The Forge Archives

The forge gets a few posts on complex combat rules. Although it's not really my thing, it made me wonder about the factor involved with them which makes them not my thing.

I was wondering if you could design it so you could roll the results of wounds and such before play. Much like a DM stocking his dungeon in advance of play, you roll up the wound and all it's micro effects.

You do several of these and number them. When the time comes, you roll percentile to see which one of them is to be used.

This could also be used for the firing of guns, in a similar way.

Now, while there would have to be some compromises, you don't have to compromise for speed purposes now. That means you can get pretty damn detailed!

Just noting the idea and seeing what people think.

Isn't the point of a detailed combat system generally to build chains of consequence as a part of an exploration effort? Having a detailed wound system is not itself that cool, but when you get that wound because of this type of axe and that type of armor interacting in a rain shower, then the wound itself partakes in the greater simulationist project. It's there because of these other facts, and dice were used in it's production to gloss over additional complexity, not because we the players think it unimportant what kind of wound you get. The wound becomes part of the SIS by the virtue of the system that produces it from facts already in the SIS.

That is, I'd imagine this is how one would think it if he had the common gamer misconceptions about axes, armor and rain showers. Personally I find these the completely wrong factors to follow even in a historical sim effort. But whatever the factors used, the point stands.

Anyway, by this notion, to get the same effect by prestocking, you'd have to prestock per fighter, weapon, opponent and all other factors the wounds are meant to mirror. In a simpler game like D&D this would be possible, but pointless. In a more complex game it'd be impossible. In any case, I doubt if there were any speed benefit.


... however, I see merit in your suggestion. It's an interesting thought, and I could well imagine using it in a game that's meant to work that way. It wouldn't be a game about complex combat, thought.

Quote from: Eero TuovinenIsn't the point of a detailed combat system generally to build chains of consequence as a part of an exploration effort?.

That's the party line, anyways.

For my tastes, I would consider any pre-game prep to be slower than work done during the game.  In the pre-game phase, I only want to think about NPCs, relationships, plots and scenery stuff (and I designed my own game to let me approximate all necessary stats on the fly so I don't even need stats for NPCs).

I think the keys to a fast system lie in:
1) allowing people to interpret their own results.  Think about the handling time involved in:
   "I rolled a 19."  
   "OK, you hit.  Roll Damage."  
   "I got a 4."
What if you could just say:
   "I succeeded. and rolled 4 for damage."
This takes about a third of the time of the initial example, with a tiny change to the system (in fact, many D&D groups have already worked in similar techniques without any changes to the system).
(Note: interpreting your own results doesn't require giving narrative rights to players, although it could include that.  You can do it in any system where they know their modifiers and TNs... roll under percentile systems have been doing it for a while.)

2) Simple dice mechanics and single-roll resolutions.  Dice pools and dice gimmicks hugely slow down combat.  Donjon, for example... I can spend as long tallying up successes for one roll in that system as I spend in an entire round in Pax Draconis.  Likewise, many systems (Palladium, for example) have a roll to hit, a roll to dogde and a roll for damage (and against missiles, Palladium adds two more rolls - a chance to shoot the missiles (which, if it hits, requires a roll for damage, and a roll to see if nearby missiles explode) and a roll to reduce the damage they do).  Literally, you could make 7 rolls for a single attack and defense.  Not only is a lot of this unnecessary mechanically, it's unnecessary statistically... rolling a d20 to resist a d20 roll is the same as rolling 2d20 to start with.  

And... with that in mind, a whole D&D battle that may take hours to whittle hit points down could be statistically condensed into something much simpler... for example, just by assuming that each roll represents two attacks and doubling the amount of damage done.

3) Representative samples for results.  When Gallup Polls wants to know who Americans are going to vote for, they don't ask 200 million people.  Typically they ask 500-900 people who are representative of different groups, then they extrapolate the results (often with tiny 3-5% margins of error).  You can do the same thing in RPGs, especially for complex damage results or lengthy spell or equipment lists.  For example, instead of having pages of damage tables for every conceivable result, take 10% of those results as a represenative sample.  You no longer have quite as much detail, but a well-chosen sample gives pretty close results for game mechanics just like it does for Gallup - in my mind, you're sacrificing 90% of the complexity and giving up only 5% of the detail to do it.

Thanks Justin, but methods to speed up in play rolls aren't really part of this topic. It's related, but for this post it I'm not focusing on it.

Eero Tuovinen: I thought this sort of percieved problem would come up.

Think of it with guns (always a favorite): You pre roll with system where you determine what a high powered weapon would do. This is weapon A.

