Playing Solo RPGs with Miniatures: Positioning, Marching Order and Turns

Miniatures make a solo fight easy to follow: you can see who is where without holding it all in your head. Here is how to set up the table, keep turns straight and play the enemies fairly when you are on both sides.

What you need (less than you think)

A flat surface, one marker for each person in the fight and a way to show the ground. Painted figures are lovely, but coins, dice, board-game pieces and bottle caps work just as well, and the Print Sheet makes fold-over paper minis from our monster drawings for the price of a page of card stock. For the ground, sketch on squared paper, print a map from Delve, or use the battlemap on a tablet lying flat on the table.

Give your hero a marker you will never confuse with anything else. Foes of the same kind can share a look; put a small number under each so you can tell Goblin 2 from Goblin 3 when one of them is hurt.

Front line, back line and reach

Most "can it reach me?" questions are answered by one idea: whoever stands in front gets hit first, and whoever stands behind is safe until someone gets round. Doorways, bridges and narrow corridors make this matter, which is why fights in them feel tactical even without rules for movement.

If your game measures distance, measure. If it does not, think in three bands: close enough to touch, close enough to throw or shoot, and too far. When you cannot tell which band someone is in, ask the oracle rather than deciding in your own favour.

Marching order

Decide it before the corridor, not after the trap. Write it down or set it in the turn tracker: who is at the front, who carries the light, who watches the rear. When a trap springs or an ambush comes, the order says who meets it, and you will not be tempted to pick the luckiest hero after the fact.

Single file suits tunnels and ledges. Two abreast suits roads and wide halls, and it means two people share the front. If something comes from the side, roll to see which part of the line it reaches; the turn tracker does this for you.

Keeping turns straight

Use your game's initiative if it has one: everyone acts from highest to lowest. If it does not, take turns side by side: all the heroes act, then all the foes. Either way, keep a round count. Effects that last "until the end of next round" are the easiest thing to forget when nobody else is at the table.

The turn tracker keeps the order, the round and each condition's countdown on your phone, so the table stays clear for the minis. If you prefer paper, put a die beside each condition and turn it down by one at the end of every round.

Playing the enemies fairly

This is the hard part of solo play with miniatures: you know your own plan, so it is tempting to have the enemies walk into it. Two habits help.

• Give each enemy a fighting style before the fight. Cowardly, brutal, sneaky, disciplined or mindless. A coward hangs back and runs when hurt; a brute charges whoever hit it last; a sneaky one goes for the weakest hero.
• Let the dice decide close calls. When an enemy has two sensible choices, ask the oracle "Does it do the riskier thing?" on 50/50. When one is badly hurt, ask "Does it flee?" on Likely for a coward and Unlikely for a brute.

Our monster generators list how each creature behaves and what it wants, which makes a quick style for anything you meet.

Your reference corner

Keep a small space beside the map for what you would otherwise forget:

• One card per kind of creature: what it wants, how it fights and what it does when hurt.
• Conditions, each with a die counting down the rounds.
• The marching order, on a sticky note you can move into the map when you enter a room.
• Your dice, and a note of any standing bonuses so you do not forget them mid-fight.

When the fight ends, write two lines about it in your journal: who fell, what was learned and what was taken. A fight that is remembered is part of the story; one that is forgotten was just dice.