The 'Counter' house rule for LEITL

[larsdangly]

Hi everyone; I post below my house rule for an active defense I refer to as the Counter (to distinguish it from the Defend action and Parrying with Two Weapons talent). My write up is quite long for such a simple rule, but I wanted to be quite clear about how it works in all situations, including several complex examples And I tacked on some editorial comments so you understand the rationale. This rule is effectively a narrower application of house rules I used for many, many years in classic edition ITL, so it has seen a lot of play testing. The experience has been that it gets used only occasionally, when high DX combatants want to do something fancy in a 1 on 1 melee duel at close quarters, but otherwise its trade off of benefits and drawbacks make it more of an option rather than something everyone would want to do all the time.

THE ‘COUNTER’ ACTION IN MELEE COMBAT
The ‘Counter’ action uses a melee weapon, shield, or any body part capable of delivering an unarmed attack, to foil a single, specified attack that is delivered against you. A Counter attempt must be declared when the attack against you is announced but before the attack roll for that attack is made.

The Counter is resolved as an opposed roll (LEITL p.8), where the countering combatant rolls vs. DX (usually on 3d, but see below) and compares the result with the relevant attack roll; if the Counter roll succeeds and has a margin of success equal to or greater than that for the relevant attack roll, then the Counter succeeds.

The result of a successful Counter is that the damage done by the specified attack (if successful; an unsuccessful attack roll obviously does no damage) is reduced by an amount that depends on what was used to perform the Counter:

Weapon: 3 points for every die of damage done by the weapon (e.g., 3 pts. for a rapier; 6 pts. for a saber or 1H bastard sword; 9 pts. for a great sword)

Shield: 3x the normal protective value of the shield. Note that this is in addition to the normal protection afforded by the shield (following the principle that shield protection applies even when the shield is used for another purpose, such as a shield bash, main gauche attack or Defend action).

Unarmed (e.g., hand): 3 points for every die of HTH damage (special: 1 pt. if damage is 1d-4; 2 pts. if damage is 1d-3).

Double and triple these values on a roll of 4 or 3 on 3d, as per damage for attack rolls.

A counter has no effect on any attack other than the one to which it is specifically directed, or if it fails or loses the opposed roll. I.e., unlike the Defend action or the protective value of a shield, main gauche or parrying weapon (see the Two Weapons talent), a Counter action influences the outcome of one and only one attack, and depends on a successful die roll.

A counter generally may be directed only against a melee attack; however, a shield may be used to counter a thrown or missile weapon attack (other than a bullet), and any weapon or body part that could deliver a HTH attack may be used to perform a Counter in HTH combat.

Unless otherwise noted, a Counter should be treated as a melee or HTH attack in all respects (i.e., with respect to restrictions on movement, DX penalties, number and order of actions per turn, etc.). Functionally, you can treat the Counter as a variant of attack, made in place of a melee attack with that same weapon (hand, shield, etc.), but resolved simultaneously with the targeted hostile attack rather than at the countering combatant’s normal place in the order of actions.

Special: In exchange for an additional penalty (below), a combatant may elect to perform an ‘Attack and Counter’ action in place of either a normal Attack or normal Counter. In this case, the combatant performs a melee attack roll with the chosen weapon (or hand, shield, etc.) at his or her normal place in the action order, and performs a Counter with that same weapon (or hand, shield, etc.) simultaneous with the relevant hostile attack. Thus, the action may be performed either by first attacking and then countering or by first countering and then attacking. Regardless of the order of actions, both the Attack and Counter suffer from a -4 DX penalty (though other factors might modify this further, as per any other attack-like roll). Because this penalty applies to both rolls, you must openly announce your selection of the Attack and Counter action whenever the first of the two component rolls is made (despite the fact that the attack you wish to counter may not yet have occurred - and in fact might never occur!).

Combatants who wish to perform a Counter (or Attack and Counter) with one weapon, hand or shield and an attack or second Counter (or Attack and Counter) with another weapon, hand or shield on the same turn should resolve these two components of their action using all the modifiers that normally apply to attacking with two weapons, as given in the rules for Left Handed weapons (LEITL p. 117), the Two Weapons talent and various ‘Peculiar’ weapons.