Using Hearts as a Combat System

[mjbauer]

This is still in the very early stages, but I thought I'd get it out and see what you think. It's a combat system for a squad-based tactical game. I'm trying to create a fast and strategic mechanic to mimic the actual firefight experience.

Players and Cards

A standard 52 card deck is used, with the cards in each suit ranking as usual from ace (high) down to two (low). There is no trump suit.

Each heart is worth one Success per pip (ie: the 4 of hearts is worth 4 Successes), face cards are worth 10 Successes each and the queen of spades is worth 13 Successes. The other cards have no value.

Object

The object is to avoid taking hearts, or in game terms, taking damage from opposing player's attacks. The confrontation is ended when one side of the conflict retreats or loses all participants.

Deal and Passing

Deal and play are clockwise. All the cards are divided evenly between the Players and NPCs involved in the combat. Any excess cards are turned right-side-up and included in the first trick. If there is a heart or the queen of spades in the excess cards it doesn't deal damage to the winner of that trick.

The Play of the Hand

Unlike standard Hearts, the first trick is played by all players simultaneously. Each player puts down their card of choice in front of them and all are revealed at once. For this initial round, cards are all taken at face value with no trump. Highest card takes the trick.

What I like about this is that the highest card wins so if someone wants to try to throw a heart in then it has to be low to be certain they wont just be throwing it away (by winning the trick).

Another difference in this version of Hearts is that hearts can be played on the first trick. If a heart is played on the first trick then any player can lead with a heart from then on. If no one plays a heart on the first trick then a player can only discard a heart if they don't have a card of the suit which was led, as usual. 

The remainder of the tricks are played like standard Hearts. The other players, in clockwise order, must play a card of the suit which was led if possible (ie: react to the situation). If they do not have a card of that suit, they may play any card (ie: react unexpectedly). The person who played the highest card of the suit led wins the trick and leads on the next trick.

Success and Failure

Each player takes damage for hearts the receive in the tricks which they win. A player will not receive damage from his own hearts or allied players hearts, only from hearts laid by the opposing team. Each heart scores one Success per pip (ie: the 4 of hearts is worth 4 Successes), and the queen of spades scores 13 Successes. Face cards are worth 10 Successes each.

Each Success represents one level of damage for the weapon that the opposing player is equipped with.

You cannot "shoot the moon" in this version of hearts.

Combat ends when one side of the conflict retreats or loses all participants.

How Player Actions in Hearts Translate to Character Actions

Taking Hearts = Taking Damage
Leading with a Heart = Making an attack & risking exposure for a counter-attack
Leading with a Low Heart = Blind fire / Suppressive fire (low accuracy, low chance of counter-attack)
Sloughing Hearts = Attack/Pointed shot (moderate accuracy)
Sloughing Heart Last = Aimed shot (high accuracy)

Taking Trick = Getting initiative
Yeilding Trick = Waiting

Sloughing Suit = Anticipating opponent
Slouging High Cards - Taking cover
Sloughing Queen = Critical Success

Taking Your Own Hearts = Miss
Taking Hearts From Teammates = Miss
Taking Your Own Queen = Critical failure
Taking the Queen from a Teammate = Friendly Fire

I haven't worked out exactly how really large fights will work and this system doesn't really lend itself to a 1 on 1 fight either. So I need to work those issues out. I also would like to incorporate special abilities that perhaps give bonuses, but I haven't worked that out either. (Like I said, this is still very rough).

[Vulpinoid]

I love the idea of using an established mechanism from a traditional game and twisting it to reflect something new...

...the roulette wheel in Fastlane...

...the poker-style mechanics for magic in Deadlands...

...the Jenga tower in Dread...

They each take something that non-roleplayers are familiar with, and use them as a doorway into the hobby. Personally I think that can only be a good thing.

This being said, I considered using Hearts as a game mechanism a while back. I abandoned it because the game is strategically complex in it's own right and I felt that it was overly complicating things when I tried to add new factors like character skills and special talents.

Rereading through your interpretation of a Hearts based combat system, I'd maybe allow certain special abilities to activate based on the cards played. If you played a spade this turn to may reduce any incoming damage by a number of pips equal to your skill. If you played a diamond, you may deal extra damage to someone equal to your skill level.

Then allow some really cool suit based abilities to kick in if you manage to win the trick while playing that suit.

The idea here is that the skills and abilities don't make a difference to the way the cards are played (no single player gains more cards than anyone else...because that gets really messy...trust me.), it only affects the way the round of hearts filters across to the game world.

And by the way, I'd consider including "Shooting the Moon", to allow for players who want to take incredible risks for the chance at ultimate glory. It all depends on the types of stories you're hoping to develop through this system.

Just some ideas...

