The thing is, you've deliberately created a situation where those are relevant and interesting mechanics. In the day to day business of the actual game, they're not worth considering or even bothering with. When you make the entire adventure or whatever you're doing around them, which you've just done, they are more than worth using.
Otherwise I don't see any reason to not handwave them away and stick with a method that involves less dice rolling etc.
Unless the players specifically want to carry out that Large statue of Orcus from the dungeon. Then it becomes relevant.
There could be a couple fun encounters wrapped around that scenario right there.
The thing is, you've deliberately created a situation where those are relevant and interesting mechanics. In the day to day business of the actual game, they're not worth considering or even bothering with. When you make the entire adventure or whatever you're doing around them, which you've just done, they are more than worth using.
Otherwise I don't see any reason to not handwave them away and stick with a method that involves less dice rolling etc.
Unless the players specifically want to carry out that Large statue of Orcus from the dungeon. Then it becomes relevant.
I have no idea who would want to do something that dangerous or ridiculous.
The thing is, you've deliberately created a situation where those are relevant and interesting mechanics. In the day to day business of the actual game, they're not worth considering or even bothering with. When you make the entire adventure or whatever you're doing around them, which you've just done, they are more than worth using.
Otherwise I don't see any reason to not handwave them away and stick with a method that involves less dice rolling etc.
Exactly. Being deliberate is important when creating encounters and adventures. And you're right, unless there's a situation that warrants it I don't usually make them keep track of minutia like arrows or torches or even rations because when those things don't matter they're boring. I still make them describe to me though what they're eating every night when they camp for their long rest. It only took 4 long rests before they were 'bored' of eating stale iron rations, and the Bard then volunteered to do the cooking each night. When they talked about going back to town, one of the first things she said was that she needed to stock up on spices and ingredients. There's no mechanic there; I don't give them a bonus for eating more imaginative food. It's simple immersion and thinking of themselves as characters in a real (make-believe) world.
They're not really thinking of encumbrance yet; the Alchemist in the party took a Bag of Holding as part of one of his class abilities, so they store everything that isn't a weapon in there. I mean everything. It's gonna be quite an adventure when he loses that bag...
Been thinking about skills a lot today. Some of them seem very bad. Thought I'd make a tier list.
A Rank-Useful constantly
Stealth-it's for being sneaky, good even though the 5e rules feel a little shaky
Perception-Spot ambushes and secret doors
Athletics-for Grapplers only
B Rank-Useful frequently
Investigation-Your other skill for finding stuff. Probably down to DM preference how often this comes up v. Perception
Insight-Is someone lying to you?
Persuasion/Intimidation/Deception-The Face's toolkit, though you probably don't need all 3 on one member.
C Rank-Useful Situationally
Arcana/Nature/History/Religion-the Librarian's toolkit.
Medicine-Keeps people alive. Healer's kits don't heal for much.
Athletics-Climbing comes up sometimes, and swimming rarely
Acrobatics-Unless you're playing a waterborne campaign on particularly stormy seas, or your GM lets you use this instead of Strength for climbing
Survival-Though in wilderness-heavy campaigns, this is probably B or even A.
D Rank-Rarely Useful
Animal Handling-5e doesn't seem meant for mounted combat, and even then it's not needed all the time
Sleight of Hand-Sure chaotic stupid players love to pickpocket every NPC, but in high leverage situations?
Performance-Almost entirely for flavor. Bards don't actually need this, which is crazy.
The thing is, you've deliberately created a situation where those are relevant and interesting mechanics. In the day to day business of the actual game, they're not worth considering or even bothering with. When you make the entire adventure or whatever you're doing around them, which you've just done, they are more than worth using.
Otherwise I don't see any reason to not handwave them away and stick with a method that involves less dice rolling etc.
Unless the players specifically want to carry out that Large statue of Orcus from the dungeon. Then it becomes relevant.
There could be a couple fun encounters wrapped around that scenario right there.
There was. It's an inside joke from a 4e campaign Aegeri ran on these forums years ago. We were exploring a dungeon in the Shadowfell and happened upon a Large-size ornate statue of Orcus, that Aegeri described in great detail. After the encounter in the room, we were looting bodies as per standard murderhobo protocol when my character looked at the statue and asked how much it was worth. What followed was a hilarious series of shenanigans as our wizard used Tenser's Floating Disk to carry this thing around for the next... like 8 sessions? Until we got to a town. By that point it had been severely damaged by all the random stuff we'd had to deal with getting it out there, but it was still worth a cool 800gp or so, if I recall.
As we reached the endgame, with all of us near max level (more than a year later), Aegeri informed us that (as a result of side stuff going on) Orcus had claimed the throne of God of the Dead. Consequently, in the final battle, if any of our characters died, they could not be resurrected because Orcus would not relinquish their souls. Another player asked,
"Why's he hate us so much? We haven't even seen him, much less interfered with his plans."
Me: "It's because of the statue, isn't it?"
Aegeri: "Yup."
Listen, sometimes you just need to desecrate a shrine to Orcus.
Orcus' followers desecrate everyone else's shrines all the time. Give him a taste of his own medicine.
Now I'm worried. Would desecrating a shrine to Orcus anger him, or be considered an act of worship?
