The Bear Necessities (2/2)
GUARD STANCE
Level 1, Cost 10 Sta, Duration: Until dropped, or the end of the fight
Assume a guard stance, and gain a bonus to your dodge skill and armor, at the cost of lowering your strength and dexterity.
WEAPON SPECIALIST
Level 1, Cost N/A, Duration: Passive Constant
Enhances your weapon skill. Automatically assigned to your highest weapon skill. If you have two or more equal highest weapon skills, you may freely choose which to specialize in at any time.
After looking around a bit, Threadbare figured out that mox was moxie. Duelist had the first skills he'd found that did something with that attribute pool. Could be handy, he supposed. He'd have to experiment with them later.
Enchanter was next.
APPRAISE
Level 1, Cost 5 San, Duration: 5 minutes
Allows you to see all relevant information about a mundane or magical item.
GLOWGLEAM
Level 1, Cost 5 San, Duration: 1 hour per level
Infuses any object with a simple light spell. The luminescence is based upon the caster's intelligence.
HARDEN
Level 1, Cost 10 San, Duration: 10 minutes
Increases the toughness of any object or construct temporarily, adding to its armor and/or damage potential.
SOFTEN
Level 1, Cost 10 San, Duration: 10 minutes
Decreases the toughness of any object or construct temporarily, reducing its armor and/or damage potential.
SPELLSTORE I
Level 1, Cost 10 San, Duration: Permanent
Prepares an object that stores a spell or skill inside of it. Anyone can then read, break, drink, or otherwise use the object in an appropriate manner to activate the spell. Requires and consumes one dose of RED Reagents. The enchanter does not have to be the person storing the spell inside the Spellstore.
Okay, that looked fairly interesting. Harden in particular... he was a construct, he thought, given how the class descriptions and other skills referred to him. Threadbare put that in his 'things to test later' list.
Three jobs down, five left. On to the big one. Golemist!
COMMAND GOLEM
Level 1, Cost 20 San, Duration: 1 minute per level
Allows the caster to issue one command to a golem that isn't currently in a party. If unresisted, the golem will follow the command to the best of its ability until it is impossible to do so, or until the command wears off.
GOLEM ANIMUS
Level 1, Cost 50 San, Duration: Permanent
Turns a prepared golem shell into a functional lesser golem, that will obey its creator's commands to the best of its ability.
INVITE GOLEM
Level 1, Cost 10 San, Duration: Instant
Used to invite golems into your party. Automatically affects golems created by the golemist, can be resisted by other golems. Will not affect golems in their creator's party.
TOY GOLEM
Level 1, Cost 100 San, Duration: Permanent
Allows the golemist to construct a toy golem shell. Requires a toy, one dose of YELLOW reagents, and a level 1 Crystal.
Wow, okay, those were some pretty costly skills, sanity-wise. And it required stuff he'd never heard of before, to make more toy golems. Maybe he'd look into this later, after Celia was safe.
Now, on to the model skills.
DIETARY RESTRICTIONS
Level 1, Cost N/A, Duration: Until broken
So long as you have spent the last week without eating anything with the UNHEALTHY identifier you gain a small buff to all pools. This bonus is cumulative, up to twice your rank of this skill. Eating UNHEALTHY designated food immediately removes all versions of the buff.
FASCINATION
Level 1, Cost N/A, Duration: Dependant upon skill
Heal, aid, or otherwise be nice to an enemy in combat. If unresisted by mental fortitude, the foe will become temporarily fascinated with you, for a duration proportionate to this skill's level.
FLEX
Level 1, Cost 10 Sta, Duration: 1 minute per level
Buff your endurance and cool by the level of this skill.
SELF-ESTEEM
Level 1, Cost 10 Mox, Duration: 1 minute per level
Buff your mental fortitude and cool by the level of this skill.
WORK IT BABY
Level 1, Cost NA, Duration: Passive Constant
Whenever one of your worn or wielded items creates a favorable impression in at least one onlooker, then this skill has a chance of increasing. All worn and wielded items that confer bonuses have their bonuses increased by a small percentage for each level of this skill. Note that the difference is harder to see with lower level gear and lower levels of the skill.
That job was a lot more useful than he expected. Three of the skills didn't even require activation, or cost anything to do so! And the downside to dietary restrictions didn't matter much to a creature that never had to eat in the first place. It was pretty much free bonuses. Yeah, he could live with this. Especially with the defensive buffs that he could whip out. They didn't look like they'd last long, but that was fine, they'd get better with practice.
Was necromancer as nice? Hopefully.
ASSESS CORPSE
Level 1, Cost 5 San, Duration: 1 minute
Allows the animator to examine the status of any undead creature he looks upon. Also analyzes any corpse for animation potential and sanity cost. Can be resisted.
