powersthatbe | Harmonic Resonance plot role info

Non-plot-role Conductors have semi-plot status (i.e. permission to read the plot role post, but no comment count responsibilities, etc).

Background: Whoever you were before, now you’re part of a team. You belong in this fight, doing your most against the nightmares. You no longer experience fear, sadness, or doubt - you’re confident. It’s maybe a little beside the point, but you’re definitely cooler now than you used to be. You’re part of the biggest Bond Group Questing Country has ever heard of. You don’t just have faith, hope, and trust in one another - you have rock-solid conviction. These Dreamers are your best friends, and being with them protects you from everything. You don’t get sad. Your courage never falters. You don’t worry what anyone outside your Bond Group thinks of you. You operate in a state of Sailor Scout Invincibility dialed up to 11, full speed ahead and damn the torpedoes. You can rationally decide something is unwise, but the fact that fear, shame, and doubt have no grip on you means you may act somewhat impulsively at times, if other Conductors agree with you. You still disagree with each other, just in the privacy of the Conductor Network.

Important Points:
1. Like being a Harbinger, being a Conductor does involve an altered state of consciousness, but a much milder one. Your characters all share some of the same goals (see below). Some of you consciously adopted these goals and joined this Bond Group/Role with informed consent. Others may have spontaneously switched Roles in an involuntary moment of epiphany - which is how changes in Role usually work for Dreamers, and probably wouldn’t be alarming if it wasn’t unprecedented.

2. The Harmony which Conductors experience is not mind control. In a way, it’s not dissimilar to being members of a cult - people in extremely close contact who have tremendous social authority within their tight-knit circle of friends. Which isn’t that different than being a Dreamer or a Traveler, just more intense. We’re not saying there’s not an eerie element to it, though Conductor characters will probably insist there isn’t. We’re not saying it’s not an unknown, outside influence of mysterious nature and unknown motive. It totes is.

But the Bond of Conductors to one another, like the Bond any Dreamer experiences, is based on genuine shared beliefs - that, when you look at it, all Dreamers already share. Beat the nightmares, protect your Bond Group first and foremost, believe in each other, remember all Dreamers are on the same side. It is, however, a really weird mutual social experience of unknown origin, but it’s important as players you know that your characters are neither evil, hive-minded, nor mind-controlled (any more than is implied by Infiltration or having access to the regular Psychic Network). We totally don’t mind non-Conductor characters thinking those things, but it’s important that all Conductors are, uh, on the same page about the implications of their all being on the same page?

One of the reasons Pillars and Harbingers can’t be Conductors is that some part of their mental state makes them unable to believe (Pillars) or comprehend (Harbingers) others with that sort of certainty.

If playing a character in this kind of Bond does not appeal to you, please do not play a Conductor.

3. Don’t forget your emotional immunities, or the fact that you now possess at least one healing power.

4. You don’t have a Dreamcatcher any more, you have a Bident. Everyone knows you have a Bident, but you probably haven’t shared that your Dreamcatcher is gone. You now only recharge power by defeating nightmares. Word of Mod: you really do convert the nightmare-stuff into wholesome dream-stuff, you’re not turning into a nightmare or anything like that, we promise. But your character has no proof of that, just a lack of doubt or fear about it.

5. OPTIONALLY: You’re a little more prone to having in-jokes and being a memelord now. This is Totally Normal.

6. There are a couple characters who may have something more Mind-Control-esque going on, but we have talked to them specifically about it, and none of the other Conductors know about it. It’s not an inherent part of the Conductor Role.

Goals: You have the following priorities in the following order.
1) Beat the Nightmares.
2) Work as a team with other Conductors, listen to other Conductors, and protect your Bond Group.
3) Don’t let anyone else’s negative emotions get you down - this includes any fear, doubt, or hostility directed at Conductors (or anyone else).
4) Work as a team with everyone.
5) Anything not on this list, you still have totally individual opinions about - and even things on this list are totally subject to very individual interpretations.

Allies: All Conductors. Any non-Conductors your character would think of as allies.

Mod Expectations:
-If any of this is unclear, please let us know so we can answer your questions!
-Please don’t read the spoilertext sections of the First Conductor’s plotting info.

Edited 2020-08-27 09:10 (UTC)

Background: You’re not the leader of the Conductors. There is no leader of the Conductors. You’re a team. That’s the whole point. But you also won’t deny that, being the first, some people might look up to you a bit.

