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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Manbearcat" data-source="post: 6048674" data-attributes="member: 6696971">I think a few of the issues here are: 1 - Overall, how granular versus how abstract are the combat mechanics?2 - Along that line, how granular versus how abstract do you expect further innovation to be?3 - To what end does granularity serve versus the end that abstraction serves? On the whole, I see the combat mechanics as abstract in the extreme. Therefore, when I see random (seemingly mismatched) attempts at granularity, I balk. In my martial combat, I don't have a warrior standing in one spot, or hardly moving (assuming no move action or just a shift for 6 seconds), looking in one direction, attacking a number of times equal to his attacks/round. In my martial combat, ***the warriors are constantly in motion (within a constrained area...perhaps 5 feet), circling, head on a swivel, defending all sides, looking for openings and ways to dictate the battlefield...and then executing modes of attack. Therefore, when I see "Facing" rules, I don't just balk heavily...I'm outright incredulous. When I have no true method to reliably act out of turn or dictate the battlefield, I don't just balk heavily...I"m outright incredulous. The abstractions of "Lack of Facing", "Immediation Actions", and "Forced Movement" reinforce my gameplay expectations. WIthout any of them, or an incoherent collection of them (facing + forced movement + wound track/death spiral/HP as solely meat + no immediation actions), I could do little more than look the other way and hold my nose while trying to play out the scene.  *** In the composite fiction of our combats, there is constantly forced movement outside of mechanical resolution. As such, having the mechanical resolution tools available to activate so they are more than just narrative dressing is actually "immersive" to my players and creates for a more enjoyable martial experience. Circling right versus an opponent who has a mean right hand is "forced movement" by the opponent with the mean right hand. Circling left when opponents have you corned such that circling right would expose your unprotected flank is forced movement by your opponents. There are dozens and dozens of examples of subconscious, cost-benefit anlaysis-driven "forced movement" that ocurrs in martial conflict, from American Football (and a DE or OLB having contain on a running play and rerouting the RB inside by their outside leverage) to cage-fighting (A strikers legendary overhand right forcing an opponent to circle right for the entirety of the fight in order to not expose himself to it). Forced movement in martial enterprise is putting all of the variables into your opponents head, and forcing him to compute an unconscious permutation that can spit out only one result...and then his body instinctively (predictably) acting upon it...to the opponent's (who "forced" the movement) advantage. The actor who is being forced is not making an autonomous (conscious, aware, ego-driven) decision to move. He is being manipulated (not exclusively "bluffed"...manipulated) by something external to his own conscious will. This can be reliably reproduced with any number of "reflex" tests. In order to inject this specific dynamism within the combat tactical interface and fictional tapestry, you have to have some sort of mechanical resolution tool. There are two other "control" mechanics in 4e (but they have their own detractors) that work differently than standard "forced movement"; marking and "move or you take damage/don't move or you take damage" effects. These are Catch-22 effects that actually provide limited autonomy to the afflected. Perhaps some feel better about these Catch-22 effects than they do with "forced movement" due to this limited expression of autonomy. However, as @<a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/members/pemerton.html" target="_blank">pemerton</a> stated above, forgoing "forced movement" entirely for the interest of "limited expression of autonomy" (and inserting a Catch-22 mechanic) will have impact on the fiction. Is it worth it?</blockquote>

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