Defensive Maneuvers
Defensive Maneuvers
An individual can 'abort' to any of these.
Block
Dexterity+Brawl or vs 6, uses the character's body to deflect or block attacks. May not be used against Lethal or Aggravated damage unless the character is wearing armor, has Fortitude, or special abilities like Do.
Dodge
Dexterity+Athletics vs 5 for hand to hand, or 9/10 for dodging firearms at close range. This is the classic 'evade'. Against Melee and Brawl, if there's not enough room to bob and weave, you must use a different maneuver. In firefights, your character moves at least one yard, and ends up behind cover (if there's no room to maneuver or cover available, you can drop to the ground). If you remain under cover or prone thereafter, cover rules apply against further ranged firearms attacks. Cover will be detailed later under 'ranged combat'.
Parry
Dexterity+Melee vs 6, using a weapon to block a melee or brawl attack. If you parry a brawling attack, and your weapon deals Lethal or aggravated damage, you may injure the attacker. If the defender rolls more successes on their parry than the attack got on their brawling attack, the defender rolls the weapon's base damage plus the parry's extra successes over the attacker as a damage dice pool against the attacker.
Example. Thugbert the thug takes a swing with his fist at Mack the Knife with his knife. Mack parries. Thugbert rolls 3 successes on his dexterity + brawl, but Mack's parry gets 4 successes. A knife does strength +1 damage...so its -base damage- is 1. Mack got 1 extra success, so he rolls 2 dice of lethal damage against Thugbert, -and- Thugbert's attack is stopped. Maybe next time he'll think to get a weapon before he goes after someone who's armed.)
Desperate Defense
Desperate Defense is a special maneuver. If you dedicate your -entire round- to defense, taking no other actions, you may declare Desperate Defense. This maneuver is like Multiple Actions, except that you make your first defensive action at full pool, and each following action loses 1 die cumulative until you run out. You may select Block, Dodge, or Parry when you declare Desperate Defense, and may not change maneuver after this point in your action. When you run out of dice, you may no longer use defensive actions against further attacks. Roll: Dexterity+athletics.