Defense and damage

Defense and Damage

You also Challenge for Defense.

  • Foes attack you by specifying a target Result
  • You Challenge with the element they choose, adding all relevant Attributes and bonuses

Result:

  • Disaster: Usually the same as Failure; however, certain strong foes may be able to inflict additional punishment
  • Failure: You fail to Defend and suffer the negative effects such as damage and forced movement
  • Success: You negate the incoming attack
  • Flourish: As success; additional bonus depends on the strength of your foe (below)

Boosts and Bonus Ki

Remmeber: You choose whether or not to apply a Bonus Ki or Boost to a Defense Challenge

  • You must choose before you roll
  • Obviously, if you gain the benefit, this consumes the Bonus Ki or Boost!
  • If you defer the Boost or Bonus Ki, you may use it for another Challenge in the future

Defensive bonuses

Any effect which grants a bonus to all challenges also applies to defense.

  • For example, the Doe’s “Aura of the Glades” grants +1 to all Challenges by allies in the same zone; this increases defenses as well

Many forms of equipment may specify +Defense

  • +Defense bonuses apply only to your Defend Challenges and no other category
  • Most +Defense bonuses apply only to specified elements
  • +Defense makes you harder to hit by improving your Challenge; however, when you suffer a hit, it offers no additional protection.
    • For that, look to Armor (below)

Aura and Health

Aura

Aura is a combination of stamina, spiritual presence, latent regeneration, and raw luck. Individual warriors vary in which aspect most represents their own Aura, but all share the core trait: a reserve that swiftly recovers after a fight and keeps you fighting.

When Aura falls, you cannot maintain a proper guard. The next strike hits true, and you suffer a wound.

Effects:

  • Damage is applied against your Aura first
  • Damage that reduces you to zero or negative Aura leaves you Open
  • While Open, any further damage causes you to take a Wound
  • After suffering a Wound, your Aura returns to full
  • When a Scene ends, your aura returns to full

Reminders:

  • Normal effects that reduce you to zero Aura stop there; it requires two effects to cause a Wound
  • Certain environmental damage, traps, and powerful effects can generate Wounds directly, ignoring Aura

Health

Health is your physical well-being. Your health is limited and does not improve over time. Even a Path Master can die to a heavy blow to the head!

You can take 2 damage to your health. On the first hit, you take a Condition representing your injury. Take another one, and you’re either out of the fight or dead.

  • Healthy > Wounded > Down

Down or Dead

The storyteller controls several difficulty sliders related to combat. Perhaps most important, the storyteller dictates whether a second damage to your health is death or not!

Make sure to discuss your expectations as a group at the start of play.

Armor

Armor reduces incoming damage on a 1:1 basis to a minimum of 1. As damage values in this system tend to be small, even a small amount of Armor can significantly reduce your incoming damage.

Armor comes in two versions: flat and additive.

  • Armor 2: This armor will reduce incoming damage by 2
  • +1 Armor: Increase whatever armor you have (including 0) by 1

Flat Armor does not stack.

  • If you have one effect that grants Armor 1 and one that grants Armor 2, your total Armor is 2
  • The smaller effect is wasted

Additive Armor stacks.

  • If two effects grant you +1 Armor each and you start with Armor 1, your total Armor is 3.

Armor only reduces damage; it does not negate secondary effects such as being Thrown or afflicted by poisons.

When counting Armor, consider the entire Action as a single transaction.

  • Example: You have Armor 2
  • You suffer an Attack for 2 damage; the Attack pushes you into a hazard for 1 damage
  • Your total incoming damage is 3, and you take 1

Armor versus Action Economy

Beware chip damage! Armor is vitally important for reducing large hits from powerful foes. However, armor will not save you from a mob. Even Path Masters can be chipped to zero by the persistent, small damage of dozens of small attacks.

Enemy health

Like you, Foes track a health pool. This health pool represents their vigor, stamina, morale, and willingness to fight.

A foe reduced to zero health is incapacitated - not killed - by default. The exact effect depends on circumstances

  • Wild animals may flee
  • Opportunistic or smaller foes may flee
  • More powerful, dedicated foes collapase in exhaustion or go unconscious

In addition to their normal health, foes can have health pools per element to represent weak points and opportunities. For example, a towering ogre might be described:

  • 10 Health total
  • 2 Health in Air to represent its single good eye

Attacks against Air would reduce the special health pool in that element first

  • Excess damage applies to the normal health pool
  • Defeating these special pools open up special effects (such as blinding the ogre)

By default, you are assumed to spare those you fight from cruel injury or death. Whether or not your enemies show the same mercy depends on whether your group uses the Down or Dead difficulty setting.

