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Chapter Seven: The Cohort

It is explained that all relationships require a little give and take. This is untrue. Any partnership demands that we give and give and give and at the last, as we flop into our graves exhausted, we are told that we didn't give enough.

— Quentin Crisp

Within Deviant: The Renegades, a cohort is simply a group of Remade that work closely together. Among Devoted, cohorts often form by design. They are teams of transformed built to serve as the specialized tools of the conspiracy. They train together, spend much of their idle time together, and execute missions together. Among Renegades, cohorts usually form by chance among Broken who know they can’t go it alone, and want help staying free of the conspiracy on one hand and striking back at their enemies on the other.

Because Deviant is a roleplaying game, “cohort” is also a collective word for the player characters, who are expected to work together closely because that is how roleplaying games work. Some disagreements and personality clashes between members of the cohort make for engaging roleplaying, but outright hostility or clear incompatibilities of goals and methods do not. At best, they cause tonal lurching, where some of the characters seem to be coming from a completely different game than the others. At worst, it results in a short-lived chronicle as interpersonal conflicts between characters (if not their players) prevent any coherent story from moving forward.

Within the world of the Chronicles of Darkness, Renegade cohorts form by chance all the time, but Renegade cohorts within a Deviant: The Renegades chronicle should not.

Session Zero

Session zero commonly refers to a gaming session before the chronicle’s beginning during which the Storyteller and players discuss various out of character considerations. Although the Storyteller plays an important role as a leader of this conversation, session zero is not the sole domain of the Storyteller. Every player should contribute. Session zero should include several key topics:

Safety Tools: Discuss the safety tools (Deviant, p. 291) the troupe will be using. This also makes a good time to establish lines and veils. This topic is crucially important when forming a new troupe or introducing new players to an existing one. Even in long-established troupes it can be good to refresh memories, especially if the chronicle is expected to include heavy material different from the troupe’s usual fare. Safety tool discussions shouldn’t be limited to session zero; between-chapter check-ins are advisable, especially at times of heightened interpersonal drama.

Logistics: Discuss practical considerations. When and where will the troupe meet? How often and for how long? How are absences handled in-game? What constitutes quorum — the minimum number of players available to play below which the game will be canceled until the next time? How can the troupe check on tardy players and how long should they wait before considering them absent? If in-person, will the troupe eat a meal together, and if so, how are the costs of refreshments divided? Do any of the players have children who will be present and may require care, and how will the troupe handle unavoidable interruptions at the table? If online, will it be through voice chat, real-time text, or play-by-post, and which programs will be used to meet virtually? What is the group’s attention etiquette; will people get frustrated if Discord tells them you’re playing a videogame in another window?

Chronicle Goals: Discuss what kind of story you want the chronicle to tell. Chronicles often start with a pitch, a high concept suggested by the Storyteller and refined by the troupe during session zero. Talk through acceptable and unacceptable in-character outcomes, taking guidance from Chapter Six (p. XX).

Character and Conspiracy Creation: Talking about the characters each person wants to play serves several important purposes:

•            Niche Protection: Niche protection means each character has a “thing” that they can do that the other characters can’t. A niche gives a character a way to shine, whether it is in combat, social situations, research, reconnaissance, or any other area. In a large cohort, some redundancy is normal and often useful. If a big fight breaks out, more combat-capable characters is better than fewer. But even then, there should be some differences — a close-combat focused character versus one that relies on firearms versus one with a powerful Aura or other area-affecting attack.

•            Tone: Deviant: The Renegades permits a nearly limitless variety of character concepts, any of which is viable in some chronicle out there. However, not every character concept is a tonal match for every other character concept, nor is it appropriate to every chronicle’s high concept or tone. A joke character concept in a chronicle where all the other characters are serious (or the reverse) can make for a jarring experience, as can an antihero in a chronicle whose other protagonists are generally heroic (or vice versa). This isn’t to say that every character should be a perfect tonal match for the others. It’s perfectly fine to play the innocent in a cohort of jaded Renegades to explore how that character loses his idealism or brings his companions around to his worldview.

•            Sticky: Establish why the characters are a cohort. How did they meet? Why did they decide to work together? Most important of all, why do they stick together? Sticky describes the bonds between characters that tend to provide a narrative explanation for the out of character reality that the members of the cohort are going to be spending a lot of time together because their players are sitting at the same gaming table (whether physical or virtual). We’ll be discussing this in greater detail in this chapter.

•            Conspiracy: Renegades largely define themselves by their enemies, and although that often means Conviction Touchstones, in a more practical sense it also means conspiracies. At any given time, a chronicle has only one active conspiracy. Session zero is the time to discuss what that active conspiracy will be. We’ll discuss this topic in greater detail later in this chapter.

Note that session zero doesn’t necessarily refer to a literal session-long discussion at the gaming table. A lot of the chronicle and character discussions can take place via email or as side conversations in other social situations. Players can sketch out and share character concepts for weeks or months, comparing notes and establishing links to make the cohort stickier.

Cohort Formation

When designing a cohort, even before brainstorming individual character concepts, as a group, consider the overall makeup of the group and the shared history that may have brought them together.

Below are possible reasons why a cohort of a single quality might form. None of them require that all the Renegades have the same Origin, Clade, and so forth. Even two Deviants with a point in common may share a history or perspective that will bring them closer regardless of whether the other members of their cohort match them in the same way.

Shared Conspiracy

A single conspiracy often serves as the primary antagonist for a cohort of Renegades. While each Deviant in a cohort could have a different conspiracy as his main enemy, this is rare for two reasons: First, it tends to dilute the narrative focus of the chronicle and makes it more difficult for characters to further Conviction Touchstones each chapter. Second, Remade — and Renegades especially — are not renowned for their patient pursuit of matters unrelated to their own Conviction Touchstones.

A shared conspiracy doesn’t necessarily mean that all the Deviants were created by that conspiracy. Renegades and Devoted alike differentiate between progenitor conspiracies, acquisitive conspiracies, and destroyer conspiracies:

Progenitor conspiracies are those that have the capacity to trigger the Divergence and choose to do so, whether rarely or frequently. Acquisitive conspiracies (also known as scavenger conspiracies) are those that expand their ranks of Devoted by seeking out and recruiting existing Remade. Destroyer conspiracies seek out Broken to neutralize or kill them.

These three categories are not mutually exclusive. Although most conspiracies who seek to expand their ranks of Devoted (or vivisection candidates) favor one recruitment strategy over the other, many will engage in either method. Conspiracies primarily interested in eliminating Deviants usually deploy Devoted to that end (and so must get those Remade somewhere), and those intent upon expanding their ranks of Remade sometimes find it necessary to remove Broken from the board — whether they are dangerous Ferals, troublesome Renegades, or simply Devoted of rival conspiracies.

Progenitor Conspiracy: Progenitor conspiracies are more frequently the primary antagonist in a chronicle that focuses on a cohort whose members Diverged recently. Quite often the Renegades were all made by the same organization and bonded before, during, or shortly after their Divergences. A progenitor conspiracy may also seek to recapture previously escaped (or accidentally released) Remade it created to bring them back into the fold.

Acquisitive Conspiracy: An acquisitive conspiracy can be the main antagonist for any Renegade cohort. These conspiracies seek to recruit Deviants and won’t take no for an answer. They are universal in wanting to bring in the Remade alive. Some lack the means to create their own Broken, so this is their sole means of expanding their ranks of Devoted (or subjects of scientific inquiry), while others have moral or ethical codes that prevent them from triggering the Divergence intentionally. In most cases, an acquisitive conspiracy pursues Broken for the same reason progenitor conspiracies do: to press them into service as Devoted. A minority of them pursue, capture, or recruit transformed as goods to sell to other conspiracies, or even as targets to capture in exchange for a bounty.

Destroyer Conspiracy: Any Renegade cohort could run afoul of a destroyer conspiracy, although it’s rarely the first one they encounter. These aren’t interested in bringing in the Broken alive. Eliminating the Deviants as a threat is their main objective. Fortunately, destroyer conspiracies rarely have the capacity to pursue all Remade — or even all Renegades. They must be selective in their targets. Usually, this means that they only hunt down Broken who have shown themselves to be a significant threat to the conspiracy’s interests, even if those interests are as simple as preventing a monster from rampaging through an urban center.

Conspiracy Diversity

While a cohort whose members share a progenitor conspiracy is the easiest to explain narratively and to manage mechanically, it isn’t a requirement for a successful Deviant chronicle. Here are some solutions to multi-conspiracy chronicles:

Hydra-Headed: Although each character was made by a different conspiracy as far as they know, they’re the product of several divisions of the same conspiracy. Narratively, the Storyteller can handle it as several different conspiracies, but mechanically it functions as a single conspiracy. Oftentimes, each character’s “conspiracy” is just one Node of the overall conspiracy. This approach works well in a limited-run chronicle where there won’t be enough time to destroy three or more conspiracies, but of course the Web of Pain structure means that it works equally well in longer-running chronicles.

Proto-Conspiracies: The characters weren’t produced by full conspiracies. Rather, their Progenitors were the head of a tiny cult, or a rogue doctor testing his experimental drug on the side, or other actors working alone or with a small group. At the time the Renegades escaped, their Progenitors didn’t have the resources to track them down. However, they have since proven their ability to trigger the Divergence, which brought them to the attention of the Web of Pain and allowed them to join a conspiracy (or they banded together into a new conspiracy), and now they do have resources at their disposal.

Secondary Conspiracy: Although each Renegade has a different progenitor conspiracy, none of those organizations are the one that currently concerns them. Instead, they contend with an acquisitive or destroyer conspiracy. It might well be one linked to their progenitor conspiracies, such as if it is a conspiracy that takes contracts from other conspiracies to capture or kill troublesome escaped Deviants. The progenitor conspiracies could instead fade into each character’s backstory, to come into play only later in the chronicle. If taking this tack, it is important to establish that fact before choosing Touchstones, since a Renegade whose Conviction Touchstones all belong to a conspiracy that won’t be appearing in the story (not right away, anyway) will struggle to manage Instability, and the lack of resolution could be a source of frustration for the player, as well.

Shared Spotlight: Each character was made by a different conspiracy, but their enemies aren’t equals. Mechanically, the Storyteller picks one progenitor conspiracy to be the starting conspiracy, building it at the appropriate Standing and taking player input as normal (Deviant, p. 224). Over the course of one or more stories, the Renegades engage with and ultimately defeat this starting conspiracy before shifting their focus to another of their progenitor conspiracies for the next “season” — one equal to or more powerful than the last. This continues until all the progenitor conspiracies have been neutralized, after which the cohort faces a final conspiracy that is the progenitor of none of them but somehow linked to or the power behind all the others. This approach works best if the troupe is small and/or the chronicle is expected to last a long time. With the right troupe, though, it can be a very satisfying structure rife with recurring antagonists and dropped hints about the hidden conspiracy.

