Legacy WOA30AE EN:Setting

Legacy: War Of Ages 30th Anniversary Edition / Contents

(NOTE: This is a work in progress.)

Chapter One: Setting

Her sword was heavy, too heavy, sticky-slick with blood. Too much of her blood, she knew. Swinging lamps overhead threw chaotic blue-grey light inside the abandoned warehouse. She was dizzy, reeling, legs cramped hard from fighting, running, fighting. Her heart pounded in her ears, refusing to stop though it had precious little left to pump. In the back of her mind she was vaguely surprised that she was alive.

Dead bodies wrapped in black with vague faces and slow leaking gouges littered the cold concrete slab. She kicked a cardboard box, desperate to shake her head clear, peering into the shadows swaying back and forth without rhythm. The hunters were hiding from her. Who were they? Before long they would spring, willing, grateful to die killing her.

The only door was blocked. Moving the fallen crates would leave her open to attack. She counted at least four when they retreated. She rotated slowly, expecting a sword flash from the shadow’s edge at any moment. Soon the hunters would realize how badly she was hurt, and close for the kill. Why was this happening? She spat blood, resisting the sweet release of death, listened to the muted church bells in the distance.

The Techno-Gothic World

The world of the twenty-first century is a study in contrasts. The technological innovations of the past two centuries make the previous two millennia seem ineffectual and stagnant. Humankind has sent its metallic children exploring all the planets of the solar system, and the time is coming when humanity shall slip the surly bonds of gravity to spread among the stars. Science has devised cures to the most terrifying illnesses of the past, including the Plague that threatened the human race’s civilization with collapse in the late twentieth century. Information has become the currency of the earth, with the Winternet connecting people on opposite sides of the globe as easily as calling a next-door neighbor.

Yet with all of humanity’s advances, the bestial nature of Man has not been overcome. With the slow dissolution of national and economic boundaries has come a new territorialism. Ethnic and cultural differences are seized upon and proclaimed sacrosanct by small-minded people who fear the loss of their cultural identity. Religious zealots seek to impose their twisted views of morality upon an unsuspecting and often apathetic populace. Megacorporations plot and play with the lives of millions, using advertising, subliminal messages, and mind control to create the perfect consumers, who buy anything and everything without asking themselves if they need it. Like too many rats in a crowded cage, humanity has begun to turn on itself, and news of serial rapists and ritual murderers are not only commonplace, but passé.

Look around you, and you see may see the world of Legacy, the Techno-Gothic world, where ancient mysteries exist side-by-side with technological marvels undreamt of a century ago. Think how revolutionary the invention of the simple transistor radio was. What would our culture be like if this contraption had never been created? To an Immortal born in thirteenth century Spain, the transistor radio appeared on the scene only yesterday. What we have become accustomed to in only the past twenty years, what we have come to take for granted in our everyday lives, has been around for only a few moments from an Immortal’s perspective. Yet these devices have changed the world.

Consider travel. To the average citizen of Europe in the Middle Ages, a trip to the next town was an adventure. Someone from as far as a thousand kilometers away would be considered exotic in the extreme, since the next country was often a trek of merely hundreds of kilometers. Yet riding only one hundred kilometers would take days of travel. The ordinary peasant and the typical merchant never went farther than 50 kilometers from where they were born. Today traveling a hundred kilometers is usually an errand of minutes rather than days, and few who do so pause to appreciate the remarkable devices which allow such freedom.

Now consider the impact these milestones of technology would have upon the psychology of beings to whom a simple telephone is strange and magical. The world and society of the early twenty-first century has similarities to the world Immortals have come to know and accept, but fundamental assumptions Immortals have held for centuries have been swept away in the blink of an eye. An Immortal who has lived in the megalopolis of New York for years may suddenly look up at the skyscrapers above her, eyes wide with fright, until she realizes they are only buildings, and that they have been there for decades. It is akin to the split-second panic you might feel waking up in a strange bed, until you remember that you spent the night at a friend’s house.

In spite of the fantastic accomplishments made by science in the provinces of medicine, agriculture, and electronics, the realms of the human heart seem as unfathomable as they were to explorers of the psyche over a century ago. The savages of our primordial past no longer stalk through wild jungles. They now hunt in the shadows of concrete and steel megaliths that touch the sky, waiting to pounce upon the weak or unwary. Warlords and despoilers no longer wear armor and lead bands of bloodthirsty mercenaries. They now wear suits and command armies of lawyers, but they are no less bloodthirsty. Every great advance has been accompanied by a new way for mortals to prey upon each other, a new way for the mean or depraved to maim the spirits and bodies of the frail or unsuspecting.

Superstitions which once seemed close to extinction at the sterile hand of science have returned to power. Religious institutions, weakened by the systematic encroachments of Science, have regained lost ground and become wealthier and more corrupt than ever before. The ignorant, the lonely, and the gullible embrace telephone psychics and video astrologers in attempts to find meaning in lives wasted watching home shopping channels. Urban myths of Bloody Mary and the Hook Man have been joined and succeeded by entities too monstrous to be imaginary.

The Techno-Gothic world is a source of great sadness to Immortals, who have seen its seeds in the metropolises and civilizations of centuries past. Too often, that which is good and beautiful perishes from the earth while that which is squalid and brutish survives. Only Immortals seem to have the depth of perspective both to appreciate the great wonders change has brought and to mourn the terrible depravity that seems so enduring. Mortals around them, with lives as short and fragile as that of butterflies, have made of their lives both a heaven and a hell; seemingly unappreciative of the one, and unaware of the other.

From the Dawn of Time

In this Techno-Gothic world, where science is doing the impossible and humankind is doing the unthinkable, walk beings who have watched humanity’s long childhood with more than casual interest. They keep themselves apart from humanity, for they know they would be hunted and destroyed if humankind knew of their existence. They are Immortals: that is their gift, and that is their curse.

Every culture has a myth about them. The Chinese called them Ba Xian (the “Eight Immortals”), and still use their symbols as good luck charms. They walked in gardens of Babylon advising Hammurabi, and fought against Rome in the Punic Wars. They explored the world with the Vikings, and they struggled against the despoilers who came to North America from beyond the sea. Every land on earth has been home to one or more of them, at one time or another, and Immortals have been born of every race and creed in all of humankind’s long and sordid history. Since the dawn of recorded time, Immortals have been among us, fighting their secret wars and awaiting Ragnarok, when the remaining Immortals will fight until there is but one survivor, the Last Immortal, who shall reap the Legacy.

This Fever Called Life

Immortals are born like anyone else, of a union between man and woman. They have a childhood, sometimes happy, oft times not, as mortals do. They live, eat, grow, and love like anyone else, but something sets them apart. Whatever it is that grants life to crude matter, that allows a mass of flesh and bone to walk and talk, whatever force motivates the mortal coil, this force infuses the Immortal with the power of life itself.

Immortals are able to shrug off injuries that would kill an ordinary being, but this is only a small part of what makes them special. Immortals feel pain as acutely as mortals do, perhaps even more so, but even the weakest of them has the stamina to withstand great physical trauma that would incapacitate a normal person. Indeed, the biology of the Immortal seems to defy the very laws of physics. Immortals need to eat, breathe, and sleep as mortals do, but lack of these things will not kill them, only make them weaker. An Immortal may survive underwater or without food indefinitely, only growing more feeble and less lucid as the days turn into weeks, and the months turn into years. Severed extremities (with one exception) will grow back in a matter of days, and even nervous system damage will repair itself. At least one Immortal has survived having the back of his head blown off with a shotgun, with only a memory loss to remind him of it.

Sex

Immortals are infused with the primal forces of life and vitality, and have the same drive to procreate as do mortals. However, where mortals give birth to a new generation, pass on what wisdom they can, and then return to the earth, Immortals do not naturally die nor do they have children. Despite the great passion and sensuality that nearly all Immortals possess, they are completely incapable of producing new life. Children, who for mortals are often the embodiment of hope that the future will be brighter than the present, provide immortality to mortals in a way that is denied to Immortals.

Immortals of both scientific and philosophical inclinations have struggled with this dilemma to no avail. When tested, Immortal men and women seem to be as fertile as their mortal counterparts, and most Immortals are possessed of even stronger carnal desires, yet all attempts for them to beget children have met with failure. It can be reasoned that since Immortals do not naturally die, there is no evolutionary need for them to bear children. It has even been argued that the lack of Immortal procreative ability is a survival trait, since immortal beings who could freely reproduce would rapidly overrun the ability of the planet to support them. Sadly, rationalizations such as these do not soften the psychological impact that Immortals are truly alone.

Aging

An extensive amount of discussion has centered about the apparent cessation of the Immortal’s aging processes. In nearly all cases, the aging of an Immortal seems to slow when she reaches her late twenties. By the time she appears to be in her forties, centuries later, her aging has slowed to the point where it has effectively stopped. No further deterioration takes place in the Immortal’s body tissues; even teeth replace or repair themselves when damaged.

Some have theorized that the age at which an Immortal first experiences catastrophic bodily injury, which would cause the death of a mortal, may somehow catalyze the mechanism which arrests the aging process. Investigation has disproved this theory, although it remains a popular misconception among Immortals. No correlation has been found between the time of an Immortal’s first brush with death and the apparent age at which an Immortal’s biological decline stops.

This, the fact that Immortals do not appear to age, is the greatest obstacle to sustaining the fiction of mortality so imperative to an Immortal’s survival in mortal society. While grievous injuries can be downplayed as near-misses, and a feat that would be impossible for mortals to perform can be rationalized as the result of adrenaline or sheer luck, the lack of an Immortal to exhibit any sign of aging after several decades is more difficult to explain.

Relocation can minimize the risk of discovery of an Immortal’s secret by neighbors or business associates, but the greatest threat in the twenty-first century comes not from people, but from computers. The bureaucracy which mortals have always used to keep track of themselves has developed into a sophisticated worldwide system of terrible power and efficiency. Financial transactions, driver’s permits, criminal histories, and all manner of clerical records are monitored, sorted, and stored by the vast computer resources of the world’s governments and financial institutions. With the advent of the Winternet at the turn of the century, what had formerly been discrete islands of data became a colossal sea of information. Fortunately for Immortals, human bureaucracies are still inefficient enough to let incongruities such as those caused by Immortal activities be classified as errors in the system.

Still, it is only a matter of time before the traditional methods of pursuing Immortal anonymity will no longer be effective. A new era of mortal bureaucracy demands new methods of circumventing it. Post-Modern Immortals have become proficient at such latter-day feats of wizardry as computer infiltration counter-countermeasures and tailored viruses which penetrate and corrupt databases holding information that may endanger Immortal secrecy. These services are sometimes sought out by other Immortals to whom such technological innovations are still an enigma.

Death

The poetry of science has begun to find words to describe the Immortal condition, though few scientists are aware of Immortals or would admit it if they were. Scholars among the Immortals, and among those mortals who monitor Immortal activities, theorize that the Immortals carry certain recessive genes which allow their bodies to somehow repair damage at the cellular level. Others maintain that Immortals are hosts for some unknown microscopic organism, which repairs the host’s body whenever it is injured. They maintain that this organism must make its home in the spinal fluid, for it is only when the spine is severed that the Immortal is granted the True Death.

Those of a more mystic inclination contend that the life force of the Immortal has been somehow strengthened, so that it can maintain the physical shell and keep it from harm. As long as the energy conduit between the chakras of the head and heart is intact, they point out, the Immortal cannot die. And this may be true, for the one way, the only way, to inflict the True Death upon an Immortal is to sever her spine between her head and her heart.

Immortals are as anxious about the afterlife as mortals are. When an Immortal dies, her life force is visibly released as a storm of energy. Is this the soul? What happens to it? The question is complicated by the fact that, when an Immortal is killed by another Immortal, the survivor can absorb a part of the power and knowledge of the dead Immortal in an experience called the Rapture. If this life-energy is the deceased’s soul, how can part of it be absorbed by another? What happens to the rest of it? Does the Immortal’s consciousness survive death? These questions, whether asked by mortals or Immortals, have no concrete answers in this lifetime. It is up to each one to decide for herself what her place is in the great wheel of the cosmos.

The War of Ages

It seems inevitable that beings from disparate places and times, whose lives do not naturally end in the earth as those of mortals do, would eventually find each other. Knowing the history of humankind as we do, it seems just as inevitable that these beings would fight among themselves for supremacy. Imagine how baffling it would be for you, a primitive being of ancient times, to have an enemy whose existence you find intolerable, yet whom you are unable to dispose of in the manner to which you are accustomed. Imagine the frustration you would feel as you confront each other time and again across the ages.

Sometimes one of you would be victorious, sometimes the other, but the war would never end, because neither you nor your enemy could die. Imagine your shock and exhilaration when you discover the secret, the one way to inflict upon an Immortal the True Death. Imagine the ecstasy you would feel as your enemy’s life force flows into you, making you stronger and wiser than you were before.

This scenario has been playing itself out repeatedly since Immortals first found each other. It would seem that beings who live so long and experience so much would learn to rise above such petty concerns as power, wealth, or dominance, but it is sadly not so. Immortals are no less influenced by these worldly motivations than their mortal brethren, and they might be even more susceptible to these base desires. It behooves even a pacifistic Immortal to gain the proficiency with weapons necessary for survival.

Additionally, the beliefs held by Immortals are no more universal or unchallenged than those cherished by mortals. Often social upheaval in the mortal sphere has been but an echo of disputes among Immortals. The Age of Faith and the Age of Revolution were periods of great strife in both mortal and Immortal society. As Immortals learn of new ideas and new ways of doing what has always been done “the old way,” lines of contention are drawn and debates rage. Disagreements sometimes turn to violence, as traditional ideas and methods are challenged by new and untested theories.

Blood of Kings

In the ancient game of chess, there are three ways to prevent an opponent from claiming one’s King. The easiest option, and the one to which beginners resort most often, is to move the King out of danger. This is a short term solution, because the opponent will certainly attack again, and there will ultimately be nowhere left to run. Another tempting choice is to sacrifice another piece to block the attack. The final choice is to capture the opposing piece.

The War of Ages has much in common with the game of chess. Even an Immortal who does not wish to fight will someday be confronted by one who does. One’s options in such a circumstance are limited. Escape is almost always a possibility, but this only postpones the inevitable. An Immortal can send mortal retainers against an Immortal opponent to gain time or as a distraction, but using them to fight one’s battles is strongly against Immortal tradition and may make enemies of Immortals who had previously been neutral or even friendly. The time will come when a challenge is unavoidable, and there will be but one way to meet it: with steel and skill.

Why should someone whom an Immortal has never met be so determined kill her? What possible reason could another Immortal have for such unfounded animosity? Immortals do not have a subconscious imperative to destroy each other any more than mortals do, yet they have a more compelling reason to murder each other than any mortal could ever have: they have the Rapture.

The Rapture

The death of an Immortal is a momentous occurrence. The energies released from the Immortal coil are wild and potent, erupting through and around the corpse. Arcs of electricity may play across metal beams or the bodies of automobiles, bursting light bulbs and motivating electrical machinery, while waves of heat and light shimmer in the air, shattering windows and knocking over nearby objects. Gravity itself may run amok, lifting the dead body into the air, while the storm of released Immortal power rages around it.

If no other Immortals are nearby, this pyrotechnic display will expend itself in a few moments, dissipating into the environment. However, if another Immortal is nearby, the forces released by the death of her kindred will flow into her, filling her briefly with all the power, knowledge, and experience, the very life force, of the Immortal whose passing the rage of energy heralds.

This eruption of power is accompanied by an ecstasy, a crystalline awareness of cosmic proportions. For a moment, all too brief, the Immortal is one with all life on earth; her consciousness taking in all things, all the joy and sorrow, the pleasure and pain, felt by everything which lives in, on, or under the surface of the earth. No other experience can compare with this, and no Immortal who has once felt it can ever forget it, for this is the Rapture.

Nor does the Rapture pass completely, for as each Immortal is killed, a small part of her power and knowledge remains behind with the Immortal who witnessed her death. Thus, with each death, the remaining Immortals grow in power until the War of Ages culminates in Ragnarok, when those who have survived the past centuries shall cross swords, until only the Last Immortal remains.

Ragnarok

It is said that when the end of this age of humankind is near, great catastrophes shall sweep the earth. Earthquakes shall swallow cities, and tsunami shall wipe away coastlines. Fires and floods shall rage out of control, and humankind shall begin tearing at itself with bestial fury. The forces of nature shall run amok, heralding the end of an era and the beginning of another. Among Immortals this legend has many names, but the term most commonly used is Ragnarok. The myth of Ragnarok is a common one, and nearly every Immortal and mortal culture has some version of it.

Some Immortals reject the idea of Ragnarok and the Conclave (the final meeting of the surviving Immortals) completely. They assert that their fate is not governed by ancient legends, but by their own decisions. The destiny of mortals and Immortals lies in their own hands and hearts, they maintain, and they are not simply sheep to accept the pronouncements of prophets long dead as the only future available to them.

Thus, Immortals are no more in accord in their interpretations of the Ragnarok or Apocalypse legend than are mortals. Post-Modern Immortals, born since the Industrial Revolution, tend to dismiss it entirely as the result of elder Immortals’ superstition and fear. Even Immortals who profess a belief in the veracity of the Ragnarok legend are divided about its significance. However, most versions of the Ragnarok legend seem to center around the figure of the Last Immortal.

The Last Immortal

At the end of this Age, so most of the stories say, those Immortals who have survived the previous centuries of war and tribulation shall meet in a place of darkness, an ancient battlefield. At this time, called the Conclave, the War of Ages will be concluded decisively. When all Immortals have met on the field of battle, the lone survivor, the Last Immortal, will be heir to all the power of all Immortals who have ever trod the earth. What the Last Immortal will do with this power, often called the Legacy, is again a matter of some contention.

Some Immortals place a sinister cast about the myths of Ragnarok and the Legacy, saying it portends the end of mortal civilization. Immortals who accept this interpretation sometimes call Ragnarok the Apocalypse. The world is at an end, they say, and it will be up to the Last Immortal to judge humankind, weeding the worthy from the unworthy, the wheat from the chaff. Those deemed worthy will be allowed to live, to serve the Last Immortal for the rest of time. The Last Immortal will rule humankind as a parent rules children, enforcing rules and inflicting punishment for disobedience.

A less ominous and more recent interpretation places the Last Immortal as the mentor of humankind during the next step of human development: the exploration of the stars. As the repository of all the wisdom of all Immortals since the beginning of this epoch, the Last Immortal will use the Legacy to guide humanity and serve as an advisor. In this version of the legend, the Last Immortal would serve not as a parent but as a sibling to humankind. Another name for this interpretation of Ragnarok and the Legacy is called the Apotheosis.

A markedly different but no less common depiction of the Ragnarok myth places a twist upon the Legacy bestowed upon the Last Immortal. In this version, the Last Immortal will be granted the only thing denied Immortals: mortality. When the Last Immortal stands alone above the last of her adversaries, she will begin to age at a normal rate, to eventually grow old and die as a mortal human being. At that moment, when the combined life force of all the Immortals of history is released, the cycle shall begin anew and a new age of humankind will have begun. The War of Ages will begin again, as new Immortals are born and humanity continues to evolve.

Loneliness

Immortality has its costs, and chief among these is peace of mind. An Immortal can never allow herself to forget that she has enemies who will stop at nothing to see her dead. The most peaceful rest, the most idyllic vacation, is marred by the fact that her foes may strike at any moment. Another factor she must consider is that, while most Immortals will not deign to kill mortal bystanders to an Immortal battle, there are many who are not so fastidious. There are some Immortals who actually seek out the mortal friends and allies of another Immortal, hoping that by slaying her friends the Immortal will be weakened and easier to defeat.

