I have never before GMed anything or even played any Roleplaying game. Neither had any of my players. So why not just jump into a game of Warhammer and see what happens ? I've always thought that RPGs looked interesting, but never known anyone who really played them. So I took the initiative and started my own group. Being an avid board & video gamer as are my gaming companions, I thought WFR3E looked like it could be a good intro due to it's innovative use of components to try to bring the game world to life.

I wasn't quite sure how to introduce the game to my group, and sitting them down for a 90 minute rules explanation and character creation pre-game process did not seem like a good idea. So I designed characters for them, based on their playstyles and personalities that I thought they'd enjoy. This aspect was largely successful, as it allowed us to jump straight into the story with them just "learning the rules as they go". This also helped shift the focus off of mechanics and rules (the focus of any board game) and onto the story and personalities of their characters.

The session was quite a lengthy one, last about 7.5 hours, but with a lengthy 1.5 hour break for supper in the middle. They managed to complete all of the introduction scenario "Eye for an Eye" in that time. The session had its highs and lows, and was a bit bumpy as might be expected in a group where no one has any experience with Roleplaying. None the less it was an enjoyable time that I had fun with, and I think my players enjoyed also. I believe they might be willing to try it again soon, but probably not anytime right away.

I had a total of 4 PCs (I have the Adventurer's Toolkit), and they managed to successfully stop the summoning of the daemon (they interruppted the ritual as it was in progress and managed to slaughter most of the cultists involved, as well as save poor Todd's life) and stopped the Wargor and his minions before they could torch the manor (though some of the outbuildings were burned to the ground, and many of the staff injured, maimed or killed in the attack). One of the PCs was knocked unconscious however (by the Wargor's Undying Ferocity no less!) and has several critical wound racked up though not enough to kill him.

The game was not without its issues however. My wife who is not a gamer but played with us and had been looking forward to the game quite a bit (and she did have a pretty good time overall) told me afterward "The combats were really boring and took forever....." The sad part was....I had to agree. There were only 3 combat encounters in the entire session (Fight with beastmen outside the gate, fight with cultists in the Chaos temple and fight with Wargor and 4 Gor henchmen in front of the manor in a dramatic finish). Yet I would imagine they easily gobbled up 60-70% of our playing time. Part of this may have been due to learning the rules and such, but even so combat as a whole even once we were familiar with it seemed to drag on forever.

So I come to you today to ask a simple question, how can I make combat more entertaining, exciting, and shorter? I foolishly neglected to use an Rally Steps, forgetting all about them in the excitement of GMing for the first time. I think these "pauses" for everyone to catch their breath could have helped this issue a lot. Also remembering that dramatic description and clever use of the enviroment and items (by the players or my NPCs) should not cease once encounter mode begins would probably be helpful. I also should probably try to remember to use more moral tracks and such, since once the combat is clearly won it would be foolish for one side to fight to the last man except under very desperate circumstances (I made that mistake in the Cultist fight, will all but 1 of the 8 cultists down there fighting until dead before I remembered they could run away once the battle was clearly lost ).

Anyone else have any tips on how to make combat encounters more enjoyable and dramatic?

The 2nd thing I recognized was that I need to do more work on bringing the NPCs to life, but I think that is just something I'm going to have to learn with experience. Still I'm open to suggestions if anyone has any for a new GM on how to be descriptive about the enviroment and NPCs as well as have them behave the way they should. Specifics would be very nice i.e. "When my characters enter the hospice I said 'X', and then I behaved in 'y' manner" Do you have the NPCs speak to the PCs first or ignore them until spoken to (I suppose it depends on the NPC)? Once they encounter an NPC do you try and stay "in character" the entire time that NPC is on the scene?

Finally one little rules question I had, with a priest's blessings, once they are invoked and draw favour, if they don't have enough then they cannot go off until the start of the priest's next turn correct? So even if the priest Curries enough Favour it is just placed in their personal supply and not on the card and won't be used until the start of their next turn? Same with gaining 1 favour at the end of their turn? Finally if casters are completely gassed (i.e. out of power or favour) how rapidly do you have that come back in Story Mode? I just used the "about a few minutes of mucking about" mentioned in the sample page of the player's guide for action cards recharging. Every so often I'd tell them they gained another power or favour.

