D&D General D&D Combat is fictionless

[Maxperson]

Unless I misunderstood Maxperson’s example, I don’t believe their was a round before.

The orcs entering the room from the other side and ending up 30 feet from the fighter and 60 feet from the door the fighter wants to leave out of, was one of the possibilities.

 

[Krachek]

Well poop.

I was having fun and now see it is only a damn game.

what’s next? Magic is not real?

Not necessarily.
There is turning point where you can choose the fiction or the game.
obviously the fiction is more fragile than the game, and thus if you need it to have fun, you will need to help the fiction whenever you can. Arguing for RAW in intense situation is not helping the fiction, helping the fiction need often more subtle move that may feel like you were playing the game badly and without any assumption on success for a roll. DM fiat and roll result can be seen on the character point of view as the obvious reality rather than a success failure player perspective.

So when the DM tell that the orc charge your character as you move toward him, a fiction wise player don’t flinch, and just say this orc is courageous to dare challenge me.

 

[FrogReaver]

The orcs entering the room from the other side and ending up 30 feet from the fighter and 60 feet from the door the fighter wants to leave out of, was one of the possibilities.

I've been thinking about that scenario and perhaps it's best to not call initiative until the Fighter player has commited to fighting. Since there is an obvious escape route, perhaps initiative should have been held off on and instead a chase scene could have ensued or the player closed and baricaded the door to buy time. Etc.

I think the fault of that situation was calling for initiative immediately (common technique I know) but if done differently i think that would remove the issue from that situation.

 

[Maxperson]

I've been thinking about that scenario and perhaps it's best to not call initiative until the Fighter player has commited to fighting. Since there is an obvious escape route, perhaps initiative should have been held off on and instead a chase scene could have ensued or the player closed and baricaded the door to buy time. Etc.

I think the fault of that situation was calling for initiative immediately (common technique I know) but if done differently i think that would remove the issue from that situation.

Maybe a chase scene would be better if the goal of the orcs is to catch the fighter. The rules are to call for initiative, though, especially at that distance where some of the monsters are within attacking range to start.

The ability to have them all run to the door before the fighter can move was to illustrate the absurdity that is D&D combat. The reality is that not all of them would do so. Some would just move up and attack, others perhaps shooting him with bows or throwing spears. It's really a combat situation.

 

[Krachek]

Then we go back to basic principles.
The DM describe.
The players tell what they do.
The DM complete description, and ask for rolls.

So if the DM describe that an orc cross the room and engage your character, it is the reality for the character. The character may feel surprised, annoyed, or shaken, he just see that happen to him. The player can step out, make an official statement that the situation is impossible by RAW, but that is an option.

 

[Undrave]

Well poop.

I was having fun and now see it is only a damn game.

what’s next? Magic is not real?

Yeah I'm not sure what the problem is with my Role Playing GAME being a GAME. I like GAMES. I play GAMES to have fun so why wouldn't I want to play a GAME?!

I guess I'm just not a REAL roleplayer.

 

[Jack Daniel]

I have to wonder.

When the player characters enter one of my dungeons, it's Turn One, which lasts for ten minutes. The party can move their exploration speed (usually 90 feet, because there's almost always at least one lightly encumbered character in the group), or each character can take an action, like searching or listening or interacting with some piece of the dungeon. On Turn Six, when the party has been in the dungeon for nearly an hour, the party needs to rest or else face mounting exhaustion penalties; also that's when torches that were lit on Turn One are due to go out. (Lanterns with a full charge of oil, of course, get twenty-four turns before they need to be refilled and relit.)

If the party encounters monsters, the very first thing checked is surprise — 2-in-6 chance that the party is surprised, probably no chance that the monsters are surprised, because they can see the party's light — followed by encounter initiative, and if the monsters win the initiative, a reaction roll (which, since none of the PCs have had a chance to speak up yet, goes unmodified by anybody's Charisma) to determine their initial disposition.

To what extent is the dungeon "fictionless" (according to whomever is making this arbitrary judgment)?

 

[Krachek]

I have to wonder.

When the player characters enter one of my dungeons, it's Turn One, which lasts for ten minutes. The party can move their exploration speed (usually 90 feet, because there's almost always at least one lightly encumbered character in the group), or each character can take an action, like searching or listening or interacting with some piece of the dungeon. On Turn Six, when the party has been in the dungeon for nearly an hour, the party needs to rest or else face mounting exhaustion penalties; also that's when torches that were lit on Turn One are due to go out. (Lanterns with a full charge of oil, of course, get twenty-four turns before they need to be refilled and relit.)

