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The sun is a god of supreme and all-encompassing power. He is untouchable and perfection is his breath. The light of the sun is the rectification of wickedness and the inspiration of great and heroic deeds.

The sun is not a god of mercy or hope. He is a god of power, conquest and pride. He faced the universe emperor and overthrew them, yet choose to sacrifice the crown of the cosmos in order to preserve the existence of free-will.

Some people are touched by his light, and they can draw power from his legacy and story. This MP shop represents the powers and blessings you can receive by committing yourself to his path and narrative (by spending MP). These blessings are not physical objects, but supernatural powers or obvious magical enchantments.

Characters with a strong connection to the sun, such as those with a Connection skill or those with a Superior skill or Affliction marking them as an Anthol of the sun, can purchase these blessings anywhere- so long as the sun's light has ever touched that place. However, this divine connection is build on the principles of the sun, and so it is closed off for 1-3 chapters after a character takes a Wicked Action involving any of the following:

Turning from a promise or oath you have sworn.
Turning from a conflict that challenges your supremacy or honor.
Allowing yourself to be subject to corrupting social or physical influences, like poison.
Willfully harming someone you believe to be innocent or worthy of protection.

Other characters can sometimes gain access to this MP shop as the reward for an Aspect 5 quest, in lieu or in addition to a perk.

Accumulated blessings dissipate naturally at the end of each Book.

Sample blessings:

1 MP

A wisp of blazing solar purity that takes root in your soul. It gives you a +1 Tool bonus to resisting a specific type of temptation, so long as your Vice issue is 2 or less.
The power to summon golden arms that aid you in combat, but only against the wicked foes of the sun. This gives you a +1 Tool bonus in such circumstances.
An unstoppable resolve. This grants a +2 Tool bonus to calling on courage in the face of death or danger.
A use of the Well-Lit power of the Creature of the Light arc.

2 MP

A golden halo, mandala of golden fire or something similar. This ethereal blessing marks you clearly and undeniably as a true scion of the Sun. This acts as a miracle that allows you to communicate your role as someone connected with the Sun to anyone and anything, including ancient spirit-servants of the sun, lesser solar deities and foes the sun. This is a miracle with infinite uses.
The sun perfects and uplifts your strengths. This blessing grants a +1 Tool bonus when using any skill you have a 3+
A use of the Divine Warrant power of the Creature of the Light arc.

4 MP

This power rejects the sovereignty of death over the sun. As long as you possess a Vice of 2 or less, this miracle can be used as a single use of the Immortality power offered to Immortal Arcs. For characters with that ability, it instead grants free Strike equal to their arc.
The sun is an unparalleled conqueror, you are no less. This blessing manifests as some solar-powered extension of your natural fighting abilities. It's obvious, flashy and supernatural. It conveys a +2 Tool bonus to conflicts that make use of it.
- A 15XP Gold Anytime quest can alter the nature of this blessing to instead grant you supernal talent in your highest mundane or superior skill.
This blessing passively grants you a potent aura of light. This light can be indefinitely wielded with your mundane intentions to harm or inflict pain on creatures of darkness, or other thing anathema to the sun. However, you can cause the light to break out into an unbearable solar corona. This fills a neighborhood sized region with your aura, which holds the temperature and luminescence of the surface of the sun. It's utterly indiscriminate, and doing this expends the blessing.

Miraculous characters who are able to purchase blessings like this can slowly internalize the powers it offers as permanent Perks with appropriate quests. If they complete an Aspect 5 or Mystic 5 quest, they can gain possession of the Blessings power of the Awakening arc as a perk. This would initially closely mimic the blessings offered here, but invocations of that power could (of course) allow them to change those. Like any character, they can benefit from their own blessings by spending the requisite MP.

A Magical Skill

The most perfect of Kingdoms was built on June 16, 1932 on a beach in Spain.

It was children who built it. They piled onto the beach as the tide fell down, reached the still wet sand and began their ambitious architectural work. A mound of sand to shape into a towered castle was first, then tiny buildings to sit in its shadow, then a wall to protect them from returning waves and errant crabs.

It was a work of care and love, with carefully shaped columns and the best seashells one could find. As they worked, the sand seemed to be more pliable to their will, acting to show their dreams of the best of castles rather than what their hands could achieve. Birds swept low, dropping feathers and interesting leaves or flowers. Crabs build a pile of shells and stones outside the walls. The tides themselves brought forth the best of building materials for them to use. As they finished, late in the afternoon, and the tide was lapping at the edges of their walled city, tiny flowers began to grow, anemones and carnations and poppies. They dances through the little streets and atop the walls and castle like proud residents. A delicate purple orchid sat near the top, on a balcony, like a queen surveying her kingdom.

The children stood still in awe of this that they had created, and then a gentle wave struck the walls and finally cracked them. Water began to flow into the small streets.

As their parents called them to leave, the children knew their kingdom had but a few hours remaining.

But they knew then that beauty held in the heart can never die.

( Read more... )

Transmigration of the Soul
Major Mystery Virtue

Like the infamous Damhan-Allaidh, you have mastered the trick of allowing your soul to travel into a new body when killed, while preserving some of your own knowledge, personality and magical talents.

At any point after gaining this virtue, you may perform an act of ritualized sacrifice. At the end of that ritual, you prepare your body and your soul to transmigrate to a new body. When performing this ritual, you may choose to sacrifice some of your knowledge to bind some of the magical taint upon your soul into the dying body.

You choose any number of Warping points to leave behind, once you die (Below). This can reduce your Warping score. For each point of Warping you lose, you also lose five experience points in one of your abilities and five experience points in one of your supernatural or arcane abilities, or arts.

Roll a stress die. Once that number of years has elapsed, your body dies and your soul enters the body of a newborn within several hundred miles of where you died. If you suffer death or some other permanent change to your state of being, such as Final Twilight, before this time then you are unable to transmigrate your soul.

