Baldur's Gate 3

Introduction

As I love Dungeons and Dragons, Baldur's Gate 3 (BG3) is now my favorite game. I wanted to write a few documents on this game for people who are new to the game. SPOILER ALERT: IF YOU DO NOT WANT TO ENCOUNTER SPOILERS, STOP READING HERE.

Click on any image in this article for the full size original image. This page is currently under construction.

Preliminary Information

One great place to get good advice on BG3 is on Reddit: the BG3 Subreddit. Other great sources of information include Game Rant

Initial Game / Initial Party Composition.

DnD, and to a lesser extent, BG3, is a game that depends on diversity. You are much better with a variety of classes and species, so it's a great game to teach diversity.

My advice for those who are new to this game is to begin playing a Bard. The class is very easy to play and gives you great options. I'd recommend playing with a species that gives armor bonus for medium armor, such as Shield Dwarf or Githyanki. This will make your bard more survivable. Bard works well because, early on, you get all 3 companions you would need to make it all the way through the game: Shadowheart, Lae'zel, and Gale. One can go find Karlach as a substitute for Lae'zel, and Wyll as a substitute for Gale, but the three I mentioned, you get super early, they are super easy to find, and even two (Shadowheart and Lae'zel) you get right in the beginning on the ship. Also, read about Wyll and Karlach's back stories below for other important things to think about before you substitute.

This means you should recruit Shadowheart (Cleric), you don't have to recruit Astarian (rogue) if you take Urchin background with specialty on slight of hand and stealth, and you can then add Lae'zel (Fighter) and Gale (Wizard). Easily, before you even get to the first major battle (the goblins attacking the caravan), you are already set. Astarian can sit at camp or you can just refuse to recruit him, or even kill him.

If you prefer an even more heavily armored Bard, take level 1 Paladin but make sure it is DEX based, then all the other levels as Bard. The first reason to use this set of people is because you fill all the important party roles (Bard as dialogue specialist and utility, Lae'zel as combat specialist, Shadowheart as support caster, and Gale as offensive caster).

The second reason is you have characters who can make important saves. As far as STR versus DEX, Lae'zel and Shadowheart can use melee weapons, and then your bard and Gale as ranged weapons. But this means you also have characters with high stats for other important saves such as CON (La'ezel/Shadowheart) and INT (Gale) and WIS (Shadowheart). That way if any area of effect spell is cast against you, at least one character may have a good chance of not being effected.

How Party Composition Works

I am going to share a screenshot of a very useful image provided in a video by FextraLife.

The goal of this is to find a way to put all five roles into four characters. This means one character may have to fill more than one role.

This first explains why I tell people that the "best" play-through in solo mode is to play Bard. Bard can fill up to three roles at one time if you stack your Bard character right. And if you haven't watched the video from FextraLife, I recommend you go watch it.

There are several benefits to playing Bard with your first play-through. First, you can specialize in your "face character" skills which will make you better in dialogue. Second, if you take Urchin or Thief as your background, you will be proficient with lock pick and trap disarm kits. Third, by level 2-3, your Bard will have Jack of all Trades, which makes you very good with your other skill checks. Finally, you can make sure you always have at least healing word and (higher levels) mass healing word, which allows you to apply some support caster healing. I say this because one player cannot usually realistically fully fill three roles, but a Bard can fill at least a partial healing function. Finally, if you can trap disarm and lock pick, you don't have to keep switching to another character (usually Astarian) while you're trying to play the game, which is convenient.

This means that three party functions would need to be filled: combat specialist (Minthara, Lae'zel, Karlach or Minsc), support caster (Shadowheart, Halsin, or Jahera), and offensive caster (Gale or Wyll). Usually, you can recruit the characters listed in the following order (due to their proximity to the crashed nautiloid at the beginning): Shadowheart, Gale, Lae'zel, Wyll, Karlach, Halsin, Minthara, Jahira, Minsc. (I am omitting Alfira due to how it's nearly impossible to keep her recruited.)

