Still learning… can someone explain something to me?

[David Hypnos]

So I’ve never played nor am I familiar with the rules of DND. It was always interesting to me, but I never had friends who were into it and thus I largely left it ignored. BG3 seemed like a great game, however, and I finally started playing it this year and wow, yes, it’s a LOT to take in. So far though I’ve been having a blast and most of what I love about it is how incredibly ignorant I am because I get to LEARN as I go and while some people might hate the trial-and-error and just want all the information handed to them I am having fun with learning as I do things in game. Because of this I am doing a mostly blind playthrough (I say mostly blind cuz I have had a few friends/followers tell me things like how a spell works or such) but mostly I am wanting to experience everything for myself on virgin eyes and ears. And I really thought I was getting the hang of it all but now I am confused (and forgive me if this seems like an obvious solution or if it seems too minor to inquire about.)

So I just hit level 7 and ventured into Act 2 in the cursed shadow lands. I was very excited to hit level 7 as I now have level 4 spell slots and tried to carefully choose which new spells my characters would learn and which spells to have prepared. I thought I was doing everything right. However, when I got into combat I saw my Druid did not have the level 4 spell I chose for him equipped and, yes, I did make sure to learn the spell, and put it in my prepared spells. On top of this my action to “move moonbeam” was gone. Moonbeam has become one of my favorites and it came in clutch during my first fight in the shadow cursed lands but now the option to move the moonbeam has just vanished. Lastly, there are two spells in my slots that I cannot choose because they show as “unprepared.” This makes sense because I swapped them out with the new spells I acquired during level up - so why are they still showing in my actions list (while unable to use) but my new spells are not? I thought I had finally understood how preparing and swapping spells and everything worked but this kind of threw me for a loop. I did it the exact way I did when we hit level 6 and everything worked out smoothly then. And the way “move moonbeam” disappeared is especially puzzling as I thought it just went hand in hand with the Moonbeam spell.

I know there are some spells that are “always prepared” and the cantrips and such and I’m kind of stuck with the ones I chose because when I was creating my character and leveling up in the beginning I had no idea what I was doing. Is this still the case? Can anyone tell me what I potentially did wrong here when I hit level 7? My apologies for being such a noob but I am trying very hard to learn without bothering others for help but also want to make sure that I am ACTUALLY learning and not thinking I understand something only to screw myself later. Thank you in advance, kind adventurers.

[Nibbie]

I would guess the issue is that you do have the spell, it just wasn't on the hotbar (what you call your action list) you are looking at. You have multiple buttons to change what you see in your hotbar, including increasing the size to display more controls at once, and a custom hotbar you can make yourself by dragging items and skills onto it from your inventory and full action list. I would double check your action list (I think the default bind is K) to see if you still have it, and you should be able to place it on your hotbar from there if needed.

As for "move moonbeam" specifically, that is only available while moonbeam is cast. Moonbeam is a Concentration spell, which means you have to maintain focus on it to keep up its effects. Taking damage can disrupt this concentration, and casting any other concentration spell would also stop it. Moonbeam also only lasts for 10 turns (which still count down every few seconds when you aren't in turn-based mode) , you can't just keep it around permanently for no extra cost.

[David Hypnos]

So I probably should have mentioned that I am playing on controller because I haven’t played a M&K game in 20 years. So if it is indeed a “hotbar” issue I will need to figure out how to fix that. On my controller you press R1 to open said menu and can continue pressing it or L1 to cycle through the actions available. I would be surprised as to why this would have a limit as it’s seen to only grow as I’ve leveled up.

As far as Moonbeam is concerned, yes, I was actively concentrating on the spell. It was only my 2nd turn when I wanted to move it and realized the action was no longer there. This is why I was confused about the non-prepared spells showing up in the hotbar. I hope I’m using that word right! Because before when I would swap out spells they would simply swap out on my hotbar and now the inactive ones are showing and the new ones are not. I can’t imagine why the game would think that is useful.

As a Druid it does let me swap out some of my spells. Outside of the initial cantrips and such it gives me the option to choose new spells every time I level up and a few times has had me choose a “land” which automatically gives me two spells I don’t have to prepare. Because I use Shadowheart mostly for support and my Druid mostly for spell damage and/or Wild Shape I chose to swap out two of my support spells I wasn’t using for some level 4 damage ones. But alas the ones I took out are still showing (albeit unprepared and thus unusable) and the new ones are nowhere to be seen.

I will attempt to mess with my settings and see if I can’t find them and bind them so I can access them in combat or something. Your responses are much appreciated. It’s been a long time since I’ve been so invested in a video game, and even if I do screw things up I will keep on venturing forth but I’d like to get the hang of it and be able to fight effectively. Thank you again.

