Affinity 101

From the moment your character is created, you can request your Affinity Rolls. This is a set of six rolls in total, three determining the rarity & three determining the words you roll themselves from the rarity categories. There are a total of three rarity fields: Regular, Peak & Divine.
-- After these rolls are done, they are set in stone. You pick one of the words you acquired from that set to be the word that governs what your character is capable of beyond the bare baseline of the race you chose for them. This too, is set in stone once it is chosen and defines your character's potential.


For Soulborn, it affects your Soul Weapon & its Releases. The way your affinity expresses itself in those is generally going to be something passive & enhancement-based, to compliment how Soulborn ordinarily release reiryoku in short ranges during their forms of combat, via. Projection.
-- This trickles into your Methods (basic custom perks that grant benefits), which determine how you influence different bodily faculties. This can be as simple as how you breathe and what your breathing does for you, or as complex as how your blood is pumped through your body.
-- Your Techniques, Styles & Buffs also express this (Kido, too, if you assign your Affinity to it), though it is important to note that your Release is the only efficient means aside from Kido for you to release ranged applications of reiryoku, and these demonstrations require your Initial Release to be active for you to use them, until a certain milestone.

For Spiritualists, it affects how your reiryoku manifests in general. If you can inherit the Affinity of Time, for example, your basal expressions of reiryoku influence time itself. Whereas a Soul Weapon for a Soulborn is a technique denoting its parameters and base feat, Spiritualists gain a statless perk that provides that passive.
-- Like with the aforementioned race, Techniques, Styles & Buffs express your affinity further, but you're granted more leeway since it is inherent to you. You do not need a medium for reiryoku or reishi because your body is that medium. The application of your affinity can range anywhere from self-enhancement to general attacks or modification of general emissions of reiryoku.
-- Your enhancement is notably not as complex as Soulborn. While they influence their very nervous system and other normally fragile systems in the body, you tend to stop at enhancing just your senses under the principle of having your reiryoku 'will' that for you. With that in mind, organ enhancement is not on the table for Spiritualists.

For Adepts, it determines how your raw reishi manifests when being fired from your reishi-based medium, aka. your Armament. This means that your ammunition and potential releases of reishi from that weapon in question (i.e. an extended slash of reishi) demonstrate your affinity. This expresses itself on the item of the Armament itself.
-- Techniques & Styles are the only things that really benefit from affinity influence, and even then Adepts cannot physically enhance themselves at all at lower-to-mid stages of gameplay because their entire use of spiritual energy is externalization. To compensate, they pull themselves to sources of reishi and just influence their reishi control in general. An Adept with 'Fire' as their affinity for example could physically burn a reiryoku attack that they've struck with their Armament.
-- Buffs are out of the range of what Adepts are capable of in general, on top of Enhancement being impossible. You compensate through versatility, range and superior externalization of reishi.

For Devils, you aimlessly release your reiryoku dangerously around yourself, and impose its effects upon your surroundings through your affinity perk and Techniques derived from it. Styles and Buffs are lost to you because you are mentally retarded, and don't really grasp (or have to grasp) such concepts.

Catalyzed by one's genetics or an encounter with a hard-to-come-by item or entity, this is exactly how it sounds. Considered a 'deformity' to one's affinity, it allows an individual to alter the way their affinity manifests. This is generally in simple, accessibility-granting ways, such as applying an element or simple concept by word ("truth", "plated", "sight", etc.) to your current affinity if it cannot normally manifest that, giving it some weight to its exploits (applying mass to something without it, applying an elemental property to an object or animal-affinity etc.).

This is even able to apply simple words that might not be an affinity themselves such as 'lie' or 'truth'. As a general rule of thumb, augmentation stays within the bounds of what one can expect from an affinity of 'Regular' rarity, but without the deviation or flexibility of actually having one. For Spiritualists, it further amps an extension of their affinity that they've already made if it permits the same thing, while other races get a smaller taste of that.

Characters of high enough level (B minimum, but normally you're not going to be seeing this until A anyway) can 'bestow' such an augmentation (high-level adepts/spiritualists in general, soulborn via. higher-end methods) and are generally the source of an entity-based encounter. For items, this hinges on what an item is made of and if it has any affinity-leaning inherent properties to it, such as a herb (normally a Soul Plains thing) or a mechanic that we've yet to show you, known as the Regalia.

