Combat Question

[Gregory Paul Stolze]

At 10:13 PM 2/10/99 -0800, Chad Underkoffler wrote:
>Hidey-ho, all.
>
>     I've just received Unknown Armies this week, and have been very
>slowly working my way through it, due to work and grad school
>concerns. I have run across a question, however, and if anyone can
>give me a hand, I'd appreciate it...
>
>     * In UA combat, you essentially roll for initiative to find out
>who goes first every combat round, right?

Correct.

>     * To attack, you roll vs. your applicable skill, right? If you
>succeed, you hit, the target has no chance to parry, block, or dodge?

Unless that person had a higher initiative and chose to dodge, right.

>And if you want to dodge, you give up your attack for that round and
>roll against dodging, right?

Right again: the thing is, you can only dodge attacks made with lower
initiative.

>     * Is there anything like a parry or block in the system, any
>in-round defense other than dodging?

Nope.  As far as I was concerned, "dodge" is broad enough to include
parrying or blocking.  If you want, you can change your "dodge" skill to
"parry" or "block" or "make attack not hit me" or whatever.

>     * It seems then that faster characters will be the ones always 
>attacking, unless the slower ones get lucky. Is that intentional?

Actually, from the combats I've run, everyone attacks and no one dodges.
As for "getting lucky," the system is loose enough that bad or mediocre
rolls are possible even if you're a speed demon.  ("I have Speed 70, but I
only rolled a 21 for initiative.  The guy with Speed 50 who rolled a 42 is
going to go ahead of me.")  

Did that help?  My rationale is that, all things being equal, it's
generally easier to attack than defend.

-G.
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