Gamma World 1e had Initiative order by Dex score, but with the assumption that combat was simultaneous. If you got killed in a round, you could still act if you did not take more than double the current HP in damage. The "death strike" aspect of the combat was kinda cool.

Quote from: Spinal Tarp;591577Simple initiative system for D&D; Each side rolls a d6 every round, highest 'has the initiative' that round.  Having the initiative gives you;

 1)  Choice of which side goes first that round.

 2)  +1 bonus on further initiative rolls.

 3)  +1 on attack rolls.

Not sure what to do about ties.

Interesting idea!

Quote from: LordVreeg;591673However, there IS a lot of book keeping, and I understand the trade off.

Exactly!

The trade off is always there and its why there will never be One True System because every group has their own sense of where the trade off exists for their style of play.

Quote from: Benoist;591677Weapon speeds and the like to me would come into play when (1) you are already in a situation where you are making a d6 roll for initiative (see previous post, e.g. no surprise, ongoing melee, etc), and (2) the results on both six-siders rolled in these specific situations tied. That's when it'd potentially matter, AFAIC.

Ongoing melee happens a lot.  I guess that is one of mine.
Not an issue.  That's one reason I have 2 rulesets I use.

But when I am playing Guildschool, we don't even use the same dice when adding on the random side. There is still weapon speed, combat moves, and skills that add into this or subtract, but...
"Rolling the Dice

In that when rolling for initiative, the die rolled can be a d10, a d8, a  d6, or a d4, depending on how deeply involved in a melee a character is .

 

•A d4 is rolled and added to the SF, and is used in the first round of a total surprise situation.[4]
•A d6 is rolled and added to the SF if the player is not affected by combat, is outside the combat and casting a automatic hit or group effect spell, targeting undead, etc.
•A d8 is rolled and added to the SF if the character is out of combat but is affecting by combat, i.e. shooting a missile weapon into combat, timing an entry into combat.
•A d10 is rolled and added to the SF If the character is in combat or has to account for dodging blows while attacking."

SO at one end, I like strategy, weapon choice, and skill use to come into play.  But again...I agree at the cost of book keeping and having a GM and group who has to know their system.  And that is a part we have not mentioned.

We had these questions and threads before. I am collecting my answers from here and there:

   In Sovereign Stone the result of the skill check is the initiative. A character just announces what he wants to do and rolls, whether it's climbing a wall, rummaging through the backpack, reciting a spell, or hitting with the axe - highest roller goes first.

So a character doing something he is proficient in acts faster than someone doing something unfamiliar.



And my favourite from my own heartbreaker, in which only players roll for initiative:

   The Initiative check is a simple DEX check. (Roll under.)
Success means your character can act before the GM characters/monsters. Failure means you have to act after the monsters.
Let players in each camp decide on their individual order.

In a PvP conflict (if both win or fail their roll and end up on the same side of the "GM divide") the DEX value acts as a tie-breaker.
Some monsters have special abilities/hindrances that may ignore the roll, eg, zombie: slow (always last); snake: fast (first strike).

double post

I like any initiative system where I get to make a decision.

You can hit hard, fast or precise, choose two.

That kind of thing. Whether it also involves dice or not isnt a huge factor.

Quote from: Benoist;591602I agree with that sentiment. To me, initiative should be put into play ONCE actual tactics have been used on the battlefield. That is, if you ambush your foes, there's no initiative. If they are surprised, there's no initiative. The actions of the combatants themselves have already decided who would go first and how. In some tactical sense, depending on a single critical roll at the beginning of combat to tell you whether you'll go first and win is a tactical failure on your part as a player: you should strive to avoid the roll and get the initiative from the get-go. If you don't, you're just gambling with your character's life.

From there, the "initiative" roll or really the "order of play" roll comes into the picture for those specific tactical situations where there are no overwhelming tactical advantages: i.e. second round of combat after being engaged in a chaotic melee and the like.

Maybe I'm picking this up wrong but I'd associate the above mechanic much more with longer mass combat type battles than with the kind of encounters a typical PC party will be running.

While as a group there can be advantages in hanging back until everyone is ready to attack a single target all at once, forcing them into serious dodge penalties, individually if you wait to see what tactic your opponent will use it regularly turns out to be hitting you in the face with an axe. Certain specific skills reward a buildup phase, like "insult", but even that is an action. Waiting behind fortifications also might qualify as a valid reason to hang back.

Likewise taking the broader sense of the word "initiative" and applying it to the narrow meaning usually found in RPGs seems to me more of a mass combat or obfuscated complexity solution. Nothing wrong with that, its just not my my more gritty tastes, I like the swing and clash of individual sword strokes, the whing and whee of copper coated candy food fights.

In the intiative wheel system the first roll is important, it allows cinematic actions like the ninja carving his way through men at arms before anyone can draw a sword, but after that its all up for grabs - if the ninja then finds himself surrounded by angry soldiers soaked in the blood of their drinking buddies, maybe that wasn't such a hot move after all.

If he's facing a fellow ninja, its far more likely that they will both get one attack in more or less simultaneously, and battle will then commence. The system encourages tactical thinking while retaining speed and grace. You can choose a type of attack, fast and more damaging or slow and more precise, which will affect your action speed, but it can be done on the fly, which is an advantage of not having rounds of any sort.

I guess some confusion is inevitable when we're talking about a mechanic used across wildly different game systems, but can you clarify a bit?

