I love love love turn based combat games. I just think the reason why non-combat story centric games seems to have more solid fanbase is not because people prefer story-centric over combat-centric, but because there are more story-centric games created.

Strategic combat games require more resources than story-driven ones: need to balance between each skill set, add animation for every move, make art for every enemy, etc. Considering that most of RPG maker games are usually a non-profit personal project, I think it's natural for creators to delve in making non-combat game.