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THIS IS A CITY OF
SACRED AND TERRIBLE FATE
ROLE-PLAYING GAME SET ON DISCO ELYSIUM
POWERED BY FATE
WRITTEN AND EDITED BY Antonio Ganfornina Andrades. ILLUSTRATIONS ZA/UM Art CHARACTER SHEET BY Antonio Ganfornina Andrades. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT All the visual content and setting is taken from the acclaimed video game Disco Elysium (ZA/UM) and from the world created by novelist, musician and video game designer Robert Kurvitz, reflected in his work Sacred & Terrible Air, from which this role-playing game takes its name. The rule system used for this manual is an adaptation of the Metric system designed by Kurvitz himself for his role games and the FATE system (Evil Hat Productions, Fred Hicks and Rob Donoghue). The action icons are a design by Jeremy Keller. SPECIAL THANKS To all the people who conveyed their teachings to me, especially those who died before I was born. Inasmuch they showed me that a quiet library is never quiet at all, for their teachings still resonate through the ages. To Marx and Engels. To Carmen, because she has helped me build the comfort zone I never had to stop weaving ideas in silence. You make me not feel like a complicated person. To Alberto, because he is my particular Kim Kitsuragi who puts up with me with every failed Savoir-Faire roll or -what is the same- with every successful Inland Empire roll.
If you've read this far, somehow you're a fascist, at her finest. Yes, I don't know why you look at me surprised, your mind is like the rusty chamber of a happy-trigger revolver called nostalgia, still more bothered by the detail of using the generic feminine than by the fact that I qualified you as what you really were before a fictional character came to tell you. A fascist who hates the Wümen, the tribe of the Men of Wü. But if you've reach these lines, it could be for up to three reasons. The first reason is that you live in the Kingdom of Consciousness, surrounded by immanent ideas and exited with rational and independent thought, embracing your moral superiority that emanates from the goddess ReasonTM who has caused centuries of famine and war. In short, you are a boring person. The second is that you are a limping corpse of a failed historical project, with at least eight hundred million dead, and which left more hunger that it was able to cure. But of course, history is written by the victors and your dialectical materialism is beyond your ability to make something. Yes, as you may have noticed, Elysium, this world, is a world of extremes. Sacred and Terrible FATE is a role-playing game, that is, an environment to develop a fiction through the rules of the FATE system, and yet, there is more truth in the mask we use, in the game we play, in the fiction we obey and follow, than in what is hidden under the mask. That mask is the characters you will play and their stories, and not an excuse to unload your trauma on people. You do not have the right to force people to engage in your trauma. Ever. This is a roleplaying game, not an exposure therapy. Keep yourself and each other safe. I almost forgot, there was a third possibility for you to have read this far. But that would mean that... Dios mío -draw a cross- A LIBERAL!
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BEHOLD!
INDEX OF CONTENTS WELCOME TO ELYSIUM 1 HISTORY 2 GEOGRAPHY 5 NATIONS 6 FACTIONS 46 INOCENCES 56 THE PALE 66 GAME RULES 71 A ROLEPLAYING GAME 72 SAFETY TOOLS 75 ACTIONS 78 DIFFICULTY 86 EXPERIENCE 88 CHARACTER CREATION 93 ATTRIBUTES 98 SKILLS 102 ASPECTS 120 STUNTS 138 HEALTH AND MORAL 140 CHARACTER SHEET 144 ADVENTURE 147 SETTING 148 LOCATIONS 149 STRUCTURE 150 CHARACTERS 151
CHAPTER 1
WELCOME TO ELYSIUM
SACRED AND TERRIBLE FATE is an adaptation to FATE of a unique urban fantasy environment from the video game Disco Elysium (ZA/UM). Portray a plethora of characters in Revachol West, a coastal city where corruption is rampant, murders are unsolved, and children just want to dance... or go beyond into Elysium world. Chase every clue, take part in the events or get lost exploring a magnificent world and unraveling its mysteries. Meanwhile, tensions rise around you as Revachol and Elysium itself threatens to explode. The gameplay experience is geared towards making your innermost feelings, doubts and memories an integral part of every action your character takes. Level your rational faculties, sharpen your wits, or give in to your baser instincts to answer a final question all around your experience in Elysium world. What kind of person are you?
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Elysium's human history dates back six thousand years, with multiple distinct eras corresponding roughly to our own ages on the Earth. The Perikarnsian period six thousand years ago (analogous to the Bronze Age), the Franconian period (early Middle Ages), the Dolorian era (Renaissance) and the New (modern era), where the clash of ideologies culminated with the Antecentennial Revolution. The Dolorian Era is broadly considered to be a golden age for humanity. If you could take us back to that far-off era, a polymathic Dolorian would be the kind of well-educated intellectual associated with the enlightened rule of the Innocent Dolores Dei. Her unprecedented interest in selfcultivation and social improvement led the people of the West to make voracious inroads into art, science, philosophy and politics. Such enthusiasm for intellectual work is considered almost obsolete and, of course, is confined to a trash can called ideology. The Antecennial Revolution was the struggle between the communists and the followers of capitalism, which was constantly evolving and full of conflicts. Even the failure of the Revolution did not mean the end of history: Sure, for a fleeting moment, the free market economy seemed the last and indisputable way of life of our species, but the collapse of the market in the 1940s and the escalation of wars across the islands have put that notion firmly in another dustbin; that of history, even if the Mazovian school insists that it is the same as the previous one. Currently, the population is around 3.6 billion plus an unspecified number of seolians (usually estimated at around 1 billion). The world is torn apart by the conflicts that serve to entrench the disasters of capitalism, with areas like Yeesut, Semenine, Saramiriza, and many others being particularly
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HISTORY
As if all of thise were not enough, this whole scenario of war and unrest has always been surrounded by the Pale. This surrounding region is an anomaly, it is suspected, similar to the oxygen holocaust that ended anaerobic life 2.6 billion years ago, when organisms began to breathe. Though much worse. Much, much worse.
GEOGRAPHY Elysium is unique. Many works of fiction accumulate on its shelves trying to match its rarity, but Elysium is really special. When you unfold a map you will not find a single contiguous landmass, but a chain of vast archipelagos, the isolas, a Messinian word for a continental archipelago surrounded on all sides by a bizarre fabric. This anomalous phenomenon is what people call the Pale and is the predominant geological feature of Elysium, the socalled interisolar mass. Its prominent grey flares, even arches of interisolar matter cover entire islets. The appearance of the world is striking and it has a rarefied matter envelope surrounding the planet, if Elysium is indeed a planet. There's no compromise on that, the images obtained from high altitude are blurry. If there ever was a sphere up there, it looks like it was fractured long ago. In the last four centuries mankind has discovered a total of seven isolas: Mundi, Seol, Samara, Graad, Katla, Iilmaraa and Insulindia. The positions of them relative to Insulindia are as follows: Mundi to the north, Graad to the northeast, Samara to the east, Seol to the west.
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good corridors of conflict. Unrest and the reluctance of local authorities to report military atrocities allow private military contractors like Krenel to operate smoothly, boosting the bottom line for companies like Senorita Pineapple Company.
In Elysium sixteen independent countries coexist throughout the known world, here we show the most important ones grouped by isolas.
GRAAD GRAAD
It is the only nation belonging to the isola of Graad. HISTORY His legacy goes back to Ramout Karsai, a former hero of Graad. Though that's a long, long way off. Seventy years ago, Graad created the Estaprelo tube amplifiers. This revolutionary breakthrough paved the way for rock and roll. Drenched in the rancid since its birth, rock and roll has always been the music of middle-aged white men in skull shirts and ponytail hair, fancy ties and leather jackets. It's a genre that is never in fashion but it doesn't go anywhere either. In the current century, Graad was the flashpoint of the Antecentennial Revolution, which developed simultaneously with a pandemic of tzaraath -a particularly virulent prion disease- that became the trigger for the revolution when Graad's authorities were unable to contain the disease. When the Graad government failed to move forward, Mazov and his party intervened. Who was Kras Mazov? May you asking. He was the leading figure of the Graad Revolution and the father of scientific communism, no more and no less. The Communist Party of Shest and Graad survived until the counter-offensives of the reactionary forces surrounded the Eleven-Day Government in the State Palace in Mirova, with the suicide -the murder- of Kras Mazov during a hard fight and ending Graad's revolutionary army in '06 of the current century.
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NATIONS
Perikarnasian (8000 years ago) ▶ The oldest recognized record in the history of Elysium. ▶ The First Innocence: the Pernikarnasian. Little is known about him, even if he was a man. It is said that he "invented" God and the equality of people before God. He also introduced the gold standard as a way of measuring that love. ▶ The Sacred Party (Founding Party) is founded.
Franconigerian Era (500 years ago) ▶ The Second Innocence: Fraconegro. In his military conquests, his famous heavy cavalry units were instrumental in laying the foundations of modern nations and the unified currency: the reál.
Dolorian Era (300 years ago) ▶ The Third Innocence: Dolores Dei. She created many modern institutions, launched several successful expeditions, and was even critical of the title she represented. Her legacy is still held to the present with great nostalgia.
Today, Graad is involved in the Tien-En conflict, a 12-year war for power with Safre. Such is the case that the town of Li Shmin, a village that has been the site of infamous war crimes, has come to be used in the language and collective imagination as a term to convey the ineffable horrors of war. CULTURE The citizens of the Graad regularly use the patronymics: Krasovich, Larsovich, etc. The revolutionaries of the Antecentennial Revolution saw this as a "chauvinist atavism" so they used matronymics, derived from the mother's name. The custom was abolished after the revolutions failed, but not before it came to Revachol. Funk emerged as an aggressive musical rhythm from the New Revacholian Aesthetics of the 1930s, but this time it originated in Graad. It came to these lands through the Iilmaraana diaspora. The Funk is more masculine and guitaroriented than disco music. It's even more dangerous. Paradox B is a marginal scientific magazine published in Graad. Its mission is to explain theories such as telekinesis and intra-isolation pallor, before it gets out of hand. The people of Graad can be victims of prejudice. The term kojko is a common insult used by racists. Graad's immigrant communities in Revachol are also commonly referred to as zemlyaki.
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On a forgotten day in the 20s, the Yugo-Graad riots occurred, fuelled by ethnic unrest and the state's repressive tactics. The socio-economic conditions that brought the people of Yugo-Graad to the streets were compounded by centuries of humiliation and despair. These events are often seen as marking the end of a brief period of liberalization known as the Yugo-Graad Spring. Like all such periods, it is frequently commemorated in art and literature.
▶ Insulindian is discovered and Revachol, the Suzerain, is founded.
The Last Century ▶ The 60s: The Star and Antler symbol is coined. It is later adopted by Mazov and the Communards during the infamous Antecentennial Revolution. ▶ The 80s: Staprelo tube amplifiers are finally invented in Graad. This revolutionary breakthrough paved the way for the rock and roll music genre. ▶ July 10, '88: The disused elevator in what is now the Whirling-in-Rags was last revised on this date. ▶ c. 92: Iosef Lilianovich Dros is born. ▶ The Fourth Innocence: Sola was an anointed Innocence in the second half of this century and lived to see the next one. She was an urban planner who spoke her mind and largely left history to her own devices, encouraging people to stand out for themselves rather than prescribing a deified history model. She is often called an antiinnocence.
The main regions of Graad are:
▶ Igaunija is a tiny, abandoned region in the federal state of Graad. Dark and cold most of the time. It has wasted not once but twice its independence in microfascism. The less said about Igaunija, the better. Except for one; the people there must consume truly amazing amounts of fish to keep their vitamin D levels high, lest they become depressed and return to fascism again.
▶ Yekokataa is an historical euphemism, the Graad term for
"Ecological Disaster Zone", an agricultural megaproject on the southeastern tip of the Graad Island. It was a cuttingedge project for irrigation and use of new fertilizers. Today, it is a horrendous landscape and supports virtually no plant or animal life. The main cities of Graad are:
▶ Mirova: 22 million people live here, the capital of Graad. It became the capital of the world after the city of Revachol was destroyed.
▶ Yugo-Graad: is the cradle of idle nationalists. In fact, one of them almost ended the life of the Innocence Sola.
▶ Zsiemsk: in ancient times, it was ruled by Zygismunt the
Great. His banners were famous for being sapphire and white, and his legacy remains strong. In modern times, Zsiemsk is the home of Stas-Rajko, one of the best manufacturers of Graad vehicles, recognizable by the emblem of the Eight Antlers .
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GEOGRAPHY
Current Century ▶ 7 March '02: The Commune of Revachol sends a decree by radio to news agencies and governments around the world. ▶ c. 02: The Antecentennial Revolution begins in Graad, during a cupareth pandemic. Kras Mazov takes over the leadership of the Graad government. The Suzerain of Revachol is deposed and thrown under a horse-drawn carriage. The Commune of Revachol is founded. ▶ c. 06: The revolution is extinguished in Graad and Safre. Kras Mazov dies. ▶ c. 07: Harrier DuBois is born on the ground floor of the Old Military Hospital of the Commune of Revachol. ▶ 13 May '08: The Revachol Landing takes place, the Coalition defeats the Commune. Randomly, loyal and civilian villagers are executed en masse and buried in unmarked graves and mass graves. ▶ c. 08: Kim Kitsuragi is born in Revachol. ▶ February 28 '09: Ellis Kortenaer is admitted to the Lelystad County Neonatal Care Unit after being found in a leaf compactor.
Orbis is a popular programming language in Graad, named after its inventor, cyberneticist Viktor Orbis. Not all inventions were equally successful. Lickra(TM) was a synthetic fabric developed by Graad's manufacturers in the mid-1940s, notable primarily for the swishy sound it makes when the carrier passes by. It is also known to be very itchy if not properly cared for and is highly carcinogenic.
KATLA VAASA
Vaasa is a social democratic power centre located in the middle of the tundra and taiga of the island of Katla. There is little to say about this place. When the communist revolutionary Ignus Nilsen of Vaasan went into hiding, he stayed in a hut on the northern plateau for ten months. His current situation is totally unknown. In fact, the most interesting thing that has happened on this isola has been a game of hide and seek with undetermined results. SOCIETY The Suru are an indigenous ethnic minority living in the middle of the tundra and taiga of Katla. There are no reports of hostility or friendly coexistence with the Vaasian social democracy.
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TECNOLOGY The telephone was invented in Graad. As such, 001 is the isolar code (005 is the Revachol analog). Other technologies invented in Graad include amplifiers, necessary for the rock bands.
▶ Date unknown: Attempted murder of Sola by a Yugo nationalist. Sola resigned her title after that. ▶ c. 21: Õlari Taal invents the eternal, supposedly eternal material at Värtna Polytechnic. ▶ c. 23: Klaasje is born in Oranje.
The New (The 30s) The third decade of the current century. The decade of the record, the decline and the victory of the free market economy over its critics. ▶ c. 31: Kim Kitsuragi joins the RCM. ▶ c. ‘33: Harrier DuBois joins the RCM. ▶ c. ‘36: Famine engulfs Yeesut. Construction of the People's Pile, a U-type particle decay generator, is completed. At its inauguration it fails immediately, requiring the Emergency Relief Brigade to be sent in to clean up the radioactive mess. ▶ c. ‘39: Cuno is born. Beginning of the Tien-En conflict.
Mundi is the largest land mass and is home to some of the most powerful nations in the world. It's commonly known as the Old World. The nations that originated on this island called it Mundi -the World- as it was all they knew, all they thought it would be.
ORANJE
The Sovereign Republic of Oranje (O-RAN-yeh), or Oranjenrijk, is a democratic nation on Mundi, to the north of Insulindia, separated by the sea and on the other side of the Pale. HISTORY Oranje is one of the six major Western nations in the Coalition that have a stake in the continued occupation of Revachol. The whole world consider it a reasonable superpower. Much of its influence derives from its alignment with the Moralintern and its participation in EPIS -a government initiative to unify the Western territories- where it contributes 28% of the organization's annual budget and deals with the political aspect. After Sur-la-Clef -the other founding nation of the EPIS program-, Oranje is probably the most prominent member of the international community. Oranje's economy is one of the most advanced in the world. It has successfully moved from heavy industry to advanced services, and generally acts as a motor for sustainable change in the international community. CULTURE Numerous traditions are characteristic of Oranjenrijk. For example, the Oranje Map of the Waterways. It was a tattoo used by travelers in the Dolorian century, more than 300 years ago. Sailors marked their bodies to map their journeys, but it's possible to see nowadays.
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MUNDI
The Fourties The economic boom of the thirties came to an end after a financial collapse, sending Revachol back into struggle and difficulty. ▶ c. 45: Dora Ingerlund breaks up with her then partner, Harrier DuBois, and moves to Graad.
The Fifties ▶ 4 February '51: Soona LuukanenKilde moves to the Dolorian Church of Humanity in Martinaise to carry out an investigation. ▶ 4 March '51: The body of a mercenary is found hanging outside the Whirling-in-Rags hotel in the Martinaise district. ▶ March '51: Harrier Du Bois arrives in Martinaise in the middle of a strike by the Port Workers' Union against the Wild Pines Group.
▶ CONTINUE
In some municipalities in Oranje, people wear wooden shoes in street parades. Green, orange and even yellow tassels have also been seen on hats. GEOGRAPHY The municipality of Lelystad has only a few districts and even fewer streets. It consists of agricultural plots near the border of Gottwald. In short: cows, silos and wheat. On the other hand, Vredefort is the capital of Oranjenrijk, known for its parks, stained-glass windows and its conference town. It is home to the IJsbrand Military Academy. MILITAR Oranje Special Forces are well known for their trained skills and lethality. Private military contractors are also common. One of the most infamous is the dreaded Pharmacie Corps, a security company hired to protect the interests of Oranje pharmaceutical companies in the Semene conflict.
KEDRA HISTORY Kedra is a great nation in the north-central area of Mundi Isola, between the Irmalan mountain range and the Pisan interregnum. It is notable for Stepan the Despicable, who defeated and humiliated the false Innocence, Ernö Pasternak. Kedra has been fighting his way into EPIS since the 21st. Some members of Moralintern believe that this warm and friendly country known for its tangerines and dust storms will never become a full member (at least as long as it remains an emerging market).
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As technology evolved, sailors abandoned tattoos and these were adopted by mercenaries, as a way to showcase their military careers. Vredefort, the capital of the state of Oranje, is traditionally placed on the right shoulder as the point of origin.
