Miracles are more or less superpowers. They can be anything from ESP to mutant powers to nanomachines powered by your blood. With them you can change the environment, your own body, and even the minds of others. Their effects range from the subtle pull of gravity to the fiery brutality of pyrokinesis.
But of course, power comes at a price. Miracles have a side effect harmful to the user, from a painful headache after trying to read someone’s thoughts to your own act of pyrokinesis exploding in your face.
Miracles work like Skills do, with an exception. Each use of a Miracle will deal Damage to your Plot Armor by 1 plus another point of Damage per each multiple of 5 you meet with the result of your Test.
Miracles more open ended and broad in what they can do than most Skills. You may purchase Miracles with CP the same way you do Skills, but a Specialization costs 10 CP and generalist mastery of a Miracle is 20 PP.
The effects of Miracle Skills take an Action to manifest and require another Action every Turn if they are to be main- tained at length. Unless otherwise noted, if you are using a Miracle Skill, you cannot be using a mundane one in the same Test.
Unlike with regular Skills, if you are not trained in a Miracle, you may not use them at all. You either have superpowers or you don’t, there is no middle ground.
Electricity
The Electricity Miracle has both subtlety and raw power. It can recharge a cell phone and operate a computer with a thought, and of course it can zap bad guys left and right. All these uses require the target to be within line of sight. Electricity uses Fitness to throw lightning bolts all over
the place, and Intellect the rest of the time. It may also be
used in combination with the Electronics Skill.
Possible Specializations: Thunderstorms, Powering Ob-
jects, Frying Electronics, Tesla Performances, ‘Tuning in’ to Digital Communications.
Possible Advantages: Cooperative weather, High-conduc-
tivity materials, Anything that would make an Electronics Test easier when operating remotely.
Possible Disadvantages: Target is surrounded with light-
ning rods, Low-conductivity materials, Anything that would make an Electronics Test harder when operating remotely.
Sample Tests: Recharging a cell phone battery (DN 5),
Zapping someone with electricity (DN Defense), Charging the local atmosphere with a few hours of lightning (DN 20).
Force
Similar to the psychic power known as Telekinesis, the Force Miracle controls kinetic forces between objects, and essentially controls local gravity. Force may be used to send items (or people) in a particular direction, to change the trajectories of projectiles, an even to temporarily fly. Force may affect targets within your line of sight. Force has multiple uses, the subtler approaches
will use Intellect. While throwing objects or people around
needs Fitness to aim all that kinetic energy properly. Possible Specializations: Deflecting Projectiles, Fine
Manipulation of Objects, Levitation, Pulling Objects to your Hand, Telekinetic Strikes.
Possible Advantages: Local gravity is in your favor, sub-
ject is cooperative, object is very light or has little mass.
Possible Disadvantages: Local gravity is working against
you, trying to reflect bullets back to their source, object is heavy or has a large mass.
Sample Tests: Gently moving an object or willing person
your size in a single direction (DN 5), altering the course of bullets coming at you just enough so they miss (DN Con- tested Combat Test), creating a gravity well (DN 20).
Phantasm
You possess the power to craft illusions and mirages that can be just as convincing as the real thing. You must concentrate and clearly visualize you want others to per- ceive – or what it is you don't want them to perceive if you’d like to hide something instead. Your illusions are no more or less than implanting sensory perception into the victim so thoroughly that the effects might as well be real. Phan- tasms may be projected within your line of sight.
Phantasm Tests make use of Awareness and need to beat
the Defense of onlookers to be believable. At the cost of suffering a Disadvantage, Phantasm may be used as a mental attack, crafting an illusion so realistic others will feel it real (like shooting someone with an illusionary gun) and they will suffer damage equal to how much their Defense DN was passed by.
Possible Specializations: Sounds, Disguises, Invisibility,
Light Shows, Nightmarish Visions.
Possible Advantages: Appropriate environment, victim is
in a suggestive state, user spends considerable time visual- izing the phantasm before manifestation.
Possible Disadvantages: Unbelievable conditions, victim
suspects something is wrong, user has difficulty concentrat- ing.
Sample Tests: A swarm of buzzing bees no greater in size
than yourself, imitating another's looks and voice, changing the writing on a letter (All DN Defense).
Matter
Through this Miracle a character is able to manipulate solid objects with a touch. They can be anything from complex metallic alloys to a raw chunk of uranium. Doors can be reinforced, swords can be sharpened... And yet turning lead into gold remains impossible. As a general rule doing any- thing to objects that are large, complex or huge in mass will be ludicrously difficult to achieve. Matter may only reshape things, it cannot create something out of nothing.
Intellect will let you improve anything of solid substance,
break it down or reshape it. It may be used to boost the Craftsmanship Skill, allowing it to skip on Extended Tests creating complex objects almost instantly as long as you have raw materials. Matter has no effect on living beings, at most it only works on dead tissue, and if you use it on anything electronic the object will cease to function.
