How do I play without minis or battle maps? (3e and 4e)

[YvizztX23]

Hi.

Does anyone have any advice for how to play 3rd and 4th Edition without minis? I'm a DM, and I'm finding the annoyance of both how long battles seem to take with all the annoyance of moving around coupled with the set-up time to get all the tiles laid out to be a major pain.

Unfortunately, one of my players does not like that idea of playing without minis, so if you have advice for how to buy him into the idea, that would be nice too.

[Aron Times]

Graphing paper + pencil.

/thread.

[Mando Knight]

No minis is fine, you just need some other way of keeping track of the battle layout.

No combat map, however, is ridiculous, as eventually you will run into problems keeping track of where everything is. Unless you're blind, and you're used to mapping things out entirely mentally without any visual references.

[Waylor]

First, forget playing 4th edition without minis.

Last year my group (im the dm) votes to remove the minis, you must give exact descriptions about the terrain/room/space, also combats will be less tactical (we also removed AoOs), if your group likes combats i dont think its a good idea.

After 6 months we decided to use both, on easy/simple combats we skip it, if theres a bunch of goblins you just charge 1 of them and have 1-2 next to you, if you cast a fireball you just kill a bunch of them (unless the terrain/room description forces it to affect a teammate), ppl will be asking a lot ¿What distance im from X? or ¿Would that feat/spell affect boss/adventurer?

When preparing the adventure make a small map, with some distances and lots of descriptions so you can handle it to your players and point with a pencil where everything is.

In hard/heavy tactical combats i suggest you to keep using tabletop/minis, we use them for big boss battles, dragons etc. I founded it interesting when dealing with combats where its more important to keep them on the situation than the battle (for example when attacked by pirates at the sea).

Pd: Please dont killme, i know my english sucks xD

[YvizztX23]

No minis is fine, you just need some other way of keeping track of the battle layout.

No combat map, however, is ridiculous, as eventually you will run into problems keeping track of where everything is. Unless you're blind, and you're used to mapping things out entirely mentally without any visual references.

Well, I would obviously have some graph paper on hand to have the area mapped out. I also have some 2nd Edition books. Would those help?

[jmbrown]

4E is nearly impossible to play without minis as the combat system is based around tactical tabletop combat. If you don't like using minis you should probably stop playing 4E. If your party has no controllers you might have an easier time but describing layouts and actions in 4E requires ridiculous book keeping and removes the fun out of playing certain classes.

3E's a lot easier but again it requires a lot of descriptive work on the DM's part. Usually I describe each character's move followed by the distance in relation to the closest enemy or enemies that may be attacking them. I describe possible terrain restrictions, spell effects and the like. Of course, once you get to higher level spells (especially wall spells, ugh) things get hectic again.

It's best to use markers like coins and stuff. Even if you don't use a battle grid some aspects of the game require visual descriptions.

[Mando Knight]

Well, I would obviously have some graph paper on hand to have the area mapped out. I also have some 2nd Edition books. Would those help?

Those could work. I was referring to the second part of the title, which implies that you wished to nix mapping out the combat entirely.

One alternative to investing hundreds of dollars in minis is to purchase a projector and use MapTool or something. Still costs hundreds of dollars, but it's all in one lump sum.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

Hi.

Does anyone have any advice for how to play 3rd and 4th Edition without minis? I'm a DM, and I'm finding the annoyance of both how long battles seem to take with all the annoyance of moving around coupled with the set-up time to get all the tiles laid out to be a major pain.

Unfortunately, one of my players does not like that idea of playing without minis, so if you have advice for how to buy him into the idea, that would be nice too.

Why don't you use Legos?

[Denkal]

I've been in groups where they used a whiteboard. They just used an inches-to-feet conversion scale and used that. Made for less restrictive movement. But it can slow things down, unless there's someone (neither player nor DM) to work the board.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

Really, the only issue in 3e that makes playing without minis a pain is AoOs; without those, you can do just fine with a whiteboard, some markers, and mediocre drawing skills. To fix that last issue, my group removed all the fiddly rules around AoOs, placement, etc. by just changing the AoO rules to "At any point in the round, when an enemy takes an action, you may make a single melee attack against them as an immediate action." Each martial class is able to augment this somehow (rangers can make a ranged attack as well, knights can take 2 per round, ToB classes don't count AoOs against their immediate actions for the purpose of counters, etc.) but that's the basic idea.

