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Ok, I think me and my group's biggest beef with combat in D&D is the duration of one round. Most of our fights average between 4 and 10 rounds. That's less than a minute in game, some fights (especially epic BBEG fights) will run 2-4!
I don't have a solution, but please someone think of SOMETHING to bring the average in-game time of a fight up to 3-4 minutes at least.
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So you want combat to last 30-40 rounds?
A round is 6 seconds. 10 rounds is a minute. Ever watch boxing or MMA? A whole lot happens in less than a minute.
Now picture them dudes throwing around acidic missiles and swinging 10 lbs of sharp steel. Seems like combats taking about a minute are pretty realistic.
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It's impossible to simulate combat effectively. If you are talking about a duel between 2 experts it might take 15 minutes, most fights are over quickly because there is almost always a skill imbalance.
When people are having gun-fights with bazookas (epic combat) then fights are usually pretty short.
24 seconds to 1 minutes average? That's not too bad. With my group combat tends to last longer, probably because I have more players at a lower average power level than normal.
One thing that is different in D&D combat is everyone does something every single round. In real combat people spend a lot of time ducking behind things and avoiding doing things because they don't want to get hurt. These sorts of actions don't translate well into RPGs.
I disagree. We are talking about intensive actions like casting, and prolonged battles between experienced fighters. These could last longer than one minute.
Agreed, a lot could happen in one minute, but it is illogical to think that two lvl 10 characters would end a fight within the minute, although with the current rules, this happens frequently.
It is just a flaw in the system that can't easily be fixed, because if you change the duration of a round to, for example, one minute, you are making one attack each minute, walking 30 ft in a minute, etc.... which is even less logical....
In my experience with the martial arts, fights between more highly-skilled combatants take a LOT less time than swing-fests involving amateurs. Between really top people, the first one to miscalculate slightly, loses (I'm talking potentially fatal techniques pulled at the last second, not a bunch of "ultimate fighting" showmanship constrained by a lot of rules and such). They might circle for 30 seconds or so, sizing each other up... then there are rapid movements, and one guy (who would have been killed) hugs the other one and they both grin. Combat done.
This is of course exactly contrary to the D&D model (in the game, hp generally increase faster than damage output does). Because of this discrepancy, any attempt to impose "realism" on time scales is more or less doomed from the start, in my view.
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I've seen UFC fights that lasted 20 seconds between 2 top-ranked competitors. And they weren't trying to kill each other with magic or sharp, pointy things.
The only time that real life combat lasts really long times is in movies or legends. If you wish to change it then go for it but my 5-10 round combats at 10th level are lasting 2+ hours in real time. I don't even want to contemplate a 30 round fight.
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Agreed, a lot could happen in one minute, but it is illogical to think that two lvl 10 characters would end a fight within the minute, although with the current rules, this happens frequently.
Most combats in D&D involve disparate power levels, when power levels are more equal combat tends to last longer. In general PCs usually significantly outclass their opponents which is why they can last 4-6 encounters per day. When you have disparate power levels combat tends to be much shorter.
If D&D combat were at all equal TPKs would be a much more frequent occurrence.
-- Dennis
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I'm not sure what you're asking for exactly, but in AD&D 2nd Ed., rounds were supposedly a full minute of dodging, ducking, dipping, diving, and dodging. It never made a whole lot of sense, but if you'd like your combats to have 'technically' lasted minutes instead of seconds, you could use that logic.
Except movement is seriously broken under that model.
Player: I want to go over there
DM: Ok, that takes you 3 rounds (minutes)
Player: It's 180', I can walk that far in 30 seconds
DM: Yeah, but you are dodging and weaving...
Player: I don't want to dodge or weave, let them shoot me, I really want to get over there NOW.
DM: Ummm, you can't.. er
Granted, real combat generally would involve a lot hiding behind something then charging forward... but it is really tough to simulate that sort of stop motion action.
The way we play it is that each round lasts 6 seconds but when combat is over they've burned 5 minutes. That includes any time dialation during combat plus recovery time... That's probably generous, likely recovery alone should be 10 minutes.
