Universal Specialties¶
Specialty document for Adventures Beyond the Mists.
Specialties any Character can buy through Advancement, regardless of Class. They are distinct from a Class's own Growth Potential list (its Class-specific Specialties, in each class file's Appendix) and from Starting Specialties, the Class-curated menu available only at creation (see character-creation, Starting Specialties and Kit, and each class file). A universal Specialty is bought like any other, with Advancement Points granted at a Level (see character-creation, Advancement).
Conventions. These apply to every Specialty on this page. A Specialty grants a flat extra die, +1d6, never Advantage (core-rules, Part Seventeen). Per-fight limits are written "Once per Combat." Requirement tiers read against the Competence ladder (core-rules, Part Seventeen): Trained is 5-6, Skilled is 4-6.
Designer's note
This document is the home for the Class-agnostic Specialty family and is where future universal Specialties belong as they are designed, rather than being scattered into whichever rules section happens to touch their mechanic. Most of the current catalog was migrated from the older Legends system and rebuilt on this engine (2026-08-01); the per-family migration records live in the design/ folder.
Specialty Summary¶
Every universal Specialty, alphabetical. Click a name to jump to its full entry. A Specialty that requires another Specialty is listed directly beneath it and marked with └, so prerequisite chains read as branches. "The Whole Line Moves" is filed under W by its first significant word.
| Specialty | AP | Requires | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bonded | 1 | None | Always sense the broad state of your Retainers and named allies, at any distance, across the Mists. |
| Borrowed Strength | 3 | None | Commit dice from your next turn's Pool to negate incoming Hits now; that next Pool shrinks by what you spent. |
| Breakthrough | 3 | None | Read a Set (four or more matching dice) and drive it into one target, past its screen onto its own Card. |
| Bulwark | 3 | None | Spend your Action to brace and negate up to 3 incoming Hits on yourself or an adjacent ally. |
| Contortionist | 1 | None | Roll Stealth with +1d6 and re-hide as part of your Move when it reaches cover. |
| Create Opening | 2 | None | When an enemy in reach attacks you or an adjacent ally, attacks against it gain +1d6 until your next turn. |
| Crippling Strike | 2 | Finesse Trained (5-6) | Spend a hit to Slow or disarm a target instead of dealing damage, once per turn. |
| Diplomatic Immunity | 2 | None | Once per Combat, redirect an attack aimed at you onto another legal target in the attacker's reach. |
| Encourage | 2 | Presence Trained (5-6) | Hand one ally within earshot +1d6 on a roll, adding no Bust risk of your own. |
| Fight Anywhere | 1 | None | Take no penalty for awkward footing: broken ground, a ledge, prone, in water, or hanging from a wall. |
| Fluid Footwork | 2 | None | Split your Move around your Action instead of the default Move-then-Act order. |
| Follow Through | 2 | None | When a two-handed melee weapon lands a Hit, one adjacent enemy also takes 1 Hit, once per turn. |
| Free Runner | 2 | None | Move through enemy squares without triggering reach reactions, and run along walls and steep faces. |
| Friend of Beasts | 1 | None | Ordinary animals do not attack unprovoked; a Wits Check lets you read and communicate with beasts. |
| Guarded Grip | 2 | None | A two-handed melee weapon banks Guard tokens as a shield does (not stacking with a shield Kit). |
| Hold the Line | 2 | None | While you can be heard, your Company's Communication Range rises from 10 to 15 squares. |
| Immovable Object | 2 | None | You cannot be moved against your will and are never Slowed by an enemy effect. |
| Interpose | 2 | None | As a reaction, move up to your Speed to reach an ally and Intercept a Hit meant for them. |
| Iron Constitution | 2 | None | +2 Hit Points; may be taken twice, for a maximum of +4. |
| Life Sense | 1 | None | As an Action, sense the presence and rough direction of sentient life around you. |
| Longshot | 2 | None | A bow or crossbow you wield gains +2 Range. |
| Mindlink | 1 | None | A silent mind-to-mind link with one willing ally, formed in downtime, holding across a region. |
| Mist-Step | 2 | Finesse Trained (5-6) | Once per Combat, negate a Hit that would land on your Card and move 1 square. |
| Never Unarmed | 1 | None | An arm wound can never disarm you; redirect it to the leg instead. |
| Nondescript | 1 | None | Witnesses recall your gear, not your face; a social and investigative edge, not a combat one. |
| One-Handed Grip | 2 | Might Skilled (4-6) | Wield a two-handed melee weapon in one hand, freeing your off-hand (this grants no Guard). |
| Pathfinder | 1 | None | After attuning to an environment, ignore its terrain penalties and weather Fatigue, and leave no trail. |
| Perfect Opening | 2 | Finesse Trained (5-6) | Read Extremes (a natural 1 and 6 together) and drive a hit onto an Unaware or Helpless target's Card. |
| Practiced Blade | 2 | None | Once per Combat, grant yourself +1d6 on a melee attack; a second purchase makes it twice per Combat. |
| Quick Hands | 2 | None | Once per turn, use a carried item (potion, poison, flask) as a Free Interaction instead of an Action. |
| Quick Study | 2 | None | Once per scene, name a field and act as though Skilled in it, one tier above your governing Virtue. |
| Rally | 3 | Presence Trained (5-6) | Once per Combat, in place of your Action, restore 1 Hit Point to an adjacent ally who has not Fallen. |
| Read the Foe | 2 | Wits Trained (5-6) | A Wits Check reads a target's Tier, HP, Speed, Range, and attack keywords; a strong read grants +1d6. |
