Baldur's Gate 3's Patch 8 is so big, it needed its own patch before it even released, and we're one step closer to a Permanent Booming Blade Economy

An Oathbreaker Paladin restoring their Oath in Baldur's Gate 3.

(Image credit: Larian Studios)

Larian has published a blog post detailing an update to the Baldur's Gate 3 Patch 8, which isn't actually out yet and is still in stress testing. The update includes a few tweaks to the balance of new sub classes in addition to the expected bug fixes, but notably absent among them were any significant changes to Booming Blade, a new cantrip that's set to seriously shake up the game's balance and crown a new subclass king⁠.

The update fixes a number of crashes, bugs, and scripting errors introduced with all of Patch 8's changes, including some tweaks to Baldur's Gate 3's long-awaited crossplay. It also features a number of quality of life improvements to BG3's upcoming photo mode. On the balance side, some bugs and unintended interactions have been cleaned up. The update has ever so slightly buffed the Death Domain Cleric's new cantrips while nerfing its Reaper passive, making it so you have to target two creatures with your double cast and can no longer hit the same one twice.

I'm definitely conflicted by all that pure power having no drawbacks, and the Baldur's build sickos over on the BG3builds subreddit are similarly torn on whether it's the best or worst thing to happen to the game's meta. On the one hand, it seems fun as hell to be a super-powered thunder-smiting spellsword. On the other hand, there's an anxiety that the relatively simple, risk-free character build of Hexblade 1 / Eldritch Knight 11 could eclipse just about everything else in the game, particularly the incoming spellsword class Bladesinging.

But I'm feeling less worried about the prospect as it appears more likely to be carried through to the final patch. Baldur's Gate 3 already has plenty of easy money game breakers like the Open Hand Monk / Thief or College of Swords Bard / Fighter / Thief, and I find myself coming back and trying new builds regardless. Even if Patch 8 goes live with Booming Blade war god Eldritch Knights, I'll still probably have my first run be with the new Arcane Archer subclass.

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Ted has been thinking about PC games and bothering anyone who would listen with his thoughts on them ever since he booted up his sister's copy of Neverwinter Nights on the family computer. He is obsessed with all things CRPG and CRPG-adjacent, but has also covered esports, modding, and rare game collecting. When he's not playing or writing about games, you can find Ted lifting weights on his back porch. You can follow Ted on Bluesky.