Defending

Defending

If you make your attack roll, you have not (yet) actually struck your foe, unless you rolled a critical hit. Your attack is good enough to hit him – if he fails to defend.

There are three "active defenses" that a fighter can use to evade or ward off an attack: Dodge (see Dodging, below), Parry (see Parrying), and Block (see Blocking). You should calculate these active defense scores in advance and record them on your character sheet.

An active defense is a deliberate attempt to avoid a particular attack. It's only possible if the defender is aware of the possibility of an attack from his assailant and is free to react ... by moving out of the way of the attack (a dodge), deflecting the attack with a weapon or empty hand (a parry), or interposing a shield (a block).

If a foe makes a successful attack roll against you, you may choose one active defense and attempt a "defense roll" against it. Exception: The All-Out Defense (Double Defense) maneuver lets you attempt a second defense against a particular attack if your first defense fails.

The active defense you choose depends on your situation – especially the maneuver you chose last turn. Some maneuvers restrict the active defenses you can make. Notably, if you made an All-Out Attack, you have no active defense.

You also get no active defense if you're unaware of the attack. Examples of situations in which no active defense is possible include a stab in the back from a "friend," a surprise sniper's shot, and a totally unexpected booby trap. And you get no active defense if you are unconscious, immobilized, or otherwise unable to react.

Active Defense Rolls

The defender rolls 3d against his active defense score. If his roll is less than or equal to his effective defense, he dodged, parried, or blocked the attack. Otherwise, his active defense was ineffective and the attack struck home. If this occurs, roll for damage.

An active defense roll of 3 or 4 is always successful – even if your effective defense score was only 1 or 2! A roll of 17 or 18 always fails.

Your foe does not get to attempt a defense roll if you rolled a critical hit against him.

Several modifiers apply to active defense rolls; see below for explanations of a few of these. For a complete list of modifiers, see Active Defense Modifiers.

Injury and Active Defenses

If you are stunned, any active defense is at -4. Active defenses never take a penalty for shock, however. For more on stunning and shock, see Effects of Injury.

Shields and Defense Bonus

If you have a ready shield, add its Defense Bonus (DB) to any Dodge, Parry, or Block roll against an attack that came from in front of you or from your shield side.

Defense Bonus is 1 for a small shield, light cloak, and most improvised shields; 2 for a medium shield or heavy cloak; and 3 for a large shield or force shield. The Shield spell gives a DB of 1-4.

A shield's DB adds to active defense rolls against melee attacks, thrown weapons, and muscle-powered missile weapons – not against firearms (unless the GM wishes to use the optional Damage to Shields rules).

Retreating and Dropping Prone

In some situations, you may give ground or drop prone for a bonus to your Dodge, Parry, or Block score. See Active Defense Options.

Dodging

A "dodge" is an active attempt to move out of the perceived path of an attack. This is often the best defense when you're not skilled with your weapon and you have no shield, when you're attacked multiple times, or when your foe has such a powerful weapon that you fear parrying or blocking it may destroy your weapon or shield.

Dodge is normally the only active defense you can take against firearms. This does not mean you can actually dodge bullets! A dodge against this kind of attack represents an attempt not to be where you think your opponent will shoot, by weaving or ducking at the right moment.

Your Dodge active defense is Basic Speed + 3, dropping all fractions, less a penalty equal to your encumbrance level (see Encumbrance and Move). List Dodge on your character sheet for quick reference.

You may dodge any attack except one that you did not know about! You only get one Dodge roll against a given attack.

If a single rapid-fire attack scores multiple hits, a successful Dodge roll lets you avoid one hit, plus additional hits equal to your margin of success. A critical success lets you dodge all hits you took from that attack.

Example: A machine gun gets four hits against you. Your Dodge is 10. You roll an 8, succeeding by 2. You dodge three of the hits; only one bullet strikes you.

You only get one active defense against each attack, unless you use All-Out Defense (Double Defense), but there is no limit to the number of times you may dodge different attacks during your turn.

Acrobatic Dodge

If you have put at least one point into the Acrobatics skill, you can try a "fancy" dodge once during your turn. You may define this as jumping over a sword blow, cartwheeling away, or whatever else you like. Make an Acrobatics roll before you attempt your Dodge roll. (If flying, roll against Aerobatics instead.) On a success, you get +2 to that Dodge roll. On a failure, you get -2.

You can combine this option with a retreat (see Retreat).

Sacrificial Dodge

You can defend a friend by throwing yourself into the path of an attack against him. To do so, you must be close enough to interpose yourself between your friend and his attacker by taking a step (see Step). Announce this after the enemy makes his attack roll but before your friend attempts his defense roll.