Shared Origin

Renegades of the same Origin are likely to have similar feelings about the conspiracy that made them — whether or not they share a progenitor conspiracy. Nuances will emerge in roleplaying, but starting from a common Origin can answer a lot of the questions of how the Renegades met and why they became a cohort.

A common conspiracy and singular Origin within the cohort suggests that conspiracy’s approach to triggering the Divergence. Even if the conspiracy doesn’t employ it universally, at least one Node is luring potential Volunteers or seeking out Accidents to press into the organization’s service, for example.

A cohort with a shared Origin with differing progenitor conspiracies — especially a cohort that has formed “in the wild”, after they have parted ways with their first conspiracy — often says more about the Renegades than their enemies. It typically means that how they came to the Divergence has stuck with them and shaped their perspective on their enemies.

Autourgics

An all-Elect cohort is unusual among Renegades, but circumstances can generate them. Most meet each other during their time as Devoted — whether they worked for the same conspiracy or different ones. Autourgic Renegade cohorts rarely form in the wild.

Banished: The conspiracy that made the Deviants rejected them. Perhaps they served their intended purpose, and the conspiracy had no further use for them. Or maybe they fucked up royally, and the conspiracy no longer wanted them around. Possibly, the program or division that made the Remade was never supposed to do so, and when it was dissolved, the Broken were quietly eliminated from the organization as well. Some banished Elect may seek redemption. Others are fueled by spite against those who exiled them.

Orphans: The Remade were Devoted whose conspiracy collapsed from within or was destroyed from without. Perhaps they were mute witnesses to the rampant corruption or external attacks that dissolved the organization. Maybe they were in some way responsible for its demise, whether they coordinated their efforts towards that end or brought about the extinction inadvertently. Perhaps they saw the danger and made a desperate but ultimately futile attempt to prevent the catastrophe. Maybe they seek revenge against those responsible for the conspiracy’s death, or maybe they are working day by day to recreate what they lost. Possibly, they see now that they were prisoners and will never surrender their freedom like that again.

Shocked: The Deviants signed on the dotted line willingly, but they later decided they didn’t want to work for the conspiracy after all. Maybe the rush of power went to their heads. Or maybe the Scars they gained made it impossible to play nicely with others. Possibly their Variations revealed the horrible truth about the organization that transformed them.

Splinter: The Broken had disagreements with the conspiracy that made them. Maybe they had moral objections to the organization’s practices. Perhaps it was a personal matter with fellow Devoted, management, or Baseline colleagues. Possibly, they just didn’t feel their gifts were appreciated enough. Or maybe they just decided they could do better with a different conspiracy or as a group of freelancers.

Epimorphs

It usually isn’t enough for an all-Epimorph cohort to share an Origin. Most of them also share a circumstance that brought them to the Divergence in the first place. If one of them was tricked into the Divergence, they were all tricked — and likely with variations of the same scam, whether it was a miracle cure or low-income housing with an undisclosed environmental hazard.

Deceived: Many Volunteers come to the Divergence because they were lured under false pretenses. It may have been an experimental treatment for a chronic condition, an offer of money, or the promise of a reduced sentence. Following their unexpected transformation, Epimorphs are understandably angry at the degree of changes wrought upon them without their knowledge or informed consent. Volunteers tricked into the Divergence tend to distrust conspiracies and are likely to remain Renegades even if approached by a less toxic organization.

Satisfied: Some Volunteers are initially pleased with what they got out of the deal, even if it wasn’t what they expected. If they become Renegades later, it is usually for one of the reasons Autourgics might.

Screwed: Many Volunteers come to the Divergence because of a Hobson’s choice. They could have chosen death instead of the miracle cure, or a leg breaker’s ministrations over the mob boss’s offered alternative. But under extreme duress, they agreed to the process that led to their Divergences. Those who escape the resulting situation are usually not just angry but as vindictive as any Exomorph.

Support Group: When all-Epimorph cohorts form in the wild, they often resemble support groups. Each has been coerced or tricked into undergoing an unquestionably traumatic experience, and sharing their feelings about that is a key component of their relationship. This doesn’t mean they spend all their time sitting in a circle welcoming new members and comparing their Scars. Many Volunteers use pain to fuel action. They fight the conspiracies of the Web of Pain to protect others from Divergence.

Exomorphs

All-Unwilling cohorts are siblings in arms, as likely to form after they elude their progenitor conspiracies as before. Exomorphs are usually the most aggressive of Remade and the most likely to express their opposition to the Web of Pain with violence.

Escapees: Some Unwilling escape their progenitor conspiracy soon after their Divergence. They often have no idea what plan the conspiracy may have had for them. At the time, they didn’t care, although they might have become curious about it later. The decision to work together was an obvious one, and that momentum alone may keep them together afterwards, especially if they are actively pursued by their captors. This alliance of necessity can sometimes mask serious differences until clashing personalities reach a flashpoint and explode.

Lab Rats: Routinely abducting people and giving them superhuman abilities is a practice that’s likely to backfire. Even the most arrogant conspiracies know it’s hard to control someone who has every reason to despise you. For some conspiracies, controlling the Exomorphs is never the goal. They might regard them as mere test subjects to experiment upon, examine, and discard. Or perhaps the act of soul-breaking violation is a form of ritual sacrifice meant to please a cult’s god. A minority of conspiracies have a means of misdirecting any Deviants they might produce, convincing the Remade that another organization was responsible for their Divergence. Broken Diverged against their will for any of these reasons are often left with the question of what purpose their Divergence served and are seldom satisfied with the answer.

Slaves: Many conspiracies that make Exomorphs do so with the intent of expanding their ranks of Devoted. Unless they are complete fools, they have some plan for how they will exert control over them afterward. Most send sympathetic faces to forge bonds of Loyalty. Others rely on hostage Loyalty Touchstones to keep the Remade in line. Powerful or particularly savvy conspiracies have mastered techniques that implant custom Scars meant to make new Deviants pliable or dependent upon resources only the conspiracy can reliably provide. All-Unwilling cohorts from the same conspiracy often escaped together and share an intense desire to bring it down. Those from diverse conspiracies typically bond over their mutual rage at the Web of Pain and are among the most aggressive and militant of Renegades.

Survivors: Unwilling frequently meet one another after their Divergences because they share the same targets. A conspiracy that abducts victims with the intention of transforming them seldom stops with one such “success story”. It makes many Renegade enemies, who can be willing to put aside their differences if it means taking down the conspiracy they hate so much. Sometimes a cohort can find new Broken to recruit by gaining access to conspiracy records of its successful (or unsuccessful) experiments, agents gone rogue, or catalog of known Remade.

Genotypals

All-Born cohorts tend to operate as a family unit, whether they behave as siblings or multigenerational households.

Birth Family: The Renegades belonged to the same conspiracy and probably grew up together as a real or manufactured family unit. These cohorts tend to be close-knit, often sharing bonds of Loyalty. They can be as argumentative as siblings or childhood playmates. They know that nothing they do or say can truly put an end to their special relationship, and it becomes easy to take it for granted. They part ways with their progenitor conspiracies for the same reasons as Autourgics, as well as for any of the reasons Baseline children and young adults choose to leave their birth homes.

Cousins: The Broken do not share progenitor conspiracies, but they knew each other before they became a Renegade cohort. Perhaps their conspiracies were rivals or bitter enemies, but they became friends despite that. Or maybe they met at a multi-conspiracy event and fate took matters from there — whether it was the massacre of their chaperones or an impulsive decision to run off together.

Found Family: Genotypal runaways and orphans who meet often form cohorts based on that shared bond. Unlike Deviants of other Origins, Born rarely enjoy normal upbringings and have always felt like outsiders. It’s difficult for non-Genotypals to understand the Born, so when they find each other along the way, it can be a relief. Here at last are others who have the context to help the Genotypal make sense of the bizarre routines and rituals of their birth conspiracy.

Victims: Although many Born possess supernatural abilities from a young age, few have enough maturity and life experience to recognize and safely navigate dangerous social situations. Some kinds of acquisitive conspiracies target Genotypals, luring them away from their progenitor conspiracies or abducting them outright. An all-Born cohort that arises from such a situation usually goes Renegade much the way Epimorphs and Exomorphs do and with the same impetus.

Pathologicals

All-Accident cohorts are difficult to generalize about, although they exist.

Divergence Event: The members of the cohort Diverged at the same time and in response to the same stimuli. Maybe the accident was particularly widespread, catching dozens, hundreds, or even thousands in its radius, and the cohort were survivors of the event. Or perhaps it only affected the members of the cohort, but they miraculously Diverged without the body count typical of such events. This shared accident gives the Pathologicals a natural bond, regardless of their other differences.

Pattern: Sometimes Divergence is a side-effect of something seemingly unrelated. It might be a medical device whose battery has unexpected occult properties or an apartment building saturated with arcane radiation that transforms its residents over the course of years. There is rarely any human malice involved. As the Remade investigate the cause of their condition, they discover a connection to one another and forge a cohort over that bond — whether for mutual protection from conspiracies, to bring more like them into their circle, or to prevent others from suffering the same fate. Possibly, the string of accidents wasn’t so accidental after all.

Recruited: Accidents usually have no Progenitor. While this means a conspiracy isn’t pursuing them immediately after their Divergence, it also means that acquisitive conspiracies target them aggressively. Each conspiracy has its own approach to this. Some play at being open and sincere, winning over the Pathological. Others lure in the Accidents with promises they have no intention of upholding — might not be capable of delivering on — keeping the Broken onside with an endless cycle of moved goalposts and stalling tactics. Many use threats or force to bring the Accident to heel.

Subculture: Rare Accidents manage to avoid conspiracy attention. The Web of Pain isn’t omnipresent or omniscient. In some places, Pathologicals meet one another and form into cohorts before they ever encounter an agent of the Web of Pain. Some bond over their shared supernatural abilities. Others pool their resources and abilities to achieve results that would be impossible for Baselines — whether it’s running a legitimate business, executing perfect heists, or hiring themselves out as elite assassins. When they invariably come to the attention to the Web of Pain, they bring that shared history with them, which colors their interactions with the conspiracies pursuing them. They may still carry out the work that brought them together, but now they also contend with enemies who hope to take away the freedom they’ve enjoyed since their Divergences.

Shared Methodology

The Renegades are the result of the same method of Divergence. They were part of the same experimental drug program, specialized elite combat unit, or occult ritual. This generally assumes that they share a progenitor conspiracy. It does not mandate Clade, although it certainly suggests that one should be the “default”. Deviant allows for diverse Remade to emerge from the same methodology. A cohort created by the same conspiracy could have members of different Clades. Perhaps three of the five are Invasives, with the other two being a Cephalist and a Coactive. Cephalists and Mutants are the easiest to explain into an otherwise single-Clade cohort, but clever forethought can usually find a way to explain most combinations.

