RP Question

Lore World's End Tavern: Role-play and Fan Fiction
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Do people really like the /roll dice for combat, or do they prefer actual combat with monsters in open areas?

I’m asking because I know it makes you feel like you’re actually playing D&D. But what about for those who think differently; those that prefer actual combat with mobs in taking part on a quest either through dungeons or open world.
Picture it like your trapped in the game as your character, you’re not going to roll dice and hope to swing when clearly the mob is right there in front of you that is already swinging at you lol.

All seriousness though, do you like or even prefer dice roll combat over actual combat or vice versa? I’m curious…

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It depends!

Some prefer the /roll 20 method, some have fully crafted D&D-ish systems, some prefer gameplay PvP/PvE, and some even just freeform write things.

Ultimately it’s up to you and whoever you’re RPing with. I’m not the biggest fan of ‘roll 20 and see what happens’ but it’s also the simplest way to go about things.

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As someone who DMs a lot (TIP: Giving your players a puzzle to solve is a good time for a DM to finally get a snack), I have a couple of views about this. But I want to clear what you mean.

When you say actual combat, do you mean what is frequently known as emote combat? Or do you actually mean combat with in-game mobs, like heading down to Taelloch and dealing with some of those ridiculously overpowered skardyn as part of the narrative?

  • Lady Vanaelia threw a polished coin on the ground, the metal echoing in the caverns. The sound and light drew the skardyn’s attention, and the fashionable elf moved in to strike (/roll 20).

or

  • Stealth, Ambush, Between The Eyes, Between the Eyes, Between the Eyes, dead.

If you mean the former, for narrative combat? I can answer the question about rolling dice easily enough. Sure, the mob is already in front of you. But that doesn’t mean the mob is just going to stand there, politely, waiting for you to hit it. The mob is going to be trying to move, just as you will when it tries to hit you. The roll of a dice is supposed to reflect that.

My main issue with just /roll 20 is that rolls of the dice are pointless without any kind of modifiers. It’s just random. Which really get annoying (to me) when it comes to something like combat. There’s no way to differentiate a military veteran from Butterfingers Brown, the Least Reliable Blade in Hillsfar.

But, yeah. What Guaah said. It depends, and it really depends on who you’re RPing with.

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I personally tend to prefer rp with emotes only, as I believe it provides the most creative freedom, though it also requires the most personal responsibility as one ideally should write their actions and reactions in way that is logical and fair.

I’ve always merely tolerated combat with rolls as it’s more efficient for events, especially those with large groups. Without some manner of modifier to help influence it, however, it’s often too random to be satisfying. Not everyone who utilizes roll combat does that, which admittedly may be a partial contributor to my personal bias against it.

I’ve never heard of people utilizing in-game combat (as in pve) for rp, beyond like internal rp, as in a personal framing for your character’s in-game actions. The other closest equivalent I can think of is people who use pvp prowess as a measure of worthiness to portray high ranking military characters. That is rather tangential to this topic, though.

Overall, as more or less mentioned before, it largely depends on who you’re with and the situation you’re in. Most events I’ve been in prefer rolls, again likely for the efficiency. Smaller groups and impromptu matters are more likely to rely purely on emotes, based on my personal experiences and observations.

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I once told someone the only way I’d do that with my civilian versus their death knight is if my successful rolls were me falling out of the way of a strike while I was DESPERATELY trying to reach the door…and freedom.

Which was funny.

But, yeah. Modifiers are and have always been a huge part of D&D rolls. I don’t mind if it’s low stakes, but with things like character injury/death or major narrative progression, it does feel like it’s important to have things be a bit less random.

Butterfingers Brown is called that for a reason, afterall.

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Same.

This is my favorite way to play these things out. Only you know how your character would react to something in a heated/combat/escape situation. But as stated, personal responsibility and fairness is key.

I usually only do this with people I know well. I write actions not in a definitive way, like ‘this action hurts you’ etc, but I write actions always open ended, letting the other person make decisions.

If this happens with someone I don’t know well, or a new RP experience, I try this, but if they don’t reciprocate or try to always win and not be fair, then I’ll chat about other options, roll 20 being my preferred option.

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Yeah, I respect other people and how they want to RP. But I much prefer writing/emoting, and I’m likely not doing any sort of combat unless the group is PvPing against horde or NPCs.

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I was always very imaginative but I actually don’t like this kind of old school rpgs because books are enough to me.

When I play I want action together with the history for the same reason I don’t like mangas but I like books and animes, mangas feel to me like a sketch of a movie or anime not the real content despite the artistic efforts of the artist.

When I read a book I can imagine the characters and situations, when I read a manga I already have the characters exposed to me and they don’t move neither speak out loud.

This kind of rpg with random stuff and random story is quite weird to me but a well made role-play written story is good.

