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Two Melee Combat Questions


RicoZaid

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6th Edition

 

If you have page or examples please post links :)

 

1) When combat starts when are Combat Skill levels assigned?

Say Joe punches Mike on phase 3 but Mike is only speed 2 and has not acted yet. Can Mike assign his 3 levels of Hand to Hand CV vs Joe's attack? I think if he blocks he can do it...

 

2) Multiple melee attackers?

 

If Joe, Shelly and Brandy attack Chuck (he really deserves it!) on Phase 6 (they all are speed 2) does Chucks 3 Combat Skill levels apply to all the hand to hand attacks against him?

 

3) 3rd Question on my next post. :)

 

Thank you!

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1)  I believe levels are assigned on their Dex, but if everyone is aware before combat starts I usually allow them to start with levels assigned.  Remember that unless you're speed 1, everyone acts on Segment 12, so wherever you put your levels on that segment, they stay until you reassign them.  So on phase 3, Mike's 3 levels HTH will be wherever he put them on 12.

 

2)  Yup, it applies against everybody.  Although you'll want to look at possible penalties for facing multiple attackers.  It's somewhere in the combat section.

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Thanks!

 

So if you're surprised(?) (or stunned) on Phase 12 start of combat and do not assign your combat skill levels, you don't get any combat skill levels until your NEXT phase? I guess you better Block-Abort here right?

 

This brings up another question:

 

Do opponents automatically know the Combat Skill Level used by other opponents? or is it secret until they are attacked? 
 
What if a Player (Dex 15) decides to use all 3 Combat Skill Levels on his OCV and then sees his opponent (Dex 15) put all her levels on OCV. Can he switch to DCV?
If he has a lower Dex he can't change it, correct?
 
Is there an order of operations on combat Skill Level allocation? Is it Dex?
 
Thanks!
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Unless you have a Detect power or perhaps an appropriate Analyse skill you never know your target's combat values.  They're not stamped on people's foreheads :)

 

If the character in your example is worried about being clocked by his opponent he should have allocated to DCV in the first place - by choosing to go on a full offense he has chosen to leave himself open to counterattack.

 

The order is simply initiative: Assigning CSV is a zero-phase action so can be done at the start of a characters phase or after a half-phase action that isn't an attack, as normal.  If he loses the dex 15 tied initiative roll off he'll have to abort to allocate them because it's not his phase yet (so might as well block or dodge at the same time) - or save them for a counter attack.

 

If he won the roll off he's going first so presumably has already attacked the other dex 15 character with +3 OCV if that's what he wanted to do.

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Thanks! Very helpful. :)

 

Sam and Joe attack Mary (she's really tough). Joe is OCV 5 and Mary is DCV 3. Mary Dodge-Aborts and puts her 4 combat levels to DCV.

 

Sam nearby can magically 'see' that Mary allocated 4 combat levels to DCV and puts all his levels to OCV when it is his turn. WOO!!!!!!!

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Only if Sam is packing something like this:

 

Size Them Up:  Detect A Class Of Things (Combat Values) 17- (Sight Group), Discriminatory (16 Active Points); Requires A Roll (Skill roll; Must be made each Phase/use; Analyse: Combat; -1)

 

Sam takes his half phase to make an Analyse: Combat roll (hope he bought it to more than 11-) and then gets to make a 17- roll to get Mary's current combat values.  He then knows how to allocate his CV to their best effect (or says 'DCV 10?' forget it).

 

Otherwise Sam just knows she dodged and looks pretty good at it.

 

Later on, if he spends 8 points to buy off the 'skill' limitation, Sam just knows people's combat values.  He's just that good - he can usually tell with a glance (no half action because sight is a sense) what an opponent is currently capable of. So he sees Mary across the room fighting Joe, sees that she has a DCV 8, and is now free to half-move over, allocate his CSL, and attack (or allocate his CSL and then make a Full Phase attack, like passing strike or move through).

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Only if Sam is packing something like this: Size Them Up:  Detect A Class Of Things (Combat Values) 17- (Sight Group), Discriminatory (16 Active Points); Requires A Roll (Skill roll; Must be made each Phase/use; Analyse: Combat; -1)

 

 

Man that's awesome. 

 

I guess if Sam and Joe are player characters, Sam will know Sue's DCV if it is disclosed by the GM... I Guess as a GM I should just never disclose the exact DCV for an NPC. :)

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Size Them Up:  Detect A Class Of Things (Combat Values) 

 

Way too meta for me.  Why not allow Detect Character Points or Detect GM Intervention while you're at it?  I'd use the Tactics Skill for this, honestly, and IMO it still shouldn't give more than a pretty rough idea (e.g. "they are fighting very defensively").

