D&D 5E Should Next reintroduce new initiative rolls every round?

[The Human Target]

Rerolling initiative every round as an optional rule?

Sure.

Weapon speeds and casting times?

No.

 

[Jan van Leyden]

No from me.

It's either group initiative rolled every round or individuak initiative rolled once.

 

[MortalPlague]

I will never go back to rolling every round. It's way faster to keep the same result, way less confusing on a round by round basis, and it helps people strategize if they can predict when people will act.

 

[DEFCON 1]

If the game was to introduce weapon speeds and casting times back into the game as an optional module... the additional re-rolling of initiative each round could go hand-in-hand with that. I'd have no problems with that added to the tactical combats tome that got written.

I most likely wouldn't personally use those rules... but if you could make all three additive to the game fairly seamlessly, I think they'd be a good module to have in the book for those that wanted it.

 

[Lanefan]

I've never been much of a fan of weapon speed but casting times are essential. To use the example from [MENTION=83996]Lokiare[/MENTION] upthread, if you start casting a 3-segment spell on a '10' to resolve on a '7' that very neatly indicates the window during which you can be interrupted.

Another idea to make re-rolling easier is to not use a d20 for init. but instead use a much smaller die - we use d6, I could be talked into d10 but nothing bigger - to reduce the number of segments in a round. Also, ties must be allowed. Let's say three people have init. '7' - a fighter swings her sword, a magic missile resolves into the fighter, and an arrow is shot into the melee from the fighter's ranger friend. What would happen here is that all three would fully resolve:
- the fighter rolls well, hits his foe and slays it
- the magic missile hits the fighter for 4 pts. damage
- the arrow (as shooting into melee is never the best of ideas) also hits our fighter by mistake, doing 6 pts. damage and putting her down.

Things also become simpler if you don't allow init. modifiers to take the roll higher than the die size or lower than 1.

{keeping the same init. result} helps people strategize if they can predict when people will act.

That right there is the biggest most glaring wave-a-red-flag reason why static initiative should never exist! In combat you've (almost always) no idea when the next swing will come, or the next shot - you cannot realistically predict anything and thus can't strategize around it. Why can't the game at least try to reflect that?

Lan-"interrupting casters for a very long time now"-efan

 

[GMforPowergamers]

I remember when we used to reroll initiative every round ages ago and we loved it. It gave us a sense of chaos during combat. I would like to see Next reintroduce this as a rule. How do you feel and why?

In my homebrew steam punk game I made initative a skill like saga, but skills work like Pathfinder...

I also have conditions modified it. Slow, hast, bloodied, dazed all make changes and I have it rolled every round... I also use the escalation die from 13th age

 

[DMZ2112]

I do miss round-by-round initiative. Single-roll initiative has always felt sterile. Can't argue with the logic that it slows combat way down, though. It's often hard enough to get players to report a single initiative roll.

I also miss speed factor, and feel like it is a conspicuously absent element of weapon balance in D&D3 and D&D4.

 

[GX.Sigma]

I'd like to see this as an optional rule. Not the super complicated one from 2e, but more like the simple one from Basic. Missile fire, movement, melee attacks, magic (or whatever).

Or really any system that doesn't make the DM listen to five or more 2-digit numbers and write them all down in descending order at the start of every fight (which can take more time than the fight itself in 5e). PCs roll a d6, monsters roll a d6. Whoever rolls higher goes first this round. Repeat next round. Simple.

 

[dd.stevenson]

I play 2e with a hack of Savage worlds' playing card round by round initiative system. Simple to implement: everyone draws and I just count down the rank. It's kind of tense, too, since no one knows what order they will get to act in.

 

[howandwhy99]

I remember when we used to reroll initiative every round ages ago and we loved it. It gave us a sense of chaos during combat. I would like to see Next reintroduce this as a rule. How do you feel and why?

I prefer initiative rolled every round. It adds variation and greater unpredictability.

However, this makes the game longer and without the option to share roll anything or use a Caller than D&D players working together are going to be hamstrung. Everyone will be re-rolling only individual initiatives, something that should not be a rule in the first place IMO. Those should be an optional tactic used by a player, not mandatory. But especially so if initiative is re-rolled every round.