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This file introduces you, the great viewing public, to the modified, mangled and kludged-all-to-hell-and-back house rules my gaming group has instituted for those two lines of check boxes at the bottom of the character sheet: Wyrd and Vitality. Hope they prove as though-provoking for you as they were for us. :-)
I should just mention that this is ver. 1.2 of an article originally written five years ago (*shudder*). It has received some modification in the wake of the publication of WFRP2, one of the few RPGs (along with "D&D", "Pendragon", "L5R" and "Cyberpunk 2020") to compete with Fading Suns for my affections.

1. Activate Occult powers (great if you have them, otherwise...).
2. Incite Passion or Steady one's hand (rarely used except by berserker Hazat. :-) ).
3. Accent rolls (probably the most underused option in the game).

Excuse me but I *thought* this was supposed to be a game about heroes. I don't know about you but I want something a little more immediate from my character's profound connection to the metaphysical; stuff like heroic surges of might, serendipitous blind luck and million-to-one get outs: hero stuff! To simulate this I use the following rules for Wyrd in my own campaigns. Readers should be warned that these rules are homebrew and, like all good homebrew, can cause hallucinations, blindness, brain damage, dementia and liver failure if used unwisely.

Players begin play with Wyrd equal to their Passion. Wyrd may be used for the following:

1. Wyrd may be used to accent rolls at no initiative penalty.
2. Wyrd may be used to incite one's Passion or Steady Hand in a stressful situation (as per the Core rules) - although you may be interested in the Pendragon Passions article for another view of Passion in Fading Suns.
3. Wyrd may be used to re-roll a single failed or successful Goal roll at a dramatically appropriate moment. he player may choose the result he/she prefers. A natural 20 is ~always~ a fumble and cannot be re-rolled.
4. Wyrd may be spent to take an additional action in a round out of one's initiative order. The player may interrupt the action at any time after his initial action to take another without so much as a "by your leave". This action suffers no multiple action penalty.
   It should be noted that this is less useful under the alternative EPT Swashbuckler Frenzy initiative and actions system.
5. Wyrd may also be used as a "Fate Point". If a character takes enough damage to be adjudged as dead as Vladimir the player may opt to spend a Wyrd point. It then turns out that the character was just knocked unconscious, blown clear of the explosion, whatever. The player must be able to give a dramatically appropriate explanation for this saving grace. Note however that, this does not allow anything so transparently miraculous as the Divine Intervention Theurgic Rite.
   This usage is similar in effect to the Death's Door Wyrd of the "Passion Play" FS LARP.
6. The GM may require a character to spend Wyrd to activate or attune Anunnaki artefacts (Soul Shards, Philosopher's Stones and Gargoyles).

Wyrd is only regained at the GM's option, usually as a reward for achieving character goals or major plot objectives. I am currently toying with the idea of allowing players to buy extra Wyrd at a cost of either a flat 10xp per point or at a cost of 3xcurrent Wyrd score.

Heroism Points - introduced in the "Juanita Monteujez de Justus de Hazat Memorial "Are you a hero or a dog?" Heroism Point Rules" section of the Revised XP Awards article - act as a supplement to Wyrd; an in-game reward for heroic, bravura play that makes the GM fell glad he bothered. There is no maximum score for Heroism points, but at the end of play any unspent Heroism points are converted into XP as a straight 1-to-1 exchange.
You see the distinction: Wyrd is a permament pool, Heroism Points strictly temporary in nature.

Mana is fully restored at the start of each adventure (or gaming session at the GM's option). Sleep now allows the character to regain 1 point of Mana per night, rather than 1 per hour. Astrological or religious events, and the use of meditation remain as they were previously. Mana may still be regained through meditation, as represented by the use of the Focus skill. However Focus is a rare skill which characters may only learn as part of a structured philosophy either in a Psychic coven or Church order. It is very rare for a charcter to learn Focus without a mentor or spiritual teacher of some kind.

It should be noted that these revised rules do rather favour theurges over psychics (remember that Calm and Passion are opposed), but that's the price these godless mind witches pay for shunning the Pancreator in favour of their own egotistical self-aggrandisation.

• Non-vital levels: 10-End. days to heal 1 level (min. 1 day/level)
• Vital levels: 28-End. days to heal 1 level

It should be noted that the use of Elixir, Regeneration Creches (TL5-6 medical tech - think of the tanks in "Starship Troopers" or "Star Wars") or Lazarus Chambers (TL8 medical artefacts capable of curing the recently deceased) can increase healing rates greatly. This should be considered to over-ride the body's natural healing. A house rule that we have instituted (the "You ain't running on that leg for a while sonny!" rule) is that a recuperating character who undertakes strenuous exertion while still injured to the Vital levels (strenuous = combat or anything that requires a Vigour test) is likely to undo all the rest he has had, instantly dropping to his previously injured state. It's easy to re-open half-healed wounds. :-)

This file last modified 30/05/2005.