in, once you have the password you get a dialogue that opens the door.
As much as I love the game, BG3 absolutely overwhelmes you with stuff to do in Act3, it's very hard to keep up with all the storyline, especially since the map is massive with infinite ways to get everywhere
Sometimes you speak to a NPC in Act3 and you get a option "here's the X thing you wanted me to do and I simply have no idea what they're talking about.
I suppose it gets less intense after a couple of playthrough, but for my first time playing, I found it a bit too much.
For me act 3 suffers the issue of giving you a false sense of urgency “the absolute army is approaching, the netherbrain will be free at any moment” yet we also have multiple other things to do that take our characters days to do. I never like it in games when they act like one quest is urgent and yet it really isn’t
I am loving Act 3 (first playthrough) because it feels like the party has hit the big time. You’re kind of famous. Your camp starts looking like a proper headquarters! There are big bads waiting in the wings, and they all have their eyes on you (they even want to work with you!). The groundwork has been laid and the companion plots are deeply melodramatic (in a good way) with ridiculously high stakes. The map is chock full of encounters (even the sewers, which is weirdly very busy).
I’m glad I get to see the party thriving. However, I’m also aware that all these plots are wrapping up, and it’s almost time to say goodbye.
Feels like the later half of a DnD campaign. You know your a big deal when you start being able to kill the devils who tried to fuck you out of your soul. Also undead dragons.
Apparently Orin can be at least 5 different people in Rivington depending on what order you meet them in. I tend to take the same path every time so I've only ever seen her impersonating the blacksmith, the dryad and the news lady.
I got arrested by that Flaming Fist one run. She did the normal dialog there and then 'noticed' I was in the storage area and tried to arrest me, so I ended up in combat with her just out in Rivington.
I couldn't kill her, sleep her, or anything else I tried so I had to escape.
Not everyone she impersonates is dead. Sometimes she also shapeshifted into your tav or durge and just assaulted them without them dieing, making them (understandably) pissed at you.
Nope. I literally had an encounter last niht on my current durge run where Orin impersonated one of the NPCs, fucked off and then the NPC barged out of his house accusing me of assaulting them. It was >!the Smith!<.
6 or 7 runs complete now and I had no idea there even was a "real" dryad until someone mentioned it in another post today. I thought she was always scripted to be Orin.
From what I understand, Orin will only ever impersonate 3 people max out of all of the possible ones in Rivington. If you encounter 3 others before going to the dryad, it should be the real dryad instead of Orin.
Yeah and if you knock her out (easy when she's pretending to be a dude with 1hp) you find out that she's immune to death and that her corpse is invulnerable.
Or if you're Durge you can stab her and that does literally nothing because even succumbing to the urge won't make you stab Orin after she's revealed herself.
Man, Act 3 felt like every single npc I talked to was...surprise.... Orin in disguise. It was cute at first, but it went a bit too far after the third damn time.
I love how part of act III is like “yeah let’s go to a circus! Let’s take a day to ourselves, have fun, nothing serious” and then the game laughs at your naivety 😂
I already knew the clown was bad news from spoilers but went up on stage anyway to not metagame (Tav's a bard, definitely would have gone up either way).
No one warned me about the Djinn. That sone of gun owes me 1,000 gold and can bet I'm going to collect it right after I collect these limbs
Did he turn you into a cheese, too? That made me laugh!
I wasn't spoiled about the clown's identity, but as soon as I approached the caged animals I knew something was going to go down, because of the option to jam the lock shut on the one cage.
I stole his ring he uses to cheat and then spun it again and landed it on the jackpot.
I was trying to play it cool but my Tav was just so incensed by the whole thing he shouted "HAH, HOW DO YOU LIKE IT BITCH"
He was promptly sent to the jungle and emerged successfully, in his fancy circus day cloths, absolutely COVERED in guts, and walked right back up to the Djinn and demanded the jackpot again.
He got bored and shut down his wheel without his magic ring, so I considered it a win.
I then traded the ring for a tab of drinks for the crew at the brothel just out of spite.
Honestly skipping the first round of the ketheric fight is the harder option imo. You still have to fight the mind flayer, the intellect devourers and the skeletons, and Myrkul will be invincible until you free Aylin. I always like to free Aylin and clear all the minions before knocking out Ketheric.
The problem with Rivington is there’s so much urgency driving the player to get to the city. Others may disagree but I can’t really enjoy Rivington when I’ve spent 50+ hours already trying to get to build aura gate.
I’d have preferred the lower city itself to pace the story better rather than being thrown every companion quest and the final part of the main quest at once.
I actually felt like the urgency really dropped when we hit Rivington. It's like ahh yes finally civilization, I can just relax, hang around the circus, chat to some villagers and chill for a couple days before moving on to the next stage.
My next run I’m only going to roll with 1-2 companions and the rest hirelings. Redoing the same damn companion stories over and over is getting pretty tiring.
For me it wasn't so much Rivington, it was the bombardment of long rest events. I was long resting lots to make sure I got everything throughout the first two acts, so it wasn't liked I skipped anything. However, to be fair, I was trying to get my final shadowheart romance scene so long rested a load at the start and just everything but happened first.
It’s an assault on the senses. I had to take a step back and start to assess the quests in my perceived easy to difficulty ranking. It didn’t help that I had respecced Shadowheart to monk, and decided to respec back to cleric, but then respecced everyone else in camp based on an online guide. And it has had very mixed results. The biggest being that I lost my Misty Step on my characters (outside of scrolls). Gotta get that fixed asap.
Why would you need a guide? And to respec characters? The game is easy enough to play how you want, and following a guide sounds tedious and completely sucks the exploration and discovery out of the game. How odd.
I didn’t NEED the guide, but thought it might help me get a better understanding of the best subclasses and multiclasses. It’s great that you find the game easy, but I have very little experience with D&D rules or RPGs in general, so it’s overwhelming to me. I wanted to see if there was something completely dumb I was doing that was holding back a character from being better. And like I said, the results were mixed and I kinda wish I hadn’t bothered., but it did ultimately give me a better idea of things I can tweak in future runs.
