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1 year ago ::
Jan 31, 2012 - 2:03PM
#51
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Date Joined:
Dec 27, 2008
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Of course, I also had a player who had to add his ability bonus, half level bonus, and magic item bonus to every d20 attack roll, and always announced the number on the die first, before adding, and had to be prompted to tell me what defense it was against, so even a well designed character sheet doesn't always make things faster.
That guy drives me nuts.
"OK, that's 12 damage."
(DM writes down 12 damage.)
"And sixteen damage. So 30 damage."
"Wait, is it 16 plus 12 or 30 plus 12 or 30 total?"
"30 plus 12, plus the bonus from combat advantage, so that's (rolls a bunch more dice) 56 damage, plus the 12 from before. But some of it is thunder."
"OK. This guy resists thunder. How much is thunder?"
"I forget. But the 16 was definitely fire damage."
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1 year ago ::
Feb 02, 2012 - 5:17PM
#52
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I say the best way to settle it, make it easy on the DM, and quicken the results would be to have the players view it more strategically. The players decide before battle what order they want to go in. No rolling. They just sit clockwise in the order they want to go. The DM rolls to see where the creatures fall. Before them, in between players 2 & 3, etc. Bam you're done. The DM could put a figure, a red jacket, whatever in between the players' seats to remember when his minions of disaster go.
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1 year ago ::
Feb 02, 2012 - 7:23PM
#53
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When someone says 'simple' in regard to D&D, what I've learned to interpret this as is 'quite complicated, but slightly simpler than this other even more complicated way of doing it'.
I think we've become inured to massive, lengthy complexity over the years. Going back to a fairly early style of D&D woke me up to just how far we've strayed from that.
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1 year ago ::
Feb 02, 2012 - 7:45PM
#54
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Date Joined:
Jun 17, 2003
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I don't remember that the 1e or 2e system was that simple and it did get cumbersome IIRC and IMX (the main difference between 1e and 2e was in 1e the group rolled a d6 and in 2e they rolled a d10). That's because you had to stop everything and redo it every round, and then you'd have to add in weapon or other action factors that changed from round to round as well making action sequencing a real nightmare. There is a very good reason this system was dropped for 3e. The devs started to use the system and then determined (correctly) that it ate up needless time.
-Polaris
Edit PS: In both 3.X and 4e, initiative is very simply. Everyone rolls once, modifiers are added, and the basic order is determined once for the entire combat. Even for the most complex of combats, this typically takes all of five seconds (at most). I find it to be quite simple as long as everyone knows their init mods (and there is no reason they shouldn't).
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1 year ago ::
Feb 02, 2012 - 8:21PM
#55
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I really really liked how initiative worked in 2e. It's simple, it varies every turn, and it is impacted by the actions that the character is going to take. That's because you had to stop everything and redo it every round,
And combat was STILL faster than in 4e by about a factor of 10
"If it's not a conjuration, how did the wizard
con·jure/ˈkänjər/Verb
1. Make (something) appear unexpectedly or seemingly from nowhere as if by magic.
it?" -anon
"Why don't you read fire·ball / fī(-ə)r-ˌbȯl/ and see if you can find the key word con.jure /'kən-ˈju̇r/ anywhere in it."
-Maxperson
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1 year ago ::
Feb 02, 2012 - 8:26PM
#56
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Date Joined:
Jun 17, 2003
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I really really liked how initiative worked in 2e. It's simple, it varies every turn, and it is impacted by the actions that the character is going to take.
That's because you had to stop everything and redo it every round,
And combat was STILL faster than in 4e by about a factor of 10
Combat yes, but we are talking specifically about initiative which is largely the same in both 3.X and 4e (one of the few things that really is). There are many root causes for the length of combat in 4e (which most do agree takes too long) but initiative isn't one of them. In fact as I said above, you can do even complex initiatives (with a Tac Lord...and I know becuase I just got done playing an epic one) in under five seconds of game time. We see that because 3.X/PF has fairly fast combat and uses the same initiative system (so initiative is not the cause of slow combats).
-Polaris
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1 year ago ::
Feb 02, 2012 - 8:37PM
#57
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I don't remember that the 1e or 2e system was that simple and it did get cumbersome IIRC and IMX (the main difference between 1e and 2e was in 1e the group rolled a d6 and in 2e they rolled a d10). That's because you had to stop everything and redo it every round, and then you'd have to add in weapon or other action factors that changed from round to round as well making action sequencing a real nightmare. There is a very good reason this system was dropped for 3e. The devs started to use the system and then determined (correctly) that it ate up needless time.
