Re: First Session Afterthoughts

[Demiurge]

For some reason the original post cannot be replied to.

My group played its first session of C&C last night, and it was a hit! Most of the players have played everything from 1E to 4E, so it was a bit like coming full circle for them. Here are some questions that came up during the game:

1. How many people actually use the engaging/disengaging rule in combats? It was the one thing that seemed to slow down combats a bit.

2. How many people use facing in combats?

3. Does anybody do mini-less combat? If so, how well does it work for you?

4. How long does the Illusionist's Disguise ability last?

1. You only do this if you want to leave a combat you are actively engaged in (i.e. your opponent is still alive and attacking you). It doesn't come up very often in my games.

2. This is important for several of the combat maneuvers so I'd recommend using it.

3. I use it about 50% of the time. For small fights it usually isn't needed. Minis do help with facing.

4. There's no easy way to put a time limit on this. Unless the illusionist does something to arouse suspicion I'd just play it by ear.

[alcyone]

1. I do. It helps to define what it means to be engaged, but once you have that, it works about as well as opportunity attacks (and doesn't preclude them), though they are not in the rules as written.
2. I use facing but it's more like, who did you melee last? Are you still engaged with them? Then you probably facing them. A lot of people seem to use the 3.5 idea of flanking instead of what C&C has; then facing is less important.
3, I have a lot of minis and battle mats and markers, and make good use of them, but I sometimes run mini-less. I definitely prefer mini-less in a situation where the battlefield is large and the party is yet to close to melee distance; otherwise you limit things a lot unless you have a huge table. An elf can see a long way, and archery and spells can do a lot. Plus you can be more imaginative with the terrain.
Once everyone closes to melee, it's helpful for my group to have the minis.
4. No one's used it in my game yet.