Iron Kingdoms help

[Saint Jimmy]

Does anyone know how HP and damage work in Iron Kingdoms? I am going to start playing it with some friends and acquaintances, but no one can really figure that out. I know about health spirals, but dont get how they work. Likewise, I know you roll d6s for damage, but I don't know how many you roll. Please help!

[Iceheart2112]

It looks like when you hit them and they take damage you roll a d6 to see which part of the spiral takes the damage. So if they took 3 points of damage you'd roll a d6 (with 1-2 being physique, 3-4 being agility, and 5-6 intellect) and apply the damage to that part of the spiral

[Saint Jimmy]

Alright, thanks

[malachi]

If your attack hits, you roll 2d6+POW to determine how much damage your attack does, and if the target has a life spiral (important non-'jack targets) or a damage grid ('jacks) you roll 1d6 to determine which column/branch you start damaging. When you get to the bottom of one column/branch, damage flows into the next one. The bottom two VIT of each branch of a life spiral (shared by 1-2, 3-4, and 5-6) only get filled in after all of the other VIT in that branch are filled in.

For damage (and most other rolls), you roll 2d6 as a default. Certain abilities will cause you to roll more dice.
For instance, charging will boost your melee damage roll, which adds a d6. If you have multiple effects that boost the same roll, you still only get the 1 extra die.
They Mighty archetype adds an additional die to melee damage rolls. As this is separate from boosting, you can have any number of additional dice.
Other effects, like the Skilled archetype ability Virtuoso or the spell Hand of Fate, add an additional die and remove the lowest. You can have any number of these effects.

2 examples:
Alex is a Warcaster with a bonded great-axe, and can spend focus to boost attack and damage rolls.
Bob is a Mighty character with a great-axe.

If Alex attacks an enemy with his great-axe, he can choose to boost the attack roll or not. If he spends a focus to boost, he'll roll 3d6+MAT on the attack, otherwise he'll just roll 2d6+MAT.
If Alex hits, he can choose to boost the damage roll or not (it will be automatically boosted if he charged). If his attack was a crit, he will roll an additional die of damage because of the qualities of the great-axe. He can roll between 2d6+P+S (if he didn't charge/spend focus/crit) to 4d6+P+S (if he had a crit and either charged or boosted with focus).

When Bob attacks an enemy with his great-axe, he cannot choose to boost the attack roll, so he will roll 2d6+MAT.
If Bob hits, his damage roll will be boosted if he charged. If he crits, he'll roll an additional die of damage because of the qualities of a great-axe. Since he is mighty, all of his melee attacks gain an additional die. He can roll between 3d6+P+S (if he didn't charge or crit) to 5d6+P+S (if he charged and got a crit).

Does that answer your questions?

[Saint Jimmy]

Yes it does, but can Alex boost his focus and charge or can he only do one? Other then that it was great, thanks a lot.

[malachi]

If Alex charges, he deals 3d6+P+S damage on a hit. (Or 4d6+P+S on a crit)
If Alex walks up and uses focus to boost damage, he deals 3d6+P+S damage on a hit. (Or 4d6+P+S on a crit)
If Alex charges and uses a focus to boost damage, he deals 3d6+P+S damage on a hit. (Or 4d6+P+S on a crit)

If Alex has 4 FOCUS, one of his many options for attacking on his turn could be:
Charge, spend a focus to boost the attack. 3d6+MAT to hit, 3d6+P+S for dmg. (Or 4d6+P+S on a crit)
Spend a focus to buy an attack. Spend 1 focus to boost the attack and, on a hit, spend another to boost the damage. 3d6+MAT to hit, 3d6+P+S for dmg. (Or 4d6+P+S on a crit)

You cannot get the benefit of multiple boosts on a single die roll, but nothing prevents you from boosting multiple die rolls that are part of the same action (as in the case of his second attack, where Alex boosted both the attack roll and the damage roll).

And for critting, just remember that while rolling all 6's on an attack roll is an automatic success, a crit is any time that you roll at least 2 dice with the same value and succeed on the check. Rolling the same number of the damage roll of an attack is not a crit, though. So adding dice to an attack/skill makes it more likely to crit, and more likely to succeed.

[Saint Jimmy]

Ok, thanks

[ShadowFighter15]

Simple rule with boosting - you can boost as many rolls as your abilities allow you, but each individual roll can only be boosted once.

However, there are abilities that specify that the roll gets an additional dice. It has the same effect as Boosting, but there's no upper limit and it can be combined with boosting.

So if a Mighty character charges someone, the damage roll would be boosted to 3d6+P+S, but the Archetype bonus from Mighty adds an additional die to the roll, so he'd be hitting at 4d6+P+S.