Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General My God Whats Up With The To Hit

Mod edit: removed all-caps in title

Please do not take my complaint as Hating the game. The game is awesome. But my god what’s up with the to hit crap 3 characters in combat with 85%, 90%, 66% can’t hit shit throughout combat yet the Warlock with an avg 35% never missing.
God for bid the opponents Who can do multiple actions and never miss it’s incredible! Let alone the dice rolls! 5 reloads and could not meet the target number of 2! The weighted dice please haven’t seen a change.

I can recommend the XCOM series if you truly want to appreciate this system of hitting an enemy..

RNG just wasn't on your side, that's all.

Lol so true I must be affected by the will Wheaton dice rolling curse

Apparantly, the suspense of the die roll to see whether each actor is too incompetent to hit the target in front of them is terribly exciting for DnD players.

As most video game players don' feel that way, most video games don't use both to-hit & damage RNGs, but simply vary the damage, and increase the HP to compensate ( hence most bosses are high HP "bullet sponges" ).

It's exciting because there's a degree of permanence, of failure.

If you average out every hit it comes down to basic math: survive x rounds and you win.

No. It's exciting because you think it's exciting ( assuming you do ), and not so if you find it frustrating.

There is no right or wrong, just a matter of personal opinion; my observation has been that, generally, DnD players do find the system exciting ( otherwise, presumably, they would play something else ), and video game players generally expect and want something different ( which is why they don't play DnD ).

Personally, I played the original DnD,ADnD and 2e, and found the high RNG variance precluded any real application of thought to combat; not at all like chess or other deterministic games of strategic combat. Sadly, the latest version of DnD has still not rectified the wild variation in possible outcomes. A good example is the critical hit, which SHOULD ( by the very nature of being "critical" ) always do significant damage, but in DnD can do as little as 2 damage.

I'm not suggesting that I like any particular video game system more, and I'm not sure that I even know what I would most like in a fantasy combat system; most systems have "something" I like. In the case of 5e, I like the reorganized magic system, but find the rest of combat to be a poor fit for the sort of fluid video game RPGs I enjoy.

However, regardless of how much some players may like "true" DnD gameplay, I can completely understand why others find it anannoying or frustrating game of chance.

I mean, there is right and wrong depending on what game you design. Most system games require unpredictable element - otherwise it will quicly beome dull and repetitive. Less so in PvP as playing against human opponent provides variety. A computer game will always be predictable, so it needs unpredictable element - it doesn't need to come from chance-to-hit though. Invisable Inc uses limited view and procedural level generation, Into the Breach unpredictable enemy spawns, FiraXCOM and DnD roll to hit.

Nice mischaracterisation. Implying that rolling dice is all DnD players are thrilled about. Never tried to understand the system itself?

DnD is a system for table top gaming where players interact with one another through the actions of the characters they are role playing. When one character interacts with another, whether it's played by a player or by the DM, the resolution has to be resolved by the dice, or it will descend into chaos. If interactions at the table aren't resolved by the dice, you'll more often than not get the following:

John says, "My barbarian slaps Peter's character in the face with the back of his hand and knocks out two of his teeth."

And Peter says, "No, your character missed and tripped over his chair and knocks out three of his teeth. And while he's on the ground, I step on his head and knock him out."

John says, "No, my barbarian is nimble and won't trip over a chair. He grabs that chair and smashes it over your head."

And so on. Each player will refuse to accept that events will play out as the other player says it. This is where the dice come in.

Things don't happen just because you wish it. Just because your fighter raised his sword to strike down a goblin doesn't mean the goblin would just stand there like a block of wood and take that blow. He'll dodge it, parry it with his sword, block it with his shield, or angle his body such that the blow is glanced off his armour. Your character doesn't get to strike the goblin simply because you wished it. Characters react to their surroundings. They aren't target dummies.

DnD players are just mature enough to understand that there are a lot of uncertainties in battle. You will never know how the altercation will end from the moment you raised your sword. So the players let the dice determine the outcome.

Well it would help a lot if the game had representations of block, dodge, or parry. There always seems to be a post complaining about misses and the topic circles back to how it plays out in D&D 5e they aren't actually always misses.

Combat in Baldur's Gate 3 would be a lot more engaging if low rolls weren't only interpreted as miss, just like in D&D 5e.

Oh God yes, XCOM is BRUTAL with the dice rolls.

I doubt that whatever will change it in the end, miss is always miss no matter what you call it.

Technically a miss always means no damage, but BG3 makes you look and feel totally incompetent when you do clean misses against a slow heavily armored target. They even added a little taunting laughter when a heavily armored character dodges like a cat. There would be a huge difference in seeing a hit bounce off of a shield or full plate and feeling the impact. The "miss" would be much easier to accept, especially once you learn how armor works in soaking all or nothing.