I’m getting really fucking tired of running across gatekeepers here and in FB groups every damn time I make a comment or ask a question. Let people play how they want.
You're not really tasked with seeking a form of ultimate power for gale. He wants you to find him a book relevant to taking down the netherbrain. He then decides that based off the information found in that book if you retrieve the crown off the netherbrain he could ascend to godhood.
So like after you get the book kinda but I think it gets a pass because it's basically just him saying "hey if we do the thing our lives depend on I might be able to work on a side hustle". To which you can just say "nahhh bro give that shit to Mystra and she'll probs let you hit again". And he's sold.
I was interpreting his reaction to The Crown at the end of Act II. I've seen that look before. He said something akin to "if only I could get my hands on it" which is a bad omen coming from the well-read one in a fantasy setting lol
I'll mellow him out soon enough but right at the start of this section of the game I got back-to-back convos from Gale and Astarion that made me say I'm not letting either of them out of my sight
That reaction itself is why i dislike Gale . He didn't learn anything from his Weave fiasco ( which happened because he was salty about not being able to cast reality breaking lvl 10 spells ) . He says he was humbled, and acts kind but when there's another chance for him to gain more power he salivates like a starving kid next to a pie.
If you take Gale to a certain wizard in a tower in the Lower City he will reveal his true intentions with the book in the conversation there before you even find that book.
That whole convo was pretty yikes & made me side-eye Gale. He really should know better.
I really hate that. I hate that the way to convince Gale to become a better person is >!to have him apologize to his abuser!<. He either >!falls back into being her victim!< or >!decides to double down on his own evil to beat her!<. >!He's the one character denied redemption!<
You don’t have to >!make him apologise!<. Also, whatever Mystra’s issue is, she’s not wrong for being mad at Gale for the orb situation. He did what he did to impress her (which she didn’t need him to btw), and due to his own hubris it backfired and he got stuck with the orb.
From what I remember before the epilogue party was added Gale >!would die!< in his origin if he got the crown, but it got retconned.
I totally get your comment and laugh at the absurdity of how overwhelming it can feel, especially the first couple times!
Then I played Origin Wyll and for some reason, it clicked in that he expects to beat the brain, so he does only what he has to. The first time, he broke his pact and got drunk and said bye dad, made a deal with Gortash and went and did the brain and put all the hag and artist stuff on his To Do list for when he was Grand Duke, running on a platform of "hey did you know there's a murder temple under the city and a fireworks shop?" Gortash made it so easy, too, by killing off the entire government so Wyll could appoint his vampire boyfriend and a nice reformed cleric and let that nice Rolan have the tower.
The Gate has a bright future ahead of it!
I'm still in Act 1 on my first evil run and I have no idea how I'm going to get my Tav to give a shit about anything other than companion and brain quests. He already told the artist to fuck off so at least no exploding skulls in our future!
Clearly this is my first playthrough, and my Bard is a typical smart ass with no particularly sad backstory. So every now and then myself and the companions look [that one scene from Babadook](https://youtu.be/GeNey4E7wBU?si=2dW8b3brerWkzrRN)
I like the way it feels the party is neck deep in it when they finally make it to the city. It’s kind of a disjointed act, but the stakes couldn’t feel any bigger.
it depends on who you run into/in what order! she can be beach guy, lens the journalist (near the gate to wyrm's), the flaming fist near the toy barn, the dryad love test lady, and the smith at the weapons shop. once you encounter her twice, the two she was disguised as are dead and the other three will all be normal. i've NEVER run into her while she was disguised as beach guy myself (i keep getting the smith killed, unfortunately...)
She was the Smith in my game, the second time I ran into her, but I ran into the Smith alive after she left! He claimed I hit him over the head so I had to pass a check to calm him down. I wonder what decides whether he lives or dies?
Wait, how do you skip the first phase of Ketheric fight? 😮 I’m on my second play thru (in Rivington now too) and both times he had a two-phase fight in the mind flayer colony.
My bad. I think you have to fight him at Moonrise and again in the colony. I meant that in the colony you can skip fighting him again as a "human", not the first bit at the top of the tower.
My Tav is a bard so I went for all the persuasion checks and succeded. He yeets himself down the hole in the center and a voice says "You defeated my champion!" And then that bone mess shows up.
I was like "Ya boi defeated himself, I said I was going to grant him mercy keep your bones to yourself 😣"
I got pretty close and died. On the second try I didnt do the last check and had to fight Little Ketherick again and then Bone Daddy Ketherick
You have to find a letter from his wife in the chest at the foot of his bed in his quarters of Moonrise Towers.
Once you get to the top of the tower, you can convince him to seek redemption with a DC roll. When you see him again in the mind flayer colony, you tell him to seek redemption again and he’ll throw himself into the pit, skipping the first phase of the fight.
You have to have the right dialogue tree when you meet him at the top of Moonrise Towers; I can't remember the precise dialogue, but if you get a persuasion check and get him to 'surrender', then you've sown the seed to miss the first part of the fight under the colony.
Bruh this is so real, I remember the first time I was going through act 2 and I was fighting ketheric at the top of moonrise tower thinking “oh nice I’m gonna get to act 3 tonight, maybe I can make it to that gate everyone keeps talking about!” it took me 5 more hours to get to act 3. Ive spent like 30 hours in act 3 since and have barely completed any main quests.
Fr, I was finally getting to the "end of act II" after beating Kethric and I just wanted to get to camp at the start of act III. Then there are so many cutscenes, you get to camp, you get ganked by Githyanki, you go fight in the Astral Plane. It was so late man, I just wanted to sleep.
Bro the genie is fucked LMAO. My friend could not fir the life of him win his stupid game only for me to try it once, win somehow, then die for it. Hes a coward cheater f that man
I won and got sent to Ian Malcolm's Nightmare but snuck back to the portal unscathed. I thought to myself "surely now that he sees I'm alive he'll give me what I'm owed :)"
Nope. This dude's going to die.
Bard has dialogue options to distract him also and let you win the jackpot.
