Combat
Homebrewed and altered from the Risus PDF
Combat
The GM decides when a combat has begun. At that point, go around the table in rounds, and let each combatant make an attack in turn. What constitutes an “attack” depends on the nature of the fight, but it should always be roleplayed (if dialogue is involved) or described in entertaining detail (if it’s physical and/or dangerous and/or does/should involve contraceptives). The GM will determine what type of Cliché is appropriate for the fight. In a straightforward physical brawl, Clichés like Viking, Soldier, Swashbuckler, and Ernest Hemingway are equally appropriate, while Clichés like Hairdresser and Latin Lover are not.
Attacks must be directed at an opponent. Both parties in the attack (attacker and defender) roll against their chosen Cliché. Low roll loses. Specifically, the low roller loses one of his Cliché dice for the remainder of the fight – he’s been weakened, worn down, demoralized or otherwise pushed one step towards defeat.
Eventually, one side will be left standing, and another will be left without dice. At this point, the winners decide the fate of the losers. In a physical fight or magical duel, the losers might be killed (or mercifully spared). In Courtroom Antics, the loser is sentenced by the judge, or fails to prosecute. In a Seduction, the loser gets either a cold shower or a warm evening, depending. While the GM will reject combat outcomes that make no sense in context (if you beat someone at tennis, you aren’t normally allowed to decapitate them and drag their corpse through the city square), the spoils of victory are otherwise down to the choice of the victor.
You needn’t use the same Cliché every round. If a Viking/Swashbuckler wants to lop heads one round, and switch to swinging on chandeliers the next, that’s groovy, too. However, anytime a character has a Cliché worn down to zero dice in combat, he’s been defeated, even if he has other Cliches left to play with.
Dice lost in combat are regained after combat, at a healing rate determined by the GM (based on the nature of the attacks involved). If the combat was in vehicles (space fighters, mecha, wooden sailing ships) then the vehicles themselves are likely damaged, too, and must be repaired. Sometimes, healing takes not only time, but conditions specified by the GM (“now that you’ve been soundly defeated, you can’t even look at your banjo until your girlfriend assuages your ego”).
There’s no standard time or distance scale in Risus; everything depends on context. In a physical brawl, each round might represent just a few seconds ... while in a long- term fight between a married couple, each round might represent an entire day (Day One: Husband “accidentally” burns Wife’s favorite dress in the oven, Wife “accidentally” feeds Drano to Husband’s prize goldfish, and so on).
As stated above, the GM determines what sort of Cliches are appropriate for the fight. Any Cliches left over are inappropriate. In a physical fight, Hairdresser is inappropriate. In a magical duel, Barbarian is inappropriate.
Inappropriate Clichés aren’t forbidden from the fight. They can still be used to make attacks, provided the player roleplays or describes it in a really, really, really entertaining manner. Furthermore, the attack must be plausible within the context of the combat, and the genre and tone that the GM has set for the game (making this kind of attack more often useful in very pulpy/swashbuckly games, or very silly ones).
All combat rules apply normally, with one exception: if an inappropriate Cliché wins a combat round versus an appropriate one, the losing player loses three dice, rather than one, from his Cliché! The “inappropriate” player takes no such risk, and loses only one die if he loses the round. Thus, a creative hairdresser is dangerous when cornered and attacked unfairly. Beware.
When in doubt, assume the aggressor determines the type of combat. If a wizard attacks a barbarian with magic, then it’s a magical duel! If the barbarian attacks the mage with his sword, then it’s physical combat! If the defender can come up with an entertaining use of his skills, he’ll have the edge. It pays in many genres to be the defender! But ... if the wizard and barbarian both obviously want to fight, then both are aggressors, and it’s “fantasy combat,” where both swords and sorcery have equal footing.
Teaming Up
Two or more characters may form a team in combat. For the duration of the team (usually the entire fight), they battle as a single unit, and may only be attacked as a single foe. There are two kinds of team: full-on Character Teams (for PCs, and sufficiently interesting NPCs) and Grunt-Squads (for nameless NPC hordes).
