ragnar63 said:

I agree with your comment here.

And this is exactly what happens in Descent. The same roll is telling you whether you hit and how much damage you do. You then add some extra damage from your skills/abilities and reduce it by the victim's armour and you are done.

Plus they added the very elegant mechanic of adding Fortune (white) or Misfortune (black) dice to the pool to take into account things that help you in your check or increase the difficulty of the check... I think this mechanic will also save a lot of time as you will no longer have to remember all the modifiers you need to apply to the roll and calculate them... I always loved Maths and usually have no problem adding several modifiers (well, with D&D my mind sometimes explodes) but I know many players that need a lot of time to process all that information: most of our brains work much better by connecting symbols and results than connecting numbers with results.

cogollo said:

ragnar63 said:

Right, I'm familiar with the rhetoric about Ulric's Fury from other posts about the dice. If you have ever played a game with dice pools, you'd know, they are slower than simple roll below. You have to not only count the dice up, you have to count them down. Grab two percentile dice and throw them (or even easier, roll 1d20) and see if it's equal or below target number is a heck of a lot faster. Warhammer adds additional complexity by having to not count six or so of the same dice, but a number of dice from different ranges. Sure, that's not huge, but it is still slower than grabbing 5d10. You now have to count out fixed sets of : Characteristic dice, skill dice, talent modification dice, conservative/reckless dice, additional fortune dice, additional misfortune dice, and challenge dice.

In addition 2e does not allow a Parry on ever attack and happens on average 1 roll per player per combat. It takes no time at all to roll I hit, you parry. Ulric's Fury is also a fair example of added complexity, but may I remind you that only happens on a 1 out of 10 rolls. Yellow dice permit the roll of two extra dice each time the hammer + comes up. So before you can even begin to really compare dice, you have to roll additional dice. That will happen 1 in 6 times...but advances to 1 in 3 then half the time and can happen multiple times in a single roll. You also do not have to simply count one stream of successes (i.e. dice rolled over 6) you have to count a stream of successes, a stream of failures, then cancel successes, then do this again for a second stream of successes and failures (i.e. through the counting of the boon banes). Finally you also have star and comet. These then have to be referenced to a weapon to find out its critical value, to an action card to see the effect, and any other secondary conditional effects (i.e. 2 banes) must also be referenced. That's actually how many steps there are to the single roll. After all that is done the damage still must be calculate, cards must be dealt, Critical's must be flipped and any other secondary conditional effect must happen.

2e happened flat: Roll to hit (parry if applicable), roll damage, score damage. There are an obscene number of less steps involved in 2e rather than 3e.

Again, I love the dice and though it will take longer, I accept the fact that the narrative impact they could have far out way the sluggish nature of a combat. I'm not saying it'll take longer as if it's a bad thing, I'm just stating upfront that it's a fact. The lost time is made up for their powerful storytelling techniques. I also agree that the misfortune/challenge are a better way of gauging difficulty (since they have a physical representation) rather than having to keep track of modifiers.

commoner said:

The points you are making are solid, but I think it's a matter of perception. My point is, 'What's the hurry'? RPG games are composed of a series of interlocking story pieces that are separated by rolls that form what is basically a complex decision tree. The dice rolls are the deciders (much like Bush). The dice rolls are the chaos in the order of the story. They keep things uncertain, even for the GMs (which is what makes being a GM worth all the time and preparation). The results of rolls are the tension builders in games. So, why rush it?

Instead of thinking, 'let's get these rolls over and get to the next roll', design your encounters where there are fewer rolls, but they mean more. I guess it's just how you look at it.

Edit: That was a long way to go just so I could use that 'decider' line...

commoner said:

What you say in your post is right, but not entirely so... What I mean is that, in theory, rolling 1d100 (or 1d20) and comparing it to a success number seems to be very fast... In practice, though, it does not play so fast, because 80-90% of the time you have to change that success number, and there will be extra time involved in calculating the whole thing.

My opinion is that adding black and white dice to the pool will be much quicker because you will only need to think "Hey, I am fighting against two guys, numbers are against me, add one black die to the pool, and the floor is slick with the blood of the battle, add another black die, etc.".... In a regular RPG with no dice pools you have to think the same and add the bonuses/penalties plus, in some groups, they will want to know exactly the bonus/penalty so they will have to look at them in the book... Add to that the fact that, in the this simple example, as a GM I can decide that if there comes a skull face up I'll make the player roll an Agility check to see if they lose their balance, which in D&D or WFRP2 is hard to implement unless if you want to do a critical fumble or you need to add an extra roll.

