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Māori 742 of the Veiled Frond Sight

—

by

Dale
in

Lore

  • Centuries ago, within the dense maritime rain forests of the southern volcanic islands, reclusive weavers and diviners sought ways to evade prowling beasts without disturbing the natural weave of the flora.
  • By combining the sorcerous shielding traditions of makutu with the prophetic foresight of matakite seers, shamans bound ancestral spirit-threads into native flax and fern fibers.
  • The weavers discovered that true concealment requires anticipating where an observer will look before their gaze lands, allowing the garment’s sorcery to bend light and sound into the ambient foliage preemptively.
  • These garments were bestowed upon scouts, gatherers, and sentries tasked with monitoring dangerous reef shores and hostile jungle borders without drawing the ire of rival factions or predatory monsters.
  • While the original craft was passed down across generations, displaced reincarnated souls arriving on Saṃsāra recognized the woven patterns and preserved the practice of binding divination with stealth magic.

Description

  • The item appears as a finely woven capelet and mantle crafted from layered, overlapping harakeke flax leaves, preserved fern fronds, and midnight-hued cordage.
  • Faint purple veins of dormant arcane energy pulse along the spine of the central leaves, visible only when examined closely through the Mind’s Eye or when active sorcery flows through the threads.
  • When draped over the shoulders, the edges of the fronds subtly shift in pigmentation, matching the hue, texture, and light levels of adjacent stone, bark, damp soil, or foliage.
  • The material remains perpetually cool and damp to the touch, carrying the earthy fragrance of rain-soaked moss and crushed river ferns.
  • Small carved bone toggles engraved with spiraling sight-runes fasten the garment securely across the collarbone, anchoring the magic to the bearer’s physical movements.

Detailed Stats

  • Item Tier: Tier 1 (Common)
  • Item Armor Check: +2 AC
  • Item Health Points: Wearer Avatar Maximum Hit Points plus 10 (Resilience 10 multiplied by Tier 1)
  • Maximum Attuned Load: 1 Attunement Slot (Openly worn, requires 1 minute for simple attunement; unattunes automatically if stored in extradimensional space)
  • Action Cost: 1 Action to don, adjust, or activate stored focus routines
  • Durability Threshold: At 50% HP or lower, the item becomes broken and all magical properties cease until fully repaired; at 0 HP, it is destroyed into raw harvested flax, cordage, and uncharged bone toggles
  • Short Rest Interaction: Avatars gain no recovery or charge replenishment from short rests; item repair and maintenance require dedicated downtime crafting

Slot

  • Shoulder Slot

Passive Magics

  • Foresight of the Gaze: Utilizing residual matakite divination, the garment alerts the wearer to the exact moment an approaching entity turns its field of vision toward them. This provides the avatar with an intuitive nudge, granting advantage on stealth-based skill checks when remaining motionless against natural terrain.
  • Environmental Hue Blending: The makutu sorcery continuously samples ambient light and surface colors, causing the outer fibers to blend seamlessly into background colors. Attacks made against the wearer from beyond 30 feet suffer disadvantage if the wearer has not moved since their last turn.
  • Scent and Sound Dampening: The dense, magically treated fibers absorb the rustle of movement and trap body warmth and natural scents, preventing beasts with ordinary tracking senses from pinpointing the wearer’s precise position.

Activable Magics

  • Prophetic Step (Somatic Chanting): The wearer speaks a short incantation of directional deflection while taking a step. Costing 1 Action, this activates a burst of illusory displacement that lasts for 3 rounds. The wearer gains the Blurred condition, imposing disadvantage on all incoming attack rolls targeting the avatar during that duration.
  • Shrouding Ward of Makutu (Silent Casting): Without uttering a sound, the wearer channels focus through the chest toggle as 1 Action. The mantle emits an immediate 10-foot radius dampening field of translucent mist that obscures visual identification, turning the immediate area into dense visual cover for 1 minute.
  • Visionary Ambush Trace (Ritual Chanting): Reciting an ancestral chant of foresight for greater than 6 seconds out of combat, the wearer focuses on an anticipated confrontation area. For the next hour, if an enemy crosses within 20 feet of the wearer’s concealed position, the wearer’s next single attack roll gains a +2 bonus on the d20 roll, carrying the full 1d4 Tier 1 damage die bonus without surprise disruption.

