Basic Rules

Summary

Checks (incl. flat checks)

Attacks

Saves

Encounter Mode

When every individual action counts, you enter the encounter mode of play. In this mode, time is divided into rounds, each of which is 6 seconds of time in the game world. Every round, each participant takes a turn in an established order. During your turn, you can use actions, and depending on the details of the encounter, you might have the opportunity to use reactions and free actions on your own turn and on others’ turns.

Encounter Structure

An encounter is played out in a series of rounds, during which the player characters, adversaries, and other participants in the encounter act in sequence. You roll initiative to determine this order at the start of the encounter and then play through rounds until a conclusion is reached and the encounter ends. The rules in this section assume a combat encounter—a battle—but the general structure can apply to any kind of encounter.

Step 1: Surprise Round

When one or more combatants get a jump on the others, they have an opportunity to take actions and get into position before the other side can react. For example, if the player characters ambush a group of enemies, they can each make attacks and move into advantageous positions before the enemy can react. Similarly, the first character to make a move in a standoff has a chance to move before anybody else.

The DM determines which characters get to act in the surprise round, if any, and how many actions they get. For a full-on ambush, the DM may give the participants a full set of 3 actions. For an instigator in a standoff, they may get only a single action.

Generally, only one side gets to act in the surprise round. In this case, turn order doesn’t matter and the participants all act as though they were a single Unit during the surprise round. Occasionally, a subset of participants on each side get surprise (for example, forward scouts spotting each other). In this case, roll initiative for all characters before resolving the surprise round and simply skip the turn of any characters not participating in the surprise round.

Step 2: Roll Initiative

When the DM calls for it, you’ll roll initiative to determine your place in the initiative order, which is the sequence in which the encounter’s participants will take their turns. Rolling initiative marks the start of an encounter. More often than not, you’ll roll initiative when you enter a battle.

Typically, you’ll roll a Perception check to determine your initiative—the more aware you are of your surroundings, the more quickly you can respond. Sometimes, though, the DM might call on you to roll some other type of check. For instance, if you were hiding at the start of the encounter, you’d roll a Stealth check. A sudden event requiring quick reactions could call for a Dexterity check. And a social encounter could call for a Deception or Diplomacy check.

It is common for individuals to coordinate their actions and act as a Unit. You may choose to pair up with other characters into a Unit before rolling initiative. If you do so, make a single initiative check for all characters in the Unit, using the lowest check bonus of all characters in the Unit. It is also possible to group up with other characters during the course of combat by using the Delay action.

The DM rolls initiative for anyone other than the player characters in the encounter. The DM may roll initiative for each NPC individually, or may group them into Units and roll one initiative for each Unit.

Unlike a typical check, where the result is compared to a DC, the results of initiative rolls are ranked. This ranking sets the order in which the encounter’s participants act—the initiative order. The character or Unit with the highest result goes first. The second highest follows, and so on until whoever had the lowest result takes their turn last.

If your result is tied with a foe’s result, the adversary goes first. If your result is tied with another PC’s, you can decide between yourselves who goes first when you reach that place in the initiative order. After that, your places in the
initiative order only changes as the result of specific actions.

Step 3: Play a Round

A round begins when the participant with the highest initiative roll result starts their turn, and it ends when the one with the lowest initiative ends their turn. The process of taking a turn is detailed below. Creatures might also act
outside their turns with reactions and free actions.

Step 4: Begin the Next Round

Once everyone in the encounter has taken a turn, the round is over and the next one begins. Don’t roll initiative again; the new round proceeds in the same order as the previous one, repeating the cycle until the encounter ends.

Step 5: End the Encounter

When your foes are defeated, some sort of truce is reached, or some other event or circumstance ends the combat, the encounter is over. Not all foes need to be defeated for an encounter to end; the DM typically decides to end the encounter when the player characters are clearly winning and it is no longer interesting to resolve the last steps in great detail. You and the other participants no longer follow the initiative order, and a more free-form style of play resumes, with the game typically moving into exploration mode. Sometimes at the end of an encounter, the DM will award Experience Points to the party or you’ll find treasure to divvy up.

