The first couple of hours in Baldur's Gate III are insanely hard. And then you click next and realize you need to create a guardian too.

The revelation of the 2nd character to make after spending an hour or two on the main one will never not be funny to me

Laezel misses with her only shot in battle. Also Laezel "you are surprisingly adequate in battle....."

I was a bard on my first play through and, let me tell you, they are a powerful class to play.

Nothing better than watching other DnD nerds enjoy this masterpiece of a game! I'm looking forward to your playthrough, Ashbee! The editing is hilarious as well, I love it! Character creation is the one of the best parts, though! I wish you'd kept a bit more of it tbh😅 Also, a piece of advice if you're interested: it's worth taking long rests relatively frequently in the game - there are many camp scenes with companions that can be missed otherwise, and there aren't any drawbacks to resting (other than needing supplies). Also, companions often have some comments about new areas or important quest developments, so it's good to check in with them from time to time both in camp and while adventuring, if you enjoy interactions with them, of course.

Gotta say it really refreshing seeing someone come into this great game with a “blank slate” and seeing them explore the early parts of. Also the fact that you know you’re way around spells and DnD combat makes it very enjoyable for someone with a bit of a min-maxer streak 😅 Looking forward to the next parts of this series

Dear god that Zhalk fight was extremely lucky!

I loved speak with animals in this game. Lots of good animal conversations.

Fun start! You're going to have a lot of fun with this, and us with you

love seeing new people try this game out, it is an absolute gem. Have abt 4 playthroughs done and 1k hrs in it and as someone else mentioned there is still new things to find. Also appreciate the Bard pick, it's my fav class, just behind druid. Speak with animals is a good pick, though as you get further in the game you'll find plenty of potions that give you speak with animals all day and at that point it's really worth choosing another spell. One spell that I will recommend is glyph of warding as it allows you to choose the effect which can be elemental damage but also has an option for sleep that doesn't have the hit point limitation of the sleep spell, I found that very useful. Looking forward to you going further with this for sure, keep up the good work.

This has been a most enjoyable first episode! Looking forward to more!

Everyone LOVE Astarion voice, welcome to the club😂 I’m so happy I find your channel, I love this first video and I want more 😍

That was so much fun! Would love to see you play more of this 🤩

I'm so glad you are reading the options you choose, it makes watching so much easier.

"I strut, I dont scuttle" LMAO!!

you're so thorough...on my first playthrough i never even thought of examining the mysterious object in my inventory

Was really fun to listen to your observations. And good job with the editing!

Always a pleasant surprise for new uploads! Excited to get into it! 🙂

OMG 😍 so glad to see you back! Can't wait to watch this!!!

Heyha! I just found this playthrough/channel. I'm on my 3(4?) playthrough, but I lso can't get enough of peoples reaction to the game, especially if they have prior knowledge of BG or DnD. Starting late can be a good thing for single-player games, as long as you can avoid major spoilers, since you get a better experience after bug fixes, changes and even entire additions of dialogue and events. You clearly have a lot of fun, while also taking things seriously and even read whats on screen. Me not wanting to pull my hair out while watching someone playing is alway big plus. And the edits are the cherry on top. I can't wait to see you continuing your journey.

Aww, I really enjoy watching people do character creation, especially if they're learning as they go. Anyway, I hope you do continue! I also hope you don't cut too much - a lot of KZfaqrs assume viewers will be bored with looting and even exploring, but it's all part of the journey and enjoyable to watch :) Good to let the action scenes breathe, as well as listening to party banter.

Glad I found this play through. I love this game and you’re making a fun to watch again

This was literally the cutest video ever lol, I love your animations!

Watching the opening cinematics. "at least there's water under him." belly flopping into water from that height would be no different then belly flopping into cement.

Your level of looking at everything and seeing details in the story is definitely better than most. You realized things most people take a while to catch. An example is Astarion being a vampire. Not only have I never played as shadowheart to look at the artifact, but you did it very very early in the game. I’ve never seen anyone else do that. There are TONS of speaking with animals opportunities. Funny and even important at times. Definitely the right move. You actually could have gotten the everburn blade by command drop with shadowheart. That is the best and easiest way, but you don’t get the experience from killing him.

