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

I agree with this completely. But don't you think this is exactly what we're getting nowadays? I am speaking strictly only about classic, old-school cRPGs (similar to BG3) and NOT the big, open-world, action cRPGs. And among those RPGs, it's almost entirely TB nowadays. You can count the RTwP games in single digits.

I don’t know. I’m not really following what everyone else doing. Is there a bunch of TB CRPGs coming out? I’m pretty confident DA4 will be tactical pause (although that’s probably more action). Over the last few years, Larian seemed to be the exception rather than the rule. It wouldn’t surprise me if they start a little trend for a bit though. Prefer not everyone jumps on the bandwagon though.

Well, there were Pillars and there is still Pathfinder. While Turn-based option is added, I believe Wrath of the Reightous was said to be still developed with Real Time balance in mind.

And then there is Wasteland (which has turn based roots I believe) and Larian, which seemed to prefer creatively turn-based over real-time.

I would like to see a big budget real-time with pause RPG. I think a big issue of games like Pathfinder or Pillars is poor visual feedback, and bigger production value might help in that regard.

Wasteland is TB.

I also would love a big budget classic fantasy RPG with RTwP. The closest right now is P:WotR, but that is nowhere near being a big budget game. And all other RTwP RPGs right now, to the extent that they even exist, are tiny budget indie games (ex. Black Geyser, Alaloth, Waylanders).

there's also tyranny, dragon age, and for upcoming rtwp solasta. and yes you are correct on wrath.

Dou you count DragonAge games in that? Or have they changed too much to really count any more?

I thought Solasta was only going to be TB? It was whan I played the demo.

oh really? i didn't hear about the demo until it was over, but thought i had read rtwp. i guess i read wrong.

I think the best bet for those who want to experience the difference between Rtwp and TB, try PoE2. I tried both and I enjoyed both immensely. I was sceptical about playing it Tb but it plays reallý well.

@DrunkPunk Solasta is turn-based. Yes, I forgot about Tyranny (mostly because I thought combat was pretty poor - I am not a fan of spamming cooldown abilities.

Yes, I do count Dragon Age, though I have a personal grudge toward that game, which is rare for me. Too much hype, first earned money spent, and much disappointment as well as my first interaction with invasively implimented poor quality DLCs.

Yeah I honestly forget DA exists most of the time, but I guess it qualifies. I'm really not sure why I thought solasta was rtwp but thanks to you and eton for clearing it up for me.

DA is borderline for me because I see it more towards the action RPG side, but either way it doesn't count for my question because I am specifically looking at the contemporary time period where even DA:I is a bit too far in the past.

But the scenario of one person managing the fireball spell and being able to devote their entire attention to managing the fireball spell doesn't exist.

You aren't solely and completely focused on casting that fireball. You're a human being with one brain and one set of reflexes trying to control four characters at the same time while dealing with 5-8 characters controlled by the computer with inhuman reflexes and reaction time. You're targeting the fireball, and you're trying to counterspell the caster, and you're trying to backstab the enemy cleric and you're trying to heal the fighter who is trying to get in an enemy fighter's face and you're trying to move everyone at the same time to find cover from the enemy attacks.

^ which is what the "P" in RTwP is for.

Disagree on that one. PoE2 was designed for RTwP with a turn based mode just added as an option. I didn’t find TB much fun.




DA games are one of the more interesting and relevant cases to discuss though. Not just because they are BioWare games, but because they are an evolution of the RTwP system with 3D graphics and big budget presentation. Even if it’s not the evolution that many here would have preferred.

Combat in DA:O (on PC at least) doesn’t feel too dissimilar to BG combat. Warriors and Rouges get a bunch more skills to make them a bit more interesting to use, and the core mechanics are different, but it’s very similar in terms of issuing commands and setting companion behaviors.

DA:I is interesting. For a moment forget the wonky tactical camera and companions just ignoring your commands half the time (argh!), and just consider the basic combat attacks. It is actually a RTwP combat system trying to disguise itself as an action RPG. That’s why instead of timing attacks, blocks and dodging, you just hold to attack the selected enemy while they attack you back.

Look more closely and you see that attack animations for warriors and rouges don’t always match the damage being done. Sometimes attacks that are nowhere near do damage, sometimes a character makes two or three swings that should all connect only to result in one hit. Meanwhile mages do an elaborate dance of striking poses for every basic attack. The reason for all this is that the game is really giving everyone an attack or action per turn, while the animations make the characters look busy and fill in any gaps when they might otherwise be standing still. It’s just an illusion to make combat look more exciting than it typically does in IE games (or DA:O).

Despite the weirdness, I didn’t really mind the combat in DA:I. World design and quests were my main gripes. I’m certainly keen to see what they do for DA4. BioWare really need a win on that, or I’m afraid they’re probably toast.

