Baldur's Gate 3 News

Hello everyone,

It’s big patch time. But this time, not only are you going to feel the improvements, you’re also going to see them. As we’ve previously said, Early Access is about improving and iterating on every single facet of the game, and that includes all of the things you see and hear.

In this big patch, we’ve got general fixes for cinematics such as this one below. He was starting to get a crooked neck, and we’re pretty sure he doesn’t have health insurance so we helped him out a bit. See for yourself:

              

It’s not just about tweaks though. As many of you know, despite playing through the Early Access content sometimes for up to a hundred hours or more (wow!) you still haven’t seen all of the content, because incrementally new things are seeded into the game. In this case, a missing cinematic. Where once was darkness, there is now light!

                           

See if you can spot the differences in the game for yourself, or continue to read this Community Update with attached patch notes for spoilers. You know you want to.

                           

A certain song has also been ‘re-shot’ by our cinematics team, which gives you an excuse to check it out again. Did you need one? Side note: we’ve been watching your reactions to this song in your VODs and YouTube videos, as well as in various streams, and the reactions are beautiful. Watching you play the game as we improve it is very motivating for all of us.

On the topic of music and joy, last week saw the Symphony of Sin, which included the first ever live performance of some of the music from Baldur’s Gate 3, as well as some wonderful songs from Divinity: Original Sin 2. You can watch the VOD here, it’s well worth it:
[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
With that said, let’s look at some of the data that’s been making us smile over the week.

Everyone knows you can pet the dog in Baldur’s Gate 3, but did you know the dog has been petted 400k times? Such a good boy deserves that many pets.

                           

Speaking of good boys, last update we discussed how Gale was ultimately attacked quite a lot. Check out last week’s update for the stats on that. Somewhat contradicturally, he’s the most “romanced” of the party. He’s been “romanced” by 33% of players. Shadowheart came second, falling in love with 31% of players, and in return 31% of players fell in love with Shadowheart.

1.37% of players chose to sleep alone. Which is cool too! We have the other stats, but thought it might be fun if you gave it a shot and guessed them. One thing we’re seeing is the stan memes aren’t correlating with the actual “romance data”. For sure, there’s enough tinder in the campfire to ignite some flames.

On a less romantic note (though this really depends on your tastes), 5.87% of players tried to steal the ring… but 26.3% of those players merely sucked a toe. If you haven’t got there yet, you’ll know when you see it. Since we’re talking about failure statistics, many people have made it to The Underdark. But 40.79% of players who jumped down a large, dark hole arrived dead, because they leapt without Feather Fall.

We’re saving perhaps the most interesting until last. Slight spoiler, so if you don’t want spoilers, don’t read this. You may know that at a point in the game, you may side with one of two factions: the Tieflings against the goblins, or with Minthara who demands the gates are opened for the goblins to attack the Druids Grove.

74.85% of you stood with the Tieflings, and 25.15% of you sided with Minthara. Good outweighs evil, it seems.

An optimistic note to end on.


Changelist:

Improvements:

• Optimized overall sound settings to improve performance on lower spec machines
  
• Added polish to several in-game cinematics
  
• Attack of Opportunity indicator is now correctly hidden for invisible enemies
  
• Improved timing of some tutorial messages
  
• Improved usability of skill selection in character creation
  
• Added new tutorial messages related to combat
  
• Listening to other players’ dialogs now correctly shows the other players’ dice rolls
  
• The reason for a waypoint being unavailable is now displayed on the map
  
• Party members now correctly cancel their spell prepare state when switching to another character
  

Fixes:

• Fixed a crash on startup for specific driver and hardware combinations
  
• Fixed a crash related to trading with Zevlor after the raid on the grove
  
• Fixed a crash in dialogs related to dynamically adding items
  
• Fixed a crash in combat AI
  
• Fixed a potential crash with moving platforms
  
• Fixed a crash related to loading savegames while in a dialogue
  
• Fixed a crash when destroying multiple familiars with a single spell
  
• Fixed a crash related to unloading resources (when loading a save or returning to main menu)
  
• Fixed a blocking issue when someone would join during level transition
  
• Fixed a blocking issue when starting a dialog just as someone leaves the game
  
• Fixed not being able to save anymore on the host when another player is stuck in “in dialog” state
  
• Fixed players getting stuck in the same dialog inside the camp after choosing to fight Minthara
  
• Fixed characters being stuck in animation if downed during precast spell
  
• Fixed characters not being at the correct position after loading
  
• Fixed not being able to talk to party members after talking with gale and summoning the weave
  
• Fixed not being able to use some spell scrolls when out of spell slots
  
• Fixed a rare issue for players that don’t have a profile on startup, requiring selection or a profile or creation of a new one
  