Generally speaking, these Methods are used in tandem with one's affinity; though it's worth noting you can implement other things like themes (i.e. animals) into these perks. For the simplicity of this guide, though, we will not be covering what that looks like. For affinities that cannot facilitate this too well (i.e. 'Gas' affinity trying to make a Mind Method), you might be able to double up on Body or Spirit. But this is a rarity; we'll try to make something work for you.

As previously explained on the SB thread itself, Mind Methods alter or help maintain your basal thought process, as well as improve anything that may appeal to it (such as will perks; Anger, Brute and so on). This is themed after whatever your affinity is and tends to be defensive. The tradeoff is that it's the hardest to come up with ideas for. But here's an example anyway - let's say you have 'Mineral' as your affinity. You have a plethora of different materials at your disposal. We'll use 'Steel' and 'War' for these:

Examples:

These are your foundational perks. It's pretty easy to benefit statistically from these types of Methods, and they tend to focus on modifying parts of the body with a 'theme' in mind. This can range anywhere from a flame-based composition that lathers one's organs, all the way to granting them an altered external sate of being. At lower levels these hone in on a particular organ or system of the body, such as the respiratory system in the case of breathing methods. We'll use Summer for this one, and combine it with modifying your organs.

Example:

Perks derived from the Soul apply properties or traits of one's affinity to their simpler applications of reiryoku. This is generally woven into uses of the Four Foundations and acts as the stepping stone to creating techniques & styles or adding unique qualities to preexisting ones that apply reiryoku. For this example, we'll be using 'Bone', so that you can get a good feel for affinities that predominantly manifest as solid matter.

Example:

Apart of the bread & butter of your affinity usage as a Soulborn, they are what separates a novice from an expert at utilizing their Soul Weapon. Soul Weapons in of themselves are techniques - so this section will be used as a stepping stone for showing you what the average one looks like. Being the most freeform means for you to express your affinity, techniques derived from your Soul Weapon do not adhere to Projection's range limit. You are granted freeform application of whatever your affinity is provided the properties & nature befit what you're doing. These techniques are referred to as 'Soul Techniques' and can be designed to fire from your weapon in whatever manner is necessary. It is even possible to release it from specific parts of your body on a whim with the appropriate Soul Method, though most Soulborn simply flow their kneaded reiryoku out from their weapon into their body to achieve the same result.

For starters, we'll be dipping into what your Soul Weapon will look like. All Soul Weapons abide by the same drain of '500' reserves and follow a set Durability / HIt Point allotment.

Netsuretsu Hitogoroshi [Soul Weapon]
(Transforms the reishi-conductive item into a Soul Weapon.)
(Weapon Type & Affinity: Spear || Fire)
(Confers a bonus of [Soul Reinforcement Tier] * 5 to the Durability of the object & +150 Hit Points. Damage Bonus is elevated to +6; higher if the base item's Damage Bonus is.)
(Netsuretsu Hitogoroshi draws blood with its every strike, inflicting 'Bleed' so long as Damage was dealt. Reiryoku expressions using this affinity do the same, and do more Damage based on how much HP this character has. For every '20' points of HP they have, increase blood-based Damage instances by 2 Points.)
(Contact with this Soul Weapon initiates a Spirit + 10 VS. Spirit Defense calculation against bleeding targets. On failure, ramps the user's 'Bleed' to 'Severe Bleed' and deals 1/4th of the calculated difference as bonus HP Damage, capped at -12. This is doable once every two rounds.)
(Lasts the duration of combat.)

Soul Technique Examples:

The center of a Soulborn's focus. Affinity applications to these are cut-and-dry, allowing stat-stick or the application of effects that normally would not work, or doing them better than average applications. It effectively makes Soulborn the best at creating styles or - as you better know them, stances, and allows them to seamlessly weave spiritual applications (and even stat gain) into physical. This example will use 'Thunder'.

