Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 dieffenbachj Jan 12, 2011 20:42:24	This is a somewhat open question. Specifically, I'm interested in reducing monster hit points, and am thinking of trying 50% max HP but want to hear what the Internet has to say on that matter, if anyone's tried it and how combat feels to you as a result. The following are my house rules related to combat speediness: Defenses Cards for Monsters: After a successful Knowledge check on a monster, or after I've decided the party has observed the monster enough to know it's defenses, I'll just put an index card on the table with the, say, Beholder's defenses. Keeps me from having to check constantly if things are hits or not against my monsters. 2/3 Monster Hit Points: This is what I'm doing now, and it seems to work out well (combat is slightly faster, but it hasn't broken the balance; it's still very much so life-or-death). Increased Damage: Not really a house rule; Essentials monsters and monsters made after the Essentials errata all have damage boosted 25-50% above standard. This makes them a bit more lethal, which in turn makes combat go quickly--one way or another. Not Ready? You Delay Your Turn: Basically, if a player has no idea what his turn is going to entail (doesn't know where monsters are, or what powers he wants to use, or what his powers do) then I delay his action until after whoever is next on the initiative order. No Eating or Electronics at the Table during Combat: The two biggest distractions and reasons for the aforementioned unreadiness, and two things that irritate me when people are doing during combat rather than playing the game. d20s That Land on the Floor Take 1: Players often will get a bit... enthusiastic about their rolling. If the die is going so fast and hard it skitters across the table and lands on the floor (in a room with tight space, no room to get down and look for it, lots of couches and beds and tables and radiators... in other words, a 2 minute search for the missing die), it's a natural 1, you miss, we move on. For other dice, it's a minimum roll. Action Points are 1/encounter, not 1/2 encounters. Action points can be used for heroic actions besides an extra action, such as forcing a missed attack to hit, or adding a +5 bonus to a failed Athletics check. You can 'burn' a healing surge to gain a +2 bonus to a single d20 roll before attempting the check, or to retain a daily power that missed every target (though you cannot attempt it again until the end of the encounter). This list is partially hypothetical and partially things I've already tried. My end goal is to make combat bloody, dangerous to the players as well as the monsters, and fast. Not so fast that the dragon gets one turn of life before he dies, but fast enough that the players don't lose track of the plot, maintain excitement, don't get battle fatigue, etc. I run very roleplay-oriented games; so nothing sucks more than a 1 to 1-1/2 hour combat that sucks the mood right out of the game, stripping players of feeling in-character. The action point and healing surge rule is borrowed from Keith Baker and modified to my own purposes, simply to make the party feel more heroic, elite, and daring. If anyone has any ideas, articles that have been written on this sort of thing, personal house rules which speed up combat, or testimonials on the effectiveness on certain house rules, I'd be glad to hear it. EDIT: Incidentally, one other house rule I am considering is: Dailies and Surges are Once Per Adventure(Level): The party regains healing surges and daily power (including items) at the start of each adventure (or level, in multi-part adventures).   Basically approaching the cinematic, episodic nature of D&D... where the hero gets one powerful move, but doesn't necessarily get it every single day (or multiple times per day if he rests a lot...). Also borrowed from Keith Baker, since the Eberron campaign setting is all about the serial fiction, pulp feel, and I'm all about Eberron...  In addition to creating the feel of making each daily/healing surge/lost hit point/chance to rest slowly and carefully under the care of a master-healer MATTER, it also creates that fictiony feeling I like and balances out the fact that players now have a huge boost to their action points and monsters have taken a hit to their hit point totals. In the end, I'm hoping these house rules will create a very cinematic feel, especially with combat moving faster and being more desperate, but again, looking for input.
#2 gate_of_hellion Jan 12, 2011 21:22:50	I like the idea to burn healing surges to get power bonuses on attack rolls. I forgot what the thread was called, but basically it was about the idea that encounters and dailies were rechargable. So maybe you could make encounter powers rechargable with a roll of a d6. Also, maybe you could reward players by with additional action points for extraordinary acts of heroism, daring feats, or just really lucky die rolls. Like if they were to roll 3 criticals in a row, might as well give him/her that extra action point to finish the job.
