Combat essentials
Learn the rules.
The mechanics behind your next run.
Armor ↗
Enemy armor plates have their own durability. Hitting an intact plate damages the plate; 25% of the damage remaining after hit-zone, critical-hit, Exposed and shield effects reaches the enemy's health. Breaking the plate removes its protection for later hits. Armor-breaking modifiers affect damage to the plate; critical hits still respect armor protection. Player shield capacity is a separate mechanic.
Burning ↗
Each application adds an independently expiring stack, dealing 20 damage per second. Damage is delivered every 1 s and on expiry; the applying upgrade determines stack duration.
Close Kills ↗
Kills within 8 m restore 15 shield and restart its recharge.
Critical Hits ↗
Hits have a 5% chance to deal 50% bonus damage. Weak-point hits guarantee that same critical hit. Damage-over-time ticks cannot crit.
Damage ↗
Generic damage bonuses add together. A gun's damage bonuses add to that sum for that gun. Momentum and conditional hit multipliers then multiply it; critical hits, armour and Exposed modify the delivered damage.
Exposed ↗
Exposed multiplies damage received while active. Reapplying keeps the stronger multiplier and the longer remaining duration; it does not add the multipliers together.
Life Force ↗
The Revenant's shared reserve for protection, attack costs and time in Shroud. Capacity: 100; a run or new map starts with 45. Outside Shroud, direct gun damage actually dealt adds 0.03 life force per damage; critical hits multiply that gain by 1.6. Overkill does not count. Outside Shroud, an enemy dying within 15 m adds 3 life force. Siphon also builds the reserve. In Shroud, Reaping Harvest and Soul Splinters can return life force after attack costs.
Magazine ↗
Magazine bonuses add against base capacity, then round once. Only newly added capacity arrives loaded.
Shield ↗
Player shield absorbs incoming damage before health. Base capacity is 50. After 10 s without damage, it restores 20 per second. Shroud freezes shield regeneration and shield restoration until you leave it. Enemy shield links are separate: they absorb incoming damage with their own capacity; the player's capacity and recharge rules do not apply.
Shroud ↗
With 30 life force or more, trade your guns for spectral claws. Damage, attacks and time drain your life force; empty, it ends. Press again to leave and keep the rest. Never heals health. While transformed, time drains 1.75 life force per second. Spectral Slash, Wraith Shard and Death's Reach spend the same reserve. Guns and their reload progress are frozen; shield recharge and restoration are suspended. Damage that exhausts the reserve continues to shield and health. Leaving early keeps the remaining life force. Base re-entry wait after leaving: 5 s.
Stowed Reload ↗
A stowed weapon reloads or vents in 2 s. Drawing it early cancels that progress.
Weak Points ↗
Weak points are specific hit zones on enemies. A weak-point hit guarantees a critical hit instead of adding a separate weak-point multiplier. The enemy reference identifies each documented opening. Damage-over-time ticks cannot score critical hits.