My DM doesn't want to use miniatures...

[Melkor]

It's that I have never seen a fight that didn't take at least twice as long with minis as it could have without them.

Square counting. Figuring out the best route to avoid AoOs. Perfect positioning of spells. I've never seen a fight with a battlemat that didn't have all of these. Sure, the fight might be more "accurate," but it also takes substantially more time. Even if you allow for the occasional repeating of details in a narrative fight--"Wait, where did you say that last drider was?"--it still takes longer with the minis. (Yet again, IME.)

And when a single fight takes longer, it leaves less time for anything else--including plot, character development, investigation, and role-playing.

Ditto.

While personally, I think that miniature use can be a fun exercise in and of itself, I tend to empathise with everything you said above - that speaks directly to the experience of my gaming group.

Sometimes the square-counting is really a "mini-game" within the larger game, which is kind of cool, and something I enjoy. Unfortunately, we are able to get through so much more roleplaying, and the combats seem to be much quicker, when we don't use miniatures - which is why my DM is going to run this campaign without them (although I might work at seeing if we can play out some of the major encounters/climactic combats with the battlemat).

 

[Davelozzi]

I think a lot of the problems that people have with minis are really problems with the grid. Counting squares, moving like a chess piece, exact positioning of spells, all this stuff.

I generally use minis but no grid. It's easy to rule that if your speed is 30', you can move about 6 inches. Sometimes the DM has to step in and make a ruling if it's questionable, and if it's important enough, grab a ruler. Same with spells. No more "a spell must be targeted at the intersection of four squares" nonsense. The player just tells me where he's trying to aim and I adjucate accordingly. Half squares aren't an issue, a quick look is usually good enough and if not again we can just grab the ruler. If the creature is really right on the edge of the area and it's unclear whether it'd be affected, I can just give him a save bonus or something. I find it works great this way. We get the advantage of knowing where everyone is but without the time wasting.

Also adding furniture and other details to the map when possible is nice too, as it allows characters to play off the environment.

 

[Monte At Home]

I'm not sure I agree 100% with Mike on this one. His observations about game design and power/control issues are very valid, but I'm not sure that avoiding miniatures necessarily pulls power away from the players. In a way, using miniatures can take power out of the hands of both the players and the DM putting it in the hands of the game system itself.

Let me illustrate by an example from my most recent session. In an encounter, one character was far away (in a very large room) fighting orcs while the rest of the group was contending with other concerns--it was a complicated encounter. The character fell under the onslaught of her enemies. If I hadn't been using miniatures, I'm sure I would have just said, the next round, "the orcs Jenna was fighting run over to where the rest of you are." But instead, we were using miniatures. It was obvious to everyone around the table, because of the miniatures, that the fallen character was surrounded by orcs who had nothing to do other than use coup de grace. (And they did.)

The power, in that situation, was taken out of my hands and lout the players' hands. It was in the game's hands. On some level, none of us wanted to see Jenna get killed in that way, but because the miniatures and the rules made it so clear what should happen, we all knew that if it didn't happen, we'd be reducing the verisimilitude of the campaign. (This was not verbalized in any way, but I'm sure it what was going through everyone's mind.)

The game is there to provide a neutral basis for reality, and the DM is there to both arbitrate and shape that reality. The players are there to, in a way, arbitrate and shape the reality for their individual character. The more clearly you define things--which is what miniatures do--the more power you put in the hands of the game itself.

In other words, if you're running a narrative encounter (to use Mouseferatu's term) as opposed to a miniatures encounter, no matter how careful and exacting you are, both DM and players have more imaginative "wiggle room." In the end, I think this probably works equally in the "favor" of both NPCs and PCs, though--both DM and players.

I also think the advantage of using miniatures as a visual aid and an elegant feature of the game outweighs this concern, but I think it is a concern.

I also agree with Mike that "miniatures take away from roleplaying" is a bit of a cop out. Use the miniatures to show where your character is in the middle of a tactical encounter, and then ignore them for the rest of the session. Surely having miniatures doesn't really affect how the PCs negotiate with the bullywug king or how they all interact to decide whether enter the wizard's tower through the door or the window (for example). I think the real issue is that people who use miniatures in their games are assumed to be running hack-n-slash only games, where combat is the only thing that happens, and thus no real roleplaying. That certainly doesn't have to be the case. Post hoc, ergo propter hoc. The DM and the players control how combat heavy the campaign is, not the miniatures.



For the curious, Jenna was an NPC, but a much beloved companion to the PCs.
And yes, I use miniatures in probably about 95% of my combat encounters. I love them. But I can see good reasons why others don't want to use them. That they prevent good roleplaying is not one of them, though. I do think the game should cater to miniatures avoiders as much as to those of us who like them.

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

Let me illustrate by an example from my most recent session.

Interesting example.

I'm not sure I believe the "historical inevitability" of the orcs taking the extra time to stand around and make sure the unconscious, bleeding woman was really, truly dead before turning on the remainder of the party, however I can certainly understand it.