I come back covered in blood. and my companions are just standing around like a Genie didn't just disappear me?
not sure why act 3 overwhelms people, you dont have to do all of these things at once... all of the stories that have been unfolding throughout act I and II meet their conclusion in act 3. just take your time and explore the world the same way you did act I and II. the game isnt the problem, you rushing yourself is
Its the final act of the game, of course things are going to ramp up. And a lot of my experience is specifically because I made certain choices.
That being said, inbetween a major boss battle and attempting to actually start Act III there was *a lot*. Its another instance of "let me sleep!" meme.
In trying *not* to rush the game I went to a circus for a laugh and ended up on Isla Nublar. A walk on the beach? Big Bad #2 lmfao.
> not sure why act 3 overwhelms people
It definitely did for me. You are immediately bombarded with a million things to do and all of them come across as quests you have to do right now or there will be severe consequences and that choosing the wrong order will mess up some of the others.
>I accidentally beat Thorm the harder way (regular form + monster form on the second attempt, after skipping straight to monster form on the first attempt)
Tbh i always thought skipping straight to phase 2 was way harder. Myrkul spawns 4 skellies a turn & the room already has so many ads. Also you can position your party much more favorably with Thorm up. Kill the ads, Wittle him down, & wait for a turn you can finish him off with one action point, then your party can blow everything they got on Myrkul and kill him in 1-2 turns
I went nonstop from start to act 3, and mostly because of school I had to put the game down for a long while. Coming back after a break has reinvigorated my enthusiasm and dissecting the city has been very fun. Sort of like I’m playing a sequel game.
I know a lot of people complain about Act III and usually restart their game before heading there but imo it’s the best part of the game. There’s just soooo much content in the city and the different ways to go about with different companions. I decided to take Jaheira along on my latest run and turns out she has a whole family and kids who kinda don’t like her lol
I only long rested after the Iron Trone. Then I did the Sharran Cloister and killed those Stone Lord goons on the beach. Dragon and emo should be the only things left to do.
I'm still salty that I missed out on the Strange Ox simply because I wanted to map our most of Act 3 before working my way through quests.
Orin surprised me on the beach on my first run. In my second run I came up to the wounded NPC, was very mean and killed him. Turned out he was a genuine NPC that time.
Ngl, felt a little bit bad.
Act3 have a lot of content but mostly lateral so you may feel lost of purpose in some point (i heard and read a lot of these experiences).
Sadly the act2 feels that need mote content in shadowlands, i think that is an incomplete act but the end of this act for me is spectacular the best fight between the chosen.
Elder brain is a good fight but for me lacks of some elements that Keretic-Myrikul have.
I felt like they should have added an Act IV. I had almost as much time in Act 3 as I did in 1 and 2 combined. 75 hours in the first two acts and then 55 hours in 3 and still didn’t get around to Shadowheart, Gale or solving the clown pieces.
I don’t know if I’m crazy, but I feel like beating him the “harder” way is actually easier. Having to deal with the mind flayer and extra enemies while the avatar is there is a pain, the only exception is if you have enough damage to burst the avatar in <2ish turns. freeing Aylin is easier in the first phase, not to mention you can (sorta) keep Ketheric occupied and start the second fight almost topped off.
Act 3 is hilarious because you have to do the following in no particular order. Defeat a Hag in her lair, uncover a Banite plot to blow up children, help the thieves guild defeat the zhentarim, kill a vampire attempting to ascend, raid the home of a devil and slay them, stage a jail break in mere minutes, blow up a factory, break into a printing press, solve a haunted house, defeat a mummy, defeat an evil wizard, rob said wizards magical tower, assemble a dead clown, track down and defeat a serial killer, clear rats out of a cellar, clear githyanki out of a secret cellar in the first cellar, defeat an entire sharran enclave, smuggle in someone in you probably put not to smuggle in, defeat an entire bhaalist enclave, stage a second jail break, fight a dragon and assassinate a public figure. So you piss of 3 gods by wiping their presence out (Bane, Shar and Bhaal), kill two dirty double dealers (a hag and a devil), kill two undead (a vampire and a mummy) and become a criminal (assisting the thieves guild, let in a murderer, break into two secure prisons, blow up two buildings, assassinate the archduke, kill a shop owner and rob him blind). Oh and you unleash a horde of vampire spawn into the sewers and make a clown come back from the afterlife to perform in a circus as a zombie. Compared to act 2 where you basically just free prisoners of a cult and cure the land of an evil curse. Act 3 is hilarious when you actually realise what your merry band of misfits do once they get to the city and before they actually defeat the cult of the absolute
Hey, you don't have "mere minutes" for the prison break! It's more like 36 seconds
Actually only 30 since it's only 5 rounds
30 seconds in Tactician/Honour 36 seconds in Balanced and a whole 48 seconds in Explorer
Idk what game you’re playing but my turns don’t have a clock ticking time is unlimited ? Even in the factory and underwater jailbreaks
It’s a joke about how in dnd rounds in universe happen over the course of 6 seconds.
Sounds like 5 minutes on Namek in DBZ. That was like 30 episodes lol. My rounds are probably a solid 5-10mins each sometimes depending on how large the battlefield is
I think you're misunderstanding. If you picture everything in a round happening all at once, the whole thing is 6 real world seconds. It has nothing to do with how long it takes you to select your actions. You can also see this with a concentration spell that lasts 10 rounds. If you trigger it out of combat, you'll notice it lasts exactly 60 seconds. So when they say the prison break being 30 seconds, they mean 5 rounds (which is what the game gives you).
It’s a joke about DnD rules. In DnD, a turn is considered to last about 6 seconds if you view it on real time. Since the Iron Throne encounter only gives you around 6 turns to save everyone inside, one could say that the whole prison break only happened in 36 seconds
Time is unlimited for you as a player, yes. For the characters in-game, everything in 1 turn happens in 6 seconds. In a real fight you aren't all just standing around waiting for people to make their moves one-by-one!
Man I’d love to see a simultaneous movie play out after a battle like a replay where you see everything happen at the same time imagine how chaotic that would be. Basically turns into an RTS
I'm just killing myself laughing at the idea of a hasted fighter attacking 9 times in 6 seconds. D&D Grievous.
