Oathbreaker Mechanics Need to Go

[Stormtruper]

That's it. Just the title. Prepare for an absolute tome of a breakdown.

I've been a dungeon master for real life D&D since 5e came out, but running other systems for close to a decade. I run/play in sometimes three games a week, and I'm told I'm really good at both sides of the table. I was periodically professional, but I didn't enjoy that aspect of being a DM, so I gave it up and just run games for friends and family.

I hope, then, that these credentials ensure that this feedback is taken seriously when I say that the Paladin: Oathbreaker (henceforth referred to as OB) mechanic is the absolute worst translation of 5e-to-video game rules in BG3 in its current state.

THE EXAMPLE
I have seen a number of posts talking about different issues with the OB mechanics, but I'm going to use this one, because it's the earliest I could find and by far the silliest.

Enter Thorne, my Tiefling Devotion Paladin. Throughout the prologue I do all I can to keep him kind, compassionate, and honest per the information on his armor description...which is a bad enough way to remind the player what their creed is, considering that armor gets replaced almost immediately by Ring Mail. How hard is it to make it a character feature or something, Larian? It's literally a text description.

Thorne, along with his three companions, happens upon the two Tieflings who have La'zael caught in a trap. In playtesting, you have four "paths" that you can take from this point.

PATH 1: "PERSUASION"
The Persuasion path is the only one that works out well. The paladin persuades the Tieflings that he'll deal with La'zael (tacitly lies to them) and gets them to leave.

This outcome is weird enough in that the way it's presented, I'm still lying to the Tieflings because it's using the exact same text lines that I think Rangers and a couple other martial classes get to try and de-escalate the situation, but it works out fine regardless because it's presented as a Persuasion when the Paladin likely doesn't mean to "deal" with her in the way it's meant.

Regardless, this is the pretty much the only way to resolve the situation favorably. If you biff your rolls, oooh boy, buckle up for paths 2 and 3.

PATH 2a: FIGHT THE TIEFLINGS
So you biff your rolls, but because you know as a player that La'zael is a critical NPC and companion, you're likely inclined to assist her. Besides, the Tieflings likely mean her harm. Unless you behave completely passively, the male Tiefling talks of killing her preemptively because of hostile encounters with other Gith. I played this scene six times in sequence to test as many outcomes as I could, and I could absolutely see why a player would see why defending her is the right thing to do based off how the male Tiefling reacts to her.

So you do the tactical thing: you try to deceive them to release her so you can talk out the situation with her free, or so that you can help her in the imminent fight. This always results in a fight, which then ends in OB scenario. I thought that maybe it was because I was being deceitful, so I tried doing 2b.

PATH 2b: Same as 2b, but just started a fight immediately after the male Tiefling vaguely insinuates that the best course of action is to kill La'zael. In truth, I get why these paths could be result in OB, but it's such a vague situation to be so harshly resolved.

PATH 3a: PASSIVITY (Dead La'zael)
So you reload your way through the previous three paths because your little lizardy meta-brain knows La'zael is important, so you should probably just let the Tieflings take her. If you don't engage at all, the Tieflings opt to capture her and take her to the settlement. La'zael always resists and turns hostile to both you and the Tieflings, who remain neutral. No matter what happens, La'zael dies and cannot be resurrected. This does not result in OB.

PATH 3B: PASSIVITY (Dead La'zael and Tieflings)
Same as 3a, but you try to turn things around and fight the Neutral Tieflings. La'zael remains hostile no matter what you do, even if you heal her back after being downed. This insanely also does not result in OB.

CONCLUSION
Oathbreaker is absolutely, 150%, unquestionably not intended to be a hard-coded mechanic in 5e. It's a narrative mechanic, not a static mechanic. No DM worth an ounce of salt would ever send their player a message after some vague situation occurred saying "yo, so you're an oathbreaker now." I would lose so many players if I pulled that ♥♥♥♥. My wife actively plays a paladin in one of my current campaigns, and she'd be heartbroken if I treated her character as insanely as Larian has treated mine.

The OB mechanics are intended to be flexible and discussed between the DM and the Player should it need to be invoked. Bare minimum, the character would likely have at least some knowledge or indication of what would constitute OB activity. That would then inform and/or influence what the player then chooses to do. There is zero transparency of the situation, and no room for interpretation. Your paladin is at the whims of a true troll of a DM in BG3.

