Callings

Adventure

Core Ability

Legendary: You strive to live up to the stories that they’ll tell of your exploits. When you gain a minor advance, refresh 2 stress. When you gain a major advance, refresh 3 stress.

Minor Beats

• Charm someone with tales of your exploits.
• Engage in reckless abandon with drink, drugs or sex.
• Slay a beast that drops a notable or remarkable resource.
• Access a haven in tier 2 of the Heart.
• Get injured and take a moderate condition.
• TODO
• Defeat a powerful foe one-on-one.
• Help an important or influential figure in a haven.
• Refuse to back down when it would be beneficial to do so.
• Establish a connection.
• Get in trouble with the Hounds.
• Rescue someone from peril.
• Make a dramatic entrance that’s a Risky action.
• Claim a notable or remarkable resource from a dangerous location.
• Defend a haven from attack.
• Have at least three havens know your name, for good or ill.
• Rush into danger before anyone else.
• Have a cocktail, fighting move or legendary beast named after you.
• Go somewhere where no-one else has stepped foot for at least a century.
• Win an unarmed brawl in a haven.
• Kick someone off a tall structure (they really deserved it).

Major Beats

• Acquire a rare or powerful (D12 value) item, preferably magic.
• Slay a beast that’s at least five times your size.
• Have a landmark or connection named after you.
• Upgrade a haunt to D12.
• Save a haven from destruction or doom.
• Connect three havens to one another with permanent paths.
• Take an action which saves the day at the cost of a desperate or perilous consequence.
• Catalogue your exploits for an extended period; either do it yourself or hire a bard.
• Lead a group or organisation (other than your delving party).
• Successfully lead, and take full credit for, a delve that takes you to Tier 3 or deeper.

Zenith Beats

• Reach Tier 4 of the Heart.
• Lead a haven to prosperity.

Enlightenment

Core Ability

Unorthodox Methods. You blend together method and madness in pursuit of your goals. You are always observant. Once per session you can ask the facilitator what secret knowledge you can infer or deduce from observing a situation.

Minor Beats

• Allude to the events that led you to seek forbidden knowledge to achieve an impossible task.
• Put the acquisition of knowledge above preserving the lives of your allies.
• Gain access to knowledge that someone tried to conceal.
• Gain favour with a faction that can help you learn more about your goal.
• TODO
• Destroy evidence or rhetoric that proves your task to be impossible.
• Sell or sacrifice a notable or remarkable resource to secure a secret.
• Reach a landmark on tier 3 of the Heart.
• Find a helpful text.
• Succeed at a task that someone else has recently failed to achieve.
• TODO
• Acquire an NPC bond who has access to useful information.
• Establish a connection on a delve.
• TODO
• Flee from combat or a similarly dangerous situation, or hide until it all blows over.
• Release your shocking findings in a journal published in the City Above.
• Meet someone from your old life who’s trying to get you to give up on your quest.
• Dissect something or interrogate someone that can shed light on your task.
• Buy some cutting-edge, experimental or finely-made equipment and use it on a delve.

Major Beats

• TODO
• Kill someone who is trying to stop you from claiming knowledge.
• Sell or sacrifice a remarkable resource to secure a secret.
• Destroy a haunt to learn more about your task.
• Gain authority within a faction that you can use to learn more about your goal.
• Find a source of knowledge on Tier 3 of the Heart.
• TODO
• Acquire a renowned piece of equipment.
• Attract a protégé who’s read your work and is determined to learn more.
• Explore a mysterious tower whilst on a delve (this increases the difficulty of the delve significantly).

Zenith Beats

• Find the final secret you have so desperately sought and use it to solve your impossible task.
• Find the final secret you have so desperately sought and destroy it so no one else can know of it.

Forced

Core Ability

Collateral. You have a knack for getting behind someone else when things kick off. Once per session, allocate stress to the nearest friendly target (PC or NPC) instead of taking it yourself.

