Help - Initiative

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#1

Hello guys, i’m designing my own ttrpg since a while now and i’m wondering what is a good Inititiative system in your opinion and what can make it fun.

There are as many initiative rules as there are systems and i don’t know any more how to make it interesting.

I don’t want to brake the flow of the game by rolling initiative too often (like every turn in Dragonbane), but in the same time, the order in which the players and the monsters take their turn is interesting in a more tactical ttrpg.

I don’t know anymore… I’m wondering if a simple static initiative value for every players and monsters might be a solution. Then the lowest initiative value go first once a combat is triggered.

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#2

If you want an initiative roll, my suggestion would be

  1. Determine surprise (if applicable): only one side can be surprised, this side gets a free surprise action at the start of combat
  2. Roll initiative, d20+dex against target. All PCs who beat the target take their actions.
  3. All monsters take their actions.
  4. Play continues with sidewise initiative and clockwise order (players, in order, then monsters)

This way, you get the excitement that someone can seize the initiative at the beginning, and the smooth flow of clockwise order after that.

#3

What kind of RPG is it?

#4

The system is used for scifi as well as for fantasy.
It is a roll under d100 system where the GM doesn’t roll any dice.
One of my design goal is to have a system that can still aplly most of its rules in a theather of the mind context, even if it is a tactical ttrpg first.

The reason is that most of my sessions are a mix of tactical and theater of the mind. I just don’t want to throw away 50% of the combat rules once i am in a narrative mode.

But the initiative is kind of a bummer when it comes to narration, i understand why Dungeon World doesn’t have one.

#5

That is such a mix of relative words that I have a hard time wrapping my head around such concepts! May I suggest that you discuss things out with ChatGPT? Don’t let it write for you, but be a bit of a philosopher and talk things out with it. Inspiration might strike!

Good luck!

#6

IMHO, the issue with mixing theatre of mind-play with grid-play is the “tactical” has different connotations in the two ways of playing.

In mind-play, tactics is general understanding of the situation, picking up details, narration, and creativity. In grid-play, tactics is much more related to rules mastery and precision.

Systems that work well for both styles therefore tend to have relatively few and narratively intuitive rules, and no “feats” or similar that only apply under very special conditions.

That said, I don’t understand why initiative is a bummer when it comes to narration. Can you elaborate?

#7

Initiative prevent the GM to bounce from a player to another in a combat situation.

The GM can’t put the spot light on the same player twice or bounce between two players then go to the next in a combat situation.

The turn order prevent that and this is why, in my point of view, this is a bummer.

#8

Ok, cool. But if I can press you on this a bit, it seems to me that this is not really an issue with the initiative system.

In my opinion, the purpose of an initiative system is to ensure fairness in a situation where action order is a relevant factor in success. So if we spotlight the same player twice, it seems to me that we either

  • are in a situation where there is no particular advantage from turn order (for example: I’m fighting one guy, and you’re fighting another, and there is no real interaction between the two fights); or
  • favor one player, by giving them the advantage, and thereby disfavor every one else (which might be fine)

Both these options arguably exist irrespective of our initiative system. In a very rigid system, the DM can still say “you guys are so far apart, that you’re basically in two different fights. Let’s focus on Amanda’s fight first” - it is totally within the rules.
And in a very ‘loose’ system, you would still have to go one at a time, effectively creating an ad-hoc system, to enable tactical decision making. So side-stepping whatever order we currently use to favor Amanda will be equally a breach of the social contract (or cheating/fudging) in a system without initiative, if the rest of the group feels that it was unjust, or a cool spotlight if they think it’s was just.

Point is: I think that these situations work equally well, or equally bad, with all initiative systems; and they don’t inherently work better or worse in mind-play than in grid-play.

Example: old d&d is played both in theatre of mind and on a tabletop/grid, using d6-roll-high as initiative; and since combat rounds are one minute long, there is plenty of space to give more spotlight to one player by letting them make a more complex action.

#9

Yeah, the GM has to be careful to not focus on only one player of course but the option to do it once in a while is available and make sense only if it is narratively coherent.

I agree with you, both have their pros and cons, it is about taste and what you want to establish around the table.
Thanks for your insight. :slight_smile:

#10

If we start to building a decision tree, the first branch is: initiative every turn or only at the beginning of the encounter? This impacts the complexity.

The next question I get from implication, how smooth is the transition between theatre-of-mind and grid-tactical? If this is the problem, having something light weight would work well.

I would recommend a d6. Everyone rolls a d6, GM starts the count at 1. Whomever has a 1 goes. Continue count until reaching the value of 6. If two parties have the same value, then the higher dex wins the tie.

If the initiative is only at the beginning, then you can add more complexity/infrastructure to the process. However, if you goal is flow between the two states (or modes), then a lower infrastructure approach would probably work better.

Just quick thoughts.

#11

Have you considered the “Dragonbane” initiative system?
Playing with cards. 1 thru 10.
Lowest goes first. Anyone with a Feet or skill that would allow them to have an advantage in an initiative situation. Would get to draw 2 cards and keep the highest. The DM could have multiple cards if he has multiple groups of bad guys. By using cards, everyone is very clear when they will go. The cool part is, you can actually switch cards, so if you have a better initiative card than another player…And it makes tactical sense for them to go first…You can switch cards and thereby switch initiative with them. What is even more interesting is you can also switch with the monsters if you want to see which way the goblins are going to go before you throw your spell, for example.

#12

I just did a DragonBane session yesterday. I love that initiative system. It adds a little bit of uncertainty every round and that is great.

#13

Troika has an interesting system where you have for example a bag of coloured tokens, one token for each monster in combat and tokens for each player… plus one special “end of round” token.

Each turn you draw from the bag, so initiative order isn’t static and chaotic, and as soon as he end of round token is drawn, all tokens are replaced and start again.