Azeria Eiju
Overview
Azeria is what most people would call a cleric - she lives in a church, provides healing to the sick, and ministers to the faithful at the Fair Maiden's Cathedral... or, at least, she did before the whole city got blown apart. However, she is not actually a cleric of any one deity. Rather, she venerates the entire pantheon of good deities and is happy to look up and provide teachings from any of them as those who come to visit her request.
In reality, Azeria is an immortal kitsune who long ago swore some oaths to the gods. In return for providing them with much of her income and remaining humble in authority, they've blessed her with a variety of useful gifts that augment her already-prolific powers. Azeria broadly prefers to remain in her humanoid form, though she can't stop her multiple tails from appearing whenever she uses magic. She typically wears a short skirt as a direct result of this; one destroyed set of pants caused by growing tails was enough to make her rethink her fashion choices.
Azeria is quite charismatic and capable of sweet-talking most people into things. She's also a capable healer, possessed of surprising acrobatic skill, and an outstanding singer and dancer who can perform in a variety of styles (from somber funeral dances to things the gods of love encourage people to do more of).
Magically, Azeria possesses the powers of both Eliciters and Soul Weavers. She occasionally creates shattering blasts of sound to strike targets from afar, or uses ghost strikes to drain her enemies' power and make it easier to capture them. She can also weave mind magic to create suggestions or put people to sleep, or create a variety of consecrations that impose limits on evil. And healing, of course, which is most of why people often think she's a cleric.
Between her magic and the emotions she can cause in others - largely positive and beneficial - Azeria is a fairly impressive supporter who often has something that's at least useful for a job, or at least useful for somebody else.
Personality
Azeria is fundamentally kind and believes in helping people, minimizing harm to innocents, and generally trying to display virtuous behavior. She also works at a church that specifically emphasizes that there are many ways to be good, so she tries to remain flexible in her thoughts and try to see the good in others even when she disagrees with their specific actions or behaviors. Like most mortal creatures, she does have her flaws and vices, including an ongoing desire to show off through performances. Resisting these urges are part of why she took an oath of humility.
While she spends most of her time working in churches, Azeria is willing to go on expeditions as part of organized teams for one reason or another. She doesn't need to eat, drink, or sleep, which makes her no drain on supplies, and her ability to nurture and support others is quite useful for helping their missions succeed. She donates half of everything she earns on these missions back to the church. She's not above using her fluffy tails (of which she gains one at every odd level) to convince people to do things, given their near-hypnotic effect on certain parts of the population.
Azeria In Combat
Azeria is fundamentally a supporter when she strikes out on expeditions. She is especially adept at the Soul Weaver's Channel Energy power, allowing her to weave positive or negative energy for a variety of effects. She can even expend it to bolster the resolve of her allies and allow them to strike at foes, and her ability to selectively channel means she rarely affects anyone she doesn't want to affect. This is bolstered by her mastery of the Anathema, which allows her to strike at evil foes, and her Channel Mastery class feature that allows her to flexibly acquire various augments for her channeled energy. While not capable of overwhelming force, Azeria can strike at least moderately well against most evil foes.
That said, Azeria's general focus on harming evil means that she can't quite perform at her maximum potential in mixed-alignment teams. Selective channeling can stop her anathema from hurting (temporary) allies, but it won't protect them from the aura of divine pressure she can create at-will.
While she's capable of harming others when pushed, her varied support magics are the real boon she brings to allies. As an Eliciter, she can channel various emotions to augments her allies and protect them from mind-altering effects, stir up feelings of love in others, or simply bring them such joy that they can perform more effectively. Her Synchronicity feat allows her to support the emotions of all allies in an area around her, which can provide a significant boost to their offense and defense.
Furthermore, her abilities with the Fate sphere allow her to bolster allies' resistance to possession or domination, and she can spontaneously bless allies to give them a better chance of overcoming a harmful effect. Her more-limited implacable blessing is even more powerful, although she often keeps that in reserve.
Azeria prefers to stay mid-range and support allies with buffs and auras. If forced into close combat, she often activates her glory power around her shield, significantly augmenting her accuracy and allowing her to channel negative energy (and even, simultaneously, her anathema) into a single deadly strike mixing positive and negative energy. She sees this as more of a last resort for desperate situations, though, given that several factors have to align for her to perform it at its maximum potential - and that dedicated warriors will generally strike harder than she can anyway.
With offense, defense, buffs, healing, and some flexibility thanks to her mythic sphere knowledge, Azeria is an all-rounder who tries to support teams in areas where they're weakest, rather than trying to stand out and do things herself.
Mythic Nature
Azeria's mythic qualities come from her veneration of the entire pantheon of good, to whom she has sworn oaths and, in turn, received power. Her mythic powers are limited by her casting tradition and, notably, her multiple tails appear whenever she's activating her mythic powers. This makes it extraordinarily difficult for her to hide what she's doing, although she's usually not trying to hide anyway because charming people is often enough to get what she wants.
In return for this obvious display, Azeria is occasionally even more obvious - her Expertise gives her the Luminous Smite ability of the Warrior of Holy Light Mageknights, allowing her to apply her outstanding charisma to strikes with her weapon (or, more often, her shield). She can also call upon the gods to twist fate, although this is risky at the best of times.
Character Options
Level: Eliciter (Id) 8/Soul Weaver (Dual Channeler) 8 | Spheremaster 2
Race: Kitsune (Fast Shifter, Magical Tails); Template: Anathemic Creature
Feats: Channel Resolve, Extra Emotion, Selective Channeling, Synchronicity
Traits: Compassion, Reckless
Oaths: Oath of Humility, Oath of Offerings; Oath Boons: Enhanced Abilities, Enhanced Defenses (2), Inhuman Resilience, Immortality, Shielded Form
Eliciter Emotions: Love: Charming Touch, Universal Love; Joy: Touch of Joy, Lingering Joy; Resolve: Determined, Willful, Implacable
Casting Tradition: Focus Casting, Somatic Casting, Witchmarked (via Magical Tails racial trait)
Martial Tradition: Equipment (Shield Expert, Shield Training, Unarmored Training), Shield Sphere
Mythic Path: Spheremaster
- Mythic Tradition: Traditional (Drawback), Twists of Fate (Quality), Expertise: Luminous Smite (Boon)
- Path Abilities: Display of Charisma, Mythic Sphere Knowledge; Mythic Feats: Shield Focus(M)
Special Defenses: Immune to Aging, Disease, Good-aligned damage, and negative effects of Positive Energy; does not need to Eat, Drink, or Sleep