Some time back, I ran a one-shot where the players were staying in a castle that had a magic sword housed in its basement. Each player had a different objective – one was to seize the sword for themselves, another was to study it, and another had to keep the others from reaching it.
The fourth player in the group had an entirely different objective that was unrelated to the sword at all – he was there to assassinate Lord Bentley, who owned the castle.
This player character – called Precious – got caught after attacking Lord Bentley’s . . . wife, Lady Shovonne. For some reason, he had it in for her (though perhaps not without reason – the players had gathered that she was sort of creepy). Anyway, Precious got imprisoned. Tried to escape twice. The second time he succeeded, resulting in him being chased by the guards through the castle’s lower levels up to the lady’s room on the third floor.
The Violence Begins
That’s when the violence happened.
The guard at the top of the stairs knocked Precious over with the haft of his halberd, sending him to the floor – which happened to be perfect for striking at the man’s unarmored legs with a stolen kitchen knife. Hamstrung, the guard went down.
Shovonne’s door in reach, another guard rushed Precious, halberd raised. My player was ready – a bit of sand from the dungeons below blinded the guard for a round, allowing for a quick follow-up with the knife to the back of his neck. Two down.
There were still more soldiers coming up the stairs, so through the door Precious went, finding his not-target, the lady of the keep.
His attack roll missed – I ruled it was because one of the servant ladies had tackled him from the side. A quick thrust with the knife sent his assailant back, and he landed a couple blows on Shovonne herself before the guards caught up with him. A couple nasty sword wounds later, and Precious was forced to flee through the window onto the roof.
The then proceeded to jump off of the roof into a hedge, breaking his neck. Ah, well.
The Nature of Narrative Combat
This was not really intended to be a combat-focused scenario – it was expected that players would use subterfuge and cunning to reach their objectives. As such, I wasn’t really planning to run any pitched battles here. The combat sequence detailed above was largely handled in a narrative fashion, with situations presented to the player as they came up.
Rulings trumped rules in most cases here. Why did Precious ignore the guard’s armor when he was attacking his legs? Because it made narrative sense to do so. Same for the stab to the other guard’s neck – he was blinded by sand, and the player got Advantage on the roll. In Lady Shovonne’s room, the miss with the knife was explained by an attack from a servant.
No rounds. No initiative. Only basic descriptions of positioning, a presentation of what opponents were doing, and a chance for the player to react. Sure, there were rolls and some combat mechanics thrown in, but the details came from imagination and rational thought about what was happening in the scene. The dice were our oracle, not our referee.
And it was cool! We got to watch an unarmored assassin take down a couple of heavily armed guards in quick succession using clever thinking and basic tools. All this from just describing the situation, getting input from the player on their response, and using dice and good sense to determine the outcome.
Narrative Combat Vs. Minigame Combat
Really, this is the core of most tabletop roleplaying games – observe the situation, say what you want to do, and resolve with GM adjudication and dice.
Yet in many games, combat ends up becoming its own little minigame (one which frequently becomes a slog). This is fine, of course – many people enjoy the tactical crunch of these kinds of scenarios. Most of my combats resemble this, in fact. Really, choosing which style to use depends on your priorities. Specifically, I’d say it’s about what role you want combat to play in your game.
Is combat supposed to be a game unto itself? If so, then minigame combat is probably where it’s at. If you find that the hobby is largely about min-maxing characters and conceiving of tactics grounded in cool intersections of game rules, then this is the way for you. If it’s about resource management and beating ticking timebombs, then it serves there as well.
However, if your game is more about the story of characters overcoming obstacles and doing cool stuff, then all that crunch may not be necessary. Just say what you want to do, chuck some dice if necessary, and roll with the results – even in combat. Of course, not every advantage needs to be obtained with a die roll – sometimes, you can just kick the door into a monster’s face. Roll 1d6 damage. The monsters are surprised. Why? Because the door getting kicked open is surprising. Don’t have to succeed a check to figure that out.
Sometimes you can just attack the guard’s legs because that’s where the narrator said you fell. Really, the rules are only there to protect players, not monsters.
Now, a Confession
Of course, I’d love to have more narrative combat in my games, yet for some reason, I struggle to break myself out of the mold of running combat by rounds and turns. It’s how I learned to play, and so it tends to be my default. The scenario above has been something I’ve had difficulty replicating, so I’d welcome a discussion on what can be done to achieve this kind of flow more frequently. Feel free to comment below!
In any case, I’ve got work to do, so until next time!
The Astral Wanderer is brought to you by poor fools brave heroes who meddle in affairs they shouldn’t – such as magic swords kept in certain lords’ basements. Comment, like, share, or shred this article! All proceeds go toward creating rehabilitation programs to help would-be assassins refrain from inventing their own mission objectives. Really.