Secondary action
At the beginning of a round you always decide what you will do. Sometimes, however, the situation develops differently and you want to do something else; this is a secondary action.
You can also use the 2 main actions for a secondary action (or split them between the first and the second).
There are feats that let you use an extra action in a secondary action. If you know more such feats, you can use more actions for a secondary action, even from different schools.
Bonus actions from the main activity
If you have more actions in your main activity thanks to feats, you cannot use them for a secondary action in any way.
Benefits
You cannot use advantages for a secondary action.
Secondary action penalties
Since you are focusing on your main activity, you do not pay as much attention to the secondary one and you have penalties to it:
- penalty -5 to accuracy and defense
- penalty -5 to WA of shooting / throwing
- penalty -5 to mental activity (telepathy, telekinesis, mental discipline)
- penalty -10 to spellcasting / praying
Third and further activity
In one round you can also use a third or further activity. You can be ready to fight (main activity), but use one action to throw and another to knock down an arrow with telekinesis. The penalties and all rules for the third activity remain the same.
Examples of use
You are shooting and someone shoots at you or attacks you with a sword
You must have at least 1 free action, otherwise you defend passively. In addition, your defense will be penalized by -5, with passive defense even -10, which is not very good.
You are fighting and want to throw a dagger
You have 1 extra defense (thanks to a combat feat).
You attack for 1 action.
Then you throw the dagger with a -5 penalty.
Then it is the opponent's turn, and thanks to the extra defense you can defend against him normally, because it comes from the main activity.