Sil 1.3 Manual

User Manual:

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Sil

A game of adventure set

in the first age of Middle-earth,

when the world still rang with elven song

and gleamed with dwarven mail.

Walk the dark halls of Angband.

Slay creatures black and fell.

Wrest a shining Silmaril from Morgoth’s iron crown.

Sil

Welcome to Sil

A game of adventure set

in the first age of Middle-earth,

when the world still rang with elven song

and gleamed with dwarven mail.

Walk the dark halls of Angband.

Slay creatures black and fell.

Wrest a shining Silmaril from Morgoth’s iron crown.

Contents

About Sil 3

Who will like Sil? 3

The basics 4

Notes for Angband players 4

The Dungeon 6

Race and House 6

Stats 7

Skills 8

Combat 11

Elements and Resistances 15

Morale 16

Stealth 18

Smithing 20

Temporary Status Effects 21

Experience 23

Abilities 25

About Sil

Sil is a role-playing game with a strong emphasis on discovery and tactical combat. It has a

simple but rich combat system which allows for a great variety of choice: should you wear

heavy armour that makes you easier to hit but reduces the damage you take? should you

wield heavier weapons to overcome your opponents’ armour, or wield lighter weapons for

more accuracy and a greater chance of critical hits? It depends on the situation and the type

of character you become. You will also have the chance to

retreat back into shadowy corridors to take the enemy

one by one, or to stealthily creep up to your opponent

and take him unawares.

It is also one of very few games that stays true to the

writings of Tolkien. Carefully researched, it dispenses

with many generic fantasy tropes and reveals a different

world. There are no wizards or priests, no plate mail or

magical scrolls. Instead, it is the Norse Saga inspired

world that Tolkien imagined, with warriors clad in

shining mail, singing songs of rage or sorrow as they slay.

The magic of the world is subtle yet powerful: there are

songs of fear and of binding, rather than spells of fireball

and teleportation.

Sil comes from a tradition of role-playing games known

as roguelikes. They stem from a game called Rogue that

was written before computers had graphics and instead used symbols on the screen to

represent a dungeon filled with monsters and treasure, that was randomly generated each

time you played. Rogue also had ‘permanent

death’: you have only one life and must choose

wisely lest you have to start again. Finally, it

had a system of unidentified items whose

powers you must discover for yourself. Sil

inherits all of these features, though it is much

more advanced in many ways.

Who will like Sil?

You will like Sil if you want to play a detailed and well balanced role-playing game with a

rich and intuitive system of tactical combat. You will also like it if you are interested in the

works of Tolkien, or even just want a less generic role-playing game. The greatest obstacle to

enjoying Sil will be its lack of graphics, but if you can overcome an initial reaction and begin

to explore the world, your imagination should fill in the details more effectively than a small

clump of pixels would.

The Basics

You take the role of an elf, dwarf or human, attempting the impossible: to infiltrate

Morgoth’s famed fortress of Angband, descend a thousand feet into the cold earth, find

Morgoth in his throne room, and escape with a Silmaril from his crown. Along the way, you

will need to find many items of power, learn potent skills and abilities, and slay many of

Morgoth’s servants.

After creating a character, you begin the game just inside the great dungeons of Angband.

However you managed to enter (disguise? subterfuge? capture?) the cost was high: you are

unarmed and carry only a few meagre supplies. Your first task will be to find a weapon so

that you can hold your own with the early enemies. You will then need to secure a basic set

of equipment over the first few levels, and begin developing your chosen skills and abilities.

The best way to pick up the basics of the game is to play the tutorial, and remember that you

can always press (?) in game to bring up the help screen.

Much of the randomness in Sil is generated through simulated dice rolls. The terminology

XdY is used for throwing X dice each of which has Y sides and adding up the total shown on

the dice. For example, throwing two six-sided dice is represented by 2d6.

Notes for Angband players

Sil borrows much from the looks and interface of Angband, but almost every game

mechanic has changed. While there are many similarities, the design principle was to do

things as I believe would be best for a new game, rather than to compromise between this

and how things were done in the past. However the learning curve should be mostly

remedied by this document. If you just want to dive in, then simply read the rest of this

section, start a new game, create a character, then press (?) for a nice explanation of the

commands in Sil. At that point you are ready to try it out. Then have a look at this manual

when you want to know more about the combat system or the skill system or the abilities…

You might be interested to know that Sil is actually descended from a variant of Angband

(NPPAngband). However, this is scarcely evident in gameplay as so many NPP features

have been changed or removed. The main legacy is the 4GAI code.

Rogue → Moria → Angband → Angband (1 to 3.0.3) → NPPAngband (0.1 to 0.4.1) → Sil

Main changes

• You are no longer trying to kill Morgoth

• The aim is now to free a Silmaril from Morgoth’s crown, then escape

• The game is much shorter

• Morgoth is found at 1,000 ft

• A winning game should take about 10 hours

• There is no town or word of recall

• It has a much more coherent theme: The First Age of Middle Earth

• There are no classes, or experience levels

• Instead there are 8 skills to improve

• With a tree of special abilities for each

• The combat system is completely new

• It is very thoroughly thought out and tested

• It leads to many more interesting choices for the player

• Monster AI is much better

• It uses 4GAI, plus numerous improvements

• The monsters, items, artefacts and almost completely rewritten

• There is much less explicit magic

• e.g. no fireballs, no teleportation…

• There is more tactical depth in combat

• Partly due to the absence of teleportation and other easy escapes

• There is an effective time limit

• Over time you can no longer find your way to the shallower depths

• You can thus play each level more than once, but not indefinitely

System changes

• Stats

• Based around the average for the Men of the first age (set as 0)

• There are no ‘stat potions’, so initial stats matter a lot more

• Int/Wis/Cha are replaced with Grace

• Hit points don’t go up with experience

• They are solely based on your Constitution

• You die at 0 (instead of –1 in Angband)

• Elements

• There are only four elemental attacks (fire, cold, poison, dark)

• Resistances stack, reducing damage to ½, then ⅓, then ¼, …

• Dark resistance is determined by your light level

• Poison does no direct damage, but damages over time

• Speed is much less fine grained and less available

• The only speeds are 1, 2, 3, 4

• normal speed is 2, so +1 speed makes you move 50% faster

• The only ‘pseudo id’ is {special}, which covers artefacts and ‘ego-items’

• You can only tunnel with shovels and mattocks

The Dungeon

Deep below Thangorodrim go the pits of Angband, and many and sprawling are the

corridors and caverns. It is so vast and lacking in order that having once left an area behind,

it is highly unlikely that you could navigate your way back.