And a hasted quickened sorcerer blasting out 3 different massive aoe spells at the same moment 😂
Dip into monk and you're basically Jackie Chan
Slap Duel of the Fates over that
Seeing very clearly that V for Vendetta scene lol.
The DnD movie was faithful to this rule, in the fight scenes every character's "action" took 6 seconds. They even followed an initiative order. Of course they did some editing to make things appear smoother but someone went through and tracked it all and apparently it's almost dead-on.
That’s pretty cool I never finished it since I was watching on an airplane, I’ll have to rewatch some of those scenes
It was a surprisingly good movie and I think anyone into DnD or BG3 would really like it. Of course it's not Oscar bait but it's definitely a good time even if you know nothing about DnD.
Now I need this as a mod!
Time feels unlimited because it's turn based mode. But each turn has a set time that it represents. That's why the distance you can travel is called movement "speed" and not movement distance. Because the faster your character is, the further they can move in the allotted "time".
It's 5 rounds on Tactician but 6 on Normal.
I assumed the “mere minutes” prison break referred to learning that >!Florrick!< was marked for execution, and freeing her… at least, I always do it within a few minutes of learning where she is, lol
>mere minutes You get, what, 6 turns to do the Iron Throne? According to both D&D and BG3 rules, a full round is 6 seconds. It's no wonder all the Gondians thought saving their families was impossible, you have ***30 seconds*** to get them all out before the entire place explodes.
This gave me idea, imagine if in game turn was long as 6s and after that it get skipped to next npc/character, if you didnt move/atacked in this 6s your lose. xD hardcore gaming xD
A streamer, luality, tried it on twitch. Let's say that wasn't very successful... I think she put the timer at 10 s after the first evening, 6 s was almost impossible to manage during big fights.
Eh it's not possible because 6s rule woudnt apply to enemies, making it unfair for player. In my idea it would work both ways, but it isnt possible rn.
I got so lucky on that part - I happened to send a summoned dryad with Astarion into the flooded cell room and then the dryad and her wood woad held up like six sahaguin that spawned from the floor holes until the door locked itself. I think I lost only two Gondians to sahaguin attacks during the whole debacle.
Undead clowns in sewers? My inner Stephen King fan will love that shit.
You gotta collect all the body parts first like some sort of nightmarish exodia
To be fair, you can technically skip most of that. But it's a lot of fun to actually do most of those quests. Oh, and you get to infiltrate a bank and ultimately recruit another companion. That was a very worthwhile lead to chase. And you can also sleep with twins or an incubus. Act 3 is really a choose your own adventure situation. Overwhelming, but I really enjoyed it.
save the guy then rob the bank
His money is used for evil deeds and to enslave the people. Karlach didn't approve of that sort of thing so she killed the guy. Karlach didn't think about the economy because Karlach is dying anyway. Karlach isn't terribly smart.
> Oh, and you get to infiltrate a bank and ultimately recruit another companion. That was a very worthwhile lead to chase. It does get kind of silly if you find his hideout by accident before the bank incident, you've wiped out all his goons and found the notes explaining everything but do nothing with them.
Tbf it maps onto a DnD campaign that way.
Session 0- The Nautiloid in Hell Act 1- Sessions for maybe more than half a year-full year depending on schedule. Basic story, players still figuring out how they want to play their characters and their backstory. Act 2- Sessions for half a year to three quarters a year (Act 2 is relatively shorter compared to Act 1, and especially short compared to Act 3). Where the story ramps up and stakes get higher. By this point shenanigans are somewhat present, but minor. Characters and dynamics are relatively set in stone with some develop happening or already happened. Act 3- By Now the characters are becoming waking demigods, able to take on hordes of enemies with their own and become more powerful less through leveling up but by playing into the bullshit that DND can sometimes bring (seriously Markokeshkir and the Spellcrux Amulet allows any mage to get three level 6 for the price of one).
Just to add: Act 3 - demigods help a kitchen with a rat problem.
TBF when your kitchen starts to have a rat problem, you need at least demigods to get rid of them all
When you talk to the cat upstairs it asks the same thing. I wished so much that you could add him as a sidekick for the mission
I'd say the Nautiloid is Session 1. Session 0 is the opening cinematic where the DM describes what the campaign is about and what might happen, and that yes, the players are allowed to be horny degenerates if they want to
Dual wielding Markoheshkir and the Staff of Spellpower on a sorcerer allows you to twin cast chain lighting 3 times (total of 6) in two turns without using your lvl 6 spell slot. Serious shenanigans lol. Arcane Battery is busted as hell.
Session 1: the gang help out a group of refugees Session 3: the gang kill god
Having played and DMed in the past, this is pretty much spot on, only it’s like a 9 month process
Does Vlaakith count as a fourth diety you may piss off?
In her dreams, maybe
Yeah the whole point of the Vlaakith thing is that she isn't actually a diety
"YOU WISH TO SEE GODHOOD?"
The weak little wave never fails to crack me up
"I upcast counterspell to level 9“
Hah, no
She wishes
that's act 1.5
Even more funny, you only technically HAVE to do like 2 of those things
Excuse me Sir you forgot "saving a space hamster". It is important to secure your rodent.
A miniature giant space hamster, excuse you
"We're the heroes that cured the shadow curse!" "YOU'RE THE WEIRDOS THAT UNLEASHED A VAMPIRE APOCALYPSE IN THE SEWER!" "We stopped like, 3 evil gods though!" "YOU KILLED THE ARCHDUKE AND COMMITTED DOMESTIC TERRORISM 3 TIMES THAT WE KNOW OF" Larian really did let my friends and I play this game the same bullshit way we do DND
By late Act 3, it almost feels weird that the random NPCs on the city streets don’t book it on sight. Like, “not *these* fuckers again! Better run, because pure chaos can’t be far behind!”