Anyway, thanks for reading and if anyone could give any advice to my two main questions (making combat Fun and bringing the NPCs to life) or answer my rules question I'd appreciate it.

(Sorry if this is the wrong forum, but I didn't think this really belonged in the GM or the Rules Questions forum).

Combats are like Golf. Slow players ruin it for everyone and if you don't have a referee PUSHING people to keep it moving, people will play it like a boardgame.

I absolutely DETEST slow players in my games. I actually start dropping black dice on the table when people are slow, dinking around with cards, strategizing liek they're not in the middle of a ferocious fight for their lives, and the like.

Here have been my solutions over time:

1. Although the "players can go in any order they want" rule is nice, it causes slower play. Call out players names, if they want to switch with someone, switch, otherwise have a set order.

2. If you're slow and unenthusiastic, then they will be slow and unenthusiastic. Prep for your games and keep the exictement moving.

3. Call out players names in the set order so they know when they go. We do this in Track & Field for instance. Bob, you're high jumping right now, Jim, you're on deck and Sven, you're in the hole. When the next guy is up, you repeat.

4. Stop the cross table talk and make the rule that nobody is allowed to tell someone else what to do..also, keep the "strategizing" by players to a minimum. It makes sense that in combat they're going to be yelling stuff to each other..that doesn't mean that they have a map all laid out in front of them and they're planning it Nazi-style in a war-room. Tell your players to keep it moving.

5. As they become more experienced, things will move faster IF THEY PREPARE. Players only have like 4 cards. How hard is it for them to read those cards ahead of time!?!? Explain to your players that as the GM, you have to spend time preparing and you EXPECT that of your players too,. Anything less by your players is rudeness (dont' say it that way of course, but insinuate how hard you work as a GM and that the game isn't just for their enjoyment, but yours too!)

6. Combat should be the most exciting part of the game for many of us. Keep it exciting, keep it fast-paced, stay enthusiastic.

Good job otherwise. If your players really enjoy the roleplaying, you may wish to modify the scenarios to include shorter or fewer combats. Some people are just great roleplayers and get more into the social interaction. That's great..thats a big part of the game. Encourage it and make it grow!

jh

Yes for your Priest Favors questions, it goes off at the start of his next turn (the Blessings waiting draws the needed Favors and activates)

For more exiting moments in combat, take 15 sec to describe certain actions dice rolls (not all or it's be too long), like hurting/killing a big guy, a "turn the tide" event/action, a good idea in general, etc.

The pace accelerates within a couple games once you get the rules and prepare the dice pools quick enough.

A few items to help your players & you get started overall :

WFRP Information Booklet (PDF) (World setting informations)

WFRP 3rd - Reference Guide (more suited for gameplay)

WFRP 3rd Rules Summary (more suited for outside game reference)

Thanks for the replies. I think Emirikol probably hit the nail right on the head as far as the combat goes. One of my group's favorite games is Descent. In that there is about a 10 seconds in reality to 1 second in game time ratio if you are moving quickly . And in that no one minds it, it is a very tactical game with a lot of options and taking your time to optimize them is part of the game. However WFRP is not in any way tactical. And taking that much time to analyze every option yanks everyone out of the roleplaying experience and into a rather underwhelming non-tactical combat experience.

Keeping the pace moving during combat is definitely something I'm going to try and do if we play another session. Debating for 3 minutes over who goes in what order is something I enjoy in Descent.....but it was definitely something that killed combat in this game. I'm going to just shout out player order like Emirikol suggestted and if they want to change it on the fly, let them. Hopefully this will cause battle to have a bit more of a hectic, hurry up and fight for your life feel, rather than a "let's stare at our very limited options for a minute and choose to do the same one we did the past 3 rounds".

Thanks for the reply on the rules question, and links to the summaries Cwell. I already had the two rules summaries and had printed out Universal Head's, but the Information Booklet was something new and it had some great fluff. I think another thing I'll do to speed up action is print out the all-in-one basic action sheet for each player. It will lower the number of cards they have to thumb through drastically, in this session I just had one for me that I used for my monsters.

I'm trying to work the iniative order as well. It's been a while since we play, but we are trying a way to work the mechanics through character acting. That is to say, as much as we can, we try to stay "in character" and deal wih the mechanics with a character point of view.

