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Much of your life in Aetolia will revolve around your skills. Skills are
either sets of abilities or a single ability representing how well you do
something (like dodge arrows and sword blows, for instance). Typing SKILLS
will list which ones you have, and typing HELP will give you some
more information on each skill. Furthermore, many skills have anywhere from 20
to 50 abilities within the skill. An ability could be an individual spell, or
something like a particular type of kick or swordstroke.
You'll notice, when you type SKILLS that next to the name of each skill will
be a word, like Inept. This word indicates your general proficiency in that
skill. As your proficiency in that skill increases, you will gain more
abilities, in the case of skills which have abilities in them, or you will
grow better at whatever that skill represents. For instance, as you increase
your Philosophy, you will take less and less damage from attacks on your mind
(psionic attacks). The word next to your skill will also change, indicating
your increased mastery of that skill. To see a list of skill ranks, type HELP
SKILLRANKS.
You will notice that when you type SKILLS, mention is made of both skills and
'miniskills'. Miniskills differ from skills only in that they take far fewer
lessons to master (see HELP LESSONS).
Though the general skills that you start off with are useful, it is the
guild-specific skills that make up the core of your character. To gain these
sets of skills, all of which will have many abilities in them, you will need
to join a guild. You may read more about guilds and classes in section 8.0.
In order to see what abilities you have in a skill (if there are, indeed, any
abilities in that particular skill), typing AB will let you see
them. After that, typing AB will give you help,
generally speaking, on that individual ability.
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will always want to be in some stance or another while using tekura. Second,
the higher your tekura, the more likely you are to hit an opponent with a
particular attack, and the more damage you will do with that attack.
The advancement system of Tekura is a bit different from the other skills. You
may progress to a certain level in the skill, and then you must be tested to
see if you are worthy of a new belt. A test consists of successfully
completing a kata, or a series of moves, in front of someone who is either a
black belt, or at least three belts above you. To practice the form, you
DEMONSTRATE (form name). At first, you will have little chance of completing
the kata successfully. With progressive practice however, your skill will
improve and your chances of completing the form go up. When you are confident
that you can complete the form without the shame of error, you must find a
monk with a high enough belt-rank to GRADE you. Your sensei must type GRADE
(your name) to grade you. It should be noted that most of the Gods are, of
course, masters of the highest level in Tekura.
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Domination is without question the most dangerous art within Aetolia. It
involves the summoning of entities from the Chaos Plane as well as Chaos
Lords. You risk your life and your very soul in dealing with them, for they
are powerful and not to be trifled with.
To gain the services of a Chaos Entity, you must first discover a way into the
Chaos Plane. Once there, search them out and DOMINATE (entity). If the
entity feels you are wasting its time, it may choose to attack you or it may
simply ignore you. However, if it feels it can gain something, it will begin a
bargaining dialogue with you, asking how you intend to pay it for its
services. Answer the questions as you like, but be warned that cheapness can
have its own punishment. At any time during the bargaining, you may ABORT to
end the dialogue. The entity may grow enraged at this, however, or may simply
refuse to bargain further with you.
After you have finished your bargaining, you will see, if you type PACTS, what
pacts you have made with entities. If you have a pact made, you may call upon
the aid of that entity by doing SUMMON (entity). In some cases, the entity
itself will come, and in some cases it will send its minions to assist you.
When an entity is summoned, it will, in most cases, remain in the land for a
full day. There are, however, ways to send it back to its infernal realm
prematurely. BANISH (entity) will accomplish this if it is your wish, while
others may have abilities that allow them to drive the entity off. An entity
cannot be killed (though an entity's minions can be). It will only be driven
back to the Chaos Plane if it falls into a state that would kill a mortal.
Summary of general Domination-related commands:
DOMINATE (entity) : Begin to dominate a chaos entity.
ABORT : Abort negotiations with the entity.
PACTS : See what pacts you have with entities.
SUMMON (entity) : Summon an entity or one of its servants.
BANISH (entity) : Banish an entity back to the plane of Chaos.
CALL ENTITIES : Call your loyal entities to you.
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Concoctions is the art of combining knowledge of various plants and other
ingredients with a bit of earth magic. The result is a series of concoctions
with various purposes, ranging from healing, to levitation, to protection
against certain types of damage.
