{"id":1116,"date":"2025-01-26T03:54:00","date_gmt":"2025-01-26T08:54:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/?p=1116"},"modified":"2025-09-11T07:09:20","modified_gmt":"2025-09-11T12:09:20","slug":"ccc2025-26-kjal-mirrorlake","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/?p=1116","title":{"rendered":"K’Jal Mirrorlake"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Game:<\/strong> Earthdawn<\/em> (first edition – FASA, 1993)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My Experience:<\/strong> I’ve run Earthdawn<\/em> twice. The first was a couple of years after its release, during one of the Louisville Gaming Mafia’s formative summers, and we maybe got four sessions in before reverting to our usual World of Darkness hijinks. The second was after college, and we did manage to complete one decent story arc before my players lost patience with the clunky and idiosyncratic system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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K’Jal Mirrorlake, Questing Nethermancer<\/h2>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

K’Jal was hatched in Kaer Skysea, far below the mountain lake headwaters of the Korien River. He grew to adulthood on tales of the surface world passed down through generations – tales of the world before the coming of the Horrors, spirits of immeasurable power from the deepest reaches of the astral realms. Like all kaers, Kaer Skysea was a self-contained city, sealed for five centuries by Living Earth and Living Water empowered through the Rites of Protection. Built to the preferences of the saurian, semiaquatic t’skrang, Kaer Skysea was half-submerged, as much tended garden as built environment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before the Scourge, when the world’s magic levels rose high enough to offer the Horrors passage to the material realm, the t’skrang of the mountain waters had enjoyed close relations with their dwarf and troll neighbors. Some few members of these races had sought shelter in Kaer Skysea, but, lacking a critical mass of population, had died out centuries before K’Jal’s hatching. still, the t’skrang of Kaer Skysea held to their traditions, teaching each generation the language and ways of the dwarves in the hope that they would one day re-establish contact with the descendants of their once-allies who’d withdrawn under the mountains and into Kaer Thrumin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As K’Jal neared adulthood, he began speaking to things that weren’t there. Quickly realizing what was emerging within him, the kaer’s elders entrusted him to the care of their few magical adepts. Under their tutelage, K’Jal claimed his birthright as a nethermancer, master of trafficking with spirits, the astral realms, and the powers of life and death.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Throughout K’Jal’s life, the annual ritual to gauge magic levels in the world had shown a steady plateau, halting the prior century’s decline. By all portents, the world’s mana was still stronger than what the Book of Tomorrow<\/em> foretold. But Kaer Skysea’s protections were aging – not yet crumbling by any means, but maintaining the wards required more and more effort from the dwindling population of spellcaster adepts. After much deliberation, the elders determined that they would send out a scouting party to assess the world’s devastation. As the only nethermancer of his generation, K’Jal was assured a place in the expedition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When the appointed day arrived, the scouts departed to much ritual and no small amount of trepidation. The magical shudder as Kaer Skysea’s sally port re-sealed behind them was the first time K’Jal had felt truly alone – but the sensation lasted only a moment as he and his companions swam toward the surface of Korien Lake and experienced another first: sunlight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The expedition spent a week meticulously surveying the area immediately around Kaer Skysea, comparing what they saw to the ancient maps preserved from before the Scourge. With no immediate threats found, they set forth for their next destination: Kaer Thrumin. The journey wasn’t without peril, wild beasts and Horror-touched monstrosities alike having no fear of a small band of t’skrang, but they prevailed without loss. As they approached the overgrown road that their maps said led to Kaer Thrumin, though, the landscape began to change. Vegetation was withered and twisted; animal life scarce and deformed. And when they beheld the gates of Kaer Thrumin, those vast portals were scarred and shattered by some unfathomable force.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The dwarves had not held out the Horrors. But Kaer Thrumin was still populated, after a fashion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The expedition escaped by the skin of its tails, due in no small part to K’Jal’s ability to sense their pursuers and direct the party away from the shambling husks that were once dwarves and trolls. Leading the undead on a winding chase, the scouts finally returned home to report what they’d found.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the three years since that first expedition, Kaer Skysea has gradually re-emerged into the sunlit world. T’skrang riverboats again ply the Korien’s waters, re-establishing trade through the high country. A dry-port is under construction along the riverbanks, reopening the t’skrang city to the other races. Regular expeditions have mostly cleared the undead from the vicinity of Kaer Thrumin, finding no sign of the Horror that breached the dwarven undercity, but none have yet plumbed its depths to investigate further. And K’Jal’s hunger for answers goes unsated – thus far.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Traits<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Discipline:<\/em><\/strong> Nethermancer
Race:<\/em><\/strong> T’skrang<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Attributes<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dexterity 14 (step 6, action die 1d10)
Strength 9 (step 4, action die 1d6)
Toughness 11 (step 5, action die 1d8)
Perception 16 (step 7, action die 1d12)
Willpower 14 (step 6, action die 1d10)
Charisma 15 (step 6, action die 1d10)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Characteristics<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Physical Armor
Mystic Armor 2<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Death Rating 32 points
Wound Threshold 8 points
Unconsciousness Rating 24 points
Recovery Tests 2\/day<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Physical Defense 8
Spell Defense 9
Social Defense 8<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Initiative step 6, action die d10<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Karma action die d6
Karma cost 8 Legend Points
Karma (starting) 5
Max karma 25<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Combat move 33 yards\/round
Full move 65 yards\/round<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Carrying capacity 60 lbs
Lifting capacity 15 lbs<\/p>\n\n\n\n