Two months ago you didn’t really know what your future in Questing Country would look like. You’re the memelord who was always telling jokes that nobody understood. You didn’t have any Bondmates, your Spirit Companion always seemed at least faintly disappointed in you, and while you believed you could make a change, leave your mark, you’d have to admit you didn’t know how. What was the unique thing only you could do?

You feel a little bit silly, thinking back on that now. You went to bed in your cramped sleep capsule aboard Aratta Station one night and woke up knowing that it wasn’t what you alone could accomplish that mattered - it was what all of you could do together. When you took on your Dream Form that night, you’d changed, and your Companion had as well. You didn’t know the words Tessera, or Bident, or Conductor yet; you only knew that you had the confidence to make a difference against the nightmares, but you’d need a team - a team that could work together.

The first two weeks were confusing, but several friends chose to help you cultivate a Bond - they felt inspired by your new outlook, your new enthusiasm for their goals, their beliefs - and together you became the first Bond Group of Conductors. Before long, the Empowered Oracle, seeking to understand what had happened to all of you, joined your Bond Group, and found themself undergoing the same transformation.

You know this seems spooky to people. But the bunch of you - you’re not all thinking the same thoughts. Over the Conductor Network, you wonder about each other, question each other, share different ideas, even disagree; you maintain your individual opinions.

It’s just that you never lose sight of what’s most important now: fighting the nightmares. Being together as a group. Supporting each other. It’s okay to disagree over the Conductor Network, but out loud, to people who don’t share the bond, you try to stick with your friends. There’s nothing unnatural about that.

And people get your jokes, now. That’s really nice, too.

Most Conductors join the Bond because Conductors are impressive - something to aspire to. Some just wake up one night already changed - no different from changing from a Champion to an Oracle, really. But there is one thing even most of your fellow Conductors don’t know.

Anyone Sanctioned by a Conductor becomes a Conductor.

Now, Sanctions are super-rare. You’d never even heard of them before the Ouroboros Retrograde - modern Champions DON’T weaponize their bonds that way. But a month ago, a Dark Oracle’s Spirit Companion panicked when it couldn’t communicate with your Tessera, and attacked you and a friend of yours. [NOTE: This Dark Oracle and this friend can be PCs or NPCs, but neither may be the Empowered Conductor. We suggest NPCs unless someone else’s plans line up neatly with this - this is the second-biggest secret in the Jaunt. Keep it safe.]

You just meant to lay the Sanction on the Oracle so their Doppleganger would stop attacking. But the next moment, they were in white and silver. The three of you agreed to keep this a secret unless it was absolutely necessary - Oracles are uncertain enough about Starmover influence on your powers without knowing you can change someone’s perspective, just like a Harbinger. You swear you won’t misuse this power, but you don’t want to let the word get out about it, either.

Goals:
-Try to keep the news that Conductors don’t have dreamcatchers any more under wraps. Try to keep that other piece of news under wraps too.
-Lead the fight against the nightmares.
-Look out for the best interests of every Conductor.

Allies: All Conductors. You furthermore regard all Harbingers as allies, but they don’t necessarily feel the same as you.

Mod Expectations:
-Make sure you read the “Conductors At Large” plot role as well. It applies to you.
-One thread per week on the Conductor Network, where you make five comments or more in a single thread.
-Two threads per week in the current mingle, with non-Conductors, where you make four or more comments in a single thread.

Weekly Reporting:
Any memes or in-jokes you share, any time you use a Plot skill, any time you consider someone a threat to Questing Country, any time a non-Conductor’s suspicion rises towards hostility.

Skill: Aura of Direction. Once per week for fifteen minutes, all allies within your line of sight can hear you clearly. If they follow even general instructions you give (“Don’t give up!” “Hold the line!” “GET ‘EM!” all count), they can suppress the first mental status effect (including ordinary or supernatural fear, sadness or doubt, and including supernatural anger, but not ordinary anger) that interferes with that instruction, and automatically heal the first non-fatal wound acquired while following that instruction. This protection is renewed every time within fifteen minutes that you give, and they choose to follow, a fresh instruction.

“Ally” as defined here can be anyone you consider to be on your side - not only Conductors (since Conductors all possess at least one healing power and are immune to most negative emotional states, the only real benefit Conductors gain from this aura is resistance to other mental status effects - i.e. shock, stun, sleep, charm, enchantment, compulsion, confusion).