Cool a new play through of my favorite game. :). Excited to see how you like it.

I loved this video. I can't wait to watch the rest of this playthrough!

You did great and you're gonna love it! I actually always got Astarion before Gale, didn't even know you could go the other way around, here I am in Act 3 and you've taught me something, just proves how many different avenues there are in this game.

I haven’t finished watching but I am now subscribed. The editing and commentary is too funny. I have a set of dice with triceratops in them, similar to the rabbit ones shown. I’m looking forward to this series.

I'm really enjoying your playthrough, hope to see more soon! I might have to start calling mind flayers Larry's now 😂

Great job on your escape and getting the everburn blade! Loved your playthru and commentary.. i was missing some BG3 playthrus and yours rocked!!! Subbed!

That was a fun watch. I love seeing people experience the game for the first time and watching their choices, challenges and solutions. There is so much to do and see in the game, and the lore (both general and storyline specific) is interspersed between NPC dialogue, Books, Notes and Companion conversations, so be sure to take your time, explore all the things, read all the books, and talk to everyone and everything you can! (Remember to cast Speak With Animals at the start of every day!) I have just under 1000 hours in the game, and I have gotten every achievement on Steam, and I still find new things on each run through (of my own or watching someone else's!). There are also so many options for classes and skills and spells (even considering how streamlined they had to make it compared to Table Top), and none of them are really bad... granted some are certainly better than others... but even the supposedly "poor" options can work really well when you put your mind to it. Bards are great for the wealth of skills and a bunch of special dialogue choices that are sometimes just hilarious. Hope you keep up the series, and have fun! Good luck!

oh wow I have been scouring this site for a first play-through of this amazing game to watch but had given up! it is so refreshing to find someone with a wonderful and funny personality who reads things and plays the game carefully! I'm so happy and excited to see more of this. thank you your hard work. the editing is absolutely top notch.

omg i love your editing style it makes it even more fun!!

With "jump" you can increase the distance of your movements during combat. Especially Laezel can jump huge distances.

Astarion sure has vampire vibes. There's just one issue: He's walking around during the day. That's generally considered very unhealthy for vampires.

I enjoy your style of playing and the fun edits. Subscribed.

This game is a wild ride and you’re going to have a blast. (Also dice goals). Absolutely love your accent!

Why is the bard motto "Red flags? We ignore those." I am certain that all bards live by that.

great gameplay!

Ohhh I loved this.👏🏼 Hope you continue to post the episodes Istik.

"Oh booty" from Laezel's outfit. Lol

Found you randomly and love your vibe and sense of humor. I’ll be back!

Very entertaining! The editing is very well done, too! I hope there's not too many backseat gamers or people trying to spoil your first playthrough! Glad you went with your gut and took animal friendship. If you're taking what you think is fun, that's all that matters.

Heyoo! Happy to see a fellow DnD nerd getting into this game! Don't worry about cutting things out. Part of the fun of watching a blind playthrough is seeing the raw exploration and thought process! I played Tactician my first time through and found it wasn't all that bad, but I've also been DMing 5e for years so if you're familiar enough with 5e's ruleset you should be fine on that difficulty. Unfortunately, I don't know if you'll get the achievement for beating the game on Tactician if you didn't start that way, but that just means you'll have to play through again. Oh darn! Just a few suggestions/tips that I found improved my experience: - Turn off "Karmic Dice" in the options. This makes your dice rolls actual dice rolls instead of skewing things towards success/failure artificially. This is truer to the DnD experience, and it makes things like stats and bonuses actually impactful. - Unless you respec her later to have different stats, Shadowheart's Firebolt is useless in combat because it uses her INT rather than WIS. Still useful for setting things on fire if you need it, but it's a notorious noob trap. - Speaking of respeccing, when you get the ability to do this, basically all of the companions have wonky stat spreads for their class. It's worth respeccing them just to change those stat spreads, even if you keep them in the same class. - Obviously, choose the spells you want and there's no wrong choices, but it's relatively easy to find/make potions of speak with animals in this game, and they last until long rest so you only need one per LR. Also, some of the spells can be cast outside of combat for free (they're ritual spells) and they last until your next long rest. They don't really indicate this well in the UI, but I would recommend casting Longstrider on all of your companions after a LR for a nice movement boost in combat all day long. You may want to look up which spells are considered ritual spells like this in BG3 since, as I said, it's not indicated well. - While I admire the commitment to not save-scum, there's literally nothing wrong with it. If you feel like a missed dice roll has robbed you of the story you really want, nobody is going to judge you for going back and trying again. There's a whole difficulty level (Honour Mode) where save scumming is disabled/prevented, so the devs kind of expect players to use it in other difficulties. That said, I would only use it for major plot points when it's going to derail the story you're going for. No need to save scum every attack roll unless you're in a truly desperate situation. - Above all else, HAVE FUN! This game has some of the best stories, characters, and environments, and based on your exploration so far you're going to uncover a LOT in your playthrough, so remember that while you do have us, the audience, following along, at the end of the day it's YOUR experience we're tuning in to, not just some content you're making to present to the rest of us. Enjoy the game, immerse yourself in it, and the rest of us are going to enjoy seeing how your journey unfolds regardless. +1 subscription, see you in the next one!

