Primeval Knacks
Primeval Knacks allow you to inhabit, exemplify, and resonate with aspects of the World such as weather, seasonal change, or the land itself. They are driven by the concepts of embodiment and environment.
For the purpose of Primeval Titan Knacks, primeval purviews encompass elemental and ancient forces, largely untouched by mortal mastery: Beasts, Chaos, Darkness, Death, Earth, Fertility, Fire, Frost, Moon, Passion, Sky, Stars, Sun, Water, and Wilds
Primeval Knacks Master
Primeval Heroic
• At Home in a Hurricane
• At Home in a Hurricane
You may spend Momentum to ignore all Complications and Difficulty increases from environmental Conditions or Fields for a scene, and instead gain +2 Enhancement to any actions that would have been affected by those environmental conditions. If a character of an equal or higher Tier created the environmental effect, you must make a Clash of Wills, but expend no Momentum if you fail.
• Bending The World
• Bending The World
You may take Close range actions at a distance using wind, plants, and other natural phenomena as your appendages. These use your usual dice pools, but dice from your Attribute cannot exceed your Primeval rating. Actions suffer a +1 Complication at Medium range and +2 at Long; if not bought off, your work slows down dramatically or has clumsy results.
• Call of the Wild
• CALL OF THE WILD
Spend Momentum. With a gesture or a summoning sound, you call forth the aid of the world itself: whether it be dozens of local animals, a sudden swelling of earth and plant life, or summoning a beast sleeping deep within the ocean. Whatever it is, it assists you, adding your Primeval dots as Enhancement to any roll, which applies before you roll.
• Chasing the Storm
• Chasing the Storm
When you take a rolled Movement action or make a Chase roll, you gain access to the following Stunts:
Churning Wake (variable successes): Any opponent attempting to move closer or pursue you must resolve a “Storm Hazard” Complication equal to this Stunt’s successes. This inflicts Injury Conditions based on its unresolved rating.
- Wreathed in Thunder (1 success): You create expendable Cover where you end your movement, which your enemies may not benefit from.
• Depths of the World
• Depths of the World
Nothing from nature can harm you, for you are the world itself. Gain your choice of Resistant Tags for each time you purchase this Knack, up to your Primeval Calling.
• Elemental Body
• Elemental Body
You shed your physical form, which is a simple action that cannot be part of a mixed action. For the rest of the scene or until you choose to end the effect (whichever comes first) choose one type of natural element to become. For example: become a body of flame, a walking storm, a moving rock, etc. While you are in your elemental form, you cannot be affected by any environmental effect (including Complications, Conditions, and Field Complications) plus any appropriate narrative effect this might have. For example, a body of flame easily catches ordinary things on fire, while a body of air can pass through even the smallest crack.
• Fists of the World
• Fists of the World
Your unarmed strikes gain the Elemental Tag, with an element of your choice. A second purchase allows this to apply to any attack using a weapon. You may continue to repurchase this Knack up to your Primeval Calling, choosing a different element each time.
• Land’s Favor
• Land’s Favor
Whenever you’re in combat, you can conspire with the land to provide you with Hard Cover instantly available to you. Suddenly present old growth trees, remarkably out of place plinths of ancient stone, and strangely durable layers of ice are all possible. If an enemy destroys or circumnavigates the cover, they have to deal with +2 Complication for “Annoyed Land” and find themselves unceremoniously exposed to your attacks. If not bought off, any subsequent attacks gain Arcing against them.
• None Grasp the Wind
• None Grasp the Wind
You gain +2 Enhancement on all attempts to resist being physically constrained, even Clashes of Wills. Spend Momentum to move through a barrier, as long as it’s not airtight.
• Sheltering Presence
• Sheltering Presence
You may apply any Primeval Knacks you know that grant immunity, resistance, or protection from Field Complications or any other environmental detriments to all allies who stay within Close range of you.
• Tectonic Reveal
• Tectonic Reveal
The first time you enter a procedural scene, without needing to roll, you may ask questions of the earth about what transpired. This counts as though you used the Q&A Stunt a number of time equal to your Primeval Calling.