Additionally, anyone under the effects of this Aura understands any in-joke or meme reference you use.

A Big Secret: Sanction Circle. In-character, you do not know if this skill is possessed only by you, or by all Conductors. When your Bond Group places an involuntary Sanction on someone, you can Sanction more than one person, can Sanction a person with an existing Bond, and your Bond Group only needs to have more members locally present than the total members of the other Bond Group. Ordinarily an involuntary, out-of-group Sanction requires you to outnumber them four to one, and cannot be done on someone who has a Bond of their own.

During the Jaunt, a person Sanctioned in this manner becomes a Conductor, unless they are a Pillar or a Harbinger. You are determined to only use this skill on Adversaries, Dark Oracles, or Travelers who pose a threat to Questing Country, and only after persuasion has failed. After the Jaunt, this skill no longer transforms those Sanctioned into Conductors, and only operates once per month, but may be used at your character’s own ethical discretion. The preceding paragraphs constitute the single exception to the Blanket Statements About Conductors. Make sure the OOC conversation about whether or not to use this skill on a given character includes a Mod, please.

Background: Listen, you don’t blame any Oracles for worrying about the Conductors. You were worried, too. That’s why you engaged in a close study of the phenomenon.

You’re a respected senpai, and during the height of the Starquakes, you lost two Champion proteges to them - one became a Harbinger. The other… it’s easier to say “they’re no longer in Questing Country.” After all, you don’t know that they died. Only that they fell a really, really long way into a blazing chasm… and never emerged. They weren’t a Bondmate, not quite, so you don’t know for sure.

Anyway. You lost people. And all your Wisdom didn’t help stop that. You’re an Oracle. You know exactly how dependent on others you are to get real work done.

When the Conductors first emerged, you were the first to openly speculate that they were Harbingers, 2.0, and you didn’t mean that as neutrally as the few who agreed with you. You had nightmares about Harbingers still, even though you don’t blame them for being who and what they are.

But where the Spirit Companions immediately grew shy and avoidant around Tesserae, you decided to delve into the mystery yourself. Understanding is the only weapon you have that doesn’t put someone else at risk. And you were - well, you were feeling pretty alone.

The moment of your transformation was a revelation. It was nothing more or less than a Bond forming, but a Bond that was so much more. The ability to send thoughts, the certainty - not hope, but knowledge that you have each other’s back - that’s why you’re calm in the face of long odds.

Everyone says that Conductors are halfway between Adversary and Champion, because of their magic, but that knowledge of each other’s support - it is as certain and supernatural as any Oracular knowledge. And whatever people outside mutter about the eeriness of this bond, you know better. If it’s eerie, all Oracle knowledge is.

You’re all meant to be fighting together against the nightmares. Now, you all have the power, agency, and knowledge to do it. All in one. You’re the future of Questing Country.

Goals:
-Evangelize and persuade others that being a Conductor is a good thing. Don’t try to force it; try to prove it.
-There are few former Oracles among Conductors - act as mentor to as many Conductors as need it.
-Really consider the answer to any question anyone asks you, or asks around you. After all, you no longer doubt yourself or fear being wrong.

Allies: All Conductors, Many Oracles. No Harbingers. You no longer fear them, but you have a… pronounced distaste for them. You’re aware the First Conductor feels the opposite - which is proof you don’t share a hive mind.

Mod Expectations:
-Make sure you read the “Conductors At Large” plot role as well. It applies to you.
-One thread per week on the Conductor Network, where you make five comments or more in a single thread.
-One thread per week in the current mingle, with an Oracle, where you make four or more comments in a single thread.
-One thread per week in the current mingle, with a non-Oracle, non-Conductor, where you make four or more comments in a single thread.

Weekly Reporting: Any new mysteries you’re investigating. Any new discoveries about the mysteries you’re already exploring. Any threat you perceive to the Conductors.

Skills: The Shortest Line. You can always find the shortest route to the location of any other Conductor. Other Conductors can’t do this; so you suspect it’s a remnant of the Oracle Knowledge you used to have before you transformed into a Conductor. In-Jaunt, this skill can be used to get to any Questing Country location where at least one Conductor is present within the space of a single thread or scene, guiding a handful of others with you through the Liminal shortcuts. Out of Jaunt, this skill can be used to follow any Traveler who has used a Portal or Bridge between any two Liminal locations, even if that Portal or Bridge is no longer active, without using a Portal or Bridge of your own, as long as that Traveler has not returned. (So you could enter an active Conversation Space, but if a character had already been returned to Liminal Space proper, you could not enter the empty Conversation Space).