Deep, deep within the earth, a thousand feet underground, is the throne room of the black

enemy Morgoth. There he holds court with all manner of foul orcs, beasts and demons, and

in his black iron crown are those three stolen gems, the Silmarils of Feanor. It is normally the

greatest and darkest of his servants who are found in the deep parts of the dungeons.

Staircases

Linking different areas of the dungeon are many winding staircases. These will normally

take you to an area 50' deeper or shallower. Sometimes you may find shafts that dive down

into the rock, taking you 100' deeper. But the dark power of Morgoth calls all new things in

Angband to him, and you will only be able to resist this call for so long: as time goes on, you

will be unable to find your way to the shallower levels (your character sheet shows this with

the ‘min depth’). Only with a Silmaril in your hand will you be able to return to the surface.

This rule stops you slowly accruing power in the shallow regions — if you want to build up

the power to face Morgoth’s throne room in time, you will need to quickly descend to the

deeper levels where the risks and rewards are greater.

Also note that if you use many staircases in a short period of time, you are liable to become

lost and may unwittingly take a wrong turn or step overbold into a trap.

Race and House

The first choice in creating a character is to choose your race. Sil is unusual among

roleplaying games in that the races are intentionally not balanced against one another.

Instead, they act like a difficulty level. Playing one of the Noldor will produce the easiest

game, and is recommended for first time players. Playing as one of the Naugrim or Sindar is

a little harder but can lead to interesting variations in playing style, and playing as one of

the Edain is noticeably more difficult, and should be considered a challenge mode. On the

other hand, within each race, the Houses are considered as approximately equal in power

level.

Each race and house gives you various modifiers to your statistics (Strength, Dexterity,

Constitution and Grace), which are added as a bonus or penalty to the numbers you choose

for your character. You can see these in the character creation screen. You will also have an

affinity or penalty for one or more skills, and may have a proficiency for some types of

weapon.

Affinities

• If you have an affinity with a skill, you get:

• a bonus of 1 to your skill total

• all abilities linked to that skill are 500 experience points cheaper

• in particular your first ability is free!

Skill mastery or penalty

• Mastery is like a double affinity for a single skill

• you get a bonus of 2 to your skill total

• all abilities linked to that skill are 1000 experience points cheaper

• (except your first one, which is free rather than giving you experience!)

• Penalty is the opposite of an affinity

• You get a penalty of 1 to your skill total

• All abilities linked to that skill are 500 experience points more expensive.

Weapon proficiency

• All elves (Noldor and Sindar) have a blade proficiency

• This gives them a bonus of 1 to their melee so long as they are using a blade (sword

or dagger).

• Dwarves (Naugrim) have an axe proficiency

• This gives them a bonus of 1 to their melee so long as they are using an axe.

Stats

You have 13 points to spend between your four stats (Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, and

Grace). The costs increase as the triangular numbers: 1, 3, 6, 10.

Strength

• Increases the damage you do in combat

• But effect is limited by the weapon weight (see the section on Combat)

• Increases your range with bows (as it is based on the weapon damage)

• Increases your carrying capacity by 20% per point of Strength

• Allows you to throw things 20% further per point of Strength

• Allows you to wield very heavy weapons without penalty

• Helps you resist being disarmed in combat

• Helps you break free of webs

• Helps you bash down locked doors

Dexterity

• Gives a bonus to the first four skills: Melee, Archery, Evasion, Stealth

• Helps you avoid needle traps in chests

Constitution

• Increases your health points (like ‘hitpoints’) by 20% per point of Con

Grace

• Gives a bonus to the last four skills: Perception, Will, Smithing, Song

• Increases your voice points (like ‘mana’) by 20% per point of Grace

Skills

The main mechanic in Sil is the skill check. This involves rolling 1d10 and adding the

appropriate skill score and comparing this to 1d10 plus the difficulty level. The first total

needs to be higher than the second in order to succeed. Skill checks are used in and out of

combat, though if any of the first three skills (melee, archery, evasion), then d20s are used

instead of d10s. The difficulty for a skill check is often based on an adversary’s skill. For

example, when you try to hit an opponent in melee, your melee skill is opposed to their

evasion skill, and when you try to sneak past a monster, your stealth skill is opposed to their

perception.

Melee

• Helps you hit an opponent in hand-to-hand combat.

• difficulty = opponent’s evasion

• You can also get critical hits (if you succeed by enough).

• See Combat section for full details.

• Helps you hit an opponent with thrown weapons.

• Helps you prise a Silmaril from Morgoth’s crown.

• difficulty = 0 (but you need to do a lot of damage!)

Archery

• Helps you hit an opponent in ranged combat.

• difficulty = half opponent’s evasion

• You can also get critical hits (if you succeed by enough).

• See Combat section for full details.

Evasion

• Helps you avoid being hit in combat.

• difficulty = opponent’s melee or archery

• You can also suffer critical hits (if you fail by enough).

• See Combat section for full details.

• Helps you climb out of pits

• difficulty = (15 for normal pits, 20 for spiked pits)

• Helps you avoid falling debris

• difficulty = 20

• Helps you avoid getting hit by dart traps.

• difficulty = 15

Stealth

• Helps you avoid being noticed by opponents.

• difficulty = opponent’s perception + numerous modifiers

• See Stealth section for full details

• Provides a bonus to melee against unwary or sleeping opponents if you have the

‘assassination’ ability.

• There is a penalty of –1 to Stealth for each 10 lb of armour worn

• Stealth mode (command: ‘S’) gives +5 to Stealth, but –1 to speed.

Perception

• Helps you notice traps and secret doors.

• difficulty = base of half the dungeon level

+10 for floor traps and secret doors

+15 for chest traps

+5 if you cannot see properly

+5 if confused

+5 for each square of distance from you (beyond the first)

–5 if you used the ‘search’ command (adjacent squares only)

• Helps you disarm traps and pick locks.

• difficulty = base from 1 to 7 depending on the trap or lock

+5 if it is a lock

+5 if you cannot see properly

+5 if confused

• You trigger a trap if you fail to disarm it by 3 or more

• Helps you detect ‘invisible’ opponents.

• difficulty = opponent’s will + 2 per square of distance between you

• Helps you avoid stepping on a caltrop trap.

• difficulty = 10

• Provides various benefits when using perception-based abilities (see the individual

ability listings)

Will

• Helps you resist many special effects: confusion, stunning, fear, blindness,

entrancement, slowing, hallucination, hunger, stat draining, and forgetting.

• difficulty = opponent’s will (if an opponent caused the threat)

• difficulty = 10 (if there is no opponent)

• Helps you successfully use staves and horns.

• difficulty = half the object level

+5 if confused

• Increases the effectiveness of many staves and horns.