Also, you say "roll to hit (plus possible parry-dodge), roll damage, score damage" as if those three actions are almost instantaneous, but that's not so. Every roll has the player searching plus getting the dice, thinking a bit on what he needs, concentrating to roll low or high (most of us think this helps sway the Winds of Luck to our side) then rolling... you need to do this ritual up to 3 times while with the dice pool you only need 1 roll and the time between rolls also counts without adding any valuable decision to your play... What I want to say with this is that, in my opinion, the time needed will be approximately the same, only that with a dice pool there is a higher percentage of the time spent in making interesting tactical/roleplay decision about your action, at least that has been my experience with Descent's dice pool.

Finally, I agree with what you say in your last paragraph, except that, as I said before, I think the time needed won't be much more than in WFRP2, probably it will be the same.

Both types of rolls have the constant of some maths (basic addition or subtraction) involved, modifiers for d%, success/failure for the pool.

You also seem to be forgetting that damage is not part of the roll with 3rd ed, that is determined by Characterstic + weapon + modifier - target soak, where the modifier is the cross refrenced result of whatever action/die result is achieved.

Compare the task system (assuming combat):
2 is 2nd ed 3 is 3rd ed task resolution

Factor roll:
2: modifiers to a characteristic
3: gather dice
picking up the dice is a constant in both

Roll:
2: roll 2 dice (or damage dice too if you combine them)
3: roll X dice

Roll Resolution:
2: check result vs factor
3: compare and tally success/ Challenges, Boons/banes

Additional resolution :
2: success? if yes parry/dodge if applicable, compare a roll
3: Compare/ interpret results to action

Resolve Damage :
2: roll damage + weapon damage - target soak (armour & toughness)
3: weapon damage (Characteristic + weapon) + modifier - target soak

Resolve Critical:
2: Ulrics or Critical Resolution, roll and compares
3: Compare boons to weapon crit rating, flip cards

Resolve Additional factors:
2: usualy none
3: factor tokens, recharge, special functions from action roll/result
Both may have any GM assigned results.

Make of the time what you will, that wasnt my purpose, each tasks will vary in time pending on familuarity, though anyway you look at it 3rd ed still has that one additional step and decisions to make in the process as to how to spend boons or resolve comets and chaos symbols.

NezziR said:

OK, but if every roll in combat takes ages then that's a problem - you run into the shadowrun problem of a 10-minute in-game-time combat taking 4 hours to resolve if it's got enough partipants.

commoner said:

Agreed that when looking at an overall percentage chance of success then adding 2 misfortune dice and 1 fortune dice equates to a penalty to the roll BUT on any given roll it could succeed purely because the fortune die comes up with a hammer, mechanically that may be no different to rolling just under your percentage chance, but from a general perception and narrative point of view that is very different.

i think a player would question me if i said, well because you are a little bit drunk you have a -20 penalty to your roll, and then when they succeed (barely) i narate that due to your drunkedness, you suddenly have a moment of clarity and realise the key to the cipher (or whatever it was they were rolling for..)...ok, they probably wouldn't question me that much because they aren't that anal but the way the mechanocs work almost directly conflicts the flavour text

it just makes more sense t say that kind of thing in 3rd ed, because the dice rolls on the table, actually phsically back that description up.

I think that's the point i'm trying to make.

phobiandarkmoon said:

I have that problem now. In our WFRP2 campaign, and now again in our DH campaign, it's rare that any combat doesn't take up the entire night (4 hours for us). A few games ago, we had 4 players (and an NPC scout) vs. a patrol of 9 Orcs and an Orc Nob (they are fighting their way through a battle zone to get to a recorder that has vital information to their mission). We lead up to the battle and placed the figures on the table the previous week. The next week, when the battle started, it took all night. It spilled over into the next week. They looted the bodies just as the session ended. 15 figures on the board - 8 hours total.

My players have a Rhino that they sometimes deploy from their dropship. When it is deployed, you can figure on it taking even longer as they decide how to move it around, use it for cover, and fire its weapons.

