Out with the old (Game design traditions we should let go)

[Reynard]

I have one: can we get rid of combats as a time filler activity?

I am in the process of converting a Pathfinder AP (Iron Gods) to 5E and I had forgotten how full of meaningless combat they were -- mostly to hit the required XP to level the PCs up, I think. Since I am using milestone leveling for this campaign (a rarity for me, but I tend to use it with "plotted" adventures) I can skip a bunch of the filler fights, and I don't think I'll miss them.

 

[payn]

I have one: can we get rid of combats as a time filler activity?

I am in the process of converting a Pathfinder AP (Iron Gods) to 5E and I had forgotten how full of meaningless combat they were -- mostly to hit the required XP to level the PCs up, I think. Since I am using milestone leveling for this campaign (a rarity for me, but I tend to use it with "plotted" adventures) I can skip a bunch of the filler fights, and I don't think I'll miss them.

I've done just this, with that AP even. Sometimes though, Players (especially D&D/PF) want to get into some fights and stretch out their abilities and just have fun beating things. Finding the right amount of henchies and staple fights is an art.

 

[Twiggly the Gnome]

I don't know what that means.

Edit: i.e. What does that look like in game play?

To do what people are describing, without long stretches of thumb twiddling by some of the players, you'd have to fundamentally change how you run a game. Perhaps a scenario where everyone has a character, and more that one person is expected to GM. More than one scene is run concurrently, and players whose characters aren't present in a scene that phase will GM the respective scenes. Once the phase ends, the players scramble scene partners. This would continue until the end of the scenario.

 

[hawkeyefan]

To do what people are describing, without long stretches of thumb twiddling by some of the players, you'd have to fundamentally change how you run a game. Perhaps a scenario where everyone has a character, and more that one person is expected to GM. More than one scene is run concurrently, and players whose characters aren't present in a scene that phase will GM the respective scenes. Once the phase ends, the players scramble scene partners. This would continue until the end of the scenario.

Or you just put one scene with one player on hold and jump to another player and do that scene for a few minutes. Then jump back to the first player or over to another, and so on as needed.

It’s not that difficult. Very much like turns in combat, but zoomed out a bit.

 

[overgeeked]

To do what people are describing, without long stretches of thumb twiddling by some of the players, you'd have to fundamentally change how you run a game. Perhaps a scenario where everyone has a character, and more that one person is expected to GM. More than one scene is run concurrently, and players whose characters aren't present in a scene that phase will GM the respective scenes. Once the phase ends, the players scramble scene partners. This would continue until the end of the scenario.

You could also have uninvolved players run NPCs in the spotlight scene.

 

[Reynard]

Or you just put one scene with one player on hold and jump to another player and do that scene for a few minutes. Then jump back to the first player or over to another, and so on as needed.

It’s not that difficult. Very much like turns in combat, but zoomed out a bit.

I find it very strange how "impossible" people are suggesting this concept is.

 

[pemerton]

I have one: can we get rid of combats as a time filler activity?

I think this is a very D&D (or D&D-inspired/adjacent) thing.

It relates to another aspect of RPGing: how much fiction/story is expected to be got through per three-or-so-hour session of play?

D&D seems to generally assume that the answer is less than a three hour film would get through. And less than twelve comics would get through (I'm figuring 15 to 20 minutes to read each comic).

I've become a fan of trying to speed that up.

 

[pemerton]

Not a fan of opposed rolls. Especially with dice pools (glares at Shadowrun). Let’s make resolution take longer.

Talk about fighting words!

Some of my favourite systems have opposed pools: Burning Wheel (and Torchbearer), Prince Valiant, Marvel Heroic RP/Cortex+ Heroic. The only one where I would say it noticeably affects the pace of resolution is the last one, because the system uses a quirky rule for building your final pool and has a lot of methods of pool manipulation.

 

[Umbran]

You could also have uninvolved players run NPCs in the spotlight scene.

But that usually requires you to brief each of the uninvolved players on their characters, which takes additional time.

 

[Umbran]

It’s not that difficult. Very much like turns in combat, but zoomed out a bit.

But, to be clear - when taking turns in combat, you have shared context. If running social scenes in this manner, you might not. Flipping through, say, five unconnected scenes means a lot of context switching for the GM, and the results are likely not going to be as good as if the GM can focus on one context.