Play-by-Post Combat

[Skjaldbakka]

How do you handle combat in your Play-by-Post games? I have found that the first combat has a tendency to de-rail a PbP game, due to the complications of trying to act in turn sequence, with the increased time delay that PbP incurs.

[Dhavaer]

I've found that having only one player helps. It does make CR tricky to judge, though.

[butch2k]

There are six players in my D&D PbP group and i haven't encountered much trouble with combat. I of course used some tricks in order to speed it up...
Indeed first round i ask everyone to roll init, tohit, and damages (inc. critical roll and damages). Then on, i ask them just to roll the tohit and damages every round.
In case one player is really lagging behind in term of posting regularity, i make the rolls myself.

So far the system proved quite efficient, and combat are quite "fast".

[KIDS]

A few tips:

a) roll reactive things for players yourself without waiting, i.e. initiative, saves, knowledge checks, spellcraft checks. Saying "roll initiative" and wasting a day on it (which is a reasonable time of response) is a killer.

b) ask players to post actions ahead, adding one "if" statement in case they suspect a change of conditions. Reasonably is something like up to 3 friendly or unfriendly creatures ahead, with exceptions and being worth it to wait for someone's own initiative if he's in a tricky condition, fighting someone in immediate reach or etc. So nothing unreasonable, but when you know what you will do, you should post it, relay that to players.

c) ask players to provide you with basic numbers in spoiler like AC, saves and preferrence for type of AoO if they get one.

d) update map if you have one after everyone one or two significant clusters of enemies act

e) use joined initiative for enemies if they are minions (like 5 zombies)

Combat in PbP doesn't have to be derailing or a chore more than any other aspect of the game anywhere!

[Shhalahr Windrider]

My Strategy is the same as KIDS. I have more detailed explanation in the OOC thread for the game I run.

[Kyeudo]

So far, I have my players roll their inititives and their first actions at the same time, let them post their actions whenever there is time, then do a recap post at the end of each round so its easy to track what's going on. It's worked so far.

[DraPrime]

Don't make encounters too complex. Roll saves for your players. And if you can avoid a roll then do. If a player says "I scramble up the 7 ft wall to follow the goblin" then don't waste time making them roll a climb check. Just let them go up. Going up a 7 ft wall isn't very difficult.

[Citizen Joe]

The trick is to reduce the ping rate and ping time to make things go faster. A ping is a single interaction (post). Ping time is the time it takes for a response to a ping. Ping rate is the number of pings it takes to resolve a round of combat.

Example of bad Pinging... GM asks for initiative. Over the next two to three days, the PC's roll and respond with their initiatives. That is one ping Request/response. GM posts initiative order and requests action from first PC. PC sees this and responds within a couple days with his attack roll. GM confirms a hit a couple more days later and requests a damage roll... a couple more days later the PC responds with the damage roll. A couple days after that the GM requests the next person's action... etc. that's like five pings and a week of real time to resolve ONE person's action with 5 more people waiting to respond... so a month to resolve a single round of combat.

Example of Good Pinging... GM states the initiative order having rolled it ahead of time. Possibly stating the actions of the adversaries as well. PCs respond within 2 days with their action and results tests. GM acts for anyone that hasn't responded in last two days and resolves that round, then states initiative results for next round. Two ping rate with a two day turn around for each round of combat.

SUPER example of pinging... Everyone agrees to a certain date to deal with combats. Everyone monitors the game that day and ping times drop to about half hour (rather than 2 days).

[Jacob Orlove]

One system I've seen that works pretty well is that, after you have the init order up, you ask each player to post their actions for the next three rounds of combat (including rolls, if/then/else declarations, etc). Then the DM puts together a big post with dramatic descriptions of the actions and their results. Keep repeating that until combat is finished--it should only take a couple days (depending on how much time you give people to respond).

Another good way to speed things up (especially with the above system) is to have the DM just roll all the dice, but some players don't like that.

[Shhalahr Windrider]

One system I've seen that works pretty well is that, after you have the init order up, you ask each player to post their actions for the next three rounds of combat (including rolls, if/then/else declarations, etc). Then the DM puts together a big post with dramatic descriptions of the actions and their results. Keep repeating that until combat is finished--it should only take a couple days (depending on how much time you give people to respond).

A lot can happen in three rounds. Very easy for your intended course of action to be rendered unexecutable or an unwise choice.