A straight line is far from the shortest distance between two points — here, let me show you.
The World of Darkness can be a very strange place indeed. Occasionally creatures from the Abyss or other even less explicable phenomena warp and twist space in ways that can cause changes as small as altering the exact location of one of the interior walls in a house or as major as causing both an entire building, and all knowledge of it to vanish forever. Although such phenomena naturally erase themselves from the minds of Sleepers, mages notice and remember such events. This combination of warping both space and perception fascinates some mages who wish to learn how to duplicate these effects. Those mages who become sufficiently fascinated with these phenomena or with the more general idea of warping space and perception often learn this Legacy.
According to the doctrine of the Reality Stalkers, the structure of the Fallen World is filled with hidden cracks through which the practitioners of this Legacy learn to peer and eventually move. Known to outsiders as Sneaks, these mages often become obsessed with such distortions in reality, and some are convinced that ancient secrets and wondrous treasures are con- cealed in this fashion, including potentially a physical path to the Supernal Realms. However, most Reality Stalkers are not theoreticians or mystics interested primarily in knowledge or spiritual enlightenment. Instead, the majority of Sneaks are people fascinated by all manner of secrets and hidden objects and take great joy in uncovering them. As a result, Sneaks are eager to observe and gain access to the world’s hidden places, including places purposefully hidden from thieves and intruders.
The major internal tension among the members of this Legacy is between those Sneaks who are fascinated by the various cracks and discontinuities in reality and those whose appreciation for these distortions of reality is purely practical and who find these cracks and faults in the Fallen World to be little more than exceptionally useful tools. Many Sneaks either seek to explore and understand the various breaks in reality or simply appreciate the beauty and wonder of such faults in space. However, an almost equal number see these cracks as little more than little-known and utterly invaluable paths to all manner of desirable goods. To many mages, Reality Stalkers have a reputation for being amoral thieves whose fascination with goods and knowledge belonging to others often verges on kleptomania.
Many Sneaks are more than happy to use their knowledge of the secrets paths through the fabric of reality to study or steal all manner of precious and useful items. The ease with which they can gain access to locations that are effectively impossible to access via mundane means has caused the Mysterium to look upon the Sneaks as one of the order’s primary tools in its continuing efforts to learn the secrets and collect the artifacts that others have hidden away. Because Sneaks’ travels avoid all risk of Paradox, they are usually far more willing to use their particular forms of transportation than other mages.
However, almost half the members of this Legacy are dedicated, if often deeply eccentric and reckless, explorers who are more interested in exploring and understanding the nature of the fractures in reality than they are in exploiting them as a way to steal from others. In addition to taking great joy in using the Attainments of this Legacy, these mages also seek out vari- ous discontinuities in reality, including both ones created by ancient and powerful magics and those due to more exotic and mysterious causes, and seek to explore them using their Legacy and their magic. Because of the obvious dangers of this sort of exploration, occasionally members of this Legacy simply vanish and are never seen again, while others develop and unhealthy fascination with the Abyss and its denizens. Although this is not a Left-Handed Legacy, the fact that a not-insubstantial number of the members are either thieves or mages fascinated with the Abyss serves to make many mages wary of the Sneaks
Doctrine
Parent Path: Mastigos, Mysterium or Seers of the Throne
Prerequisites: Space 2, Stealth 2, and one of the following additional Skills at 2 dots or higher: Subterfuge, Larceny Investigation.
Initiation: Must find and acquire an item specified by their Mentor within a single week, then work with them to craft your soul in the image of your pursuit of that which is hidden.
Magic: Ruling: Space
Yantras: Succeeding on a Subterfuge roll relevant to the spell (+2), casting upon an unknowing living subject (+1), engaging in extended research and surveillance of the subject (+2), going to lengths detrimental to oneself to pursue the target of the spell (+1, +2 if it imposes a negative Condition).
Oblations: Cracking codes, learning secrets, B&E, uncovering lost knowledge.
