Skill Progression

Holdara’s character skill system is based on equipping swappable abilities in their “cognitive inventory”:

• Skills are encoded in “Runechips” which are Holdaran neural memory chips.

• Skills map directly to actions and abilities in game, so equipping a skill will result in an action option (icon) being available in the related context menu e.g. a particular type of attack move, or a crafting capability.

• Characters can equip a limited number of Runechips (and hence skills) in their “cognitive inventory” which works the same as any other inventory in the game.

• Unequipped Runechips go in Tomes: they are like “books” in this state and can be traded like any other item. Other players can equip Runechips received from any source.

Proficiency

Characters earn Proficiency points in skills when used: this is like XP, but is specific to that specific skill. The Proficiency level for any skill runs from 0 to 100%. Proficiency is character-based i.e. it is not attached to the Runechip itself; in other words, the Runechip is the “software”, but the Holdaran needs to learn how to use it.

The current Proficiency in a skill affects its effectiveness in some way relevant to the skill: at its most basic it could be reducing the Action Points (AP) needed to activate the skill, but for a combat skill it could affect damage dealt or the duration of a status effect.

Skill Mastery

Reaching 100% Proficiency means the skill has been mastered and unlocks an associated Achievement. Once a skill has been mastered, it can be used as a dependency for more advanced skills as described in the Dependencies section below.

Dependencies

Skills can have dependencies (giving rise to a skill tree). To equip a skill requires the dependency skills to also be equipped.

The Runechips for dependencies must be mastered (100% Proficiency) to allow the dependent Runechip to function. This is the Holdaran equivalent of needing to reach level 1 before unlocking a level 2 skill.

Runechip Capacity

Skills require different storage requirements, and the higher the level, the more capacity required. Runechips therefore come in different types and qualities that determine their maximum capacity.

Different qualities of Runechip take different amounts of cognitive inventory storage: a cheap Runechip takes up more space for the same capacity, and so limits the number of skills that can be equipped.

An advanced character will therefore want high quality Runechips to hold high level skills that have high-capacity requirements. They may also want to fit a bio-mech augmentation to increase their cognitive inventory capacity.

Proficiency Degradation

If a skill is not used, Proficiency degrades over time.

Skills only degrade if they have no child skills dependent on them with Proficiency above zero i.e. a level 2 skill will degrade to zero before the level 1 mastered skill it is dependent on starts to degrade. This mechanism stops both the level 1 and level 2 skills degrading at once, which would render the level 2 skill instantly unusable until the level 1 skill had been remastered.

Previously mastered skills that degrade earn Proficiency at twice the normal rate.

Training

Skills can be duplicated to another Runechip: either a blank one or by overwriting an existing one (in doing so, any existing skill stored on the target Runechip will be lost). This is the Holdaran equivalent of learning a skill from either another character or a “book” (a Runechip that is unequipped).

Characters can train other characters up to 50% of their Proficiency in any skill. However, both characters must have the skill equipped including any dependency skills which must be at 100% Proficiency (mastered).

Knowledge

Knowledge Runechips store information on a particular topic e.g. passwords or maps. Unlike Skill Runechips, Knowledge does not gain Proficiency over time, but it does have a percentage representing how complete it is.

Knowledge level can be improved in two ways:

1. Experience: Gaining information from experience e.g. exploring a new region of the world to add to the map Knowledge.

2. Study: Being taught (copying) from another Runechip that has extra information.

Copying can go both ways: extra Knowledge held by a Holdaran can be added to an unequipped Runechip to update it like a notebook.

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