In current state, OB rules render Paladin's essentially unplayable. They're so heavy handed that I literally cannot imagine playing the length of what BG3 is projected to be as one. That breaks my heart because I love paladins. The Player's Handbook for 5e sidebars the topic of oathbreaking as being a heavily narrative, flexible, and thematic part of the rules. I became an Oathbreaker literally in hour 1 because I had the sheer audacity to play the game and save a companion that is on the cover of the ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ box. But, because I failed my roll, I'm forced into either being a Lawful Stupid paladin, or to wind up with a dead main NPC.

I appreciate that a lot of work likely went into building out Oathbreaker mechanics, but it is not a mechanic that belongs anywhere within 10 miles of the rigidity of a video game. There's so much game design in BG3 that makes it seem like Larian either doesn't have a half-decent DM on their payroll to give them common sense about how rules translation will inevitably work out, or they don't listen to that person. I want to believe that neither scenario is true, but this was such a bewildering design choice that I don't understand how else it could make it to shelf, even in EA.

The OB mechanics as implemented need to be completely scrapped or put onto the old alignment slider (or something similar) per previous iterations of D&D games. They're so opaque and inflexible that I can't see the class being functional without a peak degree of savescummery, which does not sound in any way, shape, or form, fun.

[Fawlcon]

Phychomachia: I've been a DM since Expert Addition....yes, I am that old. With over 500 hours in Early Access, I can attest the story board for this game is insane. I am sure one reason Paladin wasn't released to patch 9 was play testing. You are correct that it is basically impossible to portray every moral outcome for a true Paladin and what should make them an OB. During regular table top, I bet we can both tell a story were the party distracts the Paladin while someone else does something morally grey. I don't have all the answers, but I would like to see more options for the Paladin. Example. Telling the Tieflings he knows this particular Githyanki and will assume responsibility for her. Wins persuasion roll, all good...if Tieflings attack; bad choice by them. If a group of NPCs turn hostile do to dialog options or quest choices (rescuing Halsin) and ATTACK, even a LE Paladin should be able to defend themselves without fear of repercussions.

[Pan Darius Cassandra]

It needs some tweaking, yes.

[dolby]

and you didn't even scratch the surface of that particular spot - event .

You have way way more outcomes you can try and they are all equally weird at best or at worse range from stupid, wtf moments or just down right broken and open to exploits of all kinds.

and if all else fails then their is the worst design that comes after. WHen paying money to god knows who to get back your oath and in the end everyone can just pretend that you didn't murder +100 npcs, steal and lie and whatnot lol.

the funyy part is it's easy to fix by giving every npcs in game a tags for that fight simple as that...

[Indure]

In my opinion triggering the oathbreaker start should be easy, but choosing the path should be a decision, not forced upon the player and alleviated with a monitary penalty.

Two other quick things, I do hope vengeance paladin gets added because it's omission seems directly tied to hardcoded oathbreaker content. Also the current system doesn't change my behavior it just makes me do creative stuff to avoid the penalty which makes it more evil, like letting companions make thr bad decisions for me or letting them get killing blows.

[Morsk]

Something I like about WhiteWolf's games is the GM is not allowed to give morality penalties without warning you. (Something the GM can't do, the horror!) They can't trick or test you, or shift the burden onto the player to mind-read the GM's moral opinions. They have to say, "If you do that you'll have to roll (morality stat)," and you can always change your mind on the warning.

[mobow213]

I tried the paladin play through, And it was awfully as I had to play as a good to shoe lawfully stupid paladin. Sorry but in 5E paladins do not have to be lawfully stupid or even lawfully good. It cost me almost 6k gold to reset my oath, I mean attacking a hag shouldnt break my oath, attacking goblin holding people as slaves shouldnt break my oath. Attacking slaver druengar also shouldnt break my oath.

[FR1GHT]

We re-rolled a group play-through because our paladin was exhausted with trying to avoid oath-breaking. Like having his oath broken by attacking creatures that were neutral, but due to another players actions became hostile to the party.

Without the ability to try and calm the situation down without resorting to violence, how is the paladin meant to respond? Abandon their party?

From my understanding, avoiding unnecessary violence and protecting life doesn't shield goblins and other inherently evil races from getting smite'd into oblivion. In fact I'm pretty sure most DM's would agree that killing off an entire fortress of goblins (Even if they were neutral or even allied to you) after witnessing them torture and kill truly innocent people, is in the best interest of the "sanctity of life"