An Alternate Action Sequence Chart for VnV

Found this in the old archives.  Way back in 1985, I had recently discovered Champions, Villains and Vigilantes, and Superworld (and maybe one or two others comic book RPGs).  When "counting segments," the Champions speed chart seemed elegant, compared to VnV's mechanism.  A few years later, I figured out to just order the character actions, and not worry about "counting" anything. Live and learn :-)

This chart had two functions: First, to simplify segment "counting," and second, to prevent the "I just had three actions, what's Bull gonna do?" problem for the Heightened Agility and Heightened Speed types (we had one PC with Heightened Speed x2, and we had all missed the rule about "more than one action per turn is PR=2 per action, so you can imagine how big the problem was).

(Below are, literally, my old notes, just because I felt nostalgic.)

The basic idea is to simplify the initiative or order of action.  In this model, a turn is still 15 seconds long, but it now consists of 6 “segments”.  Characters can act (“take their phase”) on the appropriate segment.  This way the GM and players only have to keep track of six segments, instead of having to keep counting down in increments of 15.

VnV initiative value	Speed Value	Segment
		1	2	3	4	5	6
1 to 15	1				X
16 to 30	2			X			X
31 to 45	3		X		X		X
46 to 60	4		X	X		X	X
61 to 75	5	X	X	X		X	X
76+	6	X	X	X	X	X	X

When the appropriate segment arrives, characters with the appropriate Speed Value can act.  In cases of more than one character being able to act in the same segment, here are the rules:

• Higher initiative goes first;
• If tie for initiative score, then higher Agility goes first;
• If tie for Agility, then each rolls 1d20 and high roll goes first;
• If the d20 rolls come up a tie, then the player that has provided the most munchies for the group over time goes first.

Phase can always be delayed and used to interrupt.  A character can “abort to a dodge,” meaning give up next phase to start Evading right now.  Evasion lasts until the first phase of the next turn.  “Between-turns” phase happens between segment 6 of the ending turn, and segment 1 of the next turn.

Copyright P. Rogers 1985, 2011, 2017.  All rights reserved.