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From: plutchak@uwmacc.UUCP (Joel Plutchak)
Newsgroups: net.games.frp
Subject: Re: More on Fantasy Hero
Message-ID: <967@uwmacc.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 22-Apr-85 18:36:33 EST
Article-I.D.: uwmacc.967
Posted: Mon Apr 22 18:36:33 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 26-Apr-85 03:09:57 EST
References: <5055@ukc.UUCP> <14018@watmath.UUCP>
Reply-To: plutchak@uwmacc.UUCP (Joel plutchak)
Organization: UWisconsin-Madison Academic Comp Center
Lines: 29

In article <14018@watmath.UUCP> jagardner@watmath.UUCP (Jim Gardner) writes:
>
>As a matter of fact, how DO other people conduct melee?  Tight time limits
>on how long someone can think before acting?  Fairly loose?  Any gimmicks
>that make it faster or more interesting?  One of the useful things about
>the Net is that you can find out about other people's _style_ of gaming.
>Almost all my role-playing has been with the same half dozen people here
>in Waterloo, and I'm eager to find out what others are up to.
>
>			Jim Gardner, University of Waterloo

   I've used a more-or-less by the (TSR) book method, with the following 
exceptions:  on a natural '20' to hit, the hitter rolled a d4, and if it
came up a 1 or a 2, the damage was doubled.  If the d4 came up a 1, the
hitter rolled a d6 to determine if the damage was tripled, and so on.  It
never, to the best of my knowledge, ever got beyond triple damage (and the
player usually rolled low damage anyway (:-).  Also, if the players took
"too long" to decide what to do in the melee, they were attacked without
being allowed to take any action.  The exact time of "too long" wasn't set,
but it worked without too much player grumbling.  It also helped speed up
melees in general, because it encouraged quick play by the players.  Also,
I don't remember (or care, particularly) where the book stands on this, but
the players had full knowledge of the hit tables, etc., and they rolled
their own damage to the monsters they hit.  I started playing with a DM
who made a big deal out of secretly rolling his dice, and I had no idea
what was going on for many months, which was not particularly enjoyable.
That's all I can think of right now...

                            joel plutchak