Greywander
2021-09-23, 08:55 PM
I was thinking early today about a mechanic I had come up with some time ago and had a sudden epiphany that a similar mechanic already existed in D&D 5e.
Some time ago, I was working on coming up with an original system, and wanted to do something interesting with the action economy. In this system there were four stats, I don't remember the exact names but it was something along the lines of: vigor, precision, insight, and heart. Each had an associated type of action: move, use, think, and speak, respectively. Note that the "move" action would be used for any kind of rigorous physical action, such as making a melee attack, and a think or speak action might have been used for spellcasting or something. I never actually got very far in designing this system beyond what you're reading here.
Stats ranged from 1 to 5. You have a number of each type of action equal to its corresponding stat, but the actions can't be used in this form. Instead, actions have to fit into "slots", of which you have a number equal to your highest stat. The first slot tries to fill itself with as many different types of actions as possible, and the last slot will always have the fewest types of actions. Once a slot it filled, that slot can be spent on any action with which it is filled.
Okay, so that probably didn't make much sense. Let me give some examples. If you have straight 3s in all your stats, then you'll have 3 slots and 3 of each type of action, so each slot ends up filled with every type of action. This is the most versatile build, since any slot can be spent on any action. Let's say your stats are 5, 3, 3, 1 (move, use, think, speak, in order). Your highest stat is 5, so you have 5 slots. Since the minimum is 1, the first slot always fills with all four action types. However, you are then out of speak actions, so the next two slots only contain move, use, and think actions. After that, all you have left are move actions, which fill your last two slots. One way to think of such a build is that they would always be able to take at least two move actions on their turn, regardless of whatever other actions they take, so good for a character who specializes in such types of actions, such as a warrior who might use them to make two additional attacks.
Maybe you've already figured out which 5e mechanic this is. There is one major difference, though. When you spend a slot to take an action, you always spend the slot with the fewest actions in it. For example, in the previous example, if you took a move action, you would first use one of the slots that only had a move action in it. If you took a use or think action, you'd use one of the two slots that didn't have a speak action. So you'd only be able to take one speak action on your turn, but you could take four move actions first and still have the slot with a speak action in it. If, however, you took three use or think actions, you'd need to use the slot with the speak action in it. To put it another way, you always spend your most specific slot first (i.e. the one that can be used for the least types of actions) and your most generic slot last (i.e. the one that can be used for the most types of actions).
If you still haven't figured it out, don't worry, neither had I. What did it for me was when I discarded the cumbersome "slot" terminology, and started thinking of it in terms of action points. Except something weird happened when I did so. You know that last paragraph? Forget it. For some reason, I reversed this when thinking about the action points. So, using the action point terminology, the 5, 3, 3, 1 build has 5 move points, 3 use points, 3 think points, and 1 speak point. Now, how it should have worked according to the previous paragraph is that when you spend an action point, it will also deduct 1 action point from any other pool that is the same or higher. So if you spend a use point, then it will also deduct a point from your think and move pools, but not from your speak pool. Once your use pool is down to 1 point, then spending a use point would deduct a point from your speak pool. However, when it got turned around in my head I made it backwards. Any time you spend a point, it always deducts one point from every pool. As long as you have points left in one pool, you can continue using actions of that type, but once a pool drops to 0 you can't take any more actions of that type.
It's movement. It's the 5e movement mechanic. In D&D 5e, each character has pools of movement speed. Most characters only have a walk speed, so it doesn't come up often, but others might have a swim, climb, fly, or burrow speed. These speeds can have different values (in feet), and when you spend movement from one pool it gets deducted from all your pools. If you have a 30 foot walk speed and a 50 foot fly speed, you can walk for 30 feet then fly for 20 feet. But if you fly for 20 feet then you can only walk for 10 (you could then fly another 20 feet, but can't walk any further).
It might make sense to houserule 5e movement to work the other way, where you spend your most specific movement first, and your most generic last. Or, as I said above, spending movement from one pool only deducts it from other pools that are the same or less. So in the case of a 30 foot walk speed and a 50 foot fly speed, you would basically be able to fly for 20 feet without spending any walk speed. This means you could fly for 20 feet then walk for another 30 feet.
