Extli — Arts Draft¶
Working draft, not locked in. Extli has no spells; it's all Arts. See Magic Systems → Extli.
How Extli Works¶
Extli is built on WWN's Vowed, reworked for armored fighters with weapons. Like the Vowed, it exists only as a partial Mage class. The usual pairing is Partial Warrior/Partial Extli: a fighter who knows magic to strengthen themselves. That pairing gives up the full Warrior's Killing Blow and Veteran's Luck in exchange for Arts, so it doesn't outclass a Fighter.
The Vowed's three core Arts (Martial Style, Unarmed Might, and Unarmored Defense) don't carry over. Extli's core Arts are the signature armor and the signature weapon instead, and a practitioner gains both at first level, plus one more Art of their choice.
Sect skill. Each sect has a skill. A practitioner gains it as a bonus skill at level-0, or at level-1 if they already have it at level-0, the way each Vowed order grants one:
| Sect | Skill |
|---|---|
| Itztli (Breakers) | Exert |
| Apozonalli (Seers) | Notice |
| Chalchihuitl (Stalkers) | Sneak |
Effort. As with the Vowed, maximum Effort equals the practitioner's level in their sect's skill plus their best attribute modifier, with a minimum of one point.
Arts gained. The Partial Vowed progression, without its Punch columns:
| Level | Arts Gained |
|---|---|
| 1 | Blood-Bound Plates, the Blooded Extihuitl, and any one |
| 2 | Any one |
| 4 | Any one |
| 5 | Any one |
| 6 | Any one |
| 8 | Any one |
| 10 | Any one |
Once chosen, an Art can't be changed. A practitioner can take no more than two Arts from outside their own sect, and must always have more Arts from their own sect than from outside it. So their first two chosen Arts come from their own sect, and the earliest an outside Art can come is the third. The core Arts don't count toward either side, and the Arts of every sect count as the practitioner's own.
Core Arts¶
Blood-Bound Plates (the signature armor). Lamellar or scale of the sect's stone, bound with the wearer's blood. Extli Arts work in this armor, and they also work unarmored or in light armor that isn't metal (organic by nature: leather, hide, quilting, bone), though neither gives much AC. They don't work in any other armor. At each step below, the plates are remade smaller, lighter, and tougher:
| Level | AC | Encumbrance |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 14 | 2 |
| 3 | 15 | 2 |
| 6 | 16 | 1 |
| 9 | 17 | 0 |
The Blooded Extihuitl (the signature weapon). The extihuitl (esh-TEE-weetl) is a short glaive crossed with a macuahuitl: a haft with the sect's stone set along one edge and at the tip, blooded to its owner. The back edge is bare, often drilled with holes to soften it, for bludgeoning and subduing. It uses normal WWN weapon stats for its length, and it doesn't scale in damage; its power comes through Arts. It strikes as a magic weapon only once it has a Bloodwood haft (see below).
| Length | Stats | Based on |
|---|---|---|
| Short (about 2 ft) | 1d6, Shock 1/AC 15 | Hand Axe |
| Standard (about 4 ft) | 1d8, Shock 2/AC 13 | Long Sword |
| Long (about 6 ft) | 1d10, Shock 2/AC 15, two-handed, Long | Halberd |
The back edge. Turned to the bare back edge, any length of extihuitl counts as Less Lethal: a foe it brings to zero hit points can always be left alive.
The Bloodwood haft. A student's first extihuitl has an ordinary hardwood or iron haft. It becomes a magic weapon when the student fits it with a haft of Bloodwood (ezcuahuitl), and the student has to go and get that wood themselves. Bloodwood is a carnivorous tree of Azlotl's jungles, so the trip means at least one adventure, much like WWN's rule that every permanent magic item needs one adventure for its components. The student then binds the haft with their own blood. Getting the haft is the rite that turns a student into a practitioner, and most do it somewhere around 3rd level, though no level is required.