The Confederate Republic of Mesque is a confederation on Mundi isola and, in turn, the largest state in the world by territory. It is simultaneously a petrostate -a state that bases its economy on oil exploitation-, a constitutional monarchy and, more recently, an isolationist nation due to its bias towards the extreme right. It's a land of tribulations and elder wounds to be contemplated if you're planning to visit it. HISTORY Mesque has a long and complex history, closely linked to the Innocences. Franconegro, for example, is considered by many as a father figure because of his militarism and nationalism. However, all things change. Three hundred years ago, the lands of Mesque and the West and even the distant Supramundi -in total twentyone of the forty world nations of those times- immediately accepted the rule of the Innocence Dolores Dei, even before her coronation. However, the policies of Dei proved to be unpopular and eventually, the state of Mesque tried to secede from an innocent government. Some parts of the world were experiencing a lash as they accelerated towards secularism. Dolores Dei implemented a bunch of compulsory education programs. Moreover, the massive resettlement of Magritte, turned out to be more problematic than originally thought. The dissidents were suppressed by a military force that she called the Army of Humanity, which led some modern thinkers to condemn her treatment of the Mesque as reprehensible, and the many campaigns against this nation as war crimes. Mesque's status seems to have reconciled their differences, as it was one of the members of the Coalition of Nations involved in the pacification of the Antecentennial Revolution in Revachol. The Western Phalanxes and the Mesquite Phalanxes -both a volunteer division- were particularly infamous for their conduct in combat and thirst for blood. To add salt to the wound, the Mesque state was experiencing a golden age when all of these tragedies happened..
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MESQUE
CULTURE Marietti is a style of Mesque music and dance that is commonly seen at all kinds of festivities, especially weddings. It is delightfully picturesque, due to its rural origins.
MESSINA
The Republic of Messina, formerly the Republic of VesperMessina, was once a dual kingdom on the southeast coast of the West. It occupied most of the peninsula, before splitting into the Republics of Vesper and Messina. A friendly separation produced two constitutional monarchies.
SUR-LA-CLEF HISTORY Originally the Kingdom of Suresne, Sur-La-Clef had a long and historic role in world history. It is here that Innocence Dolores Dei came to power as the chief advisor to Queen Irene the Navigator. Sur-La-Clef was also responsible for opening up the Insulindian archipelago for colonization three hundred years ago and was the original owner of the town of Revachol. In the current century, it is a modern, urbanized country that ranks high on the Human Development and Freedom Index, is a leading member of the Coalition, and is the executive heart of EPIS. POLITICS Sur-la-Clef is one of the founding members and hosts the headquarters of the main institutions of EPIS. The nation is focused on the business side. MISCELLANEOUS Meatballs and mashed potatoes are popular dishes in SurLa-Clef.
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Fifty years later, today, Mesque is still in conflict. The golden age is over and the petrofascists are ruling magnanimously, isolating the nation on the inter-isolar stage.
The Vesper Republic, formerly the Vesper-Messina Republic, was once a dual kingdom. A friendly separation of ways produced two constitutional monarchies. Vesper, the richer of the two, is a western nation known for its proximity to the pale and its exotic financial derivatives. It is a stable country, and yet there has always been something ominous about its perfect stability and its place on the edge of the Isola Mundi, overlooking the Ubi Sunt islands that fracture in the Great Pale Disorder.
MINOR NATIONS
Other nations present at Mundi but with no major relevance -or so it seems for the inter-isolar panorama- are Meteo and Ubi Sunt.
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VESPER
SAFRE
The Safre Empire is one of the largest nations in the world. HISTORIA The Antecentennial Revolution metastasized in Safre, the third major region hit by it. It became extinct in the year 06. Graad is involved in the Tien-En conflict, a 12-years power struggle with Safre.
SAMARA HISTORIA The People's Republic of Samara is a product of Revachol's sister revolution on the Graad Island, which managed to survive on this isola in some way. It is known as a severely degenerate rebel state. CULTURE SamBo or Samaran boxing is an eloquent and violent set of fighting movements, one by one practiced to perfection. It implies stealth, cunning, and freshness. Originally from the Samara Island, SamBo used to incorporate a wide range of martial disciplines from archery to horseback combat. Today it is, above all, an aesthetically pleasing and efficient individual combat. In terms of gastronomy, goat's milk butter is a staple of Samara. Their land makes it easier to raise goats than cows, and local goat farmers produce high-quality meat and basic dairy products that add variety to other nations' diets. GEOGRAPHY Siigay is an archipelago of Samara, and part of the People's Republic of Samara. Siigay used to be ruled in the past by the Suzerain Apricot, and was once a colony of the Suzerain of Revachol until the Revolution.
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SAMARA
Subtropical climate, a noticeably corrupt monarchy and a bustling tourist industry along the coast. That's Tien-En, or so the international press says. Not a bad place to end up, except during the rainy season, of course. There's a lot of bulk chemical manufacturing there. There's also a lot of shipments of all kinds of delicate cargo. Despite this, it's been waging an open war against Graad for 12 years.
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TIEN-EN
An oceanic isola, dominated by the ocean of the same name. The Insulindian Ocean is the largest body of water on the planet, with Face-A-La-Mer archipelago at its inner heart. Its discovery, three centuries ago, was one of the greatest achievements of Queen Irene, the navigator of Suresne and Dolores Dei. The Great Skua (Stercorarius skua) is considered a symbol of its discovery and of all the cultural and historical tears produced by the trade of the isolas. 850 million people live in these small points scattered across the immensity of the Insulindian Ocean. The archipelago consists of a large and other small isolas, both surrounded by numerous smaller islands and islets. Some of the smaller archipelagos are Ozonne, Laurentide, Perouse, the Northern Arcade Islands and the Eastern Arcade Islands. La Caillou, the largest island, is the home of Revachol. A single mass of fertile land and the fourth largest isola in the world, surrounded by the Ozonne and Face-a-LaMer archipelagos. The islands that are not part of La Caillou are collectively called the Semenese Islands (Ile-de-Fantom). Banaital is one of the inhabited islands of the Semenese archipelago, near the Pale. It is covered with forest. It was an anchorage point for the Semenese nationalists, in the war for power that was carried out on the territory of the islanders. Olduvai is one of the main cities of this archipelago. The southern islands are home to the Semenneses, darkskinned humans who are believed to have arrived in the Insulinde archipelago four millennia ago -3700 years before the arrival of the Dolorians- and are direct descendants of the Aeropagites of the ancient Perikarnassians. They have their own customs, one of the most interesting is the belief in immaculate conception in the Pale.
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INSULINDIA
Revachol (RE-va-shol) is the former disgraced capital of the world, divided into zones of control under foreign occupation, half a century after a failed world revolution. Revachol is located on the island of La Caillou, on the isola of Insulindia. The name is used to refer to both the city of Revachol and its various forms of government, in a similar way to a fictional city called Rome. When middle-class people talk about foreign places, they like to talk about contrasts. Travel magazines, financial journals, regional news reports and all this kind of stuff. It's all about those contrasts and what they mean by contrasts is that most people are pornographically poor while a few are obscenely rich. That's what they mean by contrasts. On the East of the river, the monetary organizations promote regional stability. On the west side the cops collect taxes for money and the junkies shake so hard that their bones come loose from their ligaments. There is no city in the entire world with more contrasts than Revachol. The broken, the Magnificent and the Dishonorable old capital of the world. A great sky in flames, reflected in the broken glasses. Revachol the Suzerain, Revachol the Comune, Revachol the Administrative Region where all forms of government have failed. Revachol the Resolutive, the Answer to the great burning questions of history. How should we live? Will this horror ever end? HISTORY Revachol was originally founded in the Dolorian century, 380 years ago, during the early colonization of the Insulindian archipelago by the Kingdom of Suresne (today Sur-La-Clef). Originally populated by sheep shepherds from Suresne, the strategic location of Revachol Bay led to its rapid development and finally to its independence from its metropolis. The former colony became a kingdom and a world superpower.
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REVACHOL
LA CRISIS DE REVACHOL The foundations of Revachol's collapse were laid during the Philippine dynasty in the penultimate century, beginning with Phillipine II the Opulent. At the time of their ascension to the throne, the Suzerain of Revachol were one of the world's greatest superpowers. Phillipan II the Opulent was born congenitally deformed and while expanding the fortifications of Revachol, including the establishment of a Sea Fortress to guard the entrance to the bay, he fathered a son who would prove to be the downfall of Revachol. The son proved to be a disaster, a topologist capable of turning a spiral of decay into a free fall, earning the nickname of spendthrift by his supporters and "vicious syphilitic killer" by his detractors. By becoming the greatest of Filipino kings, he spent the entire national treasury on frivolous persecutions, and his mismanagement presaged the fall of the Suzerain in the coming Antecentenario Revolution, the end of the Filipino dynastic line and the end of the monarchy.
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The economy of Revachol depended on a diverse range of territories producing commodities for export. These included apricots from the Safre Empire, marble and archaeological treasures from Ile Marat (the ancient name of Iilmaraa), sugar from the Semenina Islands and cocaine from Supramundi and Saramiriza, which was dyed a characteristic magenta color. In fact, the excess supply of cocaine forced Suzerain to seek new markets in the middle of the last century for all the cocaine it was producing, and it settled in Safre. Introduced under exclusive contract, the little lord created an extremely valuable captive market for an extremely addictive product. Among his other properties was Tioumoutiri, a Revacholian colony in Iilmaraa. The population of the protectorate was mostly Areopagites from Iilmaraa, up to 97%. The region was known for its tobacco exports.
The next line of kings could not reverse the trend after the disaster. Over the next 150 years, Revachol went from being a superpower to a hostile bed. Phillipan IV the Mad was suffering from congenital syphilis. Phillipan V could not save the monarchy. The penultimate king, Guillaume the Lion, put an end to the monarchy with a series of military campaigns aimed at returning Revachol to its former glory. In the last decades of the last century, the monarchy conducted Operation Ikeira, a seven-year campaign during which the Suzerain Guillaume army forcibly united the people collectively known as the Ikeira tribes in the southeastern part of the Petit-Continent, under the banner of Revachol. However, it could not reverse more than a century of accumulated abuse and mismanagement. Guillaume saw the writing on the wall and abdicated in favor of his nephew, Frissel. While his uncle moved abroad to Graad, living a long and productive life as a financial broker. Frissel the First found himself alone, face to face, against the unstoppable march of the History itself. The old days of glory were totally over.
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As an example of his excesses, which were not few, he turned his bedroom into a treasure chamber, the Aurum Sun, where an unfathomable amount of krugerrands, gold bars, ornate armor, armor and several chalices covered the floor and even the walls. There were rumors that the king slept in a huge pile of gold like an obese dragon, rather than in a bed as a normal person would. He was also an eternal womanizer, which culminated in a diagnosis of syphilis. He passed it on as some sort of twisted legacy to his son, and Philippi IV was born with congenital syphilis. In addition, he established the traditional Filipino use of cocaine - Regnum Cocainum - supposedly for clarity of vision, to aid in his work. This unrevealing excuse for cocaine dependence poorly obscured the enormous amounts of wealth he wasted on the drug, consuming it at an alarming rate. In fact, his successor was brought into this world with the help of cocaine. The court physician administered a dose to his mother during delivery.
The combined forces of the anarchists and communists, known as the Blacks and Whites, respectively, organized under the collective banner of the Insulin Citizen Militia at first. Frissel tried to smother it in a brilliant military movement. Unfortunately, the monarch sent the least suitable person to lead the repression. His cousin, Drysant, led his men in an orderly column to the position of the Communards, leading them quickly to a massacre by the well-prepared and wellarmed revolutionaries. Drysant himself lost his jaw, but survived the battle thanks to one of the royal carabiners. However, the loyal, or brown, as they were called, fought bravely, for they were too loyal to be considered sane. The bloody struggle lasted four years, with the victory of the Revachol Commune. The communists of the Parti Communiste d'Insulinde set about rebuilding society after a brutal war that consumed two million lives and deposed the miserable Suzerain. The monuments of the old order were dynamited and the bones of Filippe III were thrown into the Bay of Insulinde by the revolutionaries, who immediately set about correcting the errors of the old order. Some changes took the form of repressions, others of reforms. The Revachol communists started "Ask Revachol," a radio program used to address civil issues. However, the Commune was short-lived, as the Coalition was formed soon after, interested in ending this experiment in new revolutionary rule.
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THE MAZOVIAN REVOLUTION The Antecentennial Revolution began, in the year 02 of this century, in the city of Graad and then it was spread like a wildfire. The Revolution flourished because of dissatisfaction with the Suzerain government: Numerous clandestine pamphlet printing operations sprang up in the years before and during the Revolution, helping to ferment dissent and rally the people against the King.
The cat and mouse game lasted until the year 08. To prevent the attacks, the villagers set fire to the oil wells so that no one could enter the island, stopping trade, poisoning the air and water, and creating oil slicks miles away. However, it only delayed the inevitable. Coalition ground forces invaded Revachol in a massive amphibious operation called the Beachhead. Coalition artillery bombarded Revachol's coastal defenses for a week using Lafayette guns, and then launched landings at three points simultaneously: Martinaise, Delta and Stella Maris. The Coalition aerostatic gunships had to be diverted because of the fires, but when they got there, the line simply broke. Martinaise simply collapsed. Many revolutionaries deserted. Some went over to the side of the Coalition, others simply fled. All this sealed the fate of the revolutionary project. The communist government surrendered, even though the Party did not. On the other hand, thanks to their services, the Loyalists were deposed and even executed "by mistake" by the Coalition. UNDER THE OCUPATION The city of Revachol was occupied by the Coalition as a Special Administrative Region, divided into zones, controlled by its member states from INSURCOM: the command of the Insulindian mission. INSURCOM is the command of the theatre of operations for the combined armies of the West and the Graad, with exalted volunteers from the Mesque.
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The first waves of polling attacks launched against Revachol were supported by the Loyalists, who contributed significantly to the Coalition's intelligence service, created distractions when Coalition aerostatics entered Revachol airspace and launched guerrilla attacks during the bombings.
Revachol in the 1920s was a living hell, especially on the west side of the river--a gang war, a botched privatization plan, a nuclear power plant collapse, etc. All this led to the division of the city into zones of control under foreign nations: the Mesque Zone, the West Graad Zone and the International Zone. The latter encompassed the districts of Revachol west of the river, and was the site of a decade-long urban war that saw strips of Revachol West leveled off, and offshore platforms set on fire. Despite this, it was considered a social improvement in the hellish years of '08 to '19. However, no nation wanted to claim responsibility for the area. The Citizens Militia of Revachol was founded to intervene and maintain order, allowing the citizens of Revachol to live in peace and give them an appearance of self-government. In fact, the RCM restored peace where the Coalition had failed (an unforgivable sin). However, it allowed the Coalition to go forward with its plans. INSURCOM made sure that the free-market capitalism imposed by the foreign powers would persist, and achieved the opening of the local labor market to large numbers of cheap foreign workers, allowing the rich to make a murderous profit. Meanwhile, the poor were crushed under the heels of the foreign occupiers and much of Revachol itself -especially districts like Martinaisewas left to rot, with no significant attempts at restoration or reconstruction.
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The post-revolutionary decade was a disaster for the Coalition government, as not only was much of the western part of Revachol razed to the ground, but the Coalition was busy fighting the communist resistance and carrying out mass executions, and throwing bodies into mass graves. Loyalists and innocent civilians were routinely caught up in the executions. However, the approach was successful. A combined use of mass executions, police repression, rewards, and the good old snitching trick, extirpated the communists from Revachol, along with much of the city's infrastructure.
The '40s dispelled the financial fever like a bucket of ice water in a drunkard's face. With a stabbing, smelly pain. A mirage of the market fuelled by cocaine and quantitative easing, sending the economy into intensive care for a diagnosis of recession and a pan-isolar hangover. THE ODDS ARE EVEN In '52, although almost nobody knows about this issue, the world will start heading for its own extinction in 28 years due to the invasion of the Pale. On March 5, '51, the only person capable of doing anything about it, Harrier Du Bois, will wake up on the floor of the cafeteria at the Whirling-In-Rags hostel in Jamrock, in the Martinaise district of Revachol West. Whether it succeeds or fails, Revachol is doomed, and if it does not, it will be destroyed by an atomic device around the year 74 of the current century. That's all folks. GEOGRAPHY Revachol is located on La Caillou, a fertile island in the middle of the Insulindian Ocean, the largest body of water in the world; in the eye of a large archipelago called Facea-La-Mer. The island is fertile, self-sufficient, and capable of supporting up to 200 million people. It also occupies a strategic position in the middle of the Indian Ocean, the world's connective tissue. At its heart is the city of Revachol, with a radius of 80 kilometers, the jewel in the crown of the Insulindian island. At its southern end, the old Monte Martin rises and the winding river Esperanza cuts the city in half, in its eastern and western regions.
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During the '30s there was a global economic boom. Revachol East took most of the profits and became the world's largest tax haven, with the blessing, of course, of the international community. This decade also saw a massive increase in the popularity of foreign music, as Semenese's disco genre took hold. Although the West benefited from this, several problems arose. The biggest of these came in '36, the Pila del Pueblo on the Esperanza River failed leading to widespread radioactive contamination of the river and pushing Revachol Oeste into further decline.
However, the most important area of control is Revachol Bay. It is wide and deep, over 1,200 m at its deepest point. The bay is crossed daily by huge cargo ships bearing the logos of the Indo-tribes: Wild Pines, ZAMM, Moriyn, etc., which control eight percent of world trade. At the edge of Revachol Bay, the shadow of the Coalition warship, the Archer, lurks in perpetual patrol service, ready to unleash artillery fire if the city rises up against capitalism. Underwater, the iron hulls have sunk hopelessly into the sand and mud. Soldiers' helmets, along with their finger bones, of course. Also their collarbones. Until they decide to gentrify the seabed. Revachol East In the year 21, a little more than a decade after the war, the eastern shore was already completely renovated. The slopes were lush with gardens and residences, especially in its most desirable district, Le Jardin. Houses with gardens rose up the mountainside, all the way to Saint-Batiste, where two of the five largest companies in the world were based. They include the district of Stella Maris - one of the three landing points during the invasion - and Saint-Batiste, which gives its name to Saint-Batiste Pharmaceuticals. Known as the pre-Revolutionary slums, Saint-Batiste is where Contact Mike, the world-renowned boxer, was born and rose through adversity and brain trauma to become one of the greats in sports history. Saint-Batiste is also where the Saint-Batiste boat races were conceived. Originally conceived as a biennial celebration of civic (and lucrative) pride, they were only held twice, on the years 31 and 33.
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The city is divided into three major regions: Revachol East, Revachol West (International Zone) and La Delta. As a city under military occupation, there is a substantial military presence by land, sea and air. Coalition aircraft guard the twenty-one checkpoints in the Administrative Region.
Jamrock is the main district of Revachol West which includes the following neighborhoods: Martinaise, El Pox, Villalobos, Central Jamrock, Eminent Domain, Grand-Couron, Old South and the Valley of the Dogs. Martinaise A big district, a chessboard full of wooden houses and 80,000 wandering souls. Packed with deadly traps as far as the eye can see, from Main Street to Grand Couron, from the 41st Precinct to Boogie Street forking into the distant horizon. Before the Revolution it was one of the largest districts of Revachol, benefiting from the investment and presence of Wild Pines. In fact, the district was founded and run by the Wild Pines Group to directly manage the cargo terminals, used to transport goods throughout the known world. The Industrial Port thus quickly became one of the most important parts of Martinaise, but it was its waterfront that became the main attraction for tourists. In 98 of the last century, the Rue de Saint-Ghislaine was full of bourgeoisie with umbrellas and the flags of the Wild Pines reinforced every beach and every boardwalk. That industrial bourgeoisie did not know how to see -anticipating with saving policies- that in ten years Martinaise would become a wasteland, marked by the Antecentennial Revolution and half burned by the Coalition artillery bombardments and the subsequent landings.