Of course, you can play any origin character, Dark Urge with any custom build, or just your own completely custom build. In which case, you could adjust your other party members as you see fit. Technically, once you meet Withers, you can reclass any origin character into any class you want. However, what follows below is a hypothetical way to use origin characters as their original class in combination with any of your choices and how to format your party, but with early companions.

Shadowheart: likely Wyll + Gale + Astarian.
Gale: likely Wyll + Astarian + Shadowheart.
Lae'zel: likely Shadowheart + Astarian + Gale.
Wyll: likely Shadowheart + Gale + Astarian.

However, keep in mind that you can recruit characters by telling them to go to your camp. This means, as you find more characters, you can modify your party as you see fit. See the bottom of this article for a full Decision Tree on who to recruit in order to make the 5 roles fit into 4 characters.

How Ability Scores Work

Many have written about how DnD Ability Scores work, so I am going to go over them very briefly here and how they apply to BG3.

STR: Strength is for melee weapons mainly. However, in DnD your DM may choose to ignore encumberment and gold weight. In BG3, how much you carry (encumberment) and gold weight counts. So this is the only ability score that would benefit from an odd number, and only minimally. You see, at 10, your "modifier" is zero, at 12 it is +1, etc., increasing with even numbers. But STR of 15 technically helps with carry weight over a 14, because it is 15 pounds per point. Also, BG3 will not let you put plate armor on if your strength is less than 15.
DEX: Dexterity. Mainly for ranged weapons and jumping out of the way for damage spells, and there are plenty of spells this applies to. So I try to never go below 10. Some classes that use finesse weapons should prioritize DEX. The Titanstring Bow, is the only ranged weapon I know of in BG3 that adds both STR and DEX modifiers to it, which is why on some elf builds (for species proficient in long bows) I will dump a few extra points into STR and DEX.
CON: Constitution determines your total hit points, how well you resist breaking concentration on spells when struck, and generally how well you resist poison and other such sickening spells or conditions. While it is true that often combat is won by the party that deals the most damage the fastest, I tend to prioritize CON most of the time due to wanting a high amount of hit points. If something as simple as a poison spray takes out one of my main fighters, it will lead to combat taking longer and the rest of the party taking more damage, generally.
INT: Intelligence is mainly for wizard and Arcane Trickster spells. There are some skill checks like history and nature that depend on it. When possible, I try to get at least 10 in INT. However, sometimes certain builds don't even need it, so it can become the "dump" stat (8). But be warned, in this game you will fight Mind Flayers rarely, and their spells tend to work using INT or require INT saves. This is why at least on the face character, I try not to go below 10.
WIS: Wisdom is mainly for perception checks and many spell saves. Druids and clerics depend on it for how powerful their spells are. I tend to keep it at 10 because I hate having a negative perception modifier. You see, especially in highly trapped areas like the Shaar temple, the worst thing you can see on the screen is all 4 of your characters failing a perception check, leading to you wanting to reload. So I try to always get at least 10 in WIS and I try to give all my characters proficiency in perception checks whenever possible. Also, as a side note, I try to give all my characters skill proficiency on Perception.
CHA: Charisma. This is not a measurement of how pretty or ugly your character is. Charisma is the ability to influence people and also applies to some spells for some classes. Indeed, the majority of classes in the game are CHA based: sorcerer, paladin, warlock, bard. For builds that don't need it, I dump it (8 CHA) but on any party face character I try to maximize it because nothing sucks more than using up inspiration points to re-roll, or even to reload the game based on a failed save.

Origin Characters and Stats

So here's my review of the origin characters. I will list their pros and cons. This is my opinion, of course, so it's subjective, and you can form your own opinion.

Keep in mind, I often repeated this, so I moved it here to the beginning: these are ORIGIN stats, and most of these are not set up to be the party dialogue specialist (i.e. "face"). And even if you try to switch to your "face" character before you get into dialogue, keep in mind that sometimes the game switches back to you anyways, meaning you're likely better off changing the stats and specifications ("respec") because you use them as your main character.