I think DA:O has more to do with KOTOR, then Baldur's Gate. And honestly, if DA:O was a 20-25 hour game I might have found it alright. I will put aside my issues with content and focus on combat itself.

I found abilities simply too spammy. Cooldowns are literally couple seconds long, and with multiple abilities it is difficult and tedious to control all characters. I didn't find myself using skill tactically, and when I did they were very repetitive (like trap spellcaster with the crushing trap spell). Using custom AI wasn't really an option for me, as 1) not playing the game is not fun for me. 2) if I tried it I would usually find myself out of ability when I need it. So DA:O was tediour, but shallow combat experience, which clunky and unresponsive controlls - with the way characters walk through each other one can even properly space-control. Add to it, that shallower mechanics lead to repeptitive combat, as the game isn't able to conjure varied enough enemy types for players to fight. I just never found myself asking "what should I do" in DA, and that kills a game like that for me. I had same issue with Tyranny, where one simply wanted to use abilities everytime they were on cooldown, making the whole thing feel like tedious management, then tactical combat. Luckily I liked everything else about Tyranny.

I suppose the biggest boon is Dragon Age presentation, but that is also something I never liked. I see appeal of Mass Effects well animated and directed conversations, but zooming in on poorly animated doll, doesn't make things better for me - I would rather stay zoomed and use my imagination.

[Since you appear to be trying to engage me in a sincere discussion, I will reciprocate.]
I agree with your point that the player is going to be trying to manage not only the fireball-casting wizard but also at least three other characters all at the same time. And as such, this could be overwhelming and difficult for a person to manage. But here's the key point for me in all of this, including what I said earlier about the whole fireball casting business. You seem to be (I'm guessing; you can tell me yes or no) looking for everything working out optimally, perhaps even perfectly, across all your party members' actions. The fireball gets cast perfectly. The wall of force you wanted to place gets placed perfectly. Every one of your party members does their respective actions in the round perfectly and optimally. But I don't want this to be how combat works for me. I want combat to be sub-optimal and imperfect. I want there to be screw-ups and mess-ups and things not working out exactly as I had planned or hoped for. I believe this is how combat *should* be, especially in an RPG.

So maybe (Again, I don't know. I don't have data. I am making an educated guess ...) the difference between fans of TB combat and RTwP combat is that TB fans love making some sort of "perfect" plan for how combat is going to unfold across the whole encounter, or at least across each round in the encounter, and then they want to be able to carry out that plan in an optimal way (fireball gets cast perfectly to hit maximum number of enemies and no allies, for example), whereas RTwP fans don't care about having a perfect plan for winning the encounter and their fun comes precisely from winging it. I've heard very often TB fans describing RTwP combat as being "chaotic" or "confusing" or "messy." They are correct about this. The difference, I think, is that we RTwP fans like it and want it to be chaotic and confusing and messy, whereas TB fans don't.

On the DA discussion, yeah I am one of those that not only likes DA:O but also DA:I and <gasp> even liked DA2.

I can see some of the arguments about the various weaknesses of the series, and especially DA2 of course, but ultimately I think the reason I embraced those games and enjoyed playing them was precisely because they were my only way to get my perfect combination of factors that make a videogame enjoyable for me: a role-playing game; a fantasy-setting game; a single-player game; a party-based game with full control of your companions; and a RTwP combat game. Given that I no longer can find this specific combination in too many videogames out there, I take whatever I can get and overlook or ignore or learn to live with any and all shortcomings in those games.

If you think that turn-based combat means that everything you do goes perfectly every single time and nothing ever goes wrong, you clearly have little to no experience playing turn-based games. Turn-based is not a magic guarantee of perfection. Things go wrong all the time. You make a move that isn't as effective as you hoped, or is sub-optimal, or the enemy does something that you hadn't expected. Things go wrong all the time. There's no such thing as a perfect plan where everything goes right.

Maybe someone will make a mod so that when you give a character an order, there's a 25% chance than they instead perform a completely different action than what you told them to do, and a 10% chance that they'll perform the same action, but on a different target than you told them. That's messy and chaotic, but does that sound like it would be fun?

I hope this isn't going to just become yet another ad hominum about my "experience" with TB games. I never said I think everything goes perfectly in TB combat. This was in direct response to what you said about my example of casting a fireball spell and the "complexity" of managing four characters at the same time. The actual outcome surely may not be perfect, but what you were implying was the desire to have things work out perfectly, i.e. a "perfect" casting of that fireball spell.


I was clearly speaking of TB fans referring to RTwP combat as messy and chaotic. What does any of this have to do with a game being RTwP?