Whenever a team loses a round of combat, a single teammember’s Cliché is reduced. Any team-member (Team Leader included) may “step forward” and voluntarily suffer this loss. If so, the noble volunteer is reduced by twice the normal amount (usually either two dice or six, depending), but the highest roll is doubled in the next round, a temporary boost as the team avenges their heroic comrade. If no volunteer steps forward, the Team Leader must assign the (undoubled) hit to a team-member, and there is no “vengeance” bonus.
A Victory & Defeat: With teams as with individuals, the victor determines the fate of the loser ... but when the loser is part of a team, his fate is generally reserved until the end of the team’s existence (even if he’s defeated while the fight rages on). So, if his team wins, his team – not their opponent – gets to decide. There are some fights where this won’t be so, where the PCs are under such precarious circumstance that their fates must be resolved immediately. But, in most cases, being part of a team – especially a winning team – is excellent insurance.
A Disbanding: A team may voluntarily disband at any time between die-rolls. When disbanding, each team-member instantly loses a single die from the Cliché they’d been contributing to the team (equal to “damage” suffered in the fight itself). Disbanded team-members may freely form new teams, provided the die-loss from disbanding doesn’t defeat them. Individuals may also drop out of a team, but this reduces them to zero dice immediately as they scamper for the rear. Their fates rest on the mercy of whoever wins the fight!
Grunt-Squads: This is just special effects. When a horde of 700 rat-skeletons attacks the PCs within the lair of the Wicked Necromancer (5), the GM probably won’t feel like keeping track of 700 tiny skeletal sets of dice. Instead, he can declare them a Grunt Squad, fighting as a single foe: a Skeletal Rat-Horde (7). Mechanically, the Rat-Horde is the same as any single foe – except it sometimes has more dice (as many as the GM cares to assign it). Grunt-Squads stick together as a team until they’re defeated, at which point some survivors may scatter (though at least one will always remain to suffer whatever fate the victor decides). Taken to logical (or whimsical) extremes, an entire ship’s crew, or even whole forests, dungeons, cities or nations might be represented by a single Cliché.
Character Teams: Everybody rolls dice and the totals are summed.
Clichés joined in a team need not be identical, and (provided the GM can be convinced) they can even be a mix of “appropriate” and “inappropriate” for the fight (a group of warriors might be aided by their able minstrel, for example). However, they don’t triple enemy dice-loss unless the entire team is equally inappropriate (which means the players get to explain to the GM exactly how a Hairdresser, a Parakeet Trainer, and a Lifetalker can defeat a Club wielding Giant.
Single-Action Conflicts
“Combat” depends on multi-round jockeying and wearing each other down ... but many conflicts are too sudden to be played that way (two characters grabbing for the same gun, for example). Such “Single-Action Conflicts” (SACs) are settled with a single roll against appropriate Clichés (or inappropriate Clichés, with good roleplaying). High roll wins. Note that, in nearly any case, the Game Master may jump between the three resolution methods (Target Number, Combat, Single-Action Conflict) to suit the pacing and mood. Sometimes, an arm-wrestling match works best as a combat ... sometimes it works best as a Single-Action Conflict, and sometimes (preferably if it’s against some kind of coin-operated arm-wrestling machine) even as a simple Target Number.
When Somebody Can’t Participate
Sometimes, characters find themselves facing a Combat or Single-Action Conflict where they simply have no applicable Cliché, even by stretching the imagination. Perhaps one character in the party enters a pie-eating contest with his Disgusting Glutton (2/2) Cliché, but the rest of the characters are astronauts or accountants, neither of whom traditionally engorge themselves on pie. In situations like this, the GM might grant everybody two free “brevet dice” to play with for the dura- tion of the conflict. This means the Disgusting Glutton (2/0) would become, temporarily, a Disgusting Glutton (4/2), while everyone else would get a Regular Person Talked Into a Pie-Eating Contest (2/0) Cliché “on loan” until the last crumb burps forth. The Glutton, naturally, retains his winning edge, but everyone else can still bury their noses in pie. This rule applies only to Combats and SACs, never to rolls against Target Numbers (since, with Target Numbers, the TN itself simply moves wherever it needs to, for any Cliché attempting any action).
This message was last edited by the GM at 01:17, Mon 29 Aug 2016.
