D&D 3.x Refocus disappeared in 3.5?

[HeapThaumaturgist]

This is why I love software like DMGenie. It does all of the pesky counting and whatnot for me.

When I'm NOT using DMGenie, we either use Initiative Cards from The Game Mechanics, or I, personally, deal init from a deck of normal playing cards. (Each +3 in Init bonus nets another card). While not RAW, the visuality of it makes things simpler. If somebody is delaying, they jump in when they want and I find the proper card. It's sort of odd, but I find it a thousand times easier.

We also like to redeal init for some games, and that method is the only way I've found that makes doing so fast.

--fje

 

[Infiniti2000]

Btw, why do you keep calling it a houserule if the results are the same? That's like saying that a DM who subtracts to hit modifiers from an AC as opposed to adding them to the to hit is using a houserule. The results are identical, regardless of how you do the math.

I called mine a houserule where you cannot delay until a specific initiative count. Indeed, if you do not record the initiative counts, then it seems like you rule the same way. If I'm playing in your game and I choose to delay until initiative count 17 next round, what do you do? You didn't record them and for argument's sake, let's say you totally forgot everyone's initiative or people readied, etc., so that trying to remember them all would be confusing. Either your choice of not recording the initiative counts was a bad idea or you houserule that you cannot delay until initiative count 17 (e.g.) like I do.

So, the results are not the same because in one option it can't be done.

When you said the DMG introduces new monsters at the beginning of the round, I'm not sure that's the whole story. However, encounter info isn't in the SRD, so I can't dispute it atm (will try to remember when I get home). I was sure that new characters in an encounter need to roll initiative and if you don't record the initiative counts, then you have an undefined situation.

 

[Storm Raven]

I called mine a houserule where you cannot delay until a specific initiative count. Indeed, if you do not record the initiative counts, then it seems like you rule the same way. If I'm playing in your game and I choose to delay until initiative count 17 next round, what do you do?

That's not the way delay works. "You take no action and then act normally on whatever initiative count you decide to act." The rules don't say you must specify what initiative number you will choose to act upon when you decide to delay. They say you take no action until you decide to act.

You don't say "I'm delaying until initative count 17".

You say "I'm delaying". When the initiative count rolls around that you would like to act upon, you say "I decide to act now". What the specific number that initiative count corresponds to is of no consequence, the only thing that matters are the relative initiative places of the combat participants.

 

[werk]

I understand how surprise and all that works.

If you delay, then when the first full round starts, people who were surprised roll initiative. The round starts with the person who has rolled the highest initiative. If this happens to be an opponent, you've just given up your surprise advantage entirely because you can't interrupt him.

That makes sense, thanks for writing it out for me.

 

[Infiniti2000]

That's not the way delay works.

Sure it is. "You can specify this new initiative result..." means that you can say, for example, "I delay until initiative count 17". What you're suggesting is the other half, namely "...just wait until some time later in the round and act then, thus fixing your new initiative count at that point."

 

[KarinsDad]

I called mine a houserule where you cannot delay until a specific initiative count. Indeed, if you do not record the initiative counts, then it seems like you rule the same way. If I'm playing in your game and I choose to delay until initiative count 17 next round, what do you do? You didn't record them and for argument's sake, let's say you totally forgot everyone's initiative or people readied, etc., so that trying to remember them all would be confusing. Either your choice of not recording the initiative counts was a bad idea or you houserule that you cannot delay until initiative count 17 (e.g.) like I do.

So, the results are not the same because in one option it can't be done.

Weren't you the one saying that the "declare actual initiative number" rule in the book was bad because it is metagaming?

And in my game, you can delay until initiative count 17. You just don't KNOW it is initiative count 17 when you get there.

Instead, you know you want to delay until after the enemy Wizard and you do. The only thing the initiative count 17 gives you in the "first half rule" is that if the enemy Wizard goes on initiative 18 (and if you know this), you can go right after him. No difference in results. The option is the same, you just do not do it via calling out a number. How is this minor difference relevant?

 

[Hypersmurf]

When you said the DMG introduces new monsters at the beginning of the round, I'm not sure that's the whole story. However, encounter info isn't in the SRD, so I can't dispute it atm (will try to remember when I get home). I was sure that new characters in an encounter need to roll initiative and if you don't record the initiative counts, then you have an undefined situation.

It's not the whole story.

If the newcomers are aware of the encounter, they go first. Multiple newcomers act in descending order of Dexterity score. In this case, the card system works just fine - all the newcomers just get slotted in after the 'Start of Round' card.

If the newcomers are unaware of the encounter, they roll initiative normally, and are flat-footed until their turn in the initiative order arises. In this case, it's necessary to either a/ know what everyone else's initiative scores are, or b/ house rule how unaware newcomers enter combat.

