Combat
Systems and Conflict: Glossary | General Structure | Combat | Complications | Battle Groups | Social Influence | Disease | Crafting
The Solar Exalted have returned to a world teeming with enemies, from the hired armies of greedy princes and the elite assassins of the Wyld Hunt to hostile Exalts determined to halt the Solars' rise to power. Battle is unavoidable.
How Combat Works
Combat in Exalted is a dynamic and cinematic affair. Heroes leap into battle, daiklaves flashing. They knock opponents through teahouse railings in showers of splintered wood; they're hurled through stone walls by the blows of terrible demons, only to rise and rush back into the fray. Nimble demigods run across treetops or race over the massed arrow barrages of armies. Swordsmen drive each other through rain-slick streets in symphonies of ringing steel, until a final, fatal blow settles the fight.
In order to win a battle in the Exalted Storyteller System, characters must seize the upper hand during the course of battle (by raising their Initiative) and then find the proper moment to capitalize on their advantage with a decisive blow (filling an enemy's Health Track with damage). A character whose Health Track is completely filled with damage is Incapacitated—unconscious (if his last Health Level is marked off with bashing damage), or dead or dying (if filled with lethal damage). In any event, he's not a threat any more.
Combat proceeds in a series of rounds, during which each combatant acts once; the order in which characters take turns acting is determined by their Initiative ratings (in order from highest to lowest). Generally each combatant will attempt to attack another character in each round, attempting to either bolster her Initiative at the expense of an enemy's Initiative (known as a withering attack), or to "cash in" a high Initiative value to damage an opponent's Health Track and hopefully defeat him (known as a decisive attack). When no enemies remain to offer resistance, the battle is over.
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