[Favonius]

I think like Nibbie that it's just a hotbar issue. unfortunately, i dont know how it works with a controler.

What you can check is your character sheet : there's an item for spells where you should see known and prepared spells, cantrips etc. If that is here, you"re good.

I guess you had enough spell slots to cast your spells?

If you mistakingly removed some spells during level up (or you want to choose new ones), you can go to withers and respec to the same class. Then re-do all the level up.
That costs minimal gold but it can be usefull when you play for the first time.
You can choose different feats too if you think you did some bad choice

[David Hypnos]

Oh, yes, I definitely had enough spell slots. I just couldn’t find the new spells I wanted to use or the move moonbeam action. I have been told about respeccing but I have avoided it as I’m trying to do an “honest” playthrough where if I make a mistake I have to live with it. I think that gives the game a bit more flavor, and makes my decisions carry more weight. I will still save before certain choices and such because obviously there are times you can get locked into combat that you can’t win, and I’m not looking to restart the whole game because of a bad choice or two. I’ll definitely check my character sheet. Maybe there’s a way to rotate spells out of your hotbar or action wheel or whatever it’s called on a controller interface! Thank you for the reply!

[Mike Garrison]

Moonbeam is a concentration spell. You can only have one of those active at a time. Did you maybe cast a different concentration spell? That will cancel your first one.

It is also possible to simply voluntarily stop concentrating on a spell.

[Jean-Maurice Nya]

Did you sleep after leveling up? I don't remember clearly if it's like most games of the genre but if you didn't sleep you won't have the spells available (but again, I haven't played in a year and a half or so). You just leveled up and get your first level 4 spell. It means you didn't have any 4th level spell icon on your character before leveling up. I do think you'll need to sleep in order to make it available to cast.
You don't need respec, the spell you have chosen should be on your available spell list so you can prepare it. Then you'll need a long rest to use all prepared spells.

There's no limit for the hotbar. So if you prepared it you should find it on your hotbar, but with console it seems hard to read everything and it has a huge amount of pages. If it's not on your hotbar while you know the spell and prepared it, you may want to contact Larian support.

[Mike Garrison]

İlk olarak Jean-Maurice Nya tarafından gönderildi:

Did you sleep after leveling up?

New abilities and spell slots are available immediately upon leveling up. There is no rest (long or short) required to activate them.

[harken23]

FWIW, I played the D:OS games with a controller, but use a mouse for this. I never have to use my keyboard, with a few key buttons mapped to the mouse. You can do both, I think, too.

[Vexillarius]

It sounds like your spells are just covered by your other tabs. When i play a caster i often need to move the potion tab across to see all my spells. I usually increase the spell tabs height to it max of four so have more room on the bars.

[David Hypnos]

Moonbeam was definitely still active on my next turn. I didn’t stop it. Also, even when I’m not actively using Moonbeam the “move moonbeam” action is still usually there - just not able to be used.

I don’t think I did a long rest, but like Mike said I’m pretty sure I never had to rest after leveling up to access my new abilities.

Honestly, using a mouse would be such a relief because it’s so hard to highlight and click things with a controller. The character always seems to move to something else. Like if I’m trying to open a box the number of times a companion walked in the way and I accidentally started a conversation instead lol. But I don’t know how to set it up to use both. Right now I have an issue where if I click outside of the game screen in any way it will automatically minimize the window and I can’t figure out why it does that but I think it has something to do with me using dual screens. I’m not super tech savvy - bought my first gaming pc last June and still tend to mostly play on PS5 so kinda still learning some things.

I will have to take some screenshots of what my hotbar interface looks like as I am bad at explaining things. I never thought it had a “limit” as to how much it could show because they’re all tabs that you scroll through. But I honestly don’t know because I am a total noob here lol. Thank you all for the replies. It is very kind of you to try and help me.

[Mike Garrison]

If you still had Moonbeam, but you just couldn't move it, that was probably another menu issue. Since I don't use controllers, I don't know how those menus work.

[Jean-Maurice Nya]

Ok Mike. I didn't remember that. Thanks.

[David Hypnos]

https://imgur.com/a/wngrodZ

[David Hypnos]

Ok, so that’s what my “hotbar” looks like via controller. I also uploaded my spellbook to show which spells I have prepared, etc. The newest spells I’ve chosen show in my spellbook but not in my hotbar and I still can’t figure out why.

[David Hypnos]

Also idky my Gale has Shocking Grasp listed twice in his spells. Strange? https://imgur.com/a/SZXI1BN