You catch a gust of wind beneath your little wings. You float in the air and glow as you sing your heavenly song.
for Skye Lovely
Exert your Mind and spend an Action. Select a Living target within 45 feet as well as a specific emotion. Roll Charisma + Performance at Difficulty 6. Affected targets can resist by rolling Mind at Difficulty 6 -3 dice.
If you succeed, for the next minute, your target will do things they otherwise wouldn’t have done, inspired by the chosen emotion. They will not necessarily display their emotions in an obvious way. Your own emotions are also shifted in the same way.
Actions they take will be in keeping with their character and the way they tend to deal with strong emotions. They will be unlikely to change their mind about any actions taken or decisions made until after the Effect ends.
If you choose to use Chain of Screaming, your target interacts with any valid target, they must roll Self-Control or be swept up in the same emotion. New targets pass it on as well, and so on, with the remaining duration decreasing by half until the chain stops.
Possession of this Power grants the following Battle Scar: little angel wings.
When augmenting herself, Kat alternates between restful meditative poses similar to yoga, and slowly going through a series of motions similar to martial arts katas. A light gray fog spreads down her limbs, trailing her hands and feet as she does these motions. This focuses her intention and clears her mind until the capability takes shape within her.
When using the pouch aspect, a similar looking fog appears where an object touches her as she places it into storage in a non-physical echo of herself. The same fog appears when she reaches in to pull something back out.
Heinlein wrote about other realities that may as well be fictional to us and called them Fictons. It's simpler to say than 'parallel universes' so now I call them that as well. My abilities come from a Ficton.
As explained by scientists in the Ficton I'm connected to, I have the same ability that some there do. Apparently I mentally manipulate Fermionic dark matter which connects me to their Ficton. This gives me visions from there when I focus on it. It also gives me 'super powers' like people there have.
I feel a kinship with someone there called KatAbra, both emotionally and in regards to powers. I discovered that I can learn to do anything she can do. Cat themed abilities, physical enhancement, and minor mystical abilities such as the ones I'll explain shortly. Potentially, I can learn to conceal myself from others, heal myself, erect mental defenses, that sort of thing. None of the flashy or manipulative stuff like elemental attacks, flying, or reading minds.
Improving my durability, speed, and hand to hand combat were simple enough. Environmental adaptation wasn't much tougher. Eventually I learned to manifest an echo of my physical body to use as limited storage (if you can sense magic it seems to be a shadow overlapping my body, vibrating in a pitch inaudible to normal ears). Most difficult to learn was making my mind manifest a functioning version of physical technology. While I'd like to find something more versatile to mimic than a cell phone, technology in our universe offers isn't as nice as what hero teams there use. If someone here has created a device similar to their communicators, I'd need to examine it and how it functions before mimicking it. Thankfully I don't need to know the inner workings, just the properties and how to use it.
My connection is only between here and that single Ficton, but each person who can do this connects to just one other Ficton, different for each of them. In the supers Ficton, people have connected to places that grant them things like fantasy magic, making Steampunk devices function, etc. Each of us gets something different, but we all get something somehow.
Exert your Mind and spend 30 minutes. You may only target yourself. The target can easily Resist.
You may add one augmentation to your target. Each augmentation counts as a Trauma and can have exactly one of the following Effects:
The augmentations you provide are not outwardly visible nor obvious.
You may end this Effect prematurely as a Free Action.
Your alteration "heals" over the course of the next month, after which it is fully cured.
Whispers begin. They Soft at first, like distant voices carried on the wind, but they grow insistent, layered, overlapping—a chorus of something hungry speaking in tongues long forgotten. The sound doesn’t come from any one direction but seems to press in from all sides, worming into the minds of those who witness the event.
Exert your Mind and spend an Action. Select a Sapient target within arm's reach. You must use up Animal bones in order to activate this Effect. 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. Your target may Resist to cancel the transfer.
You may choose one each of as many things as you like from the following to transfer from your target to yourself, or from yourself to them:
Whenever you transfer an Injury, it's Severity increases by 1. Whenever you transfer Mind damage or Traumas, the recipient takes an additional Mind damage.
Possession of this Power grants the following Battle Scar: Hands are blackened and have weird purple veins to her elbows.
Cassiopeia tears or destroys the symbol of Horkos drawn upon it, summoning the authority of the God of Oaths to watch over the participants. The target must place their finger on any symbol of Horkos to accept Horkos' presidence over the consequences of their actions.
On promises:
Cassiopeia has been tricked many times in this life, and while her own stupidity could be brought into the argument, at the end of the day she was not the one to break her promises or take more than what she bargained for. If only the world respected vows as much as she did. Hoping never worked, though, has it? How unfortunate. How pitiful. She'll change this soon enough. She hates liars.
On Horkos:
A lesser Greek god, but dangerous nonetheless. Cassiopeia doesn't understand why people find the need to regulate themselves under the notion that some greater being is watching them, but if that's what it takes for people to play fair, then so be it. She'll gladly play into the enforcement of all the words so carelessly strewn into the wind. Be careful what you wish for.
On the symbol:
Making all these magical symbols to represent different gods and powers have finally come in handy!
You must use up any item with the symbol of Horkos (designed by Cassiopeia) in order to activate this Effect.
You may make an oath with a Sapient target. Communicate the oath's terms to the target, including the requirements and penalties for each participant. If all agree to the terms, you must Exert your Mind and all participants must place a finger upon a symbol of Horkos (designed by Cassiopeia) to seal the deal.
Record the oath as a Condition. If a party breaks the oath, the Condition ends and they suffer the oath's penalty.
When crafting your oath, you may incorporate any of the following penalties:
The target cannot be compelled to agree via a direct threat of violence, another Effect, or another oath. If you would like to use clever wording to mislead the target, you must succeed a contested Intellect + (Culture or Influence) roll.
