Master Warrior

Normally, after every battle, a character wearing armor will lose Armor Points after spending 5 minutes resetting their armor. With the purchase of this skill, the character gains three advantages.

The first grants the character 25% bonus to their Base Armor Points or Special Armor Points – whichever is appropriate for any armor that they wear. The character should total all of their separate armor pieces then multiply the total by 1.5 (this includes the 25% bonus for the Armor Proficiency skill, if the character only has the Armor Efficiency skill, then multiple by 1.25) and round the number normally to nearest whole number.

The second ensures that the character will always have 25% their starting Base Armor Points or Special Armor Points – whichever is appropriate – after resetting their armor. The character must still spend the 5 minutes in-game resetting their armor after a battle to gain this benefit.

Third, the amount the armor degrades decreases by 1 point. After all skills, crafting and enchanting bonuses, the minimum Degradation number is 1 point.

Torso armor must be worn to use this skill. The character may remove the other parts of their armor: their helmet, greaves, gauntlets, etc. but still has to wear their torso armor.

This skill does not augment magical Armor Points from an Armor spell, an alchemical item, magic items, rituals, or similar magical effects. It will increase the Armor Points from a Ritual of Armor Enchantment.

This skill enables a blinded character to engage in hand to hand combat; without this skill a character may not engage in combat while blinded. This skill does not imply the ability to see. A character using this skill is assumed to be fighting by "feel" and sound, and can only respond to a hand to hand attack and cannot initiate combat with a foe that they cannot perceive. Once combat starts, the character can continue until the target leaves the combat entirely or out runs the player.

This skill cannot be used – ever – to detect invisible characters, but can be used to attack invisible characters that attack first.

This skill works just like the Slay skill with the following exceptions. First the target character’s head is severed and is assumed to land near the character’s body. Second, the character is not Mortally Wounded, but is at the Brink of Death. Lastly, this skill cannot be used as a parry to an attack. The character must call “Decapitate” after the blow is delivered, followed by any special damage modifiers, such as “Magic”, “Silver”, etc.

This skill requires the character to have a +5 Strength Bonus to learn and use. This can either be a natural racial bonus or from some other source, such as a magic item. However, the Strength Bonus must be a continuous bonus, not one that has a duration or is invoked for a duration. Therefore, things such as a Strength Potion does not count towards this prerequisite.

Using this skill gives the character a +3 Strength Bonus, NonCombinable, allowing the character to perform a feat of great strength, adding 3 points of damage to one swing, performing an action such as carrying a body for 15 seconds, or similar actions.

This skill may be stacked with the Giant Strength spell, Feat of Heroes spell, any giant strength potion, or any other Strength Bonus.

Unlike any other type of Strength Bonuses, the Feat of Strength skill will stack with itself. So, if a character has three purchases of the skill he can increase his damage for one swing by 9 points of damage, or perform an action requiring a +9 Strength Bonus, NonCombinable.

If this skill is used to increase the character’s damage, it is not used if they miss or the attack is blocked. If they succeed in striking their target or if the target calls an appropriate defense, the skill is used.

The character must call “Feat of Strength” when they use this skill.

This skill works just like a Disarm skill, except:

1) The skill can be used to disarm a shield. Therefore shields are now a legal target for this skill. The character can choose to disarm the shield or other limb. Just like the Disarm skill, if the character does not specify which limb is affected, then the target character chooses.

2) A weapon wielded in two hands is disarmed with one use of this skill.

3) If a weapon (not a shield) is disarmed, the target character must gently and safely toss the weapon underhanded to the character. The character can opt to catch the weapon or allow it to fall safely to the ground. No other character may attempt to interrupt the weapon in transit and must wait for the weapon to be caught or fall to the ground before interacting with it.

4) To clarify, a Greater Disarm can be used to stop a Disarm or Greater Disarm and the player should call “Greater Retain”.

Since this skill is a Master Skill, it is only stopped by Greater Disarm, Master Parry, Slay Parry, Dodge, etc. and any magical defense that stops physical attacks.

Once purchased, this skill changes how the character interacts with certain damaging attacks.

•  Kill Spell (or life effect if the character is affected by healing instead), Destroy Being Spellsong, and Soul Strike skill mortally wounds the character instead of bringing them to the Brink of Death. If they are already Mortally Wounded, they are brought to the Brink of Death.
•  The Slay and Assassinate skills bring the character to -1 Body Points instead of Mortally Wounded.
• An Eldritch Attack will bring the character with this skill to Mortally Wounded. A second Eldritch attack will bring the character to the Brink of Death and destroy their items, just like standard Eldritch attack definition.

