Combat
From Malevolent Whispers
[edit] Critical Hits
For Critical hits, you would have a natural 2% chance to get a critical. With a Keen enchanted weapon, that would increase to 4%, and with the Improved Critical skill, it would increase to 6%. The amount of bonus damage would be determined by the type of weapon in question. For Example: A longsword would be a x2 bonus to damage, while a longbow would be a x3 bonus.
[edit] General Combat Round
A typical combat round would be a single attack. If a character is dual wielding, they would have the opportunity to attack with both weapons. So they would get two attacks per round. Depending on the type of weapon, an attacker would have a chance to score a combo, or successive hit that round. Up to a max of 10 successive hits. That max encompasses dual wielded weapons. On the issue of dual wielded weapons, there would be penalties to attacks and damage because of the uncommonness of the style. But there will be skills to negate or reduce the penalties to attack. Damage will always be less than a normal swing because the full strength cannot be placed in one hand. Casting spells will prevent automatic melee as you would have to concentrate to cast, thus if a spell takes more than a single round to cast, you will lose that opportunity for melee damage, however, you _should_ make up for it with spell damage. Most spells will have casting times of one round.
[edit] Attack Rolls
Attacking will be revised and melee attacks will pull off of strength, and ranged will pull of off dexterity. Another interesting addition will be size modifiers. Character will be grouped into size categories based on their height. in much the same way that D&D groups them. Gnomes and Halflings would be Small, Dwarves, Elves, Humans, etc would be Medium, Half-Trolls, Half-Ogres, Half-Dragons and Half-Demons would be Medium or Large depending on their height. There are no benefits/penalties to being medium height, Small, Tiny, Diminutive, and Fine receive bonuses to AC, while Large, Huge, Gargantuan, and Colossal would retrieve penalties to AC, however the opposite is true for damage purposes.
[edit] Armor Class
Armor class will include bonuses from armor, shields, defender enchanted weaponry, dexterity, and size. Spells can add temporary bonuses to AC, as well as take away from it. Armor class will determine how hard you are to hit. Some creatures have a natural armor that is also added to their AC, and this will be taken into account as well.
[edit] Sneak Attacks
With the right skills, players will be able to score sneak attacks for added damage against Foes unaware of their presence. For instance, a rogue with the hide and sneak affects attacks a mage without detect hidden. The attack is checked, and the rogue hits, the rogue scores normal damage plus one half. A Critical Sneak attack is still just x1.5 damage. Critical damage would be determined first.
[edit] Size Categories
As covered previously, Size will come into play. It will affect equipment size, and will give bonuses/detriments for certain things. All categories are as follows (smallest to largest):
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
[edit] Saving Throws
Saving throws are going to be grossly simplified. There will now only be 3 types of saving throws, modeled entirely after the 3rd Edition Dungeons and Dragons saving throws. (Why not re-use something that works and make sense to replace something completely obfuscated?) These are as follows:
- Fortitude This would measure a players ability to stand up to massive physical punishment or attacks against their vitality and health such as poison, paralysis, and magic effects causing instant death. Constitution would factor into this throw. Fortitude saves would apply against attacks or effects such as poison, disease, paralysis, petrification, energy drain, destruction and disintegration.
- Reflex This would test a characters ability to dodge massive attacks such as a wizard's fireball or the lethal breath attacks of a dragon. dexterity would be applied to this throw. Reflex saves can be made against attacks or effects such as pit traps, catching on fire, fireball, lightning bolt, and red dragon fire breath.
- Will These saves affect reflect a players ability to resist mental influence and domination as well as many magical effects. Wisdom is the physical stat that is applied to Will saves. Will saves can be made against attacks or effects such as charm person, hold person, polymorph other, and most illusion spells.
[edit] Cover
Cover is the act of using an object as a means of protection, such as standing behind a tree while reloading your crossbow, and only stepping out between shots. If I could think of an easy way to do this, I would, but I can't really think of a way to pull this off.