First Attainment Sense the Flaws
Pre-Requisite: Initiation
Optional Arcanum: Space 1Sneaks are highly attuned to the cracks and flaws in the structure of the Fallen World, and from initiation gain an innate ability to sense the structural fabric of reality, and the discontinuities hidden within. It is through this method that they can find the secret hidden cracks in the fabric of existence which others are blind to. In effect, Sneaks are capable of visually perceiving the existence of any Iris, including the cracks in reality around which their Legacy is structured. Sneaks can automatically discern whether any such distortion is a crack, but beyond that they will require Active Magic Sight or other Magics to unravel other Mysteries. | Optional Arcanum: Mind 1 As minds distort the illusion of space, Sneaks can read the nature of minds through the nature of this manipulation. As an Instant Action, the mage may detect how many Mental and Social dots any individual they perceive has, as well as their Virtue and Vice Mechanical: Imitates Know Nature with free Instant Cast and Sensory Range |
Second Attainment: Gazing Through the Cracks
Pre-Requisite: Space 2
Beyond mere detection of spatial cracks and distortions, a sufficiently advanced Reality Stalker can utilize his understanding of space to gaze through a crack to perceive distant locations. As an Instant Action, the Sneak can utilize an immediately available crack to open a scrying window to any location which he has perceived before in at least in a high-quality photograph. This widened crack is one-sided and perceivable only in active Space Mage Sight, but may be seen through by another Space Mage using an appropriate Unveiling spell. Such a window opens within a specified part of the subject scene, and cannot be moved for the duration of the Attainment, however further activations may cause the new window to open in another part of the viewed scene. The window visible through the crack is open only for a short few turns (2, 3 at Space 4), but may be maintained by the Sneak longer than this through concentration. In addition to this, the Sneak may only peer through a crack to a location to which his dots in the Space Arcanum exceeds the Sympathetic Range Withstand of his connection. Should the Mage only have a photograph of the location, he may instead draw upon its Sympathy to the location, and may open such a widow if his Space dots exceed its Sympathy (a judgement of sympathy should be based on the recentness of the photograph, but should be Medium at best). mechanical: Mimics Scry with free Instant Cast and Sympathetic Range | Optional Arcanum: Mind 2 Drawing upon the understanding they have gleaned through manipulating the cracks in reality, a Sneak advanced in the Mind Arcanum learns how to hide herself in the flaws and discontinuities in the minds of others. As an Instant Action and by spending a point of Mana the Sneak may render themselves imperceptible to any conscious being, as they ‘slip between the cracks’. Should any such individual have some form of Supernatural psychic detection, this will provoke a Clash of Wills with the Sneak. This power lasts until the end of the scene, and ceases to operate on any witnessing individual should they bear witness to any overtly violent act perpetuated by the Sneak. The Mage may break a window, or knock someone unconscious if no-one else is present, but if another views such an act, they snap out of their distracted state. Mimics Incognito presence Instant cast, self only, scene only |
Third Attainment: Cracking Open the Flaws
Pre-Requisite: Space 3
Having studied the cracks in reality, and peered through them, the Reality Stalker reaches a new height in their power, and gains the ability to crack such a flaw open and pass through it to a distant location. While perceiving through a crack utilizing ‘Gazing through the Cracks’, the Sneak may spend an instant action to pass themselves, or any other item of size 5 or less through that crack either to, or from the other location, literally pushing or pulling them through the flaw in space. The Sneak can only move such subjects through the crack to parts of the scene which they can personally reason through the crack, however repeated uses of ‘Gazing through the Cracks’ should permit them to 6 | P a g e move the window to newer vantage points, allowing them to essentially clean out the relevant room, without personally stepping through the crack Mechanical: Allows physical contact through the window viewed from 2cd Attainment | Optional Arcanum: Mind 3 Just as the Sneak can pull things through the cracks in space, those with sufficiently advanced understandings of Mind can pull the thoughts out of another’s mind, or project their own through their own mental cracks and flaws. As an Instant Action, the Sneak can establish telepathic contact with a subject, either pulling the thoughts out of their conscious mind, or projecting her own thoughts in. This requires the Mage be close enough to succeed on a Ranged Attack Roll, and if successful the Mage’s dots in the Mind Arcanum must still exceed the subject’s Composure. If this is the case, then for the remainder of the scene, the Mage may either project their own thoughts, or read the subject’s thoughts. In the latter case, when utilizing this information against another in social circumstances, this can grant a bonus equal to the amount by which the Mage’s dots in the Mind Arcanum exceed the subject’s Composure. At the discretion of the ST, this may also grant a bonus in certain other circumstances, such as anticipating combat actions, knowing which way they will run in a chase, et Mechanical: Mimics Telepathy with free Reaches in Duration and instant Cast. One way to read their thoughts or project yours. |