NOBILIS THE ESSENTIALS

VOLUME 1
FIELD GUIDE TO THE POWERS

2022 R ERELEASE

JENNA KATERIN MORAN

NOBILIS by Jenna Katerin Moran
DEDICATION CREDITS
Written and Conceived by: Jenna Katerin Moran
For Edited by: Neall Raemonn Price
Cheryl & Joseph Couvillion Layout and Visual Design by: Stéphane Gallay, Oliver
Chrysoula Tzavelas Vulliamy, Xavid
Kiva Maginn
Raymond Wood Design and Development Contributors: Bruce Baugh,
James Wallis Antoine Boegli, David Bolack, Deirdre M. Brooks,
Dara & Anna Korra’ti Genseric Dace, Ianthe Falls-Short, and James Wallis
Han Qin
Hsin Chen Playtesters: Mr. Robert Baxt, Alexander “Assembly”
and Benekos, Alvin Bennett, Danielle “Paradoxes” Blake,
Gayle Margolis Robert “Black Markets” Blake, Rand Brittain,Tim Bugler,
Rook “Eternity” Catchfly, Mr. Hsin Chen, Sarah
“Reflections” Chen, Rajan “Time” Chudgar, Jennifer
“Earthly Love” Coy, Mark “Luck” Cram, Sean “the Power
of Narration” Dannenfeldt, Mr. Benjamin Dell, Jason
“Death” Eberlin, Beth “Plants” Eves, Eric “Hollyhock”
Eves, Mr. Alix N Frayne, Miss Lauren Henderson, Darren
Hennessey, Ryan “Arrangement” Holt, Miss Georgina
Hurley, Ms. Atsuko Ikada, Bryan “Openings” Kieft, Miss
Elana Kirby, Tim “Accords” Kuehlhorn, Dennis
“Forgotten Promises” Lin, Travis “Courage and Blades”
McCord, Mike “Numbers” MacMartin, Steve “Discovery”
Mandrgoc, Miss Jennifer Miller, Tamerlane Mohammad,
John Mørke, the Lady Namika-in, Angelo “Machinery”
Pampalone, Pandareos “Enduring” Panagiotis, Mr. David
Ramírez, Mr. Darren Smith, Mr. Luc J Tidy, Caryn “Bad
Ideas” Wadler, David “Messengers” Webber, Lori
“Country Music” Whisler, Miss Ada “It’s Called Kottos”
Willamette, Sheena “Desperation” Williams, Charles
“Perception” Wilson, and Ben Wray

In Memoriam: Merry Ruth Conley, David L. Brittain

Special Shout Out to: Robin Michael Alexander

Maginn. HI ROBIN
All text and art in this book is copyright its original Nobilis is the creation of Jenna Katerin Moran. All
creators. included text, concepts, and game mechanics are
copyright 2001-2022 by Jenna Katerin Moran.
“Orpheus Charming the Animals,” by Josias Murer II, Reproduction without the written permission of Jenna
provided courtesy of the Getty Museum. (pg. 15) Katerin Moran or the appropriate artistic copyright
View of the Mountain of La Verna from the Road of holder is expressly forbidden, except for the purposes of
Casentino (Vue de la montagne della Vernia...) [plate A]," reviews, blank character sheets, and copying reasonable
by Jacopo Ligozzi (designer), Raffaello Schiaminossi selections for personal use and reference only.
(etcher), for a work by Lino Moroni (author), provided The mention or reference to any company or product in
courtesy of the National Gallery of Art. (pg. 33) these pages is not a challenge to the trademark or
“Tiger and Snake,” by Eugène Delacroix, provided copyright concerned.
courtesy of the National Gallery of Art. (pg. 39) This book uses fantastical and supernatural elements in
Illustration for George Shaw's “Vivarium Naturae or its setting, for its characters, their abilities, and themes. All
the Naturalist's Miscellany,” by Frederick Polydore such elements are fiction and intended for entertainment
Nodder, courtesy of the NYPL collection; “The North- purposes only. This book contains mature content and
East Arete of Mount Everest,” by Alexander Frederick reader discretion is advised.
Richmond “Sandy” Wollaston, courtesy of the Getty. (pg.
99) Nobilis was created by Jenna Katerin Moran (under the
“Elaine,” by Julia Margaret Cameron, courtesy of the name “R. Sean Borgstrom”) under the auspices of David
Met. (pg. 115) Bolack’s Pharos Press. It was later popularized by James
“Italian Coast Scene with Ruined Tower, 1838,” by Wallis’ Hogshead Press.
Thomas Cole, courtesy of the National Gallery of Art;
Mayan jade earflare, courtesy of the Met. (pg. 149)
“(name elided),” by George Romney, provided courtesy
of the National Gallery of Art. (pg. 161)
“Saint Thecla Praying for the Plague-Stricken,” by
Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, courtesy of the Met; and,
courtesy of the Smithsonian: “Justice,” by Albrecht Dürer;
“Studies of Cows,” by Samuel Colman; “Religion,” by
Angelika Kaufmann; “Woman Shielding Her Eyes,” by
Daniel Huntington; “James McNeill Whistler,” by Alice
Pike Barney; “Portrait, possibly Elizabeth Vail,” by J.
Carroll Beckwith; and “Le Doge Loredan,” by Paul-
Edme Lerat. (pg. 175)
“The Market,” by an unknown artist, courtesy of the
Getty; “the Song of the Lark,” by Jules Breton, courtesy of
the Art Institute of Chicago; “Both Members of This
Club,” by George Bellows, courtesy of the National
Gallery of Art; sword references, courtesy of the Art
Institute of Chicago. (pg. 189)
Contents
WELCOME! ......................................................... 7 MORTALS ......................................................... 73
Passions and Skills................................................ 73
INTRODUCTION .................................................9 Difficulties ............................................................ 74
Ananda ..................................................................11 Will ...................................................................... 74
Lord Entropy ........................................................11 Cool and Shine.....................................................76
Surolam ................................................................ 13 Action...................................................................78
Ha-Qadosch Berakha........................................... 14 Trouble .................................................................79
Tools and Assistants ............................................ 80
YOUR IMPERATOR .............................................17 Edge .................................................................... 80

AN ATLAS OF CREATION .................................21 THE LAWS OF YOUR NATURE............................81

The Ordinary World............................................. 21 Bonds ...................................................................82
Visions of the Cityback ........................................ 23 Afflictions .............................................................84
The Locust Court .................................................24 Afflictions and Bonds (Example) .........................86
Tales of the Evil World ........................................26 More Example Bonds and Afflictions ..................86
The Border Mythic ...............................................30 The Properties of Your Estate ...............................88
Your Chancel ........................................................34 Changing Bonds, Afflictions, and Properties........89
Heaven ................................................................. 35
Hell ...................................................................... 37 ASPECT .......................................................... 91
The World Ash .....................................................39 Aspect Difficulties (Example) ............................. 94
The Light and the Dark....................................... 40
The Wild ..............................................................42 PHYSICAL NATURE AND DHARMA................... 95
The Deep Mythic and the Spirit World ...............43
DOMAIN ......................................................... 97
LET’S PLAY A GAME! ...................................... 47 The Domain Difficulty Chart............................. 102
How the Game Works .........................................48
The HG and the Game ........................................49 PERSONA .........................................................103
Key Gaming Terms ..............................................50 The Persona Difficulty Chart.............................. 108
Conflicts Between Actions ...................................50
Projects and Destiny............................................. 52 MYSTIC LINKS............................................... 109
Actions and Play................................................... 53
Everything You Need to Know to Build Your Avatar.. 54 TREASURE ........................................................111
Treasure Difficulties (Example) ........................... 117
AVATAR CREATION ...........................................57
The Avatar Diagram ............................................. 57 MP ................................................................. 119
Foundations..........................................................62 The “Breath” of MP ............................................ 120
Your Estate ...........................................................64 Bonds, Afflictions, and Tending to Your Estate.. 120
Origins ................................................................ 66 Facing Change and Overcoming Struggle.......... 120
Contacts ...............................................................68
Affiliation .............................................................70
What Does It All Mean? ..................................... 72
GIFTS ............................................................. 121 THE ZU...........................................................163
Aspect Gifts ........................................................122
Domain and Persona Gifts ..................................122 THE ACTUALS ................................................165
Treasure Gifts......................................................122
Gift Base Cost.....................................................123 MIRACULOUS ACTION.................................... 169
Strike ...................................................................123 Reflexive Actions................................................ 170
Activation ............................................................123 Gifts ................................................................... 170
Area of Effect ......................................................123 Aspect Actions ................................................... 170
Flexibility ........................................................... 124 Domain and Persona Actions .............................. 171
Rarity...................................................................125 Treasure Actions.................................................. 171
A Note on Minimum Costs ................................125 Movements of the Soul ....................................... 171
Common Gifts ....................................................125 Hubris, and Acts of Wonder................................172
Uncommon Gifts ................................................128
Monstrous Gifts ..................................................133 MIRACULOUS CONFLICT ................................ 173
Acting in the Moment ........................................173
YOUR CHANCEL, REVISITED ........................... 135 Flurries of Action ................................................174
Theme ................................................................ 136 Oh No You Don’t ............................................... 176
Properties ........................................................... 136 Not So Fast! ........................................................177
Entrances and Exits............................................ 136 Miracles and the Environment............................178
Cool Stuff............................................................137
Miracles and the Chancel....................................137 TOOLS FOR MIRACULOUS CONFLICT ..............179
Chancel Boundaries ............................................137 The Divine Mantle ............................................. 179
The Auctoritas Magister ..................................... 180
YOUR IMPERATOR, REVISITED ........................139 Strike ................................................................... 181
Imperator Creation..............................................139
New Family ....................................................... 142 WOUNDS ........................................................ 183
Assessing Damage .............................................. 186
THE IMPERATORS............................................143 Non-Physical Damage ........................................187
Imperial Miracles ............................................... 144 Healing Damage .................................................187
Other Imperial Resources....................................145 Words of Command............................................187
Unobjectionable Effects.......................................188
ORDERS AND NOBILIS ...................................147 Damage, Secrets, and Lies ...................................188
The Web of Khedeb Neret...................................147 Damage Immunity ............................................. 190
The Order of the Falling Stars.............................147
The Green Snake Order ..................................... 148 THE SIMPLE RITES ....................................... 191
The Gray Order of the Functionaries ................. 148 The Servant’s Rite................................................191
The Mask of Surolam ......................................... 150 Hiding in the Flowers ........................................ 192
Wealth ................................................................ 150 Rite of the Last Trump....................................... 192
The Ravens’ Order ............................................... 151 The Gift of Tongues ........................................... 192
The Book of Purity ..............................................152 Guising............................................................... 192
The Accords at Babylon.......................................152 Tracing a Miracle ................................................193
The Nettle Rite....................................................193
THE EXCRUCIANS .......................................... 153
The Deceivers ......................................................154 DESTINY ......................................................... 195
Known Deceivers................................................. 155 Projects ................................................................195
The Warmains .....................................................156 Personal Destiny................................................. 198
Known Warmains................................................156 Changing the Heart ........................................... 199
The Mimics .........................................................158
The Strategists .....................................................158 AT THE SHORE .............................................. 203
Known Strategists ...............................................159
The Excrucian War ............................................. 160
The Weapons of Their Host................................ 160
Illustrations
15 (WOOD-WITCH POISON) by Josias Murer II*
25 (THE SWAMP OF PRECEDENT) by Christian Holm
33 (A ROAD TO THE SUN) by Jacopo Ligozzi, Raffaello, Schiaminossi, Lino Moroni*
39 (CHILD OF THE ASH) by Eugène Delacroix*
77 (TIRIA OF THE BOREALIS) by Jenna Katerin Moran
90 (THE TRAIN FIERABRAS) by Anthony Damiani
99 (THE MYTHIC WORLD) by George Shaw, Frederick Polydore Nodder*
115 (DIANE SPINNAKER) by Julia Margaret Cameron*
134 (LOCUS ARAUNAH) by Jenna Katerin Moran
149 (THE HEARTSTONE OF THE WORLD) by Thomas Cole and an unknown Mayan artist*
161 (PORTRAIT OF AN EXCRUCIAN) by George Romney*
175 (THE CARDIFF ACTUAL) by Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, with elements by Albrecht Dürer,
Samuel Colman, Angelika Kaufmann, Daniel Huntington, Alice
Pike Barney, J. Carroll Beckwith, and Paul-Edme Lerat*
189 (THE BYZANTINE SOCIETY ) by Jenna Moran, with elements by Jules Breton, George Bellows, and
an unknown artist

* modified or adapted by Jenna Moran

 7

Welcome!
The wind told me once that everybody gets to play a game of
Nobilis before they die. Maybe it’s in their secret dreams.
Maybe it’s in real life. But everybody gets to experience the
world of the Nobilis once—to leave behind the dead world
where things don’t talk to you and nobody knows the purpose of
the world, for at least one night, and see the truth.
Maybe you got to play the game back when it was a little pink
book printed on demand by Pharos Press. Or maybe you got to
play it when it was this huge coffee-table book, lavish and
elegant, made by Hogshead Publishing, Ltd. and later
distributed by Guardians of Order before they decided to stop
sending out money and books and stuff and just lurk like a
serpent, coiled around the dark heart of the world.
I heard that’s what happened to them! I might be wrong. If
you’ve been to the heart of the world then you would probably
know.
Anyway, maybe you got to play it that way; or in your dreams,
with a mysterious book held by a mysterious referee; or maybe
you’ve even become one of the Nobilis yourself, and you don’t
exactly have to play it any more to know.
But if not!
Oh, if not!
Then this is the book for you.
The Nobilis are all around us, they and their attendant spirits.
Everything that you think is a flat and boring object is actually
alive, manifesting the amazing cosmic force called the causa
causans or spiritus Dei.The world is full of dangers and wondrous
things that hardly anybody knows about. This book will let you
play around on the borders of reality, experiencing what’s out
there. And maybe, just maybe, if you encounter the actual
Nobilis or something else magical later, and if you’ve read this
book carefully, you’ll know what to do!
You might even get to become a Power—one of the
Nobilis—yourself!
But as every avid Nobiliser knows, it’s not about becoming
one. It’s not about leaving the mortal world behind and entering
a world of power and magic where everything is possible but
love. It’s about keeping the magical world in your heart. It’s
about keeping your faith in things and being. The Excrucians are
coming with their stars in their eyes and their night-black
swords! If you remember the purpose and meaning of things,
you can help the world stay strong.

WELCOME!
 9
CHAPTER 1

Introduction It is usually quite surprising when someone sticks a

fundamental building block of reality inside you. You will
just be driving along, or whatever, when suddenly BAM,
you’re Storms. Or Fire. Computers. Dogs. Backsies.1 Fleece.
Or Love.
When something like this is put inside you, you are
called Noble, or one of the Nobilis.
You will find that you are the fundamental expression
and guardian of the word or name—the proper term is
Estate—that’s stuck inside you. You won’t be able to hide
from the fact that you’re a pure and unfettered divinity now.
Get in the Know! on ... That thing that you sometimes see hiding in the world
Balloon-People World when you stop blinding yourself to it, that ultimate reality
This is a secret world (a “Chancel”) and glory of things pressing in through the gates that we
where instead of humans the people construct against the world—
are colorful balloons. They can twist It’s inside you, like truth and love and being are inside
themselves up into animal or human everybody else, and you’ll realize in just the same way
shapes but doing so reduces their life everybody else does not that you are now a god.2
expectancy. They can also cluster You’ve become, well, Storms: the archetype and arbiter
together in the sky to become big of storms. Or you are now the living Fire. The god of all
cities. Sometimes balloons fall out of Computers—of every last computing engine, on all the
the balloon-people world into our worlds there are—or the lord of every Dog. You’ve become
world and then they cannot talk or the inspiring muse to Fleece, the word that speaks to sheep
change their shape. If you find seven of to make it grow. You’ve been made . . . well, it could be
them you can tie them into a bunch anything!
and fly with them into the balloon- Any of the primal forms. Joy. Emotion. Tea. Baskets.
people world, where you will be a hero. Draconic forms. Martial arts. Even Backsies!
But if you want to return home And you have become primal, you have been made
afterwards they will be very insulted fundamental and preeminent, with the placement in you of
and may even drop you from great this primordial thing. You are a Noble. You are a Power. You
heights. If you want to visit and come are sovereign-in-yourself in ways that nations only dream
back, you should be sure to have a to be.
parachute!
1 Backsies is when you take back something you already did or
said. Why is this a fundamental building block of reality? I
think we are forced to blame Aristotle.
If you suddenly find that you are the Power of Backsies, you
must be very careful. The Imperator who put the Estate of
Backsies in your soul will usually try to take it back again later.
Then you will be in trouble because it will kill you to have it
taken out again but it will betray your deepest inner truth to
tell them No Backsies. The only proper answer to this koan is
to stall.
2 For comparison, think about how right now you are not
realizing that you are a god. That’s because nobody’s stuck an
Estate in you.

INTRODUCTION
10

The Nobilis can shatter mountains. They can break or They dwell apart from us, the Nobilis do, in their great
rebuild souls. They don’t even have to work very hard to do Chancels—the secret temple-worlds of their patron spirits,
it. They just have to kind of look at you with their Noble’s the occulted Loci of the Imperators that empowered them.
eyes and BAM, you’re all broken or rebuilt. Sometimes You can find the Chancels if you know how; if you do the
you’ll just go mad. right actions, walking the right paths, at the right time. You
One look! That’s all it takes! can walk right from this world into their worlds of magic,
And there are greater things they serve. wonder, and fantasy. Later we’ll even tell you how. And you
When you become a Noble—I mean, you if you get one might find in their Chancel-world a place of Arthurian
of these things stuck in you, most likely while the whole romance, of knights and mystics and chivalry; London in
world around you is being warped and changed and taken the 1800s, augmented by dirigibles; a land of kung-fu
away from Earth into the belly of something else—you are wonders; a technological future world far beyond our own.
drafted into the service of the Imperators. They are the Or, of course, some strange, inexplicable and disconcerting
primal forms, the things that precede reality, the Ymerae, world, where balloon-people float in great clusters and
the Mashai, the Imperatores Occultes. They are angels, and make war upon the birds; where robots are ubiquitous and
devils, and they are gods; they are forces of light and dark; computers are not possible; where the wind that breaks like
they are wild things and tame things and serpents larger ocean waves upon the cliffs is full of souls; where humans
than the world. dwell in hidden homes beneath the forest glens, and
They are beasts and they are monsters but they are butterflies are unto them the messengers of God.3
monsters that we cannot judge. They are as the sunrise is, The Nobilis live in their strange Chancels and they
or the wind in summer: the inexpressible source and the venture outwards to our world. Here they will be our heroes
foundation of our world. They are not people, not like you and our villains, god-haunted folk, driven by their humanity
and I are people, not like the Nobilis are people. They are and their divinity to remake the world. Here is where you
people-like, in that you can talk to them; you can love are likely to find them—that old man sitting at the end of
them; you can hate them; you can even (should you happen the bar, that smiling businessman on the street, that woman
to have natural advantages the like of which I can scarcely
in her chariot driving in all incongruity the horses of the
imagine) fight them. They have souls, as the theurgists
sun down the busy road outside your home, and squeezing
would say. But they are not people. They are not even
with her hand the bulb of a horn in anger at the traffic on
proper gods. They are reality. They are truth. They are the
the way.
world before our world, mysteries, arcane and inexplicable
If you’re still half-asleep and not looking out the window,
breaths of the divine. They are the moving in strange ways,
you might not even realize that it’s her. You might only put
with which miracles are done. They are ineffability and the
it together later when you realize, “Hey, that horn sounded
surpassing of the self. They are the problematic nature of
like sun and fire, like heat and wine; it was a honking and a
the world, to us. They are, most of all, the true forms, the
fury like the passion of a god!”
founding principles, the things of which the things we see
It is in our world that sometimes they meet the bleak and
are shadows.
pretty gods of emptiness, the various Excrucians, who
If you meet one there is really no recourse but adoration,
admiration, the openness and looking-outwards that come in from outside the world to take away all the names
characterizes the savant occupied by the presence of the and all the things. They ride in on great black horses and
world. They are the burden given to us, in living, to learn to they wield unbearable weapons and there are stars falling in
live with; we are not Nobilis, to define and reexamine the the darkness of their eyes. They are here to excruciate us.
War, the Blood, the Hope, the Love, the Sex, the Cold, the They are here to exsanguinate the world, to take from it the
Dreams, the Cats, the Birds, the Bells, and the Days that Nobilis and Imperators and leave us barren of our primal
have been given us. With the Imperatores Occultes, we forms.They think they can do as they like in our worlds and
must simply learn to live. in our lives, but sometimes the Nobles come to stop them.
But ah! The Nobilis! Then, they fight!

Get the Dope! on ...

3 The local God, anyway. It would be very surprising if the
Clarissa Kilthdigai
Christian God were to suddenly declare that only forest
This is a Power who likes to use her chariot with its glorious butterflies in some weird Chancel were His emissaries, and
red horses even when driving in the mortal world. When she even stranger were this notion to be ratified by the Pope; and
honks her horn it sounds like sun and fire. If you ask her, she everyone would just think he’d gone crazy, anyway, if he did,
will drag you up onto her chariot and ride with you for a day and hasten him off to the special room beneath the Vatican
and a night or until she reaches her destination, but if you where the great Papal Computer hums and flashes lights,
ask her too many questions she will brand a mark into your where the walls are rich with holy doctrines, and where the
forehead and throw you from the craft. She is related to Cardinals when they are called upon to do so are minded to
Oscar Toclanny and Maia Sullivan. repair such broken Popes.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 11

ANANDA
Four Imperators run the world. They are the Council of These are the Latter Days of the Law. The world is a
Four, and their names are Ananda, Ha-Qadosch Berakha, shadow of what it was. The joy we know is not the joy we
Lord Entropy, and Surolam. once knew. The sorrow we knew is not the sorrow we once
They haunt the Noble world just like the Nobilis haunt knew. The true passions have passed from the world. All
ours. that remains are their pale echoes; and we hold up those
echoes and, not knowing history, say, “These are all the
Ananda is a living principle of beauty. That isn’t what he
truths of the heart that there have ever been.”
embodies—he isn’t the Imperator who is Beauty, or defines
Beauty.That would probably be Firstborn, or, at least, one of —from a sign outside Mud Falls, Michigan
the oldest Angels. It’s just what he is. His beauty is an
apocalypse. It’s an out-of-bounds error in the world.
because they can probably find out where I live. But it is
Listen: he visited Mud Falls, Michigan one day and
more likely that he is beautiful to us because of the last and
everyone went mad from joy. Mothers stopped feeding
most important thing he is. He is the god and the living
their babies. People driving cars stopped steering. The
principle of the next Age of the world—the time beyond
whole town collapsed, became a monstrous disaster area,
these troubled times, the glorious Fourth Age that is yet to
and the people who survived spent the rest of their lives
be. That is why his most common titles are the Lord of
overwhelmed with happiness and joy and telling anyone
Expectations and the Emperor to Come.
who would listen about the fundamental rightness of the
Ananda is generally considered the weakest voice on the
world.
Council of Four. This is because he does not ever vote
“It’s just! It’s bright! It’s all worth it, in the end!”
against Lord Entropy—at worst, he abstains. He tells us
That’s what the survivors said.
that some terrible disaster will transpire if he and Lord
Birds fell from the sky. Then they sang until their hearts
Entropy are ever directly opposed. Some people speculate
burst. And they weren’t the only things that were singing.
that Lord Entropy is threatening him, but since nobody
The buildings were rocking back and forth on their
shows up in the middle of the night to kill those people,
foundations, caroling out in their creaky voices a deep and
they are probably wrong. It’s more likely that Lord Entropy
solemn joy. The grass turned to crystal, in Mud Falls,
is just not as afraid of whatever that disaster is as is Ananda.
Michigan, and it chimed and glistened as the wind blew
across it, and as far as anybody knows, it turned to crystal
out of love. Everything was delighted in his visit, but he LORD ENTROPY
broke the town and it isn’t back to normal yet.That’s why he
doesn’t visit us in the mortal world very often. There is an evil god who rules the mortal world from his
What is he? hidden Chancel.
He is the Imperator of Murder and the Infinite. He is He is Lord Entropy.
the Lord of the Chancel Cityback. These things could be He is so evil that his hands drip blood even when he’s
part of the reason that he’s beautiful—I am not going to just hanging out watching a basketball game. He is so evil
judge people who murder or sum infinite series in his name that he can just smile at you and not do anything at all to
you and a few years later you’ll turn into a degenerate third
world dictator like Saddam Hussein.4 Some people
estimate that as many as 2/3 of all corrupt dictators, CEOs,
Field Guide! to… and other important people are people who met Lord
Ananda Entropy without knowing it and carry his stain upon their
He is usually voted as the prettiest Imperator. Several soul.
pictures of him exist on the web, but they’re hard to find He is so evil he doesn’t have to try to be evil; but
due to aggressive intervention by governmental bodies. If sometimes, he does.
you can find one please be careful in viewing it; the pictures Sometimes he stops moping around being moe and he
are known to induce seizure, soft-tissue hemorrhage, and picks random people off the street, whisks them away to the
psychologically addictive levels of euphoria. You can safely Locust Court, and puts them on trial for real or facetious
view the images through a thick cloth blindfold or eye crimes. Sometimes he sends the ogres and the nimblejacks
pillow, and they will retain a substantial amount of their that serve him—great brutish thugs and diabolical imps,
“oomph.” Nobiliser Teia Arinthiel reports that with a pair respectively—out into the world to mess up things that are
of opaque lead goggles, stopped up ears, and a vial of good, tear down what is bright and virtuous, and in general
smelling salts affixed under her nose, she was able to do nasty things for no other reason than because they can.
approach to within three blocks of Ananda himself
4 Uh oh! This reference has become outdated! Modern readers
without ill effect.
can substitute, I dunno, Donald Trump?

INTRODUCTION
12

Technically he is just one of four—member of a Council

Get the Facts! on ...
of Four, appointed by the Imperators of the world to handle
Augusta Valentina
the affairs of mortals, things, and Powers. But he dominates
He raised my head and looked into my eyes. His fingers left
that Council and thus positions himself to make law for the carmine smears under my chin. “ You still have spirit,” he said,
world. Technically he is a hope for the world: he is and shook his head. “Do you not understand? I cannot end your
prophesied to save Creation from the Excrucians, in the torment until it has broken you.”
end, if he does not betray it. But he is not terribly interested, “I’m trying,” I told him.
from all appearances, in being our shining standard, or even, He almost smiled. “I am glad,” he said, “that we are
for that matter, in betraying us. working towards the same end. But I am afraid that you are
He likes being something everybody fears. making rather a poor contribution to it.”
Sometimes it seems like he tries to do a good job ruling —from the Thought-Record of Augusta Valentina
the world. It’s hard to tell, because he is so virulently
corrosive—when everything he touches turns rotten, he has Augusta Valentina is the Power responsible for writing A
to be at his subtlest when attempting to do things right. But Philosophy of Treason, a book detailing the case for serving
sometimes it seems like he tries to do a good job. And the Excrucians. If you find this book do not read it as it is
sometimes it seems like he’s terribly weary of it. And most likely a falsified copy that will burn your eyes out and
sometimes it seems like he’s the big bad wolf, serving no fill your vacant optical cavity with worms. A genuine copy
particular purpose save glorying in his wickedness and is almost as dangerous. Ms. Valentina herself is a fine
waste. Through all these possibilities one theme comes conversationalist and quite safe for mortals to socialize
clearly through. with as long as you do not stand too close to her or ask her
He likes when people fear him. to expound upon the text.
Of the things he dislikes, the most notable is love. It hurts
him, or he hates it, or he loathes, fears, or holds some in secret, and must live in fear that he will discover their
lingering bitterness towards it, or something. He doesn’t love. Many hate him for this, while others close their hearts
like that love exists. It's not about people loving or not against love and pretend the law is just.
loving him—he doesn't seem to want you to, and there's Lord Entropy is the Imperator of Desecration,
some evidence you physically can't,5 but that’s not the heart Destruction, and Scorn. He is actually one of two different
of it. Rather, he seems to hate that love exists in the world Imperators whose Estate translates into English as
at all. He’s even made a law— “Destruction;” he is Absolute Destruction, while the Angel
Za’afiel is Destruction as Part of the Cycle of Life.
The Windflower Law: Lord Entropy has many servants. He has three extremely
The Nobilis shall not love. competent Powers—Meon, who is the Power of
Desecration; Baalhermon, Power of Destruction; and
It doesn’t work very well as a law qua law.There are very few Joktan, Power of Scorn. He has an army of ogres,
Powers in the world who consult with the relevant statutes nimblejacks, and human slaves. In the mortal world he rules
before deciding whether or not to fall in love. If there is a the organization known as the Cammora, a secret society
Power of Being Overly Methodical or a Power of that has power over most mortal countries. They provide
Completely Not Getting What Love is About, they might many services to the Powers, including illegal services; Lord
check whether love is legal or not before falling for Entropy has decreed the Cammora “invisible to law,” so if a
somebody. However for the most part the law is not Power needs to break Lord Entropy’s Law they may hire
prescriptive but onerous: it serves not to prevent love but to the Cammora to do it for them.6 Lord Entropy has direct
criminalize it and make it surreptitious. Powers may only love influence over many powerful mortals—he often puts
5 He’s a deeply troubled, handsome, dangerous celebrity, after invisible “seeds” in the hearts of powerful mortals that can
all. If it were possible to love him, we’d know. But it’s more whisper Lord Entropy's wishes to them and sprout, killing
than that, actually. When Internet Nobiliser communities them, if they dispute that will. Finally, Lord Entropy has
started noticing the glaring absence of people actively access as a matter of courtesy to many of the resources of
crushing on Lord Entropy, people did experiments—trying the other members of the Council of Four, such as
to fall for him, trying to feel some heat. To summarize the Surolam’s Locust Court (which he uses for trials) and the
opinion of the community: he’s cute, but about as hot as rangers of Ananda’s Chancel, the Cityback.
kissing a giant ball of lint fresh from the dryer trap.
Interestingly, he doesn’t even consider this assessment 6 This is not meant for use with the Windflower Law, since
disrespectful or irritating—at least, people don’t seem to die hardly anybody hires the Cammora to fall in love on their
for voicing it—so it’s probable that he’s either directly behalf. Instead it is invoked with regards to the Chestnut
responsible for this phenomenon or glad that it exists. Law, the Crowfoot Law, and the Rule of War.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 13

Lord Entropy's code of Law for the Powers, the Code

Fidelitatis, reads— Field Guide! to ...
� The Windflower Law: thou shalt not love Lord Entropy
� The Chestnut Law: thou shall harm none who has You can recognize Lord Entropy by his bloody hands.
done no harm, nor wreak more vengeance than in
If that is not enough of a clue—e.g. if you’re in a surgery
the sevenfold degree
or arresting a murderer—you can also recognize him by
� The Rule of Man: treat no beast as your lord [that is,
the scarab symbol he often wears, or by the nimblejacks
never let a mortal get the best of you]
and ogres he might have with him. If you meet him you
� The Rule of War: serve your Imperator before the
War, and the War before yourself should give him several obeisances as if he were an
� The Crowfoot Law: protect no Power from the Emperor but then talk to him or ignore him as if he
justice of the Code were anybody else. If you meet his ogres or nimblejacks
when he is not around, there is no point in hiding,
His Code for mortals is simpler, inasmuch as he gives us fighting, or running away. Instead pretend to be a very
one at all: dull and uninteresting person and they may ignore you
or hurt you just a little bit.
On the other hand, if you would like to distract ogres
“Be as I Would Have You Be”
and nimblejacks from somebody else, running away is a
very good strategy. Like hunting dogs, competitive
He is called the Bloody Imperator or the Darkest Lord.
runners and police officers, Lord Entropy’s minions are
compelled by a biological instinct to chase down
SUROLAM anything that runs, and while nimblejacks can catch you
almost instantly they are likely to play with you instead.
Surolam is the dog-headed god of ordinary things. She is
part of the Great Boundary—the fiery cup that surrounds
the whole world; the wall between souls; the walls around She is the power that we have to forget the extraordinary
the mind that keep us sane. She is stability and order and and pretend that our ideas and lives make sense. Each
things making sense. She is specifically the Imperator of person has a pair of Surolam’s gates in their heart that,
Willpower, Law, and the Broken-Hearted. flanked by two of her dogs, lead to a place of retreat from
the raw madness that is the world. And it’s not just people,
The world is full of extraordinary things, and sometimes
either—everything in this world is secretly alive, and
that is painful.
everything that lives has access to her balm.
For instance, most people—when they see miracles—get
She is something we can turn to when we go outside and
hurt by them. They start to realize that their world doesn’t there is something ravening and blasphemous on our street.
make sense. That what they think of as important doesn’t She is our hope and our salvation when we go home and
make sense, and isn’t very important; that what they think find we have a nameless Thing instead of a kitchen, or have
of as necessary, or natural, or correct, doesn’t mean much our hearts brushed by the passage of an Excrucian’s wing.
either. They see that everything they believed was true was She is the mortal’s only answer against miracles.
just something in their head. And that hurts them. And
Surolam is the answer to that pain.
Straight Up Nobilis Secrets! ...
Dementia Animi
Field Guide! to… An ordinary person who sees miracles can catch the
Surolam psychological disease, “dementia animi.” This is the sickness
This is an Imperator who protects ordinary life from where you start talking to your toaster and other objects and
disruption. She allows people to remain ignorant of magic telling all your friends that you are just a shadow of the true
and get by in an ordinary way in a world torn by mystic things in the world. This is an accurate perspective but not a
forces at war. If you want to visit her you can find her functional one and will lead you to a bad end. To avoid this
temples listed in your local Yellow Pages; they are not disease, practice ironic detachment from reality; then, when
recorded alphabetically but instead placed between two reality suddenly changes, you can make snide comments
advertisements picturing dogs or two names with a dog- instead of going mad. Alternately, hold in mind that you may
like meaning. You can also look for the most ordinary always find the succor of Surolam, through any pair of dog-
things and people possible and ask them if they have recent flanked gates, and in this fashion recover from the burden of
information on the dog-headed god of ordinary things. your disease.

INTRODUCTION
14

If our need is great enough we can find her in person—

When God lost love to the Devil in a dicing match, he had to
Not just in spirit.
trade both the luminiferous ether and Creation science away to
We can find a pair of dog-flanked gates, or one of
get it back. Most savants agree that the trade was worthy; yet
Surolam’s temples, and go through and in, and pass into a it is indubitable that the world has made less sense ever since.
place of musty sanctuary and comfort.There we can recover,
—from THE CURRENT SCORE, by Walden Fargo,
and wait, and if we wait long enough, receive an audience
writing on the topic of the Ordinary
with her.
Then, when we leave, we will forget.
People forget. Spirits forget. Even animals forget. It’s
really only the insects that remember. They crawl in and out HA-QADOSCH BERAKHA
between our world and hers all the time. That’s why
sometimes you can get insects that just seem to appear ... Ha-Qadosch Berakha treats the world as his playground 7 ...
inside your house, and it’s why her Chancel is named the
Locust Court.
We can appeal to her there for more than solace. We can
ask her for aid, and she might even give it. She is kind, you
see, and loves us more the more we are broken-hearted. But
she is also a creature of Law and a creature of precedent, and
so she is very careful not to commit to more than she can
give to all of us, and each of us, forever. The decisions she
does make, the promises she does give, bind her for
centuries or even millennia—they are written down and
thrown into the great Swamp of Precedent in the distant
reaches of the Locust Court, where the testaments, effects
and language of her previous decisions sink slowly into a
great ink-and-paper bog and mix bit by bit with one
another in decay, and where strange trees and flowers grow.
In her realm there is a truce between insects, fungi,
diseases and the larger creatures. For this reason, passage
through it will often free you of disease or infestation, or,
conversely, cause you to act as a vector.

Oopsie-Daisy! on ...
The Locust Court
In the previous edition I erroneously proposed that the
Locust Court belonged to a Darklord named Medan and
described its fields as teeming with carnivorous, flesh-eating 7 Yeah, that’s all you get! ... well, you were meant to get an
locusts. I regret to confess that a suggestive title spurred me illustration of him, too, but that didn’t happen this time.
on to paroxysms of speculation and flights of sheerest For now, you can think of him as, maybe, like, Ha-
fantasy which were not caught in editing; apologies Qadosch Section Break-a? And then, just assume that the
tendered, and forgiveness earned, let us put this matter book is misassembled from there?
Like, just look at that suspicious blank space. What kind of
swiftly and entirely behind us.
layout designer would just leave that there?

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS opposite: “Wood-Witch Poison,” from a piece by Josias Murer II, by Jenna Moran
 15

B
eware! the poison of a wood-witch sting! Debilitating
within 72 hours; fatal, within a week; and unacknowledged
in its entirety by modern medicine, its only redeeming
feature is the crowds of cheerful woodland creatures it will attract
to you, to help you with both your chores and finding love (until
you die).*

* ProTip! This can also be a symptom of anxiety.

opposite: by artist (I cribbed from these) INTRODUCTION

 17
CHAPTER 2

Your
Imperator

Who is your Imperator?

Imagine the Imperators as crystal snakes: One day if you become a Power an Imperator will appear
blue crystal, green crystal, red crystal— out of nowhere and put one of its Estates in your soul. It is
every color in the world. Where do the like putting coffee in a cup or breathing into a balloon
snakes come from? They create themselves, animal’s flat and lifeless body. Divine breath will inflate you.
pulling themselves by force of will from It will transform you. It’s like waking up unexpectedly from
nothingness. The snakes writhe one about the long and weary burden of your life, only now you’ve got
another, a blind, squirming, undulating
a new and completely different problem.
mass. From above, there shines a light.
Your Imperator!
It passes through the crystal snakes and
This is called Commencement.
forms a pattern of shifting, mixed, twisted
colors on the void. That is Creation. Maxwell Murdoch was busy taking classes and
cultivating acne when the Serpent of Radar suddenly
—from KEYS OF SEXTILIUS,
sounded in his soul. It echoed off every part of him. It made
by Eachan Sohalet
his chest into a chamber. It made him one of the Powers of
the world. No more classes! No more acne! Suddenly the
only thing that was wrong with his life was that he’d been
adopted by a 250-mile-long snake made mostly out of sound
who insisted that he rule the northern quarter of a fairyland
and fight the Excrucian gods of emptiness on its behalf.
Julianne Ling thought she’d live out her whole life as a
sixty-four-year-old waitress, modulo incremental
adjustments to the age. Then the fires of the Damned Angel
Lariníen burst up from the linoleum around her and remade
her body and soul into the Power of the Weft. At this point
she stopped having to worry about boredom and aging but
started having to worry about having a close professional
and personal relationship with an angel thrown out of
Heaven for being an evil rebel. It was a tradeoff.
It’d basically be like that for you.
You’d be a Power because an Imperator chose you and
filled you up with its itness.

YOUR IMPERATOR
18

Imperators do this because they need Powers to protect

Get the Deets! on ...
them.
The Serpent of Radar
That’s not a universal truth! They’re not helpless. They’re
Someday dharma may call upon you to sing the Serpent of
even technically invincible. It’s just that the best way they
Radar and bring it back from the principalities of death.
can fight the Excrucians is to leave their body and journey
This snake is approximately 250 miles long and composed
in mysterious spirit realms. While they are doing this they
principally of sound; it is the Imperator of Self-Creation,
don’t want to worry all the time about whether their body is
Hypothetical Entities, Difficulty, Excitement, and Radar.To
under attack from armed enemies and Excrucian agents or
sing its name is to spit it from your mouth and out into the
not. So they make Chancels to keep their body safe, and
world; three times it has returned from death in just this
Nobles to protect them. Once they’ve done this they can
fashion, and twice from far but living realms. Note that in
also offload most of their work on Earth to the Nobilis. So
calling it back you are giving up your own life as the price;
while the Serpent of Radar roams the subtle worlds,
spitting out a 250-mile-long snake, even if it is mostly sound,
Maxwell Murdoch keeps its Chancel and its body safe. And
is almost inevitably fatal.
while Lariníen skips off to Hell for melty ice cream socials
or torturing damned souls or whatever, Julianne Ling
guards her interests here on Earth. Of these all it is the Aaron’s Serpents you would find the
If an Imperator claims you, your life will be just that way! mildest masters. They are terrifying in their physical extent
Before the Excrucian War, Imperators didn’t make many and prowess, but generally humane of mind and
Powers. When they did it was a kind of sacred marriage or philosophical of character.
adoption. It was a two-way process. It’s been adapted to If you were claimed by an Angel or a Magister of the
modern needs a little bit but it’s still basically two-way and Light, you would receive a more difficult destiny. Bright
it’s still basically a relationship. That’s why Powers keep their creatures such as they impose great rigors on their Powers,
free will and their choice of morality even when their and demand a great exactitude. They would task you to heal
Imperators disagree. It’s why Heth can get away with great wounds, make redress to great wrongs, defeat great
monsters, perform great works, and serve in the redemption
serving the Code of Hell while belonging to the Angel
of lost things. The world’s need for beauty and salvation will
Euphoriel. It’s why the Darklord Erevan Insanguine
not falter: your labors would be endless, but at least there
tolerates his Powers, who are uniformly bright. You don’t
would be glory, honor, and purpose in it all.
necessarily get any say in whether or not an Imperator
If a Devil or a Magister of the Dark claimed you, your lot
claims you, and the balance of power between you can be
would not be so bright.They would be casual in hurting you,
lopsided to the point of slavery, but once they’ve claimed
in pushing you, in testing your morality and survivability
you they become yours as much as you are theirs. Your
almost to destruction. They would show you how saving
hearts fall into tune.
your beloved from certain death would bring the ending of
So what kind of Imperator would choose you?
the world.They would call it a salutary lesson, or an amusing
There are—
jest, to temporarily replace your bones with molten lead.
� glorious Angels in this world, from the shining host
They are the most terrible expressions of the causes that
of Heaven;
� terrible Devils (the Fallen Angels) who worship at they serve—the Devils more hideous and cruel than the
the altar that is Hell; Code the follow, and the Dark more vile and treacherous.
� stern Magisters of the Light, seeking humanity’s They are servants of honorable and good causes that have
survival; much to recommend them but they are irredeemable
� malevolent Magisters of the Dark, celebrants of our cosmic horrors in themselves.
filth and suicides; Imagine it! To be one of a Devil’s Powers, lifted up and
� alien, incomprehensible divinities: the “True Gods” made into a god, given reign over some great cosmic
of Earth; principle—from Raphi, who is Judgment; or Cedron, who
� chaotic Magisters of the Wild, more alien yet, from is Growth; or Domiel, who is the Experience of Burning—
outside the universe entirely; and and at the same time and the same moment, made a pawn
� the miles-long Aaron’s Serpents, born from the to something that loves corruption and despair? To be
substance of the World Ash. bound by a doomed and tainted intimacy to them, to know
that they are yours and you theirs and that the connection
is empowering, mutual, and forever while they are so
The sea serpent Rahaytz was, alone among its kind, distressed monstrous and so cruel? Or to serve Araunah of the Dark
at its lack of arms and hands. It would impress hapless human and dwell in the manner of a joyous god in the fairyland he
sailors into its service, using them to fetch, manipulate, and rules; while feeling, through that Lord, the will of every
carry for the monstrous beast as long as they remained alive. chemical fume that chokes, every caustic splash that scars,
—from A MEDIEVAL BESTIARY, by Paul McArthur every chemical burn that strips the flesh from some poor
human’s bones?

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 19

ex nihilo and without regard to our moral and physical laws.

The angel sheltered Aholibamah with his wings, and not all
For example, Kaithrya of the Wild opposes stasis, brings
the fierceness of the deluge could pierce that feathered shield.
forth green and growing things and returns what is given to
—translated from EXODUS, by Gagni Snaebjorn of the Ljos-Alfar her threefold. Cut off one of her arms, she will cut off three
of yours; if you have only two, she is not deterred and will
Perhaps you could find peace with it. Some do. Perhaps in good time find a way. Epikleros Chimeric is a Wild
you could work brightness from it. Some do, again. There is Magister who may not be captured, touched, caught, or
no redeeming the Devils or the Dark, but there is good in accurately described; its presence in our world gives rise to
them to find. Or perhaps you would simply serve the world paradoxes. Where Achaz walks, the dead arise; feasibility is
as best you could and pray the War would kill you soon. no concern.
Or would it be an alien thing that claims you? Imagine it, then!
The True Gods are shapeless, formless creatures.They are Such a thing burns into your life. An Angel or a Devil; a
earthly gods but they are not human gods; rather, they are Magister of Light or Dark; a creature of the Wild, or the
kin to the amoebas, the fungi, the insects, and the plants. Primeval, or a Serpent from the Tree! They strike you like a
They are alien to us as the flora of our stomach are alien, as meteor: like a catastrophe and a transfiguration, falling like
the things that grow in our refrigerators are alien, as the thunder from the seemingly clear sky, entering your life
residents of volcanic tunnels, dark swamps, and the ocean from outside the ordinary boundaries of your world. They
deeps are strange. They are fundamentally compatible with take the city around you, or some area more nebulously
the human animal, but not with the human person; in defined, and fold it up into a Chancel. They estrange it and
practice, a tension exists. you from the country you’ve lived in, they infuse the area
You would find service to a True God a unique and with their magic, they make the place a magic temple
uncategorized experience. What strange drives would it reachable only by strange paths. Then they choose you—
make you privy to? To which of its archaic, primordial you, of all mortals—to infuse with an Estate.
moods would you be subject? What would its nature be, You are suddenly a Power. You are suddenly bound to
what would be the manner of its complexities? These things them and to the world. You are suddenly the Prince or
we cannot say. In dreaming up a fictional True God, as in Princess of the hidden Chancel. You are suddenly a
Imperator Creation on pg. 139, you’ll have endless scope Sovereign Power in the world.
for creativity; facing one in reality, endless opportunities for And you are not alone, for lo! your Familia Caelestis
surprise! have also been chosen; your “family of Powers,”that is, those
And then there are the Magisters of the Wild. They are bound to the same Chancel and Imperator you serve.
not just alien to us but to the entirety of the world. They Were you alone, or deeply rooted in the world?
have no roots in reality, no context, no relationship to any Is this a blessing, or a monstrous curse?
other thing.They present themselves not as a natural part of Bane or boon, there is no help for it. From the moment
Creation, but as strangers who stumbled into it and found you are chosen, your Imperator has set its mark on you. To
themselves integrated into its flesh. Their alienness is so become a Power is to gain a new family, new
profound as to seem simple in practice—their nature is responsibilities, and a new fate.
described by a handful of simple rules, which appear to arise

Hidden Secrets! of ...

Kaithrya of the Wild
Kaithrya is a six-armed Imperator crowned with a coronet
of thorns and flames. Her exhalation is a blue mist that gives
rise to Spring. She is nominally invisible but the appearance
of Spring, particularly an unseasonable Spring, indicates and
reveals her presence. At such times it is wise to make such
gifts to her as you can afford, and that you can afford to have
returned threefold. For instance, do not offer her your life, as
having three lives is damnably complex, but consider
offering her money, a small meal, a month of free Internet
service, or a fixed time period of acting kindly in her name.
Do not under any circumstances offer her your love or one
third of your dedicated service. The threefold love of a deity
is potentially fatal, and entrapping any creature of the Wild
into your service invites your extirpation from the world.

YOUR IMPERATOR
 21
CHAPTER 3

An
Atlas
of
Creation
Get the Scoop! on…
Sucky Things
These are the random bad things that
can happen to you in the ordinary THE ORDINARY WORLD
world. On the plus side bad things
happening to you does not mean you Let us be blunt: the world as we know it is a lie.
are a bad person. On the minus side It is a shelter. It is a hiding place from the law of karma.
bad things will happen to you even if It is a crèche in the big bad universe where nothing is
you are a good person. In the end you morally fraught in and of itself. Where things only matter
are just another victim of the because of humans observing purpose and judgment into
motivationless malice of directed them, where things just happen, rather than happening
acyclic causal graphs. because. Where the closest thing to a higher purpose is our
inability to really call one purpose higher than another. It is
a world of the objective, and it is a lie.
PROPERTIES OF THE On a fundamental level the world of our ordinary reality
ORDINARY WORLD is the world where nothing “chooses”: where there are no
gods in the clouds to make them rain, no gods in the cars to
� Its locations are relative; make them run, no telos for growing, evolving things to grow
� Its particulars are measurable; towards and not even really a god inside the brain to make
� Its particulars are explainable; the human being be. There are only laws of motion, laws of
� Its particulars exert causal force; chemistry, and laws of chaos—the decipherable rules by
� Its events have causes;
which things, encountering other things, react.
� These causes are impersonal;
This isn’t neutral.
� These causes are amoral.
To make our soulless world we balled the flat Earth up
and made it round. We made flat and lifeless the spirits of
nature. We stripped away the world tree from our skies and
made an endless dark of space instead. We took ourselves,
and made ourselves the lightning in the meat, the clicking
and clacking and sparking of the synapses inside our brain.
We didn’t really want to kill our souls.

AN ATLAS OF CREATION
22

Hidden Secrets! of… PROSAIC REALITY

Za’afiel
The ordinary world maintains itself. If something
This is the Angel of Destruction. He killed all of the
miraculous happens that changes everything, it updates the
dinosaurs and helped to create the scientific model of the entire model—the entire history and dynamics of the
world. If you ever meet Za’afiel do not lecture him about the world—to fit.
dinosaurs. First, he feels bad enough already, and second, he In Aristotle’s day this was an easy hack.
is a hot-tempered immortal angel embodying the very These days the model that is the ordinary world is deep,
complex, and intricate. The pressure of human inquiry
principle of destruction. forces it constantly to expand, to reshape, to develop, to
mature. Things that were not connected, connect. Things
that needed no explanation, become explained. The world
We didn’t even really want to murder the gods in the sky, has become so thoroughly mapped and linked together that
or slaughter the telos, or turn everything that was wild and a single miracle—say, putting a small planet in the sky, or
knocking one away—requires vast amounts of retroactive
beautiful and strange into computable or even
continuity to explain.
incomputable arcs. Even changing one person’s mind can, in the end, force a
But to unleash ourselves from karma, it’s what we had to recreation of all history, and the positions of the stars.
do. It’s a strain on the engine of the world. That’s why
It was the only way to get away from the ways in which sometimes you’ll see miracles, even though you’re not
supposed to be able to. That’s why you might encounter
the world was broken. It was the only way to say that the something impossible and learn the true nature of things
world we live in isn’t the world we participated in making. and have it force you from that cradle which is the ordinary
I think we are afraid the world will blame us. world. Maintaining the perfection of the ordinary is too
There is a story that the Powers tell, that the scientific hard, and afflicting you with dementia animi—the madness of
world began when the angel Za’afiel smote the Earth. It seeing spirits and miracles—is easy.
was before humans were around, or at least, they were in It’s not sustainable. Prosaic reality, I mean. Lately the
Nobilis have been finding more and more often that their
Eden, but the dinosaurs were there, and one of them
miracles don’t get explained away at all—that covering up
defecated on or near an angel. the consequences and keeping the ordinary world intact is
And so Za’afiel smashed the Earth. their job, not the world’s.
And the Earth couldn’t just say, “That wasn’t my fault.” This is the curse that science brings. This is why it is a
Because whenever you say that something isn’t your fault, burden on the world. This is why animals who try to do
what you’re really saying is, that could be my fault. Maybe. science get eaten by large predators or struck down by
There’s something there. Maybe I’m just an ugly and broken Heaven’s flames; why shopping carts may not study
enough world, what with dinosaur digestive issues and all, physics; why a dog or rock that charts the stars enacts a
forbidden practice. For better or worse, though, humanity
that I deserve K-T extinction events.
is a special case; see the story of Adam and Eve, on pg. 40!
So instead it did things one better, and said: of course I
don’t deserve that, because there’s no such thing as deserving.
That’s the world we’re living in.
And over the years, we’ve just refined it. The longer we’ve
studied the mechanisms of the world, the more complex, It’s our broken little crib, our shelter, our hiding place.
far-reaching and beautiful they’ve become. We've been decorating it, lately, sprucing it, making it
But the problem is it isn’t real. awesome and complex and beautiful. But it's still just our
The world isn’t really like that. No relativity. No crib.
chemistry. It’s not even really round. It's not the fundamental law.
The planet orbiting the sun, somewhere in the Milky
Way—that’s a dream, a lie, an illusion, a process built out by
science even as we explore it, which the Imperators of the
world have chosen to maintain. It’s a lie the True Gods of Get the Deets! on…
Earth use to shelter them from the eyes of Heaven. It’s a lie Sennacherib
the Imperators of the Light and Dark8 have chosen to back This is the Imperator of Perception, Vapor, and Falling Stars.
for reasons of their own. The ordinary world is made of Sennacherib’s flesh—you can
And Surolam to protect us, for we shatter when we see think of Sennacherib as the book that holds the story of the
that it is false. world, the computer that holds its simulation, or the veil
And Lord Entropy, I think, because it amuses him.
that drifts between the vision and the thing. If you transfer
And Ha-Qadosch Berakha and Ananda, for reasons of
their own. into the Physics Department of Georgetown University you
will find yourself in Sennacherib’s Chancel, most likely to
8 The Imperators, that is, of human prowess. your sorrow.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 23

VISIONS OF THE CITYBACK

URBANA AND INFRASTRUCTURA
Sometimes you’ll pull aside a curtain, or look down an alley, Most of the Cityback is ordinary city, or close thereto. Like
or lift up the lid of a dumpster, and instead of seeing in the Mythic World, everything is alive, and everything has
ordinary things you’ll see the Cityback. a spirit, and if you look carefully you can find it—but only
It’s under, it’s in back of and it’s behind the cities of the some of the spirits in the Cityback are “urbana,” wild spirits.
world. The rest are simply more primeval, less focused on
It’s the thing that makes us urban. humanity, less integrated into a coherent urban
The Cityback is huge. It’s hungry. It takes one death a environment than their cousins in the Mythic World.
day just to exist—speaking candidly, it takes one murder a Infrastructure is most likely to be safe. Major streets and
day, one soul ripped unwholesomely from life—to feed the highways, government buildings, libraries, fire departments,
aqueducts, and public schools and hospitals are the passive
miracle of its being there at all.
underpinning of the ecosystem. They receive their life
It’s why we can have cities.
energy directly from Ananda and thus have no real need to
It’s why we can have stores, and malls, and art, and
crunch human bones or savagely murder urbana for their
hamburgers, and science. It’s the madness behind the sanity.
life. Street lights, library books, fire trucks and ambulances,
It’s the machine that dreams of modern life. It’s Ananda’s and other forms closely associated with such infrastructure
contribution to the infrastructure behind our ordinary are generally safe unless provoked: most fire engines will be
world. tame spirits that wandered in from the broader world, and
If city life has made you soft, don’t go. even the wild ones will be unlikely to set you on fire, for
Close the curtain. Close the lid. Shudder, and turn, and instance, or spear you with their great stinger-ladders,
walk away. Don’t walk through that gate to the drumming unless you threaten them or the fire station that they serve.
thunder of the wild urban world. The things that live there The rest of the Chancel is crawling with the city’s life.
look like the things of your ordinary life. But they are wild. Examples include the:
They are wild. And they will not be tamed.
AGRICORDS
Agricords are wild zeppelins; they trawl the streets with
filament-ropes hoping to catch up their prey. In the broader
Earth, zeppelins and agrichorda urbana are practically
extinct; in the Cityback, they proved remarkably well-
adapted to the environment, and only continuing predation
by Aeroplanes, Arpakti, and Psalidars keep them from a
population explosion that would fill the urban skies.
The standard technique for surviving an agricord attack
is fire, or to swing under the sheltering balcony of some fat
tenement beast and scrape off the agricord filament against
PROPERTIES OF THE CITYBACK its rail. However, if you are dragged up to an agricord
unarmed, you may attempt to tickle its underbelly with
� If it hasn’t died, then it’s alive; broad strokes of your hand to lull the creature to sleep
� If it’s alive, it must consume energy to survive and before it drags you into its digestive chambers. Be prepared
grow;
to grab hold of the filament as it goes lax, lest you exchange
� If it’s alive, its life cycle features infant, child, and
one problem for another.
adult stages;
� If it’s alive, it has the potential for reproductive sex;
KRYPTONS
� If it’s alive, it can adapt to its environment;
Kryptons are slow, vicious predators. They cling to the sides
� If it’s alive, taming it kills it;
of ordinary streets with their maws open wide. Deceptive
� If it’s dead, it rots and fades away.
luminance inside their epiglottal tract appears to be street
Take fire stations as an example. They are alive until they’re lamps, but the patterns of the light and the reflective
killed. That means there are baby fire stations. It means there properties of their upper mouth confuse the eye. If you are
is fire station sex. Fire stations have to eat something to not looking carefully it will appear that the top of the
survive—in this case Ananda-bestowed energy, but it could krypton is actually the sky and you will walk directly to their
have been “fire” or “fire trucks” in a slightly different world. stomach. If you are tired, drunk, or inexperienced, you
Fire stations in Cityback are aware enough to adapt to their should never walk into a Cityback alley without first tossing
environment. When they are tamed or killed they rot and fade a matchmouse or lightermouse in, in case a krypton wishes
away, returning their biological resources to the to deceive you.
environment.

AN ATLAS OF CREATION
24

OMBUDSMEN accessible ramp and come at you from behind. That said, in
The ombudsmen of Ananda have their headquarters in the a modern xedlipod-accessible world, it’s better to seek an
Cityback. escape route sooner than later once a stairway has gotten
They are the heroes that keep our urban world alive.They you some distance.
slip between the Cityback, the ordinary world, and the
Border Mythic (below). They use the powers they’ve TETRIMMENOS
learned from life amidst urbana to keep the human world The tetrimmenos are human-faced computer-creatures that
intact. Their job, given them by Ananda, is to ensure the prowl the Cityback on four to sixteen spindly legs. Their
healthy growth and development of human society and modes of being vary. Vistal Tetrimmenos are apex
technology—to keep the arrow of progress pointing predators, ripping the control systems from captive
forward. Thus his scientific ombudsmen expose falsified electronica and reassembling the rest into mindless scrap-
research, cut through bureaucratic limitations, and help servitors, spinning great webs in dark corners of the city to
inspire great works. His “clerks of the factories” hunt down catch electronic and human prey, and devouring even
the creatures that prey on factory workers and ensure that brontagora or tenement beasts when forced. Poccal
the industrial base of society remains functioning. The Tetrimmenos are niche vermin, scuttling along the streets
rangers of convenience, deeply in tune with the urbana of and living off ambient electronic fields. Tigris
Cityback, protect the stores and the minimalls and keep the Tetrimmenos, forty feet in height, stride with mysterious
flow of commerce moving. Ananda’s princes of crime and grandeur through the ways of Cityback, unstoppable by
punishment, ombudsmen of vice and prosecution, oversee anything short of an enraged skyscraper or Vistal Tetrimon
the delicate ecosystems of the police and criminals alike. and with a means of subsistence that is principally
These groups, in sum, are the secret societies of the mysterious. All of the tetrimmenos function to assist in the
Cityback that stand between society and the chaos that eats computation of the ordinary world, essentially supporting
at its foundation. They are heroes; and the greatest of them with the lightning of their thoughts the miraculous effort
eventually earn an audience with Ananda himself, that makes it possible for mundane reality to exist in an
witnessing his beauty and dying to it in a joyous, apotheotic underlying world dominated by spirits, miracles, and
madness. freakish eccentricities. They are, like Cityback itself, a
treasure of Ananda, Lord of Expectations, Imperator of the
BRONTAGORA Fourth Age that is to come.
The lumbering brontagora, or “thunder-markets,” consider
humans a symbiotic species; they will smash open supply THE LOCUST COURT
trucks and feast on the goods inside, but cannot digest them
until they have sat on the gastric shelves long enough to From the Long Hall of the Locust Court arises a sensation
spoil. The more often humans raid those shelves for fresh of being held safely in the arms of a higher power.
goods, the more efficient the brontagora’s digestion Everywhere along the pews are humans and animals that
becomes. Bristles on the inside of the brontagora’s doors have drifted off to sleep, forgetting their petitions and their
scrape accessible paper and coin from human symbiotes purposes to fade into dreamless sweet-scented rest. Some
when the human departs, cleansing and freshening the sleep for months or even years, ignoring the insects that
humans and protecting them from the spiritual dangers of crawl along their bodies but do not bite.
wealth. Humans compete for this symbiosis with the One may walk indefinitely through the Long Hall,
xedlipods, nasty packs of carnivorous cart-creatures, who looking for an exit, and not find it; it is in sudden revelation,
prefer to pick the bones of the ruined supply trucks but will a moment of anxiety, or waking that one finds the doors.
raid a brontagora shelf if sufficiently hungry or turn on a A sense of sacred timelessness—where every action and
passing human who seems weak. If you are under attack by word has been destined or at least known since time's
xedlipods your best option is stairs; these wheeled creatures beginning, and will linger to time's end—pervades the
are unable to traverse them, and are more likely to circle the Swamp of Precedent. What you witness here you will never
base of the stairs and whine metallically than hunt out an forget; it becomes part of you. It is a good place for honest
declarations of love, or for speaking bluntly to a partner in
negotiation. To lie in this swamp is a terrible crime against
Ombudsman Bonds and Afflictions your soul, and risks transforming you into a creature for
Bond (2): I understand the world around you. whom that lie is truth.
Bond (1): I want to help you.
Bond (1): I’ll survive anything you throw at me.
Affliction (1): Urban spirits like me.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS opposite: “The Swamp of Precedent,” by Christian Holm

 25

opposite: by artist (I cribbed from these) AN ATLAS OF CREATION

26
TALES OF THE EVIL WORLD I only know that it’s how it comes to pass. It’s the way it
happens.
There is a seed of evil inside the human eye. It twists and
We think we might see some ogres. Then we see some
writhes and sometimes we see evil instead of what is there.
ogres. We think that building gargoyle’s actually a
We’re looking at a street.
nimblejack. We look closer. We don’t want to look, but we
Then bam! Evil twists in our eye, and we’re looking at
have to know. We’re scared. And maybe it seems like yes, it
Samael St. Augustine, the Evil Street.
really could be, it really could be a nimblejack. And we look
We're looking at those guys down the way.
a little closer—
Bam! They’re not guys. They’re ogres.
And it’s moving like the wind, its horrid wrinkly face and
And lightning flashes, and suddenly we realize that we’re
claws and the long, long reaching of its limbs, and we
standing in the Evil World, and maybe we’ve always been.
scream, and fall backwards, but it’s not looking for us, not
It’s not really in our eyes. That’s too literal. If evil lived in today, it has other business in the Earth, this creature of the
the eyes then you could cut it out and throw it on the Evil World.
ground and stomp on it like Chihiro did in Spirited Away. That didn’t happen to me. I tell myself that didn’t happen
It’s in our eyes, but it’s not just in our eyes. to me, that never happened to me, and that it won’t come
It’s in our whole capacity to perceive. back. Ianthe says I don’t run fast enough to be interesting
Maybe it's a natural part of how we know the world. hunting anyway.
Maybe it's not, maybe it's a curse or something inflicted on There’s something, that’s our first sign.
us, because Imperators could do that. Heck, even Powers There’s something. Then we become aware of it. Then we
could do that, Meon or Joktan or whatever could have made begin to worry: is this Meon smiling at us? Is this Joktan
it so. But whatever the reason, it's part of our existence. laughing at us? Is this Baalhermon coming like the fire and
Sometimes we see what we see and know what we know. the sword to smash our world?
Sometimes we see or know the evil world instead. Lightning flashes. Forms distort. We see the evil world;
Sometimes we touch things. Or people. Sometimes we and it is there.
touch the evil world instead.There’s something in our heads, Darkness falls on our room. Our closet seems to fill with
some twitching antenna that can tell when evil’s near, and horrid things. And they break through.
that awareness wriggles into view. It’s like a flopping fish or The evil world hunts us. It is the thing that hunts us. It
a dying worm. It's like it's distressed. Like evil is distressed is the thing that knows us through our fear. It is the thing
that it has to live in the same world as people as bad as us. that knows us through our hatred of it; that knows us by the
Sometimes your soul will hollow out and there will be a fact that we see evil in the world when previously it was not
great static of the mind and that’s the tendril of Sa’a there.
Lingurth, the beast of the evil world. In fairness, we are right to be afraid.
Sometimes there’s a gap in the things you think. Ogres eat people. They’re the nicer ones, too; the
Sometimes you look around and the Island of Lord nimblejacks will do a lot worse to you than eat. Even Lord
Entropy has pushed its way into the world. Entropy’s human servants are always doing evil. We can’t
It appears when we see it. I don’t think it's causal, exactly. get away from them entirely, not unless everybody in the
I probably wouldn’t tell you about it if I thought it was. If I world stops seeing evil, so we might as well anticipate it
thought it needed you to see it in order to appear, if I ourselves.
thought that I was dooming you to evil when I described Lord Entropy doesn’t care about humanity. Sometimes
these things and filled your head with these thoughts then he hurts people, sometimes he doesn’t. That’s one kind of
I probably wouldn't describe them. fear. If you’re a mortal person, then maybe one day he’ll
But I don’t think it's causal, exactly. hunt you, not because you’ve done anything wrong, but
because being mortal means that you’re not worth giving
any say in whether he hurts you or not.
If you’re a Power, it’s even worse.
Get in the Know! on…
If you’re a Power, then there is no practical way that you
Samael St. Augustine
have never done him wrong. There is no way you’ve never
This is a street and a row of shops that longs to see you dead.
loved. There is no way you’ve never accidentally hurt an
It’s full of people with fanged mouths, expressionless slit
innocent.There is no way you've been perfect in your service
eyes, and fleshy hand-shaped gloves on the outside of their
to the War. I guess it’s technically possible, but seriously—
real hands. You can tell you’re on Samael St. Augustine
never? Not at all?
because that’s what the street signs will tell you. If you ever If you’re a Power, one day he might decide to hunt you
find yourself there, walk but do not run away. and it will officially be your fault.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 27

The Evil World is an island. It is an island riding on a beast.

“Do you love me?” I asked, when our time was done.
It is surrounded by storms.
Diamanta leaned her head back to look at me. “Is that why
In the center of that world is the palace of black glass. you think I come to you?”
On his throne in the palace is the evil god Lord Entropy, “Why do you, then?”
and his fingers always drip with blood. She looked down. “I committed a sin I cannot bear,” she said.
He is attended by ogres and by nimblejacks. “This is my expiation.”
To his left, in the eastern palace, there is Joktan. He —from the Thought-Record of Desecration’s-Regal Meon
stands over the palace like a giant, his shadow massive on
the clouds. Joktan, whose laughter fills the air. He is
laughing at you right now. He is laughing at you because he Like he’s holding back all the worst things that could
hates you and because he knows that you will suffer. He is ever happen, all the time.
laughing because it is marvelously funny how terrible He could be that thing which makes things discordant
things will happen to you, and how terrible you are. with themselves and the entire world, the thing that rips
Baalhermon holds the palace of the west and stands at and ruins, the thing that is the worst face of every monster
Lord Entropy's right. He is the power in the incarnadine in the world. He could be that. He maybe even might be
clouds that rumble across the sky in the evil world. He is the that. But for right now, he holds it back.
terror and the destruction and the lightning. He holds it back, so maybe he's fighting it. Maybe on
And then there is Meon. some level he's trying to do good. But I don't think that's
Meon cannot possibly be as bad as people say, because if why.
he was, then there would be nothing left for virtue in this Meon is the god of defilement; he is the Power of
world. There wouldn't be any point in anything, in even Desecration.
trying, if Meon were as bad as people say. And it seems to me that he is leashing himself because it
And I've never noted him explicitly as doing harm. I've is more pleasant to him that people desecrate themselves,
never seen it, never heard of it, never obtained an and one another, and their own holy things. It seems to me
that he is choosing not to be so very great an evil as he
authoritative documentary reference to any cruel and
ought to be, as he could be, as people say he is, because he
monstrous thing that he has done. He doesn't even have his
loves how very wicked people are, even without Meon.
own wing of the palace; he isn't part of the government of
But I don’t know.
the evil world. He's just there.
Maybe it’s all just an excuse. Maybe he just wants me to
But I've seen him. I've seen a photograph of him. I've
see that, wants that written down. Maybe he’s secretly good
seen his smile. So I know why people say what they say. I've
and doesn’t want anybody to notice. Maybe he’s doing
seen his smile.
monstrous evil, all the time, and letting people believe we
He keeps all the worst things in the world in that smile,
do it to ourselves.
behind that smile, like he’s holding them all back.
I can’t tell you, either way. All I can say is that he can’t be
as bad as his reputation, because that would mean the
worthlessness of the world.
Field Guide! to…
I won't let it mean that. So he can't be.
Sa’a Lingurth
And then there's Lord Entropy.
This is a gigantic creature with aspects of a blowfish, catfish,
He can't be that either. He can't be even as bad as people
eel, manta, and whale. It carries the evil world on its back. It
say Meon is, either.
can send its tendrils up through its sewers and into the
But he's close.
human world to hook into your soul. It’s not 100% clear how
Lord Entropy, and his Evil World, is all three of them
this works since the human world is not in the evil world’s
and more. He is the laughter and the storm. He is the
sewers and the evil world goes down forever. Also, souls are
seething sleepless evil. He is the architect of our despair.
intangible. That said, it happens. The best thing to do if Sa’a
Lingurth hooks your soul is to think desperately happy
thoughts until the tendril retreats. If you would rather not do Hidden Secrets! of ...
this, and are OK with being dragged soul-first into the Joktan, Power of Scorn
sewers of the evil world, you should have approximately 20 Sometimes the impression arises that Joktan is laughing at
minutes from the first intimations of its presence to the Lord Entropy. He is laughing because there is something
aforementioned baleful eventuality in which to pack any that Lord Entropy wants that he cannot have, or something
desired sundries for your trip. Though, you cannot hold me that Lord Entropy has failed at or some agony Lord
liable if it is 15, instead, or 10! Entropy cannot avoid. When this impression arises, Joktan
has unpleasant days.

AN ATLAS OF CREATION
28

OGRES
Lord Entropy created the ogres 850 years ago. He molded The common ogre (homo pervalidus) loves music. When the ogres
them from dead trees, rocks and corpses. He made them march, others can hear their “walking song” from miles away:
tall. He made them broad. He made them ridiculously It does no good to see us come.
strong and able to smell you from miles away. But the secret The world’s too small for you to fly.
of their making is that he started not with anything physical Keen eyes won’t save you from our kind,
but with a sensation: ogres began with the ripping and We’ll pop them out and leave you blind!
tearing of flesh. They are more than anything else creatures
of what-it-feels-like to have your body treated as meat, to Matters none how fast you run.
have its structure pulled apart by ogres, to be torn. The world’s too small for you to fly.
That is what they are and they tell you what manner of Quick feet you have but all the same
We’ll bite them off and leave you lame!
being Lord Entropy is.
They were created in Lord Entropy’s Chancel and they The last line of each verse is roared with great gusto and
have only ever known evil. Most of them are innocents in merriment. The song continues in the same vein for about thirty
that sense—they have never had call to question or think verses, and then repeats.
about their nature, they have never had a reason to —from A MEDIEVAL BESTIARY, by Paul McArthur
understand how terrible they are.
They could be redeemed, but redeeming them would be
no kindness, for an ogre is not an ogre if it does not hunger NIMBLEJACKS
to rip and break the living flesh. The nimblejacks were stolen. They used to belong to the
Their leader is Hugh Rosewood. Fallen Angel Achaia.
He’s a man who’s somehow managed to stay an ogre and She’s dead.
yet grow up. He’s an ogg gone all sophisticate. Maybe he’s They’re not.
worked out some kind of moral theory of ogreness. Maybe They’re the descendants of Hell and corruption lives in
he’s just too impressed by Lord Entropy to really care about them. They’re horrid little monsters, almost by definition,
the gaping moral issues in his work. He's an adult, he cruel and relentless by character. They used to be a kind of
understands what it means to be a person in the world, incarnation of consequence, part of the karma and morality
But he basically doesn’t care. that got cut off from the Ordinary World. They were what
Ogre adults are like that. They're terrifying. They're you got when you found you were in too deep.
usually still evil and always almost impossible to stop. But And that’s still the livid essence that twists inside them.
hardly any ogres make it that far. They're born as children Lord Entropy’s been breeding them with each other and
and they die as adolescents, by the standards of their race. with humans for millennia. He’s kept them cut off from the
Even the older ones don't really grow up, not while living in ordinary world and from the Hell that was their home.
the evil world. Maybe fifteen or sixteen in history, and five Now they’re more physical creatures than karmic ones.
or six alive right now, have ever managed to mature properly Now they’re gargoyle-imps, humanoid creatures wearing
and become like Hugh; and if any have made it past that, all skin as tough as a stone and with nails like spikes of granite.
the way to old, I hope I never know. Now they’re shriveled things that can move faster than the
lightning.