Turns

When it’s your turn to act, you can use single actions (◆), short activities (◆◆ and ◆◆◆), reactions (⤾), and free actions (◇). When you’re finished, your turn ends and the character next in the initiative order begins their turn. Sometimes it’s important to note when during your turn something happens, so a turn is divided into three steps.

Step 1: Start Your Turn

Many things happen automatically at the start of your turn—it’s a common point for tracking the passage of time for effects that last multiple rounds. If you are acting as part of a Unit, all characters in the Unit start their turns simultaneously. At the start of each of your turns, take these steps in any order you choose:

If you created an effect lasting for a certain number of rounds, reduce the number of rounds remaining by 1. The effect ends if the duration is reduced to 0. For example, if you cast a spell that lasts 3 rounds on yourself during your first turn of a fight, it would affect you during that turn, decrease to 2 rounds of duration at the start of your second turn, decrease to 1 round of duration at the start of your third turn, and expire at the start of your fourth turn.
You can use 1 free action or reaction with a trigger of “Your turn begins” or something similar.
If you’re dying, (TBD).
Do anything else that is specified to happen at the start of your turn, such as regaining Hit Points from fast healing or regeneration.

The last step of starting your turn is always the same:

Regain your 3 actions and 1 reaction. If you haven’t spent your reaction from your last turn, you lose it—you can’t “save” actions or reactions from one turn to use during the next turn. Some abilities or conditions (such as quickened, slowed, and stunned) can change how many actions you regain and whether you regain your reaction. If you lose actions and gain additional actions (such as if you’re both quickened and slowed), you choose which actions to lose – see Gaining and Losing Actions.

Step 2: Act

You can use actions in any order you wish during your turn, but you have to complete one action or activity before beginning another; for example, you can’t use a single action in the middle of performing a 2-action activity. What actions you can use often depend on your class features, skills, feats, and items, but there are default actions anyone can use, described in Basic Actions. Some effects might prevent you from acting. If you can’t act, you can’t use any actions, including reactions and free actions.

If you are acting as part of a Unit, you can freely intermix your actions with those of other characters in the Unit. For example, you could Stride to move out of a hallway, then your ally in the Unit could cast a lighting bolt spell down the hallway, then you could Stride to move back into your original position. Each character must complete one action or activity before another character begins their action.

If you begin a 2-action or 3-action activity on your turn, you must be able to complete it on your turn unless the action specifically says otherwise (for example, Channeling a Spell). You can’t, for example, begin to High Jump using your final action on one turn and then complete it as your first action on
your next turn.

Once all characters in your Unit have spent all 3 of their actions, your turn ends and the next creature or Unit’s turn begins. You can, however, use only some of your actions and end your turn early. As soon as your turn ends, you lose all your remaining actions, but not your reaction or your ability to use free actions.

Step 3: End Your Turn

Once you’ve done all the things you want to do with the actions you have available, you reach the end of your turn. If you are acting as part of a Unit, all characters in the Unit end their turns simultaneously. Take the following steps in any order you choose. Play then proceeds to the next creature or Unit in the initiative order.

End any effects that last until the end of your turn. For example, spells with a sustained duration end at the end of your turn unless you used the Sustain a Spell action during your turn to extend them. Some effects caused by enemies might also last through a certain number of your turns, and you decrease the remaining duration by 1 during this step, ending the effect if its duration is reduced to 0.
If you have a persistent damage condition, you take the damage at this point. After you take the damage, you can attempt the flat check to end the persistent damage. You then attempt any saving throws for ongoing afflictions. Many other conditions change at the end of your turn, such as the frightened condition decreasing in severity. These take place after you’ve taken any persistent damage, attempted flat checks to end the persistent damage, and attempted saves against any afflictions.
You can use 1 free action or reaction with a trigger of “Your turn ends” or something similar.
Resolve anything else specified to happen at the end of your turn.

