Eastern Monk

Description: This stranger from a far off land has come to the Realm seeking long lost knowledge and wisdom. He is a powerful fighter against individual Medium and Heavy foes, but against multiple opponents or Tremendous monsters, he is quickly overwhelmed and best served to run away.

Symbol: Yin/Yang

Weight/Vulnerability: Medium

Initiate
   Staff
   Fight M5   Fight M5   Move M5

Acolyte
   One dose of Moxa*
   Fight M4*   Move M5   Move M4*

Adept
   Two doses of Moxa*
   Fight M3**   Fight H6   Move M4*

Monk
   Three doses of Moxa*
   Fight H5*   Fight H4**   Move M3**

* Moxa: This herbal preparation is heated and then used to heal injuries. The heat and herbal smoke soak into the skin along the meridians to facilitate the healing process. Only the Eastern Monk knows how to mix and apply this medication and it only works when combined with intense meditation.
      M.1: The Eastern Monk may never have more than 3 doses of Moxa.
      M.2: Moxa may not be traded, dropped, cached, or abandoned at any time. If the Eastern Monk is killed, all the doses of Moxa disappear.
      M.3: Moxa has negligible weight.
      M.4: Moxa has a base cost of 1 Gold.
      M.5: Ingredients for mixing additional doses of Moxa may be puchased by Trading with the Scholar.
      M.6: It requires 2 Rest phases in the same day to apply a dose of Moxa:
            M.6.1: During the first Rest phase, the Moxa is prepared. This eliminates one dose of Moxa.
            M.6.2: During the second Rest phase, the Moxa is applied and the effects are performed. These effects can be applied to either the Eastern Monk, or another character that is in the same clearing.
      M.7: The effects of Moxa is that it will heal one half of a character's fatigued and wounded chits.
            M.7.1: Add up all of the character's inactive "asterisks":
                  M.7.1a: Fatigued asterisks count 1 each.
                  M.7.1b: Wounded asterisks count 2 each.
                  M.7.1c: Wounded non-asterisk chits count 1 each.
      M.7.2: Divide the total by 2 and round any fraction up. The result is the number of "asterisks" that may be rested, which are performed in the normal way.

Begins at: Inn or Chapel

Special Advantages:

   1. Ba Gua Zhang Student: The Eastern Monk has been taught to use his whole body in self defense. As a result the Eastern Monk may use his fight chits to attack and block during combat.
      1.1 The Eastern Monk may, so long as he does not have an active weapon or horse, play a fight chit to make an attack at the chit's strength and time with no sharpness stars and a reach of Tooth/Claw (0).
      1.2 If the Eastern Monk has no active armor chits or horses, he may also play a fight chit in a shield oval in order to block incoming attacks. The blocking chit automatically intercepts any attack that matches the block direction. In addition, the blocking chit intercepts any attacks with an attack time that is slower than the time on the blocking chit. If an intercepted attack does less damage than the strength of the blocking chit, the Eastern Monk takes no damage from that attack. If the damage equals the blocking chit's strength, he will take 1 wound. If the damage exceeds the blocking chit's strength, the Eastern Monk will take serious wounds (see advanced rule 4.5); a red-side up monster that hits the Eastern Monk will kill him as normal. Effort asterisks on a chit used to block count against the Eastern Monk's effort limit.

   2. Ba Gua Zhang Master: The Eastern Monk has mastered the ability of using his Chi to enhance his fighting abilities. During an Alert phase, the Eastern Monk may chose to enhance one of his fight or move chits. Only one chit may be enhanced per Alert phase. Place the enhanced chit symbol side up to show that it has been charged with Chi energy. The asterisks on an Enhanced chit still count against the Eastern Monk's effort limit when used. Any enhanced chit must be fatigued as soon as it is used regardless of what it is used for or the number of asterisks played that round. If any enhanced chits remain unused at midnight, they must be fatigued immediately.
      2.1 If an enhanced Fight chit is used to make an unarmed attack (i.e. the Eastern Monk has no active weapons) that attack gains a sharpness star.
      2.2 If an enhanced Move chit is used to make a maneuver while the Eastern Monk has no armor chits active, that maneuver's move time is improved by one. This ability does not enhance the Eastern Monk's speed when he runs away.

Relationships:

   Friendly: Order, Scholar
   Unfriendly: Bashkars



Designer: Deric Page

Designer's notes:

This character came out of an idea on how to simulate unarmed martial arts in MR. It should prove interesting to see how well his attacking, blocking and maneuvering can be balanced against the game's effort limit, and if he's better off staying unarmed or getting his hands on some weapons. His main disadvantages that I can see are his lack of reach (all unarmed attacks are reach 0) and only having one friendly (and expensive) native group to hire.