I also agree with sorcvictor. A truly faithful implementation of DnD works wonders and has a deep pool of mechanics to draw from. Something like an updated ToEE engine could be used as the source to bring many of the truly great PnP campaigns out there into the computer screen, with a good deal of accuracy.
I don't know about you guys, but I want to experience the fight with epic level Lareth the Beautiful and his companions that goes down in one of the 3.5 campaigns against Tharizdun.
I don't even see where it's a "debate" at all. As far as I can tell, there aren't even a dozen real-time with pause isometric RPGs in existence. You have Baldur's Gate 1 and 2, Icewind Dale 1 and 2, Planescape: Torment, Pillars of Eternity 1 and 2, Pathfinder: Kingmaker, Lionheart: Legacy of the Crusader and the recent Tower of Time. That's it. If you want to get cute, you can throw in Neverwinter Nights 1 and 2 and Dragon Age: Origins, since even though they are 3D, they still have the same basic concepts.
Agreed. This is why I've never understood anybody that insists on realtime. There's so few realtime tactical RPG's out there, that you're really shortchanging yourself if you refuse to play turn-based ones.
It's the height of arrogance to tell people they should give up their preference and change their preference to something else because that's the preference other people have. I will rather not have any games to play than stoop to playing a trash TB game.
Besides, there are a lot more RT games available to play if one moves away from only isometric games, for example third-person action RPGs. And again, I would much rather deviate from isometric, old-school RPGs to action RPGs than accept TB games.
I don't even see where it's a "debate" at all. As far as I can tell, there aren't even a dozen real-time with pause isometric RPGs in existence. You have Baldur's Gate 1 and 2, Icewind Dale 1 and 2, Planescape: Torment, Pillars of Eternity 1 and 2, Pathfinder: Kingmaker, Lionheart: Legacy of the Crusader and the recent Tower of Time. That's it. If you want to get cute, you can throw in Neverwinter Nights 1 and 2 and Dragon Age: Origins, since even though they are 3D, they still have the same basic concepts.
Agreed. This is why I've never understood anybody that insists on realtime. There's so few realtime tactical RPG's out there, that you're really shortchanging yourself if you refuse to play turn-based ones.
It's the height of arrogance to tell people they should give up their preference and change their preference to something else because that's the preference other people have. I will rather not have any games to play than stoop to playing a trash TB game.
Besides, there are a lot more RT games available to play if one moves away from only isometric games, for example third-person action RPGs. And again, I would much rather deviate from isometric, old-school RPGs to action RPGs than accept TB games.
Jesus christ, that's truly... sad ? And extreme. I don't get it, though. There are good TB games and there are bad TB games, the same with RTwP. For example I love BG, but PoE1 is meh for me. I like DoS2, but not so much ToEE. It's all about story and characters for me. That is the rpg essence in my book. The game mechanics it's just a nice addition, it's good when it just not get in the way.
I don't even see where it's a "debate" at all. As far as I can tell, there aren't even a dozen real-time with pause isometric RPGs in existence. You have Baldur's Gate 1 and 2, Icewind Dale 1 and 2, Planescape: Torment, Pillars of Eternity 1 and 2, Pathfinder: Kingmaker, Lionheart: Legacy of the Crusader and the recent Tower of Time. That's it. If you want to get cute, you can throw in Neverwinter Nights 1 and 2 and Dragon Age: Origins, since even though they are 3D, they still have the same basic concepts.
Agreed. This is why I've never understood anybody that insists on realtime. There's so few realtime tactical RPG's out there, that you're really shortchanging yourself if you refuse to play turn-based ones.
It's the height of arrogance to tell people they should give up their preference and change their preference to something else because that's the preference other people have. I will rather not have any games to play than stoop to playing a trash TB game.
Besides, there are a lot more RT games available to play if one moves away from only isometric games, for example third-person action RPGs. And again, I would much rather deviate from isometric, old-school RPGs to action RPGs than accept TB games.
I had no idea there was such hatred for turn-based video games until I encountered this forum. There wasn't a "real-time" RPG in existence til 1987's Dungeon Master.
Well, up until I played D:OS I did not have a hatred for TB combat. I disliked it, and strongly preferred RTwP, but was still open to it. For example, I actually liked T:ToN despite its silly TB combat system. So my current state of mind hating TB can be blamed entirely on D:OS. Maybe if I eventually come across a TB game that I don't hate so much, my feelings about TB combat will go back to what it was before.
