Combat as War, Sport, and Spectacle

Hello all!

A couple of days ago, I \posted\ on r/RPGdesign about Combat as War, Sport, and Spectacle. This conversation was linked to a discussion between \Dadi\ and \Questing Beast\.

Long story short, I have a lot of thoughts on how combat works across different systems and how that all ties in to lethality in combat. My thesis is that there are three kinds of combat philosophies across the TTRPGs I've played: combat as war, combat as sport, and combat as spectacle.

Combat as war promises lethality, but also ways to stack combat in your favor or circumvent it entirely - the idea is that combat is usually a last resort, and if you're going to engage, you need* to win.
Combat as sport doesn't promise lethality, but does* expect the players to engage with combat regularly. When the characters have all kinds of combat tools, that encourages the players to exercise them. This promise falls flat when lethality is present - the players aren't given the tools to avoid potentially lethal circumstances.
Combat as spectacle promises lethality much like combat as war, but also encourages the players to interface with combat much like they would in combat as sport. This creates some dissonance - the players are expected to willingly engage with an activity that has lethal consequences. Therefore, the GM is encouraged to pull their punches on lethality so that the players continue* to interface with combat. If lethality is delivered as promised, it teaches the players that they shouldn't engage... but the system may lack the tools to meaningfully circumvent combat.

Each of these philosophies has their own attitudes about what is appropriate to present as a challenge to the PCs, as well as what the appropriate stakes for these encounters should be.

I want to hear from you guys:

* Do you prefer combat as war? Or combat as sport? What are your favorite examples of systems that do what you like well?
* Have you played in or ran games with combat as spectacle? Do you feel like it's tied to specific games or genres?
* What are the best and worst combat encounters you've experience across any system?

I also made a \Youtube video\ about this subject, and I'm eager to hear your thoughts!

>Combat as spectacle promises lethality much like combat as war, but also encourages the players to interface with combat much like they would in combat as sport.

Which games do this? I'm not talking about like, play examples but ones that incentivize through rules, in some fashion, getting into combat regularly with lethality on par with "combat as war".

>but the system may lack the tools to meaningfully circumvent combat.

Which games provide lethal combat but lack rules for ... basically anything else? You can't talk shit out? You can't go around to avoid a fight? You can't run away?

This definition of "combat as spectacle" is extremely confusing and I don't think I've ever encountered a game which acts in that manner.

There's a lot of the TTRPG space that doesn't fit your thesis.

All of this assumes that any given game is going to both include combat as an option, and that combat will be a significant focus of the rules and gameplay.

Many systems treat combat like any other narrative conflict, without special rules or focus. Lethality is not really a concern for many, if not most, games.

Combat as War is my preference, no contest. I want combat to be nasty, brutish and short. I want an unlucky punch to be potentially lethal. I want stress, fear, torn knuckles and crushed noses. I want a thrown a bottle to be a massive escalation. I want sheer survival to be the main objective. I want fighting fairly to be a ludicrous idea.

I disagree with your categories

Assuming a game like 5e (heroic, roleplay + combat mini game)

Combat as sport: in a competitive sport, you have two sides that both have to play by the same rules, and one side eventually loses. In a game, the ideal of this might be something like chess, where the two sides are in fact perfectly balanced. Similarly, in combat-as-sport there's an expectation of some level of balance and one side that wins due to a combination of talent using the ruleset and luck. This is different than combat-as-war, where even if both sides are using the same core rules, one side could create imbalance so as it to make it impossible to lose, and/or do things that are outside of the rules (requiring a referee to make an ad hoc ruling). Now, 'losing' doesn't always have to mean death; there could be other loss conditions.

Combat as spectacle: here combat serves a narrative purpose more than a gameplay one. In an average 5e encounter, the combat introduces some enemies that the players will overcome, and this advances the story in some way. If the players are at risk of not winning, the gm might cheat to insure the pre-planned narrative continues anyway. Combat is only lethal in narratively appropriate moments. Usually players \can\ circumvent combat in some way, but usually don't because the encounter is the means of advancing the narrative. Also, given that most character abilities are combat related, engaging in combat helps express the personality of the character.

Running TTRPGs where combat is a major aspect of the game, my personal preference is to plan potential combats from the perspective of 'combat as sport' (creating challenges that the PCs have the potential to win in a fair fight), and then during the game, run combats from the perspective of 'combat as war' (enemies will do absolutely anything they can to win/survive).

Which games do this? I'm not talking about like, play examples but ones that incentivize through rules, in some fashion, getting into combat regularly with lethality on par with "combat as war".

I pretty much always end up bastardizing whatever I'm running until it turns into combat as spectacle. Usually by making maps (or if I'm doing totm) introducing lots of environmental gimmicks and interactibles that are there to make the fight more set-piecey. I also tend to have bad guys be very chatty in fights, especially if I'm doing something more superheroic.

If I'm doing a cyberpunk game, typically hand to hand fights will have that spectacular vibe while gun fights start and end very fast. A gun is a big deal.

The whole discussion is generally colored by the dragon in the room: D&D. There are tons of games that don't focus on combat systems, or otherwise don't need lethal stakes. Those games obviously are not a part of this discussion.

It sounds more like you actually agree with me rather than disagree, especially if you check out the last Youtube link in the original post.

If you want another take on the subject, expanding the classic war/sport dichotomy to have many more categories, Combat as my balls is great reading. They define "combat as spectacle" very differently from you, though.

>D&D 5E is a huge culprit.

Last time I played 5E I recall one PC being brought to zero hit points and making numerous "death saves" to avoid lethality. I can't possibly see how 5E is "combat as spectacle" according to your definition there, which seems to imply that it is the GM responsibility to remove death as a stake. 5E uses _the rules_ to remove death as a stake (except in rare of circumstances).

>In most combat as war games I've played, these skill checks to circumvent combat (talking it out, sneaking around, or approaching from an oblique angle) simply succeed.

Wait, you can just automatically talk your way out of a problem? The GM doesn't even bother making a reaction check or something? That seems ... odd, but okay.

Interesting way of thinking about it. Based on your breakdown of these three methods, you leave room for a 4th mode of interaction.

Combat as War: Lethal, Usually Avoid
Combat as Sport: Not Lethal, Actively Participate
Combat as Spectacle: Lethal, Actively Participate
Combat as \_\_\_\_\_\_\_: Not Lethal, Usually Avoid

Not sure what to call it, though.

Related to Combat as War, I'm reminded of a designer for MtG talking about how Gotcha failed as a mechanic. The mutual agreement between designer and player is that the player will play to win, and the designer will make sure the game is fun when the player does this. Gotcha sucked because optimal play wasn't fun (particularly in an Un-set, which throws away a lot of other design principles for the sake of fun). So if you go in and design something for Combat as Spectacle, you may find yourself constantly running up against people playing cautiously, gaming the systems meant to encourage spectacle to get a safe advantage, and, all in all, treating it like war rather than spectacle.

I think FATE does a pretty good job at encouraging combat as sport. You can see your character's death from far away and forfeit the fight by giving up and letting your opponent get what they want out of the situation. So it's possible to play in such a way that your character never dies, and if a character does die, there's a sense of acceptance. It also encourages having a variety of motivations beyond survival or killing your target (not to say those can't be interesting motivations by themselves, though). This works well for a game where you're more worried about whether or not a character is going to accomplish their goals than you are about whether or not a character is going to survive any given encounter.

Last time I played 5E I recall one PC being brought to zero hit points and making numerous "death saves" to avoid lethality.

The GM doesn't even bother making a reaction check or something?

That was a really good read, but holy hell that title doesn't do it any favors.