Do we get a new one every Decade?

Yep, we've been telling you for a while that Third Decade is the single biggest power spike for you for the immediate future. Fourth Decade won't be quite so easy, there's Questin' and more than just grinding involved with that, but you've got the last of the good low hanging fruits now!

Every extra Decade is a big power spike. Fourth is considered the bare minimum to be considered a fully ordained Knight for good reason, because that's the point when you can generally be expected to bulldoze over all but Super Elites from other paradigms. Even Third Decade is enough that with a bit more tempering, you could reasonably be expected to challenge even a squad of "Baby's First Raid" 'Ordinary" Norsemen looking for a quick buck and rep.
 
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Do we get a new one every Decade?

Yep! Other bonuses from the new Decade include:

+7 to all combat rolls (from Knightly Armour, would be +5 if not for Audrey's Fortitude bonus)
+1 Initiative, Stamina, Speed, and Capacity.

And the increased Fervour and Armour and so on of course, all the stuff you've been getting every Bead.

But yeah, as Alectai says, Decades are really powerful. It'll be a while before you get another, but it's worth bearing in mind exactly how good they are when thinking about how expensive and difficult buying new Beads winds up being. The bonuses are not small.
 
Yeah, a reminder that most of the guys you've fought so far didn't have Speed 3 without specifically building towards it, and that's now your baseline state, and you can spike it up to 4 with Vanguard's Prayer.

And those were fairly ordinary Fighting Men, with the fire guy being a distinct outlier in that he was a relative veteran (If not an exceptional one). You can now trivially outspeed even the fastest of them, which means you're getting multiple hits on them per exchange over them.

Decades are a big deal, and part of the reason Chivalric Cultivators are so terrifying to fight for everyone else is how relatively easy it is for them to raise their base Initiative and Speed.

For instance? Your Master? Just by way of him being Seventh Decade, he gets 7 Speed and Initiative, which means he almost always goes first, he gets twice the moves that you do, and gets +30 to every. single. combat roll he makes, just off the weight of his Decade and Knightly Armor equipment bonus

That's without even getting into any of his Armor Blessings, his Rotes, or any Meditations. Just his bare, raw chassis alone absent any of the numerous trinkets, talismans, and gadgets a fighter with over two centuries combat experience has picked up for a rainy day. Needless to say, his actual stats added on top of that make it that even without him spending a single resource, he could likely flawless victory you and every squire and young Thane in Warwick at the same time.

And a reminder that an Action can include stuff like your aforementioned Sweeping Strike, or wide range attack Revelation based Prayers, and you can kind of see how a seasoned Knight can just sort of wade through arbitrary numbers of lesser Cultivators and demands to be answered by nothing less than a proper Champion to even hope to compete.
 
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…Yanno that brings to mind a story about a lone angel killing an entire army in a single night.
Some might argue that was a single highly skilled Christian cultivator…

Angels are pretty beefy, yeah, though not necessarily for the reason you'd think.

Then again, even a child with a knife would be dangerous if you were incapable of retaliating against them. And they're far from children with knives, they've got swords, flaming ones even!
 
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Turn 6 - The Third Decade
Audrey breathes deep as incense burns her nostrils, her hands clasped tight as her knees press against warm wooden floors. Beholding nothing but the inside of her eyelids as the sounds of silent prayer fill her ears, Audrey's thoughts should be straying more than a drunken vagrant on his way home.

'Should be' being the operative phrase there, of course.

Releasing the breath trapped within her lungs, Audrey soon replaces it with yet more incense-infused air. Again and again, over and over, her breath fills and escapes in equal measure. Each inhale brings the taste of slowing down and each exhale discards a sense of speed.

With breath setting stable stage, contemplation takes the spotlight.

God, Audrey's prayer goes no further than the boughs of her thoughts, my anger, my wrath, leads me into sin. Please show me how to master my fury, please light the way to your side.

Amen.


It is the truth and nothing but it. Letting her anger get the best of her is a shameful thing, but to bring it to bear on a fellow Christian for something as little as beating her in a spar?

Nothing less than completely unacceptable. It casts shame not only on herself, but her entire family for allowing such anger to fester in her heart. Only thanks to Slade Eldred intervening in a manner as unobtrusive as he did that Audrey didn't make an utter fool of herself before all those playing present.

Swallowing the lump in her throat, Audrey takes one final breath as she opens her eyes.

A bolt of shock lashes through her as surprise takes her by the throat. The inside of the church—normally a mix of individual sounds, colours, and smells all threading together into a beautiful tapestry for the senses—is little more than a blanket of impregnable sensation. Sluggish thoughts offer uncertain answers as stuffy confusion eventually gives way to familiar recognition.