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Revachol West At the west of the river, it's time for funk holocaust all day, every day. It's the International Zone, which means no one gives a shit. It's nobody's business. In East Jamrock, wild animals roam the valley at night. It's still very outlandish to see the giraffes that escaped from the royal zoo 50 years ago living together in abandoned buildings, but it's the way the things works around here. The local Fritte kiosk chain employs a private army of 2,000 to guard its properties in Jamrock and Faubourg. That's how bad the crime rate is, you need a private army to run a kiosk chain.
The Great Industrial Port of the city of Revachol rises from the devastation, an artificial mountain range full of metallic containers of merchandise. A place of wealth, which casts a long shadow of poverty around it. Beyond is La Drisienne, the King Dris Passenger Port, full of cruise ships flanked by quays. The River Hope separates it from the Grand Couron district. There is perpetual competition between the precincts of the RCM with respect to La Martinaise: no one wants to take responsibility for the neighborhood and so it remains a gray area. Patrols of the RCM are extremely rare. In fact, it is the Port Workers' Union that functions here and acts as the police force and the de facto government of la Martinaise. Revachol the Unruly. Who has seen you and who sees you now. The Pox Once a park, a place of reflection and recovery for the patients of the Old Military Hospital. In the 1920s it was used as a quarantine center during a measles outbreak that killed many children. Since then, almost everyone has avoided the hospital and the surrounding park. Smallpox is completely wild now. It is a place inhabited by green scrub covered with snow and industrial dust, wild dogs and even wolves roaming in packs. The police try to keep the deepest corners cordoned off. Heavy drug users sneak out and hide in the Old Military Hospital, hoping to find something to satisfy their vices desperately, among the abandoned supplies. Or simply to take an overdose in peace.
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Martinaise's most outstanding feature is a twelve-storey house called the Capeside Apartments. It became an allegory. Eight of its twelve flats were destroyed by artillery fire and it went from being the symbol of effective urban management to little more than a run-down shantytown for a neighbourhood now inhabited by drug addicts, delusional communists and broken families.
An entire street is walled up and turned into a poppy field by a deified gangster named El Mazda, while his mortal enemy, La Puta Madre, employs only former narcotics officers to cultivate his own fields. Jamrock Central The heart of the Jamrock district is a little more pleasant than the rest of Revachol West, though not by much. Its distinguishing feature is a lake on the eastern edge of the district, formed when a major pipeline exploded in the early 1920s. It is also where the 41st precinct is located, for better or worse. Although it has good amenities, such as its public library, it also has its share of problems, such as damaged residential buildings that cannot be adequately repaired in the absence of a municipal government. The most notable case is a building that houses 200 people at risk of collapse. But since there are no authorities that can manage its repair or provide alternative housing, the best they can hope for is a burnt building with mold and rot everywhere, and for someone to notice the damage. Near the 41st Precinct there is a kebab dealer named Kuklov, in the market across the bridge. He makes kebabs that make you immortal if you manage to eat three of them and survive The secret: fly larvae. There are sections of the MRC that believe they make you immune to food poisoning.
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Villalobos In honor of a peninsula in Mesque, this neighborhood is mostly inhabited by immigrants from that island. It is known for its large housing projects and the Mesque gangs, notable for their culture rather than their mere presence. Villalobos was notable for a certain case of murals handled by RCM agent Harrier Du Bois. Nine thousand people associated with the case of a mural painting - all from Lakeside (Central Jamrock), Villalobos and more than half of the Eminent Domain - participated in a vote to erase or preserve that message on the wall.
Eminent Domain A working class district between Central Jamrock and the River of Hope. It's a place of hard people and hard lives. Its distinguishing feature is the 8/81 highway that passes over the Central Jamrock neighborhood, a monstrous shadow, high above the fire traps of Eminent Domain. The old workers' quarters are constantly being torn down to widen the highway. Pillars of concrete stand in the middle of the ruined wooden houses. 8/81 separates Martinaise from Jamrock. Vehicles pass from one side to the other, day and night, while those who reside in the labyrinthine alleys under the highway try to continue their lives in the snow and mud. On the horizon, barely visible, the nebula of the port machinery stifles all hope. Life here is even worse than on the Martinaise. The roars and fumes of all the asphyxiating industrial routine emanate a sacred and terrible air. Grand Couron Just east of Jamrock Central. Grand Couron is a place of impossible contrasts, an island of riches amidst the desolation of the Revachol West. Much of Couron's recovery is due to the 1930s, the boom years. As such, it is one of the most beautiful districts of Revachol West. Tall and beautiful buildings stand on the river's edge. Steel, iron, and yellow limestone, with shadows of clouds creeping up the facades. Of course, not all places in Grand Couron are so affluent. There is an unwelcome residential area in the 37th precinct. 13 floors lined up on the hillside like sarcophagi, a turning point in the boom years - in 39 the project failed catastrophically - which left a slum infested with opiates and hepatitis B.
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On the other hand, although the flame has been extinguished, traces of communist thought remain in Central Jamrock. Usually among the youth and the occasional café, where they gather to confront the brutality of life under foreign occupation and the iniquities of capitalism.
Coal City Situated in the shadow of Mont Saint-Martin, the Cité du Charbon was a booming city when the coal extracted from the countless wells near the city was needed to feed Revachol. Today, it is a miserable pile of closed mines on the dusty slopes of Mont Saint-Martin. In the remotest possible area of Revachol, no one wants to exploit these people anymore. The reason for the collapse is simple; the coal was replaced by oil from the ocean floor and hydroelectric power from the Esperanza River. Everything fell apart. Today, only the weakest remain in this neighborhood. Their hopes of getting rich are buried in the non-existent wells under their feet. Beneath the old mines is the town of L'Ossuaire, the underground cemetery of Revachol. The little rats face the underground passages, trying to reach Le Royaume, a vast network of dungeons and burial chambers, where the Filipino kings were buried, with their doctors and admirals. Mausoleums, burial chambers and gold leaf still remain at the Double Morning Gate. The whole network goes back three centuries. Children under 14 go underground, looking for artifacts to sell to foreign museums and collect relics. They hunt for rubies, melchiorite, lapis lazuli looted from Safre and Seol during the Suzerain era, in the burial chambers of Grand Old Phillipan, Guillaume II and even in the mausoleum of Phillipan the Opulent. Two kilometers underground, in a winding shaft along the walls of which mirrors have been placed so that the light of day falls eternally on the richest of all kings, the mausoleum contains incalculable quantities of gold and tons of that special, purified magenta cocaine favored by the Revolutionary royalty.
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Burnt Out Quarter Literally a stretch of burnt-out, ruined buildings.
La Delta In a strict sense, La Delta refers to the financial district, west of Revachol Oeste. Located 22 kilometers from the center of the world, the district includes some of the most important areas of Revachol. The building of the Bank of the World (called El Soldador), headquarters of INSURCOM -Coalition Government Insulindian Mission Command- on the lower floors. In a broader sense, it refers to the delta of the Esperanza River. Faubourg, the district immediately adjacent to the river that divides the city is as good as Revachol West, that is, not so good. The Pila del Pueblo, a U-type particle generator a nuclear reactor, basically - that began to be built during the Commune and came into service after its collapse. The occupation government did not help and the ad hoc construction failed due to a faulty emergency valve. The resulting damage removed the turbine and fuel containment vessel, causing a massive radioactive discharge in the Esperanza. The Emergency Aid Brigade, a self-organized volunteer clean-up team, tried to save the situation, only managing to work themselves into an early cancer grave. Despite the reactor failure, Faubourg expanded. Today it is a seemingly endless stretch of urban expansion.
OTHER REGIONS Ozonne An archipelago located about 80 or 100 kilometers away, two days away from Revachol. Its wealthy residents, used to elegant restaurants and luxury boutiques, rarely visit the Martinaise.
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Few competitor rats return from the wells and even fewer find what they're looking for. A little boy comes out of a black tunnel, with silver trinkets in his pockets. All around him, white snow in the extinct coke ovens, and in the worn-out huts, where parents beat their children after drinking. The snow melts on their fingers, turning into water. Pornographically poor, as Elysium demands.
Resurrection Far beyond Martinaise, it is a popular spa for older Ozonne children, with lots of body, full pockets and empty heads, founded in the year 18. Laurentide Located at the other end of La Caillou, its main city is Deora de los Siete Mares. Archipelagos Croyant-Morain is the leading city in this region. POLITICS After the collapse of the Revolution and the mass executions of communists, Revachol became the paradise of the I recommend you to sanctify yourself for what you are about to read - neoliberals. A tax haven and a vital centre for cheap labour and big exports. Since the fall of the Revolution, the Coalition has maintained control of the city under the Emergency, Walkers and Food Laws. Three pieces of legislation that keep the city in a laissez-faire state for the benefit of foreign capital. The Walkers' Law is one of the most perfidious, designed to limit the authority of local institutions. Part of it prohibits the RCM from applying for most documents and licenses without the permission of a representative of the Coalition. The death penalty has remained a staple of criminal justice in Revachol since immemorial times. Under the Suzerain and the Comuna, the preferred method was the firing squad. Nowadays, the Coalition occupying forces prefers a more intimal and profitable method; the electric chair.
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Ozonne was also a test site for the Coalition in 08. Hundreds of ships prepared here for the Landing, while powerful aerostatic gunners anchored at the bottom of the sea and bombed the city for three days in a row, to soften up the defenders and civilians for the occupation. Its main cities are Fond de l'Air and Virmandeux.
MISCELLANEOUS Decorations The Croix de Bravoure, a cross of courage, was the highest decoration on the battlefield of the Suzerain armed forces, awarded for exceptional courage in the service of King Frissel I. The Rising Sun was an emblem used to distinguish experienced combat veterans in the service of King Frissel I during the revolution. CULTURE As for cigarettes, contemporary Revacholians prefer Drouin (a local blend from the southern islands) or Astra, Graad's legendary cigarette. Tioumoutiri is preferred by older men for its paper filter tips, its sweet smell and the added tar.
SEMENENE
Semenene is a nation hidden at the edge of the planet, near the Pale. So remote that it has not kept all the information throughout known history to itself. Not to mention the effects on the intrahistorical fabric of the Pale itself. Who knows.
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Those who dodge the executioner's sword still face long prison sentences within the walls of the Esperanza River Correctional Facility (nicknamed Reunion), an infamous military prison.
Power is not shared and that is something that all Elysium is clear about even if they pretend otherwise. No one is safe from giving in to extremes in a world depicted on polarized magnetic tapes. Well, maybe they are. There are people who think they live on the fringes of political life; centrists, moralists, acrats, etc. In short, the worst kind of Elysium, only saves them that their sex life is as wide as their openness to the whole political spectrum. No risk, no fun.
POLITICAL FACTIONS At present, there is no evidence of clearly philo-fascist formations. These are the active political groups:
MORALIST INTERNATIONAL The Moralist International, or Moralintern, is the leading body of the Coalition of Nations and the true sovereign force of Revachol. Moralists don't really have any beliefs. Sometimes they stumble upon one, as if it were a toy left on the carpet of a room unpolluted by a child. Of course, the toy must be put away immediately and the child, of course, rebuked. Centrism is not a change, not even an incremental change. It is, above all, control (authoritarianism). Over yourself and the world. Look up at the sky, at the dark forms of the Coalition blimps hanging there and ask yourself: is there something sinister about moralism? And then answer: no. God is in the heaven. Everything works down here on Earth. Everything is fine, everything is going to be okay. The color of moralism is the blue. Its official motto, called the Moralist International, is: "A blue oblivion; a gray piece of sky." There is an additional line but it seems to be unofficial, quote as follows: "For a moment, there was hope."
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FACTIONS
The Coalition of Nations is an alliance of Graad and the republics of South-la-Clef, Messina and Oranje against the Revolutionary Communist Party of Revachol. The Coalition finally succeeded in conquering Revachol and establishing control over its economic wealth. The city came under Coalition occupation as a Special Administrative Region, divided into zones controlled by Coalition member states from INSURCOM: the command of the Insulindian mission. INSURCOM is the command of the theatre of operations for the combined armies of the West and the Graad, with volunteers from Mesque. The Revachol Citizen Militia was founded to monitor the population. INSURCOM made sure that the free market capitalism imposed by the foreign powers would persist, and allowed the opening of the local labor market to a large number of cheap foreign labor, allowing the rich to make a criminal profit. Meanwhile, the working class was crushed under the heels of the foreign occupiers and much of Revachol-especially districts like Martinaisewas left to rot, with no significant attempts at restoration or reconstruction. Things improved after the dark years of reconstruction in the 1920s and the division of the city into zones of control under foreign nations: the Mesque Zone, the Western Zone and the International Zone. The '30s were a global economic boom that helped the entire city to recover.
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COALITIONS OF NATIONS
The RCM, or the Revachol Citizens Militia, is the Revachol police service. The RCM is the self-organizing peace corps of the occupied city of Revachol, operating within a legal twilight, but its authority is rarely questioned. Its main focus is the - unclear - enforcement of the 190 provisions of the Penal Code. The RCM's dependence on volunteers has a detrimental effect on its effectiveness. Clearing 10 cases a year is enough to put a policeman in the 90th percentile, while too many policemen are fond of shooting people. This is reflected in the statistics. In the 50th year of this century, over 71% of the murders in Revachol went unsolved. In Revachol West, that number approached 85%. The RCM was divided among several services: Criminal Investigation, the Emergency Board, which receives calls from the people, and the General Inspectorate, which is in charge of internal affairs. The RCM forces, in turn, are organized into precincts, each with its own station. The most famous of these are the 41st and 57th Precincts. Of course, each precinct has a person in charge of the communications officer post and the lazareth (medical assistance) post. The RCM uses a countdown system, modeled after the dual leadership system employed by the left during the Revolution. This system was, in turn, developed by experimental psychologists from the last century at Koenigstein University. The RCM deploys a self-described "Décomptage" structure as its chain of command. Each lieutenant is responsible for two sergeants and eight officers. That means the middle lieutenant has to take care of quite a few personal matters.
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REVACHOL CITIZENS MILITIA
EQUIPMENT The RCM team consists of a badge, a gun with ammunition and a badge that they wear on their jacket, as they choose. The badges look like hollow white rectangles, but are actually halogen watermarks with the letters of the RCM and a pattern symbolizing the street map of Revachol West. The cards are covered with perforations, which track three vital statistics: years of service, cases resolved, and the number of deaths. Flashlights (manufactured by the Grundstellung RAO) are also provided to officers. Some officers are provided with motorized cars, painted blue and white, and equipped with shortwave radios to reach their assigned station at all times. CURIOSIDADES The RCM does not provide search warrants.
EPIS EPIS is a program developed by Moralintern to support certain Western nations. It began as a unified system of weights and measures, and is considered so successful that Moralintern expanded it into an economic union for steel processing. Other successes of the economic union have emboldened the Moralintern to the extent that it plans to unite all the nations of the West in the United States of the West. La Oranje and Sur-La-Clef are founding members of the EPIS. Oranje alone provides 28% of its annual budget. Oranje carries a lot of political weight, while Sur-la-Clef takes care of the commercial side and hosts the headquarters of the main institutions of the EPIS.
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Each station is run by its captain, with a list of lieutenants under his command. The General Inspectorate is a separate division, responsible for internal affairs. For the northwest region of Revachol, the average annual income of each officer is 5500 reals (not adjusted by rank).
The Communists were a powerful force in the Antecentennial Revolution, guided mainly by the writings of Kras Mazov, a philosopher of Graad and founder of scientific communism. After the collapse of the Revolution and the fall of Revachol, most Communists ended up being executed by the Coalition and bulldozed into mass graves. Although the precise ideals of the communists varied among the main branches of the Revolution, they had some common elements, exemplified by their universal symbol; the star and the cornet. This symbol of unity developed in the sixth decade of the last century and was quickly adopted by Mazov and the Communists during the revolution. An inverted star flanked by a crown of horns The inverted star symbolizes the overthrow of the old order. The crown of horns represents a natural crown. It symbolized, above all, the attempt to build a society that could exist in accordance with and above the natural world, as long as the exploitation was not of person upon person but of the resources by them. White is the colour of peace.
THE FOUNDING PARTY
The Founding Party, known as the Holy Party in the time of the Perikarnasians, is the oldest international organization in the world, which spends its time in search of the resurgence of the Innocents.
THE UNION
The Union - formally the Union of Port Workers - is a workers' union in Martinaise, Revachol. Its meeting place is the Whirling-In-Rags cafeteria. They are considered the current de facto law in Martinaise, while the 41st and 57th Precinct try to hold each other accountable for the docks.
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COMMUNISTS
A euphemism for fascists, although there is discussion about whether these are an avant-garde or conservative philosophy. In any case, they are a rabid sheet of vitalist nostalgia that refuses to accept that the past never returns. Both the Fascists and the Revacholian Realists blame all the evils of the world on the failed Revolution, 50 years ago. Their philosophy can best be summed up as follows: -"If good, kind King Guillaume were still around, he'd lead the moneylenders and the homosexuals back to the ocean!" -We were once an octopus moving around the world, absorbing natural and human resources from Iilmaraa to southeast Seol. The city-state that fucked up the whole world." -Then the deranged Communists pushed the king under a tram and lost the civil war to foreign intervention, condemning us to financial servitude. Of course, despite their conservative character, they are a strong emotional group.
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LOYALISTS
This is what companies and private entities are called. Most of them were consumed in a feast of monopolies among sharks: YBP, Expander, Saint-Batiste, Brightest Star, LUM, Resplendent, East-Insulindic, Welter, Elcassette, among others, are now only subsidiaries. Here are the main heads that have left their impact on the financial sector.
COUPRIS MOTORCORPS Coupris MotorCorps was one of Revachol's main engine manufacturers, until the failed Antecentennial Revolution ended the king the company supported and with it. Today it is just a brand name, taken over by the management company Vespertine.
FELD FELD is a defunct computer engineering company. It started as an electronics team in the town of Koeningstein two centuries ago. After an aggressive move to Revachol, FELD became a global competitor in the emerging preRevolutionary era personal electronics market. FELD was involved in the business of computer engineering. As the Tercentennial beat them to business machines, the company was rapidly developing a state-of-the-art technology, an engineering feat that even mid-century giants like Ream, ICN and ZAMM could not achieve: The FELD playback experiment, a magnetic tape-based computer was the key. The device was very elegant, even fragile. You could write directly on the tape using a special chemical solution. The machine analyzed the writing, performed operations and projected the result on a white screen. It was a beautiful and delicate thing made of black film, folding tape structures.
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INDOTRIBES
Today, all that remains of the once-proud company is Feld Electrical, a small company that manufactures ink cartridges.
FALN Faln (stylized as FALN) is an industrial conglomerate. They manufacture houses, tracksuits and heavy vehicles. The houses are terrible, the tracksuits legendary and the vehicles, well, the vehicles are fine, I guess.
