Story Points

Story points are a spendable currency that player characters can use to unlock talents in their tales, upgrade and enhance their attributes, and more.
Story points can be spent at two times: (1) as the final step in creating a character, and (2) at any time during play outside of an encounter. To spend story points, simply announce to the narrator what upgrades are being purchased, and at what costs. Then, mark that those upgrades have been purchased, and reduce the story points on the character sheet. A character cannot purchase upgrades that it cannot afford; story points do not expire, and cannot be lost in any way, so saving them for the right time is perfectly reasonable. Characters will earn more story points at the end of each encounter - expect to get a handful each time (the starting story points represent approximately 2-3 encounters worth).
  • Unlocking talents; player characters have between 1 and 3 tales, each with 7 talents (1 signature ability, and 2 talents on each of 3 tiers), a mastery track (from 1 to 10), and an innate tarr'ko card. Talents can be unlocked at the costs presented. A character must unlock the signature ability in a tale before any other talents; talents in the tiers can only be unlocked if at least one talent in the previous tier has been unlocked (in other words, you must unlock a tier 1 and tier 2 talent before a tier 3 talent). Mastery must be unlocked in order, and cannot be unlocked at all until at least one tier 3 talent has been unlocked in that tale. The innate tarr'ko card cannot be unlocked until at least one tier 3 talent has been unlocked in that tale. The costs for each talent unlock are:
    • Signature: 5SP (the signature for the first selected tale is free)
    • Tier 1: 5SP
    • Tier 2: 10SP
    • Tier 3: 30SP
    • Mastery: 10SP x mastery level (e.g., 10SP for mastery 1, 20SP for mastery 2, etc.)
    • Tarr'ko: 20SP
  • Enhancing attributes; the six attributes (not armor) can be enhanced in four different ways - the cost to do so, per attribute, is 5SP for the first enhancement, 15SP for the second, 30SP for the third, and 50SP for the fourth (the order you choose does not matter, and can vary across different attributes). The four enhancements are:
    • Action +1: add +1 to all checks where you are using this die to take an action
    • Defense +1: add +1 to all checks where you are using this die to defend against an action
    • Critical +1: you now count a natural 9 as a critical for this attribute (in addition to a natural 10)
    • Reroll 1s: always reroll a natural 1 for this attribute (your final result can be modified to a 1 or lower, however)
  • Upgrading breakpoint; player characters may upgrade their breakpoint 5 times, each at increasing cost and effect. These upgrades must be performed in order. They are:
    • 5SP: add 6 + Steel
    • 10SP: add 6 + Steel
    • 15SP: add 6 + d4 + Steel
    • 20SP: add 10 + Steel
    • 30SP: add 10 + d6 + Steel
  • Unlocking functions and entropy of devices; characters that own a device can unlock and upgrade its capability; this costs both resources and story points. They can unlock:
    • Signature: 5SP (and resources)
    • Tier 1: 5SP (and resources)
    • Tier 2: 10SP (and resources)
    • Tier 3: 30SP (and resources)
    • Entropy: 5SP x entropy level (e.g., 5SP, 10SP, 15SP, ...)