Fow iniative, it works more or less like that: when the PCs have a go, I just say "your turn guyes!". The first to start describing acts that turn. BUT we have already talked about it, it is not about who can speak faster, it's about what the characters are doing, so usually my players just look at each other (just look) before someone starts talking.

Also, someone could talk but not take that action, and that would be like: "I shout 'hit him, Sven!'". That's about how we understarnd the iniative order in game. What's the reason a character that rolled well because he is more agile is permiting someone who is less agile acting at his speed? Because a group of characters exchange a lot in combat, and most of it is just tension and body expressions. It sure makes a difference as how someone acts when he with a party of people. So the most agile could be influencing tyhe others by pointing the enemy, or just by acting fast and giving everybody a rush.

When we roleplay in this matter, we try to remember our goal is to make combat fast pacing as well as roleplayed, and not just take 15minutes to describe every action. Sure, sometimes an action seems so important is really worthwhile taking a time to describe it; you can actually feel it, and it makes the game all the more enjoyable. The focus is not on a way to do something, but on how enjoyable is the game. That is the goal, and you have to try what you can muster to achieve that goal.

If the players start discussing who goes first I step in and describe that they are looking at each other and shouting or motioning for the others to act, and that took just enough time for the next enemy to do something. That means they have lost the opportunity to act on that mark, and will have do use that action later, delayed. I don't make them lose the chance to act, just not on that mark in the iniative track. Also, they would probably suffer something for it, like some stress or the tension meter onm the party sheet would go up one or mor spaces. I'll just see what mechanic translates better what is happening in game.

On a last thought, we had a thread a while ago about games podcasts. Maybe you could look for some of them, they could give you a lot of insight on how other people deal with their games.

Keep going, man! As much as you and your group get the pace of it, the funner it gets! The first experiences usually are much more... heavy in terms of game aprehension. When things start to get lighter and everything stops being so odd, then you'll all start focusing on your hearts beating with excitment everytime an enemy appears through the bushes with a bloddy axe in hand!

I have to add this link to the above list, Mal R. reminded me of it today in another post (i don't see the credits in the pdf, but thanks anyway ) :

Provincial Features of the Empire

Some good advice here. I think some more detail would be good as to how the combats went, and what seemed to make them slow and/or boring.

Experience, of course, helps a lot as people are better used to making the dice pools and know what their action cards do.

One thing I like to do, and encourage you to do, is as a GM to provide players an extra fortune die for their Action if they either describe what they are trying to do

i.e. "I whirl my sword over my head, bracing for the impact, and try to cleave the beastman in twain."

or else for making RP comments as they perform the action.

"Furious, I snarl at the beastman, 'You will die foul fiend, as Sigmar is my witness!' "

I've found this brings a lot of color and flavor to combats. Players aren't penalized if they don't do something, but I found that even the meekest players start getting into it after a bit, and it does seem to help PC personalities to come out even in combat.

Thank you all for the additional link and more advice! I'm definitely going to try and work more Roleplaying into combat. Some of the most fun moments in our session were in story mode when the players got really creative, such as luring Karla Wagner into the wine cellar while two of them distracted her and the 3rd hit her over the head with a wine bottle (they already suspected she was a cultist). But often times once combat started my players would enter a "let's be tactical" mode, rather than a "let's roleplay and be creative and fun". In hindsight this game's combat is clearly more about being narrative and dramatic than tactical to the inth degree.

Adding a fortune die to their rolls will be a great way to encourage them to come out of their shells in combat. I can also help by taking the lead with vivid descriptions of my monsters attacks. Thanks again for all the advice.

Cwell2101 said:

Well, i found the message, and it's Mal's PDF, so credits to him!

Cwell2101 said:

yeah it is mine! but I'm a sucker for flattery. So can't help myself from commenting. other than that I love to read about new gamers and their experience with my favourite rpg.

Emirikol's advice is sound! but keep us updated how your next session goes will you? thanks

Good gaming

Thanks, I'll try to do that and post a session report either here or on rpg geek sometime. I've talked to all of my players since Saturday when we played and they all said that despite a few flaws and an imperfect first session, they really enjoyed the game and would like to play it again, so I suppose that is a good sign anyway .

I like the idea of letting players choose the order of initiative each round. It adds some much needed variety as people can change roles and order of battle based on the situation. If players can't decide on who goes when I'd add party tension and only miss the turn if it becomes extreme.