• Provides various benefits when using will-based abilities (see the individual ability

listings)

Smithing

• Lets you make more powerful items at forges.

• See Abilities section and the tutorial for more details.

• The only skill that doesn’t use opposed rolls (or any roll at all).

Song

• Increases the power of various songs that you can sing.

• See the Abilities section for full details.

Combat

Each attack you make has two stages:

1. Roll to see whether you hit your target.

2. If you hit, then roll to see how much damage you do.

Weapons and Armour

Weapons and armour have a few numbers displayed next to their names which explain how

they relate to these two phases of an attack. Take an axe for example:

Battle axe (-3,3d4)

This battle axe provides a penalty of –3 to accuracy,

and if it hits it does 3d4 points of damage. Armour

is quite similar:

Leather armour [-1,1d4]

This suit of leather armour has a penalty of –1 to

evasion, making you slightly easier to strike than if

you were unarmoured. However, it also offers some

protection, absorbing 1d4 points of damage each

time you are struck. These are very simple examples

and sometimes it can be more complex. For

example:

Greatsword (-2,3d5) [+1]

Mail corslet (-1) [-3,2d4]

This greatsword offers a +1 bonus to evasion, making you slightly harder to strike. This

represents your ability to parry with it. On the other hand, the mail corslet is sufficiently

cumbersome that it gives a penalty to accuracy as well as a penalty to evasion. You can work

out which numbers apply to offense and which apply to defence as follows:

• Offense comes first and is in round brackets.

• Defence comes second and is in square brackets.

Attacking

To determine whether an attack hits, the attacker makes an attack roll and the defender

makes a evasion roll. If the attack roll is greater, then the attack hits.

Attack roll: Attacker’s melee score + 1d20

Evasion roll: Defender’s evasion score + 1d20

The melee and evasion scores are the associated skills combined with a number of modifiers.

Firstly, as noted above, the skills are affected by your weapons and armour. They can also be

affected by other things, such as being stunned (which gives –2 to all your skills including

both melee and evasion), being overwhelmed, and various special abilities. The penalty for

being overwhelmed only affects evasion. The size of the penalty depends upon how many

monsters are surrounding you, and on where they are relative to the monster who is

currently attacking. You get a –2 penalty for each monster that is in one of the three sides

furthest away from the attacking monster, and a –1 penalty for any other adjacent monsters.

This is a severe penalty, and even weak monsters can become deadly when they surround

you. As there is only one of you, monsters will never suffer this penalty.

Finally, the melee score is halved if the attacker cannot see the defender and the evasion score

is likewise halved if the defender cannot see the attacker. Opponents that are unwary count

as not being able to see you for these purposes. If you are unfortunate enough to be fighting

from within a pit or a web, both your evasion and melee scores are halved (again). If

someone is completely unable to move (i.e. an enemy is asleep or the player is entranced)

then their evasion score is set to –5 irrespective of any other relevant modifiers.

Doing Damage

To determine how much damage is dealt when an attack hits, the attacker makes a damage

roll and the defender makes a protection roll. If the damage roll is smaller or equal, the attack

does no damage. If it is greater, it does one point of damage for each point of difference

between the rolls.

In simple cases, the damage roll is

just the damage of the weapon, and

the protection roll is the sum of the

protection rolls for every piece of

armour being worn. However,

there are often modifiers on the

weapon damage. Some of these

affect the number of dice that are

rolled, while others affect how

many sides these dice have.

For each point of strength the

attacker has, a side is added to the

dice. For example, if you have

strength 3 and are wielding the axe mentioned earlier, you would do 3d7 damage instead of

the basic 3d4. However, there is a limit to how much strength can be applied with a given

weapon. Your strength bonus is limited to 1 point of bonus damage for each 1 lb of weapon

weight. For example, no matter what strength you have, you couldn’t get more than 4 bonus

sides with a 4 lb battle axe. High strength characters will want to use heavier weapons (to

take advantage of their strength) and weapons with many dice (to take advantage of the

extra sides). Note that negative strength subtracts sides of damage up to the same strength

limit based on weapon weight.

Some weapons are ‘hand-and-a-half’ weapons, which can be used one-handed or two-

handed. If you are not wearing a shield, you are presumed to be wielding these weapons

two-handed and are given a bonus 2 damage sides. To continue the example above, let’s

suppose that the battle axe is being used with two hands, giving it a total damage of 3d9.

Extra damage dice are added in two ways. Some weapons are especially deadly against

certain enemies. In such cases, they do an extra die of damage. For example, if the axe above

is an axe of orc-slaying and is being used against an orc, it will do 4d9 damage instead of

3d9. Elemental brands (such as fire brand or frost brand) are similar, doing an extra die of

damage against enemies that do not resist the element and 2 extra dice against enemies that

are explicitly vulnerable to it (such as fire damage against a frost demon). As always,

damage by your enemies works the same way. For example if a Werewolf bites you with a

2d9 poison attack, you will take 3d9 damage if you do not resist poison. Elemental attacks

are thus a bit more dangerous than they first appear in the monster recall window.

It is also possible to get extra dice via critical hits. These are awarded when the attack roll

exceeds the evasion roll by a particularly large amount. This amount is determined by the

weight of the weapon, with lighter weapons more likely to produce critical hits, due to their

easier handling.

To get a critical hit, you need to beat the evasion roll by a certain amount. This amount is 7

points plus one point per pound of weight of your weapon. You are granted a bonus

damage die for every multiple of this amount by which you exceed the required score. For

example, if wielding a 3 lb longsword, you would need to beat the evasion score by 10

points to get the first bonus die, by 20 points for the second die, 30 points for the third, and

so on. This sounds very difficult, but characters who concentrate on accuracy can get very

large critical hits, particularly on sleeping or unwary monsters. Of course, monsters can also

get critical hits upon you if you are too poor at evasion. You don’t need to memorize this

formula; just bear in mind that high accuracy and light weapons can sometimes do a lot of

extra damage.

In summary, the weapon damage can gain extra sides from strength or from two-handed

wielding, and extra dice from ‘slays’ and critical hits.

Archery

Archery is very similar to melee, but with a few differences. Firstly, the attack roll uses the

archery skill instead of the melee skill. To this is added the attack bonus of the arrow being

fired, and a range penalty of –1 for every 5 squares the target is from the archer. In addition,

the defender’s evasion score is halved against archery (this can stack with the halvings

mentioned above). This makes evasion considerably less useful against archery than against

melee.

Damage is calculated almost identically to melee, incorporating strength, ‘slays’ and critical

hits. The strength bonus of bows is again limited to 1 point per 1 lb of weapon weight.

