The second every RPG published, Tunnels & Trolls uses simultaneous combat resolution. That's the thing that always gets me about OSR discourse...the Old School they are talking about tends to ignore all the old school games that aren't D&D.
A distinction here is I'm not talking about damage being applied simultaneously, I'm talking about all of the players' actions happening simultaneously, including fighting, moving, grappling, spellcasting, using items, etc.
In Tunnels & Trolls all of the players actions do happen simultaneously (there is one excpetion. As Zalman notes, that is because individual actions are narrated after the rolls, but it is simultaneous and continuous.
Simultaneous combat has it's roots also in D&D. In the AD&D DMG it states that when initiative rolls between the two opposing parties tie: "each party has equal chances for acting and that attacks occur simultaneously. In cases of equal initiative score, damage accrues to both groups regardless of what is inflicted." Initiative was a 1d6 roll so ties happened pretty often since you were usually only comparing 2 d6 rolls. My copy of the DMG was printed in 1979, so it's possible that versions of D&D prior to the first print of Tunnels and Trolls (1975) did not contain that language. Since AD&D was released in 1977 I'd have to comb through some OD&D books to find out. what I'm saying is it does have its Old School roots in D&D as well!
It is funny you mention that. I was just talking to a friend last week about this. I was contemplating streaming an AD&D1e campaign because everyone seems to ignore it and he (who started D&D with 2e) was talking about the "Dexterity Problem" where Dex is obviously the best stat for everyone because it impacts so many things. And I asked, "like what?" He mentioned initiative, and I had to point out that initiative was per side in AD&D1e, not per person. Thank you for bringing it up here!
So were does the individual initiative come in? Let me check my books, too.
Chainmail is per side.
OD&D from 74 uses the chainmail rules is per side.
Basic D&D...there it is. The Holmes Basic has combat individually by Dex once people get into melee range, with the example given showing individual turns. The Moldvay and Metzner Basic do start with the per side combat, but then discuss "Paired Combat" where it is individually by Dex. And since the OSR tend to focus almost exclusively on B/X and suspiciously ignores AD&D1e...I'm going to have to assume this is where this comes from. I don't have the 2e books--those are the only ones I don't have! But I'm going to have to assume individual turns with 2e, right?
Oh wow, this is excellent stuff! I love the confusion between you and the 2e player. I started with 3.5 but a few years back I did learn and run AD&D 2e. What's surprising about 2e is that it's mostly a continuation of the rules from 1e AD&D. This includes initiative! On page 124 of my revised AD&D 2e player's handbook: "To determine the initiative order for a round of combat, roll 1d10 for each side in the battle ... If both (or all) sides roll the same number for initiative, everything happens simultaneously."
I find it really fascinating that they moved from 1d6 to 1d10, presumably to reduce the frequency and confusion around simultaneous combat? I also think it's really fascinating that 2e, like 1e AD&D, actively discourages people from doing individual initiative in the text despite providing the rules for it. Really interesting that Basic D&D, the system praised for its simplicity and ease of play, had what AD&D considered the more complicated initiative and turn system.
But then why does your 2e friend remember individual Dex based initiative? Well, on pages 125 and 126 there are optional rules for "Group Initiative" and more importantly "Individual Initiative" which is based on each PC's and NPC's initiative roll. What's fascinating is that in none of these rules is Dexterity mentioned at a modifier. Almost everything else is, like what kind of weapon is being used, the attacking creature's size, type of magic item, etc.
So the question remains, why did someone playing AD&D 2e use Dex for initiative? In 2e, Dex affected a character's "Reaction Adjustment" which was used to determine whether a character was surprised or not in an unexpected encounter. This is contrasted to AD&D where these rolls were usually a fixed rate on 1d6 not affected by player stats and applied to a whole party. It's possible that many people Reaction and applied it to the individual initiative rules to simplify the modifiers. What's surprising is that this is exactly what I landed on when running 2e too to simplify initiative if I wasn't doing it in groups (which I did most of the time). I'd have to do a lot of research and interviews to see how common this practice of play was during Basic or 2e.
