Difficulty

Baldur's Gate 3 has five difficulty settings or modes: the preset Explorer, Balanced, Tactician and Honour modes – as well the customisable Custom mode, which lets the player tweak various gameplay elements.

When starting a new game, players are promoted to select a difficulty. This selection can be changed at any time from the Difficulty option of the pause menu. Any resulting changes to creature statistics are immediate.

Explorer

Explorer is the least difficult setting. In comparison to the Balanced difficulty setting:

• All Enemies maximum health decreased by 30%.
  • In comparison to Tactician, where enemies have almost twice (x1.9) as much max HP as Explorer enemies.
• Party members receive a 100% bonus to hit points.
• Items purchased from a merchant are at a 20% discount.
• All proficiency bonuses (including allies' and enemies') are increased by 2.
• Multiclassing is not allowed on Explorer difficulty. Multiclass levels previously gained will stay if the difficulty is lowered to Explorer.
  • This makes the Jack-of-all-Trades achievement unobtainable.
• The Iron Throne's timer it set to 8 turns.

Balanced

Balanced is the game's standard setting to which the others are compared.

• The Iron Throne's timer it set to 6 turns.

Tactician

Tactician is the second highest difficulty setting. The following tweaks are applied on Tactician mode:

• All NPC's Maximum Health increased
  • This applies to most temporary companions as well.
  • Most changes are between 20%-30%, with many "boss" enemies seeing larger boosts.
• More aggressive enemy NPC behavior, such as targeting spellcasters more often and attempting to finish off downed characters.
  • This could also be somewhat beneficial as they end up triggering attack of opportunity reactions more frequently.
• Some enemies will gain special attacks and/or passive features that are not present in the other difficulties.
  • Examples from the Prologue: Intellect Devourers gain a ranged psychic attack, Cambions can cast Fire Bolt, Commander Zhalk can attack twice.
• All non-party characters receive modifiers that when examined are noted as "Difficulty: Tactician" in the combat log.
  • All enemies gain +2 to attack rolls and +2 DC to their spells and abilities.
  • Other modifiers can be additional attack rolls, AC, resistances, better saving throws and sometimes unique modifiers that are not present in the other difficulties.
• Camp Supplies requirements for a Long Rest increased from 40 to 80.
  • Insufficient camp supplies rules remain the same (restore half HP and half your spell slots rounded down).
• At stores, the baseline attitude bonus for discounting is reduced, making items cost more to purchase and sell for less.
• The Iron Throne's timer it set to 5 turns.

Honour

For balance changes exclusive to Honour mode, see Undocumented Patch 5 updates.

Honour is the highest difficulty setting. The following tweaks from apply on Honour mode :

• 30 new tweaks to all of Baldur's Gate 3’s boss-fights, giving bosses new Legendary Actions.
• Stricter action economy and damage bonuses as the game progresses.
• Players only gets a single save for the entire campaign, with many special conditions:
  • The save file cannot be loaded, outside the main menu.
  • The game will override the save in the following situations:
    • The player returns to the main menu.
    • The player quits the game.
    • The player attempts to ALT+F4 out of the game.
    • The player quicksaves.
    • The game autosaves.
• Should the party die, the player is presented with two choices:
  • Continue the campaign in Custom Mode, which ends Honour Mode.
  • End the campaign, which deletes the save.

Rewards

Players who beat the game in Honour Mode receive several rewards:

• An in-game Golden D20 die skin.
• The new Foehammer achievement.