This sensation, this feeling, it is far from foreign. She's felt it before, many times in fact, when accompanying her parents to Mass in her distant youth. Back then, her mind and senses were a far cry from the refined tools they are now. Back then, amidst a sea of bowed heads, she couldn't hope to discern the subtle flavours in the delightful feast of Mass.

Silencing the tendrils of idle thought wriggling at the edges of her mind, Audrey turns her attention inward as she searches for control of this 'underclocking'. She can feel it lurking in the depths of her soul, just beyond casual reach. A dial of sorts, one currently set to the lowest speed possible; mortal. Reaching out, Audrey takes hold of the mental device and goes to twist it back to full—while restricting her thought-speed may well have its value in dealing with mortals and the like, she has little need of its virtues at this moment in time—only for a shadow's flicker to catch her inward gaze.

Cultivation is a lengthy process and even though Audrey stands at the pinnacle of the Second Decade, not even she manages to reach the true requirements. To cultivate, one must derive Fervour from Grace and then refine it into Zeal, which, in turn, attracts yet more Grace and the cycle continues forever-more. A simple task, yet one that often takes time equal to a generation of mortals to achieve.

The first handful of Decades are spent at the feet of a teacher, learning and internalising the lessons taught while drinking deep of offered Zeal. In the Zeroth Decade, where most mortals spend their lives, one learns to detect the presence of Grace in their heart. Having accomplished that, the cultivator then enters the First Decade, which is spent learning how to extract Fervour from Grace. Along the way, a teacher will provide Zeal to fuel their students' growth—just as Jesus did for the Apostles, who in turn provided Zeal for their own followers.

Once the cultivator is able to extract Fervour from Grace without leaning on their teacher for support, they are ready to enter the Second Decade. In the Second Decade, the cultivator learns how to truly cultivate; they learn how to refine Fervour into Zeal. This is done through the mentor, who serves as the sieve through which their disciple processes their Fervour. At this point, the student no longer must rely on their mentor to provide Zeal for them, only to process their Fervour into Zeal until the student is capable of it on their own.

By processing Fervour into Zeal by the strength of their own two hands, the cultivator then steps into the Third Decade.

Just as Audrey does now.

Thanks only to the slowing down of her thoughts, Audrey bears witness to the exact moment her soul completes the cycle on its own. For the first time in her life, Audrey can stand on her own two feet. For the first time in her life, Audrey needs no support other than her own spine.

In the depths of her soul, where Fervour flows over a pool of salt-flavoured Zeal, a long-practised event takes place. In flows Fervour from the borders of her being, the waves flooding across her soul and washing all of the self in a holy hue. There, in the core of her existence, the Fervour pools and collects as more and more holy energy rushes to fill every inch of being.

Normally, this is where Audrey's soul would attempt to condense the Fervour. However, as her soul lacks the needed strength to compress the Fervour into Zeal, the Fervour would eventually recede unless Reinald lends his aid.

Today, however, it would seem that her soul has a different result in mind.

Fervour pools and her soul flexes its might, pressing down and forcing Fervour to hear and obey. Fervour flares, fighting against the all-crushing pressure enough to make headway—until the collected Zeal shines bright and adds its own strength to the pressing soul.

Met with the collected might of her soul and Zeal, Audrey's Fervour can do nothing but surrender to Faith and strain away.

There, in the utter depths of Audrey's soul, where once salty Zeal collected, now rests Zeal of her own. Like a splash of blinding white in a sea of twinkling black, her Zeal floats gently at the bottom of her being.

She's done it! She's broken through!

"Well done," a wizened voice cuts through the glee as Audrey's attention returns outward. She freezes, senses clocking the feeling over a hundred pairs of eyes all focused directly on her. Of course she'd be the centre of attention—not that she wouldn't be anyways—she's just had a breakthrough! "It isn't everyday a child of the Lord steps into the Third Decade in my presence."

The Bishop of Warwickshire smiles down at Audrey as he comes to a rest just before her pew. "Come, child, and join me at the front. Be the first to receive the blessings of the Lord on this fine fair day."

As Audrey follows the Bishop to the front, not all gazes are congratulatory in nature. One set, belonging to a certain Thane of ill-will, wishes her nothing but misfortune in the near future.

It wouldn't take a genius of Audrey's calibre to conclude that this Thane means to make his move, and soon.

Alas for him, Audrey will have another blessing of her Armour for him to contend with.

0~0~0

Pick one of the following options for Audrey's new Armour Trait:

[ ] Sanctity of Motion - To be inviolate not only in form but in function, for no grasp or magic to prevent you from moving and acting as needed.
[ ] Shining Armour - To shine with an inner light, glorious and inspiring to her allies, but also attracting foes to her like a lighthouse beacon, and away from her allies and those in her charge.
[ ] Unbending Blade - To become one with your blade, united in purpose, your weapon never shifting from its rightful place or suffering harm in a righteous cause.
[ ] Write in (All write-ins must, as with last time, be directly based on Audrey's character, who she is as a person, and ideally her recent experiences, and mechanics cannot be specified any more than the above options. Write-ins may be vetoed for various reasons even if they do match her personality.)