1e did have a Dex based individual initiative modifier...but that was for the group rolls, too...and not that big.
I had to correct my 2e friend (and a bunch of people who were 2e onwards) that 1e did not have THAC0. People keep saying that it did. That was 2e.
What's funny is that I found AD&D 2e a big departure from AD&D 1e...especially if you weren't using Unearthed Arcana options in 1e. It didn't make me mad that it was a big departure. But it did confuse me when people got so mad about 4e saying that all the other editions were basically the same and 4e was the first time there was this huge departure when...I found all of the editions to have big differences. They might have all looked the same on the surface...but 1e and 3.5 are very different. Heck! AD&D and D&D Basic are quite different!
T&T could be technically called simultaneous, but that's only because individual activity is abstracted away entirely. I think of "simultaneous" meaning there are separate parts in the first place, happening in synchronicity. What's more interesting to me is a system that is both simultaneous and preserves individual combat actions.
Excellent post. It would be awesome to see you review some more Mothership zines and adventures.
In addition, I recently got Delta Green, and I wonder what you would make of it. It is not OSR, but I find it to be a brilliant system that encourages truly fantastic player action and cooperation in a way that generally aligns with OSR principles.
The actual breakdown of actions from allies and enemies happening at the same time is tough for me ("did he swing at me BEFORE I moved or after?"). BUT I will always swear by side-based initiative.
When all the players share a turn, it becomes more simultaneous planning than simultaneous action. Letting the players determine their own initiative order creates instant strategic choices.
...and players that complete their turns nearly ALWAYS help out less experienced players still thinking through what they should do, a huge plus.
Yeah, I think in order to work, simultaneous initiative needs some structure in the GM side to answer questions like this. I would still have the players roll initiative, and that number would be used for resolving ambiguous cases like the one you describe (whereas something where it is obvious in fiction, like shooting at a foe who is closing to melee with you from across the room, doesn't require using initiative as a tiebreaker).
I'm writing a game and I've dabbled in designing a structured simultaneous combat. One thing I though might work better than a fixed initiative is to simply compare the results of the rolls for the actions (and if the action doesn't require a room to roll anyways). This way you don't have a separate initiative roll, and initiative isn't known before deciding an action.
Oh I have actions decided before the initiative roll for sure (and initiative is rerolled each round). "Comparing the rolls" doesn't work when (for example) you want to know if the orc can hit the wizard before the wizard moves away from it (unless you have rolling for movement).
I miss typed, when I wrote in brakets I meant to write: "(and if the action doesn't require a roll, you roll anyways)"
By this I mean that each roll has a double meaning, for the action and for the initiative. So if the action doesn't require the roll, you still roll since you need it for initiative, but in this case it doesn't influence the success of the action.
You could decide that all actions that don't roll for success roll with the same modifiers or you could say that each action has its particular ones, that's easily solvable.
Simultaneous combat is where I ended up after many years of house ruling B/X. I eventually ended up switching my campaign to ACKS (and at the author's recommendation kept the initiative rules from that system unchanged - for now), but I'm really happy with where my B/X simultaneous combat rules ended up. It's still my favorite initiative system.
I had this exact experience running Mothership. A while back Alan Gerding was talking about some hacks to Mothership he uses. Going off of the "Treat every fight like a boss fight," idea he never rolls to hit for monsters. I started doing that and combat really changed. The stand and bang combat of D&D completely disappeared. I would describe the situation and telegraph the enemy's attacks and it was up to the players to avoid danger and alter the situation. It was so much more tense and engaging.
Professor DM on dungeon craft basically plays this way and I use if for the games I run for kids - it keeps combat moving super fast but it can also trip me up with explaining how everything pans out at once - I often ask my players to describe how their successful attacks/actions work. Again? Prof dm has some great videos on how he runs combat this way and ive really taken a liking to it! Glad to see similarities in other systems!
