Ancestral Weapon
Through this spend, your PC comes into possession of an ancestral weapon. The weapon does not need to be tied to his or her ancestors, though it is a weapon with a history--one which your PC will unlock over time. When the table below refers to enchantment or costs, it is referring to your ancestral item.
This is an exclusive spend. That is, these spends require time and involvement on behalf of your character. That means, a character may only have one exclusive spend active at a time.
Ancestral weapons may be enchanted only by their owners. As your bond increases, you'll be able to add an increasingly powerful number of abilities to your weapon. To do so, you'll need to meet the normal level requirements as per the PF item enchantment rules. However, you'll only pay half the market cost, and are automagically assumed to succeed on all rolls, even if you have no requisite craft or spellcraft skill.
Progression in this spend unlocks both the ability to assign greater enchantments, but also to add unique abilities applicable only to intelligent items. It also grants a number of abilities for free.
Ancestral Weapon Spends
| Exclusive Spends | ||
| Tier | Benefit | Cost |
| The Story Begins (Tier One) | You come into a possession of a weapon which is marked for greatness. In game terms, you receive a free masterwork weapon. Alternately, choose an existing weapon to become masterwork. This weapon may be of a special material, but you must pay the special material cost, yourself. | 10 RPP |
| Tier Two | You begin to forge a deeper, more personal bond with your weapon. So long as you possess appropriate total levels, you may augment your weapon up to a +1 bonus. That is, you may include up to both a +1 effect and +1 enhancement. You do not need to have caster levels to create this enhancement. In addition, your begin to feel the inklings of your weapon's personality. Assign an alignment to your weapon within one axis of yours. As a side benefit, your weapon's attacks are considered to be of this alignment for DR purposes. For example, if you are LG, you may choose for your weapon to be LG, NG, or LN and its damage to be treated either as lawful, or good (chosen once, may not be changed). | 10 RPP |
| Tier Three | Your weapon becomes reluctant to leave your side. As a full-round action as a supernatural ability, you may call your weapon to your hand an unlimited number of times per day, so long as it is located within 100 miles of you. You may enchant your weapon up to a +2 effect and +2 enhancement bonus. | 10 RPP |
| Tier Four | Your weapon begins to show the first signs of sentience. It gains basic intelligence, wisdom, and charisma scores of 10, as well as the ability to communicate emotionally with you so long as the two of you are touching. For example, you might feel its anger, sorrow, or elation, just as it might feel the reverse. Your item also gains a purpose, as per the Special Purpose rules under intelligent items. Ideally, its purpose should be generally aligned with yours, though this does not need to be the case. You'll contact staff to work this out in a way that works with your character's story. Your item also gains a basic ego score based on its total worth (see PRD). This number will increase over time based on abilities you add to it, so be sure and track it. Finally, should you choose to spend 500g, it gains the ability to cast one 0 level spell at will, an unlimited number of times per day. | 10 RPP |
| Tier Five | One of your weapon's ability scores increases by 2, and so long as you continue to develop your bond, you may unlock a limited number of abilities. Your item gains the speech ability for free, even if you wish it wouldn't. In addition, you may purchase an ability from the Intelligent Item Powers list of up to 1,200g. However, doing so will only cost you half of this. Note also that these spends may increase your item's ego. You may enchant your weapon up to +3. | 10 RPP |
| Tier Six | One of your weapon's ability scores increases by 2. You may enchant your weapon up to +4. | 10 RPP |
| Tier Seven | One of your weapon's ability scores increases by 2. So long as you continue to develop your bond, you may also unlock a limited number of abilities. You may purchase any two intelligent item abilities of up to 5,000g, or one ability of up to 10,000g. However, you pay half price for each. Note also that these spends may increase your item's ego. You may enchant your weapon up to +5. | 10 RPP |
| Tier Eight | So long as you continue to develop your bond, you may unlock a limited number of abilities. You may purchase any one ability of up to 35,000g. Alternately, you may purchase two abilities of up to 10,000g. However, you only pay half price for each. Note also that these spends may increase your item's ego. You may enchant your weapon up to +6. | 10 RPP |
Descriptions
Ancestral Weapon
Through this spend, your PC comes into possession of an ancestral weapon. The weapon does not need to be tied to his or her ancestors, though it is a weapon with a history--one which your PC will unlock over time. When the table below refers to enchantment or costs, it is referring to your ancestral item.
Ancestral is an exclusive spend. That is, these spends require time and involvement on behalf of your character. That means, a character may only have one exclusive spend active at a time.
Ancestral weapons may be enchanted only by their owners. As your bond increases, you'll be able to add an increasingly powerful number of abilities to your weapon. To do so, you'll need to meet the normal level requirements as per the PF item enchantment rules. However, you'll only pay half the market cost, and are automagically assumed to succeed on all rolls, even if you have no requisite craft or spellcraft skill.
Progression in this spend unlocks both the ability to assign greater enchantments, but also to add unique abilities applicable only to intelligent items. It also grants a number of abilities for free.
Ancestral Staves
Instead of a weapon, a spellcaster may choose to gain the services of an ancestral staff. Such a staff is often a hallmark of his or her work, and among a number of wizards, is considered something of a badge of pride. If he or she chooses this option, then the following changes occur.
First, he or she does not gain the ability to enchant the staff as a weapon, though it is still a masterwork object. He or she receives all other abilities the Tiers grant, such as summoning and the ability to apply the unique, Intelligent Item abilities at-cost. In addition, at Tier 5, he or she effectively gains the Craft Staff feat as regards the staff. He or she is assumed to automagically succeed at all rolls involving enchanting the staff.
If the caster personally possesses the Craft Magic Arms and Armor feat, he or she may choose to enchant it as a weapon as well, though must abide by the Tier enchantment limits. In addition, normal enchantment stacking costs must apply. For example, if a wizard owns an ancestral staff that's enchanted as a Fire Staff, then adding weapon enchantments later would incur a 50% cost increase, as per PF rules.
For balance purposes, though the staff is intelligent, it is unable to expend charges on its own...though it is certainly willing to express to the caster when it's low. Probably in colorful language.