#anyways... larian... give us more wyll content

[ragingtempests]

you ever get on nexus mods to scour it for new bg3 mods and get jumped scared by early access gale?? like... he was still my top romance in early access, but damn... that glow up was so insane that in hindsight... it's kind of insane that i was like, "yep, that's my man" while wyll and astarion were right there

[animentality]

Something I’d love for Larian to add to flesh out Wyll, Karlach, and Gale’s story are dungeons that are integral to their character like how Lae’zel, Shadowheart, and Astarion have dungeons.

The steel watch found art could be tweaked to add content for Karlach, we find diagrams of her early heart model along with how to was changed for the steel watch. Karlach can find something to improve her engine but she has to weigh the cost of taking what’s left of one of the people turned into a steel watcher and using it to save herself.

Wyrms rock should be a dungeon to get up to Gortash’s room and Wyll is faced with making another deal with Mizora to give him more power than he ever had to take down Gortash. He sees the nobles he knew dead and now the whole world at stake, not just the sword coast or his father. If he refuses to sign we get a boss fight with Mizora.

Gale’s talk with Mystra should also be part of a dungeon crawl and if he refuses to give the crown to Mystra or blow himself up then Mystra can summon like some dead powerful wizards and we have to fight those.

These are all really off the cuff ideas and I’d love to know how you’d improve the games story

Imagine with me, if you will.

That we LOST garbage quests like Stop the Presses, Lady Jannath's torture house, Mystic Carrion and Thrumbo, Suspicious Toys, the Counting House + Jaheira and Minsc nonsense, Avenge the Drowned, and the Nine Fingers/ Zhentarim nonsense.

But GAINED.

A boss fight with Zariel. Or at least SOME kind of conclusion with Karlach's beef with Zariel. Her main quest being tied to killing Gortash, who we have to kill anyway - bullshit. I like the idea of her quest being tied to the Foundry, but, I feel like tying her so tightly to Gortash was a mistake.

You could theoretically make it appropriate, if you bothered to develop Gortash and his motivations for selling her more, but they just didn't. I agree that she needs some kind of dungeon or area or boss fight. Preferably related to Zariel. Making Gortash her big bad, and then promptly killing her after, and sending her back to Zariel....? Yeah, no. Bad.

For Wyll, it bothers me that we never get to have some kind of, infiltrate the patriars in the Upper City quest. This could be tied to Cazador, for one thing, and actually make him plot relevant and not totally disconnected from the main plot, but it would make sense for Wyll, who's trying to save his dad. Maybe make him try to win over these people who look down on him for not being the perfect, silver spoonfed son he should've been. Plus, it's DND! There should be some kind of infiltration mission. That's classic DND!

Wyll could also see who his true friends are. So whether you save his dad or not, Wyll is being primed to be the new Archduke, right? And you can recruit more help this way. You can also still have a boss fight with Mizora. Maybe after the Iron Throne, at camp, or in some special zone.

Or wait.

Actually. What if Mizora was the boss fight, instead of Zariel?

You could tie Karlach and Wyll's quests together, but in a way that makes perfect sense?

Plus Mizora would be a super cool final boss, if you beefed her up. Gave her some Raphael-like powers, mayhaps? But shake it up, obviously, so it's not totally like the House of Hope.

Anyway.

As for Gale... I feel like if not Mystra...then maybe Elminster?

I know he's super powerful, though, so maybe more of a representation of him, kind of like how Myrkul is just a "representation" of him, and not him.

Maybe you can "defeat" Elminster, but only so far as, you think you beat him, brought his health to 0, after an exhausting fight... and then he tries to kick your goddamn ass for thinking you could beat him, cuz surprise surprise, he's not actually beatable...and then Gale has to role persuasion, to force him to stand down on the whole "kill yourself" thing.

I guess that might not be the most in character for Elminster, but. Something in that vein. We should definitely have some kind of big quest that's not just, "go to this random wizard's tower" and "let's talk to Mystra."

I'd love to fight Mystra, but. They don't like having you fighting gods directly, so.

I personally think Elminster would've been a more interesting opponent, even if you can't actually beat him, just persuade him not to nuke you.

