I’m a player in a campaign and just finished DMing the Lost Mine starter adventure. Enjoy, the game but being a DM is a task. One thing I found was that rolling initiative and tracking turn order slowed down combat. Do most experienced players use the basic mechanic?
In the last dungeon I abandoned rolling because I needed to speed the session. (I also replaced some combats with skills challenges which were fun and added drama). I let the players go first and alternated player and enemy turns. The player to go first rotated clockwise by seating order for each combat. This worked well. I think I would only change this by making one d6 roll to see if players or enemies go first. If enemies surprised the players they would automatically go first.
I used standard initiative rolling for the final battle and it made the combat too easy because the enemies rolled terribly and most of the party got to go first. If I ever DM again I’ll probably use my modified rules. I think it’s more realistic in medieval combat to have the two sides trade blows back and forth. What are your thoughts?
We use initiatve and turn order. It does slow down the game some, but not as much as other things.
Some people do variations, including a simple die roll and some use the seating order method. Some DM's will use the seating order method and ALSO insist that players sit in order of their Dex. Some even give a ruling that if you have a feat or other ability that increases your initiative get to ignore the die roll all the time.
That said, you can also do this to speed up combat:
1) Not have any pets, sidekicks, or large armies of enemies. All of this crap slows the game down a lot more than initiate stuff.
2) All monsters of same type have same initiative. 5 Orcs all go at same time. The hobgoblins go at the same time too, but not when the orcs go.
How are you doing initiative? Only once at the start? If you’re doing it every round, I could see it slowing things, but only once (which is RAW, if that matters to you), I haven’t found it to be cumbersome.
How are you doing initiative? Only once at the start? If you’re doing it every round, I could see it slowing things, but only once (which is RAW, if that matters to you), I haven’t found it to be cumbersome.
It is not cumbersome if you are 4 players facing a single Big Bad Monster. 5 inits, no one is sitting around, DM does not forget about anyone.
If you are 6 players, each with a sidekick/pet, facing a single BBM and his 10 guards, that is 23 initis, all the players are sitting around doing nothing for long streches of time and the DM is always trying to figure out which of the guards turn it is slash which guard is already dead. That crap slows the game down to a CRAWL.
Personally, I use the standard initiative method of everyone rolling. Depending on the number of NPCs I may have them all roll initiative individually rather than grouping all the NPCs together (this evens out the likelihood of one side having everyone go first).
That said, side initiative is an alternate option mentioned in the DMG. You can have either side go first (usually determined randomly). It can work better for theatre of the mind or play by post type games allowing the players and NPCs to describe some coordination between their team mates in the narrative.
However, initiative really doesn't slow down the game. Every creature or PC in the fight will get their turn. The initiative just determines the order. Rolling initiative is one die roll/creature at the beginning of the fight - which really isn't that much unless there is more overhead sorting out the order. Where individual initiative can slow things down is when folks don't want to pay attention. If someone is in the game then they should know what the current initiative is and when their turn is coming up so that they can decide what they want to do. When their turn comes around they do it and the game moves on. If the game has to wait for every player to start thinking about what they want to do then it really will be slower but it isn't due to the initiative system it is due to the players. Side initiative mitigates it a bit since whoever knows what they want to do will often speak up first and do it - the others seeing the other player involved know that their turn is imminent and they often start thinking about what to do at the same time so the effective overhead may be less with side initiative for players that just aren't really paying attention much.
Other than that, any of the methods of determining turn order give about the same results in terms of time required - the slow down is usually the players.
How are you doing initiative? Only once at the start? If you’re doing it every round, I could see it slowing things, but only once (which is RAW, if that matters to you), I haven’t found it to be cumbersome.
It is not cumbersome if you are 4 players facing a single Big Bad Monster. 5 inits, no one is sitting around, DM does not forget about anyone.
If you are 6 players, each with a sidekick/pet, facing a single BBM and his 10 guards, that is 23 initis, all the players are sitting around doing nothing for long streches of time and the DM is always trying to figure out which of the guards turn it is slash which guard is already dead. That crap slows the game down to a CRAWL.
Well, the guards would all go on the same initiative, but I do take your point. But does this really happen very often? I guess it would be table dependent.
