Fighting Groups in Dungeons & Dragons
Experienced D&D players quickly learn that it makes sense to concentrate their attacks on one enemy at a time until they are removed from the game, thus reducing the number of attack rolls being made against them. A logical strategy for D&D, but rather “gamey” and lacking in verisimilitude.
Similarly, regardless of the number of men-at-arms, shield mates, and comrades around a 1st-level Wizard who decides to try and help the party out by making a melee attack – a single round of bad luck can kill the character and take one of the players out of the game.
I find the standard game mechanics in classic D&D less than ideal for groups fighting other groups. Whether abstract or with minis they do a better job depicting skirmishers than they do characters fighting in close ranks or otherwise trying to assist and defend their comrades.
Looking at how other games handle fighting in groups, I think there’s a way to make D&D combat run a bit more to my liking – without adding much more complexity to the game.
A rule found in many war games that I quite like is that the defending player is the one who gets to choose which members of a damaged unit are removed from the board. I think introducing this system into D&D, Labyrinth Lord, and Swords & Wizardry combat would be fairly straightforward as well.
Player characters can choose to fight in a group with any of their allies (other player characters, henchmen and retainers etc). When any member of that group is “hit” in combat the players can decide which member of the group will lose hit points from the attack. This must be decided before any rolls for damage are made. All players with characters in the fighting group must agree with the reallocated damage roll, or the GM assigns it to the original target.
Players might choose to have damage dealt to their retainers first, possibly resulting in more casualties, but allowing them to continue adventuring longer with their main characters. Alternately a player with higher hit points might want to assign hits against retainers to their PC first, keeping more of the party’s swords in action against their enemies.
Since the members in a group are keeping close to one another, all characters must choose to melee attack against the same target – although that target could of course be an enemy group! Additional individuals and groups that choose to attack the players group may also be attacked in melee combat as well. Attack rolls are made against individuals within the group as normal, the only difference is that the defenders may choose to reassign the damage roll to another character
This system allows weak or injured characters to be protected by their comrades, although not without additional risk to the defenders. Fighting in a group means that characters can lose hit points from attacks that would not normally be able to hit their armour class if they choose to shield an ally from harm. Trying to keep an unarmoured wizard or merchant protected amidst a swirling melee is much harder than simply focusing on the fight at hand!
Introducing fighting groups to the game can turn combat into something that requires a bit more decision making from the players. However, the players should be aware that while they can use group tactics, their enemies often will as well…
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I really like that approach. It feels like it would keep everyone in the battle longer, build up some great dramatic tension as the PCs try to ‘hang on’ in a tough fight, and allow for a group surrender mechanic without subduing each and every opponent.
Would you have the attack roll made against a “group” AC (to hit target), say the lowest in the group?
Doesn’t Tunnels and Trolls do something like this? Both sides roll all their dice and add their adds, then the loosing group decides how the damage gets spread amongst its members. I think they may have certain die situations where the winning group still has to take damage too.
I think this is a good idea for melee when there is a large number of combatants on both sides. The only problem I see is that interrupting the spell caster is a big part of the strategy of combat (Is it possible to do this in S&W anyway? I know it is in OSRIC and AD&D, we always played with AD&D combat rules). Allowing for directed fire for spells and missile fire would help some.
That’s indeed how it works in T&T. Also, you have Spite Damage, which is damage that ignore armor. Both sides take that if their opponent rolls any sixes.
In T&T if you want to interrupt a spell caster you just say to the GM that your PC wont add to your side’s total, but do a stunt instead. It then gets resolved wit the Saving Rolls general resolution mechanic.
It’s damn slick in play.
@roborus: Glad you like it.
I agree this would help keep characters in the fight longer and add some dramatic tension.
Opponents might choose to roll their attacks against the character with the lowest AC in the group (although it may not always be initially apparent which target that is), so the AC for the group would effectively be the lowest AC.
However there are lots of times when the group might not agree on where the damage roll should go. If it’s almost certain to be a killing attack there might not be consensus around who’s PC or favorite retainer is going to get taken out. More complex decisions like “Wizard’s Sleep spell interrupted VS favorite retainer dies” might also not reach an easy group consensus. For this and other reasons I think it’s better to keep specific targets for each attack roll, and then consider whether the group wants the damage roll moved to another character.
@rmckee78: Tunnels and Trolls is another one of those games I’ve heard about, but never had a chance to look at or play. It was Warhammer and Warhammer 40K that introduced me to the idea of the defender deciding which member of a damaged group gets removed from the game. It really made sense for me as to why you’d want to put your 40K characters in a unit rather than have them all fight as independent skirmishers.
I agree with you about the strategic importance of interrupting spellcasters (see my reply to Rob above). Ideally you would have a fighting group of warriors *in front* of the spell-caster, blocking the hallway. A single warrior might be in a 2-person fighting group with the Wizard to act as a bodyguard in case anyone got past the shield wall, or snuck up on the party from behind.
As the attackers, decisions about how many characters to send against the main enemy fighting group and how many to use to try and sneak around and flank them, or attack spellcasters and archers would become more important considerations as well.
I think I would actually like this more than regular D&D combat as long as there was the ability to do special tactics like falnking and sneak attacks.
Well, I actually had a situation similar to this in a T&T game. The fighters in the party said they wanted to fight defensively to protect the magic-user. In T&T the combat rules everyone on one side totals their attack rolls and it gets compared to the other side’s total. This is how I did it.
I just let the defenders roll a Saving Roll to see how successfully they defended, and that determined how much of their attack rolls got added to the total. Abstract but elegant, since we started the turn by agreeing the magic-user would not get hit, and the rest of the rules was used to determine what other effect that had.
Stuart, take a look at T&T. You might like it! It has a very fluid combat system.
For D&D I see no specific problem with having a combat stance that’s called “defensive fighting” or something like that. You declare at the start of the round whom you are defending, and then all attacks at that target hits you instead. If many fighters choose to do the same you could just roll a die to determine who took the hit. That’s probably how I’d do it.
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