Moreover, it is not easy for an Immortal to find meaningful companionship among mortals, for the gift of immortality is also a curse. Mortals can never truly understand the pain of repeatedly watching lovers and friends inexorably grow old and die. Any relationship in which an Immortal involves herself is doomed; too soon, mortal beauty fades and mortal friends return to the earth, leaving the Immortal only memories and sorrow.

A painful riddle of the Immortal’s existence, and a source of endless frustration for Immortals and their loved ones, is the inability of Immortals to bear children. No Immortal of either sex has ever conceived a child. Advances in medicine have had no success in resolving this puzzle. Immortal men and women seem to be as fertile as their mortal counterparts, and they seem to have an even greater willingness and desire to procreate, yet all of their efforts have been in vain.

Friendship

One way Immortals have traditionally been able to find companionship is in the training of another, less experienced Immortal. It is a painful truth that the student may someday become strong enough to return and slay the teacher, yet one Immortal may be willing to train another to become a more lethal adversary in return for that Immortal’s friendship. This illuminates a truth of the Immortal condition: the rewards of friendship are worth the risk of betrayal.

Ties of family mean little to one who has seen generations come and go, and national loyalties are meaningless when one has seen the rise and fall of nations and ideologies, but the friendship and trust of another Immortal is a sacred thing. Among Immortals, friendship is the highest bond that can exist between two people, surpassing restrictions of mortal law or cultural loyalty; no sacrifice is too great to make to avenge a friend. It is, perhaps, the great loneliness that comes with immortality that causes them to treasure friendship so.

Again and again, the Immortal will seek comfort in the company of others whose lives are measured in centuries rather than years, but even this pleasure is tainted. An Immortal can never be entirely at ease with another of her kind; each will wonder if the other can be trusted, if the other is even now planning to make the final cut. It is possible for Immortals to grow close, and eventually to trust one another, but there is no way to forget that in the end, but one will survive.

Tradition

Immortals, like all of humanity, are social animals. As such, rules of etiquette have developed which have facilitated their interaction over the centuries. Some of these customs are simply considered good manners, like the Introduction, while others are considered sacred and are passionately enforced, like Sanctuary. In general, older Immortals take tradition more seriously than do their younger counterparts, but there are exceptions on both ends of the age spectrum. Some ancient Immortals sneer at the various conventions of Immortal morality, deeming themselves above such trivial concerns, while younger Immortals who have had the benefit of an honorable upbringing respect the various protocols which have evolved over the long history of Immortal society.

Even so, the elder Immortals are the ones who are usually more concerned with propriety and the observance of established tradition. As age follows age and society changes ever faster, traditions which once were simply convenient or pragmatic become symbols of stability in an unstable, rapidly transforming world. Tradition is the archenemy of change, and is viewed by many elder Immortals, particularly those born before the European conquest of North America, as one of the few allies they have.

Immortals have violated the various dictates of etiquette many times over the ages, and will doubtless continue to do so. The chastisement they receive on these occasions is based upon who is aware of the transgression and upon how flagrant the offender is about her acts. Also, as in mortal society, individuals who are either favored or feared get away with more than those who are neither.

The Introduction

Immortals are able to sense each other’s life forces over short distances. This sense of another’s presence is called the Foreboding, and it has saved the lives of many Immortals over the ages. The ease with which one can detect another Immortal’s proximity is directly related to the power of the Immortal to be detected and upon the strength of will of the Immortal doing the detecting. Immortals who have gained great power over centuries of life and experience cast a much greater Foreboding than do Immortals who have yet to live a single century. This has done much to protect younger Immortals from the depredations of elder Immortals who would kill them before the young Immortals are old enough to be a threat to their elders.

The tradition of the Introduction grew out of the Foreboding. When one Immortal senses another for the first time, it is considered good manners to approach the other Immortal and introduce oneself. This custom is practiced inconsistently, at best, but it is usually safe to exercise in public places. Attacking another Immortal during an Introduction is considered terribly rude, but the Immortal committing such a breach of etiquette probably will not care.

Foreboding is covered thoroughly under Psychic Abilities.

Noblesse Oblige

According to the custom of Noblesse Oblige, it is incumbent upon older and more powerful Immortals to be generous and merciful to younger, weaker Immortals. It also implies that all Immortals should be magnanimous in their dealings with mortals. The most common form Noblesse Oblige took in years past was the sparing of an opponent’s life if the challenger was an Immortal with significantly less skill in combat.

The concept of Noblesse Oblige became popular during the High Middle Ages, a part of history some Immortals refer to as the Age of Faith. It was accepted throughout most of Europe that because nobles had immunity from nearly all outside authorities and were restricted only through their obligations to their sovereign, they had certain rights and responsibilities not required of commoners. These responsibilities included respect for other nobles and the dispensation of justice among the common people.

These concepts eventually grew to become the chivalric virtues associated with medieval knighthood. Although the idea of Noblesse Oblige was once a point of great pride among nearly all Immortals, its observance has long since declined. The modern world has little room for kindness to one’s enemies, and those who practice the principles of Noblesse Oblige in the twenty-first century should not expect the favor to be returned in kind.

Sanctuary

The tradition of Sanctuary is one of the most debated, yet one of the most inviolate, rules of Immortal etiquette. It is also perhaps the most ancient Immortal custom, pre-dating written records. The law of Sanctuary states that no violence of any kind is permitted against another Immortal on holy ground. There are no exceptions, and anyone who violates the law of Sanctuary will find herself completely without allies, and in the possession of a great number of new enemies.

The roots of the tradition of Sanctuary are clear enough, stemming from primitive humanity’s obsession with omnipotent and vengeful gods. Immortals were no less susceptible to this perception of the universe, and might even have been more inclined to accept it. After all, ancient Immortals had direct experience of the power of the gods in the form of their own bodies.

In modern tradition, holy ground is accepted as any place where the worship of any deity is practiced on regular occasions. A Catholic cathedral, an Islamic mosque, and a Native American prayer lodge would all be accepted as legitimate regions of sanctuary, while cemeteries or ancient burial mounds would not be unless someone were using these locations for their place of worship.

Immortals do not have an innate or supernatural sense of what is and is not holy ground. Typically, the location is obvious to the casual observer, such as with the case of a Jewish synagogue or a Buddhist shrine. However, if an Immortal made a claim for Sanctuary when the location was not obviously a place of worship, most Immortals would tend to give the supplicant the benefit of the doubt unless the claim was blatantly absurd. It is safer to live to fight another day than to risk violating the law of Sanctuary.

Single Combat

The tradition of Single Combat is the single most fiercely defended observance of Immortal etiquette. When an Immortal faces another Immortal in combat, no interference from mortals or Immortals is brooked by either side. The roots of this behavior are not clear, but it has a keen effect upon the War of Ages. Contempt for Immortals who violate the rule of Single Combat is almost universal. Those who are honorable and fair-minded support it as the only impartial way to resolve disputes among Immortals.

Even Immortals who have no respect for other Immortals tend to view Single Combat with arrogant protectiveness, since it ensures that the strong will always overcome the weak. In fact, those who defy the principle of Single Combat risk being hunted down by the most selfish and powerful of Immortals, since these are the individuals most threatened by those who violate this tradition.

So strong is the tradition of Single Combat that many older Immortals are loath to involve themselves with another Immortal’s plight even when it is in their best interests to do so. There are many beings, both natural and supernatural, which bear enmity toward Immortals. There are even mortal groups and institutions, known collectively as Monitors, which scour news sources for clues of Immortal activities, spying on and tracking persons they suspect of being Immortal. Woe to any Immortal careless enough to fall into the grasp of these diabolical hunters.

Yet an Immortal fleeing from such forces may find it difficult to obtain refuge or assistance from other Immortals. If the Immortal being hunted has been careless enough to draw the attention of the Monitors, helping her would only draw the Monitors’ attention to the would-be defender. If the Immortal is being hunted by supernatural entities or by the unearthly Dwimmerlaik, anyone who would render assistance risks the True Death, or worse. An Immortal without close friends has few weaknesses for an enemy to exploit, but few allies, as well.

A Barbarous Age

Immortals are not stagnant beings. They live, learn, and grow just as mortals do, but like mortals they are creatures of the period into which they were born. Centuries of experience and assumptions about the essence of life and the natural order of the universe are difficult to supplant with new ideas. So it is that Immortals may be classified by the period in history into which they were born, during which their concepts of morality and social values were formed.

This is not to say that an Immortal from the Age of Myth (could one be found) would be a crude being, in awe of airplanes and worshipping the television as a god. Change is intrinsic to all things, and Immortals are not exceptions. However, it is safe to say that an Immortal born since the Age of Invention (sometimes called the Age of Madness by older Immortals) would probably have an easier time accepting the social equality of the sexes than would an Immortal born during the Age of Faith. Ideas and perceptions are deeper than simple acceptance of technology. The existence of the airplane or the television is much easier to accept than the changes these devices have wrought upon society.

Thus, Immortals from previous ages, such as the Age of Rome, take traditions like Sanctuary far more seriously than do their more youthful counterparts. This in part explains why these traditions are still adhered to so strongly; it would be foolish to recklessly invite the wrath of an Immortal who has survived since the Crusades. The ethical codes handed down from older Immortals are reinforced by the potent reminder that those who would ignore tradition must face those who created those traditions. Also, Immortals who have known each other for centuries, even as adversaries, would each eagerly seek to avenge the death of the other by a third party if the appropriate codes of behavior had not been observed. It is a matter of honor.

Most of the history portrayed here is from a Western perspective, because that is the segment of human history most familiar to those of us here in the United States. Future supplements for Legacy: War of Ages will delve into the impact Immortals have had on history in other areas of the earth, such as Africa, Asia, and the large portions of the world that follow the tenets of Islam.

The Age of Myth

The first Immortals did not have the benefit of instruction from their elders. In fact, these Immortals of antiquity often lived for centuries thinking that they were each unique, or an offspring of a divine union. So it is no surprise that the earliest accounts of human civilization center upon these earliest of Immortals and their exploits. All that remains of the bulk of these legends exist today as fragments or as myths from later civilizations, if at all.

The tradition of Sanctuary probably began in the Age of Myth, when most Immortals (and mortals who were aware of them) thought that they were divine beings. Often, an Immortal would have a sacred grove, cave, or other area, wherein her worshippers would burn incense, pray, or otherwise honor her. On this sacred land, the Immortal could not be challenged. Eventually, the practice was extended to all holy ground and any Immortal who took refuge there. The tradition of Sanctuary is the most sacrosanct of the Immortal traditions, even to this day, when gods and goddesses have been replaced by sports heroes and movie stars in the hearts of the populace.

Immortals from this, the dawn of history, are usually referred to as the Antediluvians (stemming from the Mesopotamian myth of the Deluge, which gave rise to the Biblical story of Noah; it was an old legend, even then). Antediluvians are rare, and could possibly be classified as mythological themselves. Certainly, any tales of them today rely more on imagination than manifestation. If any Antediluvians have survived until this century, they would be canny and powerful in the extreme, and not to be trifled with. However, most younger Immortals maintain that all the Antediluvians died long ago, and that stories of them being alive today are not to be given credence.

A Heritage of Words

Without question, the first Immortal mentioned in the surviving records of our distant ancestors is Gilgamesh, sometimes called the First Immortal. Very little is known of this earliest Immortal, and like all Immortals from that period, his eventual fate is a matter for speculation. The facts of his life can only be guessed at from the Epic of Gilgamesh, the first extant epic poem.

Gilgamesh was the King of Uruk, a city on the Euphrates in Sumer (modern Iraq). The Epic of Gilgamesh relates Gilgamesh’s wanderings and adventures, and it is important not only as literature but as an example of early humanity’s struggle to understand life and death, mortality and immortality. The Epic describes Gilgamesh’s great sorrow at the death of his friend Enkidu in their disastrous meeting with Istar (who may also have been an Immortal). After Enkidu’s death, Gilgamesh wanders the world looking for the secret of eternal life, hoping to find some way of resurrecting his companion. Gilgamesh’s grief for his friend has been felt countless times by Immortals over the centuries, and his story is as poignant today as it was when it was written.

Throughout the world, the Antediluvians loved, ruled, traveled, and lived. Above all, they lived: if not as rulers, then as advisers to those rulers. Legend has it that the law code of King Hammurabi was due in no small part to the guidance Hammurabi received from an Immortal advisor named Kuli-Enlil. Certainly, Hammurabi claimed that his interpretation of the nature of law and justice was divine in origin, but this was nothing new in Mesopotamia, and there are those alive today who make the same claim.

Hammurabi’s Code was not the first of its kind, but through his Immortal advisor Hammurabi was able to combine the best parts of earlier legal codes with a spirit of justice and sense of responsibility. Although the application of the Code was not uniform among the various classes, there was a strong sentiment of fairness in Hammurabi’s highly precise body of law. The Code attempted to guarantee that the punishment was always appropriate to the crime, a legal concept which still survives, although it is inconsistently applied in the twenty-first century.

The God-King

Egypt enjoyed peace and tranquility unknown in Mesopotamia. The Nile, which fed and nourished Egypt, was mild and predictable, unlike the Tigris and Euphrates, which would sometimes flood and wipe out entire cities. United by an Immortal named Menes around 3100 B.C., early Egypt experienced a remarkable period of wealth, artistic flowering, and philosophy, protected geographically from invasions and extensive immigration.

Even after Menes left the rule of Egypt to his successors, the concept of the immortal god-king became central to the Egyptian system of government, and it was mirrored in their pantheon. For example, Osiris was king of the dead, and would die and be resuscitated each year. Without the influence of Menes’ long reign, the form of Egyptian civilization would have been markedly different, and the civilizations of the Near East, Africa, and southern Europe would surely have been poorer for it.

The Age of Rome

Sometimes dubbed “The Golden Age” by Immortals born into that era, there can be little doubt that the Roman Empire accomplished what had never been done before: a period of relative peace and prosperity spreading from one end of the Mediterranean to the other, and extending to all of western Europe. The existence of the Empire allowed the propagation of ideas and philosophies that continue to influence Western thought until this day. The ascendancy of Christianity from a bizarre Oriental mystery religion to the binding force of Western civilization would have been impossible without the fertile philosophical ground provided by the Empire.

Most inhabitants of the Empire, both mortal and Immortal, took for granted that they lived in the highest form of civilization the world had ever seen. Their attitude could be compared to that of citizens in the mid-twentieth century United States of America: there was little doubt that all other cultures were inferior, and that they lived in the best and most enlightened of all possible worlds.

Immortals born during this time (sometimes called the Imperials) were cosmopolitan enough to realize the danger posed by mortal regimes with mortal armies. They prudently kept their true nature hidden from mortal eyes, and the tradition of the Introduction dates from this time. For the most part, Immortals refrained from indulging themselves at playing gods, as the Antediluvians did. Yet nearly all of them still fostered the belief that they were, indeed, divine in origin, and many chose to rule small baronies and princedoms in remote areas.

The Messiah

The most enigmatic occurrence during this period took place in the small Roman province of Judea. A man named Jesus claiming to be the Jewish Messiah taught peace and love and was executed for it. It is a great and bitter irony that such a gentle man was executed in such a cruel manner, scourged and hanged from a cross in the presence of his family, friends, enemies, and the simply curious. Yet, was he dead?

A strange rumour began circulating a few days after the man’s interment. His followers said that he had risen from the dead, while others accused them of stealing the body. The man’s death and rebirth became an element of faith among the early Christians and generations that followed them. It was more than a myth or an unexplained phenomenon to them; Jesus had conquered death, and would return to grant immortality to all Christians.

The Age of Faith

The debate over the person of Jesus has been furious and passionate among both mortals and Immortals. Great numbers of Immortals born during the Middle Ages, commonly called the Age of Faith by Immortals born during that time (and derisively referred to as the “Dark Ages” by the Modern Immortals), are devout Christians, and these Medieval Immortals take extreme offense at any suggestion that Jesus was anything other than the Son of God. Yet, as younger Immortals are quick to point out, rising from the dead is nothing that they themselves are not able to do. “Now, had the Messiah been beheaded. . . .” As pointless as they are, such arguments have not stopped in millennia, even though the subject of Jesus’ other miracles has yet to be satisfactorily addressed. However, if the divine nature of Jesus of Nazareth was an elaborate fiction by an Immortal, it is significant that no Immortal has ever successfully claimed to be the one who perpetrated such a hoax.

The Church

Nonetheless, the religious organization now referred to simply as “the Church” was a force to be reckoned with. Its spiritual and political power was the terror of monarchs across Europe. In many ways, Rome was the capital of Europe, mandating policies and enforcing its dictums through spiritual and financial extortion. The Church was a stabilizing force, as well, which made possible the economic, bureaucratic, and educational advances which in turn helped France and England challenge papal authority at the end of the thirteenth century.

The disparaging remarks made by Modern Immortals about the Age of Faith are for the most part unjustified. The High Middle Ages was one of the most creative and vital periods in Western society, setting the stage for the development of democracies and constitutional states. Medieval cities provided centers for trade and cultural exchange which led to greater wealth and a higher standard of living for many.

The Inquisition

A blot on the history of the Church, and a constant reminder of the danger posed by mortals to Immortals, took place in southern Europe in the early thirteenth century. In response to growing resistance to Church authority, including the infamous Albigensian heresy (so called for the town of Albi in southern France), the papacy initiated a new ecclesiastical court, called the Inquisition. The Inquisition has a despicable reputation, because most of the legal rights that are taken for granted in the twenty-first century were ignored. Even in the Middle Ages, there was substantial criticism of the Inquisition and its methods.

For example, the accused did not know the evidence against them, nor were they allowed to know the identity of their accusers. Interrogation and torture were used to extract confessions from people who had the poor fortune to attract the Inquisitors’ attention. So successful were the Inquisition’s tactics that heresy had been effectively wiped out within a century.

There is no doubt that if the Church had not previously been aware of the Immortals among humanity, they learned of them during this period. The dualist philosophy of the Albigensians (also called Cathars, from the Greek word meaning “pure”) appealed to many Immortals who had grown disenchanted with the wealth and apparent corruption of the Roman clergy. Also, the Albigensians treated women as men’s equals, an idea which was in accord with the teachings of Jesus, but which had been ignored and actually contradicted by the patriarchal Church hierarchy.

Finally, the Albigensians believed that to free oneself from the influence of evil, one had to live a life of abstinence, avoiding all material things. Immortals who were doubting their faith found this extremely attractive, since they were able to truly abstain from all worldly influences, even food. Unfortunately, while an Immortal will not die of starvation, she will become extremely weak from hunger and no match for the armed Inquisitors. So it was that a large mortal institution first learned of Immortals. It took the Inquisitors many weeks of experimentation with various types of torture before they learned the method of inflicting the True Death upon their Immortal captives. Until they made that discovery, Immortals who had sincerely tried to reconcile their faith with their existence were stabbed, bled, stretched, broken, drowned, and subjected to all manner of mutilation. It was a cruel lesson that no survivor of that period will ever forget: Immortals must forever keep their existence a secret from mortals, lest a new Inquisition arise.

The Age of Revolution

The shape of society was changing. Scientists and philosophers such as Galileo, John Locke, and Isaac Newton were altering the world view that had been taken for granted for so long. A growing feeling that government was an agreement between the rulers and the ruled began to take root. In the span of two centuries, nearly every nation in Europe had a revolution, and some had several. It was a time of rapid change and tremendous violence. Ideas that would alter humanity’s perception of its place in the universe would grow and thrive, while Europe would experience a succession of wars lasting almost without interruption for three centuries. Science, religion, warfare, and government would be never be the same.

