Sample Power Advantages

Control Powers
In Strands of Fate, Control is a meta-power that allows you
to, well, control stuff. What exactly you can control is chosen
upon the creation of the power and some things cost more
than others. For example, being able to control Matter provides
a lot more freedom than being able to control Earth and thus
costs more points. In Divine Blood, the Control metapower is
used as the basis for several other abilities as listed below.
// Telepathy – Every sentient is at least mildly telepathic
and empathic. That’s the reason that almost anybody
can learn to perform magic. Several Talents also have
the ability to perform a specific trick or two. However,
telepathy as it appears in comic books and movies is a
quite a bit rarer. When your character has enough
versatility to their telepathy to be able to duplicate
several other powers, it is probably best modeled as a
Control
// Kinesis – The physical control of matter or energy is
another ability that most sentients possess in small
degrees. Again, this is another thing that has a broad
spectrum of abilities that are often best related as a
control. Whether it is biokinesis, telekinesis, electrokinesis
or anything else, the versatility of such powers
is usually fairly broad.
// Conceptual – Conceptuals appear to be standard sort
Talents, usually a –kinesis, but are actually quite a bit
more broad. The primary sign that a particular Talent
is a conceptual user is when the phenomena or matter
they’re able to control is unusually narrow in definition,
such as cloth. However, they are not truly limited to
controlling cloth. The fact is that they can make changes
to most of the world around them, but they are
limited by a “concept” through which they express that
control. Most conceptual are primarily Manipulatives,
but all are, in theory at least, Metabolic and Sensitive
psychics as well.
// Domains/Realms – These are the logical progression
of the Conceptual Talent. The primary difference between
a Domain, Realm or Conceptual is that the Domains
and Realms pretty much all straddle the line of
manipulative, metabolic and sensitive powers. Gods/
Demons each have a Domain/Realm, respectively, and
their culture has dealt with such Talents for millions
of years.
// Channeling – This is a trained skill geared toward
making blatant use of raw Life-Force. These abilities
are not subtle and primarily developed with a focus
on martial use. A channneler can’t produce a burst of
electricity or fire. The most accurate way to describe
channeling is to compare its practitioners to the sort
of martial artists that appear on comics and movies
tossing about chi blasts and making seemingly impossible
jumps while shrugging off devastating attacks.
// Magic – The practice of borrowing the abilities of other
beings is most properly reproduced as a control that
places its focus on Focused Channels and Ritual Controls.
All Controls are based around six primary applications of the
Advantage.
// Attack – Use the Control to attack an enemy.
// Defense – Use the Control to either prevent yourself
from being struck or else reduce damage from attacks.
// Block – Use the Control to inhibit the actions or perceptions
of other people.
// Maneuver – Use the Control to create effects on the
setting and people around the character.
// Mold – Use the Control to control the Shape of the
controlled phenomena
// Emulate – Use the Control to duplicate another Power
Advantage
Every use requires an Overcome action to Activate the Power
as normal. It is possible to increase the activation difficulty
in order to create a more powerful effect. Like most powers,
if you fail the activation roll, the power still activates but you
suffer stress. However, if your roll is less than the Base Activation
Difficulty −3, then the power does not activate and you
take Stress.
Attack
This is probably the most obvious applications of most Control
powers: turning the thing you control into a deadly weapon.
This can be done by turning a flashlight into a laser with
control of light or unleashing a terrible mental attack with a
telepathic control.
This is a normal Attack action. It works like any other Attack
action.
However, like any active Powers, you must first Activate the
attack. The exact features of the shaped attack determine the
difficulty of this Activation roll. Attacks from Control powers
have a base activation difficulty of 3.
The procedure for making the attack is as follows:

Determine nature of attack: Physical, Mental or Life-Force.
// Determine Weapon Rating of the attack.
// Name an Aspect
// Add any modifiers to the attack and determine activation
difficulty.
// Make the activation roll.
// Make the attack roll and calculate Stress and Consequences
as normal.
The nature of the attack is based on the source. A telepathic
spike through someone’s mind will do mental stress while a
blast of lightning or fire will do physical. A channeled bolt of
chi could deal either physical or Life-Force stress. This has
no direct impact on the difficulty of using the power. The
attack should be given an Aspect of some sort at this point.
It should be a simple description of the attack such as Whipping
Cloth, Bolt of Lightning or Spike of Telepathic Pain.
The Weapon Rating is a simple matter of choosing a number.
Each point of Weapon Rating increases the difficulty of the
activation roll by 1. So a Weapon Rating of 2 will increase the
difficulty of the activation roll by 2.
Next you will add any desired modifiers to the attack, available
modifiers are listed below:
// Ranged – Ranged attacks generally have a range equal
to your connected Psychic Ability and increase the
Activation difficulty by +2. You can increase this range
further by increasing the Difficulty by +2 for each additional
+1 range.
// Area of Effect – You can affect a zone rather than a
single target, turning the Weapon Rating into an Explosive
Rating. Doing so increases the Activation difficulty
by +4. Each additional zone increases the difficulty by
+1. For each extra +1 difficulty, you can protect one person
in the area of effect from the attack. You can be
damaged by your own attack if you don’t account for it.
// Persistent Effect – Your attack deals damage over
time for an increase to the Activation difficulty based
on how often the attack occurs. Each round your target
suffers an amount of stress equal to what they suffered
last round −3. So if they took 7 Stress with the initial
attack, they’d take 4 Stress the next round and 1 Stress
the round after that with the effect ending on the third
round when damage equals 0.
Activation
Difficulty Modifer Time Increment
+6 Round
+5 2 Rounds
+4 3 Rounds
+3 4 Rounds
+2 Scene
+1 Hour
// Ignores Armor – Your attack somehow avoids armor.
For example: using Telepathy to create an aneurism
thus circumventing both physical and mental armor;
or using a pheromone to induce an Awe effect to circumvent
mental armor. Or it might be an especially
subtle and insidious curse trying to get past any spiritual
armor.
Once the Weapon Rating and modifiers of the attack are in
place, you need to roll the Appropriate Psychic Ability against
the total difficulty. Attacks from Control powers have a base
activation difficulty of 3. A failed roll causes the psychic to
suffer feedback Stress like any other power, but the power
succeeds.
Each Attack needs an Aspect to describe how it is accomplishing
its task. This can be compelled and invoked as normal.
One of Loren Mutabah’s Channeling techniques is a
Chi-Slash. This is Weapon Rating 4 ranged attack. As
such the total Activation Difficulty of this power is a 9.
Loren makes a roll and adds her metabolic of 4 getting
a total of 6. She thus suffers 3 stress but the power goes
off.
Once the power is activated, an attack roll is made against
the opponent’s defense roll to see if the attack hits and how
much damage is done. The Ability that can be used to defend
against the attack depends on the nature of the attack. Note
that the Activation roll and Attack roll are different.
// Melee and bursts of energy are defended against by
Agility.
// High speed projectiles and blasts are defended against
by Perception.
// Poisons, diseases and other biological attacks are defended
against by Endurance.
// Mental attacks are defended against by Willpower.

Defense
This is the counter to the attack action. Using your Power,
you defend yourself.
This can range from blocking a telepathic assault via your
own Talent all the way to causing fireballs to fizzle out into
smoke clouds before they reach you. This simply allows you
to roll your Psychic Ability instead of one of your normal
abilities to counter an attack.
Regardless of the nature of it, this is a standard Defense action
and, once activated, follows the rules for a normal Defense action.
Activating the Defense is a free action that can be taken at any
time and simply requires you to roll against a base Activation
Difficulty of 2. A failure results in Stress suffered but you will
still be able to roll your psychic Ability against the attack.
In addition, you can increase the difficulty by +2 to add a +1
to the Defense roll. This can be done multiple times.
Each Defense has an Aspect name to describe how it is working
that can be compelled and invoked as normal.
If you want this Defense to last for an entire scene rather than
a single round, increase the Difficulty by +2.
A bunch of cultists throw a salvo of Molotov cocktails
at Lilitu, Demoness of Smoke. She defends herself by
using her Realm of Smoke to cause the cocktails to
Smoke Out well before they reach her. This allows her
to use her Manipulative 5 score to defend against them
rather than her Agility 3 score.
The base difficulty of is 2 so she simply has to beat a 2
with her Manipulative of 5 in order to succeed with no
stress.
Now that the power has been activated, she rolls her
Manipulative to defend against the attacks and ends
up being surrounded in a lot of smoke and unlit gasoline
as not one of the impromptu bombs ignites.
Eija Semezou could also use her Channeling Advantage
to create a defense by causing incoming projectiles to
be diverted away with lines of Chi.
However, Eija’s Perception of 3 is higher than her Manipulative
of 1. As such, for the most part this would be
of no benefit to her.
She could add a bonus to the roll of +3, allowing her to
roll a Defense of 4 (Manipulative 1 +3) instead of 3 (Perception)
against incoming bullets or arrows. This would
require rolling against a difficulty of 8 and almost certainly
taking Chi Stress. She is more likely to simply use
her Perception to protect herself.
Of course, both Eija could use the channeling effect to
protect other people, which might make the almost
definite Chi Stress more worth it.
Protection: Alternately, a psychic can opt for protection
instead of defense. By rolling against a basic difficulty of 3,
the psychic gains an AR 2. This AR can be increased by adding
+1 to the Activation difficulty for each +1 of AR. This protection
also needs an Aspect name to explain how it is shaped.
For a +2 to the Difficulty, this can stack with other forms of
Armor Rating.
If you want the protection to last for the entire scene rather
than just a single round, then increase the Difficulty by +2.
Naiki sees an incoming rocket heading her way. She
immediately fashions a Shield of Chi to block the Rocket.
She decides to raise an AR of 10 because she expects
the rocket to deal a lot of damage. The base difficulty
is 3 so she has a total difficulty of 11. She rolls her Manipulative
of 3 and Manages to get a total of 4. Naiki
suffers 7 Life-Force stress, but blocks all the physical
damage from the rocket.
Block
By using your powers you make it difficult for other people
to perform actions. Perhaps you place a block in a person’s
mind preventing them from suspecting that you’re lying.
Maybe you’ve filled the area with smoke to prevent someone
from seeing things. Or perhaps you’re telekinetically grappling
the target.
Regardless, this functions as a normal block action simply
performed with your psychic Abilities.
Before you roll the block, you first have to activate the Power.
To activate you roll against an Activation difficulty of 2. If you
fail, you suffer stress equal to the difference between the
difficulty and your roll but the block activates. To place the
block roll your Ability, this represents the Potency of the
Block. A +1 can be applied to the Potency roll for each +1 by
which the activation difficulty is increased by.

