Systems Where You Dread Running Combat

[turnip_farmer]

The rulebook was enormous and seemed interesting but ended up too damn complicated for its own good.

Hah - that's funny. I've never seen Aces and Eights, but I know it was written by the same people as Hackmaster - the game I described upthread as sounding really interesting by being far too complex to ever try,

 

[CleverNickName]

The only time I've dreaded combat scenes was when we were playing Pathfinder. For my group, PF combat meant an hours-long ordeal involving multiple textbooks and arguments about flanking, attacks of opportunity, multiple types of actions, and so forth. No matter how hard the DM tried to build tension and keep everyone immersed in the story, it all went right out the window so that we could play a weird D&D board game for two, sometimes three hours.

 

[Scars Unseen]

The only two systems where I grew to actually dread running combat were D&D 3x and Pathfinder 1. They were fine at lower levels, but once PCs hit 10th level or so, both systems got ridiculous. I don't touch either now.

Yeah, this is why I never got into Pathfinder. By the time it came out, I was so over mid to high level 3E that the last thing I was looking for was another version of that. Of course when I found a group that was running 4E, I swiftly found that wasn't for me either. I started looking at OSRs and semi-OSRs (I'm not sure how I'd categorize Castles and Crusades) as well as more narrative systems (which again were very hit or miss with me).

 

[Azuresun]

One thing a lot of systems seem to be super-shy about is giving any reliability to skill rolls, especially in combat. Its one thing when an opponents defenses can make things hard, its another when even the baseline requires a lot of semi-Hail-Mary's.

(Depending on background, this could happen with some editions of RQ).

This was my main beef with the 40K RPG's--the baseline percentages are really low (and in published adventures, negative modifiers are thrown around like candy, the writers seeming to assume that the skill levels will be something like 80+). And if you're not trained, your attribute is halved, which really pushes it into the terrain of "don't bother".

The assumption seems to be that you'll be dumpster diving for bonuses on every single roll (when you shoot someone, you're at +10 for a superior weapon, +20 for a short burst, +20 for point-blank range, etc), but that just shifts the problem around, as figuring out what the modifier is this time adds overhead to every roll, and can often get uncomfortable as you try to wheedle every possible bonus out the GM rather than just rolling the dice.

I do wonder what would happen with the system if you just increased skill baselines by +30 or something, or just said that if your skill after all modifiers is 50+, you can take a basic success rather than rolling.

 

[Retreater]

Yeah, this is why I never got into Pathfinder. By the time it came out, I was so over mid to high level 3E that the last thing I was looking for was another version of that. Of course when I found a group that was running 4E, I swiftly found that wasn't for me either. I started looking at OSRs and semi-OSRs (I'm not sure how I'd categorize Castles and Crusades) as well as more narrative systems (which again were very hit or miss with me).

For years I tried to get my group into Castles & Crusades while they struggled and slogged through the rules of Pathfinder, which were making them miserable and stressing out players and GMs. Only now they're starting to get into 5e, because they had invested so much time trying to master Pathfinder. I think they got used to a system that took a decade or more to learn.
I'm starting to come to the realization that 5e is probably where I should stay when it comes to a fantasy RPG. If it's all about elves and dwarves fighting goblins in dungeons with swords and magic missiles - I guess I can just say "we already have D&D at home."

 

[TheSword]

For years I tried to get my group into Castles & Crusades while they struggled and slogged through the rules of Pathfinder, which were making them miserable and stressing out players and GMs. Only now they're starting to get into 5e, because they had invested so much time trying to master Pathfinder. I think they got used to a system that took a decade or more to learn.
I'm starting to come to the realization that 5e is probably where I should stay when it comes to a fantasy RPG. If it's all about elves and dwarves fighting goblins in dungeons with swords and magic missiles - I guess I can just say "we already have D&D at home."

I do think that Level Up could scratch the itch for complexity while allowing 5e to fundamentally stay the system of choice.

