The cold autumn wind whistles through the oak trees around the clearing, sending a spray of leaves washing against your booted heels. Krynn's solitary moon casts its eery, pale light down from the glittering heavens, and drenches the forest in unnatural light. A chilling silence blankets the land, only broken by the occasional cracking of leaves by your booted feet. A louder crunch shatters the fragile silence with the power of a thunderbolt.
You hurridly grab your hoopak as a roaring goblin leaps into the clearing. As the goblin's rusty hatchet begins its savage arc down towards your head, you react with a speed borne of terror.
"Sorry," your Narrator says. "Your kender gets hit. That's five damage."
"Wait," you protest. "How's that possible? I played a 8!"
"Well, your Endurance score is only 4. The goblin hits."
You look forlornly at your 4 Endurance, and then at your 10 Agility. Grumbling, you hand over your last card from your Hand of Fate to the Narrator, who looks quite smug with his hand on he rulebook.
How many times has your kender hero been stuck in this compromising situation? Or how many times has your minotaur hero been brought down an arrow simply because he wasn't agile enough to dodge? Well, now I've developed two simple, optional rules that will allow greater flexibility in combat.
The creators of the Saga rules system made melee attacks opposed by Endurance, and missile attacks opposed by Agilty. However, this overlooks certain aspects of warfare. For instance, someone can dodge a melee attack rather than try t fend it off, or one might wade through a storm of arrows with his shield rather than try to dodge them. However, these technique are harder to implement than conventional defenses. Dodging an enemy whose swinging his sword at you is harder than just raising your shield to defend, while dodging an arrow is easier than trying to block it wth your shield.
Therefore, a hero who wants to dodge a melee attack can attempt to make an average Agility(Strength) action. A penalty equal to the hero's defense rating is applied to the action. Therefore, if a kender who wears leather armor and no shield wants to dodge a goblin's swing, he must succeed in an average Agility(Strength) action with a -2 penalty.
A hero who wants to fend off a missile attack can attempt an average Endurance(Dexterity) action. As penalty equal to 5 plus the hero's Defense rating is applied to the action. The penalty can never be greater than zero. Therefore, a knight wearing plate mail and carrying a buckler can fend off an arrow attack with an average Endurance(Dexterity) action with a -0 penalty.
Note that magical bonuses do not help or hinder these actions.
