Combat is a very exciting and fun activity to take part in A Tempest Season. Combat in the game is easy to understand but hard to master. This section will explain the fundamentals of combat and the commands that are used within. Combat consists of  three aspects: attacks, defenses and risks.

Attacking

The very first point about the combat system is it’s NOT automatic. You have to input your attacks each round.  This offers a more interactive and rewarding type of play style.

Attacking consists of one of the following activities: melee attacks, casting a spell(Mages), praying for a gift(Clerics), or using a hostile ability.

Basic Attacks

There are 3 basic types of attacks per type of weapon. Any class can uses these basic attacks.
The three types of weapons are sharp, blunt and thrust weapons.

To execute one of these basic attacks, refer to the following tables. The syntax for each attack is:

<attack name> <target>

Example: slash stalker

Most attacks cost stamina to use with the exception of Low and Medium attacks.

Sharp Weapons

Blunt Weapons

Thrust Weapons

Ranged Attacks

Ranged attacks consist of using a bow, crossbow or firearm and a projectile to deal damage. Below, lies more information regarding these types of attacks.

Ranged Weapon Types

There are three types of ranged weapons. Not every ranged weapon is considered a main armament.

Crossbows require a lengthy windup time but they fire instantly and deal double damage.

Ranged Attacks

There are 3 basic types of attacks for ranged weapons. Any class can uses these basic range attacks.

To execute one of these basic attacks, the fire command is used.

The syntax for each attack is:

fire <attack name> <target>

Example: fire deftly stalker

Projectiles

There are several types of projectiles and heads for ranged weapons, each with various effects:

Projectiles can get stuck in a wound, which will prevent it from healing (closing). It must be removed before healing can take place.

Additionally, projectiles can be retrieved after battle, either from the corpse or from the ground on missed shots.

Loading Ranged Weapons

Generally, to use a ranged weapon, ammunition must be present. For bows and crossbows, a quiver must be worn in the quiver slot. When a bow is fired, an arrow is nocked automatically. Crossbows and firearms must be manually reloaded.

To load a crossbow or firearm, use the reload command.

reload

Example: reload

Reload reloads the current crossbow or firearm with ammo in your quiver or inventory.

Class Attacks

Some classes have special attacks. Fighters and Rogues are two classes that can acquire special melee attacks. These attacks can be used with any weapon.

Fighter Special Attacks

Rogue Special Attacks

Rogues have access to the following special attacks:

Casting Magic

Mages are able to cast magical spells. The syntax to do so is:

cast ‘spell name’ <target>

For example: cast ‘fire ball’ stalker

To learn more about how spells and other abilities work visit the Abilities page.

Praying for Gifts

Clerics are able to pray to their Entity for gifts. The syntax to do so is:

pray ‘gift name’ <target> [<favors>|min|max]

For example:

pray ‘healing rains’ dayrinni 10 (prays healing rains on Dayrinni for 10 favors)

pray ‘healing rains’ dayrinni (prays healing rains on Dayrinni for the minimum amount of favors)

pray ‘healing rains’ dayrinni min (prays healing rains on Dayrinni for the minimum amount of favors)

pray ‘healing rains’ dayrinni max (prays healing rains on Dayrinni for the maxium amount of favors)

Clerics are able to boost up their gifts by applying Favors (their resource). The more favors the stronger the gift!

To learn more about how gifts and other abilities work visit the Abilities page.

Using Skills

Any class can use skills. The syntax to do so is:

use ‘skill name’ <target>

Example: use kick dayrinni

To learn more about how skills and other abilities work visit the Abilities page.

What Attacks Can I Use?

To check what attacks you can use, simply type: attackinfo. This command will show the available attacks to you.

Available Attacks

Determining Attack Success

Determining the success of an attack is easy: a check is done with the attacker’s attack rating vs the defender’s defense rating. The difference is taken and then a linear percent scale is used (5% in each direction) from 50%. If the attack and defense ratings are equal, the attack has a 50% chance to be successful. If the attack rating is 1 higher than the defense rating, then the attack has a 55% chance to be successful.