-Polaris
Edit PS: In both 3.X and 4e, initiative is very simply. Everyone rolls once, modifiers are added, and the basic order is determined once for the entire combat. Even for the most complex of combats, this typically takes all of five seconds (at most). I find it to be quite simple as long as everyone knows their init mods (and there is no reason they shouldn't).
I would encourage you to play one night of Encounters where there are three to four tables playing the same session. I've never seen any of them take less than 5-10 minutes for initiative. This does include scanning character sheets, writing the initiative down, the DM rolling for creatures (including ones not on the battle mat yet), and then finding a way everyone knows when it's their turn. (That may be a whiteboard, a bunch of sticky notes, a seat change, etc.) But five seconds, perhaps for one very fast player. I mean, my last character used his perception modifier instead of his initiative. On top of that, everyone who rolled lower than me received +2 to their initiative. That alone requires everyone to wait for me to calculate my roll before calculating theirs.
On a side note, has the idea of weather conditions or difficult terrain ever entered the initiative discussion. Just a thought.
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1 year ago ::
Feb 02, 2012 - 8:43PM
#58
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Date Joined:
Jun 17, 2003
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I can't imagine that initiative should have anywhere close to that long. If you are using Character builders (and why not?) your initiative bonus should be precalculated on your sheets. The only think you'd have to worry about are specific bonuses such as item set bonuses and/or tac-lord (or similiar bonuses), but since those generally apply to everyone, that shouldn't be hard.
You then use either a whiteboard and simply write down the initiatives in order (ideally on magnetic strips so you can shift them around for those that delay and/or ready actions). Even if the DM has monsters coming in later, it should take all of a second or two, to roll the dice, tell the timekeeper what the new monster's init pass and go.
I've played both, and the 3.X/4e system is much faster assuming everyone has PREPARED character sheets (as in they've done their homework). OTOH the 1e/2e system gets clunky even if you have because you roll every round and each action changes your modifier and it has to be cross checked against other totals (esp for casters and spell using monsters).
-Polaris
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1 year ago ::
Feb 02, 2012 - 9:07PM
#59
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Date Joined:
Aug 17, 2011
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Determining initiative order involves more than a dice roll and a simple addition problem. Let's look at a worse case scenario, where the DM hasn't pre-rolled any monster initiatives, and has no special sheet for tracking initiative. Here are the actual steps involved.
- The DM jots down a name, or abreviated name of every combatant. So about 10 names.
- The players roll for initative, and figure out what their total is. This step can be complicated by situational bonuses.
- The DM rolls for the initiative of every monster, and figures out their totals, and writes them down.
- Then each player announces their initiative total, and the DM writes it down.
- Then the DM has to put these 10 numbers, each attached to a name, in order, and rewrite the list. This is the step that takes the longest, and cannot be avoided, without a computer program.
- In some cases the list is written a second time, in view of the players.
My first time DMing, I didn't do the last step, but I had no special initiative tracking sheets, and I didn't preroll my initiative for monsters. Determining initiative took way too long, and I felt terrible for keeping my players waiting, while I worked behind the screen. Now I preroll monster initiative, and I have a special sheet for initiative which I hand to a player to determine. It still takes at least a minute, sometimes 2. And mistakes occasionally happen.
The only way determining initiative takes 5 seconds like Polaris is claiming, is if everyone is tracking initiative in their head, and can mentally sequence lists of numbers almost instantly.
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1 year ago ::
Feb 02, 2012 - 9:17PM
#60
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Date Joined:
Jun 17, 2003
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I grant I may have exaggerated but not by much. Seriously in multiple 3.X and 4e groups, I have seldom (almost never) seen initiative take more than a minute or so (and this is NOT an exaggeration). Every player should have their basic initiative modifier on their sheet. The DM should have the Monster inits as well. All you really have to do is designate one player as "time keeper" and haven them write downt the order (heck on a whiteboard the PC names should already be there). I really don't understand how this is a horribly complex procedure even if you have to write down the monster names by hand, and it's certainly a one-time only thing (unlike pre 3e games).
-Polaris
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