Crunchy Bits

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1 Abilities
2 Secrets
3 Keys

Abilities

Each ability in The Shadow of Yesterday has an associated pool, a pool which can be drawn on in order to give a bonus die to use of the ability. This is noted when naming abilities like this: Ability Name (Pool).

Innate Abilities

Every character in this game has three innate abilities: natural reactions and quantifications of the character's physical and mental stability.

Ability Name	Uses Pool	Summary
Endure	Vigor	This is your character's ability to push on and persevere though pain and fatigue. It is used to test the limits of a character's physicality and fitness.
React	Instinct	This measures the quickness of a character's body and mind. It is as much "how quick the character notices something" as "how quick the character moves."
Resist	Reason	"Resist" is the strength of a character's will, and is used to prevent compulsion of a natural or supernatural type. This includes physical compulsion: "Resist" would be used for a character to keep her cool under torture, for example, while "Endure" would be used to see how long she could stay conscious under the same torture.

Other Abilities

While The Shadow of Yesterday has a full setting, and plenty of pre-made abilities and rules that go with that, you should never forget that it's your setting. Story Guides and players are encouraged to make up their own abilities, Secrets, and Keys.

Open abilities follow a few guidelines:

They are either innate abilities to a person (Athletics) or things that can be easily learned. Usually, they're both, as in the aforementioned case of Athletics, or Scrapping.

They are rather wide in scope, encompassing a field of actions, without being overly broad. Movement is too broad; Climbing Fences is too narrow. Fighting is too broad; Broad-sword Usage is too narrow.

They are not specialized knowledge that applies only to a certain people or culture. These are the Species and Cultural Abilities, which are much more narrow in scope.

They often overlap with other abilities, which is great. Two abilities may describe different styles of performing similar tasks.

The pre-made open abilities are below. Examine them to get ideas for your own. They've been organized by category. Any character can take abilities from any category, but it may be easier to choose a category or two that define your character and take most of the abilities from them.

Artistic Abilities

Freeload (Instinct): Freeload is used to get free meals and shelter. Your character can't really get wealthy using Freeload, but you can manage to survive even if broke, which isn't bad.

Create (Instinct): Create is used for painting, sculpting, and other arts where a concrete item is created.

Story-tell (Reason): Story-tell is used for creating or telling stories, including ballads.

Music (Instinct): Music is used for singing and playing instruments, and represents musical talent, not lyrical talent. Music and Story-tell are often used together to make an effective song.

Craftsman Abilities

Haggling (Instinct): Haggling is used to get the best price for goods. In the world of Near, coinage doesn't really exist, and this is used to make sure you get a fair trade in barter, which means it can be used to evaluate the quality and worth of goods as well.

Fine Crafts (Reason): Fine Crafts is used for leatherworking, woodworking, and other crafts that require fine manipulation.

Rough Crafts (Vigor): Rough Crafts is used for stonecutting, forging, and other crafts that require a great deal of strength.

Complex Crafts (Reason): Complex Crafts is used for any task that requires a great deal of steps or mixing of different materials, ranging from building clocks and locks to cooking.

Warrior Abilities

First Aid (Reason): First Aid is simple medicine: bandaging cuts, binding broken bones, and washing out wounds. If someone's been physically hurt, this can be used to heal them.

Scrapping (Vigor): Untrained fighting is the center of this ability. Fists, feet, daggers, kitchen knifes, table legs, and all sorts of clubbery are usually used in Scrapping.

Sense Danger (Instinct): This ability is used to perceive anything that might physically harm your character. It is not a "sixth sense": the danger must be somehow perceivable, if only barely. Here's where you get those cat-like reflexes.

Battle (Reason): Battle is the basic skills and tactics known by any military commander. It is used for giving orders in combat and planning attacks, including ambushes.

Illicit Abilities

Stealth (Instinct): Stealth is used to sneak up on people, hide from other characters, and conceal objects on your character's body.

Theft (Instinct): Theft is used for picking pockets, cutting purses, lockpicking, breaking and entering without being noticed, and safecracking, as well as any other theft-related activity.

Deceit (Reason): Deceit is used to fool other characters, including pretending to be someone else, forge a document, or straight-out lie well.

Streetwise (Reason): Streetwise is used to know information about the illegal underground, including where to buy illegal things, sell stolen goods, or know who controls organized crime.

Outdoor Abilities

Athletics (Vigor): This is a measure of raw physicality and fitness. It is used for running, jumping, swimming, climbing, or any other strength-based task not listed as a separate ability.

Aim (Vigor): Aim is used for shooting bows and crossbows and throwing objects.

Woodscraft (Reason): Woodscraft is used to track people or animals, know what sorts of plants and animals are present in an area and their properties, as well as set traps.

