Old SR-2 rules had gun bunnies mopping the floor with corpsec before a mage could even start to think about chucking a manabolt. SR-3 rules tried to rectify this by having gun bunnies go first then everyone else to follow on the next round. Although slow mages had a chance to act removing some of the resentment, it was not realistic.
The following is offered as a compromising solution to shadowrun's initiative mechanics by evenly distributing actions.
Both of the timelines represent 1 round.
The round starts with players rolling initiative as usual. The premise I was working with was that faster characters go first, but instead of sr3 rules where the everyone goes next round, the slowest person's actions would happen in the middle of fastest person's making the actions more distributed.
I used triangles to represent who would go in a top down approach. Picture sliding down the graph with a ruler.
The key is to subtract 20 from each action, keeping in mind the negatives are there for mechanics and do not affect the next round.
Example A: players A, B, C and D roll initiatives of 11, 26, 15, and 6.
combat order would be
B with 26, then C on 15, then A on 11, then B and D on 6 if you allow simultaneous actions. If not, compare reaction. In this cast B would go. D would then react if you do not allow simultaneous actions on 6, then C on 5, then A on 1, then finally B to finish at -14. (remember -14 is purely overflow to allow actions to be distributed)
Example B:
A, B ,C roll initiatives
33,4,15
A at 33
C at 15
A at 13
B at 4
C at -5
A at -7
A at -17
notice how B's action takes place in the middle of A's action for a more distributed and realistic approach.
