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Sidereal Presence Charms by BillGarrett

Past Presence

 Cost: 8 motes, 1 Willpower
 Duration: Instant
 Type: Simple
 Minimum Presence: 5
 Minimum Essence: 3
 Prerequisite Charms: (under consideration)

"You are probably wondering why I keep appearing in your memories, John. It is because I have inserted myself into them." -- Dr. Schreber, 'Dark City'

The Sidereal chooses a target, who must be in her general vicinity (but who need not be aware of the Sidereal or her presence), and a focus for memory. Thereafter she engages in an opposed roll, pitting her Manipulation + Presence against the opponent's Willpower + Essence. The Sidereal need only gain a single success on this contest. If her target succeeds by more than her own permanent Essence, he realizes that he was the victim of an attempt at mental manipulation. The Sidereal may make repeated attempts if she fails, but each attempt is at a cumulative +1 difficulty for the Sidereal unless she allows a day to pass between attempts.

If she succeeds, she alters the victim's memories - not to erase or overwrite them, but to add to them. She may choose some event or association to link this memory to, such as a particular childhood event, the sight of an origami sculpture, a song or scent, or anything else that ordinarily would trigger human memory. These memories may contain several scenes' or days' worth of content, and may (for example) be used to convey any information the Sidereal herself possesses. The memories added will always be somewhat generic on the part of the Sidereal; it is the target's own mind which supplies specific contexts.

A Sidereal may provide 'teaching' in this fashion, providing knowledge of one Charm or spell or enough training to raise any Ability to 2 dots, with any single application of this Charm.

Instead of conveying information, the Sidereal may convey persuasiveness. In this application, the Sidereal makes a reflexive Manipulation + Presence roll, which cannot be modified by Charms or other magic, at the time the target recalls the memory. This sort of recollection will always come as a surprise to the target, but it nevertheless may sway her decision-making.

Exalted targets do not receive any special ability to recognize memories for what they are; their mind accepted the memory as genuine at the time the Sidereal enacted the Charm. Charms or other magical effects which reveal or destroy implanted memories, however, will detect the falsified memory provided by this Charm.

The Sidereal may not defeat the Arcane Fate through the use of this Charm.

Comments

Neat. Reminiscent of the movie, without going too far and overshadowing Memory-Reweaving Performance. -TheMyriadOfShades