Book of 9 Swords: One discipline Only?

[Particle_Man]

The Flavour text in Book of 9 Swords is all about how this one dude went and learned all 9 disicplines. He then had 9 followers, each master of one discipline.

Yet in play, I would find it difficult to stick to just one discipline, even if I wanted to for roleplay reasons. In fact, for many of them there is no way to avoid taking a stance in a second discipline, and some of the SwordSage class abilities only work if you have a 2nd discipline to apply them too.

That said, has anyone thought of trying for just one discipline, insofar as that is possible? You likely would take extra maneuvers at 1st level outside of the discipline, but could trade those out.

Come to think of it, what would the stats be of those masters of a single school that the dude went to, one by one, to become master of all 9 schools? Would it be a special class, now lost to us?

Is this a case where the flavour historical text simply cannot be fully duplicated by the rules as given? No "diamond mind only" characters?

 

[hong]

I think it's best to treat "master of one discipline" as meaning only one guy knew the capstone maneuver of each discipline. Thus one person knows Five-Shadow whatsit, another person knows Time Stands Still, yet another knows Strike of Perfect Clarity, and so on. Not that they were limited to learning only one discipline.

 

[Victim]

I think it's best to treat "master of one discipline" as meaning only one guy knew the capstone maneuver of each discipline. Thus one person knows Five-Shadow whatsit, another person knows Time Stands Still, yet another knows Strike of Perfect Clarity, and so on. Not that they were limited to learning only one discipline.

Yeah. I don't think that being a master of 1 discipline means not being able to use the others.

Of course, before there was unified system of the disciplines, picking up manuevers from different disciplines may have been a lot harder. Prereqs may have been steeper since the understanding of martial moves was less advanced before that Rexxar guy. Back then, each manuever might have prereqs equal to its level or something, which force most characters to specialize in a single discipline. Then he goes and learns all of the styles and finds lots of common ground between the different schools so that now it's far easier to learn other styles.

 

[blargney the second]

How's the old saw go? "Master of one trade, jack of none."

 

[Corinth]

Missed that "Master of Nine" PrC, yes?

 

[wayne62682]

That's one thing that got me about the book. They make all this hoopla about each discipline, so I figure "That will be cool, a character who only does this one discipline" but you can't just use one discipline.

 

[hong]

It's kind of a cliche in martial arts that a true master knows (at least elements of) lots of styles anyway. I don't see what the big deal is.

And you _can_ play a character who only does one discipline... meaning "class". A single-classed swordsage with Diamond Mind will play a lot differently to a single-classed warblade with Diamond Mind.

 

[Particle_Man]

I do like single-class characters. But I was hoping for a single class *and* single discipline character.

 

[blargney the second]

Some of the Bo9S prestige classes only give you access to a single discipline.

 

[Rystil Arden]

In my game, I limit initiators to only one discipline through playtest showing that otherwise they aren't balance in my game (maybe not in yours, but in mine). They are still balanced with the other classes in play even with only one discipline.