Man why are you taking sponsorships from actual walware level browsers? Opera has a past of selling every piece of personal information they can get on their users and working closely with the chinese govt. Not a good look.
@@AbiBomb because its what big gaming corps want you to get. they want you to trust influencers and spread memes of consumerism. dont let it get to your head and remain critical when watching anything with brand placement
I have spent 700 hours on this game and beaten it several times on multiple difficulties including honor mode, and till this day I still find new encounters, loot and npcs I've never experienced once in any of the other playthroughs. Just goes to show how much there is in the actual game.
@@kel_ski Didn't expect a reply haha, loved the video, you captured a lot of the feelings I had when I started playing honor mode and honestly, I can't get back into playing the other difficulties after experiencing it. Though i admit, I fucking hated how you pronounced Lae'zels name 😭
@@jackalope_hunter Yeah, but they seem to be just flavoured. If anything, if you're planning on doing a full evil save, wait till patch 7 comes out which is most likely in November. Adds evil endings etc.
@@Aikidragon_Prime I make sure everyone has at least 200 gold in their inventories.... and if Astarion's one of my dead people, he gets rezed first so he can start pickpocketting Withers
@@bunnyboygamille I use Wyll for my lock and stealing because of his +1-10 plus ring, necklace and gloves gives him a +9-17 good enough for anything. I prefer not to use Astarion because of his continuous complaining, same as the Gith.
Crucial tip for Honor Mode, especially in act 2: do not put all your characters on an elevator platform at once. There is a random chance that they will all bug out and fall through the platform and die, ending your run.
@@Jules_Diplopia i wish we could choose the formation in which the party moves, is a little too common for the party to fuck itself because they can only walk by sniffing each others asses and ending up 3ft away from Tav
19:10 Withers is a gentleman and demands small-talk before you can resurrect someone. Click through the small-talk dialouge options, leave, then speak with Withers again and you can use his services.
One thing I don’t like is that you can’t switch party members when speaking to someone. In real D&D, any party member can say “Oh, I have high strength so I can do this.” But the game forces you to use who ever you are playing as at that moment.
I've done it, there is a button on the bottom left next to the barter button when you're talking click that and you can pick another member and steal everything while the other member talks.
Not sure I'd classify that ability as real D&D. No GM I know is going to allow that to happen. No way I can turn to my Bard friend and have him take over a conversation that's about to go horribly because I'm not as charming and/or will definitly fail the that I can see is about to happen. His response in that situation would be "She should have started the conversation, not you".
@@jmike8934 I don't think you understood his statement. The person doing the talking is still talking, you can then change to the rogue to do the theft. Your rogue can pickpocket while the conversation is happening and not be stuck if the interface doesn't allow it.
I had to rewind 3 times to make sure I heard those words correctly. "... on my first full playthrough." That makes this video far more interesting to me as I watch it.
I remember first time on Honor Mode I rolled a 1 for getting Shadowheart out of her pod and I was so angry, but then I realised Lae'Zel didn't try, so she tried and got Shadowheart out instead, and I was so happy about it.. XD
Small tips for folks that try this kind of run (I haven't played outside of Honor Mode for long, only getting through Chapter 1 on Tactician, similar to Kelski). You can hire a druid NPC from Withers and use all their casts on summoned magical berries each night before sleep. At around level 3 it's enough for 20 supplies. Then as the game progresses, you get two more druids. You need the druids to STAY in your party after casting or the berries disappear, so cast them immediately before sleep, and the three of them should be enough to make food a complete non-issue. You can have a Withers mage cast Mage Armor on party members to save spell casts before swapping them out as well, and you can give a Withers NPC the feat for better potion brewing so you don't suffer combat opportunity loss on your main characters. You can have a withers priest NPC cast Poison Resistance and Aid on your party members to save on casts as well. Having an escape plan is by far the most important way to ensure you don't wipe. An easy way is to simply have one member stay at camp until a fight starts and then have them join only when you know you're going to win the fight, or by keeping a member far enough away to be able to get away easily. Sanctuary is one of the strongest spells in the game for this. Shadowheart can cast it on herself along with dashing and long strider to get away from almost all fights. Misty step is also very strong for this. Bard is likely the strongest class for honor mode, and either Sword bard or Keeper of Lore are top tier classes. You can dip 2 levels into Paladin if you want, but it's fine to go full 12 levels in bard. Lucky is probably the strongest first pick for honor mode on all builds outside of very specific builds, especially if you're using druids to make long rests much more free. It's 3 free conditional rerolls on either attack rolls, saving throws, or enemy attack rolls. Divination wizards are super strong for honor mode for a similar reason as the Lucky feat. Ambushes are OP. If there isn't some urgent reason to finish a fight the first time, like an NPCs life on the line, running away with everybody and re-engaging on your own terms with an ambush is stupidly strong. Halflings have a stupidly strong racial ability for Honor mode, being able to roll all natural 1s, including attack rolls and saving throws. When you consider that nat 1 is auto fail, and it's a flat 5% chance, you're taking that auto fail and turning it into just rolling again. It's stupid stronk. You don't need to abuse things like Withers respec and/or strength potions in order to beat Honor Mode in your first play through. I've never used Withers to respec anybody. You also don't need to have busted builds. My first time through was pure class for each character. Just be prepared to run away when you need to. Even with all this, you'll still fuck some things up and/or roll bad sometimes. It's okay! Play it out! That's what this mode is about.
@@gabrielabautista2966this is too true. In my first tactician run, he was the only one standing after Raph. I had him revive my Durge and then they left the House of Hope together and wandered around just the two of them for a bit because 1) I was not wasting extra scrolls and 2) I'm quite sure if Astarion was the last man standing he would just resurect the only person he cares about and then convince them we can just pay Withers to bring Halsin and Shart back later... considering the pair basically duo'd Raph with a little help from Hope... we were just punishing Halsin and Shart for not pulling their weight.
