Playing with Initiative

Earlier I mentioned how I was handling weapon damage for my hack of Moldvay/Cook/Labyrinth Lord. The question was raised: why bother lugging around a sword if it only does the same 1d6 damage as a dagger?

Good question. The answer is initiative.

Initiative is an iffy beast in ten second rounds. Ten seconds is forever in a fight. There’s going to be a lot of back and forth. But you need some way to decide who gets to wound the other guy first, unless you just say everything is simultaneous (which I was tempted to do).

So once you decide that initiative is important, there are all sorts of ways you can handle it. Highest Dexterity score, or fastest weapon, or longest reach. Of course, then you have to wonder which is most important. If a fast man is swinging a two handed sword at an average man wielding a short sword, who should have initiative?

Mr. Moldvay dispensed with all that headache by granting initiative to the luckiest. That is to say, it’s a dice-contest. Both sides roll a single d6 and the highest roll wins. If you are feeling fancy, you could do individual initiatives, which are handled the same way, but everyone rolls instead of just one roll per side, and you add an adjustment based on individual Dexterity scores.

I, however, lack Mr. Moldvay’s wisdom and gleefully charge ahead where angels fear to tread. Why would I do this to myself? Simply because I think your choice in weapons should matter. Weapons look and work differently because they’re made for different jobs. A sword is easy to wear and great for slicing up unarmoured foes. An axe is a bit unwieldy strapped to your belt, but it’s much better at busting through chain or getting around a shield. A mace or hammer is even better at hammering around heavily armoured opponents, while a flail is great at getting around shields, but doesn’t work well at all if you really just need to decapitate an insolent peasant.

Keeping that in mind, I’m banishing randomness from initiative and basing it solely on your choice of weapon. If you’re fighting with two weapons, your initiative is based on the lower initiative of the two.

How am I deciding what weapon gets which initiative? I’m using a variety of factors. First, and most important, is reach. If a weapon’s got reach, you have to deal with getting past the hurty part before you can get to the soft, squishy wielder on the other end. Reach is a function both of how long a weapon is, and how it’s wielded. If a weapon is meant to be swung, it might be longer than a stabbing weapon, but the stabber might arrive first since it doesn’t have as far to travel. Mass, of course, is another issue, since a weapon with less mass is faster and more maneuverable. Finally, there’s the weapon’s flexibility, the number of different ways it can be used to put the hurt on someone. A weapon with greater flexibility opens up more options for the skilled the warrior, while forcing the warrior’s opponent to be more cautious.

Ok, keeping all that in mind, here are the weapons:

WEAPON	DAMAGE	INITIATIVE	NOTES
Bastard sword	1d6	9	2d4 when wielded two-handed
Battle axe	2d4	8
Club	1d6	2
Dagger	1d6	4
Hand axe	1d6	3
Lance	1d6	9	Double damage on charge.
Mace	1d6	6
Pole arm	2d4	8
Short sword	1d6	7
Spear	1d6	10	Double damage when set to receive charge
Staff	Highest of 2d6	7
Sword	1d6	8
Torch	1d6	1	+ 1d4 burning damage
Two-handed sword	2d4	7
War hammer	1d6	5

And there you have it. Highest initiative, adjusted for Dexterity using the initiative adjustments listed in the Moldvay book, goes first. Fists have an initiative of 3 and feet 1. Missile weapons firing at range always go first. However, if someone is in your face with a melee weapon, you can’t fire. And I’ll have to come up with initiatives for monsters who don’t use weapons. As a general rule, canines and reptiles have initiative 5, felines and bears 6.

I like this for a number of reasons. First, it makes your choice of weapons more interesting. The spear is an excellent weapon, as it should be. There’s a reason it’s been a popular infantry weapon throughout the world since pre-history all the way up through the 20^th century. But a spear isn’t always welcome at social events, or easy to hide under your cloak like a short sword or dagger. The swords are still good choices, especially if you want to use a shield, but the staff remains an interesting choice for warriors on a budget.

Second, there’s no need to roll for initiative, with all the searching for the right die, then searching for any modifiers and all of that. We get all the benefits of individual initiative without waiting around for people to roll dice. Your initiative is a flat number, pre-calculated. If you know you’re attacking with a sword, then you know what your initiative is. Saving time is vital when you’re playing online and already dealing with the slowdowns of the ‘net and typing.