Satori - Three Eyes Better

[Amanojyaku]

The Satori are cousins to the Eldarin, created by the Syrne as a safe means of navigating the Warp. After the Syrne's destruction, they parted ways, many settling worlds alongside the Elves who did the same. The Satori, however, are spared the pity of their starfaring cousins, still respected for their Warp-sighted third eye. They live in the highlands, literally watching over those who share their worlds.

Satori communities resemble mountain convents more than anything else... they often dislike interacting with other humanoids, leaving their isolated homes only when contracted as Navigators. Even this is rare among any but the Eldarin races, though the mutants that humans refer to as simply "Navigators" are suspected to be the result of breeding with Satori.

Physical Characteristics
Average Height: 1.6-1.9m
Average Weight: 65-75kg
Languages: Trade, Eldarin, Spirit-tongue
Common Personality Traits: Aloof, blunt, impatient, observant, sarcastic
Common Physical Traits: Lean build, long or wild hair, quiet voice, lack of presence, third eye on forehead
Example Names: Hiei, Tien, San, Viori, Shiva

Racial Statistics
Characteristic Bonus: +1 to Intelligence or Composure
Skill Bonus: +1 to Perception and Arcana
Power: Third Eye: Satori have a fully-developed pineal eye in their foreheads. You can cast the spell Detect Thoughts, using your Level + Intelligence instead of the normal magic test. You have to lose two eyes before you start taking penalties for missing eyes, and all three to be Blinded. If your pineal eye is lost, you lose this racial power and gain the Satori in Satori feat.
Size: 3

Racial Feats

Astral Seer [Kor, Satori]
Your homeworld is one where maps become useless as soon as they're finished, and landmarks disappear as often as they're memorized. You can clearly see much less impermanent landmarks in the Warp overlaid on the Materium, giving you an unerring sense of direction and allowing you to act as a Navigator regardless of other magical ability.

Insight [Satori]
The opened third eye symbolizes wisdom, perception, and insight, all birthrights of the Satori. Your Static Defense is 10 + six times your Wisdom, minus twice your Size. You can purchase the Combat Sense and Zen Shooting feats as if they were part of your class progression.

Satori in Satori [Satori]
Yo dawg, we heard you like not thinking, so we put your Satori in satori so you can not think while you don't think! Your pineal eye is gone for some reason. You lose the Satori racial power of Third Eye and gain the Impulsive hindrance if you didn't already have it. Double your Composure for the purpose of determining initiative and Mental Defense. You must declare your actions at the start of each round and cannot change your stated action. If your action becomes impossible or suicidal, you may instead choose to take no action at all. If your pineal eye is ever restored, you lose this feat.

Sight Beyond Sight [Paragon, Satori]
The Satori's third eye is a wondrous organ, designed to pick up on minute fluctuations in the Immaterium in addition to visual input surrounding the Satori. Yours is so much more. While you are in the Umbra or the Materium, your third eye sees clearly into the other plane, allowing you to see them overlaid on each other when all your eyes are open. More importantly, while your third eye is open it can pierce the veil of illusion yet more easily, giving you a free raise in all conditions set by the True Sight feat.

True Sight [Satori]
One eye grants sight, two grant depth perception... but three shatter the veil of magic. While your third eye is open, you gain a free raise on opposed tests against Illusion spells that have a visual component (such as the Image, Disguise, and Invisibility spells), as well as on attack rolls against targets whose Static Defense is increased by an Illusion spell.

Understanding [Satori]
Satori have an uncanny ability to get into the minds of others, and through that, understand them perfectly. You can cast Detect Thoughts as a Reaction, and use the result in place of a Scrutiny test made to Refute a social attack.

Physical Qualities

Satori are odd, three-eyed humanoids roughly similar to elves. Their skin almost always has the pallor of one who spends long hours away from sunlight. Their hair colors run the gamut through a wide variety of rather unnatural shades, typically cooler colors like blue or green, though thankfully include black or white among the crowd. Their eyes are also typically cool colors... blues, greys, and greens are common, though the third eye is commonly a different color than the other two, usually gold or violet. With their third eye covered, most Satori could pass for an elf, albeit one with rather short ears.

For all that their appearance resembles the Eldarin races, though, the Satori life cycle more closely resembles that of a human... they reach maturity at about sixteen years or so, and typically die around the century mark. The third eye is always the first to open, and some Satori may go through their lives without ever opening the other two.

Playing a Satori

Satori are generally quiet and dispassionate individuals, who tend to get along better with animals than with other humanoids. This is because they value thought and contemplation, and find the lack of these things among other humanoids almost painful. While they make an attempt to appear calm and unruffled most of the time, Satori tend to have little tolerance for what they perceive as stupidity, resulting in a sharp tongue and a short temper when interacting with most bashers.

Satori have an interesting system of body language based on which eyes they have open at a given time. Closing or covering the third eye while opening the other two indicates humility or a wish to be treated with as an equal rather than a superior, while doing the reverse indicates dominance, a demand to be treated as a superior, and having all three open shows naivete or childishness. Satori can and do change their "castes" over the course of a conversation as their mood dictates, though generally one will be more prone to sarcasm while their third eye is open.

One prominent taboo among Satori regards the third eye, specifically that it is sacrosanct, not to be harmed. Only the desperate would even consider blinding it, only the insane would actually do so... it's seen in a similar light to suicide. A Satori who becomes blind in her third eye is irrevocably changed by it, no longer able to think on her intentions before acting upon them, and becomes an object of pity at best among her own kind. Which is assuming the Satori in question was blinded by someone else, or accidentally... one who does it to herself is shunned entirely, her presence tolerated but ignored in polite company.

Satori Heroes

Kaguya has seen all that the Wheel has to offer during her long life, and she has found it wanting. Eldarin fights Eldarin, Orks fight everybody, and humans make a sickening mess of every situation they get into, and it all causes her no small amount of distress that the taste of the so-called "divine fruit" couldn't possibly compare to. But she does have a plan to bring peace to the Wheel once and for all, using the powers granted by that very fruit...

Ten could probably count on one hand the number of Satori he knows to have been coached along the path of enlightenment by a different people, but he's among them. Now, though, he has to learn an important lesson in detachment, as he must hunt down his former teacher, a human with the odd name of Tao who he claims has gone mad due to cybernetic enhancement.

Koishi used to hear the voices everywhere. Every cry of pain, every moment of joy, every flash of anger... she felt them all, and her heart bled. But the Wheel is not a friendly place to such an empath; it was too much. She cut out her third eye... and now she feels nothing at all.