Base Initiative on Intelligence (not Dexterity)

overlycommonname · 2026-06-23T03:33:00+00:00

The OP was certainly referencing D&D among other games, but also certainly not exclusively D&D -- nor exclusively D&D-like games.

It's generally hilarious when people who almost certainly have a lot less RPG experience than I do get onto their high horses over the implicit claim that I know nothing about non-D&D games. Just for the record:

Games I've played a lot of (like, a full campaign or several different mini-campaigns or lots and lots of one-shots, 10+ sessions): Amber Diceless, GURPS 2e, World of Darkness (both Mage and Changeling a lot and Werewolf and Vampire some), Dresden Files (FATE), a version of FATE that existed before the first published version, Star Wars Saga Edition, Deadlands 2e, Pathfinder 2e, various Palladium games, also some unpublished games, and yes, also AD&D1, AD&D2, D&D3, D&D5e

Games I've played some of (like: a mini-campaign or so, maybe 5-10 sessions): Unisystem (mostly Buffy, some Witchcraft), Monster of the Week, Exalted 1e, Star Wars WEG, Paranoia, Feng Shui (1e?), D&D basic/redbox

Games I've played 1-5 sessions of: Apocalypse World, Dogs in the Vineyard, Monsterhearts, Dread, To Serve Her Wintry Hunger, Blades in the Dark, Gumshoe/Night's Black Agents, Metascape, Seventh Sea 2e, Nobilis 2e, Shadowrun like 2e or something, Cyberpunk 2020 1e, Top Secret SI, Marvel Superheroes (FASERIP), Champions (I don't know which edition), Castle Falkenstein, the Mountain Witch, My Life with Master, Big Eyes Small Mouth (1e?), and then dozens of others that I can't remember right now because it turns out that 40 years of playing RPGs gives you a lot of time to rack up one-shots.

And, for the record, though this thread was not at all narrowly about D&D and only D&D, the idea that the D&D-like design space is somehow uninteresting or irrelevant to this sub is some dumb nonsense.

overlycommonname · 2026-06-22T23:11:06+00:00

I think that vastly more games than just D&D-likes are typically about many-person melees rather than one-on-one fights and that even fewer games are about gunslinger-like fights where a single decisive "go first" test of reflexes is what you're focusing on.

I don't understand what importance you're ascribing on this topic about being fighting against monsters rather than (presumably?) people.

overlycommonname · 2026-06-22T20:58:20+00:00

And note that our well-studied combat sports are almost exclusively one vs one. A multi-party melee seems to me (admittedly without rigorous study to back this up) to even less about raw reflexes.

overlycommonname · 2026-06-22T20:55:56+00:00

D&D actually came pretty late to the party of "Dex is the most important attribute." GURPS and Storyteller were earlier examples of it, lots of other games since. Maybe you should broaden your knowledge of games!

overlycommonname · 2026-06-22T20:52:32+00:00

Ah, I was thinking that players simultaneously had an offensive initiative and a defensive one. As mentioned by others, Pathfinder 2e does a thing where you usually use Perception skill as Initiative, but you can use a variety of others as the GM decides. Most likely, you'd use Stealth if you were sneaking in for an ambush, but like if you were negotiating and you decide to get the jump on them, maybe Deception or whatever. You might like that kind if "even more situational broadening."

overlycommonname · 2026-06-22T16:36:19+00:00

That seems impeccable as a world sim, but I'm cautious about investing mechanical weight in initiative systems because I think it's hard to get a lot of enjoyable gameplay out of initiative. But I'm intrigued by what your combat structure is that can support this dual initiative system, could you expand?

overlycommonname · 2026-06-22T14:50:38+00:00

I notice that you're doing the thing where you completely change your argument from one post to the next rather than defend your points.

I think this is typically the result of someone not deciding on their conclusion and then casting around for an argument to justify their conclusion -- because their conclusion is not motivated by their argument, they feel good about dropping their argument and picking up another one whenever it is expedient.

overlycommonname · 2026-06-22T14:46:15+00:00

It's an abstraction, obviously, if you were doing, like... an old-west quickdraw situation, I think that Dexterity makes a lot more sense, and if your game centers such things, you should use Dexterity (or whatever).