A common methodology makes it easy to explain why one conspiracy caused the Divergence of every member of the cohort without straining the suspension of disbelief as can happen when the same, low-Standing conspiracy takes the blame for the Divergences of Remade produced by many different means. The experiments of a conspiracy studying psychic phenomena could credibly produce a cohort of Cephalists who become Renegades, for example, or one dabbling in cybernetics could find itself in the crosshairs of several of the Invasives it produced. It also makes it easier to give the cohort a unified aesthetic, rather than having them seem like a random collection of weirdos.

Methodological Diversity

A common methodology requires considerable buy-in from the troupe, because while it need not impose any mechanical limits on character creation, it certainly narrows the narrative options. Deviant enjoys a lot of praise for its capacity to permit a huge range of character concepts. Some players will feel creatively stifled by methodological homogeneity.

A research study into ESP or a cloning program (even if each subject has entirely different supernatural abilities) makes for great TV because it maintains tight focus on a single enemy conspiracy and gives the characters a natural reason to work together due to that shared history (and enemy). It may be too much to ask of players in a tabletop roleplaying game, however. Each one will have a clear idea for a creative character concept, but it’s probably not one the entire table will want to go along with — but if it is, go for it!

If, like most Deviant troupes, each character’s Divergence story is different, here are some ways to address methodological heterogeneity within the same progenitor conspiracy:

Diverse Interests: By default, conspiracies are assumed not to understand the Divergence as a whole phenomenon. One might only understand Cyborgs, for example, while another only recognizes Hybrids. However, the cohort’s progenitor conspiracy has a bigger-picture view of the Divergence and dabbles in several different methods of triggering it.

Throwing Spaghetti: By default, uncovering even a single method of triggering the Divergence is a lightning strike moment. A conspiracy could spend years searching for one and never succeed, and once they do, they might never learn a new method of doing so. However, the cohort’s progenitor conspiracy has tried so many different things (likely with extremely high failure rates) that more than one of their methodologies works.

Unpredictable Methodology: By default, although the Divergence is by no means a controlled process, it is at least repeatable. The same serum can be used over and over again, for example, and while not every test subject will emerge with supernatural abilities, some will. However, the cohort’s progenitor conspiracy doesn’t work like that. Each time it triggers the Divergence, it must do so using a different methodology — an occult ritual today, a cybernetic implant next week, a mind-shattering mathematical formula a year from now. It can bring in many potential candidates, and a single event might produce multiple Remade, but today’s occult ritual will never again transform a Baseline — at least not within the lifetimes of the conspiracy’s agents. What it is able to reproduce is a means of predicting which methodology will work next time.

Shared History

The cohort have ties of history to one another that have little or nothing to do with their Divergences. This is a broad category but includes the following:

Conviction Touchstones: If members of the cohort share a conspiracy, it is quite likely that they have one or more Conviction Touchstones in common. With the caveat that players should sort out up front whether they should take an opportunity to kill this Touchstone if the other character isn’t around, this situation is a great way to get the Renegades moving in the same direction.

Form: Like Clades and Origins, some Forms lend themselves to a form of shared history. A single Transmissible might unintentionally (or deliberately) produce a cohort, for example, and many Uplifts (Clades Companion, p. XX) have a lot of natural common ground.

Loyalty Touchstones: Remade who share Loyalty Touchstones have a built-in reason to work together. Protecting the one they both love takes precedence over any petty squabbles. In some cases, this can lead to jealousy as the characters compete for the Touchstone’s attention, but it isn’t necessarily the case.

Mundane Interests: The Deviants share an academic, political, religious, or other interest. Most probably did so prior to their Divergence, but some may have acquired it afterward. It may give them a topic for small talk, but it may also inform their activity and behavior as they engage with their new state.

Old Friends: The Broken knew each other before their Divergences — possibly years before. Maybe they were close friends, classmates, co-workers, or relatives. This shared history gives them something to talk about and bond over other than the post-Divergence state. It also invites the question: Is it truly a coincidence that, for example, the five kids who sneaked into that abandoned house on a dare when they were in 6th grade turned up as Deviants decades later?

Web of Connections: The Renegades share any number of coincidental connections. These usually connect just two or three of them, although several such connections may form a web that ultimately links each character to every other character. They may share an alma mater or have a friend in common, as examples. Such connections may be skin deep, but they are still links and potential topics of conversation.

Cohort Dynamics

As the old saying goes, “coming together is a beginning, staying together is progress, and working together is success.” Once diverse Renegades find common ground sufficient to forge them into a cohort, it’s important to figure out why they stay together, what they do together, and how they navigate the friction that naturally arises between people — especially people who have suffered extreme trauma that they probably have had little opportunity to examine, much less recover from.

Most social dynamics will arise from roleplaying. It’s difficult to know any new character well enough to predict how they will respond to the quirks and habits of others. That’s to be expected. However, it can be useful to consider what a character has to offer the rest of the cohort and what he hopes to get from his association with them.

Pulling Your Weight

Renegades rarely enjoy an abundance of resources. It’s reasonable for a cohort to expect its members to contribute something to the collective good. Consider what needs the character helps the cohort meet.

Basics: The Deviant provides for the basics of continued life, such as food, clothing, and shelter from the elements. She may have a steady source of income or Variations like Hidden Compartments that let her conjure necessities. Or maybe she has lived on these streets long enough to know which restaurants leave their dumpsters unlocked overnight, which stores are easy to shoplift from, and which intersections are tolerant of panhandlers.

Chores: Renegades often live together, and although tidying up, cooking, doing laundry, and vacuuming are hardly glamorous tasks, they are unquestionably ones that someone needs to do to prevent living quarters from turning into a cockroach-infested dump. Moreover, they’re things that even Broken who can’t leave the house before sunset without creating a scene can still do to contribute to the cohort’s needs.

Errands: The Remade fetches supplies for the cohort, whether the destination is a grocery store, hardware store, or takeout restaurant. Ordinarily an “anyone can do this” task, a member capable of going out in public is not something every cohort has. Some Deviants have distinctive appearances, and even those that don’t sometimes have Scars that make it dangerous for them to be around large groups of people.

Base of Operations: The Broken owns, rents, or knows how to access a safe place where the cohort enjoys a degree of privacy, safety, and security. This is distinct from simple shelter from the elements, as it represents a place that is uniquely theirs. They can leave a spare set of clothes, a cache of weapons, or money there in the morning and be reasonably confident that it will still be there when they come back that evening. It might even offer amenities that most people take for granted, such as hot water, a kitchen, a TV, and real beds.

Transportation: Most Deviants won’t get far on their own two feet alone, and some can’t walk significant distances (or at all), either due to Scars or disabilities that predate their Divergences. Even a simple smash-and-grab robbery or straightforward attack on a conspiracy facility requires the cohort to have some way of getting to the site and getting away from it quickly afterward. Heavy weaponry and body armor are going to draw a lot of unwanted attention on public transportation, and many places are effectively inaccessible without a plane, boat, or automobile. A Renegade with a working car, or better still, a reliable cargo van or delivery truck, has an unquestionably useful asset for any cohort’s operation. Better still if he knows how to handle the vehicle during a chase — or in the case of aircraft, knows how to pilot it at all.

Equipment: The Remade has reliable access to tools, weapons, and other equipment the cohort needs to carry out its operations against the conspiracy and other enemies. While some are relatively inexpensive and easy to find, accumulating a full set of specialized tools requires time and considerable disposable income. Additionally, some tools are illegal and so necessitate contacts who have both the access needed to provide them and the discretion not to rat out the Deviant to the authorities.

Medical Care: For Renegades, walking into a hospital emergency room is an act of desperation. Conspiracies watch these places closely, especially if their agents recently tangled with Broken who limped away with injuries. Not all of them have the access necessary to abduct a Deviant as she recovers from surgery to suture bullet wounds (although some do), but they can stake out a hospital for weeks to identify associates and abduct the recovering Remade as soon as she is discharged. A Renegade with healing Variations or the medical training to treat gunshot wounds, set broken bones, and address other medical emergencies is a priceless resource, and even one skilled in first aid can be a literal lifesaver.

Combat Ability: Although some Renegades may wish it were not the case, violence is a nearly inescapable fact of their lives. When conspiracy agents arrive with guns drawn or catch poles at the ready, Deviants with combat-focused Variations and training can mean the difference between the cohort driving off or killing their persecutors, and winding up in cages again.

Knowledge: A Broken with a wealth of knowledge at her disposal can be a force multiplier in a cohort, especially if it is accompanied with the practical know-how to apply that knowledge. The exact type of knowledge she possesses is a significant factor in determining this knowledge’s usefulness. Deep familiarity with musical theater will rarely solve a cohort’s immediate problems, but an understanding of how to safely manufacture and deploy explosives will find plenty of use by a typical Renegade cohort. Remade with Variations that give them access to a veritable library of knowledge are especially valuable allies, as are those with inside information about enemy conspiracies.

Social Skills: The Deviant is a gifted social animal, whether she wins the cooperation of others through earnest pleas or deception. Renegades often run into situations they need to talk their way out of — especially those involving Baseline authority figures — and a member who can do so more than earns her keep in a cohort. This also applies to Broken with natural leadership abilities or Variations that enhance their social graces to superhuman levels.

Head for Logistics: The Remade has a clear idea of how to create and execute a plan. She knows what resources (human or otherwise) the mission will require and recognizes what the cohort can do to ensure that these are in place when and where they are needed. Variations like Precognition and Blessing can make this easier, but even mundane planning, if sufficiently thorough, can mean the difference between a smooth operation and a fiasco.

Reconnaissance: Whether it comes from mundane training or Variations, the ability to get into and out of places without being detected is one Renegade cohorts prize. Some Remade can skip the necessity of sneaking in and out entirely because they have powers that allow them to project their senses into otherwise inaccessible places.

Security: The Broken knows her way around various forms of security and countermeasures against them. This includes analog wards like locks and guards, as well as electronic measures like biometric readers and security cameras. It can include computer systems, particularly ones that control vital security measures or essential infrastructure like electricity or water.

Emotional Support: Most of the irreparable damage the Broken have suffered is psychological. Their need to love with unhealthy intensity often makes them smothering friends, and their equally extreme need to hurt their enemies frequently drives them to behavior that ranges from merely unlawful to morally reprehensible. They can be difficult to be around, and although many have enough self-awareness to recognize that, it isn’t something they can control. Some cohorts have a member who takes charge of his companions’ emotional well-being, offering unfaltering support when the entire world seems against them and being the trusted voice willing to tell them they’re full of shit when others would say or do anything just to get rid of them. This is frustrating and occasionally dangerous work. Although some such supporters end up as lovers, it is often the antithesis of a healthy romantic relationship.

Scar Management: Many Deviants have unique needs due to their Scars. Some need someone who can perform crucial maintenance, for example, while others need someone to calm them down (or knock them out) when they fly into a murderous rage. The Remade has taken on the responsibility of managing a fellow Renegade’s more disruptive Scars.

Money: The Broken has or knows how to earn money. Maybe she managed to cash out her life savings before the conspiracy convinced the bank to shut down her account, or maybe she has connections to some folks willing to pay her (and any friends she brings along) under the table, no questions asked. It’s possible she has Variations that provide for a modest income stream. Access to money, although not a panacea, solves a lot of problems most Renegades have.

