I'm trying to streamline combat and other time-sensitive situations and cut down on a little of the derailing that goes on in my game.
What do you think is a fair amount of time for deciding on initiative actions? I've seen 2 minute and 3 minute hourglass timers... which one seems more reasonable?
Frankly, neither. If focus is the problem at the table, that should probably be addressed in a more direct fashion, such as just asking the players to focus more or asking them what will incentivize them to do that. An hourglass is prelude to a penalty. It's likely to be a stressor more than anything.
I tell my own players that their turn is for acting, not thinking about what to do. If we get around to them and they don't know what to do, they have two options:
1. Say "Skip." (In 4e, it was "Delay.") We move on to the next person immediately.
2. Ask for a suggestion and take the first (good-faith) offer.
There is no reason why a player's turn can't be fully resolved in 60 second or less. Probably even 30 seconds or less.
2 minutes should be enough. It will keep players paying attention to what's going on an planning before their turn comes up, which is a pretty desirable thing. That said, I haven't had to take such measures myself, but I'm definitely willing to should it become necessary.
A round is 6 seconds. Unless your character has a lot higher Intelligence than the player feels that he himself does, it's absurd to let him sit there and think about what he's going to do. Swords are swinging, spells are going on, people are screaming.
Ask the player: "What are you doing right now?"
Unless there is a legitimate distraction, I normally give an experienced player about 30 seconds to decide their action. For a new player, I would use something like 2 minutes, giving them time to look up a spell or power. Failure used to mean delaying, but with 5E, I'll probably just force Dodge instead. I've only had to use the penalty a handful of times in 20+ years of DMing, and even then it was mostly on players who thought I was bluffing.
Of course, most of my in game delays have been more from players not being prepared (not knowing spells/powers, equipment/magic items, or easy reference modifiers). I don't want to penalize these players, because they often know what they want to do, but have to figure out how to do it. Drives me absolutely batty sometimes, because it's always the same players, but I try not to get too upset, because sometimes it happens to me too.
Zarithar wrote:
Usually our group keeps it to about 30 seconds (I'd guess, I haven't timed it) a turn. Maybe a minute if were confirming if we'd get sneak attack or if anyone needs healing.
How long is combat taking and how long do you want it to take?
AaronOfBarbaria wrote:
I think you'll burn yourself out doing that. Trying to put in more effort to make up for someone elses lack of effort is never a pay off situation.
My group plays in a FLGS with the owner as a result we are constantly derailed by him making money to keep the doors open. We just pause and let things be. But we are all very experienced (well not my 17 yr. son, he only has about 6 or 7 yrs gaming) gamers, so we can jump in and out of character and have side talk during these intrusions by customers. How dare they interrupted out game! 
Noon wrote:
I took an extreme direction, and instituted group inititative. I know this is a major house rule that goes against some of the core assumptions of the game, but for my group it really helped them focus to just go in order around the table. One player rolls the initiative for the entire group, and if the PCs win initiative, then we go clockwise from there.
If after time, this causes problems because player and monster actions are being grouped too much then I may change it, but for right now this extreme rule was necessary for the table and it helped a great deal in my game.
arjomanes wrote:
I was continually told that 5e would not have long combats.
If 5e is already giving some players option paralysis that's direct proof that the 4e system itself was never the problem. But then again, I've been saying that for years.
Give some people a choice and some people will dither. It's just human nature. Helping players to overcome their option paralysis can be difficult, but doing things like introducing a timer never worked for me. I had the best luck with just explaining to players that there are no "gotchas" in our games and no matter what choice you make, it'll turn out okay and we'll all have fun. Then proving it to them by my actions as a DM.
Now, as the OP talked about, if the game just keeps getting derailed due to chitchat or other distractions, you have two options. Either just continue to ask nicely for people to focus a little more, or else just go with it and have fun talking about whatever it was you saw on reddit last night and enjoy being social even if you don't get a lot done in the game.
Most other options are just going to come off as punative, and I don't believe it's the DM's, or anybody else's, right to punish people he's playing a game with, either with ingame or out of game penalties. That's a quick way to find yourself with no one to play with.