This new incarnation carries over your personality traits, but reduces them to no more or less than +2 or -2. Your mind is fresh and new, and it takes several years for memories to begin reasserting themselves- potentially allowing you time to grow or change as a person.

Your new incarnation may have Characteristics that differ from your previous incarnations, and lacks any Story flaws or Social status virtues that are no longer relevant. You may choose to change your character’s General, Social Status and Story virtues or flaws to suit the new incarnation, but otherwise you maintain all Virtues and Flaws from previous incarnations. If your prior incarnation had the Gift, this one does as well.

Naturally, this new incarnation lacks any aging points or decrepitude of prior incarnations.

Supernatural powers and Virtues, including Hermetic ones and knowledge of Arts or Arcane abilities, do not flow back naturally and must be remastered and learned (as described below). Your new incarnation does, however, always carry any supernatural or hermetic flaws from prior incarnations.

You do not automatically maintain any previously held mundane abilities or knowledge, starting with the normal amount of experience in abilities for a character of your age. However, your lost mundane abilities return to you as your memories do. Each year past your tenth year of life in your new incarnation, you gain an additional 15 experience points that you may divide between any of your previously known General, Academic and Martial abilities. This additional experience may only be spent on abilities previously held and may not be spent to raise those abilities higher than they were in your previous incarnation, accounting for any lost knowledge or abilities from shedding warping points with your transmigration (above). This explicitly allows you to learn abilities that would be otherwise unavailable to your background.

Your supernatural knowledge requires active effort to regain. When your soul is transmigrated, record each supernatural, hermetic or mystery virtue you possess, as well as the level of all supernatural or arcane abilities and arts. If your character has a score of less than three in a supernatural or arcane ability, or less than five in an Art, then your knowledge of that power is lost with your transmigration. Otherwise, you may regain any prior knowledge by any of the normal methods- practice, study or otherwise. You are treated as if you had a score of 0 in any applicable ability or art, save that you may not use any of the magical effects of that ability or art until you have at least a score of 1 in it. You ignore the penalty for learning new supernatural abilities or arts for those you previously held.

You may regain Virtues using similar methods. For each season spent practicing by meditation, research or attempts to recapture your lost powers, you gain 5 experience points towards any previously held virtue. Once the experience placed towards a particular virtue reaches 15 for minor virtues or 21 for major ones, your lost occult knowledge returns and you regain that virtue. The only distinction for this process is this virtue itself- the benefits of this virtue, allowing the character to relearn previously held knowledge, remain even before you relearn it. Without the virtue, however, they cannot attempt the ritual to be reborn once more.

For every three levels of supernatural abilities regained, or every five levels of arts, you increase one of your personality traits from your prior incarnations by one, up to the maximum of their previous intensity.

There is an unexpected consequence of your period of relearning your previously held supernatural powers- any power, art or virtue that you have yet to remaster or relearn does not count towards the difficulty of learning new supernatural abilities or having one’s gift opened to a new tradition. This can potentially allow a patient or clever character to gain new powers with each incarnation before remastering those previously held.

So, I wanted to discuss the potential of an AU for Ars Magica in which a different house provoked the Schism War, so that House Diedne survived to the game period.

I composed a few possibilities for what the presence of house Diedne might do to the development of hermetic magic and proposed a few of the other houses to be the victim of the Schism War (and how this impacted general hermetic magic and culture).

The survival of House Diedne led to the development of more flexible magical techniques- both due to the presence of a house who specialized in spontaneous and flexible magic and also because of the lack of a political prohibition into such areas of research.

As such, all Hermetic Magi have the Flexible Formulaic Magic virtue as a standard part of Hermetic Magic.

Additionally, the presence of more specialists in Aquam and Aurum magic led to the eventual partial integration of the Elementalist virtue. Hermetic Magi may, when opening the arts of an apprentice, grant them the Affinity virtue for one of the four elemental arts.

However, the magic of the house that fell during the schism war suffered from political repression and the extinction of many of their magical practices.

Some possible candidates:

House Verditius was long a proud house with many secrets. After rumors of them practicing rituals that could damage or even destroy the Gift reached a peak, a story began to spread of a young magus who, after offending a powerful Verditius maga, had his gift utterly sundered by a powerful magic item she wielded. Distrust and envy turned to panic rapidly as a magi, whose name and house are lost to history, presented such a sword as evidence of the house’s wrong-doings.

Struck deep by the fear of the loss of their magical power, the other houses mobilized quickly and turned on the Verditius. Magic rumbled across the Mediterranean Sea as they laid siege to the final sanctuary of the cursed house- Mount Etna.

Eventually, the remnants of the house were scattered or destroyed- dragged from the smithies, tools broken and lives ended.

The hermetic order still has a strong cultural prohibition against creating more magical items that are strictly necessary. Those that are created are expected to be clearly reported to the local tribunal. Those with unusual talent in artifice are often accused or brought to trial for being secret Verditius wizards.

Hermetic magic in this timeline suffers from poor magic item creation, from the loss of so much knowledge and the cultural backlash that followed. This offers some of the following problems:

The Linked Trigger and Concentration item modification effects are not available.
Charged items are noticeably worse- a charge is gained for every ten levels, or fraction thereof, of a magus’s lab total.
Finally, when making instilled items all hermetic magi act as if they had the Waster of Vis flaw.

Characters with the Verditius Magic Major Virtue ignore these limitations for magic item creation in addition to gaining the benefits of both the Verditius Magic minor virtue and the Verditius Elder Runes minor mystery virtue. It also conveys the Dark Secret flaw, in that the character is secretly a descendant of house Verditius.

