Combat

When chaos erupts, the game shifts into a more structured format to track who acts when and what happens. Combat alternates between player characters and opponents (or the environment), keeping everyone engaged and the action moving along.

Initiative Order¶

Only player characters roll Initiative. Roll +Wits or +Blood (whichever is highest).

• Record the results in descending numeric order (highest to lowest), visible to all players.
• If two or more PCs tie, they can either act simultaneously or decide amongst themselves who goes first. Rock-Paper-Scissors works well.
• Opponents don't roll Initiative — the Storyteller handles who's up next contextually.

The spotlight alternates between player characters and opponents: A PC acts, then an opponent acts, then a PC, then an opponent, and so on.

1. Follow the Initiative order from highest to lowest.
2. After each PC acts, the Storyteller chooses which enemy acts based on positioning, who was just attacked, or who's most dangerous.
3. Some powerful opponents may act multiple times per round — this is normal, if uncommon.
4. When all player characters have acted once, the round continues with any remaining enemy actions or environmental alterations.
5. Once everyone has acted, a new round begins at the top of the Initiative order. Carry on until the threat is dispatched or evaded.

On Your Turn¶

Each turn while you have the spotlight, you can do one of each of the following:

1. Movement: Narrative positioning in physical space; you can travel up to one Range, from Distant ↔ Far ↔ Close ↔ Hand ↔ Intimate
2. One Action: Any Basic Move or Discipline Power. Remember, you must narrate your character's actual actions to trigger your Moves!
3. One Free Action: Basic things your character can do without expending any extra effort or time while performing other tasks.

Special Turns¶

Ambushes: If enemies get the drop on you, they act first that round before the normal Initiative order. If you ambush them, all player characters act before the enemies for one round.

Environment: Often, the environment itself becomes dangerous during combat; the Storyteller may describe hazards, complications, or changes to the battlefield between PC and enemy actions.

Ranges & Distance Tracking¶

The term Range refers to a bracket within which things may or may not be able to reach you (and vice versa). There are five of them, and all weapons (plus many Discipline Powers) have a Range tag that tells you how far away you have to be to use it or get hit by it. The Ranges are:

1. Intimate: Within the bubble of your personal space. Biting someone requires you to be here.
2. Hand: Within a few feet of you. You could fight claw-to-claw or just hug it out. Almost every standard melee weapon has this Range.
3. Close: Across the room, a street, or one rooftop over. Talking distance. Or shooting distance, depending on the situation.
4. Far: Down a hallway, a street, or an alley. Within shouting distance. Ranged weapons like rifles work best at this Range.
5. Distant: Just near enough to detect, but rarely to injure. Sniper rifles, bows, and some high-level Discipline Powers work best here.

Taking Harm in Combat¶

When you take Harm during combat, mark it on your Harm track as normal (see Harm & Healing) and be sure to do it immediately; forgetting to tick just 1 box could mean the difference between unlife or Final Death. Remember:

• Superficial Harm can be healed relatively quickly, with a Hunger Check at the end of the scene (or beginning of the next)
• Aggravated Harm bypasses armor and can't be healed mid-combat (most of the time) unless you Feed, and larger amounts must be slept off with a full belly of blood
• Staking: If you're a vampire and get staked through the heart, you're immediately incapacitated (Storyteller will describe what happens)

What Happens at Zero?¶

Temporary Torpor¶

If you reach 0 HP and less than half of your maximum HP is Aggravated Harm, you enter Torpor. You collapse, your body goes rigid (or limp, up to you), and you are totally incapacitated. You cannot move, speak, feel, or react to any stimuli (with very few exceptions). You are at the mercy of whoever is standing over you.

A vampire in Torpor can be revived by giving them enough blood to slake 1 or more Hunger. The most common method is puncturing a blood bag and holding it to their mouth, which revives them after about one round of combat (or 30 seconds out of combat) with HP equal to the Hunger the blood would have slaked. Their Hunger is not reduced, but they are functional again. They may owe their savior a Debt, depending on the relationship.

Torpor from Harm or staking is a temporary state. Long-term voluntary Torpor is a separate matter, covered in the Blood Potency: Torpor section.

Final Death¶

If you reach 0 HP and half or more of your maximum HP is from Aggravated Harm, you are permanently destroyed. Your body crumbles to ash, collapses into a desiccated husk, or simply stops existing in whatever suitably dramatic fashion the Storyteller describes.

The Aggravated Harm thresholds for Final Death by Blood Potency are:

• 6 HP (BP 0–1): 3+ Aggravated
• 9 HP (BP 2): 5+ Aggravated
• 12 HP (BP 3): 6+ Aggravated
• 15 HP (BP 4): 8+ Aggravated
• 18 HP (BP 5): 9+ Aggravated

When a player character meets Final Death, the Coterie should make whatever arrangements the fiction demands — mourn, avenge, loot the body, or pretend it never happened. The player constructs a new Kindred to join the Coterie at the next narratively convenient moment.