The Enlightenment

The scientific revolution not only introduced new information, but also a new way of approaching and obtaining that information: the scientific method. Experimentation and direct observation replaced dependence upon established principles and the authority of the Church’s cosmology. This is not to say that scientists have always readily accepted new or contradictory theories about the nature of the universe and the laws that govern it, but it is in the nature of the scientific method that new theories will constantly replace the old as humankind comes closer to comprehending observable reality.

However, the rational, critical, scientific way of solving problems was a distinct departure from the established religious and theological world-view. The concept that the nature of the world could be and should be directly determined, and that the cosmic processes which govern the behavior of the universe could be found and understood, altered the perception of humanity’s place in the cosmos forever.

Immortals who embraced these notions began applying the methods of science to the riddle of their own existence. They began experimenting on themselves, trying to find the physical cause to what had always been assumed to be a supernatural manifestation. These Immortals, who began to call themselves the Modern Immortals, are the ones who first divided Immortals into Antediluvians, Imperials, Medievals, and Moderns (and later, Post-Moderns).

Their experiments and studies of the Immortal condition have not lead to any satisfying solutions. If anything, the probing of the Modern Immortals has created more questions than answers, as the biology of the Immortal seems to defy any accepted law of physics or thermodynamics. The human body is, in essence, a machine. It consumes food as fuel, using it for energy; some of this energy is radiated as heat. How, then, can an Immortal’s body continue to move, repair itself, and generate heat without food? Such questions have never been adequately answered.

The Reign of Gustavus

No Immortal has made such an impact upon the history of the modern world as did Gustavus Adolphus, who ruled the kingdom of Sweden from 1520 until his presumed death in 1632. Even so, his name and accomplishments have been largely forgotten by all but a few military historians. In a time when looting and pillaging was typical military behavior, Gustavus prohibited such behavior as theft. In a time when rape was not considered a serious crime, Gustavus fiercely punished those who committed violence against women. Gustavus’ rule marked the high point of Immortal influence on mortal affairs.

Gustavus led a revolt of Sweden against Christian III, the King of Denmark, in 1520, liberating Sweden and forming an independent state. As the new monarch of Sweden, Gustav was a truly Homeric figure. He was burly, bearded, and had long blond hair, with a personality both charismatic and forceful. In the early years of his rule, he became dissatisfied with the low standard of learning among the nobility and began hiring foreign adventurers as ambassadors. Immortals from all of Europe flocked to his domain, and he made treaties with surrounding countries and built up Baltic commerce.

Gustavus’ reign rapidly brought Sweden from a rustic country of near-barbarians, who waylaid travelers daring to venture within their borders, to an advanced primarily middle-class country with a high level of parliamentary government. He championed against the divine right of kings, yet no monarch in Europe could match the worship accorded him by his liberty-loving people. He had supreme confidence in his decisions, yet he openly granted his council the freedom to oppose him. In his military, the first truly modern fighting machine in Europe, merit was the basis of promotion more than seniority or birth.

Gustav changed the nature of warfare, primarily during his campaigns in the Thirty Years’ War. The king shunned conventional armor due to its weight and the growing efficiency of firearms, and his musketeers followed his example. This allowed the Swedes a tremendous superiority in mobility over their opponents. Gustav introduced the first trained dragoons: forces wearing little armor, carrying a carbine and saber, and which fought on horseback on the offensive and as foot soldiers on the defensive. He encouraged his armorers to invent lighter, more accurate weapons, replacing the old heavy muskets with lighter matchlocks, yet with little loss of firepower. He also invented the first mobile artillery piece in history, altering field warfare drastically.

Within thirty months of Sweden’s entry into the Thirty Years’ War, Gustav’s army smashed the Hapsburg’s power in Europe, and earned him the title “the father of modern warfare.” Unfortunately, this also marked the end of Gustav’s rule. After the bloody the Battle of Lützen, in the dense November fog, Gustav’s surviving Swedes found his pierced and bullet-ridden body beneath a heap of the enemies’ dead. He was the greatest, and the last, Immortal ruler of a European nation; no one since then has had the audacity or skill to risk following his example.

The Reign of Terror

Not all Modern Immortals were content to experiment in the realms of physics or chemistry. Some chose to experiment with systems of human government. The most notorious of these experiments resulted in the brief but bloody rule of the Committee of Public Safety in eighteenth-century France.

An Immortal by the name of Georges Jaques Danton and a mortal named Maximillien Robespierre had watched the French Revolution and the acceptance of the French constitution by Louis XVI with keen interest. When the monarchy fell and the National Convention was elected, both Danton and Robespierre were elected members. Danton had always been disturbed by the inequity in France’s socio-economic structure; furthermore, he was obsessed by the fear that other Immortals were manipulating human society for the benefit of what he imagined as the secret Immortal masters of humankind. His fears were baseless, but this did not alter his preoccupation with the destruction of the parasitic (Immortal) aristocrats. Not surprisingly, Danton was one of the fiercest proponents of the guillotine.

Danton found a suitable political ally in the form of mortal Robespierre. Robespierre shared Danton’s zeal for equality and the lofty goal of an ideal democratic republic at any cost. When the National Convention formed the Committee of Public Safety and gave it dictatorial powers to deal with the revolts and food shortages plaguing France, both Robespierre and Danton managed to join it.

Robespierre and his political allies, including Danton, quickly seized control of the Committee by arresting their enemies for treason. With total control of the central government of France, Robespierre and Danton began planning the recovery of their country and its new government, which was in danger on all sides from both foreign interests and discord in leading provincial cities. With a revolutionary vigor, the Committee harnessed the power of France’s fiercely patriotic laboring poor, the “sans-culottes,” and introduced economic controls to maximize the efficiency of France’s war effort. By 1794, French armies were triumphant on all fronts, and the Committee began to relax its economic controls.

This did not satisfy Robespierre. He extended the Reign of Terror, using unrestrained tyranny and the guillotine to wipe out any trace of resistance to the new order. Robespierre’s paranoia and viciousness surpassed even Danton’s, and in the spring of 1794 Danton and many of Robespierre’s other long-time allies were marched up the steps to the guillotine. Danton became a victim of the political machine he helped to create. Robespierre was overthrown soon after, ending Danton’s experiment and the Reign of Terror.

The Age of Madness

What older Immortals call the Age of Madness began in 1898, when a physicist named Marie Curie and her husband discovered the element radium. It cannot be reasonably argued that radium was the root cause of the woes of the twentieth century, but its discovery serves as a useful demarcation between the rural, agrarian society in the West of the early 1800’s, and the urban, industrial society it had become by 1900.

The combination of the increasingly practical advances in science and technology, the dynamic expansion of Western influence among non-Western lands, and the surge in nationalism had far-reaching consequences. For the first time, the world was truly a global community. The technology of both war and peace made it possible to wreak havoc on a scale never seen before, and the foolishness of nationalism made it acceptable. Post-Modern Immortals, as those Immortals born during this turbulent period have come to be called, are quite unlike their seniors, having been raised in an environment of technological miracles and societal nightmares.

The Rise of Fascism

Revolutionary France may have been one of the first attempts to completely control a society by a dictatorship, but it was not to be the last or the most infamous. That dubious distinction goes to the regimes of Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia. This time, the culprits were not Immortal, but mortal. With unprecedented harshness, Stalin and Hitler mobilized their countries toward monumental objectives. Eventually, Hitler’s Nazi war machine was defeated by a coalition of nearly every country in the West; it took much longer for Stalin’s regime of dictatorial communism to end, when political and economic forces combined to pressure the nations comprising the Soviet Union to split off and become independent states.

It is not within the scope of a work of this size to detail the terrible violence and psychological damage that the Great Wars caused among both mortals and Immortals. Suffice it to say that proof had been given of the destruction mortals were willing to visit upon each other. Humanity seemed to many Immortals to have become a rabid pack of vicious animals, quite willing to turn upon themselves with bloody determination and rip each other to pieces. The optimism in humanity and its destiny which had accompanied the Ages of Faith and Revolution was destroyed, replaced by a pessimism as deep as it was dark.

Welcome to the Machine

The strict controls over production and the populace which made the defeat of Nazi Germany possible did not simply go away after the end of the war. Science was no longer “pure” and impractical. The alliance between theoretical science and applied technology which we take for granted today was forged in the blood spilled during the Great War, spurring such inventions as radar, jet engines, microwave communications, and the atomic bomb.

The invention which has arguably had the most impact upon Immortals is the computer. In a matter of decades, computers developed from building-sized monoliths capable of only simple arithmetic to compact, powerful machines capable of managing and analyzing staggering amounts of information. Governments the world over leaped at the opportunity that presented itself: to keep track of their populations as no government had ever been able to before. Before long, a citizen was required to exist within the vast government databases in order to receive even the most basic benefits or services. Existing outside of this system became increasingly difficult, posing to Immortals an ever-greater threat of mortal discovery.

This Is the Future

The year is 2015. Most Immortals think that the Post-Modern Age, or the Age of Madness, is near an end, less than two centuries after it began. This shortening of the ages of the world is pointed to by traditionalist Immortals as an indication of the impending approach of Ragnarok. Some Immortals are actively hunting their own kind in preparation for the Conclave, while others go into seclusion or seek refuge in Sanctuary. Young Immortals, born in the Age of Madness, have little in common with older Immortals. They take for granted the vast power humanity exerts over the environment, and many of them exhibit a pessimistic view of life fostered in them by a harsh and predatory society.

Yet in many ways Post-Modern Immortals are poised to do the most good for humanity and Immortals alike. They are generally unburdened by the superstitious or philosophical conceits of their ancestors. They are willing to take matters into their own hands rather than wait for a solution to present itself. Immortals of this era distinguish themselves in their ability to learn from the past without repeating it. Whether they will use this ability for the betterment of themselves and their mortal kindred, or whether they will be consumed by their nihilistic view of existence and destroy themselves in their quest for instant gratification of corporal desires remains to be seen.

Winternet

The nervous system of the twenty-first century world is the Winternet. It links banks with schools, and corporate data structures with weather prediction systems. The pulse of the Techno-Gothic world is the rhythm of information passing through optic fibers finer than human hairs, and its breath is the silent song of satellites whispering to each other in the datasphere.

To its users, the realm of the Winternet is a virtual reality nearly as complex as the physical world. The datagrid of the Winternet is dazzling, with enormous corporate data structures connected by the brilliant threads of the communication network. Information streams from uplink towers connect the local grid to the satellites above, which spread the data net across the globe like a fiery spider’s web encompassing the digital earth.

Once “inside” Winternet, the user can explore vast simulated landscapes and environments. The user can meet other Winternet users from around the world, conversing at the bottom of the sea, on the moon, or in a Pleistocene jungle. Winternet opens whole new vistas to the human experience.

The Infobahn

What eventually evolved into the Winternet started as isolated computer networks in the middle twentieth century. Corporate data structures were discrete and unwieldy. Pitifully feeble computer systems occupied enormous rooms, and required arcane rituals and bizarre rites to coax them into performing their mathematical feats. The average citizen had no more familiarity with data networks than she did with moon landings.

Gradually, the power of the computers increased, and humanity’s proficiency in using them improved. Scientific and educational institutions connected their computer systems, creating the Internet, and smaller consumer-oriented computer services followed suit. But still, the interface between human and machine was too arcane, and required people to act in distinctly unnatural ways to use these powerful technological servants.

Eventually, new advances in user interfaces combined with technological innovations to create a more powerful, yet easier to use, computer information structure. With the combination of natural user interfaces with artificial intelligence, the system could accurately anticipate the needs of its users, making comfortable access to powerful information handling computers a reality.

It was only a short time before multiple independent systems were absorbed into the Winternet. By integrating into the datasphere, small corporations gained the advantages of having the same enormous computer resources as had been available only to the megacorporations. Individuals could tailor their Winternet newslinks to find and relay only news of interest to them. Financial transactions were facilitated as well, automating the day-to-day accounting tasks which human beings almost never enjoy doing. Information has become the currency of the world, slowly melting the barriers to trade and the cultural differences caused by geography.

Cyber-Punks

The digital world encompassed by Winternet, a veritable wonderland of educational and entertainment opportunities, has led to new innovations in the realm of criminal activities, as well. The virtual reality of Winternet’s financial transactions, library dataplexes and corporate matrices form the foundation of a new culture of “cyber-punks,” to whom the global data network is the largest playground in history. These renegade technophiles and hackers cruise the Winternet looking for thrills, playing hide-and-seek with automated Electronic Intrusion Countermeasure security routines (dubbed “blue ice”) or honing their skills by circumventing the more advanced corporate EIC (called “grey ice”). For the most part, these joy-riders on the information superhighway are only nuisances, causing little direct damage. The worst threat to the Winternet’s security and user’s privacy is not from thrillseeking cyber-punks, but from professional information retrieval specialists, called “wiretappers.”

Wiretappers

The vast majority of the recreational network pirates eventually tire of the game and go on to other challenges, or graduate from college and become respected members of society. A few take one too many risks, are caught by the authorities and pay the price. However, the best of those hackers who do get caught never see the inside of a prison.

Professional data espionage agents are in high demand. Megacorporations and government intelligence-gathering groups actively hunt down those hackers who violate Winternet security, ostensibly to protect society from the cyber-punks’ depredations. In fact, the best of these renegades are offered a choice: if they work for the corporation or government that caught them, their crimes will be ignored. Such a practice is, of course, denied by any organization suspected of such activity, but it is the only way for institutions to keep abreast with the constantly advancing technology binding the Winternet together. The arms race of the twenty-first century is not between governments, but between megacorporations, and the weapons involved are the skills of the best and brightest wiretappers.

Wiretappers’ activities are almost completely illegal, including industrial espionage, counter-espionage, and data sabotage. They usually have a brief career. Those who perform successfully for their company are well paid, and retire after only a few years. Those who fail, or are caught during a raid on another organization’s data grid, pose a security risk to their employer, and are usually quietly disposed of. There are no old wiretappers.

Neural Interface

There are as many ways of accessing the Winternet as there are people who use it. From the simple computer-teller at automated banking machines, to the advanced holographic three-dimensional virtual reality constructs used by corporate information brokers, there is an interface for every application and every level of sophistication. Pioneers in the technological frontier use direct neural interfaces, which feed the computer-simulated world of Winternet directly to the nervous system of the user. Unfortunately, Immortals are not able to have cybernetic devices implanted in them, since their bodies will invariably reject the foreign material. This is one area where mortals have an advantage over Immortals: Immortals are not able to use these “neural interfaces.”

Using neural interfaces, a new breed of cybernetic pirates is cruising the datasphere, flaunting their ability to evade Electronic Intrusion Countermeasures (usually abbreviated EIC, and pronounced “ice”) and daring the authorities to catch them. However, megacorporations do not take their security lightly, and rumours abound of lethal EIC programs, capable of causing massive feedback into the neural interface and brain of anyone foolish enough to invade the corporation’s data structures. Such “black ice” is, of course, illegal.

Wiretappers and cyber-punks eschew conventional holographic interfaces to the Winternet; interactive holographics do not have the level of responsiveness necessary for the wiretappers to reliably evade even the trivial “blue ice.” A direct neural interface, plugged into an adapter on the wrist or temple, connects the wiretapper’s sensory perception centers to an analog unit (the “deck”) which displays the virtual reality of the Winternet directly to the mind of the user. This allows the wiretapper to respond nearly instantaneously to the counterintrusion software, the wiretapper’s primary nemesis. Wiretappers also must occasionally engage their legitimate counterparts — the “grid cops” — and those wiretappers working for other agencies. Striving against skilled human opponents is more difficult than overcoming even advanced automated EIC.

The Geneva Conference

Before the Winternet became a reality, and while the Human Genome Project was still months away from completion, an incident was unfolding in the North Sea that was to hold the attention of the world for months. An oil platform belonging to a British mining corporation was destroyed with what was obviously a nuclear device. Every nation on earth demanded to know what happened and why.

For weeks, Great Britain claimed no knowledge of the incident, denying the rumours that an experimental weapon system had malfunctioned and had destroyed itself. Finally, the truth was revealed: the Iago Project, a secret prototype national defense system put in operation by Britain, had malfunctioned and nearly initiated a nuclear Armageddon. The Iago Project was an advanced fifth-iteration neural network artificial intelligence system (or “AI”) connected to Britain’s strategic defense and retaliatory nuclear missile systems. In theory, Iago was to be able to predict and respond to threats to Britain’s airspace efficiently and nearly instantaneously.

In practice, Iago was on-line for thirty-two hours and seventeen minutes before it armed Britain’s entire arsenal of nuclear weapons and attempted to fire them in a spread pattern calculated to render the earth uninhabitable. Failsafes built into the ersatz oil platform detected the activity and destroyed the platform, Iago, and any hope of discovering why Iago malfunctioned.

Outrage swept the globe. Nuclear Holocaust had been averted by a matter of milliseconds, and the governments of the world wanted to make sure that it would not happen again. A few individuals proposed universal nuclear disarmament, but the most vocal reactionaries cast artificial intelligence as the scapegoat of the Iago Incident.

The Geneva Conference was convened in April of 2005, with the express purpose of forming ethical guidelines for the construction of artificial intelligences. A body of 314 politicians and scientists, few of whom had any experience with the design or practical application of neural networks or artificial intelligences, debated for twenty-two days over the moral and ethical issues of creating “thinking machines.” At the conclusion of the conference, their decision was revealed: a worldwide moratorium on self-modifying programs and electronic devices (fourth-iteration or greater AI’s), to be in effect for one century, until the year 2105. Artificial intelligence algorithms of third-iteration or lower were exempted from the moratorium, as these classifications had already been in use for several years with no indication of the type of malfunction that befell Iago.

In 2105, a second Geneva Conference will be convened to review the issue; until then, severe political and financial penalties will be imposed on any person, corporation, or government caught designing or building such banned devices. Some Immortals have wryly observed that the members of the Geneva conference simply avoided the artificial intelligence issue, rather than dealing with it, since it is unlikely that any of the original mortal representatives will still be alive one hundred years hence.

The Number of His Name

After the completion of the Human Genome Project, the decades-long project to map the entire human genetic code, it became obvious that the best way to keep track of the increasing multitudes transacting business was to use each person’s genetic code, or “GenCode.” This coincided nicely with Winternet, the global virtual data exchange system that was under development at the time, so it was incorporated into the operating system. Each user has a GenCard imprinted with their unique GenCode, except corporate cards, which have the user’s GenCode with a corporate prefix code attached designating the issuing corporation.

GenCode cards are universal in developed countries, and for the most part are mandatory, much like the Social Security cards they replaced in the United States. These GenCards are nearly indestructible polycarbonate computer sandwiches in the size and shape of a credit card, and the standard card is exactly 1.5 mm thick. Some people have enhanced cards that are 2.5 mm thick, but these are reserved for high-level law-enforcement personnel, certain government officials, and the extremely wealthy.

The card incorporates a minimal Winternet terminal, with holophone and interactive programming capabilities. The holographic quality is poor at best, so pay-phones are still popular. It also keeps a record of the user’s various accounts on Winternet, as well as her medical history and any other pertinent personal information, and can perform much as the personal computer did in the 1990’s, using firmware built into Winternet. Additionally, the location of the user can be found at any time by the authorities by using Winternet, although most countries require a court order for the police to use the GenCard in this way.

