Cognitive
Charms
Imprinted Data Cluster
Cost: 1 mote per dot
Installation
Cost: 2 motes
Duration: Indefinite
Type: Reflexive
Minimum
Intelligence: 3
Minimum
Essence: 2
Prerequisite
Charms: Sustained
Augmentation of Intelligence
The Alchemical has an ornate set of
adamant polyhedral memory crystals implanted in the frontal lobe of her brain.
A complicated network of neural wires connects these nodes and links the entire
assembly to the prongs of her soulgem. This Charm
stores dedicated application of skills and knowledge rather than broad
archetypes of proficiency. For every mote spent activating this Charm (which
must be done while resting in a Vats Complex), the character downloads one
single Ability specialty from databases in the facility and adds this Trait to
her own capabilities. Specialties obtained with this Charm are considered
natural specialties for the purposes of dice-boosting limits, and therefore, a
character may not possess the same specialty more than three times for the same
Ability and may never apply more than three natural specialty dice to the same
roll. Unlike normal specialties obtained with experience points, characters may
use this Charm to store as many different specialties for the same Ability
as desired. If an Exalt ever withdraws the mote committed to a particular specialty, that Trait immediately and irrevocably vanishes from
her memory and must be downloaded anew with reapplication of this Charm at the
Vats. Players may spend 3 experience points as an instantaneous reflexive
action to release the commitment of Essence for one downloaded specialty and
add it permanently to the Alchemical’s capabilities.
Clarified Data Assimilator
Cost: 3 motes
Installation
Cost: 1 mote
Duration: Instant
Type: Supplemental
Minimum
Intelligence: 3
Minimum
Essence: 2
Prerequisite
Charms: Transitory or Sustained
Augmentation of Intelligence
Unlike most Alchemical Charms, the
Clarified Data Assimilator lacks any outwardly visible components. Instead, the
device takes the form of thousands of microscopic automata scuttling through
the Exalt’s entire nervous system. When powered with
Essence, the creatures link their spindly legs in artificial neural chains that
vastly upgrade the interconnectivity of thought and memory. As they combine,
the automata resonate in perfect synchronicity with the psychic emanations of
the Machine God.
With each activation, this Charm replaces the rating of any
single Ability with the Exalt’s total Clarity for the
purposes of one roll. All pertinent specialties for the replaced Ability still
apply and add dice as normal. The cost of this Charm is 3 motes by default.
However, each subsequent activation adds a cumulative
mote to the cost. This surcharge decreases at the rate of 1 mote for every full
day that passes since the character last activated the Charm. Characters may
not channel a Virtue to aid a roll augmented by this Charm.
Alchemicals gain 1 dot of permanent Clarity when they
install this Charm and add 1 point of temporary Clarity whenever they use it.
Abstract Abacus
Implant
Cost: 2 mote per
success/difficulty point
Installation
Cost: 1 mote
Duration: Instant
Type: Supplemental
Minimum
Intelligence: 3
Minimum
Essence: 2
Prerequisite
Charms: Transitory or Sustained
Augmentation of Intelligence
Artificial synapse webs installed in the
Alchemical’s brain allow her to perform logic-based
cognitive tasks with uncanny ease. The character’s player may reduce the
difficulty of a Mental Attribute roll by one for every 2 motes spent. Once the
difficulty reaches 1, each additional 2 motes adds one
automatic success to the roll (to a maximum number of successes added equal to
the Exalt’s permanent Essence). This Charm can only
aid rolls based on logical or deductive reasoning, such as mathematical
computation, navigation and cartography, solving enigmas and the like. The
Storyteller remains the final arbiter as to whether a specific action falls
under this Charm’s purview. This Charm also acts as a perfect mental clock and
timer at no cost.
Finally, this Charm may be used to
unravel the enigma of languages through the interpolative syntax emulator submodule (2 bonus points or 4 experience points; requires Essence
3). After spending an hour studying a text written in an unfamiliar language or
listening to someone speak the tongue or devoting a single turn to study a victim’s
linguistic knowledge with Mind Ripping Probe, the Exalt may immediately spend 3
motes and 3 experience points to learn that tongue (or 3 motes and 1 experience
point for a tribal language). This does not increase the Alchemical’s Linguistics rating, nor is any experience
expenditure required to learn the writing for a known spoken language or vice
versa.
