The Continuum roleplaying game has been in existence for about five years now officially, and there are many elements of the game system that have aspects to them that make the players, and GMs, think a little bit. This Frequently Asked Question (FAQ) page is designed to answer some of the commonly asked questions about one of the more complex Continuum game elements - Time Combat Stratagems.
In the story example of Time Combat in the Continuum rules, page 131, Amber discovers that her attacker has planted a Cobweb to deceive her. She was Oracling "Where/when is he?" It seems clear that Grimveldt set up the Cobweb to lure in any Oracler trying to locate him. If she had failed in Oracling him (if she hadn't used Dreaming and rolled poorly), she would have gotten the information that her attacker was stealing a nuclear submarine out of the naval yard in 1976.
You set up a Cobweb when you expect a particular Oracle. If I'm expecting someone to try to find me, I'll set up my Cobweb to deflect Oracles about when/where I am.
The GM should probably also adjudicate based on the locality of the Cobweb. If I'm in 1996 and Oracling "When/where is my opponent?" his Cobweb in 3867 BC won't be noticed (and unless I know generally when to look, I probably won't be able to Oracle him, either).
Thus, if I want to lure a narcissist in, I might plant a Cobweb that protects me: say, I come up with some story about a narcissist starting a fire and burning down a house. If my enemy were to, say, try to locate when and where I fragged him in a previous Sweep, he might learn when and where the house-burning allegedly takes place. If he's fooled, he may come after me at that level and I might get him if I time it right. If he sees through the Cobweb, he may come looking for *me* at the Cobweb, or can at least frag me there.
Or say I've performed a Hit and Run on a narcissist and I don't want him to be able to find the As/As Not. I might set up a Cobweb about how some other narcissist pulls off a bank robbery and interferes with his bank accounts. If the narcissist tries to Oracle anything about my Hit and Run (not me, just the event around the Hit and Run), and if he fails to see through the Cobweb, he'll get information about the imaginary bank robbery instead.
This seems to to be how it works. A Cobweb doesn't draw *every* Oracle in a Time Combat. It just draws Oracles away from *protected* people, things, or events. Furthermore, I suggest that a Cobweb not be effective in later Time Combats. No fair Cobwebbing yourself in case of Time Combats in your Yet!
The GM needn't reroll combat results for the Elders, as that would be mean (and odd and confusing). The player just has to experience the incidents in their Yet, to eliminate the Frag.
Since individuals and then Corners are the Continuum's first line of defense against Narcissists, individual discipline, self-reliance, and decision-making are what keeps the Continuum working. Third Maxim.
Is the Time Combat the character is engaged in so important that risking a major Gemini Flush with five Elders is necessary? That's the question before the player, who has to measure the option very carefully.
The "forbidding" that the Continuum does is almost always a factor of self-preservation. You *can* slipshank Geminis to within a point of non-existence, just as you *can* frag your friends until you don't have any anymore.
In theory, we could describe a Stratagem-like harassment where the affected spanner could be nervous up until the bad event, and then be relieved it was finally over, and get on with his life - but that wouldn't work within the game's Time Combat system of Sweeps. Such an event and explanation, with penalty could occur - but it would have to be roleplayed before Time Combat began, and would probably be the purview of the GM, either as an NPC harassing a PC, or as an elder bugging a hapless narc offstage.
Also, in theory we could allow "saving throws" to characters with nerves of steel, those who "disbelieve" or even bonuses to ones aching to commit suicide. The authors just figured Harbinger was a cool tool, useful on most people. ("Hello, Lydia. Why look! it's a photo of you in a full body cast. The horror in your eyes is your inability to scream as I took the picture in your dark, cold hospital room. Your jaw being wired shut and all. And then... well. See you later.")
The penalty is being applied to the opponent's efforts at points in Harbinger-ing the spanner's Age subsequent to showing the proof, including incoming points of frag. Thus, any subtle clues or proofs, like what the Harbinger-ing spanner was wearing, what other specific information he may have related, etc. are clues to the affected spanner that it was no coincidence, no extra or echo, but the real thing. And that his attacker has pulled through okay. It's as much the expected boost in the Harbinger-ing spanner's confidence as anything else. The giddy burst of power you feel when you've pulled off a prank, leaving the victim puzzled, suspicious, abashed, ashamed or afraid.
