In the morning we had another party meeting. My least favorite part of adventuring. The Miamist and the Arcanist got into a long story about why she and the princess we alone in a land pretty far from home, how they got here and so forth. The important thing for me was that all great epics had a princess somewhere. Ours was a bit early and not really playing out the role well but having one was probably the important thing. Most nobles were hoping for social Aleatory Traits or Knowledge ones at worst, well more so the first son. Later sons could do fighting or take roles in the church, maybe make their fortune as a connected merchant.

While an Arcanist was viable for mainly due to tierage, a tierage is a pierage they say, a noble being a girl with Vigor magic really wasn't. Especially a princess. Second daughters had slightly more leeway but a frontline combat trait? Even if it was magic it wasn't respected. Perhaps she was running from being married to some mediocre noble, no one likes him but he is powerful and a defective princess is just the thing.

They sought out our party when they heard about it hoping for some solidarity and ideally a lack of aspiring suitors. The duchess first posing as a lower noble with a fantastic adventuring trait and then revealng the princess only after a favorable impression. Whatever. What matters is you want 8 people to engage a *Challenge*. We needed a true frontliner and an amazing synergy caster was really a bonus.

Most importantly they agreed to expend the rest of their funds on moving us mere peons towards the towering heights of high nobility equipment. The mages all desparately wanted wands. While top level staves provided ranged benefits Academy staves were for low to mid tier adventurers. Since we were sort of racing ahead we couldn't afford to get in close for the attunement damage enchantment. The mana was nice, though. An off-hand wand would help quite a bit.

The Arcanist had a *very* fancy wand, which she'd avoided using earlier, and the princess had a much fancier warhammer. Her Arbitrary Talent was Crushing. Some preferred Offense over Close but it lacked good CC skills for Maces and Hammers.

Intelligence Attunement +3 Retention +2 Sagacity +1 Rigor +1 Will +1 Charisma Style +4 Insight +2 Tenacity +1 Zeal +1 Might Brawn +4 Fortitude +2 Tenacity +1 Celerity +1 Endurance Fortitude +3 Tenacity +3 Brawn +2 Conditioning Celerity +4 Brawn +2 Fortitude +2 Savagery Brawn +4 Celerity +2 Tenacity +2 Leadership Style +4 Insight +4 Crushing Brawn +4 Fortitude +2 Will +2 Vigentimancy Attunement +6 Will +4 Fortitude +3 Style +1 Brawn +1 Celerity +1 Brawn 17 Fortitude 12 Attunement 9 Style 9 Celerity 8 Tenacity 7 Will 7 Insight 6 Retention 2 Zeal 1 Sagacity 1 Rigor 1 Precision 0 Acumen 0 Ingenuity 0 Perception 0

Vigentimancy allows for an incredibly challenging build. It is a combination of Body and Storm. With Water, Life, and Force to empower, and provide efficient mana use, and Light and Air to protect and cleanse and even speed up. You have the Attunement to learn Corporomancy which provides the will for other magic of a non-ranged damage nature. The princess really had a strong plan. I'll call her the Crusher from now on. Maybe we'll go to the Leader if she works her way up to it.

You probably want to see her fancy powers. Vigor Magic isn't quite as rare as Chronomancy or Arcana but it is less well known as a more specialized rare talent. So you've probably never seen anything about it before.

Vigentimancy Robustness Permanent Passive -1s control DUR +5 ABS PHYS Alacrity +1 strike/s DUR 5 Self Cast 1s 30 mana Might +10 PHYS dmg DUR 10 Self Cast 1s 30 mana Mantle +5 FORCE dmg +5 LIGHT dmg on 5 Strikes Self Cast 1s 50 mana Crushing Brutality +5 dmg +1s Stun w maces/hammers Passive Permanent Pulverize +10 dmg Touch Strike 1s 10 mana Knockback add Push 5m Vigentimancy provides a wide array of martial passives as well as self buffs of low cost. Alacrity is similar to Haste but affecting only Strikes, commonly known as physical attacks with the body or weapons. Later Tiers possess a larger proportion of relatively unique passives. Under Haste and Alacrity you can attack 3 times. This is also exceptional for stacking short duration buffs and then maxing value. Robustness provides rare control reduction.