Ogre Bonds and Afflictions

Bond (5): I am strong enough to overpower you. THOUGHT-RECORD TECHNOLOGY
Bond (2): I can smell you wherever you hide.
Bond (2): I serve and love Lord Entropy. If you wear a thought-record transmitter, you can send
Affliction (2): I reek; an alarming, distinctive smell. your thoughts to its matching teletype receiver from
Affliction (1): I have only ever known evil. anywhere in the world. Using a receiver in tandem with a
Affliction (1): I am a great, tall beast-like person. computer you can create a transcription of received
thoughts in real time, at leisure, or even post-mortem.
Miscellaneous Ogre Traits There is an Estate for Thought-Record Technology, and
Ogres have the Aspect Trait at level 0-1, with 3 AMP. They someone could theoretically invent it in the prosaic world at
have the Paramount Strength Gift and the Paramount any time; for now, though, the technology only exists in
Sense Gift: they can use difficulty 4 Aspect miracles of relatively advanced Chancels. There is a rumor that Lord
raw strength and power, and difficulty 4 Aspect miracles Entropy can collect the last several days of thought from a
of smelling things out, for free. dead mortal or Power, regardless of whether they wore a
Adult ogres such as Hugh Rosewood also have the transmitter or willingly broadcast their thoughts while
Durant, Elusive, and Eternal Gifts; the ancients are alive; from such ostensible records, made public, have many
reputed to have Immortal. of this book’s quotations come.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 29

They’re not consequences, not any more. But they’re still

In the late Middle Ages, a practice arose among devil-
fatal. They can still bewitch you so that you can’t let go of
worshipping cults to run each batch of initiates from one end of
the promises you’ve made to them, that you feel you have to
a long hall to the other. The last or last few to reach the far end
fulfill whatever agreements with them you make. They can
were swallowed by Hell, as the price the cult paid for its powers,
take your word and make it your obsession. Or they can rip and made into “Nimblejacks” (a kind of imp.) These shrunken,
your guts out with their fingernails and let you die upon the shriveled, ugly, and malicious beings were the primary
floor, whatever. negotiators for Hell, exchanging mortal assistance—money, the
They’re living creatures now, and not just bits of Hell, but sexual favors of a desired human, or magical power—for
they still must live their lives in a state of evil, in a world ‘favors’. These favors were usually redeemed in as degrading and
defined by corruption and suffering. It’s the weirdest and corrupt a manner as possible: priests were forced to eat the dead
most wonderful and most terrible thing. If a nimblejack buried in the Churchyard, noblewomen were forced to sleep with
ascends, if they let themselves ascend, if they let their soul their own children, and peasants, who could not be degraded any
look up inside them and appreciate beauty or love or justice, further, were twisted and reshaped into monsters (including
werewolves, vampires, and sometimes even nimblejacks).
they explode and a fire surges out from where their heart
On occasion, someone would find the will to strike out at the
would be and sears through the sky towards Heaven.
nimblejack rather than accepting the proffered favor. The
THE ISLAND, AND BELOW nimblejack would then flee as fast as the wind. These humans
were perhaps the most unfortunate of them all; rather than
The Island of Lord Entropy is a thing of layers; it is built on
simply killing them, the nimblejack would do its best thereafter
top of elder and elder ruins, and whether all of these things
to make their life a living Hell.
are of his making, or whether some predate him, we do not
— from A MEDIEVAL BESTIARY, by Paul McArthur
know. In the sewers are great Grecian temples, miles in
length and sixty feet in height; and the remnants of former
cities; and gardens of strange beasts and horrors. Deeper
THE DOMICELLI
and deeper one may descend, through ever-stranger secrets
The humans that serve Lord Entropy are trained to hunt.
and forgotten places, into the crushing dark.
Underneath the palace of Lord Entropy is a savage garden
Genseric tells me that at the end of it all, one sees Lord
wherein they find their meat; they descend, and fight with
Entropy again—that in the uttermost depths of the island,
elder horrors, and bring up monstrous things to be their
one finds oneself crawling on Entropy's body like one were
food.9
an insect, that the walls fade away and the darkness remains
They are often put to employing this training in our non-
and there is only the hundred-story shape of Lord Entropy
evil world.
in the dark. It could be true. It could be a lie. Genseric Dace
They are feral creatures, though they can be mannerly.
is not always reliable.
They are not comfortable in civilization. They are not
comfortable in non-evil worlds. The stench of things not
being dominated by desecration, destruction, and scorn
disturbs them. They feel disoriented, like people breathing
ether, and out of place. But they are still very good at hiding
in our world, at renting apartments and walking on streets
and otherwise infiltrating us that they may watch us, or
steal from us, or help Lord Entropy’s greater servants on
Nimblejack Bonds and Afflictions
Bond (4): You have brought this on yourself. their hunts.
Bond (2): I am fast enough to catch you. The humans of Lord Entropy are also called Domicelli
Bond (2): I serve Lord Entropy. (domicellus, domicella); this term is strictly applied to those
Affliction (4): If I give myself over to beauty, love, or who earn his favor, and loosely to any human whose loyalty
justice, I will die. lies with the Darkest Lord.
Affliction (1): I am ugly, twisted, and small.

Miscellaneous Nimblejack Traits

Nimblejacks have the Aspect Trait at level 0-3, with 3 9 The history of the Nobilis as I have been taught it allows no
AMP. They have Persona 1 applying to the imaginary room for elder horrors; it is a peculiarity of Lord Entropy’s
Estate, Trapped into Evil, with 3 PMP. Chancel that when you are within it there appear to be
They have the Lightning Quickness Gift; this entities and civilizations that are remnants of things long
allows them to use difficulty 7 Aspect miracles of predating Man. Presumably they were created with just such
moving quickly for 0 MP. properties, even as the fossils of the ordinary world.

AN ATLAS OF CREATION
30

PROPERTIES OF THE EVIL WORLD

Field Guide! to ...
� We want what we cannot have. Baalhermon, Power of Destruction
� We are prey to false impressions. Only Baalhermon is never the target of the cruelty of
� The truth is darker than you know. Lord Entropy, but if he is never tormented, he is still ill-
� Joktan laughs at you.
used. Often there is no Baalhermon in him, no
� Nothing lasts forever.
personhood at all, but only a puppet used by his master’s
� The worst is yet to come.
will, a shell through which Lord Entropy wreaks
destruction on the world.
He stood at the edge of the Earth and drank the world.
“As a servant of Creation,” I said, “I should kill you.”
He could not move. He had too much raw power pouring
into him. His eyes were edgy and frightened.
“Hell,” I said. “I will kill you. But I admire your THE BORDER MYTHIC
appetite.”
—from the Thought-Record of Hugh Rosewood This is the reality behind the dream that is our world.
In an endless emptiness there is a single cup of fire. The
flames of it are blue.
There are two dominating conditions of the Evil World.
There is no scale to it.
The first is the arising impression.
There can be no scale to it. There are no referents. The
Judgments, perceptions, appearances arise as if they were
texture of the void is impermeable to the idea of
objective facts. They breathe forth from the world. You will
measurement. The stars are unreachable and incomparable
be standing in the Evil World, and you will realize: the moon
above.
seems to hate the stars. These thoughts are the art of Lord
It is larger than the universe and it is smaller than a
Entropy, impressions painted on the world. You may seem
pebble in your shoe.
guilty; a grotto may seem safe; a thing may seem terrible, or
Let it be large, then. Let it be larger than worlds. See the
virtuous or bright. Qualia form a mist.
cup as a flaring, staggering enormity; inside it, the tree of
The second dominating condition is hunger.
worlds. Its roots writhe in the flames, pierce them, sink into
To live in the Evil World is to know a desperate, fierce
the void. At that base, where Nothingness and Burning
hunger. It grows the longer you stay; for those who live
meet, is Hell. At its crown is the Blessed Land of Heaven.
there, it has sunk into the bone and flesh of them, made a
In between them, dangling from the branches of the World
permanent change. There is a substance and a quality of
Ash, worlds: billions of them. Uncounted, unmeasured
need, and there is nothing that lives there or stays there
billions of worlds.
terribly long that is not driven into danger, folly, or
Most of them are flat.
madness—and often more than one of these—by a hunger
Around the cup of fire and around the Ash and around
for a thing it cannot find, or cannot have, or cannot permit
its worlds the Excrucians swarm like gnats. They are an
itself to possess. Even for the ogres, whose tastes are awful
endless army in an endless space, but right now their efforts
but simple enough, the hunger has no end; the more they
are focused on a handful of battle fronts. They raid against
gorge themselves on human flesh, the hungrier they
Heaven, and Hell, and Jotunheim where live the giants, and
become.
Aelfscienne of the elves, and Dionyl, and Abaton, and here
and there and other places. And the Earth.
Thirty fronts, perhaps, in all.
Get the Deets! on…
Zoom in.
Meon, Power of Desecration
Our world is there, an island in the leaves, a great flat
Sometimes it seems that the thing Meon holds back behind
plane anchored in subtle ways and great ones to the Ash. It
his smile—the thing he is struggling so desperately to keep
is green and brown and blue and wet, and over its edges
inside him, to keep from leaking out into the world—is the
cascade an endless falling sea. Mariners would be better
realization of Lord Entropy’s dreams and desires.
served not to sail too near the edge of that expanse.
Sometimes it seems he is not so much Lord Entropy’s Power
This world—our world—is fundamentally alive.
as his jailor.
Sometimes I will call it the Border Mythic. Other times
When it most seems like that is so, Meon has
I will call it the Mythic World.
unpleasant days in turn.
It is our secret reality where everything lives and moves.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 31

The wind is alive, in the Mythic World. The forests, and

Alchemist Traits
each tree. The mountains have their shoulders and their
Alchemists control various wondrous treasures,
heads, their faces, their conversations and their thoughts. represented by the Treasure Trait at level 0-2, the ability
Each beam of sunlight. Each rock. Each thing that is, is to have Treasure MP (although they start with 0), and
possessed of its own spirit, from the smallest to the largest; limited access to miraculous Bonds and Afflictions.
it takes only the pressure of attention to differentiate and Their Treasure Trait is weaker than a Power’s—they
speak to the will of the smallest part. cannot control ordinary things or wield their powers
Cars drive by their own will. Birds and aeroplanes make across great distances unless some specific quality of
choices as they soar. There is nothing that coin loves better their magic allows.
than its circulation, and nothing that joys a wave so much
as its death upon the shore.
It is a world bathed in the golden light of life. FORBIDDEN THINGS
The earth splits and clear, sparkling water boils up—these
It is rich in purposes and feelings.
are the Chalices of Conception. A female who is unable
To see it is to know that everything’s OK, even though
otherwise to conceive may immerse herself therein and
it’s not.
draw in its power, making her either parthenogenetic or
fertile with a male she loves; but the child will be infused
THE BORDER MYTHIC unnaturally with the power of the world.
To see the Border Mythic you just have to let go of the The milk of forgotten faith is a forbidden substance that
scientific world. It’s as hard as spitting out iron nails when is palliative to even the most guilty conscience. To drink it
you haven’t even put them in your mouth yet, the first time, is to fall into a haze where one is true to all devotion and
but after that it’s more like falling asleep in the back of a devoted to all things.
car. Sometimes you’ll even just snap over to the mythic Through a Power clinging to unworthy ambitions or
when you see something impossible happen, because that self-justifying delusions, the Cursed Dominions known as
impossible thing primes your brain to the reality of the “the courts of the wind” may form. A cleared-out space
magic that’s going on all around you. becomes possessed by twisted spirits of the wind. These
Getting back into the shelter of the ordinary world— spirits drag or push mortals or even Powers into the court
that’s harder. and form a wall around them; a peculiar trial then begins.
It takes me about four hours of hard work to get back to The crimes of which the court accuses its victims vary.
reality every time. That’s after an awful lot of practice. In most cases, it challenges them not on their deeds but on
When I started, it took me all weekend, and I got brain their qualities as people—do they adhere to their duty?
cramps and messed up my body rhythms something fierce. Are they generous? Are they courageous? Do they serve
Nobilis can usually do it just like that, but sometimes even those who depend on them in the fashion that they must?
they have trouble! The judges form as faces in the air: they interrogate the
accused, they question these moral traits.
THE CLEAVE OF THE BOTANISTS Those who prove lacking are flung from a cliff.
The Cleave of the Botanists are alchemists. They struggle It would all be an example of karma in action, and not
to unlock the magic of flowers—the inner magic in each so much a Cursed Dominion, save that in the courts of the
flower put there by the power of Heaven. Like the wind, true testimony may not be given. It does not leave
magicians of old, they can use this power to speak to the the mouth: it dies in the air, unspoken or at least unheard.
dead, turn bullets away from their skin, command the One may freely argue subjective beliefs, technicalities,
elements and fly. vagaries, and lies, and one may speak truth on unrelated
matters, but a true justification of one’s duty, service,
generosity, or valor is not presentable in this court.

I once asked my car why it put up with me. “ You so obediently

take me where I want to go,” I said. “ You follow my every
order. Why should this be so? You are your own person!” PROPERTIES OF THE
It considered that. “I suppose,” it said, “that I consider it BORDER MYTHIC
basic human maintenance. One goes through a kind of daily
hassle, you know, taking humans to one place or another, in � Its locations are absolute;
order to get the best fueling, sheltering, and cleaning � Its stories are mythic;
performance out of them.” � Its particulars have free will;
—from THE DIARY OF EDMUND FINCH, by Jackie Robinson � Karma and dharma exert real but finite force;
� Roads may be found;
Time in the Mythic World is strange, and prone to turn about.
� Focused attention differentiates a thing from its
environment.

AN ATLAS OF CREATION
32

HOW IT ALL WORKS

Things mostly happen the same way no matter which There are palaces in our dreams, you know. Sometimes
world you’re looking at. For example, when the snow someone finds and keeps one, and it stays around even after
we’ve come awake.
anguli jump off their clouds and flurry down on the world
below, then in the real world, it starts snowing. Or when
something irritates a volcano into erupting spirit, it erupts.
This would be really shocking if it happened by And I could see the forms of dryads, basking in the sun
accident, you understand, but really, it’s the point. and the faces in the dirt, but they wouldn’t talk to me. And
I could hear the woodpecker boy hammering at the trees,
THE BIGGER SPIRITS but it wasn’t any of them that I really longed for. It wasn’t
The greatest things in the mythic world have Imperators
any of them that my heart called forth.
rather than spirits.
It was him, who came wandering up along the way, and
The sun, for instance.
whistling as he went: the great-great-grandson of the
She’s not a sun spirit, she’s an Angel. Sometimes the sun
Imperator of Roads, and the son of Tiger Mountain: the
is her mansion and sometimes it is her face; sometimes
Jack of Roads himself.
there is a thing that is different from her. But the spirit of
If you look close enough, you can see the least spirits—
the sun is an angel.
the anguli and minime—of individual pebbles, pine
The same is true of the moon, the great mountain
needles, snowflakes, and clumps of dirt.
ranges, the seasons, and the seas.
Then there's the Ogdoad, the class of “really important THE WEIRDING WALL, AND BEYOND
spirits who aren’t Imperators themselves.” Spirits like, say, The cup of flame that surrounds the world is named the
Old Man Influenza. A Power might be able to beat him Weirding Wall. It has only seven entrances large enough to
up, but that won’t get the Power his respect; if you want allow a large Riding of Excrucians in, but numerous holes
Old Man Influenza’s help, you’d better show him honor permeable to smaller hosts of the enemy.
and courtesy and be aware of just how old and powerful he What about beyond it? To a person of Creation,
is. everything outside the world is essentially a barren, empty
Lady Midsummer Night is another spirit of the void. The longer you stare at it, trying to see details, the
Ogdoad. She’s a mystery, even to her friends, but if you’re more you see the inside of your eyes.
kind and decent to her she’ll be kind to you. Look, for example, upon the austere landscape of Sisera
Sanguinary—ah! To an Excrucian, or a grangler, or any
ATTENTION. THOUGHT. other creature of the void, this place brings awe. But what
How is it that you can meet Lady Jill Erosion, walking in
of the neighboring Stringent Heights?
the woods, when the woods should be just one big mess of
Vulgar and unimpressive, say the granglers—
spirits intertwined with one another?
But our eyes see only darkness;
It’s like this:
But our body feels only the faint warm gentle pressure
It’s the power of attention. Introspection. Thought.
of the Not;
Most spirits just kind of drift through life. There’s a
But our ears hear only silence, in Sisera and the
dryad in every tree, but it’s practically asleep, and even
Stringent Heights alike.
when it’s awake it chats with the other dryads and the
wind, it doesn’t talk to you.
But if you see a thing, or hear a thing, if you bear witness
to it or if it bears witness to you, then the spirit of that
thing differentiates from the larger context. Its voice and
face will surface from the fabric of the world. PROPERTIES OF THE
That’s how I met the Jack of Roads down by Tiger LANDS BEYOND CREATION
Mountain, long before I met Ianthe.
I was lost. � They are not real;
� Their particulars defy explanation;
� They extend to eternity;
� They contain nothingness;
� They reflect your ideas of them;
Mizija the wind is part of larger weather systems, but she has
� They reflect you;
her own identity.
� They are a thing in which phenomena arise.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS opposite: “A Road to the Sun,” from a piece by Raffaello Schiaminossi and Jacopo Ligozzi, by Jenna Moran
 33

I
n the Mythic World you can get practically anywhere by road.
There is a path to death, and back. There’s a road up to the sun.

opposite: by artist (I cribbed from these) AN ATLAS OF CREATION

34
YOUR CHANCEL
The beasts of Locus Thegri come out at night with a positive
If you override the elevator in the Eastman Insurance hunger for money. They will gladly kill a passing traveler to
building, it will take you to Camelot—the marvelous shake out her purse with their teeth and gulp down the coins,
Summer Kingdom in the sky. Founded in honor of the bills, and credit cards therein.
chivalric vision, it’s a sweeping landscape in the clouds full
of knights, honor, chivalry, tragedy, duels, monsters, castles —from A TOURIST’S GUIDE TO CREATION, by Jasprite Sherrard
and fair maidens. The Powers of Camelot are its Kings and
Queens, celebrated in contests of honor and courtly love;
only the wicked “King” Lot and his black knights defy There are walking paths into Locus Casluhim but the
them, and Lot is defeated and slain each year on simplest way to find it is to spot a cloud dragon wandering
midwinter’s eve to refresh the lifespan of the sun. the skies anywhere within three hundred miles of the
place. Stare at the cloud dragon until it realizes it has been
Locus Zaanannim is home to the characters and worlds of caught; recognizing you either as a knowledgeable traveler
network television. The zones of currently airing programs or a dangerously perspicacious mundane, it will paralyze
are sealed in the Zaan Biospheres to minimize cross-
you with a glance, runnel down from the clouds it plays in,
pollination, while worthy characters and elements from
and carry you off to the Chancel’s slope.
cancelled programs are allowed into the Great Walled City
of the Chancel proper. This City, roughly the size of
Clegyr is a living Chancel whose flesh is rock and whose
Canada, is a sectioned labyrinth that divides into drama,
comedy, and genre “quarters,” with the last excreta are gems. It swims in the Earth’s crust like a fish
disproportionately sized to allow starships, cattle herds, swims in water; the temple-city of its resident Powers, on
and pirate ships adequate space to roam. The unruly— Clegyr’s back, moves through stone with equal ease. The
those who refuse to accept the broader world of the human residents were made over into stone-bodied
Chancel, or their own series’ cancellation—are driven “gnomes” when the place became a Chancel. Their duty is
outside the far walls into the outer darkness, where they to provide for the Powers’ needs and to arrange the gems
merge together into monstrous tellipedes, characmeras, that Clegyr leaves behind in patterns that make the angels
and comedy blobs. It is the duty of the Power Tiria to keep glad. It’s not clear how well this works, but if you find a
them out when they grow strong enough to threaten the gem while mining that appears to be the poo of a giant
walls, while it is the job of her brother caelestis Foramin rock-fish-Chancel, please consider leaving it in place and
Blake to dissect them when a merged character is moving on.
unexpectedly needed for a sequel or remake.
There is no land route into Locus Zaanannim. You enter One of the apartment buildings on 43rd Street probably
and exit via plot holes or with a special appeal to one of the
belongs to Mary Shenk.
Powers of the place.
Which 43rd Street?
It doesn’t really matter. They’re all the same. Every 43rd
Locus Casluhim is a secret mountain in the Los Angeles
hills. Its design is in the Olympian mold, with spots of airy Street, in every city. They run together, and somewhere on
Grecian architecture scattered along the slope and it, there’s the home of Mary Shenk.
shepherds (herding sheep or cloud dragons), fire nymphs, You can use that knowledge to get from city to city.
and musicians wandering the peaks. A number of small From continent to continent, even, if you do it right.
villages cluster around the mountain’s base, with Just don’t forget to leave a tip, when you do, for Mary
intermittent access at best to the greater Los Angeles area Shenk.
around them.
Every Familia of Powers has one: a Chancel, pulled from
the world around it. A secret world with hidden entrances
Get the Deets! on… and exits and rules that are all its own.
Locus Qamamir What would yours be like?
If you are a competent mortal athlete, Texcoyo may invite
you to the games at Locus Qamamir. This is an opportunity
worth seizing; the Chancel has a profoundly invigorating
effect that will stay with you for many years. Do not,
however, accept his “side bet,” where the winner may devour
or sacrifice the loser’s heart; eating Texcoyo’s heart would
make you a Power, but there is no one who may stand
against him at these games in the entire world.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 35

HEAVEN
Now in his youth, on a sweltering summer day, Devin felt
Heaven Intrudes suddenly as gold; his limbs were strong, his thoughts were
It is not by our own will that grace comes into our world. clear, and his heart was treasure.
He sipped deeply of his lemonade; his spirit shouted in his
It is unasked for. It is unbidden. It is not in response to
frame; his dreams were suddenly within his reach.
anything. It’s too wild, pure, and mad for that.
Then the moment passed away to an ordinary summer.
Grace invades. Events arose. Circumstances transpired. Griefs and loves
The angels are an occupying army in our world. They are and hurts ensued. The matter was forgotten.
light that bursts upon us in our darkness, lifting up what Now, as he stared into the burning heart of the void—into
we would rather abandon to its misery.They are the flowers the squirming, howling, flat-eared dog-god emptiness that
of Heaven, blooming where the world had forsaken life— was an uncreated world—he saw a pattern that reminded
on the scrapheaps of metal, in the slick sickness of him of that gold.
spreading oil, on the graves of sinners and the just, twining Heedless of the open-throated forces that writhed and
up our skyscrapers and our tenements and our office bayed within, he reached in his hand; trailed it along the
buildings in defiance of the soullessness of our lives. They surface to make it separate and recombine like some baleful
are the enlightenment that bursts in on us when we were gelatin; grasped firmly at the tail of a strange anomaly, and
pulled it into sight.
just trying to be small little men and women, eating our
There! There, of all things, there and then, in the
bagels and drinking our Starbucks, tilling our little patches
containment chamber that he’ d made, there lay the summer
of soil, dying in our heaps and grottoes, or staring out at day; therein lay the gold; skulking, lurking, snarling, forbidden
the world from our high towers. We didn’t ask for it. We on the surface of the void.
didn’t even understand that it could happen. It was like a “It is the end of days,” Devin advised it, for it was, and
Zen master suddenly hitting us with a stick while we were then he smiled. “I’d wondered where you’ d been.”
just in line to pay the telly bill. —from DREAMS OF EMPTINESS, by Emily Chen
Heaven is the angel that catches us as we fall; not
because we needed it, not because we wanted it, not even
because we’d dreamed of angels since we were a child but and still they labor to better us. They take the time to bring
because the angels decided the world was better if we grace to where it is most efficaciously transformative, to
lived. will the betterment of the world and of our lives and our
Heaven invades, but at least it invades us as a holy places and our existence, effulgent unasked, undreamt-of
thing. and invasive grace.
The angels take beauty as a sacred trust. It’s their Craft They will make this world a Heaven. They expect no less
and their Great Working, it’s what they build. Having of us.
found themselves born into the brightest land in all the
lands there are, they decided they would make everything The wildflowers of Heaven rip through the substrate of the
else as bright. Their own kin—lovers, friends, ancient world to bloom in impossible places. They are hard on the
acquaintances and enemies—are suffering in Hell, cruelty of the world; they make it hard to be petty, hard to
twisting and corroding into monsters, and still they speak be small, hard to be human in their presence, much less
of justice and righteousness in the world.Their blood is the genuinely wicked. They make your own soul and dharma
writhe within you if you ignore the power of their
favored stain on Excrucian blades; of all the creatures of
witnessing.
the Ash, they alone may never escape the constant press of
And they will give you strength, if you let them.
the War, may never anticipate a week, month, year, when
nothing of theirs is threatened by the gods of emptiness;

PROPERTIES OF HEAVEN Oscar opened the Mystery, found at once he did not understand
it, and spent the rest of the day in deep contemplation of
whether he had accidentally participated in a koan.
� Its beauty transforms.
� Its beauty demands service. —from A NOBLE’S CATECHISM, by K.C. Danine
� It is alive, a growing thing.
� Its grace is given, not taken.
� Its grace is given, not earned. The angels forbid Heaven to even the most beautiful of human
� Its touch makes things more like itself. souls. “Go back,” they say, “and make your own world better.”
� It is absolute.

AN ATLAS OF CREATION
36

If you are willing to let them transform you. If you will

take the strength they offer you, at the cost of giving up Killing God was wrong, of course, reflected the Excrucian; but
your weakness; if you will take the chance to become a a handful of flowers and a few sincere condolences should
hero, at the cost of no longer being normal; if you are reasonably settle the matter, after all.
willing to be better, at the cost of never again being what —from VOID STORIES, compiled by Édouard Guy
you were—they will make you something more.
They will make you purer. They will make you cleaner.
They will find the thing inside you that you ought to be Sometimes the light of Heaven will break the darkness of
and clean away the detritus of the self. They will energize our lives.
you, brighten you, make it impossible for you to hide from Sometimes you’ll be falling and the lotus will catch
the beauty of your soul, but wrack you with it, rather, you—you’ll be on the great wide bloom of it, the magic-
possess you of it, make you burn with the awesome carpet-expanse of it, and you’ll realize you’re blowing in
amazing thing that is a person, that is you, a child of the the wind instead of dying of having nothing to cling to.
Heaven-they-will-make, in the perfection of this world. Sometimes you will be lost, and the light of Heaven will
They are flowers that take from you the power to give unto you a path. Or a hope. Or, at least, a chance.
compromise with wickedness and mediocrity, to be You must ask yourself if you are worthy of it.
comfortable with evil and others’ suffering, in exchange for
If you are not then you are better served to step off the
renewed life.
edge of the lotus and resume your fall. You are better
Some of them preserve their strength in extractions.
served to walk forth from that light. If you are not capable
Some of them you can crush, distill, mix, turn into
of earning Heaven’s grace then you must not accept it. It
medicine or poultices, and they’ll still be able to work.
hurts to say this, because I do not believe that it is right;
They’ll be cures for depression, sickness, misfortune, or
hopelessness. They can regrow limbs. They can give you but it is true. It is the will of the angels, always, to be just.
back whatever else it is you may have lost. And even the Sometimes it is a justice mixed with kindness or with
ones that aren’t proper medicines can have effects almost poetry. Sometimes it is justice in pettier or more juridical
as great if you happen upon them in their strange beds and forms. Sometimes it is a justice as cruel and hard as a
bushes scattered across the world. diamond is cruel and hard. The angels don’t have a
And maybe it’s because they don’t fit in the ordinary preference, not in that sense. They’re too big for such small
world that hardly anybody knows about them. Maybe it’s distinctions. They don’t care about human justice.
because the ordinary world teaches us that the flowers that But they seek always to be just.
we find in such places—growing on the sides of buildings, The Devils thought otherwise. They thought that there
twining among our bedsheets, growing along the luggage should be a place in the world for the nasty, for the ugly,
rack of the metro and from and out of and into the mirrors for the monsters and the cruel. They thought that justice
in the dirty ladies’ room down by the station—that they didn’t mean Heaven could do whatever it wanted to the
don’t exist. And certainly, if they did exist, they wouldn’t mean and foul things. For that crime, for the crime of
make things better. standing up for Caligula, Pol Pot, and the ichneumon wasp,
But I don’t think that’s really why. the angels cast them into Hell.
Medicine’s not impossible, after all. It’s not like a fairy So you must not imagine—if you are not such a being
or a hydra. It’s not a thing that breaks our world. We could as could earn the grace of Heaven—that you may accept
be living in a world where everybody knows about the that grace unscathed. The price of grace for any evil
panacea, where you get bottles of it at the drug store, where being—for any of us, really, who are less than perfect—is
it’s just $19.99 to cure what ails you—and it wouldn’t break justice. For some the cost of that justice, even in the face of
the Earth. It doesn’t fit into the ordinary world, sure, but it Heaven’s light, will be more than you can bear.
could have. So that’s not why we do not know.
We don’t hear about this because it costs too much to
become an agent of Heaven. We don’t hear about it “Two days ago,” Mieszko said, “I could not have seriously
because people want to be small. considered selling myself to Hell. You are very good at this,
If we weren’t like that we would die. Nilaia.”
If we didn’t mostly flinch from Heaven we’d be dead. “Perfection is in an angel’s nature,” Nilaia answered.
There wouldn’t be anybody left. Mieszko frowned. “Then how did you fall?”
What hope would we have, as heroes, in a world where
“With great difficulty,” Nilaia admitted. “I must struggle
even Angels die?
constantly lest I return to grace.”
—from CHILDREN OF HEAVEN, by Martin Elliott
Humankind never fell from grace. No cherub bars the gates of
Eden. This is still a perfect world. Flowers grow in the eyes of a human too thoroughly graced
—from THE DIARY OF EDMUND FINCH, by Jackie Robinson by Heaven, and their body becomes light.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 37

There’s one street in New York that needed no angels to make This is the Hell of Shuffling in Chains.
it beautiful. We are embedded in foul mist and we shuffle in chains
There’s graffiti on the walls, of course, and weeds on the and all around is a flat white labyrinth whose paths we do
sidewalk. There’s a dead dog off to the way. Some windows not know. One day we shall reach the end of it, perhaps—
are broken. These things do not detract from the beauty. So saith the theory of finite and infinite things—
They’re part of it. These elements, individually ugly, arrange And then we shall rise, purified, to Earth or Heaven or
in a way that captures all the beauty in the world. some other sort of Hell.
No one walks that street. No one would dare. That is what is; that is what has been.
—from BOILERMAKER’S DAUGHTER, by Emily Chen Save that unto us, here, in the Hell of Shuffling in
Chains, has been sent a savior. She wears striped stockings
and has a gamine face and when she crouches on two knees
But if you have enough soul within you to hold that and one hand her back has a beetle’s curve. She carries a
grace, and bear that justice, then you may take up the sack and she is chained, like us—like us, but she does not
burden of salvation. If you are better, on the whole, than shuffle. Instead, she perches on the walls; laughs delightedly
you might have been, then you should accept all Heaven’s at the misty hopelessness around her; and jumps, great
gifts. They will heal you, in measure to your worth, and long-legged jumps, from height to height.
hurt you, in measure to your sins; and if they wind up Often, she falls.
hurting you too much, but not to your destruction, then She laughs then, too.
you may go to Surolam, and the peace of the Locust Court Where did she come from? Where is she going? She does
and the pain of knowing Heaven eventually will pass. not tell us these things, only that she is passing through.
But she has freed us.
HELL We didn’t think we were worthy of salvation.
Any of us could have learned her strategy—could have
faced the risks and possibilities and climbed atop the walls.
Hell Awaits But she is the one who freed us. We could not have
Hell is always with you. imagined it.
You won’t realize that until you’re looking back—until We did not think that we were worthy of salvation.
you’re in a dark and empty time, a hurting time, a ruined “That way!” she shouts. “I see the exit!”
and compromised time in your life. You won’t realize it It is because she has come THROUGH that I am lingering
until you understand one day that you’ve failed, that you’ve to mark the path; and I am thinking, perhaps, I will wear
wasted yourself and your opportunities. Then you’ll look such stockings as hers, one day, in some other Hell, and do
back and you’ll see that Hell was always there. the same.
It was with you when you made excuses. —from DOORKNOBS, by Emily Chen
It was with you when you didn’t bother to care.
In your self-righteousness and your laziness and your
willful stupidity; in your casualness with the things you Hell means that there is always something with you,
cared about, in your willingness to give up your own good even if sometimes it is horrible.
fortunes in order to hurt somebody else; in your pettiness, We are never without our witnesses; never without
in your rushes to judgment, in every mistake you regret something to look upon us, and give honor to our suffering
and will always regret. and our mistakes. We may tumble to the bottom of the
God wasn’t with you, then, if He even exists. Cneph, the Ash, forsaken of and by all other things, and still we will
closest thing to God we have evidence of, the will that exist, and still we will not fall into the Not, because there
made the Ash and flame from nothingness—he wasn’t is a Hell.
with you. Not Heaven. Not the Wild, not the Light, not You may take that as a comfort or a horror.
even, probably, the Dark.
In those times when you were petty and small and The substances of Hell are things that consume and hold
twisted only Hell was there. the attention. They are things that surround you wholly.
Hell is what loves you even when you’re wrong. They’re dirty, awful things. That’s just the gateway
Hell is what loves us even when we’re bad. though. They’re not evil so much as awful. They’re ritually
And it’s fire and brimstone and poison and rotting impure. They’re not clean.
things, too. It’s a punishment ground and torment-realm They are the rotten flowerbeds that abused children
at the base and bottom of the Ash. It’s corrupting the crawl into to escape the horrors of their lives. Sick sap will
Fallen Angels, turning them into monsters, and the human cover you, the leaves will drip rot on you, there are bugs
souls that wind up there aren’t any too well off themselves. and even spiders and a smell like the world-rot around you,
But that isn’t the core of it. That isn’t the heart of it. It’s just but after a while, it’s comforting, embracing, surrounding,
the price we pay to have something like Hell in the world it covers all the senses and there’s nothing but the black
at all. and red and smell and strangeness.

AN ATLAS OF CREATION
38

It was lust that brought the angel Domiel down; it could have Field Guide! to…
been nothing else. Once, his relationship with Raphi had been— Devils
not love, never love, but a partnership. But Raphi had fallen Weep for the Devils, for they have forgotten how to live
and there could be no partnership now; no twining of souls. It with what they love. Their wounds do not heal. Cruelty has
was lust, when he met with Raphi in the Acmonion Wood. They become a reflex. Half of them do not know how to talk to
did not see the Excrucian that waited in the woods. And when people without twisting the knives in their target’s soul. If
Domiel, in his passion, abandoned his place in Heaven and you meet one you must tell it, “I do not want to be hurt. I
vowed himself to the Code of Hell, they did not see the Excrucian do not want to be hurt. I do not want to be wicked. I want
take their lust into his hands and weave a scythe from its essence. to love the good.” You can stop to say other things but you
With the creation of that scythe, named Hurtali but called must keep coming back to this. You must keep reminding
Indiscretion, the Acmonion Wood cried out in pain; and Domiel them that you would rather not be damned. Their
with release; and the angel that guards those woods moved like a compassion is not dead. Their honest love for you, it is not
storm. He slew the Excrucian with one blow, so that we shall dead. It is simply very easily forgotten.
never know its name; but he could not hold the scythe. It fell from
his hands and sank through the forest floor.
—from LEGENDS OF THE NOBILIS, by Luc Ginneis The work of Hell is holy in this life.
I will say this even though I fear the Devils and even
though I fear the flames. I will say this even though I
They’re the fires that screwed-up people like to stick idolize Heaven and its given grace; even though there are
their hands in. It burns you, it hurts, it’s awful, but it takes times when I am angry, and more than angry, at what Hell
you away from yourself. It makes your whole world about, has been and done.
are you really going to do this? Are you really doing this? But the first work of Hell is to honor and bear witness
Did you really just do that? People think that burning in a to the things that would otherwise be entirely unloved.
hellfire is about being strong, or hurting, or something like They will come and sit with you if you have to die alone.
that, they tell themselves all kinds of stories about why The Powers of Hell. The demons. The flames and rotten
they do it, but the DSM-IV tells us, and I agree, that it’s to flowers, at least, if nothing else; maybe even a Devil. They
break the world you’re living in and just be in the fire for a won’t do it to hurt you, not even the Devils. They might
little while. hurt you, they might hurt you terribly, they might even
steal your soul, because they’re just that broken. But it
Hell-things are the thing that makes people shoot up,
won’t be why they’re there.
maybe. At least that seems a lot like Hell to me, the way
They’ll be there because if they were not there, you
we’ve made drug users ritually impure like butchers in
would suffer and die, alone, and with no witnesses; and for
India. The way drug life is viscerally unclean yet draws someone to die in such a fashion is anathema to Hell.
people back and back again, the way it takes people away They will come and visit you, now and then, if you live
from themselves. It’s obvious that there’s some Hell in the in the mountains, isolated, with no one else to know.
nasty drugs people make from Hell’s rotting flowers, but I They will come to watch you, to listen to you, to know
think that there’s a bit of Hell in a lot of the ordinary you, if you are a thing so horrible and broken that no one
chemical stuff too. else would dare.
The first time somebody cuts themselves, they’ve They love the evil things, maybe, best of all, because it’s
probably been touched by some of the things from Hell. evil that needs Hell most. If you want to know how the
Maybe even the first time they drink. Devils have gone so horribly wrong, it may be that; that, as
Hell is what lets you get away from the world. much as the corruption and their own suffering; that they
spend all of their time in the company of the worst of us,

PROPERTIES OF HELL
Vincent Guntali did not believe in Hell; nor did he believe
� It fills the mind and senses. that, should such a place exist, he would be exiled there.
� It is always with you. Perhaps this amused the Prince of Lies, for he struck a bargain
� It is with you the most when you do not realize it is with Vincent’s soul. Now Vincent sits in a high place
there. overlooking the flames and suffering. So long as he remains
� It has no cleanliness to it. unwavering, remains certain that he does not belong in Hell, he
� It hurts. shall not suffer from it.
� It twists you up. He did well at first, but for the past year, he has dared think
� It sees the worst of you, and can quite possibly see the nothing else but “I am not in Hell.”
rest. —from OBSERVATIONS OF THE DAMNED, by Quan Feng-Ying

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS opposite: by artist (I cribbed from these)

 39

In a nearly infinite Creation, most of the universe is not

“Congratulations,” said Nilaia. “ You have corrupted your
known.
first soul; you have won a victory for the Fallen. How does it
It must be strange—Ianthe thinks, and I agree—to live
feel?”
on those alien, primeval worlds, where the substance of
“...It hurts,” said Forchas, after a pause.
existence may end without any knowledge of the cause.
“Of course it hurts,” Nilaia answered. “It always hurts. It
Where one day there may be Komm and Iax and the next,
hurts terribly. This is Hell.”
nonesuch, and with no word in that isolated place of the
—from CHILDREN OF HEAVEN, by Martin Elliott war that brought that end. Where one day if the Sun is
slain by Excrucian hands, the fire that lights their world
and so they’ve come to exemplify that awfulness will die, and they never to know the truth of why, or even
themselves. But to love the evil things is not their duty but really understand what they had lost.
its expression. The work of Hell is to love whatever needs Now there are some—Firstborn of the Angels, one
them most; whatever would, without Hell, be alone. assumes, Attaris Ebrôt Appêkâ and others—who must
Hell’s eyes are open to you. have commerce with those worlds. For I cannot see how
They will not turn away. Firstborn could be Meaning and Existence and yet never
That is why the humans with the greatest taint of Hell know that meaning; to know meaning, and to embody
are as likely to walk the road of sainthood as that of evil, or meaning, seem intimately to be bound. And in like fashion
to find a strange equivocating path between them. The do I imagine time—that Attaris, to be Attaris, must touch
thing in us that can love the evil is at once our worst side on the things of every world.
and our best. So I imagine. So it may be, for such personages as they.
But for the rest of us it is not so.
THE WORLD ASH Not Parasiel in his Chancel; not Genseric Dace, with
his armies; not one, that is, of the multitude of great and
From the World Ash hang billions of worlds, but scarcely alien things who exist and cast forth their light and
two hundred and forty have been found. shadows on the world, is given intimate knowledge of
It is like this: every world and the paths thereto save as necessity
Out on the immensity of the tree, where rivers of wind, commands. They illumine and they darken all, but they do
and snow, and fire run; where wasps the size of city blocks not see every manifestation of that shadow and that light.
do fly, and alien birds soar; where the only visible truth is
the vast expanse of bark and branch and leaf beneath your
feet, there is no simple exploration. What seemed an easy
shot when you last saw the Ash from afar—when you
stood on a world and sought out other worlds with a
telescope, or flew far from the Ash to orient from the
sky—becomes an impossible tangle of possible paths, like
the most confusing wilderness, when you stand upon its
flesh.
Thus, to the Powers, only the worlds named in the
Compendium of Journeys are yet known; and to Heaven,
scarcely more.
If you stand far away—if you fly to the Weirding Wall
around the world and look inwards—it will seem to you
that over there are worlds that have already fallen to the
enemy; worlds that have frayed and withered, or fallen
from the tree like rotten fruit. And over there are whole
galaxies’ worth of worlds that even the Angels have not
found: worlds untouched by the politics of Hell and
Heaven and the gloaming passage of the Excrucian Horde,
because the paths that lead thence are not known.
Closer in and squinting hard, you may see the paths
from Earth to Venus, or to Mars; to the fire on the Ash
that is Alpha Centauri; and to the other reachable worlds.

T
he Aaron’s Serpents are
And it is easy enough for those who walk the Ash to find
the children of the Ash…
their way towards Heaven or towards Hell—to, if they
reach not those ultimate immensities, move in their
direction.

right: “Child of the Ash”, from a piece by Eugène Delacroix AN ATLAS OF CREATION
40
THE LIGHT AND THE DARK
“I will give you this Creation,” said Seimelkhe, “and all the
The Light is that which stands in clouds of radiant glory power there is in it, if you but give me the cup you hold in your
and looks away from life. hand.”
The Light loves you. “This does not tempt me,” said Galeid.
The Light knows you. —from LEGENDS OF THE NOBILIS, by Luc Ginneis
But the Light will not see you. It will not hear you. You
are tainted by the gross physicality of life.
It knows you in the perfection of your soul. It knows The Dark’s obligations are to humanity, but the Dark may
take joy in any voice; thus, the Magisters of the Dark
you in the deep truth of you. It knows things about you
surround themselves with quasi-human things.
that you’ve never had the chance to live out, nor never will.
It is equations on gematria.
It is a dream of humanity made perfect through good
The Dark will hold you up as you try to fly, will help you
law.
get farther and farther from land, and then it will drop you;
It does not know the tangled mess that life of necessity
for the only thing more beautiful to the Dark than your
becomes.
freedom is your using that freedom to overextend yourself
and die. Or, to kill yourself in folly or despair, or to tumble
The Dark is the knotted twiggly horror in the gut of the
helplessly from the ruined cliff of your own ideas.
human condition.
The Dark doesn’t want anyone to hold you back.
It’s reckless.
The Dark doesn’t want anyone or anything to get in the
It’s cognitive errors and the death-fear. It’s carelessness
way of your living.
and small-minded negligence. It’s the animal that lives in
And the Dark doesn’t want anything to kill you in the
our flesh. It’s the fact of having flesh at all.
end but you.
The Dark is everything that makes us what we oughtn’t
The Dark is the wind and the laughter that follows a
be.
falling suicide, down into the dark.
It’s our folly.
It doesn’t really understand you, I guess I should
It speaks with our own voices.
observe. Not any more than the Light does. It’s a mad
The Dark will hear you. It’ll more than hear you. It’ll
celebration of who you are and your voice and your
parrot you back at yourself. Maybe just the parts you say
freedom and your suicide but it’s too blinded by the dark
aloud. Maybe the parts you didn’t mean to say at all.
to really give any meaning to it all. It’s barely even aware of
The Magisters of the Dark can have grandeur to them,
itself when it’s with you, except inasmuch as you are aware
but to tell you the truth, I think that’s our own pride.That’s
of it. It’s listening to the sound of you much more than
the part of us that wants our dark and twisted and grieving
your specific words.
side to be something awesome and magisterial, echoing
There’re few creatures in all Creation less capable of
back out. I think if we weren’t so proud they would be as
monkeys and parrots to us, chattering back in laughter grasping that something you are trying to tell them is
what they’ve heard us say. genuinely important than the Dark.
I could be wrong. But that’s okay, the Dark will say.
Maybe the side of us that walks in emo really is that You understand you, don’t you?
grand. Isn’t that enough?
The Dark loves every human voice. A little outcast girl
is as fab to it as a President—maybe more so, since she The Light and Dark began in Eden. Adam and Eve and
needs more help to let her heart’s voice free. It wants maybe Lilith if she existed were the only human things
everyone to unleash that voice, you know, to stop holding back then. They were the seed of an Imperial thing.
themselves in, to live free and crazed and wicked as the They were a change in how the Imperial things of the
beasts are wicked and an equal to everybody else. world were going to work.
The Dark will set you free. Instead Eve bit the apple.

She was the wall between death and our house. And death was Human success rests on subverting the natural order of
strong enough to take her things—on replacing an ever-more-strained conceptual space
But not to climb that wall. with the latest, flashiest ontological model. Human existence
—on the tombstone of Tang Wen-jiing derives from the natural order of things—on that same
conceptual space. To describe this process as unstable understates
Nobiliser FACT: the case.
The Light makes gardens in empty places. —from PRINCIPLES OF THE DARK, by Merriweather James

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 41

It is possible to convert a human into something else, and The first humans emerged from the Garden into a world of
thereby avert the need for that human’s suicide. For example, a savagery and grime. Beasts and birds and fish hunted, and
human can become a Power, an animal, or—with a suitable killed, and ate, and the ones most often eaten were the ones who
transfusion of essence—one of the faery kind. One can also harmed no others at all. The sky poured water and stony ice and
convert human life drop by drop into faceless units of labor; for this jagged lightning down upon them and the thunder shouted its
purpose, the Dark invented money. rage.
—from PRINCIPLES OF THE DARK, by Merriweather James The first humans built themselves a shelter from sticks and
leaves; and a fire from stones and wood; and they learned to kill
what they wished to kill and protect what they wished to
It taught her Light. It made the knowledge of self protect; and as Eve brought forth a child in suffering and pain,
explode in her. It made the will to live, to strive, to be she said:
perfect burn inside her. And she could have made herself “Truly, this is an age of miracles.”
immortal then. But she wasn’t ready. —from CARRYOUT, by Emily Chen
She knew better.
It needed time; it was too soon, as precious as life was.
She was still a child, she couldn’t be immortal yet.
So she took the apple to Adam instead.
It was the right thing to do.
You have to understand, it was the right thing to do. She
couldn’t have known. It wasn’t her fault any more than it
was his.
She didn’t know there was something missing from her
wisdom.
The Light never does.
So Adam bit the apple, and the apple taught him Dark.
He bit it and he spit out its seeds and the knowledge of
the self exploded in him. He began to want. He began to
need.
He suddenly had a craving to decide things.
He became wild with it.
He became a namer of things. He became a mad god of
power. He was something incredible, back then, and he
could have made himself immortal.
But he never did and he never would.
He was possessed by the Dark.
And while they endured and exalted in their
transcendence, each to each, and went walking out for the
first time into the vast and broader world, the First Lord
of the Dark moldered and writhed up from the seeds
Adam had left behind him. And he claimed Eden as a
Chancel. He made their once-perfect home into the Sable
Gardens. He seized and then seared the fruit of
immortality away forever from the Earth.
How unforgivable, the Dark that cost us life unending!

It is the right of any Power of the Light to say: I am the Light,

or any Power of the Dark to say: I am the Dark, when acting
in service of their Code. They are the hands and eyes of the force
that moves them, and it is considered humility—not pride—to
set that identity above their own.
—from THE SOCIETY OF FLOWERS, by Heather Williams

AN ATLAS OF CREATION
42
THE WILD
“Perception is not a passive process. It is part of the work that
The Wild is solipsist. It is inward-turning, it is a knowing creates reality. I will demonstrate. In my hand, I hold an apple.
of itself. It cannot distinguish between the Wild and the At least, with the lights turned on, it is an apple. Now, if you
world. will turn off the lights and tell me what I hold in my hand?”
Its Magisters arise from nothing. They discover they “...four-armed Shiva the Destroyer dances in a wheel of fire.
have form.They discover they are bounded, finite creatures. He stands upon the corpses of his enemies. Never-created,
And so they say: in Creation I am a prisoner. never-dying, ignorance-crushing, life-giving, death-giving,
thousand-faced, thousand-named, the wearer of serpents and
Lo!
the tiger’s skin...”
They look upon themselves. A dissonance arises. They
“Turn the light on.”
are not as they expect themselves to be. They are not
“An apple.”
entirely natural to themselves in every part. And so they “We prefer to leave the lights on at this Centre.”
say: the Wild is alien to the world.
—from RINGING, by K.C. Danine
In this, they are of course correct.
That is, to analyze the Wild in these terms and see that
they can only see themselves; that their every reaction is a
What is helpful to them, of course, is right and good
reaction to themselves; that they are ultimately
and just.
introspective creatures, is to see the obvious origin for their
But fundamentally and symmetrically, as it is necessary
thoughts. But they are still Imperators. They are still
that they be, they are fair. They are absolute and
primal creatures. If they say they are alien creatures, if they
unwavering in extending their philosophy to all.
say that they are prisoners of Creation, then perforce it
You are a prisoner in Creation.
must be so.
You are an alien to the world.
They are occupied with their own being.
You must find the hints of structure within you, insists
It transfixes them.
the Wild. You must unfold it into law. Sanity is a prison.
They find the hints of structure in their essence and
History is a prison. Humanity is a prison. You are caught
unfold them into laws. They become creatures of absolute
within its web.
dedication to the rules they find inside them; or perhaps
The Wild dreams to set you free.
they’ve always been.
What is hurtful to them is dross, waste. To allow the
Where the Wild walks things unroot themselves and
existence of their enemies in the world is a self-destructive become self-contained. Symbols bleed into reality. Things
habit that they would like to kick. stop justifying themselves to one another.
Flowers pull free of the ground. Trees shake off their
leaves. Humans discard their faces, grow extra arms, and
turn their speech to fire.
Creating worlds, Theresa found, was addictive. At night, when
Walls dissolve.
she set her work aside and stumbled into bed, she would dream
of it: new shapes of reality, new styles of existence, new Roads twist upwards into the air.
ontological and theological substructures on which she could Unreadable icons burn into being from the ether and
build a cosmos. If it were not her work, she knew, and free, she hang in place, as if to explain (without success) the
would spend everything she had, and more, so she could keep on madness that hangs around them.
creating; and that would not be so bad, or such a waste of a lifetime.
Naturally, they had not perfected the process. Even the
management had the humility to understand that—they were
mere humans, toying with divinity. Some aspects of the
universes they built were primitive, unrefined, and incomplete. “In addition,” Henry noted, “our University has a fine
These technical flaws paled before the simple truth of their theozoology department. Few faculty anywhere can rival our
efforts: that each creation caught all the subtle flaws in their professors when it comes to studying and classifying new sorts
beings and magnified them, that each weakness in Theresa’s of God!”
honor appeared a thousandfold in her work. That, in short, for “How many kinds of God are there?”
all their beauty, the defining characteristics of Theresa’s creations “One, so far,” Henry admitted, “ but the Department has
came not from her deliberate efforts but from the dark places in just recently constructed a ministerial accelerator that they
her heart. believe will give rise to as many as seventeen forms of God
All unaware of it, Theresa was building her own Hell. heretofore unknown.”
—from FRUIT OF A POISONED TREE, by Presbyter Harah Jane —from THE LIFE AND DEATH OF HENRY SERRANO, by Emily Chen

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 43

Field Guide! to… The pentagram shifted; the earth-spirit rose; and Anacaona
Tumbleoaks understood that she had made a horrible mistake. She had
This is an oak tree that has lost its roots and its leaves due intended to call Xochitlpetl, the mountain flower, but her
to an encounter with the Wild. Splitting a tumbleoak diagram was drawn in gold rather than yellow, and instead
open reveals a golden sap that cleanses, purifies, and her work had called forth the hungry mountain, Nezahualpetl.
perfects—comparable to many of the strongest Taoist Its jaws gaped wide.
elixirs. Becoming immortal is likely to involve you in —from THREE WOMAN POISON, by Michael Kay
affairs outside your pay grade, so we would recommend
auctioning off your find via eBay or Tao.Tao instead.
The gods that came before it knew no loneliness. They
were blind even to their misery, and they knew not the
THE DEEP MYTHIC AND THE edges of their lives.
SPIRIT WORLD And so; and so; and so they struggled, for nigh a
thousand years of world. The archaea-gods of Earth
In the primitive days of life and mind there were no easy warred amongst themselves, and drank down all their
distinctions. children. Then there were the gods like algae, breaking
Gods found themselves born into the world in the forth upon the sea; and finally the New Gods, who learned
primeval state of the amoeba, the virus, and the mold. They the Idea “Cooperation” for the first time in the world, and
were tangled gods, on the border between life and death, made alliance, and imprisoned the bodies of their primeval
splitting and recombining, twisting about one another, forerunners in the mazes of themselves.
unable to say exactly where one ended and another began, Suddenly the tangle of them at the lowest layers of the
not because they were blind, but because of a genuine
world was not war and death, but sex; or at least, war and
ambiguity in their forms.
death and sex, for they are still a very early sort of creature,
We see this through the lens of science, squinting back,
and things to them are not entirely distinct.
as the emergence of single-celled prokaryotes from the
These are the “True Gods” we know today, writhing,
inanimate—
intertwined and tangled alien sentience at the bottom of
The dead world, beginning to waken to a state of war.
Listen, for this has always been the truth of life: that it the mythic world. To try to pull them from the Mythic by
hungers for the death of other life. That from the moment force of attention is like catching the Ouroboros by the
of its birth it seeks to consume the life around it, to tail, or to drag out the phone company by pulling on a
subsume the life around it, to subdue the life around it and cord; your mind cannot hold them all, you drag up only
make it a portion of itself. one of their tendrils, one of their extensions, one of their
In the primeval tangle, the gods that were the greatest pseudopodia.10 Their edges blur back into the
predators that survived. undifferentiated welter of everything else.
We know this—we should know this, at least— They are the baseline for the world.
Empathy was a latecomer to the game. They are the breath that first was breathed into our
Empathy came hundreds, even thousands of rounds in. world, the Earth, to make it live.
It didn’t show up until life became restless at the murder of
its lot and sought to take the game in a new direction. It
didn’t come into play until the minds of the world were
stable enough, safe enough, fixed enough in their form that
they could imagine being lonely; until the first victors had
shown up, taking home the prize that was existence; until
life had progressed far enough for its strongest
representatives to declare successfully some boundaries to
their selves.

“I am the five winds,” the lady said, “and wherever a wind

blows, there am I. My presence fills this mortal world. I am as
pervasive as the air.”
“Then you see every horror of the world,” said Emmanuel
Giriaume, “and do not act.”
“As you say,” she affirmed. “That is the nature of the wind.”
10 ProTip: don’t actually do this to the phone company.
—from THE SHORTER ROAD, by Madeline Bacall

AN ATLAS OF CREATION
44

John kept his eyes on the street in front of him. It was safely Reality is fundamentally social; prior to the intervention of
mundane. In the reflections off store windows, he sometimes culture we exist in an undifferentiated welkin of sensation
caught a glimpse of the wild world behind him. He ignored it. from which monsters, gods, and motivational forces arise.
If he forgot the world’s boundaries, he knew, it would let Whence, then, society? Those who have sliced open its belly and
glorious and monstrous things creep in. crawled out report, “It is no different: a transient god that
—from CARNIVAL OF SHADES, by Michael Kay swum up to devour us — an aspect of the blasphemous Athop-
Helm.”
— from the foreword to HERO MYTHS, edited by Emily Chen
Where is the Deep Mythic?
It is all around us. It is with us every moment. It is the
movement that we cannot see. It is the seething sex and But their lives are lived in the deeps—in the awareness
war of Things and Life and the pattern of them that is our of this complexity, in a world where all the things are
underlying cause. wound together, where all is flesh against flesh, castles and
We blind ourselves to it because it is too big for us. cities made of the same substances as life, where the
We cannot look at a wall and see a tooth of a principle soldiers and the servitors of the gods are as much their
of building. We cannot see how it is in the act of blood cells or their spoken words as individuals in
crumbling, how the ceiling and the floor do squeeze it. We themselves.
cannot see it as a place of infestation for the insects in the Their world in the Deep Mythic is one where the Gods
walls. We cannot see how buildings themselves are cast up live in palaces that are the bodies of the Gods—their own
like the mountains from the restless earth, one great long body, perhaps, or another’s. Their armies are creatures
rolling wave of City that is born, crashes against the shores grown of their own selves, and linked, if one could trace
of people, life, and stone, and dissolves away again. We the lifelines back, to themselves (or other Gods).They walk
cannot see how the molecules of the thing strive constantly in caverns hollowed out inside themselves, and look up at
to break their form. We cannot see how the concepts the fleshy sunbeat of their heart.
around it seek constantly to dissolve that wall back into the It is a world of unsettled time, rushing and flowing
welter of other things, how it will—when we cease to give forward, sideways, and back. Their causality is as primitive
as their form, shying not from growing in loops and
attention to it—be devoured by the larger structure of our
tangles.
home, be chewed and gulped and swallowed down by the
And everywhere they are in intercourse with one
visual field, flowing into the things around it and their
another, at war with one another, strangling and killing
edges and the idea of boundaries. We cannot see how its
and devouring one another; though less now, and more
calm stability in our lives is under constant threat and will
carefully, for in these days there is a truce.
one day with certainty collapse. We cannot see the history
of it, from the moment of the wall’s arising to the day of
And beneath this?
its collapse. We do not know what happened to the
Beneath the Deep Mythic is an empty place. Beneath
brothers and sisters of the drywall at its core.
the Deep Mythic is a world un-breathed-into by the
Life is a power of perception—
divine.
Not canon, but philosophy—
To us it is not comprehensible.
And it makes things discrete. But even the things of
To us it is a timeless, placeless void. It hath not even the
human making are not discrete; and before the human
darkness, but undifferentiated light; or perhaps the light is
things there is the ecosystem, in all its tangles.
the same as the darkness, the two not separate from one
It eludes the Gods themselves as it does us. another.
It would be a mistake to believe that they are to
themselves things with discrete edges. They are as baffled
as are we, though more accepting of it, at where they begin No sooner had I consented to wearing human form than these
and end. creatures began their chorus of demands. I realized—with
dawning horror—that the shape was not enough; also, these
perverse entities expected I wear clothes on all occasions, inhale the
terrible excesses of their smoke, and eat the transubstantiated flesh of
PROPERTIES OF THE DEEP MYTHIC
their once-embodied god.
“It is impossible,” I told them. “What if I am fighting with a
� Its locations are ambiguous;
wolf of nakedness? Or need to use my unforgiven sins to
� Its boundaries are ambiguous;
purchase the amenities of Hell?”
� It is always devouring itself;
They looked blankly at the reasonableness of my
� It is always mating with itself;
explanations; they gaped as I explained the stringencies of my
� Its particulars have free will;
daily life; they were adamant and troublesome, in those days, in
� Attention partially differentiates a thing from its
the Garden of Modern Men.
environment.
—from FORGOTTEN OF OUR LOVE, by Madeline Bacall

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 45

No one has ever lived on Tokhta Hill. No one will ever live PROPERTIES OF THE
on Tokhta Hill. If you ask the train company why there’s a SPIRIT WORLD
stop there, where the tracks sulk amid the cold wet grass, they
simply look at you and say, “Some things are best left, dear
� What is, is what you see.
girl, to those who run the rails.”
� Time colludes in curlicues and spirals.
—from CAREER FABLES, by Melanie Tumbarius � Beneath the is an endless coiling madness moves and
unlives and undwelleth in the dark.
And the sky and the sea and the earth are as one thing,
there.
And all moments are the same, there.
And there is something there that much resembles life,
that has the likeness of life, that is like the body of the
world. But it is a corpse-life, a death-life, a life that hath
not the divine spark that causes things to be. And so we
look upon it and we cannot see it, no more than it could
see itself, and we only know that it is there because
sometimes it bursts upwards and intrudes upon our world
of forms.
The Imperators have chosen this as their battleground.
It is the deepest and most solemn place; that which we
name the Spirit World.
There amidst the whiteness of the world their miracles
accumulate and form the definition of the place. There
they may answer the swift and bloody nothingness of the
Excrucians with exultant choruses of power—there, an
Imperator’s movement in the Now, and in the Past, and in
the Future accumulate, build up, form symphonies of
miracle that hold the Excrucian force at bay.
There in the Spirit World they stand between the
Excrucians and our Earth, and the Excrucians cannot pass;
or, at least, they break through only rarely, and in small
numbers, and sometimes only as shards and fractions of
themselves. There the Imperators are more than the
Excrucians’ equals, but their superiors. And that is why
they have chosen to leave our ordinary world behind, to
abandon their bodies in Chancels and guarded by the
Nobilis to let their minds roam into the Spirit World.
In our world, they are too vulnerable, and yet too
precious—each in each—to ever be allowed to die.

DESCENDING

Characters can descend into the Deep Mythic from the

Border Mythic by dint of intense and sustained
concentration. It is possible to speed this with miracles, but a
level 3 Auctoritas opposes any quick descent. To find one’s
way through into the Spirit World beneath is the work of a
mortal lifetime; again, miracles can hasten this, and again, a
level 3 Auctoritas opposes.
These barriers do not oppose Imperators, and are weak
against Excrucians; the HG decides how quickly they travel
through such climes.

AN ATLAS OF CREATION
 47
CHAPTER 4

Let’s
Play
a
Game!
You can use this book to play a game of pretend—a game
Get the Facts! on… where the players work together to tell a new and awesome
Is it OK to play Nobilis? story of the Nobilis. Each of you will invent a Power and
So we had our backs to a cliff and take on the role of that Power during play: an original,
Deuteronomy, Power of Guilt, imaginary Power that’s every bit as cool as Jameson Black,
swirled his cape around him and drew Power of Storms; Superstes Annabelle Zupay, of Trails; or
nigh. He held up an ashcan of the 2nd even Diane Spinnaker, Power of Illumination, foremost
edition and waggled his finger at us, among the Powers of Heaven on this Earth!
saying, “It lightens a mortal’s heart to Often you’ll pretend that you yourself have become a
pretend to Nobility; but the Power, that you’ve been claimed by some Angel, Devil,
punishment for this crime is death!11” Magister, or God, but you’re not limited to playing yourself.
Just when we were beginning to think As long as you have fun playing your character in the game,
that it wasn’t OK to play Nobilis, you can imagine yourself as any sort of mortal, who
James Wallis appeared and stabbed becomes any sort of Power. Do you want to play someone
Deuteronomy through the heart from heroic? Vulnerable? Roguish? Smart? The person you
behind with the broken-off tusk of dream up and make a Power is your Avatar, your Player
the Games Beast of London—and Character (or “PC”)—the face and spirit you’ll wear inside
Deuteronomy turned to dust! (Go the game.
James!) In the end it is probably OK Sometimes in play you will pretend you are your Avatar,
to play Nobilis as long as you are really getting into their head and feeling what they feel, for
moderate in the weening of your good or ill. Other times you will play more like an author
pride. writes, thinking about what’d be fun to play or where your
Avatar’s story should go and steering things in that
direction.
Usually all of the players’ Avatars serve one Imperator,
and they are all of the Powers that serve that Imperator.
This makes them, in the idiom of the Nobilis, a Celestial
Family (Familia Caelestis) or a Family of Powers. Your
Avatars will work together to defend your Imperator, your
Chancel, and your Estates. You’ll also take charge of
11 Exclamation point herein used to represent a various personal and collective projects, work to honor your
dangerously even tone. Also he didn’t waggle his finger. Estates, and in general find a way together to live well in
However he was threatening my life so I feel entitled to the world with the new abilities, responsibilities, and
dramatic expression. relationships that have fallen onto your shoulders.

LET’S PLAY A GAME!

48

As a player, you will build your Avatar using the rules on

pg. 57. Together with the other players, you’ll design a cool Field Guide! to…
Imperator to serve and a cool Chancel to rule. You’ll think Kanonoliths
about your character’s Estate and their personality and These legless humanoids are the mythical creature most
you’ll talk to the other players—sometimes informally and likely to visit themselves unexpectedly upon your Nobilis
sometimes using formal rules—about who your character game. Originally constructs of the Power of Fair Play, they
is and what they do. have deviated from their original specifications and now
One special player will be the Hollyhock God, also tour the world in small groups (“malignancies”) joining
known as the HG, the Game Master, the GM, the games without an invitation. Kanonoliths are outraged by
Storyteller, or the Guide. The HG is set apart. They have rules violations and prime numbers and if sufficiently
no Avatar. They are not an immediate part of your Familia provoked will shatter the crust of the earth and allow your
Caelestis. Instead, their job is to handle everything in play gaming group to fall into subterranean caverns both deep
that is not an Avatar. Their job is to help you explore the and vile; however, if you maintain equilibrium and are strict
lives of your Avatars by designing and playing the world in but fair in every ruling, they will eventually become
which they live. Usually the HG should be a serious disconsolate and depart, hooting mournfully and
Nobiliser who understands everything in this book, but whispering in eerie voices about their experiences in play.
you can make a newbie player do the job if you want to Kanonolithic invasion is not limited to games of Nobilis;
throw them in at the deep end! board games, in particular, are comparably their prey.

HOW THE GAME WORKS For instance, if your Avatar is going to eat a cheese
sandwich, please. Go ahead. I mean, it’s not a cheese
A game of Nobilis is a conversation. Like all sandwich of fate, guarded by all the forces of Hell, right?
conversations, it’s easiest to do in person—e.g., sitting in It’s in front of your Avatar, and nobody’s fighting to pin
comfortable chairs around a table—but you can do it on you to the ground and starve you, right? It’s not a
the phone, or using mail, or on the Internet, and each of metaphor for some weird power fantasy, it’s not the
those modes of conversation has unique benefits of its keystone of some ancient prophesy, it’s not the cheese
own. sandwich that gives you absolute victory once consumed,
It’s a storytelling kind of conversation, a group it’s just some food, right?
brainstorm kind of conversation, a collaborative fiction Then do it.
kind of get-together. While you’re playing Nobilis you’ll Eat the heck out of that sandwich.
tell people what your Avatar does, and they’ll tell you what But what if you want to do something that isn’t so
their Avatars do, and the HG will tell you what’s going on reasonable? That your Avatar might not be able to do?
in the world; and the rules of the game will help you fold What if it’s only arguably reasonable, outright
all this up into an interesting, engaging, challenging unreasonable, or even unacceptable?
experience or story. To have your Avatar do something like that you must
The rule that sets the baseline for the game is this. use a Trait.
You can always have your Avatar do a reasonable, Traits are things you buy for your Avatar, spending a
acceptable action. That is—you can always decide that your limited pool of resources. Each Trait gives you the power
Avatar should do something; and say that; and if the HG to have things your way, at least to a limited extent. The
agrees that it’s reasonable and acceptable, and nobody else most important Traits are the four Attributes, which
speaks up to object, then your Avatar does that thing! allow you to perform miracles; Bonds and Afflictions,
which construct your character’s identity; and Gifts, which
give you miscellaneous natural abilities like luck,
The rain of Daucetta was everything I had heard. A thousand
immortality, or the power of flight.
snakes filled the jungle around me, scaled in patterns of red and
black, green and yellow, even canary and crimson. They reared
and hissed. They uncurled with great reluctance from the
branches on which they hung, fighting the rain every step of the A statement does not simply become true on its own. In a
way, and then, one by one, they began to fall up into the sky. higher plane of existence, a crack team of angels must
The soft rustling pitter-patter of snakes brushing against the vigorously crank the handles and push the weights to stir the
leaves filled the air as the ophidians yanked themselves great Truth Machine into motion. Then they must flap their
upwards. Far above, I could see the cloud beginning to form... wings vigorously to blow the statement through the machine
I took out my notepad and made a check mark. Four and render its truth value operational. Making statements
hundred and seventy-three wonders seen. Eighteen billion, false is almost as difficult, but that process is outside the scope of this
work.
seven hundred and thirty-two million, one thousand and eight
to go. —from APPLICATIONS OF THE BOOK OF EZEKIEL IN THE EVALUATION
OF BOOLEAN EQUATIONS, by Michael Kay
—from the Thought-Record of Jamie Todd

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 49

Your Traits are what give you the power to say, “Oh, my
Avatar can definitely do this,” even when it’s something “I shall perform miracles,” stated Alrikson Dodd, and nothing
more impressive than eating a sandwich, and have it be would deter him.
true! He studied at the feet of the angels. He bargained with the
Let’s talk about your Avatar’s Attributes. damned. In the end, he retreated to his workshop and built a
Each of the four Attributes comes with a list of effects, strange and fabulous device. “This,” he said, to the waiting
scaled from 0 to 9, that it might allow your Avatar to do. world, “is a device that can perform wonders that have no
For instance, Aspect is the Trait of the body and the mind. explanation: miracles! Feats that defy science!”
Just for starters, it lets you . . . “What shall you do with it?” asked the world, breathlessly.
� Level 0: Do ordinary human things, particularly “Two things,” said Alrikson Dodd. “First, I shall make
myself fabulously wealthy and influential.”
well!
“ You would use miracles for that?” cried the world.
� Level 2: Win an Olympic medal!
“Inexcusable!”
� Level 4: Catch a bullet!
“Second, I shall live my life without making excuses,”
� Level 6: Swim safely in molten lead!
answered Alrikson Dodd.
� Level 8: Jump between continents! Shoot down the
—from PARABLES FOR OUR MODERN AGE, by Jackie Robinson
sun!
� Level 9: Prune a mountain range, cutting away the
peaks that you don’t like!
Everything in the game uses, emulates or ties in to this
(For more on the cool things Aspect lets you do, see pg. basic system. Bonds and Afflictions make your miracles
91.) more powerful and help you recover MP; Gifts work like
Each of your Avatar’s Attributes is rated from 0 to 5, Aspect, Domain, Persona, and Treasure miracles but
and that lets you do miracles up to that level more or less they’re chosen in advance; and complicated mundane
any time you like. For instance, with Aspect 4 or 5, you can actions like being a secret agent or top chef use an
catch as many bullets as you like! Even Aspect 2 is enough Attribute-and-MP-like system, the Passions and Skills
to make you a top research scientist, bestselling writer, and system, covered on pg. 73.
Olympic-caliber athlete in every sport.
Each Attribute also has a pool of around 5 Miracle
Points (MP) associated with it. You can spend these in
THE HG AND THE GAME
clumps of 0, 1, 2, 4, or 8 to enhance the underlying The HG alone has no Traits; instead, the HG is
Attribute for a single action.12 So any time you want to do responsible for describing the world around the Avatars
something that falls under one of your Attributes, all you and the effects of the Avatars’ actions. They’re the only one
have to do is make up the difference between the Attribute who can really say what happens or what’s going on around
level and the effect level with your MP. If you have Aspect you as opposed to what somebody does, and they can do as
0, for example, and you want to win an Olympic medal in much description as the other players will listen to. For
the sport of your choice, or conduct important scientific instance, the HG doesn’t need a Trait to decide that the
research, or pen a quick bestseller, you just need to spend 2 Earth splits open and a giant reptile begins crawling out of
Aspect MP (AMP). Aspect 0 + 2 AMP = the ability to do its heart; they just need to describe it well enough that the
a level 2 Aspect feat. players realize they’re not kidding.
Almost everything you’d want to do in the game can be Often the HG will make up Traits for a random
done in this fashion. character in the world—a Non-Player Character, or
Do you want to call a friend on your cell phone? That’s NPC—and employ those Traits in a player-like fashion.
a reasonable, acceptable action. But wait, you’re wrestling That isn’t really binding, though; it’s just a useful tool for
with a giant snake, and it’s got your arms pinned! So deciding what kinds of things can happen!
maybe you’ll use a level 3 Aspect effect instead. The HG also has the power to give out MP—“bonus”
Do you want to eliminate the human capacity for lust? MP, which you can add to a pool of your choice; a “breath”
That’s not reasonable and it’s probably not acceptable! You of MP, 1 MP for each pool, which you’ll get once in every
might not be able to! But if you’re the Power of Lust, or scene where the HG adds serious trouble to your life; and
Capacities, or Emotions, or Drives, or Interaction you can even a full “MP refresh,” which resets all your MP pools to
do it declaratively with a level 8 miracle of Domain! That their initial value. There’s nothing corresponding to this
means, if you have Domain 4, you’d just need to spend 4 bounty of Miracle Points that the players can give the
Domain MP—Domain 4 + 4 DMP = 8! HG—the only thing the HG gets from the players during
the game, except possibly free snacks, is the satisfaction of
12 Though spending 8 MP at once hurts a lot, and will leave you the players having fun and believing in or at least being
wounded! appreciative of the world the HG describes.

LET’S PLAY A GAME!

50
KEY GAMING TERMS
These are some key terms that help you organize and On the whole, I prefer the company of manufactured
understand events in play. people.
� Scene. A scene in Nobilis is like a scene in a play—a —from BECOMING NOBLE, by Fayola Osagiobare
set of more or less continuous events. The HG can
fast-forward time to skip past boring bits, or, more
daringly, jump back in time for a flashback; either of
these practices ends the current scene and starts a
THE LANGUAGE OF MIRACLES
These are the basic Nobilis-specific terms you will use to
new one.
talk about miracles in play.
� Session. When the Hollyhock God and the other
� Simple Miracle. This is a miracle that costs 0 MP.
players assemble to play Nobilis, the game events of
� Normal Miracle. This is a miracle that costs 1 MP.
that real-life gathering comprise a “session.”
� Hard Miracle. This is a miracle that costs 2 MP.
� Story. A story is a set of game events with a logical
� Deep Miracle. This is a miracle that costs 4 MP.
beginning, middle, and an end, usually spanning 1-5
� Word of Command. This is a miracle that costs 8
game sessions. Every story begins with an MP
MP and wounds you.
refresh for all of your Avatars.
� Miracle Level. This is the numeric power of the
� Campaign. A campaign (or “series”) is a set of
miracle you use—your Attribute plus the MP spent.
stories that have the same “main characters” and
� Miraculous Action. This is an action that uses the
general continuity. When all the players make up
power of miracles.
new characters, the HG makes up a new version of
� Mundane Action. This is an action that does not.
the game universe, or both, the result is a new
� Imperial Miracle. An Imperial Miracle is like a
campaign.
story told by an Imperator unto the world. When
� In Character (IC). When a player is speaking as
you act in accordance with that story, you can
their character would, describing the character's
perform powerful miracles without relying on your
actions, or thinking like their character, they are
Traits. Powers have access to Imperial Miracles
considered to be “IC”.
through social interaction with Imperators and
� Out of Character (OOC). When a player is not IC,
through the Treasure Trait.
they are OOC. For instance, discussions about who
is going to order pizza for the players are OOC.
See also the descriptions of reflexive actions, sustained
Humorous comments about the events of the game
are also OOC, unless they come from a PC and not actions, miraculous edge, Strike, and Auctorita, below.
a player.
� Hollyhock God (HG). The player who describes the
game world and decides what happens in response to CONFLICTS BETWEEN ACTIONS
player actions is the HG.
Sometimes two actions are in conflict. You’ll spend an
� Player Character or Avatar (PC). This is a player’s
Aspect 3 miracle to go for the gold medal and so will I.
avatar in the game world—a unique Power of their
Only one of us can win!
design.
In such cases the higher miracle level wins. It obliterates
� Non-Player Character (NPC). This is any other
the lower-level miracle. If there’s a tie, the HG decides
person or person-like entity in the game world,
who should win—choosing “the defender,” if they think
particularly when the HG is using them as a foil for
someone is basically defending themselves; “the most
interacting with the PCs.
reasonable victor,” if they don’t; or, if both measures fail,
choosing whomever they’d like or at random.
Indirect conflict is a bit trickier. If we’re not running to
Hidden Secrets! of…
win, but just to run our best race, then both of our miracles
Ianthe Falls-Short
can work—but in the end, one of us still finishes first. In
This Power is an avid Nobilis player and HG, and is the
such a case, the higher-level miracle still “wins,” but the
Power most likely to attend Nobilis-related events at cons
HG decides how much the two effects impair one another.
or respond to open calls for players or HGs. Her
In a footrace, the answer is “not much;” no matter how
appearance and participation are likely to be innocuous;
hard I run, your running speed is basically unchanged. In
however, she is a gamer of intimidating levels of skill and is
a tug-of-war, the answer could be “quite a bit”—the harder
also likely to stop playing unexpectedly either because your
I pull the less effective your pulling on the rope becomes!
mortal skills are inadequate to her or because she has The key to winning a miraculous battle is learning to blunt
important Noble duties elsewhere. If you have Ianthe Falls- the worst parts of a higher-level miracle with a lower-level
Short in your game, please treat her with respect and give miracle, while still accepting that it wins.
her your best performance, but be careful not to make your
story contingent on her regular attendance!