"The best part about D&D is failing" 100% agree. Failing; the chance to fail; experiencing the world on the other side of a fail; and surviving a fail that should have killed your party. The game has become so much better with Honor Mode. Now try Solo Honor Mode ;)
I mean, that partially true, i prefer to put this with the actual tabletop gaming, in a way or another the game will still respond with some selection of actions depending on how you rolled, which can make it a little frustrating
On my first Honour Mode playthrough I almost wiped from the goblin ambush in Moonhaven (the blighted village). I had to use a potion of Fly to escape, and sneak back in to revive them. I felt like an idiot almost wiping to silly goblins.
a drow would have just walked in there in broad daylight, commanded them to lick the streets clean of any dirt and used their asses as chair to sit on.
Many CRPGs have "Honor Mode" options. They usually call it "Hardcore Mode" or something similar. Gotta look around on the difficulty setting page when you start a new campaign in whatever RPG you fire up. It's usually on either the difficulty list or an extra checkbox option that adds on to the difficulty level you picked.
Yeah, some of them even allow it in the lower difficulties, like Pathfinder and the Obsidian ones. And thank god for that, their highest difficulties are truly hell compared to BG3. There's also XCOM, but that's a different vibe.
@@zzxp1 "Iron man" mode. But yeah anyways, it's pretty common in RPGs and also tactics/strategy games. XCOM is a good example. Paradox games like Crusader Kings 3 and Stellaris, too. A more obscure one is Battle Brothers, a tactics/management game where you control a mercenary company in a really gritty medieval fantasy world. Not very widely known, but great game.
I've only done one playthrough, and it was regular Tav. I'm now doing Honor mode with Durge. I'm actually using the same half-elf face as you but half-drow and with a dad mustache and the buff bod. I've been playing smart-ish, but still screw up. It's led to some ridiculous outcomes so far. Like I stalled on using Silence on Priestess Gut and ended up killing all the goblins in that area. I used the crag spiders for that (the ones by the guidance amulet) and they all survived. Afterwards when I was exploring, I sent a mage hand into a hole I found and the spiders followed it in. It was the room where Roah went to hide with the other Zhents and one of them freaked out and used a firebolt and they freaking obliterated everyone and everything in the room with the smokepowder barrels. Then it goes to the party on the other side just none the wiser to what happened. Rip Roah. I'm at level 6 at the creche now. Wish me luck.
In Honour Mode, I started thunderwaving goblins into the pit that's to the left of Dror Ragzlin's room before I could talk to Gut (I wanted the brand because Nere drops a ring that buffs thunder attacks if you have the brand.... and I am sorbard that uses a lot of thunder magic)... accidentally aggro'd the whole camp instead of quickly and quietly taking care of the gobs in that area. The map turned red, and Dror's whole group ran over into that area and I thought I was done for. Some well actioned crowd control from Shart and Karlach being Karalch saved the day. Had to finish clearing out the rest of the area before we could long rest, but thankfully Gut and her minions are all chumps and that smokepowder the Zhent have was a fun little present to gift Minty with.
My dude!! i would love a stream of bg3! but if it doesn't sound to crazy, i would recommend you to do it off stream and keep the vods. Because the back seat that you are going to endure will be HORRIBLE. love your vids kels
Having done Honor mode Act 1 as well at one point during the Auntie Ethel fight one of her duplicates bugged out and became an unkillable hostile enemy in the room even after the fight ended. Of course I can’t talk to Mayrina cause there’s still an enemy in the room, and I can’t just reset the fight because honor mode. So I had everyone skedaddle, then carefully stealthed Astarion with an invisibility potion past the line of sight of Ethel to not draw aggro, and finally got the convo to proc. Of course it did mean Astarion was leading the conversation to a woman who was in a lot of emotional distress, but we can’t win every battle.
you and I picked up BG3 around the same time. it's been such a treat going back through the fandom after the hype as an og BG1/2/PS:T/DOS fan, like digging through a huge mountain of treasure!! all the people still updating their fanworks are truly in love with the game and it shows. great video man :)
Whomever was writing the evil choice options was living his best life. I still remember laughing for a solid couple of minutes in act III when the guild members thank you for saving them from the evil Rock Lord goons and then TAV hits em' with the "I'm pretty evil myself, it's time to die" Option .
@@kel_ski hahaha yeah! I think excluding the one you have to feed the elevator, you get five in total from the tree and the garden, which is the exact amount you need to incapacitate all of them in honor mode :) they skip their turn entirely so you can just focus on Bernard (the big guy)!
@@justdoingmything oh, I didn’t know this and I have 800 hours in the game 😆 I just smooth talk my way out of any trouble by citing poetry! He always gives me a ring and a greater healing potion - I think you can also get a hug!
The sponsorship segment is incredible!!! I never saw a such well placed and included sponsor as here. I absolutely hate to watch sponsorship placements but this one i didnt even think about skipping cuz it was so well integrated
My older brother tells me once in a while "You should get Baldur's Gate 3" I've only heard about the game and I've never seen what it's about. Thanks Kelski for making this video, you're a LEGEND!
Darkest dungeon prevents you from save scumming. The game constantly saves itself and there’s only one save file. Once characters in your party die then they are permanently dead. It’s also just a really hard game.
Though I haven't tried BG3's honor mode, I've played Pathfinder: Kingmaker / WotR on hardcore so much that I don't think I could play them any other way. Even though they're sadistically designed and buggy messes, something keeps drawing me back to it. Combat and skill checks are so much more tense and impactful whenever one wrong step could end the entire run.
for me bg3 honor mode is easier than Pathfinder hardcore/unfair. i complete the honor run without any retry, although i did playthrough the game 4 or 5 time and pick the most op party comp.