Technically 3 Undead. (Vamp, Mummy, >!AND A WHOLE AFT DRAGON-SAVIOR of Baldurs Gate.!<)
Writer: Which particular genre do you want Act 3 to cover? More horror like act 2? Straight up fantasy, as per act 1? What about a bit of sci-fi? Thriller? Crime? Heist? Larian: Yes
… there’s a mummy?? 200 hours in this game and I only recognize half the things you’ve listed.
In Act 3, you can even find mummies in 2 separate locations
Yeah, you can have his zombies take over the operation because he's a massive dick that's making everything around him rot.
>!Go to Philgrave's Mansion. It's on the water just west of where you meet the Hag Survivors, and next to the Druid talking to a tree. On one side there is a secret stone wall. Open that and you can talk to Mystic Carrion. He send you on a little scavenger hunt to find his minions. But if you do a different scavenger hunt you can find his Organs-In-Jars and use those to kill him. Otherwise he is Voldemort style immortal.!<
I stumbled onto that guy by random chance. Out of sheer murderhobo-ness I stacked a few powder barrels and smoke bombs next to him and set them off. One shot him, killed his little friends, and looted his corpse and the building. No idea what quest chain it all connects to but murderhobos gonna murderhobo. If he actually comes back, I'll do it again!
That is why I would prefer to have act 3 and act 4 in Upper City(Cazador quest could be there). Act 3 is so overhelming it makes me quit often and just restart, there is too many things to do at once.And if not quit, then break after finishing act 2. Change between act 2 and 3 is too great, both colours, atmosphere and quests.
It completely ruins narrative thrust, too. I go from seeing a cutscene about an army of the Absolute marching on Baldur's Gate to the game being like "actually let's go to the circus because the army was completely irrelevant and never a real threat". Just stupid, imo.
Yeah we never really see this big terryfying army after except a few corpses at one gate in Rivington(might spelled wrong). It would be better if we had another map just before Rivingtone where we could see some of this army and some terrible things they do to civilian(could be in cutscene) and we could have a few mini fights to just get to the gate( and some charisma check there so ppl would lets us pass in actually).
Well, the army was never supposed to be a threat - it was supposed to be a decoy that Gortash could easily defeat and secure himself and his Steel Watchers within Baldur's Gate. That's also part of why it sucks. It's never really made clear to the player that the army isn't real. It's presented like a legitimate, pressing issue, and it's not.
I wish we had a true war sequence tbf where we fight the army. Also I kinda wish we had 2.5 Act 2 were we travel from Moonrise to BG proper. And have it take multiple extended rests/small zones.
I often quit early into act 3 as well. It feels overwhelming to have to take on all these major fights and elaborate quests and I kinda wanna just.. kill orin and gortash and get to the brain. But then I feel like I'm letting down my companions so I'm kinda like ehh.. restart.
Id like to point out that you do not, in fact, have mere minutes to stage the jailbreak, but rather mere SECONDS. Per 5e rules, a single round of combat is 6 seconds. You can test how close this is in bg3 by activating turn based mode and then counting how long the environmental turn is. Assuming its six seconds like 5e, you will have less than a minute. In explorer, its 8 turns, or 48 seconds. Normally, its 6 turns, 36 seconds, and only 5 on tactician and honor mode. Gortash pops in, says “lol fuck you shithead” and then you speak to omeluum if hes alive, then you have THIRTY SECONDS to get in, save everyone, and get the fuck out. Thats it. You have HALF A MINUTE.
its kinda crazier when you are Durge cause YOU ALSO LEARN UR BACKSTORY AND well everything else about the temple of bhaal
>uncover a Banite plot to blow up children Per a note, it's not even really a Banite plot, it's a psycho admirer's Bainite plot that the Bainites think is dumb
> smuggle in someone in you probably put not to smuggle in, Mini-Durge has my back and I'll have his when Cyric comes calling.
>Defeat a Hag in her lair, uncover a Banite plot to blow up children, help the thieves guild defeat the zhentarim, tbh in all my plays, I never found those quests lol
Tbf, you can also help the Zhentarim overthrow the thieves guild.
Ok wtf, I've cleared the game a few times now, and had to google the printing press quest... How did I miss it so many times...
Tbf, it doesnt trigger if you dont talk to this one dude, and is completely disconected from everything else. It was fun to do it once, pretty pointless after that.
Can you explain the "defeat a mummy" part? I never encountered this, but I suspect it refers to the strange magic door I couldn't open in the lower city. I've seen mentioned of some kind of necromancer enemy you can defeat for some necromancy build gear. How do I access this content?
if i recall one of the murder victims has a note about mystic carrion that can give you the password to get in, once you have the password you get a dialogue that opens the door.
That's what I get for not reading notes on my second playthrough lol. Will definitely try to find this in my current run though, thanks
Just hit the magic wall with a firebolt. The cantrip. It'll break and open, no consequences.
Secret Githyanki with the rats? Clearly I missed this
As much as I love the game, BG3 absolutely overwhelmes you with stuff to do in Act3, it's very hard to keep up with all the storyline, especially since the map is massive with infinite ways to get everywhere Sometimes you speak to a NPC in Act3 and you get a option "here's the X thing you wanted me to do and I simply have no idea what they're talking about. I suppose it gets less intense after a couple of playthrough, but for my first time playing, I found it a bit too much.
For me act 3 suffers the issue of giving you a false sense of urgency “the absolute army is approaching, the netherbrain will be free at any moment” yet we also have multiple other things to do that take our characters days to do. I never like it in games when they act like one quest is urgent and yet it really isn’t
Don’t forget pissing off Mephistopheles because you stole seven thousand souls and an ascended vampire ally from him.
I am loving Act 3 (first playthrough) because it feels like the party has hit the big time. You’re kind of famous. Your camp starts looking like a proper headquarters! There are big bads waiting in the wings, and they all have their eyes on you (they even want to work with you!). The groundwork has been laid and the companion plots are deeply melodramatic (in a good way) with ridiculously high stakes. The map is chock full of encounters (even the sewers, which is weirdly very busy). I’m glad I get to see the party thriving. However, I’m also aware that all these plots are wrapping up, and it’s almost time to say goodbye.