[edit] Concealment
Like cover, this is the act of obscuring an opponents view for protection. The difference is concealment is only providing a chance for them to miss because you have successfully obscured yourself from their view. Concealment includes all circumstances where nothing is physically blocking a foes blows, but rather hampers their accuracy. Concealment is subjectively measured as how well concealed the defender is. Examples of what might qualify as concealment of varying degrees are:
| One-quarter: | | 10% Miss Chance |
| One-Half: | | 20% Miss Chance |
| Three-Quarters: | | 30% Miss Chance |
| Nine-Tenths: | | 40% Miss Chance |
| Total: | | 50% Miss Chance |
[edit] Unarmed Combat
Unarmed combat has always been a weak point for MUDs, And the first step for MW will be a sort of "combo" system where players can string together certain skills (punch, kick, roundhouse, etc..) to form combos for increased damage. Any other ideas on this part are welcome.
[edit] Antimagic Fields
Spells, and certain skills would fail to work within one of these, and some mobs would be able to create them mid-fight. Summoned creatures, controlled undead, and incorporeal creature cannot exist inside an antimagic field, and therefore are either force to remain outside of it, or if already inside it are forced out of existence.
[edit] Damage Reduction
Damage reduction is another idea siphoned from D&D. In 3rd Edition, it it represented in the form ##/##. The first half of the form is the amount of damage resisted. For instance, a player with a Dmg. Resist. 5/-- would resist 5 damage from any non-magical source. Spells completely ignore it, and any weapon rated higher than the second field would ignore it as well. The second field is the type of damage that would negate the resistance. For instance, A Lycanthrope has a Dmg. Reduction of 15/silver, meaning it takes damage-15 for every hit that isn't a spell, magic weapon, or silver. So a player hitting a Werewolf with a mundane longsword for 12 would deal no damage to a werewolf. Dmg Reduction can't push damage done into the negatives, it can only push it to 0. An attack that is completely negated by Dmg Reduction cannot also apply certain effects. Magic attacks and energy attacks ignore Damage reduction.
[edit] Death Attacks
Some attacks, such as a Bodak's gaze attack, Power Word: Kill, an arrow of slaying, will instantly kill a player who fails a fortitude saving throw. However, spells such as Death Ward, can protect characters against these attacks.
[edit] Diseases
For Diseases, I'm thinking of redesigning the current implementation and developing a more intricate system where the different diseases would have different effects, and durations, incubation periods, and infection types. These diseases would also be creatable online, and would produce interesting results, such as contagion and other nifty things.
[edit] Energy Drain
This would be an interesting twist on an already existing spell, and would introduce a new dimension to combat. The ability to temporarily lose levels. Character would be given an effective level field that would represent their current level. When they got energy drained, there would be a random chance that the drain would take Hp, Mp, or a level. Each energy drain would give players the following effects:
- -1 to all skill/spell checks
- -1 to attacks, both hitting and damage
- -1 to all saving throws
- -1 effective level (whenever a characters level would be called for a die roll, you use the effective level.)
Only a restoration spell, can remove negative levels, or they return 24 hours (game time) after receiving them.
[edit] Etherealness
An ethereal creature is one that exists on both the ethereal plane, and the material plane, and has the option to be in either place. While on the ethereal plane, an ethereal creature can't be seen, heard or smelt by a player in the Material plane. They can only see into the material plane in the room they're in, and cannot influence non-ethereal objects. See Invisibility and True Seeing spells can reveal ethereal creatures to those on the material plane. Ethereal creatures can move in any direction including up or down. They move through water the same way they would move through air, and they do not fall or suffer falling damage while on the ethereal plane.
[edit] Evasion and Improved Evasion
With the Evasion ans Improved evasion skills, any attack or ability that provides a reflex save for half damage will result in no damage for a player with both these skills, and 1/4 damage for those with just evasion. A creature must have room to move to evade any attack, so a character bound in ropes cannot make a reflex save, evasion or not. Evasion cannot be used in heavier armor (anything metal).
[edit] Fast Healing
Typically, a character will gain HP equal to 1 times their effective level, every update. However, a character with the fast healing ability, will normally gain double that amount per update.
