House Rules
“Am I not," quoth the thief to himself, "a cat in climbing, a deer in running, a snake in twisting, a hawk in pouncing, a dog in scenting? - keen as a hare, tenacious as a wolf, strong as a lion? - a lamp in the night, a horse on a plain, a mule on a stony path, a boat in the water, a rock on land?" The reply to his own questions was of course affirmative.
-- Vikram and the Vampire, translated by Sir Richard Burton
Character creation
Some people were rather unremarkable before erupting; hence they have fewer points in attributes, abilities or backgrounds. It is possible (with ST permission) to turn one attribute point into 5 bonus points, one ability point into 2 bonus points and background point into a bonus point. 8 bonus points can be turned into one quantum point (but players better motivate it well; no sneaking to optimise attributes :-)
Merits and flaws are available; see Aberrant Player’s Guide and/or the collection on the background/merit/flaw page.
Backgrounds
The Eufiber background is removed. While eufiber-like substances might exist or be developed by novas, they are not widespread enough to be a background.
Attunement can be used to affect other people with personal powers such as forcefield, but it takes time – the person has to be in contact with the nova for 60/quantum minutes.
Node does not denote any physical node or organ in the nova, but the “wattage” of their abilities. Novas with well-developed nodes can accumulate and perceive quantum fields better.
Enhancements
Beside the ones in the basic book and the player’s guide some other mega-attribute enhancements are possible:
Mega int, wit and per enhancements:
http://members.aol.com/talonstudio/brainwaves/ch4.html
http://pillarsoffaith.keenspace.com/aberrant.html
Toughness (MegaStam, nova survives being dead for a while), Bide (MegaDex, wait until nobody can oppose it), Hold (MegaStr, hold people), Damn Cute (MegaCha, too cute to attack).
http://aberrant.foronlinegames.com/powers.html
Anchor (MegaStr, impossible to knock down), Love Tap (MegaStr, able to not make damage), Weapon Mastery (MegaDex), Resurrection (MegaStam, regenerates when “dead”), Navigator (MegaPer, can navigate well), Mental Prodigy: Philosophy, Taunt (MegaWit, distract opponents)
Megaintelligence Enhancement: Encrypted Thoughts
The mind of the nova works in strange ways. It could be a case of alien thinking, paranoia repressing every thought and replacing it with popular songs or simply quantum encryption of the chemical reactions of the brain. Reading the mind of the nova produces gibberish unless the reader can decrypt the thoughts. If the nova is subjected to a successful mental takeover attempt, the controller will gain access to motor functions and sensory input, but the memories and thought-processes of the nova will remain obscure. An attempt to pierce the encryption may be made with a resisted Mega-intelligence roll, if the controlling nova has knowledge of the cryptographic method employed by the controlled person. Novas with analyse weakness can find ways of hacking the encryption or finding out the code. Some powers such as information control may also help overcome the protection.
Note that manipulation like The Voice or hypnosis still works: they affect the mind from the outside.
In combination with compartmentalized mind, this becomes an especially devious protective measure. The compartment has part of the encrypted data, thus making it more difficult to recover the information in the pierced compartment. Someone decoding the visible part of the mind will only get useless fragments, and must discover where the rest is. On the other hand, the compartment mind will not have much information either unless it was totally inside the compartment. When setting up her internal firewalls the nova with both enhancements must declare what knowledge and skills are placed where.
Powers
I believe most of the “supernatural” powers ascribed to novas have a very simple and fundamental explanation. Uncanny luck, extrasensory perception, the ability to react to the future, all these powers are due to the quantum nature of novas. A nova behaves as a macroscopic quantum system. But quantum mechanics does not have any time arrow; events affect each other both backwards and forwards in time. Or rather, there is no time at all: just a unitary whole. So it should not be surprising that novas are less bound by the time arrow than we are. A nova with luck simply reacts subconsciously to make futures where a bad thing happens more unlikely.
