Discipline Design [RBL-504].pdf

CONTENTS

DISCIpLInE DESIgn

Elementalist

new Disciplines

horror Stalker

Designing a Discipline

Illusionist

Designing new Talents

Liberator

ALTERnATIVE DISCIpLInE MEChAnICS

Messenger

nethermancer

how it Works

Outcast Warrior

new Talents

Puriier

Animal Talk

Call Animal Companion

Scout

Distract

Shaman

Elemental Walk

Sky Raider

Impress

Songsmith

Improve Weapon

Swordmaster

Inspire Others

Long Shot

Taildancer

Navigation

Thief

Parry

Traveled Scholar

Read River

Troubadour

Resist Pain

Warrior

Second Attack

Weaponsmith

Second Charge

Second Shot

Wind-Dancer

Storm Shield

Windmaster

Tactics

Windscout

Air Sailor

Wizard

Archer

Woodsman

Beastmaster

DISCIpLInE DESIgn ShEET

Boatman

Cavalryman

product Director

James D. Flowers

Line Developer

Carsten Damm

Development

Carlton Anderson, Eike-Christian Bertram,

Steven J. Black, Carsten Damm, Kevin Hallock,

Lars Heitmann, Michael Jahn, Sebastian Petermann,

Jason Wallace

Artwork

Kent Burles, Paul Jaquays, Earl Geier,

Jeff Laubenstein, Mike Nielsen, Kathy Schad

Administration

Kim Flowers, Richard Vowles

Layout

Carsten Damm, James D. Flowers

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DISCIPLINE DESIGN

I’m no raider, sir. I follow the Discipline of the Air Sailor—a iner, nobler, and very

distant cousin of that barbaric ideal followed by the trolls of the Twilight Peaks!

• Jendar For, Theran Air Sailor •

The Disciplines described in the Player’s Compen-

dium are the ifteen most commonly practiced by the

adepts of Barsaive. However, adepts can and sometimes

do follow other Disciplines, such as those described in the

Name-giver’s Compendium . This chapter provides

detailed Discipline design rules, and is intended for

gamemasters and players who wish to introduce new

Disciplines into their Earthdawn campaign. These rules

can also be used to create alternate versions of existing

Disciplines, including regional and race-speciic variants.

N EW DISCIPLINES

a unique focus, while still leaving enough room for player

characters to adapt and maintaining game balance.

HISTORY

Disciplines don’t just spring into existence overnight.

All Earthdawn Disciplines have been in existence for

centuries, if not longer. Only the cumulative effects of

generations of adepts following in the footsteps of their

predecessors can establish a Discipline’s path, deining

the talents and abilities available at each Circle. The time

required for this process alone explains why new Disci-

plines are so rare in Barsaive.

Creating new Disciplines can be a fun and

rewarding process that adds additional complexity and

diversity to an existing Earthdawn campaign. However,

designing a new Discipline and playing an adept of that

Discipline can pose a number of challenges. This section

outlines a few of them.

PUBLIC ACCEPTANCE

Bear in mind that the ifteen Disciplines presented in

the Player’s Compendium are those best known to the

people of Barsaive; the ifteen Disciplines described in the

Name-giver’s Compendium , less so. Adepts of these

Disciplines are often the subject of local legend, which

frequently describes their strange and wonderful abilities.

By contrast, adepts of new Disciplines use magic in a new

and unfamiliar way, combining both known and unknown

talents. To many Barsaivians, aflicted as they are with

an instinctive distrust of the unfamiliar as a result of the

Scourge, these often startling new Disciplines may hint at

Horror magic or, more likely, Theran magic. The people

of Barsaive generally believe that the Therans are masters

of magic, and assume that their former overlords have

many more Disciplines than those known in Barsaive.

Ordinary citizens who encounter an adept that uses magic

in an unusual way may reasonably assume the adept is a

Theran spy or slaver. Given Barsaive’s history of oppres-

sion at the hands of the Theran Empire, being mistaken

for a Theran will almost certainly have unpleasant conse-

quences for such an unlucky character.

