User:DOUG/Sandbox Combat Stuff
Combat! No matter what profession you elect for your character, you will be exposed to combat in the world of Elanthia. For most professions, combat is the primary path to knowledge, advancement and riches. Outside of a town's walls the world awaits, usually to devour your character! Denizens of the lands like trolls, zombies, orcs, and even the occassional rabid squirrel - yes, all these and more wait to send your character to meet his or her demise. In many cases, the only way to fight off these horrors is literally to engage them in combat.
Combat Components
Even though for the most part your character should feel safe while in town, from time to time creatures will band together to test the mettle of a town's population. Usually, these invasions are immediately noticeable, but a sure sign is if you check the town's justice status and find that the chaos has the attention of the local constabulary. In order for your character to have a chance, you need to understand the basics about combat. This guide will share these basics to give you a fair shot at ensuring your character's survival. But combat can be very complex, so don't expect to learn all the in's and out's in this guide. You'll have to take your character out and experience it for yourself to really gain any competency.
Let's simplify it a bit, though. Combat is made up primarily of three factors: What you're going to attack with; What you're going to defend with, and; The combat resolution system itself, which compares your character's skills and various advantages against your foe's skills and advantages to determine the outcome of your attack. Or, of course, the outcome of your foe's attack against your character. Let's take a look in general at each of these three factors.