AN: Things will get Spicy real soon, please wait warmly until it's ready.
 
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[X] Sanctity of Motion - To be inviolate not only in form but in function, for no grasp or magic to prevent you from moving and acting as needed.

This seems like a good idea to get after the last couple of fights.
 
Yeah, a reminder that most of the guys you've fought so far didn't have Speed 3 without specifically building towards it, and that's now your baseline state, and you can spike it up to 4 with Vanguard's Prayer.

And those were fairly ordinary Fighting Men, with the fire guy being a distinct outlier in that he was a relative veteran (If not an exceptional one). You can now trivially outspeed even the fastest of them, which means you're getting multiple hits on them per exchange over them.

All this is true, but slightly misleading in the case of the Norsemen. In their case, they could contend with Speed 4 via their shapeshifting abilities (which allow them to increase various things, including speed), potentially, but only the cost of being meaningfully worse elsewhere. Still a very good advantage, but my pedantic nature requires me to mention it.

Decades are a big deal, and part of the reason Chivalric Cultivators are so terrifying to fight for everyone else is how relatively easy it is for them to raise their base Initiative and Speed.

For instance? Your Master? Just by way of him being Seventh Decade, he gets 7 Speed and Initiative, which means he almost always goes first, he gets twice the moves that you do, and gets +30 to every. single. combat roll he makes, just off the weight of his Decade and Knightly Armor equipment bonus

This and the rest, however, is absolutely true with no caveats. Decade gets scarier and scarier the higher it goes. Rare indeed is the cultivator who can match things like Speed and Initiative with a high Decade Knight. And unlike most others who have that sort of stats (rare as they are), the Knight just keeps coming...Stamina and running out of resources are still factors for most cultivators even at this level, but not for a Knight.
 
All this is true, but slightly misleading in the case of the Norsemen. In their case, they could contend with Speed 4 via their shapeshifting abilities (which allow them to increase various things, including speed), potentially, but only the cost of being meaningfully worse elsewhere. Still a very good advantage, but my pedantic nature requires me to mention it.



This and the rest, however, is absolutely true with no caveats. Decade gets scarier and scarier the higher it goes. Rare indeed is the cultivator who can match things like Speed and Initiative with a high Decade Knight. And unlike most others who have that sort of stats (rare as they are), the Knight just keeps coming...Stamina and running out of resources are still factors for most cultivators even at this level, but not for a Knight.

And it's even sillier for Audrey, who basically gets half-again the Equipment Bonus that other Knights get from their Plate, so at the Third Decade, she has almost as much of an Equipment Bonus as a rookie Knight, and the difference will grow more profound in time. Virtues are incredibly powerful, and having even a single one of them can make you an absolute beast, and this isn't even all that Fortitude does for you! Just the only one you can really quantify or reasonably identify right now.
 
All this is true, but slightly misleading in the case of the Norsemen. In their case, they could contend with Speed 4 via their shapeshifting abilities (which allow them to increase various things, including speed), potentially, but only the cost of being meaningfully worse elsewhere. Still a very good advantage, but my pedantic nature requires me to mention it.



This and the rest, however, is absolutely true with no caveats. Decade gets scarier and scarier the higher it goes. Rare indeed is the cultivator who can match things like Speed and Initiative with a high Decade Knight. And unlike most others who have that sort of stats (rare as they are), the Knight just keeps coming...Stamina and running out of resources are still factors for most cultivators even at this level, but not for a Knight.

How fast was halla again? I know that halla was a champion compared to our current mc but all this talk of knights being crazy fast (which is weird for the canonical walking tanks of history) makes me wonder what decade our norse mc matched up to considering she was a speedster build.
 
How fast was halla again? I know that halla was a champion compared to our current mc but all this talk of knights being crazy fast (which is weird for the canonical walking tanks of history) makes me wonder what decade our norse mc matched up to considering she was a speedster build.

Halla as an Odr Cultivator had some cheats of her own, like enough Shapeshift Slots that she could actually match someone's generally superior chassis on command without compromising on pushing her own advantages, plus her spells to reduce enemy speed and increase her own.

Every rule has an exception, and Heroes always break the mould by definition, that's why they're Heroes.
 
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[X] Sanctity of Motion - To be inviolate not only in form but in function, for no grasp or magic to prevent you from moving and acting as needed.
Fuck grapples and slows
 
[X] Shining Armour - To shine with an inner light, glorious and inspiring to her allies, but also attracting foes to her like a lighthouse beacon, and away from her allies and those in her charge.

