Initiative and turns

mechanics
question
#1

Hello Great Community.

disclaimer: I’m not a native english speaker. Any insult to english grammar or orthograph is unintended.

I’m reading ICRPG-ME right now, and I’m a bit confused about initiative and turns (page 85). As I understand it, all PC opponents will act at GM turn. Therefore, what is the relevance of table seating? Just have a “player turn” and let them choose their initiative order and adjust their strategy as they see fit.

I can pretty well imagine how the round will go with my group if we use the example seating of p85:

  • Tank Brothers’s turn: “let’s charge forward to control the battlefield!”
  • Thief’s turn: “I sneak arround to take out that high value target.”
  • Mage’s turn: rains fire on the battlefield (roll critical), probably taking out ennemy frontline, high value target, and thief.
  • Thief: “…”
  • Tank Brothers and Cleric: “LOL!”
  • GM: slow clap… “Well done, Mage.”
  • Cleric’s turn: “too bad I can’t resurrect BBQ’ed meat. I charge forward.”

So at end of turn, we have:

  • Tanks Brothers that wonder where the frontline has gone.
  • An awkward Mage.
  • a small appalled heap of ashes with protuding lockpicks (obviously a great loot).
  • a Cleric holding the front line.

If sticking to the table order rule, I really think that the right order should be the opposite:

  • After the GM turn, Cleric can either heal a near dead party member, cure a DoT before it can proc, or cast a buff for the whole party.
  • Then Mage can cast AoE without friendly fire risk.
  • Then Thief can strategically stab whatever remaining target that needs a good backstabbing.
  • Then Tank Brothers can charge forward to contain the frontline. By the way, playing tanks last is the best way to control the battlefield at first turn, whoever goes first after the initiative roll.

Did I miss something?

#2

Personally, I let the group plan their encounter first and just resolve the action in sequence. If something happens to make a certain action irrelevant (mage rolls high and eliminated the target the thief was sneeking to) I’ll allow that player to change their stated action. Unless the narrative dictates otherwise.

Nothing worse than role-playing something cool just to have your thunder stolen.

#3

There is no “right” order.

A lot of tables do prefer this order (Tank, Thief, Ranged Attackers/Mages, and Healer), only so the tanks can leap in front and the healers can go last and clean up any injuries before the DM goes.

But that’s not the only way to play. Doing it in reverse is perfectly fine.

Early on in ICRPG, the turn order for the night in my games was the person who happened to sit on my left, followed by the next person on the left, and so on, until it got back around to my right.

These days, my players roll for initiative at the start of each room, with the highest roll going first, and that determines the turn order for that room, and then we roll again for a new turn order the next encounter. We like this method just to keep it mixed up a bit.

The point is, there is no right or wrong way to do turn order. Just pick a method and then work from your left to the right (or largest roll to smallest roll), giving each player an equal moment in the spotlight. This piece is the most important part. Keep the game moving. And. Give everyone equal time to shine.

Hope that helps and translates well.

#4

I don’t do initiative I make a yes no decision on weather event goes first or PC. From here I make each player roll and explain actions and then I narrate all actions after the PCs have finished. It’s gotten to the point that my players all make better decisions about actions and which ones going to do what as I have a group Hourglass passing.

So it’s essentially GM VS PC’s, I have a list of table rules and suggested game play ideas on the table for players to read.

#5

We roll initiative at our table, highest roll goes first, but from them we go around the table to the right. (Reroll for each new encounter.)

Timers (typically) aren’t established until the GM takes their first turn during an encounter, so, in this way, if a player wins initiative they’ve essentially won a kind of “bonus” round for themselves and anyone to their left.

🤷

#6

Sounds perfectly fine by me. The key is to keep it simple.

#7

I sometimes use a roll method, but oftentimes go around the table starting with the player to my left. Then have the monster groups between player turns.

Assuming I have several super mooks, I separate them into groups then either color code or number code the groups. I try to have that Mines of Moria feel with my super mooks one hit kills them but their numbers are many. By breaking them up and having the players and monsters alternate taking turns between one another I make more cinematic battles. In addition to this monsters that have multiple actions take additional actions between turns like monster groups. This makes the climactic battles more climactic as the players can just group up and hit the boss till it dies. The in-between turns become far more unforgiving.

I started doing this in Pathfinder before ICRPG, especially with monsters like dragons or monsters with multi-attack. I would give them multiple initiatives and break their actions up accordingly. I still limit monsters to one spell action or other special abilities per turn, but regular attacks get spread throughout the round.

#8

That’s up for the players to decide.

#9

I think turn order is mostly just to make sure every player gets their turn, and no one gets skipped or forgotten.

As long as everyone feels like they’re being treated fairly, I’m happy using any turn system!

#10

OK, thank you.

I think I will stick to Jaide’s method. Lancer RPG has a similar initiative rule except that instead of seating order, players choose who act.