You can take any character, however, and change their class ("reclass") all you want and play them how you want. But keep in mind, of all the characters that will stay with you if you play as an evil character, Shadowheart, Gale, Astarian and Minthara are the ones who will not abandon you if you play evil. Gale will have a crisis of beliefs, so you'll need to convince him to stay, but the rest seem to be mostly not bothered by it.

Shadowheart

Shadowheart is, in my opinion, easily the most perfect character in this game. Usually I don't play as Shadowheart, but I nearly always recruit her into my party. Even if you don't change her subdomain from Trickery domain at level 2, she is excellent. I don't usually like her statistics, so I respec her in order to change her ability scores. I prefer her to be STR based and carry The Blood of Lathander (melee). But her back story helps the whole party and not just her. She can survive being in both a good and an evil playthrough. And her skills are almost always useful everywhere. In my opinion, Shadowheart is perfect as a support caster.

There's really only one problem: if you want to play her as your "face," you'll likely be spread too thin with needing to put most points in STR, CON, WIS, and CHA. Note that I prefer the archetype of a cleric with full plate armor, wielding a mace or morningstar. If you prefer STR based also, dumping DEX (give up on ranged weapons) and INT, you at best can get STR 14 DEX 9 CON 14 INT 8 WIS 16 CHA 14. This means first ability score improvement will likely be CHA, then CON, then STR. This is still spread too thin in my opinion.

Thus I prefer to play Shadowheart as a party member and not my main character. Again, her stats are not good as set up by default, so I would respec to STR 14 DEX 10 CON 16 INT 10 WIS 16 CHA 8. Then I'd likely use my ability score increases for STR, then WIS, then WIS. When her STR is at least 16, she hits things. But the way I play, she spends most her actions healing, at least until The Blood of Lanthander.

Gale

Gale is a very useful character. He comes as a Wizard, which means he sort of takes longer to reach his stride than other characters. His back story is at first costly it seems, but that liability goes away over time. If you play as Gale as your character, you get Tara, a Tressym (cat-bird). He doesn't really have a quest, so his character is mostly not difficult to deal with. And if Wizard bothers you, change his stats and class into Sorcerer. I prefer Wizard only so that INT-based items and buffs are possible.

As a normal character (not the party "face"), his origin stats are not good. Larian Studios is likely trying to place stats for the personality of the character and not to be a face character, but they still are not good stats. To make him simply a wizard, you can respec him to something like STR 8 DEX 14 CON 16 INT 16 WIS 10 CHA 10. Note that this dumps STR, which will make other things annoying. A work-wround is take CON 14 STR 10. DEX is for your ranged weapons. Most of the time, wizards should not be in melee range anyways, so STR 8 or 10 would work. Take misty step spell to help yourself stay out of range. I prefer Gale with two hand crossbows, a weapon combo that also works for Sorcerer.

If you want to make him the "face," there will be several problems. First, his ability points will be spread too thinly across four main stats. Second, even with the Warped Headband of Intellect to cover INT, you end up losing possibly one ability score improvement to get medium armor for the sparky build, etc. I think he works way better as a wizard than as the party "face." The best you can hope to achieve is STR 10 DEX 14 CON 14 INT 14 WIS 10 CHA 14 and with the Warped Headband of Intellect and a respec, STR 10 DEX 14 CON 16 INT 17 WIS 10 CHA 14. Just not ideal all around.

Lae'zel

Lae'zel is very useful in the game. However, most of the time, in my experience, I'm spending time in dialogue convincing her not to cause problems. But her story arc is beautiful as she learns not to see the world in extremes and to be affectionate. Githyanki have good racial bonuses for weapons and armor also. You can find her early and she is strong. If you keep her as a fighter, she easily becomes the best combat specialist you can find other than perhaps Karlach. And her personal quests involve an area where you likely will already want to go to get The Blood of Lathander. Romance options are easy: just do well in combat and it's inevitable she will highly regard you. You can pursue the relationship easily, and early, and with good results. If I am not the combat specialist role, and she is in my party, I prefer her to become a Paladin if it works for the current party, as I consider Paladins slightly stronger than Fighters. Paladins have nova damage, also called burst damage: the ability to do a lot of damage quickly. You could also hold on to fighter levels and add Paladin to get more attacks, but as a single class, Paladin is better in my opinion. And it's nice to have a Githyanki in your party because some of the best items of the game require the wielder to be Githyanki.

