Custom System: Movement (Vehicles, delays & initiative)

[Raven]

    Introduction:
 Some people have been neglecting the time rule or stretching it in their favor, in order to try and prevent or reduce such cases, I've made a chart and pulled some other resources that should allow you to accurately calculate the amount of time it would have taken you to arrive to a scene. This rule is explained in detail in the rulebooks, however some of it is relatively ambiguous and most of it is left to the storytellers. This guide was created to make up for the fact that we do not have an active storyteller.


    Movement Rates:
 You can only move a certain distance in a turn, which is why you couldn't possibly join a fight if you recently left the Bank and made your way to the pier while your friend was actively fighting. As such, on arrival a time is determined for your travel speed, normally - in tabletop games this issue does not occur, thanks to downtime and active storytellers regulating movements among players. Given the absence of either, you have to use some common sense and realize that time moves equally for all parties, and while a scene might last 30 minutes, only a few turns may have passed - and you might be unable to join entirely.

 Your movement rate can be calculated based on speed* or is directly provided in the charts.

On foot:

• Crippled: [1] yard/meter per turn
• Mauled: [3] yard/meters per turn
• Wounded: [7] You can only walk, if you move + perform actions you lose dice.
• Walking: [7] yards or meters per turn;
• Jogging: [12 + Dexterity] meters or yards per turn;
• Running: [20 + (3xDexterity)] meters or yards per turn;

(A vampire with Dexterity 9 & Celerity 3 could run 56 meters per turn which is roughly 65km/h)

 Assume that unless your character is aware of the ongoing fight - you will move at a walking pace.

Vehicle Speeds:
 Vehicle speed can be used to determine how fast you reach your destination as well, but you need to keep in mind that it refers to the average size. Cars take time to start, accelerate - and you'll take time to take a turn, these decreases and increases leave some wiggle room as far as timing goes - you may want to consult with the other party or a storyteller.
 There are two average speeds calculated for vehicles, a "safe" speed - at which you are expected to move (Note that these are not related with the legal speed limit laws, but are the car's traits) and a 'maximum' speed, which you are not expected to reach unless you're in a high speed pursuit or deliberately heading to back someone up.

 As a rule of thumb, for every 10 miles an hour that your vehicle exceeds the safe limit, the difficulty to maneuver the car increases by 1. Taking a sharp turn at 120 miles an hour may not be the brightest idea if you're driving a Turismo.



Speed*: In order to calculate the distance you've traveled, open up google and write down: "99 mph to m/s"; multiple the result by 3 for each second a turn takes and you've got yourself the result. An Infernus (Sports car) at full speed will travel 267 yards in any given turn. This is the MAXIMUM, you will absolutely never reach this speed so keep that in mind.
 
Sharp Turns, Acceleration and other complications:
Having used the /distance tool, you will get a direct - linear distance between point A and B. Unless you're willing to go and /distance each segment separately to determine an accurate total, you can add penalties to the required duration to arrive. Add between 1 to 5 turns if you encounter sharp turns (which would slow down your car) or buildings/obstacles you must travel around.


    Examples of Play:

• Lawrence Everett is at the Sheriff's Department Garage when he receives a backup call. He saddles up in a cruiser, driving to the Montgomerry dealership. His fellow cop is currently in an initiative based roleplay with the suspect. Although Lawrence arrives in 30 seconds, the others barely managed to finish the first turn. Upon arrival, Lawrence uses /distance to estimate the RANGE he had to travel, coming up with 1000 yards. Assuming his average speed is 110mph, he calculates how long it takes. As a result, he gets ~20 seconds as a result, which he divides by 3 to get 6 turns. He may then add 1 to 5 turns to get in the vehicle and exit the garage, or road turn penalties. Lawrence arrives in 10 turns.
  
  
• Alexander Parker is in the hotel lobby, he is contacted via Telepathy by Kristijan and told to head to the Fleischberg ASAP. Coincidentally, Selene Vitalis is also leaving the motel, although she is unaware of an ongoing fight. They both arrive at the same time OOCly, but the speed at which they moved varies. They look at the chart, and the distance is roughly 150-200 yards, depending on which route they take. Parker is all out running, while still mindful of the Masquerade - he only employs 5 dexterity, his movement per turn capacity being 35, while Selene only walks at 7 yards/turn. Parker will require 5-6 turns to arrive, while Selene will take over twenty.

[Raven]

Movement during Initiative

For the longest time people have been running their full movement rate without being touched simply because they had higher initiative. The books are generally unclear about how much you can move before being struck by a ranged opponent, but realism dictates you don't immediately reach your destination BEFORE they get a chance to pull the trigger. However, this gray area also restricts supernaturals - who should be able to rely on speed alone to get out of dodge. This homebrew system builds on top of the M20 basics to hopefully deliver an answer to the issue. While it's a bit more complex, it should be a tad more fair compared to how it is played currently.



When carrying someone or something over 25kg, the maximum movement speed is your Jogging rate. (12 + Dexterity)

1 /distance unit is equal to both 1 yard and 1 meter in-game for purpose of discerning movement or range/radius.

1 /distance unit is also the equivalent of 3 feet (1 yard), while paradoxically also the equivalent of 1 meter.

This is for simplicity's sake since some books clash between the metric system and that other dumb system.


