Lone Wolf Fists: Example of Play

Re-structuring the Eyebleed playtest document into the proper playtest document this week (and last, and every week, send help). Everyone's feedback has been enormously helpful and informative; thank you!

Here's the first draft of the example of play in the introductory chapters. Fair warning; there's some coarse language, about PG-13 range. It's based loosely on a playthrough I did with my wife; she's a fantastic player ya'll, but she doesn't pull any punches (as you'll see!)

Without further ado:

Example of Play

In this section we’re going to give you an example of how a game looks when you’re playing it. There are a few layers to the example, so to prevent confusion we’re going to give you a little description.

In the “real-life” part of the example, we have the GM Jack and his player, Jill. They’re sitting around the table eating snacks and playing the game.

Jill’s character Nuke inhabits the imaginary world of the game. When her character says and does things, this is the layer she acts within. We call this the Shared Mindspace.

(Jack, in his role as the GM, plays the other characters in the Shared Mindspace. He also controls some of the events, although the game’s rules have a say in this too. If you like, you can think of the rules as another player who’s playing the physics and destiny of the Shared Mindspace)

Finally, Jack and Jill are having an ongoing conversation about the game as they’re playing it. This serves as a sort of membrane between the imaginary game-world and their real world.

When we’re talking to you, the reader, we’ll be using italics. We’ll be popping in as we show you their sessions, to explain new concepts as they’re introduced.

…

We join our players, Jack and Jill, sitting around the table in the real world. Jack is behind a cardboard Game Master screen studying a spiral-bound notebook while Jill is eating nachos. He clears his throat:

“Okay, when last we left our hero…”

“Heroine” Jill interrupts. Jack rolls his eyes and grins.

“Yes, of course majesty” he smirks

This is a bit of pre-game banter. Jack, the Gamemaster (GM) is gearing up to run the game. Jill, the Player, is getting herself comfortable and preparing to play her Player Character (PC), Nuke.

“Anyway, you’re still in the Radioactive Scorpion’s camp, trying to find a lead on that little blue psychic kid. The sun is setting deep and red, and it’s painting everything bloody”

Here, Jack is Setting the Scene. He tells the player where their PC begins and what their goal is. He’s also adding some immersive detail using one of the character’s senses; in this case, the sight of the vivid red sunset. We’ll forgive his clumsy prose, since he makes it up in enthusiasm

Jill punches her palm a few times to pump herself up. “Okay refresh my memory; why do I care about this guy again?”

“Your master Toxic Dragon wants you to see if he’d make a good ally against the Emerald Kirin”

Jill blinks “The asshole tree guys-?”

“The asshole tree guys, yes”

“Ah”

She steeples her fingers “Cool, cool. What have I learned about little blue guy? Does he live in a magical village? Maybe have a ska band?”

She grins maliciously at Jack, who takes a breath to gather his thoughts under her onslaught of setting mockery “You know that he lifted a bus with his mind and smashed a demon with it-”

“Oh my god I remember that! That was awesome!”

“-Aaaand you know that happened in the gorge filled with huge mutant insects”

“….Ah. Right. That place sucks”

“It does suck. It also is rumored to lead to a haunted city in the north”

“Haunted eh?!” Jill slaps the table with both palms “That is 100% garbled rumors of a psychic guy! I am 1000% sure!”

“That isn’t how percentages work”

Jill is asking some questions here; she’s establishing the “who/what/why/where/when” of her character, the setting and the scenario. This is orienting her in the game world and helping her to get into character.

Note here that both she and Jack are referencing events from previous games. This is because they are part of an ongoing Campaign; a linked series of game sessions.

What happened in prior sessions is the “past” of characters in the game’s world, and the current session is their “present”; the events that transpire will influence future sessions. Keep this is mind; actions have consequences!

 “Okay, tell me about the camp”

Jack glances at his notes “It’s a burned-out husk of an ancient factory; the catwalks and rafters are stuffed with people under Dragon’s protection. They’ve made a kind of shanty-town out of the rusted scaffolding, to keep themselves off the hot sand”

Jill stuffs a decadently cheesy nacho into her mouth, chewing thoughtfully “I need to find a way to get through that valley without getting eaten by giant bugs” she mumbles through a mouthful of snack

She swallows it. Decisively.