Maintaining the block is a supplemental action that causes
the psychic to take a -2 to all other actions taken each round
the block is maintained.
Each Block should have an Aspect name that describes how
it works which can be compelled or invoked as normal.
// Extended Coverage: By increasing the difficulty by
+2, you can extend the block to one more person. For
every additional +2, you will affect another person. For
a +3 you can affect an entire zone with one more zone
added for each additional +3 added to the Activation
difficulty. Zone-wide blocks can be broken entirely by
one person beating the block with spin. Applying the
block at ranged increases the activation cost by +2 and
range is figured normally.
// Extended Duration: By spending a Fate Point, you
can cause your block to last for the entire scene without
further concentration.
Eija wants to prevent people from catching sight of her,
Hel and Yooji on a battle field. She uses her knowledge
of Cloaking and Channeling to create a Pocket of
Cloaked Space by placing a block against Perception
in her current zone. This is one zone and Channeling
has a base difficulty of 2 so the total difficulty is 5. She
easily makes that roll and hides herself and the other
girls from hostile forces. Unfortunately, since Eija
cloaked the zone not the people, when Yooji stands up
she is seen and captured.
Maneuver
Most of the time, if you want to perform some unusual task
with your power, you are going to perform a maneuver. Setting
the zone on fire via pyrokinesis, inducing a sense of
depression in an opponent to weaken their performance,
jump-starting a car with electrokinesis and other such things
can be represented with maneuvers. The basic difficulty for
activating your power to perform a maneuver is 3 though
exceptionally complex maneuvers might require a higher
difficulty.
For the most part, the Aspects created by these maneuvers
are temporary or easily removed but that can be altered by
increasing the difficulty of the activation roll. As can variables
like area of effect.
In some cases, your maneuver will be resisted by the opponent.
If this is so, after rolling to activate the power, you should roll
your psychic Ability against an appropriate defense Ability
by the target. If the defender wins, they shake off the effect
somehow. Remember, the Attack roll and Activation roll are
different, just like with Attacks above.
This operates as a normal maneuver action used to place,
discover or place tags on Aspects.
// Reliable Maneuver – Sometimes you’ll want to make
sure that a particular maneuver is successful. By increasing
the activation difficulty of a power by +2, you
gain a +1 to rolls made to make sure the power succeeds.
Zelus, the God of Zeal, is creating an Aspect of Curse of
Apathy and Frustration, as a result of essentially draining
the zeal from people around him. The purpose is to
make it difficult for the target he and his brother and
sisters want to capture to get through the airport and
to their plane. He definitely wants this to succeed and,
as such, wants to add a bonus to his contested rolls. He
increases the activation difficulty by +6 to get a +3 to
his Sensitive roll vs the Willpower of his targets. The
current difficulty of this effect is now 9.
Once Zelus rolls the maneuver, he will be adding +3 on
top of his Sensitive of 3 for a total of +6 to the dice. It is
quite likely that once the power is activated and he uses
it, that he will easily beat every will in the building.
// Lasting Aspect – For every +2 you increase the difficulty
of the activation, you can increase the duration
of the created Aspect by one step higher on the Time
Increment table.
Zelus also wants this Aspect to last for quite some time
and thus increases the base difficulty by +2 in order to
increase the duration of the effect from 1 round to 1
scene. The current difficulty of this power is now 11.
// Expansive Aspect – For maneuvers that don’t directly
affect combat, such as controlling weather to create
an aspect of Thunderstorm, the GM might allow you to
increase the area of effect of the Aspect. The difficulty
is increased by the Size rating of the area to be affected.
For maneuvers that directly affect combat, they may
affect one zone for an increase in activation difficulty
of +2 per zone affected.
If you want to selectively affect people in the zone, you
can increase the difficulty by +1.
The God of Zeal needs to affect more than just one
employee. He wants to affect every employee in the

airport. The GM rules that the airport is roughly size 5,
which is about 50 zones and roughly the size of an
aircraft carrier. The difficulty of using this power is now
17.
// Persistent Aspect – By increasing the activation difficulty
by +3, you can make the created Aspect Persistent.
Zelus really wants this Aspect to be pervasive and hard
to resist. He increases the cost by +3 to make the created
aspect persistent. The difficulty of using this maneuver
is now 20 and will be followed by a roll of Zelus’s
Sensitive versus the Willpower of the targeted employees.
Mold
Depending on the nature of your Talent, it may be possible
to shape energy or matter into a desired form. It will be noted
in each description as to whether or not to use the Mold
option for a particular power or not. The activation difficulty
of this is dependent on what you want to create.
Mold only requires the Activation roll to be successful. If the
Overcome action is successful, the created item or creature
is immediately put into place.
Every creation will have an Aspect to describe what it is. This
is usually something simple like Sword, but can be more
complex.
// Create – You may take the raw substance of what you are
able to control and Mold it into something usable. The
created object will last for the duration of this use of
control after which it will fall back apart. The base activation
difficulty of this is based on the complexity of the
item to be created as indicated on the following chart.
After determining the complexity of the item and the
base difficulty, you will then add a modifier equal to
the size rating of the item to be created x2, with a minimum
of 0. Thus the activation difficulty is equal to
Base Difficulty + Size x2.
The Succeed with Spin result for Create actions is different
from usual Overcome actions.
// Fail – You either fail or succeed though suffer Stress
equal to the amount by which you failed the roll.
// Tie – You succeed but suffer a Boost applied against
you that relates to the strain of the effort.
// Success – The item is created.
// Success with Spin – The created item gives a +1 bonus
to rolls relating to its intended function.
Item to be created Base
Difficulty
Stone Age. Crude spears and other tools 1
Iron Age. Swords, crossbows, herbal medicines 2
Renaissance. Complex metal armors, muskets, printing press,
early internal combustion engines 3
RL Modern Day. Automatic weapons, computers, cars 4
DB Modern Day. rail guns, virtual reality, uprights, etc 5
If Loren Mutabah wants to mold her roll of cloth into a
Rapier of Psychically Hardened Cloth, that is a base
difficulty of 2. The size of a sword is less than 0, as such
the base difficulty is 2. However, Cloth is an inappropriate
material to this use, as mentioned under Conceptual
powers, and that increases the base difficulty
by +2 for a total difficulty of 4. Loren rolls her 4 Manipulative
and succeeds with a roll of 7. She has made an
exceptional sword from her cloth and gains a +1 to rolls
made using the sword in either attack or defense.
// Create Something from Nothing – This is usually
an option that is limited to conceptual Talents. The
individual Advantage will note whether this is an option
or not. Regardless, the effort of creating something
out of nothing increases the difficulty by +2.
Your power has to be able to create something from
nothing in order to be able to do this at all.
// Lasting Creation – Created objects will last for the
scene before returning to their constituent parts. For
every +2 you increase the activation difficulty by, you
can move the duration of the creation up the time increment
chart by one step. You cannot create a Permanent
item without using the Craft Power Item ability.
// Create Minion – Some psychics have the ability to
bring together their controlled phenomena into the
shape of what appears to be an actual creature and use
it to perform errands or to attack enemies. You must
have enough matter or energy on hand to create the
desired minion and must give it an Aspect name describing
it such as Earthen Hound, Man of Fire or Telepathic
Phantasm
The base activation difficulty for a created minion is 5.
The creator has a number of points equal to their Ma-
nipulative or Sensitive x2 to assign to the creature’s
Abilities.
More points can be added by Increasing the Difficulty
by +1 for each added Ability point.
You can trade Ability points for Advantage points on
a 1 to 1 basis. Any purchased Advantages must fit the
nature of the created minion.
There are only 6 Abilities important to the minions
created by these powers: Agility, Endurance, Perception,
Strength, Reasoning and Sensitive.
The Physical Abilities work as they do for other creatures.
The maximum rank of Physical Abilities is equal
to the creator’s Manipulative or Sensitive +1, depending
on which was used to create the minion.
++ Reasoning – For each point of Reasoning, the
minion can be given one simple command to
obey. If Reasoning is 0, the creator has to command
it directly each round as a supplemental
action. The minion’s Reasoning can not be higher
than the creator’s. Commands can normally
only be changed while the creator has a line of
sight to the minion.
++ Sensitive – For each point of Sensitive, the minion
can operate up to 1 mile away from its creator
and still receive new commands. For +2 Difficulty,
it can share sensory information with its
master. The minion’s Sensitive cannot be higher
than the creator’s.
The creature’s Aspect can be invoked to represent abilities
that are pertinent to its nature. This requires using the creator’s
Fate Points. Or maneuvering on its Aspect and then
using tags
The creature can take a number of consequences equal to
your appropriate Psychic Ability (either Manipulative or
Sensitive) before being destroyed. The maximum number of
consequences that they can suffer is 4.
The creation of more complex companions is largely impossible
within the limits of Talents alone. A later supplement
will deal with companions more extensively. Minions
that can think or otherwise act independently are largely
the result of extensive scientific or shaping processes.
Until then, to simulate more advanced and generally permanent
minions, can use the Companion rules found on
page 317 of Strands of Power or the Summon Creature Power
Advantage found on page 175 of Strands of Fate.
Emulate Other Power
Depending on your particular Talent, you may be able to
emulate the use of other powers. For example, if you are a
biokinetic, you might be able to create antibodies in a target
to fight a disease (emulating the Poison Advantage with the
Antibodies modifier) or you might be able to see a long distance
by altering the way light reaches your eyes via photokinesis
(emulating Enhanced Vision).
In all honesty, almost every other power can be duplicated
via the Attack, Defense, Block, Maneuver and Mold powers.
Most of the Power Advantages in this game operate through
those basic functions in some form or fashion. Even a number
of the more unusual powers operate by manipulation of the
Aspect system more than anything else. As a result, this
application of control should only be used when you cannot
reproduce the effect you desire by the other means. This is,
in fact, a limitation of the Control. You’ll see it noted below
that Control cannot duplicate a power that performs one of
its basic functions in a more efficient manner and that cuts
out many of the pre-made powers.
When emulating another power, use the following guidelines:
// Cost Limitation – The total AP cost of the Power cannot
be higher than your connected psychic Ability. For Conceptuals
or Domains and Realms, this would be the
psychic Ability most appropriate to the desired effect.
// Purchase – When emulating a power, you decide on
all aspects as if you were purchasing it with Advantage
Points. You may select Modifiers and Meta-Powers, but
the cost of the Power may never be reduced by more
than half (after modifiers have been added, round
down) or to less than 1. Also, you may not select Modifiers
or Meta-Powers that reduce the cost without
impacting your ability to use the power. The GM has
final say on whether a power use is acceptable.
// Limits of Emulation – You may not emulate a power
if doing so would produce a better result than if you
simply used the other features of Control. For example
the Power Attack, Armor, Cloaking and Imbue [X]
Advantages are all more efficient than the basic use
the Attack, Defense, Block and Maneuver applications
of control. As such, those powers cannot be emulated.
// Activation Difficulty – The activation difficulty of
powers emulated by a Control is equal to the base difficulty
of the emulated power +2. For example, Exchange
Health has a base difficulty of 4 so emulating
it would have an Activation difficulty of 6. If the power
does not require an activation roll or Fate Point toactivate it, assume the activation cost is equal to the
AP cost of the emulated power ×2.
// Ability – Most controls require the same ability to activate
as is used to actually use the power. Magic is the
exception. Again note that activating the power and
using it (especially if the power is targeted) are often
separate rolls. However, the Control Activation roll takes
the place of the normal Activation roll for the Power.
Basically, if the Power requires two rolls normally, then
the emulated version will require two rolls.
// Duration – An emulated Power has the same duration
that it would normally have. If the emulated power
does not normally have a duration, then it has a duration
of “Scene” while being emulated. This may be
changed to a full day by spending a Fate Point, but only
for powers that do not normally have a duration.
Inappropriate Materials
Some Talents are able to alter the most basic nature of the
material they’re manipulating. This allows psychics to do
things like create swords as strong as the best steel out of
cloth or physically manifesting hope as a shielding light, for
two examples. If this is an option, it will be noted under the
specific Advantage. This increases the Activation cost of the
power by +2.
Focused Control
Sometimes, a character will decide to take extra time in order
to complete a particularly powerful effect. In this case, the
character is involved in a Contest against his own Power. This
is handled like any other contest, as described earlier on in
this book. However, defining the opposition might be a little
tricky.
Figure out the Activation Difficulty as normal. If you decide
to use it as a Focused Control instead of a normal use of Control,
then divide that Activation Difficulty by 4 and round up.
This becomes the opposition stat in the Contest which is set
up as follows.
Psychic: Intent: Perform an Action with their Power.
Power: Intent: Cause a backlash.
This works as usual for a Contest with the first “side” to reach
three victories to achieve their goals. As normal the Psychic
may attempt to perform maneuvers at each step to help him,
though failing such maneuvers will mean he gets no attempt
to make a Contest roll. These have a static difficulty equal to
the Power’s skill.
The Power can perform maneuvers as well, which can be
actively opposed by the psychic. This represents the Life-Force
being hard to Manage. Or the GM can compel Aspects of the
psychic or spell to interfere, though these will provide Fate
Points.
Zelus decides to make his Curse of Apathy as a Focused
Control. The Activation Difficulty is 20 so the skill of the
Power in this case is +5. Zelus has a Sensitive of +3.
In the First round, Zelus tries to activate the Four Point
Circle he inscribed earlier with a maneuver. The GM
decides that the distraction of focusing the Power allows
the Curse to act as a Passive Difficulty of 5. Zelus rolls
a +1 for a total of +4 and decides to spend a Fate Point
invoking his Practiced Shaper Aspect for a +2 bonus
to make the Maneuver a success.
Zelus now rolls his Sensitive against the Curse. The
Curse rolls a −1 on the dice for a total of +4, Zelus rolls
a +0 for a total of 3. He decides to use his free Invoke of
Four-Point Circle to gain a +2 on the roll for a total of
5. The GM compels the Mana Aspect of Zelus’s Life-Force
and reminds him that Mana is slow to build, reducing
Zelus’s roll back to 3. Zelus considers spending a Fate
Point to deny it, but decides he’s used enough resources
this time.
Zelus – 0
Curse – 1
Once again, Zelus tries to roll a maneuver to activate
his circle. This time he gets a +3 result on the dice for
a total of +6. He spends the Fate Point he got from the
GM to invoke his Practiced Shaper Aspect and increase
that to +8 allowing him to succeed with Spin against
the Difficulty of 5. He now adds two Free Invokes of his
Circle for a total of three.
Now come the Contest rolls. Zelus rolls a +2 on the dice
for a total of 5. The Curse rolls a +1 on the dice for a
total of 6. Zelus uses one of his two free Invokes for a
new total of 7 and the GM lets it pass, giving Zelus the
victory this time.
Zelus – 1
Curse – 1

