Please read this in its entirety before creating a new Kinain character! Thanks to DEM for finding these and revising them for our use!
Kinain in the Anywhere Cafe
Anywhere Cafe (the Cafe) is a Mage-centric WoD Chatroom using 20th Anniversary Mage: the Ascension (M20) rules. The Cafe allows non-mages, so long as they are not enemies of Ascension. This includes most Fae, and as a result, the 20th Anniversary Changeling: the Dreaming (C20) rules are used.
However, as many of the characters in play are older characters who predate the 20th Anniversary editions of the game, Kinain using the older rules set from The Enchanted sourcebook exist and will be in play. As the C20 rules on Kinain completely remove many of the abilities presented in The Enchanted, it becomes necessary to preserve continuity of character and narrative by finding ways to reconcile the two sets of rules.
Full credit for the original original form of these rules goes to Onyx Path Forums poster Windthin. Windthin’s original rules have had several minor updates and alterations in order to better fit into the framework of the room.
Kinain House Rules
As noted, we are using a melding of the old Enchanted rules and C20. Refer to the Enchanted or C20 for details on how certain powers and rules work except where noted otherwise here.
Summary:
You can totally do multi-sphere splats (ie: Kinain/Mage, Kinain/Garou, Kinain/Smurf, Kinain/Dean Winchester, whatever), but you get one magic type. The only exception to this is Enchantment, and only for enchanting yourself.
Fae Gifts still work, but they’re Kinain-only Merits now. Faerie Blood works like it does in C20, with a little bit of a Glam bump.
Background – Faerie Blood:
Faerie Blood is the background which gives Kinain greater access to the Arts and Realms of fae magic. The Enchanted and C20, however, are at odds as to what Faerie Blood grants. The Cafe uses the following scale:
| 0 | Able to use only one Art. Maximum Permanent Glamour pool is 2. |
| 1 | Able to learn two Arts. |
| 2 | Able to learn three Arts. Maximum Permanent Glamour pool is 3. |
| 3 | Able to learn four Arts. |
| 4 | Able to learn five Arts. Maximum Permanent Glamour pool is 4. |
| 5 | Able to learn six Arts. |
Detecting that one is Kinain is done with a Kenning roll at a difficulty of 10 minus the character’s level of Faerie Blood.
Note that while having a higher rating does grant you access to more Glamour and Arts, it also makes it harder for you to hide from those with an interest in your blood and power. Even those with Feth Fiada to help them slip through the cracks will find this doesn’t work if their hunter is of the Chimerical world as well. Unscrupulous fae may consider a Kinain a nice snack, and others might have their own reasons for hunting and hurting Kinain. Power can be a double-edged blade.
Enchantment:
Kinain, as creatures of Glamour, see through the Mists as second nature. All human infants do, but the Glamour within the Kinain means that this ability never fades. While this presents problems for the child and parents in keeping things secret, it means Kinain can always perceive chimerical reality around them as easily as they do the Autumn.
However, this is not true Enchantment. A Kinain might be able to see a chimera, but it remains intangible and ephemeral when she tries to directly interact. Kinain can, however, self-enchant for 1 point of Glamour (plus one additional Glamour for each additional day). This cost is reduced from the C20 cost of [Banality + 1 (+ days)], because the Kinain is already connected to the Dreaming, and so does not have to overcome the drag of Banality in order to open their eyes to the greater world.
Glamour Regeneration:
Kinain are, body and soul, a fusion of faerie and human. As such, they can’t harvest Glamour the way the fae can. They can of course always be gifted with Glamour, but, most remarkably, they possess the ability to regenerate Glamour from their own emotions. Kinain regenerate one point of Glamour a week, up to their maximum. All Kinain start play with a maximum Glamour pool of 2; raising it must be accomplished the same way Changelings raise theirs.
Heritage:
Rather than kith, Kinain have a heritage, based on the kith of their parents. As per C20, this heritage is always singular. If your character has two kithain parents of different Kiths, one must be dominant.
Birthrights:
When creating a Kinain, you select a Birthright from one of the two granted from your heritage’s kith counterpart. It’s suggested that this be the less magical of the two; most children of Pooka get the Confidante Birthright rather than the Shapechanging one, though there are exceptions. In the case of Birthrights that increase attributes, in earlier editions, the lack of a fae mien made it difficult for Kinain to explain having Birthrights that expressly affected the mein. However, as the C20 rules do not limit these birthrights to being purely chimerical, as in 2nd Edition (such as a Sidhe’s extra dots of Appearance), and so there is no reason to restrict Kinain from taking these Birthrights.