WILD PINES GROUP Wild Pines Group is one of the original indotribus of Revachol, a company that was granted a royal monopoly by the Suzerain centuries ago. Suzerain died, but several indotribus remain and Wild Pines was responsible for Martinaise's development. Unlike most of the Indo-tribes that did not adapt and were absorbed after the Revolution, Wild Pines evolved and changed to take full advantage of the changing circumstances. It is one of the richest corporations in the world, controlling 22 cargo terminals, employing 72,000 workers and facing the Union strike in Revachol. Not wanting to give in to their demands, they have paid off scabs and mercenary squads to try to subdue the 2,200 striking workers at Terminal B.
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Unfortunately, his moonshot - a term for large disruptive innovation projects - never made it to market. Moreover, the move of FELD to Revachol was counterproductive. The revolutionary government liquefied its assets and expropriated the most advanced prototypes. FELD engineers were shot by the revolutionaries and the three prototypes were lost during the fires of '07. It is speculated that a fourth prototype remains in the mausoleums below Coal City.
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An innocent is one of the most important political figures in the world, if he appears at all. He is the highest category of historical figure in the world, a literal personification of history. Traditionally, an Innocent, when anointed, assumes supreme rule over the West, or the known world in general, at least the parts that matter. An Innocent is elected to office by the Founding Party, a precedent that has occurred only six times in all of history. The legal system of the Royal Belt is built from scratch to accommodate an innocent government. Innocence is infallible. The decisions made by this figure are not decisions, they are inevitable. They would have happened anyway, only accelerated, packed into decades instead of centuries. An innocence is a continuous and compressed event, a sacred human being. They say it is an honor and a glory to live when one is in office. Commonly, an Innocence does not assert its power through military power. This is seen as unnecessary. Innocence wins because an Innocent cannot help but win, as his actions are inevitable. KNOWN INNOCENCES Only six Innocents have appeared in the whole history of the world. Although the records are incomplete, as only four are actually recorded. The Pernikarnsian was the first Innocence and little is known about him. Black and White, 500 years before the current century, was the innocence of militarism and the strongest of all in military terms. It was followed by Dolores Dei, 300 years ago. He founded many modern institutions, launched several successful expeditions, and was even critical of the very not to mention beautiful - innocent system. He is considered the most important Innocent. At the end of the last century, Sola was anointed as Innocence, although she is known as an anti-innocence, due to her reluctance to impose her will on the world.
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INNOCENCES
NO TRUCE Elysium is a modern fantasy world like the 1950s. It's a world that promises not to stagnate, that is, things are unsettled. It is close enough to our world that things have equivalents, it is a suitable framework for exploring issues relevant to our own society such as fanaticism, power relations, politics, the bureaucratic apparatus, geopolitical relations, philosophy, ideology, religion, etc. However, all that can be done in a static and unstructured world is to cry out to today's communities for cheap popularity. In a classical fantasy world there would be two main ideologies; "good" and "evil", the first is selfless and compassionate, the other is selfish and cruel. At the other extreme, the exaggerated realism that exudes the world more crude than it really is, one in which everyone is an idiot and pessimism dominates everyday life. In Elysium, its people live in sandy conditions, but without noticing the abnormal harshness of their conditions, because they don't have much to compare them to, and having hopes for the next day, because surprise! That's how it's done. Survive. In a sense, everyone in Elysium has a certain empathy, and the Innocents are the culmination of that reality.
He was the first Innocent, but not much is known about him. It's not even clear that it was "him", but Franconegro presumed him as such and called him Pius. He is depicted as a young man with molten gold coming out of his mouth. Literally everything he said was made of gold. He is said to have invented God and the equality of people under God. He also introduced the gold standard as a meassure of love. As a first introspection, he declared that there should be more like him. It is presumed that his school was the beginning of the Holy Party (Founding Party).
FRANCONEGRO
Innocence Franconegro was named the Innocence of Militarism. He codified hereditary government - but at the same time he put an end to servitude - and established the inter-solar realm as the world's reserve currency. He also established the concept of the Nation. In modern times, it is considered an icon because of its preferred military unit, the Franco-Nigerian cavalry. Franconegro tried to resolve the growing tensions between the aristocracy and the bourgeoisie by building a unified society, where each person has a place and a mission, but at the same time can reach the nobility as long as he is endowed with the strength of his virtue.
THE REÁL ✤ The IIR or inter-isolar reál is the world's current currency. One reál is divided into 100 cents. Typically, reals circulate as bank notes, while cents circulate as coins. For example, a five-reál note is black with the profile of a woman. In typography, it is represented by a four-lobed asterisk: ✤
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THE PERNIKARNASIAN
Dolores ruled three hundred years ago, following the discovery of the island of Insulindia by explorers from the continent of Mundi. She is, among other things, the innocence of intersolar travel and connective tissue. She was a woman of the court, the wife of an influential marquis and eventually the chief advisor to Irene La Navigateur, Queen of Suresne (now Sur-la-Clef). Also, she was beautiful beyond beauty. Terribly so. The women of the court at that time were expected to be intellectually equal to any man. They were expected to play both chess and bridge - a game of cards - at the highest levels, as well as demonstrate aptitude in matters of philosophy, theology and science. She made the most of her position at the Antedolian court, a court visited by the most prominent thinkers and artists of the time. Secretly, she was becoming the preeminent philosopher of the time, in her nation and beyond. A scalpel, a penetrating gaze... she was an almost preternaturally magnetic and intelligent woman. To her contemporaries she seemed out of time, a messenger of the future of the species. We all fell in love with her, from head to toe. Even before her innocence was declared, her influence was tremendous. It was on her advice that Irene La Navigateur sponsored a number of trips to the Pale regions. A costly, often tragic effort, eventually vindicated by the discovery of the New World, the piece of reality upon which Revachol stands. The lands of Mesque, the West, and even the distant Supramundi - in all twenty-one of the forty nations of the time - immediately accepted an innocent government. Even before his coronation. In a city called Advesperascit, in Vesper-Messina, his native land. The name of the city means "night is coming", but it happened on a winter morning with the frozen canals and hail falling from the sky.
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DOLORES DEI
She was insultingly beautiful. She was the young mother of humanity, a perfect mother. It was as if her face, her shoulders and her hands were covered with a soft feathery down. Everyone has that memory. If everyone who has ever read about her pales between the admiration and agitation of the superhuman. 22 years later, one of your secret service men killed her. A young man who had naively come to suspect that the Innocence Dolores Dei was not entirely human, but something more. Dolores Dei was shot in the chest with a piece of bird. The man, who is believed to be insane, said that he once touched her and that her body was unnaturally hot, like an oven, and that sometimes, while on duty, he watched her forget to breathe for more than ten minutes. That she was something that had walked among us, watching us stumble for hundreds, if not thousands of years, until she decided to interfere with the course of our history. -This was supposed to occur to us! it was reported that this man had cried out to innocence. This inhuman quality was witnessed - brilliant lungs and all that - by many others as well. All these statements are obviously - or not so much attributed to a common diagnosis of collective hysteria and an explosive manifestation of religious psychosis.
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She was dressed in a white and pearly dress in an empty square, with the crowd in the distance. Already her Terriers, the men of the secret service of innocence, were worried about an assassination attempt. The winter snow was pounding the cobblestones around her. A small group of officers stood by while their Terriers placed a white gold crown on their heads. The coronation was witnessed mostly by secret service men. When her innocence was declared and the queen whom she had advised for years knelt before her - she was so overwhelmed with emotion that her lungs began to glow in her chest. That is why the lungs are the symbol of love for the cultures of the Royal Belt.
Some modern thinkers would consider her a war criminal because of the campaigns she waged against the State of la Mesque and the resettlement programs. The State of the Mesque tried to separate itself from that innocent government. Some parts of the world were experiencing a whipping of accelerationist policy towards secularism. Its compulsory education programmes and the mass resettlement of Magritte were also problematic. The dissidents were eliminated by a military force she called The Army of Mankind. Little is known about her husband, the Marquis. It is as if he disappeared from history after completing his role, which was to introduce Dolores Dei to the court. In conclusion, yes, there is something lonely, paranoid, and even frightening that people rarely mention, but feel when they think of her...
SOLA
Sola was an anointed Innocent during the previous century and lived to see the present one. She was an urban planner who spoke her mind and largely left history to her own devices, encouraging people to stand out for themselves rather than prescribing a deified history model. She is often called an anti-innocence. Sola resigned after an assassination attempt by a Yugo nationalist, who blamed her for not taking the side of the left during the Revolution. (Innocents do not usually resign.)
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SUBTLE TERROR Although she is often considered the greatest human being who has ever lived, there was something ominous about Dolores Dei. She was always surrounded by her Terriers. She loved chess, but she also loved military games. The figures of Innocence Dolores Dei often held a small tin soldier between her forefinger and thumb. She was also blonde, the blondest woman ever seen, with emerald green eyes like the flag of the Pisan interregnum. She was the most socially isolated and the least conscious of all the Innocents.
There have been a great number of counter-innocences or false innocences. Some assumed to be innocences others simply thought so. Occasionally they have the support of a faction within the ecclesiastical establishment and sometimes the accusations of foul play have surfaced. The most famous and important of these was Ernö Pasternak. He was delighted with torture, despotism, hymns, cannons and the conquest of the world, but was defeated and humiliated by Stepan, the Despicable of Kedra.
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FALSE INNOCENCES
The Pale is the connective tissue between the islets of Elysium. This world is unique and bizarre in the sense that it is not a single contiguous land mass, but consists of vast continental archipelagos - islets - surrounded by a characteristic tissue. Such is its presence that it is the most dominant geologic feature of the world, the so-called interisolar mass, in a ratio of 2:1 to matter. In fact, it covers 72% of the known surface of Elysium, interfering with any attempt at orbital flight. The Western nations-Revachol-Graad have been conducting weather balloon experiments in the lower ionosphere since the 1930s, and have managed to create a rather surprising picture. A dark grey corona, a shell of rarefied matter surrounding the planet's dark disc. Vast swaths of land disturbed by nothingness. The images are blurred, but if there was a sphere there, it certainly seems to have been fractured long ago. APPEARANCE What does the pale one look like? It's achromatic, odorless, featureless. Pallor is the enemy of matter and life. It's not like any other place or thing in the world. It's the transitional state of being to nothingness. Where matter borders on pallor, the resulting borderline is a rush of matter, which rises towards it. Rolling. Evaporating even, in a big scene. The transition area between the world and the pale is called the collapse of the porch. A grey coronal mist, of cold vapour, marked by the spores of an opportunistic microorganism. The pale is difficult to describe and measure, since it is something whose fundamental property is the suspension of properties: physical, epistemological, linguistic and even ontological. The further you go into it, the steeper the degree of suspension. Even mathematically, the numbers stop working.
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THE PALE
TRAVEL Pallor was believed to be impregnable, perpetual. Irene La Navigateur, the Queen of Suresne, sent eight expeditions, one after the other, to the masses at the edge of the world. Five of the crews did not return. Two others lost their heads. After years of trial and error and the development of a strict psychological regime that imitated the process of creation by automatic writing, the eighth expedition returned, healthy and intact. They spoke of a new continent of matter. They told the queen and her advisor, Dolores Dei, that the pallor had begun to condense, day after day, hour after hour, minute after minute, leading to the discovery of a new island. Insulindian. Their journey was made possible by the fact that it is possible to force the dimensions of pallor and in modern times humans can even compress its latitude, bouncing radio waves from one end to the other and shortening the path. However, the only real advance in the transit of pallor is the speed with which an aerostatic craft can pass through it, since less exposure leads to fewer adverse effects later on. Aerostatics are hybrid aircraft, necessary because conventional rotors or jet engines no longer add speed after the reference point for movement is suspended once they cross from near-pale to very pale. However, it is still difficult for humans to navigate through the pale without getting lost or suffering mental damage. Some say the damage comes from extreme sensory deprivation. Others claim that they pale in some way when contemplating information from the past, and then label everything as degrading. They speak of a rarefied past, not rarefied matter. They call it the blindness of the 'I'-the pale not only suspends the laws of physics, but also the laws of psychology; perhaps history, even the human mind, is sober about the past.
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In fact, one of the few measurable effects of pallor is that it is expanding at an unknown rate.
In particular, there are signs of preterminal crossings. The success of pale navigation depends not only on technical knowledge, but also on intensive psychological preparation and equipment. Some of these tactics have been known for thousands of years. STUDY Entropology is the scientific study of the pale. The pale has been studied for thousands of years in one form or another and the most recent iteration of it comes from Graad. The study of the pallid dates back 6,000 years, to the isle of Mundi and the Perikarnasians, who called it the Western Plain. They had not travelled around the whole circumference of the Perikarnasian superisole and assumed that it was simply a feature of the west, unaware of its omnipresence.
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Over-radiation is more than a phenomenon, it's a horrible feeling. That's why international standards strictly limit civilian travelers to six days of exposure to pallor per year. People who practice within the Entropenic Business Class are specifically authorized and trained for 22 days of pale travel per year.
CHAPTER 2
GAME RULES
In SACRED AND TERRIBLE FATE, METRIC -arguably the simplest system in the world according to a ZA/UM devblog- has been merged with the core principles of the FATE system. In this chapter you will find the fundamental sections to familiarize yourself with the mechanics of FATE system. This is a role-playing game where proactivity prevails in order to build stories and overcome challenges, both imposed by the world surrounding the characters and the one living inside their cracked and laughing shells. Read these pages calmly, whether you have some experience from other role-playing games or this is your first approach to them. You'll also find a number of strategies to encourage safe play at your party. Both in a virtual and face-to-face environment. The golden rule, if you and your gaming table want to lighten a rule, if you and the table agree that this way it is easier to play, tighten that throttle, but put on your seatbelt. Elysium is just curves, and no speed limit.
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A ROLEPLAYING GAME If this is your first time playing a role-playing game, here's what you need to know: In a role-playing game a group of friends and you get together and, all together, create a story about characters you have invented. You decide what challenges and obstacles the characters will face, how they will react, what they will say and do, and what will happen to them. But it's not all conversation; sometimes you will have to use the rules in this book and some die roll to introduce some uncertainty into the story and make it more exciting. As you can see, the setting of this manual is the not-sofictional world of Elysium. However, it works best with stories in which the characters are people with initiative, competence and exciting lives, so we recommend that you choose or build one of these. WHAT DO YOU NEED? (IF NOT LOVE) To start playing SACRED AND TERRIBLE FATE you will need the following:
▶ Between three (3) and five (5) people. One (1) of them will be the gamemaster who will have a different role from the rest of the game table..
▶ FATE dice. Four (4) at least. hese are a special type of
six-sided dice. Two of their faces are marked with a +, other two with - and the last two sides are empty 0. You can find them in virtual applications or in your role-playing shop.
▶ Character sheets. They can be found at the end of the
manual for your presential sessions and in an editable digital format for your online sessions.
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THE TRIBUNAL Think of them as invencible agents who operate above the law to secure it. If a single Klaasje signal is not respected -from the gamemaster or another player-, they will act inmidiately to end such lack of courtesy and conclude the game. They are the slaying dragons of good behavior; there will be no truce with the Furies.
SAFETY TOOLS This is a role-playing game, where you will play characters through a conversation. In other words, a role play is a social activity. Despite centuries of refinement, words do not reach all that language can show and that causes a multitude of misunderstandings that in any case could at least try to be resolved. Here we recommend a series of security tools: ▶ Describe the concept of bleeding (see below) present in this game (search in Google "Bleed-Nordic Larp Wiki" if you want to read more information about it). ▶ Sesion 0: As a GM you must talk about the key topics that would be along the adventure. It's a good start to know what topics avoid. ▶ Klaasje's sign: Point the index finger up if a forbidden topic appear. Klaasje -a mysterious, clever and smart woman- will appear from nowhere to interrupt the action. She carries the aura of a terrible omen. She will recommend you to make a step back.
GAME PARTY In a session of SACRED AND TERRIBLE FATE there are several players and a gamemaster. If you are a player, your main responsibility is to represent one of the protagonists of the game, what we call a player character (usually shortened to PJ). You must make decisions on behalf of your character and describe what she does and says. You are also responsible for your character's performance: you will have to roll dice when appropriate, choose which skills you will use in each situation and keep track of your Disco Tokens. If you are the gamemaster (or GM), your task will be to take care of the world in which the PJs live. You decide what each character does that is not controlled by the rest of the game table, i.e. the non-playing characters (or NPCs). You will have to describe the places the NPCs visit and create scenarios and situations with which they can interact. You will also be the arbiter in terms of rules, make all the rolls that are not appropriate for other people and determine the outcome and consequences of the decisions made by each NPC. Both, the GM and the players has another objective: to get all the parts involved to contribute to building a great story. The FATE rule system seeks a collaborative game, where everyone shares ideas and looks for opportunities to make the story as entertaining as possible. So it's crucial to talk in terms of cooperation, sometimes the characters will compite but it is an extension of the narrative interests of all the game party. THE BLEEDING Recently, a concept that was coined during the 2007 Ropecon by Emily Care Boss has become more visible and fits perfectly with the game philosophy of both FATE and the Metric system. There are two types of bleed, the inner one (bleed-in) and the outer one (bleed-out) that we will see next.
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Bleeding occurs when a person's thoughts and feelings are influenced by those of his character, or vice versa. As the bleeding increases, the boundary between it and your character becomes more and more transparent. It makes sense to think of the degree of bleeding as a measure of how far apart the different levels of play are (real/interior/ metakeback). Bleeding is instrumental for horror role-playing games: It is often more difficult to scare the person through the character than in the opposite direction. A roll of the dice hidden from the perception of the table will make the character act more cautiously. A classic example of bleeding is when one player's affection for another player is transferred to the game or influences her character's perception of her own. Many games rely on this mechanism to influence players' actions or to achieve higher purposes in the premise. That's why it was necessary to talk about it, since SACRED AND TERRIBLE FATE will often move in a world described as magical realism where the strange is the everyday and the levels of realism are so close to our world that they are not exaggerated. You will not always have to save the world, but often you will choose to save yourself from it and that can play both ways.
▶ Bleed-in refers to when it is the player's emotional state that affects her character. For example, a frightened player may lead a character to become tense or cautious.
▶ Bleeding-out is used to refer to bleeding in the other
direction. It is the character's internal state that affects the player, the result of a mental exercise in empathy with and in fiction. Keep both mechanisms in mind along with the Klaasje Signal to feel comfortable and safe during the game.
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ACTIONS Sometimes it will take a dice roll to find out if your character's action is successful or not. You will have to use the dice whenever you are faced with another character or encounter a significant obstacle. When this is not the case, just say what your character does and assume that it happens.
TYPES OF ACTIONS When you make a skill roll you will be performing one of these actions: overcome, advantage, attack or defend. Your character can do four (4) types of actions. You will have to decide which one you are going to use. The skill description will tell you which actions are appropriate. When you put the skill description together with your intentions and the situation you are in, it is usually quite obvious what type of action you should choose; however, talk.
OVERCOME o
Overcome different objectives related to your ability. ▶ Failure: You don't get it, or you get it at a high cost. ▶ Tie: You make it, but at a lower cost. ▶ Success: You do, at no extra cost. ▶ Critical Success: You get it, and you get a boost.
