New round structure - OPTION B - we'd like your feedback!

brandonsantacruz wrote:

Maybe it is a good time to ask: How do we want the game to work? If we paint with a broad brush to start, it is easier to fill in the details afterwards than the other way around.

For example:
Should combat be very granular with lots of little steps, as it is now, or should it be simple? Stepping further back, how long should turns take? How big of a role should combat have?

This. I'm so much in agreement with this.
This is what Black Chantry should be pondering.
I just don't think that is possible without a few people complaining and stifling progress.

Ankha wrote:

Round structure
  1. Approach step
  2. Strike step.
    2.a Choose strike
    2.b Resolve strike
  3. Additional strikes step
  4. Leave step

I'm not at all sure why adding more random words to the game is helpful.

Currently, we have a Determine Range step. Range is a word that players have to be familiar with, because combat is either at long range or short range. During the range step you play maneuvers, so a feasible alternative is "Maneuvers step" - which is fine in terms of cognitive load, though still has issues that so many cards out there say "range" or "before range" on them. In either case, you have to know both terms - range and maneuver - to play the game. So why add a third term that players have to learn?

Again, V:TES is regularly criticised for making players learn lots of vocabulary to make sense of it. Adding more doesn't make it better. Requiring new players to know both, because they have to be able to read and understand old cards, makes it worse. I cannot fathom the reasoning that says "Let's take one of the problems our game suffers from and make it worse, consciously and repeatedly."


Further: as terms, approach and leave only make a whole lot of sense if combat is one round, which it isn't - Trap is a thing, amongst others. I would also foresee a lot of confusion about the "Leave" step around Strike: Combat Ends. I'm playing Majesty, so I'm leaving combat, right? Since I'm leaving combat, we're in the Leave step, right? So I can play presses?

Ugh, no. The less wording changes the better.

1) I really like the merging of the press step with the end of round. It has always been a very counterintuitive idea that deciding to go to next round is not the last thing happening in a round.

Brum wrote:

No more First Strike, please.

I would go the other way: keep First Strike, and use it for Dodge and Combat Ends instead of adding special rules.

Dodge effect: cancel the negative effect of the opponent's strike.
Combat Ends effect: go to Leave step, presses cannot be played.

Those effects do not need any special timing or resolution rule, they stand on their own. A dodge would need First Strike to negate the strike made with First Strike. Combat Ends does not prevent the opponent's current strike on its own, but that effect can be achieved by giving current Combat Ends cards First Strike. That means a First Strike always resolves against Combat Ends.

Benefits:
1) Less special rules, everything follows the standard timing,
2) A counter to dodge and Combat Ends in the core rules instead of having to look for special cards. Currently, the rules fail at teaching how combat works because one cannot understand combat without knowing that Immortal Grapple and Psyche exist.
3) Make the First Strike clans great again, mainly and .
4) New design space for Combat Ends without First Strike, Dodge with First Strike, dodge + combat ends,...
5) Make Anesthetic Touch a standard card instead of an exception.

Anesthetic Touch
Combat
Hand Strike and Combat Ends.
As above, with First Strike.

brandonsantacruz wrote:

Maybe it is a good time to ask: How do we want the game to work? If we paint with a broad brush to start, it is easier to fill in the details afterwards than the other way around.

For example:
Should combat be very granular with lots of little steps, as it is now, or should it be simple? Stepping further back, how long should turns take? How big of a role should combat have?

IMO, combat should not entirely be vampires fist-fighting and throwing sewer lids and gates at each other. The keywords of combat (Maneuver, Strike/Dodge, Press) all work abstractly and can be used to refer to social struggles as well as physical ones. And 'social combat' is actually more harmonious with what Vampire: The Masquerade presents itself as - political intrigue, devious plots, backstabbing, and powerplays.

Why would two immortals that have lived for centuries risk their eternal unlives battling with swords and guns? They would have to have some serious grievances with one another to resort to actual battle.

________________

But I agree with Brum about making all the strikes resolve simultaneously, including S:CE. I agree with James about naming the steps - don't introduce different names to call or describe the steps, please. Also, if cards could be reprinted to work within the very simple and clean Maneuver-Strike-Press framework and avoid all of the "before X" mini-steps, that would be nice.

I'm liking how committed everyone is here, press step, end of round merging is great.
"Beginning " sounds more Intuitive than adding a word because A.already referenced in pre-range cards, which are already referred to as "pres" and B. Its.the.beginning.

Grapple doesn't need nerfed.

However:

It only needs to be good because S:CE is sooooooooooooo much better. "I have 36 cards in my deck that slowly allow me the chance to win by minion and blood denial with incredibly interactive situations catalyzing it. I play rush, I play signpost, I play crows, I play flesh of marble. I play drawing out the beast..... this is going to be such an Interesting game, I see you're running brujah, what do you play?"

"Well, I'm unconcerned with anything but bleeding you at stealth with perfect paragon and resist earth's grasp, so.... I majesty and untap...."

The best red card in the game (aside from scourge of the enochians) Is Earth Meld. Sce is held in check by cards like psyche, trackers mark, telepathic tracking, and most importantly immortal grapple. Balancing combat is only possible with this in mind.

But, while we are here:

Why bother with first strike if its never first. Its actually third. Third strike. After sce. After dodge. Then your allegedly fast minion, then other stuff. Let's make it matter. Most dodge and sce can become first strike, but not all. Like carlton but not Mylan get it.
You get the idea.......