Professor Roland Penland, interviewed about the physics of Novas by the BBC January 2005.
Powers I don’t want in the campaign: Temporal Manipulation , Crosstime travel, Quantum supremacy, Time travel, Planck scaling, Universe creation. Not that I’m worried about players gaining most of them :-)
These powers are somewhat discouraged: Disrupt, Quantum leech, Quantum vampire
(i.e. the meta-powers – however, they do exist in the game world).
Temporal manipulation really should be separated into ageing-powers (which are OK) and effects that speed up the nova (also OK), but no fields of changed time exist.
Molecular alteration requires the right kind of atoms – wood cannot be turned to steel, but it could become diamond. Other powers may transform one element into another.
Making Hypermovement Faster
Hypermovement is too slow for my taste, at least for interplanetary flight. One easy way to handle this is to assume that the stated hypermovement speed is only within the atmosphere; it represents the terminal velocity that results from air resistance against the nova. Given some order-of-magnitude estimates, hypermovement gives 200 G of acceleration in space per dot. (Ordinary flight is just 20G)
This enables a nova to traverse 1 AU in 3 hours and 26 minutes if the nova just accelerates and does not slow down and 5 hours if the nova slows down in the later half of the flight to reach the destination at zero speed (otherwise the speed will be around 200 m/s^2 times the flight time). The formula is sqrt([distance in meters]/([hypermovement level] * 200 * 4.9)) seconds and 40% longer if the nova slows down to the target. Doing it with flight replaces 200 with 20; it takes about 3 times longer. Getting up to relativistic speeds using hypermovement takes 42 hours divided by the level – at these speeds the nova again starts to get slowed by relativistic effects and the resistance of the interstellar medium (which is now acting as a radioactive storm).
Novas without a serious force shield will likely be killed by moving at these speeds by hitting interplanetary dust (which will be moving faster than a bullet or act as a particle ray at relativistic speeds). Adaptation or some other life support is also necessary. Depending on the kind of flight/hypermovement the nova might need acceleration buffering – without attunement clothes and possessions might be crushed,
Another way of making hypermovement even faster is to take a variant that has no combat benefits (the nova is far too fast) and gives a speed corresponding to 500 km/h times flight times hypermovement rating. This way flight also becomes useful. With this fast hypermovement the above formulas still hold, but now it is easier to get up to extreme speed (a nova with five in flight and hypermovement will reach relativistic speed in less than two hours and move one AU in 41 minutes).
Note that moving very fast in space does not guarantee navigation. Novas without extra perceptual skills or powers will have to navigate by the stars. Getting lost can be terribly easy, since there is enormously much room out there.
I will not deal with velocity differences (on the order of a few tens of kilometres per second) between planets and stars in my campaign. If you can move there, then you can also adjust velocity.
Gravitic Spaceflight (technique of gravity control)
Dice pool: Wits + Gravity Control
Range: Around self.
Area: (Quantum + power rating) x 3 meters
Duration: Concentration
Like gravitic field, but now the nova creates a gravity field in the desired direction and falls there. Objects within the area of effect will experience free-fall regardless of the acceleration but will not have any other protection. If an object drifts out of the field it will retain the high velocity but since the field is accelerating it will appear to people in the field to fall backwards with an acceleration similar to the field’s.
Each success gives 0.5 G acceleration. The distance moved in t seconds is successes x 2.5 x t^2 meters; after that time the speed is 4.9 t meters per second. Going a distance takes sqrt(distance [meters]/(successes * 2.5)) seconds (with 40% increase if you want to slow down to the target). To lift from Earth you need at three successes or more. If the direction of the field is changed it will obey Newton’s laws – this power does not allow any sharp turns (momentum rotation could enable them, though).