Depends on what you do, I'd say. Spill the blood of innocents over the altar and Orcus would be pretty happy with that. But, clean the dried blood, get rid of all the bones, and put in a tasteful skylight to let the sun in, and I'd bet Orcus would be pretty pissed.
That along with stealth and deception proficiency makes Criminal a really nice background for anyone looking to fill the traditional rogue role in a party, no matter what class they are.
The thing is, you've deliberately created a situation where those are relevant and interesting mechanics. In the day to day business of the actual game, they're not worth considering or even bothering with. When you make the entire adventure or whatever you're doing around them, which you've just done, they are more than worth using.
Otherwise I don't see any reason to not handwave them away and stick with a method that involves less dice rolling etc.
Exactly. Being deliberate is important when creating encounters and adventures. And you're right, unless there's a situation that warrants it I don't usually make them keep track of minutia like arrows or torches or even rations because when those things don't matter they're boring. I still make them describe to me though what they're eating every night when they camp for their long rest. It only took 4 long rests before they were 'bored' of eating stale iron rations, and the Bard then volunteered to do the cooking each night. When they talked about going back to town, one of the first things she said was that she needed to stock up on spices and ingredients. There's no mechanic there; I don't give them a bonus for eating more imaginative food. It's simple immersion and thinking of themselves as characters in a real (make-believe) world.
They're not really thinking of encumbrance yet; the Alchemist in the party took a Bag of Holding as part of one of his class abilities, so they store everything that isn't a weapon in there. I mean everything. It's gonna be quite an adventure when he loses that bag...
Holy shit taking a bag of holding is amazing.
I'm about to just pull the loot rug out from under my party, and its going to feel delightful. Like they have all their useful utility items, but most of their cash, is with a certain NPC, and that guy's about to disappear all their money. Gunna be great to see that reaction.
I'm going to give it back... I'm just keeping that in my back pocket for a quick story hook. And maybe as a byproduct it'll make them think a little bit about eggs and baskets and where all there stuff physically is in the world.
It's just like the Baldurs Gate 1 2016 Beamdog expansion
when the buttler steals all your gold to pay off the mafia (but it's actually a balance thing so it doesn't matter how much gold you have when you beat the original)
Been thinking about skills a lot today. Some of them seem very bad. Thought I'd make a tier list.
D Rank-Rarely Useful
Sleight of Hand-Sure chaotic stupid players love to pickpocket every NPC, but in high leverage situations?
Isn't Sleight of Hand the "disarm traps" button in 5E? I think I'd put that a little higher
Thieves' Tools for disarming traps/picking locks. It's its own proficiency.
Also worth noting that Thieves Tools are the only "traditionally dungeon action" type skill that you can learn via downtime because they're a tool and not a skill. I think that this is likely intentional
so hey, I've been listening to Mat Colville for a while and this struck me as interesting for initiative and also as something to help keep all players engaged in the battle.
I'd probably have a 3minute sand timer for deliberation of what to do and then tell everyone to roll all their dice at once and then sort it out from there to see how all the chaos turned out for that round.
The main take away (for me) was that it would keep players engaged throughout combat because no one was just sitting waiting for their turn and it gives them a bit of a dilemma to worry over in choosing lesser attacks and going first, or weathering the storm and then you drop the hammer. Using the 3minute timer gets them to make quick gut calls and not worry about being absolutely efficient in battle (because you can't be) and to also keep the game moving.
you don't have to take it verbatim but one of the lead DnD designers is running something like that, and just providing the idea and framework we can monkey around with that idea as well.
Its shit. It works, but only because lots of things in DnD "work" even when they're poorly structured or balanced.
The main problems it has has been hashed out significantly in this thread but the main issue, even if you consider the distortionary effect on character creation and action*, is that conditional actions break the system. If you're a melee attacker and you want to "attack but not move" and the target of your attack moves away before you can attack what the fuck do you do? Well obviously you follow them but what happens to your initiative position? Do you simply lose the ability to react to things in a combat round?
As an example. Colville says at 2:30 ish "if i really want that guy to be dead before his turn i will make a ranged attack instead of casting a spell"... except that you're a 12 dex wizard so you cannot. Or you're an 8 dex fighter so you cannot. You have to take the move and action abilities (and god forbid you're an eldrich knight... i take the move, spell, and bonus actions...)
A lot of classes simply lose the ability to do their core action economy structure. Rogues for instance, at level 2, get cunning action. The entire point of cunning action is that depending on the situation you can disengage, dodge, or hide as a bonus action, or do none of those things and attack with an off hand weapon if you missed your sneak attack. But if i have to declare this then i have lost that entire balance structure of my class. If i only have to declare a bonus action i still have the problem that doing so makes me almost always go last. Melee Attack + Bonus Action + Move = 2d8+1d6, only the aforementioned Eldrich Knight is slower.
*That is the increased value of ranged attacks(which are top tier already)
There are some ways you could potentially fix this. But they're so complicated as to be painful. If each action you chose went on that point in the initiative order or could be delayed until later then things would be better... but this has its own problems as now each actor has 3 points of initiative and so there is 3 times more action resolution to go over! Plus dice are small enough that now you are likely to have multiple actions resolving on the same initiative(which means multiple "who has the better dex check" interactions... per round)... and this has its own problems with modifying action value because now movement has a high likelihood of denying an enemy their ranged attacks... and now they cannot even disengage against it because they didn't choose that action.