As a related side-note, I dislike RT (without pause) almost as much as TB.
I don't even see where it's a "debate" at all. As far as I can tell, there aren't even a dozen real-time with pause isometric RPGs in existence. You have Baldur's Gate 1 and 2, Icewind Dale 1 and 2, Planescape: Torment, Pillars of Eternity 1 and 2, Pathfinder: Kingmaker, Lionheart: Legacy of the Crusader and the recent Tower of Time. That's it. If you want to get cute, you can throw in Neverwinter Nights 1 and 2 and Dragon Age: Origins, since even though they are 3D, they still have the same basic concepts.
Agreed. This is why I've never understood anybody that insists on realtime. There's so few realtime tactical RPG's out there, that you're really shortchanging yourself if you refuse to play turn-based ones.
It's the height of arrogance to tell people they should give up their preference and change their preference to something else because that's the preference other people have. I will rather not have any games to play than stoop to playing a trash TB game.
Besides, there are a lot more RT games available to play if one moves away from only isometric games, for example third-person action RPGs. And again, I would much rather deviate from isometric, old-school RPGs to action RPGs than accept TB games.
I had no idea there was such hatred for turn-based video games until I encountered this forum. There wasn't a "real-time" RPG in existence til 1987's Dungeon Master.
But isn't that precisely because we didn't yet have the technology to properly do real time games until then? And then we got to a point in technology where it became possible. Which is exactly why I don't understand why anyone would want to do TB. To me, it's the equivalent of insisting on/preferring using oil lamps in the face of electricity.
Well, up until I played D:OS I did not have a hatred for TB combat. I disliked it, and strongly preferred RTwP, but was still open to it. For example, I actually liked T:ToN despite its silly TB combat system. So my current state of mind hating TB can be blamed entirely on D:OS. Maybe if I eventually come across a TB game that I don't hate so much, my feelings about TB combat will go back to what it was before.
As a related side-note, I dislike RT (without pause) almost as much as TB.
If I go by this logic, I would refuse to play any open world game after not falling in love with GTA 5 and would miss RDR2, the greatest gaming experience I've ever had.
(...)I like DoS2, but not so much ToEE. It's all about story and characters for me. That is the rpg essence in my book. The game mechanics it's just a nice addition, it's good when it just not get in the way.
I like story too but i wonder why making a RPG when the game mechanics contradicts the game lore/story. And love when the game mechanics doesn't try to break my suspension of disbelief every time with archers that can't hit enemies at 14m, cooldowns, axe wielding monsters that drops maces and non used gear, etc. ToEE is amazing partially due the atmosphere.
As for Turn Based, BEFORE i have played ToEE, Dark Sun Shattered Lands and other amazing TB RPG's, i had a bias against turn based games. And was partially due Wizardry 8 with extremely slow animations and large scale encounters.
(...)I like DoS2, but not so much ToEE. It's all about story and characters for me. That is the rpg essence in my book. The game mechanics it's just a nice addition, it's good when it just not get in the way.
I like story too but i wonder why making a RPG when the game mechanics contradicts the game lore/story. And love when the game mechanics doesn't try to break my suspension of disbelief every time with archers that can't hit enemies at 14m, cooldowns, axe wielding monsters that drops maces and non used gear, etc. ToEE is amazing partially due the atmosphere.
As for Turn Based, BEFORE i have played ToEE, Dark Sun Shattered Lands and other amazing TB RPG's, i had a bias against turn based games. And was partially due Wizardry 8 with extremely slow animations and large scale encounters.
There is a mod that deals with the speed of the encounters in Wizardry 8. Wizfast.
Turn Based is an abstraction, and it is used purely due to inability/inconvenience to present Real Time. It is an abstraction to simulate Real Time. Both technology limitations, game environment limitations, P&P limitations, and other limitations cause it to become convenient.
You can prefer to play a Turn Based game of course, who am I to tell you what you can prefer. However, games are already simulations, if we can make it as real as possible in terms of mechanics it is more engaging for me. I like some games even though they are turn based, not because they are turn based. That shows how awesome the other things related to that game are.
Turn based makes the most sense when it is a strategy game, as you probably need to control too many things at the same time and it might be hard to do so in real time. Turn Based in an RPG is ridiculous in this technology in my opinion. And I stress ‘in my opinion’ part.
I just can’t feel engaged in a game where we wait for the monster ‘Ok you attack me now. Then I smash your skull’. We might as well convince the monster to play chess with us to decide who will live. Like magic the gathering, you meet the monster and start playing cards with it to decide who dies.