New Powers
http://aberrant.foronlinegames.com/powers.html has some powers which I allow in this campaign:
Body modifications
Empathic Shield
Gliding
Levitate
Quantum Shield
Feedback
Force Bubble
Imperceptibility
Hyperflexibility
Lightspeed
Pain Mastery
Vaporisation
shield (extra for immolate)
The nova increases the damage of his immolate power to the degree that it starts to vaporise incoming bullets, melee weapons or attackers, reducing their damage. It acts as quantum + power rating * 2 soak against bashing damage and quantum + power rating against lethal damage. It does not protect against energy attacks or attacks immune to the immolate power.
Extended Quantum Field
Quantum minimum: 3
Level: 3
Dice pool: Per + Quantum Field
Range: special
Duration: concentration
Effect: the nova extends his quantum powers to act from within all objects in the vicinity, effectively adding dots to his Attunement. This power expands the “quantum aura” and makes the nova very noticeable; subtract successes from dormancy if necessary.
System: the nova gains one dot of attunement per success (added to the normal attunement):
1 2 kg
2 5 kg
3 10 kg
4 25 kg
5 100 kg
6 250 kg
7 500 kg
8 1 ton
9 2.5 tons
10 5 tons
11 10 tons
12 25 tons
13 50 tons
14 100 tons
15 250 tons
16 500 tons
17 1000 tons
18 2500 tons
19 5000 tons
… etc.
The influenced objects and persons form a roughly spherical volume around the nova, out to the limit set by the internal mass. A nova freely falling through the air will have a large volume (at one kilogram per cubic meter one ton equates to a sphere with a 12 meter diameter) while a nova inside water will have a small sphere. The nova has some directional control over the field, and can extend it towards (say) other people and try to avoid the floor, but very anisotropic fields subtract successes.
Radioactivity Control
Level 3
Quantum minimum: 4
Dice pool: variable
Range: variable
Area: vairable
Duration: variable
Effect: The nova can create and control radioactivity
Multiple actions: Yes
Description: Similar to elemental mastery, radioactivity control allows the nova to control how atoms and particles decay. It is extremely powerful and dangerous (especially to unshielded humans in the neighbourhood), and taking it without the invulnerability to radiation (the power or technique) is a fatal mistake. It includes a number of techniques:
Invulnerability to Radiation
As the normal quantum power.
Radiation Perception
Dice pool: perception + radioactivity control
Range: line of sight
Area: N/A
Duration: constant
The nova can perceive all forms of high-energy radiation and elementary particles, as well as the isotope composition of the surroundings. It is not so much an image as a sense of what forms of radiation exist, their strength and the direction they move. The nova can notice the sun or nuclear reactors through the Earth simply by their neutrino radiation, or feel the difference between radioactive and non-radioactive materials. Harder uses involve recognizing the age of objects by looking at their C14 content or recognizing very exotic radiation as different kinds meson beams.
Blast
Dice pool: intelligence + radioactivity control
Range: (quantum + power rating) x 10 meters
Area: N/A
Duration: instant
The nova generates a powerful beam of radiation; it is usually invisible or shines with weak blue Cherenkov light. The type of radiation can be tuned between alpha, beta, gamma rays or various elementary particles such as neutrons, mesons or neutrinos. The range depends somewhat on the type or radiation.
If used as an attack it inflicts Quantum level + power rating dice of aggravated damage, but the effect takes several hours to become apparent (power rating damage levels per hour).
Radiation sphere
Dice pool: intelligence + radioactivity control
Range: (quantum + power rating) x 10 meters
Area: (quantum + power rating) x 3 meters
Instant
The nova destabilizes nuclei within a spherical region, doing Quantum level + power rating dice aggravated damage (slow appearance as for blast) to anyone inside. This is a more powerful version of enhance fission below, which does not do any direct damage.
Enhance fission
Dice pool: intelligence + radioactivity control
Range: (quantum + power rating) x 10 meters
Area: (quantum + power rating) x 3 meters
Instant
The nova weakens the forces holding together radioactive nuclei inside a spherical region. The effect makes them decay faster, releasing much more of their energy and becoming inert. Nuclear fuel rods heat up and melt, and nuclear weapons might go off. One success fully inerts one kilogram of matter.