“I’m going to have Nuke climb up that scaffolding and check out the lay of the land”

Jack nods “You clamber up like a spider monkey. From this height, you can see the gorge running like a gash through the mountains.”

“Rad. Aside from the way I went in last time, can I see any sneakier way to get though?’

“There’s a webwork of fissures, dry mountain streams and foot-worn hunter paths, so there are a lot of ways through...”

“Awww yes-“

“… But any of them could have a giant bug’s nest hidden in it”

“-Crap”

Here Jill is taking actions with Nuke. Note that she’s treating the described world as having its own imagined reality: we call this imaginary world of the game the Shared Mindspace.

Further note that she’s moving and acting entirely like a person within that world; characters in the game’s world can do what a person can do. There’s no need to roll dice to climb the scaffolding or see the canyon; those actions are well within her capabilities and there’s no risk or danger.

Finally, this kind of pacing is called a Real-Time Scene. Time is moving at roughly the same rate in and out of character. This isn’t incredibly important now, but it will become so later when we skip ahead in time with a Montage or slow it down with an Action scene.

 “I need a new plan… Okay, Nuke scans the huddled masses; do I see any hunters that could maybe tell me about those paths?”

“Oh yeah; the hunters occupy a slightly elevated social caste, so they kind of stand out. You see an older hunter with an eyepatch leaning against a pipe and regaling some wide-eyed youths with tales of hunting in the mountain gorge”

“Effin’ bingo. I strut up to him all macho-style and say:

Oy! You an huntah?”

Jill’s speaking in-character here. This means that what she says is what Nuke says. This is an essential part of roleplaying, allowing you to communicate within the Shared Mindspace. In Jill’s case, she distinguishes Nuke’s voice from her own with an insultingly bad Cockney accent. This isn’t necessary, but it is a lot of fun.

***CALLOUT BOX*** (To make this next part a little easier to comprehend, we’re going to name the person speaking then tell you what they say.) ***CALLOUT BOX***

JACK: The hunter raises his good eyebrow at you and grins “Well I clearly ain’t a very immersive storyteller! What can I do for you Miss?”

JILL (as Nuke): “I need to get across that gorge you’re yammerin’ about. D’ya know a woy through?” and then I’m gonna jerk my thumb towards the dry creeks to kinda emphasize the way I want to go

JACK: He sneers “Sorry lass, hunter’s paths are propriety information. I’d endanger my livelihood, tellin’ you which paths are safe! Forget it”

JILL: This guy sucks! Hey Jack, do I still have some gold left over from bribing that fortune teller last session?

JACK: Oh, yeah. I think you’ve still got a few coins. Are you thinking about bribery again?

JILL: More than thinking! I am straight-up bribing him. “How about I make it woth ya while, mate?” and I’ll rub a few of the coins together

JACK: Yeah he’s not having it. He kind of shakes his head like “Can you believe THIS broad?” then he goes back to his story. “Now WHERE was I….?”

JILL: Oh you did not even. I get in his face and hold my fist under his nose. “List’n gubnuh, how many of your teeth do you need ta swallow before you’re feelin’ cooperative?!” Oh and I want to use my kung-fu fire powers to wreath my fist in fire

JACK: Your Fire Discipline Motion? Yeah alright; it’s purely cosmetic but it gets your point across. He gets REAL friendly real quick when he realizes you can turn him into a cinder with magic fire

JILL: Yeah that’s what I thought

The roleplaying going on here is purely in-character dialog, with some occasional action descriptions here and there. You’ll note that sometimes the player says exactly what the character does, and sometimes they just describe the gist of the message; either is perfectly acceptable.

The attitudes, thoughts, feelings, motivations, etc. of the characters are acted out by their respective players. You can ask questions, negotiate, threaten… Anything you could reasonably do in a real social situation. Just like in the real world, some people are helpful, and some are real jerks.

Nuke has clearly discovered an effective method for making the hunter comply with her wishes.

You might also note Jill’s use of a kung-fu technique; we’ll go in to more detail on those a bit later.

Jack nods in approval of Jill’s social aptitude. “Okay, he leads you to his trusty footpath; a winding ziggurat cutting its way through the gorge’s close end.”

Here, Jack is skipping time ahead with a small Montage. Note his description contains the character’s brief walk from the camp to the gorge. When they arrive at the path, time resumes its normal pace with a new Real-Time scene.