I'm not a tabletop player (though I certainly read the source material for it). And correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm PRETTY certain everyone in the group and the dungeon master aren't all just yelling commands and spells and throwing dice simultaneously. And what the MOST celebrated CRPGs of all-time (Fallout, Baldur's Gate, VtMB etc.) get praised for is how accurately they simulate a tabletop experience. That has always been the ultimate goal of the most high-minded games.
I'm not a tabletop player (though I certainly read the source material for it). And correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm PRETTY certain everyone in the group and the dungeon master aren't all just yelling commands and spells and throwing dice simultaneously. And what the MOST celebrated CRPGs of all-time (Fallout, Baldur's Gate, VtMB etc.) get praised for is how accurately they simulate a tabletop experience. That has always been the ultimate goal of the most high-minded games.
Nor a player playing 4~6 characters simultaneously... A PC can process 50+ unities actions in a fraction of a second. A human DM can't. I love TBRPG but really believe that a turn based game needs to have options to speed up animations and concurrent turns.
Dark Sun : Shattered Lands(1993) allowed me to skip animations. Why games such as dos2 can't allow me to do that?
When you have a proper set of dungeon tiles and miniatures, and know the rules, DnD is basically a strategic board game. It's not meant to be a poor simulation of an action game. If you don't like turned based systems, or planning several moves ahead, I'm sorry to say, you won't like DnD. That's the name of the game.
I would want it to remain faithful to that, I enjoy computer DnD games because they are an extension of those systems.
I'm not a tabletop player (though I certainly read the source material for it). And correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm PRETTY certain everyone in the group and the dungeon master aren't all just yelling commands and spells and throwing dice simultaneously. And what the MOST celebrated CRPGs of all-time (Fallout, Baldur's Gate, VtMB etc.) get praised for is how accurately they simulate a tabletop experience. That has always been the ultimate goal of the most high-minded games.
Tabletop is already an abstraction, a simulation of how events would have happened in real time. It is there due to limitations. When you try to simulate tabletop by making a turn based game, it is another level of abstraction on top of that. It makes more sense to me to try to simulate real time, in a better way than tabletop if possible. And it is definitely possible, because most of the limitations table-top has can be overcome in this technology in a single player game.
Turn Based is an abstraction, and it is used purely due to inability/inconvenience to present Real Time. It is an abstraction to simulate Real Time. Both technology limitations, game environment limitations, P&P limitations, and other limitations cause it to become convenient.
You can prefer to play a Turn Based game of course, who am I to tell you what you can prefer. However, games are already simulations, if we can make it as real as possible in terms of mechanics it is more engaging for me. I like some games even though they are turn based, not because they are turn based. That shows how awesome the other things related to that game are.
Turn based makes the most sense when it is a strategy game, as you probably need to control too many things at the same time and it might be hard to do so in real time. Turn Based in an RPG is ridiculous in this technology in my opinion. And I stress ‘in my opinion’ part.
I just can’t feel engaged in a game where we wait for the monster ‘Ok you attack me now. Then I smash your skull’. We might as well convince the monster to play chess with us to decide who will live. Like magic the gathering, you meet the monster and start playing cards with it to decide who dies.
All games contain elements that are abstractions though. Dice rolls, random number generators, even BG's "realtime" combat was using turn-based rules, again, an abstraction.
I don't even see where it's a "debate" at all. As far as I can tell, there aren't even a dozen real-time with pause isometric RPGs in existence. You have Baldur's Gate 1 and 2, Icewind Dale 1 and 2, Planescape: Torment, Pillars of Eternity 1 and 2, Pathfinder: Kingmaker, Lionheart: Legacy of the Crusader and the recent Tower of Time. That's it. If you want to get cute, you can throw in Neverwinter Nights 1 and 2 and Dragon Age: Origins, since even though they are 3D, they still have the same basic concepts.
Agreed. This is why I've never understood anybody that insists on realtime. There's so few realtime tactical RPG's out there, that you're really shortchanging yourself if you refuse to play turn-based ones.
It's the height of arrogance to tell people they should give up their preference and change their preference to something else because that's the preference other people have. I will rather not have any games to play than stoop to playing a trash TB game.
Besides, there are a lot more RT games available to play if one moves away from only isometric games, for example third-person action RPGs. And again, I would much rather deviate from isometric, old-school RPGs to action RPGs than accept TB games.