Whether a face character or not, her stats are not the best. I would recommend for a normal fighter, respec with Withers for STR 16 DEX 14 CON 16 INT 10 WIS 10 CHA 8. STR and CON are prioritized for melee and hit points, and then DEX is just for ranged weapons. DEX 15 wouldn't help, so I put the 2 leftover points into INT for mind flayer spell saves and stuff. She's incredibly powerful in this state, and versatile with her DEX for ranged weapons.

But if a face character, like her origin play-through, I normally recommend switching her to paladin for CHA anyways, because it harmonizes with being a "face." If I did that, personally my next choice would be STR 14 DEX 12 CON 14 INT 10 WIS 10 CHA 16. You can also attempt STR 14 DEX 10 CON 16 INT 8 WIS 10 CHA 16. This means my first ability improvement will likely be STR, then CHA, then CHA or CON.

Wyll

I am glad that Larian included Wyll. He is a warlock, which is charisma based. You can play him as an origin character or you can recruit him. I have not used him often as a party member. From my perspective, his personal quest is more annoying than most, and it's all his fault. That being said, if you let him kill Karlach, that's an easy way to resolve it, though you also will likely feel sad that you killed innocent Karlach. He has good abilities in general, and can also function as the face character if you configure him properly. If you have no other party members who are CHA based, Wyll is a good addition, though he cannot (in my opinion) fully fill the role of combat specialist. But if you plan on keeping Karlach, you end up having to try to roll high enough to get his patron to agree to alternative ways to fulfill his contract. What we learn here is never to make a pact with the devil.

I'm going to comment on a "face" build for him. As configured, again, three odd number stats, not good. I would change these to something more like STR 10 DEX 14 CON 14 INT 10 WIS 10 CHA 16. Again, you can dump INT to 8 in order to push CON to 16. If so, likely the ability score improvements will be DEX first, then CHA, then CHA or CON.

Astarian

When I first played this game, I was playing a Paladin and Astarian nearly bit me in the middle of the night. I let him feed off of me but he wouldn't break free, so I took the dialogue option to drive a stake into him, killing him. However, when playing the Dark Urge I recruited Astarian. Astarian is very good at being a Rogue. Astarian's side quest doesn't come up much, and theoretically you can convince Astarian to not pursue it. Astarian is definitely evil, and only concerned with himself. You can technically move his stats around in such a way that you can emphasize CHA score and make him your dialogue specialist, but I don't generally recommend it unless you also get the Warped Headband of Intellect and run Arcane Trickster to move stats around, or gloves that set your DEX to 18, etc.

So if he's not a face character, you can respec him to be a face character rather easily. This would likely look like STR 10 DEX 16 CON 16 INT 10 WIS 10 CHA 10. You don't have to dump CHA or INT for this build, making it pretty resilient, and you can't increase the origin stats more than 17, and only one stat will be able to be increased to 17 anyway. If you make him an arcane trickster, though, you can instead choose STR 10 DEX 16 CON 14 INT 14 WIS 10 CHA 8. This is a good compromise because you don't need to be increasing INT for what is sort of like being a "quarter caster" build. If you do this, I recommend only getting spells that help you with stealth. However, if I am going with the Arcane Trickster subclass, I prefer to instead choose the stats I first mentioned in this paragraph and using the Warped Headband of Intellect to bump INT to 17. That way I can get ability score increases to push DEX to 20 by the end of the game.