When the character reaches 0 or -1 Body Points from damage, they may invoke this skill by calling out, “I shall not die!” The character may continue fighting normally or perform any other action for 10 seconds. At the end of the 10 seconds, the character will be Mortally Wounded. The character is not immune to other skills, effects or spells, so a Kill spell or Slay skill, for example, will still stop the character. The character becomes immune to Ice Cast, Pin and Bind spells for the 10 seconds after activating this skill. The character cannot be healed until the effect ends.

A character with this skill may use any weapon of any length in either hand that the character has the skill to use. Two-handed weapons may be used only to block, and bastard weapons may be used to deal one-handed damage. This skill will allow the character to use two one-handed weapons at the same time.

This skill may be used to parry any physical blow including special attacks such as Critical Attack, Stunning Blow, Disarm, or a blow that does damage, but not the Slay or Soul Strike skills. This skill can be used even if it is delivered from behind, but not if from a surprise attack. It is also possible to parry an attack directed against someone else as long as they are within weapons length. A character cannot use a ranged attack to parry an attack for another. The character may block any low magic or Nature Magic spell that is not combined with a Perfect Aim skill for another character, but they then take the effect of the spell and must call an appropriate defense that will stop the spell in order to avoid the effects of the spell themselves.

A character must have one Martial Proficiency skill per Master Parry skill they wish to purchase. So, a character that wants three Master Parry skills must have three Martial Proficiency skills. The Master Parry skill can be used with any weapon the character has two Martial Proficiency skills of either type. Therefore, if the character has two Master Proficiency skills they can use their Master Parry with any weapon.

The character must call “Master Parry” when they use this skill. This skill is always used once called.

For each purchase of this skill, a character gains a Damage Bonus with all weapons in which they have a weapon skill according to the table below.

This may be combined with any other Damage Bonus the character has. Master Proficiency is not hand specific and therefore will add to both weapons of a character using the Florentine skill, but only adds once for weapons wielded in two hands.

This skill allows the character to reflect, or riposte, any melee attack back to the attacker. The character using the Riposte skill does not have to meet the requirements to use the attacking skill, but they do have land a successful blow on the desired target. The character has 5 seconds or 1 swing to try and land the attack being riposted. If the character fails to land a blow, the Riposte is used, the original attack is stopped, but the original attack does not affect the target. The character using the Riposte skill may target the attacker or any other character they can reach.

A Speed skill can be combined with a Riposte by prefixing “Speed...” with the defensive call. So the character would call, “Speed Riposte...” and the name of the attack they are riposting. You do not need a Speed to riposte an attack delivered with a Speed skill. Also, you do not riposte the Speed, just the main attack.

The attacker may call a defense to the riposted attack as usual, even another Riposte.

Any melee attack can be riposted, such as: damage, Critical Attack, Stun, Shatter Weapon, Speed, Slay, Flurry of Blows (only one of the strikes is riposted), Decapitate, a channeled spell, etc. In the case of faith skills, the attack is stopped, the faith skill is not used and the faith skill is not redirected. If an attack is defined as an area affect melee attack, the Riposte will stop the damage or effect for the character but not reflect the attack back to the attacker or protect any character in the area of effect.

The skill requires the character to be wielding a melee weapon and not be surprised, therefore, you may not riposte a Waylay or Assassinate that is used from surprise. Additionally, the attack must come from the front 180° of the character, so attacks from the rear cannot be riposted. If the attacker is standing behind the character, but hits the side, that is from the back. If the attacker is standing in front of the character and hits their side, that is from the front and the skill can be riposted. If the Assassinate skill is used in combat, you may use the Riposte. This skill cannot be used with a shield. The skill is used once called.

A character must have two Master Parry skills per Riposte skill they wish to purchase. So, a character that wants three Riposte skills must have six Master Parry skills. The Riposte skill can be used with any weapon in which the character has two Martial Proficiency skills of any type. Therefore, if the character has two Master Proficiency skills they can use their Riposte with any weapon.

Using this skill, a character may shatter any weapon or shield, regardless of size, using a one-handed edge or a one-handed blunt weapon or larger. Magic, Mithril and unshatterable weapons may not be broken by use of this skill.

To use this skill, the character must strike their target and hit either their body or weapons. This skill can be used as a defense and cannot be called if another character strikes them or they block with their weapon.

This skill is not used if the character misses their target. If they succeed in striking their target, or if the target calls an appropriate defense, the skill is used.

The character must call “Shatter Weapon/Shield” when they use this skill.