I'm trying honor mode for the first time too, almost my whole team died fighting the gnolls during act 1, only Astarion was left alive and I thought my honor mode was done for, that twink killed the remaining enemies and save my life. now he's my romance choice for the next playthrough, I owe him that lmao
He saved me from stupid gymforge battle and gityanki ambush ( yes, you can convince l’azel to go along but they are not decieved and I was level 4 so I had no choice)
I lost a 70 hour Honour mode run due to a single cocky decision that snowballed a fight in act 2 completely out of control, don't think I've ever been as devestated by a game before. 10/10 But that's the point, the stakes are actualy real which makes every action feel so important. I never played another difficulty again and have now completed HM 3 times, 1 normal, 1 no magic run, 1 only magic run (ironically somehow harder than the no magic at some points), and I've now died 4 times trying the epitome of BG3 difficulty: the Solo Honour mode run. Honestly can't get enough of this game.
The first 5 levels are usually the most difficult. My strat for honour runs is usually to just never fight a single combat encounter until level 4. I would get a wizard with 16 strength and jump all the way up to the harper stash atop the hill to skip the grove entrance fight, and turn into a drow to get a bunch of dialogue XP from just walking to the goblin camp. That way, you skip the whole withers cave fight and avoid brutal level 2 slog fests. If you want a little cheat code, have these three builds in your party: Shadowheart life cleric with phalar aluve, Astarion gloomstalker ranger with titanstring bow, Lae'zel as open hand monk, and those three can usually carry whatever mediocre build you use on your own character.
Honestly I don’t think the first 5 levels are hard at all. You can get 75xp x2 on the nautoloid by defeating zhalk and the mindflayer to get instant lv2 on the beach. Then surprise round against the intellect devours, talk my way through the bandits. Then surprise round against the rest to get withers and respec. After that instant lv3 at the gate to the emerald grove. Take out the bugbear, use calm emotions to clear the harpies, free the goblin in the prison, move to the goblin camp and basically lv4. Then I go to get bonus xp from the newborn gnolls and just surprise anders and I’m already basically lv 5.
Great video and you are a very brave man! I finished my first honor mode after practicing in tactician mode. I thought I was prepared for what was about to come in honor mode. Oh boy how naive I was. Honor mode was the wildest ride in 20 years of gaming for me.
Great video! Pathfinder's Wrath of the Righteous is another great RPG and has a feature called "Last Azlanti Mode" which is equivalent to how BG3's Honor Mode works.
You beautifully explained the thrill of honor mode in general. Currently I play Kingdom come deliverance in such way and in even the simplest things are scary - from robbing a house to travel between locations
nice to hear another person who loves this game. i also was more emotionally invested in BG3 Honor Mode than any other game (or movie or book) and the stakes ramp up. as a solo entertainment it is unique for me and I have been playing computer games for nearly 50. I have several playthroughs and although combat becomes easier the more you know there is still new content if you make the more risky choices. i’d love to see more of your adventures.
My last playthrough had one moment of punishment. I had a super OP party roll into rivington, start a fight with the guild goons, and Gale goes to disintegrate one of them only for the vagabond NPC we're saving to literally run into the blast. I didn't even know a spell could be literally intercepted like that, but there goes my intention with that quest as the guy im saving turns to dust.
Honor mode is where you haul out the broken builds. Gloomstalker/Thief/Battlemaster Hand Crossbow, Dual Staff Storm Sorc, Throwbarian or Tiger CC Barbarian, Tavern Brawler Moon Druid, Lore bard with Cleric Dip, and Bard/Paladin are all incredibly strong. Open hand monk if you're ok with the consumables. Clerics are just innately strong (though you'll need to fix Shart's build because trickery is an under powered domain and her stats are unoptimized for a full caster support cleric. Most of these builds pop off best in act 2 and 3 because that's when the itemization starts to land, but they're strong throughout. Throwbarian and Moon Druid are probably the easiest to play and the barb gets a lot of its kit in act 1 and is feels great as early as level 3 (once you get your subclass). If anyone is struggling with Grym, grab your moon druid, assume owlbear form, station them and your caster up the stairs in view of where Grym spawns, have someone go down and start the fight, enlarge the owlbear druid with magic and engage turn based mode, and then use the owlbear's jump ability. It scales with distance, size, and it's bludgeoning damage. I did 800+ damage in one move. Big Bird > Robot
Honour Mode needs to be turned into a Roguelike. Bonuses to get better start options and increased encounter difficulties with harder, new enemies and NPC upgrades.
To replicate the difficulty of most real life DnD at least in my experience it would be more like easy or normal difficulty with no reloads. IRL DMs often are nervous about getting the party killed because we described something poorly, players often don't take away the meaning that we want them too. Also unless we really want to put in a ton of time for prep (which I always have a hard time doing because my players often don't even know how their own characters work and there's like 50% chance someone last minute cancels anyway) we probably aren't testing our encounters beforehand. Now this isn't such a problem IRL because when I realize I've made a fight too hard or too easy I just slyly adjust the stats of my bad guys or try to find a way to let the survivors escape.
Yes, another masterpiece. I really loved the sponsor segment. I like how you went all out on the difficulty. And yeah, D&D IS about the things that DON'T happen and the consequences of those. Really seems like BG3 replicates the D&D experience as perfectly as a video game can.
I know honor mode is difficult, but as someone who’s spent way too much time playing D&D, me and my friends just creatively destroyed every situation we got into, and min maxed the shit out of our builds which made things a lot easier. Game is so fun.
You better bet your booty that when I get around to the hyena ears in Honor mode, I'll have a level 4 maxed Wis potion slave, straight from the Boneman.
I've never watched you but I got this video in my recommended and I gotta say, really well done. New sub :) Please make videos for the rest of ur honor mode experience too, I love seeing how people progress through this game.
I did a honor mode playthrough as my very first playthrough as well. It is difficult, but very doable. A word of warning, the last stage of the final boss of the game is the only time I felt the game was completely unfair for someone going in blind on honor mode. I would suggest asking someone to tell you what the mechanics for the final part of final boss to help you cross the finish line.
