Hi,

There is every chance I am being a bit thick here...

According to the rules can you hold your action and act later in the initiative order? Last night I had a bounty hunter throw himself out of a window and then train his gun on the window waiting for a hero to stick his head out, but we couldn't quickly find where this was covered in the rules...

Thanks!

You say, "according to the rules." Can you give me a page number?

You say, "according to the rules." Can you give me a page number?

That is what he is asking for. He actually said, "according to the rules CAN YOU"

Ah, read that as "you can." Derp derp, sorry.

Sorry to cause any confusion

I don't believe that you can, no. I've never seen that and it doesn't really make sense with the way initiative works in the system.

I've never seen anything in the rules for reaction shots either i.e. as soon as someone comes around the corner I shoot them. I don't feel confident enough to say that they definitely don't exist, though.

You can choose the lowest initiative slot your group rolls, not sure if that is what you mean.

You can choose the lowest initiative slot your group rolls, not sure if that is what you mean.

Yeah, this was what I meant with my post too. Just to be sure everything is clear for the OP, no one actually has a set initiative slot. It's just set up something like:

PC

PC

NPC

PC

NPC

NPC

This is based on the initiative rolls. Every round, the actual order that each of the individual PCs and NPCs act in might be different and is only decided on at the time. So our example might look like this in the first round:

Bob

Jane

Stormtrooper

Alex

ISB Agent

Sniper

And in the second round it could look like:

Jane

Alex

ISB Agent

Bob

Stormtrooper

Sniper

I don't think choosing to cover a spot if someone comes through a door or window is all that game breaking a concept. I'm not sure it really needs a rule either, to me I would just allow it

It sounds like your player was trying to "stand ready" like in D&D 3.5 and Pathfinder.

I've been wrestling with this myself. In my WEG d6 groups I've been letting people use the stand ready mechanic if their initiatives came up higher than the NPCs but sometimes this leads to unintended consequences or old fashioned min-maxing tactics.

Soon I'll be starting one of my groups up on EotE and I (currently) intend to draw the line that the PCs initiative slots are their slots. Either act during them or don't. When a NPC's turn comes up he gets to act and if there's a PC slot after that you can react.

Maybe I'm right, maybe I'm wrong. Listen to what everyone else has to say too.

In d20 there was something like holding your action, readying your action...one or two pages of rules in the end. Maybe the FFG guys did not want to create new rules and that is why they crated initiative rule where a PC can take a slot that was in fact rolled by another PC (you don't see that in SW d20 or d6).

Exactly, given the free flow and narrative nature of it all it seems like this is a pretty easy conversation between player and GM...."Hey, can I cover the window and only fire if and when someone comes through?' "Eh, sure, spend a Maneuver for Preparation or Overwatch or whatever you wanna call it."...Done.

Exactly, given the free flow and narrative nature of it all it seems like this is a pretty easy conversation between player and GM...."Hey, can I cover the window and only fire if and when someone comes through?' "Eh, sure, spend a Maneuver for Preparation or Overwatch or whatever you wanna call it."...Done.

Yeah, I get that, but it was I as the GM who was having a bounty hunter do this... Maybe I could intrude into the Initiative order by spending a Destiny Point...

If he could act before the players you could just do it.

Sounds like a perfectly reasonable house rule to me. Burn a maneuver, then hold your action until a specific circumstance occurs, like "When bad guys round corner, I'll fire my blaster" or "When bad guys take out their weapons, I'll jump down the wall", something like that. If the circumstance doesn't occur, then you've lost your action. It's basically "Ready an Action" in D&D 4e.

The only thing to worry about is that, unlike D&D 4e, there's no "Immediate Reaction" or "Immediate Interrupt" rules in EOTE, for which "Ready an Action" is a specific occurrence of. If you allow it in this instance, it might be tempting to allow it in other instances, which could very well change the dynamics of combat and take things out of balance. But that's pretty much a risk whenever you house rule something anyway

According to the rules can you hold your action and act later in the initiative order? Last night I had a bounty hunter throw himself out of a window and then train his gun on the window waiting for a hero to stick his head out, but we couldn't quickly find where this was covered in the rules...

Many people seem to make the assumption that a maneuver is only moving a set number of metres and an action is one pull of the trigger.

While this can be true, it is not the only truth. A combat round can be roughly up to a minute in length. During a players action, the GM should not be stating that the opponent just stand there doing nothing. The narrative nature of the system, the gm should be describing the back and forth action of a shootout, or characters dodging the claws of a nexu. This holds true for players as well. Don't jusy roll dice and say "I shoot", describe the action in more detail. Everyone needs to learn to stop thinking of dice rolls mathematically and read the story each roll has.

