That simply isn't true, I think. A game based on Pathfinder made by Larian would most certainly do better than anything they could pump out based on D'n'D without Larian. It's Larian and Baldur's Gate specifically who got more recognition, not D'n'D as whole.
Yeah I agree. They deserve a lot of credit for elevating D&D rather than relying on it to elevate the game. The result is greater than the sum of its parts; both D&D and Larian reached a wider audience through the collaboration.
5e combat is better than their garbage elemental system from Divinity. Stopped playing that shit after the tenth flight with necrofire covering the entire battlefield.
that is an extremely debatable, incredibly hot take. i wasn't a fan of cloud and surface spam but lets not pretend that 5e's combat is universally loved, either. larian made it work pretty well by sanding off some edges here and there but it's, at best, a sidegrade.