#3 dieffenbachj Jan 12, 2011 23:50:16	I ran an adventuring party solo against a fledgeling white dragon... so 5 level 1s versus a level 1 solo. The solo had 50% hp, so 64 hit points and 32 bloodied. The encounter went... poorly. For the party. What happened was by the end of round 1, the dragon was already bloodied--which meant that it had gotten to use its breath weapon, and then use it again. Thanks to the damage boost/limited use/brute nature of the dragon, this meant that only the party rogue (hiding in the back waiting for a flank) and the cleric (missed by both breaths for half) were standing. I didn't bother simulating round 2, since it would undoubtedly be a TPK. (the cleric can heal one person, the dragon may well roll to get its breath weapon back, and even if it doesn't the rogue will be caught off-guard by the tail whip and torn apart by claws... yeah...) What's interesting is that the TPK would not have happened if the dragon had more hit points. Because it was so easily bloodied by four PCs stabbing/smashing/casting at it, it got to use its bloodied abilities... which just ripped the party apart. I then tried a couple encounters with the same party (and then quickly in my head with some generic swap-outs). What I came across was that combat would be either really vicious--as it should be if the party isn't properly composed or tactical--or exceptionally easy. And it leaned more often towards exceptionally easy--one encounter, the party was universally badly injured from fire elementals, but if I added a controller instead of, say, the cleric or druid, or added a second rogue instead of the ranger, the fact that controllers can hit multiple targets or the fact that rogues deal so much damage meant 50% hit points was far, far too little to withstand even one round--the enemies were mostly dead before their turn came up. So to me, 50% hit points is a bit too low. Not by much, it's pretty close to the mark as evidenced by encounters that tore the party apart regardless of low HP... but too low as evidenced by encounters that the party barely even took damage during. My previous rule was 66%, which is a touch higher, almost as easy to calculate (if you're decent at mental math... 38 is 20 + (8*2)/3 which rounds to 5 for 25...) on the fly, and I didn't face any of these problems with that (and if I go back to the combat trials I did, I wouldn't have faced these problems--the enemies would have survived to round 2 when they were losing, and they would not have survived much longer when they were winning. And the solo battle wouldn't have bloodied the dragon in the first round of concentrated fire.) So I think, at least for the hit point  values, my final verdict will be 66%. Maybe if it doesn't work out, raised to 75%, though I don't see why it wouldn't.
#4 alisair_longreach Jan 14, 2011 15:34:24	Here is how I sped up combat in my campaign. The PCs add the ½ level bonus to their damage rolls. Action Point is once per encounter. No Milestone restrictions on magic items. When you run combat by the rules as written then the mathematics of 4E will ensure that combat takes more rounds to resolve as you go up in levels. This because there is an imbalance between monster hp per level and PC average damage output per level. By adding the PC damage bonus the imbalance is lessened. At the first levels of the Heroic tier the numbers do work and if you lessen monster hp then the PCs will have cakewalk encounters. At the high end of the Heroic tier and the upper levels combat usually degenerates into a pattern of the PCs using their encounters and maybe a daily during the first five rounds and the remainder of the combat is one long slogfest using at-wills and a battle of attrition between monster hp and the healing capacity of the party.
#5 dieffenbachj Jan 14, 2011 16:27:50	I actually considered doing that. Not only does it make damage consistent with every other 1/2 level rule, but it reduces my need to recalculate monster hit points on the fly. Also, technically, milestone restrictions on magic items no longer exist anyway since essentials--feel free to black marker them out =P I wonder by how much though... hm. I still want combat to be as short and sweet as possible--so ideally, combining reduced hit points with increased damage... hmm... In theory... in theory, at high levels, since as you say monsters increase hit points linearly and player damage logarithmically, if I were to continue to reduce hit points by 66% (a level 30 solo should have 1,104 hit points according to DMG averages, so reduced to 736) and add 15 damage per round to players via damage buff, that damage buff would be an extra 2% of the monster's hit points per round, or 5% per round spread across an entire party (2% * 5 people / 2 for fifty percent miss chance). Not too much, but a significant chunk nonetheless. And at low levels, it would have a negligible impact, being worth 1 or 2 damage... That sounds like a pretty nice house rule actually. I might just spring for that.
#6 alisair_longreach Jan 15, 2011 4:54:54	Something I forgot is Morale rules for 4E. Here is a link to where I found it. 
#7 dieffenbachj Jan 15, 2011 10:04:49	Something I forgot is Morale rules for 4E. Here is a link to where I found it. 
