"Amber stands. Years have passed since we departed it, and more may elapse before I return." -- Corwin, Courts of Chaos
Any Means Necessary is a one-shot game for Ambercon NorthWest, 2003. It is not a part of any campaign or other serial game: there is no prerequisite to playing in it, and playing it does not commit you in future cons. It was previously run in ACNW 2002.
Briefly, Any Means Necessary is a low-fantasy, espionage-focused game set in an Amber which is atmospherically similar to 18th Century Europe. The PC's are ordinary humans committed to freeing Amber form the rule of Oberon's descendents. Needless to say, this is an uphill battle, and the game has the potential to be a bit grim.
The most important thing to bear in mind about the game style is that I plan for proactive PC's who drive the game forward. If your concept of rational action upon faced with a dangerous challenge is to run off and hide, you will likely succeed, and then we will both be bored.
There are details on this page for character creation, but it is NOT necessary for the players to make their own characters. If you want to, that's fine (see below). If you do not want to make your own character, I will provide a pool of pregens to choose from.
Ten years ago, after a convulsive series of battles in and around Amber featuring firearms, demons, and black magic, the Royal Family of Amber abruptly disappeared (with a reasonable sized army), leaving only Gerard and Martin to take care of things at home. The demonic attacks abruptly ceased, and, after some disruption in the trade routes to the Golden Circle, Amber entered into a period of peace and prosperity which sharply contrasted with the five years previous.
Gerard is a man of vision and ambition, but he has always lacked implementation skills. Lacking other Royal Family, he has increasingly promoted ordinary humans to positions of autonomy and importance. Unlike Eric before him, or Oberon before him, Gerard has neither the ability nor inclination to keep his subordinates on a tight leash.
The most prosperous and able citizens of Amber, for the first time, have had a sense of self-determination and true political power. Resentments against the old order have swollen immensely, and sentiments once guarded closely and spoken only in whispers are now the topics of everday conversation. Increasingly, the people of Amber feel that they are different from the Royal Family, and have been ill used by their erstwhile masters.
Though Gerard might be credited with the institution of the reforms that led to what is increasingly called the "human movement" (see Terminology), his personal and public manners, which embody the Royal contemptuousness of humans, have prevented a sympathetic public opinion of him. Martin, however, is an affable sort who has spent little of his life around the Royal Family, and he is widely perceived as a "man of the people."
The burgeoning human movement finds sudden impetus to draw together and act when it is revealed that the Royals have finished their war in the mysterious Shadow, and are returning to Amber.
The people of the Amber employ some terms in subtly different ways from how Corwin uses them in the books.
This game will use a slightly different attribute set from the Amber standard, in order to more usefully describe humans instead of the more broadly competent Royals.
The common levels for both humans and Royals are different for each stat, and are described below. PC's are capped at 20 in all stats.
Prowess rates your ability to do things that require accuracy, hand-eye coordination, grace, sure-footedness, speed (of hand, not fleetness of foot), etc. It is the primary armed combat stat, and is also useful for stealth, etc.
A human who has a Prowess of 0 is probably handicapped in some serious way, just this side of bed-ridden. Prowess 5 is human average. Prowess 10 is noticeably dextrous and skillfull, significantly above average. Prowess 15 is world-class. Prowess 16-20 is quasi-superhuman.
It would be a rare Royal who had a Prowess of less than 15. The ones who focus on individual combat will likely have a Prowess of well over 30.
Physique is a combination of strength and endurance, including raw muscle power, lifting ability, damage absorption, fleetness of foot, and healing. It is primarily important in unarmed combat, a very close second (to Prowess) in armed combat, and generally probably more useful than you think.
The human Physique scale is much like the human Prowess scale.
All Royals have, dead minimum, a 20 Physique. The ones who focus on it can have a 50 or higher.
Intellect measures everything that has to do with intelligence without being intelligence. It's your education, your memory, your technical strategic skills, your administrative abilities, etc. It will not substitute for the Player coming up with ideas, judging the utility of broad plans, etc. It will let you set complex strategies in motion with the minimum of Bad Things happening. This is the stat for generals or spymasters.
The human Intellect scale is much like the human Prowess scale.
Royals are the most human in this stat. They tend to range from 10 to 25.
Arcana measures the character's mystical skills and strengths. Magic in the universe of Any Means Necessary tends to be either very weak or very involved and complex. There are no useful fireballs, no teleports, etc. (At least, not in Amber or the Golden Circle). Magic can be useful for things like long-distance communication, or for mild enhancements to equipment.
Most humans have a 0 Arcana (no measureable magical ability). Someone who had picked up a few minor tricks would have Arcana 5. A lifelong study would yield Arcana 10-15. Arcana 16-20 is a once-in-a-generation prodigy (and it's still not going to be that useful).
Most Royals will have picked up a few tricks (Arcana 5). The more mystically inclined might have Arcana 10-15. Arcana does not rate Amberite Pattern or Trump abilities, and the Royals generally pursue those more advanced arts than bother to become truly excellent at human magic.
