3rd. Edition was the first of the editions to even present grids in the combat rules.
AD&D DMG p69 has grids. And, well, here's a Gygax quote from Dragon #346.
When I picked up a bag of plastic monsters made in Hong Kong at the local dime store to add to the sand table array--we were playing Chainmail Fantasy Supplement miniatures at a 1:1 scale, there was the figurine that looked rather like a lobster with a propeller on its tail. As we assigned names and stats to these critters, bulette and owl bear, for instance, nothing fearsome came to mind regarding the one with the projecting feelers. Then inspiration struck me. It was a "rust monster," a thing whose touch turned ferrous metals to ferrous oxide, even magical steel armor or enchanted iron or steel weapons. The players soon learned to hit one with spells and arrows so as to slay it at a distance. When one appeared in the D&D game, usually in a dungeon setting, there was great haste to remove from its vicinity if there was no sure and quick means of destroying it at hand.
Players can do things like this even when using a battle map. But don't pretend theatre of the mind—which involves more use of observation and description than does simply thinking of the game in terms of distances—can't be strategic and tactical; it can. Your example is a gross misrepresentation of what it involves.
I wasn't giving an example of theater of the mind. I was giving an example of the type of fight where a map adds nothing of value. However, your example isn't an example of strategic and tactical, it's an example of the power of ignoring the rules.
The example given was not strategy at all. With squinting, maybe tactics. What was being illustrated is flexibility in the imagery being presented. Sometimes having minis, maps etc can narrow people's vision somewhat and get them into the trap if thinking the world in terms of "30' of movement, I can Attack, I can Cast...[etc]", like a videogame.
On the other hand, TotM does increase cognitive load as well as massively inflating the clarifications phase of a player's turn - which I find also interferes with the level of engagement, imaginative use of the world, etc.
They both have their problems and challenges to overcome. Personally, I find the challenges of grid combat easier to overcome. With TotM, how well it goes depends on how easy they find it to imagine, how capable their memory is, how distracted they are, how tired they are. All stuff that is mostly outside of my control or influence. With gridded combat, I tend to find that it's fine so long as I'm leading the charge as DM. If I'm being inventive, engaging with the world around my characters, seeing it as a story rather than simply a game, then the players follow that lead.
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If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
I despise theater of the mind as both a player and a DM. I find no matter how detailed a description no two people are going to see the same scene in their head which negates strategy and tactics.
There isn't a lot of strategy and tactics to "Okay, the door is a mimic and tries to eat you. Everyone, pound on it before it succeeds".
Sounds like a boring encounter that I would never run.
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Lightning Strike - A rebranded Fire Bolt for Wizards & Sorcerers.
Spirit Bomb - A holy fireball for Clerics, Paladins, & Divine Soul Sorcerers!
Sword Dancer - A Cleric subclass specifically for the Drow goddess Eilistraee.
Aphantasia. About 5% of the population doesn’t visualize anything at all in their head. I have always preferred a map for combats but only recently realized that other people actually “see” the stuff they are imagining—like an image they can turn over, rotate, zoom in and out to inspect etc. Husband even reports that when he reads a book, he basically plays a movie of it in his brain!
It’s not a lack of imagination, it’s likened to having a monitor that is not plugged into a computer processor; all the information is there, it just isn’t visually displayed. I didn’t know any better as I have always been like this. I’m actually pretty exceptional at recognizing actors and such even though I don’t “see” them in my head. I just know what things look like somehow. It was an interesting thing to learn about myself and others.
You are correct to point out that the DMG did make use of grids. To show how many opponents a single figure could face. That's it. This is hardly comparable to their use in 3rd. Edition and beyond.
The idea that D&D, a game that came out of the world of wargaming, and had a large market in miniatures around it (does the name Ral Partha ring a bell?), didn't do battle maps until 3e brought in the newfangled innovation is absurd. They have, save in 4th edition, always been optional.