Animal Ken (Instinct): Animal Ken is the social skill for dealing with animals, and is used to deal with domesticated animals or wild ones. Domesticated animals are much easier to control, of course, and this may be used to give them commands. For wild animals, on the other hand, this works about as far as scaring them off, or convincing them not to eat you.

Priestly Abilities

Pray (Vigor): Pray is used for meditation, blessing actions, and performing religious rituals. It involves the character's belief that she is connected to something better than her.

Counsel (Reason): Counsel is used to bring peace to someone via private conversation, not unlike mental health counseling. It is the spiritual equivalent of First Aid.

Discern Truth (Instinct): Discern Truth is used to tell if someone is being honest, or read a person's intentions.

Orate (Reason): Orate is used to sway opinion with speech or demagoguery, and is generally used with crowds.

Social Abilities

Sway (Instinct): Sway is used to affect individuals through conversation. Unlike Orate, this works better one-on-one, and the character being swayed may not even realize your character's intentions.

Savoir-Faire (Instinct): Savoir-Faire is used to act smooth, dance, get a kiss from a lady, and get another character into your character's bedchambers.

Etiquette (Reason): Etiquette is used to know your way around a society, including knowing who is important and where to get favors. It is the non-illegal society equivalent of Streetwise.

Dueling (Vigor): Dueling is the art of honorable one-on-one battle. Almost every culture has its rituals for physically solving problems, which usually involve a sword.

Ability breadth

If you've ever played another RPG, you might look at Complex Crafts and think, "Why can my master chef character fix clocks?" It's a good question, but the answer is simple: "She can't unless you decide she can." You decide what your character is good at with craft and artistic skills, and if she picks something up later, that's great. You don't have to quantify this: you don't have to write down "cooking" when you take Complex Crafts. Just play your character as you envision her, and if it's thematically interesting for your chef character to fix a clock, go for it.

Secrets

Secrets are special qualities your character has that let her do extraordinary things. They generally work in the following ways:

Permanently get a bonus die to a specific use of an ability.
Permanently get +1 damage or protection with an ability.
Permanently get a minor unusual ability. This ability may require a skill use.
Spend one die from a pool to use an ability in an unusual way.
Spend two or three dice from a pool to use an ability in a supernatural or powerful unusual way.
Spend as many dice from a pool for a scalable effect. If this effect is especially powerful or unusual, it may carry a cost of extra dice.

Most of the Secrets pre-made for The Shadow of Yesterday follow the above guidelines, but not all. Look at the ones below, and examine them for ideas for your own.

Secret of Animal Speech: Your character can speak to an animal and understand its signals. In order to get the animal to cooperate or not try to eat you, you might need a successful Animal Ken ability check. Even if you fail this check, you'll understand that it wants to eat you loud and clear.; Cost: 2 Instinct.

Secret of Blessing: With a successful Pray ability check, your character may bless the actions of a group. You must state a specific goal for them to accomplish. Your success level with this ability check is a pool of bonus dice any member of this group can use in accomplishing this task.; Cost: 1 Vigor.

Secret of the Bodhisavatta: You must have at least one ability ranked at Grand Master to take this Secret. When you roll a Transcendent success level, you do not have to have your character transcend. Your character can deny herself of perfection and will stay chained to this life. Roll a penalty die immediately. You can keep rolling penalty dice until you are no longer Transcendent.; Cost: Take a level one harm associated with the ability per penalty die.

Secret of Contacts: Your character knows all sorts of people in all sorts of places. You can use this Secret for your character to automatically have a past relationship with any Story Guide character in the adventure. You may describe the relationship in a short phrase, such as "old enemy," "wartime buddy," "ex-lover," but the Story Guide gets to decide the history and current disposition of the relationship.; Cost: 3 points from a pool determined by the Story Guide. Vigor would fit for a wartime buddy, Instinct for an ex-lover, and Reason for a former colleague in your character's field of study.

Secret of Disarm: Your character can disarm an opponent, without changing intentions, with a successful ability check using a weapon in Bringing Down the Pain. Because weapons can be all sorts of things in this game, "disarm" just means that the weapon's been rendered ineffective for the duration of Bringing Down the Pain.; Cost: 1 Vigor.

Secret of Enhancement (Ability): You must select an ability when you take this Secret. You may spend as many points out of the associated pool to give bonus dice to the ability as you like.

Secret of Evaluate: Your character's battle experience has given her the ability to read an opponent well. Evaluate your character's opponent not in descriptive terms, but in game mechanics, on a successful Battle ability check. You can ask for any of the following information, one bit per success level: Vigor score, Instinct score, best combat ability and score, specific ability score.; Cost: 1 Reason

Secret of Flying Leap: Your character can make amazing leaps. Using this Secret, she can jump much further or higher than normal. For each Vigor point you spend, up to three, you can jump another multiple of normal human ability for one leap.