• Fixed quest markers not showing up correctly when multiple markers point at the same object or location
  
• Fixed the tieflings’ celebrations not proceeding correctly if the player had already done a long rest right before
  
• Fixed the physics of the door on the Nautiloid reappearing after saving and loading
  
• Fixed Ethel not triggering her ambush if she leaves her home during combat
  
• Fixed several minor bugs related to in-game cinematics
  
• Fixed zone spells not targeting invisible characters
  
• Fixed summons from items not having an owner, causing them not to join combat
  
• Fixed the goblins not using the war drum correctly
  
• Fixed issues with lockpick progress going out of sync
  
• Fixed savegame screenshots being too dark
  
• Fixed spell sounds not playing correctly in multiplayer
  
• Fixed a long black screen being displayed if a dialog was started just as another player was joining
  
• Fixed Zevlor initiating dialog during combat
  
• Fixed audio settings not resetting when switching profile
  
• Fixed not being able to correctly switch character in trade window
  
• Fixed not being able to click through scenery you can see through, improving navigation
  
• Fixed the Gith becoming hostile incorrectly if Lae’zel was never recruited
  
• Fixed additional reroll when using an inspiration point
  
• Fixed inspiration points not being able to go up after using an inspiration point or gaining another one
  
• Fixed an issue with the hidden vault entrance closing again after the puzzles are already solved
  
• Fixed marking an item as a ware not getting set correctly
  
• Fixed being able to select summons in the trade window
  
• Fixed Zariel Tiefling clerics not being able to level up to level 4
  
• Fixed character creation color tooltips
  
• Fixed characters sometimes falling off moving platforms
  
• Fixed several animation issues with torches
  
• Fixed being able to select invalid targets for Misty Step skill
  
• Fixed not being able to see other players’ hidden summons at all
  
• Fixed party members being rearranged when detaching and reattaching characters to the group
  
• Fixed certain equipment still generating sound after unequipping
  
• Fixed several texture and skinning issues
  
• Fixed several minor localization issues
  
• Fixed minor issues with the action log
  

Mac specific:

• Automatic crash reporter is now enabled for mac
  

Update: As a gentle reminder that Baldur's Gate 3 is an Early Access release, Larian has very quickly pulled today's patch and reverted to the previous build as a result of some players being unable to load their saved games. Saves "should" be accessible again after you've reverted, and the update will be redeployed once it's fixed. Original story: Larian has already put out three small updates for Baldur's Gate 3 since its release on Steam Early Access a week ago. Larian also explained how the most popular options in the character editor came together to create the most generic dude possible. Now it's time for the first full-scale patch, which includes a significant number of bug fixes and gameplay improvements, and an interesting look at some other data points, including the ominous-sounding "Map of Death." "All feedback, positive or negative, is extremely helpful and important to us. We're really grateful to everyone who organizes their thoughts and talks to us on Steam, or the forums, or the feedback form. For us, that's a big part of what Early Access is about. Keep the feedback flowing, and we'll keep shooting out those updates," Larian wrote.