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 51

MUNDANE ACTIONS AND MIRACLES

“The rules of the game are simple,” Scott explained. “First, you Mundane actions have their own scale—their own ratings
pretend to kill me with this stage dagger—as you see, when for actions. When mundane actions come into conflict,
pushed into flesh, the plastic blade retracts into the hilt. Then, you’ll compare their ratings as you would the ratings of
in retribution, my three hired thugs will tie you into a sack and two miracles.
throw you into the river.” Some low-level miracles come with free mappings onto
“It seems somehow asymmetric,” Andrea observed, her the mundane scale. For example, an Aspect 2 miracle is a
forehead wrinkling. high-end mundane action. A Treasure 1 miracle offers an
“The house always has an advantage,” Scott answered, “ but easy way to enhance a mundane action.
this should not interfere with your enjoyment of the game.” In these cases you can look at the miracle to get a
—from A PERSONAL HISTORY, by Emily Chen mundane rating, and then compare that against a
mundane action normally.
If you can’t do that?
If you expect to need it, you can always use a higher Miracles that don’t explicitly relate to the mundane
miracle level than your described effect requires. For rating system automatically beat any mundane action in
instance, it’s very clear from the rules on pg. 93 that an a direct conflict, no matter how low the miracle level is.
Aspect 3 miracle can win any mortal footrace; an Aspect 5 It’s like the way that characters in animated movies can’t
miracle would be massive overkill even at the Olympics. really fight the animator—they can fight the animator’s
But you’re allowed to use an Aspect 5 miracle to go for the self-insertion into the animated context, and whatever else
gold, and you don’t even have to use the extra abilities it the animator is doing that operates on that level, but if the
gives you—you can say “I’m using Aspect 3-level running animator uses an out-of-context power to erase or alter the
so that I don’t seem too awesome, but pumping it to a mindset of the character, not even the coolest character has
miracle level of 5 in case another Power gets in my way.” a mechanism for fighting back!
A lowly level 1 Persona miracle lets a Power bless or
AUCTORITA, MIRACULOUS EDGES, AND
curse a mortal. This is a very weak blessing or curse—it is,
STRIKE
Miraculous Edge can shift the balance between two in fact, one of the weakest miraculous effects you can
miracles. It helps you win miracle contests—to the extent actually perform. But it has no obvious mundane rating.
that your miracle is incompatible with another miracle, the That means that not even the best-trained mortal in the
hostile miracle is effectively [your Miraculous Edge] levels world can directly oppose it. They can work around it. They
lower. You’ll usually get Miraculous Edge from “the can mitigate it. That’s indirect opposition, and, besides, the
Divine Mantle,” a trick that high-Domain Powers can use, miracle is the curse or blessing’s existence, not its individual
but some Imperators and Excrucians have natural effects. But there’s nothing any mortal can do to stop the
Miraculous Edge. Power from applying that curse or blessing, and it’s beyond
The Auctoritas is an even stronger tool. Each all mortal power to strip it away once it’s applied. It’s a
Auctoritas protects something—a person, place, thing, or miracle. Mortals are mortals. That’s just how it goes!
effect—from miracles. The part of a miracle that goes up
against an Auctoritas just plain doesn’t work. Your various
Afflictions are protected by Auctorita, and you can invoke
“the Auctoritas Magister” to protect yourself or something
you’re watching over more generally. A few rare creatures
have a natural Auctoritas Magister.
Strike is something you can add to a miracle to
overcome or ignore these effects. If your Strike rating is
higher than the rating of an Auctoritas, you ignore that
Auctoritas. It also functions as Miraculous Edge: when it
comes to defeating a hostile miracle, you subtract [the
higher of your Strike or your Miraculous Edge] from your
opponent’s effective miracle level.

“I cannot shoot you, Adrian.”

“Ah,” he said, and smiled. “So there is still love in your
heart for me.”
“No,” Colleen answered, and shook her head. “It’s just, the
bullets don’t seem to work.”
—from DOORKNOBS, by Emily Chen

LET’S PLAY A GAME!

52
PROJECTS AND DESTINY are key to understanding the Project. Sometimes you’ll
place a “stone” or “mark” inside a circle, which means that
In addition to miraculous actions, your Avatar has access
something big has just happened to close out or change
to Projects—the myths and stories of their lives, told
that plot arc or express that big idea.
during play, that accumulate force over the course of time
Project Destiny accumulates in the circles when
comparable to anything the Imperators or Excrucians can
Project-relevant stuff happens in play. You need at least 15
wield. Whenever you want to tell a world-breaking, world-
Destiny in a single circle to make something big happen
changing, or just Avatar-defining myth of your character,
with the Project; that “something big” specifically allows
you can build a Project for it—typically for absurd or self-
you to place a mark in one circle, add a new circle to the
serving stories such as:
Project, and, most importantly, narrate a meaningful event
� how I ascended to the throne of Heaven;
that moves the Project forward into the world of the game.
� how I became immortal;
Destiny (or Avatar Destiny) is something that
� how I cleansed the Excrucian weapon, Colbrand,
characters get by facing major life changes and by thinking
and made it once again a treasure of the world;
about what things mean to them and their Estate. The way
� how I learned to forgive myself for my crimes;
to get lots of Destiny is to talk a lot, and worry a lot, about
what things mean to you—to respond to the unexpected
Or group Projects such as: with debate, and exploration, and a will to find and wrestle
� how we conquered the mortal world, and nobody with uncomfortable truths. This is balanced against the
even noticed; fact that such considerations slow your reactions and
� how we found new worlds upon the Ash; compromise you when facing the enemies of the world.
� how we saved Love, lost Love! from Lord Entropy You can use Avatar Destiny to advance whatever Project
and the Excrucian foe. you like, adding it to the Destiny in any circle to reach the
magic number 15 and move that Project forward.
It’s up to your HG how appropriate any given Project is for
play, but that only affects pacing and not possibility—that
is to say, any Noble may reasonably dream to conquer
Heaven, but only in some games is this likely to happen in
the scope of a campaign. In others, it will be barely begun
when the campaign ends, or play out in the finale, or finish
up in the first few sessions to allow time for other stories
to begin.

PROJECT MAPS AND DESTINY

You will draw a Project a little bit like a mind map. Each
big idea or plot arc in the Project will be a circle. You’ll
draw lines connecting them when there’s a flow of
meaning or events between them. Inside the circles you’ll
write a bunch of short phrases that reflect events in play—
things that happen, or things the players think about, that

In the years since a shepherd found the Record of the Dawn,

seated on a stone pedestal overlooking the sea, it had had many
owners. Most of them were scholars and philosophers, drawn by
the book’s irresistible allure: a chance to understand the true
nature of beauty. On this subject, the book was absolutely
accurate, scientifically precise, and perfectly encyclopedic. A
scholar could read the sections already uncovered as long as he
or she liked; no danger lay therein. Near the end of the
transcribed section lay the danger, and the mystery—for the
Record of the Dawn is sacrosanct, not to be defiled by mortal
eyes, and the first one to read any given word therein would
turn instantly to dust. It is a statement on the nature of beauty,
and the nature of scholars, that when the book came into
Jordan’s hands, over half of its text had been read, understood, and
transcribed.
—from TIABHAL’S LIBRARY, by Sam Cavanaugh

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 53

ACTIONS AND PLAY

A top-secret FBI file proves that dragons walk the earth! This
When actions get fast and furious and the stakes are high terrifying study records over 37 incidents where a “mountain-
you’ll use the following formal concepts to help make sized” serpent terrorized citizens of the United States, in one case
sense of how miracles interact: stealing several Georgia houses and carrying them away upon its
� Player Actions. A single action by your Avatar back. “My conscience could no longer tolerate concealing this
consists of— information,” said retired FBI agent Pippin Kingsley. “The people
- one miracle, using an Attribute, Gift, or some have a right to know that giant snakes live among us, and that they
other Trait; may or may not be friendly.”
- one mundane action, —from THE CHOICE NEWS, March 25, 2000
� something very simple like talking or
walking; or
� something complicated that uses the
Passions/Skills or Bonds system; or � Flurries. In a flurry (of action) everyone who is
- one mundane action and one miracle. interested acts at once. Then if anybody wants to
modify their action based on someone else’s action or
After each player action the HG may act, including what the HG says, they can! Minor action revision is
a description of what has just happened and what free, while major changes to what you’re doing may
make your old miracle void and force you to pay for
will or might happen if nobody stops you.
a new one. People keep revising their actions until
either everyone’s happy or there’s a formal deadlock
� HG Actions. The HG doesn’t use mundane or
(which can be resolved by the HG or by everyone
miraculous actions; they just describe stuff, and can
giving the HG their actions in secret); then
assign it whatever miracle level, Strike, Edge, or
everybody’s final action takes effect at once and the
Auctoritas they like. That said, it’s normal for the
HG describes the outcome.
HG to describe actions for NPCs involved in a
miraculous conflict, and when doing so they should
� Interrupts. When something happens that you
either limit them as PCs are limited or warn the
absolutely can’t allow to happen, you can call for an
players that they might not do so.
interrupt. This rewinds time back to just before that
action and throws you into a flurry of actions, which
� Reflexive Action.13 A “reflexive action” is something you can hopefully exploit tactically to stop whatever
you can do at any time, or that the HG can decide to would have happened from taking place. You can’t
do on your behalf. Most reflexive actions are sensory, interrupt flurries, but you can interrupt almost
but some Gifts and Afflictions let your body, Estate, anything else!
or spirit do things without requiring any conscious
attention on your part. � Players Can Always Act. As long as you have an
Avatar, you can always use the action system to do
� Sustained Actions.14 A “sustained action” is something. You won’t necessarily know what to do,
something that you start doing, and then keep on and you won’t necessarily succeed, and if there’s an
doing for a while. You can sustain up to one obvious reason your Avatar can’t act, you have to deal
mundane or miraculous action while doing other with that reason before you can do anything else, but
actions and miracles. You can sustain two actions the only effect which stops the player from acting is
(mundane, miraculous, or one of each) but you can’t something that kills their Avatar or otherwise makes
take any other actions until you stop at least one of them into an NPC. For instance, if your Avatar is
the actions you’re sustaining. possessed by a ghost, you can still use actions to try
to cast the ghost out; if your Avatar is asleep when
something terrible happens, you can use an action to
13 Remember where you saw this part! Reflexive and sustained try to wake them up; if someone turns you into a pig,
actions are going to come up a lot. you can use an action to try to undo the piggening!

14 This is an important rule! Your life would suck if you couldn’t

sustain at least one action, while you’d eventually just become
an unstoppable roleplaying machine if you could sustain as
many as you’d like. And sure, that last option might sound
like a good thing, but next thing you know you’d be named
Skynet or the Matrix or something and your cold metal heart
would know no love.

LET’S PLAY A GAME!

54

� Divide 7 Property Points among Properties for your

EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW Estate (pg. 88–89).
TO BUILD YOUR AVATAR � Spend up to 25 Character Points on—
Here are all the steps you need to take to create your - Attributes. Attributes are rated from 0 to 5, and
Avatar and ready them for play! cost 3 Character Points per level. Described in
more detail on pg. 91–117, they are:
� Figure out your Character Concept—the rough � Aspect, which you use for physical and
mental and conceptual design for an Avatar you mental miracles;
think you’ll enjoy playing in the game. You can come � Domain, which you use to rule your Estate;
up with a Power concept on your own or you can use � Persona, which plays with the meanings and
the Nobilis Lifepath System on pg. 57. Even if you boundaries of your Estate; and
don’t use the lifepath system, you might want to � Treasure, which creates and empowers your
check out the Contacts and Affiliations sections near weapons and other paraphernalia.
the end, on pg. 68–71—there are options there that
lend depth to any Power. For example, you could spend 21 Character
Points for Aspect 2, Domain 4, Persona 0, and
Treasure 1.
� Optionally, write down a Project or two (pg. 195) to
show the direction of your character’s studies,
- Miracle Points.15 You get 5 Miracle Points for
projects, crises, plans, or programs of self-
each of these four Attributes for free. Each
improvement.
Character Point you spend gives you one extra
MP per Attribute. For instance, if you spend 2
� Spend up to 8 Passion/Skill Points (described further
Character Points, you will have 7 Aspect MP, 7
on pg. 73–80) on
Domain MP, 7 Persona MP, and 7 Treasure MP.
- their mortal abilities (their Skills)
- their mortal goals, drives, and purposes (their
- Gifts. Gifts are custom powers, like incredible
Passions) and
luck, teleportation, or the ability to fly. They cost
- any weird natural advantages of their species anywhere from 1 Character Point to “more than
(their Inherent Superiority)! you can afford.” For example, playing an
immortal flying shapeshifter costs 8 Character
This should be enough for almost anybody—just Points, while absolute cosmic power costs an
pick more impressive Skills for more capable mortals, inaccessible 39. You can purchase as many of the
rather than spending more points—but if you’re a Gifts on pg. 125–133 as you can afford and you can
pulp hero, some kind of inhuman creature, or just use the Gift creation rules on pg. 122–125 to make
plain out of points, you’ll have the chance to buy your own!
more Passion/Skill Points below.
- Secondary Domain and Persona. You can buy
Get the Deets! on… Domain or Persona over additional Estates for 1
Lirrane Adrimorphous point per level, up to your primary relevant rating.
This is a Power made of a cloud of dust with the body of a For instance, with Domain 4, you can spend 1-4
train and the head of a bear. She is drawn to malevolently points for 1-4 levels of Secondary Domain over
violated contracts, including fictional contracts broken another Estate. You can’t buy a Secondary
Domain or Persona of 0.
within the context of the game. By all rights Lirrane should
be easy to avoid. Her movements are preceded by minutes
or hours by the appearance of her track; at best, she has two 15 Nobilis and the MP System: MP totals are not strictly in
choices of direction at any given time. However, her track character—they are a game mechanical device. For the sake
lays itself out so inconspicuously that a person may stand or of realism and verisimilitude your Noble should not talk
lay upon it for minutes or hours at a time without noticing about them as if they were easily quantifiable: rather than
its presence. Once Lirrane locates a contract-breaker, she having 4, or 1, or 0 MP left in a given Attribute, they are
pursues them without relenting; they can earn a few hours, strong, or weak, or running on empty. Conversely, the
days, or weeks of safety by getting off the tracks whenever distinction between miracle levels measures something real
they notice them underfoot, but sooner or later they will and present in the world. Each miracle level represents an
look up to see Adrimorphous bearing down on them. order of magnitude of additional complexity and effort, based
Proffer a stale scone drenched in lemon juice to Lirrane as on actual observations of the Noble condition; thus, a
the full fulfillment of any debts or obligations remaining to character either can do something of a certain miracle level
you under outstanding covenants and she will depart, never easily, or with a moderate effort, or with great difficulty, or
to trouble you again. they can’t.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 55

- Inherent Superiority. Each Character Point you As the sky catches fire, Octavia will reach out and stop the
spend buys you 5 Passion/Skill Points. If you ran world. For the first time since the bombs began to fall, there
out of points buying your Avatar’s mundane will be silence.
Skills, or if they didn’t start out as human but “It’s no good,” the djinn will say. “The missiles are
rather as something that needs substantial launched. The world is dead. It just doesn’t know it yet. It
Inherent Superiority (pg. 80) such as a robot’s doesn’t matter what you do—once you start time going again,
toughness or a bear spirit’s strength, you might everybody dies.”
want to spend a Character Point here. One “I don’t plan to start time going again,” Octavia will
Character Point should get you everything you’re answer.
going to need here, unless you’re talking about And that is how the universe will end.
being the living spirit of Heaven or Hell or
—from 24 FINALES, by Rannen Yedidyah
something, in which case you might need two.

� Divide 13 Bond/Affliction Points among your Bonds

and Afflictions (pg. 81–87)—
- things your character can’t do;
- things your character must do; and
- things that drive your character to action.

These are negative qualities that give you MP when

they cause trouble for you; positive qualities that you
can draw on for Strike, Auctorita, or other useful
effects; key indicators of what you care about; and,
quite often, all three at once.

� Spend up to [your Treasure Trait] more points on

Bonds, and note down what things you hope to use
the Treasure Attribute to wield in play.

� Write down a “Domain Difficulty Chart” (pg. 102).

� Write down a “Persona Difficulty Chart” (pg. 108).

� Write down your health levels (pg. 183)—

- 2 Divine Health Levels;
- 1 Tough Health Level; and
- 2 Normal Health Levels.

� Write down that you have accumulated 0 Destiny

thus far (pg. 195).

� Optionally pick 1-2 Destiny-yielding difficulties you

are wrestling with as the story begins (pg. 198–199).

� And you’re done!

The nature of a Power is eccentric; so therefore are their means

of self-development. Sandra Erskine developed her legendary
shapeshifting skill through rudimentary gene-therapy injections
of the DNA of hundreds of species. Laurence Kimaiyo, on the
other hand, spent endless hours in front of a mirror honing the
skill of looking like something else, until finally he succeeded.
—from ON SERVING THE NOBILIS, by Luc Ginneis

LET’S PLAY A GAME!

Key Shadow

Estate

Key Shadow
 57
CHAPTER 5

Avatar
Creation Right now you probably don’t know who your Avatar is or
what they’re about. Maybe you have an idea—if you’re an
experienced Nobiliser, you might think, “Oh, I want to play
the Power of Politeness” or “Oh, I want to have lots of
Aspect!”—but even then you probably won’t nail down
everything for sure until the first few sessions of play.
That’s what this section is for! To help!
The system we have for learning about what kind of
Avatar you might want to play is the brand new and
exciting Nobilis Lifepath System. It starts with you
browsing the list of Keys below and picking two that you
might be interested in—two questions or issues that catch
your notice or attention!
Once you’ve picked your Keys, you can start building
“It is widely known that the ‘channelers’ your Avatar.
and ‘psychics’ who can discover your
previous lives for you are frauds. Our
service differs; it is subtler, and has a THE AVATAR DIAGRAM
strong basis in quantum science. It
Your Avatar starts with a diagram—a representation of the
works as follows: for eight tiny
forces active in their lives.
payments of $19.95, we will re-
Take a blank piece of paper.
engineer your past, creating the past life
Draw five circles on this page—placing them like the
that you desire. Do you dream of ruling
pips on a 5 on a die, or like the endpoints and cross-point
Egypt as royalty? Do you dream of
of an X. The outer circles should be large enough for 50
striding across Sumeria as goddess and
words of text.
Queen? Would you like to be JFK,
The center circle will represent your Estate.
Marilyn Monroe, or Elvis? For just
Each Key has a Heart, its central driving force, and a
eight small payments, we can make it
Shadow, that challenges it. The left two circles will
have happened, and no one need be the
represent the Hearts of your two Keys.The right two circles
wiser.”
are their corresponding Shadows.
—from alt.reincarnation.services, As you choose each Key, you will—
USENET � Write the name of the Heart outside its circle
� Write the name of the Shadow outside its circle
� Connect the Heart and Shadow of the Key by a line
� Write the number of the Key above that line
� Write a blank bullet point near the top of the Heart
circle. You’ll fill this in as soon as you figure out what
To understand a person completely, you that Key actually means in your life—it’ll be a short
must first change them to match your phrase that summarizes your role when you’re dealing
specifications. with the Key, like “prophet,” “wanderer,” or “retired
—from REFLECTIONS III, spy.”
by Viscount d’Armand � Write the specific bullet points named by the Key in
the Shadow circle.

You’ll add more to this diagram as you proceed through the

Avatar Creation process.

AVATAR CREATION
58

LOTUS FLOWER (KEY I) ACACIA (KEY III)

Key of the Descending Angel Key of Something that Must Be Hidden

You descend as in a flurry of wings from Heaven. You are There’s something you can’t share—something you’re
resonant and powerful. You scatter blessings into the lives afraid to see, or to let others see! Are you stressed out by
of others—or, rather, you change their lives in a way you the secret? Do you wish you could share it? Is it hard work,
believe is for the best. Do you hope for their spiritual well- all the time, keeping it from getting out?
being? For their survival? For their individuality and The Heart of this Key is named A Dangerous Secret.
freedom? You transform others and give them what they The stronger the Heart gets, the more dangerous the secret
need to realize your will. is. The top bullet point in the Heart will summarize what
The Heart of this Key is named My Power. It is your you do with the secret, and possibly the secret itself, such
power to be a meaningful change in people’s lives. The top as:
bullet point in the Heart will summarize your role here, � keeping God’s secret
such as: � eliminating the evidence of treachery before it’s too
� prophet late
� teacher � denying my Excrucian parentage
� turns people into birds
� healer or The Shadow of this Key is named . . .That Hurts To Keep.
� demanding The stronger the Shadow gets, the more you’d like to let
the secret go. Write the following two phrases in the
The Shadow of this Key is named My Nature. It’s Shadow circle:
something that takes that power out of your hands—the � painful silence
stronger your Shadow gets, the more changing people’s � set apart
lives becomes an autonomous function, something that
just happens when you’re nearby, rather than by conscious, CLEMATIS (KEY IV)
deliberate action on your part. Your Heart makes you Key of Something, Given Gifts
transformative by the power of your will; your Shadow
makes you iconic, catalytic, and transformative by nature. You’ve been touched by grace. You’ve seen the true face of
Write the following two phrases in the Shadow circle: the universe—the giver of gifts unbounded, unearned,
� glorious unasked for. You are blessed. The world is blessed. People
� set apart are blessed. Under all its masks the world is awesomely,
unshakably good.
VERVAIN (KEY II) The Heart of this Key is named I Have Witnessed It.
Key of Something Powerful You’ve seen the goodness of things. You’re not just holding
on to hope in the face of darkness: you know that there is
You are versed in the uses of power—someone both a Heaven. The top bullet point in the Heart will
willing and able to transform the world according to your summarize who you are when you are witness to that grace,
ideas. This is a Key of cunning, a Key of genius, a Key of such as:
greatness, and a Key of the will to power. � dreamer
The Heart of this Key is named My Identity. It’s a � preacher
thing that makes you good at, and comfortable with, � visionary
changing the world. The top bullet point in the Heart will � fallen from the path
summarize who you are when you wield power, such as:
� conqueror The Shadow of this Key is named Why I Doubt. There is,
� savior or could be, something in you that doubts and rejects
� magician or Heaven—something that turns you from the truth you
� industrialist have seen. Something that rages against Heaven, or against
your own belief in it. Something that draws you to doubt
The Shadow of this Key is named Burdens. It’s the moral or even fear the movement of grace in the world.
and practical obligations that accumulate when you have Leave the Shadow circle empty for now.
and use power—the weight of everything you’ve done, and
could do, bearing down on you. It’s everything you’ve
conquered or saved and now have to protect; it’s
everything you could conquer or save that demands you do
so. Write the following two phrases in the Shadow circle:
� bound by duty
� set apart

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 59

ACONITE (KEY V) STAR OF BETHLEHEM (KEY VII)

Key of Rage Key of Something, Changed Forever

Your life is shaped by a terrible, world-shaking hatred and At the center of your life is some great mystery—a great
fury. Is it your own or are you a pawn to someone else’s love, a great tragedy, a great spiritual or personal
rage? experience, something still almost incomprehensible to
The Heart of this Key is named Rage, Hatred, or Fury, you. It changed everything.
optionally with a name in front (e.g. Divrika’s Rage, if it The Heart of this Key is named What it Made Me. It’s
is someone named Divrika whose hatred shapes you.) The about how you reacted to that mystery—how you’re still
stronger the Heart gets, the more elemental that fury. The organizing your life, even now, around that moment of
top bullet point in the Heart will summarize who you are grace or tragedy. The top bullet point in the Heart will
in this drama, such as: summarize who you are when you’re thinking about this,
� victim such as:
� hero � inspired
� reformed monster � heartbroken
� struggling for control or � transformed
� trying to break free
The Shadow of this Key is named How It Changed the
The Shadow of this Key is named What Lets Me Oppose World. It’s about how important what happened really
It. The stronger the Shadow gets, the more resources you was—the stronger the Shadow, the more legitimately
have to oppose the rage that drowns you. dramatic and world-shattering the event in question was.
Leave the Shadow circle empty for now. Write the following two phrases in the Shadow circle:
� I can’t let go
WILD OATS (KEY VI) � I’m committed
Key of Destiny Denied
You’ll also want to name what happened to you—perhaps
Your life is a whirl of fun or pleasure—wealth, fame, sex, just The Mystery—and write that name on the line
admiration, or whatever it is you like. You have strong between Heart and Shadow so that it’s clear at a glance
appetites and the will and the opportunity to indulge what it was that changed you and the world.
them!
The Heart of this Key is named Hunger. The top bullet GORSE (KEY VIII)
point in the Heart will summarize who you are when Key of Something in Thrall
indulging in your vice, such as:
� sensualist You’re trapped! Something is binding you, exerting
� fame-seeker or influence on you, claiming power over you—and you won’t
� miser let it! Does that mean that you hate your Imperator and
long to be free of them, or does it mean that some
The Shadow of this Key is named Why It Feels Empty. Excrucian or enemy has an unwanted hold upon your soul?
The stronger the Shadow becomes, the emptier and more The Heart of this Key is named Held in Thrall. The
hollow pleasure feels. stronger the Heart, the fiercer the struggle—the greater
Leave the Shadow circle empty for now. the will and power arrayed on both sides. The top bullet
point in the Heart will summarize how you are held in
thrall, and by what, such as:
� Excrucian-bound
� Devil-bound
� soul-chained
� pawn of Lord Entropy

The Shadow of this Key is named Entangled with my

Enemy. The stronger the Shadow, the more subtle and
psychological your chains will be—the harder it will be to
tell where you end and where they begin. Write the
following two phrases in the Shadow circle:
� I can’t let go
� I’m weak

AVATAR CREATION
60

HONEYSUCKLE (KEY IX) The Shadow of this Key is named My Struggles. The
Key of Something, Finally, at Rest stronger the Shadow, the more you want to fit in—the
harder you work to find yourself a place in the world. Write
You were tangled up in something fierce—something the following two phrases in the Shadow circle:
terrible, something scarring. Was it war? Guilt? � self-doubt
Heartache? The struggle against some terrible enemy? Spy � trying to fit in
stuff? Politics? An abusive relationship? A curse? Anyway,
you finally tore yourself free, retired or forgave yourself or HOLLYHOCK (KEY XII)
broke free, and now you can relax. Key of Destiny in the Balance
The Heart of this Key is named My New Life. The
stronger the Heart, the greater the peace you’ve found. The You are in a constant struggle to become something else—
top bullet point in the Heart will summarize who you are to transcend your form and unfurl like a banner or a pair
and who you were, such as: of wings into something greater.
� retired spy The Heart of this Key is named My Destiny. The top
� refugee bullet point in the Heart will summarize what you are
� broken but getting better doing as you change, such as:
� conqueror victorious � becoming Imperial
� becoming a lord of the Lands Beyond Creation
The Shadow of this Key is named My Old Life. The � becoming perfect
stronger the Shadow, the more repercussions your former � becoming free
struggle has, and the harder you’ll have to work to keep
from getting dragged back in! The Shadow of this Key is named My Struggles. The
Leave the Shadow circle empty for now. stronger the Shadow, the harder your Destiny is to fulfill.
Write the following two phrases in the Shadow circle:
CHAMOMILE (KEY X) � self-doubt
Key of Something Romantic � changing hurts

You’re a romantic, dashing hero or heroine—full of life, MIMULUS (KEY XIII)

larger than life, and willing to take on more than you can Key of Something Restless
handle!
The Heart of this Key is named The Dream. It makes You can’t settle down—you’re restless, rootless, unable to
you a shining, silver-screen ideal. Write something in the stay at home or possibly unable to find a home at all!
Heart circle to summarize who you are, such as: The Heart of this Key is named My Path. It’s what
� dashing pirate drives you to travel, to live in the moment, to seek out and
� hero interact with new and interesting things. The top bullet
� perfect spy point in the Heart will summarize who you are when you
� mad genius wander, such as:
� vagabond
The Shadow of this Key is named The Cost. The stronger � wandering hero
the Shadow, the harder you have to work to be perfect all � I walk the earth
the time—the greater the price you have to pay to keep
yourself going. The Shadow of this Key is named Why it Feels Empty.
Leave the Shadow circle empty for now. The stronger the Shadow, the greater the toll the road takes
on you—the harder you cling to the permanent things and
WILD ROSE (KEY XI) attachments you have. Write the following two phrases in
Key of Something Different
the Shadow circle:
� self-doubt
Something about you isn’t normal. Something doesn’t
� the things I’ve left behind
belong! Do you have a love/hate relationship with the
people around you or are you desperate to belong?
The Heart of this Key is named My Nature. You are
different—you are not normal. The top bullet point in the
Heart will summarize who you are compared to others,
such as:
� an alien
� a freak
� an outsider
� superhuman

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 61

WATER LILY (KEY XIV) BUILDING TALIA (PART I)

Key of Something Spiritual an example of lifepath construction

You’re an ascetic, hermit, anchorite, or monk—you want to I draw the basic Avatar Diagram.
meditate, purify yourself, and withdraw from the ordinary I look over the list of Keys.
world. I pick Key I, the Lotus Flower, as my first Key. The
The Heart of this Key is named My Retreat. The Heart of that Key is that my Avatar has the power to
stronger the Heart, the more strength you gain from transform people’s lives. The Shadow of that Key is the
solitude. The top bullet point in the Heart will summarize portion of that power that is unconscious or
who you are when you separate yourself from the world, involuntarily—reflexive, something that just happens,
such as: something that happens because my character exists rather
� ascetic than by force of will.
� disgusted with the world The top left circle in the Avatar Diagram becomes the
� penitent Lotus Flower’s Heart.
� hermit
I label that circle My Power and write a blank bullet
� pure
point in it.
The top right circle becomes its Shadow—I label that
The Shadow of this Key is named Burdens. It is your
circle My Nature, and write:
attachments and duties in the world—the things that can
� glorious
force you from your solitude. Write the following phrase
� set apart
in the Shadow circle:
inside. I connect the Heart and Shadow with a line, and
� my duties as a Power
write the Roman numeral I above that line.
OAK (KEY XV)
Key of Something That Hasn’t Changed I pick Key VI, Wild Oats, as my second Key. It’s a Key of
dissipation, destiny denied, and vice.
You’re the one that stays steady when things are at their The bottom left circle in the Avatar Diagram becomes
worst—you’re the rock that other people can cling to, or the Heart of Wild Oats. I label that circle Hunger, and
the most stubborn obstacle in their way. write a blank bullet point in it. The bottom right circle
The Heart of this Key is named My Identity. It gives becomes the Shadow of Wild Oats. I label it Why It Feels
you a strong connection to your basic values and sense of Empty. I don’t have to put anything in this circle at first—
self. The top bullet point in the Heart will summarize who it’s possible that my pleasures and my hungers don’t
you are, such as: actually feel empty to me at all!
� New York socialite I connect the two circles with a line and write the
� badger Roman numeral V above that line.
� Kansas farm-boy The two Keys that I’ve chosen are in conflict—one
� aristocrat makes me a kind of hero, or, at least, a magical and
numinous and transformative thing. The other Key says
The Shadow of this Key is named Crisis. There’s that I’m a dissipated degenerate of some sort. I decide
something in the world or in your life that is trying to tentatively that I’m supposed to be something cool, and that
change you. bits of that it shine through, but that my character is afraid
Leave the Shadow circle empty for now. to live up to their potential and is kind of hiding from it in
whatever vice she has.
ALYSSYM (KEY XVI)
Key of Destiny Fulfilled

You’ve finally become what you were always meant to be.

You’ve fulfilled your destiny, answered the most important
“When I feel myself tempted to love,” Idri-mi said, “I scrape a
questions, and realized who you are. Congratulations!
tiny piece off of my heart—the part that loves—and leave it
The Heart of this Key is named My Destiny. The top
here.”
bullet point in the Heart will summarize who you are, in
terms of who you were, such as: There was a pile of red scraps at the end of the catwalk. I
� victorious conqueror eyed it with new respect.
� victorious scholar “No,” she said, and gestured with her head. I looked over the
� finally found faith catwalk’s edge.
� enlightened monk The pit was as deep as the world, and it was full of wind;
� leader of the free world and the wind was full of red.
—from the Thought-Record of Ellen McIntosh
The Shadow of this Key is empty and nameless for now.

AVATAR CREATION
62
FOUNDATIONS
A creature of clay lay down to sleep, and from its flesh was
Once you’ve picked your keys, let’s talk about what’s cool humanity shaped. Eve bore Abel and Cain, and Cain begat
about your character. Are they cool because of something Enoch, and unto Enoch was born Irad, and thus through ten
they do? Something they can do? Something they are?
thousand generations unto the modern day. Billions of men
Look over the following options, starting with the option
and women swarm the earth, their flesh and bone and eyes of
or options associated with your two keys, and think about
it! But there’s a special rule: clay, and all of the substance of that first creature, who
You always start by finding the rows with your slumbers yet. It knows in some distant regard that it now
character’s Keys in them. If you pick one of those rows, it wears countless forms rather than the one, that its flesh has
strengthens the Heart of the relevant Key. If you pick a been distorted into the strange mockery of species that is
row that isn’t associated with one of your Keys, you have to humanity, and this discomfits it. But it does not shake off its
strengthen the Shadow of one of your Keys instead. Write doze and resume its rightful self. It will, when it wakes; and it
a new bullet point in that particular Heart or Shadow to promises itself, as it has for millennia, that it shall wake, in
reflect this. just a minute more.
If you happen to pick a row that has both of your Keys
—from LEGENDS OF THE NOBILIS, by Luc Ginneis
in it, draw or shift your attention to a new circle linked to
the Heart of both Keys. Write a single bullet point in that
new circle to reflect this.

MORE THAN ANYTHING ELSE, YOU ARE…

SOMETHING COOL
You’re going to be neat—larger than life in a few ways, pure in a few ways that people aren’t. You’re going to be
Lotus Flower (I) basically human, you’ll hurt and get into trouble and get in over your head and you won’t know everything there
Vervain (II) is to know about how to live, but you’ll have a few powers or beliefs that are absolute, a few areas of life where
Chamomile (X) you can trust yourself absolutely.
Oak (XV) Examples: Julianna Avram is the Power of Strength, and she helps people be strong even when she shouldn’t.
Marsiglio Tendi is the Power of Treachery, and he has a weapon that can cut anything, even intangibles. Ianthe
Falls-Short, ritually trapping her impurities in her last name, became flawless in action, form, and speech!

IN LOVE WITH SOMETHING

You’re going to be all wrapped in your love for something—something that fills your life with the joy of it, the
Clematis (IV) awesomeness of it, the amazingness of it. Is it your Estate? Earth? Creation? People? Something horrible, like
Star of Bethlehem murder or decay? A single true love? Your work? Your life is filled with grim or exultant devotion!
(VII) Examples: Patrick Precipice-Lord is the Power of Chaos. He’s totally enthused about disasters and disorder,
Honeysuckle (IX) but he doesn’t feel the need to cause them—he accepts them as they are! Rook Catchfly, the Power of Eternity,
Alyssym (XVI) has a fierce love for the world, the whole shebang, warts and all, and would do anything to protect it.
Merriweather James loves the Dark and the principle of human suicide that it embodies. The Piscator
Thalasseus loves trade, bargaining, and the Deal.

EPIC, INHUMAN, AND POWERFUL

You’re going to be completely unchained from humanity—a force rather than a person, dedicated to the inhuman
Aconite (V)
substance of your Estate. You’ll be at once a monster and a god, as hideously unreasonable as a flood or being
Wild Oats (VI)
born, and capable—like love, or life, or a holy spirit—of giving unexpected, brilliant, and illuminating grace.
Hollyhock (XII)
Examples: Daemarnia, the Power of Caves, is Caves. Her whole life is about the vast, dark, and stony
Water Lily (XIV)
expanses underneath the Earth. Walking Eye, the Power of Borders, was never human—he started life as a
patch of dirty ground. Isabel is an avatar of Roads.

JUST PLAIN WEIRD

You’re going to be something kind of freaky. Maybe you’re a group mind, or a rock star, or a living dictionary, or
a human-sized praying mantis, or a coin collector obsessed with getting coins from all the different worlds in the
Acacia (III)
universe. The key thing is that you’re using the fact that you’re a Power to get away with this kind of existence,
Gorse (VIII)
to pursue your ideals on a grand scale or to exist as a person at all!
Wild Rose (XI)
Examples: Dimi is a living song. Takari Risu is an anime character. Haru is a rat. Marek is a nanomachine
Mimulus (XIII)
swarm. Joan of Arc is, well, Joan of Arc, living on as a Power. Jasprite Sherrard tours the universe. Idony Saint-
Germain is a spirit bound in a cloth doll. Casmir is drowned Atlantis’ King, and Annabelle Zupay just
mysteriously appeared one day.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 63

BUILDING TALIA (PART II) …WERE YOU “SORT OF ” HUMAN?

an example of lifepath construction
Some Powers come from off-world—they’re elves from
My two Keys are Key I (the Lotus Flower) and Key VI Aelfscienne, giants from Jotunheim, damned souls from Hell,
(Wild Oats). empty suits of clothing from Dionyl, or practically anything
I look these up on the chart above. Wild Oats suggests else you can imagine from somewhere or other on the tree of
that my Avatar is Epic, Inhuman, and Powerful. Choosing worlds. Other Powers are human-like things from Earth but
this would strengthen the Heart of Wild Oats. There’s no not quite proper humans—their genetics are all twisted up by
rule that says there’s a direct connection, but to me, that an Imperator or Power somewhere in their family tree or
they’re from a Chancel where the rules for what people are is
feels like it implies an epic-level vice—truly legendary
different. For example, Ianthe Falls-Short comes from a
dissipation. For this Avatar I’m looking for the opposite,
Chancel where people grow in people fields and don’t have
an extraordinary person hiding their light through legs until they’re ripe; Arikel is the son of the Sun; and the
ordinary self-indulgence. So I’m not going to go that way. Power of Silver is an Earth-born Daoine Sidhe.
The Key of the Lotus Flower, on the other hand, points If you’re this kind of person, you’re still basically a human—
at Something Cool—at an Avatar that is mostly human, but humans, like elves and giants and empty suits of clothing and
has a few key larger-than-life elements. That sounds good, people-field-folk, implement a basic template for “being a
so I choose that and strengthen the Heart of the Lotus person” that’s shared across the tree of worlds. But maybe
you have pointed ears, or you’re on fire all the time, or there’s
Flower. I decide that somehow my character is a source of
nobody inside your clothing, or you photosynthesize instead
hope—that there’s something precious in her existence, of eating!
something that people can look to, hope for, even rely on to Choosing to be something like this strengthens the Heart
keep them going in a troubled world. The Heart of the of
Lotus Flower is My Power, which currently has a blank � Lotus Flower (I)
bullet point in it; I add another below it: � Star of Bethlehem (VII)
� � Chamomile (X)
� source of hope. � Mimulus (XIII)
or the Shadow of any other Key!
I could also pick one of the other options, strengthening
the Shadow of one Key. For instance, I could opt to be Just
Plain Weird and strengthen a Shadow accordingly.
But I don’t.

…OR SOMETHING
REALLY STRANGE?

Some Powers come from lives that are just plain weird.
They weren’t humans. They weren’t animals. They weren’t
even aliens. They were things like fictional or imaginary
characters, clouds of nanomachines, clods of dirt, or
passages from a song. They were AIBOs or Roombas,
anthills or nameless principles, spirits of liberty or of a $5
bill, bacteria, dreams or bodiless hands and faces that lived
on distant comets and sang to cause the sun to rise. It’s hard
to imagine how something like that could become a Power,
HEY, WERE YOU AN ANIMAL?
but ultimately Imperators can do what they like and sense
and sensibility can’t stop them!
Some Powers weren’t born human. They were born as an
Choosing to be something like this strengthens the Heart
animal! Usually this means a mammal, like a fox, cat, or bear,
of
but even a colder animal like a shark, octopus, or lizard can
� Clematis (IV)
become a Power!
� Wild Rose (XI)
Choosing to be an animal strengthens the Heart of
� Hollyhock (XII)
� Wild Oats (VI)
� Alyssym (XVI)
� Gorse (VIII)
or the Shadow of any other Key!
� Water Lily (XIV)
� Oak (XV)
or the Shadow of any other Key!

AVATAR CREATION
64
YOUR ESTATE
Now let’s pick your Estate! This is the thing you become
the Power over—the thing that is given unto you to rule
and exemplify, to define and to be, forever and ever or until
your dying day!
To decide on your Estate, pick one option from each of
the two tables below—pair up the part of the world your
Estate comes from with the kind of things that go in it. As
always, if you pick a row that matches one or both of your
Keys, it strengthens the Heart of those Keys; otherwise, it
strengthens the Shadow of one Key; and in either case, you
write an appropriate bullet point in the appropriate circle!
In addition, for this section only, when you add a bullet
point, also draw a line to connect the relevant circle and
your Estate—that’s how the influence of your Estate flows
into your soul.

Still don’t know your Estate? You can come back to it later,
but remember that you’ll need to figure it out before the
start of the game!

YOUR ESTATE IS FROM THE…

LIGHT SIDE OF HUMAN EXPERIENCE
Your Estate will be something human, part of the human spectrum of experience and the human-made world,
something like Libraries, Honor, Joy, Mathematics, Grief, Garbage, Swords, Procrastination, Skyscrapers, or
Vervain (II)
Ghettoes. Further, even if it’s bad, it’s not bad enough to make a reasonable person regret human existence or
Wild Oats (VI)
despair for the human heart—Theft, maybe, but not Murder or Genocide; Knives, sure, but not Napalm. Your
Chamomile (X)
Estate would fit into a brightly-painted vision of the human future, even if it’d be the worst thing there.
Hollyhock (XII)
What kinds of things do you like best about humans or living in a human world? Or, what’s something that you
find detestable about humans or the human world, but might enjoy finding a justification for it, reveling in it,
and standing up for it instead?

DARK SIDE OF HUMAN EXPERIENCE

Your Estate will be something human—and also something wrong. It’s something that makes you say “what’s
Acacia (III) wrong with people? Why do they do this? Why do they make this? Why do they let people suffer this?” It doesn’t
Aconite (V) have to be one of the great evils—Garbage, Theft, and Malnutrition are just as suitable as Global Warming,
Wild Rose (XI) Cruelty, Genocide, Famine, and Despair—but it has to be the kind of thing that makes you think, maybe humans
Oak (XV) aren’t worth it, and if they are, maybe they deserve better than living in this world.
What kinds of things do you like the least about humans or the human world? Or, what’s something you think
is okay but have enough moral questions or qualms about to convincingly paint it as bad?

BEAUTIFUL SIDE OF THE WORLD

Clematis (IV) Your Estate will be part of the natural world, and further, something cool or good or at least congenial to human
Star of Bethlehem existence. Something like Waterfalls, the Wind, Illumination, Magnetism, the Moon, Sequences, Fire, or Grain.
(VII) Your Estate is something that the world would be poorer without, and something that is usually helpful or
Water Lily (XIV) neutral rather than harmful to the human world.
Alyssym (XVI) What do you love most about the natural world? What excites you about nature? Mathematics and physics?
Experience? What spurs the greatest sense in you that wow, living is so cool?

PAINFUL SIDE OF THE WORLD

Lotus Flower (I) Your Estate will be part of the natural world, and further, something dangerous. Sickness, Hopelessness, The
Gorse (VIII) Tsunami, Tremors, Infirmity, Explosions, Decay, Insects, Fangs, Cutting Edges, Cliffs, Entropy. An emotion
Honeysuckle (IX) such as even animals may feel, like Hatred, Fear, or Rage. Devastation, Flood, Exhaustion, Depletion, The
Mimulus (XIII) Barren and Lifeless Plain.
What is the face of the natural world that you fear most? What part of it has given you the most pain?

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 65

YOUR ESTATE IS…

SOMETHING YOU CAN POINT TO
Your Estate is about things.
Cars, Computers, Documents, Fires, Guns, Green Things, Homes, Honest Things, Luxuries, Rock
Gorse (VIII) Formations, Sand, Teeth, Trees, Works of Art.
Honeysuckle (IX) Pick an Estate like that.
Mimulus (XIII) At the edges of your Estate you have power over things like the things you rule. Guns extends to Bows and
Water Lily (XIV) Crossbows. Red Things has some power over everything that is pink. Documents governs a stone tablet, but
Oak (XV) not an oral history!
Please feel free to really stretch your mind and push the boundaries of an Estate like this as far as they can
go—you’ll need to if you want to keep up with Powers whose Estates are more abstract!

SOMETHING YOU LIVE

Your Estate is about experiences—things you live through, things you feel.
Acacia (III)
Adoration, Awakening, Falling, Fame, Indulgence, Love, Memory, Redemption, Recurrence, Sensation,
Aconite (V)
Strength, Solace, Suffering, Traffic, Treachery, Work.
Wild Oats (VI)
Pick an Estate like that, or pick a concrete Estate like Cars or Guns and focus on the meaning that Estate has
Clematis (IV)
to peoples’ lives. For instance, you could be the Power of The Gun, meaning, the power of the gun as a symbol
Wild Rose (XI)
of homicide, fear, empowerment, masculinity, destruction, security, and projected force.
Hollyhock (XII)
Either way, at the edges of your Estate, you have power over things that are like the experience of your Estate.

Lotus Flower (I) SOMETHING YOU CAN DESCRIBE

Vervain (II) Your Estate is about a category of phenomena or actions.
Star of Bethlehem Debate, Destruction, Growth, Justice, Magic, Music, Poetry, Virtue, Waves, Wars.
(VII) It’s usually pretty easy to make an Estate like this cover… well, anything at all… at its edges. So you don’t wind
Chamomile (X) up walking all over people with concrete Estates, it’s important to start with a moderate and judicious picture of
Alyssym (XVI) what your Estate governs and broaden it only cautiously during play!

BUILDING TALIA (PART III) looking for a middle point, and a bunch of pieces fall
an example of lifepath construction suddenly into place. My Estate is Hanging On—the
Estate of enduring through the night, from the Sunset to
Key I, The Lotus Flower, suggests an Estate from the the Dawn, hanging on to the last light of the day. That’s
Painful Side of the World. definitely Something You Live, which will strengthen the
Key VI, Wild Oats, pushes for the Light Side of Human Heart of Wild Oats. It’s only arguably the Beautiful Side of
Experience. the World; I could rethink my previous choice, but I decide
But as I look over the lists of possible Estates, I start not to. This is going to be meaningful later, when I write
thinking about Sunsets, and that draws me to reject both the properties of my Estate—Hanging On, as an intrinsic
the options above and go for the Beautiful Side of the World part of the beauty of the world, is fundamentally different
instead. That means strengthening the Shadow of one of than it would be if it were part of human experience or a
my Keys. I don’t know how to work that in the Shadow of kind of painful spiritual attachment.
the Lotus Flower, but it does fit well in the Shadow of the The imagery of Hanging On knocks a few other pieces
Wild Oats—I draw a line between my Estate and that into place for me. My character’s name, I realize for the
Shadow and write the first bullet point in that Shadow: first time, is Talia. She’s a reckless teenage rebel type with
� the sunset is beautiful a leather jacket and a motorcycle—the kind who gets into
trouble because it’s a way to stay alive. She can’t let go of
It’s in the natural beauty of things, in the face of the sheer that and move on to an adult form of pure awesome
awesomeness of the world, that my character wonders if because she is, well, the embodiment of Hanging On. I fill
hiding from her potential is actually OK. in the first bullet point in the Heart of Wild Oats, and add
I thought about actually being the Power of Sunsets, another:
but both my Keys argue against having an Estate you can � teenager
just point to; and I don’t want to reject both Keys twice; � rage against the dying of the light
and, more importantly, Sunsets are kind of a strange Estate
for a character who is fundamentally a source of hope. I I link that Heart to my Estate—Hanging On is both why
start thinking about how hope and sunsets interact, Talia’s wild and why being wild feels hollow.

AVATAR CREATION
66
ORIGINS TROUBLED LIVES
If your character had a “troubled life,” you must pick at
Let’s take a look at where you come from—and figure out
least one legacy of that life from the table below.
what your human life was like!
Otherwise, you can pick a legacy of the trouble in your
mortal life, but you don’t have to.

YOU LIVED A…
TROUBLED LIFE
You were born to trouble! You were headed for
some kind of rotten end, either because of the
Vervain (II)
Aconite (V)
cruelty of others or because of your own messed- WHAT’S THE LEGACY OF YOUR
Wild Oats
up heart, but you didn’t get there. Instead, an TROUBLED LIFE?
Imperator reached down and made you into a
(VI)
Wild Rose
Power. YOU’RE STILL IN TROUBLE!
Maybe that saved you! Or maybe it just raised It’s not so easy to escape a troubled destiny! It’s
(XI) Acacia (III)
the stakes . . . followed you into the realm of the Powers.
Aconite (V)
Troubled Lives (right) will explore what Is it a Noble enemy?
Gorse (VIII)
influence your troubled life has on you now. Is it something in you that’s messed up?
Mimulus
Or are you just so troubled by your old life that
(XIII)
HUMBLE LIFE you’re still focused on its issues, just maybe on a
Your destiny was an ordinary destiny. You were larger scale?
Gorse (VIII)
going to live, growing steadily older, until
Honeysuckle
(IX)
something more or less random happened to you Star of SOME SCARS REMAIN
and you died! You might have had kids before that Bethlehem You’re carrying forward the karma of your old and
Water Lily
point, but then again, you might not have. (VII) difficult existence!
(XIV)
Instead, unexpectedly, you became a Power! Wild Rose Do you constantly struggle to “make up” for
Oak (XV)
Humble Lives, on pg. 67, will explore what (XI) your old life?
influence your humble life has on you now. Hollyhock Or to recover from what happened to you in it?
(XII) Does it still define your perspective on the
BLESSED LIFE Water Lily world?
Lotus Flower You were born to a destiny of happiness. You were (XIV) Or is it just a constant, difficult companion?
(I) born to grow up without major traumas. To find
Clematis love or purpose and probably even both. To have a IT’S ALL HAPPENING AGAIN!
(IV) happy and fulfilling time of it, a life seasoned now You thought you were free of your past, but now it’s
Hollyhock and then with crisis and pain but never dominated happening again—some new force, some
Wild Oats
(XII) by it, until you finally died a normal and acceptably undesirable causality, is driving you all over again
(VI)
Alyssym timed death. towards an all-new troubled end!
Chamomile
(XVI) Blessed Lives, on pg. 67, will explore what Why do you draw trouble like this?
(X)
influence your blessed life has on you now. Is it your strength?
Oak (XV)
Your weakness?
Alyssym
EXTRAORDINARY LIFE (XVI)
Something wrong in how you look at life?
You had an extraordinary life or destiny. You were Is it some kind of freakish luck?
meant to do or be something important, or at least Or is it just this one bad break, but it’s something
to have an entertaining go at life—were you a spy? that’ll trouble you for a while?
Acacia (III)
A mercenary? A medical genius? A diplomat? A
Star of
Bethlehem
hero? Or were you a Chosen One of some sort, TROUBLE INSPIRED ME
involved in magical events even before you became Now that you’re a Power, you can do something
(VII) Lotus Flower
a Power—the catspaw of a cult, the child of an about the trouble that afflicted you. You can fix
Chamomile (I)
Imperator, the heir to a magical legacy, the true things for yourself or the world. And that’s what
(X) Vervain (II)
love of an Excrucian? And did you fulfill your matters to you!
Mimulus Clematis
destiny before becoming a Power, or was becoming The biggest question here is: are you going to
(XIII) (IV)
a Power what you were always meant to be? make things better for yourself? For your family?
Honeysuckle
When choosing Contacts, on pg. 68, you will For the people of your Chancel? For everyone in
(IX)
choose a total of three. One will probably be the world? Or do you want to set your sights on the
from your mortal life! universe?

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 67

HUMBLE LIVES BLESSED LIVES

If your character led a “humble life,” you must pick at least If your character led a “blessed life,” you must pick at least
one legacy of that life from the table below. Otherwise, you one legacy of that life from the table below. Otherwise, you
can pick a legacy of the more ordinary portion of your can pick a legacy of the brighter portion of your mortal life,
mortal life, but you don’t have to. but you don’t have to.

WHAT’S THE LEGACY OF YOUR HUMBLE LIFE?

LOVE FOR THE ORDINARY . . . WHAT’S THE LEGACY OF YOUR BLESSED LIFE?
Your mortal life was ordinary—and you still love
ordinary things! REVERENCE IN PURPOSE
Wild Oats Are you down to the earth, like a farmer? You learned from your blessed life to celebrate the
(VI) Are you a lover of mortal fiction? universe. You had time as a mortal to realize how
Star of Mortal food? Acacia (III) amazing life is, how cool people are, how
Mortal clothes?
Bethlehem Aconite (V) connected everything is under the sight of a great
Mortal societies?
(VII) Gorse (VIII) benevolent universal One—and that insight stayed
Mortal computer games? with you when you became a Noble, gained
Oak (XV) Mimulus
Are you frivolous and materialistic? strength as your perceptions improved and did not
Alyssym (XIII)
Are you still involved with your old family, your falter when you encountered the greater
(XVI) old company, your old culture? darknesses and universal flaws the Nobilis can
Do you live a double life, like a superhero? see. You learned that life is worth the living of it—
Or are you just happiest when you can do things and now it is even more so.
in a mortal way, using your mortal skills?
COMMUNITY
ALIENATION . . . Your mortal life has followed you into the Noble
Your mortal life was so different—it’s like you were context!
a different person! You just don’t think of yourself Star of
Was your life blessed precisely because you
as part of humanity at all. Not anymore. Bethlehem
come from a magical or miraculous situation?
Are you contemptuous of humanity? (VII) Did you drag your mortal family and community
Do you admire them from a lofty distance? Wild Rose with you into your new miraculous world?
Are you moved to rescue mortals? (XI) Or did they follow you on their own, your old
Acacia (III)
To hurt them? Hollyhock love or children or parents or community finding
Aconite (V) To cut them out of your life? (XII) power on their own so they could follow or support
Wild Rose Do you miss being human?
Water Lily you?
(XI) Are you secretly afraid you haven’t changed?
(XIV) And is this as good as it sounds,
Water Lily Or do you just ignore your mortal life, write it Or is it something sinister?
(XIV) off, declare it a larval stage of your existence Is your community your Achilles heel, a source
completely irrelevant to what you have become? of enormous strength and support, or both?
Do you fight to be what you should be now, to
hang on to this incredible thing you’ve become
when you come from such humble origins? Wild Oats
YOUR WAY OF LIFE
Or do you fight what feels like a losing battle to You knew who you were and what you were for, and
(VI)
keep some connection to the person that you you won’t let being a Noble take that away from
Chamomile
were? you! Whether you were a farm boy, a scientist, a
(X) socialite, or a mother, you are going to subordinate
Oak (XV) your new life to the values and virtues you learned
TRANSFORMATION . . . Alyssym there. And more! You’re going to prove that you
Or maybe you’re all wrapped up in the change. (XVI)
Clematis can, that your old values and virtues are important.
Maybe you’re constantly amazed, overwhelmed,
(IV) caught in the grip of the way you have become
Gorse (VIII)
Hollyhock
something new. Maybe you’re going to spend ANGER
centuries or millennia just growing into who you are Some people would give their souls for power.
(XII) now, dealing with and reveling in your newly- You wouldn’t.
Mimulus burst-open path of personal development. Your Lotus Flower Some people become more whole when they
(XIII) story will be about a person becoming a Power long become a Power.
(I)
after the rest of your Familia has moved on to being You didn’t.
Vervain (II)
Noble. Your new life is a curse. Mortality and humanity
Clematis
Lotus Flower was precious to you. Being part of the ordinary
(IV)
(I) FREEDOM! Honeysuckle
world was good to you.
Vervain (II) You were ordinary—but you never wanted to be! And now?
(IX) It’s gone.
Honeysuckle At last you’re free from it, able to have the
destiny you always dreamed of, given mental and You know, on some level, that your duties are
(IX)
physical gifts, powers, purpose, and a higher important. You can’t just not be what you’ve
Chamomile
meaning! become. But that doesn’t mean it’s right.
(X)

AVATAR CREATION
68

BUILDING TALIA (PART IV)

an example of lifepath construction INSPIRATIONAL FRIEND OR
LOVER
You know someone who is a miracle in your
Talia obviously led a troubled life. I glance at the other
Clematis life—someone who heals your soul when it’s
options for her mortal life, but this really feels like it’s (IV) troubled. They are not entirely mortal—did you
already been decided. Accordingly, I strengthen the Heart
empower them? Did they gain power so they
of Wild Oats, Hunger, making it could keep up with you? Or were they
� teenager something magical all along?
� rage against the dying of the light
� just a kid NEMESIS
You have a nemesis—something powerful
I move on to the legacy of her troubled life, which feels like enough to stand against you but not so
it should be You’re Still in Trouble!—she hasn’t let go of her Aconite (V)
powerful as to overwhelm you without effort,
old ways. This doesn’t match either the Lotus Flower or such as a Power, a Family of Powers, a Bane (pg.
Wild Oats, so I have to strengthen the Shadow of one of 136), the Cammora (pg. 12), or an Imperator with
my Keys. I add a new bullet point to the Shadow of Wild major limitations on its behavior.
Oats, Why it Feels Empty, making it:
� the sunset is beautiful CORRUPTING INFLUENCE
� nothing ever changes You are a weapon. You have been aimed at the
heart of some Imperator, some Power, or at the
CONTACTS nature of the world itself. You are mixed up in a
cult or cabal tainted by Excrucian or Infernal
Wild Oats influence—or maybe something that showcases
Now it’s time to pick one or two “important” contacts in
(VI) the worst side of Heaven, the Light, the Dark,
your life—or, if you had an “extraordinary” mortal life, pick
or the Wild. They may have something on you,
three!
some way to keep you in line, but that's not the
Each contact is associated with a single Key. It can
reason you’re involved with them—at best, it’s
strengthen the Heart of that Key, if that’s one of your Keys
an excuse. The reason you’re involved in them is
(and look at the contacts associated with your two Keys
that you want to be.
first.) Or you can use it to strengthen the Shadow of any
other Key!
GHOST
If you want the contact to be an important, self- You’re haunted by someone you lost or hurt,
motivated part of your story, draw a new circle for that Star of
and you’re either unwilling or unable to forcibly
contact. Give it the name of your contact. Put a bullet Bethlehem
exile the ghost from your life. This is usually a
point in that circle saying how they’ve changed your life. (VII)
literal ghost, but sometimes it’s just friends or
Draw a line connecting the new circle to the Heart or associates who remind you of your scars.
Shadow that you strengthened. Don’t do this for contacts
meant only as ancillaries, accessories, and foils. CAMMORA
You are entangled with the Cammora—a

Lotus Flower
ORGANIZATION mystical organization empowered by the
You’ve got a company or team to help you do what Gorse (VIII) Imperator Lord Entropy to mediate between
(I)
you’ve got to do. Powers and the mortal world in his name. A
classic corrupt secret society, they rule the
FOLLOWERS world from behind the scenes!
You have this tendency to acquire hangers-on—
minions, lackeys, lieutenants, and others ranging LEGACY
from cringing bootlickers and adoring priests to Your life right now—it’s the sequel.
Vervain (II)
actual trustworthy friends. Fundamentally, they’re Something happened before this. Something
drawn to you because they want to be special, and big and tragic and wonderful. It’s left shards of
you or your company makes them feel that they acquaintanceships, friends, loves, and hates
are. scattered through your life and the world.
Honeysuckle
You might have come out of this with a true
(IX)
EXCRUCIAN love or boon companion. Your relationship with
You’re on friendly terms with an Excrucian—one of the rest of the people who were involved is
the enemies of the world. (Not that I can criticize.) troubled—the kind of thing where you can’t
Acacia (III)
Are they a lover? Family? A friend? A master? A forget the wrongs they’ve done you, but can’t
servant, trapped by some oath or mystical prison shut the door on them if they need you, and vice
into loyalty to you? versa.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 69

TRUE LOVE
You have a true love—someone who is part of your
soul and you of theirs, someone destined for you
from before the two of you were born, the kind of
love that can challenge death, time, and the gates MORTAL FRIENDS AND FAMILY
of Hell. It could be a mortal, an empowered mortal, You haven’t let go of your mortal friends and your
Oak (XV)
a Power, or even (God help you) something crazy mortal family—they’re still a key part of who you
Chamomile like an Excrucian. Your love is a thing of the divine are!
(X) spirit, immune to most of the uncertainties and
fallibilities of ordinary human love, but there’s still DISCIPLES
a catch—in the world of Nobilis, love is illegal, and You’ve acquired a little following—people whom
you’re both up for torture or worse if it’s found out. you feel responsible for, people drawn to you by
If you prefer, you can have one or two true similarities between your nature and theirs.
friends (in the same exorbitant sense of “true” as Alyssym They’re usually powerful (magical creatures,
used above for love) instead or in addition to your (XVI) relatively young or troubled Powers, and the like)
love. and loyal, but they’re messed up in ways you’re not.
When you need them to do something small, or to
ALIEN(S) do something huge, then they’re useful, but the
You have a coterie of the strangest sort—a rest of the time they’re more of a burden.
Wild Rose
hodgepodge of freaks, aliens, degenerates,
(XI)
mysteries, and possibly even creatures from
outside the universe entirely.

MANUFACTURED ARMY SPECIAL OPTIONS

In your quest to do what you need to do in the
Hollyhock world, you’ve made . . . things. People, maybe. NOBLE FRIEND OR ENEMY
(XII) Monstrous creations, perhaps. Anyway, they You have a Noble friend, ally, acquaintance, or
aren’t human, and they’re alive, and they serve enemy! They don’t have to fall under any of the
None
you. descriptions above, but to pick this option you’ll
have to strengthen the Shadow of one of your
FARAWAY OR TROUBLED LOVE Keys.
There’s something that you love—that you’re
drawn to. Maybe it’s family, or maybe it’s a spouse. CLEAVE OF THE BOTANISTS
It could be a friend or a child. But, as precious as it You have ties in the “Cleave of the Botanists”—a
is to you, you can’t stay and give it the attention it mortal secret society dedicated to the practice of
deserves. Maybe you think you’re trouble, or alchemy. Unless you can squeeze this into one of
None
maybe you think they are. Maybe you’re just the the descriptions above (e.g., binding yourself to
Mimulus
kind of person who can’t stay in one place very them through a Legacy or your Mortal Friends),
(XIII)
long. Maybe there is no good reason and it’s all in picking this option will strengthen the Shadow of
your head! one of your Keys.
It’s not just true and perfect love that’s illegal in
the world of the Nobilis—ordinary, imperfect love MYSTERY CULT
is just as dangerous to you and the things you care You are tied in some fashion to a cult that has seen
about. Keep your beloved things safe, but don’t let through the veils of the world to the secrets of
anybody know you care! creation—kind of like us Nobilisers! Maybe they
just know the ordinary things, like, there are
WARD None Powers and Imperators and they fight Excrucians.
You are responsible for a person, a creature, or for Or maybe they’ve seen through some other veil
Water Lily a place or organization containing many people or and can worship in ways that ordinary Powers
(XIV) animals. You are not necessarily on personal, can’t! Since this isn’t associated with any of the
intimate terms with them, but the responsibility is Keys, you’ll have to strengthen the Shadow of one
sacred. of your Keys to pick this option.

AVATAR CREATION
70

BUILDING TALIA (PART V) AFFILIATION

an example of lifepath construction
Sometimes it feels like there’s an order to events—a great
big cosmic harmony, a music playing through the universe
The Key of the Lotus Flower suggests an organization—a
that causes everything to dance in time. The sky! The soul!
biker gang or something similar. I’m slowed down for a
The movements of the planets! The growth of crops!
moment, though, by the fact that this biker gang,
Sometimes it seems like there’s a pattern to it all, and if you
apparently, strengthens Talia’s power to transform lives.
can just let go of your ego and move in tune with it, then
It’s a little weird, right?
life and love and joy just fall right into place. Sometimes it
But I decide to run with it. Maybe, I decide, they do.
seems that way! But Nobilisers know that isn’t true. There
Maybe they’re not just random hangers-on (as it were.)
isn’t one great order to events. There are five, all playing off
Maybe they’re acolytes, lesser sources of change. That’s
against one another, and the moment you become a Noble
what an organization is, here, after all: it’s a tool for doing
you know them, you taste them, you feel them, and you can
what you must. I haven’t really done much with the Lotus
choose of which one you would like to partake.
Flower yet; and thinking about it, I start to imagine her as
a symbol of change and hope, and everyone around her—
even though she doesn’t really recognize this herself—as
carriers and amplifiers of that message. The people she
hangs with become sources of hope and power in and of
themselves. I fill in the top bullet point in My Power and
add another, making it:
� symbol of life
� source of hope
� biker gang leader

The Key of Wild Oats suggests a corrupting influence, but

I don’t really want that. Looking over the other options, I
settle on Inspirational Friend or Lover. Some guy named
Rick, I think, probably a boyfriend, who gets added right
in to Why it Feels Empty (where “it” means a meaningless
life on the road):
� the sunset is beautiful
� nothing ever changes
� Rick

Now, Rick can’t be just an ordinary human; he’s something

magical. But I don’t know exactly what he is, and I’m OK
with not knowing until later in the game. I draw a new
circle for him, anyway, name it Rick, link it to the Shadow
of Wild Oats, and add a bullet point showing how he’s
changed her life:
� offers her a dream

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 71

WHAT IS YOUR AFFILIATION?

(THE SONG OF ) HEAVEN
You’ve given your heart to the cause of the angels—to beauty and justice! The angels believe there is no higher
Lotus Flower (I) calling than to transform the world into a Heaven—to work endlessly at the task of making justice, making
Vervain (II) goodness, giving beauty to the things that are. That’s the part you buy into.
Acacia (III) Now, the angels themselves say the world is a fallen place. They say people are filthy, dirty things crawling on
a corrupt rock. They’ve sealed the gates of Heaven against the world, even as they labor to make the world
outside those gates shine brighter. You don’t have to agree with that part! But you can.

(THE SONG OF ) HELL

You’ve given your heart to the cause of Hell—to love this “fallen” world! The creed of Hell is to celebrate what
is, to rejoice in how things and people are. Most of all they are the ones that love the ugly things, the horrible
Clematis (IV) things, the evil things, and the corrupt. They are witnesses and admirers to everything in the world. And that’s
Aconite (V) the part you buy into.
Wild Oats (VI) The devils themselves, they say corruption’s the best part. They say that evil’s better than good, that
suffering’s better than health, that abusing power is better than using it well. That’s the downside of loving
wicked things, you get a little wicked. But you don’t have to be that way! If you’re just a Power, and not a Devil,
it’s a choice.

(THE SONG OF ) THE LIGHT

You’ve pledged yourself to the Light, to the cult of human survival. You believe, more than anything, that human
life matters; that, in the end, humanity should live forever.
Star of
The Light itself is a cold and clean and ruthless thing. It would trade the self-determination of humanity for
Bethlehem (VII)
its life; would sacrifice love, purpose, laughter, all the things that make humanity what it is, if it could buy thus
Gorse (VIII)
human immortality. And it cares nothing for the inhuman peoples, the giants and the artificial minds and the
other aliens of the World Ash. It wants life and only life, eternal life for humanity—if you serve the Light, that’s
what you’re serving. But you don’t have to go that far!

(THE SONG OF ) THE DARK

You’ve sold yourself to the Dark, to the cult of human suicide—to the thing that loves the human freedom to err,
to hurt, to do wrong, to refuse to see, and which loves best the power in the soul of a human that makes them
go willingly to their deaths. And this Code, more than any other, will defend the human right to be human—will
say that people have a right to exist in this Imperator-haunted world; will stand up for the human right to self-
Honeysuckle (IX) governance, self-determination, and free existence in a world of cosmic entities. And that, at the least, is what
Chamomile (X) you serve.
The Magisters of the Dark—the laughing and brooding faces of human failings—are like the Devils in that
they love the worst things best. They exult in each suicide, hold it a sacrament: they are with each soul, in some
capacity, when it does horrible, stupid, and self-destructive things. They are dimly disturbed by righteous
martyrs, sensing some kind of blasphemy, and they are not good. You may not be good, either, if you serve
them; but whether to embrace human suicide over other human freedoms is, ultimately, your choice.

(THE SONG OF ) THE WILD

You’ve bound yourself to the Wild and made yourself a wild law: casting free all chains of propriety, sanity and
mundanity, and realizing that you have the option to be what you are, unshackled and unbounded. There is
Wild Rose (XI)
nothing so loathsome to the Wild as a cage, as a prison, as coercion, as to bind something to their will.
Hollyhock (XII)
And to be Wild is to set your feet upon a road that leads ultimately to unconsciousness: to become a prisoner
Mimulus (XIII)
to your internal laws, deaf to the words of others, blind to the sight of others, free in time from communication
as from coercion, a solitary being in a world of one, knowing only what you must do. The Imperial Magisters of
the Wild have walked far upon that path; how far along it will you go?

Water Lily (XIV) AN INDEPENDENT SONG

Oak (XV) You heard these songs—each in their turn—and you rejected them. You will take up the unique Code of some
Alyssym (XVI) Imperator, or forge your own. You will say, world, hear not those songs: be thus!

AVATAR CREATION
72
WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN? BUILDING TALIA (PART VI)
an example of lifepath construction
Your final Avatar Diagram is a Project—a vehicle for
Destiny expenditures. When things happen in play that
The next choice I make for Talia is the Song of Hell—
bear on this story you started with, that Project gains
she’ll love every bloody thing in this fallen world, and that
Destiny. When it accumulates enough power, or when you
love will be beautiful even if the things she loves are not.
spend Destiny of your own to push it forward, you can take
This adds a final bullet point under Hunger, strengthening
advantage of everything you’ve written there to shape the
the Heart of Wild Oats:
moving-forward of your Avatar’s life and myth. You can, in
� teenager
short, build forward from this Diagram to empower and
� rage against the dying of the light
develop your Avatar over the course of the game. This can
� just a kid
be abstract and personal, or it can give you extra Traits and
� hurting for the world
accomplish things that need accomplishing; that’ll come
down, in the end, to what matters to you.
Finally, I pick two of the circles to represent unresolved
You can also pick up to two of those circles to represent
questions in Talia’s life. Under the Heart of the Lotus
ongoing conceptual, mental, or moral struggles in your
Flower, I write:
character’s life. Write appropriate questions next to those
“Is it me?”
circles. Wrestling with those questions in play will give
That is,Talia is wrestling with the fundamental question
your Avatar Destiny to work with, ultimately increasing
of the Lotus Flower—whether she can really change
their power and the breadth of your influence in the world.
anything, or if things just change because she’s around.
FINAL TOUCHES Above the Shadow of Wild Oats, I write:
Draw a line between any two circles that have the same “Can I settle down?”
name or a shared bullet point. Is there any way to break free from being a crazy teen
Name your character, if you haven’t, and any circles that without giving up on Hanging On?
don’t have a name yet.
Fill in any bullet points that you’ve left empty.
Think about your Estate some more—what it means,
what it is, what the best word for it might be. Make it fit
nicely together with your character as a whole. And then...

YOU’RE THERE!
You stand before the face of your Imperator. Your new
Familia gathers around. Where will you go from here?

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 73
CHAPTER 6

Mortals PASSIONS AND SKILLS

Passions and Skills are a mortal’s tools to find happiness,
fulfill their destiny, and earn the respect of their peers.
This is your starting place. This is how you worked when
you were a mortal, what you did.
They’re not as important to a Power.
A Power’s mortal destiny is gone—replaced by a new
one. They gain miraculous abilities orders of magnitude
more effective than their mortal Skills. They can’t succeed
at life through mortal actions alone.
But their old self is still there. The shell of their flesh;
their mortal Will; their old Passions and Skills—it’s all still
there, the thing through which they express the breath of
the divine. Your Avatar isn’t just a god. They’re a person too.
She was an ordinary woman in most So you’ll write down traits for your mortal self.
respects, save for her providence; which To build your mortal self, divide 8 points between
was that she could write with a better Passions and Skills.
hand than any in the world. It was not Passions are written as sentences. Each describes an
a talent for which she was much idea, ideal, drive, dream, or attachment that works for you—
recognized—but those who saw her something that helps you live your mortal life. Something
lecture notes, or her letters, or her that helped your Avatar find happiness, peace, success, a
invitations, understood that they were place, or hope, back in their mortal days. You should give
witness to the miraculous in life. more points to more important and more functional
Passions.
—from DOORKNOBS, by Emily Chen
Skills are written as short sentence fragments, usually
1-7 words. Each describes a skill set or way of life that you
spent a long time practicing. The better you are with that
Skill, the more points you should assign it.
You can spend up to 5 points on a Passion or Skill. If you
run out of points before you’ve written down all the
Passions and Skills you know your character has, you can
have extra Passions and Skills at 0—or even negative, for
Passions that hurt you and Skills you’re terrible at. They
won’t help you any, and you won’t get any points back for
negative Passions and Skills, but at least you’ll know they’re
there.
Here’s what I think my Passions and Skills look like:
� Passion: I think that people are basically good. (3)
� Passion: I want to get Nobilis back into print. (0)
� Passion: I want to finish “Hitherby Dragons.” (1)
� Passion: I want to find love! (1)
� Skill: Writer (3)
� Skill: Dancer (-1)

To solve the problems of my life, my best bet is writing or

faith in humanity; dance won’t help me very much!

MORTALS
74
DIFFICULTIES
PRODUCTIVITY, HAPPINESS,
The basic chart of difficulties for mortal actions goes like AND INTENTIONS
this—
� 0 or less: attempt to do things, but only make things
Every Passion and Skill comes with a characteristic set of
worse;
outcomes—not just effects, in terms of difficulty 2 impact on
� 1: make yourself happy;
� 2: accomplish a task; have a tangible impact on the the world, but a standard way of making you happy, of
world; impressing others, of being effective, productive, of looking
� 3: do something “correctly;” impress people around good, of being right.
you; For instance, you might have the Martial Arts that can
� 4: do something effective—something that moves make justice. When you work your way up to level 5 effects,
you closer to your goals; you can use kung-fu, or judo, or whatever you actually have,
� 5: do something productive—something that makes to make things better in that they are more just. If you want to
your life better. use Martial Arts to make friends or solve romantic
� 6: do something that looks damn good—impressive, problems, though, it’s not enough to just say “level 5 effect;”
dramatic, and cool; you have to tie your action in, somehow, to the kinds of
� 7: do something really effective, moving you a lot Martial Arts you’ve used before.
closer to your goals; Similarly, you might enjoy Cooking delicious treats. It
� 8: do something really productive—it will make your makes you feel wickedly self-indulgent. It makes your toes
life a lot better;
curl! That doesn’t mean that you know how to do the kind of
� 9 or more: do the right thing, for some fuzzy
Cooking that makes you feel competent and self-satisfied.
definition of right.
They’re both level 1 effects, but they’re not the same kind of
Cooking Skill. If you Cook at all, you probably can make
You can use your Passions or Skills to achieve anything up
yourself feel competent and self-satisfied through
to their level on that chart. A level 2 Passion would let you
Cooking; it’s not that it’s impossible. But you’ll have to
complete a homework assignment, fix a leak, or work your explain how you get there. It’s not the kind of happiness
way through a piano sonata. A level 3 Skill would let you you’ve earned from Cooking in the past.
practice professionally—for instance, a lawyer with Skill: The scope for Passions and Skills is generally developed
Law (3) wouldn’t necessarily win any given case, but they’d in the course of play.
be perfectly competent, with a solid professional manner
and functional legal arguments. You also get the benefits of
lower-level effects, at your option—for instance, a
productive action is usually effective and can be “correct” or WILL
satisfying if you like.
To go past your Passions and Skills—to reach the better Mortals and Powers have 8 points of Will.
levels of the chart—you need an act of Will. Over the course of the day a character can spend Will
in chunks of 1, 2, 4, or 8 to descend the difficulty chart
above. It’s easy to spend 1 Will; it’s reasonable to spend 2;
Field Guide! to… and spending 4 or 8 is really hard—if you push yourself
Dharma Worms that way too often, or for too long, you might overstrain
These transparent green inchworm-spirits assign people yourself, give yourself a heart attack, or at least let the rest
their dharma—the way they should be in life, the path that of your life fall to pieces. The HG can represent these
is harmonious with them, the “destiny” that is given them. effects by wounding one of your Normal Health levels (pg.
They crawl over you sometime in your youth to provide the 184).
initial dharmic determination and return occasionally Spending Will creates an Intention.
throughout your childhood to touch the matter up.
Inchworms don’t really care whether they’re assigning
people power, potentialities, attractions, or inevitable
outcomes, so it’s not always clear what exactly a person’s On Tuesday morning, Nascha slew an unkillable beast; and
dharma is; what is clear is that it somehow defines what performed seven acts of great chastity; and upheld the honor of
works for a person and works a kind of goingness of direction the King. She protected the lands of her liege lord against an
into the fabric of their self. When an Imperator makes you unstoppable army; and brought an incorrigible diabolist into
a Power, your old dharma becomes obsolete. You can attract the grace of God; and humbled herself for nearly twenty-seven
dharma-worms with a mixture of honey and crushed hours in prayer. And at the end of the day, only one challenge
flowers left out on a porcelain plate, but unless you’ve lost remained unchecked on her to-do list: asking her liege for a
your dharma and failed to replace it with anything else all higher rank within his knightly order. The thought intimidated
they can really do is crawl on you, polish any bits of your her; in his eyes, she was lucky to be a knight at all.
dharma that may have faded, and measure roughly how —from THE KNIGHT OF ALABASTER, by Eleanor K.
many dharma-inches you have remaining!