T’skrang racial tail attack: use Unarmed Combat or Dexterity step, Damage is Strength + 3 steps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Talents<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Karma Ritual 1:<\/em><\/strong> All adepts in Earthdawn<\/em> have their own karma rituals, meditative exercises which provide karma to fuel talents or boost skills. For K’Jal, it’s a polite conversation (possibly over tea) with an invisible being from another plane of existence. All in a nethermancer’s day’s work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read and Write Language (Perception) 1: <\/em><\/strong>K’Jal can become literate in one new language per rank of this talent with minimal exposure and study.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read and Write Magic (Perception) 1:<\/em><\/strong> K’Jal can learn new spells and record them in his grimoire.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Spellcasting (Perception) 2: <\/em><\/strong>Just what it says on the label, this is K’Jal’s capacity to sling magic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Spell Matrix (x2) 1 each: <\/em><\/strong>In Earthdawn’s cosmology, spellcasting is inherently dangerous because of the spiritual contamination of astral space. Spell matrices are magical constructs which serve as frameworks and filters to reduce this hazard. K’Jal enters play with two, meaning he can have two spells at a time prepped and ready to cast.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thread Weaving\/Nethermancy (Perception) 1: <\/em><\/strong>Many magical effects in Earthdawn require the caster to weave one or more threads, magical conduits which empower the spell.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Skills<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Artisan\/Wood Carving 1
Knowledge\/Magical Lore 1
Languages: Dwarven, T’skrang
Read\/Write Languages 2 (Dwarven, T’skrang)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Spells<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Chilling Circle:<\/em><\/strong> K’Jal can create a sphere of harmful, unnatural cold.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Command Nightflyer:<\/em><\/strong> K’Jal can speak and command nocturnal flying creatures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Detect Undead:<\/em><\/strong> Just what it says on the label.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dry and Wet:<\/em><\/strong> K’Jal can make wet things dry or dry things wet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Experience Death: <\/em><\/strong>Communing with a corpse, K’Jal can relive the subject’s senses at the time of its expiration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Spirit Grip:<\/em><\/strong> With a touch, K’Jal can inflict harm with pure necrotic energy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Undead Struggle: <\/em><\/strong>Locking an undead creature in direct spiritual combat, K’Jal can pit his will against that of his target in a deadly all-or-nothing duel.
<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Equipment<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Grimoire
Embroidered robe
Traveler’s garb
Padded leather armor
Adventurer’s kit (backpack, bedroll, flint and steel, torch, waterskin, loot sack)
Woodcarving tools
Sewing kit
Vial of ink
Trail rations, 1 week
Map\/scroll case
Knife
Dwarf sword
Sling<\/p>\n\n\n\n

11 silver, 9 copper<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Notes and Afterthoughts<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

This one broke the streak of good luck, with random attribute rolls just slightly lower than what I could have obtained through the book’s point-buy character creation system. Ah, well. Everyone needs the occasional set of dump stats.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nethermancers in Earthdawn<\/em> are basically fantasy necromancers without the alignment baggage. I’ve always dug on the t’skrang, who are depicted as flamboyant and gregarious reptilian humanoids with distinctly dinosaur-like features. The juxtaposition of charismatic lizard-dude with creepifying entropic magic appeals to my sense of the absurd.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Game: Earthdawn (first edition – FASA, 1993) My Experience: I’ve run Earthdawn twice. The first was a couple of years after its release, during one of the Louisville Gaming Mafia’s formative summers, and we maybe got four sessions in before reverting to our usual World of Darkness hijinks. The second was after college, and we […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[106],"tags":[116,98],"class_list":["post-1116","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-characters","tag-ccc2025","tag-earthdawn"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1116","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1116"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1116\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1163,"href":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1116\/revisions\/1163"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1116"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1116"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/libellus.de-fenestra.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1116"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}