Baldur’s Gate 3: Karmic Dice, explained

There’s a feature in Larian Studios’ game that many players may know nothing about. If you don’t know what Karmic Dice is in Baldur’s Gate 3, we’ll explain this below.

In this Dungeons & Dragons video game RPG, its most notable feature is the dice rolling. Just like the TTRPG, all characters will be making dice rolls. But what is this Karmic Dice feature?

What is Karmic Dice in Baldur’s Gate 3?

A Reddit post by Havelok urged players to turn off Karmic Dice in the game’s settings. I’ll explain more about this feature, but on the surface level, Karmic Dice in Baldur’s Gate 3 will increase the damage you receive by 400%. This is quite confusing at first, but let’s go further into detail on how Karmic Dice works.

As soon as you boot up Baldur’s Gate 3, this feature is already turned on in your settings. When enabled, your enemies will hit and crit against you more often than normal. This effect, explained by the Reddit poster, increases as your Armor Class (AC) increases. In the game itself, it says that Karmic Dice simply avoids failure streaks while keeping the dice results mostly random.

But why is this feature even a thing? Well, Larian Studios added and enabled it by default to smooth out combat. Karmic Dice is available to both players and enemies, but despite this, enemies will hit you more than you hit them. While the system helps players new to D&D 5e rules and hinders players who know the system well, it seems to be more of a detriment.

Reading the post may still be confusing if math isn’t your strong suit, like me. Still, the Reddit user does a great job explaining the numbers and all other details, so I highly recommend you read the entire post.

Related: How to examine enemy weaknesses and resistances in Baldur’s Gate 3

How to turn off Karmic Dice in BG3

Luckily, switching this feature off is super easy to do. Just head into your options, and one of the first settings listed under Gameplay is Karmic Dice. Unselect the checked box and now the setting is off! Play around with the dice rolls in and out of combat to see how you like it.

Overall, the post urges players to turn off the feature, since it seems to be a massive penalty for the player. I played my entire playthrough with Karmic Dice on and didn’t feel like it bothered me, despite knowing the D&D system well.

Otherwise, if you’re having trouble checking your Spell Slots in Baldur’s Gate 3 on console while out of combat, we have a guide that can help you out.