Combat system

Round structure

Combat is divided into reactive rounds rather than a simple player turn followed by an enemy turn.

1. Player initiative: choose an available attack or Rest.
2. Enemy response and player attack: if you attacked, the enemy may select a defense against your attack zone, then your attack resolves.
3. Enemy telegraph: the enemy announces their next attack through descriptive text.
4. Player response: choose a defensive action after reading the telegraph.
5. Enemy execution: the attack resolves using the effectiveness of your response.

Both sides can defend against incoming attacks. An enemy defense can fully avoid, partially reduce, or fail to reduce your damage in the same way that your response affects enemy damage.

Attack zones and responses

Attacks target one of three abstract zones. The zone represents the shape and direction of the attack, not only the body part being targeted.

Attack zone	Typical attack	Reliable response
High	Overhead strike or descending crush	Duck
Mid	Horizontal sweep or slash	Jump Back or Block
Low	Forward thrust, stab, or bash	Sidestep

Each defensive action contains its own effectiveness ratings against all three zones. The result controls incoming damage:

Response result	Damage taken
Good	0%
Neutral	50%
Bad	100%

The normal response phase offers defensive actions. When none of them are affordable, Rest can appear as an emergency option; because Rest is not defensive, the incoming hit is treated as a bad response.

The standard defenses are not identical. Duck and Sidestep currently cost 10 stamina, Jump Back costs 15, and Block costs no stamina but is only rated as a good response against Mid attacks.

Health and stamina

Attacks and advanced defenses require stamina. An action cannot be selected when its listed cost exceeds your current stamina. The combat overlay tracks the current and maximum Health and Stamina of both combatants.

Rest restores 50 stamina. It is configured to apply Vulnerable, whose damage rule is a 50% increase to the next enemy hit after the normal defense result. In the current implementation, however, status durations can be decremented during the response action before the enemy executes, so this penalty may expire before affecting the hit. Rest may also appear as an emergency response when no affordable defensive action remains.

Enemies also spend stamina and can choose their own 50-stamina Rest action. An enemy Rest skips its attack, but it does not currently apply a separate vulnerability bonus to the enemy.

Damage calculation

For ordinary player attacks, and for unarmed enemies without weapon data, raw damage is calculated from base damage plus Strength and Combat skill:

Raw damage = base damage + (Strength x 0.3) + (Combat x 0.3)

For an armed enemy, the equipped weapon’s base damage multiplied by its damage modifier replaces the enemy move’s listed damage before the Strength and Combat bonuses are added.

The relevant defense result is then applied. For example, a 30-damage attack deals:

• 0 damage against a good response.
• 15 damage against a neutral response.
• 30 damage against a bad response.

Current player attacks range from inexpensive strikes to high-commitment attacks. A basic unarmed Jab costs 8 stamina for 5 base damage, while the blunt Skull Crusher costs 40 stamina for 45 base damage. Equipped weapon type determines which attack set is available: Blunt, Sharp, Ranged, or Unarmed.

Combat actions can define temporary status effects. The current engine recognizes effects including Dazed and Crippled, but their action assignments and duration behavior are still being tuned during alpha.

Injuries and progression

A single hit that removes at least 12% of the player-controlled combatant’s maximum health can trigger a combat-affliction roll. In ordinary combat this applies to the player; in an arena contest it applies to the controlled fighter. Enemy damage does not currently use this injury-roll path.

Victory grants Combat training effort scaled by enemy difficulty. The current base award is 300 effort, with a difficulty multiplier from 0.5x to 3x. Winning with a blunt weapon also grants Strength effort equal to 50% of the Combat effort.

Auto-Resolve

Combat mode can be changed in the game settings:

• Normal: plays the complete telegraph and response sequence.
• Auto-Resolve: simulates the encounter immediately from both sides’ stats, available attacks, stamina, and average neutral defense.

Auto-Resolve uses a maximum of 50 simulated rounds. If the enemy has not been defeated by that limit, the simulation resolves as a defeat.

Exact action costs, damage values, and balance rules may change while the game is in alpha.

Related topics

• Vault management
• Development roadmap

Try combat in the current build.