Plus, that little fucking clown should totally pulverize your squad. It'd be funny.

He'd be more narratively interesting to fight than Lorroakan anyway, who just shows up to be a prick at the end. He's not a terribly interesting character, nor is he really intimately tied to any of the main companions, only Aylin.

So I hear you on the expansion of quests.

I just feel like...the bigger issues with the character arcs in general are a much deeper conversation. But working with what we have...

Definitely give Wyll his own separate Upper City quest.

Give Karlach an option to deal with the Zariel problem, fix her heart, or develop her story past Gortash. Don't just murder her after she kills her former abuser.

And Gale should have some kind of big quest to resolve his story too, and not just a cutscene with a Barbie looking ass goddess.

Those are my short term solutions.

I could probably think up some greater, general plot improvements that could be made. But those are my smaller quibbles.

[casmourde]

long rant about bg3 and people's weird behavior towards larian

Larian's continued support of their game and their community has given some people genuine brain rot. We were lucky to even get bug fixes post-release (I'm a cyberpunk 2077 fan), and they were both kind and creative enough to give us a FREE epilogue and add FREE content, but the community at large has taken this kindness and changed it into something entirely different and really unhealthy. Every time Larian updates us on patches and bug fixes, there are hundreds of comments demanding Larian "add" new content, "fix" characters, "fix" relationships, and I'm just baffled by how entitled this is. Do you guys know how video games work? You know you used to just get a video game once and that was it. If you bought a video game you bought a finished product. With more and more patch-based games becoming popular (stuff like Fortnite, Overwatch, Stardew, Genshin, etc), we're starting to see this design model bleed into triple a titles, which is fine (I'm not a big fan personally but I enjoy a lot of these types of games anyway), but it's giving people a really weird, backwards attitude about BG3. At this point I question whether those people actually enjoy the game they played or not. They demand so many changes and edits to characters that I find it hard to believe they even like those characters at all, and would much rather live in their world of headcanon and fanfiction (which, again, is fine) -- but at some point we have to acknowledge that BG3 was made BY Larian. The things you see as flaws in character's stories are canonical, put there by Larian for a specific reason. If you go under every post and demand they "fix" Wyll, I think there's a good chance you need to sit back and wonder if maybe Wyll is just like that. Because he is. That is who he is in the game's text. That is his story. If you don't like it, then by all means discuss what you would change, but it's unfair to belittle Larian for the story that THEY GAVE YOU. This is not to say there isn't a conversation to be had about Black characters in gaming being given really boring, lackluster stories, because that is 100% a noticeable trend (Preston Garvey from Fallout 4 comes to mind). This attitude also unfortunately extends to Gortash fans, and I know I'm kind of shooting myself in the foot here, but I want to discuss it lmao. I liked Gortash "before it was cool" you could say, back when the game dropped and it was gross to think he was attractive, et cetera (this is not something to be bragging about i know), and now that it's been kind of normalized to like him, Gortash fans are getting really invasive and, to put it bluntly, annoying. They whine like children in Larian's comments sections and on their own accounts about how Larian is so "unfair" to Gortash/Durgetash, how they are purposely removing Gortash content from the game to mess with us, etc. Once again, Larian cannot physically be "unfair" about a character THAT THEY LITERALLY MADE THEMSELVES. THEY choose what content to put in THEIR game. The Gortash that is in the game is the Gortash that they decided to put there. Nobody is hiding anything from you, nobody is hurting you, you're not special or different, there is no anti-Gortash agenda. If you can't engage with the canon content that Larian gives us, then I suggest that, for your own health, you move on. Gortash is my favorite character in BG3 because of what Larian did with him, not because of what he could potentially be if Larian bowed down to all of us and gave us everything we wanted. "Gortash romance when" NEVER!!!! And that's the fun bit!!!! We can all go crazy imagining what it would be like and we can make fan communities and fanfictions and art and it's awesome! Speculation and headcanon are awesome! Just stop expecting developers to cater to your every whim! It's unfair and will end up with you being sorely disappointed! Enjoy what they gave us and change it to fit your fantasy! If you like a thing, engage with it, play it, thank the people who gave it to us. Don't pester it to change.

