A path of independence and willpower, a road to loneliness and cruelty.

(Credit where credit is due. Most of this, apart from the channels, are taken from Zagash’s Self-Made Man, which was a rock solid concept that was, perhaps, not executed to it’s fullest potential. The channels themselves are based on the sterling ideas left in the comments section. I’ve also removed the idea that the Self-Made Man is ‘born’ to win. Self-Made Men are usually NOT born to win, that’s what drives them to great heights).

Attributes: The Self-made Man embraces the capitalistic businessman image; you don’t have to be born rich to be rich, all you need is an idea and the will to make profit with it. The avatars of Self-made Man tend to come from poor families but they all managed to change their luck sometime along the first steps on the path.

This archetype’s power is based on hard work, long nights and making the most of everything in business and making it on your own. It is a solitary path. but not in a rootless kind of solitude. The Self-made Man is like a great old oak, standing alone on a windy hill for centuries. There is only one thing that the archetype depends on: belief in one’s self. Everything else follows.

Taboo: However difficult the situation, the Self-made Man will never accept help of any kind. He will survive on his own, the way he has always survived. Neither will he help others out of compassion, for there is no room for that in a dog-eat-dog world.
Self-made Man cannot accept gifts or anything else that is not “earned”. Also, his taboo prevents him from ever forming a family as the gender roles force him to both help and be helped. Self-made Man lives a lonely exsistance.
Note: It is not against his taboo to buy for assistance. So he has to *pay* for everything. He could hire someone to build him a mansion, do his cooking or he could marry a hooker if he bought her for a lifetime.

Symbols: The market stall, the stock ticker, the notebook full of ideas, the pen, the telephone, the worn shoe, the shirt and tie.

Suspected Avatars: Frederick Douglass, Ingvar Kamprad, Benjamin Hall, Tung Chao Yung, Jack Cohen.

Masks: Lex Luthor, John Henry Irons.

Note: Despite the name the Self-Made Man need not be male. More and more women on the Fortune 500 attest to this.

Channels:
1-50%: The Self-Made Man works long hours. On a successful Avatar check the SMM can keep going for as many hours equal to the result of the Avatar:Self-Made Man roll without fatigue. A normal person typically needs sleep after 17 hours.

Yes, this does mean at higher levels the Self-Made Man can go, theoretically, for nearly 5 days without sleep deprivation penalties. The Self-Made Man still requires normal amounts of food and water (unless he’s using another of the Self-Made Man’s channels).

At the end of a Long Hour a SMM should, wisely, have a decent night’s sleep. However, he can choose to piggy-back another stretch without faltering if he makes an Avatar check at -5% (cumulative for each additional stretch). If he fails any roll ALL the sleep he’s missed hits him at once. For 36-48 hours this might just knock him out for 8 hours, or just knock him for six as the mother of all fatigue migraines sets in. Any longer… well, every full day snapping back does 2 Wound Points of damage. Any kind of piggy-backed failiure should also require some Helplessness and Self checks.

51-70%: Frugality. The Self-Made Man knows how to squeeze everything for all it’s worth. On a successful Avatar check he may reduce the resource consumption of something to it’s bare minimum, even if it’s being fully used.

Simply, the Self-Made Man designates one thing he’s being frugal with: petrol, food, water, electricity etc. For one week he will be able to use the bare minimum and still get by as if he were using the normal amount. A car will run as long as the gauge is just above empty; he can go on bread and water and not feel slightly hungry; stranded on an island he can keep a dying radio battery going for a week. Strangely, the Self-Made Man can never designate money directly.

71-91%: Pick Yourself Up. On a successful Avatar: The Self Made Man roll, the avatar can ‘pick himself up and get back on his feet’ in a way appropriate to the given situation.

So if the Avatar’s business goes under due to bad luck or mismanagement, the Avatar will be able to get a loan or a distant aunt will die and leave him a sizable inheritance which he must use to restart his business or break taboo.

Or if the Avatar gets literally knocked down in a fist fight, he will have enough time to get back to his feet no matter how viscious and no holds bar the fight.

91%+: The Self-Made Man can get in on the ground floor of anything. ANYTHING. He’s always first in line, he’s always at the head of any major business deal, he always shoots first in a firefight. Once a day, with a successful Avatar check, he can do something before anyone else can. The universe makes sure he is there first. A catastrophic failiure on this channel means the Avatar is never first for anything for an entire month.