Rule of Three: March 13

[Quickleaf]

As for interrupts, I'd say it's reasonable to have some sort of option -- spell, stance, whatever -- that lets you spend a standard action now to do something, as well as have a single specific reaction prepared.

Like, "Knight's Defense" or something. Make a melee attack, and you can hit anyone who tries to move past you or attack your allies.

Or "Inquisitor's Glare." You make a weak psychic attack against a specific enemy spellcaster, and then you can try to counterspell anything he casts on his next turn.

Or "Zen Poise." You get a bonus to defenses, and whenever anyone misses you, you can riposte against them.

But you have to consciously choose to turn on these abilities, and if you don't, you don't have to worry about reactions.

Good idea! I think a few instances of this coupled with the Hold/Ready Action rules would be enough.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

They could always go the Fantasy Hero route and allow interrupts, but at the cost of the next action. In FH, it is not a bad choice when you are outnumbered and need to buy time, as any defensive bonuses last through the interrupt until you do get to move again. Even playing D&D, I still hear occasionally the desire to "abort to dodge!"

Put that on certain offensive options, and it becomes a big gamble--can doing this now change the situation well enough now that you are willing to give up your next action to pull it off?

 

[Dragonblade]

Some of my favorite gamers to play with have very little interest in learning the rules, because the rules bore them. Those same players are most likely to try the crazy stunts and imaginative solutions that make for great moments at the gaming table. I'm not interested in a game that deems those players Unworthy and refuses to consider them in the design process.

I agree and disagree with this. A rules system should be robust enough to quickly and easily adjudicate creative player actions and should encourage such actions.

But in the long run, I expect players, even the creative ones, to put forth some effort in actually learning and understanding the rules. For a player to continually put the burden of managing their PC and interpreting their actions in a rules context on the DM and the other players in the group is not acceptable to me. I think its unfair and selfish.

If another DM is ok with it, fine. But if I DM, I eventually expect my players to learn the rules of the game and know how their PCs work mechanically. The "G" in "RPG" is just as important to me as the "RP".

Some players aren't all that into combat and don't pay much attention after "Roll initiative." But they come alive when roleplaying, and make things fun for everybody. I'm not interested in a game that deems those players Unworthy, either.

That's fine. A player can love RP over combat, but still know their PC well enough to take their turn in about 30 seconds. In fact, PCs who don't care about combat are usually faster than the ones who do because their minds don't get paralyzed with all the tactical possibilities. They just act.

And most of the folks I play with enjoy some kibbitzing and joking around. I'm not interested in a game that demands I treat every moment as Serious Business.

Of course. We don't run every combat in hardcore tactical commando mode. We screw around and joke at the table as much as the next group. But we joke around with the understanding that the length of a combat is solely in our control.

other editions have done much, much better at this than 4E.

1e/2e was fast because it was simple. Complex actions are almost entirely adjudicated via DM fiat. No dice and nothing to look up makes things fast. 3e introduced numerous complex rule subsystems. 4e streamlined the 3e foundation, but of course its not as fast as 1e/2e. That's true.

But while 1e/2e was usually fast and loose, I also remember entire sessions spent arguing about who was standing where when a trap went off. Or the impact of air resistance on the falling rate of a PC who had just cast feather fall, complete with the DM and players actually pulling out their physics textbooks and scientific calculators. Not to mention elaborate descriptions of every possible way you could poke something with a 10' pole, and so on.

 

[Hussar]

/snip
Well, it depends. I love 4e and am currently running it, but I think a lot of the problem with slow combat is systemic. Compare how long it takes to run the same adventure for a good group in 1e and in 4e- the 1e guys can finish something like Ghost Tower of Inverness in one session of play, while a 3e conversion takes... several. 4e, in my experience, is about as fast as mid level 3e play.

Between the proliferation of actions (3/round/combatant), various immediate and opportunity actions (okay, so often 4 or 5 actions per round), tactical considerations (draw an OA if I move here to gain the fountain of hooptie's bonus or stay in the terrain that lets enemies crit me on a 19-20?) and the amount of bookkeeping (okay, I'm taking ongoing 5 damage, ongoing 5 poison damage and I'm slowed... must notate damage, then make saves at the end of my turn...) there is simply far more to keep track of and to do, as well as tons more rolling, than there was pre-2e.

True, but, do we really want to make "I pelt him with d20's until he dies" the standard in D&D combat again? Take out all the tactical movement, all the synergistic actions between PC's, and most of the mechanically supported tactical options?

Yes, 4e (and 3e) combat is slower than AD&D combat. Of course it is. There's a reason checkers plays faster than chess - you can have options or you can have speed, you can't have both. The trick is to find a balance between the two that appeals to most tables.

Having played Rogue Trader, I now love critical hits. Luke Skywalker got to lose a hand and get a magical prosthesis; why the hell can't I?