The card is black, and has two insignias on the front: the Winternet logo (an open window with the Earth behind it), and the logo of the issuing institution. The back of the card has a hologram of the owner of the card (except for corporate cards, which have the corporation’s trademark) on the right, and a red square on the left. The red square is the identification grid; this reads the fingerprint and infrared image of the capillaries of the owner during transactions.

Transactions are made by transferring funds from one account to another. It is possible to transfer funds directly between cards; the transaction is uploaded to Winternet via a coded transmission to the nearest Winternet relay tower, which broadcasts the transaction to a Winternet satellite. The satellite then beams the transaction, along with millions of others, to the appropriate corporation’s mainframe computer. The transaction is stored both on the card and on Winternet.

The Characters

The stars of the story are the Player Characters. If the game were a movie, the camera would be on the Player Characters almost all the time. Their motivations are what galvanizes a simple plot description into a gripping drama, and their tribulations and passions are what makes the story interesting. Without the players, the world, obstacles, and adversaries crafted by the Game Moderator are static and lifeless. Without the Player Characters there is no story.

Guidelines

Before you make up your character, there are a few things to keep in mind. The GM may have some additional thoughts on the subject, either adding to or deleting from these guidelines. It is important to get the Game Moderator’s feedback during character creation, because she has to make sure your character fits into the story she has in mind. Also, the GM might have an idea or two that will make your character more interesting, useful, or unique when put into the context of the story and the other Player Characters.

Past

Your character will probably be an Immortal, although you can make up a mortal character, if you prefer. A mortal character would be much weaker than an Immortal character; the only real advantage to being mortal is that the character would not stand out to Immortals the way other Immortals do, and might not be considered a threat. Since this game is about Immortals, most of the rules assume the character is one as well.

Your character can be an Immortal from any place or time in the grand pageant of history. Every culture and nationality is open to you, limited only by your imagination and good judgment. Unless the GM allows otherwise, your character will begin the game without any accrued Karma (a measure of a character’s experiences and prestige), so if she is from the Middle Ages she has been keeping out of sight and out of trouble for a very long time. A new character who is nonetheless an elder Immortal might have been living as a recluse in the Appalatian Mountains for centuries, or she might have been buried in a landslide in the Alps for a thousand years or so, and only recently discovered by a surprised mountaineer.

Present

Focus first on who your character is, rather than what she can do. It is all well and good to have a character who is a master at aikido, proficient with all manner of firearms and other implements of destruction, but if you don’t know who she is you have not made up a character, you have merely written her resume. We have included some advice to help you define and build your character’s identity. Go through it, sketching out your ideas, running a few of them past the GM as you go, and revising as you get closer to who (and what) you want your character to be.

After you have a description of your character, then go through and fill in the specifics. Exactly how good is she at aikido? Is she an expert combat pilot, or does she just go up on weekend joy-rides? We have presented two different ways of determining these specific numbers and attributes, the “Quick-Start” method and the “Customized” method: pick the one that more suits your tastes and follow the instructions.

Future

It is up to you to make up a character who can get along with the other Player Characters and add to the quality of the game. Realism in Legacy, as in most games, takes a back seat to playability. Your character can be the most fascinating, detailed character ever written, with nuances Tolstoy would envy, but if she detracts from the overall quality of the game you have failed to make up a good character.

Fortunately, making up a character is a fairly simple process, and if at first you don’t succeed you can try again. It is possible to make up a unique and interesting character who gets along with the other PCs, and in the long run it is much more fun than making up a character that, despite being a brilliant creation, disrupts the game.

Character Abstract

The player begins creating a character by designing the character’s Abstract. The Abstract is a short description of the character, her background, and her abilities without resorting to numbers. A creative Abstract increases the depth of the character and enhances the ability of the GM to create adventures around the character’s concept. The Abstract should be phrased carefully, because it will affect not only how the Game Moderator perceives the character, but also how the player perceives the character. Having a well thought-out Abstract may give the character certain small advantages, too, such as an ex-CIA agent still having a contact within the CIA.

Part of the joy of creating an Abstract is describing the personality of the character. Is she an introvert, shy and serious, or is she an extrovert, outgoing and humorous? Perhaps she would like to be more outgoing, but has difficulty trusting others because of a traumatic experience in her past. What are her interests and hobbies? Is she an intellectual, who enjoys scrutinizing the world around her, or is she passionate and impulsive, doing what she feels is right without analyzing her motivations? How about the character’s family? Does she come from a large, close-knit clan or is she an orphan? What is her education, her moral philosophy? Each clue to your character’s personality will help you portray her realistically, which will add to your enjoyment and the enjoyment of everyone who plays the game with you.

Nearly as important as the personality is the physical appearance of the character. Is the character a man or a woman? Although most players tend to prefer characters the same sex as themselves, it can be an interesting change to role-play the opposite sex and see things from a different perspective. How old is she? Is she tall and broad, or short and wiry? Human beings come in a staggering variety of shapes, sizes, and degrees of health, so it’s certainly possible for a mercenary with a Strength Rank of 1 (a fragile mercenary, indeed) to be an enormous hulking brute. In this case, she is simply not a muscular hulking brute. A player should round out the minor details of her character as she goes along, filling in things such as eye and hair color, left- or right-handedness, and other minutiae.

As time goes by, the player may decide to alter or revise her character’s Abstract. People change over time, and so do their characters. If a player has become bored with a character, or no longer feels she identifies with it, she might want to revise the character’s outlook on life, perhaps by using a “traumatic event” in the game to explain the character’s change in personality. This is fine, as long as it adds to the enjoyment of the game. After all, the whole point of role-playing is to socialize and have fun.

Conception

The heart of the character is her conception. Sum up in a sentence or two what makes your character special and what sets her apart from other people, even from other Immortals. The conception of the character is what is most important about her. It can be her profession, like a surgeon or a CIA operative. Her conception can emphasize how other people see her, and whether she is admired or reviled. The character’s self-image can be the driving conception behind her Abstract, like a humble idealist or a supremely egotistical philanthropist.

Usually, the character’s conception is the first thing you think of when someone asks you to describe the character. It may even be only a word or two, which you then expand into a fully developed identity. Whatever your character’s conception, try to incorporate something interesting into it: something that you can build on as you get more specific, filling in the character’s personality and appearance.

Personality

To make creating a character’s unique personality easier, you can try asking yourself some basic questions about the way she views life and interacts with others. In psychology this is called “personality typing,” and you have probably seen techniques like this before. For human beings, personality typing is much too simplistic to be very useful, but for a Player Character it suits our purposes admirably.

Focus

Most people, and thus most Player Characters, are either focused on the world around them or on their own internal landscape. Carl Jung called these kinds of people “extroverts” and “introverts.”

Extroverts focus on the world around them. They enjoy social interaction, and prefer to understand their world by interacting with it. Extroverts tend to seek out companionship, new friends, and new experiences, and they tend to share their thoughts or private feelings easily with others. A meaningful experience for an extrovert is one that involves activity and social intercourse.

Introverts are focused on the world inside them. The prefer to interact on a one-to-one basis, or in small groups. Introverts tend to get to know people gradually, and dislike being the center of attention. An introvert prefers to think before she acts, and tends to give a question thorough analysis before answering.

Most mortals are extroverts, but Immortals are evenly divided between extroverts and introverts. How does your character respond to social activities? Is she outgoing and gregarious, the center of attention whenever possible? Or is she contemplative and private, sharing her thoughts with few others, keeping her friends few? Does she think before she acts, or does she act first, and then think about what she has done?

Vision

By “vision,” we are not referring to how well your character sees, but to what your character pays attention to. How does your character solve problems: by looking at the facts and drawing conclusions based upon hard evidence, or by examining trends, people’s reactions, and her own instincts?

A character who relies upon concrete facts and figures, basing her actions on the here-and-now instead of on intuition and imagination, can be called a “linear thinker.” Linear thinkers prefer to concentrate on things as they are rather than on possibilities, using logic to solve problems. If something does not have an immediate, practical application, the linear thinker probably will not see much use for it.

The “divergent thinker,” on the other hand, relies as much on imagination and creativity as she does on hard evidence. She tends to think in intuitive leaps, making connections based on her hunches, waiting to fill in the facts later. Divergent thinkers use metaphors and analogies to explain concepts instead of using concrete descriptions the way a linear thinker would.

Linear thinkers are often described as being practical and efficient, perhaps even cold-hearted. They try to base their decisions on objective evidence, rather than indulging their own feelings about a matter. Divergent thinkers tend to be described as emotional or frivolous, maybe even “dizzy.” Objective evidence is not as important to them as how they feel about a decision, and they have more trouble making decisions that will hurt someone than linear thinkers do.

Honor

Honor is a measure of the character’s sincerity and obedience to society’s strictures. While it may imply generosity or goodness, that is not always the case. What we mean by “honor” is how often the character keeps her word, or refrains from taking things that do not belong to her. It is quite possible for a character to be extremely honorable (by this definition), yet be rude and cruel. It’s also possible, although rare, for a character to be a liar and a thief, yet be kind and generous. Robin Hood is a perfect example of a good, yet dishonorable, person.

An honorable person is often described as straight or honest, and sometimes they may be considered dull and unimaginative. To an honorable person, the structure of society is more important than a temporary advantage that may be gained by violating that structure. Truthfulness is intrinsically valuable to an honorable character.

A dishonorable person may be described as undisciplined and mischievous, perhaps even deceitful. A dishonorable character sees nothing wrong in doing what gets the best results. The end justifies the means, in the dishonorable character’s view. Consistency and adherence to arbitrary rules are trivial to the dishonorable person, who will do whatever she thinks is best at the moment to get the job done.

Appearance

What a character looks like is not as important as the depth of her personality, but it does have an impact upon both how she interacts with others and upon how the player sees the character. As such, the player should describe the character carefully, taking note of little things like the character’s height and general build. Hair color and general style of dress help emphasize the character’s personality.

In general, the character can appear to be whatever age the player likes. There is no direct correlation between an Immortal’s chronological and apparent age, other than the fact that Immortals rarely look older than they are. The Player Character can be any chronological age, as well, as long as the player realizes that the character is extremely inexperienced no matter how long she has been alive.

Appearance takes into account such things as mannerisms, accented speech, and level of cultural sophistication. Is the character wealthy? Does she act like a rich snob, or is she “slumming?” What do people notice about the character when they first meet her? Is she attractive (as most Immortals are)? All of these things concern the character’s appearance.

Devon’s Abstract

Idea: Phill wants to make up a Post-Modern Immortal who is tired of the nonsensical traditions of the elder Immortals. He picks the name Devon for his character.

Conception: Devon is independent, and doesn’t like being told what to do. He goes his own way, and prefers to let others, both Immortal and mortal, do the same. Phill decides that other Immortals may not always like Devon, because he doesn’t get involved in disputes that he doesn’t think concern him. But if Devon decides that someone is abusing their power, he’ll step in to put a stop to it.

Personality: Phill decides that Devon is balanced between being focused on the world around him and his own inner landscape. He doesn’t mind having fun with a crowd of people, he just doesn’t find that many people whom he has fun with. Devon relies more on facts and figures than feelings, making some people think he’s heartless or unfeeling. In fact, he feels very deeply about what he considers right and wrong, but he thinks it is important not to impose his feelings or code of ethics on others. Devon also has a very strong sense of honor, although he will break the rules if he sees no other way to accomplish his goals. When this happens, he feels as if he has lost, somehow, and spends too much time blaming himself for breaking his own code of ethics.

Appearance: Devon is a muscular man with dark brown skin. He’s a bit shorter and heavier than average, and he usually wears his hair in tiny parallel braids. While he’s among friends, Devon’s deep brown eyes have a playful glint, but that glint can turn deadly in a heartbeat. Phill also decides that Devon uses his hands a lot when he talks, and that Devon’s preferred weapon is a katana his biological father (now dead) brought back from Japan after World War Two. This would make Devon around sixty years old, chronologically, but Phill decides that Devon looks like he’s in his late twenties.

Jacqueline’s Abstract

Idea: Susan wants to make up a more outgoing character than Phill did. She decides that her character, Jacqueline, is a gregarious adventurer.

Conception: Jacqueline is a younger Immortal than Devon; she looks her real age, which is 27. Susan decides that Jacqueline only knows she’s Immortal because another Immortal found her and has been tutoring her. Jacqueline doesn’t see why Immortals need to go around killing each other, and she doesn’t think she’ll ever kill another Immortal unless she’s forced to. However, she trusts her mentor (who hasn’t been made up yet), and is training in how to use a sword so that she can protect herself when the time comes.

Personality: Jacqueline is outgoing and loves to have fun. Any activity where she can do something new and exciting will draw her attention. This is especially true now that she knows she’s an Immortal and doesn’t have to fear getting hurt. Susan decides that this is a source of irritation to her mentor, who Susan pictures as a knight from the Age of Faith. Jacqueline tends to trust her instincts more than her reason, and this gets her involved in situations which she would be much safer staying away from. Susan decides that Jacqueline doesn’t respect rules unless they have good justification, so she doesn’t have any respect yet for the rules of Immortal etiquette, although her mentor has tried to get her to understand their importance.

Appearance: Susan decides that Jacqueline will look like a romance-novel heroine. She is tall, lean, and fit, and she has long, dark hair that always seems to be blowing in the wind. Her eyes are large and green, and they flash when she’s angry or excited. Susan decides that Jacqueline’s family is living somewhere far away, and that she doesn’t keep in touch with them very often. The Game Moderator, Beth, okays this, but she makes a note to herself to use Jacqueline’s family in a plot later.

Ian’s Abstract

Idea: Lloyd is interested in the idea of being Susan’s mentor, and asks the GM if that would be okay. Beth, the GM, decides that it would fun to have Lloyd’s character be Jacqueline’s mentor, at least at the beginning of the game, but she doesn’t want the character to be as powerful as a Medieval Immortal would be. Instead, the GM lets Lloyd make up a Modern Immortal. Lloyd decides to name his character Ian McAllister.

Conception: Ian was originally one of the Cavaliers who supported the British king Charles I against Oliver Cromwell and his Roundheads in England during the Roundhead Rebellion. Ian didn’t think Charles was doing a great job as king, but he felt that it was important to respect the king’s authority. When Charles was beheaded, Ian left the country and lived in France for a century or so until the French Revolution, when he helped members of the French nobility escape from the guillotine. It wasn’t until years later that he learned of the Immortal Danton’s involvement in the bloody Reign of Terror. If he had known at the time about Danton, it is likely that McAllister would have killed him.

Personality: Ian is a hopeless idealist pretending to be a cynic. He professes to have no faith in humankind, but he is always disappointed when someone takes the easy way out of a problem or takes advantage of someone else. Lloyd decides that Ian is an introvert, who spends a lot of time ruminating, having long philosophical conversations with himself. Ian thinks feelings are much more important than facts and figures, because human beings are more important than numbers. He steadfastly defends the traditions of Immortal etiquette, even when it is against his better judgment to do so, because “sometimes the rules are all we have.”

Appearance: Ian always seems to have a thoughtful expression on his face. His hair is not quite shoulder-length, and he sports the same mustache and goatee he wore in Charles’ day. He tends to bow slightly when he introduces himself, and he always opens doors for women. He has a slight Scottish accent which is really only noticeable when he’s angry.

Character Mechanics

Once the player has her character’s Abstract worked out, she can fill in all those blanks on her character sheet with numbers. (You may make as many copies of the Legacy character sheet as you like, but only for personal use. This means you can make copies for all the people who play Legacy with you, but you cannot sell them or whip up hundreds of them and give them out on street corners.) The “mechanical” part of the game is concerned with translating your character’s Abstract into Statistics, Abilities, and Accents. If the terminology confuses you, don’t worry: you’ll pick up on it in no time. New or unusual terms are normally defined the first time they are used. If you should see a term that doesn’t look familiar, take a look at the Lexicon at the back of the book. There is a reason for this odd vocabulary: it gives all the players a defined frame of reference to describe their characters.

Having two characters both described as “very strong” is a start, but if these characters arm-wrestle, who wins? Assigning numbers to various character attributes helps decide who is how good at what. “Statistics” (usually called “Stats”) are those attributes that everyone has in some measure, even if they aren’t very good at it. Strength and Intellect, for example, are Statistics. “Abilities” (sometimes abbreviated as “Ables”) are those attributes that not everyone has, and most people have to learn how to do. Medicine, Driving, and Teaching are examples of Abilities.

Statistics and Abilities are measured by their “Rank.” The higher the Rank of a Statistic or Ability, the better the character is at it. Generally speaking, Rank 2 describes someone who commonly uses the Statistic or Ability in their day-to-day life, but is not an expert. A Rank lower than 2 indicates the character is a beginner (or simply not very good), while having a Rank higher than 2 indicates that the character is particularly proficient using that Statistic or Ability. An Olympic athlete, for example, might have Strength or Agility as high as Rank 4.

An “Accent” (occasionally abbreviated as “Acc”) is one of those unusual attributes that a character either has or does not. Accents do not usually have a Rank. Always knowing the correct time, being able to wake up at the sound of a pin drop, and having severe asthma are all Accents.

Any attempt a character makes to do something is called a “Task.” The die roll the player makes to see if the character succeeds is call the “Task Roll.” Rolling a low number on the Task Roll is better than rolling a large number. Circumstances that make the Task easier or harder modify the Task Roll, and these are called “Task Modifiers” or “TMods.” Positive TMods (like “+2” or “+4”) make it easier to succeed at a Task, while negative TMods (like “-2” or “-4”) make it more difficult.

The simplest way to create a character is to choose Primary and Secondary Statistics and Abilities based upon the character’s Abstract. With this method, called Quick-Start Role-Playing, the “feel” of the character is more important than the numbers on the character sheet. However, if the player wishes and the GM allows, the character’s Statistics and Abilities may be determined using the more involved Customized Character Design rules. If you are in a hurry, just use the Quick-Start rules now, but you may want to read through and experiment with the Customized Character Design rules later.

Quick-Start Role-Playing

Primary and Secondary Statistics

Before creating a character, each player writes a few lines describing the history and personality of the character she has in mind: the character’s Abstract. If the GM thinks the idea is appropriate to the campaign, then the player may choose a Primary Statistic and a Secondary Statistic from the standard Statistics (Intellect, Agility, Strength, Presence). Psyche and Psychic Reserve may not normally be chosen as Primary or Secondary Statistics, unless the GM specifically allows it. The character’s Primary Statistic begins at Rank 5, and her Secondary Statistic begins at Rank 3. The other three Statistics begin at Rank 2, except for Psychic Reserve, which begins at its normal Rank of Psyche x 10.

Primary and Secondary Abilities

After selecting Primary and Secondary Statistics, the player may choose four Abilities related to the character’s Primary Statistic and two Abilities related to her Secondary Statistic. The character’s four Primary Abilities begin at Rank 3 and her two Secondary Abilities begin at Rank 2. The character may also have five additional Abilities of the player’s choice at Rank 1. If the player should choose Strength as the character’s Primary (or Secondary) Statistic, the character’s Primary (or Secondary) Abilities are chosen from the Agility Abilities.

Statistic-Related Abilities Table Intellect Agility/Strength Presence Psyche Computer Athletics Acting Auspice Disguise Dodge Animal Training Clairvoyance Finance Drive Aircraft Bureaucracy Domination Heavy Weapons Drive Landcraft Etiquette Farfetching Linguist Drive Watercraft Interrogation Foreboding Medicine Equestrian Leadership Illusion Perception Firearms Negotiation Mask Science Fisticuffs Persuasion Overload Security Mechanics Politics Psychokinesis Survival Melee Weapons Resistance Psychic Shield (PDef) Tactics Sleight of Hand Seduction Pyrokinesis Technical Operations Stealth Streetwise Telepathy Tracking Weaponsmith Teaching Trance  Note that Psyche cannot normally be chosen as either a Primary or Secondary Statistic.

