POWERS THAT BE

 

2C: Combat

 

Initiative: When combat begins the characters involved roll an initiative. For the sake of speed the Narrator may rule that NPC’s (especially unimportant ones) may get passive initiatives. A character’s initiative modifier is directly related to their Boldness score. A character that is attacked before it is their turn in initiative on the first round has no points to spend and must use their passive Dodge resist unless they has some Apt or such that circumvents this. The Narrator may also allow the character to use AP in advance of their first turn for active defense if the character is aware combat is imminent and aware of the oncoming attack. This is an exception, not the rule, so after that first turn they use and loose AP as normal.

 

The basic combat sequence is as follows: The attacker makes an attack roll, which costs AP (action points), based on the total score for that attack type. Usually Adroitness plus a specific weapon skill or, in the case of a power, Focus. The defender (if not surprised) can then choose to whether to defend actively with a Dodge Resist (which costs AP) or passively which is half their Dodge Resist total score, rounded up. The defender should decide how they are defending before the attack is rolled. If the Attacker’s roll does not beat the Defender’s roll then the attack fails, a tie goes to the defender. If the Attacker rolls over the Defender’s roll then the amount they beat the defender by is multiplied by the attack’s Damage Multiplier, after which any bonus damage (such as from Strength) is added in. Even if the attack is just 1 point higher it still gets the bonus damage.

 

Example: Attack-O the Robot Clown tries to hit The Dark Defender. Attack-O has a total attack score of 30 and total dodge resist score of 20. The Dark Defender has a total attack score of 20 and total dodge resist score of 30. This is an oversimplified slug-fest to illustrate the basics of attack, defense and damage.

-First Combat Round: Attack-O attacks with giant mallet and rolls an 17. The Dark Defender had chosen to defend passively, resulting in a defense of 15. So the attack h, and is 2 over The Defender’s defense, so we multiply that by his damage multiplier, which is a mighty 1.5, which comes out to 3 pts of damage plus 5 points from Attack-O’s strength which brings the total to 8 points of damage. In retaliation the Dark Defender attacks with his cestus and gets a 7, Attack-O’s also is on passive defense and the attack misses.

-Second Combat Round: Attack-O gets a 21, on this roll. The Dark Defender luckily decided to actively defend and rolled a 25, which is higher so the attack misses. The Dark Defender attacks back and rolls a 9, which normally wouldn't hit but Attack-O’s was also actively defending and rolled total of 5 so the attack h. The hit was by 4 and the Dark Defender’s cestus has a damage multiplier of 0.5 so it does 2 points of damage plus another 5 from half of his strength bonus (as it is a one handed weapon). Essentially Attack-O’s had misjudged and moved into Dark Defender’s attack.

 

 

Dedicated Attack: When using a special dedicated action attacking they use all of their AP to attack and as a result get an extra attack.

 

Dedicated Defense: When using a special dedicated action for defense the character can use all of their AP and as a result have active defense against all attacks.

 

Serpentine: A character can move erratically during a move to increase their defense against ranged attacks. The character moves erratically for at least ten feet, with the movement costing double AP. For each 10 feet of movement the character gets a +1 bonus to their effective Dodge Resist until their next turn, but only against range attacks targeted at them.

 

Knockout: A character can try to go for a knockout without wearing down their opponent. The attack is at half (rounded up) of what the total score would normally be for the attack. It includes any situational adjustments, so is easiest done on an ambush. If successful the damage is done as normal and the opponent must make a Physical Resist equal to the damage dealt. The amount they fail by is the number of rounds they are rendered unconscious for. This is generally restricted to an unarmed strike or blunt weapon, as determined by the Narrator.

 

Lethal Attack: A character can try to go directly for the kill, but this is not easy without training. The attack is at half (rounded up) of what the total score would normally be for the attack. It includes any situational adjustments, so is easiest done on an ambush. If successful the damage skips Vigor and is applied directly to Vim. 

 

Wrestling: Requires an adroitness attack roll to make contact with the target for 3 AP. The amount defense over counts towards the roll to initiate a hold. The hold is determined by contested rolls of Strength or Agility which costs the Attacker 6AP and the Defender can do for the cost of an Active or Passive defense. Once the hold is initiated it can after that, as an attack, either cause damage by the same contested check with 1/5th multiplier and full Strength bonus. Damage can be foregone to just restrain the opponent for only 3AP, though it does somewhat limit what else they might do with their actions.

 

 

Basic Weapon damage- Fairly straight forward multipliers:

Negligible: 1/10- plastic butter knife, spoon, slap (non-lethal unarmed)

Very Light: 1/5- knife, stick, punch (non-lethal unarmed)

Light:1/2- dagger, club, ice pick, punch (lethal unarmed)

Medium: 1- sword, mace, axe, small caliber gun,

Heavy: 1 ½- medium caliber gun, large ax or sword

Very Heavy: 2- high caliber gun, chainsaw

Massive: 2 ½- sniper rifle, thresher, steel girder

Excessive: 3- anti- tank weapon, cannon, dropped building

Note that the terms like Light and Heavy are based on damage dealt and are not related to weight or ease of use.

For melee weapons there is a bonus to damage from Strength scores over 10. Basically halve the bonus over ten fro one handed melee weapons, don't halve it for 2 handed weapons. Though remember there is the additional AP cost for 2 handed attack. For example a Strength of 20 would grant a damage bonus of +5 with a one handed weapon or a +10 with a 2 handed weapon.

 

Guns and some other weapons also have a built in bonus. The basic for this is +5 for Medium and an additional +5 for each step up, though the narrator may increase this. Mechanical melee weapons, such as a chainsaw, may also have a bit of a damage bonus though generally less than firearms, like a step or two down: +5 for a light chainsaw and a +10 for a more industrial one or even the sci-fi weaponized version.