Inspiration

Not to be confused with Bardic Inspiration (resource)

Inspiration is a game mechanic in Baldur's Gate 3.

Overview

Inspiration points can be spent to re-roll failed Ability Checks, and are earned by making choices which fit the player characters' backgrounds; they are shared between all characters.

The party cannot have more than 4 Inspiration points at any time. If an Inspiration trigger is hit while there are already 4 Inspiration points held by the party, the character still earns experience points (see below) but no Inspiraton point is rewarded. The number of Inspiration points currently held by the party is tracked on the top right corner of the inventory sheet, between camp supplies and gold.

Gaining Inspiration

Inspiration points are gained by completing specific actions in keeping with a character's background while that character is in the active party. These actions vary considerably; they can be anything from helping someone in need to finding certain loot, talking to certain characters or solving a problem using skills relevant to the character's background. If two characters have the same background, they may both gain an Inspiration point for the same action; occasionally some actions count for multiple backgrounds as well. Most backgrounds have pairs of mutually exclusive actions which both grant Inspiration points, making it impossible to achieve all of the goals for those backgrounds in a single playthrough.

See each individual background's page for a list of actions which grant Inspiration points:

•  Acolyte - Shadowheart and Zenith Feur'sel
•  Charlatan - Astarion and Kree Derryck
•  Criminal - Ver'yll Wenkiir
•  Entertainer - Brinna Brightsong
•  Folk Hero - Wyll, Minsc and Danton
•  Guild Artisan - Jacelyn
•  Haunted One - The Dark Urge only
•  Noble - Minthara and Kerz
•  Outlander - Karlach, Halsin, Eldra Luthrinn and Sina'zith
•  Sage - Gale and Sir Fuzzalump
•  Soldier - Lae'zel, Jaheira and Varanna Sunblossom
•  Urchin - Maddala Deadeye

A custom origin character can have any background except Haunted One.

The following pages list all known sources of Inspiration points per act:

• Act One/Inspiration
• Act Two/Inspiration
• Act Three/Inspiration

Experience reward

Main article: Experience

When a party member earns Inspiration they also gain a fixed amount of experience based on the action they completed. The experience rewards begin at 20 experience and increase in fixed increments up to 275, with the amount granted generally increasing for sources of inspiration found further into the game.

Inspiration is the only source of experience in the game not normally shared amongst all characters. Specifically, as a rule of thumb, only the character earning an Inspiration gets experience from doing so (which often leads to some party members having more experience than others). However, it is often possible for the player character in question to share experience earned from inspirations with others. To do so, the lead player character must be alone and the only member of the active party at the time the experience from the inspiration is granted (no companions). Afterwards, other companions gain this experience upon rejoining the party.

Spending Inspiration

The Inspiration option under a failed dice roll for an ability check. The player has 2 Inspirations.

When a character fails an active Ability check and has Inspiration available, the player is presented with the option to "Roll Again" by spending one point of Inspiration. The number of currently available Inspiration points is shown in parentheses after the "Use Inspiration" text.

All modifiers for the original roll apply to the re-roll, including Advantage or Disadvantage and additional dice from  Guidance and similar effects such as  Lucky. A failed check can be re-rolled multiple times until the player runs out of Inspiration or succeeds.

If the failed roll is a Sleight of Hand check to pick a lock or disarm a trap, the option to roll again using Inspiration is presented alongside the option to roll again using another Trap Disarm Toolkit or set of Thieves' Tools, if any are available.