| From: | l-hansen@*****.tele.dk (Lars Wagner Hansen) |
|---|---|
| Subject: | New Initiative rule? |
| Date: | Wed, 13 Apr 2005 13:46:31 +0200 |
is not yet in place, I dug out this old e-mail that I never finished and
never sent off:
Ever since I read SR1 back in 1989 I have been trying to tweak the
Initiative system, sometimes with good effect, sometimes with bad effect.
We actually introduced something like the SR2 system 3 months before SR2 was
published, basically because we were sick and tired of tables, so just
subtracting 7 from you Initiative would decide wether you could have extra
actions. But when SR2 came along we changed it to 10 as per the SR2 rules.
The Initiative system has however never satisfied me. The worst thing is the
notion of rounds, which I would love to throw out.
I did it for AD&D 2nd Ed. where we made a system which allowed you to roll
your initiative (1D10 + modifiers, most of the modifiers was the modifiers
AD&D already used), and when you were done with your action, you just rolled
your next initiative and added that to your current initiative. So for
example you would shoot somebody with you bow (rolling 7 for Initiative),
then you decide to cast a spell (rolling 9 for your initiative), so the
spell would be cast at 16. That was the basic of the system, it was simple
and very effective. It allowed fast characters to have more actions per
round (high dexterity gave you initiative modifiers which you would subtract
from the roll), it allowed for luck (1D10), it allowed for quick weapons
(Knife = Speed factor 2) to have more attacks than slow weapons (2-Handed
Sword = Speed Factor 10) and for quick spells (casting time=1) to be even
faster. So not only could the fighter get more attack per round, so could
everybody else (you got -1 initiative for each weapon proficiecy).
I've been trying to do something similar for SR for years, but have never
succeded. The problem is finding a base to start out with.
The best so far has been the following:
Base Initiative is 36-Reaction. Each time you rolled your initiative dice,
you subtracted them from base Initiative, and that was when you had you
action:
So Hua with a Reaction of 7 and Initiative of 7+2D6, would have a Base
Initiative of 29 (36-7), and have his action on 29-2D6.
Once you had your action you added an amount depending on what type of
action you had. Free actions you added nothing. Simple actions adde +5, and
complex actions added +10.
You next action would occour at Base Initiative-Initiative dice, added to
the action where you currently were.
Hua would roll 2D6 and get a 8 for his first action, which would occour at
21 (29-8), his action was to ready 2 of his shurikens (Quickness of 5,
simple action), and he would be finished doing this 5 counts later (26),
next he wants to throw a shuriken (current count 26+(29-2D6), rolling 10
lets him throw the shuriken at 45 (26+19), end he would be finished doing
this 5 counts later (simple action, 50), throwing the next shuriken at
(current count 50+(29-2D6), rolling 12g), and so on.
Thus:
21: Ready 2 shurikens (finished at 26)
45: Throw shuriken (finished at 50)
67: Throw shuriken (finished at 72)
etc.
If instead he had readyed his staff, and attacked his opponent with the same
rolls, the reaults would have been:
21: Ready staff (finished at 26)
45: Attack with staff (finished at 55)
72: Attack with staff (finished at 82)
etc.
That means there is no rounds, and you never stop counting. 30 counts equal
3 seconds, which means that most normal persons would be able to do one
simple actin in 3 seconds (36-30-1D6, 0 counts for free, 5 for simple, 10
for complex actions).
Last thing: In addition you can perform a single free action whenever
anybody has an action (including yourself).
Comments?
Lars