Tags

  • Shoulder, Tier 1, Common, Armor Check, Camouflage, Divination, Makutu, Matakite, Stealth, Harakeke, Illusion, Flax-Woven, Fern-Bound, Spirit-Thread, Bone-Toggle, Mantle, Foresight, Disruption-Resistant, Natural-Terrain, Scent-Trap, Evasion, Attuned-Wear

Commerce and Trade Outlets for the Veiled Frond-Sight

Independent Herbalist and Scout Outfitters

  • Family-owned and operated outfitter stalls situated along the forested borders or coastal ports of island nations frequently stock camouflage gear tailored for wilderness navigation.
  • These shops operate as modest, multi-generational storefronts where the crafters harvest local harakeke flax, process fiber threads, and bind defensive enchantments on-site without mass manufacturing.
  • When purchasing from an independent outfitter, a customer typically pays the full asking price of approximately 150 to 220 silver coins (or roughly 15 to 22 gold coins), reflecting the localized cost of accessing wilderness materials and the time required to complete the intricate weaving.
  • When an avatar sells an existing mantle to an independent shopkeeper, the merchant haggles the payout down based on standard trading customs, reducing the payout by 10% of the assessed value multiplied by the seller’s Tier 1 standing, resulting in an offer between 135 and 198 silver coins.
  • Transactions in these licensed municipal establishments are routed directly into the character’s World Bank account visible in their Mind’s Eye, with the merchant noting transaction logs for local city tax assessors, who deduct the mandatory 3% local sales levy upon the exchange.

Guildhall Provisioners and Artisan Collectives

  • Official adventuring guilds, scout syndicates, and ranger factions operating out of major cities with populations exceeding five thousand maintain dedicated quartermaster supply depots within their guildhalls.
  • These facilities do not sell broadly to the untrained public, focusing their inventories on tested gear that can be requisitioned by recognized members who openly display their guild or faction badges.
  • Active guild members in good standing who have maintained their monthly dues of one gold coin per rank receive a 10% discount on the item’s baseline value for their Tier 1 rank, reducing the acquisition cost from a standard 200 silver coins down to 180 silver coins (or 18 gold coins).
  • Avatars attempting to sell the item to a guild quartermaster receive standard appraisal rates deposited directly into their World Bank ledger, though non-members are turned away entirely or charged full retail without negotiation.
  • Because guildhalls operate under military and civic charters within major settlement boundaries, all official transactions are logged, and any foreign citizens attempting to buy or sell through these depots must pay double the customary transaction administrative surcharges.

Island Port Curio Shops and Maritime Traders

  • Situated along busy wharfs and docks where inter-island sailing vessels arrive, specialized curio and maritime navigation shops cater to travelers traversing coastal reefs and island archipelagos.
  • The availability of woven frond mantles in these seaside stalls fluctuates heavily depending on seasonal shipping routes, storm patterns, and the flow of trade from western ocean currents, creating a pronounced seller’s market where prices spike when supply is low.
  • Acquisition costs in these port shops range between 250 and 350 silver coins (25 to 35 gold coins, or equivalent in electrum) due to import tariffs, the 1 silver per person seaport entry fee, and the 5% border tax levied on goods transported across regional boundaries.
  • When an avatar liquidates the item to a maritime curio dealer, the merchant strictly calculates the resale margin against local demand, offering around 180 to 220 silver coins while logging the seller’s identity for the port authority’s records.
  • Payments processed through these harbor shops utilize direct World Bank ledger transfers, incurring the standard 1% bank exchange fee rounded up to the nearest copper for non-standard coin conversions.

Black Market Smugglers and Shadow Brokers

  • Hidden brokers operating within illicit back-alleys, secluded dockside coves, or unregistered subterranean enclaves deal in unregulated, salvaged, or stolen adventuring gear outside the scrutiny of the Royal Court.
  • These covert dealers operate completely outside the World Bank system, rejecting digital Mind’s Eye transfers and demanding physical, hard currency paid exclusively in precious metal coins such as gold or silver to ensure absolute anonymity.
  • When purchasing the mantle from a shadow broker, a buyer must pay the full asking rate or an inflated premium, often ranging from 300 to 450 silver coins (30 to 45 gold coins), with no discounts granted for faction affiliations or social status.
  • When selling the mantle to a black-market fence, the dealer keeps all transaction details strictly confidential without keeping logs or alerting municipal guards, offering a standard merchant rate of 150 silver coins, or up to 300 silver coins if the broker has an urgent, immediate buyer seeking untraceable camouflage equipment.
  • Black market transactions entirely bypass city sales taxes, state tariffs, and banking transaction fees, though the buyer and seller bear full personal risk regarding item authenticity and immediate physical theft while carrying heavy coin pouches.

Tactical Roleplay Application across Varied Environments

Dense Rainforests and Coastal Mangroves

  • Defensive Roleplay: When tracking through tangled coastal mangroves or dense fern forests, the avatar uses the mantle to vanish into the dense undergrowth. As aggressive predators approach, the wearer activates the Foresight of the Gaze, intuitively crouching near lichen-covered roots. Roleplaying the movement involves the player narrating how the fronds adapt to the damp bark textures, masking the character’s breathing and warmth to let territorial monstrosities pass within arm’s reach without triggering combat.
  • Offensive Roleplay: Prior to launching an assault on a pirate encampment nestled along the tree line, the scout conducts the Visionary Ambush Trace ritual. Chanting the soft matakite cadence for over six seconds among the mossy branches, the avatar foresees the patrol route. When the lead sentry steps into the anticipated clearing, the avatar springs forward, leveraging the surprise bonus on the d20 roll and channeling the 1d4 Tier 1 damage die seamlessly through their initial strike.