This is why I used the age old stealth archer build and would leave 1 person in camp at all times just in case if tragedy would strike. It took 2 tries but I completed my honor mode.
I got my golden dice a few weeks ago. It was absolutely incredible to finally get through it. Act 1 was the most difficult for me, once I got to Act 2 and had my first real fight I realized how well off I was, the rest of the campaign went pretty smoothly. I only focused on what I needed to to get to level 12 so I didn't do a lot of quests in Act 3. Excited to see the rest!
I did a 1 man party run of this game in honor mode. 3 runs were killed by fall damage in the Emperor domain. 1 run was killed by fall damage in the realm where you free night song. Once I finally got my achievement for honor mode I put the game down for a good while.
I just now got this video in recommendations. I really liked it. It's a pity that there is still no continuation. I would gladly watch what adventures happened in the second and third acts.
@3:14 no way dude, that's where I reloaded. I wanted to see as much as possible in one playthrough, so I picked the other dialogue options before, then reloaded and picked the one I actually wanted last. I reloaded when my dice rolls failed. I reloaded to get through fights the way I WANTED to. Some people might call it save-scumming, but for me it enhanced the experience a great deal and extended my gametime by a lot.
The reason Astarion couldn't resurrect you with withers is because you have to talk to him twice. The first time you can question what he can help you with, and after leaving and speaking to him again the option is there. You have to do this with every character in your party individually.
Your current browser is bad. Get a better one here: operagx.gg/Kelski2 #ad
Why is every youtuber getting sponsored by opera gx 😭
Aight, gonna switch from GX to GX then i guess
Man why are you taking sponsorships from actual walware level browsers? Opera has a past of selling every piece of personal information they can get on their users and working closely with the chinese govt. Not a good look.
@@AbiBomb because its what big gaming corps want you to get. they want you to trust influencers and spread memes of consumerism. dont let it get to your head and remain critical when watching anything with brand placement
Kelski, bro, I'm sorry but it's over.
I have spent 700 hours on this game and beaten it several times on multiple difficulties including honor mode, and till this day I still find new encounters, loot and npcs I've never experienced once in any of the other playthroughs. Just goes to show how much there is in the actual game.
They truly cooked up a game of the decade here
@@kel_ski Didn't expect a reply haha, loved the video, you captured a lot of the feelings I had when I started playing honor mode and honestly, I can't get back into playing the other difficulties after experiencing it.
Though i admit, I fucking hated how you pronounced Lae'zels name 😭
I've played it 650 hours, got 45/54 achievements and still haven't finished it once...
Any cool options/dialogue/interactions for evil-aligned clerics? Lolth, tiamat, etc
@@jackalope_hunter Yeah, but they seem to be just flavoured. If anything, if you're planning on doing a full evil save, wait till patch 7 comes out which is most likely in November. Adds evil endings etc.
I love “bald man’s game 3” that’s why it got game of the year truly a masterpiece.
Truly made me lose all my hair, 10/10
I think you miss read something it’s bald man’s gay 3
Real 10/good
Bald Man Gapes 3 times 😂
Having Astarion Thief as your back pocket "shit shit shit i need to get the fuck out of here and pay Withers to revive dudes" is a must
SO helpful
I loved doing that so much
you probably know this, but you can steal all the gold you've given Withers without repercussions.
@@Aikidragon_Prime I make sure everyone has at least 200 gold in their inventories.... and if Astarion's one of my dead people, he gets rezed first so he can start pickpocketting Withers
@@bunnyboygamille I use Wyll for my lock and stealing because of his +1-10 plus ring, necklace and gloves gives him a +9-17 good enough for anything. I prefer not to use Astarion because of his continuous complaining, same as the Gith.
Crucial tip for Honor Mode, especially in act 2: do not put all your characters on an elevator platform at once. There is a random chance that they will all bug out and fall through the platform and die, ending your run.
That's what happened to me. Fortunately my tav was a half orc and her race ability saved my whole run
@@ewe_e- half orc, githyanki and halflings are the best races
In actual fact, in Honour Mode always have one party member hang back a little in every situation... Just in case!
@@Jules_Diplopia i wish we could choose the formation in which the party moves, is a little too common for the party to fuck itself because they can only walk by sniffing each others asses and ending up 3ft away from Tav
@@babyzzzzzzzz That would be a nice, to be able to set a formation.
19:10 Withers is a gentleman and demands small-talk before you can resurrect someone.
Click through the small-talk dialouge options, leave, then speak with Withers again and you can use his services.
One thing I don’t like is that you can’t switch party members when speaking to someone. In real D&D, any party member can say “Oh, I have high strength so I can do this.” But the game forces you to use who ever you are playing as at that moment.
I've done it, there is a button on the bottom left next to the barter button when you're talking click that and you can pick another member and steal everything while the other member talks.
@@Aikidragon_Prime Sadly you still can't swap your character mid-dialogue to get most proficient checks
@@neekneek5465 If you're at a choice (1,2,3,4) in a conversation you can, I just did it. You can't if the conversation doesn't have choices.
Not sure I'd classify that ability as real D&D. No GM I know is going to allow that to happen. No way I can turn to my Bard friend and have him take over a conversation that's about to go horribly because I'm not as charming and/or will definitly fail the that I can see is about to happen. His response in that situation would be "She should have started the conversation, not you".
@@jmike8934 I don't think you understood his statement.
The person doing the talking is still talking, you can then change to the rogue to do the theft. Your rogue can pickpocket while the conversation is happening and not be stuck if the interface doesn't allow it.
A dark urge honor run as your first run is genuinely masochistic
especially because you WILL have 3 extremely hard save dc that you mustnt fail otherwise you'll continue honor mode alone
@ocskopf you'll continue alone assuming you can survive your own angry party members 😭
@@thearoy3338 true dat. Laezel is broken in every one of my playthroughs so I'd most likely die even in a 1 on 1
@@ocskopf *Flashback to when she challenged me to the romance duel and I had 5% hit chance with my best attack*
I had to rewind 3 times to make sure I heard those words correctly. "... on my first full playthrough." That makes this video far more interesting to me as I watch it.