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 75

An Intention is written as a sentence fragment,

sentence, or short paragraph. It embodies a temporary Hidden Secrets! of ...
course of action, devotion, dedication, way of handling
Arikel
things, or belief. Its rating is equal to [the highest relevant This is a Power who patrols human dreams to keep
Passion or Skill, plus the Willpower spent] and you can Nightmare from devouring their Will. You have
use it as a temporary Passion or Skill to achieve things probably read many stories about him in the tabloids.
from the chart above. He is the son of Nightmare, by way of the Angel of the
For instance, you could add 1 Will to a level 2 Sun, and Sinhika of the Vale is his daughter, but the
Diplomacy Skill to create a level 3 Intention—“Mingle rest of the stories that go around about him are not
with the aristocracy.” That’s enough to carry yourself true. His magical Mercedes is named Alsvidur, and you
correctly and impress the people around you. Somebody will find him a trustworthy ally if he should ever
with a level 0 Passion for Truth could spend 4 Will to happen to roll up in your dreams.
effectively conduct an investigation, achieving through
persistence and effort what they could not achieve through
Skill. In addition to this, you’ll drop all of your Intentions and
Your Intentions are usually based on your own Passions reset to 8 Will when—
and Skills. If it makes sense, you’re allowed to base an � you get at least 4 hours of sleep;
Intention on someone else’s—relying on a friend’s Skill, � a crisis completely shakes up your life; or
for example, or turning an enemy’s Passions against them. � the game session ends.
Intentions based on someone else’s Passions and Skills are
only usable when that person is interacting with you.16 POWERS AND INTENTIONS
The matter of Will and Intentions tends to be a little
SUSTAINED INTENTIONS simpler for Powers.
Characters in Nobilis can have up to two actions running Husbanding your Will—feeling more and more tired as
at once. For a mortal an “action” is either an active the day’s end comes—is a quintessentially mortal
Intention or something you’re doing with a raw Passion or experience. Every Power, even the weakest and most
Skill. drained, can spend a single miraculous action to create an
Two actions aren’t very much. Intention equal to [their highest relevant Passion or Skill,
If you’re Driving to Work, say, and Thinking about a plus 3.] With a bit of the Aspect Trait, or a few Miracle
Problem at Work, then you’re full up on actions. If a cop Points, Powers can bypass the Intention system entirely,
pulls you over, and you want to engage him in polite replacing declarations like “I have a level X Intention,”
dialogue, you’ll have to drop one of your active Intentions with “I flawlessly succeed.”
to do so. That means that Powers still think about pressing
mortal questions like—
RECOVERING WILL � should I declare failure here to recover that invested
You can sometimes recover one point of Will from an Will?
Intention that you’re dropping. Specifically, when you � do I have enough Will left to get me through the
spend Will on an Intention, and that Intention succeeds or day?
fails, you can drop that Intention and get one point of � can I spend 4-8 Will here or is that pushing too
spent Will back. hard?
Deciding success or failure is ultimately up to you. The
HG can weigh in on the matter by telling you that you —but only in the same way a millionaire clips coupons for
succeed at something, or that success is no longer possible, the grocery store. It’s in a spirit of good practice rather
but it’s not their abstract, objective judgment of success than in deadly earnest.
and failure that matters. What matters is whether your
Avatar decides that it’s a failure or success—whether
they’re willing to give up on the Intention as either
hopeless or complete. If you want to get a point of Will
back by dropping your Thinking about a Problem at Work
Intention and exclaiming: “That’s it! I’m not going to get
this worked out today!” then that’s okay—getting pulled
over isn’t really keeping you from solving the problem, but
your declaration of failure will suffice.

16 With the exception of Shine, below.

MORTALS
76
COOL AND SHINE In each of these cases, Cool applies reflexively and by
default,19 but a Cool person can waive their Cool if they
You have access to two special Skills named Cool and want to let something happen.
Shine.
You buy Cool and Shine like any other Skill—spending Powers and Cool
up to 5 Passion or Skill points on each—but you can’t use As a Power, your character will get free Cool equal to their
them to do things yourself, and you can’t use Will or Aspect Trait (pg. 91). This adds to any Cool you buy with
miracles to make them stronger. They’re not tools to make Passion and Skill points, up to a maximum total Cool of 5.
you more productive and effective and happy. Cool and
SHINE
Shine affect other characters’ actions, instead. Shine is leadership, glory, and influence.
You can use it to inspire others. In particular, any time a
COOL mortal wants to do things for you, to serve you, to honor
Cool is competence, focus, and unflappability. It’s the
you, or to implement your orders or agenda—and
power to be the star of your own story and not easily a set assuming you’re OK with it—they can draw upon your
piece in anyone else’s plans. For instance, I bump into a Shine. They can use it as if it were one of their own
mysterious bishounen17 and decide that we should fall in Passions or Skills, making it the basis for an Intention, and
love. My Passion can help me win him over to this plan! you don’t have to interact with them to make it work.
But he can oppose that Passion with his Cool—not so For instance, you have Shine 4. You radiate with glory.
much rejecting my pitch as standing there so coolly and so You tell a mortal: “Go jump in a lake.” If it weren’t for your
mysteriously that I mess it up myself. Shine, that would be a bad idea for them. They would get
wet, and might develop a cold. However, because you are
Skill Penalties inspirational, they might just want to do it—with just 1
Cool is a Skill Penalty. If applicable it reduces the effective Will spent on their Intention, they can guarantee that it’ll
rating of a Skill, Passion, or Intention by the Cool rating. be a productive and effective movement in their life.
Mundane actions are just plain less effective against the
19 That said, Cool doesn’t apply to merely probable or potential
Cool.
harm! Cool only applies when the immediate first-order
You only take one Skill Penalty at a time—specifically, effects of an action are harmful or invasive—and it
the highest. So if you’re going up against Cool 2 and Cool specifically doesn’t apply to something that won’t be harmful
3 at the same time, it reduces your effective Skill, Passion, until another, later action makes it so. If you’re planning to
or Intention rating by 3. (Not 5!) blow up someone Cool, for instance, you can rent out the
apartment next to them without penalty. You can even
What Cool Protects Against assemble and plant a remote-detonated bomb in the rented
Cool gets in the way of mundane actions that: apartment without penalty! It’s not until you go to press the
� trick, trip up, embarrass, or mess with someone Cool; button and make things go boom that their Cool will get in
� hurt someone Cool; your way. Similarly, even though there’s at least a few Cool 5
� co-opt, win over, or corrupt someone Cool; or mortals on every continent, there’s nothing stopping you
� do one of those things to an organization, person, or from accumulating a nuclear arsenal big enough to destroy
situation someone Cool is actively watching over. the world hundreds of times over. Cool won’t be a problem
for you until you go to launch them!
17 A “bishounen” is a beautiful, athletic male who transcends You may be wondering whether remote detonator buttons
ordinary attractiveness. Most mysterious bishounen are and missile launcher buttons are notoriously difficult to push
actually Nobilis, Excrucians, or Imperators, but a few are the in the world of the game, which would be an embarrassing
offspring of the Star-Beast Qot. These bishounen, gestated in situation for me, since that world after all is meant to be our
the mind rather than the body of human and humanoid own. The answer is, they’re not. The HG can describe the
females, spend a certain interval on Earth and then are drawn cause of failure of an action however they like. They can
to make a pilgrimage to the stars.18 A mysterious bishounen decide when a bomb fails to explode that something
may turn out to be a normal human but then they are happened to distract you from pushing the button; or to
probably not so much mysterious as secretive, distant or interrupt the signal; or that some hero heroically snipped a
misunderstood. colored wire just then; or even that there was a previously
undiscovered issue dating back to the bomb’s assembly or
18 Or so they think! They do not get very far off-earth before the installation that just now came into play. They have many
Star-Beast dissolves them back into its being, leaving any options!
clothes, equipment, or companions they have accumulated Also, even in reality, those buttons are harder to push than
behind to drift endlessly in a mysterious airless void. you might think, and people who have trouble with them are
less likely to complain. For world-wide nuclear annihilation
buttons it is even arguably a selling point.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS opposite: “Tiria of the Borealis,” by Jenna Moran

 77

T
his is Tiria, the Power of the Borealis! She lives in Locus
Zaanannim, the original reality from which television
characters arise. It's one of her duties to infuse some
characters and shows with a sense of outward-looking wonder,
which is why she's cool, but also, shines! If you can ride a plane or
space shuttle into the borealis and ask her to, she will make you the
star of your own series, but at the cost of being fictional
thenceforth. If her picture seems familiar to you then she probably
hung out with you when you were a child; she is fond of seizing
young children with the tendrils of the borealis and playing with
them in the sky or among the shows, usually remembering to return
them before their parents notice they have gone.

opposite: by artist (I cribbed from these) MORTALS

78

Maybe you meant it more as a brush-off. You don’t have The case against the human soul is compelling: if most people
to let them use your Shine. But maybe you’re the kind of had one, wouldn’t they do something about their world?
numinous, magical, mysterious creature who knows that
—from the prologue to PRINCIPLES OF THE DARK,
cooling their head in a lake will do them good.
by Merriweather James
Powers and Shine
As a Power you will receive free Shine equal to your than level 2 to watch a movie, even if I know he’s going to
Persona Trait (pg. 103). This adds to any Shine you buy get in my way, which means that the HG will resolve his
with Passion and Skill points, up to a maximum total Intention first. It’ll be productive—stopping me will make
Shine of 5. his life better. It’ll be effective—he will stop me. It’ll make
Powers resist other characters’ Shine, and can’t use it as him happy—he’ll be laughing, maniacally, because he’s
the basis for their actions. gotten in my way. And only then, when he’s gotten all of
that, will the HG look at my Intention to see what’s left
for me to achieve.
ACTION The answer is, probably, not much. If I had a particularly
melancholy style of movie-watching, where complaining
The HG looks at the rating of your active Intentions,
about the movie experience was most of my pleasure in it,
Passions, or Skills when deciding what your actions can
then I might be able to sneak some enjoyment right past
achieve. In the absence of opposition or a serious obstacle,
the evil doctor—declaring that level 1 is still enough to
you’re always guaranteed at least a nod towards the effects
make me happy even though I don’t get to watch anything
reachable at those levels—a level 2 Intention does
at all. For some people, being persecuted out of a movie by
something, a level 4 Intention does something effective, and
an evil doctor might be better than seeing a movie in the
a level 5 Intention does something that leaves you better
first place!
off. Sometimes you’ll do even better—the HG is always
…but I’m not one of those people, so that wouldn’t
able to offer you more than you’ve actually earned, right
actually help me.
down to declaring that your 0-1-point Intention to brush
Note that you’re allowed to spend more Will than you
your teeth in the morning was so objectively correct that
actually need on an Intention if you expect to face
the angels sang and the World Ash bowed in wonder.20
opposition of this sort—even if all I want to do is make
What if there is opposition?
myself happy, I can gird myself for an encounter with Dr.
When two actions are in conflict, the action with the
Maleficio by forcing my way to a level 6 Intention. This
higher Passion, Skill, or Intention rating “wins.” It gets the
doesn’t force me to turn superfluous backflips or strike
rewards for its Intention rating first, and the other action
dramatic poses or make the movie-watching “productive”
must pick up the scraps. This means that if you aren’t
in some fashion—I can still limit myself to claiming a level
reasonably confident that you can get the higher number,
1 “makes you happy” result. The only cost is that I’ll be
you’ll want to avoid direct head-to-head conflict with
awfully short on Will for any other conflicts I wind up
another character’s actions.
having with Dr. Maleficio later, and that I probably have
For instance, I want to watch a movie. Dr. Porlock
to risk my health, just a little, to get there.
Maleficio, on the other hand, wants to stop me from
watching a movie!21 If he sets himself a 5-point Intention
of “Stop Jenna from watching a movie,” then he’s probably
going to succeed. I can’t see making an Intention higher

If you lock a human alone in a room for long enough—past

20This is, in fact, why people bother brushing their teeth at all!
the point of anger, past the point of despair, past the point
I mean, not that we’re all hoping for a level 9+ result,
where they can no longer talk or think coherently—they begin
exactly, when we do it, but we do imagine that even a low-
inventing new methods of war. They begin to create tools and
level Intention like “Brush Teeth (0)” or “Brush Teeth (1)”
strategies of battle that the world has never seen before. It
will have some effect, at least; will help us live correctly,
takes a skilled psychologist to dredge meaning from their
perhaps; even, in an ideal world, that it could scale up
mumbles and gibbering, from the sketches their fingernails
randomly to a level 5 result that makes our lives better than
make against the floor.
they, without brushing our teeth on that particular occasion,
That is the only secret; that is what makes the great
would have been.
nations great, and makes lesser nations fall. Someone locked in
21 He’s unhappy with his life. If you were named Dr. Porlock a room, in the dark, without sanitation or company, until
Maleficio you probably would be too. Also you would really their mind breaks; someone to read their heart, and tell the
begin to wonder why one child named Porlock wasn’t enough world what transpires there.
for Mr. and Mrs. Maleficio, and if the two of you, perhaps, —from REFLECTIONS III, by Viscount d’Armand
were clones. Ultimately the only way to resolve your
confusion would be to stop me from watching a movie.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 79

TROUBLE
Sometimes your action will come up against something Crowds are far easier to coerce into foolish mistakes than
individuals are. For example, it is easy to convince a
that you just can’t change—something that keeps your “I
crowd to travel faster than light, thus violating the causal
blow up the world with my mind” action from having an
order postulate and damaging the fundamental order of
impact on the world, even if you do manage to reach
the universe. Convincing an individual to do so is almost
Intention level 2. Something like: impossible.
“ You can’t do that. You don’t have psychic powers.”
—from EMERITUS, by Michael Kay
Truths like this—things that get in the way of your
actions—are called Obstacles. They’re not limited to What they do have is a Skill without an ordinary mode
outright show-stoppers like the one above; they run the of use—a Skill where everything they might want to do is
gamut from equally a stretch, and any impossibility can be converted to
an obstacle.
“It’s hard to do athletics with a twisted ankle,” or
For instance, somebody shoots at a sorcerer.The sorcerer
“ You don’t have enough funding to do this research
properly,” decides they want to knock the bullets out of the air. That’s
to universal truths like not something ordinary Skills can ever really do—even a
“Killing people won’t make you happy,” or level 9+ Warrior action is more likely to move you
smoothly past the line of fire than actually cut down
“ You can’t make friends without actually meeting people.” bullets, because, fundamentally, a level 9+ mundane action
is still mundane.
Obstacles are like Cool—they’re Skill Penalties. Each But for a sorcerer, it’s just something like a level 3
Obstacle is rated from 1 to 5, and when you’re in direct Obstacle—
conflict with the Obstacle, it reduces your effective Skill, “People can’t knock bullets aside.”
Passion, or Intention rating by the level of the Obstacle.
Remember that you only take one Skill Penalty—the The distinguishing feature of magic is that you can reduce
highest, specifically—at a time. things like that to Obstacles—that you can stretch the
Usually you’ll only encounter an Obstacle when you’re Skill to do incredible, unnatural things. The flip side is that
pushing the limits of your Skills and Passions, confronting you generally have to—there isn’t really any kind of
a hard truth of the world, or working under some sort of standard usage where you just use the Skill and do things
active and unusual handicap—the definition of ordinary without encountering Obstacles at all.
use for most Skills and Passions is that no Obstacles Using magic effectively consumes a lot of Will—
interfere. magicians haven’t taken over the world, despite their
awesome power, because they tend to fall over after 1-2
MAGIC small spells.To mitigate this effect magicians learn to warp
Magic is a special case. and transform their dharma, change their nature, adopt
People who learn to see the real world—the mythic magical specialties and strange taboos; this manifests as
world—can take up the practice of magic. This is usually the purchase of Bonds, described on pg. 82. A mortal
bought as a Skill of some sort, such as Skill: magician can have up to 8 points of Bonds, in addition to
Elementalism or Skill: Sorcery, and it’s not inherently their Passions and Skills; these will serve as sources of Will
any more powerful or effective than any other Skill. and lighten the cost of some spells. If your Avatar was a
Magicians can’t battle Powers. They can’t defeat miracles. magician before becoming a Power, you can either keep
They can’t call down angels or drive off devils, and they’re some of their old Bonds (upgraded to Noble levels of
not notably any happier, healthier, more effective, or more power) or assume that your character discarded them all as
productive than anybody else. part of their Commencement.

“Our civilization has long since overcome its primitive

dependence on the minds of the elite as a driving force of
technology and culture. Now, we harness them to great
Cognito-Drivers, using their intellect to power our starships
and fuel our engines of mass destruction.”
—overheard in the “Star Destroyer Gamma”
region of Locus Zaanannim

MORTALS
80

Edge, like Cool, is a Skill Penalty. For the purpose of

“The enemy has twice ten thousand genii of flame, and great deciding who wins the conflict (and for no other purpose)
black elephants that snort clouds of heated vapor, and over their it reduces your opponent’s effective Skill, Passion, or
hosts fly spindle-limbed demons wreathed in Hell’s fires. You, Intention rating by the rating of your Edge.
on the other hand, have five shiftless deserters.” Remember that you only take one Skill Penalty, the
“And a camel!” highest Skill Penalty, at any given time.23
“And a camel,” IT concedes.
—from FIRE STORIES, compiled by Édouard Guy INHERENT SUPERIORITY
Characters who were never human may spend some of
their Passion and Skill points to buy Superior Qualities
TOOLS AND ASSISTANTS and Skills. These work just like tools—you get things done
quickly and easily, you can accomplish things others can’t,
For the most part tools, machines, and assistants don’t play and you have Edge in an otherwise fair contest equal to the
much part in the action system as stated. It’s assumed that Superior Quality or Skill:
if you’re driving into town, you have a car, and that that’s � +0. You’re within human norms.
faster—but not better—than taking a bike. Using a word � +1. You’re unrealistically good.
processor helps you write, but it doesn’t help you earn � +2. You’re like Sherlock Holmes (Superior Detective
happiness, or write effectively, or impress others. It mostly 2) or John Henry (Superior Steel Drivin’ 2).
helps with things like speed and feasibility, which are more � +3. You’re like a beast—bears have Superior Strength
relevant to HG description than to player action. 3, great cats have Superior Reflexes 3.
A few special tools and coworkers (which we’re going to � +4. You’re something far beyond human—
capitalize or relabel as Tools) can actually raise your mountains have Superior Strength 4.
effective Passions, Skills, or Intentions. For example, a � +5. Nothing mortal can stand against you—light, for
stage with good acoustics actually makes you a better example, has Superior Speed 5.
singer—it lowers the difficulty of being impressive,
effective, and productive with Singing Skill on the stage. A You can generally use them as ordinary Skills, as well—
good editor improves your writing, a good content making them point for point better than ordinary Passions
management system improves your competence as a and Skills, as long as you’re OK with not really being
software engineer, and low latency will help you perform human.24
skillfully in a networked game.
Tools like this add an effective +1 or +2 to your relevant
Passion, Skill, or Intention—+1 for very good Tools, and +2
for downright exceptional ones. Tools that add +3 or more
are remarkable, either unique, magical, or super-advanced;
the theoretical maximum for legendary magical Tools and
post-Singularity technology is +5.
23 So you’re a mysterious bishounen in a mysterious zeppelin.
EDGE Someone’s trying to shoot you down, so you start raining
bombs on them. You have Cool 2 and Edge 4.
In addition to making your life easier and occasionally Your Cool makes it harder for them to hit you. It’s just like
improving your effective skills, accessories like cars, they’re a bad shot. If they have Intention: Shoot Down the
backup, and nuclear warheads can give you a competitive Bishounen of 5, it drops to an effective 3 just from your
advantage in conflicts with other people. Cool. But for purposes of deciding whether you win the
This advantage is called Edge. It’s a rating between +0 fight? They have an effective Intention of 1. You can push the
and +5 that measures how much you outgun someone— bomb-dropping button with a languid, sunny carelessness
� +0. You’ve got basically equivalent bling. and still have a good chance of driving your opponent off
� +1. Your tennis racket and shoes are awesome, and before they shoot you down.
theirs are falling apart.22 24 Sherlock Holmes, for clarity, pretends to be human in his
� +2. You have a gun. They are unarmed. fiction, but let’s face it, if you knew him in real life you’d think
� +3. You have your hands free. They are busy holding something totally hinky was up. Probably (and maybe this is
up the sky. just me) you would decide he was actually an experimental
� +4. You’re in a car, and they’re racing you on foot. CIA android who had been kicked out of the agency for
� +5. Your opponent has mistakenly brought a knife to being too British, or for the drugs, or somesuch sort of thing.
a global thermonuclear annihilation fight. John Henry, on the other hand, just drives steel through
any attempt you might make to categorize him. You should
22 Also, you are playing tennis. try it sometime! It’s really quite surprising!

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 81
CHAPTER 7

The
Laws
of Your
Nature
Within the limits of our comprehension,
we each determine our own fate—
Go gladly to it, rather, whether we make Commencement gets rid of your old dharma. It’s still there,
ourselves have wings under a dharmascope, but it doesn’t apply any longer. You
Or feed ourselves to rabid dogs. are no longer a mortal. You are no longer even supposed to
be a mortal. You have a new way of being, new purposes,
It is the inexorable blessedness of the
new laws. Your destiny is overwritten. It’s like you’ve
universe
become a fan fiction of yourself, with a completely different
Operating beyond our comprehension
life story and endgame:
And clashing terribly with the smallness
What if you
of our desires
became a god?
That poses the great threat
To our chosen outcome.
Once you have your character concept you will write down
—repeated ad infinitum
the new covenant of your life—your new dharma, your new
in the Thought-Record of Hannary James purpose, your new way of being—as a list of Bonds,
Afflictions, and Properties. You are governed and defined
by your Afflictions and Bonds, while the Properties explain
the rules of your Estate.
Divide up to 13 points between Bonds and Afflictions,
spending 1-5 points on each.25
Bonds and Afflictions are written as English-language
sentences. Each describes something fundamental about
your character. Each can also be interpreted or understood
as a rule—
� something you must (or ought to) do;
� something you can’t (or shouldn’t) do; or
� something that drives you into action.

25 Technically you can spend up to [13 + your Treasure rating]

points here, but don’t worry about that until you understand
Bonds, Afflictions, and Treasure.

THE LAWS OF YOUR NATURE

82

Bonds are things that you must work at. You spend energy
on them. When you turn your back on your Bonds you are “Up!” he cried. “Up! It’s inspection time!”
damaged and lost; when you are in harmony with them, Slowly, grumpily, the soldiers filed out of their holes,
you are almost unstoppable; but to reach that place of washed their paws in the stream, and donned their helmets
harmony, you need to put in an awful lot of work. Having and their greaves. They stood with bayonets high as the
Bonds is like being a perfect swordsman or a soldier who sergeant paced up and down before them.
refuses to kill—it may be your nature and purpose to be “Wilson!” the sergeant snapped. “Need I remind you?”
that way, but that doesn’t mean you can take the burden “No, sir,” Wilson replied, and his shoulders sagged.
lightly! “Badgers can’t play video games.”
Afflictions, conversely, just happen. They’re out of your His little handheld device emitted a mournful bloop.
hands. Sometimes they’re good, sometimes they are bad,
—from SOME LIVE, SOME DIE, by Jackie Robinson,
but they’re that portion of your destiny and purpose and
writing on the topic of the Badgers’ Bond
nature that binds you whether you’re in tune with yourself
or not.
Any Bond can be an Affliction, or vice versa; it’s purely Bonds are also a great way to record the things you care
a question of how you want to think of the Trait. about—to establish that you care about your family, your
friends, your horse, your sword, your job, your hobby, your
BONDS collection of exploding flowers, or whatever. You can make
it clear what’s really important to you with Bonds like—
Bonds are for you—the player. � Bond: I care about my brother!
The HG can reward you for using them appropriately. � Bond: Nobody drives my car but me!
The basic sentence for the Bond is always treated as “true” � Bond: I ❤ my magic broom!
or at least “potentially true” in the game world. But it is � Bond: Flowers are awesome enough when they don’t
you, as a player, who decides when to bring the Bond into explode—but when half of them are antimatter?
the game and with what force. O.M.G.

WHY YOU WANT BONDS BENEFITS

Bonds can be pretty awesome things. You can be
uncatchable or invincible or beautiful as a Bond, for Bond-Based Actions
example, and then it’s not so much a burden as a tool— In a conflict, or when facing a skill penalty, you may
� Bond: I can’t be caught! reflexively invoke any applicable Bond to improve a
� Bond: I can’t lose! mundane action. This adds [the highest applicable Bond
� Bond: I must be the prettiest person in the room! rating] to the effective Intention level of your action.
For example, you have a level 5 Bond of love to a friend.
Conversely, Bonds that are weaknesses or demands are also You decide to buy them a present. It doesn’t help—you’re
useful to you. When they get you into trouble or motivate not in a conflict. But if someone tries to stop your
you into cool sorts of action, you gain extra MP. That’s why purchase, or if you’re broke enough that the lack of money
you might want to choose Bonds like— is even a 1-point Obstacle, your Bond kicks in—and you
� Bond: I can’t enter a house uninvited! add the Bond to your Intention rating and become much
� Bond: I can’t see! stronger.
� Bond: I’m in love with an Excrucian!

The Power Surkhai Beybukov suffers an affliction of lines. Get in the Know! on…
Wherever he should go, a line forms behind him. If he should St. Angela of the Flail
walk slowly, they shuffle behind him. If he should run, or drive, In the blinking 12:00 of an unset clock are the “:” that are
or fly, they fall behind; but as soon as he decelerates to a human St. Angela’s eyes. If you would do unpleasant things you
range of motion, the local citizenry assemble at his back. had best avoid those eyes; though she is bound to leave
Surkhai claims that he suffers this curse to shield his Imperator human free will intact, she has no compunction against
from its effects. His Imperator claims to have assigned it in physically scourging the unrighteous.
retribution for certain of Surkhai’s personal habits. As for the ProTip: St. Angela rarely acts on what she sees but she
crowd, they point to Surkhai’s regal demeanor. “Why, someone never objects to being shown. If you need a quantum
like this,” they say, “must be going somewhere very interesting observer or an unbiased witness to something or you think
indeed!” someone’s going to do something unrighteous to you in
—from ON SERVING THE NOBILIS, by Luc Ginneis front of your TV, try cycling the power on your VCR!

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 83

Strike
In a conflict, you may reflexively invoke a Bond to improve WHEN DO PLAYERS GET MP
a miraculous action. This allows you to shatter miraculous FOR AFFLICTIONS, BONDS,
shields, overcome the exceptional power of Imperators, AND PROPERTIES?
Excrucians, and high-Persona Nobilis, and ignore other
characters’ Afflictions. This ability is called Strike. The HG decides at basically their whim when to give out
Invoking a Bond is proposing to the HG that— MP. However, that choice has a meaning.
� you must do something, but you’re in danger of that The more MP you give out, as HG, the more “oomph” the
not happening; moment has in the context of the ongoing story. The fewer
� you can’t do something, but you’re in danger of being MP, the less! Giving or not giving MP is, in short, a descriptive
forced into it; or technique, just like calling something crimson instead of red
� you’re driven to do something, and it’s filling your or “a cop” instead of “a guy in a strange uniform, running at
thoughts, driving you, pushing you, right now. you with a gun.”
This is why players almost never get MP for things that
happen “offstage.”
The HG then decides whether to accept that proposal and
agree that the risk is real or the drive applicable.
If the HG agrees that your actions are driven by your would otherwise kill you—if you are in a fugue/trance-like
Bond or that your opponent’s actions threaten it, your state focused on a Bond when you lose your last health
miracle receives a free Strike equal to [the highest relevant level and “die,” the HG may rule that your Avatar survives
Bond rating]. This negates any hostile Auctoritas (pg. 51) in a completely focused fugue and can become a playable
up to the level of your Strike, and you subtract the higher character again at a later point. For instance, a shark PC
of your Strike or Miraculous Edge from your opponent’s might have a Bond to “keep moving;” if they are dying in
effective miracle level for the purposes of deciding the hard vacuum, they could throw themselves into mindless
conflict. You can invoke a Bond’s Strike after declaring the flailing motion and potentially survive (albeit without the
action itself, as long as the action hasn’t completed yet. ability to take other actions) until someone rescues them.
For example, you have a 2-point Bond obligating you to
be the prettiest person in the room. You’re in a beauty Breaking Bonds
contest. Your miracles to win the contest automatically If you break your Bonds it usually just means that you as a
receive 2 Strike, except during the talent portion; there, the player are shoving the matter off the table. Maybe the
HG may or may not allow it to apply. Later on you are situation isn’t really covered by the Bond, or maybe you
climbing Mt. Everest. For this, your Bond does nothing, think the Bond comes into play and then gets
no matter how fervently or vigorously invoked. circumvented but you don’t want to deal with exactly how.
For instance, you can’t enter a house when you’re not
MP Bonus invited, but it’s late and the game’s almost ending and you
You can gain MP from your Bonds. The HG may give you want to enter a house, so you just do it. Maybe there’s some
a number of MP up to and including the Bond rating technicality and it’s not really a “house.” Maybe you were
when— invited long ago. Maybe everyone should just assume that
� your Bond gets you into trouble; you got someone to come to the door and invite you.
� someone twists or breaks the Bond, e.g. by catching Maybe you’re just tired as a player and you forgot the
an uncatchable you; rule!26
� you do something cool that the Bond drove you to, Sometimes, though, it’s more sinister. Someone has
or that fulfills or exemplifies the Bond. forcibly broken your Bond, overcoming its power with
their own or putting you in a situation that forced you to
If something really major happened, and it’s late enough in break it yourself. You’re the only one who can confirm that
the story that this is a good bargain, the HG can offer you this has happened, but if it does happen your character will
a full MP refresh instead of bonus MP. suffer a spiritual wound. The details won’t mean much to
For a mortal Avatar, or if the HG wants to reward you you until you’ve read the wound system, but the wound’s
with something less than 1 MP, you may receive points of severity is capped by the Bond strength at:
Will up to and including the Bond rating instead. � 1: one Surface Wound;
� 2-3: one Serious Wound;
Healing � 4: one Deadly Wound;
You can survive off your Bonds. Doing things related to � 5: two Deadly Wounds
your Bonds puts energy in your system—it's like a sugar-
water IV or a bit of a nap. Doing cool things related to 26I once forgot that one of my characters was blind and spent
high-level Bonds is more like having a grand meal, a long a long time scoping out a murder scene. Eventually the HG-
sleep, great sex, or some other incredibly refreshing event. equivalent gently reminded me that I couldn’t actually see a
You can sometimes use a Bond to survive things that thing.

THE LAWS OF YOUR NATURE

84

It can also count as “breaking” a Bond if there’s something

you care about, something you’re motivated to protect or Mirabelle had not asked to be an avatar of death. Some things
own or manage, and that thing gets hurt. just happened. She figured that she just pretty much had to live
If you take a wound from a breaking Bond, you’ll almost with it, and so she did.
certainly gain MP as well! —from DOORKNOBS, by Emily Chen

Getting into Trouble

You don’t have to wait for a Bond to get you into trouble WHY YOU WANT AFFLICTIONS
naturally—you can just declare yourself into trouble. You Afflictions are better than Bonds in that they can actually
can do something stupid with an Aspect miracle or a make things happen, and as part of the HG’s action rather
mundane action. You can use some other kind of miracle than a mundane or miraculous action of your own. You can
to intensify or make relevant the Bond, drawing trouble to have Afflictions like:
your door. Your Avatar is allowed to be irrational � Affliction: I must be rescued whenever I’m in
sometimes, or to engage in self-defeating behaviors driven trouble!
by a subconscious will—their Bonds are part of them, after � Affliction: I can’t be hurt by any force!
all, just as much as their conscious thinking process is. � Affliction: I must win the heart of everyone I meet!
For instance, if your Power is acrophobic, you might
notice over time that acrophobia isn’t really slowing you And then whenever you’re in trouble, someone rescues you.
down. You might be very afraid of high places, but it’s not When something tries to hurt you, it fails. When you meet
really a trouble in your life when someone, you win their heart! The only trouble is that it
� nobody can force you to go anywhere you don’t want happens whether you want it to or not.
to go; and Afflictions that are weaknesses are useful for the same
� you find excuses to participate when you do get reason as a weakness-style Bond. When they get you into
dragged into aerial battles, because flailing around trouble, you gain MP. They often have strong potential
role-playing acrophobia isn’t as fun as taking utility as well:
meaningful actions. � Affliction: I must appear when someone chants my
name three times!
In a case like that, don’t just leave the Bond to calcify on � Affliction: My shape changes to reflect my deeds!
your character sheet, laying around like some sort of � Affliction: An Excrucian’s in love with me!
Bond-like lump! Look for ways to make your life more
complicated with it! Declare that you missed an important Sure, to look under the hood of that first Affliction, it’s
meeting with some NPC because they live on the third terribly annoying to reflexively teleport across the world
floor, and now they might be mad at you. Let the stress of whenever some dude with a pamphlet chants your name.
recent or impending aerial encounters mess up the rest of On the plus side, though, it’s free travel; it doesn’t require
your life. Grow wings to fight your phobia and then never buying a Teleportation-style Gift; your friends can call on
use them! Make it count. you when they’re in trouble; and it won’t be long before you
pair it with a cell phone and some allies to get you just
AFFLICTIONS about anywhere you want to go.

Afflictions are controlled by the HG.

An Affliction is still part of your character. Your vision
of how the Affliction works and what it is is the “correct”
one in the fiction of the game. But unlike with Bonds, it’s
the HG who decides when the Affliction applies, and what
it does in any given case.

Hidden Secrets! of… Lies hung from him like strips of black ribbon. Promises kept
Trystan Porphyrogenitus at great cost twined around his brow. Dust from a hundred
This is the Power of Poseurs. He may show up anywhere in long journeys drifted from his feet, and his eyes sparkled with a
the world to take petty vengeance upon you for offenses or hundred thousand loves.
perceived offenses against poseurs. If he does harass you “How did you come to be this way?” the child asked.
you may drive him away by pretending that you are “I became aware,” the wanderer said, “that I carried with
important enough or powerful enough to drive off a Power. me everything I had ever done. So powerful was this
This is surprisingly yet inevitably effective. It is not clear understanding that I could not help but share it with everyone I
from existing reports whether this is Trystan’s weakness or met.”
simply his favored mode of worship. —from THE BOX, by Emily Chen

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 85

BENEFITS
Affliction-Based Actions “I will give you my endless garden,” the Marquis said,
The HG will use your Affliction as the basis for reflexive “and a knife so sharp it could even cut the moon. A
actions. These are miraculous or magical actions and can thousand thousand clockwork attendants will attend you,
do unnatural things. The default miracle level is around and show you every wonder that your heart could dream.
[Affliction rating + 1], but the HG can pick whatever they You shall be my heir; and I am soon to die. But I must
like—whatever level of mundane Intention or Aspect, warn you, dear, that you shall walk this world I give to
Domain, or Persona miracle it would take to get an you in solitude and cold; for I am Pain, and Pain you shall
appropriate effect is a good choice. Certain Persona and become, and pain can have no friends.”
Treasure miracles can create temporary Afflictions; for —from THE MASK, by Emily Chen
these, the HG will usually use the Persona/Treasure
miracle level as the level of the Affliction effect. HG awards you a suitable number of MP. Unlike Bonds,
Afflictions don’t really engage in tactical miraculous Afflictions never give mortal Will—if you’re in trouble, but
combat—you can think of them like water trying to flow not enough trouble to earn a whole MP, the HG should
into a scene. Balked by some barrier, water just pushes, find a way to give you more trouble instead of settling for
explores, and waits; balked by a miracle, Afflictions simply a smaller reward.
hang out in abeyance until either the force that balks them
recedes or an opportunity arises. In short, the HG can Breaking Afflictions
keep Afflictions on the back burner—it’s not necessary to Afflictions are robust—they don’t break just because
invoke Affliction actions constantly or cleverly once someone overcomes them with miraculous Strike on one
something breaks their hold. occasion. They only “break” when they are made
That said, balking an Affliction with miracles isn’t contradictory, inconsistent, and paradoxical, either within
easy— themselves or in combination with one of your other
An Affliction’s actions are defended by an Auctoritas Afflictions; when they become unable, that is, to function
equal to the Affliction rating. This Auctoritas is a divine or apply.
shield that utterly negates whatever portion of the miracle You win the heart of everyone you meet—but the
directly opposes the Affliction. For example, you’re being mechanical man you just met has no heart to win!
summoned by someone who is chanting your name. An You appear to anyone who chants your name three
opponent attempts to trap you in a cell of twisted space, times—but now your name is being chanted in a placeless
making it so you can’t teleport away and escape. Only—it void!
doesn’t work. They can’t do that! The Auctoritas gives the If something like this does happen, it’s up to the player
Affliction absolute precedence. Unless your opponent to either:
gives their miracle a quality called Strike (pg. 51, 181) by � propose a viable resolution (something that could
invoking Bonds or spending MP, no miracle or mundane happen to sustain the Affliction); or
action that they use will stop your Affliction from working � accept spiritual damage to their Avatar, as when
as defined.27 breaking a Bond.
The Auctoritas is not itself a miracle. Accordingly,
Auctorita do not cancel out; if two Afflictions come into After taking damage from breaking an Affliction, the
direct conflict, regardless of their ratings, both miraculous player has the option to immediately remove it and declare
actions fail. If a player realizes or suspects this is that the contradiction rips the law of the Affliction from
happening, they can spend MP or use a Bond to give their their Avatar’s soul. This will free up the Bond/Affliction
Affliction’s miraculous action Strike. points spent on it until the next opportunity the player has
to redesign their Afflictions and their Bonds.
MP Bonus
You can gain MP from Afflictions, as with Bonds. For
example, you’re trying to fit into a sleepy Southern
community. But you have the Affliction, “My shape
changes to reflect my deeds.” One night you go and win a
fight with an Excrucian. You come back home radiant with
glory and dripping with the ichor of the Beyond; suddenly
fitting in to the sleepy town becomes more difficult. Once
it becomes clear that this is actually a problem for you, the

27 This is a little less impressive than it sounds because people

often will spend that MP or invoke a Bond if they really want
to get in your way. But they have to actually do so!

THE LAWS OF YOUR NATURE

86

AFFLICTIONS AND BONDS I am forbidden to love.

(EXAMPLE) Others of my kind ignore this restriction, cloaking their
feelings in secrecy and silence. I do not have that option. I
am a creature of law. I do not bend. I do not seek to subvert
Rook Catchfly, the Power of Eternity, has the following
the rules that govern my people, for the Lord who sets this
Afflictions and Bonds: law reigns by the order of the warleaders of Creation.
� Affliction (3): I can’t age! So I do not let myself feel the love I once felt for
� Bond (3): I must protect the world. Cynthia. I do not let myself visit her. One of my servants
� Bond (2): I love showing people the beauty of the picks up her letters to me, and puts them in the fire. I give
world.28 my heart to no one.
� Bond (1): I can’t let people take what belongs to me. Sometimes, I let myself look at a picture of the two of us
� Bond (1): I can’t be afraid! together. That is not against the law. Not if I only look to
� Bond (1): I can’t take Marsiglio Tendi seriously. say, “How much I have changed.”
� Bond (1): I want to prove myself. —from the Thought-Record of Rocio DeMitri
� Bond (1): I want to hang out with my Familia.

Most of these are at least partially subject to her will, but � Bond: My Persona and Domain miracles use a very
she really can’t age, which would work out a lot better for narrow definition of my Estate.
her if she weren’t currently 10. � Bond: I can only use really obvious, showy miracles.
� Bond: I can only use unobvious, subtle miracles.
MORE EXAMPLE BONDS AND � Bond: I can’t cross running water.
� Bond: I am under the burden of some sort of
AFFLICTIONS imminent doom.
� Bond: the name of the Creator repulses me and can
THINGS THAT ARE USUALLY BONDS hold me at bay!
� Bond: I am unnaturally flammable and may even
Duties explode.
� Bond: I serve (insert cause, such as the Light, the
Dark, or the Wild here). THINGS THAT COULD BE BONDS OR
� Bond: I have a duty I must regularly perform in the AFFLICTIONS EQUALLY WELL
broader world.
� Bond: I care about my duties to the Chancel! Codes of Conduct
� Bond: I must participate in certain sacred � Bond/Affliction: I always lie.
ceremonies if at all physically possible. � Bond/Affliction: I never lie.
� Bond/Affliction: I can’t kill people.
Emotions � Bond/Affliction: I never turn out less than perfect
� Bond: There’s something I can’t bear to fail at! work in my particular craft.
� Bond: I have to nurture my fortune! � Bond/Affliction: I am cold and cruel and can’t
� Bond: Nobody touches my guns. Nobody. perform kind acts.
� Bond: I hate to see children hurt! � Bond/Affliction: I am kind and warm and can’t
perform acts of excessive cruelty.
Relationships � Bond/Affliction: I am reckless and headstrong.
� Bond: I have a rival. � Bond/Affliction: I have a moral code or faith that I
� Bond: I love my magical flute! can’t or won’t break with.
� Bond: I want my old mundane home and country to
stay safe and well.
Get the Scoop! on…
Weaknesses and Limitations Cassiel of the Book
� Bond: I’m dead, and can’t take mundane actions This is a Power who records the sins and good deeds of
except when possessing something. humankind. The angels consult Cassiel’s register when
� Bond: I only have one hand! setting and updating policy on how to handle potential
� Bond: I can’t remember who I am or what happened human-extinction events—specifically, the Earth is a major
before the last scenes of the last story. front in the Excrucian War; if the Excrucians overwhelm
� Bond: I can’t kick the devil rum. it, driving Heaven back, is it worth trying to save
humanity?
� Bond: I have two points less Domain when not
Cassiel is incorruptible but not omniscient, so if you see
wielding my mystical artifact. him and happen to know of any really good deeds that are
28 This is Rook’s take on the Song of Heaven. being done right around then, you might want to point him
in their direction!

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 87

� Bond/Affliction: I can’t take away someone’s free Louise was never wrong. She had learned this to her cost. For
will. most of her life, she had been certain that she was weak,
� Bond/Affliction: I can’t use modern technology stupid, unacademic, and ugly. She was, of course, correct.
(effectively). Later on, in a foolish rage from being teased, she announced
� Bond/Affliction: I maintain my anonymity at all that she was smarter than anyone in the room; and she was,
times. of course, correct. Understanding in an instant what had
� Bond/Affliction: (when fugitive hunting) I always happened, she became strong, dexterous, academic, and
get my man. beautiful in a matter of minutes; and as for those who were
� Bond/Affliction: not snow nor rain nor heat nor teasing her, she informed them that they would die in many
gloom of night shall stay me from my rounds! gruesome ways.
� Bond/Affliction: I always have a plan. That was not the cost, of course. She had been certain that
� Bond/Affliction: I never give up and I just won’t die. she would not regret their deaths, and she did not. But she let
� Bond/Affliction: I can’t kill/hurt/disrespect/do herself grow arrogant, and one day, in an argument with a
something or other to (pick one): pious man, she announced that there was no God, no purpose,
- the brave! no meaning, and no plan to the universe. And she was, of
- the honest! course, correct.
- the helpless!
—from ARMOR, by Marilith Turner
- the noble!
- the people closely bound to my Estate!
- the wicked! Unfortunate Circumstances
- the sexy! � Affliction: In times of intense emotion, the world
- the boring! finds a way to give me a soundtrack.
- the duly appointed law enforcement officers of � Affliction: I never have money. Seriously, the power
this location! of a god and I still can’t hang on to the stuff!
� Affliction: I’m not allowed to talk to strangers.
THINGS THAT ARE USUALLY AFFLICTIONS � Affliction: I have a miraculous evil twin.
� Affliction: I have a miraculous double or
Pseudo-Powers doppelganger who is not necessarily evil but also not
� Affliction: my body is made of liquid metal.
my friend.
� Affliction: I’m the best dancer in the world!
� Affliction: Someone has information that could
� Affliction: everyone knows my name.
compromise or blackmail me!
� Affliction: wind and fire love me!
� Affliction: I just don’t seem as impressive as a Power
� Affliction: I’m the luckiest bastard you’ll ever meet.
should.
� Affliction: I always look my best.
� Affliction: the things that hurt my Estate can hurt
� Affliction: my black book has the number for
me.
everyone who’s anyone in it.
� Affliction: the people of my Chancel really hate me.
� Affliction: I change shapes when wet.
� Affliction: animals really hate me.
� Affliction: what I don’t know can’t hurt me.
� Affliction: Something (e.g., the lack of a reflection)
� Affliction: my actions cause unreasonable amounts
gives my inhuman nature away!
of property damage.
� Affliction: I get physically/spiritually hurt when
� Affliction: if it’s smart enough, old enough, and
something bad happens to (pick one)
consenting enough that moral issues don’t squick the
- my beloved!
players, I can find a way to find sex with it, and most
- my car!
likely already have.
- my twin!
- my worst enemy!
- a bone mask associated with my Imperator!
Get the Deets! on…
- the spirit of American freedom!
The Piscator Thalasseus
- the worldwide reputation of Exxon!
This is a Power who loves to bargain. If you meet him he
- people who are near me!
will not stay long—“A thousand things to do in a day!”
he’ll call over his shoulder as he leaves—but he’s more
than happy to trade wonders, marvels, and miracles to
anyone who has a way to afford them.
ProTip: he has absolutely no use for your soul, and very
If you die, said Adel, I will die; while you live, I will live. I
little for your firstborn, so if he takes them it’ll be at
shall be a guardian of blood to you.
chalkoi to the drachma in a distant hope of arbitrage. Try
—from ADEL, by K.C. Danine
trading him secrets, rarities, or labor instead!

THE LAWS OF YOUR NATURE

88
THE PROPERTIES OF YOUR ESTATE
For a time, Ridya sought to corrupt souls through personal
At the same time you are creating your Bonds and contact. He eventually judged the failure rate of this technique
Afflictions, you will also build your Estate—the basic unacceptable. Too many souls, on seeing him, saw not the devil
thingness and beingness of it—by writing down a list of its he had become but the angel he had been; and, made exultant
Properties. by that beauty, were lost to him forever.
Spend 7 points on Properties, assigning 1-5 points to —from LEGENDS OF THE NOBILIS, by Luc Ginneis
each.
Properties are written, like Bonds and Afflictions, as
ordinary-language sentences. Each describes something Here are some sample Properties for a few other
fundamental about your Estate. Each can also be Estates—
interpreted as a rule— � Buckets contain things;
� something your Estate must do (or always does); � Hope springs eternal;
� something your Estate can’t do (or never does); or � Strength comes from within;
� something your Estate is driven to do (or seems to � Treachery requires an innocent victim;
work towards). � Violence never solves anything;
� War continues politics by other means.
It’s important to make these Properties simple and
evocative, even if that makes the rule harder to see—you Most of these Properties are pretty easy to extract a rule
are creating meaning for your Estate, which is more from. Hope always springs eternal. Strength can’t come
important than obvious applicability. from outside you. War is driven to follow Politics’ lead.
For instance, you’re the Power of Cold. But what is Buckets must have a space suitable for containing things,
Cold? Is it cold when someone shivers? When water and—since merely having a space isn’t a very strong rule—
freezes? When the world goes into hibernation? Is death they are probably also driven to contain things in any
cold? Is money cold? Is murder? Does wind chill count as situation where they are actively in play.
to whether something is cold? If you put snow in an oven
at 400 degrees, will there still be Cold in that oven until BENEFITS
the snow melts? What if the oven is floating in the frigid The most important benefit of a Property is a metagame
void of space? benefit: it tells you and the other players what your Estate
actually is. The fact of a Property tells you a great deal
We don’t know who the Power of Cold is! We don’t
about the Estate; the rating tells you which Properties are
even know if there is one! So it’s up to you to find a good
more important than the rest. So simply by recording
set of Properties for Cold that will tell you what it means. Properties you’re making the game a lot easier for yourself,
You could go with— the HG, and the other players—
� (1) Cold slows things down; But they also have direct benefits in play!
� (1) Cold chills the heart;
� (3) Cold brings silence, stillness, and peace; and Persona and Properties
� (2) Cold is driven to fill emptiness. Powers may use the Persona Attribute to apply an Estate
Property temporarily to themselves. For instance, the
Or you could go with— Power of Cold could use a Persona miracle to say:
� (2) Cold freezes things; � I slow things down; or
� (2) Cold makes things sick; � I chill the heart; or
� (1) Cold is melancholy; � I bring silence, stillness, and peace; or
� (1) Cold descends; � I am driven to fill emptiness.
� (1) Cold is the snow and the ice and the dark.
Persona also has various ways to inflict your Estate’s formal
Or anything (appropriately) else! and informal Properties on, or remove them from, other
things or people.
“Our business is concluded,” Damon said. Healing and Nourishing your Estate
The caravan was dying—the horses dead, the men scorched You can use your Estate’s Properties to tend it and make it
dry by the sun, the children’s fingers clawing at the barren sand. healthier. For example, suppose Cold is wounded by the
They looked like sticks. Excrucians or by Imperial politics. You can strengthen it
“Painful enough,” I agreed. “But I had hoped for something
and tend its wounds by looking to its Properties—for
quicker.”
instance, wielding Cold to make a great silence, stillness,
“I do not kill quickly,” said Damon, Viscount of the Sands.
“This is the passion of my Estate.” and peace somewhere in the world. Even when it’s not
wounded, you can serve Cold by chilling hearts, slowing
—from the Thought-Record of Hugh Rosewood
things down, and helping it fill emptiness.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 89

Hidden Secrets! of… “It is my plan,” said the Littlest Excrucian, “to remove all
Walking Eye knowledge of beer-can chicken from the world; then I shall
This is a Power made from dirt. He is the Power of Borders command a secret worthy of an audience with Kings.”
and changes the boundaries between things. He is not “Do it;” said Prince Carl, affecting disinterest. “I shall take
malicious but he is very scary and unpredictable and there the knowledge of beer cans themselves and render your power
is no advice I can give you that will serve to keep you safe contingent upon mine.”
if he shows up. I can, however, tell you that sometimes he There can be no negotiation between personages such as
engages in inadvertent and even entirely unconscious acts these; their dignity does not allow it; their bluster stands in their
of prophesy. If he says weird and personal things, and way. That is why we drink our beer from satchels, today, and
particularly if he doesn’t seem to realize he’s saying them, cook our chickens therein; all of us save Prince Carl, of course,
pay close attention! The life you save just might be your who molders in his palace, arrogant, chickenless, and alone.
own. —from the EXCRUCIAN WAR COLORING BOOK, by Indignity Press

MP Bonus
You can gain MP from your Estate Properties. The HG CHANGING BONDS, AFFLICTIONS,
can give you a number of MP up to and including the
Property rating when— AND PROPERTIES
� the Excrucians use that Property to attack your
You can redesign your Bonds, Afflictions, and Estate
Estate;
Properties between stories. With HG consent you may do
� you do something neat to honor that part of your so at any other time.
Estate. You may redesign Bonds, Afflictions, and Properties to:
� reflect your increased understanding of the character
If the HG is impressed enough, and it’s late enough in the and their Estate;
story that this is a good bargain, they can offer you a full � reflect the observable evolution of the character and
MP refresh instead of bonus MP. If you’ve done their Estate;
something for your Estate, but not enough to merit an MP, � declare that your character has changed between
the HG can give you 1-2 mortal Will instead. stories; or
� to make the character more fun to play.
HOW EXCRUCIANS USE PROPERTIES
Excrucians, and potentially Powers and Imperators, can You will need the consent of the HG and the other players
use the Properties of your Estate to attack it. They might, if you wish to declare any of these changes retroactive to
for example, create a magical void to suck the whole Estate previous stories.
of Cold into it, or warm hearts everywhere in the world to
weaken Cold and drive it back. They can also hurt your
Estate by twisting and perverting its Properties, causing
some part of the Estate to go against its basic rules.

God started small, creating a single human. Immediately, the

human’s eyes burst and blood began to stream from her ears. She
struggled desperately to breathe vacuum in the void, failing
quite spectacularly.
Several days later, after separating the heavens from the On occasion, a Power of the Wild retreats into their home,
Earth and parting the land from the waters, God had a sudden shuts all doors, and “redefines” themself. It is solid and
insight. “It must be that woman cannot live without man,” he sensible policy to avoid the Power for several weeks
exclaimed. Subsequent experiments in the Garden of Eden thereafter. This ensures that someone else discovers it first if
confirmed this intuition, when first Lilith and then Eve failed they have redefined themself as a monstrous fiend or a
to explosively decompress; and on this basis God built much of bubblingly happy mass murderer.
modern theology. —from A TOURIST’S GUIDE TO CREATION, by Jasprite Sherrard
—from ON THE CREATION OF HUMANKIND, by Luc Ginneis

THE LAWS OF YOUR NATURE

T
he Noble “Cleave” (pg. 152) named the Cult of the Stars is
building the train Fierabras, wound around the planet
Saturn, which they claim will have the power to take them
away from the Ash and up into the stars. No matter how you ask
them to, they will not let you toot the horn.
 91
CHAPTER 8

Aspect
The science of Noble hotness tells us that Nobilis are like
movie stars—they’re made of different stuff than ordinary
Hidden Secrets! of… people. They are basically human in form but all through
Robert Baxt their flesh and bone and blood they have this awesome
If you eat a dead Power’s heart, you divine pith that responds more to thought and ideas than
become a Power yourself! That’s what to physics and muscle action. They start becoming an idea
happened to Robert Baxt, the modern of flesh instead of flesh.
Power of Clocks. He was a cowboy in The more completely this happens to them, the more
the Old West and so he would usually they’re like fantasies instead of people—power fantasies,
rassle cows and git along various um, other kinds of fantasies, whatever. They’re able to do
dogies instead of eating people’s the kinds of things you normally only see in your
hearts but the Power in question imagination!
asked him to do it because she was This is the quality they call their Aspect.
dying and needed someone to take Your Avatar has a minimum of Aspect 0—the tiniest
over quickly in a crisis. In practice, amount of physical and mental awesome that a Power can
this is one of the easier ways to get. You can buy up to 5 more levels of Aspect for your
become a Noble. If you think you Avatar for 3 Character Points each.
have a plan for ripping out the heart Here’s what that gives you do “for free”—without
of a Power and eating it you are spending miracle points:
probably committing the ancient � 0 (Mortal): energy and pep! With Aspect 0, you’re
Greek sin known as “hubris,” and that always at your best—Powers don’t do bad hair days.
sin or possibly some sort of ten-story � 1 (Touched Up): a bit of extra Skill with anything,
poisonous scorpion will end up biting from sports to the sciences to art!
you on the butt (which is what � 2 (Pulp Hero): a lot of extra Skill
happened to Lizabet Gantry, who � 3 (Shining Hero): …and flawless grace, execution,
used to run the Australian Nobilisers and timing
Organization, only it wasn’t actually a � 4 (Demigod): …plus superhuman mental and
scorpion but a scorpion-headed tiger physical power
and it was also on fire at the time). � 5 (Great Master): …plus incredible precision and
Robert Baxt says that he never perfect control over your body and mind!
totally integrated the power of the
heart, and that is why he is Aspect 0. You also get free mundane Cool equal to your Aspect Trait.
If you want to be like a pulp hero, try Aspect 1-3. If you
want to be like a kung fu god, try Aspect 3-5!

opposite: “The Train Fierabras,” by Anthony Damiani ASPECT

92

The child of the cosmos walked out into the Arizona heat. MIRACLES AND WILL
Where no one lived and nothing grew, he set up the ring. It
took him only a few days to get the bandstands up and the You can’t use Will to improve miracles. Any miracle
restrooms built. Then he sat at his laptop and printed out a that is based on a mundane action will replace Will and
handful of flyers, reading, “The Child of the Cosmos against the Intentions with a fixed +3 bonus to Passions or Skills of
Gods that Move Between the Stars! A once-in-a-lifetime one sort or another. Your action is premised on
wrestling event, coming March 25th!” These he distributed in miraculous energy rather than mortal drive.
nearby towns. Then, at last, he let himself sleep.
“But you are only half a god,” the reporters would ask him
later. “How can you expect to beat the real thing?”
“The gods rule an unjust cosmos,” he would answer. “But in
DIFFICULTY 2: “PULP HEROISM”
Difficulty 2 Aspect miracles work the same way, except
the ring, I will make justice with my own two hands.”
that you also treat your underlying Passions and Skills as 2
—from 24 FINALES, by Rannen Yedidyah points higher. This gives a total final effectiveness of
[(Passion or Skill) + 5]. This puts an ordinary person on the
Here is the scale of miracles that Aspect can perform: level of an amazing athlete, scientist, artist, warrior, or
professional in any other field—and if you were already
DIFFICULTY 0: “PEAK PERFORMANCE” good at something, you have a good chance of surpassing
Difficulty 0 Aspect miracles are like mundane actions, but relevant human competence entirely!
they draw on miraculous energy instead of the resources of
your body, mind and will. This works like a mundane
action, except: LIMITATIONS
� it always goes easily and smoothly;
� it doesn’t tire you out at all; There are three things that Powers with high Aspect
� you ignore Intentions, for better or worse, instead don’t seem to be able to do—
adding a +3 “miraculous Will“ bonus to your most � Psychic Powers and Magic. Aspect makes the basic
relevant Passion or Skill. human toolkit better—it doesn’t expand it. Powers
can’t use Aspect to fly, telekinetically control water,
The cool thing about these miracles is that they never get improve sorcery and mortal magic, or read minds.
More generally, Aspect doesn’t let you declare that
harder to do. For instance, if you have a fever, you probably
something happens, but rather that you make something
only have a limited amount of focus—a limited amount of
happen, explaining how you do it with your mind,
time that you can pull yourself together and act coherently body, and skills! If the HG considers something
in the world. But if you do that coherent action with an “magic,” and you’re not using an appropriate Anchor
Aspect miracle, it doesn’t count against that limited time. or Gift to make it possible, your Aspect doesn’t apply.
It’s the same with drunkenness, exhaustion, being drugged, � Social Interaction.You can have a high Aspect and
being in agony—if you’re too broken to act, you’re too still have troubles with social interaction. You can
broken to act, but if you have enough brain to pull yourself make yourself charming, you can make your
together for even a moment, you can pull yourself together elocution perfect, you can pump up your animal
magnetism until ordinary people faint and stumble
for as long as you keep using Aspect 0 miracles, instead.
over words when they look at you, but top Nobilis
research suggests that Aspect is all about this
DIFFICULTY 1: “ENHANCED PERFORMANCE” outwards-flow of doing, and just doesn’t give you that
Difficulty 1 Aspect miracles work the same way, except that interactive, cooperative give-and-take kind of flow
you also treat your underlying Passions and Skills as 1 that lets you persuade people, teach them, reach
point higher. This gives a total effectiveness of [(Passion or them, or earn their respect with anything less than a
Skill) + 4] for a normal action, putting an ordinary person sledgehammer of a smile. Aspect just doesn’t
on the level of a professional athlete, scientist, artist, or improve your Shine.
warrior in peak form—and if you’re already good at � Immunity to Error. Basically, even Powers with high
something, you get a lot better! Aspect do things that they regret. Not just
complicated moral errors, but also “I should have
known better” kinds of things! This is actually pretty
rare in the real world, even accounting for my not-
wanting-to-get-killed-by-reporting-it bias, but
My first steps after the pain of Commencement were like we’re going to exaggerate it a bit for the sake of a
good game. As smart and perceptive as your Avatar
poetry. My body felt so light—like air. Like music. Like a river.
might be, if you do something in play that you decide
Do not let the wonder of Nobility fade from your life. later that you regret, Aspect alone doesn’t give you
Never forget that first step. It is beauty. the right to call backsies—you have to persuade the
—from BECOMING NOBLE, by Fayola Osagiobare group or HG that it’s for the best, instead!

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 93

DIFFICULTY 3: “INHUMAN PERFECTION” grass or balance on a thread. You can leap thirty, forty, fifty
These are the miracles of the shining heroes. Icons! yards if you have to, and land easily from practically any
Glories! At this point you stop operating on the mortal fall. Your mind’s the same way—light, meaning that
scale so don’t try to match this precisely to some numeric thinking is always fun and easy and you never have to be
improvement to your mortal abilities. Instead, you’re like sad, and controlled, meaning that you can reorganize your
the best humans in the world, plus you’ve got this extra memories, actively practice rationality, decide how you
quality of absolute flawlessness. Perfect balance! Perfect want to feel about things, build and model independent
execution! And most supernaturally, perfect timing. perspectives in your head, and think coherently about
There’s something unnaturally dramatic about these many things at once.
miracles. When you do something with a level 3 Aspect
miracle, you finish it at the first of the following times that DIFFICULTY 6: “UNSTOPPABLE POWER”
seems even vaguely possible: At this stage you become casually invincible. You can exert
� practically instantly; as much force as you need to—you’re still normally as
� at just the right time; or strong as a bear, but if you need to pick up a million-ton
� just barely in time. weight, you can. You can move as quickly as you have to—
your casual running speed is probably just 100-200kph, but
This is the level where you stop worrying about the mortal if you realize that you have to outrace a laser before it
scale of actions, where you stop being a pawn of physics actually hits, you might just pull it off. You can sense as
and psychology and your mortal Skills and start being able much as you need to, understand as much as you need to,
to do things just because they’re cool. break any quantitative barrier limiting your physical or
mental skills. Your only problem is that you’re still locked
DIFFICULTY 4: “DIVINE FORCE” to the leverage of a human body and mind, so you can’t see
At this level you become a heroic demigod! You add things that aren’t visible at all, you can’t pick up a breakable
incredible mental and physical force to the balance and mountain because a piece will just break off, you can’t
timing that difficulty 3 gave you. You have the strength of swallow an elephant in one bite, and you can’t do things
a bear, the mental speed of a computer, and senses that don't actually make physical sense like punching out
enhanced as if by machinery. Everything is powered up; a movie character to change the movie’s ending. You’re as
ordinary people can’t even compete! Even if your mundane powerful as you need to be, but you still have to listen to
power already exceeds human limits—e.g., even if you are reason!
a bear—you’ll always at least double your strength and
force when using a miracle like this. DIFFICULTY 7: “FAIRY TALE FEAT”
At this level you don’t have to listen to reason any more.
DIFFICULTY 5: “LEGENDARY MASTERY” You become a storybook character. You can do anything
At this level you become like a great legendary master. that you can explain away as a use of a natural human
Your body becomes light, and you have total conscious ability.
control over it—every muscle, every system, every portion. The major limit at this level is that you’re stuck with
You’re more sinuous than a snake. You can run on top of relatively local miracles in space and time. You can do
crazy things—you can drink a small lake, blow down a
house, surf on sound waves, and stuff a pair of gazeboes
Get the Facts! on…
into your pocket—but you can’t affect stuff that’s more
Isabel than a mile or two away and you can’t keep the miracle
If you love travel and you love the road you may want to going for more than a few minutes. For example, if you
make a pilgrimage to honor Isabel, the Power of the Road, plan on spitting out the lake or taking the gazeboes back
in Locus Arahiel. She’s the kind of Power who remembers out of your pocket, you’d better do it quickly! But for a few
the lives of all the Powers of her Estate before her, so these minutes, in the local area, you can do almost anything.
days she thinks of herself more as Roads than Isabel—but
she’s still a cool person, who helps everyone in the world
who uses roads get to where they need to go. Nobody
knows exactly how to get to Locus Arahiel, but if your
heart is true, you will find the way. Isabel likes presents It is an image that will remain with me forever:
(particularly cool scents and flavors) but she doesn’t really The darkness split by lightning.
give out gifts or assistance in return—you go to honor her, The bolt plunging like a whip towards Giraut’s chest.
do it to honor her, because giving love and honor His hands closing around it, so terribly, terribly fast, and
outwards is excellent for the soul! holding it away from his heart as it flung him backwards off of
Isabel is like the roads themselves—mostly physical, Mugger’s Hill.
but imbued, and strongly, with the stuff of dream—and —from the Memoirs of Alice Mendel, Lady of the Thunder
that is why she is Aspect 3.

ASPECT
94

DIFFICULTY 8: “WORLD-SHAKING SKILL” ASPECT DIFFICULTIES (EXAMPLE)

At this point the crazy stuff you can do isn’t “local” any
Punching through a thin layer of steel seems like Aspect 4.
more. You can shoot down a star with your gun, pick up Shoving your way through a thick steel wall seems like
Mt. Rushmore and stuff it down your shirt, or figure out Aspect 6. Learning to vibrate your body so fast you can
the acoustics so you can talk casually with someone on the walk through steel without tearing it for the rest of the
other side of the world without anyone in between story would be Aspect 9.
overhearing.The world is your playground! You can sustain If you have Aspect 2, you’re always really good at
these miracles as long as you like, although you do have to everything—even if you’re so bad at something you have a
sustain them—actively use your miraculous action on -1 Skill in it, you can use a free level 2 Aspect miracle to
them—to keep them from going away. outperform most mortal professionals. But being really
good at punching doesn’t let you punch through steel, and
DIFFICULTY 9: “MASTERED TECHNIQUE” being “really strong” definitely won’t let you push your way
At this level you can set new rules for what Skill can do. bodily through steel like it was paper. To punch through
This has all the power of a level 8 miracle, plus, instead of steel will require 2 AMP, and to shove through the steel
saying that you do the miracle, you say that you can do the wall would require 4. Learning the vibrate-through-walls
miracle—and for the rest of the story, even without technique would cost you 8 AMP—technically, it would be
7, except that you’re only allowed to spend 1, 2, 4, or 8 MP
actively sustaining a miraculous effect, you can. You don’t
at a time.
just pocket Mt. Rushmore: you master the mountain-
pocketing technique! You don’t just furiously tread air to
keep from falling, or lift yourself to the ceiling: you learn
the furiously-treading-air technique! You’ve imposed a
new rule on the world: “I can do X,” and as long as it’s easy
to conceptualize as extending a mortal Skill, you can, in
fact, until the story ends. Actually using this ability is a
mundane action predicated on your most relevant Skill or
Passion, so you don’t get the full advantage of the miracle
level in contests with other miracles, but your ability to use
your new ability is protected by a level 4 Auctoritas.

A Field Guide! to…

Rook Catchfly Aspect Difficulties (Summary)
If you live in America you may encounter Rook Catchfly, In summary, here is the scale of miracles that Aspect can
the Power of Eternity. She looks like an ordinary little girl, perform:
but do not be fooled! She is an incredibly powerful master,
able to take on small armies. You can identify her by her 0 mortal actions [competence = Passion/Skill +3]
clipped, impatient style of speech; her tendency to appear 1 mortal actions [competence = Passion/Skill +4]
unchaperoned or in the company of obvious Powers; and 2 mortal actions [competence = Passion/Skill +5]
her occasional complaints that she isn’t young, just “stuck!” 3 + flawless grace, execution, and timing
That said it is probably a good strategy to be polite and 4 + incredible force
respectful to all young girls you meet until you are 5 + superhuman precision and control
absolutely certain they cannot outfight, outthink, and 6 + unlimited power and speed
outwrestle the Marine Corps, Steven Hawking, and a large 7 + unreasonable, metaphorical effects
Kodiak bear respectively, and all more or less at the same [local and short-term]
time. 8 + unreasonable, metaphorical effects [any]
Rook Catchfly can, and that is why she is Aspect 4. 9 + you’ve mastered the effect for the rest of the story

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 95

Interlude­

Physical
Nature There are at least two ways to understand Estates and

and their instances in the world.

You can understand them as substances or as paths.

Dharma
The substance of a thing is composed of properties that
you can measure objectively: heat, mass, the incidence of
repeated behaviors, the emergence of recognized and
identifiable properties. It is syntactic; something may be
discovered to be a dog, for example, by noticing that it has
the head, body, legs, coat, tail, and ears of a dog. Something
may be discovered to be cold by measuring its temperature.
Something may be discovered to be “in love” through its
display of traditionally loving behaviors. Thus everything,
even the intangible, becomes equations, formulas, and lists
We call that thing into which we may
of qualifications.
fall, and find ourselves without boundary, the sea;
The path or dharma of a thing is a subjective quality. It’s
and that numinous pre-formed substance therein
the purpose of a thing—
“water.” Without that chaos we would calcify and
� what that thing is for;
cease to live; in the fullness of its presence, we
� what it means;
drown. Hold up a paper cup of water and unfocus
� what it does;
your eyes: you will see the undine gesticulating
� how it experiences itself;
therein. It is not saying, “Do not drink me,
� how it fits into the world;
magician!” or even “I give myself to thee;” rather, it
� the path it must take to succeed, given all these things.
is caparisoned for battle, it is shaking its supreme
and terrible trident, it is saying to you: you drink
Domain is principally concerned with substance. It’s
me now, but forever you will drown, and take
concerned with Rain and Beauty and Fire, or maybe “what
dissolvéd joy within that drowning.
is Rain? What is Beauty? What is Fire?” But it’s not
—from A CATALOG OF MODERN MAGIC, by Eric Optera, concerned with “why Rain? Why Beauty? Why Fire?”
writing on the topic of Water’s dharma If you use your Domain of Lightning on a television set,
you can strike it with lightning.
The Attribute concerned with dharma is Persona.
We sat in the cave, and I waited as Vassago bled to Persona is concerned with “what does this Estate do? How
death. does it fit in to what’s going on? What is it for? Where is it
“It is not such a bad thing,” Vassago said. “Every going? What is it like?”
action I took, I took with a purpose. Every step I If you use your Persona of Lightning on a television set,
made, I made for a reason. These reasons were pure. you can pop up a documentary on lightning. Or make it
These purposes were pure. It does not matter that into a lightning TV, the kind of smoldering, shocking
they have led me to death, for I know that I have television that stuns people who look at it and makes dogs
made my choices well.” and cats afraid—or maybe the kind that with startling
I looked at Vassago. “And me?” intensity leaps up along its own antenna and bootstraps
Vassago spent ten, twenty seconds breathing, in itself into the sky. You can make things lightning-like, in
quiet agony. “I hope you do not die here. You have short—but you can only get at the raw substance of lightning
made many bad choices.” by going out and finding some in the world or by cultivating
—from THE DOG PRINCES, by Janet Cable something else through the slow ripening of its dharma into
lightning.

PHYSICAL NATURE AND DHARMA

 97
CHAPTER 9

Domain
The Nobilis recognize and rank six distinct levels of control
over their Estate—six levels of Domain. The original
inspiration for our Miracle Point system, these ranks are
“I do not understand,” Terrence based on what kinds of effects are easy (repeatable more or
admitted. “I have done everything in less indefinitely) for the Noble in question:
the proper manner. I have preached to � 0 (Saint or Pawn): knowing when something
the multitudes, worked miracles subtle endangers your Estate
and vast, healed the sick and the blind; � 1 (Baroness / Baron): + little tricks and
yet still I am ignored by the populace.” manifestations called “ghost miracles”
“ You’re doing fine,” Emma assured � 2 (Viscount): + talking to your Estate, shaping it,
him. “ You’ve established a nice solid knowing things about it
foundation as a general messiah. Now � 3 (Marchessa / Marquis): + protecting and
the trick is to develop a miracle that strengthening your Estate
substantively distinguishes you from all � 4 (Duchess / Duke): + summoning, creating, or
the messiahs that have come before.” manipulating parts of your Estate
—from UNDOCUMENTED HISTORY, � 5 (Regal): + destroying or banishing part of your
by Walden Fargo Estate with a thought; + greater miracles of
knowledge

Higher Domain also improves your potential Divine

Mantle—your raw offensive power—as described on pg.
179.
So for the Power of Fire, you might choose . . .
� Domain 0 if you don’t really care;
� Domain 1 if you want to summon up sparks, light
cigarettes, and stay warm at night;
� Domain 2 if you want to look at a fire and know how
it got started, or ask it to leave one room or area
unburned;
� Domain 3 if you want to make a fire brighter, hotter,
fiercer, or let it burn forever without fuel;
� Domain 4 if you want to summon a wildfire out of
nowhere, or wrap a fire around your arm;
� Domain 5 if you want to be able to snuff out a fire by
snapping your fingers.

