Fortuna
Graceful Topiary Artist
- Pronouns
- She/Her
So, I'm looking at playing in a Modern game with some friends. Specifically, I'm going to be playing a Sidereal for the first time. The trouble is that I find existing destiny rules incredibly boring, so with the ST's blessing I've put together a homebrew replacement for ascending and descending destinies. I'd appreciate both a review of my concept and some help putting reasonable numbers in all the places I haven't come up with any yet.
DESTINY-CRAFTING
This is an extended dramatic action with a variable roll interval that ranges from minutes to years, numbers and pool to be determined. The number of accumulated successes is used to calculate (or possibly just becomes) the Durability of the destiny. Where the roll interval is one day or longer, eight hours of work per day is assumed - less will slow progress, while more will only apply at a 1:2 ratio. Regardless of the chosen interval, only five intervals may usefully be spent in crafting the destiny - thereafter, no further work will improve it. The roll interval also directly becomes the action interval for the destiny. By accepting a point of paradox, or two points of paradox if the roll interval is at least a week, the action interval can instead be stepped up by one type - minutes become hours, hours become days, days weeks, weeks months, months years and years decades.
Each destiny has three important elements: a College, a goal, and a target. The target is always an individual, and must be unambiguously identified by the fate-worker at the beginning of work. The more familiar the crafter is with the target, the easier it is to craft the destiny - close personal familiarity grants <numbers>, knowledge of the target's birth date, name and location grants <smaller numbers>, access to a copy of the target's signature permits baseline operation, knowing only an official detail (birth name, legal name, SSN etc.) of the target levies <small penalty>, and without even that the crafter labours under <crushing penalty>. If by some chance an ambiguous destiny is crafted - perhaps "The murderer of Peleps Deled" is nominated, but in fact two people shared in that act - or a person unknown by the Loom is targeted, the destiny will fail harmlessly when released, although the crafter will not be aware of this unless and until they attempt to invoke the destiny directly. Similarly, no character can have more than five destinies laid upon them at once, and any further destinies will snarl back on the creator with no effect save a single point of paradox.
Once the target of the destiny is determined, the crafter must nominate a goal for the destiny. The specificity of this goal is limited by the architect's knowledge at the time of crafting: any specific characters or magical objects in the goal must be named in full, or else be defined by a direct relationship with the target, so that "The target is to fall in love with their best friend" is acceptable, but "The target is to fall in love with their best friend's spouse" is not unless the crafter can name that person.
Having named the goal, the crafter's player should work with the Storyteller to determine under which Division of the Bureau of Destiny it most accurately falls. In most cases this should be obvious, but in ambiguous cases the Storyteller's decision is final. The crafter then selects a primary College under the auspices of that Division. Optionally, up to (higher of Essence and primary College) additional Colleges can be added to the destiny, at the cost of <number> accumulated successes, at any time before the destiny is released. The crafter must have at least one dot in each such College.
Finally, the crafter may optionally specify a schedule for the destiny's triggers. This may be as irregular or even random as desired, or even contingent on the actions or circumstances of the target, although any such conditions should be simple enough to be stated in a short sentence, and depend only on facts detectable with normal human senses in the same scene as the target. Without this specification, the destiny's behaviour is left to the Storyteller to direct as best suits the needs of the game. Under normal circumstances, the destiny will never trigger more often than (lower of Essence and primary College) times in a month, but this threshold may be raised to any extent by accepting a number of points of paradox equal to the excess triggers desired. The destiny's schedule is plotted out on the scale of an action interval, and repeats each interval.
When the crafter is satisfied with the state of the destiny, it is the work of a moment's concentration to release it into Fate. The crafter should decide whether they want to retain some measure of control of it or release it completely - only (Essence) destinies may be maintained in a controlled state by a single character. Once released, a destiny lies quiescent for a single roll interval, integrating with the existing plans on the Loom. After this period, as often as its schedule dictates the destiny will work to create coincidences which steer its target towards its goal. These coincidences are strictly limited to those which fall under the auspices of the Colleges involved in the destiny's creation, and are determined by the storyteller. Due to the nature of the destiny, these coincidences cannot depend on changes to the course of Fate which predate the destiny's release (although at the Storyteller's discretion they can take advantage of natural coincidences). It is the nature of destinies to act with subtlety, so they will not cause any event which truly strains credulity - if an average person would be inclined to call any single event 'more than coincidence', it is beyond an undirected destiny, although multiple events may form an unbelievable pattern or sequence.
At the end of each action interval, and whenever the destiny expresses itself, the destiny loses a point of Durability. In the normal course of things, it will deplete itself over time, peacefully attempting to fulfil its goal. However, in extremis, a destiny may be repurposed by its creator, provided they have not relinquished control. When the creator is in the same scene as the target of the destiny, at the cost of a single point of willpower they may cause the destiny to throw off a coincidence of their choice. Such emergency fateworkings are under no obligation to follow the destiny's goal, but otherwise follow all the normal rules of destiny, and in fact are stricter still - the changes thus evoked are not retroactive, and so must either involve only elements already present in the scene or take some time to materialize. This desperate act can only be performed once per scene per destiny, and is a miscellaneous action. Finally, the creator of a destiny may cancel it at any time while they are in the same scene as the target, likewise with a miscellaneous action. Cancelled destinies dissipate harmlessly, but often leave a single omen of their primary College as they depart.
