Opposed dice rolls a thing of the past?

well really in a battle there isn't too much of a luck factor, but the soldiers in an army are of varrying skill. Therefore if one army has highly skilled soldiers they can defeat a larger opposing army, how ever to accurately simulate this you would need individual profiles for each unit like in an rpg. Now as you can imagine this would significantly complicate your game. In a game like risk (because i dont really play any other war game) all the players start out with equal chances, one nation doesnt have any advantages over the other. Dice rolls generalize specifics in the battle ie: how well soldiers are exploited, battle commands and attack patterns.
There are many alternatives to opposing dice rolls and you the game designer should think of one yourself. Im sorry but I'm not so great at designing war games. If anything comes to me I'll post it though.

Have you tried Heavy Gear by dream pod 9? It's a game that can be player either as a rpg, a tactical sci-fi game or both.

The combat system could interest you: uses only 6 sided dice, the higher the experience(rookie, experienced, veteran, elite) a unit has, the more dice you roll.

EX: rookie units rolled 1 die, experienced 2, veteran 3 and elite units 4.

You keep the highest result, each sixes add a +1 to the final result, results are then compared, highest wins the contest.

There were also pluses depending on skill levels(don't forget this was a mix of tactical and rpg, it worked very well in both aspects).

So, in this case, squads could have different skill levels in different important skills: small arms, tactics, leadership etc. And in varied situations, specific skill tests are rolled...

A very simple yet effective system.

I actually like opposed dice rolls, but there are different ways to do it and they have different strengths.

For example, one model is something along the model of "everyone throw the dice and 6's hit". This is fun, easy to understand, and everyone gets to be involved.

Another model is "attacker throw the dice, defender throw the dice, and compare rolls." As much as I like this mechanic in theory, I've found that in practice it has serious drawbacks.

For one thing, I've found that if you don't have a target number that you're rolling for, the suspense of rolling dice is pretty much eliminated. For some reason, "Come on, I need a 20!" is several orders of magnitude more enjoyable than "Come on, I need to beat the other person's roll!"

For another thing, since most interactions involve at least two attacks (one by each player), the die rolling becomes burdensome. Okay, now I roll to attack and you roll to defend. Now you roll to defend and I roll to attack...

Finally, often the defender has no options at the point that he's being attacked. He's only rolling the dice because he's forced to, which leads to the dreaded "do I have to?" feeling.

That's a pretty nasty triple-whammy: slowing down gameplay; taking away suspense; and involving players when they don't want to be involved.

Unfortunately, I personally really like the idea of players rolling against each other and I keep trying it over and over again in various game designs. So far, none have worked, and it's getting to the point where my playtesters groan when I say "opposed dice roll".

For one thing, I've found that if you don't have a target number that you're rolling for, the suspense of rolling dice is pretty much eliminated. For some reason, "Come on, I need a 20!" is several orders of magnitude more enjoyable than "Come on, I need to beat the other person's roll!"

That's a pretty nasty triple-whammy: slowing down gameplay; taking away suspense; and involving players when they don't want to be involved.

Unfortunately, I personally really like the idea of players rolling against each other and I keep trying it over and over again in various game designs. So far, none have worked, and it's getting to the point where my playtesters groan when I say "opposed dice roll".

My favorite opposing dice roll, from a game that I was working on two years ago is quick, easy and exciting for the players involved... Loser Takes the Difference as Damage. In that game, each player rolls a d10 in combat, possibly with a bonus or two added in for a weapon or innate ability. They compare their modified dice rolls. Subtract the low roll from the high roll, and the low roller's character takes that much damage. If there is a tied die roll, than nobody takes damage.

deleted post. sorry

I like the "loser takes the damage" approach also. I sort of think of this as simultaneous attacks. The two clash, and whoever is more successful does damage. You can do the same thing with number of successes - each person rolls a fistfull of dice, count the successes of each person and whoever has more wins.

Jeff, I personally haven't had much luck with the "defense dice" approach that you're using. The combat always ends up taking too long and the suspense element gets lost. That's not to say that it doesn't work in your game, of course, just that I haven't been able to get it to work.

It should be noted that I've yet to publish a game that actually uses dice...

My main question is why use a d8? Nothing against them, but, given that their range is greater, they increase the randomness, though the total of rolling fewer of them will generate the same maximum as a larger number of d6's. The more dice rolled, the stronger the bell curve, and the less random the outcome. By rolling fewer d8's, you're just weakening the curve and still doing the same amount of brainwork to add up multiple dice. So your not rolling "massive amounts" of dice, but rolling eight of any type of die is still rolling a lot, especially since the intent to total them.

Also, your numbers show problems. For instance, the chance of an infantry unit taking out a tank isn't heightened very much because of having an anti-tank rocket. The number of troops is still the deciding factor. Since the total of the roll is the only variable, a 15-man squad armed with anti-tank rockets has almost no chance of effecting a tank, since they can only roll a maximum of 40. As soon as they take any damage, they cannot do anything, as they'll be down to 4d8 again. Under these rules, it is far better to send 60 ill-equiped men to take out a tank, than 5 well-equipped men. This is the reverse of reality.

But I think this problem comes up because you have a single variable, and that's the nuber of dice rolled. Some things are best simulated in other ways, such as anti-tank weapons giving a straight +10.

That would probably be true if combat continued until one Unit was destroyed. In my game there is a single exchange, and if both Units are left standing the game just continues as normal. Also, in most attacks there is a decent chance that one, or both, Units will be eliminated and the dice results are critical, both for the Attacker and Defender.

There's no doubt that opposed dice rolls need to be used carefully. My original system was far more complex, and in the end I pared it down to the bare essentials for the reasons you noted - it was too long and killed the suspense. As it stands now a single round of combat takes about 15 seconds and then the game moves on.

A lot of it depends on scale. With a lot of units, combat should be quickly resolved and success/failure should probably be total (i.e. live or die). With a smaller number combat can be a bit more involved and units could probably experience partial damage as the game progresses.

In my game, there are usually no more than six units per side and most likely there are 4-5. 9 is theoretically possible, but highly unlikely. Thus, every unit is crucial and one or two wounds are very signficant.

This is not to say that it works in my game - I think it does but there's still plenty of testing ahead. However, I think the principles I outlined above have some merit. Certain opposed di roll systems will not work in some games but be just what the doctor ordered in others.

Jeff K.