Arid Volcanic Slopes and Rocky Badlands

  • Defensive Roleplay: While traversing jagged basalt terrain near active fissures, standard green foliage would normally stand out. The wearer channels the makutu sorcery to force the harakeke fibers to dull into ash-gray and charcoal hues. If an aerial beast circles overhead, the player narrates the avatar flattening against a volcanic boulder; from beyond thirty feet, the mantle breaks the silhouette entirely, causing the predator’s visual checks to fail against the stone.
  • Offensive Roleplay: In an open gorge where cover is scarce, the avatar initiates combat against a raiding party by closing the distance across exposed ground. By invoking the Prophetic Step with a sharp somatic chant, the wearer gains the Blurred condition. The player describes illusory afterimages rippling across the ash clouds, confounding enemy archers and allowing the avatar to strike an isolated foe while incoming counter-attacks suffer disadvantage.

Subterranean Cave Systems and Undercity Vaults

  • Defensive Roleplay: Deep underground where luminescent fungi and dripping stalactites define the terrain, the avatar utilizes the mantle’s scent-trapping weave to evade blind subterranean predators that hunt by vibration and smell. When cornered in a damp cavern, the avatar invokes the Shrouding Ward of Makutu as a silent action. The player narrates pulling the bone toggle, unleashing a silent ten-foot pocket of cool mist that conceals the entire party’s tactical retreat into an adjacent shaft.
  • Offensive Roleplay: When stalking an underground enclave of smugglers, the wearer observes the guards from the ceiling crevices. Using the mantle’s intuitive sight cues, the avatar times a drop directly behind the rearguard. The player roleplays the sudden, silent descent from the darkness, delivering a swift weapon strike using full Tier 1 damage before the surrounding enemies realize their perimeter has been breached.

Urban Settlements and Steampunk Metropolises

  • Defensive Roleplay: Within crowded industrial districts thick with boiler exhaust and mechanical conduits, the avatar drapes the mantle to resemble soot-stained canvas or utility clothing. When pursued through alleyways by corrupt city enforcers, the wearer utilizes the environment’s high steam levels to obscure their trail, ducking into a cluster of steam pipes where the garment mimics metallic plating and damp bricks, misleading pursuers whose visual focus is deflected away by the matakite weave.
  • Offensive Roleplay: During an infiltration of a guarded warehouse near a municipal shipyard, the avatar uses the garment to bypass rooftop watchposts. The player narrates slipping between rotating search spotlights, timing each dash to the mantle’s predictive hum. Reaching the target, the avatar silently triggers an ambush, catching the sentry flat-footed and completing the take-down within a single fluid action of drawing, striking with added magical force, and securing the perimeter.

Perception of Activation:

Sensory and Extra-Sensory Breakdown

  • Visual Perception:
    • User’s Perspective: The user perceives the edges of their peripheral vision softening into a translucent, violet-tinted ripple as the frond fibers pulse with glowing purple veins, while the surrounding environment appears heightened in contrast, marking optimal pathways of shadow and physical cover.
    • Observer’s Perspective: An observer sees the outer woven flax and fern leaves rapidly shift in tone and pattern to mirror the immediate backdrop, while the wearer’s silhouette blurs and dissolves into a hazy, shimmering mirage.
  • Auditory Perception:
    • User’s Perspective: The user hears a low, harmonic hum akin to wind whispering through high mountain grass, followed by the complete muting of their own footsteps, gear clatter, and breathing.
    • Observer’s Perspective: An observer perceives an abrupt deadening of localized environmental noise, hearing no rustle of foliage or sound of footfalls from the direction of the activated mantle.
  • Olfactory Perception:
    • User’s Perspective: The user smells an invigorating, crisp surge of crushed river ferns, petrichor, and damp coastal soil as the inner lining binds to their shoulders.
    • Observer’s Perspective: An observer notices that any distinctive scent of the wearer, such as leather, sweat, or food rations, is instantly replaced by a subtle, ambient scent of wet moss and earth that blends seamlessly into the surrounding wilderness.
  • Tactile Perception:
    • User’s Perspective: The user feels a sudden drop in temperature along their collar and shoulders as a soothing, damp cool spreads across their upper body, while the weight of the garment seems to lift and become nearly weightless.
    • Observer’s Perspective: If an observer makes physical contact with the active field, the space feels like passing a hand through dense, chilly mist that offers slight static resistance without finding solid form.
  • Gustatory Perception:
    • User’s Perspective: The user experiences a faint, mineral-rich aftertaste of fresh rainwater and herbal tannin on the back of the tongue upon completing the activation chant.
    • Observer’s Perspective: An observer in immediate breathing proximity might catch a faint, metallic herbal taste in the air if they inhale within the newly manifested condensation ring.
  • Extra-Sensory Perception — Divinatory Foresight:
    • User’s Perspective: The user experiences intuitive, split-second mental precognitions of where nearby creatures intend to look, allowing preemptive adjustments in posture before an observer’s gaze arrives.
    • Observer’s Perspective: An observer feels a subconscious sense of misdirection, repeatedly finding their gaze sliding off the concealed area and focusing elsewhere without understanding why.
  • Extra-Sensory Perception — Arcane Mind’s Eye Resonancy:
    • User’s Perspective: Through the Mind’s Eye, the user views glowing arcane threadlines of makutu and matakite sorcery tethering their physical presence to the localized elemental weave of the world.
    • Observer’s Perspective: Observers utilizing True Sight detect a soft, ultraviolet radiance weaving through the ambient air in shifting spiraling patterns around the wearer’s concealed footprint.