He takes another look at his notes. When he’s digested the information to his satisfaction, he raises his head and adopts the mannerisms of the one-eyed hunter again “Alright lass; this here’s called the jumper; it’s safe enough, but there’s a chasm halfway through that justifies the name”

Jill narrows her eyes “I sense his usefulness has ended. I’ll shoo him off and check out this path”

“Alright then! Its narrow, like a shepherd’s path; you would have totally overlooked it without the tipoff”

“True. I’m not much of a navigator-ess”

“Not actually a word”

“What about this jump again?” Jill chides, eager to get to the good part (and who could blame her?)

“Yeah yeah, I’m getting there. Or rather, you are.”

“Wait hold up; I just realized I don’t trust the hunter like, at all”

Jack arches an eyebrow “Ok…?”

“I want to search around, make sure he’s not leading me to my doom”

Jill picks up five 10-sided dice (also called d10s) and rolls them. “How good can I see and hear with a Senses roll of 23?”

Now, finally, Jill’s using some game mechanics. There’s a real risk of failure and potential consequences present in scanning the path for lurking danger. Hence, she’s using Nuke’s Effort Dice and Skills to increase her chances of success.

Effort Dice are a pool of d10s that represent a character’s capabilities. To use them, pick up one d10 per point of Effort and roll them all at once.

The number on a die’s face-up side is its Facing; higher is generally better, read 0’s and 10’s as 0.

Line the dice up on your character sheet in order from lowest to highest Facing, with same-Facing dice positioned above each other vertically. 

Here’s the dice that Jill rolled for Nuke:

1,2,3,3,5

When you take an action, you can pick from any single die or any Set of dice; Sets are dice with the same Facing.

To read the total for an action:

• The number of dice in the Set is the “tens” column or Rank

• The Facing is the “ones” column

In this case, if Jill had selected the 5 her total would have been 15 (one die of Facing 5). She went with the Set of 3’s though, giving her a total of 23 (two dice of Facing 3)

Note that Jill initiated her Effort Dice this time. This is one of three ways that mechanics enter the game. Jack could have called for a roll as the GM, or the game’s rules can prompt a roll.

Jack cracks the spine on his wonderful copy of Lone Wolf Fists, consulting the rules to determine what Nuke can achieve with her action. He wisely uses the index to locate the Senses skill and references the Effect Chart to determine the effectiveness of her roll.

“That’s a pretty good result; your senses return no danger. You can hear some of the big bugs scuttling along far below you, but you’re safe up here”

Jack is here performing one of the most important duties of the GM: being the rules referee. He consults the rules and using a combination of his good judgment and the mechanics, makes a call on what happens. The players commonly turn to the GM for such rulings; keep this book handy!

In this case, he’s determining what effect the Senses skill has. There are seven skills which every character possesses:

• Power: Physical might and strength

• Endurance: Toughness, durability and stamina

• Agility: Speed, reflexes, balance, and grace

• Intellect: Raw brainpower; depth, breadth and speed of thought

• Senses: Earthly senses; sight, touch, taste, hearing, smelling

• Heart: Charm, persuasiveness, manners and force of personality

• Spirit: Enlightenment, inner peace, and mystical skill

When a character wants to push their limits, they take an action with one of these skills. The GM compares the result of the action to the skill’s Effect Chart, which broadly describes what that Rank of capability with that skill can achieve.

Note that it wasn’t necessary to roll anything to see the gorge earlier when Nuke climbed the scaffolding: both the climbing and the viewing were within the capabilities of a person, and there was no significant danger, risk or time constraint which would necessitate taking an action.

“Alright, free and clear!” Jill crows triumphantly “I’m going to pull the 2 and 5 into my Focus Slots; I might need a boost through that jump”

“It’s a solid plan, and I endorse it” Jack muses

Nuke’s Focus Slots allow her to hold some dice after she rolls. This represents her character’s focus and mental discipline.

Typically, once you’re finished taking an action, any additional dice are discarded. However, if your character has an unfilled Focus Slot, you may move one of the unused Effort Dice into the slot, storing it for later.

The die retains its Facing. In this case, Jill stores the 5 and the 2 in Nuke’s two unfilled Focus Slots.

