Almost had this happen the other night. A heated DoW with threats of blood. Ends with a compromise. Both characters already had weapons drawn.
If one character then wants to go for blood, should there be any tests to see if the aggressor gets the drop on the other dude? Any steel tests for surprise maybe?
Are the Murder Most Foul and Honor Besmirched rules on page 401 of any use?
Also note that, if it wasn’t a tie, the Shocking Defeat rule obtains (p. 400), which can help set up the available choices for using those drawn swords.
Well, I knew it would fall under Murder Most Foul. I had told him that it was really the only way out of a DoW result. He was just asking if it was possible to get the drop on someone immediately after a DoW by surprise them with a knife strike out of the blue or something. we didn’t go that direction but it got me to wondering mechanically how to determine it. He felt he should get some sort of chance to cause surprise if he waited for the dude to turn and leave and then shiv him.
Ah, that would have worked Alexander. The player actually won the DoW, but with a major compromise. He teetered on the brink of murder but decided against it. But Shocking Defeat would have had it covered for what I’m talking about, thanks for reminding me of that!