Now, if weapon B was actually used (a weaker one), in play remove results that don't apply to B. If weapon C was used, remove A and B results.

QuoteHaving a detailed wound system is not itself that cool, but when you get that wound because of this type of axe and that type of armor interacting in a rain shower

For this you have pre rolls that determine slashing damage like that gun example. This type of axe removes certain results you pre rolled rolled. The particular armour type can remove results as well. Other results you generat can have 'if' statements, eg; if confusing circumstances are happening then this effect applies (and one listed confusing thing is a rain storm). Same for the armour; the axe can produce 'if' statements that say if its type of armour X, this effect then happens.

How's it sound now? Roll more than you need, either taking away stuff because the weapon isn't that strong or the requirements of the 'if' statement aren't met.

Callan, I can see it working in a very limited context.

The first limit is that you have to do it for the specific weapons that are going to be used in play. Thus if you have four characters, you would run primary weapons for each of them--this guy uses his sword and his long bow, that guy his dagger and sling, the other guy his axe and crossbow, whatever. You would have to generate character-specific results. Similarly, you could use them for a horde of orcs, but all the orcs would have to have the same chance to hit and the same weapons doing the same damage.

The second limit is that you could only use this for standard attacks. If the game allows tactical uses of weapons (e.g., martial arts, http://www.mjyoung.net/dungeon/specweap.html">special weapon maneuvers) they have to be handled individually. The degree to which the players rely on these is the degree to which pre-rolled results become impractical.

The third limit is that there can be no connection between chance to hit and damage. For example, in Multiverser part of the tactical options in combat include that by increasing your chance to hit you also increase your potential damage, and that by decreasing your opponent's chance to hit you decrease your potential risk.

Also, again citing Multiverser, you hit trouble if the game penalizes damages based on skills or attributes of the target, even apart from chance to hit.

The problem with pre-generated attack results is ultimately that it assumes the system has an inherent simplicity up front, and in that case you have less need of it. Yes, if you have a simple pattern of roll to hit, roll damage, roll hit location, roll chance to stun, you could do that all in advance, check whether the next attack on the list will succeed and if so run the numbers. To the degree that the game has complexities at any of these steps, even as player options, the method starts to fall apart.

Finally, I would suggest that such pre-generated rolls would only really be helpful if you programmed a computer to generate and print them, so you could have such long lists made quickly. Considering the number of rolls you would make in pregenerating the results that you would not have to make in play (because if the hit roll fails the others don't matter) you're investing much more time before the game to save much less in the game, and that's rarely a good choice for most of us.

--M. J. Young

The whole "pre-generated" rolls and damage sounds a lot like RoleMaster to me.  RoleMaster has gotten a bad rap in some circles, but the principle was to fold in a lot of complexity into at most two rolls, or often only one.  As long as you had copies of the correct tables in front of you, hit resolution went pretty smoothly.  

These days, this could be improved by having a computer utility which printed out a different chart for a given individual.  The problem is that if conditions change (i.e. someone picks up a non-standard weapon or otherwise acts unusual), then you have to recalculate.  This sort of thing could alternately be done by having a specialized deck of cards for wound results.  

Actually, I found that just having dice pre-rolled was a great help in my Conan D20 event.  Given a bunch of monsters with multiple attacks, I found that my end was helped a lot by having a printout and just crossing off numbers instead of rolling the die.

Quote from: M. J. YoungCallan, I can see it working in a very limited context.

The first limit is that you have to do it for the specific weapons that are going to be used in play. Thus if you have four characters, you would run primary weapons for each of them--this guy uses his sword and his long bow, that guy his dagger and sling, the other guy his axe and crossbow, whatever. You would have to generate character-specific results. Similarly, you could use them for a horde of orcs, but all the orcs would have to have the same chance to hit and the same weapons doing the same damage.

Not really. You can have slashing and piercing results for example. Before you think that simplifies it, basically the result(s) from slashing can have 'if' statements like; Result X: If this comes from a great axe, this result applies.

That way you can just have basic damage effects, but their results can customise to the weapon involved quite easily.

Also, I'm wary of the 'horde of orcs' thing. To get on the same page here, don't most of these people just have one on one fights? The reason you have hordes of orcs in D&D for example, is because it's not that interesting to just fight one. I thought all these complex combat things were about quality not through quantity (of bad guys). Am I reading them wrong?

Quote

The second limit is that you could only use this for standard attacks. If the game allows tactical uses of weapons (e.g., martial arts, http://www.mjyoung.net/dungeon/specweap.html">special weapon maneuvers) they have to be handled individually. The degree to which the players rely on these is the degree to which pre-rolled results become impractical.