Companionship

Cohorts are most often mutual protection pacts. The Renegades primarily work together to remain free of the conspiracy pursuing them and strike back at it when the opportunity arises. In bad times when the conspiracy is in hot pursuit and its agents are seemingly everywhere, this imperative can be all-consuming. It likewise gains tight narrative focus when the cohort strikes back, planning and executing missions of mayhem and sabotage.

In those times when the cohort is neither actively attacking nor defending, its members often find themselves engaging in other activities together. To some extent this is inertia. The Renegades become used to one another’s company. It also speaks to how socially isolated Broken tend to be. They don’t have a wide social network inviting them to social events, at least not one whose lives the Remade wouldn’t endanger simply by showing their faces at the wedding, barbecue, or other gathering. This loss of ties is yet another casualty of the Divergence. A Renegade’s Loyalty Touchstones plus the members of their cohort are often the only friendly faces they see regularly.

As with all associations, how a cohort spends its time together depends on where their interests align.

Housemates: Proximity is an essential component of the protection a cohort offers. When the conspiracy’s agents break down a Renegade’s door, the last thing he needs to hear when he calls his cohort for reinforcements is that it will take half an hour or more for them to arrive from the far side of town. Nearly all cohorts are at least neighbors — living in different apartments in the same building or in a row of adjacent houses. Many don’t stop there, living in the same house or apartment to ensure that an attack on one of them is an attack on all. This comes with all the potential conflicts that can normally arise when sharing living quarters (arguments over privacy, chores, and appropriate behavior) but it also offers its benefits. The Renegades can prepare and eat meals together and enjoy entertainment in one another’s company. Even tasks like home maintenance and automobile repair that can be drudgery are often more bearable when they come with friendly conversation.

Friends: Ordinary friendship often begins with at least one common interest and arises as the culmination of shared experiences, often with favors and gifts given and received as further mortar to the relationship. It isn’t surprising that Renegades usually come to regard the members of their cohort as friends. Engaging in mundane social interactions with their fellows, like going to a movie or having a night on the town, can lend some much-needed normalcy to their otherwise abnormal lives. It’s less common but by no means unusual for this close association to lead to romance between members, whether they pair off or form into a polycule.

Loyalty Missions: A Deviant will do virtually anything for his Loyalty Touchstones, something his fellow Remade keenly understand. When a Loyalty Touchstone needs help from one Renegade, often the whole cohort shows up, especially if it’s a task too big for one person. The nature of this help varies. Sometimes it’s as simple as rescuing her from the conspiracy that has abducted her, or scaring off someone who is sending her threats. It can also include tasks the Touchstone sets before the Broken that have nothing to do with keeping her healthy and safe, such as asking him to steal something, kill someone, or take on some other unpleasant task non-Deviants might balk at due to the moral ramifications or potential legal consequences. Often a cohort goes along with these requests in solidarity, but there is a selfish component to this as well. First, if one member is captured or killed in lone pursuit of such a task, it means one less Renegade to contribute to the already limited pool of resources the cohort has. Second, each Remade knows that tomorrow it might be her Touchstone who needs rescuing or a favor, and she wants to be able to rely on her cohort’s support when that happens.

Accessories: As with Loyalty Touchstones and for most of the same reasons, Renegades often rely on their cohort to help them destroy their Conviction Touchstones. This is obvious when the Touchstone is a member of the conspiracy the cohort is currently fighting, but it is often true even of Conviction Touchstones of a more personal nature who have no connection to the conspiracy.

Coworkers: To survive in the long term, Renegade cohorts must find a means of meeting their basic needs. Oftentimes this means pooling their talents and Variations to earn money. It could be legitimate (if undocumented) work as private investigators, day laborers, or entertainers. However, it more often carries some whiff of violence, criminality, or both, such as forming a band of mercenaries, assassins, burglars, or con artists. If they can avoid conspiracy attention, the Renegades might earn a good living, although they will need to find ways of laundering their money to prevent it from being traced back to them by the Web of Pain.

Hobbyists: Deviants are capable of being interested in things other than the conspiracies pursuing them. Some enjoy the thrill of hunting monsters. Others explore places largely inaccessible to Baselines or set out to solve mundane or supernatural mysteries. They are still Remade, however, so Conviction or Loyalty must usually enter into it somewhere. They might take pity on someone wronged by a gang or whose beloved pet is missing, taking them on as a Loyalty Touchstone whose dilemma they must solve. Or they might pour their hatred into the object of their hunt or into utterly humiliating their opponent in a race or other contest. No one ever accused the Broken of being good sports.

Activists: Some cohorts feel obligated to make the world a better place. What that means and what action it demands depends on the cohort, although it seldom involves attending political marches or going door-to-door collecting signatures on a petition. Renegades might act as vigilantes or play at Robin Hood. If the cause they adopt is a political one, they’re much more likely to take it too far. The most common Renegade causes involve undermining the Web of Pain as a whole, whether by liberating test subjects, turning Devoted, or drawing public scrutiny to the practices of the worst conspiracies. Such a higher purpose can unite the cohort in ways that mere survival, friendship, or financial benefit cannot.

Sources of Conflict

People who spend a lot of time together sometimes come into conflict — even if they like each other. Stress only exacerbates this, whether it is a shortage of resources or the threat of violence, and most Renegades must contend with both. When Scars and serious personal differences enter the mix, clashes can become explosive.

A troupe may certainly choose to play a well-oiled machine of a cohort whose members share a set of values and get along swimmingly. However, Renegade cohorts are unions of chance. Circumstances often throw Remade together who wouldn’t have interacted with one another socially as Baselines. When not actively on the offense or defense against mutual enemies, their differences can create friction, and many troupes will find it rewarding to explore these differences and the intra-cohort conflicts they engender.

Mundane Differences: Deviants are still human and can dislike or argue with one another for any of the reasons Baselines find. It might be rich versus poor, old versus young, blue collar versus white collar, or well-educated versus not. It can also arise from differences in religious upbringing, political affiliation, views on gender and sexuality, or even favorite sports teams.

Priorities: All Broken share the twin drives of Loyalty and Conviction, but even in cases where they have overlapping Touchstones (and not all cohorts do), they can disagree on priorities. Some favor defense against the conspiracy, while others want to go on the attack. They can also argue fiercely over what and when to attack — the importance of the element of surprise versus the advantages of careful planning.

Methods: In the furtherance of their Touchstones, Renegades protect and fight, but they don’t necessarily do so in the same ways. Some prefer the expedience of violence and physical action, while others aren’t satisfied unless they can outwit and thoroughly destroy their enemies. Some flout the law, counting on their Variations and the laziness of Baseline police to preserve them from justice. Others prefer to keep secret any crimes they commit — less because of any moral qualms than because an overzealous police detective can become a distraction from their real enemies.

Scars: All Broken have Scars. Intellectually, they know that their fellow Renegades will sometimes behave oddly, lose control, or require additional care because of theirs. But it’s easy to lose track of that in the moment, when the teammate you’re counting on starts screaming hysterically about cockroaches with human faces in the middle of the most delicate part of a dangerous operation. That a Deviant can’t control and isn’t to blame for her Scars does not make them any less disruptive.

Cohort Static

The triboelectric effect is a type of contact electrification frequently illustrated by rubbing a balloon against your hair and then sticking it to a wall, or by rubbing a plastic pen against a cotton shirt and using it to pick up a tiny piece of paper with the force of the static electricity this generates. It likewise enables the generation of static electricity that can be discharged with a touch (a static shock).

The same principle also produces lightning in the hearts of storm clouds.

The social dynamics of a cohort are a similar sort of static. It arises as Deviants come together and are placed in proximity until their personalities and foibles rub against one another. By turns it binds them together, drives them apart, and generates the occasional violent spark.

Cohort Static is an optional system for navigating in-character negotiations, bonds, grudges, and blow-ups in a way that makes for dramatically interesting roleplaying without generating resentment or sparking arguments between players. It serves as a barometer for whether the current level of intra-cohort conflict is normal (if interesting) or whether it is becoming disruptive to the flow of play.

Flow of Static Summary

Static that is earned or generated is created ex nihilo and added to a character’s total — or more rarely, to the Operation Pool (p. XX).

Static that is transferred or exchanged is moved from one character’s total to another’s. Usually, this is voluntary. However, if a character is entitled to Compensation, the transfer of Static to them is mandatory.

Characters can bid Static as part of a Decision Point (p. XX), using it to influence the cohort’s next operation.

Once a cohort settles on an operation, characters can invest Static, removing it from their total and adding it to the Operation Pool.

Static that is discharged is removed from a character’s total or from the Operation Pool, disappearing.

It’s usually a good idea to track Static with physical tokens at the table, such as coins or poker chips.

Earning Static

Cohort Static relies on the generation, exchange, and expenditure of Static. Characters accumulate points of Static when they make sacrifices or suffer due to their association with the cohort. They expend points of Static when they make demands of the cohort or otherwise test the patience of its members.

The following generate new points of Static:

•            Familiarity: At the end of each chapter, each member of the cohort earns one point of Static. Simply spending significant time together strengthens the bonds between members of the cohort. However, if the Static rating of any member of the cohort is currently negative, the cohort does not earn this free point of Static unless all members with negative Static (Static debt) currently have the Doghouse Condition (p. XX).

•            Selflessness: Once per scene, a character can earn a point of Static by suffering, taking a risk, or making a sacrifice for the benefit of another member of the cohort — or for the cohort as a whole. A willingness to put self-interest aside for the sake of the other Remade endears the character to the rest of the cohort and makes it more likely they will reciprocate.

•            Acceptance: Once per scene, a character can earn a point of Static by suffering a narrative complication as the result of a cohort member’s Scars. This includes suffering direct harm, but it can also include taking steps to minimize the harm a Scar might cause in a situation — such as restraining an ally with Murderous Urge until her berserk fury subsides. Broken are sensitive about their Scars and aware of how much trouble they cause, and most appreciate the companionship of fellow Deviants who can accept them despite these flaws.

•            Intuition: Characters may earn Static by correctly assessing the likelihood of an operation’s success (p. XX). Renegades are engaged in guerrilla warfare against enemies with superior numbers and resources. They must often enter situations with limited information about what they’re up against. Boldness can yield great rewards or turn failure into fiasco, and excessive caution can lead to disaster as easily as it leads away from danger. Remade who consistently, correctly assess the likelihood of an operation’s success after weighing the risks and rewards quickly earn their cohort’s respect.

Discharging Static

Some expenditures of Static remove points from the pool entirely. They cash in some of the cohort’s goodwill to bring conflicts to a head or demand action.

Except where explicitly noted, a character cannot go into Static debt. She cannot spend Static that she doesn’t currently have.

