Combat Movement

[GMJames]

I recently started playing an Earthdawn campaign and purchased the complete Third Edition books set. I have not been able to find rules associated with combat movement. Is there a location that details how characters engaged in melee move with respect to each other?

For instance; If a character can move their entire movement rate and then take a standard action, what prevents the initiative winner from running to the blindside of an opponent each round before attacking?

[Flagg]

This may not be the official word, but I always assumed that under normal circumstances an opponent can always keep himself facing his opponents unless he is surrounded, or nearly so. Initiative is an abstraction. Characters are not actually frozen in time an another character's turn; I think they should be able to pivot to face their attackers, within reason.

Of course, if a character is snuck up on, or is otherwise explicitly not aware of an opponent at his rear, that would override the above.

[GMJames]

That is the way we played it for the first session. Without "attack-of-opportunity" rules though, engaging and disengaging opens up a lot of opportunity for simply flowing through a battle and moving to opponents already engaged but with their backs toward you.

[Telarus_KSC]

The movement rules are light. Right now you're playing as intended (characters will re-face to threats dynamically unless an effect overrules their awareness of the threat). From my experience with earlier editions, characters with high initiatives would bounce around a combat a lot.

One of the optional rules that add back the tension to those moments is Movement by Initiative: every hex moved drops your initiative result by 1 (if you drop to another character's Init, they get to take an action against you).

I've been considering some other optional rules to go along with my Mass Combat system, but I'm still working them out.

[GMJames]

Consider these possibilities and discuss...

1. I like the assumption that engaged opponents choose their facing. Facing change should be a simple action that can be made at any time, but only once per round after reacting to the primary opponent. This means you get a facing determination when you engage with your first opponent and them another to adjust once more per round.

2. If an opponent is engaged entirely from a blindside, then roll an ability or skill check opposed by opponent to determine if attack is detected. If not, then engage and attack once from blindside. Then allow facing change. If detected, allow facing change.

3. To disengage from melee should require a standard and move action. This prevents strafing attacks by speedy characters with high initiative rolls. One could also choose to run instead of normal move, with run penalties. It does not prevent split move, which has its own penalty.

4. No attacks of opportunity, but movement through more than one opponent's reach in a round incurs a penalty of harried.

[Telarus_KSC]

I just read this in a thread on RPG.net and I liked it (especially alongside the Move-by-Init rule):

Hexes alongside able threats ("threatened hexes") count as Hazardous Terrain. You could have each such hex cost 2 movement points. Or use part of the Impaired Movement rules (Player's Guide, p228). I like the Dex tests for Medium(5) and Hard(7) terrain, where failure stops movement.. but the book rules subtract a mod from your whole move rate for the round (depending on situation).

[arma]

[GMJames]

Arma - We have never played Earthdawn rules before, so this may be an odd question. But you mentioned combat was not supposed to be that tactical. How do you avoid that? Do you play without miniatures to represent position and just talk it through?

[Flowswithdrek]

As an EarthDawn GM I don’t use miniatures very often. I do use them on the rare occasion that I feel warrants it however, say at the end of a long campaign were rather than some powerful individual there is to be a large battle, and tactics, not just the player characters' abilities, may determine the outcome.

I find simply including miniatures on the gaming table forces the use of tactical play over the storytelling aspect of describing the melee, which is my preference. The last time I broke out the miniatures my players got a bit confused as they normally describe their character action which seemed to get replaced by simply moving a miniature – they just weren’t used to it and it changed the game considerably.

[galafrone]

on the opposite i like all the hints and suggestions that are coming out from this thread, since we always play on battlemaps (with squares or hexes) and we use colored dices for "miniatures", with some kind of "facing" interpretation