COMMAND THE DEAD
Level 1, Cost 5 San, Duration: 1 minute per level
Allows the caster to issue a command to a single undead creature. If unresisted, the creature most follow its orders to the best of its ability. Can also be used to invite unintelligent undead into a party, at which point they can be verbally commanded indefinitely by the caster.
SOULSTONE
Level 1, Cost: 20 San, Duration: Permanent
Creates a soulstone crystal, which can house a newly-deceased spirit or an existing incorporeal undead. A spirit in a soulstone may be conversed with, used to create a new undead, or simply unleashed upon the world at a time of the caster's choosing.
SPEAK WITH DEAD
Level 1, Cost: 5 San, Duration: 1 minute per level
Allows the necromancer to converse with corpses, spirits, or normally incoherent undead. In places with particularly strong spirits, the caster may be notified of the presence of conversable spirits.
ZOMBIES
Level 1, Cost: 10 San, Duration: Permanent
Turns a corpse into a zombie. Requires a spirit present in the area.
Threadbare didn't have any natural revulsion to the dead, or any sort of taboo against messing with them, but he didn't know how useful this was. Still, he'd had to do an awful lot of fighting in his short existence, so he knew that corpses weren't too hard to come by. Spirits? Hard to say. He did notice that unlike animators, necromancers didn't seem to have any way to heal their undead. Animated objects sounded more useful that way... though zombies were evidently permanent, whereas animi needed to be renewed when their duration was up. And golems took special stuff to build.
Mulling over the differences, he moved on to the Ruler skills.
EMBOLDENING SPEECH
Level 1, Cost: 10 Mox, Duration: Instant
Buffs all allies moxie and sanity by an amount related to the ruler's charisma. Only affects allies within earshot.
IDENTIFY SUBJECT
Level 1, Cost: 5 Mox, Duration: 5 minutes
Allows the ruler to examine a sworn subject's status screen. May also be used on people within your party, giving more information than the party status screen.
NOBLESSE OBLIGE
Level 1, Cost: N/A, Duration: Passive Constant
Buffs all sworn subjects and party members a small amount. The stat buffed is dependant upon your highest attribute.
ROYAL AUDIENCE
Level 1, Cost 10 Mox, Duration: 1 Minute per level
Buffs your charisma, but only when dealing with sworn subjects
SIMPLE DECREE
Level 1, Cost 10 Mox, Duration: Permanent until changed
Declare a simple command in twelve words or less. All sworn subjects are notified of the decree. Any who do not comply with this decree take moxie damage influenced by your charisma and wisdom, resisted by cool. Only one simple decree may be in place at a time. Simple commands may not be used to inflict suicidal or self-harmful activities.
Threadbare looked over these skills, and... well, there was that one that buffed people in his party, and one that let him restore moxie. That must have been what the rat king used, he thought, remembering back to the desperate fight in the basement.
But the rest dealt with sworn subjects. How did you get those? Maybe skills would show up later on.
The last job was up, and from what he'd seen Mordecai pull, it had some awesome stuff.
CAMOUFLAGE
Level 1, Cost 5 San/Min, Duration: Until dismissed or exhausted
Blends the Scout in with his surroundings, buffing their stealth skill. More effective in the wilderness, scales according to skill level.
FIRESTARTER
Level 1, Cost 5 San, Duration: Instant
Creates a fire, burning any flammable material it's used upon. Intensity of the starting flames depends on the skill level.
KEEN EYE
Level 1, Cost 5 Sta, Duration: A minute per scout level
Buffs a scout's perception, effects dependent upon skill level
STURDY BACK
Level 1, Cost NA, Duration: Passive Constant
Lightens the burdens of any heavy load carried, making items literally weigh less. Does not apply to weapons and armor equipped. Higher skill level means more weight reduction
WIND'S WHISPER
Level 1, Cost 5 San, Duration: 1 message
May be activated silently. Sends a message on the wind to any named target within range. Range and amount of words speakable per message increase with skill level.
This now, this was helpful. he could see most of these coming in handy, and soon, too. There wasn't much except wilderness all around him, and this would help him avoid trouble and find what he needed out here.
Mulling it over, Threadbare flicked a pebble into the river, and watched it splash and sink. It had taken a very long time to read all those entries, and he had Celia to save. He pretty much had nothing to work with here, and nothing to gain by staying beside the river.
He was going to need help, that was the inescapable conclusion that finally meandered its way through the little bear's mind. The half-orc brothers had vanished, maybe they were still around? It was a long shot, but he didn't have very many shots right now. Threadbare thought back, to before the long sleeps and endless dark of the basement, and he remembered Garon saying something about meeting back up at Oblivion Point.
Well.
He knew how to get there, didn't he?
The little bear got up and headed into the woods.