D&D General Alternate Stats for Initiative [+]

The characters are suppose to be heroes, and with the skill system what it is, why not let players use their best attributes in what is a very abstract part of the game? Why should Dexterity dominate initiative if other approaches can be justified? A Barbarian giving an intimidating roar causing the enemy to hesitate? why not?

Personally, I don't like the lack of variation.

As long as they are the same level, the party will all have the same proficiency bonus. And by a fairly low level, all characters will have the same number (+4 or +5) for their highest ability modifier. So everyone ends up having the exact same modifier to the initiative roll.

Functionally, letting the players pick a skill is the same as letting them just pick their preferred ability modifier, which is effectively the same as just rolling a d20. Every character is exactly the same. Which is fair, but not interesting. An option with greater variability will increase strategy, character specialization, group dynamics, etc. YMMV.
 

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When everybody uses their best stat or just their proficiency bonus, everybody has always the same or around the same initiative bonus. Building a "fast" character with fast reactions is not worth it anymore at least in terms of initiative.

Furthermore the explanations are lacking. IMO Dex is the only stat that makes sense. WIS is a good contender, but WIS is already the most important "mind" stat, its the DEX equivalent, no need to buff it. Also the "heightened awareness" aspect of WIS is already in use to realize danger: Sense ambushes etc. with perception(WIS). For me "heightened awareness" and "reaction time" are different phases of a combat.

INT is for me "slow thinking" (and WIS "fast thinking", in terms of Daniel Kahnemann) and doesnt make sense at all for initiative. Its rational thinking, not gut reactions. Its thinking a problem through, investigating all options etc.

The other stats make even less sense, I think DEX is the most fitting contentender. If you want to be better at initiative, you can always take "alert" feature. If you really want to nerf DEX I think you should look in other places. But also DMs need to stop give DEX checks for everything. Its quite common for many DMs to let players use acrobatics where athletics is required, climbing for example. Also if you use encumbrance STR stops becoming a dump stat for non STR-classes. And use monsters with abilities that trigger STR saving throws. If you use STR more, it stops being outshined by DEX so much. (CON needs no buff imo)
 

The characters are suppose to be heroes, and with the skill system what it is, why not let players use their best attributes in what is a very abstract part of the game?
Why bother will different skills at all? Every character doesn’t have to be good at every single thing. They can have areas they’re weak in. If you’re just letting them use any skill they want then just get rid of skills and give them a proficiency bonus and choose their best attribute for every roll.
 

PF2 has this interesting thing where you usually use Perception, but if you can justify it, you can use other skills like Stealth.

Something to consider for those thinking on using a skill-based variant.
 

Personally, I don't like the lack of variation.

As long as they are the same level, the party will all have the same proficiency bonus. And by a fairly low level, all characters will have the same number (+4 or +5) for their highest ability modifier. So everyone ends up having the exact same modifier to the initiative roll.

Functionally, letting the players pick a skill is the same as letting them just pick their preferred ability modifier, which is effectively the same as just rolling a d20. Every character is exactly the same. Which is fair, but not interesting. An option with greater variability will increase strategy, character specialization, group dynamics, etc. YMMV.
The flip side if this is: whichever stat you pick, you give that one a significant boost in usefulness. Yeah, Dex definitely didn’t need the help but unless the real goal is to make Int more useful you’re just moving the cheese without changing how the maze works.

Not that empowering Int is a bad idea per se, although it might make wizards a lot better (since they’re more likely to get a control spell in before characters move around and get mixed together)

If you only want to limit Dex, I’d still suggest not using ability scores or skills but maybe adding more ways to invest in initiative specifically (a fighting style, something for rogues, an origin feat that would stack with Alert, etc)
 

I think DEX attacks should also have their damage adjustment based on STR. That's where I would start. (Admittedly, this is a theoretical idea, not one I have tried out.).
It is a good idea and it works well IMO. It has been a long-standing house-rule when I don't run more "RAW" games.
 

From what I can remember, weapon/casting speeds were needlessly complex, slowing the game down considerably and making things less fun. It just wasn't worth the effort. Not only that, but it didn't make a whole lot of sense. A dagger is quicker, sure, but if you've got a foot of steel and I've got three feet of steel in the form of a longsword I'm going to have an opportunity to hit you before you hit me. It doesn't make senese that I have a penalty to my initiative.
Yeah, it was pretty complex in 1E, with weapon size/reach being also taken into account (at least for the initial determination of who would strike first). It may have been simplified in 2E and could be further refined for 5E.

Light weapon or natural/unarmed weapons, Cantrips - +5 init bonus
One-handed weapons, spells 1st - 2nd level - +4 init bonus
Versatile weapons, spells 3rd level - +3 init bonus
Two-handed weapons, spells 4th-5th level - +2 init bonus
Heavy Two-handed weapons, spells 6th - 7th - +1 init bonus
Improvised weapons, spells 8th+ - +0 init bonus

There might be some exceptions, for example the various Power Word spells might have an init bonus of +5 instead of +1 or Tavern Brawler improving the init bonus for improvised weapons. Things like Polearm master and Reach could account for cases where the length of the weapon gives the attacker a one-up when fending off opponents through the superior reach of the weapon.

<edit> in the case of multiple weapons (longsword in main hand, dagger in off-hand, for example), use the init modifier of the slower weapon.
 
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Since Light Weapons are sometimes used in pairs for Two-Weapon Fighting, how would a weapon in your offhand affect your overall weapon speed?

And what if you are carrying a shield around for protection?
Shield would only modify your init in the system above if you were using it to shield bash, and in that case I'd be inclined to treat it as a one-handed weapon.
 

Well, instead of weapon speed, you could use the 5e weapon properties. "Weapons with the Heavy property impose disadvantage on initiative, and weapons with the Light property grant advantage on initiative checks."

Same thing for armor, I suppose: "Heavy armor imposes disadvantage on initiative checks, and Light armor (or no armor) grants advantage."

But this would be tedious to apply to the hundreds of monsters in the game, and it would be hard to apply fairly--monsters would almost always be rolling at advantage, and melee characters are put at even more of a disadvantage. And it kinda misses the whole premise of the thread: unless you stack it with some other modification, it's still just Dex-based initiative with extra steps.
 

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