Minor Beats

• Receive orders from your masters.
• Follow orders from your masters, even though they put you at risk.
• Rebel against your orders, even though this puts you at risk.
• Forge a friendship or romantic relationship with an NPC.
• Get into trouble as someone discovers your chequered past.
• Betray someone because of your true nature.
• TODO
• Do something dangerous to conceal your past.
• Invoke your masters’ name to get what you want.
• As a result of using the Collateral ability, an NPC is taken out of action or a PC stresses out.
• Find a sanctuary where your masters cannot reach you.
• Rescue an NPC from trouble that you caused.
• Receive a time-critical mission that leads you away from your other objectives.
• Receive aid from someone reprehensible who’s in the employ of your master.
• Send a requested resource (notable or remarkable) back to your master rather than using it yourself.
• Perform a seemingly unconnected action for your masters that has grim consequences.
• Cover up a crime that someone else committed on behalf of your masters.
• Claim you’re doing something on behalf of your masters when in fact it’s for your own ends.
• Involve an NPC in your master’s schemes.
• Do a favour for someone to gain leverage over them.

Major Beats

• Destroy something important to your masters.
• Learn or possess something that lessens the control your masters have over you.
• Perform a truly reprehensible act on behalf of your masters.
• Suffer the consequences of refusing to perform an important act on behalf of your masters.
• TODO
• An important or beloved NPC dies after you bring them into your master’s schemes.
• Thanks to your actions, a haven is pitched into deadly chaos.
• Coerce an important or beloved NPC into undertaking a task they don’t want to do.
• Aid another person, who you know and hate, that is also in the employ of your masters.
• Complete a major objective for your master — something taking at least two sessions to achieve.

Zenith Beats

• End the control your master has over you.
• Take bloody revenge on your master.

Heartsong

Core Ability

In The Blood. You move through the Heart as if blessed. When you resist the twisting of your body or mind by the heart, choose one: it costs one less stress OR you can resist a third time. Once per scene, you can apply this benefit to any consequence.

Minor Beats

• Following a long ritual, name The Heart. Only refer to it by this name from now on.
• TODO
• See something from your dreams in the real world.
• Consume something of the Heart (eat the flesh of a heartsblood beast, etc).
• Be rendered helpless in the Heart for an hour or more.
• Perform a rite at a place of power (Tier 2 or deeper).
• Damage or sabotage a haven, letting the Heart in.
• Sacrifice something you love to the Heart.
• Allow something dangerous of the Heart to live when you could have killed it.
• Let your curiosity lead you into danger.
• Undergo a trance-like vision that lasts for hours.
• Communicate with something of the Heart.
• Witness an emissary of the Heart Itself.
• Experience a pulse — the changing of the Heart from one state to another — first-hand.
• Receive insight from a witch, a heartsblooded person or something stranger still.
• Gain information on why you have been chosen by the Heart.
• Receive a strange surgical implant or heartsblood transfusion.
• Build a shrine to the Heart somewhere important.
• Terrify or intrigue an NPC with your obsession.
• Perform an act of service to an NPC witch.
• Shelter someone touched by the Heart from persecution.
• Find a heart-touched sapling on a delve and bring it back to a haven for planting.
• Convince the party to collect cursed resources on a delve, prolonging the delve.

Major Beats

• TODO
• Perform a rite at a place of power (Tier 3 or deeper).
• Sacrifice someone important to the Heart.
• Establish a bond with a hearts-blood beast (Tier 2 or deeper).
• Show the truth of the Heart’s majesty to an outsider (Tier 2 or deeper).
• Meet and learn from an emissary of the Heart.
• Destroy a haven, returning the land to the Heart.
• TODO
• Deliver a crucial message on behalf of the Heart.
• Visit three Vermissian Stations.

Zenith Beats

• Become one with the Heart, and bind your essence to it.
• Break the hold that the Heart has over you, ripping it from your body and spirit.

Penitent

Core Ability

Not Yet. Your willpower, fuelled with guilt, is legendary. Once per session, you can ignore the effects of physical or mental conditions for a scene.

