Re: Skills, feats & classes
Classes so far:
Stoicist
Focus: Melee, cybernetics
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Stoicist believe that there is only a physical world. It is their goal to achieve absolute indifference towards everything what sentient beings describe as good or bad. Only those who are truly apapethic towards any affect are truly wise. The three pillars of Stoicism are Autarky (self-sufficiency ), Ataraxia (imperturbability ) and Apatheia (apathy).
Although their philosophy seems rather egoistically they try to extend it on all humanoid beings. To accomplish this bold plan they rely on cybernetic enhancements which they implant into their bodies to achieve greater control over mind and flesh.
They are organized in so-called orders which world views can (slightly) differ from the doctrine of their highest authority, The Exalted One, who resides in Adiaphora, the holy city of spheres.
Since cyberware is mostly ancient technology and due to the fact that only simple enhancements have been backwards engineered and reproduced, Stoicists are rather rare and not a real political or military power.
In battle they use their superior physical abilities and seek close-range combat where they use steampowered melee weapons or integrated weapons such as flamethrowers or shockers.
Stoicists are the only class that is completely unable to use psionics (except from psionic equipment) and to compensate for this they have the most cybernetics slots.
Epicurean
Focus: Melee, psionics
Epicureans are not so different from Stoicists at the first sight but soon one will see the vast difference. They concentrate on the things that provide pleasure and try to avoid adversity.
While "good" Epicureans try to achieve pleasure for everyone, "bad" Epicureans tend to be egoistical hedonists. Their main principles are Ataraxia (freedom from fear; tranquility of soul) and Aponia (freedom from pain) which they try to reach.
Instead of choosing their fate like the Stoicists for example they are born with their powers.
The most important trait of Epicureans is the ability to change their shape at will.
At young age they can barely control it but with increasing experience they are able to morph particular limbs or even their whole shape. The more the aspired form is different from the own nature the more likely is a loss of identity and sanity. There are many legends about Epicureans who turned permanently into stones or trees.
Due to their psionic nature, Epicureans can sense kindred spirits easily and are drawn to each other.
They don't really have a real culture and often live together in nomadic tribes outside of the cities.
Epicureans love to tell stories and their most important myth is about the first Epicurean, a divine being that transmuted into what we call universe. Because of this and that they often morph into animals they respect nature and life in general though this is not the norm.
While fighting they transform their bodies into powerful weapons or armour. Their psionic powers usually have just a short range and thus they are mostly found in the first row.
Subjectivist
Focus: Melee, anti-psionics, stealthy
It is not easy to describe what Subjectivists are. No one really knows where they come from or what they do. Scientists call their mysterious powers anti- or meta-psionics because they mostly affect the minds of other beings. Subjectivists are able to negate psionics and to create anti-psionic fields.
There are some rumours that they have been especially created to kill off psionics users.
The other, even more enigmatic ability is their power to "overwrite" objective reality with their own subjective reality (thus the name Subjectivists). Basically, it's like having a third arm – that works interdimensional. This power seems almost divine but it has its limits – it only works with anorganic matter and only on a very small area, constant usage can affect sanity.
And no matter how strong your arms are, it is unlikely that you will ever be able to lift a building with it.
Subjectivists are very rare and they usually try to avoid showing their abilities to other persons because more than once known Subjectivists have been killed off by the Guild or used for various experiments by other, shady organizations.
In battle they are able to attack from the shadows – even if there are none, they will gladly ignore the shining sun. Because that doesn't work too well from distance they have to use melee weapons and they will do that without honour.
The reality warping makes them terrific thieves and more than one Subjectivist used it to bend the laws.
Existentialist
Focus: Long-range, cybernetics, stealthy
The Existentialists are a loose brotherhood of information collectors. While the Stoicists are rather a collective of various, dogmatic machine-cults guided by one person as supreme authority, the Existentialists are only lead by a small council. The brotherhood knows only one goal: gathering all kinds of informations and artificats of past cultures. The members are only restricted by few rules:
1.The council watches you.
2.If you betray the council, you are dead.
3.Only reveal as many informations as necessary to strangers.
By normal people they are usually called wanderers because never stay long at one location and roam the wilderness between the cities. Existentialist can come from everywhere, former soldiers, orphans or bandits can be found amongst their rank. Usually they get hired by Existentialist talent seekers.
The organization provides them with weapons training, money and access to their information vault. What they are eventually do with all this is up to them as long as they fulfill their missions. Since bringing back the informations to the Great Library is the crucial point of being an Existentialist, they tend to fight from the distance with advanced firearms. Also, they use cybernetics to simplify that task but far less than the Stoicists. No one exceeds their knowledge about ancient and modern technology.
Monolatrist
Focus: Depends on the god, healing
Someone is called a Monolatrist when he ackknowledges the existence of many gods but decides to worship only one. In this case, it's a bit more complicated. In fact, the gods choose the persons they want as a real followers prenatally. Because of that they are gifted with psionics but a different kind that concentrates mainly on people, which means basically healing or killing.
The prenatal intervention leads also to some minor physical mutations like odd eye or hair colours, a sixth toe or partial scales. Depending on the culture, having such a person in the family is either a very good or a very bad thing.
Monolatrists are the most versatile class of all. They don't have a real combat focus and depending on the god that chose them they can even combine cybernetics with psionics as the only class.
Everything further, well, depends on the god.
Rationalist
Focus: Long-range, psionics
Rationalists are not born, Rationals are made. There are many legends about a shady organization called The Guild that takes children away from their homes and makes them "wizards" though the academical term is always Rationalist since they try to perceive objective reality and try to change it
on that level with the vast power of their minds. This means they have to learn a lot of formulas and the whole "magic" thing comes down to mathematics directly woven into the world.
Little is known about The Guild and their goals, their agents can be found all over the world and they sure are a power that has to be reckoned with.
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Just a quick summarization so far. Didn't thought that really through.