[carryoncastiel]

The constant frustration when it comes to Wyll's writing...

Thinking about how Wyll is the only companion you can neither hug nor kiss in the epilogue. Then we also had the very tasteless and ooc joke about him and Mizora in the Christmas animation short...

And even if Larian gives us something good like the new kissing animation (which is definitely great) they take something else away, case in point the old kissing animation (which was totally fine) not existing anymore.

It's just constantly shown that Wyll is very much treated as an afterthought. Larian obviously has a huge racist blind spot when it comes to him but it also gets amplified by fandom as a whole.

The whole feedback and listening to fans thing that Larian gets applauded for is a double edged sword. It can be good for certain gameplay problems but when it comes to the story and character writing it just seems to reward the loudest people. Hence especially vampire boy getting piled with content even though he has zero relevance to the main plot and is not more special or interesting than the other companions and memes getting added into the game as well because the vast and loud majority of fans eat that shit up. It started with EA, continued into the full release and continued for every single patch.

(Disclaimer: This is just my speculation. Maybe EA didn't play a huge part and Larian would've fucked it up anyway. Idk) Now with Wyll is where I think that whole thing backfires. I wasn't there for EA but from what I heard and from the way fandom treats Wyll now it's probably save to assume that a lot of people either outright hated him or did not care for him at all because he's black and the other characters are not. Obviously they would say it's because he's boring or whatever but let's be real the majority of it is just straight up racism.

But there are not enough fans of his character to balance out the haters as there are for the other characters and the rest of fandom just doesn't give a shit. Coupled with, I assume, a very white writers room you get Larian not going "Our writing is fine we just need to tweak a few things", which as op mentioned above is what they should've done, but apparently panicking and scrambling to rewrite his entire character for the full release and then just never caring to clean up that rewrite. Because feedback loop: people care more about the other characters, they put more work into those characters because people care more about them, people care more about those characters because they have more content so they add more for those char-, yadda yadda rinse and repeat.

It sucks.

Now, I'm very bad at organizing things but I still think we as Wyll fans should get together and do some kind of feedback campaign to get Larian to at the very least add a kiss and hug for the epilogue. Apart from it being fucked up that he doesn't have that in the first place and that should be rectified I also think about them likely working on DLC and I really cannot take them neglecting Wyll in that too. But given their track record so far it's not looking good unless we actually make a huge fuss about it. Not on tumblr where we are screaming into a void but by shoving the feedback right into Larian's face.

I just find it strange that the developers chose to rewrite Wyll. I love new Wyll I think he's fantastic and I don't necessarily want the previous version. But I find it bizarre that there was somehow so much negative feedback about old Wyll that they risked completely rewriting him.

Now I love all the companions. This is not Dragon Age Orgins where I debate recruiting Ogrun every time. But I just find it strange that the reason given was Wyll's negative feedback when most of the other characters have been unpopular too. Like Lae'zel is infamously unlikable to a great many people.

People love to bully Gale and there's even lines in game that call him pathetic. The DEV's in the IGN interview even agreed that Gale killing himself can be a good ending, " I really liked Gale setting off the bomb with the brain, and actually that felt like the right ending to me.

AS: In many ways it is, yeah." Which feels problematic to say the least, like I get supporting player choices but suicide is never the "right" way to do things.

Or even I'm pretty sure I remember Neil Newbon talking about how he was sure a lot of players had killed Astarion permanently in their playthroughs.

Then there are people being absolute freaks on the internet about Halsin all because he's polyamorous.

Like these characters are wildly popular too but they certainly have their haters. So why did they lack such confidence with Wyll? The best source I could find on early access Wyll is this article https://gamerant.com/baldurs-gate-3-wyll-early-access-story-change-karlach-explained/. It says that this change was made to make his story stronger, make him more unique, and give him more complicated emotional ties. Unless he was really basic before they did not accomplish this. He has less content so his story lacks the depth the other's do. It's also inconsistent, with you being able to put him off being a duke by telling him he'll be too power hungry which he has never been. His emotional ties are rushed. He never really confronts his father, having the tadpole do most of the work and never hashing out his feelings beyond that he's fine.

