This actually speaks to the whole ranged boost and melee nerf that happened recently. All combat actions, ALL combat actions, are a contest between the skill level of the one attempting the action, and the skill level of the target at countering that action. That is true for offensive skills like using a knife, or a spear, or a firearm, and of defensive skills like parry and dodge using whatever tool or weapon the defender is using, against whatever class of weapon the attacker is using.
So, shooting a zombie is no different than shooting a well trained soldier. The soldier is simply more skilled at defending against firearms, and so is harder to hit. You don’t have to simulate the evasion for a turn based game, just compare their competing skills. Conversely, a more experience shooter will have seen the evasion techniques used by the soldier and will be better able to pick their shots. And a more experienced soldier will have more evasion techniques etc. Just as a person doesn’t advance their skill to 10 cooking nothing but tea, so a person doesn’t advance their marksmanship and rifle skills to 10 shooting nothing but zombies, targets and turrets. You learn to shoot more skilled opponents by trying to shoot more skilled opponents - and having them successfully shoot you or close on you for melee in the process. The whole, “you can’t defend against ranged weapons” thing is just simply ridiculous, both from a reality perspective and a gamification perspective.
The same goes for gaining experience at avoiding getting shot.
The same is true of defensive skills like dodge and “kiting”. Kiting is a defensive skill, because it relies on the ability of the character to prevent their opponent from closing. If reach weapons had an opposing counter dynamic, kiting would be a VERY good simulation of reach weapons for a turn based game like this. A person who has never used a spear can be easily rushed, because they don’t know how to move themselves and the spear to prevent it (dodge and parry NEVER happen in isolation). This is the zero-skill dynamic we have now, where a person can’t think beyond dodging by moving around carrying their weapon, or parrying while standing in place. Reality is that a person who practices with their spear for 10 minutes soon figures out how to use the spear’s size and mass to their advantage, to parry, dodge, plant the spear in the ground to give themselves leverage, to keep the spear between themselves and their opponent. They also figure out they can use the spear as a long staff if they do get through, to stun, trip, or knock back their opponent to regain their separation. Any attacker can easily get through the zero-experience spearman’s defenses and get close. Any non-zero (10 minutes!) experienced spearmen can keep mindless attackers, like zombies, at bay (with a few odd hits or grapple attempts here or there). More experienced and more massive attackers require more experience with the spear to keep them at bay - to successfully kite. And again, skill using a reach weapon can only build against opponents skilled against reach weapons. But there is no counter skill to reach weapons, so kiting immediately became OP.
The idea of “balancing OP skills” really becomes an exercise in deciding what level of experience at that skill a particular monster is able to reliably counter. NO combat skill set, offensive or defensive, can exist without a counter skill set. EVERY new offensive or defensive skill that is developed MUST have a corresponding counter skill set. That’s why dodge became to be considered OP. There is no counter skill set, so they limited dodge to a zero-skill dynamic (one dodge attempt per turn - rate based entirely on the speed (mass) of the dodger’s weapon because the dodger has no idea what to do with their weapon other than carry it around with them as they dodge, as if it were a knife, as if they had zero experience using their weapon in a defensive manner). Any combat skill without a competing counter dynamic will become OP unless it is somehow limited to a constant-skill dynamic (zero-skill is just one version of constant skill).