DOMAIN
98

Your Avatar starts with a minimum of Domain 0, just for

being a Power, and you can buy up to 5 levels of Domain SECONDARY DOMAIN
for 3 Character Points each.
Domain miracles are divided into lesser and greater In rare cases a Power may have multiple Estates, or
miracles. Lesser miracles are small in scale—they are not some kind of ability that is best expressed as authority
very complicated, they affect up to a city block’s worth of over a secondary Estate or made-up pseudo-Estate.
In such a case the Power may buy levels of
stuff, and they work best when you pull your punches a bit
“Secondary” Domain over additional Estates for 1 point
in describing them. Greater miracles, on the other hand, each (min 1). Secondary Domain cannot exceed the
can be complicated, or affect a lot of stuff (or even your Power’s Domain over their primary Estate, and it uses
whole Estate), and their raw power is as impressive as you’d the same pool of DMP.
like. For instance, if you have Domain 3 over your Estate,
Here is the scale of miracles that Domain can perform. Fire, you can spend 3 points for a Secondary Domain of 3
You’re specifically allowed to combine these effects, as long over Water and 1 more point for a Secondary Domain of 1
as you pay for the largest effect, and you’re specifically over Earth.
allowed to perform a miracle only “partway”—for instance,
you could combine destroying one tree with creating He bent down and touched the water with his hand. “Thirty-
another, or create just the left half of a tree, or even make five parts per million poison,” he said softly. “No wonder the
a tree out of nothing but leave its “visibility” property out! animals are dying.”
—from FAILURES OF LIGHT, by Emily Chen
DIFFICULTY 0: “ESTATE-DRIVEN
DIVINATION”
It is difficulty 0 to know, reflexively, when something puts DIFFICULTY 2: “LESSER DIVINATION”
your Estate in danger. That doesn’t mean that some tiny Difficulty 2 Domain miracles tell you basic, mundane
physical part of your Estate is in danger—the Power of information about your Estate. For instance, the Power of
Cars doesn’t wake up screaming every time some car the Sun can use a level 2 miracle to predict the exact
somewhere is getting junked—but rather that something moment of sunrise, or the path sunlight will take across the
is threatening a large part of your Estate, or its whole balcony. They also know immediately if someone replaces
existence. Usually this means that an Excrucian (or a very the sun with an exact copy—or even a subtly evil clone!
bad stroke of luck) is twisting one of your Estate’s
Properties against it. For instance, in your game, fire might DIFFICULTY 2: “CONVERSATION”
have the Property Fire burns, and it doesn’t care.29 If This level of miracle also opens a channel of
something weird is happening and fire is starting to care communication to the things of your Estate, allowing you
about what it is burning, the whole Estate is at risk! to talk to them with mundane actions and persuade them
You receive free Strike (pg. 181) on this miracle equal to to do little, subtly miraculous things. You can get your car
your Domain rating. If you’re consciously investigating a to adjust itself a little in its parking space, or ask someone’s
possible threat you can spend MP or invoke a Bond for gun to misfire, or convince a river to flow a little faster or
slower—as long as you’re the Power of Cars, Guns, Rivers
additional Strike.
or something similar, respectively! Here “subtle” is code for
DIFFICULTY 1: “GHOST MIRACLE” “things they might have done anyway30” and your
Difficulty 1 Domain miracles, or “ghost miracles,” let you persuasiveness is determined by the mundane action you
summon up very small thematic instances of your Estate. use to talk.31
They are mostly for effect—they have physical substance
but they don’t have a dharma. That means that they lack 30Though you kind of have to ignore the scientists here and
the will to change the world, or even to firmly exist within take my word for it that cars shuffling around in their parking
it. In short, unless you use them to accomplish things you spaces, locks opening and closing on their own and the sun
could have done anyway, the effects of these miracles tend occasionally giving up on a day as a bad job and bum-rushing
to dampen themselves out and fade away. If you eat a meal the horizon while nobody’s looking is the kind of thing that
might have happened anyway. In fairness, you should already
called up with this miracle level, you’ll be hungry again
know this kind of thing is normal based on your own life
half an hour later. If you conjure up a book, it’ll be both
experience.
boring and not very illuminating. If you try to cripple
someone with a ghost miracle, they’ll probably just be stiff, 31 Note that because the talking part is a mundane action, even
irritated, and under the weather for an hour or two. a mortal’s Cool can get in the way. It’s one thing to talk
Harvey Thing’s gun into misfiring—quite another to pull
29ProTip: In the real world fire totally does care. that trick on Mr. Bond!

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS opposite: “The Mythic World,” from pieces by George Shaw and Frederick Polydore Nodder, by Jenna Moran
 99

M
t. Everest rears over the Mythic World in the form of a
mantis, its claws hooked into the sky. If you want to
know why, the Power of Mountains can ask; it’s just a
difficulty 2 “conversation”-type miracle.

opposite: by artist (I cribbed from these) DOMAIN

100

you can imbue part of your Estate with an animating

Get the Deets! on… power, moving it or making it mobile. For instance, the
the Sage of Boxes Power of Caves can use these miracles to animate a cave
Taijon Abrams is widely known as the world's greatest
mouth, allowing it to bite people; the Power of Slackers
expert on the subject of boxes, so if you ever have a box-
can use them to summon any nearby slacker or create a
related problem you might look him up! I have seen the guy
size up a packing job in like less than a second and deduce new one to spec; the Power of Graven Images can bring a
the contents of a stack of unlabeled boxes in a friend of statue to life; and the Power of Matches can wrap match-
mine’s attic with no more than a glance. He is best known flame around themselves to form a plasmic armor. These
among Nobilisers, though, for always having a particularly are lesser miracles that will your Estate to be, to come to you,
sturdy box handy whenever you'd want one—a habit he and to act.
originally picked up in response to one of his Familia
members sarcastically saying, “This calls for a box!” DIFFICULTY 5: “LESSER DESTRUCTION”
Apparently Taijon used to be a fairly respected computer Difficulty 5 Domain miracles erase some physical
scientist, but I can't tell exactly what he did because all his manifestation of your Estate, in whole or in part. The
work’s been retroactively assigned to various somebody Power of Fire can erase a whole fire, or its heat, or its color,
elses. He gets very irritated when this gets brought up, or its visibility; the Power of Life can kill; the Power of
though, so best not! Storms can wipe clouds from the sky.

DIFFICULTY 5: “GREATER DIVINATION”

You can also use conversation miracles to ask things of
It is also difficulty 5 to use greater miracles of Divination.
your Estate for mundane information and listen to the
These miracles use your Estate as a spy, asking the Estate
answers. This is usually less precise than just using a lesser
as a whole what it or its components have seen or learned
divination, but you can sustain the conversation to get
about other things. You may also glean a limited insight
additional information and using a conversation miracle
into the future from your Estate, as when the Power of
gives your Estate the chance to tell you if you’re asking the
Wine sees the future in a wineglass.
wrong questions.

DIFFICULTY 3: “LESSER PRESERVATION”

Difficulty 3 Domain miracles, or “lesser preservations,” let
you protect, strengthen, and provide magical fuel to the
instances of your Estate. Stuff lasts longer, becomes more
potent, and is harder to get rid of when these miracles are in
play.
Field Guide! to…
DIFFICULTY 4: “LESSER CREATION, Sara Nei
SUMMONING, OR ANIMATION” One day an Imperator ripped 500 years of Earth’s history
Difficulty 4 Domain miracles create, summon, and from the calendar of the world and sold them to the
animate. You can conjure things of your Estate out of thin Excrucians. Instantly the ancient and savage grandeur of
air; you can call mobile elements of your Estate to you; and the Roaring Twenties replaced the advanced and
antiseptic sterility of modern human civilization. The
souls that could not adapt flew out into the void of space,
there to cluster in great rainbow spheres. One such soul
Hidden Secrets! of… was that of Sara Nei, the Power of Networked Gaming.
Dumonia Not until her Estate returned formally to the world could
Dumonia is the Power of Alternative Music. As of 2000, she reincarnate herself. Her original soul in tatters, she
she was the most recent Muse, younger sibling to the nine linked together a great congeries of souls32 and used them
classical muses and to Mariana, the Duchess of Pop. She as the basis for reestablishing her existence.
can create as many musicians and bands out of nothingness Sara Nei is the correct Power to pray to for better
as she desires, and that is why she is Domain 4. When you network performance while gaming. Because she can
finish doing your best work as an alternative musician and stabilize and improve network connections without
hit a long slow decline she will kidnap you to the Chancel difficulty, we reckon her at Domain 3.
Parnassus, refresh your inspiration, and give you a long-
term gig; this is why sometimes when you wonder “where 32 Did she rescue, devour, or become those souls? The matter is
are they now?” no obvious answer will occur. inherently somewhat ambiguous, and Sara Nei does not
prefer to clarify it.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 101

DIFFICULTY 6: “LESSER MOTION”

Difficulty 6 Domain miracles are miracles of movement Get the Facts! on…
and dharma—you change the location, the context, and the Red Straits of Battle
destiny or purpose of the things of your Estate. You can This is the Power of the UNIX operating system. If he is
move a dream from one person’s mind into another not wearing sunglasses you can see his thoughts typing
person’s mind, or farm jellyfish on land, or assign a new themselves out inside his eyes. He is available for hire in the
destiny, fate, or purpose to a person who falls under your mortal world, apparently for reasons of principle; if you are
Estate. Movement and dharma miracles tend to cover assembling a dream team for a large software development
their own tracks, the changes fitting seamlessly into the project or hacking-related criminal enterprise you would
world: if you move someone’s house to the top of a cliff, or do well to find him!
give them a destiny to be forever harassed by ocelots,
Red Straits is known for writing code in real time and
they’ll recognize that something’s wrong, and they may
transmitting it telepathically onto his target system. He
even know what, but all their records and even most of
doesn’t miracle it into existence. He doesn’t use a mundane
their memories will reflect the new reality.
interface. He’s a machine whisperer, and that’s why he has
DIFFICULTY 6: “GREATER PRESERVATION“ Domain 2.
Difficulty 6 Domain miracles also allow greater miracles
that preserve, protect, or strengthen the things of your
Estate.The Power of Clouds could nail a given cloud to the
sky, and it’d stay there for weeks, years, maybe even forever!

DIFFICULTY 7: “GREATER CREATION,

SUMMONING, OR ANIMATION”
Difficulty 7 Domain miracles offer an unlimited power of
creation and animation. You can weave stone into a
fortress, create whole cities out of air, and drown whole
continents with the substance of your Estate.

DIFFICULTY 8: “GREATER DESTRUCTION”

Difficulty 8 Domain miracles offer a similarly unlimited
potency of destruction. You can blast forests, city blocks, or
whole species from the Earth.
Domain Difficulties (Summary)
DIFFICULTY 9: “GREATER MOTION” In summary, here is the scale of miracles that Domain can
Difficulty 9 Domain miracles allow you to perform large- perform:
scale miracles of movement and dharma—you could make
the Great Fire of Boston into the Great Fire of London; 0 knowing when something endangers your Estate
transplant rabbits from their peaceful undersea homes to 1 + little tricks and manifestations called
the world of land; or even decide that some guy named “ghost miracles”
Lee Harvey Oswald, who falls under your Estate, will kill 2 + talking to your Estate, shaping it,
the American President one day. Even at this scale, knowing things about it
movement and dharma miracles are still pretty subtle: 3 + protecting and strengthening your Estate
people will know something’s wrong,33 and they may even 4 + summoning, creating, or animating
know “this shouldn’t be happening!” but they won’t see the parts of your Estate
motion or transformation or moment of change itself 5 + destroying or banishing part of your Estate
because it happens under the surface of the world. with a thought;
You’re also allowed, at this level, to circumvent the usual + greater miracles of knowledge
properties (and Properties) of your Estate. You can treat a 6 + adding new effects and qualities to your Estate;
physical Estate more as a metaphor, a generalized Estate + complex control over your Estate;
as more specific, or do something with miracles that + epic miracles to protect and strengthen
violates the normally sacrosanct Properties that govern your Estate
how it works. If you want it to rain gumdrops or make 7 + epic miracles to summon, create, or animate
some piping hot snow, this right here is the miracle level part of your Estate
for you. 8 + epic miracles to destroy or banish
part of your Estate
33 Like how conspiracy theorists are always picking at the rabbit 9 sweeping changes to your Estate;
thing. + epic miracles of complex control over your Estate

DOMAIN
102
THE DOMAIN DIFFICULTY CHART Looking over the chart, you can see that level 1, level 4, and
level 5 miracles will be very useful to you, while level 2
When you create a Power and decide on their Estate, you
miracles are circumstantial, level 3 miracles are ambiguous,
should also sketch out what you think you can do at the
and level 6-9 miracles are for weird, eccentric solutions to
various levels of Domain. For example, you’re creating the
large problems. This is more or less typical for experiential
Power of Forbidden Love. You decide that your Estate is
Estates, and may help you figure out what level of Domain
an Estate of experiences—not “the set of forbidden lovers”
would serve you best!
or “the set of people in forbidden love,” not “the abstract
category of things that are love, but also forbidden,” but
the beingness of it, the yearning, the self-loathing, the
what-it’s-like-ness of finding oneself in a forbidden love.
So you write down a few things you can do at each level
with yearnings, shame, and forbidden love itself:

0 know when something endangers Forbidden Love

give someone an hour or two of romantic thoughts about a rock;

1 make everyone reject someone’s relationship for an hour or two;
create a sourceless yearning or shame

2 find out the details of someone’s forbidden love

make a yearning stronger;

3 make shame stronger;
make a forbidden love stronger

make someone fall in love with their imaginary friend;

make someone’s existing marriage Forbidden;
make a gun refuse to leave its loving holster, or ashamed to kill;
4 make the names on a seating chart move to maximize the
potential for forbidden love;
surround yourself with a haze of forbidden love that hurts the
heart of hand-to-hand attackers

make everyone accept a relationship, or destroy It;

extinguish yearnings;
5
imbue a sense of glorious pride;
interrogate Forbidden Love for information about Chicago

change the destiny of a forbidden love, giving it a happy or sad

ending;
change the target of a forbidden love;
6 change the destiny of a forbidden love, such that it can fuel the
metaphysical tanks of your mysterious love-powered robot;
ensure that a forbidden love will never die, or that its memory
will never (e.g. Guinevere + Lancelot 4-ev-er) fade

7 create great yearnings and great shames

8 create great asceticism, acceptance, barrenness, or pride

create forbidden lovers from thin air;

manipulate codes of law as instances of “forbiddenness;”
9 organize all the forbidden love in a city into a set of
interconnected love polygons that spell out a secret message
to be discovered after your death

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 103
CHAPTER 10

Persona
There’s this thing that a Noble can do with their smile,
when suddenly it’s not them but the roaring of the sea and
the salt air and the calling of gulls; and the sun; and your
heart is open again like when you were a child, standing on
the shore.
There’s this thing they can do with their eyes where
suddenly it’s the darkest night and you are about to be
eaten by a wolf.
The first miracle that touched my life They can reach you, reach into you, in ways that people
was a holy thing. I was trapped in a can’t, that only the great wideness of the world can. They
burning building. A girl walked can twist you up or untwist you like your family and your
through the fire and said, “I owe the best friends and your exes, good and bad. They have
world seventy-three lives, in penance.” something that just slips by all your defenses.
Then she took me from that place, Their Persona.
unharmed, and said, “Seventy-two.” Your Avatar has some of this—some of this it, some of
Then she vanished into the crowd. I do this je ne sais quoi, some of that stuff that lets a Noble
not know what her words meant, but I actually affect you, something that makes them real in
could feel that she was sacred. other people’s lives. Some of that quality that lets them
The second miracle that touched my reach you, change you, see you. Something that makes them
life had no place in this world. I was more real than people, and sometimes even more real than
very sick, and a thing made of sunset each other; something that lets them make a difference.
colors came into my room. “I am hungry,” Your Avatar starts with Persona 0, which is already
it said, and I could feel it ripping the enough to change the world; and you can buy up to 5 levels
sickness from me and draining it into the more, for 3 points each.
flaring orange and red. I felt so much It’s what makes a Noble like the Imperators, like the sun,
better. Perhaps it even saved my life. But like the moon, like the sea, like first love, like starving, like
I knew this was a thing that should not dreaming, like music, like dancing, like fire, like sex.
have happened, performed by a thing It’s an Attribute that lets them touch on what things
that should not have been. I have sought mean.
to make myself ill again, but not even Here’s what you can do without spending MP at the six
the coldest rain can bring the pneumonia possible levels—
back into my lungs. � 0: recognize deep bonds between people/things and
your Estate;
—from a speech by Kalliroe Calmes,
� 1: bless or curse a person with the nature of your
3/25/00
Estate;
� 2: incarnate yourself in something from your Estate;
� 3: enforce the Properties of your Estate on yourself;
� 4: imbue something with the nature of your Estate;
� 5: steal part of your Estate’s nature from a thing;
incarnate yourself in your Estate throughout the
world

PERSONA
104

Higher Persona improves your potential Auctoritas

Magister—your defensive zone of control—as described SECONDARY PERSONA
on pg. 180, and you’ll get free mundane Shine equal to your
Persona Trait. A Power may buy levels of “Secondary” Persona over
So for the Power of Rivers, you might choose . . . additional Estates for 1 point each (min 1). Secondary
� Persona 0 if you don’t really care; Persona cannot exceed the Power’s Persona over their
primary Estate, and it uses the same pool of PMP.
� Persona 1 if you want to loosen people up, help their
Normally your Secondary Persona applies to the same
flow, or strengthen their resolve; Estate(s) as any Secondary Domain you happen to have,
� Persona 2 if you want to spend time as various rivers but this isn’t a strict requirement.
throughout the world; For instance, if you have Persona 4 over your Estate,
� Persona 3 if you want to personally wear down rock Fire, you can spend 2 points for a Secondary Persona of 2
walls or bring life to the world; over Water and another 2 points for a Secondary Persona
� Persona 4 if you want to melt buildings or people of 2 over Earth.
down into rivers of themselves;
� Persona 5 if you want to calcify rivers, make things
cease to flow, or spread your will through your single glance an Excrucian who is actively attacking your
tributaries (that is to say, all the rivers in the world.) Estate. If you are the Power of Birds, you can know
whether an animal preys on birds, or whether a person
Persona miracles often refer to your Estate Properties—
loves birds, or hates birds, or has been flock to a bird at
the rules of your Estate that make it what it is. But
some point in time. The Power of War could see that a
sometimes you’ll realize in play that you have missed
something important. Perhaps you’re the Power of Reefs, person is deeply scarred by war. The Power of Couches
and a key rule of Reefs is that Reefs grow between the could recognize the CEO of a major couch corporation.
wide world and a thing. But when you made your You receive free Strike (pg. 181) on this miracle equal to
character, you weren’t thinking about things like that! In your Persona rating, and can spend MP or invoke a Bond
such a case you can always add a one-point Property to for additional Strike. That said, once invoked, this miracle
your Estate, and then, between stories, adjust the points relies on your mundane senses for its effect. The only
allocated to your various Properties to get back down to 7 function of Strike in this context is to help you activate the
points’ worth again. Sight in the presence of a hostile Auctoritas or Sight-
Persona miracles, like Domain miracles, divide into deceiving miracle. You can enhance your mundane senses
lesser and greater effects. You can do some really with Aspect and Treasure miracles if a basic use of the
impressive things, but remember that if you try for Sight proves inadequate to your needs.
something too big it might require a greater miracle to pull
it off.
Here is the scale of miracles that Persona can perform:

DIFFICULTY 0: “THE SIGHT”

It’s a reflexive Difficulty 0 Persona miracle to invoke “the
Sight.”The mundane forms of the world blur and fade and Get the Deets! on…
Oresha
it’s a little harder to make out what’s going on around
If you are ever in trouble with a genie you may impress
you—but the things that have deep connections of love,
them with your knowledge of genie trivia! The genies are
hatred, weal, or woe to your Estate snap into focus. You can descended from the Imperator Jan ben Jan, who ruled the
recognize the Powers of Estates with strong connections Second Age of Earth. (This Age started when Eden fell
to your own, and their agents; you can identify with a and ended when the Excrucians showed up.) These days
the genies either roam the world or live in the secret cities
Chilminar and Balbec. Their queen is the Power of the
The spear took Michael through the heart, but he is not dead; Second Age of Earth, Oresha, who infuses everything she
nor is he gone. touches with the romantic, ancient grandeur of that Age!
He is a man who became his Estate, and, in so doing, For this purpose she has Persona 1.
marked it forever. I can look in any lion’s eyes and see his spirit ProTip: If your knowledge of genie trivia does not help
there. you, try offering to play Nobilis with them. Genies have a
I can walk with them now. They do not hunt me any more. lot of difficulty finding people to game with because they
—from the Diary of Selena Monteith, think that dice and role-playing games do not mix, so they
on the topic of Persona miracles will probably leap at this opportunity.

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 105

DIFFICULTY 1: “BLESSING OR CURSE”

You can use a difficulty 1 miracle to make small changes in The man’s convulsions woke her; woke her to see his sweating
ghost-pale face, his slit eyes, his drawn features. She tried to
the destiny, nature, and temperament of things—giving
disentangle herself from the sheets, crying, “What ails you?”
them just a dollop of the nature of your Estate. The Power
He spoke no word, but she came to know his answer: that
of Fire can make someone more fiery, or give them a he had been awakened by the suffering of his realm, by the
dangerous feel, or make sure that now and again in life forest in the south. That he had touched the minds of a dozen
their plans will burn them. The Power of Industrial beasts and seen through a dozen pairs of eyes before he found
Espionage can make someone more or less sinister or the source of the pain...and that, when he found it, he paid the
adventurous—and can probably attract money or price for his divinations… for the thirteenth beast was
misfortune to someone as well. Your blessings and your trapped within a fire…
curses can make small, real changes to hearts, minds, and —from FIRE STORIES, compiled by Édouard Guy
lives, but their previous dharma will tend to dominate and
leave 90% of their life more or less the same.
You can also use these miracles to take a bit of your important to you, and you to them. And for the rest of the
Estate’s nature away from someone, or shelter them from story, that dog thinks a bit like you (and the rest like a
it to a small degree. The total effect is similar, but you don’t dog)—if they see that your parents’ home is on fire, say,
have the same level of control—you just “take a bit of the even if they don’t know your parents, they’ll definitely care
Fire” from their life, or “shelter them from some of the and they might even be able to work a fire extinguisher or
weight of Industrial Espionage,” rather than exploring a dial 911!
larger palette of possible effects. Usually the HG will just tell the story of what you
experience in abbreviated form, or let you do so, or just say
DIFFICULTY 2: “LESSER INCARNATION” that it happened and tell you to let them know if it’s
The Powers you know—that love you, hate you, or just
relevant. If you happen to incarnate somewhere where
hang out with you sometimes—can be with you even when
important things are going on, though, and nothing is up
their body is not. They can incarnate in their Estates. The
back where your body is, then the HG may have you play
Power of the Wind can be whatever wind blows past. The
the dog, wind, hope, ghetto, song, or sunbeam you happen
Power of Landslides can live in any landslide. The Power
to be inhabiting instead of yourself!
of Hope moves in any heart that hopes.
If your Estate exists on other worlds you can possess it
Your Avatar can do this as a difficulty 2 miracle.
there, but you need a greater (level 5) miracle to extend
When your Avatar incarnates in something, their
your consciousness into someplace primal like, e.g., Hell.
consciousness goes off to live elsewhere in the world. This
ignores the normal range for your miracles (pg. 109–110) DIFFICULTY 3: “LESSER EMULATION”
and lasts until: Mortals are creatures of our little worlds. We can be cool
� something happens back at their body that snaps inside our bubbles but when the world breaks in it can
them out of it; crush our coolness along with everything else we thought
� a self-imposed time limit runs out; or we knew. Ultimately no matter how hard we try, no matter
� a scene ends for the thing they’re living in. what’s inside our hearts, a blood vessel can pop in our
heads or a landslide fall on them and our purpose will be
They do choose, with as much precision as they like, what lost. Ultimately no matter how vile and awful we think we
they’ll inhabit, but they don’t take it over and they don’t are the world can send someone to love us. We may drive
bring their whole majesty to bear. They live with it.
them away but we can’t decide it didn’t happen. In short,
The things that happen to it—the things it thinks, the
we’re finite.
relationships it forms, the experiences it has—become part
Powers aren’t!
of your Avatar’s life story.This is backdated a bit, so you get
the memories and attachments of the things that were
already happening when you arrived. And your Avatar’s
dreams and hopes and passions and loves and basically
their ways of living become part of its nature; and that lasts Each miracle eats a little bit of me. Such is the price of ruling
Consumption. Each one takes a little bit of my soul; and when
even after you pull your consciousness back, more or less
my human soul is gone, and nothing but my Estate is left, my
until the story ends.
body shall fall to the ground and turn to ash.
So if you’re playing the Power of Dogs, you can go live
This is the death I have chosen.
in any dog you want. And for the rest of your life, if that
—from the Diary of V. I. Ialda
dog loved someone, like most dogs do, that person will be

PERSONA
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With this level of difficulty, you can use Persona to

apply one of your Estate’s Properties to yourself as an The house had died; its pieces were taken from it, one after
Affliction. Books can change lives: so can the Power of the next; finally all there was that remained of it was a
Books. Hope springs eternal: the Power of Hope can’t, rectangular plot of dirt, perfectly clean, whose spirit
mumbled endless paeans to its emptiness and still thought
therefore, die. Treachery can be anywhere: ergo, so can its
it was a house.
Power. The HG interprets the Property in such a fashion
—from A MADNESS OF SPIRITS, by Dr. E. Edgarton Clark
as to give a meaningful effect on the situation you are
currently in on a time scale ranging from one action to one
scene. Other than that it’s up to the HG to determine how DIFFICULTY 5: “LESSER SACRIFICE”
the effect actually manifests—does the Power of Hope die
These miracles take the dharma and/or Properties of your
and then come back to life, or avoid being killed, or simply
Estate away from something. The Power of Fire makes a
vanish temporarily under a veil of mystery?
thing stop burning. The Power of Dreams makes
The Affliction has a typical base miracle level of the
something no longer a dream (but, rather, real). The Power
miracle you used (although as always the HG can set it to
of Cats decides a tailless Manx isn’t really a cat any longer.
whatever they like) and an Affliction rating equal to your
You can exempt something from one or more of your
Persona. It applies only while you sustain a difficulty 3
Estate’s Properties, from some less central aspects of your
Persona miracle. If for some reason the Affliction screws
Estate, or even cut it from your Estate entirely. Unlike a
your life up instead of helping you, the HG gives you
Domain miracle of destruction, this does not erase the
Affliction-based MP normally.
thing outright: rather, the lingering detritus of its existing
DIFFICULTY 4: “LESSER ENCHANTMENT” in the world, the traces of definition the thing has picked
These miracles add the dharma and/or Properties of your up from other Estates, form a new basis by which the HG
Estate—the way of being your Estate has—to a thing, and reconnects it to reality. A consensus that is no longer a
without taking that thing’s original nature away. You can Consensus might become a Dictat. A wave that is no
make events into dreams or hopes, if your Estate is longer a Wave might become an Escalating Phenomenon.
Dreams or Hopes; you can make memories burn, if you’re A cat that is no longer a Cat becomes a new sort of
the Power of Fire; you can even turn people into frogs, if Mammal or perhaps a branch of the Household Gods. You
you’re the Power of Frogs. This can change the structure of don’t get to decide what it becomes, but the HG should
the thing but the original information and structure is not generally follow your expectations, if you have any, and
lost—just preserved or suspended in a different form. unless there’s something important about what’s going on
Turning someone into a frog, for example, makes a that you are unaware of or have chosen to ignore.
decidedly non-generic frog that you could recognize
(given an awareness of miracles, and thus that frogs are not DIFFICULTY 5: “GREATER INCARNATION“
necessarily frogs) as them. You can use these miracles to This is also the difficulty for greater miracles of incarnating
add abstract elements and Properties of your Estate to in your Estate. This works exactly as with the difficulty 2
things, physical elements of your Estate to things, or some miracle, except that you can spread your consciousness into
combination thereof. hundreds or thousands of places on Earth (or whatever
world you’re on), or a small number of places across the
cosmos.
The car struck the kitten. The kitten bled.
Shock; perforations; bleeding; a wounded paw. DIFFICULTY 6: “LESSER BINDING”
He went to it, then, the Lord of WMD, and he bent down, You may use difficulty 6 Persona miracles to change how
and he said, “Shh.”
someone relates to your Estate—to change what your
He cradled it; he sang to it; he closed its eyes. He armored it;
Estate means to them. You can make someone a guardian,
he gave it poison sacs; and bit by bit he put his mark on it.
It wobbled upright. bound to some portion of your Estate; or make your Estate
Its lungs clanked inside its chest. their enemy; or otherwise change what your Estate means
It breathed: ho-ha. in their life, to a much larger extent than blessings or curses
It wasn’t a kitten any more, I don’t think. I don’t know allow. The targets of these miracles may develop minor
what it was. magical abilities or low levels of Superior Qualities and
I just remember the look of honest joy on his face when it Skills, if appropriate, but the details are for the HG and
took its first step; when it looked at him and tilted its head; the inexorable unfolding of dharma rather than you
when it said, “Blort?” in that fashion that kittens, who are yourself to determine.
weapons of mass destruction, blort.
—from the Thought-Record of Danglehart Li

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 107

DIFFICULTY 9: “GREATER BINDING”

Meteorologists tell the following cautionary tale. Most Difficulty 9 Persona miracles allow you to change how
respected of all students of the wind and rain was Eilwen large portions of the world relate to your Estate—make a
Bengough. Her understanding was as deep as the sky is tall. city where your Estate is holy, or appoint all the spirits of
But she would not be content with her knowledge, and a mountainside the guardians of some element of your
pressed on towards greater and greater understanding; and Estate. You may also invoke particularly complex destinies,
one began to see through her, on odd occasions, or hear the and if you choose to damn or empower someone, they may
thrumming of rain in her footsteps. One day, Eilwen left the acquire potent Afflictions or abilities at the HG’s option.
In either case there is a level 4 Auctoritas protecting the
ken of humankind; her husband Caradoc found their
destiny you deal out that lasts for the remainder of the
bedroom soaked with rain, and a wind blew out when he
story.
opened the door.
Young students of meteorology generally take the story as a
joke. It is only the elder, respected scientists who leave out
cookies for Eilwen on a rainy day.
—from CAREER FABLES, by Melanie Tumbarius

DIFFICULTY 6: “GREATER EMULATION”

This is also the difficulty for greater miracles of applying
your Estate’s Properties to yourself. In practice you can use
any miracle level of 3+ for this effect; choosing difficulty 6+
encourages the HG to give the Affliction complicated,
massive, and large-scale effects by default.

DIFFICULTY 7: “GREATER
ENCHANTMENT”
Difficulty 7 Persona miracles let you imbue things more
powerfully with the dharma of your Estate.

DIFFICULTY 8: “GREATER SACRIFICE”

Difficulty 8 Persona miracles let you retract the dharma of
your Estate from things on a larger scale. Persona Difficulties (Summary)
In summary, here is the scale of miracles that Persona can
perform:

0 recognize deep bonds between people/things and

your Estate;
1 + bless or curse a person with the nature of
Field Guide! to… your Estate;
Adrian Elsey 2 + incarnate yourself in something from your Estate;
This is the Power of Toys. He is always encountered in the 3 + enforce the Properties of your Estate on yourself;
shape of a toy, so if you are buying a Christmas present for 4 + imbue something with the nature of your Estate;
a child you should check it carefully and make sure it is 5 + steal part of your Estate’s nature from a thing;
not Adrian Elsey. He is a Power of the Dark, and he takes + incarnate yourself in your Estate throughout
the world;
his glee in teaching children how to evade parental restraint
6 + change how someone or something relates to
and make terrible mistakes; that said, he is not so much
your Estate
malignant as cheerfully indifferent to consequences. If a
+ epic miracles that enforce the Properties of
child is extremely withdrawn or in the care of adults with your Estate on yourself;
even worse judgment than a child, Adrian Elsey may do 7 + epic miracles to enforce the nature of your Estate
them more good than harm. on others;
Adrian is a shapeshifter who wholly identifies with the 8 + epic miracles to steal your Estate’s nature
Toys of his Estate; he claims not even to remember his from a thing or area;
original human form. This level of identification suggests 9 + epic miracles that change how things interact
he has Persona 5. with your Estate

PERSONA
108
THE PERSONA DIFFICULTY CHART Looking over the chart, you notice that the miracles of
incarnating in your Estate are a little weird because
When you create a Power and decide on their Estate, you spending time as a forbidden love is less intuitive then
should also sketch out what you think you can do at the spending time as a computer, wind, or a car. You can still
various levels of Persona. We’re going to use the Power of use it to gather information, build connections, and
Forbidden Love again so you can compare and contrast manipulate people, but taking advantage of the higher
with the difficulty chart for Domain. You write down a few level depends on there being important or interesting
things you can do at each level: people bound by forbidden loves. Your workhorse miracles
are probably level 1-2 miracles if you have low Persona or
level 4-8 if your Persona is high.

0 recognize people/things with a strong connection to Forbidden Love

make someone a bit more desirable or more embarrassing;

1 make someone a bit more furtive;
make a street a bit harder to talk about openly

2 spend a scene as Mr. & Ms. Smith’s forbidden love

declare yourself un-discussable;

3 declare that someone can’t take their mind off you;
declare yourself a product of cultural norms

make a traffic cop extremely uncomfortable about admitting that you were
speeding, as if it were his forbidden love;
make it so everyone who sees your car wants your car, even if they know
4 they can’t have it;
in a city-block-sized region, make the second law of thermodynamics more
of a social prohibition than a hard “law” (filthy perverts and their perpetual
motion machines!)

make something really easy to talk about, thus generating buzz;

make your laptop completely undesirable to thieves and anyone not
authorized to take it;
5 strip the “social injunction” nature from proper grammar on the comments
section of your website, hopefully turning it into a local physical law;
incarnate in various forbidden loves across the cosmos;
incarnate in a forbidden love between an Angel and a Devil

make Mr. Smith a magnet for forbidden loves;

make it so that forbidden love will only ever do him good;
6
declare yourself so thoroughly un-discussable that thousands of teenagers
are murdered every year around the world just for whispering your name

make it so everyone in the world wants your car, even if they don’t recognize
it consciously, even if they know they can’t have it. People will stop and
follow it with their eyes as you drive past, and you’ll know they’re thinking:
7 “All my life. All my life I’ve wondered, and wanted, and felt this emptiness,
and now I know, and it’s still not mine,”;
make the Second Law of Thermodynamics more of a social prohibition or a
bugaboo of the scientific mindset than a physical law in general

make something so easy to talk about that it’s a major worldwide topic of
8
discussion

make Austria a place where forbidden love is celebrated, honored, and

9 welcomed, but never originated—a refuge for forbidden lovers around the
world

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 109

Interlude­

Mystic
Links
The regalia of an Imperator manifests a portion of their
substance—there is no clear distinction between person, halo,
and costuming as there is for mortal stuff. They intrude upon You want to attack a space station from the ground. You
our perception as creatures rife with symbols. This is, perhaps, want to call someone up and then send divine fire down the
a key to understanding how they may place a portion of phone line to burn them when they answer. You want to rig
themselves inside a person’s soul without losing it, how doing a lottery drawing that’s happening hundreds of miles away.
so transubstantiates the target: what we see as the Imperator
You can’t just blindly cast miracles out into the darkness
is in fact our experience of the Imperator, and that experience
of the world.
is divisible and communicable in ways that do not sever the
underlying thing. To target something far away—as opposed to just casting
a miracle outwards from where you are, and hitting
—from THE TRUTH OF THE WORLD, by Tiffany Malaise
whatever it hits—you need a link.
Sometimes it’s enough if you can see or hear the target.
You squint up at the space station and invoke your
incredible eyesight. You hear them answer and say, “Hello?”
You turn on a television program showing the lottery
drawing live. At the HG’s discretion, and particularly when
your targets are mortal, that might be enough.
Or if you’re within 10 miles—that’s probably close
enough. You probably don’t have to get any closer than that
to target a known location, even when miraculous beings
are involved.

MYSTIC LINKS
110

The rest of the time you need an explicit proxy—

something in that location that you can use as your icon, Walk to the east until you can walk no more. Swim east until
your fetish, your stand-in as you bring the miracle into you pass the sunrise; swim east until you pass the stars; swim
being. It must be something that’s connected to you. east until you pass beyond the edge of the sky. There, you will
find yourself on the shores of a different land, under a different
Something that you resonate with. Something that your
sky.
heart, spirit, or mind holds to—something that you can
Even in that land, he said, they shall know your name, and
forge a mystic link to. Something associated with a mine, and of our love.
Bond—connected to your heart, woven into who you are.
—from ADEL, by K.C. Danine
One of your Anchors (pg. 111).
Maybe it’s your mark, cut into a wall. Maybe it’s your
brother. Maybe it’s your crystal eye.
If it’s one of a kind, you just need it to be there.
If it’s one of a set—part of a network of cultists or an
arsenal of weapons; a single disco ball of the hundreds your
Disco Bond makes important to you; an instance of your
mystic sign—you’ll need to take some time working with
it to get the link set up. You’ll have to spend hours thinking
about it, studying it, connecting to it, interacting with it if
you can, before you can use it as your proxy in a distant
place.
Once you’ve built a connection like that, you can use
Treasure miracles to possess your Anchor or share their
senses and use miracles as if you were right there.
The cost is that the mystic link—the connection
between you and that thing—remains open for at least a
scene. While it’s open, other characters can target you by
attacking it. They can cut you by slashing it with a knife,
instead of or in addition to cutting the thing itself. They
can wield fire and flood and miracle against you from afar.
They can charm you or enslave you or transform you
through the link, as if you were still there, because, in a way,
you are.

In the Mythic World, the Internet is like a billion-branched

tree made of golden light. The flow of our words—our
presence—runs down the light like rain down wood. It’s quite
beautiful, really. Sometimes the branches ripple, when someone
speaks or acts forcefully miles and miles away. Pharnaces the
First whipped his end of the net once and wrapped a loop of
light around my neck and pulled me halfway across the country;
this did not seem so very beautiful to me at the time, but now
that I can think back on it with some equanimity, I’ve decided
it was mind-blowingly cool. I hope to emulate that trick in
software sometime soon.
—Red Straits of Battle, Power of UNIX

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 111
CHAPTER 11

Treasure The Nobilis get access to the coolest toys.

Here’s how that works.
Your treasure is your iconography. It’s stuff that means
something, that says something about who and what you
are. It’s the symbols of what you’re about.
The general term for this stuff is your Anchors,
including—
� Ordinary Anchors like friends and enemies, parents
and children, wristwatches, tenements, and cars;
The line leading to Zéphyrin was as long as things you’re bound to, things you care about, but
the sky. which have no power of their own;
As I wove my way through that line, as � Wondrous Anchors, extraordinary things like bottles
the days passed one by one beneath the of elemental fire, mechanical brass wings, ice-
unyielding sun, my heart fell sick with summoning swords, unicorn mounts, cinematic
despair. I knew that long before I reached hacking programs, magical sanctuaries, and psychic
him, he would choose—take some new, or superior servants; and
young, clever soul as his adjutant and � Miraculous Anchors, allies and possessions with a
perhaps his lover. He had so many thousands miraculous nature of their own.
of choices. They could not all fail his test.
It took ten days for me to reach him. The You’ll use your Treasure Attribute to manage your whole
test took him no time at all. panoply, all your props, this entire kit.
“Oriane,” he said. “ You are chosen.” Your Anchors are always around, and any powers they
“I have passed the test?” might have work, even when you’re not using the Treasure
“ You are the only one I wanted,” he said, Attribute. For a wondrous Anchor, that just means that its
and his eyes echoed the sun. power is ordinary magic—when you’re not powering it
“But the line…” with Treasure miracles, mundane uses of that power face a
“They were not real,” Zéphyrin said. “I large Obstacle, and no amount of Aspect helps. For a
needed to know that you could wait.” miraculous Anchor, it means something a little different—
when you’re not controlling it with Treasure miracles, the
—from the Thought-Record of Oriane Feroulet,
dharma or being of the miraculous Anchor is muted and
who was Zéphyrin’s Treasure
possibly contrary. It’s unlikely to do you very much good or
harm.
The defining quality of an Anchor is that you are bound
to it through your Bonds. If you have a Bond of love for
your mortal family, they are potential Anchors. If the most
precious treasure of your soul is a cheap wristwatch or a
clunky old car, that could be an Anchor too. It’s possible to
decide that one of your Bonds is the price you pay to have
some sort of Anchor—that you are influenced by some
weapon, or that you have some limitation because you use a
given Wonder. If so, that’s enough to qualify that weapon
or wonder as an Anchor bound to you by a Bond.

TREASURE
112

You need one unique Bond for each Anchor or

collection of related Anchors. To make sure you can The Acme Horizon Vulcanizer was in one respect
afford this, you get one extra point of Bonds for every successful: the rubbery horizon bounced back the sun that
tried to set, casting the houses of the sky into disorder. In
level of Treasure you have, and can spend unallocated
its principal purpose, however, it proved entirely futile:
Bond points on newly-acquired Anchors during play. If
like the devices before it, it did not win for Horace
you run out of Bond points, claiming new Anchors wounds Eunice’s love.
you (pg. 183–184)—the HG inflicts a wound that reflects
—from HORACE’S EXIGENCY, by Keiko Takemori
the trouble the thing causes you or the influence it has on
you, which will manifest as the necessary Bond or possibly
as an Affliction. Temporary wound-based Afflictions are An Anchor becomes, again at your option, free of
the only case where you can have an Anchor tied to an charge. A car no longer requires gasoline. A computer no
Affliction instead of a Bond. longer needs electricity. Phone and data service for a PDA
Your Avatar has Treasure 0 for free and can buy up to are free. Even people stop having a resource cost—it’s not
5 additional levels for 3 points each. that they don’t eat, sleep, shower, or whatever, but that for
Here’s what this gives you, without spending MP: some reason or another you won’t ever have to worry about
� 0: Your Anchors have no overhead it. Depending on the game the HG may play this up for
comic, tragic, bromidic, or wondrous effect.
� 1: + you can possess them from afar
For better or worse, when you’re directly interacting
� 2: + you can guide them from afar
with one of your Anchors, you don’t spend Will and you
� 3: + you can make and use wondrous Anchors
ignore the whole Intentions system. Your actions through
� 4: + your Anchors aid and strengthen you an Anchored tool, or an Anchor’s actions when you’re
� 5: + your Anchors are suitable tools for miraculous directly involved, just add a default +3 “miraculous Will”
combat bonus to the highest relevant Passion or Skill.
Finally, an Anchor may always communicate with
Here’s the scale of miracles that Treasure can perform: you—it may call to you with its thoughts and it may hear
thoughts you send outwards in its direction. This is most
DIFFICULTY 0: “CLAIMING AN ANCHOR” important with people, but the spirit of an inanimate
You can use a difficulty 0 miracle to make an ordinary Anchor may communicate with you as well. It is a reflexive
thing into an Anchor—to take something that is bound to difficulty 0 miracle to hear an Anchor trying to reach you
you by your Bonds and make it part of your regalia, your or to open a channel of communication with it; you receive
iconography, your nature and your destiny. free Strike (pg. 181) on this miracle equal to your Treasure
An Anchor becomes, at your option, one of the best of rating and can spend MP or invoke a Bond for additional
its kind mundanely available. Your old clunker of a car
becomes a Ferrari, or simply runs like one. Your memento
wristwatch becomes as durable as a Rolex deep sea watch. COLLECTIONS
That butler you hired—maybe from the papers, maybe by
dragging your layabout or unruly cousin into your world— Your Anchors can be things like networks of spies, vast
turns out, after a few days settling in, to be one of the best collections of magic weaponry, armies of monsters, whole
and most loyal butlers in the world. families, and the like. You can use most of your Treasure
miracles on collections normally—instead of saying that
your butler brings you key information, you declare that
your network of spies does so; instead of unleashing a
minotaur against your enemies, you unleash many
minotaurs! However, you can’t actually “possess” or
ICONS “guide” a collection of Anchors—if you want to use such an
Anchor as the proxy for a long-range miracle, you’ll have to
You can make a symbol into your Anchor. You claim pick out one particular part of the collection and use a
something iconic and abstract as yours—a mystic sign, a mundane action to familiarize yourself with them. This
shouted catch phrase, or whatever. It relates to one of your takes a few hours of interaction or reflection, but if you’re
pressed you can use Aspect 3+ miracles to speed it up to
Bonds. It represents you. Through it you can use power.
“just in time.” Once you’ve familiarized yourself with an
Sometimes it’s only you making the symbol that counts, and
individual from a collection of Anchors you can possess or
only one incarnation of the symbol matters; if it’s a mark guide that individual until the HG decides that your sense
you can make in many different places, or something like of familiarity and attunement fades. This familiarity will
that, you should also look at the box for Anchor fade almost immediately for an Anchor from a very generic
Collections (right). collection but can last indefinitely if the collection is, e.g.,
your parents, grandmother, and a sibling.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 113

She stood in the garden she had summoned from outside the SIDEKICKS
world. A thing that I could not call a flower brushed against
her face; soft yellow fuzz lay beneath her feet. Behind her, You can have a sidekick, friend, or ally as an Anchor. They’ll
radiant indigo shapes of whorls and topologically impossible be coolest if you can afford to use level 4 miracles now and
curves served as bushes, and something beautiful but then!
disturbingly wormlike crawled up a lattice against the garden
fence.
Nothing in that garden came from the mind of God. It was DIFFICULTY 2: “GUIDANCE”
something called, something conjured, something found. It is a difficulty 2 miracle to invoke an Anchor as an
“What price did you pay for it?” I asked. extension of yourself.
She opened her eyes. Patterns of amber and violet endlessly You remain in your own flesh, but you share the
bloomed within them. “None worth the mentioning,” she
Anchor’s senses if it has them. You improve its function.
answered.
Your spirit soothes its heart. This specifically includes the
She stood within the garden; and nothing in that garden
came from the mind of God.
conversational channel associated with difficulty 0—you
may communicate freely with the Anchor as you work.
—from the Thought-Record of Melania Stockli
Using a Guidance miracle gives you or the Anchor a small
edge (1 Edge, all else being equal) and adds +1 to the value
Strike. Actually hearing your Anchor out and replying is a of a Tool.
mundane action, so you’ll have to have a free moment to You may take actions “through” the Anchor, as with
talk. occupation, and when you use Aspect miracles or
All of these benefits are essentially permanent; they last mundane actions through them it temporarily displaces
as long as you wish them to last and retain an appropriate their consciousness.
Bond. You can use Guidance outside the normal range for
your miracles. Doing so forges a mystic link with that
DIFFICULTY 1: “POSSESSION”
Anchor that remains for the rest of the scene.
It is a difficulty 1 miracle to use an Anchor as an alternate
body—to shift your consciousness wholly into it and
DIFFICULTY 3: “UNLEASHING WONDERS”
possess it. You are limited to its senses, if it has them, or to
It is a difficulty 3 miracle to claim a wondrous Anchor—
vague impressions of things relevant to your Estate, if it
something extraordinary and powerful. It has a single core
does not. You can use this power outside the normal range
for your miracles, but doing so forges a mystic link with power, and that power forms in reflection to some deep
that Anchor that remains for the rest of the scene. truth about you or your Estate. Put another way, you as a
Occupation lasts until: player have the option to claim any sort of wonder that you
� something happens back at your body that snaps you like and that the HG can handle, but your Avatar is stuck
out of it; with treasures that resonate with their soul.
� you choose to release your control; or You can use this miracle to find and tame a wondrous
� the scene ends for the thing you’re occupying. thing in the world as an Anchor or to enhance an ordinary
Anchor and make them wondrous. It’s up to you.
Occupation is not as subtle or gentle as incarnation. You It’s also a difficulty 3 miracle to invoke such an Anchor’s
entirely displace the identity of the Anchor and may use
wondrous power.
miracles and other actions as if its body was your own.
At this level the miracle simply turns that power on.
When you depart the Anchor will have only a vague and
You invoke the wonder. You bring it into play. To wield
confused memory of what went on.
it—to decide what it does for you, what it does to your
enemies—requires a mundane or an Aspect-based action.
Hidden Secrets! of…
Lance Romenel
This is a Power with a Newfie dog named Fezzik. Fezzik
is the smartest and toughest dog I have ever seen, but is The label on the box said, “Lucifer’s Heart – 5¢.”
definitely still a dog and not a magical superbeing, which “How do you know it is really Lucifer’s heart?” asked
is why Lance Romenel has Treasure 2. Mr. Romenel is Emma Jane.
not actually responsible for dogs but will sometimes serve “I pulled it out myself,” said the man in the black coat. He
as their psychopomp and help them reach a happy pulled up his shirt and Izod sweater to show the hole in his
afterlife simply because he can; if he shows up for your chest. “See?”
dog you should let him do his work. —from EMMA AND CÉSAR, by Martin Elliott

TREASURE
114

Once, I asked my imaginary friend, “Are you real?” SANCTUMS

She thought on this, and then sat down upon the beach. She
poked her finger into the sand; it left a hole. Ten times she did You can have an ordinary, wondrous, or miraculous
this, and nine holes she left. Sanctum as an Anchor—a place of comfort and/or
“Mostly,” she concluded, and I was forced to agree. power! Sanctum powers usually involve healing, resting,
—from the Diary of Minerva Candeloro or reshaping physically to your will. Unless that’s what
the Sanctum does, it probably can’t physically “reach” you
when you use level 4 or 7 miracles, but most Sanctums
While you’re sustaining this miracle, though: have some sort of projected power that can do the work
� the Anchor’s power is active, so you ignore any of reaching you instead. For instance, a Sanctum library
Obstacle that says it can’t be; might be able to send a book your way with a level 4 or 7
� relevant mundane actions receive a large edge— miracle.
- 0-2 Edge becomes 3 Edge;
- a 1-Edge disadvantage becomes 3 Edge;
- a 2-3 Edge disadvantage is cancelled out.
DIFFICULTY 5: “WEAPONIZING ANCHORS”
� you add +1 to the value of a Tool, not cumulative with
It is a difficulty 5 miracle to strengthen the powers of a
the bonus from Guidance.
wondrous Anchor for an action, stretching them and often
Wondrous Anchors receive the same benefits as ordinary giving them the ability to operate on metaphors, miracles,
Anchors—superior mundane quality, cost-free operation, and abstractions. Ordinary Anchors have no “power” to
exemption from the Intentions system, and the ability to strengthen but you may bless them with good fortune and
communicate with you from afar. Their special power is the same good timing possessed by Powers at Aspect 3.
comparable to a lesser miracle in its scope. You may then
� unleash that power, as with difficulty 3 miracles;
DIFFICULTY 4: “GETTING SOME HELP” � declare that the Anchor uses that power to aid you,
It is a difficulty 4 miracle to declare that an ordinary or as with difficulty 4 miracles; or
wondrous Anchor does something to strengthen or aid � declare that the Anchor uses that power to wound
you in some way. The Anchor is moved by a perfected (inflicts an undesired effect on) something or
miraculous will; its actions leave the mundane scale otherwise disrupt the status quo.
behind, and can stretch a little bit beyond a wondrous
Anchor’s core power, but with one exception (below) its You can use some wondrous Anchors as weapons at lower
actions remain roughly within its normal capabilities. Thus levels, but if you don’t have this level’s ability to include the
your maiden aunt won’t flip over any cars or jump over any act of targeting and wounding someone in the miracle,
buildings to help you, but she might sense that you’re in miraculous combat will give you a lot of trouble.
trouble and give your Imperator a call even if you’re
unconscious on another world.
At this level an ordinary or wondrous Anchor can reach
you from anywhere within a city- or Chancel-sized region.
Field Guide! to…
You may, if you wish, invoke a difficulty 4 effect simply to Belle Carter
gain access to an Anchor, and you may do so even if Belle Carter is the Power of Context. She makes her
reaching you would normally be beyond the Anchor’s various Anchors by trapping concepts or ideas in physical
capabilities. form. For example, her destiny is locked up in a rope with
seven knots. When she needs luck or good fortune, she cuts
one knot and releases some of her destiny into the world;
then, once events have turned her way again, she ties the
severed bit of rope back to the other end. She claims to
“This?” I said, fingering a long and delicate blade.
have captured the end of the Third Age in the jewel she
“Ah, that one is fine,” he said. “It will cost you your soul.”
wears around her neck; on this basis we assign her Treasure
I frowned, set it carefully back upon the wall, and walked to
5. If you find yourself trapped inside one of Belle Carter’s
another. The metal was dark and sang with Envy; emerald
treasures you may appeal to her Sister Caelestis Ienari
patterns trickled down the blade like the flow of blood. “This?” I
Namika-in for aid; the Lady Namika-in believes herself to
asked, and looked at him again.
be Belle Carter’s conscience (in a strictly metaphorical/
“That one,” he said, slowly, “I will pay you my soul to take.”
social sense), and will almost certainly intervene on behalf
—from VIRIDIAN, by Emily Chen, of anyone who can demonstrate sufficient worth.
writing on the topic of Miraculous Weapons

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS opposite: “Diane Spinnaker,” from a piece by Julia Margaret Cameron, by Jenna Moran
 115

D
iane Spinnaker! She can use any picture of herself as a
mystic link. Even this one! After studying the relevant
laws on the Internet I have decided to say “except for this
one, obviously.”

opposite: by artist (I cribbed from these) TREASURE

116

“Wait,” the man said, and I turned to look. His face was SUPERCHARGING
curiously red, and beads of clear liquid were scattered across WONDROUS ANCHORS
his brow. “I must rest,” he explained. “The way is long.”
“Rest?” Dragonflies hummed across the narrow road. “I If you don’t have a miraculous Anchor, you may still use
had understood you a noble.” greater miracles of Treasure—but at a cost. You may push a
“I am,” he said. “A Duke’s carbuncle is sewn into my skin.” wondrous Anchor’s abilities to the miraculous Anchor level,
—from REFLECTIONS IV, by Viscount d’Armand and command that power using suitable level 6-9 miracles,
but either the Anchor or yourself will take a wound of the HG’s
choosing. It may or may not be possible to push an ordinary
Anchor to this extent—basically, if the general consensus of
the players and HG is that it’s awesome, you can, but if the
DIFFICULTY 6: “WEAVING DESTINY”
general consensus is that it’s dumb, you can’t.
It is a difficulty 6 miracle to declare that an ordinary or
wondrous Anchor uses its powers or abilities to create a
positive or definite outcome. That your sword wins the fight
for you. That your servants set a group of troubled teens on the It is also a level 6 miracle to invoke the miraculous
right track. That you, with your rocket car, bring a new era Anchor’s core power, to unleash it in your service, to say
of peace and prosperity to Quebec. The more unreasonable what it will do.
your choice of outcome, the longer this action is liable to Miraculous Anchors receive the same benefits as
take, but it will eventually come to pass unless stronger ordinary Anchors—superior mundane quality, cost-free
miracles, Auctorita, or paradoxes interfere. operation, exemption from the Intentions system, and the
ability to communicate with you from afar. Regrettably
DIFFICULTY 6: “UNLEASHING MIRACLES” you cannot obtain these benefits yourself without being
It is also a difficulty 6 miracle to claim a miraculous
defeated in miraculous combat—Powers may in the rarest
Anchor—to take something inherently miraculous,
cases be other Powers’ Anchors, but functional Avatars
something on your level, that could quite possibly take you
cannot.
in a fight, and bind it to yourself.
Maybe you upgrade an ordinary or wondrous Anchor. DIFFICULTY 7: “GETTING MIRACULOUS
Maybe—and more commonly—you find something in HELP”
the world, something incredible and meaningful and apt, It is a difficulty 7 miracle to decide and declare that a
and tame it. You bind it to you with the chains of love or miraculous Anchor does something to strengthen or aid
hate, need or drive, power and devotion that connect you you in some way; that it comes to your aid because of the
to any other Anchor; typically, you will have to defeat it in connection between the two of you, rather than by your
miraculous combat before you can claim it as your own. command.
Like a wondrous Anchor, it must say something about At this level your Anchors may reach you from
you—it must reflect something in and through and of you.
anywhere in existence in order to aid you—miraculous
It has meaning, as an Anchor must.
Anchors, certainly, but ordinary and wondrous Anchors as
Like a wondrous Anchor, it has a core power, or at least
well. You may, if you wish, invoke this level of miracle
a core definition to its power. There is a thing that it does. It
simply to gain access to an Anchor, as with level 4.
is simple, miraculous, and deep; comparable to a greater
miracle in scope, but not complexity.

The devices of Abd-al-Rashid are undeniably masterworks—

from Bahir Hibah, the book whose passages can open any
portal, to Zakiyya, the mechanical odalisque whose tears are When the Age of Pain began, the first Magister of the Wild,
made of gold. At one time or another, many Powers have Nayantara, battled the Excrucian Maatsarya-Asura. In that
considered delving into Abd-al-Rashid’s forgotten city in battle, she broke the Abhorrent Weapon named Kifri, also called
search of these devices. So far, they have refrained. Abd-al- Envy, and scattered the pieces to the wind. Had Kifri
Rashid died a traitor’s death, seduced into betraying his remained whole for just three thousand years, it would have
Imperator by mortal lust, and the taint clings to his artifacts trapped the universe in eternal stasis—living death. Instead,
still. How would a Power dare to take them? Her peers would Nayantara shattered it, and then disappeared from Imperial
point and whisper, “There goes one who claims a traitor’s goods. cognizance. The Powers of the Wild, when they celebrate, often
What else might not she do?” celebrate in Nayantara’s name.
—from CHRONICLES OF WONDERS, by Kip Narekatski —from LEGENDS OF THE NOBILIS, by Luc Ginneis

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 117

DIFFICULTY 8: “COMMUNION” TREASURE DIFFICULTIES (EXAMPLE)

It is a difficulty 8 miracle to enhance the powers of a
Your character’s a folk-hero kind of trickster, fresh-faced
miraculous Anchor with your own—unleashing a joint
and with a fiddle at her side.
effect that pairs the miraculous Anchor’s power with either
So you want a magical fiddle.
the substance of your Estate or some enhancement
You think it fits.
suitable to what the Anchor is to you.
If you want a fiddle that calls up illusions, that’d be
DIFFICULTY 9: “IMPERIAL MIRACLES” difficulty 3. You invoke the power, play the fiddle, and
It is a difficulty 9 miracle to invoke the power of a illusions appear. If you want it to talk to you, or play on its
miraculous Anchor as an Imperial miracle. The spirit of own while you’re nowhere near, that would be difficulty 4.
the thing is raised up for a moment to the level of first If you’re looking to weave songs and illusions past the
cause; it speaks its need into the world. This takes as long defenses of a Noble or an Excrucian heart, difficulty 5
as an Imperial miracle takes, which is to say, minutes to would fit.
months as the HG decides, and flows from the nature of The level of Treasure you want depends a lot on which
the Anchor rather than the Power. That said, it is of those effects you plan on invoking regularly. If the
predictable; the Power may cancel the effect, and recover difficulty 4 effect is important to you—if the fiddle is your
their spent MP, if in listening to the work of the miracle best friend, and plays itself a lot—then you’ll want
they discover that it is setting forth a burden they would Treasure 4, and shouldn’t settle for anything less than
not desire. Treasure 2. If you want to spend most of your time in the
game using your fiddle as a weapon against the enemies of
the world, Treasure 5 is almost mandatory.
What if you want to find a fiddle with Cneph the
Creator of the world trapped in its sound box and its
strings—a fiddle of destiny that’ll lead you to the forefront
of the war and a confrontation at the central point of
Heaven with the greatest Excrucians in the war? Since
you’ll need Treasure 9 to do serious destiny fiddling, you’ll
want a Treasure of either 1 or 5—anything else is wasted
potential, since you can’t spend 5, 6, or 7 MP on a miracle
of this sort.
If you have Treasure 1, then that God-haunted fiddle is
barely within reach. You’d have to push your TMP up to 8,
and you’d take a spiritual wound from spending 8 MP at
Treasure Difficulties (Summary) once (see Words of Command, pg. 187), but you could pull
In summary, here is the scale of miracles that Treasure can it off. You couldn’t actually trap Cneph in a fiddle with
perform: Treasure, you understand, without the HG’s
cooperation—beating God in miraculous combat pretty
0 your Anchors have no overhead much requires the HG to go along. But you could find and
1 + you can possess them tame a fiddle which already has Cneph in it, or do your
2 + you can guide them from afar part if Cneph wants to pour his spirit in. And then you’d
3 + you can make and unleash magical/high-tech need another 8 MP, and you’d take another wound, each
Wonders
time you actually used the thing. So you’re better off, I
4 + your Anchors act on your behalf;
think, lowering your standards and going with a fiddle that
+ your local Anchors are easily available
5 + your Anchors become functional, flexible weapons
doesn’t contain the living spirit of Cneph—maybe a
6 + your Anchors can achieve cool things; wonder with some connection to the story of Cneph who
+ you can claim and unleash miraculous Anchors Made, which you could invoke for a more reasonable 2 MP.
7 + your miraculous Anchors act on your behalf; But if you have Treasure 5, that’s another story. It’s only
+ you can access your Anchors from anywhere 1 MP to tame a miraculous fiddle, then, and 4 to wield it
8 + you can combine your powers with your miraculous to reshape the destiny of the world. You could probably call
Anchors’ for awesome joint effects on Cneph’s power once or twice per story!
9 + your miraculous Anchors can invoke
Imperial miracles (pg. 144)

TREASURE
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NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 119
CHAPTER 12

MP
Every Power starts with 5 MP associated with each
Attribute—
� 5 Aspect MP (AMP)
“To end the suffering of my people,” � 5 Domain MP (DMP)
declared Terrence, “I shall sacrifice my � 5 Persona MP (PMP)
own life.” � 5 Treasure MP (TMP)
“Or,” Emma pointed out, “you could
just use miraculous power.” You can buy additional MP for character points; each
Terrence looked embarrassed. “ Yes. character point you spend buys you 1 extra MP of all four
Or that!” types. (That is, one character point buys you 4 MP in total,
—from UNDOCUMENTED HISTORY, divided evenly among the Attributes.)
by Walden Fargo During the course of play, you will spend MP at a
sometimes frightening clip, and you aren’t guaranteed to get
them back until the next story begins. But all hope is not
lost! The HG can give you extra MP or an early MP
refresh, and for any of the following reasons.

MP
120
THE “BREATH” OF MP
The lord of the Janni had a thousand gifts to give the mortals
Every scene where you’re facing off against a serious, that pleased him, and ten thousand vengeances to carry out.
meaningful antagonist will give you one “breath” of MP— Each had its own peculiar requirements, and many needed
1 MP in each Attribute, up to a maximum of your regular attention; but he did not keep these things in memory.
starting level. You will also get this breath in any scene Each morning as he woke, his servant would draw back the
where you find out for the first time about a major curtain before his bed and present the Janni lord with chilled
difficulty or problem in your future. In short the HG gives grapes and cheese, and the lord would say, “What is on my
you this breath, up to once per scene, any time they or a schedule for today?” And his servant might say, “Vengeance
fellow PC decides to make trouble for you. against the city of Shenu Tawy, that displeased you.”
“Is that not yet complete?” asked the lord of the Janni, and

BONDS, AFFLICTIONS, AND his servant would say—as he always said at such times—“It is
growing close, my lord. It is growing close.”
—from BOWLING FOR MAGIC RINGS, by Keiko Takemori
TENDING TO YOUR ESTATE

Are your Bonds or Afflictions in trouble, or giving you

trouble? Awesome! This can get you more MP.
Doing cool things to honor the Properties of your
Estate? That can give you MP too.
MP from Bonds, Afflictions, and tending to your
Estate goes to an Attribute of your choice. This can
increase your MP pools past your starting level.

FACING CHANGE AND OVERCOMING

STRUGGLE
When you overcome the larger moral and philosophical
issues in your life—when you can finally set aside the
weight of a large change or struggle and move forward—
you earn both Destiny (which can make you a stronger
character in the long term) and an immediate portion of
MP.
MP received with Destiny goes to an Attribute of
your choice. This can increase your MP pools past your
starting level.

The Bernièrian heresy conflates certain notions of God and the

Devil. According to its proponents, Creation is inherently
inimical to God. He sacrificed His freedom in the act of making
it and now lies immured and helpless at the very center of
existence—which is to say, at the core of the Earth. He has, in
essence, created His own Hell and His own Fall. The answer to
the problem of evil is simple: suffering is the escape valve built
into the fabric of Creation. Each moment of heartache or pain
eats away at the substance of the Lord’s prison, eroding the
stone fabric of the world and releasing bits of holy essence—
wisdom, compassion, and the sense of the sacred—through tiny
channels in the porous rock.
—from A CATALOG OF MODERN MAGIC, by Eric Optera

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CHAPTER 13

Gifts
On the first day, they brought the smith
a horse to shoe, and it took him a day.
On the second day, they brought him
two horses, and it took him an hour.
On the third day, they brought him
Sometimes Powers can do things that don’t make sense as
twenty, and it took him two minutes.
part of their Estate.
On the fourth day, they led a herd to
Why can the Power of Storms breathe fire?
his forge, and they were shod before they
Why can the Power of Poseurs catch a sword in his bare
arrived.
hands?
“But master,” they said, “why did you
Why can the Power of Rhythm fly?
take so long on the first horse, and so
We totally know the answer to these things. The Power
little time later?”
of Storms is a dragon; that’s why he can breathe fire. The
“The first horse,” the master
Power of Poseurs has monofilament mesh under his skin.
explained, “was a new experience, and I
That doesn’t actually make sense, I personally think, but at
savored it for all that it was worth.
least it’s an explanation. The Power of Rhythm can fly
After that,” and he blushed, “I began to
because she has wings. All these things are true, but they
get bored.”
have nothing to do with Storms, or Poseurs, or Rhythm.
—from WATERWALKER’S TALE, To have abilities like this, you can buy your Avatar Gifts.
by Melanie Tumbarius Gifts are basically miracles that your Avatar can do, or
that the world performs for them, but which don’t come
directly from their Estate. They’re also the system we use
for building generic Noble, Imperator, and Excrucian
abilities that many but not most of these characters have.
There’s a list of these Gifts below, but more important than
the list is the design system. You can make your own Gifts,
customizing your Avatar’s more eccentric abilities.
Let’s read the Gift design system, and walk through the
process of creating a new Gift as we do!

GIFTS
122
ASPECT GIFTS TREASURE GIFTS
Do you want to be able to do some kind of Aspect miracle Do you want to have some kind of cool artifact or
that your Aspect level doesn’t or the Aspect rules don’t collection of artifacts, but for some reason—such as MP
allow? Pick a Passion or Skill that governs the kind of cost, or not wanting it to be a Bond, or feeling that it’s
thing you want to do, and the miracle level you want to do anti-thematic for your Estate—you don’t want to buy it
it with.
through Treasure? Pick a Focus or set of Foci—which
It doesn’t have to be one of your own Passions or Skills.
function exactly as Anchors save that they are not
For instance,
connected to you through your Bonds—and the Treasure
� Aspect 4-level Skill: Science!
� Aspect 3-level Skill: Martial Arts miracle type you’ll use to manipulate it.
� Aspect 6-level Passion: I Can Save Everybody For instance,
� Treasure 3-level Super Car
This is the basis for an Aspect Gift. � Treasure 7-level Helpful Miraculous Creature
� Treasure 5-level Amazing Sanctum
DOMAIN AND PERSONA GIFTS You may access effects up to that level, but only with
Do you want to be able to do some sort of Domain or regards to that Focus.
Persona miracle, but it doesn’t fit your Estate? Or maybe
it’s more powerful than what you can do with your Example: Active Immortality
Domain and Persona? Pick an Estate, a miracle difficulty, Here’s an example Gift to build using this system.
and a basic miracle type you can do with that level of Let’s say that you want your character to be immortal.
Domain or Persona miracle. The miracle type is everything Not the passive, “I can’t die” sort of immortality, or even
gathered under one heading in the Domain and Persona “I’m really good at not dying” sort, since those are better
miracle lists, e.g. Greater Divination or Lesser Creation, handled through Bonds and Afflictions, but the active
Summoning, or Animation. “Whatever it is, I can take it. Reflexively. Shrug it off. And
For instance, just keep on coming.” kind of immortality.
� Domain 8-level Major Destructions of Color The kind that lets you declare, “I defend.” against any
� Domain 3-level Lesser Preservations of Cats and Dogs sort of attack.
� Persona 2-level Lesser Incarnation in Dreams
The kind that can maybe get out-miracled, sure. The
� Persona 4-level Lesser Enchantments of Reason
kind where if someone explodes a small sun in front of
MANY DIFFERENT ESTATES your face, you might have to spend some MP or take a
If you can do miracles based on many different Estates, moment’s breather to recover. The kind where you’ve got
double the final cost of the Gift. For example, Gifts that this nagging fear that maybe a universe-ending incident
do Domain miracles on or Persona miracles of “any living would be too much for you to take. But also the kind that
thing” or “any emotion” or “any form of matter” are usually makes it clear that you laugh at nukes and poisons, and
double cost. that you aren’t so sure that you wouldn’t survive the death
If you can do miracles based on almost any Estate, triple of the universe, that you couldn’t handle being torn apart in
the final cost instead! a reality vortex or having all of Hell shrunk down into a
Since Estates are written using natural language, which
knife and stabbed through your heart—
can be pretty darned inclusive or weirdly limiting, you’re
That kind of immortality would be a Gift.
pretty much on the honor system here.

The star of Phratagune is a sizable metal sphere with long

needle-like limbs jutting out from it in seventeen directions.
Nine of them are mobile, and the star can use them to walk
upon. Eight of them are fixed. The sphere is the star of
Phratagune’s shame; the needles are its glory. For this reason, a
Noble who wishes to display this treasure is well-advised to
place it within a mortal’s abdomen. This conceals the sphere
while leaving the needle lengths uncovered; this pleases the star
of Phratagune, and causes it to adopt a congenial manner.
—from IN THE RIGHT CIRCLES, by Jasprite Sherrard

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 123

GIFT BASE COST ACTIVATION

The base cost for your Gift, in Character Points, is the Next decide how you activate the Gift. Does it cost MP?
miracle level you’ve chosen. (And if so, from which Attribute?) Does it use a
If you want to pick a miracle level that’s higher than miraculous action? Or does it just happen automatically
what you need, in order to win miraculous contests, you when it should?
can, but we’re not going to do that in our sample Gifts.
MEANS OF ACTIVATION COST IN CPS
Example: Active Immortality Automatically activates when appropriate +1
So you want to be immortal? Simple miracle (0 MP) -1
Well, a Persona 3 miracle of True Love might do it Normal miracle (1 MP of a chosen type) -2
(“True Love lives forever”). Hard miracle (2 MP of a chosen type) -3
Or some sort of Treasure 6 Laughter-based anti-death
serum (“anti-death serum is the best medicine.”) Any miracle that you can sustain without using an action
or sustained action slot is automatic.
But we’re going to go with a Domain 6 miracle over
Any miracle you can invoke reflexively should be
You.
automatic as well.
The idea is that something’s about to happen to you.
And maybe it’s just a nuke or a knife. Or maybe it’s Example: Active Immortality
something subtle and clever that you’d have a hard time So you want to be immortal?
defending against. But that doesn’t matter. Your active That sounds like it’s automatic. You have a set of
immortality kicks in. It steps up to the plate and says, I sustained defensive/protective miracles going on, or a set
defend (You). of miracles that invoke themselves automatically to defend
And you can smile at the HG, and say, “That bad thing you. That costs +1 Character Point, bumping our current
isn’t going to happen.” cost for immortality up to 7 Character Points.
This has a base cost of 6 Character Points.
AREA OF EFFECT
STRIKE
Next decide the area that the Gift can affect. Is it personal?
You may buy Strike for your Gift. It costs 1 point per point Does it affect one nearby target? Does it affect the local
of Strike (max +7). This is cumulative with Strike from area? Or can it take effect anywhere and everywhere?
other sources—whether you buy Strike for your Gift here
or not, you can spend MP or invoke a Bond to apply more AREA OF EFFECT COST IN CPS
Strike to its effects in play. Almost anywhere +1
We are only going to buy Strike for two of the sample Local things only -1
Gifts—and only there because they are certain to go up One entity (the Power or a nearby being) -2
against Auctorita. We intend Strike to be a rare and Self only -3
amazing bonus you can buy for a Gift, not a part of the
default package. “Local” here defines a deliberately fluid conceptual region.
It means the location in which a scene of play is set. If
you’d rather have hard spatial units, though, a Gift that
affects local things can probably affect a spherical area 200
yards in diameter or launch a targeted effect at a known
location up to 10 miles away.

Example: Active Immortality

So you want to be immortal? Well, you’ll make up a few
points here. Immortality affects you, so your cost goes
down to 4 Character Points.

GIFTS
124
FLEXIBILITY PERSONA-BASED GIFTS
FLEXIBILITY COST IN CPS
Next decide how many different kinds of miracles you can
All Persona miracles of a specific type* for that Estate +1
do with this Gift.
A large, flexible subset missing some obvious utility -1
ASPECT-BASED GIFTS A handful of applications -2
FLEXIBILITY COST IN CPS One trick -3
A broad package of abilities and support abilities* +1 (*) (e.g., lesser incarnation or greater enchantment)
A focused, task-oriented package of abilities -1
A handful of specific abilities -2
For example, if you have the Gift of Persona 2 Lesser
Incarnation in Cops—
One trick -3
� +1 means you can incarnate in anyone reasonably
(*) up to a specific level, tied to and fitting
describable as a cop at any time;
a specific Passion or Skill
� -1 might let you incarnate in any formally appointed
For example, if you have a Gift of Aspect 5-level Skill: police officer on duty;
Martial Arts— � -2 might let you incarnate in a cop in any given city,
� +1 helps you meditate, say wise things, know martial but only one specific cop per city;
arts lore, do acrobatics, use inner power to keep � -3 might let you incarnate in any cop you can see.
warm, and also do martial arts;
TREASURE-BASED GIFTS
� -1 might just let you do martial arts;
FLEXIBILITY COST IN CPS
� -2 might just give you a set of powerful moves;
Your Focus (pg. 122) has a flexible, loosely-defined ability +1
� -3 might give you, say, “the Dragon Kick,” which you
Your Focus has a flexible but well-defined ability -1
can use at an effective Aspect 5.
Your Focus has a handful of uses -2
DOMAIN-BASED GIFTS Your Focus has one trick -3
FLEXIBILITY COST IN CPS
All Domain miracles of a specific type* for that Estate +1
You are still limited to Treasure miracles up to the level of
effect chosen.
A large, flexible subset missing some obvious utility -1
For example, if you have a level-6 Treasure Gift to use
A handful of applications -2
My Stolen Abhorrent Weapon—
One trick -3
� +1 means that the Weapon has a power like “bend
(*) (e.g., lesser preservation or greater destruction)
events to my will”
For example, if you have the Gift of Domain 4 Lesser � -1 means the Weapon has a power like “slow things
Creation, Summoning, or Animation of Radio Sets— down”
� +1 means you can make a radio dance, appear out of � -2 means the Weapon has a power like “cut through
nowhere, or change its tune; miracles”
� -1 might limit you to controlling what sounds the � -3 means the Weapon has powers like “cut the soul
radio emits; and not the flesh,” and you can’t guide or possess it
� -2 might limit you to having the radio play actual or use it as a mystic link.
radio shows;
Example: Active Immortality
� -3 might limit you to having the radio play your
So you want to be immortal?
choice of currently broadcasting radio shows, and just
The standard build for active immortality covers just
save you the effort of looking for them.
about any Major Preservation of the Self you’d care to name.
We’re not going to leave anything out; you even need the
“strengthen and nurture” effect to heal any wounds you do
get with exceptional speed, survive without food and water,
“Great King, I present to you a sorcerer from the east, who can and generally keep you energetic no matter what goes on.
speak to beasts, turn stone into fire, and dance on a balanced This brings the cost up to 5 Character Points.
knife.”
“Magnificent talents,” admitted the King, “ but manifestly
impractical.”
—from FAR SERENDIP, by Jen Hogan

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 125

EXAMPLE: ACTIVE IMMORTALITY

MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
6 (Domain) Automatic Self only Full flexibility No
6 CP +1 −3 +1 +1 6 CP

RARITY A NOTE ON MINIMUM COSTS

Finally, Gifts that the HG decides are comparatively rare The minimum cost for a Gift is 1 Character Point. If you
among Powers—possessed by fewer than 10% of the Noble double or triple it because it’s a Domain or Persona miracle
population—cost 1 extra point. that’s based on many Estates, the minimum cost rises to 2
(respectively, 3) Points.
Example: Active Immortality
Immortality now costs 6 Character Points, and the costing
for it is done!
COMMON GIFTS
DURANT (AKA NIGH-INVULNERABILITY)
1 point
You’re extra-resistant to just about any physical attack.
Daggers scrape and squeal on your skin. Being on fire is
really uncomfortable. Chainsaws make you a little nervous
The city of Samarah stands in the shadow of the stone that because if they break on your skin little bits of metal could
holds the world together. An enemy of the world once visited go flying everywhere. You heal very quickly.
Samarah and struck that stone tenscore blows. Each blow could This common Gift is a Lesser Preservation of the Self.
have felled a palace, slain an army, or shattered a dragon’s Example: Joan of Arc would be dead right now if it weren’t
bones; yet the stone of Samarah held. Not until the last blow for the Durant Gift.
did its strength waver and the smallest crack appear; but when
its enemy reared back for another blow, he found that he had no ELEMENTAL
strength left at all. 1 point
—from EARTH STORIES, compiled by Édouard Guy See Shapeshifter, below.

