Tips for trying theatre of the mind combat

[The Cats]

So I've figured out that the only part of DMing that I really don't like is drawing battle maps and picking out pawns I'm going to use before a session. It just takes too long and isn't fun for me.

I want to start using theatre of the mind, but our group has never really done so before, besides in very simple combats with one opponent in basically a white room.

They do have a whiteboard on their side of the screen they can make simple maps with, and use tokens to represent baddies to give them some kind of visual cues. I'm not about to be like "no no you must use only your imagination!" I just don't want to spend hours before the session sorting through my pawns and drawing ugly maps (because good lord are my maps ugly).

So what are some things I can work on to make for good theatre of the mind? I'm pretty good at evoking visualizations, but i am worried about keeping track of positions when there are multiple opponents, and seeming like I'm arbitrarily saying 'this thing is out of range but this thing is in range.' And a lot of my asking here is because I'm sure there are a lot of things I just haven't thought of that I should pay attention to.

[Haldir]

use tokens for positioning, and don't draw a map.

Alternatively, I get a ton of use out roll20, reused isometric and SNES game maps set up on a nearby t.v. That is of course, when I am not drawing my own maps in CAD.

[TerryHerc]

These two articles are long, but filled with a ton of fantastic information. I highly reccomend them. Both are on DnD Beyond and written by Mike Shea from Sly Flourish.

How to Run Theater of the Mind

Why Run Combat in the Theater of the Mind

[gkathellar]

As has been mentioned, it can be helpful to have a rough map and tokens to help keep a sense of relative positions. Consider allowing your players to fill in details of the environment - i.e. letting them say things like "I grab onto a nearby flagpole" without requiring that you've mentioned anything about a flagpole. Jot down any notable features of the environment that emerge as combat develops, so that you can call back to them and keep things consistent.

[Tanarii]

I started off running exclusively TotM, then started using white boards. Now I'm back to battle mats for any encounter with anything more than fairly specific or simple situations. TotM was just confusing the heck out of my players, in situations I thought were easily explainable in words. I'd forgotten the Nth rule of DMing: what seems clear to you is clear as mud to the players. It's far to easy to catch players in gotchas in general, and that just becomes worse when you take something fast moving and complex as combat.

OTOH it's fine if PCs are suddenly ambushed suddenly out of the dark and embroiled in a swirl of melee. Of just standing off and trading shots from behind cover, or have a solid line of combat that isn't shifting much. Basically any time fog of war and confusion makes perfect sense, or tactical positioning isn't going to change dramatically.

Edit: I currently run large group of Pcs, often with henchmen, and prefer large groups of enemies as well. That's a major factor. If I was running games for 2-3 friends I'd probably use TotM more often and battle mats less often. The added value of cutting down the combat swoosh, and the dramatically faster speed of play when the players aren't confused, is amazing. So don't take this as me bad mouthing it. TotM is great and I'd prefer to use it all the time. I'm pointing out issues I ran into with implementing it despite it being my preferred choice.

[Mutant Donkey]

Descriptions go a long way. You are the DM so you decide what is within range. Keep the action going.
This is specially useful when you have a long chase. It's useless to keep drawing stuff when characters are at a dead run. Just describe the scenery and people as they run by, the twist and turns, obstacles etc...
Back in the day the DM didn't draw anything. It was up to the adventurers to have graph paper and track their location based on what the DM described. In a way it forces the party to pay more attention and makes for a more in depth role playing experience.
The mind is a very powerful projector.

[Thrudd]

I would work out some new rules for determining distance and position, like take everything that is listed in feet and change it to a range category like "touching, close, moderate, far". For area of effect spells and abilities, either specify a max number of targets that can be affected within a certain range. Movement speeds will be similar- instead of something like 30ft per round, a character can reach something that begins one distance category away in one round, or two if they run (for an example). On each player's turn, you'll probably need to re-describe the distances and positions of everything on the battle field. You'll probably need to sketch the overall battlefield, at least for yourself so you don't lose track of things.