Before you can make any concoctions, you must go out and harvest the
ingredients or, in a few cases, collect or purchase them. HARVEST (plant) will
allow you to harvest a particular plant. You will find that there are two
types of plants. The first are wildflowers and herbs. These will die when you
pick them, though there may be many in a room. The second type are perennials.
They never die from being picked, but they can only have a certain amount
harvested from them each year.
Initially, you will only be able to make elixirs. To make an elixir, you will
first have to obtain an oaken pot. Then, you will collect the proper
ingredients for what you are trying to concoct, and INPOT (ingredient) TO
(pot) for each ingredient. You may concoct up to five batches of an elixir at
once. Simply multiply the number of each ingredient by the number of batches
you want.
Once you have all the ingredients in the oaken pot, put it on the ground and
BOIL (pot) FOR (elixir). After a couple minutes, the mixture will stop boiling
and you will either have a useless mess or an elixir. If it is a useless mess,
you will want to EMPTY (pot) before putting anything else in it. Probing your
pot will give you this information. If you were successful, you may FILL
(vial) FROM (pot).
There are three factors that determine whether or not you are successful at
your concoction. First is the freshness of the ingredients. If you use them
within an hour of harvesting them, you will have the best chance. After that,
your chance is reduced, and after 3/4 of an Aetolian day, the ingredients, if
they come from a plant, will disintegrate. Non-organic ingredients are useful
forever and their effectiveness does not decrease with time. The second factor
is your skill level, and the third is the particular concoction you are trying
to make.
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The abilities in Spirituality revolve around two main things: Guardian Angels
and Spiritual Maces. When you gain the skill of Spirituality, you will also
get a guardian angel, who will stay with you forever. Generally speaking, your
angel will only act in a defensive capacity, except when it involves Chaos
Entities. Angels and Entities have a long-standing hatred of each other.
Spiritual maces, on the other hand, form the core of a Priests offensive
ability. By using them in different ways, the Priest gains the ability to
cause damage, smash limbs, and cause a variety of other effects, including the
feared Judgement, where a Priest stands in Judgement of a player. Failing the
judgement means death. This is, of course, an ability that only the most
powerful of Priests may perform.
Unless there is a help file on an ability (which there are for all the
mace-related abilities), the syntax to use an ability is ANGEL .
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The skill of Tattoos is an ancient one, having been discovered and perfected
by the earliest Tsol'aa. Using special dry-powder inks made from berries and
roots, the tattoo artist magically inscribes, without a needle, various types
of symbols onto a body (his own, or another's).
Each type of tattoo requires a different combination of inks. In order to ink
a tattoo, the syntax is: INK (tattoo) ON (body part) OF (player/me). The
available body parts are: head, torso, right arm, left arm, right leg, left
leg. Inking a tattoo requires that you have the proper inks in your inventory,
and it will take approximately 25 seconds, during which neither the inker nor
the inkee may do anything. Usually, one may find ink for sale at the various
markets in the land.
You may have but a single tattoo on each body part, until you receive the
ability of Superscribing, which will allow you to have two tattoos on each
body part. A tattoo may be wiped off your body by doing WIPE OFF (tattoo).
Tattoos come in a number of varieties. Most you will TOUCH in order to use,
while others will work automatically under certain circumstances. Some tattoos
have a limited number of uses, while some have a chance of wearing off after
each use.
Typing TATTOOS will show you what tattoos you currently bear.
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Weaponry is a skill that everyone acquires. Although anyone may use any weapon
in Aetolia, those untrained in weaponry, and without proficiency in that
weapon, will find it difficult to be effective with it.
Initially, you will have only the ability to learn proficiencies. A
proficiency means that you have mastered a particular type of weapon, e.g.
longsword, broadsword, halberd, whip, mace, etc.
Each weapon has three statistics that are relevent to how well it works (and
these may be seen with the ability WeaponProbe): Damage, To-hit, and Speed.
The higher a weapon's damage, the more damage it is capable of doing. The
higher the to-hit bonus, the easier it is to hit someone with it, and the
greater the Speed, the more quickly you will recover your balance after using
it.
