Now, with all that said, I do think there are a few things that could be done that could reduce RNG without removing it. And I think they’d be fair.
I don’t think they’d be fair. I think they’d only mess up a solid system we already have for no real gain.
Misses being hits would only make heavy-hitting weapons even more powerful – think about Orcs. Or skeletons with two-handed weapons, etc. – and remove any reason for having nimble characters. Regenerating HP is just a poor fix here to cover the fact that this change would only encourage being tanky.
Same goes for giving more attacks per turn – you’d have to factor is stamina, weapon durability (more attacks = weapon breaks sooner) and the fact that enemy can outnumber you (meaning they’ll get more out of the Overwhelm bonus). If you throw in “miss damage” into the mix we get really powerful combination.
And on top of that you want to make shields even better… Sure, they would need SOMETHING with “every miss is a hit” mechanic but again, like HP regeneration, it’s just a way of fixing the effects of your proposed change. I’d rather not fix something that’s not broken.