It depends on how you want to handle your special manouver. If it's basically a specially modified to hit roll, then this doesn't need to be pre rolled since it's pretty basic. The complex wounding stuff is where the time cuts in. The only prob I see is in hit locations...if the players can choose their location, you need to somehow accomidate that in your pre rolling (damage for every location). Either that or don't let them choose.

If your too hit rolls are complex as well, they can still be pre rolled. Whatever results you generate can have special target numbers listed. If the PC's skill equals the number, the result occurs. Otherwise it doesn't.

Quote


The third limit is that there can be no connection between chance to hit and damage. For example, in Multiverser part of the tactical options in combat include that by increasing your chance to hit you also increase your potential damage, and that by decreasing your opponent's chance to hit you decrease your potential risk.

No, not really. Just as I said you would roll for a powerful strike and then only apply the strength effects the weapon warrants, you could just as easily only apply the effects the weapon plus the skill it was wielded with.

The only prob is that sometimes someone might beat the best pre rolled result you've done. But then again, if the bad guys head has already been chopped off...what would all that extra skill do anyway (no, no carving a Z on the flying head!)

Quote

Also, again citing Multiverser, you hit trouble if the game penalizes damages based on skills or attributes of the target, even apart from chance to hit.

The problem with pre-generated attack results is ultimately that it assumes the system has an inherent simplicity up front, and in that case you have less need of it. Yes, if you have a simple pattern of roll to hit, roll damage, roll hit location, roll chance to stun, you could do that all in advance, check whether the next attack on the list will succeed and if so run the numbers. To the degree that the game has complexities at any of these steps, even as player options, the method starts to fall apart.

Basically you just need to think of modular results. Imagine I pre roll a cut artery and a cut muscle. But the strength of weapon X only qualifies for the cut muscle. Two modular results and I throw out one.

Quote

Finally, I would suggest that such pre-generated rolls would only really be helpful if you programmed a computer to generate and print them, so you could have such long lists made quickly. Considering the number of rolls you would make in pregenerating the results that you would not have to make in play (because if the hit roll fails the others don't matter) you're investing much more time before the game to save much less in the game, and that's rarely a good choice for most of us.

--M. J. Young

Mmmm, it's a matter of work Vs time. It could be more work before play, but during play ten minutes of silent table consultation is more deadly than 20 mins of work before the game.

Also, you might not get what I mean. In how I roughly envision it, you use pre rolled results for attacks that hit. You don't throw away results because of a miss...that result gets used once someone hits.

Quote from: NoonAlso, you might not get what I mean. In how I roughly envision it, you use pre rolled results for attacks that hit. You don't throw away results because of a miss...that result gets used once someone hits.

Yes, that would work in many games. It would not work in Star Frontiers, Multiverser, and a few other games, because the hit roll is the damage roll. You couldn't have the situation of determining whether it hits and then consulting a separate roll for damage, because the damage depends on the first roll.

I can see games it would help, but I don't play any of them even though I do play games in which there are some complex combat options.

--M. J. Young

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding exactly what you're looking for, but what makes your suggestion different than a pre-built table, aside from who is putting in the time to build the table?

It sounds to me like you're saying "I don't like complex combat, with a bunch of rolling and consultation along the way.  I would like it if it was a table of pregenerated results."

....which isn't complex combat anymore.  It might be a complex algorithm that feeds into making the table, but the actual combat is just a table lookup.

James

Hi M J,

But as I said, if you figure the damage for a strength 10 attack (for a rough example), and then the attack done is strength 4 plus 3 because of the skill, then it's strength 7...you just remove the effects from 10, 9 and 8 strength.

If I'm imagining your system right. I'm imagining something like a 'for every point you get over what you need to hit, you add a point to damage to represent exceptional accuracy'


Hi James,

Why isn't it complex combat if its 'just' a table look up? I don't really see the difference between a lot of complex wound generation (for example) before game (and recorded in a table for latter use) and the same thing generated during the game with the same rules.

The complexity of the situation is still accounted for with the 'if' statements and modular effects, those which don't apply aren't used. But instead of looking through the book during play and reading 'if its a battle axe being used, figure out these set of effects' it is instead 'before play, figure out this set of effects. If a battle axe is used, then this applies.'

Quote from: NoonWhy isn't it complex combat if its 'just' a table look up? I don't really see the difference between a lot of complex wound generation (for example) before game (and recorded in a table for latter use) and the same thing generated during the game with the same rules.

