Faster combat with help of 2 second turns?

[foxanik]

Hello!

I sometimes find GURPS combat a little bit slow, especially when we additional rules. Other games gives you possibility to reload a crossbow in one turn and shoot in another.

Okay, I know GURPS did divide turns into 1 second sequences so it can be more "real", but still sometimes you need faster combat.

My question is: what would possibly happen when you'd have 2 seconds instead of one (just like everyone would have Altered Time Rate only in combat time), of course I can imagine some strange situations like, what would happen if you do All-Out Attack first and then do All-Out Defense? It'd probably lead to really fast and deadly combat where 1st who attacks will probably win.

What do you think about that?

Maybe someone tried it? Or there are already some rules regarding it?

[LemmingLord]

You can allow non all out maneuvers for the first choice and then allow any maneuvers for the charactwr's second maneuver.

[Onkl]

I wouldn't rock the 1-second turn pillar, everything in Combat is balanced for 1 second turns and the deadlyness of GURPS accentuates that. Once you're in that death spiral... so not allowing you player to react for 2 maneuvers the opposition can make might well kill them. Also, you'll have a lot of the AoA/AoD maneuver combinations once your players find out about them, just like you feared.

In Action 2: Exploits there are cinematic combat rules that might help you "speed up" combat. They can be found on page 38 of said publication.

I never felt that combat was slow... if after a 10 turn combat I reflect on what happened in just 10 seconds, it amazes me. Problem is that this 10 seconds combat can take 2-3 hours if the players (or the GM for that matter) don't know the system very well.

Combat could be slow because the players have too many options at their hands, which is very much possible with only the Basic Set involved. If you add Martial Arts, Tactical Shooting (or Gun Fu) this gets worse. So why not just start with GURPS Lite combat and slowly increasing the options for your players. So they'll be able to choose faster what they do.

Also, have a look at Martial Arts, page 134. There they talk about combat lulls... that's another option to give your players a chance to recuperate. I use it in Dungeon Fantasy to give my players a chance to quaff a potion or to get something from their backpack.

Just my 2 cents

Cheers!

Onkl

[foxanik]

Originally Posted by Onkl

I wouldn't rock the 1-second turn pillar, everything in Combat is balanced for 1 second turns and the deadlyness of GURPS accentuates that. Once you're in that death spiral... so not allowing you player to react for 2 maneuvers the opposition can make might well kill them. Also, you'll have a lot of the AoA/AoD maneuver combinations once your players find out about them, just like you feared.

In Action 2: Exploits there are cinematic combat rules that might help you "speed up" combat. They can be found on page 38 of said publication.

I never felt that combat was slow... if after a 10 turn combat I reflect on what happened in just 10 seconds, it amazes me. Problem is that this 10 seconds combat can take 2-3 hours if the players (or the GM for that matter) don't know the system very well.

Combat could be slow because the players have too many options at their hands, which is very much possible with only the Basic Set involved. If you add Martial Arts, Tactical Shooting (or Gun Fu) this gets worse. So why not just start with GURPS Lite combat and slowly increasing the options for your players. So they'll be able to choose faster what they do.

Also, have a look at Martial Arts, page 134. There they talk about combat lulls... that's another option to give your players a chance to recuperate. I use it in Dungeon Fantasy to give my players a chance to quaff a potion or to get something from their backpack.

Just my 2 cents

Cheers!

Onkl

I should say it in the beginning - I GM for about 8, maybe 9 months GURPS and my players are with me since the time I started using this system. They know quite well their options, but I sometimes feel that reloading crossbow for 4 turns or bow for 2 turns when everyone are fighting there is sometimes boring for those players, they jsut say that they're reloading, and wait and wait, it can be disappointing, so I came up with this idea, don't know really how it will affect whole system so I ask you.

Of course I try to use mooks, so it'll go faster but it's still slow comparing to quite simpler games, but still, I don't want to have simpler system, I want to have quicker combat.

[Onkl]

Originally Posted by foxanik

I should say it in the beginning - I GM for about 8, maybe 9 months GURPS and my players are with me since the time I started using this system. They know quite well their options, but I sometimes feel that reloading crossbow for 4 turns or bow for 2 turns when everyone are fighting there is sometimes boring for those players, they jsut say that they're reloading, and wait and wait, it can be disappointing, so I came up with this idea, don't know really how it will affect whole system so I ask you.

Of course I try to use mooks, so it'll go faster but it's still slow comparing to quite simpler games, but still, I don't want to have simpler system, I want to have quicker combat.

