Mano a Mano:Rounds
Rounds, Turns and Actions
A round of action represents one to two seconds of game time - enough time for most characters to perform a single action or quick combination. Each character has one turn during each round. Rounds can be measured from the beginning of any character's turn until the beginning of their next turn (or from the end of their turn until the end of the next.
Order - If there is no surprise attack, characters may choose to start out in defense mode or ready to counter, and who goes first is decided by the circumstances (whoever throws the first punch in the story,) or random die rolls if there is a dispute. (Characters with longer reach or weapon range usually have the opportunity to attack first.) Characters typically take turns in the order their players are seated, going around the group of players clockwise. To move in formation, characters may delay their turns until they are sequential.
Stealth and detection abilities are used for surprise attacks. If two characters are mutually stalking each other, do two separate rolls. If both fail, combat doesn't happen. If both succeed, they fight without either having the advantage of surprise. The advantage of surprise is two fold:
- First, the character who has suprised the other gets to go first.
- Second, the character who has been suprised is not ready to defend (+2 defense) or counter. We should include all this in the combat tutorial
Speed - Characters with 1/4 speed must skip 3 out of four turns, so they must skip the next three turns of moving and actions after one turn of moving and performing actions. Characters with 1/3 speed must skip 2 out of 3 turns, and Characters with 1/2 speed must skip every other turn. Characters may skip more turns than they are required to skip.
Actions - If a character's stun plus damage is less than half of their health (health/2), they can move and do one powerful action, quick action, combo, counterattack or covering action. If a character's stun plus damage is at least half of their health (health/2), they can only move half as far and perform only one quick action.
| Quick Actions | Powerful Actions | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Strikes | attack | powerful attack, flanking | ||
| Takedowns | push | trip, throw | ||
| Holds | hold | wrench, choke, disarm, reversal | ||
| Defense | evasion | defend (evasion + single attack) | ||
| Stance | drop, stand | instant stand | ||
| Aiming | aim | aimed attack | ||
| Throwing | quick throwing | powerful throwing, heave | ||
| Archery | draw(light) | draw(heavy), draw and fire | ||
| Reload | load, unload | replace a clip |
Other quick actions include things like pushing a door closed. Slower actions could count as powerful actions or take a certain number of turns.
- Combos
- A character can perform one quick action in a combo for each point of speed (rounded up, so a character with 1/3 speed can perform one quick action), plus an extra quick action if that character is using multiple weapons in the combo. If a character splits their attacks between multiple targets they may only attack each target one time per combo.
- Counterattack
- This tactic has no immediate effect, but the counterattacking character can do any attack as a defense against one attack directed at him before his next turn. (This include combos, using the normal combo attack rules, including the combo rules for attacking multiple targets.)
- Covering
- Covering another character is similar to counterattack, except that the covering character chooses an ally to defend instead of himself. If the covering character doesn't have enough reach to hit the attacker, or for some reason he can't parry the attack, that covering character will be hurt by the attack when he successfully defends his ally (i.e. "taking a bullet".)
Recovery - At the end of the character's turn, the character recovers one stun if they have any.