Just like you, your foes react over the course of a Scene; additional Arts, special triggers, and even additional transformations are all on the table. Don’t get cocky!

Damage

Damaging foes

Unless stated otherwise, a successful Attack deals 1 damage to the foe’s health.

Naturally, equipment will greatly influence total damage calculations. Damage comes in two versions: flat and additive.

  • Damage 3: This effect deals 3 damage
  • +1 Damage: This effect adds one additional damage to your existing baseline

Using the example of the ogre above:

  • A Damage 1 effect would need 3 successful Challenges to defeat the foe’s Earth
  • A Damage 3 effect would defeat the target’s Earth in a single successful Challenge

Foes damaging you

Your Aura are a global reserve shared across all elements.

When foes deal damage to you:

  • Subtract Armor from the damage to a minimum of 1
  • Apply the remainder (if any) against your Aura

If you have no Aura and an attack would deal damage:

  • Take a Wound
  • Since you always take at least 1 Damage, Armor cannot not prevent this Wound

Cover each other’s weaknesses

Your Bane element is a tempting target for enemy attacks. When a foe is strong in your Bane, they can drub on your weakest points to bring you to your knees. When fighting alone, this is a grave threat!

If you do not want to experience this one-sided bruising, make sure to cooperate with your allies and cover each other’s weak points! Try some of the following:

  • Leverage tank Arts to improve your Bane defense out of the critical range
  • Throw the enemy to where they cannot hit you
  • Focus fire to take down the foe as quickly as possible

Flourishes on Attacks

When you flourish on a damaging attack, you may spend the Flourish to deal +1 damage.

Pierce Aura

Powerful effects ignore your Aura. These are typically limited to effects that are overwhelmingly lethal.

For example, a trap that drops a 10,000kg boulder onto your head would Pierce Aura. Another example would be a Crystal Eruption; no amount of spiritual presence is going to protect against that!

Advanced Defenses

Advanced Defenses are reactive traits that allow you to improve your Defend Challenges.

  • To have access to an Advanced Defense, you must gain the effect from an Art, equipment, or a Path ability
  • Each Advanced Defense is equipped to a single element; however, you may activate your Advanced Defenses for any Defend Challenge of any element

Important: You do not have access to Advanced Defenses by default! You must gain these defenses through Arts, Equipment, or your Path!

The Advanced Defenses by element:

  • Air: Evasion
  • Water: Parry
  • Earth: Block
  • Fire: Absorb

You may receive Advanced Defenses from your Path or equipment. These usually sync to a Chakra and always require Charge payment. Certain Arts and Paths greatly improve the basics outlined here.

You must be able to interact with the effect to use an Advanced Defense. For example, you must have Spirittouch on a weapon to parry certain Spirit attacks.

Evasion

  • While equipped:
  • You Challenge Defense as normal
  • If you dislike your Result, spend 1 Air Charge and reroll
  • Take the higher of the two

Parry

  • While equipped, add +C to your Defend Challenge
  • If you Flourish:
    • Instead of gaining 1 Charge, you may spend 1 Water Charge to redirect the Attack against one foe in the same zone as you
    • Resolve the Attack against that foe instead

Block

Block improves your Armor rather than your Defense.

  • When you Block, you add your Block Rating to your existing Armor against a single incoming effect.
  • Cost: 1 Earth Charge
  • You may choose to block after completing your Defend Challenge
    • In other words, you only need to block when you know you’re getting hit

Once you trigger your Block:

  • Add your Block Rating to your Armor for this incoming effect
    • Enemy pierce subtracts Armor as usual
  • As with all Armor, the minimum damage is 1

Absorb

Absorb syphons energy from incoming effects to fuel your own powers.

  • When an incoming effect hits you, spend 1 Fire Charge
  • Generate 1 Charge in the element of the incoming effect

Light and Dark?

Surely there are advanced defenses for Light and Dark, but they remain a mystery to the Kingdom.

And don’t call me Shirley.