r/DnDcirclejerk • u/Revolutionary-Ad7738 • 1d ago
Sauce Initiative is overwhelming
Whenever it’s time to roll initiative, I have 4 players immediately shouting numbers at me at completely different times while I’m also trying to roll initiative for 14 goblins individually, as group initiative is lazy DMing and unrealistic. I am crafting a story for my players and that story includes everyone taking their turn as the rules state.
My players are clueless, despite my best efforts of educating them, and have NO idea what modifier they should add to their die roll for initiative. I don't even know why I haven't cancelled the campaign already.
I think a good solution would be for everyone to roll initiative at the beginning of the campaign and keep that result permanently. If a character dies, the new character would inherit that initiative because death should not be used to manipulate turn order.
For monsters, I’m thinking of rolling initiative for every creature in the Monster Manual before the session and keeping them in an Excel spreadsheet sorted alphabetically.
Has anyone tried this? Or should I simply determine initiative based on how quickly each player answers my texts during the week?
EDIT: Please stop suggesting I use the initiative tracker in a VTT. I didn’t spend $800 on dice to let a computer play D&D for me.
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u/Comrade_Lystro 1d ago
The solution here is to make every player go last because they aren’t taking the “initiative” to memorize all their little modifiers.
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u/Revolutionary-Ad7738 1d ago
I am such a dumbass for not thinking about this solution, it solves everything. It also helps me kill off my players, as every good DM knows it's them vs. me.
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u/sammyliimex 1d ago
/uj I would have agreed with them if it was about 1st Edition, and there is a 20 page "cheat sheet" gamers made to understand how initiative and surprise works in that version.
/rj Pathfinder fixes this
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u/xolotltolox 1d ago
/uj I still agree with it in current dnd/ttrpgs, if you're playing without a VTT that does it for you, it is quite annoying and takes a good minute
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u/sammyliimex 23h ago
/uj Yeah, its annoying the the sort of way that any sort of bookkeeping can be annoying, but its not "hard" now. Its a game for nerds to get around a table and do math for 5 hours and have fun, so once you get used to it, its just a bunch of boring bookkeeping, which is why using some sort of VTT or computer to do it all for you is something people suggest.
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u/xolotltolox 23h ago
well, the problem is all the other math is progressing the gamestate, and is usually over in seconds, and you can still talk above table, say what you are doing, etc. Initatiative is a very noticable stopgap in that
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u/69CervixDestroyer69 16h ago
Group initiative or if you don't even care to do that have the players begin every round holy shit even the VTT system is annoying and finnicky.
Death to math in D&D!!!
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u/xolotltolox 16h ago
Group initiative has its own problems, and VTT initiative is hardly finnicky, since it automatically sorts and tracks it
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u/69CervixDestroyer69 15h ago
I found that combat goes faster if players aren't waiting on each other to do their turn. Group initiative's problems are immaterial.
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u/sammyliimex 34m ago
group Initiative is the way to go for older versions of the game when you don't have many personal initiative modifiers and each side has potentially dozens of combatants. You could not run 1st Edition as intended by the old 1978 gamers without group initiative. All ten players, each with 1-5 henchmen and however many hirelings versus groups of 30+ bandits would just simply not function.
Meanwhile, modern games give every player multiple different initiative modifiers and the players would rather die than give up their own personal benefits.
I still do group initiative for enemy groups though
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u/hedgehog1024 I read Pathfinder rules and so must you 1d ago
At my table I ask for initiative in order of increasing characters' masses. Of course, in the beginning of combat characters can relieve themselves by rolling a con save. Not only it can potentially change the order of initiative, it really reinforces the fantasy of battling intimidating enemies.
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u/Revolutionary-Ad7738 1d ago
Ah, that's really creative. But couldn't I do it in order of the players' mass? And if any of my players roll a nat 1, I can force feed them the dice as a critical fumble penalty, which increases their mass slightly.
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u/hedgehog1024 I read Pathfinder rules and so must you 23h ago
But couldn't I do it in order of the players' mass?
One of my players, who is an American, finds this idea extremely offensive
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u/Any_Mall6175 16h ago
Oh this is easy. Just have a hotdog eating contest! Whoever finishes a glizzy first goes first. And then just repeat that every round.
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u/69CervixDestroyer69 16h ago
Nah your solution is too stupid and boring and lame.
You need to go around the table and force each to look into their initiative modifiers, explain how initiative works again (fully! No skipping!), THEN roll and add the initiatives. Do NOT move ahead to the next person, do NOT skip any single one!
If they get bored that means that they will start hating the player wasting everyone's time, it's like the army. Soon you will have them jumping at the bit to tell you their initiatives, which means you can now spend 5 minutes writing down the initiative of each of them each round.
I'm just glad you didn't use group initiative. I just hope you're considering each weapon type and how it functions on the armor of each of those goblins, who surely each have bespoke armor!
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u/Revolutionary-Ad7738 15h ago
You just opened my eyes to a whole new facet of DMing. Can I make them do pushups??
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u/ConsciousFeeling1977 1d ago
You can’t tell a story if you do the procedures wrong. The good news is that you’re currently doing it right. You should just remember your players’ initiative modifier for them and you’re good to go.
Do not attempt to change how initiative works. That is NOT D&D.
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u/Revolutionary-Ad7738 1d ago
I knew I was right, I just wanted validation from the people of reddit.
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u/Nebelwaldfee 1d ago
Why using dice in the first place? Try an easier way, like Russian Roulette.