How do people enjoy the combat of this game?

[Jazz the Goose]

It just seems like a gigantic chore. Micromanaging everything, but not in a fun fashion like you do in a turn-based game. You are just babysitting everyone and then spamming space whenever their individual turn is over. Plus how often you have to click and how loose it all feels because someone might just walk away.
This really makes me worry about Baldur's Gate 3. Divinity OS2 had amazing combat that I will never grow tired of so I hope they do a similar one for BG3.

[D'amarr from Darshiva]

Which game do you refer to?

Rounds and turns in this game (6 seconds and 60 seconds, respectively) is just the base measurement for action speed and duration of spells/abilities. You don't need to do anything special at the end of a round or the end of a turn.

Also, BG3 will be developed by Larian --> completely different developers, and whether they will do RTwP or turn-based combat isn't known yet, afaik. I hope they will prefer RTwP, because turn-based combat sucks.

[Flavio]

There are character scripts that automate most of the "chore" you're talking about. You should read the manual about that.

[ruppe27]

When you set up your party right then you barely need to micro manage.
It is absolutely pointless to keep track of each characters turn and make them manually do something every time it ends
The game would take forever to beat if you played every battle like that.

[PancakeWizard]

Every trash encounter:

1. PAUSE
2. Select all, attack nearest.
3. If character takes too much damage PAUSE, tell them to fall back, have everyone else attack the enemy that was targeting them.
4. REPEAT UNTIL VICTORY.

Every encounter with a caster/tough monster:

1. PAUSE
2. Select all, attack caster/toughest monster
3. P** about with spells from caster characters for spell interrupts if required and/or use ranged attacks to mop up trash.
4. DONE.

That's literally it.

RTwP is a lot harder and a lot easier to criticise with a game like Pillars of Eternity, because a lot of the character abilities are really situational, but Baldur's Gate? It's pretty simple. Hence why no one EVER complained about the Infinity Engine combat systems and people only started asking for turn-based when PoE came along.

KOTOR functions practically the same way as BG. As does Mass Effect, come to that.

[☂Mawiois]

Read the manual, wiki, whatever.
Scout the map for enemies with ranger or thief with stealth, or the cleric's Sanctuary spell. You should also do this when entering suspicious buildings.
Use one of the default attack scripts on everyone.
There are gear, potions, scrolls that completely negate poison, magic, lightning, fire, web, etc. Also there's potions that seriously raise your strength (hit more often and do more damage).
Have a tanky character or two out front, and if your scout has spotted casters, make the tank drink magic resist potions etc. Especially if you already died once.
Have about half of your characters equip ranged weapons, they're just a liability otherwise.
DO NOT always cram all your characters in a tight room, just a lone fighter is sometimes enough.
Do not even try to use a mage for every fight, same goes for other casters. Mage is there to cast Haste and CC. Scout for enemies, cast sleep/fear/web/silence, and let your team safely fill the enemies full of arrows.

[AlexMBrennan]

Scout the map for enemies with ranger or thief with stealth, or the cleric's Sanctuary spell

OK, my thief just died because finding traps is mutually exclusive with stealth. Now what?

There are gear, potions, scrolls that completely negate poison, magic, lightning, fire, web, etc. Also there's potions that seriously raise your strength (hit more often and do more damage).

Well either you didn't bother to read any of the complaints, or you don't understand what "micromanagement" means (hint: swapping out your rings before every combat encounter to gain free action definitely qualifies)

[necaradan666]

Use invisibility ring, or a potion, or get a spell from a caster while you look for traps. Also stealth doesn't lift immediately so you have a few moments to look for traps and retreat before it goes down.

If you're swapping gear before every fight that's not micromanagement built into the game, that's your own fault. Just leave the free action ring on one character, maybe someone that can cast free action on a second character, or release a character from a paralyse or hold. Besides the OP's complaint looks like it was aimed more at controlling party members, not inventory management which btw would be exactly the same whether the game was RTwP or TB if you were just swapping gear around pre-combat.

[Dark Helmet]

You do not need to micromanage every fight or babysit nowhere near to the extent you seem to assume. This game and its sequel are incredibly influential and games like Divinity and other modern RPGs would not exist at all without it.

That said, it has aged poorly in some ways. The biggest issue with the game in terms of annoyance is the pathfinding, but the combat and strategy is mostly really good, if not outstanding and it is still one of the best RPGs ever made and the sequel is even ten times better.

If you have not played a real-time with pause RPG, then it may take more time to understand how to play it without needing to micromanage everything. It takes some "know-how", some experience to truly "get it", but if you don't get to that point, then you'll never like the game.

If you're ignoring obviously helpful tips here, it's doubtful that you'd do that anyway. Then you may just be looking for others to echo the same incorrect view, because you've been having a tough time with the learning curve and have already made up your mind about it, which is really a shame considering the respect this game deserves.

[WhispersOfTheWind]

Just by trying out the Pits Arena shows that you really got to know what you're doing in other words there seems always to be a way to tackle any situation with or by doing certain things like utilizing skills and tactics.

By ways of applying strategy this way people find themselves challenged to perform and often outperform AI opponents that, if you don't know what you're doing (sort of like myself) you just won't be able to get further and thus not perceive any fun, until that is...

You start to learn. Games and learning... don't necessarily go hand in hand, at least in this deep learning way and RPG's at least some of them like Baludr's Gate provide for an excellent challenge there where otherwise you wouldn't have it in an average Action-RPG.

So it's all about the challenge, adapting and potentially overcoming it.

To me it's more about exploration, story and chances (enemy variety and player character variety) of and in combat than playing the game just for the combat alone would be. It comes more down to something like a 'whole' or (more) complete experience of factors.

Just love the game because of this type of depth.