Yeah, you heard me. This may be the only time I actually have something good to say about the game, so buckle yourselves in, it could be a bumpy ride.
Let's face it, combat is, a lot of the time, not actually very interesting. I mean, sure it's a life or death struggle over which turns the fate of your characters lives and possibly the whole world, but in all honesty rather than coming across as dramatic battle most of the time it simply boils down a few people standing next to each other
taking it turns to hit each other.
Kinda lacks a certain something is what I'm saying.
You look at any pretty much any fight scene from pretty much anything ever, and what you'll see is MOVEMENT. People leaping about, charging, dodging, pressing the enemy back. The tide of battle moves and shifts. However in your average roleplaying game the most dramatic movement you'll get is whoever wins initiative and charges. Once you've actually reached the enemy you just stand there, hacking at it until it falls over. But why? Well, firstly and most obviously there's very little reward for moving. Hitting someone in the side of the head doesn't grant any additional bonus over punching them in face. Indeed, facing is generally dispensed with altogether. It certainly is in D&D. The nearest you get is flanking.
Secondly of course is the fact that you are generally punished for moving once someone is standing next to you. I get that the idea of the dreaded Attack Of Opportunity is, at least on paper, perhaps reasonable. But in practise it just tends to mean combatants getting glued into little clumps. And it's here that D&D actually had it's first actual good idea: The 5 foot move action. Actually giving people the opportunity to take a step in the right direction without being punished for it is....
Well, it's OBVIOUS really isn't it?
Now, I understand that 4th ed D&D has been a little divisive, but it was when we tried playing it that I first encountered the option of safely disengaging from an enemy. And I have to say I really liked the combat in 4th ed. Different people want different things from games to be sure, and I've heard it said that 4th ed is basically a miniatures game with a roleplay system tacked on as an afterthought. Although I'm a big fan of miniatures games and thus happy as Larry to play something like that I do feel it's a little disingenuous. The problem with 4th ed was that it was a MMO simulation with a miniatures game tacked onto it. But that's another post I think.
Perhaps it partly because not everyone likes to use minis that these rather static feeling encounters became the norm. After all, it's a lot harder to keep track of everyone if they're bouncing around like coked up rabbits.
But what can I say? I'm a minis guy. Even if those minis are just whatever Ultraman gashapons I happen to have to hand. And being a minis guy I want to PLAY with my minis. I want to move them around. I want the fights my guys are having to feel like the fights in the movies. I wanna have long drawn out Errol Flynn style duels where we go back and forth over the castles and chop the hell out of some candlesticks. Whilst 4th ed went to far with trying equalise all the different classes and locking people down into predetermined roles, I don't think they went quite far enough with the role of movement in combat. I like that everyone had special moves, but I always felt it would be better for them to integrate movement requirements and effects. For example your swordsman should be able to press an attack that forces his opponent back a number of squares, a roundhouse kick could require a move to the left but knock the enemy to the right. Dodging should involve ACTUALLY HAVING TO DODGE. So if you can force an enemy into a corner and he's got nowhere to go then he'll actually be in trouble. Stuff like that, to give things a sense of dynamism and some crunchy tactical decision making.
Basically, I don't want to see THIS happen. The players shouldn't be penalised by the rules for trying to do stuff that's exciting and dramatic (if perhaps a little risky). They should be ENCOURAGED. Doing awesome crazy stuff is part of the job description for a hero after all.
Note that I'm not implying that a player shouldn't be punished for doing something retarded. Although to be fair the consequences of their actions will probably be punishment enough. But there needs to be something that allows for the occasional bit of bravado and daring do. To let the characters do stuff simply because it would be cool. Fate points, once per game boss as fuck bonus, something like that.
Of course the system has to actually allow for such maneuvers. I'm happy to say that we'd moved onto Pathfinder before we had to deal with the grappling rules in D&D. Frankly I doubt I really need to say anything on that, given the sheer amount of jokes and comics based on them. Although my experience of Grappling in Knights Of The Chalice does leave a lot to be desired. Basically once you get grappled you either fail to break free (doing nothing for a turn) or succeed (doing nothing for a turn) only to be grappled again once your opponents go comes around. It lacks is what I'm saying.
