Feature Discussion: Option to skip certain combatants in combat tracker

[Moon Wizard]

I'm looking at an option to be able to skip certain combatants in the combat tracker when advancing the turn.

Since it seems like this would be a very individual GM feature, I'd like to get an idea of what people would like to see in their game for a feature like this, as well as how you handle these situations in your game. I don't want to make this a blanket feature, since there are many unique situations in every campaign and for every GM.

While I will consider all the information presented, I'm going to try and keep a feature like this as simple as possible as well to keep UI confusion/expansion to minimum.

Specifically, I am looking at adding an option to skip combatants which are hidden and/or dying/dead.

Some questions:
* Should PCs be skipped when dying/dead? (or just NPCs)
* Should there be a differentiation between dying and dead? (again PC/NPC differentiation, and consider feats/abilities that allow action during dying state)
* Which options should be offered? (Skip when hidden, skip when dying/dead, skip when either, something else...)

The concept is to speed up play as well as to provide less information to players on "hidden" combatants, especially when preplacing units for ambushes or continuation battles.

Regards,
JPG

[JohnD]

Yes, skip when hidden/dead for NPCs but don't skip PCs.

[leozelig]

Agree with John D - skip hidden/dead NPCs.

[TASagent]

Third-eded

[damned]

I often have a number of NPC combatants hidden until after the battle begins. Hidden does not preclude them from acting though... Skipping dead/dying seems sensible to me.
Im not 100% sure but I seem to think that in the old v2 Castles&Crusades ruleset that if you set an actors INIT to 0 (or blank?) it would skip them? That doesnt work anymore (or it never dead and Im imaging it...) and I use the auto reroll init each round so that would bugger that too....

[Moon Wizard]

Yeah, that C&C hack falls apart with negative initiative modifier combatants, since they can actually have zero initiative. The only other way to do that is to add another checkbox to "skip" combatant, but that seems like creating as much work as solving plus UI proliferation.

Personally, I just click fast when changing initiative over hidden combatants, and my players don't even notice. Of course, they rarely advance the turn themselves, because they are lazy.

However, I wanted to explore this option. My thought was that the GM would handle the "skipped" combatant while handling the next actor or while the PC was doing their turn.

Regards,
JPG

[damned]

My thought was that the GM would handle the "skipped" combatant while handling the next actor or while the PC was doing their turn.

Yes that would work fine.
Jalador is swinging her Great Axe at the Trolls head when an arrow strikes her in the shoulder...

[TASagent]

Moon Wizard, how feasible is it to create a meaningful difference between Null and 0? IE, selecting the box and pressing delete clears the value, whereas setting it to 0 just puts him at that part of the initiative order?

[Mgrancey]

Most definitely agree on skip hidden or dead npcs, because right now it becomes apparent that there are more hidden or lurking npcs when tracker goes to ... nobody. Not sure how difficult it would be to mod but would be really nice.

[Moon Wizard]

The number fields in FG have no concept of null or undefined. So, it would have to be a completely separate database node and field, with a separate mechanism to set/unset null state.

I'm concerned that the null field fix in this situation doesn't really simplify anything in the long run.

JPG