“I keep going; I want to get over this chasm so hard”

Jack chuckles “Okay point taken. It doesn’t take you long to get there; it’s easily a twenty-foot gap with a nauseating fall between. You see a few corroded metal ladders haphazardly tossed on the near side”

“So that’s how that loser got across…” Jill sneers “I don’t trust those ladders. I’m gonna jump!”

“You know what to do”

Jill does know; she rolls her Effort Dice again. “Booyah, two 5’s; I’m adding my 5 from Focus to that and getting a thirty-freakin’-five. How’s THAT for chasm jumping?” She pumps her fist in triumph

“You forgot something”

“What? OH RIGHT; I’ve got Agility Mastery! That means I get FOURTY-freakin’-five, fools!”

“That chasm never stood a chance”

Jill’s character has a Mastery of Agility; this represents training to peak human capability in a Skill. 

A Mastery adds 1 Rank (+10) to every Action taken with the mastered skill. In this case, it boosts her impressive Rank 3 Agility action to a breathtaking Rank 4.

 “The rest of your journey through the chasm is pretty long and largely uneventful. Since we’re Montaging it, you’ve got the time to work on a Long-Term Project if you like”

“Hells to the yes I will; I’m gonna tinker with that magic battery the fortune teller gave me”

“The Prana battery? Sure, roll ‘em”

Jill does so “What do I still need to fix it up?”

Jack consults his trusty notes again “Looks like you need a Rank 3 and 2 Intellect, and one Rank 1 Spirit”

“Rock on, I got a 21 for Intellect then and a 15 for Spirit. Almost there…”

Jill is engaging in a Long-Term Project here. These are tasks that require significant time, effort and work to bear fruit. Since they’re so time-consuming, it’s only possible to work on them during 

Montage scenes. They require multiple actions of different Skills and Ranks.

In this case, the Prana battery will be repaired when she achieves a Rank 2 and Rank 3 Intellect action in addition to a Rank 1 Spirit action. She’s well on her way with her latest roll!

While Jill tucks in to the remaining nachos, Jack rolls some dice and consults his notes once more 

“Uh-oh”

“Uh-uh? What’s uh-oh?”

“Looks like somebody’s about to ruin your day”

Jill chokes down the last of her snack “But I hate that!”

“Sucks to be you, I guess”

“Gonna suck to be this fool in a hot second”

Jack is rolling for Orthogonal Content here. Content is just our fancy name for stuff in the game like places, bad guys, and treasure. There are three varieties, each accessed in different ways; Horizontal, which character get by exploring, Vertical, which they get by investigating, and Orthogonal, which crops up whenever it gets rolled. We’ll spare you all the thorny details for the moment but suffice it to say that Jill’s in for a tough time.

“Many fools, actually. Okay, let me set the scene: You’ve just emerged from the gorge, dusty but otherwise fine. The glistening weirdness of the city shimmers on the horizon, it’s silver buildings blending with the mirror-sheen waters in the sparkling sunrise.

You’re monkeying with your Prana battery and making some significant headway when you hear the sputtering roar of an engine approaching. 

Mounted on a dilapidated dune buggy are four waste-barbarian raiders. They’re brandishing lead pipes and scrap-metal blades. They holler tribal war cries as they barrel down on you”

“They’re want to fight, huh? They’re about to regret THAT decision…”

“We’ll see; time for a combat!”

Jack’s setting the scene here, an important GM talent to master. This is just like in the beginning of the session: any time there’s a radical change of scenery, you describe the new setting and orient the characters within it.

Now, Jack and Jill are about to enter an Action Scene. These are breakneck-paced scenes of danger and excitement! They’re highly structured, with a formal action order that we’ll guide you through next.

The gang of berserkers is a Group of adversaries; these collections of lesser foes act in tandem for greater power; they add together their Effort Dice into a single pool, making them function similarly to a single more powerful character.

Jack picks up four d10s for the barbarians “Okay Nuke, time to fight; roll ‘em up”

Jill rolls her Effort dice: 2,3,3,6,9

“Okay run me through the initiative again, I remember its weird”

“That’s a strange way of saying ‘awesome’”

Jill exaggerates a sigh

“Okay so you bid Effort dice, whoever gets the highest initiative bid goes first”

“And… They can bid again, if I outbid them?”

“Nailed it”

“And I get to see what they roll, right?” Jill says, raising her eyebrow

“Oh, yes! Right…” Jack rolls his dice sheepishly: 1,2,3,7

“Who bids first?”