If a loyal Continuum spanner is affected, and a narcissist is the Harbinger-ing spanner, the Continuum spanner's faith in his invincibility is shaken a little.... Bear in mind that any Harbinger (or indeed any Stratagem or Instant Skill) that is declared but is ill-defined at the time can be explained in retrospect, if necessary. However, it is often best to be definitive at the time, for the sake of everyone's ongoing clarity.
You can be Oracled only on a Victory. Presumably, this only includes the "Where and when is he/it?" and "Where and when did he/it go?" questions, since this is related to the opponent at the current Sweep. You should still be able to Oracle "Who/What is this?" and "How (when/where) was it done?" since these actions are not related to the opponent at his current Sweep. He wasn't Hiding when he performed the Hit & Run, so you can probably Oracle a spanner in a previous Sweep just fine. Presumably also, you should be able to Oracle "Where and when is he/it?" and "Where and when did he/it go?" about a spanner of a previous Sweep, to prepare a Hit & Run on him (you know he passed on, so attacking him in a previous Sweep would frag him - just be careful you don't frag yourself or your chronies!).
The chance to Frune you is halved. One would hope that your chronies, of all people, would not help an enemy Fruner! (Of course, if your chronies *are* your enemies, but their juniors don't know it yet, I imagine Frune wouldn't be of much use. "What? Yeah, I saw him slinking around that week. Looked like he might have been fragged. I figured he was in a Time Combat, but when I offered to help, he told me to get lost. Why do you ask?") Easier than Oracling, presumably because the questions are broader and you're going after spanner gossip, etc. Stuff that goes on in spanner corners doesn't make it to libraries and museums!
Attempts to frag you are penalized by +1 on the roll. This is the bit I have trouble with. If you have identified a point of spacetime where the opponent exists, what the guy is doing on this particular Sweep should have no effect on any Hit & Run you may perform on his junior. I agree that all of the other Strategems would be thwarted by Hide, but I really don't see how it affects frag attempts. I mean, you can't frag someone by attacking his current Sweep! If I've missed a rational, I look forward to hearing it!
Anyone who tries to Physically attack you gets your corner to gang up on them. And rightly so!
Ideally, the Continuum seeks to focus all generated frag onto the fragger (i.e., the Narcissist), shutting him down with his own evil devices, and then sweeping up the mess once the assailant's sentient force is spent. Hence Isolate and the "Swarm".
The +1 penalty to attempted Frag is a bit arbitrary, and may not apply to all events. (What is a "point" of frag to a living, breathing spanner, anyway?) The table in Continuum , page 54, relates "points" to conditions, some of which the Continuum reacts to. Points are game elements by definition; we only start playing with a double entendre with "crash points" in Narcissist.) But hey presto, the GM often decides whether a point of frag is delivered anyway, as per many middle entries on the Frag Table.
This strategy is good to be used when fighting someone who doesn't know precisely who you are. Maybe you're the attacker, and you do a Hit and Run on someone who doesn't know you. You then Hide in your corner. The only piece of your Age the victim knows about is when you Hit and Run, and that may be insufficient. Hiding will help prevent him discoving the you of this Sweep. Also, Hide is primarily good against the Foxhorn, who *do* want to kill you rather than Frag you. Hide would be fairly useless against someone who knows you, unless they were coming to kill you on that Sweep, rather than frag you. Bear in mind, each subsequent Sweep has the _eldest_ played version of the spanner. Therefore, the Continuum is more and more likely to kill a narcissist and stop his shenanigans. And if narcissists can kill a Continuum spanner, that fixes either a point in his Yet (allowing for a nasty Reverse Engineer on him and his corner) or violates the Second Death proviso. Either way, a happy crasher and a sad spanner.
The chronies rendezvous in their meeting place, and share all they have learned about the attack. They know he hides in an alley as the executive walks out of Penn Station and mugs the man a block away. (They were careful to get their information second-hand, so it can be manipulated after the Combat and not cause them frag.)