#8 Krusk Jan 15, 2011 10:39:07	Cut monster HP by 1/4-1/5. I don't do math and eyeball it. Turn time limits. If you literally have no idea what you want to do you are holding action until you figure it out. Initiative cards. I have phsyical cards I use, that I move into order, instead of writing and all that. Lots of monsters. I don't think I have run a solo by itself since my 3rd session of 4e. (3 days after the preview stuff came out). Minions are everywhere No rules debate during the game. Talk to me after if you want. Roll multiplke die. If it says 3 [w] you need to roll 3d10, not the same d10 3 times. Battlemap, not dungeon tiles. I can quickly throw something onto a mat. Putting the exact tiles I want takes forever. And someone always bumps it and messes it up. I don't DM epic 4e. Every number seems to be over 9000 and I am fine running lower level games. I hear people complain 4e bogs down in higher levels. ( i have played a few games and it did, but I could also attribute it to the DM) I have sentient monsters run away when the result of the battle is obvious. If 4/6 enemies have been killed or defeated, the other two try to run. If the solo goes down, there might be a break among his troops. I do everything in the open. To the point that if a player asks "What is his AC" I will tell them. They can then just roll and say hit. (I used to try to keep it secret, but my players are smart enough to figure it out on their own anyway [most are working on masters or doctorates in chemistry or engineering].) My combats tend to last 30-45 min. 45 being an unusually long one.
#9 johnnii Jan 15, 2011 17:42:35	I do everything in the open. To the point that if a player asks "What is his AC" I will tell them. They can then just roll and say hit. (I used to try to keep it secret, but my players are smart enough to figure it out on their own anyway [most are working on masters or doctorates in chemistry or engineering]. This one does more than you imagine (coming from RPGs where you roll below a value that represent your skill, and thus the player see directly if they hit or miss). However, something tells me it's a taboo against immersion. How many of you do this alreayde respectively thinks this is heresy?
#10 dieffenbachj Jan 15, 2011 22:19:15	I do everything in the open. To the point that if a player asks "What is his AC" I will tell them. They can then just roll and say hit. (I used to try to keep it secret, but my players are smart enough to figure it out on their own anyway [most are working on masters or doctorates in chemistry or engineering]. This one does more than you imagine (coming from RPGs where you roll below a value that represent your skill, and thus the player see directly if they hit or miss). However, something tells me it's a taboo against immersion. How many of you do this alreayde respectively thinks this is heresy? You used respectively wrong. *cough* Anyway. That's sort of why I'm including the 'monster knowledge check to reveal defenses/HP' rule. It gets that stuff out in the open ASAP, rewards knowledge skills... but even more than that, it's much more immersive than simply telling the PCs straight-out. Plus, I like to keep things a little bit opaque. I love my DM shield. Transparency is good, but I think it's better to work it into some kind of character-based skill check than anything else. Hm. Maybe if players roll exceptionally high knowledge checks (High DC instead of Moderate), I'll add a little tag-line to each monster's stat card (or whatever) that describes their most relevant special ability in one go. The kind of short advice Navi might offer to Link: "That halfling thief is dangerous if he gets into a flank!" or "Attacking the dragon from behind risks getting hit by his tail!"
