GUIDING ANCESTOR RUNES (ENCHANTER UPGRADE)

• Ancestral Shield. The bonded bearer of the rune retrieves a glimmering echo of an ancestor in the line. This ancestor can assist, in combat or a challenge and/or risk test. It usually takes a full round and a Resolve to manifest the ancestor, who can assist for up to an hour, for one scene or one fight. A Resolve may also be spent to manifest the ancestor for a single round as a free action. This ancestor counts as one of the two maximum assistants a character can have.
  • There are powerful iterations of this rune that can summon two ancestors, manifest them more clearly and in a more articulate way, or more visibly or tangibly, for longer times. These bear costs related to legacy and bloodline in addition to permanent Vitality.
• Ancestral Lookout. The bonded bearer of the rune retrieves a glimmering echo of an ancestor in the line who can stand guard for 1 shift, 4 hours, automatically waking the bearer if detecting something unusual. The echo can also scout up to a mile away, moving about as well as a dwarf would. Ancestors chosen as lookouts and scouts tend to be ones who had primary skill in those roles. If the lookout is attacked, it dissipates, and the bearer gets a fleeting impression of what did it. The lookout cannot fight.
  • There are powerful iterations of this rune that can fly, move through walls, act with greater intelligence, connect with the bearer as though scrying, and detect supernatural energy. These iterations tend to manifest remarkable traits in the ancestor they echo. Most only bond with bearers from the same family, whether by blood, by having the same Guiding Saying, adopting the same mission, or by living out of similar perspectives.
• Ancestral Rebodying. These runes can bond an ancestral spirit to an animal that the ancestor had an affinity to in life. The animal gains the ability to talk, and takes on shades of the ancestor’s personality and memories. An enchanter can spend 1 Vitality to coax the ancestor’s shadow into the animal for a brief conversation, or 1 permanent Resolve to bond the ancestor to the animal for the rest of the animal’s lifespan. A permanent bonding is a challenge/risk test, where the risk is breaking the rune and losing the spirit echo and the challenge is sucessful bonding; neither success nor failure means the bond doesn’t work, the Resolve is not lost, and the enchanter can try again with another animal (but that particular one will never work for that echo.)
  • There are powerful iterations of this rune that bring physical mutation to a hybrid animal/dwarf, or allow the fusion to use one or more abilities the ancestor had in life. There are cheaper versions that only bring forward one or two aspects of the echo. Some versions retain the memories the echo earns in each body and conversations, others start from the reset point each time, others don’t bring memories only personality and some abilities.