Zelus forgoes maneuvering this turn and goes straight
to the contest rolls. He rolls a +2 on the dice for a total
of +5 before invocations. As usual, he waits for the
opposition to roll before deciding how to use his free
Invokes. The curse rolls a +3 for a total of +8. So Zelus
forces the curse to re-roll with his last free Invoke of the
Four-Point Circle and the new roll is −3 for a total of
+2.
The curse goes off and Zelus looks down to his Four-
Point Circle which still has three free Invokes on it. He
considers it briefly and immediately goes about forming
a second effect to layer on the first since he has it
ready to use.
Backlash: As stated, if you cannot maintain your Focus for
some reason, or you get distracted, then you suffer backlash
in the form of an attack. The longer you’ve been focusing, the
more power you’ve built up and the more dangerous that
backlash is. The attack you receive as a backlash has a rating
equal to the total you have accumulated so far while focusing.
The stress you receive will be related to the effect you were
trying to create. As such, a pyrokinetic will suffer burns when
they fail to create a massive fireball, a channneler will be
wracked by stressed Life-Force and a telepath will suffer
headaches or terrifying visions. You defend against the attack
with Endurance, Willpower or your relevant Psychic Ability
as is most logical for the sort of effect you were hoping for.
If you are attacked while focusing, you must make a Willpower
roll against a difficulty equal to the stress caused by the
attack suffered accounting for inflicted consequences. If you
fail, then the Focus is disrupted and you suffer backlash as
normal. Stress suffered from Focus rolls does not trigger this.
If your Focus roll results in a Consequence, then you have to
make a Willpower check against a difficulty determined by
the severity of the Consequence. Difficulty for this check is 2
for Minor, 4 for Major, 6 for Severe, 8 for Extreme. Failing the
Willpower roll causes the Focus to fail and backlash to occur
as normal.
Environmental situations such as loud noises or shaking
ground might also cause enough distraction to disrupt a focus.
In the presence of such things, the GM should assign an appropriate
difficulty to the Willpower roll. As normal, a failed
Willpower roll results in backlash.
By spending a Fate Point, the psychic can choose to take only
half the backlash with the remaining backlash spilling out
into the world around him and attacking any valid targets in
the zone around the psychic. You suffer at least half (round
up) of the backlash as per normal and the rest affects the zone
around you, enemies and friends both, as an attack based on
your relevant psychic Ability + the remainder of the backlash.
The normal way the backlash is inflicted is as raw damage
usually to Physical or Life-Force tracks. For example, if a
pyrokinetic managed to start the creation of that fireball but
then loses it, they’ll have gotten burned and take physical
damage. On the other hand, they could have been working
their way up to bringing the fire into existence and take Life-
Force Stress from the effort of controlling the chaotic energies,
resulting in the typical bursting blood vessels. However, it is
possible to express the backlash as mental damage, especially
when trying to use sensitive powers, or as short term curses.
The GM can also choose to demonstrate the backlash in
other ways if they choose.
Hel is trying to get herself out of detention through her
Realm as the Demoness of Prisons, detention being a
kind of prison. She is using a simple circle to bolster her
ability since she still lives under the minor-binding. She
has an effective Sensitive of 1 (after the binding) and
another +1 from the circle. While she’s working, Naiki
is trying to get her attention and the GM rules that she’s
been persistent enough to be a distraction. Hel fails a
Willpower roll and turns around to snap at Naiki demanding
to know what she wants. This causes backlash.
Normally, this would cause Hel damage as the power
of her psychic Talent grounds out through her, but instead
the GM rules that her Talent goes off but that the
effect benefits Naiki instead of Hel. The Demoness can
only sputter as Naiki gets released from detention rather
than her.
Ritual Control
By taking the time and effort to carefully prepare a use of
Control over several minutes or hours, you can perform more
powerful effects with no chance of backlash. In this case, you
only need to spend one FP instead of one per roll. This usually
takes the form of a meditation of some sort.
// The more time you spend, the more powerful the effect.
For every hour spent performing the ritual, add a +2
bonus to your activation roll. If your relevant Psychic
Ability is 3 or greater, you instead gain a +1 every 10
minutes. No matter how much time you spend, however,
the maximum bonus allowed is equal to your
relevant Psychic Ability.


// There are a number of items that can be used to make
rituals easier ranging from the quartz crystals used by
humans to the specially grown familiars and runes of
the Demons and Gods. Some of these you will find in
the section on equipment or companions. In preparation
for a ritual, the character can spend a Fate Point
to determine a Cost and make a Resources roll to acquire
materials for the ritual. If you’re successful, you get a
bonus to the ritual roll equal to the Cost you set in the
beginning.
// Circles are another common way to enhance a person’s
power for the performance of a ritual. Circles can perform
a number of different functions and those that
are drawn up quickly and non-permanently are mostly
used for Focusing or emergency Rituals. The character
can spend a Fate Point to set a Potency, they then
make the roll on their Craft Ability with the determined
Potency as a Difficulty. If successful, they receive a
bonus to the Ritual’s activation equal to the Potency of
the circle.
It is possible for a psychic to pull so much Life-Force through
their systems that they burn out their bodies, minds or spirits.
Such sacrifice adds a bonus to the roll for completion.
Each consequence you take adds another bonus to the roll.
Major +3, Severe +6, Extreme +9 and Defeated +12.
The Defeated result requires the death of the participant for
all intents and purposes. Either their mind, body or spirit is
burned out entirely and their soul passes on to the afterlife,
or hangs around as a ghost.
These consequences need to be all of the same variety. For
example, they can all be Mental consequences or they can all
be Physical consequences.
Zelus’s Curse of Apathy and Frustration that he wishes
to place on the airport employees has a difficulty of
20, and since he has the time, he plans to perform it as
a ritual. He has a Sensitive rank of 3, so he plans to
spend at least 30 minutes on the ritual itself, giving him
a +3. He also has a Rune on hand which adds another
+3 to his rolls involving his Domain of Zeal, which this
falls under. Finally, he decides to build himself a circle
by cutting into the roof of the airport in an unwatched
corner. He sets the Potency of his circle at 6 and completes
the Craft check successfully with a 7. He decides
not to make any other ritual purchases and doesn’t
want to take any injuries himself. His final bonus to the
roll is +15 [Sensitive (3) + 30 minutes (3) + rune (3) +
circle (6) = 15). He spends the Fate Point for the ritual
as well as the crafting of the circle and makes his roll,
getting a +2 on the dice for a total of 17. He decides to
take the 3 Stress to make up for rolling less than 20 and
now his Curse sweeps out over the airport creating a
bunch of apathetic, unenthused employees and increasingly
annoyed customers creating all manner of chaos
and delays.
Rotes
When you take the Control Power, you should sit down and
work up several different uses of that Control that you think
you might want to use regularly. Take the time to think things
through ahead of time so you don’t take up too much time
trying to put together a power at the table when you want to
use your Control. Strands of Fate calls these “Rotes”, the
psychics within the Divine Blood setting call them different
things for different Controls as noted in the description of
each power but we will call them “rotes” as a general term.
Some of the Control powers below give you a bonus to your
rolls if you’re using a rote that you already have, others give
you a penalty if you don’t use a rote and still others do not
allow you to use anything but your known rotes except under
special circumstances. Each Control will explain how they
deal with Rotes including what name they are known by, if
they are known by any particular name.
What constitutes an individual Rote is different from application
to application. Attack, Defense and Emulate Power are
the applications treated the most restrictively.
// Attack: Changes in Weapon Rating do not require
separate rotes. Changes in modifiers (ranged, area of
effect, persistent and ignore armor) or Aspects do require
separate rotes. So a single target Fire Lance
(ranged) would be a separate rote from a multi-target
Fireball (AoE) and a Telepathic Thrust(ranged attack)
would be a third rote.
// Defense: Each change in Aspect requires a separate
rote. Protections are a separate rote from defenses.
// Block: Each change in Aspect requires a separate rote.
Extended coverage and duration do not require separate
rotes. Small changes in Aspect such as changing
the X in Blindspot for X do not require separate rotes.
// Maneuver: Each separate Aspect requires a separate
rote, but the modifiers to that maneuver do not. Small
changes in Aspect such as changing the X in Blindspot
for X do not require separate rotes.

