Hi there, I know that Elven spell songs are learned and advance like sorcery (or at least I think I know!)
But how do skill songs work, are they treated just like mannish skills, with beginners luck attempts and aptitude etc?
Thanks.
Skill songs are treated like other skills. They have a category, root, etc. The difference is that they are restricted to Elves and 6s automatically explode.
You can tell from the skill type in the skill list - Spell Songs are all sorcerous (and so require instruction for the first test, and have a super long practice cycle), while skill songs belong to the same realm as their mundane equivalents - Martial, Peasant, etc.
EDIT: Woops, too slow.
Note that Beginner’s Luck tests are not open-ended for these, since you are testing the root stat.
We ran into an interesting question today. Can normal elves learn Dark Elf skill-songs that aren’t rooted in Spite? We said yes, for the fun of it, especially since all our elves have been exposed to ridiculous amounts of spite and spiteful energy.
I would say that if it’s for the fun of it, everyone agree and it’s the same rule for everyone then it’s all good!
The fun part is getting instruction for that first test. Presumably from a Dark Elf – unless you want to have a few Elves running around that already have the skills.
Done!
In our game, dark elves aren’t a separate culture, it’s an attitude (but more profound, like a mental illness). In practice, this leads to some slightly weird moments of the sort you get with D&D alignment, where the mechanically either/or nature of your outlook pokes through the otherwise morally ambiguous story. But, long story short, we do have dark elves embedded within normal elf culture.
This raises the question for me, do elves even need instruction for the first test, since skill songs act like skills in other ways (which don’t require instruction)?
Only Sorcerous skills require the first test being from instruction. Skill Songs have their type noted, at least Lyric of Law (the one I looked up) is Academic, not Sorcerous, thus need not have the first test from instruction.
Frank