Baldur's Gate III - Spoiler Edition (please read updated OP)

I'm enjoying reading all of the comments/observations you all are posting! I won't be getting EA for a lot of reasons (mainly I don't think my current PC can run this game), so it's great to get a little preview. It sounds like there are some really neat features, though I'm a bit concerned that the game seems to be actively encouraging "evil" play (most companions being evil alignment, merchants are so broken stealing is the only way to make money, etc.). I have no problem if all of the companions don't get along with each other, but the descriptions make me wonder if any of them would get along with a good aligned player character. Neutral characters are fine, I guess, but I'd rather not have a whole party of Jaheiras.

Also, count me among the group who enjoys playing humans in fantasy RPGs (at least for a first playthrough). In real life, I'm closer in height to the average dwarf than human, so playing a tall human is part of the fantasy experience for me!

The EA currently only have the evil/neutral companions. The good aligned ones will come later. Larian wants one origins (tus companion) per class and they plan to have all PHB classes, so 12 of them. I personally think that's a lot considering the amount of work they get, so we might not get that many.

You can do a "good" playthrough right now, just don't go around telling NCPs you want to help them in a goody-two-shoes fashion. You still can get most quests by other dialogue options or stumbling on them. Funny enough, there are people complaining about the "evil" choices in the game not being evil enough on the official forum...considering what you can do, it feels these people haven't really tried to be evil.

The current companion alignments based on my interactions with them (as the game has no alignments):
- Shadowheart: Neutral Evil (but not "mouahaha, lets kill everyone evil")
- Astarion: Chaotic Evil
- Lae'zel: Lawful Evil (Githyanki to the core)
- Gale: Chaotic Neutral (with good manners)
- Wyll: Neutral Good intention vs Neutral Evil nature is how I would describe him.

Astarion and Lae'zel are probably the hardest to please if you don't play it straight "murder everyone you don't like" evil. But Astarion's chaoticness makes him malleable a bit.

The merchants aren't really broken. It's just not balanced and Larian haven't implemented using highest score from party for skill checks (it's coming, Sven mentioned it in an interview, along with using spells and scrolls to buff checks in dialogues instead of doing it before or switch character to apply while you are talking).

Astarion is glitched. He died in the harpy fight and noting I can do can revive him. Oh well, stay dead then. Ciao! Wasted the resurrect scrolls too. Going to reload.

If you pick that option. It's either +2 attribute points or a feat with maybe a +1 to a specific attribute + some other stuff (or just other stuff).

Do you have Hooded Dude at the camp? Maybe he can help you with that.

??? Why is there a book on Miniature Giant Space Hamster?

I made the weirdest of realization.

My ranger bounty Hunter with Urban Tracker with the following proficiencies:
- Investigation
- Insight
- Animal Handling
- Deception (would be better with Intimidate)
- Sleight of Hand

is basically Batman! I need to find some black leather armor now...

I'm hoping they'll tweak the AI so that Warrior-types can actually generate some aggro. Enemies seem so fixated on targeting your weaker characters, especially anyone that has a ranged attack. I mean it's sound strategy to target spellcasters, but there has to be some way to pull their attention away from them.

I just had 2 fighters kill a pair gnoll archers who completely ignored them to just keep shooting Wyll over and over. Who was already long unconscious. You can hit them, push them down. Nothing gets their attention.

Fighters actually have it easy in BG3. Just keep yourself separate from the weaker characters so you don't get caught in the splash damage from all the bombs and acid and flaming oil attacks they'll use on them.

Decided to get EA after all. I am enjoying it a lot so far. I made an elf wizard. I only have Gale and Shadowheart so far, which makes my party 2 wizards and 1 cleric. Luckily, it is pretty easy at the start, so that combo works fine. I just finished up the ruins.

The main thing I hope they fix is the camera. It is hard to see things sometimes.

Lol! Okay, I preface this by saying that I don't take Astarian out much. But I didn't realize up until this point that the game actually assumes the PC doesn't know that Astarian is a vampire.

Uhh... wut?

That's a problem also in DOS2, thats one of the reason why tank builds are bad there, because you don't have any real option to force the enemy to target the tank instead of your squishies. You keep yourself from getting hit either by evasion/dodge skills, using CC with all your party members, or just outputting very large amounts of DPS (Fire-based strats or exploits such as the neutron star chest). I didn't play yet BG3, but I guess it's similar there. If I go by the BG1-ToB and the stuff I saw from videos, CC is still very effective, especially sleep.

The help action is the right most one in the brown icons row, looks like shaking hands. Help also work for prone, entangled and a bunch of other status.

There is also someone who can show up in your camp that will revive dead party members for a cost (200). You just need to find him 

It also didn't help that the gnoll hunters are bugged and make 3 longbow shots per round instead of 2. If they win initiative, they just drop weaker characters in the opening round.

But yeah, strategies usually involve igniting the flammable barrels before they do, dropping stalactites, chandeliers, etc. on them. Depending on where you are, there can be useful things in the environment.

Best strategy I've found is to scout, use stealth, and pick them off. And sometimes, depending on where you are, you can use ranged attacks and kite enemies.