You could put player names and monster names on index cards, and arrange them in the correct order to speed up organising the turn order - there are other computer tools available, or magnetic boards, which provide a similar function.
For the BBEG battles, quite often there are lair actions which always occur on initiative 20. But I agree that sometime the bad guys can roll badly which allows the PCs to get a jump on them - but also not having enough enemies will also cause this. Having a large imbalance in the number of actions performed each round by each side would also make for an unbalanced fight.
I think more than slowing the actual game down, it just feels like a needless chore that adds little value. Just my opinion, and from someone without much rpg experience. I am curious how often people roll for individual enemies versus groups. If it’s like 5-6 enemies I would roll all, anything more and I would roll in groups of 2.
With the set order that alternates between players and enemies no one sits too long without doing anything, it’s easy to track without cards (for not too many enemies) and you don’t get instances where the players or enemies all go first. It also seems more realistic. As long as it doesn’t break the game I think I’ll stick with some version of this, with an added single roll to see if enemies or players start first.
I think more than slowing the actual game down, it just feels like a needless chore that adds little value. Just my opinion, and from someone without much rpg experience. I am curious how often people roll for individual enemies versus groups. If it’s like 5-6 enemies I would roll all, anything more and I would roll in groups of 2.
With the set order that alternates between players and enemies no one sits too long without doing anything, it’s easy to track without cards (for not too many enemies) and you don’t get instances where the players or enemies all go first. It also seems more realistic. As long as it doesn’t break the game I think I’ll stick with some version of this, with an added single roll to see if enemies or players start first.
I usually roll types of enemies together. The 3 Goblins go one one count, the 1 hobgoblin in charge of them goes on it’s own. That kind of thing. But hey, whatever works for your table. If you’re having fun, you’re doing it right.
I play that sidekicks, familiars and the like all go immediately after the player controlling them which speeds things up a bit.
Something to bear in mind is a lot of characters get features that increases their initiative for example war wizards can add their int to initiatve. If you are making everyone have an equal chance to go first you negate those features.
If you are 6 players, each with a sidekick/pet, facing a single BBM and his 10 guards, that is 23 initis, all the players are sitting around doing nothing for long streches of time and the DM is always trying to figure out which of the guards turn it is slash which guard is already dead. That crap slows the game down to a CRAWL.
It's hardly having an initiative order that slows things down. If you have a combat with 23 creatures in it then surely it is the fact that you have 23 creatures doing something that slows it down, not the fact that you have and order in which they do whatever they do.
You could put player names and monster names on index cards, and arrange them in the correct order to speed up organising the turn order - there are other computer tools available, or magnetic boards, which provide a similar function.
When we play live we go low-tech, pretty much just a stick with individual markers that can slide along it. Every marker starts on one side, ordered by their roll, and when it takes its turn it is moved to the side. When everyone has gone they all slides back to the starting side and the next round starts. Very easy to see when anyone goes, how long it is until your next turn or to add things like lair actions or such.
And we usually group baddies of similar strength/type so that there aren't many more initiative rolls for the DM than there is for the party.
I think more than slowing the actual game down, it just feels like a needless chore that adds little value. Just my opinion, and from someone without much rpg experience. I am curious how often people roll for individual enemies versus groups. If it’s like 5-6 enemies I would roll all, anything more and I would roll in groups of 2.
The rules for Initiative say:
Initiative determines the order of turns during combat. When combat starts, every participant makes a Dexterity check to determine their place in the initiative order. The DM makes one roll for an entire group of identical creatures, so each member of the group acts at the same time.
This will make tallying initiative much quicker, since there will be ONE marker in your initiative tracker/list for an entire group of NPCs.
If you are 6 players, each with a sidekick/pet, facing a single BBM and his 10 guards, that is 23 initis, all the players are sitting around doing nothing for long streches of time and the DM is always trying to figure out which of the guards turn it is slash which guard is already dead. That crap slows the game down to a CRAWL.
I'm getting quite grumpy in my middle age. If a player can't run their own character and a minion/familiar/beast/whatever in a timely fashion then they aren't allowed to play a pet class.
