Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Surprised

Few things are broken with Surprised.

You get the actual full surprise round AFTER you initiate combat by attacking. So you really get two surprise rounds.

You can just decide to surprise a neutral enemy. They get no Perception check to notice your hostile intentions and avoid being surprised. It shouldn't be that easy to draw a Greataxe and go whack someone with it completely without stealth. I hate it when my high Perception characters don't even get a chance to avoid being surprised by some acidic goo ambushing me.

The initial "attack" against a neutral should perhaps just be a declaration to initiate combat and roll initiative. Stealth or Invisibility should be required to get any kind of free surprise turn, and even that should be possible to avoid with a Perception check (hear the footsteps of someone trying to sneak up on you).

Another thing is that even at low levels, the alpha strike damage is getting so high you can kill anything before they get a turn. Many things contribute to this - haste potions, giant strength potions, Action Surge, abundance of dipping and poison, Divine Smites that now also work on BA Pommel Strike and synergize with Haste, extra Bonus Actions from items that can be used for off-hand attacks, Moonbeam and Cloud of Daggers triggering twice before enemy gets a turn, game allowing multiple leveled spells per turn.. list goes on. They should actively try to downgrade the effectiveness of surprise attacks but so far they've only made everything much worse to promote this kind of combat that's more like a one-sided stomp.