#11 Krusk Jan 16, 2011 12:07:18	This one does more than you imagine (coming from RPGs where you roll below a value that represent your skill, and thus the player see directly if they hit or miss). However, something tells me it's a taboo against immersion. How many of you do this alreayde respectively thinks this is heresy? Oh, plenty of other DMs hate my style. Plenty of first time players to my group are totally weirded out and shocked by player freedom. Things like a player even thinking of asking the monsters AC, and then shocked when I answer the question. I talk DM shop with other DMs, and they all think I'm crazy with half the stuff I say.  I basically try to cut down on all that secret DM stuff. I don't use random dice to decide anything. Outside of occasionally "Uhh. The archer shoots.... you" in combat. The shops just have the items you want, unless a plot element means they do not. You travel safely through the woods, unless the plot needs you to be ambushed. You find helpful items in the loot of enemies. If you kill the BBEG in combat, he doesn't grow plot armor and run away. He dies. I don't keep track of incidental expenses, your PC is always assumed to have food and be able to build a camp, unless the plot demans otherwise (deserts). If your PC would obviously notice something, they notice it, no trivially easy spot check (DC 8) needed. I use passive skills like a mother, and keep them written on my DM notes. I tell you what you see, and assume you are checking to see if people lie to you/things are hidden.If you want you can still roll, but thats an obvious attempt vs a passive use. If you want to use a weird origin, go ahead and tell me how it fits. Go ahead. My primary group and I have been playing since the trail end of 2nd ed. (like 2 months, but as young teens we didn't know about the imminent release of 3e, and spent all our allowances on the 2nd books). I have been primary DM for most of the games, and so most of them have only played under me. They constantly come back from game at college, or their new areas and tell me things like "it was so weird, the DM didn't tell me when foes were bloodied, and when I asked a tree branch fell, hit my PC and did 10 damage. I started calling bullshit on that and the other players were shocked I would dare. The DM rolled some stuff behind a wall and then said lightning strikes my PC, and if I wanted a new one I'd have to reroll at level 1. Anyway I left". My secondary groups occasionally will have just finished a game with another DM, and it takes me a bit to get them retrained. (trained as in "Don't make assumptions about this game or setting based on anyone elses game or setting")
#12 mysticbelmont Jan 16, 2011 14:18:51	When everyone in your group knows their class/role, combat goes by faster. My group lost a player do to having to move.  As much of a nice guy as he was, he slowed down combat a lot.  Encounters would take about 2 hours to complete. Now an encounter takes 1 hour.
#13 stargazer_dragon Jan 16, 2011 23:08:00	I dm very similar to krusk, I don't hide my rolls and with the way I roll I do so openly for a reason if I didn't players would never beleive I rolled a crit THAT many times in a row lol, also I find dm screans cut me off from the party, anyhows I tend to be prety combat oriented thoguh we do get into long rp's also but here are things we do to keap combat flowing well First thing to note My combats still take 30-2 hours per cpmbat but sometimes include literaly armies of minions upwords of 200 at somerare fights though in waves not all at once. So first thing I use my laptop and a program called VCC (virtual combat card) this program tracks initiative, monster stats, hp, status effects and stuff. it has greatly sped up combat as I have all my monster and pc stats right there easy to track I also track player hp as well as non minion monster hp there so I know how the players r doing. again haviong all the monster stats and powers there with a click saves a lot of time looking at difrent pages or printouts for each monsters info Secondaly I  am very open with a monsters defences, the first few attacks the players ttel me what they hit after they hit though I let them know what there taregt defences are, this speads up combat and greatly removes the strain on me as they can tell me if they hit or miss and how much damage they do, I then add some fluff to the attack and describe how the monster is looking and move on to the next player. the players watch each others dice roll helps keap everyone honest with what they rolled and gives me more time to think about the monsters actions. I group minions together on initiative, this makes tracking the little things a ton easier and has sped things up a bit A huge spead up has ben changing how AOE powers work, instead of a zillion attack rolls all AOE powers use a single attack roll and a single damage roll, this brings chance of crit hit crit fail balenced to non aoe powers as well as greatly speading things up specialy when theres a lot of minions players have absalutaly loved this, don't think they let me go back to seperate rolls if I wanted to. I don't make players roll for things that I feal they should know like if there fighting a goblin the monster is a common race so I tell them it's a goblin stuff like that. if the combat is oviously over I eather start rolling moral checks to see who runs away or just say the pcs clean up the rest of the creatures and move onto the rest of the story
#14 stargazer_dragon Jan 16, 2011 23:20:55	back to Krusk's post, I always hated when dm arbitrarily killed a pc becouse they didn't like how the player acted or something, I mean thats just poor dming, if the player don't fit the group kindly tell him there play styles not working out and send them to find a new group or fix the issue by talking to them don't just kill a char for no reason (refering to the player who complained of the other group he tried to play in) But yea I definatly have similar gaming style, I mean whats the point of hiding your rolls, just makes the players wonder if your being honest with them specialy if you roll hot that night. same with defences, I agree why bother keaping it a secret hiding defences sept maybe against bosses for a more dramatic feal just slows down combat might as well trust your players and let them know what they goto roll, combat still is dramatic as the players all watch the dice spin and all at once chears or says oh crap depending on the roll, ok so random rolls I like random rolls but more for things that I can't quickly decide on, like who does it attack, or if they encounter something or stuff like that as for shops if it's reasonably there then