Chase Scenes - A how to?

[Jurble]

Hi all,
so ive grabbed some chase cards from one system and had a look into it in a few different ways, but im trying to work out how to run a chase scene in my game. Its a star wars SWSE game and id like to doa speederbike/swoop/speeder chase scene through a city.

Would it work like a combat scene, but instead of moving the distance, its mostly moving just the difference in distance between the pursuit and runners?

How do others run chase scenes in their games from a GMs perspective. Im fairly new to GMing so i guess more than specific SWSE rules for it, im looking for the

-how it works turn by turn
-how you describe it
-how you make it more interesting than "you move this far, you take a shot it hits/misses" etc.

really interested in peoples different ways of doing this

thanks alot!

 

[The_Gneech]

You might want to check out Hot Pursuit (RPGNow.com - Adamant Entertainment - Hot Pursuit: The Definitive D20 Guide to Chases). Intended for standard d20, but easy enough to convert to Saga Edition.

-The Gneech

 

[Drammattex]

If the chase occurred on foot, I would likely make a skill challenge. I'd use skills like Athletics, Streetwise, Perception, Insight, maybe even Stealth and Diplomacy ("Have you seen a tall man running by, blood on his hands?"). I'd set the DCs and complexity dependent on how much I cared whether the PC/PCs caught their mark. I'd rely exclusively on cinematic description and storytelling, doing the chase as a play by play -- aiming to describe something like that rooftop chase in Bourne Ultimatum, perhaps.

If the chase were to involve occasional combat, I'd keep some dungeon tiles and miniatures handy in order to show the relative positions of the combatants. In ranged combat, the chase would probably continue. In melee, it would likely end unless one combatant could knock the other prone or push him off a building, then make an escape.

If the chase involved vehicles, I'd spread out a BIG graph mat and run it using the vehicle rules as presented in The Adventurers Vault. I like these rules because they're simple enough to remember, but abstract enough to fill with my own description/flavor. I'd only lay out the graph mat if the vehicles would be in close proximity to one another. Otherwise, I'd probably run it as a skill challenge, however the vehicle combat would be more fun, I think.

That's how I'd do it. I'm finding that I like somewhat light, abstract rule sets that I can put my own description/story into as opposed to rules-heavy mechanics that I tend to have to look up and burn game time every time I need them.

 

[El Mahdi]

I'll second what The Gneech said. Hot Pursuit here and Hot Pursuit: On Foot here, are the best chase systems ever. Like he said, they were designed for OGL D20, but they'll work for D20 Modern, Star Wars D20, Star Wars SAGA, 3E and 3.5E D&D, the system would probably even work for Pathfinder and 4E, all with no, or little, modification. They are only $1.00 each on RPGNow.com. You could probably use these books with any system, not just D20 systems, also with little or no modification. I don't buy very many 3pp products, but this is one that I can't do without now that I have them.

 

[Umbran]

-how it works turn by turn
-how you describe it
-how you make it more interesting than "you move this far, you take a shot it hits/misses" etc.

really interested in peoples different ways of doing this

thanks alot!

The 4e rulebooks have a section on Skill Challenges, for which a chase scene is one of their examples. This idea is not actually dependent on 4e's rules, and might be useful to you, so you might want to read that chapter.

 

[Jurble]

awesome thanks guys, downloading that PDF now

another thread to copy into my onenote RPG section for reference later hehe. much appreciated!