House Rules

SYSTEM

Advantages

Numbers Advantage: Is gained by the Primary Attacker in Fray challenges. It represents the tactical advantage of a superior number of allies fighting together.

Character Creation

No Maturity: Characters may not take Maturity. As far as backgrounds go, characters can have Reckoned at any point after 1970.

DOWNTIME

Hinder: As an option, if you know the true name of a NPC belonging to the Host or Horde, you may create ripples in the Symphony to interfere specifically with them. Regardless if your attempt is successful, the NPC will be aware someone is trying to meddle with them.

If successful, you temporarily strip a number of Inspirations from the NPC for the upcoming month equal to your number of Marks.

If unsuccessful, the backlash on the Symphony causes you to temporarily lose your Inspirations for the upcoming month, and the NPC is aware of your identity & your attempt to interfere with them.

Claiming Turf: The mortals of Kingdom Come: Los Angeles are far too vibrant and unpredictable to be easily swayed. No single Fallen, no matter how Wrathful, is going to bring down a peaceful tight knit family community over the course of a few months of Predomination, and turning a violent ghetto into a paradise is the type of endeavour that takes dozens of devoted community members years or decade. Certainly, a Congregation of Fallen taking up residence in a community will have its impact, much as the community will shape those Fallen in turn, but they will be far from the only factor shaping the direction a neighbourhood takes over the years. In a city like Los Angeles, the Fallen are outnumbered by mortals hundreds of thousands to one.

Unable to outright control millions of mortals, the Fallen turn to the strategies of organized crime and protection rackets. They Fallen don't need to influence all those mortals when they can simply lock down their turf and make sure no other celestial beings reap the benefits of all that mortal activity. Using a very diffuse application of Hallow, a united Congregation can claim turf as their own. So long as they can keep other supernatural beings from violating their turf (occasional visitors are fine - if they respect the rules and behave as proper guests, preserving the symbolic dominion of the residents), a Congregation can reap the benefits of Predomination. In order to symbolically stake their claim, a Congregation needs to exist as a distinct entity - have a stable membership, a Prelate, a name, and at least some symbolism (whether it be gang colours and graffiti tags, or a formal sworn code of conduct and a set of sigils in angelic script).

In game terms, the Predomination action is replaced by a Claim Turf action. The action can be done as a Group Action by an entire Congregation, and it isn't necessary to name a specific neighbourhood or district - the Storyguides instead track things abstractly by how much of Los Angeles each Congregation (or Devil) controls. You *can* name another Congregation you are trying to seize the Turf from - this is actually recommended, because the case where there is just unclaimed turf waiting to be grabbed will be pretty rare, so most gains in Turf will come at the expense of another group.

Based on how much territory a Congregation holds in comparison to others during a particular month, they'll gain a number of Inspirations to share during for that game session. The Prelate generally determines how those Inspirations are distributed among his or her Congregation members at the beginning of each session. If the Prelate is not present at a particular game session to decide on how Inspirations are distributed among the membership, then majority rules.

MORALITY

Kingdom Come: Los Angeles is as much about morality and tough choices as any Kingdom Come game, but the choices aren't always black and white, right and wrong. In keeping with that idea, there isn't any spot on your character sheet that will tell you whether you are "Moral" or "Immoral" - it is up to you to decide for yourself whether your characters actions can be justified.

Instead of measuring Moral Alignment, characters in Kingdom Come: Los Angeles are divided between those who identify most strongly with their human memories and lives, and those who see themselves as fundamentally celestial beings with the remains of a human disguise still clinging to them. We replace the traditional game’s “Moral Alignment” with house ruled “Sympathetic Alignment” - how each individual Fallen sees themselves.

Sympathetic Alignment

Generally, in rule situations which call for a character's Moral Alignment, simply substitute a character's Sympathetic Alignment.

“Innocent,” “Typical,” and “Hardened” characters are considered to have “Human Sympathy,” which is equivalent to Moral for most rules purposes. “Hardcore” and “Inhuman” (the new name for Irredeemable) characters are considered to have “Celestial Sympathy,” and are treated the same as Immoral characters for most rules purposes.

Innocent (Requires Potent Talent): Innocent characters have Human Sympathy. They are "more human than human" in ways - they are not only shocked by supernatural atrocities, but even the inhumanity of mankind is disgusting to them.

Typical: Typical characters have Human Sympathy. They are the 'average' person who lives in the world. A Typical Fallen most often has accepted their angelic nature, but most tend to think of themselves as "Joe the mechanic from Oakland who likes baseball and classic cars...and who used to, once long ago, be an Angel" instead of the other way around, and tend to prioritize human motivations.

Hardened: Hardened characters have Human Sympathy. They are your 'average' soldier or anyone who leads a rough life - or a Fallen who has already been seasoned in supernatural conflicts. They still tend to think in terms of human motivations, but their Embodiment has a stronger influence on them than Innocent or Typical Fallen.

Hardcore: Hardcore characters have Celestial Sympathy. Hardcore Fallen tend to think of themselves as Angels first and foremost - "Zacharial, Wrathful Infernal Fallen...who recently spent a brief part of their existence as Joe the mechanic". The wants and desires of their most recent human life still will have an influence on them - but they are far more guided by their Embodiment and, often, the principles of their Conviction. Hardcore characters aren't necessarily good or evil - an ascetic Temperance who leads his life according to a strict monastic code of self-deprivation and good works is just as Hardcore as a brutal Wrath who terrorizes for fun - but they are very difficult for normal humans to relate to.

Inhuman (Replaces Irredeemable, requires Potent Talent): Inhuman characters see themselves as angels encased in bodies of clay, regarding their former human lives as mere illusions now discarded. Again, they don't necessarily see themselves as evil (though some might) but your average human would almost certainly see them as alien. To the people on the ground, a slavering monster and an uncompromising agent of righteous vengeance are equally terrifying.

Like Irredeemable characters, Inhuman characters can be Controlled or Uncontrolled.

Aside from the changes above, the different Sympathetic Alignments work as the stock KC Moral Alignments (with Unrelatable Acts replacing Questionable Acts, and Unfathomable Acts replacing Heinous Acts).

Revised Acts

Affinity: Living amongst mortals as if you were mortal, encouraging love, giving hope, and otherwise connecting with the masses of humanity. Like Acts of Grace in vanilla Kingdom Come, it is hard to force another character to perform an Act of Affinity - plenty of predators blend in with their prey while never really forming emotional bonds with them.

Minor: Hurting someone who can take care of themselves, breaking codes important to the mortals around you (cheating, petty shoplifting, etc), covering up use of supernatural power via Nimbus, or otherwise acting as if the rules that apply to humanity don't apply to you.

Unrelatable: Killing out of necessity, maiming, major violations of human moral codes, treating your body as a mere tool (nonchalantly going into dangerous painful situations trusting in the Fallen ability to heal quickly and come back from most deaths), using supernatural powers to harm others or to overtly violate their free will (even if you are making them do "good" things).

Unfathomable: Heinous violations of human moral codes (violation, cannibalism, torture, killing for pleasure), committing suicide, and use of supernatural powers on a grand scale - either in scope (affecting large groups of mortals with a power) or in impact (raising the dead, completely reprogramming a personality).

As with Morality (page 198 of the KC rulebook), each Sympathy has acceptable, prohibited, and possibly restricted acts.