Clutz'O the street sam is caught out in the open alley and lead is sprayed in his direction. He has three IPs and chooses to go on full defense to save his hoop and also decides that's it is his best interest to run to cover behind a dumpster.

As I understand it, he spends a complex action on his upcoming turn to be able to go on full defense so he can add his Dodge dice pool to his reaction in order to duck and cover. Does he still get his full compliment of actions in his next two IPs (i.e can return fire from the safety of cover from the dumpster)?

His run movement rate is broken in three segments for his three IPs. Is he considered running through all three IPs for dice modifier sake or only the first IP?

So, in your example, Clutz'O would use the complex action on his first IP to dodge. He would continue to get the benifits of dodging until his second IP, at which point he is no longer dodging, but once again has a complex action that he can do whatever he wants with (continue dodging, shooting the other guys, whatever).

As for running, the same thing applies. He uses his first IP's free action to run, and continues to run until his second IP, at which point he needs to spend another free action to continue running, take the super free walk action, or simply not move.

Perfect. Thanks K.

A point to note – full defence can be used as an interrupt action to gain the bonus from before the sacrificed action phase up to the subsequent one. Technically you can get as much as two IPs worth of full defense for the loss of just one action (i.e. if you get shot at straight after you've acted).

Another interesting point (not that you asked) is that full defence comes in full dodge (add Dodge vs ranged and melee), full parry (add blades/clubs skill when parrying) and full gymnastics (add Gymnastics vs ranged and melee, even though you can't normally use it in melee) but you can only pick one and that's the one you use until your next action.

Yes, true, you can use interrupt to get roughly 2 IPs worth of protection, but you also suffer 2 IPs worth of '-1 per previous attack since last action', so it is a tradeoff to do things that way.

Is there a benefit to using Dodge, vs. Gymnastics Dodge? It seems Gymnastics is better, as there are various enhancements to it, it's part of a skill group, and its keyed on Agility.

There is no mechanical benefit, though some people will try and give you drek about dodge requires less room. The one benefit is that you can use dodge in melee without a full defense, but you cannot use gymnastic dodge without full defense (And even then, as only one of your two skills, not both of them). The other slight benefit of dodge is that you can spec in melee/ranged dodge, which gives it a nice +2 over gymnastic dodge, but that can be easily negated with reflex recorders and other boosters, and the fact that gymnastics is useful for alot of other things (like jumping)



That part is irrelevant. It is Reaction + Gymnastic dodge for your defense, agility isn't a factor.

Ah! Good to know...I hadn't realized that it was still Reaction for defense.