Combats take a long time. I can't see V3 taking significantly longer. But, if it does, I'll try and roll with it

The demo is coming up. They are saying it will take 1-1.5 hours. You can figure there will be at least one combat in there. Since the box is balanced for a GM and 3 players, you can figure there will likely be the players and an similar number of opponents (to properly demonstrate the system). If you can get 6+ participants through a combat, with a new system, and still have time for intro and wrap-up, in an hour and a half, I'd say there's no 'speed' issues. We will have the answer soon

NezziR said:

I guess it mostly depends on gaming group style of game.

In your case you do a very detailed combat with minis, distances and such. You are doing what we could call a "Combat Simulation". Not bad at all, it's a way to understand and play combat in WFRP and it's even the way the rulebook suggests to play combat encounters.

But if a gaming group is used to cinematic combat, then the "rolling time" issue might kick in, a degree of 10 seconds more for each combat action could break the mood and cinematic flow a GM is effortly creating. In that case, having to do several separate rolls instead of a unique one helps keeping the pacing:

- Player: Rolls to hit/GM rolls to parry for the NPC

- GM: Describes the hit action - Meanwhile the player rolls to hit

- GM: Describes the caused wounds.

There is a flow in it and it works quite well. Maybe it will work with V3 and maybe not, but my fear is, reading the diary, that while dice picking/rolling/interpreting can be made to flow, there is more in the cake: counters, "resource managing"... that can quite slow down the entire process.

Oh, I DO need to play that demo game every day a little more.

Erik Bauer said:

10 seconds?

I have at least 2 players that can't find 2d10 when it's their turn in less than 10 seconds. I shall have a talk with them. They are doing it wrong!

Edit: I even have a small hour glass for one of my players. If he takes to long, we flip it. The timer shares his name.

- Player: Rolls to hit/GM rolls to parry for the NPC

- GM: Describes the hit action - Meanwhile the player rolls to hit

- GM: Describes the caused wounds.

I think you are forgetting some steps, but running with that, in v3 it's:

- Player assembles his pool

- GM assigns a difficulty

- GM flips wound cards

Well, if you think it well, 10 seconds are not that few... try, next time you play, to tell your players to count backwards from 1000 to 990 before each time they start even to search for their dies and then tell me how the gaming flow works.

But as always, it depends on your style of playing.

NezziR said:

As you can see in my example, the GM starts/continues describing the action WHILE the player rolls subsequent damage dies, keeping a higher description frequency, needed for cinematic combat. With not so distracted players I can manage to make tension growing up by adding some details to the beastmen charging while the player gathers his 2D10 and rolls them.

As you depicted it in V3, there is a greater time gap between points where I can verbal description of what's happening. It's like taking a parallel processing and streaming it into a serial processing. Maybe the overall time it's the same, but the flow is not as smooth. Even more, comparing the beastmen example, the time that the player takes in order to think about which dies to use, what resources to spend and collecting 3-4 kinds of different dies risks to become too long in order for me to continue an exciting enough and not too long.

Ok, I DO know this is nitpicking and maybe I'm pretending a bit much from the system... but that has to do to the fact that completely changing a rocksteady gaming system has it's disadvantages.

Erik Bauer said:

I'm not sure it was that rock steady. I find the whole concept that as soon as you get 2 attacks, you nearly always end up using the full attack option, to which your opponent always parries one attack (or tries to) and doges another (if they are able) quite dull in the longer term.

It makes combats go on for a long time potentially and it takes ages to get to the critical charts, which is the really fun/interesting part.

It looks like V3 might have changed this aspect, which for me, is a big improvement.

pumpkin said:

My players and NPCs often get more tactic than this, combining it with Feints and All out attacks. Moreover, each player has his preferred technique, one of them for example starts doing 2 attacks and a dodge just to switch, after a couple of rounds, to All Out attack that with his 2 handed mace most often quits the combat. Combat can get interesting when players learn how to properly use all the actions.

I do not know ho you do handle combat, but most times mine do not last more than 3-4 rounds before getting deadly crits and the 2 attacks make it evern quickier. Rolling D10 for wounds deals quite a LOT of damage.

V3 might improve this or might not, we will see. But completely changing a solid system like WFRP one is quite a hard bet in my opinion.

Erik Bauer said:

the feint and attack combination is rarely used, but the all out attack has almost never seen use, certainly not since pcs have gained 2 attacks. It's not hitting they have a problem with it is getting around a parry/dodge combination, that makes the combats drag on, them same applies to the npcs trying to kill the players!

