Combat

The RTFM combat system of Icesus has been under development since 1996. RTFM stands for Realistic Time Fragment Management — every action in a fight costs a slice of your character's attention, and the trick is spending those slices wisely. The system has been rewritten twice and grown deep enough to keep veterans busy, but the basics fit on one page and that page is this one.

Read this once before your first serious fight. Most newbie deaths come from one of three places: not knowing what your hit points actually mean, not setting a wimpy, or never assigning combat points to attack.

Basic Terms

Hit Points

Hit points represent the vitality and constitution of the character. All hits cause damage and reduce hit points. When hit points drop to zero, the character dies. If they drop very low, the character usually falls unconscious before bleeding to death. Larger races are naturally tougher and have more hit points than smaller ones.

To get constant updates on your health, turn the HP monitor on with mon on. You can also set the monitor to report your shape to all other party members with mon party. Adjusting your prompt with the prompt command also helps. See Prompt.

To check the shape of an opponent without spamming look, use shape. There's a global alias x for it. To see every fighter in the room, type shape all; to include non-combatants, shape livings.

Endurance Points

Endurance points represent determination, physical prowess, and resistance to exhaustion. They are spent during combat — especially on combat maneuvers — and chip away under hard hits. If endurance drops to zero, the character is totally exhausted and takes damage from moving. Drop below zero and any tiring activity risks a heart attack and instant death.

Spell Points

Spell points represent magical knowledge and control. They are spent casting spells. If they drop very low, the character is mentally exhausted, and endurance, strength, hit-point and endurance-point maximums all fall — a dangerous spiral.

Healing and Regenerating Lost Points

Regaining hp, ep and sp is easy: stay in one place and rest. Camp fires and sleeping greatly speed regeneration. The more hurt you are, the slower you heal — flee before your hp drops below a third of your maximum if you can. Building a camp enhances sleep recovery. A friendly air-priest is the fastest way to refill hp and ep. The skill resist exhaustion raises ep regeneration and the endurance maximum.

Combat Points

Each character has a budget of combat points each round, divided between three actions:

• attack — how often you swing
• defence — how often you dodge or parry
• casting — how often you finish spells

Set the split with battle -a <attack>,<defence>,<casting> where each number is bounded by your personal maximum for that category. Type battle to see your current split, your caps, and your active combat style.

Quick presets:

battle -a attack
battle -a defence
battle -a casting

The single most common newbie problem is never assigning attack points and then wondering why nothing is dying. Always check battle first.

Stats and skills grow your budget. Wisdom and intelligence raise the total. Concentrated attack, concentrated defence, and concentrated casting raise the per-category caps. Most combat guilds teach these as you level. See Combat points for the full breakdown.

Combat Styles

A combat style decides how you fight: cautious and defensive, all-out berserk, careful and accurate, and so on. Set yours with combatstyle <name>.

There are twelve styles plus normal default. Each trades some things off for others — fast styles swing more but defend less, defensive styles survive longer but kill slower. Most warrior guilds teach a battle strategy on top of your style, which sharpens the same trade-off. Monks have their own martial arts strategy.

Without the matching strategy, the style still works but at a weaker level than the wiki tables show. See Combat styles for the full table of styles, hit-style mappings, and what each strategy adds on top.

Combat Maneuvers and Momentums

Many guilds teach combat maneuvers — special moves like use strike, use trip, use cleave, and dozens more. Type use to see what you know.

During a fight you may notice a combat momentum — a brief opening that lets you fire a maneuver instantly without paying its full cost. When the momentum message appears, type the maneuver name fast: the window closes in a couple of seconds. With a momentum you can't pick a target or pass options, only fire the basic version of the move.

Triggers (auto-firing momentums) are forbidden. See Triggers and the Rules.

Equipment in Icesus

Better material and quality means a better item. Heavier materials usually cost more and hit harder; lighter ones are faster. See Materials for the full list and trade-offs.

Weapons

Lighter and smaller weapons swing faster. Heavier and larger weapons hit harder. Larger races tend to use larger weapons; the biggest can swing greatswords one-handed. Balance is usually the key.

A common pattern is one weapon for offense and a shield for defense — or two offensive weapons if you can take the hits. See Weapons and Weapon types for the full picture.

Armours

Armours are divided into three classes by weight and encumbrance:

Light Armour

For those who prefer mobility over protection. The protection is modest, but even the lightest armour beats none at all. The best NPC-available light material is chitinium silk — expensive, but excellent.

Medium Armour

The most common protection in Icesus. Heavier than light, but with much better defence. Cheaper than heavy and far lighter — a solid compromise.

Heavy Armour

Plate and the like. The strongest protection, but very heavy, hot, and cumbersome — combat penalties for the unfit, expensive, and uncommon.

Quality

The better the material and quality, the better the protection. Cover head and neck and torso first, and legs for taller races. Type slots to see how well your hit locations are protected. Read Adjectives for the order of protection adjectives. Full overview at Armour.

