Ascaris Miseria

2
Requires Seasoned
This Artifact allows you to heal the mind after traumatic experiences.
Used by Luci Alessi, Created by Riley.
On Legendary Artifact Luci's Sketchbook.
(You must use this Artifact obviously when activating this Effect.)

While Luci communicates with her target (and in her own case, while she's projecting her thoughts and feelings onto the page), she draws a picture depicting the target's trauma and the circumstances behind its manifestation. Afterward, she rips the page out, crumbles it up into a little ball, and gives it to the target to eat.

It slips down into the user's stomach, melts into a bubbling mucus, and forces itself into their nervous system. The rogue energies force themselves directly up and into the target's brain, where they seek out the trauma they have been sicced on and forcefully pull it from the roots of grey matter. Not a pleasing experience in the slightest.

But to cap it off, the mucus coagulates in the target's stomach and begins to bubble violently until, inevitably, the target vomits the mucus back up. The inky black liquid- not too immediately dissimilar to the likeness of a roundworm, as it splatters onto the surface, takes a physical form related to the removed trauma and groans lowly as little appendages reach out and attempt to crawl back into the target's body.


Exert your Mind (unless you win a coin flip) to activate. Select a Living target within arm's reach. Over the course of one minute, your patient must communicate with you and reveal at least one of their Traumas to you, including the details of those Traumas and the circumstances of how they were acquired. After the full treatment time has elapsed, roll Charisma + Crafts at Difficulty 6.

Your target may Resist. If your treatment is successful, you may remove one of the patient's revealed Traumas without incurring any Experience cost.

Once per day per target, you may choose to use this Effect to stabilize the Mind of a target within arm's reach. Treatment takes 30 seconds but will not remove any Traumas. If you are successful, restore 2 Mind damage.

Anyone who witnesses you during this Effect's activation will almost certainly be disturbed to see the target consume a piece of paper, and then a minute later, vomit up a thick black mucus. As it splats on the ground, it reaches up with several thin appendages and tries to crawl up and back into the target's mouth.

  • When narrating disturbing content, be cognizant of your group's tone and accommodating to those who would like to "fast forward" through the description.
  • The treatment time may be broken up into multiple sessions if necessary.
  • You can target yourself if you qualify as a valid target by the other requirements.
  • Your target must be within line of sight, or within range of another sense if more fitting for the Gift's flavor.

Community Legendary Artifact Gifts

Expend a point of Battery to activate. Select a Living target within arm's reach. Your target must make a Trauma roll to reap the benefits of this Effect. They may choose to Resist the Effect and not make the roll. Over the course of one day, your patient must communicate with you and reveal at least one of their Traumas to you, including the details of those Traumas and the circumstances of how they were acquired. After the full treatment time has elapsed, roll Charisma + Influence at Difficulty 6.

Your target may Resist. If your treatment is successful, you may remove one of the patient's revealed Traumas without incurring any Experience cost.

Your patient is required to not talk about this artifact, the person who used it on them, or whatever was cured for the next month. If they violate this rule, your treatment is immediately reversed.

Once per day per target, you may choose to use this Effect to stabilize the Mind of a target within arm's reach. Treatment takes 30 seconds but will not remove any Traumas. If you are successful, restore 2 Mind damage.

You may choose to use this Effect to temporarily relieve any number of the patient's Traumas (including mental Conditions). In this case, Treatment takes an Action and the effect lasts two hours. If the Patient is currently experiencing an episode, Difficulty is increased by 2.

  • The patient is aware of the after-care requirement.
  • The treatment time may be broken up into multiple sessions if necessary.
  • You can target yourself if you qualify as a valid target by the other requirements.
  • Your target must be within line of sight, or within range of another sense if more fitting for the Gift's flavor.

Take a Severity-1 Injury and spend one minute. You must use up blood, paint and paper in order to activate this Effect.

Summon a single samurai at your location. They will last until they are destroyed. They are controlled by the GM but will follow any commands you give. This Artifact may have at most 1 minion active at a time.

  • Attacking: Minions can make melee range attacks with 6 dice to attack and +2 Damage.
  • Body: Minions have 8 Body.
  • Movement: Minions can move 45 feet per Round as Free Movement, and double that when performing an all-out Sprint.
  • Intelligence: Minions have dog-level intelligence, and cannot communicate back to you. They may use equipment.
  • Actions: Minions cannot dodge or Defend. Any Perception checks they make are rolled with 8 dice. Your minion is able to Melee with a 7-dice pool.

