Well, when Saga Star Wars first came out, people said you’d have to have minis, period. I proceeded to take it to the Boy Scout Summer Camp I was working at as a cook, and ran it for 6 weeks without a mini anywhere. At all. What Saga (and 4E combat) boils down to is relative distance. For 4E, those distances are; Melee - Reach - Short - Long For example, Party of a Warlord, Paladin, Fighter, and Rogue are fighting a White Dragon at the top of the falls in Fallcrest. (Actually, the game I ran last week). Paladin is Longsword, with some dabble ranged from being multi-Feylock. Warlord is longsword/longspear (this fight, using shield for the bonus to reflex defense), Fighter is using a Halberd, and Rogue is using Shuriken. Thus, for this fight, the relative ranges break down as follows; Warlord - Melee
Paladin - Melee or Short
Fighter - Reach
Rogue - Short
Dragon - Reach Now, via description, I just described the fight in terms of relative range. The Rogue kept herself at short range, out of the dragon’s breath/claw range. The fighter and the dragon kept each other at Reach range. The Warlord and Paladin had no choice but to close to melee, in reach of the dragon. They would shift in and out of Melee into reach as needed to heal, letting the Fighter and Rogue try and keep the dragon pinned near the cliff (she used trick strike). Whole fight, not one mini used.