Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Technical & Gameplay Problems Problems with initiative skipping and sneak attack

I've noticed there are a few times when the displayed initiative order isn't followed. It'll sometimes randomly skip over my characters - for instance two were shown in order, but only one was allowed to act, and the other was skipped. I didn't notice any effects that would have justified the skip.

Additionally I've seen several instances where I should've had sneak attack opportunity (like when a monster is threatened by another party member) that, when I tried to use the ability, it only performed a regular attack. I didn't notice anything like disadvantage that would preclude the sneak attack. Also sometimes when attacking while dual wielding, only one attack will trigger. Maybe this could just be the result of one attack missing, but that miss not being displayed. I'm not sure.

A few other problems, which I'm sure are just the nature of early release, are the bugged appearances of almost every dialogue scene where someone will:
Not move their mouth when speaking;
Be attempting to hold an object, but some strange physics will occur, like having an open hand, or the object remaining static while their limbs move;
Just completely freeze when another is speaking;
Look in completely the wrong direction when speaking to someone;
Some others.

A couple of physics problems, the most noticeable being when, upon having slain an enemy with a crit, the enemy's body flew somewhat beneath the ground and stretched to a ridiculous length.

I noticed that there is a usable ability for sneak attack, so maybe you need to click on that instead of just normally attacking. Also, the off-hand weapon has it's own attack as a bonus action. I have yet to use dual-wield, but I noticed the off-hand attack -button on my hotbar after equipping 2 daggers.

Ditto - noticed the same thing re: not getting sneak attack damage in the first fight. I also noticed that all attack damage always equaled the STR or DEX modifier... for instance, my rogue should be hitting for 1d6+3 on ranged attacks... all attacks hit for 3. Similarly, the first combat, enemy fire bolts always hit for just 1 damage... I wonder if that's by design -- essentially making the first combat non-lethal. If so, it should say something because it was frustrating to never get sneak attack damage when I thought I should be

I went to do some testing. It appears that sneak-attack is shown as it's own line in the combat log, here are screenshots.

This is with dual-weild:





This is with 1 dagger equipped:



So, atleast for me, it should be working.

Edit: Both times I clicked the sneak-attack ability. The % on the left is from mouse-overing the target.

Hmm. Well, I'll say, I am aware that sneak attack is an activated ability (which, really, I'd prefer was just automatically applied seeing as how you can try to use the ability whether or not it's applicable), it just doesn't always seem to happen when appropriate, for instance after a guiding bolt or when the enemy is threatened by an ally. And I have noticed that it shows a separate damage roll, which is how I knew it was working initially and how I noticed its absence.

As for bonus attacks: I know that the bonus attack is an ability that effectively gives you the potential for three attacks while dual wielding.

For dual wielding: I have seen that both attacks with dual wield get a different roll for each attack and damage; again that's how I noticed the absence. So I'll have to go back and look around and see if it's just missing but not visibly displaying that. But I would expect that a sneak attack while dual wielding should yield damage from three sources; those being main hand, off hand, and the additional sneak attack die. I'm not sure that's reflected in your dual wielding example.

Initially, I wasn't aware of the combat log, but upon consulting it, here's what I'm seeing: on a normal attack, both of my weapons swing; on a sneak attack, only the primary weapon swings, and sneak attack is rolled separately and is amplified by that formula in parenthesis . What should happen is: both weapons swing, and the sneak attack is added. I can't say I fully understand why there's a formula derived from character level involved in the calculation of the sneak attack instead of using two separate attacks. It seems to gimp potential damage, at least early on.

And for the first strike of combat being non-lethal, I know that I was one-shot by one of the sailors in the area immediately after exiting the Illithid ship, and I can't say I've noticed it limiting the amount of damage I do. It could boil down to consistent bad luck on the rolls.

If you use the Sneak Attack (on the right side, not the default attacks on left) you will get 2 damage numbers on your combat log. That second number is Sneak attack damage, not your off hand attack.
Your Off hand attack, uses your Bonus Action, so instead of "always using it" and maybe screwing up a plan that had your Bonus Action for something else, it has to be done manually. It will be on the right side HotBar.

Well, that's just not correct. A regular attack while dual wielding does use two attacks. The bonus attack is an extra attack.

The reason I demonstrated the sneak-attack with both the dual-wield and with only 1 dagger was to show that in both cases I got 2 lines for damage, suggesting that only one weapon was used for sneak attack. I should've tried the off-hand attack for bonus action too but it didn't occur to me. I have to try that out at some point.

Well, I suppose here's maybe where the problem occurs: in D&D 5e, the second attack should be a bonus action, but it appears that in this game, a normal attack triggers both a primary and off-hand swing, while still allowing you to use the off-hand attack as a bonus action. The sneak attack should be a flat number of dice, but instead appears to be gaining some multiplicative bonus. Perhaps I just don't understand the way BG3 is supposed to work according to its modified D&D rules.

I don't know too much about the rules of D&D. This is all just based on what I've noticed in Baldur's Gate 3.

I've played a lot of CRPG games but this is the first where offhand attack appears to be a separate action. I'm thinking this is the decision Larian came up with while trying to make BG3 resemble the PnP style of play, where you need to usually say how many times you attack with what weapon, what you do with your bonus actions etc..

I suppose it would have to boil down to that. It just seems a little odd to have both attacks trigger on a normal attack, but not a sneak attack, and to also have a separate ability to attack with specifically the off-hand. Plus the sneak attack tooltip appears to say there's only a 1d6 added, but at the same time it's evident in the combat log that there's some sort of formula calculating damage in addition to that die roll. It's all very confusing.

Nevertheless, I'm still enjoying the game for what it is so far.