Ta-da, AoO problem solved. Does doing X action provoke an AoO? Who cares; if you want to whack him, whack him. Did he pass through your reach at this point or that point? Doesn't matter; attack him whenever you want while he's in reach. Wizard wants to cast defensively? Oh well; hit him anyway. Sure, it changes things up a bit tactically, but it makes playing without minis so much easier if you can say "The bad guy dot is within an inch of your dot, make the attack roll."

Why don't you use Legos?

Well, it won't help with the moving minis issues, but using Lego dungeons definitely makes setup easier, and I completely support using them. When I'm not in college, I have access to a Lego dungeon I've built and my group uses that.

I'm sure I've linked these pics before, but if you haven't seen them:

Spoiler

Show

The dungeon entrance as it was when I first built it several years ago:


-------------------------------

Connecting tiles is a snap:

[Kylarra]

We use a cloth dry-erase grid. It's fast enough for easy sketching of areas, but it lacks some of the "oooh" factor of tiles.

[kjones]

When you say that you don't want to use minis, do you mean that you don't want to use actual figurines, or you don't want to have physical items moving around a battlemat? If it's the former, the answer is simple - use something else to represent things, like dice, coins, anything small. If it's the latter, it's a little trickier.

[YvizztX23]

Well, we do actually use legos as minis, and dungeon tiles to represent the battle area. Works pretty well, because I have tons of legos and can usually find any minifigure I need for little more than a dollar or so online if I need it. Materials aren't a problem, as I am extremely determined when it comes to avoiding spending money on something I might not necessarily. You can find pdf versions of D&D books ANYWHERE if you look hard enough. Guess that'll teach WotC to sell on drivethrurpg...

But, in response to kjones, using minis or maps is fine, to figure out distance and everything. What I need is a quick set up method, or way to stop every encounter from taking about 40 minutes to a few hours. Role-playing, not roll-playing, people. Maybe, and this will be a bit weird, you could do it with little or no movement, like (shudder) turn based combat in the Final Fantasy games, dare I say it.

[Mando Knight]

Guess that'll teach WotC to sell on drivethrurpg...

Yes, yes it did. Drivethrurpg has no WotC-published 4e material available, and 3.X material is out of print so Hasbro doesn't care as much.

[YvizztX23]

Yes, yes it did. Drivethrurpg has no WotC-published 4e material available, and 3.X material is out of print so Hasbro doesn't care as much.

Still, the damage has been done. Unless they want to try to make ALL of the various downloading sites out there, they just have to grin and bare it.

Of course, if TSR was still around, they would be suing left and right. Heck, we wouldn't even be having this conversation, as this website would not exist.

Anyone who just says "Huh?" needs to read gamespy's Magic and Memories: The history of D&D, which covers everything from the beginnings of the game to the flurry of attacks by cartoonists, ex-vampires, and worried mothers, to the final days before WotC bought them up.

But, back to the original subject of this reply, while I like WotC, and 3rd and 4th Edition, I think that they try WAYYYYYYYYY to hard to draw in income. Wasn't one of the points of buying up TSR in the first place to make sure that there wouldn't be an insane amount of products being made for the game?

Naughty corporations...

[Zeful]

4E is nearly impossible to play without minis as the combat system is based around tactical tabletop combat.

MYTH!

You can play any edition of D&D without a combat map, some editions make it harder than others (though 4e is the hardest, but that's not saying much), it's totally possible.

[Tackyhillbillu]

A combat map makes D&D much better.

Minis are waste of money.

My group always used to let people use whatever. I usually ended up just pulling out a good ole quarter,

[YvizztX23]

We are, primarily playing 4e. I'm thinking about starting a 3e campaign, though.

One of the reasons I'm asking this is that I think the roll-playing is beginning to way overshadow the role-playing. I'm not sure if I can actually sell my players on the idea of switching to 3rd Edition, though. Any suggestions?

[kjones]

But, in response to kjones, using minis or maps is fine, to figure out distance and everything. What I need is a quick set up method, or way to stop every encounter from taking about 40 minutes to a few hours. Role-playing, not roll-playing, people. Maybe, and this will be a bit weird, you could do it with little or no movement, like (shudder) turn based combat in the Final Fantasy games, dare I say it.

In my experience, most combats in 4e take about an hour. Is setup time really the problem here? It seems that the bigger issue is that you find combat in 4e to be boring, and I'm not sure a different battle mat will help with that.

