Welcome to Gaia! ::

There are seven Abilities in this RP. Think of them as the character "stats" in RPGs such as Final Fantasy, Pokemon etc. Each of the abilities partially describes your character and affects the outcome of most of his actions in combat and missions.

The abilities are Strength (Str), Dexterity (Dex), Constitution (Con), Intelligence (Int), Wisdom (Wis), Charisma (Cha) and Chakra (Chk). Different levels of strength in each ability will help to make each character unique and different from each other. This will also help you tailor your character's fighting style and strengths and weaknesses to fit his personality, and also allow us to kill godmodding completely.

Sometimes your abilities will determine how well your character performs in a task. For example, a character moving a heavy object will have to use his Strength. In this case your character will have to roll a Strength check to determine how much strength he used for this task.

The formula for Ability checks is:
d20 + Ability modifier.


Strength: (Str)
Strength measures your character's muscles and physical power. This ability is especially important when using taijutsu in combat, and it helps when moving heavy objects, swimming, breaking bones and objects or trying to break free of a grapple. When you have high strength you have a higher chance of hitting when fighting with taijutsu/melee weapons, and also have higher taijutsu/melee weapon attack damage.

When to roll a strength check
-When moving a heavy object.
-When pitting your weapon against someone else's "Example when two sword hit each other and both swordsman try to push each other."
-When lifting weights during training.
-When you are trying to break a door or any inanimate object.


Dexterity: (Dex)
Dexterity measures hand-eye coordination, agility, reflex and balance. This ability is especially important when you are using ranged weapons such as shurikens, kunais, bows, crossbows and any other throwing or ranged weapon and determines chance of hit and damage. Dexterity also increases your ability to dodge and react to attacks. Finally, dexterity also helps skills like Escape Artist and Stealth. For example, when trying to open a lock, moving silently or escaping after being bound by rope.

When to Roll a dexterity check
-When sprinting against someone else.
-When rolling to see who goes first in battle. {Initiation check}


Constitution: (Con)
Constitution represents your character's health and stamina. The higher your character's constitution, the longer he can last in battle {the higher his Hp} or hard physical conditions, such as running for extended periods of time, spending long periods of time underwater, or even resisting poison. Constitution also affects your character's ability to concentrate.

When to Roll a Constitution check
-When holding your breath under the water.
-When holding your breath against poison gas.
-When running long distances.


Intelligence: (Int)
Intelligence determines how well your character thinks and reasons. This ability is especially important for genjutsu users, since the higher your intelligence score is the hardest the genjutsu will be to resist. Also, this ability helps you learn faster, so a ninja with high intelligence score will learn techniques faster than one with a low score.

When to Roll an intelligence check
-When you are doing any kind of task that requires thinking.
-Identify a Genjutsu. ((You cannot automatically use the Genjutsu Kai))


Wisdom: (Wis)
Wisdom determines a character's willpower, common sense, perception and intuition. While intelligence helps you analyze information, wisdom helps you become one with your surroundings. For example, some characters might be quick to learn technique and are really good in training, but they lack in skill in combat and are easy victims of genjutsu and illusions because they believe everything is real. Some others may be slow at learning but have great insight skills. Thus wisdom helps with resisting mental attacks and any type of perception.

When to roll a Wisdom check
-Wisdom mostly affects its related skills such as Sense Motive and Read Lips, etc.


Charisma: (Cha)
Charisma measures the character's force of personality, persuasiveness, personal magnetism, ability to lead, and physical attractiveness. Charisma is especially important when gathering information, using seduction, and over all interacting with NPCs. A character with low charisma might make an NPC shinobi get mad at him easily, or disobey orders given to him. Having high charisma also makes it easier to get information out of enemies or NPCs. Although charisma is perceived by many to be a relatively soft trait, it must be said that nobody has ever succeeded without getting people to do things for them.

When to roll a Charisma check
-When trying to persuade people to do something.


Chakra: (Chk)
Chakra is the energy needed by a ninja to perform techniques. In this guild chakra will be used to determine how much chakra you have: in other words, how many techniques you can perform a day. Furthermore it also determines how much damage the techniques deal to your enemies.

When to roll a Chakra check
-When doing anything related to chakra (unless it is Chakra Control).

How to Fight

Fighting in the system is simple and depends on the type of attack you wish to make.




1. DETERMINING THE ORDER IN WHICH EACH CHARACTER WILL TAKE ACTION

Inititative

Initiative is a roll every player makes at the beginning of the fight to determine who will attack first, second, etc. Attacking first can represent a sizeable advantage as it can allow you to keep an opponent on their back foot, reacting instead of acting. The way to determine initiative is fairly simple, as each player simply applies the following formula:

Initiative = d20 + Dexterity Modifier

It is possible that certain abilities or certain jutsus may affect the initiative roll.



