Embassy:Dreamlands

Informal Names: Daydreamers, Somninauts, Terriers, The Resistance (defunct), Hearlds of the Rooster (defunct)
 * Alternative Name: The Lords and Ladies of Sleep

''We live two lives, in two worlds. Each is missing something we dearly need. Our task is to bring them together, to build something new, something whole and complete.''

For centuries the Dreamlands has kept the souls of the Kingdom imprisoned but not all souls touched by the Light were from the Kingdom. A rare few souls Blossomed without any help from a past life during the Long Night. Most were alone and without guidance but a rare few found a tradition left to them by their forebears: The Embassy to the Dreamlands. It was recorded in books Charmed to find their way into the hands of another Princess. Within was a simple mission: Learn about the dreamlands, find a way to free the souls trapped within.

The efforts of the Embassy amounted to naught when the moon landing beat them to the release but the story only begins. The Dreamlands remains a source of hope, power and danger to the Enlightened. New Princesses flock to the Banner of the Daydreamers, eager to explore the new world that waits for them in their dreams. Though the release was not a silver bullet for all the world's ills the Daydreamers still see it as a chance to heal the world. To hear them say it, Earth has reality but is short on hope. The Dreamlands is full of hope but lacks reality. By becoming a bridge between dream and reality the Daydreamers hope to forge something shining and new, the best of both worlds.

Marks and Requirements
The Embassy to the Dreamlands has one of the odder styles of Regalia. They are sleepers and dreamers, but they are also explorers, searching for new horizons in the Dreamlands. Their Regalia draws from both, adorning the Daydreamer in a clashing contrast of exploration gear and pyjamas, as though they were woken up in the middle of the night and told they had five minutes to grab what they needed for an expedition and get out. Thick hiking boots are worn below a nightdress. Torches and climbing gear hang from a dressing gown belt. A plinth helmet and sturdy backpack are combined with flannel pyjamas. Even their bodies shift, becoming rugged and built for tough outdoor conditions, yet also soft and dreamy in movement, with a faraway look in half-closed or entirely shut eyes... no matter how awake and perceptive the Princess really is.

Most Somninauts are Seekers. Many follow the Queen of Diamonds. They seek to study and understand the Dreamlands itself, or they believe that the Dreamlands offers a fresh perspective that can lead to new discoveries in other fields, such as sociology or the history of the Enlightened. Followers of the Queen of Clubs are also well represented. The Wilds are often drawn to experience the world and no one – certainly not their Queen – said the world ends at the physical. Yet the most common court of all is the followers of the Queen of Mirrors. Before the release, Onceborn Lightbringers often felt that freeing the Enlightened souls from the Dreamlands was a simple one-step solution to fixing the world (and being crowned True Heir and saviour, of course). Even now that it has been proven that things are not that simple, many Brats still find that they prefer life in the Dreamlands, where their greatness is fully appreciated and honoured.

The Attribute and Skill of the Daydreamers are those used to navigate the Dreamlands: Wits and Empathy.

Secretary Privileges
The long history of the Embassy has left records of several heroes and heroines. To pay tribute to their forebears' memories the Lords and Ladies of Sleep have named the Embassy's Privileges in their honour.

Alice's Daydream
The Secretary can instantly find a Crawlspace entrance anywhere she wishes. She need only spend 1 Wisp to give herself a perfect impression for the maneuver to reach the Dreamlands. This doesn’t remove the cost to open the final gate. If some magical barrier blocks access to the Dreamlands by making the impression level worse, the Secretary’s impression starts at perfect before the barrier’s effect applies, and any Conditions which improve the impression level also take effect.

Coraline's Choice
The Secretary has complete control over her sleep and circadian rhythms allowing for a variety of benefits. As an instant action she can fall asleep at any time, and trying to keep her awake with loud music, uncomfortable conditions or even physical pain is futile. Supernatural powers can force her to remain awake, but the Secretary’s attempt to go to sleep triggers a Clash of Wills, in which her dice pool is Resolve + Inner Light. The same benefits apply to waking up or staying awake: the Princess cannot be kept asleep against her will by drugs or other mundane methods and may enter a Clash of Wills against magical powers that force sleep. (Any other effects of mundane attempts to force the Secretary to wake or sleep still take effect - the Privilege does not protect the Secretary from Tilts like Drugged or Insensate.)

Before the Princess falls asleep she may choose exactly when she will wake up, be it after a certain amount of time has passed or when a certain condition is triggered. She can choose as many wake up calls as she wants and will wake up when the first condition is triggered. The usual things that would wake anyone up like an alarm clock, fire alarm or a little sister climbing into your bed and shaking you all work like normal with no benefit or hindrance from this Privilege unless the Secretary specifically chooses that they will or won’t wake her up. If the Princess is in the Dreamlands then this ability manifests as a Crawlspace spontaneously appearing and her hearing the alarm clock, little sister or equivalent from within. If she ignores the wake up call any others that come later will have the same effect and as always she is entitled to a roll if a Dreamlander tries to trap her in the Dreamlands and prevent her from waking up.