Jack eyes his result, clearly unsatisfied “GM bids first, but I’m going to have them pass on the first bid. They clearly need to save their Effort”

Jill moves her 9 triumphantly towards the center of the table “Tough tits, fellas, look’s you’re the fist-train to pound town” she gloats, seizing the opportunity to put her foes aboard the fist-train “They gonna bid now?”

“Nope; all aboard! Tooooot!”

Our players are entering a Combat here. In combat, time passes in Rounds, representing a few second to a few minutes of frantic fighting on all sides. Each round begins with an Effort die roll, just the same as earlier.

However, the single roll of the dice is used throughout the round; it’s first used to determine Initiative, which is the order in which character’s act.

This is done at the beginning of every round in an Initiative Bid; starting with the GM, every player bids whichever Effort dice they wish towards acting first. Once everyone has bid, players may, going in the same order, bid again, replacing their earlier bids.

Only the final bids count. it’s possible to shuffle a lower bid back into your Effort pool and replace it with a higher bid. You can only bid up, not down.

Once everyone is done bidding, the actions order is set with the highest bidders going first, acting in order towards the lowest bidders. Effort dice from the final bid are removed from the character’s 

Effort pools this Round.

Tied character roll a single d10 to determine who acts first among them with high rolls winning (re-roll ties until a victor emerges).

Once every character has taken their turn, the round concludes.

Note that all the dice are rolled openly; this gives every player, including the GM, complete tactical transparency of the character’s combat capabilities.

Next, you’ll see how this same pool of dice is used for both attack and defense.

 “Okay Nuke, you’re faster; what are you going to do?”

Jill pounds her knuckles together “Can I move without dice? I want to run up their stupid dune buggy and kick one of them in the teeth”

“Yeah you’re staying on the same Battlefield, so that’s free”

“Okay, I can do one thing with a single die, then after that I’ve got to use sets, right?”

“Yeah you’ve got it”

“Rock on; I’m going send my boot into the driver’s jawbone with this here 16” She pushes the die facing 6 forward, signifying her attack

“Well, he’ll defend with this 13” Jack says, pushing forward his 3 “So he takes 3 damage: He brings his pipe up and catches some of the force of your kick, but still flies off the buggy onto the sand”

Here we have an Attack and Defense exchange, as well as our first combat actions.

As the first actor, Nuke gets to move and attack before the barbarians.

Jill moves Nuke to the barbarians to launch her strike. This movement is within the same Battlefield (the place where the fight is occurring, typically describing an area about as big as a sports stadium). 

She could have moved into an adjacent Battlefield, or used her movement to climb, descend, or otherwise interact with the terrain within the Battlefield instead.

Simple, direct movement like this does not require any Effort dice; however, more demanding movements such as acrobatics or moving multiple Battlefields require Agility actions to accomplish.

Nuke also launches an Attack on the poor clods. Attacks require Effort dice; in this case, Jill uses her 6-Facing die to strike, generating a result of 16. Note that she’s using only a single die to act; this is allowed only once per combat round.

The barbarians Defend with their 3-Facing die, resulting in a defense of 13. A defense subtracts from the attack’s total; Nuke’s 16 result is reduced by their 13 defense, for a net of 3.

Any positive number remaining after all defenses is applied as Damage to the foe. Damage is applied to the next empty Health Box a character possesses; each box can receive 10 damage before it is filled. If all boxes are filled, a character is vanquished, which means defeated though not necessarily killed. In this case, the barbarians take 3 damage.

Note that Jack could have chosen a better defense; he could have used the 7-Facing die, which would have completely defended against the attack with a result of 17

Further note that Jack and Jill both describe their actions in a fun, action-oriented way during this exchange. This greatly adds to the entertainment of the game and links their use of mechanics with actions in the Shared Imagined space.

 “Okay, I still have dice left; I want to use my Set here…” Jill pushes forward her two 3-Facing dice 

“…To punch another one’s head through the steering column”

Jack exaggerates a wince of agony “Woof, 23 huh? He’ll throw his hands up to defend with a 12” He removes the 2-Facing die from his pool “But that’s still 11 damage; you smash his head right into that steering column and he goes limp”

“That’s what you get for screwing with me!” She gloats, shooting their remaining dice the bird

Here Jill is using a Bonus Action to attack a second time. After your single 1-die action, you make take Bonus Actions with any matching Sets of 2 dice or more. In this case, she’s using her Set of two 3-Facing dice to form a 23.