// Mold: Create and Create Minion require separate rotes.
Other modifiers do not.
// Emulate Power: Each Rote applies to a particular
power within the limits of the AP cost.
Channeling
Sample Aspects: Breholm Warrior, Gargoyle Sentry, SG Expeditionary
Psychic
Base AP Cost: 2
Activation Difficulty: Metabolic per Control
Activation Time: Simple Action, Free Action for Defense
Power Type: Training
Channeling is the trained skill of molding and controlling
one’s own Life-Force so that you might use it to accomplish
amazing things. In some ways, it is the least versatile of the
Controls but a well-trained channneler is usually more dangerous
than the average psychic. While there are plenty of
mundane uses for the skill, channnelers are primarily focused
on being a more effective combatant.
Channeling is divided into three overall Skills within which
there are multiple techniques:
// Blasts – These are primarily damaging attacks of pure
Life-Force. Contrary to the implication of the name,
this includes melee attacks. Dazzling sparks meant to
distract or blind, bursts meant to displace air quickly
enough to make a loud sound, surges of force meant
to knock over but not damage and harmless, entertaining
monochromatic illusions are also all included
as blasts.
Life-Force dissipates quickly once released and it takes
a lot of effort to create a blast that will have much range.
Because of this Ranged channeling effects have +1
Activation Difficulty in addition to the +2 difficulty for
adding Ranged to other powers.. (This means making
ranged attacks is a +3 Activation Difficulty total)
Blasts can target the Physical or the Life-Force Stress Tracks.
Blasts can be used to create a Defense effect by diverting
incoming attacks with sudden bursts of Life-Force.
// Auras – These are manifestations of Life-Force which
cling to the channneler. They are primarily of a defensive
nature. Only one aura can be active at a time and,
since they are usually tailored to specific attacks, this
means channnelers are commonly better protected
from one sort of attack than another.
Auras mostly use the Defense options for Control,
usually Protection, and follow the same rules. Auras
designed to protect against environmental concerns
like poisonous gas or vacuum would instead Emulate
Environmental Protection found in Strands of Fate on
page 131.
// Enhancements – These are internal manipulations
of the physical body or hand-held tool via Life-Force.
The body is performing most of the work here with the
Life-Force bridging the gap or providing support where
necessary. This can extend to some enhancements to
concentration or perception as well. Any number of
enhancements can be active at once though each active
enhancement increases the Activation difficulty for
subsequent enhancements by +1.
Channeling refers to its rotes as “techniques” and a channneler
receives a number of starting techniques equal to their
Metabolic Ability. Channnelers receive a +2 difficulty when
they try to use powers outside of their established techniques.
Also, Channeling cannot be used in a ritual normally.
Most schools of channeling have an identifiable flavor to them
that experienced people can recognize. This can identify an
attacker, give insight into the probable philosophies of an
opponent and may even predict flaws in their fighting style.

Identifying the flavors requires that one has an Aspect implying
some experience with Channeling or some supernatural
analytical ability. The difficulty to recognize a style is set
by the GM based on how common it is and/or how likely it is
the character has seen it before. Some difficulties should thus
naturally be 0. Recognizing a style is a reflexive free action.
If a character fails to recognize the style automatically, they
may try to take a simple action to analyze it. Analyzing an
unknown channeling school has a difficulty of 4.
Channnelers can hide their style by increasing the Difficulty
of all uses of the Power by +1 as long as they are keeping their
style concealed. Hiding their flavor increases the difficulty
to recognize it or analyze it by the lower of the characters
Deception or Metabolic Ability.
You can change your style by changing the Power Aspect for
Channeling to represent the changes in training and personality
that have caused your style to drift. Changing an Aspect
typically costs 5 experience points.
Note that Molding is rare for Channnelers. For channnelers
Molding is always a use of Inappropriate Materials and thus
add +2 to the Difficulty. Also, instead of having a set duration,
the channneler must maintain the Mold by taking a supplemental
action each round and rolling against half the Activation
penalty of starting the Mold. They must remain in
contact with the Mold or it will dissipate completely.
Channeling activation stress is dealt to the Life-Force Stress
Track. Channeling may Emulate any Power marked as Channeling.
Modifiers:
+1 (Skill Specialization): You receive a +1 to Activation rolls
for one of the three techniques: Blasts, Auras or Enhancements.
This can be taken three times, once for each Skill. This
does not affect Attack rolls or other rolls made to actually use
the Power after it has been activated.
+2 (Skill Expertise): You receive a +2 to Activation for one
of the three Skills: Blasts, Auras or Enhancements. This can
be taken three times, once for each Skill. This is cumulative
with specialization. This does not affect Attack rolls or other
rolls made to actually use the Power after it has been activated.
+2 (Indiscriminate Channeling): You no longer receive a
-2 penalty for improvising rotes on the fly. You instead gain
a +2 bonus when you use your already established techniques.
+1 (Dark Style): When hiding your style you add the higher
of your Deception or Metabolic to the Difficulty to analyze or
recognize it.
+1 (Blank Style): Requires and replaces Dark Style. When
hiding your style you add both your Deception and Metabolic
to the Difficulty to analyze or recognize it.
+1 (Ritual Channeling): You must have at least one Shaping
ritual. You can perform a channeling technique as a ritual if
you desire.
Sample Rotes
Semezou Channeling:
Attacks: Cutting Chi Disc (Ranged Attack – Blast)
Defenses: Deflecting Chi Disc (Defense vs Physical –
Blast); Sheltering Chi Disc (Protection – Blast); Battle
Aura (Protection – Aura)
Blocks: Disrupted Chi (Block psychic abilities in humans
- Blast), Cloaked Field (Block Perception – Aura)
Maneuvers: Flash of Chi (Blast), Chi Assisted Jump (Enhancement)
Mold: Chi-Patch (bolster a damaged object temporarily
– Blast)
Emulate Powers: Cloaking – 3 pt Emulation of Cloaking
(Aura), Chi-Strength – 4 pt Emulation of Super
Strength (Enhancement)
Mutabah Channeling:
Attacks: Chi Slash (Ranged Attack – Blast)
Defenses: Chi-Parry (Defense - Blast)
Blocks: Chi-Static (Block Psychic abilities in an area
- Blast)
Maneuvers: Chi-Attuned Sword (Enhancement)
Mold: Chi-Patch (bolster a damaged object temporarily
– Blast)
Emulate Powers: Chi-Sped Reflexes – 3 pt Emulation
of Enhanced Reflexes (Enhancement), Accelerated Metabolism
- 2 Emulation of Accelerate Metabolism,
Self-Only (Enhancement)

Conceptual Control
Sample Aspects: Physical and Conceptual Control of Cloth
Base AP Cost: 5
Activation Difficulty: per Control rules at beginning of this
section + stretch Modifier
Activation Time: Simple Action; Free Action for Defense
Power Type: Touched, Magic
Talents with Conceptual Controls are among the rarest of
Talents. They appear to be basic kinetics for the most part,
though often with what appears to be a psychological block
limiting their controls to specific materials or elements. This
is a common enough thing and usually the first assumption.
However, Conceptuals go beyond anything those with a similar
–kinesis can accomplish.
For example, a magnetokinetic might be able to magnetically
control metal to provide a defense against attack and a
Talent with Conceptual Control of magnetism could do the
same. However, the Conceptual Talent could parlay that all
the way out into a seduction power based on animal magnetism.
Basically, Conceptual Controls run on PC logic, however,
GMs are encouraged to add penalty modifiers the more
tenuous a connection is (see Domain/Realm for some suggested
modifiers). Despite this, most Conceptuals are still
limited to physical manifestations of power, even if those
manifestations are only metaphorically related to the control
aspect. As they grow in ability they may become able to internalize
the concept as well, both mentally and biologically.
Conceptual controls will use all three Psychic Abilities. Primarily,
they will tend to use Manipulative, but Metabolic
occurs fairly frequently and Sensitive is of use occasionally,
especially defensively and detecting the controlled phenomena
or substance.
Like with kinetics, Conceptual Controls have no particular
name for their Rotes. They start with a number of rotes equal
to their ranks in Manipulative. In addition, Conceptual Controls
suffer a -2 penalty to Activation rolls when they are not
using their rotes. This is because the extent of what they’re
manipulating is very complex.
Forcing a phenomenon to behave or react in ways counter to
what is physically possible makes the use of a Conceptual
Control more difficult. This is an Inappropriate Material use
and thus increases the difficulty by +2.
Conceptual Control cannot Emulate Telepathy Powers unless
they have the Telepathic Conceptual modifier. They cannot
Emulate Shapeshifting Powers unless they also have Shapeshifting,
Morph, Transmogrification or Self-Evolving
with the Luminous Being modifiers. Some Powers have
multiple types because they can be fluffed in multiple ways.
In these cases, ignore this restriction. Use your common
sense.
Read Thoughts has the Telepathy type and can’t really
be simulated without assuming Telepathy and thus
cannot be Emulated by Conceptual Control unless they
have the Telepathic Conceptual modifier. Affliction
has the Shapeshifting type because being able to alter
your internal structure provides a rationale for being
able to produce weaponized diseases. However, that is
not the only way to produce an Affliction, and thus
Conceptual Control can emulate it. Morph and Transmogrification,
however, can only be explained as shapeshifting
and thus can only be Emulated by the Conceptual
Control if the character has shapeshifting from
an independent source.
Conceptual Control activation stress is dealt to the Life-Force
Stress Track.
Modifiers:
−1 (Inability to Focus): You may not spend additional rounds
to focus on a use of Control