Now, as to the original question, the actions of the bounty hunter can be interpreted as a meneuver out the window and an aim action. There is no delay action, but the gm should interpret the next round the npc gets as a continuation of the narrative they've set up.

Maybe have the player make a roll whether to spot the bounty hunter or athletics to charge out the door, etc, and treat any despair/ threat rolls as the bounty hunter firing. If this is the case, have the bounty hunters aim maneuver add black to the players roll, rather than a blue to the bounty hunters' roll.

I think the old WEG D6 or D&D style of RPG gameplay has stuck on many players and GMs alike. Remember that combat rounds can last up to a few minutes.

In one round, the character is not just popping his head once and taking a shot then going back to cover, he's popping his head a few times and taking a few shots. So a character on the other side of the window can still shoot him at the same time, even if it's not on the same initiative slot. The GM should just give a cover value for the window and add those black dices to the difficulty to hit said character.

If you want to keep it more realistic and say that you can't shoot him until he does his action... meaning that an earlier initiative slot cannot shoot said character until he tries to pop a shot, since he's still behind a wall... to make sure they dont abuse of the last initiative slot for their shots and thus cannot be shot ever, use the same rule for "Evasive Maneuvers" where the boost/setback applies until the end of the next action. (I wouldn't use this one, I don't like houserules)

Also remember that even if the character hides behind a wall, the Bounty Hunter can still lob a grenade throught that window and Booomm!!!

Don't try to house rule too much....
RAW is pretty good has is... just try to remember it's a narrative style of RPG.

In your case... i'd just say that the character has a 2 setback die cover and roll with it.... You could even make if more cinematic and just say that he shoots the characters while jump out the window and then ducks for cover...

Your way : BH jumps out of window, ducks for cover, waits to pop a shot at character's head.... waiting... waiting...
My way : BH jumps out of windows and pops a shot at the characters at the same time, then ducks behind cover...

In both cases the BH spends 2 strain to get an extra maneuver, but my way is more dynamic and cinematic.

Another way to do it is pretty simple... RESET the combat... Combat ends when the Bounty hunter jumps out the window, the players loose sight of him and don't know where he is.... when a character says he looks out the window, make a new initiative roll (Cool vs Vigilence) and apply new initiative slots... you could even give the BH a boost die for the aim maneuver.

If it was a NPC, it could go either way...., I could say that the NPC has a 2 setback die cover, of I could say that he doesn't run after the players and that they will now have to backtrack to get him, move in line of sight....


Here... you've got a few ways to do it... choose the one you prefer...
Like I said... no need for houserules.

Enjoy!

This came up in our games early on mostly because the other 3 players are D20 murder hobos... or were. The GM, wise man that he is who also gives me my undeserved allowance (hi Daddy!), said that the EotE system, being narrative, just doesn't need it. Unlike D20, a round in EotE does not have a hard duration. Things happen at whatever speed you need them to. So if I've established that I am guarding a door, the gm will stop the enemies from simply coming through, bypassing me, taking cover in the room and shooting at us, etc. They come in and when my turn comes, I do whatever my guarding would have me do - shoot, yell, etc. We also try, when we can, to ensure that the person with a move dependent upon an npc is in the initiative slot immediately after them.

Sometimes weirdness happens because then people who weren't guarding might get to go before I do. We have a general understanding that we try not to break the narrative. If the timing of a move doesn't make sense to the story, we don't do that move. So if I'm guarding, the others don't react to what I'm guarding againt until I've taken my action. They can take cover, prepare, do whatever else, etc.

BTW, this also works against us.... Because our GM, who gives me my woefully inadequate allowance, is EVIL (hi Daddy!)

Hi,

I also think that there is an issue here that needs addressing.

EotE is an excellent, innovative game which IMHO sits in the same group of games as Feng Shui and Savage Worlds. Indeed I think that it does certain things much better than either of those games, which--if you know anything about me--is high, high praise indeed.

However, at heart, the combat system is pretty crunchy... Not difficult, and it certainly gives players and GM the wriggle room to describe things in a narrative as fashion once the dice results have been discerned. And that is the thing--the dice results dictate the result. This is in no way a slam, I much prefer things that way!

There is another game--Marvel Heroic---which also has a margin of player decision on the order of initiative, but the GM in that game can interrupt their careful orchestration of events by spending his resources

Holding your action, or a lightning reaction to escalating events should be allowed within the rules without falling back on narrative fiat, and table discussion which only serves to slow the game down and be the possible cause of player dissatisfaction and inconsistency.

Maybe there is a Talent that I have missed that can do this... or an NPC ability?

I do have a solution, not sure what people will think about it....

If a character or NPC, uses a maneuver to "Go on Hold" but forgoes their action for that turn, they can momentarily act out of the initiative order once but doing so will cost a point of the Destiny pool.