#11

Hi and welcome,

There’s many way to play initiative.
For my part I use playing card from As to 9. When a initiative is call, I give one card to me, one card to each player, after that we play beginning with lower card to the higher one.
When all cards was played, we shuffle the cards and give one card to each person again.
We do that until the encounter is finished

#12

Hey 8bit,

As above, the initiative system included in ICRPG ME is just one example. It is essentially side-based initiative. The players go, in whatever order they decide, and then the GM goes. Or, the opposite if the party is surprised or whatever. And this actually works surprisingly well in practice. But there are other systems, many of which you might like better.

  1. Individual Initiative: Every gets their turn, all actors in the encounter determine their order, and follow that order. (Most D&D)
  2. Paired Initiative: Each combatant has one, perhaps more, direct foes. The warrior faces an orc. Those two roll a die to see who “has the initiative”, and act in that order. (Never seen this in published material, read about it on forums)
  3. Integrated Initiative: Your action roll (attack, cast a spell, etc.) is your initiative roll. Rolling high is best. The archer who rolled a 19 will hit the orc who rolled a 15 before the orc’s attack lands – maybe killing it and preventing the attack. (PDM early work, PBTA in essence)
  4. Phased Initiative: All actors in an encounter act in the phases they qualify for, simultaneously (all missile attacks, all melee attacks perhaps separated by long vs short weapons, all spells, all movement, etc.). (Perrin Conventions, old D&D/1e AD&D)
  5. Action Oriented Initiative: Fast Actions > Slow Actions > Movement and Any Action (Forbidden Lands, Shadow of the Demon Lord)
  6. Player Directed: Players decide whether to be aggressive, balanced, or defensive. Aggressive goes first, then balanced, then defensive (relative to other players and the monsters). (Hack of The One Ring 2E, which also resolves missile attacks first with the “opening volleys”)
  7. Speed Based: Actions have incremental speeds, and are completed by those speeds (a spell with a cast time of 5 will end after a dagger attack with speed 3 if the attacker is already in melee range). (AD&D, Runequest, Mythras)
  8. Freeform: Players and GMs just decide who goes when, making sure everyone feels like its fair. (DW)

My current favorite is a mixture of a few of these. Personally, I’m less interested in everyone getting an equal turn (I’m not playing a wargame) and more interested in the game being believable. A novice swordsman against a veteran knight probably doesn’t get a turn unless the knight makes a mistake or gives them clemency. It would be wise for the novice to negotiate, appeal to honor, flee, bribe, or something else.

I’ve talked about initiative before in many noodley posts, so I’ll cut this one short. My only real advice is, if the initiative system you’re using isn’t helping you play the games you want to play, change the system! You’re the game MASTER!

AC

#13

Hi, Antony_C.

You can add tick based initiative in your initiative systems list (Feng Shui, by Robin D. Laws). Each combatant roll for a tick total. Highest goes first, and each action has a cost (attack: 3 ticks, active defense, 1 tick). Initiative roll defines both play order and how many action you get per round.

GM simply clock down from higher tick number to zero to play the turn.

This system works well for adrenaline packed explosive action scenes.

#14

The question I can’t seem to find the answer to is, when using the RAW, if everyone is going in clockwise order, when does the GM go? Does the GM wait till all the players have gone in their clockwise order then go? Or is the GM a part of the clockwise turn order and go in order so that there are possibly players that go after the GM? Is the GM part of the clockwise turn order or is the GM outside the order in that all players take their turn in clockwise order, then the GM goes?

I hope this makes sense. (Tougher to describe than show on a diagram)

#15

Yes, the GM is part of the turn order. Example with 4 players and the GM: player 3 wins Initiative and starts the round. Player 3 acts, then 4, then GM, then 1, then 2; end of the round.
Hope that helps. :coffee::+1:

#16

OK, I see. I suppose other methods could be used such as Players roll initiative, highest roll goes first, then clockwise through all Players, then GM gets the last turn. I seem to remember reading that somewhere that the GM goes last.

Thank you for the response. I’m just getting into this game and I love the simplicity but there are alot of vague descriptions of rules. (Healing and First aid, for example. How many HP are recovered by spells, or potions. I can’t find an answer to this anywhere.)

#17

Here’s a part with more detail on initiative:

Screenshot_20230617-140159
Screenshot_20230617-140159.jpg1080x1793 818 KB

And for spells this bit tells you what to roll:

Screenshot_20230617-140333
Screenshot_20230617-140333.jpg1080x1738 730 KB

Hope that helps. :coffee::blush:

#18

OK, I read that as whatever roll I get for effort when casting a healing spell, that’s how many HP the “patient” would receive.
Thank you

#19

No worries, amigo. Most welcome. :blush:

#20

If that’s the order they want to do it, then they can sit in that order. No big deal. My party often has the thief-like character go first.