House Bjornaer, always a house with strange and pagan seeming ways, began to experience problems when other magi began to accuse them of stealing and devouring gifted children in dark and diabolic rituals for their own personal power. Rather than responding to these accusations, the house simply became more and more insular and distant. Eventually, an investigation led to the discovery of one of their sacred cultic sites. It’s unclear what was found there, but the response from house Bjornaer was absolute, brutal and a complete violation of the code.

Seizing on this, the other houses began to agitate and push until open warfare broke out. While the initial conflict was explosive, the war soon began to become a long and drawn out struggle. Bjornaer Magi disappeared into the wilderness- taking refuge in the seas, skies and forests. It became increasingly difficult to even find them, and they would emerge explosively from unexpected places- often in vast and terrifying monstrous forms.

The Order of Hermes never really won the Schism War- they simply reached a point where the Bjornaer attacks became rarer and rarer as their numbers dwindled.

Because of the incredibly prolonged war the Order suffered, their magic has become more focused on survival and defense. Theoretical research flagged.

This version of the Order lacks the innovations that allow Vim to affect Realms other than Magic.
Circle magic was never properly integrated from the tradition of the Columbae- it exists within the order as a minor Hermetic virtue.
Additionally, the continual unexpected death of magi left many apprentices without proper tutelage- many hermetic wizards suffer from Hermetic flaws such as Deficient (Form).

Shapeshifting into animal forms is considered, legally, a forfeiture of one’s hermetic rights- much like entering another Magi’s sanctum. The threat of beast-wizards has driven the Order to paranoia. Displaying one’s familiar with incredible openness is very common in the culture of the order, as this is seen as one of the few definitive ways to identify someone as being of the proper Order.

Characters with the Bjornaer Magic Major Virtue have the Heartbeast Minor Virtue and one of the three Inner Mysteries of the House (HoH:M pg 30-33). Capable of turning into beasts of legend, terrifying chimeras and elemental monsters- the Bjornaers have become few but fearsome. Unlike what Hermetic Magi fear, few Bjornaers try to infiltrate the order. They live in isolation or work alongside traditions of Folk Witches that they have adopted and mold into a facsimile of the old House Bjornaer. Bjornaer Magic gain the Enemies (The Hermetic Order) Major Flaw.

There are non-hermetic Bjornaer characters. These are typically Folk Witches who exchange their Shapeshifter ability for the Heartbeast Ability. Some Bjornaer magi have taken their connection to their new covens even further, setting themselves up as the bestial queens or gods of these witches and granting them other mystery initiations adapted from Bjornaer magic.

At least one has taught her flock the coveted secrets of the Parma Magic and hopes to one day lead them against the Order in terrible vengeance.

This is a magical skill for a very common type of character in anime and young adult fiction. It’s for characters who live in a world full of demons, ghosts or monsters that normal people can’t see or interact with- but who corrupt or drain ordinary people.

But you are a magical hero! You are a hunter of demons!

You protect people’s lives!

This skill has the following non-magical techniques:

0: Sense the presence of sinister intent, dark spiritual forces or other unclean energy.

The following are magical techniques of this skill:

0: See and hear most manifested demons or wicked spirits.
0: Endure the curses or powers of most wicked spirits or demons.

1: After a few hours or scenes, locate the source of a spiritual corruption or danger.
1: Constrain or ward off most manifested demons or wicked spirits.
1: See or hear very sneaky, subtle or unmanifested spirits or demons.

2: Free someone from demonic corruption or possession; or, allow them to eventually recover from spiritual or magical wounds caused by the same.
2: Locate the source of a spiritual corruption or danger by the end of this scene.
2: Endure the powers of a notably powerful demon or wicked spirit.

3: Exorcise, destroy, cage or otherwise permanently deal with most wicked spirits or demons.
3: Banish a notably powerful demon or wicked spirit from this world for at least a few sessions or books; or, seal them away as a recurring minor character or mascot.

Magical Skill
This skill is not healthy. It isn't good for you. It is an obsession that will drive you to uncover things that should not be known. It will drain you.

It will separate you from your life. It will hollow you out and fill you up with the ceaseless need to know- that will be the only fire of your life.

It is a suitable skill for tragic occult detectives, arrogant scholars or servants of the Ceaseless Watcher.

Non-Magical Techniques

0: Discover a relevant folktale, dreadful past event or local legend about some supernatural force or event, after a few days of research.
1: Identify and name a known supernatural force at play in a place or upon an object or person.

Magical techniques

0: Have recording devices or writing implements on hand.
1: Discover a relevant folktale, dreadful past event or local legend with a few hours of research.
1: Cause a willing witness to give you a clearer, more detailed and more truthful account of a supernatural event they witnessed.
1: Decipher something in an archaic text, difficult format or something that's been slightly ruined or destroyed- like shredded files.
1: Recall some piece of public record, such as a phone number or encyclopedia fact, without ever having learned it.
2: Endure long and grueling research sessions without your findings suffering.
2: Understand a language you do not speak.
3: Coerce, with terrible supernatural compulsion, someone to answer a question.

The following are traditional bonds associated with this magical skill:

I am always wrestling with some question, enigma or mystery. Once I become attached to one, I dedicate all my time and energy to dragging it out into the light.
I can always be drawn into a mystery by…
- ...a blisteringly attractive person.
- ...an old friend in need.
- ...a member of a certain marginalized group.
- …the memory of someone I failed.
My enemies have plans and schemes, and I need to know what they are before it’s too late!
I feed off of the terror of...
- ...exposure or vulnerability.
- ... revealed secrets.
- ...observation, or the implication of having been observed.
- ....the violation of trust.
I am sustained by…
- ...other's recounted tales of horror and pain.
- …coffee and the hunt.
- ...the satisfaction of being proved right.
I make people feel like I know their secrets.
I am repulsed and weakened by uncanniness, distortion and ambiguity.
Regardless of their resolve, everyone speaks to me in due time.
In my questioning, I am so blunt as to be cruel.
I have very odd and distinctive eyes.

