Advanced Combat Rework

Combat:

Into every spacefaring adventurer's life a little caseless ammunition must fall. While prudent starfarers avoid combat whenever possible, there are times when a peaceful solution to a dispute is impossible. When those circumstances arise, it's important that an adventurer be able to exert a little practical self-defence.

The Combat Round:

Combats and other tense situations in Stars Without Number are divided up into rounds. A round is roughly six seconds long. During a round, each character involved takes a turn doing something. When all characters have acted -or chosen not to act- the round ends and a new one begins.

During their turn a character can:

• Take up to three Actions; Attack, Move, Take Cover, etc.

• Move freely up to 3 meters, which can be split up as the character sees fit between Actions, but cannot be utilised after the final Action for the turn is taken. Once the third Action has been taken and resolved the character's turn ends.

• Make any number of free actions; Drop a carried item, use a specific psionic power, pulling out a readied item, etc. (Note, Free actions as their name implies can be used at any time. Both within and outside of their turns)

Further down under the Examples of Actions section, there's an in-depth explanation of what constitutes an Action and what requires more than one Action to perform.

Initiative:

When a fight begins, every participant rolls initiative, rolling 1d8 and adding their Dexterity attribute bonus. Participants act in initiative order, highest roll first. In case of ties, PCs act first. If two PCs tie, the player with the highest Dexterity score acts first. Initiative is only rolled once, as when all participants have had their turn a new round begins from the top.

Examples of Actions:

One Action Examples:

• • Attack: Make a Ranged or Melee Attack with either a weapon or unarmed. Any additional attacks made beyond the first have a cumulative -6 modifier to the attack roll. This means if a character makes three attacks in one turn, the third has a whopping -12 in addition to their other bonuses and malices applied to the action.

  • Aim: Line up that shot. Gain a +1 for each action spent aiming to a maximum of +3 to your next ranged attack. Sniper Rifles and Sniper Rifle like weapons do not benefit from this when firing at extreme ranges as they have their own separate Set Up and Aim actions detailed in their own sections.

  • Move: Move as described in the Movement section below.

  • Fighting Retreat: Move out of melee combat without provoking an opportunity attack.

  • Assist Character: Make an assist roll for another character's action.

  • Take Cover: Pushing yourself up against the wall at the corner just after having finished firing around it, crouching down behind a pushed over desk, and similar ways to defend yourself by using the environment to your advantage. Increases the cover effectiveness by one rank. None to Light, Light to Heavy, Heavy to Full. You cannot Take Cover if there's nothing to intercept bullets or blades, but something that otherwise might not provide cover might do so if using this Action, which is up to GM discretion.

  • Use Psionic Power: Activate certain Psionic Powers. The psionic powers that take an action specifically states such. If one doesn't specify, it takes two actions. Psionic Power action costs can be found here.

  • Other: Another activity that would be relatively quick to complete in combat. Up to GM discretion.

Two Action Examples:

• • Use Psionic Power: Activate certain Psionic Powers. Unless otherwise specified, a Psionic Power requires two Actions to perform. Psionic Power action costs can be found here.

  • Reload: Reload a weapon. Certain weapons may take longer and certain modifications to other weapons may reduce the reload time to one action.

  • Unstow: Move an item from Stowed to Readied.

  • Stow: Move an item from Readied to Stowed.

  • Access Terminal: Make use of a computer or other terminal.

  • Apply Lazarus Patch: Applying Lazarus patches is finicky work, and requires a bit of finesse.

  • Hold Action: Specify an action or two action activity to be taken later under certain circumstances.

  • Other: Another activity that requires a bit more focus and time to complete than a one Action activity. Up to GM discretion.

Free Action Examples:

• • Talk: Speak to anyone within audio range.

  • Opportunity Attack: Strike at an opponent leaving melee range when holding a melee weapon.

  • Draw: Draw or pull out a readied item.

  • Drop Item: Drop any readied item onto the floor.

  • Use Psionic Power: Activate certain Psionic Powers that specify that activate using a Free Action. Psionic Power action costs can be found here.

  • Other: Another activity that would be so fast in combat, the time and focus it would take is next to negligible. Up to GM discretion, although few things could be this quick.

Movement:

Moving around in a whirling broil of monoblades, shotgun blasts, and laser fire can be hazardous. During their turn, a character can move up to 15 meters when they take the Move action if they're unencumbered. 10 meters if they're encumbered, and 5 meters if they're heavily encumbered.

Climbing ropes, swimming, crawling or otherwise perform advanced movement during combat is far slower than regular movement. For each meter of such activities, it counts as moving three meters regularly, meaning you could, for example, climb 5 meters if you're unencumbered, or crawl 2 meters if you're heavily encumbered.

Characters can move freely past enemies with ranged weapons but if within reach of an enemy with a melee weapon the character must take a fighting retreat action or grant their opponent a free attack against them.