Example:

Phill decides, with the GM’s blessing, to write up Devon using the Quick-Start character generation rules. Phill envisions Devon as a combat-oriented character, with little in the way of social graces. Accordingly, he chooses Agility for Devon’s Primary Statistic, and Strength for Devon’s Secondary Statistic.

Devon now gets four Abilities at Rank 3. These four Abilities must be related to Devon’s Primary Statistic, Agility. Phill chooses Athletics, Fisticuffs, Melee Weapons, and Stealth. Devon gets two Abilities related to his Secondary Statistic, Strength, at Rank 2. Phill chooses Dodge and Sleight of Hand for Devon’s Secondary Abilities. Now Phill gets to choose any five Abilities at Rank 1 to round Devon out. For these Abilities, Phill chooses Disguise, Perception, Security, Survival, and Foreboding. Because Devon is an Immortal, he may buy the Foreboding Ability even though Phill has decided not to make Devon Psychic. So far, Devon looks like this:

Devon Post-Modern Immortal Statistics Abilities Intellect 2 Disguise 1 Agility 5 Perception 1 Strength 3 Security 1 Presence 2 Survival 1 Psyche 2 Athletics 3 Psychic Reserve 20 Dodge 2 Fisticuffs 3 Melee Weapons 3 Sleight of Hand 2 Stealth 3 Foreboding 1

Customized Character Design

Unlike old-fashioned games, which often rely upon dice, auctions, or some other random method to determine a character’s abilities, a Legacy character may be completely customized by the player. This is possible by using a point-based system in which the player “buys” a character’s Statistics and Abilities. This not only allows the player to build a character to her exact specifications, it also ensures that each player’s character will have abilities approximately equal to those of the other players. As the game progresses, the players will be awarded “Karma” points, which may be used to increase a character’s proficiency in her Statistics and Abilities (a full discussion of Karma and its uses is covered later).

Customized Statistics

Before creating a character, each player writes a few lines describing the history and personality of the character she has in mind: this is the character’s Abstract. If the GM thinks the idea is appropriate to the campaign, then the player may buy Statistics that reflect the character’s Abstract. Each character begins with 160 points to spend among her Statistics. All standard Statistics begin at Rank 1, and may each be increased one Rank for a number of points equal to the Statistic’s current Rank multiplied by ten. The initial maximum for any standard Statistic is 5, but this may be increased through spending Karma after the game starts. The Psychic Reserve total begins equal to the Psyche Stat multiplied by ten, and it may be increased by one for each point spent. Psychic Reserve has no initial maximum, and it may also be increased through spending Karma. Any points which are left over after the player has finished designing the character are lost, so it is a good idea to use them all, if possible.

Statistic Table Statistic Base Rank Starting Max Cost per Rank Intellect (INT) 1 5 Current x 10 Agility (AGL) 1 5 Current x 10 Strength (STR) 1 5 Current x 10 Presence (PRE) 1 5 Current x 10 Psyche (PSY) 1 5 Current x 10 Psychic Reserve (PR) Psyche x 10 None 1 Point

Jacqueline Post-Modern Immortal Statistics Abilities Intellect 3 Linguist 1 Agility 3 Perception 1 Strength 3 Dodge 1 Presence 4 Firearms 2 Psyche 2 Fisticuffs 2 Psychic Reserve 20 Melee Weapons 2 Etiquette 3 Persuasion 3 Seduction 3 Domination 2 Telepathy 2

Customized Abilities

The Abilities a player chooses for her character should reflect the character’s Abstract. At least half of the character’s Abilities should directly pertain to her Abstract, and the GM may veto certain Abilities or require the character to possess other Abilities. Each character is given 50 points to apportion among her Abilities. To buy an Ability at Rank 1 costs 2 points. To increase an Ability by one costs the Ability’s current rank multiplied by two. The initial maximum for any Ability is 3, but this may be increased through experience (spending Karma). Any points which are left over after the player has finished designing the character are lost, so it is a good idea to use them all, if possible.

Example:

Susan would like to try out the Customized Character Design rules, and the GM gives her permission. Susan pictures her character, Jacqueline, as an outgoing person with a lot of athletic ability. Susan has 160 points to spend on Jacqueline’s Statistics. Susan wants to buy Jacqueline Rank 4 Presence and Agility, but that would leave only 40 points to spend on the rest of Jacqueline’s Stats. Susan decides to compromise, and spends 60 points on Jacqueline’s Presence, buying it at Rank 4. Susan then spends 30 points each on Jacqueline’s Intellect, Agility, and Strength, brining them all up to Rank 3. This leaves 10 points, which Susan uses to buy Jacqueline’s Psyche at Rank 2.

Now Susan has 50 points to buy Jacqueline’s Abilities. Half of Jacqueline’s Abilities must directly pertain to her Abstract, but Susan doesn’t think this will be a problem. Since an average level of competence in an Ability is Rank 2, Susan buys Jacqueline Rank 2 Melee Weapons, Firearms, and Fisticuffs for 4 points each. This is in keeping with her tutelage under Ian McAllister; she knows how to fight, but she’s not an expert. She now has 38 points left. Since Jacqueline is a “people” person, Susan buys Jacqueline Etiquette, Persuasion, and Seduction at Rank 3 for 8 points each, leaving Jacqueline 14 points. Looking over the Psychic Abilities, Susan decides she would like Jacqueline to have the Psychic Abilities Domination and Telepathy. She buys them each at Rank 2 for 4 points each. Jacqueline has 6 points left. Susan picks Linguist, Perception, and Dodge at Rank 1 to finish off Jacqueline’s Abilities.

Playing Elders

The players might not want to play “newbie” Immortals, preferring to make up experienced characters from ages past. With the GM’s permission, one or all of the characters can be given extra points to spend on their Stats and Abilities. The characters would be given Karma, as well, to reflect this extra experience. The added Karma would be “spent” Karma, since the character is given more points when she is created to reflect the Karma spent during her life.

This is different from the normal method of creating a Player Character, since normal Player Characters all begin with zero Karma. Normal Player Characters are assumed to begin the game inexperienced, no matter how old they are. Only if the GM wants a character to begin the game with added Abilities or higher Stats should the player write up her character using the rules for creating experienced elder Immortals.

To make up an experienced elder Immortal, the player must use the Customized Character Creation rules, but substitute the points shown in the table for the amounts normally used. The maximum starting value for an experienced Immortal character is dependent upon her age. The highest Rank Statistic a Post-Modern Immortal may possess is Rank 5, while the highest Rank Statistic an Antediluvian Immortal may possess is Rank 7. These maxima only apply when the character is created: the Statistics may be increased later through the expenditure of Karma (Karma and its uses are covered thoroughly later). Likewise, the maximum initial Rank of a character’s Abilities is limited by her age. A Post-Modern Immortal may only have Abilities up to Rank 3 when she is created, while an experienced Imperial Immortal may have Abilities up to Rank 5 when she is created. Once a character is created, there is no set limit on how high her Statistics and Abilities may be bought with Karma, as long as the GM approves.

Example:

Since Lloyd is making up Ian McAllister as an experienced Immortal, he uses the Customized Character Design rules, but Ian starts out with more points with which to buy Statistics and Abilities. Lloyd has 210 points to distribute among Ian’s Statistics, rather than the normal 160 points, because Ian is a Modern Immortal. However, the highest starting Rank Ian can have in a Statistic is still 5. Since Lloyd sees Ian as the contemplative sort, he starts by buying Ian Rank 5 Intellect for 100 points. Ian has been around for a while and he knows how to handle himself, so Lloyd spends 60 points to purchase Ian Agility at Rank 4. Lloyd also sees Ian as being strong-willed, so he buys Ian a Psyche Rank of 3 for 30 points. The remaining 20 points Lloyd splits between Ian’s Strength and Presence, buying each at Rank 2.

Lloyd now has 100 points to split among Ian’s chosen Abilities, half of which must directly pertain to Ian’s Abstract. The maximum Rank Ian may possess in any Ability is 4. Lloyd decides that Ian’s highest Ranked Abilities would be Linguist, Tactics, and Melee Weapons, so he spends 14 points on each to buy Rank 4 in each Ability. At Rank 3, Lloyd buys Ian Medicine, Science, Dodge, Firearms, Leadership, and Streetwise. To round Ian off, Lloyd buys Ian Equestrian and Fisticuffs at Rank 2 and Teaching at Rank 1.

Elder Immortal Creation Table Age Statistics Abilities Max Accents Total Karma Post-Modern 160 pts 50 pts 5 / 3 30 pts 0 Karma Modern 210 pts 100 pts 5 / 4 30 pts 100 Karma Medieval 260 pts 150 pts 5 / 4 30 pts 200 Karma Imperial 310 pts 200 pts 6 / 5 30 pts 300 Karma Antediluvian 360 pts 250 pts 7 / 6 30 pts 400 Karma

Ian Modern Immortal Statistics Abilities Intellect 5 Linguist 4 Agility 4 Medicine 3 Strength 2 Science 3 Presence 2 Tactics 4 Psyche 3 Dodge 3 Psychic Reserve 30 Equestrian 2 Firearms 3 Fisticuffs 2 Melee Weapons 4 Leadership 3 Streetwise 3 Teaching 1

Statistics (Stats)

Whether chosen as Primary and Secondary Statistics, or determined point by point using the Customized Character Design rules, Statistics are numerical representations of a character’s physical capabilities. The higher the character’s Rank in the Statistic, the better the character is.

Statistic Cost

To increase a Statistic (other than Psychic Reserve) by one costs the Statistic’s current rank multiplied by ten.

Intellect (INT)

Intellect is a measure of the character’s ability to reason and solve problems. Intellect is used in any situation or Task requiring problem solving ability or quick thinking. Intellect is vital to any technical Ability, and it also makes the character more aware of her surroundings, since the Perception Ability is based upon Intellect. Intellect starts at Rank 1, and may be increased for a number of points equal to its current Rank multiplied by 10.

Agility (AGL)

Agility is a measure of a character’s manual dexterity, reflexes, and reaction time. The outcome of most combat is directly affected by the character’s Agility: how good she is with any weapon, and how difficult a target she is for others to hit, as well. Agility starts at Rank 1, and may be increased for a number of points equal to its current Rank multiplied by 10.

Presence (PRE)

Presence is a measure of the personality and charisma of the character. Presence also reflects how seriously a character will be taken by others: a character with a high Presence will rarely have to give her troops an order twice. Presence does not reflect the physical appearance of a character; a character may be as beautiful or as grotesque as the player desires and the GM will permit. Presence starts at Rank 1, and may be increased for a number of points equal to its current Rank multiplied by 10.

Strength (STR)

Strength is a measure of the physical prowess of the character, including lifting power and stamina. A character with Strength Rank 2 can lift one hundred kilograms over her head, although she would not be able to walk more than a step or two with it. For each two Ranks over Rank 2, she can lift twice as much, while her lifting ability is halved for each two Ranks below Rank 2. In hand-to-hand combat, Strength increases the damage a character can do (each point of Strength adds a point of damage), while in ranged combat, the distance a character can accurately throw a grenade, football, or knife is dependent upon her Strength. Strength also reflects how tough a character is, and how much damage she can shrug off without it hurting her. Strength starts at Rank 1, and may be increased for a number of Karma points equal to its current Rank multiplied by 10.

Psyche (PSY)

Psyche is a measure of the force and power of a character’s will. The strength of a Psychic character’s Psychic Abilities is in direct proportion to her Psyche. Psyche also determines how vulnerable a character is to Psychic Abilities, truth serums, or brain-washing. Psyche starts at Rank 1, and may be increased for a number of points equal its current Rank multiplied by 10.

Psyche also influences how sensitive an Immortal is to the presence of another of their kind. Immortals with greater Psyche will notice other Immortals from farther away, and will be able to estimate their power with better accuracy. This sense is called the Foreboding, and it is covered fully under Psychic Abilities.

Psychic Reserve (PR)

Using a Psychic Ability requires the expenditure of a character’s Psychic Reserve. A Psychic with a high Psychic Reserve Rank will be able to use her powers for longer periods without resting. The base Psychic Reserve Rank is the character’s Psyche multiplied by 10, but this may be increased at the cost of an additional point per point of Psychic Reserve. If Psyche should increase or decrease, Psychic Reserve will also be affected at 10 points of Psychic Reserve for every point of Psyche.

Statistic Cost Table Rank Increment Cost Total 1 0 0 2 10 10 3 20 30 4 30 60 5 40 100 6 50 150 7 60 210 8 70 280 9 80 360 10 90 450

Maximum Lift Table Strength Kilograms 1 70 2 100 3 140 4 200 5 280

Thrown Range Table Range Meters TMod Short 2xSTR -0 Medium 4xSTR -1 Long 8xSTR -3 Extreme 16xSTR -5

Abilities (Ables)

Abilities are Statistic-based capabilities that are acquired by training or study. Each Ability is associated with a Statistic. Under normal circumstances, this Statistic is the one used for any Task Rolls with that Ability. Under unusual circumstances, the GM may require that the character use an alternate Statistic with an Ability for a specific Task Roll.

Example:

Ian is attempting to perform surgery while on a moving troop transport. Normally, this would require an INT + Medical Task Roll. However, the GM determines that Ian’s manual dexterity must be sufficient to compensate for the jarring and bouncing of the vehicle. Ian must roll his AGL + Medical, with a Task Modifier of -5 for the difficulty of the surgical technique. Ian’s Agility Statistic is 4 and his Medical Ability is 3, giving him a total of 7. Adjusting for the -5 TMod, Ian must roll a (7 - 5 = 2) 2 or less on a d10 to successfully perform the operation.

Ability Cost

The Abilities a player initially chooses for her character should reflect the character’s Abstract. At least half of the character’s starting Abilities should directly pertain to her Abstract, and the GM may veto certain Abilities or require the character to possess other Abilities. To buy an Ability at Rank 1 costs 2 points. To increase an Ability by one costs the Ability’s current rank multiplied by two. The initial maximum for any Ability is 3, but this may be increased through experience.

Intellectual Abilities

Intellectual Abilities are dependent upon the character’s capability to reason and solve problems, as well as the character’s ability to think quickly and make decisions under pressure. In a dangerous and uncertain world, Intellect is the Statistic that not only determines who will survive, but who will thrive.

Computer

Computer allows the character to write new programs and take apart old ones. It also allows a character to create or circumvent computer security programs and protocols. If a character is extremely familiar with the program in question, the GM may assign a positive Task Modifier of +1 or +2. If the character is unfamiliar with the program in question, the Task Modifier may be from -2 to -3. If the character is attempting to break into a computer system, the GM may assign a Task Modifier of -3 or lower, since these programs are designed to prevent interference.

The equipment the character uses to interface with the computer system will affect the Task Modifier incurred. If the programmer is using a standard interface board (or “deck”) with a neuroelectronic interface socket (usually at the base of the skull, the temple, or the wrist) the equipment incurs a +0 TMod. Unfortunately, Immortals are not able to have cybernetic devices implanted in them, since their bodies will invariably reject the foreign material within a matter of days. This is one area where mortals have an advantage over Immortals: Immortals are not normally able to use these neural interfaces without extensive nanotherapy to suppress their healing abilities.

Using an obsolete model deck, or some non-intrusive neural interface (using pasted-on electrodes, perhaps) will incur a -1 to -3 TMod, depending on the condition of the equipment and the connection. Indirect access to the network, using a holographic terminal or VR equipment, will incur a -2 to -4 Task Modifier, depending on the quality of the equipment.

Use of non-intrusive interfaces, while less efficient than a direct neural interface, has the advantage of isolating the programmer from potentially lethal electronic intrusion countermeasures, or EIC (pronounced “ice”). The worst damage that an indirectly interfaced programmer can take from EIC is Casual Damage, while it is possible for a neurally-interfaced wiretapper to take Severe Damage from accessing high-security systems without proper authorization. It is, of course, illegal to have lethal EIC installed on any civilian computer system in the United States (thus its nickname, “black EIC”).

Failing a Computer Task Roll might mean that an attempt to circumvent a computer security system is simply unsuccessful, or it may mean that the character has set off an alarm or left a “trail” which may be followed back to her location.

(See also: Virtual Combat)

Disguise

Disguise is the Ability to alter someone, or something, so that they appear to be other than what they are. A man could be disguised as a woman, a car could be disguised as a shrub, or a pistol could be disguised as a cigarette case. The Task Modifier is dependent on the change in appearance to be made and the materials at hand with which to affect this change. Disguising a car to resemble a shrub would have a TMod of +2 (or more) in the deep woods, but would incur a TMod of -5 in the center of a basketball court. Disguising a pistol as an umbrella could be fairly straightforward (TMod of 0) with the proper tools and equipment, but would be nearly impossible (TMod -5) on the spur of the moment in an automobile.

The Disguise Ability also allows a character to hide something where it will not be seen and/or found. In an elevator, for example, there are several places to hide a pistol, but they require time and/or tools to reach (TMod of -2). Hiding in a tree, in a forest full of trees, would be fairly simple (TMod of +4) unless it was the middle of winter and the person hiding was wearing fluorescent colors (TMod of -4).

Each point the Task Roll is made by is an additional negative Task Modifier to anyone attempting to find or see through the Disguise, while failing the Task Roll indicates that the person or item can easily be seen for what it is.

Example:

Devon is attempting to disguise himself as Alhred Akbar, the infamous gun smuggler. The GM decides that with Devon’s handy disguise kit, this is fairly simple: a TMod of +2. Devon rolls his INT + Disguise + TMod (2 + 1 + 2 = 5), and gets a 4. He succeeds at the Disguise Task Roll, making the roll by 1 (5 - 4 = 1). Anyone who suspects that Alhred Akbar is not who he seems to be may make a Perception Task Roll, at a Task Modifier of -1, to spot the deception.

(See also: Perception, Stealth)

Finance

The Finance Ability gives the character expertise in the complex and sometimes arcane subject of math, interest, and bureaucracy. The Task Modifier to make sense of any financial transaction may range from +2 to -4, depending on how many lawyers are involved in the deal.

Heavy Weapons

Heavy Weapons include any weapon fired or controlled from a console. Some larger weapons systems require two, three, or even more operators, but such devices are rarely portable. There are a wide variety of heavy weapons systems, incurring Task Modifiers from +1 all the way to -3. Success on a Heavy Weapons Task Roll indicates a hit.

Linguist

The Linguist Ability allows a character to speak and read languages other than her native language. Each point a character has in the Linguist Ability adds one language with which the character is fluent.

Example:

Devon has a Rank of 1 in the Linguist Ability. He is fluent with one language of his choosing (Mexican Spanish), along with his native language (American English).

Medicine

A knowledge of Medicine can be very useful in the violent world of Legacy. Any medical procedure, from taking a person’s temperature and splinting broken limbs, to performing open-heart surgery and administering nanotherapy, is covered by the Medicine Ability. Knowledge of Medicine also gives the character an expertise with various drugs and toxins, and a thorough knowledge of their effects on human physiology. Simple procedures, such as diagnosing and treating mild infections, have a positive Task Modifier from +1 to +3. Extensive and difficult medical procedures, such as re-attaching a severed limb or performing brain surgery, incur Task Modifiers from -3 to -5.

