Adapting Troika!'s initiative system to 5e D&D

Troika! is a neat little game that is very loosely derived from the system behind the Fighting Fantasy gamebooks. The rules are easy to digest & teach, the setting is a weird, sometimes silly, sometimes poignant mix of Warhammer Fantasy and Spelljammer, characters' stats & background are randomly generated but they can learn new skills in play. You have no control over who you were, but you decide what you will become.

If I were to become even more of a cliche by starting an actual-play podcast, Troika! would be one of the few games I'd consider running.

It currently has a Kickstarter for a revised "Numinous" edition with better print quality, and there's a free no-art version of the current edition.

But seriously, check out the art :O

from the revised edition, art by Sam Mameli

Troika! Initiative Rules

Here are the rules verbatim from the no-art version:

5.1 Assemble the bag. During combat or at other times where it is important who goes first you will need to assemble the initiative bag. To do this get a container and a selection of coloured dice or other convenient markers. Each player will be assigned two dice of a single colour, all enemies will share one colour of the number specified by their entry or the GMs whim, and a final single token of a distinct colour will be added to mark the end of a round when drawn (5.3).

5.2 Using the bag. The GM will remove a token from the bag at random, the colour of which will determine who holds the initiative and takes a turn.

5.3 End of round. If the end of round token is drawn then all tokens, including the end of round token, are put back in the bag. Resolve any per round or end of round activities such as magic effects, fire, poison or bleeding out, then draw another token and carry on.

5.4 Henchmen. If you have any hired help that are willing to fight for you treat them as their own character that only gets 1 initiative die in the bag.

5.5 Rationale. The random turn length adds a degree of uncertainty where you never know how much time you have left. When actions are not taking place it represents hesitation, panic or other incidental delays that can happen in a tense encounter where every second counts. The goblins have few dice because they are cowardly, not because they are slow; the dragon has many because it knows exactly what it wants, not because it is fast.

Adapting for 5e D&D

• Disregard Initiative modifiers. Dex is already too much of a god-stat anyway.
• Characters with a class feature or feat that would give a bonus to Initiative get an extra token in the bag each round, but only act on the first two tokens drawn. Multiple "improved initiative" features don't stack. A non-exhaustive list of such features:
  • Alert -- feat
  • Feral Instinct -- Barbarian 7
  • Remarkable Athlete -- Fighter (Champion)
  • Dead Ambusher -- Ranger (Gloom Stalker) 3
  • Ambush Master -- Rogue (Scout) 13
  • Rakish Audacity -- Rogue (Swashbuckler) 3
  • Tactical Wit -- Wizard (War Magic) 2
  
  Exceptions can be made for very high-level or situational abilities. e.g. a 17th level Rogue (Thief) gets an extra two tokens in the bag on the first combat round, and acts on the first four drawn.
  Note that as no d20 roll is made, the following don't grant an additional initiative token:
  • Enhance Ability -- spell
  • Bardic Inspiration -- Bard
  • Portent -- Wizard (Diviner) 2
  
  
• Beast Master rangers don't have to spend their action to command their animal companion to attack. Either give their companion one token in the bag, as with NPC henchmen, or let the animal companion act on the ranger's first token drawn each round.
• Since everyone gets up to 2 turns each round, I'm not sure how to handle spell durations that specify "1 round, until the end of your next turn". For now, I'll treat it as "until the end of your next turn", regardless of when your next token is drawn.
• Similarly, I'm not sure whether spellcasters are restricted to one non-cantrip per turn, or per round. For now, it's per turn.
• Instead of the suggested DMG method of representing a mob of monsters by cross-referencing number remaining, attack bonus, and player AC to see how many auto-hit, do the following:
  • Multiply a monster's HP by about half of however many there are? You can multiply it by the full number if using a Morale rule.
  • Give them one or two extra Initiative tokens, and advantage on all attacks. They can't all get good positioning to attack at once, some might be cowardly or willing to let others be the vanguard, but they can all assist whoever's attacking.
  • Single-target attacks deal all their damage as though it were one big monster, i.e. if your greatsword hits for 15 damage against a mob of 5 hp hyenas, you cleave through three of them, not just one
  • Area attacks may deal double or even triple damage.
   

That's all that occurs to me for now. It'll probably be a while before I get to playtest these changes (my current 5e game deliberately has almost no houserules to keep it accessible to drop-in players), but I'm keen to switch up the rather... clockwork nature of modern D&D initiative for something a bit more exciting and scary.

If there's any glaring issues I've missed, let me know in the comments :-)