Secret of Herbal Health: Your character can always find an herb that is an effective healing agent with a successful Woodscraft ability check in the outdoors. The herb lets you use your Woodscraft Ability to act like First Aid and heal others.; Cost: 1 Reason.

Secret of the Hidden Pocket: Your character is adept at hiding objects on her person. No matter how carefully searched the character has been, she may pull an inexpensive, small (hand-sized) item off her person with a successful Stealth ability check.; Cost: 2 Instinct.

Secret of Imbuement: Turn an item into a weapon or armor, using the rules found in the Resolution chapter. You can add one weapon or armor rating to the item each time you take this Secret. In addition, you can use this Secret to imbue the item with the power of another Secret. That Secret will have its costs lowered by one pool point. The item can be taken away from you, but you must be given a chance to get it back, or you can roll your advances spent on this Secret into a new item. You can take away someone else's Imbued item, but you'll have to pay the original cost to keep it.

Secret of Inner Meaning: Your character's art carries a meaning beyond the surface. Use any non-physical Instinct-based ability at a distance via a piece of your character's art.; Cost: 2 Reason.

Secret of Knock-back: Your character's blows send people flying. Knock back a stricken character one yard per success level. This immediately ends Bringing Down the Pain if you're involved in that, with no resolution as to intentions.; Cost: 2 Vigor.

Secret of Languages (Specific language): Your character knows a language outside her homeland's.

Secret of Mighty Blow: Your character can strike with extreme might. Spend as many dice of Vigor as you like to increase the harm of a successful blow in combat.

Secret of Quality Construction (Craft Ability): You must choose a specific Craft Ability when you take this Secret. Your character can craft items of excellent quality. Any item your character creates using this Secret gives one bonus die to a particular ability when using the item, permanently.; Cost: 5 Reason.

Secret of Scribing: Your character can read and write any language she knows.

Secret of Shattering: The weight of your weapon can be used to destroy other weapons and armor in combat. With a successful attack, your success level (not including any damage bonuses) is removed from the damage bonuses of weapons or damage reductions of armor. If reduced to 0, the item is destroyed.; Cost: 2 Vigor. (Note: if used against player characters' weapons or armor bought with the Secret of Imbuement, they may repair the item or have it become something new after the scene.)

Secret of the Signature Weapon: Your character has one weapon with which she is bonded. You gain a bonus die to any action taken with that weapon and any other character else attempting to use the weapon receives a penalty die. (Note: to change this weapon, this Secret must be taken again.)

Secret of Speciality (Skill): You must select an ability when you take this Secret. Choose a speciality your character has within that ability - for example, cooking pastries for the Complex Crafts skill. You always have a bonus die when your character attempts an action that falls within that speciality.

Secret of Synergy: You can chain multiple abilities together in Bringing Down the Pain as you would in a normal ability check; that is, you can roll multiple ability checks in one action to add bonus dice to the final check.; Cost: 1 associated pool point for each extra ability you roll.

Secret of the Sudden Knife: Your character is a master of the assassin's art. In a surprise attack, the victim automatically takes harm level 4 (bloodied) if your character successfully hits. She should make an Endure ability check resisting your roll. If she fails, she automatically takes harm level 6. This is irrespective of being in a Bringing Down the Pain situation.; Cost: 3 points from whatever pool is associated with the ability you're using, plus 1 from each of the other pools.

Secret of the Throwing: Anything is a dangerous missile in your character's hands. She can throw anything fist-sized to greatsword-sized as an attack, using the Aim ability, and the object counts as a +1 weapon.; Cost: 1 Vigor.

Secret of the Unwalked Path: Your character's footfalls leave little trace for others to follow. You can use your character's Woodscraft ability in resistance to anyone trying to track her.; Cost: 1 Instinct.

Keys

Keys are the motivations, problems, connections, duties, and loyalties that pull on your character. To the player, they're highly important because they generate experience points. Creating new Keys may be easier than new Abilities or Secrets - they follow very simple rules.

A Key must involve a motivation, problem, connection, duty, or loyalty.

Keys come in two types:

Motivations. When the motivation is fulfilled in play, gain an experience point. When the motivation is fulfilled against good odds, gain three experience points.
Everything else. When the Key comes up in play, gain an experience point. (You can use this three times per session. This applies to all Keys below.) When the Key presents a minor problem, gain two experience points. When it presents a major problem, gain five experience points.

All Keys have a Buyoff, which is a reversal from the Key by the character. All Buyoffs give the character 10 experience points. This Buyoff occurs only when you, the player, wants it to happen: you can lose a battle with the Key of Bloodlust and still keep the Key. If you want your character to undergo a change in her personality, though, adding to the story, you can take this Buyoff by fulfilling it. If you do take the Buyoff, you can never take this Key again.

As always, see the pre-made Keys to get a feel for creating your own.

Key of Bloodlust

Your character enjoys overpowering others in combat.

