Studies    Studies are the first and primary way your character will progress in Legends. As you gain XP, you'll get to increase your abilities in ten different Study areas, each of which is recognized in Lur-Asko as a vital sector of adventuring culture. You may choose to spread your character's skills wide, or concentrate on your favorites - the possibilities are endless!

    Your proficiency in a given Study is described in tiers. When creating a new character, you may either receive the 1st tier in 2 Studies of your choice, or gain 2 tiers in a single Study. You must meet whatever stat requirement exists for any Study you enter. If you really want to begin with a specific Study, make sure you allocate your starting stat points to meet its requirements:

Quick Reference - Benefits of Study Tiers & Tiering-Up Steps    Unless your chosen Background gives exceptions, gaining a tier in any Study has the following benefits:

    Step 1 - Choose one Ability to obtain. Below 4th tier, this must be a favored Ability (if required by your Background). At 4th tier and above, you may forgo a new Ability in favor of emphasizing an existing favored Ability. At 12th tier and above, you may emphasize unfavored Abilities, but not in a greater amount than your total maximizations.

    Step 2 - At high tiers: You may maximize one already-emphasized and favored Ability at 12th, 15th, and 18th tier, and at every 2 tiers beyond 18th. You also gain expertise re-rolls at 10th, 16th, 20th, 23rd, and 25th tier. These are extra benefits in addition to your Ability/emphasis at that tier, and are not interchangeable with any other benefit.

    Step 3 - Update your notes for each of your Abilities in the tiered-up Study. Consult only the appropriate progression type for each Ability, and see if any effects have changed.

    Like any rule not connected to how tiers are gained, these rules make no distinction between base and extra tiers. Terminology like "2nd tier" and "10th tier" always refers to your total tiers in a Study.

Study Abilities    Study Abilities are the primary benefit of any Study. Abilities are the biggest way in which your character is distinguished from non-adventurers. Look around Lur-Asko, and you might find many everyday people who happen to be fairly strong, intelligent, or otherwise high in certain stats. An Ability, though, is exactly that: something your character is able to do which the average person is not. You will eventually gather a unique mix of Abilities which will will set you apart and define your function in your party; try to take ones that sound fun and interesting to you as a player.

    You normally gain one Ability every time you gain a tier in a Study. Beginning at 4th tier, you gain the option to forgo taking a new Ability in favor of emphasizing an existing one (see below). Many Backgrounds also provide extra Abilities at certain tiers (often 1st tier), in addition to the one you choose normally at that tier. Unless otherwise stated, you cannot take the same Ability more than once.

Ability Progression    Each Ability first lists its basic effects - those which any character with the Ability has access to, even at 1st tier. But the effects also become more powerful as you gain tiers in that Ability's Study; this is called progression. Each Ability lists up to three categories of progression, one of which will apply to you and modify the basic effects for that Ability as you gain tiers.

    The first progression type is normal, which is the default type for all Abilities. Emphasized progression is something you gain access to later; at 4th tier, you gain the option to emphasize an Ability instead of gaining a new one. This replaces the listed effects of normal progression with the effects of emphasized progression. Maximized progression is achieved much later; you may maximize one already-emphasized Ability at 12th, 15th, and 18th tier, and at every 2 tiers beyond 18th. This replaces the other progression types with the maximized type. Beware characters at high tiers - not only are they applying more tiers' worth of progression to more Abilities, but those tiers are actually causing more progression effects through emphases and maximizations.

    Note that the tier at which you gain an Ability or apply an emphasis or maximization does not matter in terms of progression effects. An Ability's progression always includes all your tiers, entirely using one progression type, regardless of the tier at which you gained or upgraded a given Ability. Whenever you gain a tier, simply consult the appropriate progression type for each of your Abilities in that Study to see whether they have improved.

    Some Abilities cannot be maximized, and a few cannot be emphasized either.

Study Backgrounds & Favoredness    Study Backgrounds describe your character's attitude towards, approach to, and history with the Study area. You must choose one Background for each Study you take tiers in, and you cannot have more than one Background in a single Study at a time. Many Backgrounds which require lengthy training or schooling will list an LP cost (if one does not, it costs 0 LP). Remember that your character starts with 15 LP.

