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.
Oh, no offence taken, mainly because I'm not a tabletop DnD player. I responded because it has become all too common to dismiss the views of others by labelling those who hold them as "purists", or "fanatics", or just being irrational and stupid. So, we're good!
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.
A discussion on the finer points of DnD's armour class system would be lengthy enough to warrant it's own thread, so I'll just say that since Larian touted this game to be based on DnD 5E rules, it would be a show of bad faith to renege on this.
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.
True, not all computer games get the mechanics right, but Solasta has shown how it can be done. The poorer aesthetics of that low budget game might drive away many, so it won't have as many players as BG3, but for those who know that it is based on DnD SRD, and bought it on that basis, largely enjoy it for what it is and have little to complain about it except for some bugs. Solasta promised a DnD tactical game, and it looks like it will deliver what it advertised. Larian loves it's own cheese, and there's strong likelihood that they intend to keep it in the game, but offering a mode where DnD rules are strictly adhered to is the honourable thing to do for marketing BG3 as a DnD game.
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.
The dichotomy may not even exist. I'm not a tabletop DnD player, so the desire for a facsimile of the tabletop experience was never there. In fact, I thought I enjoyed the combat for the first 2 or 3 characters. I didn't understand why there was so much discussion that Larian should stick as closely to DnD 5E as possible. I didn't see what the big deal was. I understood their arguments intellectually, but I didn't feel it. But I arrived at the realisation on my own that the combat in this game is incredibly shallow, with Larian homebrews being more powerful than class abilities and spells, leading to every melee character playing the same way and likewise for ranged ones. So if an average player like me, who is not a tabletop DnD player, could see something wrong with the combat in this game, there may be more who might come to realise this on their own too, once they've played the game enough. There will always be those who just love to cheese their way through the game. But for the ones who desire a more tactical game play, enough time spent on the game just might expose the shallowness of the combat system.
