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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Elder-Basilisk" data-source="post: 2639082" data-attributes="member: 3146">The last time I played tabletop without a battlemap featured this conversation:Player: "I shoot at the spectres once and move to the back of the party."DM: OK, the spectres' turn. They move right up next to you and attack. Take four negative levels."Player: But they're a long way away, right? Can they move that far?DM: They're very fast.Player: Don't they take any AoOs moving through the entire party like that?DM: Nope. There's enough room for them to get through.Other Player: I thought we were in a 10' corridor; how can there be that much room?DM: There's enough room. That's just the way it is.Player: Fine.After the game: Player 1: I'm not gaming with that DM again.Player 2: Me neither.I've done some AIM games without a map though we did have a gridded map that we used to keep track of where people were in one combat. They featured a lot of "can I move and hit him?"/"No"/"OK, can I move and cast a spell and end up where he can't charge me?"/"How do you know how far he can charge?"/"I'll assume he's normal human speed--he looks like a human."/"You move over there." Next round: "I move up next to"/"But you're already there."Yuck. It worked alright when there was only one opponent whom we couldn't see. And it worked alright when there was a fairly clear position with only 1 PC in a relevant position and the combat was very short. (I charge him with the lance/ OK, you nearly drop him. Since you're in front of the door then, you'll get AoOs with your lance for the four orcs that are coming out from behind the wall now. OK, you dropped three out of four. Now, the rest of the party magic missiles the fourth and the BBEG. You're done.) In general, it didn't work too well. As for cinematics, I've found that miniatures can actually be a big help if the terrain is detailed enough. (Oone games rendered battlemaps are great for this). If players see that the BBEG is right next to a stack of barrels and a bannister, they might hop on the barrels, hop up to the bannister and balance there while attacking. If they don't see exactly where he is, any such manuever would require a detailed description of the room (noting that there is a staircase with a stack of barrels next to it right next to the table where the PCs start and then that the NPC backed himself next to the staircase) followed by a series of questions: how close is he to the bannister? Can I jump up to the bannister? How about if I hop onto the barrels first? The barrels you said were stacked near the staircase. With a detailed map, players can see possibilities directly without asking lots of questions of the DMs.</blockquote>

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