Very cool concept, I see how it solves that awkward issue of a character taking the initiative narratively only to have the dice decide that they did not, in fact, take the initiative 😝
Love the Shadow of the Demon Lord initiative system--I remember reading the book and/or listening to Rob's Basement podcast where Schwalb was doing some playtesting, and he mentions how the feeling of "the foes are upon you, you rush to battle, now let's take a 2-3 minute break to get all the dice rolls we need" is kinda ridiculous and just going straight to combat definitely cuts down on the ludo-narrative dissonance! I think it's a bit less of an issue with VTTs nowadays of course. Kinda interesting that immediately all player characters have a very valuable reaction. Presumably monsters get reactions back at the top of the enemy phase, so this can be a really nice way to scoot before the big grabby creature gets its Reactive Strike back or whatever. It *does* somewhat devalue having really good perception for those classes who get it, as the initiative boost is a nice bonus for them, but Perception has value as a defense and in Exploration anyways, so I'm not too fussed. Maybe I'll give it a try in a little one shot sometime, would be a fun little shakeup.
Do you have any suggestions on how to approach character features that would normally add a bonus to a player's initiative? I like the idea of this variant quite a lot but I feel rough about the idea of completely disregarding a bonus that a PC might have towards initiative.
Oh, how fun! How do you feel about the "characters can choose to take a 2-action turn or a three-action turn. all the 2-action turns go first, then the three-action turns" sort of fast/slow initiative? I feel like that's the variant/homebrew I see discussed more regularly. Weird Initiative I think is tapping into a similar space, where there's agency and choice still as the large factor, just sacrificing the reaction instead, but it's interesting that in Weird Initiative you might choose to stick to the players' phase so that you can Take the Initiative next turn when you need it more.
That would be very similar to the system in Shadow of the Demon Lord, and I think it's definitely usable- but I avoided it for the supplement partially to keep things lightweight and partially because I think the three-action economy doesn't play particularly nice with the loss of full actions. I still think it's a fun alternative rule though! Just not for me.
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Very cool concept, I see how it solves that awkward issue of a character taking the initiative narratively only to have the dice decide that they did not, in fact, take the initiative 😝
That was a big design goal! I'm glad it came across well.
Love the Shadow of the Demon Lord initiative system--I remember reading the book and/or listening to Rob's Basement podcast where Schwalb was doing some playtesting, and he mentions how the feeling of "the foes are upon you, you rush to battle, now let's take a 2-3 minute break to get all the dice rolls we need" is kinda ridiculous and just going straight to combat definitely cuts down on the ludo-narrative dissonance! I think it's a bit less of an issue with VTTs nowadays of course.
Kinda interesting that immediately all player characters have a very valuable reaction. Presumably monsters get reactions back at the top of the enemy phase, so this can be a really nice way to scoot before the big grabby creature gets its Reactive Strike back or whatever. It *does* somewhat devalue having really good perception for those classes who get it, as the initiative boost is a nice bonus for them, but Perception has value as a defense and in Exploration anyways, so I'm not too fussed.
Maybe I'll give it a try in a little one shot sometime, would be a fun little shakeup.
Do you have any suggestions on how to approach character features that would normally add a bonus to a player's initiative? I like the idea of this variant quite a lot but I feel rough about the idea of completely disregarding a bonus that a PC might have towards initiative.
Oh, how fun! How do you feel about the "characters can choose to take a 2-action turn or a three-action turn. all the 2-action turns go first, then the three-action turns" sort of fast/slow initiative? I feel like that's the variant/homebrew I see discussed more regularly. Weird Initiative I think is tapping into a similar space, where there's agency and choice still as the large factor, just sacrificing the reaction instead, but it's interesting that in Weird Initiative you might choose to stick to the players' phase so that you can Take the Initiative next turn when you need it more.
That would be very similar to the system in Shadow of the Demon Lord, and I think it's definitely usable- but I avoided it for the supplement partially to keep things lightweight and partially because I think the three-action economy doesn't play particularly nice with the loss of full actions. I still think it's a fun alternative rule though! Just not for me.
If a character has one of the feats that give them a second reaction, can they take the initiative and still have the extra reaction available?
They cannot, as Taking the Initiative prevents them from using reactions until the next round.