Me and my group have finished the Game Master's Kit Adventure and we have some questions about Combat and Character's movimentation:

First things we have to say: we are play with a more realistic grip of the roleplay and we like tactical and strategy combat, when it is necessary. So we have adopted 2 House Rule for combat.

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House Rule 1: If a Character uses any type of move to enter the Weapon Range (Mai) of a readied Weapon of a opponent, he suffer 1 Strife. Moving inside the the Weapon Range has no effect, only when entering. This is caused by the rising tension of exposing itself to harm. This is widely teached at Martial Arts that uses weapons (such as Kendo).

House Rule 2: If a Character becomes Compromised by the first time in this Skirmish, any opponent can make a Strike Action, Out of Turn, as the opponent distract itself and leave oppenings in his guard. (This is based on The Finishing Blow of a duel, but with no bonusses) We are using this to finish some fights faster, and to have a little more of the old Samurai Drama movies.

Questions:

1) - How was the movementation? My close combat players FEEL (we have played only 3 combats, so it could be only a feeling) that Ranged Characters have too much advantage because of the really slow movement of the system. If we are not mistaken, we can move 1 Range Band each turn, 1 more with Maneuver Action, and if they pass the Fitness Test 1 more, and 1 more for each 2 bonus sucesses (And we are combining movement as the proposed at 266 of Core Rulebook). In a grid we used page 266 as references, so Range Bands 0 to 5 were: 0, 1, 2, 5, 9, 14.

2) - Challenge Action of the Skirmish: Instead of making a special duel inside the combat, we are starting a Warrior's Duel inside the Skirmish, resolving each initiative rolled before, but with each special rules of the normal duel. Is that correct?

3) - In the Water Stance it says that a Character can use a one additional action that does not require a Check. So could I use a Free Move, A Maneuver Action OPTING FOR NOT ROLL THE FITNESS CHECK, and then use a Strike Action?

4) - About Stances, Techniques and Rings: If a Character is in Fire Stance, any Action that does not define a Ring is rolled with the Fire Ring? Or the Character may use he/she wants? Does a Technique that require a Skill/Water Ring may only be used in the Water Stance?

5) - There is any Critical Strike modifiers for Criting multiple times on the same opponent? (As the +2 modifier of the Star Wars)

1) I'm not really a fan of the range band system, but I don't think that's really the problem here. Range is a big advantage in pretty much any system regardless of mechanics. If ranged characters have too much of an advantage, consider evening the playing field by framing the scene properly. Most combat should not be on a wide open field with up to 5 range bands between opponents. Castles, courtyards, forest clearings - 4 range bands should be the limit for most combat scenes.

2) Correct.

3) Correct.

4) If you're in a stance, all checks you make must use the corresponding ring. Techniques that call for another ring can't be used.

5) Critical hits are resolved separately, they don't affect each other.

Thanks @nameless ronin . Our group well take a holyday off to see the family. And we will update our rules, sheets and everything to return after the new year. I will try to make a life easier for the players.

your houserule #1 is definitely not helping favor melee over range. if that is your concern.

you should give strife for people moving OUT of range, and not IN range.

maybe.

Thanks for the reply @Avatar111 !

Yes, I understand that. But we felt very "wrong" for people to enter and maneuver passing for the bushi and goin to strike Shugenjas and Courtier on the second "line". We thought about making these Squares Difficult Terrain to difficult these movement. On Page 266: Difficult Squares says that only the square OCCUPIED is considered difficult.

But in all our combats, instead of getting more strife to get in melee, my players tried to play as tactical and safe, and got many kills because of the Compromised Opponents. (Minions normally have little to none Composure). I meant to say that they used the rule far more to their advantage, instead of their detriment.

The highlight of the last combat was a duel between our Kakita Bushi, that is the only Emerald Magistrate in the group, against Azif. Azif got compromissed, but our bushi rolled bad ans wasted the Doubled Critical Strike =x

Group suffered 6 to 8 TOTAL Fatigue. Our Group is made of a Tortoise Courtier, a Shosuro Courtier, a Kakita Bushi, a Kaito Shrinekeeper and a Agasha Shugenja.

20 hours ago, Xupim said:

Azif got compromissed, but our bushi rolled bad ans wasted the Doubled Critical Strike =x

Erk. Yeah....arguments about the strength and weaknesses of various schools in duels aside, virtually nothing can help you if you screw up the finishing blow opportunity. Sorry!

