Past Life RPG:

I decided to ask Josia where we are headed. She did not appear to take my question seriously. But I could see the look hidden in her eyes, she was as uncertain as I. The calm, purposeful presence of Fr. Heilder came over me. He (I) told her, "fear is rot in the soul, it will bring down even the sturdiest unless it is shown to the light." She looked at me. "We must trust Professor Gail would not lead us here for nothing."

"Indeed," I replied, "but trust is certainly in short supply in this dank pit." I looked around the cargo hold, feeling the waves rocking the ship. And then a sudden lurch shook us. I reached to Josia to offer as steadying hand. She waved it away, listening carefully. And then the ship stopped rocking. We looked at each other. "Out of the frying pan ..."

January 18th 1895:

Thinking back on our perilous escape but a few days ago I asked Josia after she had finished rebinding the Professor's bandages, "How ever did you learn to throw knives like that?" She smiled slyly, "I didn't, but Captain Jack had a penchant for them." At this point I concluded discretion is the better part of valor, especially as pertains to my compatriot's martial skills.

January 23rd 1895:

The Professor looked over the five young faces he'd journeyed so far with, and raised his bushy eyebrows. "What I still can't figure, old chap, is what those black robed cultists wanted with a live crocodile?" A quiet, sinister voice whispered to me. Shivers went over my spine, I felt suddenly tainted, suddenly I asked myself who had I been and what am I becoming? But then I meet the Professor's eyes, "Sab'yathuin. To summon her you must sacrifice a great lizard at the new moon." He turned to me, a look of surprise quickly fading to calm acceptance, and touch of sadness.
 

Introduction:

Here in the rebirth of mysticism, you and your compatriots begin to delve into your pasts, and see what hidden splendors and terrors await. It is a place few brave, but you are different. You are an adventurer. Welcome to the greatest frontier of all, yourself.
 

Character Creation:

What is your name? - give your character's name.

What do you do? - give your character's profession, or profession he or she is being trained for.

What is your weakness? - give a basic character flaw, one word or so.

What is your instinct? - give a basic character virtue, one word or so.

The remainder of the game involves fleshing the character out. Don't worry about other details, though a quick physical description may be in order.
 

Playing the Game:

Each action has two values associated with it: Depth and Breadth.

Depth = Difficulty - Highest applicable past life
Breadth = The number of applicable past lives equal or greater than the difficulty.

In general, depth determines how certainly you succeed while breadth determines how effective you can exploit your success. If depth is negative the action fails, but any value of depth equal or greater than zero is a successful action. For an action to have significant effect however a larger breadth value is required. Also if an action is desired to supersede another action it needs to have a higher depth.

For example:
Vance has:
0) Doctor
1) Soldier
2) Pirate
3) Herbalist
4) Housewife
5) Knight
6) Alchemist

He is trying a fairly simple action trying to diagnose a sick dog. The GM determines that this is an apprentice difficulty action, so Vance can apply Doctor and Herbalist, giving him a breadth of 2, likewise his current (0th past life) is Doctor, so he has a depth of 4. His diagnosis is very certain and he gets two significant layers of information thanks to his multiple approaches.

A little later Vance is fighting a trained Soldier trying to escape a manor house. The soldier's current occupation is mercenary, so Vance is acting against a difficulty of 0. As such Vance can't apply any of his past lives, as Soldier is two high, and Doctor does not apply to combat. Vance needs to do something special to get out of this predicament.

Players have two additional options in taking actions: Channelling and Discovery. In either case these add to either the depth or breadth of the action, but only one for each option used. In either case these options require the past life involved to be appropriate to the action being attempted. These options may also be taken by defenders to reduce the depth and breadth of the action.

Channelling is when the character calls upon a past life for added support. Any past life can be chosen, but most can be channelled only once before the character has rested. A past life that supports the character's strength gives an additional chanelling. Also a past life that relates to the character's fault gives an additional channelling as well, and these effects are cumulative. So a past life can have as many as three channellings available. Only one of these can be used per action, and they should be checked off as used. Any channelling of a past life related to the character's fault also gives the character a Villainy point, which is discussed below.

Discovery is when the character blindly seeks help and finds a previously unknown past life to aid her. This discovery essentially provides a "free" channelling, with the past life capable of being channelled the full number of times after it is discovered, and no villainy points are gained in a discovery. Also a discovered past life is added to the past lives already tallied, can provide an increase in breadth or even depth from this as well. The limitation on discovery is that all the characters cannot have a past life higher than the maximum delve. This value will change as the game progresses, but usually starts near six and increases by one or two per well-played game. The only restriction on newly discovered past lives is that they cannot duplicate any past lives currently in the list. Past lives need not be discovered in order, but they cannot be higher than the maximum delve. Once a past life is discovered it is permanently part of the list.

For Example:
Look at Vance from the previous example. He has a strength courageous, and a fault greedy.

The strength lets him channel Soldier, Knight, and Pirate one additional time. The fault lets him channel Pirate a third time, but every time he channels Pirate he will get a villainy point.

So Vance is faced with the combat in the previous example. He wants to hurt the soldier quickly. His current depth is -1 and breadth is 0. He decides to channel all three applicable past lives, which gives him a villainy point for channeling Pirate. He adds one to his depth and two to his breadth, making the depth 0 and the breadth 2. If the soldier has an appropriate channeling free he could reduce the depth by one and cause Vance to miss. Fortunately for Vance he doesn't, and so Vance deals two strikes to the solider.

There are two bad things a character can accumulate: villainy points and strikes. Villainy points represent a corruptive influence on the character. These points can be spent by the character when they take actions that detrimentally affect the party as a whole. The GM can spend up to half the character's villainy points to force such and action. In either case the action should be related to the character's fault. Use the following table to determine the villainy points expended by and action:
 

Villainy Points	Action
1	replaces a potentially useful action
2	risks extra complications
3	certain extra complications
4	puts party in potential danger
5	puts party in certain danger

Strikes are how damage is recorded in Pastlife. For every breadth of a successful attack the target receives a strike. Strikes can be removed by a master difficulty medicinal or healing roll, one for each breadth. Once a character has received three strikes they are barely conscious for the duration. Any further strikes kills the character.
 

Appendix: Suggested Strengths, Faults, and Past lives