Kai Disciplines
This is the complete list with description of all ten basic Kai disciplines, wich each player will know at the start of the game.
Weaponskill
This Kai discipline refer to skill in general martial prowess, as well as knowledge on matter of war, rules of engagement, military matters, leadership on the field, strategy, and expertise in the use of weapons.
It is important to notice that Weaponskill, while less so than most other disciplines, is still powered by the Kai's innate psychic powers; most of the more skilled expert in this discipline say that the weapon almost speaks to them, and describe their fights as involving a tag-team of them and their weapon against the opponent.
Due to this, Weaponskill doesn't limit itself to the knowledge of a single way to wield a weapon; the user learns how to handle that kind of weapon in general, and they have some level of understanding of any fighting style involving their own weapon category.
It must be noted that no Kai can master more than one weapon category through Weaponskill; given that this limit is later removed by the higher level of learning of Weaponmastery, and that the skill is so much similar to Animal Kinship, some have theorized that the weapon a Kai learn weaponmastery in is a reflection of their own personality, and that it symbolize the way in wich, deep down, they prefer to handle the resolution of conflicts.
Gameplay Use
When picking the weaponskill discipline, the Kai must pick 1 of the 10 weapon categories (Dagger, Short Sword, Sword, Axe, Warhammer, Mace, Broadsword, Spear, Quarterstaff, Bow); whenever the Kai is using weapons of this category in combat, s/he can add 1 point to her/his CS for the entire fight. If the weapon is a bow, the +1 bonus is added to the die roll result of any shot made instead.
In addition, depending on the kind of weapon mastered, the Kai can spend 2 WP in combat to get one of the following bonus for a duration of 5 rounds:
Dagger, Short Sword: whenever a shield is being used, the player can get a -3 penalty to CS to reduce all damage received by 2 (this is the result of using a more defensive fighting style)
Sword, Axe, Warhammer, Mace: by getting a -1 penalty to CS, the player can pick any one roll he made in combat and increase it by 1 (this is a result of varying the style of combat used for the round to get in a surprise strike).
Spear, Broadsword, Quaterstaff: by foregoing the use of a shield, the player can add 1 point to any damage inflicted in combat (this is the result of adding power to the weapon and a benefit of wielding it with two hands).
Because of the experience with mitary matter, leading soldier, negotiating with army's officers, evaluating the tactical soundness of a plan and other such thing are done through a Weaponskill roll; this use does not require WP, but spending 1 on the roll grant a +1 bonus on it.
Also, there's other two uses that weaponskill has outside of combat, each of wich requires a 1 WP cost to be used: weapon understanding, and evaluation of a fighter potential.
Whenever a player face somebody carrying a weapon of the same category they're skilled in, a roll can made to approssimately judge the person Combat Skill outside of combat, based on telling signs like the way the weapon is carried, how much cared for it is, it's quality, how much it armonize with the body of the wearer, etc. This roll receives a +1 bonus if the player had the chance to witness how the target wield his weapon.
Additionally, whenever seeing a weapon of the category they're skilled in, a Weaponskilled Kai can use his abilities to determine the quality of the weapon, and even wheter it has any magical properties - though they wouldn't be able to identify wich one.
Hunting
This is the ability of skillfully surviving in the wild, and includes a superior level of agility, an harder fiber and resistance to the elements, and the ability to procure food - both through recongizing poisonous fruits and berry from edible ones, and through the hunt of animals, most likely small ones through the use of ambushes and traps. The skill also include knowledge on how to properly prepare this kind of food in the wild appropriatedly.
Gameplay Use
The main use of the discipline is that of procuring food in the wild; a Kai need eat at least twice a day, and missing a meal equals a -3 damage to the Kai's END.
Hunting require the user to spend 1 WP for being used; the Kai can try to find food for a single person, or try to find food for a whole group.
The cost for using the ability is the same (1 WP), but the difficulty for finding food for a whole group is always a +2 increase on the normal difficulty of a roll. While every player can try to find food for one person as long as they have WP to spend, if a roll for looking for food for an entire group, if failed, forbid the player of attempting any more hunting rolls for food in the area.
The secondary use of the discipline is to use it to accomplish feats of athletic/acrobatic prowess that are beyhond the limits normally imposed to humans. For any kind of acrobatic manouver, it is necessary to spend 1 WP; it is important to notice that there are limits to what can be done with hunting on these matters. Basically, for the Kai to do something a record setting world champion would be able to do, a roll of 7 is needed.
Thanks to this discipline, Kai are able to survive for longer periods of time in harsh climates like those of icy regions or hot deserts; whenever a Kai is subjected to damage from the element, they can decide to reduce the damage taken by spending 1 WP for every point of END damage they'd wish to negate.
