Movement during combat

[jaymz]

I've been discussing movement during combat with Damian Magecraft and while we seem to be looking for similar goals we are definitely going about it a bit differently. We both use a phase system like many others do I am sure so I will post my thoughts and anyone can chime in.

I use 3 phases of 5 seconds each per melee.
SPDx15 = maximum feet per melee thus SPDx5 = maximum feet per phase

Movement is done as follows:

Walk - SPDx1 = feet per phase. It is a free action with no penalty or bonus to actions that would be affected by movment. (Perception, strike, parry, dodge. any others that may even be percentile based are welcome)

Jog/Light Run - SPDx3 = feet per phase. It is also a free action but incurs a -3 penalty to strike, parry, perception but +3 to dodge

Full Run - SPDx5 = feet per phase. This costs 1 action but incurs a -6 penalty to strike, parry and perception but +6 to dodge.

Also I use a base of 3 actions/attacks per melee for untrained characters (or 1 action/attack per phase) thus more actions/attacks is definitely advantageous when it comes to movement.

For us in RAW the only change that would need to be made is that a Full Run would cost 3 actions/attacks. Thus someone with no combat training would lose all of their actions/attacks and anyone with combat training would still have at least 1 action/attack left they could take with the above penalties or bonuses.

Well?

[Damian Magecraft]

tagged for later debate

[jaymz]

[Killer Cyborg]

We never did anything that formal.
If you move fast enough, then you're firing Wild... but that's about it.

[jaymz]

Technically not aiming any shot is a wild shot iirc.

[Killer Cyborg]

Technically not aiming any shot is a wild shot iirc.

There are aimed shots, standard shots, bursts, and wild shots, as of RUE.

[jaymz]

Technically not aiming any shot is a wild shot iirc.

There are aimed shots, standard shots, bursts, and wild shots, as of RUE.

Ah yes that's right my bad. Prior to RUE Wild shots are what are now called standard shots.

[Killer Cyborg]

Technically not aiming any shot is a wild shot iirc.

There are aimed shots, standard shots, bursts, and wild shots, as of RUE.

Ah yes that's right my bad. Prior to RUE Wild shots are what are now called standard shots.

Kind of.

Anyway, that's all we'd do, judge whether or not somebody would be moving too fast to aim (or, these days, take a standard shot).
One of the things I like about the Wild shot rules is that they're simple.
If things get too screwy, and you can't aim for whatever reason, you're -6 to strike.
Easy to remember, and easy to implement.

[jaymz]

The rule seems unnecessarily complicated. Rifts combat is already complicated enough IMHO. If anything, it needs some simplification, not more rules added on to it. To play devil's advocate it makes perfect sense that the faster you are moving the harder it is to hit you. But remember this is only in abstraction. If someone is running towards you it actually makes it easier to hit them. If someone is running away from you it does not make a very big difference. If someone is running horizontal to your frame of reference then it does indeed make it much more difficult to hit. But be aware that this house rule favors defenders in a system that already favors defenders and has the potential to make combats last a lot longer.

A system that favours defenders only if they are willing to give up their own chance to counter attack or have an auto dodge in regards to ranged combat. Parrying and striking in melee are relatively even up across the board.

EDIT - Also you cannot try to determine distance of movement and its effect on your actions per melee (in my case per phase) without in fact adding rules. The above that I submitted are relatively straight forward and gives an actual USE for the SPD attribute which otherwise just sits there taking up space on a character sheet

EDIT 2 - Unless you are saying yo allow characters to move whatever distance they want without penalty?

[jaymz]

Technically not aiming any shot is a wild shot iirc.

There are aimed shots, standard shots, bursts, and wild shots, as of RUE.

Ah yes that's right my bad. Prior to RUE Wild shots are what are now called standard shots.

Kind of.

Anyway, that's all we'd do, judge whether or not somebody would be moving too fast to aim (or, these days, take a standard shot).
One of the things I like about the Wild shot rules is that they're simple.
If things get too screwy, and you can't aim for whatever reason, you're -6 to strike.
Easy to remember, and easy to implement.

Still it leaves no rule as to how much one can move in a given time frame during combat. Also if you see what I did a full run is in fact the same as shooting wild jogging/light run is just not AS wild.

[Killer Cyborg]

Still it leaves no rule as to how much one can move in a given time frame during combat.

The issue there is that "One Action" isn't a set amount of time, so there's no good way to say specifically how "distance per time unit" speed interacts with it.
But I've rarely run into situations where it really mattered.
Don't get me wrong- I'd like to see the system be able to lay things out specifically, like the movement rules in D&D and other games... but the entire rules would have to be rewritten in order to do it really right, in my view.

Also if you see what I did a full run is in fact the same as shooting wild jogging/light run is just not AS wild.

Yep!
I noticed that, and appreciate it.
I've just never really needed that level of granularity in this area.
As somebody else said, combat already takes too long.

