Predicts the End Times

Description

Things end. It happens, truly, to the best of us. Unlike the rest of the world, however, who spend their days cautiously optimistic (or fitfully paranoid) that today won’t (or will) be their day, you know better. You’ve no understanding of where the knowledge comes from, perhaps some ultraterrestrial that has seen it happen is enjoying pushing these things into your consciousness, or perhaps you’re just lucky. Irrespective of how, it’s there, impressing itself into your mind without a care for how that might affect you–or those ruled to be undone. It comes in spurts, with sudden flashes of grisly insight into the fate of the world and those both near and far from you.

Of those who are told of this, most proclaim you a charlatan and disregard your apparent insanity, some grow furious for your indolence, while others revere you as the end of their and the world’s whole surviving ordeal. Those precious few who have chosen to ignore the possibility that you are nakedly insane are the only things that keep your existence from being too lonely to bear. You have seen things that others can’t. And as it so happens, patterns are most definitely present. Through a great effort on your part, you feel as though you’ve begun to wield the wrath of the fatalistic cosmos, even if you are merely grasping at straws… Or perhaps it is your imagination, as people so often love to tell you.

Note: This Focus was originally a friend’s idea, I just helped with a mechanic or two here and there. T’was fun, Uxie.

Details

Connection:

Pick a PC. The two of you share a bond. You, a doomsayer proven correct, and they, one who is in awe of your surprising talent. Perhaps they suffer your incessant babbling about destruction and gloom in hopes of hearing one day that their enemies will be brought down, or in anticipation of knowing when their own time is to come.

Esotery Effects:

Entropic Esoteries: All of your esoteries are only vaguely at your beck and call and are more akin to your frantic gesturing at the sudden and unfortunate target of the universe’s great equalizer, entropy. All things fall to entropy, and none are safe from it. No esotery you ‘predict’ will ever inflict greater damage due to the target’s weakness to you brand of devastation (Effort and minor/major effects excluded) yet none can reduce the catastrophe of atomic dissolution, however slight. No esotery or focus skill you possess can benefit from edge, for the universe does not care how fast you run.

Minor Effect Suggestions:

A small, otherwise unimportant aspect of your enemy crumbles to the weight of the universe. Unimportant thought it may have been, they noticed, and are left horrified and perplexed by your seeming control over such events.

Major Effect Suggestions:

People have said that the universe is a cruel master, they are sometimes correct. A weapon or object of importance to your target is vaporized in an instant as you connect, robbing them wholly of its use as anything but what it has become, dust.

Tier 1:

Mortality Clarified: At the beginning of the round, ignoring initiative order, declare a target that you can see, then expend between 1 and 5 points from any one pool. At the end of the round, inflict damage equal to the points expended. This effect fails if you have taken direct damage that is inverse to the points expended. Paying 1 point has a buffer of 5 damage, 2 has a buffer of 4, and so forth. If this skill fails, its point cost is not refunded. Applying effort to this skill increases the damage buffer by 2 for each level of effort. Action.

Tier 2:

Danse Macabre (2 Points From Any One Pool): In a spur of insight, you see the immediate danger you might end up in and take appropriate measures to try and circumvent it. Roll a d20, and until the end of the round, if you are capable of evading an attack of targets whose levels fall under the target number you beat, you automatically dodge it with a cost equal to the target’s level per evasion. If you cannot pay the cost to evade the attack with this skill or you have not beaten the attacker’s level, you are blinded by your premonitions and forced to roll the appropriate defense with the difficulty increased by two stages. Action.

Tier 3:

Copying Clotho: Occasionally a single thread of your stygian dirge is bright, it compels you, calls out to you, and finally, you can claim it, hold onto the moments like this, where circumstance aligns. You need them, cherishing them as things that have a value that cannot ever be known to those who cannot see what you do. Reality holds such an action with intense distaste. You secret away your trump card, and reality darkens miserably for you. Once, when you roll, you may ignore the result, write it down and treat it as though it were a natural 1, and at any later point until you have slept, you may replace one roll with the written roll as though it were naturally rolled. Only one number can be stored at a time. Enabler.

Absolution: Having incontrovertibly predicted the dissolution of so many, you are coming to accept your role in existence even if others do not. You may now expend up to 10 points whenever you use your Mortality Clarified ability. Enabler.

Tier 4:

Chaos Theory: Seeing the darkest, most unpleasant futures is little more than a sardonic joke to you now, as the patterns are becoming clearer. People watch you perform small motions seemingly without reason, not knowing that every tiny tick you make can influence things in ways the commonfolk would consider irrelevant. You know better. Once per roll, you may pay 2 XP to reroll it after you have seen the result, decrease the difficulty of the task by one stage, and take whichever result you choose. If you wish, you may store the roll you do not use with Copying Clotho at a cost of 5 points from any one Pool. Enabler.

Tier 5:

Destabilize (7 Points From Any One Pool): Your skill at prediction has increased to the point where you can influence the chaos of the universe in the tiniest manners though not without a steep price. However, entropy is a tricky beast and negotiating the outcome you want with the entirety of existence is no simple task. Designate one ally or enemy that you can see, yourself excluded. If it is an enemy, roll against the target’s level, success yields 7 damage, failure heals 7 damage, effort can be applied normally. If it is an ally, they make a difficulty 3 defense roll that matches the pool used for this skill. If they succeed in their roll, restore 7 to the pool they defended with, if they failed, they take 7 damage. Effort reduces the difficulty of the defense roll by 1 per level of effort. Action.

Point of No Return: Any doubt in your abilities is now cast aside, as the end of all things is now within your sight. You may now expend up to 15 points whenever you use your Mortality Clarified ability. Enabler.

Tier 6:

The End: The cosmos bends violently to your suggestion for the briefest instant, lashing out at your behest at up to three targets (Two if impaired, one if debilitated) and attempts to remove them from the dance cosmic. For each enemy targeted by this skill, reduce a pool to 1, then make a roll against the target’s level. Upon a success, they are wholly undone along with all of their possessions in a sudden, barely comprehensible burst of entropy. Regardless of success, make the appropriate defense roll for each pool reduced, starting at difficulty 7 and becoming a step harder for each additional target. Upon a failure, the pool is reduced to 0. Action.