Perhaps you didn't play that way. Neither did I. But they've always been there, and always been popular. Neither is an inherently superior way to play, and the idea that TotM allows for anything you can't also do with battle maps is unsupportable -- your example could just as easily be done by a battle map group.
(Now, battle maps do allow for strategy you can't do in TotM, but not everyone cares about that kind of careful use of positioning and maneuver.)
While it is true that any plan to tackle a problem is strictly speaking a strategy or tactic, that is not what is generally meant colloquially in the D&D community. The example you provided earlier is neither helped nor hindered by the existence of a map because it has little to do with relative positioning on the playing field. Most groups use maps to answer questions like “Am I in range?”, “How many people can I fit in this 20’ radius?”, “Will I catch my allies in this AoE?”, “Do I have line of sight on that mob?”, “How far is it to the door?”, “Can I move over there without provoking an AoO?” etc. The sorts of things that you did not address at all in your strategizing.
Maps also provide a real time update as combat progresses. This helps move the game along faster because people can plan organically while it is not their turn and there is less need to for each player to quiz the DM on details that are readily apparent. It’s not about imagination or the lack thereof, it’s about how you want to spend your time at the table—recapping the field of play, answering the player’s questions and then having them take their turn or simply answering the player’s questions and then having them take their turn. With a map, you can skip a whole, often lengthy step.
Aphantasia. About 5% of the population doesn’t visualize anything at all in their head. I have always preferred a map for combats but only recently realized that other people actually “see” the stuff they are imagining—like an image they can turn over, rotate, zoom in and out to inspect etc. Husband even reports that when he reads a book, he basically plays a movie of it in his brain!
It’s not a lack of imagination, it’s likened to having a monitor that is not plugged into a computer processor; all the information is there, it just isn’t visually displayed. I didn’t know any better as I have always been like this. I’m actually pretty exceptional at recognizing actors and such even though I don’t “see” them in my head. I just know what things look like somehow. It was an interesting thing to learn about myself and others.
Fascinating. If you don't mind my asking, how does that affect your ability to be immersed in the game? Like, when I'm playing, I'll have a mental image in my head and that's how I get immersed. I'll imagine the people talking, taking the actions, and doing whatever. Obviously, you don't get that scene in front of your imagination's eyes, as it were, but do you still understand how things are happening like that? Or do you interact on a more factual basis (eg just remembering that they're 20ft away from another creature, they're outside of Reach but inside of your hand-crossbow range, etc)?
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If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
3rd. Edition was the first of the editions to even present grids in the combat rules.
AD&D DMG p69 has grids.
I’m 99% sure the BECMI red box included grid paper and had a section in the books regarding mapping. I don’t have mine anymore to verify but, when I was little, I spent soooo many hours drawing soooooo many maps.
You are correct to point out that the DMG did make use of grids. To show how many opponents a single figure could face. That's it. This is hardly comparable to their use in 3rd. Edition and beyond.
The AD&D DMG provides a lot of detail on the use of miniatures and even grids. There is an entire section entitled “Use of Miniature Figures with the Game” that discusses how corporeal objects can help track movement, range, position in combat, etc. This section does not discuss grids specifically, but does go into detail on using measurements (like war games) to calculate distances. (AD&D DMG Page 10). Grids, after all, are not necessary to miniture play - they exist as a shortcut so you do not have to constantly be breaking out a ruler.
The use of minitures with a grid is explicitly covered in the “conducting combat” section, where it discusses using a hex grid to calculate movement. In fact, if specifically advocates for the use of minitures and a grid, saying it is the “more accurate” way to play. (AD&D Page 52). The section you reference about where a character faces is found on Page 69. In the example “how to run a game dialogue” the scenario specifically spells out that some of the theater of the mind segments can be shortcutted by just moving miniatures. (AD&D DMG Page 98).
