Family creation

The family

You are part of a decaying noble family, so you all have assess to your legacies, resources and the family manor.

The wealth, power, and possessions of the family are represented by Family Resources. Usually, the first generation of your chronicle has 7 Legacy Points you can use to spend on the Family Resources your generation has inherited from those before you. As each generation’s story arc ends, your successes and failures will cause the Rookwoods to gain or lose Legacy Points, which results in adding or losing a Family Resource.

Using family resources

Each Family Resource can be spent once per session by any family member to either:
* provide an automatic success (before rolling) or
* allow any number of dice to be re-rolled (after rolling) for any roll that the player can justify.

If the spending of a Family Resource is in dispute between family members, those in disagreement should argue it out and make opposed Trait checks, if necessary (if you can't come to a quick agreement about a point of Garage, make a Brawn check to see who grabs the keys first.)

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Spending a Family Resource doesn't destroy it, but it prevents it from being used to gain these benefits again (it can still be used for narrative purpose). If the Manor has a library, you can use it to justify making Guile rolls to do research even if the resource has already been spent for the session. The Family Resource makes the research action possible, but spending it provides a one-time bonus when you really need it.

Multiple Family Resources may be spent at once and applied to different things, but they cannot be "stacked" on one Trait check. Don’t try to claim 4 automatic successes on a combat roll because you’re spending Staff, Armory, Garage, and Library resources to say "I’m riding in the sidecar while reciting from the Necronomicon while Mr. Singh drives a motorcycle with one hand and fires a shotgun with the other!"

Types of Family Resources

Family Resources fit into one of the following five types: Money, Manor, Name, Favors or Power. The Family Resources can be non-specific features (e.g. "the Manor has a competent housekeeping staff") or a specific feature (e.g. "the Manor’s butler, Mr. Singh, is most resourceful").

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1. Money is the family’s purchasing power in the form of savings, business income, investment dividends, or credit. Spending a Money resource for an automatic success allows the family to (at least, temporarily) solve a problem by throwing money at it.

* A fire inspector is bribed to declare a mysterious explosion to be a gas leak. Witnesses to an indiscretion are paid to forget they saw anything.
* The organ of the local cathedral finally gets that costly repair (and the family finds itself in possession of a hogshead of holy water).

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2. The Rookwood Manor remains the family home despite the Rookwoods struggles with their family curse over the centuries. As their fortunes wax and wane, it takes a toll on stately Rookwood Manor. During poorer generations, portions of the manor fall into disrepair or disuse. In wealthier times, the manor undergoes renovations and restorations. Sometimes old sections are torn down and new additions are built to fit the whims and needs of the family. As a result, the Rookwood estate is riddled with overgrown outbuildings, buried ruins, forgotten cellars, old wells, sealed rooms lost to living memory behind plaster and cobwebbed shelves, and many more mysteries. You can sketch or label these changes on the Rookwood Manor record sheet. Each Legacy Point invested in Manor adds a resource that any Family Member may use while at home.

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3. Name is the family’s reputation. Each Legacy Point in Name makes the Rookwoods famous (or advantageously infamous) among a particular social circle.

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4. Favors represents debts owed to the family, or useful contacts and family friends. Each Legacy Point spent represents a Favor that can be used to define one of these debts or contacts. This can be done at the beginning of a new generation’s story arc or as the need arises

"How are we going to get this crate to the Isle of Wight without filing a cargo manifest?" "Uncle Remy has an old Navy mate with his own boat who could take us there off the record."

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5. Power represents seats held by the family in political offices, corporate boards, chairs at university, mob ties, and the other areas listed above under Name. Where Name represents reputation in these circles, Power is actual authority. Each Legacy Point point spend represents a different area of power the family managed to gain.

Ending a Generation

The default assumption for a Rookwood Chronicle is one story arc per generation. There may be many parallel plots and subplots within a generation, but only one major overarching plotline involving the entire family. When that major arc is resolved, time skips forward to a later generation that has to deal with the fallout. "Generation" in these rules refers to all members of the Rookwood family, regardless of age, who are alive and active at the same time. A more accurate term might be "contemporary familial cohort", but that’s really awkward so let’s stick with "generation".

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At the conclusion of a generation’s story arc, you need to go through an epilogue or denouement that describes what happens to the surviving family members. Each player takes a turn describing a short final scene to provide closure for their character’s story. If time allows, players may attempt to bury any remaining Skeletons. If a skeleton can’t be satisfactorily resolved in a short scene, it goes unburied and the family slowly declines.

As part of these final scenes, you should describe the impact of each Skeleton. Each Hopeful burial gives the family 1 new Legacy Point and each Fearful burial costs the family 1 Legacy Point. Each unburied Skeleton costs 2 Legacy Points. How does your Skeleton alter the family’s Legacy and Resources?

1. If the family’s total Legacy points dropped, how do you explain it?
Did cousin Serena fall out with her father and move abroad with a large chunk of the family fortune? Did uncle Henry go mad and set fire to the carriage house?

2. If the total Legacy points increased, decide which Family Resources were gained.
If you increased the family’s Money, did an investment pay off or did you uncover a lost vault behind the wall in the wine cellar?

Rookwood Legacies