"Under the hood we're starting to get our first look at data, and decisions players are making, which teaches us how you're playing the game. Before you launch a game, you're making a lot of assumptions about what people will do, and why they'll do it. When you launch, you can start to see if you were right." To illustrate the point, the update includes a heat map of player deaths—the "*map of death*," as Larian described it, asterisks and all.  (You can find the digital remains of my party amidst the bright yellow areas just below Chapel Forest. Several times.) Amusing name notwithstanding, the studio said it can combine that data with player feedback and bug reports to determine why people are dying in particular areas, and more importantly, whether it's normal that it's happening. Lots of people appear to be dying when they first meet Gale, for instance, which Larian said seems "strange," and as we alluded to in our recent rundown of whether you should wait to buy Baldur's Gate 3, there's also a surprising amount of death happening in camp. (I won't spoil anything, but I will say I'm not surprised.) Some other interesting data points: Gale died 333757 times, giving him a party-member kill rate four times higher than any other NPC in the game. 5717 players died trying to tame the owlbear cub. 3753 players died trying to tame a mind flayer. (Why would you try this?) 4000 people died as a result of the thing with the ogre and the bugbear. (You can google that if you want to know more.) Shadowheart is the only companion who's actually managed to die more than the player character. Larian said it will continue to share "data and insights" throughout the Early Access period, and encouraged players to continue horsing around in whatever ways they want, saying, "The results of this make the game better." It also said that public multiplayer lobbies will soon be switched on, and Discord integration is coming, although there's no date for either at the moment. The patch notes for today's big update are below. Improvements: Added polish and bug fixes to several in-game cinematics, such as Shadow Heart recruitment, Astarion recruitment and Volo's Poem. (These will be ongoing throughout EA). Added minor text tweaks to various bits and bobs. Altered certain dialogue choices for different NPCs. Added extra combat tutorial messages to better explain the basics (let us know how you get on). Astarion no longer thinks Lae'zel inspected you at camp when she is not in your party. Quite rightly. Baldur's Gate 3 review: Our Early Access verdict
Baldur's Gate 3: Everything we know
Baldur's Gate 3 tips: Start smart
Baldur's Gate 3 classes: Find your perfect profession
Baldur's Gate 3 races: Pick your favorite face
Baldur's Gate 3 companions: Learn who's who Bug fixes: Fixed a crash related to having the level up screen open while in a dialog. Fixed a crash related to dropping items from inventory. Fixed a rare crash that could happen at the start of combat. Fixed a possible blocking issue when using the transponder at the end of the tutorial twice. Fixed black screen issue when ending tutorial if the transponder was used by any character that is not the main player avatar. Fixed a possible blocking issue when reassigning characters to others players while in combat. Fixed an issue with lip sync not working correctly. Fixed several localization issues. Fixed combat UI not updating correctly when someone joined during combat. Fixed party shared gold and items not always working in dialog checks. Fixed summons from NPC’s getting stuck in combat. Fixed levelled up characters having duplicated racial and class features. Fixed not being able to level up to level 4 on a Zariel Tiefling Cleric of Light due to cantrip selection. Fixed text cut-off issues in several interfaces. Fixed party members getting stuck trying to open doors they run past. Fixed listening in to dialogs getting stuck in multiplayer, also causing players not being able to save. Fixed camp button being broken after closing the camp window with escape key. Fixed "end the day" multiplayer message being broken if a player closed it with an escape key. Fixed certain quests not having map markers. Fixed certain secret entrances incorrectly showing up on the map. Fixed incorrect player portraits in the lobby screen as more people joined. Fixed Cambion wings and Tiefling tail animations. Fixed map not centering correctly on player characters in smaller subregions. Fixed health values not being synced correctly to the Baldur's Gate 3 twitch extension. Fixed superiority die not showing actual values when using abilities such as Menacing attack. Fixed minor issues with hair, skinning and textures on several models. Fixed lighting issue in owlbear cave. Fixed not being able to walk over corpses. Tweaked ragdolls to reduce the possibility of models exploding (or glitching. Idk how to explain it, but it’s spooky).

Hello everyone!

We launched Baldur’s Gate 3 exactly 1 week ago, ish. The launch surpassed all our expectations. Our philosophy heading into Early Access was to hit a comfortable amount of players, gather feedback, and incrementally iron out and improve the game towards launch.

Good news! That’s still the plan. But the *bigger than expected launch* broke a few things. In chronological order, it apparently broke Steam, it then broke our launcher sign ups because the servers couldn’t keep up, and then it went on to break our support pipeline with a huge influx of support tickets. We’re not complaining. These are good problems to have.

The day before launch, the weather also broke the Ghent basement. Which was suboptimal because we were shooting a thing for those who get to the end of Act 1 (no spoilers).

                                                

Soon after, the power broke in Quebec. This is the 3rd launch in a row where Larian has had a powercut somewhere. One of the good things about upscaling to 5 studios globally, is that now if one gets defeated by water or electricity (please, not both together), we have 4 other studios to deal with the tornado, earthquake, or a Kaiju. At this point launching a game is basically like playing Sim City.

On launch, which we managed to get to in the end, we celebrated very socially, very distanced, and watched you all play the game. Someone at the office (we won’t mention the name of the perpetrator... I mean, we get it) stole Gale from the gateau. We have since recovered Gale.

                                  

Since then, we’ve shot out 3 hotfixes that have greatly reduced the number of crashes and stability issues experienced in the first week of launch. The real heroes in this are the community who stuck with us as we were working on those patches and hotfixes. We know that jumping into an unfinished game in Early Access, when your saves will eventually be wiped, is a big ask. We are phenomenally grateful to each and every one of you who’ve jumped in, provided feedback, and sent error reports. These reports are channeled back to our QA leads and producers, and the information you provide helps us to understand why certain things are happening, and thus reproduce and solve them.

Working with feedback

All feedback, positive or negative, is extremely helpful and important to us. We’re really grateful to everyone who organizes their thoughts and talks to us on Steam, or the forums, or the feedback form. For us, that’s a big part of what Early Access is about. Keep the feedback flowing, and we’ll keep shooting out those updates.

