This is a sort of follow on from 'Crunchy' scene-resolution, in which I suggested

I figure the basic reason D&D combat gets dull is because of it's take turns standing still and being hit mechanic. In effect no matter how good you are you still get lots of damage inflicted on you. This means that hp totals have to be boosted to make this possible. As a result the fights get longer, and more boring, as you painstakingly wear down the megabeast.

So, my suggested fix is this. Make it so only one combatant (the winning one) gets to deal damage in any given combat round. Since the winning party only deals damage, the hp totals can be lower, and the combat's quicker.

This is some thoughts I've been having about how to develop an interesting combat system that satisfies this suggestion.

Initially I look at a simple d20 switch, each character rolls d20 + their attack mod. Highest wins, rolls damage. Repeat. However it soon became obvious this wasn't going to work out. I couldn't see a good way of working armour in, other than damage reduction. I don't like damage reduction. Damage reduction slows combat down.

So I moved on to a 'dice pool' kind of mechanic.

Here's my idea, each combatant has a number of dice (say 4-10, or so), each round begins with the aggressor declaring how he wishes to split the dice between 'attack' and 'defence'. Then the defender also declares how many he wishes to use in 'attack' and 'defence'. If the aggressor wishes they can then call 'feint!' and change their allocation of dice, but in doing so they get one less dice to play with in the new allocation.

When the dice are rolled, any 'attack' dice which come up with the same numbers as any shown on the opponents 'defence' dice are discarded, and the remainder added up. Whoever gets the highest total left wins the round. If they win with a total of less than ten, then they simply reduce their opponents combat pool by one for the rest of the combat. But if the get a total of more than ten or more then they do a number of hitpoints damage to their oponent equal to their total - 10, AND take off an additional combat dice for each whole ten points in their total.

Thus with a total of 4 left over you simply remove one of their dice, with a total of 10, you remove two, and with a total of 19 you remove two and deal nine points of damage.

You'll note this system rarely results in much of the way of damage. Won't that slow things down? No. The idea is that rather than defeating your opponent by beating down their hitpoints to 0, you remove all their combat dice. When you're opponent loses all their combat dice you have the choice of killing them, disabling them (knocked out for one minute, reduced to 0 hitpoints), or pinning them (holding them uninjured in a position you can kill them at your leisure).

Onto the frilly bits.

Multiple opponents are easy. You simply have to divide your dice pool between them. You can attack more than one but you'll end up spreading yourself thin. Armour adds a (small) number of dice to your defence pool, maybe up to 3 dice for the best.

Drawbacks of this idea.


• I can't see an obvious way to generalise it to make a common combat and skill system.
• Ranged weapons would need to be resolved by the skill system seperately. And would simply deal hp damage.
• It doesn't leave a lot of room for graduated skill levels
• There isn't a great deal of space for weapon differentiation. Now, I don't consider this a totally bad thing, in that I prefer weapons to be chosen on character concept that mathematical goodness, but it would still be nice to seperate a huge great axe and a stilleto in the mechanics.


This is mainly just a few random thoughts, I don't know whether I'll develop it into a full system but I thought I'd toss it out there for your contemplation.

Mr Jack wrote: It doesn't leave a lot of room for graduated skill levels

Not a lot of room, but some.

Have you considered using die type for graduated skill levels? A rank amateur would use d4's, increasing to d6, d8, d10, and d12 as advancement steps. The character with the d4's could still overcome the one with the d12's, particularly if he has more of them, as low rolls on the d12's would be cancelled by d4 rolls. Thus, the amateur with the bastard sword might have enough dice to overcome the expert with the bowie knife, if the rolls favor him.

I'm extrapolating something I didn't see mentioned. When the player says how many offensive and defensive dice he is rolling, does he have to divide them and roll them as separate groups? I see this as upping handling time, as you have to have all the attack and defense dice on the table at once, but clearly sequestered into their individual groups, in order to work through the process. It strikes me as a bit awkward in practice, unless I'm misunderstanding how it works at the table. You couldn't, presumably, roll all the dice together and then decide which ones go in which group, unless you're allowing tactical considerations at this point, which might really slow down play significantly.

--M. J. Young

This is a bit of an aside based on the following quote taken out of context.

Mr Jack wrote: ... Initially I look at a simple d20 switch, each character rolls d20 + their attack mod. Highest wins, rolls damage. Repeat. However it soon became obvious this wasn't going to work out. I couldn't see a good way of working armour in, other than damage reduction ...

If the goal is still to make combat faster, why not use d20 + attack mod + AC?

HMT wrote: If the goal is still to make combat faster, why not use d20 + attack mod + AC?

Because then armour becomes the most important aspect in any combat.