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I used to think initiative as a stat or an extra roll was an essential element of any game, now I see it something that is largely unnecessary as speed/distance/additional actions can be handled in the resolution stage through modifiers.

Do you use it in your designs?

Discuss

A superb question!

Yes I do and the reason is that it adds an extra tactical element without having to break out a battle map. As soon as you get shot of a battle map and start scribbling on paper, you gain freedom (and speed) at the cost of a tactical game for the players to play. So, you add system elsewhere to make up for the tactics shortfall. Most players (and me as a GM) look forward to manipulating the game system to do cool stuff and bring about a win in a combat. Without those decisions, the game becomes more deterministic (pre-determined) and you will find that players resort to much the same grind in each combat.

Initiative is one of the tools we have that adds tactics and variety back in. By going first/last (depending on how your combat rounds are arranged) the player has different choices to make. This can change the game immensely.

Our little group has tried to get away from a mechanical style of play in all the games we're playing lately. Rob raises an interesting point about the game becoming less of a statistcal anylasis of a combat simulation by adding an extra statistic. I agree to a point. We try to roleplay as much of the situation as we can before we have to start looking at the char sheets.

The GM and Player description of events and charactor reaction can work out the order before you start the combat rounds.

have i made sense?
an example if i have not;

"James creeps along the wall with his pistol at his ear, as he rounds the corner he bumps into a guard. The guard looks shocked as his ciggerrette drops from his mouth and the rifle in his right hand arcs up in spooked reaction."

James has a lighter weapon, in a nearly useable state. He is alert to danger.
The guard has a rifle casually hanging from his hand while he smokes a cig, hes not prepaired and his weapon is not ideal for close combat.

Who goes first? roll inititive add mods?
If a situation is well roleplayed surely you can avoid rolling.

If the situation is obvious, I agree that you don't need to roll. However, unless NPCs or PCs get the jump on the other there's always a chance that a super-fast PC can react first. If you have an Attribute (some sort of Dex) that is used mostly for combat initiative, to ignore initiative is dropping that Attribute. That is going to annoy any player who thoughtfully created their character to take initiative into account and pumped the attribute.

good point. some people are just really slow and some just really fast,

Interesting stuff. I like the fact that there is more of a flow between roleplay and combat here. Asking everyone to roll for initiative is sort of announcing to the world WE'RE GOING INTO COMBAT NOW, which I would sometimes like to avoid.

On the flipside, my combat tends to rattle on at a breakneck pace and to get everyone acting in turn and keep it all moving, having a turn sequence with a starting player and an ending player means that I can turn up the tempo to napalm. If a player drags their feet, we move on - their character dithering for that turn. If you leave it abstract, you have to do more explanation at every turn and with a group of 6 players, this can really slow down a combat.

How does your system work with 8 NPC with 2 in a car and 6 players? Who gets to say what they are doing first? How does character 'speed' affect the combat?

I find Initiative to be rather necessary, but I do feel many games don't put a lot of thought into it. does a fast character go first, do they act often, or some combo of both? should it be set once or change to show flow of exhaustion and second winds?

I have in more complex systems used slots to determine action cost and initiative. They are like stacked poker chips and characters with better reactions, greater experience and better skills would have a lot more of them and they used from the greatest number downwards to buy actions with bigger actions costing more chips. It works quite well and there is nothing wrong with separating out the factors of combat courage, initiative, skill, strength and toughness etc. to individual rolls except that it takes time.

I do think however you can handle this in a more abstract way without totally sacrificing verisimilitude by going around the table in no particular order (clockwise would do) asking what the reactions to an event in a scene are (After all characters are not so much faster han each other that they can complete attacks without everyone else having started their own action)The exception would be when one character initiates the action eg. during a tense negotiation around a table he suddenly throws his drink over a member of the other side; this would just happen before anyone else could act.

Who goes first isn't important because the system uses a single sliding resolution roll which is applicable to the player and npc. So no one attacks first, they just fight and the outcome is determined. So if for example one character wants to rush a NPC pointing a gun at the party with a knife, the character with the knife depending on the distance involved would carry a negative modifier to winning because he has to close the distance first while the npc has the opportunity to shoot at him.

It is obviously important if there are sepaprate attack and defense rolls to determine who goes first.
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I think initiative is more than just who hits who first. It is more about seeing what other people are going to do and how that works out. In Icar all actions are simultaneous, which means that if you go first, you are deciding what to do before the bad guys do. If you go last, you get to see what others are doing before you get to decide.