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Combat Basics

Turn Order and Initiative

At the beginning of an encounter, all involved characters make a special Initiative check to determine turn order, and go in the order from the highest roll to lowest. An Initiative check is a special Reflex check + your Dexterity ability. In the case of a draw, have the characters who tied roll initiative checks again, the one who rolled higher goes before the lower. Initiative can be used to determine actions both in-and-out of combat; any time when you need to know who does something first (who speaks first, who grabs the cursed magic item first, etc.) have the contesting characters make a Reflex check for initiative.

Late Arrivals

If a character shows up to an encounter late, simply roll an Initiative check for that character (as above) the same as for the others, and insert them into the Initiative order based on their roll.

Delay Initiative

A character can, on his turn, choose not to act. Instead, he can delay his turn until later. At any time after his skipped turn but before his next turn, he can take his turn „ even if it is in the middle of someone else‚s turn (but not in the middle of an action, such as an attack or combo). If this happens, the other character begins his turn, the delayed character interrupts him, and the other character finishes.

Combat Rounds

A round represents six seconds. Every round, each combatant gets a turn. On your turn, you have six in-game seconds in which to act. To help keep track, you can keep a d6 in front of you, and count down one step for every second that you use in combat.

Actions

An action represents any task that takes a relatively significant amount of effort. A character can take any number of actions in a round, so long as the total time taken by them adds up to six seconds. In one second, a character may (for example) move or draw a weapon. In four, he could use a combo or cast a spell. This means that in a full round, he could move six times, use two combos, cast a spell and move three times, or any combination thereof. Action time is sometimes abbreviated, so a 4-second action could be written as a “4SA.”

Unless otherwise specified, actions that take longer than 1 second must use concurrent seconds. So a character couldn't spend 3 seconds casting a spell and then an hour later use the final second to trigger it, all 4 seconds must be done successively. This doesn't mean that the whole activity must be done in one round, though. A character can, for example, spend the last 3 seconds of one round casting a spell and finish it on the first second of the next round.

Delays

A delay is an activity that takes time, but little or no effort. For example, if a character casts a spell that has a 2-second delay, the spell comes into effect two seconds after casting. Casting the spell takes 4 seconds, then the character has 2 seconds in which to move before the spell occurs, and then one second after that. If a delay makes the action happen after the end of your turn, it happens on your next turn. For example, if you cast a spell (4 seconds) with a 11 second delay, you could act normally in your remaining 4 seconds on your turn. The spell now has 7 seconds left of delay. On your next turn, you have 6 seconds in which to act normally. The turn after that, the spell occurs immediately after your first second of action.

Zero-Second Actions

A zero-second action (“0SA”) represents something that takes little-to-no time or effort. An example of a 0SA is talking, or dropping a held object. Characters can take any number of 0SAs on their turn (within reason). Despite the name, a 0SA need not necessarily take zero seconds, but it must be something that you could do without distracting you from another action. The GM is the final arbiter of what is within reason.

Example Actions:

Time Taken

Action

4SA

Cast most spells

Use a Combo

Single Melee attack

Single Ranged attack

Stand up from prone

3SA

Run (or longer)

2SA

Grab an object from a pack or pocket

Aim a ranged weapon

1SA

Move

Draw or sheathe a weapon 1

Aim before a ranged attack

Stand up from crouch

Go from prone to crouch

Crouch or go to prone

0SA

Talk

Drop a held object


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