Changes come
Keep your dignity
Take the high road
Take it like a man
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Birth8 September, 2001 CE (18)
Abilities
Conditions
Broken - State
Whatever you did or saw, something inside you snapped. You can barely muster up the will to do your job anymore, and anything more emotionally intense than a raised voice makes you flinch and back down. Apply a -2 to all Social rolls and rolls involving Resolve, and a -5 to any use of the Intimidation Skill.
Beat: You back down from a confrontation or fail a roll due to this Condition. If you regain a dot of Integrity, lose another dot of Integrity, or achieve an exceptional success on a breaking point, you can shed this Condition.
Merits
Anonymity (• to •••••) - Advantage
Prerequisites: Cannot have Fame
Effect: Your character lives off the grid. This means pur- chases must be made with cash or falsified credit cards. She eschews identification. She avoids any official authoritative influence in her affairs. Any attempts to find her by paper trail suffer a -1 penalty per dot purchased in this Merit.
Drawback: Your character cannot purchase the Fame Merit. This also may limit Status purchases, if the character cannot provide sufficient identification for the roles she wishes to take.
Danger Sense (••) - Advantage
Effect: You gain a +2 modifier on reflexive Wits + Composure rolls for your character to detect an impending ambush.
Your character’s reflexes are honed to the point where nothing’s shocking.
Direction Sense (•) - Advantage
Effect: Your character has an innate sense of direction, and is always aware of her location in space. She always knows which direction she faces, and never suffers penalties to navigate or find her way.
Language (•) - Advantage
Effect: Your character is skilled with an additional lan- guage, beyond her native tongue. Choose a language each time you buy this Merit. Your character can speak, read, and write in that language.
Mystery Cult Initiation (• to •••••) - Advantage
Cults are far more common than people would like to admit. “Mystery cult” is the catch-all term for a phenomenon ranging from secret societies couched in fraternity houses, to scholarly cabals studying the magic of classical symbolism, to mystical suicide cults to the God-Machine.
Mystery Cult Initiation reflects membership in one of these esoteric groups. The dot rating dictates standing. One dot is an initiate, two a respected member, three a priest or organizer, four a decision-making leader, and five is a high priest or founder. If you wish your character to begin play in a cult, work with your Storyteller to develop the details.
Designing a Mystery Cult requires three things, at bare minimum. First is a Purpose. This is the defining reason the cult exists. Usually it’s tied in with the cult’s history and recent background. Second is a Relic. This is an item that grounds members’ faith. For example, a piece of the God- Machine, an ancient text bound in human flesh, or the mummified flesh of a saint. The last is a Doctrine. Every cult is defined by its rules and traditions.
In addition to standing, a Mystery Cult Initiation Merit offers benefits at each level of influence. Develop these as well. The following are guidelines; use them to craft your cults:
• A Skill Specialty or one-dot Merit, pertaining to the lessons taught to initiates.
•• A one-dot Merit.
••• A Skill dot, or a two-dot Merit (often a Supernatural Merit)
•••• A three-dot Merit, often supernatural in origin.
••••• A three-dot Merit, or a major advantage not reflected in game traits.
Sympathetic (••) - Advantage
Effect: Your character is very good at letting others get close. This gives him an edge in getting what he wants. At the beginning of a Social maneuvering attempt, you may choose to accept a Condition such as Leveraged, or Swooned in order to immediately eliminate two of the subject’s Doors.