Prayer's End

Prayer's End
Prayer's End looked interesting when I read it, but it's a bit confusing. My brother pointed me to the FAQ, which helped, but I still have some doubts. Kata don't have to be kept active, so it's possible to activate them in the middle of a fight. Prayer's End takes away one of your rolled and kept initiative dice. How does that work if I activate it after initiative has already been rolled? Do I have to remember all the different dice results so I can drop the lowest one I originally kept, or should I simply subtract a fixed number, like the average value of a rolled and kept die? And what happens when my initiative was swapped with Combat Reflexes?

No opinions? Not even suggestions?

Re: Prayer's End
Prayer's End looked interesting when I read it, but it's a bit confusing. My brother pointed me to the FAQ, which helped, but I still have some doubts. Kata don't have to be kept active, so it's possible to activate them in the middle of a fight. Prayer's End takes away one of your rolled and kept initiative dice. How does that work if I activate it after initiative has already been rolled? Do I have to remember all the different dice results so I can drop the lowest one I originally kept, or should I simply subtract a fixed number, like the average value of a rolled and kept die? And what happens when my initiative was swapped with Combat Reflexes? LOL... Looks like you found another whole in the Initiative system. Here is a link to a clarification that Shawn made on this kata. Unfortuanately, your question is not discussed in it. I would rule that since Initiative is rolled at the beginning of combat and the kata was not active then, the penalty would not apply. But, there are alot of questions about how the fundamentals of initiative works, so my answer could be subject to change.

Prayer's End is pretty powerful without the penalty IMO and with the way kata activation works, ruling that the penalty doesn't apply if the kata isn't active when init is rolled pretty much comes down to ruling there is no penalty. It'll only matter for multiple skirmishes. Personally, I'd prefer if Prayer's End (and Boundless Fury, which has the same problem) were officially errata'ed but as a simple houserule, I'd let the player make a 1k1 roll to deduct from his character's init when activating the Kata (2k2 for Boundless Fury). That's what I suggested to Okko (who's my little brother).

(who's my little brother) Oh that's cool. Personally, I'd prefer if Prayer's End (and Boundless Fury, which has the same problem) were officially errata'ed but as a simple houserule, I'd let the player make a 1k1 roll to deduct from his character's init when activating the Kata (2k2 for Boundless Fury). That's what I suggested to Okko I had thought about this, but I knew there was no basis in the errata/clarifications for it. But, if it works it works.

Oh that's cool. Occasionally. ;) I had thought about this, but I knew there was no basis in the errata/clarifications for it. But, if it works it works. Basically, this is my KISS solution. I would very much prefer a major rewrite of these kata, possibly one that doesn't use init-based effects at all, but I'm not about to suggest anything on that order as a houserule. That's going a bit far for me.

Oh that's cool. Occasionally. ;) I had thought about this, but I knew there was no basis in the errata/clarifications for it. But, if it works it works. Basically, this is my KISS solution. I would very much prefer a major rewrite of these kata, possibly one that doesn't use init-based effects at all, but I'm not about to suggest anything on that order as a houserule. That's going a bit far for me.A large chunk of the kata were written with second edition kata rules in mind. I don't even think that the current official rules work as the Devs intended. In essense Tsukaede, Shinjitsu and I created the official rules for kata for third edition. The kata would have ended up working the same as in Second edition, except somebody decided to put in an on/off switch for the kata rules haphazardly which threw everything out of whack. In essence we had to reinterpret everything, just because of the addition of that one damned sentence. In second edition, kata could not be turned on and off, were immediately active upon being prepared, couldn't be reactivated if ended early, and prepared and active meant exactly the same thing. Many kata were written with this in mind, or just copy/pasted and don't interact well with the new rules. This is the reason why Striking as Void is problematic, as in second edition, letting you have to kata prapared meant that both were active, as both terms were synonimous. This is also why that there was no clause in third edition saying that you cannot have more than one kata prepared, as saying that you can not be under the effects of more than one meant the same thing in second edition. In the case of initiative altering kata, two things messed these up for third edition. 1) Before hand you rolled initiative every round, and 2) Since kata were automatically active and ended permanently when you ended them, you could neither skip the intiative step and activate a kata with an Initiative penalty, or turn off a kata with an initiative bonus, with the knowledge that you could just activate it again at the end of the skirmish. The third edition translations to kata either did not take these changes into account, or the person who wrote the rules for activating and deactivating kata did not take the overall mechanics of kata into account. My guess has always been it was whoever did the second part. Without that blasted sentence in the book the rest of the kata rules could have been assumed to work identical to the way it was presented in second edition.

So in answer to your question Okko do what Cooper does, have different coloured "prayers end" dice for initiative and just subtract the result when its active and add the result when its not.

That how I do it myself.

That works, but really I would have preferred a system where the penalty - since it's variable - wouldn't be known on beforehand. More specifically, the Mantis will know if and how his initiative position will be affected by activating the kata. If the kata is active before init is rolled, this isn't the case. I prefer the latter situation, but I understand we can't always have it exactly like we want it.

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