I agree with all of these changes except the fisherman one. That scene so clearly explains the mind control powers of the mind flayers and their tadpoles, whereas the kissing scene does an awful job of explaining anything except “this mind flayer tried to trick you, just like 90% of the other random characters you meet”.. And even that is missed by a huge percentage of players because you only learn that if you submit and die. For any other choice, you never know what would have happened.
Ehh, I disagree. The new scene is much more subtle but still relatively clear in what's trying to convey. "It's forcing you to... love it" telegraphed to me immediately it was trying to manipulate me. I don't dislike the fisherman scene but it's very on the nose instead of being a little more coy.
@@Cassandra_Solidor given all the information about mind flayers, it made me not defend the mind flayer when it was necessary (though my friend trusted them) so I’m sure more would’ve made the same mistake
I feel like I can already sense the problem with EA Wyll's storyline form the other side. The goblins become utterly irrelevant at the start of Act 2 so having him be so tied to their story would leave him hanging too. I do love that they had an actual voice acted '"gobbos" line that's so English
It swings both ways though. Astarion has to roll entirely off his personality since his entire storyline is basically 1 dungeon in Act 3. Worked fine for him. I think the better way to "fix" Wyll as a character would just be to make him a bit more of a weasely prick. After all, Gale's already doing the "hopelessly heroic idiot who chases big powers".
I mean EA Wyll still had a lot of other things going on, most of all saving Mizora from Moonrise and any other dealings with her, and then most likely more things to do with the flaming fist and his family in act 3.
@@jaeusa160 Astarion's story is a build-up to act 3 though, whereas once you're done with the goblins there wouldnt be any narrative tension left in Wyll's story. I do wish Wyll had a bigger flaw than his father not liking him though, I get that hes a heroic archetype but its just a little too good for me, he doesnt ever seem the slightest bit tempted by mizora or evil so like. Whats his internal conflict? Where's the character growth? He starts heroic he ends heroic in his backstory he's heroic. I just need a little bit of moral greyness for spice. A single regret where he could have made a different choice. Something.
@@jaeusa160 It worked because everything in the early Acts built tension and setup to a satisfying pay off. With EA Wyll, that payoff was in Act 1 since his whole story revolved around the goblins. Now it could have easily shifted to something with Mizora but they didn't seem to have the antagonistic relationship they do in the game proper. Personally, I think Wyll suffered more from a lack of screen time due to the rewrites than anything else. I didn't love his EA character even if the concept was intriguing. Maybe if there was a way to blend the two that could have worked.
Replacing dream visitor with guardian just removed ceremorphosis plot from the game. Illithid powers were extremely useful in act 1, but using them caused suspicious dreams, and narrator was saying something like "You lost something you’ll never get back". In full version there is no reason to avoid those powers. There are no consequences, no fear of ceramorphosis, no need to remove to worm which makes almost all main quests in act 1 void. I think they removed it because of complaints in forums. Almost all difficult decisions are removed in full version.
2 major reasons they changed. 1. when you were creating the dream person, the voice only said "who do you dream at night". no indication on what this dream person role would actually be. therefore, plenty of people made dream person a non-romance figure. so people were very uncomfortable when they found out what dream actually was . 2. the dream person was straight up just tell you to give up. it was just very bad writing if it was suppose to lure you in.
While it's disappointing that the illithid powers no longer tie into the story at all the dream visitor was unlikely to work as it was just too obviously a bad guy.
Wyll and Mizora also were hinted to be lovers. Mizora's broken pod could be found close to the goblin camp and all the companions had a special voice line about it smelling like sulphur. Gale was a lot more creepy in his obsession with Mystra and basically only talked about how much he misses her even during the romance scene at the tiefling party. Shadowheart used to be A LOT more hostile towards the player and she was toned down with every update because players disliked her. Her wound also was hinted to be some sort of sorcerer power (with a special dialogue with sorcs). Every new update also introduced a new way to punch/kick Astarion and at one point you could even break his nose during his introduction. Very early on he would also take acid damage while standing in running water, which made his pathfinding AI refuse to cross rivers. The dream visitor was insanely creepy and you could not resist their sexual advances which made players really uncomfortable. If you used the tadpole powers to mind control npcs enough times, you would also get the [True Soul] tag in dialogues. There was a famously difficult roll, after the cultist dwarf dies and the tadpole escapes you could stomp on it. The DC wasn't even that high but the roll was probably bugged because it was almost impossible to roll any higher than a 10 (with bonuses). If you succeeded you would gain approval from all your companions.
I believe the [True Soul] dialogue tag is available in the release version. It takes 5 uses of the Illithid powers on NPCs. It doesn't do much other than remove the dice roll. Unless you mean it was a unique tag that worked like racial or class tags.
That pod was not Mizora’s. That was karlach’s, she was captured while trying to hitch a ride on the nautiloid. You can also see the surrounding of the pod is burned. Indicate that she use her engine to break the pod.
I'm about 99% sure the dream visitor was originally meant to be the parasite in your head and they changed it to what it is now while they were making act 3. Even in the final version I never trusted the darn thing and stabbed it when I had the chance lol.
There's a line late in the game where Dream Visitor says they've never lied to you, but there are at least a few lies between within the first 2 acts, even if you don't count "lie by omission" as lying. It's also hard to sympathize with them when you do 95% of things their way but then they make a fuss about trust if you do some peculiar things that don't even harm them.
wouldve been much better. the whole ending in act 3 splits into way too many story lines at once. i personally dont like it, i wouldve preferred if they made the guardian like a plot twist where it was the evil all along
Making Karlach a companion and giving her such a good story was such a good decision on larian’s side. Karlach is one of my favorite characters in the game.
6:56 My theory is that destroying the moonstone lights up all the candles, lamps and braziers because it's seen as a punishment for destroying the only thing protecting the underground temple, meaning that the fortress has fallen to invaders and thus a bright place in the underdark is like to attract the wrong type of attention; maybe natural predators like the bullette and hook horrors, maybe beholders and spectators.
It would be a lot of effort to bring all those lights down that crazy ladder just to punish someone who wanted to take up residence after everyone who built the fort was dead. More likely in my opinion is that destroying the moonstone is seen as equivalent to removing it in whatever ordinary way they would have had set up. The selunites down there weren't used to the underdark, they didn't know just how bad an idea making a beacon of themselves would be. My guess is that it's a day-night cycle to give some semblance of the surface to their fort. "Day" is fires lit and more ordinary guards on the walls. "Night" is when they sleep with illumination and protection from the Moonstone.
@stevenmcclary534 even if they themselves didn't know dangerous the underdark was, it's still a fairly documented place out of caution for travellers and adventures. I would think Clerics and Paladins would have access to that sort of knowledge.
I mean, it took quite a few updates, but supposedly is the case in the control ending, if you use too many parasites you do get a consequence from what I've seen....
In my first playthrough, I categorically refused to use them at all, as I was fully convinced that their use would come at some sort of cost. I was disappointed at first, but it actually makes a lot of sense that putting a whole bunch of cool powers in the game that are off limits to many RP styles wouldn't be very fun.
So Wyll looking for Mizora in the goblin camp (probably she was captured as the nautloid passed through Avernus) finally explains to me how she ended up captured in the colony in Act 2.
The EA Goblin Spike (he still exists but has no dialogue basically) tells Wyll that the drows took Mizora from the Crash site. I had always wondered how she got here too, and totally forgot that it was mentioned. Not sure if that's still true for the current game or not though.
@@ProxyGateTactician In the release version of the game Mizora was not captured in the crashed ship. You can tell from the fact that when Mizora first appears in camp to reward/scold wyll regarding karlach, she is "solid" and real. While in A2, when she asks you to rescue "an important zariel asset", she is clearly a projection and not really there.
One thing I would like to know is if there was ever any plans for the players to side with kith'rak therezzyn at the crèche. She doesn't really care about the artifact and would rather assault moonrise, and she's visibly upset at the inquisitor when he threatens her, the lack of any real options when talking to her also feels really unfinished to me, like there was more to it but it got cut out at the last second before release.
It was just supposed to foreshadow the fact, that not every Githyanki is on board with Vlaakith 's nonsense. The Inquisitor is a simp for the queen, the Gith you mentioned doesn't understand why they are there, because taking out the tower would solve a LOT of issues but the Inquisitor is refusing to greenlight the assault.
The Amulet of elemental torment is still in the game though it has been moved around repeatedly with different patches. As of right now it drops from Hope.
edit: I made a mistake! One item I said was cut was not cut just moved to an end game character. The Amulet of Elemental Torment. Sorry all! Just moved countries so if anything else seems strange here please let me know! (Different setup etc now).
@@ProxyGateTactician Oh, wow! I hope you're happy with the moving! In any case, thank you so much for all work you do. Your videos have made me happy. Also, special props to the occasional StarCraft 2 tracks you put as background music! :D
As someone who didn’t play EA, I’m kind of sad some of this stuff got removed! It’s also crazy to see how different certain characters acted in EA, like Wyll.
They changed wyll because he was disliked a lot, people found him boring because he didn't have enough story. According to Larian that was because he story didn't take off until after the EA areas. so Larian said that they rewrote him and moved his story up to start earlier, making him the son of the duke and hunting karlach
My least favorite part of the Wyll changes is that they removed my favorite voice line from EA. When asked how to deal with the goblins he would respond with "That reminds me of an old saying that I just made up, to kill a dragon you must cut off its head".
@@IsilionNELE I get the idea, but they took out so much content from EA! Still, people say he’s kind of boring now, but tbh he’s still one of my favorite companions.
From my limited time in EA Wyll and Gale were hit the hardest. They sanded off all their rough edges due to feedback but should've stuck to their guns.
Plus I think the Faceless One background in the tie in adventure book was originally meant for Wyll, as it doesn't really fit in that book otherwise imo. "The Blade of the Frontiers is really Wyll Ravengard" was probably meant as more of a plot twist.
It's funny people nowadays say the EA Wyll was better because Wyll got changed precisely because he was disliked by the EA testers. Feedback showed that he was the least popular character in the game because he had so little story. Except for goblin killing there was nothing about him because his story would only start taking off beyond the EA areas. That's what Larian said about rewriting him, so his story was moved up, making him the son of the duke, making him hunt Karlach, etc People now: Wyll is boring, he's too much of a goody two shoes People back then: Wyll is boring, he doesn't have enough story
@@IsilionNELE But its more funny that he's not exactly popular now because he comes out as extremely bland. EA Wyll had a more strong personality. I don't mind release Wyll, as I enjoyed that not all companions were adversarial or aggresive.
@@IsilionNELE Yeah, but people now are judging Wyll on the basis of a complete game, so I think current criticism is a little more fair. But it's true people now like EA Wyll more for the promise of intrigue. If Larian continued in the same direction for Wyll, there's no guarantee we'd actually get a better character than what we got.
I think Wyll's character would have benefitted from the anti-hero archetype in EA. That is because in release, once you help Karlach, he becomes a generic hero archetype with little to no further development of his inner conflict. Picture what could have been if Wyll was not hyperfocussed on goblins, but a generally bitter slayer of all things evil without mercy or nuance. That could have been a much more interesting character than Mr. "Well met, how art though faring?"
Or even if he wanted to give up the slaying and go home and find a way to reconcile with his family. Or if he wanted to give up the pact and train with the fists or something to have a way to protect people that wasnt tied to mizora. Or lean into his charisma skills and become a diplomat. He can stay heroic he just needs some kind of character development after Karlach.
Yeah I think a combination of FR Wyll, with his ideals and heroism and good intentions, with a contrasting bit of self righteous no nuance anger and need to kill anything “bad” would have helped give him more interesting depth without sacrificing the good things about the rewrite. It would be a deliberate flaw plus maybe a reveal that his cool calm collected charm and charisma is a front of deep insecurity and nervousness. That was in EA but he was somewhat too arrogant. His toned down charm in FR worked, but he was missing the insecurity
Seriously, he was SO much more compelling in EA, and his storyline added a ton of context not only to him, but Mizora, the Goblins, some parts of the Underdark, and some more incentive to get into Act 2 quickly. It's one of the things I DON'T agree with Larian removing. He was still annoying, but he was annoying with PURPOSE!! Also, the "He's Wyll Ravenguard" thing was MUCH more of a plot twist with his old back story. 😅
Half your party is already Evil (also Durge) meanwhile Wyll being an edgelord warlock is... bit on the nose. He's much more interesting as a paladin-type. Now if only they hadn't patched keeping him pretty.
