I’m on my second playthrough and made it to the githyanki creche as a druid, but tonight I respeced as a paladin. I was a paladin on my first playthrough and in other games like FFXIV, I really like being a spellcaster because… idk, I really like playing a spellcaster.
A lot of my gaming experience comes from about three years (and counting!) of playing FFXIV. I have all my jobs leveled to 90 and paladin was the last one because paladin was the worst one. That’s more of a FFXIV comment than a D&D one, which I had heard from other people but didn’t experience myself until BG3. FFXIV’s paladin suffers from button bloat and it isn’t fun to play. But, I think that’s my opinion of FFXIV tanks in general: maybe it’s the MMO performance anxiety when tanking a dungeon with strangers, but it’s a role that lets me down a lot. It’s a big defensive meat shield that as a rule doesn’t do a lot of damage, so it’s hard to gauge if you’re a good tank! Your success is invisible and your failure is tangible (everyone wipes).
Since paladin in FFXIV was generally terrible and anxiety-inducing, I was surprised at how much I loved paladin in BG3. I think a friend of mine on her one of many playthroughs suggested paladin because it would be kind of easy? Nothing about getting into BG3 was easy, but paladin was pretty easy! Hit things, cast spells, repeat. Still, I decided to go with druid for the second for spellcaster reasons, PLAYING AS A DINOSAUR REASONS, and to see if being a druid would change up the dialogue with fellow druid and forever-romance Halsin. Guess I won’t find out!
Unfortunately I don’t think my issues with playing as a druid will change as I level up through Acts 2 and 3. For one thing, I had Jaheira in my party for the fight at Moonrise Towers in my first playthrough and the main druid skills like wild shape weren’t as much help as I had hoped (or as fun! But since she was a limited companion, I think she only had spider form and… something else I didn’t use). The issue that bothers me is utility, I think? The spells aren’t as useful as my hundreds of kinds of paladin smites, which are also more immediate. You can do so much damage in an instant with a big ass sword; meanwhile, transforming into a sabre-toothed tiger takes a wild shape slot and doesn’t have as much of a chance of one-shot’ing what you’re aiming for. I’m a little sad about it! But respecing to paladin and going through the githyanki inquistor fight with a big sword and big magic again felt very good.