[edit] Fear
Certain monsters, and spell effects, cause mobs and players to be frightened, while frightened, players suffer penalties to their attack, damage, saves, and skill/spell checks. And each round there is a chance that the player will randomly flee from the fight. Dragons are notorious for their aura of fear, as they are some of the strongest, and most feared of the lands.
[edit] Gaseous Form
Gaseous forms, such as a vampire's mist form, disallow creatures from interacting with objects other than to obscure it from view. They cannot run, but fly. The can move about and do the things any cloud of gas could do such as issue under the crack of a door, but cannot pass through a solid wall. They cannot attack or cast spells within a gaseous form, and they gain Dmg Reduction 20/+1 while in their gaseous form. They do not have to breathe while in this form, they cannot enter waters or other liquids, and they automatically gain the hide affect when in a heavily misty area.
[edit] Incorporeality
Incorporeal creatures are immune to normal attacks and can only be harmed by magical weapons, spells, and spell-like abilities. They are unaffected by fire, acid, or cold. Even if struck with a magic weapon or spell, an incorporeal creature has a 50% chance to shrug it off and take no damage, except for damage dealt by a force type attack such as magic missile, or by a ghost touch enchanted weapon. Incorporeal creatures may move in any direction at will, up or down included, because they do not need to walk on the ground. Incorporeal creatures are inaudible unless they choose to make noise. Physical attacks of incorporeal creatures ignores AC gained from armor, and spells, unless it is that of the force type, such as the spell Mage Armor, or the armor has been enchanted with the Ghost Touch enchantment.
[edit] Paralysis and Hold
A paralyzed character runs the risk that they will fail to attack each round due to their paralysis, however, a character under the influence of a hold spell, cannot move, typically they can still attack with spells and melee, so long as the target is within range. However, they cannot move until the spell wears off.
[edit] Poisons
The poisons system will be expanded to allow for OLC poisons, with affects ranging from ability score damage, to constant health loss, inability to regenerate, and other such affects. Full details will come at a later date.
[edit] Regeneration
Creatures with the extraordinary ability to regenerate do so at phenomenal rates. Damage isn't dealt to a creature regularly until a certain condition is met, an attack that they happen to be susceptible to such as fire or acid. These creatures can typically regrow or reattach severed limbs and continue using them normally. Attack forms such as disintegration and most poisons, ignore regeneration. Instant death attacks can only affect a regenerating creature if said attacks are delivered with a weapon that would otherwise deal normal damage to the regenerating creature.
[edit] Spell Resistance
This kinda falls under the category of both combat and magic, but since its implications are more pertinent to combat, I decided to describe it here. Spell resistance is the extraordinary ability to avoid being affected by spells. Some spells can even be used to provide spell resistance temporarily. To affect a creature with spell resistance, a character mut make a check of at least equal to, or greater than the creatures spell resistance. If the caster does not succeed, the spell is cast as normal, but fails to affect the target. Only spells and spell-like abilities are subject to spell resistance. A creatures spell resistance can never interfere with it's own spells, and it will not interfere with beneficial spells cast by others. Spell resistance cannot be imparted on others by sharing the same group or touching them.
[edit] When Spell Resistance would apply
- Targeted Spells, spell resistance only applies if the spell is targeted at the resistant individual.
- Area Spells, A creature within the area of effect of an area spell can apply it's spell resistance only to the part of the spell that affects it.
- Effect Spells, Most effect spells summon or create something and are not subject to spell resistance. Sometimes, however, spell resistance applies to effect spells, usually to effect spells that affect a creature more or less directly, such as web (summons a massive sticky spiderweb like substance preventing foes from fleeing).
[edit] Successful Spell Resistance
Spell resistance prevents a spell or spell-like ability from affecting or harming the resistant creature, but it can never removes magical effects already in place, or on another creature, or negates a spell's effect on another creature. Spell resistance prevents a spell from disrupting another spell. Against an ongoing spell that has already been cast, a failed check against spell resistance allows the resistant creature to ignore any effect the spell might have, however it continues to affect others normally.