GAME BALANCE

The Disciplines in the Player’s and Name-giver’s

Compendiums were carefully designed to be balanced

with regards to one another and to be lexible enough

that an adept character can use his Discipline’s talents

and abilities in a variety of different settings. For this

reason, new Disciplines should be added to the game with

caution, and generally only when the existing Disciplines

(or combinations thereof) do not satisfy the players’ or

gamemaster’s needs. Because no system for creating

any new game element is perfect, a new Discipline could

potentially be powerful enough to threaten game balance,

or come with a focus so narrow that it has little use in most

adventures. When designing a new Discipline, it is impor-

tant to select talents and abilities that give the Discipline

TRAINING

Given that adepts in general are relatively uncommon

in the irst place and the vast majority of Barsaive’s adept

population practices one of the ifteen standard Disci-

plines, tracking down a member of a less well-established

Discipline can be dificult at best. Additionally, members

of a single race only practice some of the non-standard

Disciplines, or have so few followers that most adventurers

will never encounter more than a handful of them. As a

result, inding a teacher for training or Circle advance-

ment often proves both costly and time-consuming, as it

frequently involves signiicant travel and/or research.

D ESIGNING A DISCIPLINE

DETERMINE IMPORTANT ATTRIBUTES

Adepts who follow the new Discipline will ind certain

Attributes more important than others. Each Discipline

emphasizes certain Attributes over others. Do adepts

of this Discipline need quick relexes or great physical

strength? How about a keen mind, or above-average

charisma? Do they need extraordinary perception?

Important Attributes not only help to deine the type

of character best suited to become an adept of a Disci-

pline, but they also deine which Attribute-only Tests he

may use Karma on when advancing in Circles (see Deter-

mine Special Abilities , below). Each Discipline should

have at least two, but no more than three, important

Attributes.

This section offers in-depth explanations of

the steps for creating a new Discipline from scratch. At

each step of the process, players should work with the

gamemaster to ensure that their new Discipline its

into the gamemaster’s view of the Earthdawn world

and game. The gamemaster makes the inal decision on

whether or not a new Discipline may be added to his

game. All Disciplines published by RedBrick have been

designed with this system, so it should be easy to modify

them by following the guideline presented below.

Use a copy of the Discipline Design Worksheet

(provided at the end of this document) as a guide to the step-

by-step process of creating a new Discipline. Creating a new

Discipline follows a series of eight steps, described in detail

below.

 Deine the Discipline’s Purpose

 Determine Important Attributes

 Determine Racial Restrictions

 Determine Artisan Skills

 Select Talents

 Select Spells (if applicable)

 Determine Special Abilities

 Describe the Discipline in Writing

DETERMINE RACIAL RESTRICTIONS

Though you should consider the reasons for a Disci-

pline’s racial restrictions when you decide its purpose,

this step requires you to deine precisely which races can

and cannot follow the new Discipline. Can all races adopt

this Discipline? Which ones cannot and why? If a partic-

ular race is strongly lacking in the Discipline’s important

Attributes, that may be suficient reason to exclude its

members. Similarly, if the Discipline’s worldview is

contrary to that of a particular race, the race in question

should probably be restricted from it.

Sometimes, a Discipline is only available for a speciic

DEFINE THE DISCIPLINE’S PURPOSE

Start by explaining the new Discipline’s intended

purpose. What role does the new Discipline play? Is it

unique, or simply a variant of an existing Discipline?

What is the Discipline’s name? All existing Disciplines

are built around a central theme that is relected by the

Discipline’s name: Swordmaster, Warrior, Weaponsmith,

and so on. This approach should be maintained when

designing a new Discipline.

A Scholar Discipline might concentrate on the

acquisition of knowledge, drawing on the intel-

lectual talents of the Wizard and Troubadour

Disciplines. Similarly, a Spiritual Warrior might

combine the ighting abilities of the Warrior Disci-

pline with the astral talents of the Nethermancer.

race, excluding all other races from following it. The

racial restrictions of these Disciplines only need to list the

name of the allowed race, followed by the word only. For

example, if only obsidimen can understand the way of a

Discipline, it should be listed as ‘Obsidimen only’.

Of the 13 talents

assigned to the

Initiate/Novice status

levels (Circles 1–4)

of the new Discipline,

6 must be available

at First Circle, 3 at

Second Circle, 2 at

Third Circle, and 2

must be available at

Fourth Circle.

