INITIATIVE

A character's Initiative modifier indicates how likely they are to give their side an edge when a conflict begins.

• At the start of each conflict, the Player Characters perform an Initiative Group Check: this is a Group Check (see page 50) that relies on Dexterity and Insight.
• The Difficulty Level for the leader's Check is equal to the highest Initiative Score among the heroes' adversaries; supporting characters perform their Support Check against the standard Difficulty Level of 10.
• Whether you act as the leader or as a supporting character in this Group Check, remember to apply your Initiative modifier to your Result.

If the leader succeeds, this means the heroes seized initiative for this conflict and the first participant to act during each round will be someone from the Player Characters' side; if they fail, it means they have lost the initiative for this conflict and the first participant to act during each round will be one of their foes.

See the next page for an explanation of rounds and turns.

Example:

The warrior monk Silida and the mage Ricard are exploring the ruins of an old waterway when they come across a bronze golem (page 330) barring their way!

The Game Master calls for an Initiative Group Check, and Ricard is happy to have Silida be the leader. She only rolls a 6, but Ricard's Check is a 12 (even taking into account the -2 penalty caused by the armor he is wearing). Silida's total is now 7, which is enough to reach the golem's initiative score!

The Player Characters have seized the initiative, which means the first turn of each round will belong to either Silida or Ricard.

Note that even if a new participant joins an ongoing conflict scene, they will simply adapt to the existing initiative.