Perception

Vision Task Modifiers Condition Short Med. Long Ext. Clear 10 100 500 1000 Light Fog, Rain 10 50 250 500 Twilight 10 25 100 200 Moonlit 7 15 30 60 Dark Night 5 10 20 40 Heavy Fog 1 2 4 8

Hearing Task Modifiers Condition Short Med. Long Ext. Silence 10 20 40 80 Party 5 10 20 30 Rock Concert 1 2 5 10

The Perception Ability increases a character’s awareness of her surroundings. A Perception Task Roll is only necessary when the GM determines that the character might not notice something (i.e., a smell, a sound, a small or inconspicuous clue). There are thousands of variables that could affect the Perception Task Modifier, but the two most common are context and distance.

A strong aroma would not stand out in a smelly stable, but a soft whisper might be quite noticeable during a solemn church service. Similarly, seeing anything at night typically incurs an additional -3 to -4 Task Modifier, but if the object is illuminated it will be more noticeable at night. The GM will have to be the final arbiter on what the situational Task Modifiers for a Perception Task Roll will be.

Making a Perception Task Roll to notice a sight or sound originating from far away is more difficult than making a Task Roll to notice something nearby. At Short Range (S) there is a +0 Task Modifier for Perception Rolls. At Medium Range (M) the TMod is -1, and at Long Range (L) there is a -3 Task Modifier. At Extreme Range the Task Modifier is -5.

Perception also makes it more difficult to fool the character. Disguise, Stealth, and Sleight of Hand are more difficult to use effectively on characters with a high Rank in Perception.

Science

The Science Ability can cover a variety of fields, depending on the character’s interests. Each point a character has in the Science Ability adds one science with which the character is familiar. Each field of endeavor in which the character has experience is rated at the Rank the character has in the Science Ability. Science Task Rolls outside a scientist’s field may be made at some lower Rank, as the GM decides.

Example:

Ian has a Rank of 3 in the Science Ability. He is knowledgeable in three fields of science (physics, chemistry, and astronomy). Any Science Task Roll he attempts within these fields is made with his Science Ability of 3. Ian is investigating a strange plant (the field of botany); the GM determines that Ian may make a Science Task Roll with a Science Ability Rank of 2.

Security

The Security Ability allows a character to install, recognize, remove, or evade security systems of various types. These include simple traps, locks, electronic locks, electric eyes, retinal scanners, and other kinds of security systems, but it does not include software-based computer security systems (these require the Computer Ability). Most security systems are designed to prevent tampering, so a Task Modifier of -3 or lower is quite common.

Failing a Security Task Roll might mean that an attempt to circumvent a security system is simply unsuccessful, or it may mean that the character has set off an alarm.

Survival

Survival is the Ability to live off the land and cope with adverse environments. The GM should have the character make a Survival Task Roll each day the character is in an adverse environment. The Task Modifier required is dependent upon the terrain, temperature, and availability of food and shelter, and how well equipped the character is for the particular area. Harsh, hostile environments (the Gobi Desert, the Antarctic) would have a very low Task Modifier (-3 to -5) depending on how prepared the character is, while very mild environments (Central Park, or the woods just outside town) would have a higher Task Modifier (+0 to +3).

Failing the Survival Task Roll one day might mean that the character has caught a cold or eaten a plant that has made her sick. Failing the Survival Task Roll several days in a row could be lethal.

Tactics

Tactics includes the ability to predict an opponent’s action and respond effectively and efficiently. A character with Tactics is capable of making the most of a bad situation, and can direct her forces to minimize losses. The GM should only require a character to make a Tactics roll when the player is having trouble analyzing a situation that the character might be able to handle. On a successful Tactics Task Roll, the GM should give the player a hint on what the enemy is likely to do next, or perhaps a way to more effectively counter the enemy’s tactics.

Technical Operations

Technical Operations is a catch-all Ability, allowing the character to operate everything from radar equipment to videocassette recorders. Technical Operations would be used to operate any equipment not covered by Computer, Heavy Weapons, Science, or Security. The complexity of the equipment will determine the Task Modifier Applied, but the TMod is rarely lower than -2.

Tracking

The Tracking Ability allows a character to follow another person (or creature) from marks they have made on the ground or from subtle cues in the landscape. A successful Tracking Task Roll may tell the character how long ago the target passed by, how many people were in the tracked party, how heavy they were, or anything else the GM decides. If the person being tracked does something to throw off pursuit (doubling back, going through water or over rocks), the GM may have the tracker make a Task Roll to see if she successfully follows the trail. If the party being tracked has many people, or if they do not realize that they are being followed, the GM may give the tracker a positive Task Modifier from +1 to +4. If the circumstances are particularly unsuitable for tracking (i.e., a parking lot, a blizzard), the GM may impose a negative Task Modifier of -2 or lower.

Agility Abilities

Agility Abilities are dependent upon a character’s manual dexterity, reflexes, and reaction time. Agility is paramount in combat, and only the swift will survive.

Athletics

The Athletics Ability describes the character’s physical fitness and athletic prowess. The GM may require an Athletics Task Roll to see if the character successfully climbs a building, jumps from tree limb to tree limb, or swims without drowning in rough waters. Athletics does not replace any other Ability, such as Dodge, Firearms, or Fisticuffs.

Dodge

Dodge is an unusual Ability, because it rarely requires a Task Roll to use. If a character is aware of an attack, the character’s Dodge Rank is applied as a negative Task Modifier to the attacker’s Task Roll. No roll is required by the person Dodging for this use of the Dodge Ability.

Example:

Devon, who has a Dodge Ability of 2, is being shot at by the bounty hunter Nicholas Schaeffer. Schaeffer’s AGL is 4, his Firearms Ability is 3, and the gun he is using incurs a -1 Task Modifier. Schaeffer’s required Task Roll to hit Devon would ordinarily be 6 (AGL 4 + Firearms 3 + TMod -1 = 6). However, Devon’s Dodge of 2 is applied as a negative Task Modifier (-2), making Nicholas Schaeffer’s required Task Roll a 4 (6 - 2 = 4). If Nicholas Schaeffer rolls a 4 or less on a d10, Devon will be hit.

Another use of the Dodge Ability is to avoid falling objects or non-targeting projectiles. If the character has a chance to be hit by a random falling object (rock, meteor, piano, etc.), the GM may require a Dodge Task Roll to see if the character avoids being hit. If the character has a zero Rank in Dodge, she may still make a Task Roll using just her Agility.

Example:

Jacqueline’s friend Shawna is hiking through the mountains when an unexpected rockslide threatens her. She wants to Dodge the falling debris, but she has a zero Rank in her Dodge Ability. Shawna has an Agility of 2, so she must roll a 2 (plus any Task Modifiers imposed by the GM) or less to avoid being hit by the falling rocks.

Drive Aircraft

The Drive Aircraft Ability allows a character to operate a vehicle designed for airborne travel. It also gives the character a familiarity with a broad range of airborne vehicles (i.e., helicopters, airplanes, gliders, zeppelins). A Drive Aircraft Task Roll is generally only required when something unusual happens such as when the aircraft is damaged, the pilot is attempting to lose pursuit, or the vehicle is caught in a storm.

Drive Landcraft

The Drive Landcraft Ability allows a character to operate a vehicle designed for land travel. It also gives the character a familiarity with a broad range of land vehicles (i.e., automobiles, motorcycles, 18-wheelers, construction vehicles). A Drive Landcraft Task Roll is generally only required when something unusual happens such as when the vehicle is damaged, the driver is attempting to lose pursuit, or the vehicle is maneuvering through a crowded city sidewalk at 100 KPH.

Drive Watercraft

The Drive Watercraft Ability allows a character to operate a vehicle designed for water travel. It also gives the character a familiarity with a broad range of water vehicles (i.e., boats, hovercraft, submarines, JIM diving suits). A Drive Watercraft Task Roll is generally only required when something unusual happens such as when the vehicle is damaged, the driver is attempting to lose pursuit, or the vehicle is maneuvering through a crowded marina at 100 knots.

Equestrian

The Equestrian Ability allows a character to ride and control a riding animal. It also gives the character a familiarity with a broad range of mounts (i.e., horses, mules, camels, elephants). An Equestrian Task Roll is generally only required when something unusual happens such as when the animal is injured, the rider is attempting to lose pursuit, or the rider is maneuvering through a crowded mall at full gallop. The Equestrian Ability may only be used on an animal that has been properly trained by someone with the Animal Training Ability.

Firearms

The Firearms Ability allows a character to fire and perform maintenance on hand-held ranged weapons. It also gives the character a familiarity with a broad range of small arms (bows, crossbows, pistols, rifles, machine-guns). The Firearms Ability does not allow the character to build or design weapons: this requires the Weaponsmith Ability.

Fisticuffs

Fisticuffs is the use of the hands (or other extremities) as weapons. A wide variety of unarmed combat styles are represented by the Fisticuffs Ability, from boxing and street brawling to karate and aikido. It is up to the player to determine what style (or styles) her character uses. The various Melee Combat Maneuvers are covered in the Combat Maneuvers section.

Mechanics

Mechanics is the relevant Ability whenever a character attempts to build or repair a mechanical device. A Mechanics Task Roll might be required to repair a damaged airplane, modify a refrigeration unit to be a dehumidifier, or install a high-performance engine into a VW Beetle. Failing the Mechanics Roll might indicate that the device simply does not work, or that it will fail catastrophically during use.

Melee Weapons

The Melee Weapons Ability represents the character’s proficiency in the use of hand-held weapons. A wide variety of combat styles are represented by the Melee Weapons Ability, from brute force to artistic finesse. It is up to the player to determine what style (or styles) her character uses. The various Melee Combat Maneuvers are covered in the Combat Maneuvers section.

Sleight of Hand

Sleight of Hand is used to fool the eye or misdirect attention from what the character is doing with her hands (or other extremities). A Sleight of Hand Task Roll might be required to slip a dagger to an ally, to pick someone’s pocket, or to pull coins out of a child’s ear. The size or complexity of the deception will affect the Task Modifier of the Sleight of Hand roll.

Each point the Task Roll is made by is an additional negative Task Modifier to anyone attempting to notice the Sleight of Hand, while failing the Sleight of Hand Task Roll indicates that the deception is easily spotted by the casual observer.

Example:

Devon is attempting to slip a key to Jacqueline, who is in a Mexican jail. The GM decides that with the guards admiring Devon’s new Nissan Headhunter, this is fairly simple: a TMod of +2. Devon rolls against his AGL + Sleight of Hand + TMod (5 + 2 + 2 = 9), and gets a 6. He succeeds at the Sleight of Hand Task Roll, making the roll by 3 (9 - 6 = 3). Any guards watching Jacqueline may make a Perception Task Roll at a Task Modifier of -3 to see Devon slip her the key.

Stealth

Stealth is the art of sneaking around. A Stealth Task Roll might be required to slip into a college dorm after curfew, to sneak up on a sentry, or to shadow a suspect back to the criminal’s hideout. Terrain, available cover, camouflage, and background noise will all affect the Task Modifier of the Stealth roll.

Each point the Task Roll is made by is an additional negative Task Modifier to anyone attempting to notice the person trying to be stealthy, while failing the Stealth Task Roll indicates that the furtive prowler is easily spotted by the casual observer.

Example:

Devon, who has a Stealth Ability of 3 and an Agility of 5, is trying to sneak away from the Mexican prison where the bounty hunter Nicholas Schaeffer left Jacqueline. Since the guards have noticed Jacqueline’s absence and turned on the floodlights, the GM decides that the TMod is -3. Devon rolls his AGL + Stealth + TMod (5 + 3 - 3 = 5), and gets a 1. He succeeds at the Stealth Task Roll, making the roll by 4 (5 - 1 = 4). Any guards searching for Devon may make a Perception Task Roll, at a Task Modifier of -4 to see Devon skulking in the shadows by the palm trees.

(See also: Disguise, Perception)

Weaponsmith

The Weaponsmith Ability allows a character to design, build, and repair weapons. A Weaponsmith Task Roll might be required to repair a damaged carbine, modify a surveying laser to be a laser pistol, or design a more deadly hand grenade. Failing the Weaponsmith Roll might indicate that the weapon simply does not work, or that it will fail catastrophically during use, probably injuring the person holding it. Generally speaking, the weaponsmith must have some familiarity with the type of weapon she is working on; if not, the GM may choose to impose negative TMods as appropriate.

Presence Abilities

Presence Abilities rely upon the personality and charisma of the character. In any interaction with others, Presence Abilities will be what separates the leaders from the followers.

Acting

Acting is the Ability that allows a character to modify her behavior, accent, and even mannerisms to seem other than who she is. A character can mask her moods by using Acting, hide her identity, or impersonate someone else. Simply feigning emotions is relatively easy, incurring a TMod of +1 or even more. Impersonating a specific person is more difficult, incurring a TMod from +0 to -3, depending on how familiar the impersonator is with the subject. Impersonating someone with which the character is extremely familiar might even incur a TMod of +1 or +2.

Carrying on an impersonation over a period of time increases the character’s chance of making a tell-tale mistake; the character must make a new Acting Task Roll each day the impersonator is exposed to someone she is trying to fool, or during any occasion which the GM thinks will challenge the character’s acting abilities. During an event such as a family reunion, the GM may even require the character to make an Acting roll every few minutes, but this is an extreme case.

Each point the Task Roll is made by is an additional negative Task Modifier to anyone attempting to find or see through the charade, while failing the Task Roll indicates that the impersonator has made an obvious gaffe, revealing herself to be a fraud.

Animal Training

This Ability allows a character to train an animal to do as she wishes. By using this Ability to train an animal over an extended time, the animal trainer may condition the animal to the point where it will accept commands from nearly anyone, even those who do not themselves have the Animal Training Ability. Training an animal normally takes many weeks, depending on the intelligence and temperament of the animal and the skill of the trainer.

Animal Training is the Ability used to train an animal to accept a rider and follow her commands. The Equestrian Ability is required by the rider to successfully give those commands and stay mounted while the animal obeys them.

Bureaucracy

The Bureaucracy Ability is used to cut through (or create) red tape, to find the proper line at the Department of Motor Vehicles, to wade through the paperwork at tax time, and to deal effectively with snide civil servants. A Bureaucracy roll must be made any time the character wants to interact with a bureaucracy when time is of the essence.

Etiquette

Etiquette is the skill of using the proper manners for a given environment. This includes the appropriate grammar (or lack of it), suitable attire, and how to blend in with any cultural group. An Etiquette Task Roll may be required whenever the character is trying to socialize with a group without offending them. A failed Etiquette roll would result in the character being snubbed by polite society, or possibly in her being maimed by a coarser crowd.

Interrogation

Getting information from someone by using threats of violence or death is accomplished by using the Interrogation Ability. A skillful Interrogator can gauge how close the subject is to breaking, can inflict the maximum amount of pain with the least amount of physical damage, and can usually tell when the subject is close to death. The Interrogation Ability may, at the GM’s discretion, include a familiarity with mind-control drugs, truth serums, or other esoteric means of extracting information. The Psyche Rank of the victim is usually applied as a negative modifier to the Interrogation Task Roll. Failure of the Task Roll may result in the subject convincingly giving false information or possibly in the subject’s accidental death.

Leadership

Leadership is the Ability that allows one to give orders and have them followed. Leadership is as much a matter of how to say something as it is what to say. Use of the Leadership Ability assumes that the supposed leader is already an ally of those to be led, although not necessarily the person nominally in charge. A Leadership Task Roll is only necessary when the character’s “troops” are in the losing end of a fight (incurring a TMod of -1 or -2), or when the character gives an order that the troops consider suicidal (TMod -5). A failed Leadership Task Roll could result in some of the leader’s troops disobeying the order or deserting, or possibly even a mutiny resulting in the death or dismemberment of the erstwhile leader.

Negotiation

Negotiation is the art of the deal. There isn’t enough of everything to go around in this life, and Negotiation is the way a character makes sure she gets her share. A Negotiation roll might be necessary any time the character is trying to exchange goods or services with someone else. Normally, each side would make their Negotiation Task Rolls, and whoever made the roll by a greater amount would get the better deal. A failed Task Roll could indicate that the character has gleefully paid far too much for far too little.

Persuasion

Persuasion is used to convince someone of the truth of a given statement or situation, usually with the aim of getting them to act on it. Persuasion could be used to convert someone to a religion, sell someone a car, or simply win an argument. It is not necessary for the persuader to actually believe her own argument, but if she does her side is more convincing (TMod of +1). If the person being persuaded is inclined to believe the persuader’s arguments, the GM could grant a TMod of +2 or more to the persuader’s Task Roll. If the character is trying to persuade someone to believe a patent absurdity (from the target’s point of view), the GM might impose a TMod of -3 or less to the Task Roll. A failed Persuasion Task Roll usually means that the subject simply does not believe the arguments of the persuader, but it could mean that the attempt at persuasion has backfired, firmly convincing the subject of the opposite of what the persuader was trying to get across.

Politics

Politics is a mixture of the Persuasion and Seduction Abilities, but it is used mainly on large numbers of people. Often a successful politician will seem distasteful when met one-on-one, yet be able to sway large crowds to her point of view when she addresses them as a whole. Politics also has an element of Negotiation in it, as the politician will ask for certain favors now in return for her promise to grant certain favors later. More often than not, the return favors never materialize, yet the politician’s reputation remains unsullied. A failed Politics Task Roll could result in the politician’s corrupt lifestyle being exposed (and believed by the populace), or it could simply mean that she is unable to catch the attention of a fickle and inattentive crowd.

Resistance

Resistance is the Ability of a character to withstand severe pain, interrogation, or mind-control drugs, usually by using self-hypnosis or some other esoteric training. Resistance is an unusual Ability, because it rarely requires a Task Roll to use. If a character wishes to Resist an attempt at Interrogation, the character’s Resistance Rank is applied as a negative Task Modifier (in addition to the character’s Psyche Rank) to the interrogator’s Task Roll. No roll is required by the person Resisting for this use of the Resistance Ability.

The GM may also allow the character to make a Resistance Task Roll to endure some other debilitating pain without passing out or becoming incapacitated. The TMod incurred is dependent upon the situation, usually from -2 to -4, at the GM’s discretion.

Resistance is distinct from the Iron Will Accent, since it has no effect on Psychic Abilities.

Seduction

Seduction is the art of convincing someone that you care about them, and getting them to like you. Often the goal of a seduction is a favor of some sort, not necessarily sexual in nature. Seduction is as much a matter of style as it is appearance, and can sometimes be successful even if the target is aware she is being seduced. A failed Seduction Task Roll can mean that the attempt was simply unsuccessful, or that the target finds the would-be seducer offensive or pathetic.

Streetwise

The Streetwise Ability gives a character a thorough knowledge of the dark side of civilization. The character knows where to find illegal substances or devices, knows who to pump for information, and knows where to find bars that have cheap beer and attractive bartenders. A Streetwise roll might be required to track down the bolt-hole of a certain drug dealer, or to get the word to the Mafia that the shipment of guns at midnight is a set-up. A failed Streetwise roll can be particularly dangerous, since folks who make their living in the shadows often don’t like busybodies.

Teaching

Historically, Teaching has been a tragically undervalued Ability. Teaching is not merely coercing a student to memorize tables and quotations, but the ability to spark an awareness and an understanding in the student’s mind. Any time the character is trying to impart a new idea or technique to someone, the GM may require her to make a Teaching Task Roll. Teaching can be used to role-play out the spending of another character’s Karma points, or as a way of increasing an NPC’s Abilities. A failed Teaching Task Roll usually means that the student is confused, and understands less than she did before the teacher began explaining.