A much, much, much better system would just be hidden rerolled initiative. That is, the DM has a list and each time combat round ends he rerolls initiative and then goes down the new list without telling players their point in the order. People have to pay attention because they don't know when they come up in the order so each turn of combat gives them another situation that they have to know how to respond to.
edit: His suggestions don't make it better in the slightest. Oh god now you have to delcare what level of spell you're casting and if something happens and you don't want to cast that spell level what do you do? Nothing? Cast a faster spell? If that is the case everyone will almost be forced to declare the highest level spell they could always cast, they would almost always have to because if you only have one attack cantrip and its ranged and then you get moved on you're almost literally going to sit with your hand up your butt for an entire round of combat
Edit2: the "3 points of initiative" system also breaks the movement system in 5e where there is no "move action" but rather you can move and do any of your actions at any point of your move
edit3:
As an example, think about a fighter who isn't foolish. They don't know if their target is going to be next to them so every turn they declare "I attack with my weapon and move". Their turn gets up and they don't have to move, so they don't take that action. Why does that fighter to go after a fighter that declared they only attacked with their weapon?
Like. Hidden Rerolled initiative is actually pretty decent to fix the problems people have with the current system. And almost any modifications to the prior system will devolve into re-rolled initiative anyway.
As an example, in the thread Colville suggests that if you want to change your action you have to add the new action to the initiative by rolling it again and adding your roll to what you currently have. Which is just so much overhead its mind boggling. You need to recreate a list each round with potentially custom modifiers and then you need to reorder the list on the fly as things change and oh my god why.
Get a goddam initiative app for your phone. Stick everyone in there and reclick the button that rolls and lists every round.
Edit: Its also really really harsh in terms of action value.
So one thing you can do is check the probability of action by looking at the various distributions and then map them by going to anydice.com and entering "distribution 1-distribution 2" and then checking the totals. The value at 1 is P(distribution 2> distribution 1) assuming that distribution 1 beats 2 on a tie.
So P(1d20>1d20+1) = output 1d20-1d20-1 (and then look for "at least 1" in the results) = 42.75%
For some values for initiatives based on the difference between initiative orders would be
But now common initiative values for that system...(assuming lower die has priority, note that this is reversed because we're wanting to look at lower values winning rather than higher)
P(1d12<1d4) = 12.5%
P(1d6<1d4) = 25%
P(1d12<1d10) = 37.5%
P(1d8+1d6<1d8) = 14.58%
P(1d4+1d6<1d8) = 27.08% or 38.02%(depending on which die you say is the "lower", the d4 and d6 or the d8)
P(2d8+1d6<1d4) = 2.28% [equivalent to about +15 initiative vs +0)
Even if you're hedging around with what die go to what actions you're almost hard coding initiative compared to a system which people complain has too much value on dexterity because of its effect on initiative.
I can see the problem with a known initiative order - Its predictable, but I don't see how a convoluted Initiative system like this: where you know there's going to be debate every round about which initiative die needs to be rolled, let alone the discussion about what people are going to do is just going to slow down combat even more. regardless of class-balancing or anything similar. this adds like 10 to 15 minutes to each combat round for no seeming reason.
The value of an unknown initiative order is that players, because they do not know who goes in front of them, are more likely to be paying attention to the game.
Tonight I'll be running ICRPG which uses a fixed initiative order based on where the players are sitting, DM goes last. I'll let you know how it works.
And yes, people can metagame by sitting in certain seats to optimize their turns with each other.
I haven't used it yet with my 5th edition games, but my favorite initiative system is Player turn, GM turn, repeat. Obviously it allows for focus-fire, and the players and GM need to be ready for that, but the upside there is that on the player turn they usually do a little mini-planning session, tell me what it is, and then just execute. It actually saves time in most cases because they're all invested during their turn and they don't need the situation reexplained all the time. It also let's them work together splendidly: the sequence of actions in my last recap that let the bard steal the scroll from the sorcerer was done in this kind of format, though we rolled initiative immediately following for the actual fight.
Also, the biggest downside to this system is that you don't get to say "Roll Initiative" to let the players know that shit just got real.
For our latest game we made cards with each of the characters, and then a few different colored "enemy goes now" for each enemy type (i.e. fighting 5 goblin archers and a goblin shaman = two enemy cards). Characters and enemys get shuffled each round and that's initiative that round. Alterations like the Alert feat or initiative advantage Mystics get, etc.. are represented as that character getting two cards and going on the first one.
The value of an unknown initiative order is that players, because they do not know who goes in front of them, are more likely to be paying attention to the game.
Yes. but the value in a more mutable initiative order like the one talked about is that it encourages players to think tactically, which is the real goal with an initiative system like that. You can get people to pay attention by making it interesting, which in my opinion is a better solution than getting people to pay attention by making their turn a surprise.
The only thing really stopping it from working really well is that dnd characters only tend to be able to do one thing, so it's less of a choice and more "decide that ranged characters go first and spellcasters go last."
Most of the other complaints you have can be effectively handwaved away. If you get a bonus action, it's free. If you want to be able to chase an opponent that goes before you, you must roll a movement die. You don't need an initiative list if people's initiative dice are sitting unmolested in front of them, you just count up from one and people go when their number is called.
