This is something I joined the forums to ask about. It feels like they need to prune a few checks. There shouldn't be many situations where you're having to make two consecutive checks unless you're trying to do something ambitious or it's deliberately meant to be very hard.
I'm not so sure I agree consecutive checks is a bad thing. To me it's a tension builder. I use this often when I DM. It can get frustrating though, but I think the dice rolls adds to the feeling of DnD that BG lacked before. At least now your skills and stats matter in many aspects of the game, not just in combat.
It's also better than the "you cannot do this because you don't have 15 in Charisma" greyed out option solution many RPGs has. I love that I can try, but fail, rather than not try at all.
