Rakasha Setting Guide, Combat And Fighting
Welcome Game Masters and Players. This is the guide to combat in the world of Rakasha. As you read through this guide you will be able to strike with devastating blows, learn the ways of initiative, learn how to block and dodge, how to use cover, movement, even combat underwater, and damage reduction.
The Heat of Battle
In a typical encounter for combat there usually are two sides clashing each other, a flurry of weapon swings, feints, footwork, and spellcasting. This is not an exception in Rakasha, most of the rules for combat that Dungeons and Dragon's fifth edition has extremely similar to the rules applied in Rakasha, with only a few exceptions that will be covered in this guide.
This cycle of bloody combat is organized into two phases: Player and Enemy Phase. The Two phases are exactly the same, but the players control and dictate the Player Phase.
Player Phase
On the Player Turn, each of the players have three action they can perform on their turn: Action, Bonus Action, Reaction, and Movement. As well as have a special stat called Stamina.
Every player gets a turn to do what they wish to do, such as movement first or an action first—or even a bonus action, if the player wants to. Initiative can be rolled if the party want a more organized way of determining who in their group goes first, but it is not required. Most common actions you can take are described later on in this guide. Many class features and other abilities provide additional options for your action as well.
Bonus Actions
Various class features, Incantation features, and other abilities let you take an additional action on your turn called a bonus action. The Keen Action feature, for example, allows a sleuth to take a bonus action. You can take a bonus action only when a special ability, incantation, or other feature of the game states that you can do something as a bonus action.
You choose when to take a bonus action during your turn, unless the bonus action's timing is specified, and anything that deprives you of your ability to take actions also prevents you from taking a bonus action.
Other Activity On Your Turn
You turn can include a variety of flourishes that requires neither your action nor your move, such acts are communicating however you are able, whether this is through brief utterances and gestures as you take your turn, or during your turn as well.
You can also interact with one object or feature of the environment for free, during either your move or your action. For example, you could open a door during your move as you stride to your foe, or you could draw your weapon as part of the same action you use to attack.
If you want to interact with a secondary object, you need to use your action. Some magic items and other special objects always require an action to use, as stated in their descriptions.
Reactions
Certain special abilities, Incantations, and situations allow you to take a special action called a reaction. A reaction is an instant response to a trigger of some kind, which can occur on your turn or on someone else's. The opportunity attack is the most common type of reaction.
When you take a reaction, you can't take another one until the start of your next turn—unless stated otherwise. If the reaction interrupts another creature's turn, that creature can continue its turn right after the reaction.
Surprise
A band of adventurers might be able to get the drop on an unsuspecting group of enemies. This is called a Surprise. The GM determines who gets surprised. If neither side tries to be stealthy, they automatically notice each other. Otherwise the GM compares the Dexterity (Stealth) checks of anyone hiding with a passive Wisdom (Perception) score of each creature on the opposing side. Any character or monster that doesn't notice a threat is surprised at the start of the encounter.
If you're surprised you can't move or take an action on your first turn of the combat, and you can't take a reaction until that turn ends. A member of a group can be surprised even if the other members aren't.
Movement
In combat, characters and monsters are in constant motion, often using movement and position to gain the upper hand.
On your turn, you can move a distance up to your speed. You can use as much or as little of your speed as you like on your turn, following the rules here.
Your movement can include jumping, climbing, swimming. These different modes of movement can be combined with walking, or they can constitute your entire move. However you're moving, you deduct the distance of each part of your move from your speed until it is used up or until you are done moving.
Breaking Up Your Move
You can break up your movement on your turn, using some of your speed before and after your action. For example if you have a speed of 30 feet, you can move 10 feet, take your action, and then move 20 feet.
Moving Between Attacks
If you take an action that includes more than one weapon attack, you can break up your movement even further by moving between those attack. For example, a Bruiser who can make two attacks with the Extra Attack feature and who has a speed of 25 feet could move 10 feet, make an attack, move 15 feet, and then attack again.
