PENALTIES IN DARKNESS These rules apply to total darkness, and are the penalties a creature incurs for acting in such darkness. If conditions are not quite as bad as total darkness, then these penalties will be reduced to about half severity. All blindfighting advantages only apply to melee combat and situations within melee reach of the blindfighter. Missile attacks strike at a blindfighter as if he was unskilled, with the exception of Masters, who can defend against missile attacks, if they pass their check, detailed below. Penalties in Total Darkness -4 penalty to hit. Defense Pool is halved. The special ability of warriors, clerics and rogues to critical on numbers other than a natural 20 if the target was hit by 5 or more than needed is lost. All classes can only critical on a natural 20, just like a mage, if they hit the target by 5 or more than needed. All movement rates are reduced by 1/3. Weapon mastery bonuses to hit, to damage, that increase damage and knockdown dice, and to improve critical hits, both critical number and severity, are lost. The multiple attacks and speed factor reductions are all retained. Backstabbing bonuses are lost, as are any other sight related bonuses. Attacks of opportunity are lost, and so fumbles have no special effect aside from missing. Active/passive defenses: block, dodge, etc. are not allowed, and called shots are also prohibited. Finally, all skills, proficiencies and abilities that have total reliance on sight are lost. Those with partial reliance on sight are penalized according to how important sight is to the ability’s success. This includes thieving abilities. Blindfighting The blindfighting skill helps reduce the above darkness penalties. Some of the blindfighting bonuses require a proficiency check for the skill to help, but others take effect without need for such a proficiency check. The blindfighting skill is now WIS based. You must use my system for the following details to make sense, and even if you do not wish to use my system for all skills, at least use it for this one. The bonuses gained depend on the skill of the blindfighter: Novice(Skill Rating 1-6) The blindfighter has only a -2 to hit in darkness, this applies without need of any check. If the Novice passes a check, he gets his full Defense Pool that round. This is the extent of the bonuses a novice blindfighter receives. Skilled(Skill Rating 7-12) The skilled blindfighter gets all the bonuses he had as a novice, plus the ability to attempt called shots and blocks/dodges and the chance to gain back some lost bonuses. If the Skilled blindfighter fails his check, he gets only the -2 to hit rather than the -4 normally, but can still attempt called shots or block/dodges. If he passes the check, he gets his full Defense Pool as well, and also gets back half of the sight related bonuses lost to darkness for that round(rounded down). Called shots and/or blocks/dodges can be attempted, but if the blindfighter fails his check with a -4 penalty, the attempt fails, but the action is used up. Expert(Skill Rating 13-18) Expert blindfighters gain all the abilities they had when they were skilled, and because they are now experts, they can ignore the requirement of making normal proficiency checks to gain the extra bonuses of the skilled blindfighter. Only when attempting to block/dodge or make a called shot does he still require a check, because the penalty is -4, to much for his expert ranking to allow him to ignore, but even here, he gets to reduce this penalty by the 2 points all experts are entitled to, so his check is only at a -2. In addition to these improvements, experts also gain the following bonuses or upgrades, but must pass a -4 proficiency check to have access to them, making this check on a round by round basis, and the expert +2 penalty offset does apply to this -4 penalty as well, so the actual check the expert must make to gain access to these bonuses is a -2 check: he is able to take advantage of attacks of opportunity his foe’s open up to him, so well does he sense his surroundings; he can sense attacks coming so well, he is allowed to oppose and defend against(ie. use his DEX/dodge and/or combat defense points against) flank or rear attacks, but shield bonuses cannot be applied in this way. He can use this ability even when he can see, but must pass the -2 proficiency check to be able to use it that round. Master(Skill Rating 19+) Master blindfighters are truly masters of their own intuition and have fully developed their sixth sense powers. Only truly blind warriors or martial artists gain this level of skill, as for a seeing student to achieve and maintain this level of mastery, he must purposely fight blind at least half of the time he fights in is life, or he will slowly come to rely on his eyes, and lose the heightened senses his intuition seeks to bring him. Masters gain all the benefits of experts, and because they can ignore proficiency checks with up to a -4 penalty, they get the abilities of experts at all times, without the need to check for them each round. In addition to these benefits, masters get the following additional abilities, but these require a -8 check for the master to have them during each round, making a new check at the start of each round. The master does get his +4 penalty offset, so his proficiency check is actually made at -4 when checking to see if these bonuses are gained in a round: masters gain full use of all sight related bonuses, and can move at full normal rate. Finally, masters can sense missile attacks, if they pass their check at -4, and get to react and defend against them. This makes masters potentially as competent in the dark as they are when they can see. Because of this, masters always seek to fight in darkness, so their foes are at a severe penalty and the master can make full use of is skill against them. Blindfighting Penalties Certain conditions will impose additional proficiency penalties upon blindfighters. Magical silence or intense noise(either makes the blindfighter unable to detect the noises around him) imposes an additional -4 penalty to any check the blindfighter must make. This may force experts or masters to have to make checks they could normally ignore, because the combined penalty would push the total penalty over that which allows the expert or master to ignore the check. Other conditions which disrupt the calm spirit and senses of the blindfighter will also impose penalties. Confusion, magical or otherwise, will impose at least a -4 penalty, and fear will also impose a penalty, as it interferes with the mind and spirit of the blindfighter, giving from -1(fear associated with a new or dangerous situation) to a -4 for magical fear effects, like dragon fear. Although novices need not make checks normally, if the penalties imposed on them, or any other skill ranking for that matter, would reduce a proficiency check to 0 or less, the blindfighter functions so poorly, he gets none of the bonuses of this skill!