LogFAQs > #895683353

Turn-based combat is mostly archaic and has little place in modern gaming. It can however still have a place when used to serve a greater emphasis on planning and strategy. In most cases though it exists more as a placeholder that says "we couldn't be bothered to come up with a serviceable real-time combat system or just copy one of the successful ones"

In a sense it's like text-based adventures. Those had their place in history back when that was just what people had to put up with due to limitations to convey ideas. But now we can do so much more, so it's really quaint.

Turn-based battles are at least not as bad when not paired with Johnny Random Encounters.

Another problem though with turn-based battles is the tendency towards RNG which detracts from the strategy/thought element. Basically, the more RNG involved in a game, the less skill, planning and thought involved (see: Mario Party), and yet the biggest strength of turn-based battle is to give it a more strategic and thoughtful approach to battles, so these two attributes are at odds with each other. And the random encounters they can be paired with also do a fine job pooping all over exploration when every 2~11 steps you're interrupted in a jarring way and hurled into an alternate dimension where you must fight the same 3 dudes for the 60th time before being farted back out into the dungeon/overworld to have just enough time to remember your positioning before having to oblige the next encounter of those same 3 dudes.
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