If we attack with a sword or if we cast a wizard bolt spell at a beastie, the mechanics of the attack are the same. We have an attack strength, which is a number. This number shows up under the heading of AS. The beast will have a defensive strength. This is also a number, which shows up under the heading of DS.
Our weapon, our sword or our choice of bolt spell, is going against the fur of the giant rat, or the armor of a kobold. Our attack weapon will have a certain degree of effectiveness against the defensive armor of the beast we are attacking. This number shows up as AvD. This means Attack versus Defense adjustment. When we are attacking, we would prefer that the AvD number to be high, because that means our attack weapon is very effective against the armor of the defender.
The last statistic is called d100. This is a random number between 1 and 100. We have no control over this number, but we know what it's range is. The higher the number the higher our attack scores against the nasty.
The statistics that spew forth from combat represent the attack strength minus the defense strength, plus the AvD adjustment, plus the die roll between 1 and 100. All total, these must add to more than 100 if the attack is to be successful. If the attack is successful, then the effectiveness of the attack beyond 100 is used to compute the amount of damage inflicted upon the defender.
When the beast turns it around and attacks you, the AS is the beastie's attack strength. The DS is your defense strength. And the AvD is the effectiveness of the attack weapon of the beast against the armor you are wearing.
Swinging a sword, our basic trait is strength. Casting wizard bolt spells, our basic trait is dexterity. Swinging a sword, our most helpful skill is our training level in edged weapons. Casting a bolt spell, our skill is our training in spell aiming. The wizard strength 509 spell will help us swing a sword. The wizard elemental focus 513 spell will enhance our ability at casting bolt spells, but at great expense to our ability to swing a sword. So by the time that we acquire the elemental focus spell, we must decide whether we are attacking using swords or using spells when we determine whether to cast elemental focus, or not. We can also employ skills we learn from whatever societies we join.
With some forms of attack, heavy armor is better than lighter armor. With some forms of attack, the agility of a flowing robe is better than the encumbrance of plate armor. If somebody is swinging a sword at me, I might prefer to be wearing armor. If somebody is casting lightning bolts at me, I'd much rather have on a robe.
AS - DS + AvD + d100 = Result.
To determine how effective we are at battling or defending against a given nasty, we compare the Result to the d100 die roll. If we are attacking, and our Result is less than our d100 roll we can give up the attack because we will never hit the target. If our Result is more than the d100 roll +100, then we know that we are going to hit the nasty every time we try. That is important when we are attacking with spells and mana. We need to make progress against the beastie every time we try.
The way that we keep from getting hit is to always have a defense strength which is higher than the opponent's AS + AvD. We may need to get better equipment, better spells, or we may just need to avoid a certain class of nasty entirely.
Nearly any solid hit will stun a wizard. Stunning causes us to lose total control for a time while lowering our defense strength. Some attacks may cause us to fall on the ground, thus lowering our defense strength and lowering our attack strength as well for the time we are down.
A bad hit to the arm might cause us to lose our sword or shield, which are often very valuable commodities to us. Some critical hits cause instant death.
The best defense against a critical hit is to never get hit to begin with.
This sort of spell is the mainstay of the sorcery profession, but wizards have a few warding spells in our arsenal as well. We cast a spell at a target, and the spell will work unless the target beastie successfully wards the spell off.
For warding attacks, the formula for your attack casting strength CS is your aura plus triple your training level plus your rank in trainings of the spell circle that the spell is cast from, plus half your rank in trainings from all other spell circles.
Your CS for Minor Elemental Circle warding spells is:
CS = aura + caster_level*3 + minor_elemental_rank +
(wizard_rank + major_elemental_rank)/2
The defense for warding attacks is called the Target Defense TD statistic, which has many of the same components as the CS. Different races and different armor classes have different affects on warding spells. The CvA statistic embodies this affect.
A warding attack is successful if the target fails to ward off the attack.
CS - TD + CvA + d100 = Result
If the result is less than 100, or if the die roll is 1
regardless of the result, the warding is successful. Successful warding
means the spell fails. A very high result often will have bonus results.
