According to Steam, I am 40 hours into my first properBaldur’s Gate 3playthrough. I’ve spent almost two days with my Dragonborn Monk, wholoves to get a bit murdery every now and then(through no fault of his own!). He’s level eight at the moment, and he’spowerful. He can attack three times a turn, turn his Ki into glorious magic effects, and is decked out with more magic items than Gale could ever gulp down.
I estimate that I’m roughly halfway through the second act, and this gives me pause. I haven’t even reached the titular city yet and I am only four levels away from the reported level cap of 12. While higher levels take far more experience to reach, the tougher enemies provide buckets of the stuff, so my rise to power has been steady and felt measured.
RELATED:I’m Nervous About Starting Baldur’s Gate 3
That said, it doesn’t feel like I’m very far into the campaign - I haven’t accomplished many great feats and I’m still in the dark about many important lore details, but I’m apparently two-thirds of the way towards peak physical condition. This balance is out of whack and feels like a problem.
One of the greatest joys in a CRPG is leveling up. Making choices and seeing them translate palpably into bigger numbers and smoother fights is incredibly satisfying. If it’s possible to hit the level cap in BG3 many hours before you reach the end of the game, this feeling of progression slips away almost entirely. Incremental boosts via slightly stronger magic items won’t cut it. I want feats and spell slots, and loot just doesn’t fill the same void as it does in games likeDiablo 4.
I’ve been a bit of a completionist, so I’m definitely outleveling the curve, but I’m worried that I’m going to plateau a bit too soon. you may’t blame me for scouring every area to its fullest before progressing - the combat encounters are engaging, the side quests are rich, and I want to help each and every one of my companions. But it’s a pattern that has led me to this predicament. I’ve accidentally grinded too hard and I don’t have a DM to curtail my behaviour.
There are very good reasons for the level cap, of course. With 12 classes and almost 50 subclasses to account for, pushing the cap any further would lead to ridiculous levels of content, playtesting, and potential ways to break the game in half. While a DM can alter their story and encounters on the fly to account for their players’ builds, trying to balance a video game around the ridiculous things a D&D character can do must have been a herculean task. That’s not going to stop me feeling a bit miffed when I hit that cap and the experience flowing into me gets wasted, though.
Larian itself reckons the game will take around 100 hours to complete, so I should be just under halfway through the entire game. Given the scale of Baldur’s Gate (the city), I should expect the next act to be a very long one, but is that going to be an engaging experience without the promise of new thresholds of power? I trust in Larian - it seems to have learned all the right lessons fromDivinity: Original Sin 2- but I can’t help but dread that twelfth level and the brakes it’ll put on my train of satisfaction. I don’t want to have to turn to modders to solve this (admittedly petty) problem for me, but this may just be the inevitable solution for future playthroughs.
NEXT:Baldur’s Gate 3 Isn’t Ashamed Of Nudity, It Actively Celebrates It
