As River runs a finger over their ring and suggests a course of action, the person they’re talking to finds that it sounds like one of the best ideas they’ve ever heard. They might even find themselves wanting to please River, wanting to impress them. Something in River’s brain squirms, happily, wriggling its way in just a little bit farther.
The parasite that’s worked into River’s brain has psychic potential that they’re only barely beginning to understand, but it loves their natural charisma. Tips at the coffee shop have never been better.
Exert your Mind and spend at least one Action. Select a Sapient target within 20 feet. You must actively and obviously use a shiny ring to activate this Effect. Your target may be actively engaged in Combat. Communicate a command to your target. Roll Charisma + Influence at Difficulty 6. The target may resist by rolling Mind at Difficulty 7.
If the contested Outcome is positive, your target will be compelled to follow your command to their best understanding of the letter and spirit of the command until they have completed it or for your Outcome in minutes. You cannot issue another suggestion to the target until 10 minutes after they have completed the first command or 10 minutes after a failure.
The target is unaware that they are under supernatural influence and feel they are acting of their own free will. If you fail, they realize that you were attempting to influence them supernaturally with your command.
Your command can be an order to take an immediate Action. You cannot order a target to "do nothing," and they are free to take other Actions as they fulfill your request. Your command cannot be obviously self-destructive. The Effect ends if following your command would cause a target to cross one of their Limits in a way that would necessitate a Trauma roll.
You may activate this Effect as a Reaction to contest any Action a valid target is taking, reducing their Outcome by your own. Your command has no impact beyond disrupting their Action.
fire
make mean people go boom
Exert your Mind and spend an Action. Select a Location within 40 feet. The area within 25 feet of the chosen Location immediately and obviously becomes imminently dangerous. Anyone in the area has 1 Round to attempt to escape. During the next Round, on your Initiative, roll Intellect + Occult at Difficulty 6.
If the Outcome is positive, your blast hits everything within 25 feet of the chosen Location with Damage equal to your Outcome + 4.
Vergil is nice to a literal supernatural degree, and through a combination of nearly invisible spores in the air that glow a light blue, and a healthy helping of empathy and emotional intelligence Vergil can ensure that the people he's around are in better mental health than any mental hospital in the world. Though blissfully unaware of its assistance by the mushroom parasite inside him, hey. What you don't know won't kill you... right?
Exert your Mind to activate. Select a Living target within arm's reach. Roll a single D10 as a critical failure check. If you roll a 1, the Effect fails, and you On a critical failure inflict them with Algernon's Flower.. Over the course of one Downtime, 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.
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 assist at least one innocent in the next month in a meaningful way for the next month. If they violate this rule, your treatment is immediately reversed.
You may attempt to treat an unwilling patient. They may choose to resist by rolling Mind at Difficulty 7. The nature of their Trauma will still be revealed to you if you treat them successfully, though they may not tell you directly.
Once per day per target, you may choose to use this Effect to stabilize a target's Mind. 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 permanent Traumas which were recorded as Conditions). In this case, Treatment takes 30 seconds and the effect lasts two hours. If the Patient is currently experiencing an episode, Difficulty is increased by 2.
Really, an upgrade is just another form of repair. The universal constructor is able to tweak an object to upgrade it.
Exert your Mind and spend a minute. Select a Device within arm's reach. Can be used on Alien technology. Roll a single D10 as a critical failure check. If you roll a 1, the Effect fails, and you the item is broken. You must use up lithium-ion battery in order to activate this Effect. Can be used on Armor.
Lasts the next day. Your target receives 3 extra dice to all actions taken for its intended use. Attacking with an upgraded weapon grants +3 Weapon Damage instead of additional dice. If it is a piece of Armor, it instead receives half that amount as bonus armor rating, rounded up. If an upgraded shield and armor are both worn, the upgrade bonus does not stack with itself.
Upgraded weapons count as any material your opponent might be particularly vulnerable to. Upgraded Armor cannot be circumvented by called shots. Upgraded Devices do not run out of fuel or energy.
The user touches the target with the ring, and the target's skin begins to shimmer with a faint red hue.
Spend an Action. Select a Animate target within arm's reach. Roll Dexterity + Melee at Difficulty 6.