Use the ordinary rules for a dodge, except that you cannot combine this with a retreat (see Retreat). If you succeed, you are hit by the attack. If you fail, you didn't move in time, but your friend still gets his normal defense roll. In either case, since you moved, you cannot retreat if you are attacked before your next turn.

Vehicular Dodge

An evasively maneuvering vehicle gets a Dodge roll. Instead of Basic Speed + 3, use half the operator's skill (Driving, Piloting, etc.), rounded down, modified by the vehicle's Handling statistic. For example, a biker with Driving (Motorcycle)-14 on a motorcycle with Handling +1 would have a Dodge of 8.

Blocking

A "block" is an attempt to interpose a shield, cloak, or similar large object between yourself and an attack. This requires a ready shield or cloak. (If you're strong enough to grab and lift someone, you can block with his body!)

Your Block active defense is 3 + half your Shield or Cloak skill, dropping all fractions. For instance, Shield-11 would give a Block of 3 + (11/2) = 8.5, which rounds down to 8. In general, you can block any melee attack, thrown weapon, projected liquid, or muscle-powered missile weapon. You cannot block bullets or beam weapons .... these come too fast to be stopped this way.

You may attempt to block only one attack per turn.

Parrying

Parrying Heavy Weapons

You cannot use a flimsy rapier to parry a titan's tree-sized club, the slam of a charging linebacker, or the sword of a giant robot! Heavy weapons are liable to knock your weapon away – or even break it.

The same is true for unarmed attacks from high-ST creatures. For the purpose of these rules, treat a punch, kick, bite, etc. as a weapon with an effective weight of 1/10 the attacker's ST. Use his full ST if he made a slam, flying tackle, pounce, or shield rush! Your weapon may break if it parries anything three or more times its own weight. (This does not apply to barehanded parries; for damage to limbs when parrying unarmed, see Parrying Unarmed.)

A weapon parrying three times its own weight has a 2 in 6 chance of breaking: it breaks on a roll of 1 or 2 on 1d. Add +1 to these odds per whole-numbered multiple past 3 (a 3 in 6 chance at 4 times weapon weight,a 4 in 6 chance at 5 times, and so on). Weapon quality modifies these odds: +2 if the parrying weapon is cheap, -1 if fine, or -2 if very fine.

If your weapon breaks, the parry still counts unless the odds of breakage exceeded 6 in 6. If so, your weapon offered so little resistance that the parry does not count!

Regardless of the weight of your weapon, if you are parrying unarmed or using a one-handed weapon, you cannot parry a weapon heavier than your Basic Lift – or twice BL, if using a two-handed weapon. Attempts to parry anything heavier fail automatically; whether or not your weapon breaks, the attack sweeps it aside and damages you normally. If your weapon does not break, you drop it; if you are unarmed, you are knocked back one yard (make a DX roll to avoid falling over).

An attacker can also deliberately break or knock away weapons; see Striking at Weapons.

A "parry" is an attempt to deflect a blow using a weapon or your bare hands. You cannot parry unless your weapon is ready – or, if you are unarmed, you have an empty hand.

You can use most melee weapons to parry; see the Parry column of the Melee Weapon Table for special restrictions and modifiers. Some hefty weapons (e.g., axes) are unbalanced: you cannot use them to parry if you've already used them to attack on your turn. (You can still parry with a weapon in your other hand, if you have one.) A few long, well-balanced weapons (e.g., the quarterstaff) get a +1 or +2 bonus to parry due to their ability to keep a foe at bay.

Your Parry active defense with a given weapon is 3 + half your skill with that weapon, dropping all fractions. For instance, Broadsword-13 would give a Parry of 9.

A parry won't stop anything except melee attacks or thrown weapons, unless you have special skills. Exception: If a foe attacks you with a missile weapon and he is within reach of your melee weapon, you may parry. You're parrying the weapon, not the projectile! For example, if an attacker fired a pistol at you from only one yard away, you could attempt to parry barehanded. Success would mean that you slapped his arm or gun aside, causing him to fire wide of your body.

Number of Parries: Once you have attempted a parry with a particular weapon or bare hand, further attempts to parry with that weapon or hand are at a cumulative -4 per parry after the first. Reduce this to -2 per parry if you are using a fencing weapon or have the Trained By A Master or Weapon Master advantage – or to -1 per parry if both conditions are true. This penalty only applies to multiple parries on the same turn; it does not carry over between turns.

Parrying with the Off Hand: You parry with your "off" hand (your left or "shield" hand if right handed; see Handedness), or with a weapon held in it, at -4 to skill. Since Parry is calculated off half skill, this gives -2 to Parry. You may ignore this penalty if you have the Ambidexterity advantage.

Parrying Thrown Weapons: You can parry thrown weapons, but at a penalty: -1 for most thrown weapons, or -2 for small ones such as knives, shuriken, and other weapons that weigh 1 lb. or less.