Psychic Abilities

Psychic Abilities are those strange powers stemming from the subconscious, the darker side of the mind that lies beneath the surface of the rational veneer. With Psychic Abilities, the character may peer into another’s mind, change the information found there, or erase it altogether. Unlike other Abilities, the use of Psychic Abilities is only possible by characters with the Accent “Psychic” or “Latent Psychic.” Characters with the Accent “Psychic” may use their Psychic Ability at any level, but those with the Accent “Latent Psychic” may not attempt any Psychic Task Roll with a negative Task Modifier. In addition, a Psychic may only attempt to use those Psychic Abilities in which she has a Rank of at least 1.

Using a Psychic Ability requires the expenditure of a character’s Psychic Reserve. The base Psychic Reserve Rank is the character’s Psyche multiplied by 10, but this may be increased at the cost of an additional point per point of Psychic Reserve.

When using any Psychic Ability, the Task Modifier for that Task is applied to the character’s Psychic Reserve, “spending” the Reserve. Under typical conditions, Psychic Reserve points are recovered at the rate of the character’s Psyche every hour. If the Psychic Reserve is drained below zero, the character’s Psyche begins to be affected. Every ten points below zero that the Psychic Reserve drops, the character’s Psyche drops one rank (at the end of the Turn in which the Psychic Reserve was expended). Should the character’s Psyche drop to zero, the character’s mind dies, leaving the body a vegetable (which will expire shortly thereafter).

Example:

A Psychic member of the Woodland Warriors, an ecological fringe terrorist group, has a Psyche of 3 and a Psychic Reserve of 32, and she is attempting to cause a Psychic Overload on Devon. The Warrior is attempting to cause 5 points of Severe Damage each Turn, which incurs a -10 TMod. Every Turn the terrorist attempts the Overload, 10 points are subtracted from her Psychic Reserve. Three attempts leaves her with 2 points of PR. Her next attempt to Overload Devon reduces her Psychic Reserve to -8 and reduces her Psyche to 2 (at the end of the Turn). If the Woodland Warrior should continue until her Psychic Reserve is reduced to -28, her Psyche will be reduced to zero and her brain will die.

The use of Psychic Abilities does not put the Psychic into a “trance” or catatonic state (except for the Trance Ability), but it is distracting, and will prevent the character from paying serious attention to anything else. A Psychic could walk around while using a Psychic Ability, but she would not be able to pay much attention to where she was going. Any normal Perception Task Rolls attempted while using a Psychic Ability are usually at a -2 TMod.

The use of Psychic Abilities is not visible or otherwise detectable to normal people. Only those who are Sensitive, Latent Psychics, or Psychics may perceive the use of Psychic Abilities. The effects of Psychic Abilities such as Psychokinesis and Pyrokinesis (i.e., objects floating or spontaneously combusting) may be quite visible, but a non-Psychic observer would not be able to determine the source of such effects.

Psychic Abilities are necessarily “fuzzy,” and require the GM to carefully monitor their use. Many factors may affect the TMod of a Psychic Ability Task Roll, including the number of distractions around the Psychic and her emotional state. It is up to the GM to assign appropriate TMods for a given situation, but the GM must walk a fine line between regulating Psychic Abilities and rendering them useless.

Psychic Abilities that effect another person’s mind or body are more difficult if the Psychic cannot see or otherwise perceive the target. Using a Psychic Ability upon someone whom the Psychic cannot directly perceive, through her normal senses or Clairvoyance, incurs an additional -2 TMod, in addition to any other Task Modifiers (this includes using a remote camera or some other electronic imaging system, but not a reflective/refractive device such as binoculars or a simple periscope). If the Psychic cannot perceive the target at all, it is not possible to affect the target’s mind or body at all, although pre-existing effects may remain once the target leaves the Psychic’s presence.

Auspice

Auspice allows a Psychic to recover her expended Psychic Reserve points more rapidly than normal. Under typical circumstances, once each hour a Psychic will recover a number of Psychic Reserve points equal to her Psyche. If a Psychic has Auspice, however, she will recover her Psychic Reserve points much more rapidly. Each point the Psychic has in Auspice will add the Psyche Rank of the Psychic to the amount of Psychic Reserve she recovers each hour. If the Psychic has Rank 1 Auspice, she will recover twice her Psyche each hour in Psychic Reserve. If the Psychic has an Auspice of Rank 3, she will recover an amount of Psychic Reserve each hour equal to four times her Psyche. Auspice does not require an action or Task Roll to use; it is automatic and unconscious.

Clairvoyance

Clairvoyance Task Modifiers Time (+/-) TMod 1 hour -0 6 hours -1 1 day -2 1 week -3 1 month -4 6 months -5 1 year -6 5 years -7

Clairvoyance operates much like the Perception Ability, but it allows a character to use her senses to perceive things at a distance. The Task Modifier for the Clairvoyance Task Roll is not dependent upon how far away the target area or object is from the clairvoyant, but upon how familiar the clairvoyant is with the object or area. Finding her own car in a crowded parking lot would be quite easy, for example (TMod +2). A Task Modifier of +0 is sufficient to find a recently lost item, if the owner of the item is touching the Psychic while the Psychic is looking for the item, while finding an object the clairvoyant has never seen that belongs to someone the clairvoyant has never met would have a TMod of -3 or lower. A successful Task Roll will result in the clairvoyant perceiving the object from somewhere close by, and will give her a general idea of its location. A failed Task Roll will result in the clairvoyant seeing false images or nothing at all, and will prevent the clairvoyant from ever finding the object using Clairvoyance.

Finding people is generally more difficult than finding inanimate objects, unless the clairvoyant has in her possession an item which the subject holds dear. Without such an item, finding a person (or other living thing) incurs an additional -3 TMod.

Clairvoyance may also be used to see (or smell, hear, etc.) through time. Perceiving through time incurs TMods dependent upon how far away, temporally speaking, the clairvoyant wishes to perceive.

Each use of Clairvoyance lasts up to ten minutes. Using it longer to observe a given object or person does not require an additional Task Roll, but it does require the expenditure of additional Psychic Reserve points for each additional ten minutes. If the Psychic wishes to view a different place or person, she must make a new Task Roll and spend the additional Psychic Reserve points.

Domination

Domination Task Modifiers Delay TMod 1 hour -0 6 hours -1 1 day -2 1 week -3 1 month -4 6 months -5 1 year -6 5 years -7

The Domination Ability allows a character to override another person’s will with her own. This makes possible a wide variety of effects, from short-term single commands to long-term conditioning. Domination may also be used to alter a person’s memories, by ordering the subject to forget certain events or to remember them differently. Domination does not allow the Psychic to read the subject’s mind, however; this is the domain of the Telepathy Ability. It is not necessary to speak to Dominate the subject, but it does make the Domination easier (+1 TMod). The Task Modifier for the Domination is also dependent upon the reasonableness of the command: if the command is reasonable, the TMod is +0 or +1. If the command is unusual or would seem strange to the subject, the TMod is -1 or -2. If the command is bizarre or self-destructive, or is something the subject would be violently against doing, the TMod would be -3 or -4 (most alterations to the subject’s memory would fall into this range). If the command is blatantly stupid or suicidal, the TMod may be -5 or lower.

The Psychic may plant commands or “suggestions” for the subject to carry out at a later date. The TMod incurred for such a command is dependent upon how far into the future the command is to be obeyed. Also, the subject may attempt a Psyche Task Roll at the time the command is to take effect; if the roll is successful, the subject will shrug off the suggestion.

Each use of the Domination Ability lasts up to ten minutes. Using it longer to command a given animal or person does not require an additional Task Roll, but it does require the expenditure of additional Psychic Reserve points for each additional ten minutes. If the Psychic wishes to command a different person, she must make a new Task Roll and spend the additional Psychic Reserve points. If the Psychic wishes to implant a delayed Domination suggestion that would take longer than ten minutes to accomplish, the Psychic must expend sufficient Psychic Reserve points at the time of the initial Domination to cover the entire duration of the action to be taken. If the victim of the delayed Domination takes longer than anticipated to perform as ordered, the Domination will end and the action will be incomplete.

Normally, the subject of the Domination will clearly remember her actions after the Domination ceases, and she will realize that her will was not her own. If the subject was ordered to forget something, she will indeed forget it, but she will recall being Dominated. If the Psychic wants the subject to be unaware of the Domination after its effects have passed, the Task will have an additional -1 TMod. If the roll is successful, the subject will either think they were of her own volition, or (if the subject would be violently opposed to doing as she was Dominated to do) she will not remember having performed the actions she took while Dominated. If the Psychic fails her Task Roll, the subject will realize that something strange has taken place, but she might not realize that someone has been tampering with her mind unless the subject has experienced the effect before.

Farfetching

Farfetching is the least definable but potentially the most useful Psychic Ability. Farfetching is equal parts Clairvoyance, Telepathy, and good old-fashioned intuition. By Farfetching, the Psychic can tell if a person is lying, hiding something, or simply misguided. A person’s general character could be discerned by the attentive Farfetcher, as well as their motivations or basic personality traits. However, Farfetching rarely reveals these insights in concrete terms. The Psychic is allowing her inner awareness to examine her surroundings; the information gleaned in such a manner cannot be directly communicated to the conscious mind. The Psychic will have a sense for the “rightness” or “wrongness” of a situation, or she will have an intuitive understanding of a person’s motives, but she will have difficulty expressing these things in terms others, or even she, can understand.

The Task Modifier for Farfetching is dependent completely upon the situation. Strong feelings or powerful forces will make Farfetching easier, with a Task Modifier of only -1 or -2. Obscure motivations, or conflicting feelings, will make Farfetching more difficult, incurring a TMod of -3 or more. In all cases, Farfetching is nearly impossible when another Psychic is involved, imposing a TMod of -5. A failed Farfetching Task Roll usually results in conflicting impressions, or no impressions at all.

Foreboding

Foreboding Task Modifiers Radius (meters) TMod 0 to 5 -0 6 to 10 -1 11 to 20 -2 21 to 40 -3 41 to 80 -4

Foreboding allows a mortal Psychic or an Immortal to sense the presence, and possibly the approximate location and strength, of Immortals in the immediate vicinity. Unlike Clairvoyance, the Foreboding Task Roll is rolled individually for each Immortal in the vicinity of the Psychic. Immortals do not need to use a Turn to use the Foreboding; it is innate and automatic. Mortals may make one Task Roll per Turn for each Immortal in their area; if there are four Immortals in proximity to the mortal Psychic, for example, the Psychic may make four Task Rolls (one for each Immortal) in the Turn that she uses the Foreboding. There is no penalty for making such multiple Foreboding Task Rolls in a single Turn.

The Task Modifier for the Foreboding Task Roll is dependent upon the Karma of the Immortal to be sensed and her nearness to the person doing the sensing. For each ten points of total earned Karma (fractions rounded up) possessed by the Immortal to be sensed, the individual using the Foreboding is granted a +1 TMod to her Foreboding Task Roll to sense that Immortal. Thus, an attempting to sense an Immortal with 32 total earned Karma would grant the Psychic a +4 Task Modifier. Distance from the Immortal to be perceived also affects the Task Roll, as indicated in the Foreboding Task Modifier Table.

If the Foreboding Task Roll is successfully made by more than three, the Immortal’s direction and approximate Karma may be deduced. The direction indicated will be very general (“Behind you,” for example, or “somewhere ahead of you”), and the Karma of the Immortal will be given as a range of possibilities (between 20 and 40, for example). Thus, if an Immortal who needed to roll a 5 to successfully sense the presence of another Immortal rolled a 2, the Immortal would be able to discern the approximate direction and strength of the Immortal she perceived. If the player rolls a 1, then the Immortal or mortal Psychic knows the precise location and Karma of the sensed Immortal.

Example:

Devon is sneaking up on Major d’Estaigne, an old enemy of Ian McAllister. As Devon comes within eighty meters of d’Estaigne, both Devon and the Major may make Foreboding Task Rolls to sense each other. Devon has a Psyche of 2 and a Rank of 1 in Foreboding, while Major d’Estaigne has a total accrued Karma of 65, so Devon must roll:

2 + 1 + 7 (65 / 10 = 7) - 4 (for 80 meters) = 6

six or less to sense d’Estaigne. The Major has a Psyche of 4 and Devon has a total accrued Karma of 3, so the Major must roll:

4 + 1 (3 / 10 = 1) - 4 (for 80 meters) = 1

one or less to sense Devon’s advance. Devon rolls a three, which is enough to let Devon know that d’Estaigne is in the area, but not enough for him to know the Major’s direction. Major d’Estaigne rolls a two, which means she is unaware of Devon’s stealthy approach. When Devon comes within forty meters, both Devon and the Major may roll again.

Foreboding is an unusual Ability because, although it acts much as any other Psychic Ability, an Immortal does not have to be Psychic to possess it (also, Immortals are not considered “Psychic” simply because they have the power to sense each other’s life forces). All Immortals automatically have Rank 0 in Foreboding, and they may increase this Rank with Karma as with other Abilities. However, Immortals do not need to have the Psychic Accent to use the Foreboding, nor do most of the usual Psychic-related penalties apply to the use of Foreboding by Immortals. Immortals who do not have the Psychic Accent are at no penalty to use the Foreboding, and it requires no conscious action on the part of the Immortal to activate it. It costs no Psychic Reserve to use, the Immortal does not have to be able to see another Immortal to sense her, and physical barriers do not impede the sense of Foreboding. The normal penalties for attempting Psychic Task Rolls while distracted do apply to both mortal Psychics and Immortals.

Mortal Psychics may buy the Foreboding Ability, but it functions normally when possessed by mortals. It takes a conscious action to activate, and mortals without the full Psychic Accent are at penalties to use it, just as they are for normal Psychic Attributes. However, the Psychic does not have to be able to see an Immortal to sense her, and physical barriers do not impede the sense of Foreboding. Each use of Foreboding by mortals lasts up to ten minutes. Using it longer to sense the presence of Immortals requires the expenditure of additional Psychic Reserve points for each additional ten minutes.

Example:

Coincidentally, Major d’Estaigne has employed a mercenary with the Psychic Ability Foreboding. Once an hour, the mercenary spends a Turn and two points of Psychic Reserve to sense if any Immortals are within ten meters. The mercenary could spend up to four points of Psychic Reserve, if she wanted to stretch her Foreboding sense out to eighty meters. She has a Psyche of 3, so to sense Devon at ten meters she needs to roll:

3 + 1 (3 / 10 = 1) - 2 (for 10 meters) = 2

two or less to detect Devon as he creeps up on the Major’s yacht. The mercenary rolls a two, allowing her to give the Major a few seconds notice before Devon comes crashing through the door.

Illusion

Illusion Task Modifiers Delay TMod 1 hour -0 6 hours -1 1 day -2 1 week -3 1 month -4 6 months -5 1 year -6 5 years -7

A Psychic may use Illusion to make objects, people, or a setting appear to be other than they are to a single target individual. The Psychic must choose a single target to affect with the Illusion for each Illusion Task Roll, and the TMod is determined by the degree of change the target perceives.

A mild or cosmetic change, like changing the model of an automobile or the style of someone’s clothes, is fairly simple: a TMod of +0. A moderate change, such as making an enemy look and sound like a friend, or making a lump of coal look and taste like a piece of cake, would incur a TMod of -2. Severe changes to the target’s perceptions, so that what the target perceives has little or no basis in reality, would incur a TMod of -5. The Psychic must have some familiarity with the objects or situations she creates in the mind of the target; if not, the GM may impose additional negative TMods.

Once the Psychic has successfully made her Illusion Task Roll, the Illusion will continue until the target successfully makes a Psyche Task Roll, with the Psyche Rank of the Psychic as a negative TMod to the target’s Psyche Task Roll. The target of the Illusion may attempt to make a Psyche Task Roll once each hour until the target succeeds, at which time the target’s perceptions are no longer distorted by the Illusion. If the Psychic wants to make it more difficult for the subject to break free of the Illusion, she may attempt the Illusion Task Roll with the negative TMods based on how long the subject must wait between Psyche Task Rolls.

Normally, the Psychic only needs to make one Task Roll to initiate the Illusion, after which it will continue until the target breaks free of its effects. If the Psychic wants to control the Illusion as the target reacts to it, such as making Illusionary people speak intelligently (other than meaningless small-talk), or if the Psychic wants to change the Illusion or create a new one, the Psychic must make another Task Roll and spend additional Psychic Reserve. The Psychic may end the Illusion voluntarily at any time.

A character may take damage from an Illusion, but the character may subtract her defenses from the attack as if it were a “real” attack. Any damage caused by Illusionary objects or events will vanish once the Illusion ends. If a character takes enough Illusionary damage to die, she will go into a coma. Once in the coma, the target of the Illusion may normally only attempt a Psyche Task Roll once per day to break out of the Illusion and come out of the coma.

If others are trying to break the grip of the Illusion on the character, and the victim of the Illusion can perceive them, the victim may get an additional +1 or +2 to her Psyche roll to break free of the Illusion, or she may be able to attempt a Psyche Task Roll more often than normal, at the GM’s discretion.

Mask

Mask Task Modifiers Radius (meters) TMod 0 to 5 -0 6 to 10 -1 11 to 20 -2 21 to 40 -3 41 to 80 -4

The Psychic may mask herself, others, or even an object, making them effectively invisible to anyone looking for them. The Psychic Mask affects all normal senses: sight, hearing, smell, etc. Anyone who touches the Psychic using a Mask will not notice the fact she has done so, as long as the Psychic makes no effort to draw attention to herself. If the Psychic undertakes any particularly violent sensory activity (i.e., punching someone, firing a gun, using a bullhorn, opening a bottle of ammonia), those who would most notice the sensory stimulation may attempt a Perception Task Roll to perceive the Psychic, with appropriate TMods as the GM dictates. Punching someone would only allow the person punched to attempt a Perception Task Roll, while firing a pistol would give everyone near the Psychic the opportunity to make a Perception roll.

The Task Modifier for the Psychic Mask Task Roll is dependent upon the size of the area to be affected around the Psychic. Anyone entering the area affected will immediately be under the influence of the Psychic Mask, while anyone leaving the area will immediately be able perceive the Psychic.

For an additional Task Modifier, the Psychic may alter her appearance and/or mannerisms, appearing to be other than who she is. Impersonating a specific person is generally more difficult, incurring a TMod from +0 to -3, depending on how familiar the impersonator is with the subject. Impersonating someone with which the character is extremely familiar might even incur a TMod of +1 or +2.

Each use of the Mask Ability lasts up to ten minutes. Using it longer to obscure herself or others does not require an additional Task Roll, but it does require the expenditure of additional Psychic Reserve points for each additional ten minutes. If the Psychic wishes to change the area Masked or the area affected by the Mask, or she uses the Mask change her appearance, she must make a new Task Roll and spend the additional Psychic Reserve points.

A Psychic Mask will not affect anyone whose Rank in the Clairvoyance Ability is higher than the Masked Psychic’s Rank in the Mask Ability. A character who possesses a Clairvoyance Rank greater than the Psychic’s Mask Rank will perceive the Psychic normally, but will be aware that the Psychic is using a Psychic Mask.

For an additional Task Modifier, the Psychic may attempt to Mask other people or objects. The Mask normally will obscure up to one hex (normally the Psychic’s hex, but it may be any hex within sight of the Psychic). The radius of the area hidden by the Mask may be increased by one hex for each additional -1 TMod. Any masked person or object which leaves the range specified by the Psychic will seem to suddenly appear. If one person Masked by the psychic performs actions which void the Mask, the person doing so will no longer be protected by the Mask but the Psychic and any others Masked will not be adversely affected.