It is abundantly clear that miniature play and grids are a foundational component of the game. Perhaps you did not play that way - which is, of course, fine! - but you are incorrectly trying to generalize your experiences to the game as a whole. The plain text of the AD&D DMG repeatedly makes it clear that miniature use and grids were not just supported in the early game, they were actively encouraged as a more accurate way to play.
Aphantasia. About 5% of the population doesn’t visualize anything at all in their head. I have always preferred a map for combats but only recently realized that other people actually “see” the stuff they are imagining—like an image they can turn over, rotate, zoom in and out to inspect etc. Husband even reports that when he reads a book, he basically plays a movie of it in his brain!
It’s not a lack of imagination, it’s likened to having a monitor that is not plugged into a computer processor; all the information is there, it just isn’t visually displayed. I didn’t know any better as I have always been like this. I’m actually pretty exceptional at recognizing actors and such even though I don’t “see” them in my head. I just know what things look like somehow. It was an interesting thing to learn about myself and others.
Fascinating. If you don't mind my asking, how does that affect your ability to be immersed in the game? Like, when I'm playing, I'll have a mental image in my head and that's how I get immersed. I'll imagine the people talking, taking the actions, and doing whatever. Obviously, you don't get that scene in front of your imagination's eyes, as it were, but do you still understand how things are happening like that? Or do you interact on a more factual basis (eg just remembering that they're 20ft away from another creature, they're outside of Reach but inside of your hand-crossbow range, etc)?
It’s hard to describe. I would say a little from column A and a little from column B. A map is very helpful and I keep track of things based on the facts—20’ away, outside of reach etc. At the same time, I feel immersed. I have a good sense of what is going on but, as you say, I don’t observe the action unfolding in my mind’s eye. It’s weird: the same way I just know that guy on TV is some obscure actor most others wouldn’t recognize, somehow I just know what’s happening in the game.
Fascinating. If you don't mind my asking, how does that affect your ability to be immersed in the game? Like, when I'm playing, I'll have a mental image in my head and that's how I get immersed
Aphantasia, the inability to voluntarily visualize mental images, affects about 1% of the population. %1 of 8.1 Billion is 80,000,000 people with no internal vision. There is a spectrum of this, where there are even more millions who have difficulty with mental imagery and then at the other end there are people with extremely vivid internal visualization.
Then there's people who just go into la-la-land when information is dumped on them. Maybe four new elements of data, and woosh, they are out to the twilight zone until you can snap them back to earth.
Or they are hearing all the information, processing it, and entirely lost in a visual reenactment of it all, and their brain is so tied up in the visualization that when they are called on to speak the brain forget how to form words, it was so happy with someone else's words and the pretty pictures within it's own domain.
I know, coming to terms with people being different from us on levels that are beyond our comprehension is very hard to maintain a grasp on. It's not like people come with stat blocks we can check and say "Oh you are vulnerable to audible stimulation and immune to sarcasm!" Maybe next year
Oh but to the point: THEATRE OF THE MIND FOREVER / with cheat days for a good MMO
I started with AD&D and it had grids in one of the books. We just never bothered with them because we had smaller scale fights ( and were children sitting on a floor )
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He/Him. Loooooooooong time Player. The Dark days of the THAC0 system are behind us.
"Hope is a fire that burns in us all If only an ember, awaiting your call To rise up in triumph should we all unite The spark for change is yours to ignite." Kalandra - The State of the World
Theater of the Mind is fine for me until combat. I get confused very easily on where everyone is or what exactly we're facing without a constant reminder. Otherwise I don't mind and I enjoy the active work I have to do for myself. Miniatures are preferred for me since I also like to see what everyone wants me to see their character as.
I can't imagine why anyone would play shadow of the mind, when there are an abundance of map generators as well as modules that comes with maps. I haven't done theater of the mind since I was in my teens
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AD&D DMG p69 has grids. And, well, here's a Gygax quote from Dragon #346.