ADVANTAGE c
Create a temporary aspect/ leverages an existing one. ▶ Fail: Don't create the aspect, or create it and another character who harms you gets a free summon / Another character who harms you gets a free summon. ▶ Tie: You create a momentum / You get a free summon. ▶ Success: Create a temporary aspect with a free summon / Get a free summon. ▶ Critical Success: You create a temporary aspect with two (2) free summons / You get two (2) free summons.
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ATTACK A
You hurt another character or thing, or defeat it in a scene. ▶ Failure: You do not inflict damage. ▶ Tie: You don't do damage, but you get a boost. ▶ Success: You cause both stress and gain. ▶ Critical Success: You cause both stress and gain.
DEFEND D
Avoid an attack or prevent someone from creating a certain advantage against you. ▶ Failure: You suffer the consequences. ▶ Tie: You give your opponent a boost. ▶ Success: You avoid the attack or the attempt to create an advantage. ▶ Critical Success: You avoid the attack or the attempt to create an advantage and get a boost. ASK FOR HELP Any PC can help you carry out your action. When they helps you, they renunce their action in that exchange and describes how they do it; you get a +1 on your roll for every PC who helps you in this way. The gamemaster will decide how many character ple can help you at a time. ROLL THE DICE AND ADD UP YOUR BONUS It's time to roll the dice. Take the bonus associated with the skill you have chosen and add it to the outcome. If you have an aspect or a stunt that applies, add it -or subtract it- too. That's your total score. Compare it to the target number, which will be the difficulty set by the gamemaster in secret. She may also let you know the difficulty before the roll. THE METRIC APPROACH Even if you came from a fictional country, you can use Metric System as alternative to FATE. Just follow the next formula:: 2d6+Attribute+Skil±(Aspect/Stunt) vs Difficulty. You'll have to sum a 6 to every difficulty in the Difficulty Scale. That's all.
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TYPES OF SITUATIONS We have talked about actions and results. But in what context do they take place? We distinguish between Challenges, Contests and Conflicts. Here we describe the roles of each type of situation and the steps to be taken when they arise. Because of the idiosyncrasies of Elysium, you may prefer to consider that there are no contests, only conflicts.
CHALLENGES (TO OVERCOME)
▶ You will have to make a roll to overcome each obstacle or target that requires a different skill. ▶ To determine the outcome, interpret the failure, cost and success of each roll.
CONTESTS (TAKE IT FRIENDLY)
▶ Los PJs en la acción tiran por la habilidad apropiada. ▶ Whoever gets the highest score gets a victory.. ▶ If you have a critical success and the other one does not, the victory is double. ▶ If the highest scores tie each other, no one wins and an unexpected twist happens depending on the scene. ▶ The first participant to get three (3) victories wins.
CONFLICTS (SEEKING TO HURT)
▶ It sets the scene, describes the environment in which the
conflict is taking place, creates temporal aspects and zones, determines who is involved and on which side. ▶ The gamemaster determines the initiative. ▶ The gamemaster determines the initiative. ▶ Start the first exchange: In your turn, perform an action and determine its outcome. In the others' turn, defend yourself or respond to their actions when necessary. When their turn has been played, start a new exchange. ▶ The conflict ends when all parties on one side are defeated or have surrendered.
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SET THE SCENE Establish what's happening, where everyone is and what the environment is like. Are there opponents? The gamemaster should write down a couple of time points - on a paper note or in digital format - and announce them to the game table. In addition, the director can also suggest temporary aspects. The gamemaster sets up zones, fairly freely defined areas that indicate where the group of characters are located. You can determine the zones based on the scene and the following indications:
▶ You can usually interact with other characters in the same
zone, or in nearby zones, if you can justify the way you act from a distance (for example, if you have a weapon from a distance or use some sort of gadget). ▶ You can move from one zone to another free of charge. You need an action to move if there is an obstacle in your path (such as someone trying to stop you) or if you want to move two or more zones. ▶ Sometimes it helps to draw a quick map with a few lines to represent the zones. INITIATIVE The initiative during a conflict is based on your skills and determines the order of performance of each character in the scene. As a gamemaster it is important to know how to manage the pace of fighting and interventions.
▶ In a physical conflict you will have to compare the skill of
Perception; in a mental one, that of Empathy. Whoever has the highest level of the skill in question will go first, and so on in descending order. ▶ If there is a tie, compare a secondary or tertiary skill. For physical conflicts they are Physical Instrument and Reaction. For mental ones, Volition and Rhetoric. ▶ There is a simple option for the gamemaster: choose your NPC with the best initiative and make all other NPCs act at the same time.
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THE EXCHANGES The exchanges of a conflict are a little more complicated than those of a competition. During an exchange, each character has a chance to act, while the gamemaster can make an action with each NPC she controls in the conflict. Most of the time you'll use your turn to attack or outflank your opponent, because that's the whole point of a conflict: to defeat your opponent or to change the situation in a way that makes it easier for you to defeat your opponent. However, if there is a secondary objective in the conflict scene you may need to roll the dice to make an overcoming action. This usually happens mostly when moving between areas where there is a time aspect that makes things difficult. However, you can only roll one skill roll in your turn to trade, unless you are defending against an action (you can do that as many times as you like). You can even perform defensive actions on behalf of others, as long as you meet these conditions:
▶ The maneuver you use to get between the attacker and the target must be reasonable. ▶ You will have to suffer the effects of any missed roll.
FULL DEFENSE If you want, you can give up your exchange action and concentrate on defending yourself.
▶ You can't do anything actively, but all your defensive actions in this exchange earn a +2.
STRESS AND CONSEQUENCES When an attack hits you, the difference between the attack roll and your defense roll represents the severity of the damage you suffer; this is measured in increments. When you are hit you have two options:
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▶ La maniobra que uses para interponerte entre tu atacante y su objetivo debe ser razonable. ▶ Tendrás que sufrir los efectos de cualquier tirada fallida
For example, if your opponent gets a +5 on his attack and you get a +3 on your defense, the attack deals two increases in damage (5 - 3 = 2). Fortunately, you have two (2) ways to absorb damage to keep fighting:
▶ Receive stress. ▶ Suffer a consequence. You can also surrender before you are defeated, which allows you to have some control over what will happen to your character. WHAT IS STRESS? If you have an attack -whether physical or psychologicaland you don't want to lose, you may decide to suffer stress. Stress represents your physical and emotional pain, whether it is from a superficial injury, or any other circumstance. On your character sheet there are a certain number of stress boxes available, each with a different magnification value and separated into two (2) categories: Health and Morale. Each character has a one (1) point and a two (2) points box, although depending on the level of some skills (Endurance for the Health and Volition for the Morale) you may receive additional boxes of higher level. Cross out one of the stress squares of equal or higher value than the attack, take one or more consequences, or combine both options. If you can't reduce the damage to zero, your character suffers an embarrassing defeat. You can only cross out one stress square each time you are hit, but you can cross out one stress square and accept one or more consequences at the same time. You can't cross out a square that has been crossed out before. After a conflict, after a break, delete the marked boxes.
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CONSEQUENCES The consequences are new aspects that you take to r strapping having received serious damage of some kind.The character sheet has three spaces to write down consequences. Each one represents a numerical value for the received damage: 2 (mild consequence), 4 (moderate consequence) or 6 (severe consequence). This represents the number of increments that the consequence absorbs. You can cross out, as many as you want, to absorb a single attack, but only if the space is blank. If you have already scored a moderate consequence, you cannot score another until you do something to make the first one go away. A serious drawback of the consequences is that each one is a new aspect that your opponents can invoke against you. The more you have, the more vulnerable you are. Also, just like with the temporary aspects, the character who creates them (in this case, the character who hit you) gets a free summoning of that consequence. You can also choose to have one of your allies use the free summon. EXTREME CONSEQUENCES In addition to the mild, moderate and serious consequences, each PC has one last chance to continue fighting: the extreme consequence. An extreme consequence can absorb up to eight (8) increases in one hit, but the cost is quite serious: you will have to replace one of your aspects (except the main concept) with the extreme consequence. Unlike with other consequences, you cannot use a recovery action to alleviate the extreme consequence. You will keep it, forever. After this happens, you can rename the extreme consequence to reflect that you are no longer so vulnerable, but you cannot change it to the aspect it replaced. Indeed, an extreme consequence is a permanent transformation; treat your character in this new form.
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SUMMARY OF CONSEQUENCES ▶ Mild: -2 to the value of the attack. ▶ Moderate: -4 to the value of the attack. ▶ Severe: -6 to the value of the attack. ▶ Extreme: -8 to the attack value and permanent change of an aspect of the character. PROBLEMS SOURCES Although most NPCs have such a minor role that even their name does not matter, this should not be the case, as they are a source of emotions for every NPC. We recommend that you create a character sheet for each one.However, if you prefer a more macho experience, you can follow this guide:
▶ Average NPCs: Two (2) aspects, two (2) average skills (+1)
and no stress boxes. ▶ Fair NPCs: Two (2) aspects, two (2) average skills (+1), one (1) fair skill (+2) and one (1) stress boxes. ▶ Good NPCs: Two (2) aspects, two (2) average skills (+1), two fair skills (+2), one (1) good skill (+3) and two (2) stress boxes.
HEALING
At the end of each scene, he erases all the stress boxes. Recovering from a consequence is a little more complicated; you must explain how you recover from it, either by a visit to the ER or by taking a walk to calm down or whatever makes more sense depending on the consequence. You should also wait for a sufficient period of time.
▶ Mild consequence: Delete it at the end of the scene,
whenever you have had a chance to rest. ▶ Moderate consequence: Delete it at the end of the guiding session, provided that the recovery makes sense within the story. ▶ Severe consequence: Delete it at the end of the adventure, as long as the recovery makes sense within the story.
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DIFFICULTY A scale (see The Scale) is used to score both, the value to be beaten on a dice roll and the skill competence of a character.
DIE ROLLS When you have to make a roll, take four (4) FATE dice and throw them.. Each + is equal to +1, each - is equal to -1 and each 0 is equatl to 0.Add them up. You can get between a +4 and a -4, although the most usual is to get a result between -2 and +2. The result of this roll is not the final result, since you will have to add your character's skill value to it.
THE POSSIBLE OUTCOMES The results of a die roll (value of the FATE dice plus the sum of the skill score) are compared with the difficulty (at the discretion of the gamemaster).
▶ Fail: if your die roll is less than the difficulty, you fail. This
is one of the following options: you don't achieve what you set out to do, you achieve it but at a high cost, or you suffer some negative consequence. ▶ Tie: if your roll is the same as the difficulty, you tie. You achieve what you set out to do, but you have to pay a lower cost or settle for a less satisfactory result. ▶ Success: if your roll is 1 or 2 increments higher than the the difficulty, you succeed. You achieve what you set out to do at no cost. ▶ Critical success: if your die roll is 3 or more increments higher than the difficulty, you have a critical success. In addition to achieving what you set out to do, you receive an additional benefit. In a nutshell, establish a difficulty with the scale. Roll four (4) FATE dice, add up your skill and compare.
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THE SCALE
+8
Legendary
+7
Epic
+6
Fantastic
+5
Superb
+4
Great
+3
Good
+2
Fair
+1
Average
+0
Mediocre
-1
Poor
-2
Terrible
EXPERIENCE People change or try it, your skills improve with practice. You accumulate life experiences that define your personality. These life experiences are called milestones. A milestone is a moment during the game when you have the opportunity to change or advance your character. A milestone is something that usually happens when the action of the story undergoes a major change: the end of a game, the end of an adventure, and the end of a campaign arc. Typically, these moments of change occur immediately after some significant event in the story that justifies the change of the character group. It could be an important plot detail, or a moment of uncertainty and suspense at the end of the game. It could be the defeat of your rivals or the total resolution of a plot at the end of the adventure. It could be the solution to one of the main issues, whose impact will affect everyone at the end of the campaign arc. Obviously, sometimes things will not be so clear, so the gamemaster has some freedom to decide when a milestone occurs and the level of it. If it seems right to say that it happens in the middle of a game, then go ahead, although it is advisable that progress is rare.
DEFINING MILESTONES Milestones have three levels of importance: significant, relevant and transcendent. SIGNIFICANT MILESTONE A significant milestone usually takes place at the end of a game session or when a part of the story is resolved. Instead of making your character more powerful, this kind of milestone changes your character (if necessary) in response to what is happening in the story.
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There will be times when taking advantage of a significant milestone doesn't make much sense, but there is always that possibility if you feel it is necessary. Once you reach a significant milestone, you can choose to do one (and only one) of these things:
▶ Switch the bonus of two skills with each other. ▶ Change the name of one (1) of your aspects, as long as it is not your main concept. ▶ Change one (1) stunt for a different one. ▶ Choose a new stunt and reduce your refresh if you have more than three (3).
RELEVANT MILESTONE A relevant milestone usually takes place at the end of an adventure or at the conclusion of an important event in the plot (or, if you are not sure, at the end of every two or three sessions). Unlike significant milestones, which mostly consist of change, relevant milestones involve learning new things; overcoming problems and challenges has made your character more capable. In addition to the benefits of a significant milestone, you also receive these two benefits:
▶ If you have a serious consequence from a minimum of two
(2) sessions, you can delete it. ▶ An additional skill point, which you can spend to buy a new skill at Average (+1) or increase an existing skill by one (1) level. You can move up one step in the scale when you spend the skill point, so you can use it to buy a new Average skill (+1) or use it to increase an existing skill by one (1) level, for example from Good (+3) to Great (+4). The skill score can never be higher than the limit set by the score of the associated attribute. You will read about it more specifically during the character creation.
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TRASCENDENT MILESTONES Significant milestones should only occur when something in the campaign turns upside down, such as the end of an important goal, the definitive defeat of rivals or any other large-scale change that affects the entire world in which you play. It modulates the scale, stopping an eviction is a transcendent milestone for a worker, gentrifying a mud is relevant for capitalists. These milestones are about gaining more power. Yesterday's challenges no longer scare the characters, and tomorrow's enemies will have to be more skilled and determined and better organized if they are to have a chance. Reaching a major milestone grants the benefits of a significant milestone and a relevant one, in addition to all of the following:
▶ If you have an extreme consequence, you can change the
name to reflect that you've overcome its aftermath. You will be able to take another extreme consequence in the future. ▶ Earn one (1) additional refresh point, which allows you to purchase a new stunt immediately; or save it and start each session with one (1) more Disco Chip. ▶ Improve, if you can, a skill beyond the skill ceiling. ▶ Change, if you wish, your main concept. Reaching a transcendent milestone is, in fact, a big deal. The characters who earn the most feats will have a diverse range of bonuses, which will make their skills more effective on the ground. Those who increase their recovery will have a greater reserve of destination points at the start of the game, which means that they will be more immune to the forces for a while. You should keep something in mind as a GM: when a player surpasses the top of a skill you'll have to switch enemies, because you'll need NPCs that can match the characters' skill and offer a worthy challenge.
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It won't happen right away, allowing you to introduce those more powerful enemies gradually, but if you play enough games, you'll end up with PCs with Epic or Legendary skill levels; the name of the level alone should give you a clue as to what kind of villain you'll have to resort to. A major milestone is, above all, a sign that your game world has changed quite a bit. It's likely that some of those changes will be reflected in the world, but after all the opportunities the PCs have had to transform their aspects in response to history, it's quite possible that you now have a very different set of priorities and concerns than you did at the beginning of the campaign.
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CHAPTER 3
CHARACTER CREATION
SACRED AND TERRIBLE FATE is a well suited for characters with anachronisms. Don't we have real cybernetic members and donkey carts operating in our time? Besides being a basic feature of reality -an anachronism is nothing more than time that does not fit the stereotype of it-, it is also a lovely creative tool, allowing a plethora of scenarios, but above all; hypothetical characters. Elysium is a window in a visiting room where elements of fantasy and science fiction come together. One comes as a visitor, the other resides inside this prison. Which one is not important. But there are leaks. Many leaks. When you are creating characters, keep in mind social, political and psychological issues (add some aesthetics perhaps, since we also love the world for its beauty) and start swinging. Keep swinging.
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Before your character starts to walk, remember that Elysium is a world of extremes. This means that whether you choose to take part in a conflict or not, whether you choose to play a lady in a wheelchair who talks a lot about cryptozoology or a boring moralist with a double life behind the scenes, either way, games work best when used to tell the stories of proactive, competent and -of course- dramatic people. These are the pillars of FATE, and while this role-playing game you're reading over magnetic tapes has part of the METRIC system developed by ZA/UM for Disco Elysium, they should serve as a compass rather than a foundation. Proactivity The characters must sweat proactively. They have a variety of skills that lend themselves to active problem solving, without emptying out when using them. They don't just wait for the solution to an existential crisis, but they go out and apply their energies -few of them-, taking risks and overcoming obstacles to achieve -or fail to- their objectives. This does not mean that they never plan or strategize, or that they hang a neon sign announcing that they are a shortcut of carelessly illiterate crypto-fascists. A thousand times, no. This only means that even the most patient will finally stand up and take action in a tangible and demonstrable way. Elysium demands that we take sides. Not to do so implies that they have taken it for you. Face it. In addition, every game session should give you an interesting opportunity to solve your problems, and have a variety of ways in which you can do so. A game in which intellectuals spend all their time between books learning things is not proactive. One in which they use some kind of forgotten knowledge to save - or condemn - the world is.
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FELD PLAYBACK FILM FELD MAGNETIC EMULSION FILM
FELD PLAYBACK FILM FELD MAGNETIC EMULSION FILM
STEP BY STEP
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This does not mean - by any stretch of the imagination - that they will always succeed, or that there will be unintended consequences. It only means that when they fail, it is not through a lack -unintentional- of preparation. A game about street artists trying to get into an art school and only getting their asses kicked all the time is not the way to go. A game about street artists becoming the art police is. Drama It's what every story needs. Dramatic lives. Every session you play should provide the potential and the opportunity to dramatize each character, and give you the chance to relate as a person. Because surprise! In SACRED AND TERRIBLE FATE you will be playing people. An adventure in which your character senselessly beats up an ever-increasing number of bigger and better equipped bad guys is not at all dramatic. When he resists wave after wave of loyalists soldiers because if he falls, his most loyal companion will become an orphan dog... that's dramatic. Play hard. Your characters also have interpersonal problems and struggle daily with them, and although the external circumstances of their lives may be much greater in scope than what we go through outside this fiction, you can still sympathise with your characters and the rest. This doesn't mean you have to spend all their time wallowing in misery or having their lives shaking up Elysium. It's more simple; their lives require you to make difficult decisions and live with the consequences. In other words, to be essentially like you and me. Real people, real protagonists. Real human beings living through the fiction imposed on their world.
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FELD PLAYBACK FILM FELD MAGNETIC EMULSION FILM
FELD PLAYBACK FILM FELD MAGNETIC EMULSION FILM
Competence The characters are competent beings. They may be clumsy and feel tiny when they try to do things one way, but that means they will be fully available, talented or trained to make visible changes in their world by other means. A game should treat the characters according to the risks and challenges they face.