Dance of the Thunderblade [B-Rank] | [150 Reserves, 100 Stamina]
(Thunderclap: By paying '200' reserves this character can release a 3X3 shockwave, reducing a target's Awareness by [Weapon Arts Tier * 3] for the duration of the user's next action. This penalty applies fully to their Clash/Parry calculation if they were in contact with the user's weapon during this effect's activation. Usable every two rounds.)
(When using Quickdraw this character elevates its Action Speed Bonus by '5' points. Their quickdrawn attack deals Medium-Capped Spirit + 5 VS. Spirit Defense calculation that inflicts [Dazed] if Medium+ was dealt.)
(Uses Blade / Thrusting Arts.)

A niche of the Soulborn race. This is how you effectively 'energize' yourself with the full extent of your affinity. Buffs tend to be full-body Soul Techniques that exude your affinity-influenced reiryoku across your body, enhancing you. While this won't get into how much the buff drains or what stats it gives, this will address what the effects normally look like. It is worth noting that you won't see making this as an option, until you can make B-Rank techniques, and have at least one Method. Our example will use 'Lucky'.
-- Fortunate Resonance [B-Rank]
(Blessed with the resplendence of luck, this character rolls a D6 every round and applies the result to the Reflex Range of a single defensive action. All other die rolls that they attempt with this buff raise result, so long as the result in question is a buff or debuff, by '4' points (i.e. Rebound). This cannot negatively affect them, because they are lucky!)
(I Don't Think I Will: So long as an action's Action Speed is within [10 * Skill Rank] points of this character's Reflex, they can -force- a graze if they were not able to normally dodge it. If they can still graze it, they can commit to fully dodging. This is usable [Soul Reinforcement Tier] times in a singular combat situation.)

You already know enough about this, so I'm skipping to their ordinary effects and appearance. We'll use 'Fruit' & 'Rend' here.

Affinity Examples:

The alteration of preexisting traits inherent to an affinity, often piggybacking off of effects or something generally accessible through techniques. Preexisting properties usually adhere to this type of perk, such as changing the limited sentience in a plant to something wholly sentient and aware.. if you're strong enough. For this example, we'll be using 'Money'.
Grand Heist [T2]
(Increase all money made from all Post-Calculation sources by 1.5X.)
(This character's Spirit / Damage are treated as [Self Tier * 5] higher when determining their ability to succeed in a calculation.)

Generally speaking, the sort of ability above would also have a bonus penalty applied to someone, such as a loss in confidence (and thus Awareness, Reflex etc.) or something such as bankruptcy. Given the rest of the specifics for this affinity would normally lean toward things established by the basal affinity perk, though, this'll be where this example stops.

Changing how your affinity manifests, from one 'form' it may be interpreted as to another. This tends to be simple 'phase changes', such as taking Water and turning it into Ice due to rendering its state of matter a solid, but words like 'justice' tend to exaggerate this or guide it into other manners of interaction that they use. 'Law' for example may normally only try to assign rules or deny use of specific actions in a given area. By altering its State of Being, 'Law' can change to 'Enforcement', permitting outright / excess punishment for breaking the original laws instead.

Some affinities will outright not be able to utilize this if a unique application would require lots of 'stretching' of definitions, such as ones that are very linear (Samurai, Invisibility etc.)
Our example will be 'Trueshot', which ordinarily aids in your marksmanship, accuracy & aim.
Well-Struck! [T2]
(This character's Targeted actions passively apply to Damage as well. Effects that already bestow this are instead amplified in effectiveness by +5.)
(Able to 'Critical Strike' once every three rounds, upping a singular damage instance's cap to Major. If all that prevents the Critical Strike from dealing Lethal is its Damage Cap, expand the radius struck to a 1X1, damaging the entire region.)

Completely pushing the envelope of all properties is Evolution of Being. It is a hard-to-come-by feat that generally is only accessible as a T3 or higher, and does not count toward a spiritualist's Specialization slots. Hard to approve, these allow feats that extend beyond what is normal for an affinity. We'll use something nice and abstract for this, like 'Attention', which focuses on reallocating where someone is paying attention to. Normally this relies on preexisting stimuli 'suffused' with kneaded reiryoku that bears this 'energy'. In the case of an Evolved application of it, it can do something else:
Overcharged Neurons [T2]
(Targets suffering from having their attention forced onto something are inflicted with [Dazed]. They can no longer utilize the 'Focus' mechanic unless it is on the stimuli in question.)
(Offensive Pressure effects work /against/ the target, instead applying the excess debuff they'd put on their opponent to themselves, on a per-round basis for up to the duration of the penalty. (i.e. +2 extra Reflex debuff via. OP will apply to them per round).)