When actually hitting someone with a weapon though, there are two other
factors besides the weapon's statistics that matter. First, as was mentioned
earlier, whether or not you are proficient in that weapon. Second, your skill
in weaponry. The higher your weaponry skill, the faster you will hit, the more
damage you will do (up to a certain point), and the more easily you will hit
someone. An opponent, however, will automatically attempt to dodge your blows,
with the success rate dependent on your weaponry skill compared to his
avoidance skill.
Though there are many ways to use a weapon, ranging from slash, to whip, to
bash, each weapon has only particular methods in which it will be effective.
You CAN, for instance, whip someone with a sword, but you won't have a very
good chance of hitting your target, and you will not do much damage if you do
hit. In order to see the proper commands to use a particular weapon, simply
PROBE it.
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Forging is the skill of creating a wide assortment of weapons and armour,
ranging from the chipped-obsidian throwing dagger to the venerable longsword,
to the impressive full plate armour wearable only by the forger himself.
In order to forge something you know how to make (AB FORGING will show you
what you can make, if you have forging), you must first find a forge. Chances
are it will not be burning, in which case you must buy some coal (probably at
one of the markets), and put it in the forge. Then, you must FIRE FORGE to get
it going. If a forge goes too long without anyone forging in it, then it will
go out.
Once you have got the forge going, you can try to forge something. Each item
has certain commodity requirements. FORGINGCOMMS (item) will tell you what you
need to have in your inventory in order to make that item. For all forging
commands, you should use the exact name of the item that you see when you type
AB FORGING.
Once you've established that you have the proper ingredients, you may FORGE
FOR (itemtype). The commodities will be removed from your inventory and put in
the forge, at which point you cannot recover them. You then simply continue to
type FORGE everytime you regain balance.
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Enchantment is the skill of either enchantment pre-existing items with magical
powers, or creating magical items. Doing either an enchantment or a creation
involves three things:
1) The presence of two Ourobori.
2) Some commodities.
3) Performing a sequence of ritualistic actions.
Each ability help file for enchantment will show you the syntax for creating
and using that item, what commodities are required, and what actions you need
to perform.
Once you have obtained the necessary commodities, put them in one of the
ourobori (ouroboros is the singular). If you are enchanting an item (as
opposed to creating), then put the item to be enchanted into the other
ouroboros.
After doing this, you will need to do either:
BEGIN CREATION OF (whatever)
or
BEGIN ENCHANTMENT OF (whatever) WITH (enchantment)
The exact syntaxes for each one are in the ab help files.
After this, you simply have to perform the relevant actions in the proper
order. Once you've done this, merely type END RITUAL. If you've performed
everything properly, you will succeed. If not, you will fail, destroying your
commodities and item (if enchanting as opposed to creating) in the process.
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The tailor's art is that of transforming regular cloth, leather, and thread
into magnificent vestments fit for a sultan, fearsome uniforms of elite
fighting units, or modest coverings to warm old bones on frigid nights.
To become a professional tailor, you must be trained by the craft guild of a
major city. Go to the craft guild office and BUY TAILORING PERMIT. The
craft guild assesses a fee of 100 credits for the permit, which does not
expire. Once a licensed tailor, you will have basic ability in the Tailoring
miniskill. The more you train in this skill, the higher quality your products
will be, in durability and in prestige.
To produce an item of clothing, simply purchase a clothing pattern and the
components required to make the item as indicated by the pattern (usually
cloth and/or leather). Then SEW (pattern) to construct your garment.
Once you have attained Expert skill in tailoring, you will gain the coveted
ability to design clothing of your own. This process is a bit more involved:
1) Purchase a blank design sketch from a craft guild office.
2) Acquire a garment pattern of the same type as the garment you wish to
design (hat, belt, pants, etc.), then DESIGN (sketch) COPY (pattern.)
This will make a copy of the existing pattern on your blank sketch.
If you copy a pattern onto a sketch that has been partially described, only
the pattern type (boots, trousers, etc), and fields that are undescribed in
the sketch will be copied. DESIGN (sketch) ERASE will completely erase a
sketch, allowing you to start fresh.
3) Customize your sketch's appearance when worn, when viewed in a room, and
when examined closely:
DESIGN (sketch) APPEARANCE (description),
DESIGN (sketch) DROPPED (description),
DESIGN (sketch) EXAMINED (description).
DESIGN (sketch) EXAMINED EDIT.
4) Take your design sketch to a craft guild office and DESIGN SUBMIT
it for evaluation. The craft guild will review your sketch and make a
garment pattern from it.