I remember first time on Honor Mode I rolled a 1 for getting Shadowheart out of her pod and I was so angry, but then I realised Lae'Zel didn't try, so she tried and got Shadowheart out instead, and I was so happy about it.. XD
The fact that every companion can do a skill check at least once is a godsend
@@josephdoria5237 Amen to that.
Im a simple man. I see that Kelski has uploaded and I press on it no matter what
Insanely based
i would never even play bg3 and i did the same thing 😅
Small tips for folks that try this kind of run (I haven't played outside of Honor Mode for long, only getting through Chapter 1 on Tactician, similar to Kelski).
You can hire a druid NPC from Withers and use all their casts on summoned magical berries each night before sleep. At around level 3 it's enough for 20 supplies. Then as the game progresses, you get two more druids. You need the druids to STAY in your party after casting or the berries disappear, so cast them immediately before sleep, and the three of them should be enough to make food a complete non-issue.
You can have a Withers mage cast Mage Armor on party members to save spell casts before swapping them out as well, and you can give a Withers NPC the feat for better potion brewing so you don't suffer combat opportunity loss on your main characters.
You can have a withers priest NPC cast Poison Resistance and Aid on your party members to save on casts as well.
Having an escape plan is by far the most important way to ensure you don't wipe. An easy way is to simply have one member stay at camp until a fight starts and then have them join only when you know you're going to win the fight, or by keeping a member far enough away to be able to get away easily. Sanctuary is one of the strongest spells in the game for this. Shadowheart can cast it on herself along with dashing and long strider to get away from almost all fights. Misty step is also very strong for this.
Bard is likely the strongest class for honor mode, and either Sword bard or Keeper of Lore are top tier classes. You can dip 2 levels into Paladin if you want, but it's fine to go full 12 levels in bard.
Lucky is probably the strongest first pick for honor mode on all builds outside of very specific builds, especially if you're using druids to make long rests much more free. It's 3 free conditional rerolls on either attack rolls, saving throws, or enemy attack rolls.
Divination wizards are super strong for honor mode for a similar reason as the Lucky feat.
Ambushes are OP. If there isn't some urgent reason to finish a fight the first time, like an NPCs life on the line, running away with everybody and re-engaging on your own terms with an ambush is stupidly strong.
Halflings have a stupidly strong racial ability for Honor mode, being able to roll all natural 1s, including attack rolls and saving throws. When you consider that nat 1 is auto fail, and it's a flat 5% chance, you're taking that auto fail and turning it into just rolling again. It's stupid stronk.
You don't need to abuse things like Withers respec and/or strength potions in order to beat Honor Mode in your first play through. I've never used Withers to respec anybody. You also don't need to have busted builds. My first time through was pure class for each character. Just be prepared to run away when you need to.
Even with all this, you'll still fuck some things up and/or roll bad sometimes. It's okay! Play it out! That's what this mode is about.
19:10 Withers can only resurrect your companions if they are dead. I believe at that moment, your companions were still down.
Bro Astarion left all his buddies behind literally lmao.
@@SavageDragon999 Astarion would 100% do that
@@gabrielabautista2966this is too true. In my first tactician run, he was the only one standing after Raph. I had him revive my Durge and then they left the House of Hope together and wandered around just the two of them for a bit because 1) I was not wasting extra scrolls and 2) I'm quite sure if Astarion was the last man standing he would just resurect the only person he cares about and then convince them we can just pay Withers to bring Halsin and Shart back later... considering the pair basically duo'd Raph with a little help from Hope... we were just punishing Halsin and Shart for not pulling their weight.
LETS GOOOOOO ITS BEEN BASICALLY 1 YEAR SINCE YOU MADE A VID ON BALDURS GATE!!!!!!!!
OHHH you right you were there for the OG stream!
@@kel_skismh everybody talking about Kelsin but nobody remembers Kelborn the OG
"The best part about D&D is failing" 100% agree. Failing; the chance to fail; experiencing the world on the other side of a fail; and surviving a fail that should have killed your party. The game has become so much better with Honor Mode. Now try Solo Honor Mode ;)
I mean, that partially true, i prefer to put this with the actual tabletop gaming, in a way or another the game will still respond with some selection of actions depending on how you rolled, which can make it a little frustrating
Aye since im a save scummer it was liberating being able to accept my actions and not backtrack at every corner
On my first Honour Mode playthrough I almost wiped from the goblin ambush in Moonhaven (the blighted village). I had to use a potion of Fly to escape, and sneak back in to revive them. I felt like an idiot almost wiping to silly goblins.
a drow would have just walked in there in broad daylight, commanded them to lick the streets clean of any dirt and used their asses as chair to sit on.
Many CRPGs have "Honor Mode" options. They usually call it "Hardcore Mode" or something similar.
Gotta look around on the difficulty setting page when you start a new campaign in whatever RPG you fire up. It's usually on either the difficulty list or an extra checkbox option that adds on to the difficulty level you picked.
Yeah, some of them even allow it in the lower difficulties, like Pathfinder and the Obsidian ones. And thank god for that, their highest difficulties are truly hell compared to BG3.
There's also XCOM, but that's a different vibe.
Iron mode is the most broad term used. X-COM for example has a similar mode and is downright diabolical.
@@zzxp1 "Iron man" mode. But yeah anyways, it's pretty common in RPGs and also tactics/strategy games. XCOM is a good example. Paradox games like Crusader Kings 3 and Stellaris, too.
A more obscure one is Battle Brothers, a tactics/management game where you control a mercenary company in a really gritty medieval fantasy world. Not very widely known, but great game.
HELLO AGAIN, NEW VIDEO FINALLY
I'm fully settled into the new office and got my new PC up and running. Let's make some videos, yeah?