If you make him a face character, you'd likely respec to STR 10 DEX 16 CON 16 INT 8 WIS 10 CHA 14. If you are using Astarian as the face and you insist on Arcane Trickster, you will need the Warped Headband of Intellect to make this work. From here, ability score increases would likely be, for me, first CHA, then DEX twice. Astarian can be a good face character if you do these things.

Karlach

Karlach is easily a favorite of many players due to her cute statements and behaviors. She comes as a barbarian, which is a good combat specialist class. However, there are a couple of considerations for her backstory. First, it's not easy to just walk into the druid grove with her if Wyll is still alive, because it triggers an encounter. Second, Karlach can sometimes lose control of her anger at times that it's not convenient. Third, if you destroy the druid grove, she will leave your party, but you would also not be able to repair her infernal engine (Dammon dies). So for a good play-through, she can be very beneficial. Her personal arc is annoying in the beginning but then gets way easier to tolerate.

Note that some player complain about how much you have to do in order to keep Karlach in your party. This is one of the reasons why I prefer Lae'zel.

Karlach's ability scores for an origin character are bad. Again, the only stat that can be odd and benefit is STR, and the benefits are low. Because barbarians don't need lots of ability scores, here is a way to push CHA into the build for being the face, such as STR 16 DEX 10 CON 16 INT 8 WIS 10 CHA 14.

But keep in mind, if you don't make her the "face," you can do something like STR 17 DEX 11 CON 16 INT 10 WIS 10 CHA 10. I did this only because the first ability score improvement can go to STR and DEX, then the second improvement to CON, then the third to STR for a total of 20 at end game.

Dark Urge

The origin Dark Urge has, again, like many origin characters, several odd number ability scores. This is detrimental to gameplay. I know it says Sorcerer above, but I just took a screenshot of the defaults. For my own Dark Urge paladin, I choose STR 16 CON 14 CHA 16 beause CON doesn't do much for a Paladin due to not holding concentration on most spells. Your focus is on smites, which are not CON related. STR affects the total damage of your smites, and you don't get distance based smites (i.e. DEX can stay 10). This means you end up dumping INT to 8 but keep in mind, one can either take the Warped Headband of Intellect to work around this or, if this is a face character, INT to 10 for saves. But for a paladin, since you end up being front line, smites are where it's at. Note that you can also (Sorcadin) take levels in sorcerer for distance damage spells if needed.

    But going back to the sorcerer build above, if this is not a face character, 8 INT, otherwise 10 INT. For a sorcerer, I prioritize CON over DEX because sorcerers will likely want concentration spells to stay potent. To be fair, however, if one decides to ignore concentration spells and focus on one-time damage spells, CON can be a secondary focus. Indeed, I tend to play sorcerers that are focused on non-concentration damage spells. INT isn't a requirement.

    One sorcerer / wizard build that works very well is the sparky build, so I generally recommend taking a species that offers medium armor, or taking medium armor as a feat. This is because there's a medium armor (insert name) that synergizes with all the other lightning charge equipment and can give you a very potent build.

    Another possibility is the Sorcadin build: take levels 1-2 of Paladin and the rest as Sorcerer. That way one can use heavy armor and shields and then a nice melee based weapon. So then you'd likely end up with CHA 16 CON 16 STR 14 in some way. One can keep DEX at 10 and use only distance spells for distance damage and then the melee weapon for smites up close.

Minthara

Minthara is difficult to recruit as the game is currently configured. These stats are from the Goblin camp, when you first encounter her. I would point out that she is very capable as a Paladin, but first, she will likely not be happy in your party unless you are playing as evil Dark Urge or similar. She's also difficult to romance. But as a party addition, she is amazing. And currently I multi-classed her into sorcerer but keeping level 1 Paladin for armor benefits. She can run around the combat zone with a good melee weapon and then cast really nice spells.

She is not an origin character, but she is recruitable, and I think she is a very good party member for that. It's slightly frustrating that you can't recruit her fully until act 2. But if you keep other recruitable characters around, you won't be suffering through the game with only 3 party members.

