The writer got mad when a goblin shoved Astarion off a cliff. It reminded me of when I had Karlach shove a goblin in lava, then a goblin ran up and shoved HER in the lava. I didn’t get mad; I took it as a learning moment: enemies can shove me back, so move away from the lava.
The author really loved the sound of their own voice. I’m a dozen paragraphs in and there’s not an actual argument to back up the assertion that “it’s not fun” besides combat being “tedious”. I mean, look, I gave up 5e in favor of other systems after the OGL disaster and haven’t looked back, but this is a garbage tier article and I’m surprised it made it through Polygons editors, given how many of their writers and members have been espousing their joy for the game. Criticism is great, but “it’s not any good” just seems lazy and contrarian for contrarian sake.
5e is a bad table top game, but that’s part of what’s made it so successful - it’s not treated as a game unto itself anymore, but just some loose guidelines to help generate setpieces, and people like that.
But also BG3 seems to recognize this and actually fills in the broken or missing game elements, just like everyone’s DM does whenever they come across these gaps. It takes an opinionated approach to implementing the rules, and does so with the confidence of years of building CRPGs.
It’s an impressive feat.
The only thing that I would say is missing from BG3 is a more comprehensive encyclopedia of game and class mechanics a la the Owlcat Pathfinder games. Being able to see all the things a class would get ahead of time would be hella dope and help with character planning.
I feel like the game really, really, really needs an “I’ve Never Played D&D” mode - one that actually explains what the terms and such means. It took me forever to figure out what things like “1d6” in weapons meant, and I’m still not completely sure what a “cantrip” exactly is.
I think the problem with 5e is that it’s super crunchy with combat but super fluffy with everything else. It is really combat centric. It encourages a lot of ad hoc roleplay but super rigid combat. “The problem” is a strong term. This is mostly my opinion. It’s a popular system so everyone is going to have things about it they dislike.
I’ve tried to get my friends to try other systems but it has been tough getting buy-in. It’s good enough. We basically play with one combat per long rest but there’s a sort of an unspoken agreement to not go crazy with dumping a bunch of strong spells. Plus I think we actually don’t even have any full casters in the group which is what would benefit most from that style so it works out nicely.
5e is a bad table top game
No it’s not. Everybody loved 5e before the OGL fiasco early this year, but the hardcore old-schoolers who found it too simplified. The recent bad sentiment is about poor business moves by WotC regarding their license, and has nothing to do with the 5e system, which has been to date the most successful edition of dnd.
It really depends on what you mean by “good” and “bad” for a table top game. Clearly many people are having fun with it, so it’s hard to say that it’s a complete trash fire except as hyperbole.
However! I would argue that many of the people playing DND would have more fun with a different system. All those people who do one fight per day? Should play a game that supports that. All the people who do mostly social encounters with the occasional fight? That’s not what dnd is good at, and would have more fun with a system that was built for that.
Unfortunately DND is mega popular and sucks most of the air out of the hobby. This has a important effects.
One, I suspect there’s a huge survivorship bias in the hobby. DND is the first game most people play because it’s super popular. Thus, most of the people who stick around the hobby are people who didn’t hate DND enough to leave. There are probably lots of people who would like rpgs in general that don’t play anything because their first experience was DND, and they hated it. Most of them won’t come back to the hobby.
Second, because DND is such a janky system that’s difficult to learn (don’t you tell me a 15 is a +2 is an easy system), most of the people who do stick around are hesitant to try something else. Why would they want to learn another system and memorize another set of stat mappings? Some people probably don’t even know there are rpgs without six stats, or character attributes like that at all.
Anyway. I digress. 5e is very good at being 5e, but it is not a general purpose RPG. It also has something I dislike in pretty much every one of its systems. As a shorthand I often say it’s a bad game.
Being popular and being a good game are completely different things. Being fun and being a good game are different things. Being useful and being a good game are different things.
I’m not making a value judgement on whether 5e is likeable. I like 5e. It’s just that it’s not a complete and coherent experience.
Argument ad populum doesn’t change that.
To be honest I think they have a really good point, in that the game _isn’t _ a dungeon master and it isn’t going to have the sort of creative leeway that a real DM could give you. But… no shit, it’s not a real DM. Nobody expected it to be one. It is a video game, and a damn good one at that, and while it does its absolute damnedest to give you as much creative freedom as possible it’ll never possibly be able to match up to your buddy Frankie telling you to make an athletics check to slam-dunk the goblin through his own war drum.
But this author sounds like they frequently try for… Let’s say, non-standard approaches, and bothers the DM about it until they allow it. Or, alternatively, the DM is just awesome and has rule of cool take priority over nearly any other rule (I admit I am guilty of this sometimes). It’s not necessarily a bad thing but the author is comparing apples and tomatoes by comparing the video game Baldur’s Gate 3 with the tabletop game Dungeons and Dragons. Sure, they’re just about the same color, but the similarities end there.
I don’t mind the content of the review, it’s a fine opinion to have. But, what boggles my mind is the “Polygon Recommends” badge. The tone of the review is so dismissive and negative, I would never have guessed the reviewer enjoyed the game. It’s like the writer assumed you read all the site’s positive coverage and didn’t feel the need to mention the game’s best qualities.