One of the tiny bits of EA Wyll remaining in full release was earning disapproval from him if you intervene to save Sazza in the druid grove, regardless of the way you convince the tiefling to leave. Obviously, EA Wyll hated goblins with a passion and would hate you doing anything that would spare one, but it's kind of odd for Full Release Wyll since you'd think he'd not want Arka to give into revenge by shooting a defenseless prisoner. In fact, FR Wyll seems like the origin character most likely to talk her down!
It's so funny to me that the theme of the entire game that you hear all the time, Down by the River, is in reference to Daisy, who isn't even in the final game. I wish they did something with that.
They cut the possibility to be Cleric of Bhaal, Baine or Myrkul... which I find sad. The difficulty to keep the storyline would not have been so difficult by having your God entity asking you to kill their former champion as proof as devotion.
I think the main problem would be that a cleric of one of the dead three would instantly recognize the symbol of their god inside the symbol of the Absolute and would figure out too quickly who was behind the absolute
and Shar. ironically enough there are fully voice dialogue for all those deities if you unlock them through modding even in act 3. so it wouldn't really have taken that much more work for them to include.
@@RikkeDK1996 mabey it should be added as a new game plus kind of reward, like after you beat the game meeting certain conditions you unlock that in the charcter creator
@@IsilionNELE And that a god can remove their clerics' powers if they want to. Shadowheart only keeps her cleric powers after sparing the nightsong because Selune decides to start giving her powers after Shar got pissed and stopped supplying them. A cleric of the dead three would likely get told "stop that or else I take away your powers" as soon as they did anything that disrupted the plan, let along stuff like killing Ketheric or similar. Bhaal might tolerate it because murder but judging by Myrkul's reaction to Ketheric's death, I'd expect him to retaliate against his cleric if they killed his champion. Bane would only be ok it if you kill Gortash but since he comes to Gortash's help during the fight by giving his champion a power boost, I'd also expect him to stop allowing you to use cleric powers if you opposed his champion.
Lets not also forget that Shadowheart and her wound used to be completely different as well, as it was seemingly granting her sorcery-like powers, made me feel really cool as a sorcerer in the EA being able to guide her through her newly developing powers
Right so did the rogue one it got put onto an item too. I don't remember which one though. Creating darkness and hiding you. (I think the dark justiciar from Yurgir's quest?)
@@murata_5585 no, the cape sold by Mattis makes you leave a fog cloud when you disengage, but doesn't make you hide, it's not a separate action and you can use it every round by just disengaging
I seem to be a minority of online folks, but I prefer release Wyll. I like that he's actually heroic and righteous, him and Karlach are the only Good aligned companions. If i could change anything with him I'd have preferred if his relationship with his father was frayed due to some actual disagreement (vigalante son vs head cop dad) rather than a devil caused misunderstanding. And of course Ansur... Why does Wyll have nothing to do with this quest outside of getting the book? That is also lame
Yeah I don't think he was hated as pre-release Wyll. He was insufferable, but he was that way for a REASON. He had chops. He was an ass, but there was an interesting backstory hiding behind all that over the top bravado. His (clearly one sided) "relationship" with Mizora made me WANT to help him get free, whereas now he's just a teenage muppet with a silver spoon in his mouth and delusions of grandeur. I miss the old Wyll. He was one of my go-to companions. He basically sulks in camp now 😭
It’s crazy how much content appears in the game that looks incomplete or severely trimmed down/removed. Some examples I noticed - Lenore in the underdark - Isabel’s deception about being Ketherics daughter, and her distrust of the MC (her first line is very sarcastic “if it isn’t the person who’s gonna save us from disaster” or something like that) - ketheric being persuaded to be an ally - there was a deeper plan with the explosive toys in act 3 - Dame Aylin breaking her oath (she “feels” it break in the game, saying that she feels like something’s gone from her, but nothing comes from it) - the lady selling flowers In act 3 graveyard is probably another Hag that the act 1 hag was corresponding with - the umberlee followers had a ruler that some of them disliked and wanted to overthrow - Mol, and the other tiefling girl whose parents died clearly have more plans, though maybe this is a set up for future games Probably more but these were the ones I noticed
In a meta sense it also explain why wyll had a crush on mizora in the Christmas animation, that was the intent in eary access and didn't carry over to the full game
Thank you for the nostalgia! I'd add that they removed a lot of reactivity from the companions (which I'm still confused about). They used to want to talk to you a bunch more throughout act 1. Some of those scenes got repurposed to be one-line banter, but I still don't get the change, since it made them feel more alive. There were a couple scenes where they talked with each other but since they were related to the Dream Visitor I guess that's why those in specific were cut. Also, EA Wyll was an Ulder, not a Ravengard! At least according to the datamines. The Ulder family founded the Flaming Fists :D I'd argue that whether or not he was liked depended on the section of the fanbase you were looking at. I certainly heavily preferred EA Wyll and quite liked him, but FR Wyll is a bit blander because they sanded off the edges.
Even though I love how good and honorable a character Wyll is, and my character romanced him in the first playthrough and went to Avernus with Karlach and him, I am curious how EA Wyll would have turned out. I know that Wyll's lack of dialogue and parts of his story felt off sometimes. I know his voice actor had very little time to record all his lines and he did a great job. Its just very noticeable (to me) that Karlach and Wyll had less time to evolve as characters compared to the other origin characters
my theory is that EA Wyll would've had his whole arc be like "be the hero you've played yourself up to be" because it's clear his EA version is somewhat of a fraud, not in so that he was a coward but that he wasn't a good person
@@crumblyairship I agree with this - that's how it was shaping up in my mind too, and I find it more interesting than what we got. I wish Larian had had more faith in their companions - people didn't like some of the companions, sure, but it's a three-act game. You don't need to make Shadowheart act like you're the sister she always wanted before you even take your first long rest, lol.
@OrigamiAhsoka it was great. I tried it co-op back then and my buddy was like "I can't get past this part" and I was confused as to why because all you had to do was jump and yeah found out the hard way that his class wasn't specced right lol
Wait? People actually thought Wylls old character was solely focused on killing goblins? I only got the idea was he was similar to how he is now a powerful but nerfed badass that hunted monsters/demons/etc just he would go after anything that was against the weak and defenseless just he had a extra bone to pick with the goblins. I actually liked his old version a bit better than the current. They also removed how utterly bitchy everyone but Wyll was for romance. Shadowheart and Laezel and Gale were ridiculous on how hard they were to romance. Especially Gale partially due to bugs. Hell to this day I still can't trigger his romance scene of seeing Mystra
By fixing that bug, they introduced a bug that made everyone a sex pest. You couldn't talk to Gale at all without him trying to jump your nuts. Same with Wyll.
Reminds me of the time I romanced Astarion for the first time, and within seconds Gale was on my ass about how I had to choose between them... I never even talked to Gale outside of giving him an artifact or 2 💀💀 It's been patched out now but that was funny 🤣🤣
@@ZPu95 Funnily enough I wouldn't consider Astarion hard to romance at all, I'm still on my first playthrough which I haven't finished yet(I'm in Act 3), I never really had to do anything that I didn't want too, to get him to like me. He may complain and drag his feet when I want to help people, but he still bit me on the 3rd long rest and jumped my bones on the 4th 😂.
For the fishermen there's still some hints to this cut out stuff as if you speak with dead with one of them it'll say he was trying to help a blonde lady survivor.
No mention of the cut female halfing bard werewolf origin companion? Her name is Helia. She has 770 recorded voiceline dialogues in the game files. Someone uploaded a video with all 770 recorded lines. A lot of npcs also had recorded lines for her. Like Auntie Ethel had a special taunt for her knowing she is a werewolf. Shadowheart had some lines being scared of Helia for being a werewolf. Halsin also had some recorded lines about her. Astarion has a cut banter dialogue in the files about wondering what her werewolf blood tastes like. The only reason she was cut is because Karlach replaced her due to user demand of early access players wanted Karlach to be a companion. So they had to cut one of the origin characters and she got the short end of the straw.
Could the halfling bard hireling be a reference to her? I mean I love Karlach to bits, she's my second favorite companion, but it would have been so cool to have a werewolf companion. The dynamic between her and Astarion could have been interesting too depending on the writing for their interactions.
As much as I desperately wish they’d have done more with Wyll’s character/questline (made him less passive about the whole thing, have perhaps a point system related to the contract similar to Gale or Shadowheart, etc), I’m actually rather glad they made him a more stereotypically heroic guy. All the other origin companions have some serious problems so it was actually kind of refreshing to have a companion that had his shit together (despite the whole demon thing). They could’ve done better, but I don’t think making a character morally gray automatically makes them more interesting. It can, but it definitely doesn’t always do that.
very much agree. he's definitely been cheated out of getting the amount of content all the other companions have, but i do really like that we have a member of the team who is just nice and doesn't need constant moral babysitting. like yes, there's also karlach, but then you get into the more chaotic stuff (i love her, don't get me wrong, but still). wyll is a charisma class, he's a charming folk hero, he's just a nice person, and that doesn't mean he's a nothing character. i think his backstory is actually really cool, especially as someone who knows forgotten realms lore. being an edgelord or a kinda bad person isn't more interesting. it's fine to like them, i love astarion deeply, but that isn't the only way to make a character cool. wyll just needed more scenes. i wish he had been able to comment more on actual forgotten realms/faerûn lore (i would pay money for a cutscene where he corrects gale on saying that netheril was totally destroyed thousands of years ago. it's been like five years wyll would know about this) and really embrace how tied into it he is as the son of a well-established character.
Wyll is an INCREDIBLY simple character. The most stereotypical hero. Uncompromising unless it is about sacrificing himself. Normally I wouldn't care too much about that kind of character, but honestly, it is outright nice to just have a simple good dude trying his best and fighting for what he believes in. The fact he doesn't have a "I will become the mind flair" like Karlach does is honestly really surprising. I assume they didn't give it to him to avoid possibly taking away part of Karlach's sacrifice, and that makes sense. I bet if they didn't go with Karlach possibly turning squidward for you Wyll would be the one that got that role. I can already imagine the lines for it. "You...have a full life after this, and an afterlife... Don't let your soul get corrupted and stripped from your being...like I did...Look at me, I might still have my soul, but it is already sold to a devil that will NEVER give it back... Let me take on this burden, to save my city once more and save you from such a terrible faith!"
Wyll could have so easily been a really interesting character. He is this stereotypical lwaful stupid paladin, but than you realize that he is actually a warlock. I really like that, because it does play with the idea of how strict and clearly defined a moral compass can be. And is a nice contrast to companions like Astarion, who don't have one at all and just make the rules up as they go. It even causes Wyll to be quiet hypocritical at time. After moonrise tower he gave me this whole speech about how saving Baldur's Gate was worth sacrificing his soul and only hours of in-game time later, after the emperor essentially asked me to trade my soul to save all of Fâerun, Wyll is like "I would never do that!". It would have been so cool to see him grapple with that hypocrisy. Not everyone needs a moral dilemma. Sometimes an annoying character trait is perfectly enough to provide some interesting character growth. Wyll is exactly the type of character I like to play, but he never gets any of the development that makes me want to play this archetype.
In EA I liked the True Soul tadpoles running off and the sense of urgency to 'stomp' on them as they emerged. Also, there was a real sense that the Dream Visitor was wrestling for control within your mind against the urges as it tried to convince you to trust them. There was a real choice to use the powers or fight the urges with the Dream Visitors help. Of course, this seemed counter to the new storyline of consuming more 'Space Gummies' that don't have any negative consequences.