Positives and Negatives

  • Positives:
    • Grants near-total visual and acoustic concealment against standard mundane perception.
    • Masks natural biological cues such as body scent and radiant heat, rendering standard beast-tracking senses ineffective.
    • Provides split-second predictive awareness of incoming lines of sight to maintain optimal positioning.
    • Lowers the wearer’s perceived mass, facilitating silent and agile movement over unstable terrain.
  • Negatives:
    • The cold, damp sensation of the activation can cause physical numbness over extended deployments in freezing weather.
    • The constant influx of predictive sensory feedback through matakite foresight can induce mental strain or brief sensory disorientation.
    • Emits an ultraviolet signature easily detectable by entities equipped with True Sight or higher magical sensory gear.
    • Sudden disruption or physical strikes against the mantle instantly break the sensory concealment and force the item to unattune.

Crafting Recipe: Mantle of the Veiled Frond-Sight

Materials Needed

  • 1 Tier 1 Magic Crystal (coin-sized and weighted, to serve as the core catalyst and magical battery for the enchantment).
  • 18 Mature Harakeke (Flax) Leaves (harvested fresh from coastal or temperate riverbanks).
  • 12 Preserved King Fern Fronds (treated in salt-water brine to prevent drying and brittleness).
  • 2 Carved Beast-Bone Toggles (sourced from the limb bones of a medium or large predatory creature).
  • 30 Feet of Spun Plant-Fiber Cordage (braided from inner tree bark or heavy hemp).
  • 1 Flask of Tree-Specific Sap (harvested with a fluid collector from an ancient hardwood to bind the herbal fibers).
  • 1 Vial of Ground Luminescent Moss Extract (to establish the reactive ultraviolet channel for makutu sorcery).

Tools Required

  • 1 Fluid Collector (syringe apparatus with needle for fluid harvesting).
  • 1 Bone-Carving Scrimshaw Chisel and Mallet.
  • 1 Weaving Shuttle and Wooden Loom Frame.
  • 1 Fiber Stripping Knife.
  • 1 Alchemical Pestle and Mortar.
  • 1 Inscribing Stylus (for etching rune pathways into bone).

Skill Requirements

  • Alchemical Crafting: Rank 2 or higher (to refine the sap and moss extract into a stable binder).
  • Textile/Weaving Crafting: Rank 3 or higher (to execute the dense overlapping harakeke plaiting).
  • Magical Crafting / Runecraft: Rank 2 or higher (to inscribe the matakite foresight matrices and channel the Tier 1 crystal).

Crafting Steps

  • Prepare the Fibers: Using the fiber stripping knife, remove the dull outer skin of the harvested harakeke leaves, extracting the strong muka fibers within. Soak both the muka fibers and the preserved fern fronds in a shallow bath of tree sap mixed with crushed luminescent moss extract for four hours to imbue the plants with arcane permeability.
  • Carve and Inscribe the Fasteners: Take the two beast-bone toggles and use the scrimshaw chisel to shape them into smooth, curved fasteners. With the inscribing stylus, etch the dual spiraling runes of makutu (warding) and matakite (sight) into the surface of each toggle.
  • Embed the Catalyst: Carefully bore a central aperture into the inner receiving toggle. Insert the Tier 1 coin-sized magic crystal securely into the void, sealing the seam with the remaining alchemical tree-sap compound so the crystal sits flush within the bone.
  • Warp and Weft Foundation: Set up the wooden loom frame with the braided cordage. Begin weaving the muka flax base in a tight, diagonal plait across the shoulder collar, ensuring the structure creates an airtight, dense backing that can trap warmth, scent, and sound.
  • Layering the Fronds: As the collar descends into the mantle, hand-weave the preserved fern fronds into the outer layers in a downwards shingling pattern. Anchor the spine of each central leaf directly to the underlying muka cords to ensure structural durability and flexible mobility.
  • Rune-Tethering and Channeling: Connect the carved bone toggles to the collar’s front edges using braided cordage. Thread thin, sap-coated fibers from the embedded magic crystal through the structural spines of the central fern leaves to form the dormant purple vascular channels.
  • Final Attunement Infusion: Suspend the completed garment on a stand during the early morning or evening transition. The crafter must channel their focus through the inscribed toggles for twenty minutes, reciting the binding incantations to link the botanical weave to the ambient arcane flow, completing the mantle’s capacity for environmental camouflage and foresight.

