Time
The mountains were here before us. The stars will be here after.
Time is the Horizon of what came before us and will outlive us: geological ages, destiny, the return of the seasons, the moment that does not come back. A human life sees only a spark of it.
Every age has seen it differently: a thread spun by the Moirai or the Norns, a wheel turning without end, an arrow pointing toward progress, a clock, a probability. And every age has invented figures to inhabit what no life can inhabit: oracles, immortals, the reincarnated, gamblers whom luck favors.
Why Agents
The difference of scale. A human life lasts a few decades; Time is counted in ages. Eternity does not fit in a moment, and destiny can only be seen from very far away. There must be beings who overflow a single life — through duration, through vision, through return.
What each side experiences. Through Agents, humans touch what exceeds their lives: knowing the future, seeing the past, lasting. Through them, the Powers of Time meet what they ignore: urgency, regret, promises, what one does with a life because it is short.
What is transformed. An immortal who has loved mortals too much is no longer indifferent to duration. A Power that welcomes what they bring back changes what it means to last.
Powers
Destiny
What is already spun: the Moirai, the Norns, maktub.
- Everything is already spun
- No one escapes it
- Reveals itself in fragments
- Never goes back
The Moment
The Greek kairos: the opportune moment, luck, the chance that does not come twice.
- Happens only once
- Gives no warning
- Favors the bold
- Remembers nothing
The Cycle
What returns: the seasons, the ages of the world, the wheel of rebirth.
- Everything returns
- Every end is a beginning
- Nothing is lost
- Knows nothing of progress
Duration
What lasts: stones, stars, what was here before and will be here after.
- Was here before, will be here after
- Slow
- Wears everything down
- Indifferent to the moment
Chance & Destiny: the Moment and Destiny are the two faces of Time most readily played together. Their Agents can contend over almost anything that happens.
Families of Agents
The suggested traits are Bond traits: each comes from the relationship itself or from the Attribute shown. The Agent's Anchors belong to them and remain to be written.
Oracles — Destiny
Sibyls, seers, diviners. The Bond is a vision.
- Sees what will be, from Everything is already spun;
- Cannot not see, from the vision itself;
- Never quite believed, from Reveals itself in fragments.
What the figure lets us think: knowing without being able to change; what freedom remains when everything is written.
Gamblers — the Moment
Adventurers, players, those whom luck favors as long as they dare. The Bond is a wager kept.
- Senses the opportunity, from Gives no warning;
- Luck smiles on them, from Favors the bold;
- Cannot refuse a bet, from the wager itself.
What the figure lets us think: the moment that does not come back; what one does with one's luck.
The Reborn — the Cycle
Those who return, life after life, and remember. The Bond is the wheel itself.
- Remembers past lives, from Nothing is lost;
- Always returns, from Everything returns;
- Recognizes those they have known, from the wheel itself.
What the figure lets us think: being several lives; what persists of oneself when everything changes.
Immortals — Duration
Those who do not die of old age and watch the centuries pass. The Bond is a duration received.
- Does not age, from the duration itself;
- Has seen everything, from Was here before, will be here after;
- Outlives everyone they love, from Wears everything down.
What the figure lets us think: watching everything one loves die; memory without end; what a life that never ends is worth.
What appears
- the calendar, the mechanical clock, standard time;
- history as a discipline, archives;
- probability, and with it insurance: chance given a price;
- geology, which discovers deep time;
- carbon dating, which makes bones speak;
- photography, which stops the moment;
- messages left for future centuries.
An Agent
- Bond: a vision. Traits: Sees what will be, Cannot not see.
- Anchor Insurance actuary: Speaks in probabilities, Can put a figure on a risk.
- Anchor Raising her son alone: no trait written yet.
Destiny reveals itself in fragments, and Cassandra has never been able to say when. At work, she has learned to speak in probabilities. If she gets probability recognized as belonging to Destiny, Speaks in probabilities will pass into the Bond: oracles will be able to say how likely — and Destiny will stop being entirely certain.
Situations
Bringing a novelty. An immortal discovers photography, and that faces can last; one of the reborn discovers archives, and finds their previous life in them.
Contending for a novelty. Probability appears. Destiny sees in it the future finally quantified; the Moment sees chance put in a cage; the Cycle sees the same events returning. Their Agents contend over what the calculation of chances will become.
Transforming one's own Power. An oracle has seen her son's death. She wants Destiny to be able to leave one thread free — and to do so, must undo one of its Attributes: Everything is already spun.
Tones and time
Time lends itself to melancholy, epic, philosophical tale, and adventure.
It is the Horizon where campaigns across the ages find their most natural form: a campaign's timescale becomes the very subject of play.