Legacy:
Kinain have Legacies, but don’t sort them into Seelie and Unseelie; in fact they don’t really have a Court, though they may run with one or the other. For Kinain, Legacies are even more like Nature and Demeanor. In addition, as per decisions by room staff, Kinain Legacies supplement, rather than replace, Nature and Demeanor. This is done to allow greater interplay between Legacies and Personality Archetypes, and with the acknowledgement that really, nobody tends to track Willpower beyond small clusters of connected scenes anyway, so regaining Willpower is far less powerful than it would be in a normal tabletop environment.
A Kinain might only fit one Legacy her entire life, the second slipping through under intense pressure, or the two might flip back and forth. Someone normally bouncy and enthusiastic could switch to paranoid dread, and have that simple be a matter of which Legacy is dominant. Both Quests are active no matter what, but only the Ban for the Legacy she is expressing at the time applies. Kinain can also choose to have two Seelie or Unseelie Legacies, as the distinction for them is negligible.
Arts and Realms:
Unlike in the Enchanted, a child of the Fae can now freely use any Arts and Realms somebody is willing to teach them. Their only limit is that the number of different Arts (not Cantrips) cannot exceed that set by their Faerie Blood Background. Their lesser Glamour pool is also a limit, of course. Realms are not limited at all, other than the way Changelings face. All Kinain get one free dot in an Art at Character Creation, and one free dot each in their parent’s Affinity Realm and another Realm (which may be the same one).
Non-Mortal Kinain:
Please be aware that Arts and Realms are only available to single-sphere Kinain. Kinain who have access to other forms of magic (Spheres, Sorcery Paths, Numina, Gifts, etc) may not take Arts and Realms. Kinain who Awaken in play will find their Arts and Realms fading into and subsumed by their Sphere magic.
This has the side-effect of meaning that multi-sphere Kinain do not use Glamour for anything beyond self-Enchantment. And, as they cannot use Arts, the main benefit from the Faerie Blood Background is completely lost. Rather than leaving these Kinain with a Background that is of minimal use, or introducing a whole new XP-sink for additional Enchantment time, these Kinain can use their normal magical pools to supplement their Glamour for the purposes of self-enchantment time only at a rate of 2:1.
Thus, a Kinain who is Bastet who wished to self-Enchant for 3 days would spend 2 Glamour and 2 Gnosis, or 1 Glamour and 4 Gnosis. Similarly, a Kinain Mage could spend 1 Glamour and 2 Quintessence for a two-day self-Enchantment. In any event, the first day of self-Enchantment must come from Glamour itself, not the supplemental magic pools.
Banality:
Kinain are not affected by Banality in the same way that Changelings are. They still have a Banality trait, but all this represents for them is how they interact with Changelings and chimera; it has no real effect on the Kinain themselves. A Kinain with high or low Banality is treated the same as a mortal with high or low Banality. Kinain begin with a Banality of 3, which is raised or lowered like any other character’s throughout play.
Backgrounds:
This is a list of Backgrounds Kinain do and don’t have access to.
Banned
- Dreamers – Kinain characters may not take Dreamers – since they can’t harvest Glamour the way Changelings do, there’s no point to this. They might have Allies or Contacts who could act as Dreamers to their Changeling relatives and friends, though.
- Holdings – While it is not entirely impossible for a Kinain to wind up the caretaker of a Freehold, Kithain society would make this a very difficult situation to encounter. Therefore, at present, Kinain cannot take Holdings.
- Remembrance – Kinain don’t undertake the Changeling Way. Whether or not it is possible for a Kinain to be reincarnated is a topic for debate, but if it is, they do not seem to possess the Kithain affinity for remembering past lives.
- Retinue – Retinue is something very specific to Changelings. Kinain will instead have Allies and Contacts. They may be PART of a Changeling’s retinue.
- Kenning – The Enchanted treats his as a Background for Kinain. That is silly, and Kinain can take it as a talent like Changelings.
Restricted
- Title – C20 puts this on the banned list. However, there is a history of Kinain knights, and there is an actual Kinain Duke of House Gwydion, one of the most strict houses, listed in C20 on page 67. In the current metaplot, Kinain are muttering about their place as second-class citizens, so the Title background is not impossible for them, but it would be rare enough that it must be approved.