Being willing to play and enjoy turn-based games is not giving up a preference. Again, if you want games that focus on tactical/strategic puzzle solving, the overwhelming majority of those games are turn-based. You are literally, mathematically, short-changing yourself if you write them off as inferior. And games like Baldur's Gate, PoE, etc, still fall under strategic puzzle solving. They're not Dark Souls or Diablo, despite being RPG's.
I don't even see where it's a "debate" at all. As far as I can tell, there aren't even a dozen real-time with pause isometric RPGs in existence. You have Baldur's Gate 1 and 2, Icewind Dale 1 and 2, Planescape: Torment, Pillars of Eternity 1 and 2, Pathfinder: Kingmaker, Lionheart: Legacy of the Crusader and the recent Tower of Time. That's it. If you want to get cute, you can throw in Neverwinter Nights 1 and 2 and Dragon Age: Origins, since even though they are 3D, they still have the same basic concepts.
Late to this, but Tower’s of Time isn’t a RtwP game, it is more of a Tower Defense game. The developers designed it so the player could slow down time but added the option to pause it later in development.
But combat is on a separate map, enemies come at you in waves that you need to defeat and you only need one hero alive at the end of combat to beat it. Your heroes always get fully restored for the next battle. It is nothing like the other RTwP games you have listed here.
I'm not a tabletop player (though I certainly read the source material for it). And correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm PRETTY certain everyone in the group and the dungeon master aren't all just yelling commands and spells and throwing dice simultaneously. And what the MOST celebrated CRPGs of all-time (Fallout, Baldur's Gate, VtMB etc.) get praised for is how accurately they simulate a tabletop experience. That has always been the ultimate goal of the most high-minded games.
Yes, because when you have a group of humans around a table, the ONLY way you can play a game - any game for that matter - is by taking turns. It is a limitation of the medium through which that game is being played. The moment you move that game to a computer, and especially today's computers, you no longer have that limitation because your gaming medium has now changed. So why continue to maintain that limitation when you no longer HAVE to do so?
In a tabletop setting you have to use turns. You have no other choice. In a video game, you no longer have to limit yourself to taking turns. There are other, better ways to play the game. So why regress back to that old and limiting way of playing the game? This is how I see it.
I don't even see where it's a "debate" at all. As far as I can tell, there aren't even a dozen real-time with pause isometric RPGs in existence. You have Baldur's Gate 1 and 2, Icewind Dale 1 and 2, Planescape: Torment, Pillars of Eternity 1 and 2, Pathfinder: Kingmaker, Lionheart: Legacy of the Crusader and the recent Tower of Time. That's it. If you want to get cute, you can throw in Neverwinter Nights 1 and 2 and Dragon Age: Origins, since even though they are 3D, they still have the same basic concepts.
Agreed. This is why I've never understood anybody that insists on realtime. There's so few realtime tactical RPG's out there, that you're really shortchanging yourself if you refuse to play turn-based ones.
It's the height of arrogance to tell people they should give up their preference and change their preference to something else because that's the preference other people have. I will rather not have any games to play than stoop to playing a trash TB game.
Besides, there are a lot more RT games available to play if one moves away from only isometric games, for example third-person action RPGs. And again, I would much rather deviate from isometric, old-school RPGs to action RPGs than accept TB games.
Being willing to play and enjoy turn-based games is not giving up a preference. Again, if you want games that focus on tactical/strategic puzzle solving, the overwhelming majority of those games are turn-based. You are literally, mathematically, short-changing yourself if you write them off as inferior. And games like Baldur's Gate, PoE, etc, still fall under strategic puzzle solving. They're not Dark Souls or Diablo, despite being RPG's.
A game does not need to be TB to have tactical/strategic puzzle solving. TB is specifically for combat, which imo is NOT puzzle solving.
As @Ludwig_II pointed out, in a true strategic combat game, I can accept TB combat because there can literally be hundreds, even thousands of units in play. A game like Civilization is a good example of this. But TB has absolutely no place in an RPG if the RP truly stands for role-playing.
I think one of the best things to happen to the RPG genre in recent years is the advent of RPGs that have no combat in them. If getting rid of combat altogether is what needs to happen for the turns mechanic to go away, I am so rooting for no combat RPGs.
The combat in BG, PoE, is indeed puzzle-solving. It's strategy/tactics, hence the phrase "wizard chess" for BG2 battles. You don't get better at BG's combat by having fast reflexes or excellent button execution. You get better via strategy/tactics, that's what the game is challenging the player on.
