Gambits

Gambits are a way to enact permanent change to the battlefield other than dealing damage to your opponent. Mechanically, a gambit is a special type of decisive attack, so any magic, effects, or rules that apply to decisive attacks also apply to gambits.

Gambits include things like introducing hazards, disarming opponents, setting things on fire, collapsing walls, and so on.

Examples of Gambits

• Topple a pho cart to obstruct your pursuers;
• Disarm your opponent;
• Throw knives to pin your opponent’s clothes and hold him in place;
• Collapse a bridge you are fighting on;
• Throw a bomb from your belt;
• Rip open the giant’s glowing weakpoint for massive damage;
• Unfurl the ship’s sails into the opponent’s face to blind him;
• Smash a jar of oil and set it ablaze;
• Wrap your opponent in magical prayer strips;
• Disable your opponent’s left arm with a series of snake-hand strikes;
• Grab your opponent and wrestle him to the ground;
• Distract your opponent to open an opportunity for your ally;
• Unhorse your opponent and send him crashing to the ground;
• etc.

Establishing a Gambit

Describe what you would like to accomplish.

If it has no opposition – for example, toppling a cart – then it is automatically established. If it is opposed by something, you will roll to establish the gambit.

If you successfully establish your gambit, spend (gambit rank)i. If you failed to establish it, pay 1i less.

Common Gambits

These gambits are common enough that they are conveniently defined in advance.

Create an Environmental Hazard

Rank: 5i, 10i, 15i, or 20i

If you succeed, you create an environmental hazard that can deal damage over time to anyone caught inside it. The environmental hazard engulfs a whole range band, either the one you are in or one at short range from you, depending on the description of the hazard.

Hazards can deal single instances of damage, or damage over time. The damage of the hazard depends on the rank.

Whenever a character is exposed to a hazard, they may make a roll to avoid the damage; Dexterity, Dodge, Athletics, etc. can allow you to avoid a hazard entirely, and Stamina, Resistance, Integrity, etc. will allow you to push through it. If you succeed at the roll, you completely avoid all damage; if you fail, then you reduce the damage (or damage for this interval) by 1 for every success you did gain, minimum 1.

Hazards Table

Disarm

Rank: 3i

You knock your opponent’s weapon out of their hands. They must spend a draw/ready weapon action to get it back.

Disable

Rank: 5i

You disable a target’s capabilities. You might blind them, lock one of their arms from use, etc. You inflict them with an appropriate status based on your description.

They must spend a Miscellaneous action to restore their function, or use an effect that allows them to do so.

Distract

Rank: 2i - 10i

You distract the target, opening an opportunity for your ally to attack.

Your ally gains the Initiative you spend, minus 1. They must use it next turn to make an attack against the target of the Distract gambit, or they lose it.

A character may only benefit from one distract gambit at a time.

Exert Pressure

Rank: 2i - 10i

You cut through your opponent’s defenses.

The difficulty to establish this gambit is your opponent’s Defense. If you succeed, they lose half of the cost of this gambit in Initiative, rounded down.

This gambit exists to allow you to spend your own resources to ignore the target’s Soak, potentially opening them to an ally’s attack.

Knock Prone

Rank: 1i

Knock your target prone.

Unhorse

Rank: 4i

You knock your opponent off of their mount.

He loses the mounted status from his mount and is knocked prone.

Grapple

Rank 2i

Make an attack roll against your target, per usual. If you win, you attempt to grapple them.

Roll (Strength + Brawl/Martial Arts) opposed by the target; if you are using a weapon with the Grappling tag, you may use the weapon’s Ability instead. If one of you is so physically large that the other cannot resist, you roll unopposed.

If you win the roll, you establish control of the grapple and have them in your grip. They gain the Clinched status. If they tie you or win, they escape at the start of their next turn.

While you are in a grapple, you may only savage, throw/slam, restrain/drag, or release.

Rounds of Control

You get 1 round of control for each success on your control roll in excess of your target’s.

You lose 1 round of control whenever you are targeted by an attack, even if the attack misses.

Savage

Spend 1 round of control. Make an automatically successful attack against your clinched defender. They get difficulty 0, if it matters for any rules.

Throw/Slam

You spend all remaining rounds of control. You savage your target, and up to (your Strength) of the rounds you spend eac add 1 decisive damage, or 2 withering damage. Your opponent is then released.

Restrain/Drag

Spend 2 rounds of control. Your opponent cannot take any actions on their next turn. You may use your reflexive move to drag your opponent with you until the start of your next turn.

Release

You let your opponent go.