As a rule of thumb, a

talent should be available

within the Circle range of

its status level or higher.

One consideration that

may affect your decisions

is that the higher the

Circle a talent is assigned

to, the more Legend

Points it costs to increase

its rank.

The Melee Weapons talent is an Initiate/

Novice talent, but possessing it may make the

difference between surviving an attack and dying.

This talent should be available within Circles 1–4,

but you may want to assign it to a higher Circle in

your new Discipline for any reason. If that’s the

case, keep in mind that at Circles 1–4, rank 1 in

this talent costs only 100 Legend Points, but costs

200 Legend Points if purchased at Circles 5–8.

When assigning talents, you should ind an equal mix

of core and support talents for your Discipline. For

example, two talents can be assigned to most Circles, one

of which should be a core talent and the other a support

talent.

Circle

number of

Talents

6 (7; see text)

DETERMINE ARTISAN SKILLS

As noted in the Disciplines chapter of the player’s

Compendium , each Discipline lends itself to certain

Artisan skills that relate in some way to the tools or

purpose of that Discipline.

Swordmasters often practice the Artisan

skill of runic carving by etching runes into their

swords. This increases the weapon’s value as

a work of craftsmanship and proves that the

wielder is free of Horror-taint. Magicians of all

Disciplines have a long-standing tradition of

practicing the Artisan skill of embroidery. In the

days just prior to and after the Scourge, magi-

cians stored spell matrices in their robes. Though

this is no longer true, over time embroidering

intricate patterns and designs into the robe came

to represent the weaving of matrices into the

fabric.

When creating a new Discipline, try to match its

nature and purpose with one or two Artisan skills that

somehow relate to the Discipline.

SELECT TALENTS

Once the new Discipline’s purpose, racial restric-

tions, and important Attributes have been determined,

it’s time to select talents. Talents are an important part

of every Discipline, representing the unique way adepts

of that Discipline focus their magical abilities. A Disci-

pline’s talents should function in a manner consistent

with the Discipline’s central philosophy, whether it’s

the pragmatism of the Warrior, the unbridled curiosity

of the Troubadour, or the intense intellectualism of the

Wizard. A new Discipline should consist of a unique blend

of talents, including a number of new talents that help to

distinguish it from the existing Disciplines.

Assign a number of talents available to adepts of the new

Discipline, as shown on the Talents Per Circle Table. Keep

in mind that some of these talents are predetermined (see

Core Talents and Support Talents , below).

Disciplines which allow the Thread Weaving, Spell-

casting, and Spell Matrix talents at First Circle are known

as magician Disciplines and receive an extra talent at

First Circle to compensate for the use of spell matrices.

Two points need to be considered when selecting

talents: irst, each talent is keyed to a certain status level

(Initiate, Circle 1; Novice, Circles 2–4; Journeyman,

Circles 5–8; Warden, Circles 9–12; and Master, Circles

13–15), and should be available to a character within that

status level or later (ind a table of available talents for

each status level at the end of this section). Second, each

Circle of a Discipline must be assigned a certain number

of talents, as shown in the Talents Per Circle Table.

Core Talents

Core talents deine a Discipline. Most often core

talents are also Discipline talents (see Determine

Special Abilities , below), and a number of core talents

are unique to one Discipline only. There are a number of

core talents which have to be assigned to a speciic Circle:

Durability, Karma Ritual, and Thread Weaving talents, as

described below.

Durability : All Disciplines must have the Durability

talent available at Second Circle. Durability for new Disci-

plines uses the same rules described for that talent, using

the following numbers. If the new Discipline offers the

Spellcasting talent at Circles 1–8, add +4 to the charac-

ter’s Death Rating and +3 to his Unconsciousness Rating

for each rank in Durability. If the Discipline does not offer

the Spellcasting talent, or offers it at Circles 9–15, add

+6 to the character’s Death Rating and +5 to his Uncon-

sciousness Rating for each rank in Durability. These

values can be modiied later (see Determine Special

Abilities , below). Durability cannot become a Discipline

talent.

Karma Ritual : All Disciplines have the Karma Ritual

TalenTs Per

CirCle Table

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