Unfortunately the one fundamental problem is that it's not tactical, because only a handful of dnd archetypes actually get to choose between even 2 of "melee, ranged, and spells."
But the Colville tweaks to me seem like a whole lot of extra dice roll that more or less results in: Ranged Go -> Non Moving Melee -> Spell Casters -> Moving Melee. Every round. Over and over. At least with default initiative, you're not going to get the same characters going in the same order, only ever broken up depending on what the monster does.
Speed factor I think is pretty good, accomplishes the same idea as the Colville initiative, and at least to me, does so in a way that allows everyone to make interesting decisions. And ultimately, it doesn't overly penalize or alter the process of rolling initiative.
Diagnosed with AML on 6/1/12. Read about it: www.effleukemia.com
The value of an unknown initiative order is that players, because they do not know who goes in front of them, are more likely to be paying attention to the game.
Yes. but the value in a more mutable initiative order like the one talked about is that it encourages players to think tactically, which is the real goal with an initiative system like that. You can get people to pay attention by making it interesting, which in my opinion is a better solution than getting people to pay attention by making their turn a surprise.
The only thing really stopping it from working really well is that dnd characters only tend to be able to do one thing, so it's less of a choice and more "decide that ranged characters go first and spellcasters go last."
Most of the other complaints you have can be effectively handwaved away. If you get a bonus action, it's free. If you want to be able to chase an opponent that goes before you, you must roll a movement die. You don't need an initiative list if people's initiative dice are sitting unmolested in front of them, you just count up from one and people go when their number is called.
Unfortunately the one fundamental problem is that it's not tactical, because only a handful of dnd archetypes actually get to choose between even 2 of "melee, ranged, and spells."
It does not, even in an idealized form where you fix all of the problems, encourage people to think tactically any more than they do normally.
Tactical thinking and action is a function of abilities and advantages, not a function of when you go in the round. The idea that the "big threat" doesn't need to be prioritized if you don't talk about it before hand is dumb. No it still needs to be prioritized and people with low initiatives should consider that...
And you can talk about that before or during the combat round under normal initiative just as you can using wonky init.
I like the idea of hidden reroll initiative for each round but could it be modified to weight the numbers so that the overall order doesn't significantly change?
E.g. rolls are 21, 16, 15, 10, 7, 3. The reroll algorithm creates a lottery type system so that 21 will probably go first again but 15 and 16 could easily get swapped. Then there's a rare situation, but still plausible, that Captain Baddrol gets to repeat his turn immediately.
To me this would feel slightly more random than RAW, especially if you only call out who is up rather than revealing the complete new order, but also function with some predictability. It'd be like FF's active time battle, sorta.
I like the idea of hidden reroll initiative for each round but could it be modified to weight the numbers so that the overall order doesn't significantly change?
E.g. rolls are 21, 16, 15, 10, 7, 3. The reroll algorithm creates a lottery type system so that 21 will probably go first again but 15 and 16 could easily get swapped. Then there's a rare situation, but still plausible, that Captain Baddrol gets to repeat his turn immediately.
To me this would feel slightly more random than RAW, especially if you only call out who is up rather than revealing the complete new order, but also function with some predictability. It'd be like FF's active time battle, sorta.
That sounds like a whole lot of game time lost to recalculation for a very minor and occasional upside? Nevermind Captain Baddrol being in the bathroom because they didn't figure their turn would be up soon and other practical matters. At a certain point you need to step back and ask if a given rule is worth the effort for the additional enjoyment it brings to the table.
I like the idea of hidden reroll initiative for each round but could it be modified to weight the numbers so that the overall order doesn't significantly change?
E.g. rolls are 21, 16, 15, 10, 7, 3. The reroll algorithm creates a lottery type system so that 21 will probably go first again but 15 and 16 could easily get swapped. Then there's a rare situation, but still plausible, that Captain Baddrol gets to repeat his turn immediately.
To me this would feel slightly more random than RAW, especially if you only call out who is up rather than revealing the complete new order, but also function with some predictability. It'd be like FF's active time battle, sorta.
Yes. You can sum init rolls and then reorder. You could also drop the init mod when rerolling int for the sum
Do people have combats in 5E that are still interesting into round 3 and beyond, to the point that reordering initiative even has any effect? I feel like most fights are effectively mop-up operations after two rounds, but maybe that's just my table/DM.
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AegisFear My DanceOvershot Toronto, Landed in OttawaRegistered Userregular
Well, if you're following the Undermountain game, we just finished killing 37 Stirges in which has to be the most clown fiesta of clown fiestas I've been a part of.
Tactical thinking and action is a function of abilities and advantages, not a function of when you go in the round.[/i].
So, if I announce at the top of the round that the dragon is getting ready to breathe, you don't think that it suddenly becomes more important to go before the dragon? Or, if you find yourself at the top of the round low on health, you don't think you might find it important to go first to put yourself in a protected position? Or maybe you have some sort of combination of a magic item and a spell which is much more effective if you can use one right after the other before any enemies activate. Maybe you'd find it advantageous to go as soon as possible in the initiative order on that particular round.
There are a million situations where going first in a given round is a tactical advantage. It doesn't happen every round, but to simply assert that who goes first is never a meaningful decision is foolish.