−1 (No Rituals): You may not utilize the ritual option of
Control.
+2 (Summon From Nothing): You are able to summon the
phenomena you’re able control even though it is not present
by pulling together quantum matter in the area to fit the
necessary mass or energy for the desired phenomena.
+2 (Telepathic Conceptual): At this point, there is very
little difference between a Conceptual and the Domains and
Realms of the Gods and Demons.
Whereas before your power extended to physical phenomena
that had a tenuous, metaphoric connection to your theme,
such as making cloth act like armor because you can control
cloth, now you can perform things that are entirely metaphorical.
For example, a Talent with Conceptual Control of
Fire could rouse the flames of rage and start a riot, enkindle
the fires of passion when trying to seduce someone or stir
the embers of a person’s courage.
Telepathic Conceptuals are also able to have a wider variety
of themes they center around. For example, some might have
a Conceptual Control over Hope, which would still allow them
to call a light because of the idea of hope being the light at
the end of the tunnel.
If you start the game with this modifier, you start with a
number of rotes equal to the higher of your Sensitive or Manipulative.
If you have this modifier, you can Emulate Powers marked as
Telepathy.
Sample Rotes
Conceptual and Physical Control of Cloth
Attacks: Remote Garrote (ranged attack, ignores armor);
Piercing Threads (ranged attack)
Defenses: Iron Cloth (Protection); Dancing Cloth (Defense vs
physical); Concealing Curtain (Defense)
Blocks: Cloth Snare (block motion); Silk Manacles (Block all
actions)
Maneuvers: Fraying Threads; Ariadne’s Thread
Molds: Steel-Cloth Rapier, Fancy Dress, Cloth Puppet
Emulate Power: Carpet Walking – 4 pt Emulation of Flight,
Relative Speed; Trip Threads – 2 pt Emulation of Barrier, Permeable,
Alarm
Domain/Realm
Sample Aspects: Demoness of Smoke, God of Thunder, Demon
of the Sun, Goddess of Victory
Base AP Cost: 2
Activation Difficulty: per Control Rules at beginning of this
section
Activation Time: Simple Action, Free Action for Defense
Power Type: Magic, Talent
Requirement: You must have a defining characteristic that
identifies you as a God or Demon
Only Gods possess Domains and only Demons possess Realms.
The other races cannot take this power and Half-Demons and
Demi-Gods can only take this power if the other half of their
make-up is the other type of Immortal.
While Domains and Realms come about through differing
means than Talents, they function similarly enough that the
game mechanics for a fully developed Domain or Realm to
work with essentially the same systems. However, while all
Gods and Demons have access to these powers, only a handful
actually make much effort to develop their powers.
At the basic cost, a Domain or Realm functions exactly like
the Power Tricks Meta-Power Advantage. As the Demon or
God learns (or relearns) more about the manipulation of the
world around them, they acquire more of the basic functions
of a control. They still have all the basic limits of Power Tricks
or Control, so a Demon who has upgraded to using Emulate
Power but not attack would only have the ability to attack
within Power Tricks’ limits.
The difference between a Conceptual Control and a Domain
or Realm is in how the psychic reaches the ability. A Conceptual
Control Talent operates almost entirely on instinct and
has something of a head start. Domains and Realms occur
because Gods and Demons are one of the few species that is
equipped to actually analyze directly what happens when
certain powers are used. In essence, Domains and Realms are
the ultimate goal of the sorcerer.
Gods and Demons still make use of the Conceptual visualization
tools to make things easier. They tend to fudge the lines
much more than Conceptual Talents, which is a result of the
fact that their themes are deliberately formed visualization
tools rather than a psychological block. This is similar to
Inappropriate Materials but goes well past that. Whereas
Inappropriate Materials deals with causing the phenomena
you’re able to manipulate to behave in a physically unusual
manner, they are actually able to manipulate reality as a
whole. It is merely much easier for them to do so within the
concepts defined by their Domain or Realm. The more tenuously
connected to their Domain or Realm Aspect, the more

difficult it is for them to affect. GMs are encouraged to increase
the Activation Difficulty. Some suggested difficulty modifiers
are given below.
Modifier Connection to Domain
+1 Close Metaphorical connection to Domain. Smoke to Illusion.
Cheer to Celebration.
+2
Close physical connection to Domain. Smoke to Fire.
Metaphorical connection to Domain. Cheer to Bravery.
Raw manipulation of Mana similar to a Channeling effect, but
flavored by your Domain, such as creating a blast of Mana that
appears to be blue flame.
+3
Physical connection to Domain. Smoke to Heat
Distant Metaphoric connection to Domain. Cheer to Respect.
Raw Manipulation of Mana with your Domain flavor hidden.
+4
Distant Physical connection to Domain. Smoke to Mist.
No Metaphoric connection to Domain.
+5 No Physical connection to Domain
Modifier Connection to Realm
+1 Close Physical connection to Realm. Smoke to Fire. Sun to
Light
+2
Physical connection to Realm. Smoke to Heat
Close Metaphoric connection to Realm. Sun to Hope
Raw manipulation of Vitae similar to a Channeling effect, but
flavored by your Realm.
+3
Distant Physical connection to Realm. Smoke to Mist
Metaphoric connection to Realm. Sun to Healing
Raw manipulation of Vitae with your Realm flavor hidden.
+4
No Physical connection to Realm.
Distant Metaphoric connection Realm. Sun to Time
+5 No Metaphoric connection to Realm.
Lilitu Geisthexe is the Demoness of Smoke. According to
the chart above, she can make effects related to fire at a
+1 Difficulty because Fire has a close physical connection
to Smoke. If she wants to make illusions with sound or a
level of realism beyond smoky figures, however, she has a
+2 Difficulty because she is a Demon with a Realm and
Smoke to Illusion is a close metaphoric connection.
There will always be something of the character’s Domain or
Realm in their use of this power, even if it is just raw use of Vitae
or Mana or else has no connection to their normal Domain.
Lilitu could, in theory, create an apple pie by taking a
+5 Difficulty to a Mold maneuver. However, it would
taste or smell smoky. Likewise, when her auras will have
a smoky semi-gaseous appearance and the decay patterns
of her blasts will appear to be red smoke.
Even if a Demon or God is sticking straight to their Realm or
Domain, making things behave in ways that are normally
physically impossible still increases the difficulty just the
same as if they were using a Conceptual control.
Lilitu is able to condense enough smoke into one place
that it forms a physical, impassable wall. It is still smoke,
but it is behaving in ways that would normally be impossible
so that power use would have a +2 Difficulty,
because it is an Inappropriate Material. If she wanted
to make a brick wall, however, that would be a +5 Difficulty
increase for her since brick walls have almost
nothing to do with smoke.
Likewise, she could force smoke into the Mold of a pie
that has the same texture as an apple pie with a +2
difficulty. But eating that pie would be eating pure,
solidified smoke and would taste like it. Meanwhile by
taking a +4 Difficulty as described above, she can make
an actual apple pie, albeit one with a pleasantly smoky
flavor or aftertaste. If she wanted it to have no connection
to her Realm at all, she could increase the Difficulty
by a total of +5 and have a normal apple pie.
Likewise making a Labyrinth of Smoke does not increase
the Difficulty beyond the basic requirements for
any maneuver as long as it remains simply thick smoke.
Even making it harmful to the health doesn’t increase
the difficulty. If she makes it solid enough to hamper
motion, though, that’s a +2 Difficulty. If she makes the
smoke into actual walls of smoke, that’s a +4 Difficulty.
If she suddenly turned that smoke labyrinth into walls
of smoky jade, that would be a +5 to her difficulty.
Domain and Realms refer to their rotes as “spells” just like
High Magic does. This is hardly surprising because Domains
and Realms are the source of all High Magic. Any use of
power a God or Demon makes with their Domain or Realm
is a power that any trained magician can duplicate with
enough study or meditation. Demons and Gods have difficulty
preventing people from using their magic this way, even
if the target of the power is themselves. They can deliberately
initiate a mindscape to stop it, but short of that they don’t
have much option. The prices are the best effort they’ve made
to metaphorically poison that well. At the start, players receive
no rotes and are simply assumed to be able to do anything
that can be accomplished via Power Tricks easily enough.
Once a Demon or God has upgraded to one or more of the
basic Control uses and gained their first spells. They gain a
+2 on the Activation roll whenever they are using one of their
own established spells.
Lilitu’s Harmless Cigarette spell is a simple maneuver
with a difficulty of 5 representing the extended duration
of 1 scene. She casts it with a +2 bonus because it is her
spell; she created it and is the source of it. If she improvises
a spell, she does not get the +2 bonus.
Demons with the Demigod Advantage default to the Realm
modifiers. Gods with the Half-Demon Advantage default to
the Domain modifiers. Purchasing the Hybrid Vigor modifier
allows them to default to which ever modifier is most
favorable to them for that spell.
Domains and Realms can Emulate any Power that is not
marked as Touched. Stress from Domain/Realm activation
is dealt to the Life-Force Stress Track.
Communal Mindscape: Gods or Demons must choose to be
part of either Ashvattha or Orochi. They cannot connect to
the other through normal means (they can go through the
mindscape of a citizen of the other mindscape, however) due
to blocks that are in place to prevent it. However, they are
always connected to their chosen mindscape and can thus
skip the connection phase of Magic if they take that power.
Modifiers:
+1 (Attack): You can use your Domain/Realm for attacking
as per Control rather than Power Tricks. Gain 1 Attack spell.
+1 (Defense): You can use your Domain/Realm for Defense
as per Control. Gain 1 Defense spell.
+1 (Block): You can use your Domain/Realm to make Blocks
as per Control. Gain 1 Block spell.
+1 (Maneuver): You can use your Domain/Realm to make
Maneuvers as per Control. Gain 1 Maneuver spell.
+1 (Mold): You can use your Domain/Realm to Mold things
as per Control. For cases where your Domain/Realm doesn’t
cover a physical phenomenon, creating a physical incarnation
of your Realm or Domain (either object or creature) is covered
by metaphorical connection. For example, a God of War could
create a sword with a +1 Difficulty because weapons have a
Close Metaphoric connection to War. Creating a map would
be more difficult. Gain 1 Mold spell.
+2 (Emulate Power): You can use your Domain/Realm to
Emulate other powers within limits as per Control. Gain 1
Emulation spell.
+1 (Hybrid Vigor): You must either be a God with the Half-Demon
Advantage or a Demon with the Demigod Advantage to
take this modifier. You take the most favorable modifier between
both the Domain and Realm charts.
Lilitu is a Demoness and thus has more difficulty with
Metaphoric stretching of her Realm than she does with
Physical stretching of her realm. However, she also has
the Demigod Advantage and thus chooses to take Hybrid
Vigor as a modifier. She now uses whichever chart
is most beneficial to her because she has an easier time
shifting between Demonic and Divine thought patterns.
She now decreases the difficulty of illusions to +1.
+1 (Connection Specialty): You use a particular connection
to your Domain/Realm very frequently. You reduce penalties
to use of this not-quite your Domain/Realm theme by -1 to a
minimum of +0. The chosen specialty should be very limited
however and this has no effect on other stretched connections.
This can be taken multiple times and, in theory, with enough
time and experience, a particular God or Demon could eventually
have no penalties in any manipulation of reality whatsoever,
but given the nature of Gods and Demons, they find
it more efficient to specialize and borrow tricks from friends
than to try to do everything themselves.
You must have at least one of the following modifiers to take
this modifier: Attack, Defense, Block, Maneuver, Mold,
or Emulate Power. You must also have at least one of your
own spells that uses that connection.
In addition to having Hybrid Vigor, Lilitu specializes
in illusions and trickery. She takes Connection Specialty
to represent that. When she creates an illusion