Evolutions of Being tend to do what Spiritualists generally embrace in theme - pushing the threshold of their ability. Most vague applications or manner or affinity use (i.e. applying a concept such as limited sentience to something to turn it into a living being to fight alongside).

Techniques are quite plain and simple for Spiritualists. Whether drenching themselves in kneaded reiryoku and punching you, or letting loose a seemingly simple-looking blast that is saturated with something as abstract as 'Vegetable', these guys are as innovative as they are absurd to fight. The benefit of creating techniques for a Spiritualist is that they can specify how a technique conducts their kneaded reiryoku. We'll use Weight for this:
Mass Blast [C-Rank] | [300 Reserves] | Medium
(Fires at Control + 10 Speed.)
(Deals Spirit + 10 VS. Spirit Defense & initiates a raw Spirit VS. Spirit Defense calculation to affect a target's weight.)
(Heavy: Raises Damage Cap to Major. Target is inflicted [Dazed] after being struck, and has their Action Speeds lowered by [10] points. The # of Tiles they can move in a round is lowered by 6.)
(Light: Granted +5 tiles of movement in a round, and a bonus of +7 to their Speed Statistic. Grazes are easier for them, allowing them to perform them uncommitted.)
(The above effect lasts the user's [Self Tier] in rounds.)
(Three Round CD)

Styles do not really differ all that much from the ordinary types for Spiritualists. This is the field they are weakest in when applying their affinity, unless they have a word that can excuse self-enhancement (such as an element). We'll use 'Plant' for this:

Rhythmic Vinesway [B-Rank] [140 Stamina, 60 Reiryoku]
(This character is capable of grappling from up to [Self Tier] away, utilizing vines. Targets lose -8 Awareness when attempting to graze or dodge grapples from them, provided the Vineswayer's Action Speed exceeds their target's Speed by at least twenty points.)
(When using Mix-Up Artist, this character can initiate a grapple attempt while retracting from an action, provided they are in the Reflex Range to do so. Their Action Speed on these attempts is raised by 7 Points.)
(Uses Lashing / Leg Arts.)

Rarer among Spiritualists, these are normally just bare means to empower oneself. These frequently cover the entire body in kneaded reiryoku and involve generating more sustainable coatings of it or constructs it produces. This example will use 'Knight', as it's a more unordinary application:
-- Donned Chivalry [B-Rank]
(Covers the user in armor, utilizing their Spirit for its Durability. This is capped at [Self-Tier * 20] + 10 Durability and uses [Control + 10] * 1.5 Statistic for HP. When this armor is destroyed, this buff ends.)
(Able to form or empower traditional knight objects such as the 'Sword' or 'Shield'. When forming/empowering, grants a bonus of +10 to Damage, or a reduction of -15 to incoming Damage.)
(Contact with the Knight is buffered by their Spirit Statistic. This is initiated against targets - who suffer this calculation as Medium-Capped Damage, and debuffs/movement displacements/impositions (Knockback, Knockdown etc.), which calculate their value against the user's Spirit + 15. This is useless against impositions of higher rank than Donned Chivalry.)

Examples:

For this one we'll use Illusion; the next will be Lightning for simplicity:

Examples:

Adepts ordinarily use styles in the same manner as other races. Their only advantage is that they have an easier time pulling off range feats, primarily by lengthening their Armament or expanding them.
-- Burstblade Style [B-Rank] [130 Reserves, 130 Stamina]
(Attacks from this style are lengthened by +1 in Tile Reach and occur +[Weapon Arts Tier] faster, but deal Medium-Capped Spirit VS. Spirit Defense past a 3-Tile Reach.)
(Can periodically release a 'Burstwave' after performing a swing, occurring at Attack Speed or Control and dealing Major-Capped Spirit + 10 VS. Spirit Defense in a 1X1 around oneself. This has a three-round CD.)