Combat Rounds: How Long Should They Be?

[Traken]

I vote for 1 second rounds. Limit everyone to one action a round. Complex tasks like using a bow or casting a spell take multiple rounds.

This keeps players more engaged as fewer actions lead to less time between turns. It minimizes the cyclical effect of a round based system. It gets rid of the nonsense about "one attack is really 4 attempts to attack."

The biggest "problem" with it is that there will be turns where absolutely nothing exciting happens. I don't see this as a problem, but there will be those who do.

 

[Oni]

I vote for 1 second rounds. Limit everyone to one action a round. Complex tasks like using a bow or casting a spell take multiple rounds.

This keeps players more engaged as fewer actions lead to less time between turns. It minimizes the cyclical effect of a round based system. It gets rid of the nonsense about "one attack is really 4 attempts to attack."

The biggest "problem" with it is that there will be turns where absolutely nothing exciting happens. I don't see this as a problem, but there will be those who do.

Yeah, I'd be on that list of people.

It just occurred to me, that on the whole, D&D works much better when you zoom out a little bit, rather than zoom in. All the sorts of things that people complain about seem to complain about seem to be much easier to swallow if you don't stuck trying to delineate all the little details of them.

IMHO combat shouldn't be about trying to lay out every little action that happens, each person's turn is their chance to point out that moment where they are doing something interesting that round, not describe every single thing they did since the lat moment we checked in on them.

 

[Recidivism]

I vote for 1 second rounds. Limit everyone to one action a round. Complex tasks like using a bow or casting a spell take multiple rounds.

This keeps players more engaged as fewer actions lead to less time between turns. It minimizes the cyclical effect of a round based system. It gets rid of the nonsense about "one attack is really 4 attempts to attack."

The biggest "problem" with it is that there will be turns where absolutely nothing exciting happens. I don't see this as a problem, but there will be those who do.

I inhale. 15 on my inhale check!


(FWIW, I don't think combat rounds should have a corresponding time frame. Very much in the One Comic Frame camp.)

 

[Lanefan]

A long time ago I took my 1e game to 30-second rounds (a turn stayed at 10 minutes) each of 6 5-second segments. So far, no problem at all.

The only time I really want a different "round" length is during things like naval combat, where things happen slowly; but that doesn't interact well with spellcasting.

And cyclical initiative can die in a fire whenever it likes.

Lanefan

 

[Oni]

I have a soft spot for the '...and then everything happens, chaos ensues' style initiative of earlier editions, and wouldn't be terribly upset to see cyclical initiative disappear, but I would honestly be very surprised if WotC was daring enough to drop cyclical initiative. I feel like it might not be a popular decision with a large segment of the audience. I suppose giving options to do it one way or the other wouldn't be too out of question, but there are some ramifications that extend from the initiative system might have to be designed around, such as what it means for being able to interrupt spellcasting and readying actions and such.

 

[Blackwarder]

I vote to go back to the one minute round, it's much more cinematic and it leave a lot of wiggle room to the DM to play with not to mention that when the players know that their action will take approximately a minute they feel more at ease to try some of the more interesting things.

Warder