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Archetypes

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Savage Sands of Tarisia is a dark and challenging setting filled with harsh environments, deadly creatures, and powerful tyrants. The archetypes below represent some of the iconic characters who might brave its savage wastes, along with Traits, Edges, and Advancements that support their particular style of play. These are starting points rather than rigid classes, and players are encouraged to modify them or forge archetypes of their own.

ALCHEMIST

Alchemists combine the strange plants, minerals, venoms, and other natural ingredients of Tarisia into potent potions, oils, powders, and explosive concoctions. Though their creations can produce effects that seem magical, Alchemists wield neither Sorcery nor Miraj, relying instead on closely guarded recipes and an intimate knowledge of the natural world.

Attributes: Smarts, Vigor
Skills: Healing, Herbalism, Survival
Edges: Alchemist
Advancements: Herbalism d8+, Scavenger, New Powers

ARCHON

Archons are the magically empowered champions and favored lieutenants of the Thrones, transformed by Sorcery into formidable instruments of their master’s will. Adventuring Archons have abandoned, betrayed, or escaped their former masters, though few Thrones willingly surrender such valuable servants.

Attributes: Strength, Spirit, Vigor
Skills: Battle, Fighting, Intimidation, Notice
Edges: Archon
Advancements: Fighting d10+, Command, advanced Archon Edge?

BARBARIAN

Barbarians are hardened warriors from the wild reaches beyond the city-states, where survival demands strength, courage, and a capacity for sudden violence. Whether tribal champions, wasteland reavers, or exiles far from home, they meet the horrors of Tarisia with ferocity and steel.

Attributes: Strength, Vigor
Skills: Athletics, Fighting, Intimidation, Survival
Edges: Berserk
Advancements: Fighting d8+, Brawny, Frenzy

BEASTMASTER

Beastmasters possess an instinctive sensitivity to the Miraj coursing through all living things, allowing them to form extraordinary bonds with the strange creatures of Tarisia. Through patience, intuition, and experience, they can understand and befriend creatures most travelers would consider little more than dangerous beasts.

Attributes: Spirit, Vigor
Skills: Athletics, Herbalism, Miraj, Survival
Edges: Beast Bond, Beast Master
Advancements: Miraj d8+, Survival d8+, advanced companion/taming Edge

CORSAIR

Corsairs are the raiders, brigands, and freebooters of Tarisia, roaming beyond the reach of the city-states and preying upon the caravans that cross the wastes. Some race across the dunes aboard swift sand skimmers, while others ride exotic beasts or travel with wandering bands, but all share a reputation for being agile fighters who survive through speed, audacity, and a willingness to take risks.

Attributes: Agility, Spirit
Skills: Athletics, Fighting, Intimidation, Piloting
Edges: Quick, Extraction
Advancements: Ace, Frenzy, Improved Extraction

CULTIST

Cultists are keepers of forbidden rites, ancient relics, secret names, and half-remembered traditions devoted to the dead gods of Tarisia. Whether their prayers truly reach forgotten divinities or their power lies in the strange artifacts and rituals they preserve is a question even the Cultists themselves may not be able to answer.

Attributes: Smarts, Spirit
Skills: Miraj, Occult, Persuasion
Edges: Ritualist, TBD
Advancements: Miraj d8+, Occult d8+, ritual/relic/prophecy edge

DECEIVER

In the treacherous courts and crowded bazaars of Tarisia, a convincing lie can be sharper than any blade. Deceivers are spies, thieves, charlatans, and infiltrators who survive through cunning and disguise, though many are just as comfortable slipping a dagger between the ribs when words fail.

Attributes: Agility, Smarts, Spirit
Skills: Persuasion, Stealth, Thievery
Edges: Thief, Streetwise
Advancements: Persuasion d8+, Stealth d8+, Assassin

ENTERTAINER

As the Thrones limit education and literacy amongst their people, the majority of storytelling, record-keeping, and entertainment is performed by wandering bards and poets. The role of these individuals in society has thus become performative, administrative, and educational. As adventurers, they boost party morale and are an excellent resource for lore and knowledge of the world and its locales.