However one thing that did come up was the issue of Called Shots. Now, again these are fairly standard and not unique to any one particular system. You try to strike a particular point of your opponents anatomy, and you get a penalty to hit. This is pretty much to be expected. The question I have is why? Is this REALLY the only way we've come up with to represent this? The problem for me is if you're fighting some big gribbly or other and you're trying to hit it in the head, sure the chances of hitting the head are a bit smaller, but just because you miss the head it doesn't automatically follow you wouldn't hit ANY part of it. When you're trying to hit a thing in any system you're basically trying to roll over a certain number. To hit part X that number is larger. But why not have that number get larger by quite a bit, but then have the basic number increase by a little bit? So if you roll over the aimed number you hit it wherever. But if you don't, but you still get over the modified base number you still catch it a glancing blow? Apply some portion of the modifier to damage as well, sure, but at least account for the fact that the body parts are connected.
Speaking of such numbers, let's take a moment to discuss AC. Obviously this stands for Armour Class, and is what you need to roll over to hit something. Which kinda works, but I have to admit that there are elements to it that bug me a little. I know, on an intellectual level that AC is an abstraction of various defensive capabilities, such as armour, agility, resilience and so forth. I know that this is rolled together in order to keep combat streamlined and avoid having to roll sixteen different things to make a single attack. But when I've got a knight fighting a 30 foot long dragon and he's only got 5% chance to hit I can't help but feel a little aggravated. I mean, how can you MISS that? It's the size of a house! It's standing RIGHT THERE!! Of course, what this really means is that my puny warrior has very little chance of DAMAGING a giant dragon. Except of course that damage resistance is a separate thing entirely, only comes into play AFTER the attack roll. What this says to me is that the terminology employed is more important than one might think when establishing the feel of a combat. My mind is locked into the idea that my guy is blindly waving a sword at a wall simply because I'm think in terms of To Hit roll.
The problem there of course is balance. How complicated do you want to make the process of making a single attack? There's no one clear answer to this, it all depends on personal taste and how you want the combat to feel. But when there's a bunch of people at the table waiting for their go there is a lot to say for keeping things moving.
I realise that all this whinging about called shots and AC may well come across as the ranting of some over entitled man child who can't deal with the fact that his character isn't automatically the best at everything. But I at least hope that's not true. There is one last thing I'd like to discuss though. I'd like to talk about Hit Points.
Now, we've all come to expect HP in pretty much any RPG context, be it pen and paper, electronic or even LARPing. And to be sure you need some metric of character health and survivability. But, as ever, there is a problem with way HP are employed. Can you guess what?
Yeah. You are either fine or dead, with very little in between. Again, I'm sure a lot of this come down to streamlining the game. Not everybody wants to get bogged down in the minutiae of hit location damage effects. But if you're going to have rules allowing for targeting specific bits then you need specific effects to be applied to them. And I mean something a little beyond just giving your arms and legs hit points as well.
I must confess that, since one of the earliest systems I ever played was MERPS, I do have a certain fondness for bewildering arrays of disturbingly specific critical damage tables. But I don't think it's really necessary to go quite that far. As funny as the results may be you don't always want to stop the game for fifteen minutes to look up exactly how dead you are. What you want is something in the middle.
What I'd really like to see is something that actually includes pain as a part of the system. I mean, give your various locations HP to measure physical integrity, sure. But the more battered you get the harder it should be to do stuff without passing out or hemorrhaging your guts out all over the place. Having a broken arm doesn't just make it tricky to duel wield after all. Until you deal with it it's gonna be pretty tough to concentrate on anything else.
Of course, the characters should have ways of dealing with and overcoming such effects, or at least reducing them to manageable levels. You don't want to render the characters useless after all. That's no fun for anyone.
Although.... A thought occurs. What if you design the system so that rather than rendering characters dead you render them ineffective? Rather than having everyone stand up being fine until they die, how about you just mess them up until they're no longer a threat, and then worry about the actual dying part later? It's surely far more interesting to put someone on the floor, but give them the possibility (however remote) of doing something about it than just have them fall over and then check to see if they die every round. Rather they're lying there holding their guts in, and maybe gathering strength for one last heroic effort.