Under the hood we’re starting to get our first look at data, and decisions players are making, which teaches us how you’re playing the game. Before you launch a game, you’re making a lot of assumptions about what people will do, and why they’ll do it. When you launch, you can start to see if you were right.

As an example, let’s look at a cut down version of a heatmap (avoiding spoilers)! This is a *map of death* (make a spooky noise when you read that). *MaP of dEaTh*.



As our early access campaign progresses, you’ll see a shift as combat is tuned and content is altered. It might not look like much, but this shows us where to investigate. We can correlate this with direct player feedback, balancing feedback, and even bug reports to find out why people are dying where they’re dying, and also is it normal that people are dying there? It’s just one example of how people are helping simply by playing the game.

A strange point of interest is for instance that there are lots of deaths where you first meet Gale. Maybe people don’t like being ambushed by a spooky wizard jumping out of a rock? Something to investigate.

The amount of death in the camp is also surprising. We won’t spoil as to why that may be, but there are many, many in depth stories online, and on Reddit, about how death befell the campsite. They’re hilarious so please keep sharing them!

We also know how many times characters are dying. Gale died 333757 times. 333758 if you include the cake incident. Gale has a party-member kill-rate 4 times higher than any NPC in the game, so maybe he deserved it?

The Owlbear Cub has killed 5717 of you brave enough to try and tame it. Exactly 4000 people died as a result of interrupting the intimate moments of Ogres and Bug Bears.

And Shadowheart is the only companion that died more than the player character.

We’ll continue to share more data and insights over Early Access, but this is early days. Play however you want, in whatever way you want. There’s no one way to play the game. We’ve created systems that try to react to whoever you are, and whatever you do. The results of this make the game better.



(We’re working on this btw. Soon.)

Quick note on Discord and public multiplayer lobbies: The public multiplayer lobbies will soon be set live. Discord integration is in the works, so your friends can stop pinging you when you’re trying to tame a Mind Flayer (and dying 3753 times).

With that said, here are the full notes for Patch 1 - Launch. TLDR; fewer glitches, better stability, and more polish.

Improvements:

• Added polish and bug fixes to several in-game cinematics, such as Shadow Heart recruitment, Astarion recruitment and Volo's Poem. (These will be ongoing throughout EA).
  
• Added minor text tweaks to various bits and bobs.
  
• Altered certain dialogue choices for different NPCs.
  
• Added extra combat tutorial messages to better explain the basics (let us know how you get on).
  
• Astarion no longer thinks Lae'zel inspected you at camp when she is not in your party. Quite rightly.
  

Bug Fixes:

• Fixed a crash related to having the level up screen open while in a dialog.
  
• Fixed a crash related to dropping items from inventory.
  
• Fixed a rare crash that could happen at the start of combat.
  
• Fixed a possible blocking issue when using the transponder at the end of the tutorial twice.
  
• Fixed black screen issue when ending tutorial if the transponder was used by any character that is not the main player avatar.
  
• Fixed a possible blocking issue when reassigning characters to others players while in combat.
  
• Fixed an issue with lip sync not working correctly.
  
• Fixed several localization issues.
  
• Fixed combat UI not updating correctly when someone joined during combat.
  
• Fixed party shared gold and items not always working in dialog checks.
  
• Fixed summons from NPC’s getting stuck in combat.
  
• Fixed levelled up characters having duplicated racial and class features.
  
• Fixed not being able to level up to level 4 on a Zariel Tiefling Cleric of Light due to cantrip selection.
  
• Fixed text cut-off issues in several interfaces.
  
• Fixed party members getting stuck trying to open doors they run past.
  
• Fixed listening in to dialogs getting stuck in multiplayer, also causing players not being able to save.
  
• Fixed camp button being broken after closing the camp window with escape key.
  
• Fixed "end the day" multiplayer message being broken if a player closed it with an escape key.
  
• Fixed certain quests not having map markers.
  
• Fixed certain secret entrances incorrectly showing up on the map.
  
• Fixed incorrect player portraits in the lobby screen as more people joined.
  
• Fixed Cambion wings and Tiefling tail animations.
  
• Fixed map not centering correctly on player characters in smaller subregions.
  
• Fixed health values not being synced correctly to the Baldur's Gate 3 twitch extension.
  
• Fixed superiority die not showing actual values when using abilities such as Menacing attack.
  
• Fixed minor issues with hair, skinning and textures on several models.
  
• Fixed lighting issue in owlbear cave.
  
• Fixed not being able to walk over corpses.
  
• Picking up stackable items in when in combat will no longer crash the game.
  
• Tweaked ragdolls to reduce the possibility of models exploding (or glitching. Idk how to explain it, but it’s spooky).