Flowchart

I hope I’m not losing my manliness, as I realized that I dislike elaborate and detailed combat mechanics in tabletop roleplaying games. Not every one, mind. D&D revolves around… Actually, D&D is very tangentially related to roleplaying.

But in Star Wars and, I got tired of the combat rules. They are restrictive and reality-based. But after watching Clone Wars (not to be confused with Clone Wars the movie, Clone Wars 2008 CGI series, Clone Wars comic book series nor Clone Wars novel), I realized that reality or common sense has nothing to do with Star Wars combat. The Jedi do backflips, restrict their force use, duel for an insane amount of time with other lighsaber-wielders and take on dozens of battle droids at once. Non-force wielders fire blasters with deadly accuracy, run around, use all manner of gadgets and run directly at the enemy in large-scale battles. And every opposing mook has been trained in the Imperial Stormtrooper School of Marksmanship. D20 packs the action tight and limits the imagination of the players.

My summer Star Wars campaign finale was regretfully done before a strict deadline and one of the players had to leave just before the characters had to plan a dashing rescue. Had it degenerated into combat, it would have taken at least half an hour, and people would have just shot at each other. Instead, I suggested that they fly in with a speeder, toss the enemies with a stun grenade while one of the characters jump to the rescuee with a jetpack, grabs him and jumps to the speeder. The whole process took five die rolls and was awesome enough for me to describe energetically. That was the final straw.

I tend to push events in a game forward like a train. I like it when stuff happens and the characters do something. I don’t like it when a game is just standing still while the players speculate some irrelevant detail, shop around comparing equipment, or indeed, shoot some irrelevant mooks (Again, in a game where fighting is but a part of some greater whole). It wastes time and throws the pacing off the tracks.

I’m starting to like process-based mechanics more and more. The Skill Challenge mechanic in D&D and in Saga Edition’s source booke is an example: Get X successes before Y failures. The GM describes the situation and you decide what you want to do. The Noitahovi-system is also a process: First opposed Perception, then Mind/Body, then Grit. If you do not get enough successess, you need to use Sisu points or lose. The advantage of a process-based system is that the scene advances. Look at the lightsaber battles in Star Wars: The duels take ages and usually move from locale to locale. It would be perfect to simulate with a process-based system.

I’ll give a concrete example later, when the threat of falling asleep at the keyboard has passed

Fusion energy

The DESUS has worked. It has not revolutionized anything, but the players have started to do cool maneuvers now and then. The system has encountered a minor setback, however: It requires interesting encounter areas to work. Frantically making last-minute balance evaluations on my selection of foes, selecting combat music, drawing the map and providing descriptions leaves me little time to add interesting terrain features to interact with. Especially since most of the latest combat areas have been in outdoors.

A long time ago in a website far far away, there was a FAQ for Star Wars Roleplaying Game. There was one detail I remember from the pages of text: “…you can make combat more interesting by letting every player describe a detail of the combat area; For example, an exposed power conduit…” That was the key to one sort of fusion energy: An endless sea of imagination for me to populate the environment with.

I gave the player an option to freely suggest terrain features and applied the good old improvisation adage to it: “Yes, and…” I try to never say no to their suggestions, and merely add mechanics. Last game, I had to improvise a combat area and attacking creatures while I was describing that one of the players saw attackers coming. Apart from a very basic game area (two trees, ground, one ancient warpgate…) I had nothing. Then I reminded the players of their right to add details. One of them suggested very tall patches of grass. I made them difficult terrain and cover. Another suggested a nest of bees. I made it hang on a tree branch, made it have an area where the bees attack if the players fail a Diplomacy check. In the encounter, one of the players took about 20 damage when they failed the diplomacy. The player then kicked the tree, making the nest fall, and then kicked it at a goblin shaman. The situation was funny and cool.

Combat does not happen in a vacuum. Environment is an important factor, and I heartily suggest that if you wish for a more exciting combat, ask the players to provide details.

A funny detail: One of the players had to skip the session, leaving me with the question on how to handle his character. I did not have the character sheet, meaning that I couldn’t run him in a combat situation. After a malfunctioning warpgate, the party was lost in an unknown place. One of them decided to scout around, since his character had a horse. I remembered the absent players character and exclaimed “Shuwe says ‘I have a horse too!’ as he gallops away to scout, beyond the borders of my combat grid” The wonders of patchwork player substitution.

Combat of Star, part 2

Was preparing for a larp last friday. ’twas great. Anyway, how does combat handle itself mechanically in Star?