That style of combat reminds me of a game published by Roll 10 called Burn Bryte. In it, a combat round works in 3 phases: 1) GM declares enemy and environment actions, 2) players take actions, and 3) enemies resolve actions, with the note that the GM can spend accumulated metacurrency to change a declared action out of phase.
It's not quite simultaneous, but gives a lot of similar vibes of moment-to-moment problem solving. For groups that prefer more structure or find simultaneous turns a challenge while liking the telegraphing, this hybrid type of system might be up their alley.
Love it! Combat taking hours to resolve has been one of my hang-ups with D&D.
Now take it one step further and resolve combat simultaneously in real time - everyone can move their units, roll to-hit & damage dice, cast spells, etc. at the same time. Players need a battle plan before combat begins and things get crazy!
Not exactly simultaneous combat in the sense of Mothership but your article brings to mind a few examples of initiative done in a similar fashion. The old Fighting Fantasy books from the early 1980s had the solo adventurer "rolling off" against the monster each round ... to quote INXS "sometimes you kick, sometimes you get kicked". Basic Fantasy RPG still has an initiative order but if two or more combatants roll the same number then they act simultaneously. Some editions (maybe all?) of Vampire: The Masquerade require players and the GM to declare actions, starting with the bottom of initiative then working up to the top, before the round is described in a manner that makes narrative sense (so quite similar to the Mothership example). Agon is a little like that too.
As can be seen from the comments, there are a couple of different ways that people can consider combat ‘simultaneous.’
I remember running simultaneous rounds in AD&D on init ties… which with the declaration phase introduces some complexities regarding ‘wasting’ actions and such.
One high-intensity thing you can do is bring in simultaneous *attacks* — really adding an element of risk, especially for non-melee specialists. (Kick or be kicked.) For great takes on this, see Troika! (and therefore Advanced Fighting Fantasy), Warlock!, and even Rangers of the Midden Vale — based on Knave 1e!
If you integrate Position & Effect from BitD you have an even more elegant way of handling problem solving and the stakes involved. I think some OSR/NuSR folks will wake up to this—we are already seeing hacks in the OSR/NuSR that are leaning this way. Problem solving is based upon the narrative situation and particulars and the Blades system handles this really well.
Ben, I strongly agree. I’ve played a few games that did view combat as simultaneous. OSR Tunnels and Trolls (not rebellions new mish mash which i do like but its not TnT). Uses it all happens at once combat and its pretty unique. There are a few others; Classic Traveller is also all resolution happens at once too. It does create a more dynamic problem oriented combat. Its interesting with Traveller because most ‘good’ players are using their actions to seek cover and then plan how to overcome. Riddle of Steel from memory also has this but not really in the way you wrote about as its more structured up front. Leverage literally treats ‘combat’ as a skill roll - that is you can take someone out of the scene with one successful skill check if you are smart about it. I think Mouse Guard may well be worth more of a look as from memory that used simultaneous combat too [although I think that games adventure construction system is its real innovation].
The only way I could see simultaneous combat working is if each player marks their action separately, like on a note card, that way as you go through them the players aren't changing their actions based on what others are doing. I love the idea, because all actions are supposed to take place at once but you're right that it ends up becoming sequential. Difficult task.
The second every RPG published, Tunnels & Trolls uses simultaneous combat resolution. That's the thing that always gets me about OSR discourse...the Old School they are talking about tends to ignore all the old school games that aren't D&D.
A distinction here is I'm not talking about damage being applied simultaneously, I'm talking about all of the players' actions happening simultaneously, including fighting, moving, grappling, spellcasting, using items, etc.
In Tunnels & Trolls all of the players actions do happen simultaneously (there is one excpetion. As Zalman notes, that is because individual actions are narrated after the rolls, but it is simultaneous and continuous.