Are you gonna be doing fallout 2 this week also is fallout tactics on the table
TECH SUPPORT TECH SUPPORT
@@DramaticBatu yuh also I got gifted a membership during the half life Alex stream
Fallout 2 tomorrow:^)
@@kel_ski tech support tomorrow, please, WE NEED IT
I've only done one playthrough, and it was regular Tav. I'm now doing Honor mode with Durge. I'm actually using the same half-elf face as you but half-drow and with a dad mustache and the buff bod.
I've been playing smart-ish, but still screw up. It's led to some ridiculous outcomes so far. Like I stalled on using Silence on Priestess Gut and ended up killing all the goblins in that area. I used the crag spiders for that (the ones by the guidance amulet) and they all survived. Afterwards when I was exploring, I sent a mage hand into a hole I found and the spiders followed it in. It was the room where Roah went to hide with the other Zhents and one of them freaked out and used a firebolt and they freaking obliterated everyone and everything in the room with the smokepowder barrels. Then it goes to the party on the other side just none the wiser to what happened. Rip Roah.
I'm at level 6 at the creche now. Wish me luck.
In Honour Mode, I started thunderwaving goblins into the pit that's to the left of Dror Ragzlin's room before I could talk to Gut (I wanted the brand because Nere drops a ring that buffs thunder attacks if you have the brand.... and I am sorbard that uses a lot of thunder magic)... accidentally aggro'd the whole camp instead of quickly and quietly taking care of the gobs in that area. The map turned red, and Dror's whole group ran over into that area and I thought I was done for. Some well actioned crowd control from Shart and Karlach being Karalch saved the day. Had to finish clearing out the rest of the area before we could long rest, but thankfully Gut and her minions are all chumps and that smokepowder the Zhent have was a fun little present to gift Minty with.
We are so back! I was hoping you would do a Baldur's Gate video, but I never thought you'd actually do it
I always wanted to haha, but since I was late, doing it Honor Mode style seemed like so much more fun
Kelski opening my gates with the baldur's gate video
💀
@@kel_ski he baldurs my gate untill i 3
@@dxcvvxdbro
World wide weave was actually genius. You're funny, internet man. I'll even subscribe and smash that like button like a good little consumer
Thank you other internet person, I’m glad you enjoyed the video
For real, that was one of the better sponsor segues I've seen
god please continue this series. Such copious amounts of seratonin just gave my body a facelift.
0:12 ROCK AND STONE
ROCK AND STONE LADS
FOR ROCK AND STONE
Kelski truly rolled a Nat 20 on video production, this is another banger.
I’m glad it came out good 🙏 always be putting my all into em!
@@kel_ski definitly notice that, your uploads are some of my favorite to see in my inbox and watch! Keep it up!
My dude!! i would love a stream of bg3! but if it doesn't sound to crazy, i would recommend you to do it off stream and keep the vods. Because the back seat that you are going to endure will be HORRIBLE. love your vids kels
Phewww you’re probably right on that backseating lol, I’m sure people would judge every single dialogue option I choose
But thats honestly the chat interaction that will boost views even if it may be insufferable to endure😂
@@kel_ski Imagine getting caught with no game live. That would be be like your homies in real life seeing you choke lmaoo
I really hope you're making more of these of Kelsin's adventures!!!
Gotta be the funniest thing I've watched in a while.
Can't wait for part 2!
Having done Honor mode Act 1 as well at one point during the Auntie Ethel fight one of her duplicates bugged out and became an unkillable hostile enemy in the room even after the fight ended. Of course I can’t talk to Mayrina cause there’s still an enemy in the room, and I can’t just reset the fight because honor mode. So I had everyone skedaddle, then carefully stealthed Astarion with an invisibility potion past the line of sight of Ethel to not draw aggro, and finally got the convo to proc. Of course it did mean Astarion was leading the conversation to a woman who was in a lot of emotional distress, but we can’t win every battle.
Fun fact you can web a windmill to save a gnome after scarring off some goblins
I always love hearing castle crashers music in videos
You even got the best Knight profile pic too hell yeah
you and I picked up BG3 around the same time. it's been such a treat going back through the fandom after the hype as an og BG1/2/PS:T/DOS fan, like digging through a huge mountain of treasure!! all the people still updating their fanworks are truly in love with the game and it shows. great video man :)
“Extremely curvy and clickable” is DIABOLICAL description 😂
Whomever was writing the evil choice options was living his best life. I still remember laughing for a solid couple of minutes in act III when the guild members thank you for saving them from the evil Rock Lord goons and then TAV hits em' with the "I'm pretty evil myself, it's time to die" Option .
watching him fight the animated armor in arcane tower without the sussur blossoms pains my soul
THAT MAKES SO MUCH SENSE AHHH, why did I not think of that 🥲
@@kel_ski hahaha yeah! I think excluding the one you have to feed the elevator, you get five in total from the tree and the garden, which is the exact amount you need to incapacitate all of them in honor mode :) they skip their turn entirely so you can just focus on Bernard (the big guy)!
@@justdoingmything oh, I didn’t know this and I have 800 hours in the game 😆 I just smooth talk my way out of any trouble by citing poetry! He always gives me a ring and a greater healing potion - I think you can also get a hug!
I love the random bits you do!
What a video man, so glad you made a video on this in your special way
Thanks for watching brotha 🤝 glad I could put my spin on it!
The sponsorship segment is incredible!!! I never saw a such well placed and included sponsor as here. I absolutely hate to watch sponsorship placements but this one i didnt even think about skipping cuz it was so well integrated
Thank you so much 🙏 I give any sponsor segments the same love and care as every other part of the video haha
My older brother tells me once in a while "You should get Baldur's Gate 3" I've only heard about the game and I've never seen what it's about. Thanks Kelski for making this video, you're a LEGEND!
I gotchu 🙏 hope you give the game a try!