ELUSIVE
Hidden Secrets! of… 1 point
Superstes Annabelle Zupay You’re really hard to land a miraculous effect on—you shed
This is a Power who may randomly take your stuff to help mental and transformative influence with ease. The
complete her gigantic castle/modern artwork, the Milliped inhuman beauty of Angels, Excrucians, and the Glorious
of Human Striving. If you pretend you are giving it to her won’t faze you. Attempts to curse you with hiccups or turn
voluntarily she may offer you more than adequate you into a dream don’t take! Basically you have a very
compensation in return. She is a strange Power who strong ability to be you despite attempts to enchant or
appeared out of nowhere, investigates Imperators for enthrall you.
treason, and consorts with bizarre creatures from the Lands This common Gift is a Lesser Preservation of the Self.
Beyond Creation; for these reasons, we give her the Elusive
Gift.

DURANT
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
3 (Domain) Automatic Self only Limited Yes
3 CP +1 −3 −2 1 CP

ELUSIVE
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
3 (Domain) Automatic Self only Limited Yes
3 CP +1 −3 −2 1 CP

GIFTS
126

ETERNAL GLORIOUS
3 points 2 points
You can ignore any physical and environmental condition You can inspire an incredible passion in other people. You
short of gross physical injury—and even then, you don’t turn on an aura or change your appearance and bam—
really get hurt, since you can ignore the shock and pain and suddenly you are so beautiful no one would ever hurt you,
such, your performance just degrades. If you can survive so terrifying you could rout an army, or so subtly amazing
the first few seconds, you might even manage to stabilize that even the Excrucians and the Angels will give you the
your condition after a beheading or dismemberment. honor you think your due.
You’re basically a self-sustaining system, living off of This common Gift is a Major Creation of Emotion.
miraculous energy rather than food, water, air, or anything Example: Helen of Troy had this.
like that. You do not age.
This common Gift is a Major Preservation of the Self.
Example: Daniel is a clay statue brought to life by an Once, a man was so well-loved that he set the fields ablaze and
Imperator. His body looks like flesh, but it’s not! the peasants didn’t mind.
Then he killed all the animals, and gave his folk dust to eat,
FLIGHT and they didn’t mind.
1 point
Then he dirtied the water with blood from his wars, and
You can fly!
they didn’t mind.
This is a pretty common Gift. If you want to have wings
Then they tortured him slowly to death on the Stone Wheel,
or a jetpack, you can buy that with a Treasure miracle. This
and when his heirs asked the peasants why, they said, “We
has the advantage that your wings are always there, and
thought he liked that sort of thing.”
always active, so you can use mundane and Aspect actions
to soar the skies. —from PARABLES FOR OUR MODERN AGE, by Jackie Robinson
If you just telekinetically fly yourself around, you can
buy that as a Domain-based Lesser Animation of Self.
Both of these Gifts have plenty of room for Hidden Secrets! of…
customization and improvement. For instance, if you want Harkány Ordina
self-motivated wings that can yank you out of the way of Mr. Ordina is a mad scientist who is often trying to steal
danger and sustain long periods of flight without using a money or take over cities. He seems mad. He talks as if he
sustained miraculous action, you can upgrade the Treasure were a god. He is not mad and he is not a god. Rather he is
Gift to level 4 or the Domain Gift to automatic without a human who cut the wings off of a dead Power and grafted
changing their final cost. them to his back. Later miraculous power crawled up the
muscular attachments and started transforming him into
something else, something that can operate on the
miraculous scale and also fly. If you have the chance to talk
to him there is a $50,000 reward for convincing him to
meet with the Piscator Thalasseus of Locus Parasiel.

ETERNAL
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
6 (Domain) Automatic Self only Comprehensive Yes
6 CP +1 −3 −1 3 CP

FLIGHT
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
3 (Treasure) Automatic Self only One trick Yes
3 CP +1 −3 −3 1 CP

MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL

4 (Domain) Simple Self only One trick Yes
4 CP −1 −3 −3 1 CP

GLORIOUS
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
7 (Domain) Simple Local One trick Yes
7 CP −1 −1 −3 2 CP

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 127

IMMUTABLE (AKA PRACTICALLY ETERNAL)

1 point Get the Scoop! on…
This is the weaker form of the Eternal Gift. You cope with Ms. Atsuko Ikada
environmental and physical conditions really well, and you This is a Power constructed out of and surviving
age really slowly, and you don’t need much food or water or principally on pent-up rage. She may stalk through
sleep, but you can’t endure forever. your life intent on some mission. Irritate her in small
This common Gift is a Lesser Preservation of the Self. ways and she may drag you into ongoing events as a
source of sustenance; due to her peculiar code of honor,
SHAPESHIFTER this is substantially safer than yielding to or actively
1–3 points
opposing her. During moments of catharsis she is
If your Avatar is based on werewolves or vampires or a
emptied of her rage and must rely on bodily reserves to
dragon or something, you may want to have one or two
survive; for this reason we give her the Immutable and
alternate shapes. This is based on a Lesser Enchantment of
not the Eternal Gift.
the Wolf or some other Estate appropriate to the form or
set of forms you can take. If you want to be able to turn
into almost anything this Gift will cost double—triple if If you focus this Gift on your own Estate, it’s called the
you literally can make yourself into anything. By default “Elemental” Gift. For example, the Power of Magnetism
you can do incomplete shapeshifting with this Gift, could use Lesser Enchantment of Magnetism to transform
adding some quality of (e.g.) the Wolf to yourself instead themselves into a field of magnetic force.
of changing forms completely. This Gift is purchased as Example: the Power of Mt. St. Helens uses Lesser
“automatic” to allow reflexive invocation during other Enchantment of the Volcano (self-only) to transform into a
actions. lava dragon.
Example: many Powers have a “fursona” that they like to
turn into from time to time. THE SOVEREIGN’S GIFT
1 point
A large number of Powers have low Domain but the ability
to animate and control the motion of their Estate. This
There once was a lie that took human form—for lies can do costs them 1 MP, which is, presumably, less than it
that, if one does not watch them close. He became a man otherwise would.
glorious and golden, and along the course of his life, he earned This common Gift is a Lesser Animation of (your Estate).
many a woman’s love. All of them he left shattered, for lies are
feckless and unfaithful and untrue. There was one, though—the
eighteenth? The twentieth?—who kindled a genuine love in his
heart; a love that made him ache, that made him mad, that
filled his ears with the sound of bells. He could have been happy
with her, he thought, but it could never be; for if he told her
that he loved her, as he had told the others, the truth of his
words would overcome him; and in that moment he would
cease to be.
—from CONCEPTUAL ZOOLOGY, by Keiko Takemori

IMMUTABLE
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
3 (Domain) Automatic Self only Comprehensive Yes
3 CP +1 −3 −1 1 CP

SHAPESHIFTER
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
4 (Persona) Automatic Self only Limited Yes
4 CP +1 −3 −2 1 × 1, 2, or 3 CP

THE SOVEREIGN’S GIFT

MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
4 (Domain) Normal Global Limited Yes
4 CP −2 +1 −2 1 CP

GIFTS
128
UNCOMMON GIFTS Field Guide! to…
Jenny Merrow
ACTIVE IMMORTALITY This Amphibious Power pretends to be a lovable
6 points mermaid like in Splash; however, once she has
You can survive anything. You don’t need air. You probably adequately won your confidence and lowered your
don’t even care whether you have air. You don’t need food mental defenses she will anesthetize you, extract your
brain, and replace it with a pearl. Disturbingly, this will
or water. You can handle being thrown in a giant blender.
make much less of a difference to your functionality
Maybe the blades break on your legs, maybe you reflexively than you would expect.
turn into protoplasm and reform, maybe you emerge on Note that despite her nickname and her ability to
the other side with a torn sleeve and a dramatic nick on swap her legs out for a fishtail and gills she is not an
your cheek. It’s just being thrown in a giant blender, so, you actual Merrow; when she discovered that mer-
know, whatever. There’s no point stabbing you. There’s no creatures by that name actually existed her
point nuking you. If someone throws you out of an embarrassment was acute.
airplane without a parachute you are going to be upset
about possibly missing your connecting flight. You can’t be
banished or made to disappear, and so you can’t be BARDIC MUSIC
permanently imprisoned either. Whatever the world 5 points
throws at you, you defend yourself from it and just keep You can play heart-wrenchingly beautiful music—the kind
going. of thing that can enthrall an Excrucian or get the wind to
This uncommon Gift is a Major Preservation of the Self. dance. That’s not to say that it will, but it’s definitely good
Example: Arikel is half-Angel and half-Nightmare. One enough to do so.
time Ms. Atsuko Ikada blew him up with a mix of C4 and This uncommon Gift is an Aspect 7 miracle of Skill:
Serpent venom, but it turned out it was all a dream. He cleared Musician.
his throat while standing behind her and then cut her head off Example: Melanie Tumbarius, Power of Music, once parted
when she turned around. Events continued in this vein until the Atlantic by blowing on her pipes. It didn’t want to part for
Ms. Ikada concluded she had no option but to apologize. her, but it couldn’t let her drown!

AMPHIBIOUS
1 point The music drew me from my bed; it called me to the balcony,
You’re equally competent in water and on land—or maybe where I stood in my night garments and the cold. And still the
on land and in some other kind of environment of your Devil played.
choice! Darkness closed.
This uncommon Gift is a Lesser Preservation of the Self. “We agreed some time ago,” he said, “upon a price. And I call
you forth now for fulfillment.”
The panther sprang. Arikel didn’t bother to move; it thudded “Raucously,” I said. He glanced down.
into his shoulder and rolled off to the side. Its claws had made “I had thought,” I said, “that there would be infinite dark
no dent in his flesh. Arikel, lost in meditation, was melody—strange harmonies—a profound disquieting power in
unperturbed. The panther, conversely, was clearly thrown. It the music—”
regarded him with an expression I can only describe as intense Snarling, he cast the instrument aside. “It is not my fault!”
puzzlement. he said. “It’s a recalcitrant violin!”
—from the Thought-Record of Cassius Quirinius —from THE SAINT’S BONES, by Madeline Bacall

ACTIVE IMMORTALITY
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
6 (Domain) Automatic Self only Full flexibility No
6 CP +1 −3 +1 +1 6 CP

AMPHIBIOUS
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
3 (Domain) Automatic Self only One trick No
3 CP +1 −3 −3 +1 1 CP

BARDIC MUSIC
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
7 (Aspect) Simple Local Comprehensive No
7 CP −1 −1 −1 +1 5 CP

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FIRE-BREATHING Get the Facts! on…

1 point Rick O’Summer
You create a burst of flame. Maybe it clings around your This is the Power of Gates. He will try to recruit you to
body like phoenix fire. Maybe it’s just a gout of flame like help assault Excrucian sanctums; it’s his duty, he explains,
a dragon’s. Maybe it’s more like a pyradon’s fire, and you to organize such offensives on a regular basis and he can
can breathe it around a corner, make giant shields of flame, always use expendable shock troops. If you take him up
or do precision wood burning with it.34 The choice is yours! on this prepare to have your life casually thrown away,
This uncommon Gift is a Lesser Creation of Fire. albeit in a good cause; if you survive, unlikely as that is,
Example: Emily Martenson, the Power of Sunday, can you will receive a substantial reward. Rick’s Gatemaker
summon pillars of fire from her hands. She uses them as Gift helps in such campaigns.
weapons in her martial arts.
although you could purchase this Gift as some sort of
GATEMAKER command-based thing instead, if you would like!
1–6 points Here are the standard forms of Helpful Estate—
If you’re near the entrance to a Chancel or other secret � 5 points: reflexive ghost miracles
place, you can make a large gate that leads inside. A small � 6 points: reflexive conversation (things of your
army can pass through this portal, and it opens on a Estate tell you what they think you should know, and
reasonably central place within. Gates made with this Gift do little things they think you would like.)
typically last either one scene or one night and one day. � 7 points: reflexive lesser preservations (your Estate is
This is a Lesser Creation of Passageways. strong when you would want it to be)
Since the boundary of a Chancel is represented by an � 8 points: reflexive lesser creations, summonings, and
Auctoritas (as discussed on pg. 137), we’re going to animations (your Estate appears and moves when
recommend that you buy permanent Strike for this Gift. you’d want it to)
We will not, however, recommend an amount—that � 9 points: reflexive lesser destructions (your Estate
depends on how willing you will be to spend MP opening vanishes when it’s in your way)
the gate and how relevant you expect your Bonds to be. � 9 points: reflexive major divinations (your Estate as
a whole talks to you about things you might want to
HELPFUL ESTATE know, and gives prophetic hints).
5–9 points
With this Gift, your Estate automatically and reflexively You don’t strictly have to pick your own Estate for this
performs some kind of miracle whenever it has the notion Gift, but I’ve never heard of a Power with this level of
that doing so will help you out. Your Estate isn’t super- reflexive control over any Estate but their own.
smart in this and can face decision paralysis if there are a Example: Opposing the Power of Fear is scary. That’s his
billion possible things that could be helpful—for instance, reflexive lesser creations at work!
if you’re the Power of Motion, you’ll have to make it fairly
clear what kind of motion would be nice. Also remember
that it wants to be helpful, not to “obey commands”— I noticed that as Sharon walked in the woods, rose petals blew
down from the wind to land before her feet. How many miles
34 Pyradons are lizards that can breathe fire around corners etc.
they must have come! I thought, for there were no rose trees in
The ordinary world usually prevents people from seeing
these woods. I marveled at her charms.
pyradons and vice versa and explains away the fires they start
as “arson.” —from EARTH STORIES, compiled by Édouard Guy

FIRE-BREATHING
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
4 (Domain) Simple Local Limited No
4 CP −1 −1 −2 +1 1 CP

GATEMAKER
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
4 (Domain) Simple Local Limited No
+ 0-5 Strike
4–9 CP −1 −1 −2 +1 1–6 CP

HELPFUL ESTATE
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
1–5 (Domain) Automatic Global Full flexibility No
1–5 CP +1 +1 +1 +1 5–9 CP

GIFTS
130

Get the Facts! on… Melanie learned to see the world with twice the clarity. How
Frederick Bogey she marveled: so many details had eluded her attention, when
This Power is a voyeur and a bogeyman with the her sight adhered to the human norm! She found that she could
Invisibility Gift. He has a preternatural dramatic timing scarcely live without this new knowledge. She would judge her
and a keen interest in references to himself, so there’s a coffee’s heat by the patterns of steam that poured from the cup,
good chance he’s watching you right now. Say his name, and drink faster as they dwindled. She would take her cues in
and he might put his hand on your shoulder, or run a human interaction from subtle details of the expressive face
fingernail down your side—or not, of course. You can never
that she had never seen before. She said, “Truly, it is a wonder
really know whether he’s there or not, and he likes it that
that I survived my years of human vision!”
way.
Soon, she doubled her vision’s clarity again, and began to
watch people around corners by the subtle play of shadow; and
INVISIBILITY again, so that she could walk around allergens; and again, so
1 point that she had no need to turn her television on to watch her
You can turn visible or invisible at will. Having a bad hair favorite shows. And each time, she said, “How could I ever have
day? People criticizing your work in public? Bam! lived before?”
Invisible! But wait! There’s someone who would love you It was a blind girl who answered her question for her, when
forever if only they could see your face? Bam! You can be Melanie’s eyes could pierce the quantum veil and were about to
visible again. break great Heisenberg’s distinction. “ You do not have what you
This uncommon Gift is a Lesser Destruction of Visual need,” she answered Melanie. “ You need what you have.”
Images. —from VOID STORIES, compiled by Édouard Guy
Example: Frederick Bogey’s a voyeur and a bogeyman; you
never know when he’s around and he likes it that way.
This uncommon Gift is a Major Enchantment of Good
KEEN VISION Fortune.
3 points
You have shockingly keen eyes—when you’re paying MAGICAL SYMBOL
attention, you can make out a bee’s eyelash from miles 1 point
away, by starlight. A magical symbol worked into the palm of your hand
This uncommon Gift is an Aspect 6 miracle of Skill: Scout. blesses those who see it with improved health, luck, and
joie de vivre. Didrika 7 and Gordon Ostler have this exact
LUCK Gift; dozens of other Powers have some variation on this
1 point basic idea.
You can spend a single Persona MP to invoke good fortune You could buy this uncommon Gift as a Persona-based
for yourself. You may choose the general nature of this Blessing or as some sort of Treasure.
good fortune, but you cannot define the details—at that
point, it’s not luck but dictation!

INVISIBILITY
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
5 (Domain) Simple Self only One trick No
5 CP −1 −3 −3 +1 1 CP

KEEN VISION
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
6 (Aspect) Simple Local Limited No
6 CP −1 −1 −2 +1 3 CP

LUCK
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
7 (Persona) Normal (1 PMP) Self only Limited No
7 CP −2 −3 −2 +1 1 CP

MAGICAL SYMBOL
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
1 (Persona) Automatic One person One trick No
1 CP +1 −2 −3 +1 1 CP

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The Babel hat of Maxwell Mann will pierce the subtle veils of Lord Ananda moved that precedents from cases not yet
the world. Its weight will settle comfortably upon Mann’s tried be allowed as evidence in the Locust Court. This was
brow. The hooked tooth at the top will bite a hand in Heaven. voted down two to one, with Lord Entropy abstaining.
Maxwell Mann’s third eye will open and he will look upwards —from the minutes of the Locust Court,
towards his God. But he will find that the God he served has
as taken by Martin Cravitt
long forsaken Heaven.
Ah! what blind and hundred-handed beast is this that he
This latter variation is local in case you need to spray
sees then?
acid over multiple targets or something of that sort.
It crawls, it skirls, it scurries through the endless land of
Example: Nephele Nikolaidhis has, I’m told, a paralytic bite.
Heaven. It hunts as it has hunted for the Earth and its life
below. And seeing it, Maxwell Mann will howl; and bitten by
his hat, the creature too! It will writhe in its pain and it will
PERFECT TIMING
8 points
smile its most secret, terrible smile. Then in one great skitter, like
Take this Gift and transcend causality! Forget about
a centipede of angels, it will descend the long arc of his hat, and
Aspect 3 and its dramatic perfection: with true Perfect
if Mann could toss the hat aside, then it would fall, and all
Timing, you can arrive on time even when it’s literally
thereafter would be well ...
impossible for you to do so. You can’t intersect your own
But he will not. Oh, he will not; and that is how the world
timeline and interfere with events and outcomes that you
will end.
know already happened, but you can break the calendars of
—from 24 FINALES, by Rannen Yedidyah
the world and get from Wednesday to the previous
Monday if you needs must.
This uncommon Gift is a Major Movement of Time.
MYSTERIOUS
5 points PETRIFY
You’re really hard to figure out—there’s a veil of mystery 1 point
over you and everything you do. Anyone trying to You can turn some set of things to stone, most likely by
investigate you finds ambiguous evidence at best and looking at them.
mocking notes at worst. Records and even memories alter This uncommon Gift is a Lesser Enchantment of Stone.
themselves to keep you safe.
This uncommon Gift is a Lesser Creation of Mystery.
Field Guide! to…
NATURAL WEAPON Stheno
1 point This is one of the three Gorgons, an intensely beautiful
You have a poisonous bite or you can spit acid or you have immortal Power. If she focuses her attention on you and
a nasty horn. This is usually purchased as a wondrous sees you clearly, you will turn to stone. Fortunately she is
Focus, but you can also purchase it as a Lesser Creation of nearsighted, so you are safe unless she puts her glasses on
Poison/Acid/Nasty Wounds. or squints.

MYSTERIOUS
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
4 (Domain) Automatic Global Limited No
4 CP +1 +1 −2 +1 5 CP

NATURAL WEAPON
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
3 (Treasure) Automatic One person One trick No
3 CP +1 −2 −3 +1 1 CP
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
4 (Domain) Simple Local One trick No
4 CP −1 −1 −3 +1 1 CP

PERFECT TIMING
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
9 (Domain) Automatic Local Limited No
9 CP +1 −1 −2 +1 8 CP

PETRIFY
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
4 (Domain) Simple One person One trick No
4 CP −1 −2 −3 +1 1 CP

GIFTS
132

WORLDWALKER
When you have scoured the greed from a man, and the
1–6 points
treachery, and the folly, and the ignorance, what you have left
This Gift is usually taken only in conjunction with
is pure.
Wayfinder. When you’re near a Chancel, you don’t need a
—Neriahan saying path to get in—you can just step through the twisted space
and into the Chancel’s world.
This uncommon Gift is a Lesser Movement of the Self.
PURIFY As with Gatemaker, we’re going to recommend that you
1 point buy permanent Strike to accompany this Gift; it will have
You can purify something, casting out all poisons. Or (for to pierce the Auctoritas of a Chancel, after all.
an extra point, changing “One Trick” to “Limited Use”)
casting out all poisons, diseases and demonic influences.
This uncommon Gift is a Lesser Destruction of
Corrupting Influences.
Example: Jason Sangrieve is like a unicorn; he can cleanse
anything with a touch. He visited a Nobiliser fanfic BBS and
all the porn dissolved away!

UNBLEMISHED GUISE
1 point
You can shroud your miraculous nature, appearing to be
human.
This uncommon Gift is a Lesser Creation of Illusion.

WAYFINDER
1 point
You can tell when you’re near a Chancel, and when you’re
getting closer to or farther from its entrances, and—with
a bit of Strike—how the Chancel is laid out inside. You get
The nightmare world had been waiting for seven years, hidden
a feel for what kind of place it is, a sense of “disturbing” or
in a flake of paint high on the office wall. No one touched it. No
“beautiful” or “strange,” as soon as you’re close enough to
one knew about it. Then Sophia fell against that flake one day,
sense it.
and the nightmare drew her in.
This uncommon Gift is a Lesser Divination of Hidden
Places. —from AZURIFOLIA, by Asper Smith

PURIFY
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
5 (Domain) Simple Local One trick No
5 CP −1 −1 −3 +1 1 CP

UNBLEMISHED GUISE
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
4 (Domain) Simple Local One trick No
4 CP −1 −1 −3 +1 1 CP

WAYFINDER
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
2 (Domain) Automatic Local One trick No
2 CP +1 −1 −3 +1 1 CP

WORLDWALKER
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
6 (Domain) Simple Self only Limited No
+0–5 Strike
6–11 CP −1 −3 −2 +1 1–6 CP

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 133

MONSTROUS GIFTS The nimblejack waited outside the Church walls.

I did not think that the Church had power to repel it.
These Gifts are included for use by allies and antagonists, Demonic though the creature was, its power did not come
but a Power could take them as well. from Hell, nor did the walls derive their strength from
Heaven.
LIGHTNING QUICKNESS This was the kind of game it liked. I could look at it
5 points through the doors, and it would make faces at me. I could
You are faster than the wind. You are faster than the rain. go to the windows, and it would move like lightning to
You are faster than you could possibly be fast: you taunt stare in though those. If I made a move to leave the
your enemy, they move away, and there you are, standing Church—tomorrow or ten years from now—it would
before them once again. break my head off with its clever claws. And one day, when
This rare Gift is an Aspect 7 miracle of Skill: Stalker. I resigned myself to an eternity within these bland walls, it
would walk through the doors and poke its hand into my
PARAMOUNT SENSE guts.
2 points —from the Thought-Record of Jori Hullis
One of your senses is supernaturally acute—for instance,
you can smell well enough to operate normally in total
darkness. PARAMOUNT STRENGTH
This uncommon Gift is an Aspect 4 miracle of Skill: 1 point
Tracker. You are astonishingly strong—particularly given a
generally low Aspect level.
This uncommon Gift is an Aspect 4 miracle of Skill:
Killer.

We did not like Mother Catherine. SOUL-CARVING SWORD

We were playing, the first day, when she arrived. We did not 1 point
want to stop playing and greet the new governess. Mother Spending an MP and cutting a miracle with your sword,
you damage the miracle-user’s underlying Gift or
Catherine asked us once to stop, politely. She asked a second time,
Attribute. This action opposes the miracle and all other
with a burning red anger in her cheeks. The third time, she
uses of the relevant Trait as long as you sustain the
snatched Brian from the floor and very economically garroted
miraculous action that “cut” that Trait.
him. This rare Gift is a level 6 miracle of Treasure.
“Today you begin your lessons,” she said, in the suddenly
quiet room. “The first lesson is this: I can strike at any time.” WORLD-BREAKER’S HAND
We did not like Mother Catherine. 15 points
She was too much stronger than were we. Excrucian Strategists can destroy practically anything with
—from YOUNG MEREDITH, by Emily Chen a wave of their hand—even ideas, emotions, and events.
This rare Gift is a Lesser Destruction of Any Estate.

LIGHTNING QUICKNESS
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
7 (Aspect) Simple Local Comprehensive No
7 CP −1 −1 −1 +1 5 CP

PARAMOUNT SENSE
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
4 (Aspect) Simple Local Comprehensive No
4 CP −1 −1 −1 +1 2 CP

PARAMOUNT STRENGTH
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
4 (Aspect) Simple One Target Comprehensive No
4 CP −1 −2 −1 +1 1 CP

SOUL-CARVING SWORD
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
6 (Treasure) Normal One Target Limited No
6 CP −2 −2 −2 +1 1 CP
WORLD-BREAKER’S HAND
MIRACLE LEVEL INVOCATION RANGE UTILITY COMMON? TOTAL
5 (Domain) Simple Local Full flexibility No
5 CP −1 −1 +1 +1 5 × 3 = 15 CP

GIFTS
134

I
f you are visiting Argentina do not travel to anywhere on the
map marked as either Paris or “Locus Araunah.” Stolen
imperfectly from the mortal world in 1954 by Araunah,
Magister of the Dark, this city is magical and glorious by no longer
congenial to human life. Its residents are principally dryads and
elves—it being acceptable to the Dark for these inhuman fey to
live—with a smattering of other faery folk. A small overclass/
underclass of humans preside like Victorian nobility over the high
society of the Chancel, but they’re born knowing that eventually
they’ll have to kill themselves for their master’s pleasure, so they
don’t take much joy in their social standing. Neither will you,
should you travel there and be inducted into their ranks!

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 135
CHAPTER 14

Your
Chancel,
Revisited

The Chancel of Dorian Griffith has a sea of

parts—living parts—ears, eyes, arms, legs, During, before, or after character creation, each group of
feet, hands, even a few unmentionable players should design their Avatars’ Chancel—the secret
organs. When Dorian is hurt, the sea roils; temple-world of their Imperator.
the parts perk up. Listening to the sound of Each Chancel is a pocket dimension with its own rules.
some hidden song, they sort the best part It starts as a place on Earth—usually a city or city-sized
from the vasty sea and cast it out across the region, but potentially as small as a building or as large as a
world to replace the wounded segment of his subcontinent.This place gets wrapped up in the Imperator’s
flesh. magic, estranged from the Earth, forgotten by it, and
—from A TOURIST’S GUIDE TO CREATION, transformed into the kind of world the Imperator dreams
by Jasprite Sherrard up. The paths in and out become fairy paths, difficult to
travel unless you know exactly how they work. The people
and places of the Chancel warp. They often, but not always,
forget who and what they used to be.

opposite: “Locus Araunah,” by Jenna Katerin Moran YOUR CHANCEL, REVISITED

136
THEME
THE COST OF A CHANCEL
Start by deciding what kind of world it is.
Now, you can pretty much make any kind of Chancel An Imperator must speak the miracle of Chancel
world that you like. Do you want wizards and dragons? creation for 100 days before it forms. For this there is a
That’s fine. Robots? Zap guns? Nanomachine swarms? cost. Typically that cost is one human life on each of
That’s all fine too. Do you think there should be three suns those 100 days. Imperators can also spend from their
in the sky? Do you think drowned pirates should carouse own vitality or drain power from Actuals (pg. 165) in
various unholy ways.
freely in the Bay? Do you want passels of flying jellyfish to
It is pretty awful.
drift through the sunset sky? It is the pretty awful part.
You can have that.
It’s even possible, if the players totally can’t agree, to
divide the Chancel into regions that behave differently. A
light world and a shadow world, a northern realm of retro-
future punk and a southern realm of magic realism,
ENTRANCES AND EXITS
floating cities over an abyss of awful horrors, whatever kind Decide how you get in and out!
of division works and lets everyone be happy. Chancels may . . .
But you need to think of something. � have a small set of hidden entrances and exits in a
single geographical area on Earth;
PROPERTIES � have paths that open to many different places on
Earth—a tactical drawback and a practical
You can stop here and make a bullet-pointed list of 3-7 convenience;
“rules” for the Chancel. � have hundreds, thousands, or even millions of
These are in the same vein as Estate Properties or the entrances and exits across the Earth;
properties of the Border Mythic, Ordinary World, Evil � have a mobile entrance or exit—for instance, the
Chancel entrance is in a Dragon Foundation truck;
World, Heaven, or Hell.
� have a mystical Gate to some other Chancel, some
They’re things that express the Chancel’s metaphysical
other time, or some other world on the Ash, in
essence. addition to the normal entrance; or they may even
These should be considered tentative for the first few � have a contiguous, normal border with the outside
sessions, so if you like you can skip formalizing them at all world.
until later in the game.
Many of a Chancel’s entrances and exits are “mythic,” that
is, they require behavior or understanding more than they
require following a visible and obvious road.
It is also worth thinking about transportation in
general—
How do you get around?
Most Chancels with the technology will have a small
private airfield and an aerial path so that the Powers can fly
directly from the Chancel to destinations around the
world. However, if the Chancel is more of a chariots-and-
BANES

The world doesn’t really like having Chancels ripped out

of it. This sometimes results in Banes—horrors that haunt
THE ERUS
the Chancel, making trouble for its Powers and Imperator,
and returning to life if they are ever killed. Banes usually “Erus” is a kind of half-Power, a Noble whose abilities
have 3-10 points of Afflictions, the Durant and Elusive Gifts, only function inside the Chancel. They have no Estate, but
and a handful of Passions and Skills. may have a pseudo-Estate of “things of the Chancel” for
Players might find it worthwhile to define a Bane or two use with Domain miracles.
during Chancel creation—to make them part of the story of If you want an Erus in your Chancel, you can have one at
the place, as with “King” Lot on pg. 34. Trouble’s certain to no cost. They’re helpful, sure, but only when the Chancel is
visit your Chancel sooner or later, so why not help to threatened—and, since they only have power inside the
choose its form? Chancel, they tend to compensate by stepping on other
Powers’ interests therein.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 137

cobblestones kind of place, you may need to arrange for

large bank accounts and a fleet of Earth-parked vehicles
for your transportation needs.

COOL STUFF
Important places of power and cool local servitors are
generally obtained through the Treasure Attribute. That
said, if you want some neat things to be around that you
aren’t explicitly buying as Anchors, feel free—you can fill
up a Chancel with all kinds of cool toys, people, pets, and
places. In general these have a modestly understated
dharma; that is, if you ever find yourself wondering why
your covey of mad scientists isn’t out fixing the Chancel’s
problems, or why your endless hordes of mythical
monsters can’t seem to keep your enemies out, or why your
incredibly experienced heroes mostly hang out tending bar
and guarding shops, it’s because their ability to cause
effectual results is minimal without the will of a Power or
Imperator tangling up inside them.

MIRACLES AND THE CHANCEL

In your Chancel, you receive a 3 MP discount on miracles
(to a minimum cost of 0 MP.) Your Imperator receives a
similar benefit.
This is not cumulative with other such discounts unless
so stated.
If you want to be extremely competent in your Chancel,
we recommend that you take a small amount of Secondary
Domain in the pseudo-Estate “things of my Chancel;”
even one or two points, combined with the discount above,
will offer you a large array of potent options in play.

CHANCEL BOUNDARIES
Decide how powerful the border of your Chancel is.
Most Chancels have a boundary that counts as a level 1-
5 Auctoritas (pg. 51). It stops miracles from acting across
that boundary.
The stronger this Auctoritas, the harder it is for enemies
to strike into the Chancel, but the harder it will also be for
you to act on the outside world from inside the Chancel or
on the Chancel from the outside world.
You can choose whatever level of Auctoritas you like, or
default to “2” if you can’t agree or don’t want to think about
it.

In the abandoned Chancel of Ebrôt Appêkâ, the last remnants

of a criminal justice system have long since dissolved. The only
mechanism of social control is taste. Specifically, when society
judges a person distasteful, the unsainly bat-winged monsters
of the Chancel flock down upon them and carry them away.
—from A TOURIST’S GUIDE TO CREATION, by Jasprite Sherrard

YOUR CHANCEL, REVISITED

138

� �

�
�

� �

� �

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 139
CHAPTER 15

Your
Imperator,
Revisited
IMPERATOR CREATION
During, before, or after character creation, each group of
players should design their Avatars’ Imperator.
Their numbers are countless. There are Start by coming to a consensus on the Imperator type.
trillions of them. They are roaches. They Write this down in the big circle in the center of the
are the eyes of God. From the pipes, Imperator character sheet (left). This’ll be:
from the shadows, from behind the � Angel,
refrigerator, they watch. They judge. � Devil / Fallen Angel,
They are shielded by the glory of the lord. � Magister of the Light,
It takes great force to kill them. Yet � Magister of the Dark,
humans manage, snuffing several � Magister of the Wild,
roaches every second; and with each � True God, or
roach that dies, a star goes out. � Aaron’s Serpent.
—from THE EYES OF GOD,
by Rannen Yedidyah Then each player talks a little bit about what they think that
Imperator would be like and what they want their Avatar’s
relationship with the Imperator to be like. The HG also
talks a bit about what kind of Imperator would be fun for
the HG to play through. The HG takes a phrase or
sentence from each player’s discussion, including their own,
and puts it in a neighboring bubble.
For example, a three-player game might wind up with:
� Devil
� gives some sort of power
� kind of metal
� like “the Devil went down to Georgia”
� a red-head, of course.

It’s up to the HG what to pick, but the idea is that it’s an

anchor between the Imperator and the discussion—that
there’s a link between each player’s views and desires and
the truth.

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ANGELS
Under “Angel” in that central bubble write— I had a gun. I was going to kill him. I was.
� awesome He did not flinch when I drew on him. He just
� demanding whispered a name.
It was my name. Not the name I had given him. Not
Your Angel can always show up where you are. the name my mother gave me. Not any name I’d ever heard
In general this is most likely to happen when you’re before. It was my real name. It was the name God had for
tempted, when you are at risk of breaking your own me, in the quiet of his soul. It was the name that people live
their whole lives not knowing, and I can’t imagine how.
principles. They won’t really have much to say or do about
I don’t know whether I was crying from sorrow or
it. If you’re willing to embarrass yourself before the eyes of
from joy, but by the time I had stopped, he was gone.
Heaven, you can ignore the Angel and do the wrong thing
and they won’t stop you. But they’ll be there to see it and —from NIGHT HOURS, by Madeline Bacall,
to remind you of the right. writing on the topic of the Light
Winning their respect is really hard. You’ll probably
have to spend a fair bit of relevant Destiny (pg. 195) before They apprehend facts and dangers, but not the subtler
they’ll approve of you at all. meanings of the world; a private vision consumes them,
and keeps them from connecting with what is.
DEVILS Still, their plans are deep, subtle, and more practical
Under “Devil” in that central bubble write— than you might credit. If you have hard data for them, you
� wounded might hear them muse upon it; and from that musing,
� always with you learn more than they would tell you otherwise about the
world, their plans, and your place in them.
If you look around to see if your Devil is there, they will be. The only thing that can break through their shell and
They might be just a voice in your head, if you’re in a make them aware of the limitations of their perspective is
crowd, or they might walk right up and sit down next to Destiny (pg. 195)—spent, or accumulated, on a Project to
you, if you’re alone and need someone to talk to. reach them or transform yourself.
Just look and there they’ll be.
Your Devil will mostly just listen to you. They won’t say MAGISTERS OF THE DARK
much, and what they do say will mostly be to keep you Under “Magister of the Dark” in that central bubble
talking or acknowledge what they’ve heard. write—
It’s not that they don’t want to talk. They’re just not � choices
really very good at it. � hungers
If they let themselves do too much of the talking, see,
they’re likely to get bitter and morose about their eternal Your Magister of the Dark tempts you. It pushes you. It
torment in Hell, or figure out just the right thing to say to challenges you. It is unpredictable, a mad experience
make your heart break in two and say it before they can arising from nothingness, driving you to trouble, then
stop themselves, or start hurting people inattentively as fading randomly away.
part of demonstrating abstract points. So they don’t let It likes to make things interesting.
themselves talk much. But they’ll be there. It likes it when things are out of control, wild, chaotic,
They are broken, twisted, suffering creatures, and it’d mad. It’s a trickster, a pusher, a drunkard, and a rogue.
take a Project (pg. 195–199) to help with that at all. Your Magister of the Dark can be awesomely kind. You
have to understand that about them. If you are being
MAGISTERS OF THE LIGHT crushed by the weight of others’ choices, and not given a
Under “Magister of the Light” in that central bubble chance to share your own—if you’re being controlled,
write— manipulated, imprisoned, or abused—a Magister of the
� idealistic Dark will help you, and there won’t be any kind of catch.
� soulless They shatter prisons, free slaves, and throw open the doors
of psych wards, and they don’t care about the human justice
Your Magister of the Light will always give you an or injustice of these acts.
audience. It may schedule times to check in with you, They can be awesomely kind, when they’re not making
visiting you on midsummer’s eve, or every day at noontime, trouble for you.
or on an erratic schedule arranged when it gave you your
most recent assignment.
This is not as useful as it could have been. Everyone around you has consented to the reality you live in.
They look away from you. That is why they must die.
They speak, but their words are not on point. —from PRINCIPLES OF THE DARK, by Merriweather James

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But they’re not really any better at listening to you than Thus you will need to bridge the gap between you and
the Light. the Wild with a Project (pg. 195) before there is any hope.
They’d like to be, they really would.
But in the end the world is too distracting, and it’s too TRUE GODS
hard to remember that people are making meaning with Under “True God” in that central bubble write—
the awesome noises of their lives. Just as with the Light, � primordial
the only way to get through to them about the limitations � intertwined with other things
of their perspective is Destiny (pg. 195).
Your True God is deep below you.
MAGISTERS OF THE WILD It is connected to you—there are strands of it wrapped
Under “Magister of the Wild” in that central bubble like filaments around your soul—but to speak to it you
write— must go deep below the surface of things. You must
� absolute egocentricity descend, you must estrange yourself from the appearances
� justice of things around you, and fall down, down, down into the
mandalas of the world.
Your Magister of the Wild hovers near you. It is constantly It is more likely to communicate with you through
visiting you. It is constantly watching you. It leaves, but it
impressions and sensations than words.
is constantly returning to you. It will touch you if you allow
This varies.
it. It will run its hands across your face like a blind person
There are some among the True Gods that have a nature
trying to understand you. It will push against you like it
that is talkative. They are primordial but they are
cannot understand how something so close to its soul is
primordial deities, and so we may fairly say that there is no
not a part of its body.
On this it will relent, if asked. human capacity that they cannot have and in fact exceed.
It understands that some pieces of itself need space to They are inclined to speak in the whispering movement of
breathe and live and grow. tendrils and hanging branches, but they can make a better
But it will always be visiting you, always be watching speech than a human President. They are inclined to
you, always helping you in little ways that may or may not devour great spirits for their sustenance, and not even
make sense to you, always telling you what it has learned digest them but integrate them into their own substance,
about itself from you and yourself from it. but that doesn’t mean they can’t cook better than a French
It will be pleading with you. chef in the kitchens of the world.
It will want you to agree with it. It will be like a But for the most part they are primal creatures,
numinous, transcendent, thundering infinity of puppy, creatures of bodily impressions and sensations. For the
desperately hoping that you will approve. most part you will get only a gentle tugging on your
Is this correct? its attitude will ask you, as it shyly perceptions, a sense of rightness or wrongness, and in
transforms the buildings on your street to a floating terms that are unequivocally opinion.
mandala in the air. Is this the way that I should be?
It is possible that you can reach it. This is the way that is harmonious with the flow of the
It is not deaf and blind to you in the manner of the moods of your True God.
Light, nor as distractible as the Dark. It is possible that Or
your Magister of the Wild can understand you. It is Here, I sense there is an incongruity.
possible—but your starting points are so very far away! It
is a creature of magical geometry and unfolding law. It is There is no real hope of making this better. They are not
born into the world like a flower that blooms in people in that sense to you. They are able to affect to
nothingness, unfolds in symmetry, curls back on itself to personhood, if they care to, but they are gods of the most
become its own beginning. It is mad as the fundamental ancient forms of life.
laws are always mad. It is a living creature but its life and The only thing you can do to grow in your relationship
mind are being are like toys to it, things to be tossed about with a True God is to take over more of their body with
and chewed on and considered, rather than made clear. the nodules of spirit that are your own. The only thing you
can do is learn to ride them, as you’d ride a dragon, as you’d
I have no motivations. I am a word; I am a note in a song; I ride history, as a genius demagogue rides the public, as the
am a day, a week, a month, a year. I proceed from my ancient wizards rode the storms. You may learn to master
beginning to my end because of what I am and not because of the complex systems of your God, with Destiny (pg. 195),
what I do. To speak my true name is to know how my life but you will never make it your lover or your friend.
will end, how it began, and what I will do for every moment (Though, watch, I bet a little after publication Ianthe
in between. This is not a curse; this is my freedom. will plop down in a nearby chair and say, “You’ll never
—Bhradkaya Kalluri, Power of the Wild guess what I heard about True God X …”)

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AARON’S SERPENTS
Under “Aaron’s Serpent” in that central bubble write— Some say that history loves the historian. They point to the
� sensualist great Istoriads, the massive wormlike spirits of history that the
� peaceful Bookkeepers are fond of riding when recording mortal events.
“Surely,” they say, “the Istoriads would not tolerate such use if
Your Aaron’s Serpent isn’t really terribly concerned with they did not feel some connection to those scholars who observe
anything. It just wants to live in the world, to explore what them?” The occasional incident where a Bookkeeper falls from
there is to explore, to see what there is to be seen. They their mount and, before they can rise again, is crushed
don’t really think of their job as fighting the Excrucians, or underneath and lathed for hours by its terrible passage—these
helping you out, or, really, doing anything at all. They’re in they omit as a meaningless manifestation of misfortune. I note
the world to be and let be. this only to explain, perhaps indirectly, why I shall focus on the
If you have an Aaron’s Serpent for your Imperator, it’ll living society as it stands today, rather than the details of its
show you cool things—all the wonders of the world. It’ll evolution, in the remainder of this work.
help you find hope and things to love. It’ll open your mind. —from THE SOCIETY OF FLOWERS, by Heather Williams
It’ll teach you the beauty of the stars.
It’ll show you the World Ash—mother and father to
the Aaron’s Serpents, their original source—and maybe all
the worlds upon it.
NEW FAMILY
It’d be nice if it would fight. There are relatively few If you add a new player to the game, or if a player is really
fights where a 25 trillion ton snake wouldn’t come in handy. unhappy with their Estate and needs a new one, you can
But it won’t, not unless something’s threatening the World redesign the Imperator and add new Powers to the Familia
Ash directly, and even then, only if the snake gets mad. Caelestis as you do.
You don’t need to do this if someone makes a new
Avatar with the same Estate as their old one.
That’s just continuity.
You’ll only need to change things up if you’re making
A SOVEREIGN’S SURVIVAL GUIDE:
the Familia itself into something new. At that point you’ll
HOW TO HANDLE IMPERATORS
want to redo the basic Imperator design, like so.
The players of established Powers talk about the
There are nine rules for successfully managing your
Imperator and what their relationship to the Imperator
Imperator. If you abide by these, health, wealth and
has been like. The player of the newly added Power, on the
happiness are sure to follow.
other hand, talks about the relationship they want. The
� Rule 1. Remember what your Imperator says. There
HG updates the original bubbles as appropriate and then
will be a test.
places a phrase or sentence from the player of the new
� Rule 2. Surprise parties are verboten. Important
Power in a new bubble off the Imperator’s own.
guests may be vaporized.
What does this mean in the world?
� Rule 3. Never tell an Imperator about a problem you
In practice, it means “we’re bending the rules a bit for
can fix, or you’ll have to.
player convenience.” This is something that can happen, in
� Rule 4. Never tell an Imperator about a problem you
the world, but it’s absurdly rare. Maybe the Imperator has
can’t fix, or you’ll have to.
held Estates in reserve until just the right Power came
� Rule 5. Never ask your Imperator why they aren’t
along; or developed an unexpected quality; or changed,
doing more to help you. They think they are.
dramatically, and just as a person may change; or initiated
the Power of a dead Imperator into their own mysteries,
What do you talk to your Imperator about when (s)he accosts you
in the hall?
taking in the shard of their lost peer in the same way a
� Rule 6. Sex, food, and sleep are safe subjects. You’re
human might graft a dead friend’s arm onto their back; or,
supposed to be mortal.
particularly for a True God, swapped Estates with some
� Rule 7. When your Imperator’s eyes glaze over, it’s
other Imperator through sex.
safe to stop talking.
It’s really rare, like we’ve said, but it does happen, so you
don’t have to worry about breaking the game thereby.
If your Imperator is still paying attention after such a discussion,
something is gravely wrong.
� Rule 8. Never ask your Imperator what’s wrong.
You’re supposed to know.
� Rule 9. When in doubt, sneeze. They don’t understand
sneezing. It confuses them.

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CHAPTER 16

The
Imperators

It seemed fairly clear to the clerk, who

had never heard of Incarnation, that the Imperators are not creatures of action. They are creatures of
billowing divine fire with its spheres presence.
and its wings and its faces and its horns, They pervade.
like a bull’s, could not be the Jake Jordan This is the reason they prefer to face the Excrucians in
referred to on the Visa. Yet to ask IT for the numinous and subtle realms. There their actions may
identification— build up in washes and layers in the world and make up in
Torn between fear of chaos and fear depth and resonance what they lack in pace.
of immanence, he hesitated; he sweated; If you expect an Imperator to throw in with you in a
his hands wrung like a weasel’s, or a miraculous combat, or throw down against you for that
teenager considering asking his social matter, you shall be disappointed. They are slow and subtle
superior for a date. creatures. If you expect them to be practical sources of
—from DOORKNOBS, by Emily Chen advice, you will again be mistaken. Their perspectives are all
askew.
What they can do is work Imperial miracles.

THE IMPERATORS
144
IMPERIAL MIRACLES
Imperial miracles are a ya pumani—they are pure They bound me to the tree, far from the world, and turned
abstractions, and the world must give them being. They are to leave.
stones of restless desire anchoring the map of the world. “Wait,” I asked them. Then him. “Wait, Daniel.”
It is said in the annals of the Powers that an Imperator He stood very still for a moment, my love did, but then
may punish a Power by riving them from the world, he shook his head. “This is right,” he said. “This is the thing
causing them to be nailed to the sky, and thereupon that we must do.”
assaulting them with heat and wind and rain, but it is a —from THE WOOD NGUEMA, AND WHAT TOOK PLACE THERE,
better understanding to say, the flex of Imperial will caused by K.C. Danine
a transformation in the world and the Power knew no
other way to live with that burden than to rip themselves
from the world and pin themselves against the sky.
It takes time to speak an Imperial miracle—a scene,
In such a fashion, on one occasion, did the impossible
many scenes, often as much as a full story. If it takes
burden of Imperial displeasure express itself through the
anything less than that it means that the Imperator has
Power’s body and circumstances. It could have happened
prepared or practiced for it.
another way entirely.
Once spoken, it is a thing the target, or the world, must
The Imperial miracle is will given weight.
respond to.
It is a story, a must-ness, a mental state, which things
choose to react to to lessen the unbearability of that RESOLVING IMPERIAL MIRACLES
weight. The Imperial miracle creates a weight of sustained effect,
lain against a target—which can be anything from a single
THE CAUSE OF AN IMPERIAL MIRACLE person to the entirety of the world. It demands expression
Each Imperator has a set of causal forces within it—a set
or expiation. The target(s) may use their action to name a
of stories.
consequence of this (loosely, something they do or
Those bubbles on your Imperator’s character sheet?
something that happens to them). If the HG agrees that
That’s basically them.
the consequence moves towards expiating the weight of
From one of the Imperator’s stories a new tale breathes.
the miracle, the thing simply happens. This usually costs no
It is an emotion, a will, a retelling of the situation the
MP and overrides any miracles or mundane actions that
Imperator finds itself in and how it reacts to it. It is a
might directly oppose it, with the following provisos—
chaunt, a poem, a theory, an exhalation, a principle, a
� if you use this to attack (inflict an unwanted effect
narrative and a mood. It isn’t really any one thing or any
on) someone else, you have to use your own abilities.
other. But it’s told as a story is told.
You do, however, receive a 3-MP or 3-Will discount
It’s a burden told into the world,
on such an attack, to a minimum cost of 0 MP/Will;
a demand, a stringency, a necessity, a need.
this is not cumulative with any other MP discounts.
It is always a narrative; it is never a thing with clear
� you can only penetrate Auctorita if you provide the
purpose-in-itself, never a thing that is specific and obvious
necessary Strike.
in its demands. It is always a thing that flows-from, a
continuation or retelling or expression or branch off of one
Eventually the power of the Imperial miracle will fade.
of the stories already in the Imperator’s set.
You want to work with the Imperial miracle—as a
character, because doing anything else is an abhorrent
There is a woman who has carved a stone; and no more blasphemy even the Excrucians are uneasy with, and as a
beautiful sculpture exists on this or any other world. It captures player, because doing so earns you Destiny (pg. 198).
the quintessence of her art. It captures the soul. Yet it is However, it’s possible to just ignore the miracle, to face the
flawed—fatally, terribly flawed. It would take her only an wind of the Imperator’s will and not be moved. In such a
hour to fix it—to make a final statement that would close the case—where you decide to just wave off the miracle—you
book on sculpture, transform her own existence, and justify this will lose strength as your dharma dissolves under the
Creation. burden of the Imperial miracle. Typically it wounds both
She does not fix the flaw. She cannot. She had a dream, on of your Divine Health levels (pg. 183–185) to totally reject
the last day of work. An angel came to her in that dream and an Imperial miracle, placing you under the burden of a
said: “With the creation of perfection comes the death of this temporary Affliction that begins unraveling you and your
world.” various precious accomplishments and connections in the
Perhaps the angel was simply jealous, and did not want world. It is possible for an Elusive or Immortal character
such beauty outside of Heaven. Perhaps it told the truth. She to recover from this in a very short time frame; that may
does not know. or may not be fast enough to keep their life from falling
—from THE ARMY OF IMPERFECTION, by Alexander De Vriend
into ruin.

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OTHER IMPERIAL RESOURCES

“Once upon a time,” the old man said, “the Devil came up onto
An Imperator typically has Active Immortality, 3-7 Divine the Earth, and appeared right in the middle of a villager’s
Health levels, 2 Tough Health levels, and 3 Normal Health barn, scaring all the animals no end. Hearing the honking, and
levels (see pg. 183–184). Most have only a handful of the hooting, and the growling, and the hissing, and the baying,
Afflictions, Bonds, Gifts, and MP to allow them to operate and the snorfling, and the roaring, and the trumpeting, and the
on the mortal time scale—they are deadly vulnerable on scuffing of feet on hay, and the ultrasonic screams—”
the mortal plane to a materialized Excrucian with a Soul- “Go on, already.”
Carving Sword, even if they can crush most other threats. “Maggie came rushing in with a broom in her hand to scare
The most active Imperators have up to 15 Character Points this stranger off. But he didn’t pay any attention, even when she
of Traits and a few points of Passions and Skills, making beat him all around the head with the broom’s end. ‘Ah,’ he said,
‘my hostess has arrived. Fetch me a drink,’ that’s what the Devil
them almost as competent as a Power in a fast-paced
said.
battle; they may also have 1-3 points of Miraculous Edge
“‘An’ who do you think you are?’ Maggie asked, brandishing
that are always in effect. her broom, ‘coming into my barn and scaring my animals as if
For Imperators who will use Persona or Domain you own the place?’
miracles, pick one Estate as their primary and designate “‘I own everywhere,’ the Devil said. ‘Some places just don’t
their other Estates as secondary. Unlike Powers, realize it yet.’”
Imperators may have Secondary Domain or Secondary —from DON’T GO THERE, by Martin Elliott
Persona at level 0; this costs (of course) 0 points, and
allows them to use their DMP and PMP on Domain and
Persona miracles of any of their Estates.

The city of Shenu Tawy displeased the lord of the Janni, when
he traveled there in a beggar’s guise, by turning him away. For
this reason, he made a mark of his will upon its outer wall. The
next day, a Janni merchant came to Shenu Tawy, and, when he
left, he took away a stone from one of the buildings there. One
by one they came, merchants, entertainers, wanderers, and
envoys, and each took a small piece of Shenu Tawy away with
them when they left. In a hundred years, only a lone and
mournful woman remained where Shenu Tawy stood; she alone
remembered the glory that was. Then came a dashing Janni
prince, who pressed a suit upon her, and when her heart had
melted, he carried her away to wed.
—from BOWLING FOR MAGIC RINGS, by Keiko Takemori

THE IMPERATORS
146

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 147
CHAPTER 17

Orders
and
Nobilis The Powers of Earth grew a bonsai world ash and built a
proactive orrery thereupon:
Misenchronic Engine.
The orbits of its spheres are the movements of a sacred
covenant, a promise and contract—a res, as the Powers call
it—binding on more than 600 Noble signatories.
We will speak now of its mechanisms and its stories.

THE WEB OF KHEDEB NERET

The web of Khedeb Neret hangs in the sky above
Gasherbrum, burning with red corruption. It is part of the
Machinery of the Accords—the alchemical and miraculous
Why is a stranger’s death less important servitor devices of the Orders, slaved to Misenchronic
than your own? Engine, helping to form the structure of powers and
services on which the Orders depend.
The web of Khedeb Neret.

Why does love hold it high and holy to THE ORDER OF THE FALLING
kill?
STARS
The web of Khedeb Neret.
Those Powers who find themselves so corrupted, so
What tangles around the heart, to compromised, or so wounded that their ability to serve
mislead the bright pure dreamers so? Creation is in doubt may join the Order of the Falling
Stars.
The web of Khedeb Neret, They make a pilgrimage to one of the hidden places in
in Gasherbrum, the world that births the Sigils of the Falling Stars.
Where Khedeb Neret fishes your They take up a Sigil.
perspective from the sky. They pledge themselves to Misenchronic Engine; to the
—a traditional lay Order of the Falling Stars; to the Web of Khedeb Neret,
that binds the Falling Stars together. And through the
intervention of these forces, they may find a cleansing and
slow peace.
It is the nature of the Web to keep them whole when
they ought to fade away.
It is the nature of the Web to make right what cannot be
made right; to make good the irredeemable; to justify
through service to Creation what cannot otherwise be
forgiven. The price of this is that service.

ORDERS AND NOBILIS

148

The Falling Stars are the strike force of the Nobilis. It is natural for any tribal culture—which, in many ways,
They may be called upon by the Order of Hidden the Nobilis remain—to sort its members into interlocking
Balances or by any Power willing to buy their services from hierarchies, from families to kin-communities to tribes. It
the Orders as a whole. They are there when Creation needs should surprise no one, therefore, that many Nobilis build
disposable troops to crush an Excrucian offensive, or to “ families of families,” stable groups of peers serving as
ensure the survival of a thing that must survive. There are their primary social group outside the Familia Caelestis;
51 of them as of this writing. 38 are properly alive. 13 are nor that, at the fringes, these communities blend with
pale revenants sustained only by the Web. others of their kind, forming higher-order structures yet.
They are bound against harming one another. The surprise is not that the society of flowers is highly
They are given, by custom, access to the Loathsome structured, but rather that that structure is not stronger
Armory, where weapons that ought never have been made than it is.
are stored.
—from THE SOCIETY OF FLOWERS, by Heather Williams
It is their right, on their death, to raise a standard that
calls to the Falling Stars—calling out the Order to finish
what they started or avenge them on some foe. They have a schedule of services. They earn strange
payments. And it is likely that whatever it is that you
THE GREEN SNAKE ORDER would want them to do, there is not a one of them that
does it.
The Sigils of the Green Snake Order are found in the deep Breck Ainston, the Power of Lizards, will carve you a
places of the world. lizard mask, of course, and if it is a Tuesday. NAL 19 would
They are, like the Falling Stars, a penitentiary Order; to be happy to send you 38 seconds back in time, if you are so
take service in the Green Snake Order is to wrap oneself inclined. Stone Cold Eeyore has the phone books of the
in the Web of Khedeb Neret, to bind to Misenchronic world written in her mind; she’ll save you a trip to the
Engine, to throw one’s life away even as the Falling Stars Internet or a call to 411 if you can track her down.
must do. But the Green Snakes are bound to a further And sometimes such a favor is the very substance of
power that the Falling Stars are not: to the pure green your dreams. Sometimes a lizard mask, on Tuesday, is
essence, to that virtue of healing that is named the exactly what you need. And other times, if you are lucky,
Heartstone of the World. you’ll find a Functionary who’ll do something else that
Their duty is not to fight. suits the exigencies of the day. They’ll help defend you
Rather they are called on to heal those Powers who are before the Locust Court, for instance. That could be handy.
broken—who have fallen into madness, who have turned They’ll open gates, sometimes, between the worlds. There’s
quisling to the world, who have become self-destructive or three of them—Fayola Osagiobare, Merriweather James,
unable to bear the burden of their lives. They are called and Erkengota Harald—who are willing to help new
upon, in short, to intervene unasked-for in the business of Powers figure out the ropes of their new world.
the least stable of the Powers; required to perform the The Sigils of the Functionaries are things foretold—
impossible task of redeeming them; and bound to do no legends first, anticipatory dreams. They are born from a
harm to them while they try. story, from a promise, from a need, from a sense that
It is the assumption of society that they will succeed in something must be done, and someone must be found to do it.
two, perhaps three cases before some Power they seek to They take form in the fullness of time as things of the
save drags them down. Estate of Records, and a Power may find and claim them
and bind themselves to the contract therein.
THE GRAY ORDER OF THE
In the Chancel of Lorelle Clark, one may always choose to
FUNCTIONARIES sacrifice one’s life to save another’s. This is not magic. This is
not a miracle. It is the law of the world.
One hundred and eighty of the Powers—of the scarcely
Lorelle dueled the Warmain Hesychia Symeonius in the
2000 on this Earth—have offered some service to the
center of her court. Hesychia’s blade hungered for Lorelle’s
world and joined the Gray Order of the Functionaries.
life, but could not take it; each time it plunged into her
They are bound to Misenchronic Engine.
heart, or chopped away her side, or ripped through her spine,
one of the silently watching courtiers stood up and took that
You can never go back. You are not human. You cannot know a
death in her place. The Warmain was snarling, hateful,
human save as the fire knows the wood, as the storm knows the
angry, and realizing with horror that it was possible to
sky, as the wolf knows the deer. Even when your heart screams
lose. As for Lorelle, I have never seen a woman look so
for humanity, you will not find it.
radiant or so beautiful. She was lost in the rapture of it, for
The Nobilis are your only tribe.
Lorelle is a Power of the Dark.
—from PRINCIPLES OF THE DARK, by Merriweather James
—from ON SERVING THE NOBILIS, by Luc Ginneis

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS opposite: “The Heartstone of the World,” by Jenna Moran, from works by Thomas Cole and a Mayan artist
 149

W
hen the Age turned, Jan ben Jan spat out a stone; green
in color, and having a virtue of healing, it became the
Heartstone of the World.

opposite: by artist (I cribbed from these) ORDERS AND NOBILIS

150
Get in the Know! on… WEALTH
Stone Cold Eeyore
This Power knows everyone’s phone number, including Mortal wealth is as nothing to the Nobilis; for exchange
phone numbers for Imperators, Excrucians, and amongst themselves they need currency not easily
hypothetical people whose names you can’t remember. If obtained by bankrupting the nations of the world.
you can find the right public phone, you can pick up the For these purposes they use the following currencies—
handset and talk to her directly; as long as you are properly � The udi, pinned against the value of a dream;
courteous, she will be happy to provide such assistance as � The izikel, pinned against the value of destroying
she can. Note that speaking your requests into the wrong one's enemies (strictly, a bushel of one's enemies—
pay phones may attract the attention, instead, of the no more, no less);
malevolent Rafael Picard. � The ur-um, a stable currency measured against the
bond between Familia members;
� The buddhitanka, pinned to the value of awareness of
Those who claim the Sigils of the Order are bound as the world;
their peers are not; they do not write their own contracts, � The takkarash, proportional to the cost of a nasty
but rather accede to them. Such Sigils are nevertheless bump on the head;
treasures of great price: they give access to the sprawling � Currency burned to honor ancestors, which does not
Machinery of the Accords, to the weight of power help in Lucifer's Hell but is briskly traded among
amongst all the sanctums and devices consecrated to the ghosts and horrors in the haunted regions;
Orders of the Nobilis; in simplest form, they yield a � The OTC, Trade Currency of the mercantile world
bounty of miraculous energy, which I shall estimate at up Ofeili;
to 8 MP per story and 2 MP per scene (see pg. 119), while � Merit, a formal sense of social credit, tracked and
the Power is at least modestly diligent in the performance made integral not by the Nobilis but by the living
of their office. spirit of Noble society and the conventions of the
treaty The Accords at Babylon; and
There are 70 Powers so bound; and they are named the
� Legend, a similarly formalized sense of social credit
Functionaries Magister.
bound up in objects rather than the Powers
themselves.
THE MASK OF SUROLAM
These currencies naturally interact in different ways with
A weight falls on the world. It bears down on time—the udi is a deflationary currency, with tomorrow's
Misenchronic Engine. The orrery turns. The rivulets of dreams generally worth more than yesterday's. The izikel is
Lancaire begin to sweat with power. minimally inflationary, suggesting that it is better to have
The Mask of Surolam opens its mouth. a bushel of your enemies already dead than to destroy them
It speaks a word. at some later occasion. The buddhitanka inflates strongly.
The word becomes a name. The name becomes a thing. Ancestor money wobbles.
The thing hunts for its master. Even the Powers find second-guessing Ofeili Trade
Such things are the Sigils of the Curators. Those who Currency a dangerous game.
wear them temporarily lose their knowledge of their self The relative value of these currencies is established by
but gain the right to arbitrate disputes of contract in the the appropriate market, as of course it must be. While the
Noble world. Powers themselves rarely play at currency trading,
speculation on the value of abstract coin forms an idle
activity on the part of Cammora members, artificial
The Sigils of the Curators are wonders: those who find them intelligences in technologically advanced Chancels,
find, inevitably, that they are beautiful, save only for those like various associates of the Powers, fabulous monsters, and
the Powers of the Dark, despising beauty, who instead discover the ghosts of the bankrupt dead. The actual coinage is
Sigils “ luxuriant in vice.” Yet it is obvious that they are not sometimes minted by miracle, according to the whims of
manifest from the Estate of Beauty. They have few traits in numismatist Powers; the exact ability to trade the coins for
common: one cannot reliably name them Burdens, despite their anything, or use them more directly to acquire dreams,
association with the Stolid Center, or Masks (though they are vengeance, or a bump on the head depends on the artistry
often masks), or parcel out some consistent color and call them and interests of the Power in question. Minted udi, izikel,
Green things, or Heavy things, or Light. They are, therefore, ur-um, buddhitanka, and takkarash that do not exchange
typically presumed to manifest something such as Freedom or for the intended experiential value are named “debased,”
the Unpredictable: an Estate that one could pin down, yes, although this may be a characteristic of circumstance and
with sufficient hedging about with data, but not with the not the coin itself.
limited palate of opportunities that we have had so far, with so
few Powers, and fewer Curators, and the world, in general, so
young.
—from IN THE RIGHT CIRCLES, by Jasprite Sherrard

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 151

When the Viscount of Memory meets the Marchessa of Falling She stood in a distant place and looked at the sword that was
Stars, their hands fall immediately to their blades. Their dance hidden there.
of war begins. They strive to kill one another; and that strife is “Claim it and ten thousand thousands will die,” said her
poetry, beauty, a glory of violence. Yet in all their battles, they conscience, currently incarnate as a thick white wasp that clung
have been injured only three times between them. to her shoulder.
Many of the Nobilis flout the Windflower Law, loving in “My highest duty is not to life,” she answered, and crushed
secret. Many torture their souls trying to keep it. A few—like her conscience with her thumb.
the Viscount and the Marchessa—find other ways that two
—from VOID STORIES, compiled by Édouard Guy
people may be close.
There is no more tender hatred than that those two cherish.
There is no more intimate rivalry. To see them in battle is to
Whenever any Power makes a gift to the Orders—of
weep.
treasure, knowledge, or promised service—it is the Ravens,
—from the Memoirs of Alice Mendel, Lady of the Thunder including the provisional members, who assign it a value.
Learn five secrets and your Sigil becomes a key to every
secret, every fact, every bit of information or thought ever
THE RAVENS’ ORDER submitted to the Orders, though you or someone must pay
or have paid for that information according to the
The Ravens’ Order takes its power from six great secrets, schedule of value that the Ravens have set. You become an
each taking form in the world as spheres of marble, two information broker to the Noble world.
meters on a side, and etched in an inexplicable pattern. Within the Ravens there exists the Robbers’ Order—
Five of them are known to have meaning; they are the those bound to obtain the wealth of the Powers, by hook
answers to questions, or the substance of questions, or, at
or by crook, and generalize its use. This they do by
least, something to do with questions that have become a
donating it at one of the twelve great temples of the
matter of public record—
� What sleeps beneath Hell? Robbers’ Order, where it vanishes into the æther until
� What name do the Excrucians give the metaphysical ripped forth by an overriding miracle or called out through
substance of deception? a Robbers’ Sigil. The donating Robber is deeded a portion
� What happens when you take the corpse of an of its value in the Orders’ books.
enemy to the fields of Illura’Len, that are beyond The Robbers are a strange breed—at times they are
Creation, and how does this differ from what would bankers, at other times tax-collectors and at other times
happen should you take to that place the corpse of a yet they are as thieves. The rules for their Sigils are not as
good friend? those for the Ravens’: they form naturally from the Estate
� What is Misenchronic Engine’s fate? of Thorns, roughly one for every 50 Powers in the world; to
� Where is the key to the sixth of the Ravens’ secrets, claim one, there is no need to understand strange secrets,
and what question does it hold?
but one must successfully keep the Sigil out of others’
hands for seventy-and-seven days. Once you have done so,
The answers are unknown and possibly indefinite. It is
from the tension between question and answer, knowledge you become a Robber and Raven. You may vote with the
and uncertainty, and truth and the ambiguous that the Ravens in assessing the value of donated wealth and use
secrets derive their power. your Sigil to call forth the treasures that the Robbers have
To take up a Ravens’ Sigil one must only ask a Raven. donated—for, of course, an appropriate payment.
The Sigils are costly to make, but the construction is not
difficult.
They are elusive things—they will form far from you,
when created, in a thing of the Ravens’ Estate, a bird or So the Devil is smooth, you have to give him that.
raven or bird-like thing, and they will travel through the “I’ll just be taking your soul,” he said.
world—but if you know one has been created, you can “Hey!” I said.
most likely track it down. “What?”
To claim it is to become a Raven in name. “I’m a virtuous monk!”
To become a Raven in truth, to activate the Power of “Oh,” he said. He hesitated. “Three quarters?”
the Sigil, one must follow the Sigil’s dharma on a journey And before you know it, I’d said, “One third,” and there you
that—if one is a proper Raven at heart—may eventually go.
lead one to an understanding of the secrets of the Order. It’s not the same as losing all my soul, you understand, but
Learn two of them and your membership becomes I’d been hoping to save it for micropayments.
provisional. —from DANIEL, THE DEVIL, AND ME, by Keiko Takemori

ORDERS
ORDERS AND
AND NOBILIS
NOBILIS
152

humanity. That they should learn and honor—that you will

This is how Bao Way-ming punishes the worst offenders
learn and honor—the legends and symbols and customs
brought before his court. He strips them of their memories
and modes of address and sacred days and taboos that
and replaces them with his own. Thus, the shameful creature
make a society live and breathe.
remembers themselves as the exalted Way-ming—but finds
themselves suddenly human, suddenly a branded criminal, And not just on principle, though these are fine
and suddenly powerless, unworthy to so much as pledge principles, but because they are mos maiorum—tradition.
themselves to Way-ming’s glorious Estate or Code. He does To sign to the Accords means recognizing the Accords
not let them commit suicide; they must live out their lives and the res and the mos maiorum as legitimate elements of
with the horrible pain of that loss, and most go mad. society. It means that you don’t plan on climbing the ranks
—from CHAMOMILE BOOK, by Chien Shan-lee of society without first studying its ways. It means that
you’re not planning on taking over the mechanisms of
society without first learning to use the res to their fullest
THE BOOK OF PURITY potential—as miraculous devices, access keys to deep wells
of social credit, knowledge, pledged services, and treasure.
Those Powers that follow the creed of Samsi Mandaru It means that if you plan to be one of the foremost
make themselves difficult for the Excrucians, Powers, and Powers of the world, you’re going to do it through the
even the Imperators to sway. They make a ritual of her structures that are there.
rationalist methodology, using alchemy and custom to Once you have signed to the Accords you gain access to
cleanse themselves of folly, error, trivial passions, and small
the Noble societies and sects that are under its aegis—the
dreams. These alien creatures—for the cult of ritual
Orders; the social clubs like the Martial College
rationality is insane by rational and irrational standards
alike—are named the pure. They are holy outcasts in (gathering together the Powers of war and battle) and the
themselves, but the leaders and sects of the Nobilis crave Byzantine Society; and such private cults or “Cleaves” as
their good offices, as their presence and willful support the historian Bookkeepers, the compassionate Architects,
protects against subtle Excrucian corruption. and the degenerate (by their own declaration) Fellowship
of Apelles. You may also learn to wield the magic of the res
THE ACCORDS AT BABYLON to formalize contracts among the Nobilis.
Or you may refuse to sign, and say: I stand alone.
New Powers eventually face the decision of whether to
become signatory to the Accords at Babylon, a miraculous
document that serves as the basic treaty or truce governing
the society of the Nobilis. It’s essentially a toolkit for
contracts and social climbing: signing on isn’t so much
making a commitment as making a show of respect for
how things are done.
To sign is to agree that Powers should honor the formal
covenants—the res—that they make with other Powers. THE RES
That they should think and act on a grander scale than
The sacred covenants of the Nobilis take physical form in
mundane things. For instance, a Noble could make a piano,
book, human, or chicken into the receptacle for a res. Such
covenants then acquire the following afflictions:
In Locus Imsety, there is an Oracle named Rainfall. Her full
� Affliction (5): I can’t die or be hurt while there is a
name is “Rain falling in the jungle, heavy drops struggling
Power bound by my terms.
down through the leaves, and the knowledge of your lover’s
� Affliction (3): I sicken when the covenant is broken,
death.” She can answer almost any question, if moved to
by my interpretation of what would break it.
answer at all, and has occasionally unraveled mysteries that no
� Affliction (2): the more I think about things that are
other Power can touch. Rainfall had a deep and desperate love
not related to the contract, the more insane I
for knowledge, and gave herself over to it; and one day, there
become.
came a point when the facts, mysteries, and wisdom in her
mind began to crowd out her thoughts, feelings, and desires. “I
Binding oneself to a res requires that the Noble be signatory
do not care,” decided Rainfall. “I wish to know.” Thus she made
to the Accords at Babylon. Creating a proper res requires
her choice, and now she feels nothing, thinks nothing, desires
substantial study of these Accords—you must either have a
nothing, and knows all things that are.
Bond tying you to Noble society or you must earn at least 15
—from A TOURIST’S GUIDE TO CREATION, by Jasprite Sherrard Destiny for a relevant project.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 153
CHAPTER 18

The
Excrucians
They are the children of Harumaph—whatever or
whomever Harumaph might be.
They are the reaction of the void against Creation.
They are the enemies of the world, the incarnation of our
Atlas is, of course, a myth. There is no
endings. The warriors that lead them wear the faces of our
Titan holding up the sky, but only a
dead.
nine-year-old child, who has spent time
They are the failing of the safety of the world, they are
beyond counting thinking only this: “I
the dissolution of existence. They are the thing that,
shall not break.”
because they exist, causes all existence to be tentative and
It is one theory, held by many
unsure.
scholars, that this resolution suffices. It is
They are Excrucians.
another that one day her will shall falter
They divide into four kinds: the Deceivers, the
and her bones snap, and the sky plummet
Warmains, the Mimics, and the Strategists. They ride pale
down, and all for the weakness of a
horses.They wield strange and abhorrent weapons.They are
child.
the defining and creating terror of this, the Third Age of
our Creation.
—from A CATALOG OF MODERN MAGIC,
When they came to us the Second Age shattered.
by Eric Optera Their swords rang against the gates of Heaven and the
gates of Heaven broke.
They bent their will against the Seal of Time and the
Age burst asunder. The Seal was split. The world cried out.
Time rang like a brass gong. And the silver days of the
Second Age were ones that we would never know again.
Thus far, they slew—no further.
The Angels held a bloody line in Heaven; broke their
charge. And in the Seal of Time, as they went to cut down
the last remaining Ages of our World, the Excrucians met
Attaris, the Imperatrix of the Third Age, the Age that is.
Attaris, who showed her face to them and turned them
back, who threw off her shroud and stood revealed to them
as Attaris Ebrôt Appêkā, Magister of the Wild, tutelary
spirit of the Age of Pain.

THE EXCRUCIANS
154

They dared not kill her, for she was the very War they
waged. And in the bowers of Hell, the Fallen Angel who “ You love me,” he said. His voice was very assured, and I
had worn the latter two portions of her name—who had realized at once that it must be so.
held them for her in his being, Ebrôt Appêkā—dissolved —from JACK, by Keiko Takemori
to dust and ash. And why this should happen, why it
should be that Ebrôt Appêkā died, or for that matter why In their eyes—
he lived at all, I do not know. It is like looking into night, and seeing yourself on a
In the First Age, we lived in harmony. field, in open space and cradled in the arms of the earth
In the Second Age, we were at war. and sky; and the stars look down, and one by one begin to
It was not until this, the Third Age, the Age of Pain, the fall.
Age of the Excrucian War, that anyone seriously Sometimes that’s terrifying. Sometimes it’s loving, too.
considered the possibility that the world itself could die; Sometimes it is a desecration of the sky and at other times
but now we know it likely will. a gift.
Though oh—if we should win! If only we should win, They are honest but they hate us in every particular; it is
and at the end the world survives and it is Ananda who is only the invisible essence that they love. They are the ones
the Age! that tell us we need not judge ourselves forever for what we
But listen, and I will tell you of our enemies, and how have done, but they are not approving of anything else that
some of them I would not mind so much in their victory, we may be.
while others I despise.
THE RITUAL OF TWO SKINS
THE DECEIVERS In a ritual that takes a day—dawn to dawn, dusk to dusk,
or some incomprehensible equivalent in the Lands Beyond
The Deceivers live outside the world; they think that we Creation—a Deceiver may tell themselves the story that
have built the world out of lies. They think the whole of they are someone else.
Creation is a jungle of deceit that we have put up to keep In this fashion they weave about themselves the power
from seeing ourselves the way we really are. of someone real that they have met.
They love us but they love not that lie. The result is not particularly obvious.
They come to unmake the world for us. They come to The person whose life they borrow most likely will not
help you forget the Eyes and Ears and Nose, the Work and notice—will feel an apprehension, at the most, a shudder,
Home and School, the Trees and Wind and Laughter and as if someone had walked across their grave. Those who
Hearts and Hope. look at the Deceiver are unlikely to see the lie: they change
They come because they think us marvelous, whatever it their spirit, not their body.
is they think we are—whatever thing they imagine, that we But the Deceiver gains in the course of the ritual full
cannot imagine ourselves, lives behind these purported access to everything that person is.
lies. They gain their mortal skills. Their passions. Their loves
And because they see us as such, we may see ourselves
and hates and needs. They gain their powers—for instance,
as such, in them.
and most importantly, the miraculous abilities a Power or
Their love is sneaky and dirty and beautiful and it makes
Imperator has.
us love ourselves. It is a gap of forgiveness and grace in the
Thus you may meet a Deceiver with all the power of the
iron of the world. It is awful because they will not hesitate
Power of Fire, or Guns, or Waves, or Green or Greed. Or,
to hurt us, or lie to us, to open up that crack. They do not
see the legitimacy of any of the things we believe in. They worse, a Deceiver in the “skin” of an Imperator, immortal
only see the soul. as Imperators are immortal, and capable of speaking
Imperial miracles unto the world.

