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I just picked up the book The Runelords by david farland, and am loving it. Love the pace, the dialog, the action, and the involved magic system.
The magic system is rather unique, where it is based off of a person giving to another an endowment, making the recipient stronger, while the person who looses the endowment is weaker in some aspect.
I pulled the following from wikipedia, since someone has spent the time typing this up, so i give whomever credit for the following:
Runes
Most works of magic require the use of runes. These symbols each carry power, some greater than others. Common people can use some of them to minor effect, though they are most powerful when created by wizards. Anyone may draw runes of strength to make a stone keep durable, but those same runes drawn by a wizard will protect a fortress's walls for centuries.
Endowments
The main magical system of the series relies on a system of attributes which are inherent to every living creature. These attributes are transferable to and from both man and animal, so brawn from a dog can be transferred to a man. Once an individual gives an attribute to another, the giver loses that particular attribute until the death of the recipient. Each person can only give one endowment in their lifetime. Endowments include brawn (physical strength), grace (physical dexterity), wit (memory and clearness of thought), metabolism (speed at which the body's processes operate), glamor, voice, stamina, sight, hearing, smell, touch, taste, talent, will, bloodlust, and pain. The third and fourth last are more difficult to create and are only known by the Inkarrans. The last two are perverse in nature and were devised by the one true master of evil to strengthen her troops and torture the humans, specifically Fallion.
How Endowment works
Endowments are transferred with special tools called forcibles. A forcible is cast of a rare material called blood metal into the rune corresponding to the endowment to be transferred. Files and other tools refine the rune. The finished forcible resembles more than anything a small branding iron. The method of creating forcibles, and the supervision of their creation, is part of the duties of a special class of magician called a facilitator. When the forcible is ready, the facilitator invokes its power, which causes the instrument to glow. The facilitator touches the forcible to the dedicate, who experiences a brief burst of excruciating pain. The instrument glows more brightly, and leaves trails of light when moved through the air. An expert facilitator can tell whether the endowment worked properly by examining the forcible and the light trails. If satisfied, he touches the instrument to the recipient, who receives the attribute and is marked with the rune. The dedicate experiences the corresponding loss of that attribute. The forcible is expended by this process and may not be reused.
Dedicates
A dedicate must give up his attribute willingly; the simple act of touching him with a forcible is not enough. However, unscrupulous Runelords can threaten a potential dedicate's friends and family to force cooperation. Dedicates are normally selected from individuals whose attributes are strong; one selects a strong man to dedicate his brawn, a person with excellent vision to dedicate sight, and so forth.
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Special characteristics of certain Endowments
Individuals must be careful that their physical endowments, such as brawn and stamina, are similar in number, or the borrowed brawn may literally tear the body apart (for example). This could happen to individuals who choose poorly in the balance of endowments or who have only certain forcibles available, but the more usual cause is the death of one or more dedicates, resulting in the loss of their attributes. Such individuals are sometimes referred to as "warriors of unfortunate proportion."
Individuals endowed with metabolism move faster than ordinary men, but they pay a price: they age at the same proportion. (A dedicate who provides metabolism sleeps until his lord dies, not aging at all. A dedicate who gives up metabolism requires virtually no caring for at all, other than a cat or rat terrier in the vicinity to ensure that the mice don't eat the flesh of the comatose dedicate.
Individuals with large numbers of glamor and voice endowments can become so beautiful and so persuasive that men will obey them even when they know rationally that it is a poor idea.
Two individuals who endow each other with wit become mentally linked. This is the basis of the Days' power. An individual endowed with wit learns much faster and remembers more than other men, but if his dedicates die much of this knowledge disappears. If he later receives additional endowments of wit, he must relearn what he once knew.
Vectoring Endowments
A dedicate can vector endowments. That is, he can receive endowments of one particular variety from several dedicates, becoming extremely well endowed. Then he can himself dedicate that same endowment to another, who benefits from the endowment supplied by his dedicate and those supplied by all of that individual's dedicates. Each endowment requires space on the skin for the rune inscribed by the forcible; Runelords who intend to acquire hundreds of endowments (such as Raj Ahten) must vector them because there isn't sufficient room on their bodies otherwise.
So, i am looking to see this in action in a pathfinder game. I had a group going to find the blood metal, and then learn about endowments, but our group broke up afterwards. But now, i wonder what it would be like, and how it would affect a game.
thoughts?
and yes, i recognize that i misspelled endowments....
Huh. I was just thinking about doing something similar.
My 2 cents: It would only work if there were just as many enemies with endowments as the party, though in lesser proportions. You can't have the party be Raj Ahten or Gaborn and have the rest of the cast be city guardsman #10.
You also may want to look at how mechanically Endowments of Wit interact with prepared spellcasters.
Also, how Metabolism affects creatures with no aging. Free super speed for basically no cost indeedly doodly.