Tactical thinking and action is a function of abilities and advantages, not a function of when you go in the round.[/i].
So, if I announce at the top of the round that the dragon is getting ready to breathe, you don't think that it suddenly becomes more important to go before the dragon? Or, if you find yourself at the top of the round low on health, you don't think you might find it important to go first to put yourself in a protected position? Or maybe you have some sort of combination of a magic item and a spell which is much more effective if you can use one right after the other before any enemies activate. Maybe you'd find it advantageous to go as soon as possible in the initiative order on that particular round.
There are a million situations where going first in a given round is a tactical advantage. It doesn't happen every round, but to simply assert that who goes first is never a meaningful decision is foolish.
No. None of those things are functions of when you go in the round, they're functions of
A) Being told what the enemy is going to do Situations which need resolution
Nothing forces those situations to come from having this type of initiative system. Nothing in this initiative system generates those types of situations.
I like the idea of hidden reroll initiative for each round but could it be modified to weight the numbers so that the overall order doesn't significantly change?
E.g. rolls are 21, 16, 15, 10, 7, 3. The reroll algorithm creates a lottery type system so that 21 will probably go first again but 15 and 16 could easily get swapped. Then there's a rare situation, but still plausible, that Captain Baddrol gets to repeat his turn immediately.
To me this would feel slightly more random than RAW, especially if you only call out who is up rather than revealing the complete new order, but also function with some predictability. It'd be like FF's active time battle, sorta.
Yes. You can sum init rolls and then reorder. You could also drop the init mod when rerolling int for the sum
Is there an app that already does this? I was talking to my boss yesterday about it trying to figure out the equation for it.
Tactical thinking and action is a function of abilities and advantages, not a function of when you go in the round.[/i].
So, if I announce at the top of the round that the dragon is getting ready to breathe, you don't think that it suddenly becomes more important to go before the dragon? Or, if you find yourself at the top of the round low on health, you don't think you might find it important to go first to put yourself in a protected position? Or maybe you have some sort of combination of a magic item and a spell which is much more effective if you can use one right after the other before any enemies activate. Maybe you'd find it advantageous to go as soon as possible in the initiative order on that particular round.
There are a million situations where going first in a given round is a tactical advantage. It doesn't happen every round, but to simply assert that who goes first is never a meaningful decision is foolish.
No. None of those things are functions of when you go in the round, they're functions of
A) Being told what the enemy is going to do Situations which need resolution
Nothing forces those situations to come from having this type of initiative system. Nothing in this initiative system generates those types of situations.
I didn't say this initiative system generated those situations, I said that such a system would promote tactical thinking when situations like that happen to come up.
If you're low on health at the top of the round, under normal circumstances, you hope any enemies that go before you either miss or choose not to hit you. However, maybe you choose to just move, dramatically lowering the EV for your initiative roll and making it much more likely you go before those enemies so you can make it into cover of some sort. That's an additional tactical decision, which is fun. Unfortunately, "attack" or "attack move" or "move without attacking" are generally the only three choices you've got due to the way dnd classes hyper specialize, so that is just about the only sort of situation where you actually would be making an addition nontrivial decision. That's the reason this system doesn't work, not because it doesn't provide meaningful decisions.
Tactical thinking and action is a function of abilities and advantages, not a function of when you go in the round.[/i].
So, if I announce at the top of the round that the dragon is getting ready to breathe, you don't think that it suddenly becomes more important to go before the dragon? Or, if you find yourself at the top of the round low on health, you don't think you might find it important to go first to put yourself in a protected position? Or maybe you have some sort of combination of a magic item and a spell which is much more effective if you can use one right after the other before any enemies activate. Maybe you'd find it advantageous to go as soon as possible in the initiative order on that particular round.
There are a million situations where going first in a given round is a tactical advantage. It doesn't happen every round, but to simply assert that who goes first is never a meaningful decision is foolish.
No. None of those things are functions of when you go in the round, they're functions of
A) Being told what the enemy is going to do Situations which need resolution
Nothing forces those situations to come from having this type of initiative system. Nothing in this initiative system generates those types of situations.
I didn't say this initiative system generated those situations, I said that such a system would promote tactical thinking when situations like that happen to come up.
If you're low on health at the top of the round, under normal circumstances, you hope any enemies that go before you either miss or choose not to hit you. However, maybe you choose to just move, dramatically lowering the EV for your initiative roll and making it much more likely you go before those enemies so you can make it into cover of some sort. That's an additional tactical decision, which is fun. Unfortunately, "attack" or "attack move" or "move without attacking" are generally the only three choices you've got due to the way dnd classes hyper specialize, so that is just about the only sort of situation where you actually would be making an addition nontrivial decision. That's the reason this system doesn't work, not because it doesn't provide meaningful decisions.
Uh...I'm pretty sure this post literally says "This initiative system adds additional meaningful decisions, which is fun. Unfortunately, due to the way dnd classes hyperspecialize, it usually won't add additional meaningful decisions. This system doesn't work because it doesn't provide meaningful decisions, not because it doesn't provide meaningful decisions."