Possible Specializations: Weapons, Food, Duplication,
Money, Prosthetics.
Possible Advantages: Object to be transformed is similar
in function and origin to the one you desire, Object you are trying to break is very light, of simple structure, or has little mass.
Possible Disadvantages: Transforming one object into
another that shares little or nothing with it, Trying to break an object that is heavy, of complex structure, or with a large mass.
Sample Tests: Granting any one item an Advantage to all
tests made with it for a Scene (DN 5), Breaking down rein- forced steel (DN 15), Anything that you could use Crafts- manship for.
Probing
The most basic use of this Miracle is reading the minds of people and communicating with them telepathically. But it can also manipulate others with the art of suggestion, play- ing the role of the whispering devil sitting on their shoulder. You must have line of sight with the subject.
You can send telepathic messages in the form of a voice, text or images through Charm. The next type of Test is one
of Awareness versus a Willpower Test from the subject
to read their surface thoughts. Finally, you may also Test
Charm against Contested Willpower to plant thoughts
inside someone’s head. Repeated failed attempts, unsubtle questions, and generally suspicious uses of this Miracle will provoke suspicion on the subject, and once they become paranoid they will start to look for someone to blame. You better be sure they will think it is your fault whether there is any actual evidence to their claims or just a gut feeling.
Possible Specializations: Daydreaming, Introspection,
Self-Doubt, Spreading Mistrust, Stirring Anger.
Possible Advantages: Subject is unconscious, has good
reason to do what you are suggesting or to question what you want to ask them.
Possible Disadvantages: Subject is very focused on the
task at hand, decidedly against the suggestion, or even of exploring a question.
Sample Tests: Reading another’s mood, finding out what
accomplishment another person is most proud of, giving a sleeping victim nightmares (All DN Contested Willpower).
Providence
Providence is the ability to manipulate the threads of Karma through good or ill fortune. People with strong connections to particular concepts are exceptionally vulnerable to this. The blessings and curses that Providence casts do not have to trigger immediately, they can take place at any time during the same Episode when a condition of your own choosing triggers them.
The perception and manipulation of Karmic connections needs a combination of careful observation, sharp intuition, and being one of those genre-savvy types. Thus, users of Providence rely on Awareness. Blessing someone is a
Help Test, while cursing them is a Disruption Test. Other- wise, it may be used to enhance any Resources Test to let
you coincidentally find exactly who or what you needed.
Possible Specializations: Blessings, Curses, Reasons,
Typecasts, Banes.
Possible Advantages: The subject of either a blessing
or a curse is fulfilling one of their Themes, the subject of a blessing has made a promise or vow and will be helped to upkeep it, the subject of a curse has betrayed the trust of a friend and will suffer it when facing them.
Possible Disadvantages: Blessing someone who really
has it coming to them, cursing someone who has done no ill to anyone and has only helped other folk.
Sample Tests: As Help or Disruption Tests, Detecting
another’s Themes (DN Contested Willpower), Meeting a celebrity (DN 10), Winning the lottery first prize (DN 20).
Let’s say you do not want to do any of these immediately obviously useful things like “Firing Missiles” or “Taking Cover” and instead you want to do something fancier. Something like rescuing civilians, retrieving an escape pod, or even picking up a disabled Mecha. For the most part those things should be Utility Actions, perhaps making use of a Might or Systems Test if necessary, but in general shouldn’t be too hard.
But things can always get more complicated. Such as, for instance, when a PC wants enemies to drop their weapons and stop fighting. Obviously, this cannot just be a thing you solve through just a simple Test (if you could do that, why bother fighting at all?) but it should remain possible for the characters that really, really want to spare someone else’s life without having to beat them into submission first.
Persuading Enemies to stand down and stop fighting (or to retreat before they are shot down) is an Utility Action with a DN of 20. You gain an Advantage for each Power Level you have over theirs, but also suffer a Disadvantage for each Level of Threshold they have intact. Only one Enemy may be affected per Test and it may only be attempted once per Enemy - the group as a whole only get one shot at talking any of them out of a battle, so make it count.
Some Enemies, like alien monsters and AIs, simply cannot be convinced out of a fight. Named NPCs with their own moti- vations can either be easier to pacify or outright impossible to reach, depending on circumstances.
Somatics
Somatics induces the body of the user (or of another person) to overexert itself and achieve superhuman physi- cal feats. Anything from superstrength to regeneration of wounds. The reverse effects may be applied to others as well, causing internal damage or weakening enemies. All uses of Somatics require the target to be touched.
Help Tests made with Somatics have no Action cost if used on yourself. Somatics can replace Medicine as part of a Healing Test or Combat as part of an Offensive or Disrup- tion Test. All uses are keyed to Fitness.