| Read the Room | 2 | None | Once per scene, read a group's disposition; a strong read lets you take the Initiative if it turns to a fight. |
| Reopen the Question | 1 | None | Out of combat, force a Presence Check on a settled subject, made one Difficulty tier higher. |
| Retribution | 2 | None | After you Intercept, Guard, Borrow, or Bulwark a Hit, your next Hit on that attacker deals +1 damage. |
| Rider | 2 | A trained mount | Ride a warhorse for +4 Speed and charge attacks; useless in tight terrain, punished by braced spears. |
| Second Loadout | 2 | None | Carry a full second Kit and swap which one is active as your Free Interaction (one active at a time). |
| Shadowed Sight | 1 | None | Never Blinded by darkness or poor light, and immune to darkness-based ambush. |
| Stand Your Ground | 2 | None | On a turn you take no Move, hold enemies in your reach (Speed 0 to leave), one per point of reach. |
| Standard Bearer's Word | 2 | None | Once per Combat, remove a Condition from an adjacent ally, or grant immunity to the next one. |
| Steady Draw | 2 | None | Once per Combat, grant yourself +1d6 on a ranged attack; a second purchase makes it twice per Combat. |
| Straining Blow | 2 | None | Once per turn, spend 1 Hit Point to safely reroll a missed personal die, with no Bust risk. |
| Suppressing Fire | 2 | None | A ranged attack as a Radius Area of Effect that Weakens every enemy in it instead of dealing damage. |
| Trapsmith | 2 | None | Place a Snare, Spikes, or Scatter trap on a square; the first enemy to enter triggers it. |
| Unstoppable | 2 | None | Once per Combat, ignore or end one Condition on you: Weakened, Slowed, or Stunned. |
| Vanish | 3 | Finesse Skilled (4-6), or Assassins Guild | As an Action, make a target Unaware of you; your first hit on it each Combat carries Rend 2. |
| └ Lost in the Melee | 2 | Vanish | While adjacent to an engaged ally, use Vanish with no Finesse Check; it succeeds automatically. |
| The Whole Line Moves | 2 | Commander's Mace Kit | Once per Combat, in place of your attack, grant every ally in your Company +2 Speed. |
General Specialties¶
Class-agnostic picks that do not belong to any archetype family.
Fluid Footwork¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Effect. Splits a Character's Move around their Action instead of the default Move-then-Act order (core-rules, Part Five): some movement before the Action, the rest after. Grants no additional movement, only splits an existing Move into two segments.
Example. A Character with Fluid Footwork and a Speed of 5 wants to step out from cover, attack, and then duck back. Without this Specialty, all 5 Speed must be spent before or after the Action, not both. With it, they spend 2 Speed moving into the open, Act (attack), then spend the remaining 3 Speed retreating back into cover, all in the same turn.
Designer's note
Adopted alongside Move, Act, and Free Interaction becoming formally distinct turn components; before that split existed, there was no "around the Action" to speak of. See open-questions and retired-mechanics for the turn-economy history.
Second Loadout¶
Cost: 2 AP (provisional).
Flavor. Two trades, mastered. You carry the tools of both and change your mind as the fight turns.
Effect. You carry a full second Kit, perk and all, alongside your active one. As your Free Interaction for the turn (core-rules, Part Five), you may swap which Kit is active. Only one Kit is active at a time, so you benefit from only one perk at a time, and the one-Free-Interaction-per-turn limit means at most one swap per turn. Reconfiguring either Kit still happens only in downtime (kits.md).
Designer's note
[STUB], 2026-08-01. The paid, deliberate version of carrying two loadouts, kept off the free baseline so ordinary Characters commit to one Kit per fight (kits.md, Reconfiguring a Kit) while the ordinary sidearm covers the "never left with nothing" case (kits.md, Sidearms and backups). Open: the final cost (2 AP is the working figure), whether the swap should be once per turn or once per Combat, and whether pairing two two-handed Kits needs a carry restriction. [PLAYTEST]
Assassin and infiltration Specialties¶
The Assassins Guild (setting, guilds) deepens several of these and gates the strongest.
Designer's note
Migrated from the older Legends system and rebuilt on this engine (2026-08-01). Every one is open, which is what lets a Ranger, a Knight, or anyone else take assassin tools without changing Class.
Contortionist¶
Cost: 1 AP.
Flavor. There is always a smaller space than anyone thinks.
Effect. You roll Stealth (Finesse) Checks with one extra die (+1d6, so 4d6 on a standard 3d6 Check). You may re-hide as part of your Move rather than spending an Action, provided your Move reaches cover.
Designer's note
Cheap support for Vanish and for out-of-combat infiltration.
Crippling Strike¶
Cost: 2 AP. Requires Finesse Trained (5-6) or greater.
Flavor. You do not always aim to kill. Sometimes you aim to stop.
Effect. When you assign one of your hits to a target, you may spend that hit to impose a wound instead of dealing damage. Choose one: the target is Slowed until the end of your next turn, or the target takes the arm wound and is disarmed, dropping its weapon and contributing no die until re-armed or healed. Usable once per turn. Slowed and the arm wound follow their existing rules (core-rules, Parts Eight and Nine); this Specialty only lets the attacker, rather than the defender, dictate the harm.
Designer's note
Merges the old Hamstring and Muscle Slice into one pick. The engine already lets a defender choose arm or leg per point of damage; this hands that choice to the attacker for one hit, which is the whole of a called shot.
