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[Solved] ver 1.23, page 33 Combat Example

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(@greymorn)
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"Faced with two hits, Never opts for Full Defense to try to thwart both attacks…"

This looks like a timing problem to me. Never lost init to two goblins. The first goblin hits, the second goblin must be on a lower init rank between the first goblin and Never and so has not yet attacked. How is Never's player supposed to decide Full Defense is needed? I would expect the ref and players need to fully resolve the first attack with any defense roll, damage, soak and any other conditions applied before the second goblin attacks.

This is partly a result of how you parse initiative. Page 30: "All combatants roll a Quickness check and then act in the order of initiative from highest to lowest. Initiative rank is determined once per combat. Ties are resolved by comparing weapon length, Quickness, and finally a d10 roll." This doesn't leave any gray area, every combatant must have a unique place in the init order.

I don't know any DMs who do this as a matter of practice, we all group up similar enemies on a single init, and sometimes we group up attack rolls before rolling damage all damage at once because in 5E there's usually nothing affecting that damage. If you want the novice GM to run combat this way you'll need to describe it precisely.

When writing rules, timing is one of those things that always bites me in the ass.


   
Overlord
(@scribe)
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Posts: 212
 

The example is correct and if you look at Part I you will see "all" the goblins are acting on initiative  9. Both go before Never and the example states that they both hit, one with a 5 and one with a 4.

The intent was always to group like opponents as demonstrated in the example.  I added a line to Initiative to clarify.

Scribe of the Adventure System


   
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