The Gaming Den

My friend and I were debating the other day about a system that uses action points per turn. Basically, his idea was as follows:

Rather than splitting actions into standard/move/swift, your number of actions you can take in a round is determined by your action points. You roll a d12. You get a number of action points to spend for one round equal to the result. You can then spend those on movement, drinking a potion, and so on. However, the biggest deviation from traditional dice games was that you use action points as your roll for the round.

For instance, let's say that Billy the Stabber has a +2 bonus to attack and defense, and a +3 bonus on picking locks. He rolls a 10 for his action points. He spends three action points to move over by a safe and then allocates two action points to attack, three to defense, and then one on picking the lock.

For the duration of the round, Billy has "rolled" a 4 on his attack roll, his AC is a 5, and his lockpicking "roll" is a 4.

I have some reservations about the system. We've discussed some of the pros and cons to it (giving players more freedom, potential for abuse, and so on).

What are your thoughts?

Biggest problem is that it greatly supports camping with a ranged weapon, since moving uses up attack and defense values.

Good point. I'll have to mention that. Though I'm assuming that reloading a bow will consume a lot of action points (in terms of gameplay; let's not get into a realism vs. balance debate).

I'm partial to http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/408816

Yeah, you use up offensive/defensive power for move, but here the tradeoff means something

Good in that it really forces players to do things like make hard choices about whether to sacrifice people or save them, possibly losing more in the process. I like how it very much reinforces the feel of the movies in board game form.

But yeah, using something like that in the context of fighting other humans head to head or something? Camp with ranged weapons.

Rolling a high and saying "Put it all in attack" would throw you off the RNG quite quickly.

You'll know if what you are planning will work before you do it and you should, realistically speaking, never fail at anything.

If you have +3 to lockpicking and need a 15 to break the lock, the mechanics of this system encourages your lockpicker to walk up to the safe and stand there for ~12 turns looking around suspiciously with his shield over his head doing full defense, then turning and popping the lock in 3 seconds when he finally rolls a 12.

Roll d12 is a pretty extreme variance.

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Reasons:
Variable action amounts per round. This means that you aren't sure if you'll be able to make it over and heal the fighter next round.

Bad rolls. Wizard can't cast a spell this round because 'spell' is 3 action points. This doesn't appear to have a bearing on anything, because the wizard is not involved in combat. No one knows why the wizard can't spellcast this round, when he could last round. You will seriously have combats where one person has rolls like 2-3-2-3-1, and gets to cower the entire combat through no fault of his own. You have this problem with the d20 system where characters will whiff each other for 4 rounds (attack rolls of 7-5-2-9-3), but it at least feels like they are in heated combat, rather than simply not attacking.

Gishes lose unless this is done very carefully. Using a touch attack spell (or delivering with a weapon, or whatever) uses Attack, Defend, Spell, and probably Move, while Attack with Sword uses Attack and Defend and Move. You can make exceptions, but you shouldn't design a system that needs exceptions from the getgo.

Fighters Lose. Anyone on the front lines has to have Defense (melee), Defense (spell), and Attack. Anyone not on the front lines (camping archer, buffing cleric, artillery wizard) can freely mash the Attack or Spell button. This is okay-ish in video games but it sucks in D&D, because in any given round SOMEONE is using this tactic for great success.

Scaling. This can scale by level very good or very bad. If you let everyone add their character level to the roll, you don't much care about the roll at level 20. If you don't let this scale by level, then the BBEG rolling a 2 means that he dies to the players 6s, 7s, and 8s (they all mash Attack/Spell and he has no defense), and this is regardless of level. Your level 2 characters could seriously roll 12s and Full Offense a level 20 BBEG that rolls a 2. This encourages Total Defense, Looking for an Opening, from all involved.

Casters win. Casters pretty much have to pick "Cast a Spell" action. If this is not variable, every round they pick this, +/- a move, and pour everything else into defense. Casters now have the best defense now, and this is stupid.

Designers lose. Battlefield controllers win. Spells like Grease or Wall of Iron don't care how many points you put into Spell, while presumably spells like Flaming Punch and Fireball grow in power the more points you put into them. You have to scale a whole lot of spells, like "you get X amount of Grease for the area grease spell per point, while the targeted grease spell will have a DC of 10+mod+Points".

Planning loses. Situation:
You are meleeing a monster with medium hp. You want to kill it, and intercept a monster that will attack squishier characters next round. You roll a 12 this round and nearly kill the monster. The other characters don't know if you will roll good enough next round to kill it and defend them. If you roll a 2, you probably have no impact on combat. If you roll a 12, you can attack/move/attack. If you roll a 5 you can attack/move. No other character knows what is possible next round.

