Combat & Resistances
How rounds, actions, and attacks resolve at the table — and how defense, soak, alertness, and saving throws keep you alive.
Turn Structure
Combat is structured into round cycles where every participant takes a turn. On your turn, you may take 1 Movement, 1 Action, 1 Bonus Action (if eligible), and 1 Reaction per round.
There are four basic types of actions: move, standard, bonus, and reaction. Most are only relevant during combat. Move, standard, and bonus actions can only be taken on your initiative. Reactions can be taken anytime, as long as their triggering conditions are met. You are not required to take any of these actions on your turn. Sometimes you may not have any actions of a certain category available.
Movement
- Move up to your Speed.
- Stand up from Prone (costs half Speed).
- Draw or stow an item.
Standard Action
- Attack — make a melee or ranged weapon strike.
- Cast a Spell — a spell with a 1-action casting time.
- Dash — double your movement for the turn.
- Disengage — move without provoking Opportunity Attacks.
- Dodge — attacks against you have Disadvantage until your next turn.
- Help — grant Advantage to an ally’s next check or attack.
Bonus Action
- Off-hand weapon attacks.
- Class-specific quick maneuvers or minor spellcasting.
Reaction
- Opportunity Attack — strike an enemy leaving your melee reach.
- Triggered Spells / Abilities — cast reactive spells like Shield.
Tactical Mechanics
Initiative
Combat is broken up into rounds. At the onset of battle, every participant (or a handful) makes an initiative roll to determine their place in the countdown. The combatant with the highest initiative score acts first, and all other combatants act in descending order of initiative.
Ambush
To successfully spring an ambush, the attacking party must succeed on a group stealth check against the highest enemy alertness value. Failure means that someone notices and shouts a warning in time; in this situation, roll initiative normally.
If surprise is achieved, all combatants still roll initiative normally, but the ambushed party does not act on the first combat round. This is extremely dangerous. Most successful teams have at least one member with high alertness to reduce the threat of being surprised.
Attacks & Damage
To make an attack on your initiative, roll a d20 and add the weapon's calculated hit bonus. If the resulting number meets or exceeds a target's defense, roll the damage die and add any calculated bonuses. Deduct the target's soak value from this damage if applicable. The target then sustains any remaining damage to its health pool. Melee attacks must be made within a weapon's reach. Missile attacks suffer disadvantage if an attacker is threatened in melee or shooting at creatures engaged in melee with its allies. Attack rolls of 1–2 always miss, and attack rolls of 19–20 always hit.
A natural 1 on a melee attack always provokes an attack of opportunity from the target (requiring a reaction). A natural 20 on an attack roll is always a critical hit and deals double damage. Damaging spells can only score critical hits if they use arete as an attack bonus. Spells that involve a saving throw can never score critical hits.
Tactical Positioning
Cover & Concealment
- Half Cover (+2 AC / +2 Dexterity Saves): Obscured by low walls, furniture, or other creatures.
- Three-Quarter Cover (+5 AC / +5 Dexterity Saves): Obscured by arrow slits, portcullises, or thick tree trunks.
- Total Cover: Cannot be targeted directly by attacks or spells.
Opportunity Attacks
Leaving an enemy's melee reach provokes an Opportunity Attack using their Reaction.
- Prevention: Taking the Disengage action prevents Opportunity Attacks for the rest of your turn.
- Teleportation: Spells and magical movement do not provoke Opportunity Attacks.
Defense
Defense measures how hard your character is to hit with physical attacks. It is an abstract concept that includes the benefits of parrying, dodging, wearing armor, etc. All warrior archetypes can choose to add their proficiency modifier to their defense instead of their armor bonus if they wish. This represents their skill at arms. Barbarians get a bonus to defense to allow for characters thematically similar to “Conan” or “Red Sonja”.