A GM who doesn't want to run that adventure can let a student buy the wood instead. It should be expensive: about 10,000 sp for a haft-length of Bloodwood, close to WWN's 12,500 sp creation cost for a Sword +1, even though Bloodwood only makes the extihuitl strike as magic and gives no +1. The student still binds it themselves.
The Code: the Binding¶
Draft. Every Extli practitioner keeps a code, called the Binding, after the blood that binds their plates. It's short, and it isn't a creed of virtue: it's what keeps a lineage of dangerous people working together. It runs on the rules in Edicts, Anathemas, and Goals.
What a practitioner carries. Two tenets: the shared Anathema, which every practitioner keeps, and one tenet from their sect, picking either its Edict or its Anathema. Binding tenets don't count toward the usual limit of four Edicts.
Edicts. Following a Binding Edict earns a Hero Point, as with any Edict. Edicts carry no cost.
Anathemas. An Anathema is an Edict for pros: it rewards and it cuts. As with any Anathema, a practitioner earns a Hero Point when they clearly play to a Binding Anathema. Breaking one earns the usual Anathema Point, but it also costs 1 point of maximum Effort until the practitioner atones. A second breach before atoning costs another point, down to zero.
Atoning. The practitioner confesses to their teacher, or to a senior of their sect if their teacher is gone, who sets a penance: a task, a service, or a debt to pay. Once it's done, the practitioner rebinds their plates with fresh blood, which takes a day and costs 1 System Strain, and their lost Effort returns. A practitioner who won't atone is rogue, and their teacher still holds their plate.
The Shared Anathema¶
- Never sell out your line. Never harm or betray your teacher, your students, or those who share your teacher, and never sell the Arts or their secrets to anyone outside the line.
Sect Tenets (pick one)¶
| Sect | Edict | Anathema |
|---|---|---|
| Breakers | Be first in. When the fight comes, be the first to meet it. | Never yield a fight you started. |
| Seers | Look before the leap. Read what you can (the ground, the object, the people) before you commit to a job. | Never lie about what you've seen. You can keep silent about a vision, but you can't misrepresent one. |
| Stalkers | Finish the hunt. Once you take up a hunt, see it through. | Never reveal who you hunt for. |
Arts of Every Sect¶
The two blood-and-body Arts are taught in every sect. Arts marked adapted from come from the WWN Vowed list, renamed, with as few other changes as possible. Arts marked new are Tir Hathar's own.
- Enduring Blood (adapted from Master's Vigor) — Your body keeps its vigor and youthful vitality for the full normal span of your life. You regain two lost hit points per hour through your natural restorative powers.
- Mending Blood (adapted from Revivifying Breath) — Commit Effort for the day as an On Turn action to heal yourself for 1d6 hit points plus your level. This healing doesn't add System Strain. You can use it on your turn even at zero hit points, but then it Commits all your remaining Effort for the day. Usable only once per scene.
The Sects¶
Itztli — Obsidian (Blackglass)¶
Breakers: shock fighters who crash through walls and battle lines on fury and blood, like a dragoon coming down from a leap. Their power runs hottest of the three sects, and their code is what keeps it aimed.
- Answering Blow (adapted from Brutal Counter) — Commit Effort for the scene as an Instant action after resolving an enemy melee attack against you, whether it hits or misses. Make a free physical attack against your assailant, either a normal attack or another offensive ability that takes no more than one Main Action. No more than once per round against a single foe, but usable during a Total Defense.
- Hurl Aside (adapted from Hurling Throw) — After a successful attack, Commit Effort for the scene as an Instant action. The target makes a Physical save or is thrown up to 10 feet in any direction, landing prone and taking the damage rolled for your attack. On a successful save, it simply takes the damage. Once per round on any given target, and the target can be no larger than an ox.
- Unbowed in the Press (adapted from Mob Justice) — As an Instant action, Commit Effort for the day to become impervious to the Make a Swarm Attack maneuver: your assailants can't use it against you for the rest of the scene, and you're immune to Shock while you're in melee with at least two foes. Using it disrupts any spellcasting you attempt, because of the violent motion it takes.