If you succeed, you create a barrier around your target, which absorbs the next Outcome +4 Damage. The Damage reduction from the barrier is applied before Armor. This Artifact may only have 1 active barrier at a time.
The barrier will fall after two hours, 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.
This Gift cannot have more than 3 Drawbacks, and its Gift Cost is capped at 1.
Zelvi prepares the target for surgery, and spends 30 minutes performing surgery upon the target in order to implant them with Cyberware. If the Gift has a critical failure, the body rejects the Cyberware and bleeds heavily. Otherwise, the Cyberware is safely implanted, causing no significant adverse effects to the target.
Exert your Mind and spend 30 minutes. Select a Living target within arm's reach. Roll a single D10 as a critical failure check. If you roll a 1, the Effect fails, and you cause the target to gain the following: Severity-4 injury - Severe blood loss (2 pints). The target can easily Resist.
You may add one augmentation to your target. Each augmentation counts as a Battle Scar and can have exactly one of the following Effects:
Through years of practice, the mobster is able to shatter someone's kneecap without much effort.
Spend an Action. Select a Living or Animate target within arm's reach. You must actively and obviously use a melee weapon to activate this Effect. Roll Brawn + Melee at Difficulty 6. The target may roll Body, -2 dice at Difficulty 7, as a Free Action to resist.
If you succeed, the target receives a new Battle Scar of your choosing, limited by the contested Outcome:
All alterations you make must damage the target's knees.
This Gift cannot have more than 3 Drawbacks, and its Gift Cost is capped at 2.
All it takes is a flick of your hair and a bat of your eyelashes, and you’ve got their attention.
Exert your Mind and spend an Action. A number of Sapient, Living targets within 50 feet who can perceive you through no greater than your Charisma rating are affected. Audiences or mobs with a singular focus count as one target. Roll Charisma + Performance at Difficulty 6. All affected targets may resist by rolling Mind at Difficulty 7.
If you succeed, the targets will keep their full attention focused on you for Contested Outcome in Rounds. They will automatically fail any rolls related to noticing anything other than you.
If you pass from their perception and they are unable to pursue you, the Effect ends. If they can follow you, they must do so for 2 Rounds or the Effect will end. The Effect ends early if the target is Injured or violence occurs nearby.
This does not affect the target’s opinion of you or their mood, and they may take any Actions while affected (including attacking), as long as that action centers on you. Fascinated targets cannot Concentrate.
The Witch summons a crow, whispers a message to it, and sends it off to deliver her words. Half an hour later, the crow arrives at the recipient and repeats her message aloud in its croaking, animal voice.
Spend an Action. Select a target any distance away from you. You must have a specific target in mind, but you require only an intuitive understanding of them, such as their name, face, or Location.
You may send a single message to your target. It can be as complex or as large as you like. It takes at least 30 minutes before it is received.
The message may be intercepted while in transit, and may be overheard, read, or otherwise understood by anyone near either you or the recipient. You must share a common language for your target to understand the message.
This Gift cannot have more than 3 Drawbacks, and its Gift Cost is capped at 2.
As a free creature, The Fairy cannot withstand being caged or imprisioned in any way. Luckily, they possess a glamour that allows them to unlock any lock binding them with a wink of their eye. The lock falls open with a sparkle of light and a sound like a ringing bell.
Spend an Action. Select a Non-Alien door, container, knot, or lock within arm's reach. This Effect cannot be used unless the targeted lock or door is being used to restrain or imprison you.
You may lock, unlock, and/or open your target.
The spy is able to transform an ordinary ballpoint pen into a monitoring device that is inconspicuous enough to blend in to most settings, but advanced enough to allow 360 degree surveillance as well as audio capture, which is sent to their smartphone.
Exert your Mind and spend an Action. Select a Location within 10 feet. You must actively and obviously use a ballpoint pen to activate this Effect.
You place a ward, which is fixed to its initial location. You can hear and see through the ward as though you were standing at its location. Your wards last 3 hours. You may have at most 3 wards active at once.
The ward requires Concentration to monitor, though it will remain active until you deactivate it. It can be detected with a roll and destroyed through mundane means.