    No Background will completely restrict you in your choices as you develop the Study. Nearly all Abilities are (eventually) valid choices for characters of every Background. However, most Backgrounds restrict you heavily at first in regards to favored versus non-favored Abilities. Each Ability will list the Backgrounds by which it is favored. Until 4th tier, all Abilities you choose to obtain must be favored. At 4th tier and above, you can gain unfavored Abilities, but can only emphasize favored ones. At 11th tier and above, you may finally emphasize unfavored Abilities, but your total amount of emphasized unfavored Abilities cannot exceed your amount of maximizations. Unfavored Abilities can never be maximized. An Ability that lists All-favored simply counts as favored for all Backgrounds.

    It's possible to change Backgrounds over the course of your character's development. Each Study will have particular rules for changing Backgrounds. But because of the rules above, if you have any unfavored Abilities, you must also have at least 3 favored Abilities. If such a Background change leads to you breaking this rule, having too many emphases on unfavored Abilities, or having a maximization on an unfavored Ability, see Swapping & Placeholders below.

    Some Backgrounds specifically remove favoredness restrictions. This means that all of the rules above regarding favoredness can be freely ignored (or, if you prefer, it means that all Abilities in the Study are favored for you). Such Backgrounds usually entail greater LP costs, a tier cap, or philosophical restrictions. All Backgrounds follow favoredness restrictions unless they state otherwise.

    Stuck trying to pick from the large amount of Abilities available? Consult your Background's list of Suggested Abilities. These are simply useful starting points for most adventurers of that Background during the first few tiers, and you should at least examine the benefits of those choices. But the whole point of the Ability system is to give you freedom in developing your character, so don't be afraid to go your own way if you think different Abilities are a better fit.

    Some Backgrounds are Elite Backgrounds, which are detailed in a different chapter than their Study and not recommended for PCs in most campaigns.

    You begin the game with an XP Net Worth of 30. If you choose to begin with 1 tier in 2 Studies, you have 15 XP allocated to each. If you choose 2 tiers in 1 Study, you have 25 XP allocated to that Study, and may allocate the remaining 5 wherever you wish. Whenever you gain XP, you must allocate it to one or more Studies; you cannot save it and decide later.

    To gain the first tier in any Study, you must meet that Study's stat requirements and must be able to choose a valid Background in that Study. If you do not meet the requirements of the Study or any of its Backgrounds, you can only invest a maximum of 14 XP in that Study.

    The maximum base tiers in any one Study is 30. However, as the cost of 30 base tiers is 2,335 XP, this is virtually unheard-of.

    Beware the continually increasing cost of base tiers; it takes more XP to give a character 10 base tiers in one Study than to give them 5 in three Studies. However, in matters concerning that one Study area, a 10th-tier character will generally be far more than twice as capable as a 5th-tier one.

Study Diversification    A large portion of adventurers focus primarily on one Study - many times the one with which they started their adventuring career - supplementing it with lower tiers in other areas. Others choose to spread their efforts evenly between many or even all of the Studies. There is one limiting factor: if a character focuses to an extreme degree on one or two Studies, they will find it impossible to progress into the high tiers, as they do not have the extra perspectives provided by life experience in other areas.

    You cannot add XP to a Study to obtain a base tier if doing so would raise the Study more than 4 base tiers above your next-highest Study. For example, if you have 4 base tiers in just one Study, you cannot raise that Study above 4 base tiers without raising at least one other Study to 1 base tier. Similarly, to raise one Study to 11 base tiers, you would need another Study with 7 base tiers, which in turn would have required a third Study with 3 (another reason why characters never reach the 30 base tier maximum).

Study Training     It is presumed that a character spends an unmentioned portion of their downtime practicing skills in their Studies, as well as training in the advancements that will eventually become their next base tier. However, a more intensive type of training can be purchased in major cities or performed between party members. In terms of game mechanics, training is basically a "loan" of XP, which can allow a character to quickly gain a useful Study tier when time is of the essence.