Darkest dungeon prevents you from save scumming. The game constantly saves itself and there’s only one save file. Once characters in your party die then they are permanently dead. It’s also just a really hard game.
I’m interested 👀
Epic, a new Kelski video! I wonder who's sponsoring him this time.
This is so good 👍👍👍 Really want this to become series
Though I haven't tried BG3's honor mode, I've played Pathfinder: Kingmaker / WotR on hardcore so much that I don't think I could play them any other way. Even though they're sadistically designed and buggy messes, something keeps drawing me back to it. Combat and skill checks are so much more tense and impactful whenever one wrong step could end the entire run.
for me bg3 honor mode is easier than Pathfinder hardcore/unfair. i complete the honor run without any retry, although i did playthrough the game 4 or 5 time and pick the most op party comp.
Now if that wasn't THE best commercial integration I've ever seen...
3:07
Thats why you enable "Karmic Dice" in the settings
no, never do that. it takes the fun out of the game.
Puss
I'm trying honor mode for the first time too, almost my whole team died fighting the gnolls during act 1, only Astarion was left alive and I thought my honor mode was done for, that twink killed the remaining enemies and save my life. now he's my romance choice for the next playthrough, I owe him that lmao
He saved me from stupid gymforge battle and gityanki ambush ( yes, you can convince l’azel to go along but they are not decieved and I was level 4 so I had no choice)
I lost a 70 hour Honour mode run due to a single cocky decision that snowballed a fight in act 2 completely out of control, don't think I've ever been as devestated by a game before. 10/10
But that's the point, the stakes are actualy real which makes every action feel so important. I never played another difficulty again and have now completed HM 3 times, 1 normal, 1 no magic run, 1 only magic run (ironically somehow harder than the no magic at some points), and I've now died 4 times trying the epitome of BG3 difficulty: the Solo Honour mode run. Honestly can't get enough of this game.
NEW KELSKI UPLOAD!!! I LOVE YOU
The first 5 levels are usually the most difficult. My strat for honour runs is usually to just never fight a single combat encounter until level 4. I would get a wizard with 16 strength and jump all the way up to the harper stash atop the hill to skip the grove entrance fight, and turn into a drow to get a bunch of dialogue XP from just walking to the goblin camp. That way, you skip the whole withers cave fight and avoid brutal level 2 slog fests.
If you want a little cheat code, have these three builds in your party: Shadowheart life cleric with phalar aluve, Astarion gloomstalker ranger with titanstring bow, Lae'zel as open hand monk, and those three can usually carry whatever mediocre build you use on your own character.
Honestly I don’t think the first 5 levels are hard at all. You can get 75xp x2 on the nautoloid by defeating zhalk and the mindflayer to get instant lv2 on the beach. Then surprise round against the intellect devours, talk my way through the bandits. Then surprise round against the rest to get withers and respec. After that instant lv3 at the gate to the emerald grove. Take out the bugbear, use calm emotions to clear the harpies, free the goblin in the prison, move to the goblin camp and basically lv4. Then I go to get bonus xp from the newborn gnolls and just surprise anders and I’m already basically lv 5.
Great video and you are a very brave man!
I finished my first honor mode after practicing in tactician mode. I thought I was prepared for what was about to come in honor mode.
Oh boy how naive I was. Honor mode was the wildest ride in 20 years of gaming for me.
Great video! Pathfinder's Wrath of the Righteous is another great RPG and has a feature called "Last Azlanti Mode" which is equivalent to how BG3's Honor Mode works.
You beautifully explained the thrill of honor mode in general. Currently I play Kingdom come deliverance in such way and in even the simplest things are scary - from robbing a house to travel between locations
18:53 "please, PLEASE, PLEASSSEEE!!! o my god! My buthole is puckering" im dyin 😂
nice to hear another person who loves this game. i also was more emotionally invested in BG3 Honor Mode than any other game (or movie or book) and the stakes ramp up. as a solo entertainment it is unique for me and I have been playing computer games for nearly 50. I have several playthroughs and although combat becomes easier the more you know there is still new content if you make the more risky choices.
i’d love to see more of your adventures.
My last playthrough had one moment of punishment. I had a super OP party roll into rivington, start a fight with the guild goons, and Gale goes to disintegrate one of them only for the vagabond NPC we're saving to literally run into the blast.
I didn't even know a spell could be literally intercepted like that, but there goes my intention with that quest as the guy im saving turns to dust.
I beat honor mode last week and it was so awesome to finally complete it :D
thank you larian for this game!!!
If you compare my Bae‘Zel to the Shrek queen one more time, I swear by my oath, I will divine Smite you
Best game in the last decade hands down. My fav game of all time. Currently replaying DOS 2 trying to fill the hole left by BG3
Honor mode is where you haul out the broken builds. Gloomstalker/Thief/Battlemaster Hand Crossbow, Dual Staff Storm Sorc, Throwbarian or Tiger CC Barbarian, Tavern Brawler Moon Druid, Lore bard with Cleric Dip, and Bard/Paladin are all incredibly strong. Open hand monk if you're ok with the consumables. Clerics are just innately strong (though you'll need to fix Shart's build because trickery is an under powered domain and her stats are unoptimized for a full caster support cleric.
Most of these builds pop off best in act 2 and 3 because that's when the itemization starts to land, but they're strong throughout. Throwbarian and Moon Druid are probably the easiest to play and the barb gets a lot of its kit in act 1 and is feels great as early as level 3 (once you get your subclass).
If anyone is struggling with Grym, grab your moon druid, assume owlbear form, station them and your caster up the stairs in view of where Grym spawns, have someone go down and start the fight, enlarge the owlbear druid with magic and engage turn based mode, and then use the owlbear's jump ability. It scales with distance, size, and it's bludgeoning damage. I did 800+ damage in one move. Big Bird > Robot
'Shadowheart Disapproves' *reloads game*
Honour Mode needs to be turned into a Roguelike.