Might is a strong physical damage buff which has a relatively low cost since it is only a self buff. Mantle does not benefit from Alacrity because it isn't time based but provides rare early non-physical damage on strikes. Additionally and helpfully for our party it *does* benefit from properly Aspected Domain spells. Specifically the Light from Static Field, though sadly not the water.

Crushing Weapons is similar to Close Combat, they are often picked together, in providing strong physical control and damage boosts. Notably Brutality applies to Bash. It applies to Smash as well, though Smash isn't free. Pulverize and Smash are not generic buff spells. They themselves are actually Strikes. Attacks that used a weapon, if applicable, even though mana is used. Bash is a Strike as well but costless. Pulverize benefits from Brutality if you use an appropriate weapon. Knockback is a Strike as well. Weapon damage is added to Strikes. The Shieldmaiden and the Treant had not previously had weapons. Shields do not have damage sadly for Shield Bash.

Leadership is an interesting skill. As a noble the princess was probably forced into it. Not that it is bad but later Tiers have non-combat abilities as well as combat ones. It also requires Style and Insight which you wouldn't typically take on most fighters and it provides them as well. Defensive Line is a decent skill for our party with 3 people on the front line. Shout may be helpful combined with Unbind. Especially as Vigor magic provides control reduction. AoE control spells could be usefully reduced in danger. Roar is a decent combat buff although it is somewhat weaker with only 3 combat members. It is incredibly useful in military battles or dungeon farming with more people involved compared to *Challenges*.

The most interesting spell here is Coordinate. Somewhat similar to Opportunity from Close Combat. Unfortunately the Princess would only deal raw hammer damage since she likes a 0 cost strike. If she had Close Combat for Bash she and the Treant could double Bash. The Shieldmaiden's Shield Bash is also viable. Coordinate would work with Alacrity and Haste but would require using multiple allies. She could Roar, then Coordinate with 2 allies thus getting 4 attacks with bonus damage while using all 3s of action from Alacrity and Haste combined.

Her equipment was quite amazing. 2 +5 phys dmg/+14mana bracelets, a +56 health amulet, which must have cost a fortune, a +1s control and +10 dmg warhammer to go with Crushing Weapons, and a Vigentimancer's Plate worth +10 ABS, +40 health, +14 mana, and +5m/s MOV, though our party didn't typically move around. But good to rush the backline if we faced casters. Her head slot was a Crest of Vigor, a circlet with an enchanted gem of proper aspect, which provided +5/s HP, +5/s mana, and -1s control. She put on her armor but only equipped her other gear in a Dungeon or right before a fight in the wilds. Otherwise she'd be discovered for sure with such valuable stuff. Even with her and the Arcanist forgoing gear upgrades for months we'd struggle to equalize the party.

In any case once we got things worked out and discussed a party formation and strategy we decided it was time to attempt to *Challenge* the Academy Dungeon. 5 of us would Tier Up Manasophy while the other 3 would Tier Up Crushing Weapons, Contegomancy, and Close Combat. While the Academy was Mana, Light, Air, and Force Aspected Vigentimancy needed 4 of its 5 Aspects to be available. The Shieldmaiden could have Tiered Up Shields but she could do equipment at any dungeon and 2/3 Aspects qualified Contegomancy. Roboromancy at 1/2 also qualified but it was lower Tier and could be improved anywhere with Force or Earth.

The first several floors we churned through with raw damage. We did some smaller practice fights with the Crusher on some later floors with small monster groups. Having a strong physical damage dealer was quite useful. Our first fight was against 4 Dire Rats.

Dire Rat lvl 2*4 Health 200 Abs Phys 10 Mana 100 MOV 10m/s Fierce Claw 30 dmg 1s Massive Claw 70dmg 2s 10mana Furious Chomp 100dmg 2s 30mana 2s Chronomancer Crusher Health 78 Health 204 +5/s Mana 238 +5 mana/s 98 mana +6/s MOV 5m/s MOV 10m/s

We started with her 20m out and me 25m. I cast Quicken and she casts Might. The rats closed by 10m. I cast Accelerate and she cast Alacrity. The rats closed to attack range.