All that being said, if I did need that level of specificness in combat, your rules do indeed make sense, and are pretty consistent with the existing rules.

[jaymz]

and are pretty consistent with the existing rules.

Anytime I try to add house rules or add-ons, I always at least TRY to make it work within the rules that already there.

[Damian Magecraft]

I initially worked up my version with 5 phases of 3 seconds. (based on the assumption that an "optimized" 1st level character starts with 5 APM.)
After having perused Jaymz's quick notes I think the 3 phase melee actually will work better in the long run.

I cannot speak for Jaymz but I developed my version in response to complaints from some of my newer players (they said it did not allow for "tactical" thinking) as well as the perennial topics on these boards on how to "fix" the movement issue; many of which were overly complicated and tended to ignore or out right eliminate other aspects of the combat system.

[jaymz]

I developed my 3 phase system just to see if I could speed up combat without really completely rewriting the rules. I think it worked.

[jaymz]

Still it leaves no rule as to how much one can move in a given time frame during combat.

The issue there is that "One Action" isn't a set amount of time, so there's no good way to say specifically how "distance per time unit" speed interacts with it.

Actually having now thought about this a bit...losing an attack while running at full speed isn't so much losing X amount of time for me but more along the lines your focus is taken away enough to cause you to not be able to act as much as you normally would in a given time whereas walking or jogging still allows you to more or less keep your full attention on what you are doing. The phase is the time unit that determines how far you can get not the attack that is lost. Does that make sense?

[jaymz]

A system that favours defenders only if they are willing to give up their own chance to counter attack or have an auto dodge in regards to ranged combat. Parrying and striking in melee are relatively even up across the board.

I disagree with you. The system favors defenders in a number of ways. Most importantly are:
1) Defenders win ties on parry and dodge (more significant statistically than you might think).
2) It is far easier to gain bonuses to parry and dodge than it is to gain bonuses to hit. This includes situational bonuses and static bonuses.

I really do not recommend adding rules that further favor the defender. Let me reiterate that combat following the rules as written in Rifts already takes a long time. Your proposed rules give an even greater advantage to the defender, which means more dice rolls are required before combat comes to a resolution.

I might also point out that giving advantages to a defender makes melee and ranged weapon combat less threatening than magical and psionic combat. Psionic combat ability is somewhat limited, but magic spells already have a number of distinct advantages over melee and ranged weapon combat.

Actually it isn't that much easier to get parry and dodge bonuses as it is strike bonuses. HTH gives them out relatively equally as do ancient weapon proficiencies. PP gives them across the board. The only other thing is physical skills give slightly more parry/dodge bonuses as opposed to strike bonuses but modern proficiencies only give strike bonuses. To get the advantage I give them the defender also loses some ability to do anything back and can even lose 3 attacks in the melee. That isn't instead of giving up other attack to actually dodge so I am not sure how it becomes too much of an advantage. If anything the numbers are on the side of the attacker who only needs an 8 plus to hit. The defender while he may get a bonus from running still has to use an a attack to do so and if he is running at full is burning 3 attack in the melee right there. If you only have 4 attacks you get to actually dodge one while running at full while your opponent gets to shoot at you 4 times with a 60% chance to hit you each time you don't dodge, in this case 60% chance to hit you 3 seperate occasions.

We'll just have to agree to disagree then Sam because we are obviously on opposite sides of this debate and not likely to convince the other of our position. For me this works and it works more or less within the already set rules of the game. No more different than having Aiming Bonuses for shooting or burst rules which are essentially also add-ons to the basic attack roll that are outside your skills and attribute bonuses. They are essentially circumstantial bonuses which the game has plenty of.

I'll ask though, how do you handle movement during combat then? Palladium has no rules outside of "you can run SPDx20 yards per minute" which by and large is useless during a combat scenario as there is nothing that has it effect what you are doing when logic would dictate it would HAVE to have an effect.

[flatline]

If you want a tactical game, then unless you're willing to play on a map, it's not worth the effort (and maps become hard when combatants move quickly and have long range weaponry like many in the Rifts setting).

I do away with the whole "attacks per melee" concept. In my study of martial arts, hand to hand combat does not have a predictable pace.

It's better to keep things simple. Have everyone declare what they want to do in the next moment and then make the moment's length equal to the shortest action being taken (rounding up so that as many actions as reasonable are counted as taking the full moment) and then any long actions carry over into the next moment. The amount of distance that can be covered depends on the characters speed, agility, and the length of the moment.

Characters that have a low number of attacks declare their action first so that characters with higher number of attacks can adjust their actions according to what the slower characters are doing without penalty. A slower character can hold their action in order to make a defensive action at no penalty or they can abort their declared action to take a defensive or other action at a penalty (penalty determined according to how easy it would be to transition from the first declared action to the new action). Faster characters can also hold or abort with penalty, but if everyone holds, then the moment passes and the next moment begins. If everyone aborts or holds, then those who held their action can declare a new action with no penalty (or continue holding, if they please). Actions resolve in the order that makes logical sense based on what was finally declared.

