During D&D combat, how do you run it?

[Ahrimon]

High School gaming saw no miniature or battlemat use, although it's pretty much a given that we couldn't afford it with the number of books we were buying.

Not that I'm on my own, I have a nice battlemat, loads of mini's(Mostly unpainted, but I love the new plastic mini's. I just need to buy a case or three more. Damn Plasti-Crack) and I'm starting on my Hirst-Arts dungeon.

[Hijack]
For those people using the plotters. Do you know of any good maps (without grid) that can be printed up? I may have access to a plotter and I would like to print a bunch of maps that could be laid under an old battlemat that is clear with a grid on it. It should make for a very customizable map system.
[/Hijack]

Ahrimon

 

[Ashrem Bayle]

For my Forgotten Realms games, we use Tact-Tiles and the new D&D mini's (as well as some metal ones).

For my Midnight games, we don't use minis or a grid. I try my best to keep the player's attention focused on their own imagination instead of getting very tactical.

 

[just__al]

I voted We use a battlegrid and tokens, counters, chessmen, etc. but we also use minatures if we have them and magenight pieces.

For battles with Numerous mooks we have plastic zombies that have their bases numbered.

When I DM my wife is nice enough to keep track of initiative for me, probably has something to do with the fact that one game everybody kept delaying and readying actions and then argued about where they were in the init order and I threw the initiative cards across the room and called a 5 minute break. Oops.

All the other DM's just use a piece of paper for init but we all use my map and minis, dice, mage knight stuff, plastic zombies.... We just don't feel that D20 combat works without everybody knowing where everybody is, too many feats and skills that rely on knowing where you and they are...

 

[Hjorimir]

We use a battlemat with miniatures for the PCs. Usually we use dice to represent monsters but have slowly started to migrate to the Harbinger - Dragoneye monster minis (I refuse to buy blind boxes with those trashy personalities that I never use so, instead, get specifically what I need from the secondary markets such as ebay or PopularComics...I love most of the monster minis).

In addition to wet-erase we have a nice box of 1" cubes of wood (bought at Michaels, a local craft store...hrmm maybe it is in other cities) that can quickly be made into most any structure that is straight (if it can't we use the markers to draw in what cannot be easily defined with the blocks) and dominos provide doors as needed.

If battles are larger than what our already large mat can handle, we rollover to a nice whiteboard (which is also used to write down names and other important information).

Index cards are a godsend for tracking initiative and other modifiers (I actually print out full monster stats on 3" x 5" cards so when the monster's turn is up I don't have to look elsewhere for any numbers.

If I feel like setting dungeon mood, we turn off lights and play by candlelight instead. A bit harder to read numbers that way, but does add a certain ambiance to the game.

 

[Orius]

I don't see how people think it's impossible, just tell people who they can get to.

It's not that it's impossible, it's more a matter of differing imaginations. Im my current group, the players generally accept my authority as DM and go along with my calls, unless it starts getting late, or the battle stats dragging on, and I goof up and say something that doesn't make sense. But there've always been situations when you're not using a grid that some player will try to take advantage of theings to his own benefit, like suddenly not being in range of am attack when he should be, given his last action.

 

[d20Dwarf]

Well, I'm one of the 3 miniatures/no grid votes, because there was no option for miniatures and Master Maze (or other terrain)!