The chronies have decided to Isolate the frag. This means they coordinate their fragging actions (essentially one mini-Hit & Run for each of them) so they don't accidentally frag each other. They each agree on the exact moments they'll descend upon to frag the narcissist. "Chad, you push him into the alley at 12:45:06. Louise, give him a taste of your kickboxing at 12:45:05. Francis, grab his gun at 12:45:07 and span away with it. I'll span in front of him at 12:04 and scare him with a blast on my air horn." All of these actions, together, work in favor of the spanners, but have the possibility of fragging the narcissist. Meanwhile, they'd better make sure the executive walks past the area without noticing anything!
The chronies go and perform their individual tasks, spending only a second or so at that level. Then they return to a minute after they left the rendezvous. The Isolate is finished!
What happens in the game rules is that there is a contest of Quick between each spanner performing Isolate versus the narcissist. This contest of Quick represents the abilities of each opponent, spanner and narcissist, to get the upper hand in the situation. At 12:45:06, Chad is supposed to push the narcissist into the alley. Does this frag the narcissist? Is he able to avoid the attack? Rolling a contest of Quick is a simplified way of resolving all of this (and presumably if you're playing out a Time Combat, you'd use skills other than just Quick - but also, the Isolate is about timing the attack just right, along with your chronies). Whoever loses the contest of Quick takes a point of frag: you mess something minor up and stay too long, getting fragged when your chrony spans in a second later; the narcissist avoids your attack and somehow interferes with it; you didn't stick around long enough to make sure he was in the right position for the next chrony to attack; and so on. The exact details are never specified by the game rules, and GMs or players are free to make up their own reasons.
Each spanner can only take one point of frag from the Isolate - and that's only if he loses his contest of Quick. The narcissist, on the other hand, can take up to as many points of frag as there are attackers! The fragged narcissist is the one *at the current Sweep* (so if you're on Sweep 6 and you Isolate the narcissist as he performed a Hit & Run on Sweep 2, the narcissist performing Sweep 6 takes the frag).
Using the Time Combat rules, the following would happen in my example: the spanners Rendezvous, plan their attack, span, and make contests of Quick against the narcissist, then span back to a minute later to discuss the results. End of action. The details of what they actually *do* are glossed over in the rules, because the details vary in every situation. The spanners must do those things that frag the enemy and not anyone else.
For a description of what Isolate looks like from a level point of view, see Continuum , pages 118-120, "Out in Society."
Next time, explain to the players that Isolate is what happens when Hit & Run is combined by several people. Why would they only want to get one point of Frag on a person when they could get three or more? I would also rule that if they are at a Rendezvous, they can all go on the same action, allowing what you are doing with your Rendezvous.
In addition, the game system suggests 3 points is enough Frag to mark you as anathema (Continuum, page 54); it also declares that 2 points of Frag on the same opponent from the same assailant ends the Time Combat. So, 3 successful hits in one Sweep has a much greater chance of putting the target out of the Combat. Two successful Isolates, and the target is at least in serious trouble, likely fragged out. The Continuum is ruthless about narcissists, and Isolate is meant to be their favorite tool - the target effectively losing his turn is an added incentive, since by the Sweep it recovers, the Continuum is bringing down another Isolate. (A pattern of Frune/Oracle - Rendezvous - Isolate - Rendezvous - Isolate is very effective. The narcissist had better get his licks in by Sweep 2...)
This has to do with the swarm effect. When you perform a Hit & Run, you roll on the Frag Tables (Continuum, page 129), which takes into account the Span of the attacker and victim. Isolate, on the other hand, has attackers roll their Quicks vs. the victim's Quick (with a cumulative penalty per successful attack), and has nothing to do with Span.
In other words, a Hit and Run is about your ability to span. Isolate is about your ability to coordinate very focused fragging actions. There's not a lot of coordination going on with just two attackers (some, but neither is really under any duration constraints). Once you hit three attackers, at least one of them is only going to have a fraction of a second to act (wedged in between the other two). And Isolate is a tight focus on a particular incident of frag that "already" existed "before" they started the Isolation.
It also just seems unfair to be able to undo frag caused by higher Span opponents simply by being Quick, and maybe having one friend. It might be an arbitrary number that the authors chose, but it feels right to me. Two spanners just don't constitute a swarm!
