VI - Combat

A - Turns
The game is divided up into turns, and each turn lasts 1 second. During most of the gameplay, this will be irrelevant, but in combat, or when split-second operations are taking place, the concept comes into play.

What a character can do in a turn depends on it's speed. See the following list:

Speed	1	Attacks	1 time every 6 turns.
	2		1 time every 4 turns.
	3		1 time every 3 turns.
	4		1 time every 2 turns.
	5		1 time every turn.
	6		1 time every turn.
	7		1 time every turn, 2 times every 3 turns.
	8		1 time every turn, 2 times every 2 turns.
	9		2 times every turn.
	10		2 times every turn, 3 times every 3 turns.
	11		2 times every turn, 3 times every 2 turns.
	12		3 times every turn.

Be sure to remember how often your character attacks, so you won't have to keep looking it up.

When two creatures attack in the same turn, first the players will announce what the creatures will attempt to do in that turn, and then one die will be rolled for each creature. The creatures will then move in the order that they rolled. If two of the rolls are the same, the characters move simultaneously.

Any character may attempt to dodge any attack, but by doing so, the character sacrifices its next attack, and cannot dodge again until after it was supposed to attack. For a character with a speed of 9, this is hardly an inconvenience, as he can attempt to dodge a blow, and still attack in the same turn. However, if a character of 4 sees a blow coming in the first turn of a fight, and chooses to dodge, he will do so, but will not attack in two turns as he would normally, and will have to wait until his next attack in the fourth turn.
Dodging doubles a character's Speed against the attack he is dodging, and against no other attacks.

Many actions are roughly equivalent to attacking, but some are not. Here are some examples of some common actions, and how many attacks they would take the same time as.

1 attack:. Open a door, drink vial, pull item out of purse, remove pack.
2 attacks: Unlock/lock a door, put on pack.
3 attacks: Pull item out of pack.
4 attacks: Tie/untie rope, strap, etc.

B - Attacking
To attack a creature, roll 1 die. To hit it, you must successfully roll less than your Attack, less the Speed of what you are trying to hit. Since it is the Manager's responsibility to keep track of creatures, he will usually be keeping track of things attacked by the party (unless they are quarreling among themselves, or one is playing a bad guy, due to an Enslave Spell or something similar).
Note that any creature or object that is not moving at all, is considered to have a Speed of 0.
Say a character is attacking a ghini. The Manager knows that the character has an Attack of 9, and the ghini's Speed is 4. 9 less 4 is 5, so the character must roll 5 or less. Usually the Manager will not need to convey all this information to the player. He will simply watch and report the results. If the player rolls a 3, he will tell that player that the character has successfully hit the ghini. If he roles a 6, he will say that the character has missed.
What happens if a character misses with a missile weapon (bows, magical bolts, etc.) is more or less up to the Manager. If there are characters or creatures behind the target, they stand a chance of getting hit, but not a very good one, since the missile was not aimed at them. All such "rogue" missiles can be considered to have an Attack of 7, which means that they should be easily avoided by most creatures.

Optional Rule: If you prefer to add a bit more chaos to the game, you could use the rule that all Attacks be rolled, whether the character has a chance to miss or not. If a 6 is ever rolled, roll again, and if you get another 6, the character misses because he tripped, or was dazzled by sunlight for an instant, pulled a muscle, etc. Similarly, you could opt to roll for characters that have no chance at all to hit (defending Speed is 5 or more greater than attacking Attack), and re-roll if it comes up 1. If you roll another 1, the character hit by pure luck, because the opponent tripped in fell into the weapon, or pulled a muscle and couldn't move properly to avoid the blow, etc.

C - Shields
A character with the Shield skill using a shield can hold it in front of him to catch blows during any turn in which it is not attacking. During a turn in which the character attacks, the shield is dropped.
If a character sees an attack coming from a direction in which he is not blocking, he can sacrifice his next attack in order to turn the shield to block it, but he will stay facing that direction until the turn in which he would have attacked.
A character without the Shield skill trying to use a shield must roll 1 die each time he attempts to block a blow from the direction he is facing. (Such a character cannot block blows from other directions.) If he rolls higher than the Attack (less penalties) of the attack he is attempting to block, the block will be successful. Otherwise, the shield has no effect.
(Note: You must declare, at the start of the turn, which creature you are blocking missiles from, or your character will be assumed to have the shield dropped.)

D - Darkness
Ill-prepared or surprised characters may find themselves in dark environments. How dark is "dark" depends highly on the Manager's interpretation, but generally, caves are considered to be dark, and other terrains are not.
It is interesting to note that the Valley of Death on the largest island in Hyrule is always dark because the volcanic ash that rises from that hellish place blots out the sun except during the strongest of winds.
Creatures fighting in darkness (except for creatures that can see in the dark, noted in the individual descriptions) lose two points of Speed and Attack, cannot dodge, and use all missile weapons at Attack 7. They cannot see more than 10 feet in front of themselves, and cannot read or write legibly.
Characters cannot use shields in darkness unless they have the Shield skill. Characters competently using shields use them as though they did not have the Shield skill as described above in C - Shields.

E - Awakening
If a character is asleep when something loud or exciting happens near it, roll one die. On a roll of 1-3, the character wakes up, and takes stock of its surroundings. On a roll of 4-5, the character half wakes up, and does not fully realize what is going on. In this state, the character can hear, but cannot see. On a roll of 6, the character sleeps on. Re-roll every time something interesting happens in the room.
Any sleeping character will immediately be fully awake if it is attacked in any way.

The Hyrule role playing game is made by Krystofor Goldensword (a fan), for all Zelda fans who have any imagination, and care to use it.

The Legend of Zelda, The Adventure of Link, A Link to the Past, Link's Awakening, The Ocarina of Time, Majora's Mask, and the characters Link, Zelda, Impa, and all other persons, places, and things in Hyrule, as well as the land of Hyrule, itself, are copyright Nintendo of America, Inc. Krystofor claims no rights for the materials, and this game may not be used for profit in any way.