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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 6073756" data-attributes="member: 42582">What RPGs do you have in mind (other than D&D, obviously)? [MENTION=94389]jrowland[/MENTION] mentioned "zooming" in and out upthread. Here is how HeroQuest revised handles that:(1) Combat can be resolved by a single opposed check of appropriate abilities: the degree of success determines who suffers what sorts of consequences. (2) Combat can be resolved by an extended contest: each round an opposed check is made between combatants, and whoever wins earns a number of points reflecting their degree of success, and when the required number of points has been accrued the comat is over, and consequences for victor and loser are determined by reference to the number of points each had accrued.Extended contests obviously take longer to resolve, being a series of opposed checks, but the payoff is more colour, more detail, and the capability for choices made in each round to shape the fiction for the next round, so that the context for the next opposed check changes. (Not unlike a 4e skill challenge.)HeroQuest revised gives the GM the job of deciding which resolution method to use, based on pacing considerations.Burning Wheel handles "zooming" like this:(1) Melee combat can be resolved via BW's generic skill check mechanics: the player declares "My guy draws his rapier and runs the NPC through", the GM assigns a difficulty, the player makes a skill check, and if it succeeds then the player's PC has indeed run the NPC through with his rapier. (2) Melee combat can be resolved using the "Bloody Versus" mechanic: each player gets a pool of dice, based on combat skill plus modifiers, and allocates some of the pool to attack, and some to defence. Each pool is rolled, and attack successes over defence successes go to wounds. So the possible outcomes are both hurt, one hurt or neither hurt (and the game has guidelines for interpreting these various outcomes, and moving on from them in the game). (NB. It's called "Bloody Versus" because it involves opposed - or "versus" - checks, and the outcome is generally bloody.) (3) Melee combat can be resolved using the "Fight!" mechanic: actions are scripted in conditions of mutual ignorance on a second-by-second basis, and then declared and resolved via the appropriate checks. There are intricate rules for jockeying for position, getting in close with your knife or holding them off with your polearm, blocking blows with shields and absorbing them with armour, etc.When using Fight!, both the resolution and the outcome will have a lot more colour and detail than either of the other two methods. You have multiple rounds each involving comparisons of declared actions and resolution of them (via opposed checks, unopposed checks or whatever else is appropriate given what the combatants declare). And Bloody Versus is clearly going to take longer than a simple check, because pools have to be split and two opposed checks resolved, plus outcomes of those checks compared to wounds charts. Whereas resolving combat via a simple check is no different from rolling a skill check in 3E or 4e.Burning Wheel gives the group as a whole the job of deciding which method to use for resolving any given combat. The GM might suggest one approach, but a player is entitled to call for another approach, and in particular to call for Fight! if s/he thinks the stakes are important enough to be worth spending time on.The thing about both these systems is that they separate "zoom detail" from difficulty of challenge. You can do mopping up the kobolds as a single check or two if you want to - but if they're the kobolds who destroyed your village, you can play out your defeat of them in detail using Fight! even if it's pretty much guaranteed to go your way.And conversely if the PCs are surrounded by 10 efreets that they can't beat, they can fight until unconsciousness using Bloody Versus resolution if that's what the group wants, the real focus of the action being not on the unwinnable fight, but rather what the efreets want once they've beaten the party into submission.4e doesn't really have options like this - if you make the fight quick by making all the enemies minions, you also make it a pushover for the PCs.I would like D&Dnext to be more flexible. Maybe the grid vs "theatre of the mind" approach that jrowland mentioned is one way to come at this. As I said upthread, I'm not realy sure.</blockquote>

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