I like your energy and narration. I enjoyed the playthrough.

This has been a really fun playthrough so far! Love Bg3 but new to your channel, really enjoying the video and the edits and looking forward to the next part!

i enjoyed watching this! love your approach to the game! quite surprised you have not seen any spoilers or things online about astarion/shadowheart this past year

Great editing :)

HEY! I remember you! Its good to see you back here on the 'tubes. :D

New to this channel after getting BG3 your a delight to watch and already showing me how the game should be played thank you 🙏

Yay! You took Speak with Animals! that and Guidance are probably the 2 most useful spells in the whole game.

Loving your playthrough. Subbed

Been subbed for years glad ur back

Excited for the next part!

I can already tell I'm gonna like watching your playthrough

I also just started. I bought the game back at the beginning of april, but since i only play on weekens, I just started act 3. Love, love, love BG3!❤

Yes please, continue to venture, we'll follow you :)

Speak with animals is actually a surprisingly useful spell. Picking that was a good idea. Use it at every opportunity you can. I'm going to start calling mind flayers Larrys now lol.

New sub, you're amazing! 😊😊

In case you are not aware, the thief subclass of rogue actually gets another bonus action to use on every single turn. It can be a very powerful multiclass dip or choice for Astarion.

KZfaq recommended this video to me, and I do hope you continue to share your adventure with us! Your editing is great, your humor on point, and so many other things that "just worked" to make this a very engaging video to watch. But it was your *_utter disgust_* with the default Bard outfit that sold me on your channel! I mean, what the hells were they thinking? LOL Hope to 'see' you soon!

Hell yeah, continue! Just got another sub

Welcome back Ashbee! ❤❤

really good start, you're very smart and perceptive

You don’t need to kill the devil, you can cast command on him to drop his sword

first time watching you and you just became my favourite streamer.

Watching Baldur's Gate while playing it is always good lol

I was thinking "Nooo, the famous trick is to make the Commander drop the weapon, not to fight him..." Then you managed to defeat him! 😅 That usually goes as a string of misses followed by reloading. You're very observant, btw. Glad you are enjoying it.

Dragon V.S. flying Ammonite!? HELL-YEAH!!! My first, one, & only experience with Baldurs Gate games was in 2001 when i was getting big into Medieval Fantasy Adventure content. My Bestie brought over Baldurs Gate for PS2 and we did revel in the D&D lore & trappings of generic hack&slash gaming. This was in the middle of my Diablo 2 game and he knew it would be super-cool for us to partake of that game. He was my guide into D&D and we had fun playing it for a few days while he was visiting.

ASH!! 😭😭 You were my favorite KZfaqr in 2018 and I got soo worried when you just left. Welcome back 🥰❤️❤️

Hi from Italy. You are really good and nice. I really liked the video and I had fun. Thank you

Subbing because you were kind to your dice. ❤

Nice work with the commander. Just so you know for future, you can use the Cleric's ability to command an enemy to drop their weapon if you want it from them ❤

Heyyy!! good to see you back :)

25:17 I'm looking forward to a compilation of your best sentences from this playthrough haha

Ah! you are just like me! Touch everything! Read Everything! loot Everything! I am going to enjoy watching your let's Play!

