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Regulus

Operative Handbook

You will use this handbook when you create your operative character for Regulus. You need to do the following to make your character:

  1. Pick a Primary Move from your operative’s Volume Move list. You get all the moves, but one is your Primary move.
  2. Choose a primary Gig, and take a listed Quality from it. If it is a Solo Gig, pick a job tactic from it.
  3. Choose a secondary Gig if you want, but only if you did not pick a Solo Gig. If you do so, take a listed Quality from it. If you do not take a secondary Gig pick a job tactic from the provided section. You can picture this as you either: get a job tactic, or take a secondary gig and get one of it's qualities instead.
  4. Pick freely from the listed Qualities in the handbook, or create them until your operative has five Qualities in total.
  5. Answer the questions in your Volume and then one more of your choice from your Primary Gig.
  6. ?
  7. Profit!

Moves are actions your operative can take while not in a job that have specific rules and application to the narrative.

Gigs and Volumes

When you choose a Volume, you are choosing how your operative fits into the world of Etheria. When you choose a Gig, you choose a criminal skill set applicable to the Jobs your operative works. Making these two choices defines a lot about the operative. Some Volumes synergize with certain Gigs, and some do not. Nothing of that nature is required by the game or its rules, so just do what you want.

Table of Contents

Volume: Crusader

  1. Choose a religion for your crusader, but not Knights of Liberty Corps (Knight) or Temple of Etheric Resplendence (Lightbearer).
  2. Work with the Director to establish who the Control Supervisor is that backs your crusader, just a name and general impression is enough to start the game.
  3. Introduce one thing your crusader did to promote their cause behind the scenes, likely through Network operations. Feel free to brainstorm with players.

Move list:

Volume: Insider

  1. Work with the Director to establish who the Control Supervisor is handles your insider, just a name and general impression is enough to start the game.

Move list:

Volume: Irregular

  1. Decide on a empire where you gained your Duke title, and the province of that world that is your duchy.
  2. Decide if your rank is also Ascendent, which is the level of a Duke that is in consideration for gaining the world title of Regent (the top title of a world, from which Stewards are determined).

Move list:

Volume: Missionary

  1. Choose a religion for your missionary, but not Knights of Liberty Corps (Knight).

Move list:

Volume: Professional

Move list:

Volume: Rector

  1. Choose a religion for your rector, from the options: Conservators of the Quintessential Chalice (Conservator), Open Church of the Technocracy (Technocrat), or Shrine of the Holy Eye (Seeker).
  2. Work with the Director to establish who the Empire Regent is that backs your rector. Choose an empire world that is home to that Regent (and will establish Union alignment). A name, world, and general impression is enough to start the game.
  3. Create in brief the small church your rector presides over: it's rough count of parishioners (10-100 or so), and the haven where it resides.

Move list:

Volume: Runner

Move list:

Volume: Spook

Move list:

Gig: Chipper

A Chipper, or casually Chiphead/Chipped, has purchased a Mirrochip on the black market. While each person in Etheria is a node in the galactic ‘Net, each mind is blocked from accessing it directly by the thought barrier. Not the Chipper, they plug the Mirrochip into their port, and then can jack into the Matrix. This is a projection of the ‘Net as a virtual space a chipper can enter and exit. A serious Chipper also has a Sleeve, a device that wraps an arm, which can be loaded with caps containing single-use Matrix programs. Using these highly illegal tools, a Chipper can explore the ‘Net in ways no one else can.

Tagline: There no corner of the 'Net I can't reach.

Props: Mirrochip and Sleeve.

Quality list:

  • Chipped the Fuck Up: You don't have just any run of the mill Mirrochip, you got a special one with cracked out specs. You may markdown Wealth between jobs to load up to five charges into it. You may spend charges in Matrix contests to get leverage.
  • Total Neural Lace: You let Control advancements division do a number on your neural pathways, jacking up your reaction time beyond known limits. Painful though to use, but powerful. You may markdown Comfort at any time to provide leverage for combat and Matrix contests.

Gig: Face

A Face, or casually a Shill, is a particular type of confidence man with a focus on charisma and charm. A social tactician or merit, but unlike the Shark, the Face remains the same always. They embrace a charismatic persona and flex the power of a mighty Patron behind them. Building a web of support in all arenas as they go forth, the Face hides in plain sight.

Tagline: Baby you can trust me, I got you.

Props: Platinum Holocard.

Quality list:

Gig: Heavy

A Heavy, or casually a Hitter, is a combat specialist. Not a ground, air, or space warfare specialist, but a behind-the-scenes show up suddenly and take some people out kind of combat professional. There are many types of Heavies, but the most common is the Duplicator. You use a special single-use cap called Carbon-Copy to put yourself into a Red type Automata (combat synthetic), and essentially fall into a temporary coma. Then you do whatever you need to do in your synthetic body. Eventually, your body recovers, and the copy of yourself in the Auto burns out. In order to better serve your needs, you bought an Autoworks at some point. This is a toolkit that lets you tool up Automata, including straight changing their model type.

Tagline: Ok, so I go in and kick ass. Rinse and repeat.

Props: Autoworks, 1 Carbon-Copy cap.