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Depends on the RP. I’ve done all the above mentioned in varying forms. Although I have rarely done RP-combat vs another player in-game. Most of my RP doesn’t typically go that far. On the Forums, or other Text based format /roll doesn’t really seem feasible, so you have to rely on who your RPing with to be fair. The idea is to write a story together after all.

I have never actually played D&D myself. If I am actively questing while RPing, I will just use the in-game’s combat system combined with an /emote addon like Speak-in-Spell that can trigger automatically based on what abilities you use or get hit by. For example:
If my Tauren here get hit with a “Bleed” Debuff it could trigger an emote that says “Titanwolf felt his armor get soaked in blood. Unaware if it was his or his target’s he felt his swings grow harder.” Or alternatively. “Titanwolf roared as he felt the cuts into his flesh as blood flowed freely from the wound.”

True enough, unless you are a rogue with that ability that does this very thing.

I really don’t like dice rolls personally as I’ve had bad experiences where my skilled character seemed to have forgot his breeding and failed every single one.

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Looking back at my earlier post, I do want to go into a bit more detail! At least for my preferences, I prefer not to do any kind of combat ICly unless it’s organized or in an event.

I really don’t like unmodified /roll 20. At all. It ignores anything your character may be good or bad at and is purely luck. Guuah is a great shot. He’s been blastin’ things for a good while. It’s real awkward when he rolls a 1 and ends up shooting his foot or something.

Like I said, it’s the easiest to just jump in and do? It’s just real frustrating to see your character flounder like a fish out of water when they shouldn’t, unless you want to make several RP posts about your equipment malfunctioning.

Proper D&D systems work a lot better, purely because you have failsafes against bad luck. Modifiers to make up for low rolls, abilities that can succeed regardless, themed to your character. Still have the ability to make your actions seem cool and impactful! It’s a lot better. You won’t ever find this doing public RP, but if you find a guild or something that does something like this? Do recommend.

Freeform emotes is my preferred option, but I must stress: Never do this with some stranger. It just doesn’t work. It requires an understanding from all parties involved how their characters work, their strengths and weaknesses, and no systems tying them to it. Without that, you will have people miss or flat out ignore some things your character should do, and it becomes a competition of ‘how can I godmod this person more than they did so to me’.

I had PvP be a factor exactly once, barring my time in RP-PvP servers back in the day. I have an alt who was a Darkfuse bruiser. She’s not a nice character. She made fun of an orc’s belt that had a skull on it, and he wanted to fight her in game.

I do have a habit of playing PvE and PvP, and I have equipment sets ready for this purpose. :stuck_out_tongue:

It can work, as long as both parties understand that it’s going to be based on gameplay and skill, and less on words and systems. And that both parties are ready to take defeat gracefully so the story can continue or end without anyone feeling sassy or upset over it.

Just, yeah! Hyper important you hash it out with your other party(parties) beforehand, and see what everyone is comfortable with. Think the end goal is for everyone to have a good time, and have their character do neat stuff!

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In most cases these days, I’m lazy and do free form with a simplistic roll to see how successful I am with things like perception, stealth, lore knowledge, etc. I prefer that with people I trust, so if we get to a point where someone should lose, they don’t balk at the last minute because “my character would never lose that.” Losing happens and some of the best character growth I’ve ever gotten is from not being the constant winner of every encounter.

And if there are mobs and they’re not super important to the story, then mechanics for attack is fine. But I prefer harder mobs to one-shots. I’ll also do actual combat if we’re ICly going through a delve or something, but it’s not just zerg. It’s usually interspersed with RP scenes as we go.

But I also have a full RP roll system that includes everything from stealth to setting traps to creating weaponry, and allows for modifiers based on activity, class and flaws. The only issue I have with the roll system is that it slows the encounter down while attack rolls are made or defended against.

As far as PvP, the only people who like to use that for combat seem to be people who are good at PvP. And it used to be that they’d try to maneuver into encounters with non-PvPers so they could win. I learned to get around that by being friends with good PvPers, so if someone randomly challenged my character, I’d call one of my PvP friends to be my mercenary/champion in the fight. And that stopped that right away.

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There is an orc by the name TheBuffet who keeps ganking me repeatedly in Stormwind by the memorial fountain. Just in case it has to do with someone from WRA, I make sure to log in remotely a few times a day just to keep the fella online, always, watching, always waiting… :wink:

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If I was traped in the game as my character, I’d be dead. I’d never be able to shoot a bow, swing a sword , cast a spell, or slaughter the way my characters do. I’m not an outdoors person, I live on grid, I need grid.

I actually don’t have an answer to that. I engaged in factionPVP back in the old days when we knew the people we fought since it was just the one server and we’d meet in combat time after time.

I’ve been a GM for longer than this game has been around, but never had PC on PC combat as a factor in the games I ran. So I think that the duel system is the most honest method, but it has serious limitations.

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I prefer /roll 20 to freeform, because when people do freeform they tend to godmode.