Unseen Stalker and Whispering Leaves of First Horizon

In the many turns of the great moon before the counting of the nine thousand cycles, when the sky-fire Helios rose from angles not yet measured by the builders of stone, there lived a hunter upon the wet shores named Tane-Kauro. The words carved upon the shattered clay cylinders speak of his bloodline as coming from beyond the great waters, where the sky had no giant face of swirling vapor looking down upon the world. He was a man of quick feet, but his belly was often empty, for the beasts of the ancient island were large, fierce, and possessed many eyes that could smell the heat of a mortal shape through the thickest moss.

In that dawn era of the waking dirt, the wild monsters created from the grand menagerie of the Earth Mother roamed the high ferns. Among them was the Great Razor-Beak, a terrible prowler with the talons of an eagle and the heavy shoulders of a cave-stalker, whose hunger was never made small. Tane-Kauro wished to gather the sweet tubers and the nesting eggs that lay upon the high volcanic cliff, but whenever he stepped from the shelter of the river reeds, the beast did cast its sharp sight upon him, roaring with the fury of elemental fire and chasing him back into the freezing surf.

Tane-Kauro sat beneath the shadow of a weeping tree, speaking sorrow into his own hands. There came to him an ancient woman of the village named Marama-of-the-Two-Gazes, who was known to carry the sight of what had not yet arrived, being a matakite of the deep spirit-lines. Her speech was twisted with the ancient tongue, and she said to him, “You walk as a red fire upon a black hill. The beast sees not only your meat, but it sees the place where your feet will go before your body has chosen to run. To be not eaten, you must look into the tomorrow of the beast’s eyeball.”

Tane-Kauro did not understand the heavy meaning of her breath, but he bowed his head and brought to her eighteen leaves of the tall river flax, pulled when the dew was green, along with twelve fronds of the ancient king fern that grew where the cold springs leaped from the stone. Marama took also the leg bone of a fallen horned creature and cut upon it the marks of makutu, which is the binding of shadows and the turning aside of spears.

For seven days and seven nights, while the great moon eclipsed the sky into darkness, the seer did not sleep. She chewed the bitter bark of the ironwood and spat the green juice upon the cords of flax. She sang into the marrow of the bone, commanding the spirit of the wind that sleeps inside the fern to hold its breath whenever a hunter had fear in his breast. With her crooked thumbs, she wove the leaves one upon another, like the scales of the deep-water swimmers, and placed a tiny crystal of glowing purple light inside the bone toggle so that the garment would drink the mist and stay wet forever.

When the craft was finished, she placed the mantle across the shoulders of Tane-Kauro. The translation states that when the bone toggle clicked against his chest, his skin turned the color of damp tree trunk, and his breath smelled no longer of meat or sweat, but of crushed herbs after a great rain. He looked down and saw his legs, but when he looked into the pool of water, he saw only the reflection of the sky and the ferns behind him.

“Go now,” Marama spoke with a voice like dry sticks breaking in the brush. “When you walk up the path of black rock, you will feel a sharp twitch within your liver. That twitch is the eye of the monster turning toward the leaf. When the liver twitches, you must become stone. You must not blink, you must not spit, and you must not remember that you are a man. You must believe you are only a wet fern growing upon the dirt.”

Tane-Kauro climbed the high cliff of the volcano where the Razor-Beak had made its lair. The path was narrow, surrounded by thorny scrub and jagged basalt. As he reached the plateau where the golden eggs lay resting upon a bed of dry moss, the great beast stood upon the rock above, lifting its horned head to sniff the wind. Tane-Kauro felt a violent pulling in his side, an extra sense of the matakite magic showing him a vision of the beast’s head snapping toward his left shoulder.

Remembering the words of the seer, the hunter dropped to his knees and pulled the edges of the green mantle tightly around his neck. The sorcery of the makutu woke instantly; the long fronds rippled with a quiet purple vein and then took into themselves the dark gray of the volcanic shale and the pale yellow of the cliff lichen. The beast looked down directly into his face with its four yellow eyes, but its mind could not find him. To the monster, the hunter was only a clump of ancient river weeds that had taken root upon the stone.

The beast walked past him, its heavy talons striking the rock only a hand’s breadth from Tane-Kauro’s foot. The translation notes that the wind carried no sound from the hunter, and the terrible predator grew confused, scratching its beak against the cliff in anger before leaping into the sky to hunt in the distant valleys. Tane-Kauro arose silently, took the sustenance his people required, and walked down the mountain without breaking a single twig or leaving a print upon the mud.

For many years, the mantle kept the village alive through the seasons of famine, allowing the hunters to walk among the deadliest creatures of the wild lands as if they were ghosts made of water and moss. But the story tells that Tane-Kauro eventually grew proud, believing that because he could not be seen, he could never be touched by the laws of the earth, leading to great misfortune when he forgot that the mantle hides only the body, while the spirit remains tethered to the ground.

Moral of the Story: True survival requires not only hiding from the eyes of the world, but knowing when the world is looking, for the wisest hunter does not conquer the wild by force, but by bending his nature to become one with the earth.