Call Out

Everyone knows that Renegades fuck up. As many times as they’re called upon to make snap decisions while hampered by stress and the changes wrought by the Divergence, they’re going to make the wrong call at least some of the time. However, it occasionally happens that a character makes several poor decisions in a row, until the weight of their mistakes begins to wear on the rest of the cohort’s nerves, and although Renegades need each other, that doesn’t mean they have an unlimited capacity to put up with one another’s bullshit. When a player character has failed or betrayed the cohort so many times that it has made him a liability, a moment of sincere, heartfelt criticism can put a stop to his disruptive behavior.

A character can only call out a cohort member with Static debt who doesn’t already have the Doghouse Condition (p. XX). A character cannot call out more than one target per chapter.

Spend points of Static no greater than the target’s Static debt and roll an equal number of dice. If the roll succeeds, the character performing the call-out imposes the Doghouse Condition on the target. If the roll fails, the target shrugs off the criticism for now.

If multiple characters call out the target in the same scene, the one who rolled the most successes imposes the Doghouse Condition, rerolling ties.

In-world, this usually takes the form of the initiating character calling out the target in front of other members of their cohort. If successful, the target is suitably chastened — or at least recognizes that he is on the outs with the rest of the cohort.

Stray

Renegades don’t always put the needs of the cohort ahead of their own. In moments of weakness, some will even strike deals with conspiracy agents and other cohort members’ Conviction Touchstones. This not only damages the standing of the offender within the cohort, but it also damages the cohesion of the entire group.

This is not about right or wrong, moral or immoral. Rather, it reflects that a character has taken an action that breaks the trust of the cohort. In all these cases, if at least half the rest of the cohort approves of (or makes clear that they don’t condemn) the offender’s action, she does not suffer the discharge of Static. For example, if she executes a conspiracy agent with the approval of her cohort (even if that approval came after the fact), she does not lose Static.

Unlike other Static discharges, straying can put a character into Static debt. Additionally, the Static discharge does not occur until at least one member of the cohort is aware of the lapse.

Actions that directly harm a player character or their Loyalty Touchstone or that harm or further the goals of their Conviction Touchstones are a special case. The wronged Renegade is entitled to Compensation from the offender. This is a mandatory transfer of Static from the offender to the victim equal to half the discharge cost of the offense (rounded up), even if it puts the offender in Static debt.

For example, executing another player character’s Conviction Touchstone after the cohort takes him prisoner and without the cohort’s blessing normally discharges 4 Static. The killer also owes the Broken whose Conviction Touchstone he killed 2 Static as Compensation.

If multiple player characters are harmed by the same unsanctioned action, the offender must pay Compensation to each one. He must spend enough Static to pay all offended parties.

Typically, the cost of straying is 1 Static for a minor lapse, 2 Static for most lapses, 4 Static for serious lapses, and 6 Static for egregious lapses. Reduce this by 1 or 2 if there were mitigating circumstances. Increase it by 1 or 2 if the offender intended to harm cohort member (or their interests).

Lying: Whether by omission, half-truths, or bald-faced lies, the character deceives her cohort. The amount of harm the mistruth inflicts determines how much it damages the character’s standing in the cohort.

The lie is petty but ultimately harmless, such as claiming you were researching a conspiracy agent when you were actually at a movie (1 Static). The lie masks a complication that will likely become important later (2 Static). The lie creates a complication for the cohort (3 Static). Reduce the cost by 1 Static if the lie concerns a personal secret the character reasonably wishes to keep. Increase the cost by 1 Static if the lie was intended to harm the cohort, any of its members, or any of their Loyalty Touchstones, and this entitles the victim to Compensation.

Fraternizing with Enemies: The character knowingly associates with the cohort’s enemies. This includes agents of the conspiracy, as well as other characters’ Conviction Touchstones even if they aren’t connected to a conspiracy.

Agreeing to or seeking out an illicit meeting for the purpose of either hearing them out or tricking them into revealing valuable information to you (1 Static). Befriending or becoming the lover of an enemy without the intention of betraying the cohort (2 Static). Knowingly giving an enemy a piece of information the cohort would prefer to keep secret (2 Static). Acting as a spy within the cohort on the enemy’s behalf over the course of weeks or longer (4 Static). Performing a single act of sabotage against the cohort on an enemy’s behalf (4 Static). Performing regular acts of espionage and sabotage against the cohort on an enemy’s behalf (6 Static). Reduce the Static cost by 1 if the enemy used leverage (such as a hostage Loyalty Touchstone) to force the association.

Bullying: The character attempts to use threats, emotional manipulation, or Variations to force members of her cohort or their Loyalty Touchstones to capitulate.

This nearly always costs 1 Static. Although it cannot force a player character to comply, this is often coupled with a Bribe, as the target is cowed by the bully’s threats into doing something he might otherwise not do. If this targets another player character’s Loyalty Touchstone, that player is entitled to Compensation.

Harming: The character harms a member of his cohort or their Touchstones. This could be physical harm, but it might also be emotional trauma, mental anguish, or spiritual damage.

The harm is minor, such that the victim will make a full recovery in a couple hours (1 Static). The harm is significant, with recovery taking days (2 Static). The harm is serious, with recovery lasting a week or more (4 Static). The harm is complete and irreversible, such as death or Divergence (6 Static). Reduce the Static cost by 1 if the harm was due to carelessness or accident, or by 2 if it was self-defense. Increase the Static cost by 2 if the harm was premeditated and intentional. The victim’s player is also entitled to Compensation.

Dereliction: A Renegade cohort’s success depends on its members working together, and this is most important during operations against the conspiracy and other enemies. A Deviant who allows himself to be distracted during an operation, or one who doesn’t show up when expected, endangers the entire cohort.

Tries to carry out his duty but fails, whether due to misfortune, incompetence, or unavoidable complications (1 Static). Carries out his duty only after a significant delay because other interests distracted him (1 Static). Fails to carry out his duty because he made poor choices, panicked, or allowed other interests to distract him from his purpose (2 Static). Intentionally and knowingly fails to carry out his duty (4 Static). Abandons a planned operation midway (4 Static). Intentionally fails to show up for an operation (6 Static). Reduce the Static cost by 1 if the failure was in the furtherance of an equally important cohort goal. Reduce the Static cost by 2 (potentially earning Static) if the failure was in the furtherance of an even more important cohort goal.

Other Lapses: Renegades cannot rely on a neutral outside enforcer to police them. Many regularly commit crimes ranging from trespassing and petty theft to kidnapping and first-degree murder, so they don’t want to be beholden to an outsider. However, cohorts gradually establish best practices, rules of engagement, and courtesies — whether through formal rulemaking or informal mutual agreement. Those who fail to adhere to this code of conduct quickly find themselves on the outs with the cohort. In addition to the amount of Static these lapses discharge, a cohort can stipulate that some or all of them entitle impacted members to Compensation.

•            Breaks a Promise. 1 Static for a minor promise or a more serious one with significant mitigating circumstances. 2 Static for most promises. 4 Static or more if the broken promise has grave consequences or if the Broken has a pattern of broken promises.

•            Causes unnecessary mayhem that could attract the attention of law enforcement or the conspiracy. 1 Static for petty crimes or vandalism unlikely to be investigated. 2 Static for a crime that law enforcement will take an interest in or for making a scene in front of dozens of Baselines. 4 Static for a high-profile crime or making a scene in front of hundreds of Baselines. 6 Static for a high-profile crime in front of hundreds or making a scene in front of thousands.

•            Makes an enemy for no purpose. 1 Static for making an enemy of a Baseline who isn’t a threat to the cohort. 2 Static for making an enemy of a Baseline who could cause some trouble for the cohort. 4 Static for making a powerful Baseline enemy or an enemy with supernatural powers or connections. 6 Static for making an enemy of a powerful Baseline organization. Reduce the Static cost by 1 if the Deviant declares the new enemy a Conviction Touchstone. Increase the Static cost by 2 if the Remade makes an enemy of someone the cohort would like to be an ally (or one who already is).

•            Commits a war crime. 1 Static for threatening or roughing up a prisoner. 2 Static for taking a hostage or using a bystander or prisoner as a human shield. 4 Static for executing a prisoner or hostage or for engaging in acts of torture. 6 Static for habitual torture or execution, or for intentionally triggering the Divergence in an unwilling victim. Reduce the Static cost by 1 if the victim is the offender’s Conviction Touchstone. Increase the Static cost by 1 if the victim is an innocent — such as a bystander, the young child of a conspiracy agent, or a Conviction Touchstone’s grandmother who has no idea what he has been doing.

Transferring Static

Static can be exchanged between players. The points aren’t lost. They simply transfer social influence from one character to another. However, players can often earn Static from the same action for which another player transferred Static to them. For example, a player might accept a Bribe of Static to have his character volunteer for a dangerous task, earning a point of Static for his selflessness (see above) in addition to receiving whatever Static the other player gave him to capitulate.

Bribe

As straightforward as it gets, one player offers another player one or more points of Static to have his character do what she wants (or to not do what she doesn’t want him to do). It may mean he goes along with her on a plan or believes her obvious lie, for example, or it could mean he finds somewhere else to be when she wants to have a serious private conversation with a Storyteller character.

Within the game fiction, this often takes the form of begging, cajoling, or tricking the recipient into acting (or not acting). In some cases, the recipient Deviant surprises himself by doing something he considers a little out of character because fuck it, she’d do the same for him.

Compensation

Deviants are notoriously easy to provoke and vexingly difficult to mollify. However, one player’s character naming another’s as a Conviction Touchstone is seldom good for a chronicle. Imposing a strict rule that fellow player characters have a sort of halo that demands the instant forgiveness of any wrongs, however egregious they would be in a Storyteller character, isn’t the answer, either.

When one player character strays (p. XX) and her actions harm another player character, the victim is entitled to Compensation. Compensation is always paid, even if it puts the offender in Static debt. So long as a player character pays an appropriate amount of Compensation (or other members of the cohort pay it on her behalf), the Renegade she wronged will not name her as a Conviction Touchstone.

Within the game fiction, this often involves the offender apologizing to the wronged party or otherwise making amends. If other characters interceded, they are the ones making the apologies on the offender’s behalf or otherwise smoothing things over. If Compensation is paid out of a character’s abundant supply of Static, it can mean that she has depleted her supply of goodwill somewhat, but not so much that the wronged party won’t let it slide this time.

Problem Characters, Not Problem Players

The Cohort Static systems are not meant to rein in a disruptive player. If the problem is the player, no game mechanic is going to solve it. Rather, they are a set of mechanical tools meant to enforce certain narrative tropes surrounding character types common in the inspirational media.

First, they encourage turn-taking and spotlight-sharing among the players by offering ways to abstract discussions and decisions that would use up a lot of time at the table unnecessarily. After all, a skilled Storyteller will usually go along with any plan the players come up with to further the story — introducing complications, sure, but not killing off the whole cohort for the crime of not noticing some hidden flaw in their strategy.

Second, they reflect the reasonable narrative steps Renegades might take to rein in a disruptive member of their cohort, shy of simply kicking him out. It permits a character to be on the outs with his companions — and for that to mean something mechanically — while allowing him to redeem himself.

