Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Mega-threads and Guides The Turn-Based/Real Time with Pause topic

Not that I'm particularly invested in the discussion or interested in an argument of any sort, but I'm just pointing out that there's a difference there. DOS2 is Larian's own thing, they could do whatever they wanted to, going with whatever formulas or systems they came up with. Other than the core things that worked well in DOS, they didn't have to worry too much about sticking with anything specific. On the contrary, BG3 is "supposedly" the successor of a classic series. There are veterans and fans, and hell, there are fanatics too, of the original games who *expect*, *want*, and *demand* certain things from this game. It's only to be expected that a number of players will be turned off if certain aspects diverge too far from those in the original games.

It is even worse with this game. It is like the perfect storm: You have hardcore old BG admirers, new bg gamers, D&D tabletop players, enthusiasts of Larian or the DoS games, casual players attracted by the brand, etc etc and a mix and match of the aforementioned. All of them expecting different things from the same game.


To be honest, there are as many different opinions as there are people. That is why you create mods in the first place, so you can choose and change the SP game to your liking. That is why I hope they gave a good editor and mod support.

Despite how loud they are, I'm pretty sure the "RWTP or nuthin'" and the "TB or nuthin'" segments of the gaming population are actually pretty low.

The split between RTwP and TB is about 50/50 in the polls I've seen. I would be interested in the overlap each group shares with the "or nuthin."
It's a metric I think will be interesting. Here's a strawpoll. Share it around where you want. https://strawpoll.com/5we4h165

As I already said weeks ago, I'd be more or less fine with whatever they pick, if well executed, and quite frankly I doubt any arguing among users is going to change whatever Larian most likely already decided and set in stone a couple of years ago.


That said, I have to say I tend to resent the ongoing implication among several users that "If you are an old school BG fan you'll prefer RTWP" (typically followed by "if you prefer turn-based you are probably just a recent Larian fan").

I'm 41, I played all these games when they launched and I was even an "adult" already back then, I still hold BG2 pretty damn close to the top spot of best RPG ever made (at very least in the top 3 for me, for the plurality of things that it did right) and I STILL think the real-time part of its combat used to be one of its weakest elements and something resembling a hybrid between DOS or Temple of Elemental Evil would make for a better game, with better battles, given some proper encounter design.

This is usually the case AFAICT. Even when forums in general were much more of a thing than they are today, the people who you'd see on forums were only a small subset of gamers overall and typically weren't that representative of what the majority actually want. It seems that as often as not, when studios have given the loudest voices what they want it's come back to bite them so most seem to approach things with some caution and solicit opinions from a much broader range of sources.

The Dark Eye: Book of Heroes, which is based on a TT RPG system, is going RTwP. Not much of a TB trend if at all. Seems like it's primarily the D&D-based games (Realms Beyond, Solasta, BG3) that are going TB. And it is precisely because those three games are D&D-related that I will even consider playing them (backed the first two; am open to BG3). Dark Envoy as a TB game gives me no incentive to bother with it (whereas I did play and enjoy Tower of Time).

The thing is you really can't compare all the other CRPG in recent years with BG3. Since they were all done by small teams with Indie budgets. BG3 seems to have a budget that at least is in the upper AA area. The CGI trailer, they made must have cost a small fortune(the studio who made it usually works for AAA studios like Ubisoft and Sony!!!) which should give us an idea of how much money Larian is willing to spend on this game. So I highly doubt Larian cares about these small teams are doing, the same way Activision doesn't care about Indie shooters like Insuregeny are doing.

