[Game Unnamed Yet] My Combat Model is Running Out Of Control
Amphetryon:
Thanks for your thoughts, btrc.
Re: Attributes
I made the conscious choice to separate Coordination and Balance because the ability to maneuver in space is not the same thing, to my mind and experience, as fine motor skills and eye-hand coordination. A tight-rope walker uses a very different skills-set than an archer, for example. For another example, I was always reasonably good at dodgeball, but can't hit a baseball well at all )and there are many professional examples of good fielders with poor hitting skills, and vice-versa). Also, the attributes modifiers are listed at the top of the document linked; yes it's always a positive modifier or no modifier at all, as indicated.
Re: Combat
The attributes that contribute to the chance to hit are specifically listed: the attacker's Coordination and the defender's Balance, relative to each other. Your inclusion of the parenthetical "I presume" indicates there's some confusion about this, is that correct? Without a comparison of die rolls, we're left - as I understand your suggestion - with rolls against a static DC, something I'm specifically trying to avoid as much as possible in the system; it's included only as a passive defense at present. I would prefer not to mimic Shadowrun's "counting 6's" variety of combat, because it does not model the sort of oppositional combat structure I'd like to create.
Re: Dice rolls
I have yet to see a system where "the chance that a gun jams" did anything more in the long run than punish players to a significantly greater degree than it punished NPCs, so I do not want to include any sort of fumble/catastrophe chance beyond simply missing. That doesn't mean such a system doesn't exist or is impossible, simply that I've never seen one and am not a fan of that additional complication. Damage is already linked to the 'quality of success on the attack roll,' as the differential between your Attack roll and your opponent's Defense roll is added to the damage.
I think I'm missing part of the rationale behind your weapon damage suggestion, because it reads from here as an extra step rather than a streamlining. If it's not an extra step, then I think it is intended to replace multiple aspects of my current model, and I am unsure which aspects you propose to replace.
btrc:
Regarding attributes, stuff like this is always a designer decision. I was just trying to see the rationale behind it in the interest of streamlining.
For combat, you have your attacker's Coordination and defender's Balance, but isn't there also a separate bonus if one exceeds the other? This is something where you have to make a separate check against each opponent, which would slow down a melee a little. I wasn't suggesting going against a fixed number, just that a separate comparison step for each of multiple defenders could add some slog to things.
On dice, the "gun jams" was just an example of making one roll do multiple things. In your case, you have a “critical”, but that critical requires an additional roll, rather than being an effect generated by already existing parameters. It would be like a "gun jam" roll that then forces me to roll again to see the nature of the jam.
On the weapon damage suggestion: You have a 1d10 roll to hit, then potentially another roll for a critical, and a third roll for the damage of the weapon. All of these rolls are in the same ballpark in terms of the dice used. Specifically, you have a success margin already existing in the roll between you and the defender. If you get a really good hit (like a critical), then odds are that it is going to be a more damaging hit than an attack that is barely successful. However, the way you have it, it is possible to get a marginal hit that rolls well for damage and a critical hit that rolls minimum damage. Since you have damage as a random roll and "to hit" as a random roll, why not just factor damage into the success of the random roll and knock off an entire step?
So, let me give an example:
Yours:
1) Roll to hit
2) if get a critical, roll again
3) Roll for damage
Mine:
1) Roll to hit. If you hit, take the amount you hit by and add it to a fixed damage for the weapon type.
So if I know that my damage in combat because of my weapon, attack, muscles, etc. is (success margin + 4), the combat roll instantly tells me the damage my opponent has to deal with.
You see, if you hit your opponent by a lot, you automatically get the benefit of increased damage on them without needing a separate critical roll. A "critical" is just a really good roll to strike your opponent.
As a side effect, this actually gives you the potential for more variation in weapon types. Instead of d4, d6 and d10 weapons you can have additions of every amount from +1 to +10 as a fixed value for a particular weapon. So, instead of all "light" weapons being d4, you could have +1, +2 and +3 additions to the success of your combat roll.