Even the narrow situation you're describing is still a trivial decision, because skipping your action is virtually never correct. You need your action in that scenario, either to disengage with the enemy you're fighting so you don't eat OAs running for cover, to drink a potion/otherwise heal yourself, or just to kill your opponent before he hits you again. The whole reason you're trying to go first in that scenario is so that you don't get knocked out before your turn and lose your action for the round. If you give up your action to go first, all you've done is turn "I might not get my action" into "I definitely do not get my action". And then very probably gotten knocked out anyway.
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There could be a couple fun encounters wrapped around that scenario right there.
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
I have no idea who would want to do something that dangerous or ridiculous.
Currently DMing: None
Characters
[5e] Dural Melairkyn - AC 18 | HP 40 | Melee +5/1d8+3 | Spell +4/DC 12
Orcus' followers desecrate everyone else's shrines all the time. Give him a taste of his own medicine.
Now I'm worried. Would desecrating a shrine to Orcus anger him, or be considered an act of worship?
Currently DMing: None
Characters
[5e] Dural Melairkyn - AC 18 | HP 40 | Melee +5/1d8+3 | Spell +4/DC 12
Exactly. Being deliberate is important when creating encounters and adventures. And you're right, unless there's a situation that warrants it I don't usually make them keep track of minutia like arrows or torches or even rations because when those things don't matter they're boring. I still make them describe to me though what they're eating every night when they camp for their long rest. It only took 4 long rests before they were 'bored' of eating stale iron rations, and the Bard then volunteered to do the cooking each night. When they talked about going back to town, one of the first things she said was that she needed to stock up on spices and ingredients. There's no mechanic there; I don't give them a bonus for eating more imaginative food. It's simple immersion and thinking of themselves as characters in a real (make-believe) world.
They're not really thinking of encumbrance yet; the Alchemist in the party took a Bag of Holding as part of one of his class abilities, so they store everything that isn't a weapon in there. I mean everything. It's gonna be quite an adventure when he loses that bag...
A Rank-Useful constantly
Stealth-it's for being sneaky, good even though the 5e rules feel a little shaky
Perception-Spot ambushes and secret doors
Athletics-for Grapplers only
B Rank-Useful frequently
Investigation-Your other skill for finding stuff. Probably down to DM preference how often this comes up v. Perception
Insight-Is someone lying to you?
Persuasion/Intimidation/Deception-The Face's toolkit, though you probably don't need all 3 on one member.
C Rank-Useful Situationally
Arcana/Nature/History/Religion-the Librarian's toolkit.
Medicine-Keeps people alive. Healer's kits don't heal for much.
Athletics-Climbing comes up sometimes, and swimming rarely
Acrobatics-Unless you're playing a waterborne campaign on particularly stormy seas, or your GM lets you use this instead of Strength for climbing
Survival-Though in wilderness-heavy campaigns, this is probably B or even A.
D Rank-Rarely Useful
Animal Handling-5e doesn't seem meant for mounted combat, and even then it's not needed all the time
Sleight of Hand-Sure chaotic stupid players love to pickpocket every NPC, but in high leverage situations?
Performance-Almost entirely for flavor. Bards don't actually need this, which is crazy.
There was. It's an inside joke from a 4e campaign Aegeri ran on these forums years ago. We were exploring a dungeon in the Shadowfell and happened upon a Large-size ornate statue of Orcus, that Aegeri described in great detail. After the encounter in the room, we were looting bodies as per standard murderhobo protocol when my character looked at the statue and asked how much it was worth. What followed was a hilarious series of shenanigans as our wizard used Tenser's Floating Disk to carry this thing around for the next... like 8 sessions? Until we got to a town. By that point it had been severely damaged by all the random stuff we'd had to deal with getting it out there, but it was still worth a cool 800gp or so, if I recall.
As we reached the endgame, with all of us near max level (more than a year later), Aegeri informed us that (as a result of side stuff going on) Orcus had claimed the throne of God of the Dead. Consequently, in the final battle, if any of our characters died, they could not be resurrected because Orcus would not relinquish their souls. Another player asked,
"Why's he hate us so much? We haven't even seen him, much less interfered with his plans."
Me: "It's because of the statue, isn't it?"
Aegeri: "Yup."
Depends on what you do, I'd say. Spill the blood of innocents over the altar and Orcus would be pretty happy with that. But, clean the dried blood, get rid of all the bones, and put in a tasteful skylight to let the sun in, and I'd bet Orcus would be pretty pissed.
Isn't Sleight of Hand the "disarm traps" button in 5E? I think I'd put that a little higher
Thieves' Tools for disarming traps/picking locks. It's its own proficiency.
Holy shit taking a bag of holding is amazing.
I'm about to just pull the loot rug out from under my party, and its going to feel delightful. Like they have all their useful utility items, but most of their cash, is with a certain NPC, and that guy's about to disappear all their money. Gunna be great to see that reaction.
Also worth noting that Thieves Tools are the only "traditionally dungeon action" type skill that you can learn via downtime because they're a tool and not a skill. I think that this is likely intentional
I'd probably have a 3minute sand timer for deliberation of what to do and then tell everyone to roll all their dice at once and then sort it out from there to see how all the chaos turned out for that round.
