I'm surprised by Larian trying this on since the DOS2 initiative system emphasized balance over realism: Only the highest initiative acted first and the subsequent turns alternated between enemy and team depending on who started. Team-initiative is neither balanced nor realistic. I see no real upsides to team-initiative in a cRPG, and many negatives. Such a system would almost dictate the player to create a character optimized towards that regard while allowing the rest of the party to ignore it. The entire team acting first or last would be very imbalancing and very hard encounters would become nearly impossibly hard just by losing a single dice roll. This in turn would lead to the save scumming Larian have stated they are mindful of avoiding by not overly punishing bad luck on rolls.
The interactive environments I'm more for having played and quite like the combat of DOS2. It adds an extra layer of tactic to the encounter. As you say, it's easy to ignore if you want, just don't plan on the enemy to be so courteous as to return the favor.