Movement loses. If movement is based around that die roll, then armies never move as groups. You move variable amounts round to round, which is stupid.

No Sir, I don't like it.

That Aliens game is awesome. Thanks for the link. I can't stop myself playing it, even though its almost impossible. How the hell are you supposed to do the third level, even with loads of marines?

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For some reason I compare this idea to WoD, with a pool of action points rather than a pool of dice. I get the idea that individuals are just as prone to being killed by groups of 4 year olds as in WoD.

I really think that unless your action points are constantly around 3 or 4, it would almost definitely be better in a computer game rather than a paper based RPG. Are there any RPGs that use action points that work?

Parthenon wrote:
I really think that unless your action points are constantly around 3 or 4, it would almost definitely be better in a computer game rather than a paper based RPG. Are there any RPGs that use action points that work?

Feng Shui.

The "Carnival of Carnage" shtick where you get to spend less action points to kill unnamed characters is fucking awesome and validates the entire system.

-Username17

SunTzuWarmaster wrote:Text.

Excellent points.

Parthenon wrote:That Aliens game is awesome. Thanks for the link.

I'm glad you like it. I can recommend some other games to you as well. For example, Don't Look Back is really great in the same sort of way that Ico is.

I can't stop myself playing it, even though its almost impossible. How the hell are you supposed to do the third level, even with loads of marines?

Really? I beat it with no deaths after only a few tries. It just takes a good mind for tactics and stacking the odds in your favor. I'll give some pointers if you like.

My strategy of choice:

1st level:
Okay. You really want to get all your marines out of here (especially certain, particularly badass ones) because it makes the next round much easier. The ones that will become pistoleers in round 2 are more expendable and you can let them die if you have to.

Order of actions: Apone (badass flamer), Dietrich (flamer), Wierzbowski (flamer), Drake (MGer), Hudson (pistol), Hicks (badass shotgunner), Crowe (pistol), Vasquez (MGer), Frost (pistol). Map start positions:
Apone: (counting from top, left side) First square
Hicks: Second square
Drake: Third square
Frost: Right behind Drake (one square to right)
Vasquez: Fourth square
Crowe: Sixth square
Dietrich: Seventh square
Hudson: Eighth square
Wierzbowski: Ninth square

Do not let Hicks or Apone die if at all possible. Always go back to save them. Don't be like the movie marines and let Apone, the most badass marine of them all, get killed off in the first scene in order to make the movie shout "fuck you, plot armor."

Anywho... lead with the flamers, clearing out easy, open targets. Apone going down right-way, other two going down left. Hicks, Drake, Vasquez, and Frost will follow behind Apone and shoot everything off everyone else at range. Make sure to keep all marines in the MGer/Shotgunner line of fire. Have the other two pistolers follow between the two regular flamers. At the second half, take the LEFT route. Keep in mind that there is no penalty for diagonal movement and use it to get out faster. Move as much as possible and don't waste attacks on aliens that are too far away to be any immediate threat. Have the pistolers melee things off of people if they get dropped on, but don't bunch them up all at once (going one after the other). If one or two pistolers can't melee it off, have Hicks and Vasquez blast it. Don't be afraid to move closer to aliens then shoot with Flamers. The point is to make them an advancing party that'll clear the front way.

With any luck, you'll lose no one. Or maybe just a pistoler or two. With particularly bad luck you might lose someone more important. Eh.

2nd level: If you have everyone, this is a breeze. Keep everyone fairly well back, and set up your turn order with your retreat down the choke point firmly in mind. You do NOT want to waste turns with people stumbling over each other. Make absolutely sure that you're getting Newt in front so you don't get stuck in the tunnels. Keep your flamers at the back. The first few waves of aliens should be overwhelmed by your gunfire until the door opens to the corridor. Once that happens, get everyone in IMMEDIATELY. Make sure your flamers are at the back, and your plasma gunners have the best possible line of sight into the main room behind you. Again, make sure Newt/Ripley is in front, and have a pistoler slice open the next door. Now then: Once the door opens, *don't* close it as fast as possible. What you actually want to do is set up Newt in front of the duct, and *hold off the superhoard as long as possible,* then lock the door. To do this, use Flame Ground and grenades (make sure you don't injure your own marines with grenades!!). You should be able to buy several rounds. At this point, have everyone file into the ducts in a proper turn order (so you're not getting stuck and wasting time) and have the flamers take up the rear, continuing to Flame Ground. Have newt and ripley lead, and keep everyone else in between. Maximize lines of sight and movement in the ducts where possible to save people who have aliens drop on them. The flamers should be the last ones out, followed by a trail of like 20 aliens blocked by flame ground. Remember to flame ground in places that are only passable by one square, not at a corner where they can go diagonally. Also make sure to keep up the pace so that you do *not* run out of flamer ammo. With this in mind, you can get all the marines out safely with a fairly high chance of success.