Why talk about mischaracterization when you pass off adding comfort with probability to a contrived game scenario as a signal for maturity? Please.

The AI does not give a damn that you hit a goblin. That's why HP exists, and some even bigger pedant saying "well combat should be a binary between getting hit and die in one hit, as is the realistic scenario when hit by a blade or lightning, or crippled and useless for a while on a long healing period as would be realistic."

The dice exists on a tabletop because you have to negotiate the adventure among a group of players.

This will be for the vast majority of players a single player RPG where the dice as an impartial arbiter is irrelevant. They can keep that die in a multiplayer setting if they so choose, but ecen there it's absurd because your campaign is not clashing against other players'.

The idea that flipping a coin to get results adds strategy is a farce. The decision tree remains wholly simplistic.

This is a single player RPG videogame in design intention, not a tabletop campaign.

Many games use RNG to various levels of success. Comparing to a pretty different series, Fire Emblem, in that series it can be amazing or horrible depending on the game. In a good use of it, it adds a sense of tension cause the thing you are doing could not work, while also acting as a metric of power/defense cause if you get to where it is guaranteed that means you surely have the advantage. When done poorly it can be frustrating at best, and a complete lie at worst. In FE I have had instances where I miss on a 99 and that feels horrible but RNG works that way, and I've also had instances where I hit on a 14 which felt exhilarating. But I've also played games in the series where RNG was manipulated in the code which made things feel very eh. In dnd RNG is similar, you are gambling while roleplaying. You might get a nat 1 or a nat 20 or anything in between. There is a strange satisfaction getting a nat 20 and besting the odds that were clearly against you, and a despair at getting a nat 1 at the wrong moment. Overall I am fine with good rng, that is fair RNG, and even now the rng in BG doesn't feel too fair cause of the variance and how it likes to get numbers close to each other consistently.

Your railing against dice rolls and your inability, or unwillingness, to understand the need for them, calling whatever you disagree with as "absurd", "contrived", and "a farce", don't make the relevance of the dice any less true.

Your assertion that dice rolls are "absurd" because campaigns are not about clashing against other players, shows just how little you care to learn and understand DnD, not even thinking through the implications of what you so ardently advocate. In campaigns, there will always be interactions between player characters and characters played by other players AND the DM. Is the DM then supposed to let you strike that goblin just because you wish it so, while it stands there like a pinata, in order that the game is not "absurd"? Is this how DnD games should be played in your mind? And what happens when the DM says a second goblin thrusts its sword into your character's chest? I suppose, in order to not be "a farce", your character would also just stand there and be skewered, then?


On the contrary, accounting for bad outcomes in a battle plan engenders better planning and strategy. Expecting your enemy to be hit just because you wished betrays your own simplistic thinking. As in life, things don't always turn out the way you wanted it, and DnD reflects that. It takes maturity to understand and embrace it. It takes the lack of it to brand it as "absurd", "contrived", and "a farce".


This game is also designed to be enjoyed by players coming together for a campaign. No amount of forceful, hyperbolic adjectives in denying it will make it any less true.

Clearly calling adherence to DnD rules as adult and mature isn't a hyperbolic adjective. You don't plan for missing an Eldritch Bolt, you just press it again next turn. If your character eats a Bulette slam and dies, there is no strategy about the fact your next character hits Healing Word if Bulette won't be dead by the end of the party's turn. You pretending like reacting to random misses makes for a rich environment in high level thinking is nothing more than self deception. There will always be an optimal route to ending combat, and all a miss causes is the stalling out of said combat, not what actions are used afterwards.

In fact, it limits the combat because nobody will bother to use witch bolt at a 65% hit chance when you can use force missiles and not waste your time.

When a goblin swings at me and takes off a fraction of the pool, I don't recoil because it's unrealistic to RP of how I would react to having a sword pierce through my upper lobes. It's totally irrelevant , because I understand what suspension of disbelief means in exchange for pragmatic, enjoyable gameplay.

That's the whole point of HP, ability tuning, and ability combos/layering in encounter design, to add the difficulty by making me figure out optimal ability mixes to deal with an encounter. This dice a rama of yours is no different, no matter how enlightened you portray your argument as. Missing 65% of my wizard skills has not done anything to make me think strategically other than narrow down the set of spells least likely to miss and optimize the one spell with the most damage output and reliability. In this case, force missiles and thunderwave, and when that loses popularity, ray of flame and hex or poison ray cantrip from the staff of the crone after that in the priority list. It just railroads people into monotone gameplay.

The vast majority of people playing this game will be doing it as a single player rpg, and their play experience should not be held hostage to the few who will play a campaign with an acting DM.

I'll admit, RNG on basic attacks probably doesn't change how any combat is played. As you say, "you just press [attack] again next turn."