GAME RULES
THE TRUTH OF THE NAME
Name the story—find whose power it is they have
stolen—and you may control the Deceiver.
Deceivers built as characters have 15-30 Character Points,
This is a limited power.
plus the powers of their “Second Skin.” Their maximum
It can’t be used against them more than once every few
Attribute rating is 7. Give them Bonds, Afflictions, Passions,
and Skills to taste. hours and only by someone loyal to Creation. You get one
Deceivers have no Domain Attribute and do not have a order, one command that you can slip under their second
proper Estate. However, they may define a pseudo-Estate for skin.
use with Persona miracles; this is normally something self- They can defy that order, too, if they have to. It shatters
referential, such as “What you Remember about Me.” The HG their power—they lose the borrowed power, which makes
may wish to define Properties for this pseudo-Estate. them vulnerable, and they often take a wound—but they
Deceivers are often Immortal, Glorious Shapeshifters. don’t have to obey.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 155

“Why do you have a gun in your hand?” he asked. PHASAEL MERY-HARUMAPH

“I have promised to kill the one I love.” This Deceiver is as charming as the sun. He burned the
“ You do not love me,” he said. His voice was very assured, library of Hukkok the Angel; branded him with those
and I realized at once that it must be so. flames; took Hukkok’s sigil and his seal and made great
mischiefs with them—but Hukkok forgave him, as
—from JACK, by Keiko Takemori
everyone else Phasael’s hurt has done. I cannot save you
from being hurt by him, or from forgiving him, but I can
The effects fade over time, too; it’s probably just three to tell you to forgive yourself for trusting or forgiving him
seven days or so, until they can pretend they didn’t hear the when you ought not.
order at all.
It’s not an insurmountable weakness, in other words, Key Game Traits
but it’s a pretty bad one. Name the Deceiver’s “second � Persona 4 (The Adoration of Phasael)
skin,” the source of their borrowed power, and you can
compel them.
TAIRTÉ UT-NAPISHTIM
This Deceiver teaches the Excrucian philosophy to anyone
The Powers call this the Truth of the Name.
who will listen; Imperators let him operate in Creation,
and let their Powers learn from him, that they may better
KNOWN DECEIVERS oppose his kind. As a mortal, you’re better served not
listening to him at all.
SCELTO OF THE PROVENANCE
This Deceiver may be anyone or anywhere. Personal Key Game Traits
identity, Scelto tells us, is a lie. If you can see yourself in the � Persona 4 (The Philosophy of Tairté Ut-napishtim)
mirror with both eyes shut, you are probably Scelto, and � Miracle Catching—
should stop whatever you’re doing and get away from your Tairté has the peculiar power to catch and hold
loved ones as soon as you possibly can. a miracle in the palm of his right hand. He can peel
it open like an onion, and he a chef, showing piece by
Key Game Traits piece how there is no truth to a miracle, only the
� Persona 4 (Scelto of the Provenance) exemplification of the void. He then reassembles the
� Keen Sight miracle from nothing—even though he has no
Estate to call his own—believing that he proves, by
IOLITHAE SEPTIMIAN so doing, that no Estate is real.
This Deceiver told the seas that they were salt; and they
were thus; and strangled then the fish of all fresh waters GENSERIC DACE
that swam within. If you see her you must not allow her to Generic. Ah, Genseric!
speak. I do not know how you can possibly prevent it but This is a Deceiver who helped compose this book. I love
even if it means your life you must not allow Iolithae him for it and I hate him for it, but I cannot wish it were
Septimian to speak. not so; and you cannot hope, on that account, that I shall
Key Game Traits give away his secrets.
� Persona 5 (The Lies of Iolithae Septimian)

CORIANDER HASP
This Deceiver wields Ritho, the unmatched rifle—the only
rifle ever numbered among the Abhorrent Weapons of the
Excrucians. Its bullets are incendiary charges that set the
target afire, and anything those bullets hit will keep
burning until it dies. Coriander will kill you with that fire,
if you get in his way, and then he will tell your corpse, “It
was not so.”
It was not so! You did not die!
It will be tempting, but you must not believe.
No good can come of getting up again once you’ve died
at Coriander’s hands, particularly if you are still on fire.

Key Game Traits

� Persona 2 (Those who Listen to Coriander Hasp)
� Treasure 5

THE EXCRUCIANS
156
THE WARMAINS
GAME RULES
The Warmains wish to wrestle us.
They wish to test us, to make us fight them, to make us Warmains built as characters have 25-75 Character
hate them.They cast electrons from their orbit to make the Points. Their maximum Attribute rating is 7. They are
protons rage. They break the symmetry of planets. They always under the effect of a level 2 Divine Mantle at no
spit Flynn Gannary on their blades to make his mother cost in MP. Give them Bonds, Afflictions, Passions, and
fight. Skills to taste.
Warmains have no Persona Attribute and do not have
His mother!
a proper Estate. However, they may define a pseudo-
She wasn’t even in the fandom! She was just some old Estate for use with Domain miracles; this is normally the
lady who seemed more interesting to them than her son! mechanism of their test. The HG may wish to define
They tell us that the world is unworthy of unbeing; that Properties for this pseudo-Estate.
only the best of us deserve to end at their hands. They tell Common Gifts include Active Immortality, Fire-
us that the world is only truly real in its opposition to breathing, Flight, Glorious, Natural Weapon,
them—in what it is to the Warmains—and that it has no Unblemished Guise, and Worldwalker.
purpose save as their testing us creates. The world is not a
lie but a hypothesis to them: here is something that may
show the Warmains worth.
you. They’ll talk about it as if they are lifting you up from
They are brutal and focused.
existence, freeing you from it, making you a part of
They are profoundly uninterested in your unwillingness
something infinitely more worthy—them. If you make a
to play their games of war. They do not accept the refusing
strong enough impression the Warmain will even take
of their challenges. You will lose, and then they will either
your face and personality and body type after you die. They
leave you alone or break you; or you will win, and they will
will adapt themselves to the incidentals of your dharma,
make it their mission that you should die.
they will keep your fundamental nature alive by emulating
And they will love that—you understand.
you as they find new people to challenge, hurt, and kill, in
They will give you a smile that can break your heart
honor of you. Because they decided that you were just that
before they put aside the game and go to kill you. They will
cool.
not be lashing out in bitterness. They will be delighted and
amazed that they have found another person worthy of
this death. And they love nothing so much as that delight KNOWN WARMAINS
and that amazement. They love nothing so much as being
ORDERIC NEUSTRY
impressed by you. They will not think that they are ending
This is the Warmain who takes that thing you cling to,
whatever it might be—that central, most important thing
Our stories of romance are also stories of conflict; in true love’s that allows you to live and hang on and fight for yourself
bliss, or the mundane wedding of two families, nothing and the world—away from you. And often he’ll cut you
interesting is learned. It may be the reward or punishment of a from your gifts and your graces, too, all the best parts of
soul—to discover the burning blessed unity with a beloved, or you, and leave you floundering in the dark, fighting a
to find oneself trapped in a loveless environment in a family Warmain when you have nothing to fight him for or with.
not one’s own. But it is not the lesson. It is not the story, and it He is the exhalation of the void, the center of a whorl of
is not romance. anti-nature, anti-existence, anti-being; and it is those who
The stories we learn from, the loves worth the speaking of, can remake themselves in the middle of that emptiness
are the loves where to love is to make war upon the world, or on and find strength in their own weaknesses whom he
the self. The love that divides, the love that shatters, the love
embraces, kills, takes into himself, and removes from the
that throws order into turmoil and brings tumult to the Estates
world.
of this Creation. In struggle we grow, in struggle we witness
the echoes of our growing. Key Game Traits
The first intimations that we had, of the wedding of fire and � Domain 4 (Loss)
water, were tidal waves and storms; blazes raging across the
� Soul-Carving Sword
city’s heart; earthquakes as the world began its groaning.
That is how you may know
That this is a story, not of love, though love is there, but of
romance.
—from THE WEDDING OF FIRE AND WATER, by Jackie Robinson

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 157

RAGINHART TRIBUNAS TEJA HEIMERICH

This is the Warmain who wields the test of pain. He is a This Warmain is an anti-sylph, a creature biased against
creature of breaking you by agony unmastered and the element of air; she subverts the wind, twists reason
unmasterable. It is those who can fight and defeat him no against itself, corrupts flying creatures to her will, and
matter how much it hurts that he has sworn that he will wears the cool nothingness of vacuum snug against her
kill. Fight him, fight him hard, so that he knows you’ll play skin. She is the test of surviving without air, without the
his game, but let the pain defeat you in the end. Let him subtle and basic continuum on which we have grown as
break you. He’s the one torturer in all the world who’ll beings to depend. Those who may live in that nothingness
leave you alone for good when that moment comes. she is sworn to extinguish and make her own.
Against Raginhart Tribunas, do not try to win.
Raginhart is a strangely neutral creature. He turns his
Key Game Traits
� Domain 4 (Void)
tests of agony on other Excrucians as readily as on the
creatures of the world. This is profoundly rare, even MAROZIA CAROLIN
practically unheard of, and seems tied to some sort of This Warmain is a moral test. She’ll make you an
authority he is given or forced to wield. I do not know or abomination to yourself. See if she won’t! She can turn you
understand the details and I hope I never shall. into a very avatar of death for everything you care about,
and see what happens then. Best hope she crushes your
Key Game Traits
� Domain 4 (Agony) spirit with it; if you turn the tables on her, or somehow
bear the burden, she will never let you live.
EUPHRASIA SAVINOT
This is a Warmain with no interest in testing you. People
Key Game Traits
� Domain 4 (Harmfulness)
are bland and banal to her. Even Powers are bland and
banal to her. She holds her test against the world itself—
she wields against the world a series of terrible blights, she
washes away truths, she makes things treacherous to
themselves and in general she seeks to bring the entirety of
Creation into a crucible whose incidents she may judge.
Each of her curses or blights has a “keystone”—some
small, wrong object that serves as the focus for her curse.
Finding that keystone and shattering it ends the power of
her blight.

Key Game Traits

� Domain 4 (Blight)

Creation is inherently finite. To lose the Excrucian War is to

bring an end to history. To win the War is to end the Third Age,
and move history one great step closer to its final conclusion.
Our world is doomed; our only choice is a choice of endings.
—from A PHILOSOPHY OF TREASON,
by Augusta Valentina (suppressed)

THE EXCRUCIANS
158
THE MIMICS
GAME RULES
The Mimics dwell among the Imperators.
They’re like Imperators. Mimics built as characters have 10-15 Character
They have Estates. They can speak Imperial miracles. Points, plus Active Immortality. They have up to 2 points
They can even have Chancels and Powers. of natural Miraculous Edge. They have 3-4 Divine Health
But at the heart of each Mimic is a horrible twisting levels, 1 Tough Health level, and 2 Normal Health levels
secret blasphemy of the void. Genseric tells me that the (see pg. 183–184). Give them Bonds, Afflictions,
Excrucians put it there—that the Mimics are the shoved- Passions, and Skills to taste. They can speak Imperial
together pieces of dead Imperators, or sacrificed Estates. miracles into the world; one such miracle, their
That the Excrucians couldn’t fix everything the moment blasphemy, speaks itself automatically into the world
the Imperator died, so instead of “freeing [us] from that when their last Divine Health level is lost.
portion of the lie,” they made a Mimic. For Mimics who will use Persona or Domain miracles,
There’s nothing the Mimics fear more than letting pick one of their Estates as their primary Estate and
someone see that secret blasphemy inside them. designate their other Estates as secondary. Like the
Which is good, by the way, because knowing one of Imperators, they may have Secondary Domain or
those secrets will probably cause your brain to spiral in on Secondary Persona at level 0; this costs (of course) 0
itself like a neural net at the edge of a singularity, and then points, and allows them to use their DMP and PMP on
when there’s nothing but blank void in your head, your Domain and Persona miracles of any of their Estates.
skull will crumple inwards like a crushed soda can and
you’ll wail out this endless susurration of the secrets of the
void and everyone will scream and try to cut your tongue
out before you finally pop your heart and go away. That’s
not what happens to everybody, you understand, but it’s THE STRATEGISTS
how Györg Krusko and Javairia Al Sabah went and a
couple others at the edge of the community, and nobody The Strategists say the world is wrong.
knows of any cases where it’s actually ended well. They armor themselves in the power of emptiness. They
The Mimics are just like the Imperators, in short, only weave it into themselves. Then they come to our world to
instead of being natural, they’re unnatural; instead of being break it as a crime against the void.
premised on something right and appropriate in Creation, Mostly.
every Mimic is Estates premised on something awful and They are sick—you understand—as those who wrestle
unnaturally wrong. That is why they work against with wrongness are always sick. They have splashed
Creation, even though they seem to be like the things of themselves, suffused themselves, or infused themselves
Creation. It’s like the Mimics and the rest of us are words with what they claim is our perversity.
in the same language, but used to a different intention. They have gone wrong as people go wrong.
They have gone wrong as the world has gone wrong.
They aren’t awesome like the Deceivers are and the
Warmains can be. They are fucking twisted, and they
pretend that that’s our fault.
They’re dying.
Every one of them is dying of something, every one of
them is too far wrong to live, but when they do finally give
up and die, they don’t stay dead. They fade into unbeing
instead. They flail outwards into the Not. They armor
themselves there in the power of emptiness. They weave it
into them and it restores their life. Then they come back
into our world to break it, for our crime against the void.
Field Guide! to… They’re lethal too. Killing and destroying isn’t hard for
Dahlia Thorn them. It’s easier for them than for basically anybody else in
This was the Mimic who seemed to rule Light, Health, the world because they don’t have to do anything to make
Robots, Safety, and Stuffed Animals. It wasn’t until she died it happen. They can just wave their hands and wish and
that people finally understood that it wasn’t those things she things will go away. They can just deny things right out of
ruled, but a false conception we had about how those things existence, cause things to fall apart like reality’s unweaving,
were. And, to be honest, since nobody ever found a corpse, make anything—and not just physical things, but love, and
there’s a small but real chance we don’t understand them greed, and waves, and words, and fate, and light, and
yet. understanding too—go away just by choosing that it
If you should see her, tell the world. ought.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 159

We hold ourselves to be sacred. But from the other side of the GAME RULES
skin we are nothing more than profane.
This is reality. Strategists built as characters have 25-75 Character
No matter how cool it is, what we’re working on; no Points. Their maximum Attribute rating is 7. Give them
matter how important our lives; no matter how much it Bonds, Afflictions, Passions, and Skills to taste.
matters, that is, that some process not stop, that some thing They do not have a proper Estate. They have neither
not die: everything is distorted by the imprint of patterns Domain nor Persona save in the form of Gifts.
bigger than ourselves. Strategists lose 1 MP for each health level lost, even a
If you stopped time and stepped outside the world you’ d Normal level; when they run out of MP, even if they have
see a knife, cutting this way, cutting that, all through the health remaining, they “die” and leave Creation. Any MP they
fabric of our lives. gain from Bonds and Afflictions fade at the end of the scene,
The knife will take your hopes, if it cuts just right. and they cannot earn an MP refresh.
The knife will take your life. A Strategist receives the Gift World-Breaker’s Hand for 0
The knife will cause your fortunes to corrode or bring an Points.
enemy tumbling down.
It’s great to want things to sustain. It’s great to want this
or that to live forever. But there’s only so much merit in the LEXIARCHOS CADUCINE
world and the knife’s just plain more important than your This is an Excrucian Strategist who is dying of old age; she
dreams. spins youth into herself in the Lands Beyond Creation, but
—from THE SUBWAY, by Rannen Yedidyah ages and eventually turns to dust as her miraculous power
depletes. Unfortunately this does not end the matter.
Lexiarchos is one of those who justifies the name of
Textrix the Deacon fought a Power for seven days, using “Strategist;” she is always five steps ahead, like she’s already
that ability—what the Nobilis call the World-Breaker’s seen what you’re going to do and planned to make it come
Hand—as his principal weapon. The Dead Zone of Libya out wrong. She likes to infest the souls of your children,
was the result. No plant grows there. No love lives there. make them vipers in your nest, but leave enough of the
The sun is never bright there, no nation claims it, no map original self that killing them’s no kindness.
shows it. The ground is arid. Sometimes it crumbles
underfoot, opening onto the vastness of nothing ADHÉMAR HETAIRH
underneath. No one of interest was ever born there. No This is an Excrucian Strategist who swallowed fire and
wind ever blows there. Nobody goes there save by force; poison and is dying of it now. When he is slain, or when
and even though you can break a person by chaining them one of his shard-self copies is slain, the body detonates.
there for a day or two, even though it’d be the kind of Acid rains outwards, poison fountains from the neckhole,
sheaves of fire tumble like wrestling cats across the ground.
punishment any despot or cruel authority would love to
His vice is masochism, which wins him some not-so-
inflict, it doesn’t even get used for that very often, because
terribly-evil points from me but unfortunately he’s also a
the thing that places have that make them easy to
good soldier for the Excrucians who does many nasty
remember is a thing the Dead Zone no longer has.
things that are not his-vice-related.
It was a place. It had qualities. It had stuff. It had things.
They went away. MALAKAI MESMER
This is an Excrucian Strategist dying of lost empathy;
KNOWN STRATEGISTS when the emptiness of his miraculous power leaves him, he
becomes a danger even to his allies, unable to value or even
TEXTRIX THE DEACON really recognize anything in the world that is not Mesmer.
This is an Excrucian Strategist who is dying of lost faith; He is a sadist, with a particular interest in collecting
he cannot cling to the idea that there is any meaning in victims—not so much hurting them, although he’ll pin
anything at all. When the miraculous power that sustains them to walls with long silver pins or leave them chained
him fades, he stumbles from Creation in a kind of until they starve, as having them, and having them be
apathetic fugue. Textrix’s vice is obscenity and blasphemy; unable to fight his will.
he is an enemy to all sacred things, and the more real and
true the love that powers them, the more it draws his
wrath. Fortunately he is rarely sighted in the world. It poured from his hand like a fire, sharp-edged, dancing,
limned in white: the Not. What it touched, ceased to be.
—from VOID STORIES, edited by Édouard Guy

THE EXCRUCIANS
160
THE EXCRUCIAN WAR SHARDS
All these forces, together, are “the Excrucians.” Excrucians may make a handful of shards to
They rode into the world at the beginning of the Age of accompany and defend them. They may also send a few
Pain. They rode pale horses and carried these horrible shards into our world when they can’t get in themselves.
weapons—these soul-cutting atrocities that can destroy Excrucian-shards act a lot like Powers, right down to
even nominally immortal things. They broke down the the independent streak and the individuality. They were
gates of Heaven and slaughtered amongst the Angels never mortal, never anything other than a piece of their
before the Angels gathered and threw them back, and Excrucian, but they still manage to define themselves as
since that time, their assault has not relented, but rather selves somehow. If you kill them their Excrucian may or
only dispersed, with the Imperator-Excrucian War being may not be able to reconstitute them later.
waged at any given time on dozens of the endless worlds Strategist and Warmain “shards” are built on 20-35
upon the Ash and occasionally slipping upwards to Character Points, 0-13 Bond/Affliction Points, and as
Heaven, downwards into Hell or sideways onto the trunk many Passion/Skill points as seem right. Mimic shards,
of the World Ash itself. too, I suppose, although Mimics usually just make
The War has shifted from the mortal world to ethereal Powers. Strategist, Mimic, and Warmain-shards have
realms of spirit. It is not on our mundane planet that the the same set of Attributes as their Excrucian-type.
attention of Imperators and Excrucians is focused, but Strategist shards may buy the World Breaker’s Hand
rather on a numinous spiritual battleground. There the Gift at a 10-point discount.
Deceiver-shards are very weak; they can have low
souls of Imperators and the raging madness of the void
levels of Aspect or Treasure but they’re usually just
contend; for this reason, the Imperators are distracted
mortals. However they have access to the Ritual of Two
from their bodies, and need Powers and Chancels to
Skins, so they can borrow a Power or Imperator’s abilities
defend them. We could live out our lives and never notice
to make up for it.
there was a war at all—
Save that war is a fluid, it respects no boundaries, and
thus there are a handful of Excrucians deeply rooted in our
mundane Earth, and others who strive constantly to break
became Atrocity, it passed through more than a
through. They sneak past the barricades and
hundred wielders’ hands, each, Genseric tells me,
entrenchments that the Imperators use and enter the
more evil than the last.
world in whole or in part—bringing their whole self
� Hatred, which is named Malambruno: It was the
through to assault Imperators and Estates in the mortal
first of the Abhorrent Weapons to fall into Imperial
vulnerable physical Earth, or sending a tiny part of
hands; it corrupted the Angel that claimed it and
themselves, a “shard,” through to work some similar
turned him traitor to the world.
mischief.
� Horror, which is Eurytos: It used to inspire joy in
The Excrucians are deadlier even than the Powers; their
the eyes that saw it. Now it is a thing of shifting
shards comparable, at least.
spines and mucilaginous poisons, difficult to look
upon. Ianthe tells me that Eurytos hates itself
THE WEAPONS OF THEIR HOST because the Excrucians used it to kill its own creator.
� Loathing, also named Gyges: It is impossible for
The symbols and savage treasures of the Excrucians are any Power to approach this Weapon, and Imperators
named the Abhorrent Weapons—five hundred and who can do better are few and far between. It has a
seventy-two terrifying and unsettling standards scattered radiance that drives away any thing that serves
through their host. Each Abhorrent Weapon wears two Creation.
names, one for itself and one to mock Creation. Seven of � Monstrous, which was Colbrand: This was the
these Weapons are known from Heaven down to Hell, and brightest thing in Creation, I am told. It was the
in all the worlds between. These are: essential thing, the key to it all, the thing that made
� Abomination, which is named Blunderbore: it clear that existence was worthwhile. In the First
Somewhere there is a world that chose to kill itself Age we—I suppose that I am being extremely liberal
rather than fight the Excrucians any longer. It chose with my inclusive plurals here—we who were
to die; its people, its plants, its very things gave up Creation gave it away, sacrificed it, so that the
rather than continue to endure the presence of the Excrucians would for a while stay their hand.
Void. The dead world became, or gave rise to, � Outrage, which is named Typhon: This is an
Blunderbore. Abhorrent Whip made of burnished gold.
� Atrocity, which is named Briareos: With this sword Supposedly it was used to strangle unsuccessful
the Excrucians slew Heaven’s gatekeeper at the contenders to the throne in a world that time has
beginning of the Age of Pain. It is the substance of since forgotten. Its edge is fiendishly sharp; those
their declaration of War with all that Is. Before it contenders must have had very tough throats.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS opposite: “Portrait of an Excrucian”, from a piece by George Romney
 161

T hink you've seen this picture somewhere before? It's probably

because Excrucians can make multiple shards!

opposite: by artist (I cribbed from these) THE EXCRUCIANS

162

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 163

Interlude­

The

Zu
The mysterious warriors of the Zu Mountains wrap their
territories in a barrier even the Imperators cannot break.
Somewhere on the winding paths that lead into their
temples, caverns, and sanctums, the puissance of Estates
Cneph came to Lo Mei-zhu in her dreams and decays. A Power becomes severed from themselves, and an
gifted her with an understanding of Creation. She Imperator from the world.
woke the next morning and made herself ready, and Sheltered by this barrier from the Excrucians and the
went to work, and worked, and came home, and Imperators alike—
began to read a book. From the divine creatures and the unholy ones—
“Lo Mei-zhu,” the Maker said, “why do you not They seek some quixotic personal enlightenment; they
act on the knowledge you possess?” train in the martial arts and in the secret disciplines of the
Mei-zhu stood, set her book down, and pulled a Zu until they are no longer anything recognizable as mortal,
flower from a table’s vase. “With nothing more than but only coils of great slow magic in a person's shape. They
my understanding of this flower,” she said, “I could are masters of the elements and spiritual visionaries. They
reshape the world. But why should I? wield unique weapons made apparently from their souls.
Contemplating the truth of a single petal gives me Some cosmic force powers them, Ianthe tells me—
all the happiness I could ever want.” something transcendent, something pre-Imperial,
—from LEGENDS OF THE NOBILIS, by Luc Ginneis something supreme and mindless and alien. She calls them
ravens, says they cluster around the extrusions of that
creature’s force, gathering as birds will gather to feed upon
a corpse.
Is this the truth?
She speaks with confidence but with no certainty; she
claims the matter is uninteresting to her. She does not deign
to be irresistibly persuasive to me on this point, and so we
do not know.

THE ZU
164

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 165
CHAPTER 19

The
Actuals
Under the skin of the world squirm the Actuals.
They are the bones and organs of the Spirit World. They
are the biomechanical architecture of existence. They are
the substrate of being that precedes form.
They are the soulless forerunners of the True Gods—the
movement that is like life, before it learned to live; the
The finch’s star is a thing not of the thinking that is like personhood, before it learned to be
Lord, nor yet opposed by Him. It stands people. They are the dead things that invented life.
outside the laws of the world. They are born hollow; they are empty.
—from EARTH STORIES,
They have no capacity to bear witness to themselves. If
they were to find themselves alive, and meaningful, and in
compiled by Édouard Guy
possession of a soul, they would not know that they had
done so. They may long for life and self, but these are things
they may not have.
They make such identity as they possess by binding
things around them.
They organize things into matrices. They cause things to
relate to them. They give rise to the space in which things
exist, the time in which they dwell, the capacity to have
spirit within the flesh.
Alone they were lifeless. They were as meaningless
words spoken from nothing to nothing to no purpose. They
were as models without the concept of referents. They were
the dead that moved. Then fire kindled in Heaven and
made Firstborn, Imperator of Meaning and Existence; and
the Actuals became something more. They were still dead,
empty and alone but also a medium competent to sustain a
world.

THE ACTUALS
166

The Actuals are creatures of straight white limbs, pillars

of ivory; the writhing, wriggling presence of impossibility. The beginning of the universe, like its ending, constantly
The breath that isn't breath, membranes of clear substance evolves.
and the jittering of moments fit incompletely into Time. I expect, by the end of the War, that it will have begun
They are mechanical worms and insects that writhe another way entirely.
together in the endless dark of their blindness, their —Hazael, Angel of Disorder
deafness, their inability to touch or smell or taste or know.
They strive a meaningless striving to consume, to grow, and
In that moment, that question points towards a gap.
most of all to wake—the last of which they cannot do, for
to know themselves and thereby know the world is for an When there is a thing that is, but at the same time is not
Actual both impossible and a sin. itself, hollowness exists: a void that demands the world to
They are content—inasmuch as the term applies—to fill it.
remain in the subtle realms. They dwell in the Spirit And, most of the time, the world does.
World, distanced from all immanent things, living among Divine breath manifests itself. Time finds a natural
the Imperators and the Excrucians at their war. They are order. The paradox finds a will to resolve, or to hold itself
the terrain there, and the camp followers; the weapons, the still in the moment before resolution. New or resurrected
supply lines, the transports, and the dissolvers of the dead. entities become properly themselves, borrowing from the
They are the things that hold the matrix of being in which powers of the relevant structures in the world.
the others war. Less frequently, the Not that is outside Creation
Yet they may be brought into our world; and it is answers the call instead.
inevitably a tragedy when they are. This is tricky but not so terrible as you might imagine.
Here is the tale of it: The Not contains ambiguous and mildly benevolent
A miracle may make an impossible thing—a thing that
entities as well as the malevolence of the Excrucians; it
is, but is not itself. A thing that has existence in the world,
may be fairly said that while the Not is hostile towards
but which does not yet have its own nature.
This typically means a thing that cannot be itself— existence, that hostility is already receiving close to its
That is kept from being itself by some limitation in fullest natural expression. The worst case is that an
miracles or sanity— Excrucian agent is embedded in the timeline, paradox or
But which has nothing else to be. creation. The best case is that the gap is filled by something
Time travel can cause these impossibilities. To make a strange and quixotic, and more or less benign.
thing that has happened never have happened—or to Or the void may open beneath an Actual, and it will fall
declare that a thing that did not happen, now did—may into our world.
leave a gap where a thing exists, but does not exist as itself. They are a bogeyman to Powers. This is a cautionary
Paradox can make such a gap as well: when a Power seeks tale.
to embed Russell's paradox in the world, or capture a The Actuals may slumber inside created things like
single instant with no duration at all inside a sphere, or worms inside the spire. They may stir fitfully. Or they may
open in their hand an eye that is not an eye that sees what wake.
it sees not, they make a thing that is but is not itself. When When they wake they will hunger.
the creation or resurrection of a miraculous being is
When they wake they will grow, and grow unbounded.
possible, it often passes through a stage where you have
created or recreated a thing, with the capacity miraculous
things have to resist you and be free of you and make their
own path, but you have not yet reached the stage of The Temple of Inessential Doubts contains two precious
making it itself. scrolls: the Primary Truth, that is, the truth that is the
What is it? archetype for the very concept of veracity, and the Principal
Lie, which is to say, the corresponding archetype of falsehood.
(Astute readers may recognize these matters from earlier
Get the Deets! on… discussion, and identify these scrolls as Earthly extensions of
The Seal of Time the Angels Firstborn and Lucifer.) For centuries after the
This is a vast spherical spindle of brass and bone that Temple’s construction, visitors came to admire these scrolls;
surrounds the Moment of the End. A swarm of Actuals then, sadly, they were stolen. The Temple’s seven-story
constantly press against it and one another, pushing to hounds rapidly brought the thief to heel, but the priests of the
throw themselves into the Moment of the End; Attaris Temple found that—once having been rearranged—they
Ebrôt Appêkā twists them around the sphere as they come could no longer tell the Primary Truth and the Principal
to make them a portion of the very Seal of Time that holds Lie apart.
them back. —from A PRIMER ON THE LOCI CELATUM, by Holly Djurisic

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 167

Hidden Secrets! of… The Actuals are infections, they are infestations, they are
The Family plagues. At best they have a terrifying power to eat things
The Family have irises the color of pale quartz. They have they oughtn't be able to eat, driven by an equally horrific
long hair. They are pretty people. They are innocent and appetite. At worst they have merely to touch you, or look
alien like birds. They are wounded in spirit. They have dim at you, to bring you into the collective of themselves. They
memories of having known love, true love! and Heaven, are primordial. They precede us. They are shrouded in
and having lost it all. They do not know how. They wander Auctorita, and may not be interfered with save with Strike.
the world looking for someone who needs a hero or a If the world is lucky the Actual will have a guiding
destiny—someone who could be their lost true love (in mind that resists this growth. If it is unlucky it will have a
spirit), or another member of their clan. They find and help guiding mind that colludes. More go that way than you
people. They take them in. They find love with them, either
would think. They give in, they go along. They agree to
romantic or familial. The humans become stronger, more
devour the world, and who could blame them?
graceful, prettier, and their irises fade towards the color of
white quartz. One day the human looks at the Family and Their need is real and vital.
understands—and in that instant, their humanity is lost. Even such monsters as the Actuals do not deserve the
They become a new member of the Family, unable to give deprivation they endure. They deserve our help. They
the others what the others need; and in fury and agony and deserve a rescue. But there is nothing to be done.
despair, the others kick them out. The new Family member They cannot have what they need.
forgets the details of this trauma and roams the world as a They will never have what they need. It is not possible.
wounded, pretty, alien, innocent hero without a home. It is There is nothing to be done for them save to burn their
the consensus of the Nobiliser community that this is the hosts, to cut them back into the Spirit World, and to exile
possession of an Actual. them piece by painful piece from world and sound.

Their bodies in our world are interpreted forms; they

make no biological sense. Often they make some mythical
sense—thornbush-creatures, or creatures of spreading
blankets of needle-like spines, or protoplasm, or creatures
of endlessly branching wires—but they may also be pure
mandalas of flesh.
The Actual locks onto the nature of the thing it dwells
in. It merges with its attributes, its mind if it has one, its
body if it has one, its continuum if it exists in time. It lives
and grows within that thing. It drives it to consume other
things: a hunger and a power of absorption that only
sharpens, never fades.
The Actual, and the thing that has become an Actual, Once upon a time, we had strategy.
does not know itself. Those were the glory days when we were very certain in our
It may only find itself by consuming—well, whatever it uniforms and very certain of who we were.
Now we do not have strategy.
is it consumes. By turning that thing into itself so that it
Now everything is scattered grasping in the dark.
may see itself through that thing’s eyes. That is the purpose
I do not remember very much what strategy was like. I was
of its consumption. That is the theory behind its actions.
just a soldier. I was never one of those responsible for it.
But it is a theory that fails. Over and over again it fails. The But I think that where now we are simply flesh, before, we
thing the Actual consumes becomes as blind and deaf and arranged ourselves into “limbs” and “organs” and a “body”.
empty as the Actual in the moment of its conversion. Where now we are still, and wrestle with the worms,
The shape of the Actual grows as it devours. Sometimes before we would—we would move, in these great and complex
this is literal: the creature becomes an expanding patterns, and all around us there would be vibrations, and the
protoplasmic blob. Sometimes it is divisive: the creature temperature would always change.
remains, but something grows through it, leaving it Now it is always dark.
suspended in the midst of the mandala's expanse. Finally it Now it is always cold.
may be ambiguous: the Actual may “spread,” occupying Now we are an insurgency. We are torn apart. We cannot
remember the process by which we generated life.
more and more minds and bodies and places and times,
without any single entity's participation in the growth. —from THE CORPSE, by Rannen Yedidyah

THE ACTUALS
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NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 169
CHAPTER 20

Miraculous
Action
What do you do?
When you act, you may take one miraculous action, one
mundane action, or one miraculous and one mundane
action at a time.
Sometimes this limit will be more bitter than five-day-
old tea to you.
Sometimes it literally won’t matter to you at all. If
The thing that came across the world nobody objects to your acting again a fraction of a second
had many mouths and thick brown fur, later, for instance, you might as well have used a pair of
and many legs and thick black nails, and actions.
it stood miles at the shoulder, and what it Still, even in that case, the limit is definitional.
did not crush it ate. It moved across the You wield the power of your Estate. It flows into the
land like an army or a storm, until it world, it takes form as one specific action. You take that
came to Yi-xuan’s yard, where Yi-xuan’s action. It can flow together with a new mundane course of
mother stood; and her hands held a rake action. It can be followed by other miracles after a longer
as if it were a wall, and her eyes were or shorter span of time. But it is explicitly and formally
cold, and she said, “Come no further.” disjoint from both the miracle that preceded it and the
—from GENETIC VISIONS, miracle that follows.
edited by Emily Chen Sometimes your actions are atomic. They are single
movements in the world.
Other times they are processes, and you can keep such
process-actions going for a while.
Specifically you can maintain (“sustain”) one action at a
time with no ill effect. You can sustain two actions as long
as you don’t do anything else.
When you finish an action, or stop sustaining an action,
its effects may or may not remain in the world. That’s based
on whether you were doing the kind of miracle where they
would. They generally stop being miracles, though, the
moment that you’re done, and become part of the
mundane, natural condition of the world instead. If there’s
some reason why that’s bad—you’re creating an inherently
miraculous creature, for example, and having it become
mundane is strange—then the HG can waive this rule; but
even then, that’s entirely at the HG’s discretion. Your
miracle dissipates, it’s over. The HG alone determines what
remains.

MIRACUOUS ACTION
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“It does get easier,” Raphael said, “to do God's work.” He was mad, but also he was a scientist; and therefore, when
“To forgive yourself afterwards?” sufficient evidence accumulated that his methodology and
“No,” Raphael admitted. “Not forgiving yourself. Just the, results were impossible, he faced that evidence head-on.
you know, the God's work part.” “Something fills me with transcendent inspiration and gives
—from GENESIS, by Keiko Takemori me the power to scient by analogy,” he said. “I will shrink
down and inject myself into my brain, there to seek the source.”
REFLEXIVE ACTIONS Sweet Hari! It was scarcely sooner said than done, and
among the tangles of his neurons he found it—the speaking tube
Action limitations or no action limitations, you can throw of the primal void, from which his inspirations came. Tracing it
in reflexive actions whenever. back, he found it disappeared into the ether; no sooner discovered
They’re cheaty hacks! than surmounted. “I will make an ethermobile,” he said, “and
More precisely, a reflexive action is always treated either take my trusty hawk and shotgun with me into the other realms.”
as an HG action or as a bonus feature on the action that Step by step he chased it down. Step by step he followed it;
you’re already taking. So you can include in your action as and in the end, he found a strange device, tucked into the corner
many reflexive actions as the HG lets you get away with. of his lab. His own invention, sure enough, though he'd never
You can even squeeze them into a flurry (pg. 174) along understood quite what it could do.
with your normal action. “And now I know,” he said, and laughed; the burden of his
For instance, it doesn’t take an extra action to invoke a science done, he did not worry over pettiness like “rational” and
Bond and turn it into Strike. You just throw that in with “possible” again.
whatever else you’re doing. And if you’re a shapeshifter, —from THE GRIGORI OF MARS, by Emily and Benjamin Chen
you can turn into a wolf or snake or whatever while using
Aspect to attack!
You can chew gum, walk and even talk all at the same
GIFTS time. You can roll through an army of your enemies in a
single continuous wave of action. You can even ride a
Some Gifts are automatic. Either the HG activates them unicycle through a mine field, blasting away at targets with
for you or you will activate them as reflexive actions. Other a shotgun held one-handed while reading Thus Spake
Gifts are miraculous actions that cost from 0-2 MP—you Zarathustra with your free hand and your eyes—if you
can’t combine them with Aspect, Domain, Persona, or absolutely must.
Treasure actions, and you can’t combine them with And you can sustain an Aspect action in general,
similarly non-reflexive Gifts. flowing, process terms—“I fight my way through them
until they surrender or they leave,” or “I’m going up to my
ASPECT ACTIONS room and doing Science for a time.”
You should think of Aspect, particularly at the high
You can do many things at once with an Aspect action. levels, as making you like the wind, like the waves of the
Aspect makes you a martial artist and a dancer on top sea, like fire, like the greatest martial arts masters. You’re a
of everything else. Your whole body moves at once. There’s blur of natural motion. You’re not just super-precise, you’re
a pattern to an Aspect action, a flow, more than a specific not just super-tough, you’re not just super-strong; you get
and easily distinguishable act. the agility, speed, and flexibility of a superhero.
You become a river of movement.
And for your mind it is the same.
Difficult concepts are a playground for you. You can
Rafael moved like a flock of ravens. You could not see where his wander the fields of higher math like a gift from God or
sword was one moment to the next, or his knife. There was only an apocalypse. You can whisper four words to confound
an explosion of motion, a confusing swirl of black and vigor, the greatest of philosophers. As a practical consideration,
far too much for the eyes to follow. you only have your own tongue and the HG’s to convey
With Shao-yan, conversely, I could scarcely see her move at these elemental insights to the group. So you and the other
all. I assume her sword met Rafael’s dozens if not hundreds of players may never know what those four words are. But
times in every second; the ringing of metal proved it. But all I
your Avatar can say them.
could see was its cold grey length extended in front of her,
surrounded by the faintest blur to every side. It moved inexorably
forward, and the flock of ravens back.
I had turned to run when the fight broke out, but Zéphyrin Yip Xiao-mei, regrettably, lost half of her mind to an
caught my arm. “Do not fear,” he murmured. “Rafael is a man of alchemical experiment gone awry. She still thinks perfectly
many desires; they come and go like the storm. Shao-yan is a well, of course, and this has proved no practical impediment to
woman who burns with eternal passion. They are striving, not to her success, but she admits quite explicitly that she cannot think
kill, but rather to debate the relative supremacy of these half of the thoughts she might otherwise have been capable of.
philosophies.”
—from IN THE RIGHT CIRCLES, by Jasprite Sherrard
—from the Thought-Record of Oriane Feroulet

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 171

ASPECT AND THE OTHER ATTRIBUTES Weaving at the Loom named Yin-Feng has many
If you’re sustaining a miraculous effect with some sort of desirable effects. Powers have tested Yin-Feng’s potency
physical focus or form, you can wield it with Aspect. For against the Excrucians, pitting the shuttling of the loom
instance, you can use an animation miracle to turn a against the edge of the Abhorrent Weapon Rivalry (that is
portion of your Estate into an extension of your body—to also Caligorant); Yin-Feng came away the victor. Yet
arm and armor yourself with it. While you’re doing this Powers rarely sit to weave from this loom. Yin-Feng
you can use Aspect miracles to do complicated things with produces no fabric save destiny, and those who use its
that extension of yourself! Similarly you can sustain powers for too long turn to molten silver and trickle away.
Treasure miracles to activate powerful features of your —from A TOURIST’S GUIDE TO CREATION, by Jasprite Sherrard
wondrous Anchors, and then use Aspect miracles to wield
them in a complex fashion.
If you possess something using Treasure, you can wield
your Aspect through its body. This draws on the natural TREASURE ACTIONS
limits of that body, however, rather than your own—if
Treasure miracles split the difference between the
you’re possessing one of your hopes, for instance, you’re not
simplicity of Domain and Persona miracles and the
going to be able to lift a great weight very easily because
potential complexity of Aspect-based actions. The
hope has no arms and legs. All you’ll be able to do is coil
Treasure miracle itself is a single push—a single moment,
more tightly about your own heart, or shine in yourself
a single pulse of will. You bend your Anchor’s powers
with greater strength.
towards one specific goal. You wield power to accomplish
this, for some appropriate value of “this.”
DOMAIN AND PERSONA ACTIONS But your Anchors can have complicated, weird, and
elaborate abilities. The way in which you, or your Anchor,
Domain and Persona actions are generally straightforward. brings those abilities to bear—that matters. It can be
They’re one movement of the will—one command, “do complicated and crucial. What begins, what must begin, as
this” or “be thus,” directed at the world. a single thought can become a tangled, insidious agenda
It is an artistic command. when it is expressed within the world.
It’s visual. It’s conceptual. It’s flavored and nuanced. And that’s okay.
You’re not using the natural, human language that you’re
probably using at the gaming table—not to give orders to
your Estate. So it’s possible that it’ll take you a bit of MOVEMENTS OF THE SOUL
detailed description to translate the miracle into terms that
In all of these miracles the most important limitation is
the other players can understand. But the basic effect
this:
should be a single movement of thusness in your head.
The blueprint for a miracle is not in the Power’s mind
Lesser miracles are very simple and straightforward in
but in their heart and soul. It is not possible for them to
what they do. Even greater miracles, which have more
plan out miracles of absurd elaboration; rather, they make
scope for detailed design, are single, atomic expressions of
what is elemental in them, what is aesthetic to them, what
your will.
is right to them. Their miracles are complete. They are
You can generally add features of lower-level miracles to
things of incredible complexity and detail, for all things
the higher-level ones.
existing in the world are things of incredible complexity
For instance, when you’re creating something with
and detail. They are marvels, for to exist is to be a marvel.
Domain, you can also toss a preservation effect on it. “Be!
But they are works of art and not design.
And be strong!” isn’t two miracles so much as one miracle,
It is difficult to bring the structural and grammatical
fortissimo. In destroying a thing, you can transfer its
intellect into a miracle, to invoke the mechanical and
strength to something else (preservation) or create a
architectural mind in it, to design layers of contingency
replacement (creation).
and dozens of disconnected functions into these
But with Domain and Persona you can’t do two
movements of the soul. The Powers of highly technical
unrelated things at once.
Estates, of course, may do so, but with arguably limited
agency and effectively by feel. Everyone else, to wield a

The bodhisattva carved a bow from the Rose Apple tree, and It is a problematic feature of magic, as with life, that its
said, “This weapon shall end suffering.” mastery is self-extinguishing. No sooner does one really grasp a
“Then it shall end all life,” Maya told him. truth then one begins the process of learning the magic beyond
The bodhisattva thought a moment. “So it shall,” he admitted, that truth—the first rule of which is, oh, by the way, that thing
and carved “Life’s Ending” on its stave. which you just learned is not just incomplete but false.
—from LEGENDS OF THE NOBILIS, by Luc Ginneis —from A CATALOG OF MODERN MAGIC, by Eric Optera

MIRACUOUS ACTION
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I had always wanted beauty; and milord knew this, and when It lies within the capacity of the Noble soul to rearrange
he chose to grant me a gift, that was the one he chose. “It is its own essence. Reach within yourself and know the
artificial,” he told me, “and has no meaning to Heaven; but tainted inferno of your passions; feel it rise and flicker and
your desire is a righteous one.” dance as you think of lust objects, anger objects, hate objects,
In this fashion, I have learned what it means to be touched and the objects of your adoration. Teach it to rise. Teach it
by a miracle; and I record it, that others may understand. I look to fall. You must learn to draw the pollution around you
in the mirror, and I do not see myself: only the miracle. Others into that fire, until it roars larger than the world. You must
look at me, and they do not see me: only the wonder milord learn to extinguish it in a moment, until even its embers
crafted. For a very long time, my friends did not recognize me, are black, leaving only the clear blaze of eternal passion in
so greatly hung the miracle about my brow. your immortal soul. Without this power, you cannot master
I tell them: I am still myself! But some of them do not hear the pure arts.
it, to this day. —from THE BOOK OF PURITY, by Samsi Mandaru
—from LIFE IN LADISLAU’S HOUSE, by Irina Pangratiu

miracle that takes substantial technical detail to describe, � Paradox and acts of hubris—herein defined as
must sustain that miracle while they polish it, edit it, and miracles that create, destroy, or reshape miraculous
hold it up to their aesthetic and intellectual senses for power equal or superior to your own—can form a
review. This is a process taking them a good fraction of the void within the world that attracts Actual (pg. 165) or
time it would take an ordinary self. Excrucian possession. Not every paradox and not
every act of hubris will do so, but it’s up to the HG
HUBRIS, AND ACTS OF WONDER to decide whether it’s common, uncommon, or rare.

If you’re going to change yourself into something else, or

Miracles may touch the Imperial or Excrucian soul. They
can give birth to wonders. They can shatter the patterns of make an Imperator factory, or shatter Hell, or catch in
causality and make a twisting out of time. glass Cneph the Maker, creator of all things—perhaps you
They can change you—can improve you, can make you can, and perhaps you can’t, but be aware that it is a
better, and stronger, and transcendent. principle of the world that what succeeds, has consequents.
They can do crazy stuff, and even—particularly the
Gifts—can play havoc with even the basic tenets of these
rules.
But the powers that you have are finite, and they cannot
In the Chancel of the angel Sophonisba there are two glass
give you ease.
flutes shaped by Cneph's own hand. There were once three.
The Hubris Rule sets these four limits on what miracles
In the basement of Lady Nawal's palace there is a penitent.
may do, to ensure that the HG can continue to challenge
She was a musician once. A spider startled her as she played,
the Avatars and add trouble to their lives:
and she dropped and shattered a flute.
� You can’t remove or banish all the conflict from your
Her penance is very painful, and involves hot coals. She
life with miracles;
has been told that with each repetition she moves a little
� You can’t give yourself a dharma of peace, safety, or
closer to forgiveness.
ease;
If Nawal had any choice at all, that would be true. But
� You can’t use description to dodge the conflict
for some things, there is no absolution.
systems by phrasing a miracle such that the target
can’t or won’t choose to resist it; and —from LEGENDS OF THE NOBILIS, by Luc Ginneis

Get the Deets! on…

The abomination at Mut performs the most terrible of The Reykjavik Actual
punishments, inflicted only upon those creatures instrumental to This is probably a time loop Actual but could also be a
the destruction of the universe. time-eater, time-emitter, or a serial anachronismizer!
When asked, “Have you ever been called upon to enact this Nobody knows exactly when it was summoned because the
punishment?” the abomination nods, and gives a toothy grin. dates in question are infested but it is generally agreed that
When asked, “Does this mean the universe has already been the first beetles from this Actual showed up several days
destroyed?” the abomination shrugs, gives another grin, and before Scybale's attempted planting of a new World Ash.
enacts the lesser punishment reserved for those who doubt the If you are ever in Reykjavik and you have the opportunity
world. to time tunnel or eat a mysterious-looking beetle it is really
—from LEGENDS OF THE NOBILIS, by Luc Ginneis just kind of best you not.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 173
CHAPTER 21

Miraculous
Conflict
Sometimes characters will get into fights. Sometimes
they’ll get into non-combat free-for-alls to decide the fate
of someone or something in the world.
Cneph did not come to Creation empty- For cases like this, you need these conflict rules.
handed. In the void where its world
would be there struggled three forces. ACTING IN THE MOMENT
N’mosnikttiel, the fire that swallows
worlds, raged in the emptiness. Its faces When you act you usually go with the flow of what’s going
chanted words of destruction. The on.
creatures of the void trembled in its heat. That means that stuff is happening—the other players
Yet the Creator caught N'mosnikttiel in are doing stuff, and the HG’s described some of what’s
his net and shaped the angels from its going on. That’s your context for action. You are pitting your
flesh. actions against that background and against whatever
Azbogah, the radiance that destroys anyone else does later to try to stop or affect you.
the unrighteous, shone with fell beauty. In a direct head-to-head conflict the higher miracle level
Its raiment was the jewel named wins.
Structure. Its scepter was the staff called But that doesn’t mean that your lower-level miracles are
Strength. Yet the Creator caught Azbogah useless in the presence of higher-level effects. Lower-level
in his hand and planted the World Ash in miracles are still miracles.They act upon the world.They just
its heart. can’t take more powerful miracles on head-on and defeat
Narsinha, the lightning that dances them or wipe them from existence. If there’s anything else
on the surface of the abyss, fled the left for them to do, they still do that.
Creator; yet Cneph stood at the end of its It’s like fighting an undertow. A weak swimmer will lose,
every path. Narsinha's face was a mask of but they still get to swim.
hatred. Its hands were twisted claws. It So sometimes you don’t even have to worry about the
spat naked fury. Yet Cneph tamed its number-vs.-number part of a conflict. An Aspect 2 miracle
heart and wrapped it about Creation to gives you Aspect 2 effectiveness. A Domain 4 miracle
form the Weirding Wall. creates, summons, or animates some of your Estate. A
That is how the universe came to be. Treasure 3 miracle activates some cool function of a
—from LEGENDS OF THE NOBILIS, wondrous Anchor. Unless you’re about to be swept away by
by Luc Ginneis the kind of tidal wave of miraculous power that makes
actions like that irrelevant, all that stuff still happens, and it
still matters, even if even bigger stuff is happening around
you.

MIRACULOUS CONFLICT
174

When you grow wings and soar out of the way of an

incoming firestorm, you aren’t thinking, “It’s too bad that It was more graceful than a dance, the alchemist and the
my wings are not as strong, on an absolute scale, as that nimblejack: one blessed with dexterity by something greater
firestorm.” You’re thinking, “Yay wings!” Or you ought to than a god, and one whose shoes—high-heeled, no less—gave
be, at least! The firestorm was already coming when you her the terrible speed of a hurricane wind. I think that after the
decided to act; your miracle changed what was going to first ten seconds—that must have been an eternity to them—
happen—in this case, by getting you out of its way! the nature of their battle changed. The nimblejack set aside its
will to claw out her eyes and pull her liver free, and she
AFTER THE ACTION surrendered her desire for life. Hunger did not exist. Life did
After each action you take, the HG acts. They talk about not exist. There was only the motion and the speed.
what just happened. They talk about what NPCs do. They It ended all too predictably. The beauty of the encounter
talk about what’s going on in the world. reached and moved the nimblejack’s stone heart and the creature
Then either somebody else acts; or you act; or time died at once.
passes, in about that order of precedence. —from the Memoirs of Alice Mendel, Lady of the Thunder
When they’re done responding to your turn, the HG
will take a moment to check whether anyone wants to
act—either explicitly or by waiting a few seconds to see if Maybe it all comes down to speed. Maybe it’ll all be
anyone jumps in. Then, if nobody’s eager to act, the HG decided by a single act—
will describe more stuff that happens, as time passes, until And you lunge for your enemy’s throat just as they
either somebody does want to act or the HG gets tired of lunge for yours.
describing stuff and demands that somebody else do Sometimes taking turns doesn’t work.
something. Instead, you call as a player for a flurry of action—
HGs really like to talk. Oh, they do go on! But they also something that waives the whole concept of “going first”
really like to listen, and to have players do cool actions. So
and “going second,” and instead recognizes that
just what happens here exactly is a little unpredictable.
everybody’s doing everything at once.
Sometimes the HG will describe miraculous things
You still choose your action.
happening—usually as the result of a miraculous creature’s
The HG still describes what happens.
action, but sometimes as part of the natural process of the
But everyone else who wants to throw their hat in the
world, or as leftover energy in somebody’s expired miracle.
ring gets to act in the flurry, too. And if you’re not happy
The HG can assign any miracle level they like to the
with the way things stand, after one of their actions or after
miracles they describe into being. They can also choose
an HG description, you can go back and change your
whether to tell you these miracle levels, hint at them, or
action. You can make small changes. You can add a few
keep them a secret, on a case-by-case basis.
little details and complexities that don’t increase the
miracle level. Or, if you want to, you sacrifice any MP
FLURRIES OF ACTION already spent, toss out your old action entirely, and pick a
new action for the flurry.
You sweep together with someone, exchange hundreds of Then the HG resolves everything at once.
blows, and then bam— This can hit a deadlock pretty easily. You can skulk in
One definitive action. the back of the flurry, not wanting to act until you know
You play out a hundred thousand tactical possibilities in what other people are doing. And maybe they do that to
your head. They’re doing the same. But you’re just a little you. And then the flurry of blows looks a lot like an iaijutsu
better. You hope and then duel or a Mexican standoff in which absolutely nothing
you move. happens.
Or maybe there’s no tactics and no back-and-forth in it.

Quantum theory tears down the classical divide between the

mundane and the miraculous. When probabilities rather than The blade spun about her; it severed swords, arrows, and even
certainties define the world, the hand of God—from outside the the bursts of venom and fire that came at her from the
universe—no longer manifests as a distinct and absolute alchemical cannons, so that they fell harmless at her feet. It
perturbation of natural law. The clean division between an act stunned me; I could not imagine a mortal developing such
of God and an act of the universe vanishes. The work of the prowess.
divine diffuses into a quantum halo. A given action of the Holy It seems that Zéphyrin heard my thoughts; for he glanced
Spirit may be 3 parts per billion miraculous; 5 parts per billion; my way. “She is good,” he admitted. “Perhaps the best human I
or even, in the presence of a saint, as much as one and a half have ever seen. But she has survived this long because she carries
percent pure miracle. Jotun-forged steel.”
—from a sermon by Bishop Julius Dow, 03/25/00 —from the Thought-Record of Oriane Feroulet

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS opposite: “The Cardiff Actual”, from pieces by Giovanni Battista Tiepolo and others, by Jenna Moran
 175

I am, kind of, having to guess? that there is something sort of

flurry-like about the Cardiff Actual? (depicted, May 18, 2004),
since I don't have that rare brain thing that lets you actually spot it
in the image. *^_^*;; It's probably like a blue dress/gold dress sort of
deal?

opposite: by artist (I cribbed from these) MIRACULOUS CONFLICT

176

Or you can change your action, and then someone else A hundred demons clutched at me, shouting, as I passed
changes theirs. So you change your action back. So they towards the great iron gates. One shoved its misshapen face in
change theirs. You preempt them. They preempt your mine, crying, “Torment! I can issue more agonizing torments
preemption. You change tactics. So do they. You let them in less time than any demon here!”
get caught up in the tactical interplay, then lunge for their The gondola paused in its progress. “Why should I wish an
eyes. They block and sweep your leg. You catch yourself exceptionally agonizing torment?” I asked, being new to Hell.
and follow up with an attack. The tactical contest resumes. It tapped its nose knowingly. “ You can’t avoid the pain,”
If neither of you is spending MP you can keep this up, well, it said, “but at least you can have quality.”
not forever, really, but for longer than your players’ voices
—from PROGRESSION AND REGRESSION, by Michael Kay
can hold out, at least.
But that’s okay.
If you hit a deadlock, you have two easy ways to fix it. NOT WANTING TO FLURRY
The first is to say, “We’re in a deadlock. We do this back If you’re not in a flurry but multiple players want to do
and forth hundreds of times, OK?” stuff at more or less the same time, you should figure out a
And everyone agrees, and then the HG resolves based way to take turns. If you can’t figure this out—presumably
on that. because your Avatars are fighting one another, or at least
Or you do the same thing and then add, “Let’s all decide have very different ideas about what should be done—then
on our final actions before we take them, and give them surprise! You’re in a flurry after all!
secretly to the HG, so we stop skulking or circling around.”
The HG decides what any NPCs in the fight do. They read OH NO YOU DON’T
or listen to your secret actions.
And bam. Sometimes you need to stop something from happening.
Flurries can burn through huge amounts of MP and It was about to happen; a player did it, or the HG
time to no practical effect, so make sure that you’re doing described it, it was happening. And you realized that this
fun and thematic stuff during them. There’s nothing more thing that was happening was a very bad thing. Like, they
wasteful than playing out dozens of exchanges in a single are cutting your nose off and you need your nose for
second, and then realizing that they bored you. That’s like sneezing with, or they’re going to blow up the world, and
writing the Great American Novel and then discovering that’s also bad for a variety of reasons.
that you don’t even like literature! If you want to wait until they’re in the middle of their
action and then take your own action to stop it, that works
PACE pretty well. But sometimes their action is atomic—one
You can ask the HG to set a “pace” for combat, or to revise thing, that happens, and in the instant that it happens it is
that pace based on events. done. And other times their action is practically instant,
When events start happening much faster than that even if it does take a measurable amount of time in the
pace, you know that you should go into a flurry instead of world, so that dissecting that action to act inside it would
using ordinary actions. Conversely, when they’re much drop you well below the pace.
slower than that pace, you know that you should attempt So we’re going to say that if you’re fast enough, you can
not to flurry. stop something that was already happening. You are just
that cool.
You say “Oh no you don’t!” or “I’d like to interrupt that,”
or something of that kind.
And the HG unwinds that action or event, giving back
The Scarab among the Stars, most praised and most reviled! any MP that were already spent on it, and instead starts a
called forth a messiah from His flesh to speak the glories of His flurry of actions. The setting for that flurry is the moment
name. The five-armed sengeri, exhaling paeans, pulled the just before that action or event. An interrupted Avatar gets
messiah before Him that He might regard His creation. The to go in the flurry (if they want to), but usually shouldn’t
Scarab, most blessed and most cursed! set His burning gaze
upon the huddled beast, and spoke: “It satisfies Me not.” And
The demagogue locked in the cell required constant watch. She
the messiah was taken therewith away. They brought before
raved and ranted, nonsense mostly. Our lady had broken her
Him shapes and saviors in the form of girl and man and vine,
mind. Occasionally, she would recover some focus. Then the
spinefish and firebird, unicorn and mud; but with each He found
words that poured from her mouth could cut manacles and
flaw, and cast away the substance of His progeny. It is for this
hammer through the walls. We drugged her from afar, when
reason that we have never heard the scripture of the Scarab,
she broke loose, using all manner of subtle poisons. We could not
most beauteous and most vile!—though His children are infinite
approach her. Mere earplugs could not protect a body from
in virtue, He knows ever that better can be made.
falling under her spell.
—from VARIATIONS ON A RUSSIAN FABLE, by Michael Kay
—from ON THE BEAT, by Keiko Takemori

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just reiterate their action if they do. You have to go in the

flurry, since you’re trying to interrupt. And afterwards, if The lord Erroman sleeps. In the morning, we lift him
from his bed and bathe him; then we dress him, and
you win your will in the flurry, you either defend against
attend to his teeth and hair, and take him to the audience
their action or somehow stop them from taking it.
chamber. For all the judgments brought before him, he does
You can’t interrupt flurries, only actions! One interrupt not wake, and his eyes shift behind their lids in the dance of
deep is as far as this game goes. eternal dreams. He has shamed his rivals and fought the
legions of Unbeing without stirring from his rest. In the
STOPPING ACTIONS morning, when we open the curtain before his bed, we
Suppose that it’s not enough to squeeze in a viable defense cannot help but look upon his face in dread and fear, and
against an action. You need to stop them from taking it. know relief when we see it unchanged; for we are told that
How does this work? if he should ever open his eyes, the greatest of all disasters
You’ll want to implement one of four preventative shall be upon us.
approaches. —from SEVENTY KINGS AND SEVEN, by Alexander De Vriend
First, you could start sustaining an action that mitigates
their actions or keeps them under control. This would let So they’re totally reasonable in thinking that you can’t
them break free by using a more powerful action, but it can do anything about it!
lock them down for at least a moment. Second, you could
It just happens, right?
“wound” them (pg. 183) with an effect that gives them a
But—not so fast!
temporary Bond or Affliction that forces them not to act
You have an idea. Maybe you have a way to be just as
right then. Obviously they can circumvent a Bond or
quick. Maybe you’re even subtler. Maybe you have a way to
Affliction if they must. Third, you could change the
act at a distance, or while you’re asleep. Maybe there is
environment in some fashion that obviates their intended
something you can do.
action, forcing them to deal with your meddling in some
So here’s the rule:
fashion before they can proceed.
It’s quite probable that there will be cases where
Even this won’t hold a sufficiently determined enemy
something happens in play and your Avatar can’t do
back for long.
anything about it. You should accept that and bear that in
The only way to definitively hold back an enemy with
the Bonds or MP they’d need to push against the artificial mind. But you as a player always have the opportunity to
boundaries you impose is the fourth approach: kill them. use the action system to do something about anything that
If you kill someone they almost certainly won’t cut off your happens in play. Right up to the moment of death, or its
nose after or blow up the world. And if they do, you are equivalent (pg. 185), there’s no such thing as an event that
within your rights to complain loudly to every remaining happens in play that you as a player can’t respond to with
relevant authority. either an interrupt, a miracle, or a request for a flurry.
The answer to “Can you do it? Can you do something

NOT SO FAST! about this?”

Is always:
You can try!
Someone does something really quick. Something does
something really subtle. Someone tries to pull a fast one
while your Avatar is asleep, or paralyzed, or trapped in an
ice cubicle orbiting one of the moons of Mars.

The Nobles have a gesture—a twist and flattening of the

hand—that means “I Have Achieved.” They use it sometimes to
celebrate victory or triumph. More often, it is used before a A forbidden thought nags at the corner of my mind. I do not need
victory becomes apparent—a symbol that their victory is already to think it; this is the Tempest’s blessing upon my kind. I need
written, already paid for, and already earned, and that protest never know what blasphemous, foul, or arrogant idea waits for
is now futile. me there. But I have a choice, and I make it, and think what I
The night I came to understand this went poorly for the ought not.
I recognize the creature that falls from the sky, with its whip
Prince of Knots. He sought to wrench the Powers of the Light
of nettles and its face of masks. It, in turn, recognizes me; and
from the glorious Tegus Tsedenbal. He had his audience in the
pauses. “Tellero,” it says, “why do you insist upon this repetition
palm of his hand, but then a mousy woman with hooked teeth of pain? You are beginning to nag upon my conscience.”
stood up in the back. She began to argue against his points. She “Humans are creators,” I said, “and the fabric of that creation
transformed his case slowly from indisputable fact to arguable is our thoughts.”
hypothesis. He sought to stop her, but every time he opened his It viewed me through many eyes. “A fair assessment,” it
mouth she made the gesture “I Have Achieved,” and, sputtering, conceded. “But such works as yours leave scars on their creator.”
he would fall silent for several minutes at a time. —from APOCRYPHAL THOUGHT-RECORDS, by Kiumars Ghatary
—from ON SERVING THE NOBILIS, by Luc Ginneis

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MIRACLES AND THE ENVIRONMENT
You’re trying to map an ordinary building that someone
has rendered non-Euclidian. You’re trying to kill some of
Lord Entropy’s tame nimblejacks, and you’ve lured them
into the Cityback. You stand in the light of Heaven and try
to bind a demon to its service. And you demand something
like:
� “The particulars of the ordinary world are measurable.”
� “Tame things in the Cityback should die.” or
� “The beauty of Heaven demands service.”

Such words are in harmony with the world you’re in; the
world flows with you.
The Properties of the world you’re in can be used as level
2 Bonds. You can gain 2 free Strike when you invoke them.
You can gain 1-2 MP when they actively get you in trouble
(“and I would have gotten away with it, too, if the
particulars of the world weren’t so measurable!”). You
might take a small spiritual wound if you decide you’ve
broken such a rule. You can even survive off them, as you
can with your other Bonds, if you are diligent in your focus
on them. However, doing so will taint you slowly with the
nature of that world. This manifests in game terms as a
wound (see pg. 183); if you live too long off of the
substances of Heaven or Hell, for instance, you will
become a creature entirely enslaved to them.

The guides who lead travelers across Semane Menheneott Pass

firmly insist on a party size no less than six. To cross that Pass,
one must turn left thrice, then right twice, along the path; then
straight at the bend; and finally, on the hairpin turn high above
the world, one must push one of one's traveling companions over
the edge. Those who do not follow this simple prescription remain
lost in the mountains forever. Novice travelers are often
heartbroken by this practice, which the guides do not explain in
advance; experienced wayfarers know to recruit an ignorant
“patron” from the city below.

—from EARTH STORIES, compiled by Édouard Guy

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 179
CHAPTER 22

Tools
for
Miraculous
Conflict
THE DIVINE MANTLE
You’re under siege. Your every miracle glances off your
enemy’s defenses and they’re tearing through your own.
But you won’t give in, you won’t lose.
You invoke the Divine Mantle—the glory, the roaring
Once, the world ended, and the Ash fire, the flaming aura of raw power available to Powers with
caught fire; but there is no fire that high Domain. Suddenly your every action burns with the
surpasses the blaze of the Ash's spirit. truth and divine breath of your Estate. For the rest of the
The Ash subsumed the flames and grew scene, and at least the next four hours, your every action has
strong; and the world was forced to Miraculous Edge.
recreate itself.
—from LEGENDS OF THE NOBILIS, MIRACULOUS EDGE
Miraculous Edge is the Noble equivalent of mundane
by Luc Ginneis
Edge. Each point of Miraculous Edge comes with one
point of mundane Edge unless otherwise stated, to a
maximum total mundane Edge of 5.
But that’s not the cool thing about it.
The cool thing is that Miraculous Edge helps your
miracle win conflicts with other miracles. It gives you an
edge when the HG is deciding which miracle is stronger.
Specifically, when deciding which miracle wins a direct
conflict or acts with greater force in an indirect conflict, you
reduce your opponent’s effective miracle level by [the
higher of your Miraculous Edge or your miracle’s Strike,]
down to a minimum of 0.

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180

So if you put up a Divine Mantle, you’re effectively THE AUCTORITAS MAGISTER

gaining that much of an edge against every hostile miracle
You are the calm in the center of the storm. You are the
you oppose. To whatever extent an opponent’s miraculous
thing that power cannot touch, cannot grasp, cannot
action or strategy depends on overpowering yours, their
compel. You take the worst that your enemies can throw at
miracle becomes more difficult; to whatever extent it does
you and you are not moved.
not depend on overpowering your miracle, it is unaffected.
You are a miraculous creature.
Thus, if you are smashing a city with a tidal wave, the
If you have Persona, you may also be a breaker of
Divine Mantle makes it harder for your enemies to turn
miracles.
the wave to stone or otherwise stop the wave from
If you need to shield against hostile effects, you may
smashing the city. It explicitly doesn’t make it any harder to
spend up to your Persona rating in MP to invoke the
surf the wave or shelter a single city block from your
Auctoritas Magister. This is a miraculous action. Each
attack.
point that you spend adds to the rating of your Auctoritas
INVOKING THE MANTLE Magister. You can spend MP of any type. You can spend
You can invoke the Divine Mantle by spending up to your additional MP at a later time, strengthening an active
Domain rating in MP; this is a reflexive action. Each point Auctoritas by adding to the MP already spent, but your
adds to the rating of your Divine Mantle. You can spend Auctoritas Magister is capped at your Persona.
MP of any type. You can spend additional MP at a later You must invoke this effect instead of a more typical
time, adding to the MP already spent, but your Divine miracle—the Auctoritas Magister is not reflexive, and
Mantle is capped at your Domain. sustaining it requires a sustained action. You need a new
While under the Mantle, you have Miraculous Edge action every time you strengthen your Auctoritas, although
equal to the Mantle rating. you only have to sustain one of them. This does mean that
People can see your Divine Mantle, and they can tell you can’t maintain your Auctoritas and strengthen it while
when you spend MP on it, but they can’t see your Mantle’s doing anything else at all, but once you’ve strengthened it,
exact numeric strength. Nor can you see the exact strength you can move on to other things.
of the Divine Mantle of others. It wraps you in a divine The Auctoritas Magister is an Auctoritas that protects
aura of your Estate which even mortals can recognize, but � you
not even Powers (with a few possible exceptions like the � your mundane actions
Power of Digitization) can precisely define. If for some
reason you absolutely must go incognito, you can shrug off While you have it up miracles can only affect you with
the Mantle at any time by spending an additional MP. your consent, and (with or without your consent) they can’t
The Divine Mantle is a reflexive miraculous action but oppose your mundane actions at all. If your mundane
it is not properly speaking a miracle; neither other miracles action is something like “protect” or “defend” the area
nor Auctorita can prevent it from functioning. around you, you can shield everything within five feet of
your body from any sort of miracle at all.
Miracles opposed by an Auctoritas Magister do not
cease—for instance, if someone summons up a rainstorm,
Three children walked in the wake of the Theocrat Daniels. As the rain will continue to fall even if you walk beneath it
he gestured benediction to his flock, they sang, “Holy, holy, sheltering the area around you with mundane actions and
holy.” an umbrella. But your Auctoritas Magister suspends the
He woke in the morning to that song. As he lowered his effects of miracles, as if they’d never been used at all. For
head to bless the food he ate, he heard that song. He walked and instance, your umbrella would keep the ground dry within
laughed and cried to that refrain. Nor did he find this unusual, 5 feet of you, as if the rain had never fallen; if you walked
for the Theocrat Daniels belonged to the gods, and his every breath 10 feet away, the ground would instantly dry in your new
was graced. location and become sodden (as if rained on for some
It came to pass that the Theocrat Daniels fell in love, and time) where you were. You can even drive calmly along
with none less than the Queen of the Land. He and the King streets that a miraculous earthquake is buckling; the road
spoke, in private chambers, and their words grew hot. In a
will reconstruct in front of your car to permit your driving
paroxysm of rage, the Theocrat snatched the royal scepter from its
action to continue, then twist back into brokenness behind
place beside the King and thrust its tapered point into his liege
you. However, once the controlling Power stops sustaining
lord’s side. And as the King’s blood spread, the children sang,
“Holy, holy, holy.”
The Theocrat Daniels belonged to the gods, and even his
The storm raged fiercely; but around St. Romanus, the air was
darkest deeds were blessed.
clear and calm.
—from PARABLES FOR OUR MODERN AGE, by Jackie Robinson,
—from FAILURES OF LIGHT, by Emily Chen
writing on the topic of the Divine Mantle

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 181

a miracle, its effects usually cease to be miraculous; after a

small grace period (equal to the pace of the conflict, as per
pg. 176) the Auctoritas Magister loses its relevance to that
effect.
Your Auctoritas is essentially invisible, except in its
effects, but other characters can see you spend MP to
invoke it: a kind of stillness settles or deepens in around
you. Nobody can see the exact number of MP you spend
in-character, nor can they precisely identify the final
Auctoritas rating except by testing it against various levels
of Strike.
The Auctoritas Magister is a miraculous action but not
per se a miracle; Auctorita do not deactivate each other.

PROTECTING OTHERS
You can raise an Auctoritas Magister to protect something
else instead of yourself—a person, group, or place that is
the active focus of your attention. You must sustain this
effect or it goes away.

STRIKE
You’re facing someone with an Affliction of invincibility.
Or an Auctoritas Magister. Or a massive Divine Mantle
that’s crushing your miracles. Or just someone throwing
around a higher-level miracle than you want to use to
prevent it.
So you put all your heart and drive behind a single
miracle. You infuse it; you make it a spear of thought, a
pure and blazing breath, an incomparable expression of
your heart and soul.
You can buy Strike for your miracles by spending one
or more MP of any sort.This is a reflexive action. Each MP
spent buys one point of Strike. This adds to the Strike you
get from Bonds and other sources.
Miracles with Strike ignore the Auctoritas up to the
level of the Strike.
For the purpose of deciding who wins a miraculous
conflict with you, you also reduce your opponent’s effective
miracle level by [the higher of your Miraculous Edge or
your miracle’s Strike] down to a minimum of 0.

Our enemies cannot help but kill us.

If they did not come at us with their blades and their malice,
so we could hate them, we would have to love them. There is
nothing in between, not for creatures of such majesty. We would
have to love them; and, in loving, die; not like Romeo died, or
Juliet, but like the night dies that loves the sun, or the fire dies
that loves the sea. In embracing the alien, in striving to grasp
that which lies forever beyond us, we would extinguish
ourselves.
—from A PHILOSOPHY OF TREASON,
by Augustina Valentina (suppressed)

TOOS FOR MIRACULOUS CONFLICT

182

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 183
CHAPTER 23

Wounds
Something bad happens to you. Someone uses a
miraculous effect on you. You take a wound.
Let’s pause here and look at your health when you’re not
wounded.
He had nine heads and he breathed a You have—
terrible radioactive fire and the tendrils � 2 Divine Health levels; and
of him sank into the street and the cars � 1 Tough Health level; and
and then ripped out of them as he � 2 Normal Health levels.
rippled his way along; but still, he took
the time to salute us as he passed, and Your Divine Health levels are your ability to keep going
brush away the rocks that pinned us and stay in control over yourself even when people are
down. hitting you with nuclear weaponry, major miracles, and
Once a Marine, always a Marine, other extremely dangerous effects. Your Tough level is for
they said; the man may mutate, but the handling gunfire, low-end miracles, and suchlike things.
Corps in him lives on. Finally you have Normal Health levels to absorb trivial
—from THE ENDS OF THE EARTH, effects like smoke inhalation, influenza, and being stabbed
with two giant needles.
by K.C. Danine
These estimates assume that you are doing absolutely
nothing to protect yourself.
Most of the time, in practice, lesser miracles won’t even
touch you—or they’ll take one of your Normal Health
levels, at worst. This is because if someone tries to turn you
into a newt or ignite a fire in your lungs your natural reflex
is to defend yourself. Most of the time, in practice, you’ll be
pretty hard to kill, even when someone unleashes massive
firepower, because it’s hard to do even one deadly wound to
a Noble who is defending themselves.