It is my understanding that, in our armour, we are a very good tank, and between this, Hordebreaker Style, and our other Blessing, if we attract all the damage our way while shielding our allies, we can basically funnel all the enemy chaff to break against the impenetrable wall that is Audrey.
 
Is a purty of purpose a possible armor trait? Something that helps against illusions/ mind attacks meant to stop us form achieving our objectives? Basically Sanctity of formation but instead of being for things that physically stop or restrain us being for things that do so for our mind?
 
How fast was halla again? I know that halla was a champion compared to our current mc but all this talk of knights being crazy fast (which is weird for the canonical walking tanks of history) makes me wonder what decade our norse mc matched up to considering she was a speedster build.

Halla had ludicrous speed at the end of NQ, but she was also cheating, like, a lot. Entirely leaving aside her special status as an Odr cultivator she also had Items/Shapecrafts giving her +7 Speed and another +1 from a Trick. She went hard on speed. Way more so than most Norsemen do. Comparing her to random knights is not a good comparison unless you give that Knight a speed-based build and, like, at least three magic items all jacking up Speed significantly, plus other stuff as well. Halla was, as Alectai notes, on that protagonist juice, and it shows, and was a speed build on top of that.

And Knights in history were as fast as anyone else, generally speaking. Faster, if you're thinking charging on horseback. The idea that they were slow and lumbering is a myth...you can do cartwheels in full plate easily enough. They wouldn't be sprinting anywhere but that's because it would make them tired, not because they couldn't, and in terms of how fast they were in a fight, well, then they were as fast as anyone.

Is a purty of purpose a possible armor trait? Something that helps against illusions/ mind attacks meant to stop us form achieving our objectives? Basically Sanctity of formation but instead of being for things that physically stop or restrain us being for things that do so for our mind?

Technically yes, but I don't think getting it fits any of Audrey's recent formative experiences very well, and you sort of already have Litany of Resolve for that? They'd stack, but it's stacking a lot into something that has literally never come up in a serious fight or even a spar (Audrey's literal only experience with magical mind-effecting stuff was Slade keeping her from doing something stupid out of anger).

Like, the only time a mental effect stopped Audrey, she's probably grateful it did.
 
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[X] Sanctity of Motion - To be inviolate not only in form but in function, for no grasp or magic to prevent you from moving and acting as needed.

To have something that is on par with the saintly requirement of "Incorruptibility of Form" is yet some distance away but aversion to corrosion and now inviolate in function to not be grounded by grasp or magic? This is a great next step.

Because I think if we build the armor towards certain points or along the same theme of a Sanctified Armor, it'll make things that may lead eventually to something as rad as an almost saintly presence of being even if only for limited moments. An armor utterly dedicated to being immaculate without stain or ill done deed would be a potent tool for anyone.
 
[X] Sanctity of Motion - To be inviolate not only in form but in function, for no grasp or magic to prevent you from moving and acting as needed.
 
[X] Sanctity of Motion - To be inviolate not only in form but in function, for no grasp or magic to prevent you from moving and acting as needed.
 
Also, a lot of people forget. Actual Tanks are still pretty god damn fast. That they're not as fast as an unarmored race car doesn't mean a good tank can't move at 40+ miles per hour even in less-than-ideal circumstances.

"Heavy Armor = Slow" is a game balance mechanic, not a real life mechanic. While yes, armouring something up gives it more mass, which increases how much energy you need to move it, a tank that can't zoom faster than infantry is a dead one.

Proper plate harness even historically didn't impair your mobility at all, it was just hot as hell and added weight on you to boot. Now, mail armor was pretty heavy, but even that was chiefly because your shoulders are what are carrying all the weight, while plate is distributed evenly across your body. This is part of why plate needed to be tailored to the wearer and professionally made.

And this is closer to Stormlight Archive Shardplate than historical plate. It just hasn't become too fancy yet for Audrey because she's still low Decade. It'll be very distinct by Fifth or so, and already showing some differentiation at Fourth.
 
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[X] Sanctity of Motion - To be inviolate not only in form but in function, for no grasp or magic to prevent you from moving and acting as needed.

bruh this is amazing.
 
Now, mail armor was pretty heavy, but even that was chiefly because your shoulders are what are carrying all the weight, while plate is distributed evenly across your body.
For the record, this is slightly incorrect. Belts were worn with mail armor to help distribute the weight on the hips as well as the shoulders.
 
[X] Unbending Blade - To become one with your blade, united in purpose, your weapon never shifting from its rightful place or suffering harm in a righteous cause.
 
[X] Shining Armour - To shine with an inner light, glorious and inspiring to her allies, but also attracting foes to her like a lighthouse beacon, and away from her allies and those in her charge.
 
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