Using Different Speeds
If you have more than one speed, such as your walking speed and a flying speed, you can switch back and forth between your speeds during your move. Whenever you switch, subtract the distance you've already moved from the new speed. The result determines how much farther you can move. If the result is 0r less, you can't use the new speed during the current move.
For example, if you have a speed of 30 and a burrowing speed of 60, you could burrow 20 feet, then walk 10 feet, and then dig underground 30 feet more.
Different Terrain
Combat rarely takes place in bare rooms or on featureless plains. Briar-chocked forests, treacherous staircases, or mountainous caves— the setting of a typical fight contains difficult terrain.
Every foot of movement in difficult terrain costs 1 extra foot. This rule is true even if multiple things in a space count as difficult terrain.
Low furniture, rubble, undergrowth, steep stairs, snow, and shallow bogs are examples of difficult terrain. The space of another creature, whether hostile or not, also counts as difficult terrain.
Being Prone
Combatants often find themselves lying on the ground, either because they are knocked down or because they throw themselves down. In the game, they are prone.
You can drop prone without using any of your speed. But standing up take half of your speed. For example, if your speed is 30 feet, you must spend 15 feet of movement to stand up. You can't stand if you don't have any movement or enough left.
To move while prone, you must crawl or use magic such as teleportation. Every foot of movement while crawling costs 1 extra foot. Crawling 1 foot in difficult terrain, therefore, costs 3 feet of movement.
Moving Around Other Creatures
Moving through a hostile creature's space only if they are two sizes larger or smaller than you. But you can move through nonhostile creature's space. Another creature is considered difficult terrain for you, so remember.
Whether a creature is a friend or an enemy, you can't willingly end your move in its space.
Flying Movement
Many creatures in Rakasha rule the skies, such as the Rakashan, or the Sparkscale Goh'Blyn—enjoying the flight they have been given, but they must also deal with the perpetual danger of falling. Flying creatures enjoy many benefits of mobility, but they must also deal with the danger of falling. If a flying creature is knocked prone, has its speed reduced to 0, or is otherwise deprived of the ability to move. The creature falls, unless it has the ability to hover or it is being held aloft by magic.
Combative Actions
When you take your action on you turn, you take one of the actions presented here, an action you gained from your class or a special feature, or an action that you improvise—remember the rule of cool.
Attack
The most common action to take in combat is the Attack action, whether you are swimming a sword, firing an arrow or bolt from your bow or crossbow, or brawling with your fists.
With this action, you make one melee or ranged attack at a creature within your range. Certain features, such as the Extra Attack feature of the Bruiser, allow you to make more than one attack with this action.
Cast A Incantation
Spellcasters such as Arcanist and Devoted, as well as many monsters, have access to the ten Incantations and can use them to great effort in combat. Each Incantation has a casting time, which specifies whether the caster must use an action, a reaction, minutes, or even hours to cast the Incantation. Casting a Incantation is, therefore, not necessarily an action. Most of the Incantation Features have a casting time of 1 action, so a spellcaster often uses their action in combat. See the Rakasha Setting Guide, Spellcasting for more information.
Dash
When you take the Dash action, you gain extra movement for the current turn. The increase equals your speed, after applying any modifiers. With a speed of 30 feet, for example, you can move up to 60 feet on your turn if you dash. Any increase or decrease to your speed changes this additional movement by the same amount. If your speed of 30 feet is reduced to 15 feet, for instance, you can move up to 30 feet this turn if you dash.
Disengage
If you take the Disengage action, your movement doesn't provoke opportunity attacks for the rest of the turn.
Help
You can lend your aid to another in the completion of a goal. When you take the Help action, the creature you aid gains advantage on the next ability check it makes to perform the task you are helping with, provided that it makes the check before the start of your next turn.
Alternatively, you can aid a friendly creature in attacking a creature within 5 feet of you. You feint, distract the target, or in some way team up to make your companion's attack more effective. If your ally attacks the target before your next turn, the first attack roll is made with advantage.
