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The 10 Player Races in Volo's Guide Revealed
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<blockquote data-quote="MiraMels" data-source="post: 7703155" data-attributes="member: 6855497"><p>The initiative round is a game state: the narrative slows down, and everyone's actions are tracked with much greater degree of precision.</p><p></p><p>The initiative round is usually concurrent with the beginning and end of combat, but you can use initiative time to resolve anything that requires such attention to order of action and positioning (ie, plenty of things that we wouldn't consider combat). Likewise, initiative isn't a necessary component to combat; you can resolve combat without initiative, using the same action resolution mechanics of the rest of the game. </p><p></p><p>Initiative time is a game state, and combat is just something you do in the course of gameplay. </p><p><span style="font-size: 9px"></span></p><p><span style="font-size: 9px">As to why I'm being nitpicky about this: The terms you use to describe your game necessarily effect the goals and behaviors of people playing the game. Communication about expectations and the game will become a lot more difficult if the designers continue this trend of canonizing combat as the primary thing that D&D is about. This shift from <strong>'combat'/'exploration'/'interaction'</strong> to <strong>'combat'/'non-combat'</strong> (even just in natural language references to what the designers assume your table play is like) will necessarily change the way the game is played by many, and not in a way that I would like. </span></p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="MiraMels, post: 7703155, member: 6855497"] The initiative round is a game state: the narrative slows down, and everyone's actions are tracked with much greater degree of precision. The initiative round is usually concurrent with the beginning and end of combat, but you can use initiative time to resolve anything that requires such attention to order of action and positioning (ie, plenty of things that we wouldn't consider combat). Likewise, initiative isn't a necessary component to combat; you can resolve combat without initiative, using the same action resolution mechanics of the rest of the game. Initiative time is a game state, and combat is just something you do in the course of gameplay. [SIZE=1] As to why I'm being nitpicky about this: The terms you use to describe your game necessarily effect the goals and behaviors of people playing the game. Communication about expectations and the game will become a lot more difficult if the designers continue this trend of canonizing combat as the primary thing that D&D is about. This shift from [B]'combat'/'exploration'/'interaction'[/B] to [B]'combat'/'non-combat'[/B] (even just in natural language references to what the designers assume your table play is like) will necessarily change the way the game is played by many, and not in a way that I would like. [/SIZE] [/QUOTE]
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