Baldur's Gate 3's new custom difficulty mode lets you make the RPG as easy as you want - or you can have a "more realistic D&D experience"

(Image credit: Larian Studios)

Baldur's Gate 3 patch 5 is upon us, with a host of major additions including a super-tough hardcore difficulty mode - but it also adds a way to make the RPG just as easy or difficult as you want it to be.

As Larian describes it, Custom Mode is "a new game mode that allows players to pick and choose the type of experience best for them. With many options to pick from, a few favourites include the option to hide the required roll to succeed dice checks, which gives a more realistic D&D experience, as well as the ability to hide enemy HP in battle, again more closely simulating the tabletop style."

You can see some further examples of what's available in Custom Mode in the screenshot below, and there are quite a few options. I'm particularly interested in the proficiency bonus slider, which looks like it will let you add a flat bonus (or penalty) of your choosing to your dice rolls. You can make short rests fully heal the party, or multiply the cost of goods at traders by your liking.

This is all on top of the new Honour Mode option, which is basically a hardcore mode that keeps you from save-scumming. It looks like Custom Mode will have a lot of benefits for players who want an easier way to play, but it seems versatile enough to also let you make the game way, way harder for the true masochists among you.

Baldur's Gate 3 patch 5 also includes a long-awaited inventory fix, a massive new epilogue with "some of the most complex writing in the game," and a selection of performance improvements and other fixes across all platforms.

Baldur's Gate 3 is already competing with some of the best RPGs of all time.

Dustin Bailey joined the GamesRadar team as a Staff Writer in May 2022, and is currently based in Missouri. He's been covering games (with occasional dalliances in the worlds of anime and pro wrestling) since 2015, first as a freelancer, then as a news writer at PCGamesN for nearly five years. His love for games was sparked somewhere between Metal Gear Solid 2 and Knights of the Old Republic, and these days you can usually find him splitting his entertainment time between retro gaming, the latest big action-adventure title, or a long haul in American Truck Simulator.