D&D 5E Old School Initiative

[Charlaquin]

Exactly.
Bad simulation, bad for narration and roleplaying, slower, more decision stages, more work for the DM, less fun unless you love losing turns or doing the worst things because of the decisions made minutes ago when things were different, etc.

Is this assessment based on actual experience or just your impressions from reading it? Cause I have tried it and in my experience, the “simulation” is no better or worse than that of the standard system, it’s MUCH better for narration and roleplaying, there are indeed more decision stages but decisions are made MUCH faster, yes it is a little bit more work for me as DM but not that much and I’m happy to do more work if it improves the game, it is more fun due to the faster action resolution and better narrative pacing, and losing turns very rarely actually happens.

 

[pming]

Hiya!
[MENTION=93444]shidaku[/MENTION], okey-dokey. As I said...I disagree with your view of initiative and that "loosing an action because something happens before you" is a bad thing, but that's cool. As I've said many times before, one of the shining factors of RPG's is that two groups can be playing the same game, but have strikingly different play styles, interpretations, etc.

^_^

Paul L. Ming

 

[rabindranath72]

Note sure it has been mentioned, but the Immortals Set for Classic D&D has a very nice initiative system, which I have used since...forever, even from Basic-level games.

In short, it splits actions into two tiers:

A: movement, missile weapons, use of magic items
B: spellcasting, turn undead, melee

Both parties roll d6; the highest roll wins and goes with A, the losing side goes with A; then the winning side goes with B, and the losing side goes with B.

It's a very simple scheme, but it creates interesting tactical situations. For example, it makes missile weapons very useful, because even when losing initiative, an attacker can go before a spellcaster or a melee combatant. It makes magic items like wands very desirable. It makes spellcasting dangerous.

 

[toucanbuzz]

Weighing in again, and for a history lesson, read Merric's Musings as he extensively goes through a lot of what I'm talking about and provides an insightful interview reference.

1. Declaring your action isn't new. It was AD&D's style for nearly 25 years before 3rd edition. Back then, you had options for the "easy" way (whoever wins roll goes first) and the "hard" way (what you're doing affects roll). Players who wanted more strategic impact would choose the "hard" way, which worked if the DM knew the modifiers by heart.

2. Having played 2E for nearly 15 years, I can attest players didn't get screwed over by coordinating actions before the round, and no one dominated by telling others what to do (because we wouldn't play with those types).

3. Third Edition made things simpler. Not necessarily better, simpler. If you're going to attract new players, an overly complicated system of any kind = a turn-off.

4. For some, a simpler system is repetitive and predictable. Repetitive and predictable = tedious, and for the thrill junky, unrealistic (e.g. I always get a spell off before the troll acts...every round.) AD&D knew some players would want "easy" and some would want "hard."

Moral of the story folks: Right and wrong, should or shouldn't use a particular rule, are relative to the players.

Per Merric's article, AD&D designer Steve Winters mused initiative is however you want it to be based on the game you want:

If you want to emphasize narrative and planning, then keep it after [edit] declarations. If you want initiative to be more of an advantage, put the roll before declarations and make the losers declare first so the winners can adjust their plan accordingly. We approached this differently in different games, and the genesis is enlightening. The Conan RPG and Top Secret: S.I. use declarations-then-initiative-roll; Boot Hill (1990) uses initiative-then-declarations; GangBusters uses a rigidly interlaced, action/reaction sequence with no initiative rolls at all, and Indiana Jones uses a very free-form “who wants to go first” approach.

 

[dco]

Is this assessment based on actual experience or just your impressions from reading it? Cause I have tried it and in my experience, the “simulation” is no better or worse than that of the standard system, it’s MUCH better for narration and roleplaying, there are indeed more decision stages but decisions are made MUCH faster, yes it is a little bit more work for me as DM but not that much and I’m happy to do more work if it improves the game, it is more fun due to the faster action resolution and better narrative pacing, and losing turns very rarely actually happens.

I've played the old edition but in any case people can see how things differ reading it, if you can't it is your problem.

To be a slave of decisions made previously is bad for roleplaying, it only makes things more boardgamey. People could bring their decisions for combats written from home if they think otherwise.

Simulation is bad, good old rolemaster was better 30 years ago, taking into account things like position, weapon length, wounds, etc and actions had their own phases. Other systems have improved beyond that, on the other hand this one only brings random iniative variability per round and future chores for players.