20 hours ago, Xupim said:

But in all our combats, instead of getting more strife to get in melee, my players tried to play as tactical and safe, and got many kills because of the Compromised Opponents. (Minions normally have little to none Composure). I meant to say that they used the rule far more to their advantage, instead of their detriment.

Were they fighting minions as solo opponents or in mobs? See the NPC squads rule on page 317:

"Group Strife: Assign the squad a squad strife value equal to 3 times an individual member’s composure. This can be helpful as a means to determine the point at which undisciplined foes likely break and run."

That should give a mob of Azif's crew a composure of 18 or so - which would also allow them to tolerate an all-out fire stance attack once or twice, too, making them much more threatening.

20 hours ago, Xupim said:

Group suffered 6 to 8 TOTAL Fatigue. Our Group is made of a Tortoise Courtier, a Shosuro Courtier, a Kakita Bushi, a Kaito Shrinekeeper and a Agasha Shugenja.

That's....very impressive. Credit to them for their tactics (or their rolls....) but also, again, consider NPC squads - minions in self-assisting squads gain a surprising amount of effectiveness; because bonus successes translate to damage, not only is a squad of 3-4 grunts much more able to hit a high TN target, but presented with a standard opponent they'll do more damage, too.

On 12/18/2018 at 4:40 AM, Xupim said:

Me and my group have finished the Game Master's Kit Adventure and we have some questions about Combat and Character's movimentation:

First things we have to say: we are play with a more realistic grip of the roleplay and we like tactical and strategy combat, when it is necessary. So we have adopted 2 House Rule for combat.

Questions:

1) - How was the movementation? My close combat players FEEL (we have played only 3 combats, so it could be only a feeling) that Ranged Characters have too much advantage because of the really slow movement of the system. If we are not mistaken, we can move 1 Range Band each turn, 1 more with Maneuver Action, and if they pass the Fitness Test 1 more, and 1 more for each 2 bonus sucesses (And we are combining movement as the proposed at 266 of Core Rulebook). In a grid we used page 266 as references, so Range Bands 0 to 5 were: 0, 1, 2, 5, 9, 14.

Not quite. Close, really close, but not quite.

• You get 1 band free
• you may sacrifice an action to maneuver, gaining either of (but not both of †)
  • move 1 additional band
  • roll a TN2 Fitness (Stance) and either get...
    • Failed 0 additional
    • succeeded 2+(BonusSuccesses / 2).

† This is because the Maneuver action says "instead of", and thus you risk getting no movement at all. I've seen it happen. We described it as a freeze-up ...

Also note: in water stance, you cannot use two actions which have the same categories, so you cannot add a band by taking two maneuver actions (since both have the Move Action type).

@Magnus Grendel The group barely started to play, so I wanted them to play more free. And the NPC Squads ere too strong for them, I think. Either way they played carefully, and prevailed in the end. They did rolled above the curve (except the Finishing Blow). But did not had too much points on Martial Skills at all.

@AK_Aramis I missed the instead of clause. I will update players, and make a some tests alone to see the speed they should get into melee. I think that a good normal combat should each of the closest melee character at 10 range of eachother, and 15 ranged. Obviously normal conditions rarely apply as their are ambushed or armbush, a spreads in the middle of the city, or monster spawn from the ground.

We looked for the Action Types, so that we did not err.

A good combat could definitely start at range 0-1. The idea is to vary the distances and terrains/obstacles so that the players are forced to use creativity and vary their approaches.

2 hours ago, Avatar111 said:

A good combat could definitely start at range 0-1. The idea is to vary the distances and terrains/obstacles so that the players are forced to use creativity and vary their approaches.

Indeed. An argument or gambling game turning ugly with people drawing blades in a camp/inn/whatever could easily start within swords' reach of one another.

The more different situations you throw in, the more you avoid "the one auto-win" build, technique or tactic, and the more different players and schools will get their moment of awesome, be it (from our Beta adventures) a Hida Defender's "who said anything about first blood?" duel arrival in full plate with an otsuchi, a Kakita Duellist nailing an adversary character to a distant cliff with a ballista, or a shosuro shinobi's "murdered you....and you....and you and you...." with The Final Silence.