Hide
When you take the Hide action, you make a Dexterity (Stealth) check in an attempt to hide, following the rules for hiding. If you succeed, you have advantage on attack rolls against creatures that can't see you.
Hidden Targets
When you attack creatures you can't see, you have disadvantage on the attack roll. This is true whether you're guessing the target's location or you're targeting a creature you can hear but not see.
If you are hidden—both unseen and unheard— when you make an attack, you give away your location when the attack hits or misses.
Ready
You may want to get the drop on a creature or foe with a certain circumstance before you act.To do so, you can take the Ready action on your turn, which lets you act using your reaction before the start of your next turn.
First, you decide what perceivable circumstance will trigger your reaction. Then, you choose the action you will take in response to that trigger, or you choose to move up to your speed in response to it. Examples include "If the Rakashan flies into the air, I'll shoot my bow," and "If the Brak charges at me, I move away."
When the trigger occurs, you can either take your reaction right after the trigger finishes or ignore the trigger.
You can ready an Incantation, activating it but you hold its power—which you release with your reaction when the trigger occurs. The Incantation must have a casting time of 1 action, and to keep it maintained requires concentration. If your concentration is broken, the Incantation dissipates without taking effect.
Search
When you use the Search action, you must make either a Wisdom (Perception) check or an Intelligence (Investigation) check, depending on the nature of your search.
Use An Object
You normally interact with an object while doing something else, such as when you draw a sword as part of an attack. When an object requires your action for its use, you take the Use An Object action. This action is also useful when you want to interact with more than one object on your turn.
Dodge and Blocking
During combat you'll be able to block or dodge when attack. If an hostile creature hits you with an attack, you can use your Stamina to block or dodge.
Dodging
One chosen action to use Stamina points on is the Dodge option. When you are attacked by a hostile creature, you can choose to dodge the attack entirely with a successful Dexterity check against the enemy's Dodge DC, spending two points from your Stamina pool.
The DC equal 10+ the enemy's Strength or Dexterity modifier (whichever is higher)
On a successful Dodge roll you take a quarter of the damage as they attack still hit you. This damage is of course reduced further depending on your armor and/or shield your character possesses.
On the event of a 20 on the roll, you automatically succeed the dodge and reduce the damage further by 1d12. While a 1 on the roll will give you full damage on the attack.
Blocking
Another option that you can spend your Stamina on is the Block option. When you choose to take the block option, you spend one point from your Stamina pool and make roll a Block check against the creature's Block Range equal to the creature's AC. If you succeed you reduce the incoming damage by your shield's Armor Reduction Dice.
Magical Blocking
Blocking follows the same rules for spellcasters but instead of using only Stamina, they use their Weave of Magic as well. They must expend one Stamina point and two Weave of Magic to produce a magical barrier that will keep them from harm. This magical barrier reduces damage by 1d6 per Weave of Magic beyond two spent.
In the case of a 20 on the d20 roll, you take none of the incoming damage and the creature gains the Staggered condition and that creature's turn ends immediately after the hit.
In the case of a 1 on the d20 roll, you become staggered and take all of the damage.
Improvised Action
Your character can do things not covered in these action, such as breaking down doors, intimidation, sensing weakness in magical defenses, or calling for a parley with a foe. The only limits to the actions you can attempt are your imagination and your character's ability scores.
Rolling An Attack
However you're attacking, be it a melee weapon, firing a weapon, making an attack with an Incantation, attacks have simple order of events.
- Target Choice:
Pick a target within your attack's range: a creature, an object, or a location. - Determine modifiers:
The GM determines whether the target has cover and whether you have advantage or disadvantage. In addition, spells, special abilities, and other effects can apply penalties or bonuses to your attack roll. - Resolve The Attack:
You make the attack roll. On a hit, you roll damage, unless the particular attack has rules that specify otherwise. Some attack cause special effects in addition to or instead of damage.