This Psychic Mask will not affect electronics, cameras, or other devices, but it will affect anyone currently using those devices within the area of the Psychic. The Psychic does not need to be aware of the viewer for the viewer to be affected by the Mask; the viewer must simply be in the area around the Psychic. A failed Task Roll indicates that the Psychic is just as noticeable as anyone else would be in the same place and time.

Overload

A Psychic Overload is an attempt to damage or destroy someone’s nervous system by flooding it with information. To accomplish this, the Psychic must roll (Psyche + Overload + Task Modifier) or less on a d10. The Task Modifier for a Psychic Overload is -1 for every point of Casual Damage the Psychic is attempting to cause. A Task Modifier of +0 is sufficient to cause the target to have a severe headache, if the Task Roll is successful. Attempting to cause the target Severe Damage incurs an additional -5 Task Modifier. The target’s Psyche is applied as Casual Defense against the damage caused by Psychic Overload, while a Psychic Shield acts as Severe Defense against the damage caused by a Psychic Overload.

Psychokinesis

The Psychokinesis Ability allows a Psychic to move objects with her willpower alone. The Psychic can pick up or move objects as if she were picking them up and manipulating them herself. Thus, she could dial a phone, throw a baseball, or punch someone, but she could not do microsurgery or pick locks without the appropriate tools. The Psychic may use her Psychokinesis on as many different targets as she wants, but each target requires a separate Task Roll to pick up (on separate Turns), and Psychic Reserve points must be spent separately to maintain the Psychokinesis on each target. At the GM’s option, a homogenous mass of small objects may be treated as a single object (i.e., a bushel of apples, a pile of gravel, a bucket load of nuts and bolts), but the Psychic must pick up and manipulate the objects as a unit.

The Task Modifier of the Psychokinesis Task Roll is dependent upon the force brought to bear by the Psychokinetic field. For every point of Strength the Psychic attempts to use, there is a cumulative -1 TMod. A TMod of +0 is sufficient to lift a negligible amount of weight, similar in Strength to a small baby. Note that the Psychic’s Psychokinetic Strength is not limited to her Rank in the Psychokinesis Ability. If the Psychic wishes to use her Psychokinesis to attack someone, she must still make an applicable combat Task Roll (Firearms, Fisticuffs, or Melee).

Physical barriers, such as windows, will not impede the Psychokinetic force, but they may make it more difficult for the Psychic to directly perceiver her target. It is not possible, even if the Psychic somehow was granted x-ray vision, to use Psychokinesis to reach inside living beings or plants due to the aura of life surrounding them. Thus, it is not possible to reach inside someone and grab their heart. There are other energy fields that impede Psychokinesis as well, but these are extremely rare and usually not 100% effective. Also, Psychokinesis is non-reactive: no energy or motion held by the manipulated object is translated to the body of the Psychic. It is thus possible for the Psychic to pick herself up with Psychokinesis and “fly” using it, although Psychokinesis requires that the Psychic spend Psychic Reserve points every Turn to maintain the effect. If the Psychic should stop spending Psychic Reserve points for any reason, any items held will begin falling.

A failed Psychokinesis Task Roll may mean that the Psychic cannot focus the Psychokinetic force enough to use it, or perhaps that the Psychokinesis goes wild for a few moments, throwing random objects around the room.

Psychic Shield (PDef)

A Psychic Shield protects a character from Psychic Overload and Pyrokinesis attacks. The character’s Rank in her Psychic Shield Ability is subtracted from any damage caused by a Psychic Overload or Pyrokinesis. A Psychic Shield is considered Severe Defense versus Psychic Overload and Pyrokinesis attacks, but it is not effective against Illusionary attacks unless the Illusion is of a Psychic Overload or Pyrokinesis. Psychic Shield does not generally require a Task Roll or the expenditure of Psychic Reserve points to use.

Pyrokinesis

Pyrokinesis is a specialized form of Psychokinesis. By using Pyrokinesis a Psychic is attempting to heat up an object by increasing its molecular motion. To accomplish this, the Psychic must roll (Psyche + Pyrokinesis + Task Modifier) or less on a d10. The Task Modifier for a Pyrokinesis is -1 for every point of Casual Damage the Psychic is attempting to cause. A Task Modifier of +0 is sufficient to cause a human target to be uncomfortably warm, if the Task Roll is successful. Attempting to actually ignite a target, causing Severe Damage, incurs an additional -5 Task Modifier. The Pyrokinetic force thus applied may cover an area as large as a hand with the fingers spread, or as small as the tip of a finger. The target’s Psyche is applied as Casual Defense against the damage caused by Pyrokinesis, while a Psychic Shield acts as Severe Defense against the damage caused by Pyrokinesis. Non-living objects normally have little or no defense against Pyrokinesis (even materials usually considered non-flammable), but they are not usually permanently harmed by the Casual Damage Pyrokinesis causes.

Physical barriers, such as windows, will not impede the Pyrokinetic force, but they may make it more difficult for the Psychic to directly perceive her target. It is not possible, even if the Psychic somehow was granted x-ray vision, for Pyrokinesis to penetrate inside living beings or plants due to the aura of life surrounding them. Thus, it is not possible to reach inside someone’s head with Pyrokinesis and incinerate their brain. There are other energy fields that impede Pyrokinesis as well, but these are extremely rare and usually not 100% effective.

Once the Pyrokinetic force has been interrupted, targets whose temperatures have been increased through the use of Pyrokinesis will begin to cool at a rate typical for the material. Ignited flammable materials will continue to burn after the Psychic has stopped using Pyrokinesis unless some attempt is made to douse the flame, while ignited non-flammable materials will be quenched and begin to cool off.

A failed Pyrokinesis Task Roll may mean that the Psychic cannot focus the Pyrokinetic force enough to use it, or perhaps that the Pyrokinesis goes wild for a few moments, igniting random objects around the room.

Telepathy

Telepathy allows a Psychic to read another person’s thoughts, emotions, and memories, and allows a Psychic to “speak” directly to a person’s mind. Telepathy cannot be used to force a person to obey commands, nor can it be used to alter a person’s thoughts or memories: this is the province of the Domination Ability. When attempting a Telepathy Task Roll, the Psyche of the subject whose mind is to be read or communicated with is applied as a negative Task Modifier to the Psychic’s roll, unless the subject is completely willing.

For a +0 TMod, the Psychic may “read” inanimate objects, sensing who owns the object, or perhaps picturing traumatic events in the object’s history. Also for a +0 TMod, two Psychics who both have the Telepathy Ability may set up a “communication only” mind-to-mind link. This link requires no Psychic Reserve expenditure or concentration to maintain, but the actual communication is distracting as is the use of any Psychic Ability. If either Psychic goes unconscious or wishes to end the communication, the link is severed. No Psychic attacks may be launched through such a link, unless the victim specifically and deliberately allows it.

Each use of the Telepathy Ability lasts up to ten minutes. Using it longer to communicate or sift through the victim’s mind does not require an additional Task Roll, but it does require the expenditure of additional Psychic Reserve points for each additional ten minutes. If the Psychic wishes to change the target of the Telepathy, she must make a new Task Roll and spend the additional Psychic Reserve points.

If the person whose mind is to be read is asleep or unconscious, the Psychic will only be able to perceive dim flickers of thought, but she will still be able to sift through the person’s memories. If the Psychic fails the Telepathy Task Roll, or attempts to “read” an object with no significant emotional attachments, the Psychic will not be able to perceive anything using Telepathy.

Trance

Trance Task Modifiers Duration TMod 1 hour -0 6 hours -1 1 day -2 1 week -3 1 month -4 6 months -5 1 year -6 5 years -7

A Psychic may enter a Trance to control her metabolism, enhance her powers of concentration, or focus her will. Both entering and exiting the Trance require a Task Roll and the expenditure of Psychic Reserve points. The TMod for entering a Trance is generally +0, but the Psychic must be in a quiet place with no distractions. If the Psychic attempts to enter a Trance amid noise and confusion, or under stress or duress, the GM may impose a TMod of -1 to -3, or even lower. At the time the Psychic enters the Trance she must declare how long it will last, and the TMod incurred when coming out of a Trance is dependent upon the amount of time the Psychic has been under. While in a Trance, Psychic Reserve points are recovered at the rate of the character’s Psyche every hour. If the Psychic Reserve is drained below zero through the use of other Psychic Abilities, the character will be unable to come out of the Trance until she has regained sufficient Psychic Reserve points to do so.

While in a Trance, the Psychic may slow her metabolism, even to the point where she appears dead to someone performing a medical examination, or she may increase her metabolism to the point where she heals at three times the normal rate (her Strength in Casual Damage points every eight hours, and her Strength in Severe Damage points every ten days). She may also double her Intellect Rank or Psyche Rank, but not both.

The Psychic has no awareness of her surroundings while in a Trance, and may use only Clairvoyance (if she possesses it) to perceive the world outside of her own consciousness. Even if the Psychic is on fire, she will remain in the Trance until the allotted time has passed, unless she has some way of determining what is going on outside of her mind (Clairvoyance, Telepathy, etc.).

Ability Cost Table Rank Increment Cost Total 1 2 2 2 2 4 3 4 8 4 6 14 5 8 22 6 10 32 7 12 44 8 14 58 9 16 74 10 18 92

Accents (Acc)

Accents are distinctive character traits. Immortal characters begin with 30 points with which to buy Positive Accents, but this may be increased up to 40 points by taking Negative Accents. Positive Accents may only be purchased during character creation. Mortals start with 0 points, but they may take up to 10 points in Negative Accents to purchase Positive Accents. Negative Accents may be taken at any time, but are only worth points if taken during character creation.

Positive Accents

Positive Accents are those distinctive traits that set a character above her fellow Immortals, usually requiring no Task Roll or knowledge by the character possessing them. Mortals who posses Positive Accents are rare, but they do exist. Each Positive Accent may only be taken once.

Ambidextrous (10 points)

Attempting to perform a Task with the character’s off hand normally incurs a Task Modifier of -1. An Ambidextrous character incurs no penalty when attempting to perform a Task with her off hand.

Calculator Mind (20 points)

The character can perform complex mathematical calculations in her head in the same amount of time that a skilled mathematician could perform the same calculations on a powerful scientific calculator. Also, the character has an intuitive understanding of higher mathematics, and is able to comprehend and remember intricate formulae and equations after examining them briefly.

Combat Awareness (30 points)

The character has an intuitive understanding of the art and science of hand-to-hand combat, such that she can predict with remarkable accuracy the actions of anyone with which she is in hand-to-hand combat. Even if blinded and deaf, the character may attack and defend at no penalties as long as her opponent remains within hand-to-hand range, and as long as either she or her opponent has scored a hit upon the other within the last three Turns.

Extreme Patience (10 points)

The character has inhuman amounts of patience, and can wait motionless for hours or even days. This does not mean that the character is spared the necessities of eating or excreting, but it does mean that the character with Extreme Patience can tolerate the hunger and/or soiled clothing without anxiety.

Iron Will (20 points)

When the character is attacked Psychically with the Domination or Telepathy Ability, the attacker has an additional -2 Task Modifier to her Domination or Telepathy Task Roll. The character with Iron Will also adds two to her Psyche for purposes of Psyche Task Rolls to break out of delayed Domination commands, but this in no way affects any other Psychic Ability, or any other use of the Psyche Statistic.

Latent Psychic (20 points)

A Latent Psychic may buy Psychic Abilities, but a Latent Psychic may only attempt to perform Tasks with a Task Modifier of zero or higher. A character who is a Latent Psychic may buy up the Accent to that of full Psychic with an additional 20 points of Karma and the GM’s permission.

Light Sleeper (10 points)

The character is easily awakened from even the deepest sleep, coming fully awake and aware immediately. To wake up in response to any external stimulus, the character may attempt a Perception Task Roll as if she were awake. If the roll is successful, the character wakes up alert and ready.

Money (varies)

If the GM allows, a player may trade a character’s Accent points for money, with which the character may buy weapons, armor, or other equipment. Each point may be traded for five hundred credits (500 Cr). If the GM wants the characters to start with more or less equipment, she may allow each point to be worth as much as 1,000 Cr or as little as 100 Cr. Accent points may only be traded for money during character creation, and only with the GM’s permission.

For the most part, characters are assumed to be well off, with investments that provide a healthy income. Houses, cars, clothes, and other necessities of life do not need to be “bought” using the Money Accent; this is only for players who want their characters to start with an unusual amount or quality of equipment.

Night Vision (20 points)

The character may see in dim light without incurring a negative TMod to her Perception Task Roll. Although Night Vision will not help the character see through fog or rain, the character may see even on the darkest night as if it were merely twilight (see Perception Ability). If no light is available at all, then the character can not see.

Perfect Timing (30 points)

The character has an acute sense for the passage of time. She only needs to check the time once per day, and she will know the correct time to within a tenth of a second until she goes to sleep. She may also keep track of the duration of as many intervals of time as her Rank in Intellect. If she has an Intellect Rank of 3, she may keep up to three “internal stopwatches” going simultaneously, with an accuracy of up to a tenth of a second.

Eidetic Memory (30 points)

The character may remember explicitly any document, recording, picture, etc., which the character has taken time to study and memorize. The character does not need to understand the items to be memorized, she only needs to study them for approximately one minute per page to memorize the image. The subject to be memorized is not memorized as text; it is stored in the character’s memory as a picture. As such, the information is not subject to instantaneous retrieval, but the character may mentally “turn pages” looking for a specific bit of data. For each point of Intellect the character possesses, she may memorize an amount of information equivalent to three novels, one volume of an encyclopedia, three hours of conversation, or the blueprints to one high-rise office building.

Psychic (40 points)

The character may buy and use the Psychic Abilities. To use any Psychic Ability, the Psychic must have a Rank of at least 1 in that Ability.

Quick Draw (20 points)

When comparing Agility for purposes of initiative, or to determine which character will react first in any given situation, the character’s effective Agility is +1. The character may also draw and ready any one-handed weapon without expending her Turn. This in no way affects any of the character’s other Task Rolls, or any other use of the Agility Statistic, except with the GM’s permission.

Sensitive (10 points)

The character is capable of perceiving Psychic Abilities when they are used, but is unable to use them. A character who is a Sensitive may buy up the Accent to that of Latent Psychic with an additional 10 points of Karma and the GM’s permission.

Total Concentration (10 points)

The character is capable of focusing her concentration under the most adverse and distracting circumstances without incurring a negative Task Modifier. The character can work on complex puzzles or problems while hanging upside down in the middle of a mine field and being pelted with fruit, without any negative TMods for distractions.

Negative Accents

Negative Accents are those distinctive traits that limit or hinder a character. A character may take any number of Negative Accents, but she may only gain a maximum of 10 points for them. The GM is final arbiter on what Negative Accents are allowable, and on how many points each is worth.

(Note: The examples in the following sections are meant as guidelines for game play only, and are not meant to be taken as a commentary or judgment on the seriousness of a particular illness or disadvantage.)

Mental Impairment (10 points)

The character has one or two slight mental aberrations which sometimes prevent her from functioning at her full potential.

Sample Mental Impairments:

• Claustrophobia
• Code of Honor
• Kleptomania
• Mild addiction (nicotine, alcohol, etc.)
• Mild bipolar disorder (noticeable mood swings)

Physical Impairment (10 points)

The character has one or two mild physical impairments which sometimes prevent her from functioning at her full potential. Immortal characters very rarely have physical impairments, since they are immune to most illnesses and quickly recover from almost any injury.

Sample Physical Impairments:

• Asthma
• Deafness
• Diabetes
• Prosthetic limb (if inferior to original)

Social Impairment (10 points)

The character is subject to discrimination or animosity by one or more groups, or the character is a person who practices such discrimination or animosity.

Sample Social Impairments:

• Active Communist (or other unpopular political minority)
• American Indian (or other ethnic minority, depending on the geographic location)
• Animal rights activist (or other fringe group)

Example:

Susan wants Jacqueline to be Psychic, but since Immortals start with 30 points and the Psychic Accent costs 40 points, Jacqueline must have 10 points in Negative Accents to be fully Psychic. Susan really would rather that Jacqueline not have any Negative Accents, so she instead buys Jacqueline the Accent Latent Psychic for 20 points. With the GM’s permission, Susan holds Jacqueline’s other 10 points until Jacqueline earns 10 points of Karma, at which time Jacqueline will be able to buy Latent Psychic up to the full Psychic Accent.

Trivia

Once you have the basic character, complete with all of her Stats, Abilities, and Accents, think about the little details and finishing touches that complete the character. It is not necessary to work out everything in minute detail, but give it some thought and jot down a note or two. Let the GM know what you have in mind for your character’s everyday existence: it will make her job easier when she is crafting the story if she has an idea of what kind of life your character leads.

People

If you haven’t already, think about the people in your Immortal’s life. Who are her loved ones and friends, and what is her relationship with them? We are known by the company we keep: what company does your character keep? Is she part of a large family, or an orphan? Does she keep in touch with her siblings, or their descendants? Do they know her secret? How does she keep the secret of her Immortality from them?

Immortals, like mortals, are social beings. How does your character satisfy her needs for companionship? Does she have very few, close friends, or does she have a wide variety of brief affairs? Is she monogamous, in a solid relationship? How does her companion feel about the fact that they literally will not grow old together?

Does she know any other Immortals; a mentor or old enemy, perhaps? Does she have any old enemies who may be hunting her? Sometimes old friends can be old rivals, as well. Who are her business associates? Is she well known among a certain small professional group? Give thought to the relationships which bind your character into the web of life.

Goods

Now is a good time to look at the equipment lists toward the back of this book. What kind of weapons, if any, does your character possess? Are they special or esoteric, or are they “off the shelf” weapons? Unless your character bought the Money Accent, she is restricted to a modest selection of mundane weapons, but the GM might allow the character to have one special heirloom of exceptional price or quality. Does your character have armor, special cars, fortified buildings? Anything is possible. Where does your character live? Your character might own an antique book store, be a reclusive writer in a cabin in the woods, or be a globe-trotting mercenary. Try to paint a picture of the character’s life, and what you might find in it.

Services

Does your character have any employees or retainers? Servants, secretaries, and bodyguards are often taken for granted, but they can make a big difference when trouble comes knocking at your door. How loyal are they? Are they close associates, or simply hired help? Do they owe you a favor? Years of affiliation can form a strong bond between a fair employer and a trusted employee; how much does the employee suspect about the Immortal’s true nature? What sets your character’s employees apart from other mortals? Do they have special skills or abilities? Making employees three-dimensional characters adds to the realism of the game, and can help the GM create a more interesting story.

Peculiarities

Nearly everyone has character quirks, those little idiosyncrasies that annoy or amuse other people and add diversity to our character. Adding a peculiarity or two to your character will give her style and a sense of uniqueness. Peculiarities could include a particular catchphrase the character uses frequently (“Not a problem.”), an odd hobby, or a keen interest in a bizarre subject. The character could have a strange but passionate like or dislike of a certain food, subject, or mechanical device. You do not have to go overboard to make a peculiarity interesting, and you don’t have to give a character any peculiarities at all (although that could also be considered peculiar).

Stereotypes

Stereotypes exist for a reason. An ethnic or professional stereotype is the result of a noticeable tendency for certain groups of people to exhibit certain types of behavior. Of course, not all brilliant scientists are absent-minded, nor are all teen-agers poor drivers. Still, a player should not be criticized for having a stereotypical character, because absent-minded professors do exist, and many teen-agers are terrible drivers.