As a GM, some of the ways I use to speed up combat are:
• Use groups. If a druid summons four wolves then all four go on the same initiative. If the party are fighting five archer kobolds and three warrior kobolds then all the archers go on one intiative and all the warriors go on another.
• All familiars, summons, pets, hirelings and so on use average damage.
• Talking is limited - on someone else's turn you are only allowed two- or three-word answers. No long conversations between party members on every turn. Note that banter with opponents is allowed (talking is not a free activity, but it is an important part of the game so it needs to be allowed to some extent).
• At the beginning of every round I summarise the situation. "Five kobold archers, all unwounded, a badly-wounded giant lizard attacking the ranger, the bard is almost dead." On a player's turn, if they ask me something already covered (for example, how badly injured is the giant lizard?) then they need to spend their Action on Investigate to get an answer.
• I'm now in the habit of writing a lot of scene information on a corner of the battlemat (twice, one upside down so people on both sides of the table can read it). Things like elevation, ceiling height, difficult terrain, environmental hazards. If a player asks, "How high is that wall?" then I point at the map.
• I have cards on the top of the GM screen or on the edge of the map showing the order. As each player finishes a turn I physically move the card from one side of the screen to another to indicate their turn is over. Everyone can see the cards and see how close it is getting to their turn
• At the beginning of each turn, I announce the next player's turn as well. "Bard, then Barbarian. Bard, what are you doing?" Next turn it might be, "Bard, then the Evil High Priest, Bard, go!"
FInally, you just have to be blunt, maybe even mean. "Look, friends, we only have three hours to play this game. If everyone takes 10 minutes for their turn then that's half a combat over the entire evening. Speed it up, allright?"
If I've asked a player, "What do you do?" and I haven't had an answer in a short time (ideally a few seconds, but realistically under a minute) then I'm going to move on. I've only done it once, and it caused the player in question to get grumpy, but it has to be done. In that case the player was on their phone searching for something completely unrelated to their character, so I think missing a turn was fair.
Of course, the newer a player is to the table and to the game system, the more lenience they get.
What can you do as a player?
First, pay attention. Observe things on everyone's turn. Start planning your turn three or four turns earlier.
Second, know the rules and know the character. You shouldn't have to open the book or app every time you cast Cool Missile Spell to look up its range. If you can't remember it then write it on your character sheet.
As for character sheets, I have a contentious view - They should not be on a smartphone screen. I'm sick of people scrolling tiny screens to find each piece of information. Print the stupid thing out on pieces of paper, and put the papers on the table so you can scan all of them all at once.
How are you doing initiative? Only once at the start? If you’re doing it every round, I could see it slowing things, but only once (which is RAW, if that matters to you), I haven’t found it to be cumbersome.
It is not cumbersome if you are 4 players facing a single Big Bad Monster. 5 inits, no one is sitting around, DM does not forget about anyone.
If you are 6 players, each with a sidekick/pet, facing a single BBM and his 10 guards, that is 23 initis, all the players are sitting around doing nothing for long streches of time and the DM is always trying to figure out which of the guards turn it is slash which guard is already dead. That crap slows the game down to a CRAWL.
If the DM is slow figuring out which NPC goes next and which ones are still alive - that is a DM problem with a lot of solutions. I've run combats with more creatures than that (somewhere around 40 max) and it went along pretty efficiently. I just moved all the NPCs of the same type to wherever they were going and then rolled the attacks all at once to make it as efficient and quick as possible. Any which died get taken off the board. The PHB rules for grouping the initiative of identical opponents were designed to make this go as quickly as possible. I wouldn't use separate initiative for grouped NPCs unless the groups were small or I was running on a VTT that keeps track of everything for you.
On the player side, I had a friend running a druid who liked to summon groups of Deinonychus. Each of these CR1 creatures has three attacks. He would roll all the attacks for each creature all once including damage (roll d20, and damage die with the dice being the same color for example so it is clear which d20 goes with which damage) - he then resolved them all and based on the DMs replies to previous die rolls there was only a small range of results he would have to ask the DM whether they hit or not. His entire turn including his wildshaped moon druid attacks went by faster than most of the other players at the table despite the fact that he was rolling for several creatures.