There is a relic in modern games from the times when pen and paper were the most used gaming platform: Hit points. When wielded by a fast-thinking, flesh and blood human they are a potent tool, summarising an individual’s fighting capability in just a number. When an orc deals damage to you with an axe, he scrapes your thigh, forces you to strain yourself by dodging, or hits your shield hard, numbing your arm.

But in a computer game, the same orc usually connects with the axe, which whooshes through your body, tossing liters of blood around and eliciting a grunt of pain. And you keep fighting, despite having just taken a 5-kilogram axe to your face. Same thing with firearms. As long as you have that one hitpoint left, it does not matter whether you have been shot with a bullet, rocket or stone-melting plasma bolt. It does not impair your ability to fight, and once you have gotten used to the red flashes and a slight toss in your aim, you can take machinegun rounds while carefully aiming at the enemy who is peering out of cover. “Someone is shooting at me? No matter, I’ve still got over half my HP left.”

No. Getting hit hurts. As I understand it, modern guns are already too efficient for any body armor to handle. And in the future, they get more powerful still. When a person gets hit, he is going down. X-Com Enemy Unknown had this in the start: When an alien hits your man, he is going to die. In extremely rare cases, the hit will not kill him immidiately, but after a few turns. With body armor, the chances to die immidiately were reduced to about 50-50. But even then being hit was sufficient to knock the unit’s stats down enough for him to be useless in the fight. And healing from damage took ages.

But since we do not have the ability to hire faceless mooks, we need something else. Let’s imagine that a character is hit. If the hit was not instantly fatal, the shock and pain would probably knock the person down. The guy wouldn’t probably rise up immidiately, but attempt to crawl somewhere safe first. Assuming that he is capable of coherent thoughts. But in combat situations, he wouldn’t be a threat for a few moments. And even if he could grab a weapon and shoot back, undoubtedly his efficiency would be questionable. In the game, we shall simulate this by checking where the shot hit by checking which body parts are visible. Then we calculate the effect from weapon damage and hit location: Knockback, physical damage and pain. Knockback is checked against the Fortitude of the target, which consists of Willpower and the weight of the character. If the check succeeds, the character falls down and drops any held objects. Physical damage reduces the stats of the character. This damage is semi-permanent; It can only be cured in the main hub. Armor reduces physical damage by small percentages. Pain is an accumulating value, which drains from the characters slowly. Depending on the Willpower of the character, Pain might reduce his stats, force him to skip turns, moaning, or even drop the character unconcious. Too much physical damage will kill the character.

So now we have a system for handling damage. A common result of being hit would be being knocked over and thrashing on the ground in agony. This is effectively a kill and will reduce the combat efficiency of one side by a significant amount. The lesson is not to get hit.

Next time I’ll see how shooting works.

War of Star

A choice was made and a fight breaks out. The game goes into combat mode. Here is a  simulation of it, giving an overview of how combat works in Star.

The Core of Star

I have a special way of looking at games. Since I need to analyze and play all sorts of games, I do not apply my personal preferences. Instead, I try to acknowledge what the game is supposed to give me. Is it supposed to be an explosive, action packed adredaline pump, a deep and thoughtful puzzle, a nail-bitingly difficult tactical experience? The longer it takes to understand the game’s purpose, the more it annoys me. This is why most jack-of-all-trades games fail. The audience cannot appreciate the game’s offering if it does not understand it.

Then I look at if the game succeeds in its goal. Do I have to stand around in a fast-paced action game? Is the roleplaying aspect of the game just the common black and white moral choice? Is the complex, effect-laden game broken with a simple combination? If the game delivers what it promises, it is a good game, even if I do not appreciate the content fully.

Therefore, the first thing I need for Star is its purpose. What is the game meant to give the player?

I enjoy tabletop roleplaying, and I own the Star Wars Saga Edition roleplaying game books and miniatures. The miniatures have another purpose; They can be used in a tactical miniature wargame called Star Wars Miniatures. While unfortunately I haven’t been able to play it very often due to lack of players, it still has inspired me. Both players control a small band of about less than ten miniatures and move them in a square grid map. Most of the units have some sort of blasters at their disposal, and many games saw desperate firefights in tight corridors, where combatants took cover behind corners and tables, with powerful lynchpins charging into melee and sneaky rogues flanking the enemy positions. That is the experience I wish to give the players. Small-scale tactical warfare with some melee and stealth aspects.

Now I have a target.