Basics of the Demon Lord: Actions in Combat

Like many adventure RPGs, Shadow of the Demon Lord has special rules for tracking who does what when during combat. Specifically, it has what's called an "action economy," a predetermined set of options that constrain how much your character can do in one turn of combat. But SotDL introduces a very cool twist, fast and slow turns, which changes those options a bit. Let's dig in! To follow along at home, please open your textbooks to pages 46-50, the first part of the Combat section in Chapter 2.

You Can Go First or You Can Do More

At its heart, the fast/slow turn rule is about making a decision: do I want to go first, or do I want to wait until later but do more on my turn? The combat round is divided into two big chunks, fast turns and slow turns. Each of these chunks is divided into player turns and GM turns. So the round looks like this:

1. Player fast turns
2. GM fast turns (monsters and other enemies, etc.)
3. Player slow turns
4. GM slow turns
5. End of the Round

Each player chooses whether to act on a fast turn or a slow turn. You can't do both, and once you've acted, you can't act again until the next round. In other words, the players can always go first if they want to! So why would you take a slow turn? Because you can do more: any creature that acts on a fast turn can either use an action or move, but not both; a creature that waits until slow can both use an action and move.

Actions are for Big Things...

So what is an action? It's the big, main thing you do on your turn. Attacking (which includes both attacking with your weapon and casting an attack spell) and casting a utility spell (any spell that's not an attack) are the two most common actions, but there are plenty of others such as concentrating on a spell effect, helping an ally, hiding, and retreating from combat (see pages 48-49 of the core rules).

...and Moves are for Moving

I know. Obvious, right? Most of the time, moving just lets you move up to your Speed around the battlefield. If you're taking a slow turn, you can use your action at any point during the move, so for example if you have a move of 10 you could move 4 yards, cast a spell, then move another 6 yards. There are multiple special types of movement, though, such as swimming and riding (see pages 47-48 of the core rules).

Except When Actions are for Moving

There are a couple of actions that allow you to move! These are Retreat and Rush. Even though they involve movement, they still take an action to use. Retreat lets you move half your Speed without triggering free attacks (a type of triggered attack, see below, that lets an enemy try to hit you as you move away from them). If you're next to an enemy who's kicking your butt, this is a great option on a fast turn to get you safely away from it. You can also use it on a slow turn, though-- use your action to Retreat away from the enemy, then use your move to keep running! This would effectively let you move 1.5 times your speed in the turn, and the part of the movement caused by the Retreat action would be safe from free attacks.

Rush is the other action that lets you move. Specifically, you move up to twice your Speed. Like Retreat, you can use it on its own on a fast turn (when you really need to get somewhere quickly!) or combine it with your move on a slow turn. In the case of Rush, waiting until a slow turn would let you move up to three times your speed in total.

One More Thing About Fast/Slow

What we've seen in playtests is that combats often fall into a certain pattern. At the start of the fight, the combatants are far away from each other, so the first round is often spent closing that gap. That means that melee combatants will generally wait until slow turns, so they can get next to an enemy and attack during the first round. They may also wait for the foe to come to them. There is also an option to charge (see page 52 for that and many other attack options) which allows a creature to move and attack as one action, at the cost of banes to all their rolls for that round.

After the melee combatants have closed on each other, they often take fast turns for much of the remaining combat, using an action to make their attack as soon as possible. They've found their position and they're staying there! Spellcasters who have gotten into a safe position may also take mostly fast turns, as they can throw spells from that spot unless a clever enemy moves to threaten them.

You Also Get One Triggered Action Per Round

Last up in our list of important stuff you can do is the triggered action. You get one triggered action per round, and that's it! Otherwise, your triggered action can happen anywhere in the round, either your own turn or someone else's. Any talent, spell, or other power that uses a triggered action will tell you what the trigger is. It could be extremely specific, or as general as "on your turn." But no matter when it happens, you only get one per round. So if you use a triggered action on your own turn at the very top of the round-- for example, using the Priest's Prayer talent to give yourself a boon to your attack roll on a fast turn-- then even if an opportunity arises to use one later on someone else's turn, you're out of luck.

The most common triggered action is probably the free attack. If an enemy is within your reach (a number of yards equal to your size number, so for most player characters reach is 1 yard) and they willingly move away from (that is, they're not pushed around by some outside force) and you're wielding a melee weapon (sword, axe, dagger, that sort of thing) you can use your triggered action to attack them with it. This rule exists to help front-line fighters lock down their foes and keep squishy casters safe in the back, but the key thing here is that it uses your triggered action-- so if you've already used yours for the round, enemies standing next to you can feel free to move with impunity until the next round.

What About Minor Activities?

Whew, almost done! There's one more type of thing you can do in combat, and it's so small it's not even called an action. Minor activities are things like opening and closing doors, drawing a weapon, and picking something up off the floor. The rule is that you can do one minor activity on a fast turn or two on a slow turn (another advantage for slow turns, if you really need to sheathe your current weapon and draw a new one, for example) but it's really up to your GM how much you can get done. For example, as a GM I would probably rule that a warrior could kick open a door and draw her sword while moving into the room beyond, all on a fast turn, because that's awesome and it feels realistic to me. But I probably wouldn't let her make an attack, sheathe her sword, and shut the door all on her next fast turn.