I’m just about to start my second full playthrough, and have run through Act I multiple times. Rather than choosing my main three companions and leaving everyone else in camp, I’m wanting to juggle companions. There are three main reasons for this: advancing everyone in the group and keeping them geared; giving each character a chance for their unique personal interactions; and trying to max out all opinion sliders. For an example: Lae’zel offers unique interaction with Kithrak Voss.
I’m hoping we can compile a list of best party compositions for roleplay potential in certain areas. I’ll start us off with all that I can think up from above ground Act I.
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Party Pairings: Wyll and Karlach pair well. Lae’zel and Shadowheart clash. Astarion generally clashes with any companion with a modicum of decency.
Grove:
- Recommended party composition: Shadowheart, Wyll, and Gale for kind interactions, Lae’zel and Astarion for mean/underganded interactions.
- Lae’zel is necessary for an interaction with Zorru.
- Be mean to Zorru to get night 1 romance with Lae’zel.
- Keep Wyll out of your party if you intend to free Sazza.
- Keep Astarion and Lae’zel out of the party if you intend on being kind to tieflings.
- Take S/W/G if you intend on saving Arabelle
Risen Road:
- Recommended party composition: Wyll, Karlach, anyone with high Wisdom.
- Karlach and Wyll are a good duo for confronting the paladins of Tyr. This is a personal quest for Karlach.
- For the gnoll fight, a character with high Wisdom is useful in persuading the flind to fight for you and then kill itself.
Waukeen’s Rest:
- Recommended party composition: Wyll, any other two (I just go Lae’zel and Karlach).
- Wyll has a personal interaction regarding the kidnapping of Duke Ravengard.
Mountain Crossing:
- Recommended party composition: Lae’zel, any other two (Wyll and Karlach for me).
- Lae’zel has a unique interaction with Kithrak Voss.
Blighted Village:
- Recommended party composition: Gale, Astarion (if he has snuck out of camp), any other.
- Astarion has something to say about the boar drained of blood.
- Gale is intrigued by the Thayan necromancer and the book of necromancy. Consider giving this to him.
Goblin village:
- Recommended party composition: Shadowheart, Astarion, anyone else NOT including Wyll.
- Shadowheart has unique remarks about the repurposed temple of Selune.
- Shadowheart and Astarion have a good time watching you bask in Loviatar’s love.
- Wyll struggles to keep his fat mouth shut. Keep the liability in camp.
Teahouse:
- Recommended party composition: sneaky people or people with Hold Person (if you intend on minimising casualties), someone with create water for cheese.
- I just always fight the hag. +1 to any stat is useless as only even stats count, and you should be shuffling the “standard” ability array to get all even stats (including two 16s). The Hag Eye is also a liability as perception is rolled more often than intimidate.
- Sneak and cast Hold Person if you don’t want to fight any of the masked people.
- cast Create Water on Myrina’s cage to protect her. You can usually tell her and Ethel apart through use of Examine, but Create Water results in Mayrina being wet, which doesn’t require examine to discern.
I just wish shuffling party members wasn’t such cancer in this game. In any sensible RPG, you could access everyone’s inventory and character panel in camp, and simply build a party as you leave. In BG3, you go to camp, put away your party member, speak to the new member, realize your old party member has gear you need, back out of the conversation, go back to the original party member, speak to them and put them back in the party, start to move their equipment, and finally realize none of this is fucking worth it and commit to keeping the 3 party members that you like the most for the entirety of the run.
I like shifting party members around in games like this, trying a variety of builds and party compositions, even if some are suboptimal. It helps keep combat fresh. As much as I like BG3, this is one quality that is insulting inconvinient, when there are dozens of cRPGs out there that previously set precidences for convinience.
Once, I had to pickpocket one of my old party member for that reason. I don’t know if it works for a equipped weapon or something like that.