Combat Mechanics

The combat mechanics of World of Darkness, as written, leave much to be desired. Combat is clunky, involves a ton of dice rolling, and is very damage/kill focused. In the real world, violent confrontations can end in any number of ways beyond one party killing or beating the other into unconsciousness. From The Ashes: Detroit By Night uses the following conventions, instead. We believe that these alternate rules give players legitimate alternatives to lethal force as a means to emerge victorious from a conflict (without removing lethal force as a legitimate option).

This system also abstracts combat (in particular hand-to-hand, or claw-to-fang engagements) away from the blow-by-blow, where every punch, parry, bob, and weave gets its own dice roll into a contested dice roll between combatants meant to reflect a longer period of time. The reality of a fist fight is that many dozens of punches may be thrown in a very short time, but in the end the results will boil down to a chaotic mix of skill, good fortune, and comparative grit.

These rules are new, should be considered to be 'in beta' and as with anything on From The Ashes: Detroit by Night, players may feel free to agree to resolve things per RAW or whatever other system all participants in the scene agree to.

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Basics: How To Combat

This section covers the fundamentals of resolving combat scenes in WoD. If you're new to WoD, running combat scenes, or just like going back to basics read this section carefully, first. If you're familiar with WoD combat systems in general, you can skim here.

Structure of a Combat Round

A combat in World of Darkness, and by extension From The Ashes: Detroit By Night, is broken down into Combat Rounds which represent fifteen seconds of in-character time passing. Because of the nature of World of Darkness' various supernatural powers, Combat Rounds are broken down into Phases. Phases are then broken down into individual characters' actions.

Initiative: At the start of each Combat Round, players roll a single D10 to which is added the sum of their Wits and Dexterity scores. In From The Ashes: Detroit By Night this is handled automatically by the +init command. Initiative represents a combination of a character's mental presence and awareness of the current conflict as well as their ability to swiftly act upon opportunities that present themselves. Ties in initiative are resolved by comparing the non-rolled component (usually Wits+Dexterity, but sometimes other bonuses apply), with the highest non-rolled component being considered to have scored higher. In the case that these are also tied, combatants should declare simultaneously (via paging the storyteller, rather than out-loud) and the ST will declare for both of them at once. Their actions resolve simultaneously as well.

Phase Structure

Characters declare their intended actions beginning with the lowest initiative and moving progressively higher until finally the highest initiative declares last (and thus benefits from knowing what all other actions happening in the combat are). Actions are, however, resolved in the reverse order. Higher initiative characters will be able to interrupt, obsolete, or obviate earlier actions declared in the round. A character who's action is no longer viable or possible may attempt to salvage their action by aborting to another action. See the aborting section in Permutations below.

Every Combat Round has, at a minimum, a Main Phase which proceeds as described above. The Main Phase happens first, after initiative has been rolled. The presence of characters who are entitled to additional actions (Vampires, through Celerity; Werewolves, through the expenditure of Rage; Mages through a variety of means, usually Time magick; and Changelings through the Quicksilver cantrip), called Haste Actions, triggers additional phases called Haste 1, Haste 2, Haste 3, etc. until all participants have used their Haste Actions. In any given Haste Phase, only those characters with actions to spend may be pro-active, characters without Haste actions may only react to attacks made upon them. Consider the following example:

Jane, Frank, Teddy, and Paulo engage in a combat. On the initiative roll, Jane scores a 17, Frank a 9, Teddy an 11, and Paulo a 19. They declare actions in the order of Frank, Teddy, Jane, Paulo. Actions are resolved in the order of Paulo's, Jane's, Teddy's, and finally Frank's. Frank, as part of his declaration, announces that he has a Time Magick effect that gives him a Haste Action so Teddy, a Ghural, announces he will spend two Rage points for additional haste actions.

As a result, this Combat Round will have a Main Phase with the order described above, followed by the Haste 1 Phase, which will feature only Frank and Teddy, with frank Declaring first, and Teddy resolving first. This will, in turn, be followed by the Haste 2 Phase, during which, only Teddy is entitled to act, he declares and resolves in the same go. After this, a new Combat Round begins, starting with a new initiative roll.

Action Structure

Actions, in a combat, tend to fall into one of three categories: Attacks, Defenses, and Miscellany. Attacks are broken up into basic, powerful, feinting and grappling attacks. An attacker is NOT considered to have abandoned their defense. Defenses, by comparison, are someone abandoning the attack in order to prevent personal harm, they come in blocks, dodges, escapes, and grapple defenses - which are a special case. These are broken out, and discussed below.