Characters who attempt to flee a fight completely might be chased by angry enemies. The chase can usually be resolved by an opposed Athletics check, usually modified by Constitution for anything longer than a sprint. If the fleeing character wins, they get away, and if not, they're cornered or run down by the opponent and must fight.

Making an Attack:

A character may use one of their action to attack an enemy. To attack, the character rolls 1d20 and adds their relevant Combat skill, the attribute bonus associated with the weapon, their target’s armour class, the weapon's Attack Bonus (if any), and the Attack Bonus for their class and level. If the total is equal to or greater than 20, the attack hits the target. A natural roll (the unmodified result on the die) of 1 always misses, and a natural roll of 20 always hits.

A normal, unarmoured human has an AC of 9, but agile or armoured characters can have substantially lower armour class. The target’s Dexterity modifier is subtracted from their base armour class as well as their base armour class from wearing armour.

Circumstances can apply other penalties or bonuses to the hit roll. Energy weapons grant a +1 to hit as their Attack Bonus due to lack of recoil, for example, while heavy cover reduces the target's AC. These modifiers are cumulative, and the GM is the final arbiter of what merits a modifier.

If the attack hits, the character then rolls the damage dice associated with the weapon and adds the appropriate attribute bonus. This damage is then subtracted from the victim's hit points. Creatures reduced to zero hit points are either dead or mortally wounded. Note that while you add the relevant skill bonus to a weapon's hit roll, you don't add it to the damage. The only exception is with the Combat/Unarmed skill, which adds its level to both the hit and damage roll.

Dual Wielding:

A character can dual wield any weapon that requires a single hand to operate. Such as two pistols or two monoblades. This allows the user to make two attacks per attack action during their turn with a -4 negative modifier on each of the two attacks. This assumes that the weapons are the same type and aimed at the same target. If targeting two separate targets the modifier for only the second attack becomes -6, the first still has the -4 from dual wielding as normal.

Note, holding a firearm in one hand and a melee weapon in the other so that you can switch between the two on the fly doesn't count as dual wielding unless you try to make two attacks in one action, one with each weapon.

Fire and Incendiary Weapons:

Incendiary Weapons are a dangerous class of weapons that can inflict incredible pain and damage. Often they will cause an initial flash damage followed by the horrific possibility of burning alive. Whenever a target is hit they will take the base weapon damage and then must succeed on a Luck or Evasion save (target's choice), adding relevant cover bonuses or catch fire. Causing them to take Burning Damage.

When a creature starts its turn on fire then they must pass a Mental Save before they are able to act. If they fail then they spend the turn running around screaming as the fire burns them. On a success they are able to act as normal. Regardless of the result they take 1d6 damage at the start (or the Incendiary's burn damage if different) until the fire is extinguished.

On their turn, a person can expend an action to either extinguish themselves or someone else on fire. When attempting to extinguish themselves a person must make a Physical Save. On a success the fire is put out and the person is no longer burning. Otherwise they are still on fire. When putting someone else out they must pass a DC 8 Athletics/Dexterity skill check in order to extinguish the fire.

Certain armours such as Assault Suits and Powered Armours may protect the target from burning and in such case the target cannot catch fire. However, prolonged exposure even in these armours in high temperatures may cause system damage or failure or cause the person within the armour to pass out from heatstroke, so don't spend hours in a burning building thinking you'll be fine.

VACUUM and Zero-G Combat:

Certain weapons simply cannot function in a vacuum environment. Mainly projectile weapons such as the crude pistol or musket. Anything which either doesn't rely on combustion or uses a sealed cartridge can be used in a Vacuum. While in a Zero-G environment, the Advanced Movement rules apply, as detailed in the Movement section above. However, if your feet are touching a surface, you're wearing a suit that has some way of keeping you anchored to that surface, and you have adequate training for that suit or armour (generally Exosuit 0 or 1 or Culture/Spacer 0 if you're wearing a Vacc-suit) then the movement penalty is reduced from 3 meters per 1 meter of movement, to 2 meters per 1 meter of movement. Zero-G environments also offer interesting challenges to ranged combat:

• The first is that any primitive or projectile weapon no longer has a maximum range because of Newton's first law. An object in motion stays in motion unless acted upon by an outside force. Though they still have an optimal range they can and will keep going until they hit something.

• The second is that any Projectile or Primitive ranged weapon that isn't the Void Carbine or Advanced Bow inherently suffers a -2 to hit due to the recoil not being mitigated by Gravity. This doesn't apply to Energy weapons as they don't have recoil.

• Finally, those without a background in Zero-G environments or at least a 0 in the Culture/Spacer skill suffer a -2 penalty to hit rolls and a -1 to physical skill checks. This can be mitigated to a -1 and a 0 respectively for the unskilled if anchored to a relative surface. (Such as mag-boots to a Starship hull or holding onto a ladder outside an orbital.)

Cover and other Bonuses:

There are three types of cover in Stars Without Number:

• Light Cover: -2 to target AC, +1 to Saving throws against weapons that ignore cover and grenades whose origin is beyond the cover.

