Dodging Fireballs and other Readied Action Sheneigans

[Starfox]

I've met many gamers who [...] try to nerf the Ready action.

Simulationism-wise, readied actions are in doubt. The whole action-reaction timing thing is very much under discussion. I tried googling for what I thought was the common scientific opinion now, that action always beats reaction - but seems the internet currently favors the opposite theory. It is very much an open question tough. Anybody's opinion can be right - or not.

In my homebrew rpg, I don't have a generic readied action, only specific stunts that lets you react in specific situations.

 

[Obryn]

Simulationism-wise, readied actions are in doubt.

Simulation-wise, the whole initiative system is what should really be in doubt.

-O

 

[pemerton]

Simulation-wise, the whole initiative system is what should really be in doubt.

Quite.

From here:

The causal sequence of task resolution in Simulationist play must be linear in time. He swings: on target or not? The other guy dodges or parries: well or badly? The weapon contacts the unit of armor + body: how hard? The armor stops some of it: how much? The remaining impact hits tissue: how deeply? With what psychological (stunning, pain) effects? With what continuing effects? All of this is settled in order, on this guy's "go," and the next guy's "go" is simply waiting its turn, in time.

The few exceptions have always been accompanied by explanatory text, sometimes apologetic and sometimes blase. A good example is classic hit location, in which the characters first roll to-hit and to-parry, then hit location for anywhere on the body (RuneQuest, GURPS). Cognitively, to the Simulationist player, this requires a replay of the character's intent and action that is nearly intolerable. It often breaks down in play, either switching entirely to called shots and abandoning the location roll, or waiting on the parry roll until the hit location is known. Another good example is rolling for initiative, which has generated hours of painful argument about what in the world it represents in-game, at the moment of the roll relative to in-game time.​

 

[Starfox]

The problem is that continuous time action (as opposed to segmented time action à la DnD) is generally much harder to do, and rarely gives a better or more dramatic feel. Also, it never really is continuous - it is almost impossible to make a continuous time model, because of Zeno's paradoxes and related problems of infinite division.

The to-hit model permerton quotes above also has the problem that it does not take into account fatigue and the somewhat vague notion of "advantage" in combat. The superior side in any challenge can force the weaker side to exert themselves more and more to counter feints and blows designed specifically to stretch the weaker side's limits. A hit is generally only scored after your opponent's guard has been worn down - all the attacks prior to that are really preliminaries, not really made to hurt but to force the target to take more and more extreme defensive actions. I believe this is most easily observed in tennis - how the player who has the initiative (or advantage - no relation to DnD initiative) forces his opponents to run further and further with each ball, and finally sends the ball to the opposite side of the court from where his opponent is, making that ball impossible to catch. It is not any single ball that is impossible to catch, it is the sequence of balls that builds a pattern where the opponent is forced into an impossible situation.

Ok, DnD's combat system does not model this very well either (best was perhaps 1E and 2E with 1-minute combat rounds), but that's not what I was trying to say - I'm merely saying that continuous time and discrete time combat systems are both so far from the "real" that we might just as well arbitrarily pick the one we feel is the most fun.

I do think that the above can be used as an explanation for hit points and why there is no physical damage until you reach zero hit points - any damage before that point simply represents building advantage. In my homebrew, I also use this assumption to motivate why hits below that threshold is recovered very quickly.

 

[MJS]

I think this whole readied action mechanic breaks my flow. Keep the fireball strong, my friends.

 

[pemerton]

The problem is that continuous time action (as opposed to segmented time action à la DnD) is generally much harder to do, and rarely gives a better or more dramatic feel.

I've played a lot of Rolemaster which combines more-or-less continous time within rounds with an initiative roll between rounds.

It is more demanding to run than 3E/4e turn-by-turn intitiative. It makes movement a bit more dynamic, but it still produces oddities, and you can get "burned" by the way the initiative roll falls between otherwise sequential actions.