Possible Specializations: Healing, Inflicting internal
wounds, Physical Boosts, Crippling and Weakening.
Possible Advantages: Anything that makes touching
someone easier.
Possible Disadvantages: Anything that makes touching
someone harder.
Sample Tests: As Help, Healing, Offensive and Disruption
Tests.
Speed
Perhaps more accurately described as “The Miracle that slows down Time”, Speed just so happens to look like your reflexes are inhumanly fast. Through Speed you accelerate your brain and heartrate, turning what other people feel as seconds to minutes as far as your own processing power is concerned. You are not really any faster, you just get to make the best of every second you’ve got.
Speed can be used to enhance any Fitness Test. More
interestingly, you can use Intellect to hit what is effectively
a ‘pause’ button. The only thing this pause does is let you think peacefully, and attempting to move or affect the world outside your head in any meaningful way will cause things to get back in motion again.
Possible Specializations: Athletics, Finesse, Combat,
Vehicles, Pauses.
Possible Advantages: Anything that would make a Fitness
Test easier, quiet or calm surroundings when trying to make a pause.
Possible Disadvantages: Anything that would make a Fit-
ness Test harder, noisy or chaotic surroundings when trying to make a pause
Sample Tests: As all Fitness Tests, Taking a break for one
minute in what is one second for everyone else (DN 5), doing the same but for one hour in the lapse of one minute (DN 10).
Sight
Your Extra Sensory Perception provides you with subtle clues about specific things and warns you of impending danger, but it does so in odd manners. Perhaps you feel a certain pressure from important people, or you can hear the ringing of a bell when something is threatening you, or maybe information comes to you during lucid dreams. Sight’s workhorse is Awareness and it can be used to
improve any kind of Test using that Attribute, whether any Skills are also being applied or not.
Possible Specializations: Surprise Attacks, Premonitory
Dreams, Sensing Lies, Noticing Hidden Passages.
Possible Advantages: Anything that would make an
Awareness Test easier.
Possible Disadvantages: Anything that would make an
Awareness Test harder.
Raymond: You want your character to have at least one of
Combat, Diplomacy, Electronics and Investigation. While you can get by without having most Skills, doing so without these is considerably harder. Other Skills handy to have around include Deception, Medicine, Stealth and Vehicles.
Maya: The latter are slightly less universally useful than the
former, but supplement them very well. Ideally there should be someone in the group trained in one of each of the above. Teamwork makes everyone’s life easier!
Raymond: You also want to generalize and not Specialize,
because you get a lot more bang for your buck that way.
Maya: And when there is no PC in the group that can get
the job done. Having a PC with a decent Resources Attrib- ute can help find an NPC who does.
Ryu: I wish you’d let me shoot lightning bolts. Or fireballs.
Or straight up force blasts.
Ingham: We’ve talked about this. In this particular game
you are heroes, but not super heroes.
Raymond: Right, Miracles are a whole different issue. If
they’re allowed, then Probing, Matter and Somatics all are very versatile while having a tremendous impact. Phan- tasm, Force and Electricity can also do a lot with very little, but are more prone to failure or require a more sustained effort to get the job done.
Ryu: If I write you a ten page essay explaining how my
character is psychic like I’m sure Maya did can I at least have Temperature?
Maya: I have no idea what you are talking about.
Ingham: Let me clarify. You will not start with superhuman
abilities, but after some experiments with Outsider bits you might get a chance-
Ryu: Oooooh. Ingham: -for a price.
Maya: You say it like it is supposed to not make it sound
even more fun.
Temperature
This Miracle controls the unseen thermal forces around your person, but does so according to your mood. If you are calm, it is easier to make the environment cooler and if you are excited, then heat proves simpler to generate. You need to be within an environment with oxygen in order to use this power, and it will not work even in a partial vacuum.
For as long as you are in proper conditions, you may use
Charm to influence your surroundings, generally no further
than your current Zone. This Skill can burn or freeze others, but it will require the environment to provide a bonfire or windy frost to draw power from. Attempting an Offensive Test in an improper environment will be at a Disadvantage. You may create these conditions on your own, but you need to stop maintaining the effects to make your attack, effectively using them up.
Possible Specializations: Gases, Environment, Liquids,
Offensive Tests, Solids.
Possible Advantages: A suitable environment (a sub zero
room or one on fire), being in the proper emotional state (soothing or violent) or affecting materials that react easily to temperature (nitrogen or flammables) according to the desired effect.
Possible Disadvantages: Improper environment, emotion-
al state, or materials for the effect you are trying to achieve.
Sample Tests: Being your own microwave or air condi-
tioner (DN 5), making people feel uncomfortably hot or cold (DN 10), creating the conditions for an Offensive Tempera- ture Test (DN 15), making a small area freeze over, or melt- ing a small amount of metal (DN 20).