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Question: 506+ Mystery questions per story seems a little excessive. Maybe let the players add successes as if Mystery were an Epic Attribute, then let them save any unasked questions to be used throughout the story?

We were a little confused by this one. John responds to confusion by yelling. I respond by organizing things. So here's a shouty but very well-organized post, comin' at ya.

In case anyone missed it or wasn't quite sure what we were doing, I'll preamble with a quick explanation of the recent change to Mystery and why it's now better than it was. In the old system, your Scion with Mystery had channels equal to his dots of Mystery each story, and to use them he'd pay a point of Legend, roll his Intelligence + Occult without the benefit of Epic Attributes or Fatebonds, and then use the resulting successes as a pool of questions he could ask the Storyteller to gain secret knowledge. In the new system, the Attribute is removed; the Scion instead rolls only her Occult, and gains her level of Mystery as automatic successes as if it were an Epic Attribute. Then, just as before, she uses those total successes to ask her questions.

The old version worked well enough, but its major problem was that it wasn't justifying its XP cost. Scions who purchased more Mystery were spending ever greater amounts of XP, but their only reward was a single Mystery channel more per story than they already had, and that remained constant throughout the purview's lifetime. It sucks to pay 40 XP and still get only the same benefit you got when you were paying 15 XP, and since the roll was totally dependent on an Attribute and Ability, it didn't actually make you any better at your powers and buying more Mystery became an increasingly expensive way to throw some XP down a black hole until you made it to the Wyrd. You were getting benefits for your XP, but they weren't scaling the way they should have been. So the new system solves that problem; each dot of Mystery you buy still gets you an additional channel, but your increased XP cost also brings with it increased success at actually using the purview.

So that's why we made the change, and it's a good one that rewards Scions for their investment. So on to your question!

First of all, the number 506 puzzled the daylights out of us - where did it come from? What kind of character are you envisioning and what kind of model are you using? What's going on here? In an effort to put the world in order, I made a table of the average Mystery questions at each level, because shut up I can do that if I want to.

Level of Mystery	Average Successes	Total per Story
1	2-4	2-4
2	3-5	6-10
3	5-8	15-24
4	8-10	32-40
5	12-14	60-70
6	17-20	102-120
7	23-26	161-182
8	30-34	240-272
9	38-42	342-378
10	47-51	470-510

Okay, there we go - obviously, you're thinking of someone with maximum Mystery (and probably maximum Occult or close to it). Groovy. Keep in mind that the table above is just for average, unadorned rolls - if you have Arete or Serendipity, apply dice adders to Occult, choose to use Legendary Deeds or channel Virtues or do anything else to buff your Mystery rolls, these numbers can easily go up. Of course, that's not new - you could do all those things in the old Mystery system, too (at least the new one cuts Animal Aspect out of the equation).

Moving on to the question: actually, we don't think 500+ish is excessive at all. The person you're talking about is a god or goddess of Mystery; they are one of the few embodiments of that concept walking the Worlds and are masters of it in a way that very few deities ('bout 10% of the gods available as divine parents) could ever hope to be. We're not just talking about a Scion's Mystery roll - we're talking about Thoth's Mystery roll, and we have no trouble whatsoever believing that Thoth can easily pull a 50+ every time he reaches into the mysteries of the universe. It can look a little daunting when you realize that you'll have to deal with that same level of successes, either from the point of view of a Storyteller who's going to have to answer all of them or a player who's going to have to come up with that many things he needs to ask about, but it's important to remember that, once that PC has reached this level, he's on a level playing field with Thoth. Scion's famous for the stratospheric power curve that lets lowly semi-mortals become insane divinities by the time they reach godhood, and that goes for the mental powers just as much as for the physical ability to hit stuff or the social moxy to charm the kingdoms of heaven. If you don't want to Storytell for PCs who become equivalent in power to the gods themselves, you'd better tell your players ahead of time that you'll be capping them after Demigod or else get out of the game entirely. If you don't want to play as a being equivalent in power to the gods, you probably aren't looking for God-level Scion play.

It's also important to remember that worrying about the 506/510 number is more of a panic and distraction issue than a useful one. That's going to be spread out over the course of a story, remember; nobody is ever going to sit down in front of the ST and say, "Okay, I got 510 questions and YOU WILL ANSWER THEM RIGHT NOW." (Well, I suppose that could happen if they blew all their channels at once, but sweet fried froglegs, why would you ever do that?) What you'll actually be encountering are PCs who say, "Okay, I got 55 questions," and they'll do that occasionally over the course of the story, when it's most important or useful for them to do so. This is manageable for both player and Storyteller; I promise it is. Our Prophecy and Mystery PCs at Legend 9 were rolling more than that in the old system because they wanted to juice their rolls or would blow more than one channel together, and it still worked just fine. Don't let the big number scare you - it's theoretical, not a bogeyman that will ever actually appear at your table in all its glory.

