Fighting
Out past the safe ground you will have to fight. Fighting in gluniverse is directional: the tiles decide what you can hit, and where you stand decides what can hit you.
Your soul decides your kit
A horse and a human do not fight the same way, and neither is strictly better.
- A horse hits harder and reaches further, but recovers slowly between swings. It gets two moves nobody else has: the rear kick and the brace.
- A human hits lighter and shorter, but recovers roughly twice as fast, and lands a harder counter. The ground slam is a human move.
One catch worth knowing: a mounted rider fights as a human. Climb on your horse and you lose the rear kick and the brace, and gain the slam.
The moves
| Move | Key | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Strike | click, or R | The plain hit. Costs stamina only when it lands, so a whiff is free |
| Charge | hold T, release | An aimed dash down the line in front of you. Hits everything on that line and shoves the target. A horse's charge also scales with the clear runway ahead of it; a human's scales with the hold alone |
| Rear kick | R | Horse only. Hits behind you and nothing else, for a little over twice a plain horse strike. Shoves the target a tile |
| Brace | hold Q | Horse only. Plant and take the hit. See below |
| Ground slam | Z | Human only, level 16. A leap that comes down in a ring and stuns everything for 2 seconds |
| Relic skill | K | Fires whatever relic you wear, level 28 |
| Throw | tap or hold 1 2 3 | The ranged attack, for anyone wearing a slinger or flinger charm with ammo in the slot. Tap for a 2 tile toss, hold to wind up to the charm's range |
| Jump | Space | Your dodge. See below |
| Lock on | X | Cycle to the next living enemy |
Turning your back on a horse can be the whole move: a rear kick is by far the biggest hit you own early on.
Five seconds of grace at every door
Step into a zone where something can hurt you and you get a 5 second truce: nothing can damage you, and you cannot attack either. Run, read the room, leave if it is too hot. Swinging at anything ends it early, so it can never be used to open a fight. The clock re-arms when your screen actually finishes loading, so a slow connection does not spend the truce on a spinner.
Everything costs stamina
Every move draws from the same bar. The horse's charge costs the most at 18, the rear kick 12, the slam 12, a plain strike 10, a brace 8, a jump 6. Gathering costs 8. Walking is free. Galloping drains steadily.
Your stamina comes back at about 3 a second, and that regeneration is cut in half for 5 seconds after anything hits you, and stops entirely while you sprint. So a long fight is a losing fight. Empty the bar and you cannot gallop and cannot jump, which means you cannot run and cannot dodge. A winded horse is just meat.
Watch the crouch
Creatures tell you before they bite. Every attack starts with a crouch, then the lunge. That crouch is your cue, and how long it lasts is the animal's whole personality:
- a wolf crouches for nearly a second, so it is the easiest thing in the world to dodge,
- a stag for about half that,
- a boar barely at all, a jittering fifth of a second, and it is never the same twice.
That is why a boar is a real fight and a wolf is a rhythm.
Jump (Space) as it strikes and the bite finds air. A clean dodge opens a counter window: your next hit lands as a guaranteed crit, more than double for a human. Read the crouch, jump, answer. That rhythm is the whole of good play, and it works exactly the same on another player.
Brace, the horse's other answer
Holding Q plants your hooves. Time it right, in the first fifth of a second before the hit, and you take 65% less damage and it arms your counter, the same as a dodge. Late, it still cuts the hit by 30%.
Two limits: it only covers a cone in front of you, so anything hitting from the flank or behind goes straight through, and it does nothing against a slam ring. Brace is for the thing you can see. Jump is for everything else.
The charge combo
Land a charge and you get a short window, about a second and a half, where your rear kick costs half stamina and recovers in barely a third of the usual time. Charge in, kick on arrival. It is the highest damage two beats in the game, and it is why the charge is worth its cost.
The ground slam
At level 16 a human unlocks Z: leap, and land in a 2.5 tile ring that stuns every creature caught in it for a full 2 seconds. Move while you leap and you carry three tiles forward.
It is not a damage move, it is a reset. Two seconds of a wolf pack standing still is two seconds to heal, to run, or to line up a charge. The cooldown is a long one, four minutes, and it follows you across zones, so it is a once-a-fight card, not a rotation.
Against other players in the Arena it deals its damage but does not stun. Nobody gets to freeze a person.
The lands size you up
At level 1, at the fringe:
- a badger is a fair first fight
- a boar is a real one, and it will cost you
- a wolf you can take alone if you pull it wide, but the den runs as a pack, and an engaged wolf wakes its denmates
- a provoked stag wants a friend at your side
Deeper creatures are higher level and hit far harder. The name and level float over every one, so you always know what you are walking up to. The Creatures has every number.
Learn it safe first
You do not have to learn any of this the hard way. There is a training yard off the Crossroads, a room of your own with one patient badger. It walks you through the whole thing step by step: footwork on the tiles, the charge line, the kick behind you, dodging the crouch, the counter. Nothing you carry is at risk there. When you can beat the badger clean, the real wild is waiting.
Why fight at all
Killing pays in XP, and XP is what levels you and gates your land. Creatures also drop materials, hide and bone and more, that feed crafting and trade on the Exchange. But remember the rule of the world: everything you carry drops where you fall. Ride out heavy into a fight you cannot win and you are betting the whole trough.