Highlights

  • One player has discovered a way to save scum in Baldur's Gate 3 Honour Mode by filling up its save slots.
  • The method requires starting enough new playthroughs until there's no more room for automatic saves, like the ones Baldur's Gate 3 creates upon exiting Honour Mode.
  • It is possible that Larian will patch out this exploit in the future.

One Baldur's Gate 3 player has found a way to reliably save scum in Honour Mode by filling up the game's save slots. While the accidentally discovered exploit defeats the whole purpose of Baldur's Gate 3 Honour Mode, it also presents a tempting option for players who have been struggling with overcoming the game's ultimate challenge.

Honour Mode is one of many additions that Larian introduced as part of Baldur's Gate 3 Patch 5 in mid-December. Apart from a stricter action economy and harder bosses, the key change that this mode makes to the overall gameplay experience is removing the player's ability to save scum; by saving progress on exit, the mode prevents the player from reloading the game in search of more favorable outcomes, at least in theory.

baldur's gate 3 scratch fetch runepowder barrel honour mode fail
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Baldur's Gate 3 Player Loses at Honour Mode Because of Scratch

Scratch decides to play a dangerous game of catch in Baldur's Gate 3's most difficult challenge, causing a player to lose their Honour Mode run.

In practice, it turns out that there is a way to circumvent this core Honour Mode mechanic in quite a reliable manner. The method, discovered by TheGamer's Rhiannon Bevan, involves filling up the game's save slots until there's no more room for automatic saves, like the ones that Baldur's Gate 3 attempts to create while exiting an Honour Mode playthrough.

How To Save Scum In Baldur's Gate 3 Honour Mode

Baldur's Gate 3 Minthara close-up Steam promo screenshot
  • Start enough new playthroughs to fill up the game's quicksave and autosave limit (around 1.5GB, depending on the platform).
  • Start a new Honour Mode playthrough and rely solely on manual saves.
  • The game will notify the player that it is unable to autosave on exit due to hitting the aforementioned limit, thus letting them know that the exploit worked.

One thing to keep in mind is that Baldur's Gate 3 will actually overwrite both quicksaves and autosaves that are shared between a single character whenever it hits its built-in limit. Also, manual saves don't factor into the equation, as they are unlimited and cannot be automatically overwritten. Meaning that the only way to take advantage of this exploit is to start enough new playthroughs to fill up the game's quicksave and autosave limit, which normally stands at around 1.5GB, depending on the platform. It's only then that Baldur's Gate 3 will be prevented from auto-saving in a new Honour Mode playthrough, consequently allowing the player to save scum.

It goes without saying that save scumming goes against the whole "honour" part of Honour Mode. But seeing how Baldur's Gate 3 is a single-player game, there's no harm in playing it however one sees fit. After all, the only reward for beating Honour Mode is a golden dice. None of that is to say that Larian won't patch out this exploit in the future, though.

In the meantime, it is worth pointing out that while Honour Mode is certainly a punishing experience, it is still very much beatable without resorting to exploits. This was recently illustrated by speedrunner Chronos, who managed to beat Baldur's Gate 3 Honour Mode in just over 38 minutes.