Conflicts & Rolls v5

* Physical Pools
* Social Pools

Brawl-based combat is up-close and usually requires direct application of body strength to deal significant damage. Hard punches, fast kicks, or any given variant uses Strength and Brawl. Brawl-based weapons are generally fist-load weapons that enhance physical kicks and punches. Examples include Brass Knuckles, Weighted Knuckle-Gloves, Caestus, Iron-Toed Boots, Studded or Spiked Cleats, or the supernatural transformations of Feral Weapons and Body Arsenal.
In general, Brawl-based weaponry counts as a "light weapon" and only give a +1 damage modifier. Claw or bladed weapons can confer a +2 or higher, as seen with Feral Weapons.
Prowess still only adds half its damage modifier to Brawl-based weapons, meaning that with high enough Potence it may be better not to use them at all.

### Light Weaponry

**Dice Pool**: *Dexterity + Melee*
Attacks that use most one-handed weapons tend to favor accurate strikes and agility to inflict significant damage, or require a trained form of combat to wield well enough to be threatening. Knives, Daggers, Short Swords, and Rapiers are examples of one-handed dexterity weapons.
There are a few two-handed weapons that are still considered dexterity-based, such as Katanas and spears.
One handed blunt weapons, such as hatchets or a tire iron, are generally considered "Heavy Weaponry" regardless, as they require application of pure force rather than accuracy.
Prowess still adds half its damage modifier to Light weapons even if they are not Strength based.

### Heavy Weaponry

**Dice Pool**: *Strength + Melee*
Attacks that use strong impacts to inflict damage, rather than accurate strikes, or require a certain amount of raw strength to heft or hold. These are generally two-handed weapons such as hammers, axes, large swords, or heavy objects like doors, benches or a fire extinguisher.
One-handed strength weapons are usually blunt, and include things like claw hammers, wrenches, or tactical batons.
Prowess still adds only half its damage modifier to Heavy weapons.

## Ranged Combat

Ranged combat is generally more complex than close combat, using rolls based one in-the-moment attacks or specific set ups. All ranged attacks are *directly* influenced by the target's position:

Cover influences the defender's ability to dodge. They confer these changes to pools.
-2 - No cover
-1 - Concealment only (bushes, a small tree vs rifle calibre bullets)
+/- 0 - Hard Cover (a car engine block, the corner of a concrete building)
+1 - Entrenchment (sandbags, military bunker)
+2 Murder Hole (IFV firing slit)
+4 Completely behind a surface, used only as "All out Defense" (As in, the defending player cannot attack back or "peak" from behind cover at all that turn). Also requires a weapon that must pierce the surface and hit the target behind in addition to the test.
Firing on a target that is not actively defending causes the attacker to roll their pool against a Difficult of 2, if the target isn't moving or is particularly large this can be lowered to 1. Failing this test means that an attack simply misses.
Attacking people outside of the weapon's effective range confers an associated penalty to dice pools that must be decided based on the weapon. Effective range is usually decided on a weapon-to-weapon basis, usually heavily influenced by weapon caliber.

### Fire Arms Pools

**Dice Pool**: *Firearms + Composure*, *Dexterity*, *Resolve*, or *Strength*
A general contest that uses a gun is *Firearms + Composure*, with Firearms signifying the character's skill with a gun, and Composure signifying their ability to keep calm and take steady aim in combat.
*Firearms + Dexterity* is used on quick-draw attacks, with Dexterity signifying the character's ability to draw and then fire the weapon accurately at a moment's notice. There are a few instances in L.A. by Night where a character rolls *Firearms + Wits* to fire as a reaction to an ambush.
*Firearms + Resolve* is used for long vigils, after which the character shoots, or for very long range attacks, with resolve signifying the character's ability to stay focused over any given length of time beyond a few minutes. This roll is also used for Snipers, as they need resolve to accurately line up the shot and then take it.
*Firearms + Strength* is used when a character is trying to shoot an opponent who is actively engaged with them in close combat, with Strength signifying their ability to wrestle the gun into place and take a shot.