Maybe this is just because pretty much every Tokusatsu hero will spend at least some portion of a fight on the floor struggling to get up. That sort of thing is fairly hardwired into my dramatic phraseology, but is not really the sort of thing that you get in games very much.
Kinda lacks a certain something is what I'm saying.
You look at any pretty much any fight scene from pretty much anything ever, and what you'll see is MOVEMENT. People leaping about, charging, dodging, pressing the enemy back. The tide of battle moves and shifts. However in your average roleplaying game the most dramatic movement you'll get is whoever wins initiative and charges. Once you've actually reached the enemy you just stand there, hacking at it until it falls over. But why? Well, firstly and most obviously there's very little reward for moving. Hitting someone in the side of the head doesn't grant any additional bonus over punching them in face. Indeed, facing is generally dispensed with altogether. It certainly is in D&D. The nearest you get is flanking.
Secondly of course is the fact that you are generally punished for moving once someone is standing next to you. I get that the idea of the dreaded Attack Of Opportunity is, at least on paper, perhaps reasonable. But in practise it just tends to mean combatants getting glued into little clumps. And it's here that D&D actually had it's first actual good idea: The 5 foot move action. Actually giving people the opportunity to take a step in the right direction without being punished for it is....
Well, it's OBVIOUS really isn't it?
Now, I understand that 4th ed D&D has been a little divisive, but it was when we tried playing it that I first encountered the option of safely disengaging from an enemy. And I have to say I really liked the combat in 4th ed. Different people want different things from games to be sure, and I've heard it said that 4th ed is basically a miniatures game with a roleplay system tacked on as an afterthought. Although I'm a big fan of miniatures games and thus happy as Larry to play something like that I do feel it's a little disingenuous. The problem with 4th ed was that it was a MMO simulation with a miniatures game tacked onto it. But that's another post I think.
Perhaps it partly because not everyone likes to use minis that these rather static feeling encounters became the norm. After all, it's a lot harder to keep track of everyone if they're bouncing around like coked up rabbits.
What I think D&D should look like. Apparently.
But what can I say? I'm a minis guy. Even if those minis are just whatever Ultraman gashapons I happen to have to hand. And being a minis guy I want to PLAY with my minis. I want to move them around. I want the fights my guys are having to feel like the fights in the movies. I wanna have long drawn out Errol Flynn style duels where we go back and forth over the castles and chop the hell out of some candlesticks. Whilst 4th ed went to far with trying equalise all the different classes and locking people down into predetermined roles, I don't think they went quite far enough with the role of movement in combat. I like that everyone had special moves, but I always felt it would be better for them to integrate movement requirements and effects. For example your swordsman should be able to press an attack that forces his opponent back a number of squares, a roundhouse kick could require a move to the left but knock the enemy to the right. Dodging should involve ACTUALLY HAVING TO DODGE. So if you can force an enemy into a corner and he's got nowhere to go then he'll actually be in trouble. Stuff like that, to give things a sense of dynamism and some crunchy tactical decision making.
Basically, I don't want to see THIS happen. The players shouldn't be penalised by the rules for trying to do stuff that's exciting and dramatic (if perhaps a little risky). They should be ENCOURAGED. Doing awesome crazy stuff is part of the job description for a hero after all.
Note that I'm not implying that a player shouldn't be punished for doing something retarded. Although to be fair the consequences of their actions will probably be punishment enough. But there needs to be something that allows for the occasional bit of bravado and daring do. To let the characters do stuff simply because it would be cool. Fate points, once per game boss as fuck bonus, something like that.
Of course the system has to actually allow for such maneuvers. I'm happy to say that we'd moved onto Pathfinder before we had to deal with the grappling rules in D&D. Frankly I doubt I really need to say anything on that, given the sheer amount of jokes and comics based on them. Although my experience of Grappling in Knights Of The Chalice does leave a lot to be desired. Basically once you get grappled you either fail to break free (doing nothing for a turn) or succeed (doing nothing for a turn) only to be grappled again once your opponents go comes around. It lacks is what I'm saying.