I have markers for PC and npc initiate on one side of the table, and 1 marker on the other side showing where we are in the initiative.

If my players don't act, I move it down 1 space, that usually makes them act much faster... especially when I say "NPC XXX takes advantage of your hesitation and launches an attack on XXX".

Of course you can't do this untill the players are expected to know the rules, but when they do, it's their job to act fast.

One player was frustrated that he didn't have time to find the "right" action, and I said that is what "hesitation" is, it's the time you spend thinking, instead of acting.

My NPC's never use the "best" action, they "act"!

Needless to say, it caused my players to act a lot faster... and now they find it highly amusing when they after combat see they forgot to use X-action, or X-reaction.

My use for party tension allmost only comes from inter-party roleplaying, or from NPC's using social skills at one char (of course this is also roleplaying, but it's roleplaying from an outsider as well), like when a merchant tries to win one PC over to him from using bribes/guile/charm. If he succeeds his roll vs. the PC, then the PC has no choice but to roleplay he took the "bait".

Forgot to add, that I take into consideration which stance the player is in. Conservative players are given a little more time to think, than reckless stanced players.

One thing that we did a while back when we were going to make an attempt to play WFRP3 was to run some test combats with our characters against each other to try and get a feel of what we should do and when. Due to time restrains and other games the attempt never got off the ground but the practice combats did help to get a feel of the combat system.

You should get the players together in smaller groups and get them to run through a few combats, ask them for suggestions on how to speed things up. Sometimes as a GM it can be hard to tell players to do things, if they suggest it though it often makes it easier to impliment the idea.

The WFRP 3 system is intuitive when you get the hang of it but I actually think its very difficult for first time players. It requires you to know so much more about the system than almost any other RPG out there. I can pick up Dark Heresy and someone can tell me that to hit in combat all I need to do is roll weapon skill and get below my score and then if its not dodged or parried then I roll damage and tell the GM my results and weapon pen and in general thats all I need to know to get started. In WFRP 3 I need to know what all the symbols are, what cancels out what, what possitive things add to my dice pool, what negative things add to my dice pool, what does fatigue/stress do (as I can generate it myself), what does the weapons crit rating mean, whats the difference between defence rating and soak. When you think about what you need to know its far more than most other systems, its not a good game to pick up and play.

I would be comforable with teaching someone Dark Heresy on the fly but I would insist on sitting down a new player for an intoductory lesson for WFRP.

So yeah get 2 or 3 people who can look at the books and work out what they need to do and run them through some fights, not only will it give them a better appreciation of the rules but it should get them more familiar with their own characters abilities which should speed up the decision making process, also if possible get them to discuss some strategies before hand so that going into a fight they generally know how they should operate.

Kaihlik

Thanks for the additional suggestions and advice. I've posted the highlights of our first game in a session report here if anyone's interested.

Combat in 3rd ed. can be slow, but there are some steps you can take to speed it up.

1. Each player MUST have their own dice and the same is true with the GM. Sharing dice takes a lot of time.
2. Make sure the players have their dice pool ready before it's their turn so it's just adding a few dice and roll. The same is true for the GM. If you have several monsters then have the dice pools ready. Know the dice pools of your monsters.
3. Players do everything else (like removing/adding tokens) when it's not their turn.
4. Make sure you don't bother with NPC vs. NPC fights... they are a waste of player time. Just narate what happends.

Now for the fights being exciting. That's harder. I don't have any real solutions, but can offer a bit you can think about in terms of setting up combat.

