You cannot attack with a broken weapon, the same as you cannot shot without projectiles, so you need to repair it or find a replacement, the same as finding more projectiles or crafting more. If you do not fulfil this requirement you cannot attack the way you want, so it is related. Both can be annoying in the long run IMHO because we are not talking about spells, healing or shapeshifting or supernatural abilities, we are talking about basic attacks... for a warrior that seldom has other ways of intervening in the combat.
If we are talking BG-BG2 I think it was a handicap to have stacks of only 20 arrows like in the original game. Thankfully that was fixed.
I totally agree with stacks of 20 ammo. This was really boring.
It's 80 in the EE editions and I don't find it's a real problem to have so many ammo. The fact is that it's NOT unlimited. You HAVE to think about it and manage it, even if it's not every hours.
Melee can use range weapons in BG1&2, and they can pick more than only one weapon so they always have something else...
Not saying this is fun but only to answer to the "they have nearly no other way of intervening" : take a look at the firsts chapters in BG1 during iron crisis... Your weapons break all the time...
Is that anoying ? Yes I think it is (because it's only random and you can do anything against or to prevent it).
Is it impossible for you to continue ? Do you always need to go back in town and forget everything you were doing ? Not really.
However, some games include weapon sharpening and durability...
I don't find it's the same because we can continue saying that the rope of your bow can also break... But anyway these mecanics exists and are not "handicap", it's just a part of the game.