Mist-Step¶
Cost: 2 AP. Requires Finesse Trained (5-6) or greater.
Flavor. The blow passes through a curl of mist where your throat had been.
Effect. Once per Combat, when a Hit would land on your own Card, negate it and move 1 square. You lose your Free Interaction on your next turn.
Designer's note
Kept Character-scale and once per Combat so it does not tread on the Blade Retainer's Elusive or Shadow Step, or on the Sword-and-Shield Guard token.
Never Unarmed¶
Cost: 1 AP.
Flavor. They took your sword at the gate. They did not take everything.
Effect. An arm wound can never disarm you. Redirect any arm wound you would take to the leg instead, and you never drop out of the Pool to a disarm.
Designer's note
Built around the arm-versus-leg wound choice that is the real disarm mechanic here. The appear-unarmed flavor lives in the Hidden Blade Kit (kits.md), so this Specialty stays purely the durable disarm immunity and the two do not overlap.
Nondescript¶
Cost: 1 AP.
Flavor. Average height. Average build. A face people are sure they have seen before, on a name they cannot place.
Effect. You have a knack for blending in. Anyone describing you struggles to pick out a single distinguishing trait beyond your gear. Witnesses recall your cloak, your blade, your horse, and not your face, your voice, or your bearing. Change or discard that gear and the description falls apart. This is a social and investigative edge, not a combat one; it does nothing once a fight has begun and you are seen acting.
Designer's note
A pure intrigue Specialty, the assassin who cannot be described to a magistrate. Deliberately gear-dependent, so it is beaten by the obvious countermeasure of changing what you carry, and scoped out of combat so it never touches Unaware or the Pool math.
Perfect Opening¶
Cost: 2 AP. Requires Finesse Trained (5-6) or greater.
Flavor. The best and the worst a moment can offer, arriving in the same breath. You have been waiting for exactly this.
Effect. You can read Extremes in your Pool (a natural 1 and a natural 6 in the same roll; see core-rules, Part Eighteen). Once per turn, when Extremes appears, one hit from that turn may be assigned directly to the Card of a target that is Unaware or Helpless, bypassing any screen. If no such target exists, that hit instead carries Rend 1.
Designer's note
The unlock for the Extremes pattern, which nothing reads by default. With Vanish or a Contract setting up Unaware targets, a Perfect Opening turns the rare, perfect roll into a strike no bodyguard can stop. [PLAYTEST]
Quick Hands¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. The vial is empty and back on your belt before anyone saw you reach for it.
Effect. Once per turn, use one carried item as a Free Interaction instead of an Action: drink a potion, coat a blade in poison, ready a flask. This overrides the default that drinking a potion costs a full Action (core-rules, Part Five).
Designer's note
Real action-economy value, but only for a Character who invests in consumables, which keeps it from being the universally correct pick. [PLAYTEST] whether it should cost 1 or 2.
Read the Foe¶
Cost: 2 AP. Requires Wits Trained (5-6) or greater.
Flavor. Every guard has a habit. Every beast has a tell. You have already found it.
Effect. Before a fight, or as an Action during one, make a Wits Check against a target. On a success you learn its Tier, Hit Points, Speed, Range, and any attack keywords (Rend, Piercing, Inevitable). If the Check clears a Difficulty of 2 or more, your side also gains one extra die (+1d6) on its first roll against that target.
Designer's note
A recon Specialty. There is no soak or damage-resistance to read in this engine, so it reports the stat line and keywords that actually exist.
Shadowed Sight¶
Cost: 1 AP.
Flavor. Dark is only dark to those who still need the sun.
Effect. You are never Blinded by darkness or poor light, and you fail no Check for want of light alone. You cannot be made Unaware by an attacker relying on darkness or concealment you could reasonably sense.
Designer's note
Scoped tighter than the Night Fey Lineage Specialties (Creature of the Dark, Shadow's Favor), which grant a flat bonus in darkness, so the two do not simply repeat each other. This one is denial: light-based Blinded and darkness ambushes do not work on you.
Vanish¶
Cost: 3 AP. Requires Finesse Skilled (4-6) or greater, or membership in the Assassins Guild.
Builds into: Lost in the Melee.
Flavor. The line breaks, a shout goes up, and where you stood there is nothing. The one you mean to kill is still watching the space you left.
Effect. As your Action, choose one enemy that could plausibly lose track of you, meaning there is cover, a crowd, smoke, or the churn of a melee to vanish into, and make a Finesse Check against a Difficulty the GM sets by how exposed you are. On a success, that enemy is Unaware of you (core-rules, Part Eleven) until you act against it or it detects you. While it is Unaware of you, your hits against it bypass its screen, an enemy Character's Company or a cluster of lesser foes the GM is running to shield a larger threat, and land on that target's own Card, exactly as the Unaware rule already provides. The first hit you land on a target made Unaware this way each Combat carries Rend 2.
Worked example
The party fights an ogre warded by a swarm of goblins. The Knight and Skirmisher grind at the goblins, and every hit lands on that screen. A Ranger who has taken Vanish spends her Action instead to slip behind an overturned cart and makes her Finesse Check against the ogre. It succeeds. The ogre is now Unaware of her. On her next turn she strikes: her hits ignore the goblin screen and land on the ogre's own Card, and the first of them carries Rend 2. The ogre never saw the knife.