it's there I never use random rolls for such things like shop content like you I don't track rations and basic supplies unless the specific area dictates they need to watch it closly like harsh terain, I mean it just slows junk down to worry if they remembered to buy food in the last town or if they goto go hunt though sometimes making them hunt can be fun but Then use that as a specific encounter not a random common event. I basicaly ignore all the every day mundane stuff only pointing it out when it become out of the ordinary, like while traveling through harsh mountains with little to no food supplies I might warn the players that there food is running low and they can't find food in the area, or tell the player with the best hunting skills that during his huntingb trip that night so and so happens, just stuff that breaks the mold of common tasks, I mean tracking common tasks gets tediouse like anyone ever wonder why PC's and monsters never use the rest room, though it can be funny to have the player in heavy plate mail get cought squating when a goblin attacks lol. anyhows those things r more to spead non combat junk up and stay focused on the good stuff then anything else
#15 Darth_Jerrod Jan 16, 2011 23:40:42	This is a somewhat open question. Specifically, I'm interested in reducing monster hit points, and am thinking of trying 50% max HP but want to hear what the Internet has to say on that matter, if anyone's tried it and how combat feels to you as a result. The following are my house rules related to combat speediness: Defenses Cards for Monsters: After a successful Knowledge check on a monster, or after I've decided the party has observed the monster enough to know it's defenses, I'll just put an index card on the table with the, say, Beholder's defenses. Keeps me from having to check constantly if things are hits or not against my monsters. 2/3 Monster Hit Points: This is what I'm doing now, and it seems to work out well (combat is slightly faster, but it hasn't broken the balance; it's still very much so life-or-death). Increased Damage: Not really a house rule; Essentials monsters and monsters made after the Essentials errata all have damage boosted 25-50% above standard. This makes them a bit more lethal, which in turn makes combat go quickly--one way or another. Not Ready? You Delay Your Turn: Basically, if a player has no idea what his turn is going to entail (doesn't know where monsters are, or what powers he wants to use, or what his powers do) then I delay his action until after whoever is next on the initiative order. No Eating or Electronics at the Table during Combat: The two biggest distractions and reasons for the aforementioned unreadiness, and two things that irritate me when people are doing during combat rather than playing the game. d20s That Land on the Floor Take 1: Players often will get a bit... enthusiastic about their rolling. If the die is going so fast and hard it skitters across the table and lands on the floor (in a room with tight space, no room to get down and look for it, lots of couches and beds and tables and radiators... in other words, a 2 minute search for the missing die), it's a natural 1, you miss, we move on. For other dice, it's a minimum roll. Action Points are 1/encounter, not 1/2 encounters. Action points can be used for heroic actions besides an extra action, such as forcing a missed attack to hit, or adding a +5 bonus to a failed Athletics check. You can 'burn' a healing surge to gain a +2 bonus to a single d20 roll before attempting the check, or to retain a daily power that missed every target (though you cannot attempt it again until the end of the encounter). This list is partially hypothetical and partially things I've already tried. My end goal is to make combat bloody, dangerous to the players as well as the monsters, and fast. Not so fast that the dragon gets one turn of life before he dies, but fast enough that the players don't lose track of the plot, maintain excitement, don't get battle fatigue, etc. I run very roleplay-oriented games; so nothing sucks more than a 1 to 1-1/2 hour combat that sucks the mood right out of the game, stripping players of feeling in-character. The action point and healing surge rule is borrowed from Keith Baker and modified to my own purposes, simply to make the party feel more heroic, elite, and daring. If anyone has any ideas, articles that have been written on this sort of thing, personal house rules which speed up combat, or testimonials on the effectiveness on certain house rules, I'd be glad to hear it. EDIT: Incidentally, one other house rule I am considering is: Dailies and Surges are Once Per Adventure(Level): The party regains healing surges and daily power (including items) at the start of each adventure (or level, in multi-part adventures).   Basically approaching the cinematic, episodic nature of D&D... where the hero gets one powerful move, but doesn't necessarily get it every single day (or multiple times per day if he rests a lot...). Also borrowed from Keith Baker, since the Eberron campaign setting is all about the serial fiction, pulp feel, and I'm all about Eberron...  In addition to creating the feel of making each daily/healing surge/lost hit point/chance to rest slowly and carefully under the care of a master-healer MATTER, it also creates that fictiony feeling I like and balances out the fact that players now have a huge boost to their action points and monsters have taken a hit to their hit point totals. In the end, I'm hoping these house rules will create a very cinematic feel, especially with combat moving faster and being more desperate, but again, looking for input. The not ready part I started this past game session yesterday. I have 8 players in my game, last night was just 7 but still that is a lot of people. I can manage it most of the time but with D&D I was getting tired of the initiative order coming up for players and they just were like "hmm let me think" The session before last the first encounter in Bark at the Moon took 2 hours! Last night the 2nd encounter took all of 1 hour. I took time outside of the game to mention that problem of not being ready on their turn to get them think about it before we played again. This time most of them were ready and it caught on. I do not think cutting HP of the enemy solves anything. I did use a morale system were (X) creatures died then the rest would try to run. I have been seeing posts on long combats on forum posts and twitters and everyone is saying how complex the game is for players and I just say that if your players do not know their role or just what their character can do then will hamper them and make the game seem hard for them.
