Summary
Baldur’s Gate 3is chock-full of loot, filled with all the same magic and mundane items that can be found in the averageD&Dcampaign. However, the wayBaldur’s Gate 3gives out this treasure could serve as a source of inspiration for those running the game’s TTRPG base.
Treasure isa vital piece ofDungeons and Dragons, particularly with regard to its history. In earlier editions of the game, XP was calculated by how much gold the party managed to scrounge up from a dungeon. Moreover, getting that gold back to a safe town was a mini-game within itself, requiring an entirely different hexcrawl game to facilitate this. As manyD&Dcampaigns shifted to heroic fantasy as opposed to loot-goblin plundering (though the latter aspect has always remained), treasure has taken on a slightly smaller role in its mechanics.
Dungeon Masters Should Take Note Of How Much Treasure Baldur’s Gate 3 Gives Out
The world ofBaldur’s Gate 3is stuffed full of treasure, even more so than a typicalD&D 5eadventure. Crates, buried chests, and specialized loot containers are at every turn in the slice of Faerun players can access, something that greatly encourages exploration and thorough investigation. This is in contrast to the way many DMs approach loot, reserving piles of gold, consumables, equipment, and magic items for the post-boss treasure hoard. Part of this relates to the different mediums; any side loot a player finds through investigation is often improvised by the DM to reward a high roll. On the other hand, there are still ways for DMs to make loot more of an exploration reward than a combat reward if they choose.
Small Loot Chests Incentivize The Other Pillars Of D&D
It is readily repeated with officialD&Dmaterial and fandom spaces that there are three pillars to the game: combat, exploration, and roleplay. Unfortunately,exploration hasn’t beenD&D 5e’s strong suit, especially when compared to the other pillars. There are many reasons for this, from lackluster travel rules to spells that contradict wilderness survival, but one of the biggest is the lack of incentive. If players have no reason to explore the world of their own impetus, they will focus on the more inherent fun of combat and social encounters.
The buried treasure, plentiful chests, and small containersofBaldur’s Gate 3aren’t revolutionary in the gaming scene by any means, but that just makes them easier for a DM to implement. Describing a scene as having pots or crates is a good first step, though getting players to smash them can be tricky. A good way to do this, and to encourage exploration of worlds the DM has worked so hard on, is drawing attention to suspicious piles of dirt or doors with mysterious inscriptions. Once players know that everywhere they go has a ready supply of secrets, the DM can sit back and enjoy watching players solve puzzles and check all their bases.
Baldur’s Gate 3’s Mimic Makes Opening Random Chests Viable
Something thatmakes encouraging exploration tougher isD&D’s mimic, an iconic creature that pretends to be a chest before attacking surprised adventurers. Its beloved status is a double-edged sword, though; most players expect just about every chest to be a mimic, making them overly cautious.
Baldur’s Gate 3uses lootto make a simple fix here. Mimics are centralized in specific locations and, when they’re killed, they can drop gold and magic items. Considering that any adult mimics would have swallowed prior adventurers, this makes a lot of sense. Moreover, it turns mimics into creatures that players actively want to seek out and fight — in a similar vein toTerraria’s mimics. If a DM rewards players for squishing mimics with a nice magic item of common or uncommon rarity, players will be quick to forgive the nasty surprise.