Third, they serve as a guideline for players whose characters are ornery assholes, lone wolves, or even occasional traitors by providing a metric for whether the additional drama they’re bringing into the chronicle is merely making the social dynamics of the cohort more interesting or whether it is likely disrupting the fun of the rest of the troupe. If you’ve run out of Static, and especially if someone has put you in the Doghouse, you should probably dial back the team-killing for a bit.

Operations

A Renegade cohort can only get so far by improvising from moment to moment. Conspiracies are organizations above all else. For all their faults, they excel at making and executing plans. To have any hope of defeating them, Renegades must learn to do the same.

An operation is a moderately complex activity organized and conducted by all or most of the cohort to achieve a stated objective. Its three components are a goal, a plan, and a risk of failure that carries consequences. An operation always requires multiple scenes and usually lasts most of one or more chapters but less than a full story.

Proposals

Renegade cohorts are seldom led from the top down. Most are democratic at best, if not outright anarchic. In practice, even for those that claim to make all decisions by consensus, the loudest and most eloquent voice wins out more often than softer and less polished ones.

The Goal: Operations almost always begin with a goal. This can be action-oriented (“steal some of the serum the conspiracy has been using to create Remade from the shady clinic,” for example) or not (such as “find out which dockside warehouse the conspiracy is using to traffic abducted test subjects”). Sometimes, the members of the cohort all agree on the goal, but more often Broken will propose different goals. This is a normal part of the process. Varying degrees of risk tolerance, personal feelings, and differing opinions on what is most important now all influence the goals a Deviant may propose.

The Plan: An operation’s plan flows from its goal. A cohort that has reached consensus on a goal may have fierce disagreements on how they will achieve that goal. Using the serum theft as an example, the plan could be to infiltrate the clinic in broad daylight, sneak in under cover of darkness, or go in with overt Variations active.

Each combination of goal and plan is its own proposal.

Decision Point

Once the cohort has had a chance to present and discuss various proposals, they must decide how to proceed. The decision point is the moment when discussion turns from presenting and comparing proposals to committing to one.

A cohort can reach a decision point naturally. Conversation tapers off, and it becomes clear to everyone that one proposal is superior to the others — or maybe the first serious proposal never had any competition. In such cases, calling the question and bidding on proposals are moot. Proceed directly to Investment.

Many Renegade cohorts struggle with analysis paralysis, however. They can’t decide which course of action is their next best step, or they can’t decide which is their least bad option. When the cohort is locked in a loop of proposing and dismissing plan after plan and seems to be spinning their wheels, any one of them may call the question.

Calling the Question: To call the question, the cohort must be seriously considering at least two different courses of action, and the characters must have had adequate opportunity to discuss their pros and cons. The character calling the question must also have at least one point of Static. This changes the in-character discussion of the cohort’s next move into an out-of-character one using Static to express the direction the debate ultimately went. Once someone has called the question, no one may present a new proposal; only those already discussed (however briefly) are on the table.

Bidding: Starting with the character with the most Static and proceeding to the one with the least Static (break ties with appropriate Social rolls, such as Presence + Persuasion), each player bids Static in support of one or more of the proposals on the table. The character who called the question must bid Static on at least one of the proposals. Continue around the table until no one bids additional Static. The proposal with the most Static bid on it becomes the operation. If there is a tie, refund bids on non-tying proposals and go around the table again. Break ties with appropriate Social rolls (Presence + Persuasion is typical), with each character’s successes supporting one proposal of the player’s choice.

Investment

Just because the cohort has reached a decision on their next course of action doesn’t mean that they’re all equally on board with it. Investment is a measure of each character’s commitment to an operation and so of the cohort’s collective will to carry it out.

Investing: Starting with the character with the most Static and proceeding to the one with the least Static (break ties with appropriate Social rolls, such as Presence + Persuasion), each player invests Static in the Operation Pool. This continues until the option goes around the table once with no one investing more Static. The Operation Pool is a collective resource shared by everyone in the cohort.

Minimum: A character can normally invest as much or as little of their Static into the Operation Pool as they wish — including investing no Static. However, if the operation came about through a decision point, any character who bid in favor of the operation’s proposal must invest at least as much Static in the Operation Pool as they bid on it.

Operation Leader: The character who invested the most Static into the Operation Pool gains the Operation Leader Condition (p. XX). Break ties with Social rolls.

Invested: Any character who invests at least one point of Static in the Operation Pool gains the Invested Condition (p. XX).

Dissent: Sometimes a Deviant strongly objects to an operation. Although a single dissenting voice is seldom enough to dissuade an entire cohort, even the most iron-fisted despot can be overruled if enough Renegades oppose him. To dissent, the character discharges a point of Static; this cost is waived if the operation involves a plan that endangers or harms one of the character’s Loyalty Touchstones or hinges on aiding or working with one of his Conviction Touchstones. If the supporters of the operation equal or exceed the dissenters, the operation moves forward as planned; each dissenter gains the Dissenting Condition (p. XX), and the Operation Pool gains Static equal to the number of dissenting characters.

The Operation

Every operation has a clear endpoint where it becomes clear that it has succeeded, failed, or reached an inconclusive dead end. While the operation lasts, so too does its Operation Pool, although the Conditions members received during the investment step can sometimes add to or discharge Static from it. The outcome of an operation determines how it affects the Static distribution of the cohort; all of these possibilities count as the operation’s end for the purpose of resolving relevant Conditions:

Mutiny: If the number of dissenting Renegades exceeds the number who have invested Static in it, the operation does not occur. The Static in the Operation Pool is returned to the cohort, dividing it equally among all members; any remainder is discharged. The operation leader then discharges Static equal to the number of dissenters. The operation leader cannot propose a new operation during the current chapter. Characters with the Dissenting Condition earn 1 Static.

Abort: Sometimes it becomes clear immediately before it starts that an operation is doomed to failure. As long as none of the Static in the Operation Pool has been discharged and no member of the cohort has yet lost something significant (hasn’t died, been captured, suffered injuries that won’t heal in a few hours, or lost a resource they can’t readily replace), the operation leader may discharge a point of Static to abort the operation. All Static in the Operation Pool is returned to the cohort, dividing it equally among all members; any remainder is discharged. The characters withdraw gracefully, usually with minimal risk of complications. Characters with the Dissenting Condition earn 1 Static.

Success: An operation that accomplishes its goal, even at a price, is considered a success. The operation leader distributes any Static remaining in the Operation Pool, as per the Operation Leader Condition (p. XX). Characters with the Invested or Operation Leader Condition earn 1 Static.

Failure: An operation is a failure if it neither achieves its stated goal nor provides any other significant benefit to the cohort. The Renegades walk away from the operation emptyhanded and likely worse off than they were when it started. When an operation fails, any Static remaining in the Operation Pool is discharged, and each member of the cohort takes a Beat in addition to any from resolving related Conditions. Characters with the Dissenting Condition earn 1 Static.

Inconclusive: An operation is inconclusive if it partially achieves its goal or if it advances the cohort’s interests in some way without achieving the goal. The Renegades accomplish something of importance, just not what they had intended. Any Static remaining in the Operation Pool is returned to the cohort, dividing it equally among all members; any remainder is discharged. Characters with the Dissenting, Invested, or Operation Leader Condition earn 1 Static.

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Static Summary

Earning Static

Familiarity: 1 Static at end of chapter (unless you have the Doghouse Condition, or a cohort member has Static debt but lacks Doghouse Condition). 1 additional Static per person who has Doghouse Condition because you gave it to them.

Selflessness: 1 Static when suffering, taking a risk, or making a sacrifice for cohort or a cohort member.

Acceptance: 1 Static when another cohort member’s Scar creates a complication for you.

Intuition: Gain Static based on Conditions:

•            Dissenting: Earn 1 Static if you correctly predict a complicating plot twist. Earn 1 Static if the operation ends in mutiny or failure or if it is aborted or inconclusive.

•            Invested: Earn 1 Static if the operation succeeds or is inconclusive.

•            Operation Leader: Earn 1 Static if the operation succeeds or is inconclusive.

Discharging Static

With the exception of straying or paying Compensation, you can’t go into Static debt.

Call Out: Once per chapter, discharge Static no greater than target’s Static debt and roll equal number of dice. If successful, impose Doghouse Condition on target. Can be contested by other cohort members also calling out the target.

Stray: 1 or more Static for putting own needs ahead of cohort’s. Typically, 1 Static for a minor lapse, 2 Static for most lapses, 4 Static for serious lapses, and 6 Static for egregious lapses. Reduce by 1 or 2 if there were mitigating circumstances. Increase by 1 or 2 if intended to harm cohort member (or their interests). Cohort members harmed by your action are owed Compensation. If you have Doghouse Condition, you don’t discharge Static by straying, but you still owe Compensation.

Invest: 1 or more Static, which is added to the Operation Pool (p. XX).

Transferring Static

Bribe: 1 or more Static given to another player to do something.

Compensation: 1 or more Static given to cohort member harmed by your actions — equal to half the Static you discharged (rounded up).

Operation Summary

Each proposal has a goal and a plan. Each combination of goal and plan is a separate proposal.

If cohort reaches consensus, proceed directly to Investment. Otherwise, after proposals have been discussed, anyone with 1+ Static may Call the Question, leading to a Decision Point.

Decision Point

In descending order of Static, characters bid (but don’t discharge) Static on preferred proposals until no one increases their bid for one cycle of bids.

Character who Called the Question must bid at least 1 Static.

Cohort members can bid on multiple proposals but can’t bid more Static than they have.

Winning proposal becomes the operation. If a tie, cohort members withdraw Static bid on non-tying proposals and continue bidding. Break remaining ties with Social rolls.

Investment

In descending order of Static, characters may invest Static in Operation Pool. Those who bid in favor of the winning proposal must invest at least as much Static as they bid.

•            Character who invested the most Static gains the Operation Leader Condition. Break ties with Social rolls.

•            Any character who invested at least 1 Static but is not the Operation Leader gains the Invested Condition.

•            Characters who didn’t invest may discharge 1 Static to gain the Dissenting Condition; this adds 1 Static to the Operation Pool. Cost is waived if operation involves endangering/harming dissenter’s Loyalty Touchstone or aiding/working with Conviction Touchstone.

The Operation

Operation Conditions can influence the operation:

•            Dissenting: One dissenter per scene may suggest a complication; if it comes true, the dissenter earns 1 Static and adds 1 Static to the Operation Pool. Earn a Beat whenever an unexpected plot complication arises.

•            Invested: During operation, when spending Willpower to increase a resistance or add dice to a roll, may discharge 1 Static from Operation Pool to add five dice instead of three or increase resistance by three instead of two.

•            Operation Leader: During operation, whenever any member of the cohort spends Willpower to increase a resistance or add dice to a roll, you may discharge 1 Static from Operation Pool to have this add five dice instead of three or increase resistance by three instead of two. You may spend 1 Static to reset cohort member’s per-chapter use of an improvised Technique. Earn a Beat when member of cohort fails to execute part of the operation.