The range of a bow is equal to 1.5 times the number of sides of damage you do with it. Thus,

if you are doing 1d10 with your Longbow, its range will be 15 square.

Finally, it is very dangerous to use your bow when there are enemies in melee range. Firing

your bow in such a circumstance will let your guard down, allowing all adjacent enemies to

make a free attack on you.

Thrown weapons

Throwing is like melee, but with a few differences. Firstly, many items are not designed to

be thrown and they thus give a penalty of –5 to the attack roll when thrown. The items that

are designed to be thrown include daggers, throwing axes, spears and tridents. All throwing

attacks also suffer a range penalty of –1 for every 5 squares.

Damage is just like melee, except that the number of damage sides is halved if the object was

not designed for throwing. Thus, even if you can hit with a thrown longsword, it will do a

lot less damage than in melee.

The range is calculated from the weight of the object and your carrying capacity (which in

turn depends on your strength).

Range: carrying capacity / (5 × (weight + 2))

For example, if you can carry 100 lb and are throwing a spear weighing 4 lb, then your range

is 100 / (5 × (4 + 2)) = 3.333 = 3 squares. While the range is tricky to calculate, all throwing

weapons display it when examined (the ‘x’ command).

Elements and Resistances

As well as purely physical attacks, there are four special types of elemental attack that some

monsters may use against you:

Fire

• The most common and dangerous element — the fires of Angband are legendary.

• It can destroy arrows, bows, axes, polearms, hafted weapons, boots, gloves, cloaks,

soft armour, chests, torches and staffs.

Cold

• Treated similarly to fire, but less common and less dangerous.

• It can destroy potions and flasks of oil.

Poison

• Many spiders and werewolves are famed for their deadly poison.

• Instead of damaging you directly, poison damage is added to your poison counter. If

you don’t take steps to prevent this, you will eventually suffer all of this damage. Each

round, the poison counter is reduced by 20% and you suffer this damage.

Darkness

• Morgoth is the Lord of Darkness, and some of his servants use darkness itself against

you.

• Darkness resistance works differently to the other elements. There is no ‘darkness

resistance’ available, except a strong source of light. If the light level on your square is

above 2, you get a level of darkness resistance counted for each level of excess.

Elemental damage

Elemental attacks are either pure (like dragon breath and poison gas), or mixed with

physical damage (like a balrog’s flaming sword). Mixed elemental damage was explained in

the combat section: if you don’t have the relevant resistance, you take an extra die of

damage. If you are especially vulnerable, you take two extra dice of damage. There is no

advantage in having multiple sources of resistance to mixed elemental damage.

Dragons and some other foes have potent elemental breaths. Their breath spreads out in a

cone, damaging everything within, but the damage decreases by 2d4 for each square.

Armour is usually no defence against such an attack. The only sources of protection that

count are special protection from special abilities, or magical rings and amulets. If it is fire or

cold damage, you can also count the protection from your shield. Any damage that gets

through this meagre protection is then halved if you have resistance, or divided by three if

you have double resistance etc. If you are vulnerable to the element, the damage is doubled.

Morale

Sil has a sophisticated morale model for its enemies. Other than mindless creatures (which

always just attack you) most enemies take stock of the situation and retreat if needed. They

have a morale level which changes depending on the circumstances.

Bonuses:

• The base for morale (6)

• Appearing after their usual depth (+1 per 50 ft)

• The player is escaping Angband with a Silmaril (+2, instead of the depth modifier)

• The player is blind, hallucinating, or stunned (+2 each)

• The player is confused, slow, afraid, or heavily stunned (+4 each)

• The player is entranced or knocked out (+8 each)

• The player has ≤ 75% health (+2)

• The player has ≤ 50% health (+4)

• The player has ≤ 25% health (+8)

• The monster is hasted (+4)

• Similar creatures in line of sight that are not fleeing (+1 each, or +4 for leaders)

Penalties:

• Appearing before their usual depth (–1 per 50 ft)

• The monster is stunned (–2)

• The monster has ≤ 75% health (–2)

• The monster has ≤ 50% health (–4)

• The monster has ≤ 25% health (–8)

• The monster is already fleeing and ≤ 75% health (–2)

• Light susceptible and the player’s square has more than 3 light (–1 per level in excess)

• A non-unique monster is carrying items (–2 per item)

• The player has the ability Majesty (–1 per 4 points of player’s Will)

• The player has the ability Bane (–x, where x is the player’s Bane bonus)

• Similar creatures in line of sight that are fleeing (–1 each, or –4 for leaders)

Temporary modifiers (which decay by 10% each turn):

• Unable to escape (+6)

• Just stopped fleeing (+6)

• Just started fleeing (–6)

• It (or a similar creature) is hit by a slaying weapon (–2)

• It (or a similar creature) is hit by an elemental brand it is especially vulnerable to (–2)

• It (or a similar creature) is hit by a Cruel Blow (–2)

• A similar creature is killed in line of sight (–4, or –16 for a leader)

• Song of Elbereth (–1 per point by which you won the skill check)

• Horn of Terror, Staff of Majesty (–2 per point by which you won the skill check)

The morale level of an enemy determines its ‘stance’ which can be one of the following

three:

Aggressive

• (Morale > 20)

• Aggressive monsters simply attack you.

• Mindless creatures are always Aggressive.

• Trolls are Aggressive instead of Confident.

• Enemies who have been angered are Aggressive instead of Confident.

• Items of Wrath make creatures Aggressive instead of Confident.

Confident

• (0 > Morale ≥ 20)

• Confident monsters may use tactics while attacking you (such as lurking in rooms

waiting for you).

Fleeing

• (Morale ≤ 0)

• Fleeing monsters try to get as far away from you as possible.

• Creatures that are immune to (non-magical) fear stay Confident instead of fleeing

Stealth

In the tale on which Sil is based, Beren and Luthien did manage to enter Angband, obtain a

Silmaril, and escape. This they achieved not by force, but by subterfuge. Similarly it is

possible to succeed in Sil by sneaking past your enemies rather than fighting them.

Mechanics

At any time, an individual monster may be in one of three states:

Asleep

• They cannot move and their evasion is set to [–5].

Unwary

• They are awake and going about their business, but they do not know that you are

there. Their evasion is halved.

Alert

• This is further subdivided into whether they are Confident, Aggressive, or Fleeing, but

this is a matter of morale rather than stealth.

This is modelled internally by an ‘Alertness’ score for the monster. Monsters always start

out Asleep or Unwary, but may as a result of your actions notice you. An ‘Alertness’ of 0 or

more means they are aware of you; between –1 and –10 means they are awake but unwary,

and –11 or below usually means they are asleep. But be warned: not all inhabitants of

Angband sleep!

