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Actions
Actions are the acts taken by creatures on their turns in Baldur's Gate 3. Actions are generally taken in order to deal damage or inflict harmful conditions, but they can also be taken to heal or aid allies.
A special form of action – known as a reaction – can be used as a response to certain triggers, including on the turns of other creatures.
Taking actions usually requires the acting creature to expend one of three resources:
Action
Bonus action
Reaction
Overview
Actions are categorised by their source:
- Common actions
- Common actions are actions available to all creatures.
- Class actions
- Class actions are actions available through features, such as those gained from classes or equipment. Many actions taken by NPCs are also considered class actions.
- Racial actions
- Racial actions are actions available through racial features, and are exclusively gained from race.
- Weapon actions
- Weapon actions are actions available through equipping weapons.
- Spells
- Spells are cast by casters and by other creatures through the use of scrolls.
- Situational actions
- Situational actions unlock as a result of another ability, feature, or condition. It remains at the side of the character's hotbar until the conditions creating it expire. One such example is Forced Manoeuvre as a result of Manoeuvring Attack (Melee).
Resources
Creatures take actions in turn-based mode by expending one of two resources: Action or Bonus action.
Additionally, some actions require both of the two resources to be expended.
An additional resource – Reaction – is used to take conditional reactions on another creature's turn.
All creatures have 1 charge of each of the three resources that recharges at the beginning of each turn, but additional charges can be gained from various sources.
Exceptions
- Additional actions
- Actions that allow a creature to take an additional action per turn – such as
– do not consume the resource they provide. - Free attacks
- Classes that have the
feature can take an additional free Attack action on their turn after taking an Attack action, without expending an Action resource.
Reactions
Reactions are actions taken in response to a trigger, and can be taken even if triggered on another creature's turn.
Some reactions require the acting creature to expend a , whereas other reactions do not. Those that do not are generally class features which use the reaction mechanic, such as 
, 
or 
.[note 1]
The Reactions tab
Reactions are managed for each character through the Reactions tab, located on the spellbook page of a character sheet. The tab can also be accessed immediately by pressing on one of the active reactions on the hotbar, or by pressing a hotkey (default: L).
Reactions can be set to be taken automatically, or the game can be set to prompt the player first.
If taking the reaction expends any resources, they are listed under the reaction's name.
Limitations
Creatures that are 
, 
, 
, 
or 
cannot take reactions.
Some spells – such as 
and 
– inflict specific conditions that prevent targeted creatures from taking reactions. However, these conditions do not prevent those creatures from taking reactions which do not consume the Reaction resource.
Examples of reactions
Spells
Class actions
Lists of common actions
Actions
Bonus actions
See also
- Category:Bonus actions, a category of all bonus actions.
Footnotes
- ↑ Many class features which are implemented as reactions in Baldur's Gate 3 are not reactions in D&D 5th Edition which Baldur's Gate 3 is based on. This change may have been made because reactions were added to the game fairly late in development.
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