The following are some non-standard techniques associated with this magical skill. They are not inherent parts of it, but characters may pick them up as quest rewards.

0 - Manifest either viscerally physical or colorfully spectral extra eyes.
1 - Organize an archive such that anyone attempting to use it as the focal point of research spends hours instead of days, or minutes instead of hours, when performing research there. This fades after a chapter or two of you dropping the intention.
1 - Escape a complex maze, or lead a group out of the same.
2 - Escape a place that is supernaturally entrapping, alluring or inescapable.
2 - Cause a useful source or clue to some mystery you are studying to appear, after spending some time discussing theories and searching the records.
2 - Appear in a surreal and liminal spiritual space, or a dream, long enough to convey a message or observe something happening.
2 - Form a solid understanding of the underlying occult mechanics that govern a particular and specific type of supernatural power, being or place.
3 - Use a solid understanding of underlying occult mechanics to redirect powers, curses, influence or similar to another target, or ward an area against something that uses those mechanics.

And the tide rose,
And the fire came as it would, with all of its heat and agony.
The screaming pain of a world's death throes rang out in her heart.
It hurt. It ached with the dull, throbbing pain of an ancient wound.
Of a life lived in exhausted heartache and cruelty borne.

It would kill her and the world.
She should weep.
It should make her cry.
But quietly,
So quietly,
she whispered,
"It was just a foolish dream."

And try as it might, the fire could not eat her heart.
Because it had already drowned a tide of glittering obsidian.

Obsidian Tide of the Heart
Type: Chthonic, Bleak

0MP - Invoke this power, 1/book.
4 MP - While at Hollow 0 or 1, invoke this power an additional time.
2 MP - While at Hollow 2+, invoke this power an additional time.

This bleak power makes you apart from the world. It separates you from yourself, from them, from the foolish dreams of the heart.

You gain a point of the Hollow issue whenever you use this power.

Whenever you are exposed to one of the following, you may invoke this power:

A primarily magical, spiritual or metaphysical attack or danger.
A sudden swell of emotions.
A sudden recollection of a memory.

The offending threat faces an Obstacle and Auctoritas equal to your Hollow issue in order to affect you directly. If the issue is primarily an unthinking part of the world, it simply fails to affect you at all- you may take an Obstacle 0 action to simply avoid or quell it.

This protective ward lingers until the end of the scene, and can be applied to any broadly similar type of threat. Using the dark chill of the void to quash your feelings of angry jealousy could also oppose other angry, jealous or envious feelings, for example.

However, this power lingers in your soul. It inundates it. It becomes part of you. For the rest of the chapter, you are cursed with a hollowness in your heart. You suffer the same Obstacle and Auctoritas granted by this power on any attempt to:

Feel good about the world or yourself.
Feel love, joy, enthusiasm or any other positive feeling.
Open up to others, or for others to read your feelings and connect to you.

If this power is invoked while at Hollow 2+, this negative lasts instead until the Hollow issue is resolved.

If someone overcomes the lingering curse of this power by Making Answer to the Bleak, this may, depending on the desires of the character’s player, resolve the Hollow Issue or lower it to 1 or 2. But not always- sometimes the tide of night cannot be stymied by even the most heartfelt of efforts. There is no shame in the healing being long-fought and slow.

This perk is an appropriate miraculous perk for an Emptiness 3 or 4 quest. It could also be, in theory, the reward for a particularly long and awful Emptiness 2 quest.

Credit to @RoseMythos for her invaluable and insightful assistance in making this miraculous power.

(Trigger Warnings: Spiders, Manipulation)

The Mother of Puppets, who is named Destiny, has many arms and many legs. She lives in every small web woven in every dark corner. She lives in the way we convince ourselves that we are weak. She pushes into your mind and your life slowly, robbing you of volition by your own hands.

She is a sluggish, creeping poison and she is always hungry.

She is a great and terrible spider that tells you that power and control are the greatest gifts, because if you do not dominate others then they will dominate you.

Perhaps they already have.

The Mother of Puppets lies, and confesses her lies. She professes false plans and hides the truth. She speaks to you in your own voice. She robs you of certainty and stability. She eats at your mind and drinks your blood. She leaves behind cobwebs.

The Mother of Puppets has already begun to eat you. You just haven’t realized yet.

The name of the Mother of Puppets is Destiny- The fear that you are a passenger in your own life.

The heralds of the Mother of Puppets are webs; the sound of skittering; the sensation of presence when there is none; limbs touching you when you are alone; dreams of red lines in the sky.

The weapons of the Mother of Puppets are lies; premonition; fine grey strings tied to pale limbs; divesting you of responsibility; growing paranoia; an unwillingness to let go; your own hands.

You turn aside the Mother of Puppets by running fast and hard, shedding this life for a new one; by consigning it all to the fire; by the hands of someone else intervening.

The Mother of Puppets kills you by strangling you with your own hands; suffocating you in dark webs; making you drink poison.

The Mother of Puppets is drawn to a sensation of helplessness; a willing cessation of control; a desire for a higher purpose; a fear of spiders.

The Mother of Puppets hungers for your flesh made pale from lack of blood; your life, made hers by your own hand and not her intervention; sycophants who feed her to escape her jaws.

You may kill the Mother of Puppets by living your life without caring if you control it; turning her webs into inescapable infernos; feeding her to herself.

The Mother of Puppets is reborn when someone convinces another to lay down in a grave filled with spiders; one of her servants tries to take her crown in the false belief that she was free; when someone weeps into a shawl of cobwebs over the agony of choice.

You may avoid the attention of the Mother of Puppets by allowing others to help you without fear of their motivation; burning with passion without forethought; accepting the contradictions of free will and destiny as part of a life you can live with.