The main take away (for me) was that it would keep players engaged throughout combat because no one was just sitting waiting for their turn and it gives them a bit of a dilemma to worry over in choosing lesser attacks and going first, or weathering the storm and then you drop the hammer. Using the 3minute timer gets them to make quick gut calls and not worry about being absolutely efficient in battle (because you can't be) and to also keep the game moving.
you don't have to take it verbatim but one of the lead DnD designers is running something like that, and just providing the idea and framework we can monkey around with that idea as well.
Thought?
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The main problems it has has been hashed out significantly in this thread but the main issue, even if you consider the distortionary effect on character creation and action*, is that conditional actions break the system. If you're a melee attacker and you want to "attack but not move" and the target of your attack moves away before you can attack what the fuck do you do? Well obviously you follow them but what happens to your initiative position? Do you simply lose the ability to react to things in a combat round?
As an example. Colville says at 2:30 ish "if i really want that guy to be dead before his turn i will make a ranged attack instead of casting a spell"... except that you're a 12 dex wizard so you cannot. Or you're an 8 dex fighter so you cannot. You have to take the move and action abilities (and god forbid you're an eldrich knight... i take the move, spell, and bonus actions...)
A lot of classes simply lose the ability to do their core action economy structure. Rogues for instance, at level 2, get cunning action. The entire point of cunning action is that depending on the situation you can disengage, dodge, or hide as a bonus action, or do none of those things and attack with an off hand weapon if you missed your sneak attack. But if i have to declare this then i have lost that entire balance structure of my class. If i only have to declare a bonus action i still have the problem that doing so makes me almost always go last. Melee Attack + Bonus Action + Move = 2d8+1d6, only the aforementioned Eldrich Knight is slower.
*That is the increased value of ranged attacks(which are top tier already)
There are some ways you could potentially fix this. But they're so complicated as to be painful. If each action you chose went on that point in the initiative order or could be delayed until later then things would be better... but this has its own problems as now each actor has 3 points of initiative and so there is 3 times more action resolution to go over! Plus dice are small enough that now you are likely to have multiple actions resolving on the same initiative(which means multiple "who has the better dex check" interactions... per round)... and this has its own problems with modifying action value because now movement has a high likelihood of denying an enemy their ranged attacks... and now they cannot even disengage against it because they didn't choose that action.
A much, much, much better system would just be hidden rerolled initiative. That is, the DM has a list and each time combat round ends he rerolls initiative and then goes down the new list without telling players their point in the order. People have to pay attention because they don't know when they come up in the order so each turn of combat gives them another situation that they have to know how to respond to.
edit: His suggestions don't make it better in the slightest. Oh god now you have to delcare what level of spell you're casting and if something happens and you don't want to cast that spell level what do you do? Nothing? Cast a faster spell? If that is the case everyone will almost be forced to declare the highest level spell they could always cast, they would almost always have to because if you only have one attack cantrip and its ranged and then you get moved on you're almost literally going to sit with your hand up your butt for an entire round of combat
Edit2: the "3 points of initiative" system also breaks the movement system in 5e where there is no "move action" but rather you can move and do any of your actions at any point of your move
edit3:
As an example, think about a fighter who isn't foolish. They don't know if their target is going to be next to them so every turn they declare "I attack with my weapon and move". Their turn gets up and they don't have to move, so they don't take that action. Why does that fighter to go after a fighter that declared they only attacked with their weapon?
guess it will be fun watching him trying to get it to work in his september game. :P
Steam - NotoriusBEN | Uplay - notoriusben | Xbox,Windows Live - ThatBEN
As an example, in the thread Colville suggests that if you want to change your action you have to add the new action to the initiative by rolling it again and adding your roll to what you currently have. Which is just so much overhead its mind boggling. You need to recreate a list each round with potentially custom modifiers and then you need to reorder the list on the fly as things change and oh my god why.
Get a goddam initiative app for your phone. Stick everyone in there and reclick the button that rolls and lists every round.
So one thing you can do is check the probability of action by looking at the various distributions and then map them by going to anydice.com and entering "distribution 1-distribution 2" and then checking the totals. The value at 1 is P(distribution 2> distribution 1) assuming that distribution 1 beats 2 on a tie.
So P(1d20>1d20+1) = output 1d20-1d20-1 (and then look for "at least 1" in the results) = 42.75%
For some values for initiatives based on the difference between initiative orders would be
+1 = 42.75%
+2 = 38.25%
+3 = 34%
+4 = 30%
+5 = 26.25%
+6 = 22.75%
+7 = 19.5%
+8 = 16.5%
+9 = 13.75%
+10 = 11.25%
But now common initiative values for that system...(assuming lower die has priority, note that this is reversed because we're wanting to look at lower values winning rather than higher)
P(1d12<1d4) = 12.5%
P(1d6<1d4) = 25%
P(1d12<1d10) = 37.5%
P(1d8+1d6<1d8) = 14.58%
P(1d4+1d6<1d8) = 27.08% or 38.02%(depending on which die you say is the "lower", the d4 and d6 or the d8)
P(2d8+1d6<1d4) = 2.28% [equivalent to about +15 initiative vs +0)
Even if you're hedging around with what die go to what actions you're almost hard coding initiative compared to a system which people complain has too much value on dexterity because of its effect on initiative.
And yes, people can metagame by sitting in certain seats to optimize their turns with each other.
