Combat vs RP
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Shadowrun is amazing and is one of the top systems I hate combat in. Agonizing combat.
Completely agree on both counts, though I can't speak to 6th edition.
Some of the community likes a Blades in the Dark conversion for Shadowrun, though.
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I have the math kind of autism so I prefer combat
Thank god, I'm not alone lol
I also prefer combat -
This made me miss srgrafo's stuff on reddit. He's the artist who made the original. https://srgrafo.com/ i really like reading the white rooms.
he was a perv and I'm glad he's dead
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Quick grain of salt: when I say combat in GURPS goes faster than other systems, I'm only comparing it to other games that focus on tactical combat. The fastest combat I've seen was in Trail of Cthulhu, which paid so little attention to combat rules that your combat turn can be summarized as "roll 1d6 and pray"
Horror RPGs in general have very succinct combat. Prolonged battles don't really fit the vibes. It's pretty much either you die quickly, kill the monster quickly, or run away.
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I think the "I move and attack" stuff can get boring, especially if it's slow. Like, if the players are speedy about it then you're basically playing a board game, and that's fine. I start to lose patience when you get the "can i move here? oh i can only move 30 feet. what about here? oh that will provoke. maybe if i cast misty step? oh i can't cast two leveled spells in a round. Can I hide first? Oh that takes my action? Sorry I usually play rogue. Uhhh I guess I just shoot them." mode.
I also kind of really want to spend more time in systems where the talky parts have rules, too. D&D tends to be just "wing it' and "DM decides". If you're at the noble's ball and try to make a big speech to convince the duke to flee before your army attacks, there's not really a lot of structure there. It can be fine to just "talk it out, man", but that runs into the problem where my character on paper has CHA 20 but me in real life rocks a solid 10 CHA. Or the other case, where the fighter with 8 CHA has a salesguy for a player, and he punches well above his on-paper skills using his real life personality, where I'm sidelined.
Honestly, just removing all the social skills from D&D would normalize the system.
But there's also games like Fate, that handle social conflict and sword conflict with the same rules. Stab someone? Roll fight vs whatever they defend with. Stab someone with your words? Roll Cruelty vs their Composure. In either case, if your dice come out on top enough then they don't get to go on.
I think some peopel who want more RP would hate this, since it gamifies it. But I'd rather have it than the aforementioned "real life sales guy hogs the spotlight" problem.
Fate is probably my favorite system I've played. It's somehow got this magic that lets people really jump into scenes and their characters that other more crunchy systems don't.
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Combat can be fun, but DnD in particular reeaaally drags sometimes. An excellent DM helps, but even Dimension 20 takes a full session for a big combat encounter, which is usually just exhausting IMO. I much prefer systems like PBTA that keep combat pretty breezy and improv-friendly.
B/X is good. When characters have d6 hp and it's instant death at 0 the combat becomes way more serious and tense.
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I also (don’t lynch me) think that combat should be an RP experience. That could be my love for certain systems where you get bonuses for good, accurate descriptions and not simply, “I roll. I hit. I do X damage.”
Combat should be a RP experience regardless of system. What you're describing is one where proactive roleplay is a mechanical system, and I'll be honest, as someone who's never entertained a theatre career, fuck that god awful fucking noise. But the choice of what to do, and how you react after the roll should be informed by the fiction of the game and the fiction of the combat, and that is roleplay.
The fact that much of the discourse around the games and resources available to players is focused on min/maxing number munchers is a social problem, not a system one.
Fair enough, but I think as long as you don't let it extend to where players are trying to do things that they shouldn't with their actions, encouraging them to describe their character flicking a sword around the opponent's shield strap is encouraging them to engage with the scenario in a different way than just seeing stat numbers listed on a square.
I also think that the reactions in combat are exactly what you should be after. I love seeing a player take the 'nontactical' move that isn't what they designed it to do (so a rushing charger kill everything in one hit character taking a shielding action).
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I DMed a lot of shadowrun, and I really do love both of them equally. RP makes the world fun and meaningful, while combat gives it physicality, makes it real.
I miss it, if only I could afford to spend 10 hours on prep every week :<
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I DMed a lot of shadowrun, and I really do love both of them equally. RP makes the world fun and meaningful, while combat gives it physicality, makes it real.
I miss it, if only I could afford to spend 10 hours on prep every week :<
I'll expand this and say encounters. Sneaking past a patrol, disarming a trap, or charming a suspicious cook having a break at the service entrance... Those encounters often require some rp, but damn if there aren't stakes.