I wasn't giving an example of theater of the mind. I was giving an example of the type of fight where a map adds nothing of value. However, your example isn't an example of strategic and tactical, it's an example of the power of ignoring the rules.
The example given was not strategy at all. With squinting, maybe tactics. What was being illustrated is flexibility in the imagery being presented. Sometimes having minis, maps etc can narrow people's vision somewhat and get them into the trap if thinking the world in terms of "30' of movement, I can Attack, I can Cast...[etc]", like a videogame.
On the other hand, TotM does increase cognitive load as well as massively inflating the clarifications phase of a player's turn - which I find also interferes with the level of engagement, imaginative use of the world, etc.
They both have their problems and challenges to overcome. Personally, I find the challenges of grid combat easier to overcome. With TotM, how well it goes depends on how easy they find it to imagine, how capable their memory is, how distracted they are, how tired they are. All stuff that is mostly outside of my control or influence. With gridded combat, I tend to find that it's fine so long as I'm leading the charge as DM. If I'm being inventive, engaging with the world around my characters, seeing it as a story rather than simply a game, then the players follow that lead.
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
Sounds like a boring encounter that I would never run.
Lightning Strike - A rebranded Fire Bolt for Wizards & Sorcerers.
Spirit Bomb - A holy fireball for Clerics, Paladins, & Divine Soul Sorcerers!
Sword Dancer - A Cleric subclass specifically for the Drow goddess Eilistraee.
Quicksilver & The Scarlet Witch - A pair of magical firearms for your Gunslinger or Artificer.
Aphantasia. About 5% of the population doesn’t visualize anything at all in their head. I have always preferred a map for combats but only recently realized that other people actually “see” the stuff they are imagining—like an image they can turn over, rotate, zoom in and out to inspect etc. Husband even reports that when he reads a book, he basically plays a movie of it in his brain!
It’s not a lack of imagination, it’s likened to having a monitor that is not plugged into a computer processor; all the information is there, it just isn’t visually displayed. I didn’t know any better as I have always been like this. I’m actually pretty exceptional at recognizing actors and such even though I don’t “see” them in my head. I just know what things look like somehow. It was an interesting thing to learn about myself and others.
The idea that D&D, a game that came out of the world of wargaming, and had a large market in miniatures around it (does the name Ral Partha ring a bell?), didn't do battle maps until 3e brought in the newfangled innovation is absurd. They have, save in 4th edition, always been optional.
Perhaps you didn't play that way. Neither did I. But they've always been there, and always been popular. Neither is an inherently superior way to play, and the idea that TotM allows for anything you can't also do with battle maps is unsupportable -- your example could just as easily be done by a battle map group.
(Now, battle maps do allow for strategy you can't do in TotM, but not everyone cares about that kind of careful use of positioning and maneuver.)
While it is true that any plan to tackle a problem is strictly speaking a strategy or tactic, that is not what is generally meant colloquially in the D&D community. The example you provided earlier is neither helped nor hindered by the existence of a map because it has little to do with relative positioning on the playing field. Most groups use maps to answer questions like “Am I in range?”, “How many people can I fit in this 20’ radius?”, “Will I catch my allies in this AoE?”, “Do I have line of sight on that mob?”, “How far is it to the door?”, “Can I move over there without provoking an AoO?” etc. The sorts of things that you did not address at all in your strategizing.
Maps also provide a real time update as combat progresses. This helps move the game along faster because people can plan organically while it is not their turn and there is less need to for each player to quiz the DM on details that are readily apparent. It’s not about imagination or the lack thereof, it’s about how you want to spend your time at the table—recapping the field of play, answering the player’s questions and then having them take their turn or simply answering the player’s questions and then having them take their turn. With a map, you can skip a whole, often lengthy step.