Also just want to add that saying "TB has not place in RPG's" is just a weird thing to say given that's how pretty much all tabletop games function. And I also fail to see how turn-based is breaking of "true RP" but a pause button isnt.
The Infinity Engine games are still running on turns or rounds. They are just on an internal clock instead of sitting there infinitely waiting for you to make a decision. However, you are able to manipulate how QUICKLY those turns go, right down to the millisecond if you'd like. Now, it offers you the OPTION to just set 5 of your other characters to an AI script so the entire things just runs itself if you let if proceed. I frankly NEVER play this way, so it's not an issue for me. I don't think I've done a single fight in a RTwP game where I haven't individually laid out commands for every party member. I mean, is this just a speed thing?? Do people want to be done quicker?? I enjoy making these games last as long as possible.
Well, i an neutral about turn based and real time with pause. But BG3 being turn based is good because Larian is experienced with turn based. My unique fear is if they don't follow the rules
I enjoy making these games last as long as possible.
Well, i don't like spell/arrow/hit sponge enemies. Making a game longer due replay ability, choice and consequence, engaging dungeon, different builds changing how you approach to a determined situation, etc.
What you guys are missing to note is that all of your examples you are using are just abstractions to simulate real life combat. Board games turns, D&D turns etc. They are solutions to how to simulate real life combat.
Turn based is already an abstraction, all board games utilise it to avoid chaos. That's for convenience, due to the limitation of the board game medium. Same with P&P.
If we don't have this limitation anymore, and if we don't need this convenience, then there is no point in enforcing it upon ourselves. I'd rather play a game with more realistic game mechanics if it's possible and convenient to do so. If not, then sure I'll go with the convenient way, TB, RTwP, or whatever else.
jjstraka34, it's not a speed thing. I prefer RTwP, because the flow of the game is much more closer to real life, thus more realistic and engaging for me. In addition, it provides the convenience of controlling multiple characters by pausing, which is a solution to simulate those characters deciding what to do themselves at that point. Turn Based is an additional artificial layer of abstraction, and not realistic. So if I can avoid it, I will. If I'm playing a board game, I probably can't avoid it, thus the expected outcome.
What you guys are missing to note is that all of your examples you are using are just abstractions to simulate real life combat. Board games turns, D&D turns etc. They are solutions to how to simulate real life combat.
I think that you are missing the fact that we don't play simulation, we play games. Ofc games abstract reality in some ways but it's not the main goal. Reality is often boring... The goal is to have fun !
Wanting something realistic is just taste. Like some people can't be hooked by a game that is not graphicaly very advanced (3D and such). Some like FPS, some TPS, and so on.
Turn based is not inferior, it is just another mechanic style that allow other ways of strategic planning etc. And that aims at a different spot in player's fun.
We don't have fun the same ways. The Bartle taxonomy of player lists 4 types of players : Achievers, Explorers, Socializers, and Killers. Others classify by motivations : immersion, cooperation, achievement, and/or competition.
There are more detailed profiles but it's not the subject.
I played tabletop D&D quite a bit when I was young. Computers weren't a thing at the time. We enjoyed rolling the dice and doing combats, but we couldn't all go at the same time. It had to be turn-based for practical reasons. But we weren't imagining it that way in our heads. The turn-based gameplay, as it has been said here, was a necessary abstraction for a group of people to manage a hectic combat.
Later, I would always reimagine all our combats in my head as real-time events. That was part of the fun for me - taking the abstraction of a game session and using my imagination on it to produce a kind of movie in my head starring my friends and me.
We also enjoyed studying our books and theory crafting our characters, between sessions. It was an early form of power-gaming along with our role-playing, I suppose.
But none of that was the core of the experience. The core of the fun was the social interaction with friends. It was something we all enjoyed in common, and spent most of our free time doing. We bonded over imaginary experiences that happened in the game. Sometimes we would even slip up and call each other by our character's names outside the game, especially those of us who were acquaintances only through the game, rather than close friends. Some of the guys I knew, who were outside my immediate circle of close friends, used to laugh with me when they would call me my character's name, and then have to say, "Wait, what was your real name, again? I only know you from the game."
I fell in love with Might and Magic 6 and then Baldur's Gate because they did such a good job replicating the social experience of D&D on a computer. The cast of Baldur's Gate were written to be like real people playing a game of D&D and playing their characters.