Each round, you make a Stealth roll (your stealth score + 1d10), to see how stealthy and

quiet you are. Each monster makes a Perception roll (their perception score +1d10), to see

how observant they are. Various modifiers are applied, listed below. If at the end of this the

monster's perception score is higher than your stealth score, their Alertness increases by

difference which may make them move from Asleep to Unwary, or from Unwary to Alert.

Modifiers to Stealth

Helpful factors:

• Distance to monster: each square reduces monster perception by 1 point, and sound

does not pass through stone or rubble at all.

• Each closed door on path reduces monster perception by 5.

• If you are in Stealth mode (press (S) to activate, but be warned that it makes you move

more slowly than normal), you get a bonus of +5 to your stealth

• If you passed last turn (pressed (5) or (z), or (Z)), you get a bonus of +7 to your stealth

(not cumulative with Stealth mode).

Hindrances:

• For each 10 lb of armour you are wearing (–1)

• Being attacked by one or more enemies (–2)

• Attacking one or more enemies (–2)

• Awake but unwary monsters which are in line of sight get some additional bonuses:

• Doubles the modifiers for attacking or being attacked

• For every adjacent passable square (–1)

• So you may do well to stick to walls and corners.

• If you are singing, this reduces your stealth by a value equal to the noise level of the

Song (see the list of Songs).

• Setting off some traps (–5 to –10)

• Landing from a leap (–5)

One-off effects that are not modified by stealth:

• Player actions:

• Earthquakes (30), horns (10 to 40), smithing (10), bashing doors (5 or 10), tunneling

(5 or 10), setting off some traps (–10 to 20).

• Monster abilities:

• Earthquakes (30), arrows (5), boulders (10), crying out (10), breath weapons (10),

unearthly screeching (20).

Stealth is thus quite abstract: a high stealth may mean little noise made, or that you kept in

the shadows, or that you moved in an unobtrusive way, or let the noises that did occur

sound like the natural background noises in the dungeon.

If you attack a monster, or an unaware monster tries to move into the square you are on, it

will immediately notice you.

Once a monster has noticed you, it will become unwary again if you are out of sight of it,

and it fails its perception check to spot you by 25 points or more. In this case, they lose a

point of alertness for each point in excess of 25 that they fail by. This is very hard to achieve

and will typically require you to get a fair distance from the monster and close some

intervening doors. Note that this number is reduced to 15 if you have the ability ‘Vanish’. In

addition, there are a few other ways in which you can make monsters become unwary:

• It is possible to put monsters to sleep with a Staff of Slumber or the Song of Lorien.

• Territorial monsters such as dragons will become unwary or even fall asleep if they

have returned to their lairs and cannot see you.

Smithing

As well as its many treasures, Angband has mighty forges, to arm the hosts who fight under

Morgoth's banner. If you find one, you may be able to use such a forge to make yourself

arms or armour, or even items of great power.

To create an item, you need:

• to be at a forge which has enough resources left,

• to have the relevant Smithing Ability:

• Weaponsmith for weapons, including bows, arrows, and digging implements

• Armoursmith for armour, including cloaks and shields

• Jeweller for amulets, rings, and light sources

• Artistry if you want to make a particularly fine weapon or piece of armour

• Enchantment if you want to add a special enchantment to a weapon, piece of

armour, or light source

• to have enough mithril, if the item requires it,

• to have a high enough Smithing skill (which depends on the item type and the

bonuses you add to it),

• to put a part of yourself into the item, for certain types of enchantment:

• this can be experience points, which is a permanent cost (this is normally the cost

for items which grant Abilities or give bonuses to Skills),

• it may instead be one or more stat points (which will be drained until such time as

you eat or drink something which can restore them).

Making an item will take ten turns per point of difficulty, and makes noise, so you may be

interrupted during this time. If this occurs you can resume your forging where you left off.

Some items are particularly easy to enchant. The costs for weapons (including bows),

shields, body armour, helms, and amulets are lower than those for other equipment slots.

The costs for robes, sceptres, and crowns are even lower.

When not at a forge, you can still plan what you'd like to make if you find one by pressing

'0' to enter Smithing planning mode and explore the possibilities.

Creating artefacts

Truly great smiths are capable of working beautiful or terrible pieces. If you have the

Artifice ability, you will be able to create your own artefacts, which may be a matter for

songs and legends of the future. This can let you customise your items much further, as well

as going beyond the bounds of what is normally possible. In addition you can name your

artefacts, and they are virtually indestructible. Creating an artefact is a great work, and

requires three uses from a forge. These must all be at the same forge, so you must find a

forge with enough resources; it is impossible to begin work at one and finish at another.

Enchanted forges

Many forges in Angband are used just to produce swords and mail for the legions of orcs,

but some few are used for the axes of the Valaraukar or the armour of the Troll Guard of

Gothmog. If you are lucky enough to be working at such a forge, it will give you a bonus to

your Smithing, allowing you to make more powerful items than otherwise.

Temporary Status Effects

At certain times you may find yourself suffering from various effects. Many of these are

displayed in coloured text near the bottom of the map. These will usually wear off in time,

and there is typically some kind of consumable item to be found which will immediately

remove the effect.

Hunger

• Gorged:

• ≥ 8,000 turns of food

• You are so full that you cannot eat or drink any more until you recover

• You digest food much faster in this state.

• Full:

• ≥ 5,000 turns of food

• Hungry:

• ≥ 2,000 turns of food

• Weak:

• ≥ 1,000 turns of food

• You are at –1 to Strength until you manage to eat enough food to recover

• Starving:

• 0 turns of food

• You take a point of damage each turn and no longer regenerate health

Other negative effects

• Blind:

• You cannot see anything.

• Note that Melee, Evasion, and Archery are halved against foes you cannot see.

• Hallucinating:

• Enemies and objects look like other enemies or objects.

• You occasionally see things that are not there.

• Slow:

• You are moving at half your normal speed.

• May be caused by carrying more weight than your weight allowance (in which case

the only way to stop it is to reduce your load).

• Confused:

• You are unable to choose directions normally for moving, attacking, etc.

Attempting to choose a direction may randomly choose a nearby direction instead.

• Afraid:

• You are too afraid to attack, either by melee, archery, or throwing.

• Entranced:

• You are frozen in place, cannot act, and are at [-5] evasion.

• This is broken the first time an enemy attacks you (or when enough time passes).

• Stunned:

• (1 to 50 turns on the stun counter)

• You get –2 to all of your skills

• Heavily Stunned:

• (51 to 100 turns on the stun counter)

• You get –4 to all of your skills

• Knocked Out:

• (101 to 105 turns on the stun counter)

• You are frozen in place, cannot act, and are at [-5] evasion.

