Topic: Questions about Waiting Action in Arms Law

[R?che]

Under the example on Pg 30, Arms Law it talks about the Waiting Action; however, I am unable to find reference to this anywhere else in the book.  I am curious what the original intent was, as it comes up often in our games that someone is going to wait for a specific event to happen before reacting.

Is there general guidelines on how the Waiting Action works, does the character declare his intent and the amount of the round he wishes to spend on the action and then it happens when the specified trigger happens?  Does this supersede initiative rolls?  Is thee any penalty other than losing the action if the trigger event doesn't occur?

Thanks,

~T

[Marc R]

Waiting Action was originally supposed to replace "Opportunity Actions". . .. but with the new round structure, they really ended up being more limiting than beneficial.

A player controlling the ogre used in the example, could merely state "For my first action I spend 10% activity looking around." keep repeating until something happens you want to react to.

[Rasyr-Mjolnir]

LM is correct. The "Waiting Action" was officially cut because of issues, but apparently we missed the reference.

However, a potentially good way of handling it would be as follows:

Waiting Action - a declaration of an action that is triggered by a specified event. The "Triggered Action" (TA) must be one that is able to be completed within a single round. Declaring a Waiting Action requires 10% activity. The TA cannot require more than 90% activity.

The character basically does nothing until and unless the trigger even occurs. The character will act outside of the normal initiative order for resolving the TA. The TA happens AFTER the trigger event, not simultaneously, nor before.

If the trigger event does not occur before the end of the round, the character may continue waiting for it. In this case, he may increase the percentage activity for the TA to 100%

If the character cancels a Waiting Action before it completes, his remaining activity percentage will be equal to either 80% (if the Waiting Action is canceled before the 50% breakpoint) or 40% (if canceled AFTER the 50% breakpoint.

That should handle things nicely...

[Marc R]

That seems about right, it would prevent abusive activity hording. (i.e. saying "I spend 10% activity waiting to attack", waiting until everyone is spent out, then using your 90% remaining activity.)

For more on opportunity actions, take a look at the RM2 activity round file:

http://www.ironcrown.com/ICEforums/index.php?action=tpmod;dl=item578

That should explain what an Opportunity Action is, and why it was more necissary under the old fixed phase activity sequence.

[R?che]

Thanks.  I like the suggestions and probably will run with that.

~T