Planning and efficiency for each PLAYER makes the turns go much more quickly.
I've literally played with folks where the process is the following - and they are experienced players.
----
"Oh, is it my turn?"
Looks at the map for a few seconds. Decides to attack the creature standing next to them.
Searches their dice for a d20. Take the result and look at their character sheet to get the modifier. Add them up. No matter what result comes up they ask the DM if they hit even if the number has come up previously.
If it is a hit, search for the damage die. Spend a few seconds shaking it in their hand before rolling. Take the number and look at their character sheet to get the damage modifier. Add them up. Tell the DM the damage.
Repeat the process for every attack they make.
DM asks if they have anything else they'd like to do. They sit there thinking for a bit before saying No.
Honestly, and not to be negative to players, but that process is repeated in so many games I have played that I would have to say it's a significant reason that turns are slow. In a game where players are paying attention, decide what they want to do reasonably quickly (even if it might not be perfect) and roll dice all at once - the game goes much more quickly.
----
P.S. I've seen a player with three attacks with crusader's mantle in effect ... they picked out three d20s, three d8s, three d4s ... coordinated by dice set and rolled all the dice at once - asked the DM only about to hit rolls that were in doubt - added up all the damage from those that hit and told the DM (the DM lets them know if he needs the attacks one at a time because the target is close to dead). Player said that they had no other actions to take. Turn done. Their turn literally took half or less the time of most of the others at the table.
I'd not suggest that all players need to play that way but there may be quite a bit of room for improvement on both the player and DM side if combat rounds feel like they are going really slowly.
To repeat advice given above: Roll attack dice and damage dice all at the same time. If you have advantage then roll the two d20s at the same time.
I have a player who rolls a d20, adds their attack modifiers (which they have to look up every single time), announces the result, then rolls the second d20, adds the modifiers, announces the result, asks if it hits. Then they grab a d6, roll it, announce the result, get prompted by other players to add modifiers, add the modifiers (looking them up every time), then grab a d4 and roll it (fire damage) and announce it and expect me to add them all together.
Then repeats all of this for extra attack.
Then repeats all of this for the martial arts bonus attacks. But gets the modifiers and dice wrong because they still haven't learnt that attacking with their magic dagger has different attack and damage bonuses to an unarmed attack.
And if any of them are criticals, repeat the above process again.
Sheesh, this player is a 40K player, you'd think they can handle rolling millions of dice. :-)
I have been known to exaggerate things for comedy (really? no!) but the above is not exaggerated at all. Not complaining though, the player in question is good company and has great characterisation and acting at the table. They are also not the slowest player at the table. Oh no, that would be the player that wants to have a minutes-long discussion of tactics involving everyone at the table at the start of every turn…
Seriously though, there is no law that says only one die at a time is allowed to be in your hand. You can pick up multiple dice at the same time and roll them.
People with sneak attack and smite, I'm looking at you. Buy more d6s/d8s (most online shops allow you to buy individual dice) or borrow them from the person sitting next to you.
I think it’s more realistic in medieval combat to have the two sides trade blows back and forth. What are your thoughts?
Nothing realistic about it.
That said, you are both really punishing players and making things a lot easier with your way of doing things. You punish players because quite a few classes and subclasses have special abilities that allows them to add bonuses to their initiative rolls. If you just go back and forth those abilities are worthless. Some subclasses also have abilities that rely on them acting before their opponents. You are basically saying "screw that ability, you can't use that because it's not your turn to go first this combat".
Also, what do you do if there are more players than enemies? Do some enemies get to go more than once? Also, if there is just the one big bad boss and the players always get to start, they will have a huge advantage. That actually goes for all battles, even more so when the PCs outnumber their opponents.
Those are some really good points. In the one dungeon I ran it didn’t seem to matter which character went first (paladin, barbarian, rogue). The entire campaign was played with standard rules except for the last dungeon where I experimented with things to get it in in one session. The consensus seems to be suck it up and roll initiative and use cards or other aids to track. I actually don’t like grouping all enemies together, but would break groups into chunks, to avoid all enemies going before or after the players. To answer your question if there was one boss, the boss would always go second after the first player (unless I added the d6 roll off to determine if player or enemy went first). The alternating enemy/player sets the turn order, but you still need to track individual enemies to know when they act. It will be interesting to see if any changes are made to streamline combat in the next rule set.