The effect also inhibits fusion by a corresponding amount.
Inhibit fission
Dice pool: intelligence + radioactivity control
Range: (quantum + power rating) x 10 meters
Area: (quantum + power rating) x 3 meters
Instant
The nova strengthens the forces holding together nuclei inside a spherical region. The effect makes them decay more slowly, preventing radioactivity. One success makes one kilogram of radioactive matter safe. The effect also enhances fusion; with enough successes it can make light nuclei start fusing if the density is high enough.
Fission Feeding
Dice pool: intelligence + radioactivity control
Range: (quantum + power rating) x 10 meters
Area: (quantum + power rating) x 3 meters
Instant
Like enhance fission, but the released energy is converted into quantum energy usable for the nova. By using this technique there is no visible effect of the energy release, the matter just quietly becomes inert. One kilogram of radioactive matter produces roughly one quantum point. There is of course a corresponding fusion version, fusion feeding.
Surface Tension Control
Level 2
Quantum minimum: 2
Dice pool: variable
Range: variable
Area: variable
Duration: variable
Effect: The nova can control surface tension of liquids.
Multiple actions: Yes
Description: This power enables the nova to control the surface tension of liquids.
Increase Tension
Dice pool: Intelligence + Surface Tension Control
Range: (Quantum + power rating) x 10 meters
Area: (quantum + power rating) x 3 meters
Duration: Maintenance
By increasing surface tension liquids become more manageable. They tend to curl up into droplets and resist intrusion as if an elastic membrane covered them. To create wobbly balls of water that can be handled as if they were jelly only one success is needed. To walk on water requires three successes – but remaining standing on the moving surface requires a dexterity roll. With five successes the surface becomes hard enough to allow anybody to stand unaided. Waves are dampened into nothing, and a thin sheet of water becomes reasonable armour.
Decrease Tension
Dice pool: Intelligence + Surface Tension Control
Range: (Quantum + power rating) x 10 meters
Area: (quantum + power rating) x 3 meters
Duration: Maintenance
By decreasing the surface tension liquids become more miscible. Oil and vinegar can be mixed into a perfect salad dressing with one success. With more successes any liquid can be turned into a foamy froth. With four successes water will spontaneously start frothing, and with five molten iron will start to foam. Liquids start climbing with capillary power, finding ways of sneaking out of containers.
Adhesion
Dice pool: Intelligence + Surface Tension Control
Range: (Quantum + power rating) x 10 meters or self
Area: (quantum + power rating) x 3 meters
Duration: Maintenance
By increasing the surface tension along a surface it can be made adhesive or sticky. A nova with adhesion can climb walls and even stand in the ceiling using surface tension. It can also make things and people stick in place. The number of successes gives a strength of the adhesion.
It can also increase the power of glue, duct tape and chewing gum.
Fear control
Level: 2
Quantum minimum: 2
Dice pool: Charisma + Fear Control (Willpower resisted)
Range: (Quantum + power rating) x 20 meters
Area: N/A
Duration: As Empathic Manipulation
Effects: Controls fear in target
Multiple actions: Yes
Description: A nova with fear control can regulate fearful emotions in other beings able to feel fear – humans and other higher animals. He directly influences the fear systems of the brain and body, producing varying degrees of anxiety, fear, terror or phobia. Unlike Empathic Manipulation the nova can control the fear in a detailed way.
Induce panic: the nova creates unspecific fear. The target will experience a general feeling of unease, shortness of breath, impending doom, an escalating feeling that he will die or something disastrous happen at any moment. The effect is similar to panic disorder. If used on enough people in a crowd general panic may ensue, as people start to shout, crowd together and attempt to escape.