Greg
Chris_Chinn:
Hi Amphetryon,
I guess something that would be useful for helping guide the discussion is to let us know how set in stone what you already have is, vs. how fast you want things to run for how many-ish combatants?
I mean, there's a lot of games that use maps and run well with lots of combatants (Savage Worlds), but they're usually highly simplified, and lots of games that have detailed combat choices and run well with up to 5 vs. 5 numbers (Burning Wheel, Riddle of Steel) and a whole lot between.
Knowing what you're aiming for on the spectrum is going to be necessary to pick out what kind of advice you're really looking for.
Chris
Amphetryon:
Re: "separate bonus"
It's a single, static check of attacker's Coordination vs defender's Balance, which should only 'slow down' combat in the smallest amount and only in the first round, since either the game-master already has access to the relevant stats to compare or can get and share the necessary information in a single exchange ("What are your Coordination and Balance?" '53 and 37' "Okay, you apply +1 to your attack rolls, then"). Subsequent rounds, and combats, the GM would not need to ask this for comparison unless notes went missing.
Re: criticals.
Criticals would be exceedingly rare in this system, since an intelligent defender would not pair 1s against 1s if possible. They are included to emulate a lucky shot, which may still only graze the temple or throat and thereby do less than spectacular damage. They're also intended to help shape the system overall in a way that doesn't favor rolling high or rolling low especially.
Re: what's set in stone.
I want to keep a declarative initiative round; it need not be 20 segments of 1/2 a second each.
I want the choice of going first or reacting to combat to be a viable one, rather than having going first as the only good choice.
I want to keep actions measured in segments to allow for a a variety of actions within a combat round, and to allow for actions to spill over into subsequent rounds such that combat order does not feel artificial.
I want to model combat so that 1-to-1 combat is the most common model, 2-to-1 combat gives a reasonable edge to the group vs the solo, and so that more than 4 combatants against 1 means the 1 should run away. At the same time, I want the system to actually be able to model 4 on 1 (and up) combats, which I'm not convinced is something I've achieved as of yet.I want to figure out if the combat model, as presented, is too lethal, or not dangerous enough to keep players engaged and excited, given the '3 rounds of combat should be dangerous' comment, made before, as the baseline.
I want to figure out of the current combat model can handle reinforcements arriving after combat starts, without everything going all wahooni-shaped.
I want to assign reasonable segment costs to ranged attacks in combat, both mechanical weapons(bows) and thrown weapons, with a "draw/quickfire" as well as a "draw/aim/fire" option available, with the latter marginally less efficient and damaging in combat than 'normal' melee attacks, and the former less efficient and damaging than that.
I want to figure out a way to model movement in combat, without radically rethinking the entire paradigm, that doesn't result in situations where combat can never be joined if the first to move simply runs away.
Chris_Chinn:
Hi Amphetryon,
That's a great set of clear goals! It seems like a lot of those are detailed on the specifics of numbers and probably are best found out with a bit of playtesting.
The issue of folks staying always out of reach is something a lot of games work with, differently:
- Old school D&D has pretty swingy odds on initiative- basically the only way to stay constantly out of reach is to win initiative and run, run, run (provided your movement is equal/greater than the opponent's).
- Games like Burning Wheel use an initial "positioning test" sort of thing- winner gets to take an advantageous position. For your game, maybe it gives them a number of free segments to take movement actions? Or, if they're holding position, it lets them dictate at what distance the opponent can get to before they get to start firing ranged weapons/charging/whatever.
- A lot of minis war games do stuff like split up movement and make melee "sticky" - that is, if you're armed with melee weapons and get within reach of an opponent, they can't just flee. In some cases you get free attacks, in some cases, they just can't flee at all until they've managed to injure/stun/whatever to get a second to run.
I'd probably look around at some war games for movement ideas and do some playtesting to see about the numbers, and perhaps get some inspiration about what might be a better approach to avoid the movement problem you mention?
Chris
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[*] Previous page