That all is a lot of work, however, that's a huge adjustment for D&D. It might be better if you treat combat more cinematically. Don't worry too much about position and distance. Describe the scene, and use dice to decide who gets attacked by what, how many things are in range, etc. For instance, someone says, "How many orcs can I get in a fireball blast?". Roll a d6, or 2d6, or whatever, to decide. "Can I reach that big guy this turn?" Roll a d6, 1-3 yes, 4-6 no. Who gets attacked by which enemies? Unless they have a reason to go after one particular PC, assign each PC a number, and roll a die on each enemy's first turn. "Can I move, attack the closest guy, and then keep moving and hit the next guy?" You can just say "yes", or roll a die to see if two enemies are close enough for them to do that.
Yes, this method is going to make a lot of attributes listed in the book obsolete. You will want to inform the players beforehand about which spells and abilities and traits are not really going to be relevant, and which will be replaced with random rolls and descriptions.

[Pex]

Don't be too concerned about distance. The range of things matter, such as spell range and how far someone can move, but don't worry about exact measurements. All you need is "close enough" or "I cast Fireball behind the enemy so the area hits them but not the other party members." Be generic.

[Psikerlord]

It's super easy to run Totm. Just describe what's going on. You can say the orc is about 30 ft away, or the group of griffons are swooping down on you about 200 ft distant, etc. You just exchange questions and answers with the player until they have enough info to decide what to do (usually just one question is enough). It's as quick as you can talk; way quicker than a grid, and much more importantly, infinitely more flexible.

The only trick is AoE stuff. You basically have to make judgment calls on some of those: you can hit 4 orcs with your fireball, or 8 if you are also willing to catch your ally dwarf in the blast. What do you want to do?

Best of luck.

[kyoryu]

For any non-trivial encounter, I'd definitely use some sort of map. The trick is to make it deliberately crude, etc. It's purpose is not to serve as a play area, but as a reminder to people of general layout so that they can imagine what is going on. In no case whatsoever should you measure anything on the map or use it for line of sight (apart from at an extremely crude resolution).

One of hte problems with TotM is that it's easy to lose track of everything - the map exists to solve that problem and no more. And make the map as crude as possible so that it doesn't draw attention.

[The Random NPC]

It's super easy to run Totm. Just describe what's going on. You can say the orc is about 30 ft away, or the group of griffons are swooping down on you about 200 ft distant, etc. You just exchange questions and answers with the player until they have enough info to decide what to do (usually just one question is enough). It's as quick as you can talk; way quicker than a grid, and much more importantly, infinitely more flexible.

The only trick is AoE stuff. You basically have to make judgment calls on some of those: you can hit 4 orcs with your fireball, or 8 if you are also willing to catch your ally dwarf in the blast. What do you want to do?

Best of luck.

The problem I've always run into is that I find those questions tedious to ask so I end up stating that I run up to the nearest enemy and hit them, with changes depending on class.

[Thrudd]

The problem I've always run into is that I find those questions tedious to ask so I end up stating that I run up to the nearest enemy and hit them, with changes depending on class.

That's been my experience with how TotM usually plays out most of the time, too. Most of the mechanical tactical elements are removed from combat. To replace the excitement of tactical combat, it helps to shift to the idea of cinematic action instead. Not that there should not be any descriptive imagery and cinematically described scenes when you use minis, but when you don't, that's all you have. The DM and players need to adopt a different philosophy regarding what the "point" of combat is if you want it to be more interesting. It can't just a means of overcoming an obstacle by using your character's abilities. Without the tactical element, this is really boring. It could be seen as a challenge for the players to invent and describe a cool and interesting action scene. To this end, homebrew mechanics need to be added that assist and reward this process, and remove elements that are made obsolete without minis and measurements. Maybe the use of inspiration is expanded in some way, different levels or types of inspiration benefits that can be claimed as action rewards. Some sort of "stunting" system or new combat actions, so that players have more prompts for action as well as providing a more objective way to resolve the benefits of stuff like swinging from chandeliers and throwing big things at a group of guys, leaping off the wall or sliding between someone's legs.

Of course, IMO, there are a number of systems which are actually good at this and are designed for this style of play, that would be far preferable to D&D, given how much homebrew is required to make it a comparable experience to playing with the full suite of mechanical options.

[Tanarii]

The only trick is AoE stuff.

The trick is all ranged attacks and all movement.

What finally broke me was realizing how often my players were having to ask "so who is within 60ft" and "what if I move up 30ft, who can I hit then" over and over again.

Now if I had been willing to treat the enemies as one amorphous blob, and just said they're all 60ft away from you and you hit the one with the least hit points, probably wouldn't be an issue.

I've played classic D&D that way and it works just fine. In retrospect (and his thread is helping), I was busy transitioning out of 4e still in some ways, so probably didn't make some necessary. I do know I was trying to hold a detailed layout in my head, and communicate that descriptively. That very well may have been my mistake.

