Do you miss the Turn?

[MerricB]

The designers of D&D 3E made many great improvements to the game of D&D. However, there is one change that the designers made that has come to irritate me over the past few years.

It is the loss of the unit of game time known as the Turn.

For those people who started gaming with 3E and never played with the Turn, it was simple: it represented 10 minutes of game time. The beauty of the Turn was that it allowed you to easily track the amount of time the PCs spent in the dungeon.

A combat lasted one Turn - any time not spent fighting was spent resting.

You could travel a certain distance in a dungeon - mapping and staying alert - in a Turn.

It took a Turn to (thoroughly) search a 10' x 10' area.

It took a Turn for a thief to search an item for traps.

Every few turns, the DM would make a check for Wandering Monsters.

Sure, it wasn't always realistic, but it was a very useful bit of the game - allowing a simple form of time-keeping that didn't get bogged down in details.

So: do you miss the Turn? Do you still use it? Are you happier with the new system?

Cheers!

 

[irdeggman]

Nope.

It added an unnecessary amount of complexity and bookkeeping to the game.

Anyone remember flipping over initiative numbers (1-100) over and over again just to be able to keep track of who went when? 10 phases per round 10 rounds per turn.

While the Player's Option: Combat & Tactics did a great service in simplifying this it still comes no where near as simple to handle as the present (3.0/3.5).

It really only matters when in combat, hence a turn is an unnecessary thing to keep track of. Keeping track of things in terms of time is a whole lot more logical and easier for things outside of combat.

 

[TheAuldGrump]

Whereas today you have to go to the trouble of saying 'it takes 10 minutes' to search for traps.

Six one way, half a dozen the other, so why bother having 'turns'. Do you also miss 1 minute melee rounds that were also integral to the whole idea of 'a turn is 10 rounds'? I don't. Most combats are over in less than 2 minutes, so why would I want humongous unwieldy rounds just to have neat, compact turns.

The Auld Grump

 

[the Jester]

I kinda miss segments, too. But with a six-second round you don't really need 'em anymore.

 

[johnsemlak]

Are you happier with the new system?

Cheers!

What exactly is the 'new system' in 3e? Don't DMs just have to keep track of time?

 

[Dr Simon]

Nope.

Sounded too much like a game term. "10 minutes" is just as easy.

 

[Eremite]

No, like far too many of the original rules I don't miss it. It was just one of those random rulesets slapped onto the creaking hulk of 1E/2E. May it rest in peace....

 

[Algolei]

Miss 'em? Heck no! I still use 'em!

I don't play 3E, I play AD&D.

 

[Berandor]

Well, I would prefer a less standardized way of keeping time (for. example "1 combat", "1 encounter", "1 scene", "half a day", etc.), so I kind of miss the turn only as a lesser form of that.

 

[Li Shenron]

Turns may be useful to keep track of time if what you can do in a turn made sense, and that's not how it used to be IMO. I prefer to have more freedom and keep track of time in minutes/hours or whatever is more appropriate (and 10min is too long as a unit IMO for most situations).