Martial Discipline Guidelines

[Erth16]

I'm currently working on a martial discipline, and would like to know if there are any specific guidelines or conventions that are widely followed, such as number of maneuvers per level, stance placement, and the like. Thank you in advance.

[Zaydos]

In the official books stances tend to be 1st, 3rd, 5th or 6th, and 8th, although there are exceptions (Tiger Claw gets a 7th level one instead of a 5th or 6th one).

As for maneuvers 1 9th, 1 or 2 8th, 2-3 below that, and as many as 4 or 5 1st level ones (these numbers don't include stances).

Requirements vary but ~0 on 1st and 2nd, ~1 on 3rd-4th, ~2 on 5th-6th, ~3 on 7th-8th, and ~4 on 9th. Of course there are even more exceptions here than anywhere else. Tiger Claw has requirements on 1st level maneuvers, Stone Dragon has none on its 9th, Devoted Spirit tends to have fewer requirements, and Swordsage only ones

That's what I remember from when I went through ToB and figured these things out; unfortunately I lost my spreadsheet with everything so some of it might be off.

[Adam1949]

So far as I can tell, Martial Disciplines have a few basic ground rules to them, in addition to the ones that Zaydos already mentioned.

The discipline has 25 various maneuvers and stances, give or take about 5 depending on how you order it.
Only a few of the maneuvers care about what weapon you are using (unless your style is explicitly centered around such a thing, like Archery or Reach). Few, if any stances care.

[Amnoriath]

In general keep most of your maneuvers in the lower levels and gradually decrease to one. Also be sure you actually get to use the skill in question.

[Zaydos]

Also double checking things, I was wrong. Most disciplines only have 2 or 3 maneuvers (not counting stances) at any level; Desert Wind is an exception having the most maneuvers of any discipline.

In official disciplines no maneuvers care about what weapon you're wielding beyond that it's a melee weapon, except for those that require 2 weapons (it's feats that care about what weapon you have).

In my opinion Amnoriath is right that you want to have the skill actually be used, although many of the official disciplines don't do it.

[Erth16]

Thank you for the help, when I looked through Tome of Battle I couldn't discern the different little nuances myself, such as the 25 total maneuvers or the general stance placement, mostly thanks to Tiger claw, and had completely forgotten about the prerequisites.