It's not a trick or anything, just figuring out what Rena would do under the tactical situation that she sees/saw when the encounter started.
It's my job to state what she attempts to do but it has to be based on a description that includes the foes' distances.
Without knowing distance I might say "Rena casts magic missile" and you reply "out of range".
Normal combat speed is 12" = 120'/r = 12'/segment.
When we saw the orc group how far away were they?
When we saw the goblin group how far away were they?
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Just seen the main post, Here we go:
GM:
In reply to Beverly (msg # 417):
OOC - Requested ranges but I will redo so everyone can get in actions per round and try to make each combat/encounter back to round by round.
First round, flaming arrows strike the wagons, tents and what not. Group was surprised this round...
Autosurprise, fine, but why not tell us roughtly how far away the arrows seemed to appear (even if it's to the nearest 100'). Could give us clues as to how many groups we're dealing with.
GM:
...Second Round, group comes out of being surprised as Orcs and Goblins jump out from the brush/tree line almost among the group and wagon area. Orcs North, Goblins South. Some Orcs are closer to the group then others and can reach the group by the end of this round. Goblins a bit out but faster though will take the full round to get to the group. You assume they are after you all...
We're no longer surprised, good, but shouldn't we roll init at this point rather than orcs auto winning that too?
Orcs north, fine, how far? Doesn't have to be accurate, "About 50 feet away" is fine. We need to know this so that if we win init will cwertain of our spells be within range or not. Same thing for the goblins.
Some orcs are closer than others is kind of helpul but not very. Unless they're marching in a single row that's always the case. Some will be here this round, is a lot better, thank you, but how about the other? Next round? Or are they still a few hundred yards away. If you say "they will arrive next round, then that commits their action. Much more flexible to say something like "They seem to move at about 90'/round and about 6 are about 80' away. Maybe another half dozen are about 150' away." We can make whatever assumptions we like; it's just decribing what we see, which is important and straight forward. It also doesn't commit the orcs' actions for next round.
GM:
....You assume they are after you all...
I may assume that but maybe not. That's my job.
I'm really not meaning to be difficult at all, just trying to say "Please tell me what I see, including approx tactical distances, and then I can get on with it without having to make layered conditional statements.
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Afterthought: I think Gygax used to use something like 5d6 x10' for random encounter distance.
This message was last edited by the player at 21:09, Sun 22 Jan 2023.
