Baldur’s Gate 3 player beats game as sentient cheese wheel

A Baldur’s Gate 3 player managed what may be the most impressive and ridiculous playthrough yet by completing the game as a wheel of cheese.

There’s no shortage of ways to complete Baldur’s Gate 3, between making new Tavs or Durges, picking an Origin character, and, of course, speedruns and player-imposed challenges.

The latest, and perhaps the most impressive yet, was shared by YouTuber Bouch, who managed to complete all of Baldur’s Gate 3 as four sentient wheels of cheese.

Claiming that “every other cool idea has been exhausted,” Bouch took on the challenge of saving the Sword Coast as a party with no items or spells available, modding the game to permanently Polymorph characters into cheese.

Unsurprisingly, the wheel of cheese’s gameplay options are pretty limited. Outside of rolling around and (somehow) jumping, cheese can perform unarmed strikes and has the unique Cheesy Smell ability, which creates a smell so “pungent” that creatures within its cloud can’t use actions.

Making things even more difficult is the fact that Polymorph sets the character’s Strength, Constitution, and Dexterity to 10 and gives cheese just 1 HP and 10 AC. Additionally, a wheel of cheese isn’t able to speak to anyone, locking you out of the ability to revive characters with Withers, among other things.

Fortunately, what does transfer to Polymorphed characters are any passive features they have. Because of this, Bouch built their cheesy characters as famously OP Monks, who can add their Wisdom modifier to their AC when unarmed, deal extra damage with unarmed attacks, and can make unarmed strikes as a bonus action.

Also useful are the cheese’s ability to use spell scrolls, a workaround the player found that allowed them to trade, and the ability to use Elixirs of Hill Giant Strength to boost the cheese’s Strength to 21 until the next long rest.

While Bouch ultimately did have to leave cheese form a couple of times to make progress, mainly going from one area to the next, they ultimately beat the game using a mix of Monk powers, consumable items, and good old-fashioned Barrelmancy.

Comments on the video are full of fans shocked and impressed by the achievement, expressed with plenty of cheesy puns. Others questioned the player’s well-being, with one simply asking the YouTuber, “Bouch are you ok?”

This run also has players questioning what absurd challenges the Baldur’s Gate 3 community will come up with next, with one commenter noting “At this point the only way to 1-up this is ‘Can you beat Baldurs Gate 3 without launching the game?'”