Defense Checks

You don’t have to outrun the bear. You just have to outrun the fool next to you.

After the party is done with each character’s activation, the GM describes what the adversaries will do and calls for defense checks from all characters in danger, which are all rolled simultaneously.

The defense check is not an action, so everyone is allowed to roll. It works just like a check, and you can only perform defensive maneuvers with any [+] generated, such as protecting or covering.

The GM decides which skill should be used as a defense goal (usually from the Movement, Perception or Warfare skill trees) depending on the nature of the danger, sometimes assigning different skills to each player and allowing some to choose between multiple skills. The consequences for each player are then resolved depending on the results:

Defense Roll Result

ROLL	RESULT
Success with at least 1[+]	SAFE AND SOUND	As it sounds, you avoid the danger completely and can start to plan your next move.
Success with no [+]	BARELY SAFE	When you roll a success, you have avoided the bulk of what you’re defending against and won’t receive any damage, but maybe you lose your balance, have bullets and shrapnel flying all around you, or your adversary cuts the distance and is suddenly up in your face. The GM assigns you a negative aspect that will affect your next verse or even become a disadvantage when you try to end the conflict.
Failure	WOUNDED	Receive damage depending on how the other players rolled. The highest damage among those of all adversary types is dealt to the player who failed with the highest roll, the second-highest damage to the second-highest failed roll, and so on.
Botch	BADLY WOUNDED	Resolve in the same way as a failure, but your armor is ignored and you lose [HP] immediately, which could kill you on the spot.