Simultaneous combat has it's roots also in D&D. In the AD&D DMG it states that when initiative rolls between the two opposing parties tie: "each party has equal chances for acting and that attacks occur simultaneously. In cases of equal initiative score, damage accrues to both groups regardless of what is inflicted." Initiative was a 1d6 roll so ties happened pretty often since you were usually only comparing 2 d6 rolls. My copy of the DMG was printed in 1979, so it's possible that versions of D&D prior to the first print of Tunnels and Trolls (1975) did not contain that language. Since AD&D was released in 1977 I'd have to comb through some OD&D books to find out. what I'm saying is it does have its Old School roots in D&D as well!
It is funny you mention that. I was just talking to a friend last week about this. I was contemplating streaming an AD&D1e campaign because everyone seems to ignore it and he (who started D&D with 2e) was talking about the "Dexterity Problem" where Dex is obviously the best stat for everyone because it impacts so many things. And I asked, "like what?" He mentioned initiative, and I had to point out that initiative was per side in AD&D1e, not per person. Thank you for bringing it up here!
So were does the individual initiative come in? Let me check my books, too.
Chainmail is per side.
OD&D from 74 uses the chainmail rules is per side.
Basic D&D...there it is. The Holmes Basic has combat individually by Dex once people get into melee range, with the example given showing individual turns. The Moldvay and Metzner Basic do start with the per side combat, but then discuss "Paired Combat" where it is individually by Dex. And since the OSR tend to focus almost exclusively on B/X and suspiciously ignores AD&D1e...I'm going to have to assume this is where this comes from. I don't have the 2e books--those are the only ones I don't have! But I'm going to have to assume individual turns with 2e, right?
Oh wow, this is excellent stuff! I love the confusion between you and the 2e player. I started with 3.5 but a few years back I did learn and run AD&D 2e. What's surprising about 2e is that it's mostly a continuation of the rules from 1e AD&D. This includes initiative! On page 124 of my revised AD&D 2e player's handbook: "To determine the initiative order for a round of combat, roll 1d10 for each side in the battle ... If both (or all) sides roll the same number for initiative, everything happens simultaneously."
I find it really fascinating that they moved from 1d6 to 1d10, presumably to reduce the frequency and confusion around simultaneous combat? I also think it's really fascinating that 2e, like 1e AD&D, actively discourages people from doing individual initiative in the text despite providing the rules for it. Really interesting that Basic D&D, the system praised for its simplicity and ease of play, had what AD&D considered the more complicated initiative and turn system.
But then why does your 2e friend remember individual Dex based initiative? Well, on pages 125 and 126 there are optional rules for "Group Initiative" and more importantly "Individual Initiative" which is based on each PC's and NPC's initiative roll. What's fascinating is that in none of these rules is Dexterity mentioned at a modifier. Almost everything else is, like what kind of weapon is being used, the attacking creature's size, type of magic item, etc.
So the question remains, why did someone playing AD&D 2e use Dex for initiative? In 2e, Dex affected a character's "Reaction Adjustment" which was used to determine whether a character was surprised or not in an unexpected encounter. This is contrasted to AD&D where these rolls were usually a fixed rate on 1d6 not affected by player stats and applied to a whole party. It's possible that many people Reaction and applied it to the individual initiative rules to simplify the modifiers. What's surprising is that this is exactly what I landed on when running 2e too to simplify initiative if I wasn't doing it in groups (which I did most of the time). I'd have to do a lot of research and interviews to see how common this practice of play was during Basic or 2e.
1e did have a Dex based individual initiative modifier...but that was for the group rolls, too...and not that big.
I had to correct my 2e friend (and a bunch of people who were 2e onwards) that 1e did not have THAC0. People keep saying that it did. That was 2e.