(Edit: technically what finally broke me was having a discussion with a couple of different groups of players after a few forum threads, but the final straw was noticing how often these conversations happened during play after those discussions.)

[Pelle]

To replace the excitement of tactical combat, it helps to shift to the idea of cinematic action instead.

There's some truth in this. When using TotM, players need to be able to let go of some control. If they really insist on knowing every 5 ft square to get optimal use of their actions, it doesn't work that well.

Why should players want to give up control? Because it can save a lot of time, and it's not really important if you kill 3 or 4 goblins with that fireball. And IME, when using TotM, players are more likely to pay attention to the environment and the whole situation, and it seems like they get a better mental picture of the scene. When using a grid, they just focus on the mechanics. Using a grid doesn't in any way limit players from swinging from chandeliers et al., but that's what often happens in practice. So if you care about the fiction, and not really the boardgame tactical aspect, that's a reason to use TotM.

I love using TotM, even though I bring a lot of my old miniatures to every game. However, there's a limit for when it's possible to accurately enough describe the scene so that the players follow. And that's different for every group. If it's a lone goblin in a narrow hallway, no one has a problem following how the situation develops. If it's a TPK threatening fight with a goblin tribe and a band of ogres in a forest, use something to help indicate positions. Factors that affect what you should use includes number of enemies, challenge level, environment complexity and group's ability to describe the situation. If you run mostly my precious set piece combat encounters, that's probably not suited for TotM.

[Mordaedil]

Yeah, you kind of have to stop thinking about the game in strict feet limitations. Thinking in spell ranges is probably better. Target within 30 feet? They are close. Target within 100 feet? They are at a medium distance away. Target within 400 feet? They are a long distance away. Beyond that, they are "too far away". If an enemy has attacked you, it is reasonable to say they threaten you and moving away requires a withdraw or 5-foot step. Don't bother with obstacles like walls or rocks or hindrances of terrain. If they are flanked, they can't 5-foot step effectively. Heck, in theatre of the mind, you don't have to specify if they are 5-foot stepping away, you can just assume they do, unless they specifically tell you they do not.

[Pelle]

Yeah, running TotM requires good faith from both players and GM. Anyways, TotM or grid is a false dichotomy. Use TotM when you can get away with it, and grids when it gets too complicated to keep track of the situation.

[Tanarii]

There's some truth in this. When using TotM, players need to be able to let go of some control. If they really insist on knowing every 5 ft square to get optimal use of their actions, it doesn't work that well.

The problem is in D&D, you often need to know ranges and positioning to use any action. Barring melee warriors already in melee who aren't going to change targets, and even they care about enemies manuevering. That's why grids are so popular.

And IME, when using TotM, players are more likely to pay attention to the environment and the whole situation, and it seems like they get a better mental picture of the scene.

My experiences say this is utter BS. Players definitely get a better mental picture of the layout of a scene with a grid or diagram. What they often lose is an evocative mental picture of descriptive trappings. Moss hanging on walls, how ugly that Large token Ogre is, etc. But that's not a "better" mental picture when they have major confusion over where everything actually is. It's just trading off one kind of mental picture for another.

[Pelle]

The problem is in D&D, you often need to know ranges and positioning to use any action. Barring melee warriors already in melee who aren't going to change targets, and even they care about enemies manuevering. That's why grids are so popular.

My experiences say this is utter BS. Players definitely get a better mental picture of the layout of a scene with a grid or diagram. What they often lose is an evocative mental picture of descriptive trappings. Moss hanging on walls, how ugly that Large token Ogre is, etc. But that's not a "better" mental picture when they have major confusion over where everything actually is. It's just trading off one kind of mental picture for another.

Well, it's subjectively better. I want the evocative mental picture. That's easily lost when players only see the grid as a chess board. So it depends on what you want out of the combat experience.

On ranges, that's why you ask how far away things are, or if you are in range of things. And why both sides need to act in good faith and accept a judgement of yes or no. On major confusion, that depends on how complicated the situation is. The point is that you use totM when the situation isn't too complicated. Do you really bother to spend time on drawing up the grid and fishing out minis when you face a lone creature in a narrow hallway? It's a spectrum.

I do know I was trying to hold a detailed layout in my head, and communicate that descriptively. That very well may have been my mistake.