Parrying Unarmed Attacks

Parrying Unarmed Attacks: If you successfully parry an unarmed attack (bite, punch, etc.) with a weapon, you may injure your attacker. Immediately roll against your skill with the weapon you used to parry. This roll is at -4 if your attacker used Judo or Karate. If you succeed, your parry struck the attacker's limb squarely. He gets no defense roll against this! Roll damage normally.

Parrying With Improvised Weapons

You can parry with anything of suitable size and shape, using the closest weapon skill. A pole or rifle could parry like a staff, a bow like a light club. However, parrying just once with a bow will ruin it as a bow – although it may survive for a few seconds longer as a club! Other fragile objects may be similarly ruined. Most improvised weapons count as "cheap" for breakage; see Parrying Heavy Weapons for what this implies.

Parrying Unarmed

If you are fighting without weapons, or with at least one hand free, you may choose to parry bare-handed. Beings that lack hands (like most animals) can't parry unarmed – they can only dodge.

You can use Boxing, Brawling, Judo, or Karate skill – or DX, if higher – to parry with one hand. You can also parry with Sumo Wrestling or Wrestling skill, but this requires both hands. Your Parry active defense is 3 + half your skill or DX, dropping all fractions.

There's no penalty to parry another unarmed attack. You are at -3 to parry weapons, unless the attack is a thrust or you are using Judo or Karate (in either case, use your full parry). See individual unarmed-combat skill descriptions for other limitations.

A failed parry means you are hit. If you are using hit locations, a failed parry against a weapon means your attacker may choose to hit his original target or the arm you parried with! If your arm suffers more than half your Hit Points in injury, it is automatically crippled (see Crippling Injury).

Some unarmed skills (e.g., Judo) give you special options after a successful parry. See individual skill descriptions for details.

Active Defense Options

You can improve your odds of success with an active defense by choosing one of these options to go along with it.

Retreat

"Retreat" is not a separate defense, but an option you may add to any active defense against a melee attack. To exercise this option, you must move away from your attacker: at least one yard, but not more than 1/10 your Move – exactly as for a step (see Step).

Retreating gives +3 to Dodge, or +1 to Block or Parry. Exception: If you parry using Boxing, Judo, Karate, or any fencing skill (Main-Gauche, Rapier, Saber, or Smallsword), a retreat gives +3 to Parry, as these forms make superior use of mobility.

Your step back takes place immediately. It is assumed to occur as your foe is striking. If it would take you out of your attacker's reach, he still gets his attack. If he has multiple attacks (e.g., from an Extra Attack, All-Out Attack, or Rapid Strike), your retreat does not put you beyond the reach of his remaining attacks. However, you get your retreating bonus on all active defense rolls against all of his attacks until your next turn.

If your opponent attacked you with a maneuver that allows a step, but has not yet taken his step, he can choose to follow you by taking his unused step. In effect, he is forcing you back! You can retreat only once during your turn. In other words, once you retreat, you may not retreat again until after your next turn.

You cannot retreat while in a sitting or kneeling posture, or while stunned. You also cannot retreat if you moved faster than your Basic Move on your last turn (that is, if you were sprinting or using Enhanced Move).

You can retreat (by rolling) if you are lying down.

Dodge and Drop

When under fire, hit the dirt! You may drop to the ground while dodging, earning a +3 bonus to Dodge. This is a "dodge and drop." It is similar to a retreat, but only effective against ranged attacks. It also has a drawback: it leaves you prone on the ground.

Like a retreat, a dodge and drop applies to all of your defenses against one foe for one turn. Any cover you drop behind does not count against the initial attack that inspired the dodge and drop, but is effective against subsequent attacks directed at you.

Sacrificial Dodge and Drop: You can use dodge and drop in conjunction with sacrificial dodge to protect a friend who is no more than a step away from you. If you succeed, you both fall prone and you take the hit ... unless you succeed by 3 or more, in which case neither of you is hit! You can also use a sacrificial dodge and drop to throw yourself on an explosive (e.g., a hand grenade). If you succeed, treat the blast as a contact explosion.

Diving for Cover: You may also attempt a dodge and drop if you are within the area of effect of an explosion, cone, or area-effect attack and there is cover (such as a trench) only a step away. Success means you reach it in time; failure means you don't. Even if there is no cover handy, an extra yard or two of distance from a blast can still help, since explosive damage declines with distance. If you succeed, you are a step farther away; if you fail, you suffer the effect before you make your step.

Flying or Swimming: Dodge and drop is possible only if a step would take you below concealing terrain (e.g., a flyer dropping below a hillcrest). You don't end up prone. You can still dive for cover to increase your distance from an explosion, etc.