Tips for making combat faster

[Fallon Kell]

[Naaman]

I thought we were trying to speed up play, not speed up actions. :p

The way we play, each combatant takes all of his actions at once. Makes for fast resolution and allows for more epic battles.

[Fallon Kell]

[Naaman]

Yes. Each character takes his whole turn before anyone else reslves his actions.

[Bigkrieg]

So far, I am seeing a couple of things folks have said that they do to speed up combat. First off, some of you eliminating initiative rolls and have each player do all their actions at the same time.

Does anyone have any other suggestions?

[Fallon Kell]

I keep the voice memo app on my iPod running so I can save most of the bookkeeping for afterwards.
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Or that excessively long "Noooooooooo" was the Whining Side of the Force leaving him. - Dustflier

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[Bren]

Suggestions depend on what takes time for your group and what are the parts of the rules that they are willing to give up or streamline. The easiest solution that requires little to no rule change is to structure the round to eliminate wait time. For example:

Initiative is slowing play.

• Roll initiative once for the combat.
  
• Roll inititative once every X rounds rather than every round.
  
• Use simultanteous actions.

Players or GM take a long time to decide on their action(s) for the round and everyone is waiting on player A, B, C in succession.

• Give players a 5 count and then move on to the next character.
  
• For the GM, decide on preplanned actions for certain NPCs to speed up your decisions and abide by the same 5 count as the players.

Players or GM take a long time to roll and add up their dice.

• Have players simultaneously roll their actions and record the results on scrap paper then proceed in turn order to have players describe their results.
  
• Switch to something like Mini 6 that uses static numbers for defense or attack.
  
• Use a dice roller program.

So what do you find is causing the most wait time for your group?

[Bigkrieg]

My group tends to spend a lot of game time in the store shopping. I am planning on eliminating this by creating "loot tables" or "streetwise black market" tables. In other words, they roll streetwise, it puts them in a specific category for what’s available on the black market. They then roll some dice to determine what items are available for sale. They would roll several dice and get maybe 6-7 items currently available. Still working on the tables, but it will have references and page numbers to cut down on time spent with all that.

With combat, it simply takes too long. During my last game, my players were fighting an Elite bounty hunter, 4 magna droids and 2 snipers. My group consisted of 3 Jedi and one Mercenary. It took us about 30 minutes to complete the combat. It might take 5-10 minutes before I get around to a player for him to act. It's just boring for them.

One problem is two of my players don't know the rules very well. I am attempted to educate them and offer Character point incentives for them to research it on their own. Id rather not have to get pissed about it. that would help things along so I dont have to explain the rules everytime.

We will be playing totally online soon and will thus allow all of us to use a dice roller. I know that will cut down on time. i am also planning on having fewer combat encounters and possibly predetermine the roll and the outcome. The whole illusion of free will stuff

I am just after anything the Rancor Pit Community might suggest to speed things up during game play.

[Bren]

[Bigkrieg]

Well, I am going to try it and see what happens. If my players like it, we will stick with it. If not, we will go back to the original rules.

A couple of my players really want me to start using the d20 system. I really dislike that system and am fighting it. I've basically told them that if they want to play that system, they buy the books, learn it, and then run the campaign because I am not going to do it. Again, driving all of this is the length of time it takes to complete combat.

[Raven Redstar]

Combat in D20 takes longer than D6... period... and the main reason is Hit Points... It's a shin kicking contest.

I've had a simple low level fights last over an hour cause of sub 10 rolls. The D20 system is choppy and full of little boxes that everyone fits into. People like it cause you roll 1 die and add a flat number to that. Apparently pairing up tens on six siders is too much brain power for your average person.

One of the ways I can see for speeding up combat is to eliminate wound levels from non-bosses or major npcs. Give your Storm Troopers 2 health levels: Incapacitated/Dead 8> does incapacitated, 8< kills them. Open D6 does this with many of the bad guys to speed up play and to give the players a more heroic edge. Keep in mind that death damage destroys armor, so they won't have an abundance of ST armor to sell and throw around. If they chew through your baddies too quickly, have another squad around the corner.

If rolling initiative is taking too long, just let it so the person with the highest perception goes first, and so on and so forth.
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RR
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[Fallon Kell]

[Bren]

If you have 4 fairly normal* PCs (3 Jedi and 1 Merc) than an elite bounty hunter, 4 magna droids, and 2 snipers sounds like tough opponents that on a skill basis actually outclass the PCs. The 3 Jedi will have to deal with the Magna Droids with the toughest Jedi facing two tough opponents. The Merc will need to deal with the bounty hunter and the snipers (or one Jedi could try to take out the snipers leaving 2-1 odds against the other two Jedi. Unless the PCs are burning FPs and the bad guys have none the PCs are in for a tough and possibly somewhat lengthy fight.

How long does it take your group to resolve combat between a party of 4 PCs and twice there number of tough opponents in D20?

D6 uses 3-5 second rounds so it often seems very reasonable to me to make players make quick decisions - but then not be too strict, rigid, or mean on interpreting the results of those choices. IME that tends to make for a faster feeling combat. I haven't played much D20 but it seemed to me like the feat trees and spells and such tended to make tactical decisions less forgiving than the way I run D6. If players are dithering or fussing over their action choices they may be spending too much time trying to optimize their combat actions. It may help to discourage a less tactical style of play.

Out of curiousity, how long (in-game time) is a round in D20?


* I.e. not statted up to defeat Han Solo in a gun fight, Chewie in a wrestling match, or to tie Darth Vader in a Lightsaber battle.

[Bigkrieg]

Yea, it took the players a while to take out the droids. The bounty hunter I used I created to be a reoccuring villian the players will contend with. After they dispatched the snipers and droids, the bounty hunter appeared and knocked several characters out with a paralysis canister. I was attempting to make the players hate this NPC.

I think only one person was not knocked out making it a 1 on 1 match for a few rounds. This fact could have contributed to their feelings that combat was too slow.

We are suppose to play this Thursday night. It will be completly online using googleplus. I am going to implement some of these suggestions and see how it goes.

If anyone has any other suggestions though, I'm still interested

[Raven Redstar]

In saga, a round is 6 seconds in game.
It's probably the same in any other version of D20.
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RR
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