Something I've always hated about Palladium is how you have to play dumb with the dodge system. The only correct way to fight in Palladium by the book is to build a character with the maximum actions per round, hopefully get 2 more than whoever you are fighting, and then fire a long burst at the end of the round when they are out of actions and have to take the damage.

Quote from: Cranewings;408221Something I've always hated about Palladium is how you have to play dumb with the dodge system. The only correct way to fight in Palladium by the book is to build a character with the maximum actions per round, hopefully get 2 more than whoever you are fighting, and then fire a long burst at the end of the round when they are out of actions and have to take the damage.

Here's how you avoid this:

1) On your Init, you get to spend your Attack Actions.   Outside of your Init, you can only spend remaining Actions on Moves or Defense.  

OR

2) Your Init is divided by your total Actions, and you go on various Phases.  AKA, if I roll 13 for my Init and I have 5 actions, I go on phases 13 / 10 / 7 / 4 / 1.   So if I fire a long burst at 13 that costs 2 actions, my shot actually goes off on 10.  

I use Option 1 because I don't care for Phase bookeeping unless I used Fixed Init and even then its a bit rigid for me.    Instead, I like how Option 1 forces players to decide how aggressive they can get and how they have to balance the offense vs. defense.  So the guy dropping long bursts had better get lucky and blow his foe away or he's gonna be a sitting duck himself.

It makes Juicers scary.   That auto-dodge ability lets them spend all their actions on attacks, never caring about economizing.

That is a pretty solid system. I dig option 1.

Quote from: RPGPundit;408220I've certainly never used the dodge rules in that way; I've always read it and played it as dodging had to be rolled against each individual attack and cost one of your actions each time.

Same here.

Quote from: Spinachcat;408226Here's how you avoid this:

1) On your Init, you get to spend your Attack Actions.   Outside of your Init, you can only spend remaining Actions on Moves or Defense.  

Loved this! Looks like a good way to make Palladium combat more tactical.

Bah, pointless. First of all, the current combat system is a feature, not a bug. It supposes that if a person has been shooting, winding their way past bullets, dodging, etc, then at some point, they just can't move anymore and will be stuck for getting hit.

Second, with the proposed solution, if I read it right, there'd be nothing that would actually solve this problem. Player A on his init has 7 attacks, NPC villain B has 5 attacks; so player A can just fire 7 shots all at once, forcing villain B to try to dodge or parry or do simultaneous attacks (assuming that was still allowed with this change) until he's out of attacks, at which point player A still had two free hits on the guy. It changes nothing.

Except that, yes, then they're both out of attacks. But so what? My players, I know, would choose that every time. They'd use ALL of their actions to make attacks, based on the logic that the very best shot they have is to try to do max damage they can on the other guy and hope for the best.

So all this would probably end up doing is that, when the above tactic goes bad and players have left no actions for dodging, you're going to have a lot more dead RIFTS PCs.

RPGpundit

Good point Pundit, but it still leaves it the way my group has always played it, playing dumb with the system. No one tries to screw someone by going out of the way to target them when they are out of actions.

My players try to target opponents out of actions all the time, and my NPCs would do the same if a PC was out of actions; this is like I said something that seems perfectly emulative to me.  A guy has gotten so distracted by trying to hit or avoid being hit that he just can't avoid your shot by that point in the action.

RPGPundit

On the proposed actions fix: not sure it really solves the problem. The only real "fix" I think would be to say everyone has 4 actions, period - No bonuses for level ups, boxing or whatever.
Still I wouldn't actually do that since its just some characters schtick that they have lots of attacks (from memory mostly the robot combat training guys since they add their robot training attacks to their base HtH).

On the "Dodge applies vs. everyone" thing: haven't seen this either that I can recall. Checked the Palladium Books FAQ and nothing with that interpretation. One weird thing I did find that I thought was interesting is that officially "Autododge" (e.g. for Juicers) doesn't get the characters full Dodge bonuses, just PP bonus and any specific autododge bonuses.

In Ninja's and Superspies, there is Automatic Dodge, which has a lower bonus but doesn't cost an action, and Multiple Dodge, lower bonus but works against all incoming attacks.

Personally, I wouldn't mind people running out of actions and getting shot if there was a chance that a bullet would miss without a dodge roll, but it is pretty fucking easy to hit a 5 with an aimed shot.

Quote from: RPGPundit;408220Huh? Where was this clarified?
I've certainly never used the dodge rules in that way; I've always read it and played it as dodging had to be rolled against each individual attack and cost one of your actions each time.

RPGpundit

Then pre-RUE you were doing it wrong.

Originally, Palladium combat worked like this:

Player 1 has rolled high on initiative.  Player 2 is next.  Player 3 is last.

Player 1 attacks.  His target is Player 3.  Player 3 decides to dodge.  He uses his next action (his first one), and dodges.

Player 2 attacks Player 3.  Player 3's dodge roll is still in effect as his "action phase" hasn't come up.  In order to hit, Player 2 must roll higher than Player 3's existing dodge roll.

Player 3's action phase comes up.  He has already used his action to dodge.  Therefore, his dodge ends and his phase passes.

Player 1 attacks....

and so on.

In this way, each "action phase" (my own term, Palladium has no name for it) corresponds to the action everyone is on.  Action phase 8 is everyone's 8th action.  You have as many action phases as the combatant with the highest number of actions.

Basically, all trained dodges in Palladium are what Ninjas and Superspies calls Multiple Dodges.  The example in the original Rifts rulebook supported this flow of combat and it was more or less what was explained as the way to do it in Ninjas & Superspies (the book which is supposed to be the definitive combat book for the Palladium system).