Suggested conversions to other systems:

Call of Cthulhu (7th Edition)

Mantle of the Oceanic Seer (Enchanted Artifact)

  • Description: A woven capelet of preserved archaic fern and flax fibers, secured by an inscribed scrimshaw toggle made of non-terrestrial bone. When draped across an investigator’s shoulders, it dampens biological scent, muffles physical vibration, and bends ambient lighting around the user.
  • Sanity Cost to Attune or Activate: 1D3 Sanity points upon securing the mantle and opening the mind to its alien, precognitive visual cues.
  • Inherent Concealment: Grants a flat bonus die on all Stealth checks when remaining motionless against natural or weathered surfaces. The artifact traps body heat and personal scent, rendering standard scent-tracking or thermal detection ineffective against the wearer.
  • Preemptive Evasion (Matakite Foresight): Once per encounter, when the investigator is targeted by an incoming physical attack or ambush from an unseen entity, the wearer receives an involuntary flash of precognitive sensory feedback. The wearer may immediately spend 5 Magic Points to gain a bonus die on their Dodge roll against that specific attack.
  • Veil of Makutu: The wearer can focus their will and spend 8 Magic Points to create a localized shroud of thick, translucent condensation spanning a 10-foot radius. This obscurement lasts for 1D6 rounds, imposing a penalty die on all ranged combat attacks made into or out of the mist.
  • Mythos Insight Burden: Wearing the mantle while encountering hyper-dimensional entities or Mythos horrors causes the precognitive threads to violently misfire. Any Sanity loss suffered from witnessing unnatural beings while the mantle is active is increased by +1 point.

Blades in the Dark

The Ghost-Frond Shroud (Arcane Gear — 1 Load)

  • Description: An arcane garment made of treated spirit-dampening botanical fibers, interwoven with an electroplasmic crystal core set into an etched bone clasp.
  • Quality and Tier: Tier I (Fine Arcane Gear).
  • Shadow-Weave Masking: When you attempt to blend into dim lighting, industrial steam vents, or overgrown ruins, this gear provides +1 Effect level to your Prowl actions. The fibers absorb physical noise and personal scent, allowing you to slip past guard dogs, spirits, and automated sound-detectors without raising an immediate alert.
  • Matakite Reflex: You may take 1 Stress to preemptively react to an incoming threat before it manifests. This allows you to declare a flash of foresight, granting you +1d on an Action Roll to avoid or counter an ambush, or improving your position from Desperate to Risky on an evasive maneuver.
  • Makutu Mist Ward: You may push yourself (take 2 Stress) to activate the crystal core, unleashing a dense, static-charged burst of chilling vapor that blankets your immediate area. For the next few moments, you gain Potency on all actions taken to vanish, disengage, or slip away from an engagement.
  • Drawback: The artifact resonates strongly on the spectral plane. When active, it emits an unnatural ultraviolet hue visible to ghosts, Whispers, and entities attuned to the Ghost Field, making complete supernatural concealment difficult against attuned occultists.

Dungeons & Dragons (5th Edition)

Mantle of the Matakite Scout Wondrous Item, Uncommon (Requires Attunement)

  • Item Properties: While wearing this mantle, you gain a +1 bonus to Armor Class, and your movement produces no audible sound, granting you advantage on Dexterity (Stealth) checks made to move silently or hide within natural foliage, rocky terrain, or heavy mist.
  • Foresight Step: When a creature you can see targets you with an attack, you can use your reaction to invoke the mantle’s predictive magic. You gain the benefits of the blur spell until the start of your next turn, causing all incoming attacks against you to be made with disadvantage. Once used, this property cannot be used again until you finish a long rest.
  • Shrouding Ward: As an action, you can speak a command word to cause the mantle to emit a 10-foot-radius sphere of dense, magical mist centered on yourself. The sphere heavily obscures the area for 1 minute or until a wind of moderate or greater speed (at least 10 miles per hour) disperses it. The mist moves with you. Once used, this property cannot be used again until the next dawn.
  • Scent and Temperature Shielding: You cannot be tracked by non-magical scent or thermal senses while the mantle is drawn over your shoulders, and you gain resistance to environmental cold weather effects.

Knave (2nd Edition)

Woven Mantle of the Seer (Item / Armor)

  • Inventory Cost: 1 Gear Slot.
  • Armor Check: Provides +1 to Armor defense (worn over the shoulders; stacks with light armor but does not replace standard cuirasses or shields).
  • Natural Camouflage: When stationary against natural stone, vegetation, or within mist, the wearer cannot be spotted by mundane sight beyond 30 feet.
  • Predictive Dodge: Once per day, when the wearer fails a Wisdom or Dexterity saving throw against an incoming attack, trap, or hazard, they may declare a split-second premonition and reroll the saving throw, taking the higher result.
  • Mist Shroud: Once per day as an action, the wearer may channel the bone toggle to produce a dense cloud of damp vapor that fills a 10-foot area around them. The mist lasts for 10 rounds (1 exploration turn), blinding mundane vision within the cloud and allowing an automatic escape from non-magical pursuit.
  • Durability: 3 Quality. If the wearer suffers a critical hit from an enemy attack, the mantle loses 1 Quality point. When Quality reaches 0, the bone toggle shatters and the item becomes unusable until repaired by a skilled weaver or runecrafter during downtime.

