Techniques and Actions

For example where the Earthhammer spell says Draw that means that 1 points of Draw (a Derived Attribute of Spiritum) must be provided.  And where its says Direct 1 point of Direct (a derived attribute of Electra) must be provided.

In the latter case, the character will have to balance up Speed with Direct.  Speed is also a derived attribute of Electra and is needed to advance the technique.  If the character has Brilliance (Electra 5) they can advance by Invoking Electra for 3 points of Speed, and still have 2 points left for Direct.

Variations to the Theme

There are also a raft of circumstances that can add other factors to the Attribute Check.

Various artifact cards modify particular derived attributes, without modifying other attributes derived from the same main Attribute.  For example "Plate Armour hauberk and vambraces" has a -2 penalty to Speed, "Ring of haste" imparts a +2 to Speed, and "Wand of Summoning" provides +3 to summoning.

Many scenario cards will impart a penalty to some derived attributes, or even whole categories of them.  "Crumbling Stair" gives a -2 penalty to Standard Movements, Acrobatic & Martial Arts Manouvres, and Martial Arts Attacks.  Other possibilities are spells, and special abilities which may increase or decrease derived attributes.

Techniques Increasing Difficulty of their own Actions

There are some techniques where actions within that technique, make other actions more difficult due to effects imparted.  An example of this is the Jumping Spinning Back-kick - a difficult and advanced martial arts technique.  It requires your character to perform a Jump x 2 action with the text "Jump x 2 up to kicking height".  Whilst jumping all Attacks, Manouvres and Counters are +3 to Skill Calls (States above).

Because of the x 2 we must multiply the current skill call x 2, to give 2.

Lets assume our character has Divinity (Spritum 5) and can Invoke 2 Jump and still have 3 Spiritum spare.

The next action in this technique is "Spin accelerating the kick".  Note from our States that whilst spinning all Attacks, Manouvres and Counters are +2 to skill call.  Spin is a Manouvre so instead of being 1 it takes 3 and the character must now Invoke 3 Spiritum to complete that action.

Our character can complete this action.  But now he is out of Spiritum.

The next action is "Kick to your surprised opponents face : dmg 3".  This Kick action requires spiritum 1 +2 for the jumping, +2 for the spinning, for a total of 5.

Unless our character has something like a staff of jumping (+2 for Jump, and all Martial Arts Attacks, Manouvres and Counters performed while jumping) he will fail in his attempt to do this action, unless he waits until next turn to advance this technique.

Failing an Action

If there are not enough points for the skill call, typically it will be ideal to interrupt the action before it fails.  But if the inertia is too great this may not be possible - see the section on Inertia.

If the technique cannot be interrupted, and not enough points are available for the skill call, then it fails.

Whenever an Action fails, unless there are special abilities or effects which state the contrary, the Technique is abandoned.  It goes to the side of the tableau as though it had been enacted, and the player must perform a Alternate Ready (one of the Basic Actions) costing 2 time ticks.

The effects and other desired results of the Technique do not take place, unless they were specified in an action which took place prior to the failed action.  This will be rare as the effective actions are usually only followed by fairly easy "follow-through" type actions.

The Consequences of Failure

Often technique cards will specify particular consequences of failing, specific to that technique.  A common one is falling.  Any technique which involves a jump action will have Fall as a failure consequence.

Falls cause an amount of crush damage, and cause the character to go to the state "Prone".  The character must perform the Default Actions Fall and Ready in order to get to their feet, before any other techniques may be deployed.  If the character was wielding a weapon at the time of Falling they must check for Dropping (and if dropped, Breakage) as below.

Weapons - Failure Consequences

If a character has a Weapon Artifact which was involved in the failed technique, that technique may specify "Fail: drop" or "Fail: break", or even both "Fail: drop/break".

Dropping: the character rolls a 10 sided die - if the result is greater than their  then the weapon is dropped.

Breakage: roll a 10 sided die, unless otherwise indicated.  If the result is greater than the break figure shown on the weapon card the weapon breaks.

Next: Attributes