-Hyp.

 

[RigaMortus2]

My group uses standard initiative counts. Though I guess you can call this a house rule (or variant rule), there is never a time two people go on the same initiative count. If more than one person "ties" on init, whoever has the higher Dex goes first, then the other person goes next. If their Dex is even, they do a "roll off" until one rolls higher than the other or unless one person really doesn't care and says, "You can go before me". In the case of a player tieing with the enemies, I beleive the DM either compares init bonuses or does a roll off, I forget which. Of course, this only occurs at the beginning of combat when init is rolled. Example:

Player 1 rolls 18 for init
Player 2 rolls 13 for init (Dex of 15)
Player 3 rolls 13 for init (Dex of 16)
Player 4 rolls 9 for init
Enemies roll 12

So the init board would look like:

Player 1 @ 18
Player 3 @ 14 (gets bumped up since no one is in this init spot)
Player 2 @ 13
Enemies @ 12
Player 4 @ 9

Make sense?

Let's say combat has been going on for awhile now, and the init order has stayed the same. The Enemies have just gone and it is now Player 4's turn. Player 4 is a Mage and doesn't want to waste his spells if he doesn't have to. So Player 4 says he wants to Delay until after Player 2 goes, but before the enemies go again. This way if his allies finish off the monsters, he doesn't have to waste a spell, and he still gets to act before the monsters go again so nothing is loss. The new init would look like:

Player 1 @ 18
Player 3 @ 14
Player 2 @ 13
Player 4 @ 12
Enemies @ 11 (gets bumped down)

Works for us

 

[AuraSeer]

We don't use "initiative counts" to time combat, because they're meaningless.

They are certainly not meaningless. Do you never have new monsters show up? Once you throw out all the initiative counts (though you say you don't use them, your example proves you do), how can you place a new monster?

The DM always knows when another monster is nearby, so he rolls its initiative normally. On each of its actions, it gets Listen/Spot checks to perceive the battle, along with other actions it happens to take. (Patrolling guards take Move actions, etc.) Once it perceives the battle or wanders into range, it continues to act at that same point in the round.

Anything that shows up due to the actions of unpredictable PCs, like summoned monsters or whatever, acts immediately after the PC who caused it. I can't think of any other case where there really could be a "new" monster that the DM doesn't know about.

All that matters is the order of action.

This isn't true either, if you use the (first-half of) Delay as written. Since I choose an initiative count, then unless initiative counts still exist, I couldn't do that. It seems like you use the same houserule I do, though I maintain the record of the initiative counts in case a new creature appears.

I don't see how the "first half" of Delay makes the slightest difference to anything. There's no benefit to declaring a specific initiative roll to act on; you get precisely the same benefit by specifying the creature you want to go after (or before). In fact that's what would be going through your character's head-- he doesn't know from count 17, he only knows "just before the troll attacks again" or "right after the mage casts enlarge on me."

Regardless, you can still specify a count to act on if you really want to. The meaning of the numbers has just changed. In this system if you say you want to go "on 3" you will act third in rotation, instead of acting as if you had totalled 3 for your initiative.

 

[KarinsDad]

It's not the whole story.

If the newcomers are aware of the encounter, they go first. Multiple newcomers act in descending order of Dexterity score. In this case, the card system works just fine - all the newcomers just get slotted in after the 'Start of Round' card.

If the newcomers are unaware of the encounter, they roll initiative normally, and are flat-footed until their turn in the initiative order arises. In this case, it's necessary to either a/ know what everyone else's initiative scores are, or b/ house rule how unaware newcomers enter combat.

It's most of the story though.

Although unaware newcomers could show up, how often do newcomers show up who are not aware of an encounter (assuming the encounter is a battle and the players are in initiative)?

Granted, you could have some very unusual situation like a Wizard Teleporting home into the middle of a combat (or the entire battle being within the radius of a Silence spell), but even then, it doesn't really matter when a newcomer comes into the encounter when you have a circular initiative system. It's still mostly just a random result (with the exception of the init modifier which doesn't really make that much sense after combat has started anyway). And it is also DM prerogative as to which round the newcomer(s) show up anyway, so having a detailed system to determine exactly when an unaware newcomer goes when the DM is already determining which round he shows up is kind of unnecessary.

Note: The teleporting Wizard should already have an initiative, the moment he arrived. That's when he did his last action. The NPC cook who walks into a Silent battle should already have an initiative. The moment he walked in. The fact that the rules have you roll an initiative at that point is kind of strange.


For that matter, the aware newcomer rule is pretty silly as well. Newcomers should show up when they show up, not stacked up in a row "at the beginning of a round".