Designer's note
The bypass itself is not new; the Unaware rule already routes an Unaware defender's damage past its screen. Vanish's actual grant is the power to re-impose Unaware in the middle of a fight, turn after turn, at the cost of a whole Action and a Check that can fail. That tempo cost is the balance. [PLAYTEST] against Initiative's "ambusher acts first" rule.
└ Lost in the Melee¶
Cost: 2 AP. Requires Vanish.
Flavor. When steel is already ringing an arm's length away, no one is watching for you. You step into the noise and are gone.
Effect. While you are adjacent to an ally who is engaged in combat, you may use Vanish without making its Finesse Check. It succeeds automatically. This changes nothing else about Vanish: it still costs your Action, and the target must still be one that could plausibly lose track of you. Away from an engaged ally, Vanish works as normal and requires the Check.
Designer's note
Turns Vanish from a gamble into a certainty under the one condition an assassin most wants, a melee already underway beside them. The Action cost is kept, so this does not become a free every-turn bypass; the ally's fight buys reliability, not tempo. Whether the Action cost should also be waived is [PLAYTEST].
Command and support Specialties¶
Several suit the Chancellor and other command-minded Characters best.
Designer's note
Migrated from the older Legends system's Diplomat archetype and rebuilt on this engine (2026-08-01). The full migration record, including what did not translate and why, is in diplomat-migration.md.
Bonded¶
Cost: 1 AP.
Flavor. You know the mood of your household the way you know the weather. A soldier in trouble three valleys away tugs at you like a change in the wind.
Effect. At any distance, you always know the broad state of each of your Retainers and any ally you have named: whether they are safe, in a fight, wounded, or Fallen. This is a standing sense, not a roll, and it works across the Mists.
Designer's note
A near-literal migration of the Legends Bonded, trimmed to the states the system tracks and extended to "Fallen." Touches no combat math. Suits the Chancellor's large Company and the Falling-back-to-a-Retainer rule.
Diplomatic Immunity¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. They came for you and found they had a better reason to be somewhere else. Someone always does.
Effect. Once per Combat, when an enemy attack would target you specifically and a valid alternative target is within that attacker's reach, you may force the attacker to strike the other target instead. Cannot be used while you are Unaware (core-rules, Part Eleven), the same restriction Intercept carries, and cannot redirect an attack that has no other legal target.
Designer's note
The defender-side mirror of the Chancellor's Redirect command effect. Redirect reroutes an enemy's next attack onto a Retainer of the Chancellor's choosing; Diplomatic Immunity reroutes an attack away from oneself onto any legal target the attacker can reach. The thematic echo is intentional.
Encourage¶
Cost: 2 AP. Requires Presence Trained (5-6) or greater.
Flavor. A word at the right moment is worth a second sword. You steady the hand that was about to slip.
Effect. Once per Combat, and once per social scene out of combat, you may grant one ally within earshot a flat extra die (+1d6) on a single roll they are about to make, a combat Pool roll or a Check. You are not joining their effort in the Help sense, so you add no Bust risk of your own; you simply hand them the die. You must be able to speak and be heard for this to work.
Designer's note
Merges three near-identical Legends voice buffs (Encourage, Motivating Words, Save the Day) into one. Situational Advantage becomes the flat +1d6 per core-rules Part Seventeen. Distinct from the Help loop in that it adds no Bust risk.
Hold the Line¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. Your voice carries further than any banner. As long as they can hear you, they hold together.
Effect. While you can be heard, your Company's Communication Range (companies-and-command, Part Four) rises from 10 squares to 15, letting your Retainers spread further and still act as one Pool rather than splitting into separate Detachments.
Designer's note
A new Specialty carrying the command-and-control fantasy of the Legends Formations through a rule Hynafol already has. Deliberately reconciled against the Bard Guild's Performer, which doubles the same range to 20: Performer stays the stronger, Guild-gated version, and Hold the Line is the open, shallower one. Voice-based, so unlike Performer it needs no instrument and functions in a fight.
Rally¶
Cost: 3 AP. Requires Presence Trained (5-6) or greater.
Flavor. You do not close the wound. You make them forget it long enough to keep standing.
Effect. Once per Combat, in place of your Action, restore 1 Hit Point to one adjacent Retainer or ally who has not Fallen. This cannot revive a Fallen combatant and cannot raise a target above its starting Hit Points.
Designer's note
Migrates Inspiring Words and Inspiring Presence, cut down from a flat 5-point radius heal to a single point, in line with the Priest Retainer perk (companies-and-command, Part Five) and deliberately weaker than The Priest's Hand. Priced at 3 because preventing a Fall is the most valuable thing a support Character can do in this engine. The overlap with the Priest is accepted; this stays open rather than Guild-gated.
Read the Room¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. You walk into a hall and you already know who is afraid, who is lying, and who is about to reach for a knife.
Effect. Out of combat, once per scene, make a Wits Check to read the disposition of a group or a key figure: who holds real authority, where the tension sits, and whether violence is close. On a Check that clears Difficulty 2 or more, if that reading turns into a fight you move to preempt, you take the Initiative and act first (core-rules, Part Four). This does not apply if an enemy springs a genuine ambush; a successful read means you were not caught unaware, but it never lets you act ahead of an attacker whose surprise you failed to detect.
Designer's note
A new Specialty in the archetype, replacing Legends' Snap Response, which keyed Initiative off an attribute Hynafol's 2d6 Initiative has no room for. The ambush clause resolves the potential conflict with Part Four's "ambusher acts first" rule: reading the room successfully is itself the detection that prevents the ambush.
Reopen the Question¶
Cost: 1 AP.