Well, because a table lookup isn't complex, to be a bit blunt about it.  I think we might be getting hung up on the definition of "complex combat", tho.  I am taking that to mean "there is a lot of work involved in figuring out the results of combat" - is that what you mean as well?

If there is complexity in generating the result of a combat system, one of two things is happening:

a)the complexity is due to poor design, or
b)the complexity is in and of itself desired.

Your suggestion of doing all the work ahead of play is, basically, dumping the burden of a) on the player.  "All of these complicated rolls and stuff could have been chopped out, along with 40 pages of rules, and a well-built table used instead." is not good design, unless the complicated is desired.  I guess you're saying "why do it in play, if you can do it beforehand?" and I'm responding with "If you can do it beforehand, why didn't the guy who wrote the rules do it beforehand?" and then answering myself (bad habit, I know) "Because the guy who wrote it might have meant the complexity to be part of play."

I'll pull up a couple of examples, one RPG, one not.

Riddle of Steel has very simple combat rules that interact in a very complex fashion.  It's very clearly an example of b)  -Jake has been pretty clear about wanting the combat system to simulate his understanding of real fighting, as experienced with ARMA. That requires active choosing *during combat*, which means you can't short-circuit it by doing the number crunching ahead of time without breaking the intent of the rules.

Attack Vector: Tactical has really obscene* amounts of complicated result generation during combat, that is - as much as is humanly possible - turned into chart lookups, tables and graphs.  It's definately a case of "we do not want to be a)" - there is complexity we want, but there is no need to dump it on our players.

thanks,

James

*no, really.  Ask Ken about the spreadsheets someday.

Quote from: NoonHi M J,

But as I said, if you figure the damage for a strength 10 attack (for a rough example), and then the attack done is strength 4 plus 3 because of the skill, then it's strength 7...you just remove the effects from 10, 9 and 8 strength.

If I'm imagining your system right. I'm imagining something like a 'for every point you get over what you need to hit, you add a point to damage to represent exceptional accuracy'

Ah, no. Multiverser's system is designed to be simple as long as the players keep things simple, but to become more complex as the players want to do more and/or improve their character abilities.

I thought about not explaining it, but decided it's probably relevant to the discussion, so here goes.

The first part of the problem is calculating the character's chance to hit. This is the sum of several character scores, sometimes adding values from targeting skills (e.g., scopes, magic bonuses), modified by the world bias (which means the player doesn't necessarily know his own total, because the world bias is something he's probably trying to figure out), then subtracting opponent defenses (always includes the target value, can include armor and skills). This gives the number against which you're going to roll. It's a roll-under percentile system with no automatic success or failure on the roll (although the chance of success can be greater than 100% or less than 0%). Compare the roll to the chance of success, and find out whether it's successful.

In the simplest attacks, the damage is drawn straight from the roll by virtue of the damage category of the weapon. The damage categories are:

[*]Annoying ((Roll/50)-1)[*]Damaging (Roll/20)[*]Dangerous (Roll/10)[*]Lethal (Roll/5)[*]Fatal (Roll/2)[*]Annihilating (Roll)[*]Obliterative (Any hit destroys target)[/list:u]The majority of weapons are from damaging to lethal, and ordinary people usually take 15 points of damage. Rolls round up to the nearest whole point of damage.

So if the player rolls 45 with a damaging weapon and it was a hit, he did 3 points of damage, all things being equal.

However, two of the scores that are summed to get the target number have other functions. If either of them are level 2, he gets a "damage category bonus", treating his damaging weapon as a dangerous weapon, so that the roll of 45 is now 5 points; if both are level 2, he gets two damage category bonuses, making it a lethal weapon, and a 45 is worth 9 points. He could have damage category bonuses for other reasons, such as quality weapons or martial arts skill. At the same time, his opponent could impose damage category penalties, pushing it down into a lower damage category, such as special defenses. Obviously, bonuses and penalties cancel each other. Once all bonuses and penalties are counted, the damage category is allowed to move up as many as two or down as many as three, with any additional categories being converted to damage points. Damage points can also be gained in several other ways, including level three in those two scores previously noted, martial arts skills, and other bonuses.

Damage points are added to the roll after it has been determined whether or not the roll hit, for the purpose of transposing to the amount of damage done. Thus if the character has +10 damage points, that roll of 45 is treated as 55 before calculating the damage. With the damaging weapon, that doesn't make a difference in this example, because 45 and 55 both round up to 3 points. The dangerous attack goes from five to six points, and the lethal one from nine to eleven points. There can be damage point penalties as well, reducing the effective damage. It is possible to do more than the ordinary maximum damage for the weapon, and it is clearly possible to hit the target and do no damage at all.

