A recent thread about declaration mechanics made me think about Statement of Intent. Statement of Intent is common in the BRP world but not so much in the D&D world. it's when everyone says what there PC will do prior to initiative or prior to anyone taking an action.

I was running 5E and had a player join the game and his other DM was using statement of intent. The logic is sound, you only have 6 seconds to decide so you can't just change targets on the fly, but I found it slowed things down so much I more or less ignored the thing except maybe the first round of combat.

I'm curious if anyone else uses Statement of Intent or if they've modified the idea in any way.

I last saw this used in a game of D6 Star Wars many, many years ago. Prior to that I saw it used in, IIRC, Twilight 2000. I don't think it was hardwired into those games, but was instead something the GM opted to implement. In both cases, it was dropped for the same reason you mention--it slows things down.

It can be used, but basically needs its own line of initiative to pull it off if everyone declares intent at the same time. Reverse order declare, normal order enact is what I've seen most commonly.

But you have to write a lot down to keep track, and it only really works in especially violent and swingy systems. Else the combat drags on forever. 

I have something kind of like this though much less formal, and limited to a set of specific actions. for example I allow someone to "conceal their draw" such as them reaching into their pants or coat for a gun before any fighting starts. typically inferring something like a +1 to initiative or lowering the range on a surprise check.

Likewise letting them ready or overwatch an action given it has a pre-condition "I'll ready a shot at anything that comes through that door."

I use a "statement of intent" (what I have always known as the "declaration phase" of combat) -- and it works great -- but this is in a system without turn-based combat. We all roll simultaneously, so the declaration phase is necessary to know what everyone is rolling for.

I agree with you that in turn based systems, where every player rolls for their action outcome one-at-a-time anyway, it's just too much of a time-sink for too little payoff.

It sounds like a good idea on paper, for people who think they're adding realism.

In practice, everyone has to document their action somehow, in case situations come up that invalidate the declared action. If you don't write it down somehow, you're relying on people's fuzzy memories of what was declared.

Next, you'll find that actions will invariably be wasted for various reasons, causing your combat to take additional rounds.

It's not clear to me what actual problem is being solved here that makes it worth the additional overhead.

It works fairly well, if you do reverse initiative order declare and then initiative order execute, at making initiative actually matter. Mainly in the sense that those with better initiatives can react to more and take preemptive action to interrupt key maneuvers.

It also can encourage tactical play and planning, for the more gamist folks, in that it's an added level of tactics.

This makes it a potentially decent choice for systems with combat that is over quickly and where each action has lethal intention.

However, in any system with hp bloat or strong survivability, it's not usually a good idea.

I usually play this way:
Describe the surroundings or the situation.
"What do you want to do?"
It's just a 2-player campaign, so I'm asking the other person how the party is to react.

It's easy enough with a small group, but becomes hard to track with a bigger one.  The big plus is realism.  In real life everything happens at once.  When you decide what to do you don't know what everyone else is going to do at the same time.  Taking turns is useful for a game, but kind of silly if you're trying to make your game as realistic as possible.

Quote from: Zalman on March 18, 2025, 12:14:59 PMI use a "statement of intent" (what I have always known as the "declaration phase" of combat) -- and it works great -- but this is in a system without turn-based combat. We all roll simultaneously, so the declaration phase is necessary to know what everyone is rolling for.

I agree with you that in turn based systems, where every player rolls for their action outcome one-at-a-time anyway, it's just too much of a time-sink for too little payoff.

I'm curious which system, and could you tell me more about that process and how it plays out? I'm interested in giving it a try in my games.

Quote from: Ruprecht on March 18, 2025, 10:48:19 AMA recent thread about declaration mechanics made me think about Statement of Intent. Statement of Intent is common in the BRP world but not so much in the D&D world. it's when everyone says what there PC will do prior to initiative or prior to anyone taking an action.

I was running 5E and had a player join the game and his other DM was using statement of intent. The logic is sound, you only have 6 seconds to decide so you can't just change targets on the fly, but I found it slowed things down so much I more or less ignored the thing except maybe the first round of combat.

I'm curious if anyone else uses Statement of Intent or if they've modified the idea in any way.

Star Wars D6 1st edition is similar. You have to declare in order to figure out initative.
This is one of the first things I house rule to a regular initative system.

Declaring actions, IME, tends to be clunky and inflexible. It does add another step to combat, and I don't think it adds anything worth the extra effort.

Quote from: Nakana on March 18, 2025, 04:05:10 PM

Quote from: Zalman on March 18, 2025, 12:14:59 PMI use a "statement of intent" (what I have always known as the "declaration phase" of combat) -- and it works great -- but this is in a system without turn-based combat. We all roll simultaneously, so the declaration phase is necessary to know what everyone is rolling for.

I agree with you that in turn based systems, where every player rolls for their action outcome one-at-a-time anyway, it's just too much of a time-sink for too little payoff.

I'm curious which system, and could you tell me more about that process and how it plays out? I'm interested in giving it a try in my games.

It's a homebrew system I call Simultaneous Mass Opposed Roll (SMOR). I'll post a separate thread detailing it. Happy to answer any questions!

Edit: Here - https://www.therpgsite.com/design-development-and-gameplay/the-smor-system/

Quote from: Ruprecht on March 18, 2025, 10:48:19 AMA recent thread about declaration mechanics made me think about Statement of Intent. Statement of Intent is common in the BRP world but not so much in the D&D world. it's when everyone says what there PC will do prior to initiative or prior to anyone taking an action.

I was running 5E and had a player join the game and his other DM was using statement of intent. The logic is sound, you only have 6 seconds to decide so you can't just change targets on the fly, but I found it slowed things down so much I more or less ignored the thing except maybe the first round of combat.

I'm curious if anyone else uses Statement of Intent or if they've modified the idea in any way.

I posted in the other thread about that but I'll repost here.  Back in 3.5, I was running a larger sized group (6-8 players) so time was always an issue during combat.  To reduce chatter and try to simulate a more interactive environment, I had players and NPCs reveal their actions in reverse initiative order so that higher initiatives could react to it accordingly and then have them actually occur in normal order... and it worked well.  If what they declared was impossible or impractical by their turn then they could (iirc) sacrifice their move or standard action to change it.  I could see folks here assuming that it would take alot more time but I was pretty ruthless (with fair warning to all players that I would be!) to have their actions decided at the top of the round as they'd only get a few seconds to declare. 

I liked the idea of higher initiatives being able to somewhat react to what lower initiatives were more slowly doing and in play it felt that way luckily.

I've always used a statement of intent when DMing old-school D&D. But it's relatively vague, like the procedure outlined in Swords & Wizardry; it controls the order in which certain kinds of attacks occur (ranged versus melee), but it mostly matters for spellcasting on both sides because a spell is generally lost if a caster is struck before he gets the spell off.

Quote from: Corolinth on March 18, 2025, 12:35:04 PMIt sounds like a good idea on paper, for people who think they're adding realism.

In practice, everyone has to document their action somehow, in case situations come up that invalidate the declared action. If you don't write it down somehow, you're relying on people's fuzzy memories of what was declared.

Next, you'll find that actions will invariably be wasted for various reasons, causing your combat to take additional rounds.

It's not clear to me what actual problem is being solved here that makes it worth the additional overhead.

I've seen facedown cards used for this (and yes, each character had a custom deck). Actually the Street Fighter RPG did most actions this way.