Not quite. It's just harder to disconnect the 3D visual of a sword or mace swing very clearly hitting a creature and said hit missing entirely, especially as you're in direct control of when and where the attack happens. For comparison, it's much easier to accept misses in Neverwinter Nights because you're not directly controlling the attacks. The fact that you can also look at the log of dice rolls helps a lot, too.

Hell, even in Arena and Daggerfall, where you're also in direct control of your swings, it's easier to accept when it doesn't hit thanks to the slow animations and 2D graphics of your equipped weapon and the enemy sprite.

What is the most "paper RPG" version? Morrowind? Daggerfall? Morrowind is as far back as I've played, maybe I need to revisit older titles?