The Master-Puppet is a Level Five Mannikin Treasure.
Overview[]
The mannikin developed this nasty piece of work out of a sense of pure maliciousness and cosmic irony. Legend has it that the infamous Jack Visegrip cried out, "Who's pulling the strings now, meat sock?" as he completed his creation. The Master-Puppet he built is a featureless marionette made f plain wood and cheap string, a design upon which his successors have never seen the need to improve. To work its charms, the would-be puppeteer must first shape the Puppet to resemble the individual she wishes to torment (Dexterity + Crafts, difficulty 8). Like a voodoo doll, some sort of personal connection to the target must be incorporated into the design for this process to work: The Puppet's costume can be made of the target's old clothes, the paint used for its face might contain a drop of the target's blood, and so on. Once the puppeteer produces a successful likeness, she must spend a point of Glamour to link Puppet and target. If she changes her mind and wants to control someone else, she will have to start all over again, constructing a new Master-Puppet.
At this point, the fun begins: By spending another point of Glamour, the Master-Puppet's user may control the physical motions of the target at any distance for one scene, provided she has a line of sight. (Soothsay and other scrying Treasures or techniques count here.) You can make your victim dance jigs, trip over an invisible root, punch his best friend, or bump into strangers. You simply need to mime the desired action with the Master-Puppet, and the target follows suit. The Puppet doesn't allow you to affect the target's mind or emotions, nor does it let you force the target to do something directly harmful to himself, but the mannikins prefer it that way. A free mind feels the terror of an unruly body more acutely, and corpses can't be humiliated.
There are additional limits to the puppeteer's control of her victim. Whenever a target is compelled to act, he may make an extended resistance roll (Willpower, difficulty 8). When the total successes on any single resistance roll exceed the puppeteer's Willpower + number of successes on the original creation roll (maximum of 8), no further control attempts are possible for the remainder of the scene. Targets may also spend Willpower points to free u[ their motor functions; each point spend counts as a success on their resistance roll. Finally, all Master-Puppets may only be used as many times as they have strings (five is the standard number). A single string snaps at the end of each control period; although a given string may be retied (so that the Puppet can continue to function), the breaking of the final string causes the Master-Puppet to fall to the ground and shatter.
References[]
- CTD: Inanimae: The Secret Way, p. 96-97