Fascinating. If you don't mind my asking, how does that affect your ability to be immersed in the game? Like, when I'm playing, I'll have a mental image in my head and that's how I get immersed. I'll imagine the people talking, taking the actions, and doing whatever. Obviously, you don't get that scene in front of your imagination's eyes, as it were, but do you still understand how things are happening like that? Or do you interact on a more factual basis (eg just remembering that they're 20ft away from another creature, they're outside of Reach but inside of your hand-crossbow range, etc)?
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
I’m 99% sure the BECMI red box included grid paper and had a section in the books regarding mapping. I don’t have mine anymore to verify but, when I was little, I spent soooo many hours drawing soooooo many maps.
The AD&D DMG provides a lot of detail on the use of miniatures and even grids. There is an entire section entitled “Use of Miniature Figures with the Game” that discusses how corporeal objects can help track movement, range, position in combat, etc. This section does not discuss grids specifically, but does go into detail on using measurements (like war games) to calculate distances. (AD&D DMG Page 10). Grids, after all, are not necessary to miniture play - they exist as a shortcut so you do not have to constantly be breaking out a ruler.
The use of minitures with a grid is explicitly covered in the “conducting combat” section, where it discusses using a hex grid to calculate movement. In fact, if specifically advocates for the use of minitures and a grid, saying it is the “more accurate” way to play. (AD&D Page 52). The section you reference about where a character faces is found on Page 69. In the example “how to run a game dialogue” the scenario specifically spells out that some of the theater of the mind segments can be shortcutted by just moving miniatures. (AD&D DMG Page 98).
It is abundantly clear that miniature play and grids are a foundational component of the game. Perhaps you did not play that way - which is, of course, fine! - but you are incorrectly trying to generalize your experiences to the game as a whole. The plain text of the AD&D DMG repeatedly makes it clear that miniature use and grids were not just supported in the early game, they were actively encouraged as a more accurate way to play.
It’s hard to describe. I would say a little from column A and a little from column B. A map is very helpful and I keep track of things based on the facts—20’ away, outside of reach etc. At the same time, I feel immersed. I have a good sense of what is going on but, as you say, I don’t observe the action unfolding in my mind’s eye. It’s weird: the same way I just know that guy on TV is some obscure actor most others wouldn’t recognize, somehow I just know what’s happening in the game.
Aphantasia, the inability to voluntarily visualize mental images, affects about 1% of the population.
%1 of 8.1 Billion is 80,000,000 people with no internal vision.
There is a spectrum of this, where there are even more millions who have difficulty with mental imagery and then at the other end there are people with extremely vivid internal visualization.
Then there's people who just go into la-la-land when information is dumped on them.
Maybe four new elements of data, and woosh, they are out to the twilight zone until you can snap them back to earth.
Or they are hearing all the information, processing it, and entirely lost in a visual reenactment of it all, and their brain is so tied up in the visualization that when they are called on to speak the brain forget how to form words, it was so happy with someone else's words and the pretty pictures within it's own domain.
I know, coming to terms with people being different from us on levels that are beyond our comprehension is very hard to maintain a grasp on.
It's not like people come with stat blocks we can check and say "Oh you are vulnerable to audible stimulation and immune to sarcasm!"
Maybe next year
Oh but to the point: THEATRE OF THE MIND FOREVER / with cheat days for a good MMO
I started with AD&D and it had grids in one of the books. We just never bothered with them because we had smaller scale fights ( and were children sitting on a floor )
He/Him. Loooooooooong time Player.
The Dark days of the THAC0 system are behind us.
"Hope is a fire that burns in us all If only an ember, awaiting your call
To rise up in triumph should we all unite
The spark for change is yours to ignite."
Kalandra - The State of the World
Theater of the Mind is fine for me until combat. I get confused very easily on where everyone is or what exactly we're facing without a constant reminder. Otherwise I don't mind and I enjoy the active work I have to do for myself. Miniatures are preferred for me since I also like to see what everyone wants me to see their character as.
I can't imagine why anyone would play shadow of the mind, when there are an abundance of map generators as well as modules that comes with maps. I haven't done theater of the mind since I was in my teens