I play and enjoy quite a few games - some of them are real time with pause, some are action rpg's that can't be paused at all, and some are turn-based. The type of mechanics isn't a predictor of whether I will enjoy a game.
Whether I like BG3 or not is probably going to come down to the cast of characters, and how much they remind me of real people playing D&D.
So I guess the bottom line is that I really don't have a dog in the Rtwp vs. Turn-based dispute.
But none of that was the core of the experience. The core of the fun was the social interaction with friends. It was something we all enjoyed in common, and spent most of our free time doing. We bonded over imaginary experiences that happened in the game. Sometimes we would even slip up and call each other by our character's names outside the game, especially those of us who were acquaintances only through the game, rather than close friends. Some of the guys I knew, who were outside my immediate circle of close friends, used to laugh with me when they would call me my character's name, and then have to say, "Wait, what was your real name, again? I only know you from the game."
I agree with this part. I hear TB supporters often saying that they want a game to "recreate the tabletop/PnP experience" as their way of justifying TB. For me that's a BS argument, because the only part of the tabletop experience that holds any interest for me is what you are saying here: the social interaction and cameraderie of friends including eating pizza, drinking beer and cracking jokes. But these things are precisely what can never be recreated by a video game. Recreating the experience of rolling dice and taking turns is rather meaningless.
Also just want to add that saying "TB has not place in RPG's" is just a weird thing to say given that's how pretty much all tabletop games function. And I also fail to see how turn-based is breaking of "true RP" but a pause button isnt.
To repeat, I don't care one bit how tabletop games play. As far as I am concerned, it is completely irrelevant. We are talking about video games here, and it was very obviously implied that I was talking about computer RPGs and not RPGs generally.
Also just want to add that saying "TB has not place in RPG's" is just a weird thing to say given that's how pretty much all tabletop games function. And I also fail to see how turn-based is breaking of "true RP" but a pause button isnt.
To repeat, I don't care one bit how tabletop games play. As far as I am concerned, it is completely irrelevant. We are talking about video games here, and it was very obviously implied that I was talking about computer RPGs and not RPGs generally.
That's fine, but it isnt irrelevant to other people - and their opinions are just as valued as your own.
A Good game > RTwP/TB.
Lastly - I generally agree with @BelgarathMTH - but as someone does very much enjoy 5e, (and D&D's rules in general) - its important to see them effectively recreated in the game.
RTwP and TB are two sides of the same coin, and as long as the system does a good job implementing the rules, I'll be happy.
Also just want to add that saying "TB has not place in RPG's" is just a weird thing to say given that's how pretty much all tabletop games function. And I also fail to see how turn-based is breaking of "true RP" but a pause button isnt.
To repeat, I don't care one bit how tabletop games play. As far as I am concerned, it is completely irrelevant. We are talking about video games here, and it was very obviously implied that I was talking about computer RPGs and not RPGs generally.
That's fine, but it isnt irrelevant to other people - and their opinions are just as valued as your own.
Please don't misrepresent me by taking what I said out of its context. I did not say how TT games play is irrelevant in general. I am very clearly saying it is irrelevant to the point I am making.
Assessing whether a game is "good" or not involves a collection of (multiple) factors for most people. For you, the combat system of the game is not one of those factors. For me, it is, and an important one at that. But by no means is it the only factor, or even the most important factor.
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I don't know about you guys, but I want to experience the fight with epic level Lareth the Beautiful and his companions that goes down in one of the 3.5 campaigns against Tharizdun.
It's the height of arrogance to tell people they should give up their preference and change their preference to something else because that's the preference other people have. I will rather not have any games to play than stoop to playing a trash TB game.
Besides, there are a lot more RT games available to play if one moves away from only isometric games, for example third-person action RPGs. And again, I would much rather deviate from isometric, old-school RPGs to action RPGs than accept TB games.
Jesus christ, that's truly... sad ? And extreme. I don't get it, though. There are good TB games and there are bad TB games, the same with RTwP. For example I love BG, but PoE1 is meh for me. I like DoS2, but not so much ToEE. It's all about story and characters for me. That is the rpg essence in my book. The game mechanics it's just a nice addition, it's good when it just not get in the way.
I had no idea there was such hatred for turn-based video games until I encountered this forum. There wasn't a "real-time" RPG in existence til 1987's Dungeon Master.
As a related side-note, I dislike RT (without pause) almost as much as TB.