What's funny is that I found AD&D 2e a big departure from AD&D 1e...especially if you weren't using Unearthed Arcana options in 1e. It didn't make me mad that it was a big departure. But it did confuse me when people got so mad about 4e saying that all the other editions were basically the same and 4e was the first time there was this huge departure when...I found all of the editions to have big differences. They might have all looked the same on the surface...but 1e and 3.5 are very different. Heck! AD&D and D&D Basic are quite different!
Yeah I was very confused reading this, I thought simultaneous combat was the norm?
T&T could be technically called simultaneous, but that's only because individual activity is abstracted away entirely. I think of "simultaneous" meaning there are separate parts in the first place, happening in synchronicity. What's more interesting to me is a system that is both simultaneous and preserves individual combat actions.
Classic Traveller used simultaneous combat rounds. So that puts it back at 1977.
Advanced Fighting Fantasy has simultaneous combat resolution. Exactly like how you describe.
That's really interesting. I've played the solo books, but not the RPG
Although the combat sequence is better elaborated in the Core rules,
here are the free quickstart rules: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/108092/advanced-fighting-fantasy-quickstartAdvanced Fighting Fantasy Quickstart - Arion Games | Advanced Fighting Fantasy | DriveThruRPG
Excellent post. It would be awesome to see you review some more Mothership zines and adventures.
In addition, I recently got Delta Green, and I wonder what you would make of it. It is not OSR, but I find it to be a brilliant system that encourages truly fantastic player action and cooperation in a way that generally aligns with OSR principles.
The actual breakdown of actions from allies and enemies happening at the same time is tough for me ("did he swing at me BEFORE I moved or after?"). BUT I will always swear by side-based initiative.
When all the players share a turn, it becomes more simultaneous planning than simultaneous action. Letting the players determine their own initiative order creates instant strategic choices.
...and players that complete their turns nearly ALWAYS help out less experienced players still thinking through what they should do, a huge plus.
Yeah, I think in order to work, simultaneous initiative needs some structure in the GM side to answer questions like this. I would still have the players roll initiative, and that number would be used for resolving ambiguous cases like the one you describe (whereas something where it is obvious in fiction, like shooting at a foe who is closing to melee with you from across the room, doesn't require using initiative as a tiebreaker).
I'm writing a game and I've dabbled in designing a structured simultaneous combat. One thing I though might work better than a fixed initiative is to simply compare the results of the rolls for the actions (and if the action doesn't require a room to roll anyways). This way you don't have a separate initiative roll, and initiative isn't known before deciding an action.
Oh I have actions decided before the initiative roll for sure (and initiative is rerolled each round). "Comparing the rolls" doesn't work when (for example) you want to know if the orc can hit the wizard before the wizard moves away from it (unless you have rolling for movement).
I miss typed, when I wrote in brakets I meant to write: "(and if the action doesn't require a roll, you roll anyways)"
By this I mean that each roll has a double meaning, for the action and for the initiative. So if the action doesn't require the roll, you still roll since you need it for initiative, but in this case it doesn't influence the success of the action.
You could decide that all actions that don't roll for success roll with the same modifiers or you could say that each action has its particular ones, that's easily solvable.
Simultaneous combat is where I ended up after many years of house ruling B/X. I eventually ended up switching my campaign to ACKS (and at the author's recommendation kept the initiative rules from that system unchanged - for now), but I'm really happy with where my B/X simultaneous combat rules ended up. It's still my favorite initiative system.
https://thedwarfdiedagain.blogspot.com/2023/01/my-house-rules-for-bx-d-v24.html
It's cool too see convergent development on this issue
I had this exact experience running Mothership. A while back Alan Gerding was talking about some hacks to Mothership he uses. Going off of the "Treat every fight like a boss fight," idea he never rolls to hit for monsters. I started doing that and combat really changed. The stand and bang combat of D&D completely disappeared. I would describe the situation and telegraph the enemy's attacks and it was up to the players to avoid danger and alter the situation. It was so much more tense and engaging.