V

[Simon C]

What this is missing is opportunities for the game fiction to impact on the mechanics of the game.  For example, your game has "you played a high card - therefore you're taking cover" rather than "you're taking cover, you can play a high card".  What this can lead to in play is that the fiction - i.e. what's happening in the game, gets ignored or glossed over, in favour of focussing on the cards.  If what's happening in the fiction doesn't matter to how the cards play out, then players will ignore it.

An easy way to introduce this is with the "trumps" rule from Hearts.  Each hand, the players say what their squad, character, or whatever is doing, and the GM (if there is one) decides which suit is trumps based on that action.  Something like:

Laying ambush, sneaking, hiding: Spades (This interacts interestingly with the Queen of Spades)
Holing up, defending, retreating: Clubs
Gathering information, getting the lay of the land, taking the high ground: Diamonds
All out attack: Hearts

This skews the game heavily in favour of the players, if they coordinate right.  I think that's ok though.

What I like about your mechanic is how leading with hearts has a really visceral effect on the game.  In Hearts, leading hearts means there's going to be a lot of points won or lost, similar to a firefight, going in guns blazing can be a big win, or a big loss.

You'll want to work out some conventions on tabletalk (is it ok to announce what you've got in your hand?) and on who gets dealt into a hand.  I'd want just one or two hands for NPCs, with a hand representing a squad or a small group, but each player should for sure get their own hand.

[Simon C]

Oh, and you should totally take damage from your own hearts.  Think of playing a heart not as "shooting" but as "initiating gunfire".  It might work out in your favour, or you might get shot up.

[mjbauer]

This being said, I considered using Hearts as a game mechanism a while back. I abandoned it because the game is strategically complex in it's own right and I felt that it was overly complicating things when I tried to add new factors like character skills and special talents.

Vulpinoid, thanks for the feedback. I agree that the game itself is complex and that's part of the reason I chose it. I was trying to recreate the complexity of a gunfight with standard rolls and bonuses and penalties and a combat map, and it become really cumbersome. What I like about Hearts is that it's fairly light on rules and has a simple objective:

Hearts objective - Avoid getting hearts, and give the hearts you have to everyone else.
Gunfight objective - Avoid getting shot, and shoot everyone else.

But, there are a lot of variables and it requires a some play to learn how to best deal with the situation you are given:

Hearts Strategy - Lead with spades to draw out the queen, unless you are holding the queen, then get the lead and divert to another suit hoping to distract the other players. If you have a lot of high cards, take the lead early and eliminate whichever suit you have the least of. Then give the lead to someone else so that you can slough off your high cards when other suits are led...
Gunfight Strategy - Anticipate your opponents movements, use cover and terrain to your advantage, be mindful of range (yours and your opponents), work with allies to pin, flank and neutralize targets...

I think that this mimics the feel and tempo of a gunfight nicely, but I do worry (like you) that it may be too complex and potentially frustrating for players. I think some playtesting will quickly make that evident.

I'm attempting this because I'm interested in what happens during a gunfight more than what the outcome of the fight is. The excitement of what each character does during the fight is the emphasis of the game.

[mjbauer]

What this is missing is opportunities for the game fiction to impact on the mechanics of the game.  For example, your game has "you played a high card - therefore you're taking cover" rather than "you're taking cover, you can play a high card".  What this can lead to in play is that the fiction - i.e. what's happening in the game, gets ignored or glossed over, in favour of focussing on the cards.  If what's happening in the fiction doesn't matter to how the cards play out, then players will ignore it.

I'm definitely worried about losing the fiction entirely. The point of going to this system was an attempt to preserve the description of the action in a gamist system. I don't know if it is going to work or not. Playtesting may destroy all my hopes for this.

An easy way to introduce this is with the "trumps" rule from Hearts.  Each hand, the players say what their squad, character, or whatever is doing, and the GM (if there is one) decides which suit is trumps based on that action.  Something like:

Laying ambush, sneaking, hiding: Spades (This interacts interestingly with the Queen of Spades)
Holing up, defending, retreating: Clubs
Gathering information, getting the lay of the land, taking the high ground: Diamonds
All out attack: Hearts

This skews the game heavily in favour of the players, if they coordinate right.  I think that's ok though.

I'm definitely going to consider this option. I'm not sure if it's exactly what I'm looking for, but I think you are heading in the right direction.

What I like about your mechanic is how leading with hearts has a really visceral effect on the game.  In Hearts, leading hearts means there's going to be a lot of points won or lost, similar to a firefight, going in guns blazing can be a big win, or a big loss.

Yeah, I like this aspect as well. And I totally agree with your follow-up post that hearts laid down by a player can come back to them as damage. I'm still going to say that friendly hearts can't hurt allied players, that seems too disconnected and also it penalizes action on the part of the players too much.

