The man who know’s where he’s going … or maybe he just gets all the luck.
The Finger of Destiny always seems to have luck when he needs it. Maybe he has some kind of special purpose given to him by a higher power, and can’t be allowed to lose until he fulfils it. Or maybe he is simply so determined that he can override the forces of blind chance by the application of pure willpower.
If an avatar has a ‘destiny’, it should probably be one picked out by the GM. He might not even know what it is in character, just that someone or something seems reluctant to let him die.
(Alternate version: If its really his sheer will overriding luck, then he should pick either his obsession, or his noble or rage stimulus)
Taboo
The Finger of Destiny cannot turn away from his destiny. Any action (or lack of action) which makes him less likely to complete his assigned destiny weakens his connection to the avatar. As most avatars don’t actually know what their destiny is, it may be possible to learn by feeling their powers apparently wax and wane as they seek different goals. However, this would take quite a long time.
(The determination-driven FoD is somewhat simpler: he weakens his connection if he ever backs down from a challenge)
Alternative Taboo
The Finger of Destiny has incredible luck, whether it comes from himself or some higher power. However, he must rely on this luck. Cheating in a game of chance is something he’d never do.
1-50% : Things go my way
The finger of destiny has good luck. If he makes a successful avatar roll, he can predict a random event. For example, he could know which number will come up on a dice that is being rolled, or know which card is on top of a deck. If the roll fails, he doesn’t get a hunch. A matched failure means that he thinks he knows what will come up, but is wrong.
If the dice is loaded, or the deck manipulated by a card-sharp, this ability will always fail whether or not the FoD knows about it. It only works on truly random events.
51-70% : Things I need to know
The Finger of Destiny has an amazing degree of luck, and can sometimes substitute raw chance for a necessary skill. If he needs to do first aid but isn’t skilled, maybe he happened to see the exact procedure needed on TV last night.
(This only works when the skill in question would help him fulfill his destiny)
When the FoD rolls to use a skill he doesn’t have, a roll under both his mind and avatar skill indicates that he succeeds anyway by a complete fluke. A matched success indicates that he really needs that skill in order to fulfill his destiny – he gains the skill at a level equal to his roll.
71-90% : Things always go right
By this point, the FoD knows that destiny has cleared the road ahead of him, guiding him towards his fate. Making a successful FoD roll allows him to remove any uncertainty from life. When he is heading towards his destiny, he may make an avatar roll to decide the outcome of any random event. Dice roll what he wants, and he can choose to draw any card from a pack. This channel also acts to negate any attempt to cheat against the FoD in a game of pure chance.
91-99% : Things I need
If the FoD needs something, there’s a good chance it could be there. If he’s attacked in a dark alley, he could find a knife which some other brigand had carelessly dropped in the gutter.
The FoD can request a single item (“a knife”, “something which conducts electricity”, “something I can use to contact Dave”). As long as there is any chance of such an item being in the area, the FoD will find it on a successful avatar roll. There may be a negative shift on items which are rare or would be unlikely to be in such a place. In many cases, a less specific request such as “a weapon” rather than “a knife” will improve your chance.
Godwalker channel
The current godwalker (A guy named Shigure) has chosen a power which as well as giving him the luck needed to approach his destiny, prevents conscious intervention.
Any person who actively tries to prevent him acheiving his destiny will immediately suffer some random mishap. He might be hit by tiles falling from a roof, or have the floor break under his feet due to years of bad maintenance, or even be struck by lightning. This does a straight d100 damage, a maximum of once per day.
The thing about this…one’s destiny isn’t always a good or desired thing.
Also, why Finger? Why not the Hand of Fate, or The Destined One, or Destiny’s Child (so Bootylicious!)
Why not fear stimulus? Think Macbeth.
There’s something very meta about this avatar concept. It’s like something from “Over The Edge”.
If you consider the way a GM lovlingly crafts a story around their players (or brutally railroads them into experiencing the plot they’d otherwise ignore to do (gasp) roleplaying) wouldn’t you say that most PCs in RPGs are in fact channeling this avatar for free?
Who hasn’t observed their GM fudge rolls in order to get players into the evening’s desired scenario? (or fudged it themselves as GM)
Most players have already gotten the benefits of channel 2 and 4 without even trying.
If the will of the GM isn’t a pretty good shoe-in for destiny in an RPG setting, then what is?
Hmmm… I think destiny is something that just happens to people, not a skill they can improve. And avatars (especially high ranking) in general already HAVE destiny, in boatloads – there’s this thing called the invisible clergy…
Write an article on how the IC affects with people instead, this is not useful. Sorry for the harsh diss.
Yeah, to be honest the UA supernatural world is caught between two major forces: Humanity (adept obessions, IC, demons, etc.) and Weird Alien Reflections of Humanity (see: otherspaces and random weirdness). And THOSE forces are apparently caught between some version of Order and Chaos. This doesn’t really feel like any of that. Who sets a destiny? The closest to gods the UA world has is the IC and they already have their tools, as mentioned previously, in the form of avatars and people subtly tuned in that aren’t actually avatars (like the True King subtly manipulating Elvis impersonators). Like was said earlier, between GM fudging and the IC, this really doesn’t have anywhere to be put. On the other hand, I could see transforming this into some other type of avatar for at least a few of the channels.
The whole destiny thing is clearly just a personal spin on the archetype. It doesn’t need to be set by anyone.
Could just as easily have called him “the guy who gets all the luck”, but FoD is a snappier name.
Looking back at Nick’s writeup, I think we can ditch the whole destiny thing … I mean, you don’t see that many guys who have some obvious kind of destiny, but everyone knows somebody who always seems to win.
Also, the 4th channel should be the 3rd, I think. The actual 4th channel should be a permenant hunch.
But the luck thing is already sort of covered by other archetypes: The Fool, The Gambler, etc.
We all know someone who gets a lot of luck, but usually they have some theme, like just being generally nice guys who have the world be nice back to them. The world is pretty cynical and doesn’t really trust luck much, we don’t REALLY know anyone that lucky without it seeming like some sort of trade off (like with the Fool) and a lot of the time we realize that its actually due to other influences (talent, money, schmoozing, charm, etc.).
I do realize that not all archetypes have to be something that one is able to (at least hypothetically) choose. I could maybe be convinced of a “The Chosen One” archetype because even though it’s not ACTUALLY that common, the IDEA of some dude just being the Chosen One is really universal. How does one BECOME the Chosen One?
When enough people really feel that you are the one that will save them/etc.
The thing is, this brings up the interesting topic of what happens when behaviors overlap for different archetypes. A demagogue can easily trick people into believing that, so there might be some other requirements OR it might weaken his connection OR it might be too… meta, I suppose, wherein its more a show of success of some other archetype (the Warrior getting one of his people into a position of critical importance, etc.).
But this just seems … eh. You could always just write up a duke who has uncanny luck and a sense of destiny who is neither following an archetype or an entropomancer. Or maybe a piece on how Archetypes affect their avatars.