Fatemaster Friday - "Deep in the man sits fast his fate..."

[Kimberly]

Heya Wyrdos!

This week's Mail Call selection comes courtesy of @Steamtastic Vagabond Here is a bit about what they had to say regarding the last TTB Global Campaign:

Quote

"...The best moment however was when I had to improvise the ENTIRE Shuten-Dojo battle because the players decided not to climb the beast but to bait it into swallowing an entire cart with barrels of sleeping potion."

Today I'm going to talk about my favorite part of character creation, the Tarot Spread, and how Fatemasters can use those destiny steps a Fated's Tarot generates to maximize engagement and enjoyment for each player!

I love the Tarot Spread as a method of character creation in TTB. Cross Roads Tarot is the basic one presented in the TTB 2nd Ed book, but Assembly Line Tarot, Lifeline Tarot, Waterways Tarot, and Ram's Head Tarot each provide a unique spin on character generation. The use of these alternative Tarot Spreads allow for a more personalized experience to the player of a Faction-connected Fated. Aside from the important Stats the Tarot Spread creates a Destiny unique to that Fated. 

Now, if I'm feeling particularly dramatic, I'll read each Destiny out loud in my best swamp hag impersonation. I love watching players come up with suggestions for what the Destiny may mean. This is great for seeing how they interpret each step, and it gives me great story and plot ideas! Remember, the Destiny of each Fated should help shape your campaign and roughly guide the length of your campaign. 

When a player is unsure what to make of their Fated's Destiny, this can allow you as Fatemaster to drop hints and leads into sessions building up to that step's resolution. If a Fatemaster uses the collective Destinies of each Fated to plot out their campaign, the game can cycle through each Fated at different times to put a spotlight on each story! 

If your campaign is a series of Penny Dreadfuls, keep each Destiny in mind as you go over the Penny Dreadfuls. Each Destiny step is designed to be open many interpretations so you can get creative with how you incorporate each Destiny step into the Penny Dreadfuls. 

Overall, I love the nature of the Tarot Spreads, and how Destinies can add so much to a campaign for your players. This week's Mail Call question: Fatemasters, what is your favorite instance of a Fated's Destiny step fulfillment? 

[The13Fates]

My favourite destiny step so far, I had to bend to near breaking point to fit into the session. The player in question is a Doctor seeking a new life in Malifaux after being hounded for his work from a cult who believed Pneumatic replacement limbs were against humanity (very Deus Ex Mankind Divided).

The Destiny Step: Once your vendetta is nigh upon the mountains

Trouble was, the session was taking place in the docks and along the main river in Malifaux City, so no mountains in sight. I had to get creative with the individual word's meanings, and thus ended with:

"Once your prolonged quarrel with the cult is almost upon the mountains."

Still no mountains to be seen, until I had a bout of common sense, what if Mountain was a surname, thus 'Mountains' was just short-term for 'the two Mountain brothers'.

So the session starts and the Doctor is witness to an accident where a man's arm is caught between two boats on a narrow river, amputating it clear off, yet the man and his brother didn't want the doctors help because they had recently spoken to the very same cult that my player's character was running from, leaving it up to him how to go forward.

It was a fun challenge and made for a really memorable scene.

[Stormlight]

I can't remember the exact wording of the Destiny step, I think it's "When you are a stranger to yourself,"

I used the Penny Dreadful, "Bad Blood" about children mysteriously disappearing from the Dogsend Children's Home, an orphanage. I changed the name of the lead-in/hook character from "Hazel Green" to "Hazel Flynn," so she was the previously unknown niece of one of the Fated. It led to some fun dialogue while they were both denying a relation  (though they looked very much alike), and a greater sense of urgency when she goes missing. Also leads to a hook about what happened to Hazels' father (... off in the Badlands to establish a homestead), and made the characters much more invested in the fate of the orphans after the baddies were knocked out. Also, whether to leave Hazel with the rest of the orphans, take her to others to raise, or even take her along on their adventures...

[Douglas Scoundrels]

Ok, I have a lot of these. The one I guess I'll go with is "If you glimpse death through the cracked lens" due to how much it's shaped the character's story moving forward. The character in question is Maggie Sawyer, an undead Necromancer. Her backstory was that of tragedy. Engaged to the love of her life, she contracted an incurable illness and wasted away. Her fiance left her one day and never returned. She kept telling herself he was going to come back one day, and in her feverish delusion, kept herself awake for days on end hoping he'd return. One day, she discovered that she had died. The engagement ring he had given her actually contained a soulstone, and it seemed that its unique properties kept her connected to her body, even in death. Maggie eventually fled her home and wandered aimlessly for over a year before the start of the actual TTB game. I decide the 'Cracked Lens' in the Step was to be a relic, an ancient spyglass called the 'Heart's Desire' that supposedly showed you the one thing you wanted the most. The party was actually hired by an antagonist from a previous story arc to steal it (I always wanted to run a heist). The party eventually gets their hands on it, accidentally killing half of the guards and burning down the auction house in the process. As I had hoped, the party passed the spyglass around and I let them decide what they saw. However, when it got to Maggie, I detailed that she saw her ex-fiance asleep in bed, and gradually worked in that there was another woman in that same bed. I had planned to key her character's future based on this reaction. If she became angry, she would 'glimpse death' and go down a path of fiery revenge. If she felt sorrow, icy madness would grip her as her anguish would eventually make her a danger to everyone else. To my surprise, Maggie felt nothing but a surprised shock at the reveal. Because of that, I gave her the option of following the path of nothingness (obliteration), but I've been tempting the character with the most meager possibility of a happy life.

[J4bberw0ck]

Ooooh, mine was "when nightmares rise from the traveler's smile". It led to a Doppelganger summoning Alps and Stitched Together to lay siege to a town, all while disguised as the helpless daughter of the (now deceased) general store owner. My players immediately became protective of her, even ignoring the fact that she was new in town ("the traveler"), and the only resident who seemed happy to see them.

She charmed Blanche Lifespring, the ironically-named necromancer who just kinda wants to be loved, with no trouble at all. Flora Fauna Fanny-Sutton, the oversized gremlin lass and self-professed "brains of this here operation" was won over by the presence of a very large, very red hat in the Doppelganger's shop. A few well-placed screams during the attack that night cemented their belief that she was in dire need of protection. In fact, they didn't suspect a thing until she introduced Blanche's liver to the end of her knife and her player to the critical damage tables!

Blanche is now much more careful about who she flirts with, and her player grumbles at me occasionally whenever they meet someone new. "Last time I trusted someone I got stabbed in the ribs..."