Also what's your guys take on the party spending a long time planning something?

Should the goal be to keep a brisk pace and start throwing random encounters at them if they start going around in circles over their plans?

Or is it just as fine if they spend 4 hours just debating what to do and then do nothing.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;860654Ah okay, so they use initiative order still. That makes sense then. Also yes, it's 5E.

Couldn't they still coordinate and have a strategy meeting BEFORE rolling initiative when they're all declaring what they'll do? Or do you allow that and it just ends up being less time anyway.

Yeah, there's still the usual strategy talk before rolling for a given round, but since it's just once a round rather than a full re-evaluation on everybody's turn it works out to be much shorter.

For combat, I prefer "simultaneous moves", which means I go around the table getting each player's declaration of intent - bing, bing, bing - before getting into resolution. If someone's not ready, I may go on then come back; if he's not ready then, neither is his character.

Initiative -- which figure actually completes an action first -- is dealt with as needed after declaration, in the resolution phase.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;860656Also what's your guys take on the party spending a long time planning something?

Should the goal be to keep a brisk pace and start throwing random encounters at them if they start going around in circles over their plans?

Or is it just as fine if they spend 4 hours just debating what to do and then do nothing.

It's fine if they take responsibility for their choice, though if it makes me as GM irrelevant then I might find a more interesting way to spend 4 hours of my time than sitting around listening to them.

If it's not cool with everyone, then we need to check it. However, I don't appreciate being treated as a first-resort 'club' against other players; the complaining player should address the situation first with the others (and if appropriate remedy it in character).

Changing encounter frequencies for such a reason (as opposed to reasons of the PCs attracting more WMs) is to my mind down the list of options. I can understand, though, why other GMs might turn to it sooner.

Quote from: Natty Bodak;860658Yeah, there's still the usual strategy talk before rolling for a given round, but since it's just once a round rather than a full re-evaluation on everybody's turn it works out to be much shorter.

How do you handle movement?

Suppose you have a Sorcerer next to a wagon and as the GM I control 4 Orcs that want to attack the Sorcerer. I say the Orcs move X spaces to the tile where the Sorcerer is near the wagon and attack him; the Sorcerer happens to say that he moves somewhere else and attacks another enemy.

Do the Orcs now just run to where the Sorcerer was even if he's not there anymore (he moved somewhere before them) or do you take it as an abstract "the Orcs try to go after the Sorcerer, wherever he happens to be at the time" thing.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;860668How do you handle movement?

Suppose you have a Sorcerer next to a wagon and as the GM I control 4 Orcs that want to attack the Sorcerer. I say the Orcs move X spaces to the tile where the Sorcerer is near the wagon and attack him; the Sorcerer happens to say that he moves somewhere else and attacks another enemy.

Do the Orcs now just run to where the Sorcerer was even if he's not there anymore (he moved somewhere before them) or do you take it as an abstract "the Orcs try to go after the Sorcerer, wherever he happens to be at the time" thing.

It looks as if the approach in question is similar to my mine, so I'll answer for myself.

It's not a problem of 'movement' so much as intent. I learn intent by -- neat trick, this -- asking the player!

My guess from common sense may be correct: The orcs wish to attack the sorcerer, so they'll try to catch him, whereas the sorcerer doesn't care about them and is intent on whacking somebody else. If I am in doubt, though, why settle for assuming when I can instead get the actual answer?

Perhaps the part you don't get is that people are not frozen statues while others act. Unless you're doing something like teleporting at the last instant, your departure from where you were a few seconds ago, visible while I moved, won't be a surprise I discover only when I get there.

Well, I was thinking more of how movement is generally associated with a specific point on the grid when you normally play with one. You don't say "I move next to the Orc," you place your piece exactly where you want it. It just so happens that you follow it up with an attack.

But handling it abstractly sounds like a good solution there. Go after the target, not the positioning. What do you do if they had 2 conflicting goals in mind though?

Like suppose I declared that I want to move towards an enemy next to a lever, and attack him, and then flip the switch next to us. But the enemy ends up moving far away from the lever. Do I now go after the enemy or the lever? Would the GM just ask for more clarification when that comes up as the moves are being resolved?

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;860672Well, I was thinking more of how movement is generally associated with a specific point on the grid when you normally play with one. You don't say "I move next to the Orc," you place your piece exactly where you want it. It just so happens that you follow it up with an attack.

But handling it abstractly sounds like a good solution there. Go after the target, not the positioning. What do you do if they had 2 conflicting goals in mind though?

