MAKING AN EXECUTIONER
To make an executioner, grab an executioner sheet and a piece of paper. Answer the following questions, then write them on the paper and give them to the Admin (or via message, if playing digitally):
- How did you first manifest your powers?
- Is your grace seed in your brain or in your heart?
- What do you hide in the deepest parts of you?
- Is your hand your hand?
- Do you remember the face of your mother?
You can share the answers to these questions with the group if you like.
Name your executioner now or later if you like and decide on a look for them. Write down your executioners’ internal id number and fill out details. (written out as an ‘X’ followed by 3 numbers.)
Then, in order:
- Set all your skills at 1. Then, increase two skills to 2, and reduce three skills to 0.
- Pick an agenda and one ability from that agenda.
- Pick a defiance and two powers from that defiance.
You’re done and ready to embark on your first hunt!
INCREASING IN POWER
Your executioner increases in power two ways: by gaining and spending experience, and by surviving missions.
EXPERIENCE
You earn experience at the end of a session by answering the checklist questions on your sheet. At the end of a session, executioner gain experience. Go down the checklist and for every ‘yes’ answer, gain 1 xp.
- Did you survive?
- Did you follow your first agenda item?
- Did you follow at least one bolded agenda item?
- Did you take an injury or affliction?
When an executioners’ experience bar is full (4 segments) they can empty it and cash it out for an advance.
Some hunts may take more or less sessions - meaning executioners may have more or less opportunities to earn experience during each hunt.
ADVANCES
Any time your experience bar is full (4 segments), you cash it out for an advance. You can bank these advances and spend an advance after a session in the following ways:
- Gain a new agenda ability.
- Gain a new defiance power or a new defiance.
- Evolve a strain mark and roll for a new ability for that strain mark. On duplicate, choose.
- Gain 3 scrip.
- Improve a skill by 1. You can do this six times, total, and have only two skills at 3 maximum.
SURVIVAL
If you survive enough missions, you qualify for an advance in category rating. You only needed to have participated in a mission and survived - the experience and training from fieldwork is usually enough to hone your powers. Each category rating requires a number of total missions survived.
- Category 2: 1 mission survived.
- Category 3: 2 total missions survived.
- Category 4: 4 total missions survived.
- Category 5: 7 total missions survived.
Increasing in category ups the general capabilities of your powers.
AGENDAS
Pick an agenda when creating your executioner, then pick an ability from that agenda. You can gain a new ability from your active agenda by spending an advance.
For a full list of all agendas, see Game Mechanics. Afterwards, return here to continue character creation.
Agendas have two agenda items, normal and bolded. If you fulfill your normal agenda item, at the end of a session, you get 1 xp. If you fulfill at least one of your bolded items, you also get 1 xp. Often these require a different approach than your agenda would otherwise encourage.
You are able to swap agendas between missions if you feel like your old agenda no longer fits your character. Swapping agendas carries over any bolded agenda items and abilities, though doesn’t automatically grant you a new ability. You can then take abilities from your new agenda as normal - although you can’t have more than five abilities total from any agenda (you can swap them out if you feel like replacing one when you spend an advance to gain a new ability).
Agendas broadly describe your character’s approach to problems rather than being descriptive of your character as a whole.
DEFIANCE
Defiance are the psychic manifestations of a person’s inner turmoil, honed to a razor’s edge. Only those with grace seeds, blessed by grace, are capable of manifesting them. They draw on a wielder’s subconscious, the roiling emotional sea underneath the facade of humanity. Therefore, only those touched by darkness or turmoil are able to truly wield their full potential.
When making your executioner, pick a defiance, then pick two powers.
Your defiance can be used in the following ways:
- You gain a passive benefit from (most) defiance simply for having them.
- You can use your defiance creatively any time by activating a mental burst to give +1D on a roll, as long as your defiance power would help that roll.
- You can spend a mental burst to activate a specific power you have acquired from a defiance.
- Some powers require you to roll MENTAL. You can also roll MENTAL when you want to use a power in a creative way but are unsure of the outcome. Roll dice equal to half your CAT, rounded up (so 1 die for CAT 1/2, 2 for cat 3/4, and 3 for CAT 5). You can gain advantage dice on this like normal.
- All powers have notes that describe how they function.
- Defiance sometimes specify that they can target humans, anomalies, or executioners. Each are a different category. Executioners are not humans.
All executioners start with the BLAST defiance.
Powers that require a burst will be marked with ★ (with a + for one or more) Powers that do not require a burst will be marked with ☆
★ BLAST
Spend a mental burst and roll MENTAL to produce a weaponized form of concentrated psychic energy in melee or short range. The specific look and feel of this basic executioner skill varies between executioners. The strength of this blast scales with CAT.
When your executioner produces a blast, they might:
- Imbue a slash of a blade or a shot with a ranged weapon with psychic energy.
- Shoot an invisible ball of force from their fingers.
- Fire scathing lightning.
- Shoot a bead of, frigid fire.
Unlike your mundane service weapons, blast is a superhuman weapon and therefore scales with CAT and doesn’t become hard by default when used against anomalies.
THE TWELVE
Defiance have been categorized into twelve typical types by TEMERITY researchers. The look and feel of each defiance might vary widely between user. A flux user (one that manipulates time), might use simple motions hands to use their abilities, or might rely on a physical implement like a knife or an hourglass.
The defiances are the following:
I. Tension: Project powerful fields of force to block, cut, or entrap.
II. Ardence: Manipulate potential energy into furious destruction.
III. Flux: Tap into the ebb and flow of time.
IV. Vector: Imbue anything you touch with a strong burst of velocity.
V. Gate: Manipulate space as a sculptor works with clay.
VI. Smother: Suppress innate properties of things, like friction, sound, or light.
VII. Whisper: Your shadow talks to you. It knows the future.
VIII. Edit: Change yourself , the world, or others by pulling from different possible realities.
IX. Bind: Bind weak anomalies to your service and use them as servants or weapons.
X. Jaunt: Separate body and soul, perception and flesh.
XI. Palace: The contents of your mind are a tangible place you can visit.
XII. Sympathy: Pull on the innate connections to human tools or objects.
NOTES
Duration notes describe how long a power lasts before its effects expire.
- Instant: Lasts only a few moments, then expires.
- Until Rest: Lasts until rest.
- Scene: Lasts until the scene passes.
- All mission: Lasts all hunt.
Powers can always be willingly dismissed unless specified otherwise.
Range Notes describe how close a target must be for the power to be effective. This is a narrative range, so the notes are kept loose for a reason.
- Self: Yourself
- Adjacent: Right next to you
- Short: Across the street
- Long: A few blocks away
- Extreme: Half a mile away or more
Effect-type Notes describe advanced effect or powers you can create with a defiance. Effects with the same notes do not stack with each other - the most recently used power replaces the last one. Not all powers have effect notes.
- Curse: A power affecting another person, usually negatively.
- Charm: A power affecting yourself or another person, usually positively.
- Transmute: An effect that affects or alters the physical world in some way.
- Summon: An effect that creates a psychic construction or entity.
ADVANCING DEFIANCE
You may spend an advance to gain an extra power inside your own defiance. You can take additional defiance outside of the first one chosen. Each one reduces your cap for strain overflow by 1 and increases your xp advancement cap by +1.
You can only have five powers from any defiance at once, in any combination. You can replace a power when taking a new one.
CATERGORY
Defiance advance in CAT with your executioner. Effects that draw on CAT therefore scale up with your executioner - only those effects listed.
For a full list of all deviances, see Game Mechanics. Afterwards, you’re finished with character creation and can proceed to the next section.