I feel like the belt slot and ring that transfers surface traits were holdovers from D:OS2. Surfaces are *really* important in that game and while abusing combos is basically required for honor mode in BG3, in DOS2 abusing and understanding combos is basically required for every difficulty above story mode
I wished they added more of the old Wyll’s personality into the character as the story progressed, since he goes from having to present himself a noble and heroic figure, to being more lax and witty after connecting with friends.
It's true magic items used to be more expensive in EA, but that was part of a broader change. Everything was more expensive in those days. The best example of this is the ruby you can find in the chest hidden under a rock on the beach. Nowadays the ruby has a base value of 90 but back then its base value was 1600 gold! It's not known why all the prices were rebalanced on release. It's still possible to check the original values of all the items if you use the wiki and browse back to the EA version of pages.
Whenever I open youtube and see one of your vids I immediately watch it. I have exhausted all your content and would love more. The challenge run vids are my favorite! Still this stuff is really cool too didnt play early access cool to see!
It would be cool if they released a free (or $5) DLC with just cut content. Clearly, some of it wouldn't really fit the game in its current state, but an extended nautaloid introduction, the fishermen, some extended / added dream-visitor sequences, plus some of the items, could still work well for those who want to use them.
The more I learn about cut content, the happier I am that I've started playing just a year ago. I mean, I enjoy learning more about it-it’s fascinating! It’s also comforting to know that the story that captivated me so much wasn’t as perfect before as it is now. It makes my dream of achieving this level of screenwriting someday feel more realistic and shows just how crucial it is to refine the story, cutting off fragments that may be good on their own but interfere with the overall narrative. Thanks for the awesome video!
What if I said Wyll was more entertaining in those 3 minutes of early access clips then all of release? Crucifixion? Understandable... (I genuinely don't remember much of my time of early access. But I must not have spent much time with early access Wyll. A shame. He seemed... Charismatic. In a none preachy way.)
Even with the cuts made here to make him look WAY tf more one note "hur fuck goblins" then he actually was, he is still more compelling here, frankly. Encourage anyone interested to find a longer vid showcasing what EA Wyll was like. He wasn't perfect obviously, but it was also comparatively early in development. Call me team "should have reworked it rather then scrapped it and been rushed to fill out content for an entirely new guy".
Yeva still appears at Walkeen's Rest. She still asks you to help breaking the door down. Then she is ordered by Floric to bring word to the Manip and that is when her and a group of fist leave to not be seen again until they are found in the pods in the Mindflayer colony at the end of Act 2. Some of the things with Wyll's eye are still present in the game. If you are a Cleric and talk to him enough before it's revealed that Mizora is his patron. You can pass an investigation check that the narrator will say that the eye appears to be a seeing stone. An object used to track and keep tabs on a person. At which you can question him about why his eye is a seeing stone. He will not answer why. Instead try to play it off as not being one.
My Tav wasn't a cleric but got the investigation check and passed. at the end of act 2 after Mizora gives the go ahead for Wyll to talk about how they met he'll tell you that you were right about the eye
I’m glad I didn’t play early access. Plus the way Wylls old story was presented in post elsewhere made it seem more compelling. What’s shown here suggests it’s very meh. I’d like to see more about cut content. Also as for the cut upper deck of the Nautoloid I wouldn’t have minded it personally. Restartitis is a thing and maybe just maybe if the intro was longer I’d be less inclined to restart.
Thank you for making this video! I love watching any content related to Early Access BG3 as I personally think they had a lot of really great stuff that didn't deserve to be cut ♥️
I wish there was a bit of representation of dwarves, gnomes, and halflings throughout the game. They’re kind of forgotten about. You don’t even get a small folk companion
@ honestly I’m just now replaying the game again after having played into the mid point of Act 3 and stopping the first time back when the game was new. For some reason I just felt very bored and let down by Act 3 the first time from a story/worldbuilding perspective and because certain elements weren’t really fixed yet. But I’m hoping revisiting it will be better now, because I really did and still do love the first two acts… which is to say I didn’t encounter those small folk late in the final act because I’d quit lol partially my fault, partially still the game’s, as I think they could’ve been included more from the start. If I didn’t already know DnD, I’d have forgotten they existed outside of underdark races.
@@ProxyGateTacticianI just want more variety than 5 elves, 2 humans, 1 teifling (Alfira does not count) and le'zel. They didn't even use half of the available races for character creation, it's a bit dissapointing. I get that gnomes and dragonborn were added later but they could have used halflings (in fact that seemingly was a plan they had based on some Ethel lines), or a half orc. Heck this might be recency bias but people love the duegar, they could have made one a companion.
i do wish wyll still had more of a dark side, something that seemed present in his early access version. He is just too nice, kinda makes him boring ngl
We have so many party members that have dark sides, he would have just been another one in the party. Somebody had to be the noble heroic do gooder. There literally isn't one except Minsc but you don't get him till so late in act 3
It's hard to say, but while replaying the EA it surprised me just how anti-hero Wyll used to be. Constantly lying to you and wanting to torture the guy really were weird when we see him now. This also explains better how Mizora got to Moonrise than the current game does
I think current Wyll's story has more potential, but EA Wyll's was more fleshed out. I think combining the two would bee perfect, like the new story with his old personality (though with the current one being maybe a final personality he could have by the end of the game on a good path for example). Imagine this : a man that is the son of a known hero, living constantly in his shadow who wants to make a name for himself and make him proud, wants to save the city from an evil ploy but he can't do anything about it so he sells his soul to a devil to do it, thinking it would give him the recognition he craves ..... only for him to be unable to explain his exploits and be disavowed and cast out by his father for making a pact with a Devil. Now he scours the land trying to gain back his father's trust by becoming a known folk hero, except that he's not nearly as glorious or virtuous as he claims to be and is not afraid to go through shortcuts or lie to create this legend he craves. I think the current Wyll's personality could be him by the end of the game if he managed to actually live up to his name and become an actual hero instead of someone pretending to be one. I see so much potential in Wyll, but he was so wasted
EA Wyll I feel like was the side where he held his secrets in high regard and had troubles. The current Wyll throws everything out to the point that you might as well know everything about him within the very moment he decides to spare Karlach with you, and literally has 0 troubles in his life despite basically being harassed constantly by his devil patron. Previous Wyll was a man of mystery and growth; which is what all the others had. The one we have now just became an accessory for Karlach in case the player wants to do the boring good guy run without redeeming any of the evil run companions
EA Scratch looks like he teleported into BG3 from a game from 10 or 15 years ago - glad he got some fur, too as there are enough furless-for-no-apparent-reason pets running around Faerun. And EA Minthara looks like a full-size version of Thulla to me (the poisoned gnome in the Myconid colony). Not sure which model of her I like better since current Minthara has some serious "sadistic high-school-teacher" vibes - although that could just be the voice-acting.. :).
I actually prefer the more violent and secretive wyll. His overly heroic and noble approach to everything was incredibly annoying after a while, whereas this other wyll seems to have been a more interesting character.
I honestly can't stand Wyll and usually either reject him up front or push him out of the party at my earlier convenience. I would like it better if he started out as the goody two shoes hero but over time be revealed not to be as pure as he claims to be. It seems like they kind of wanted to go that route with him being pledged to a devil but ultimately he even did that for the sake of the greater good and is annoyingly heroic the whole game
@@kevinwells9751 I honestly can't stand take like this. Even a character is morally grey, if they're boring personality wise, then they're boring. Current wyll's problem is not his moral stance, but his lack of negative emotions or flaws that isn't relevant to a his moral.
EA Wyll was like Daeren from Wrath of the Righteous. (Probably) Had a good story once you got to know him but was an insufferable asshole for all of act 1.
Too be fair Karlach was never meant to be a companion which is why she had such a bad model. It was fan demand in early access that led to her becoming an origin companion which resulted in the werewolf halfling bard origin companion being cut since someone had to be cut to make room for her due to their limited resources at the time.
i remember a lot of these (to this day i look for the fishermen around the mindflayer before remembering they've become tears in rain), but somehow i've completely blacked out old minthara it would have been an actual crime to leave her hair like that😭
I have always wondered about that boat and the dead fishermen. Personally i think that is super cool and should of been kept. Same with the outdoor segment on the nautoloid. I remember my brother playing EA and when I booted it up I was amazed how quickly i got off the ship.
Unironically just woke up my wife to watch it together lol. I get this is a classic meme and I didnt exactly play it out that way but funny nonetheless.
Really miss the EA spectator model It actually looked like a spectator, unlike the one we have now which just looks like a regular beholder with 4 eyestalks.
@@Asgaardiangatekeeper They literally ARE Beholders, have you ever examined a Spectator in the game? It reads, that it is a Beholder species. So that's not a "greedy CEOs" thing. It has nothing to do with copyrights.
I actually would have liked early access Wyll. Like if they made him a mix of current Wyll witht he intiall secrets and things and slick personality of early access. I love Wyll because they cut so much content for him its ridiculous. His storyline dind't neccessarily need to to be tied to the goblins but him lying and not telling the whole truth until he is comfortable enough with you would have been cool & spicy tbh.
They kept the "attack camera" in a sense - the camera randomly pans to the character making an attack and then back, it's actually a huge source of disconcertion!
I still hate how the camera jumps from my ranged character's target back to him when I want to attack the target a second time. It makes me have to move the camera again. It's also annoying when an enemy is floating/bouncing and hard to click on.
@@hairytentacle3924 In the original BG1-2 being a bhaalspawn made barely any difference in gameplay, it was just a story thing. You developed some powers in the form of low level spells, but there were no consequences, there were no urges, you didn't randomly kill bards, etc
@@hairytentacle3924 Ah you're right, I forgot about that because I never once did that because it was just sooo bad. His attacks sucked pretty bad when compared to a normal character in gear, and he had only 100 HP which wasn't a lot. Even worse, if your normal character had more than 100 max hp and you changed back from the Slayer to your normal character, your current hp would still be 100, so you'd basically injure yourself by doing that. People basically only used the Slayer form to lower their reputation by 2 if they had evil party members and didn't want them to leave because your reputation was getting too high.
@@IsilionNELE I used that when my char was a mage and I wanted to handle some situation like a tank. That was long ago and I'm not sure if that was was optimal approach.
I just find Astarion unbearable overall I love Neil but I don't like him. He's very much just oh you didn't do this clearly evil thing well I'm handsome so you should.
something that will always surprise me is just how many people dislike wyll lol, i get that he's somewhat simple but i think the criticism is way overblown. the guy is witty, charming and genuinely hilarious sometimes, he plays the very important role of being the one vaguely normal person in the camp, and his character is a lot more complex than it gets credit for. he is an archetypical hero obsessed with self sacrifice which isn't that interesting, but being bound to mizora complicates that significantly (even if it was a heroic sacrifice for him to bind himself that doesn't take away from the uniqueness) as does his sheer hatred for any kind of monster. if you weren't there to talk sense into him he would've murdered karlach despite it being painfully obvious that she's a lovely person and not even a devil, there was no excuse for that he just got so blinded by his disgust, his twisted honour and his hunger for violence that he chose to side with mizora (an obviously manipulative and cruel monster) rather than even giving karlach a chance. he's been slipping into evil (aka he's becoming the thing he swore to destroy lol) as a result of his pact, and his arc gets even more complex later on when remaining in that pact becomes the noble choice again, choosing to free himself or become a duke doesn't seem particularly evil but by choosing that he would be obsessing over himself rather than actually fighting to protect the weak, and now that he's regained his senses he knows the right thing to do is stay pacted but this time he'll remain focused on being good
I personally hate Wyll, mostly because I find his personality insufferable, but in part because it feels like they missed the opportunity to go a darker route that would have made him more interesting and complex. If they had committed to the character arc of slowly sinking deeper into evil actions out of a misplaced sense of heroism that would be compelling, but after the scene where he almost kills Karlach he never really has those moments again. An zealot hell bent on destroying anyone he sees as evil would have been interesting, but instead we got a goody two shoes who can't stop bragging about how great and honorable he is. The most complex decision he has to make is "Should I renew my pledge to the devil in exchange for information about where my father is or should I decline the offer and just find him myself?" which isn't very compelling because it's so easy to just do it without Mizora's help. Plus that path is bugged so in some conversations people think you did sign the contract because Duke Ravengard is alive and in others they know you didn't. If they had made it so Ravengard was totally lost if you declined Mizora's offer then it would be a real choice but as it stands it's kind of a dud
@@kevinwells9751 from a narrative perspective the fact that you can rescue the duke without mizora is irrelevant, you're entitled to do that but in terms of his story it's a choice between his freedom and his father's life. i do agree with you that his evil storyline isn't very well written, the choice to sacrifice his father's life to be free of mizora is way out of character for him and with choosing to become grand duke it wasn't explained well enough why that's even a bad thing for him, but that doesn't take away from his character. it's a shame we didn't get to properly explore his worse side but he's still interesting and i at least always enjoy his story
@@bimbiman8495 nah it's not that, if that were true then karlach wouldn't be so popular. wyll just conforms to a lot of classic heroic tropes and the more complex aspects of his character don't get appreciated, which is mostly larian's fault for rushing his new story. i think people are excessively harsh about it and let it ruin a fairly interesting character but the criticism is still pretty valid
So interesting thing about the belt slot - it's technically still in the game, and IS used. In some menus (don't remember which, its been a while) I started noticing a belt icon and eventually I realised that it's actually the underwear slot, because my first character was a naked half-orc barbarian. As he wasn't wearing underwear for pretty much the entire game, there was this one single menu where the game would display a belt icon to represent it.