You'll want to work out some conventions on tabletalk (is it ok to announce what you've got in your hand?) and on who gets dealt into a hand.  I'd want just one or two hands for NPCs, with a hand representing a squad or a small group, but each player should for sure get their own hand.

Agreed on both points. I think that table talk should be allowed, but I'm not sure how to implement that. Can the GM use their information to his advantage? Or does the table talk represent the groups months or years of training and it's just a matter of them knowing what to expect from each other?

As for NPCs, yes, groups of unnamed NPCs would be represented by one or two hands. Main NPCs would have their own hand.

[Simon C]

This post on Vincent Baker's blog might be useful to you - he's talking about just this topic, i.e. how to maintain focus on the fiction with strongly procedural rules like the ones you're developing.

http://www.lumpley.com/comment.php?entry=438

don't worry if it doesn't make sense to you.  What he's basically saying is that you need there to be some point at which the mechanics referr to what's actually ocurring in the fiction, otherwise it stops mattering.

[mjbauer]

This post on Vincent Baker's blog might be useful to you - he's talking about just this topic, i.e. how to maintain focus on the fiction with strongly procedural rules like the ones you're developing.

http://www.lumpley.com/comment.php?entry=438

don't worry if it doesn't make sense to you.  What he's basically saying is that you need there to be some point at which the mechanics referr to what's actually ocurring in the fiction, otherwise it stops mattering.

Really interesting thread. Thanks for the link.

So what you are saying is that I have it backwards. I should have the mechanics come from the player's descriptions of their actions and not the other way around. Otherwise the story gets lost to the mechanics and what I'm left with is a card game.

Am I understanding you correctly?

[Simon C]

Yeah, basically.  I think what Vincent's saying is that you need an interaction between mechanics and the fiction - so the mechanics both alter the fiction (e.g. when you "win" hearts you're being shot up), and the fiction alters the mechanics (e.g. what suit is trumps is determined by your character's actions).

[Callan S.]

I should have the mechanics come from the player's descriptions of their actions and not the other way around. Otherwise the story gets lost to the mechanics and what I'm left with is a card game.

Not the story so much and instead it's the prior narrated fiction that is absent or fairly irrelevant to the activity. What would be absent is one or more people, upon being moved by the prior fiction, deciding how they represent that with a mechanical change. So it didn't just move them somehow. Through them it actually moves the game as well. Tangibly - well, as tangibly as pencilied numbers on a sheet changing are tangible. All that would be absent.

Forgive my phrasing, but you seem to have latched onto the idea of having mechanics that come from player descriptions and sound like your considering only having that. If that's the case; This isn't much better than throwing paint at a physical canvas. The canvas never throws anything back at them, if all mechanics come from player description. It's all one way. A mixture of both - of mechanics triggered by people being moved by prior narration, and of imaginatively named mechanics set off by people simply choosing options set out for them by written procedure, creates a sort of arrow which circles through mechanics, people and prior narration, then back again, looping around and around.

Just having mechanics triggered by player descriptions is just going all one way, pushing the mechanics around but the mechanics never effect the imagined space. And equally the hearts game so far just pushes the narrated fiction around, but the narrated fiction never (through moving someone) pushes the mechanics around. They are both one way, while in the loop from above, neither mechanics nor narrated fiction 100% get their own way. In the loop they must blend, so there is neither imagination getting it's own way all the time (and becoming stagnant) or mechanics use always getting it's way (and relying solely on what is mechanically pre-existing for it's complexity - though that's not a bad thing, as many board games attest. It's just that isn't your goal, as I can tell).

Or I could have just said it more simply by saying

I should have the mechanics come from the player's descriptions of their actions and not the other way around.

No, you shouldn't. It should be both ways around, in order to meet your goals (assuming I understand them)

[mjbauer]

I should have the mechanics come from the player's descriptions of their actions and not the other way around.

No, you shouldn't. It should be both ways around, in order to meet your goals (assuming I understand them)

Can you give me an example of how this works in other games? I'm having a hard time visualizing it.

[Simon C]

Oh, Callan's making it sound way more complicated than it is.  It's stuff like in D&D (3.5) you get a +2 bonus to attack if you've got the higher ground, and you get a +2 bonus to attack if you charge, and you get +2 for having a certain feat and so on.  Some of the bonuses come from things on your character sheet, and some of the bonuses come from things your character's doing in the fiction.  So sometimes you're going to charge because you need the +2, sometimes you're going to take the higher ground because you need the +2, and sometimes you're going to look at your character sheet and work out how you can get another bonus.

What's important is that there's an element of "judgement".  Someone (either the GM or the whole group) is judging what is happening in the fiction and deciding if it qualifies for the rule/bonus, whatever.