Just writing down the order on a piece of scrap paper works really well.You'll get the hang of it in a bit. :)
Another perk of rolling for initiative is that it gives the players a moment to breathe and think through their options a bit before combat starts so that they can act quickly on their turn, which helps speed up the game.
Each player rolls, all minions go immediately following their master.
As DM I create encounters using monster-type groups. Eg A monster raiding party might have a Bugbear group, an Orc group, and a Goblin group. I'd try to roughly balance the groups, but typically stop at five members in a group (should I need more than five, they become a second group). Thus I might end up with a single Bugbear alone in his group, plus three Orcs in a group, and then five Goblins in a group. Each group rolls, so I'd have 3 initiative results for these 9 creatures. If instead I wanted two bugbears and twelve goblins, I'd create one Bugbear group and three Goblin groups. So, 4 initiative results for these 14 creatures.
It is very easy to manage this in combat, and helps create some speedy identifying on the battlemap since I also use different tokens for the different groups, with different additional marks to denote their number in the group. "I shoot my bow at the red goblin 3" would be easily identifiable which of the 14 enemies the player is aiming for.
Been playing D&D for nearly 30 years and this is the product of many iterations and improvements for streamlined play. It works very, very well. And also helps with encounter balancing when designing the encounters in the first place.
Edit: Oh and might go without saying, but Named enemies are always in their own group.
I’m a player in a campaign and just finished DMing the Lost Mine starter adventure. Enjoy, the game but being a DM is a task. One thing I found was that rolling initiative and tracking turn order slowed down combat. Do most experienced players use the basic mechanic?
In the last dungeon I abandoned rolling because I needed to speed the session. (I also replaced some combats with skills challenges which were fun and added drama). I let the players go first and alternated player and enemy turns. The player to go first rotated clockwise by seating order for each combat. This worked well. I think I would only change this by making one d6 roll to see if players or enemies go first. If enemies surprised the players they would automatically go first.
I used standard initiative rolling for the final battle and it made the combat too easy because the enemies rolled terribly and most of the party got to go first. If I ever DM again I’ll probably use my modified rules. I think it’s more realistic in medieval combat to have the two sides trade blows back and forth. What are your thoughts?
We use initiatve and turn order. It does slow down the game some, but not as much as other things.
Some people do variations, including a simple die roll and some use the seating order method. Some DM's will use the seating order method and ALSO insist that players sit in order of their Dex. Some even give a ruling that if you have a feat or other ability that increases your initiative get to ignore the die roll all the time.
That said, you can also do this to speed up combat:
1) Not have any pets, sidekicks, or large armies of enemies. All of this crap slows the game down a lot more than initiate stuff.
2) All monsters of same type have same initiative. 5 Orcs all go at same time. The hobgoblins go at the same time too, but not when the orcs go.
How are you doing initiative? Only once at the start? If you’re doing it every round, I could see it slowing things, but only once (which is RAW, if that matters to you), I haven’t found it to be cumbersome.
It is not cumbersome if you are 4 players facing a single Big Bad Monster. 5 inits, no one is sitting around, DM does not forget about anyone.
If you are 6 players, each with a sidekick/pet, facing a single BBM and his 10 guards, that is 23 initis, all the players are sitting around doing nothing for long streches of time and the DM is always trying to figure out which of the guards turn it is slash which guard is already dead. That crap slows the game down to a CRAWL.
Personally, I use the standard initiative method of everyone rolling. Depending on the number of NPCs I may have them all roll initiative individually rather than grouping all the NPCs together (this evens out the likelihood of one side having everyone go first).
That said, side initiative is an alternate option mentioned in the DMG. You can have either side go first (usually determined randomly). It can work better for theatre of the mind or play by post type games allowing the players and NPCs to describe some coordination between their team mates in the narrative.