How much can you move before being shot at?
Basically - assuming a turn is 3 to 5 seconds - then the entirety of your movement pool is traversed and as such split during these few seconds, rather than taking place immediately. Common sense, yeah?
It doesn't take a whole 3 seconds to pull the trigger and shoot someone before they manage to flee either, right? Well - no.

Reaction time plays a factor in this - which defers you to your Initiative score. Here's how it works:

To determine how much you move in any given turn before someone reacts, compare your initiative to your opponents.

• If your initiative is greater than theirs by 1-5, you can run a fifth of your movement rate (20% | 1/5) [Movement per turn / 5]
• If your initiative is greater than theirs by 6-10, you can run an additional fifth. (40% | 2/5) [Movement per turn / 5 * 2]
• If your initiative is greater than theirs by 11-15, you can run an additional fifth (60% | 3/5) [Movement per turn / 5 * 3]
• If your initiative is greater than theirs by 16-20, you can run an additional fifth (80% | 4/5) [Movement per turn / 5 * 4]
• If your initiative is greater than theirs by 21+, you can run the entire way before they can react accordingly. [Movement per turn]
  
  
• Extra actions from Rage & Celerity occur after the entire movement chain was completed.
• Foresee (Patterns 3), Gut Instincts, Tremor Sense and other similar effects allow you to run 3/5 of your movement rate by default. For each 5 additional initiative points above theirs (6-10), then (11+) - you gain an additional fifth. For this reason, you roll Initiative regardless. Just because you have the Wits part covered and can react quick, doens't mean you are physically capable of doing so in time. Initiative applies here for this reason.

As an example: Damien Meark (38) is desperately fleeing a scene and trying to take cover 30  yards away behind a building. Igor Zdranovich (32) and Anthony Egan (21) are both using ranged attacks against him.
Let's assume Damien has a movement rate of [(15x3)+20] = 65. Igor's initiative is lower by 6, meaning Damien can only run 65/5 x 2 = 26 yards before being hit by a good ole' Ironhammer. He is just 4 yards away from taking full cover and is as such hit directly. Anthony Egan - on the other hand is greatly outmatched. With an initiative that's 17 points lower, he only fires after Damien covers four fifths (52 yards) of his movement rate. By that time, he's in full cover behind the wall and can no longer be hit at all.

Hit and Run tactics are disallowed!
Some of you might be thinking: my initiative is higher, I should be able to step out of cover - shoot someone and then dip back in with just half my movement rate.. since they react too slow, I can do it unharmed, yeehaw!

Hold your horses there buckaroo, cause it aint happening. Even if you have a greater initiative score, if you try and do this - you will be shot at the moment you leave your cover.

If you run at someone, stab then and then run away - they CAN stab you back in that exact moment, even if their initiative is 50 points lower.


"Reflexive" Movement
There are many cases in which a lower initiative target declares an attack, only for the other target to turn around and leave you in the dust. Since you didn't declare moving in pursuit, do you just hang there - unable to reach them or even budge an inch? Technically, you should because you were too lazy to write a "/me rushes towards their target and then strikes", and went with a "/me burns bloodpoint and attacks" instead. Since I dislike the "mean manager" attribute I've been given, I'll give you folks a pass.

If you wish to perform undeclared movement, roll Wits (difficulty 8). If you succeed, you can move at half your rate.
Willpower cannot be spent for an auto success, and you can only attempt this check DURING the declaration phase.
Once the rolling phase is on its way, you are no longer able to alter the course of events.


Flanked Strikes
Attacking someone from the side or from behind confers a difficulty reduction. However, since movement is reflexive, and a defender can spin around like a fidget spinner and block all attacks - it is unfeasible to take advantage of this. Likewise, you cannot use half your movement rate to move behind someone and then strike them. There are two notable exceptions to this, however.

a) The target is stunned or held still, whether by a grapple or other means such as telekinesis. NOTE however that the reductions from Stun/Grapple do not stack with Flanking.
b) The target is overwhelmed by multiple opponents, who coordinate their attacks at the same time. To perform this, the highest initiative attacker assumes position then yields their action until the perfect moment, striking along with the next person. For example, assuming Damien Meark (example above) pulls out his Riot Shield and desperately defends the bullets, Igor Zdranovich can go behind Meark - wait until Egan is ready to fire - and then attack at the same time. This will prevent Meark from turning around at an 180 degree. As a result, at least one of the attackers benefits from -2 to their CQC attacks, and further bypass the need to go around his shield for an effective -4 in difficulty reduction simply by using this tactic.


Jumping
Jumps and leaps are done with a Dexterity + Athletics 3 roll, and usually require a certain amount of successes to cover the distance fully.

Each success on the leap allows you to jump half a SAMP unit in height, or one SAMP unit in length. You can either estimate a distance visually or use /distance. The average height of a wall is 3 meters, so as a rough rule of thumb - each floor you try to leap up to requires 6 sucesses on average.

The following rounded up chart applies to supernatural forms.
For each success you can jump the following /distance SAMP unit:
Humanoid: 0.5 vertical, 1 horizontal
Crinos: 1 vertical, 1.5 horizontal
Hispo: 1.5 vertical, 2 horizontal
Lupus: 1 vertical, 2.5 horizontal