Operation Results

All operation endings resolve relevant Conditions, earning a Beat.

•            Mutiny: If number of dissenters exceeds those invested in the operation, the operation doesn’t happen. Invested Static is refunded evenly. Operation leader discharges Static equal to number of dissenters and can’t propose new operation this chapter. Dissenters earn 1 Static.

•            Abort: Operation leader discharges 1 Static to cancel operation before cohort has discharged Static from the Operation Pool or lost something significant. Operation doesn’t occur, and invested Static is refunded evenly. Dissenters earn 1 Static.

•            Success: Operation achieves its goal. Members with Invested Condition or Operation Leader Condition earn 1 Static. Operation leader decides how Static remaining in Operation Pool is divided between cohort members.

•            Failure: Operation accomplishes nothing of importance. All Static remaining in Operation Pool is discharged. Members with Dissenting Condition earn 1 Static. All characters take an additional Beat.

•            Inconclusive: Operation isn’t successful but accomplishes something of importance. Static remaining in Operation Pool is refunded evenly. Members with Dissenting, Invested, or Operation Leader Condition earn 1 Static.

[end static/operation summary]

Techniques

Humans are a creative lot. Give them a problem, and they will quickly seek out tools in their environment that might solve it. They’ll wield a tool one way, and then another, and then attack the problem with it from a completely different direction until the problem is solved. A tool or technique that serves them faithfully once often finds itself applied to new problems — sometimes in ways for which the tool is not ideal. “When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail,” as the old saying goes.

The Remade are no exception. Once they overcome the initial shock of the Divergence, Deviants experiment with their newfound abilities — whether in a systematic way or only in moments of desperation — and discover ways to use them. The obvious applications (the ones printed in Deviant and its supplements) come naturally, of course, but trial and error yield unobvious ones, too. These crude tools occasionally prove worthless, but enough of these approaches to problem-solving through Variations succeed to encourage the transformed to apply them to new problems.

Over time, if they live long enough, Broken develop favored alternate uses for their abilities. Such applications cease being ad hoc improvisations and develop into formal techniques. Most never pass beyond the transformed who developed them. After all, even the cleverest use of telekinetic powers is useless to anyone who doesn’t possess telekinesis (which is nearly everyone). But some have principles that can be applied to other Variations — and some Remade meet others who share their abilities — which allows one Deviant to teach their techniques to another. Remade who teach their techniques (or who help other Deviants develop techniques appropriate to their own Variations) are quite common among the Devoted, but a few such mentors exist among Renegades.

In Deviant: The Renegades, these novel applications of the Broken’s Variations are represented by Techniques.

Technique Basics

No Variation permits the use of every Technique. The player must supply a narrative justification for why a Variation (or Adaptation or Form) allows a given Technique, which must be one the Storyteller finds reasonable. This will usually reflect the Variation’s mechanics as-written, but in some cases the specific manifestation of that Variation for a Deviant can serve as a rationale. Even if a Variation generally justifies a Technique, it will not work in every situation. A quill plucked from the Remade’s Deadly Ichor might work as a crude lockpick, but it will be useless against a magnetic keycard reader.

To use a Technique, the Variation must be active first. Techniques based on a Form or Adaptation calculate Scar Power/Finesse/Resistance based on the Deviant’s Mental, Physical, or Social Attributes, chosen when the Technique is first used (or when it is learned, if purchased).

Learning Techniques

•            Although Remade benefit from practicing a Technique until they have mastered it, any Deviant with an appropriate Variation can improvise a given Technique. A Deviant can improvise a Technique once per chapter. Adaptations can reset this limit.

•            Whenever the Remade increases his Acclimation, he learns one new Technique for free. He may choose this immediately or save it for a time when he needs it, purchasing it mid-scene, if needed.

•            The Broken may master additional Techniques by purchasing the Mastered Technique Merit (p. XX).

•            Whether gained by raising Acclimation or buying a Merit, a purchased (Mastered) Technique is more potent than an improvised one. However, although many Variations can express the same Technique, when purchasing a Technique, the Deviant must decide which Variation she uses to accomplish it. She must further specify its exact effects. For example, a purchased Technique based on the improvised effect of giving the Remade an equipment bonus on Skill checks must specify not just the Skills it enhances (typically one or two such Skills) but the specific applications of the Skills that benefit. It’s as narrow as a Specialty — useful when it applies but by no means applying to all situations involving its Skill.

Technique Effects

Most Techniques provide one of the following benefits:

•            If using a Variation to perform a mundane action, either replace the normal Attribute + Skill roll with a Scar Finesse roll or treat the Variation as equipment with a bonus equal to the lower of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude — chosen when invoking the Technique. This equipment lasts until the end of the scene and does not stack with the Variation’s normal bonus to rolls/resistance. Mastered: The Scar Finesse roll enjoys a +2 bonus, or the equipment bonus is instead the higher of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude.

•            If improving a static trait (like Defense, Speed, or armor), increase the trait by the lower of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude. This improvement requires an action and lasts until the beginning of your next turn. Mastered: This is instead the higher of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude.

•            If using a Variation to set up or aid an ally in the scene, add dice equal to the lower of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude to the ally’s roll, or make a Scar Finesse roll and add your successes as dice to their roll (as a teamwork action) — chosen when invoking the Technique. This affects a single roll. Mastered: The Scar Finesse roll enjoys a +2 bonus, or the bonus is instead the higher of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude.

•            If using a Variation to create a melee weapon, it has a damage bonus equal to half the lower of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude (rounded up), minus 1. The weapon is improvised and suffers a –1 penalty to attacks. Producing the weapon requires an action, but it lasts until the end of the scene. Mastered: The weapon does not suffer a penalty to attacks, and the damage bonus is instead half the greater of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude (rounded up), minus 1.

•            If imposing a penalty to an unwilling character’s mundane action, it requires a Scar Finesse roll as though it were a Directed effect, the penalty it imposes is equal to the lower of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude, and it lasts for a single roll. This requires the Deviant’s action for the turn and does not stack with the Variation’s normal penalty to rolls/resistance. Mastered: This penalty is instead the higher of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude.

•            If worsening another person’s static trait (like Defense, Speed, or armor), it requires a Scar Finesse roll as though it were a Directed effect. If successful, reduce the trait by the lower of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude. This requires an action and lasts until the beginning of your next turn. Mastered: The reduction is instead the higher of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude.

•            A Variation can grant the Deviant or an ally a Magnitude 1 Variation for a turn and without requiring the target to use an action to activate it. This must be one the Variation could potentially impart. Using Holographic Projection to hide an ally (Camouflage) makes sense but using it to impart Aquatic does not. The Scar Power of the temporary Variation is the same as that of the Variation that emulates it; Scar Finesse rolls use the Scar Finesse of the Variation that is the basis of the temporary Variation + Magnitude of the temporary Variation (typically 1) + Acclimation. Mastered: The temporary Variation can be up to Magnitude 2” to “The temporary Variation can be up to Magnitude 2 or it lasts up to 1 + Scar Power minutes (turns in action scenes).

•            A Variation can produce an “off-label” effect that reflects the in-world explanation of how it works or else a second-order effect its use could reasonably have, even if this doesn’t strictly fit the as-written mechanical effects of the Variation. This effect should be narrow in application and small in scope and is subject to Storyteller approval. A Cutting Weaponry Lash (Incinerating) 2 (Deviant, p. 122) that manifests as a flaming sword could be used as a torch to light the way, for example, or it could be thrust into a pile of kindling to ignite a campfire. Mastered: The effect can be a little more potent or broader in effect. The flaming sword might be able to ignite most flammable materials with barely a touch, for example, or it could be used as a heat source in a cold room.

Example Techniques

The following are examples of Techniques Deviants are likely to have. Each lists likely Variations that could be used to produce the effect, but these are by no means exhaustive. Each also provides the effect of mastering it, rather than improvising it. Some follow the guidelines above, while others use mechanics unique to them.

Alley-Oop

Sample Variations: Flight, Superhuman Strength, Telekinesis, Terrakinesis

As an action, the Deviant gives an ally a boost, allowing them to jump higher or farther than they could on their own. This mimics the effect of Brachiation 1 (Bounding).

Mastered: This can instead mimic Brachiation 2 (Leaper).

Awe

Sample Variations: Bioluminescence, Creeping Dread, Holographic Projection, Shadow Command

As an action, the Remade produces a dramatic visual display of power, claiming to be an angel, demon, or other supernatural creature held in fear or reverence by the average Baseline. The Broken enjoys a bonus to relevant Intimidation and Persuasion rolls equal to the lower of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude.

Mastered: Use the higher of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude, instead.

Blackmail

Sample Variations: Blessing, Electrokinesis, Pheromones, Traumavore

The Deviant threatens to reveal an enemy’s secrets to the authorities, a rival conspiracy, or the world, to secure concessions from them. The Remade must have first collected (or convincingly fabricated) damning evidence of the target’s wrongdoing (or taken a hostage the target cares about). The Remade either makes a Scar Finesse roll using the Variation or adds the lower of her Scar Power or Variation Magnitude as an equipment bonus to an appropriate Social roll (Intimidation and Persuasion are common). Voluminous or particularly damning information may grant a bonus to this roll. If the target is a conspiracy agent, she subtracts half the conspiracy’s Standing (rounded up) from the roll.

If successful, the target does one of the following, as decided by the Broken and circumstances:

•            The target backs down from a violent confrontation, calls off any goons or others under his command, and lets the Deviant and her cohort leave the scene without pursuing her.

•            The conspiracy backs off temporarily. It may still surveil the Remade and her cohort, but it suffers a point of lethal damage to its Association the first time it takes any conspiracy action against them unless provoked. This affords no protection from other organizations in the Web of Pain.

•            The target or conspiracy gives the Broken something she wants. This might be temporary access to an Icon or other resource, custody of a prisoner or hostage (perhaps one of the Deviant’s friends), a briefcase full of cash that will let the Remade live in relative comfort for a few months, or anything else the target is able to offer.

On an exceptional success, the Deviant secures two of the concessions above or can retain a copy of her evidence even after apparently destroying it.

Mastered: Use the higher of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude, instead.

Bodyguard

Sample Variations: Carapace, Extra Appendages, Predator’s Cunning, Precognition

As an action, the Remade blocks, deflects, or otherwise turns aside attacks on the ally against which the bodyguard would enjoy her Defense. This can also represent Variations that allow the bodyguard to give the ally advance warning of danger or to move him out of harm’s way. This increases the ally’s Defense by the lower of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude until the Broken’s next turn.

Mastered: Use the higher of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude, instead.

