Altanian warriors who have proved themselves in battle are inducted into one of their clan's Warrior Lodges. All but the smallest clans have several Lodges. Warrior Lodges are normally for men only, with the exception of the female-only Ivory Swan Lodge. Each warrior lodge is headed by a Sword Knight, a great warrior who wields an ancestral blade and follows the Way of the Sword founded in ancient time by Bondorr, the ascended hero. There are also itinerant or questing Sword Knights. There are inner mysteries which only the Sword Knights are privy to.

Each clan within a geographic area such as the Carnelian Plains typically has the same or similar set of warrior lodges (White Wolf, Ivory Swan, etc), 4-8 per clan, so the lodges are cross-clan, create some cross-clan affinity, and are thus a useful social glue when eg Altanian war leaders need to gather the clans for major warfare. Naturally they are also rivalrous intra-clan, and compete to see eg which can carry out the most successful raids, gather the most orc heads, etc.

A typical Altanian clan has around 200 combatants (varying from around 30 to over 300), not including elites/leaders like the Sword Knights. Around half (100) of those are bravos, half are Lodge warriors, typically 5 Lodges with around 20 warriors per lodge. Men, even married men, tend to spend more time in their communal Lodges than in the huts of the womenfolk, who do all the vegetable farming and gathering of produce.

Sword Knights

The most common Paragon Path for the Sword Knight PCs is Sword Master, one who has devoted himself to mastery of his ancestral blade.

Sword Master

Prerequisite: Fighter

You and your blade are as one. You are a master of the sword, able to employ your steel in ways that no lesser warrior can even imagine.

SWORDMASTER PATH FEATURES

    Steel Defense Action (11th level): When you spend an action point to take an extra action, you also gain a +4 bonus to AC and Reflex until the start of your next turn.
    Steel Grace (11th level): When you charge with a light blade or a heavy blade that is not a polearm, you can use cleave, reaping strike, sure strike, or tide of iron in place of a melee basic attack.
    Steel Blitz (16th level): When you score a critical hit with a light blade or heavy blade, you regain the use of a fighter encounter attack power that you have already used during this encounter.

Precision Cut: Swordmaster Attack 11

You slip your blade past an enemy’s armor and slice your foe just so, leaving a bleeding gash.

Encounter