Length of a Combat Round

[aldarron]

Mar 26, 2012 20:47:32 GMT -6 18 Spears said:

I can't figure out if this thread is comedy gold or if all of you are really this obsessed ...

Heh, this is nuthin; you should try reading Binford and Sackets debate on stochastics

One reason to be interested in the topic is to know whether the 3lBB’s support tactical “blow by blow” combat or an abstract win or lose the round combat. Played as intended these are two very different sorts of gaming. Certain parts do lend some support the “blow by blow” game (free hit on a dragon frex) whereas other parts arguably don’t, and that’s what’s under consideration.

[jacar]

Mar 26, 2012 20:03:22 GMT -6 @dubeers said:

I didn't read the whole thread. I didn't have to read the whole thread. That picture sums it up nicely. Now. Pass the popcorn. ;D

[Deleted]

I hope you like it with lots of butter!

I am constantly amazed by all the brilliance I read here on the boards. As a referee I've always been more concerned with what works at the gaming table than some of the exacting details discussed here. Working with BHP on Delving Deeper, however, forced me to look at the rules in a different way than I was used to doing. It has been educational, to say the least.

[talysman]

I think where we're getting bogged down in the discussion is that it's not really about what a turn is, but about whether one minute of combat should be subdivided into tenths. I think we all pretty much get that "turn" really means the same thing as in Monopoly or Trivial Pursuit and it is only equated to time units because the goal of the game is to emulate an adventure in a fictional world that more or less resembles the world we know.

What people are really disagreeing about is whether a one-minute section of combat should be broken into six-second segments or not, and which one was the intention of the rules. Chainmail does break it down (perhaps not literally into ten parts, but certainly multiple parts.) Holmes followed that pattern. The later clarifications from SR don't follow that pattern, sticking instead to 1-minute rounds.

But there was something that I think Old Geezer once said on RPGNet. If you are using the alternative combat system and not adding a lot of combat mechanics, but assuming instead that the attack roll represents the results of multiple swings, thrusts, feints, parries, and blocks, then one d20 roll per combatant takes about 1 minute of real time to resolve 1 round ... and thus the combat is being resolved in realtime. The comment at the end of U&WA about one week of actual time equaling one week of game time seems to support the idea that the game was meant to play out as being roughly realtime, one minute equaling one minute, speeding up for boring segments (ten minute exploration turns, 1 day wilderness travel turns.

That being said, I'm wondering if part of the reason behind abandoning the Chainmail "1 hit = 1 kill" principle in favor of 1d6 hit points and 1d6 damage was that the damage roll really represents how many attacks in a one-minute round of combat actually connected. In a way, it maintains the multiple mêlée phases of Chainmail without adding multiple die rolls.

[Harbinger]

I like that there's a good mix here of 'OD&D scholars' who parse the text and debate semantics and intent, and 'old-school DMs' who patiently show everyone why the 3LBBs are actually very refined works of gaming and any rule has a reason for existing.

[Professor P]

Mar 26, 2012 19:51:41 GMT -6 aldarron said:

... or that he could be saying "where turns are longer than these rounds", which is a more possible reading but assumes added meaning where I initially simply took the statement at face value. On the other hand given Gygax's habit of opaque writing that could be exactly what he meant, as you say, that the shorter "turns" were the previously mentioned rounds, in his mind. It's a plausable reading.

I think this is exactly the case. It is a prime example of Gygax's lack of clarity and/or lack of an editor.

[Zenopus]

Mar 26, 2012 4:16:38 GMT -6 Professor P said:

It seems to me the biggest problem with the change from the Chainmail combat turn of 1 minute to the OD&D exploration turn of 10 minutes with 1 minute combat rounds is what is actually happening during combat.

Correct me if I am wrong, in a Chainmail 1 minute combat turn there is a magic phase, a missile phase, a movement phase and then multiple melee phases. Thus in 1 minute there is quite a bit happening.

In a 1 minute OD&D combat round, each combatant gets 1 set of actions (magic, or 2 missiles (if bow), or move and melee, or other combinations, but you get the idea). The combat is very abstract, such that in 1 minute it appears that not much occurred. Especially because only 1 phase of melee occurred instead of the multiple melee phases in Chainmail's combat turn.

In fact, my guess is that most OD&D combats are very similar to a Chainmail combat. A magic-user uses his spell early in the combat (if at all). Missiles are fired until melee is engaged, and then missile use ceases so that comrades are not accidentally hit. Melee continues until the combat ends.

Since it seems that most OD&D combats are fast and furious, i.e. only takes a few rounds anyway, an OD&D combat is unlikely to take more than 1 exploration turn. Thus, the scale of exploration turn and combat is resolved in OD&D.

In the end, IMO, it really depends on how abstract you want your combat to be. Plus, consider that in Holmes (I believe), a combat, no matter how many rounds will take up one exploration turn (to rest and recover). Does it really matter if the combat rounds are one minute, 10 seconds, or 6 seconds?

Good observations. Yes, in the Holmes B2 Gygax suggested having a full exploration turn (10 min) go by after the end of combat, to account for resting, cleaning, etc.

In Holmes the 1 min turns are not put to much use. Even if spell durations are supposed to shift to "combat turns" during combat (which is not really specified in the text), the shortest duration is 2 turns, which would equal 20 rounds of combat - not many combats last that long.

I think this is why Moldvay kept the 10 sec round and the 10 min turn but got rid of the 1 min turn.