Flavor. A mind made up is not a mind closed. You find the one loose thread and pull, and suddenly the matter is open again.
Effect. Out of combat, against one subject who has already settled on a position, you may compel a Presence Check that would not otherwise be offered. The subject is not persuaded by this alone; you have only reopened the question. Because you are arguing against a decision already reached, the Check is made at one Difficulty tier higher than the same argument would face on an undecided subject. Usable on a given subject once per day, and never on a close ally.
Designer's note
Migrates the Legends Diplomat's Force the Precipice. "Requires an additional success" becomes "one Difficulty tier higher" on the Check ladder. Renamed from the Legends jargon, since Hynafol has no precipice concept.
Standard Bearer's Word¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. One steady voice at the right moment turns a rout back into a line.
Effect. Once per Combat, as your Action, remove one Condition (Weakened, Slowed, Stunned, or Blinded) from an adjacent ally or Retainer, or grant one ally immunity to the next Condition that would be applied to them before your next turn.
Designer's note
A new Specialty giving the support family the roster's only clean Condition-removal effect. Uses only the existing named Conditions (core-rules, Part Nine), adds no new machinery, and counters the Chancellor's own Anchor and Pacify as well as monster Conditions.
The Whole Line Moves¶
Cost: 2 AP. Requires the Commander's Mace Kit (kits.md).
Flavor. You level the mace and the whole line leans forward. Nobody waits to be told twice.
Effect. Once per Combat, in place of your attack, raise the mace and call the advance: every Retainer and ally in your Company gains +2 Speed until the start of your next turn.
Designer's note
Deepens the Commander's Mace's "Commands" perk from a single redirected Hit into a company movement order, the requested Kit upgrade. A pure Speed grant is the safe axis for a Company-wide effect (companies-and-command, Part One names reach and movement as the buff that does not touch Pool size or Combo math). Migrates the Legends Flow formation, the one Formation that survives the pass. Pairs with the Chancellor's Field Command, which delivers the same order through the command economy rather than a Kit.
Guardian and defensive Specialties¶
Assembled from these picks, a Character of any Class can play a defensive protector.
Designer's note
Migrated from the older Legends system's Guardian archetype and rebuilt on this engine (2026-08-01). The protector core (Borrowed Strength, Bulwark, Interpose, Stand Your Ground) was briefly held as Warden-only, and became universal when the Warden was deprecated (2026-08-04). The full migration record, including the self-heal that was omitted for design consistency and the Defense, soak, resist, and momentum abilities that do not translate, is in guardian-migration.md.
Borrowed Strength¶
Cost: 3 AP.
Flavor. Guard spends a hit you already rolled. This spends one you have not rolled yet.
Effect. Before or during an enemy's attack, you may commit dice from what would otherwise be your own next turn's Pool. Each committed die negates one incoming Hit this round, applied against an attack on you or, at your choice, an adjacent ally or Retainer. When your next turn arrives, that turn's Pool is reduced by however many dice you committed. You may never commit so many dice that your next turn's Pool would fall below 1; you always keep one die to act with, so Borrowed Strength can never cost you a wholly dead turn.
Designer's note
The inverse of the Shieldbearer's Guard: Guard banks a Hit already rolled and spends it later, Borrowed Strength spends a Hit not yet rolled, drawn from a turn that has not happened. The Warden's old signature, opened to any Character when that class was deprecated (2026-08-04). Strong and repeatable, so priced a step above the other defensive picks. The cost and the 3 AP price are [PLAYTEST].
Bulwark¶
Cost: 3 AP.
Flavor. You set your feet, drop your weight behind the shield, and decide that nothing gets through this turn.
Effect. As your Action, brace. Until the start of your next turn, negate up to 3 incoming Hits against yourself or an adjacent ally or Retainer, in any combination. Unlike Borrowed Strength, this draws nothing from your next turn's Pool; the cost is your whole Action this turn. You use Bulwark or attack on a given turn, not both.
Designer's note
The other way to buy a wall, spending the present Action where Borrowed Strength spends future dice. [PLAYTEST] the two together, so alternating them across turns cannot make a Character trivially unkillable.
Create Opening¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. You take the blow meant to break the line, and in the taking you show everyone exactly where the enemy is soft.
Effect. Once per Combat, when an enemy within your reach attacks you or an adjacent ally, you may create an opening: attacks against that enemy gain one extra die (+1d6) on their Pool roll until the start of your next turn.
Designer's note
Migrates the Legends Create Opening. The original granted Advantage; per core-rules Part Seventeen an earned feature grants +1d6, so that is the port. Reactive and attack-triggered, which keeps it distinct from Encourage (proactive, one ally, one roll).
Guarded Grip¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. A long haft is a bar you can set against a blade as well as swing. Held right, it turns like a shield.
Effect. A two-handed melee weapon you wield can bank Guard tokens exactly as a shield does (core-rules, Part Eight, and the Sword-and-Shield Guard perk in kits.md): when you score a Hit, you may bank it as a Guard token instead of dealing damage, negating one incoming Hit on your next turn. Does not stack with a shield Kit, since a Character already carrying Guard gains nothing from this.
Designer's note
Migrates the Legends Guardian's Large Weapon Defense. Hynafol's shield currency is the Guard token, so the port grants Guard to the Greatsword, Polearm, Pike, and Warhammer families, which otherwise have no access to it. A real trade: the two-handed Kit gives up its own perk-turns for durability.
Immovable Object¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. Push all you like. The ground and you have an understanding.