When crafting your oath, you may opt to enforce compliance. If you do, any participant that wishes to break the deal must take 3 Mind damage and succeed a Self-Control roll. They may attempt once per day.
The target may be at any range, but you must still be able to communicate the terms to them, and they must be able to place a finger upon a symbol of Horkos (designed by Cassiopeia).
Possession of this Power grants the following Trauma at all times: Iron Grip: Vows are everything to you. Whenever you find out someone has broken a promise to you, roll Self-Control to avoid lashing out at them or taking out your anger on nearby objects.
When Jacob decides to use this power, he must be within arm’s reach of his target. If the target is unwilling, Jacob’s natural charisma comes into play as he attempts to sway them—using a blend of persuasive charm and subtle manipulation to lower their defenses. A successful use of his power results in an almost invisible exchange, like a whisper of energy transferring between him and his target.
Exert your Mind and spend an Action. Select a Sapient target within arm's reach. If a target does not consent to the transfer, you must roll Charisma + Influence at Difficulty 6 to use the effect on them. They can resist by rolling either Body or Mind at Difficulty 6, depending on what you are attempting to transfer to them.
You may choose a single instance of one of the following to transfer from your target to yourself, or from yourself to them:
Whenever you transfer an Injury, it's Severity increases by 1. Whenever you transfer Mind damage or Traumas, the recipient takes an additional Mind damage.
Spend an Action to activate. Select a target within 20 feet. You must use up Cigarette in order to activate this Effect. Roll Perception + Investigation at Difficulty 6. The target] may contest by Defending or Dodging.
If you succeed, your target will be restricted at their location by a physical, tangible binding. They cannot move to a new location, and any physical actions they take suffer a dice penalty equal to twice the contested Outcome from the Effect activation, except attempts to escape or break the binding, which only suffer half this penalty.
The binding around a target must be destroyed in order for them to break free. Breaking the binding requires a total amount of damage equal to twice the contested Outcome from the Effect activation. Damage from multiple attacks is cumulative and stacks linearly.
Anyone who witnesses you during this Effect's activation will almost certainly be disturbed to see Smoky tendrils.
This Gift's Cost is capped at 2 and cannot be increased further.
You must retain Concentration to keep up the effect; if your Concentration is interrupted, the effect will end.
The psychic can glean various important details about a person simply by engaging in a short conversation with them.
Spend one minute. Select a Sapient target within 20 feet. You must actively converse with the individual in question for one minute in order to gather any information. At the end of your investigation, roll Perception + Influence at Difficulty 6.
You learn all the following information about your target:
The quality and specificity of information gained depends on your Outcome.
Any information you gather is spoken aloud in conversation and made publicly available.
This Gift cannot have more than 3 Drawbacks, and its Gift Cost is capped at 2.
You cannot investigate the same target more than once per day.
The detective pulls out their magnifying glass and investigates the area, learning details about any nearby structures and picking up details on what sorts of beings have passed through and when.
Exert your Mind and spend a minute. Investigate an area with a radius of up to 100 feet You must actively and obviously use a magnifying glass to activate this Effect. At the end of your investigation, roll Perception + Investigation at Difficulty 6.
You learn the following information about the area:
You cannot investigate the same area more than once per day.
The Thief examines an object closely for a minute to appraise its value. As their eyes dance across the subject, their pupils split vertically, and their irises fade to gold. If it is a particularly valuable item, the Thief may greedily lick their lips, revealing a forked tongue.
Within a minute, they have determined how materially valuable the object is and why.
Exert your Mind and spend a minute. Select a target Object within arm's reach. At the end of your investigation, roll Charisma + Culture at Difficulty 6.
You learn all the following information about your target:
You cannot investigate the same target more than once per day.
Come one, come all! Stand in amazement and behold as the Fire Eater consumes a flame as if it were cotton candy! Gasp with fright as they breathe a plume of fire a great distance! And yes, ladies and gentlemen, it is quite dangerous.
Exert your Mind (unless you win a coin flip) and spend two Actions performing the following ritual: perform a fire-breathing trick. Select a target within 20 feet which has both fuel and oxygen available (if you are starting a new fire). Roll a single D10 as a critical failure check. If you roll a 1, the Effect fails, and you take a Severity-4 Injury as the fire burns your throat. You must maintain Concentration while activating this Effect, and it fails if you are interrupted.
You may start or extinguish a fire as large as a firepit's fire at your target. Extinguishing a fire does not cost Exertion. You may create or extinguish fires the size of a lighter or candle flame without Exerting your Mind. Your fires require fuel and oxygen in order to continue burning.
Lighting a target on fire deals 4 Damage each Round on your turn, starting in the Round after the one in which they caught fire. This Damage is reduced by Armor, but the target’s Armor rating will be shredded by any Damage dealt, destroying material Armor once it reaches 0.
You may extinguish flames as a Reaction. This does not extend to explosives.
By focusing and whispering a prayer under their breath, the priest may invoke their god to protect those who have good works left to do.
Exert your Mind and spend an Action or Reaction. Select a Animate target within 20 feet. This Effect cannot be used unless the target is a living human. Roll a single d10, Difficulty 4. If you fail or botch, the Effect fails and you cannot activate it again for an hour. Roll Charisma + Occult at Difficulty 6.
If you succeed, you create a barrier around your target, which absorbs the next Outcome +2 Damage. The Damage reduction from the barrier is applied before Armor. You 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.
This Effect is not obvious, and the only sign you are using an Effect is you whispering a prayer under your breath. If someone suspects that an Effect was used, they must roll Perception + Alertness, Difficulty 8 to pick up on your Tell.