Now, down into the nitty gritty of managing large numbers of Mystery questions. I sympathize with you, actually, because I personally hate using Mystery on my own characters because I always feel pressured to come up with questions. I don't have a lot of real-life Wits, so in the heat of the ASK YOUR QUESTIONS moment I often get scatterbrained or feel like I must be forgetting something I need to know. I'm also familiar with the dilemma of, "Well, I learned everything I popped Mystery for, what the hell do I do with these other twenty questions I still have?" I feel you, I really do. But there are things that both parties involved can do to make large numbers of Mystery questions not just palatable but fun, and nobody need groan when they roll high. Like all other things in Scion except for Virtue Extremities, rolling high is good! It means you are awesome and able to do and learn ever more awesome things!

For players, the first thing to keep in mind is that there are other fish in the sea. Most of us use Mystery because we're in a predicament, stumped by a puzzle or in need of more information before we go into a situation, but it's easy to lose sight of the fact that you can ask about anything, not just what was first and foremost on your mind when you decided to use Mystery. If you get thirty questions and still have ten left over, those ten aren't accidental excess and cause for consternation; they're an opportunity to get some other stuff figured out, like a bonus! Ask about other things that are important to your character, perhaps personal issues, side quests or just things she's curious about and can't figure out on her own. Ask about events transpiring elsewhere, about the secrets of your fellow Scions, about the weaknesses of recurring enemies who aren't here right now. There is an entire world that your Scion lives in that contains secrets she doesn't yet know; ask about those secrets! Some of our Mystery-using PCs in the past have kept a list with their character sheet of things they might want to know about, so they can whip it out and start firing off questions if they have any extra available. That's actually how Sophia solved the riddle of her true birth parents; she used extra questions to ask about them whenever she had them until she finally figured out what was going on. Yes, Mystery is often used to succeed at whatever the band's up to and to help out the team, but don't be afraid to use questions on your own agenda, too. If your friends complain about it, they can get their own Mystery channels.

And speaking of your friends, that's the other really helpful part of extra Mystery questions - you can open the field to everybody else! Mystery is modeled mechanically by the player asking the Storyteller for information, but that doesn't mean that within the gameworld it necessarily means that, so you could learn hidden knowledge you weren't even looking for at the drop of a hat. If you've got extra questions and don't have anything to use them on, see if your fellow players have suggestions; just as we talked about above, there may be plenty of things they want to know about that aren't directly related to your current mission, or they may have suggestions that didn't occur to you. You should never feel pressured or obligated to use your Mystery questions for others if you don't want to - as I said, they can buy their own damn Mystery if they're that hungry for it - but if you've got extras, why not share the love? Remember, too, that you're the one gaining that knowledge, not them, and if you're so inclined you can wait until the perfect moment to reveal what you know or hide it until it most benefits you. Aurora drove Will absolutely bonkers by withholding Mystery knowledge so that he would do what she wanted him to do, and we had a really fun time with the interaction of those two characters bartering knowledge and favors.

On the other side of the table, the single most important tool at a Storyteller's disposal for Mystery is this line right here from the purview's description, bolded for your convenience: Extremely complex, fateful or intentionally obscured questions may require more than one question be used in order for Fate to provide the answer. That means that successes don't necessarily translate directly to questions. Some questions, by virtue of being too important, large or mysterious, cost more than one success in order for a Scion to get an answer about them, and if they don't pony up they'll remain in the dark. Sure, if all of a Scion's questions are along the lines of "How many soldiers does the enemy have right now?" or "Where is the troll's treasure-hoard buried?", those will all be easy one-question answers. But if they start asking things like, "Who was that suspiciously clever old one-eyed man who disappeared when we weren't looking?", you know what? That's gonna cost you, let's say... fifty questions. Odin ain't as easy to find information about as your garden-variety spartan soldiers. Cough up or go home.

That doesn't mean you should abuse the system just to cut down on questions; your player paid XP and Legend to use this power, and you should let him shine just as much as the guy who did the same to buy Mortal Stroke or Theme Music. If you charge five questions a pop for mundane things like the movements of people the same Legend as the Scion or what the secret code to a locked safe is, you're being an asshole. But you're fully justified when, if your Legend 4 player rolls in with his ten questions and asks you where Atlantis is sunk, you smile cheerfully and tell him he'll need like six times as many questions to find that out. After all, if some things are mysteries even to some gods, your Scions with only a couple of dots of Mystery shouldn't be able to easily find them out. Remember that anybody after Legend 4 can pick up a few dots of Mystery for a couple measly XP, so there are a lot of things in the world that can't be and shouldn't be answered for the price of a single success on that roll.