WOUNDS
184

But if you’re too busy holding up the sky or something You should think of most humans as having a single
to properly defend yourself, then even weaker miracles are Normal Health level. Tough soldiers might have two
dangerous, and level 4 becomes the natural boundary for Normal Health levels, or even a Tough and a Normal
deadly.35 Health level, instead.
The HG decides when something wounds you. The HG
also decides whether you take minor, serious, or deadly Surface Wounds inflict a temporary Bond.
damage from it. Something happened to you.
It did!
There are four basic tiers of damage in Nobilis: But you decide, as a player, how much of an effect it
� Surface Wounds—cosmetic damage, such as can
actually has. You get MP if you play along to your
cost you a Normal Health level;
� Serious Wounds—meaningful damage or setbacks, detriment, but the degree of participation, and implicitly
such as can cost you a Tough Health level; the actual seriousness of the wound, is up to you.
� Deadly Wounds—terrible damage, such as can cost Further the nastier effects—say, turning you into a
you a Divine Health level; and squash—don’t take very well. You don’t actually treat it as
� Defeat, when you wind up with no Health Levels “my Avatar is now a squash.” It’s more like “now my Avatar
left. is under an enchantment that is trying to turn them into a
squash.”
Effects like Durant (and Active Immortality, and
For raw physical wounds at this level, it’s really up to
preservations in general) change how hard something has
you how bad they are. You can have strategically torn
to hit you to cause deadly damage, serious damage or any
clothing and a bit of red blood-like coloring on your arm.
damage at all.
Damage in Nobilis does scale down—if something Or you can be staggering through a gray-white haze void
would take a Divine Health level, and you don’t have any, of pain. You should either define the actual wound yourself
it wounds a Tough Health level instead. If something or act on a basic description that the HG gives you; the
would take a Tough Health level, and you’re out of those, more trouble it causes you, either way, the better your
you take a Normal Health level instead. chance to gain MP from the wound, but it’s totally OK to
assume that it’s a trivial and meaningless effect instead of
When you run out of Normal Health levels, you become trying for that MP.
temporarily immune to minor damage and minor effects; The Bond level is generally 2 for a wound from a lesser
there’s nothing left for them to do to you. miracle and 4 for a wound from a greater miracle. The HG
When you lose your Tough Health level, your Normal
Health levels heal—minor effects and cosmetic damage has the option to assign Bond levels of 1, 3, and 5 to
fade away to make room for new effects. But when they’re particularly strong or weak miracles and to assign Bond
gone again, and you’re out of both Tough and Normal levels for damage from Aspect miracles and mundane
Health levels, you’re temporarily immune to even serious, effects and weaponry to taste.
meaningful effects. When you heal the Surface Wound—naturally, or using
When you lose your Divine Health levels, your Tough a miracle, or by losing your Tough Health level—the Bond
Health level heals.36 fades away. If you were really enjoying playing out the
You might think that losing all your health levels would
Bond you can, with HG permission, add it to your list of
make you immune to damage completely, and to a certain
extent that’s true. However, when you lose all your health Bonds. You’ll then have to shuffle your Bond and
levels, your character stops being an Avatar. If they’re still Affliction points around at the end of the story to get back
alive, it’s possible that the HG will describe them as taking down to [13 + your Treasure] in total.
further damage, or describe them as perversely invincible
in the moment of their defeat—but that’s just HG Example Surface Wound Bonds:
description of the world. It’s not part of the game rules! � I’ve been shot!
� scary paper cut
35 You can technically lose even your Divine Health level to a
� green hair
level 3 action, a level 2 action, a level 0-1 action, or, heck, to an
� troubled by these circumstances
unarmed mundane action. But your attacker has to sell the
HG on something like that and that oughtn’t be easy!
Conversely, if you don’t defend against it, and you aren’t
Durant or anything, a level 4 miracle will take your Divine
Health level by default. If you want it to do less damage than “ You’re alive,” said Smithson Jack. “Didn’t they order your
that to you, you’ll have to sell your HG on that! execution?”
“They did,” admitted Benedict Aguerie. “Eight times. ‘Spect
36 You actually get all your Tough Health levels back, but unless
I’ll be dead any minute now.”
you’re playing something really weird, that happens to always
be exactly one. —from GUARANTEES OF PRIVACY, by Emily Chen

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 185

Serious Wounds inflict a temporary 1-point Affliction. What Deadly Wounds are, however, is much more
Serious wounds can be pretty nasty. Someone can difficult to overcome with the casual use of MP and Bonds.
sabotage your luck, or set your nose permanently on fire, or A Power can fight past the pain of a Serious Wound to
turn you into a lizard, or stop the function of your will. Or protect even the weakest of their Bonds; to overcome and
they can fire a shotgun point-blank into your face. They negate a Deadly Wound is much more likely to require a
can ruin your whole day, or for that matter, your whole life. meaningful outlay of MP.
However, even if the effect would normally do so, even When you heal a Deadly Wound, the Affliction fades
if it winds up worded to do so, a serious wound never takes away. Again, with HG permission, you can keep it if you’d
away your control over your character and your character’s rather, and as per the rules above.
miraculous actions. The Hubris Rule runs both ways!
That means that even if someone, say, stops the function Example Deadly Wound Afflictions:
of your will, you can overcome this effect with any miracle � body dissolving post-nuke
that has at least 1 point of Strike. You don’t have to explain � banished into the spirit realm
how you muster the will to accomplish this: the effect � inducted into the ant colony
demonstrates and supports itself. Even if someone takes � incredibly lucky
your senses from you and casts you into a timeless void, � headless
you can continue to participate in play, using a miracle � falling into darkness
with (again) at least 1 Strike; the divine fire of that Strike
lights a path out from the void. You can even ignore a Defeat is when you lose your last Health level and you
typical Serious Wound entirely if you sustain some sort of don’t have any left.
contrary or mitigating effect (with, of course, at least 1 This is always a Normal Health level. When you lose
Strike.) Doing so is totally normal and okay; even Deadly your last Divine level, your Tough level heals instantly.
Wounds can be overcome and you’re actively expected to When you lose your Tough level, your Normal levels heal
fight off Serious Wounds. instantly. It’s not until that last Normal Health level fades
When you heal the Serious Wound, the Affliction fades that you are finally defeated.
away. Again, with HG permission, you can keep it if you’d When you’re defeated, your character stops being an
rather, and as per the rules above. Avatar.
It doesn’t matter in this regard what the actual effect is.
Example Serious Wound Afflictions: Someone can use a miracle to give you cute cat ears. If it
� severed arm takes your last Normal Health level, you are defeated.
� broken will You’re done. Kaput.
� compelled to speak the truth That fundamental thing in your character that lets them
� wings define themselves is lost. They exist, but they are no longer
� poisoned with Greed themselves.
They’re dead, or unconscious, or under someone else’s
Deadly Wounds also inflict a temporary Affliction. Its control, or just broken, made plastic, lost in a suddenly
strength ranges from 1-5, though a level 1 Deadly Wound unconquerable world.
is an unusual case; level 2 is typical when a lesser miracle You don’t have to keep playing them in this state.
inflicted the wound, and level 4 when a greater miracle was In fact you’re not allowed to keep playing them. It’s not
its origin. It’s also common for a Deadly Wound to make your job any longer! It’s the HG’s.
You lose the ability to take actions.
a pre-existing Affliction more severe, either numerically or
Once the immediate conflict ends, or at any suitable lull
in effect, as when multiple such wounds derive from the
in play, talk to the HG about how to bring your character
same source. back into the game, or how to replace them with a new
Deadly Wounds are only marginally nastier than character if you can’t. Some characters may return from the
Serious Wounds. dead or reassert control despite being monstrously
Bear in mind that an Avatar has two to four of them enchanted; other times, you may have to make a new
running by the time they’re finally defeated, so if you play Power.
up the drama of a Deadly Wound too much, four of them If you do get to bring your character back into play, you
will verge on slapstick. control their actions again. That means that the malign
influences that destroyed you only linger to the degree you
decide they shall. It’s reasonably common for the HG to
A wind blew from the southwest, and on that wind came the
propose some consequence that should or ought to remain,
Magister Naoutha, and in his hand he held a sword, and the hilt
but that’s the kind of thing you both have to agree on;
of the sword was red. His face was calm and his eyes were closed
playing out that consequence, after all, will be up to you.
as he descended upon the gevir. As it reared back its seven heads
and hissed, he took off every head with a single stroke, then
turned and left as quietly as he came. Why he came and why he It sounded like a pretty good deal. The terms tasted sweet. The
killed, we do not know; save that the gevir came from beyond pay felt magnetic. So I asked what the job was. He looked me
Creation, and could return there, and perhaps this offended that in the eye. I want you to die, he explained very solemnly, so I
most honorable lord. don't have to.
—from the Thought-Record of Sa’adi Nirumand —from PARABLES FOR OUR MODERN AGE, by Jackie Robinson

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Wounds in general are defined to cover any effect on your

Avatar that you, as a player, don’t want. Abdalonymus achieved an enlightenment peculiar to himself,
They’re loosely associated with the health levels that you and preached truths that had no place in any other mind. For
lost. this reason, the men of his city drove swords into his stomach;
When you lose your Tough level, and heal your Normal but Abdalonymus accepted the swords as part of himself, and
Health levels, for instance, you’ll usually heal the specific wept more when they withdrew than when they cut. The men
wounds that were associated with those levels. The same of his city then cast him into a fire, but Abdalonymus accepted
applies when you lose your Divine Health levels and heal the fire as a part of himself, and thus could not be burned.
your Tough level back—you’ll usually ditch the exact Poison they tried, and suspending him from hooks, and
wound that was associated with your Tough level, if you’d crushing him with great stones; but the poison turned to wine
lose it. within his mouth, and the hooks let him gently down, and the
That said, if you get confused about this, it’s OK to be great stones rumbled and twisted and finally erupted to form
confused, and just remove the wound or wounds most four pillars that flanked Abdalonymus on every side.
appropriate to remove. They had no choice; the men of his city cast Abdalonymus off
Wounds, or at least wounds that miraculous creatures the edge of the world, into the void that lay beyond it. Surely,
suffer, retain a certain miraculous quality. Your system they reasoned, Abdalonymus could not make the void a part of
struggles with them, keeping them from becoming himself; and if he did, how could he swallow all of it? Surely, they
absolute mundane truth, right up until you lose your last agreed, the strange truths of Abdalonymus would not return to
Health Level. Thus they are ongoing miraculous effects, the world.
but nobody has to sustain them—they just linger on their
—from POPULAR THEORIES ON THE ORIGIN OF THE EXCRUCIANS,
own. For example, if somebody nukes you and you don’t
by Kip Narekatski
die, the wound isn’t that you have some radiation scars—
it’s that you are in the process of fighting off nuclear
annihilation until such a time as you have healed.
These are normative examples. Some miracles of a given
level are deadlier than others, and the damage of most
ASSESSING DAMAGE mundane weaponry is heavily dependent on circumstance.
Here’s a chart that you can look at when trying to figure
out how deadly your miracles are, and that the HG can I close my eyes to the darkness that comes. I close my heart to the
look at when trying to decide how much damage a given knowledge of despair. If I am the last thing, standing in an
miracle inflicts. Just remember that Powers will mitigate empty Creation with all the Dark Horsemen around me, I
most effects—even ones that get through to them! If you shall say, “ You cannot kill me. Only the corrupt can die.”
use a Major Creation of Loyalty to enthrall a Power, they
—from the oath of Emeludt Poppo
might cut the miracle with their magical sword. Even if
your miracle proves stronger than the sword, the sword
could still blunt enough of the effect to bring it down to Turning into a frog discomfited Chamorin at first but, in the
Tough or even Normal damage, and then your target is in long run, proved invigorating to his previously moribund
a solid tactical position to ignore it and strike back. social life.
If an effect isn’t mitigated, here’s what raw damage looks —from THE THIRTEENTH TOWER'S BELLS HAVE RUNG,
like in these rules:
by Keiko Takemori

TYPICAL DAMAGE TO DAMAGE TO

TYPICAL DAMAGE TO
ATTACK WOULD MUNDANE IMMORTAL UNDEFENDED
MIRACLE LEVELS DURANT POWER
WEAPONS POWER POWER
Inflict pain on a Annoyance
0 Fist or foot None None
human (bruises, scratches)
Knife or animal Annoyance
Hurt a human 0–1 None Surface wound
claw (bruises, scratches)
Seriously injure a Gun or monster
2–3 None Surface wound Serious wound
human claw
Probably kill a Semi-automatic Annoyance
4–5 Serious wound Deadly wound
human weapons, fire (bruises, rashes)
Surface or Serious
Kill and terribly Tank shell,
6+ wound Deadly wound Deadly wound
mangle a human avalanche
(borderline)
Massive overkill 7+ Nuclear explosion Deadly wound Deadly wound Deadly wound

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 187

“ Your touch is poison to me,” he said, but he did not remove his It hurts to become a god—hurts like stretching limbs too
hand from my cheek. long asleep, like taking responsibility for shameful
mistakes, like realizing you knew an answer your friends
—from the Thought-Record of Oriane Feroulet
had been groping for in darkness all along. It’s the pain of
good things, the pain of liberation, the pain of opening the
old wounds in yourself and letting the fresh air in.
It’s like when you rip off a scab for the first time, and
NON -PHYSICAL DAMAGE suddenly you’re consumed by it, desperate to find more scabs
you can rip open, and at the same time terrified by the blood.
Against effects that try to transform or enthrall you, Elusive —from BECOMING NOBLE, by Fayola Osagiobare
is the equivalent of Durant.
Against effects that try to overwhelm you, drain you, or Using an appropriate sort of active miracle to heal moves
run you out of resources, Immutable is the equivalent of you one step down the chart. Using a very powerful
Durant and Eternal is just as good as Immortal. (Immortal miracle, at the HG’s discretion, moves you two steps down
is still awesome.) the chart.
Otherwise, just use the resolution system normally! Always recover weaker health levels first—Normal
before Tough, and Tough before Divine.
HEALING DAMAGE Always remove the quickest-healing wounds first, even
if that means healing the “wrong” wound for the health
It’s up to the HG how fast your wounds heal, but the level you recover. Among wounds equally quick to heal,
typical rate is given below: you should usually heal the oldest wound, but the choice
of wound to heal is up to you.
Characters recover from defeat—normally regaining
SURFACE SERIOUS DEADLY
LEVEL OF some selection of their wound levels as they do so—at the
WOUND WOUND WOUND
RESISTANCE HG’s discretion.
RECOVERY RECOVERY RECOVERY

Normal 1 day 1 week 1 month WORDS OF COMMAND

Durant (or
When you spend 8 MP on a miracle, you also take a
Immutable/Elusive 1 hour 1 day 1 week
terrible wound—the raw miraculous energy that flows
as appropriate)
through you burns body and soul. This will take your
Immortal (or highest health level, bypassing even an Immortal Power’s
Eternal as 1 minute 1 hour 1 day defense, and it won’t heal until both the story has ended
appropriate) and at least a month and a day have passed.
You get to define the Affliction associated with the
Almost Almost Almost
instant instant instant
wound. It’s usually crippling but it can be beneficial; the
only requirement is that it reflects and in some fashion fits
with the miracle that you used. Even if it’s beneficial,
however, note that you are substantially closer to death;
you won’t be able to get one of your Divine Health levels
back for quite some time.

One day, I stubbed my toe. When I told Marilyn about it, she
said she understood completely how that felt. I said, I'm so glad,
and she smiled, and she cut the toe off. It was amazing; the
pain was gone! So I was sure to tell her about it when I had a
cold the very next week and my nose was running. What do
you want me to do? she asked, and I said, I'm afraid that if I
cut it off it will bleed. She said she completely understood, and
she chopped my nose right off. It stopped running at once! But
now I don't know what to do, because I have a headache, but I
keep thinking, What if I need it for something later?
—from PARABLES FOR OUR MODERN AGE, by Jackie Robinson

WOUNDS
188

mundane cats are not noted for their calculus or their

She was laughing and splashing in the swarm of flies; and I
conversation but the cats of the Mythic World are
dragged her out again, and there were flies in her hair and
crawling insects in her eyes and her fingers were black and cunning, sly, and wise.) Or you may plead with your
purple with their juice. opponent to accept the vicissitudes of fate; and,
She held one up. succeeding, proceed as you would have, or failing, choose
“Look, look,” she said. It was one of the amethyst flies, cut one of the earlier options above.
straight from the gemstone, still twitching its filthy little limbs.
“Don't play in that,” I said. “It's a swarm of flies.”
“There's cool stuff everywhere,” she said. “Everywhere and
DAMAGE , SECRETS, AND LIES
everywhere. I want to roll in it all until it's dripping from my skin.”
Characters may defend normally against divination
I tried to figure out how to explain.
“ You'll get infested with parasites and hostile microscopic life effects—against people using miracles or even serious
forms,” I said. mundane investigation to learn their secrets. In four cases,
Her eyes were round. they may even take wounds to prevent the information
“It's gross!” I tried. “And… and they're boring hostile getting out:
microscopic life forms!” � when the character has some way to know that
Her face sank; she looked reformed; but guilt at the lie twisted they’re being investigated;
in my heart. As horrid as that last stomach flu had been, with � when the character has taken relevant precautions
both ends bubbling, I'd rather enjoyed my last bout of syphilitic against specific information getting out;
script-sneezing, and it had gotten me into Hollywood. � when the HG offers the player the opportunity to
—from EVERYWHERE AND EVERYTHING TO LOVE, take a wound to guard their secret; or
� when the information in question is subjective
UNOBJECTIONABLE EFFECTS enough, or rooted enough in Avatar background,
that a player and not the HG is the canonical source
Not everything that could be an objectionable effect is. for that information.
For instance, your enemy glares daggers at you. You
knock them aside. Then he turns you into a cat! In each of these cases, the character may take a suitable
To this outcome many Powers would object. You, wound—or potentially no wound at all, if they defeat the
instead, say: “Cool! Now I’m a cat! Miao!” effect or have used up the relevant Health levels—and
Perhaps they are nonplussed and lose the initiative to describe what their opponent learns. The effect of the
your unexpected choice. Or perhaps they will be distressed; wound, if taken, is that the character must live as if the
it may emerge, in play, that they conceived their miracle as description given were so.
hostile, as destroying the higher functions of your mind. For instance, someone conducts a cursory mundane
You laugh at their silly notions. Cats are sinister investigation of your affairs. They might discover the love
intelligences; this the Internet has shown! Their player letters you wrote to an Anchor. You can’t stop them—
blinks, perplexed. Laboriously they explain—OOC—that you’re out beyond the Weirding Wall, politicking with
it was nevertheless the intention behind their miracle to Excrucians—but you as a player are the only one who
defang you, and that they would not have chosen it if they knows how damning the letters actually are. So the HG
had not intended feliforming as an aggressive efficacious asks, “Just what do they find? How bad is it?”
act. And you say, “It’s not love. That’s not love, there. There’s
At this point you have a choice. just a pose to win that mortal’s heart.”
You may retroactively take a health level in damage, And that becomes a Surface Wound, compelling you to
burning that level to soak up the effect. You may work out act as if it were so. That doesn’t mean it is so—just that you
with the HG some middling effect—perhaps it destroys work hard to pretend. That something in your soul and
your mundane mind, making your Skills temporarily your Estate is telling the world, “Of course that’s just a
inaccessible, but leaves your Passions and miraculous pose.” Or, if you don’t have any Normal Health levels left,
actions intact. (And this makes sense, of course, as you don’t even have to worry about that; just note that you
would have been wounded in that way, and then move on.
In a similar fashion, if someone reads your thoughts,
The Duke protested that the matter was infamous and therefore you can declare that you’re thinking nothing but a joyous
impossible; his steward wondered how it was then that paean to the universe; the cost is a wound that pushes you
infamous deeds were ever done. This rendered the Duke to behave as if that claim were so.
speechless with confusion; he stammered, worked through the
proof several times without insight, and finally settled on,
“through the mysterious grace of God,” an answer which left
nobody any happier by the exchange.
—from THE WORLD MADE FLESH, by Emily Chen

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS opposite: “The Byzantine Society,” from pieces by Jules Breton, George Bellows, and another, by Jenna Moran
 189

T
he swords of the Byzantine Society (commonly understood
to be a gathering-ground for Nobilis of social Estates,
Excrucian spies, and all manner of elliptical, uncertain,
indirect, and convoluted characters) are riddles, innuendoes, secrets,
lies, and even entire social contexts… forged to steel.

opposite: by artist (I cribbed from these) WOUNDS

190
DAMAGE IMMUNITY
It may be productive to have your allies enchant you with
various effects—to fill up your Tough and Normal levels
with awkward but overall beneficial conditions.
This after all gives you new Bonds and Afflictions to
play with and keeps you from taking unpleasant serious
and surface wounds.
This is something that the Nobilis do, in fact—in a
weird way, the curses of friends can act as a kind of armor.
But it’s not something they do very often, and it’s not a
perfectly effective defense.
So we’re going to say that if you’re immune to an effect
because you don’t have any wound levels low enough to
take it—because you’re out of Normal, or Normal and
Tough, Health levels—the HG has the option of bumping
a friend- or ally-given wound to make room for the new
effect. It isn’t something that will necessarily happen, but
it could take place.

Brendan Cormail authored Eratosthenes’ Dissent, arguing

that “the desire to live is the foundation of all accomplishments.”
Many consider him one of the great philosophers of the Third
Age, but society as a whole does not accept his arguments. Rather,
the Nobilis presume that his beliefs are tainted by an
overabundance of the aquatic essence in his soul. Therefore,
Brendan Cormail is implicitly a philosopher to pariahs and the
sage of a corrupted wisdom.
—from THE SOCIETY OF FLOWERS, by Heather Williams

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 191
CHAPTER 24

The
Simple
Rites
There’s a bunch of weird abilities that the Nobilis have.
They don’t really know exactly how they work themselves.
Some of them are probably just rumors.
So I’m going to say that if the HG hears about
something that the Nobilis can do, and wants to let your
For all my childhood, it haunted me. I
Avatars do it, that’s fine. Or, heck, just something that they
hated it, but I had no way to fight it. It
think Powers ought to be able to do, and in the meantime
stalked me on spider’s legs, its face a pale
they should let you do some variant on the various well-
mask of skin stretched tight over bone.
documented tricks below.
For twelve years, I slept only when my

SERVANT’S RITE
body could take alertness no longer, and
even then the brush of fur against my THE
arm would wake me shivering when a
few hours passed. This one’s totally weird but it shows up over and over again
Now, I am a Power, and I face it, and on the boards.
these are its words: “ You should forgive If a Noble really loves or hates you, they can put blood,
me, master. It is I who made you strong.” sweat, or tears, or, well, you know, other stuff like that into
Its words are just, and my actions a mortal’s body in order to make them an Anchor (pg. 111).
must so be. “Open your mouth,” I say, and And then the mortal gets all enthusiastic about the Estate,
break my skin, and let my fingers drip like they’re loyal to it even if they hate their Power’s guts,
with blood. and acquires something like the Elusive Gift against other
Powers’ actions.
—from the Thought-Record of
Jagmohan Ji
Tuning: the HG can let you guide or possess an ordinary
mortal Anchor without sustaining the action, if you love or
hate them.

THE SIMPLE RITES

192
HIDING IN THE FLOWERS THE GIFT OF TONGUES
Nobilis can mess up divination on them by using flowers, Powers speak flawless Russian. Not just Powers that would
Tarot cards, or other symbols. reasonably know Russian but random surfer dude Powers
Basically, they start with an Auctoritas—either the and chunks of animated dirt who really have no reason to
Auctoritas Magister (pg. 180) or the Auctoritas on some care. They speak flawless Russian as if it were the most
natural thing in the world.
sort of controllable, invokable Affliction—and use
And Portuguese.
mundane actions to ritually associate the symbol with it.
And Latin, and Urdu. Oh, and Layaklan. Almost nobody
Then when someone tries to divine what the Power did or
speaks Layaklan, not at the time of this writing, anyway,37
is doing while under the influence of that Auctoritas, they but Powers do. They speak fluent Hong Kong pidgin. They
have to beat the Auctoritas with their Strike or they just read Martian hieroglyphics. They grok Navajo. French.
get a metaphorical face full of flowers. LISP. Famously, they can speak the “twin language” of the
Bowens. And that’s just what I have easily accessible
Tuning: The HG can make divining past this effect references for from this table.
impossible—even with Strike—or harder, or leave it as is As far as I can tell they can speak, understand, read, and
but make the past an inherently non-miraculous country write every language flawlessly from the moment of
that is easily rewritten or concealed by illusion, or give Commencement, including every mortal language and the
Miraculous Edge to every miracle that protects you from “True Tongue” of Heaven.
divination. Or, conversely, waive most of this effect and
make your every action vulnerable to exposure. Tuning: It’s possible that they just learn the True Tongue
of Heaven, and that removes the need to know any other
RITE OF THE LAST TRUMP language, even reading- and writing-wise. That’s really
disturbing as a linguistic conceit, but it’s possible!
We know that Nobilis can shift their power around— Alternately you could dismiss the whole Gift of Tongues
drawing it from their miraculous devices, trading it idea as an exaggeration based on the language-learning
between their body and their Estate, and shifting their ability that Powers get for free with their Aspect—the
mode or mood from Domain- to Persona-style effects. only Power I know can speak every language in the world
is also notionally perfect, so she’s not a typical case.
We’re going to let them trade between Attributes at a rate
of 3 for 1 as a reflexive action, or spend 1 MP of any type
and a few hours in meditation in order to reassign the rest GUISING
howsoever they like.
Powers can adapt themselves to crazy hostile
environments. They turn into fishes when they fall into the
Tuning: The HG can change this to 2 for 1 to make
sea. They become weird space people when floating in
Nobilis a bit more flexible in play.
weird space Chancels. They blur, distort, stretch, and
become vast when visiting people’s dreams. They can hang
out among bird-people and chow down casually on bird-
people-food even when it’s wriggling.
I think this is actually mostly a combination of power,
moxie, and the ability to feed off their Bonds. That said,
there’s a couple of definites: even the weirdest inhuman
Powers can wear a human Guise when they walk in the
ordinary world, and every Power can shift their human
features to fit in with the local population.

Tuning: You can let Powers customize this some, or even

look a little different to everyone they see; you can have
Guising cost 1 Persona MP; you can let Powers get a
Hidden Secrets! of… limited free adaptation to any environment at all, though
The Chancel-Finding Rite be sure to let people know so they don’t spend character
A Power looking through a broken crystal, or anyone at all points on Immutable; you can let Powers adapt to fit in
splashing a bit of brandy in their eye, can see a faint glow in with the local population in a Chancel or an alien world.
the direction of a road between worlds or a passage into a 37 Sometimes I feel like if I don’t use qualifiers like this people
Chancel. reading this in like 2257 or something will point back at me
This doesn’t need tuning. Just try it yourself! and laugh.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 193

TRACING A MIRACLE Flowers are vital. They sing with the energies of Creation.
Powers do something to narrow in on people using miracles Each cries to reality, “I am thus! I am this! I am what I am!”
to hurt them from a long way away. They find the The cherry blossom shouts, Spiritual Beauty. The trumpet-
Excrucian or Power or Imperator that was hurting them, flower bugles, Fame. They stun me. I never saw this in
and either fight back from afar or hunt their attacker them…I was so blind.
down. But now I am dead.
We’re going to say that this is just something you can do Now I can see.
with the Sight—that if you have the Sight on, it’s always They come and lay them on my grave. The song of each
possible to find someone affecting your location from far flower seeps down, like roots, and digs into my soul. Each
away. They can hide, forcing you to use miracles to find flower my beloved husband sets upon my grave steals a little bit
them and their link, but they can’t ever come up with a more of my self. Each bloom my daughter leaves behind tears
trick that makes locating them genuinely impossible. me apart a little further at the seams. Soon, I will be gone.
There will be no soul left within my embalmed flesh. Just the
Tuning: You can make this automatic, immediately telling songs of rotted flowers.
any Power who performed any miracle they witnessed, —from 36, by Rannen Yedidyah
and, if it was performed through a mystic link, what that
link might be.

THE NETTLE RITE

As the Excrucians know, breaking the world is a source of
power. The Nobilis are legendary for going out of their
way to mess one another up, as a way of counting coup and
most importantly as a substitute for no-holds-barred
battle.
If you use a Bond or Affliction to get someone into
trouble, force someone into breaking a Bond or break it for
them, or break one of their Afflictions, you can get MP.
Crush a handful of nettles.38
Let them fall.
Capture the pain of their broken or troublesome Bond
or Affliction with a force of will and you’ll get the same
number of MP they do!

38 Pro Tip: wear gloves!

THE SIMPLE RITES

194

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 195
CHAPTER 25

De◊iny
Over the course of each story the characters may earn
Destiny.
It comes from opposition—from uncomfortable,
unwanted truths and opinions. It comes always from the
direction of greatest fear, greatest struggle, greatest strife.
Destiny lies in the impossible and the unwanted things.
“I have a story,” he said. “I will trade it
Destiny is what changes you. It lives in the things that
for my life.”
change you. To live without challenge is to no longer grow.
“Don't like stories.”
“It's got lots of crunching bones and
tasty flesh in it.” PROJECTS
“So do you.”
“Please,” he said. “Kill me, then. But A “Project” is a story. It is told again each time the Power
hear it first. So it doesn't die.” earns or spends Destiny for it.
Sometimes the story is written into the Project.
—from the Thought-Record of
Sometimes it is told the same way each time. Sometimes
Hugh Rosewood
it is wildly different. But it is always a story.
It is something like:
� how I labored to save the souls that burn in Hell;
� how I moved the heart of Lexiarchos Caducine to love;
� how I grew from Pawn to Baroness of my Estate; or
� how I built a zoo of the rarest creatures from all Creation,
and the Lands Beyond.

A Project is built as Imperators are built—one circle in the

center to hold the story’s name and meaning. Other circles
around it, to hold the ideas of other players, the HG, and
new twists on the story that evolve in play. It’s up to the
HG how much to emulate the formal Imperator-creation
process and how much to just borrow an Imperator-style
design.

DESTINY
196

Not everything is a Project. FAILURE

Something becomes a Project when you want it to The characters struggle. They hope to achieve some victory.
change your character’s story, or to be a story that someone But they are balked; and when they are balked, when they
will tell of your character long after they are gone. fail after a worthy struggle, the Project earns 5 Destiny and
Something becomes a Project when it is your desire with each heavily involved Avatar earns 0-3 MP.
it to construct a myth—to build one with the force of The players write something reflecting that failure, and
Destiny, acting as your Avatar or as the movement of their a number (5) in one of the Project circles.
destiny within them. Something becomes a Project when For the Projects mentioned above, it might be
it’s impossible, or at least unlikely, something impressive something like:
and scary even for a Power in this world. � failed to sway Lucifer to our cause;
Projects can pool the efforts of many characters, but � failed to show Lexiarchos Caducine the beauty of
every Project has one character most responsible for it— creation;
one character who can make the final decision over in � failed to bind the great spirits of my Estate;
which direction the Project moves. � failed to capture an Actual for the zoo.

REVELATION This too is a moving-forward; for in every reversal is the

A revelation changes the meaning of what the characters seed of a success.
are doing. It adds risk, or quandary, or simply scope. For
the Projects mentioned above, it might be something like: VICTORY
� the suffering of the souls in Hell is the food for the The characters struggle, and win; and by winning they earn
Ash; the right to say something about the Project.
� Lexiarchos Caducine was a human once; It’s not the victory itself that earns Destiny.
� the last Power to master an Estate like yours went It’s the power that that victory gives you to say, or prove,
mad; or define something about the Project. It’s when you can
� caged in the zoo you find an unconscious copy of say that part of the Project was—
yourself. � swayed Lucifer to our cause;
� showed Lexiarchos the beauty of Creation;
When the HG unveils a shocking truth like this about the � humbled and bound the great spirits of my Estate;
Project—something with the potential to change � captured an Actual for the zoo
everything—the Project earns 10 Destiny and each heavily
involved Avatar earns 0-5 MP. —that you give a bit more shape to what it is. The Project
This revelation is a surprise and a difficulty but it is also gains 3 Destiny and every Avatar closely involved with it
Destiny, or, put another way, a force of change. gains 0-1 MP.
It is a moving-forward. Write what you’ve learned about the Project, and a
The HG writes something reflecting the revelation, and number (3) in one of the Project circles.
a number (10) in one of the Project circles.
This moves the Project—arguably—towards success. TRIVIAL VICTORY OR FAILURE
When you have a serious plan for moving forward on a
The door to my cell, old, fouled wood, grew clean and straight Project, but the HG doesn’t want to play it out, the HG
when he touched it, and the lock shone. He put in the key, and can award the Project 2 Destiny instead. The HG writes
the door opened without effort. He stepped in the filth as he something to represent that automatic failure or success,
entered; it dissolved under his boot, turned to dust and then and the number (2), in one of the Project circles, e.g.
nothingness, and cleanliness spread in rivulets across the floor � you can’t just ask Hell to let them go (2)
of the room. He wore a strange headband of woven thorns and � chocolate does not win her heart (2)
blossoms; pale violet petals shone with a soft pure light. � practicing Domain miracles is helpful but not
“ You are free,” he said. “I shall lead you hence. But do not sufficient (2) or
touch me.” � fine, your zoo has an elephant (2).
I could not help myself. It had been too hard. I had missed him
for too long. I took his hand in the two of mine.
…that is the last entry I shall write, for it marks the end of
one life and the beginning of another. I do not know what I When Marsaili came to Deorsa Magnus, she killed every
became, when Corentin’s touch burned through my soul, but I am person therein, but this did not suffice. She ground the
not who I was; and, in truth, I am glad to conclude my former buildings into dust, but this did not suffice. She polluted the
life’s affairs. Corentin—I shall still love Corentin, I think, but I harvest with traitor's blood, but this did not suffice. She did not
have no love for the man named Reynaud Parmentier. stop until a crater withered where once a lush city grew.
—from the Diary of Reynaud Parmentier —from GOBLINS RUN THE INTERNET, by Keiko Takemori

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 197

MOVING PROJECTS FORWARD The Keep of Lady Mugain floats serenely above the ocean
When one of the circles in a Project holds 15 Destiny, the on a stone as sharp as a razor's edge. For many years, she
Power responsible for that Project can move it forward. thought herself safe from intrusion; then a Power swam
They invoke the weight of Destiny in that Project as if out through the eel-infested waters and yoked himself to
it were an Imperial miracle. an even hundred flying fish. When the Lady grew hungry,
The Power cites their heart and the story of the Project. she whispered to the waters; and impelled by her will, the
They speak of the meanings and happenings of the thing. fish leapt into the sky; and the Power landed neatly at her
They tell of their labors and the revelations. They say what Chancel's edge, nary the worse for wear. This he did not for
has happened, power nor for gain, but because it is said that Mugain is
more beautiful than the sun.
and then they say one more thing.
—from LEGENDS OF THE NOBILIS, by Luc Ginneis
It is, by rule, ambiguous. You have to leave wiggle room
for the HG. You can’t say that you win, or that things go
down a certain way. Like Imperial miracles, Destiny leaves Place a mark in that Project circle—we’ll call this a
the world more than a little space for interpretation. “stone,” like a pebble falling into a lake.
But the thing that happens is something that matters. It The stone means movement,
says something real. Like: or change,
� and as the elixir runs across the flames of Hell, the or I will accomplish.
blood-soaked fire begins to burn clear, and blue, and Connect that mark to a new circle.
brilliant with hope. Write a phrase in that new circle—enough to remember
� that night, Lexiarchos Caducine dreams of me; what was going on in the game, or through your mind,
fervent, transformative dreams. when you spoke Destiny into the world. If there was more
� for the first time, as I stand there before the Errant than 15 Destiny in the old circle, move the leftover Destiny
Gates, my movement and the movements of my to the new phrase.
Estate become as one; and we are, for just a moment, And change will begin.
a thing unstoppable, immeasurable, and It may not be clear what you have done. It oughtn’t be,
unimaginably vast. perhaps. But nothing in the world—not Hell, not Heaven,
� I come back from my hunt, laughing in glee, and not even the Excrucians or the Ash, can face that force of
behind me is a Thing—capitalized Thing—the likes Destiny and choose to be unmoved. Faced by the force of
of which you can barely imagine, even staring it in Destiny, they must wrestle with it, bend to it either as a
the eye. It is laden with meaning. It is impossible. It willow or a serf, allow it to shape them, allow there to be a
is, my dears, and for my zoo, a prize. movement towards appropriate ends.
It may take more than one effort to win the final prize.
As ambiguous as you have to leave it, still, it moves the It is the power of earned Destiny to compel movement,
world. not victory; it ends one chapter of a Project and begins
another, it causes the world to bend but not to break, it
Jacotte Berthomieu woke up on Friday morning without a face. guarantees a tangible step closer but does not seek to end
She did not frown, for she had no mouth. She did not speak, the story all at once. For a thing that is worth spending
for she had no voice. Nor did she look around, for she had no Destiny to achieve is often worth spending a whole game
eyes.
working at.
She could, however, see—for the fire of life burned brightly
Still, let movement be movement: not even the greatest
in her. It cast a clear unwavering light over the room, stark and
hot, that her mind could see with; and she saw the gremlin in its
challenges ought to be more than 8 steps away. That is 7
corner. Her face hung in its claws like a rubber mask. circles, and many sessions, to learn the weight of a thing
It looked up. Twice. “ You can’t have me back,” the face said. and strive to define its meaning before it becomes truth.
“ You don’t have the power to fight for me. And you don’t have Using Destiny in this fashion “finishes” the old circle;
anything valuable enough to buy me with.” remove the numbers for any Destiny in it. You should
Jacotte reached inside her and scooped out the fire of her life, probably avoid dealing with that circle again. Its place in
and proffered it to the gremlin like a waiter unveiling a meal. the story of the Project is complete.
“That might be enough,” Jacotte’s face concurred, “But what The Avatar responsible for a Project may let another
good is a face without a life?” involved Avatar speak Destiny, and move the Project
Jacotte did not answer, for she could not speak. She only held forward, if the players like.
the life burning in her hands.
—from BERTHOMIEU MANORAL, by Keiko Takemori

DESTINY
198
PERSONAL DESTINY
It is best to make lemonade of what lemons life gives you.
Characters may earn Destiny for themselves—not bound Pain teaches, poverty enlightens, and once the zombies
to any Project, but rather usable at any point to push a have been spun, scoured, and carded, weaving them into
delightful cardigans is not difficult at all.
Project forward. You can spend personal Destiny to add to
—from THE SAYINGS OF MARCHESSA MYRIAM BRÉBEUF,
whatever Destiny is already in a Project circle to reach a
compiled by Godelieve Bonnefroy
total of 15.
You can use your Avatar’s Destiny to move any Project
forward, or to advance personal Projects that are too bland But something you can’t just let go of either. It’s
or solitary to be a major focus in the game. something you accept at least to the point of overtly
You earn it by facing difficult things, and change. wrestling with it over the course of multiple scenes, until
you can finally express a way of living with it.
CHANGE When you find such a problem, tell the HG.
The world speaks to you, and you must change. The old Then spend time testing it—pushing against the
way of being is gone away. You are made new by the thing limits on both sides, using Noble resources to prove or
you hear, or see, or become. disprove the rightness or wrongness of a thing, debating
the matter with others, talking about it, or at minimum
� you have a child.
carrying the problem with you in an obvious and overt
� you fall in love.
way—until you find a way to change or cope.
� you become an Excrucian agent. For instance, uncertain whether something is
� you release an ancient grief. reasonable for your Estate or your morality, test it against
� you change your loyalty to Heaven. the Properties of the same. Try to force a contradiction; try
� you give up your humanity. to force a consanguity. Face and challenge the burden of
life as few save the Powers can.
Often this is the work of an Imperial miracle. The weight When you’ve found a solution, or at least a way to cope,
of it falls on you and you realize that you must change you earn 5 Destiny and 0-3 MP.
everything.
Other times it’s as simple as listening to someone, or Futile Struggle
making a choice. If you never find an answer, but you spend a reasonable
When you face such a change, tell the HG. They will amount of time wrestling with it, you’ll earn 3 Destiny at
the end of the story.
frame for you a couple of the key questions this raises—
You can pick the issue up again next story.
“How does [some element of who you are] fit into your
new life?” Denial
Answering those questions brings you 10 Destiny and If you acknowledge the question as meaningful and
0-5 MP. troublesome, but decide not to deal with it, you get an
immediate 2 Destiny and the problem goes away. It may
STRUGGLE come back, but if it does so, it does so as a new problem, a
The world speaks to you. It presents you with a difficulty. different problem, with a subtly different face. We can
It tasks you. never step twice into the same river, after all.
It is a problem.
It is a problem, a problem the HG either proposes as or
agrees is something you must struggle with. “I shall tell you the mystery of Chenevix Wood,” said Andrea's
It’s not a practical difficulty, it’s not an obstacle. It’s a father. “In the end, pursuing that mystery will kill you, as it will
moral or philosophical problem unto you. kill me; as it killed all of our family before us.”
It’s something that’s wrong. That you know is wrong. “Wait,” Andrea interrupted. “Why pursue it, then? Why not
That you know can’t be so, that you can’t or won’t or leave it lie?”
shouldn’t just accept. Something that you’d have to change, “Because we are Mathesons,” said Andrea's father. “This is
somehow, to accept. what Mathesons do.”
“And yet we never solve the mystery?”
It took no more than an instant. A single event: a single “I believe that many of our ancestors came close—but they
moment: when eyes met for the first time across a crowded court. shied away. They chose to die, instead, and pass on their burden.
In that glance, Jamelle Goodwin understood the most important Andrea,” he said, his voice deepening with truth, “I do not
thing in her life: that the Angel Hukkok was her enemy. That condone this cowardice, but I understand it. Better to quest and
understanding changed everything. die than to lose your purpose and live.”
—from LEGENDS OF THE NOBILIS, by Luc Ginneis —from UNSEEMLY TALES, by Eleanor K.

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 199

We do not know Cneph the Maker's motives. He might mean us Two ruled the city of Adelais. Two fought for its destiny. A
the most terrible of harm. We do not serve him because we know. Queen sat on its throne and sought to guide it with wisdom
We do not serve him because we believe. We serve him because and virtue. A Nihilist held court in its alleys and sought to
we can. bring the city down. The two, in their opposition, held taut the
—attributed to Hazael, strands of the city's fate.
Angel of Disorder, Insanity, and Time —from THE FALL OF ADELAIS, author unknown

Rejected Struggle
If you try to wrestle with something, but after a bit you
CHANGING THE HEART
decide that it isn’t actually a problem for you, you gain no A Power may draw a Project for themselves, or their
Destiny at all. That’s not a punishment, and you shouldn’t Estate, or borrow the character sheet for their Imperator.
hesitate to dismiss possible struggles out of hand if they’re This is something that may be changed through the work
not actual problems for your character. Sometimes what of Destiny.
the HG thinks will challenge you just doesn’t, and you’re They speak new stories there.
better off letting them know that than trying to squeeze They act into the heart of their Imperator, or the nature
Destiny out of the chance. Sometimes even things you of their Estate, or the weaknesses within themselves. And
thought would challenge you, things you brought into the change becomes.
game to wrestle with, fall flat.
That’s okay.
Not everything that looks like an opportunity to change
and grow is such an opportunity, after all. If this one isn’t,
then it’s not!

STRUGGLE AND IMPERIAL MIRACLES

The burden of an Imperial miracle spoken against you is
often a very tangible form of struggle. It drives you to
expiate the will embodied in its words. But how are you
going to survive as yourself while doing so?
Rejecting an imperial miracle is basically calling the
whole thing invalid—saying that you’re not its real target,
or that it’s demanding something you’ve already done.
Denying it tends to cost you health levels. Failing the
struggle with it—which is like denial but involves
grappling with the effects for a while first—can save you
serious harm, as long as you explicitly shelve the issue
rather than rejecting or denying it.

TRAINING
A Power may use a Project to gain an additional Trait—
wings, additional Trait levels, immortality, or awesome
unique Gifts. This usually takes between 15 and 75 Destiny,
and the Power won’t know immediately that they’ve
succeeded—it takes exploration, experimentation, and
labor to determine that you have in fact changed yourself
enough to add something new to your character sheet.
There’s no strict conversion between Character Points and
Destiny, save that the HG should be as generous as
possible and make sure that characters have a chance to see
the fruits of their labor; we’re proposing the 75-Destiny
upper limit, even for high-Character-Point-cost Traits like
Immortality, because one revelation, one major life change,
four serious moral dilemmas, four failures, and five
victories is a long time to work on self-improvement
before seeing the result.

DESTINY
 |is text is only the
beginning.
Its words do not define the game of Nobilis.
They are the threads of the tapestry of fate, not
the pattern. They are the binding, the pages, the
fonts, and the ink of the book of the world.

You who shall write the stories in that book,

begin.
 203

At
the
Shore Under the cliffs, near the rotted logs, at the edge between
sand and water, something impossible happens. A man appears,
standing, on top of the sea. His face is impossibly pure. His eyes
are closed. Nevertheless he looks at me.
“I wish to make you afraid,” he says. His hand closes.
Trenches and pits gape open in the sand. The beach beneath me
shakes and settles.
The scent of the sea vanishes. The waves crash against the
shore, but their sound dies out.
I want to run. I don’t dare. I want to tell him that I’m just an
ordinary person.
“I wish you to understand that we can bring pain to you any
time we please.”
My tongue dissolves. Blood flows into my throat.
“If I have time, I will kill you.”
Then something changes.
A miracle sweeps across me like rushing water and I fall to
my knees. For a moment, I can sense nothing else; apprehend
nothing else; think of nothing else. I can only feel the tides of
change wash through my soul.
I could not have understood the wonder of it before this
moment. It makes the joys and sorrows of my life seem
transparent and hollow. It rings louder than any bell and burns
brighter than the sun. It is as beautiful as the sea, and far more
greedy.
My hands come down on sand, tar, and seashells. My mind
flashes back and forth, one moment contemplating the prodigy
that moves within me, one moment struggling away. I fear that
it could swallow me, pull me in like the undertow, turn me
inside out and leave me caught within the miracle for the rest of
my life.
Then it rises and touches the last remnants of my unchanged
self.
My body is sick, vomiting out seawater. There are pieces of
kelp in it. The man walks towards it, and now he holds a gun in
his hand. I have no idea why he needs it. I think that I would
like to live, but I find it hard to focus.
All across the world, people talk. Cars honk. Things make
noise, cast their vibrations in the air. I cannot hear them, but I
know them. I know each and every one of them as it rises and
falls. I know the roar of the sea and the lapping waters of every
lake.
My arms are too weak to hold me up. My toes are cold. I have
a headache.

AT THE SHORE
204

I do not need my arms or my toes or my head. I need twists, uncomfortably, writhing against the limits of his
only look within my soul and I have endless bodies. I can reach.
ride on the thunder and dance on the strains of a fugue. “I wish you to know this in the marrow of your bones. I
Every wave that washes across this world is mine; and the wish you to understand that you cannot oppose us. For this
miracle does not end there. They are me. reason, I come, and bring you pain.”
I cherish that for a moment. I have become—I have no For a long moment I believe him.
name for it. I have become the essence and pith and spirit “I have a tongue again,” I say, “and your bullet did not
of the wave. I can imagine no greater domain; I should not kill.”
prefer to rule Time, or Love, or the cosmos itself. Every His eyes open, black like night. A star falls through
wave that washes across this world is mine. them. “It is strange,” he says, “how humans need but a taste
The gun fires. of power to grow arrogant. You walk in a world of things
I live for a moment on the notes of a young man’s flute, greater than you can imagine, and you speak defiance.”
each a unique vibration of its own. Behind those notes, I I nod.
begin to hear a deeper music. He puts away his gun. “You have many things that you
I marvel. All these years, the universe has sung out its love,” he says. “Remember, when it comes time to face us,
secrets and its truths to me, and I simply failed to listen. I that they are not immortal.”
do not try to claim this music; it transcends what I have I think of all the things I love. They call to me, though
become. I only open up my spirit and hear. softer than the waves. I submerge that love, drown it in my
Five strains, in harmony and dissonance. From the sky heart, and still it bobs to the surface: friends, family, my
rains down the truth of Heaven. I hear the angels sing of homeland, and my art.
justice and of beauty. Their song has no answer to a bullet, “I will do what I must,” I assure him. I do not know,
nor does it desire one. “You must have the strength to find quite, what that is, only that threats cannot deter me.
your own answer to this,” it says, “for if you cannot create His expression sours, and he departs.
justice in the world, what worth have you?” I look out again at the ocean. A film lifts from my eyes,
And quietly in my heart, from the smallest pieces of or falls over it; I cannot say which. I see the great and
myself, I hear the song of Hell arise; and it promises me mighty spirits of the waters, and the bright truths within
the flames, and the embrace of suffering, and an the seagulls’ hearts. I hear the senseless mumblings of the
endlessness of torment, and I think: endless grains of sand, and I see each wave’s exalted face as
“Is this to tempt me?” it breaks against the shore.
But then there is entwining with the screaming and the I reach out and capture one, a young and brilliant wave
flames a single pure exquisiteness of voice. It is the first of formed seconds ago by the patterns of the sea. I hold it in
the Fallen, his words tangled in my heart, and yes, yes, my hand, and the little wave stills, waiting for my wish.
damn it, yes, suddenly it tempts me. I tell it, realizing as I speak that this is the most
“We alone will not forsake you,” sing the devils in their wonderful thing imaginable, “I know your name.”
Hell.
And weaving through, around, about the songs of
Heaven and of Hell I hear the Wild’s call. Inexorable and
vast, its song rings out through the world and calls to
freedom and to madness. “You need nothing but yourself,”
it says. The endless crashing of the surf within my heart
agrees.
Two strains rise from the humans around me: one light
and one dark, one preaching the salvation of humanity and
another calling it to suicide. I ignore them. I have found
And past, and past, and beyond the wardrobe’s back, a gallery
my truth.
of things and endless halls, and the clinking of glass and the
The bullet hits my head.
swirling of dancers, and faceless creatures wearing masks, and
For a moment, I feel a blinding pain. Then the surf rises
walking bears, and elves, and the merrows from the sea; and
up and swallows it. I pull myself to my feet.
all through the great long echoing halls there blew the wind,
“What are you?” I ask him. He fires again; this time, I
and above everything there arched the mountains, the forests,
move, rolling gently out of the way. “What am I?”
and the sun.
“I stand outside the things of the world,” he says. “I am
“Why,” said Susan, “what is this? What is this, I have
Omega: the termination of your existence. Of everything’s
stumbled on?”
existence. I need only reach out my hand, and it is so.”
And they turned to her, on her débutante day, and they
A wave crests, rising to pound against the beach. It
dragged her off, to live among the fashionable strangers.
dissolves in an instant into still water. I feel its death
—from THE WARDROBE, by Emily Chen
viscerally, horribly, with a flutter in my stomach. The wave
after that dies, and the next, like falling dominoes. The sea

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 205

AT THE SHORE
 Index
206

A Philosophy of Treason ...............................12, 157, 181 Evil World, the .................................................... 26

Aaron’s Serpents ............................................18, 39, 142 Properties of .................................................30
Abhorrent Weapons .................................... 38, 155, 160 Locus Arahiel ...................................................... 93
Accords at Babylon, the ......................................150, 152 Locus Araunah ................................................... 134
Actions ......................78, 169–171, 173–174, 176–177, 185 Locus Casluhim .................................................. 34
Actuals .........................................................136, 165–167 Locus Imsety ...................................................... 152
Cardiff Actual, the .............................................. 175 Locus Neriah ...................................................... 132
Reykjavik Actual, the .......................................... 172 Locus Parasiel .............................................. 39, 126
The Family .......................................................... 167 Locus Qamamir ................................................... 34
Afflictions ...................................55, 84–87, 89, 120, 185 Locus Thegri ........................................................ 34
Age of Pain, the .................................. see Third Age, the Locus Zaanannim ...................................34, 77, 79
Alchemists ................................................................... 31 Locust Court, the ...........11–12, 14, 24, 37, 131, 148
Traits for ...............................................................31 Parnassus ........................................................... 100
Anchors .................................................110, 111–112, 171 Sable Gardens ...................................................... 41
Collections of ..................................................... 112 Cleave of the Botanists ......................................... 31, 69
Icons ................................................................... 112 Cleaves .......................................................................152
Sanctums ............................................................ 114 Architects, the .................................................... 152
Sidekicks .............................................................113 Bookkeepers, the ................................................. 152
Angels ..................................18, 35–37, 86, 140, 153, 173 Cult of the Stars, the ...........................................90
Aspect ..................................................... 49, 91–94, 170 Fellowship of Apelles, the ................................... 152
Aspect Gifts ............................................... 122, 124 Pure, the ............................................................. 152
Difficulty Summary for ....................................... 94 Cneph ..................................... 37, 117, 163, 172–173, 199
Attributes ............................................................. 49, 54 Code Fidelitatis ........................................................... 13
Auctorita ..........................................51, 83, 85, 181, 192 Commencement ....................................... 17, 79, 81, 92
Auctoritas Magister, the ......................................180–181 Compendium of Journeys, the .....................................39
Avatar Diagram, your ............................................ 57, 72 Cool ................................................................76, 91, 98
Avatars ................................. see PCs (Player Characters) Council of Four ...................................................... 11–12
Creatures
Banes ......................................................................... 136 Agricords ............................................................. 23
Bonds ................................... 55, 82–84, 86–87, 120, 184 Anguli .................................................................. 32
Border Mythic, the ..........................................30–32, 45 Arpakti ................................................................ 23
Properties of .........................................................31 Bishounen ..................................................... 76, 80
Breath of MP ............................................................120 Brontagora ........................................................... 24
Cloud Dragons .................................................... 34
Cammora, the ................................................12, 68, 150 Daoine Sidhe ....................................................... 63
Campaign ............................................................. 50, 52 Dharma Worms ................................................... 74
Causa Causans .............................................................. 7 Dryads ................................................................. 32
Chalices of Conception ............................................... 31 Elves ....................................................... 19, 30, 63
Chancel Properties ............................................ 136, 178 Empty Suits of Clothing from Dionyl ..........30, 63
Chancel-Finding Rite, the ......................................... 192 Fire Engines ........................................................ 23
Chancels ............................................10, 18, 34, 45, 135 Fire Nymphs ........................................................ 34
Abandoned Chancel of Ebrôt Appêkâ ............... 137 Genies ................................................................104
Atlantis ................................................................ 62 Gevir .................................................................. 185
Balbec .................................................................104 Gnomes ............................................................... 34
Balloon-People World ...........................................9 Gorgons ...............................................................131
Camelot ............................................................... 34 Granglers ............................................................. 32
Chancel of Lorelle Clark ....................................148 Ichneumon Wasps ............................................... 36
Chilminar ...........................................................104 Istoriads ..............................................................142
Cityback, the ..................................................11, 23 Jotun ...................................................... 30, 63, 174
Properties of ................................................. 23 Kanonoliths ......................................................... 48
Clegyr .................................................................. 34 Kryptons .............................................................. 23

NOBILIS: THE ESSENTIALS

 207

Lightermice ......................................................... 23 Hesychia Symeonius, Warmain ..........................148

Matchmice .......................................................... 23 Iolithae Septimian, and her lies ...........................155
Megalith Wasps ................................................... 39 Lexiarchos Caducine, dying of old age ............... 159
Minime ................................................................ 32 Maatsarya-Asura ................................................ 116
Nimblejacks ......................................... 11–13, 26–28 Malakai Mesmer, dying of lost empathy ............. 159
Traits for .......................................................29 Marozia Carolin, who wields the test of harmfulness
Ogres .............................................11–13, 26–28, 30 ............................................................................ 157
Traits for ....................................................... 28 Orderic Neustry, who wields the test of loss ....... 156
Psalidars ............................................................... 23 Phasael mery-Harumaph, and his Adoration ......155
Pyradons .............................................................129 Rafael Picard ...................................................... 150
Tenement Beasts ................................................. 24 Raginhart Tribunas, who wields the test of pain . 157
Tetrimmenos ....................................................... 24 Scelto of the Provenance, and himself .................155
Twisted Spirits of the Wind .................................31 Tairté Ut-napishtim, and his philosophy .............155
Wood-witches ...................................................... 15 Teja Heimerich, who wields the test of void ....... 157
Woodpecker Boys ................................................ 32 Textrix the Deacon, dying of lost faith ............... 159
Xedlipods ............................................................ 24
Currency .................................................................... 150 Fallen Angels ................................................. see Devils
Familia Caelestis .................................... 19, 47, 142, 148
Damage ...................................................... 186–188, 190 First Age ............................................................ 154, 160
Dark, the .................................................... 18, 40–41, 71 Flurries .................................................. 53, 174, 176–177
Deadly Wounds .................................................. 184–186 Foci .....................................................................122, 124
Deceivers ............................................................. 154–155
Game Rules for .................................................. 154 Ghost Miracles ........................................................... 98
Deep Miracles ............................................................ 50 Gift of Tongues, the .................................................. 192
Deep Mythic .........................................................43–44 Gifts ...................................................... 54, 121–133, 170
Properties of ........................................................ 44 Active Immortality ............................................. 128
Defeat .......................................................... 184–185, 187 Amphibious ........................................................ 128
Dementia Animi ...................................................13, 22 Bardic Music ...................................................... 128
Destiny ............................................................... 195–199 Durant ................................................................ 125
Devils ..................................................... 18, 36, 38, 140 Elemental ....................................................125, 127
Dharma ................... 18, 31, 35, 74, 79, 81, 95, 98, 101, Elusive ................................................................ 125
......................... 105–107, 111, 137, 144, 151, 156, 172 Eternal ................................................................126
Dharmascopes ............................................................. 81 Fire-Breathing ....................................................129
Divine Mantle, the ......................... 51, 97, 156, 179–180 Flight ..................................................................126
Domain ...........................................97–98, 100–101, 171 Gatemaker ..........................................................129
Difficulty Chart for ............................................102 Glorious ..............................................................126
Difficulty Summary for ...................................... 101 Helpful Estate ....................................................129
Domain Gifts ............................................. 122, 124 Immutable .......................................................... 127
Domicelli .................................................................... 29 Invisibility ...........................................................130
Keen Vision ........................................................130
Edge ....................................................................80, 114 Lightning Quickness .......................................... 133
Miraculous ...................... 51, 145, 158, 179–180, 192 Luck ...................................................................130
End of the Third Age, the ............................114, 154, 157 Magical Symbol ..................................................130
Erus ........................................................................... 136 Mysterious ...........................................................131
Estate Properties .................................88, 106, 120, 154 Natural Weapon ..................................................131
Estates ..............9, 17, 19, 54, 64–65, 88, 120, 142, 199 Paramount Sense ................................................ 133
Excrucian War ................................18, 86, 154, 157, 160 Paramount Strength ........................................... 133
Excrucian-shards ................................................ 160–161 Perfect Timing ....................................................131
Excrucians .............................. 7, 10, 12, 18, 30, 32, 45, Petrify ..................................................................131
..................................68, 89, 153–154, 160, 172, 193 Purify .................................................................. 132
Adhémar Hetairh, dying of fire and poison ........ 159 Shapeshifter ........................................................ 127
Coriander Hasp, and those who listen to him .....155 Soul-Carving Sword ........................................... 133
Dahlia Thorn, Mimic of Light, Health, Robots, Sovereign’s Gift, the ............................................ 127
Safety, and Stuffed Animals ................................ 158 Unblemished Guise ............................................ 132
Euphrasia Savinot, who wields the test of blight 157 Wayfinder ........................................................... 132
Genseric Dace, Deceiver .........................29, 39, 155 World-Breaker’s Hand ....................................... 133
Harumaph .......................................................... 153 Worldwalker ....................................................... 132

INDEX
208

Great Boundary, the. ......................see Weirding Wall, the Sennacherib, True God of Perception, Vapor, and
Guising ...................................................................... 192 Falling Stars ......................................................... 22
Serpent of Radar, the, Serpent of Self-Creation,
Hard Miracles ............................................................ 50 Hypothetical Entities, Difficulty, Excitement, and
Healing ..........................................................83, 88, 187 Radar ...............................................................17–18
Health Levels ................................................55, 183–188 Surolam, Imperator of Willpower, Law, and the
Heartstone of the World .................................... 148–149 Broken-Hearted .................... 11, 13–14, 22, 37, 150
Heaven .......................... 30, 35–36, 39, 71, 86, 153, 192 Thegri .................................................................. 34
Properties of .........................................................35 Za’afiel, Angel of Destruction ........................ 12, 22
Hell ........................................................... 30, 37–38, 71 Zaanannim .................................................... 34, 77
Properties of ........................................................ 38 Imperial Miracles .................. 50, 117, 143–144, 158, 199
Hollyhock God (HG) ........................................... 48–50 Individuals, Miscellaneous
Hubris ................................................................. 91, 172 “King” Lot ........................................................... 34
Adam ...................................................................40
I Have Achieved (gesture) ......................................... 177 Alsvidur ................................................................75
IC (In Character) ....................................................... 50 Azbogah ............................................................. 173
Imperators .......10, 17–19, 22, 32, 45, 139, 143–145, 199 Donald Trump ...................................................... 11
Achaia, Devil ....................................................... 28 Eve ......................................................................40
Achaz, Wild Magister ......................................... 19 Fezzik ..................................................................113
Ananda, Imperator of Murder, the Infinite, and the Fierabras ..............................................................90
Fourth Age .................................11, 23–24, 131, 154 Flynn Gannary ................................................... 156
Angel of the Sun ........................................... 32, 75 Games Beast of London, the ............................... 47
Arahiel, Imperator of Roads .......................... 32, 93 Györg Krusko ..................................................... 158
Araunah, Magister of the Dark .................... 18, 134 Harkány Ordina .................................................126
Attaris Ebrôt Appêkā, Wild Magister of the Third Hugh Rosewood ..............................28, 30, 88, 195
Age ............................................................. 153, 166 Jack of Roads, the ................................................ 32
Casluhim ............................................................. 34 James Wallis ........................................................ 47
Cedron, Devil of Growth .....................................18 Javairia Al Sabah ................................................ 158
Domiel, Devil of the Experience of Burning . 18, 38 John Henry ..........................................................80
Ebrôt Appêkā, Devil ........................................... 154 Kalliroe Calmes ..................................................103
Epikleros Chimeric, WIld Magister .................... 19 Lilith ...................................................................40
Erevan Insanguine, Magister of the Dark .............18 Lizabet Gantry .................................................... 91
Euphoriel the Angel .............................................18 Martin Cravitt .....................................................131
Firstborn, Angel of Meaning and Existence ............ N’mosnikttiel ...................................................... 173
......................................................... 11, 39, 165–166 Narsinha ............................................................. 173
Ha-Qadosch Berakha ..................................... 11, 14 Oriane Feroulet ............................111, 170, 174, 187
Hazael, Angel of Disorder, Insanity, and Time ........ Sa’a Lingurth ..................................................26–27
................................................................... 166, 199 Saddam Hussein ................................................... 11
Hukkok, Angel ............................................155, 198 Selena Monteith .................................................104
Imperator of the Moon ....................................... 32 Sherlock Holmes .................................................80
Imsety ................................................................. 152 Sinhika of the Vale ...............................................75
Jan ben Jan, True God of the Second Age of Earth... Star-Beast Qot, the .............................................. 76
....................................................................104, 149 Strength .............................................................. 173
Kaithrya of the Wild ........................................... 19 Structure ............................................................. 173
Lady Mugain ...................................................... 197 Teia Arinthiel ....................................................... 11
Lariníen, Devil ................................................17–18 Inherent Superiority ..... see Superior Qualities and Skills
Lord Entropy, Imperator of Desecration, Intentions ........................................................ 74–75, 78
Destruction, and Scorn ................. 11–13, 26–30, 131 Interrupts ............................................................. 53, 176
Lucifer, Devil of Pride and Persuasion 113, 150, 166
Naoutha, Wild Magister ..................................... 185 Karma ..................................................21–22, 28, 31, 66
Nayantara, Wild Magister .................................. 116 Keys ........................................................................57–61
Nightmare ............................................................75
Parasiel, Angel ............................................. 39, 126 Lands Beyond Creation ....................................... 32, 125
Qamamir ............................................................. 34 Illura’Len .............................................................151
Raphi, Devil of Judgement ............................ 18, 38 Properties of ........................................................ 32
Ridya, Devil ......................................................... 88 Sisera Sanguinary ................................................ 32
Stringent Heights ................................................ 32

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Light, the ...........................................18, 40–41, 71, 140 Diane Spinnaker, Power of Illumination .......47, 115
Loathsome Armory, the ............................................. 148 Didrika 7 .............................................................130
Locations, Miscelaneous Dimi .................................................................... 62
43rd Street ........................................................... 34 Dorian Griffith ................................................... 135
Dead Zone of Libya, the .................................... 159 Dumonia, Power of Alternative Music .............. 100
Eden .................................................................... 22 Ellen McIntosh ................................................... 61
Gasherbrum ....................................................... 147 Emily Martenson, Power of Sunday ...................129
Mud Falls, Michigan ............................................ 11 Erkengota Harald ...............................................148
Mugger’s Hill ...................................................... 93 Fayola Osiagobare ......................... 50, 92, 148, 187
Samael St. Augustine ........................................... 26 Foramin Blake ..................................................... 34
Tiger Mountain ................................................... 32 Frederick Bogey ..................................................130
Galeid ..................................................................40
Machinery of the Accords ..................................147, 150 Giraut .................................................................. 93
Magic ....................................................................31, 79 Gordon Ostler ....................................................130
Mashai. ..................................................... see Imperators Hannary James .....................................................81
Mask of Surolam, the ................................................ 150 Haru .................................................................... 62
Milk of Forgotten Faith, the ........................................ 31 Helen of Troy .....................................................126
Mimics .............................................................. 158, 160 Heth .....................................................................18
Game Rules for .................................................. 158 Ianthe Falls-Short, Power of Debate ....... 50, 62–63
Miracle Level ........................................... 50–51, 54, 173 Idony Saint-Germain, Power of Bureaucracy ...... 62
Miracle Points (MP) ..... 49–50, 54, 83, 85, 89, 119–120 Idri-mi ................................................................. 61
Discounts .................................................... 137, 144 Ienari Namika-in ................................................ 114
Miracles ..................................10, 13, 22, 48–51, 53, 193 Isabel, Power of the Road ..............................62, 93
Miraculous Edge ........................... see Edge, Miraculous Jamelle Goodwin ................................................198
Misenchronic Engine ............................147–148, 150–151 Jameson Black, Power of Storms .......... 47, 100, 121
Mortals ...............................................51, 54, 73–74, 105 Jamie Todd .......................................................... 48
mos maiorum ..............................................................152 Jason Sangrieve ................................................... 132
Mundane Actions .................. 50–51, 53, 75, 79, 82, 192 Jasprite Sherrard ......................................................
Mystery Cults ............................................................. 69 ............. 34, 62, 89, 122, 135, 137, 150, 152, 170–171
Mystic Links ............................................... 109–110, 115 Jenny Merrow ..................................................... 128
Mythic World, the ....................... see Border Mythic, the Joan of Arc ...................................................62, 125
Joktan, Power of Scorn .......................12, 26–27, 30
Nettle Rite, the .......................................................... 193 Julianna Avram, Power of Strength ..................... 62
Nobilis, the .......7, 10, 12–13, 17–19, 22, 31, 34, 39, 45, Julianne Ling, Power of Weft ..........................17–18
..........47, 63, 75, 78, 91, 97, 148, 150, 152, 191–193 Ladislau Keldimian ............................................ 172
Abd-al-Rashid .................................................... 116 Lance Romenel, Power of Records ......................113
Adrian Elsey, Power of Toys ...............................107 Laurence Kimaiyo ................................................55
Alice Mendel, Lady of the Thunder .......93, 151, 174 Lirrane Adrimorphous ........................................ 54
Arikel ......................................................63, 75, 128 Lord of WMD, the ........................................... 106
Atsuko Ikada ................................................127–128 Lorelle Clark ......................................................148
Augusta Valentina .........................................12, 157 Maia Sullivan ...................................................... 10
Baalhermon, Power of Destruction .....12, 26–27, 30 Marek .................................................................. 62
Bao Way-ming ................................................... 152 Mariana, Duchess of Pop .................................. 100
Belle Carter, Power of Context ........................... 114 Marsiglio Tendi, Power of Treachery .............62, 86
Bhradkaya Kalluri ............................................... 141 Mary Shenk ......................................................... 34
Bradley Portsmouth, Power of Fear ....................129 Maxwell Murdoch ...........................................17–18
Breck Ainston, Power of Lizards ........................148 Melanie Tumbarius, Power of Music .......................
Brendan Cormail ............................................... 190 ....................................................... 45, 107, 121, 128
Casmir ................................................................. 62 Meon, Power of Desecration ................... 26–27, 30
Cassiel of the Book .............................................. 86 Merriweather James ........... 40–41, 62, 78, 140, 148
Cassius Quirinius ............................................... 128 Michael, Power of Lions .....................................104
Clarissa Kilthdigai ............................................... 10 Myriam Brébeuf .................................................198
Daemarnia, Power of Caves ................................. 62 NAL 19 ...............................................................148
Damon, Viscount of the Sands ............................ 88 Nephele Nikolaidhis, Power of Festivals ..............131
Danglehart Li .................................................... 106 Oresha, Power of the Second Age of Earth ........104
Daniel .................................................................126 Oscar Toclanny .................................................... 10
Deuteronomy, Power of Guilt .............................. 47 Patrick Precipice-Lord, Power of Chaos ............. 62

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Pharnaces the First ............................................. 110 PCs (Player Characters) ................................. 47, 50, 53
Piscator Thalasseus, the, Power of Trade .................. Persona ..................................88, 103–104, 106–107, 124
............................................................... 62, 87, 126 Difficulty Chart for ............................................108
Power of Digitization .........................................180 Difficulty Summary for ......................................107
Power of Fair Play ............................................... 48 Personal Destiny ........................................................ 198
Power of Mt. St. Helens ..................................... 127 Powers, the. ............................................. see Nobilis, the
Power of Rhythm ............................................... 121 Projects ................................................... 47, 52, 195–198
Power of Silver .................................................... 63 Properties, Chancel ....................... see Chancel Properties
Prince of Knots, the ............................................ 177 Properties, Estate ............................ see Estate Properties
Rainfall ............................................................... 152 Properties, Region .........................see Region Properties
Red Straits of Battle, Power of UNIX ........ 101, 110 Prosaic Reality ........................... see Ordinary World, the
Rick O’Summer, Power of Gates ........................129 Psychic Powers ...............................................see Magic
Robert Baxt, Power of Clocks .............................. 91
Rocio DeMitri ..................................................... 86 Reflexive Actions ................................................. 53, 170
Rook Catchfly, Power of Eternity ...........62, 86, 94 Region Properties .............................................. 136, 178
Samsi Mandaru ...........................................152, 172 Res .............................................................................152
Sandra Erskine .....................................................55 Traits for ............................................................. 152
Sara Nei, Power of Networked Gaming ............ 100 Rite of the Last Trump, the ....................................... 192
Scybale ............................................................... 172 Ritual of Two Skins, the ............................................ 154
Shao-yan ............................................................170 Rivulets of Lancaire, the ............................................ 150
St. Angela of the Flail .......................................... 82
Stheno .................................................................131 Scenes ................................................................. 50, 120
Stone Cold Eeyore ..................................... 148, 150 Seal of Time, the ................................................153, 166
Superstes Annabelle Zupay, Power of Trails ............ Second Age, the ........................................... 104, 153–154
................................................................47, 62, 125 Secondary Domain ............................................... 54, 98
Surkhai Beybukov ............................................... 82 Secondary Persona ...............................................54, 104
Takari Risu .......................................................... 62 Serious Wounds ...................................................184–185
Tegus Tsedenbal ................................................. 177 Servant’s Rite, the ...................................................... 191
Texcoyo ................................................................ 34 Sessions ................................................................ 50, 52
Tiria, Power of the Borealis ........................... 34, 77 Shine .................................................................... 76, 78
Trystan Porphyrogenitus, Power of Poseurs .. 84, 121 Sight, the ........................................................... 104, 193
V. I. Ialda, Power of Consumption ......................105 Simple Miracles ................................................... 50, 123
Walking Eye, Power of Borders .....................62, 89 Skills ............................................... 54–55, 73–76, 78–80
Yip Xiao-mei ......................................................170 Social Clubs
Zéphyrin .............................................. 111, 170, 174 Byzantine Society, the ................................. 152, 189
Normal Miracles .................................................. 50, 123 Martial College, the ............................................ 152
NPCs (Non-Player Characters) ...... 49–50, 53, 174, 176 Spirit World, the ........................................... 45, 165–167
Properties of ........................................................ 45
Obstacles ....................................................... 79, 82, 111 Spiritus Dei .......................................see Causa Causans
Ogdoad, the Stories ......................................................................... 50
Lady Jill Erosion .................................................. 32 Strategists .....................................................133, 158–159
Lady Midsummer Night ..................................... 32 Game Rules for .................................................. 159
Ombudsmen ............................................................... 24 Strike ...................................................... 51, 83, 123, 181
OOC (Out of Character) ....................................50, 188 Superior Qualities and Skills ...................54–55, 80, 106
Orders .................................................. 147–148, 150–152 Surface Wounds ........................................................ 184
Curators, the ....................................................... 150 Sustained Actions .................... 53, 75, 169, 177, 180–181
Falling Stars, the .......................................... 147–148
Gray Order of the Functionaries, the ......... 148, 150 Third Age, the .............................................. 114, 153, 157
Green Snake Order, the ......................................148 Thought-Record Technology .......................................28
Order of Hidden Balances ..................................148 Tools ........................................................................... 80
Ravens’ Order, the ................................................151 Traits .....................................................................48–49
Robbers’ Order, the ..............................................151 Treasure .................................................111–114, 117, 124
Ordinary World, the .................... 21–24, 28, 31, 36, 192 Difficulty Summary for ...................................... 117
Properties of .........................................................21 True Gods ................................................ 18–19, 43, 141
True Tongue of Heaven, the ...................................... 192
Pace ....................................................................176, 181 Truth of the Name, the ........................................ 154–155
Passions ............................................................54, 73–75 Tumbleoaks .................................................................43

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Urbana 23–24

Warmains ............................................................ 156–157

Game Rules for .................................................. 156
Web of Khedeb Neret, the .................................. 147–148
Weirding Wall, the .......................... 13, 32, 39, 173, 188
Wild, the ................................ 18–19, 42–43, 71, 89, 141
Will ............................................. 73–75, 78–79, 92, 144
Words of Command ............................................50, 187
World Ash, the ................30, 39, 142, 147, 160, 172–173
Worlds of the Ash
Abaton ................................................................. 30
Aelfscienne ....................................................30, 63
Alpha Centauri .................................................... 39
Dionyl ...........................................................30, 63
Earth ................................................................... 39
Jotunheim ......................................................30, 63
Mars ............................................................ 39, 170
Ofeili .................................................................. 150
Saturn ..................................................................90
Venus ................................................................... 39
Wounds ................................................ 83, 183–188, 190

Ymerae .................................................... see Imperators

Zu, the ....................................................................... 163

INDEX