Rambler

A gambler of the esoteric variety, one who senses the winds of fortune and can use them to increase their chances in games of risk and chance. While they are primarily gamblers, their rambling often leads them to be classified as vagrants as well.

Winds of Fortune

Fortune is an energy that cannot be controlled, but it can be nudged. Tweaked. Maybe. If you're lucky. And it can be sensed. Ramblers, like fortune-sailors, can sense the winds of fortune. Like anything to do with fortune, this ability develops by chance, usually when they are young, and it comes with a price. How they sense the winds varies - each rambler has a different way of interpreting it, and it is not unusual for them to have it slightly wrong. Being able to sense the winds is called "being touched".

The Cost of Fortune

Those who can sense and choose to follow the winds of fortune become subject to the whims of those winds, meaning they risk falling on hard times. For ramblers, those hard times often leave them adrift in the world, hence their name. This is determined by the classic set up of triple rolls. A triple roll will alter the rambler's luck:

• Triple 1s: luck lowers by one level
• Triple 2s: luck lowers by two levels
• Triple 3s: luck raises by three levels
• Triple 4s: luck lowers by three levels
• Triple 5s: luck raises by one level
• Triple 6s: luck bottoms out
• Triple 7s: luck tops out
• Triple 8s: luck lowers by four levels
• Triple 9s: luck raises by two levels
• Triple 10s: luck raises by four levels

Levels of Luck

The levels of luck are as follows:

1. Calamity
2. Very bad luck
3. Bad luck
4. Neutral
5. Good luck
6. Very good luck
7. Miraculous

A person with calamitous luck will be unable to succeed at any roll and horrible things will happen to them. A person with miraculous luck will be unable to fail at any roll and amazing things will happen to them. With very bad luck, they will always take the low die on rolls and bad things will happen to them, while a person with very good luck will always take the high die and good things will happen to them. With bad luck, they will always take the low die, but no narrated bad things will happen to them. A person with good luck will always take the high die, but no narrated good things will happen to them. A person wtih neutral luck takes the middle die and has no narrated effects upon them.

Calamitous luck cannot be escaped except by tripling out. Miraculous luck will go away very quickly. The more extreme the luck, in either direction, the more improbable events become around them.

Following the Wind

Following the winds of fortune also means they are driven to wander. Ramblers see the world as full of opportunities. They seek to find them.

Gambling

A rambler's primary occupation is gambling. While they use the typical skills of all gamblers - reading people, assessing the odds, the occasional cheating - they rely far more on luck than others.

Tells

A tell for a gambler is some quirk, some action, some common gesture that informs them what another person is about to do. But for a rambler, tells are also what informs them of the nature of the winds of fortune. It's how they sense the winds. This varies for every rambler. For some, it might be the feeling of breath upon the back of their necks. For others, it's a twinge in their knee. For some, it's when a clock strikes seven when it's not actually seven. For others, it's when something narrowly misses them. The variation is extreme, and sometimes, the ramblers are wrong about their tells.

Superstitions

Ramblers believe they can nudge the winds of fortune through a variety of superstitions. If they have seen a tell, they believe the winds of fortune are flowing their way - that they have good luck - and that this can be embraced if they do certain things. The most famous of these is blowing on dice before rolling them, but these superstitions vary greatly. It can be something more broad, such as not sleeping with your head on a pillow for a week after seeing a tell, so as to maintain good luck, or crossing yourself twice before making a bet, or even something completely unseen, like counting to seven seven times before each hand. Most revolve around acts of gambling, but some are less specific. These will, if they work, temporarily boost their luck up to three levels if their luck is good or lower. If their luck is very good or miraculous, these will instead simply cause narrated good things to happen. If their luck is calamitous, these will not work unless they roll a triple to get out of calamitous luck.

Sevens

For all ramblers everywhere, the number seven is lucky. Doing something seven times will bring luck. Seeing or engaging with the number seven will always indicate a positive shift in luck.

Bets

If a rambler makes a bet, their luck will control it more than anything else. Placing any bet, no matter how big, no matter how small, engages the winds of fortune (unless other energies are already at play, such as fate, misfortune, or Eldritch energy). Once a bet has been made, the rambler's sense of the winds will heighten as well, and they will know they have a short window to engage one of their superstitions (if not already applied).

Double or Nothing

Escalating the risks on a bet will heightened the winds of fortune even more, raising them to extremes and pushing luck either to calamitous or miraculous if done enough. Ramblers use this recklessly sometimes.

