Swords & Wizardry: White Box

Advanced Combat Techniques for the Original Edition Simulacra

Astute Tactics: The character is skilled in assessing combat situations and

coordinating effective tactical responses.
Expert: The character gains +1 to surprise rolls and +4 to initiative.
Master: Up to sixteen of the characters nearest allies gain +2 to
initiative. This ability cant be stacked through multiple commanders.
Benevolent Defense: The character can intercept blows meant for others.
Expert: Whenever an ally near the character is attacked, the
character may cover them. The to hit roll against the ally is then
applied against the character instead, with an additional +4 added.
If the sum is sufficient to hit, the character takes damage as normal.
Master: The character can perform the action above without the
additional +4 added to the to hit roll.
Cavalry Fighting: The character is skilled in fighting while mounted.
Expert: When the character attacks with a melee weapon while
riding a mount, the mounts Hit Dice are added to any damage rolls.
Master: Should either the character or his mount suffer damage
from an attack, a successful saving throw by the character allows the
damage to be switched from one to the other.
Fleet Feet: The character is proficient in dodging attacks against him.
Expert: If not more than lightly encumbered, the character can single
out one foe against whom he gains a +2 bonus to his Armor Class.
Master: As above, but the bonus gained is +4 instead.
Heavy Weapons Fighting: The character able to skillfully leverage the
power of weapons requiring two hands to use.
Expert: No initiative penalty for using heavy weapons is suffered.
Master: When the character scores a hit against an opponent while
using a heavy weapon, the player rolls two dice for damage, keeping
the higher of the two results and discarding the other. If the player
rolls doubles, the player repeats the process, adding any previous
doubles results to the final roll to find the total damage inflicted.

Marksmanship: The character is highly adept at targeting with missiles.

Expert: The character can accurately use missiles in a melee without
risk of hitting unintended targets.
Master: The characters missile range increments are extended by
50%. Furthermore, any missile attacks made at targets within pointblank range (i.e., inside of half of the short range increment) gain
an additional +2 to hit for a total of +4 to hit.
Pole-arm & Spear Fighting: The character is proficient in using extended
range melee weapons to maximum effect.
Expert: Prior to the first round of a combat, the character gains a
free attack if the reach of his foes weaponry is less than that of the
characters pole-arm. This ability is only effective in the front row.
Master: The character can keep foes at bay so long as the
enemys weaponry has less reach than the characters. Until foes
held at bay make a successful attack against the character (and
thereby get inside his defenses), they suffer -2 to their to hit rolls.
Reckless Abandon: The character is able to sacrifice accuracy for power
in melee combat in order to inflict devastating blows.
Expert: For every -2 a character takes to his to hit roll in melee
combat (before rolling), he adds +1 to his damage roll if successful.
Master: The character can now exchange to hit penalties with
bonuses to damage on a -1 to hit to +1 to damage basis.
Shield Bearer: The character uses shields with greater effectiveness.
Expert: An extra +1 to Armor Class is gained when using a shield.
Master: Any shield used by the character is able to absorb one
additional blow using the Splintered Shields rule prior to breaking.
Two-Weapon Fighting: The character is skilled in wielding paired
weapons in melee combat.
Expert: The character gains an additional +1 on to hit rolls with
his primary weapon when fighting in this style (for a total of +2).
Master: The character is able to leverage greater defense from his
use of two weapons, providing +1 to his Armor Class.
Weapon Specialization: The character is highly proficient with a
particular type of weapon of choice. Note that this technique may be
chosen multiple times to gain specialization with multiple weapons.
Expert: A +1 bonus is gained on to hit and damage rolls.
Master: The character attacks more quickly than normal. Weapons
with a rate of fire of 1/2 can be fire once per round. Those allowing
one attack per round can be used twice on odd numbered rounds.
Weapons with a rate of fire of 2 or greater add 1 to that number.