 

[jdrakeh]

Yeah, this is why I never got into Pathfinder. By the time it came out, I was so over mid to high level 3E that the last thing I was looking for was another version of that. Of course when I found a group that was running 4E, I swiftly found that wasn't for me either. I started looking at OSRs and semi-OSRs (I'm not sure how I'd categorize Castles and Crusades) as well as more narrative systems (which again were very hit or miss with me).

Castles & Crusades was the first 'light' d20-based game I got into. I don't think it's technically OSR as most people use that term (as it doesn't try to mechanically recreate any specific older system), but it's certainly a good, light, alternative to mechanically heavy d20-based RPGs and does capture the feel of older editions of D&D (it feels a lot like AD&D to me).

 

[Blue]

Yeah, but the HP attrition is still the main factor, it just gets worse in the newer editions as HP bloat makes combat take forever. It's just tedious.

Um, it doesn't change the combat length. They took away the wildly high defenses and damage resistance and rolled all the "how hard to defeat this" into HPs. Combats take the same number of rounds because there's less misses and less reduction of damage.

Well, that's not quite true - removal of quadratic casters has also reduced the damage dealt. So if you actually want to blame longer combats on something, it's that pure casters don't eclipse martials anymore.

 

[aramis erak]

Perhaps I am alone in this, but there are systems I otherwise enjoy with the exception of an important portion of the game - such as combat.
[snip]
Are there any systems that you find yourself dreading combat (or other significant portions of the game)? How do you get past it in your GM brain? Do you just avoid those rules sets altogether?

Twilight:2000 2E... Loved the game overall, but the combat rules were... underwhelming. PC's were hard to kill, NPCs were easy to kill.
T2K 2.2 added the skill resolution to the problem list... and was the basis for Traveller: The New Era

Traveller: The New Era - combat and skills. Inherited from T2K2.2 Char Gen was great. The Setting sucked, but I ran it mostly in the classic Setting, some 100 years before the TNE setting.

WEG Star Wars (d6) 1E. The "Your skill success roll is your initiative" is spiffy in concept, but not in play. 6P+ a credible threat in Stormtroopers (about 2 per PC) goes to a positively painfully slow process. And realize that PCs can, and often do, 2 to 3 actions per round, so that's doing it 2 to 3 roll→sort→resolve passes per round. One turn went like so: Declare→Roll1→Sort1→Resolve1→Roll2→Sort2→Resolve2→Roll3→Sort3→Resolve3→Roll4→Resolve4→Roll5→Resolve5 (PC with 8D Blaster skill and a +1d Scope did 5x4d shots; no other characters had more than 3, hence dropping the sort step).

AD&D (both editions) - The combat rules are overcomplicated and not exciting, at the same time.

L5R 2E/3E: Art duels. Not that they're hard, they just don't feel right.

TOR 1E: Travel process. Hope Recovery
TOR 2αE: Councils. Encounter table. Difficulties. Hope use.

Generally, I just avoid games that have too much of this sort of problem. Often, I use other editions with differences for that. Exceptions:

T2K 2.2 however, made things worse, not better, for T2K. It's only been the 4th ed that has solved the combat and skill issues for me. Until that point, i simply halved the PC hit points per location.
AD&D - I'll never run it again. The differences in Cyclopedia push it, barely, into the "yes, I'll run this edition if sincerely asked by sincere players"...
WEG SW: I'd rather run FFG.
TOR: hybridizing.

 

[pemerton]

I can't stand D&D hit point attrition style combat. I find the monotony of it extremely tedious and boring.

I think you have to take a pretty broad brush to lump everything in that group together. OD&D combat and D&D4e combat were both "hit point attrition" but they were pretty vastly different in how you did things and the benefit thereof.

For me, what differentiates 4e from classic D&D attrition is that most hits have not only the attrition component but some sort of forced movement and/or debuff component. Which is much more directly connected to the fiction.