Minion groups and melee

By player266669, in Game Mechanics

Posted at

LethalDose said:

Voice said:

With your interpretation of the minion group rules, the only thing you have to have is a group of minions with the same gear present in the same encounter. They get all the advantages of being individual minions (independent positioning, ability to attack from and defend against different targets independently ) as well as the advantage reserved for acting as a group (skill ranks). You haven't reduced any complexity, because your minions still have varying position and range, so you've got to keep track of each and every last one of them just like you would if they were individuals.

This statement (especially the bolded part) indicates we have one of two situations:

  1. We are unable to communicate about this topic in a transparent way.
  2. You aren't reading my posts.

Either way, I'm done trying to fix it. I won't post here about it anymore.

-WJL

Or, it indicates that I missed a couple words when I was typing. It was supposed to say, "…ability to attack from different locations and defend against different targets independently…". Nothing any more nefarioius than disagreeing that a bunch of minions, potentially separated from one another by a wall or blast door, can be part of the same minion group.

Posted at

If I could weigh in…

My perspective is that the GM should feel free to space his minions in a single group as far apart as he's willing to deal with . If you don't want the headaches of trying to narrate a Wookiee taking out 3 relatively distant mooks at once, then don't spread them out so far. Or treat them as two separate groups. But the rules are beautifully simple; I would say codifying this sort of situation really goes against that beauty and ultimately will add MORE headaches as players and GMs argue about rulings and such. Play the rules as written, and interpret them as needed. Of course it's a GM's prerogative to be sensible; but I would say when doing that, always rule in favor of the players. So if your player gets lucky and rolls a crapload of damage against your minion group, let him use it.

Let's ALSO not forget that combat rounds are equal to about a minute's worth of action. That in itself should inform some of the interpretations we make.

Example: Trandoshan brawler goes crazy and rolls a bazillion damage with his virbosword. So the player and GM narrate: He decapitates stormtrooper minion #1, barreling into stormtrooper minion #2 and sending him flying into #3. They are both out cold. Finally, in the same murderous rampage, he backhands a small crate and sends it across the room, flying into stormie #4 and cracking his skull with the impact.

See? No need to teleport. Just some good ol' cinematic awesomeness.

Posted at

I still find that "a turn is a minute" thing a bit silly. It didn't make sense in AD&D and it doesn't make sense here. I get that time is fluid in this game (and so we don't spit it up exactly into 5 second turns or whatever), as is distance, but it is highly unlikely that the kind of fire fight that a player group is going to be involved in (short distances, with a smaller number of opponents) is even going to last a minute. WIth guns in that situation, either one side or is going to be dead, surrendered, or have decided to run away within a minute.

While I don't think it matters so much in this system, as it is so abstract and fluid, but if trying to be at all simulationist I do think 5 seconds a turn is about as long as you can go in any setting with repeating firearms (and even that is pushing it, as you can empty pretty much any modern firearm in less then 5 seconds). For a more historical setting I think this can be extanded to 10 seconds or so (partly to avoid having rediculous waits between reloads for weapons such as crossbows and blackpowder fire arms).

Posted at

awayputurwpn said:

… But the rules are beautifully simple; I would say codifying this sort of situation really goes against that beauty and ultimately will add MORE headaches as players and GMs argue about rulings and such. Play the rules as written, and interpret them as needed. Of course it's a GM's prerogative to be sensible ; but I would say when doing that, always rule in favor of the players. So if your player gets lucky and rolls a crapload of damage against your minion group, let him use it.

…

Glad someone's hearing what I'm saying. Or at least independently came the same interpretation independently.

-WJL