• Ten Ton Hammers
• Ten Ton Hammers
When you labor over acts of creation and construction, you can wield the World itself as a tool; your fires rage like those of the sun, your bellows the seasonal winds, your hammers the mountains themselves. When using the procedural crafting rules, you can automatically satisfy one Milestone with your Primeval industry.
• The Old Ways (Nemetondevos-Specific)
• The Old Ways (Nemetondevos-Specific)
Like the Titans of the Wild Reclaiming, you may set yourself against human industry. Spend Momentum to inflict a Compliation equal to your Primeval rating on an action using a complex tool — guns and phones, obviously, but anything more finicky than a crossbow will do. If not bought off, the item is destroyed at the end of the action and returned to its constituent elements. The first time you use this in a scene is free, as are any uses against trivial characters.
• The Tender Wilds
• The Tender Wilds
Once per session, you may have the World take on one of your burdens, drawing forth anything from despair to injury to magical curses and binding it away from you. Select a Condition affecting you. It immediately stops affecting you, and becomes an externalized object in a nearby wild space, such as a sword wound becoming a crumbling seam of sandstone in a gorge, or a curse becoming a rotting stump in a forest.
• The World is My Partner
• The World is My Partner
You gain a bond with your Purview that resets itself to your Primeval rating at the start of each session. You may spend or bank successes to it just like any other bond on actions that dramatically affirm your commitment to the Purview and what it represents.
• The World Obeys
• The World Obeys
Spend Momentum. Reduce an environmental-based Field Complication’s value by your Primeval Calling, which may reduce it to zero thereby canceling its effect. If this eliminates the complication, get the Momentum back. This refund does not apply to Field Complications you create.
• The World Provides
• The World Provides
As an action, you can shape a simple, mundane object out of stone, wood, iron, or similar common elemental materials. This replaces the need for any non-unique resources or supplies during crafting projects.
• Whirling Cosmos
• Whirling Cosmos
You’re in tune with the cyclical nature of the seasons, the tides, the planets, or some other inevitable change in nature. You may spend Momentum to gain the following bonuses for the next three rounds; only one each round, and only once each (i.e., you could use Zenith on the first round, Rising on the second, and Falling on the third, but not Zenith on the first and second and Falling on the third, or Zenith twice on the first).
- Rising: You gain +2 Enhancement for an Attack action.
- Zenith: You gain +2 Enhancement for a non-Attack action
- Falling: You gain +2 Enhancement for Defense.
• Whispering Weald Verse
• Whispering Weald Verse
During procedural information gathering play, you may always target the landscape or long-lasting environmental features with any of the available approaches for finding clues. This may open up additional avenues of investigation, and also allows you to ignore any Complications involving enemies overhearing or interlopers noticing you.
Primeval Immortal
•• All Disaster
•• All Disaster
Make a Primeval skill roll. With any successes, you fill an area with primal eruptions as you call them forth from the World, whether they be storms, earthly upheavals, unlikely rains of celestial objects, or improbably violent waves. The more successes, the larger the disaster. In combat, spend Momentum to do this quickly, distributing successes to making “Primal Hazard” Complications in local Fields of your choosing. They inflict Injury conditions based on their unresolved rating. Disaster always calls further disaster; add one to the Collateral pool whenever you use this Knack.
•• Alpha and Omega
•• Alpha and Omega
When you are caught in the middle of an environmental event or disaster (a storm, a blizzard, a tornado, an earthquake, or any more severe version) you may spend Momentum and cause it to end immediately. This ends any narrative effects appropriate to the event and dismisses any Conditions or Complications that might have been caused by it. Alternatively, for the same cost you can summon a disaster of your own design which acts as a Field Complication with a rating equal to your Primeval dots. This Complication affects everyone in the Field, including your allies, unless you have other Knacks or Boons that afford specific protections against such a thing.
•• Always Been Here
•• Always Been Here
You may choose to ask a place for help, whether it’s an ancient valley, a verdant meadow, or a trash-stuffed alleyway incongruously crammed between two high-rise condos. When you do, spend Momentum and make a Knack skill roll. Success allows you to call forth allies from natural and supernatural inhabitants of the place alike, as either the Creature or Followers Birthright, with a rating equal to your Primeval Calling. Such monsters and strange legions follow you loyally for up to a day and a night, or until you use this Knack again.
