Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Skill checks aren't interesting

Rolling a dice for walking in a straight line and failing 80% of the time bc of RNG - This is how this game feels right now.
Constant reloading is your "friend" as failing a roll and getting involved in combat with far too powerful enemies is in most cases deadly and no fun at all.

I don't think that's true, or at least I've seen some failures that turn out more interesting, even if it's not immediately obvious. In fact, it looks like you might miss out on some plot lines if you're always reloading after every failure.

In Nettie' s case it would have been better to not have those three checks at all and just go straight to combat if they intend it to be practically impossible to succeed. It would have been less aggravating in the end.

I agree that the current skill checks are not done well. What actually annoys me most is waiting for that damned die to roll - and if you click space to make that wait time go away you never know if you failed or not. Infuriating.

But, especially with Nettie, there's another view of the situation. Even if you fail the dialogue checks, that is not a total failure of the situation. You still have 3 or more ways to solve it, and the in the end the game continues the same no matter which you choose - the only thing that changes is how much loot or xp you gain from it. And the peaceful solution, through dialogue, is as always the worst outcome here.



So in then, it's all the same.

I am not sure if there are any dialogue checks which have a really hige difference in the outcome. The one I can think of is the outcome after the 'evil ending party'.

Yep pretty much, but this is encounter has quite a few issues. Personally I never thought of picking the cure from her. I also never noticed there being a cauldron. I did not want to kill her, so the persuasion check was the only choice. The issue is that there are multiple ways to the same result, which is nice, but the game rarely tells you anything or gives you hints what to do. You just fail a skillcheck and therefore deduce you are at a disadvantage. Other games somehow solved this better. I am generally for skillchecks, but I somehow feel cheated when I fail, especially when I do not precisely know the bonuses or mali applied and get the feeling I am missing out on content.
Also the skillchecks do not really tell you or hint at you, what might happen if you fail the check and what the further consequences are. In the Fallout franchise, which makes heavy use of skillchecks, it is usually extra information, a little help, extra money, or a peaceful solution to a potential conflict (or the other way around). All pretty clear, that is why fails are no real issue.
In BG3 I intimidate someone, for no clear reason and with random consequence. So I want to pass every check and see what is behind it. For example there is this frog with a medium skillcheck. I fail it attacks. I pass the check and interact further it attacks. Thousand questions arise and I am left totally puzzled.

Absolutely, they should have been. Single most frustrating detestable implementation I've come across in a while. Really takes away from what is otherwise a stellar experience.

I think a happy middle ground would be for characters to automatically pass skill checks if their character level + proficiency bonus + ability modifier is greater than or equal to twice the magnitude of the skill check. Equation:

Auto success when [Character level + proficiency bonus + ability modifer] > or = [Skill check x 2]

This way, at max level (12) with 18 in a primary stat (+4 modifier) and also with that skills proficiency (+4 modifier), a character will automatically pass skill checks of 10 or lower.

This would help develop the feeling of proficiency the character has by streamlining certain interactions (no roll required) and avoiding those frustrating critical failures on low skill checks, while at the same time maintaining the difficulty level of higher skill checks.

I’m going to suggest that, if folk would like to discuss the dice roll dialogue mechanic in the full release, a new thread is started to avoid confusion. This one was from Early Access and I don’t think all the info in it is actually true of the game as eventually published.

Resurrecting an old thread for new discussion on an old topic can sometimes be appropriate, but in general we should draw a line under Early Access feedback and sometimes even that from earlier patches so we don’t end up with muddled discussions that mix up old and new info and end up with people replying to posts that no longer apply or restarting old arguments, not realising they were from years ago.

I’m going to lock this thread, but anyone interested in the topic is very welcome to open a new one.

(Personally, btw, while I’d like more in the way of fun results from low rolls, I still really enjoy the element of randomness introduced by the dice.)