Units

Groups of characters can choose to coordinate their actions and act as a unit in the initiative order. A unit acts as a single entity in the initiative order, starting their turns, taking their actions, and ending their turns together. Effects that change a character’s position in the initiative order (such as the Delay action) cannot split a Unit – the character’s new initiative position is either before or after the Unit.

Joining a Unit: Using the Delay action, you can delay your position in the initiative order to join with a friendly Unit. While Delaying, you can merge with the Unit as a free action triggered by the start of the Unit’s turn.

Leaving a Unit: If you use the Delay action while part of a Unit, you are no longer part of that Unit.

Actions

You affect the world around you primarily by using actions, which produce effects. There are four types of actions: single actions, activities, reactions, and free actions.

These icons appear in stat blocks as shorthand for each type of action:
◆ Single Action
◆◆ Two-Action Activity
◆◆◆ Three-Action Activity
⤾ Reaction
◇ Free Action

Single actions can be completed in a very short time. They’re self-contained, and their effects are generated within the span of that single action. During an encounter, you get 3 actions at the beginning of your turn, which you can use as described here.

Activities usually take longer and require using multiple actions, which must be spent in succession. Stride is a single action, but Sudden Charge is an activity in which you use both the Stride and Strike actions to generate its effect.

Reactions have triggers, which must be met for you to use the reaction. You can use a reaction anytime its trigger is met, whether it’s your turn or not. In an encounter, you get 1 reaction each round, which you can use as described here. Reactions are usually triggered by other creatures or by events outside your control.

Free actions don’t cost you any of your actions per turn, nor do they cost your reaction. A free action with no trigger follows the same rules as a single action (except the action cost), and a free action with a trigger follows the same rules as a reaction (except the reaction cost). You can use multiple free actions per turn, within reason. The DM may limit the use of excessive free actions.

Activities

An activity typically involves using multiple actions to create an effect greater than you can produce with a single action, or combining multiple single actions to produce an effect that’s different from merely the sum of those actions. In some cases, usually when spellcasting, an activity can consist of only 1 action, 1 reaction, or even 1 free action.

An activity might cause you to use specific actions within it. You don’t have to spend additional actions to perform them—they’re already factored into the activity’s required actions. (See Subordinate Actions on page 462.)

You generally have to spend all the actions of an activity at once to gain its effects (see Channeling a Spell for an exception). In an encounter, this means you must complete it during your turn. If an activity gets interrupted or disrupted, you lose all the actions you committed to it.

Simultaneous Actions

You can use only one single action, activity, or free action that doesn’t have a trigger at a time. You must complete one before beginning another. For example, the Sudden Charge activity states you must Stride twice and then Strike, so you couldn’t use an Interact action to open a door in the middle of the movement, nor could you perform part of the move, make your attack, and then finish the move. Free actions with triggers and reactions work differently. You can use these whenever the trigger occurs, even if the trigger occurs in the middle of another action.

Subordinate Actions

An action might allow you to use a simpler action—usually one of the Basic Actions on page 469—in a different circumstance or with different effects. This subordinate action still has its normal traits and effects, but is modified in any ways listed in the larger action. For example, an activity that tells you to Stride up to half your Speed alters the normal distance you can move in a Stride. The Stride would still have the move trait, would still trigger reactions that occur based on movement, and so on. The subordinate action doesn’t gain any of the traits of the larger action unless specified. The action that allows you to use a subordinate action doesn’t require you to spend more actions or reactions to do so; that cost is already factored in.

Using an activity is not the same as using any of its subordinate actions. For example, the quickened condition you get from the haste spell lets you spend an extra action each turn to Stride or Strike, but you couldn’t use the extra action for an activity that includes a Stride or Strike. As another example, if you used an action that specified, “If the next action you use is a Strike,” an activity that includes a Strike wouldn’t count, because the next thing you are doing is starting an activity, not using the Strike basic action.

Actions with Triggers

You can use free actions that have triggers and reactions only in response to certain events. Each such reaction and free action lists the trigger that must happen for you to perform it. When its trigger is satisfied—and only when it is satisfied—you can use the reaction or free action, though you don’t have to use the action if you don’t want to.

