While Baldur’s Gate 3 offers players plenty of opportunities to create the most powerful characters possible, that’s nothing compared to the pretty useless companions Larian itself has created.
It’s common knowledge in the Baldur’s Gate 3 community that Shadowheart, the cleric you meet at the beginning of the game, has pretty weak powers. Some blame it on her odd spell combination, others swear that she’s programmed to miss 90% of her attacks. Either way, the poor, lovable companion just can’t take much in combat.
However, after players took to Reddit to investigate why Shadowheart can’t quite keep up, it turns out it wasn’t her spells or coding that were letting her down, but her stats and subclass.
Larian StudiosTypically, as highlighted in the post, clerics are designed to be frontline fighters. Their high armor class, weapon skills, and well-crafted spells make them perfect frontline healers. However, at 13 in Strength and 14 in Constitution, Shadowheart’s armor class and attack damage are already incredibly below average.
Combine that with her Trickery Domain subclass, and many fans are quickly wondering why Larian decided to design her in such a strange way.
“The way her stats are balanced in her base kit is INCREDIBLY stupid,” one fan commented, going on to explain how the issues “caused a lot of new players who may not have understood why things weren’t working/how to fix them to have a really bad opinion of her.”
Of course, when Shadowheart is re-specced, players will be able to completely change their stat subclass, and fans were quick to comment on the best options for doing so.
“Shadowheart gets redistributed to Tempest or War Domain every time,” one player explained, adding that “the former has more caster vibes and the latter is also fun and badass.”
The Tempest Cleric is undeniably the preferred subclass for Cleric and Shadowheart. After all, it grants you plenty of damage spells like Thunderwave, Shatter, and Call Lightning, but also some handy utility spells like Freedom of Movement.
So if you plan on adding Shadowheart to your Baldur’s Gate 3 party, be sure to respec her abilities as soon as possible, change her stats to work better with her attacks or spells, and avoid the Trickery section as much as possible.
