The completed starting Sense profile normally contains two or three unique trained Senses, with a maximum of three after the two Sense Ember advances. Keep each Origin Kind’s fixed Senses and unavailable or Locked Senses. Rhunai and Karthine are the explicit five-Sense exceptions in the table below. Sense Embers improve eligible Senses within that limit; they do not authorize a fourth Sense for an ordinary Hero.
Starting Sense Training in guided creation shows the completed starting profile: the Origin’s training plus two Sense Ember advances. Check a Sense to include it, then choose its Training. Origin-fixed and unavailable Senses remain constrained, and starting Training cannot exceed Adept.
A Sense Ember records one of the two senses your Hero developed beyond their Origin’s starting profile. Choose two distinct eligible Senses from the checked Training grid. The creator matches those choices to the Origin inheritance underneath; it does not add more Training to the completed grid.
The Sense you rely on is the one of your two chosen Sense Embers you most naturally bring into the story. It helps describe how your Hero notices and interprets their surroundings, without granting another Training advance.
Sense Choices on the SheetCopy link
The initial build combines the Origin’s starting Sense profile with two selected Sense Embers. The initial profile is generated within the options below; Choose the two added Sense Embers in What Calls Me Forward. An unavailable Sense stays locked. Use Abilities & Training to record later advancement.
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A Hero does not enter the world perceiving it as a blank slate. Their Origin shapes the way their senses first develop, determining which forms of perception come naturally, which require greater effort, and which may be fundamentally unavailable to them.
Each Origin begins with a specific Starting Sense profile. These starting Training Levels represent the Hero’s inherent sensory nature before personal experience further shapes their perception. Some peoples possess exceptional awareness through a particular Sense, while others experience limitations created by divine design, fractured inheritance, mortal adaptability, or tangled blood.
During Hero creation, the Hero also receives 2 Sense Embers. These Embers represent the earliest ways experience has sharpened their perception beyond what Origin alone provided: a childhood spent tracking movement through dense woods, learning to distinguish voices in crowded streets, recognizing danger by scent, developing a careful eye for detail, or simply relying upon one Sense until it became indispensable.
Apply the Hero’s 2 Sense Embers after establishing their Starting Senses, following the normal rules for Sense Training and any restrictions imposed by their Origin. Sense Embers cannot train a Sense the Hero is forbidden from training or unlock a Sense that has been permanently Locked.
Origin determines the senses with which a Hero begins.
Sense Embers begin to show how they learned to perceive the world for themselves.
Source | Starting Sense(s) | Sense Modifications |
|---|---|---|
Zaltar | Trained Touch, Trained Sight, Adept Sound | Cannot Train Smell or Taste |
Rhunai | Trained in all Senses | Cannot raise any Sense above Master |
Veloth | 2 Trained Senses (choice), 1 Adept Sense (choice) | May rearrange chosen Senses once per day |
Karthine | Trained in all Senses, 1 Adept Sense (choice) | No Sense may exceed another by more than 2 Training Levels |
Gahlian (Dalo) | Adept Touch, 1 Trained Sense (choice) | Cannot Train Taste |
Gahlian (Cora) | Adept Taste, 1 Trained Sense (choice) | Cannot Train Touch |
Kalthir | Adept Smell, 1 Trained Sense (choice) | Cannot Train Sound |
Pahric | Adept Sight, 1 Trained Sense (choice) | Cannot Train Smell |
Ezhani | Adept Sound, 1 Trained Sense (choice) | Cannot Train Sight |
Nuhlrin | 3 Trained Senses (any) OR 1 Adept + 1 Trained | No restrictions |
Orvah | 1 Adept Sense (any), 1 Trained Sense (any) | 1 unchosen Sense becomes permanently Locked and cannot be trained |
ASTRALKIN Copy link
Zaltar Copy link
Born of radiant Order, Zaltar perceive the world through contact and clarity. Touch represents authority, structure, and force, while Sight reflects judgment and illumination. Sound echoes their connection to command and resonance. They cannot train Smell or Taste because they are not beings of instinct or indulgence — they are forged in purpose rather than appetite.
Rhunai Copy link
Rhunai exist in a state of balanced awareness, equally attuned to all Senses. They cannot excessively specialize because they embody equilibrium itself. Their perception is broad, harmonious, and naturally aligned with the whole of existence.
Veloth Copy link
Veloth are mutable and unstable, shaped by fractured cosmic influence. Their shifting sensory strengths reflect unstable identity and constant adaptation. Their perception changes with circumstance, emotion, and resonance.
Karthine Copy link
Karthine pursue disciplined sensory mastery through balance and structure. They train all Senses methodically, but reject extreme imbalance. No single perception may dominate the others completely.
VATHIANS Copy link
Gahlian (Dalo) Copy link
Dalo Gahlians experience Touch with exceptional intensity, while Taste is absent or profoundly diminished. Their sensory restriction comes from their fractured Vathian nature, not from choosing conquest or rejecting indulgence. Individual Dalo may interpret that inheritance in different ways.
Gahlian (Cora) Copy link
Cora Gahlians experience Taste with exceptional sensitivity, while Touch is muted. Their inability to train Touch is an inherited sensory limitation, not a rejection of contact or a required philosophy of nonviolence. Their cultures and individual relationships develop within that sensory experience.
Kalthir Copy link
Kalthir perceive the world through extraordinary Smell, including scent, pheromones, chemical traces, and associations of memory. Sound is inaccessible to them. Their communication and cultural practices adapt to that inherited limitation; it is not a preference against hearing or vocal expression.
Pahric Copy link
Pahric possess heightened Sight and are often associated with visions, observation, and interpretation. Smell is absent. Their inability to train Smell follows their fractured sensory nature rather than a choice to reject instinct or favor abstraction.
Ezhani Copy link
Ezhani possess extraordinary Sound, perceiving resonance, vibration, and rhythm with great precision. Sight is diminished and cannot be trained under their Starting Sense profile. Their ways of communicating and navigating develop around that inheritance, without prescribing one personality or worldview.
NUHLRIN Copy link
Nuhlrin Copy link
Nuhlrin are mortals shaped more by experience than divine inheritance. Their sensory training is flexible and adaptable, allowing them to specialize modestly or diversify broadly. They possess no inherent restrictions because they are not bound to singular cosmological design.
ORVAH Copy link
Orvah Copy link
Orvah emerge from severed Threads and tangled creation. Their Starting Sense profile is uneven: one unchosen Sense is permanently Locked and cannot be trained. This sensory limit reflects their Tangle; it is not a moral failing or evidence of a single creator’s intention.