There are only a few basic reactions and free actions that all characters can use. You’re more likely to gain actions with triggers from your class, feats, and magic items.

Limitations on Triggers

The triggers listed in the stat blocks of reactions and some free actions limit when you can use those actions. You can use only one action in response to a given trigger. For example, if you had a reaction and a free action that both had a trigger of “your turn begins,” you could use either of them at the start of your turn—but not both. If two triggers are similar, but not identical, the DM determines whether you can use one action in response to each or whether
they’re effectively the same thing. Usually, this decision will be based on what’s happening in the narrative.

This limitation of one action per trigger is per creature; more than one creature can use a reaction or free action in response to a given trigger.

TODO: figure out what happens in a race condition where multiple creatures respond to the same trigger

Other Actions

Sometimes you need to attempt something not already covered by defined actions in the game. When this happens, the rules tell you how many actions you need to spend, as well as any traits your action might have. For example, a spell that lets you switch targets might say you can do so “by spending a single action, which has the concentrate trait.” The DM can also use this approach when a character tries to do something that isn’t covered in the rules.

Gaining and Losing Actions

Conditions can change the number of actions you can use on your turn, or whether you can use actions at all. The slowed condition, for example, causes you to lose actions, while the quickened condition causes you to gain them. (see Conditions). See Start Your Turn. In brief, these conditions alter how many actions you regain at the start of your turn; thus, gaining the condition in the middle of your turn doesn’t adjust your number of actions on that turn. Whenever you lose a number of actions—whether from these conditions or in any other way—you choose which to lose if there’s any difference between them. For instance, the haste spell makes you quickened, but it limits what you can use your extra action to do. If you lost an action while haste was active, you might want to lose the action from haste first, since it’s more limited than your normal actions.

Some conditions prevent you from taking a certain subset of actions, typically reactions. Other conditions simply say you can’t act. When you can’t act, you’re unable to take any actions at all. Unlike slowed or stunned, these don’t change the number of actions you regain; they just prevent you from using them. That means if you are somehow cured of paralysis on your turn, you can act immediately.

Disrupting Actions

Various abilities and conditions, such as an Attack of Opportunity, can disrupt an action. When an action is disrupted, you still use the actions or reactions you committed and you still expend any costs, but the action’s effects don’t occur. In the case of an activity, you usually lose all actions spent for the activity up through the end of that turn. For instance, if you began a Cast a Spell activity requiring 3 actions and the first action was disrupted, you lose all 3 actions that you committed to that activity.

The DM decides what effects a disruption causes beyond simply negating the effects that would have occurred from the disrupted action. For instance, a Leap disrupted midway wouldn’t transport you back to the start of your jump, and a disrupted item hand off might cause the item to fall to the ground instead of staying in the hand of the creature who was trying to give it away.

Miscellaneous Rules

Hit Points, Healing, and Dying

All creatures and objects have Hit Points (HP). Your maximum Hit Point value represents your health, wherewithal, and heroic drive when you are in good health and rested. Your maximum Hit Points include the Hit Points you gain at 1st level from your ancestry and class, those you gain at higher levels from your class, and any you gain from other sources (like the Toughness general feat). When you take damage, you reduce your current Hit Points by a number equal to the damage dealt.

Some spells, items, and other effects, as well as simply resting, can heal living or undead creatures. When you are healed, you regain Hit Points equal to the amount healed, up to your maximum Hit Points.

Temporary Hit Points

Many effects, including most mid-battle healing, grant temporary boosts to your hit points, representing morale, adrenaline, shielding magic, or other temporary effects to keep you on your feet.

Multiple attack penalty

Range penalty

Armor Class

Spell Attack Rolls

Perception

Damage, temporary hp, and resistances

Conditions

Effects

Duration

Range and Reach

Targets

Areas

Counteracting

Hit Points, Healing, and Dying

Movement

Perception (light, concealment)

Stealth

Hero Points (inspiration?)

Encounter Structure

Basic Actions

Encounter Movement

Terrain

Flanking

Cover