Bonus to Initiative!? Madness.

For some reason I never allow the characters to add their dexterity bonus to their initiative. Castles & Crusades does, in the rules, suggest that you add the bonus to the roll. Though I don’t know if Advanced Dungeons & Dragons did, or does, but if it did, I never allowed it to. I went from that game to C&C, and have never allowed the dexterity bonus to come into play with initiative.

When asked why that was, I couldn’t give a decent answer. I wasn’t sure why. Somewhere in some dark corner of my GM’s mind, the roll should be pure, leaving it all to chance. Or so I surmise. But that doesn’t sound right. It doesn’t sound like me. I’m know I had valid argument for it once, long ago, as we used to sit and discuss things like this back in the woebegone days.

If I were to roll the dice though, I think my argument went something like this. Animals are fast. Sweet good lord, they are fast. I can’t imagine any upright two legs with the soft cushions of civilization in their past, equaling the lion’s speed. And by default, you can assume the manticore moves every bit as fast as the lion or wolf or the fabled honey badger. No matter what, getting the drop on them is tough. So the advantage that comes with an 18 dex, just doesn’t seem to fit.

Mechanically my argument probably went like this. Because monsters do not have attributes listed in either game (I know they do in modern versions of Dungeons and Dragons), but they can arguably be faster than people, then it puts the characters at an unfair advantage (which is a horrid way to put that) as they are the only ones with the bonus.

Maybe it was one or both of those. Maybe something else I forgot?

Regardless, when you show up at my table, and I hope that you do. You aren’t going to add your dexterity bonus to your initiative roll!

Next week we gear up for the latest release of the Castles & Crusades Players Handbook (8^th printing, available for sale on December 6, 2021).