A watchful eye, a fluttering page.
Discovered secrets of the twilight age.
Fear, pride and cooling rage,
The men who made the mirror.

Molten glass and song of steel
Permit whispered thoughts to reality unreel.
At last their dead hearts fear do feel,
But still they work.
The men who made the mirror.

With hiss and crackle
And muttered word.
With hearts soaked in forbidden verb.
With whisper knife and guillotine ring.
And thousand spiders dancing on ancient string.
They labored their doom to bring,
The men the mirror made.

This is about a perk for CMWGE called Toxic Shine. It modifies the normal Shine skill. You are still charismatic, but it’s a dark charisma. You are not inspiring and uplifting. You are an object of obsession and fixation, and of reverence. Interest in you is sickly and draining and unhealthy.

Toxic Shine functions much like normal Shine, in that other people may use your Toxic Shine to form intentions. However, unlike Shine these intentions act similarly to Magical Skills. They face a natural Obstacle, which renders their use is draining and unnatural. Another character may use Toxic Shine to form intentions that:

Uplift, protect or directly benefit you,
Sacrifice themselves or their health for your sake,
Pursue your stated plans,
Pursue what they believe your plans to be, or
Endure unpleasant conditions in pursuit of an obsession with you.

These all face an Obstacle of 0 in a place that has been ritually dedicated to you in some way, or while in the Outside. They suffer an Obstacle of 1 in normal places and contexts, and an Obstacle of 2 in places that are notably distant from the Outside or spiritually distant from you, like a place that is consecrated to some principle or ideal that is antithetical to your own paradigm.

If a character uses your Toxic Shine to perform a magical technique with a skill that resonates with your personal ideals, principles, aesthetics or drives- such as one you possess or embody, then that character may claim edge up to the rating of your Toxic Shine.

Access to Toxic Shine is an appropriate reward for a Bindings 4, Otherworldly 3, Emptiness 4 or Mystic 5 quest. The character may convert their Shine into Toxic shine, or move a point from one of their inherent skills into Toxic Shine. Other perks that raise Shine may also raise Toxic Shine.

The Web
(TW: Spiders, Webs, Isolation and Manipulation, Loss of Free Will)
There is a thing that sits at the center of the world. It sits replete upon the wheel of destiny, and the laws of the world it weaves.

A strand of that web has brushed on your life. A bit of the terror of dominance, power, of being controlled and used- of manipulation and lies and paranoia- it has touched you.

How intermeshed will it become?

You may pick up the Web issue by…

Loitering in abandoned places filled with cobwebs and hidden spiders.
Being affected by, or pursued by, one of the acolytes or monsters of the web.
Being so afraid of someone controlling or manipulating you that you become isolated and hostile.
Being in the wrong place at the wrong time, because the world is terribly unfair.

Web 1

Omens of encroaching strings

Something skitters just outside of your line of sight. You feel like something far away is.. calling you. You feel an intention that is not your own. Your dreams are becoming strange.

It’s probably nothing, though.

Web 2

Signs and portents only you believe

You see them now. You see.. Something. Maybe fleeting dreams fill you with an unsettling sense of déjà vu. Or, just for a second, you see thin grey strings wrapped around your friend’s arms, vanishing up into the sky. Or you wake up every morning with webs woven between your hands.

Something is happening, you just can’t understand the pattern yet.

...but no one else sees it. No one else understands it. They can’t face the encroaching web.

At this point, traditionally, you begin to experience supernatural changes to your being. This manifests as a level 1 Superior skill. Often this is Superior Affinity to Spiders, but it can be any Superior skill that conveys extrasensory awareness, mental control of others, precognitive powers, skittering movement, lying prowess or affinity for webs and silence.

If this is the first time you are experiencing the Web issue, you may not manifest any power at all.

This superior skill remains until the issue is resolved.

Web 3

Establishing what’s controlling your life.

You see it all the time now, inescapably. You find yourself doing things sometimes, things you don’t really want to do, or you didn’t plan to do. You make decisions and find they somehow get passed over.

You see the lights in the sky that tell you what you are going to do in excruciating detail. You see the puppet strings that connect everyone and everything, winding into buildings and down streets. You see the men in black suits watching everyone and you see the people they take away.

The web is all around you.

At this point, you should establish what, specifically, is controlling your life.

What has your fear writ wide across your world?

Is it something like…

Premonitions that unfold in your waking dreams and extinguish any illusion you may have of your own free will?
A vast conspiracy that weaves through everyone and everything you know, revealing them all to be part of some organization or power that wishes you ill?
An unseen puppeteer that moves people by invisible strings, crouching like a vast spider in some unseen celestial web?
A vampiric cult that calls innocent people into the dark streets, only to suck them dry?
Something else?

This level of the issue intensifies your supernatural affinity with dark forces. You may raise the Superior skill granted by this issue to 2 and choose one of the following:

An affliction that revolves around destiny, your loss of control or the physical changes to your body and mind that are happening. It scales with the Web issue.
A bond representing your fear, fascination or desire for power and control. It scales with the Web issue.

If you choose to bear more of the power of the web, you may also complete the Acolyte’s quest to solidify your connection. The powers granted by this Issue typically vanish soon after it is resolved, but they may linger in much the same way you might keep a wound (Chuubo Core book, 129).

Web 4

A final moment of freedom

Despite the strangling cords of destiny. Despite the feelings of helplessness that wash into your soul- you have a moment, a chance to escape.

Perhaps you fought and marshaled your will. Perhaps a friend came through when you least expected. Perhaps the web just loosened, unexpectedly.

When your Issue reaches this level, you may make a choice to escape or to remain.

If you choose to escape, you may close out this issue by...

