DMs who dislike using minis during combat?

[Uller]

A picture is worth a thousand words and a battle map with some minis on it is essentially a picture of combat. Not every combat requires minis, but most are better with them, IMO.

Personally, I've never understood the need some DMs have to describe combat (or any aspect of the game) as if he is telling a story. I've got my own imagination and it is far better than anything a DM can describe. Don't get me wrong...I don't mind the DM giving some cinematic descriptions now and then, but if it is over done it just gets old and distracting (like having too many highly dramatic slow-motion shots in an action movie..eventually you just start wondering when the movie will be over).

The need to have minis look exactly like whatever it is they represent is far more distracting to me than just having a collection of generic minis and letting my imagination do the rest (I've been known to use dice, pennies, whatever).

I had a dwarf cleric to a war god that is one of my favorite PCs of all time. I had a gnome with a spear for a mini for him. It looked nothing like what Theorin Forkbeard looked like. Two of the players in my group are professional mini-painters (full-time job...who knew?). They're really good at it. They painted up a fig to be Theorin...but it wasn't like how I pictured him so it kind of ruined it for me (not that I didn't appreciate their effort...it was a really kewl paint job). Kind of like when you read a book and then see it on the big screen and it just doesn't do it for you because the director's image of important characters, locations, etc doesn't match yours.

 

[kengar]

I agree and disagree. Minis are a love-hate thing with me. 3E D&D has pretty much made it mandatory for the use of minis or at least the use of a drawn out area on graph paper for a combat. We can thank WOTC for the Attack of Opportunity rule which from what I've seen is the biggest reason for it.
Hates:
1) Tactical movement - "Let's see... I have a movement of 30 (counts out the spaces). Crap, if I move there I'll be out in the open, maybe instead I'll go here (counts out the spaces again). Damn, that'll give the Orc Warchief an attack of opportunity.

Do what I do. Don't allow re-counting on their turn. It slows the game down and is unrealistic. I tell the players "Figure out what you're going to do ahead of time and then, when it's your turn, DO IT! If you count out the squares on your turn, that's where you are or you don't move that turn." If things change since they last counted squares (bad guys move around, etc.), then they need to take that into account quickly or suffer the consequences.

 

[reveal]

Do what I do. Don't allow re-counting on their turn. It slows the game down and is unrealistic. I tell the players "Figure out what you're going to do ahead of time and then, when it's your turn, DO IT! If you count out the squares on your turn, that's where you are or you don't move that turn.

I've tried to do that but I have players in my group that ended up not paying attention to what else is going on because they were too busy thinking about what they would do. So on their turn, they'd ask questions like "So what did so-and-so do again?"

I ended up implementing a 30-second rule. Basically, the player has 30 seconds to decide what they are going to do or they forfeit their turn. It may seem harsh, but it helps a lot and has sped up our combats tremendously. Of course, 30 isn't a hard and fast number, but it gets the point across.

And, no, I don't have a clock or anything. I also don't allow other players to say things like "You only have 5 seconds left!" I just count silently to myself.

 

[Wombat]

Overall, I find battlemats and miniatures both slow down the game tremendously and bring in more of a "wargame" feel. The whole thing tends to boils down to minute manipulation of figures and minor tactics (many of which would not work out if you were to use simultaneous movement), along with a "God's Eye View" of combat, which is illogical.

We (my group) don't worry too much about AoOs. We don't worry too much about the specifics of combat. Instead, we concentrate on the "tale" of the combat.

Then again, I know people who like the "old school wargame attitude" of 3e combat.

I, too, came to D&D via wargames (mini-gamed from 1971-6) -- and I was very happy to finally get away from the minutiae and arguments that such battles led to.

 

[kengar]

What's funny is that I left d20 for a more minatures-based game and play has sped up! I run combats with 15-20 combatants in less time than it used to take to run a party of 4 v. 6-7 bad guys with more details and flexibility (ahhh, Savage Worlds, whatever did I do without you? ). Of course I love minis and painting them, as well as making WorldWorks scenery, so this meshes well with my interests.

 

[Qualir]

I resisted minis for years. My group tended to play on couches in the living room with only coffee tables and notebooks to roll dice on. Using miniatures has replaced that relaxed atmosphere and my extra comfy lazy boy with a dinning room table. My desciptions were not perfect for tactics, but questions like "how many orcs are cought in the fireball" were answered with a random die roll.

3 E changed all that. 3 E combat feats are definitely built along tactical guidelines. I gave in to minis, but I rarely draw more than a simple box on the grid to represent room size (furniture was made to be destroyed, kicked out of the way, or jumped over). I have to admit that minis add a great visual and keep down the randomness of AoE dice rolls.

My new problem is that one of my players is a professional freelance artist and art teacher who happens to have a one tract mind. Minis have become his new obsession and we constantly have to stop him from giving disertations on how he painted this or that mini. Granted, they look awesome, but I have no interest in the process, and he can go on talking about it forever. We game at this player's house. He insists on painting minis at the table, which means he pays no attention to me, the DM, or any of his fellow players. We frequently have to ask him several times, and very loudly, what his character is doing. We are used to this in role play (he is total hack and slash and not interested in anything that doesn't result in blood), but now we have to deal with it during combat as well.

I miss my comfy lazy boy.

 

[Orryn Emrys]

I actually have yet another take. I, too, tend to prefer "descriptive" combat over the use of a battlemap... though I generally track the combat myself behind the screen. I have used fully detailed tactical maps for miniature combat before... usually for especially important battles... and I have quite a collection of counters.... That's really just to do something different, however... to change things up a bit, and to keep the game fresh and interesting.

Typically, I shy away from this approach because I don't feel that it's realistic for individual characters to have such a clear idea of the overall scenario. With a battlemap, for example, it is unusual for a PC to move into an enemy's threatening area if it requires more than a single move action... essentially providing the opponent ample opportunity to strike first with a full round of attacks. It is, however, unrealistic to expect your average PC to tell the difference between 30', 35' or even 40' of movement upon approaching an adversary.

My descriptions of most anything in the game are always very specifically tailored to the perceptions of the PC to which I am providing said description... if a player has a question about something his character requires specific information concerning, he will ask me. Conversely, if a character is likely to incite an Attack of Opportunity, or otherwise put him/herself in any potential jeapordy... and I judge that the character in question is likely to note such a detail... then I will generally indicate the issue to the player so that he/she can moderate his/her actions.

Otherwise, of course, minis also tend to slow things down... and I don't really want the players to have too much time to consider the options their characters are taking six seconds at a shot... so to speak.

 

[Nalathani]

have your cake and eat it too

As a DM I find it nearly impossible to do combat without minis and a battlegrid. Players always argue over their ability to do things because my description does not match what they envision in their heads (as stated by many others earlier).

However, what is to stop you from doing both? That's what I have been doing. Describe what's going on around everyone, describe the hits and misses and the actions the npcs are making. Just because you have a stupid looking mini representing a Fiendish ogre war hulk (I think I was using a quarter, all my other minis were missing), doesn't mean the players have to lose their imagination. Have him snarl and foam at the mouth, tell them he stamps his feet before he swings, etc. They'll forget all about the minis.

 

[Ottergame]

What little time is wasted by setting up minis on a battlemap is made up by not losing time having to describe in inane detail who is where and doing what every round.

 

[Barak]

My main reason for using minis when I DM is not for my players' benefit, but for my own.

Especially when they face a group of many foes.. I have enough stuff to keep track of (Init, HPs, spells, magic items, whatever) that the fact that I don't have to keep track of who is where (or even who is engaged in the combat!) is a great benefit. I don't think I'd DM if I had to do it without minis.