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Gralamin
2010-07-19, 01:21 AM
I've played in a lot of games, and have also DMed a lot of games, but nearly universally, I see movement basically stop when you meet the enemy (Adjustments to force movements, needing to retreat, etc. aside). So if I wanted more movement, and to award players that focus on movement as part of combat, what are some of the best ways of doing so?

What I have already thought of (Some of this is thanks to a A Blog post by Gabe (http://www.penny-arcade.com/2010/6/30/), and some is due to the ending of ME2 (Nothing is spoiled)).


Moving Goals You have to move to achieve the goal, or the goal moves on its own.
Mechanical benefits to moving enemies hazardous terrain for enemies. Enemies that while in formation are stronger, etc.
Mechanical penalty for being moved Hazardous terrain for players, Traps, etc.
Allies who need to keep moving due to time constraints, having to reach something to help other allies, etc.
Time Limits in general.


Are there any other good ways of encouraging movement? Also, if anyone has any sample encounters which did a good job of encouraging movement, feel free to post them.

Kyeudo
2010-07-19, 01:27 AM
The major reason that players don't move around is that usually there are tacticaly advantages tied either to a particular location (magic circle against evil, height modifier, consecrate, etc.) or there are penalties for moving (loss of full attacks, attacks of oppourtunity, etc.)

If you want to see more movement, you have to remove the penalties from moving and add incentives to moving. Combat in Exalted usually sees lots of leaping, charging, and what not because there is no penalty for moving and the movement makes it easier to snag stunt dice, a major part of metagame strategy.

Safety Sword
2010-07-19, 01:29 AM
For anyone who's played WoW.... what you need is "the fire*".

Some effect that lands in a location and deals massive amounts of damage if you stand in it. It then (optionally) fades away. Usually you take a small amount of damage at first, then exponentially in increasing amounts.

*Fire may or may not actually be fire. It could be cold, acid, negative energy, or any other energy descriptor you can come up with. The fire may be a consequence of enemy NPC action or the environment, or the interaction of the two.

Milskidasith
2010-07-19, 01:31 AM
Basically, in D&D movement is not useful because it's heavily penalized to move around for no reason; you lose full attacks (unless you have pounce, in which case it's just constant charge setups), you take AoOs, and really, there's not much of a difference between square X and Y, but you can full attack if you stay in square X.