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<blockquote data-quote="Weird Dave" data-source="post: 6969538" data-attributes="member: 6749823">Many of the game mechanics of 5E are based around action economy - you can only do so much on your &quot;turn&quot; in a combat round, but here are some nifty tricks you can alternate between. Changing that would be difficult, and while I agree that initiative might be one of the more &quot;this is a game!&quot; aspects of RPGs in general there have been some stabs at making it more intuitive that are worth highlighting.One of the most interesting that I've seen is the HackMaster 5th Edition system, which uses a &quot;count up&quot; system. There is no round - time is measured in seconds, and actions you decide to take use up so many seconds. Swing a sword? You can do that once every 10 seconds. Swing a two-handed sword? You can do that once every 18 seconds. Etc., etc. You can move 5 feet in one second, but then you can jog 10 feet the next second, and then break into a run on the third second. It's pretty intuitive BUT it's a huge pain for the GM I've found and almost totally reliant on a grid &amp; miniatures.Depending on what kinds of problems you are trying to solve with initiative, you can also look at kitbashing the Savage Worlds game system. That system uses a deck of regular playing cards, deals out one to each participant in the combat, and then counts down from Ace to Deuce (spades, hearts, diamonds, clubs for suits in case of ties). Holding your action involves flipping your card upside down and not getting another one on the next draw but allows you to interrupt someone else's action. In Savage Worlds there are Edges (similar-ish to feats) that change some of the mechanics of the card-based initiative - Level Headed, for example, allows you to take two cards and keep one of them of your choice. Jokers are wild and give you a special bonus.Anyway, those are just a few ideas!</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Weird Dave, post: 6969538, member: 6749823"] Many of the game mechanics of 5E are based around action economy - you can only do so much on your "turn" in a combat round, but here are some nifty tricks you can alternate between. Changing that would be difficult, and while I agree that initiative might be one of the more "this is a game!" aspects of RPGs in general there have been some stabs at making it more intuitive that are worth highlighting. One of the most interesting that I've seen is the HackMaster 5th Edition system, which uses a "count up" system. There is no round - time is measured in seconds, and actions you decide to take use up so many seconds. Swing a sword? You can do that once every 10 seconds. Swing a two-handed sword? You can do that once every 18 seconds. Etc., etc. You can move 5 feet in one second, but then you can jog 10 feet the next second, and then break into a run on the third second. It's pretty intuitive BUT it's a huge pain for the GM I've found and almost totally reliant on a grid & miniatures. Depending on what kinds of problems you are trying to solve with initiative, you can also look at kitbashing the Savage Worlds game system. That system uses a deck of regular playing cards, deals out one to each participant in the combat, and then counts down from Ace to Deuce (spades, hearts, diamonds, clubs for suits in case of ties). Holding your action involves flipping your card upside down and not getting another one on the next draw but allows you to interrupt someone else's action. In Savage Worlds there are Edges (similar-ish to feats) that change some of the mechanics of the card-based initiative - Level Headed, for example, allows you to take two cards and keep one of them of your choice. Jokers are wild and give you a special bonus. Anyway, those are just a few ideas! [/QUOTE]

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