Quote:

Originally Posted by Ts_ View Post

And a completely different thought:
I don't like the ideas of players precalculating the AP system to construct situations where they get
two actions while the opponent is doing only one action. Say, player A needs only 9 AP / attack,
while enemy B needs 10 AP / attack. Player A delays the fight until the point where the "rounding"
lets him get two attacks without B reacting.

...

In Sagatafl, there are many different actions to choose from, including Move Actions (Charge,
Walk, Run, and Step although pedantically Step doesn't count as a Move Action), and different
attack types, and also the Feint to build "combo points". And then there are Re-Actions which may
be taken out of turn, typically to defend when someone attacks you.

APs are generated each Round, with each character making a Reflexes roll. On a Successful roll,
the character gets 10 AP plus 1 per Success. On a failure, he gets 8, 6 on a Minor Fumble, 4 on a
Medium Fumble, 2 on a Major Fumble, and none on a Grand or Disastrous Fumble. A few unspent
APs can be stored in the character's AP Bank to be carried over to the next Round. Anyone (any
Human, anyway) is born with a Bank capacity of 1, and can easily increase it to 2. More training is
required to increase Bank size to 3, and much more to get it to 4, but I'll expect that it's worthwhile
getting it at least to 3 for the added flexibility: Not having to sit there with unspent lost AP so often.

A basic attack has a base cost of 10 AP. Special attacks have base costs of 12 or 14 AP. Feints are 8
AP base cost, but the "combo points" you build with Feints must often be "cashed in" with a normal
or special attack. Reactions tend to have base costs of 6 AP (Dodge, Shield Block, Attack of
Opportunity) or 8 (Parry, Unarmed Deflect). All these costs can be lowered with specific training,
e.g. Faster Attack, Faster Dodge, Faster Block.

A 1-hx Step costs 2 AP, and you can take as many as you can afford. Move Actions such as Walk
and Run are more efficient than Steps, but you're softly limited to 1 Move Action per Round (if you
do more, you must pay Fatigue, eventually Willpower Points). A Charge is a Move Action that
combines movement with an attack as one "instant action", base cost 14 AP.

But I don't understand your constructed situation. Nobody ever gets just one action. You have a
number of AP and a list of actions you can perform, each action having a cost in AP. Unskilled
combatants most likely will only be able to do one expensive action, like an attack, and then maybe
also move slightly, or do a cheaper Defensive Reaction and a lot of movement. It's much more fluid
and flexible than you assume.

A slightly skilled combatant will probably have a Bank of 2, and at least 1 Speed Factor on Basic
Attack or Charge for his favourite weapon (e.g. sword), reducing the costs to 9 AP and 13 AP
respectively. If you have a shield and have learned how to use it, it's a no-brainer to train 2 Speed
Factors to reduce the AP cost of a Block to 4.

A skilled combatant has Bank 3, and a bunch of Speed Factors on several actions. He might well be
able to attack for only 7 AP, and Block for 4 AP, meaning if he generates 11 AP in a Round, he can
do one of each.

A really serious heroic hero might have 6 Speed Factors on his sword attack in total, some from
training, a few from craftsmanship or Enchantment, and a few on sword parry (since the sword
probably has a Durability-improving Enchantment, making it suitable for parrying) as well,
foregoing the use (and encumbrance) of a shield, so he can make a basic attack for perhaps 4 AP,
and 6 AP per parry. Or instead of training to parry faster, he could train the Dodge skill and train
that for speed, paying 4 or even only 3 AP per Dodge.

But of course for "really serious" combatants there's a huge amount of room for variety, so that's
just one example. Some are optimized for Charging, or for Strength-based Power Strikes, or for
Feinting, or for using Precise Strike against armoured foes.