A noob's questions about combat: please help

[jpegbert]

I just received the core book in the mail this week and am running my first full game this weekend but there are a couple of things I am fuzzy on:

1: Partial evasion: the description says that if the evasion is successful the defender may spend 2 CP to steal the initiative, but I thought the defender automatically steals initiative if he defends successfully, no matter what defense is being used (full evasion being the exeption).  What am I missing?

2: multiple opponants: if a character is fighting two opponants and he fails to use terrain to limit the number of opponants facing him, he is supposed to divide up his dice between his opponants.  Does this mean that the lone character can perform two defensive maneuvers per exchange, one per opponant?  If so,  can the lone character elect to attack one target and defend against the other.   Also can a character make one full evasion against two opponants?

3: another question about evasion:the description of evasion states that the advantage of evasion is that it "leaves your weapon completely open for a strike as your opponant's [weapon] is whistling through the air".  Does this mean that a combatant is allowed to strike as he is evading or is this  simply referring to the duck and weave maneuver?

Any help is appreciated.

[MonkeyWrench]

1: Partial evasion: the description says that if the evasion is successful the defender may spend 2 CP to steal the initiative, but I thought the defender automatically steals initiative if he defends successfully, no matter what defense is being used (full evasion being the exeption). What am I missing?

I'd also like an answer to this. While playing around with the combat sim occasionally my defender would win and it would ask if I wanted to pay 2 CP to steal initiative, I thought it was automatic.

[Brian Leybourne]

Gidday Jpegbert, welcome to the forum.

1: Partial evasion: the description says that if the evasion is successful the defender may spend 2 CP to steal the initiative, but I thought the defender automatically steals initiative if he defends successfully, no matter what defense is being used (full evasion being the exeption).  What am I missing?

What you're missing is that evasions are not the same as other defensive moves suchy as parries and counters et al. You'll notice they're seperated in the book. When making a defensive move, the defender gets initiative if they win. When making an evasion, you're throwing yourself out of the fight to an extent, and thus often not in a position to steal initiative. In a full evasion, you're definately not. In a Duck and Wave, you definately are. In a partial evasion, you may or may not have thrown yourself too far afield to get initiative, thus the decision - do you want to spend 2 extra CP on the evasion to ensure you evade in such a way as to stay in position to strike back immediately, or would you rather just get the hell out of dodge and thus NOT be in a position to strike back straight away.

2: multiple opponants: if a character is fighting two opponants and he fails to use terrain to limit the number of opponants facing him, he is supposed to divide up his dice between his opponants.  Does this mean that the lone character can perform two defensive maneuvers per exchange, one per opponant?  If so,  can the lone character elect to attack one target and defend against the other.   Also can a character make one full evasion against two opponants?

Correct on all counts. If you're unlucky enough to face two opponents (or three if you botch) then you split your CP and essentially run a combat round against each. Sucks huh? The best thing to do is, as you say, a full evasion, which works against both of them and forces a new round where you might be able to use terrain again.

Two things though - remember that you can't use full evasion the exchange after you've attacked your opponent(s), so you will have to do two parries and/or partial evasions for one excahnge first. Also, when full evading against more than one opponent, I usually up the difficulty by +1 per extra opponent. That's not in the book, it's just my own rule. YMMV.

Oh yeah, and I wouldn't allow two parries in the same round with only one weapon, but a parry and a block (weapon and shield) or a parry and a partial evasion (weapon only) is fine.

3: another question about evasion:the description of evasion states that the advantage of evasion is that it "leaves your weapon completely open for a strike as your opponant's [weapon] is whistling through the air".  Does this mean that a combatant is allowed to strike as he is evading or is this  simply referring to the duck and weave maneuver?

It's more referring to Duck & Weave and Partial Evasions where you steal initiative. You can't make a strike during an evasion.

I hope those help clear things up. Feel free to ask away when/if you have more questions. If I'm not here, someone else will answer your question - we're a pretty freindly bunch here.

Brian.

[jpegbert]

Thanks for the quick response.  This is exactly what I needed to know.