Effect. You cannot be moved against your will. Forced movement, a shove, a push, a Whirlwind Kit's knock-back, a monster's displacement, simply fails against you. You are also never Slowed by an enemy effect, though terrain still slows you normally.
Designer's note
A new Specialty in the Guardian pass, using only concepts already in play (push effects on the Whirlwind Kit and in the bestiary; Slowed as a named Condition). Fills the positioning-denial gap the Legends list gestured at with Overbearing Presence but never gave the Guardian itself.
Interpose¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. You are already moving before the blow lands. The space between the strike and your ward is exactly your stride, and you close it.
Effect. Base Intercept (core-rules, Part Ten) already lets you take an outside ally's Hit onto your own Card, but only for an ally within reach, adjacent by default. Interpose is the stride that closes the gap. As a reaction to a declared attack, you may move up to your Speed to reach any ally within that distance and Intercept a Hit meant for them, taking it on your own Card. The Hit is declared before it resolves, as Intercept requires.
Designer's note
Reach held at full Speed pending playtest; it may prove too generous.
Iron Constitution¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. Blows that would put another down are, to you, a reason to keep your feet.
Effect. Your Hit Points increase by 2. May be taken twice, for a maximum of +4.
Designer's note
Merges the Legends Sturdy Build and Thick Skin, both raw durability, into a flat Hit Point bump, since Hynafol expresses armor and toughness as extra Hit Points and has no soak value (core-rules, Part Eight). Matches the "Armor, as extra Hit Points" starting-specialty category. The +2 value and the two-purchase cap are [PLAYTEST], to be adjusted during testing.
Retribution¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. Every blow you take is a debt, and you are punctual about collecting.
Effect. Once per turn, when you Intercept a Hit, negate one with Guard or Borrowed Strength, or absorb one with Bulwark, your next Hit against that attacker this Combat deals 1 additional damage.
Designer's note
A new Specialty in the Guardian pass, giving active defense a small offensive payoff so a pure damage sponge does not feel inert. Leans naturally toward the Warden but open to any Character; the Borrowed Strength and Bulwark triggers simply do nothing for a Character who lacks them.
Stand Your Ground¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. They cannot go around you. That is the entire point of you.
Effect. On any turn you take no Move, you become an anchor. Until your next turn, an enemy that begins its turn within your reach cannot leave it: its Speed is treated as 0 for the purpose of moving away from you (Slowed relative to you, core-rules, Part Nine). It may still act, attack, and reposition within your reach. This holds one such enemy per point of your reach.
Designer's note
A flat zone of control built on Slowed, replacing the old Overbearing Presence opposed roll, which has no Hynafol equivalent. [PLAYTEST] against Halberdier and Pike reach, since an anchor that also has reach could stop an entire approach.
Unstoppable¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. The world tries to make you stop. You have made a habit of declining.
Effect. Once per Combat, as a free reaction, ignore or immediately end one Condition affecting you: Weakened, Slowed, or Stunned.
Designer's note
Migrates the Legends Unstoppable, mapping disoriented, stunned, and called-shot penalties onto the named Conditions Hynafol has. Self-only and reactive, which keeps it distinct from Standard Bearer's Word, the ally-facing Condition-remover; the two share design space and are priced against each other.
Mounts and cavalry¶
Rider¶
Cost: 2 AP. Requires narrative access to a trained mount.
Flavor. You come to the field already moving, from a height, at a speed the ones on foot spend the whole fight trying to answer.
Effect. You keep a trained warhorse or comparable mount and may ride it into battle. While mounted, your Speed increases by 4; the mount adds no die to the Pool and reads no Combos, in line with the one-die rule and the mounted-Retainer guidance (companies-and-command, Part One). You may charge: moving at least 3 squares in a roughly straight line toward a target before attacking counts as a charge, which enables charge-keyed effects such as the Lance Kit's Couched Charge (kits.md). The charge grants nothing on its own without a weapon that uses it. The mount layers onto any Kit, so a mounted archer, lancer, or sword-and-shield rider is this one unlock plus the Kit they already carry.
Drawbacks. A mount is a large body a braced spear line is built to punish: the Halberdier's 2-square reach, the Pike's 3-square reach, and any Set Against the Charge or Polearm Reaction perk threaten a charging rider before arrival, and a mounted Character has no special protection against them. A mount is useless where it cannot go: corridors, stairs, dense woods, rooftops. Being unhorsed is handled as a dismount rather than a wound at the GM's call: you lose the mount's benefits and must remount, an Action or a downtime beat.
Designer's note
Modeled as a Specialty rather than a Kit so it does not multiply the weapon list (every "Mounted with X" is this one unlock plus the weapon Kit), and rather than free gear so riding into battle is an earned choice. The Character-side companion to the Retainer growth option Fleet or Mounted (companies-and-command, Part Three). The +4 Speed value and the unhorsing trigger are both [PLAYTEST].
Ranger and wilderness Specialties¶
The Ranger-exclusive members (Quarry, Patient Aim, Volley, Sixth Sense) live on the Ranger's own Growth Potential list (classes/ranger.md).
Designer's note
Migrated from the older Legends system's Ranger archetype and rebuilt on this engine (2026-08-01). Full record in ranger-migration.md.
Free Runner¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. Walls, enemies, broken ground. To you they are all just floor at a different angle.
Effect. You may move through squares occupied by enemies without stopping (you may not end your Move there), and doing so does not trigger reach-based reaction attacks such as the Polearm and Pike Kits' free strikes (kits.md). As part of your Move you may also run along walls and steep faces at your normal Speed, falling clear at the end of the turn if you are not on stable ground.