Something else important happens this attack; the Group takes ten or more total damage. This is enough to fill a Health Box. When a Health Box is filled, it has special consequences; in this case, they lose a member to damage, and he will no longer contribute his Effort Die to future rolls. Ouch!

 “I’m not done; I’m going to start charging up my Fire Disciple Motion so I can burn these fools next round” Jill marks a line through one of her Focus Slots with a pencil

“Wait, how many Prana do I have?” Jill looks at an empty spot on her sheet “Oops. I forgot that part”

Jack smack his forehead “D’oh! I forgot too. Well, it’s ten Prana per open Chakra; you Slumbering ones have to get Awakened during the round” He hands Jill ten glass beads to represent her character’s magical energy

“I’m going to spend them all! It needs 11 to activate, so that means I only need one more next round; correct?”

Jack nods sagely “You learned well from that battle with the spider demon last time. Are you finished?”

“Yeah, I’m done. Go ahead, punks!”

Jill’s charging a Technique here. Techniques are a character’s magical martial arts moves. They’re powered by Prana, a mystical energy that character’s channel through nodes in their bodies called 

Chakra.

Every Chakra’s Pool of Prana begins at 10 if it’s Open, or 0 if it’s Closed or Slumbering.

To use a Technique, you spend Prana from your Prana Pools. Because Prana is spent and re-fills constantly through a combat, it is generally represented by dice, beads, or tokens. Simply remove spent Prana tokens as you power a Technique.

If you can’t afford to spend the entire Prana cost in a single round, you can Charge the Technique as 

Nuke is doing. You “store” the Technique and all the saved Prana in one of your Focus Slots. Once you’ve spent enough Prana to cover the cost of the Technique, you can unleash it at any time thereafter.

If you release the Technique from your Focus Slot without using it (either because you changed your mind or because you haven’t covered its cost) it and all the stored Prana are lost

Note in this example that the players made a mistake; they forgot to fill up Nuke’s Prana pool at the start of the combat. Mistakes like this occasionally happen; it’s ok! Do your best to correct them and carry on having fun.

Further note we haven’t told you what a Techniques actually does; we’ll tell you all about them when 

Nuke unleashes this one in a little bit!

Now that Jill has ceded her turn, the barbarians get to act

“The remaining three barbarians are going to try to wreck you” says Jack, considering his remaining Effort dice carefully

“Oh bring it”

Jack pushes forward a 1-Facing Die “They’re going to swing wide at you with this 11” he pushes forward the 1-Facing die

“Not this time!” grins Jill, pushing forward her 2-Facing die “That’s twelve to your eleven; no damage from that! I’ll bat his pitiful attack aside easily”

“True… But now you’re out of dice”

“Uh-oh”

“Uh-oh is correct; it’s time to bring the pain” Jack points to his 7-Facing die “This guy gets some revenge for his friend, smashing you in the skull with a lead pipe”

“Ugh….”

“For seventeen total damage”

“Argh!” Jill records the damage in her health boxes in pencil “Okay that fills up one of my Health 

Boxes with damage, and there’s seven damage in the next one. That’s…. Bad, right?”

Jack nods his head grimly “Oh yeah, you’re going to take a Physical Imbalance from that. That bash jostled your optic nerves, so you’re blinded”

Jill groans; things just got serious!

Jill didn’t spend her Effort dice very carefully this round; the barbarians were able to make an attack against Nuke when she had no dice to defend. This means that she took all 17 damage from their strike; yowch!

Because she’s taken more than ten damage, one of her Health Boxes is now filled. When a powerful character like Nuke fills a Health Box, they take a lingering injury called an Imbalance.

This one is a Physical Imbalance, affecting the body. There are Emotional and even Spiritual 

Imbalances representing more esoteric injuries.

Imbalances force characters to choose between a Mechanical Penalty (which removes Effort Dice, seal Focus Slots, or closes Chakra so that they can’t be used for Prana) or a Dramatic Penalty, which forbids or requires certain additions to the player’s actions.

Players choose which penalty will apply to their character at the beginning of a round, before Effort Dice are rolled. Whenever the Imbalance is first created, the character must take the Dramatic Penalty for the remainder of the round. Looks like Nuke’s blind for now.