Clear Threat

Sample Variations: Gigantic, Lash, Matter Emulation, Shadow Selves

By making himself an obvious threat, the Remade draws enemy fire to himself, potentially sparing less battle-ready members of his cohort. As a reflexive action after taking an opponent out of the fight in a turn, make a Scar Finesse roll. If successful, a number of Baselines in the scene equal to the lower of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude — or a single non-Baseline opponent — concentrate their attacks on the Broken next turn. They remain focused on him until he is no longer a threat or until he fails to take one of their number out of the fight on his turn.

This effect is cumulative with successive turns. As long as the Deviant continues eliminating opponents each turn, he attracts the attention of more and more of the remaining enemies.

Mastered: Use the higher of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude, instead.

Decoy

Sample Variations: Beast Mastery, Bioluminescence, Pyrokinesis, Storm-Caller

The Deviant uses Variations to attract attention to herself. If she remains in the scene, allies enjoy a bonus equal to the lower of her Scar Power or Variation Magnitude to their Stealth rolls and other actions to operate unnoticed for as long as the distraction lasts.

She may instead provoke enemies into giving chase. For each success she achieves on a Scar Finesse roll, she draws away four Baseline (or one non-Baseline) pursuers. This can be resolved following normal chase rules (Deviant, p. XX), with the pursuit ending either when the Remade gives the hunters the slip or they catch up with her. Each turn of a chase is 30 seconds to one minute, which can give allies a clear window to overcome the remaining guards, plant the explosives, or otherwise exploit their numeric advantage.

Mastered: If remaining in the scene, use the higher of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude, instead. If fleeing, each success draws away twice as many people.

Dossier

Sample Variations: Chronological Alignment, Memory Thief, Psycho-Onomastics, Shadows of the Past

The Deviant uses Variations to stalk or research a target to learn their routines, identity, history, and associations. Often deployed to identify a potential Linchpin ahead of an attack on a Node, this can replace or enhance an ordinary research roll. The Remade either makes a Scar Finesse roll using the Variation or adds the lower of his Scar Power or Variation Magnitude as an equipment bonus to the research roll.

Mastered: The Scar Finesse roll enjoys a +2 bonus, or the bonus is instead the higher of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude.

Focused Defense

Sample Variations: Carapace, Refuge, Telekinesis, Translocation

The Deviant focuses on avoiding harm, to the exclusion of taking any other actions during the turn — although movement is still allowed. This increases their Defense or general armor (as appropriate to the Variation) by the lower of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude until the beginning of their next turn.

Mastered: Use the higher of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude, instead.

Guide

Sample Variations: Blessing, Internet Acuity, Otherworldly Connection, Specialized Sense

The Deviant feeds allies information at critical moments to steer them away from unexpected threats or towards unseen advantages. One ally enjoys a bonus to a relevant roll equal to the lower of the Remade’s Scar Power or Variation Magnitude, or all her allies enjoy a +1 bonus to a relevant roll of their choice. This bonus must usually be used during the current scene, but the Broken may instead stipulate it be used in an anticipated future scene (such as a named stage of an operation).

Mastered: Use the higher of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude, instead, or increase the bonus to all allies to +2.

Inquiry

Sample Variations: Dream Invader, Face Thief, Memory Thief, Psycho-Onomastics, Telepathy

The Deviant uses his Variations to enhance an attempt to draw information from someone — whether this takes the form of an intense, one-on-one interrogation or a more casual setting such as infiltrating his enemy’s goons and eavesdropping on their gossip. The Broken enjoys a bonus to relevant Empathy and Investigation rolls equal to the lower of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude.

Mastered: Use the higher of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude, instead.

Juggernaut

Sample Variations: Boneless, Carapace, Immunity, Rapid Healing; Relentless Adaptation

The Broken uses his seeming invulnerability to drive his enemies to despair.

At the end of each turn in which the Remade’s Variations allowed him to seemingly ignore a source of harm — either by evading it, suffering no or negligible damage from it (i.e., without increasing his wound penalty), or immediately recovering from it — make a reflexive Scar Finesse roll. This is an extended action with a target number of successes equal to twice the enemy’s Resolve. If at any time the Broken suffers damage that increases his wound penalty (and from which he does not recover on his next turn), he loses all accumulated successes and must start over. Success on the extended action manifests in one of two ways:

•            If the Deviant took at least one opponent out of the fight, he scatters his foes or forces them to surrender. Opponents suffer the Beaten Down Tilt, and most Baselines will flee.

•            The Remade uses the time his invulnerability buys to convince his persecutors to listen to him. This will not work if he has actively harmed any of his attackers. His impression level moves to average, and until the end of the scene he can either use Scar Finesse rolls in place of Social rolls or treat the Variation as equipment with a bonus to Social rolls equal to the lower of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude.

Mastered: Add +2 dice to Scar Finesse rolls to accumulate successes.

Ninja

Sample Variations: Aquatic, Boneless, Brachiation, Stretching

The Broken exploits her ability to maneuver into places where ordinary people could not hide — such as crouching against a ceiling or lurking in a pond. The Deviant enjoys a bonus to relevant Stealth rolls equal to the lower of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude.

Mastered: Use the higher of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude, instead.

Presumed Dead

Sample Variations: Environmental Adaptation, Immunity, Pyrokinesis, Refuge; Tolerant Adaptation

The Deviant places herself in a seemingly fatal situation from which her Variations protect her. She stays inside a burning building, flees into the frozen tundra, touches a high voltage wire, falls off a building, or otherwise places herself in a situation that promises certain death. Unless her enemies in the scene have documented her invulnerability, she may make a Manipulation + Expression roll with a bonus equal to the lower of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude. If successful, enemies assume she is dead and behave accordingly until the end of the scene unless she breaks the illusion by moving, speaking, etc.

On an exceptional success, any surviving opponents reporting back to conspiracy superiors attest to her death and are sufficiently convincing that the conspiracy’s next surveillance roll suffers a penalty equal to half the lower of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude (rounded up).

The Remade can impart this Technique’s effects on an ally if she has Variations that allow her to preserve or restore him from death.

Mastered: Use the higher of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude, instead, and the Manipulation + Expression roll enjoys a +2 bonus.

Psychotic Break

Sample Variations: Blessing, Emotion Amplification, Soul Seer, Telepathy

The Remade uses their Variations to wage subtle or not-so-subtle psychological warfare on a target, disrupting their sleep patterns and wearing away their mental defenses. If the Broken successfully uses the Variation against the target on a given day, the victim loses a point of Willpower and cannot recover Willpower from sleep that night. If the victim has no points of Willpower remaining when targeted by this Variation, she suffers a penalty to all Resolve, Stamina, and Composure rolls (but not derived traits) equal to half the lower of the Deviant’s Scar Power or Variation Magnitude (rounded up) until the next time she fully recovers her Willpower.

Mastered: Use half the higher of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude (rounded up), instead, and the target loses two points of Willpower instead of one.

Scout

Sample Variations: Animal Transformation, Astral Travel, Camouflage, Clairvoyance

The Broken uses their Variations to scout the perimeter of an area the cohort intends to enter — such as a building, military base, or city park. The Deviant makes a Scar Finesse roll using the Variation. If successful, she establishes a rough layout of the area, including any guards or other obvious security. For each success, she may also ask the Storyteller one question about the facility that may not be as obvious but can be deduced based on the occupants’ routines. The Storyteller should provide an accurate answer, although he need not disclose all the details. She might identify which wing of the hospital is off-limits, for example, or establish the existence of a drainage pipe that could be used to circumvent the barbed wire fence. However, the Storyteller need not disclose why the hospital wing has restricted access, nor must he mention that the drainage pipe leads to the lair of several nasty Manticores produced as a byproduct of the conspiracy’s medical waste.

The Deviant may forgo some questions, exchanging each of them for an additional point of Static that must be added to the Operation Pool of a relevant operation (p. XX). This does not count as an investment of Static and it is not refunded at the end of the mission if unused.

Mastered: On a successful scouting roll, the Remade may ask additional questions equal to half the lower of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude (rounded up).

Secret Weapon

Sample Variations: Animal Transformation, Holographic Projection, Monstrous Transformation, Tool Mastery

The Broken holds one or more capabilities in reserve, revealing them when they’re most likely to turn the tide of battle.

To benefit from this, the Deviant must not have activated a new Variation during the previous turn and must activate a Variation whose Magnitude equals or exceeds that of any Variation he already has active (or a Variation of any Magnitude if he has no Variations active). The first action the Remade takes that benefits from the Variation enjoys a bonus equal to the number of consecutive preceding turns during which he did not activate any new Variation, plus the difference between the Magnitude of the new Variation and the highest-Magnitude Variation he already had active.

A Variation whose Magnitude increases due to Adaptations such as Focus or Living Conduit can benefit from this, treating the boost in Magnitude as though activating a new Variation of the Variation’s increased Magnitude.

Mastered: Increase the bonus by 2.

Shepherd

Sample Variations: Electrokinesis, Hydrokinesis, Lash, Pyrokinesis

The Broken uses her Variations to drive an opponent in a direction of her choosing by threatening greater harm if he does not cooperate. Direct the Variation normally but at a penalty equal to the lower of the target’s Wits or Composure. If successful, the Variation has its normal effects but offers the victim a choice:

•            He must use his movement either this turn or next to move toward a designated point. This cannot be obviously suicidal, but it can place him in greater jeopardy.

•            He suffers additional damage from the Variation equal to the lower of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude.

Mastered: The target must use his movement on this turn and next to move towards the designated point. The additional damage for refusing the movement is instead equal to the higher of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude.

Shield

Sample Variations: Carapace, Cryokinesis, Gigantic, Superhuman Stamina

The Deviant interposes herself between a nearby ally and his attackers as a reflexive action that counts as a dodge. The ally enjoys the benefits of concealment, but the Remade loses her Defense until her next turn. The ally is barely concealed (–1) if his Size is greater than the Broken’s, partially concealed (–2) if they are of the same Size, and substantially concealed (–3) if the Deviant’s Size exceeds the ally’s.

Instead of attempting to overcome the concealment the Remade provides, an enemy may try to shoot through her. In this case, the Broken takes the full damage from the attack but counts as cover with a Durability equal to her Stamina + armor (including ballistic armor, if the attack is subject to it).

Once she is in place, the Broken may continue to provide concealment without requiring an additional action, until the ally moves out from behind the cover she offers or his enemies find a way to circumvent her (such as by circling around to attack from behind).

Mastered: The Remade’s armor increases by one while using this technique.

Skirmisher

Sample Variations: Brachiation, Enhanced Speed, Flight, Shadow Selves

The Remade takes advantage of her speed and mobility to present a constant threat to an enemy. If the target chooses to ignore the Broken, he loses his Defense against her attack this turn. Otherwise, the Deviant’s movement consumes her action for the turn, but she reduces the target’s Defense by the lower of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude until the start of her next turn.

Mastered: If ignored, the Remade also enjoys a bonus to the attack equal to half the lower of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude (rounded up). If reducing Defense, use the higher of Scar Power or Variation Magnitude, instead.