The Festival of Scarlet and Amber

The World Beyond

There are things in this world that escape the comprehension of modern man. For decades - centuries - millenia - mankind has managed to thrive despite them, ignorant, feeling safe in their ignorance of the transcendent beings that once dwelled on Earth and will, one day, dwell upon it again. As some say, ignorance is bliss - is it not better to not be aware of the sword of Damocles hanging over your head when there is absolutely nothing that you can do to overcome the threats facing you?

Nevertheless, not all of mankind has been able to live in peace. Since the ancient times, there have been those who, by accident or by design, encountered the machinations of the ones that dwell and writhe in the great beyond, in which human species was nothing more than yet another pawn. It was knowledge that was also poison; it left no-one unchanged.

Some were driven insane, if they managed to survive the experience; their tales ignored as the incoherent ramblings of madmen. Humans would rather invent their own monsters that they could overcome with bravery and determination, rather than accept the existence of real ones, in front of whom all of that was naught.

Some betrayed their own kind for power, trying to futilely amuse their incomprehensible masters with ever-greater depravities, to gain the attention of the ancient ones that still remembered when the stars were young, and to learn from them. In the few rare cases, the great ones even listened, and granted those who worshipped them as gods a sliver of their immense power.

Some were content to merely study the transcendent ones, to learn the arts of alien mathematics and geometries. Frightened of what dwells behind the veil, they created the human arts of sorcery, fragments of knowledge that they could glean from timeless tombs and alien ruins. Yet, as time passed, many of them lost more and more of their original humanity, until they became nothing more than ancient husks, caring for nothing but expanding their understanding of the forbidden lore in a desperate bid to escape the inevitable.

Some, however, decided to fight. Even if their struggle was ultimately futile, if, thanks to them, the rest of mankind could live just one more day in peace and blissful ignorance, then they would gladly sacrifice their lives. Their lives were often short, brutal and unpleasant, but it was something that they, with time, came to accept. Such was the fate of those who struggle against the ineffable, the great, transcendent titans for whom Earth is little more than a toy.

Which will you become?

The Basics

The Setting

The events of the Festival of Scarlet and Amber take place over a single month before the much-awaited festival in a quiet, sleepy coastal city, somewhere, somewhen. The city persists mostly on its well-developed fishing industry and tourism, though it is also a reasonably important port within the region. There are plentiful local legends and rumours about the strange and the supernatural dwelling within and around it, though no investigation so far has proven those to be anything more than tourist traps.

It has existed for many centuries, from its humble beginnings as a fishing village to its current status, though its development has suffered due to its relative isolation from the rest of the nation due to the mountains surrounding it; the main method of contact with the outside is by ship.

The Players

The player characters are all students at a local, highly respected high school, though there is no restriction on gender, or the class or year that they are in. For one reason or another, they have gained the attention of the school idol and the daughter of the school headmaster, who invited them to her house for a pleasant chat - one that ended up being slightly more eventful than initially suspected.

The System

The system used in Festival is a modification of the "standard" d10 model used in games here, so to speak. Most normal rolls are resolved through as usual, but in case of contested rolls, the results are summed up for each character, and the action with the higher total is assumed to be successful, the difference between the two being used to determine the effect. Equipment can further modify the outcome.

For example, in a fistfight, two characters would roll their Physical stat. If one got 6, and the other 9, then the second would win the roll, their attack would connect, and the first character would lose 3 health points.

Physical and Mental Health

A typical character, before applying any modifications, would have 10 health points and 10 mental health points, from this point on referred to as HP and MP. This number can be reduced or increased during an investigation, as well as its aftermatch.

HP represents the ability of the character to go on in the physical meaning of the term. Loss of HP is typically associated with grazing wounds, bruises, cuts, burns and so on; they can be treated in relatively short period of time and are generally not life-threatening. Serious wounds are ones that are dealt by attacks or accidents that cause loss of HP equal to or greater than 10 HP in one go; those are the broken bones, ruptured organs and such. Their specific consequences and methods of treating them are context-dependant, but they can be assumed to be incapacitating to a normal character.

If a character has Physical score of 2 or more, they can continue acting even after taking a crippling wound, at the cost of a temporary loss of a single point of the stat. This can continue for as long as their Physical lasts - once they hit 0, they're out. (and probably in for a long visit at the hospital)

Light wounds are healed fully in-between investigations, thanks to the wonders of modern medical care. They can also be mitigated by treatment during the investigation itself; taking painkillers, bandaging the wounds and such, though those can have their own consequences attached. Serious wounds are context-sensitive, and depend on various variables within the story itself.

