Combat
Peacemaking
Peacemaking stops a monster attacking outright for a while, which is a stronger thing than it sounds: for that window the fight is entirely one-sided. The catch is that hitting it can snap it out of the calm, so the opening is for the party to set up in rather than for you to spend swinging. It is at its best played into a group, where one person losing a turn buys everyone else several safe ones.
How hard each monster is to calm
The tougher the monster, the more skill it takes before your songs land reliably — and the top three tiers never become a certainty at all. The skill here is the skill your INSTRUMENT lets you play at (see the next table): the Grandmaster column is a Grandmaster on Valiwood. The last column is the hard ceiling on GAIN: play to a monster of that tier and your Peacemaking trains exactly as far as that tier can teach you, then stops. Training past it means finding something worse.
| Monster | 90% chance at | Never fails at | Grandmaster on Valiwood | Trains you to |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Trivial | 10.0 | 20.0 | 100% | 20.0 |
| Easy | 20.0 | 30.0 | 100% | 30.0 |
| Moderate | 30.0 | 40.0 | 100% | 40.0 |
| Challenging | 40.0 | 50.0 | 100% | 50.0 |
| Tough | 50.0 | 60.0 | 100% | 60.0 |
| Dangerous | 60.0 | 70.0 | 100% | 70.0 |
| Deadly | 70.0 | Never | 97% | 80.0 |
| Lethal | 80.0 | Never | 95% | 90.0 |
| Legendary | Never | Never | 70% | 100.0 |
What your instrument lets you play at
The wood caps how well your songs land, whatever your skill: Valiwood plays up to a full 100, each wood below it 11 less, and Blackwood a little past 100. A novice on a plain lute loses nothing until their skill outgrows it — then the next wood is what they need. The chances are a Grandmaster calming each kind of monster.
| Wood | Plays up to | Tough | Deadly | Lethal | Legendary |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wood | 12 | 30% | 20% | 16% | 10% |
| Dullwood | 23 | 47% | 33% | 28% | 17% |
| Shadowwood | 34 | 65% | 46% | 40% | 24% |
| Copperwood | 45 | 82% | 60% | 52% | 31% |
| Bronzewood | 56 | 96% | 73% | 64% | 38% |
| Goldwood | 67 | 100% | 86% | 76% | 45% |
| Agawood | 78 | 100% | 92% | 88% | 52% |
| Veriwood | 89 | 100% | 94% | 92% | 59% |
| Valiwood | 100 | 100% | 97% | 95% | 70% |
| Blackwood | 111 (past Grandmaster) | 100% | 98% | 96% | 75% |
What a calm buys you
- How long it holds
- 12 seconds, or until something hits the monster
- Chance a 20-damage hit breaks it at 0 skill
- 50%
- At 100 skill
- 20%
- Bigger or smaller hits
- The chance scales with the damage: half the damage is half the chance, double is double, up to 95%. A 3-point punch at 100 skill is 3%; a 35-point spell at 0 skill is 87.5%
- What counts as a hit
- Weapon swings, bare fists and damaging spells alike
- Who can break it
- Any party member landing a hit — your own bare-handed swings included
- While it holds
- The monster does not swing, cast, breathe or throw rocks — and a spell or rock it was winding up is broken off
- When it breaks
- The monster must wind up a fresh swing, it does not hit instantly
- Enrage
- 33% of broken calms wake the monster in a rage: it turns red, hits 25% harder and attacks 50% faster for 10 seconds