D&D 5E Anyone Using the Optional Initiative from the DMG?

[Gundark]

I roll initiative every round. It stops the players from "gaming" the system and adds a Chaos factor to combat which I like.

 

[Tormyr]

As far as I've been able to tell, there isn't. In fact, there doesn't seem to be any official way to change your position in the initiative order, since a readied action just uses your reaction when it triggers.

EDIT: On a side note ...

Has anyone got any suggestions on how to achieve this same result without mucking around with the way initiative works?

These things speed up combat and work for the DM as well:
1. Let the players know that if they don't have their action ready they will be skipped / delayed / check back with them later.
2. Roll damage dice with the attack roll.
3. Spell cards for the spellcasters so they do not have to root through the PHB. http://www.enworld.org/forum/rpgdownloads.php?do=download&downloadid=1119
4. Dry erase magnetic name plates for a dry erase board. When initiative is rolled, one of the players gets everyone's initiative, writes it on the corresponding name plate, and arranges them in initiative order on a magnetic dry erase board. They then make space on the initiative board for any monsters I roll, and I can surprise them later with another creature jumping in. Everyone know where they come in the initiative order. So they should be ready, and they keep me honest because I sometimes screw up and skip someone.

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

IMO, the best initiative system is still 1E Deadlands. You roll your speed, and for each success of 5+ you draw a card from a deck. Initiative goes from high card to low. Because there's an upper limit of Aces, it avoids D&D's problems of guessing what the top initiative is and working down, you just call out "Aces, Kings, Queens etc" as you work down. Longer actions start on the high card and resolve on the low card (or multiple low cards if they take more than 1). If you don't have enough cards, it gets resolved on your next round. Delaying works by keeping a high card "up your" sleeve for the next round. Ties are broken by suit order.

Best part is because everyone is holding a physical representation of their initiative, there's no farting around with whiteboards or making an initiative grid. Just call high and work down. Fast and elegant.

I'm tempted to do something like this for 5E if we decide to change initiative. Give everyone 2 cards, one for your move, one for action. For every +4 you have on initiative, you get one extra card (but not one extra action), increasing the odds you can act faster.

 

[pukunui]

Popcorn handles PCs all going first if that's what they pick - because then the monsters are in control and often end up going twice in a row. (End of round one, then beginning of round 2) which can be a big advantage.

My concern there is that in 5e, especially at lower levels, this could result in one side not getting a turn at all.

That said, popcorn is from MHR where PC damage output is more consistent. So D&D where multiple opponents can be removed before acting because of a few characters going nova may have consequences on battle dynamics.

Exactly!

4. Dry erase magnetic name plates for a dry erase board. When initiative is rolled, one of the players gets everyone's initiative, writes it on the corresponding name plate, and arranges them in initiative order on a magnetic dry erase board. They then make space on the initiative board for any monsters I roll, and I can surprise them later with another creature jumping in. Everyone know where they come in the initiative order. So they should be ready, and they keep me honest because I sometimes screw up and skip someone.

I've been using one of these (the Paizo Gamemastery one) for years now, and I can't say that it noticeably speeds up combat or gets the players to pay attention any better. Lately I've taken to using tent cards hung on my DM screen, but that still doesn't help, even though the initiative order is right there in front of them!

 

[Tormyr]

I've been using one of these (the Paizo Gamemastery one) for years now, and I can't say that it noticeably speeds up combat or gets the players to pay attention any better. Lately I've taken to using tent cards hung on my DM screen, but that still doesn't help, even though the initiative order is right there in front of them!

It helps in a couple of spots:

Set up time for an encounter:
Another player writes initiative down while the DM sets up other stuff for the encounter (notes, minis, maps, etc.)

Lost time while a player figures out what to do:
It lets them know when they should be ready. If they are not ready, they are delayed / skipped. Player's will be ready to go after being skipped once or twice.

That coupled with rolling attack and damage dice together, having spell cards, and other things like that reduce all the stops and starts that happen more frequently as characters become more complex. When everyone knows what they are going to do, knows what their spell does, and can call out not only the attack number but the damage number as well, combat flies. The speed of mid and high level combat can become close to that experienced back at level 1.

 

[pukunui]

As I said, I've been using one for years, and it doesn't speed things up in any appreciable way. Maybe we're using it wrong?

 

[Nebulous]

I haven't tried it, but I'm really torn. I like everything it does. I don't like the fact that it adds substantial time (real time, not game time) and numbers to track to combat.

Exactly. I love the idea, but I don't want to slow combat down. In fact I like what Sancroscant said about "above X, just go."

 

[trentonjoe]

I'm going to check out that Popcorn Initiative thing. That sounds interesting. I tried Side Initiative but it made the combat really boring. The players would usually win (which happened often due to some bad rolls on my part) in which case they would just dominate the monsters completely. It made combat way too easy. If the monsters did win (rarely) I held back (I'm not very good at being a killer DM). It just didn't work for me. Plus I didn't like how it eliminated some PC abilities. I like that faster characters go first.

I'm thinking I'm going to try the speed factors and see how it goes (although popcorn might change my mind).

Thanks everyone.

I'll be trying popcorn this evening!

 

[Wolfskin]

Nope. What I'm using is the "Monsters' initiative is 10+Dex mod" optional rule, with only players rolling for initiative. It saves me a lot of time for mixed monster encounters.

 

[Rune]

My concern there is that in 5e, especially at lower levels, this could result in one side not getting a turn at all.

This can easily happen with cyclical initiative anyway (and is even more pronounced with sided initiative), depending on the dice, especially at low levels. It's actually less swingy with popcorn initiative, because you know, typically, all but one of the PCs will go first, then all of the monsters, then the last PC. Every round. Unless one of the monsters wins initiative and the roles are reversed (which can be equally dangerous to low-level PCs).

Either you plan for that when prepping an encounter (with extra or tougher foes), or don't and let the players enjoy a first round victory once in a while.

I do think popcorn initiative might not work as well with a combat-as-sport preference, but my players are combat-as-war, so they're doing everything they can to unbalance things before the first die is rolled, anyway.