[Martial Arts] Massive Close Combats

[DouglasCole]

Originally Posted by Xakaz

DouglasCole, I agree - it's kinda hard to imagine more than two human-sized characters fighting in 1x1 yd hexagon. But how then close combat fights with four or five participants should be played?

It's a good question. Probably with penalties for combatants past the first two?

I think, one way, to keep things simple and avoid contradictions with rules, is assume that it's possible to have unlimited number of combatants in the same hex. As per:
B392: "Any number of people may participate in close combat in the same hex."

This is 100% the most gameable way to go.

This assumption brings the issue with facings. As in the thread: http://forums.sjgames.com/showthread.php?t=53231. If i get Kromm's answer referred in that thread right, then in the close combat situation like:

A><B<C

B is either facing A - then C is in its rear, or B is facing C - then A is in its rear. But what about A and C? Are they always in front of each other (as well as B is in front of them)? Are they capable of hiting one another? What if A wants to move to C's rear? Does he need to leave the close combat and move all the way around this hex and then enter the combat behind C? What if D an E join the combat?

I've, probably, dumped a lot of questions here, but I feel like there is a simple, non-contradictive solution in the rules, that I'm missing. And if there is no such solution, then I'm very interested in discussing your experience and approaches in handling such situations.

I talk about arc of facing in Technical Grappling quite a bit, since it's entirely possible that "the front" of a character is "all of the world, since they're lying face-up on the ground."

[(E)]

If its scrum like conditions my quick at the table response would be, enforce random hit locations and maybe thrusts only. In tight quarters that cramped working with the options given seems to be the way to go. You could even go to the point where there is a random element to the people you have the option of attacking even if they are right in front of you.