But isn't that precisely because we didn't yet have the technology to properly do real time games until then? And then we got to a point in technology where it became possible. Which is exactly why I don't understand why anyone would want to do TB. To me, it's the equivalent of insisting on/preferring using oil lamps in the face of electricity.
If I go by this logic, I would refuse to play any open world game after not falling in love with GTA 5 and would miss RDR2, the greatest gaming experience I've ever had.
I like story too but i wonder why making a RPG when the game mechanics contradicts the game lore/story. And love when the game mechanics doesn't try to break my suspension of disbelief every time with archers that can't hit enemies at 14m, cooldowns, axe wielding monsters that drops maces and non used gear, etc. ToEE is amazing partially due the atmosphere.
As for Turn Based, BEFORE i have played ToEE, Dark Sun Shattered Lands and other amazing TB RPG's, i had a bias against turn based games. And was partially due Wizardry 8 with extremely slow animations and large scale encounters.
There is a mod that deals with the speed of the encounters in Wizardry 8. Wizfast.
You can prefer to play a Turn Based game of course, who am I to tell you what you can prefer. However, games are already simulations, if we can make it as real as possible in terms of mechanics it is more engaging for me. I like some games even though they are turn based, not because they are turn based. That shows how awesome the other things related to that game are.
Turn based makes the most sense when it is a strategy game, as you probably need to control too many things at the same time and it might be hard to do so in real time. Turn Based in an RPG is ridiculous in this technology in my opinion. And I stress ‘in my opinion’ part.
I just can’t feel engaged in a game where we wait for the monster ‘Ok you attack me now. Then I smash your skull’. We might as well convince the monster to play chess with us to decide who will live. Like magic the gathering, you meet the monster and start playing cards with it to decide who dies.
Nor a player playing 4~6 characters simultaneously... A PC can process 50+ unities actions in a fraction of a second. A human DM can't. I love TBRPG but really believe that a turn based game needs to have options to speed up animations and concurrent turns.
Dark Sun : Shattered Lands(1993) allowed me to skip animations. Why games such as dos2 can't allow me to do that?
I would want it to remain faithful to that, I enjoy computer DnD games because they are an extension of those systems.
Tabletop is already an abstraction, a simulation of how events would have happened in real time. It is there due to limitations. When you try to simulate tabletop by making a turn based game, it is another level of abstraction on top of that. It makes more sense to me to try to simulate real time, in a better way than tabletop if possible. And it is definitely possible, because most of the limitations table-top has can be overcome in this technology in a single player game.
All games contain elements that are abstractions though. Dice rolls, random number generators, even BG's "realtime" combat was using turn-based rules, again, an abstraction.
Being willing to play and enjoy turn-based games is not giving up a preference. Again, if you want games that focus on tactical/strategic puzzle solving, the overwhelming majority of those games are turn-based. You are literally, mathematically, short-changing yourself if you write them off as inferior. And games like Baldur's Gate, PoE, etc, still fall under strategic puzzle solving. They're not Dark Souls or Diablo, despite being RPG's.
Late to this, but Tower’s of Time isn’t a RtwP game, it is more of a Tower Defense game. The developers designed it so the player could slow down time but added the option to pause it later in development.
But combat is on a separate map, enemies come at you in waves that you need to defeat and you only need one hero alive at the end of combat to beat it. Your heroes always get fully restored for the next battle. It is nothing like the other RTwP games you have listed here.
Yes, because when you have a group of humans around a table, the ONLY way you can play a game - any game for that matter - is by taking turns. It is a limitation of the medium through which that game is being played. The moment you move that game to a computer, and especially today's computers, you no longer have that limitation because your gaming medium has now changed. So why continue to maintain that limitation when you no longer HAVE to do so?
In a tabletop setting you have to use turns. You have no other choice. In a video game, you no longer have to limit yourself to taking turns. There are other, better ways to play the game. So why regress back to that old and limiting way of playing the game? This is how I see it.
A game does not need to be TB to have tactical/strategic puzzle solving. TB is specifically for combat, which imo is NOT puzzle solving.
As @Ludwig_II pointed out, in a true strategic combat game, I can accept TB combat because there can literally be hundreds, even thousands of units in play. A game like Civilization is a good example of this. But TB has absolutely no place in an RPG if the RP truly stands for role-playing.
I think one of the best things to happen to the RPG genre in recent years is the advent of RPGs that have no combat in them. If getting rid of combat altogether is what needs to happen for the turns mechanic to go away, I am so rooting for no combat RPGs.