Damage to Equipment

Equipment can take damage from hard hits. The chance is usually low, and depends on the damage type, the material, and how hard the hit landed. Marking a piece of gear reduces its damage chance. See Equipment damage for the smith breakdown — city smiths handle common materials, player Pro Smiths offer the wider service set, and province workshops do the heavy and rare-material work.

How to Prepare for Combat

The first thing is to get weapons and armour. Most starting characters begin with cheap equipment and a small purse. To benefit from a piece, wear it (wear <item>) or wield it (wield <item>). To wear everything in your inventory at once, wear all.

Weapons can be wielded one-handed or two-handed; two one-handed weapons can be wielded together. Two-handed grip is stronger (fewer fumbles), and lets smaller characters manage larger weapons. To wield in two hands explicitly, wield <item> in right hand,left hand.

Starting Combat

Combat starts the moment you type kill <monster>. Some monsters are aggressive and attack you first.

Generally it's a good idea to open with a combat maneuver — unless you lack the endurance points or expect a long fight where you'll need every point of stamina later.

Fleeing

Fleeing is not easy. Consider getting out of a fight before your shape drops to bad — earlier still if your opponent uses heavy weapons or casts spells.

The speed of fleeing depends on your controlled retreat skill and on luck. In a party, the leader's skill replaces yours (if the leader is a humanoid). Rangers know wilderness retreat for the outworld.

While fleeing, your character forgets attacks and combat maneuvers. The enemy keeps fighting normally and usually scores a few hits before you escape. Switch combat points toward defence when running.

Wimpy

Wimpy is the level of danger you're willing to face before fleeing automatically. The lower it is set, the longer you stay in combat before bailing out. Set it with wimpy <level>:

• off
• very very low
• very low
• low
• normal
• high
• very high

A high wimpy is also good insurance against link issues — if your connection hiccups, your character bolts before something kills it. New characters should set wimpy high until they know what they're doing.

Effects of Statistics

The higher your stats, the more effective your skills are. Some skills have minimum stat requirements for their higher levels — even at maximum skill, raising the stat helps.

Physical stats matter in melee and missile combat:

• Constitution — better resistance to stuns, more hit points
• Strength — more damage, faster and more accurate hits with big weapons, sets the maximum weapon size you can use effectively
• Dexterity — better dodge and parry, faster and more accurate attacks

Use help stats in-game and help skill <skill> to see which stats influence which skills. See Stats.

Effects of Hits and Damage

Normal hits cause damage. Heavier or critical hits can stun and inflict bleeding wounds that drain hp over time. Stunned characters wander randomly — try to stay in one room so you don't get hopelessly lost. Training determination helps avoid stuns.

Bleeding wounds can be treated with the first aid talent and a bandage (or cloth armour). Stop the bleed before it costs more hp. Carry a few bandages.

If you fall unconscious in combat, you are as good as dead unless your party drags you out. Helping unconscious players is done with the revive talent (only usable on other players). Don't hesitate to flee — better to come back later than not at all. Use drag <player> if needed.

Ranged Combat

Missile Weapons

Bows, slings, crossbows and blowguns are a system of their own. They take time and skill to use well. See Ranged weapons for the full guide.

Throwing

You can throw items at opponents with throw <item>. Real damage requires the throwing skill.

Spells

Many guilds teach offensive spells. Mages have the deepest destructive powers. See Magic.

Parties

Parties are an enormous part of Icesus. A solo character can survive — but with a party you can take on what would kill you alone. To find a party, ask on the wanted channel or tell a specific player.

Advantages of a Party

A single enemy can't defend against attacks from two or more opponents at once. Damage gets divided between members, so each takes less than they would solo. The enemy can only attack so many times per round, so defence is easier too. Parties also grant a small experience bonus.

The enemy normally attacks only the front row, so spell-casters and healers behind the tank are usually safe from physical hits.

Formation

A party has up to nine members, three per row. Tanks fill the front row. Healers and priests of air go in the second row. Archers and blasters round out the second or third row.

Party Shares

Experience is not divided evenly. More experienced characters take the larger share, but the inexperienced still gain something even when partied with veterans. Charisma affects share size.

Leadership

The more skilled and charismatic the leader, the better the party runs. Leaders gain extra experience, and a strong leader can grant a small bonus to the rest. The leader's skills decide when and how the party flees. See Partying.

See Also

• Combat points — the attack/defence/casting split
• Combat styles — twelve styles and three battle strategies
• Weapons, Weapon types, Materials
• Armour, Armour types
• Equipment damage — wear, breakage, and repair
• Ranged weapons, Bows
• Magic — spellcasting overview
• Wimpy, Death, Death commands
• Partying, Channels

Useful Commands

A short list of the most common combat-related commands:

kill <monster>
wear <armour>          wield <weapon>
mon on/off             shape (x)
battle                 battle -a   battle -c   battle -m
slots
wimpy <level>
use <maneuver>
help newbie            help adjectives
help skills            help skill <skillname>
help points            help stats   help commands

Many players use aliases to switch between battle settings or fire common maneuvers.