However one thing that did come up was the issue of Called Shots. Now, again these are fairly standard and not unique to any one particular system. You try to strike a particular point of your opponents anatomy, and you get a penalty to hit. This is pretty much to be expected. The question I have is why? Is this REALLY the only way we've come up with to represent this? The problem for me is if you're fighting some big gribbly or other and you're trying to hit it in the head, sure the chances of hitting the head are a bit smaller, but just because you miss the head it doesn't automatically follow you wouldn't hit ANY part of it. When you're trying to hit a thing in any system you're basically trying to roll over a certain number. To hit part X that number is larger. But why not have that number get larger by quite a bit, but then have the basic number increase by a little bit? So if you roll over the aimed number you hit it wherever. But if you don't, but you still get over the modified base number you still catch it a glancing blow? Apply some portion of the modifier to damage as well, sure, but at least account for the fact that the body parts are connected.
Speaking of such numbers, let's take a moment to discuss AC. Obviously this stands for Armour Class, and is what you need to roll over to hit something. Which kinda works, but I have to admit that there are elements to it that bug me a little. I know, on an intellectual level that AC is an abstraction of various defensive capabilities, such as armour, agility, resilience and so forth. I know that this is rolled together in order to keep combat streamlined and avoid having to roll sixteen different things to make a single attack. But when I've got a knight fighting a 30 foot long dragon and he's only got 5% chance to hit I can't help but feel a little aggravated. I mean, how can you MISS that? It's the size of a house! It's standing RIGHT THERE!! Of course, what this really means is that my puny warrior has very little chance of DAMAGING a giant dragon. Except of course that damage resistance is a separate thing entirely, only comes into play AFTER the attack roll. What this says to me is that the terminology employed is more important than one might think when establishing the feel of a combat. My mind is locked into the idea that my guy is blindly waving a sword at a wall simply because I'm think in terms of To Hit roll.
The problem there of course is balance. How complicated do you want to make the process of making a single attack? There's no one clear answer to this, it all depends on personal taste and how you want the combat to feel. But when there's a bunch of people at the table waiting for their go there is a lot to say for keeping things moving.
I realise that all this whinging about called shots and AC may well come across as the ranting of some over entitled man child who can't deal with the fact that his character isn't automatically the best at everything. But I at least hope that's not true. There is one last thing I'd like to discuss though. I'd like to talk about Hit Points.
Now, we've all come to expect HP in pretty much any RPG context, be it pen and paper, electronic or even LARPing. And to be sure you need some metric of character health and survivability. But, as ever, there is a problem with way HP are employed. Can you guess what?
Yeah. You are either fine or dead, with very little in between. Again, I'm sure a lot of this come down to streamlining the game. Not everybody wants to get bogged down in the minutiae of hit location damage effects. But if you're going to have rules allowing for targeting specific bits then you need specific effects to be applied to them. And I mean something a little beyond just giving your arms and legs hit points as well.
I must confess that, since one of the earliest systems I ever played was MERPS, I do have a certain fondness for bewildering arrays of disturbingly specific critical damage tables. But I don't think it's really necessary to go quite that far. As funny as the results may be you don't always want to stop the game for fifteen minutes to look up exactly how dead you are. What you want is something in the middle.
What I'd really like to see is something that actually includes pain as a part of the system. I mean, give your various locations HP to measure physical integrity, sure. But the more battered you get the harder it should be to do stuff without passing out or hemorrhaging your guts out all over the place. Having a broken arm doesn't just make it tricky to duel wield after all. Until you deal with it it's gonna be pretty tough to concentrate on anything else.
Of course, the characters should have ways of dealing with and overcoming such effects, or at least reducing them to manageable levels. You don't want to render the characters useless after all. That's no fun for anyone.
Although.... A thought occurs. What if you design the system so that rather than rendering characters dead you render them ineffective? Rather than having everyone stand up being fine until they die, how about you just mess them up until they're no longer a threat, and then worry about the actual dying part later? It's surely far more interesting to put someone on the floor, but give them the possibility (however remote) of doing something about it than just have them fall over and then check to see if they die every round. Rather they're lying there holding their guts in, and maybe gathering strength for one last heroic effort.
Maybe this is just because pretty much every Tokusatsu hero will spend at least some portion of a fight on the floor struggling to get up. That sort of thing is fairly hardwired into my dramatic phraseology, but is not really the sort of thing that you get in games very much.
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