Thats something you could add back with homebrewn rules.
Anyway, the rule specified by Einstein about physics is "make it as easy as possible, but not any easier". This is also a good idea for rule design for games.
AD&D was definitely not designed with this rule in mind. AD&D was completely bloated with endless individual tables for all kinds of things.
And the central goal of game design is always that the players are enjoying the game. Not realism.
Likewise D&D is designed for P&P. Making the rules easier speeds up the whole game. So in that regard I can see how simplifying the rule about attacks may have been a good idea. Even if its less "realistic".
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D&D5 solved a lot of essential design problems of earlier versions. The proficiency bonus is an example. In previous editions of D&D, your level 20 fighter would end up with +20 to attack. Which means armor class was worthless, for you couldnt reach sufficient armor class anyway.
Knights of the Old Republic used d20, which was a simplified version of D&D3, and I have seen countless people make characters who focus on armor class and never understood why. I would forgo armor class and just put everything into offense and hitpoints, and I was much more efficient this way. For example a character like that can kill the final boss, who is like a half an hour on a defense focused character, within two minutes or less.
In D&D5 we get only a proficiency bonus of up to +6 from level 17 on, which is much less extreme. Armor class stays meaningful here.
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The real complaint for me about D&D5 is that D&D5 dropped the essential Delay Action. This allowed your character to delay acting until the character later in the initiative queue would act. This was absolutely essential, but yet was "optimized away".
For example on the Nautiloid, when I want to do the final battle, I often reload if I dont like the initiative queue. It makes a huge difference and without Delay, I cannot fix it. You need someone before Zhalk, or after the Mindflayer, otherwise you cannot push the Mindflayer so Zhalk has to move and you get Attacks of Opportunity.
As a consequence, in BG3 absolutely every character has to take Alert as their first feat, unless of course they are Gloomstalker Ranger or Barbarian, who get a weaker version of Alert on level 3 and 7, respectively. Only then all your characters end up at the top of the initiative queue, always, and can coordinate what they do.