Gain 1 XP every time your character defeats someone in battle.
Gain 3 XP for defeating someone equal to or more powerful than your character (equal or higher combat skill.)
Buyoff: Be defeated in battle.

Key of Conscience

Your character has a soft spot for those weaker than their opponents.

Gain 1 XP every time your character helps someone who cannot help themselves.
Gain 2 XP every time your character defends someone with might who is in danger and cannot save themselves.
Gain 5 XP every time your character takes someone in an unfortunate situation and changes their life to where they can help themselves.
Buyoff: Ignore a request for help.

Key of the Coward

Your character avoids combat like the plague.

Gain 1 XP every time your character avoids a potentially dangerous situation.
Gain 3 XP every time your character stops a combat using other means besides violence.
Buyoff: Leap into combat with no hesitation.

Key of Faith

Your character has a strong religious belief that guides her.

Gain 1 XP every time she defends her faith to others.
Gain 2 XP whenever this character converts someone to her faith.
Gain 5 XP whenever this character defends her faith even though it brings her great harm.
Buyoff: Your character renounces her beliefs.

Key of Fraternity

Your character has someone she is sworn to, a friend who is more important than anyone else.

Gain 1 XP every time this character is present in a scene with your character (maximum 3 per adventure).
Gain 2 XP whenever your character has to make a decision that is influenced by them.
Gain 5 XP every time your character defends them by putting herself at risk.
Buyoff: Sever the relationship with this person.

Key of Glittering Gold

Your character loves wealth.

Gain 1 XP every time you make a deal that favors you in wealth.
Gain 3 XP every time you double your wealth.
Buyoff: Give away everything you own except what you can carry lightly.

Key of the Guardian

Your character has a ward, someone who depends on her for security and protection.

Gain 1 XP every time this character is present in a scene with your character.
Gain 2 XP whenever your character has to make a decision that is influenced by them.
Gain 5 XP every time your character rescues them from harm.
Buyoff: Sever the relationship with this person.

Key of the Impostor

Sometimes your entire life is a lie.

You gain 1 XP whenever you pass yourself off as someone/something you're not.
You gain 2 XP whenever you convince others in spite of serious skepticism.
You gain 5 XP whenever your story survives a deliberate, focused, "Hey everybody, look!" attempt to reveal your identity.
Buyoff: Confess your imposture to those duped.

Key of the Masochist

Your character thrives on personal pain and suffering.

Gain 1 XP every time she is bloodied and 3 XP every time she is broken.
Buyoff: Flee a source of physical or psychic damage.

Key of the Mission

Your character has a personal mission that she must complete.

Gain 1 XP every time she takes action to complete this mission (2 XP if this action is successful.)
Gain 5 XP every time she takes action that completes a major part of this mission.
Buyoff: Abandon this mission.

Key of the Outcast

Your character has lost fellowship or membership in an organization - which could just be a culture, or a specific cross-cultural group. This separation defines your character as much as membership in the organization defines its members.

Gain 1 XP every time her status with this organization comes up.
Gain 2 XP every time her disassociation brings her harm.
Gain 5 XP every time the separation brings your character great pain and suffering.
Buyoff: Regain membership in the organization.

Key of Renown

"You must be the worst assassin I've ever heard of." "But you have heard of me."

You gain 1 XP whenever you see to it that your name and deeds are known, by bragging about them or making sure there are witnesses.
You gain 2 XP whenever you put yourself at risk to do something unnecessary or foolish that will add to your reputation.
You gain 5 XP whenever you risk your life to take credit for your actions (bragging that you were the one who killed the Duke's son, for example.).
Buyoff: Give someone else credit for an action that would increase your renown.

Key of Power

You don't even care what you do with it, you just want it.

You gain 1 XP whenever you earn a boon from someone important, earn a slight gain in prestige, or make a rival look bad.
You gain 3 XP whenever you ruin, kill, or otherwise eliminate a rival, and improve your own position because of it.
Buyoff: Relinquish your power and position.

Key of Vengeance

Your character has a hatred for a particular organization, person, or even species or culture.

Gain 1 XP every time your character hurts a member of that group or a lackey of that person.
Gain 2 XP every time your character strikes a minor blow at that group or person (killing a member of the organization or one of the person's lackeys, disrupting their life, destroying their property).
Gain 5 XP every time your character strikes a major blow at that group or person.
Buyoff: Let your enemy go.

Key of the Vow

Your character has a vow of personal behavior that she has sworn not to break. This could be a dietary restriction, a requirement to pray at sunbreak every morning, or something else like that.

Gain 1 XP for every adventure in which your character does not break this vow.
Gain 2 XP every time your character does not break this vow even though it causes her minor harm or inconvenience.
Gain 5 XP every time your character does not break this vow even though it causes her great harm.
Buyoff: Break this vow.

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Category: Core