•• Earthblood and Starflesh
•• Earthblood and Starflesh
Once per session, you may choose to discorporate into elemental energies and primal matter, becoming part of the landscape or local weather effects. This removes any Bruised Conditions you have, and you can’t be attacked or otherwise interacted with by anyone without appropriate supernatural abilities (who must still win a Clash of Wills to target or affect you). At any point later, you may reform and resume normal existence, either at the location you discorporated or in the presence of a friendly character who was there when you initially used this Knack.
•• Elemental Minion
•• Elemental Minion
Your will gives life to elemental forces. Make a Knack Skill roll. On a success you summon an Elemental (Scion: Titanomachy, p. 111) until the end of the scene. Its attacks have the elemental (Scion: Saints & Monsters, p. 95) and natural tags, plus half your Primeval dots (rounded up) in additional tags. Elementals dissipate at the end of the scene unless made permanent as a Realm Condition. Gain Momentum if the Elemental gets Taken Out without doing the same to at least one opponent. Summoning an additional Elemental in the same scene requires spending 1 Momentum, up to your successes on your Knack Skill roll, but only one can be present at a time.
•• Fly on Wings of Wind
•• Fly on Wings of Wind
Spend Momentum to uplift yourself and a number of allies equal to your Primeval Calling. In a combat sequence, you fly along upon a storm wind or other elemental source (a jet of flame, a moving geyser, a floating platform of ice, etc.), taking movement actions vertically as well as horizontally. This may allow you to bypass hazards, difficult terrain, or Field complications that would involve ground-level presence.
•• Implacable as Winter
•• Implacable as Winter
Once per scene, you may reset one attitude to 0 or reduce the influence of an atmosphere on you by your Primeval rating. For the rest of the scene, attempts to play on your ambitions or desires suffer a +2 Complication; if not bought off, the target suffers an Inury as the elements rage against his audacity.
•• Lay Across the Land
•• Lay Across the Land
Spend Momentum to become a natural feature such as a stream, a copse of trees, or a rocky hillock for a scene. You occupy your current field and cannot move beyond it, but benefit from Size 3 Scale for purposes of defense and durability, may add your Primeval rating as Enhancement to noncombat actions that would benefit from your massive natural presence and reach, and the Shockwave and appropriate Elemental tags to any attacks you make in combat.
•• Living Font
•• Living Font
the World’s miracles flow from you like water but threaten to rush uncontrollably into the world the more power you exert. You may pay for marvels from Primeval Purviews by adding dice to the Collateral pool (see Titanomachy, p. 142) in place of spending Legend, or to Tension if the Collateral pool is not in play. In Divine Rule play, creating a Realm Condition with a Primeval Purview doesn’t count as an investment of that Purview once per session.
•• Never Not at Home
•• Never Not at Home
You are not negatively affected by Field Conditions or other environmental complications, and gain access to the following Stunt on all actions.
- Redirect the Flow (2 successes): An ally of your choice benefits from the protection of Never Not at Home for the rest of the Scene.
•• Personal Territory
•• Personal Territory
The elements constantly rearrange themselves in your presence. Other characters treat close range to you as difficult terrain, though you may exempt up to your Primeval Calling of them from this Knack’s effects at any one time. You may spend Momentum to increase this effect by a range band for a turn or to make it also count as Complication 1 dangerous terrain. You may spend Momentum for this effect multiple times in a turn to intensify it. In Divine Rule play, gain an additional point of effect when using a primeval Purview to create a Realm Condition.
•• Rising Tide, Falling Sky
•• Rising Tide, Falling Sky
There is no force of the World that is beyond your use. When you work to call up enormous elemental forces or call down great natural destruction, imbue rather than spend Legend to invoke your Legendary Title as a Feat of Scale.
•• Single-Minded Disaster (Kami-Specific)
•• Single-Minded Disaster (Kami-Specific)
Loudly declare your intentions for the immediate scene. You gain Enhancement equal to your Primeval rating to resist any action that dissuades or impedes your attempt. For example, if you declare you’re going to tear apart a titanspawn, you get the bonus to avoid some well-meaning bystander restraining you, or a Bandmate talking you out of this reckless endeavor, but not to your rolls to actually make the attack. You suffer a Complication of the same rating when you do anything except pursue your stated mission. If not bought off, you suffer an Injury Condition as your own nature betrays you.
