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

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Then maybe you haven't played any tactical or strategic wargames, especially ones that use waypoints for movement orders that can take more than one turn? Unit versus character is like the difference between 'potaytoe' versus 'potahtoe.'

Also, exactly what do you mean by Turn Based? Do you mean IGoUGo without reaction? IGoUGo with reaction? Phased IGoUGo with reaction? WeGo? WeGo with reaction? Phased WeGo with reaction?

The reason RTwP feels more immersive to me than TB is because once the next turn begins in a TB game I am totally irrelevant and at the complete mercy of the RNG Gods. I don't even need to pay attention to what happens once the next turn begins. I could walk away and ignore it because I no longer matter to what is happening. No matter what new opportunities present themselves during the turn, and maybe vanish before the end of the turn and thus before my chance to take advantage of an emergent opportunity, my attention is not necessary and totally irrelevant. Whatever is going to happen is going to happen and there isn't a damn thing I can do about it. But during RTwP my total attention is absolutely necessary ever second as I pay close attention to what is happening and how well my last orders are working. My total attention is necessary every second to take advantage of new opportunities that present themselves before the opportunity vanishes. Just because I'm pausing the game I haven't stopped thinking or doing because I am both reacting to what has happened and proactively issuing new orders. So my presence and my attention are absolutely essential all the time unless I need to take a break. Sure the RNG mechanics are still happening in the background, but I can at least make changes on the fly to mitigate or leverage the RNG results in the moment. A pause in the action doesn't mean a break in my involvement. A pause in the action doesn't mean I'm irrelevant. That means I'm MORE relevant.

Then the best solution is to provide us with the ability to choose which mode we want. That way players who want only TB can play it that way, and the players who want RTwP can play it that way, and players who want a combination of the two can play it that way, and the players with similar preferences can team up with each other.

All right, I'll amend my comment to say I don't know of any turn-based games with individual initiative for characters where they carry out orders until told to otherwise. Thinking about it, I do know some phase-based games where each team goes all at once, and you can give orders to units and then execute them all at once.

No, I haven't played any tactical or strategic wargames, but since BG3 is not in that genre, it's not that relevant a comparison.




In a turn-based game, the reason to not walk away is because you need to be thinking of your next move, how you want to react to what the enemy is doing. If you decided to close your eyes and ears and ignore what the enemies are doing in DoS/DoS 2, you wouldn't do as well as someone who actually paid attention. Your presence is not "irrelevant" on an enemy turn.

Yeah, in RTwP you do need to pay close attention, but a lot of that is because you need to cancel what you were doing and reposition a unit to be in a useful place to attack from. That's little more than busy-work.

Yes indeed. And I'm sure eventually at least some developers will also come to this conclusion, that the view that giving players options takes something away from the game is silly and self-defeating, and being inclusive of both these groups of fans is more important than many other considerations in making a game.

DOS = Divinity Original Sin, the landmark game (at least DOS2) of Larian, the makers of BG3. It's odd that you are in this discussion and don't know that, or at the very least, what we're all talking about when we say "turn-based." And that's probably why you said something like...


...which makes no sense here. Even when playing multiplayer (at least while communicating with the other players), when you aren't actually controlling each character, you are still invested in everyone's turn, since it is a collective strategy.

Except that turn-based gameplay where you can consider your options carefully, and real-time gameplay where everything is happening at once are vastly different, with different approaches to how things are designed.

In real-time, for instance, enemy attacks have to be less damaging and often highly telegraphed and avoidable. The fights are more attrition-based. Making that turn-based will result in turns which have little impact because the enemy threat is generally lower. In turn-based, attacks are unavoidable except through dodges and misses, and the damage received can be much higher because you have time to consider your options. The fights have more burst damage. Adding a real-time option onto a turn-based game will result in harder-to-avoid, high damage attacks.

You could not just slap real-time combat on the Original Sin games, it would be a completely unplayable clusterfuck, given that a single enemy can deal a lot of damage to a character on one turn alone. You think the complaints about "everything is always on fire" are bad now, just see how it would work in real time.

This is not something you can just slap on as "an option" and call it a day. The demands of the different styles require different approaches in design.

Then how do you explain RTwP games having a TB option? This same argument should equally apply there as well, yet the TB mode in P:Km works very well according to TB fans themselves. Seems like this is a very convenient one-sided argument being made only from the TB side, that all RTwP games should have a TB option but not vice versa because TB games cannot have a RTwP mode something something. I don't buy it for even a second. Seems like a self-serving argument from TB fans so that they can have everything their way.