This skill allows a character to strike down a target character with one strike. The character hit with this skill is Mortally Wounded and requires the appropriate healing. This skill ignores armor and does not damage it. The character must strike between the elbows to the shoulders and shoulders to the knees of the target character. The character must call “Slay” after the blow is delivered followed by any special damage modifiers, such as “Magic”, “Silver”, etc. This skill can also be used as a Slay Parry, which will stop any one physical martial attack, even a Slay skill. Either use of this skill expends that use of this skill for that Tag Cycle.

It is also possible to parry an attack directed against someone else as long as they are within weapons length. A character cannot use a ranged attack to parry an attack for another. The character may block any low magic or Nature Magic spell that is not combined with a Perfect Aim skill for another character, but they then take the effect of the spell and must call an appropriate defense that will stop the spell in order to avoid the effects of the spell themselves.

A character must have one Proficiency skill per Slay skill they wish to purchase. So, a character that wants three Slay skills must have three Proficiency skills. The Slay skill can be used with any weapon in which the character has two Proficiency skills of either type. Therefore, if the character has two Master Proficiency skills they can use their Slay with any weapon.

This skill is not used if the character misses their target, does not hit the appropriate area on the target, or the attack is blocked. If they succeed in striking their target or if the target calls an appropriate defense, the skill is used.

Using this skill, a character may automatically strike their opponent with a single blow. To use this skill, the character must strike at the opponent and hit any part of them – a legal body part, weapon or shield. The character prefixes the attack with “Speed”, followed by either weapon damage or a specialty attack such as the Disarm or Slay skills. This skill can only be used with hand to hand weapons and not with ranged attacks.

Since Speed is a master level skill, only a Master Parry or a Slay skill will stop this attack. Even if the Speed skill is used with a Disarm, for example, the targeted character must use a master level skill to stop the attack.

This skill is always used once called.

With this skill, the character may hit any target character within line of sight flawlessly without having to actually hit the target. The character must have the appropriate ranged attack in hand and the character must fire or throw the attack. If the character or targeted character is outside a building the missile attack must go at least as far, if not farther than the target. It need not hit or be close, just reach the target. If the character and the target character are inside an out-of-game real world building the range of a True Aim skill is unlimited. The character must prefix the attack with “True Aim…”, and call the damage or effect. The character should indicate the target clearly by pointing at the target.

This skill is always used once called

Using this skill, a character can pinpoint the “chink” in their opponent’s Armor, and hit their Body Points directly. The character must suffix the word “Body” after the amount of damage. This notifies their opponent that such damage is to be deducted from their Body Point total. This skill may be used with other damage skills such as Critical Attack and Speed, as well as being an effective way to deliver blade poisons. This skill will work against mundane or magical Armor Points, even those from an Armor spell.

This skill cannot be used with an attack that does not do damage.

Once the character makes their first attack, they can continue to make direct body damage attacks for 5 minutes.

This skill grants the character a 2 Threshold for 1 minute. This skill will stack with itself, so each additional use of this skill will grant the character an additional +2 Threshold up to a maximum of an 8 Threshold. The player must decide when they invoke this skill how many purchases they wish to use; they cannot decide later to increase the Threshold value.

To use this skill, the character must be wielding a weapon. The player should call, “Weapon Barrier, x Threshold”, where ‘x’ is the value of the Threshold. Then about every 30 seconds they should remind everyone they are using this skill by saying, “Active Weapon Barrier x”. If the character should lose their weapon, they no longer gain the benefit of the Threshold. When the character is once more wielding a weapon, the benefit of the Threshold is regained. This same rule applies to the character being rendered Unconscious or forced into a Death Count. Once the character is awoken or healed, the Threshold continues. Finally, if a character is unable to wield their weapon – they are bound, paralyzed or imprisoned, their limb is broken, they are blinded and do not have the Blind Fighting skill, etc. – they will lose the benefit of the Threshold until they are able to wield a weapon again. Note that the 1 minute count continues even if the character is not gaining the benefit of this skill.

This effect stacks only with non-magical threshold effects.

Note: This skill is considered Lost and a teacher must be found in game.

With the purchase of this skill, a character gains the ability to use every form of weapon and shield listed on the Warrior Basic Career Skill List and the Florentine skill. Weapons not listed on the Warrior Basic Career Skill List may be learned at no additional cost when taught by someone with the specific weapon skill or Weapons Master and the knowledge of how to use the weapon.

Additionally, any Build Points spent on weapon skills the character may have are refunded when this skill is learned. So, if a character has Edged Weapon, Thrown Weapon and Shield skill the character would get back a total of 11 Build Points, effectively getting the Weapons Master skill for free and refunding 1 build point.