Resources measures a character's economic and extra-personal strengths. Wealth, captaincy of a corps of devoted troops, control of a nascent spy network, owning firearms, or the like are all Resources.
Unlike the other stats, since Resources are extra-personal, there is no difference in human and Royal ratings (though Royals who have access to Shadow can always get anything they want, with enough time). 0 indicates someone who has little more than what mundane items he carries with himself. Resources 5 is the wealth and influence level of a common tradesman. Resources 10 is what might be expected of the owner of a medium sized trading company. Resources 15 indicates a wealthy nobleman. Resources 20 is the level of Duke or other such major Nobleman. Martin, the Grand Duke of Amber, Ambassador to Rebma, and General of Amber's armies, has a 30 Resources. Gerard, the Regent of Amber, has a 40 Resources (excluding whatever resources either could get from Shadow).
In some cases, a character will be good at a select subset of an attribute's scale, but not-so-good at other parts of it. This is handled by a system called "specialties." In essence, you find a name for what you're good at, and buy the stat up at a reduced cost for that specialty. The exact point breaks are negotiable, but, in general, a specialty is at half-cost.
For example, suppose that your character concept is a master thief. Most of the traditional AD&D-like thieving skills (skulking, lockpicking, climbing) are Prowess-related. However, you do not want to be a master swordsman as well. You buy Prowess 6 (slightly above average), and define a Specialty (Thief Skills) which you buy up to 15 (world-class). When you are in a swordfight or a tightrope walk, we treat your Prowess as 6. When you are scaling a wall or hiding, we treat your Prowess as 15.
Note: You are not required, nor even encouraged, to create your own character. The GM WILL bring a pool of pre-gen characters to the game. There WILL be more characters than players, so you are guaranteed not to get your last choice of pre-gens. The GM does NOT write personalities into the pre-generated characters, beyond, occaisionally, a very broad outline necessary to nail down some minimal background. All characters will be gender-undetermined until they are chosen by the players, so you can play whichever sex you feel like (the GM has no problem with players of one sex playing characters of the other sex). In general, the GM recommends taking a pre-gen character. However, it is fully permissable to make a character yourself. In this case, the GM needs to know the broad outlines (but not necessarily the exact points) of your character by November 15th. Email at msulliva@wso.williams.edu). The GM is also happy to create a pre-gen character according to some guidelines, and reserve it for your use, if you want some control over character creation, but don't want to deal with the system.
Creating a character is a simple points-buy process. There is no auction, and points are rated on an absolute scale, not a relative one.
Start off with Physique, Prowess, Intellect, and Resources at 5, and Arcana at 0 (ie, a human average template). You have 20 points to distribute amongst them. A maximum of one attribute can be purchased above 15. A maximum of one attribute (besides Arcana) can be lowered below 5, and its points put in another attribute. In general, you can buy specialties for any attributes as long as those specialties are a reasonably narrow subset of the attribute. Specialties usually cost 1/2 as much as a normal attribute (so, if you take your base state to 7, and then get a specialty to 11, it costs 2 points (for the base of 7) and another 2 for the specialty, or a total of 4 points. The GM reserves the right to make a given specialty cost more or less depending on its perceived utility.
Example: Elizabeth Otrickdotter is the heir to a wealthy Duchy in the Golden Circle who are participating in the scheme to rid Amber of its Royals in order to put themselves on more of an equal footing with Amber. Her player's conception is that Elizabeth is cagey and political, without a lot of physical ability.
Elizabeth is a court lady and an intellectual, more interested in the realm of the cerebral than the physical, and she's a bit slight of build. Her player decides to lower the stat of Physique below human normal, to 4.
Elizabeth is also no prodigy in terms of hand-eye coordination. She is average in the stat of Prowess, with a 5.
Elizabeth is strategically minded and a good organizer. Her player sets her initial Intellect at 10, and wants to come back to it if there are points left over.
Elizabeth is uninterested and uninclined towards the magical arts. Her Arcana remains 0.
Elizabeth is the heir to a very wealthy Duchy, and she enjoys the current Duke's covert support. Still, her father is trying to maintain deniability, should things go awry, so she doesn't have access to the entire Duchy's resources (which would be 25 or more). She sets her Resources at 15.
Thus far, Elizabeth has spent 14 of her 20 points. For her remainders, she wants to get some specialties. Her player decides that, while Elizabeth can't make quite as much money flow out of her Duchy as she might like, she can always recruit from its extensive military organization. So she buys a Specialty of Resources — Military Personell. When she's trying to summon up people trained in breaking things, her Resources is to be considered 20 instead of 15. This will cost Elizabeth 2.5 points.
Elizabeth is very experienced at court games, and so her Player decides to purchase another three points of Intellect when it comes to Politics and Intriuge. That costs the standard 1.5 points.
Finally, Elizabeth is going to be a bit more capable of taking care of herself than her Prowess suggests. She's not much for straight-up combat, but she has, on occaision, found that a stilletto can make an excellent surprise. She spends her remaining 2 points, so when she wields that weapon, her Prowess is considered to be 4 points higher.
Elizabeth's final character sheet is: