imagination vs battlemat

[Elder-Basilisk]

I previously wrote that I always use a mat for combat. AuldGrump's email reminded me this isn't strictly true. There are some combats that are easy enough that, not only do I not bother with a map, I don't bother with the rules either. "Some orcs attack you and you kill them. Moving on...."

Unless the combat is ridiculously easy I haul out a map and minis.

 

[Crimsonite]

I'd have to say other.
Basically I have this rather large (3'²), square piece of thin white pseudo-wood with a grid system on it. They are numbered with X## and Y##. I don't know how many squares, either way: they're lots. You can use the square for any type of square meassurement you want. Meters, furlongs, yards, rhinotoeclippings. I usually leave them at five feet but sometimes it's ten or 15, depending on how large the area is and how much detail I need.

The figures are basically coloured chips (red for the party, green for NPCs, gray for unknown and black for obviously hostile) and in the case of the players they all have a little sticker with their initials on them.
I put a plastic foil (the kind you use for overhead projectors, just larger) with the same meassurements as the board.

Your standard battle looks like this:
I quickly describe the scene, ask my players what march order/formation they're in and quickly sketch out the area with three markers. Blue is solid structures such as walls, trees, etc. Red is cartographic data (red squiggly arrows a change in height (for terrain), straight arrows a slope and the numbers are the relative height (0 being normal ground, - being holes and such)) and yellow is for doors, treassure chests, ponds and what have you not.

My style of drawing these is very simple but it gets the point accross.
We're in an opening in a forest, there's a few large trees standing there and we're basically surrounded by dense woodwork that we can't see into all too well. The tree is this thick and so on.



It may sound complicated as hell but it's very convenient. The enviornment is perfectly destructable (so you just sent a crackling lightning bolt straight into that tree? *roll roll roll* It catches fire, is broken apart where you hit it and falls about here. *wipe wipe draw draw*) and it gives a great insight into just how the battlefield (or the city or the target temple for looting) looks.

I keep most maps on small post-it note sized papers so I don't have to draw them from memory. So whenever they're traveling somewhere I just describe the scenery because I'll be damned if I draw them the whole damned desert. But as soon as something that requires knowledge of the landscape comes up I whip out the markers again.


Usually when they enter cities they can buy a town map (a nice, printed out map for them to look at) while I draw crude groundlines. Sometimes I have to add relative window positions and heights on harder to get maps for the party rogue. Usually the scale is a lot less detailed then.

Sure, it means a lot of extra work when someone decides to explore something by night without a map (usually they have someone with a compass drawing a map as we walk along, these guys are mercenary pros) or if we're crawling through a long forgotten dungeon. But in the end it's worth it.

It adds a lot of depth to the game and makes the actual experience and profesion differences visible. At least with good players. The first level fighters will still act clumsy and cocky or shy, according to their character. They'll slip up while rogues will sulk behind and sneak about. Really sneak about, not just say "well, uh, I snuck up behind the ogre and totally pwned him!" but actually making a path. Sometimes stumbling upon traps. Usually not, though.
The barbarians will usually charge angry and huffing in as traight bullrush line, shrugging off most attacks and tactics to stop them, the wizard will be more tactical while the sorcerer just relies on his natural talent with the art to destroy anything that comes too close.

Experience also matters. There was a young, upstart troop of mercenaries who were heavily equipped with magical weaponary who were funded by the Church of Mask to put "my boys" out of comission to protect some of the church plots.

They outnumbered my guys easily and even their equipment was better. But my guys (from now on refered to as damned mercs) chose the battleground through a strategic retreat (not without problems, mind you, but the youngins were a bit too green behind the ears to realize that while wizards are great targets you shouldn't try bullrushing them out of a tight formation when they're well guarded. That boy got his leg cleaved off by an excellent critical AoO) getting them into a bottle neck trying to get up the hill, pelting them with arrows and magic (and conveniently placed heavy boulders.)

This would have hardly worked if I had said "Well .. you're in this open field and behind you is a hill that is only accesible from where your back is facing. You see some boulders but the youngins are already closing in on you." Instead they saw: We can get this distance behind us swiftly and safely if we hold our turns in such an order that the rogue can go first with laying a trap and that the meatshields can go just after the ranged attackers so keep them covered. We've also got some heavy boulders up there and a bottleneck where a landslide has placed a lot of debris.


But I'm trailing off.

Yeah, my sollution is cheap (as I'm chronically flat broke) and tricky at times but it really enhances the game. Which doesn't mean that it's flat out mean to the players or me. If I want someone to get away or not get away I can somehow arrange that with a snare, a monster or someone simply tripping. I like to hide the rolls so I can influence the game where I need to (I can't have the cleric die from a trap she missed if they'll really NEED her to get past the undead hordes at the exit.)

A good room description is still required to add an element of depth and also understanding. Otherwise it just looks a lot like a pretend city.


It really depends on your preference. I'm just the type of guy who extorts every bit of definition out of the rules and the enviornment.

 

[RangerWickett]

I just keep scrap paper handy, to sketch out the location and the terrain, with a scale of distance. I do the terrain in pen, the combatants in pencil. Works well, and is much faster than having to wipe clean my battle mat (which I do have, though I've only used it a few times). I don't mind battle mats when they're used fast, but since I don't own minis, we have to pull out either Counter Collection counters and assign one to each PC, or use coins.

What I would love to do is have a large TV screen hooked up to a PC, and run combat in Adobe Photoshop. The battleground would be one layer, and each character would be a different layer. We could keep a folder full of 'token images,' and whenever battle began, we'd just paste them into the battle picture. Since each token is a different layer, they could be moved easily.

