Combat has been a major part of tabletop rpgs since the hobby's inception, the earliest games were born out of modified miniature skirmish games. But has it ever really grown beyond that starting point?
The discussion point here isn't whether combat being a major focus in RPGs is good or not, I'm most just curious about what system do you think has done it *best* at this point. Or has some feature or mechanic that you feel elevates it above the typical dnd 'everyone waist their turn then slaps for 1d6 damage until someone runs out of health' sort of combat. Something where the combat feels unique and fun to play, whether for you that means autistic attention to simulation or something that designed to be fast and brutal.
tldr: what TTRPG does fighting best/has the best mechanics for it in your opinion? What makes it good? If we are going to be fighting all the time in these games, we might as well be doing the best version of it we can.
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Honor + Intrigue is good. Combatants have a number of maneuvers they can perform based on their circumstances rather than simply attacking, all of which have their uses depending on circumstances. This includes even banter to throw the enemy off. Additionally, the combatants have a lesser action they can use to do things like parry and riposte, or spend on their turn in other ways. You can yield advantage rather than relying on your meat points. You can master moves to make them better, and styles made up of moves to make those better, too. You can use fancy special actions to take out a ton of mooks at once (called a Stunt). All of the system's stats are combat relevant, and which ones you favor will ultimately inform your fighting style and even whether you're better as a reactive or proactive combatant.
I know this is super late, but I just wanted to say that I've looked into this and Honor + Intrigue seems really cool. Thanks anon
No worries, just glad it was helpful.
Looked into H+I last combat thread when it was introduced. I gotta say, the concept of Advantage has really gripped me, and got me putting down notes for a cinematic samurai-themed conversion/homebrew.
God, I love discovering niche RPGs that have really unique/meaningful mechanics.
Play 4e.
Doesn't 4e just double down on the wargame skirmish mechanics, though? It might be the best balanced version of DnD, but that doesn't mean it has done anything particularly new or special compared to DnD and the many systems that copy it.
>Doesn't 4e just double down on the wargame skirmish mechanics, though?
That's what makes it good.
4e, lancer or ICON, theyre all similar to each other.
Ive heard some historical ttrpgs have some good things with maneuvers too.
No not really.
It doubles down on combat but i dont kniw any skirmish wargame thats like 4e.
At least the big ones like Mordheim , frostgrave or necromunda work nothijg lke it.
Wargames tend to be more about dice tell stories on one Hand and risk Management on the other.
4e is if anything more like MTG with lots of off-turn actions and interconnected parts which would be seen as bloat in a wargame.
Not to mention beeing grid based which most wargames are averse to
>does it expand on dnd
Yes.
AEDU, healing surges and mark/punish are all novelties that expand on TTRPG combat by adressing its problems and adding new layers to it
Yes.
That's why it's good. It actually tried to make combat interesting. Unlike most other RPGs, whose designers are stuck in the ghetto, so combat ends up as a Calvinball slog, and is only interesting because of context. You can tell most RPGs are written by people who haven't played any skirmish game released in the last 20-30 years.
Which is probably another factor in why it performed so poorly. 3+ D&d is the pleb catcher, it isn’t supposed to be focused on any one design aspect, or require player skill. It’s like if McDonald’s started serving caviar. “What’s this weird foreign muck?!”
It's basically the only version of D&D where positioning and teamwork genuinely matter outside of GM fiat. That of course makes it very gamist and the rules for improvised actions are fairly arcane so the system doesn't particularly reward out-of-the-box creativity (without GM fiat), but if you actually wanna have fun with tactical combat where everyone needs to be on the same page and actively following the course of combat, then 4e works real well.
Very few games know how to make challenging decisions arise from simple gameplay. The lite stuff goes for very simple structure so you can get down to imagining shit, leaving no room for interesting mechanical interactions; and the crunchy stuff usually gives you a set spread of options that just doesn’t appeal to my shade of autism.
So I made my own, that doesn’t even try to be simulating stuff. Instead it goes full in on the puzzle gameplay, but leaves enough room for the narrative to be whatever the frick you want. For example there’s only four (types of) actions, and they all do the same thing. You have to apply them like how you interpret an action through base stats - there is no “attack” option, because they can technically all be given the right context. And context (and the context they inspire) is one of the only two justifications for there to be any distinction between them; the other being, each one has HP. Or reverse-HP. Or a clock, or whatever the frick you want to call a changeable quantity that’s integral to the game state. Get one of these pools high enough, and you can off an enemy without even having to make a single roll. Your enemies can do the same to you.