If you want to transfer frag to an opponent and you don't have a host of chronies handy, you'll have to Hit and Run at that incident of frag, and rely on your Span rating.
(Crashers by the way, would argue that Isolate is designed to both mess up an individual, and wipe out the crash points that would connect Swarm Prime to another 'verse. Isolate is the practice where the Swarm earned its hated name.)
The second function might "work," but it's not useful unless the Measurer *and* the target spends at least 14 days on the Level in question. The bonus is as listed in Continuum , page 125: +2 for every 14 days, up to 42 days. Thus, if a narcissist has caused an As/As Not by spending one day on a Level, Measure can't be used to get any bonuses.
Measure *can* be used to gather information in these short-term Levels for immediate use, but without bonuses it doesn't help others, and if you decide to play out the scene to actually use the information yourself, you're leaving yourself open to frag.
Here's an example, from the point of view of the Measurer. (Note that we, the players, usually don't share this point of view during the game!) During a Time Combat Rendezvous, Chad and Louise have Oracled the source of their frag: a narcissist has slashed the tires of Chad's car when Chad and Louise were supposed to get in and drive away. They make plans, and then during the next Sweep, Louise Oracles the identity of the narcissist, and Chad Measures the Level where the fragging action takes place.
Chad spends the day watching the park where his car will be. As the moment of the tire slashing approaches, Chad is hiding in the bushes and sees the narcissist appear with a big knife, and bend down next to the car. Suddenly, Louise appears right next to the narcissist, surprising him, and attacks him! As they fight, Chad notices that Louise seems pretty confident about the fight, and has an uncanny sense of what's happening. It helps her defeat the narcissist before he has a chance to slash the tires. It seems pretty clear to Chad that she's using the foreknowledge he's gaining right now. He marks in his Yet that he must tell her how to defeat the narcissist.
The next Sweep, Chad and Louise Rendezvous again. Louise has spent a couple of weeks doing research, but hasn't been able to uncover the identity of the narcissist who fragged them. Chad describes him for her. He then proceeds to outline for her how she would need to go about defeating the narcissist in an attack on that event. For the next Sweep, Chad plans to Frune the identity of the narcissist (perhaps he'll have more luck), and Louise plans to Hit and Run at the tire-slashing incident.
See? Chad now knows precisely what took place at the Level in question, and any interference would probably frag him.
Now, remember, the story I just described is how it would appear *from the point of view of the spanners*. We, the players, will see it differently. Let me describe the exact same situation, as the players see it.
Caryn (playing Louise) and Loring (playing Chad) have figured out through the Oracle strategem that their frag comes from an incident where a narcissist slashes Chad's car's tires. Caryn decides that Louise will try to Oracle the identity of the narcissist, while Loring says that Chad will Measure the event.
Louise goes first, and Caryn rolls her Internet skill. The result is a negative number, failure. Caryn makes notes on her Span Card.
Next is Chad's turn. Loring declares that he spans to the day in question and performs Measure, describing his actions. He rolls his Mind and succeeds. "You did it," says the GM. "You've gathered some good information about the event."
"What happens?" asks Loring.
"We can't talk about that yet," says the GM. "What happens there all depends on whether someone else goes there."
"Uh, okay," says Loring, not sure.
For the next Sweep, Caryn and Loring declare a Rendezvous. They discuss what they learned, and the GM tells Caryn that Chad tells Louise information about the Level of the tire slashing, and if that if she goes there, she'll have bonuses to act.
"What does he tell me?" asks Caryn.
"We don't know that yet," replies the GM. "But what he tells you arms you with valuable information about what happens at the Level. If you decide to go there, you'll have bonuses."
For the next Sweep, Loring agrees to Frune the identity of the narcissist, and Caryn wants to frag the guy. Louise goes first, so Caryn declares a Hit and Run on the tire slashing event. She describes how she wants to attack the narcissist using her Kickboxing skill. The GM describes how she spans in, and Physical Combat begins. Caryn gets bonuses on her rolls during the Physical Combat, because her character's been told by Chad what to do. Louise takes down the narcissist.
