Eidetic Memory
Merit · 2 pts
You remember, with perfect detail, things you see and hear. Documents, photographs, conversations, etc., can be committed to memory with only minor concentration. Under stressful conditions involving numerous distractions, you must make a Perception + Alertness roll (difficulty 6) to summon enough concentration to absorb what your senses detect.
Also in BoS p. 45 — text differs from V20 (39%)
Gifted with the proverbial photographic memory, you clearly recall details about something you read, view, or other wise experience. A serious boon for ritual magicians, field ops, and tech-minded magi, this Merit lets your character remember stuff even if you, the player, do not.
Under most circumstances, your character easily recalls the memories in question. Really detailed memories, or ones gathered under stressful conditions, might require a Perception + Alertness roll before the character can remember essential elements of the moment she’s trying to recall.
Memory, of course, is subjective, and so while this Merit allows you remember things as you perceive them, those memories will still be based upon your perspective – internal as well as external – which is not the same as having access to some ob jective god-view of that experience! Especially in a game about
subjective reality, that’s an important distinction – one that also keeps this Merit from becoming a potential game-breaker.
Folks with such memories are often subject to PTSD, as in the Flaw of that name. That’s especially true when people face
Things Man Was Not Meant to Know, as described in Mage
20, p. 407. Vivid recall has its drawbacks, and in the traumatic world of a mage, some things really are best forgotten!
See also 2
Abilities & Attributes
- Alertness shared/trait/ability/alertness
- Perception shared/trait/attribute/perception