Some magic questions..

[g33k]

 

First:
Hello @Mordante, and welcome to the Tribe!  🙂

 

On 11/4/2022 at 4:08 AM, Mordante said:

I really can't seem to getmy head around strike ranks!

Strike-Ranks are a bit odd.  You aren't alone!

They are primarily a "ranking" -- an ordering.  Who goes 1st, who goes 2nd, etc.

It's tempting to consider them a "timing" -- when in the round things happen -- but that is (seldom) correct.  There are some time-ish elements to SR's (5-SR delays, DX-rank delays, movement "cost" in SR's) and sometimes the entire issue under consideration can be treated as a "time" issue.

I find they model things best for 1:1 combat situations where both parties begin just a pace or two outside engagement range.

In some combats, however, you get weird glitches ... e.g. where one combatant's movement imposes a SR penalty on them, so that they strike "late in the round" ... even if they have a huge DEX and long weapon for a very-low SR (this can lead to a grappler (who stands and waits for a lancer's charge) to get their grapple-attack before the mounted lancer gets to roll their Lance-attack, which is weird.  And wrong.)  If the *entire* combat was those two, this artifact wouldn't happen; but if they're both part of a larger melee, their 1:1 action can get shoehorned into the SR-sequence of a round so that this "timing" problem occurs.

I usually solve this by treating each individual 1:1 "first engagement" as it's own SR-sequence, independent of any larger melee or any other 1:1 combats happening "at the same time" elsewhere in the larger melee.