    To train in a study, spend 8 hours with a fellow party member with a higher base tier than yourself in the chosen Study (and no incompatible training restriction in their Background), or 8 hours training in a major city. City training typically costs around 20 coins. If you currently have no tiers in that Study, you must be able to obtain a valid Study Background (due to either no LP cost for the Background, or a Background choice you have already paid LP for). You must be within 20 XP of obtaining your next tier, and must also have 0 XP stagnation. Upon completing training, you immediately gain the exact amount of XP you need in order to reach your next tier, but you also receive an identical amount of XP stagnation.

    Many Study Backgrounds restrict training between individuals, and a few even restrict training in cities.

bINT Increases from Study XP    Many Studies will increase your bINT when you reach certain thresholds of XP allocated to them. You gain 1 bINT for reaching each of the following amounts of XP in these Studies:

    Regardless of how many amounts you have reached, the total amount of increases to bINT from Study XP cannot exceed your bINT from initial stats.

Extra Tiers    Extra tiers cannot be purchased with XP, and are "bonuses" to a Study that come from your character's other pursuits. Many extra tiers come from Attributes, and some Studies offer extra tiers to other Studies. Regardless of the source, extra tiers must follow these rules:

    -Your extra tiers cannot exceed your base tiers in the same Study. In other words, at least half of your tiers in each Study must be base tiers, and you cannot gain extra tiers in a Study you haven't entered. If the rules call for you to gain such an extra tier, that tier "waits" until you increase your base tier, at which time it becomes effective.

    -You cannot gain extra tiers that would cause a Study to be raised above 30th tier. This is extremely unlikely, but in such a case, you may lower your Study XP to the next-lowest tier threshold, and reallocate the removed XP to other Studies.

Tier Caps    The 30th-tier limit is a hard cap that cannot be exceeded by any means. Some Study Backgrounds also list lower tier caps- typically Backgrounds that are easier to enter and/or are unrestricted by favoredness. If your Background has a tier cap, you can still technically gain Study tiers above that amount, whether base or extra tiers. However, any tiers above your tier cap provide no benefit to your character in any way; you gain no Abilities or other tier effects from them. Any other rule that refers to your tiers in a Study, such as your amount of melee insight from Close Combat tiers or resistance to Word of Wrath (Sorcerer) from Arcana tiers, ignores any tiers above your tier cap.

    Tier caps can only be altered by changing to a Study Background that has a higher cap (or no cap). Whenever your tier cap is raised or removed and you already had tiers exceeding your cap, you immediately gain the benefits those tiers normally provide. If you gain a tier cap when you had none (or your cap is lowered), resulting in you now having too many tiers, you choose which Abilities and other tier benefits you lose the use of; these benefits do not disappear from the record, but "wait" to return until your tier cap is removed or raised. In other words, manipulating a tier cap is not a way to gain free Ability swaps.

Swapping & Placeholders     It is possible to switch an existing Study Ability, emphasis, maximization, or Ability detail choice out for another one, without affecting your tier in that Study. In some cases, this is simply a matter of preference; perhaps you chose an Ability, but it was not as beneficial for your character as you expected. In other cases, you may be swapping out Abilities or emphases that were lost due to no longer meeting favoredness requirements (for example, as a result of changing Backgrounds).

    Whenever something occurs that results in you now having unfavored Abilities while also having less than 3 favored Abilities, you must choose an emphasis or unfavored Ability to replace with a placeholder Ability. If something occurs that results in you having an emphasis on an unfavored Ability (unless within the amount allowed at high tiers), or on an Ability you no longer have, you must likewise replace that emphasis with a placeholder Ability. Placeholder Abilities have no effect and cannot be used by your character in any way, but always count as favored Abilities for your current Background. If necessary, you must continue replacing unfavored Abilities or emphases with placeholders until you meet the favoredness requirements for your Background again. You may then proceed into swapping rules to replace the placeholders with legitimate Abilities.

    Likewise, whenever something occurs that results in you having a maximization on an unfavored Ability or on an Ability without an emphasis, it is immediately replaced with a placeholder maximization. Placeholder maximizations have no effect and are not tied to any specific Ability; they are simply "waiting" to be applied to a new and valid Ability via swapping rules.

