Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Garanted hit ...

Hello there.
I was just reading through 5e materials, when i found something that might seem like totally logical, but it was not for such a noob as myself.

The thing is Magic Missile does not include attack roll ... and therefore does not provoke damage from Hex (kinda surprise for me, when i tryed first time ... since im used to think "attack" as hostile action, rather than rolling attack dice) ...
But then it hits me ... since there is no attack dice, those spells are unable to crit aswel!

So ...
I would like to ask for adding some "garanted hit" to tooltip for such spells as Magic Missile, or Witch Bolt subsequent cast ... wich would show us when pined that "garanted hit means that attack roll is not used for this spells ... wich means it will allways sucesfully hit, but for one its unable to score critical, and for two does not provoke damage from Hex".

Thank you.

You are correct, Magic Missile simply hits, does not make an attack roll, and thus cannot crit, and does not trigger hex damage.

I want to have faith in general humanity that the descriptions about what triggers crits (i.e. rolling a 20 on an attack roll), and what triggers hex (dealing damage with an attack roll), are sufficient for people to understand that if you're not doing those things, then the subsequent effects will not happen...

It would be sufficient, if this would be what is written in there ...
But it isnt ...

Tooltip says litteraly:
(source: https://baldursgate3.wiki.fextralife.com/Hex)
And that is what im talking about.

Magic missiles "allways hits" therefore should have granted damage to Hexed targets ... that was my thought (yes i know it was wrong, now) ...

And i believe so will be many people who never get closer to DnD before and therefore dont see "Attack" as "make dice roll to see if your *attack* was sucesfull" but more like "hostile action towards the target".

And since there isnt "Crittical hit description" present all the time, but spell tolltips are ... i believe it should be written there. :P
At least for us, noobs.

+1 to the OP

In my opinion, the added or improved description should be made on Hex, not on magic missile

PS: I might be remembering things wrong, but I believe it's mentioned in the spell description of Magic missile that it's guaranteed to hit

Yeah but I can't hurt to provide a little extra blurb about how magic missile can't ever do a critical hit and such.

Exactly as GM4Him say ...

And nope, the tooltip ingame is exactly the same as here:
https://baldursgate3.wiki.fextralife.com/Magic+Missile

You can figure that out by the fact that this is the only spell that dont have any "Attack/Save" descriptions like the others ... but i really hope Larian didnt expect us to search for such clues. o_O
And since i would never ... i dare to presume that Magic Missiles tooltip was updated (downdated more like?) recently. :-/

Then I definitely agree they could flesh out the description on magic missiles on the guaranteed hit part.

But keep it separate from Hex, as all that should be in that spell description for Hex

Yup ... and most of them are false, since you can still change the poin of your enemy body to get the hit ... at least, i never find any place where i was litteraly unable to make that magic missile to hit.
I admit it sometimes require searching for "specific pixel" figuratively speaking ofcourse ... but that dont change the fact that in every situation i have ben in my 460hours, i was able to make it work. O_o

Also ... not quite the topic mate.

Simple algoritm:
I see patch magic missile will take, also i see that tooltip on my enemy says "path is blocked" ... so i adjust my targeting so path isnt blocked > therefore magic missile hits.

Just as it does in tabletop ...
Tooltip litteraly says that Magic Missile hits IF you see any part of your enemy, since DnD dont play for limb damage, it does not matter if you aim for your oponent ear, or heart ... the point is, you see it > you aim at it > you hit *him* ...

No RNG included to determine your chances for hit means guaranted hit, however you dislike it.

The tooltip are really confusing at the moment.
I don't really care a tooltip saying "garanted hit" but the tooltip are terrible to teach D&D.

And therefore you keep searching the spot on their body, where trajectoria of missile do not colide with anything ...
Same story over and over, i allready pecificly told you that i did that multiple times ... why do you keep persuating me that something i DID is impossible?

I uderstand you ...
You pick your target, dont see where the missile will fly, bcs you expect it to adjust its trajectoria itself ... but it does not.

I pick my target, check the trajectoria, and adjust it myself so i have no problem.

Isn't this the problem:

Magic missile fires 3 missiles, all of which have different trajectories for some reason. So a situation can occur where the game SAYS MM will hit, but when you click "fire" the 2nd and/or 3rd missiles take different paths and don't hit.

Ok, have it your way ...
Here is tooltip from 5e ... quote me any part that say that darts automaticly reaim themselves so you allways hit your target no matter wich par of his body you were aiming at:

https://roll20.net/compendium/dnd5e/Magic%20Missile#content

"Each dart hits a creature of your choice that you can see within range."
If you can see an enemy creature, then magic missile can hit the creature automatically because no attack roll or saving throw is mentioned. And because 5e doesn't care about body parts, seeing even a fingernail means that you can hit them for full magic missile damage.

If you hover over an enemy and BG3 tells you there's a valid path (direct, non-curving line-of-sight) between you and the enemy for the first missile to travel along, then all missiles should hit. You shouldn't have to find a valid body party where 3 missiles can take different paths and all hit.

Lets put aside for a second that tooltip specificly say "a CREATURE that you can see" not "any small part of the creature you can see" ...

LETS SAY ... for a second ... that you are right, and you should be able to hit enemy by his fingernail ... you still have to aim for that fingernail, bcs you simply dont see anything else.
If your Darts are flying on curve, instead of flying straight ... you simply need to aim so that curve ends on that fingernail, otherwise you can never hit ... logicaly.

Therefore if you aim so your dart ends on any obstacle, you hit the obstacle. Easy as that.

I could, but it was not good point ...

I do engage good discusion, but repeating the same sentence and expecting different result is not good, nor even discusion ...
That is just childish atempt of yelling louder.

From my perspective, you are the one who come with an obscure hypothetical scenario, based on nothing but absence of RNG in determining if Magic Missile cast will hit, or fail. Wich is all the tooltip actualy say ... no diceroll included!

And finaly ... i started this topic, so i thank you for your analysis about that have anything to do with it ... but i dare to say i know its original purpose quite well.

To bring it back to the intended discussion...

Yes, as of right now, there are a lot of spells that do not function as intended due to the way they interact with the game engine and the environment. In fact, the game often provides information in relation to these situations that then turns out to be abjectly false, due to such interactions.

These are bugs. These are unintended consequences of a system that was built to do something else, and is now being asked to do something it's not really well suited for. They're bugs that have been reported by others, but which you should always take the time to report, with your save file or screenshot, whenever you encounter them and can spare the time and energy to do so.

As bugs, however, they aren't really a valid part of this conversation, related to how much information should be supplied where, about what works in which ways. They should never be a consideration of any sort when discussing this.

I'd personally like it if we had a glossary we could check somewhere, maybe within the tutorial section, that would explain the terms used in the language of the game - spells often mention a 'creature', for example, so a glossary entry that explains that in game terms, everything that acts is a 'creature', even if it is an undead or a construct, etc., Similarly, it would hold one description for what 'an attack' is, and what is meant by 'making an attack', and outside of that one entry in a glossary, all of the spell and ability tool-tips could simply use the normal 5e language without having to worry about whether it's clear enough.

+1, sounds good