• Poisoned X:

• You have been poisoned and will take X damage over the next few rounds.

• Each round you take 20% of X damage (rounded up) and X is decremented by this

amount.

• Bleeding X:

• You are bleeding from an open wound.

• Handled like Poisoned X.

Drained stats

• If any of your stats (Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Grace) are drained, they will

appear in yellow.

• This will not heal with time: you must find some item to cure it.

Resistances

• Elemental resistances are described in the section on the elements.

• Resistance to a status effect grants a very large bonus (+10) to any roll to avoid it.

• Free Action conveys resistance to Slowness and Entrancement, as well as helping you

escape from Webs.

• See Invisible grants a +10 bonus to seeing otherwise invisible enemies.

There are various positive status effects which may be granted by pieces of equipment or

consumables (in the latter case they are always temporary). These include resistances,

increased stats or light radius, speed, etc, which are generally explained elsewhere.

Of special note is Regeneration:

• You regain health at three times the normal rate.

• You also suffer from great hunger, and will grow hungry at three times the normal

rate

Experience

Sil has neither classes nor levels, but it is far from the case that all characters of a given race

are the same. As you adventure, you will accrue experience points, which you can spend in

the character screen (accessed by pressing the @ symbol) to improve your prowess. There is

a lot of flexibility in how you spend your experience, and this is a major part of the game.

Sources of experience

All characters begin the game with 5,000 experience points to allocate. There are four

sources of further experience in the game: encountering monsters; killing monsters;

descending deeper into the Iron Hells; identifying objects.

Encountering monsters

• You gain experience for encountering each individual enemy the first time you see it

(or if you kill it without ever seeing it).

• For the first monster of a given type you encounter, you get d/5 experience points,

where d is the depth (in feet) at which it is normally met. For subsequent encounters

with monsters of the same type, the amount that you get decays: when you meet the

second one you will only received ½ this amount of experience, then ⅓, then ¼…

Killing monsters

• For the first monster of a given type you kill, you get d/5 experience points, where d is

the depth (in feet) at which it is normally met. The experience gained for killing

additional monsters decays in exactly the same way as for encounters.

• Thus there is the same amount of experience available for killing monsters as for

encountering them. All characters are likely to get more experience from encounters

than from kills, and for some this may be much more.

Descending

• The first time you reach a depth of d feet (or deeper), you are awarded d experience

points.

Identification

• Whenever your character identifies a new type of potion, herb, ring, amulet, horn,

stave or special item, you are awarded 100 experience points.

• In the halls of Angband one may find ancient or renowned items of great power,

which we collectively refer to as artefacts. Each time you identify an artefact, you are

awarded 200 experience points.

Note that there are several ways to deal with enemies apart from killing them: you may, for

instance, sneak past them, make them flee before you, or run yourself. Characters who kill

few enemies may thus get a little less experience than those who do, but may also have a

higher chance of survival (combat is dangerous!). It is possible to complete the game

without ever attacking.

Spending Experience points

Your character may use the lessons learned to train any of the eight skills detailed below.

Your first point in a skill will cost 100 experience, your second 200, your third 300, and so

on.

You may also learn various unique abilities. Each ability is linked to a skill, and may have

requirements before you are able to learn it. For each skill, the first linked ability costs 500

experience points, the second costs 1000, the third costs 1500, and so on.

Abilities

Melee

Power

• Gives a bonus of +1 damage sides to your melee attacks.

• But increases the amount needed to score each level of critical hit by 1.

• e.g. need to hit by 8 + weapon-weight instead of 7 + weapon-weight.

Finesse

• Lowers the amount needed to score each level of critical hit by 1.

• e.g. need to hit by 6 + weapon-weight instead of 7 + weapon-weight.

Throwing Mastery

• Gives a +5 bonus to melee when using throwing attacks.

• Prevents thrown items from breaking.

Polearm Mastery

• Gives a +1 bonus to melee when using polearms.

• Allows you to ‘set’ a polearm to intercept attackers.

• If you waited last turn (pressed ‘5’ / ‘z’) and any opponent who wasn’t adjacent to

you moves into an adjacent position, you get a free attack on them.

• Note that you don’t get the free attack if you cannot see the opponent or you are

confused.

Charge

• If you attack an opponent after having just moved towards that opponent (so that

your move and attack are in the same direction or at most 45° apart), then your attack

is calculated as if you had 3 more points of strength and dexterity.

• The damage bonus is only gained if this is a regular, flanking, or controlled retreat

attack.

Follow-Through

• If you kill an opponent, you get a free ‘follow-through’ attack on another opponent

adjacent to you.

• Note that you don’t get the free attack if you cannot see the opponent or you are

confused.

• The follow-up attack only applies if the killing blow was a regular, flanking, controlled

retreat, or follow-through attack (so it can be chained).

Zone of Control

• If an opponent moves between two squares which are both adjacent to you, you get a

free attack.

• Note that you don’t get the free attack if you cannot see the opponent or you are

confused.

Subtlety

• If you wield a one handed weapon and have nothing in your off-hand, then the

amount needed to score each level of critical hit is reduced by 2.

• Note that hand-and-a-half weapons like Bastard Swords do not count as one

handed weapons for these purposes.

Momentum

• Allows you to apply your strength more effectively with your weapon. Your strength

bonus to damage is usually limited by the weapon weight in pounds. With

Momentum, this upper limit is doubled.

• For example a character could get up to 3 bonus damage sides with a 1.5 lb

shortsword.

• This works for melee and thrown weapons.

Rapid Attack

• You receive two melee attacks instead of one, but they are calculated as if you had 3

fewer points of strength and dexterity.

• The extra attack is only gained if this is a regular, flanking, or controlled retreat attack.

• In other cases the single attack doesn’t suffer the above penalties.

Two-weapon Fighting

• You can wield a weapon in your off-hand instead of a shield.

• Only one-handed weapons can be placed in your off-hand (no hand-and-a-half

weapons).

• You receive an attack with this weapon which is calculated as if you had 3 fewer

points of strength and dexterity.

• The extra attack is only gained if this is a regular, flanking, or controlled retreat attack.

Knock Back

• When you hit a monster, you make a skill check to see if you can force them back a

square. You roll twice your effective strength with that attack against twice their

constitution. Your effective strength includes the modifiers for abilities like Charge or

Rapid Attack, it is capped by the weight of your weapon, and then there is a +2 bonus

if wielding a weapon with two hands.

• They are only knocked back if there is an empty square for them to move into.

• They miss their next turn if they are actually moved back.

