Nerve

A man can stop fighting before anything stops his body. Every fighter carries nerve, and what happens on the field tests it: a friend going down, a wound he cannot fight through, three enemies round him and nobody beside him. When it goes he runs, and a company whose men are all running or down has lost as surely as one that has been killed.

The five states

Every man starts a battle steady. His nerve moves between five states, usually one step at a time:

The guard figure is added to his defence against every blow and shot aimed at him, so a wavering man is both worse at hitting and easier to hit. The wound chart lists it under Nerve among the other things his condition costs him.

Where you see it

• The Nerve bar in the panel, with the state named beside it.
• On the map, a breaking man has breaking written under him, and a runner has a dashed ring and runs.
• In the order bar, a man who is not steady has his state among the words under his name.
• In the log, every change of state, and beside a drop, what caused it: badly hurt, shot at, surrounded, or seeing a named friend fall or run.
• The Nerve box in the panel, under the All and Nerves tabs. It reads "Keeps their head n% of the time when a friend falls nearby or a grave wound lands", and under it every part that makes up the figure.

The figure is his nerve before whatever frightened him is counted. A friend falling beside him, for instance, is tested at 18 less than the figure shows (see What tests it).

What nerve is made of

The figure in the Nerve box is the sum of these parts, and it never goes below 5 or above 95:

• own nerve: the man's own, rolled when he was mustered, between 35 and 65 for a man. It is the nerve on his muster card. A beast has its kind's; see Who you will meet.
• a fighter's footing: 30, for everyone.
• outnumbering them or outnumbered: 4 for each man his side has more or fewer still fighting, up to 16 either way.
• beset by n: 6 off for every enemy beside him after the first.
• friends at the shoulder: 3 for each friend in a hex beside him, counting two at most.
• better armed or worse armed: the price of his kit against the average price of the enemy still fighting, 1 for every 40 crowns of difference, up to 15 either way. A beast counts as the crowns the muster says it does.
• broken once already: 14 off for every time he has broken in this battle. A man who has run once runs more easily the second time.
• pain: once his pain reaches 8, a quarter of it comes off.
• blood loss: 10 off once he has lost more than 15% of his blood, 20 once he has lost more than a quarter.

Only men still fighting count, on either side. A runner, a dead man and a man down for good stand at nobody's shoulder and add to nobody's numbers.

A man's nerve is worth the most where you can do something about it. Two friends beside him are worth 6 and take away the chance of being caught alone. Every man you lose moves the numbers against every one of your men at once.

What tests it

A test rolls against his nerve, made harder or easier by what happened. If he fails, he drops one state. If he fails by 25 or more, he drops two, which can take a wavering man straight to running.

A grave blow is one that does something a man cannot simply fight on through: cuts a nerve, opens a vessel, reaches an organ, takes a limb off, breaks a bone worse than a crack, puts out an eye or a joint, or leaves his legs unable to bear him. These are the blows the log marks in red, and a blow that only bruises or cuts shallow tests nothing.

A man who only drops senseless from shock, and will come round, is not a fall for this purpose.

Arrows are worth more than the wounds they make: every shaft loosed at a man tests him, including the ones that miss.

What steadies it

• Felling a man. When a man falls, the enemy who felled him gets a chance to rise one state, at his nerve plus 20. Every other man on that side within 4 hexes of the fall gets a chance too, at his nerve less 10. This is how a man becomes confident.
• Getting out of contact. At the start of his turn, a wavering or breaking man with no enemy beside him gets a chance to steady one state, at his nerve less 10. Pulling a shaken man back a hex is often the best thing you can do with him.

A steady man does not become confident by standing still. Only a fall does that.

Breaking and running

When a man's nerve reaches fleeing, he breaks. The log says he breaks and runs, and from then on:

• He will not fight. He strikes nothing, looses nothing, and cannot handle his gear.
• You do not command him. On his turn the bar says he has lost his nerve and runs, and the game moves him as it moves a broken enemy.
• He is easy to hit: his guard is 15 worse, and 10 worse again, since his weapon no longer turns blows aside. He does not turn to face a blow from his flank or his back.
• He makes for the edge of the field his company formed up on, keeping away from the enemy as he goes. If he is on the ground he gets up first, if he can.
• Stepping out of an enemy's reach invites the free blow that any such step does (see free blows on the move), and if it lands he is stopped where he stands.
• He leaves the field when he reaches that edge, or once every enemy still fighting is two turns' walk or more away from him. A man who has left has fled: he is alive and out of the battle, and the box at the end says he fled the field.

A running man counts for neither side. A company with nobody left fighting has lost, and men who are running are not fighting; see How a battle ends.

Rallying

At the start of each of his turns, a runner still on the field has a chance to rally. The chance is his nerve less 15, or his nerve plus 5 if no enemy still fighting is within 3 hexes of him. If he rallies he is wavering again, and a man of yours is back in your hands for that same turn. His nerve still carries the 14 for having broken.

So a runner who gets clear of the enemy rallies more readily, but one who gets two turns' walk clear of all of them is gone.

When a whole company gives way

At the end of every round, a company that has lost half its number (the men it still has fighting are no more than half the men it brought) and is outnumbered by the men the other side still has fighting judges itself as one body. Its chance to hold is the average own nerve of the men still fighting, less 12 for every man the enemy has over them, and less another 10 when it is down to two men, or 20 when it is down to one.

If it fails, every man left breaks together, the log says the company gives way, and since nobody on that side is fighting any more the battle ends there. It can happen to either side. A company with high nerve of its own, such as bears or trolls, is much harder to break this way than a company of men.

Seasoned men and cohesion

A man in a warband carries two more facts from his band: whether he is seasoned (soldiers and raiders are, militia and a rabble are not) and how much his fellows' blood weighs with him (his own disposition, pulled up among soldiers, raiders and militia, and down in a rabble). Your own company, and one drawn by lot, are green.

Neither changes anything in a battle today. Both are read only when a man looks further ahead than the act in hand, and nobody on the field does that yet. Neither touches his nerve.

No one ever runs

The No one ever runs box, on the muster's tab for your own company, turns nerve off for both sides in the battles you march to after ticking it. Nobody is tested, nobody breaks, no company gives way, and the Nerve bar and the Nerve box leave the panel. The muster remembers the choice with your company.

With nerve off, a battle ends only when one side has nobody left able to fight at all; see How a battle ends.