That's the thing, you don't need to establish exactly where everything actually is. Like keeping track of a 5 foot grid in your head and describing that. Just have more general descriptions, and let everyone build on what has been established narratively. It's less tracing accurate lines of sight, and more establishing that you have higher ground and thus a good overview. So your frustration comes when someone misunderstands your description, and suddenly is objectively in the wrong spot, instead where they thought they was. Be more flexible instead.

[Tanarii]

On ranges, that's why you ask how far away things are, or if you are in range of things.

Unless you chop a huge amount out, this question needs to be asked by every player every turn.

There are game systems that handle it better. But they do it by being vague. ie chopping a huge amount out. That's fine, those games get their fun elsewhere than using abilities that depend on tactical positioning. But a 'grid' is baked in on multiple levels in the system, despite what the developers claim.

Let's be clear here btw, Theatre of the Mind means D&D 5e.

[kyoryu]

My experiences say this is utter BS. Players definitely get a better mental picture of the layout of a scene with a grid or diagram. What they often lose is an evocative mental picture of descriptive trappings. Moss hanging on walls, how ugly that Large token Ogre is, etc. But that's not a "better" mental picture when they have major confusion over where everything actually is. It's just trading off one kind of mental picture for another.

This is exactly why I recommend (and use!) an approach of having an extremely crude diagram for rough positioning, and TotM on top of that. Trying to get everyone on the same page regarding the overall layout via words is tedious at best.

Now, in a game where ranges are such that the boundaries are frequently an issue, it may not work as well. I'll certainly grant that!

[Man_Over_Game]

Check out 13th Age. It's made by the designers of DnD 4e, with emphasis on fixing what everyone had a problem with (which was a lack of storytelling). 13th Age uses no grid, and explicitly has the entire system be a Theatre of the Mind, while also having a rigid mechanical core for distances.

Effectively, everything is translated into distances in comparison to one another, based on these rough equivalents:

Adjacent (within melee striking range, 5ft)
Close (requires one step of movement to become adjacent, <30 ft)
Far (requires two steps of movement to become adjacent, <60 ft)
Very Far (requires three steps of movement to become adjacent, >60 feet)

All abilities are based on relative distances. For example, a Fireball-esc spell would say something like "Deal X damage to a target creature and all creatures within Close range of it". It's fairly simple and it does well to combine mechanical strategy with theatrics and vivid action scenes. It might be worth a look for reference.

[Thrudd]

Check out 13th Age. It's made by the designers of DnD 4e, with emphasis on fixing what everyone had a problem with (which was a lack of storytelling). 13th Age uses no grid, and explicitly has the entire system be a Theatre of the Mind, while also having a rigid mechanical core for distances.

Effectively, everything is translated into distances in comparison to one another, based on these rough equivalents:

Adjacent (within melee striking range, 5ft)
Close (requires one step of movement to become adjacent, <30 ft)
Far (requires two steps of movement to become adjacent, <60 ft)
Very Far (requires three steps of movement to become adjacent, >60 feet)

All abilities are based on relative distances. For example, a Fireball-esc spell would say something like "Deal X damage to a target creature and all creatures within Close range of it". It's fairly simple and it does well to combine mechanical strategy with theatrics and vivid action scenes. It might be worth a look for reference.

Right, that's exactly why D&D, despite what the designers say, is clearly not designed for theater of the mind. Sure, you don't need to use minis and measurements - but if you aren't, and you aren't homebrewing something like 13th Age, it's a poorer game.

[Pelle]

Unless you chop a huge amount out, this question needs to be asked by every player every turn.

That depends on how complicated the situation is. Do you really bother drawing up the grid for every single combat? Even for combats that take only 5 min, against a single enemy, where there is very little tactical positioning? Say a mindless zombie blocked by the fighter in a bottleneck. This categoric resistance to totm is puzzling to me.

[Pelle]

Sure, you don't need to use minis and measurements - but if you aren't, and you aren't homebrewing something like 13th Age, it's a poorer game.

The thing is, in some situations, that's it's a poorer tactical game isn't the biggest concern. Not wasting time on unneccesary setup is. Say when taking out that lone guard. It's not a situation where that tactical positioning is important anyways, so it doesn't hurt to take it away for this fight.

[Thrudd]

The thing is, in some situations, that's it's a poorer tactical game isn't the biggest concern. Not wasting time on unneccesary setup is. Say when taking out that lone guard. It's not a situation where that tactical positioning is important anyways, so it doesn't hurt to take it away for this fight.