Choosing a fiery baptism, immolation, and reconstruction from the ashes.
Choosing desperate, sudden violence against them. Turn the tables.
Choosing to run away from this life, abandon order, embrace chaos and live.
Choosing to accept help, to put yourself at another’s mercy, to trust again.

It is possible that your choice may embrace another power to escape this one.

If, in this final moment, you falter and choose to remain, then your fate is sealed. It’s only a matter of time now.

Web 5

Make peace with how your dark fate will manifest.

The world seems so unreal.
The world seems so gray.
It wasn’t like this. It wasn’t like this.
You are surrounded by it.
Your body is not your own.
Your mind is not your own.
You do not control your thoughts, but-
Mercilessly your feelings are still your own.

They’re going to take you soon. They’re going to eat you. They’re going to render you down into whatever they wanted from you.

And the worst is, you know that the entire course of your life has been leading up to this.
Destiny is the tool of a dark and evil god, and you never had a choice to begin with.

This issue is resolved when you are taken by dark powers. The character disappears for a time, at least a chapter or so.

They may be dead, but they are always gone.

If they return, they are not the same.

Their player may move points from mundane skills into a Superior skill representing these changes, or rewrite Bonds or Afflictions to suit this. These changes always mark their connection to dark and insidious forces, to spiders and to consumption. They typically interfere with the character’s free will.

The Spider Acolyte’s Quest [30 XP]
Blue 1

This is a quest about cleaving to the dark powers. It is about becoming part of the spider, of the mother of puppets, of the web. It’s about giving in before you are eaten.

It is about forging a bond of fearful reverence with something that controls the world.

Major Goals

The HG may reward you with 5 XP when…

You wield vicious lies, rumors, cruel jibes or similar horrible tricks to hurt or coerce someone, or when you bear through and accept the same as an inescapable part of life.
You are subject to some kind of terrible psychic or mental trauma associated with isolation, spiders, authority figures or distant gods.
You begin to act, physically or metaphorically, like a spider.
Your Web issue rises to 4 and you choose to embrace, rather than reject the Web.
You accept, in your heart, that even an evil god is better than none.

You can earn each bonus once, up to a maximum of 15 XP.

Quest Flavor

1/chapter you may earn an XP towards this quest when:

[Green] You feel sick and terrible, and then see that it’s part of your metamorphosis. Describe the horrific changes in as much detail as you can bear.
[Green] You open a window or leave an external door uncracked so that spiders can enter.
[Blue] You experiment with wielding social conventions, power dynamics and lies to make your environment better for you.
[Gold/Green] You feel ecstatic joy at your body and mind doing things without your input or decision.
[Red/Gold] You flee from an alien being of burning hatred or ecstatic violence.

The reward for completing this quest is an Acolyte perk:

Acolyte Perk: You gain a Connection 1-2 for the Web as a concept. In addition, you are so deeply connected to it that you can never really escape- After resolving the Web Issue, you gain a point in it at the end of the current scene.

The tree is dark, the tree is ugly. It is a thing of bowed limbs and countless crevasses. Cracks and knobs in the wood reach out like eyes and open like hungry mouths.

It radiates a dark want. An unholy desire.

But the fruit is beautiful. There are so many- a thousand different kinds, shifting from day to day and hour to hour. Every color and shape imaginable is present. A cure for every ill and a balm for every pain is there, if you watch and wait.

If you give the tree what it wants, those things can be yours.

Traditional payments for the tree are written prayer, whispered secrets, beloved photographs, precious relationships and, in a pinch, blood.

This is formally an MP shop. The tree offers blessings that hold back or repel death, cure or heal injury or illness, break enchantments or curses or return to the dead to life.

Sample blessings:

1 MP

A simple bracelet woven from the tips of the lightest branches. The dark wood conveys a +1 tool bonus to evade the attention of ghosts or resist their ghost magic.
A bright and shiny apple that conveys a +2 tool bonus to resist a specific illness that is neither rare nor frequently fatal, like a cold or chicken pox. This benefit lasts about 2-3 books after the apple is consumed.
A twisted purple fruit that smells faintly spicy. This can restore the vigor and health of most domestic animals, returning them to the prime of their life and health. One use.

2 MP

A glittery blue pomegranate. It splits neatly into two parts and, if the halves are pressed together, returns to whole. It never spoils or goes bad. You gain a +1 tool bonus to attempts to heal physical injury or illness, so long as you give someone a seed from the fruit. The seeds are notionally endless, but you can declare that you’ve run out- or feed the whole fruit to someone, to increase the tool bonus to +3.
A star shaped and slightly hairy looking fruit that tastes absolutely dreadful. If someone under the effects of a curse of some kind, this fruit lessens the severity and side-effects of that curse. It can temporarily allow them to rewrite Afflictions, Wounds, Superior Skills or tweak the context of the Sickness issue. The duration of this effect depends on the perceived severity of the curse- if the character’s arc centers on the curse, then it usually lasts 1-2 chapters. If it is something that is a recurring problem they face, but their story centers on other things, then it may last until the end of the current book- or longer, if the book ends soon. If the curse feels minor enough, this can actually permanently alter the curse. This is a one use effect.

4 MP

A shriveled fig that can return the dead to life. If given to a ghost or similar undead creature, they become a living person once more. This can also be given to a dying person, or offered up ceremonially to someone a character knows who once died. The dead person returns, cured of whatever killed them in the first place. However, this is a taxing and very unnatural effect. All characters revived by this fruit bear a serious wound representing the way the forces of death continue to seek them out, the trauma they suffered as part of their return, or a way that death changed them. This can be healed with time and effort, as normal. If a character revived wishes, they may also use the moment of their resurrection to rewrite or reorganize their skills, or tweak bonds or afflictions to represent the change. This is a one use effect.

This is another version of the Tree of Monstrous Divinity miraculous perk, intended to be used as a mundane replacement. Access to this MP shop can be the reward for a Bindings 4 or Shepard 3 quest, in lieu or in addition to a perk.