--Dennis
The way we play it is that each round lasts 6 seconds but when combat is over they've burned 5 minutes. That includes any time dialation during combat plus recovery time... That's probably generous, likely recovery alone should be 10 minutes.
That's a good thought -- almost no one takes rest and recovery into consideration.
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It's a tough call. CON is supposed to represent more than just endurance. I don't think there is a simple stat-endurance relationship. I cycle a lot and there are some people who can ride like crazy but if they catch wind of the flu they are sick for 2 weeks. I have the constitution of an ox and even when I was seriously out of shape I never got sick. Maybe if your endurance was a combination of CON+STR... feh... it's just not easy to model like that.
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Would it be too much to increase movement during the round without changing the number of attacks in a round? After all one attack roll could simulate a series of attacks and not just one big swing.
Might also encourage more movement in combat instead of everyone just standing around hitting each other.
It's a tough call. Maybe if your endurance was a combination of CON+STR... feh... it's just not easy to model like that.
That's why I have an Endurance skill now!
Would it be too much to increase movement during the round without changing the number of attacks in a round? After all one attack roll could simulate a series of attacks and not just one big swing. Might also encourage more movement in combat instead of everyone just standing around hitting each other.
That would be most welcome. The people who would most benefit are the fighter (with his high BAB, and hence number of iterative attacks) and the monk (with his oodles of movement). Both of them could use the boost, and your suggestion is, in my opinion, the best way to give it to them. The barbarian would be an unholy terror, though... maybe limit it somehow for him, maybe by making him spend rage points to move between attacks...
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Would it be too much to increase movement during the round without changing the number of attacks in a round? After all one attack roll could simulate a series of attacks and not just one big swing.
I slept through 2e-3.0 so I'm not sure when it happened but sometime in there the game changed from being very freeform combat to being very structured and metered. Probably the biggest blow to free moving combat? Attacks of Opportunity. Ditch those and combat suddenly becomes much more flexible. It will be interesting to see if a lot of people take the Dodge/ Mobility tree and what impact that will have on combat. Seems like a must have for rogues.
In the real world attacks of opportunity happen when the other guy comes from behind cover and runs for the next cover. How come there are no missile AoOs, those make more sense.
Oh... 30" move rate and distance covered per round... I'm convinced it is a product of the size of the designers dining room table. Much more movement than that and characters would be able to move off the board in a round.
It's all my conspiracy theories... nothing to see here, move along.
Monte Cook, in his Book of Experimental Might, suggested using breathers to lengthen combat slightly (to break up the go-go-go mentality of the combat round system). Once per combat, as a standard action, a character can take a breather to heal a small amount of hp, gain a damage bonus, gain an attack bonus, increase a spell DC, or get a new saving throw to throw off an effect with a duration. Character unable to take actions, cannot take a breather.
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Yes. In the old days, turns were truely long periods of time. With the advent of third edition, combat has in fact been measured more tightly in 6 second increments - the equivalent of what was once called a "segment". [...there were 10 segments (6 seconds) in a round (1 minute), and ten rounds in a turn (10 minutes).
In your 3rd edition games, a varied approach to combat execution might be a good way to remedy the needs we've read in this post. The DM can choose, say, in the first encounter with the snow spiders that he will not use a combat grid, describing much of the encounter verbally and descriptively, hand-waiving much of the movement measurement in favor of high drama and epic actions. But just following this encounter, the PC arrive at the ruins of the cold temple and the DM lays out a combat map for more precise actions.
In other words, where it makes story-sense, or dramatic sense to do so, the DM can facilitate PC choices. [...facilitate is a word that means "to make easy", that is, the DM helps make the player choices happen.] As a recommendation, the DM must ensure no one player is favored in this way, allowing all to occasionally persue extremely non-traditional but fantastic combat choices. This really spices the mechanical play with rich story and visualization, making them quite memorable. If you haven't tried this in a while - just try it and watch your players expressions! When they're high-5ing, smiling, and thanking you for an excellent session, you'll know that the varied approach was worth the slight inconsistency of adherance to mechanics. That is, the end result was worth making the exceptions. This captures, in 3rd edition, the "feel" of how 2nd edition provided enough "time" to justify sweeping movements and large action within a "turn". Again, in moderation, and within reason to the rules, but fun and varied is sometimes a great way to go.
