Firan Survival Guide: Melee Fighting

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(Redirected from Tutorial 10c: Melee Fighting)

Melee fighting is anything that's not a ranged weapon: brawling, swords, daggers, clubs, and so forth. See help combat in a hurry for a quick overview of the steps involved in melee combat. Typical you need to wield a weapon if you're using one, engage or be engaged by someone, and attack. There are, of course, a number of subtleties that can improve your odds of winning if you understand them and employ the proper tactics.

1 Wield
2 Engage
3 Attack
4 Disengage
5 Unwield
6 Capture
7 Tactics and Tricks

Wield

You can only yield one weapon at a time, and if you're not wielding anything, you're using your fists. You can only wield something if you're not engaged at the moment. There's no combat check required, you simply need to be holding the weapon. You can see what (if anything) a person is wielding by looking at them. And that's all there is to it.

Engage

Before you can attack a person in melee you need to either engage them, or have them engage you. The person who engages has the advantage in combat. This is for two reasons:

Whoever engages has the luxury of disengaging whenever they like, without having to wait on combat timers and without having to make a roll.
If weapons of mismatched lengths are being used (i.e., one person has a dagger while another has a sword) only the person who originally engaged will be able to attack. The other person can only disengage or get hit.

You can only engage one person at a time. However, you may be engaged by multiple people at once, and it may be that you have multiple opponents you can attack because of this.

When you engage somewhere you'll see a combat message. In the case of unequal length weapons it will look something like this:

COMBAT: Unsel gets into a position to attack Inarus.

If the weapons were of equal lengths, the message would look like:

COMBAT: Unsel gets into a position to attack Inarus. Inarus may attack also.

Engaging a person uses the combat timers. When you engage someone, their own combat timers reset. There is also a roll required. Engagement timers are affected by reflex and intuition, along with any combat style chosen. The details of the engagement roll can be found in help details engage. In general, it's based on agility and/or reflex, size, your combat still with your wielded weapon, and any style modifiers. If you're the person being engaged you can substitute your dodge skill for your combat skill, if it's higher.

Attack

Attacks work off the combat timers, and require a dice roll to determine success. If you were the person who engaged your opponent, you are always allowed to attack. If you were the person engaged, you can only attack if you have a weapon of a similar length. If by some unfortunate chance you are engaged to multiple people and have a choice of targets you can choose who to attack by typing attack <player>.

Details on the stats involved in attack rolls can be found in help details attack. Attack timers are based off reflex and luck attributes. In general, attack rolls for the attacker are based off agility, a relevant combat skill, and a style modifier. Defense is typically based off reflex, the relevant combat skill of whatever you're wielding, and a style modifier. Note that the dodge skill is not used to avoid attacks. If the attacker has more successes they hit. How much damage they do is determined by a number of factors including number of successes, damage factor of the weapon, combat style of the attacker, muscle of the attacker, and luck of the dice.

Different weapons function in different ways, as outlined in the section on understanding weapons. Some hit quicker, and some hit harder. Some are likely to bruise, while others are likely to cut. On a successful attack damage will be computed, and if your opponent is armored some of it may be soaked up by the armor. See the section on armor and damage for information about this.

Disengage

If you're the person who engaged someone in combat you can disengage at any point, without a check. Otherwise, disengagement runs off the combat timers and is subject to a dice check. If you're engaged to multiple people you can select who to disengage by using the disengage <player> command. Otherwise the code picks at random. Disengaging is the only combat maneuver you can perform if you're out of EP.

Details on the stats involved in disengage rolls can be found in help details disengage. Disengage timers are based off reflex and attention attributes. In general, to disengage you roll a combination of reflex or agility, your combat skill, and a style modifier. The person who's being disengaged from counters by rolling similar stats. Whoever has the most successes wins. If you're the person disengaging, you can substitute your escape skill for your combat skill if it's higher.

Unwield

You can unwield a weapon at any point in time, even while engaged in combat, by using the unwield command. There's no timers involved. There's no checks involved. It's pretty straightforward. (Note that when you have no weapon wielded you use your combat/brawling skill and are now considered to be using short weapon length.)

Capture

By capturing a character, you completely subdue them and there is no further hope for escape (without wizard intervention, via a @911 call). A captured character cannot use combat commands, cannot move at will, and is utterly defenseless. It is assumed that they're restrained in some fashion to make escape impossible. It takes another character's use of the uncapture command to free a captured character.

Captures are very hard to do. The wrestling stat is involved, as is dodge and/or escape skills on the defender's part. The exact details aren't clear (as I think the code on the web site is old) but in general it seems to be a reasonably tough thing for most people to do. It's also relatively expensive in terms of EP, which makes repetitive attempts costly.

You can only capture another character when you are engaged to them.