Chronomancer Crusher Health 78 Health 204 +5/s Mana 172 +5 mana/s 50 mana +6/s MOV 5m/s MOV 10m/s

The crusher made 3 attacks for 10 mana using Pulverize dealing Warhammer(10)+Might(10)+Pulverize(10)+Brawn/2(8)+Brutality(5)=43. Haste and Alacrity was a fantastic combination. 43-10=33 for absorbtion. 99 damage and 6 seconds of Stun from Brutality and the bonus on her royal warhammer. I cast Stagnation on one of the other rats. Stagnation if you don't recall since usually all I do is mass cast Accelerate is a reverse Haste debuff. Move speed and strike and casting time double. Stagnation lasts 4 seconds. It is a bit weaker than it seems since the effect itself reduces the number of actions it can effect.

2 rats begin their 2 second 100 damage attack on the Crusher. 1 rat begins the same Furious Chomp but with a 4 second strike time.

The Crusher has 26 mana and so she forgoes Pulverize and focusing on damage to apply 2 seconds of stun to every undamaged rat. They all also take 23 damage. The one benefit of Stagnation is that like other control it stacks. While both controlled and stagnated Stagnation clears as though it was control With 3 seconds of Stagnation the rat is functionally stunned for 5 seconds while his attack will return to normal speed. I cast Time Stop on the two rats who were not triple stunned or Stagnated. Time Stop applies Stasis for 2 seconds meaning that those 2 rats can't be touch or affected but control, dots, healing, and buffs on them do not progress their duration.

2 rats drop to 1 second of Stasis. 2 rats lose 1 second of Stun. With 32 mana the Crusher can use Pulverize again. Very unfortunately she can't kill the rat since it will be at 2 health. For that reason she does not cast Pulverize. She deals 69 damage with 3 of her standard attacks which applies another 6s of stun and deals 69 damage. The previous 99+69=168. One Pulverize next turn will finish it. I cast Quicken to regain Haste.

2 rats are freed from stasis but still have 2 seconds of stun to clear. The other 2 rats are basically stunlocked. The Crusher spends 10 of her 38 mana on Pulverize and then uses 1 basic attack to add 2 seconds of stun to the stagnated rat. I cast Accelerate to give her Haste back.

2 rats drop to 1s of Stun. The third rat remaining alive clears another second of Slow. The Crusher has 34 mana. She uses 2 more basic attacks to refresh stun and then a Pulverize for 10 mana to take the Slowed rat from 23 to 56 damage. I have 21 mana, not enough to cast a spell. 2 rats drops to 2 seconds of stun. The damaged rat is almost clear of Slow. The Crusher at exactly 30 mana hits the Slowed rat for 66 and 4 seconds of stun. 66+56=122. She ran out of Alacrity.

The rats lose 1s of control each. The Crusher has 16 mana and 1s of Haste. She deals 56 damage to the damaged rat. 178. He'll die next turn to her single unboosted attack. I am at 26 mana.

The rats clear their control. I am at 31 mana. The Crusher kills the Slowed rat.

The rats deal 85 damage each out of 100 after absorbtion. The Crusher is at 34. I am at 36 mana. I cast Accelerate, taking me 2 seconds without Haste, on the Crusher. She has 1 attack and 2 seconds of Might left. She attacks 1 rat for 33. She has 12 mana. One rat has taken 46 and one has taken 79.

1 rat begins to attack. I finish Accelerate. The crusher deals 23 damage to the attacking rat. She has 18 mana.

1 rat is at 1 second of control and 1 is at 2s. They have taken 79 and 69 damage. The Crusher has 24 mana. She can attack twice again and deals 66 damage to the most damaged rat adding 4s of cc. She is now at 4 mana. 66+79=145.

1 rat is at 1s of control and 1 is at 4. The crusher spends 10 mana to put one rat to 178 damage and one at 92. Both rats are stunlocked. She kills 1 and has 6 mana. 1 has taken 115. Her third second after accelerate is to deal 46 to put the final rat at 161. 3 seconds later the permanently stunned rat dies. We won. Barely. With only 2 party members fighting our control was limited since there was not a lot of damage being dealt and then we ran out of mana.