Since Rifts Ultimate Edition, combat works like this:

Player 1 has rolled high on initiative.  Player 2 is next.  Player 3 is last.

Player 1 attacks Player 3.  Player 3 dodges.  He spends one of his actions.

Player 2 attacks Player 3.  Player 3 dodges.  He spends another one of his actions.

Player 3 gets to attack.  He uses his third action to attack.

and so on, untill all players run out of actions.  Player 3 will run out long before the other two.

Another difference is that this new method allows borrowing actions from the next round.  In this way, a character can spend all their actions for the current round as well as the next for dodging.

RUE radically changes what the number of attacks per round mean while simultaneously ignoring all previous examples and explanations of how combat works.

Im sorry, but where are you getting this?! I've got a ton of different palladium books, and I have NEVER seen the rules written in that way. Just right on-hand here, I have the original RIFTS book (deluxe edition, but not the UE), I have The Sentinels, I have the Robotech RPG, and I have Systems Failure, and NONE of them describe dodging the way you do.

In fact, in Systems failure it explictly says, "With only a few exceptions, each dodge uses up one of the character's attacks per melee round. So constantly dodging means the
character has no opportunity to attack."
In other words, you use an attack EVERY time you do a dodge.

Where did you get this idea of a one-roll per full-round dodge?

RPGPundit

Quote from: Cranewings;408618Personally, I wouldn't mind people running out of actions and getting shot if there was a chance that a bullet would miss without a dodge roll, but it is pretty fucking easy to hit a 5 with an aimed shot.

Again, though, it reflects the fact that the characters in RIFTS all start as pretty badass guys at level 1. Its a different power-level than in D&D.  Its expected that if the other guy isn't able to get out of the way, you will pretty well hit.

RPGPundit

Quote from: RPGPundit;408952Im sorry, but where are you getting this?! I've got a ton of different palladium books, and I have NEVER seen the rules written in that way. Just right on-hand here, I have the original RIFTS book (deluxe edition, but not the UE), I have The Sentinels, I have the Robotech RPG, and I have Systems Failure, and NONE of them describe dodging the way you do.

In fact, in Systems failure it explictly says, "With only a few exceptions, each dodge uses up one of the character's attacks per melee round. So constantly dodging means the
character has no opportunity to attack."
In other words, you use an attack EVERY time you do a dodge.

Where did you get this idea of a one-roll per full-round dodge?

RPGPundit

I'm not saying one roll per full round dodge.  I'm saying one roll per action phase.

First off, there's Rifts p. 34-35 where the sequence of combat is outlined.  Each participant in the combat does each of their actions in initiative order.  Everyone does their first action.  When everyone has done their first action, second actions are resolved, and so on.  Someone who dodges gives up their next attack.  Meaning they cannot act when their next phase comes up.

The combat example on p. 42-44 illustrates this.  In particular, pay attention to the bandit who dodges and therefore doesn't get to act when his action phase comes up.

This same sequence of combat exists in Ninjas & Superspies, which makes sense because N&SS is supposed to be the definitive and authoritative combat book for the Palladium system.  Dodge is explained on page 129.  "A Dodge roll is good against MULTIPLE attacks."  Also look at the Dodge Illustration at the bottom right of the page.

Also, I didn't say a dodge lasted for the entire round.  My example showed it only lasted until the character's next action came up, or for one "action phase."  Both the Rifts example of play and N&SS Dodge Illustration support and confirm this.

Here's the example again:

Phase 1; All characters on Action 1

Player 1 attacks Player 3.  Player 3 dodges and rolls a 15.

Player 2 attacks Player 3.  Player 3's dodge is still in effect, so Player 2 must roll higher than a 15 to strike.

Player 3's action comes up, but this is their action used for the previous dodge.  The dodge now expires.

Phase 2: All characters on Action 2

Player 1 attacks Player 3.  Player 3 dogers and rolls a 16.

Player 2 attacks Player 3.  Player 3's second dodge is in effect, so Player 2 must roll higher than a 16 to strike.

Player 3's action comes up.  This action was used for the second dodge.  The dodge now expires.

Phase 3: All characters on Action 3

etc.

Dodging means you give up an action as well as an attack phase.  If you keep dodging, then you run out of actions and never get to attack.

Hmm
An "action phase" would be what they'd call "First attack"  then "second attack", etc ?
I wouldn't call "Ninjas & Superspies" the definitive combat handbook - it isn't necessarily going to be the same as other Palladium books exactly (its Erick whereas Rifts is Siembieda) and there seem to be other minor changes to rules between the two -i.e. how Death Blow works, or in number of attacks characters get maybe (2+HtH elective, vs. just the number listed for your martial arts Form).

I don't think anyone's disputing that a Dodge uses up your next attack (i.e. skip your next turn) just whether it lets you roll or use the same roll against multiple foes shooting at you during that attack. If Rifts 34-35 lets you do that, that'd be correct then (I can't verify as my book is currently packed somewhere).

There's no such thing as an "action phase" in palladium, you just made it up.

And this is important because combat doesn't work in that way, in those kinds of "phases" like you are thinking about. In your earlier posts you were very clearly suggesting that one dodge roll affects everything for the round, now its for the "aciton phase" you just invented.

If dodge worked the way you suggested, the concept of "multiple dodge" from N&S would be meaningless.

You have yet to show anywhere in RIFTS or in any other system (aside from N&S, where clearly the guy was using a Multiple Dodge, which is a SPECIAL KIND OF DODGE FROM N&S, not the standard dodge you use in all palladium games) where a single dodge roll is shown to apply to more than one attack.

Its a nice little house-rule system you have there, but don't pretend that this is how the rules are actually meant to be played.

RPGPundit