D&D General Combat as War vs. Sport and a Missing Third Mode

Steady Vane · 2026-04-02T20:16:04+0100

TL;DR Theater is the type of group that yaps for three hours and then have a single combat per session. I do not think the game focus is the only reason this happens, famously 3.5 had a similar problem caused by combat length after all, but Theater generally assumes risky moments might happen but your PC will only die if you want them too, not on a random encounter. So they just skip the random encounters for "high impact" fights. And that is story flavor impact, not mechanical generally.

Lanefan · 2026-04-02T20:22:42+0100

CreamCloud0 said:
i think the reasoning is that in CaT the dice are often treated as more secondary to telling a good story, whereas in Sport and War the dice are given more weight and respect, when fudging is done in those two (if at all seeing as War is more inclined to let the dice lie where they fall: if you lose then you should've made better decisions) to 'avoid negative outcomes' whereas in Theatre i believe it would be used far more often than in the other two would ever to 'achieve desirable outcomes' towards compelling story beats.

Which raises a question: is CaT more the domain of diceless or dice-light games, rather than dice-centered D&D where it's kind of an add-on or overlay to what's already taking place?

Steady Vane · 2026-04-02T20:25:06+0100

jmartkdr2 said:
I feel like we're re-inventing the older "Gamist, Narrativist, Simulationist" idea but framing it slightly differently - and carrying the same issues.

The "Combat as X" framework seems to be written by CaW/Simulationist gamers and so slightly advantages their own ideas while not quite understanding others, but that's the same flaw GNS has (in a different direction.)

The other thing to remember is: for most actual players, the difference in style is more about the order of priorities, rather than what thise priorities are. A CaS/Gamist player cares about the game itself being fun above immersion or telling a story - but they care about all three.

Of course now there's a part of my brain trying to invent a third taxonomy that favors CaS/Gamist priorities in its framing.

There is a problem that simply by labeling and dividing them up like this, we imply each type can only do its own thing. Which is incorrect.

IMO each style is about the order of priorities, and I thank you for pointing that out. Every edition had each of these as somewhat of a goal, it is simply some editions of D&D leaned more one way over the others. Notably afaik the terminology came about to describe why the OSR hated the 3e/3.5/4e gameplay shift. But that has the downside of mainly exaggerating the differences instead of encompassing the whole. Be remiss to forget that.

Lanefan · 2026-04-02T20:33:23+0100

Steady Vane said:
Player improvisation can happen no matter which paradigm the game is under. It's about level of scale and impact.

Oh, sure - but let's instead ask why is the combat there at all?

Is it there mostly as a vehicle for in-character roleplay and story development (CaT) or is it there mostly as a challenge or task for the PCs to overcome (CaW) or is it there mostly so the PCs can bust out their combat feats and mechanical abilities (CaS)?

And yes, a combat can indeed be all three at once during play. The questions are more a) why did the DM (or module writer) put it there in the first place and b) which approach - War, Sport, or Theater - are the players and DM going to lean towards while playing it out?

CreamCloud0 · 2026-04-02T20:44:58+0100

Lanefan said:
Which raises a question: is CaT more the domain of diceless or dice-light games, rather than dice-centered D&D where it's kind of an add-on or overlay to what's already taking place?

i'd be inclined to think the answer to that would be yes.

jmartkdr2 · 2026-04-02T21:46:28+0100

Lanefan said:
Which raises a question: is CaT more the domain of diceless or dice-light games, rather than dice-centered D&D where it's kind of an add-on or overlay to what's already taking place?

I don't know if CaT favors dice-light gaming more than CaW - after all, in CaW you're trying to get around the random elements.

But diceless CaS would be a really tough sell, I would think.

GobHag · 2026-04-03T04:32:12+0100

Lanefan said:
Which raises a question: is CaT more the domain of diceless or dice-light games, rather than dice-centered D&D where it's kind of an add-on or overlay to what's already taking place?

I'd surprisingly argue that it's orthogonal but most dice light are also power light. CaT wants cool prompts and powers because they can just go all Freeform Roleplay anyways,

Steady Vane said:
Player improvisation can happen no matter which paradigm the game is under. It's about level of scale and impact.

You mention the classic examples of flooding the dungeon, but I can counterpoint with a classic example of player improvisation in combat as sport: swinging on a chandelier across the room.

The difference is in scale. Combat as sport has small-scale combat options on the character sheet. War has macro-scale options on both the character sheet and in table-wide rules. Compare old Vancian-style casters who could delete an encounter with a Sleep spell, but the gameplay was about choosing when to do so. To something like 4e sorcerers who had buttons to press, and got the pleasure of dithering over encounter and at-wills every single fight.

War wizard decision is at the macro scale. Sport wizard decision is at the round during the encounter scale. Both can improvise, but usually tend to improvise at the scale they are expected to operate at.

Theater instead flips the focus and improvisation to the PC's story, and improvisation is therefore generally found there instead. Smoking out the dungeon would be considered a dick move for table vibes. Focusing too much on combat min-maxxing loops instead of flavor and shared spotlight likewise.

As a self-avowed Combat as Sports guy, swinging on a chandelier isn't CaS. In CaS, swinging from a chandelier is just how you flavour your 'Move 15 squares, you ignore any terrain effects during this move'.