Anyway, I do think it's an interesting mechanic that could be good for an original system. I guess that's why I mentioned it here. I hope someone is able to learn something from this and use it to improve a system they've been working on.
Some time ago, I was working on coming up with an original system, and wanted to do something interesting with the action economy. In this system there were four stats, I don't remember the exact names but it was something along the lines of: vigor, precision, insight, and heart. Each had an associated type of action: move, use, think, and speak, respectively. Note that the "move" action would be used for any kind of rigorous physical action, such as making a melee attack, and a think or speak action might have been used for spellcasting or something. I never actually got very far in designing this system beyond what you're reading here.
Stats ranged from 1 to 5. You have a number of each type of action equal to its corresponding stat, but the actions can't be used in this form. Instead, actions have to fit into "slots", of which you have a number equal to your highest stat. The first slot tries to fill itself with as many different types of actions as possible, and the last slot will always have the fewest types of actions. Once a slot it filled, that slot can be spent on any action with which it is filled.
Okay, so that probably didn't make much sense. Let me give some examples. If you have straight 3s in all your stats, then you'll have 3 slots and 3 of each type of action, so each slot ends up filled with every type of action. This is the most versatile build, since any slot can be spent on any action. Let's say your stats are 5, 3, 3, 1 (move, use, think, speak, in order). Your highest stat is 5, so you have 5 slots. Since the minimum is 1, the first slot always fills with all four action types. However, you are then out of speak actions, so the next two slots only contain move, use, and think actions. After that, all you have left are move actions, which fill your last two slots. One way to think of such a build is that they would always be able to take at least two move actions on their turn, regardless of whatever other actions they take, so good for a character who specializes in such types of actions, such as a warrior who might use them to make two additional attacks.
Maybe you've already figured out which 5e mechanic this is. There is one major difference, though. When you spend a slot to take an action, you always spend the slot with the fewest actions in it. For example, in the previous example, if you took a move action, you would first use one of the slots that only had a move action in it. If you took a use or think action, you'd use one of the two slots that didn't have a speak action. So you'd only be able to take one speak action on your turn, but you could take four move actions first and still have the slot with a speak action in it. If, however, you took three use or think actions, you'd need to use the slot with the speak action in it. To put it another way, you always spend your most specific slot first (i.e. the one that can be used for the least types of actions) and your most generic slot last (i.e. the one that can be used for the most types of actions).
If you still haven't figured it out, don't worry, neither had I. What did it for me was when I discarded the cumbersome "slot" terminology, and started thinking of it in terms of action points. Except something weird happened when I did so. You know that last paragraph? Forget it. For some reason, I reversed this when thinking about the action points. So, using the action point terminology, the 5, 3, 3, 1 build has 5 move points, 3 use points, 3 think points, and 1 speak point. Now, how it should have worked according to the previous paragraph is that when you spend an action point, it will also deduct 1 action point from any other pool that is the same or higher. So if you spend a use point, then it will also deduct a point from your think and move pools, but not from your speak pool. Once your use pool is down to 1 point, then spending a use point would deduct a point from your speak pool. However, when it got turned around in my head I made it backwards. Any time you spend a point, it always deducts one point from every pool. As long as you have points left in one pool, you can continue using actions of that type, but once a pool drops to 0 you can't take any more actions of that type.
It's movement. It's the 5e movement mechanic. In D&D 5e, each character has pools of movement speed. Most characters only have a walk speed, so it doesn't come up often, but others might have a swim, climb, fly, or burrow speed. These speeds can have different values (in feet), and when you spend movement from one pool it gets deducted from all your pools. If you have a 30 foot walk speed and a 50 foot fly speed, you can walk for 30 feet then fly for 20 feet. But if you fly for 20 feet then you can only walk for 10 (you could then fly another 20 feet, but can't walk any further).
It might make sense to houserule 5e movement to work the other way, where you spend your most specific movement first, and your most generic last. Or, as I said above, spending movement from one pool only deducts it from other pools that are the same or less. So in the case of a 30 foot walk speed and a 50 foot fly speed, you would basically be able to fly for 20 feet without spending any walk speed. This means you could fly for 20 feet then walk for another 30 feet.
Anyway, I do think it's an interesting mechanic that could be good for an original system. I guess that's why I mentioned it here. I hope someone is able to learn something from this and use it to improve a system they've been working on.