Custom

Custom difficulty lets the player tweak various gameplay elements to their liking. Custom Mode settings with the exception of two can be changed at any time. However the player cannot revert back to the original Explorer, Balanced or Tactician difficulty. The following options can be tweaked:

• Use Honour Mode's single save system.
  • This setting can't be changed once the game starts.
  • Default: Off
  • The player cannot load saves outside the main menu.
  • The game will override the save with the same conditions as Honour Mode.
  • Unlike in Honour Mode, players can reload the save if their party dies.
    • It is possible for players to become stuck if the game is saved when the party is about to all be downed, such as during an enemy turn.
• Enemy aggression: Adjust how dangerous enemy combatants will be in combat.
  • Default: Balanced
  • Explorer: "Enemies will not be as ruthless in combat."
  • Balanced: "Enemies will provide a balanced challenge."
  • Tactician: "Enemies will attack ruthlessly and efficiently."
• Character power: Adjust how powerful players, allies and enemies are by modifying their bonuses to rolls and how hard they are to kill.
  • Default: Balanced
  • Explorer: "Friendly characters will be stronger and harder to kill in combat."
  • Balanced: "Keeps enemies and allies alike at the same level of strength."
  • Tactician: "Hostile characters will be stronger and harder to kill in combat."
• Enemy loadouts: Adjust the items and spells enemies will have access to in combat.
  • Default: Balanced
  • Explorer: "Enemies will only have access to basic spells and items."
  • Balanced: "Enemies will use a variety of spells and items in combat."
  • Tactician: "Enemies will employ advanced spells and items in combat."
• Additional combat mechanics: Change the difficulty of combats by adjusting how many new mechanics or enemies are added to certain fights.
  • Default: Balanced
  • Explorer: No details.
  • Balanced: No details.
  • Tactician: No details.
• Proficiency bonus: Increase the proficiency bonus of all characters - reducing the impact of random rolls. This will impact game balance.
  • Default: 0x. (At level 1 +2)
  • Range: -1x - 4x (At level 1, bonus at -1x is +1, 0x is +2, 1x is +3, 2x is +4, 3x is +5 and 4x is +6)
• Enemy critical hits: Enemies will be able to score Critical Hits.
  • Default: On
• No death saving throws: Enable to stop player characters dying at 0 hit points. They will be stabilised until Helped.
  • Default: Off
• Disable free first strikes: Harming a character before combat starts will cost you one attack or action on your first turn in initiative.
  • Default: On
• Camp cost multiplier: Adjust how many camp supplies a long rest costs.
  • Default: 1x (40 supplies per Long Rest)
  • Range: 0.5x - 3x (20, 40, 60, 80, 100, 120)
• Short rest full heal: Your health is fully restored on a short rest.
  • Default: Off
• Trade price modifier: All prices traders ask for their wares are multiplied by this value. All prices you get for your gear are divided by this value.
  • Default: 2.5x (Item worth 100gp costs 250gp and sells for 40gp)
  • Range: 1x - 4x (item worth 100gp at 1x costs 100gp and sells for 100gp, whereas item worth 100gp at 4x costs 400gp and sells for 25gp).
• Multiclassing: Enable to allow choosing an additional class upon level-up.
  • This setting can't be changed once the game starts.
  • Default: On
• Always prompt reactions: All reactions that can pause the game will do so by default.
  • Default: Off
• Hide NPC health: Only HP counts of characters controlled by the player will be displayed.
  • Default: Off
• Hide failed perception rolls: Perception rolls to spot traps and hidden objects in the world will only be displayed if successful.
  • Default: Off
• Hide passive rolls in dialogues: Prevent dialogues showing you if you have passed or failed a passive roll to learn information.
  • Default: Off
• Preview dialogue check difficulty before rolling: Enable to see how hard Ability or Skill Checks will be before you select them as dialogue options.
  • Default: Off
• Hide Difficulty Class during rolls: Obscure the Difficulty Class while making ability checks during dialogues, as well as when lockpicking and disarming traps.
  • Default: Off

Example of difficulty changes

One named 4th level enemy in Act 1's statistics change the following across the three difficulties:

• Explorer Difficulty: 46hp, +4 Proficiency Bonus
• Balanced Difficulty: 67hp, +2 Proficiency Bonus
• Tactician Difficulty: 87hp, +2 Proficiency Bonus, additional +2 Difficulty: Tactician bonus to attack rolls.

Achievements

Critical Hit
Complete the game in Tactician mode.

Foehammer
Complete the game in Honour mode.