Don’t let them hear why a lot of people go to museums.

My first TES game was Arena. I’m familiar with the way it used to be (and still wish we had Thaumaturgy and Mysticism). I still think those games were simulationist immersion games. No other series would let you essentially live a life as a burglar in a fantasy world. I don’t think being simulationist immersion games precludes them from having stats. I do think it means they wouldn’t really be the same if they were turn-based (which is what I was talking about).

Edit: when this posted I saw that I typed “real time” instead of turn-based in my last comment. So I guess I did indicate I wanted turn-based combat, but this was a mistake.

I’m of the exact opposite opinion. Take the last two Pathfinder games. So much complexity about what you can and can’t do within melee (5 foot step, melee spell prep gets AOO, have to prep then step in, etc.), but it’s all wasted because the CPU can trigger those same actions faster than a human possibly can, and do it across many combatants simultaneously. It ends up being about building stats/feats that win instead of tactical combat.

It’s a shame you turned it off the first time you realized it was turn based. I have a friend that hated turn-based combat. BG3 made it so he nopes out of real time combat in his favorite games prior to BG3.

For me, turn based is top tier RPG.

Edit: that said, Elder Scrolls is more of a simulationist immersion game and does not need real time turn-based combat.