> 1) Suppose a hero has an alynx follower. The player gives it two
abilities:
> Sentient and Thunder Leap. But an alynx also has its normal alynx
(even
> significantly higher) abilities. Can he use them? And do they
improve? If
> so, how? Maybe the two abilities of choice improve automatically,
whereas
> the player must spend HP to improve the others. And if a player
chooses an
> ability that the alynx already has, such as Move Silently, what's
its
> rating?
That's not 'A' question, that's an entire interrogation... Anyway, if
you have an animal Follower, you can do it's abilities one of two
ways, as I see it. Either give it two abilities, as you have
(although I would never have allowed 'Sentient', it's far, far too
wide a category), or give one as the species keyword, and one other
(for example, my character has Follower:Warhorse (Horse, Obey Vocal
Commands). If the former, the character may be loaned AP only by the
two Follower abilities, and only when they are relevant (thus my
objection to 'Sentient'). The Narrator may, if kind, allow the
follower, when acting independantly, to use it's normal species
abilities, but the character may not benefit directly from them (no
AP loan, no augment, etc). Now... how do you raise the species
abilities? If the Follower abilities do NOT include the species
keyword, you need to use HP, just as if you were improving the
character. If the follower abilities DO include the species keyword,
then they will rise with the character's best stat. I can see two
ways to do this, too:
1) use the best of the natural stats or the follower stats (-8 or -12
from the character's best)
2) judging that a 'standard' beginner character has a best ability of
5W, a follower has abilities at 17 & 13. Treat this as '0', and
improve the animal's abilities 1-to-1 when you improve the hero's
best ability above 5W.
In any case, which species abilities can improve and which cannot is
up to the Narrator. 'Run Fast 5W' can improve, but can 'Small 10'?
> 2) Now suppose another (Heortling) hero takes a human follower. The
player
> chooses Warrior and Womanizer. But the follower does belong to a
culture
> (likely Heortling). Does he get the cultural keyword abilities? And
if he is
> a Troll? He must have the Troll keyword? In this case how the
abilities of
> the keyword scale according to the keyword overall rating?
This is one recently discussed. Logically they must have a Cultural Keyword, and realisticlly they should also have both Occupational and Magical if they're decent Orlanthi. But, unless these keywords are listed as one or both of the Follower abilities, the character may not use them for AP, and they must be raised using the character's AP as before.
Wulf
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