After all this, if the target has a second or third level damage value (rare, but not impossible), he divides the total damage by his level, and discards fractions.

Attack forms may have damage riders. That means that there is a second determination of damage. These fall into three types.

[*]Intrinsic damage riders essentially mean that it's normal for this one kind of attack to do damage calculated on two scales and summed, such as attacking with a piece of construction equipment which does annilhilating plus lethal damage. The one success roll determines the success of both damage calculations.[*]Secondary damage riders occur when an attack form does two kinds of damage on the same attack form, such as a grenade which does both concussive/impact damage and incendiary damage. Different defenses may apply against the second attack form, but the same roll is used.[*]Dependent damage riders involve damage caused by a second skill riding on the first, such as a magic sword which does ordinary kinetic damage by hitting the target plus magical bonus damage. In such cases, the second skill is rolled to see if it is successful, and damage calculated based on that roll, but only if the first roll was successful.[/list:u]Damage category bonuses and penalties and damage points may also affect damage riders, and may do so in different values than those of the primary attack.

If the attack does more than ten points of damage after all this is determined, it might result in a crippling injury. This is rare, as doing more than ten intensities on one attack yet not killing the ordinary target seldom occurs. In the event of a potentially crippling injury, a hit location is rolled, and the actual damage done becomes a percentage chance that the injury is crippling against which a roll is made. That creates a temporarily crippling injury. If in the judgment of the referee a temporarily crippling injury at that location could become a permanent disability, the target must roll against its own stamina to avoid permanent disability.

There are apart from this extensive rules for martial arts in which special attacks may do special damage.

In short, when combat becomes complex in Multiverser, it is possible for every attack to be unique as the various skills of the attacker and the defender interact. A chart system to cover all the possiblities would be almost as long as our entire five hundred page rule book, while the description of how to do it actually only takes forty pages with all combat-significant variables and examples.

A complex system doesn't lend itself to pre-generated results because the real complexity lies in the choices made at the table, not the number of rolls it takes to work out each combat move.

--M. J. Young

QuoteA complex system doesn't lend itself to pre-generated results because the real complexity lies in the choices made at the table, not the number of rolls it takes to work out each combat move.

First I must establish that I'm not suggesting current complex systems can be converted to this. Just that some of the main concepts can carry over, like choice.

So, in terms of how your design allowed player choice to interact with the system, I don't think that's the only way to do it. As I see it, the idea of a complex design is to give lots of feedback from prior choice, and thus prompt more choice. Pre generated result scraping with 'if' statements is able to do that.

Also there seems to be a lot of intimate statistical interaction there that hasn't anything to do with player choice (barring PC generation). That style of interaction wouldn't be suitable for pre gen, but I think I already said it's not the only way to get to the same goal of giving lots of feedback from choice to prompt more choice.


I think I've managed a second thread where I need to give an actual design to show what I mean, when I wanted to just give a suggestion and discuss it.

QuoteRiddle of Steel has very simple combat rules that interact in a very complex fashion. It's very clearly an example of b) -Jake has been pretty clear about wanting the combat system to simulate his understanding of real fighting, as experienced with ARMA. That requires active choosing *during combat*, which means you can't short-circuit it by doing the number crunching ahead of time without breaking the intent of the rules.

I flatly disagree with not being able to do number crunching ahead of time. You do understand that these 'if' statements I keep going on about are controlled by player choice? That you can generate material ahead of time, if you design it so that pre generated material can be influenced by player choice. Things like 'if the PC is swinging an axe, this result happens' and 'if the PC is doing an upper cut, this result is applied'.

And were not just talking some fixed result. It'll be a unique result, generated so it's always different. When I mentioned tables, the GM isn't working from them...he's using the books to make a list of results to work from...basically making a table himself, then working from it.

This is almost the same as having an D&D NPC's stats generated before play. IF the player fireballs the NPC then use its precalculated reflex score to do a save.

It doesn't matter if you never use the pregenerated reflex score/don't use the whole NPC because of player choices. Here, the entire pregenerated result (or NPC) doesn't need to be used, only the parts that apply because of player choices. The simplicity of calculating something like reflex doesn't make any difference to the idea of generating complex results ahead of time.

Quote"why do it in play, if you can do it beforehand?" and I'm responding with "If you can do it beforehand, why didn't the guy who wrote the rules do it beforehand?"

If your generating something randomly, your going to end up with something different each time from the same rules (the rules for wound X or whatever). That's the only reason why it can't be done by the designer before hand.