3rd level:
This level pisses me off because it has a degree of fake difficulty. That is to say, it's actually harder if you have more marines and they'll probably just drop on your face and take half your force in no time. I find it easier to win by *just using Ripley*. Really, I just send all my other marines up the elevator. Ripley will usually punch aliens off if they land right on her, and she can easily flame away pretty much all the competition. Nuke da queen with grenades.

Still a degree of luck involved, but I can regularly win the game with no casualties.

Where are you getting flamethrowers in the Operations level? Because I'm not seeing them, and that would be an awesome boon.

You can use Continue Mission to go on to the next one from a mission.

Psychic Robot wrote:Where are you getting flamethrowers in the Operations level? Because I'm not seeing them, and that would be an awesome boon.

If you save the right marines in the first mission, you get flamers in the second mission. Two of them!

If you just try to skip to the second mission, or if you flub the first mission and let your important people die, then you don't get flamers in the second mission.

So the moral of this story is: Play the first mission and continue to second mission, don't just start on mission 2. And don't fail horribly at mission 1.

I just suddenly got the hang of it and now most of the time I can get everyone out of the Reactor. Barring aliens spawning directly on top of me.

Operations is slightly harder and I often have trouble pulling back after I get the door open. But it is awesome for when you get close to the end of the tunnel with about 20 aliens close behind you, moving back one space at a time and flaming the ground after you. The wounding/killing within 6 of grenades seems a bit much though.

The third level does seem arbitrary and spiteful.

Do you know if they have released the rules for free yet? Reading some descriptions of the board game it came out in the 80s and the rules took up two or three sides, so it doesn't sound completely unreasonable that I'd be able to get hold of the rules.

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I did like Don't Look Back. Simple but very effective.

In terms of games, I'd like more turn-based/tactical games with a sense of progression. I've seen a couple of chess like games where you set up a couple of classes and then have a fight between equal sides, but they don't hugely interest me. Maybe something like Fire Emblem but with an actual character development thingimajig rather than relying on the RNG gods and having one choice over 40 levels.

Just not real-time games because I mostly browse games with my laptop and trying to use a touchpad for RTSes or FPSes is ridiculous.

Maybe there should be a thread in MPSIMS about actually good online flash games.

Parthenon wrote:Barring aliens spawning directly on top of me.

This is bullshit, fucking dice gods. I had to play it 5 times to get no kills, because every fucking time they would spawn right on my fucking flamers. And sometimes, two would spawn at the same time on top of two people.

Parthenon wrote:I just suddenly got the hang of it and now most of the time I can get everyone out of the Reactor. Barring aliens spawning directly on top of me.

There's actually a pretty good chance of you saving people if you have aliens spawn right on top of you. That's what the turn order I had set up is for: Maximizing the chances of saving someone when the dice gods of spawning give you a "screw you" situation.

The third level does seem arbitrary and spiteful.

That'd be my only complaint about the game.

I did like Don't Look Back. Simple but very effective.

It's one of the best free online games I've ever seen. I especially appreciate the Ico-style storytelling.

Caedrus wrote:There's actually a pretty good chance of you saving people if you have aliens spawn right on top of you. That's what the turn order I had set up is for: Maximizing the chances of saving someone when the dice gods of spawning give you a "screw you" situation.

Yeah? I know confirmation bias and random chance and so on, but about three or four times I've had someone get grabbed and tried to melee them off with four people- 7-9 melees, without anything happening. About half the time I try to shoot them off it kills or incapacitates them and everyone around them. (obviously I'm not using flamers to shoot them off)

Thats one reason I wanted to get hold of the rules: curiosity about just how melees are resolved.

Parthenon wrote:

Caedrus wrote:There's actually a pretty good chance of you saving people if you have aliens spawn right on top of you. That's what the turn order I had set up is for: Maximizing the chances of saving someone when the dice gods of spawning give you a "screw you" situation.

Yeah? I know confirmation bias and random chance and so on, but about three or four times I've had someone get grabbed and tried to melee them off with four people- 7-9 melees, without anything happening. About half the time I try to shoot them off it kills or incapacitates them and everyone around them. (obviously I'm not using flamers to shoot them off)

Thats one reason I wanted to get hold of the rules: curiosity about just how melees are resolved.

Melees are something like a 10% chance. Not very good. And you should try to shoot things off before bunching up all your guys. Yeah, sometimes acid blood will kill you, but it usually doesn't, and if it just incapacitates, you can get that ally to the end of the map alive and he will bye usable next match.

If it's a pistol guy you can let them die if it would be risky to save them, but if it's Apone, Hicks, or the round two flamers I generally say risk it.