Melee weapon "to hit" calculation?

I was just wondering how the “too hit” calculation is done, I just had a frustrating experience getting mauled by a skeletal dog, and not being able to hit it once despite 30+ or so attempts. I was using a gun in melee with a -1 to hit, and had an encumbrance level of 2 on my torso-nothing major. Is there not a “threaten critical but hit normally if you don’t crit” ala DnD? I had a skill of 5 in melee weapons, and around 2 or so in bashing I think.

Getting around this I can use throwing weapons, which seem to be WAY more accurate, like it is calculated based on something else.

Knowing how the system works might ease some frustration, thanks guys

DEX also affects it. But your bashing skill was just too low and your encumbrance penalty too high. Use a weapon with a higher to hit bonus on small, quick enemies like skeletal dogs until you’re better with bashing weapons.

I know how you feel, “How hard is it to hit something in front of you and why is throwing more accurate than hitting?” I get frustrated with this all the time, especially whenever I’m wearing a backpack (which is about 100% of the time). I think this part of the game is inherently flawed; I was trying to hit a regular, non-hostile dog for 30 turns, all misses. I had a torso encumbrance of 4, +1 to hit bonus weapon, LV 2 melee, 8 dex and 9 PER, deft, LV 1 bashing weapons. I got frustrated and threw the pipe at the dog, who was about 2 spaces away, and got a crit hit, which some how killed it ( i only had 8 strength and LV 1 throwing!)

How in the hell is it easier to throw when your torso is encumbered? Never mind throwing to kill, just throwing accurately should be harder than hitting something with a sizable melee weapon.

The problem is invariably torso encumbrance, which in my opinion needs some serious looking at. I usually tweak it in my game. You can achieve a torso encumbrance of 1 with a storage of around 200 and high armour using fanny packs, dump pouches, “MOLLE” packs and some of the stalker armour, but personally I don’t like being shoehorned into a single setup like this.