### Other Ranged Attacks

**Dice Pool**: *Athletics + Dexterity*, *Strength* or *Composure*
Attacks that use these dice pools are generally non-firearm ranged attacks, which include Bows, Thrown Weapons (Knives, Shurikens, Javelins, etc.), or Spitting (as per use in Scorpion's Touch pg. 273). Bows can sometimes use Composure in place of Dexterity, especially large and powerful bows generally use Strength.
It should be noted that Bows cost a minor action to knock another arrow on each Attack, this is partially to force a PC to take a Bow specialty.

## Defensive Moves

Defensive combat differs from typical attacking conflicts. In general, when a character uses a defensive move, they avoid damage outright on a success, but cannot deal damage in return. Defensive Dice Pools suffer a penalty of 1 for each action they occur after.

**Example**: *Three thugs attack Dani. He wants to Dodge or Attack the first, and Dodge the second and third. The second Dodge will always suffer a penalty of 1 dice, and the third will have a penalty of 2.*

### Dodging

**Dice Pool**: *Dexterity + Athletics*
Rolled in place of the typical conflict. Dodging is notable in that everyone can attempt it and it requires no weapon. Fleetness is notable in that it can add the user's Celerity rating to their Dodge pool.

## Specialized Defensive Actions

These actions are sometimes instituted by certain STs to open up combat to more skills and attributes. These have been referenced by WW ST's and combat designers and have some official capacity, but aren't in the Core Rule Book proper for methods of combat. These actions are generally agreed upon to require an applicable evasive or defensive specialization to perform, such as "*Guarding*" or "*Defensive*". Some more flavorful examples include "*Bobbing*" or "*Parrying*". Some examples will be listed with the associated actions.

### Defensive Brawling

**Dice Pool**: *Dexterity + Brawl*
**Specializations**: *Out-Boxing*, *Bobbing*, *Footwork*
When engaged in brawling with another character, a character can use Brawl in place of athletics. This usually symbolizes using martial arts or boxing techniques to defensively block, duck, bob, and weave through a brawling opponent's attacks.

### Parry or Block

*Dexterity + Melee* or *Strength + Melee*
**Specializations**: *Parrying*, *Fencing*, *Deflecting*, *Blocking*
When engaged in melee combat with another character, a character can use Melee in place of athletics to defend. This usually symbolizes using trained techniques to defensively deflect and parry weapon attacks with the user's weapon. When using strength-based weaponry, or a shield, some ST's allow the character to roll Strength + Melee to block an attack.

# Minor Actions

Minor actions reduce the character's dice by 1 for each action taken. Any number of minor actions can be taken in a single turn, within reason. Generally a character cannot take more than three. The following are examples of some, but not all, minor actions that can be taken in combat:

■ Running up to attack a target more than six feet away.
■ Drawing a weapon.
■ Handling equipment in some way before using it, such as reloading.
In some cases a character can roll with different stats to perform a minor action without a penalty. Such as quick-drawing a weapon with Dexterity in place of another Attribute. In general, Strength-based attacks cannot be "quick drawn" without use of Rapid Reflexes.

# Discipline Usage in Combat

Some Disciplines directly impact the performance of a character in combat even if they aren't otherwise listed as such in their system, through creative means. Examples include:

## Potence

Usually rolled in addition to or in place of raw physical use.

### Soaring Leap

**Dice Pool**: *Potence + Athletics*
When used to evade, allows the character to roll with Potence in place of Dexterity. There were a few instances in L.A. by Night where the character was allowed to use *Strength+ Athletics*, but this was in the first season where some Dice Pools were a bit dubious.
### Prowess

While not adding to conflict per say, allows a character to wield absurdly large weapons with high damage modifiers. Annabelle uses this in L.A. by Night when fighting the werewolf, picking up a large iron grate to wield as a weapon.
### Uncanny Grip

Allows the user to add their Potence to rolls to resist Disarm, some STs allow it to prevent Disarms outright.
### Earthshock

**Dice Pool**: *Dexterity + Athletics*; Difficulty 5
When used to stomp onto something below the user, deals an absurd amount of damage, killing it outright. The La Sombra in L.A. by Night uses this power to instantly kill a fleshcrated beast prone before her. The mechanics for this require the prone individual to roll *Dexterity + Athletics* against a difficulty equal to the attacker's Potence to survive.