Damn, I didn't realise how much was changed from EA! I don`t remember this violent outbursts - and trying to kill your dream visitor! - at all. I'm glad it was changed, I much prefer just having a choice to make your character violent.
I recently read some bits about cut stuff and major changes to the Nightsong plot, including a different character and model that would become Alylin. I'm fascinated by...
I remember the outdoor area, after full release when I played for the first time I remember I kept looking for the way up to the top of the Nautiloid and thinking I was either missing something or going nuts. Thanks for pointing this out The early access version of Wyll actually reminds me of Goblin Slayer too for some reason. XD
Baldur's gate didn't exist in the beginning. Actually the shadowlands didn't either. You got on the boat in the underdark and that was pretty much the end. We restarted the game so many times, I didn't want to play through the beginning again. I believe that is why the actually shortened some of the first act. like on the nautiloid. We were tired of playing it. LOL
1- I wish we could change Minthara hair back, it's the one from her MTG card art and I love it 2- The thing that diferenciates EA Wyll and release Astarion is the timeing. Astarion only plot point aside from maybe finding Raphael on act 2 so he can read his back is the 1 dungeon on act 3. EA Wyll thing with gobbos is that the goblin camp is literally across the street, so unless the Mizora part carried it over there is no reason to keep him with you, that or him revealing Ravengard is his father when he gets a high enough aproval or Mizora telling it to you in some wear what if scenario only to make you keep him arround.
Another thing removed, in early access, after bigger events, you could talk to coop player characters about what was going on, was such a nice touch but sadly scrapped :c
For the fishermen, I remember that if you passed a charisma check you avoided the fight. Also that last scene with the dream visitor makes me wonder if durge wasn't supposed to be the default custom origin...
1. The nautiloid from Early Access was such a good section and it's change leaves the introduction to the game feeling a bit...lacking. As for why it was changed, my understanding is that Larian found out people had figured out ways to reach level 3 by the end of the section, so the changes to the nautiloid feel very much like Larian deciding to be the Fun Police. 2. The fishermen were _also_ a great sequence in the Early Access build, a nice tutorial to "puzzle combat" encounters. Changing it to a "kissing scene" just feels like a lot of changes they were doing pre-and post launch, where they just started playing up to what horny fans wanted. 3. The switch from the Dream Visitor to the Guardian was a very clear attempt to hide an obvious plot twist that people had quickly figured out by replacing it with...a plot twist that is just as obvious that was _also_ quickly figured out. It also removed any real consequence surrounding the use of the illithid powers.
People say Wyll is boring now but the previous version of him was so bad it would have probably ruined the entire game for me. I like Wyll and it's a nice change to take him sometimes instead of Gale. At least Wyll does not come onto you when you are already romancing someone.
Was there ever an option to initiate dialogue with your custom character to other multiplayer custom characters? I remember seeing my Tav talk to my friend’s Tav after specific story events. It was pretty humorous because it would usually be meaningless non voice-acted conversations like “can you believe that happened?” “No, I couldn’t!”. I still don’t know if this was an actual thing in the game or not however.
I only ever saw that with one thing, and it was always the crèche. My character would use Lae’zel’s conversation with my friends main character. Then have the same convo 5 mins later with laezel
@@kingofgrim4761 It's still in the game, or at least the game can bug out into that conversation. We've had it recently, my Durge was talking to my GFs Karlach and the conversation had lines as if I talked to Lae'zel. A few moments later her Karlach was talking with Lae'zel (in her party) and the conversation was just a copy paste of what we (our avatars) just did.
@@ProxyGateTactician Not Divinity 1, that's a different game from that series, you mean Divinity: Original Sin (the first D:OS), but it's in D:OS2 as well. Mostly after some crucial events the whole party will have a conversation, including hearing the opinion of the other player's character on the matter.
True, I think my record was just a whisker shy of level 3 leaving the Nautiloid. There were many more enemies and you could cheese some of the enemies that got killed by other NPC's if you had a good range attack. While the dude with the sword has always been challenging, the other cambions were much easier to kill too. It added up to a LOT of xp. It's why so many people were jonesing for an increased level cap for EA. By the time we found the Goblins we were max level (for EA) already🤣
I've read online that old Wyll was supposed to be the stereotypical "devil in his shoulder" type of guy. He was a refined nobleman with inclinations of wrongdoing by the temptations of the pact. Is this true?
You know I played the game after it was released, and I never used the illithid powers not even one worm, cuz I thought it was obvious I was gonna get a terrible ending because of it..... Turns out it meant nothing
yeah outside the new evil endings there aren't really any repercussions to using or consuming tadpoles. outside having to throw a dice to not automatically evolve when empy gives you the astral touched tadpole. and ofcourse the evil endings where you will have to throw a dice to remain non-illithid. Which is skipped entirely if you didn't indulge at all.
I believe the Dream Visitor change implies they were also gunning for making the Dark Urge playthrough only but ended up making it an optional background.
I thought you were going to mention the helmet of grit being moved! I believe it was originally in dror ragzlin's hoard of treasure before being moved to the szarr palace.
The idea With the dream visitor might have been that the main character is always a bhallspawn. In the first 2 games, the main character was always the bhallspawn. It could be that the parasite was trying to take you over. But the fact that you're the bhallspawn is what prevented it from doing so. Hence why a mindflayer parasite is calling you a monster. It would also explain the protection.
I played EA but I still enjoyed this walk down memory lane. If you have more, I'd love to watch that too! To this day I wonder why they cut the fishermen.
i really wanna see more of EA stuff, this looked crazily good ! and honestly there was certainly something to do with EA Wyll. he could've hated Ravengod BECAUSE he's his father and that he rejected him ? idk, something with him not being 100% a pure soul would've made him more human to me and more likable too imo
It could have been fun if they had made the dream visitor a little less aggressive, and have them somewhat openly be an incarnation of the tadpole. Treat the tadpole like a party member. They want to LIVE and your survival is necessary there. They are being blocked from turning you into a mind flayer by *something* and are cut off from the elder brain. Let the tadpole develop without that influence, and become its own person based on how you treat it, and have different endings and different deals you can make with it for power. I’ve seen “malevolent parasite becomes a legitimate ally” done fairly well in at least one book. Most of the endings possible are tragic or uncomfortable, but that’s ok. That kind of shit happens all the time.
I agree with all of these changes except the fisherman one. That scene so clearly explains the mind control powers of the mind flayers and their tadpoles, whereas the kissing scene does an awful job of explaining anything except “this mind flayer tried to trick you, just like 90% of the other random characters you meet”.. And even that is missed by a huge percentage of players because you only learn that if you submit and die. For any other choice, you never know what would have happened.
Tbf it shows you have to make a save, and explains its basically trying to hy tize you
Ehh, I disagree. The new scene is much more subtle but still relatively clear in what's trying to convey. "It's forcing you to... love it" telegraphed to me immediately it was trying to manipulate me. I don't dislike the fisherman scene but it's very on the nose instead of being a little more coy.
Yeah I don't get that part, that was such a small scene it won't change anything in a bad way.
@@Cassandra_Solidor given all the information about mind flayers, it made me not defend the mind flayer when it was necessary (though my friend trusted them) so I’m sure more would’ve made the same mistake
I loved the action camera hope they bring it back!
I feel like I can already sense the problem with EA Wyll's storyline form the other side. The goblins become utterly irrelevant at the start of Act 2 so having him be so tied to their story would leave him hanging too. I do love that they had an actual voice acted '"gobbos" line that's so English
He had like 5 other Gobbo lines too that I didn't show that were cut.
It swings both ways though. Astarion has to roll entirely off his personality since his entire storyline is basically 1 dungeon in Act 3. Worked fine for him.
I think the better way to "fix" Wyll as a character would just be to make him a bit more of a weasely prick. After all, Gale's already doing the "hopelessly heroic idiot who chases big powers".
I mean EA Wyll still had a lot of other things going on, most of all saving Mizora from Moonrise and any other dealings with her, and then most likely more things to do with the flaming fist and his family in act 3.
@@jaeusa160 Astarion's story is a build-up to act 3 though, whereas once you're done with the goblins there wouldnt be any narrative tension left in Wyll's story. I do wish Wyll had a bigger flaw than his father not liking him though, I get that hes a heroic archetype but its just a little too good for me, he doesnt ever seem the slightest bit tempted by mizora or evil so like. Whats his internal conflict? Where's the character growth? He starts heroic he ends heroic in his backstory he's heroic. I just need a little bit of moral greyness for spice. A single regret where he could have made a different choice. Something.
@@jaeusa160 It worked because everything in the early Acts built tension and setup to a satisfying pay off. With EA Wyll, that payoff was in Act 1 since his whole story revolved around the goblins. Now it could have easily shifted to something with Mizora but they didn't seem to have the antagonistic relationship they do in the game proper. Personally, I think Wyll suffered more from a lack of screen time due to the rewrites than anything else. I didn't love his EA character even if the concept was intriguing. Maybe if there was a way to blend the two that could have worked.
Replacing dream visitor with guardian just removed ceremorphosis plot from the game. Illithid powers were extremely useful in act 1, but using them caused suspicious dreams, and narrator was saying something like "You lost something you’ll never get back". In full version there is no reason to avoid those powers. There are no consequences, no fear of ceramorphosis, no need to remove to worm which makes almost all main quests in act 1 void. I think they removed it because of complaints in forums. Almost all difficult decisions are removed in full version.
yeah sadly they should have kept the dream visitor, the current tadpole plot we have gotten is extremely disappointing
2 major reasons they changed. 1. when you were creating the dream person, the voice only said "who do you dream at night". no indication on what this dream person role would actually be. therefore, plenty of people made dream person a non-romance figure. so people were very uncomfortable when they found out what dream actually was . 2. the dream person was straight up just tell you to give up. it was just very bad writing if it was suppose to lure you in.
While it's disappointing that the illithid powers no longer tie into the story at all the dream visitor was unlikely to work as it was just too obviously a bad guy.
@@korakys Absolutely, like with Guardian I truly had this "Damn is he with me or not?" while Daisy was just "Yeah this ones evil as hell"
@@alexwang3282So they needed to change it not remove it
Wyll and Mizora also were hinted to be lovers. Mizora's broken pod could be found close to the goblin camp and all the companions had a special voice line about it smelling like sulphur. Gale was a lot more creepy in his obsession with Mystra and basically only talked about how much he misses her even during the romance scene at the tiefling party. Shadowheart used to be A LOT more hostile towards the player and she was toned down with every update because players disliked her. Her wound also was hinted to be some sort of sorcerer power (with a special dialogue with sorcs). Every new update also introduced a new way to punch/kick Astarion and at one point you could even break his nose during his introduction. Very early on he would also take acid damage while standing in running water, which made his pathfinding AI refuse to cross rivers. The dream visitor was insanely creepy and you could not resist their sexual advances which made players really uncomfortable. If you used the tadpole powers to mind control npcs enough times, you would also get the [True Soul] tag in dialogues.