Miscellaneous actions represent actions during a combat that are not pertaining to the combat, for example: trying to hack a locked door's keypad while a Garou is trying to chew your face off is a Miscellaneous action. (Also ill-advised.)

Some basic guidelines: When two individuals attack each other, the attack rolls are contested. The loser's successes subtract from the winner's, and then the winner's attack resolves while the loser's is negated. When two individuals defend against one another, nothing happens.

Subsequent Attacks, aka "piling on": Any individual who is attacked is entitled to a defense roll. When multiple attacks come in, however, anyone carrying on with an offense suffers a cumulative 2 dice penalty to defend against each subsequent attack until their pool hits zero, at which point any remaining attacks simply land. Storytellers should keep in mind that unless the character is facing a firing squad, there is a limit to the number of attackers that can successfully engage a single person. Terrain like fighting in a doorway can limit this even further. More than five attackers is probably not reasonable, and that requires the victim to be completely surrounded. Three is a reasonable maximum if the victim's back is to a wall. Consider a situation where A is fighting B and C. A and B attack each other, and C attacks A. A wins over B (barely) and inflicts damage. In this instance, C's attack does not land uncontested. A is still fighting, and is hardly unaware of C's attack - but he does suffer from split actions. He defends with his choice of a Block or Dodge (the choice may be made for him, by the ST if the situation warrants it), but at -2 dice. If there was a third attacker, D, A would block or dodge at -4 dice, and so on with each new attacker increasing the penalty by 2 dice until the pool hits 0.

An individual engaged in a Defense suffers half the penalty for someone carrying out an attack would. So the second attack they must defend against incurs -1, the third, -2, the fourth -3, etc.

An individual who uses an Escape defense makes ONE roll, and all attackers compare against that roll. If anyone breaks the defense, those attacks land and the escape fails. If no one breaks the defense, the defender escapes and starts a chase.

An individual who uses dodge against multiple ranged attackers makes ONE roll, and all attackers compare against that roll. Any attackers who beat the defense may inflict normal damage. All others miss. Storytellers may make exceptions for victims taking fire from unique angles of attack, where the quality of cover is substantially different versus one angle than the other(s). One roll per group of attacks originating from a given direction makes the most sense here. See the Firefights section under Permutations for more.

Special Note: Haste Actions: Haste Actions represent supernatural speed or acuity. As such, they count as subsequent attackers for purposes of piling on. If a Garou spends two rage to make a total of three attacks, the poor sod on the receiving end defends against the first one at full, Haste 1 at -2, and Haste 2 at -4. This is less powerful than Garou players are accustomed to, but given the consequences of a single Garou's attack passing a defense, we feel that the fuzzies will still do just fine.

Attacks

Basic Attack: By hook, crook, or cannon, you attempt to hurt the other person. The attacker's pool is based on the means of harm. Bare-handed would use Brawl. A sword or the like would use Melee. A gun would use Firearms. A Magickal attack would use whatever the proscribed pool is.

Power Attack: Basic attacks include an understood level of concern for one's own safety. When you're throwing that away to pile on the hurt, you may add 1 to your attack's difficulty (making an opponent's counter-attack more likely to prevail), and add 2 to your subsequent damage pool.

Feinting Attack: The opposite end of the spectrum is an attack that doesn't have the full force behind it, the focus is instead on getting through an strong opponent's defense. -1 difficulty on the attack, and it suffers from -2 damage pool.

Grappling Attack: Reaching out and grabbing someone. This is how someone who wants to start a non-consensual grapple does so. Brawl is the only ability that makes sense here, and is either paired with Dexterity or Strength, depending upon the type of grappling technique used. Grapples are unique situations that have their own mechanics, see the Grappling section below.

Committed Attack: A special case attack which utterly forgoes personal safety and abandons the defense. The attacker may not defend against ANY inbound attack this round, but their target must either accept the full force of this attack, suffer a +2 difficulty, or abort to a defense (they do not need to roll to abort). Committed attacks may not be initiated during Haste Actions.

Defenses

Blocking Defense: Using your weapon to intercept or deflect an incoming attack. Importantly, the pool used for this defense depends upon the type of attack. Defending against a Brawl attack uses Brawl. Defending against a Melee or Ranged attack may use Brawl or Melee. Defending against Ranged attacks comes at +2 difficulty for launched projectiles (bolts, slings, and arrows), and +4 versus gunfire, freakin' laser beams, and other beyond-sight attacks. The base difficulty for blocking is 4 with same-pool, 5 with different pool.