MP represents the ability of the character to withstand the horrors of this world - human or not. Loss of MP usually happens due to seeing or participating in particularly traumatic events, or witnessing things not meant for human eyes, such as certain arcane effects, entities or lore. Their loss is handled mechanically in the same way as HP loss, though with no equivalent for serious wounds. Notably, though, each consecutive damage to a character's mental health that comes from the same source has a reduced effect, as they build up mental resistance to the source.

Total loss of MP results in mental incapacitation, as the character is overcome by the events that he or she has encountered. From that point on, any further action first requires a successful Mental Health roll. Repeated failures may lead to insanity and mental illness.

MP are regenerated in-between investigations with a Mental Health roll; the sum of numbers on d10 dice rolled is the amount of MP points regained. They can also be recovered in mid-investigation due to context-dependant actions.

Eldritch Lore

The knowledge of the arcane and the leftover mysteries of the transcendent ones that still remain on Earth, even as their masters slumber. It is responsible for all actions related to them - comprehending alien mathematics, recognising servitors of the transcendent ones and the characteristics of their cults, learning and using sorcery and so on and so forth. Proper knowledge of Eldritch Lore synergises well with high Mental Health score - it does not protect the character from mental trauma, as even though he or she might be more familiar with the strange sights, they also know far better what they see and the grave implications associated with it, unshielded by ignorance. Of course, there are also those who have embraced the horror fully, throwing their worries to the winds...

Notably, Smarts can be used to substitute for Eldritch Lore when learning from arcane tomes, as even though the contents are incredibly alien and often incomprehensible, created thanks to millenia of desperate attempts of mankind to understand the ineffable and experimentation, they were still written by humans and there is a certain method to their madness that, with luck, one might glean even without fundamental arcane education. Nevertheless, all such rolls are made at higher difficulty, up to difficulty 10.

Character Creation

Stats

• Physical
  
• Smarts
  
• Charisma
  
• Perception
  
• Mental Health
  
• Eldritch Lore
  

All stats start at 1, with the exception of Eldritch Lore, which starts at 0. This can be considered the "baseline" ability of a high school student. However, all player characters can be assumed to excel in a certain field; you can add a single point in a stat of choice, with the exception of Eldritch Lore, representing ability that is easily above average in the given field.

In addition to that, a single Skill might also be chosen; this is essentially a character's speciality, not bound to any specific stat, but instead having wide application to actions related to it. For example, a Cooking skill would not only allow the character to prepare an unusually tasty meal, but also cover things such as recognising ingredients, memorising recipes or swift use of a kitchen knife - not all of which have to be used for entirely harmless purposes.

Special Characteristics

A character has a single Special Characteristic as well; it goes beyond only affecting stats and may have significant effects on the character's background, as well as future plot developments. It is also the only way to raise Eldritch Lore stat above 0 for a starting character, though any additional points gained can only be spent on it when specifically noted.

Note: the list is by no means complete. If you have any ideas for more, feel free to put them on the talk page, or discuss them in the chat.

• Defying the Fate - gives the character access to a full set of three Fate points, as compared to a single one that others have access to, allowing them to deny the seemingly inevitable and change fate. A Fate point can be spent to automatically succeed on a roll, even after the original roll fails; however, this is limited to what is at least remotely possible. No matter how hard the mortals might try, they will never be able to throw the sky. (they can also be used for normal rerolls if you so fancy)

• School Idol - the character is highly popular within the school, based on their own merits - they are smarter, prettier, more athletic and more pleasant to talk to than other students. Perhaps they are the winners of a nation-wide mathematics contest, or represent the school as the ace of the sports team - either way, they are the pride of their school. They get two more points to spend on their stats, but they also have greater attention and pressure put on them - and maintaining their current life without utterly collapsing is far harder for them than for the others. They only regain half the MP in the same amount of time as other characters.

• Renaissance Man - the character's expertise spans a significant number of different areas, though not exceling in any given one more than usual, granting them two additional Skills, but no bonus stat points.