Fate (Fate Core / Condensed)

The Shroud of the Matakite Weaver

  • Aspect: Preserved Fern-and-Flax Shroud of the Prophetic Seer
  • Inherent Stunt — Foresight of the Approaching Gaze: Because you wear an attuned mantle woven with predictive matakite threads, you gain a +2 bonus to your Stealth or Defend rolls when attempting to avoid visual detection or ambushes, provided you have remained in the same physical zone since your last action.
  • Inherent Stunt — Makutu Shrouding Ward: Once per session, you may spend a Fate point to immediately create a situational zone aspect called Blinding Vapor Shroud with one free invoke, representing a dense, cold cloud of magical condensation that blankets your current zone and hinders all line-of-sight attacks.
  • Extra / Rule Feature — Scent and Temperature Masking: The garment completely suppresses your biological scent, radiant body heat, and the rustle of physical movement. Opponents attempting to track or detect you using purely mundane senses, thermal tracking, or animal scenting cannot invoke situational aspects related to tracks, scent trails, or acoustic noise against you.

Numenera & Cypher System

Phasic Fern-Weave Shroud

  • Level: 3 (Artifact)
  • Form: A shoulder mantle crafted from preserved, bio-synthetic fern fronds bound with organic muka fibers, fastened by a carved predatory bone clasp containing an embedded luminescent crystalline nodule.
  • Depletion: 1 in 1d20 (checked whenever an active effect is triggered).
  • Effect (Constant): The wearer is treated as specialized in Stealth and evasion tasks whenever remaining stationary against natural vegetation, rocky terrain, or industrial mist. The garment suppresses personal scent, biological heat signatures, and movement noise.
  • Effect (Action): The wearer triggers the bone clasp to activate one of the following abilities:
    • Prophetic Blur: For the next three rounds, all Speed defense rolls to avoid incoming physical or projectile attacks are modified by one step in the wearer’s favor.
    • Shrouding Vapor Field: Releases a 10-foot (3 m) radius sphere of thick, cooling mist centered on the wearer that heavily obscures the area for ten minutes or until dispersed by high winds.

Pathfinder (Second Edition)

Veiled Frond Mantle Item 2, Uncommon, Divination, Illusion, Magical, Invested

  • Price: 30 gp
  • Usage: Worn cloak; Bulk: L
  • Perception and Defense: While you have this mantle invested, you gain a +1 item bonus to Stealth checks to Hide and Sneak in forested, mountainous, or misty environments. The dense botanical weave muffles your footfalls and traps your natural scent, making you undetected by creatures relying solely on the Imprecise Senses of scent or thermal tracking.
  • Activate — Prophetic Displacement: Single Action (concentrate, verbal); Frequency: Once per day; Effect: You speak a short matakite phrase of deflection. The mantle shimmers and grants you the concealed condition against all creatures until the end of your current turn, even if you do not have physical cover or concealment.
  • Activate — Shrouding Mist: Two Actions (manipulate); Frequency: Once per day; Effect: You manipulate the bone toggle to unleash a burst of damp fog. This functions as an obscuring mist spell centered on your square, producing a 10-foot-radius cloud of mist that lasts for 1 minute before dissipating into the surrounding air.

Savage Worlds (Adventure Edition)

Mantle of the Veiled Frond-Sight

  • Item Classification: Major Magic Item (Shoulder Slot, Weight: 2 lbs)
  • Camouflage Weave: The wearer gains a +2 bonus to all Stealth rolls made to conceal themselves or move silently within wilderness, subterranean, or foggy settings. Mundane beasts and trackers attempting to track the wearer via Notice checks based on scent or hearing suffer a -4 penalty.
  • Power (Foresight Evasion): Once per encounter, the wearer can tap into the matakite foresight within the bone toggle as a Free Action. When targeted by an incoming attack roll, the wearer imposes a -2 penalty to the attacker’s Trait roll for that single attack as the garment’s predictive magic triggers an evasive blur.
  • Power (Obscuring Fog): As an action, the wearer may channel the makutu enchantments to cast the obscure power centered on themselves (using an effective arcane skill die of d8). The dense, damp cloud fills a Medium Blast Template and persists for 3 rounds before fading, providing Heavy Cover to those within.

