Merits & Flaws

When you need time to yourself, there’s a place you can go to that no one knows about except you. It’s small, yeah, and remote enough that your friends and enemies can’t find you there. Chances are, it’s a secret apartment or condo, a distant cottage, a mobile home, or a literal cave or grove or

camping spot where you go to escape the stress of your usual life. It could even be a pocket Realm, accessible only to you and whomever you choose to share it with, should you be foolish enough to trust anyone else with this secret hideaway. Unless you give its location away, however, or wind up getting tracked to it by a dedicated stalker, this little getaway is your personal escape hatch. Use it wisely, and be careful when you come and go!

Unlike the Merit: Property (see below), or the Backgrounds: Chantry, Node, and Sanctum, this discrete hidey-hole isn’t expan­ sive, elaborate, or innately magickal. That said, it’s hidden from most forms of casual detection. You could combine this Merit with Property, Node or Sanctum, although those Traits would need to be purchased in addition to your Hideaway, and their existence must remain secret from other characters. Chantries are social by default, and so cannot also become a Hideaway. This place is stocked up with whatever you would need for a roughly two-week stay, and may, of course, be stocked up for longer periods if you bring in additional supplies. Although you might be traced to your hideaway with magick or other tracking methods, your little retreat is not linked to you by any searchable official channels: bills, lease, mail, Internet services, etc.

Once per story – if events occur which could lead other people to your hideaway, if you do something that could reveal its location, or if someone dedicates time and effort

trying to track you down – the Storyteller may roll two dice against difficulty 6. (Yes, this roll is done in secret, so you won’t know the results.) If that roll gets at least one success, then your secret remains hidden; one failure means that someone has gotten a clue but not your exact whereabouts; four successive failures reveal the location of your hideaway, and a botch on that roll exposes its location immediately. So long as you continue to cover your tracks, however, this place remains yours and yours alone.

For four points, this Merit could also be purchased un­ der the name Safehouse. In this case, it’s a secured getaway that features better facilities and protections than a typical Hideaway. Its store of supplies can provide for a dozen or so people for roughly two months, and the Merit includes a small dedicated staff (in game terms, two dots in Retain­ ers or four dots in Backup) to maintain that site. Unlike a Hideaway, this area can withstand a minor-league assault, and features up to three offices /work areas, reinforced walls, bulletproof glass, and a vault-like panic room. This safehouse also includes a shielded communications array (-2 to attempts to hack or trace that system), and a simple but effective alarm and security camera system (again, -2 to subversion attempts). The downside is that the Merit is not your property; it belongs to your superiors, and can be taken away from you if you fall out with the folks who foot the bill for it. Generally, a Technocrat in good standing with her superiors can get a Safehouse Merit (or, for especially good service, be awarded with one), but other mages could obtain a similar facility as well.

For six points, your refuge can be both a Safehouse and a Hideaway; in this case, the property belongs entirely to you. Enjoy your Batcave, Mr. Wayne!