- Wallbreaker (adapted from Shattering Strike) — Commit Effort for the day and take a full round of motionlessness to prepare. On the next round, as a Main Action, your extihuitl can shatter a wooden door, wooden wall, or similar object, to a depth of one foot per level and wide enough for a human-sized creature to pass. At 4th level it affects stone walls, and at 7th, metal walls and solid iron doors. Useless against a target that can move, but against an immobilized creature it deals 1d12 damage per character level. (Changed: the Vowed version uses an unarmed attack.)
- Red Fury (new, draft) — The blood-rage. Commit Effort for the scene as an On Turn action. Until the scene ends, your melee hits deal +2 damage (+3 from 5th level, +4 from 9th), and the Shock you deal applies against any Armor Class. But you can't retreat, take a Fighting Withdrawal, or use Total Defense, and each round you must attack a foe if one is in reach. The fury can't be ended early. When the scene ends, gain 1 System Strain.
- Breaking Charge (new, draft) — When you Charge, Commit Effort for the scene as an Instant action. Your straight line can pass through enemies' spaces, and each foe you pass through, no larger than an ox, makes a Physical save or is knocked prone. You don't take the Charge's -2 AC penalty.
- Cut the Shot (new, draft) — Your extihuitl cuts bullets, arrows, and bolts out of the air. Commit Effort for the scene as an Instant action. For the rest of the scene, while you hold your extihuitl and can see the attacker, you gain +2 AC against ranged attacks (+3 from 5th level, +4 from 9th).
- Falling Stone (adapted from Leap of the Heavens) — Commit Effort for the scene as a Move action to leap up to your full Move horizontally, or half that vertically. You can also Commit Effort for the scene as an Instant action to negate falling damage, no matter the distance.
Apozonalli — Amber (Honeycoats)¶
Seers: seekers of what is known and hidden. Object reading belongs here (a new Art, still to write).
- Forewarned (adapted from Faultless Awareness) — You can't be surprised, and you'll wake even from a sound sleep in time to respond normally to imminent peril.
- Eyeless Sight (adapted from The Inward Eye) — Commit Effort as an On Turn action. For as long as it stays Committed, you're mystically aware of your surroundings, with a sense equal to normal eyesight regardless of darkness, obscuring mist, or your eyes being closed or blinded.
- Glimpse of the Blow (new, draft) — A heartbeat's warning of what's coming. Once per scene, Commit Effort for the scene as an Instant action, either after an attack against you hits, or after one of your own attacks misses. That attack is rerolled, and the new roll stands. (This is deliberately weaker than a Warrior's Veteran's Luck, which turns the result outright rather than rerolling it.)
- The Moment Before (new, draft) — A lesser premonition: you feel a fight coming half a breath early. You add +1 to your initiative rolls, or to your side's roll if initiative is rolled by sides; this doesn't stack with the Alert Focus. Once per scene, you can also Commit Effort for the scene as an Instant action at the start of a round to act first that round, ahead of anyone but a creature with the second level of Alert.
- Echo in Amber (new, draft) — Amber holds what it caught, and so can you. Commit Effort for the day and handle an object for a full scene. You see the strongest moment in its past, and you get a sense of the last person who held it for long. Blood leaves the deepest marks: if blood was ever spilled on the object, that moment is the one you see. From 5th level you can also ask the GM one question about the object's history, and from 9th, two. The vision shows what the object was present for, not what anyone was thinking.
- Read the Pulse (new, draft) — You read the blood, not the mind. Commit Effort for the scene as an On Turn action. For the rest of the scene, you can sense the heartbeat of any creature you can see within 30 feet. You know whether it's calm, afraid, angry, or straining, whether it's wounded, and whether it has a heartbeat at all. You roll twice and take the better on Notice checks to read someone's mood or catch them in a lie. A racing heart isn't proof of a lie, though: fear, anger, and excitement all look the same in the blood.
- Clean Blood (adapted from Purified Body) — Commit Effort for the day as an Instant action to cure any disease or poison affecting you, or to negate any need for sleep, food, water, or air for the next 24 hours.