[herrhauptmann]

When I first started, we tended to just use various objects for the figures.
Dragon was a lighter, various dice represented the party members, and other objects for other monsters.
It gave a good enough idea of who was where that we could get our flanking or sneak attack without relying on the DM being in a good mood.

[YvizztX23]

In my experience, most combats in 4e take about an hour. Is setup time really the problem here? It seems that the bigger issue is that you find combat in 4e to be boring, and I'm not sure a different battle mat will help with that.

I'm not sure. I definitely think that an hour is way to long to spend on combat- if I wanted to have fun moving miniatures around on a battlefield, I'd play Warhammer, not D&D.

Even in video game RPGs, combat is less fun than other activities. Don't ask me why.

As I said before, I would rather me and my group be role-playing, instead of moving around on a grid, which is why I want to try and get them to convert to 3rd Edition. Can anyone help with that?


The unbridled genius of World of Darkness is now quite apparent.

[YvizztX23]

Okay everyone, my issue is not lack of miniatures or funds to get miniatures! Please stop suggesting I use lint, quarters, etc to represent creatures.

[valadil]

The best thing to do if you want to play without minis is to imagine the scene in your head and tell the players what their options are. "You can move or charge to one of the three swordmen, but the mage is too far" or "your fireball will hit the two in front or the two in back" will suffice. It isn't worth trying to communicate the grid to players - english just isn't that well suited to spatial description and you'll find yourself taking longer than if you had the grid. Let the players ask who their powers will affect.

This kind of play will be frustrating at first for people who are used to D&D combat. They'll feel limited. I think they'll get over it. I actually prefer this style, but only for games that aren't D&D.

[Megaduck]

Hi.

Does anyone have any advice for how to play 3rd and 4th Edition without minis? I'm a DM, and I'm finding the annoyance of both how long battles seem to take with all the annoyance of moving around coupled with the set-up time to get all the tiles laid out to be a major pain.

Unfortunately, one of my players does not like that idea of playing without minis, so if you have advice for how to buy him into the idea, that would be nice too.

Disclaimer, I don't really like miniatures and I think my group used a map in combat once.

My advice is to be flexible. As a DM you need to remember that everyone will have a slightly different mental layout of combat.

What you don't want to do is have your own mental map so fixed that you start telling you're players, "No, that's not how it is."

If you think the warrior is 15 feet away from the orc and he says he charges forward 10 feet to hit it with a sword, don't argue with him. Especially don't say, 'you can't do that you're to far now you five feet from the orc and it hits you.'

If he thinks he's in charge range, then he's in charge range, if he doesn't then he's not.

When in doubt, roll the dice. If the wizard casts a fireball and you think the rogue is in the way then say so and give the rogue a saving throw. Then make a rousing description of the rogue diving epically out of the way and emerging scorched but unharmed.


Also I would advise you to let party members make up their own bits of combat, even if you didn't specifically put it there. If the priest wants to pick up a vase of flowers from the table and throw it at the orcs then there is a vase of flowers to throw. If the wizard wants to dive for cover behind the pile of rubble then there is a pile of rubble there.

As long as you realize that the combat will be more free form then it should be fine.

[YvizztX23]

Disclaimer, I don't really like miniatures and I think my group used a map in combat once.

My advice is to be flexible. As a DM you need to remember that everyone will have a slightly different mental layout of combat.

What you don't want to do is have your own mental map so fixed that you start telling you're players, "No, that's not how it is."

If you think the warrior is 15 feet away from the orc and he says he charges forward 10 feet to hit it with a sword, don't argue with him. Especially don't say, 'you can't do that you're to far now you five feet from the orc and it hits you.'

If he thinks he's in charge range, then he's in charge range, if he doesn't then he's not.

When in doubt, roll the dice. If the wizard casts a fireball and you think the rogue is in the way then say so and give the rogue a saving throw. Then make a rousing description of the rogue diving epically out of the way and emerging scorched but unharmed.


Also I would advise you to let party members make up their own bits of combat, even if you didn't specifically put it there. If the priest wants to pick up a vase of flowers from the table and throw it at the orcs then there is a vase of flowers to throw. If the wizard wants to dive for cover behind the pile of rubble then there is a pile of rubble there.

As long as you realize that the combat will be more free form then it should be fine.