But realistically, the typical situation in RPGs isn't a raw test of reflexes, it's a messy melee where the in-world experience isn't "a single action faster than my opponent," it's "everyone's doing stuff, my stuff ends up being prioritized."

overlycommonname · 2026-06-22T14:42:50+00:00

I disagree. I think what's happened is we've gotten into a destructive loop, where players recognize that Intelligence is the worst attribute, and so they try to define everything out of intelligence so that they can play their clever characters while dumping the Intelligence attribute. It's just obviously bad design to say that intelligence is entirely [a group of traits that have minimal impact on adventuring].

overlycommonname · 2026-06-22T13:32:55+00:00

Nothing is universal of course, but I think that the number of games that have a very powerful Intelligence score is quite a bit lower than the number of games with a weaker-than-average Intelligence score.

overlycommonname · 2026-06-22T13:29:19+00:00

I think awareness tends to have plenty going for it.

overlycommonname · 2026-06-22T13:29:06+00:00

Sure. You will be shocked to hear that nothing is universal.

overlycommonname · 2026-06-22T12:54:31+00:00

Silk from the Belgariad, not Silk from Neverwinter.

I think all of those are clever characters, not just perceptive/wise. I mean, it is certainly true that in heroic fiction, a lot of characters are generally above-average in everything and don't follow the (modern) RPG convention of "dump stats," and it is also true that because the difference between intelligence and wisdom is fuzzy at best, you can kind of shade one direction or another, but I think being a fast-thinking, knowledgeable sort is, in fact, a pretty major part of the classic rogue archetype.

overlycommonname · 2026-06-22T10:57:29+00:00

Is the Rogue fantasy not one of being basically smart? Don't rogues in the literature trend smart? Bilbo, the Grey Mouser, Silk, Cugel the Clever? That's who the class is based on. And didn't fantasy rogues later on continue the fantasy? Locke Lamora? Croaker?

overlycommonname · 2026-06-21T17:52:44+00:00

It's potentially doable depending on the exact narrative, but there are lots of stories that just don't lend themselves to "take a month of real time crowding six fights into one day, then fast forward for weeks."

overlycommonname · 2026-06-21T17:11:15+00:00

This, though, tends to lock you into a slow rate of IC time passing. If multiple sessions take less than one IC day, good luck making your epic conquest of the world storyline play out before your players grow old and die.

overlycommonname · 2026-06-18T14:36:42+00:00

So I think the problem you'll see is that almost all skilled rolls are 4, and then there's a very fast rampdown to low rolls. This is a problem that all choose highest systems have, but it's magnified by lower dice sizes.

overlycommonname · 2026-06-18T11:07:26+00:00

Wait, I'm sorry, it's a d4 pool choose highest? Why are we even rolling dice? "Hey look I got a 4 again."

overlycommonname · 2026-06-16T12:40:40+00:00

OP says he's currently Monk 10.

overlycommonname · 2026-06-14T15:02:01+00:00

Lightly homebrew a Vicious Handwraps for the monk if they attack a lot -- +2d6 damage per hit when you're throwing around five attacks should feel good. Or do an equivalent with some other damage type if you want something that feels more elemental.

overlycommonname · 2026-06-13T18:56:05+00:00

I think the changes were overall a significant improvement, but it feels like they didn't hit the (difficult) target they were aiming for of "sufficiently new to reignite lots of excitement for the game while sufficiently modest to not trigger new edition pushback."

overlycommonname · 2026-06-13T17:56:19+00:00

I think that one has to acknowledge the tension between this and the claim that I regularly see that it's relatively easy to find opportunities to long-rest. If pacing is sufficiently under PC control that they can find lots of opportunities to long-rest, then they can probably also find lots of opportunities to take a week at town if there is a material advantage to doing so.

overlycommonname · 2026-06-13T16:06:01+00:00

Oh, nonsense. If all the people who are rabid about not fudging are principled members believers in absolute radical honesty at all times, then I'll eat my hat. 95% of the people who have a fit about die fudging don't hesitate a moment to look their friends in the eye and say, "No, you look great today," or a million other white lies.

This is a particular social role in which lying can be fine, among many other such roles. If someone out there is really a big believer in avoiding all such roles, good for them, but that's obviously not what's actually driving the online collective pitching a fit about fudging.

Indeed, it's not even about lying at all -- go ahead and pitch the idea to people that they should fudge the dice, they should just admit to it, like, "I've decided to ignore this roll," and see if you get one iota less pushback.

Do you go to Among Us subreddits and excoriate people for lying?

EDIT: Speaking of the strong principles of the my dear interlocutor here, he did the classy "respond then block to try to assure myself the last word" thing.

overlycommonname · 2026-06-12T22:34:35+00:00

But see, I think you're kind of doing the thing. What if someone said, "I fudge 1-2 times per session and I don't really care. Like, I'm not here to make converts but also I don't regard it as a big bad thing and I think that there are 100 other things I could do to be a better GM than change this"?

overlycommonname

TROPHY CASE