It is up to the players and GM to enforce that no actions are declared using information that a particular character has no way of knowing.

This way characters with more attacks per melee have significant advantages in combat, but you're not bogged down keeping track of how actions are burned within the turn by everybody. You only keep track of what's been declared for the current moment (and any penalties assigned).

Upon reading this, it sounds more complicated than it is (I curse my ability to make simple things seem complex). But my experience is that after a little experimentation, the group quickly falls into a rhythm and because time isn't rigid, creative tactical thinking is both encouraged and rewarded.

--flatline

[jaymz]

This is similar to how actions/combat rounds are done in d6 from West End Games. No one has a set number of actions. eveyone getsone action in the round adn doing multiple actiosn will garenr penalties though.

[finn69]

I've been discussing movement during combat with Damian Magecraft and while we seem to be looking for similar goals we are definitely going about it a bit differently. We both use a phase system like many others do I am sure so I will post my thoughts and anyone can chime in.

I use 3 phases of 5 seconds each per melee.
SPDx15 = maximum feet per melee thus SPDx5 = maximum feet per phase

Movement is done as follows:

Walk - SPDx1 = feet per phase. It is a free action with no penalty or bonus to actions that would be affected by movment. (Perception, strike, parry, dodge. any others that may even be percentile based are welcome)

Jog/Light Run - SPDx3 = feet per phase. It is also a free action but incurs a -3 penalty to strike, parry, perception but +3 to dodge

Full Run - SPDx5 = feet per phase. This costs 1 action but incurs a -6 penalty to strike, parry and perception but +6 to dodge.

Also I use a base of 3 actions/attacks per melee for untrained characters (or 1 action/attack per phase) thus more actions/attacks is definitely advantageous when it comes to movement.

For us in RAW the only change that would need to be made is that a Full Run would cost 3 actions/attacks. Thus someone with no combat training would lose all of their actions/attacks and anyone with combat training would still have at least 1 action/attack left they could take with the above penalties or bonuses.

Well?

i like this system and am going to play test it with my group if we get it down to make it run smoothly it will become a regular rule for my palladium games

[jaymz]

I've been discussing movement during combat with Damian Magecraft and while we seem to be looking for similar goals we are definitely going about it a bit differently. We both use a phase system like many others do I am sure so I will post my thoughts and anyone can chime in.

I use 3 phases of 5 seconds each per melee.
SPDx15 = maximum feet per melee thus SPDx5 = maximum feet per phase

Movement is done as follows:

Walk - SPDx1 = feet per phase. It is a free action with no penalty or bonus to actions that would be affected by movment. (Perception, strike, parry, dodge. any others that may even be percentile based are welcome)

Jog/Light Run - SPDx3 = feet per phase. It is also a free action but incurs a -3 penalty to strike, parry, perception but +3 to dodge

Full Run - SPDx5 = feet per phase. This costs 1 action but incurs a -6 penalty to strike, parry and perception but +6 to dodge.

Also I use a base of 3 actions/attacks per melee for untrained characters (or 1 action/attack per phase) thus more actions/attacks is definitely advantageous when it comes to movement.

For us in RAW the only change that would need to be made is that a Full Run would cost 3 actions/attacks. Thus someone with no combat training would lose all of their actions/attacks and anyone with combat training would still have at least 1 action/attack left they could take with the above penalties or bonuses.

Well?

i like this system and am going to play test it with my group if we get it down to make it run smoothly it will become a regular rule for my palladium games

Did you want an explaination of the phase system i use as well?

[finn69]

i like this system and am going to play test it with my group if we get it down to make it run smoothly it will become a regular rule for my palladium games[/quote]

Did you want an explaination of the phase system i use as well?[/quote]

sure ill try anything at least once

[jaymz]

i like this system and am going to play test it with my group if we get it down to make it run smoothly it will become a regular rule for my palladium games

Did you want an explaination of the phase system i use as well?[/quote]

sure ill try anything at least once [/quote]

Well the movement rules work best using my 3 phase system so I'll give you the basics.

All combat is almost exactly the same except there are three phases in stead of every one just going around the table 1 action/attack at a time until every one runs out. Each phase each person takes a number of attacks (see below). Typically 1-2 per phase. In other words when your turn in a phase comes up you can take multiple actions if you have them at once.

# of attacks - Attacks per phase

3 - 1/1/1
4 - 1/2/1
5 - 2/1/2
6 - 2/2/2
7 - 2/3/2
8 - 3/2/3
9 - 3/3/3
10 - 3/4/3
11 - 4/3/4
12 - 4/4/4

If you have more than 12 attacks in a melee I am sure you can figure out the pattern.

I find this speeds up combat greatly as every melee round is 3 phases so every one get 3 three turns essentially in which their characters can take 1 or make actions/attacks per turn. This is instead of their being anywhere from 4-12 turns (or possibly more) per melee.