Characters gain +1 to attack and defense per level. A character at level 100 will have a 100 attack and 100 defense.

Attack Skills

Each class can learn multiple attack skills. These include weapon skills, sorcery and praying for Clerics. The higher level these skills are the larger the attack bonus for that type of attack. The following chart explains each skill:

It’s very beneficial to raise your main attack skill as high as possible as soon as possible. A Fighter and Rogue should focus on their melee attack, a Mage on Sorcery and a Cleric on Praying.

Modifiers

Abilities, classes, races and temporary buffs/debuffs all modify a character’s attack and defense ratings so the exact percentage varies. These temporary affects can be seen in the ‘score’ screen.

Here are some example modifiers:

There are many more modifiers that can affect how you perform in combat and the game. Always be on the lookout to find beneficial modifiers!

Defenses

As mentioned above, each character has a baseline defensive capability equal to their character level. This is automatically used during combat. There is no need for a character to actively train their defensive skills.

However, there are still three types of defensive actions that are performed during combat: dodging, parrying and blocking with a shield. Each action is effective in different ways:

Defensive Maneuvers

Defensive Maneuvers is a skill that every character gets. It gives a passive increase to your defensive rating. The skill has 10 levels and each level will reward the character with a bonus to defensive rolls.

Getting Hit

If you fail a defense, you will take damage. There are many places where you can be hit:
Head, chest, left arm, right arm, left leg, and right leg. There are damage modifiers on each part. For example you would take more damage from a blow to the head rather than the right arm.
If you have armor equipped it will deduct damage. Sometimes if you have good armor it will block all of the damage and your health will not be decreased.

Armor

Armor can be bought to protect portions(head, chest, arms and legs) of your body. Chest armor protects every spot of your body. Arm guards protect the arms. Legs protect the legs. Helmets protect the head.

Armor Types

There are three major armor types in the game: leather, chain and plate. Each protect against different attacks in different ways:

Different monsters and players use varying attacks so always be aware of what armor you’re wearing.

Shield Types

There are three major shield types in the game: buckler, kite and tower. Each protect against different attacks in different ways:

All shields have a base auto-block chance against normal attacks. This chance is based on the material type of the shield used. For example, an orinsteel shield will have a better base auto-block chance than a wooden shield would.

The shield type simply adds to this base auto-block chance. If a wooden shield had an auto-block chance of 1%, the buckler would not add to this while the kite shield would add an extra value to this.

Hindrance

The game has a hindrance system for armor and shields. A higher hindrance will lower the offensive and defensive capabilities of your character. To see your current hindrance type hindrance:

Hindrance

To lower hindrance of armor, it is advisable to train the armor skills, raise the strength attribute or simply wear less hindering armor.

Hindrance Modifiers

Hindrance has several modifiers which range from a bonus to a negative depending on the final hindrance modifier.

When the hindrance is high the modifiers will be negative. When hindrance is low the modifiers will be positive.

While having a high hindrance will generally make your character slower in combat, the added protection in armor offsets this. Plate is extremely effective at blocking damage. A lower hindrance will make your character faster but this usually comes at a cost of protective armor (leather).

The following breaks down the hindrance rankings:

Hindrance Ratings

The hindrance ratings for armor depend on the type (leather, chain and plate). The values are not affected by weight or material used. This is done for simplicity.

The values are:

The hindrance ratings for shield are similar to armor types.

The values are:

Lowering Hindrance

There are several ways to lower hindrance:

• Get more strength.
• Train armor skills.
• Train shield training (assuming you’re using a shield).
• Some rare skills can lower hindrance.
• Wear armor that benefits your class.
• Do not mix and match armor types unless you have high skills in each.

