Advanced - Effects

What is an Effect ?

Simply put, an Effect is something that will change any value related to your character. For instance, when you wear a Belt of Giant Strength, your character will gain more strength: the "effect" in this case, is an increase in Strength for your character.

The Types

Ok so we have seen that the stacking rules prevent bonuses of the same type (with a couple of exceptions) from being added. Now let us look at all the Types that Parse Effect can handle - you will see that a few more were added to allow some very powerful parsing! But first: What the heck does Parse Effect means anyways??

The Parse Effect name: The Parse Effect name is twofold: Parse means "To examine closely or subject to detailed analysis, especially by breaking up into components". Effect means "any condition that change a numerical value related to your Character" (like getting a +2 to your Strength score because your character is wearing Gauntlets of Ogre Power). So in essence, Parse Effect will breakdown all the Effects applied to your Character, analyze them and come up with a total result, taking into account the Stacking Rules! Simple eh?

The Available Types

There are basically three types used within Parse Effect. The stackable Types, the non-stackable types and the special types. Let's look at the first two types that Parse Effect can handle.

Table: The stackable and non-stackable Types

Available Types	Does it Stack?		Available Types	Does it Stack?
Alchemical	No		Luck	No
Armor	No		Morale	No
Circumstance	Yes		Profane	No
Competence	No		Racial	Yes
Deflection	No		Resistance	No
Dexterity	No		Sacred	No
Dodge	Yes		Shield	No
Enhancement	No		Size	No
Inherent	No		Unnamed	Yes
Insight	No

So as you can see, most types do not stack, with the four exceptions listed above.

The "Natural Armor" type is not defined as it is specific to Armor. If you need to affect the natural armor, use the "Natural Armor" effect to do so! Note that Natural Armor stacks with any other armor bonus the character has.

What should I do when I have an Effect with a type that does not normally stack, but the description of that ability specifically says that it stacks? Simple! If it should always stack, even with the same typed bonus, use 'Unnamed' instead!