#16 Krusk Jan 17, 2011 10:38:16	I group minions together on initiative, this makes tracking the little things a ton easier and has sped things up a bit I forget this isn't RAW. All goblin soldiers go on the same count, all goblin archers go on another, goblin minions go on a third. Not just minions.  So basically I can grab 4d20 for the 4 archers, roll them and tell a player "2 hits from the archers". I am also trying to sell my groups on static damage.  1d6=3.5 round down. crits do rolled max, or double. I am betting this will speed things up even more, but rolling damage is a hard cow to kill.
#17 stargazer_dragon Jan 17, 2011 13:02:48	try just killing monster damage let the players have there rolls but use average damage for all monster, added side effect would be that they couldn't tell wich ones were minion, though it also makes it realy hard for low lvl monsters top overcome some effects like damage resistence
#18 Krusk Jan 17, 2011 16:07:50	I'm pretty obvious for minions. Players pick that out in heartbeat, even without watching to see if I rolled damage die. Also if asked I'll tell. I might just do it for monsters next game though. To help convince them the sky won't fall.
#19 Sarlax Jan 17, 2011 18:51:39	My last game was in Eberron and ran from levels 1 to 8. We didn't use many house rules, and those we did didn't affect speed very much. Here's what I did as a GM:  - Be open about defenses, especially after a successful attack. Describe monsters in a way that informs the players about their stats. A creature with AC 23, Fort 25, Ref 17, and Will 20 should be described as looking determined and very tough, but slow, for instance. As I said, though, after a hit, I'll generally just announce the stat if asked, although I really like the idea of putting out a card with defenses listed. This rule also goes to fairness: GMs generally know the stats of the PCs and are probably (if unconsciously) adjusting monster behavior in light of that knowledge. Players should have the same option. - Avoid solos and their ilk. Any monster with high defenses, high HP, regeneration, etc. drags a fight. Monsters are also trouble when they have a lot of abilities, since this slows down your ability to choose what they'll do.  You can split a solo into a few different monsters, either of the same type or different kinds. If you have monsters of the same type, you can run them fast since you know they have the same powers. If you split a solo into different monsters, you can get the variety without the duration - one will go down first usually. - Make the fight turn on big powers. It's hard to pull off, but I generally want even a tough fight to be done within a round of the time the PCs have expended all of their encounters and dailies. If the PCs are down to at-wills, the fight is taking too long. D&D is a resource management game, and the fewer resources the PC. - Have monsters surrender. This is huge. You don't need a morale system. I generally decide if a monster's going to flee when it becomes bloodied, when it's at 1/4 HP, if a more powerful creature than itself is destroyed, if it can escape without an OA, etc. This might appear to favor the players, but note that almost all encounters are designed with the expectation that the PCs will win. This only accelerates the conclusion. --- On the PC side of thing, I try to encourage faster play in two ways. First, the player shouldn't take more than a minute to resolve their action, including deciding what it will be. Second, PC actions shouldn't go to committee. I don't mind out of character talking or even metagaming (since metagaming is done with the goal of producing the best tactical result, which is what the PCs would actually do if fighting for their lives), but discussing options really drags the time down, especially when it goes like, "If you use Winged Horde and hit at least two, then Rodank can shift and use Cunning Strike, allowing me to..." Blah. It's not chess.