The Secretary is also free from such crass limitations as a proper sleep cycle. She still needs the same amount of sleep as anyone else but may acquire it in whatever configuration she wishes. Midday is as good as midnight. Sixteen half hour naps are exactly equivalent to a full night’s eight hours of sleep and she may use even odder choices, she could spend the entire weekend asleep and stay awake for the entire week. Providing she gets roughly the right amount of sleep (9 to 11 hours a day depending on her age and individual needs) she will suffer no penalties. Willpower is awarded the first time she gets a genuine rest in a day.

Finally falling asleep will not cause the Secretary to de-transform. She will however need to roll to sustain her transformed state when she wakes up.

Lucy's Wardrobe
By touching another person and spending a Wisp, a Secretary can show them a Crawlspace entrance; it is up to the target if they wish to go through. The effect is the same as getting one success on a roll to guide the target to an entrance; one Door opens for him automatically, and his impression is the same as the Secretary’s. The Secretary may use Alice’s Daydream at the same time as Lucy’s Wardrobe to give herself and the target a perfect impression, if she didn’t have one already.

If a target chooses not to enter the Dreamlands they remain awake, so this Privilege cannot be used to send enemies to sleep in the middle of a fight. The Privilege doesn’t give the target any ability to find Crawlspaces without help, so unless the target naturally has that ability or finds a Princess in the Dreamlands willing to lead them back they could easily be trapped. Crawlspaces leading to the Dreamlands function as normal. Crawlspaces leading to Earth return the target to their sleeping body; when the target is a Dreamlander it will lead to the vicinity of the Secretary’s sleeping body.

For people lacking the power to enter the Dreamlands, Crawlspaces created by Lucy’s Wardrobe remain for the remainder of the scene. Those who have that power treat the Privilege’s entrances as they do the entrances they find for themselves.

Dorothy's Farmhouse
As the Daydreamer’s connection between both worlds grows. She can use her connection to her sleeping body and the walking world as an anchor to protect herself from being blown away by the Gales. So long as the Consul is fewer than her Resolve days outwards (or in a Queen’s domain) she does not have to roll to resist the Gales. Once she travels far enough outwards this Privilege has no effect at all and the Consul must face the Gales as other Princesses do.

Calvin's Tiger
With her growing connection to the Dreamlands a Consul can call nearly anything from beyond the wall of sleep, bring it to the real world and turn it into something real and tangible. When a Consul is transformed, needs a special tool and doesn’t have it or anything like it, she may roll Inner Light + Wits. Success draws upon her connection to the raw stuff of the Dreamlands to create a piece of equipment well-suited for the task she currently faces. She may then hold or touch a real object of roughly the right size and shape, concentrate for a full turn (losing her Defense, if in combat), and spend 2 Wisps to transform the object into a useful tool. The transformed tool has an equipment bonus equal to her successes - 1 and must function identically to a piece of mundane equipment, though it may have an odd appearances or unusual operating principles. The transformation lasts for the rest of the scene, after which the object returns to its original shape. The Consul may use this Privilege a number of times per day up to her Intelligence.

Though the Daydreamer can bring Dreamlanders to Earth with Lucy’s Wardrobe she still requires the Charm Privy Counsellor to ease one into a new body, while Bequeath remains necessary to create more powerful tools from the Dreamlands. If she knows either of those Charms she can use Calvin’s Tiger to aid their Invocation. If she activates the Privilege just before beginning either Charm, the threshold that the Charm requires drops to 2x the target’s Inner Light or dot rating; on an exceptional success with the Privilege, the threshold for the Charm becomes just the target’s Inner Light or dot rating.

Wendy's Boys
An Ambassador becomes a living bridge between both worlds pulling the impossible idealism of the Dreamlands and the hard reality of Earth into a happy medium. This Privilege has two different effects, depending on if the Ambassador is on Earth or in the Dreamlands; it activates while the Ambassador is transformed.

On Earth the Princess creates what the Embassy has termed a daydreaming zone. In this zone the world begins to take subtle cues from the fantastic aspect of the Dreamlands: colours seem brighter and livelier, sounds seem to spontaneously harmonize, the rustling of leaves seems to be hiding something you can’t quite believe is an animal, but may just be. Mundane characters bask in the optimism of the Dreamlands; they gain a +1 bonus on all breaking point rolls. For Dreamlanders, a daydreaming zone has the Open Condition [GMC 226] and grants the Materialize Manifestation at a cost of 3 Wisps per activation.

In the Dreamlands the Princess bestows what the Embassy calls a lucid zone. The Dreamlands does not lose its fantastic nature but it seems more solid, more stable. In this place of sanctuary the Gales do not blow at all.

Both zones remain centred on the Princess at all times and extend Inner Light * 10 yards from her person. Each zone lasts as long as the Ambassador remains transformed, and does not try to navigate Crawlspace.

Drawback: Using this Privilege almost seems to place the Princess between two worlds. Her senses are overwhelmed by flashes of whichever world she is not currently in inflicting a -3 penalty to Perception at all times. In addition no matter how aware and awake she actually is she always looks like she’s lost in a daydream which inflicts a -2 penalty to Social rolls with anyone who thinks she’s not paying attention.