ATTRIBUTES In SACRED AND TERRIBLE FATE there is a hidden scale behind every action. This determines how far each character has mastered, taking as a starting point the METRIC System -arguably the simplest system in the world- and adapting it to the mechanics of FATE. However, you already know this so... What defines each person who lives in Elysium? Their attributes and their skills. A certain psychological school -idealistic and reactionary- of the University of Koenigstein states that it is not possible to conceive a measurable scale of these factors. But this is not the case, at least not here. Attributes have a value between the one 1 and 6 and mark the natural learning cap of any skill. These numbers are also indicators that affect every die roll. This is a role-playing game, and while there are many ways to play and enjoy them, here you will need them. In particular, you will need FATE dice. Going back to the attribute and skill scores, not all mankind is made of the same material, but in the case of the Elysium people, four (4) Attributes are enough. Attributes cannot change. With practice, you will reach your potential, but since the moment your character is born, alea iacta est -as a not so mindless fascist said. The four (4) attributes are: Physique, Motorics, Psyche and Intellect. All of them are important, since they have a huge influence on your character's strengths and weaknesses. But most of all on how you expect her to behave. Exactly, skills add a certain flavor to your character's personality. You will soon discover that attributes operate more as modulators of your character's personality and the way she is expected to act, than as a measure of his virtues and vices. Especially vices. Indeed, an attribute at level 6 (and even level 4) should not only begin to bring out a number of advantages, but also a big bunch of associated difficulties. Especially if it has been at the expense of neglecting the other attributes with low scores.
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HOW ARE YOU? Hi, my name is Kim Kitsuragi, criminal investigation lieutenant in the 57th precinct of the Revachol Citizens Militia. I've been asked to help you with your paperwork. Don't worry, I'm here to brief you on the important parts of the identification process. It consists of the following sections to be completed: 1. Attributes There are four (4) attributes. You have twelve (12) points to distribute among them. 2. Skills There are twenty-four (24) skills. You have twenty (20) points to distribute among them. The score of the associated attribute indicates the limit of a skill. 3. Aspects You have five (5) aspects to define yourself. Each aspect can play in your favor, against you or be used by others.
▶ Character concept. ▶ Ideology. ▶ Secondary aspect. ▶ Secondary aspect. ▶ Secondary aspect. 4. Stunts You can choose three (3) to five (5) stunts. 5. Name You will need one.
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INTELLECT
The ability to analyze the data that emerge from the etymological origin of each concept, to wield words as a double-edged sword, to project a myriad of fascinating data, to have spatial vision, to channel emotions and to take advantage of the information that reality leaves apparent during a short period of time. A high score in intellect confers a security in what is learned. A low score will give inconsistent and superficial ideas.
PSIQUE
The psyche is the fuel that feeds abstract thought, that cultivates reflection, that keeps the engines of consciousness alive, avoiding the internal debacle that is typical of the human being. A high psyche score is unmistakable proof of great willpower that collides with a wild imagination. A low score blinds the character to reality, discourages him from asking himself new questions and ideas.
PHYSIQUE
Well, you're strong, but you're as hot as a racing car's engine, sometimes in an unstable and psychotic way. Your physique doesn't express itself in words, but when it does, it usually carries more weight in conversation. A high physique score needs to be tested and a lot of physical confrontation. A low score will make you feel the weight of gravity on your lungs.
MOTORICS
Force without control is worthless. Anyone who tries to make their way through the Elysium with a high motor score will hopefully be able to adapt and react elegantly. A low score is the equivalent of wandering aimlessly in a deadly wreck through inter-solar matter, except that that wreck is you and the world around you turns out to be as indifferent as the Pale himself.
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SHAPING IT Let's see with some examples how having a low attribute score affects. Oliver Svransky is distinguished by his disgusting score of 1 in PHYSIQUE. On his business trips he has suffered from the combined effects of the Pale. He is not well at all, his doctors -since he can afford private insurance- have bad news for him, his immune system is in a terminal and irreversible state. It will be very difficult -almost impossible, a miracle- for him to overcome this situation. The working class is crossing its fingers, and so is the competition. Now let's see how having a low score for an skill, limited by its attribute score, affects in the game. Sarah Fisher has always had a superhuman ability to think and analyze all the details of her environment. Her INTELLECT score is 5. She was the best engineer in her class. However, when dealing with a cabinet of bureau(c)rats with no training or interest in science, her position is in danger as her PSYCHE score is 2 and her AUTHORITY score is 0. She has a difficult time, however, aware of this fact, she decides to train in the dynamics of power within a company and her AUTHORITY score becomes 2.
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SKILLS The skills represent the character's virtues and weaknesses. Either way, they determine how you try to make your way through Elysium every day. Skills are linked to difficulty rolls, which come in two flavors. Sometimes failure can be an incentive to try again later, in the same way as initially intended. Other times it will simply mean that, a flat refusal by fate. The initial level of an ability is equal to your Attributes. You have twenty-four (24) skills, divided into groups of six (6) for each attribute. The maximum score you can assign to a skill is given by its associated attribute. For example, if your character's Physique score is two (2), you can't assign three (3) skill points to any of the skills corresponding to that attribute, at most two (2). Right? Okay. In SACRED AND TERRIBLE FATE, a skill plays a similar role to the Styles in FATE Acelerated. Each skill describes a family of abilities that are specific to certain personality types that your character has. You can interpret them as the Enneatypes of the tabloids or the personalities of psychoanalysis. In either case, the skills are the basis for everything your character does in the game that involves challenge and randomness (and die rolls). The higher the score, the better your character's skill and therefore its behaviour. Overall, your skill list gives you an idea of your character's action potential at a glance: what you excel at, what you are good at and what you are not. In FATE, skills are defined in two ways: in terms of the actions in the game that you can do with them, and the context in which you can use them. There are only a handful of basic game actions, but the number of potential contexts is infinite.
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ACTIONS When you make a skill roll you will be performing one of these actions: overtaking, advantage, attacking or defending.
OVERCOME O Overcome different objectives related to your ability.
ADVANTAGE C Create a certain temporary aspect / Take advantage of an existing aspect.
ATTACK A Damage another character or thing, or defeat it in a scene.
DEFEND D Avoid an attack or prevent someone from creating an advantage against you.
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INTELLECT SKILLS LOGIC Ocd
It allows you to exercise the raw intellectual power to deduce information from the world. Logic urges you to analyze your daily experiences. It allows you to gather facts, detect inconsistencies, and impress everyone with your surprising conclusions. It is the bread and butter of any investigation. It is the coffee that stimulates the search for new clues.
▶ Great for: analysts, rationalists and inquisitive minds. ▶ High score: allows you to solve the most complicated
puzzle. Although it can also make you a very proud person and therefore susceptible to intellectual flattery; blinded by your own brilliance, often missing important details. ▶ Low score: you will find it difficult to solve even the simplest puzzles, even with all the pieces available. Good luck putting them together.
ENCICLOPEDIA Oc
Invoke all your knowledge of the world to produce fascinating curiosities. The encyclopedia makes you a know-it-all person, making your mind a database of facts and historical records. It offers you a wealth of knowledge about all things related -and unrelated- to each question. What does this brand of cigarette have to say about the nationality of the person who is following us?
▶ Great for: freaks of curiosities and anecdotes. ▶ High score: your wealth of knowledge is overwhelming. While it can give you crucial insights, it will more often fill your mind with useless gossip. ▶ Low score: You will have to work only with the present. Without any historical knowledge, facing your future without knowing Elysium is going to be a difficult task.
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INTELLECT These are the six (6) skills linked to your INTELLECT. Each of them is represented on the character sheet with its name and the following images.
LOGIC
ENCICLOPEDIA
RETORIC
DRAMA
VISUAL CALC.
CONCEPTUAL.
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RETORIC Ocd
Practice the art of persuasion. Rhetoric urges you to debate, to be a punctilious person, to make an intellectual speech and win it, because you know it is a competition. This skill allows you to break down arguments and hear what people really want to say. Fallacies are detected as soon as they are used. Is that an ad-hoc argument to your neoliberal thesis? Was that double meaning intended? Anyway, the important thing is to make the public believe so.
▶ Great for: gurus, talkers and political figures. ▶ High score: you will become an impressive political beast
- one whose beliefs are impenetrable. That is, one whose mind will not change, one who will calcify. ▶ Low score: you will find it difficult to reject any argument. Confronting people with their testimonies will be almost impossible.
DRAMA Ocd
This is the role you've wanted so badly. Act, lie and detect the lies. The drama urges you to treat the world as a stage, with its entrances and exits, and in it, play multiple roles. It will allow you to lie, invent the most elaborate and wonderful stories; assume ingenious characters and perform scenic acts in a very entertaining amalgam of entanglements and deceptions, at least for you, of course. Besides, it allows you to recognize your tricks in the rest, their false antics, their unbearable victimhood. If they're lying, you'll know immediately.
▶ Great for: spies, method players, psychopaths. ▶ High score: Your performance will be insufferable, prone
to hysteria and paranoia, because to know that the world is a stage is to know that truth is pure vanity. ▶ Low score: You cannot lie or emotionally discern when others lie. And a person who can do neither is a person who will soon be buried six feet under.
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CONCEPTUALIZATION Oc
Understand and perceive the art in the world. This skill has a special role that it wants you to play in this world. It allows you to make new associations, to go deeper into the concepts of the world. From Jan Kaarp's postmodernist karperie, Revachol's arabesque architectural style, and even the HARDCORE concept, to then add your own contribution to these works.
▶ Great for: creative, disruptive and psychedelic minds. ▶ High score: makes you go -too- inspirated. It's ostentatious,
demands great displays. What if the Pale was just a side effect of our memories? We don't know, sometimes a kebab is just a kebab. What does that mean? ▶ Low score: you can't see through a creative light. You won't be able to contribute to conversations in an art gallery. Only boring people will invite you to their parties. Boring people with the depth of a puddle. .
VISUAL CALCULUS Oc
Reconstruct and visualize the moment Visual calculus allows you to create virtual models of scenes, of any situation, in your mind's eye. You'll see how a bullet broke the glass and follow its path with mathematical precision. You'll also count so many footprints, and at a glance you'll discern the size and design of the shoes, as well as the height, weight, and gender of the wearer.
▶ Great for: forensics, strategists and architects. ▶ High score: it makes the world reveal its secrets to you, but you may be so engrossed in your mental dilemma that you don't realize that thieves are stealing your pants right in front of you. Seriously, please. Just do something. ▶ Low score: your mind's eye will be blinded. Scene reconstruction and any attempt to move you to another place and time will be futile. Your world may extend beyond the present, but certainly not beyond six feet in front of you.
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PSYCHE SKILLS VOLITION Ocd
Hold on to your guns. Keep up the morale. The will drives you to be a good person, to others and to yourself. It allows you to resist temptation: whether in a bottle, between a pair of legs, or at the end of an iron bridge that promises oblivion. It gives you the will to face tasks and difficulties that affect your morale; one of the characteristics of your character.
▶ Great for: healthy, stoic and resilient people. ▶ High score: When you're about to mentally collapse, it
keeps you afloat. It's a bit of a buzzkill, so why fool yourself. ▶ Low score: you'll have low morale. Without it, you'll be a deeply unstable person, crumbling every day as you make irreversible mistakes...
INLAND EMPIRE Oc
Feelings and intuitions. Dreams in the awake life. Inland Empire is the unfiltered spring of imagination, emotion and foreboding. It is the sum of your emotions, dreams and unfiltered hunches. It allows you to grope your way through the invisible dimensions of reality, getting a glimpse of what neither science nor reason can see or understand. What is really going on? What do these enigmatic riddles mean for the fate of the world?
▶ Great for: dreamy and parapsychological minds. ▶ High score: Encourages the inanimate. You'll have conversations with your clothes, conversations that can change the course of your life if you don't get thrown in the psych ward first. The information you provide may be correct... in hindsight. ▶ Low score: Your head will be empty of imagination and character. So tell me, how will you shape the cosmos?
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PSYCHE These are the six (6) skills linked to your PSYCHE. Each of them is represented on the character sheet with its name and the following images.
VOLITION
INLAND EMPIRE
EMPATHY
AUTORITY
CONTACTS
SUGESTION
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EMPATHY Oc
Understanding others. Work with your mirror neurons. Empathy breaks into the soul of others and forces you to feel what's inside. It picks up subtle signals that indicate something else is happening under rational language. Because you know that there are details that language cannot reach. It allows you to notice social cues that other people may overlook. Perhaps a hidden sadness that you could get a little more out of, a strange joy from someone who should be grieving, or a seemingly harmless resentment that might come back later in the form of revenge.
▶ Great for: interviews, interrogations, psychologists. ▶ High score: puts you in other people's shoes. You will cry
for their sorrows, pound on the walls to relieve their anger, and share both their joy and their fury. In sickness and in health, until your huge -and of course egocentric- wounded heart separates you. ▶ Low score: you will be a gangly beast unable to talk to anyone without disturbing them, unable to read about a person beyond the depths of a paper. You better excel at something so that someone in society will tolerate you.
AUTORITY Ocd
Intimidate the public. Believe in your convictions and step forward. Authority urges you to assert and reassert your dominance over those around you. It also provides you with useful information on how to understand the various power dynamics within a group. It lets you understand the power dynamics of bully groups, how far you can push a perpetrator, and how to establish control of situations.
▶ Great for: leaders, teachers, law enforcement. ▶ High score: demands respect; even a perceived minimum could be a sufficient deterrent. ▶ Low score: you will always be in uncomfortable situations, such as when you have a psychological breakdown after being shouted at and laughed at by a group of teenagers.
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CONTACTS Ocd
Connect with the world, expand your agenda. Contacts is your "meanwhile, back at the ranch" skill. It allows you to bring your loved ones and acquaintances to the front lines, while fulfilling your tasks, drawing parallels throughout the Elysium. Not everything is about you. There are other stories that run parallel to yours, people who give up and get back on their feet.
▶ Great for: companies, detectives, the criminal world. ▶ High score: you will be the heart of your asymmetric
network of contacts, operating retroactively. Always with the courage -or recklessness- to attend. Regardless of your situation. ▶ Low score: you will be flying blind, unable to understand the discreet comments that colleagues make in high-risk situations; comments that could save your life. .
SUGESTION Oc
Charming men and women. Play the puppeteer. Suggestion is a mild degree of coercion, a soft power approach. If people think they want what you want, you've already won. This skill allows you to implant ideas in the minds of others. You can make the public worship you. You can also turn gangsters against each other; after all, many crime rings have been broken by a little doubt.
▶ Great for: diplomacy, seduction and for sociopaths. ▶ High score: makes you friendly with everyone and more
resistant to their charms in turn. But all that gossiping, oozing charm will make you slimy. And you'll know it, even if no one else does. ▶ Low score: you'll have difficulty getting along with others. There's no place for you, they tell you with their silence. Where is that place? You beg with yours. What good is everything you have to say if no one notices you? Welcome to capitalism.
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PHYSIQUE SKILLS ENDURANCE Ocd
Take the hits. Don't let the world kill you. Resistance is your metabolism and your circulatory system. Improve your health, one of the two characteristics of your character. It allows you to survive physical pain. Who cares if you can't point a gun, if you can take a few bullets? Why be afraid of drugs that damage your health if you are a very, very resistant person?
▶ Great for: punching bags, athletes, human batteries. ▶ High score: allows you to take a few knocks on the head, enjoy more drugs, and get rid of a few heart attacks. Makes you a powerful person, who looks down on the weak who can't keep up. ▶ Low score: you may well have - great - difficulties. The body is already fragile, and its fragility will often be tested. And if you don't pass the test, you die.
PAIN THRESHOLD Ocd
Shrugging off the pain. They will have to hurt you more. Threshold of pain ignore the damage so you can go on, with blood and crawling, to the bitter end. It allows you to deny the damage you would otherwise take. Even the mental pain, the anguish and the loneliness. In fact, these things can become an emotion that is perversely seen and enjoyed.
▶ Great for: prophets, masochists, fighters. ▶ High score: provides a barrier to pain that turns against you in a seriously unhealthy way, with completely selfdestructive behavior. ▶ Low score: you will suffer too easily. Even a mosquito bite will feel like childbirth, even a glance of laziness can tear your soul apart.
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PHYSIQUE These are the six (6) skills linked to your PHYSIQUE. Each of them is represented on the character sheet with its name and the following images.
RESISTENCIA
PAIN THRESHOLD
PHYSICAL INST.
ELECTROCHEMISTRY
SHIVERS
HALF-LIGHT
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PHYSICAL INSTRUMENT Oca
Flex your powerful muscles. Enjoy healthy organs. The physical instrument is not only the muscles and skeleton, but the ability to use them effectively. It allows you to do push-ups, sit-ups, knockout punches and 360-degree spin kicks. It's a unique solution for thriving and surviving in the physical world.
▶ Great for: Mountaineers, athletes and gymnasts. ▶ High score: you break doors, chains and bones, and make
fun of the weak who can't. But it's not just violence. You can use this skill to inspire others and pass on your motivation. ▶ Low score: you will find it difficult to impose on anyone who is not seriously ill or has died. In fact, engaging in physical combat could leave you -yes, you- in either state.
ELECTROCHEMISTRY Oca
Go to Party Planet. Love and embrace your pulsating emotions. Electrochemistry is the animal within you, the beast that longs to be released to indulge and enjoy. Measure your addiction to emotions. Be careful, as it governs the hormonal response, without any filter. It is the remnant of our reptilian brain and limbic system. If you need to understand a chemical breakdown, someone who has lost their mind, or understand the sexual dynamics, electrochemistry will be there to guide you.
▶ Great for: bodies brimming with pure hedonism. ▶ High score: makes you a person of unbridled pleasure, an
unrepentant devotee who stares at people with a speed bottle and a plastic straw in each hand, unable to keep from getting lost on the dance floor. ▶ Low score: you will be too innocent to be practical. Too serene and not given to crossing unsuspected boundaries. Without a working knowledge of drugs and sex, the city will be difficult to understand.
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SHIVERS Oc
Lift the hair on your neck. Tune in to the city. The chills come when the temperature drops and you become more aware of your surroundings. It allows you to hear the city itself, to really belong on the streets. It's a supernatural ability; old mistakes manifest themselves in the present, scenes of the city follow one another in front of you. But who's talking to you? Obviously, it is you, the city.
▶ Great for: characters from a film noir. ▶ High score: lets you see where all the roads meet. The
depths of the ocean where all hope sank looking for you. Move through the silence and find in that corner - in a windowless room - the truth. You don't listen to anyone else, you are in another conversation that tells you that fear is lurking. ▶ Low score: you rarely hear the city talking to you, and if you can't hear it, how can you save it? .
HALF-LIGHT Oc
But although the Logos (λóγος) is common, almost everyone lives as if they had a particular intelligence (φρόνησιν). It allows you to feel the way situations are about to change. It injects a palpable fear into your heart, a fear that urges you to act before it is too late; a fear that makes you afraid of others.