Animal Kinship
This ability allow the user to psychically sense the presence of animals in a specific area, to comunicate with sentient animal by sending them their own emotions and getting a feeling for what the creatures themselves are feeling, to offer suggestions and counsels to the beasts.
This discipline also include, as part of its curriculum, a deeper study and understanding of animals' behaviours; a Kai is capable of using this discipline to judge the age, attitude, healt and other similar characteristic of animals when meeting them, as well as being able to appropriately judge the correct reactions toward such creatures and being able to know, if necessary, how to better handle themselves in a combat that include them.
This power is based under a basic understanding of needs, sensations and feeling between the Kai and the creatures he communes with; as such, whenever "animal" is referred to in the description of this discipline, it is intended to mean "mammal and/or bird"; these are the only two animal families on whom the Kai can execise this skill.
Gameplay Use
When fighting alongside and/or against an animal, the Kai can get a +1 to their CS, due to their expertise with handling them in combat. This include mounted combat, or facing off against a mounted opponent.
Aside from this combat use, by spending 1 WP, the discipline can be used to commune with animals, feel their intention, and send thoughts to them.
At the cost of 1 additional WP, the Kai can impart a suggestion into the animal. The suggestion might be something the creature would feel inclined to do on his own anyway (so no asking a cat to swim, for example) and the creature must also be offered a valid reason to do it, or it will reject the suggestion automatically: a starving wolf wouldn't stop attacking just because the Kai wouldn't like being eaten, for example, but it could if food was offered in addition, and the suggestion was to eat the food instead of risking a dangerous fight with the Kai.
Lastly, the skill can be used to make a quick esteem of an animal condition, including battle stats, reasons for being in an area, age and healt status, wheter it's domesticated or not, and other similar things. No WP is required to use this skill, and a roll determine wheter it would work or not, but 1 WP can be spent to get a +2 bonus on the roll.
Mindshield
Gifted in the psionics art and capable of reaching a supreme control of their own inner mind, the Kai who possess this discipline have learned how to witstand and neutralize the pain caused by mind assaults by reaching a superior level of inner calm.
The discipline of Mindshiel require great inner discipline, and various Kai have different apporaches to the art; all are effective in their own ways, but the more skilled mindmasters can say much on the personality of a Kai by the way they decide to face the greatest of fears, that of losing control of one's own mind.
Some expert in this discipline reach a level of detatchement that allow them to feel the pain of a mind attack as something happening to a different person, thus being able to ignore such pain and never lose their control. Other prefer to channel the pain of a mind attack, allowing the extraneous emotions to grow in strenght so much that the pain caused by their inception is overcome through a stronger sourge of ones really felt by the practitioner. Others yet do the opposite, anchoring themselves to an opposite feeling from the one induced in them, and using this contrast to push the pain outside their mind.
It's even said that certain Kai opted for the darker path of filling their own mind with pain themselves, to the point when any extraneous one would not be effective, and then using their mastery of the mind arts to force themselves into liking this sensation of pain, so as to be empowered by these opposite emotions; however, this is a dangerous path to walk, since it's known that, in the past, Kai who walked it ended up crazy.
Gameplay Use
Whenever a battle start, during wich the player is under the attack of an extraneous mindforce, the player can spend 1 WP to immunize themselves from any effect of this attack for 5 full rounds of combat. Some creatures are powerful enough that they can overcome this defence; in these case, a superior mind protection is required.
Also, Mindshield is a very effective way of preventing a Kai's Sixth Sense from sensing one's emotions; while this use is sufficiently simple that no effort is required from a Mindshield user to simply stop a Sixth Senser from perceiving anything, if the Mindshield user prefers the opponent to also not realize their probing has been negated, they have to either roll, or pay 2 WP; the options are mutually exclusive, and if somebody rolls they cannot spend the 2 WP to avoid detection anymore.
Lastly, thanks to the exercises that the users had to do to reach a great control over one own's mind, the Mindshield user can enter a state of trance before going to sleep; while this reduce the effectiveness of the restore for the body, it does wonders for recovering the users peace of mind.
Mindblast
Of all the abilities that makes the Kai the more dangerous fighting force in all of Magnamund, none is quite as famous and feared as their power to penetrate the mind of their targets, filling it with debilitating pain. While most of the other Kai powers are usually not publicized by the Order, this one is a sort of calling card, and as such, it actual effectiveness is usually exaggerated by those who aren't well versed in the arts of the mind.
The focus of this Discipline is to stimulate and create an unpleasant sensation in one own's mind, and then project it into the mind of somebody else, thus provoking them a level of pain that can go from something as light as an headache to a powerful shock to the system that might leave the victim paralyzed.
In addition, the power can even be used to just exercize a light psychic pression on the target's mind, making them feel fatigued and tired.
Gameplay Use
The power can be used to inflict a sensation of pain and unease into any opponent one faces in battle, thus reducing the opponent's combat skill; by spending 1 WP, the user get an effective +2 CS increase for the following 5 rounds of battle.
In addition, the ability can be used out of combat to make an opponent exausted, as well as inducing states like headache and fever, thus making them generally less reactive and slower; this require a roll, beside costing 1 WP to use.
Lastly, both in and out of combat, a Mindshield user can exert a stronger push, and attempt to paralyze the target; this require 2 WP to use and a roll; results will depend on the roll, and since this require great power, it'll get progressively difficult for people with a more solid will. In combat, this ability disable the target during the following round.
You cannot use a Psychic Stun Attack during the same five combat rounds when you use the standard mindblast +2 CS boost.
Mindblast is considere a mid-level psychic attack, so any mid or high level psychic defense might be able to negate any or all of these effects. Use at your own risk.
Sixth Sense
Usually considered by many Kai lord and ladies the most important Discipline, and one of the more popular among the lower ranked Kai, this skill is focused on picking out clues from a social situation to understand what's going on, feel the emotions of people one is facing to understand wheter they're lying or not, giving an expanded perception of an area to the point when one can sense danger before it strikes, and generally working as an incredibly quick, effective and detailed mean of obtaining information on what happens around the user.
While this level of self-awareness is pratically constant and requires no effort for the user to collect this wealth of information from around themselves, there's more that can be done with Sixth Sense if one focus on his own perceptions and try to better understand them.
Lastly, the power might be used to detect if telepatic conversation is going on in an area, although such an use is exceedingly tiring, highly imprecise, and rarely useful.
Gameplay Use
It is important to remember that, while Sixth Sense will automatically rely information on what's going on and any incoming danger, to understand the nature of the danger, the Kai must focus and actively look for its source - thus spending 1 WP in the effort.
While Sixth Sense will automatically tell a Kai wheter somebody he's speaking to is being honest or not, this will only happen for people without any kind of mind defence; to realize wheter somebody capable of occluding their thoughts is telling the truth, they need to spend 1 WP to analyze the opponent mind - and even so, a good level of psychic defense might allow the subject to avoid detection, although this is more tiring for the one on the defending side.
For intercepting telepatic communications in an are, the Kai need to really focus on any psychic coming and going around himself; the user must spend 3 WP just to attempt it, and requring a roll to determine wether such attempt is successful or not - usually at high difficulties, too, since telepathy capable psychics are usually also armed with powerful mind defenses.
Sixth Sense is considered a low level psychic offensive ability, so it is of course easily confused by higher level of psychic protection.
Mind over Matter
Quite clearly, this is the psychic ability to use one's mind powers to influence reality - specifically, by controlling slight winds and breezes to move objects of very small weight.
The most basic and more used skill for this kind of ability by part of the Kai is for lockpicking, but there's many other uses, too; any task that require precision can use the added help that manipulating small items without using one's mind would give. Examples of this are surgical interventions, retrieving small items from unaccessible heights/distances, and stealing.
Gameplay Use
The basic use of Mind over Matter is for picking small lock, analyzing locking mechanisms (even ones that cannot be activated by using this Discipline), activating traps from a distance, and psychically untying knots. An effort of this kind requires the user to spend 1 WP and roll - with the rolling determining how succesfull the attempt will be.
As said, Mind over Matter controls air currents; thusly, a skilled enough user is able to use this ability to check wheter somebody is concealing things like weapons or such at a distance by focusing hardly - the user will be able to push a wind current toward his target and feeling anything that's being touched as if one own's hand was being used. This effort spend 2 WP for the required focus, and is important to notice that, unless it happens in the open, there's a considerable chance of the target realizing that something is not ok when a burst of wind will envelop it.
Any small item - like keys, pendants, knives and such - can be moved toward the user with this skill, by creating a sucking air current that would move the item toward the Kai who's using this ability. This require an expenditure of 1 WP; a roll is required if the item is under the watch or on a person - to see wheter they realize that the item is being lifted - but, otherwise, this ability automatically suceed. This ability cannot be used to push incoming items or enhance throw - the level of control on air currents is too weak for the first option, and too imprecise for the second, to be applicable in either instance.
Lastly, Mind over Matter can be used to increase the chance of success when doing something that require dexterity and/or careful coordination; this result in the expenditure of 1 WP to gain a +1 bonus on any such rolls.
Tracking
This Discipline focuses on more than just being able to follow a prey, be it human or animal; its practitioner are experienced in finding their ways through mazes or confusing areas, are able to decipher signs in unknown languages or recognizing recurring patterns in work of arts, including buildings.