List of some of the TB RPG games in the making only in 2019 (a few of them already launched):

Trails of cold Steel III, Divinity: Fallen Heroes, Wasteland 3, Realms Beyond, Solasta, Stygian: Reign of the Old Ones, Disgaea 4, Tale of Ronin, Ash of gods: Redemption; Dark Crystal Tactics, Forged of Blood, The Hand of Merlin, Overland, Ultimate Adom, Othercide, Indivisible, Project Sakura Wars,Broken lines, Iron Danger, Edge of eternity, Unsung Story: Tale of the Guardians, Romancing Saga, Soul Saga, Utarerumono: Prelude to the fallen, Dungeon of Naheulbeuk: The amulet of chaos, Crist Tales, Wildermyth: Stories of the Yondering Lands, We are the Plague, Eidolons: Nethergate, Encased, Heralds of the Order, Knights of the Chalice, RAM Pressure, Broken Lines, Grand Guilds, Tenderfoot Tactics, The Protagonist, Arcadian Atlas, Alder’s Blood, ColonyShip-4: Survivors, Guile & Glory: Firstborn, Monster Sanctuary, Rising Lords,...

https://www.gamepressure.com/games/ps4/rpg/turn-based/33
https://turnbasedlovers.com/lists/top-upcoming-tactical-turn-based-rpgs-of-2019/

Some promising RTwP titles too: Black geyser or The Dark eye: Book of Heroes. I loved the Drakensang titles based in TDE (also RTwP, but uses a isometric 3rd person view similar to Dragon age games),

ED:

I certainly hope they find inspiration or ideas in those indie games if they need outside input, not in AAA RPG games like Pokemon or Monster hunter...

Agreed. From what I've been able to read about it, seems like the money they're putting up would qualify it as a AAA game. Which then also means they will want sales in the tens of millions which is an order of magnitude greater than D:OS2 sales. That's why I doubt the game will be isometric. I think it will be third-person, and likely to also have some action elements to it (though not a fullblown ARPG). And certainly very fancy graphics.

Re. the "ragin' debate," I still feel they may surprise us and use a combat system that is not RTwP but not quite TB either.

In other words... this will be like how DAO evolved into DA2 and then DAI?

Goodness me.

Well I happened to like the DA games, including DA2, so ....
But I don't think BG3 will be quite like DA:I, because for one thing we've already established it won't be RTwP.

You like the games, but do you also believe that both DA2 and DAI are a step up from DAO? A definite improvement? Pretty visuals don't count. Better visuals in sequels are par for the course.

Either way, it was just a joke. I was being sarcastic about how the DA series got worse and worse. It is an example of how NOT to make sequels.

I don't think you got that straight.

Whatever you typed has nothing to do with my post.

This I agree with.

At least the first part.... I have no idea what Larian prioritizes. They've never had a budget like this before.

This was posted weeks ago, and it's just not possible.

You CAN NOT have a system where you combine different aspects so it's partially TB and partially RTwP... It really does have to be one or the other, because you're talking about how the player manipulates time during combat. I'm not going to go into it again, search the thread if you need to, but it's just not possible.

The camera perspective really doesn't matter In this regard.

I have no doubt that Larian cares what these studios are doing, because they are fans too! I wouldn't surprised if some of them back these smaller studio VRPGs games kickstarters as fans.

Yeah, and just like the last time so too here you are misrepresenting what I am saying. I never said anything about it being partially one and the other. I am talking about a system that takes one OR the other and then makes some technology-based changes to it to make it more palatable to those who don't like that type of system. In Realms Beyond, for example, the devs have talked about having an option to completely skip over the animations for the enemy and even for your party as a way of speeding things up. They have also said you can set up AI profiles for your party members and then have the AI auto-resolve combats for you, a feature I intend to use a lot. But the feature I am thinking of that Larian could potentially use, in a TB system, is to allow me to input the actions for all of my party members all at once and then have the AI resolve everything simultaneously. This way I won't have to suffer through the usual tedium and irritation of a sequence of turn-taking.

Yeah, most of them seem to know and respect each other. The devs of Inxile, obsidian, Larian, CD projekt, the defunct Troika,... are joking together in twitter, they put photos in the gamecons,... some of them worked in several games of those companies like Chris Avellone. Josh sawyer and Tim Cain used to talk in their interviews about Dos or Pathfinder:kingmaker in a appreciative way, as Swen Vincke did with tyranny.

Some of them are even D&D fans too, they put a show together playing a short PA in a games con. And it showed that It wasn´t the first time they played.

This is why ideas in other games will likely inspire BG3.