This is an extended dramatic action with a variable roll interval that ranges from minutes to years, numbers and pool to be determined. The number of accumulated successes is used to calculate (or possibly just becomes) the Durability of the destiny. Where the roll interval is one day or longer, eight hours of work per day is assumed - less will slow progress, while more will only apply at a 1:2 ratio. Regardless of the chosen interval, only five intervals may usefully be spent in crafting the destiny - thereafter, no further work will improve it. The roll interval also directly becomes the action interval for the destiny. By accepting a point of paradox, or two points of paradox if the roll interval is at least a week, the action interval can instead be stepped up by one type - minutes become hours, hours become days, days weeks, weeks months, months years and years decades.
Each destiny has three important elements: a College, a goal, and a target. The target is always an individual, and must be unambiguously identified by the fate-worker at the beginning of work. The more familiar the crafter is with the target, the easier it is to craft the destiny - close personal familiarity grants <numbers>, knowledge of the target's birth date, name and location grants <smaller numbers>, access to a copy of the target's signature permits baseline operation, knowing only an official detail (birth name, legal name, SSN etc.) of the target levies <small penalty>, and without even that the crafter labours under <crushing penalty>. If by some chance an ambiguous destiny is crafted - perhaps "The murderer of Peleps Deled" is nominated, but in fact two people shared in that act - or a person unknown by the Loom is targeted, the destiny will fail harmlessly when released, although the crafter will not be aware of this unless and until they attempt to invoke the destiny directly. Similarly, no character can have more than five destinies laid upon them at once, and any further destinies will snarl back on the creator with no effect save a single point of paradox.
Once the target of the destiny is determined, the crafter must nominate a goal for the destiny. The specificity of this goal is limited by the architect's knowledge at the time of crafting: any specific characters or magical objects in the goal must be named in full, or else be defined by a direct relationship with the target, so that "The target is to fall in love with their best friend" is acceptable, but "The target is to fall in love with their best friend's spouse" is not unless the crafter can name that person.
Having named the goal, the crafter's player should work with the Storyteller to determine under which Division of the Bureau of Destiny it most accurately falls. In most cases this should be obvious, but in ambiguous cases the Storyteller's decision is final. The crafter then selects a primary College under the auspices of that Division. Optionally, up to (higher of Essence and primary College) additional Colleges can be added to the destiny, at the cost of <number> accumulated successes, at any time before the destiny is released. The crafter must have at least one dot in each such College.
Finally, the crafter may optionally specify a schedule for the destiny's triggers. This may be as irregular or even random as desired, or even contingent on the actions or circumstances of the target, although any such conditions should be simple enough to be stated in a short sentence, and depend only on facts detectable with normal human senses in the same scene as the target. Without this specification, the destiny's behaviour is left to the Storyteller to direct as best suits the needs of the game. Under normal circumstances, the destiny will never trigger more often than (lower of Essence and primary College) times in a month, but this threshold may be raised to any extent by accepting a number of points of paradox equal to the excess triggers desired. The destiny's schedule is plotted out on the scale of an action interval, and repeats each interval.
When the crafter is satisfied with the state of the destiny, it is the work of a moment's concentration to release it into Fate. The crafter should decide whether they want to retain some measure of control of it or release it completely - only (Essence) destinies may be maintained in a controlled state by a single character. Once released, a destiny lies quiescent for a single roll interval, integrating with the existing plans on the Loom. After this period, as often as its schedule dictates the destiny will work to create coincidences which steer its target towards its goal. These coincidences are strictly limited to those which fall under the auspices of the Colleges involved in the destiny's creation, and are determined by the storyteller. Due to the nature of the destiny, these coincidences cannot depend on changes to the course of Fate which predate the destiny's release (although at the Storyteller's discretion they can take advantage of natural coincidences). It is the nature of destinies to act with subtlety, so they will not cause any event which truly strains credulity - if an average person would be inclined to call any single event 'more than coincidence', it is beyond an undirected destiny, although multiple events may form an unbelievable pattern or sequence.
At the end of each action interval, and whenever the destiny expresses itself, the destiny loses a point of Durability. In the normal course of things, it will deplete itself over time, peacefully attempting to fulfil its goal. However, in extremis, a destiny may be repurposed by its creator, provided they have not relinquished control. When the creator is in the same scene as the target of the destiny, at the cost of a single point of willpower they may cause the destiny to throw off a coincidence of their choice. Such emergency fateworkings are under no obligation to follow the destiny's goal, but otherwise follow all the normal rules of destiny, and in fact are stricter still - the changes thus evoked are not retroactive, and so must either involve only elements already present in the scene or take some time to materialize. This desperate act can only be performed once per scene per destiny, and is a miscellaneous action. Finally, the creator of a destiny may cancel it at any time while they are in the same scene as the target, likewise with a miscellaneous action. Cancelled destinies dissipate harmlessly, but often leave a single omen of their primary College as they depart.