•• State Shift
•• State Shift
Spend Momentum. You may transform water from solid to liquid to gas by one state. This affects all water or vapor by one state (from solid to liquid or liquid to gas as an example) within Close Range. Your character can use this ability to evaporate a flooded room or freeze over a portion of a body of water wide enough to run across, and so on. This may be applied to other matter (such as metal or ore), but it then also requires a Knack Skill roll.
•• The Body’s Trove (Theoi-Specific)
•• The Body’s Trove (Theoi-Specific)
As Gaea concealed secrets within her cavernous depths, so too may you store useful tools and servitors within you. You may absorb up to your Primeval rating in objects or willing characters of roughly your size, who are kept safe and (mostly) comfortable. They always leave some hint — tattoos, wriggling flesh, strange marks, identifiable with a difficulty 3 Occult + Intellect roll. Extracting a stored object or character requires an action
•• The Bones of the Universe
•• The Bones of the Universe
You know the secret structure of the World and beyond, and may move through passages ancient when the Gods were young. When you choose to travel, you may travel from like to like, putting a boat into the water on the Great Lakes only to emerge from Lake Victoria, walk into the Sahara and walk out of the Gobi, or even dig through a snowbank in Alaska to emerge from the snowpack in the Alps. Such travel takes no longer than a day’s travel (about eight hours). While native dangers or obstructions from either your entry or exit might bar your way, those otherwise trying to track or waylay you must make a Clash of Wills to intercept you before you reach your destination. If the connection between elements you travel through is tenuous (“Well, Central Park and the Amazon both have trees!”) or relies on the constructions of man (such as going from sewer system to sewer system), spend Momentum to use this Knack.
•• The Caldera Overflows (Atua-Specific)
•• The Caldera Overflows (Atua-Specific)
Harm to you is dangerous to all. When you suffer an Injury Condition, you spread dangerous terrain out to maximum Medium range based on an outpouring of one of your Purviews. Characters within range suffer a Complication on their next action based on your Injury (1 for Bruised, 2 for Injured, 3 for Maimed), which they must buy off to avoid suffering an Injury of their own. You may spend Momentum to increase the Complication by 1 level per point of Momentum to a maximum of 3.
•• The Voice of the Storm
•• The Voice of the Storm
You may send forth your intent into the World, delivering messages through the patterns in leaves, the whispers in crashing waves, or the crackling of fire. This allows you to communicate with any willing target, while you may spend Momentum to deliver messages to unwilling targets. In either case, you may choose to allow them a short reply, and may make intrigue actions targeting them.
•• The World Entire
•• The World Entire
When you work to turn existing natural forces to your will on a massive scale, such as rerouting rivers, directing wildfires, or taking advantage of a tidal change, imbue, rather than spend, a point of Legend to invoke your Legendary Title as a Feat of Scale.
•• Tidal Force
•• Tidal Force
As fast as the ocean itself, you race across the world, treating your Primeval Calling as Speed Scale. When you make Combat Movement actions, you may choose to apply the Shockwave Tag to any attack following the movement. If you choose to do so, add 1 to the Collateral pool, or 1 to Tension if the Collateral Pool is not in play.
•• Wild Growth
•• Wild Growth
Spend Momentum. Bless a single creature or character with the untamed power of the World, causing them to grow to enormous size for the duration of the scene. If the target is an animal, it counts as a Creature Birthright under your control with a dot rating equal to your Primeval Calling. If the target is a Storyguide character, you determine their course of action, which the Storyteller must agree with. If the target is another player’s character, you must get permission from the player first. Regardless, any target gains half your Primeval dots, round up, to Size Scale for appropriate actions. Other players’ characters cannot benefit from additional Size Scale increases while benefitting from this Knack.
•• World-Spinner
•• World-Spinner
Spend Momentum and create an environmental-based Field Complication with a rating equal to your Primeval dots. This lasts for the duration of the scene. Spend additional Momentum to extend the duration by one scene per Momentum spent. There is no limit to the number of scenes this can be extended to, but must end when the session of play does.
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