Induce fear: the nova makes the target fear a particular thing – an object, a person, the nova or a certain kind of situation. The victim cannot approach or attack the object (unless he succeeds on a willpower roll against the number of nova successes) and will want to escape
If the target botches the willpower roll the fear becomes permanent; the nova can also make a fear permanent by getting more than five successes and spending an extra quantum point. This produces a phobia (for a fear) or panic disorder (for induce panic).
The nova can also remove fear, essentially decreasing the power of something fearful with every success. With enough successes (5) phobias can be cured, and otherwise rational people made to (say) no longer fear traffic. They are still rational, but will have to reason that walking in front of a car would be counterproductive – compare it with the descriptions of people with Urbach-Weithe syndrome or orbitofrontal damage.
Extras: Group effect. The fear affects all people in the range.
Pleasure Control
Level: 2
Quantum minimum: 2
Dice pool: Charisma + Pleasure Control (Willpower-1 resisted)
Range: (Quantum + power rating) x 20 meters
Area: N/A
Duration: As Empathic Manipulation
Effects: Controls pleasure in target
Multiple actions: Yes
The nova can induce feelings of pleasure in other beings able to feel pleasure. She directly triggers the pleasure systems of the brain, producing everything from pleasant sensations up to states of unearthly ecstasy. Novas with this power can easily become extremely popular – and they can misuse their popularity immensely. Pleasure is immensely addictive and novas with pleasure control can addict others to themselves relatively easy. They can also train animals (and humans) very efficiently by giving rewards directly for the right actions. On the other hand, a nova with this power who starts using it on herself will risk a very dangerous form of addiction. Unlike Empathic Manipulation (but like Fear Control) the nova can control the pleasure in a detailed way.
Since pleasure is something people are instinctively drawn to, the difficulty of resisting it is one level higher for the target. If the target has a nature such as thrill-seeker or a flaw like lusty, the difficulty to resist is increased further.
Sense pleasure: the nova can sense pleasure in other people, judging the quantity and quality of it. When taking this power the nova has to decide whether this is just an abstract knowledge (like seeing people light up in different colours) or an actual experience of their pleasure (although strongly diminished). The second kind of pleasure sense of course has an addictive potential, but also enables the nova to respond much more directly to variations in other people.
Induce pleasure: the nova creates unspecific pleasure. The target will have a general pleasant feeling, either linked directly to what is happening to just to the situation. For example, if the nova kisses the target and triggers the power the kiss will be experienced as pleasant, while if the target is just working the work situation will feel better. One success denotes a mildly pleasant experience, like being in a good mood or stroked. 4 successes denote orgasmic pleasure, and beyond that the nova can trigger pleasures unknown to morals. The nova can sustain the pleasure, or allow its strength to vary between zero and the peak power. The target will likely try to continue doing what gives pleasure, and by using the pleasure as a stirrup the nova can affect the actions. If the pleasure is strong and clearly linked with something (like touching the nova or eating something) the target may become addicted. Of course, not gaining the reward when the nova is not around might cause extinction of the addiction, unless the target now has learned to experience the desired action as pleasant on its own (e.g. by botching the willpower roll or by the nova accumulating enough successes over a long time).
Anhedonia: the nova can also remove pleasure from a target, producing a grey and flattened world. Food, sex, love or other normally pleasant experiences lose their spice as long as the nova sustains the anhedonia. Each success removes the pleasure level one step from all things: one success makes eating snacks no longer rewarding but a happy marriage is still experienced as happy; at five successes the marriage will to be grey dust in the mind of the target. Combined with inducing pleasure for desired actions anhedonia can be used for very strong operant conditioning.
Extras: Group effect. The pleasure affects all people in the range in the same way.
Inertia Manipulation
Level: 3
Quantum minimum: 4
Dice pool: Variable
Range: (Quantum + power rating) x 5 meters
Area: One target, less than (quantum + power rating) meters.