[Zenopus]

Mar 27, 2012 11:30:20 GMT -6 Harbinger said:

I like that there's a good mix here of 'OD&D scholars' who parse the text and debate semantics and intent, and 'old-school DMs' who patiently show everyone why the 3LBBs are actually very refined works of gaming and any rule has a reason for existing.

Hear, hear!

Exalt.

[aldarron]

Mar 27, 2012 11:19:25 GMT -6 talysman said:

.....That being said, I'm wondering if part of the reason behind abandoning the Chainmail "1 hit = 1 kill" principle in favor of 1d6 hit points and 1d6 damage was that the damage roll really represents how many attacks in a one-minute round of combat actually connected. In a way, it maintains the multiple mêlée phases of Chainmail without adding multiple die rolls.

Interesting observations as always John. The behind the scenes reason Hit Points came about was that Ross Maker, the Snider brothers, Dave Megarry, Greg Svenson and the rest of the boys complained to Dave that they didn't think much of having thier characters killed in one all or nothing roll, so Dave assigned Hit Points to each character so they could get wounded a time or two before being killed, and Hit Dice to determine how damage a hit would cause.

[thedegenerateelite]

While most will accept that the usage of the term turn implies the underground 10 minutes of movement, exploration, and mapping and further, that ten rounds of combat will occur during an (implied) 10 minute turn, there is nothing to suggest that these rounds are of any specific length of time. There are ten of them but the subdivision could be anything that is appropriate to the situation.

10 rounds of 1 minute each is one interpretation.

2 rounds 30 secs each, 4 that last 1 minute, 1 that is two minutes long and so on, as long as the sum total of time spent amounts to ten minutes would be another interpretation.

While some may see such an interpretation as spurious, Chainmail did say that melee rounds (turns) last as long as they need too, rather than giving a specific passage of time.

Just a thought....

I play ten minute exploration turns, 1 minute melee turns, six second combat rounds.

[Sean Michael Kelly]

Mar 27, 2012 11:19:25 GMT -6 talysman said:

....That being said, I'm wondering if part of the reason behind abandoning the Chainmail "1 hit = 1 kill" principle in favor of 1d6 hit points and 1d6 damage was that the damage roll really represents how many attacks in a one-minute round of combat actually connected. In a way, it maintains the multiple mêlée phases of Chainmail without adding multiple die rolls.

I think that, even if this isn't the intention, though I suspect it was, it really works out well this way.

[Stormcrow]

Apr 3, 2012 0:03:32 GMT -6 thedegenerateelite said:

Chainmail did say that melee rounds (turns) last as long as they need too, rather than giving a specific passage of time.

In Chainmail, "melee rounds" are not turns. Turns include movement and missile fire; melee rounds include only melee. There are any number of melee rounds in a single turn, continuing until the units move apart or one side is eliminated.

[aldarron]

Had forgotten about this combat example and as fodder for the gristmill, I thought I'd add it here.

"Surprise gives the advantage of a free move segment, whether to flee, cast a spell
or engage in combat.... For example a Wyvern surprises a party of four characters when they round a corner into a large open area. It attacks as it is within striking distance as indicated by the surprise distance deter-mination which was a 2, indicating distance between them was but 10 feet. The referee rolls a pair of six-sided dice for the Wyvern and scores a 6, so it will not sting. It bites and hits. The Wyvern may attack once again before the adventurers strike back." U&WA:9,10

Regardless of what Gygax intended when he wrote the ten rounds to a turn bit, the above example would seem to bolster the idea that combat in the OD&D was originally intended as rounds of a few seconds, not minutes. Otherwise we have to imagine a party of adventurers standing with thier hands on thier mouths for more than a minute 10 feet from a wyvern while it attempts to eat them with impugnity.

[talysman]

Surprise situations have always been assumed to deal with short time periods: a monster that surprises the party gets an extra action, not an extra minute. I believe the AD&D DMG specifically states that a combatant that surprises an opponent gets one or two extra segments (AD&D speak for 6-second time periods) and that these extra segments are treated as full rounds for the purpose of movement, attacks, and actions.

[arkansan]

My question, being rather new to all of this, is how does assuming 6 second rounds and 1 minute turns instead of 1 minute rounds and 10 minute turns affect actual game play, other than assuming a "blow by blow' combat rather than an abstraction of drawn out "thrust and parry"?

[cooper]

Harder to run away as maximum movement is still limited to a 1 minute turn (it resets every turn), but blows fall every 6 second segment. So instead of a monster getting 1 free attack as the party turns tail and runs, the monster can wail on them almost indefinitely as the party flees segment/round by segment/round.

[arkansan]

Ahh, so in some situations this could make combat deadlier for the party? I would think something like that would also make players a bit more cautious about picking their fights.

[aldarron]

Apr 21, 2012 11:36:28 GMT -6 cooper said:

Harder to run away as maximum movement is still limited to a 1 minute turn (it resets every turn), but blows fall every 6 second segment. So instead of a monster getting 1 free attack as the party turns tail and runs, the monster can wail on them almost indefinitely as the party flees segment/round by segment/round.

I can't make sense out of this assertion. At most you might allow a rear attack bonus each round assuming you are allowing move + attack + move. I can see a stationary archer continuing to shoot at a retreating party, but not continuous free attacks.

In practical game terms, the length of a combat round is really most about flavor. Short rounds facilitate individual cinematic moves and related houserules; "dodging the Orc's thrusting spear, I swing my axe at his ugly head". Long rounds lump it all together; "after a furious exchange of blows with the orc, you finally bury your axe in his hemet, ending the fight." or at least that's what they are supposed to do.