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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Crazy Jerome" data-source="post: 5948962" data-attributes="member: 54877">No, I wasn't pointing to you as anti-tactical (or pro-tactical, for that matter).  It was more of an aside that I've noticed in the last few weeks, but brought up now because I'm saying that one of the reasons that cyclic initiative ends up being slower in practice is that the tactical options that tend to grow up around it are slow. As I mentioned earlier, the trick to declarations is to make them general and loose.  If you try to make them specific and strict, you are correct--you'll burn up any time you save from just going to a cyclic system.   Note that playing AD&D's version close to RAW, you sometimes can't be general and loose with declarations, because it applies modifiers to initiative based on the specifics of what you are doing.  We don't want that, either, as it is trying to simulate very precise decisions in an abstract system.  Again, if you want to do that, would be better to go to a cyclic system. I think side-by-side, with loose declarations, fits the Next core thus far very well.  Then add the cyclic initiative as a module, one that works well with the tactical module, though you can adopt just it if you want, and ignore most of the other tactical options. As an example, here is what loose declarations might look like:  Wizard: I'll blast some orcs while drifting towards the stairs.Fighter:  I'll hold the passage.Rogue:  I'll snipe from the left flank.Cleric:  I'm backing up the fighter. If I'm running that game, I'm holding the wizard to casting a spell (or trying anyway), the fighter to not moving much, and the rogue can't suddenly stab an orc that comes through a secret door on the right side of the room.  It's when we start insisting that the wizard pick a spell, that the fighter pick a spot, etc. that side-by-side declarations get messed up.   And of course, the DM has to pick a plan for each set of enemies, and then honestly stick to it. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f600.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":D" title="Big grin    :D"  data-smilie="8"data-shortname=":D" /></blockquote>

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