There was a famously difficult roll, after the cultist dwarf dies and the tadpole escapes you could stomp on it. The DC wasn't even that high but the roll was probably bugged because it was almost impossible to roll any higher than a 10 (with bonuses). If you succeeded you would gain approval from all your companions.
I believe the [True Soul] dialogue tag is available in the release version. It takes 5 uses of the Illithid powers on NPCs. It doesn't do much other than remove the dice roll.
Unless you mean it was a unique tag that worked like racial or class tags.
@@greenian5254 Oh it is? Good to know. I didn't manage to get it in the release build so I assumed they removed it.
раньше было лучше
That pod was not Mizora’s. That was karlach’s, she was captured while trying to hitch a ride on the nautiloid.
You can also see the surrounding of the pod is burned. Indicate that she use her engine to break the pod.
Let's not forget that using tadpoles on your companions does nothing but buffs them, they don't need to roll to avoid astral tadpole, only you do.
I'm about 99% sure the dream visitor was originally meant to be the parasite in your head and they changed it to what it is now while they were making act 3. Even in the final version I never trusted the darn thing and stabbed it when I had the chance lol.
There's a line late in the game where Dream Visitor says they've never lied to you, but there are at least a few lies between within the first 2 acts, even if you don't count "lie by omission" as lying. It's also hard to sympathize with them when you do 95% of things their way but then they make a fuss about trust if you do some peculiar things that don't even harm them.
The “down by the river” song was supposed to be an analogy to submitting to the parasite and forfeiting your free will
wouldve been much better. the whole ending in act 3 splits into way too many story lines at once. i personally dont like it, i wouldve preferred if they made the guardian like a plot twist where it was the evil all along
Making Karlach a companion and giving her such a good story was such a good decision on larian’s side. Karlach is one of my favorite characters in the game.
6:56 My theory is that destroying the moonstone lights up all the candles, lamps and braziers because it's seen as a punishment for destroying the only thing protecting the underground temple, meaning that the fortress has fallen to invaders and thus a bright place in the underdark is like to attract the wrong type of attention; maybe natural predators like the bullette and hook horrors, maybe beholders and spectators.
It would be a lot of effort to bring all those lights down that crazy ladder just to punish someone who wanted to take up residence after everyone who built the fort was dead. More likely in my opinion is that destroying the moonstone is seen as equivalent to removing it in whatever ordinary way they would have had set up.
The selunites down there weren't used to the underdark, they didn't know just how bad an idea making a beacon of themselves would be. My guess is that it's a day-night cycle to give some semblance of the surface to their fort. "Day" is fires lit and more ordinary guards on the walls. "Night" is when they sleep with illumination and protection from the Moonstone.
@stevenmcclary534 even if they themselves didn't know dangerous the underdark was, it's still a fairly documented place out of caution for travellers and adventures. I would think Clerics and Paladins would have access to that sort of knowledge.
spectators are a type of beholder
I do think the idea of there being repercussions to using the illithid powers beyond "you kind of look ugly" would have been an interesting touch.
Originally it seemed that way but no clue what it could have been
I mean, it took quite a few updates, but supposedly is the case in the control ending, if you use too many parasites you do get a consequence from what I've seen....
honestly i just wish the toggle to turn that off was not just a mod, but other non appearance changes would have been cool.
Only thing now is if you do an evil run to control the absolute, you will be forced to be changed into a mindflayer for all your tadpole consumption
In my first playthrough, I categorically refused to use them at all, as I was fully convinced that their use would come at some sort of cost. I was disappointed at first, but it actually makes a lot of sense that putting a whole bunch of cool powers in the game that are off limits to many RP styles wouldn't be very fun.
So Wyll looking for Mizora in the goblin camp (probably she was captured as the nautloid passed through Avernus) finally explains to me how she ended up captured in the colony in Act 2.
The EA Goblin Spike (he still exists but has no dialogue basically) tells Wyll that the drows took Mizora from the Crash site. I had always wondered how she got here too, and totally forgot that it was mentioned. Not sure if that's still true for the current game or not though.
A pod could be found that smelled of sulfur and Wyll reacted to it with hint that the Goblins had taken the occupant.
Well no because Mizora now shows all well and fine after first encountering Karlach it means that she got captured somewhere around start of act 2 now
@@ProxyGateTactician In the release version of the game Mizora was not captured in the crashed ship.
You can tell from the fact that when Mizora first appears in camp to reward/scold wyll regarding karlach, she is "solid" and real. While in A2, when she asks you to rescue "an important zariel asset", she is clearly a projection and not really there.
@@widfara1where ? Had play the game 3 times and never noticed this.
One thing I would like to know is if there was ever any plans for the players to side with kith'rak therezzyn at the crèche. She doesn't really care about the artifact and would rather assault moonrise, and she's visibly upset at the inquisitor when he threatens her, the lack of any real options when talking to her also feels really unfinished to me, like there was more to it but it got cut out at the last second before release.
It was just supposed to foreshadow the fact, that not every Githyanki is on board with Vlaakith 's nonsense. The Inquisitor is a simp for the queen, the Gith you mentioned doesn't understand why they are there, because taking out the tower would solve a LOT of issues but the Inquisitor is refusing to greenlight the assault.
The Amulet of elemental torment is still in the game though it has been moved around repeatedly with different patches. As of right now it drops from Hope.
Ohhhh wow my bad! Thank you for pointing this out
edit: I made a mistake! One item I said was cut was not cut just moved to an end game character. The Amulet of Elemental Torment. Sorry all!
Just moved countries so if anything else seems strange here please let me know! (Different setup etc now).
Audio sounded slightly different, I just assumed you were tired.
Sorry if you can't say it, but where do you live now? Is it better than before? :D
@@Ed.07 I'm in Canada so moved back here. I was living in Korea previously since starting the channel and loved it there so i'll miss it
@@ProxyGateTactician Oh, wow! I hope you're happy with the moving! In any case, thank you so much for all work you do. Your videos have made me happy. Also, special props to the occasional StarCraft 2 tracks you put as background music! :D
Quality seemed on par with the rest sir!
Hope the move went well and Happy Holidays!
As someone who didn’t play EA, I’m kind of sad some of this stuff got removed! It’s also crazy to see how different certain characters acted in EA, like Wyll.
They changed wyll because he was disliked a lot, people found him boring because he didn't have enough story. According to Larian that was because he story didn't take off until after the EA areas.
so Larian said that they rewrote him and moved his story up to start earlier, making him the son of the duke and hunting karlach
My least favorite part of the Wyll changes is that they removed my favorite voice line from EA. When asked how to deal with the goblins he would respond with "That reminds me of an old saying that I just made up, to kill a dragon you must cut off its head".
@@whitefang5549 I saw that line! It was really funny LOL Sad they took it out
@@IsilionNELE I get the idea, but they took out so much content from EA! Still, people say he’s kind of boring now, but tbh he’s still one of my favorite companions.
From my limited time in EA Wyll and Gale were hit the hardest. They sanded off all their rough edges due to feedback but should've stuck to their guns.
Wyll really got done dirty. The cut Wyll has so many compelling bits, I wish it would've been worked in a bit more
Plus I think the Faceless One background in the tie in adventure book was originally meant for Wyll, as it doesn't really fit in that book otherwise imo. "The Blade of the Frontiers is really Wyll Ravengard" was probably meant as more of a plot twist.
It's funny people nowadays say the EA Wyll was better because Wyll got changed precisely because he was disliked by the EA testers. Feedback showed that he was the least popular character in the game because he had so little story. Except for goblin killing there was nothing about him because his story would only start taking off beyond the EA areas. That's what Larian said about rewriting him, so his story was moved up, making him the son of the duke, making him hunt Karlach, etc
People now: Wyll is boring, he's too much of a goody two shoes
People back then: Wyll is boring, he doesn't have enough story
@@IsilionNELE But its more funny that he's not exactly popular now because he comes out as extremely bland. EA Wyll had a more strong personality.
I don't mind release Wyll, as I enjoyed that not all companions were adversarial or aggresive.
@@IsilionNELE Yeah, but people now are judging Wyll on the basis of a complete game, so I think current criticism is a little more fair.
But it's true people now like EA Wyll more for the promise of intrigue. If Larian continued in the same direction for Wyll, there's no guarantee we'd actually get a better character than what we got.
@@mister-x2lol I feel the same, I tried all the origin and my favorite is La’zel both as companion and an origin.
I think Wyll's character would have benefitted from the anti-hero archetype in EA. That is because in release, once you help Karlach, he becomes a generic hero archetype with little to no further development of his inner conflict.
Picture what could have been if Wyll was not hyperfocussed on goblins, but a generally bitter slayer of all things evil without mercy or nuance. That could have been a much more interesting character than Mr. "Well met, how art though faring?"
Or even if he wanted to give up the slaying and go home and find a way to reconcile with his family. Or if he wanted to give up the pact and train with the fists or something to have a way to protect people that wasnt tied to mizora. Or lean into his charisma skills and become a diplomat. He can stay heroic he just needs some kind of character development after Karlach.
Yeah I think a combination of FR Wyll, with his ideals and heroism and good intentions, with a contrasting bit of self righteous no nuance anger and need to kill anything “bad” would have helped give him more interesting depth without sacrificing the good things about the rewrite. It would be a deliberate flaw
plus maybe a reveal that his cool calm collected charm and charisma is a front of deep insecurity and nervousness. That was in EA but he was somewhat too arrogant. His toned down charm in FR worked, but he was missing the insecurity
Seriously, he was SO much more compelling in EA, and his storyline added a ton of context not only to him, but Mizora, the Goblins, some parts of the Underdark, and some more incentive to get into Act 2 quickly. It's one of the things I DON'T agree with Larian removing. He was still annoying, but he was annoying with PURPOSE!! Also, the "He's Wyll Ravenguard" thing was MUCH more of a plot twist with his old back story. 😅
Half your party is already Evil (also Durge) meanwhile Wyll being an edgelord warlock is... bit on the nose. He's much more interesting as a paladin-type. Now if only they hadn't patched keeping him pretty.
One of the tiny bits of EA Wyll remaining in full release was earning disapproval from him if you intervene to save Sazza in the druid grove, regardless of the way you convince the tiefling to leave. Obviously, EA Wyll hated goblins with a passion and would hate you doing anything that would spare one, but it's kind of odd for Full Release Wyll since you'd think he'd not want Arka to give into revenge by shooting a defenseless prisoner. In fact, FR Wyll seems like the origin character most likely to talk her down!
It's so funny to me that the theme of the entire game that you hear all the time, Down by the River, is in reference to Daisy, who isn't even in the final game. I wish they did something with that.
They cut the possibility to be Cleric of Bhaal, Baine or Myrkul... which I find sad. The difficulty to keep the storyline would not have been so difficult by having your God entity asking you to kill their former champion as proof as devotion.
Or Cyric. Because Cyric was involved with the OG Bhaal plot with Sarevok.
I think the main problem would be that a cleric of one of the dead three would instantly recognize the symbol of their god inside the symbol of the Absolute and would figure out too quickly who was behind the absolute
and Shar.
ironically enough there are fully voice dialogue for all those deities if you unlock them through modding even in act 3.
so it wouldn't really have taken that much more work for them to include.
@@RikkeDK1996 mabey it should be added as a new game plus kind of reward, like after you beat the game meeting certain conditions you unlock that in the charcter creator
@@IsilionNELE And that a god can remove their clerics' powers if they want to.
Shadowheart only keeps her cleric powers after sparing the nightsong because Selune decides to start giving her powers after Shar got pissed and stopped supplying them. A cleric of the dead three would likely get told "stop that or else I take away your powers" as soon as they did anything that disrupted the plan, let along stuff like killing Ketheric or similar.
