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Re: [TS] Slicing the pie, a question?

Quote:

Originally Posted by DouglasCole (Post 1845105)

One thing that wouuld be interesting, but I'm not sure if it'd be a good idea, would be to allow the Wait-and-Aim guy to add his Acc to the Perception roll, or maybe Acc-2, min 0. That gives a mechanical advantage to the guy who chooses the frozen Wait. Thing is, I'm not sure if that works in reality-ville.Does using an Acc 5 rifle give you an advatage over a PPQ with Acc 2 or 3 in your ability to detect a target coming around a corner? I'd think not.

Yeah, I'm thinking not as well. At most I'd give a +1 to Per do the shooter focusing his full attention on that area, I don't see a guns Acc making things more noticable and from my (rather limited to be fair) experiance a scope would make things harder to spot at such close range.

Quote:

Alternately, frozen Wait couuld perhaps claim a bonus to the Per contest of up to +3 for repeated Evaluates, which would make the net QC delta 5ve points - enough that you will really need/want to be a truly expert room-clearing guy to win that.

I want to say yes to this idea but I have a hard time seeing how your Per bonuses could stack by looking at thin air, there's no frame of refrance for you to evaluate. I can by +1 for being focused on a small area but given that in this situation there are to many unknowns to process to warrent any bigger of a bonus, at lest in my book.

Re: [TS] Slicing the pie, a question?

Okay, I've talked it over with Kromm.
Short version:
Kromm endorses the Step-while-Waiting variant, but making it an official rule is a hypothetical 5th edition issue (i.e. it is not a rule in 4e):

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kromm

Quote:

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

I know that you at some points endorsed the use of a Step and Wait manoeuvre in GURPS 4th Edition, which, contrary to Basic Set, allows performing a Step before the trigger condition occurs, and considered even allowing to use the Move pre-trigger for when the trigger converts to a Move and Attack or All-Out Attack.
[...]
Is the new manoeuvre meant to be [list]First declare trigger condition, then make a step, and if while stepping the turns out to be true, you immediately shift in your declared conditional manoeuvre (including against somebody else who is standing and Waiting), otherwise proceed to wait for the condition to happen'?

Pretty much this. Wait works precisely like it does in the Basic Set, with the one difference being that you already took your movement. The trigger is defined at the very start of your turn, though, and can be set off by another Wait before or during your movement, by something your movement brings into range or into sight, or by events that occur after your movement and before your next turn.

But:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kromm

[...] It may be that +2 [in a Cascading Wait] is too small, and that an official "step and Wait" rule – which does not exist, so we're debating a future edition here – might need to amend this, [...] That sort of refinement is why we playtest.

Long version:

Spoiler:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kromm

Quote:

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

First[/b] declare trigger condition, then make a step, and if while stepping the turns out to be true, you immediately shift in your declared conditional manoeuvre (including against somebody else who is standing and Waiting), otherwise proceed to wait for the condition to happen'?

Quote:

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

lets people enter the threatened area of a Waiting enemy and yet get a chance to attack before the standing enemy attacks (by invoking Cascading Waits)

They have a chance, but that isn't automatic. Ultimately, this lets high-skill, high-Basic Speed fighters usually go first in a Wait-vs.-Wait situation, which seems fair. And the one who doesn't move at all is at +2 relative to the one who stepped. I really, really dislike the "automatically go first" version of Wait . . . Cascading Waits exists to give you a chance to act first, not to guarantee it, much as Attack gives you a chance to hit someone, but doesn't deny that person an active defense.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kromm

Quote:

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

But why is it allowed to step into an enemy Wait with the right of a QC to act faster than the standing-Waiter at all?

Why not? I don't see the problem at all.

GURPS turns are meant to emulate simultaneous action with at most a millisecond-scale offset for differences in Basic Speed. Nobody actually steps a full yard toward another person while the other person does nothing . . . but nobody who's waiting gets settled in and sees an enemy stepping a full yard toward her, either. Per Cascading Waits, they both decide to Wait all at once, and the decision favors the highest skill + Basic Speed, with the person who stands still getting +2 for not dividing attention between watching and moving. I fail to see any issues with that.

Quote:

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

I mean, you say you dislike the automatically-go-first, but yet automatically-go-first was brought in when 4e was written

. . . by my co-author, and not entirely with my blessing.

Quote:

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

and was retained (against non-Waits) in Martial Arts too.

To be clear:

Against people who aren't taking a Wait, I have no problem with someone with a Wait going first automatically. In that case, a character as sacrificed an entire quantum of action – a turn – on an obvious gamble. It seems fair for that to pay off, because too often, it will not.

When two people take Wait, though, I dislike "I win!" going to the person who said it first. That's just an artifact of the turn sequence. It leverages even a lousy +0.25 to Basic Speed, worth next to nothing, into total victory over skill when the other party has made an equivalent sacrifice (giving up a turn). That seems wrong.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kromm

I guess I just don't see the problem. From my perspective, it'll always come down to Cascading Waits, which means allowing a little movement adds value to having Combat Reflexes, high Basic Speed, good skill, etc. Which is important, because those things – unlike Wait maneuvers – cost points. And there's still +2 going to the person sitting around a corner or whatever, so in close matches, moving can be fatal.

