SPD roll off

[LouGoncey]

I was reading one of Steven Long's DH posts from his 5e days and he was talking about rolling off as an option for determining what segments you act on.  At the beginning of a segment, everyone rolls a 12 sided die -- if it is equal to or less than your speed value you have a phase in this segment.  Then all the players acting that segment roll a DEX roll to determine the order that they go in.

 

My players loved it.

 

The only additional rule I added was on Segments 6 & 12 there is no rolling -- everybody goes.  This gives everyone a 'technical' speed of 2 and a chance for greater speeds.

 

(I should note that I am basically playing Heroic games.)

 

What are peoples thoughts?

[Lord Liaden]

I first saw this optional rule proposed in a column by Steve Perrin back in Adventurers Club #20 (1993). I've used it successfully with groups who preferred randomizing the order of action. (I personally love the Speed Chart, but some players just don't like its predictability.)

 

I never tried giving everyone actions on particular Phases, but I did play with a couple of other options Steve Perrin suggested. One was to give players who miss their action roll on one Segment a +1 to their target number the next Segment, cumulative for each miss on successive Segments. E.g. someone with Speed 4 who misses has to roll a 5 or less next Segment; if he misses that he rolls for 6 or less next time; and so on. Once the roll is made, the target number resets to the character's Speed. This helps offset the vagaries of random dice, which can sometimes keep one player from acting for (relatively) long periods. It's especially helpful if there's a sizeable difference in Speed between the slowest and fastest character. The other option was to ignore post-Segment 12 -- anyone who rolls a 12 gets a Recovery and can take other post-Segment 12 actions.

[PaycheckHero]

Hmm. A variant of this that would be a bit less random would be for each player to have twelve chits. A number of them equal to their SPD would say "move" and the rest would say "pass". Each segment they'd draw a chit and lay it aside, and move if it said "move". After segment 12, put them all back in the bag (or whatever use use to draw).

 

This applies some correlation between segments so that over a full turn you'd still get exactly as many phases as you paid for, but it still wouldn't be as predictable as the standard spd chart. Though it would

have the interesting effect of getting more predictable throughout the turn--by segment 12, you already know if you move in segment 12 or not.

 

You could mess with it in similar ways to the dice method--for example, perhaps you eliminate turns but write "12" on one of the "move" chits. When you draw that chit, you take your post-segment 12 recovery and put the chits back in the bag.

[LouGoncey]

The chit system sounds like some boardgames I currently play and I am definitely trying it the next time we play.  Each player will get 12 playing cards with the red cards equal to their speed -- the rest are black.  Everyone will shuffle their 12 card decks at the beginning of their turn, then draw the top card at the beginning of the segment -- everyone who draws a red card has an action.

 

(This will satisfy the girl who was playing who just complained about her bad luck rolling a 12-sider.)

 

This is definitely a system I recommend people trying for an Heroic Tarantino style game (which I am currently running.)

[PaycheckHero]

The chit system sounds like some boardgames I currently play and I am definitely trying it the next time we play.  Each player will get 12 playing cards with the red cards equal to their speed -- the rest are black.  Everyone will shuffle their 12 card decks at the beginning of their turn, then draw the top card at the beginning of the segment -- everyone who draws a red card has an action.

Very nice. The cards are a definite improvement over my chit suggestion. For one thing, if you hold an action you could just place the card in front of you as a reminder (though that won't say if you're holding a half-move or a full-move). I'm less clear on how to handle an abort--probably pull out a red card from your deck and then re-shuffle what remains. You could also have one of the red cards distinguishable for the seg-12 recovery if you like that variant.

[LouGoncey]

Thanks a lot for the chit reminder.  I played GMT's Glory about 10 years ago and it had the chit pull system for 'who goes next.'  It was right in front of me the whole time!

 

My players should be so happy.

[bigbywolfe]

Taking a half-phase action and then holding?  Turn the card sideways.  Aborting an action?  Maybe keep one of the black cards in front of you to remind you that you already spent your action when a red card shows up again?  Just some thoughts.

[Spence]

Thanks a lot for the chit reminder.  I played GMT's Glory about 10 years ago and it had the chit pull system for 'who goes next.'  It was right in front of me the whole time!

 

My players should be so happy.