• Opportunist attacks don’t trigger Knock Back

Whirlwind Attack

• When you attack an enemy in an open area (no walls or rubble adjacent to you), you

get a free attack on all other enemies that are adjacent to you.

• Note that you do get the free attacks even if you cannot see the opponent or you are

confused.

• The extra attacks are only gained if this is a regular, flanking, or controlled retreat

attack.

• Note that all the attacks are treated as whirlwind attacks, so they are incompatible

with many other abilities.

Strength

• You gain a point of Strength.

Archery

Careful Shot

• Halves the chance of arrows breaking (from 20% to 10%).

Precision

• Lowers the amount needed to score each level of critical hit by 1.

• i.e. need to hit by 6 + bow-weight instead of 7 + bow-weight.

Point Blank Archery

• When you provoke attacks of opportunity by firing your bow, the enemy you fired at

doesn’t get one.

Versatility

• If you have more skill points in archery than in melee, you gain a bonus to melee of

half the difference between the two scores (rounding down).

Crippling Shot

• If you score a critical hit using archery (and do at least 1 point of net damage), your

opponent has to make a Will check against 4 times the level of your critical hit. If they

fail, they become slowed for one round for each level of the critical hit.

Flaming Arrows

• Your arrows do an extra die of damage against enemies that are not fire-resistant, but

they always break.

• Remember that you can turn abilities off when you don’t wish to use them.

Rapid Fire

• When you fire at an enemy, you fire two arrows instead of one, but the attacks are

calculated as if you had 3 fewer points of strength and dexterity.

• If the first shot kills the enemy and there are no more enemies in that direction,

there will be no second shot.

• Note that if it is your final arrow there will be only one shot and no penalty.

Dexterity

• You gain a point of Dexterity.

Evasion

Dodging

• Gives you a bonus of +3 to evasion if you moved last turn.

• This is not displayed on the side of the screen, but does happen.

Blocking

• Doubles the number of dice of protection granted by your shield against ranged

attacks, and also against melee attacks on any turn where you wait (press ‘5’ / ‘z’).

Parry

• Doubles the evasion bonus granted by your weapon.

• This bonus does not apply to a weapon wielded in your off-hand.

Crowd Fighting

• Halves the bonus to melee that opponents get for surrounding you.

Leaping

• You can leap over a square of a chasm, a false floor, or a pit.

• You must have moved roughly towards it on the previous turn.

• It takes the usual two turns to reach your destination, one of which is spent in the

air and you can’t do anything in this turn, but can be attacked.

Sprinting

• You gain +1 speed if you move four or more squares in roughly the same direction.

• Each of the four moves can be up to 45° different from the one before it.

• The speed lasts until you fail to meet the condition.

• Note that you can never exceed speed 3.

Flanking

• Gives you a free attack on an opponent if you move between two squares which are

both adjacent to it.

• You cannot get a flanking attack and a controlled retreat attack on the same turn,

flanking simply adds to the eligible opponents.

• Only works on one opponent each time and gives preference to the one that is

targeted (if any).

• Note that you don’t get the free attack if you cannot see the opponent or you are

confused.

Heavy Armour Use

• Gives you [1dX] extra protection, where X = total armour weight / 15 lbs

Riposte

• If an opponent misses you in melee by at least 10 + your weapon weight, you get a free

attack on it.

• You only get at most one riposte per round.

• Note that you don’t get the free attack if you cannot see the opponent or you are

confused.

Controlled Retreat

• Gives you a free attack on an opponent if you move from a square adjacent to it to a

square not adjacent to it, but only if you didn’t move on the previous round.

• You cannot get a flanking attack and a controlled retreat attack on the same turn,

controlled retreat simply adds to the eligible opponents.

• Only works on one opponent each time and gives preference to the one that is

targeted (if any).

• Note that you don’t get the free attack if you cannot see the opponent or you are

confused.

Dexterity

• You gain a point of Dexterity.

Stealth

Disguise

• Halves any bonuses that awake but unwary monsters have to notice you due to you

being in their line of sight.

Assassination

• Gives you a melee bonus equal to your stealth score when you attack unwary or

sleeping opponents.

• Note that you don’t get the melee bonus if you cannot see the opponent or you are

confused.

• The melee bonus is only gained if this is a regular, flanking, or controlled retreat

attack.

• The bonus is not applied if you are doing a charge attack.

Cruel Blow

• If you score a critical hit in melee (and do at least 1 point of net damage), your

opponent has to make a Will check against 4 times the level of your critical hit. If they

fail, they become confused with pain for one round for each level of the critical hit.

Opportunist

• If an opponent moves from a square which is adjacent to you to one which is not, you

get a free attack.

• Note that you don’t get the free attack if you cannot see the opponent or you are

confused.

Exchange Places

• You may use the ‘X’ command to swap places with an adjacent enemy.

• Alert enemies get a free attack on you unless they are confused or mindless.

• Cannot be used when you cannot see the enemy, or you are in a web or pit.

Vanish

• It is easier to make enemies unwary again.

• Instead of needing to beat them by more than 25 in their perception check when out

of line of sight in order to reduce their alertness, you only need to beat them by

more than 15.

Dexterity

• You gain a point of Dexterity.

Perception

Eye for Detail

• Gives you a bonus of +5 to perception rolls for finding traps and secret doors.

Focused Attack

• Gives you a bonus equal to half your Perception score to your attacks if you waited on

the previous turn (pressed ‘5’ / ‘z’).

• Only works for the first attack of the round.

• A set of attacks using rapid attack, or two-weapon fighting, or rapid fire count as a

single attack for this purpose).

Keen Senses

• Allows you to see enemies who are just beyond the edge of a pool of light.

• Provides a +5 bonus to spotting ‘invisible’ enemies.

Lore-Keeper

• Allows you to tell the which items are cursed, and to distinguish between mere special

items and artefacts.

Concentration

• Gives you a +1 bonus to attack for each consecutive round spent attacking a particular

enemy (to a maximum of half your perception).

• Spending a turn waiting/blocking (‘5’ or ‘z’) doesn’t break concentration.

Bane

• You receive a bonus to all skill rolls against a selected broad category of enemy.

• The categories are: Orc, Wolf, Spider, Troll, Wraith, Rauko, Serpent, Dragon.

• You need to have killed 4 enemies from the category to select it.

• When you reach 2n kills of your chosen enemy, the bonus increases to +n.

Lore-Master

• You can immediately identify all items and gain full knowledge of all types of enemy

that you might encounter.

• You still gain the experience for identification only when you actually encounter an

item of a type you had not seen before.

Listen

• Gives you a chance each turn to detect monsters that you cannot see (including around

corners and through doors).