Bhaal might tolerate it because murder but judging by Myrkul's reaction to Ketheric's death, I'd expect him to retaliate against his cleric if they killed his champion. Bane would only be ok it if you kill Gortash but since he comes to Gortash's help during the fight by giving his champion a power boost, I'd also expect him to stop allowing you to use cleric powers if you opposed his champion.
Lets not also forget that Shadowheart and her wound used to be completely different as well, as it was seemingly granting her sorcery-like powers, made me feel really cool as a sorcerer in the EA being able to guide her through her newly developing powers
5:17 Reflective Shell also got reused in the full release, it's an action you get access to when you equip Viconia's Walking Fortress
Right so did the rogue one it got put onto an item too. I don't remember which one though. Creating darkness and hiding you. (I think the dark justiciar from Yurgir's quest?)
@@ProxyGateTactician The Dark Justiciar Shield grants this 🙂
Wasn't it a cape sell by one of Mol friends in Act 2 ?
@@ProxyGateTactician Yep, on Lyrthindor's Shield, I forgot about that one, mostly because I never use it
@@murata_5585 no, the cape sold by Mattis makes you leave a fog cloud when you disengage, but doesn't make you hide, it's not a separate action and you can use it every round by just disengaging
Played early access for several major patches and forgot about 90% of this stuff. Thanks for saving it and reminding us all what could have been!
I seem to be a minority of online folks, but I prefer release Wyll. I like that he's actually heroic and righteous, him and Karlach are the only Good aligned companions. If i could change anything with him I'd have preferred if his relationship with his father was frayed due to some actual disagreement (vigalante son vs head cop dad) rather than a devil caused misunderstanding. And of course Ansur... Why does Wyll have nothing to do with this quest outside of getting the book? That is also lame
Yeah I don't think he was hated as pre-release Wyll. He was insufferable, but he was that way for a REASON. He had chops. He was an ass, but there was an interesting backstory hiding behind all that over the top bravado. His (clearly one sided) "relationship" with Mizora made me WANT to help him get free, whereas now he's just a teenage muppet with a silver spoon in his mouth and delusions of grandeur.
I miss the old Wyll. He was one of my go-to companions. He basically sulks in camp now 😭
It’s crazy how much content appears in the game that looks incomplete or severely trimmed down/removed. Some examples I noticed
- Lenore in the underdark
- Isabel’s deception about being Ketherics daughter, and her distrust of the MC (her first line is very sarcastic “if it isn’t the person who’s gonna save us from disaster” or something like that)
- ketheric being persuaded to be an ally
- there was a deeper plan with the explosive toys in act 3
- Dame Aylin breaking her oath (she “feels” it break in the game, saying that she feels like something’s gone from her, but nothing comes from it)
- the lady selling flowers In act 3 graveyard is probably another Hag that the act 1 hag was corresponding with
- the umberlee followers had a ruler that some of them disliked and wanted to overthrow
- Mol, and the other tiefling girl whose parents died clearly have more plans, though maybe this is a set up for future games
Probably more but these were the ones I noticed
In a meta sense it also explain why wyll had a crush on mizora in the Christmas animation, that was the intent in eary access and didn't carry over to the full game
Ketheric is a BIG one. He was originally supposed to be recruitable as a companion!!
Thank you for the nostalgia!
I'd add that they removed a lot of reactivity from the companions (which I'm still confused about). They used to want to talk to you a bunch more throughout act 1. Some of those scenes got repurposed to be one-line banter, but I still don't get the change, since it made them feel more alive. There were a couple scenes where they talked with each other but since they were related to the Dream Visitor I guess that's why those in specific were cut.
Also, EA Wyll was an Ulder, not a Ravengard! At least according to the datamines. The Ulder family founded the Flaming Fists :D
I'd argue that whether or not he was liked depended on the section of the fanbase you were looking at. I certainly heavily preferred EA Wyll and quite liked him, but FR Wyll is a bit blander because they sanded off the edges.
Even though I love how good and honorable a character Wyll is, and my character romanced him in the first playthrough and went to Avernus with Karlach and him, I am curious how EA Wyll would have turned out. I know that Wyll's lack of dialogue and parts of his story felt off sometimes. I know his voice actor had very little time to record all his lines and he did a great job. Its just very noticeable (to me) that Karlach and Wyll had less time to evolve as characters compared to the other origin characters
my theory is that EA Wyll would've had his whole arc be like "be the hero you've played yourself up to be" because it's clear his EA version is somewhat of a fraud, not in so that he was a coward but that he wasn't a good person
@@crumblyairship I agree with this - that's how it was shaping up in my mind too, and I find it more interesting than what we got.
I wish Larian had had more faith in their companions - people didn't like some of the companions, sure, but it's a three-act game. You don't need to make Shadowheart act like you're the sister she always wanted before you even take your first long rest, lol.
I remember playing early access to where if your character didn't have high enough dex/str you couldn't make the jump tutorial lol
Yeah lol in the very earliest build. It was fixed pretty quickly at least
LMAO
@OrigamiAhsoka it was great. I tried it co-op back then and my buddy was like "I can't get past this part" and I was confused as to why because all you had to do was jump and yeah found out the hard way that his class wasn't specced right lol
that's hilarious
Wait? People actually thought Wylls old character was solely focused on killing goblins? I only got the idea was he was similar to how he is now a powerful but nerfed badass that hunted monsters/demons/etc just he would go after anything that was against the weak and defenseless just he had a extra bone to pick with the goblins. I actually liked his old version a bit better than the current. They also removed how utterly bitchy everyone but Wyll was for romance. Shadowheart and Laezel and Gale were ridiculous on how hard they were to romance. Especially Gale partially due to bugs. Hell to this day I still can't trigger his romance scene of seeing Mystra
and now laezel is the easiest to romance lmaooo
By fixing that bug, they introduced a bug that made everyone a sex pest. You couldn't talk to Gale at all without him trying to jump your nuts. Same with Wyll.
Reminds me of the time I romanced Astarion for the first time, and within seconds Gale was on my ass about how I had to choose between them... I never even talked to Gale outside of giving him an artifact or 2 💀💀 It's been patched out now but that was funny 🤣🤣
@@Asgaardiangatekeeper Kinda funny how Astarion is hardest you have to work for to romance. You'd think it'd be the opposite.
@@ZPu95 Funnily enough I wouldn't consider Astarion hard to romance at all, I'm still on my first playthrough which I haven't finished yet(I'm in Act 3), I never really had to do anything that I didn't want too, to get him to like me. He may complain and drag his feet when I want to help people, but he still bit me on the 3rd long rest and jumped my bones on the 4th 😂.
8:05 “anime hair Minthara isn’t real, she can’t hurt you”
Anime hair Minthara:
They should've kept that hair as her epilogue style on a good run!
She still has it on her MTG card
My wife Minthara can and will hurt you whatever her hairstyle is
Aunt Minthara
@@sunbleachedangel yes my nephew/niece
For the fishermen there's still some hints to this cut out stuff as if you speak with dead with one of them it'll say he was trying to help a blonde lady survivor.
No mention of the cut female halfing bard werewolf origin companion? Her name is Helia. She has 770 recorded voiceline dialogues in the game files. Someone uploaded a video with all 770 recorded lines. A lot of npcs also had recorded lines for her. Like Auntie Ethel had a special taunt for her knowing she is a werewolf. Shadowheart had some lines being scared of Helia for being a werewolf. Halsin also had some recorded lines about her. Astarion has a cut banter dialogue in the files about wondering what her werewolf blood tastes like. The only reason she was cut is because Karlach replaced her due to user demand of early access players wanted Karlach to be a companion. So they had to cut one of the origin characters and she got the short end of the straw.
Could the halfling bard hireling be a reference to her?
I mean I love Karlach to bits, she's my second favorite companion, but it would have been so cool to have a werewolf companion. The dynamic between her and Astarion could have been interesting too depending on the writing for their interactions.
As much as I desperately wish they’d have done more with Wyll’s character/questline (made him less passive about the whole thing, have perhaps a point system related to the contract similar to Gale or Shadowheart, etc), I’m actually rather glad they made him a more stereotypically heroic guy. All the other origin companions have some serious problems so it was actually kind of refreshing to have a companion that had his shit together (despite the whole demon thing). They could’ve done better, but I don’t think making a character morally gray automatically makes them more interesting. It can, but it definitely doesn’t always do that.
very much agree. he's definitely been cheated out of getting the amount of content all the other companions have, but i do really like that we have a member of the team who is just nice and doesn't need constant moral babysitting. like yes, there's also karlach, but then you get into the more chaotic stuff (i love her, don't get me wrong, but still). wyll is a charisma class, he's a charming folk hero, he's just a nice person, and that doesn't mean he's a nothing character. i think his backstory is actually really cool, especially as someone who knows forgotten realms lore. being an edgelord or a kinda bad person isn't more interesting. it's fine to like them, i love astarion deeply, but that isn't the only way to make a character cool. wyll just needed more scenes. i wish he had been able to comment more on actual forgotten realms/faerûn lore (i would pay money for a cutscene where he corrects gale on saying that netheril was totally destroyed thousands of years ago. it's been like five years wyll would know about this) and really embrace how tied into it he is as the son of a well-established character.
Wyll is an INCREDIBLY simple character. The most stereotypical hero. Uncompromising unless it is about sacrificing himself. Normally I wouldn't care too much about that kind of character, but honestly, it is outright nice to just have a simple good dude trying his best and fighting for what he believes in.
The fact he doesn't have a "I will become the mind flair" like Karlach does is honestly really surprising. I assume they didn't give it to him to avoid possibly taking away part of Karlach's sacrifice, and that makes sense.
I bet if they didn't go with Karlach possibly turning squidward for you Wyll would be the one that got that role. I can already imagine the lines for it.
"You...have a full life after this, and an afterlife... Don't let your soul get corrupted and stripped from your being...like I did...Look at me, I might still have my soul, but it is already sold to a devil that will NEVER give it back... Let me take on this burden, to save my city once more and save you from such a terrible faith!"
@@bibbobella Nice lines! I played them with Wyll's voice in my head. Works well!
Wyll could have so easily been a really interesting character. He is this stereotypical lwaful stupid paladin, but than you realize that he is actually a warlock. I really like that, because it does play with the idea of how strict and clearly defined a moral compass can be. And is a nice contrast to companions like Astarion, who don't have one at all and just make the rules up as they go. It even causes Wyll to be quiet hypocritical at time. After moonrise tower he gave me this whole speech about how saving Baldur's Gate was worth sacrificing his soul and only hours of in-game time later, after the emperor essentially asked me to trade my soul to save all of Fâerun, Wyll is like "I would never do that!". It would have been so cool to see him grapple with that hypocrisy. Not everyone needs a moral dilemma. Sometimes an annoying character trait is perfectly enough to provide some interesting character growth. Wyll is exactly the type of character I like to play, but he never gets any of the development that makes me want to play this archetype.
Did he tho? When (or rather if) he turns into a devil he seems like he loses it, and never quite recovers
In EA I liked the True Soul tadpoles running off and the sense of urgency to 'stomp' on them as they emerged. Also, there was a real sense that the Dream Visitor was wrestling for control within your mind against the urges as it tried to convince you to trust them. There was a real choice to use the powers or fight the urges with the Dream Visitors help. Of course, this seemed counter to the new storyline of consuming more 'Space Gummies' that don't have any negative consequences.
OH, so that's why there's a huge area of the Nautiloid with a battleaxe lying there and I can't reach it. It's left over from early access.
The fisherman scene would’ve been so good 😭
It was awesome! It was SOOO creepy the first few times we did it!
I feel like the belt slot and ring that transfers surface traits were holdovers from D:OS2. Surfaces are *really* important in that game and while abusing combos is basically required for honor mode in BG3, in DOS2 abusing and understanding combos is basically required for every difficulty above story mode
I wished they added more of the old Wyll’s personality into the character as the story progressed, since he goes from having to present himself a noble and heroic figure, to being more lax and witty after connecting with friends.