The Rank of the Imbalance determine how powerful a penalty it applies; Every Rank can remove 1 Effort die, and every Even-Numbered Rank can either seal a Focus Slot or close a Chakra.

Rank can be increased each time a character fills a Health Box with damage. The attacker chooses which Imbalance to increase, or they can create a new Imbalance. A character can have a total of 3 unique Imbalances in an given category (Physical, Social, and Mental) at once, for a grand total of 9 unique Imbalances.

Finally, damage creates and increases Physical Imbalances only; it can’t create or increase Spiritual or Emotional Imbalances. That requires more skillful manipulation!

“Alright, end of the round! Go ahead and recover some Prana”

Jill puts two glass beads on her sheet, over the Chakra entry “Just wait ‘til next round, you jerks…”

Jill is recovering Prana from her Chakra here. At the end of the round, every open Chakra adds its 

Recovery stat in Prana back into its Pool. This way, characters can continue drawing from their wellsprings of magic in subsequent rounds.

Open Chakra have a Recovery value of 2.

 “New round! So, are you going to be blind, or do you want to fork over an Effort die?”

Jill bites her lip, considering her options “I’m going with blindness; I don’t need to see to kill these 

jerks”

“Actually, you know what? Nuke shouts that at them with blood streaming into her eyes!”

Jack purses his lips in appreciation of this bit of roleplaying “That’s pretty awesome, Jill”

 Jill is opting to take the Dramatic Penalty here. This means that she can’t describe her character’s actions with sight, and she’s must describe them in terms of her sightlessness. If she violates these criteria, the GM can veto her proposed action or make her revise it.

Jill rolls her Effort dice, getting 1,3,4,4,8

The barbarians only roll 3 this round, as one of their member’s head has been driven into a steering column, getting 0,5,6

“This time, the punks are bidding their 10 for Initiative” Jack boasts, picking up his 0-Facing die and waving it tauntingly at Jill.

“You know what? I’m going to stagger and waver around on this speeding vehicle; I’m too disoriented form the head trauma to seize the initiative

Jack smiles unconsciously; he’s really enjoying Jill’s roleplaying “Well they’ll seize it then, but bravo for the entertaining description”

Jill pantomimes blood spurting out of an exaggerated headwound with manic drama, eliciting a chuckle from her GM

“The remaining punks slam on the breaks, taking advantage of your loss of balance to swing their pipes into your ribcage” He pushes forward both the 5 and 6-Facing dice “That’s 15 and 16”

Jill sneers at the result “Okay disoriented doesn’t mean helpless, assholes!” She pushes forward two dice of her own; the 3 and 8-Facing “Nuke leans into her own inertia and totally dodges that 16 with an 18; she’ll use the 13 roll with the impact of that second one, so that’s 2 damage”

“Not quite your tenth huh?”

“Nope! Still got 1 left!” Jill raises her index finger is mock triumph “Ouch!”

“Alright hero; they’re spent. It’s your turn”

Jill cracks her knuckles and grins maniacally

Jill is roleplaying into her Imbalance here. Whenever a player chooses the Dramatic Imbalance, their actions must reflect their impairment and damage.

The GM determines if a character’s description qualifies; Jill’s hammy performance was both fitting and entertaining, so Jack feels they qualify.

Note that Jill refused an advantage for which she qualified; this isn’t strictly necessary, but it goes a long way to convincing a GM of your sincerity!

Further note that Jill’s now taken an additional 2 damage from the weaker strike. With her previous 7 damage in this Health Box, she’s at a precarious total of 9 damage; one away from worsening her Imbalance!

 “Okay, I’m lining up my ducks this round; these ducks are gonna be linear” Jill says, emphasizing the mallard’s planar nature with by pointing her knife-straight palms at Jack

Jack, helpless before her Cartesian fowl, merely holds up his hands in a defensive gesture

“I’m using my 24 to Awaken my Chakra” She marks her Slumbering Chakra to indicate this “That gets me 4 Prana, right?”

“Well…” Jack drawls, casually flipping through his rulebook to look up the relevant rules “It says here that the Rank of your action, which is 2, determines the Recovery, and the Facing is how much it fills with at the end of the round. So yes, you’ll get 4 more Prana then”

“Just in case this next move doesn’t obliterate these resilient bastards….” Jill mutters, drumming her fingers together

Jill is Awakening Nuke’s Slumbering Chakra here. This requires a spirit action of at least Rank 2; 

Nuke’s set of 4-Facing dice fit the bill nicely.