However, initiative really doesn't slow down the game. Every creature or PC in the fight will get their turn. The initiative just determines the order. Rolling initiative is one die roll/creature at the beginning of the fight - which really isn't that much unless there is more overhead sorting out the order. Where individual initiative can slow things down is when folks don't want to pay attention. If someone is in the game then they should know what the current initiative is and when their turn is coming up so that they can decide what they want to do. When their turn comes around they do it and the game moves on. If the game has to wait for every player to start thinking about what they want to do then it really will be slower but it isn't due to the initiative system it is due to the players. Side initiative mitigates it a bit since whoever knows what they want to do will often speak up first and do it - the others seeing the other player involved know that their turn is imminent and they often start thinking about what to do at the same time so the effective overhead may be less with side initiative for players that just aren't really paying attention much.
Other than that, any of the methods of determining turn order give about the same results in terms of time required - the slow down is usually the players.
Well, the guards would all go on the same initiative, but I do take your point. But does this really happen very often? I guess it would be table dependent.
Roll initiative once at the start of combat.
You could put player names and monster names on index cards, and arrange them in the correct order to speed up organising the turn order - there are other computer tools available, or magnetic boards, which provide a similar function.
For the BBEG battles, quite often there are lair actions which always occur on initiative 20. But I agree that sometime the bad guys can roll badly which allows the PCs to get a jump on them - but also not having enough enemies will also cause this. Having a large imbalance in the number of actions performed each round by each side would also make for an unbalanced fight.
I think more than slowing the actual game down, it just feels like a needless chore that adds little value. Just my opinion, and from someone without much rpg experience. I am curious how often people roll for individual enemies versus groups. If it’s like 5-6 enemies I would roll all, anything more and I would roll in groups of 2.
With the set order that alternates between players and enemies no one sits too long without doing anything, it’s easy to track without cards (for not too many enemies) and you don’t get instances where the players or enemies all go first. It also seems more realistic. As long as it doesn’t break the game I think I’ll stick with some version of this, with an added single roll to see if enemies or players start first.
I usually roll types of enemies together. The 3 Goblins go one one count, the 1 hobgoblin in charge of them goes on it’s own. That kind of thing.
But hey, whatever works for your table. If you’re having fun, you’re doing it right.
I play that sidekicks, familiars and the like all go immediately after the player controlling them which speeds things up a bit.
Something to bear in mind is a lot of characters get features that increases their initiative for example war wizards can add their int to initiatve. If you are making everyone have an equal chance to go first you negate those features.
It's hardly having an initiative order that slows things down. If you have a combat with 23 creatures in it then surely it is the fact that you have 23 creatures doing something that slows it down, not the fact that you have and order in which they do whatever they do.
When we play live we go low-tech, pretty much just a stick with individual markers that can slide along it. Every marker starts on one side, ordered by their roll, and when it takes its turn it is moved to the side. When everyone has gone they all slides back to the starting side and the next round starts. Very easy to see when anyone goes, how long it is until your next turn or to add things like lair actions or such.
And we usually group baddies of similar strength/type so that there aren't many more initiative rolls for the DM than there is for the party.
The rules for Initiative say:
This will make tallying initiative much quicker, since there will be ONE marker in your initiative tracker/list for an entire group of NPCs.
I'm getting quite grumpy in my middle age. If a player can't run their own character and a minion/familiar/beast/whatever in a timely fashion then they aren't allowed to play a pet class.
As a GM, some of the ways I use to speed up combat are:
• Use groups. If a druid summons four wolves then all four go on the same initiative. If the party are fighting five archer kobolds and three warrior kobolds then all the archers go on one intiative and all the warriors go on another.
• All familiars, summons, pets, hirelings and so on use average damage.
• Talking is limited - on someone else's turn you are only allowed two- or three-word answers. No long conversations between party members on every turn. Note that banter with opponents is allowed (talking is not a free activity, but it is an important part of the game so it needs to be allowed to some extent).
• At the beginning of every round I summarise the situation. "Five kobold archers, all unwounded, a badly-wounded giant lizard attacking the ranger, the bard is almost dead." On a player's turn, if they ask me something already covered (for example, how badly injured is the giant lizard?) then they need to spend their Action on Investigate to get an answer.