I will give the feint combined with standard attack option another go though as that could help matters. I'm not sure all out attack really helps reduce the time taken to resolve a combat though, unless the npcs are mooks, they would probably parry it.

pumpkin said:

You have to keep in mind that there also is something called Initiative Order, not always NPCs are in the position to know what the PC is doing and sometimes I play them aggressively, thus not declaring my parry half action, maybe they're frenzied berserkers or hungry dire wolves. That's when the PC's All out attack kicks in.

Moreover we've houseruled that the parry works like in V1 thus decreasing damage instead of negating it all. This make Parry quite less no brainer and the other combat options more viable (Like adding +20WS to your double handed mace strike when you know your opponent is clumsy at dodging).

Returning in topic, this makes WFRP an overall solid system with a strategic combat ruleset.

My overall impression is that these v3 combat rules loose in details, speed and general dynamics, while gaining in downtime, mechanical complexity.

I've re-read the articles about combat from Jay and, to me, and I can't notice how much work must be done at the table to come up with less details.
The rules lose ground on several points like hit locations, tactical options, recharge time ???, armor as misfortune ???, changing weapon gaining fatigue ???, talen that can be put in the party "pool" of talents, Henchmen rules, damage computation, armor (again) as damge reduction.

Imho these preview aren't depicting a satisfactory combat system. I see it as the more weak point in the v3 system.

DeathFromAbove said:

I won't comment on all of these, but from what I've read about the system hit locations are part of the critical hits system, you draw a card and it says you broke your arm etc. However, it does seem like we're loosing localised armour. I don't think I'm all too upset about this, but I can understand if some people are.

He doesn't suffer fatigue from readying his weapon. He draws it as one maneuver and then it costs fatigue to make other maneuvers on top of this. Read it again and I'm sure you'll spot the difference.

Talents being "socketed" to the party sheet. This is one of the things in the new system that can either be thought of as way too abstract or perfectly logical depending on your point of view. It IS kind of an abstract mechanic but I also thinks it fits well with the idea of trying to make the whole party into an extra character. And it's usually easy enough to justify; if I have the Fearless talent I could percievably be able to rally my friends and make them as strong willed as I. If I know how to charge effectivaly I could teach my friends the same technique etc...
It's all a matter of personal opinion, but I like the whole expanded party philosophy.

Fatigue and Stress are an excellent system of balances. Players can gain them to push themselves to do better on actions, or do more actions, but at a cost and eventually into possible unconsciousness (or insanity). Fatigue and stress also are often the results of Banes or Chaos symbols, so if you push the line too close it could push you over against your will. Exciting stuff!

As for some of the other stuff:

- No hit locations.

- There are plenty of tactical options for players. Besides which action to use (and when), there are talents that can be used, other maneuvers, etc. In fact, I'd say there are more options for players in 3e than v2.

- As pointed out by Poe. PCs get a single free maneuver each round. They can gain fatigue to perform additional maneuvers, which is what happened.

- Henchmen rules seem fine to me, and don't have to be used unless the GM has too many NPCs to comfortably manage

- Damage is pretty simple. Stat+Weapon = base damage. Add any bonus damage as specified by the card and the roll. Subtract target's Toughness+Soak. Minimum 1 Wound. It's no more complicated than any other RPG, including v2.

- Some armors provide a decrease chance to be hit (misfortune) while others provide more resistance to damage (Soak). Robes, for example, provide a slight chance to avoid being successfully hit because they are voluminous and it's hard to tell where the body part actually is under it (it's not form fitting), but provides no soak value as there's no substance to it should it get hit. Makes good sense to me.

I think it just looks harder than it really is. I think most players will be able to pick it up fairly quickly. We'll find out this weekend.

Erik Bauer said:

Ok, if you have done that I can see why combats might play out a little differently in your games and if i wasn't switching to third ed, I might be inclined to introduce the 1st ed parry rule back into my game myself... however, using the fact that you have had to house rule combat as proof that the overall system is solid is surely a bit of a contradiction in terms!

personally, I hate long stagnant combats and I'm still looking for the system that gets around that out of the box; one system that comes close is Grimm rpg (not the D20 version), and from what i have seen WFRP 3rd ed may well have borrowed some ideas from that. Here's hoping..!