Attributes: Smarts, Spirit
Skills: Common Knowledge, Performance, Persuasion
Edges: Performer, Charismatic
Advancements: Performance d8+, Common Knowledge d8+, Connections

GLADIATOR

Gladiators are warriors of Tarisia’s fighting pits and arenas, trained to make violence into spectacle. Whether celebrated champions, desperate pit fighters, or wandering veterans of the games, they combine martial skill with showmanship, using bravado and intimidation to unnerve their opponents and seize control of a fight.

Attributes: Agility, Strength, Spirit
Skills: Athletics, Fighting, Intimidation, Performance
Edges: Gladiator, Provoke
Advancements: Fighting d8+, Rabble-Rouser, Strong Willed

MIRAJIN

Mirajin are warriors gifted with an exceptional sensitivity to the Miraj, allowing them to extend their awareness and will beyond the confines of their own bodies. Through discipline they develop uncanny intuition and perception, exert subtle influence upon the world around them, and manifest the deadly Mind Blade.

Attributes: Agility, Spirit
Skills: Fighting, Miraj, Notice
Edges: Mind Blade, Miraj Instinct
Advancements: Master Mind Blade, Blade Shifting, Miraj d10+

NOMAD

Nomads are wandering hunters and survivors who have learned to thrive among the shifting dunes and hostile wastes beyond the city-states. Skilled at tracking game, finding water, navigating trackless wilderness, and reading the signs of approaching danger, they can guide others through places where an inexperienced traveler might last only days.

Attributes: Spirit, Vigor
Skills: Athletics, Notice, Shooting, Survival
Edges: Alertness, Nomad
Advancements: Fleet-Footed, Riding d4+, Shooting d8+, Survival d8+

RELIC HUNTER 

Relic Hunters brave the forgotten ruins and buried cities of Tarisia in search of artifacts and treasures from the Age of Abundance. Equal parts explorer, scavenger, and tomb robber, they have a talent for finding hidden places, avoiding ancient dangers, and recognizing when some dusty piece of forgotten history might be worth a fortune.

Attributes: Agility, Smarts
Skills: Athletics, Notice, Occult, Thievery
Edges: Scavenger, Danger Sense
Advancements: Notice d8+, Heirloom Artifact, Thief

SORCERER

Tarisia was once a verdant paradise, until the arrival of corruptive magics that drain the life from its land and fauna. A Sorcerer wields this terrifying and defiling power by harnessing the very life from the surrounding land and people. These magic users are universally feared and often persecuted or imprisoned if caught publicly.

Attributes: Smarts, Spirit
Skills: Occult, Sorcery, Stealth
Edges: Arcane Background (Sorcery), Subtle Magic
Advancements: Sorcery d8+, New Powers, Power Points

STOIC

Stoics are disciplined warriors who turn their sensitivity to the Miraj inward, strengthening the connection between mind, body, and spirit through rigorous physical and mental training. Through this discipline they develop extraordinary control over their bodies, allowing them to endure punishment, overcome physical limitations, and perform martial feats beyond those of ordinary warriors.

Attributes: Agility, Spirit, Vigor
Skills: Athletics, Fighting, Miraj
Edges: Chi, Dodge
Advancements: Acrobat, Combat Acrobat, Martial Artist

SWORDHAND

Tarisia is a world at constant war. City-States battle each other for control of valuable resources and the people struggle against the deadly environment. Individuals trained in battle are often conscripts of war, or militia trained to defend their homes from the lethal fauna, but occasionally you’ll find a warrior with no allegiances except his own. These are the so-called Swordhands of Tarisia.

Attributes: Agility, Strength, Vigor
Skills: Athletics, Battle, Fighting
Edges: Trademark Weapon, Counterattack
Advancements: Fighting d10+, Improved Trademark Weapon

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