You really have no choice but to continue. You've not even scratched the surface of all this game have to offer you. It gets wilder after this.

For the change in the voice when talking to Lae'zell, much of the early lines were recorded at the voice actors homes because of Covid. They did do a lot of rerecording, but some stuff may have a change in timber because of the home mic's vs studio equipment.

So awesome to see you get started! Best i can say is, play this game unlike any other video game. Keep up the rpg! There is no wrong choice, there are only "alternatives and their consequences". Like, this game is a masterful piece of long game pay off in so many ways! The story you write as you play will be it's own masterpiece!! I've played several different times, and seen absolutely absurdly different outcomes for my companions, the type of ppl they can become (very few companions are a static characterization, they can and will be watching what you do and growing in good or bad ways based on you, whether you respect them, or maybe believe they have no boundaries.... And so on. Sure they're video game characters, but they're not written to serce you. You're just another regular adventurer, experiencing this stiry from your own perspective, not "the hero of the story". You and they might grow to become heros, but the world is living around you!! Can't wait to see what your playthrough is like!

Definitely glad you are playing BG3. I really like this game, unfortunately the map and mini-map are just black for me (apparently due to the age of my graphics driver, even though the card itself is a powerful nvidia card) so not playing as much as I'd like until I get a better machine. Have fun playing, and looking forward to the next video.

As a streamer I saw your follower count and subscribed immediately, need to pump those numbers up :P Not that I can talk, :) Anyway I hope to enjoy your content because I'm in the boat now :P (I love this game so much, my main is a sorcerer/monk, so I've interested to see your journey develope.)

Ashbeee! Its great to see you back! Hope things have\are going great for you and hope you enjoy the masterpiece that is BG3 :)

excited for part 2

Pulling Gale out of the portal: "Imagine we rip his arm off." Evil durge players: "Lol."

Laezel is magnificent. She is a bit like General Zod from one of the latest Superman movies. Completely devoted to the cause, trained from a young age for one thing and one thing alone. Not one hypocrite cell in her body she means every word she says. But to invite her to your birthday....maybe not. One of the other guests might die.

Just in case of feeling that your half-high-elf cantrip is underperforming, down the line... all cantrips from high elf background scale same way as wizard spells aka INT scaling

Love the video, you’re too funny. How often do you plan on uploading the next ones? Keep up the good work!

Entertaining play-through; hope to see it continue. FWIW, I'm one who would vote for less editing, though. Subscribed.

I hope you continue. Left a sub.

Hi Ashbee! I can get enough of BG3! I beat the game twice and every time i watch i see new dialogue choices! Its such a well made game! have fun!

oh fun fact Shadowheart is 48 years old and Lae'zel is the youngest :)

9:33 "Hell, yeah! City defense!" Not so much. Githyanki long ago made a pact with Tiamat, god-queen of chromatic dragons. Red dragons serve as mounts for Githyanki warriors, and in exchange the dragons are pampered and paid well. The Gith were once enslaved by the Ilithid, so it's a rite of passage for warriors to kill a Mindflayer.

One good use for Shocking Grasp is if you need to escape from an enemy in melee range, because it prevents their reaction which is to attack you when you move away. The downside is that all High Elf attack cantrips use INT and yours is only 12 so the chance of the attack succeeding is not good.

Shocking grasp is an excellent cantrip even if it is melee. Gives damage and shocks enemy, and it allows you to disengage for free on a hit. It's not OP, but it is very clutch in some situations. It's top 3.

Im new but i will love to see more of you playing BG3

Your tav: Cute little elf with a fancy class and fun gimmicks. My tav: Human fighter.

That was fun and I would definitely like to see how this plays out. I have to say, as someone who has DM'd a lot of D&D and also has a few thousand hours in BG3, you are a very good player. So yes please 😁

When creating a character and getting the elven cantrip keep in mind it's an INT based cantrip no matter which class you choose

Hello! New to this channel but I love BG3 and I've been looking for a good playthrough to watch someone else experience it for the first time. Such a good game, the writing and acting is amazing, and I can't wait to see what kinds of choices you make. You commented about loving Astarion's voice, his VA is Neil Newbon, an amazing voice actor who does voice acting and mo-cap work in a lot of video games.