2. NUMBER OF ACTIONS A CHARACTER MAY TAKE PER TURN

Action Points (AP)

Action Points determine the number of actions your character can take in a given combat turn. Every character has 4 AP per turn, although certain skills or equipment may impact that number in specific cases.



3. ATTACKING

Simple attacks

This includes basic melee and ranged attacks such as punches, using katanas or throwing projectiles. Simple attacks cost 2 AP to perform.To perform a simple attack, make an attack roll.
The formula of an attack roll is:

Attack Roll = d20 + Level + Str Mod + 1 per 2 in Weapon/Fighting Skill

If you are making multiple hits or throwing multiple weapons in a single turn, you must make a roll for each weapon. The total number of rolls is limited by your available Action Points (AP).


Advanced techniques and Jutsus:

This includes all type of jutsus. Each technique being unique in its own right, you will have to read each jutsus individual characteristics to verify how to use them and how to resist or avoid them.


Combat Tactics:

These are special moves that can be learned by a character to coordinate a group in combat with specific maneuvers. Using these techniques grants bonuses based on the strategist's leadership skills (among other things) and could very well be an absolute necessity to win certain fights against stronger opponents.

When executing a combat maneuver, each player has to accomplish certain actions, meaning that those who aren't team players may not rejoice in having to follow strict orders instead of taking the actions they normally would have. That is, however, what being part of a team is about!

Of course, these tactics cannot be used repeatedly against the same opponents, as they will anticipate them if they were victim to them once.


Critical Hits:

Rolling a natural 20 does not guarantee a succesful hit on the opponent. It will however, have very significant consequences:

a. The opponent will not have the opportunity to attempt to deflect the attack (see more on this in the section below).
b. Weapon's or attack's critical hit benefits will apply (see specific techniques for détails).


Combat damage:

In most d20 systems, calculating damage requires a roll between certain values to determine its impact. While that is an interesting system when you have people face to face in real time, this can have the effect of severely slowing down fights done over a forum such as this one.

Therefore, in this system, combat damage does not require a roll. If using a melee or ranged attack, damage will normally be equal to character's strength modifier.

If using a jutsu or technique, the damage will be specified in the technique description.



3. DEFENDING


Dodging:

Dodging ability is measured by the Dodge Bonus. This measures how trained you are at dodging attacks and is the counter for the attack roll. It incorporates your reflexes as well as your combat experience.

Contrarily to attacking, dodging normally requires no roll from the player, as the attacker is the one who has the burden of reaching a certain roll to make contact.

Armor also has an impact on your dodge bonus as it is possible for an Attack to connect with an opponent, but not directly enough to pierce through their various pieces of armor.

Your dodge bonus is calculated as follows:

Dodge Bonus (DB) = 10 + Your Level + Dexterity Modifier + Armor Bonus

If the opponent's attack roll is above your dodge bonus, the attack hits. If it is below, the attack misses.

Note: Ties go in favour of the attacker.


Deflecting:

While dodging is passive (in the system) there is a basic way to give it a little boost. Depending on the attack coming at you, it might be possible to attempt to deflect the blow in addition to stepping out of its trajectory.

When an opponent makes an attack that connects, the defending character may use the first two action points of his next turn to add to their Dodge Rating a value of 1 per 2 points in their melee skill. Succesfully beating the Attack roll with this modifed dodge rating will then prevent the Attack from making contact, at the cost of offensive opportunities.

Deflecting Value = Level + Dexterity Modifier + Armor Bonus + 1 per 2 in Melee Skill.

Blocking/Parrying:
Using a weapon to block an attack from another weapon is an essential skill to the survival of all shinobi. Blocking is a technique (considered D-Rank) and obviously the techniques for blocking with a kunai are not the same as blocking with a spear. Thus, how to block with a weapon must be re-learned for each weapon.
To block, use the formula 1D20+Weapon Skill against attacker's attack roll. If the Block is higher all damage from the attack is negated. Note that blocking takes double the amount of Dice Rolls as attacking.


Controlled Damage:
In order to avoid fatal blows to characters during training or for storyline purposes, a user can control the damage they deal. You can have an attack deal any amount of damage BELOW the number you generated or below the lowest possible damage.


Critical Hits:
Critical hits are made when your attack roll is a natural 20. When you make a critical hit, your damage is doubled and you inflict a Wound on your enemy (-4 Hp per turn). Also, if you are using a slashing or tearing weapon, you will also inflict Bleeding damage (check the effects of the weapons in the Weapons thread). Bleeding damage is -2 Hp per turn. Wounds can be treated with basic first aid and the Treat Injury skill.