Tactics and Tricks

As you utilize the combat code, and watch others fight, you can pick up on a number of tricks and tactics. I make no claims as to the utility of these tactics. I'm simply reporting what I've had luck with, and what I've seen others do.

One tactic centers around what skills to learn, an issue particularly of interest with new players with combat-oriented characters. Different weaons have different advantages. Knives, for example, can be very quick to use, but do less damage than swords. Some weapons cost more XP to learn than others. Some, like the staff, are better defensive weapons. Others, like the spear, are better offensive weapons but suffer defensive penalties. Some are better geared to different stat combinations. If really depends on your character's strengths and desires.As a matter of comparison, swords are very popular weapons to learn, followed by spears, especially amongst soldiers going to war and fighting with melee weapons. Staves are a very good defensive weapon and fast, but they aren't going to make anyone a powerhouse on the battlefield given their relatively small amounts of damage. Though some small number of infantry fighters use them, they are mostly favored by archers (who tend to avoid melee combat if possible, but also because they are the companion weapon skill used when engaged with a bow in hand). Daggers and knives are small and quick, but are seldom seen at war given their relatively small amount of damage and short length. Axes are another sometimes but rarely seen weapon; they do a tremendous amount of damage but are very slow and poor defensively. Brawling is good for boxing competitions and barroomm brawls, but relatively low in damage. Wrestling doesn't apply damage. Clubs are rarely used, and whips even less so, in actual combat situations.
Another stat-related issue concerns whether or not to learn secondary skills like dodge and escape. Dodge is mostly used in combat to avoid being engaged, and escape to disengage, but only if they're higher than your weapon skills. (Dodge and escape can both help you avoid being captured if you don't have the wrestling skill, and dodge also helps a little if someone is shooting arrows at you. Both may come into play in GMed scenes as well.)One argument says to concentrate on weapon skills and avoid these secondary skills, and just stick to your primary weapon. Another theory says to spend the XP on these skills as they're easier to learn than primary combat skills, and apply to a variety of different weapons. Yet another theory suggests skipping these skills and learning the brawl skill, as that's what is used when you're attacked without a weapon in hand and you can always unwield. Really, there's a number of pros and cons on either side, and different people decide different things.
Once you've decided what combat skills to focus on, there's still the choice of what exact weapon to use. For example, someone with the combat/sword skill could use either a long sword or a short sword. A long sword is slower but does more damage and is slightly easier to defend with. Some with the combat/knives skill could use either a dagger or a knife. A dagger is slightly slower but does slightly more damage and is easier to defend with. And so on.Finally, there are different types of metals, ranging from flint to bronze to iron. Iron does the most damage among weapons of the same type, but iron weapons are more expensive and a bit heavier. Flint weapons do the least amount of damage among weapons of the same type, but are slightly lighter.
Different weapon lengths can be used as a tactic. If you have a long length weapon, for example, and engage someone with a medium length weapon, they can't counterattack. If you can manage to keep them engaged and just keep attacking, mismatched weapon lengths can work to your advantage. On a similar note, sometimes it's more useful to match their weapon lengths. Some people switch weapons of different lengths during the course of combat to suit their needs. They may attack for a while with a spear (a long length weapon), then decide to use a long sword (a medium length weapons) for a while.
Characters that are fast to attack can use the combat timers to their advantage. One tactic involves engaging a slower character, attacking once, and then disengaging before they can hit back. If this can be repeated often enough it will wear away at an opponent. If you find yourself the victim of this tactic you should be sure to try to keep the other person engaged in combat to prevent its usage. Alternatively, you could switch to a faster style or weapon.
Sometimes you need to disengage in the course of combat, but your timers are too slow. For example, long swords in particular (though they hit hard) are very slow weapons. One tactic involved unwielding your weapon in order to make your combat timers faster. When you do this your defense goes off your brawl skill as you're unarmed, and you can't choose to wield a weapon until you successfully disengage. You may end up sacrificing defensive strengths in order to attempt to disengage faster.
This trick is used when someone with a medium or long length weapon is engaged by someone with a short length weapon, such as a knife. Normally you would have to disengage to attack your opponent. However, as brawling is considered short range, you can also unwield your weapon and start punching. This tactic likely works better for those with higher muscle attributes.
In group situations, such as in battle royales or in war, tag-teaming an opponent is very useful. In particular, engaging a person resets their combat timers. There's nothing more frustrating than to wait 80 or 90 seconds for the chance to attack some opponent, only to have a third person move in to engage you and start the waiting process all over.
There are, in general, a number of tactics related to timers and knowing when to do what. For example, assume you're slightly slower than your opponent. You trade blows for a while. Eventually you'll get to the point where he's going to get two attacks in a row in. Disengaging right before this point might not be a bad idea.