The unwritten rules of the Spar

[SmilingHypocrit]

Hello everyone, here'll be my first post on this magical thing called a forum and I would like to propose a topic on spars. They are things I find rather amusing to partake in, and can set a good scenario for two people to meet up, get to know one another, hone the skills a bit while being ‘social’ and so on – but there are a few things that keep me confused or pondering..

- One of those things would be turn-order. Seeing I myself favour and do my best to come up with somewhat lengthy and descriptive emotes, there’s some time required to write these things. But say, would I fight someone who would be content to just write a simple one-or-two liner each time, chances are that person would have the first strike on me each time; Now with that in mind, I ask if we can/should use a thing to determine who goes first and who goes last. In some occasions, it can be resolved by a simple emote PRIOR to a fight, such as a simple gesture to strike first to initiate combat but once you’re in the fight, it doesn’t always have to be trading blows one for one – I’d say. Do we, for example, make use of rolled dice and see who scores highest, or are there unspoken rules such as: When you strike first, you may strike first for x amount of turns before I get that honour. I only write and ask this because of how little actual information is found on the social rules of this, and I myself can end up slightly annoyed if I end up fighting someone who keeps sending rather cut-short emotes (( things like: grins and steps closer, quickly attempting to strike (me)´s ) (location) with his weapon )) almost as if he/she wants to guarantee always getting in the first strike – which can be considered an advantage in some situations if not most.

- Another question would be about matters like disarming, attempting to floor/trip someone, stuff that is not implemented in the game but would still pose a typical potential move in combat. If you’d fight me with say a polearm and use its lengthy haft to attempts to trip me with an attack to the feet or legs, I’d roll a check to see how my character would respond to that and either end up having to use a defend, charge, maybe even a skip-turn – or of course still be able to attack but I can understand why some people would not favour such an action. Is this a thing more likely to be an end-result of two people getting to know eachother OOCly and deciding this would be a fun addition to their spars, or should we all take to this to some regard? Luckily, I was recently told by a staffer that disarming will be put on the table for discussion soon – so I can look forward to that being potentially implemented, but my question remains.

- Then last (for now) would be if there is a certain right to call any unsportsmanlike behaviour when, for example, I would have struck for their left hand at left four times using a well-heavy mace and all they end up doing is grimace and grin in challenge at me – where a normal situation like that could have easily left you to change your approach or drop your weapon, suffer from say difficulty in continuing to relentlessly charge at me to get into your dagger-range etc. I know that in an actual fight, we all want to NOT see our characters die – so rules are more dark and shady, but a spar is like a match of sports and participation and fun are key-concepts bigger than coming out victorious.. Hence, I wonder if we or a majority/minority of the players have a set of such unwritten rules that we all claim to in such a bout.

Hit me up with your thoughts on the matter, hit me up with potential suggestions about other possible things one could implement into a spar – or hit me up with an invitation to come sparring!

[Dice]

A lengthy and thoughtful post! Myself, I abide by strict turn order in spars: if you attacked first, you keep attacking first, period. Otherwise, someone will get two attacks in a row before the other person attacks again, and I think that ends up being a bigger advantage/more likely to be impossible to overcome. I think this is definitely an unwritten rule almost everyone follows and is in line with our general requirement to take turns in any meaningful situation.

Regarding techniques that aren't coded: I personally eschew them. To do only a stat check to determine their success/failure skews the system, which is actually more about skills than stats. Since there's no way to handle these things yet, I just stick to regular attacks and defenses, though I do try to incorporate what my partner does into RP.

I like to use spars as a way to demonstrate my character's style, as well, and think about weapon choice+defense as an actual STYLE. A dagger/footwork fighter is going to be highly mobile, swift and agile in their methods, even if you aren't needing to codewise move between attacks, etc. A dagger/parry fighter might look very different.

[SmilingHypocrit]

Ah, yes: That is how I'd casually approach a combat-scene - but then, imagine taking a serious blow to the skull from a mace which can quite open up the scenario for the attacker to have thus created a window for him to strike in again.. To me, I'd find a roll to see if you can recover in time to not lose your turn-balance there a more appropriate response.. or not appropriate, but it seems more fitting. Same goes for missing say a swing of the halberd that you emoted would have likely caused a lot of your balance to be toppled by a failure, and if you would be fighting a dagger-wielding opponent, he/she too would have the potential of having a window to respond and even strike in twice. Again, this would - in my eyes - be a matter which you would either settle by a check if that balance indeed would have allowed for such an opportunity.

But aye, in the general scheme of things - I'd cling to 'who attacks first, moves first constantly' but I actually see some potential through both RP and small things like previously-mentioned to create scenes more unpredictable.

[Voxumo]

Firstly yes, turn-order seems to be a generally accepted rule, except when it comes to things like fighting non-player characters in events and whatnot. Typically I've found people aren't so worried about turn order then gennerally because it is chaotic, and these situations aren't typically friendly to long poses, though there are some, such as myself, who still like to try and get at least one meaningful long attack out in the chaos of things. But outside of npc fights, I almost always use long poses.