Eh, that's pretty much Kingmaker and apparently people love it.

We don't really know how difficult it is to accommodate both. We can only speculate. It might be easier to add TB to a RTwP game, or vice versa, or more likely, depends on the mechanics of the game itself. As for Kingmaker, if I understand correctly, the game had an underwhelming reception, so it was in their best interest (i.e $$) to try to make it more appealing/accessible. Conversely, DOS2 had no such need to add a RTwP option, because of how well the game did (and probably continues to do). If it hasn't started already because of the success of DOS2, a hit with BG3 might spell the end of RTwP (or slumber, at least).

I'm sure this is how TB fans will spin it, but I wouldn't buy that spin at all. If a TB mode can work well in a RTwP game, the same is equally true the other way around. Claims to the contrary are merely self-serving, imo.

Wrong. P:Km has had excellent sales numbers for such a small-budget game made by a tiny studio nobody had ever hear of. Subjectively, Owlcat themselves have stated they are overwhelmed by the financial success of their game. Objectively, a recent article somewhere put their sales number at somewhere around 1.2 million. D:OS2's sales stand at around 2 million. P:Km did extremely well, and all of this was even before the current definitive edition which includes the official TB mode and console release.

So it is indisputable that a vibrant market exists for RTwP party-based cRPGs. Sure, the TB side may be the majority, perhaps something like 54% to 46% going by recent surveys on people's preference. But if the cRPG industry decides that 100% of cRPGs made are going to be for that 54% group, then they deserve to be made to pay a price for telling the 46% group to drop dead. And the only way for the 46% group to make their voice heard and be treated fairly by the industry is to refuse to support games that don't recognize and cater to their preference. It is exactly how all minority interests ever get heard.

I honestly think it's a very vocal and fierce minority that even is that much fussed about it all to care. I may be biased, because I firmly fall into that camp who isn't bothered much.

I personally wouldn't play Kingmaker in TB entirelly though, because that game is loaded with trash and paste&copy filler mobs -- the endgame even to a fault. (I like Kingmaker). However, their TB mode (as the mod before) is an on/off toggle, so may give it a try if I will ever replay the game.

According to Steam charts:

Players right now: P:K (2,896), DOS2 (9,341)
24 Hour Peak: P:K (3,180), DOS (10.535)
All Time Peak: P:K (22,643), DOS2 (93,701)

Steam is of course not the only platform, but the sample size is more than sufficient to expect very similar results elsewhere.

And how you think that first quote of mine is spin is amusing. I don't know how I could be more reasonable. What special knowledge do you claim to have that lets you be so certain that "If a TB mode can work well in a RTwP game, the same is equally true the other way around?"

And if the markets for RTwP are there, games will be supplied. It's no conspiracy. Developers and publishers are businesses (with more knowledge on the matter than you or I), and if they think offering one or the other (or both) will be more profitable, they'll do it. There's no more to it than that. There's no ideals involved, no persecution, or oppression. So drop the whole martyr complex about your "minority interests" being heard or not. It's not politics. It's business.

You are wrong. Anyone who actually played the Original Sin games would know that the combat would not be balanced by flipping the switch to "real time". It's false to say all games will work equally well in either mode. That's like saying that a circuit designed with diodes will work the same way if you just reverse or remove the diodes out and reverse the current.

Anyone play, say, Diablo III? How would that play if all you did was make it turn-based instead of real time?

If you have never played tactical or strategic wargames then how can you possibly know that isn't a relevant comparison? According to my experience playing both kinds of games I can assure you it is very relevant and valid comparison. A turn based game is a turn based game is a turn based game. It doesn't really matter if it is a TB RPG or a TB wargame. Turn based games feel to me more like problem solving and puzzle solving as a passive observer rather than participating in the action. No emersion. No excitement. No sense of urgency. No adrenaline rush. I am nothing more than a passive observer while the turn runs. I could take five seconds, five minutes, or five hours to do my turn because I can think about it and figure out what to do at ANY time. Hell, I don't have to be there to watch the turn as it runs. I can start a turn and then walk away because I'm totally irrelevant at that point. I don't need to see what happens because I can figure it out afterwards just by "looking at the board" so to speak. It doesn't even matter when I do my turn or how long I take unless there is a time limit on the turns like in speed chess. I can start a turn and then walk away and think about my next turn at ANY time.

