No it is, its in the game. If it works or not doesn't matter, really shouldn't have to say this but you know, ITS EARLY ACCESS!!!!!!!. Truthfully I don't really care, if little critters are standing next to you and you cast shield maybe you should of thought about it in the first place....like really?! come on, use your head and plan your turns out instead of blindly rolling your face on the key board and complaining its not working.
You would obviously not cast Shield in this situation. If the game is forcing all reactions to be automatic then it would make you cast it when you would rather save it for later. Counterspell too, why waste it on something silly when you can save it for something important. Hellish Rebuke even, why waste a spell slot on a nearly dead enemy or one with fire resistance. Some reactions make sense to be automatic like Shield master, Uncanny Dodge and probably others, but not spells. Perhaps make the manual/automatic part a menu toggle for those that don't care or don't have any reaction spells so you don't have to worry about it.