It's GURPS, nothing is verboten! Do with it as you like! :) Might be good to give these news rules a go with just a friend or two and just combat in a little test-session. So you'll not wreck your campaign by introducing the ATR 4 All rule.

If my players were complaining about having to wait 3-4 seconds to reload that (cross)bow, why not allow them to buy Heroic Archer (DF1:14) and Quick-Shot (DF11:33). Since I don't know what type of game you run this may be totally inappropriate advice though.

Cheers!

Onkl

[RyanW]

Originally Posted by foxanik

I should say it in the beginning - I GM for about 8, maybe 9 months GURPS and my players are with me since the time I started using this system. They know quite well their options, but I sometimes feel that reloading crossbow for 4 turns or bow for 2 turns when everyone are fighting there is sometimes boring for those players, they jsut say that they're reloading, and wait and wait, it can be disappointing, so I came up with this idea, don't know really how it will affect whole system so I ask you.

Generally, when I play an archer, I'm quick to switch to my knife, sword, or axe. If I'm using my bow, it's usually a choice of either:

Turn 1: Draw arrow.
Turn 2: Ready bow.
Turn 3: Attack.

or:

Turn 1: Move.
Turn 2: Move.
Turn 3: Attack.

The latter allows for faster subsequent attacks, but also puts me in reach for a counterattack. That's the choices we have to make, though.

[JP42]

Originally Posted by foxanik

I should say it in the beginning - I GM for about 8, maybe 9 months GURPS and my players are with me since the time I started using this system. They know quite well their options, but I sometimes feel that reloading crossbow for 4 turns or bow for 2 turns when everyone are fighting there is sometimes boring for those players, they jsut say that they're reloading, and wait and wait, it can be disappointing, so I came up with this idea, don't know really how it will affect whole system so I ask you.

Of course I try to use mooks, so it'll go faster but it's still slow comparing to quite simpler games, but still, I don't want to have simpler system, I want to have quicker combat.

Well, you may be hitting on GURPS' inherent realism there. It's been discussed more than once how you often find that the best course of action is to carry around this loaded crossbow that's just about as heavy as you can load for yourself out of combat, fire it once, draw steel and advance.

Heroic Archer might be of some benefit for your cinematic ranged attackers to invest in, if only to eliminate some of the slow down. Without introducing some 'nuisance rolls' rules it leads to more rolls at once for your archers, but a much faster turn-around on shots in exchange.

[DanHoward]

Archers tend to forget that they already have a huge advantage by being able to stay out of reach of their opponents. It is unreasonable for them to complain about melee characters getting more attacks.

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by foxanik

What do you think about that?

The big issue with altering round length, in any RPG system, is movement. In the real world, expert sprinters can reach somewhat more than 10 meters per second (about 11 yards/s), and I wouldn't hesitate much to claim that it's 11 m/s because competition sprinters need time to accelerate after the starter pistol is fired.

So the ideal situation is one in which it s actually rules-possible for characters to move at that speed, if optimized for sprinting.

Even more important, though, is for it to be not possible for characters to move faster than that speed, even if wildly optimized, with every relevant stat set at the maximum Human possible.

If you increase round length, you lose item number one, but much more importantly you're nowhere near violating item number to.

And in fact it is likely that many RPG systems which use longer round lengths (many use rounds of 5, 6 or 10 seconds - GURPS with its ultra-short rounds is in a minority, although I know of two systems that use shorter rounds, and one that - in a way - uses comparable 1s rounds) aren't good on item number one above, either.

[Otaku]

Is it complicated maneuvers slowing things down, or just the steps of combat in general?

As per usual, I don't have the 4e rules available, but in 3e there was an article called "Very basic Melee Combat: Really Simple Shortcuts for Really Quick Battles" by Steffan O' Sullivan. It was on Compendium II, the sidebars for pages 89-92. It combines Attack, Defense, and damage into a single roll, and suggests anyone not directly involved in combat be given 2-3 turns to do non-combat things to compensate. Pretty sure 4e has something similar... and if it doesn't you can always import a rule from 3e. If GM and players are all focused on slower weapons and I still needed to speed things up even more, I would either:

1) Assess a penalty and allow things to get cinematic with archers regularly firing an arrow per turn (in place of the normally required Skills, Advantages, Perks, and/or high Skill levels required).

2) Give a bonus to weapons that didn't need the rules tweak (ones that under normal rules already get one or more attack per one second turn).

3) Not give penalties or bonuses along with using the optional rule; everyone just knows that its being "fudged" and they want to take advantage of the intentional loophole, they should do so now (as the GM will adjust the NPCs accordingly).