The only spell in our arsenal which helps our casting strength is the Elemental Targeting 425 spell. Our target defense strength is helped with the Elemental Defense I, II, & III 401, 406, 414/419 spells. It is also helped by the Elemental Bias 508 spell, and by the Elemental Barrier 430 spell. Outside the wizard realm, Spirit Warding I & II 101 & 107, also known as light & deep blues, help TD. Also the Spell Shield 219 spell, known as opals, helps a lot but it can only be cast once at a time.
Sword attacks and wizard bolt spells are affected by stance in the same way. Warding attacks are unaffected by stance, except that casting any spell will take you out of defensive stance and put you into a guarded stance.
We want to have a defensive strength which is high enough that we are not at risk, even when we stand in offensive stance. If a spell wears off or if something else puts us at risk, we should go into a full defensive stance and refresh our spells or just get out of there.
There are a total of five different stances, each a 20% graduation from the previous stance. If you can find a stance from which you are able to attack well enough and defend well enough at the same time, use that stance. Generally, we use the offensive stance until something goes wrong and then we use the defensive stance to get out of there.
There are two types of round time. Physical round time involves doing something physical which takes time such as swinging a sword or bandaging a wound. Mental round time happens whenever we prepare or cast a spell. We cannot do much of anything while we are in physical RT, other than speak. If we are in mental RT, we can move from room to room, but we cannot prepare or cast any spells.
Wielders of swords drastically want their RT's low, so that they can land more attacks in a short amount of time. They travel light and they train in armor use appropriate to the type of armor they wear. Wizards who hunt with their spells are not burdened from hunting by the weight they are carrying. For that reason, wizards often carry lots of weight around with them. Be careful, though, that you do not run into any creatures who will be casting mobility attacks at you, or your burden may prove to be quite heavy indeed.
Four trainings in armor use will eliminate any adverse affect that full leather will have on your physical round time. This does not affect how long it takes us to attack with spells, but it does affect our sword use, our climbing, swimming, and standing-up success and round times. It also affects how successfully we dodge manuver spells.
Spells that affect RT are the strength 509 spell, which helps us carry more. Also the slow and the haste spell put on or take off seconds from RT. Elemental Barrier appears to help RT, and probably Elemental Deflection 507, which is also called agility. The Ranger Mobility spell is another good one to get when you might have to dodge something.
Cloud spells are manuver attacks: Death Cloud, Fire Storm, and Meteor Storm. Another manuver attack which we cast is the Boil Earth 917 spell. It is our level as a caster which is pitted against the level of the target and other mobility factors to determine the success of the spell. Critical hits from these spells can be quite deadly.
Wizards should avoid nasties which toss manuver attacks about for as long as they can. The spells which help you with round time should also help you to dodge mobility attacks. Wizards should train in the armor use skill as many times as they need for the armor they will wear. That is four times total for full leather. The combat maneuvers skill is the one which will best help you avoid manuver attacks. You should have lots of trainings in combat maneuvers late in life, but it is an expensive train for wizards so don't start until your mana share and your triple spell-training are finished.
Travel lightly when you are around mobility-attacking critters like arch wights or tree spirits. Avoid them until you are their age or higher, possibly much higher. Swing a sword at something to test your round time before going near a mobility attacker. If your RT is too high, get rid of some things or put them in a floating disk.
Field experience fills our minds to capacity as we hunt successfully. Our minds can only hold a certain maximum amount of experience, after that any experience we gain goes toward fame, but not toward advancement.
Field experience becomes permanent most quickly at a node. Resting at a node off our feet, our minds become clear again quickly. The quickest path to level advancement and training is through hunting beasts which we can kill quickly until our minds are full, resting until our field experience has been relatively well absorbed, and then hunting again. A cycle. The faster the rate the field experience can be absorbed, the faster we can advance.
We adventurers have levels. Beasties have levels as well. Unfortunately, the levels of the beasties are known to us only through the efforts of adventurers who have gone before us, who tallied these levels on scrolls. Defeating a nasty which is the same level you are, will yield your mind 100 measure of field experience. Killing a higher level monster will result in more field experience per kill. Killing a lower-level nasty will result in less field experience per kill. If you are old enough, fighting a much lower-level critter you will gain no experience at all.