So my situation was as follows the Gand Bounty Hunter flings himself through a window, and then uses another maneuver (and 2 strain) to then turn and train his gun on the window. He hasn't got up or taken cover, he is just lying on his back pointing his blaster at the smashed window waiting for someone to poke their head out...

If a character does do this, he can then take a shot, but doing so costs the GM a point of Dark Destiny. Then the initiative returns to the normal flow of things and the Bounty Hunter falls back into the usual order of things...

Thoughts, flames?

Ignoring for a moment, the idea of some kind of house rule for being "ready", what about this simpler issue?...

Initiative order results

PC

PC

NPC

PC

NPC

NPC

What if, as the round of play develops, one of the PCs decides he wants to go last. As in, after even all the NPCs have acted? In this case, there is no rule for that. The PC would theoretically be forced to take the final PC slot. Which is still in advance of 2/3rds the NPCs.

Do you allow him to bump his slot back? If so, what does that do to slot order for subsequent rounds? And what if one or more of the NPCs also wants to do this to try and "out delay" him? What then?

Ignoring for a moment, the idea of some kind of house rule for being "ready", what about this simpler issue?...

Initiative order results

PC

PC

NPC

PC

NPC

NPC

What if, as the round of play develops, one of the PCs decides he wants to go last. As in, after even all the NPCs have acted? In this case, there is no rule for that. The PC would theoretically be forced to take the final PC slot. Which is still in advance of 2/3rds the NPCs.

Do you allow him to bump his slot back? If so, what does that do to slot order for subsequent rounds? And what if one or more of the NPCs also wants to do this to try and "out delay" him? What then?

Simple sarcastic answer? The PC should choose to go first the next round. First, afterall, is after last.

I agree that it would be useful to have some sort of delay mechanic. I bet the current rules were designed to not allow for a "out delay" battle. Because the ability to select your slot, more often than not the need to delay is non-existent.

Some options that I'd throw into the discussion. Spend a maneuver and declair your action to delay, but the slots stay the same. Spend a maneuver and declair your action to delay, but the slots change. Spend a destiny point and declair your action to delay, but the slots stay the same. Spend a destiny point and declair your action to delay, but the slots change. Spend a destiny point to change the slot location.

Sarcasm what it is, you are aware, I hope, that occasionally, end-of-round has substantive meaning...

But yes. That's why it wouldn't always matter. Yet, I brought it up anyway "because sometimes"...

Sarcasm what it is, you are aware, I hope, that occasionally, end-of-round has substantive meaning...

But yes. That's why it wouldn't always matter. Yet, I brought it up anyway "because sometimes"...

Yup, I agree.

There are also times when you want to pick when you go too. Such as with the order listed before. Here's an example. What if the PC wanted to go between the last two NPCs. Let's say one needs to jump the back of a truck with the other NPC so that the last one can drive them away. The player wants to toss a grenade into the truck after the two passengers are in it but before the driver speeds away. I wish there was a mechanic to allow a player to do this.

The more I think about it the more I like keeping it as restricted/costly as possible. People are already changing which slot they are taking so I don't want it to get too crazy with where the slots are. If a delay situation comes up in my game then I might suggest the following.

To delay, an acting character must spend a destiny point and 2 strain and declair an action and trigger during their turn in the normal initiative order. When the trigger is met then the action goes off after the triggering character's turn. The initiative slots do not change in future rounds.

I think it is important to put more than a destiny point cost to keep the delay from happening too much. If it's just a destiny point cost then PC X could spend a destiny to go after NPC Y, then the GM could spend a destiny point to still have the NPC go last. Declairing the action and spending strain should keep this meta-gaming to a minimum. Might even be worth restricting things to a single action/manuever instead of the full allowance, or cost a manuever when activating the delay.

I don't think there are currently any mechanics that last "until the end of the round," are there? It's usually "until the beginning of your next turn," or something akin to that. The combat round itself would seem to be a rather squishy concept.

To the OP, I would say this: I agree with PrettyHaley and the others, for general play. If a player or NPC wants to "hold his action," just have him take a later slot. This is actually better: say we have a player called Fred. In accordance with GM Jimmy's House Rules, Fred wants to take the first PC slot but then hold his action until "Event X" happens. Then "Event X" doesn't happen. The Fred has done 2 bad things:

1) He has bogged down the game and bloated the encounter

2) He has stymied himself and his whole group by losing a PC action.

What is cool about the current system is that Fred can just wait until the NPC takes his turn, and THEN react to the situation. He doesn't have to try and predict what's going to happen in "the next 6 seconds." He can just take the NPC action and run with it.

No more gritty square-based tactical combat with interrupts. Just a system whose dice tell a narrative story that is continually evolving.

TL;DR held actions should be undesirable in general. I wouldn't allow them in 99% of cases.