As the only player in the group, the role of the party’s face falls to you - unless you’re on multiplayer, but that’s a different conversation. Most of us loners will venture throughBaldur’s Gate 3with our NPC companions, meaning you’ll be talking to all the characters in the game.
To help you with your social skills, we have Charisma, an ability score that is extremely useful here in the game, solving many problems without violence - perfect for a good-character playthrough. Still, how far can you go through Charisma alone, and how can you improve your talking skills?
Updated on July 03, 2025, by Alfredo Robelo:Baldur’s Gate 3 continues to be as popular as ever, and with that popularity comes new discoveries for using Charisma in the game, be it in or outside of combat. We’ve updated this list to include even more ways to use Charisma more effectively in the game.
6Choose Classes That Lean On Charisma
A Charismatic Fighter Is A Weak One
If Charisma is a big deal for how you want to play the game, then classes that also rely on it for combat are an obvious choice. That means Paladins, Bards, Sorcerers, andWarlocks would all be great classesfor you, as their spells rely on their Charisma score.
Bards, in particular, excel at this task, given that they can get expertise in certain skills, doubling their proficiency score, or give a Bardic Inspiration to an ally and let them do the talking.
Still, you can use other classes or rely on allies a lot. Take Rogues, for example. They don’t need a high Charisma score, but nothing stops you from adding it, and they also get expertise in skills of your choice, making them a good option for talking.
Other classes, such as Clerics, Druids, or Wizards, can use spells to give them an advantage. Some will cost spell slots, but a Cleric can help you with Guidance all the time, so being one or having one in the party is very useful.
5Choose Skill Proficiencies That Use Charisma
Make The Most Out Of The Stat
Of all skill proficiencies, Intimidation, Persuasion, Performance, and Deception are the ones that rely on your Charisma. While Performance won’t have a lot of utility for people who aren’t Bards, the other ones are useful almost the entire game. After all, nearly all conversations give you the option to use one of them - and in most cases, you’ll have two or all three as options, so you can choose.
Bards can use Performance rolls to get extra coins by doing live performances, and they can lure in and distract NPCs for pickpocketing or area attacks.
Thus, for characters such as Bards or Rogues, having expertise in one of these skills can make a lot of conversations go smoothly, and you still get to stack Guidance or Bardic Inspiration, among others, as mentioned before.
Since most conversations will let you use either of them, there’s no need to be good at all three if you’re only using one of them every time you talk to someone. We’d recommend Persuasion for good characters, as being honest rarely has too negative of a repercussion, even if you fail (though it can occasionally end in a fight). As for evil characters, Intimidation and Deception will both work similarly, though animosity is almost guaranteed if your ability check fails.
Every class gets two skill proficiencies among a few options, but you’re able to sneak in a few extra ones. Your background, for example, can give you some, such as the entertainer background, nobles, criminals, and so on. You can also get extra stuff through races, like Humans, who get a skill proficiency of your choice for free, and Half-Orcs, who get Intimidation for free.
4Pick Feats That Help In Combat And Conversations
Your Charisma Only Goes Up To 20 After All
Sadly, there aren’t many feats to improve your conversation skills - most are dedicated to combat. Still, there are a few things you can get here, and you can still use a lot of Charisma-based feats to be more powerful in combat, too.
If you’re not a Rogue or a Bard, the Actor feat can compensate by giving you proficiency in Deception and Performance, then doubling your proficiency bonus - essentially giving you expertise. you may also create a Bard or a Rogue, intentionally ignore these two skills, and get the Actor feat, giving you free expertise on these skills while you focus your actual expertise somewhere else. It’ll also increase your Charisma score by one.
The bonus from your ability scores only increases on even numbers, meaning there’s no bonus difference between 16 and 17. If you’re planning on getting a feat that gives you one point, leave your ability score at 17, so it’ll increase to 18 along with your feat, giving you an ability score bonus increase as well as whatever bonus the feat will give you.
Performer is another interesting one, though it’ll be useless for Bards, as they can already play musical instruments. Still, you’re able to use it to get some performance money or distract enemies with your mighty Paladin, for example.
Lastly, two more feats are particularly interesting. Lucky allows you to do a reroll on attack rolls, ability checks, and saving throws, so not only can you use it in failed conversation rolls, but it’s pretty helpful in combat, as you can just roll the die again. Then, you have Magic Initiate, with a variation for all spellcasting classes. You can get extra cantrips and spells, and as long as you choose Bard, Sorcerer, or Warlock, you will use Charisma on these rolls.Perfect for your Paladin,for instance, who can learnEldritch Blastand stop being useless when they’re too far from enemies.
Alternatively, you can multiclass between these options, as they can all mesh well together, since they rely on Charisma a lot.
3Use Spells To Expand Your Conversational Options
This Way, You Can Talk To Animals Too
You can always cheat through conversations with the Weave – also known as using magic. We’ve already mentioned Guidance, a free cantrip that helps a lot, and Bardic Inspiration - which is not technically a spell, but it helps. But there’s more.
Charm Person, Friends, or Enhance Ability can all help you with Charisma checks, making your job a lot easier here, too - and Friends is a cantrip, so you may cast it at will. If you’re not a caster, like a Rogue, you can rely on scrolls for their benefits– Charm Person scrolls are not difficult to find.
Lastly, we highly recommend Speak With Animals. Speak With Dead is recommended, too, but that won’t demand ability checks, so it’s unrelated. Being able to talk and persuade animals expands the game significantly, and they can help you with specific missions, reward you, and give you information earlier than you’d normally get it. Besides, it’s just fun to see the animals' perspectives on the world.
2Equip Items To Further Increase Charisma
You Can Go Past 20 This Way
Be on the lookout for what you’ll wear throughout the game; many items give you a Charisma boost. There are quite a few gear items specifically for Bards during the journey, too, showing that Bards got some love from the developers, apparently. you may get some by helping Volo and Alfira or checking the Mimics at Grymforge.
One of the best examples is Birthright, a hat that gives you a +2 on your Charisma bonus, which you’re able to find in Act Three. A plus two doesn’t seem a whole lot at first. Still, it lets you bypass the 20 maximum limit, meaning that if you reach 20 on your Charisma and wear the hat, you’ll have 22 on your Charisma. A +6 on anything Charisma-related– and that’s not counting your proficiency bonus.
As for the other classes, there aren’t many items that make Charisma more useful in combat, so you’ll still rely on your Strength or Dexterity for attacking– unless you’re a Pact of the Blade Warlock (which you could multiclassto use your Charisma on the weapon, but that’s up to you).
1Spend Inspiration Points To Avoid Combat
You Can Get A Lot Of Them With The Right Background
Of the many ways in which you’re able to succeed in a roll in Baldur’s Gate 3, the most readily available is using Inspiration Points, granted when either you or someone in your party does something aligned with their background. They work similar to the Lucky Feat, although they can be recharged many times during a single day, provided you keep doing actions that trigger your background.
If you’re planning on using conversation options often anyway, picking the Charlatan background will make you have a near endless supply of Inspiration points, meaning that you’ll almost never fail any roll. If you want even more access to these points (or you don’t want to pick that background), keeping Astarion in your party is another way of getting them, since he’s already a charlatan in nature.
This can make you the deadliest creature in all of Baldur’s Gate, since there are plenty of encounters where you not only avoid combat, but convince your foes to remove themselves from existence. Keep in mind that not all conversations offer a way out, particularly if you’re doing an evil playthrough; no matter how good you are at talking, eventually Jaheira is going to find out what you did, and ambush you over it.
