Religious skills
Every religious skill requires a dose of liao to use. Liao is provided to everyone who ministers to a congregation, which is a personal resource. A starting congregation resource produces five doses of liao per event.
The majority of the religious skills involve the creation or removal of auras. These are roleplaying effects; they can affect a person, an item or an area but they have no mandated rules outcome.
Priests can work together to perform most religious skills. Each priest who contributes to a ceremony must have the relevant skill and must consume a dose of liao, but doing so helps to strengthen the effect and make it harder to remove. A priest may only support another priest if they are dedicated to the same virtue as that priest or if they are not dedicated to any virtue.
Religious skills do not require touch, but do require you to be close enough to touch the target. If there are multiple participants, they must be close enough to touch the target or another participant. You must complete at least 10 seconds of appropriate roleplaying to use a religious skill.
Using religious skills without being dedicated
Dedication, anointing, consecration and hallow create effects that depend on the virtue dedication of the priest leading the ceremony. Characters who are not dedicated to one of the seven virtues cannot lead such a ceremony but they may always contribute to make the effect harder to remove and lead, or contribute, to the other ceremonies.
Dedication
- You must purchase the dedication ceremony before you can purchase any other religious skills
The Way of Virtue recognizes seven fundamental virtues. This skill allows a priest to dedicate another pilgrim to the virtue that the priest leading the ceremony is dedicated to. A person may have their dedication removed with exorcism or by replacing it with a more powerful dedication.
Any character who has purchased this skill is able to act as a guide when someone consumes True Liao. A character who consumes True Liao can choose to have a single character with the dedicate skill act as a guide. Although that character does not experience a past-life vision of their own, they do share the past-life vision of the character who has consumed the Liao.
A character who has purchased this skill during character creation is entitled to choose to begin play devoted to one of the seven virtues.
Anointing
A priest may use this skill to perform a ceremony over an individual. This creates a roleplaying effect that directly affects the recipient of the anointing. The roleplaying effect is chosen by the priest leading the ceremony based on the virtue they are dedicated to. More information, including details of effects, is available here.
Consecration
A priest may use this skill to perform a ceremony over an area creating a roleplaying effect that affects that area. The roleplaying effect is based on the virtue the priest leading the ceremony is dedicated to. Stronger consecrations replace weaker consecrations, or one can be removed by an exorcism of equal or greater strength. More information, including details of effects, is available here.
Excommunication
This skill can be used to excommunicate a character. A character who has been excommunicated cannot make use of liao or use any skill that requires liao. Any priest with the skill can participate in an exorcism - the more priests that participate the harder the excommunication is to remove. The excommunication can only be removed via a sufficiently powerful exorcism.
Exorcism
This skill can be used to remove dedications, excommunications, annointings and similar effects from a target person, object or area. Whilst some auras can be replaced with a stronger aura, others, such as testimonies, excommunication and possessions, can only be exorcised. Any priest with the skill can participate in an exorcism - the more priests that participate in the exorcism the more likely to be able to take down the effect. An exorcism needs to equal the strength of the aura to remove it. Each exorcism ceremony must be directed at a specific mark or aura.
Hallow
A priest may use this skill to perform a ceremony over an item. This creates a roleplaying effect that affects anyone bonded to that item. The roleplaying effect is chosen by the priest leading the ceremony based on the virtue they are dedicated to. Stronger hallows replace weaker ones, or one can be removed by an exorcism of equal or greater strength. More information, including details of effects, is available here.
Insight
This skill allows you to examine the target’s soul. You can see their dedication, read any testimonies and see any auras that are affecting them.
Testimony
By performing a testimony, you can place an indelible mark on the target’s soul. This consists of, at most, two words; an adjective and a noun. Examples include “Oathbreaker”, “Bold Warrior”, “Fool”, “Wise Leader”. Testimonies can be perceived by any character who uses the insight skill or an equivalent ability to examine the victim’s soul. Multiple priests may participate in the ceremony making it stronger, causing a mark to be harder to remove with exorcism. Soul marks of this kind can only be removed with a sufficiently powerful exorcism.