Sure, there are edge cases where you can dispense with setting up a battle. But there are going to be many times where tracking position and distance is necessary.
The point is, if someone never intends to use the tactical elements of the game, they should add something to replace it that makes the game equally engaging to play in the many combat scenarios that inevitably take place in D&D.

[Pelle]

Using totm doesn't mean you have to use totm for every combat. So not using minis in the combats where they aren't needed doesn't make the game poorer.

[Drascin]

Right, that's exactly why D&D, despite what the designers say, is clearly not designed for theater of the mind. Sure, you don't need to use minis and measurements - but if you aren't, and you aren't homebrewing something like 13th Age, it's a poorer game.

I dunno. It's a different game, sure, but I found my games to be significantly faster and more engaging when the details got ditched and we started working on "close enough" and "probably a bit too far". Instead of breaking out the rulers, players ask "how many guys do you think I can get with a 60' line spell" and the GM makes a guess of "four, five if you're willing to get close enough that they can whack you on their turn if you can't drop them", and then we move on.

[Knaight]

Right, that's exactly why D&D, despite what the designers say, is clearly not designed for theater of the mind. Sure, you don't need to use minis and measurements - but if you aren't, and you aren't homebrewing something like 13th Age, it's a poorer game.

I'm on board with this. I'm generally all for theater of the mind combat*, but it fundamentally doesn't work well with a movement and range system full of precise units. When it's closer to an implicit zone system where you don't actually define where zones are but still effectively use them it works just fine, especially as that looseness allows for slightly different visualization among the group where everyone's version still works fine.

*Though I despise the term. "Not using a map" has worked just fine for ages, and ToTM sounds so incredibly pretentious.

[Thrudd]

I dunno. It's a different game, sure, but I found my games to be significantly faster and more engaging when the details got ditched and we started working on "close enough" and "probably a bit too far". Instead of breaking out the rulers, players ask "how many guys do you think I can get with a 60' line spell" and the GM makes a guess of "four, five if you're willing to get close enough that they can whack you on their turn if you can't drop them", and then we move on.

I don't like that kind of ambiguity - I'm all for DM's making judgment calls and keeping the game moving, but it seems to cheapen the players' character choices when you replace a huge chunk of the game mechanics with "close enough" and "mother may I?" There needs to be rules and mechanics to make combat less of an ongoing DM judgment call when it is cinematic/theater of the mind. Also, how much faster it is is debatable. Time spent putting tokens on the table is replaced with time spent answering questions about "how far is that guy?" and "how many did you say there were, again?" and "I thought that guy was on the other side of the door?" "Nope, I said he came through the door." "Oh, then I don't want to do that." I can streamline and economize the process of setting up minis and making measurements more easily than I can prevent the inevitable 20 questions (that would be answered by a single glance at table with minis).

I also think the game may be missing some challenge if every combat is so nonchalant that you can do everything quickly with the "close enough" style, and players don't need to ask very many questions about what's going - which they would be doing if their characters' lives depended on not making a wrong move in a difficult combat scenario.

Every edition of D&D, so far, has been lacking in guidance and support for TotM-style. So much more design effort and page space is put into tactical combat elements that it seems pointless, to me, to play it without those things. It feels like playing less than half a game. I've run and played without any minis before, many times, so I'm not just saying that. It just became a 100% more satisfying, fun game when those things were present, from Basic/Expert and 1e AD&D on up to the present.

[Tanarii]

That depends on how complicated the situation is. Do you really bother drawing up the grid for every single combat? Even for combats that take only 5 min, against a single enemy, where there is very little tactical positioning? Say a mindless zombie blocked by the fighter in a bottleneck. This categoric resistance to totm is puzzling to me.

To answer your questions, of course not.

To answer your questions again, and rebut your classifying me as categorically resistant, I suggest you go reread my first post in this thread.

I'm on board with this. I'm generally all for theater of the mind combat*, but it fundamentally doesn't work well with a movement and range system full of precise units. When it's closer to an implicit zone system where you don't actually define where zones are but still effectively use them it works just fine, especially as that looseness allows for slightly different visualization among the group where everyone's version still works fine.

Exactly. The problem is a lack of precision in a system that is built with precision in mind, in situations where precision is required.

*Though I despise the term. "Not using a map" has worked just fine for ages, and ToTM sounds so incredibly pretentious.

Right?