Bleeding

During combat you can suffer wounds which will bleed. To see your wounds type HEALTH. The display follows as:

Health Screen

If you had wounds it would look like so:

Wounded!

Having a wound will cause your character to bleed every update. If the wound is not healed it may kill you. Wounds have a chance to close on their own, but a better way is to bind your wounds.

Bind wounds is a skill that can be learned at a trainer and applies first aid to a character, including yourself.

The syntax is: bind <target>

If a wound has a projectile, such as an arrow, lodged into, it must first be removed! You may use the REMOVE command.

remove fromwound arrow

 Vitals

Each character has certain vitals that are important to them. They consist of Health, Stamina, Essence and Favors.

Health is used to determine what state your body is currently in. When it reaches 0, you die. In order to restore health, simply rest – it will regenerate over time.

Stamina is used as power for melee attacks(such as cleave or backstab) and skills. The more these attacks are used the quicker the stamina drain is. To restore stamina, simply rest – it will regenerate over time.

Essence is used to cast magic spells! To regain essence use Channel or Intervention. See the Magic page for more information!

Favors are used by Clerics to pray for gifts from their Entites. Favors regenerate every minute. To see more on Favors, visit the Cleric Page.

Movement and Distance

Movement in combat is possible in A Tempest Season. All attacks have a distance that can be used within.

Each room is broken up into a number of units, each consisting of 5 feet. A player and NPC can move a certain amount of units each move, which depends on their attributes and hindrance.

Assessing

To see everyone’s location in a room, use the ASSESS command:

assess

By default, everyone is in the center of the room.

Moving

To move in a room, use the advance, retreat, or move command.

Advancing (moving forward):

advance <units>

ie: advance 2

advance <target>

ie: advance stalker

Retreating (moving backwards):

retreat <units>

ie: retreat 2

retreat <target>

ie: retreat stalker

Move combines advance and retreat into a single command:

move +/-<units>

ie: move -2

move <target>

ie: move stalker

Risk

Combat is a risky business. Movements, attacks, and a collection of factors affect the outcome of a battle. By far risk is a deciding one.

Combat is a risky business. Movements, attacks, and a collection of factors affect the
outcome of a battle. By far risk is a deciding one.

There are 3 parts to the risk system:
1. Position: this changes when you are fighting. Every action you perform and attack you
receive modifies your position. Being in a red(bad) position will lower your defense, your
damage output(-35%) and make you more susceptible to knock downs. Staying in a green(good)
position will increase your defense, increase your damage output(+10%), and be less
susceptible to knock downs. These modifiers apply to both players and NPCs. To maintain a
good position, it is important to combo attacks and abilities. For example: interweave high
risk attacks(cleave) with lower risk attacks(slash).

2. Morale: Starting at level 30, the Morale System unlocks. Every NPC has a Posture(1 of 4
types) which you use the corresponding skill to steadily build self-buffs when killing
them.

3. Weakness: Starting at level 30, the Weakness System unlocks. Every NPC has a certain
Posture which you use the corresponding skill to exploit weaknesses during each attack.

As stated above in the attacks section, attacks raise and lower your risk. The combat systems expects a player to be able to combo their attacks in some way that fits their play style and current situation. The most ideal situation, however, is to combine high damaging and risky attacks (such as Cleave) with low damaging lowering-risk attacks (such as Slash). This will allow you to deal damage with Cleave, but make sure your risk does not get high by using Slash.

Risk Levels

There are 11 levels of risk, each color coded to give the player an idea of their current situation.

Postures and Morale

Starting at level 30, you can turn on postures which are used to build morale when killing
NPCs and to exploit weaknesses during attacks. Each NPC has a specific posture and it is up
to you to discover each while fighting them.

The postures are:

In order to build the most morale and exploit weaknesses against NPCs, the matching posture
must be active. For example, if a mud stalker has Posture: Form, you must also have that
posture active to build morale and exploit weaknesses.