    Whether you are replacing placeholders created due to a favoredness change, or simply switching out true Abilities, emphases, or maximizations you no longer want, you follow the same swapping rules. A single swap is defined as any one of the following options:

    You have access to a single free swap per Study tier. In other words, you may make 1 swap (according to one of the four options above) without drawback or cost, but may not do so again until you gain another tier in that Study. Each Study is considered separately for this rule; making a free swap in one Study does not take away your free swap in another Study. Free swaps do not need to be used immediately upon gaining a tier, but they do not accumulate within a Study - that is, if you gain more than 1 tier without using a free swap, you still only have 1 free swap available. It is recommended that the GM only allow free swaps during an overnight rest, and only allow one Study's free swap to be used per night.

    If you have used your free swap and still wish to make additional changes, you have two options. Once per Study tier, you may make a single additional swap through training, according to the same sources described under Study Training above, and according to the specific training rules of your Study Background. Training for a swap does not interfere with training for a Study tier (though both cannot be trained at once). Obtaining a swap in this way inflicts 5 XP stagnation, but it can be done even if you already have XP stagnation.

    Finally, if you are between campaigns, you may make a swap for 1 LP using the Retraining LP Element; unlike normal swap training, this can be done multiple times at the same tier and does not inflict XP stagnation.

    Swapping rules cannot be used to break favoredness rules, nor the rules for Abilities, emphases, and maximizations. If you attempt to do so - for example, swapping an emphasis out from under a maximization on the same Ability - you will simply create placeholders to swap later. You cannot use swapping rules to have a smaller number of favored Abilities than you would be allowed without swaps.

    You cannot swap out specific Abilities that are given by your Background instead of chosen.

Expertise Re-Rolls    As a character attains true mastery of their Study, it becomes much less likely that they will fall victim to extreme mistakes. To reflect this, higher tiers award your character expertise re-rolls. You can use these to repeat a roll (typically an important one you failed). Normally, in order to be eligible for an expertise re-roll, a roll must either be one found in the rules of an Ability from that Study, or one that is receiving a +TN or Easing from an Ability in that Study. Reactive +TNs do not count as +TNs for the purposes of this rule. To use Close Combat as an example, you could use a Close Combat re-roll on the INT roll found in Insightful Style, but you could also use it on any melee offense or defense roll that receives a +TN from Melee Competency. You cannot normally use another character's re-rolls, even if their Abilities are affecting your roll.

    Once you decide to expend an expertise re-roll, you simply make the exact same roll again; you must take the new roll as your true roll, even if its result was higher than your first roll. The re-roll must include all dice (including Hindrance and Easing), and the TN remains the same. Any other resource spent to affect the roll continues to do so, without the need to be spent again. Be careful of overconfidence - re-rolls are typically used to replace an unusually bad result on an important roll. If you have multiple expertise re-rolls valid for the roll, you may use as many of them as you like; each one replaces all previous rolls as your true roll. Remember that while most rolls will be eligible for only one Study's re-rolls, some may be valid for more - for example, the offense roll for Energy Ranged Attack (Arcana) can receive a +TN from Shooting Stances (Marksmanship), and thus be eligible for your expertise re-rolls from both Arcana and Marksmanship.

    Together with reactive +TNs (see Rolling), expertise re-rolls are the only rules in Legends that you can use to affect a roll after you see the result. You can use both to affect the same roll, but expertise re-rolls must come first; once a reactive +TN has been added to a roll, it cannot be re-rolled.

    Any expertise re-rolls you have expended will be restored when you take a 4-hour rest.

Losing Tiers    In rare situations, you might lose an extra Study tier (for example, losing an Attribute that granted you an extra tier). If this occurs, you do not need to remember the exact Ability or emphasis you obtained at your last tier; simply choose an Ability or emphasis to give up, along with any other benefits of the tier (such as Ability progression, a maximization, or an expertise re-roll). Losing a tier does not change whether or not you have a free or training swap available or require you to "undo" any swaps. If available, you may choose a placeholder when giving up an Ability/emphasis or maximization. When you lose the tier, record all benefits of the tier that were lost; you regain those benefits if you gain back the tier later. In other words, you must choose the same Abilities; manipulating tier loss is not a way to gain free Ability swaps.

    If for whatever reason you no longer meet the base stat requirement to enter a Study you already have tiers in, you do not actually lose tiers, XP, or Abilities. Instead, you temporarily lose the use of any Abilities from that Study until you meet the stat requirements again.