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Size Them Up:  Detect A Class Of Things (Combat Values) 17- (Sight Group), Discriminatory (16 Active Points); Requires A Roll (Skill roll; Must be made each Phase/use; Analyse: Combat; -1)

 

Is there a way to defend against a "Detect"? i.e. (hide your CV levels) I need to have a counter-strategy against this since the people fighting both use this strategy.

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Man that's awesome. 

 

I guess if Sam and Joe are player characters, Sam will know Sue's DCV if it is disclosed by the GM... I Guess as a GM I should just never disclose the exact DCV for an NPC. :)

 

I don't see any reason why not.  It can make things easier during play; you can let players figure out what they need to roll in order to hit, but you could also go the other way; have every character roll against 11 + OCV, and however many they made it by is the maximum DCV they hit.  

 

 

Is there a way to defend against a "Detect"? i.e. (hide your CV levels) I need to have a counter-strategy against this since the people fighting both use this strategy.

 

Detect is an Enhanced Sense, so Darkness, Flash, and Invisibility are all typical counters for those.  But my own favored method for dealing with it would be Running... as in my own Running as a player, not my character's Running, and I would run, far away from that game, and find another. 

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Thanks!

 

So if you're surprised(?) (or stunned) on Phase 12 start of combat and do not assign your combat skill levels, you don't get any combat skill levels until your NEXT phase? I guess you better Block-Abort here right?

 

 

Becoming Stunned in particular will immediately halve your DCV and DMCV and switch off all skill levels and non-persistant powers at the end of the segment. Also a Stunned character isn't allowed to abort until they get their next phase. And it takes a full phase action to recover from being Stunned - and is the only action allowed in that phase. I'm fairly sure that because of that, skill levels can't be switched back on until the following phase, though you'd be able to allocate them as part of aborting to take a defensive action.

 

Being Stunned aside, you can change skill levels as a zero phase action any time you act, but only once per phase. So you aren't allowed to put everything on to OCV, attack, and then put them all on to DCV, although if you abort to Dodge in the following segment you're fine to allocate them to DCV then as it's a new Phase.

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Way too meta for me.  Why not allow Detect Character Points or Detect GM Intervention while you're at it?  I'd use the Tactics Skill for this, honestly, and IMO it still shouldn't give more than a pretty rough idea (e.g. "they are fighting very defensively").

 

The analyse skill already gives you that rough idea if it's appropriate.

 

I agree - it's way too meta for me as well but there's a certain amount of meta when CSL are involved anyways: you as a player know you allocate three levels - the character just knows he's trying his hardest.  Still, there is a numerical component to the game and if someone wanted to spend the points needed to know exactly what kind of numbers they're up against I'd probably allow it... though I'd describe it as 'she's as skilled as you are when you try your best' over saying 'She's currently DCV 10'.

 

(The closest this has ever come up to happening in my own games was when someone created a 'detect structural integrity' power - the idea was they'd know the pd of a target so they knew how hard they could hit.  I allowed it but only the player knew the numbers: the character themself perceived it as comparing to other objects (ie: he's as tough as a brick wall).  The player knew that was a PD of 4 ... the character knew it as 'brick'.)

 

Also someone did once make a Detect Power Levels (Active Points) once as a joke. "Vegeta, what does the scouter say about his power level?" 

 

I don't see any reason why not.  It can make things easier during play; you can let players figure out what they need to roll in order to hit, but you could also go the other way; have every character roll against 11 + OCV, and however many they made it by is the maximum DCV they hit.  

 

 

 

Detect is an Enhanced Sense, so Darkness, Flash, and Invisibility are all typical counters for those.  But my own favored method for dealing with it would be Running... as in my own Running as a player, not my character's Running, and I would run, far away from that game, and find another. 

 

These, Invisibilty to this detect would about the same price as the Detect itself. Everyone would take it if everyone took the Detect power and you'd be back to square one.

 

I've played it both ways.  There are times where I've over-tuned an encounter in some way I hadn't anticipated or the dice are being particularly cruel to the heroes so the villain suddenly drops a few points of dcv or ocv - that fudging is harder when all the chips are out.  At the same time I've had less important encounters laid out 'All the thugs are highly trained ex-military and have OCV and DCV 5.'

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