Chalchihuitl — Jade (Greenscales)¶
Stalkers: hunters and infiltrators who track, close unseen, and strike, the way the jaguar hunts.
- Jaguar's Climb (adapted from Nimble Ascent) — Commit Effort for the scene as an On Turn action. For the rest of the scene, you move up vertical and overhanging surfaces and across difficult terrain at your full movement rate, with no chance of slipping or falling, unless the surface is glass-smooth or enchanted. You need only one free hand to cling to a wall or ceiling.
- Scent of Blood (new, draft) — You smell blood the way a jaguar does. Commit Effort for the scene as an On Turn action. For the rest of the scene, you know the direction and rough distance of every wounded creature within 100 feet, seen or unseen, and you roll twice and take the better on Survive and Notice checks to track. If your extihuitl has drawn a creature's blood within the last day, you can instead Commit Effort for the day to know the direction to that creature, within a few miles, for the next 24 hours. A plate from an Extli practitioner's armor or a shard from their extihuitl works the same way, at any age, since both hold their owner's blood. Tracking someone this way takes magic, and so far only this Art can do it. This is how a rogue practitioner is hunted (see The Teacher's Plate, below).
- The Patient Kill (new, draft) — The jaguar waits, then strikes once. Commit Effort for the day to set up an Execution Attack in a single round instead of a full minute, as long as the target is still unaware of you. Every other rule for Execution Attacks applies as written.
- Still Blood (new, draft) — You slow your heart and breath almost to nothing. Commit Effort as an On Turn action, and choose one form:
- Seeming death. For as long as the Effort stays Committed, you appear dead to any examination short of magic. You stay aware of your surroundings, but you can't move or act without ending the Art. If you're Mortally Wounded while this form is active, the six rounds before death don't count down until it ends.
- Stillness. For the rest of the scene, you move at half speed, but roll twice and take the better on Sneak checks to hide, and creatures that sense by breath, heartbeat, or body heat can't sense you that way.
- Unseen Step (adapted from Unobtrusive Step) — You have considerable skill at disguise and concealment, and you can become extremely hard to detect. Once per scene, Commit Effort for the day as an Instant action to reroll a failed Sneak check, or a failed check to impersonate someone.
Left Out¶
- Style Weaponry — It lets a Vowed use Punch with weapons. Extli already fight with the extihuitl on the Stab skill, so it has nothing to do.
The Teacher's Plate¶
Every Extli practitioner gives one plate of their armor to their teacher, and any teacher takes one from each student in turn. It isn't a tenet of the Binding; it's simply how Extli is taught. It's a pledge that they won't go rogue, and it's how they're found if they do: with that plate, a Stalker can follow its owner anywhere.
Capstone Arts¶
Capstone Arts reach into someone else's blood. They can be taken only from 8th level, and they're taught in every sect, so they count as the practitioner's own. None needs the target's consent.
- Stanch (new, draft) — Commit Effort for the day as a Main Action and touch a creature. Its bleeding stops, and if it's Mortally Wounded, it's stabilized.
- Quicken Another (new, draft) — Commit Effort for the day as a Main Action and touch an ally. Choose one of your Arts that affects only you, other than the core Arts, and Commit its usual Effort as well. The ally gains its benefit instead of you, for as long as it would last. Lending Red Fury lends its limits along with it.
- Boil the Blood (new, draft) — Commit Effort for the scene as a Main Action. A wounded creature you can see within 30 feet makes a Physical save or loses its next Main Action, wracked as its blood seethes. Creatures without blood are unaffected. The sects frown on this Art, but the Binding doesn't forbid it.
- Blood Call (new, draft) — Your extihuitl must have drawn the target's blood this scene; a punch or an arrow won't do. Commit Effort for the scene as a Main Action. The target, if within 60 feet, makes a Physical save or is dragged up to 20 feet toward you, and it can't move farther away from you until the end of its next turn.
Still open¶
- Bloodwood itself: a monster stat block (waiting on the first pass at monsters), where its groves are, and what it takes to fell one.