EXAMPLES: Tony is engaged in fisticuffs with Juan. He uses a blocking defense against Juan's punch. His roll is Dexterity + Brawl, difficulty 4. Elsewhere, Maria was caught empty handed against a Ninja with a sword. She uses a Blocking defense to deflect the Ninja's sword, using Dexterity + Brawl, difficulty 5. Finally, Jake - a total badass - is facing off against a psycho with a machine gun with nothing but a titanium spork. He attempts to block the bullets with the spork, because he's that badass. His roll is Dexterity + Melee, versus difficulty 9. Good luck, Jake.

Dodging Defense: Evasion is always an option, and for ranged attacks usually much easier. The roll is usually Dexterity + Athletics, but other rolls can be asked for if the situation warrants. (Dodging an anti-tank missile while driving your 1964 Dodge Dart is a Dexterity + Drive roll, for example.) The difficulty for hand-to-hand attacks is generally 5. Against ranged attacks, the difficulty depends on the availability of nearby cover: Being half-hidden behind a brick wall would be difficulty 3. Having a counter close-by enough that one could dive and land behind it would be difficulty 6. Standing alone in an open field is difficulty 9.

Escape Defense: Not always an option, but sometimes it makes no sense to block or dodge, but rather to get the hell out of dodge. Generally this will involve Dexterity + Athletics, but as with dodging, creative escape techniques call for different dice pools. The difficulty is 6, but a successful defense, in addition to negating the attack, starts you with a head-start for a subsequent chase. As with grapples, chases are unique. As a form of extended conflict with potentially violent circumstances, chases are covered in our combat rules, in the Chases section, below.

Grapple Defense: Aikidoka, Wrestlers, and people taught to fight in Krav Maga classes, of by a military learn that sometimes the best way to end a fight isn't necessarily to inflict wounds - but to take control of and immobilize the attacker. When you're not willing to initiate violence, but still want this as an option, you may initiate a grapple in response to an attack. See the Grapple section, for how to handle this situation. The only functional difference between a Grapple Defense and a Grapple Attack is that the Attack variant starts the grapple, period. The Defense variant only begins the grapple if one is attacked, similar to Guarding.

Guard: A special-case defense. Sometimes you have low initiative and want to attack, but ONLY if the other person is going to be violent. Guarding leaves you the option of attacking in this case, even if your initiative is low. If a person in a Guard defense is attacked, this action automatically converts to an Attack action against the first person to attack them. If they are not attacked, they do nothing.

Resolution

Attack vs. Attack: Once the manners of attack and defense have been identified and the relevant dice pools selected, resolution is fairly straightforward.

In the case of two individuals attacking each other in hand-to-hand combat, only one can be successful. The lower number of successes is subtracted from the greater and that attack is successful at the reduced number of successes. A successful attacker rolls damage appropriate to the method of attack, plus 1 die for any successes beyond the first. Damage pools are rolled versus difficulty 6 and do not count 1s as negative successes. The amount of damage inflicted is equal to the successes scored. The damage type is dependent upon the method of attack.

Anyone can soak bashing damage. Shifters, Vampires, Ghouls, Trolls, Redcaps, Satyrs, Scathach Sidhe, and others under special circumstances may soak lethal. Vampires with Fortitude, Garou in Crinos, and others under special circumstances may soak Aggrivated damage. 'Unsoakable' damage, obviously, may not be soaked. A 'soak' roll is Stamina versus difficulty 6, successes are subtracted from the inbound damage from an attack.

Special Case: Armor: Armor dice, which are granted by wearing armor and certain other abilities, are not subject to the 'unsoakable' restriction, and often apply to damage types that the wearer may not, themselves, soak. If the armor may soak the incoming attack, but the user may not, then the soak pool is just the armor dice. If the armor and the user may soak the attack, then the pool is Stamina + Armor.

Attack vs. Defense: The subject of an attack who is using a defense subtracts their successes from the attacker's roll. If the attack is reduced to or below zero, the attack is utterly negated, no further resolution is necessary. If the attack has at least one success left it is successful and is resolved as above.

Attack vs. Escape: Escape defenses that are successful have their successes reduced by the attacker's number of successes. Attackers attacking someone who is Escaping have the escape successes subtracted from their attack in the same way. A successful Escape begins a chase with the prey having a Head Start equal to the number of successes remaining in the Escape attempt.

Attack vs. Grapple (Attack or Defense): A grapple attack that is successful, or a grapple defense that is successful begins a grapple with a Control equal to the number of successes remaining.