Being in the SCA (www.sca.org) and having BEEN in armored melee combat for many minutes at a time, I can tell you that a 24 second fight is well long enough to determine an outcome in a 5-on-5 or so fight.
As a DM, I give some color commentary and description during rounds, so you could house rule that there is perhaps a 3-second gap in between combat rounds (that has *no* impact on game mechanics) to reflect tactical positioning, parrys/feints/posturing of combatants, etc., perhaps the hurling of insults or battle cries...
When lives are on the line, seconds truly do seem like minutes - play up the description of combat, not the actual passage of the rounds themselves; if each round takes ten minutes to run, a single encounter might fill up half a session.
When I ran a table of 12 players, a single combat encounter could run up to 40 rounds and take *three full game sessions*...most days, I don't miss it!
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Monte Cook, in his Book of Experimental Might, suggested using breathers to lengthen combat slightly (to break up the go-go-go mentality of the combat round system). Once per combat, as a standard action, a character can take a breather to heal a small amount of hp, gain a damage bonus, gain an attack bonus, increase a spell DC, or get a new saving throw to throw off an effect with a duration. Character unable to take actions, cannot take a breather.
Sounds like another good use for the Concentration skill that many have been fighting to re-implement into the rules.
Robert
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I slept through 2e-3.0 so I'm not sure when it happened but sometime in there the game changed from being very freeform combat to being very structured and metered. Probably the biggest blow to free moving combat? Attacks of Opportunity.Funny, we were just talking about this at my last game, and most people on the table agreed that they'd like to just get rid of them. I want to play-test that notion, see if it works within 3.5's combat system, which is designed with AOs in mind. If it's faster and easier on the brain, I'll take it. I'm not married to AOs, really.
Mutants and Masterminds uses D20 system and no AoO.
Of course since its quite common to play characters with super human agility and speedier than bullents movement, AoO's would just be silling in that arena.
Robert
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Would it be too much to increase movement during the round without changing the number of attacks in a round? After all one attack roll could simulate a series of attacks and not just one big swing.
Might also encourage more movement in combat instead of everyone just standing around hitting each other.
One of the things I'm redisigning for my new campaign is changing the way combat movement is done (slightly).
I've been playtesting it from a few different perspectives - don't have it perfect yet.
I'll share what I've come up with so far that seems to work okay.
[Designer Note: the idea behind the change is to make combat more fluid and movement not stagnant - just standing there hacking and slashing it out]
Essentially, most can/will/should agree that spellcasters are eventually more powerful than warriors. Spellcasters can theoretically cast two spells a round (with quickened spell feat), and still have their full movement.
Why should a warrior be limited to only one attack if he moves more than 5'.
So essentially, I'm reworking movement to where you can "attack" "Move" and "Make your second attack"
However you cannot move away from your first target unless he doesn't threaten you.
Thus you can knock him out, kill him, disarm him, use new combat manuevers that thrust him backwards 5' after a successful attack, etc. Then move on to the next target.
This is to try to replicate cinematic moments in movies/TV where the heroes are moving through the scene - not stopping to kill the combatants just yet - but knocking them aside, thrusting them off the stairs, etc, and continually moving through to get an advantageious spot etc.
I'm tired of combats where warriors just stand then "5' step - make 2 attacks" next warrior; "5' step - make 2 attacks"
It's boring. I want to liven it up.
This wont change the time-frame of the combats - but it will add more flair to it, I think.
Robert
I'm not sure what you're asking for exactly, but in AD&D 2nd Ed., rounds were supposedly a full minute of dodging, ducking, dipping, diving, and dodging. It never made a whole lot of sense, but if you'd like your combats to have 'technically' lasted minutes instead of seconds, you could use that logic.
One of the most crappy things in 2e. When I played 2e (which was after I got the 3e books, but had to play 2e because the players didn't want to switch), I was always annoyed that I'd take my character a minute to draw his sword. Or mumble a short formula and sling forth a magic missile." Or shoot a single arrow.