5) When the garment pattern is finished, you will be notified by letter that
your pattern is ready to pick up. Return to the craft guild office and
DESIGN REQUEST (pattern), using the pattern number specified in the letter
from the craft guild. The craft guild charges a fee for the creation of
the pattern based on the complexity and opulence of your design.
Use DESIGN LIST to list all of the unsubmitted sketches you are holding.
Once you have attained Transcendent skill in tailoring, you will have the
ability to list all patterns in your inventory with PATTERNS.
P.S. Try SHOWOFF (garment) to display your fabulous clothing to the rest of
the world, you gorgeous thing you.
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Granted to Sahmie Rhashye at the time of her revelation, Illumination draws on
the power of light, and specifically on its incarnation in fire. Those with
the power of Illumination believe that light is the natural state of all
things, and are devoted to focusing light on the world and ending the Midnight
Age. An Illuminations adept works hard to attain a communion with the pure
essence of light inherent in himself and the world around him. Once gained,
the adept can draw on that attunement to affect the world around him, to banish
the darkness from the world and bring forth a new Aetolian dawn. To aid in
this attunement, the guild maintains a spectral flame in the guildhall, imbued
with the concentrated power of light.
Torchbearers for the light, the bringers of Illumination are the first heralds
of the end of the Midnight Age. They stand firm and bright to destroy the
night and its minions.
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Illumination is made up of a mix of attack and defense abilities; most of these
are evoked by calling upon the light or your attunement with the light. Some
major abilities require drawing on the store of light shared by the guild.
Each ability requires a small amount of the light you carry inside you. To
refresh and invigorate yourself in the daily fight against the creeping night,
you must periodically meditate on the altared flame within your guildhall.
Your guild as a whole must maintain the flame's strength through a series of
rituals, in which they act as a conduit for natural light to flow into the
flame and restore it to full power.
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Those who can craft useful items from wood are highly sought after for some of
the basic staples of adventuring life, as well as some more esoteric objects.
Vials, pipes, coffins, and elixir pots are some of the items frequently
requested of skilled woodcarvers. Wealthy and powerful individuals often
commission specialized designs for their own use, preferring to sip their
elixirs in style.
To become a professional woodcarver, you must be trained by the craft guild of
a major city. Go to the craft guild office and BUY WOODCRAFT PERMIT. The craft
guild assesses a fee of 100 credits for the permit, which does not expire. Once
a licensed woodcarver, you will have basic ability in the Woodcraft miniskill.
The more you train in this skill, the higher quality your products will be.
To produce a useful item from a chunk of wood, simply purchase a project
diagram and the components required to make the item as indicated by the
diagram (usually wood). Then CARVE to construct your item.
Once you have attained Expert skill in Woodcraft, you will gain the coveted
ability to design items of your own. This process is a bit more involved:
1) Purchase a blank woodcraft design sketch from a craft guild office.
2) Acquire a diagram of the same type as the item you wish to design (vial,
pipe, etc.), then DESIGN (sketch) COPY (diagram). This will make a copy of
the existing diagram on your blank sketch.
If you copy a pattern onto a sketch that has been partially described, only
the pattern type (vial, pipe, etc), and fields that are undescribed in
the sketch will be copied. DESIGN (sketch) ERASE will completely erase a
sketch, allowing you to start fresh.
3) Customize your sketch's appearance when held, when viewed in a room, and
when examined closely:
DESIGN (sketch) APPEARANCE (description),
DESIGN (sketch) DROPPED (description),
DESIGN (sketch) EXAMINED (description).
DESIGN (sketch) EXAMINED EDIT.
4) Take your design sketch to a craft guild office and DESIGN (sketch) SUBMIT
it for evaluation. The craft guild will review your sketch and make a
project diagram from it if the design is approved.
5) When the project diagram is finished, you will be notified by letter that
your diagram is ready to pick up. Return to the craft guild office and
DESIGN REQUEST (diagram), using the diagram number specified in the letter
from the craft guild. The craft guild charges a fee for the creation of
the diagram.
Use DESIGN LIST to list all of the unsubmitted sketches you are holding.
Once you have attained Transcendent skill in Woodcraft, you will have the
ability to list all diagrams in your inventory with DIAGRAMS.
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Skills