A Ritual

This is a ritual for when your psyche is collapsing inward like a dying star, the many layers of your soul collapsing together in an explosive singularity. This is a ritual for facing the shadow memories of your loved ones as they cruelly pull open your chest, rip out the beating heart from within, and listen to your secrets.

This ritual is a trial, an interrogation, a collapse of the divide between us and them.
This ritual is unreal by nature. It is the blurring of boundaries and the haunting of the soul.

This ritual beings with a player saying, the gulf between souls is collapsing, and I have answers that need questions. I have fears that must be met.

And then..

You are falling.
You are falling into yourself.
You are collapsing like a star dying, the layers of your soul blending into one.

You fall down, down onto the throne of your soul.

The HG says: The Trial Begins.

The defendant's player write down the biggest fear, insecurity or problem. This is their great secret, which they will defend until the end.

Then, the defendant names four or five important people in their life. People who matter. People who they hold dear. The other players take the role of their character, or one of the people who resembles them or is heavily associated with them. They are the accusers.

As each accuser appears, they give shape and form to the mindscape around the defendant's throne- they weave the person's personal symbology and aesthetic into the world.
Each of the accusers take turns performing any of the following ritual actions:

Ask the defendant, "What do you fear I think about you?"
Ask the defendant about themselves and their place in the world.
Ask the defendant the question you think will hurt them the most.
Press the defendant to answer a previous question.
Describe, as a flashback, a time you and the defendant interacted.
Switch places with the defendant.

Whenever one of the accusers take an action, the defendant may respond with any of the following rituals actions.

The first time you answer a question, answer with a lie you tell yourself.
The second time you answer the same question, say something hurtful about the questioner, or have a flashback to a time you a moment you shared.
When you have no other choice, answer truthfully.

Additionally, the HG may take the following ritual actions:

Describe how the mindscape twists and changes with the memories and emotions.
Describe how the defendant and accusers are the same.
Describe how the trial is spiraling deeper and deeper into the defendant's psyche.

There once was a boy who was a good listener. As he had patience in spades and a clever way with words, he soon found he had many friends.

But the boy also had a spider nature, and this he feared.

For he could never really tell what was the call of his human heart and what was that of his innermost nature. Sometimes he asked himself if he had a human heart at all. It could be a cunning spider trick so well done even he was taken in.

The dark clouds of anxiety that troubled him swelled as he feared his friend trapped in an invisible web, being pulled ever closer to something he neither knew nor trusted.

He… detached. His heart was torn between his fear for them and his fear of the terrible silence of solitude. A web of deceptions was born to cover the clouds of his mind, for who could trust a boy with a spider nature?

They spun and spun…

Until his cocoon was so complete that he could no longer tell the lies from truth, the pure from the corrupt, the sincere from the artificial- and his every action only wound the webs around him tighter.

And to him, his heart said nothing at all...

Someone who possesses a spider nature may be represented be either the following Superior Skill or with an Affliction Perk, both detailed below.

Superior Spider Nature

1: You have the focus and patience required to be a good listener. You read just a bit more of the subtext of their words they really intend. You have a touch more social poise than normal, a way of knowing what people would laugh if they heard.

2: People like to be around you. They open up to you far more than they should. You don't read minds, but people make jokes about it. You have a keen knack for always knowing how people feel, and you can always read a room. You have to make a conscious choice to show fear, anger, impatience or anxiety. Not that you feel impatient much anymore. You could wait, completely still and silent, for hours at a time if you needed to.

3: It’s so easy for you to know what people want and what they are afraid of. You can tell by looking at people what their soft spots are- you can see the fractures of a person’s heart and know exactly where not to tread. Consequently, people adore you. You’re very comfortable to be around. You can just.. not say the things they don’t want to hear. No one feels they have to explain themselves around you, no one worries you’ll see what they’re like and leave.

….but you can also draw people close, even from a distance. People show up when you want them to. People call when you need them, they give you the things you require with barely any prompting. It’s impossible for you to show that you’re afraid, that you’re angry, that you’re anxious- the emotions slide off your face and out of your words, leaving charm and brightness instead. You couldn’t stop the people from laughing and coming closer, even if you wanted to.

As an Affliction Perk, Spider Nature scales off of Sickness or Hollow issues. It provides you with an increasing awareness of other people’s desires and fears as the issue’s rating rises. The HG can invoke Spider Nature to perform intentions that make people feel better around you, draw people closer to you, or prevent you from articulating your own feelings- even to yourself.

Whenever you want to say something, but can’t-
Whenever you want to push people away, but can’t-
Whenever you feel like your actions are manipulative and awful, but people just can’t see it-

The HG can award you with Will or MP up to the rating of the chosen Issue.

When the sound of war reached the village, they were sorely afraid.
For they had no warrior-heroes, no ancient sorcerers.
And the thunder of horses and the song of the sword would be their undoing.
But there was one woman who so loved her home that she took up the spear,
And they wove her the lion banner in the manner of their custom.
And she departed south to seek the Lion at the End of the World.

And the sands became as sun-bleached bone,
And the deserts as cremation ash,
And the heat beat without the comfort of brightness,
And cracked and thin, the woman continued to seek him-
The Lion at the End of the World.

The lion skeletons rose to meet her,
They snapped and yowled,
But they saw that by her banner she was beyond their reach-
The prey of the Lion at the End of the World.

And the mirages that danced with the faces of dead men,
And the villages conquered by the undying lords,
And the ghosts that howled all bowed their heads,
To her, the fool, who would duel him,
The Lion at the End of the World.