Also, the biggest downside to this system is that you don't get to say "Roll Initiative" to let the players know that shit just got real.
Yes. but the value in a more mutable initiative order like the one talked about is that it encourages players to think tactically, which is the real goal with an initiative system like that. You can get people to pay attention by making it interesting, which in my opinion is a better solution than getting people to pay attention by making their turn a surprise.
The only thing really stopping it from working really well is that dnd characters only tend to be able to do one thing, so it's less of a choice and more "decide that ranged characters go first and spellcasters go last."
Most of the other complaints you have can be effectively handwaved away. If you get a bonus action, it's free. If you want to be able to chase an opponent that goes before you, you must roll a movement die. You don't need an initiative list if people's initiative dice are sitting unmolested in front of them, you just count up from one and people go when their number is called.
Unfortunately the one fundamental problem is that it's not tactical, because only a handful of dnd archetypes actually get to choose between even 2 of "melee, ranged, and spells."
http://theangrygm.com/fine-i-wrote-about-speed-factor-initiative-in-dd-5e/
But the Colville tweaks to me seem like a whole lot of extra dice roll that more or less results in: Ranged Go -> Non Moving Melee -> Spell Casters -> Moving Melee. Every round. Over and over. At least with default initiative, you're not going to get the same characters going in the same order, only ever broken up depending on what the monster does.
Speed factor I think is pretty good, accomplishes the same idea as the Colville initiative, and at least to me, does so in a way that allows everyone to make interesting decisions. And ultimately, it doesn't overly penalize or alter the process of rolling initiative.
It does not, even in an idealized form where you fix all of the problems, encourage people to think tactically any more than they do normally.
Tactical thinking and action is a function of abilities and advantages, not a function of when you go in the round. The idea that the "big threat" doesn't need to be prioritized if you don't talk about it before hand is dumb. No it still needs to be prioritized and people with low initiatives should consider that...
And you can talk about that before or during the combat round under normal initiative just as you can using wonky init.
E.g. rolls are 21, 16, 15, 10, 7, 3. The reroll algorithm creates a lottery type system so that 21 will probably go first again but 15 and 16 could easily get swapped. Then there's a rare situation, but still plausible, that Captain Baddrol gets to repeat his turn immediately.
To me this would feel slightly more random than RAW, especially if you only call out who is up rather than revealing the complete new order, but also function with some predictability. It'd be like FF's active time battle, sorta.
That sounds like a whole lot of game time lost to recalculation for a very minor and occasional upside? Nevermind Captain Baddrol being in the bathroom because they didn't figure their turn would be up soon and other practical matters. At a certain point you need to step back and ask if a given rule is worth the effort for the additional enjoyment it brings to the table.
Yes. You can sum init rolls and then reorder. You could also drop the init mod when rerolling int for the sum
Currently DMing: None
Characters
[5e] Dural Melairkyn - AC 18 | HP 40 | Melee +5/1d8+3 | Spell +4/DC 12
So, if I announce at the top of the round that the dragon is getting ready to breathe, you don't think that it suddenly becomes more important to go before the dragon? Or, if you find yourself at the top of the round low on health, you don't think you might find it important to go first to put yourself in a protected position? Or maybe you have some sort of combination of a magic item and a spell which is much more effective if you can use one right after the other before any enemies activate. Maybe you'd find it advantageous to go as soon as possible in the initiative order on that particular round.
There are a million situations where going first in a given round is a tactical advantage. It doesn't happen every round, but to simply assert that who goes first is never a meaningful decision is foolish.
No. None of those things are functions of when you go in the round, they're functions of
A) Being told what the enemy is going to do
Nothing forces those situations to come from having this type of initiative system. Nothing in this initiative system generates those types of situations.
Is there an app that already does this? I was talking to my boss yesterday about it trying to figure out the equation for it.
I didn't say this initiative system generated those situations, I said that such a system would promote tactical thinking when situations like that happen to come up.
If you're low on health at the top of the round, under normal circumstances, you hope any enemies that go before you either miss or choose not to hit you. However, maybe you choose to just move, dramatically lowering the EV for your initiative roll and making it much more likely you go before those enemies so you can make it into cover of some sort. That's an additional tactical decision, which is fun. Unfortunately, "attack" or "attack move" or "move without attacking" are generally the only three choices you've got due to the way dnd classes hyper specialize, so that is just about the only sort of situation where you actually would be making an addition nontrivial decision. That's the reason this system doesn't work, not because it doesn't provide meaningful decisions.
Uh...I'm pretty sure this post literally says "This initiative system adds additional meaningful decisions, which is fun. Unfortunately, due to the way dnd classes hyperspecialize, it usually won't add additional meaningful decisions. This system doesn't work because it doesn't provide meaningful decisions, not because it doesn't provide meaningful decisions."
Even the narrow situation you're describing is still a trivial decision, because skipping your action is virtually never correct. You need your action in that scenario, either to disengage with the enemy you're fighting so you don't eat OAs running for cover, to drink a potion/otherwise heal yourself, or just to kill your opponent before he hits you again. The whole reason you're trying to go first in that scenario is so that you don't get knocked out before your turn and lose your action for the round. If you give up your action to go first, all you've done is turn "I might not get my action" into "I definitely do not get my action". And then very probably gotten knocked out anyway.