In addition, Kai with this skill gain a supernatural ability to find their bearing, and it's very hard for them to get lost in an area they've been in for some time.
Gameplay Use
By spending 1 WP to focus on a path and examinating it, a Kai lord can easily tell where it is headed (assuming he has a clear mental image of the area), it's direction in relation to the north, wheter the track has being used recently, and if so by whom.
When in a maze, an expert of this discipline can spend 1 WP to easily determine wether he's moving toward the exit of the labyrinth or not, simply thorugh an accurate analysis of any flow of air; additionally, the Kai lord can roll to get an idea of how the maze is structured, and wheter or not the current area is one s/he has already passed through. Cave systems and town with a confusing layout of roads are treated as mazes by this skill - though, usually, the roll to keep track on oneself in a maze is harder than it's equivalent in a cave system or town would be.
Obviously, an expert tracker can follow any kind of prey, be it human, animal, or monster; this skill doesn't require WP expenditure to be used, since a normal roll would suffice, but spendin 1 WP on it allow the user to get a +1 bonus on such a roll. Of notice, since this skill is based on reading tracks and footprints, as well as judgin how the locale was influenced by the prey's movement, it cannot be used to track anything that moves flying or swimming.
Lastly, a Kai can use his skill in the art of tracking to look for pattern or evidence in any work of art, as well as attempting to decipher the meaning of signs and written text in a different language through study. This require great focus (for an expediture of 4 WP) and a roll with a very high difficulty (7 being the lower difficulty in such an attempt).
Camouflage
The focus of this discipline is to allow the Kai to go unnoticed in many situations; alongside Sixth Sense, this is a discipline that most Kai learn early into their training, since knowing it might often be a factor on wheter or not a young Initiate can be sent on a mission or not.
Thi discipline emphasize patience, guile, and the importance of being able to adapt one mindset ot the circumstances - thus being also an essential gateway to the higher levels of learning in the Kai disciplines.
Since this skill includes the ability to pass oneself as member of a different culture and a deep study of languages spoken in faraway lands, being good at it is essential for Kai who are interested in being sent on diplomatic missions.
Gameplay Use
Caomuflage is the art of going unnoticed, and nowere else is this art more easily used by a Kai than in the middle of nature. A Kai can use their camouflage discipline to hide themselves from detection, make the location of their camp harder to notice for passing creatures, moving stealthly, or to go unnoticed when settling up an ambush. A roll is needed to apply these bonuses, but by focusing on the work of mimetizing oneself - thus spending 1 WP - it is possible to get a +2 bonus on that roll.
In addition, camouflage can be used to correctly mimetize in a city: this include understanding and speaking one's place languages (wich need focus and thus require the user to spend 2 WP) and passing themselves as locals (this requires a roll as well as a spent WP; also, if 2 additional WP are spent to speak in the appropriate language, the roll get a +3 bonus to it).
Lastly, when in a wild area or pursued by enemies, it is possible to hide one's tracks, making themselves harder to follow; this require a spent WP and a roll as well.
Healing
This discipline focuses on the study of the body, it's inner workings, it's possible ailments, and how they can be remedied. Like most other Kai disciplines, there's an element of psychic skill in this one, as well; once the user has been properly trained, they can use their psychic power to command somebody's body to increase its rate and speed of healing, although for most healers, the concept is more hazy than this, and explained through feelings and emotions rater than commands.
To complement this supernatural power of helping a body recovery, learning the discipline includes a general training in standard medicine procedures, since without that knowledge, it is impossible to use the skill in the proper manner.
In general, healing is seen as a useful discipline, but not something every Kai need to learn quickly - in fact, it is favored taking some time to better understand it. It's also a discipline that requires a greater degree of emphaty, wich often isn't easy to muster for some of the more aggressive, martially focused Kai.
Gameplay Use
The most important and basic use of the Healing discipline is to impose the hands on a wound to heal it - this works both for the user and for others. The user can pay any number of WP, to heal the same number of END, in a 1 to 1 conversion.
Whenever a character sleeps, the healing discipline automatically activates, increasing the normal recover associated with the rest; after sleeping for eight hours, a Kai regain 5 END upon waking up - assuming the sleep was uninterrupted.
An healer has to, necessarily, have some knowledge of potions; if told the name of something, they can easily recognize the effects. However, at this level, such knowledge is only cursory; when they find a potion, they have to roll to see if they've ever seen one before - the difficulty depending on how rare the potion is. Potions that have already been in the character's hand during the mission are easier to identify.
Whenever they met a sick or poisoned person, healers can spend 1 WP to automatically determine the source of the affliction; to attempt a cure, an additional WP is needed, as well as a roll.
This message was last edited by the GM at 18:01, Wed 16 Nov 2011.