Well, i don't like spell/arrow/hit sponge enemies. Making a game longer due replay ability, choice and consequence, engaging dungeon, different builds changing how you approach to a determined situation, etc.
Turn based is already an abstraction, all board games utilise it to avoid chaos. That's for convenience, due to the limitation of the board game medium. Same with P&P.
If we don't have this limitation anymore, and if we don't need this convenience, then there is no point in enforcing it upon ourselves. I'd rather play a game with more realistic game mechanics if it's possible and convenient to do so. If not, then sure I'll go with the convenient way, TB, RTwP, or whatever else.
jjstraka34, it's not a speed thing. I prefer RTwP, because the flow of the game is much more closer to real life, thus more realistic and engaging for me. In addition, it provides the convenience of controlling multiple characters by pausing, which is a solution to simulate those characters deciding what to do themselves at that point. Turn Based is an additional artificial layer of abstraction, and not realistic. So if I can avoid it, I will. If I'm playing a board game, I probably can't avoid it, thus the expected outcome.
I think that you are missing the fact that we don't play simulation, we play games. Ofc games abstract reality in some ways but it's not the main goal. Reality is often boring... The goal is to have fun !
Wanting something realistic is just taste. Like some people can't be hooked by a game that is not graphicaly very advanced (3D and such). Some like FPS, some TPS, and so on.
Turn based is not inferior, it is just another mechanic style that allow other ways of strategic planning etc. And that aims at a different spot in player's fun.
We don't have fun the same ways. The Bartle taxonomy of player lists 4 types of players : Achievers, Explorers, Socializers, and Killers. Others classify by motivations : immersion, cooperation, achievement, and/or competition.
There are more detailed profiles but it's not the subject.
Later, I would always reimagine all our combats in my head as real-time events. That was part of the fun for me - taking the abstraction of a game session and using my imagination on it to produce a kind of movie in my head starring my friends and me.
We also enjoyed studying our books and theory crafting our characters, between sessions. It was an early form of power-gaming along with our role-playing, I suppose.
But none of that was the core of the experience. The core of the fun was the social interaction with friends. It was something we all enjoyed in common, and spent most of our free time doing. We bonded over imaginary experiences that happened in the game. Sometimes we would even slip up and call each other by our character's names outside the game, especially those of us who were acquaintances only through the game, rather than close friends. Some of the guys I knew, who were outside my immediate circle of close friends, used to laugh with me when they would call me my character's name, and then have to say, "Wait, what was your real name, again? I only know you from the game."
I fell in love with Might and Magic 6 and then Baldur's Gate because they did such a good job replicating the social experience of D&D on a computer. The cast of Baldur's Gate were written to be like real people playing a game of D&D and playing their characters.
I play and enjoy quite a few games - some of them are real time with pause, some are action rpg's that can't be paused at all, and some are turn-based. The type of mechanics isn't a predictor of whether I will enjoy a game.
Whether I like BG3 or not is probably going to come down to the cast of characters, and how much they remind me of real people playing D&D.
So I guess the bottom line is that I really don't have a dog in the Rtwp vs. Turn-based dispute.
I agree with this part. I hear TB supporters often saying that they want a game to "recreate the tabletop/PnP experience" as their way of justifying TB. For me that's a BS argument, because the only part of the tabletop experience that holds any interest for me is what you are saying here: the social interaction and cameraderie of friends including eating pizza, drinking beer and cracking jokes. But these things are precisely what can never be recreated by a video game. Recreating the experience of rolling dice and taking turns is rather meaningless.
To repeat, I don't care one bit how tabletop games play. As far as I am concerned, it is completely irrelevant. We are talking about video games here, and it was very obviously implied that I was talking about computer RPGs and not RPGs generally.
That's fine, but it isnt irrelevant to other people - and their opinions are just as valued as your own.
A Good game > RTwP/TB.
Lastly - I generally agree with @BelgarathMTH - but as someone does very much enjoy 5e, (and D&D's rules in general) - its important to see them effectively recreated in the game.
RTwP and TB are two sides of the same coin, and as long as the system does a good job implementing the rules, I'll be happy.
Please don't misrepresent me by taking what I said out of its context. I did not say how TT games play is irrelevant in general. I am very clearly saying it is irrelevant to the point I am making.
For you. For me, TB = strike against a game
Assessing whether a game is "good" or not involves a collection of (multiple) factors for most people. For you, the combat system of the game is not one of those factors. For me, it is, and an important one at that. But by no means is it the only factor, or even the most important factor.