• This chance takes the form of a perception skill check:

• difficulty = opponent’s stealth score

–3 if it is awake but unwary

–5 if it moved

–10 if it called out or smashed a door

–15 if it tunnelled through rock

+(Song/2) if you are singing the Song of Silence

+1 per square of distance along the shortest sound path

+5 per closed door along the shortest sound path

• Successes represent the opponent as a grey asterisk, unless you succeed by 10 or more,

in which case they are completely revealed.

Master Hunter

• Gives you an attack bonus of +1 for each time you have killed an opponent of the same

narrow type (up to a maximum of a quarter of your Perception).

• e.g. killing 3 Orc soldiers gives you a +3 attack bonus against Orc soldiers.

Grace

• You gain a point of Grace.

Will

Channelling

• Gives you a bonus of +5 to your Will when trying to use staves or horns.

• Lets you know how many charges remain in a staff.

Mind Over Body

• Lowers the rate at which you grow hungry to one third the normal rate.

Curse Breaking

• Allows you to remove cursed equipment and thereby break the curse.

Inner Light

• Strengthens the light in your light radius against the unnatural darkness that some

monsters create.

Clarity

• Gives resistance to confusion, stunning, and hallucination.

Hardiness

• Gives you [1dX] extra protection, where X = Will / 6

• This protection works against all damage types, like a ring of protection.

Poison Resistance

• Gives you a level of resistance to poison.

Strength in Adversity

• Gives you bonuses to Strength and Grace when seriously injured:

• +1 when ≤ 50% health,

• +2 when ≤ 25% health.

Critical Resistance

• Increases the amount by which an enemy must successfully hit you in order to score a

critical hit (by 1 for every 5 points of Will).

Majesty

• Makes monsters more likely to flee, by lowering their morale (by half the difference

between your Will and theirs).

Constitution

• You gain a point of Constitution.

Smithing

Weaponsmith

• Allows you to create weapons when at a forge.

• Includes bows and arrows.

Armoursmith

• Allows you to create armour when at a forge.

Jeweller

• Allows you to create rings, amulets, and light sources at a forge.

Enchantment

• Allows you to create {special} items at a forge.

Artistry

• Allows you to improve the attack, evasion, damage, and protection values of items

that you create at a forge.

Artifice

• Allows you to create your own custom artefacts with many different properties.

• Note that these require three uses of a forge each.

Masterpiece

• Allows you to create items whose difficulty exceeds your Smithing skill.

• For each excess point of difficulty, you lose one Smithing skill point.

• This loss is permanent, but you can always regain the point with more experience.

Grace

• You gain a point of Grace.

Song

Song of Elbereth

• Causes fear in intelligent enemies.

• This is done through a skill check of your Song skill versus:

• difficulty = enemy’s Will skill

+1 per square of distance along the shortest sound path

+5 per closed door along the shortest sound path

• Temporarily lowers their morale by 1 per point you succeed by.

• Voice: ⅓ per turn.

• Noise: 8

Song of Slaying

• Gives you a bonus to attack that increases each time you kill an opponent and fades

away over time.

• Killing an enemy will give you a temporary bonus of 10% of your Song, but this

will quickly start to fade

• At any time your bonus will be proportional to your Song score

• If you are killing enemies at a steady rate r, the bonus will be proportional to the

square root of r (so you need to quadruple the killing rate to double the bonus).

• Voice: ⅓ per turn.

• Noise: 12

Song of Silence

• Quietens sounds in the dungeon, making opponents less likely to notice you.

• Lowers the noise you make by half your Song skill, effectively giving opponents a

penalty of this size to their perception checks.

• Also gives this penalty to opponents in hearing each other when they call for help etc.

• But it even gives this penalty to your own perception checks if using the ‘listen’ ability.

• Voice: ⅓ per turn.

• Noise: 0

Song of Freedom

• Eases your passage through the dungeon.

• It gives you free action (protection from entrancement and slowing) and makes

existing effects of these types wear off very quickly.

• It has a chance of disarming nearby traps (whether discovered or not), removing

rubble, and discovering secret doors and unlocking locked or stuck doors or chests.

• This is done through a skill check of your Song skill versus:

• difficulty = base of: dungeon-level/2 + 5

+1 per square of distance along the shortest sound path

+5 per closed door along the shortest sound path

• Voice: ⅓ per turn.

• Noise: 4

Song of the Trees

• Increases your light radius by 1 per 5 points of Song skill.

• Voice: ⅓ per turn.

• Noise: 4

Song of Aule

• Increases your Smithing skill by 1 per 4 points of Song skill.

• Voice: ⅓ per turn.

• Noise: 8

Song of Staying

• Gives you [1dx] protection, where x is one third of your Song skill.

• This protection works against all damage types, like a ring of protection.

• Increases your Will skill by 1 per 3 points of Song skill.

• Voice: 1 per turn.

• Noise: 4

Song of Lorien

• Lowers the alertness of nearby enemies, making them unwary and then ultimately

putting them to sleep.

• This is done through a skill check of your Song skill versus:

• difficulty = enemy’s Will skill + 5

+1 per square of distance along the shortest sound path

+5 per closed door along the shortest sound path

• Voice: 1 per turn.

• Noise: 4

Song of Este

• Makes you recover your health X times faster, where X is a quarter of your Song skill.

• Makes you recover from all negative status effects X times faster.

• Includes: hallucination, blindness, confusion, slowness, entrancement, fear,

stunning, poison, and cuts.

• Voice: 1 per turn.

• Noise: 4

Song of Sharpness

• Helps you penetrate the armour of your opponents with swords, axes, polearms, and

arrows.

• The opponent’s protection roll is reduced by 2% per point of Song.

• Voice: 1 per turn.

• Noise: 8

Song of Mastery

• Attempts to make nearby enemies completely powerless before you.

• If you succeed in a skill check against an enemy, they will completely miss their turn,

staying still and not attacking.

• This skill check uses your Song skill against:

• difficulty = enemy’s Will skill + 5

+1 per square of distance along the shortest sound path

+5 per closed door along the shortest sound path

• Voice: 1 per turn.

• Noise: 8

Woven Themes

• Allows you to add a ‘minor theme’ to your song.

• This means that you can begin a second song and have its effect in addition to your

major song, but its power is less, treating you as if your Song skill were half what it is.

• The noise from your singing is the average of the two songs, and the voice cost is the

sum of the two.

• You can end the minor theme without ending the major theme by attempting to sing

the major theme again, and you can swap the order of the themes by attempting to

sing song ‘x’.

Grace

• You gain a point of Grace.

Sil 1.3 Manual

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