Melee
Attack
Melee is used in conflicts when fighting hand to hand with weapons.
While all characters can usually justify adding their Violence Aptitude when attacking with a weapon even if they don't have the Melee Ability trait, the Melee Ability trait represents legitimate hand to hand capabilities beyond the norm.
Range: Melee is typically only effective against opponents in the character's current zone.
Effect: Melee is usually used on actions to inflict Body damage, but can also be used to create a Asset or target a Complication when appropriate.
Melee can be used on reactions to defend against Melee, Unarmed, and Strength attacks. It might be used on reactions to defend against some other attacks if it seems appropriate to the narrative. This can provide justification for a character to spend a Plot Point to cause stress to their attacker on a successful reaction.
Common SFX: Some characters might choose to take one or more SFX such as 'Weapon Master' or 'Riposte' to further nuance their Melee fighting capability, but it is not required.
Common Limits: Melee is almost always paired with the Gear Limit to represent weapon usage; a good justifaction should be required for a given character to not do this. Characters that do not need a weapon to make hand to hand attacks or cannot be disarmed should generally take the Unarmed trait instead.