on the fly, she receives no increased difficulty (Hybrid
Vigor allows her to use the favorable Difficulty increase
of +1, Connection Specialty reduces that to +0). She is
still the Demoness of Smoke but she would stand equal
with a Goddess or Demoness of Illusion in her skill at
creating such things.
Sample Black Magic
Attack: Sun Ray, “The Burning Sun, bright and blazing star
above the desert sands, comes forth to sear my enemies.”
Source: Moloch Baal (Demon of the Sun), WR: 4, Ranged,
Activation Difficulty: 9. Requires the presence of sunlight.
Defense: Warrior Scales, “The Warrior Serpent, caimant of
Tiamat’s glory, lends me her scales for this battle.” Source:
Illujanka (Demoness of Snakes), AR: +2, Compatible with
other Armors, Activation Difficulty: 5. Creates an aura with
a somewhat scaled appearance.
Block: Desert Gale, “Emptiness, that presence between breezes,
denies your presence here!” Source: Shu (Demon of Wind),
Block movement, +3 on Block roll, Activation Difficulty: 5
(Single Person), 8 (one zone). Winds push against the target
or anyone entering the targeted zone.
Maneuver: Wetted Cloth, “The Impetuous Male, that wild son
of the heavens, soak this cloth with the rain.” Source: Amatsukami
Susano’o (God of Storms). One scene duration. Activation
Difficulty: 5 (7 in an especially dry environment) It
makes the targeted piece of cloth or clothing wet as water
vapor condenses over the target creating a momentary, targeted
rain. Most magi prefer not think about why Susano’o
has a spell specifically to get clothing wet.
Mold: In Triplicate¸”That girl that is no warrior will get me a
copy.” Source: Rene Jones (Demoness of Paperwork), Create
a copy of a targeted piece of paperwork or document. One
scene duration (long enough to get to a mechanical copier)
Create something from nothing. Activation Difficulty: 4
Emulate: Searching Eyes, “The Thousand Eyes see more than
my own ever could.” Source: Ravanna Vitra (Demon of Eyes),
Clairsentience (SoF pg 124), Clairvoyance (vision only). Activation
Difficulty 8+Sympathy modifiers. Requires a sensitive of 2.
Sample White Magic
Attack: Gremlin Wave, “Font of Misfortune, bring your gift
to this place.” Source: Dhanistha (Goddess of Misfortune),
WR: 6, Area of Effect, Activation Difficulty: 13. Only affects
machines, this includes simple machines like windmills and
catapults. Dhanistha last used this in response to a local
computer gaming café that had opinions about female gamers.
Defense: Fated Parry, “Queen of Soldiers, daughter of heaven
and hell, guide my hands to be a shield.” Source: Urd Jotundottir
(Goddess of Fate), Use Sensitive for Defense, +2 on
Defense roll, lasts one scene. Activation Difficulty: 8. Gives
the caster a glimpse of intended attacks against him and
suggests proper defenses.
Block: Sheltered Child, “Mother of Many, seeker of redemption,
let no one harm this precious child.” Source: Kishimo-jin
(Demoness of Children), Block attacks against the child for
one scene. +3 Potency to Block roll. Activation Difficulty: 7.
Individuals must defeat the Block with a Willpower roll in
order to even be able to attack or endanger the protected child.
This does not protect from accidental harm. This spell unfortunately
has a reputation among heralds for being abused
with regard to youth contact sports such as soccer or American
football.
Maneuver: All Access(P), “Silver Traveler, far wandering
traveler, I ask your words clear my path of all obstacles.”
Source: Hermes (God of Messengers), Persistent, One Scene.
Activation Difficulty: 7. This spell makes you seem trustworthy
and causes people to not question your presence so you can
get in and out of a building with no trouble.
Mold: Need a Tool, “Clubbed Foot, master of the forge, I have
need of a tool.” Creates a tool, Create Something From Nothing,
Activation: (Varies, 2+ Complexity Difficulty from the
chart in the Mold section).
Emulate: Knowledge Seen, “Burden of Wisdom, from the wise
who sits under the great tree, I seek to have sight of that which
you know.” Source: Vishnu (God of Wisdom), Emulate: Life
Force Sight with Easy Focus and Extended Vision. Activation
Difficulty: 6. Grants Life-Force Sight for a scene.

—Kinesis
Sample Simple Aspects: Photokinesis, Pyrokinesis, Electrokinesis,
Umbrakinesis, Biokinesis, Geokinesis
Sample Dramatic Aspects: Font of Light, Firestarter, Living
Battery, Miasma, Plague-Carrier, Earthquake Control
Base AP Cost: 5
Activation Difficulty: Manipulative or Metabolic per Control
Rules at beginning of this section.
Activation Time: Simple Action; Free Action for Defense
Power Type: Touched, Magic
Basic telekinesis is handled by one of the basic powers of the
game, but for powers that control other physical phenomena
a variety of powers would normally be needed. In the case of
most Talents, who are specialized in specific uses of broader
categories, purchasing individual powers is fine. However
more versatile powers are best represented by a control. These
Talents are usually Manipulatives though biokinetics are
more often Metabolic with some Manipulative capabilities.
There are a wide variety of these sorts of Manipulatives and they’re
usually related to less versatile but more specialized Manipulatives.
As such, there is no specific name for the rotes used by these
psychics. Individual psychics will refer to their rotes as whatever
strikes their fancy. Akiras who aren’t part of the Community and
not familiar with the lexicon will even erroneously call them
spells. It is theorized that pyrokinesis and cyrokinesis are essentially
the same capability but with a psychological block limiting
the user to cold or heat. Likewise for cases of Telekinesis compared
to control of things like metal or earth.
Kinetic power activation stress is applied to the Life-Force
Stress Track.
Modifiers:
−1 (Inability to Focus): You may not focus over several rounds
to produce more powerful effects.
−1 (No Rituals): You may not utilize the ritual option of
Control.
+2 (Summon From Nothing): You are able to summon the
phenomena you’re able control even though it is not present.
Sample Rotes
Electrokinesis
Attacks: Electrified Touch (Attack); Lightning Bolt (Ranged
Attack); Chain Lightning (Ranged AoE Attack)
Defenses: Disrupt Shock (Defense vs Electricity); Reactive Field
(Defense vs Physical attacks); Grounded (Protection vs Electricity)
Blocks: Jamming (Block Perception of Electrical phenomena);
Power Loss (Block of Actions requiring electricity); Neural Shut
Down (Block Actions by Living Beings)
Maneuvers: Static Field; Joy Buzzer; Heart-Starter; Zone of
Interference
Molds: (normally would not be possible, the GM may decide
otherwise)
Emulate Powers: Sense Electricity – 3 pt Emulation of Sense
Common Phenomena; Electrified Wall – 3 pt Emulation of
Barrier, Wall, Damaging Energy; Overcharged Reflexes – 3 pt
Emulation of Enhanced Reflexes, Strenuous
Photokinesis
Attacks: Laser (Ranged Attack); Laser Barrage (AoE Attack)
Defenses: Distracting Flashes (Defense vs Visually aimed
attacks); Photonic Field (Protection); Dissipate Lasers (Defense
vs Lasers);
Blocks: Bend Light (Block vs Visual Perception); Dispel Darkness
(Block Darkness effects)
Maneuvers: Flash of Light; Blinding Spark; Dazzling Light Show;
Dynamic Lighting
Molds: (normally would not be possible, the GM may decide
otherwise)
Emulate Powers: Holograms – 3 pt Emulation of Illusions,
Mobile Illusions; Disguise Field – 3 pt Emulation of Illusion,
Illusionary Disguise
Earthquake Control
Attacks: Earth Spike (Ranged Attack), Avalanche (Ranged
AoE Attack); Chasm (AoE Attack)

Defenses: Disrupted Footing (Defense vs Physical Attacks)
Blocks: Stabilized Zone (Block Seismic Events)
Maneuvers: Shaking Ground; Sapping Stability
Molds: Earthen Club, Stone Spear
Emulate Powers: Stone Wall – 1 pt Emulation of Barrier, Wall
Magic
Sample Aspects: Herald Magician, Family Magician, Faustian
Magician
Base AP Cost: 3
Activation Difficulty: Sensitive per Control Rules at beginning
of this section; See Below
Activation Time: Simple Action; Free Action for Defense
Power Type: Trained
Magic is the skill of borrowing the Talents of other psychics.
Technically it is possible to find the instructions for any Talent
by going deep enough into the mind to find the instinctual
thought processes. However, for most sentient beings,
the instincts for Talents are so deep in the mind that you’re
more likely to kill a person before even a fully capable telepath
could find them. However, it was discovered long ago that
the how’s and whys of a Talent can be found in material which
a psychic has left behind. This is generally a genetic sample
of some sort, blood being the most common. This can range
from a few drops of blood to a full sacrifice leading to the
death of the source of the Talent. This is called Low Magic
and probably the most common sort of magic.
However, there are magicians who prefer High Magic, casting
the spells of Black and White Magic. Gods and Demons have
minds that make it possible to access the instincts of how to
perform wonders without even attracting much notice from
the Immortals, much less hurt them. However, both Black
and White Magic have prices involved. The casting of spells
has a series of steps that must be taken.
Magic is essentially a highly specialized form of telepathy. It
doesn’t require much in the way of telepathic talent, in fact
anybody can learn how to do it, but it is quite a bit different
an application from common telepathic methods. As such,
while there are certainly overlaps between magician and
telepath families, it is not really common for one person to
be both. In any case, this comes to an odd situation. Magic is
a Sensitive category psychic ability, because it is essentially
telepathy, however most of the powers that can be borrowed
in this way are Manipulative or Metabolic. As such, while you
need Sensitive to activate any particular power, you need the
appropriate Psychic Ability to use many of those abilities
effectively.
Chelsea is a Herald magus with Sensitive 4 but no ranks
in any of the other Psychic Abilities. She could quite
easily find a White Magic spell for creating fire, but
once she cast it, she would be attacking with her Manipulative
Ability of 0.
Low Magic
Low Magic is entirely based around the ritual casting rules
stated in the general Control section above. At a minimum,
Low Magic requires a similar viable genetic sample to use as
the center of a ritual. Contrary to a lot of the rumors concerning
magic that are passed among people that only believe
they know what they’re talking about, things like fingernail
clippings, dead hairs or bits of dead skin are rarely all that
useful. The preferred ingredient is blood as it can be collected
with minimal harm to the donor and still actually be of
use; however, hairs with live follicles are also sometimes used.
In extreme cases, magicians have mutilated, tortured and
killed donors for the sake of rituals, but most magicians find
such rituals to be as abhorrent as any layman.
Since every sentient has some level of Psychic Ability, there
is at least some use out of donations from any individual. The
average unaware person’s blood can be used in a number of
simple recipes that can do things like give a person a glimpse
of the emotions held by the donor, even provide some memories
of the use of particular skills or cast a curse transferring
a cancer from one person to another. Common magicians
can do a lot with blood regardless of who it comes from, but
for most of the obviously supernatural recipes, blood from a
Psychic is necessary.
Low Magic is more like psychometry than telepathy in action,
since it is taking advantage of the fact that the material in
front of them was once connected to a living entity and thus
has lingering telepathic impressions without the nearly impregnable
fortress of a complete mind. The result is, however,
likewise fragmented and subdued compared to the real
deal. Also, a particular donation is typically only usable once
before it is burned out.
Low Magic works exactly like a normal use of a Control Power
as modified by Ritual Control: set the Activaition Difficulty;
make your preparations; make a single roll to see if you succeed.
Low magic refers to its rotes as “recipes” and a magician
knows a number of recipes equal to their own Sensitive Ability
and suffers a -2 penalty on rolls to perform any recipe that
they do not know and require some form of reference material
to work from. This is usually a scroll or tome, but USB
memory is not an unknown way to document magical recipes.
Stress taken in activating Low Magic is dealt to the Life-Force