The few TB RPGs I've played feel EXACTLY like a small unit tactical wargame, which pretty much feels just like a large unit tactical wargame except the turns take longer because there are more units. In turn based combat it doesn't matter if I'm controlling a party of six characters in an RPG, or if I'm playing a wargame controlling a fireteam of six infantry soldiers, a platoon of six tanks, a squadron of six ships, or a corps of six divisions. My isometric or overhead view is pretty much the same as an observer rather than as a participant. I'm a passive observer helplessly watching when the turn executes and my presence is irrelevant, IF I watch because watching it isn't really necessary. In a TB game of any/every genre I've ever played I'm basically just moving pieces around on the board like in chess., I'm not playing a character involved in the action. When I play an RPG I want to participate in the action, not passively observe it as if I'm a general watching a map waiting to find out how my army is doing before issuing the next set of orders for my units, or characters, to execute. I have no interest in playing an RPG that will feels just like playing a tactical wargame when the combat is happening. When I want to play like that I'll play a wargame or other kind of strategy game. I play two different kinds of games to get two different feels when playing.

For example, right now I'm literally in the middle of a turn in Panzer Corps 2 that I started yesterday. I haven't thought about it since I shut it down. I don't have a clue what orders I will give next. But when I boot it up in a few minutes to continue playing all I have to do is look at the map, reassess the situation, figure out what orders to give next, and then move my units, or pieces, just like if I was playing chess with pieces that have different attributes from the units in traditional chess.

The more I read the comments in this forum the more I get the impression that all Larian Studios is going to do is put D&D skins on a different game so it will look like D&D, but it won't play or feel like D&D during encounters, and so it won't really be D&D.

Have you ever actually played D&D? I don't mean D&D as manifested in games like BG1 & 2, but actual table top D&D?

Steam current player charts do not at all represent sales numbers. Sales numbers are often readily available from the studios themselves mentioning them somewhere or the other. That's what I go by.

And I don't need, nor claim, any special knowledge. It is common sense to me.

Businesses routinely do exactly as I laid it out, which is to completely cater to the majority group at the expense of all others. So enough with your "martyr complex" insults. If you have no interest in engaging in a sincere and civil discussion, feel free to ignore my posts and I'll do the same of yours.

Diablo? Really?? Very convenient to bring in what is explicitly an action game. As for the D:OS games, yes they would be hard to convert to RTwP because Larian explicitly created mechanics for that game that can only work in TB, for example Action Points, which by their very definition cannot work in RT because the player has to input commands to the game about how they want to spend those points. So they set up the game to not be playable in any way other than TB. That was their deliberate choice. But for a D&D game on the other hand, which uses the Initiative mechanic, it is possible to convert that to RTwP as has been amply demonstrated in the IE games. Yes 5e has some additional mechanics for combat that may be harder to convert, but both WotC people as well as Larian devs, in early BG3 interviews back in February, said very clearly that there was nothing in D&D 5e that couldn't be done using RTwP. Larian chose TB for BG3 because that was their personal preference, and not because it was the only possible option for them. And the fact that the new Dark Alliance game uses 5e rules but is not TB clearly demonstrates this reality.

Sales are one factor (and can you point to any source?). But if so many people who bought the game declined to keep playing it, that is not a good sign.


Common sense has nothing to do with this. It's about coding, budgets, deadlines, and aspects of a game's rule set that may or may not be compatible with one or the other play style.


No. Businesses cater to themselves. They only care about profits, and profits reflect what people want most (in a free market economy, at least).

RTwP is specifically designed to make combat a cinematic part of the experience.

Consider the fight scene in Balin's Tomb in Moria in Peter Jackson's Fellowship of the Ring.

The scene is fast paced, chaotic, full of emotion as each cut and each camera pan adds emotional connection to the action on screen. There is no cut that lasts longer than 3 seconds.

Each cut is a pause, where the focus moves to a different character to give them directions based on the situation at that moment.

You are directing the action in the story that is playing out before you.

You cannot have that level of immersion with Turn Based.

It is ergodically impossible.

Baldur's Gate was DESIGNED to be a cinematic narrative experience. Not a combat simulator.

No game has ever matched Baldur's Gate BECAUSE no game has ever had the level of immersion that RTwP combat allowed the designers of Baldur's Gate.