Generally, I've ruled that intelligent opponents - especially those who believe they'll make it through this particular encounter with the enemy - tend to worry about knifing the dead *after* the main fighting is over. After all, the witch isn't fighting any more and those louts over there are about to start (or already are!) hurling javelins and worse in your direction. Besides, warm meat tastes better!

So, on to the real topic.

My group plays at the house of a gentlemen and his wife who are very into the miniatures aspect of playing. He comes from a background of wargaming, and has one of the most extensive miniatures collections I've ever seen.

I've found that having the proper "window dressing" - minis, battlemats, dungeon pieces, set dressing, etc. - can help me get more easily pulled into a scene. I like the ability to Tumble past the [Nasty], climb up onto *that* table, and jump into the melee over *there*. Moreover, I like the ability to keep all that straight in my head without needing to draw it out on notepaper, as I generally did whenever I played in a mini-less game.

 

[scourger]

It depends on why your DM doesn't want to use minis. I gave up their use when I DM because it's too much time, money, effort & space to have minis when I run a game. I do like them for the players, though; since I use counters for the bad guys (thanks to Counter Collection Digital!). They are just a great visual aid for my game. In other words, the minis exist to serve the D&D RPG (unlike the Warhammer game which exists to serve the Warhammer minis).

When I play D&D (or another RPG), I find that a cool mini actually helps me round out my character. I've never gone wrong basing a character concept on a cool mini, preferably a painted one.

 

[Testament]

I use the minis when it's goign to be a large, complicated, or very important fight, or one that will take a long time to resolve. Miniatures actually help speed up such combats, because they eliminate the problem of everyone having a different picture of the action in their head. No more, "I thought he was across the room." discussions. Minis put everyone on the same page, at a glance, and that's a good thing.

For simpler, shorter fights, the minis slow things down. If there are only a few mooks who are going to go down with just a sword thrust or two, the setup and use time for a battlemat can be longer thant he fight, so I don't use it.

Bingo, my setniments exactly. More importantly, they give my play group a chance to exercise our tactical combat methods, we have one player who makes very heavy use of Bull-rushing, tripping and a reach weapon. Heck, if your players want to be able to use tactical feats from CW, then minis really are a must, everything is visible and they can plot it out neatly. Square counting and the AoO dance have never been an issue for us, since we tend to work that out in everyone else's turn.

It does require a certain play style, and an agreement amongst the players, but introducing a turn time limit can force people to actually get their act together and reduce the time-suck that a battlemat can sometimes create.

And yes, if its just a few mooks, then we don't bother. In most Living Greyhawk mods, our regular GM altogether skips those encounters, since they pose no threat whatsoever to our ultimate fighters of doom.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

Monte,

Why couldn't the orcs have captured Jenna (or worse, depending on the tone of the campaign and your preferred explanation for half-orcs ) rather than finishing her off?

Unfortunately, that doesn't negate the potential for that to happen, or your point. An orc may take prisoners, but a dire wolf pack certainly won't.

 

[AuraSeer]

I just can't link player skill with tactical combat to the desire not to use miniatures....Now DM skill might play a factor, but even then, I think we have a fairly remarkable DM. I say it might play a factor because a DM that was not good with descriptive flavor might not want miniatures adding what he perceived as a "distraction" to his already weak ability to narrate the game.

I don't think weak DMs try to avoid minis. IME it tends to be the other way around. If a DM is concerned that his narration may not adequately describe the battlefield, he will use maps and figures to help. That way, even if his description is flawed, the players can look at the map and see exactly what he means.

The DMs who tend to resist map games are those confident in their own narration, who think they can communicate the scene well enough without help. Some DMs are really so good that they don't need the maps, and they still run some of the best sessions I've ever seen.

(Unfortunately there also exist bad DMs with an overinflated sense of their own skill. They don't use maps, but neither do they explain the battlefield well, and combat degenerates into a soggy mess. If you find yourself asking "Didn't you say we killed that guy?" you may have this kind of DM.)

 

[Testament]

I don't think weak DMs try to avoid minis. IME it tends to be the other way around. If a DM is concerned that his narration may not adequately describe the battlefield, he will use maps and figures to help. That way, even if his description is flawed, the players can look at the map and see exactly what he means.

The DMs who tend to resist map games are those confident in their own narration, who think they can communicate the scene well enough without help. Some DMs are really so good that they don't need the maps, and they still run some of the best sessions I've ever seen.

Right...so, following this logic, only bad GMs use maps.

And what about several GMs I know, who I'd pay money to play under, they're that damn good, yet they use maps?

IMHO, the map simply cannot be beaten, since no narration can be perfect, nor can any but the truly superhuman keep it 100% consistent. To say nothing of the players keeping track of a fight solely in their brain, irrespective of how good or "weak" the GM is.

 

[Morpheus]

Disclaimer: I draw counters...

and some damn fine ones at that! I just bought Greek Counters of Doom and they are sweet! This works out great because we use minis, but our supply of Greco minis is rather slim (0 actually).