Technological Analysis
Engrams
Cost: 3 motes
Installation
Cost: 1 motes
Duration: Instant
Type: Simple
Minimum
Perception: 3
Minimum
Essence: 2
Prerequisite
Charms: Transitory or Sustained
Augmentation of Perception, Abstract Abacus Implant
This Charm adds a metallic sub-lobe to
the top of the Alchemical’s brain, providing an
intuitive database of mechanical and magical engineering principles. Using this
device, the character may spend a turn analyzing any machine or artifact to
discern its function. This process only requires visual scrutiny
if most of the object’s components are immediately visible. If the
device is designed so that its operational parts remain hidden behind panels or
an outer shell, the character must spend the turn holding it (or running his
hands over its surface if it is too large or heavy to lift). At the end of the
turn, roll the Alchemical’s Perception + Lore. The
difficulty is 1 or 2 for non-magical devices, with 2 reserved for the most
complicated and strange machines. For artifacts, the difficulty is the rating
of the device (difficulty 6 for N/A artifacts). With a single success, the
character gains a general understanding of what the object is supposed to do.
Two successes also reveal whether it is damaged or in need of maintenance and
to what degree. Three successes provide a precise understanding of all
capabilities and every pertinent detail regarding the object’s current
condition. A failure provides no information, while a botch provides erroneous
details supplied by the Storyteller. This Charm may be used repeatedly to study
the same object, but the scans are not cumulative.
An Alchemical who obtains two or more
successes studying an object adds one automatic success on his next roll to
repair it during the scene. Alternately, the character may study the flaws of a
device with the intent of demolishing it. This doubles the raw damage of his
next attack against the item. A character can only have one automatic success
or damage bonus “banked” at any given time, regardless of the number of times
he uses this Charm.
Omnitool Implant
Cost: 4 motes
Installation
Cost: 1 mote
Duration: One hour
Type: Simple
Minimum Wits: 3
Minimum
Essence: 2
Prerequisite
Charms: Transitory or Sustained
Augmentation of Wits
This Charm fits into all of an Alchemicals hands. Upon activation, the character can
unfold and transform any of her fingers into tools. If she runs out of fingers
or needs full use of her hands, she may opt to extend a tool on an articulated
metal stalk from a wrist compartment. Regardless of how it appears, this Charm
can create any form of tool imaginable, from simple hammers and screwdrivers to
powered gadgets such as drills or welding torches. The character can generate
any simple tool or anything required to use an Ability in which he has at least
one dot.
For example, chefs with Craft (Culinary)
may extrude a vast array of cutlery and whisks, while those with Craft (First
Age Weapons) manifest Essence calibration sensors and circuit welders, etc.
Creating lockpicks requires dots of Larceny or Craft
(Locksmithing).
Each activation of this Charm provides as many tools as
needed for the rest of the scene, allowing the character to freely exchange
gadgets as needed for her work. Storytellers should monitor all use of this
Charm to prevent abuse, vetoing as necessary. An Omnitool
Implant is designed to create tools for constructive or utilitarian purposes
and to lend narrative flavor, not to provide an arsenal. Blunt tools may be
used as crude clubs while sharp instruments make unwieldy daggers (-1 accuracy
from usual), but this is the limit of the Charm’s offensive power. Trained
interrogators can do horrible things with their tools, but this requires time
and a restrained victim, so even this macabre usage has no bearing on combat.
As a final benefit, tools grown by this
Charm are of particularly high quality, adding one die to any roll involving their
use. This bonus is considered an artificial specialty, cumulative with all
other pertinent specialties.
If a character uses this Charm in a
purely cosmetic manner without gaining any real benefit (i.e., lighting a pipe with
a sparking fingertip or buffing fingernails with an extruded file), the
Storyteller may allow the display even if the Alchemical has not spent Essence
activating the Charm.
Synaptic Acceleration
Node
Cost: 2 motes per hour
Installation
Cost: 1 mote
Duration: Varies
Type: Reflexive
Minimum Wits: 3
Minimum
Essence: 2
Prerequisite
Charms: Transitory or Sustained
Augmentation of Wits
Relay crystals implanted throughout the Exalt’s nervous system vastly speed her thought processes.