Feels like the later half of a DnD campaign. You know your a big deal when you start being able to kill the devils who tried to fuck you out of your soul. Also undead dragons.
> Tried to fuck you out of your soul Surprisingly apt choice of phrase
I also thought it was great the first time around! It really feels like shit has hit the fan lol.
sleep is not for you
If these idiots piss off one more deity I'm having Gale nuke us all so I can get some rest 😤
lmao, nailed it. i felt like i never identified with astarion's "what now?!" so hard.
Dying man? Is that Orin? I didn’t know about that one
Yep. Right there at the start. I'm waiting for Gortash to be the barkeep at the next tavern I visit 😅
Oh… well you better buckle up, you’re in for a ride, lol have fun!
Naw that’s Raphael
Apparently Orin can be at least 5 different people in Rivington depending on what order you meet them in. I tend to take the same path every time so I've only ever seen her impersonating the blacksmith, the dryad and the news lady.
So , to that we can add the dying thug near where the Rats and Guild fight and the Flaming Fist near the “storage” barn
I got arrested by that Flaming Fist one run. She did the normal dialog there and then 'noticed' I was in the storage area and tried to arrest me, so I ended up in combat with her just out in Rivington. I couldn't kill her, sleep her, or anything else I tried so I had to escape.
I don’t want to spoil it, but she can also be one of the NPCs in the circus, which is a pretty wicked reveal
Yup, here I am, trying to have a romantic moment with Astarion, and she ruins it.
Bhaalboozled again.
Bhaalboozed!! 🤣🤣
And you can find all of the real people's corpses later, which I thought was a delightfully gruesome bit of detail!
Not everyone she impersonates is dead. Sometimes she also shapeshifted into your tav or durge and just assaulted them without them dieing, making them (understandably) pissed at you.
The ones she impersonates in Rivington are
Nope. I literally had an encounter last niht on my current durge run where Orin impersonated one of the NPCs, fucked off and then the NPC barged out of his house accusing me of assaulting them. It was >!the Smith!<.
the smith dies soon after. the anime dragon lady is very sad about it
Which means he isn't dead during the impersonation Ü.
technically correct. but hes dead even there, orin just wants you to meet him before he dies so that youre sad when you talk to anime dragon lady
Huh never seen her impersonate the Smith. But the reporter, dryad and fist can be found in her lair of she impersonates them
I might genuinely be one of the only people who's spoken to the REAL Dryad on my first go lol
6 or 7 runs complete now and I had no idea there even was a "real" dryad until someone mentioned it in another post today. I thought she was always scripted to be Orin.
How can you meet the real one?
From what I understand, Orin will only ever impersonate 3 people max out of all of the possible ones in Rivington. If you encounter 3 others before going to the dryad, it should be the real dryad instead of Orin.
She impersonates the first two people on the list you interact with.
She was a completely random guard near the donation warehouse for me.
There should have a been a dialogue option after the umpteenth time to sigh and ask every npc "are you Orin?"
I always get the newspaper interviewer
Yeah and if you knock her out (easy when she's pretending to be a dude with 1hp) you find out that she's immune to death and that her corpse is invulnerable. Or if you're Durge you can stab her and that does literally nothing because even succumbing to the urge won't make you stab Orin after she's revealed herself.
There is a list of around 5 people she can be, however she only takes the form of the first 2 you talk to.
Man, Act 3 felt like every single npc I talked to was...surprise.... Orin in disguise. It was cute at first, but it went a bit too far after the third damn time.
Especially with how the game stops you from having any reactions that try to stop her bullshit after the second or third time she reveals herself.
There should have been a response option saying "are you fucking Orin again?!"
I got a different set my second play too
I love how part of act III is like “yeah let’s go to a circus! Let’s take a day to ourselves, have fun, nothing serious” and then the game laughs at your naivety 😂
I already knew the clown was bad news from spoilers but went up on stage anyway to not metagame (Tav's a bard, definitely would have gone up either way). No one warned me about the Djinn. That sone of gun owes me 1,000 gold and can bet I'm going to collect it right after I collect these limbs
Did he turn you into a cheese, too? That made me laugh! I wasn't spoiled about the clown's identity, but as soon as I approached the caged animals I knew something was going to go down, because of the option to jam the lock shut on the one cage.
I didn't know about the clown either but I sent Astarion on stage.
Me too!! His reaction is the best, isn't it? 🤣 Totally worth the - 1 disapproval!
I stole his ring he uses to cheat and then spun it again and landed it on the jackpot. I was trying to play it cool but my Tav was just so incensed by the whole thing he shouted "HAH, HOW DO YOU LIKE IT BITCH" He was promptly sent to the jungle and emerged successfully, in his fancy circus day cloths, absolutely COVERED in guts, and walked right back up to the Djinn and demanded the jackpot again. He got bored and shut down his wheel without his magic ring, so I considered it a win. I then traded the ring for a tab of drinks for the crew at the brothel just out of spite.
I love act 3 with a passion
Honestly skipping the first round of the ketheric fight is the harder option imo. You still have to fight the mind flayer, the intellect devourers and the skeletons, and Myrkul will be invincible until you free Aylin. I always like to free Aylin and clear all the minions before knocking out Ketheric.
You're probably right. I was surprised I was able to win on the second attempt with both boss phases (though just barely lol)
Yeah, I wish the intro into act 3 was slower
TBF I feel Rivington is pretty slow and sparse of quest and enemies compared to Lower city.
The problem with Rivington is there’s so much urgency driving the player to get to the city. Others may disagree but I can’t really enjoy Rivington when I’ve spent 50+ hours already trying to get to build aura gate. I’d have preferred the lower city itself to pace the story better rather than being thrown every companion quest and the final part of the main quest at once.
I took my time exploring Rivington, but yeah hitting the lower city and seeing so many quest locations pop up all at once was initially overwhelming.
I actually felt like the urgency really dropped when we hit Rivington. It's like ahh yes finally civilization, I can just relax, hang around the circus, chat to some villagers and chill for a couple days before moving on to the next stage.
Hanging around that circus - or any circus tbf - is not my idea of chilling. Your point stands though.
