Kicking Up Combat

[PencilBoy99]

What approaches have you taken (or house rules) for making combat even more interesting? One of the general bits of advice I've read is to (1) include the environment and (2) have the situation change from round to round.

[Majestic]

You can look to some of the published adventures for ideas. For example, some have had a chart that gives what is happening to other NPCs, or situations around the PCs, while they fight.

[jamesrbrown]

The more the Loremaster describes the battlefield, the easier it will be for players to narrate how they are spending their advantage dice. Players could also make up details about the environment if the Loremaster allows.

Complications (page 181, core rules) can be assigned to specific locations to make combat more interesting. Loremasters can allow heroes to move to more advantageous positions when they are between close engagements or when they are in rearward, or even during close engagements by declaring a non-combat action (page 180). In this case, I would probably require a test of Athletics as if using the Escape combat task. If the player-hero wished to attack in the same round, I would raise the TN of the Athletics test to succeed on the movement.

Battle events can be used to spice things up. These events are pre-determined to happen on specific rounds of combat or when they are triggered. For example, you could plan for new enemies to arrive by the third round of combat or for a trap to be sprung as soon as someone enters a chamber.

Finally, combats would naturally be more interesting if players used Combat tasks and options instead of simply attacking every round.

[Rich H]

What approaches have you taken (or house rules) for making combat even more interesting?

These are the following house rules I use in my game:

1) Before the AC came out I was using a couple of extra combat options for each stance in my game that added some mechanical options for the players, these have worked well. The expanded Called Shots in the AC are also pretty cool.

2) I use damage reduction for armour

3) Apply extra rules for when a PC gets wounded (critical wounds where they pick up a negative trait until the wound is healed).

4) Use a new condition (Exhausted) to allow PCs to 'fight on' when previously they should be unconscious.

5) When a player rolls an EoS when making Battle rolls for combat advantage I give their Adversaries a bonus die to use as I see fit in the same way that these bonus dice workfor PCs.

That's about it for hard mechanical rules.

One of the general bits of advice I've read is to (1) include the environment and (2) have the situation change from round to round.

This is really important - we all need to make combat interesting and remain fluid in lots of ways. There's been some great advice already by previous posters but there are also a really nice section in the LM's Guide for AiMe where it discusses scenery in combat. I've lifted this for TOR and where 5e mechanics are mentioned I've converted them to the TOR system (eg, providing moderately hindered conditions or specific tests to negotiate some terrain, etc). This fits in well to some guidance rules I wrote for myself with respect to battle maps. Link here: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/795 ... 20Maps.pdf.

Afraid I can't provide the conversion I did for the AiMe content.

[jamesrbrown]

Rich, I know you created it awhile ago, but nice work on the battle map piece. Drawing a map wouldn't be difficult either if artwork couldn't be found. On the player-heroes' map I would put all advantage information, such as complication bonuses and possible objectives. Adversary tokens or pieces could be physically placed on the map so the player's know where they start. On the Loremaster's map, I would include secret information such as battle events, hidden items including traps, and TN's for non-combat actions, etc.

I will try your ideas in my next session in 10 days and then post it here as an example.

[Rich H]

Rich, I know you created it awhile ago, but nice work on the battle map piece.

Thanks James, and just to note, drawing up these kind of maps can work perfectly with your Mythic Battles rules; which is partly why I put the idea together in order to support the more epic scenes in my campaign using those rules.

Drawing a map wouldn't be difficult either if artwork couldn't be found. On the player-heroes' map I would put all advantage information, such as complication bonuses and possible objectives. Adversary tokens or pieces could be physically placed on the map so the player's know where they start. On the Loremaster's map, I would include secret information such as battle events, hidden items including traps, and TN's for non-combat actions, etc.

That's exactly how I use them. /thumbs_up/

It's worth noting that in my experience they really support play as they allow the players to focus and to refer back for things like environment specific rules, understand the strategic points, give them ideas/inspiration to riff off for using bonus dice, etc. I've been really pleased with the outcomes when I've used them.

I will try your ideas in my next session in 10 days and then post it here as an example.

Can't wait!