Designer's note
Merges Battlefield Flow and Wall Running. The momentum-fueled dodge half of Battlefield Flow is dropped, as there is no momentum.
Friend of Beasts¶
Cost: 1 AP.
Flavor. The wild does not read you as a threat. It never has.
Effect. Ordinary animals and simple beasts do not attack you unless provoked or driven to it. You may attempt a Wits Check to read and communicate with an animal in simple terms for a short while. This is a social and exploration edge, not a combat one.
Designer's note
A near-literal migration, the Legends knowledge roll becoming a Wits Check. Touches no combat math.
Longshot¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. Others measure the range and call it impossible. You have already made the shot.
Effect. A bow or crossbow you wield gains +2 Range.
Designer's note
Migrates the reach half of Strongarm Archery; the attribute swap has no Hynafol equivalent. The Character-side twin of the Archer Retainer's Keener Eye (companies-and-command, Part One).
Pathfinder¶
Cost: 1 AP.
Flavor. Give you a day in a place and it stops being able to surprise you. The cold, the mire, the trackless dark: all of it becomes ground you know.
Effect. After a stretch attuning to an environment, you ignore movement penalties from its natural terrain and take no Fatigue from its conditions (heat, cold, wet, thin air). You function without penalty in severe weather there, and you leave no trail an ordinary tracker can follow.
Designer's note
Merges Self-Sustaining and Natural Stride. Personal and passive, deliberately distinct from the Bard Guild's The Long Watch (an instrument played for the whole Company) and the Root Ritual's Blessing of the Long Watch (communal and ceremonial): those reach the whole Company, this protects only its holder.
Steady Draw¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. You take the extra half-second no one else does, and the shot is better for it.
Effect. Once per Combat, grant yourself one extra die (+1d6) on a single ranged attack Pool roll. A second purchase of this Specialty raises it to twice per Combat.
Designer's note
Merges Ranged Expertise and Increased Expertise. Advantage became +1d6, and the upgrade became a repeat purchase.
Suppressing Fire¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. No one crosses that ground while you are watching it. They have tried.
Effect. As your Action, make a ranged attack against a point as a Radius Area of Effect (core-rules, Part Sixteen). Rather than dealing damage, every enemy in the radius is Weakened (hit range narrowed one tier, core-rules Part Nine) until the start of your next turn.
Designer's note
Legends put the target and adjacent squares at a disadvantage on their attacks; Weakened is exactly that, and the Radius shape carries the reach. The ammunition cost and move-through-the-zone rider are dropped, as Hynafol tracks neither.
Sage and lore Specialties¶
The Sage's support-caster identity is otherwise distributed across the Witch, the Squire, and the Alchemist, Mage, and Priest Guilds.
Designer's note
Migrated from the older Legends system's Sage archetype (2026-08-01). The Sage's momentum engine does not migrate. These are the open, non-Guild survivors; the crafting and identification pieces went to Guilds, and the mist-reset became a Priest capstone (setting, guilds). Full record in sage-migration.md.
Life Sense¶
Cost: 1 AP.
Flavor. The world is never as empty as it looks. You feel the others in it, out past the treeline, around the bend, waiting.
Effect. As an Action, sense the presence and rough direction of sentient life (roughly human intellect or greater) around you, out to a range the GM sets by the terrain. Within a close radius you sense only that something is near, not where. Known allies do not register as threats.
Designer's note
Migrates Signs of Life. A clean detection utility that touches no combat math.
Mindlink¶
Cost: 1 AP.
Flavor. A thread runs between the two of you, thin as a thought, and it carries exactly that.
Effect. Establish a silent, mind-to-mind link with one willing ally, formed during downtime and holding while the two of you stay in the same region. While linked you may communicate wordlessly at any distance you could plausibly still sense each other across.
Designer's note
A near-literal migration of Spiritual Connection and a clean addition; nothing deployed does this. Complements the Diplomat pass's Bonded, which senses an ally's state but carries no message.
Quick Study¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. You do not know everything. You just know how to know the next thing faster than anyone expects.
Effect. Once per scene, name one field of expertise (a craft, a lore, a language, a trade). Until the scene ends, you act as though you held a Skill in it, taking Checks that field governs at one tier above your governing Virtue (core-rules, Part Seventeen). Only one such borrowed field at a time; naming a new one ends the old.
Designer's note
Merges the Legends Sage's temporary skill-point (Sage's Knowledge) and its skill-breadth Specialty (Jack of All Trades) into one flexible, on-demand Skill, using Hynafol's existing "a Skill raises one task one tier" rule rather than a point pool.
Trapsmith¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. You were here first. You always are. The ground itself is waiting for them.
Effect. As an Action, or during setup before a fight, place a trap on a square within reach. The first enemy to enter that square triggers it; an enemy actively watching for traps may make a Wits Check against your placement to spot it first. Choose the trap's kind when you place it: Snare (the enemy is Slowed, Speed 0, until it frees itself with an Action; core-rules Part Nine), Spikes (a single Hit carrying Rend 2; core-rules Part Fourteen), or Scatter (a Radius 1 Area of Effect, core-rules Part Sixteen: roll one die at your Wits tier and apply the result to every enemy in the radius). You may keep a small number of traps set at once, a soft cap the GM sets by the fiction.