Damage: Resistances, Vulnerabilities, and Types
After you've resolved your attack you get to roll your damage. But what kind of damage do you roll? What is the damage? Damage is separated into two categories: Physical and Magical
Physical Damage
Physical damage is damage that is dealt by nonmagical weapons, such as swords, fists, axes, hammers, bo-staves, and many more. Physical damage comes in three forms: Bludgeoning, Piercing, and Slashing damage.
Regular means of armor can reduce this any of these damage by the Armor's Reduction Dice, but some Incantations do this as well, reducing the damage based by its Magical Reduction Dice. Some class features like the Berzerker's Wrathful Armor can reduce Physical damage by 1d12, or many of the Aegis' features can give an ally or allies Physical or Magical damage resistance.
Magical Damage
Magical damage is damage dealt by Incantations, magical weaponry, and special class features that deal magical damage. Magical damage comes in all forms, some common forms of Magical damage are: Fire, Cold, Lightning, Force, Psychic, Acid, Thunder, Poison, Radiant, and Necrotic.
Magical damage cannot be reduced by normal armor, only magical armor and the Incantations can reduce this damage.
Some monsters have an innate resistance to Magical and Physical damage, reducing all damage from those sources by their Resistance Dice.
Underwater Fighting
When a party has a quest that leads them into the ocean, they might fight off sharks in an ancient shipwreck, find themselves in a Tidal Prime Karathigan's lair and have to fight it, or become trapped in a temple room that becomes flooded with water. While the party or group is underwater during comeback the following rules apply.
When making a melee weapon attack, a creature that doesn't have a swimming speed (either natural, or granted by magic) has disadvantage on the attack roll unless the weapon is a dagger, javelin, shortsword, spear, or trident.
A ranged weapon attack automatically misses a target beyond a weapon's normal range. Even against a target within normal range, the attack roll has disadvantage unless the weapon is a crossbow, a net, or a weapon that is thrown like a javelin (including a spear, trident, or dart).
Creatures and objects that are fully immersed in water have resistance to Magical Fire damage.
Mounted Combat
An Exorcist charging after a Kazzra on a Shadowbounder, a Arcanist casts his Incantation from the back of a Hypogryph, or a Devoted soaring through the sky on a Prime Karathigan. All of these characters share one thing: enjoying the benefits of speed and mobility that a mount can provide.
A willing creature that is at least one size larger than you and that has an appropriate anatomy can serve as a mount, using the following rules.
Mounting And Dismounting
Once during your move, you can mount a creature that is within 5 feet of you or dismount. Doing so costs an amount of movement equal to half your speed. For example, if your speed is 30 feet, you must spend 15 feet of movement to mount a horse. Therefore, you can't mount it if you don't have 15 feet of movement left or if you speed is 0.
If an effect moves your mount against its will while you're on it, you must succeed on a DC 10 Dexterity saving throw or fall of the mount, landing prone in a space within 5 feet of it. If you're knocked prone while mounted, you must make the saving throw.
If your mount is knocked prone you can use your reaction to dismount it as it fails and land on your feet. Otherwise, you are dismounted and fall prone in a space within 5 feet it..
Controlling A Mount
While you're mounted, you have two options. You can either control the mount or allow it to act independently. Intelligent Creatures, such as Hypogryphs, act independently.
You can control a mount only if it has been trained to accept a rider. Domesticated horses, donkeys, and similar creatures are assumed to have such training. The mount moves as you direct it on your turn, and it has only two action options: Dash and Disengage. A controlled mount can move and act even on the turn that you mount it.
An independent mount acts on its own on the Player Phase. The rider puts no restriction on its actions, and it moves and acts on its own whims. It might flee from the fight, rush to attack and consume a injured foe, or otherwise act against your wishes.
The mount provokes an opportunity attack while you're riding it and if the attacker targets you or the mount.
Thank you, Game Master and Player, for reading this guide on combat in the world of Rakasha! I hope it served you well! If you have any questions, comments, or concerns, please tell me in the comments below! Happy rolling and happy brawling!