• I'm now in the habit of writing a lot of scene information on a corner of the battlemat (twice, one upside down so people on both sides of the table can read it). Things like elevation, ceiling height, difficult terrain, environmental hazards. If a player asks, "How high is that wall?" then I point at the map.
• I have cards on the top of the GM screen or on the edge of the map showing the order. As each player finishes a turn I physically move the card from one side of the screen to another to indicate their turn is over. Everyone can see the cards and see how close it is getting to their turn
• At the beginning of each turn, I announce the next player's turn as well. "Bard, then Barbarian. Bard, what are you doing?" Next turn it might be, "Bard, then the Evil High Priest, Bard, go!"
FInally, you just have to be blunt, maybe even mean. "Look, friends, we only have three hours to play this game. If everyone takes 10 minutes for their turn then that's half a combat over the entire evening. Speed it up, allright?"
If I've asked a player, "What do you do?" and I haven't had an answer in a short time (ideally a few seconds, but realistically under a minute) then I'm going to move on. I've only done it once, and it caused the player in question to get grumpy, but it has to be done. In that case the player was on their phone searching for something completely unrelated to their character, so I think missing a turn was fair.
Of course, the newer a player is to the table and to the game system, the more lenience they get.
What can you do as a player?
First, pay attention. Observe things on everyone's turn. Start planning your turn three or four turns earlier.
Second, know the rules and know the character. You shouldn't have to open the book or app every time you cast Cool Missile Spell to look up its range. If you can't remember it then write it on your character sheet.
As for character sheets, I have a contentious view - They should not be on a smartphone screen. I'm sick of people scrolling tiny screens to find each piece of information. Print the stupid thing out on pieces of paper, and put the papers on the table so you can scan all of them all at once.
If the DM is slow figuring out which NPC goes next and which ones are still alive - that is a DM problem with a lot of solutions. I've run combats with more creatures than that (somewhere around 40 max) and it went along pretty efficiently. I just moved all the NPCs of the same type to wherever they were going and then rolled the attacks all at once to make it as efficient and quick as possible. Any which died get taken off the board. The PHB rules for grouping the initiative of identical opponents were designed to make this go as quickly as possible. I wouldn't use separate initiative for grouped NPCs unless the groups were small or I was running on a VTT that keeps track of everything for you.
On the player side, I had a friend running a druid who liked to summon groups of Deinonychus. Each of these CR1 creatures has three attacks. He would roll all the attacks for each creature all once including damage (roll d20, and damage die with the dice being the same color for example so it is clear which d20 goes with which damage) - he then resolved them all and based on the DMs replies to previous die rolls there was only a small range of results he would have to ask the DM whether they hit or not. His entire turn including his wildshaped moon druid attacks went by faster than most of the other players at the table despite the fact that he was rolling for several creatures.
Planning and efficiency for each PLAYER makes the turns go much more quickly.
I've literally played with folks where the process is the following - and they are experienced players.
----
"Oh, is it my turn?"
Looks at the map for a few seconds. Decides to attack the creature standing next to them.
Searches their dice for a d20. Take the result and look at their character sheet to get the modifier. Add them up. No matter what result comes up they ask the DM if they hit even if the number has come up previously.
If it is a hit, search for the damage die. Spend a few seconds shaking it in their hand before rolling. Take the number and look at their character sheet to get the damage modifier. Add them up. Tell the DM the damage.
Repeat the process for every attack they make.
DM asks if they have anything else they'd like to do. They sit there thinking for a bit before saying No.
Honestly, and not to be negative to players, but that process is repeated in so many games I have played that I would have to say it's a significant reason that turns are slow. In a game where players are paying attention, decide what they want to do reasonably quickly (even if it might not be perfect) and roll dice all at once - the game goes much more quickly.
----
P.S. I've seen a player with three attacks with crusader's mantle in effect ... they picked out three d20s, three d8s, three d4s ... coordinated by dice set and rolled all the dice at once - asked the DM only about to hit rolls that were in doubt - added up all the damage from those that hit and told the DM (the DM lets them know if he needs the attacks one at a time because the target is close to dead). Player said that they had no other actions to take. Turn done. Their turn literally took half or less the time of most of the others at the table.
I'd not suggest that all players need to play that way but there may be quite a bit of room for improvement on both the player and DM side if combat rounds feel like they are going really slowly.