1. Are you just placing the enemy figures in front of the players and starting combat? That can be boring. Take advantage of terrain, cover, buildings and let the players use their imagination. Promote player suggestions by giving them white dice. Don't spend much time on it, but allow players to say "I jump up on the wagon next to the wall and try to fend off the three attackers from there". Even though you didn't know there was a wagon... there could be.
2. Take advantage of the 3rd ed. system. Have NPCs use action cards like duellist strike (I think that's the one), that allow him to move engagements. Mix up your NPCs with ranged and melee characters. Create the fights so there is something the players have to think about. Like how they take out the sniper, the wizard or escape the burning building while fighting.
3. We have a different rule for assists. In combat assisting another player doesn't give him a fortune die. Instead it allows you to parry or block attacks against him. This means a fighter can stay close to a wizard and defend him. It works well with the abstract nature of combat.
4. Let players exploit the fact that they have more movement options that typical NPCs. Players can spend fatigue to move faster, whereas a monster usually only has one maneuver. Stick to this limitation of NPCs as it will give players some tactical advantages that lets them outsmart NPCs. Then add in some surprises for instance where those orcs suddenly charge the players like mad (giving them either wounds or subtracting some of their A/C/E) dice.
5. Split the encounter up in different engagements. Perhaps the NPCs attack from two flanks, while archers attack from further back. This force the players to think instead of just standing still slashing away.
6. Always use a morale track for NPC. Let it start at one track and every time a NPC is killed then move the counter down one spot. At some points there could be a spot where the NPCs roll a morale check modified by any players who have intimidate. The starting morale of NPCs could vary, so the track can be long or short. Also if a leader is killed it could be moved down 2-3 steps depending on how important he is for the troops. A morale track results in varied fights where NPCs sometime decide to flee, which can be a problem in itself if the players can't tolerate any witnesses or anyone getting away to warn a bigger force. Let players use social action cards to move this track in either direction.
7. The rules makes a point out of how to interpret the dice to explain how you do well... skill, luck, bad luck, enemy skill (parry etc.). Don't waste time on that. Instead save it for the really spectacular rolls. Explain the action and let is have consequences for the fight. A particularly nasty attack by a player could result in blood from the NPC spraying into the eyes of a nearby NPC giving it the blinded condition for two rounds. You can also let players narate what happends on their attack whenever they make a particularly good roll (6+ successes, 2 boons and a sigmars comet could be called the master result). This would allow them to narate how they cut off an arm, hand, leg or you could even rule that such a result grants the player an instant kill on any normal NPC (not bosses or more epic NPCs/monsters).

Just a few random ideas and suggestions, but it's really a long and deep debate. How to make combat exciting and not take up too much play time

Kartigan said:

Hi I have read your review of your first session, it was a great review by the way. And here is my comments

Chapter 1: Great intro to the perilous and grim world of warhammer, by setting an example of how dangeours magic can, especially when cast recklessly and/ or without concern. A cantrip wouldn't set fire to a forest immediately, but it can make bush start to burn. As a rule of thumb you should not let cantrips be able to damage opponents directly.

Chapter 2: At this point I can clearly see you have a good grasp of GMing, and are able to modify the rules as you go along. Splitting up in a module, is never a good thing to do, avoid that in the future if you can. While it might seem smart to do if time is of the essence in the modul, you end up wasting a lot more time by going through each and every players actions, revisiting areas etc, to allow a new check etc.

Sometimes splitting the party up can be a good thing, but then try to avoid splitting in more than two equal groups, that way a player will not lose too much attention from the gamemaster

Chapter 3: you show inquienity, and never halt the story, despise your awarness that you had done some mistakes along the road, that is what its all about. You never fail to be a GM (even if you screw up the written module), if the players (and you) had fun along the way.

Conclusion: You certainly have GMing skills, crafty skills especially when knowing this is your first xperience with rpgs and gming. you did what is the most important job for the GM: to let the players have fun, create an enjoyable time for everyone.

But you are quite generous with your xp awards. I would propaply only given them 2 (1 for the session, and another 1 for completing the story and most of its goals). Remember if you will like awarding them extra, there is tons of award mechanics you can use: reduce party tension, award extra fortune points, or even let them have an additional characteristic die (blue die) to a certain check. these are tangible and fast rewards, that if spent wisely, might not let them level up faster, but keep them alive in dangerous situations.

giving them too much xp has its own disadvantages, the game is fairly knew and are lacking in advanced careers. depending on how ofthen you are going to play, giving too much can end in leveling sideways instead of up. there is no immediate danger of awarding them 4 xp, you can balance that by giving them fewer until you feel you have corrected the issue. or not at all, depending on your gamestyle, some GMs prefer that players advance quickly, but I strongly reccomend a slower approach until more support for high-level characters arrive.

My party have 15 xp by now, and all have changed into their second careers. we played through Eye for an Eye, Tale of Red Rose, and Gathering Storm. I plan playing through Winds of of Change, Horror of the Hugeldal, and my own expanded version of Edge of Night, by then they will around 30 or so xp and be in third career. I have not included some smaller modules, like Emirikol's excellent Revenant or False Pretenses.

