BG3 has actually made me think that RTWP with a turn-based option might be needed.

Let me put it this way. During important fights, I think turn based is clearly the superior option. But not every fight is going to be an important fight. Some fights *in every game* are going to be easy fights. In fact, some fights that are important fights on some playthroughs, are going to be easy fights on other playthroughs (like if you explore more and get to a higher level before you hit them.) And for the easy fights, turn based becomes tedious. It would be much better to have a real-time option to mow through them quickly. The alternative is to intricately balance every fight in the game, including things like level scaling, so that they feel important.

The problem is that it's not simply having it as an option; switching between real time and turn based has big effects on the game. For one, turn-based almost always ends up being much easier. Especially in a high-information environment like BG3. Simply being able to target enemies, knowing their turn order, and exactly how much health they have, so that you can take them out before they can even have a turn is *huge.* You get hit FAR less than you would in a real time environment. Going from turn based to real time really changes the dynamic of combat. Thats why I always thought that the best RT system would be one designed from the bottom up to be real-time, rather than an adaptaton of a turn-based system. Deadfire did that. Then they were pressured to add a turn-based mode, because of DOS2, and we got to see how janky the reverse was, too: Going from a real-time system to a turn-based system, when things were balanced around the idea of real-time combat, REALLY screwed things up.

But still. Though I think turn-based is superior for the battles where it really matters, BG3 convinced me more than ever of the value of RTWP. There needs to be a way to get through the easier combats quickly.