Stochastic Combat Rounds

Based on the sometimes-loose-and-vague ways the terms “Turn” and “Round” are used in CHAINMAIL, 0D&D, Holmes and so forth, it seems to me that the actual time period of a combat round is less important than accounting for what happens. The Twin Cities groups of Dave Arneson treated combat as frenzied blow-by-blow action. Dave solidified his Round time as twenty seconds in Adventures in Fantasy later on.

So let us say that a combat round is not a set period of time. It could be 6 seconds or 60. It is simply the period from the first action to the last - going “round” the table (and giving the enemy it’s due.)

The whole of a combat will fit inside a ten minute exploration Turn or perhaps a little more. Recovering from a combat will take time too. 

Therefore after a combat, move the character’s clock two Turns (20 minutes) ahead of when the combat began. If you as the Referee judge that the combat was especially short or long you can adjust this to be one Turn or three or in rare cases even longer. 

This especially solves the problem with the apparently low ROF in one-minute Rounds. Scholars estimate that an Englishman using a longbow would be able to aim and fire 8-12 times in a minute - or about once every six seconds. This likely refers to volley fire from a mass of archers rather than dungeon nonsense which would be slower. But at either rate, the figure using a bow would certainly fire off more than one arrow in a one minute round. Where do those extra arrows go?

We have played around with a couple of answers to the question which I could talk about if anyone is interested. But a stochastic Round seems like a good solution. It also feels better. After all no one keeps a stopwatch on the action and blows the whistle when time is up.