TomVanDyke
Any corrections/additions to this summary of bloodline powers? Arran's current bloodlines: 1) Ruiner (bloodRUIN, Mardek) - Permanently strengthen body using natural essence in food. Perhaps also body transformation when it is strong enough. 2) Devourer (BLOODruin, Narzhan) - Strengthen and heal body (most of the strength is temporary) using life energy of nearby dying creatures. 3) Darian citizenship - Drastically reduced need for sleep. 4) Sage - Incomparable mental focus and clarity --> help build insights and practice magic. 5) Master - Ability to control magical essence that is not his own --> magic resistance. 6) Guardian - Damage resistance (both physical damage and magical damage). 7) Titan - Physical strength. 8) Hungerer - Strengthen body by absorbing natural essence from the nearby area (including nearby plants). Bloodlines not yet acquired by Arran: A) Hunter - improved senses to find distant prey B) Immortal - regeneration of physical wounds C) Gale - speed D) Champion - sword skills E) Shade - stealth F) ?? - priests' ability to see bloodlines ...
When it says that he can activate 3 bloodlines at a time, does the blood ruin count for 0, 1, or 2 of the activated bloodlines? In other words, to activate guardian, titan, and master simultaneously, does he have to turn off the life-absorbing power of the blood part of the blood ruin and the natural-essence-from-food absorbing power of the ruin part of the blood ruin?
Of the known bloodlines, what should Arran prioritize for his next purchase (if he gets the opportunity)? Here is my analysis in order of increasing time to payoff: *Gale* if Arran prioritizes winning duels against powerful foes, defending his allies, fleeing foes that are too powerful, and speedy solo travel. DUELS: With his strength, shadow sword, and true insight into severing, Arran can defeat almost any foe if he lands a clean hit. Gale should speed him up enough to land that clean hit on any normal knight who doesn't also have Gale. It might also enable him to dodge warlocks' (and mages') magic and kill them before they can land a spell. ALLIES: In army battles, Gale would help him kill armies before they can touch his allies. In chapter 381, many allies died because Arran couldn't kill the blightspawn quickly enough. FLIGHT & TRAVEL: self-evident. *Champion* if Arran prioritizes getting the most he can out of being trained as an imperial knight. He doesn't know yet how the Champion bloodline improves swordsmanship. Is it through increased understanding or intuition of how to fight? Or through increased bodily control, like the tempering? Or improved ability to learn techniques? Regardless of how it improves his swordsmanship, becoming more talented as a swordsman will enable him to learn more quickly when he is trained, which will likely also give him opportunities for more advanced training. *Hunter* if he prioritizes getting to end his mission and return to the valley. The Darian oath seal prevents him from betraying the Darians or sharing their secrets. So without breaking the oath, he can't tell Brightblade what he learned, he can't train mages in enlightenment, and he can't fight for the valley against the Darians, so there is little point in returning until he can break the oath seal. But "the Hunter's bloodline would be invaluable in studying the seals he had to break" (ch409), presumably because it would help him to notice more details of the seals. As a minor effect, it would help his spying job by helping him to overhear conversations at a distance, like he needed in ch302. *Immortal* is much less valuable, since Arran already heals so quickly (outside of the Desolation). Also, either Gale and Champion would already greatly decrease the odds of him being wounded in the first place. *Shade* is much less valuable, since stealth is rarely Arran's approach, and his improved shadowcloak will cover most cases when it is needed.