Quality list:

  • Stealth Mode Unlocked: When you CC yourself into an Auto, it's stealth features are unlocked. It becomes undetectable by other Autos and nearly silent and invisble to the naked eye and medium quality sensors. If stealth can be used to win a Contest, you automatically have Means/leverage for the roll.
  • Yes, that is a missle rack: When you CC into a Red type Auto, it fabricates a serious business missle rack. When in a Combat Situation, your attack contests automatically have boths Means and one leverage. If you trade these in, you can instead attack all valid targets at once, and the rack is disabled for the current situation.

Solo Gig: Mastermind

A Mastermind, or casually Wizard, is a true schemer. You are the one to make plans within plans. You always play the long game. Beyond that, you are a detail-focused organizer who holds crews of operatives together. A Mastermind has a large load on their shoulders, so at some point, you acquired a Simlet/Sim, an extra intelligence living inside the ‘Net of some power. This Sim does much of the heavy lifting for you, letting you focus on the big picture.

The Mastermind has an additional Rating for their character: Focus. This begins at 6, and once per sequence between jobs they can meditate, reducing Comfort 1 level and increasing Focus 1 level. When Focus reaches 0, they meet a Sanity Crisis.

Tagline: Well you see, you would have gotten me there, but ...

Props: Simlet

Quality list:

  • But I Planned For That, You See: Reduce Focus 1 level, and explain how a clever plan made earlier by your operative allows them to earn a Yes result automatically for a contest.
  • A True Visionary: When you are on a Job and a roll is made, you may reduce Focus 1 level and shift the roll result up or down 1 or 2.

Job Tactics list:

Gig: Shark

A Shark, or casually a Hustler, is a con artist at the core. A truly pliable social creature moving in and out of personas. One who is not afraid to use chicanery to get what they are after. You picked up a highly illegal Simsuit, which, when worn, lets us create true tactile and visual changes to your appearance. It is often a thankless job, as when you do your work right, it seems like nothing was ever done at all.

Tagline: I'll go in, find the right guy for the code card, and they'll never even know what happened.

Props: Simsuit

Quality list:

Solo Gig: Technomancer

A Technomancer, or, more casually, a Mage, is someone who has been taught the ways of technomancy by a mentor. This is an advanced skill set that can create direct effects, not unlike magic, from the use of pure ACE. Technomancy is a high crime in the Empire and is actively hunted. The rub to that is the first magic taught to the technomancer is cloaking magic. If the safe is beyond that wall, the technomancer walks through it.

Technomancers get a rating called Cloak that begins at 6. At the start of every job unwind step, they increase Cloak one level.

Tagline: You ain't seen nothing yet friend...

Props: Stareye

Quality list:

Job Tactics list:

Gig: Thief

A Thief, or casually a Lifter, is all about getting into the places that someone has decided are off limits. You aren’t always purloining valuables, though that is a lucrative endeavor in its own right. Instead, you often gain access to things that are restricted in order to make a job work. A quite illegal Polycard is the main tool of your trade, allowing you to bypass standard security locks.

Tagline: Reveal each secret, opening one locked door at a time.

Props: Polycard

Quality list:

Solo Gig: Xenogene

A Xenogene, or casually a Fiend, is someone who has taken body hacking far past the point considered sane by most. At this point, considered human only by the most casual observation, the xenogene exceeds human capability. While not considered high crime in the Empire, the fact that the extreme body hacking must be done by a technomancer puts the xenogene in a gray area of the law.

Xenogenes get a rating called Fever that begins at 6. At the start of the job wind up step they increase Fever one level.

Tagline: King Kong ain't got nothing on me.

Props: Corepump

Quality list:

Job Tactics list:

Prop List

  • Autoworks: A set of tools that fits into a small carrying case the size of a large book which allows one to tool up Automata. The limit is changing their model type (Blue, White, or Red), which takes some hours to complete.
  • Carbon-Copy Cap: A caplet that let's you duplicate into an Auto and your normal body falls into copy sleep for a few hours. Eventually your duplicate in the Auto burns out, generally within a day. Like many caps, these are single-use. It costs 1 Wealth (markdown) to buy 1 such cap on the black market.
  • Corepump: Replacing a xenogene's heart is a Corepump that runs off ACE. It is also exposed to release heat and radiation waste (think Ironman's arc reactor kind of thing).
  • Mirrochip: A small disc device that can be installed on a person's port, allowing them to link to their Sleeve and jack into the Matrix.
  • Platinum Holocard: A not quite unlimited line of holocred given to the Face from their patron.
  • Polycard: At first glance a norrmal CommunoCard, but this one has software allowing it to open all normal security locks.
  • Simlet: AKA Sim, or an extra intelligence living in the 'Net. Think of it like an AI helper with access to the 'Net streams of information, a little like a personal Chipper in some ways. Imagine something like the disembodied voice Jarvis from the Iron Man movies.
  • Simsuit: A very advanced suit that gives the wearer the ability to alter their appearance. It's complexity field creates more than just illusion, changing both the look and tactile feel of the wearer. This does mean it has the downsides of a coplexity field though (touching fields completely disrupt each other, and so on). The other limitation is that changing the field is a complicated mental process that takes a full minute.
  • Sleeve: A complex ultratech tool that wraps around the forearm with slots for caplets. It links to the wearer's Mirrochip and allows them to both access the Matrix and expend program caplets installed in it. You can get 5 generic program caplets on the black market for 1 Wealth (markdown), then these are programmed by the user.
  • Stareye: A bio-engineered eye replacement allowing the technomancer to work magic.

Job Tactics

Vocation Qualities

Action Adventure Qualities

Crime Genre Qualities

Etheric Qualities

Background Qualities