I use to reward my players with fortune points when they are on the right track, or have accomplished something important in the module, like finding out that the venison is poisoned (either from the sliped note, or firsthand). that way they know they are NOT on the track when there has gone some time without any fortune points awards (or that I forget to reward them, which I do sometimes ).

Now I am really competing against Commoner's posts he he, anyway keep up the good work, I have total confidence in your GMing skills.

Good gaming

Thanks for the advice and comments Mal. I agree with what you say about splitting up in an adventure, I'm going to try harder to keep the party together from now on, unless their is a really good storyline element to why they are splitting up. As far as the XP goes I just used the experience point advice given at the back of the ToA for Eye for an Eye (1 XP per chapter +1 for stopping the ritual), but I agree that's probably way too fast. It was a very lengthy session (7.5 hours, with a 1.5 hour break for supper in the middle) and they accomplished a lot, but if I keep going at this rate it won't be too many more sessions and they'll be advancing sideways like you say.

Thanks again to everyone for your comments, encouragement, and advice.

About Exp rewarding, i noticed that "a session" is about 4 hours for most groups. When you complete a scenario in 2 or 3 session, you get 3 or 4 Exp (sessions +1 on average i'd say).

My group completed an Eye for an Eye in one "session" of 12h+. I though about it and got them 5 Exp considering it's about 3 average sessions time (1 per charpter, 1 for completing + 1 bonus as per the guideline). They did not look around doing nothing during that time & it was our 1st WFRP game too.

Then i got in an online game as a player and with the 1 Exp per session (~3.5 hours average), my character will most likely progress as fast.

That is how i figured (and from some other people messages too) that "a session" is often ~4h (& 1 Exp), i'll keep using that guideline.

In our group we usually have 10-12 hour sessions (once a month). They get 1 or 2 exp per session and still they are around 24 exp now. They'll be past rank 4 before any rank 4 stuff is released.

But in terms of the TTT campaign it's alright. They will end up just short of rank 5 I believe. That's a decent advancement for such a long campaign. Once they get past rank 3 the options for players start to thin out in terms of their speciality and they will most likely start investing in other skills. But even when they get to rank 5 they will still have valid advancements. Stats cost a lot to increase.

Awarding xp to the players depends largely on the GM's intention and goal for his campaign.

I think I ended up awarding them 3 experience points for Eye for an Eye (since it took them one and a half session to complete, and other circumstances that warranted an additional xp). my definition of a session is a night of gaming. wheter it be 4 hours or 12 hours. You could also argue what is exactly 4 hours of play? the actual time that passes by? or 4 hours of efficiently play in a 6 hours session? So every GM must find his own pace to when he should award xp.

It can be tricky, but the idea is to make the players accustomed to your award methods, what other gaming circles do is not that important.

Next, what did the players do that session? did they succeed a challenging quest? or did they simply enjoyed a carousing at the inn, starting fights, checking out the GM's new binge drinking rules? For me what did go on in a session is far more important than keeping track of the 4 hour xp tablet-feeding-system.

on a average I think between 1 and 3 xp would be what is to expect of such a system, but taking in the account of the chance of leveling sideways, due to lack of advanced career options, I would advice about giving more xp, and even suggest to reduce the award.

What about giving half points? like 1,5 xp for a session? the idea is compelling for me.

other than that the GM is the final arbitator, after all he knows his players best, and what campaign he want for his players.

Good gaming.

The fact is, unlike most other RPGs, the players should be being awarded for RPing and play as they go. Fortune Pool refreshes, extra fortune dice on dice pools for tests, etc. So, session endings, and XP awards, really should have less "weight" than typical RPGs.

Yea, it's not only about Exp. You have a racial ability, Career abilities, Talents, etc. that can be used "once per session". You need to define some time frame because of those mainly, thus the reflexion about how long is a session. "Exp per session" then came on top of it for me

Cwell2101 said:

We usually allow the "once per session" talents to recharge once per game day, as we've found the exhaustible talents to rarely be chosen over the persistent bonuses.

As for EXP, we're having less of an issue with that than most. I've converted into a 100XP per advancement system, so I often give out 20-25XP per session, meaning one advancement per adventure or so.