The small intro game tells players how they became a Bestia Master: They came into direct contact with an ephemeral mana crystal that changed their nature through magic and connected them to the mana flows of the universe. They are therefore receptive to the influence of mana and are able to communicate with the beings that emerge from this mythical energy: the Bestia.

The attachment to mana also explains why Bestia masters were able to survive the destruction of their world relatively unscathed and to pass on to the next incarnation of the world.

Master Skills link

The bestia master can learn a set of skills. These skills are freely chosen by the player and determine the job or profession of the master.

Some of these account skills can be used by every Bestia in possession of the master, or at least have a passive effect on them. Others can only be used actively by the master itself.

• The possible rank counts of a skill should be: 1, 3, 5 and 10
• Every profession offers two routes, two different ways to play it. A Priest can hunt Demons and the Undead or be the full support of a party; a Hunter can be an archer or a tracker. A route is a chain of dependent skills that a player buys as a unit, and its capstone is part of it.
• A fighting profession (the Warrior sub-trees, Priest and Sage) holds about 55-60 ranks: two routes of about 25 each, plus a few shared skills.
• A job profession (crafting, gathering and trade) holds about 30-40 ranks: two routes of about 15-20 each.
• A base tree holds 10-25 ranks. It teaches the basics and gates its sub-trees.
• The Wizard is the widest sub-tree because it repeats the same skills once per element. That is width, not depth: a Wizard picks the elements they want and ignores the rest.
• There should be some kind of three tiers inside a route to lead from low and basic skills to the much more powerful ones.

Especially crafting skills should be, when possible, require some sort of minigame or meaningful player interaction. Their outcome should also be dependent on the status values of a player, on the skill level but also on environmental aspects. An example teleport could go as follows:

After the master Saferu has selected a few of his and friendly Bestia he prepares to teleport to a fairly distant location. While he is very skilled and has a maxed teleport skill, on the target location there is a manastorm causing some interference. Upon teleportation the group is set of course and spawns almost a kilometer off from their target in a very hostile environment.

Ultimately, it remains important to leave the outcome of skills open in some way. However, the result should remain understandable and influenceable by the player.

Skill Progression link

Every master starts out limited to the Novice skill tree - a small set of basics that teaches the player how to get around and how to deal with others. Once 5 skill points are invested into Basic Skill all remaining skill trees unlock and the master can start to specialize.

The Novice tree then closes behind the player: as soon as the first skill point is spent outside of it, no further novice skills can be learned. Everything learned up to that point is kept. It depends on the player how much of the Novice tree he wants to finish before branching out.

On each level up the master gains 1 skillpoint to put into the skills rank. This is permanent and means a player can spend about 100 points for improving the ranks of his skills.

Of the about 100 points, 5 go into Basic Skill and 5 into each base tree a master uses, to open its sub-trees. That leaves about 85 points for professions. Some builds that fit:

A master who spreads over three sub-trees still has only two professions, see below: the third one gives its skills but not its equipment.

Professions link

Skill points spent in a sub-tree (Blacksmith, Sage, Wizard, …) do more than unlock its skills. They also make the master a member of that profession, and the profession decides which weapons and armor the master can use.

• A sub-tree counts as a profession from its first skill point. One point in Knight is enough to pick up a sword.
• A master has at most two professions: the two sub-trees with the most points. A master with 8 points in Sage, 8 in Knight and 2 in Forester is a Sage / Knight.
• The master may use every weapon type that one of the two professions allows, and the heavier of their two armor types.
• Points in a base tree (Novice, Craftsman, Survival, Scholar, Warrior) belong to no profession.
• Holding a weapon in each hand needs the Assassin skill Dual Wield. No profession allows it on its own.

Changing Professions link

The two professions follow the skill points. A third sub-tree replaces one of the current two only when it has more points than it. On a tie the master keeps the profession they already have, so two equal sub-trees never decide the gear by chance.

When a profession is lost, everything it allowed and nothing else allows goes back to the bag. Nothing is destroyed, and the master can wear it again as soon as the profession comes back.

Base Equipment link

Every master can use these, with or without a profession:

• Cloth armor
• Slings
• Tools: pickaxe, hatchet, shovel, fishing rod
• The novice equipment below

Novice Equipment link

Every new master starts with a novice set. It is weak, but it ignores professions: every master can use it at any level. A Novice can try out each way of fighting before spending a point outside the Novice tree, and a master who just left it is never unarmed while their first profession opens.

The Novice Bow comes with 100 arrows. The novice health and mana potions are not equipment and stay for Novices only.

Equipment per Profession link

Armor is limited by its heaviest type. A master who may wear Medium armor may also wear Light and Cloth. Shields carry an armor type as well and follow the same rule, see Armor Type. The weapon types are listed in Weapon Type.

Heavy armor comes from the Knight alone, so a master who wants plate gives one of their two professions to it. Every fighting profession owns at least one weapon type few others share - the Knight’s greatsword and polearm, the Assassin’s fist weapons, the Bard’s whip and instrument, the casters’ tome - while every crafting and gathering profession can still defend itself.

Bestias are not affected by professions. A bestia wears what its species allows, see Designing a Bestia.

Mana Circles link

Almost every master skill that can fail rolls against a success chance: forging a blade, cutting a rune slot, binding an enchantment, transmuting matter, inscribing a spell. Skill rank, status values and equipment all feed that roll, and a lone master eventually hits the ceiling of what those three can buy.

A Mana Circle is how a group pushes past it. It is a placeable prop - a ring of Mana Concentrate laid into the ground with a focus stone in its middle - where a group holds a ritual. The master who owns the skill leads it. Up to five helpers join, whatever their profession, and each player sends one helper: their master or one of their Bestias. After 30 seconds of channeling, the leader’s next skill takes a charge. How a Ritual Runs has the steps, the costs and the rest every helper pays.

For a skill that rolls a success chance, the charge adds:

  Circle Bonus = 5 × Participants × ManaFactor   [Participants ≤ 6, leader included]
  

ManaFactor comes from the local mana concentration: 0.5 in a drained region, 1.0 in an ordinary one, 1.5 where mana runs thick. A full circle of six in a mana-rich place is therefore worth +45% on the roll - as much as most governing skills grant at max rank - while the same six people standing on drained ground get +15% and would have been better off scouting a different site first.

The same ritual also raises the Potency of a spell and makes damage and healing a little stronger, see Spell Potency and Rituals. Standing in a circle is a real cost, not a favor that takes a second: every helper pays a quarter of their maximum mana and rests for 5 minutes afterwards.

Skill Trees link

The skills are organized in five trees, and each tree in sub-trees. Every tree has a page of its own. After a level up one skill point can be spend to increase a single level of a skill.

• Novice Tree: The few basic skills every master starts with, and the gate to all other trees.
• Craftsman Tree: Blacksmith, Artificer and Alchemist: the skills that discover, produce, refine and enchant items.
• Survival Tree: Forester, Prospector and Miner: living off the land, charting the unknown and digging for what it hides.
• Scholar Tree: Priest, Trader and Sage: keeping a party alive, running trade and chasing magic to its source.
• Warrior Tree: Wizard, Brawler, Hunter, Assassin, Knight and Bard: the fighting professions.