Baldur’s Gate 3 Patch 1 eliminates a popular speedrunning method

Following the release of Patch 1, Baldur’s Gate players have found that a method used to complete the game in under 10 minutes no longer works.

Baldur’s Gate 3‘s first full patch has brought a multitude of changes to the game. As promised, Patch 1 makes over 1,000 mostly small adjustments, improving the flow and overall balance of the game.

However, one of the patch’s changes is impacting the speedrunning community in a major way.

Following Patch 1, players will need to find a new approach for Any% runs, as the current method involving the Origin character Gale is no longer possible.

Note, spoilers for Gale’s storyline to follow.

Larian Studios

Baldur’s Gate 3’s jumping Gale speedruns are no longer possible

As pointed out by Reddit user and speedrunner Junior_Tart_6442, the latest patch notes include: “Fixed a level design quirk that would allow you to use a spell like Misty Step or Dimension Door to skip part of the main quest sequence in Act II.”

This is a major element of Baldur’s Gate 3’s current Any% speedrun method, which uses a unique aspect of Gale’s character to hop across Acts 1 and 2, skipping virtually all story content. At the end of Act 2, there’s a point where the player can choose to detonate the Netherese Destruction Orb in Gale’s chest, which kills the party and major villains, causing the credits to roll.

As of this writing, the Any% record is 6 minutes 29 seconds. For context, the record for runs without Gale is a significantly longer 49 minutes 55 seconds – still quite the achievement for an RPG with hundreds of hours of content to explore.

A commenter on Junior_Tart_6442’s post pointed out a practical reason for the change: Some players who weren’t attempting the speedrun were missing important story content by using these spells in certain places.

While disappointing for some players, Larian Studios definitely made the right choice here. Given the creativity and resilience of the speedrunning community, it surely won’t be long until someone finds a new way to finish Baldur’s Gate 3 at lightning speed. Until then, players will just have to keep trying to shave seconds off the time it takes to sleep with Lae’zel.