It is important to note that any attack roll of 1–2 is always a miss, any attack roll of 19–20 is always a hit, a natural 1 provokes an attack of opportunity from the target of a melee attack, and a natural 20 on any attack roll is always a critical hit.
Soak
Soak is a measure of how well-armored a character is. A character's soak value is deducted from physical and elemental damage they sustain, but not radiant, psychic, necrotic, poison, or force damage. Most soak values are small, but the savings a character enjoys over multiple hits is substantial.
No matter how good a creature's soak is, it cannot reduce the damage it receives below 1. In practice, well-armored characters can withstand many weak attacks, but powerful attacks are deadly.
Edge Cases
Situational mechanics, kept out of the way until you need them.
Maneuvers — Grappling, Shoving, Mounted & Aerial Combat+
| Maneuver | Effect |
|---|---|
| Brace | You set a polearm to impale a charging foe with lesser reach from a single direction. If you are charged while bracing, you can attack your assailant once as a reaction before it attacks you. If it succeeds, this attack is always considered a critical hit. Bracing is a bonus action. |
| Charge | You move up to double your speed in a straight line. If you move 20+ feet before attacking, you deal +2 damage with your first attack. If you are wielding a polearm, this damage bonus becomes +4. This maneuver uses both a move and an action. |
| Constrict | You deal your unarmed damage die plus twice your MIGHT modifier in crushing damage to an opponent you have successfully grappled. This is an action or a bonus action, but it can only be done once per round. |
| Dash | You move up to your regular foot speed. This is a move. |
| Disarm | You attempt to disarm your target with an opposed melee attack roll made at disadvantage. It provokes an attack of opportunity (reaction) from your target. This is an action. |
| Hold | You delay your initiative until later in the round. If you act on the exact initiative count as other combatants, you take your turn after theirs. This becomes your new initiative in subsequent rounds. This does not take an action. |
| Kipup | If you have the acrobatics skill, you can instantly regain your feet without provoking an attack of opportunity as a reaction or a bonus action. There is no roll for this. |
| Support | You set up your ally for advantageous strikes. Your ally gains advantage on attacks against a specific target they are currently threatening in melee for the rest of the round. This is an action. |
| Grapple | Replaces one weapon attack. Make an Athletics check opposed by the target's Athletics or Acrobatics. Success imposes the Grappled condition (Speed becomes 0). |
| Shove | Replaces one weapon attack. Make an Athletics check opposed by the target's Athletics or Acrobatics. Success knocks the target Prone or pushes them 5 feet away. |
| Mount / Dismount | Mounting or dismounting costs half of your total Movement speed. |
| Mounted Opportunity | If your mount provokes an Opportunity Attack, the attacker may target either you or the mount. |
Alertness & Stealth+
Alertness measures how hard a creature is to sneak up on. It is the target number a creature must roll on a stealth check to ambush a given creature or to evade its notice. In most situations, a single stealth check is sufficient to hide from a creature for several minutes. It only needs to be repeated if the hiding creature does something significantly risky to necessitate another roll.
If a creature is on high alert, meaning it has substantial cause to suspect an enemy is nearby, its alertness score goes up by 5. It is not possible to be perpetually on high alert, as it is very stressful and mentally taxing. The Storyteller has the final say on whether a creature, or character, is justified in being on high alert.
Saving Throws+
A saving throw (or “save” for short) is a roll made to resist a harmful effect. There are three kinds: fortitude, reflex, and will.
| Save | Stat | Resists |
|---|---|---|
| Fortitude | ENDURANCE | Effects one can resist through toughness or physical stamina, such as poison. |
| Reflex | AGILITY | Area effects one can resist by leaping out of the way, such as explosions. |
| Will | SPIRIT | Mental effects one can resist with willpower. |
Every class is proficient in one (or sometimes two) saves. Proficiency in a save means that, in addition to adding your governing statistic modifier to the roll, you also add your total proficiency bonus. Nonproficient saves add your governing statistic modifier plus half of your proficiency bonus, rounded down.