This is a RPG, I'm not sure who loves to narrate what he thinks and later how he can not do what he would like to do or how he can not react to current events because of what he thought previously.

More decision stages slow things, unless the decisions get simplified and this is not the case, they are not changed to rock, paper or scissors. There is a good reason why the DM's book says this kind of initiative rule is slower but you are free to call the authors liars.

Most DMs don't want more work, a good reason behind the simplifications of this edition.

 

[Charlaquin]

I've played the old edition but in any case people can see how things differ reading it, if you can't it is your problem.

So despite dodging the question, the answer is no, you haven’t actually tried either Greyhawk Initiative or Speed Factor Initiative in 5th Edition, as presented in UA or the DMG. That’s fine, if the default Initiative system works for you, more power to you in using it. There is, however, a continuing pattern of people who say the Greyhawk/Speed Factor system(s) are terrible and slow not actually having tried them, and people who have tried them saying that in their actual play experience, these systems are not significantly slower and in fact flow better than the default system.

To be a slave of decisions made previously is bad for roleplaying, it only makes things more boardgamey. People could bring their decisions for combats written from home if they think otherwise.

There is a world of difference between declaring an action at the top of the round, after seeing the current layout of the battlefield and hearing what the monsters are gearing up to do, as compared to making your decisions at home, away from the table, devoid of context. This is false equivalence and a fallacious argument.

Simulation is bad, good old rolemaster was better 30 years ago, taking into account things like position, weapon length, wounds, etc and actions had their own phases. Other systems have improved beyond that, on the other hand this one only brings random iniative variability per round and future chores for players.

Greyhawk Initiative and Speed Factor Initiative don’t take any of those things into account, and their primary benefit is the narrative pacing and flow of combat, not simulation. Interestingly, another pattern in this conversation is people who have not tried these alternate Initiative systems but claiming they’re terrible assuming that simulation is the reason people use them, while people who have actually tried them say that no, simulation is not the reason they like these systems, pacing is.

This is a RPG, I'm not sure who loves to narrate what he thinks and later how he can not do what he would like to do or how he can not react to current events because of what he thought previously.

This sentence is a little difficult to parse, but players do have the opportunity to react to the current situation on their turn under Greyhawk and Speed Factor. They are only locked into the decision of what action to take (and by default Greyhawk, if they want the option to move). Everything about where to move and how to use the action is still decided on the player’s Initiative count.

More decision stages slow things, unless the decisions get simplified and this is not the case, they are not changed to rock, paper or scissors. There is a good reason why the DM's book says this kind of initiative rule is slower but you are free to call the authors liars.

The decisions are in fact simplified. In standard Initiative you have to decide if and where to move, what action to take, and any necessary targets all on your turn. In Speed Factor Initiative you only need to decide which action to use at the top of the round, and decide on your turn if and where to move and any necessary targets. In Greyhawk Initiative you only decide what action to use and whether to move at the top of the round, and where to move and necessary targets on your turn. In all three cases you are making the same number of decisions per round, but in Greyhawk and Speed Factor you make a subset of those choices at one point and the rest at another, which means there are fewer variables to account for at the time of making each of those decisions. You also have to make some of those decisions with incomplete information. This means you do not have the luxury of weighing every possible variable and trying to plan out the ideal options, instead you have to be satisfied with something good enough and move on. Since you’re also doing this during a shared decision making time instead of personal decision making time, there is more pressure to make your decision quickly. Finally, I am not calling the designers liars. They said these systems were more complex, not slower. And they are more complex. I find the added complexity to be a worthwhile trade in exchange for better gameplay flow for some groups, and not worth it for others. It depends on the experience of the players and their familiarity with the system in general and with their characters’ abilities in particular. You may not find it worthwhile for any group, and that’s perfectly fine. But please do not call me a liar for saying that, in much experience, these systems do improve the flow of the game, while not noticeably impacting the total time it takes.

Most DMs don't want more work, a good reason behind the simplifications of this edition.

That’s their decision to make. Personally, if more work on my part will make the game better for the players, I’ll do that extra work, as long as the amount of extra work is outweighed by how much it improves the game. I think most DMs would agree, although everyone has different thresholds for how much payoff they consider worth how much work. In this case, I find these alternate Initiative systems to be only a small amount of work for a significant payoff, but only if the players are fairly experienced. Your mileage may vary, and that’s perfectly fine.