Quote from: The Traveller;591714Maybe I'm picking this up wrong but I'd associate the above mechanic much more with longer mass combat type battles than with the kind of encounters a typical PC party will be running.

That's not that surprising since the basic logic sustaining it comes from wargames. That said, I find it works also very well for skirmish combat, i.e. the type of combat a group of adventurers with hirelings, mercs, versus an opposing force including a few to numerous individuals, is most likely to face in an O/AD&D game.

Quote from: The Traveller;591714While as a group there can be advantages in hanging back until everyone is ready to attack a single target all at once, forcing them into serious dodge penalties, individually if you wait to see what tactic your opponent will use it regularly turns out to be hitting you in the face with an axe. Certain specific skills reward a buildup phase, like "insult", but even that is an action. Waiting behind fortifications also might qualify as a valid reason to hang back.

Waiting for the opponent to come to you while you are waiting behind a makeshift barricade in the dungeon works just as well. Behind a door frame you can open and close to isolate opponents from each other. Etc etc. Fundamentally, the situations you are facing as you explore an hostile environment are tactical in nature. If you just walk through corridors expecting to make it out totally fine because you cleared certain areas a few hours before and you're flabberghasted that the opponents aware of your presence flanked you in the meantime by going around you using routes that were unknown to you, you're doing something really wrong.

What about this initiative system: Everyone declares their actions and rolls simultaneously, then AFTER the roll you can choose to 'abort to defend', or more generally to block any action.

Quote from: Skywalker;591578I have most recently become enamoured with Marvel Heroics "pass the initiative" system. Its quick (no rolling), avoid repetition (which tends to reduce predictable downtime), and it has more intricacy than most initiative. It also flows with the action better than most initiative systems.

Most importantly, it keeps all the players engaged in the game instead of 'waiting for their turn'.

And I'll take player involvement over 'realism' any day.

Quote from: chaosvoyager;591749What about this initiative system: Everyone declares their actions and rolls simultaneously, then AFTER the roll you can choose to 'abort to defend', or more generally to block any action.



Most importantly, it keeps all the players engaged in the game instead of 'waiting for their turn'.

And I'll take player involvement over 'realism' any day.

Especially if you allow for riposting and other combat moves.

It works for MHR because the "game" it's keeping the players involved in is the game of being a comic writer storyboarding a fight scene.  Which is good for what it is, but it's not really useful for any character-driven initiative decision-making.

Quote from: CRKrueger;591754It works for MHR because the "game" it's keeping the players involved in is the game of being a comic writer storyboarding a fight scene.  Which is good for what it is, but it's not really useful for any character-driven initiative decision-making.

You couldn't be more wrong. The initiative system is entirely character driven because there are no random elements involved. The Watcher can use his resources to try and stuff up the players' plans, but that isn't randomly generated. The game, again, is also not about being a comic writer.

Quote from: Ghost Whistler;591847You couldn't be more wrong. The initiative system is entirely character driven because there are no random elements involved. The Watcher can use his resources to try and stuff up the players' plans, but that isn't randomly generated. The game, again, is also not about being a comic writer.

Wrong, it's entirely player-driven, unless you mean every superhero has gained the ability to alter how fast everyone else moves provided they manage to gain the initiative.

Quote from: chaosvoyager;591749What about this initiative system: Everyone declares their actions and rolls simultaneously, then AFTER the roll you can choose to 'abort to defend', or more generally to block any action.

That's basically the system that I described a few posts before.

   In Sovereign Stone the result of the skill check is the initiative. A character just announces what he wants to do and rolls, whether it's climbing a wall, rummaging through the backpack, reciting a spell, or hitting with the axe - highest roller goes first.

So a character doing something he is proficient in acts faster than someone doing something unfamiliar.

In combat that means that the low roller can either use his check result for his planned action, or roll a defend check instead.

Quote from: Skywalker;591578I have most recently become enamoured with Marvel Heroics "pass the initiative" system. Its quick (no rolling), avoid repetition (which tends to reduce predictable downtime), and it has more intricacy than most initiative. It also flows with the action better than most initiative systems.

Can you provide some details please?
The mental image that "pass the initiative" evokes is quite intriguing.

Quote from: Dirk Remmecke;591858Can you provide some details please?
The mental image that "pass the initiative" evokes is quite intriguing.

Quote from: Marvel Heroic Roleplaying pg. OM36Everyone gets a Panel of their own to act, and this string of Panels is called the action order. Once the first character has acted—whether it's a player hero or a Watcher character—the action order has begun. It's the player of the character who just acted that determines who goes next.

As a player, you have a choice between another hero or one of the Watcher's characters. It might work to your advantage to choose the opposition next. Why? Well, apart from making the story flow better, or seeing what the villain has planned and then being able to let somebody else respond to it, the person in control of the last character to act in any action order chooses who goes first at the top of the next action order.

100% Player-driven Metagaming mechanic from a Narrative/Tactical viewpoint.  Most of the game is like this.

Tim said it best...

Quote from: SilverlionMy experience as a playtester is that its very "Story" games based, and for my use, not in a good way. It has a problem with the gap between character and player being wide enough to sink a battleship.

Quote from: CRKrueger;591856Wrong, it's entirely player-driven, unless you mean every superhero has gained the ability to alter how fast everyone else moves provided they manage to gain the initiative.

I think you are both right. You are just attributing different meaning to term "character driven". You mean it is not something your character would be concerned with. GW means that it is not random and so can be used to highlight elements of character.