It may be that +2 is too small, and that an official "step and Wait" rule – which does not exist, so we're debating a future edition here – might need to amend this, perhaps to state that static Wait is always at +4 or +5 or whatever vs. step and Wait. It might be that a clause like "if your step triggers the condition you just specified, you barely waited at all, and are acting hastily at -4" is needed. That sort of refinement is why we playtest.

Re: [TS] Slicing the pie, a question?

Quote:

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh (Post 1845959)

Long version:

Everyone make sure to read the long version. Lots of key context there.

Re: [TS] Slicing the pie, a question?

Quote:

Originally Posted by DouglasCole (Post 1845976)

Everyone make sure to read the long version. Lots of key context there.

Definitely. (The actual long version is even longer - I left out some of my message paragraphs because it's long already, but it's fully or mostly a reiteration of my concerns in this thread.)

I just posted the short version in to make sure that even with TL;DR, the two important points stand: that what DouglasCole said about Kromm endorsing Step-while-performing-a-Wait is 100% supported by the Line Editor, and that, on the other hand, the endorsed rule does not exist within the 4e ruleset.

For me, the unexpected but understandable nuance was the lack of a 100% blessing for the way things are set in the RAW.

Re: [TS] Slicing the pie, a question?

Quote:

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh (Post 1845987)

For me, the unexpected but understandable nuance was the lack of a 100% blessing for the way things are set in the RAW.

Well, two points regarding that:

1. Like any RPG with close to half a million words of core rules and a couple million words of follow-on content – written by several people, and subject to changes made during playtesting, peer review, editing, proofreading, and publisher approval – GURPS Fourth Edition was necessarily designed by committee. You can't expect every rule to meet with the glowing approval of every individual involved. I was one influence on the design, but no more than David Pulver was – and both of us were junior to decision-makers above us on the ladder. I know that David didn't like every last one of my decisions, he knows that I disagreed with some of his, and both of us were overruled on many things . . . but that's not pettiness or politics, merely the nature of huge projects.

2. It has been a decade since those words were set down – a decade of actual-play experience, of customer feedback, of fellow GURPS writers examining our ideas and creating works that interact with the implications and flaws, of improving our own craft and looking back at what in retrospect feels a little rougher than it seemed at the time. After that long, even the primary creators are entitled to be somewhat critical of the product! I'm still proud of the work and happy to stick to the current edition, but I'm more aware of its imperfections and willing to point them out. If I weren't, I wouldn't be a very honest person!

We often lose sight of the sheer magnitude of this game system. It was created in 1986 and will celebrate its 30th birthday in less than two years' time. I was hired in 1995 and I'll have been working on GURPS for 20 years come summer 2015, yet that means I missed the first decade of its design and evolution, and truly know nothing about why many things are the way they are to this day. The edition I do know about just turned 10 years old this past summer. The total publication list is well in excess of 300 volumes (excluding deck plans, 'zines, marketing items like posters, etc.), which represents tens of millions of words – of which more than five million words are associated with the most recent edition alone. The number of primary authors falls between 80 and 100, higher if you add contributing authors and 'zine contributors. And all of that is ". . . and counting."

So yeah, there are going to be some changes of heart. ;)

Re: [TS] Slicing the pie, a question?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kromm (Post 1846031)

Oh, of course, as I said, it's understandable. I've experience with a different sort of game design, and know what disagreements are like.
I just somehow assumed that David Pulver was primarily responsible for equipment and vehicles (as the vehicles specialist), and I underestimated the level of Steve Jackson's level of active participation in such tactical nuances (probably because he isn't as active in author lists of later books, and on the forum, which is a silly line of reasoning now that I think of it). Come to think of it, both of my ideas were silly in retrospect.
So, anyway, my mis-assessment.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kromm (Post 1846031)

2. It has been a decade since those words were set down – a decade of actual-play experience, of customer feedback, of fellow GURPS writers examining our ideas and creating works that interact with the implications and flaws, of improving our own craft and looking back at what in retrospect feels a little rougher than it seemed at the time. After that long, even the primary creators are entitled to be somewhat critical of the product! I'm still proud of the work and happy to stick to the current edition, but I'm more aware of its imperfections and willing to point them out. If I weren't, I wouldn't be a very honest person!

Changes of heart are certainly an important bit. It's just when they seem somewhat sudden that I'm surprised. If a book gets published, and after weeks to a couple years, an author says 'maybe I would do it differently if I knew how others will read it' (or whatever), that seems almost expected; as is when a change is slow. When a book's ruling is defended for some while, then suddenly get changed (or de-recommended) in a new supplement or post, that's what ambushes me.

Sometimes in these cases I have an 'I told you so' feeling. Such as the return of follow-up shots in Tactical Shooting, or the issue of Attack being too good compared to AoA with guns (which got changed in TS, but not in a way I expected). Who knows, maybe some day we'll have an Alternate GURPS treatment of Rapid Fire that doesn't have scaling issues.

But the system is continuing its development - that's the good thing.