It wasn't supposed to be this way. According to the article he was meant to have a dark side like Shadowheart "According to the panel, depending on whether players allow him to go through with killing Karlach, he will become a radically different companion instead of if she is recruited." Which would have been cool but if they didn't have enough time to do that maybe they should have tweaked what they had.

Plus, according to the article in early access he was "a straightforward hero who develops a violent side regarding his patron or goblins." This article too show's that his early approval matches current Wyll pretty well except for dealing with Aunty Ethel and more goblin hate https://fextralife.com/baldurs-gate-3-early-access-companions-guide-wyll/.

I just don't know I just find it so frustrating that it was the black main character they chose to tweak and ran out of time to complete his story and still haven't fixed it with a patch. And in the IGN interview the devs kind of sounded like there wouldn't be anymore patches and it's just frustrating. Wyll deserves just as much content as any one else.

[valiant-if]

no more huge gacha things to say, but still related to games...

I finished my patch 8 bg3 playthrough yesterday. I really like most of the new subclasses. I played them without multiclassing for the most part just to get the full feel of them, though I suspect some of them get better mileage out of that. (but it doesn't matter much to me because i'm not really a minmaxer anyway). In all, I do really like most of them, though there are a couple i still haven't tried. I think one of the unfortunate things about them is that they don't get special dialogue choices, which is not unexpected but still would have been a nice addition that gives them a little more identity. i.e. like how necromancer wizards have special dialogue when talking to Balthazar or Great Old One Warlock Durges get a super special extra scene when interacting with the shit in Moonrise in Act 2. Like, it would have made sense for my shadow sorcerer to have resistance to the shadow curse in act 2 or have special things to say about shar, but alas... only in my dreams

also i'm mildly annoyed by some of the very pervasive bugs that still haven't been fixed, especially ones regarding Wyll. Like, he gets the least love from the devs and it shows, and his buggy ass voice lines and banter that they haven't fixed for many patches on end (while adding new content and voice lines for other characters) are pretty glaring. 😒 get it together, larian

My Remnant 2 kick kind of faded for now, but it was good while it lasted. In the wake of that, I used birthday money to get Barotrauma and have really been enjoying learning that game. I've been eyeing it for years and finally made the leap. It's more complex than I thought it would be, but i like that about it. My friend and I still haven't played super far into the game, but I'm intrigued by the sub customization possibilities. Also I'm really glad that hiring bots is a normal thing in the game so we can play around with larger subs and still have enough bodies to man them.

I still have a tiny bit of birthday money left. At first I was considering getting the Oblivion remaster with it because it looks great, but also... I mean, I've played Oblivion a hundred times. I know the remaster has a lot of great things going for it, but if I have to choose between a game I know with a fresh coat of a paint (even if it's a thicker coat than usual) and a well-performing brand-new game, I'm going with the latter. I've been eyeballing Clair Obscur and have only heard good things and can't wait to dig my teeth into it 👀

gacha game time

arknights is being really mean to me and i've only pulled one 6-star in 113 pulls on the We Mischievous Few banner. granted, that one pull was big lappland, but still 😂 i want to try for vulpisfoglia too (this is payback for pulling four separate limited characters when il siracusano ran for the first time shortly after i started playing)

meanwhile, in hsr, i pulled for anaxa and got both him and his lc in less than 30 pulls, which i suppose is a nice consolation after being pushed to hard pity three banners in a row. (but then i decided to try and e1 him and ended up pulling another yanqing instead. i should have known better lol.)

wuwa has been exactly average in that i pulled zani in about 50 pulls. now i'm trying to decide if i hard save for cartethyia or take advantage of the anniversary banner to get phoebe

i did one ten-pull on reindeer hong lu in limbus and got nothing, but i'm saving the rest because as much as i want another hong lu id, i really don't need reindeer and would rather wait for whatever hong lu id(s) we get in canto 8

and any other gachas i play i have not touched for a hot minute, so that's all i have to say about that 😂