If the party encounters monsters, the very first thing checked is surprise — 2-in-6 chance that the party is surprised, probably no chance that the monsters are surprised, because they can see the party's light — followed by encounter initiative, and if the monsters win the initiative, a reaction roll (which, since none of the PCs have had a chance to speak up yet, goes unmodified by anybody's Charisma) to determine their initial disposition.

To what extent is the dungeon "fictionless" (according to whomever is making this arbitrary judgment)?

That is good old ADnD! It was before the declaration of players right!

 

[pemerton]

This seems the point of time where initiative is rolled.


This seems to be imposing intent over the randomness of determining initiative. I might rephrase the fiction here to be "He has decided to run and didn't spend any time waffling on that decision. Unfortunately for the fighter, the orcs moved quicker and surrounded him before he put his decision into action."

<snip>

The fighter is 30 feet in a room and there are a bunch of orcs 30 feet farther in. Everybody sees everybody, so no surprise. Things go south and initiative is rolled. So everybody then reacts to either flee out the door or cut off that escape. Initiative seems to match up to who reacts quicker to things turning bad and effecting that into action.

You can reasonably quibble about orcs moving 60 feet before the fighter reacts being farther than you would expect in this fictional scenario, but I think it is only a quibble about specifics of distance and speed.

As we make choices and roll dice, we discover more about how things are. The fighter aimed not to waffle, but he really did roll lower initiative. Of the possible worlds he might have found himself in, he turned out to be in one in which the orcs were faster.

<snip>

We can feel vexed that our fighter in that square located so very close to the door couldn't make it there before the orcs, but the phase space included other dimensions. They play a part in our narrative, too.

<snip>

In a way, our complaint is that initiative shouldn't trump grid, and we are vexed because initiative does sometimes trump grid.

<snip>

A viable way to solve @FrogReaver's problem may be simply to adjust our expectations so that we don't feel jarred out of SoD by initiative telling us something different, than grid alone.

My thought was - having rolled lower initiative what seems to be represented is that something prevented him winning the race to the door. Getting a lower initiative can be taken to represent a fact about the world, just as much as his grid position. Albeit better narrated with language around reasons for being slower.

Player: I want to race for the door without hesitation. Rolls badly on initiative.
DM: (Correctly avoiding telling player that they in fact did not intend to race to the door without hesitation.) Ugh, you stumble slightly and the orcs race pass you.

This suggested interpretation of @Maxperson's example does open up another @FrogReaver-style pressure point: we are not positing that each round is not 6 seconds, but rather is in the neigh1bourhood of six seconds. This will bump into duration rules, like spell durations. (4e D&D avoids this issue by using non-real-world time durations for combat-relevant effects.)

There are some other oddities too, like the fact that the fighter stumbling doesn't actually cost any actions in the action economy - so the stumble is real enough to permit the Orcs to swarm past the fighter to the door, but not s real that it actually impedes the fighter's actions for the round.

 

[FrogReaver]

I have to wonder.

When the player characters enter one of my dungeons, it's Turn One, which lasts for ten minutes. The party can move their exploration speed (usually 90 feet, because there's almost always at least one lightly encumbered character in the group), or each character can take an action, like searching or listening or interacting with some piece of the dungeon. On Turn Six, when the party has been in the dungeon for nearly an hour, the party needs to rest or else face mounting exhaustion penalties; also that's when torches that were lit on Turn One are due to go out. (Lanterns with a full charge of oil, of course, get twenty-four turns before they need to be refilled and relit.)

I don't see any major issues with this. I mean having to rest after just an hour of exploring or facing penalties is a bit of a stretch for me, but that's really very minor.

If the party encounters monsters, the very first thing checked is surprise — 2-in-6 chance that the party is surprised, probably no chance that the monsters are surprised, because they can see the party's light — followed by encounter initiative, and if the monsters win the initiative, a reaction roll (which, since none of the PCs have had a chance to speak up yet, goes unmodified by anybody's Charisma) to determine their initial disposition.

Not sure why there would be an issue with this.

To what extent is the dungeon "fictionless" (according to whomever is making this arbitrary judgment)?

Everything you've described as far as I can tell is the players interacting with the dungeon or the DM using checks to generate fictional details on the fly. That's not the kind of stuff I'm having issues with.