Professor DM on dungeon craft basically plays this way and I use if for the games I run for kids - it keeps combat moving super fast but it can also trip me up with explaining how everything pans out at once - I often ask my players to describe how their successful attacks/actions work. Again? Prof dm has some great videos on how he runs combat this way and ive really taken a liking to it! Glad to see similarities in other systems!
That style of combat reminds me of a game published by Roll 10 called Burn Bryte. In it, a combat round works in 3 phases: 1) GM declares enemy and environment actions, 2) players take actions, and 3) enemies resolve actions, with the note that the GM can spend accumulated metacurrency to change a declared action out of phase.
It's not quite simultaneous, but gives a lot of similar vibes of moment-to-moment problem solving. For groups that prefer more structure or find simultaneous turns a challenge while liking the telegraphing, this hybrid type of system might be up their alley.
Love it! Combat taking hours to resolve has been one of my hang-ups with D&D.
Now take it one step further and resolve combat simultaneously in real time - everyone can move their units, roll to-hit & damage dice, cast spells, etc. at the same time. Players need a battle plan before combat begins and things get crazy!
Not exactly simultaneous combat in the sense of Mothership but your article brings to mind a few examples of initiative done in a similar fashion. The old Fighting Fantasy books from the early 1980s had the solo adventurer "rolling off" against the monster each round ... to quote INXS "sometimes you kick, sometimes you get kicked". Basic Fantasy RPG still has an initiative order but if two or more combatants roll the same number then they act simultaneously. Some editions (maybe all?) of Vampire: The Masquerade require players and the GM to declare actions, starting with the bottom of initiative then working up to the top, before the round is described in a manner that makes narrative sense (so quite similar to the Mothership example). Agon is a little like that too.
As can be seen from the comments, there are a couple of different ways that people can consider combat ‘simultaneous.’
I remember running simultaneous rounds in AD&D on init ties… which with the declaration phase introduces some complexities regarding ‘wasting’ actions and such.
One high-intensity thing you can do is bring in simultaneous *attacks* — really adding an element of risk, especially for non-melee specialists. (Kick or be kicked.) For great takes on this, see Troika! (and therefore Advanced Fighting Fantasy), Warlock!, and even Rangers of the Midden Vale — based on Knave 1e!
If you integrate Position & Effect from BitD you have an even more elegant way of handling problem solving and the stakes involved. I think some OSR/NuSR folks will wake up to this—we are already seeing hacks in the OSR/NuSR that are leaning this way. Problem solving is based upon the narrative situation and particulars and the Blades system handles this really well.
Ben, I strongly agree. I’ve played a few games that did view combat as simultaneous. OSR Tunnels and Trolls (not rebellions new mish mash which i do like but its not TnT). Uses it all happens at once combat and its pretty unique. There are a few others; Classic Traveller is also all resolution happens at once too. It does create a more dynamic problem oriented combat. Its interesting with Traveller because most ‘good’ players are using their actions to seek cover and then plan how to overcome. Riddle of Steel from memory also has this but not really in the way you wrote about as its more structured up front. Leverage literally treats ‘combat’ as a skill roll - that is you can take someone out of the scene with one successful skill check if you are smart about it. I think Mouse Guard may well be worth more of a look as from memory that used simultaneous combat too [although I think that games adventure construction system is its real innovation].
The only way I could see simultaneous combat working is if each player marks their action separately, like on a note card, that way as you go through them the players aren't changing their actions based on what others are doing. I love the idea, because all actions are supposed to take place at once but you're right that it ends up becoming sequential. Difficult task.
IIRC the way Mothership 1E handles combat was influenced by my post about using simultaneous resolution in Mothership 0E:
https://www.traaa.sh/no-initiative-action-for-mothership
a lot of my house rules for 0E wound up in the 1E rulebook :)
https://www.traaa.sh/mothership-house-rules
That's really cool! I'm hoping it becomes a more common way to doing combat in OSR games.