Yeah, I'm really thinking about taking a more free-style World of Darkness approach to combat.

My first actual introduction to D&D style RPGs was a game my friends and I played conveniently called RPG, where one person was the "Narrator", who would try to annoy the other person by having them go into bizarre situations, as well as asking them what they would do, and the player's job was to attempt to fight off the weirdness.

Of course, this was very...theoretic, not to mention erratic. For example, in one session, the player was force to fight off vampiric pinatas using a rolled up Battlestar Galactica poster.

Could this freestyle approach work?

[Tiki Snakes]

I'm going to second megaduck here.
If you don't want to focus on combat, then relax it a bit. If you want to brush through combat when it kind of has to happen but there is no real interest in the actual doing of it, just run a turn or so and then brush over the rest.

Simply, if you aren't interested in anything other than breif fights now and then for continuity/verisimilitude reasons, just get them over with in a nice relaxed way and then you can get back to the bit of the game you are interested in.


Of course, the problem is if your group enjoys spending more time on combat, but that's less about system and setup time and more about people having different tastes and expectations.

[YvizztX23]

I'm going to second megaduck here.
If you don't want to focus on combat, then relax it a bit. If you want to brush through combat when it kind of has to happen but there is no real interest in the actual doing of it, just run a turn or so and then brush over the rest.

Simply, if you aren't interested in anything other than breif fights now and then for continuity/verisimilitude reasons, just get them over with in a nice relaxed way and then you can get back to the bit of the game you are interested in.


Of course, the problem is if your group enjoys spending more time on combat, but that's less about system and setup time and more about people having different tastes and expectations.

Well aside from the one player who I've been mentioning, about half of the group (not including myself) prefers combat, and the other half prefer role-playing, exploring dungeons, etc.

I'm trying to keep everyone happy, which is one of the hard parts of being DM. Don't keep the player's happy, and they will leave. Make them too happy, and they'll start getting annoyed when the steady flow of XP, GP, and magic items starts to wain.

[AslanCross]

My battle grids are inch grids drawn on A3-size paper that I had laminated. I draw on it with whiteboard markers. Very quick to set up, and I make sure I do them before game day. Even if I have to change them on the fly, it makes mapping relatively quick.

[Tiki Snakes]

Well aside from the one player who I've been mentioning, about half of the group (not including myself) prefers combat, and the other half prefer role-playing, exploring dungeons, etc.

I'm trying to keep everyone happy, which is one of the hard parts of being DM. Don't keep the player's happy, and they will leave. Make them too happy, and they'll start getting annoyed when the steady flow of XP, GP, and magic items starts to wain.

If you have several players who prefer combat, I'd suggest instead then simply reducing the length of the combats, rather than making too many major changes. For example, sentient creatures shouldn't really be fighting to 0hp without damn good reason. They could be faking death, passing out from shock, surrendering, running away, whatever. Make the invisible threshold roughly around the bloodied value, (that is, after all, the point when they should be noticing they are, infact, hurt) and adjust closer to their full hp value the more insane/fanatical/badass and bosslike they are.
Throw in a full combat every couple of sessions, and and a few shorter ones now and again just to tide them over.

I've heard it said that there are clear points in a battle when the outcome becomes obvious or inevitable. If you keep an eye out for this point, you should be more readily able to get away with speeding things up. Just always make it clear that if the enemy is falling apart, surrendering, or legging it all of a sudden, it is an acheivment of the players, NOT just you getting bored.

[YvizztX23]

If you have several players who prefer combat, I'd suggest instead then simply reducing the length of the combats, rather than making too many major changes. For example, sentient creatures shouldn't really be fighting to 0hp without damn good reason. They could be faking death, passing out from shock, surrendering, running away, whatever. Make the invisible threshold roughly around the bloodied value, (that is, after all, the point when they should be noticing they are, infact, hurt) and adjust closer to their full hp value the more insane/fanatical/badass and bosslike they are.
Throw in a full combat every couple of sessions, and and a few shorter ones now and again just to tide them over.

I've heard it said that there are clear points in a battle when the outcome becomes obvious or inevitable. If you keep an eye out for this point, you should be more readily able to get away with speeding things up. Just always make it clear that if the enemy is falling apart, surrendering, or legging it all of a sudden, it is an acheivment of the players, NOT just you getting bored.

So, save the full on combat for more dramatic battles against a main villain or other significant foe? I like the sounds of that. Thanks.