Let's talk about running combat. The sequence in Labyrinth Lord is thus:
- Players declare movement & actions
- Roll init for each side
- Winning side acts first:
- Check morale
- Movement
- Missiles
- Spells
- Melee
- Losing side acts in same order: Morale, Movement, Missiles, Spells, Melee
- Round ends
DMs, is that roughly how you do it? If not, what do you do and why? Players, what's your experience of combat? Does it work well? What would you like to do differently?
Personally, I run it like this: group initiative, the winning side acts in any order, losing side acts in any order. Initiative is rolled by one player, using his PC's Dex modifier, until he loses init, at which point it passes to the next player in the circle.
I do it that way because individual initiative slows the game down, in my opinion, while everyone figures out their place in the new order. It also creates a much slower sense of combat, as each player acts in turn, rather than letting the DM hear all the actions and attempting to narrate them as a nearly simultaneous and wild melee. I also like that there are some tactical choices but not the huge amount of tactics present in modern D&D.
The downsides to my method: high dex characters are penalized. DM narration can make or break a combat. Few tactical choices.
It just occurred to me that the use of the battle mat and counting 5' squares for movement is closely linked to any discussion of combat. I try not to be too precise with distances, but when the mat is out, it's all too easy to treat the map like a chess board, and march PCs around on it.
Anyway, let's talk about it…
Chris
Vancouver Red Box: a site for old school D&D