Shadowrun (Sixth World)

Talismanic Frond-Weave Cloak (Magical Focus / Gear)

  • Classification: Force 2 Sustaining / Quieting Focus (Shoulder Slot)
  • Karma Cost to Bond: 4 Karma
  • Availability: 4 (Rare / Talismonger)
  • Inherent Camouflage Rating: Grants a +2 dice pool modifier to all Stealth + Agility tests when attempting to hide or move unseen in natural vegetation, misty terrain, or damp industrial sectors.
  • Acoustic and Thermal Masking: The woven organic flax fibers suppress the wearer’s acoustic output and biological heat signature, applying a -2 dice pool penalty to opposing Perception tests made with acoustic sensors, ultrasound, or thermographic vision.
  • Preemptive Evade (Matakite Divination): Once per combat turn, when targeted by an incoming physical or projectile attack, the wearer may spend 1 point of Edge to execute an immediate defensive premonition, adding the item’s Force (+2) as bonus dice to their Defense test.
  • Makutu Vapor Burst: By spending a Minor Action, the user commands the talisman to unleash a localized 5-meter cloud of dense, cool vapor. The cloud functions as heavy smoke, imposing a -4 dice pool visual modifier to all ranged attacks passing through the area for 2 Combat Turns.
  • Astral Signature: When active, the cloak projects an active Force 2 Astral signature radiating a faint ultraviolet hue, making it easily detectable to Astral Perceiving mages and spirits.

Starfinder (Second Edition)

Phasic Fern Mantle (Hybrid Item)

  • Item Level: 2 (Uncommon)
  • Price: 450 Credits
  • Usage: Worn (Shoulder Slot); Bulk: Light
  • Capacity: 20 Charges (Uses 1 charge per activation; recharges via standard commercial battery or ambient environmental heat over 8 hours)
  • Environmental Camouflage: While wearing this hybrid botanical mantle, you gain a +1 item bonus to Stealth checks to Sneak and Hide in wilderness, fungal caverns, or foggy terrain. Its integrated field-dampeners suppress physical scent and thermal emissions, giving you concealment against creatures utilizing low-light, thermal, or scent-based imprecise senses.
  • Activate — Prophetic Phase-Shift: Single Action (concentrate); Frequency: 1/day (Costs 2 charges); Effect: The woven fibers pulse with purple light, predicting incoming attack trajectories. You gain the Concealed condition against all ranged and melee attacks until the start of your next turn.
  • Activate — Shrouding Mist Field: Two Actions (manipulate); Frequency: 1/day (Costs 2 charges); Effect: You activate the bio-synthetic bone clasp to vent a 15-foot cone of dense, cooling moisture that heavily obscures vision for 1 minute before dissipating into the surrounding atmosphere.

Traveller (Mongoose 2nd Edition)

Bioluminescent Chameleon Mantle (TL 12 Camouflage Armor Mod)

  • Tech Level: TL 12 (Specialized Xenobiological Artifact / Camouflage Wear)
  • Mass: 1.0 kg; Cost: Cr 15,000 (Black market / Research Station only)
  • Protection Bonus: Armor +1 (Stacks with standard non-powered armor suits, mesh, or cloth armor).
  • Dynamic Optical Blending: The surface layer of treated botanical polymers samples the surrounding terrain in real time, granting DM+2 on all Stealth (DEX) checks when moving slowly or remaining stationary in forested, planetary wilderness, or dense fog.
  • Sensor Dampening: Integrates thermal and acoustic baffle channels, imposing DM-2 on opposing Electronics (Sensors) or Recon checks attempting to detect the wearer via infrared or acoustic detection arrays.
  • Micro-Condenser Fog Discharge: The wearer may pull the central bone toggle to vent a high-pressure cloud of condensed water vapor filling a 3-meter radius around the user. The cloud blocks line-of-sight visual targeting for 3 combat rounds, granting DM-2 to all incoming weapon attacks during that period.
  • Fragility: If the wearer sustains damage exceeding their END characteristic from a single physical hit, the crystalline toggle fractures, disabling the active camouflage until repaired with an Electronics or Science (Life Sciences) check at TL 12.

Warhammer (Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 4th Edition)

Mantle of the Emerald Augur (Enchanted Trappings)

  • Item Type: Shoulder Mantle / Cloak (Encumbrance 1, Quality: Fine)
  • Availability: Exotics / Talismanic Craft
  • Armour Points: Provides 1 Armour Point to the Body and Arms against non-magical strikes.
  • Stealth Trait (Chameleon Weave): When moving through woods, marshlands, or damp ruins, the wearer gains the Stealthy Trait and gains a +20% bonus to all Stealth (Rural) Tests. The fibers deaden footfalls and trap body odor, making tracking dogs and predatory beasts suffer a -20% penalty on Perception Tests to track the wearer by scent or sound.
  • Matakite’s Premonition: Once per day, when the wearer is targeted by a Melee or Ranged attack that would cause a Critical Wound, the mantle’s latent divination triggers a frantic premonition. The wearer may spend 1 Fortune point to automatically treat their Dodge Test as having an additional +2 Success Levels (+2 SL).
  • Shroud of the Deep Woods: Once per day as an Action, the wearer whispers a word of power to release a thick bank of damp river mist extending in a 2-yard radius around them. The cloud counts as Heavy Obscurement, imposing a -20% penalty to all Ballistic Skill and Weapon Skill tests directed at targets within the fog for 1D10 rounds.
  • Arcane Resonance: The mantle channels raw Ghyran (Life) and Azyr (Heavens) magical winds. Witch hunters and spellcasters utilizing Second Sight perceive a swirling violet-green aura around the wearer, gaining a +20% bonus to identify the mantle as an unsanctioned magical relic.