That’s it, that’s the game. You get special abilities that shake stuff up and keep the puzzle fresh, but it’s otherwise just 4d Nim with each move inspiring the fiction. (1/2)
(2/2)
And it’s fricking awesome:
>Seeing the fight turn, the remaining cloak sheds his runic aura, concentrating it into a single blast that hurls Dan out above the rooftops (Forceful), before making a run for the stairwell (Resistant)
>Nae hurls her dagger into the closing door (Resourceful), grabbing it back just before she shoulder-slams it open and begins pursuit (Forceful).
>He was waiting. She trips over a leg sweep (Artful), smashing through the wooden railing and about to plunge to her death - before he catches her by the coat scruff (Resourceful). “I remember you.” He rasps. “No second chances, thief.”
>He lets go. But Nae kicks off the wall as she falls and catches onto a swinging crane hook (Resistant), running up the massive chain before delivering a devastating slash to the face (Forceful).
If there’s a grid-based wargame-like that could do this kinda shit, I still probably wouldn’t play it because it would likely still be too convoluted and crunchy enough to drown out any creative flow.
mu homebrew will have the best combat system ever designed
wow
related to the OP I guess, what games do parrying and dodging in a way that doesn't feel like it invalidates the rest of combat? I've seen both extremes, where it is either a trivial generic defense boost or active defenses that mean no one can hit anyone else unless you swarm them with a bunch of attacks in one round. But I don't think I've ever seen it done in a way that seemed good.
what would you consider good?
Feels like a meaningful choice to use instead of spamming at every attack that comes your way. Strong enough that it feels good when it works, not so strong that it invalidates singular strong attacks entirely because "Yes, you fired an ICBM at me, but I dodged it so zero damage".
Why wouldn't you try to parry every attack?
Because that's bad game design. If your active defense is universally applicable, you are just introducing extra steps to every attack action to resolve and massively slowing down your combat system.
This is not unique to parry. Having your players roll to dodge against every single attack that comes their way is just as bad.
A possible solution would be something like a forfeit of advantage. Lets say that if someone attacks you in melee, you normally get a small bonus to attack them in response next turn, because by definition they cannot have their guard up if they just swung at you. You have the option to try and parry their attack as an active defense, but if you roll to parry you lose the benefit to your attack roll they have given you no matter whether you succeed or fail. If there is no cost to parrying you might as well try and parry everything even if you only have a 1% chance of success, because why not? But if there is an opportunity cost to doing so, even a small one, now you have good reason not to frivilously spam active defenses.
thank god you're not in charge of designing games
GURPS. Weapon weight and type matter for parrying, and you can lower enemy defenses with feints and deceptive attacks in addition to just overwhelming them with attacks.
>If we are going to be fighting all the time
I had the opposite conclusion. I have never played a roleplaying game with good combat, so I decided the best option was combat that is decisive and over quickly.
So I like delta green, because it is meaningful, affected by player stats in a significant way, can be unpredictable, and is usually over fast. Exactly how a couple federal agents shooting some cultists should be.
prowlers and paragons
'Best' is always going to be purpose built. The sword autism in Riddle of Steel inspired two or three games for a very specific audience, but would not work at all for heroic fantasy or skirmish level wargames.
Atmosphere and narrative heavy games get dragged by having almost any combat system at all, and benefit from just using some simple way to track if someone is alive, dead, or maybe hurt. Most of the time in these cases combat is just a skill roll like any other.
Generalist systems will always feel a bit awkward but having the advantage of being able to evoke a few different ideas for a range of purposes. I think something will always work better being built to spec or at least rejigged for a particular purpose.
With a bunch of wonky aspects not withstanding, I think Lancer does well, and I was impressed with cyberpunk RED given how skeptical I was; there's this tension between wanting to be cinematic 80's zany punk shit and street level high lethality life sucks tones. Slightly more survivability than 2020 with more health and luck points, but the constant threat of exploding damage and luck running out or falling short.
Prowlers and Paragons. Special Effects and direct damage are equally viable methods for defeating an enemy, and they synergize with each other so you need not solely focus on one or the other to be effective. Combat Stunts, Power Stunts, and special actions allow for effectively unlimited creativity in how you approach any conflict.