Dragon Age 2 - Kvetching @ Armchair Empire

Matt Barton "kvetches" about Dragon Age II on his blog at The Armchair Empire:

At some point, you just have to decide what combat should be like in a CRPG. Do you want to feel like the guy swinging the sword? Or do you want to feel like the guy standing over a table full of miniatures, contemplating the terrain, troop movements, area effects, and so on? For me, it will always be the latter. That's why I liked Pool of Radiance so much; the combat looked like a tabletop miniatures game come to life. Oblivion seems to have come closest to putting you in the boots of an actual warrior in the field. Dragon Age 2 seems somewhere in the middle, with some armchair stuff but mostly concerned with making you feel responsible for making your warrior's arm move or your mage's staff shooting fireballs. Coming back to the military metaphors, DA 2 seems to make you a sergeant. You're giving orders, but you're also there on the field playing the game. So if we compare the three game types, Oblivion makes you a foot soldier, DA 2 makes you a sergeant, and the games I prefer make you a commanding officer, guiding the preparation and action but not usually in the fray. If you wanted to go all the way to general, seems like you need to shift into the strategy genre.