After you finish activating this Effect, you cannot move quicker than a walk (max 15 feet per Round) for one minute and suffer a -1 dice penalty for an hour. Exhaustion’s penalty and duration stacks with multiple activations.

You may only use this Effect once per day.

  • Exhaustion penalties and duration stack. If you activate this Effect or another Effect with Exhaustion, your penalty will worsen, and the duration is increased by one hour.

Exert your Mind and spend at least two Actions performing the following ritual: A ritual Circle must be drawn and offered a drop of the casters blood while a chant is used to bind the summoned demon to activate. You must maintain Concentration while activating this Effect, and it fails if you are interrupted.

Summon a single ________ at your location. They will last until they are destroyed. They are controlled by the GM but will follow any commands you give. You may have at most 1 minion active at a time.

Minions have 6 Body and can make melee range attacks with 5 dice to attack and +1 Damage. They cannot move faster than a walk and cannot dodge incoming attacks. They have dog-level intelligence, and cannot communicate back to you. Any Perception checks they make are rolled with 3 dice.

Your minion is able to Manual Labour with a 4-dice pool.

As I flash my winning grin, you can see the glint of a golden veneer on my tooth. Perched atop it is a radiant Ruby, the gem of my Pot-Winning Bluff. With the curl of my smile, the room seems to shimmer with anticipation. The Ruby sparkles, emitting a red hue across the table. A psychic repulsion field emanates from me, extending out in every direction for 45 feet. It's like a force field of confidence, daring anyone to challenge my hand.

Any fool who can't see past my bluff knows that they're going to bust. They're trapped in their own defeat, pushed back to the edge of the radius like the pill of a spinning roulette wheel. They realize they've already lost before the first card is even dealt.

Exert your Mind and spend an Action or Reaction. Roll Charisma + Influence at Difficulty 6. Any Animate targets may resist by rolling Mind at Difficulty 7.

Create a repulsion field which extends out 45 feet from you in every direction, and lasts for the next 5 Rounds. Any Animate targets within the field that failed to resist cannot move any closer towards you. If they were within 45 feet from you when you activated the effect, they are immediately pushed back to the edge of the repulsion field.

You must maintain Concentration during this Effect.

When you activate this effect, you may designate any number of specific individuals to exclude from the Effect. Anyone designated in this way is unaffected by the repulsion field, and can approach you as normal.

After this Effect ends, you cannot move quicker than a walk (15 feet per Round) for one minute and suffer a -1 dice penalty for an hour.

  • If you use this Effect as a Reaction to dodge, you still need to make a roll to dodge. The Effect will occur regardless of the Outcome of this roll, but if you fail you will be hit by the relevant attack prior to the Effect occurring.
  • You can target yourself if you qualify as a valid target by the other requirements.
  • Your target must be within line of sight, or within range of another sense if more fitting for the Gift's flavor.

Exert your Mind and spend an Action or Reaction. Roll Intellect + Occult at Difficulty 6.

If you succeed, you create a Barrier extending out 15 feet from yourself, which absorbs 2 times the next Outcome + 4 Damage. Only applies to attacks which originated outside the 15 foot radius, and protects anyone who is within that radius. Half any Damage absorbed by the barrier is reflected back to the attacker. They may attempt to Dodge or Defend using a Desperate Defense, and their Armor applies in full. The Damage reduction from the barrier is applied before Armor. This Artifact may only have 1 active barrier at a time.

You must maintain Concentration while using this Effect. The barrier will fall if you are interrupted, or if it absorbs the full amount of Damage. When a barrier falls, you cannot use this Effect again for a minimum of 2 Rounds.

  • If you use this Effect as a Reaction to dodge, you still need to make a roll to dodge. The Effect will occur regardless of the Outcome of this roll, but if you fail you will be hit by the relevant attack prior to the Effect occurring.

Stock Legendary Artifact Gifts

This Artifact can change its appearance. When not transformed, it is roughly the same size as a passport and just as difficult to conceal.

Exert your Mind and spend an Action to activate. This Artifact changes its appearance into an Object within the category of forms of identification. This lasts until you decide to end the Effect, which may be done as a Free Action.

The new object's appearance can mimic specific items (such as a particular painting, a certain person’s ID, etc), but must be of a similar size and weight to this Artifact.