• Clearly a Mermaid - the character gets bonuses to all actions involving sea or water in general - gaining a bonus dice to the relevant stat and reducing the difficulty for the action being taken by one. (this does apply to Eldritch Lore)

• Old Blood - the character's ancestors have made a terrible pact with the transcendent ones - or engaged in a blasphemous union with one of their servitors. By now, this has been long forgotten, and the results of it have thinned considerably - yet there is still the taint of something inhuman within the character's blood, and regardless of the possible benefits it might bring, if it surfaces, the results might be exceptionally unpleasant. The character gains 1 bonus stat point and 1 point of Eldritch role applicable to non-knowledge based rolls, also reducing their difficulty by one. They also gain some visible sign of the taint, chosen by the player and based on its original source, and technically have access to the results of one arcane ritual as an innate ability - if the taint manifests itself, which is both not reversible and potentially with very serious consequences. Power that transcends human by its very nature requires a denial of humanity.

• Cult Connections - the character's family, or perhaps a childhood friend, are a part of a cult of one of the transcendent ones, though they themselves are not properly initiated as a member. The character gains 1 point of Eldritch Lore, one arcane ritual and can call upon the cult's resources when in need, but they are also tied to it and its objectives, even when they conflict with the ones that the party is trying to accomplish at the moment. After all, what are mortal friendships and human morals in the face of the eternal ones, before whom all human accomplishments and civilisation are nothing but dust?

• Call of the Underworld - the character's family, a friend or perhaps just the character, is involved at some level in organised crime present within the City, which is surprisingly vibrant, given the kind of heavy (and heavy-handed) police presence that features within it. A variety of organisations, many of them coming from the homelands of the immigrants, have taken root here. Some cults have taken to using them as their providers and the occasional disposable asset, particularly the human traffickers, but they're generally kept in the dark as to what is really going on. The character gains 1 point of Physical, and can call upon the resources of their organisation if needed - including buying illegal items from the City's black market.

More TBD

Inventory

Conventional

The characters initially have access to the personal belongings of them and their families - from pens to cellphones. Those don't need to be "bought" during character generation and can be safely assumed to be part of their normal lives.

If they have access to appropriate channels, they can also acquire other, less widely available items - such as weapons. Characters who - either themselves or via their families - have connections to the City's criminal underground or cults can even acquire firearms. (while ones such as hunting rifles can be taken even without that, there is a greater risk of them being traced - or your family starting to wonder just where their young child is taking a gun to, for that matter)

Exact stats are still WIP, though as a rule, weapons increase damage done when they hit. Other items, such as tools, generally open up new options. (such as cellphone cameras letting you make photos of various scenes. Which may or may not be a good idea, depending on what you want to make the photo of)

Arcane

Magic is fundamentally based on either asking entities of higher order to do something for you, or using the remains of the creations of the transcendent ones that still linger on Earth to achieve certain effects - often effects that modern science really can't explain.

There are generally two methods of doing so - via rituals, and via improvisation.

Rituals are often highly elaborate and, truth to be told, often contain unnecessary elements, added to the original knowledge over the centuries or even millenia. They take time to set up and perform, but, being the end result of a long history of trials and errors, they are typically relatively safe, as long as the steps are properly followed.

Improvisation, on the other hand, means trying to come up with something of your own, possibly even on the fly, using the knowledge that you have. This can result in causing effects far faster than with rituals - but also means that there is no safety net of tradition and rote present, and failures can backfire rather spectacularly; knowledge that man was not meant to know is not a toy and can be very lethal to the user if treated as such.

Eldritch Lore is the stat that governs how well you can use it. Each point in the stat gives you 2 dice to use. Dice are rolled normally, with 6 as the target success number - however, additional dice can be spent to lower the target number by 1, at the cost of limiting the effect. Competent sorcerers can perform minor effects reliably - of course, that kind of knowledge does not come easily.

Mechanically, the biggest difference between rituals and improvised magic is that, in case of the first, there is far lesser chance of it backfiring catastrophically in case of a botched roll - while improvised magic can be potentially fatal, and/or come with unintended consequences.

Rituals are worked out on case-by-case basis, but do need to be prepared in advance. Typically, a character can remember as many of these as they have Eldritch Lore points, plus any gained from their special characteristics. If you have an idea for a ritual - or an innate ability equivalent to one, in case of the Old Blood characteristic - just drop it onto the talk page or in the channel and we'll work out the details.