Bonuses to get better start options and increased encounter difficulties with harder, new enemies and NPC upgrades.
11:10 that is baldur's gate in the intro cutscene. You can even find the destroyed tower in the lower city lmao
14:25 i'm glad I wasn't the only one surprised by that encounter and died...honor mode is something else man
Love your video, I can't wait to see other ones about this game
To replicate the difficulty of most real life DnD at least in my experience it would be more like easy or normal difficulty with no reloads. IRL DMs often are nervous about getting the party killed because we described something poorly, players often don't take away the meaning that we want them too. Also unless we really want to put in a ton of time for prep (which I always have a hard time doing because my players often don't even know how their own characters work and there's like 50% chance someone last minute cancels anyway) we probably aren't testing our encounters beforehand. Now this isn't such a problem IRL because when I realize I've made a fight too hard or too easy I just slyly adjust the stats of my bad guys or try to find a way to let the survivors escape.
Yes, another masterpiece. I really loved the sponsor segment.
I like how you went all out on the difficulty. And yeah, D&D IS about the things that DON'T happen and the consequences of those.
Really seems like BG3 replicates the D&D experience as perfectly as a video game can.
I always try to make the sponsored segments fun haha, thanks for watching 🙏
That "Spawn-Die" reference just earned you a sub lmao
I know honor mode is difficult, but as someone who’s spent way too much time playing D&D, me and my friends just creatively destroyed every situation we got into, and min maxed the shit out of our builds which made things a lot easier. Game is so fun.
You better bet your booty that when I get around to the hyena ears in Honor mode, I'll have a level 4 maxed Wis potion slave, straight from the Boneman.
The kicking the squirrel thing works for anyone if you make it go away haha not just the Durge, but the Durge seems to enjoy it
The trick to beating that Githyanki sword summoner guy, is to bait him out of the room, and throw him over the top rope.
Can't wait for the next episodeeee and I hope you make the video longer cuz your sooo entertaining ♥️
Time to make a 7 hour video now lmao
Thanks for watching!
I've never watched you but I got this video in my recommended and I gotta say, really well done. New sub :)
Please make videos for the rest of ur honor mode experience too, I love seeing how people progress through this game.
I think I’ll definitely cover Acts 2 and 3 now! Thanks for watching, glad you enjoyed the videos 😁
@@kel_ski hell yeah, looking forward to it!
5:29 i have video evodence of spending multiple hours on one fight because i wouldnt save scum i have video evidence link coming tommorow if i rember
To clarify it wasn't even a hard one I'm just unlucky and I hate playing with the baby karmic dice that aren't really random
I absolutely throw it back to the song at 9:52 whenever it comes on in my game
Chef kelski cooked another delicious meal
Hope you enjoyed it 🙏
@@kel_skitruly delectable
So true
I love that you customized your character to look similar to Balduran
If I reloaded every time Astarion disapproved of something, the heat death of the sun would happen before I even got close to finishing the game.
I did a honor mode playthrough as my very first playthrough as well. It is difficult, but very doable. A word of warning, the last stage of the final boss of the game is the only time I felt the game was completely unfair for someone going in blind on honor mode. I would suggest asking someone to tell you what the mechanics for the final part of final boss to help you cross the finish line.
Great video! Durge could be considered THE origin character, given how deeply his backstory is interwoven with the games story.
This is why I used the age old stealth archer build and would leave 1 person in camp at all times just in case if tragedy would strike. It took 2 tries but I completed my honor mode.
15:25 This cracked me up so hard, I can't breathe
I got my golden dice a few weeks ago. It was absolutely incredible to finally get through it. Act 1 was the most difficult for me, once I got to Act 2 and had my first real fight I realized how well off I was, the rest of the campaign went pretty smoothly. I only focused on what I needed to to get to level 12 so I didn't do a lot of quests in Act 3. Excited to see the rest!
2:52 BIOSHOCK MENTIONNED 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
Legendary franchise
I did a 1 man party run of this game in honor mode. 3 runs were killed by fall damage in the Emperor domain. 1 run was killed by fall damage in the realm
where you free night song. Once I finally got my achievement for honor mode I put the game down for a good while.
I just now got this video in recommendations. I really liked it. It's a pity that there is still no continuation. I would gladly watch what adventures happened in the second and third acts.
I like how your character looks like Anakin Skywalker and also has the dark urge lol
please continue this series 🙏
„Thing look good so far.“
Just left the prologue and has 80 hours of gameplay ahead of him.
your first death is exactly how i died on my first honor run
5:40, my first playthrough, I save scum(ed?) like there's no tomorrow. I WANNA GET THROUGH THE STORY
When I do Durge, i'll avoid that lil load button tho,
Great video! Would love videos of your journey through the lands between
This is exactly how I did my first playthrough, dark urge honor mode. It was unbelievably cool
Only took us a month to get a new Kelski upload. Nice.
LMAO new record
We need more Balders Gate 3 content, I can’t wait for more 😂
Bet 👀
@@kel_ski can’t wait!
Damn good edits. I don't think I'll install Opera GX but you did it big justice, well done. Most def a like 👍
Banger game. Banger video. Excited for the continuing story
“We don’t reach for her artifact bc Kelsin knows consent”
Be like Kelsin. But like… not too much
Also, I forgot what Withers looks like without a giant rack. I have a mod installed that give him massive tits
@3:14 no way dude, that's where I reloaded. I wanted to see as much as possible in one playthrough, so I picked the other dialogue options before, then reloaded and picked the one I actually wanted last. I reloaded when my dice rolls failed. I reloaded to get through fights the way I WANTED to. Some people might call it save-scumming, but for me it enhanced the experience a great deal and extended my gametime by a lot.
The reason Astarion couldn't resurrect you with withers is because you have to talk to him twice. The first time you can question what he can help you with, and after leaving and speaking to him again the option is there. You have to do this with every character in your party individually.