RedSiegfried wrote:
Be ready, decide before turn - done. Players ask each other on their turn, interupt a persons turn with suggestions. That drives me nuts!!!
Now how about DM's turn time - I really try and do what I preach but having to keep track of conditions, hp, blah blah plus having many more individuals to control means often times my own turns are quite long. If I make a mistake, that's just tough, on to the next monster / NPC.
Question ... should I be aiming for 60s per monster / PC?
I think 60 seconds per turn, whether one PC or multiple monsters, is plenty. I'd expect the basic interaction to take no more than 30 seconds on average. DM describes environment. Player says what he's going to do. DM calls for checks and narrates results. Since initiative is also visible to everyone when we play, I also ask the player to hand off their turn to the next person in initiative by saying something like, "What does Ragnar do?" when it's Ragnar's turn. As opposed to saying "Done" or whatever and DM having to jump in and tell the next person they are up. That's an unnecessary step that I think the players can do on their own.
I say that option paralysis IS what is being experienced here but when you think about it, it is a symptom of the problem of distracted players, not the cause of distracted players. It is/was never a problem with the game itself, regardless of edition, despite what some people said and are still saying.
Think about this: if players are getting distracted, what is it about the way you're all playing your game that's making them not want to pay attention when it's not their turn? Don't take this personally, but is it possible that you and/or your players are ... boring? In the words of someone else who I can't remember, would you pay money to watch your character fight monsters?
Putting the blame on external distractions or rude players is perhaps accurate, or perhaps not, but is there a way you can adjust your gameplay to make it more engaging so you don't have the problem in the first place?
On the other hand, speed of play is irrelevant if the play is fun, which I've also been saying for years, but people don't seem to get that because speed of play seems to be more important to them than quality of play. If the quality of the play is what everyone considers to be high, then you've killed two birds with one stone: speed and quality, because people will want your games to go even LONGER.
And I still say your two best options are either just to continually remind people politely to be "on point" or else just deal with it. Anything else I can think of will probably just escalate the situation. I guess what I'm saying is that you could have WORSE problems.
I like 1-page Character sheet designs. I feel that having fewer pages helps the newer players. I also find that if a player is stuck, it helps to ask him/her questions about their desired strategy, and have them ask me (or whoever is the DM at the time) more about their surroundings. Do I have line of sight to this monster? Am I within 60 feet of my desired target? Are they using cover?
It's probably nice to make them default to the dodge action if they run out of time, rather than just do nothing.
AaronOfBarbaria wrote:
Sword_of_Spirit wrote:
Thanks for all of the replies and suggestions. I will be the first to admit that I myself am in part to blame, as I tend to participate actively in some of the derailing. Given that we only meet once per month (and sometimes skip a month), I think I need to dial down the derailment by several degrees, starting with myself. I am going to experiment with a 2 minute timer and just see how it goes. If everyone ends up hating it, then I'll adjust as needed.
Zarithar wrote:
Honestly, talking so much for a turn bother me prevalently as player, since as DM you can use that extra time to reorganize and think about strategy and powers of your monsters. But as player you have only small thing to do and then all you can do is wait and do nothing. Especially in 4E it was a big problem with players nervously browsing their powers list when things were not turning the best way for players.
So for me it is more of a players' issue as it does not affect DM that much as it affects players.
This is one of my favorite topics and I've commented on this subject many times over the past couple decades.
D&D is not an old geezer miniatures napoleonic wargame anymore.
Combats shoudl be fast and players should be ready for their turns.
If players are taking longer than (2x) their character's Intelligence score, in SECONDS, to take an action, they are not playing actively and need to pay better attention.
I dare you to take a timer and sit there and watch a player to see how long he takes. 60 seconds is a LIFETIME.
When your turn arises, you are robbing the other players of valuable time, if you are not paying attention and are taking too long.
If you are taking a long time because you are puzzling out the best course of action, I only give that to PCs who have intelligence or wisdom scores of 15 or higher.
This is because in the heat of the battle, YOU DON'T HAVE TIME TO PUZZLE THINGS OUT. Characters with a high INT or WIS score deserve a little more time
because this demonstrates their benefit for playing a wise or genius character.