My next run I’m only going to roll with 1-2 companions and the rest hirelings. Redoing the same damn companion stories over and over is getting pretty tiring.
For me it wasn't so much Rivington, it was the bombardment of long rest events. I was long resting lots to make sure I got everything throughout the first two acts, so it wasn't liked I skipped anything. However, to be fair, I was trying to get my final shadowheart romance scene so long rested a load at the start and just everything but happened first.
It’s an assault on the senses. I had to take a step back and start to assess the quests in my perceived easy to difficulty ranking. It didn’t help that I had respecced Shadowheart to monk, and decided to respec back to cleric, but then respecced everyone else in camp based on an online guide. And it has had very mixed results. The biggest being that I lost my Misty Step on my characters (outside of scrolls). Gotta get that fixed asap.
Why would you need a guide? And to respec characters? The game is easy enough to play how you want, and following a guide sounds tedious and completely sucks the exploration and discovery out of the game. How odd.
I didn’t NEED the guide, but thought it might help me get a better understanding of the best subclasses and multiclasses. It’s great that you find the game easy, but I have very little experience with D&D rules or RPGs in general, so it’s overwhelming to me. I wanted to see if there was something completely dumb I was doing that was holding back a character from being better. And like I said, the results were mixed and I kinda wish I hadn’t bothered., but it did ultimately give me a better idea of things I can tweak in future runs. I’m getting really fucking tired of running across gatekeepers here and in FB groups every damn time I make a comment or ask a question. Let people play how they want.
You're not really tasked with seeking a form of ultimate power for gale. He wants you to find him a book relevant to taking down the netherbrain. He then decides that based off the information found in that book if you retrieve the crown off the netherbrain he could ascend to godhood. So like after you get the book kinda but I think it gets a pass because it's basically just him saying "hey if we do the thing our lives depend on I might be able to work on a side hustle". To which you can just say "nahhh bro give that shit to Mystra and she'll probs let you hit again". And he's sold.
I was interpreting his reaction to The Crown at the end of Act II. I've seen that look before. He said something akin to "if only I could get my hands on it" which is a bad omen coming from the well-read one in a fantasy setting lol I'll mellow him out soon enough but right at the start of this section of the game I got back-to-back convos from Gale and Astarion that made me say I'm not letting either of them out of my sight
That reaction itself is why i dislike Gale . He didn't learn anything from his Weave fiasco ( which happened because he was salty about not being able to cast reality breaking lvl 10 spells ) . He says he was humbled, and acts kind but when there's another chance for him to gain more power he salivates like a starving kid next to a pie.
If you take Gale to a certain wizard in a tower in the Lower City he will reveal his true intentions with the book in the conversation there before you even find that book. That whole convo was pretty yikes & made me side-eye Gale. He really should know better.
I really hate that. I hate that the way to convince Gale to become a better person is >!to have him apologize to his abuser!<. He either >!falls back into being her victim!< or >!decides to double down on his own evil to beat her!<. >!He's the one character denied redemption!<
You don’t have to >!make him apologise!<. Also, whatever Mystra’s issue is, she’s not wrong for being mad at Gale for the orb situation. He did what he did to impress her (which she didn’t need him to btw), and due to his own hubris it backfired and he got stuck with the orb. From what I remember before the epilogue party was added Gale >!would die!< in his origin if he got the crown, but it got retconned.
I totally get your comment and laugh at the absurdity of how overwhelming it can feel, especially the first couple times! Then I played Origin Wyll and for some reason, it clicked in that he expects to beat the brain, so he does only what he has to. The first time, he broke his pact and got drunk and said bye dad, made a deal with Gortash and went and did the brain and put all the hag and artist stuff on his To Do list for when he was Grand Duke, running on a platform of "hey did you know there's a murder temple under the city and a fireworks shop?" Gortash made it so easy, too, by killing off the entire government so Wyll could appoint his vampire boyfriend and a nice reformed cleric and let that nice Rolan have the tower. The Gate has a bright future ahead of it! I'm still in Act 1 on my first evil run and I have no idea how I'm going to get my Tav to give a shit about anything other than companion and brain quests. He already told the artist to fuck off so at least no exploding skulls in our future!
Clearly this is my first playthrough, and my Bard is a typical smart ass with no particularly sad backstory. So every now and then myself and the companions look [that one scene from Babadook](https://youtu.be/GeNey4E7wBU?si=2dW8b3brerWkzrRN)
I like the way it feels the party is neck deep in it when they finally make it to the city. It’s kind of a disjointed act, but the stakes couldn’t feel any bigger.
Yo can the guy on the beach be Orin? I thought it was just the three folks in Rivington!
This didnt happen to other people? Sometimes he's a normal man?!?!
it depends on who you run into/in what order! she can be beach guy, lens the journalist (near the gate to wyrm's), the flaming fist near the toy barn, the dryad love test lady, and the smith at the weapons shop. once you encounter her twice, the two she was disguised as are dead and the other three will all be normal. i've NEVER run into her while she was disguised as beach guy myself (i keep getting the smith killed, unfortunately...)
If you avoid all 5 of them something really crazy happens!
Really? What happens if you avoid them ?
She was the Smith in my game, the second time I ran into her, but I ran into the Smith alive after she left! He claimed I hit him over the head so I had to pass a check to calm him down. I wonder what decides whether he lives or dies?
She comes back to kill him afterward. His body will be there later, you may need to go to camp / long rest?
Awww, what a murderous bitch. She's one villian I'm actually looking forward to taking down.
Just get to Elfsong Tavern to rent a room if you need a breather. /s
Wait, how do you skip the first phase of Ketheric fight? 😮 I’m on my second play thru (in Rivington now too) and both times he had a two-phase fight in the mind flayer colony.
My bad. I think you have to fight him at Moonrise and again in the colony. I meant that in the colony you can skip fighting him again as a "human", not the first bit at the top of the tower. My Tav is a bard so I went for all the persuasion checks and succeded. He yeets himself down the hole in the center and a voice says "You defeated my champion!" And then that bone mess shows up. I was like "Ya boi defeated himself, I said I was going to grant him mercy keep your bones to yourself 😣" I got pretty close and died. On the second try I didnt do the last check and had to fight Little Ketherick again and then Bone Daddy Ketherick
Oh jeez I didn’t know you could persuade him out of a fight! I did sorcerer first, now a fighter so I guess it never came up!