Designer's note
The one genuinely new tool the Sage brings, migrated from Trap Maker. Legends' four trap types collapse into three built from existing machinery (Snare and Sticky both become Slowed, Spikes a Rend hit, Explosive a small Area of Effect). Pairs naturally with the Alchemist Guild. The active-trap cap and Scatter's die read are [PLAYTEST].
Warrior and weapon-technique Specialties¶
The Warrior has no namesake Class, so all of these are open, with the Knight and Skirmisher as natural buyers.
Designer's note
Migrated from the older Legends system's Warrior archetype (2026-08-01). Most of the Legends Warrior was already delivered by the Kit list or rested on subsystems Hynafol lacks; the full record, including the large cut list, is in warrior-migration.md.
Breakthrough¶
Cost: 3 AP.
Flavor. Four blows land in the same breath, in the same place, with the same intent. No shield wall closes fast enough. There is only the one who was meant to fall.
Effect. You can read a Set (four or more dice showing the same face; core-rules, Part Seven). Once per turn, when four or more of your banked hits show the same face, you may commit them: assign all of those matching hits to a single target, and they bypass that target's screen entirely, landing on its own Card exactly as the Unaware rule routes damage past a screen (core-rules, Parts Ten and Eleven). They cannot be soaked by the target's Company or the lesser foes shielding it, nor Intercepted onto a Retainer. Per one die, one purpose (core-rules, Part Eighteen), dice spent on this Set cannot also feed another Set effect such as the Chancellor's Grand Muster or the Knight's Charge.
Designer's note
Reimagines the Legends Warrior's With Gusto: soak does not exist to bypass, but the screen does, so an unstoppable blow becomes a screen-pierce, the same thing Vanish and Perfect Opening do. The trigger is lifted to a Set to make four matching dice the big, rare payoff. Grants the Set read to any Character, previously held only by the Chancellor (Grand Muster) and Knight (Charge); that widening and the four-damage screen-pierce are the [PLAYTEST] questions.
Fight Anywhere¶
Cost: 1 AP.
Flavor. Hanging off a railing with your sword in your teeth. A ledge, a bog, a rolling deck. It is all just where the fight happens to be.
Effect. You take no penalty for fighting from awkward footing or an unusual position: broken ground, a narrow ledge, hanging from a wall, prone, or in water. Checks and attacks another Character would make at a penalty or one Difficulty tier harder for footing alone, you make normally.
Designer's note
A near-literal migration, touching only situational penalties. Distinct from the Brawler pass's Sure Footing, which is about movement over terrain; this is about acting without penalty once you are in a bad spot.
Follow Through¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. The blow does not stop at the first body. Why would it.
Effect. Once per turn, when a two-handed melee weapon lands a Hit on a target, one adjacent enemy also takes 1 Hit. The carried Hit cannot itself carry further.
Designer's note
Migrates Carry Through as a clean cleave without a second roll. Named Follow Through to stay clear of the retired Cleaving Strike Kit perk (kits.md).
One-Handed Grip¶
Cost: 2 AP. Requires Might Skilled (4-6) or greater.
Flavor. They built the blade for two hands. You were not consulted.
Effect. You may wield a two-handed melee weapon in one hand, freeing your off-hand for a sidearm, a torch, a grip on a ledge, or a grapple. This does not grant a shield's Guard, which still requires a shield Kit; the freed hand is for utility, not a second Kit perk.
Designer's note
Migrates One Handing It, scoped so it cannot bolt a free Guard onto a greatsword and sidestep the Kit-commit design (kits.md). The exact interaction with a Kit's Hands value is [PLAYTEST].
Practiced Blade¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. You have made this cut ten thousand times. The ten-thousand-and-first is not going to be the one that misses.
Effect. Once per Combat, grant yourself one extra die (+1d6) on a single melee attack Pool roll. A second purchase of this Specialty raises it to twice per Combat.
Designer's note
The melee twin of Steady Draw, built the same way. Migrates Melee Expertise and Increased Expertise; Advantage became +1d6, the upgrade a repeat purchase.
Straining Blow¶
Cost: 2 AP.
Flavor. You put more into the swing than the swing can safely give back. The cost is yours to pay, in the only currency that always spends.
Effect. Once per turn, spend 1 of your own Hit Points to reroll a single missed personal die. This reroll sits outside the push: it cannot cause a bust, and the spent Hit Point is lost regardless of the result. You may not reduce yourself below 1 Hit Point this way.
Designer's note
Migrates Straining Blow. The push loop already gives free rerolls at bust risk, so the real port is rerolling safely, paid for in blood. Cost and cap are [PLAYTEST].
Changelog
- 2026-08-10: Added a Specialty Summary chart at the top with anchor links (name, AP, requirements, description). Reformatted to the class-page template: italic cost line in place of the Cost and Requires labels, worked examples as example admonitions, and all design rationale moved into collapsed designer notes. Alphabetized Specialties within each family, ordered the families alphabetically (General family first), gave the general picks their own heading, and set the "not yet finalized" Second Loadout to its working price of 2 AP. Introduced a prerequisite-branch convention: a Specialty that requires another is listed directly beneath its prerequisite (out of alphabetical order) and marked with └, in both the chart and the body, with the requirement linked. Applied it to Lost in the Melee under Vanish.
- 2026-08-05: Repointed references away from the retired standalone Starting Specialties page (Starting Specialties now live in each class file and in character-creation).
- 2026-08-04: Opened the Warden's protector Specialties (Borrowed Strength, Bulwark, Interpose, Stand Your Ground) to any Character as the Warden was deprecated.
- 2026-08-03: Added to the v0.3 playtest site.