As for interrupts, I'd say it's reasonable to have some sort of option -- spell, stance, whatever -- that lets you spend a standard action now to do something, as well as have a single specific reaction prepared.

Like, "Knight's Defense" or something. Make a melee attack, and you can hit anyone who tries to move past you or attack your allies.

Or "Inquisitor's Glare." You make a weak psychic attack against a specific enemy spellcaster, and then you can try to counterspell anything he casts on his next turn.

Or "Zen Poise." You get a bonus to defenses, and whenever anyone misses you, you can riposte against them.

But you have to consciously choose to turn on these abilities, and if you don't, you don't have to worry about reactions.

This is an idea I really like. Make these things active, and ONE AT A TIME, and people hopefully won't forget them. I LOVE the idea of acting out of initiative order. IMO, this is the best innovation of 4e. However, I can totally see that having ten different interrupts on the go is a PITA. Make them some sort of "stance" effect and most of the processing power issues go away.

 

[I'm A Banana]

No crit tables? Yay.

Fewer/more limited interrupts? YIPPEEE! (I like RW's idea above, btw).

A 3-level "commoner tier"....hmmm....it might be OK, if you can E6-ify the game at that point for those who never really want to leave that tier, and if you can easily pop out a higher-level character for those who never really want to start in that tier.

 

[Dornam]

I like what I hear.

Interrupts have their place in the game but there are a lot of gamers who would really like to have "orderly" combat rounds and are galled by the plethora of interrupts that may happen and delay their own turn.

So making saves more active by tiing the possibility of an action to it seems a fine middle way.

 

[ExploderWizard]

True, but, do we really want to make "I pelt him with d20's until he dies" the standard in D&D combat again? Take out all the tactical movement, all the synergistic actions between PC's, and most of the mechanically supported tactical options?

How are all the tactically rich options any different if in the end it all comes down to HP attrition anyway? How is pelting something with "I attack" functionally different from " I use at-will/encounter/daily" except perhaps the simple attack takes less time?

The main difference I see is that everything in 4E has a much larger pile of HP and just takes longer to chop through. All the pushing pulling sliding is just to keep your eyes from glazing over from thinking about how long the whole process is taking.

If some of these cool maneuvers could accomplish something beyond the same old reduction of HP then perhaps they might be worth the time it takes to deal with them. Conditions are just more things to track while the HP ticker winds down.

D&D combat is abstract. Abstract combat should be quick and simple. If combat is to become a larger part of play and be focused on for the majority of play time then a detailed tactical system that involves more than a HP grind should be be implemented. Once you go that far, then you are outside the scope of D&D and into other game territory.

 

[Hassassin]

D&D combat is abstract. Abstract combat should be quick and simple. If combat is to become a larger part of play and be focused on for the majority of play time then a detailed tactical system that involves more than a HP grind should be be implemented. Once you go that far, then you are outside the scope of D&D and into other game territory.

How about "outside the core of D&D and into optional rules" instead?

 

[ExploderWizard]

How about "outside the core of D&D and into optional rules" instead?

Heavy tactical fiddly bits as optional modules are fine.

 

[Hussar]

How are all the tactically rich options any different if in the end it all comes down to HP attrition anyway? How is pelting something with "I attack" functionally different from " I use at-will/encounter/daily" except perhaps the simple attack takes less time?

The main difference I see is that everything in 4E has a much larger pile of HP and just takes longer to chop through. All the pushing pulling sliding is just to keep your eyes from glazing over from thinking about how long the whole process is taking.

If some of these cool maneuvers could accomplish something beyond the same old reduction of HP then perhaps they might be worth the time it takes to deal with them. Conditions are just more things to track while the HP ticker winds down.

D&D combat is abstract. Abstract combat should be quick and simple. If combat is to become a larger part of play and be focused on for the majority of play time then a detailed tactical system that involves more than a HP grind should be be implemented. Once you go that far, then you are outside the scope of D&D and into other game territory.

Ok, there's two things here.

Firstly, my 4e combat does not take significantly longer than my 3e combat. Although, to be fair, that is longer than AD&D combat. But, the thing is I LIKE 3e and 4e combat. I like the fact that there are actual tactics going on. That position, movement and the like actually matter during combat. I never, ever want to go back to combat that looks like this:

Shamus Young's DM of the Rings - the Epic Sound of Combat

This happens all the time. No matter how epic the battle, once begun, the thing sounds more or less like a bingo game: People shout out numbers and other people get excited about them.

If a combat lasts for 15 minutes, why did we bother in the first place? It obviously wasn't a challenge to the PC's, there were virtually no tactics being used. It was an excercise in dice fapping. No thanks. Very much to my taste.

Granted, I have no problems with an abstract, streamlined combat system being put into a module. That's fine for those who want it. But, I want the baseline to be nice and crunchy thanks. If I wanted to play a game where combat takes 10 minutes, I'd go back and play AD&D. Since I enjoy the tactical elements of the game, then I'll stick with later editions.