This also means that your players can never cheat the system, they can never use clever wordplay to screw with you, and they can never get more answers out of you than they should. They never get to say, "Ah, but I worded like five questions into one so you have to answer all five for the price of one question!" You don't. Tell them no. They never get to say, "It's only a single question I'm asking so you have to answer even though I'm demanding to know where the lost regalia of Amaterasu is hidden!" You don't. Tell them no. You are in charge of personifying Fate, and Fate is not impressed by their shenanigans. You're the one in charge of this show, and your job is to appropriately dispense hidden wisdom in proportion to the effort, power and success of their Mystery rolls. You want to encourage them to discover neat stuff and to peer past the mists of obscurement, but you don't have to put up with them being dicks.

Another thing to keep in mind to increase your players' comfort level with Mystery is that every player's different in how they want to actually do the deed. Some love to do their Mystery at the table as a community event, sharing all the info around so they don't have to repeat it later and relishing the excitement as everyone learns new stuff together. Others prefer their answers to be secret, since after all only they actually know this information in the game's world, and need more shenanigans to be involved. Don't be afraid to step into another room with your Mystery player for a second to give them their secret answers, or to write them down on a piece of paper and slide it over to them instead of speaking things aloud, whatever works best for your group. If the other players grouse about not being in the loop, remind them, once again, that they can buy Mystery themselves if they want access to this power.

Finally, if you see that a player's struggling with their Mystery questions, it's okay to make suggestions. Don't outright spend their questions for them by just giving them info they might not have asked for, but as the Storyteller you're totally free to suggest alternative options they might not have thought of, or to remind them of things they've mentioned wanting to know more about in the past. Just as you'd nudge a group that was floundering with where to go or what to do, you can nudge a player who's floundering on Mystery.

With all of those things in your corner, you should be able to make Mystery as awesome as it needs to be whether you're a player or a Storyteller. Remember that it's all about the magical power to discover secret knowledge, and have fun with that; don't get stressed or panicky because it's "too hard to think of questions" or "might ruin your plot". Scions have a lot of things going on that they need to know about, and their actions can change the course of plots in a lot of ways, regardless of whether or not Mystery is involved. Treat the purview like a collaborative effort between the Storyteller and the player (and the rest of the band, if the player is so inclined) so that everybody knows what to do and can benefit from that Scion's awesome and unexpected wisdom.

As for the last part of your question: no, we're not going to do that. Mystery is about learning unknown or arcane knowledge through some ritual agency - throwing bones, entering a trance, becoming intoxicated or otherwise calling in some impressive way upon Fate to reveal its mysteries. Actually performing Mystery (which could be any of those ways or whatever other thing your players want to stunt) should be an event that has a result in the sudden gain of mysterious enlightenment. It isn't, however, a random "let me ask whatever I want whenever I want regardless of what's happening" power, and it shouldn't be used that way. "Banking" questions like that takes Mystery from the realm of the divinations and enlightenments of mythology to a bland RPG power that's just about getting the ST to answer your questions, and it loses all of its mythological resonance as a result.

Then, too, it's also powergamey in the extreme; isn't it always better to "bank" questions if you can, because then you can ask them after you're learned more later rather than when you first decided you needed Mystery? You're in effect able to finagle it so that your Mystery questions are worth more if you save them because they can build on knowledge you didn't have yet back when you first used Mystery, and it would be silly to do anything but always use all your Mystery channels at the beginning of a story and then just sit on the monster pile of questions and parcel them out throughout. Doing so at the beginning of the story also ensures that you never have to worry about having enough resources to use your Mystery, that you have all your channels, Deeds and other buffs ready and unused and just waiting to go into buffing it, and that you're never in danger of picking up Fatebonds or spending ticks in combat doing it, thus avoiding all the normal issues that powers are prey to. That system actually encourages Scions to field the giant number of questions rather than discouraging it, and, more importantly, it's not part of the mythology of what people like Dionysus or Orunmila actually do and represent.

And besides, it's just the reverse mirror of what is already happening in the current system. You're suggesting they do a divination, then ask questions when they need to know things; we're suggesting they wait until they need to know things, then do a divination. There's no good reason to swap - it doesn't even bring the total number of questions down! - and a very good reason, the dissolution of Mystery's actual function in mythology, not to.

I hope you guys wanted to read a lot about Mystery today.