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One thing that is different in D&D combat is everyone does something every single round. In real combat people spend a lot of time ducking behind things and avoiding doing things because they don't want to get hurt. These sorts of actions don't translate well into RPGs.
This is a consequence of having an open and transparent initiative order on display. The players know that 'Archer Group 2' have fired, and won't be doing anything else for a while, and their leader has fired all 4 of his arrows as a full-attack action, against whichever enemy was visible during one single slice of time, rather than one...two...three...four, split over the full 6-second round, against whoever breaks cover.
As such, the players have an unrealistic knowledge that they are safe to step out and let fly.
Keeping initiative secret from the players can introduce some uncertainty, but is more work for the DM.
Allowing combatants to hold/delay/ready part of a full-attack (rather than the current standard action) would go a long way to balancing the classes, and make casting during melee, or within a crossfire more deadly.
I find it odd that in order to disupt a spell, a Fighter has to halve, third, or quarter his attacks, rather than go all-out attack. A single 1hp pinprick will force a Concentration check, if it occurs simultaneously, yet if a fighter unleashes 4 blows on a caster, they can then cast back with no Concentration check required, because all the damage occurred on Initiative Count 15, and he casts on Initiative Count 14, so he's not in any pain.
One thing that is different in D&D combat is everyone does something every single round. In real combat people spend a lot of time ducking behind things and avoiding doing things because they don't want to get hurt. These sorts of actions don't translate well into RPGs.This is a consequence of having an open and transparent initiative order on display. The players know that 'Archer Group 2' have fired, and won't be doing anything else for a while, and their leader has fired all 4 of his arrows as a full-attack action, against whichever enemy was visible during one single slice of time, rather than one...two...three...four, split over the full 6-second round, against whoever breaks cover.
As such, the players have an unrealistic knowledge that they are safe to step out and let fly.
Keeping initiative secret from the players can introduce some uncertainty, but is more work for the DM.
Allowing combatants to hold/delay/ready part of a full-attack (rather than the current standard action) would go a long way to balancing the classes, and make casting during melee, or within a crossfire more deadly.
I find it odd that in order to disupt a spell, a Fighter has to halve, third, or quarter his attacks, rather than go all-out attack. A single 1hp pinprick will force a Concentration check, if it occurs simultaneously, yet if a fighter unleashes 4 blows on a caster, they can then cast back with no Concentration check required, because all the damage occurred on Initiative Count 15, and he casts on Initiative Count 14, so he's not in any pain.
This is a very valid point. I am interested in the idea of taking iterative attacks throughout an initiative order, rather than all at once. Sort of like an immediate action or, in Magic terms, an interrupt. Something that you can use to harry spellcasters... I wonder how best to implement this without it truly breaking down.
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This is a very valid point. I am interested in the idea of taking iterative attacks throughout an initiative order, rather than all at once. Sort of like an immediate action or, in Magic terms, an interrupt. Something that you can use to harry spellcasters... I wonder how best to implement this without it truly breaking down.
The only way to do it would be to break each round into 4 or 5 "sub-rounds."
Round 1.1 would be everyone's initial attack.Round 1.2 would be anyone's second attack (if applicable) or quickened spells, etc.
Round 1.3 would be anyones third iterative attack
so on and so on until all iterative attacks are complete
Then
Round 2.1....
This would take longer in combat though.
To piggy-back on my earlier post about how I am implementing movement and changing it in regards to the way it works with full attacks:
One of the things a warrior with two BAB attacks can do is:
Attack Foe he is threatening with first attack. If that drops him, and he's not sure what he wants to do with the rest of his round - he can "ready a charge" with his second attack. Then at some point later in the round he sees a wolf come up and trip his wizard companion and is about to tear him up. So the warrior then says I'm taking my readied partial charge at the wolf with my second attack.
This I believe gives more freedom to move about the combat and just doesn't leave people doing 5' steps and full attacks all combat long.
It has the added benefit of keeping people paying attention when it's not their turn - since there's so much stimuli happening everywhere now that could require attention. And the other good concept that has is that the fighter can then survey the battlefield so-to-speak and ready an action for when and where he's needed most.
(at least - thats my hopes for it - wont know until it's all thoroughly playtested).
Robert