Hustle and Flow. Once per week, use your bident to absorb any one liminal object or magical effect or energy within reach, doubling the effect of the next skill or spell you use in this thread. This works on any magic, not only QC’s Archetypal Magic. In Questing Country, if any Oracles see this, they will figure out your Bident has replaced your Dreamcatcher, and that Conductors refuel by consuming nightmares. Please inform both the mods and any relevant Oracles if this occurs. It would be Very Cool if this happens in Week 2-4 somewhere, but is not required.

Background: The thing is, you went Adversary on your second night in Questing Country. You’ve asked around, and you’re pretty sure that’s a record. But your Spirit Companion, Zygi Protium Cation, couldn’t or wouldn’t explain some basic things to you. Things like why Spirit Companions speak in riddles, why Familiars only speak to their Oracles, how is it that only Dopplegangers can mimic their Chosen, or where a Pillar’s Spirit Companion even goes. You’re more than willing to fight nightmares. You know you can make a difference. But Spirit Companions are hiding something. From all of you. And you’ve been trying to figure it out ever since.

You know everyone thinks you’re crazy. You’re kind of used to that. But you’ve had your eyes open. You’ve seen how the Spirit Companions felt threatened by the Arcana, how in the long past they even put Adversaries on leashes, and how, no matter how optimistic they pretend to be, they’re terrified of Guiding Stars and Tesserae. They want to keep their monopoly on whispering in Champions’ ears, of brushing aside the basic questions.

And you think you’ve figured it out. You see - Guiding Stars are just Starmovers. They’re not Spirit Companions at all. The Travelers have their own fake Spirit Companions. That means that Tesserae aren’t really Spirit Companions, either. And they’re making an army of Dreamers who all dress alike, think alike, don’t even challenge or question their system.

That’s really, really scary stuff. But the Spirit Companions can’t admit it, of course. Because that would mean admitting they really are manipulating everyone, and they’re not going to let go of their control enough to do that.

You can’t do this alone. So, you’ve snuck down to the Opaline Bore with a stolen Conductor’s bident, tied a message in a bottle, and thrown it down the Bore. It worked - Bidents keep ectoplasm from being moved by dream powers - so your message made it into Backstage, where it will be expressed as part of the structure of Questing Country. If help is out there, it will come to you.

Goals:
-Remember that first and foremost you’re still powered by hope and want to defeat the influences of fear. This character isn’t only or primarily comic relief, and this isn’t a dark Jaunt, even if there’s some sketchy mysteries going on. There’s a core of unshakeable hope at believing the powers of the dreamworld are conspiring against you and have pulled the wool over everyone’s eyes - but thinking that’s no reason to give up, that you can make everyone see and save them all.
-Explore and develop every suspicious theory you can about what’s really going on with Conductors or Spirit Companions. If reasons come up to suspect Travelers or Oracles, run with that. If you can’t come up with any good crackpot theories, ask the mods to provide at least one new “insight” per week. Some of them might be true - feel free to investigate seriously as well as suggesting some probable dead ends.
-Constantly question any facts given by Oracles, Conductors, or Spirit Companions. How do you really know?
-Try to help Adversaries work together against the orthodoxies that might oppress them.

Allies: At least one other Adversary or Dark Oracle who you have a specific friendly bond with. It’s important, in plotting with this person, that they neither dismiss nor believe your theories.

Mod Expectations:
-One thread per week in the current mingle, of at least four comments per thread, with any Adversary or Dark Oracle.
-One thread per week in the current mingle, of at least four comments per thread, with any Investigator.
-One thread per week in the current mingle, of at least four comments per thread, with any non-Adversary Dreamer.

Weekly Reporting: Any new theories, or if you need theories. Any suspicious things you catch anyone doing. Any Adversaries who need help, or any plans Adversaries put together.

Skill: Weight of the World. Once per week, you can convince one target to feel that the current situation, thought, feeling, or decision they’re in the midst of is of absolutely vital importance. At your option, this can either a) make them take things so seriously they expend resources to be sure they give their peak performance, or b) feel overwhelmed or paralyzed by the severity of consequence of what they do next. Note that as this can be a type of “choice paralysis,” not necessarily fear or doubt, it works on Conductors just fine. This skill is persuasive and psychological in nature, not magical, and is not subject to magic resistance.