However, RNG on more impactful abilities like Hold Person, Blindness, Confusion, Entangle can absolutely change how a combat plays out. Related, the chance that I'll get hit and lose concentration also significantly impacts a combat. If I'm caster currently concentrating on a powerful spell and facing a bunch of small enemies, I might be willing to wade into melee range and trust my Shield spell to keep me unhit. However, if I know that the enemies have high to-hit bonuses or have spells that deal damage even on a successful save, you bet I'm going to play more cautious to try to keep my concentration. RNG is incredibly important for spells and powerful abilities as failing a single saving throw can have drastic consequences.

Actually, I was simply parroting what some other DnD players have claimed on the Larian forums ( not you, clearly ) - that die rolls provide suspense, and that this is a good thing. I was being ironic/sarcastic, but I apologise if you felt slighted; it was an inadequate attempt at humour on my part.


As I mentioned in a converstion flow above, I am old enough to have played the original game in the 1970s. Back then, it was genuinely different from the tabletop wargaming it grew out of, and in a way, exciting.

As a completely new concept, DnD was a mix of good and bad ideas. Other games like "Empire of the Petal Throne", or "Runequest" came up with alternative systems that also contained good and bad ideas; but it was a really niche and nerdy market at the time, so DnD with first-mover advantage has stayed the course best.

The DnD system has, over the years, managed to lose the illogical Thac0, and finally updated the magic system in 5e to something more sensible, but, unfortunately, it still has questionable representation of the very basic ideas of combat.

I assume players in the tabletop world still accept it ( although it was heavily criticised, even in the 1970s ), but the DnD notion that increasing armor weight makes you more difficult to hit while not mitigating damage at all, is highly abstract and lacks reason ( and I won't even get started on the notion of the "saving throw" in a computer game ).

When presenting that sort of DnD combat concept in a computer game, you are always likely to get a lot of people who dislike the illogical and random nature of abstract tabletop rules in a medium that can do a more convincing job.

Not that all computer games actually do provide good mechanics, of course, but the mechanics usually make more sense within the computer game medium. It's not even an argument that there should be no randomness, just that it should exist only where it makes sense, and that it is not actively visible where it doesn't need to be.

The basic difference is between players wanting a more fluid computer game, and those wanting a facsimile of the tabletop experience. You, I assume, want a facsimile of the tabletop expeience, but that seems a long way short of being a majority opinion.

Yes, sure, there are many different ways to design games. In the physical domain there are entirely deterministic skill games such as "chess" or "go", and others like "backgammon" that are skillful, but with an element of random chance. The personal opinion comes in when you consider whther you do, or do not, enjoy these games. An avid chess player may hate backgammon, and vice-versa.

Games like BG1/2 were faster-paced compared to BG3, and allowed you to enjoy the game without necessarily being aware of the die rolls, which may have been enough for some not to find RNG a problem. In BG3, the combat is explicitly much slower, and the RNG is more in-your-face, which may be part of the problem for some players.

You limit yourself in how you play, and then assume that anyone who doesn't limit himself like you do, is engaging in "self-deception". This has been the crux of all your diatribes, whether it be dice-rolling, or Concentration spells or the other game aspects you love to be bombastic about when you complain. You think that if something has a low chance to hit, then it MUST be useless. It never seems to occur to you that the low hit chance of some of the spells is to balance the power it gives you if it sticks. So you limit yourself to only the obvious and safe choices, like using only Bless and never Bane, and use only attack spells that target the AC from high ground or are sure-hits, and never any of the maledictions such as Hold, or any other spells that target the saving throws.

Good players plan for the event that the Bane didn't stick, or the Hold didn't last and switch up their game plan. Go ahead and limit your own game play if you like, but to say that those who don't are engaging in "self-deception" tells us more about you than you realise.



This just goes to show how dismissive you are of DnD. So combat to you is about one party sticking his sword into another without resistance and you call that suspension of disbelief? And what if the DM just says that the goblin's sword lops off your head and you fall over and die? What then? Will you challenge that, or will you go on with your suspension of disbelief? The dice are there to resolve such conflicts. I can't make it any clearer to you.


This right here is the perfect demonstration of your own limitations in your approach to the game. You only look for sure-things, or those with high hit probabilities. And because your own limitations lead you to a combat plan that plays out like a rote, you're incapable of accepting the possibility that a better game plan might involve taking risks for larger reward, and plan for the event that those risks don't pan out. Hold the enemy and all hits become crits. That's a huge payoff. And then plan for the spell to not land or last long enough, and have a backup plan. Don't assume your game plan that is boiled down to your own low appetite for risk is the optimal game plan.



I'd say the rest of us shouldn't be held hostage to your own limitations on game play.