- House – Not actually a Background, but since we’ve brought up Titles, Kinain CAN be members of Houses. Some particular Houses, such as Scathach and Liam, are particularly prone to embracing their Kinain, while others, like Fiona, do so on a more individual basis.
Allowed
Both types of the Chimera background, Contacts, Fame, Influence, Mentor (you can look at the Faerie Mentor version from The Enchanted for ideas), Resources, and Treasures are all allowed. So are the following.
- Dross – Found on page 70 of The Enchanted, this gives Kinain a steady source of Dross (and is also available to Changelings).
- Faerie Blood – Of course. Detailed above.
- Feth Fiada – Found on page 72 of The Enchanted, this is effectively Arcane for Kinain. In this case, it works via the Mists, allowing them to cloak the existence of fortunate (or unfortunate) Kinain.
- Mastery – Effectively the Scathach version of Title. House Scathach embraces its Kinain, though those with low levels of Faerie Blood may be limited in how far they can go just by the inability to access both Chronos and Soothsay.
Fae Gifts:
The Enchanted offered Fae Gifts, special powers that the Kinain could partake of. C20 did away with these entirely. The Cafe’s compromise between the two is as follows.
The following Fae Gifts are no longer applicable, as they have been completely subsumed into simply being Kinain: An-da-shealladh, Parted Mists, and Weakened Mists. Also, Fith-Fath is no longer allowed because it sucks really really hard.
As for the rest, Fae Gifts used to be their own special category, and the number of different gifts you could have was based on the Faerie Blood Background. It no longer makes sense to retain these rules, as there are two few now and just not enough to go around, and there were never enough points to go around to get high levels of them if you had high levels of Faerie Blood. Instead, the following Fae Gifts are now a class of Merits available only to Kinain called… Fae Gifts. Kinain get a pool of 5 points that can be spent only on Fae Gift Merits. More can be bought with Freebies, but ONLY during Character Creation except under unusual circumstances.
- The Bardic Gift – Now a 1 to 4 point Merit working the same essentially as previously, though Persuasion is replaced with Expression now. Note that this power works far better OUT of combat, for the simple reason that combat rounds are 3 seconds and you can’t really get through much of a song or speech in 3 seconds. The level five Strain of Truth is no longer allowed, as Kinain no longer Rapture.
- Honored Birthright – Now a 4 or 5 point Merit that allows the Kinain to take two Birthrights instead of one. For 4 points the character gains a second Birthright appropriate to their heritage. For 5 points, that birthright may be a unique Birthright determined by the ST that blends the heritages of two different Kiths. The 5 point version is only available to Kinain with two Changeling parents of different Kiths.
- Nine Lives – Now a 3 point Merit. Works the same as before, save of course that Kinain don’t have to worry about losing memories due to the Mists, thu the lowered cost.
- Riastradh – Now a 4 point Merit, working the same as in The Enchanted, except you can make the Willpower roll without spending 1 WP; forcing a character to spend 1 WP to make a diff. 8 WP roll is just plain cruel and basically a way to swiftly drain a character’s willpower.
- The Second Sight – Now a 1 to 5 point Merit. Given that future vision powers can get annoying fast for STs if over-used, I will ask players not to go overboard with this, though.
- Spearman’s Shield – Now a 1 to 5 point Merit that works as in The Enchanted.
- Taghairm – Now a 2 point Merit that works as per The Enchanted.
- Taidhsear – Now a 1 point Merit that works per The Enchanted.
All of the flaws listed in The Enchanted are also available for Kinain.
Basic Kinain Character Creation Chart
Step One: Concept
Choose concept, heritage, Legacies, and house (if applicable)
Step Two: Traits
Attributes 6/4/3, Abilities 11/7/4
Step Three: Advantages
Fae Gifts 5, Backgrounds 5, Arts 1, Realms 2 (one must be in a parent’s Affinity Realm)
Step Four: Tempers
Record starting Willpower (4), Glamour (2), Banality (3)
Step Five: Birthright(s)
Record any Trait adjustments and special systems from the Kinain’s Birthright. If allowed a second Birthright via the Fae Gift Merit Honored Birthright, note this as well.
Step Six: Freebie Points
Spend freebie points (21)
Select Merits and Flaws.
Step Seven: Specialties
Record specialties for Attributes or Abilities rated 4 or higher.
Step Eight: Spark of Life
Describe character’s backstory, motivation, appearance, and identity, making use of the questions on the Kinain sheet.