For a number of hours equal to the motes spent activating the Charm, the
Alchemical multiplies her cognition rate by her permanent Essence. In practice,
divide the time required to complete a Mental Attribute-based action by the character’s
Essence. In the case of extended actions, apply this modifier to the required
interval of time between each roll. When performing a series of quick mental
tasks (i.e., those with a required duration of one turn or less), the Exalt may
spend each turn performing a number of these up to her Wits rating per turn,
reducing the multiple-action penalty on each by her permanent Essence. This Charm
is most often used for planning agendas or designing the blueprints for new
devices.
Incomparable Efficiency
Upgrade
Cost: 6 motes
Installation
Cost: 1 mote
Duration: Indefinite
Type: Simple
Minimum Wits: 5
Minimum
Essence: 3
Prerequisite
Charms: Synaptic
Acceleration Node
From simply accelerating her mind, an
Alchemical with this Charm may speed mind and body in unison for a specific
utilitarian goal. Upon activating the Incomparable Efficiency Upgrade, the
player declares a predominantly physical extended action with an estimated
duration greater than one turn. This task can be almost anything not related to
combat, from writing a letter to digging a ditch to crafting an artifact to
reading a book. This Charm cannot be used to shorten the time necessary to
learn an Ability or to advance Traits, since the act
of learning still requires the usual period of reflection. An Alchemical who
speed-reads through a training manual knows what the book says on the subject but
cannot put any of the lessons to use without practice.
The Storyteller remains the final
arbiter of whether a task may be aided by this Charm. For as long as the Exalt
commits the required Essence and works at the task without any interruptions or
breaks longer than five cumulative minutes per hour, he multiplies the speed at
which he can perform the action by his permanent Essence. While under the
effects of this Charm, a character’s movements become clipped and mechanical,
lacking any organic grace.
Logic Engineering
Lobe
Cost: 3 motes per difficulty point
Installation
Cost: 1 mote
Duration: Instant
Type: Reflexive
Minimum Wits: 5
Minimum
Essence: 3
Prerequisite
Charms: Abstract Abacus
Implant, Synaptic Acceleration Node
This Charm allows an Alchemical to plan
difficult actions in advance, devoting sub-clusters of his consciousness to
compute likely outcomes and to determine solutions for anticipated problems.
The player declares an action to the Storyteller that the Exalt intends to take
on the following turn, and the Storyteller informs him of the most likely
difficulty number of that roll (as best the Storyteller can determine given
that she does not know what modifiers may end up applying). For every 3 motes
spent, the Alchemical reduces the final difficulty of the task by 1. This Charm
can only be activated once per turn.
On the turn after using this Charm, the character
is not bound to follow his plan. If he does not do so, he wastes the Essence
spent on the computation. If he carries through, the difficulty of the roll
decreases according to the Essence spent. If the character spends more Essence
to reduce the difficulty than is needed to obtain difficulty 1, the excess motes
are wasted.
Storytellers should consider awarding
stunt dice to players who actually declare their intentions in advance to incredulous
opponents.
Eidetic Processing
Core
Cost: None
Installation
Cost: 1 mote
Duration: N/A
Type: Permanent
Minimum Wits: 3
Minimum
Essence: 2
Prerequisite
Charms: Transitory or Sustained
Augmentation of Wits
The Alchemical’s
brain houses a nest of microscopic automata spirits designed to scuttle through
his synapses, cross-referencing and indexing stored memories. At any time, the
Exalt can perfectly remember anything he ever experienced while he had an
Eidetic Processing Core installed.
Remembering memories from times when the
Charm was not installed requires a reflexive Wits + Awareness roll (difficulty
1). Only one roll can be made each turn to call upon the same memory. On a
failure, the mind-wisps have difficulty locating the imperfectly filed memory.
On a botch, a spirit accidentally moves the memory into another synaptic cluster,
making it inaccessible for the rest of the scene. If this Charm is pitted
against an effect that tampers with or erases memory, make an opposed roll of
the Alchemical’s Wits + Awareness against the
aggressor’s Manipulation + Performance.
If the Alchemical wins, the Eidetic
Processing Core discovers the truth. If the aggressor wins, the Charm glosses over
the changes, reporting erased segments as blank patches and reporting false
memories as real.