Agents in Paradox

Paradox is the latest attempt to create a viable system for Karbon.

Every player has an Agent in the game, a Karbon hunter they get to design as they wish using the construction set presented below. You create Powers and Features for your Agent, then pick Aspects and Explicit Steps for your Agent. All of these define them in the rules.

You create one to three Powers for your Agent. These are the most powerful assets they have at their command, from innermost virtue to learned skills. Regardless each power is something sweeping, something with broad application that makes your Agent special. Each power also has detail, something about that agent that ties specifically into it - almost an example. Finally each power ends with the text: earns one or more Advantage where applicable. Here is an example:

• Astonishingly Capable Soldier, Intense Eyes - earns one or more Advantage where applicable.

Whenever a Power is applicable, it will give your Agent Advantage within the fiction and rules.

While a Power just grants advantage outright, a Feature gives the possibility of earning Advantage with a roll of the dice by exploiting that Feature. Features aren't narrow of purpose (see Explicit Steps later), but aren't sweeping like Powers either. A Feature could be looked at as a duty the Agent can fulfill in the story. In fact, it is how you define them: You slash tag them with the duty they support. Here are the available duties:

• Duties: Bruiser, Captain, Doctor, Ghost, Hacker, Hustler, Investigator, Kingpin, Pilot, Scientist, Soldier, and Technician.

You create a Feature by describing some characteristic of your Agent that aids in them in a given Duty. When you can call that characteristic into play in the fiction, you earn the chance to gain Advantage (via an Exploit roll). Here are examples of a Feature, with the duty that it aids slash tagged after it.

• Herculean Endurance /Soldier.
• Caring Heart /Captain.

You pick one or more Aspects for your Agent from the list of those available. Each defines something about the Agent and how they relate to the world overall. Items in this list with the ^ may be taking up to three times, otherwise it may only be taken once.

The list:

• Attractive+, Attribute+, Body Overhaul, Brotherhood, Career Criminal+, Committed Agent+, Confirmed Loyalties+, Cyberbrain, Deep Training+, Excellence+, Experience+, Expertise+,Exploit, Flat Busted^, Foresight, Fortunate, Fragile Flower, Hard Life^, Hardcore, Hawkeye, Heredity^, High Class^, Highly Compensated, Lightning Reflexes, Low Class^, Marketable Skill^, Mastermind, Menacing Aura, Miser^, Natural Genius, Respect, Standard of Living+, Storage Locker, Strength+, Successful Career^, Talent+, Team Player, Tough+^, Trained Assistants, Trusted Contact, Viscous+, Windfall

You can get Explicit Steps from your Agent in a few manners:

• You may create them directly using the Explicit Step Toolkit, in which can they are illustrations of one or more of your Agent's Powers.
• You may get them from Agent Gear.
• You may get them from some Aspects.