Defensive combat:
You can improve your defence by sacrificing your chances to hit back. When fighting defensively, you can only make one attack regardless of how many extra attacks/Dice Rolls you have. Furthermore, you lose a -1 in attack bonus per +1 in dodge bonus you add. This bonus can either be applied to a dodge bonus or a Reflex save.
In other words, a level 20 character can sacrifice all his 20 maximum Base Attack bonus and attack only once using a D20 + his Str/Dex modifier depending on the situation. By doing this he increases his dodge bonus/Reflex Save by 20.


Disarming:
To disarm your opponent with a weapon, you roll an attack roll as normal but add your dexterity modifier instead of your strength mod. Your opponent also gets to roll an attack roll (with str mod). If you beat your opponent's roll you successfully disarm him. If you don't, nothing happens.
When disarming with bare hands, roll an attack roll as normal (with str mod). However, your opponent gets a +2 bonus against the bare-handed disarmer.


Grappling:
Grapples are a form of submission hold intended less to damage the opponent and more to keep the opponent in place. Depending on the grappling method, the only actions allowed after a grapple has been succesfully applied are attacks that don't require handseals or massive movements of the body.
To grapple, simply make an attack roll. If your opponent fails to dodge the attack, he/she is grappled and cannot make large movements. Grappled opponents lose all Dex. bonus to their Dodge. Depending on how he/she is grappled, other movements (eg. hand seals) may also not be possible.
Every turn, you must reroll your Grapple DC. This is to accommodate subtle bodily movements and the dynamism of real life situations.
Damage per roll is normal taijutsu damage.


Hiding:
Depending on the battle and your shinobi's fighting style, you might want to hide in combat, may it be to recover or set up a sneak attack. In order to do so, your character must have a place to hide and must have broken his enemy's line of sight, usually done through techniques such as the Kawarimi. Going into hiding requires that one attack turn be spent for which a d20 + Stealth is rolled, which will be the Awareness DC for all people trying to find them this turn. The stealth DC needs to be rolled again each turn until the shinobi is found.


Resting:
To rest you must make one post of physical inaction. Thus you cannot fight or train when resting, unless it's mental training. Additionally, to rest in battle you need to be successfully hiding. However, if attacked when resting you lose all dexterity mod bonus to your Dodge Bonus.

Hp: 2% Hp per post. (minimum +1 Hp)
Cp: 2% Cp per post. (minimum +1 Cp)
MHp: 2% MHp per post. (minimum +1 MHp)

Note: Just for clarification, you can simultaneously regain Hp, Cp and MHp at the same time.


Sneak Attack:
To make a sneak attack you must be successfully concealed somewhere (ie. opponent failed the Awareness DC to detect you, etc.). Simply make a normal attack roll, but add on the Sneak Attack bonuses, which are determined by the amount of points you have in that skill.
Every 2 points in Sneak Attack gives you a +1 to your attack roll when launching a sneak attack. For every 10 points, reduce the natural roll needed to make a Critical Hit (20) by 1. So, if you have 20 points in Sneak Attack, you only need to make a natural roll of 18 to score a critical hit.
When you inflict a critical hit during a Sneak Attack, you inflict a Critical Wound (-8 Hp per turn). If you used a weapon that causes Bleeding damage, that damage is doubled to -4 Hp per turn.


Taking cover in combat:
You get a bonus to your Dodge and your Reflex Save. How much your dodge increase depends on the cover you are receiving at the moment:
1/4 cover: +4
1/2 cover: +8
Total Cover: +16 and take half damage on attacks that require a Reflex Save. If Reflex Save is less than 10 points higher than the Reflex DC, take no damage anyway.


Taking damage for other people:
This can be done by simply comparing your Dodge Bonus or Reflex Save (depending on the type of attack being blocked) to the incoming attack's DC.
If your dodge attempt check is less than 10 under the DC of the incoming attack, you can take the damage for the target.
If your dodge attempt check beats the incoming attack's DC by 10 points, you can not only push the intended target out of the way but you can also dodge the attack yourself.

Note: Body Flicker can also be used to add your chk mod to this attempt.
Note 2: This will not work for wide spread area of effect jutsu.


Tripping:
You can make your opponent lose his balance by making a normal melee attack roll. If that attack succeeds, make a Strength roll vs. your opponent's Dexterity roll. If you win, you successfully trip your opponent. However, if you lose, your opponent has the opportunity to make the same roll against you (his Strength vs. your Dexterity) to try to trip you.
Successfully tripped opponents receive a -4 to their attack rolls and Dodge. Using certain weapons and tools (eg. metal wire) gives you a bonus in tripping. Also, if you are tripped by your opponent when you are trying to trip him, you can drop your weapon to avoid being tripped.