The new appearance is illusory; it will hold up to scrutiny, but its composition is not altered and it gains no new functionality. Any attempt to use it for a function which it cannot perform (for instance, making bread look like a knife and then trying to stab someone) will cause the illusion to fail or allow a Perception check to see through the illusion, at the GM's discretion.

This Artifact can be used as a blimp. It is roughly the same size as a blimp but can be collapsed into a phone-sized canvas cube and concealed. Collapsing or expanding it costs a Quick Action.

This blimp has full science laboratory, bullet-proof envelope, and ample parachutes. Any roll to pilot this vehicle receives +2 dice.

You also gain the following effects:

  • Crew of One: You alone may stand in for an entire crew if the vehicle would normally be piloted by more than one.
  • Mind of its Own: This vehicle can move and take Actions without you driving it. It has seven dice for all Drive rolls.
  • No Muffler: Any stealth rolls made to hide your vehicle automatically fail, and any rolls made to notice your vehicle automatically succeed.

  • If there is not enough free space to expand the object, it cannot be expanded. You cannot expand this Object as an attack.

This Artifact can change its appearance. When not transformed, it is roughly the same size as a passport but can be collapsed into a wallet and concealed. Collapsing or expanding it costs a Quick Action.

Spend a Quick Action to activate. This Artifact changes its appearance into a chosen Object. This lasts until you decide to end the Effect, which may be done as a Free Action.

The new object's appearance can mimic specific items (such as a particular painting, a certain person’s ID, etc), but must be of a similar size and weight to this Artifact.

The new appearance is illusory; it will hold up to scrutiny, but its composition is not altered and it gains no new functionality. Any attempt to use it for a function which it cannot perform (for instance, making bread look like a knife and then trying to stab someone) will cause the illusion to fail or allow a Perception check to see through the illusion, at the GM's discretion.

When used as identification and scanned, the scanner will act appropriately and bring up appropriate generic information. Further searches for the identity in the computer will turn up no results. This will not open security doors on its own.

  • If there is not enough free space to expand the object, it cannot be expanded. You cannot expand this Object as an attack.
  • Changing the Artifact’s appearance does not allow you to conceal its Alien nature while any of its other Effects are in use.

This Effect activates whenever you are submerged in salt water. It does not require an Action or Exertion. Your target should be intuitively based on the triggering event.

You transform into small for two hours or until you choose to end the Effect. See the Extended System text for stats.

While transformed, you cannot use any equipment (including Artifacts and Consumables), and you cannot use your Active, Targeted, or Trap Powers. However, you can use your Passive Powers. Any equipment you are wearing transforms with you.

Injuries and Wound Level are carried over between forms. However, transforming can never kill you; you merely remain Incapacitated until your Injuries are sufficiently healed.

  • When triggered, the Effect activation resolves immediately after the triggering Action. It is not Reaction speed.
  • Creature Stats
    • Medium (large house cat up to human) Body 3. Brawn 1. Dexterity 3. Fall damage reduced by 1.
    All creatures get +3 dice to any non-combat Action that they are naturally adapted for. All creatures Medium and larger may attack by rolling Body, dealing +0 Damage (+1 for “predators”). Gms and Playgroup leaders can apply other bonuses and effects to specific animals.
  • Animals that are quicker than humans (like dogs) have 50 feet of Free Movement. Animals that are very slow (like turtles) have 0 feet of Free Movement.
  • You cannot transform if there is not enough room to do so.
  • The form you take must have the same stats and abilities as a single, extant animal of the relevant size.

Exert your Mind and spend an Action. Select a Location within within arm's reach. All Sapient targets within 20 feet are affected. This Effect cannot be used unless the target is looking directly into the device with uncovered eyes. Roll Charisma + Influence at Difficulty 6. The target may resist by rolling Mind at Difficulty 7.

If the contested Outcome is positive, the most recent 1 hour from your target’s memory is either replaced with new memories or forgotten entirely. This is recorded as a Condition. The level of detail and completeness of the alteration depends on your Outcome. If you fail, the target realizes that you are attempting to alter their memories.

The period is chosen either by time (i.e. “last Friday night”) or by reference to a specific event (i.e. “when the murder occurred”).

  • You do not gain mind-reading through this effect, so your ability to alter their memory is limited by your knowledge of what they might know.
  • The target's roll to realize their memories have been altered can be made a maximum of one time per day.
  • You can target yourself if you qualify as a valid target by the other requirements.
  • Your target must be within line of sight, or within range of another sense if more fitting for the Gift's flavor.