Stress Track primarily, but the GM may occasionally rule that
it is dealt to the Mental (if the recipe calls for a horrifying
sacrifice, or causes a jarring change in perspective), Physical
(if the material is introduced into the caster’s body and may
be harmful), or Social (if word of the practice, whether actually
benign or not, reaches prejudiced acquaintances) Stress
Tracks instead.
Most magicians also end up purchasing Perfected Recipes as
described in the Rituals section below.
High Magic
High Magic is the process of invoking Gods and Demons to
borrow the power of their Domains or Realms for a time. This
is possible due to the nature of the Gods and Demons minds
and the differences from the minds of most mortals. There
are a handful of humans with similar mental structures, but
they are not, as of yet, well known and most do not have much
in the way of Talents that can be borrowed for much effect.
Magi fall into two categories: those that are knowingly part of
Immortal politics and those that learned their art from family
or a book without being much aware of the situation between
Gods and Demons. The number of magi who are actively part
of Immortal politics (Gods, Demons, mortal Faustians and Heralds)
are in the minority. Most magi believe the Gods and Demons
to be a sort of entity that occasionally possesses a host to give
the appearance of having a physical life, an attitude which
causes most Gods and Demons to question the sanity of these
magi. After all, entities mostly lack understanding of physical
existence and have been known to cause massive troubles when
they cross paths with mortals and Immortals alike.
High Magic works similarly to the rules for Focused Control
in the general Control section above; however, instead of
spending a Fate Point for each round the magi continues
casting, they begin to suffer Stress when they remain connected
for too long.
Casting a spell is essentially a Challenge, but instead of using
3 different Abilities, you roll your Sensitive at least twice.
Depending on how well you roll the first two rolls, you might
not need the third. This means that spell casting will take at
least 2 rounds of a conflict though will take 3 rounds for most
people.
Connecting: This is the first step of High Magic. It is a simple
action made to reach the desired mindscape and begin the
search for the spell you intend to cast. You roll your Sensitive
against a difficulty of 4. The success or failure of this is determined
with the following result table.
Demons and Gods skip this step as they are constantly connected
to the communal mindscapes. Avatars and Apprentices
can spend a Fate Point to skip this step by connecting
first directly to their patron. See the modifiers below to see a
more extensive explanation.
// Fail – You fail to connect to the desired mindscape.
Alternately, you succeed but immediately take 1 stress
and begin taking 1 stress per round you stay connected.
// Tie – You connect for 1 round, after which you begin
to take 1 stress per round.
// Success – You connect for this round +1 round for each
point you rolled more than the difficulty.
// Success with Spin – You connect as with the success,
but also gain a Boost which can be used with the Conjuration
or Incantation phase.
Chelsea has a Sensitive of 4 and is moving to cast a
spell. She has a persistent Specialty Aspect Artist in
White Magic (P) and uses that to gain a +2 to the roll.
She also has a rune that makes it easier for her to cast
magic by adding a +1. She gets a +2 on the dice for a
total of 9. This is a success with spin and 5 over the
Difficulty. As such, she can remain connected for this
round and 5 more before she begins suffering stress.
She also has a Boost that named Like Always to use
on the spell casting.
Conjuration: Once you have connected to the proper mindscape,
you must find the God, Demon or communal pool of
spells that you are looking for. Take an Overcome action against
a Diffculty determined below, modifiers are cumulative.
Situation Difficulty
Obscure God or Demon +8
Uncommon God or Demon +6
Common God or Demon +4
Delved Spell +2
Patron God for avatars
Patron Demon for apprentices
+0
Newly Learned Spell +2
Using Reference Material −1
Frequently Used Spell −2
The success or failure of the overcome action is determined
as follows:
// Fail – You have the choice of outright failure or else
succeeding with major cost.
// Tie – You succeed with a minor cost.

// Succeed – You succeed in completing the Conjuration.
// Succeed with Style – You can immediately apply any
of result over the Difficulty toward Activating the spell.
Chelsea is continuing to cast the spell she started last
round. She’s casting a Life-Force Sight spell from Vishnu.
Vishnu is the High King of Nirvana, but his spells
are not often written down for mortal and books of such
knowledge are actively tracked down and destroyed so
the base Difficulty would be 6 to account for the combination
of a well-known but rarely invoked God. It is
a delved spell increasing the Difficulty to 8. However,
Chelsea’s grimoire is one of the few references that has
such spells in it, giving her a -1 to the Difficulty and she
has used it fairly often, so that gives her another -2. The
Difficulty is thus 5.
Chelsea rolls her monstrous bonus for White Magic and
gets a +2 on the dice for a total of 8 including her tools.
She easily completes the conjuration with Spin and
doesn’t have to invoke either her Like Always boost or
Artist of White Magic (P) Aspects. She could still do
so if she wished and apply the extra results to the Incantation
portion of the spell.
Incantation: Once you have connected both to the proper
mindscape and the desired Immortal or pool of spells, then
you must make an Incantation check. The Difficulty for this
check is the Activation Difficulty of the spell you are casting
as per the rules for Control. A common major cost for a failed
Incantation is for the spell to take longer than a round to
complete.
The Incantation Difficulty for the spell that Chelsea
was trying to cast was a 4 and she rolled 4 over the
Conjuration Difficulty. Since that was more than the
Difficulty for the Incantation, she immediately casts
the spell after completing the Conjuration. In fact, she
decides to invoke her Persistent Aspect and her Boost
for an extra +4 on the Conjuration so that she completes
the Incantation with spin and has a Boost to apply to
the actual use of the spell.
Maintaining Connection: When you first connect you determine
how many rounds you may stay connected without
suffering Stress. For each round past that that you remain
connected, you suffer 1 stress as either Orochi or Ashvattha
try to politely encourage you to leave.
Chelsea successfully managed to initiate Connection
such that she can remain connected for a total of 6
rounds without problem. Casting her spell took 2 of
those rounds, including the Connection and the blowaway
Conjuration. She can remain in Ashvattha for
another 4 rounds without a problem, making her future
spell casting take less time. On the 7th round, she begins
to suffer 1 Life-Force stress per round until she disconnects
or is Taken Out.
Price: Gods and Demons extract a Price from their Magic.
White Magic gives the source Immortal the perceptions and
surface thoughts of any magus invoking one of their spells
while Black Magic casters owe “favors”. This was originally a
God and Demon split, but in the last few thousand years, there’s
been a fair amount of side-switching. Now White Magic refers
to spells from any entity in Nirvana, God or Demon, while Black
Magic refers to spells that come from any entity in Yomi. Most
magi will go their entire lives without suffering too much from
either Price. PCs, however, should be special cases.
Whenever a PC casts a High Magic spell, they should acquire
an Aspect related to the Price. Black Magic Price Aspects
should note the severity of the favor involved such as Invoked
Rene for a Minor Favor. White Magic Price Aspects should note
the situation during which the spell was cast such as Invoked
Hermes during negotiations with the Sidhe. They should get
one of these Aspects each time they cast a spell and the Aspects
should last until the GM calls them due.
Black Magic favors are the easiest Price to call due but possibly
the most problematic depending on campaign style.
However, Yomi Immortals do not actually need to be talking
to someone face to face in order call a debt due. It is considered
polite to negotiate the manner in which a debt can be fulfilled,
but a Demon can always just enforce it without warning.
When the debt comes due, the magus receives a Fate Point
and is overcome by an urge to do something. Sometimes it’s
rather minor, sometimes it’s rather major. Also, a Demon
does not have to cash in the favor at its highest level of effectiveness
if they don’t want to.
A player can refuse to accept this Fate Point as normal, but
unlike normal, they must also lose a Fate Point in order to
escape this Compel.
White Magic is the more difficult Price to apply in a game.
The answer is fairly simple though requires some bookkeeping.
Through the Aspects accrued, you have a reasonable idea
of what information the character has given to Nirvana. In
order to make them feel the impact, you can assume that
some other White Magician ended up with that information
through a spell or such and it ended up getting in the hands

of the character’s enemies… or allies if that would be equally
problematic. The magus should receive a Fate Point once it
becomes obvious that the information was used against them.
However, they will not get a chance to turn down the Compel,
since it will originally occur when they are not aware of it.
Cross out these Aspects once they are used. You may decide
to keep them written down to serve as a source of history and
also might provide ideas for game play later. For example, if
you’ve frequently followed through on favors for a particular
Demon without any trouble, then you have some justification
for that Demon to come to them for a favor.
Do not necessarily use all of their debt Aspects, but use them
often enough to make them consider carefully whether or
not to cast spells regularly.
Spells: High Magic rotes are referred to as spells and a character
begins with a number of spells equal to their Sensitive
Ability. High Magic stress is dealt to Life-Force, though occasionally
it can be ruled by the GM to deal Mental damage if
it is deemed appropriate to do so. That will usually be a compel
and result in the player gaining a Fate Point.
Delving: Magi begin with a number of spells equal to their Sensitive
Ability. Unlike most other Controls, Magi cannot just improvise
powers off the cuff. They are mostly limited to the spells
they have studied in grimoires. However, Magi can acquire spells
aside from those they know through a process called Delving.
Delving takes place as a contest between you and the spell
with each roll taking an hour. If the character is in a hurry,
they can take on a Boost such as Hurried Casting or Cutting
Corners to perform the delving at 10 minutes per roll. If they
are in an extreme hurry, that Boost will be a situational Aspect
with one free Invoke which the GM can use against you.
In order to delve for a spell, they must first Connect to the
appropriate mindscape as normal. This step is the same as
connecting for the immediate casting of a spell: a roll of
Sensitive against a Difficulty of 4 with the same result table
for Connecting as normal with one exception: the time that
the character can remain connected is based on how many
delving rolls they make, not how many rounds they remain
connected. The rational is that if they’re not hurriedly poking
around everywhere then they attract less attention.
The second part of the challenge is to determine the Activation
Difficulty of the desired effect. Divide this by 4 and this becomes
the active opposition to your spell casting. The character
must then make 3 victories before the spell does. If the
spell wins the Contest, the character suffers some sort of cost.
This could be anything from a curse that leaves them flagged
by the mindscape in question all the way to direct attention
by one of the Immortals. The exact nature is up to the GM.
Magi can delve for spells ahead of time but the total Activation
Difficulty of spells you’ve delved for cannot be more than the
magus’s Sensitive x4. These may be held for up to 24 hours
or until the magus sleeps. Though the magus has a chance
to lose hold of these unfamiliar spells any time they cast them.
If a pre-delved spell is used, the caster needs to roll their
Sensitive against a Difficulty of 3. Each additional time they
use the spell before releasing it and delving again increases
the Difficulty of that roll by 1. If the roll fails, the spell is lost
until re-delved. This is mechanically the same as checking to
see if the ammo runs out in a gun and represents the difficulty
of holding onto unfamiliar spells. The price is accrued
for each time the spell is cast.
When it comes to delved spells, casters acquire a new favor
debt every time they recast a Black Magic spell. The price for
a delved white magic spell is ongoing from the first time it is
cast until it is finally let go. This means that even instant cast
attack spells become a gate way for Immortals to watch you
for an extended time.
If a caster wishes, they may spend XP to make any delved spell
a permanent spell on their lists. This costs the normal amount
for adding rotes: 5 XP.
Chelsea has a massive Sensitive of 4 allowing her to
hold on to any number of spells whose Activation Difficulties
equal a total of16 or less. For example, she
could delve for a ranged attack spell of +2 WR which
would be an Activation Difficulty of 7, a +3 AR spell with
an Activation Difficulty of 3 and an emulation of Life-
Force Sight with Easy Focus and Extended the Activation
Difficulty of which would be 6 because emulat-