[Callan S.]

I'm really trying to avoid and even disprove the idea that +2 for 'height advantage' works the same as getting +2 for a feat. I'm 98% sure it's a destructive notion. If I get complicated, it's like I'm getting complicated about how to fold and pack a parachute - I want to make sure it works for you all because the alternatives appear destructive to me.

Can you give me an example of how this works in other games? I'm having a hard time visualizing it.

I'll list a functional sequence because I can't actually think of any game I've played that haven't screwed this up.

Someone asks, perhaps verbally, perhaps just with a raised eyebrow, the GM (or whoever the rules appoint to express this) to declare if they get the height advantage bonus. The GM then decides it in much the same way Salvador Dali decided a clock should be melted over a tree branch - it's an artistic expression. Lets say his artistic expression happened to match the players expectation - he declares +2 applies. That's not a judgement, it's an expression - as much as applying paint brush to canvas isn't a judgement but an expression, even though the paint is a physical, mechanical substance. Here the GM is applying the paint that is coloured '+2'.

Thats the loop going from prior narrated fiction, through the GM via stimulating him, to the mechanics (resulting in a hard +2 bonus in this case. Whether it's +2 or no bonus, both are results of the prior narration stimulating the GM).

Now lets say getting that +2 means the player just managed to hit and finish off a goblin, saving the player a few more hitpoints - and latter in an encounter with an important boss, the player just happens to have enough hitpoints that he survives the boss's last blow before the boss escapes. So he attacks back, and kills the boss. Slain! On the floor!

That's the loop coming back from hard mechanics, and via stimulation of artistic sensibilities, entering any future narration (assuming participants are to any degree allowing mechanics to stimulate their imaginations). Now if the player climbs the bosses corpse to get height advantage...can you see how this completes a loop?


Just as a side note, historically in roleplay culture the GM's declaration is never refered to as artistic expression, as far as I've read. It's typically refered to as judgement, like an umpire might give, or even somehow seen as pure mechanics and as clear cut as getting half your level as a bonus to hit in 4E is clear cut. So what I'm saying is an aberration to all that. I'm not trying to sneak this idea in as being something everyone says already.

[mjbauer]

This is really discouraging to me, even though it shouldn't be. In a way this system does exactly what I intended it to. But, finding out that "exactly what I want" is exactly wrong, is a bit disappointing.

My biggest complaint about combat in other games is that it takes too long. Overall, it takes too long. Each individual turn takes to long. Each roll, check stats, add bonuses, counter roll, check stats, add bonuses, compare, takes too much time. The feel of combat is lost. The adrenaline-filled step into the unknown is lost. The disorienting, loud, chaos is lost. It seems less like combat and more like a careful, deliberate chess match. All of the components of a fight are there, but the atmosphere is completely lost. To me, that is the biggest disconnect in roleplaying combat.

Every way I've tried to simplify my system has either failed or has made it too restrictive. The reason for trying this specific method out was to eliminate (or consolidate) variables. I think it worked. However, it sounds like in doing so I removed the interesting part of the game, the part that connects the fiction to the mechanics and vice versa.

My biggest worry is coming up with a seemingly good system and later finding out that there is a way to combine or twist the rules to give an unfair advantage. Then all the options that have been carefully included become worthless because any other option besides THAT ONE is just a decision to handicap yourself.

I really need to get some of these ideas out of my head and off of forums and just try them out. Too much talk, not enough test.

[Callan S.]

Well, is it wrong? I said 'Assuming I understand your goals'. I might not, or you might not have even set certain goals in concrete yet. You might want to test, not so much to test if something works, but to test what your goals are. Bringing in the imaginative factor (and to what extent) is simply one component in design you could use. You might not want to use it. Or you might. Wherever your creative urge takes you.

I would recommend buying and playing the card game 'Lunch Money'. It would be interesting to compare play with what your aiming for in your post. Several years back I tried using it as the combat system for dungeon run with my partner, with a few tweaks. In that case though, it felt like several disconnected games of lunch money (which had been watered down with the tweaks) with some narration of tunnels and such in between. There was no overall game each one tied into, so it felt like just playing it over and over when typically one game of it is satisfying. They didn't blend into one bigger game just because there was a bit of narration between them. So it's funny what you think is going to happen but yeah, testing shows otherwise.

Though, with a bit of spiteful humour, perhaps that's why combat is slow and boring as you put it, in many RPG's? So people aren't actually satisfied and stop after the first combat? Heck, come to think of it, world of warcraft works that way too.

I hope I didn't put you off playing lunch money, I really think it's a good idea, but also thought my playtest account might help somehow. I agree with doing more testing - test the hearts game! Good luck!