Like suppose I declared that I want to move towards an enemy next to a lever, and attack him, and then flip the switch next to us. But the enemy ends up moving far away from the lever. Do I now go after the enemy or the lever? Would the GM just ask for more clarification when that comes up as the moves are being resolved?

Basically, this is in my view way too much action to make sense as a 'turn' allowance in a multi-player game that's meant to move along briskly. I can only wonder on what basis the division was made; why not two, three or ten more "and then" clauses?

Anyhow, you don't have any decision to make there until the enemy starts to move. At that point, you can choose.

I'll say again, though, that it basically seems pointless in the first place to be counting so many chicks before the eggs are even laid.

Action = attack
Bonus action = flip switch

Isn't that part of a standard turn? Although I wondered if you can only use bonus actions for when special abilities specifically allow it, rather than for anything.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;860681Action = attack
Bonus action = flip switch

Isn't that part of a standard turn? Although I wondered if you can only use bonus actions for when special abilities specifically allow it, rather than for anything.

Might be a "standard turn" in some game, and for all I know or care so might "10 action points". The jargon is beside the point.

The point is that 30 things per turn (3 each for 10 units, or whatever) might be pushing it even in a two-player game. Making one or more of those actually more than one thing ups the ante.

With 8, 9, 10 players, it really sucks to get hung up on one or two at a time over and over. Say you're taking 20 seconds per player; with 10 players, that's somebody waiting 3 minutes before he gets another chance to do something. And half a dozen other players at any time with a minute or more likewise on their hands.

People are pretty likely to get into side shows to pass the time, and no big surprise if those sometimes get more engaging than the supposed main event.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;860672Like suppose I declared that I want to move towards an enemy next to a lever, and attack him, and then flip the switch next to us. But the enemy ends up moving far away from the lever. Do I now go after the enemy or the lever? Would the GM just ask for more clarification when that comes up as the moves are being resolved?

Why on Earth would the referee NOT ask?  I can think of no rational reason for doing anything else; the referee is supposedly supplying data to the player for making decisions.

Because from how it was described it sounded like there wouldn't need to be talking after declaring your initial actions, but once I started imagining how it would be run at my table I started seeing various scenarios that might need it.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;860668How do you handle movement?

Suppose you have a Sorcerer next to a wagon and as the GM I control 4 Orcs that want to attack the Sorcerer. I say the Orcs move X spaces to the tile where the Sorcerer is near the wagon and attack him; the Sorcerer happens to say that he moves somewhere else and attacks another enemy.

Do the Orcs now just run to where the Sorcerer was even if he's not there anymore (he moved somewhere before them) or do you take it as an abstract "the Orcs try to go after the Sorcerer, wherever he happens to be at the time" thing.

I should probably mention that the way we play this is essentially the Speed Factor option in the 5e DMG, but without any of the actual speed factors affecting initiative values (that may sound like gibberish, but take a look at the section and you'll see what I mean).

You declare what you are going to do with your Action (capital A) before the round starts, and then when your turn in initiative comes up, you can use your Move, any Bonus action, and free interactions as you like in support of doing what you declared for your Action. Somewhere in your round, you either do your Action, or you don't take an Action.

We try not to get to the point of it being "pact with the devil" legalese. If you're going to attack a goblin, you don't have to name the one with the lazy left eye and the bushy nose hair if you don't care which particular goblin you attack.

Similarly, the GM commits to some sort of plan for the NPCs/monsters at the top of the round and sticks to it.

We do use a grid overlay for maps for general convenience, but aren't slavishly devoted to using the grid itself.

I have bee struck down with the lumbago, so I missed sooo much of this. Sorry everyone.

First, Natty Bodak and philip, thank you for fielding these questions. For the most part we seem to do things similarly, with minor variations and labels.

Second, I call it Fog of War because it encapsulate the experience of declaring first and then resolving. We have intent but things may not always work out as we intended. It's to simulate that liminal state in combat where our senses are heightened but our perspective of time starts to do screwy things. That and it is quicker to say (and sounds cooler, IMO) than "Declare First, Then Resolve," Initiative.

I will come back and answer mAcular's other questions from my experience and hopefully it will help his cause.

Quote from: Opaopajr;860785That and it is quicker to say (and sounds cooler, IMO) than "Declare First, Then Resolve," Initiative.

Definitely sounds cooler. You could go the acronym route:

DFTR: Declare First, Then Resolve. Which is pronounced defter, so it would be the defter initiative system.

I may have to try that for H+I. I could use rotating clockwise order of declaration so it isn't always the same player declaring first or last.

Oh and thanks for explaining and I hope you feel better soon.