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Combat can be fun, but DnD in particular reeaaally drags sometimes. An excellent DM helps, but even Dimension 20 takes a full session for a big combat encounter, which is usually just exhausting IMO. I much prefer systems like PBTA that keep combat pretty breezy and improv-friendly.
Most ttrpgs are a roleplaying game glued to a strategy game and we flip flop between the games as we play. PBTA is a roleplaying game end to end. I love it with a group that enjoys roleplaying and doesn't care for strategy.
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Personally I find adding a lot of flavor that has no mechanical impact kind of distracting and tiresome in a different way. Like, sure, it sounds cool you slashed their ankles or whatever, but if it doesn't do anything I need to discard that. I can't, in most systems, then be like "ok he just got stabbed in the leg he's off balance. I can take advantage of that!". It's just noise.
Some people have been like "You just don't have any imagination!" but it's not that. It's that the flavor stuff is often actively not true, and it's tiresome to hold two separate world states in mind at the same time. One where the fighter just stabbed the guy in the hand and threw sand in his eyes, and the other where he hit for 5 damage and his hand + eyes are fine.
(Contrast Fate, which explicitly encourages you to be creative about the scene, and lets you mechanically benefit as well.)
Exactly this. Well said. I don't understand why people love the long meaningless descriptions. Does FATE narrative always match the mechanics like PBTA does?
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Exactly this. Well said. I don't understand why people love the long meaningless descriptions. Does FATE narrative always match the mechanics like PBTA does?
I don't know PBTA well but I believe so.
Basically, every scene and character can have 'aspects', which are things that are true about them. They're free form. Sometimes they're just there, like if you're in a bar it might have "Bubbling with drunk banter" or "Loud Pop Punk Soundtrack". Aspects can then affect what makes sense in the scene. "Loud Pop Punk" can make it easier to move without being heard, but harder to make a speech because no one can hear you, for example.
You can also explicitly create aspects. Turn off the jukebox and the aspect might change to "Weirdly Quiet Bar" or whatever. In a fight, you can use the "create an advantage" move. That's for stuff that isn't about taking them out of the conflict right now, but setting things up. Like pushing them off balance, disarming them, screaming "LOOK! A DISTRACTION!" whatever. If the roll comes out if your favor, you can create an aspect that's true and can also be invoked for a numeric bonus on a dice roll. So if you pants the guy you're fighting, he can't run full speed to chase you because his pants are down. You can also invoke that if you want to kick his ass, for a bonus on the dice roll.
These are all free form and it's up to the group to decide what it actually means. Most groups probably wouldn't let you invoke "I'm literally on fire!!" as a bonus if you're trying to sneak through a crowd.
Typically, as I understand it, you're either trying to take them out of the fight or trying to create advantages for side of the conflict. On a dramatic success on trying to take someone out, you can also create a small advantage.
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Come play World of Darkness, where that's the main focus!
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Personally I find adding a lot of flavor that has no mechanical impact kind of distracting and tiresome in a different way. Like, sure, it sounds cool you slashed their ankles or whatever, but if it doesn't do anything I need to discard that. I can't, in most systems, then be like "ok he just got stabbed in the leg he's off balance. I can take advantage of that!". It's just noise.
Some people have been like "You just don't have any imagination!" but it's not that. It's that the flavor stuff is often actively not true, and it's tiresome to hold two separate world states in mind at the same time. One where the fighter just stabbed the guy in the hand and threw sand in his eyes, and the other where he hit for 5 damage and his hand + eyes are fine.
(Contrast Fate, which explicitly encourages you to be creative about the scene, and lets you mechanically benefit as well.)
This is one thing cool about DCC (among several), that warriors can attempt a mighty deed along with their attack to get extra effects, like slashing their ankles, throwing sand in their eyes, swinging from a chandelier or anything else. Then the GM decides what effect it has. It makes warriors a lot more bad-ass than just whack whack whack.
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Come play World of Darkness, where that's the main focus!
Imo WoD I feel gets the right balance of RP and streamlined combat with optional additional rules if they are needed. I'm also generally a firm believer in combat means all other forms of diplomacy has failed. I also love that no matter how strong you are, everyone has 7 points of health they can take (but there are ways of getting around that especially for mages)
And for all the good and bad that the 5e splats that Paradox is putting out, the "3 rounds and call it" philosophy of combat is something I enjoy immensely.
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People will say this and still only play Dungeon Combat Game 5e rather than 1 of a thousand systems designed for exactly the type of player they are lmao
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I just want the story to move forward.
Also, having a combat in 2 rolls build tension for when you can, in fact, avoid the combat.
