T2K using Twilight 2013 Reflex System -Pitfalls?

[recon35]

We are looking at starting a campaign, and like the character generation of the newer Reflex system. However, none of us has actually played it. Does anyone have experience with it they could share, as well as some potential pitfalls or rules shortcomings?
Thanks

[Ash247]

We've been using the system for our group now for a few months, it took a while to pick it up as its pretty different from what we have been using previously, but now we're up to speed its working well.

We use the optional initiative system of declaring actions then waiting till the ticks have past then take it rather than the slightly easier standard of do the action then you next action is after the ticks have past.

[recon35]

Ok, thanks. Let me ask you this. Did you find it necessary or particularly beneficial to increase stats (other than CUF and OODA) during creation or focus on skill increases?

[alexei]

I can barely remember even one rule set, so after getting the Twilight 2013 rules I started using those for everything, even campaigns with the v1 timeline.

As far as character generation, I remember that I had to make the PCs a few years older than v1 to get skill levels I was happy with.

Using Advanced Combat Timing some smaller weapons (SMG) seem more viable at shorter ranges because they can fire much quicker.

One of the differences I have noticed is the increased difficulty when living off the land compared to previous versions. I remember it being easier to survive in the wild in v1, especially during the summer and autumn months.

Twilight 2013 doesn’t really have any encounter rules or charts, so I used the v2 info if I wanted to generate a random encounter.

[recon35]

Thank you. Any insights are most appreciated.

[VagabondElf]

I've been using T2013 for both a variation on Twilight 2000's setting (pulled forward to the Donbass War) and for Firefly. It's been working well for both games.

Character creation takes forever. But once the characters are made the system itself is very clean and workable.

I used a point-buy for attributes, rather than die rolls, and used a slightly higher amount, because attributes are vital in this game. I don't remember the total I used, but it worked out to an average attribute of 7. 52 maybe?

Downtime is very important for character progression. When the Twilight game got on the train from my adaptation of "Going Home," they were moving so fast they encountered stuff almost constantly and the game slowed down to near real-time. Since both ways of improving skills need a week's downtime, this was a problem. Shifting the campaign pacing to be "adventure followed by 1 - 2 weeks downtime" seems to be much better. (Firefly didn't have this issue, since it's between 6 and 28 days travel time as they flit between planets.)

The Rules-As-Written initiative system is very swingy. If all your PCs have comperable OODA, it's not too bad, but my games had a mix of goons with high OODA/CUF, and Techs who were much lower. Several fights were over before the slower PCs ever got to act. In one memorable battle, a lightly-encumbered PC rolled a margin of 10 (OODA 9, rolled a 1, second die also succeeded) giving him 20 ticks above "Light" worth of action. He was using a C8 carbine (the Canadian M4) with a Reflex sight, so 3 ticks for a snapshot. The five bad guys all had serious or worse wounds before anyone else got to act.

After that fight, we adopted a simple change: no longer doubling the margin, just adding it flat. It keeps the initiative range narrower and made fight scenes much more interesting.

I also found that players where getting caught up in trying to maximise the efficiency of their tick use, rather than just reacting as characters. This not only broke immersion, it resulted in noticible delays as players tried to decide what to do.

To counter this, I first ruled that tick expenditure could go negative, as long as the character had at least 1 tick left. If the next round was a pause, no arm done; if the next round was another exchange, the deficit was removed from their total. This resulted in a much more organic series of actions as players no longer stopped to go "oh, I don't have enough ticks left to tie my boots." (Also, it meant that NPC marksmen with bolt-action rifles could still attack even if they flubbed their OODA rolls...)

The other thing I adopted was keeping track of all tick totals myself. To facilitate this, I made a grid of boxes labeled-8 to 32 (because that's what fit on the paper!) and then a set of markers, coloured for the PCs and numbered for bad guys. At the start of the exchange, the markers get put on whatever box matches their initiative ticks. Then, as a player acts, they tell me the tick cost and I move the marker down, then see who has the highest marker and tell them it's their turn. This not only pulled the player away from the accounting side of tick management, letting them focus on their decisions and actions, it also made it much faster to figure out who was next.

Using two markers would make the "declare now and act at the end" system mentioned by Ash247 much simpler, I suspect.

The last change I've made is hit locations in melee combat. My decade and a half of armed martial arts makes me feel that melee hits are much less random than gunfire. To keep it simple, after hitting in melee the player chooses what one of the dice are (both number and whether it's top or side) and then rolls the other one.

A proposed change I've yet to test is allowing a target to declare a melee defence if their current tick total is within their skill in dice of the attackers, rather than within one. (So, if an attacker delcares a strike on Tick 10, an unskilled character can only defend if they are also on Tick 10, a Novice if they are on Tick 10 or 9; Competent, Ticks 10, 9, or 8; and so on.) To be sure, melee combat rarely comes up in Twilight, but the Firefly game has more brawls and knife-fights than shoot-outs.

That's all I can think of, off hand. All in all I like the system, and it's level of accounting/logistics is super flexible. My Twilight game keeps track of daily calories; my Firefly game tracks food in person-weeks (and for that, only so we know if the players are too broke to eat yet). The biggest downside is Character Creation. Attributes are vital; any character who wants to function in a fight needs a CUF of at least 5 and an OODA of at least 6, and if you want to be good 8s or higher is my recommendation. Likewise, whatever attribute governs the thing you mostly do should be at least a 7 for a decent chance of success.