It's true magic items used to be more expensive in EA, but that was part of a broader change.
Everything was more expensive in those days. The best example of this is the ruby you can find in the chest hidden under a rock on the beach. Nowadays the ruby has a base value of 90 but back then its base value was 1600 gold!
It's not known why all the prices were rebalanced on release.
It's still possible to check the original values of all the items if you use the wiki and browse back to the EA version of pages.
Wow amazing how many spells they cut. I can only imagine what mischief you would've done with some of them!
Whenever I open youtube and see one of your vids I immediately watch it.
I have exhausted all your content and would love more. The challenge run vids are my favorite! Still this stuff is really cool too didnt play early access cool to see!
It would be cool if they released a free (or $5) DLC with just cut content. Clearly, some of it wouldn't really fit the game in its current state, but an extended nautaloid introduction, the fishermen, some extended / added dream-visitor sequences, plus some of the items, could still work well for those who want to use them.
The more I learn about cut content, the happier I am that I've started playing just a year ago. I mean, I enjoy learning more about it-it’s fascinating! It’s also comforting to know that the story that captivated me so much wasn’t as perfect before as it is now. It makes my dream of achieving this level of screenwriting someday feel more realistic and shows just how crucial it is to refine the story, cutting off fragments that may be good on their own but interfere with the overall narrative. Thanks for the awesome video!
What if I said Wyll was more entertaining in those 3 minutes of early access clips then all of release?
Crucifixion? Understandable...
(I genuinely don't remember much of my time of early access. But I must not have spent much time with early access Wyll. A shame. He seemed... Charismatic. In a none preachy way.)
Even with the cuts made here to make him look WAY tf more one note "hur fuck goblins" then he actually was, he is still more compelling here, frankly. Encourage anyone interested to find a longer vid showcasing what EA Wyll was like. He wasn't perfect obviously, but it was also comparatively early in development. Call me team "should have reworked it rather then scrapped it and been rushed to fill out content for an entirely new guy".
Early access Wyll was FAR superior and nobody will change my mind. I'll die on that hill.
Yeva still appears at Walkeen's Rest. She still asks you to help breaking the door down. Then she is ordered by Floric to bring word to the Manip and that is when her and a group of fist leave to not be seen again until they are found in the pods in the Mindflayer colony at the end of Act 2. Some of the things with Wyll's eye are still present in the game. If you are a Cleric and talk to him enough before it's revealed that Mizora is his patron. You can pass an investigation check that the narrator will say that the eye appears to be a seeing stone. An object used to track and keep tabs on a person. At which you can question him about why his eye is a seeing stone. He will not answer why. Instead try to play it off as not being one.
My Tav wasn't a cleric but got the investigation check and passed. at the end of act 2 after Mizora gives the go ahead for Wyll to talk about how they met he'll tell you that you were right about the eye
I remember the Nautiloid from early access and wish it was back the way it was except for the Lae'zel flip through the air.
I’m glad I didn’t play early access. Plus the way Wylls old story was presented in post elsewhere made it seem more compelling. What’s shown here suggests it’s very meh. I’d like to see more about cut content.
Also as for the cut upper deck of the Nautoloid I wouldn’t have minded it personally. Restartitis is a thing and maybe just maybe if the intro was longer I’d be less inclined to restart.
Thanks for this. I'm making an essay on BG3 and I didn't know about the bloodlusty parts in EA or that final dream scene.
Thank you for making this video! I love watching any content related to Early Access BG3 as I personally think they had a lot of really great stuff that didn't deserve to be cut ♥️
I wish there was a bit of representation of dwarves, gnomes, and halflings throughout the game. They’re kind of forgotten about. You don’t even get a small folk companion
Agreed!!! But not many people liked the dwarf companion in their previous game so that may have influenced it?
well there are the ironhand and gondian gnomes in act 3
@ honestly I’m just now replaying the game again after having played into the mid point of Act 3 and stopping the first time back when the game was new. For some reason I just felt very bored and let down by Act 3 the first time from a story/worldbuilding perspective and because certain elements weren’t really fixed yet. But I’m hoping revisiting it will be better now, because I really did and still do love the first two acts… which is to say I didn’t encounter those small folk late in the final act because I’d quit lol partially my fault, partially still the game’s, as I think they could’ve been included more from the start. If I didn’t already know DnD, I’d have forgotten they existed outside of underdark races.
@@ProxyGateTacticianI just want more variety than 5 elves, 2 humans, 1 teifling (Alfira does not count) and le'zel.
They didn't even use half of the available races for character creation, it's a bit dissapointing.
I get that gnomes and dragonborn were added later but they could have used halflings (in fact that seemingly was a plan they had based on some Ethel lines), or a half orc. Heck this might be recency bias but people love the duegar, they could have made one a companion.
i do wish wyll still had more of a dark side, something that seemed present in his early access version. He is just too nice, kinda makes him boring ngl
Why is being nice boring? Being morally gray does not automatically make a character better.
We have so many party members that have dark sides, he would have just been another one in the party. Somebody had to be the noble heroic do gooder. There literally isn't one except Minsc but you don't get him till so late in act 3
@princeblackelf4265 true, doesn't mean it doesn't make him boring
I honestly do think I like EA Wyll’s story a little more than current Wyll’s, but I’m not sure why. Awesome video!
It's hard to say, but while replaying the EA it surprised me just how anti-hero Wyll used to be. Constantly lying to you and wanting to torture the guy really were weird when we see him now. This also explains better how Mizora got to Moonrise than the current game does
We have the power of hindsight now. That makes us more curious about what could've been
I think current Wyll's story has more potential, but EA Wyll's was more fleshed out.
I think combining the two would bee perfect, like the new story with his old personality (though with the current one being maybe a final personality he could have by the end of the game on a good path for example).
Imagine this : a man that is the son of a known hero, living constantly in his shadow who wants to make a name for himself and make him proud, wants to save the city from an evil ploy but he can't do anything about it so he sells his soul to a devil to do it, thinking it would give him the recognition he craves ..... only for him to be unable to explain his exploits and be disavowed and cast out by his father for making a pact with a Devil. Now he scours the land trying to gain back his father's trust by becoming a known folk hero, except that he's not nearly as glorious or virtuous as he claims to be and is not afraid to go through shortcuts or lie to create this legend he craves. I think the current Wyll's personality could be him by the end of the game if he managed to actually live up to his name and become an actual hero instead of someone pretending to be one.
I see so much potential in Wyll, but he was so wasted
EA Wyll I feel like was the side where he held his secrets in high regard and had troubles. The current Wyll throws everything out to the point that you might as well know everything about him within the very moment he decides to spare Karlach with you, and literally has 0 troubles in his life despite basically being harassed constantly by his devil patron.
Previous Wyll was a man of mystery and growth; which is what all the others had. The one we have now just became an accessory for Karlach in case the player wants to do the boring good guy run without redeeming any of the evil run companions
he's just a chill guy
So glad minthara's hair changed but im mad the pregnancy bit is gone
I still miss the old Nautiloid level
same
but i get why they clipped it down
Same! The potions and herbs lying around upstairs were always handy!!
EA Scratch looks like he teleported into BG3 from a game from 10 or 15 years ago - glad he got some fur, too as there are enough furless-for-no-apparent-reason pets running around Faerun. And EA Minthara looks like a full-size version of Thulla to me (the poisoned gnome in the Myconid colony). Not sure which model of her I like better since current Minthara has some serious "sadistic high-school-teacher" vibes - although that could just be the voice-acting.. :).
Wait till you see early access Owlbear cub! He looked like a brown, feathered Bart Simpson with a beak lol
I actually prefer the more violent and secretive wyll. His overly heroic and noble approach to everything was incredibly annoying after a while, whereas this other wyll seems to have been a more interesting character.
I honestly can't stand Wyll and usually either reject him up front or push him out of the party at my earlier convenience. I would like it better if he started out as the goody two shoes hero but over time be revealed not to be as pure as he claims to be. It seems like they kind of wanted to go that route with him being pledged to a devil but ultimately he even did that for the sake of the greater good and is annoyingly heroic the whole game
@@kevinwells9751 I honestly can't stand take like this. Even a character is morally grey, if they're boring personality wise, then they're boring.
Current wyll's problem is not his moral stance, but his lack of negative emotions or flaws that isn't relevant to a his moral.
EA Wyll was like Daeren from Wrath of the Righteous. (Probably) Had a good story once you got to know him but was an insufferable asshole for all of act 1.
Boy... The Scratch, Spectator, and Karlach model changes were much needed.
Too be fair Karlach was never meant to be a companion which is why she had such a bad model. It was fan demand in early access that led to her becoming an origin companion which resulted in the werewolf halfling bard origin companion being cut since someone had to be cut to make room for her due to their limited resources at the time.
I miss the expanded prologue, TBH. Not that it made a huge difference in the long run. I played early access so much its burnt into my brain.
I really liked class-based illithid powers and was sad to see them go
i remember a lot of these (to this day i look for the fishermen around the mindflayer before remembering they've become tears in rain), but somehow i've completely blacked out old minthara
it would have been an actual crime to leave her hair like that😭
What surprised me is I had downloaded the newest EA release and the Fisherman were already cut. So they were cut before Early Access was even finished
I have always wondered about that boat and the dead fishermen. Personally i think that is super cool and should of been kept.
Same with the outdoor segment on the nautoloid. I remember my brother playing EA and when I booted it up I was amazed how quickly i got off the ship.
Babe, wake up, new Proxy video just dropped!
Unironically just woke up my wife to watch it together lol. I get this is a classic meme and I didnt exactly play it out that way but funny nonetheless.
Really miss the EA spectator model It actually looked like a spectator, unlike the one we have now which just looks like a regular beholder with 4 eyestalks.
Spectators are just the work-around for not being allowed to use actual Beholders. They are supposed to be Beholders, but you can thank greedy CEOs.
What do you mean not allowed to use beholders? I haven't found anything about larian not able to use that monster.
@@Asgaardiangatekeeper They literally ARE Beholders, have you ever examined a Spectator in the game? It reads, that it is a Beholder species. So that's not a "greedy CEOs" thing. It has nothing to do with copyrights.
I actually would have liked early access Wyll. Like if they made him a mix of current Wyll witht he intiall secrets and things and slick personality of early access. I love Wyll because they cut so much content for him its ridiculous. His storyline dind't neccessarily need to to be tied to the goblins but him lying and not telling the whole truth until he is comfortable enough with you would have been cool & spicy tbh.
They kept the "attack camera" in a sense - the camera randomly pans to the character making an attack and then back, it's actually a huge source of disconcertion!
I used mods to disable all that but yeah it used to be much lite aggressive
I still hate how the camera jumps from my ranged character's target back to him when I want to attack the target a second time. It makes me have to move the camera again. It's also annoying when an enemy is floating/bouncing and hard to click on.
@@Sedines the ranged attack no camera move mod can fix that. I hated how it zooms out Everytime you attack. (Assuming you’re on PC)
"They thought a guy who hunts goblins was kinda lame"
Goblin Slayer: "And I took that personally!"
I tried to recreate goblin slayer for one of my runs. It was a lot of fun until I was forced to kill things other than goblins.
And they were right. A guy who just hunts goblins is lame.
Lets go! Ive been waiting for new stuff on your channel:)
I like this version of Wyll better, it makes more sense too. Most of the changes though I agree with, especially making the Dark Urge optional.
in the original BG1-2 Dark Urge wasn't optional, though
@@hairytentacle3924 In the original BG1-2 being a bhaalspawn made barely any difference in gameplay, it was just a story thing. You developed some powers in the form of low level spells, but there were no consequences, there were no urges, you didn't randomly kill bards, etc
@@IsilionNELE In BG2 you could tansform into Slayer at the cost of becoming more evil. That was gameplay thing.
@@hairytentacle3924 Ah you're right, I forgot about that because I never once did that because it was just sooo bad. His attacks sucked pretty bad when compared to a normal character in gear, and he had only 100 HP which wasn't a lot. Even worse, if your normal character had more than 100 max hp and you changed back from the Slayer to your normal character, your current hp would still be 100, so you'd basically injure yourself by doing that.