Halsin

I have no experience with Halsin just yet. However, I noticed that if you set him free and encounter him in the grove afterwards, you can recruit him. See elsewhere in here where I go over how I would spec druids. These stats above are from the Goblin camp, where you first encounter him.

Jaheira

Jaheira is a good character. These stats are from Act 2 on the top of Moonrise tower, when you first get an option to engage in dialogue with her to recruit her. She's pleasant to be around, and capable. She's a druid. Recruiting her can be difficult, but also easy depending. For instance, as Dark Urge evil play-through, we set the Nightsong free, but then I straight up murdered Isobel, then fast traveled to the Moon Rise towers. Jaheira was outside, so I told her I'm on her side to kill Ketheric, and then she let me recruit her. She seemed to not notice or be bothered that I killed Isobel. I've played with her in my party, and she is very effective at combat, and seems in fact to specialize in combat. She uses dual scimitars, so if you respec her, make sure she is DEX based.

Custom Character Builds

Here, I will go over some custom character builds I would play or recommend. I tend to use RPGBot.net to filter my thoughts through, but mostly these builds are based on my experience with DnD 5.0 rules. I intend to play the game with all of the below custom builds and classes. Note that I think differently than people who only play BG3, and I play for dialogue, so all of these would also work with DnD 5.0. Some of these I know, from experience in BG3 and DnD 5.0, will work, and some I have not play tested yet.

Keep in mind that some would call what I am about to do "min-maxing." And it probably is: I am choosing the species and all other factors around the class in the examples below. You can ignore the species if you want, however, and just play whatever species you want.

A note on species: Githyanki and Shield Dwarves are proficient in both medium and light armor, which can be helpful if you want to play a "squishy" class that doesn't come with armor proficiencies, like Sorcerers and Wizards. But also keep in mind, there is an Elven Chain shirt that is medium armor in the game that considers you proficient with the armor just for wearing it. This means you may not need to pick a species or take a feat for armor if you can wait until you get to the Rivington General store in Act 3.

Custom Deep Gnome Ranger

In DND 5.0, deep gnomes have species bonuses such as dark vision and disguise self that work well with the ranger class, especially the gloom stalker subclass. As is usual for me, I set it up as 10 STR because I've had bad experiences with dumping STR (to 8) and not being able to make certain jumps in the game, requiring the use of spells or scrolls or elixirs. CON and DEX are maxed due to what Rangers do, and I set WIS to 14 for spells and saves. I kept INT at 10 because I prefer to do well at saves for INT, but those are rare, so in theory one could dump INT to 8 to put more points towards STR or something else.

In BG3, the gnome species have a couple of possible species bonuses: Rock Gnomes have dark vision and double proficiency on history checks, Forest Gnomes have dark vision and can cast speak with animals once per long rest (useful for many situations in the game) and Deep Gnomes have long distance dark vision and advantage on stealth checks.

Custom Drow Half Elf Sorcerer

In DnD, the half-elf drow species has innate spell casting that should work well with the sorcerer class. I dumped STR to 8 this time only because I wanted INT to be at least 10 in case of spells. However, there are ways around this, such as STR 10 and INT 10 but then reduce DEX to make it work. Then find / equip gloves that increase DEX if you want to do well at ranged attacks. However, I tend to prefer using spells for ranged attacks and keeping DEX at 10 as well as STR at 10. So there are many ways to do this but that's how I would do it.

As for sorcerers, in my opinion, it can be beneficial to take level 1 paladin for armor.

Custom Duergar Fighter

In DND, Duergar have species advantages such as enlarge, reduce, and invisibility spells. This can make a fighter very viable in certain combat situations. Because fighters don't need much, I kept all unused stats at 10. But one could easily dump INT and CHA if one wants to max out DEX. Me, I prefer to play fighters as melee and close range, which means I put leftover pionts in DEX for ranged attacks. However, one thing to keep in mind with fighter, if one plays a "pure" fighter, one can. However, you can also perhaps max WIS or INT instead of DEX if one wanted to make the fighter good at specific skills that would round out the party.