 

The chit system for initiative was fairly common for war-games back in the 70's.  It was also used for most randomization that couldn't be met by six sided dice.  We didn't have poly's until the RPG came out IIRC.

[PaycheckHero]

Hmm. Suppose instead of shuffling you stack each deck according to the speed chart. Now you have an alternate bookkeeping method for the standard system. If the cards are labeled with the character's dex instead of ordinary playing card faces, it even encodes the order.

 

Hmm. That might actually work slicker than me fumbling around for where I put the speed chart, especially with new players. Perhaps I could find children's flashcards with larger numbers. (Or, maybe use playing

cards but add 10 or 20 (depends on genre, and probably also Hero edition since 6e doesn't reward you for high DEX like previous editions do), since in many games few combatants have a DEX that low anyway.

 

This is kind of a fun topic!

[Ndreare]

Only somewhat related:

 

We first came to Hero from palladium and the way we did it when we first came, worked okay for low speed character, but broke down completly after trying supers.

 

We just let people use all their actions at once, evryone got all their actions in what would be considered phase 1.

 

If the player wanted to haymaker or something else that affected his phase, he was bumped to the bottom of the initiative order.

 

One advantage was it made movement based on price equal, as oppossed to movement times speed.

 

If we did that system again now, I would divide speed by two and use phase 6 and 12.

 

I should also say it speeds up combat drasticly.

[LouGoncey]

After a good night's sleep, I find myself slowly going over to Perrin's idea of rolling for your phases, adding +1 for each miss, and rolling a 12 means you get a recovery.

 

Maybe that is why Perrin is a game designer and I am just a game player.

[Hugh Neilson]

I've seen a few suggestions with cards in the past.  I like the idea of 13 cards, rather than 12.  A-10 is 1-10, J = 11, Q = 12 and K = PS 12 recovery.

 

I've seen this suggested as a single draw for all participants (when a 4 comes up, all characters who get a phase on Segment 4 act), but there's no reason you could not have a separate 13 card pool for each character.  In that case, I'd say the King means "take a PS12 recovery and draw the next card".

[phoenix240]

There's several great suggestions in this thread. I'm definitely going try some of them out.

[hawkfu]

Hi, this is a great thread. Some excellent suggestions. My group plays online using Roll20 (our player live in both coasts of Florida, one in Chicago and one in California). We have been using a system based on Shadowrun.

 

each character rolls their Speed in dice (adding any lightning reflexes they might have) and that number determines when they go. Then we subtract 10 from their number to determine if they go a second time (or a third, or fourth). Example:

 

player has Speed 6 and rolls 23. He has +3 lightning reflexes so the number becomes 26. They have an action on 26 - 16 - and 6.

 

It's added a real random element, which has been fun, but a lot of paper work for the GM (that's me). The random element is really important to me. Having played Hero games for more than 25 years (on and off), the Speed chart is too predictable.

 

However, I love the idea of randomizing the segments with a 12 die roll in each segment.

[lou_tennant]

We have been testing a version of this in Fantasy Hero. Using D6 rolled openly by the GM.

 

We have SPD 2-4, so each 'phase' a D6 is rolled if your SPD is equal or greater than you get to act, duplicate numbers are re-rolled. You then have a post-turn recovery.

[LouGoncey]

Just a Post-script kinda thing, but my group and I are using the playing card system.  You take a number of red cards equal to your SPD-1 then black cards to fill out your deck to 11 cards.  Everyone goes on Segment 12, so no card is needed.  For the rest of the Turn, at the beginning of the Segment you each draw a card and a red card means for have a phase this Segment.

[Spence]

For me the phase system is one of the big attractions of Hero.  One of the reasons I wanted to get away form regular RPG's was random initiative and multiple and very broken systems of opportunity attacks out there. 

[phoenix240]

How would you handle Movement and Endurance expenditure in this system?

[LouGoncey]

Using the cards for SPD thing where you place in the number of red cards equal to your SPD, it is the same number of phases per turn, so movement and endurance end up being the same -- the only change is you just don't know when you are going to go in the Turn.

 

This is just something I like to use because I think some chaos does represent battle.  I am not saying the system is stupid.  I liked it when I first played Star Fleet Battles and I like it now.  Just wanted to try something different.

[phoenix240]

I was more asking about the roll system. The cards are cool but since I mostly play online a dice system would be easier.