People basically only used the Slayer form to lower their reputation by 2 if they had evil party members and didn't want them to leave because your reputation was getting too high.
@@IsilionNELE I used that when my char was a mage and I wanted to handle some situation like a tank. That was long ago and I'm not sure if that was was optimal approach.
To be fair to EA Wyll, Astarion is also insufferable in Act 1 so where he goes after that could've been really interesting.
I just find Astarion unbearable overall I love Neil but I don't like him. He's very much just oh you didn't do this clearly evil thing well I'm handsome so you should.
something that will always surprise me is just how many people dislike wyll lol, i get that he's somewhat simple but i think the criticism is way overblown. the guy is witty, charming and genuinely hilarious sometimes, he plays the very important role of being the one vaguely normal person in the camp, and his character is a lot more complex than it gets credit for. he is an archetypical hero obsessed with self sacrifice which isn't that interesting, but being bound to mizora complicates that significantly (even if it was a heroic sacrifice for him to bind himself that doesn't take away from the uniqueness) as does his sheer hatred for any kind of monster. if you weren't there to talk sense into him he would've murdered karlach despite it being painfully obvious that she's a lovely person and not even a devil, there was no excuse for that he just got so blinded by his disgust, his twisted honour and his hunger for violence that he chose to side with mizora (an obviously manipulative and cruel monster) rather than even giving karlach a chance. he's been slipping into evil (aka he's becoming the thing he swore to destroy lol) as a result of his pact, and his arc gets even more complex later on when remaining in that pact becomes the noble choice again, choosing to free himself or become a duke doesn't seem particularly evil but by choosing that he would be obsessing over himself rather than actually fighting to protect the weak, and now that he's regained his senses he knows the right thing to do is stay pacted but this time he'll remain focused on being good
I personally hate Wyll, mostly because I find his personality insufferable, but in part because it feels like they missed the opportunity to go a darker route that would have made him more interesting and complex. If they had committed to the character arc of slowly sinking deeper into evil actions out of a misplaced sense of heroism that would be compelling, but after the scene where he almost kills Karlach he never really has those moments again. An zealot hell bent on destroying anyone he sees as evil would have been interesting, but instead we got a goody two shoes who can't stop bragging about how great and honorable he is. The most complex decision he has to make is "Should I renew my pledge to the devil in exchange for information about where my father is or should I decline the offer and just find him myself?" which isn't very compelling because it's so easy to just do it without Mizora's help. Plus that path is bugged so in some conversations people think you did sign the contract because Duke Ravengard is alive and in others they know you didn't. If they had made it so Ravengard was totally lost if you declined Mizora's offer then it would be a real choice but as it stands it's kind of a dud
@@kevinwells9751 from a narrative perspective the fact that you can rescue the duke without mizora is irrelevant, you're entitled to do that but in terms of his story it's a choice between his freedom and his father's life. i do agree with you that his evil storyline isn't very well written, the choice to sacrifice his father's life to be free of mizora is way out of character for him and with choosing to become grand duke it wasn't explained well enough why that's even a bad thing for him, but that doesn't take away from his character. it's a shame we didn't get to properly explore his worse side but he's still interesting and i at least always enjoy his story
I mostly blame the edgy people who see "good aligned" = "boring"
@@bimbiman8495 nah it's not that, if that were true then karlach wouldn't be so popular. wyll just conforms to a lot of classic heroic tropes and the more complex aspects of his character don't get appreciated, which is mostly larian's fault for rushing his new story. i think people are excessively harsh about it and let it ruin a fairly interesting character but the criticism is still pretty valid
So interesting thing about the belt slot - it's technically still in the game, and IS used. In some menus (don't remember which, its been a while) I started noticing a belt icon and eventually I realised that it's actually the underwear slot, because my first character was a naked half-orc barbarian. As he wasn't wearing underwear for pretty much the entire game, there was this one single menu where the game would display a belt icon to represent it.
Damn, I didn't realise how much was changed from EA! I don`t remember this violent outbursts - and trying to kill your dream visitor! - at all. I'm glad it was changed, I much prefer just having a choice to make your character violent.
I recently read some bits about cut stuff and major changes to the Nightsong plot, including a different character and model that would become Alylin. I'm fascinated by...
I remember the outdoor area, after full release when I played for the first time I remember I kept looking for the way up to the top of the Nautiloid and thinking I was either missing something or going nuts. Thanks for pointing this out The early access version of Wyll actually reminds me of Goblin Slayer too for some reason. XD
Cool 😊
I am curious what areas and stories they cut out in act 3
I believe the noble quarters are one of those areas
Baldur's gate didn't exist in the beginning. Actually the shadowlands didn't either. You got on the boat in the underdark and that was pretty much the end. We restarted the game so many times, I didn't want to play through the beginning again. I believe that is why the actually shortened some of the first act. like on the nautiloid. We were tired of playing it. LOL
Honestly would’ve preferred that Wyll. This new one is such a good and noble guy that it’s a boring story. Almost reminiscent of Preston in Fallout 4
1- I wish we could change Minthara hair back, it's the one from her MTG card art and I love it
2- The thing that diferenciates EA Wyll and release Astarion is the timeing. Astarion only plot point aside from maybe finding Raphael on act 2 so he can read his back is the 1 dungeon on act 3. EA Wyll thing with gobbos is that the goblin camp is literally across the street, so unless the Mizora part carried it over there is no reason to keep him with you, that or him revealing Ravengard is his father when he gets a high enough aproval or Mizora telling it to you in some wear what if scenario only to make you keep him arround.
Another thing removed, in early access, after bigger events, you could talk to coop player characters about what was going on, was such a nice touch but sadly scrapped :c
For the fishermen, I remember that if you passed a charisma check you avoided the fight. Also that last scene with the dream visitor makes me wonder if durge wasn't supposed to be the default custom origin...
I like cut Wyll a lot more. He actually has depth and character as opposed to a blank slate good two-shoes
1. The nautiloid from Early Access was such a good section and it's change leaves the introduction to the game feeling a bit...lacking. As for why it was changed, my understanding is that Larian found out people had figured out ways to reach level 3 by the end of the section, so the changes to the nautiloid feel very much like Larian deciding to be the Fun Police.
2. The fishermen were _also_ a great sequence in the Early Access build, a nice tutorial to "puzzle combat" encounters. Changing it to a "kissing scene" just feels like a lot of changes they were doing pre-and post launch, where they just started playing up to what horny fans wanted.
3. The switch from the Dream Visitor to the Guardian was a very clear attempt to hide an obvious plot twist that people had quickly figured out by replacing it with...a plot twist that is just as obvious that was _also_ quickly figured out. It also removed any real consequence surrounding the use of the illithid powers.
Personally, I'm glad they shortened the nautoliod scene. and much of the beginning actually. I was SO tired of playing through that over and over.
I think I liked the more secretive Wyll, rather than the goody-two-shoes Wyll. But maybe that's because my Tav filled that archetype already 😀
People say Wyll is boring now but the previous version of him was so bad it would have probably ruined the entire game for me. I like Wyll and it's a nice change to take him sometimes instead of Gale. At least Wyll does not come onto you when you are already romancing someone.
The fighters' illithid pull ability is reused in the Mind Weaver mod, Forceblade Subclass
Was there ever an option to initiate dialogue with your custom character to other multiplayer custom characters? I remember seeing my Tav talk to my friend’s Tav after specific story events. It was pretty humorous because it would usually be meaningless non voice-acted conversations like “can you believe that happened?” “No, I couldn’t!”. I still don’t know if this was an actual thing in the game or not however.
I only ever saw that with one thing, and it was always the crèche. My character would use Lae’zel’s conversation with my friends main character. Then have the same convo 5 mins later with laezel
They did that for Divinity 1, but not BG3. People didn’t like it in that game as far as I heard
@@kingofgrim4761 It's still in the game, or at least the game can bug out into that conversation. We've had it recently, my Durge was talking to my GFs Karlach and the conversation had lines as if I talked to Lae'zel. A few moments later her Karlach was talking with Lae'zel (in her party) and the conversation was just a copy paste of what we (our avatars) just did.
@@ProxyGateTactician Not Divinity 1, that's a different game from that series, you mean Divinity: Original Sin (the first D:OS), but it's in D:OS2 as well. Mostly after some crucial events the whole party will have a conversation, including hearing the opinion of the other player's character on the matter.
@ yup, exactly what I had happen. It’s funny to look at, and made sense in our playthrough as all githyanki
The Nautaloid was cut because players were too OP coming out of the tutorial area if they played it right.
True, I think my record was just a whisker shy of level 3 leaving the Nautiloid. There were many more enemies and you could cheese some of the enemies that got killed by other NPC's if you had a good range attack. While the dude with the sword has always been challenging, the other cambions were much easier to kill too. It added up to a LOT of xp. It's why so many people were jonesing for an increased level cap for EA. By the time we found the Goblins we were max level (for EA) already🤣
Hii Proxy I just wanna say I love your videos so much, keep up the great work! I always look forward to watching your new uploads :)
Thank you so much!
More of this. Would love to know more about the cut story
Also, no more closeups when the player character talks, e.g. the Edwin cultist scene, and several others. Sad that this got cancelled
Thank you for showing off these changes Proxy, especially for those of us who never ended up seeing the Early Access ❤
I've read online that old Wyll was supposed to be the stereotypical "devil in his shoulder" type of guy. He was a refined nobleman with inclinations of wrongdoing by the temptations of the pact. Is this true?
There are hints at it yeah but he lied to the player a lot so we don’t know if that’s for sure the case
I loved the action camera and miss it every time I rage as a barbarian...
I played about 3 years of EA, and it’s nice to see I recognized everything here. I liked OG Wyll a lot more, and wished they had kept him similar
You know I played the game after it was released, and I never used the illithid powers not even one worm, cuz I thought it was obvious I was gonna get a terrible ending because of it..... Turns out it meant nothing
yeah outside the new evil endings there aren't really any repercussions to using or consuming tadpoles. outside having to throw a dice to not automatically evolve when empy gives you the astral touched tadpole.
and ofcourse the evil endings where you will have to throw a dice to remain non-illithid. Which is skipped entirely if you didn't indulge at all.
I believe the Dream Visitor change implies they were also gunning for making the Dark Urge playthrough only but ended up making it an optional background.
I thought you were going to mention the helmet of grit being moved! I believe it was originally in dror ragzlin's hoard of treasure before being moved to the szarr palace.
The idea With the dream visitor might have been that the main character is always a bhallspawn. In the first 2 games, the main character was always the bhallspawn. It could be that the parasite was trying to take you over. But the fact that you're the bhallspawn is what prevented it from doing so. Hence why a mindflayer parasite is calling you a monster. It would also explain the protection.
old mindflayer voice way better ngl
As someone who never played the early access, that version of Wyll is much more intreaguing that what we actually got.
I played EA but I still enjoyed this walk down memory lane. If you have more, I'd love to watch that too! To this day I wonder why they cut the fishermen.
i really wanna see more of EA stuff, this looked crazily good ! and honestly there was certainly something to do with EA Wyll. he could've hated Ravengod BECAUSE he's his father and that he rejected him ? idk, something with him not being 100% a pure soul would've made him more human to me and more likable too imo
It could have been fun if they had made the dream visitor a little less aggressive, and have them somewhat openly be an incarnation of the tadpole. Treat the tadpole like a party member.
They want to LIVE and your survival is necessary there. They are being blocked from turning you into a mind flayer by *something* and are cut off from the elder brain. Let the tadpole develop without that influence, and become its own person based on how you treat it, and have different endings and different deals you can make with it for power.
I’ve seen “malevolent parasite becomes a legitimate ally” done fairly well in at least one book. Most of the endings possible are tragic or uncomfortable, but that’s ok. That kind of shit happens all the time.
"a guy who hunted goblins was kinda lame..." *Goblin Slayer wants to know your location*