I've never played AD&D1

[Agamon]

You can't do that, but you can take one attack on one target, and then switch to another target. Or take an attack, and then decide weather to full attack or move depending on if the target is dead or not, for example It's because of the 6 second combat round, much closer to realtime combat than the 1 minute rounds of earlier editions.

And that was what I meant. The MM thing was completely erroneous, not sure why I even mentioned it.

 

[Griffith Dragonlake]

Well, to be honest, SCA combat doesn't bear that much resemblance to actual medieval combat, either...

True, but I never had a chance to try out HACA (or whatever it's called now).

 

[Aaron L]

True, but I never had a chance to try out HACA (or whatever it's called now).

I think it's currently the Association for Renaissance Martial Arts, this week...

But if you want the real stuff, go for that crazy German sword fighting society, where they end up hacking each others faces off!

 

[Aaron L]

And that was what I meant. The MM thing was completely erroneous, not sure why I even mentioned it.

Oh, just a brain burp, everyone has one now and then Don't sweat it.

 

[delericho]

I know 3.x uses cyclical initiative, but don't players have to declare their character's actions prior to the first round of combat?

Nope. You declare your action just as you're about to take it.

In 3e, the risk of casting a spell in combat is covered by the Readied Actions and the Attack of Opportunity rules.

To briefly summarise:

Readied Action: on your turn you declare "if X, then I'll Y". If, between then and your next turn, condition X occurs, you immediately take action Y. So, for example "If he casts a spell, I'll shoot him with my bow."

Attack of Opportunity: If you are within the reach of an opponent, and you do something to lower your defences, the opponent gets a free attack against you. (I believe AD&D1 had a similar rule about retreating from melee.) So, if you're standing next to a guy with a sword, it's best not to start casting a spell.

In general, these do the job pretty well. The AoO rules, however, are full of lots of special cases and exceptions, and are widely disliked as being overly complex and/or making combat too much of a minute tactical exercise. So, they're not for everyone.

 

[Nikosandros]

FWIW, the guys who wrote Runequest were also ex-SCA and that combat system bears a striking resemblence to AD&D 1e rules.

I disagree... RQ combat rules are vastly different from the ones in AD&D (or any edition of D&D for that matter).

 

[Quasqueton]

I understand, now that I've found that rule, how everything in initiative revolves around declaring actions first -- imagine my confusion about all the initiative rules before I knew about the declaration phase. That was maddening confusion.

This is the initiative system from the Moldvay BD&D:

A. Each side rolls for initiative (1d6).

B. The side that wins the initiative acts first. (If simultaneous all actions are performed by each side at the same time):

1. Morale checks, if needed.
2. Movement per round, meleed opponents may only move defensively (spell casters may not move and cast spells).
3. Missile fire combat:
a. choose targets
b. roll 1d20. . .
c. DM rolls damage
4. Magic spells (roll saving throws, as needed)
5. Melee or hand-to-hand combat:
a. choose (or be attacked by) opponents
b. roll 1d20. . .
c. DM rolls damage

C. The side with the next highest initiative acts second, and so on. . .

D. The DM handles any surrenders, retreats, etc. as they occur.

Quasqueton

 

[Hussar]

Nice to know that I'm not the only one in this boat. Sigh.

 

[Quasqueton]

I don't think anyone has addressed my question about convention and tournament AD&D1 games: Did they use *all* the AD&D1 rules? I mean, that pretty much was Gygax's driving reason for organizing the AD&D1 rules -- for convention and tournament play consistency.

Quasqueton

 

[PapersAndPaychecks]

Not usually, they didn't, no. Psionics for example was widely ignored.