To repeat advice given above: Roll attack dice and damage dice all at the same time. If you have advantage then roll the two d20s at the same time.
I have a player who rolls a d20, adds their attack modifiers (which they have to look up every single time), announces the result, then rolls the second d20, adds the modifiers, announces the result, asks if it hits. Then they grab a d6, roll it, announce the result, get prompted by other players to add modifiers, add the modifiers (looking them up every time), then grab a d4 and roll it (fire damage) and announce it and expect me to add them all together.
Then repeats all of this for extra attack.
Then repeats all of this for the martial arts bonus attacks. But gets the modifiers and dice wrong because they still haven't learnt that attacking with their magic dagger has different attack and damage bonuses to an unarmed attack.
And if any of them are criticals, repeat the above process again.
Sheesh, this player is a 40K player, you'd think they can handle rolling millions of dice. :-)
I have been known to exaggerate things for comedy (really? no!) but the above is not exaggerated at all. Not complaining though, the player in question is good company and has great characterisation and acting at the table. They are also not the slowest player at the table. Oh no, that would be the player that wants to have a minutes-long discussion of tactics involving everyone at the table at the start of every turn…
Seriously though, there is no law that says only one die at a time is allowed to be in your hand. You can pick up multiple dice at the same time and roll them.
People with sneak attack and smite, I'm looking at you. Buy more d6s/d8s (most online shops allow you to buy individual dice) or borrow them from the person sitting next to you.
Nothing realistic about it.
That said, you are both really punishing players and making things a lot easier with your way of doing things. You punish players because quite a few classes and subclasses have special abilities that allows them to add bonuses to their initiative rolls. If you just go back and forth those abilities are worthless. Some subclasses also have abilities that rely on them acting before their opponents. You are basically saying "screw that ability, you can't use that because it's not your turn to go first this combat".
Also, what do you do if there are more players than enemies? Do some enemies get to go more than once? Also, if there is just the one big bad boss and the players always get to start, they will have a huge advantage. That actually goes for all battles, even more so when the PCs outnumber their opponents.
Those are some really good points. In the one dungeon I ran it didn’t seem to matter which character went first (paladin, barbarian, rogue). The entire campaign was played with standard rules except for the last dungeon where I experimented with things to get it in in one session. The consensus seems to be suck it up and roll initiative and use cards or other aids to track. I actually don’t like grouping all enemies together, but would break groups into chunks, to avoid all enemies going before or after the players. To answer your question if there was one boss, the boss would always go second after the first player (unless I added the d6 roll off to determine if player or enemy went first). The alternating enemy/player sets the turn order, but you still need to track individual enemies to know when they act. It will be interesting to see if any changes are made to streamline combat in the next rule set.
Just writing down the order on a piece of scrap paper works really well.You'll get the hang of it in a bit. :)
Another perk of rolling for initiative is that it gives the players a moment to breathe and think through their options a bit before combat starts so that they can act quickly on their turn, which helps speed up the game.
Roll Initiative at the start of battle.
Each player rolls, all minions go immediately following their master.
As DM I create encounters using monster-type groups. Eg A monster raiding party might have a Bugbear group, an Orc group, and a Goblin group. I'd try to roughly balance the groups, but typically stop at five members in a group (should I need more than five, they become a second group). Thus I might end up with a single Bugbear alone in his group, plus three Orcs in a group, and then five Goblins in a group. Each group rolls, so I'd have 3 initiative results for these 9 creatures. If instead I wanted two bugbears and twelve goblins, I'd create one Bugbear group and three Goblin groups. So, 4 initiative results for these 14 creatures.
It is very easy to manage this in combat, and helps create some speedy identifying on the battlemap since I also use different tokens for the different groups, with different additional marks to denote their number in the group. "I shoot my bow at the red goblin 3" would be easily identifiable which of the 14 enemies the player is aiming for.
Been playing D&D for nearly 30 years and this is the product of many iterations and improvements for streamlined play. It works very, very well. And also helps with encounter balancing when designing the encounters in the first place.
Edit: Oh and might go without saying, but Named enemies are always in their own group.
I got quotes!