Duration: Concentration
Effects: Controls the inertia of an object
Multiple actions: Yes
A power closely related to momentum control, but affecting the inertia of bodies. By inertial manipulation the resistance of an object to movement can be increased or decreased. Cars can become as easily throwable as ping-pong balls, and leaves turned into shurikens.
Inertial manipulation does not change the speed of objects, in flagrant violation of the law of conservation of energy (an object given greater inertia will gain kinetic energy, which will be released when it hits something). However, if an object leaves the range it will return to its normal inertia.
Decrease Inertia
Dice pool: Wits + Inertia Control
Range: (Quantum + power rating) x 5 meters
Area: One object or area less than (quantum + power rating) meters
Duration: Instant
This technique decreases the inertia of an object, making it easier to move with smaller forces. It will behave as if it was a light object: a weak push will give it a high speed. Gravity still affects the object, but since the gravitational and inertial mass now differ inertia-decreased objects will fall faster than ordinary objects (although air resistance will give them the same terminal velocity). Low-inertia objects can easily be spun.
One success decreases the inertia with 1 kg (making a one kg object having zero inertia and a ten kg object as if it was 9 kg). For each success beyond this the decrease is tripled: 3, 9, 27, 81, 243… kilograms decrease. Within this range it is possible to decide on a certain level of inertia, such as zero or 34 grams.
A zero inertia object would tend to zoom off at the speed of light to any force. On the surface of Earth it is however constantly surrounded by forces driving it in all directions simultaneously, resulting in a neutral behaviour: the object can be pushed freely with no resistance, but once free it will just hang in the air (drifting slightly). In space the object zips around randomly at the speed of light until it appears outside the range of the nova, moving with its original speed.
In principle a nova could use the power on herself to reach lightspeed, but due to time dilation she would never be able to slow down. Even worse, moving nearly at lightspeed using very low inertia makes the nova vulnerable to being deflected by interstellar dust like a pinball. Inertia decrease combined with ordinary flight or hypermovement is possible; each halving of the inertia doubles the acceleration.
Negative inertia objects are confusing and dangerous. They will be attracted by pushing, and repelled by dragging. This means that if they collide with something they will approach it, pressing ever more strongly into it until they or the object breaks. Usually this also breaks the inertial decrease.
Increase Inertia
Dice pool: Wits + Inertia Control
Range: (Quantum + power rating) x 5 meters
Area: One object or area less than (quantum + power rating) meters
Duration: Instant
The user increases the inertia of an object, making it resist movement as if it was heavier (it still weighs the same). An object with increased inertia will move sluggishly, and require great force to set in motion (or stop). It will fall slower than ordinary objects. With enough inertia nearly everything behaves as if it consisted of lead. Air can be made heavy and thick, a person slowed to a crawl.
Each success doubles the inertia of objects.
Increase Projectile Damage
Dice pool: Wits + Inertia Control
Range: (Quantum + power rating) x 5 meters
Area: One projectile
Duration: Instant
By increasing the inertia of a projectile (after it had been launched) it can be made to make more damage. A bullet becomes a heavy missile packing much punch, and even thrown papers or pens can become deadly weapons.
Each success increases the damage of the object by 33% (round up), not taking effects of the skill roll into account. A projectile normally makes 5 dice of damage will make 7 dice with one inertia control success, 9 with two successes 11 with three and 15 with four.
Decrease Projectile Damage
Dice pool: Wits + Inertia Control
Range: (Quantum + power rating) x 5 meters
Area: One projectile
Duration: Instant
By decreasing the inertia of a projectile or weapon it can be made to make less damage. Cannon balls bounce harmlessly from people and bullets get caught by ordinary clothing. The nova surrounds herself with a field of reduced inertia that makes incoming projectiles, weapons, fists and kicks low-inertia. It does not help against radiation, fire etc.
Each success reduces the damage by 33%. A ten-point attack makes 7 points of damage with one success, 5 with two, 3 with three, 2 with four.