## Celerity

### Rapid Reflexes

Within the ability's description it states that vampires with the ability can react instantly. Within the context of combat this means that they always have an initiative on nearly any given action, even when ambushed, allowing them to contest an ambush with free minor actions. A character that's being ambushed can effectively react, draw their weapon, and attack and incur no penalty to any of their pools.
### Blink & Traversal

Shown to allow a character to instantly seek and gain a cover advantage against ranged attacks where they had none before.

## Fortitude

Rarely used in combat to help decide rolls outside of situations directly stated by the abilities themselves.

### Toughness

Characters that have this are generally treated as being immune to "stunning" effects from blunt trauma.

## Auspex

Situational state-based events that may be decided by the storyteller. Examples across various streams/pocasts are:

### Heightened Senses

When in use, allows the user to reduce or outright remove the partial cover penalty and called shot penalty. From the instances it's used in L.A. by Night, the roll is always *Firearms + Resolve* in place of composure, as the character was ensure to take steady, aimed, shots. It was only used once without a sniper rifle, and was used to line up a shot with a hand gun through several desks and chairs.
### Premonition

Can be used to prevent ambushes, but doesn't always occur. Some ST's require a *Wits + Auspex*; Difficulty 2, to do this.

## Seduction Pools

Pools that heavily favor Charisma and Manipulation, generally used to seduce mortals into a vulnerable position.

### Scoping the Room

These rolls are generally used to canvas an area to find potential "partners" who are already in the mood, or might be an easy mark to get into the mood. A lot of these are used in the CRB or L.A. by Night.

*Charisma + Insight* or *Awareness* = Generally used in bars and restaurants.
*Wits* or *Charisma + Athletics* = Used in gyms or other physical venues.
*Charisma + Etiquette* = Used in "high class" settings to find a proper date.

## Intimidation Pools

Possibly the most open-ended and flexible Social Dice Pool. Intimidation can be used with nearly every other Social Attribute, as well as Physical and Mental Attributes. Sometimes it can also gain certain bonuses by using an object, such as a massive weapon, or other contextual items. It should be noted that Intimidation is one of the few Social pools that can be used in direct combat to "fear" an opponent and keep them from attacking, or cause them to outright flee.

As a general rule, *Composure + Resolve* is treated as a "Social Dodge" when dealing with Intimidation conflicts. If the resisting character wishes to make light of the threat by thinking of their opponent as too stupid to deliver on it, *Composure + Intelligence* is also acceptable.

### Basic Intimidation

*Charisma + Intimidation* - According to the CRB, this is the basic Dice Pool, however in practice it seems the least used. The PC attempts to use basic Social cues to cow their opponent.
### Veiled Threats

*Manipulation + Intimidation* - Used for unobvious threats, usually in situations where a typical attempt at intimidation would be inappropriate or draw unwanted attention, such as Elysium.
### Reactive Intimidation

*Wits + Intimidation* - Did that guy just make fun of you? Immediately shoot him a subduing glare, or reply with a remark that'll shut him up.
### Draw Attention & Stare Downs

*Resolve + Intimidation* - The CRB lists this as the best way to draw attention to ones self when someone is trying to avoid looking at the PC, by making the PC appear threatening enough that they need to be looked at. Without Presence, this is the best way to succeed at using Dominate on victims that are avoiding eye contact. Generally doesn't work in combat.
This pool is also used in prolonged "staredowns".
### Showcase Strength

*Strength + Intimidation* - Threatening using raw Strength to Intimidate, such as when wielding a huge weapon, or breaking a giant desk.