▶ Great for: End Time Adventists. ▶ High score: the pale one makes you absorb the memories of others, reflecting a breakdown of individuality in a kind of unconscious gestalt mind of the universe that contains all memories. Terrifying and delirious. To the rest of the world you are simply the kind of person who goes around preaching that "no one - except you - knows what reality is really like. ▶ Low score: you will find that you lack survival instincts and your methods will be weak. Static. Mummies. But fire, when it comes, will judge... and will condemn all things.
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MOTORICS SKILLS COORDINATION Ocad
All set? Point and shoot. The Coordination loves the interaction between you and the things that fly in the air. It allows you to take coins from mob bosses, shoot straight and understand guns. It also allows you to manage your body with style, grace and panache from avoiding dropping a tray of food to stopping the timer just as the bullet passes the mark, without slow motion.
▶ Great for: shooters, jugglers, living measuring machines. ▶ High score: makes you deadly, assuming you have a gun in
your hand. Each extremity of your body is an entity of its own that spins like an engrossed dervish. Beware of losing sight of what is beyond your surroundings. ▶ Low score: I'm only going to ask you one thing, for f*ck's sake, don't call someone from the audience to do the game of Wilhelm Tell and the apple. It's not funny.
PERCEPTION Ocd
See, hear and smell everything. Don't let any detail go unnoticed. Perception wants you to be open to the world, with your eyes, ears and nose working at full capacity. It allows you to take in what others do not notice. The little wad of bills always hidden in the sugar bowl; the smell of a criminal, hidden under the floorboards; the drink of a suspect, after claiming they have nothing to hide.
▶ Great for: urban trackers and scavengers ▶ High score: takes every final detail of the physical world,
enough to overwhelm everyone except the strongest mind. ▶ Low score: you'll miss out on everything. After all, the world is a matter of perception. You cannot stop what you cannot see, hear, or smell.
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MOTORICS These are the six (6) skills linked to your MOTORICS. Each of them is represented on the character sheet with its name and the following images.
COORDINATION
PERCEPTION
REACTION
SAVOIR-FAIRE
INTERFACE
COMPOSURE
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REACTION Ocd
The fastest to react. An untouchable person. The speed of reaction is the agility of your body and mind. It's instinct. It allows you to dodge punches, a vehicle, bullets. It also dodges verbal punches. Your cunning also wants to play, you will never get lost in words or lack a witty touch. Your alertness allows you to connect small details on the fly, working in tandem with your intellectual abilities.
▶ Great for: rap artists and special agents. ▶ High score: your reflexes are extremely good. However,
when your body acts before your mind, innocent situations can quickly turn bad. You're all about nerve, you're too alert. ▶ A low score: you will not be the first person to act, possibly not even giving you time to carry out an action.
SAVOIR-FAIRE Ocd
Sneaking under his nose. Stun with immense panache. Savoir Faire urges you to be better than you are: he urges you to follow the precepts of Disco style. Slip in with the others in Samarian boxing style, then jump out from behind with unexpected stunts. It allows you to move with quiet steps to make a good rhythm, and uncover useful evidence without other people noticing. It also makes you an amazing person, whose style will certainly impress the public. It's an indicator of style and subterfuge.
▶ Great for: sneaky, naughty people. ▶ High Score: will make you the most dumb and stylish
person. No one will see you until you decide; and then, they'll get the whole show, whether they want it or not. ▶ Low score: you will be a clumsy, unsportsmanlike and elusive person. Unable to deal with issues of social etiquette for your benefit. Unable to deal with what all the magazines call glamour.
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INTERFACE Oc
Mastering the machines. Opening locks and pockets. Interface wants you to connect to the machines: to use them and improve them, because that makes you a better human organism. It allows you to understand your interactions with machines, whether it's repairing the engine of a Kineema car, analyzing how a suspect used a pen, or configuring electrical circuits. It even allows you to steal keys from a keychain without being noticed.
▶ Great for: Machinists, craftswomen, instrumentalists. ▶ High score: it will isolate you from society. Why bother
with people when you can talk to machines? And why bother with things like money when you can pocket that sandwich by cheating the machine? ▶ A low score: technology is a routine part of our daily lives. Face it, you need to upgrade and stop feeling sorry for living in your bubble of incompetence. .
COMPOSURE Ocd
Straighten your back. Keep your poker face. Composure wants you not to break: or, at least, it wants you not to break in front of other people. It allows you to put up a strong front. It keeps your emotions hidden from the world. Plus, it makes you look good while you're doing it. You're going to make that disco suit a lot more attractive if you don't slouch.
▶ Great for: winning at poker, military and listeners. ▶ High score: you'll play your heart out and keep a stern
expression. Even if you go to bed late at night, when no one else can see you, you'll have to keep it up. You will never be able to give yourself an emotional break and let your guard down. You will suffer a lot. ▶ Low score: you will always be the first person to break. Every person has a point where all that fear and anger spills out of the glass. Unfortunately, your glass is more like a glass plate five microns deep.
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ASPECTS Aspects are little phrases -maybe even some advertising slogans or famous quotes- that add layers of definition to your character. Be careful, because these simple phrases have the power of a U-pile. Seriously, there's no uranium in the aspects, but they do have something that makes them glow. They not only explain who you are, but what you want. They make the difference between being and the power of being something or someone in Elysium. Think about your favorite fictional character. Exactly, detective Dick Mullen. There are several novels about this character on every shelf in Elysium, many vary in color and type of cover, but in its pages he is always described with phrases like "a respectable detective from Vespertine", "the best instructor to be a detective", "capable of faking his own death to solve the case" and a long etcetera. Although, sometimes, his character or some relevant fact can be glimpsed not by descriptions, but by the very title of the book "Dick Mullen and the Wrong Identity" or "The Fearless Dick Mullen". The aspects complement the attributes and skills. An aspect like "I am a woman with a fork and my world is a soup" could mean anything. It could give a bonus to living against the tides, but it also opens up the possibility of a person being overwhelmed by their existence, and if your world and mine have taught us anything, it's that it's lucky to bring together the material and emotional conditions to have an open dialogue with someone. Keep these three characteristics always in mind. THE THREE PILARS OF AN ASPECT Each aspect is made up of three elements: the invoke, the mark and the compel. Invoke gives you a specific advantage when rolling the dice. The mark is a disadvantage that will be used against your character. Finally, other player can compel an aspect to make your character act on the way it does, for better or worse.
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THREE PILARS Hello again. This part is important and I thought it would be good if you knew what and what the three reasons for an aspect are. To begin with, a distinction is made between mechanics and narrative. The first concerns the roll of the dice and the second the flow of shared fiction. Namely, the motifs of an aspect are the following:
△ INVOKE
Invoking an aspect gives you a mechanical advantage when performing an action. Play to your advantage.
▽ MARK
When they mark your aspect, your character has a mechanical disadvantage when it comes to performing an action.
⚭ COMPEL
When your aspect is compeled, your character's behavior is limited to the description you gave of that aspect.
EXAMPLE CRYPTOZOOLOGIST GURU
△ INVOKE
To track clues about paranormal animals. ▽ MARK Hiding your identity is not going to be easy. ⚭ COMPEL Obsessed with uncovering what science is hiding.
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DISCO POINTS All players have a set of points called Disco Points that they can use to influence the narrative. Disco Points are a measure of the amount of influence you have to make the story unfold in favor of your character. You start with a certain amount of Disco Points in each game session, depending on your refresh capacity. In addition, you will get that amount back if you finish a session midway through the adventure and have a lower number of Disco Points than your refresh rate. In this world, the house always wins. It can be tough, but it doesn't make it unfair. So the gamemaster, unlike the rest of the gaming table, will have a reserve of these Points to spend on each scene. Three (3) points to be exact. When your aspects come into play, you will usually spend or earn a Disco Point depending on the three pillars that define each aspect.
△ INVOKE
Each aspect can be invoked free of charge once per session. Subsequent invocations will cost you one (1) Disco Point. Invoking an aspect allows you to add a +2 to your action after the roll or repeat the roll.
▽ MARK
Marking an aspect will cost you one (1) Disco Point that will go to the reserve of the marked character. That is, if you are marked, you will earn one (1) Disco Point. Marking an aspect penalizes the action with a -2 before the die roll.
⚭ COMPEL
Forcing an aspect will cost you one (1) Disco Point that will go to the reserve of the forced character. In other words, if they mark your look you will earn one (1) Disco Point. Compel may be rejected, but it will cost you two (2) Disco Points. It is important not to mix invoke, mark, and compel. Each one at its own time and in favor of fiction.
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TYPES OF ASPECTS The five (5) aspects that define your character are classified in three (3) types -categories if you prefer- that give a focus to your alter ego situation in Elysium. These are the main concept, the ideology and the secondary aspects. MAIN CONCEPT Your main concept is the phrase that summarizes what your character is about, who it is and what it does. It's the main aspect, the first and the most important. Think of this aspect as your job, your vocation or your life plan. Examples: Revacholian software engineer, Mesque bookstore owner, bass player in a funk band, Oranje governmental spy, Yekokataa ex-liquidator, etc. IDEOLOGY In Elysium there are several ideologies that are the result of the last few decades that have been so convulsed. You do not have to stick to them, if you see interesting that another one germinates for the sake of new social conflicts, go ahead. In Elysium there is moralism, communism, fascism, ultraliberal ideology and the feminist movement. There are some others, but may be so underground right now. SECONDARY ASPECTS The following three aspects are aimed at completing your character's brushstrokes. There is no limitation, from an old friendship, an intimate desire, some touching memory, your favorite song, an absurd fact or a painting in a bad station that captivated you. Will you be a depressive bass player or a cuddly one? You may have put your problems in order, but that doesn't stop someone from blaming you for your past mistakes. What is your character's sexual orientation? Elysium needs to know. So you'll choose to be a real estate agent concerned with ethical consumption under capitalism? There's no such thing, but good luck trying to justify a positive aspect of it.
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Cuno knows all sorts of s#!&. Cuno's not a snitch, that's all.
Words are fucking s #!&, make you stupid! Cuno's got own words now -- Cuno-words.
THOUGHT CABINET
THE IDEAS On the next pages, you'll find thirty-six (36) ready-to-use aspects that can help you as examples or even as a source of inspiration. Elysium is a world of extremes that requires you to take part. Mold your character in a responsible way. After all, ideas are as vengeful as the Furies, and they've come home.
THE F#!& DOES
CUNO
?
CARE
THE FURIES The Furies are at home in the mirror; this is their address. Even the clearest water, if it's just deep enough, it can drown. No Truce with the Furies, R.S. Thomas.
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KINDNESS WITHOUT BORDERS
An authentic person, her compassion knows no limits and she is kind and peaceful with everyone, even with her rivals. Violence does not end up germinating in your heart. This kindness is typical of future Innocences. △ INVOKE Compassion flows from your heart like a waterspring. ▽ MARK It's hard for you to get angry, you lack that spark. ⚭ COMPEL You're nice to everyone, even with your adversaries..
BROKER OF THE NEOLIBERAL CLAN
If you have a shitty ideology cooking, don't worry, just repeat after me: taxeation is theft. It's better to use the term Indirect Taxation Methods. Preach about tax havens, free up the millionaire's income.. △ INVOKE You're very expensive when you sell and it works. ▽ MARK The masses don't care about your first world problems. ⚭ COMPEL You keep preaching the goodness of the free market.
THE SORRIEST PERSON ON ELYSIUM
You let life get the better of you. All the gifts your parents gave you, all the love and patience of your friends, you drowned in a neurotoxin. You let misery win. And it will keep winning until you die... or you get over it. △ INVOKE So many disappointments, you see the blows of fate coming. ▽ MARK You find it difficult to assert yourself to others. ⚭ COMPEL You feel like a pitiful, penitent, flagellant waste.
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REALLY RABID TRADNOSTAGIAN
They fucked up the world, they killed it! The liberals, the Wümen and the socialists. A good strong state must emerge, a beautiful and serene place of mystery and peace, without hysteria or fragility and, of course, without ankle britches. △ INVOKE Always ready to attack that scum (everyone). ▽ MARK You can't focus when someone challenges your honor. ⚭ COMPEL You get angry in the presence of other ideologies.
FOLLOW A FEMINIST AGENDA
Something is moving in you. Is it a newly formed reaction to the tyrannical gender roles around you, or something you've always had? One thing is certain: these are ideas aimed at undermining the pillars of society. That's cool, always.. △ INVOKE You know the weak points of heteropatriarchy. ▽ MARK The normative dynamics block any interest. ⚭ COMPEL You will fight an injustice no matter what the status quo is.
EIGHTH SEAL OPENER
You woke up and started rambling about the end of the world. It's not your usual cry of doom, something colossal is coming. It's not the fire. It's not ash. A cavity where everything will fade and recede. You're not kidding. △ INVOKE You can see the signs of the terrible end coming. ▽ MARK Please stop speaking in ancient Greek. It's a dead language. ⚭ COMPEL You need to tell the world its end, no matter where or when.
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DISTURBINGLY BORING
Well, you seem to have a little bit of the usual in you. You've spent most of your life searching every corner of your personality. But you have found it, and now you're not only crazy, but also disturbingly boring. △ INVOKE Your first job is to keep a low profile, the other is boring. ▽ MARK Why is it so hard for you to put crazy ideas in your head? ⚭ COMPEL You're as boring as unspontaneous.
ARTIST'S LICENSE HOLDER
You use an army of adjectives to represent and degrade the mediocrity of other works. Trivial, artificial, mediocre, amateur, childish, gonorrheic cliché, ode to conformity, crime, pedantic, wildly boring, etc. △ INVOKE New forms of Art are made in the moment. ▽ MARK If you keep yelling with your hands, put the gun down. Now. ⚭ COMPEL You need to review everything, because Art is everywhere.
MAZOVIAN COMMUNIST BUILDER
People think that communism was a crazy idea that got its due 40 years ago. A fever that shook the world, never to return. They were right... until you woke up, those shit-eating billionaires will pay. △ INVOKE You've taken the dialectic to a new level. ▽ MARK Communism is extinct, it's not attractive. I'm sorry. ⚭ COMPEL A true communist always gives the strongest hugs.
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THE WORLD'S MOST LAUGHABLE CENTRIST
Anxiety is powerful, but democracy is subtle. What is this change in the wind? It's democracy, it's coming in the blimps of the Moralintern. Is there something sinister about it? No, God is in heaven and this is its Kingdom of Consciousness. △ INVOKE By honoring your goddess; the equidistance. ▽ MARK Your survival instincts are ashes. ⚭ COMPEL You don't lose your temper and maintain the status quo.
ENEMY OF THE PHYSICAL REALM
This world is holding you back. Containers, mailboxes, doors, chairs. Atoms conspire against you. But don't worry, the Anti-Objects Brigade has gathered and you're their avenging angel, ready to take on these dark beings. △ INVOKE Your pain threshold for hitting objects has increased. ▽ MARK You're having a hard time stopping your Luddite frenzy. ⚭ COMPEL Even if you can knock on the door, you knock it down.
THE MOST HONORABLE OF THIS TOWN
You are not alone. Honor is your family. You ain't no house. Courage is your home. Dignity is your desire. Humility, your friend. Dishonor, your enemy. This is your vow of honor. Doing the right thing is the reward. △ INVOKE The respect that your actions inspire honors you. ▽ MARK Lies are the greatest kind of dishonor. ⚭ COMPEL You tell the whole truth, without hiding any details.
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NOT SO SIMPLY EVIL
In reality it is simple, either they have not understood that power is not shared or they prefer to ignore that fact. Either way, they're in your way. They cannot judge you for having an aspiration to fulfill. No matter what it costs. △ INVOKE Al hacer sufrir a quienes se interponen en tu camino. ▽ MARK A veces la sed de poder se apodera de ti. ⚭ COMPEL Te verás obligada a dejar atrás a tus seres queridos.
RED CARPET WALKER
You're a metaphorical superstar. You bring that authenticity and passion of rock and roll to a line of work where people don't expect -or want- to see it. To all these people you say: fuck off and get bored with your lives. △ INVOKE Influencing others is easy, it's just acting. ▽ MARK You can't fool yourself all the time. ⚭ COMPEL Fame makes you lose your mind and you will regret it.
REMOTE VIEWERS DIVISION
Close your eyes. Let your mind wander. A sharp pain fills your body as the Inner Eye opens to a cascade of presences, but you made it. You have entered the vault of extrasensory knowledge of exotic matter. △ INVOKE You find it easy to see through the paranormal. ▽ MARK You're naive if you think anything exotic is real. ⚭ COMPEL You share your crazy ideas out loud.
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PALEWALKER
In the Pale, the ocean melts, becoming a tangle of sines and cosines, the mountain range becomes a sharp-angled azimuth. A blank space with no point of reference where it is only possible to swallow saliva. △ INVOKE You move easily through the Pale. ▽ MARK Travels have left you with collective social traumas. ⚭ COMPEL You need to go back to the Pale and go through it, again.
PILLAR OF THE STATUS QUO
Choosing the right words at the right time is vitally important. Putting them in the right place at the right time is a premium pass to great favors. Knowing the rules means knowing when to break them, but you must be careful. △ INVOKE You know the protocol in a certain situation. ▽ MARK You don't know what to do if someone breaks these rules. ⚭ COMPEL Even if your life is at stake, you never break protocol.
BANKRUPTCY SEQUENCER
Businesses love the silence, the second loudest sound in the world, only eclipsed by the collective cries of the victims at the fall of the markets. Failure is a basic principle of liberalism. It escapes the Law. △ INVOKE Economic crises are your time for sales. It's free real state. ▽ MARK It's layoff season. Quick, next please. ⚭ COMPEL You've just gone into another business breakdown.
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RACIAL THEORY THEORIST
A mass of fantastic races swirls around: pygmies, kojkos, mauns, etc. It's so anachronistic. Phylogenetics seems distant and, to be fair, a little ridiculous. Now you understand the mystery of the Great Race, whatever that is. △ INVOKE Maybe this "racial" thing will lead you to new concepts. ▽ MARK You want to deceive, but your theory is an absurd deception. ⚭ COMPEL You're basically an idiot, certified by the Academy.
INCARNATION OF THE BOIADEIRO
With a gun in one hand and an unfiltered cigarette between your lips, these beings made their own rules. What would it take for you to become like that too? Smoking, the smell of coffee passing over a chestnut-flavored cigarette. △ INVOKE You can steal my heart with that sweet talk. ▽ MARK All that lonely stuff makes people pass you by. ⚭ FORZADO You need to have a cigarette. Now.
PHYSICAL INSTRUMENT TRAINER
So you were minding your own business, when suddenly a voice came from inside you and said SHUT UP NAMBYPAMBY! This train of thought ended abruptly. Today it's your turn to do legs! △ INVOKE Every pore in your body oozes motivation in bulk. ▽ MARK You haven't formed yourself intellectually at all. ⚭ COMPEL No matter what you're doing, it's time to make legs excercise.
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COL DO MA MA DAQUA LISTENER
You heard it. You're sure you did. Well, maybe not so sure, hoping, perhaps, to have heard that invisible bird. So far you've sharpened your ear so much that your skin is picking up the vibrations of these mechanical waves. △ INVOKE Your hearing is at the pinacle of the evolution. ▽ MARK You can't concentrate much more when you hear everything. ⚭ COMPEL You're gonna hear things you don't want to hear.
