Lore
The Five Ledgers
Karma, Corruption, Faction reputation, Relationships and Personality: five separate records of who you are.
The world keeps several accounts of you, and none of them is the whole of you.
- Karma is what your conduct, witnessed, says about you. It runs from −100 to +100 and moves by what you do in view and by the weight of certain story choices.
- Corruption is the accumulated cost of Dark magic. It ignores your intentions.
- Faction reputation is how organised groups see you: Start Village, the Hidden Village, the Cult, the Kingdom, the Thieves. Each is its own ledger, in its own range.
- Relationships are how individual people respond to you: a person can like you when their faction does not.
- Personality is the style you choose to speak in: Witty, Empathetic or Bold. Each styled reply adds to it, and some people have a preference.
A faction can respect you when a friend does not. A village can be fond of a person with blood on their hands. The system is designed so that the numbers disagree.
Some story events are fixed. The player’s motives and the world’s responses are not.