See? As players, we're mired in one Level, and can't know the outcome of our play before it happens. Therefore, we simulate foreknowledge with bonuses to die rolls. That's what Measure does, and that's why a Measurer can't use the bonuses himself. (I suppose it's possible that the Measurer could see himself at the Level being Measured...)
You've got to have some idea of what you're looking for, or how you're going to look for it. You've got to use an appropriate skill to find the information. If your opponent is in ancient Jericho, you're not going to find him without some serious History or Anthropology skills. Likewise, if your opponent has spent his whole life in the same locality as you, these skills would probably be useless. Library Science or even Locality Knowledge would be of the most benefit.
It would seem that the Scribes *do* keep track of nearly everything. They're just not necessarily going to tell you. Go to an important Scribe corner and tell them you want the entire Age of your opponent. They'll tell you further information is not available here. On the other hand, there may be times when you're allowed some special knowledge of these records. Perhaps this is where some of the Oracling comes from. The point is that in the Strategem-based version of Time Combat, it's all summarized and abstracted for you. If you want to role play it out, you're going to have to demand that the players tell you *how* they're getting their information. If they need to know where you were on June 3 when you were 6 years old, ask them how they find out.
Perhaps the best explanation of this is the German movie Run Lola Run, which is something of a paeon to Narcissism. Being even a few seconds off from one event to the next alters causality for every person, animal, plant and dust mote. The movie demonstrates this very well, and I recommend it to everyone who wishes to understand the nature of the Patch.
Basically, Patch is any solution which satisfies a spanner's personal frag for that As/As Not, for at least the duration of the Time Combat, but which might not satisfy the precision needed to repair all the damaged causality.
A Patch is a fix that takes place between 15 seconds and 30 minutes Up from the As/As Not. *Your* timeline is restored, but the Ages of every object involved in the event are not. If their Ages are not repaired also (at your convenience after the Combat), their frag will fester and grow. Other objects can even include microscopic organisms and air molecules (the butterfly-beating-its-wings thing), so you can't simply apply a Patch for every object involved separately!
Let's take an example. Your junior is staying at a hotel. The narcissist performs a Hit & Run: he spans into the bathroom and steals the bar of soap your junior uses to shower with. You're fragged. After you figure out what happened (probably with Oracle or Frune), you decide to Patch it, to lose the frag from the Hit & Run. You wait until the narcissist leaves that level (this should be at least 15 seconds!), span in carrying an identical bar of soap, and put it in its place. Your frag is cured (the bar of soap is there as it is supposed to be), but the frag of the bathroom environment is not cured. Since there *is* an As/As Not (otherwise you wouldn't have felt frag), this As/As Not has affected the air molecules, microscopic life, water, and so forth in the area of the bathroom. This frag *must* be cured, but you can probably wait until after the Time Combat to fix it.
Of course, in some cases it might be simpler to just Hit & Run the narcissist just as he spans into the bathroom to frag you, thus removing your frag and fragging him in the process.
The 15-second time limit is somewhat arbitrary to the game, but it's supposed to represent the amount of time an As/As Not can go unstopped before it starts to unravel the universe. See Continuum , page 57. (As a side-note, it's the energy released by these few seconds of remaining paradox that allegedly allow crashers to travel to parallel universes.)
The events of the Time Combat are always going to be related, in some small way if not a large one, to your precise circumstances when you're hit by the frag. How you begin the Time Combat itself is threatened. If the frag hits you as you're on a plane to L.A. from New York, and a narcissist uses Statue of Liberty to stop you from boarding the plane in the first place (perhaps by stealing your ticket), your junior will feel the frag in New York, not halfway across the country at 30,000 feet.
Or, one might suppose, that the frag you feel is specifically associated with the "correct" timeline. If your circumstances are changed at that moment, your junior might not even get any frag. Ultimately, you have to ensure that your junior *does* stay on the right path, and feels the frag on schedule.
However, you're right...as the Continuum rulebook says, it's a powerful Strategem. It would seem to take more Sweeps than you seem to think, but it can be done relatively quickly.
Special thanks to Chris Adams, Dave Fooden, Barbara Manui, David Trimboli, and the folks on the Continuum Mailing List for their help in the compiling of this FAQ information.