Minor Beats

• TODO
• Help someone vulnerable with no expectation of repayment.
• Repair something physical — a bridge, a door, a wall, etc. — that someone needs.
• De-escalate a situation that would have led to bloodshed.
• Spare someone’s life.
• Make penance at a site that is important to your order.
• Punish an NPC for wrongdoing.
• Meet an NPC who hates you for what you’ve done.
• Perform an act in service to your order.
• Bring bodily harm to those who stand against your order.
• Sabotage the assets of those who stand against your order.
• Establish a connection to a landmark that’s important to your order.
• Witness first-hand the tragic extent of your failings.
• Donate needed supplies to your order.
• Teach someone the value of your order’s philosophies.
• Put yourself in great danger to protect your companions.
• Make reparations to an NPC that you have personally wronged.
• Do something your order would frown upon.
• Rescue or assist an NPC who belongs to your order.
• Openly attack the enemies of your order.
• Refuse a desirable offer due to the restrictions of your penance.

Major Beats

• TODO
• Convert an important NPC to your order’s cause.
• Establish continual connections between two landmarks on different tiers that are important to your order.
• Perform an act that, if your order discovered it, would undo your penance.
• Betray someone who really trusts you.
• Save a landmark dedicated to your order.
• Attack the enemies of your order when the odds are massively stacked against you.
• Eliminate or completely undermine a faction that is opposed to your order.
• Your order suffers a devastating setback, and you believe that it’s your fault.
• A member of your order begs you to perform an undesirable task; to refuse would be disgraceful.

Zenith Beats

• Be truly absolved of your sins by a higher power.
• Betray your order — intentionally, this time.

Classes

Cleaver

Core Abilities

Heartsblood

You have a bone-deep connection to the Heart Itself; the closer you get, the more powerful you become. You are more resilient the deeper you delve into the Heart. Once per session you can negate stress equal to the tier of the Heart you’re on.

The Red Feast

Your crucible guts pluck memories from the meat. When you eat a resource, you become attuned to it’s origin for the rest of the scene. There’s no limit to what you can eat, but tough or noxious materials require you to resist to avoid causing yourself harm. Consuming resources requires your attention and leaves you exposed.

Major Abilities

Monstrous Appetite

When you eat, you unhinge your jaw and wolf down anything within reach until your belly is distended and you are resplendent with power. When you use The Red Feast to consume a resource, refresh 2 stress.

Deadwalker

Core Abilities

Death Follows Close

You never knew anyone could love you as much as your own death. You are followed around by a manifestation of your death that is invisible and intangible to everyone but you — although when you are on the verge of dying, or in places that resonate heavily with death and sorrow, it might be visible to others. The exact appearance of it is up to you. The first time each session you suffer a moderate condition, your death manifests to protect you and deals severe harm to whatever caused the condition.

Enter The Grey

You know the trick of stepping sideways into the Grey: the space between the worlds of the living and the worlds of the dead. It takes around ten minutes of preparation, e.g. donning ritual garb, inhaling sacred smoke, communing with your death and so on. Afterwards, the smoke clears, and you (and anyone you bring with you) are in the Grey.

Within the Grey, the world is a shadowy echo of its living counterpart. Some souls linger here, awaiting their eternal reward, but for the most part it is grim, empty and monochrome. (For more information on travelling and surviving the Grey, see p. 169.) Exiting the Grey is a simple enough task for a Deadwalker and those they ferry across; anyone else takes a lesser condition “faded”.

Major Abilities

Invidious Spectre

Your death has got your back — right up until it can claim you for itself. Your death manifests as poltergeist activity and other supernatural phenomena that distresses and confuses your enemies. You can push yourself to attune any weapon you carry to the Grey.

Junk Mage

Core Abilities

Ravening Knowledge

You crave the touch of what others call “madness”. The glimpses of truth that ravage your frail, mortal mind give you unimaginable power. When you have a moderate or severe condition related to your mind, you have extra impact when you cast a spell.

Sacrifice

You are willing to sacrifice anything for another hit. Before you cast a spell from this class, you can opt to destroy an occult resource. You can resist any consequences from the next spell you cast for no cost.

Greed Of The Red King

The Red King’s one desire is wealth; he was so devoted to the pursuit of gold that he dreamed himself a reality of infinite splendour. When you cast this spell, you determine what a target you can see wants most right now. In addition, you can smell money, or anything of particular value.