I'm having fun with Tactical Breach Wizards, it's really good. But it also reminds me of that really wide spectrum of game under the "tactics game" or "tactics RPG" umbrella term.
There's probably technical game design terms for these but for me it always feels like a spectrum from the word "Tactics" to "RPG."
So on the "Tactics" end of the spectrum it's stuff like Tactical Breach Wizards, Steamworld Heist II, and Into the Breach. Every single turn counts, you have to be really careful about what you're doing. They're very "swingy" to me, as in the tide of battle can swing in the opposite direction very quickly on a misplay. Usually, to make this all happen, the game is designed with really low max HP numbers.
And then the other side of the spectrum is the "RPG" end with stuff like Final Fantasy Tactics and Disgaea. Where battles are long, HP gauges are large, and you kind of chip away at each other. You also usually have more character customization and party customization, spread out over a longer time. Maybe even Baldur's Gate 3 is in this category?
Both ends of the spectrum have the potential to kind of lose my interest sadly. The idea of having to be perfectly tactical with every single move can be a bit exhausting and disheartening (maybe I should be putting on Easy modes when available) and feel a little bit left-brained. Especially if your own character can be KO'd in one turn. But the other end, when the RPG battles are sooooooo long and slow, is also exhausting in a different way.
In terms of things meeting in a happy middle...I've come to appreciate that maybe Fire Emblem is halfway between these extremes. I used to consider it much more on the swingy side, because of how much more quickly a Fire Emblem character can die than a FFT character, but now that I know a little bit better how to play...they kind of mix up the pace in a generous way. Battles against equally-matched units can be the slow, drag-out, chip-away-at-their-HP fights But battles where one unit is super effective against the other are more drastic and swingy.
And from Sacred Stones onward, they've gravitated over letting you have more control over your character's eventual "build."
This is why I really really wish Fire Emblem Heroes was better about having some sort of non-gacha mode, or roguelike modes, or more modes with rental units (I know there is a recurring limited time event that does this) because the way they shrunk down the maps and army sizes I think is really appealing. But sadly, because it's a gacha live service game, the character progression is this endlessly stretched out treadmill where you characters can always have better stats and you can't judge if anything is a matter of skill or a matter of grinding.
Triangle Strategy is closer to the "RPG" side, but they streamline the character progression and character customization to make it much simpler and faster than FF Tactics, which I can respect.
Some other games that I feel kinda meet in the middle are Kingsvein, Dream Tactics, and Marvel's Midnight Suns. Maybe I should go back and beat those one of these days...