And his men did meet her,
Bound in armor as white as bone,
As dark as night,
And as silent as a hero’s grave.
The rode with her for a time,
For she was the woman who would face him-

The Lion at the End of the World.
When she came at last to his citadel,
Night-black and unlit,
Sitting in a field of bone wider than kingdoms,
The lone power of this dismal land,
The fortress of him-
The Lion at the End of the world.

So she entered and so she met,
So she saw-
Iron clad, giant of frame,
Agile like the lion, cruel like the snake,
A man who man betrayed; yet-
Death dared not claim.
Him, forsaken in his glory,
Black hearted and invincible-
The Lion at the End of the World.

So she raised her rusty spear,
And so she met him in battle.
Then, with a single motion,
An old technique long practiced,
She became a woman slain by him-
The Lion at the End of the World.

As his custom demanded,
He heard her then- The need that drove to death,
What had caused her to face the unfaced one,
The ancient lord of heat and violence,
Him that could not die,
The Lion at the End of the World.

So she spoke and so he heard,
And he returned to his iron throne,
And thought long.
For where warrior-queens,
Where heroes great,
Where monsters of dark violence,
Where all swords failed to reach his heart,
This woman, who faced certain death-
For the sake of home,
For the sake of people,
Who laid down her life in the name of others-
Troubled the heart of him,
The Lion at the End of the World.

And so when armies met,
When the lightning horses danced,
When the mud mixed with blood,
A single village of no import,
With no warrior-heroes,
Survived.
For at the gates, unweeping stood,
Him who had honor not forgotten,
The Lion at the End of the World.

A Superior Skill

The girl sits by the window. The winds howl outside with the storm and all the fury of nature is held back by a single pane of glass. She watches it, wordlessly, while wrapped in a blanket. A mug sits near her, cold and untouched.

She watches as the wind thickens with rain. She waits.

Minutes pass before she spots one, drifting against the wind. A small shell in the air, green and translucent. Then another, and another. Suddenly, a long, scaled shape darts out from above and snaps at the drifting school of shelled creatures, scattering them. The distant trees seem to get softer, and more indistinct. The wind gives way to a quiet pulsing, the air slows down and cools.

The girl watches the grass drift lazily and the trees sway slowly and gently. A large worm spins lazily just outside the glass. It pulses with colors as it extends and retracts spines, coiling through the air.

She reaches out to the window, pressing her hand against the cold glass. The girl stands up and swings the window open, and-

The sound of rain enters the room, the wet cold wind howls in. There’s nothing but trees and grass.

The girl closes the window and sits down. She waits.

( Read more... )

Mary Walsh talks to God.

This is not, itself, unusual. Most people who can see God talk to it at some point or another.

God was, after all, a permanent fixture in people’s lives. It looked out at the world with unblinking scarlet eyes that lurked in every shadow and patch of darkness and in the space between stars.

So Mary whispered to God at work, and chatted with it on her way home. She told it about customers who were rude and about vacations she could never afford. She told it about how her manager just never seemed to get her and how she was absolutely going to read that book her sister got her for yule. “It’s just a big commitment,” she’d say, “What if I reach a cliffhanger and then have to go to work, or answer a call?”

God never spoke back, and that suited Mary just fine. Everyone had heard about that time in Montana, after all, though people were saying that it’d be safe to go back in just a few more years.

But sometimes, sometimes people would come to Mary’s apartment and knock on her door to ask her for help. They’d tell her they were looking for a lost child or sibling or husband. That they’d met someone in their dreams who had stolen their heart and they just needed to know if that person was real.

Mary would invite them in, offer them some tea or coffee or hot chocolate and then ask them to have a seat while she set up a few things. Then Mary would go to her bedroom, close her door and sit down on the floor with a lit candle in front of her and a pen and notepad in her hands. She’d carefully put down the notepad and position her writing hand over it, pen poised. She’d take a deep breath and reach forward to snuff out the light, and then tightly shut her eyes.

Then Mary would let the pen go and count the seconds.

Her current record was twenty seven seconds before the pen hit the floor with a quiet click. Then Mary would say thank you to the room in general, reach out and light the candle by feel, and open her eyes.

Mary never read what was written on her notepad. She just tore the pages out, neatly folded them and handed them over. She always asked them to read them later, and would quietly usher them on their way. People sometimes asked if she wanted a reward, or offered to pay her, but she never accepted. It wasn’t as if she was doing anything, really.

Once they left, Mary Walsh would sink down into her comfy, beat up sofa. She’d spare a glance at the book her sister had given her before turning her TV on and settling into a rerun of her favorite sitcom.

She’d laugh along to the same old jokes.

And from the dark places of her home, God watched along with unblinking, crimson eyes.

The world is broken and mostly shit.
Don't give up or give in.
Fucking fight them. Fight everyone. If it has an ass, kick it.
If you have a problem with me, fucking fight me.
If people have a problem with you, I'll fucking fight them.
Feel the heat of your blood and know you are alive.
And as long as you are alive, you can fight.
Fuck dispassion. Fuck apathy. Fuck distance.
Die struggling to make a world you are proud of.

Current Mood: determined
Current Music: Disparity by Design

This is a move designed for Masks: The Next Generation, a PbtA game about teen superheroes. It is inspired by rituals from Chuubo's Marvelous Wish Granting Engine.

Previously, On Halcyon City

When it's been a while since your last session, the GM says, "Previously, On Halcyon City... (Or your local equivalent)."

The GM describes the camera panning over the various characters and locations in the game, and then, starting with the GM, each player does one of the following:

Describe one of your favorite scenes from the last session.
Point to one of your character's conditions, and describe who or what is responsible.
Play any song you feel is appropriate.
Highlight some simmering drama that was born in, or unresolved in, the last session.
Put the spotlight on a character you really liked from the last session, or someone you want to show up in this one.
Remind everyone if you grew closer to the team, away from the team, or into their own image of themselves; and why.

This continues until everyone is ready to start the session, and everyone has spoken at least once.