# Enemies That Take Turns Attacking

> Stop a group of enemies from attacking the player all at once in Unreal Engine 5: one swings, the rest circle and wait their turn, set up in Blueprint with no C++.

Markdown version of https://rigbak.com/docs/soulslike-combat/enemies-take-turns, a page of the Soulslike Enemy Combat documentation. Link that page when citing it.

> Five enemies around the player and only one swings. The others circle, hold their distance, and step in when the attacker finishes. Soulslike Enemy Combat does this with one gate on the attack and one number in Project Settings.

## The problem

Drop several melee enemies into an Unreal Engine level with a plain Behavior Tree and each one runs the same logic: see the player, walk up, attack. They arrive together and swing together, and the fight turns into a pile of overlapping hits the player cannot read or answer.

Souls-like and action games solve this with an **attack token** system, sometimes called the kung fu circle. The player hands out a small number of attack permissions. An enemy needs one to swing, gives it back when the swing ends, and waits its turn without one. The waiting enemies keep moving, so the group still looks alive and threatening.

Building that by hand means a token manager, claim and release logic on every exit path of every attack (finished, interrupted, canceled, the enemy dying mid-swing), and movement for the enemies that are waiting. Soulslike Enemy Combat ships the token pool, the claim and release on each of those paths, and the waiting movement.

---

You need an enemy that already attacks through an Action Set. If you have none, [Getting Started](https://rigbak.com/docs/soulslike-combat/getting-started) builds one in a few minutes.

## Set it up (1 minute)

1. **Gate the attack**

   Open the enemy's Action Set, select each melee attack, and add a **Combat Token Gate** to its **Scoring > Gates** list. Set **Token Tag** to `SEC.Token.Attack`.

   In **DA_ActionSet_Grunt**, under Combat Token Gate, set:

   | Property | Value |
   | --- | --- |
   | Token Tag | SEC.Token.Attack |
   | Cost | 1 |

   *Every attack with this tag draws from one shared pool.*

   Leave dodges, repositions and taunts ungated, so a waiting enemy can still do them.
2. **Allow one attacker at a time**

   **Project Settings > Plugins > Soulslike Enemy Combat > Combat Tokens.** Set the **Budget** of `SEC.Token.Attack` to 1. It ships at 2.

   In **Project Settings**, under Combat Tokens > SEC.Token.Attack, set:

   | Property | Value |
   | --- | --- |
   | Budget | 1 (replaces 2) |
   | Reissue Delay | 0.8 (replaces 0.0) |

   *Budget is how many may swing at once. Reissue Delay is the pause before the next one steps in.*
3. **Give the turns a rhythm**

   Set **Reissue Delay** to about the length of one attack recovery, somewhere between 0.5 and 1 second. One enemy swings and backs off, a beat passes, and the next one comes in. At 0 the next swing starts the same frame the last one ends.
4. **Play and watch the turns**

   Press Play with three or more enemies and run `SEC.Debug.Tokens 1` in the console. A line above the player reads `Token.Attack 1/1` while the slot is free and `0/1` while an enemy holds it.

An enemy that finds the slot taken drops the attack from its choices and picks something else, so it keeps strafing, circling or backing off while it waits. The slot comes back when the attack ends, however it ends, and a dying enemy hands back what it holds. Nothing queues: the next enemy to reach for the free slot gets it.

> **Note**
>
> Slots belong to the target. Two players each get their own pool, so enemies fighting one player never use up the other player's turns.

---

## Make the waiting enemies look smart

With tokens alone, every enemy without a slot moves the way its normal movement profile says. To give the front-line enemies and the ones hanging back different behavior, add [Combat Roles](https://rigbak.com/docs/soulslike-combat/combat-roles) on top.

Roles split the group into **Attackers** that press in close, **Waiters** that hold their distance, and **Flankers** that circle for an angle, and they swap each enemy's moveset, reactions and movement to match. A common setup:

| Setting | Value | Result |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Role Limits, **Attacker** | 3 | Three enemies stay close and pressing |
| `SEC.Token.Attack` **Budget** | 1 | One of those three swings at a time |
| Default Movement Profile | `MovementProfile_SEC_Waiter` | Everyone else circles at range |

Roles decide who is in the fight and how they move. Tokens decide who swings right now. Each works on its own, and they stack.

---

## Common questions

**Can a boss allow more than one attacker?** Yes. Add an **SEC Token Budget Component** to the actor being fought and give it its own row, say `SEC.Token.Attack` at 3. **Set Token Budget For This Actor** changes it mid-fight, for a phase that opens the arena up. See [Combat Tokens](https://rigbak.com/docs/soulslike-combat/combat-tokens#give-one-target-its-own-numbers).

**Do parries and dodges wait for a turn too?** No. A token gate on a reaction passes without taking anything, so an enemy defends itself whether or not it holds a slot.

**Can a heavy attack use the whole turn?** Set **Cost** on its gate to 2 with a Budget of 2. The heavy attack runs alone, while two light attacks at Cost 1 can pair up.

**Does it work in multiplayer?** Yes. The token ledger runs on the server, and clients see the result through the attacks the enemies play.

**Do I need C++?** No. Every step on this page is a Data Asset or a Project Settings value.

**They still all attack at once.** Check that each attack carries the gate and that the tag has a Budget row. [Combat Tokens](https://rigbak.com/docs/soulslike-combat/combat-tokens#debug-it) lists the other causes.

---

## Related

| Page | Why |
| --- | --- |
| [Combat Tokens](https://rigbak.com/docs/soulslike-combat/combat-tokens) | Every token setting, per-target budgets, and the Blueprint nodes |
| [Combat Roles](https://rigbak.com/docs/soulslike-combat/combat-roles) | Attackers, Waiters and Flankers, and how roles swap behavior |
| [Movement System](https://rigbak.com/docs/soulslike-combat/movement-system) | How waiting enemies strafe, circle and keep their distance |
| [Action System](https://rigbak.com/docs/soulslike-combat/action-system) | Where gates sit and how an enemy picks its next move |