As for calling people out. Well that's up for debate. How I judge my character's reaction to attacks is based purely on how damaging the attack was, since that takes my defense into account. so let's say a person manages to hit the same spot 4 times in a row. If the attacks reads "Swings wildly about" I take that as meaning they basically grazed me, nothing too serious. But of course if all four attacks are 'critically' i'm gonna treat it differently and more serious.

As for techniques, again it falls under how damaging the attack was. If somebody tried a technique and their damage came out as "Swings wildly about" i would take that as they failed or my character was able to circumvent the technique since again, attacks take defense into consideration. But if the damage was like medium, I'd react to the technique, and pose it partially working to account for the attack. Massive damage, it worked. Though this is only for spars. When a character's life is on the line, I think it's bad tact to try a technique and expecting them to roll with it, such as if it's an attack that would disarm them.

[Dice]

I also think that we can't ever be fair in trying to account for all of these things without consistent rules. Is it fair to tell someone who wields a polearm that they should have to accept the drawback of possibly being slow and unwieldy when we don't give them the benefit of greater damage in return? What we choose to simulate is always going to be a narrow fraction of everything that truly enters into combat, and incorporating things outside of that window really departs from fairness.

Beyond that, too, there's the fact that TI combat is designed to be extremely bloody and quick-paced. Since almost all attacks hit, and it only takes a few attacks to down a person, a double hit or eschewing a round WILL lose you a fight, almost assuredly (unless there's a big difference between combatants). If there was a way to conveniently handicap yourself one rung on the table for your next attack to indicate a small disadvantage, sure, I'd be fine with that - but asking people to sacrifice an entire round to something RP-only is more or less asking them to lose a spar based on something that was never truly incorporated into the system in the first place.

I'd LOVE to see us add techniques! But I think we need to be careful about focusing too much on realism and not enough on balance and fair play.

[Applesauce]

Disclaimer: I am not a TI Combat Expert, and my limited practical experience fighting means I may be missing something obvious here.

That said, I have never been fond of strict turn order in fights. It seems if you have two evenly matched opponents, the person who attacks first EVERY time will tend to win. If we both start at 300hp and each turn knock 30hp off of each other, obviously my last hit will knock you out just before you get your last hit in. That seems unfair.

Because you can only perform one task per turn, I personally wouldn't see a problem with someone attacking second and then first. I can immediately do the same to them if I want - because they have to wait for the next round, *I'm* in control over when that round starts. I can prepare this turn's emote, next turn's emote, and fire them back to back to "regain" the advantage. More importantly, if I get that "extra" attack by going second and then first, I'm then "stuck" in first position unless you get a double attack too. I can't get a double attack and then somehow double attack again. That seems fairer than always going last or always going first...... When you start the spar, you can either get the first-hit advantage, or you can get the second-then-first advantage, but both players have some advantage.

Again, I have been in few fights so if two hits is a complete fight breaker then so be it, but honestly I would think that getting ONE cemote in between wouldn't save anyone who's at that much of a disadvantage.

[Dice]

I can admit I haven't stringently tested this, but the problem with two in a row is that your attacking ability is yoked to your HP. So two attacks in a row means that when you attack back, you're not 30 hp down, you're 60 hp down or more; even if you attack twice in a row in turn, your two in a row probably isn't comparable to their two in a row. And also, the bigger problem is this suddenly turns it into a typing contest - everyone racing to try and steal the first attack in the round.

For example, guy A and guy B are equal combatants. Guy A hits once, does 40 damage. Guy B smacks back and does 40, then hits again and does 40. Now A is going second and he's pissed. He's down 80 HP to his partner's 40; he HAS to do the same double attack in a row, but Guy B has a vested interest in not letting him. So now both partners have a reason to speed as much as possible to keep stealing the advantage back and forth from each other. I've seen this happen - I've seen even spars devolve into rushed flurries of nonsense emotes to maximize that first hit advantage.

Now, I suppose if you did it precisely so the first person to attack got hit by two in a row halfway through the fight and then it switched order over, that'd probably be pretty dang fair - but that'd require doing it once and once only in a very specific way.

Now, a cool fix for this (albeit probably a very difficult one) would be to resolve attacks simultaneously so that the penalties of the first attack didn't kick in until after your partner had replied - all HP damage and defense penalties and etc. only hitting people at the end of the round. Of course, this would very potentially mean somebody being ganged up on would take more damage than they even have HP, but it would be cool and cinematic and would keep turn order within a round from being such a big deal. I don't even know if this would be POSSIBLE.

But, in the interests of both fairness (probably) and good RP (definitely) I really prefer strict turn order, at least for 1v1.

[Voxumo]

Also as for the first to go likely being the one to win, this isn't true in the slightest. I've been involved in fights where someone who is lesser skilled than my fighter ends up winning because of bad rolls on my end. One missed attack can make all the difference in a fight.

[Applesauce]

Per Dice/Vox, consider me convinced.

[vaxin]

Ariel is correct. While there are lots of other factors that can unbalance a spar, between two grandmasters with even stats and skills going twice basically means you win.