Another good species for a fighter class in BG3 is Githyanki, as they also have innate spellcasting.

Custom Forest Gnome Wizard

I chose forest gnome because in DnD they get minor illusion and gnome cunning as species benefits. However, the species advantage is overwhelmingly imporant for the wizard class. For this build, similar to Sorcerer, I prefer 10 STR for carrying items and for jump distances, etc. Note that for all spellcasters, again, DEX is because you usually go with ranged attacks with spellcasters instead of melee. Makes sense to me, though one can max STR instead. Anyways, the other way to do it is take a species that gets armor benefits (Githyanki, Shield Dwarf) and then have armor, so one can run it either way. With wizard, you want INT and CON maxed out though, as CON is both hit points and your ability to pass concentration checks in combat. But you can see below for my option with a Sorcadin build also. Another alternative to a species with armor proficiencies would be to start off level 1 fighter, then take the rest of the levels in Wizard.

Custom Githyanki Paladin

I chose Githyanki and set up these statistics this way only because when you are in point buy, above 14 it costs 2 points. This is a way to potentially get more at the level 4 ability score increase, but admittedly it's a bit weaker until that point. This is also a valid way to build Lae'zel, for what it's worth. I dumped WIS and INT only because I wanted to try to max out CHA, STR and CON with DEX. But another way would be DEX 10 then WIS 10. Many ways to do it.

Custom Drow Half Elf Warlock

In DND, half-elf drow receive some innate spellcasting that is charisma-based, so this works very well. As usual, INT 8 only because this is a Warlock. If I was making a Warlock for a face character, however, I would make INT 10. Anyways, Drow racial benefits will allow the Warlock to move spells into other areas. I am told that DEX Warlocks are superior, but keep in mind one can pick Githyanki or Shield Dwarf in order to gain access to medium access instead, and then go STR based Warlock. This could also be even more useful for a face character, as I hate trying to play "squishy" character as face character because you have to misty step out of danger at turn 1 of most combat. For DEX based, note that Wyll as a Warlock comes with a rapier. Your rapiers are your best friend for melee as a DEX based class.

Keep in mind, BG3 is slightly different than DnD. Warlock Patrons include The Fiend (Armor of Agathys, Arms of Hadar, Dark One's Blessing), The Great Old One (Dissonant Whispers, Tasha's Hideous Laughter, Mortal Reminder), and The Archfey (Faerie Fire, Sleep, Fey Presence).

Custom Half Orc Barbarian

I chose half-orc due to species bonuses (DnD) on stats, darkvision, and intimidation. I chose to dump INT and CHA in order to prioritize STR, CON and DEX. I left the stats that were left over in WIS, though to be fair, one could have instead put those into INT. I put points into DEX to make it a purely combat focused build: if not in melee (STR) this character can then do a ranged attack (DEX). But there are surely other ways to do this. Note that bonuses on intimidation may also work well if you want to build a face character (increase CHA) that depends on intimidation.

Custom High Elf Rogue

I chose high half elf rogue for this one due to its DnD species basis. But in this game, you don't get Booming Blade for this species. This is very similar to how I would build Astarian, but with some caveats. I didn't go below 10 in any of the stats because I like having at least half decent saves for all the possibilities for traps and spellss that might trigger when trying to steal stuff. But there is another way to build this that's more like a face character (see my run-down with Astarian).

Custom High Half Elf Cleric

I chose this species because I thought it would work well for Cleric. This build is a lot like I tend to build Shadowheart: high half elf for the cantrips and the proficiency in longbow (FACT CHECK). I tend to prefer melee clerics, so I sunk stats into STR and CON, also WIS. To be fair, one can take the 10 DEX and move it to INT for better INT saves. From here, I tend to choose life domain and to prioritize healing spells. I prefer high CON and STR for hitpoints and for fighting in melee. My archetype in my head of the cleric is full plate armor, a mace or morningstar, and shield. There are other ways to play this (FIX IMAGE BY MAKING IT 10 INT).