I routinely pressure players and skip them. This has earned me more than a few baby-tantrum cat-calls when I run games at game conventions when you get some dude
who is used to taking 17 minutes to decide if his character will go left, right or straight.
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG.
To be fair too though, you as the GM need to keep the action moving as well. If you're messing around looking up rules and dithering, its not fair to expect anything
different from your players.
A couple other tips:
Stand up during combats
Point at the active player
To the /next/ player, let him know "prepare your action" while the first player is finishing his dice roll and assessment.
To the player afte the /next/ player, just like at a Track & Field meet, you tell them "you're after bob..start thinking about what you're going to do."
Not slow at my table..unless I'm slow!
You do what you want at yours ;)
Zarithar wrote:
Maybe its the people I play with but I have never had trouble with people sitting around for five minutes trying to figure out what to do. I played quite a bit of 4th ed and the analysis paralysis I heard so much about was just never a problem. I haven't played 5th yet but it seems so much simpler, especially at low levels, that i don't grok how this can be an issue. The fighter basically swings his sword, or swings his sword, or he might throw a handaxe, or he swings his sword.
Are the players doing other things, like going online, texting or tweeting, reading other rmaterials, leaving the room? Are adult beverages or other cognition affecting substances being used? Is there a tv on or some other media going? Are there side games (of what ever type) going on?
My best advice is to remove all distractions. Ask players to stay at the table other than bathroom breaks and scheduled meal or smoke breaks. Get people out of their phones/tablets/latptops and focused on the paper and dice. If someone is playing something on the side politely ask them to stop and focus on the group game. Turn off the TV and turn down the music unless its background/mood music for the game. If someone doesn't understand the rules, or the ins and outs of their character, suggest options until they become more familiar.
Also, encourage players to talk through their process if they are having trouble. You or a player may be able to prompt them or help them decide. If the wizards is looking up how his spells work all the time make him some spell cards. If after all of that someone is still just sitting there with a dumb look on his face then suggest a few alternatives. "Do you want to charge the orc or do you want to throw your javelin?" Something along those lines.
I have a short section on my character sheet where a player writes down several vanilla combat actions before the game even starts. If combat paralysis starts to occur, I'll prompt the player to look at that list. Sometimes it sparks an idea, and sometimes it's a fallback. In any case, it helps keep things moving.
If the issue is focus a big thing for my group is a grounding activity at the beginning of each session. When we first sit down I will ask if everyone is ready to play, and then I will ask everyone to go around the table and recount what they remember from the previous session as well as what their character looks like after all that. Are their clothes torn? is their armor dented? Do they have bandaged wounds, or a limp? it helps players get centered and paints a nice picture for the rest of the group. I also made up a little mini character sheet that has room for just the most important combat stats and informtaion. I call it our combat cheat sheet and everyone used it at the beginning of the campaign before they had their base stats memorized. A slightly more drastic step that I take when playing with a lot of new players is I offer a +2 bonus to their first roll if they know what they are going to do as soon as their turn starts. This encourages them to be prepared without punishing them for now knowing what to do.
That's my two cents
Stay organized. Keep the initiative order where the players can see it readily and let people know when they're "on deck". Move fast and stay focused yourself and your players will tend to fall in line. Disallow cell phones at the table, that's a killer. People start using them when they're not in a scene, and by the time the action is focused on them they forget to put them away. Finally, always get your players to help. Start with your most focused player and give them the job of making sure the person who's coming up next knows it's about to be there turn. Having two people doing the prompting is far more effective than being in charge of everything yourself. If you have a DM or really solid player at the table turn the entire initiative order over to them and let them just run it, but even someone doing a half ass job of helping is still probably more help than you're getting now.
Talk to the players. Find out what the incentives are for taking such a long time and try minimizing those incentives. One common one is the player not wanting to make a decision that can be pointed at as the cause of a boring set of consequences. Such a player agonizes over the decision, because everything they might do might result in boredom. For that player (and for a lot of problems with the game, in every edition) one of the best things you can do is assure the player that the game will be fun no matter what, and then follow through on that.