Cherished

A cherished is naturally drawn to others. Unlike a normal highlord, her power is not that of the ruler, but of a treasured ally. She uses the minds and hearts of their compatriots as a conduit, allowing her to support her protectors by inspiring them to fight harder and empowering them from afar.

There are cherished that captivate others naturally, with a genuine, sometimes innocent charm. More malevolent examples use their psionic powers as a tool to control others, rather than merely befriending them. Others still may even be unaware of their psionic manipulation, rallying their allies and manifesting her powers unconsciously in the hopes of aiding those around them. Regardless of how they use their powers, however, cherished tend to find themselves deeply ingrained in any group they take part in, quickly becoming a valued member of even the most antisocial teams.

### **Weapon and Armor Proficiencies**

A cherished is proficient with all simple weapons, light and medium armor, and shields (except tower shields).

This replaces the highlord’s weapon proficiencies.

### **Image of Innocence (Su)**

The cherished’s true motives, however benign or wicked they may be, are concealed behind a psionic veneer of innocence. As long as she is psionically focused, she is immune to any magical, psionic, and supernatural effects that may try to read her mind or detect her intentions. When such effects fail against the cherished, the cherished becomes aware of the attempt and may choose to still seem to be affected, displaying different surface thoughts or intentions than what she truly feels.

This ability replaces guarded rulership.

### **Way of the Cherished (Su)**

A cherished does not choose a tenet to follow. Instead, she gains a unique set of abilities, described below. A cherished adds the following psionic powers to her power list, at the listed levels. She can select them normally as highlord powers.

* 1st—*Empathic connection, suppress compulsion*
* 2nd—*Compelling voice, read thoughts*
* 3rd—*Forced share pain, guarded sleep*
* 4th—*Geth’s mind control, personality parasite*
* 5th—*Mind probe, psychic crush*
* 6th—*Aura alteration, mind switch*

This ability replaces tenet and alters the cherished’s power list.

### **Favor**

A cherished’s base power points from the highlord class are halved (if this reduces her base to 0, she must have another source of power points, such as from having a high Charisma score). However, she gains a second pool of power points, equal to that a normal highlord of her level would gain. These power points are referred to as her favor pool, and may only be used to manifest psionic powers and use abilities that affect other allied members of her collective. She may still include herself in effects that allow multiple targets, but can never use these power points on an ability that targets only herself.

If the cherished gains bonus power points from having a high Charisma score, she adds them to both of her power point pools. For example, an 8th-level cherished with a Charisma score of 18 (+4 modifier) would have a normal pool of 26 (20 halved to 10, then +16 from her Charisma) and a favor pool of 36 (20 base, then +16 from her Charisma).

This ability alters power points and replaces tribute.

### **Cherished’s Gift**

Starting at 1st level, a cherished can always treat her highlord powers as having the network descriptor, but only for the purposes of manifesting them on allied collective members. When she manifests a power in this way, she can remove the mind-affecting descriptor from the power, and ignores the ally’s power resistance (if any) against the power. This ability replaces conscription and gift of power.

### **Treasured by All (Su)**

Whenever a creature attempts to damage or inflict a harmful condition upon the cherished with an attack or ability, the cherished can attempt to demoralize that creature as a free action. Instead of making an Intimidate check, the cherished rolls 1d20 and adds her manifester level and her Charisma modifier to determine the demoralize attempt result. If she normally gains any extra bonuses on Diplomacy checks (such as from Skill Focus or her first impression class feature), these bonuses are also added to the check. She may make this attempt regardless of the location of her assailant, and it occurs before the action that prompted it, (potentially causing the attacker to miss). If the cherished wishes, creatures who can perceive her get a sense that they should not attack the cherished. The exact details of this sense varies from cherished to cherished, and creature to creature, but generally, it creates a slight feeling that the cherished is innocent, nonthreatening, or heavily guarded, in spite of any evidence to the contrary. The cherished can only demoralize a creature with this ability once per action, regardless of whether or not they attacked her multiple times during it.

Regardless of the success or failure of this attempt, the cherished can then send a mental call for aid to an allied collective member as an immediate action. That ally is granted a standard action that they use immediately (even if it isn’t their turn), as long as that the action affects or moves them closer to the cherished or her attacker. The member of the collective who takes this action becomes staggered for 1 round (even if they would normally be immune).

This ability replaces lifeblood resonance.

### **Tenet Power**

At 1st level, a cherished gains *appointed champion* as a bonus power known.

### **First Command (Su)**

A cherished gains highlord’s command as her decree at 1st level. In addition, they gain an expanded use of this decree. While using its effect, the cherished can give a specialized command to an ally in their collective, allowing that ally to make a single attack with a weapon they are wielding, at their highest attack bonus. The ally does not gain any additional actions from this effect, but unlike other uses of the decree, this does not stagger them.

### **Talents (Su)**

A cherished gains *empathy* as a psionic talent at 1st level.

### **First Impression (Su)**

Starting at 2nd level, a cherished gains a bonus on Diplomacy checks equal to 1/2 her class level. Creatures’ starting attitudes towards the cherished are improved by one step (from hostile to unfriendly, unfriendly to indifferent, and so on), up to a maximum of helpful.

This ability replaces skill affinity.

### **Air of Fragility (Su)**

Starting at 6th level, the cherished is surrounded by an aura that forces those who attack her to second-guess their actions. Creatures susceptible to mind-affecting effects who attack or target the cherished with a hostile ability must succeed at a Will save (DC 10 + 1/2 the cherished’s class level + the cherished’s Charisma modifier) or become unable to follow through on their attack. The action is not lost, and resources are not spent, but until the end of the creature’s turn, they cannot attempt to harm the cherished with their actions (though they may still attack the cherished’s allies, so long as it doesn’t harm the cherished).

This effect persists until it affects a creature with a number of Hit Dice greater than 1/2 the cherished’s class level (regardless of their success or failure on the saving throw). When this occurs, the cherished’s air of fragility shatters, ending this effect until the start of her next turn.

As a standard action, the cherished can focus her air of fragility on a specific creature within her sight. For 2 rounds, that creature takes a –2 penalty to Will saves against the cherished’s air of fragility ability. Even if the air of fragility is broken for other creatures, it remains functional against this creature for that time.

This ability replaces lifeblood siphon.