Failure
When a player doesn’t have enough successes to overcome the Difficulty of a challenge, they fail. Depending on the challenge, this can either mean that they fail to achieve their goals, or inflict entirely new problems. For example, a character who fails to abscond out of their bedroom window might be caught mid-escape. Alternatively, she might get away…by plummeting to the ground and bruising something important.
Failure is never a dead end in Scion. It always leads to something new, or builds up to a heroic comeback, because the failing character receives a Consolation. This is a minor benefit that doesn’t exactly give the character what she wants, but advances the group’s interests somehow.
A Consolation is a helpful, but minor, side effect of failure, which the Storyguide can use to keep the game moving. The simplest type of Consolation is Momentum, a resource which players can later spend for a variety of effects. Other Consolations are listed below:
• Fateful Encounter. Failure reveals another approach to the character’s goals, through new information or sheer coincidence. For example, a failed lockpicker might overhear gossip about the new ventilation system.
• Chance Meeting. Failure introduces a new character who can offer help or information, though perhaps at a price. For example, a character fails to endure the ravages of poison, but wakes in the care of a sewer-dwelling hag with her own agenda.
• Unlooked-for Advantage. Failure results in a level 1 Enhancement to a future challenge, though it can’t benefit a second attempt at the same goal. For example, a character fails to land a vicious strike, but their dazzling form wins the admiration of a watching asura prince.
The force of destiny gathers behind heroes, and is represented by Momentum. This is a resource that players can spend to affect the game on a dramatic level. The characters themselves aren’t normally aware of Momentum, but instead put its effects down to Fate or good luck. Momentum is stored in a single pool shared by all players (called the Momentum pool), which can hold up to (twice the number of players) at a time. Whenever a player receives Momentum as a Consolation, she adds 1 Momentum to this pool.
Momentum can activate Knacks (cool, epic things characters can do that make other people drop their jaws), add dice equal to Momentum used to a dice pool, or enable additional attempts at complex actions.
All players can spend Momentum in the following ways:
• Add Dice. A player can spend 1 Momentum per die to add a single die to a dice pool, before it is rolled. This dice pool can belong to any player, or even a Storyguide character. This is with the agreement of the table; if a player wants to spend Momentum, they must share their idea with the table. If every player agrees, the Momentum is spent.
• Add Interval. A player can spend 3 Momentum to add another interval to a complex action, giving the characters more time in which to work.
• Activate Knacks. If a player has a Knack that requires spending Momentum, they may spend it. They don’t need another player’s say-so.
An especially bad failure is called a botch. This occurs when a character rolls no successes at all, and at least one of their dice shows a 1. When a character botches, they fail to achieve their goal, and they also suffer an additional setback. A botched attack not only misses, it slips the character’s weapon from her grip. A botched escape gets her both captured and injured. The only Consolation players can receive for a botch is Momentum. However, they receive an additional 2 Momentum, for a total of 3.
If a character fails and the Storyguide wants to make that failure more awful (and interesting), she can offer the player 2 Momentum for the pool. If the player accepts, their character suffers a botch just as though they’d rolled no successes and at least a single 1.
Failure is never a dead end in Scion. It always leads to something new, or builds up to a heroic comeback, because the failing character receives a Consolation. This is a minor benefit that doesn’t exactly give the character what she wants, but advances the group’s interests somehow.
CONSOLATION
A Consolation is a helpful, but minor, side effect of failure, which the Storyguide can use to keep the game moving. The simplest type of Consolation is Momentum, a resource which players can later spend for a variety of effects. Other Consolations are listed below:
• Fateful Encounter. Failure reveals another approach to the character’s goals, through new information or sheer coincidence. For example, a failed lockpicker might overhear gossip about the new ventilation system.
• Chance Meeting. Failure introduces a new character who can offer help or information, though perhaps at a price. For example, a character fails to endure the ravages of poison, but wakes in the care of a sewer-dwelling hag with her own agenda.
• Unlooked-for Advantage. Failure results in a level 1 Enhancement to a future challenge, though it can’t benefit a second attempt at the same goal. For example, a character fails to land a vicious strike, but their dazzling form wins the admiration of a watching asura prince.
MOMENTUM
The force of destiny gathers behind heroes, and is represented by Momentum. This is a resource that players can spend to affect the game on a dramatic level. The characters themselves aren’t normally aware of Momentum, but instead put its effects down to Fate or good luck. Momentum is stored in a single pool shared by all players (called the Momentum pool), which can hold up to (twice the number of players) at a time. Whenever a player receives Momentum as a Consolation, she adds 1 Momentum to this pool.
Momentum can activate Knacks (cool, epic things characters can do that make other people drop their jaws), add dice equal to Momentum used to a dice pool, or enable additional attempts at complex actions.
All players can spend Momentum in the following ways:
• Add Dice. A player can spend 1 Momentum per die to add a single die to a dice pool, before it is rolled. This dice pool can belong to any player, or even a Storyguide character. This is with the agreement of the table; if a player wants to spend Momentum, they must share their idea with the table. If every player agrees, the Momentum is spent.
• Add Interval. A player can spend 3 Momentum to add another interval to a complex action, giving the characters more time in which to work.
• Activate Knacks. If a player has a Knack that requires spending Momentum, they may spend it. They don’t need another player’s say-so.
BOTCH
An especially bad failure is called a botch. This occurs when a character rolls no successes at all, and at least one of their dice shows a 1. When a character botches, they fail to achieve their goal, and they also suffer an additional setback. A botched attack not only misses, it slips the character’s weapon from her grip. A botched escape gets her both captured and injured. The only Consolation players can receive for a botch is Momentum. However, they receive an additional 2 Momentum, for a total of 3.
If a character fails and the Storyguide wants to make that failure more awful (and interesting), she can offer the player 2 Momentum for the pool. If the player accepts, their character suffers a botch just as though they’d rolled no successes and at least a single 1.
WHAT GRANTS MOMENTUM
• Consolation from a failed roll: 1
• Failed Specialty: +1
• Botch: +2
Certain Knacks, divine relics, or Purviews can additionally grant Momentum to the pool. See Scion: Hero for details.
Type
Natural
MOMENTUM AND VIRTUES
Scions and mortals known as saints possess a trait called Virtue, powerful polar forces of attitude that suffuse and define the pantheons. The Æsir, for example, are defined by their Audacity and their Fatalism; every Æsir is doomed to die, yet is not the greatest heroism to be found in the darkest of moments? The Netjer, by contrast, are consumed with Balance and Justice; they are concerned with the proper and orderly flow of the world, yet all things demand an accounting.
Virtues are represented mechanically by a track with a trait on either side. When a Scion, God, or other being with the track takes an action in line with one of their Virtues, they slide on the track closer to that trait, and any Momentum spent out of the Momentum pool to add dice to that roll results in bonus dice added.
Example: Vera is playing Sigrun, a Scion of Loki. As an Æsir Scion, she possesses the Virtues of Audacity and Fatalism. Vera decides to add Momentum to a roll to defiantly attack some support beams in defiance of a witch’s curse on her destiny, collapsing a flaming temple on her ice giant opponent; she receives bonus dice to the roll.
Saints and Origin Virtues are covered elsewhere. For more on Virtues, see Scion: Hero.
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