Each time a NPC is killed, you gain morale if you stayed in the Green
positions. More morale is gained if you are in the same Postures as the NPC. There are 3
Morale states and each gives a cumulative bonus to the player. The states are:

Morale decays if not actively engaged in combat. Also, switching Postures will completely
remove all morale.

Additionally, each NPC has a weakness which can be exploited on every attack if the same
Postures is currently active.

It is up to you to discover each NPCs Postures in order to build high morale states and to
exploit their weaknesses. There are 3 ways to determine a NPCs Posture:
1. If you get more than 5% morale after killing a NPC while in Green positions,
2. You afflict a weakness on the NPC,
3. You use Detect Magic on the NPC.

Weaknesses

There are several types of Postures you may use to build morale and exploit weaknesses
against NPCs. Each NPC has a weakness which can be exploited on every attack if the same
Postures is currently active.

When a weakness is exploited, the NPC suffers a short term debuff based on the player’s
Postures.

It is up to you to discover each NPCs Posture in order to build high morale states and to
exploit their weaknesses.

Death

The world of Eihydia is a dangerous place and there will eventually be a time when you meet your fate at the hands of another.

When your character reaches 0 health, they will perish. Your body will fall and become a corpse in the room, and you will remain there. At this point, two options await you:

1. Resurrection by a Cleric.
2. Releasing your body by typing ‘die’. Dying will incur experience debt if not over level 10. You’ll be returned to the center of town or to your place of deity’s place of worship, if it exists.

Other Topics

Equipment

Your equipment will wear down overtime. You can repair your items at the Forge in Tralisia for a small fee, based on weapon price.
When an item becomes damaged you will receive messages and the word damaged will print out next to the item in your inventory screen. If you do not repair the item and it breaks – the item is gone forever. You can repair most items as many time as you want.
Weapons take damage from attacking and from parrying. Armor takes damaged from being hit.

Fleeing

There is no FLEE command in A Tempest Season. If combat is not going well – simply walk away. While the combat is challenging in A Tempest Season, we don’t want to automatically penalize a player for not doing well. So run out of the room, rest up and get your revenge!

Getting Loot

Getting loot is important! There are currently two ways to get loot from a defeated enemy:

Getting all the items from their corpse and stripping.

Getting

To get all of the items from a corpse, use the get command. This command will take an item from the corpse and place it your inventory.

The syntax is: get <item> corpse

Stripping

Stripping places all of the items a NPC corpse has onto the ground, in the room. In addition, it can be used to strip items from players.

To strip a NPC, simply type: strip corpse

Stripping items from players requires more typing as it’s a very powerful command. It is possible to strip items both from a player’s inventory and equipment.

The syntax is:

strip <(inv)entory|(eq)uipment> <item> [from] <player>

Prompt

The prompt is displayed to your character after every thing you see or do. This a line that gives useful information about your character.

Above, the H represents Health, the S represents Stamina and E represents Essence.

This allows you to easily ascertain the state of your character. Additional information such as if you’re knocked down, hidden and your current risk position will be displayed here.

General Tips

Here are some basic tips that will help you get started:

• Always stay in a GREEN risk position!
• Combo high risk attacks with low ones.
• If you’re in trouble – run away and use bind wounds.
• Always train your main attack skill (weapon skill, or sorcery) and defensive maneuvers.
• Look at a NPC to see how easy they will be to hit.
• Keep your equipment up to date!
• Train your abilities!
• Gain another level to automatically increase your attack and defense.

Getting Help

We realize that combat can be intensive and difficult at first to master. Here are some resources to assist you:

• Ask on the NEWBIE channel.
• Post on the forums for help.
• Ask the staff for assistance (in particular Dayrinni). Use the ORACLE command or send a tell to contact the staff. The staff will come to your aid and help in any way they come. We are here for YOU, the player. Alternatively, you may contact Dayrinni here.