For me, I think this'd be better than buying miniatures, since each image would be individualized to the PC. It's good having artists in your group.

 

[Thanee]

Voted other. We only use the battlemat when they are needed to better get a grasp on combat, which surely isn't the case with all combats, mostly larger ones.

Bye
Thanee

 

[Buttercup]

I've played both ways; I haven't yet been in a situation where the map made everybody turn off their character and just start moving pieces around the board.

This goes for me too.

I use a giant gridded tablet and Fiery Dragon counters. When the players are in a dungeon, I draw the floorplan. Also, I always use it for combat. My players like to roleplay, so they don't turn it off once the fight starts. I think the grid helps them think about what is possible in a given circumstance, though. And I think I probably am not as good at description as I could be, so having a drawn floorplan focuses me on what I need to be describing. For example, as I'm drawing a door, I'm telling them what it's made out of. And if I don't give enough detail, they ask, bless 'em. Of course, I'm fairly big on handouts too.

The game I'm playing in though, doesn't use minis or a battlemat, and we haven't had any handouts other than the character creation guidelines and his custom character sheet.

I think both ways work. I'd actually like to play in Pogre's game, which uses minis and scenery and so forth. I've never played in such an elaborate setting. I have no inclination to run a game like that, but I'd sure like to try playing in one.

 

[Peskara]

I don't feel it's a matter of battlemat versus imagination. In our group, which has been using battlemats since 2e, we find battlemats really aid imagination, giving us a clearer picture of what's possible. We always try to describe the combats pretty cinematically when we use them, which is pretty much every combat.

I agree that a battlemat also helps keep everyone focused. Back in our old apartment where we didn't have a dining room table and didn't always use a mat, I recall that the DM pretty much had to re-describe the scene just about every round (more if a player went off to use the bathroom in between turns). And there is at least one player who would pretty much be paralyzed with indecision far too long every turn if there wasn't a battlemat as a visual aid. It also neatly solves the problem of players who are convinced their characters can be everywhere at once.

Since we've moved to a house with a dining room, it's no longer a matter of "dragging out the battlemat," when combat starts. I had my dining room table built to accomodate a large battlemat so that there's room for everybody's books and dice around it. Plus most of our players love painting minis and those that don't can always find a fellow player willing to paint and often convert a mini for their characters. And when my husband has to DM he can often decide what to throw at us by looking over his minis collection and saying, "What looks cool and interesting?"

It does take a little time for the DM to draw out the scene on the map sometimes (although for ruined cities we use some cardboard buildings we picked up from GW's Mordheim for just such occasions). But it's less time consuming than re-describing the scene every round or so. And one Dm who drives a long way to play with us and is fond of complex dungeons, has a giant pad of 1" graph paper so he can draw everything out while he's planning the adventure if things are really complicated.

Nobody here ever stops roleplaying to start "rollplaying" when the battlemat comes into play and using some form of tactics doesn't detract from roleplaying. I think it actually enhances roleplaying as it help us more clearly visualize what our characters see and what their options are (it's especially helpful to spellcasters in this regard, I find). It also lets each player use their character's abilities to the fullest, which would be hard to do otherwise. If you simplify combat to make it easier to do without minis a lot more things come down to the DM's judgement and I think many opportunties to use particular feats and whatnot, may be missed.

 

[Ogrork the Mighty]

I've played both ways and w/o a battlemap DEFINITELY adds to the role-playing experience, if for no other reason than the DM and players are required to ask more questions about the situation. Interestingly, combat ran FASTER as there weren't as many arguments over the technicalities of the rules.

It's important for a DM to be flexible; a lot of people have said that players' image of the battle may be different than the DM's. That's fine, b/c it's a better representation of a REAL battlefield where people don't have the ability to look down on things to get the whole picture. However, a good DM will be flexible and allow PCs to do interesting things or react in interesting ways to situations that the DM might not have envisioned.

3E has really turned D&D into a pseudo-war game where a battlemap is required to play "by the rules." I'm not saying that's bad, but it's definitely a step away from role-playing (not to say RP doesn't still exist, but it's reduced by the heavy reliance on diagrams and miniatures).

After playing both ways, I don't really have a preference. Both have their advantages and disadvantages; it's just a matter of taste. In the long run, however, I believe battlemaps and the use of miniatures will stifle imagination and reduce creativity (in the same way computer/console games foster less creativity than, say, reading a book).

 

[Deadguy]

3E has really turned D&D into a pseudo-war game where a battlemap is required to play "by the rules." I'm not saying that's bad, but it's definitely a step away from role-playing (not to say RP doesn't still exist, but it's reduced by the heavy reliance on diagrams and miniatures).

That's you opinion, Orgrork, but I think plenty of people here have said that they don't find this to be the case. 3E is a lot more tactical when it comes to combat, that's true, since it assumes a game where jockeying for position gives concrete advantage in combat. But whilst that's a shift from earlier editions, I don't feel that turns it into a wargame (pseudo- or otherwise!).

 

[Umbran]

But whilst that's a shift from earlier editions, I don't feel that turns it into a wargame (pseudo- or otherwise!).

In my group, we find that the map actually aids roleplay, in two ways.

1) Given a more clear picture, the player is beter able to choose to do what his or her character would do.

2)Combats with the mat actually take less time than 1e and 2e combats of similar intensity. There's less discussion and disagreement about what's going on, fewer mismatches between what images are in everybody's heads. So, even though there are more tactical options, we get through the combat more quickly, and get back to the playing of personality outside of a tactical situation more quickly.

 

[Wraith Form]

Sometimes my pants are too tight.