Custom Human Druid

I chose human species for this druid because I didn't find any species that would have significant BG3 bonuses. (This doesn't mean you can't use a species that has a benefit you want.) I chose high CON for hitpoints, WIS for spell potency, and DEX for weapons. I'm told tht a druid should not need STR because they should be using wild shape for melee. But I mainly chose DEX because I would prefer to be in ranged combat (because druids are "squishy") yet use animal summons for my close range "body guards." Druids do not get many armor options in this game, and indeed a DnD limitation on druids is that they can only use natural armor (i.e. not metal) and non-metal shields, so species benefits for medium armor (like Githyanki and Shield Dwarves) won't really help much. I've played druids in DnD but usually I choose a species with natural armor like Tortle.

Custom Shield Dwarf Bard

Most of these builds, I have not played in BG3 yet, though I have played them in DnD. But this build, shield dwarf for Bard, I have played and I like it a lot. I won't lie: I make my shield dwarf bard play violin and customize his appearance to look like Ithak Perlman. Shield dwarf provies medium armor proficiency, which helps a lot to keep this build from being "squishy." Then just add all other stats. As configured here, this is not really a face character, only because I don't like having less than 10 on any stat if I am a face character. But this build works as a face character just the way it is. Keep in mind, one can prioritize DEX (i.e. DEX 16 CON 14) if one chooses non-concentration spells and prefers to have a combat edge. Those wanting good combat would likely move towards college of swords, and those wanting a face character College of Lore (only because College of Eloquence doesn't exist in BG3).

One advantage of Bard for a face character is Jack of all Trades. You can add half your proficiency bonus to ability checks you're not proficient in. The Bard class already excels at face character duties due to being CHA based. The other benefit of the shield dwarf species is that you can forge medium adamantine armor in Grymforge in the underdark, which is one of the best medium armors in the game.

In BG3, the dwarf species is a bit different than in DnD. Gold Dwarves gain 1 extra hp per level, Shield Dwarves are proficient in medium and light armor, and Duergar get 80 ft dark vision and Duergar Resilience (advantage on saving throws against illusions, charms, and paralysis).

Custom Wood Elf Monk

Someone once told me that Urchin background was best for Monk in BG3, so I have went this direction , as well as wood elf. (INSERT WHY) DEX and CON are priorities due to being a monk, then WIS for a little bit of potency with spells. Note that I put 12 in STR, which one could instead put to 10 INT. Given that BG3 incorporates mind flayers, INT saves are a bit important in this setting.

Sorcadin Build, Minthara vs Dark Urge

The fun part about BG3 is that many DnD 5.0 mechanics work great in this game. This Sorcadin build is one of them. Here is where I explain one of my favorite builds for DnD and BG3: the Sorcadin (i.e. Sorcerer + Paladin).

Basically, someone discovered in DnD that, by the rules, if you take 1-2 levels of Paladin but then the rest as Sorcerer or Bard, you get more smites via spell slots. Hence I tried it, and I actually like it. (Paladin must be level 1 in order to gain the armor and weapon advantages.) While the damage output of smites depends on the character's stats (STR for example) and the specifications of the weapon, you can see below how Minthara, currently Paladin 2 Sorcerer 8, has access to level 5 smites, versus Dark Urge (evil playthrough) as an Oathbreaker Paladin 10 has smites with less levels. Obviously there are differences in that Minthara's STR is 14 at this point in the game, and you can tell her hit points are lower, but this build absolutely works for her. This allows me to focus on distance based spells, but also wear heavy armor. Therefore, I can take DEX 10 because my spells handle enemies at a distance, and then have smites for if they get too close. Indeed, this combo allows me to have two paladins smiting on enemies in certain game situations. I believe in this photo, Minthara is holding Nyrulna, while Dark Urge ("Durge") is wielding the Selune's Spear. In my experience in the game, smites like these are more effective for a Sorcerer than most the close-range / melee range spells.

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