• Heavy Cover: -4 to target AC, +2 to Saving throws against weapons that ignore cover and grenades whose origin is beyond the cover.

• Hard Cover: Target cannot be targeted nor target others except with weapons that ignore cover. E.g Flamethrowers, although the target gains a +4 to Saving throws against weapons that ignore cover, and depending on the structural integrity of the cover (up to GM discretion), either provide this same bonus against grenades or completely blocks their effect.

Advanced Weapon Ranges:

In Advanced Combat, Ranged weapons are assigned four distinct range bands rather than the normal two of Normal and Long. Now instead you'll find in the tables below each ranged weapons Close, Short, Medium and Long ranges along with a select few which have special rules that govern addition and exceptions to these ranges. Additionally, each of these ranges has a corresponding penalty when an attack is made from within that range band. Close Range imposes a -0 penalty, Short Range a -1 penalty, Medium a -3 and long-range a massive -5. As being closer to a target makes it a lot easier to hit, no matter what weapon you are using. With it getting exponentially harder the further away it is.

Primitive Weapons Special:

Scatter on Miss:

When an attack using a Grenade misses, the weapon scatters to a random location away from the target location. The direction is determined by rolling a d10 and assigning a direction to each number on the dice. 1 for example being directly behind the target while 5 is in front. After that, the weapon travels a number of meters equal to the difference between their roll & 20. For example, a roll of 18 would cause the weapon to travel 2 meters (20 - 18 = 2) while a result of 9 would miss by a massive 11 meters (20 - 9 =11).

Projectile Weapons Special:

Burst Fire:

The weapon is able to fire multiple projectiles in a single attack. This grants the attack a bonus +2 to its hit chance and an additional +2 to the damage caused. Burst firing however costs three times as much ammo as a normal attack would. So if a weapon would use one bullet in an attack it instead uses 3 during burst fire.

Setup to Increase Range:

The Weapon is unable to be fired without first spending an action setting up and aiming the weapon. Which will then allow it to use the ranges listed in the table above. If a second action is then spent to aim the subsequent attack will then gain the bonus normally given to aimed attacks (+1). If three continuous actions are used to set up and aim twice, the weapon able to be used at the following range bands:

• Close = 500 Meters / Short = 750 Meters / Medium = 1000 Meters / Long = 2000 Meters

In addition, when the weapon has been fully set up with 3 continuous actions, it gains the assassinate ability. Any hit inflicted by the weapon with this ability on an unsuspecting target requires an immediate Physical Effect save by the victim at a penalty equal to the attacker’s Combat/Projectile skill. Failure indicates death.

Shotgun Range in Brackets:

The weapon has an integrated Shotgun whose weapon characteristics are listed alongside the normal stats in brackets.

Fire to Suppress:

The rate of fire of the weapon means that it is able to hit multiple exposed target's in front of the user. When the wielder decided to Fire to suppress, double the usual ammunition is fired in one attack, and every target in front of the weapon that is not under Hard cover, is automatically hit for half normal damage. A successful Evasion or Luck Save eliminates this damage. Firing to suppress costs two actions to use.

Cannot fire beyond X m:

The weapon has a maximum range for its attacks. Any weapon with this Special rule is unable to engage any target beyond its short range band under normal use of the weapon.

Energy Weapons Special:

Target can loose 1 Action:

Anyone successfully hit with the weapon, not wearing a Vacc-Suit, Assault Suits or Powered Armour, must make a successful Physical Save or loose an action for their next turn.

Setup to Increase Range:

The Weapon is unable to be fired without first spending an action setting up and aiming the weapon. Which will then allow it to use the ranges listed in the table above. If a second action is then spent to aim the subsequent attack will then gain the bonus normally given to aimed attacks (+1). If three continuous actions are used to set up and aim twice, the weapon able to be used at the following range bands:

• Close = 500 Meters / Short = 750 Meters / Medium = 1000 Meters / Long = 2000 Meters

In addition, when the weapon has been fully set up with 3 continuous actions, it gains the assassinate ability. Any hit inflicted by the weapon with this ability on an unsuspecting target requires an immediate Physical Effect save by the victim at a penalty equal to the attacker’s Combat/Projectile skill. Failure indicates death.

Psitech Weapons Special:

No Medium or Long Range:

The weapon is unable to operate at range bands longer than short range.

Gunnery Weapons Special:

Fire to Suppress:

The rate of fire of the weapon means that it is able to hit multiple exposed target's in front of the user. When the wielder decided to Fire to suppress, double the usual ammunition is fired in one attack, and every target in front of the weapon that is not under Hard cover, is automatically hit for half normal damage. A successful Evasion or Luck Save eliminates this damage. Firing to suppress costs two actions to use.

Minimum Range (X m)

The weapon has a minimum range that must be between the user and the target before it can be used against it. For example, the Mortar has a minimum range of 300 meters, any shots at a target closer than this are not allowed in the normal and safe operation of the weapon. A clever or foolhardy user might be able to target a location closer but this will come with much greater risks to life and limb.