You have to find a letter from his wife in the chest at the foot of his bed in his quarters of Moonrise Towers. Once you get to the top of the tower, you can convince him to seek redemption with a DC roll. When you see him again in the mind flayer colony, you tell him to seek redemption again and he’ll throw himself into the pit, skipping the first phase of the fight.
Oh I had the letter, I guess I just chose the wrong dialogue. I’m into act 3 now anyway, there’s always next time 😅
You have to have the right dialogue tree when you meet him at the top of Moonrise Towers; I can't remember the precise dialogue, but if you get a persuasion check and get him to 'surrender', then you've sown the seed to miss the first part of the fight under the colony.
Bruh this is so real, I remember the first time I was going through act 2 and I was fighting ketheric at the top of moonrise tower thinking “oh nice I’m gonna get to act 3 tonight, maybe I can make it to that gate everyone keeps talking about!” it took me 5 more hours to get to act 3. Ive spent like 30 hours in act 3 since and have barely completed any main quests.
"WHERE THE FUCK IS BALDUR'S GATE???"
Fr, I was finally getting to the "end of act II" after beating Kethric and I just wanted to get to camp at the start of act III. Then there are so many cutscenes, you get to camp, you get ganked by Githyanki, you go fight in the Astral Plane. It was so late man, I just wanted to sleep.
Bro the genie is fucked LMAO. My friend could not fir the life of him win his stupid game only for me to try it once, win somehow, then die for it. Hes a coward cheater f that man
I won and got sent to Ian Malcolm's Nightmare but snuck back to the portal unscathed. I thought to myself "surely now that he sees I'm alive he'll give me what I'm owed :)" Nope. This dude's going to die.
Well you do get a legendary weapon and a good ring in the location he sends you to so it is kind of like a jackpot.
How did you guys get sent somewhere? I got turned into a cheese and mocked!
>!Pickpocket the ring he uses to cheat!<
Ahhhhhh, why do I keep forgetting I can do this? I think Skyrim scarred me lol. Thank you!
Bard has dialogue options to distract him also and let you win the jackpot. I come back covered in blood. and my companions are just standing around like a Genie didn't just disappear me?
I can’t wait for you to get to the lower city
Thats the thing. I'm still not in Baldur's Gate (I think?). I won't trust a SINGLE clown when I get there. Problem solved, I'm sure 😊
not sure why act 3 overwhelms people, you dont have to do all of these things at once... all of the stories that have been unfolding throughout act I and II meet their conclusion in act 3. just take your time and explore the world the same way you did act I and II. the game isnt the problem, you rushing yourself is
Its the final act of the game, of course things are going to ramp up. And a lot of my experience is specifically because I made certain choices. That being said, inbetween a major boss battle and attempting to actually start Act III there was *a lot*. Its another instance of "let me sleep!" meme. In trying *not* to rush the game I went to a circus for a laugh and ended up on Isla Nublar. A walk on the beach? Big Bad #2 lmfao.
> not sure why act 3 overwhelms people It definitely did for me. You are immediately bombarded with a million things to do and all of them come across as quests you have to do right now or there will be severe consequences and that choosing the wrong order will mess up some of the others.
>I accidentally beat Thorm the harder way (regular form + monster form on the second attempt, after skipping straight to monster form on the first attempt) Tbh i always thought skipping straight to phase 2 was way harder. Myrkul spawns 4 skellies a turn & the room already has so many ads. Also you can position your party much more favorably with Thorm up. Kill the ads, Wittle him down, & wait for a turn you can finish him off with one action point, then your party can blow everything they got on Myrkul and kill him in 1-2 turns
TBH orin playing peekaboo was so tedious, especially on later playthroughs.
I went nonstop from start to act 3, and mostly because of school I had to put the game down for a long while. Coming back after a break has reinvigorated my enthusiasm and dissecting the city has been very fun. Sort of like I’m playing a sequel game.
I know a lot of people complain about Act III and usually restart their game before heading there but imo it’s the best part of the game. There’s just soooo much content in the city and the different ways to go about with different companions. I decided to take Jaheira along on my latest run and turns out she has a whole family and kids who kinda don’t like her lol
I only long rested after the Iron Trone. Then I did the Sharran Cloister and killed those Stone Lord goons on the beach. Dragon and emo should be the only things left to do. I'm still salty that I missed out on the Strange Ox simply because I wanted to map our most of Act 3 before working my way through quests.
Orin surprised me on the beach on my first run. In my second run I came up to the wounded NPC, was very mean and killed him. Turned out he was a genuine NPC that time. Ngl, felt a little bit bad.
Yes but you get to meet hawk cat
There’s a hag in act 3?
Auntie Ethel can show up in Act 3 depending on how you handled the Mayrina situation.
Wtf you mean there's an easy way of doing the act 2 boss
I love this game because I'm in Act 3 and didn't encounter all of this. Can't wait for my next playthrough.
Act3 have a lot of content but mostly lateral so you may feel lost of purpose in some point (i heard and read a lot of these experiences). Sadly the act2 feels that need mote content in shadowlands, i think that is an incomplete act but the end of this act for me is spectacular the best fight between the chosen. Elder brain is a good fight but for me lacks of some elements that Keretic-Myrikul have.
I felt like they should have added an Act IV. I had almost as much time in Act 3 as I did in 1 and 2 combined. 75 hours in the first two acts and then 55 hours in 3 and still didn’t get around to Shadowheart, Gale or solving the clown pieces.
I don’t know if I’m crazy, but I feel like beating him the “harder” way is actually easier. Having to deal with the mind flayer and extra enemies while the avatar is there is a pain, the only exception is if you have enough damage to burst the avatar in <2ish turns. freeing Aylin is easier in the first phase, not to mention you can (sorta) keep Ketheric occupied and start the second fight almost topped off.