ing powers adds +2 to the Activation Difficulty. That
would be 7+3+6, for a total of 16.
The first time she used any of these spells, she would
roll Sensitive 3 in order to maintain a connection to the
spell’s location in Ashvattha. The second time she used
any particular spell, she’d roll Sensitive against a 4
Difficulty. If she holds onto the spell through successive
uses, she still loses hold when she goes to sleep.
Chelsea wants to Delve for a maneuver spell that allows
her to blanket an area of the city in cheer for a full day.
This is a maneuver Base Difficulty 3 + Expansive Size 5
+ Lasting Duration 6 = 14 Activation Difficulty. The
Delving Difficulty of this is there for 28. Including Aspects,
she rolls an 8 on the Connection check which is
a success with spin and thus gains a Boost Easy Does
It to use on the delving. She can also remain connected
for a total of 5 rolls, including this one before taking
stress.
For the delving itself, 28 divided by 4 is 7, meaning she
is in a contest against a 7 skill, which is very dangerous.
She has set up prior to this with a Four-Point Circle
with one free Invoke. She also has Artist of White Magic
(P) and Avatar of Thalia (P) as Aspects.
In the first rolls of the contest, she tries to activate her
Four-Point Circle with a Knowledge maneuver and
gets a +2 on the dice for a total of 4 against a difficulty
of 7. She decides to invoke her Artist of White Magic
(P) and spend a Fate Point on her Long Line of Avatars
Aspect, bring her to a total of 8. This is a success on the
maneuver allowing the player to add a new Tag on the
Circle representing the benefit they get from their effort
to get the circle working.

Now it comes to the Contest rolls. She rolls a −1 on her
check for a total of 3 before Aspects, 5 with her rune
bracelet and grimoire. The spell also rolls a −1 for a total
of 6. Chelsea opts to Invoke her persistent Aspects for an
extra +4 to give he a total of 7. The GM compels the weak
nature of Chi since she’s a human and has to use her chi
to bring down the Mana. This brings her total down to
5. Chelsea then has the choice of either saving or using
one of her free invokes. She decides to use the Boost Easy
Does It and save the free invokes on her circle for later.
Her total is now 7 again and she succeeds.
Chelsea – 1
Spell – 0
The third hour of the spell starts with the second round
of the contest. She opts to forgo further activating the
circle and goes straight to the contest. She rolls a −2
result for a total of 2 while the spell rolls +1 for a total
of 8. If she allows this, the spell will succeed with spin
and have two victories. She decides to use one of her
Persistent Aspects for a reroll and gets a -1 for a total
of 3. She adds in her second persistent to bring her to
a total of 5. The spell is still going to succeed with spin.
However, she has 2 stacked invokes of her Four-Point
Circle and decides to use all of them for a +4 bonus,
and spends a Fate Point to invoke Long Line of Avatars
for another +2 to give her a total of +11. This would give
her spin and end the contest.
The GM decides to compel the fact that this is White
Magic and therefore tends to be slow, increasing the
spell to a 10 and giving Chelsea a Fate Point. The Contest
continues.
Chelsea – 2
Spell – 0
In the fourth hour, Chelsea again moves to activate her
circle rolling a knowledge maneuver and get a -2 on
the dice. She uses her Artist of White Magic (P) for a
reroll and Manages a total of 5. She spends another of
her acquired Fate Points invoking Long Line of Avatars
to get to a total of 7. This gives her enough of a total to
place a new free Invoke on the Four-Point Circle.
The GM points out that White Magic is prone to behave
in strange, abstract ways. As such the spell attempts a
maneuver to stack the White Magic Aspect with a Free
Invoke. Chelsea interferes rolling a −3 on the dice for a
total of 1 against the spells’ roll of +0 for a total of 7.
Chelsea uses her Avatar of Thalia (P) aspect for a reroll,
citing that she’s very used to the way White Magic works.
Her new roll is a +2 for a total of 6. She then invokes her
Artist of White Magic(P) Aspect for a +2 and a total of 8.
The spell fails the maneuver. This would normally mean
that it doesn’t get a roll this round. Since that would
mean the end of the contest, the GM rules that, instead,
the spell grants Chelsea a free Invoke of White Magic.
So now Chelsea is likely going to succeed this round,
but it’s not certain.
The Contest comes and Chelsea rolls +1 for a total of 5
before Aspects. The spell rolls −1 for a total of 6. Chelsea
uses her Persistent Aspects and free Invokes for a total
of +8 bringing her to 13. The GM could compel certain
Aspects to reduce this, but there’s no point really. Chelsea
succeeds with spin, granting her 4 victories total.
Chelsea – 4
An environment of unreasoning cheer comes down on
a large portion of Edinburgh.
Modifiers:
+1 (Apprentice): You have a permanent connection to one of
the citizens of Yomi. You gain a Specialty Aspect Apprentice of
X (Persuasion). Casting spells from this Immortal no longer
accrues favor Aspects, but then again, you are permanently
indebted somehow to this Citizen of Yomi so they may call on
you for favors at any time. Being an apprentice covers a wide
range of possible relationships. Sometimes this connection
represents a very professional student to teacher relationship.
Other times it indicates a romantic relationship. In some cases,
the apprentice is a guardian to a newly reincarnated Demon.
There are Demons and Dark Gods who are actually apprentices
to each other. You may rename the Aspect to represent the
specific relationship you have with your Patron.
Apprentices may spend a Fate point in order to connect directly
to their Patron’s mindscape at any time, which can
allow them to skip the Connection roll in spell casting. This
does not necessarily insure conversation with the Demon or
Dark God at the other end, but at least you’re in position to
make a racket and attract attention. For conversational scenes

within the patron’s mindscape, the normal rules for staying
connected can be dispensed with if desired. Since they used
a Fate Point to get there, they certainly deserve some uninterrupted
time. However, if time or situation goes past conversation
to become critical, the difficulty of remaining within
Orochi should again be an issue.
You cannot also have Avatar but you can connect to Ashvattha,
in fact Gods and Demons use Apprentices and Avatars
as ways of keeping a back door of communication without
directly contacting each other.
You can only be an Apprentice to one Immortal.
+1 (Avatar): You have a permanent connection to one of the
citizens of Nirvana. This works exactly like Apprentice but
for a God or Holy Demon.
You cannot also have Apprentice but you can connect to
Orochi, in fact Gods and Demons use Apprentices and Avatars
as ways of keeping a back door of communication without
directly contacting each other.
You can only be Avatar to one Immortal.
+1 (Close Relationship): You must also have Avatar or
Apprentice. The Specialty Aspect you gain from that modifier
becomes Persistent. This means you no longer gain Fate
Points when your Patron interferes in your life, but you gain
the chance for a +2 or reroll on related magic or other rolls
pretty much constantly.
+1 (White Magic Specialist): You gain a +1 bonus to your
Connection rolls for staying connected to Ashvattha. Immortal
citizens of Ashvattha, Gods or Demons, cannot take this
modifier. They are permanently connected already. If a magus
later becomes a God as part of Ashvattha, this modifier becomes
Ashvattha Citizen.
+2 (White Magic Expertise): You gain a +2 bonus to your
Connection rolls for staying connected to Ashvattha. This is
cumulative with White Magic Specialist. Immortal citizens
of Ashvattha, Gods or Demons, cannot take this modifier.
They are permanently connected already. If a magus later
becomes a God as part of Ashvattha, this modifier becomes
Ashvattha Native.
+1 (Ashvattha Citizen): You reduce Stress suffered by casting
White Magic by 1. Only Immortal residents of Ashvattha
can take this modifier.
+2 (Ashvattha Native): Consequences suffered from casting
White Magic reduce Stress received by 1 more than usual.
Only Immortal residents of Ashvattha can take this modifier.

+1 (Black Magic Specialist): You gain a +1 bonus to your
Invocation rolls for casting Black Magic.
+2 (Black Magic Expertise): You gain a +2 bonus to your
Invocation rolls for casting Black Magic. This is cumulative
with Black Magic Specialist.
+1 (Recipe Specialist): Your Sensitive is considered +1 higher
for determining how much of a bonus you gain from taking
extra time on a recipe.
Normally a magician can gain a +1 bonus for every 1
hour (10 minutes for magicians with Sensitive 3 or higher)
they spend on mixing a recipe to a maximum bonus
equal to their Sensitive rank. A magician with a sensitive
of 3 would gain a +3 bonus if they spent 30 minutes
on preparations and they would gain no more benefit
from spending longer. A magician with a sensitive of 2
could gain a maximum bonus of +2 by spending 2 hours
on preparing the ritual but gain no more benefit for any
other time spent.
With this modifier, the magician with the Sensitive rank
of 3 can gain a bonus of up to +4 by spending 40 minutes
on the preparation. The magician with the Sensitive
rank of 2 can gain a bonus of up to +3 by spending 3
hours on the preparation.
+2 (Recipe Expertise): Your Sensitive is considered +2 higher
for determining how much of a bonus you gain from taking
extra time on a recipe. This is cumulative with Recipe Specialist.
+1 (Delving Adept): You can hold a total Activation Difficulty
worth of Delved spells equal to your Sensitive x5.
+2 (Delving Master): This requires and replaces Delving
Adept. You may hold a total Activation Difficulty worth of
Delved spells equal to your Sensitive x6.
A magus with Sensitive 2 can normal hold a number of
spells with a total Activation Difficulty equal to 8. If
they also have Delving Adept they can hold a total
Activation Difficulty of 10. If they have Delving Master,
they can hold a total Activation Difficulty of 12.
Sample Recipes
Attack: Essence of Disease, WR: +4, ranged, area of effect,
ignores armor stopped by Resistance: Disease. Activation
Difficulty 15. Requires the blood of a person suffering from a
major illness. This doesn’t actually infect the target with a
lasting disease, but causes them to suddenly suffer several
symptoms at once and possibly damage their body. The attack
is made by throwing the vial containing the potion. The potion
should be air tight to prevent accidental triggering.
Defense: Thickened Skin, AR: +2, one scene. Activation Difficulty:
5. Requires the blood of a person with some form of
body hardening. Natural born talents and individuals who
have been modified either through scientific or shaping
processes both count. Actually hardens the skin temporarily.
Maneuver: Leansidhe Blood Wine(P), creates the stated Aspect,
Persistent, Duration: one hour. Activation Difficulty: 10.
Requires the blood of someone with a good amount of artistic
talent. Gives the drinker one hour to enjoy a personal view
of the donor’s artistic vision. This is usually done as a Perfected
Recipe so that it can be created and kept good for a time.
Mold: Effigy, creates a statue of the donor out of the donor’s
blood and other available materials. Create Renaissance quality
statue, inappropriate materials. Activation Difficulty: 5 The
statue lasts for one scene and grants a bonus equal to the caster’s
Craft to targeting the connected individual with long-distance
shaping or magic rituals. Only works against the donor.
Emulate: Drink of Death, grants basic function of the Death-
Seer Power Advantage, Activation difficulty 6, requires the blood of a death seer,