Background: These days, you can’t wait to get to sleep. Your waking life has been rough lately, and a night of facing nightmares you can stab and explode is actually a huge relief.

Like many Hecatite dreamers, you did very poorly on your Orthotropic Exams - the testing that, when passed, gives you adult status and career path. Unlike most Hecatites, Dreamers or no, after failing to prove your adulthood you didn’t go back to the Orthostroma, the “cram school” that would help you grow into your approved mode. You took one of the few other legal options - you joined the Diaphoron of the Conditioned.

In Hecatite society, a legal but not officially condoned belief, practice, or lifestyle is isolated from other ‘correct’ paths of life in a Diaphoron, an isolated community. The Conditioned, who adapt their behaviors rather than their bodies to better perform desired tasks, are known to be useful in combat and interspecies diplomacy, so their strangeness is… tolerated. Usually.

A little less so, lately. More and more Conditioned Hecatites are cracking under the stress of social disapproval and abandoning the Diaphoron - and the alien Conditioned who live within the community are reporting ever-greater problems with meeting the bureaucratic hurdles and guidelines Hecatite society throws up against those they disapprove of.

To you, that sounds like a nightmare at work. Speaking to alien spacefarers, they don’t seem to report this kind of trouble elsewhere, so it’s something local to Aratta. Every night, as soon as you can, you’ve been seeking out any Oracles you can to try to find this nightmare, to learn more about it, but so far they’ve just looked grim and troubled and been unable to point at anything more specific than the vague Human and Gorgon nightmares that have been popping up. But that isn’t right - this is bad Hecatite behavior, and it affects everyone, so it should either be Hecatite or universal.

You’ve been wondering lately if you should try to join the Conductors - nobody shatters more nightmares - but you’ve been wondering if, religiously speaking, it’s allowed. Conditioned aren’t supposed to deliberately augment themselves with outside assistance, but to find disciplines that unlock inner strength, and really, you just can’t tell whether this counts or not. But even if you don’t become one of them, at the very least you can take help wherever you can get it.

Goals:
-Search everywhere you can for new, powerful nightmares, especially xenophobic ones. Take any help you can get.
-Look for spiritual practices or disciplines that can give you inner strength
-Try and figure out whether you ought to become a Conductor, or if you have to decline for religious reasons

Allies: You look up to Oracles and Conductors, of course. Any other Conditioned. Anyone from Aratta Skyhook. Anybody else who will believe you that there’s a new threat somewhere out there that no one’s found yet.

Mod Expectations:
-Two threads per week of at least four comments in length where you’re hunting for nightmares in some way
-One thread per week of at least four comments in length where you’re engaged in Conditioned spiritual practices or asking spiritual or theological questions

Weekly Reporting: Any progress toward your goals. Any time you ask an Oracle about your quest (let the Oracle’s player know to contact the mods for the results of any oracular knowledge).

Skill: Kinesic Diagnosis. Whenever you fight someone, you learn at least one profound, true thing about their state of mind. This does not work if they are motionless during the fight, if you neither see nor touch them during the fight, or if either of you are treating the fight as practice. Things you can choose to learn include if they are being honest with you, whether they are generally friendly or hostile towards you, what their underlying emotional state is, what they presently want or fear. A fight which goes on an especially long time or which is especially intense or dangerous, may reveal multiple profound truths, at the discretion of the player (if the opponent is a player character) or mod (if the opponent is an NPC). This ability works on non-sentient beings, including nightmares, but the insights into a limited mind may be less profound. The only way to counter this ability is by keeping all physical motion unobserved, or, IF they are aware you possess this ability, by any skill which grants complete conscious control of body language. This insight is not magical or psychic and is not subject to magic resistance or psychic protection. The skill does not necessarily require the opponent to be consciously aware of the answer to your question for you to extract it.

Shacklebreaker. This gravity-warping melee weapon was built both in dreams and the Waking World - though you have to hide it there - and the dreams it’s forged of mean that in dreams it can, at least temporarily, shatter any chain, literal or metaphorical, that it strikes.

CONDUCTORS AT LARGE

FIRST CONDUCTOR - DEEDEE

EMPOWERED ORACLE - THORNE

CONSPIRACY THEORIST ADVERSARY - GIL

HECATITE DREAMER - RAIDOU

A PLOT SKILL WITHOUT A PLOT ROLE