THE UNIQUE DETECTIVE COSTEAU
Saying that fictitious name feels like you're tasting a lemon meringue while sitting on the terrace of a cafe on the coast. It's not you, but you look alike. Sophisticated, an expert in antiquity, art and culture. △ INVOKE You're outgoing and refined with your research colleagues. ▽ MARK New technologies get away from you very easily. ⚭ COMPEL You have to respect the old ways.
WITH THE FINGER ON THE EJECT BUTTON
Who hasn't thought about disappearing? Well, some people don't, but it makes you feel alive and think about how much you'll be missed. You have nothing to lose and you act on it, but you should get help. △ INVOKE You have nothing to lose and you're very clear about that. ▽ MARK When you're faced with a conflict between characters. ⚭ COMPEL You will leave the safe path and take the risky one.
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CHAINED WITH THE RED CURTAINS
Someone's been dancing a tune in your dreams, looking for something. Tidying up, rearranging, not looking past those red curtains. What if you didn't lose your memories? What if someone kept them behind those immovable curtains? △ INVOKE That information was looking for you. ▽ MARK For some reason the electricity terrifies you. ⚭ COMPEL That song, isn't it too dreamy? You feel like dancing.
EXPERT IN THE WORLD OF MILLIONISM
You imitate the sexual practices of Guillaume Le Million, but you haven't died -yet- of autoerotic asphyxiation, hanging from a tree, amidst drugs and unhealthy objects while Sylvia Trainor's Wonderland song was playing. △ INVOKE It's harder to hurt you, since you practice it for pleasure. ▽ MARK This is not a matter of art, nor eros. You're out of your mind. ⚭ FORZADO It's time for the C!#% Charrousel, chu! chu!
LOVER OF HARDCORE AESTHETICS
Not only have you internalized the HARDCORE aesthetic, but you have also contributed to it. What are we talking about? Drugs, let's face it. Not just amphetamines and pyrholidon. You mean it with "LOVE IS HAAARD-wait for the drop-CORE." △ INVOKE This dance is really amazing. Your soul is immense. ▽ MARK F#!%o grammar and semantics. You don't speak well. ⚭ COMPEL You're going to need another dose of HARDCORE.
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LGTB+ UNDERGROUND ACTIVIST
It's late at night, they talk quietly on dark corners. A radical cell conspiring against the social order. How will they achieve their sinister, world-altering goals? And most importantly... Are you one of them? You might be. Maybe you've forgotten. △ INVOKE You're a great listener, and your speech dazzles. ▽ MARK When they discover your plan to destroy the family model. ⚭ COMPEL There's something strange in the way your body language.
DIAGNOSED WITH JAMAIS VU
Nombre tras nombre y ninguno de ellos es familiar. Parecen reales, pero algo está mal. Jamais vu. Lo contrario de déjà vu.Todo lo que debería ser familiar parece extraño y nuevo. Es como un recuerdo de la infancia, solo que en el presente. △ INVOKE Los conceptos aparecen con mayor velocidad. ▽ MARK Ningún conocimiento general te es familiar. ⚭ COMPEL Admites que todo te resulta ajeno y no recuierdas nada.
DWELLER OF THE LONESOME LONG WAY HOME There, at the end of a pine lined street: a small house, no bigger than a matchbox. 11 Voyager Road. You don't live there anymore. Those times are gone, and so are those people. Don't settle into the nostalgia of the distant. △ INVOKE Everything you know you've lived in the spotlight all these years. ▽ MARK There are things that are better left unsaid about you. ⚭ COMPEL You can't avoid going back to those memories.
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MAGNESIUM-BASED LIFE FORM
The carbon lifeforms are over. Humanity must no longer depend on slow background radiation to further our genetic destiny. This is the age of guided evolution, and magnesium is the key. Take the first step. △ INVOKE Your nerve ramifications are more resistant. ▽ MARK As your nerves are stronger, you feel less chill. ⚭ COMPEL Ok, biology doesn't work like that, but one dose can't hurt.
MOTORWAY SOUTH DRIVER
The solitary vector extends in your mind's eye to the Pale wilderness all along the way. At an unreachable distance, forgetting and forgetting. Until you can no longer remember anything. A lost piece of the person you were. A dark hope. △ INVOKE Paranormal concepts are not so hurtful. ▽ MARK You've lost a bit of sight of your surroundings. ⚭ COMPEL It's 5:00 a.m., far from sleep, time to drive.
INSULINDIAN MIRACLE WANNABE
Nothing will change in the light! Colours like grey and brown. I found a white spot on the white. Everyone else looked up: What a beautiful day! What beautiful weather! But all I heard was the printing press. That's strange. △ INVOKE You are fascinated by exploring new places. ▽ MARK When you've been in the same place for a long time. ⚭ COMPEL You will take an unknown route out by necessity.
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BORN IN A PRECARIOUS WORLD
It seems the object of this game is to win. The absence of defeat on all fronts. How can we not lose? It's impossible not to. The world is balanced on the edge of a knife. It's a game of frayed nerves. Keep fighting. △ INVOKE You have a sharp and adaptable mind. ▽ MARK You have trouble empathizing because you've suffered . ⚭ COMPEL Surrender is a class privilege to which you do not belong.
RAISED BETWEEN KEYS AND SCREENS
Human relationships are abstract and open to ambiguous interpretations. It does not have the mechanical means to last a decade, let alone a lifetime. Machines are not like that, they are just noises and clicks that work. △ INVOKE You have implants, you're one with the machines. ▽ MARK The human language is not a business of your own. ⚭ COMPEL You're not going to stop refining the timing of your code.
WEAR LE DEUIL BLANC IN YOUR HEAD
You see yourself from above. Even from this distance you can see your eyelids fluttering. You rise above the world. Sitting with white flowers on the windowsill. You can smell them from up here, it's horrible. A white mourning. △ INVOKE Your view extends across all axes of space. ▽ MARK You lose the reaction to respond to what's close. ⚭ COMPEL You stay stuck in the middle of any situation..
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STUNTS Stunts are tricks, maneuvers or techniques that your character knows or has and change the way a skill works. This usually means that you receive a bonus in certain situations. A stunt can also represent specialized equipment, or quality and/or exotic items that your character has access to and that often give they an advantage. Stunts changes your character's skills. You receive three (3) free stunts, but can choose up to two (2) more at the cost of reducing your ability to refresh by one (1) for each you choose above the initial value. The reasoning goes like this: the more strunts you know how to do, the more you will need to accept compel to earn Disco Points. Making stunts can take time, so you can choose them now and choose others along the game sessions. STUNTS AND REFRESH Each stunt above the third reduces your character's Disco Points refresh by one (1). HOW TO DESIGN A STUNT? For this task, follow these two general guidelines:
▶ Because I am/have [describe something that makes
you exceptional, an item, an special element of your team or anything else that allows you to do formidable things], I get a +2 for [choose an action: Attack, Defend, Advance, Overcome] when using [a skill] when [describe a situation].
▶ Because I am/have/can [describe something that makes you exceptional, allows you to do something amazing or shows how formidable you are in some way], once per session I can [describe what you can do].
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INVENTORY As described above in the design of prowess, an object -a common item or a potential oddity- is considered as a stunt. This may sound a bit authoritarian, but as a member of the RCM I am obliged to remind you that even if you need medication you must stick to the recommended daily dose, that wherever you go your gun has limited ammunition and -unless we are returning to the State of Emergency- you cannot just go around there shooting. No, it is not an attack on your individual liberties. These laws are necessary for them to prevail in fact. Don't abuse your belongings and yes, by abuse I mean all kinds of recreational substances, legal and illegal. Items can be very diverse, from a Kupris vehicle, soundproofing helmets, to a range of ties and certain weapons. However, I will illustrate two (2) examples of stunts I have met during the service.
EXAMPLE RISING SUN BADGE Because of this badge you receive a +2 for Advantage when using Authority with Loyalists. ROUGON-MACQUART 0.9 Because I own almost all the net worth among a group of individuals, once per session I can bend the light around me.
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HEALTH AND MORALE Each character has two (2) stress counters. The health counter absorbs the physical damage, and the morale counter takes care of the mental damage. The more squares a Stress Counter has, the more resistant your character is to that kind of damage. Characters have, by default, two (2) squares on each counter. Each PC also has three (3) slots for consequences: one (1) mild, one (1) moderate and one (1) severe. Unlike stress, consequences can be applied to any type of damage. The consequences are injuries and trauma from which it is more difficult to recover. Some skills and stunts -psst, the drugs- can increase these initial values. In SACRED AND TERRIBLE FATE, the skills that modify stress and consequences are Endurance (for physical stress) and Volition (for mental stress). Each skill provides one (1) extra stress box of the corresponding type if they are at Normal (+1) or Good (+2) level, or two (2) more boxes at Large (+3) level or better. An Excellent skill (+5) or better also provides an extra space for moderate consequences. Unlike normal consequences, this can only be applied to physical (Endurance) or mental (Volition) damage. THE DRUGS Write them down. Pyrholidon, The Lightning, Al-Gul and the sumptuous Tabac grass. Nature's greatest gifts to mankind. In Elysium, everyone knows them, but not their risks. Before introducing them in the same way that death is vanalized in the combats, think about them carefully. Each drug has a dose of three (3) charges that increases by one (1) the value of all the skills linked to the affected attribute. For each charge that boosts your Intellect and Psyche abilities, cross one (1) Health box. For each charge that increases your Physical and Motor skills cross one (1) Moral box.
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THE COUNTERS Your physical and mental health are crucial. There are no half-measures in this matter, your character must be kept alive and at a decent level to avoid dying from an imminent heart attack -it's the most common cause in victims of sleep disruption due to sudden light awakeningor deciding to get lost at the end of a dock route in the harbour.
EXAMPLES René has a Endurance of +3, which gives him two (2) additional Health boxes ■ ■. His Volition is only Normal (+1), but it is enough to give him one more box of mental stress
MORAL:
SALUD: X
X
Valina's Volition is at +5, which provides you with three (3) additional Moral boxes ■ ■ ■. Her Endurance is Normal (+1), but it is enough to give her one more mental stress box. In addition, it has one (1) more slot for moderate consequences.
SALUD: X MORAL:
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THE BIRD'S NEST These are the four (4) drugs that exist in Elysium. Cocaine was almost completely removed from circulation with the fall of the last Revachol Suzerain, so here we will only see the substances mentioned above. NICOTINE ▶ Brands: Astra, Tioumoutiri. ▶ Positive effect: +1 in Intelect skills per dose. ▶ Negative Effects: Cross one (1) Health box per dose. PYRHOLIDON ▶ Brands: It is anti-radiation medication. ▶ Positive effect: +1 in Psyche skills per dose. ▶ Negative Effects: Cross one (1) Health box per dose. ALCOHOL (AL-GUL) ▶ Brands: Pale Vodka, Potent Pilsner, Commodore Red, etc. ▶ Positive effect: +1 in Physical skills per dose. ▶ Negative Effects: Cross one (1) Morale box per dose. AMPHETAMINE ▶ Brands: Saint-Batiste 'PREPTIDE!', Speed Bottle. ▶ Positive effect: +1 on motor skills per dose. ▶ Negative Effects: Cross one (1) Morale box per dose. ADDICTION Every time you consume a dose of any drug, you must do an electrochemical check. The difficulty should be decreased by two (2) levels from the initial set, at the discretion of the gamemaster. Passing the roll for the first time means one (1) slight consequence, the second one one (1) moderate and so on. A critical success means, at any stage of consumption, immediate addiction (serious consequence).
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NICOTINE
ALCOHOL
PYRHOLIDON
AMPHETAMINE
Psst. Hey, you... Yeah, you. Don't play the fool. Do you want to see good stuff?
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4
CHARACTER SHEET The character sheet contains everything you need to 4 know about
intellect your characters: skills, personality, important facts about their LÓGICA ENCICLOPEDIA RETÓRICA DRAMA
V
past and any other resources they can use during the game. Let's make a reminder:
4
psyche
2
physique
2
motorics
▶ Attributes: You have twelve (12) points to hand out. Minimum
one (1), maximum (6) in an attribute. ▶ Skills: You have twenty (20) points to hand out. You cannot exceed the limit imposed by the attribute score. 2 ▶ Aspects and Stunts: Choose five (5) aspects, then three (3) to VOLICIÓN EMPIRE EMPATÍA five (5) stunts. WriteINLAND down your Disco Points refresh rate.AUTORIDAD ▶ Health and Morale: Check the boxes that are not available. ▶ Name: Everyone needs theirs.
ACELERATE
RESISTENCIA
U. DEL DOLOR
INST. FÍSICO
ELECTROCHEM.
If you prefer, you can find a consignment of four (4) character sheets ready to start your adventure along with this manual. You will also find one (1) adventure seed 2 following the creation scheme proposed by the brilliant Marissa Kelly, in Fate Codex COORDINACIÓN PERCEPCIÓN REACCIÓN Vol. 1 #5.
2 SAVOIR-FAIRE
BOARD O
Mid Moderate Severe Extreme
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THIS IS A CITY OF
SACRED AND TERRIBLE FATE NAME
ROUSTAME DIODORE ASPECTS
VISUAL CALCULUS
CONCEPTUAL
▶ A guy with a high net worth. ▶ Broker of the Neoliberal clan. ▶ He loves to converse.
4 CONTACTS
4 SUGESTION
▶ Resident of a container. ▶ Philanthropic investor. STUNTS
▶ Rougon-Macquart 0.9. SHIVERS
HALF-LIGHT
2 INTERFACE
COMPOSURE
▶ Blank check to be filled in.
STRESS & DISCO POINTS
HEALTH:
MORALE:
X X
OF CONSEQUENCES
X
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CHAPTER 4 AN ADVENTURE "Now the angel's got a fiddle. The devil's got a harp. Every soul is like a minnow. Every mind is like a shark. Me, I've broken every window. But the house, the house is dark. I care, but very little. What happens to the heart."
THE CAST
ROUSTAME
Happens to the Heart - Leonard Cohen Number of players Three (3) to four (4) players. Duration Single session of three (3) hours.
MIKAEL
DISCLAIMER Sensitive issues may arise. Key words Capitalism, communism, class struggle, gentrification, survival, home, fame, nostalgia, depression, personal concept, unrealization, self-image. Recommended songs Want to be free - British Sea Power What happens to the Heart - L. Cohen Roads - Portisheads Red Rock Riviera(Day) 1 - Disco Elysium Industrial Harbour - Disco Elysium
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ANAÏS
LENA
THIS IS A CITY OF
SACRED AND TERRIBLE FATE WHAT HAPPENS TO THE HEART
SETTING CURRENT PROBLEM
What is the problem that the group of characters is going to confront along this adventure? Evrart Claire wants the representatives of the Revachol West fishing village Assembly to sign a document to modernize the sector with new facilities and state-of-the-art services. The reality is that these two signatures would mean a free path to expel the families living there and build a real estate complex for the wealthy families of Revachol East and open the city to foreign investment.
LATENT PROBLEM
What facet of the current issue threatens to ruin this world if something is not done soon? Among the dwellings in the fishing village is one with a television correctly connected to a makeshift power grid that has not stopped emitting a static white noise in a decade. Then, the original spark emerges. You can feel something coming. You're not sure what it is, but you have a strong feeling that you won't see the people in the room with you again.
EVRART
ISOBEL
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PALEDRIVER
FACE 01
What powerful figure is critical to the evolution of the latent problem? Set her goal. The Paledriver, it is said that, even in her old and unknown age, she still drives her old truck, completely unhinged by the effects of passing through too many routes through the Pale.
FACE 02
Who benefits from the current problem? Set his goal. Clearly, Evrart Claire. He is the commander-in-chief of Union Docks and he has promised a sustantial reduction in working hours for his staff. Although that last detail will depend on how the situation with the fishing village will be managed.
FACE 03
Who is trying to change things with respect to the current problem? Set her goal. Isobel, the fisherwoman, was born here and hopes to die here, amidst the waves that carry oil and gunpowder of the end of the Revachol Commune. She is an old woman, wise and has not known the word surrender in her more than seventy years. In Revachol West no one has a decent house, but this village is the closest thing in the world to a home.
LOCATIONS LOCATION 01
The fishing village on the seashore. Especially the house with the TV and grey curtains.
LOCATION 02
The offices of the Union Docks in the middle of a labyrinthine network of industrial containers
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STRUCTURE INITIAL SCENE ▶ In one of the created locations: The group of characters
can start in the offices of the industrial complex or in a warm talk around a fire. ▶ Talking to the faces of the current problem: Evrart Claire will be stuck in a chair in his office, this one resists all the weight of his greed. Isobel will be wiping the rust off the fishing rods with her worn hands. ▶ Related to the current problem: Which side will they take in this conflict of interest? ▶ Solved with a challenge: Will the group counterfeit both signatures? Will they convince Isobel to sign? Will they push for a revolt of the Union Docks staff? It is important that each character has a strong motivation to move the story forward. Work together so that no one is left behind.
SWITCH SCENE
The group of characters sees the results of their actions. Suddenly, every PJ is somewhere else: the room. You can see shadows in human form, a carpet covers the floor, the walls are covered with paper and, most disturbing of all, they are watching the scene from inside the TV. Each character's eyes continue to search for a mirror between the curtains. There their eyes meet, but no one else manages to perceive it. The Paledriver has arrived.
FINAL SCENE ▶ Related to the latent problem: The paledriver comes willing to return all those memories from the pjs to the Pale and end this absurd ideological struggle over what is reality. ▶ Confrontation: Finally, the television screen is clear, the Paledriver wants to sit quietly for eternity to watch her favorite soap opera, but she wants an independent series for each playable character involved. What will they do? If they survive, the players will describe how they are in the future.
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CHRACTERS PLAYABLE CHARACTERS ▶ Lena: A woman married with Morell, a cryptozoologist. She
visits the Whirling-In-Rags cafeteria for tea. Two decades earlier, she was a director of a footwear company. She had a scaffolding accident that left her paraplegic. ▶ Anaïs: A working class woman who has held several jobs, raised two children and three husbands. She has a great and constant passion for history books. Accepting the cruelty of history helps her to be a better person, almost an angel. ▶ Mikael: He is a curious and intelligent child very interested in programming languages and feminism. At the same time, he likes to color books and has some problems interacting with strangers, he is as cute as naïve. ▶ Roustame: He has an incredibly astonishing high net worth, with a Rougon-Macquart coefficient of around 0.9998 (out of 1). This allows him to alter the laws of physics on certain occasions, even bending the rays of light.
SECONDARY CHARACTERS ▶ Isobel: She's the old lady of the place and a kind of village
sage. She sings songs to the children and still repairs the metal that comes from the sea. Her greatest strength is her transparency and openness to people in need. ▶ Evrart Claire: He's the representative of the Union Docks. He exercises a control that far exceeds the powers granted by his charge. His circulatory system supports in an anomalous way his overweight. ▶ The Paledriver: She is an older long-distance trucker. Completely unhinged by the effects of spending too much time on Southern Highway routes. She just wants a soap opera with a good cast, and the characters may have shown that they deserve a protagonist role, each one in a different soap opera.
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