Intuitions

Like anyone touched by the winds of fortune, ramblers have insights and intutions they cannot explain, brought on by straight rolls and some variants:

• 012 roll: flicker - rambler knows something important has happened or will happen, but not what.
• 050 roll: major intuition.
• 123 roll: mild intution
• 234 roll: vague insight.
• 246 roll: major intuition.
• 345 roll: same as last straight.
• 369 roll: clear insight.
• 456 roll: vague insight.
• 567 roll: mild intuition.
• 678 roll: moment of distress - wild misunderstanding.
• 789 roll: thunderbolt moment - perfect understanding.
• 890 roll: clear insight.

Note on 0 rolls: a roll of 0 is a roll of 10, but because the classic d10 shows 0 as a zero, these can be interpreted as such when it comes to straights. A roll of 050 is not actually calculated for gameplay purposeds as 0, 5, 10, but still 5, 10, 10. However, it will still be considered a straight.

An insight is a clear understanding. An intuition is a certainty without understanding.

Slots

Slot machines are always rigged with misfortune. Always. Therefore, no amount of superstition or other luck-tweaking can affect them.

Inventory

Ramblers vary greatly in what they carry or use, but some traditions have developed.

Cards

Ramblers usually carry a lucky deck of cards that they use, with up to three cards picked out as their lucky cards. They never use these decks for gambling, but as miniature fortune vanes, holding them up to the actual wind to see how they react, using them as a form of cartomantic guidance.

Dice

Ramblers will often have a set of lucky dice, usually dice they blow on before using, which they roll to 1s before engaging in gambling as a sacrifice to the winds, to purge themselves of bad luck.

Longcoats

A rambler who has achieved the rare feat of hitting miraculous luck seven times in their life will find that the next time they put on a long coat, it will have a magical pocket that allows them to hide things in it bigger than the pocket seems to be.

Variations

Some ramblers take up different occupations while maintaining the use of gambling and risk to nudge fortune:

• Dap: a rambler whose focus is cartomancy, telling fortunes for others, usually as part of street performance.
• Deilealai: a rambler who works for a casino as a dealer, subtly tossing fortune to the players they like.
• Dwaas: a rambler who works in investing or stocks, whose gambles are the stock market.
• Leathcheann: a buffoon whose performance is a high risk set of pratfalls and tricks that causes the winds of fortune to whirl about the audience.
• Long rambler: a rambler who takes up odd jobs delivering messages as they travel.
• Oddsmaker: a rambler who is an expert at the odds, a mathematician rambler.
• Plesač: usually a dancer and street performer in Ranu who takes great risks in their movements. Usually accompanied by clapping or shaken percussion.
• Tiratore: a rambler whose risks and gambles are done with bow and arrow or firearms.
• Wishbone: a rambler who engages in risky acts of theft.

Lady Luck

A woman (or non-male) rambler who uses bits of the lore as her superstition, serving as a source of good luck for others. Like all morrigans, a lady luck uses a blend of witchcraft and other arts, but does not have the apotheosis that comes with the maiden-mother-crone cycle. She instead is subject to the whims of the winds of fortune.

Sevenspinner

Some ramblers focus on using their powers to grant luck to others rather than using it for themselves. These are called sevenspinners because they are luckier than others, as fortune favors those who share it. They are a sort of mystical healer who fixes the bad luck of others.

Similar Occupations

Other wielders of fortune include

• Arokin: a jali who tells stories of good luck.
• Blue Falcon: a fortune-sailor turned pirate.
• Femminielo: a crossdressing male in central Jesenya who draws fortune to themselves and gives it to others.
• Fortune-Sailor: a wanderer who uses a fortune vane to sense and follow the winds of fortune, but does not seek to tweak or control it.
• Gruff: a "hobo"-style clown who uses fortune to perform strange feats for audiences.
• Sortefabricante: a fortune-sailor who makes sails for other fortune-sailors.

Societal Role

Ramblers are seen as pests by most governments, sources of bad luck by most people. They are not liked. Messing with fortune is seen as a grave risk by most. In more brutal societies, they are jailed, but most seek to just drive them out, as prisons seldom hold a rambler for long.

Skills

Some common skills include

• Gambling
• Languages
• Travel survival
• Direction sense
• Odds-making
• Sewing
• Cooking
• Riding
• Fishing

Stats

Modifiers from base of nation/species:

PRO /
ATH +1
STR -1
AWA +2
WIL -2
STH +2
PRS +2