A newly-Awakened Chakra’s Recovery is equal to the Rank of the action that awakened it; 2, in this case. Its Pool is equal to five times it’s Recovery. This Chakra’s pool will therefore be 10, meaning it can hold up to 10 Prana at once.

When a Slumbering Chakra is Awakened, it fills with Prana at the end of the round (i.e. when the other chakra Recover). The number of Prana it acquires is equal to the Facing of the Set that Awoke it.

In this case, Jill’s dice had Facing 4, so her Chakra will acquire 4 Prana at the end of the round.

“Time to burn you sons of bitches!” Jill roars as Nuke “I’m spending the last Prana on my Technique; these jokers are gonna fry!”

Jack arches his eyebrows “Going to attack blind?”

Jill nods hungrily “Nuke is past caring about collateral damage and so am I! I’ll swing my arms in a wide arc and have the fire shoot out everywhere!” She makes a Fwoosh sound effect to help paint the picture

She picks up her 8 “I’m adding this to my Fire Disciple Motion and blasting everything in the vicinity with a 38!”

Jack shakes his head “And they take all of it, huh? Well they’ve only got about 20 health left, so they’re toast”

Jill is using her charged Technique here. Techniques are a character’s mystical martial arts moves. 

They consist of the following parts:

Cost: how much Prana is required to use it.

Rank: A Technique creates Effort Dice equal to its Rank; each Rank is an additional die.

Facing: Which Facings may be chosen for the dice created by the Technique. All created dice have the same Facing.

The dice generated by a Technique function like other Effort dice; they can be combined with other dice to make larger Sets, and if they provide 2 or more dice they can be used as a bonus action.

Power: Describes what powerful effects the Technique creates when activated. Sometimes there are numerous Powers to choose from; the text of the Power will describe its effects.

Techniques may have Keywords that describe how they’re used. The three most common are Offensive techniques which may only be used to attack, Defensive ones that can only defend, and Versatile techniques which may be used to attack or defend.

Nuke’s Technique, the Fire Disciple Motion, generates a Rank-2 effect. It carries the Offensive keyword, so it must be used to make an attack. The dice’s Facings may be anything between 4-9; in this case, Nuke is combining them with her 8-Facing die, creating a total of 38 (3 Dice, all Facing 8)

 “Okay, so they’re beaten, but are they dead?” Jack queries, eyebrow arched mysteriously

She blinks “I’m missing something”

“Well, if you spare them, then you could almost certainly pound some information out of them. It’s 

up to you if you want to pull your fire-punches a little”

Jill considers this, looking over her sheet “Well, I would… But my Dharma is urging me to spill their blood!” She points at a section of her sheet “See? Ruthless Tiger; I get Kharma every time I demonstrate my cruelty! Bwahaha!”

Jack pantomimes shock “Oh noes! You’re killings my favorite NPCs! What ever will happen to their elaborate backstories and my well-plotted game?”

“They’re gonna BURN!” Jill snarls, cupping her hands in emulation of a kung-fu super move 

“Fwooosh! Take that, plot hooks!”

Jack smiles and hands her a poker chip “Here’s your Kharma, you merciless animal. I hope you spend it on a conscious”

“Yeah not likely” she beams

Jill is gaining Kharma from her Dharmas here. A Dharma is a character’s destiny, and when they act in accord with (or foolishly oppose) their destiny, it grants them Kharma.

Kharma is the insight, experience and realization of destiny that allows a character to surpass their limitations and grow more powerful. It’s accrued by a character and spent to learn new Techniques.

Dharma has a set of Triggers that tell the player how to act to follow or fight their Dharma. To “hit the trigger”, a player makes a declaration of what they’re doing (as Jill does in the example above) and this is either accepted, amended, or vetoed by the GM. If it’s accepted (with or without amendment) then the player receives Kharma.

Each Dharma may only be triggered once per scene. Hitting a trigger rewards the player a single point of Kharma. To get more Kharma, a player must take more Dharmas!

Thankfully, there are temporary or Minor Dharmas that characters can acquire through play, such as entangling themselves with an organization or a quest. These often have larger Kharmic rewards when completed, but then resolve and expire.