Blood Cult

ENEMY STAFF
Follower of Nar-Sie	Access: Whatever you have Additional Access: Wherever a teleportation rune is Difficulty: Medium Supervisors: Nar-Sie Duties: Killing everyone and creating a construct army Guides: This is the guide Quote: NAR-SIE HAS RISEN

The Beginning of a New Era

The Geometer of Blood, Nar-Sie, has sent a number of her followers to Space Station 13. As a cultist, you have an abundance of cult magics at your disposal, something for all situations. You must work with your brethren to summon an avatar of your eldritch goddess!

Several cultists will arrive on the station. When you spawn, you'll find a piece of paper, which is really a three-use summoning talisman in your backpack. The three-use talisman will allow you to do summon useful talismans and other objects.

Objectives

Your objectives usually require you to sacrifice a certain crew member and either:

Summon Nar-Sie,
Escape with a certain amount of converted crew members.

The general path of action of the cult and those in it:

Summon your tome.
Contact your allies through your Commune verb. The Commune verb sends a whispered message to all cultists.
Important: Communication and teamwork is essential! If you fail to read the guide this far and follow the steps until here, you will probably fuck up the round for everybody and are not worthy enough for the cult of Nar-Sie and may be antagbanned!
Find an area to convert into a base, usually accessible by one or more members of the cult, and cut cameras and in general make the base usable and hidden for the cult.
Setup a teleport rune, so all cultist can access it.
Secure your base by placing wall runes infront of windows and doors.
Get some paper for talismans and if possible get metal for constructing empty shells and platsteel for creating cult structures.
Convert new members and give them a tome.
Fulfill your objectives

Sacrifice

REMINDER: One cultist is required to sacrifice a dead body, three for a live one, standing adjacent to the rune.

To please Nar-Sie, you must find and sacrifice your target using an offer rune. Only then you can scribe the Summon Nar'Sie rune.

The Tome

Your Tome is your most important object and has several functions:

It lets you communicate with your fellow cultists.
You can draw runes with it.
Hitting a cultist with it, removes holy water from them.
Hitting a non cultist with it, causes them burn damage.
Hitting runes with it, removes them.
Hitting cult structure with it, will unachor and anchor them.
Hitting a cult wall with it will open/close the wall (like fake walls).

If you're in a position that would usually wander the halls, try to seek out your fellow cultists in person. If not, check in with your brothers using your Commune verb, but do this in private, to prevent people from hearing your whispers. A lot of jobs have access to isolated areas of the station that are great for this, and there's also space. Remember, if you get caught, you endanger the entire cult.

Talismans

Talismans are usually created through the "Create talisman" rune. They're one-use or limited-use tools that disappear after they're spent, and they're your bread and butter when fighting the crew. Make sure to have a stun talisman and a teleport talisman with you, to escape risky situations.

The Starting Talisman

You, as a cultist, begin the round with a supply talisman. It's heavily recommended you spend one charge on a tome, as without it you cannot draw runes, and you will lose access to all the cult powers until a fellow cultist gives you one.

List of Available Talismans

Name	Description	Talisman
Supply Talisman	Can be used to summon various talisman and tools to get started. The initial talisman has 3 uses, while archive-generated talismans only have 2. It can be used to: Summon an arcane tome. Summon 5 sheets of runed metal. Summon a Talisman of Teleportation. Summon a Talisman of Electromagnetic Pulse. Summon a Talisman of Stunning. Summon a Talisman of Veiling. Summon a soulstone. Summon a construct shell.
Talisman of Tome Summoning	Summons an arcane tome, used to scribe runes and communicate with other cultists.
Talisman of Teleportation	A single-use talisman that will teleport a user to a teleport rune, which you can choose from a list.
Talisman of Veiling	A multi-use talisman that hides nearby runes. On its second use, will reveal nearby veiled runes.
Talisman of Disguising	A talisman that will make nearby runes appear fake, as if drawn in crayon.
Talisman of Stunning	A talisman that will stun and mute the target for several seconds. To use it, hit someone with the talisman. After the mute runs out, the target's speech will still be extremely distorted, preventing them from revealing anything specific. However, it will still give away the presence of a cult if heard.
Talisman of Electromagnetic Pulse	A talisman that will cause a moderately-sized electromagnetic pulse.
Talisman of Arming	A talisman that will equip the invoker or whoever is struck with the talisman with cultist equipment: armored and hooded cult robes, cult shoes and a cult backpack. They will also receive a 30 force cult sword, that cannot be used by non-cultists, and a reinforced bola. If the slots for the armor are occupied the armor will be lost.
Talisman of Horrors	A talisman that will cause the victim to hallucinate.
Talisman of Construction	Use this talisman on at least twenty-five metal sheets to create an empty construct shell, or on plasteel to create runed metal. Can convert up to 25 sheets of plasteel per talisman.
Talisman of Shackling	Use this talisman on a victim to handcuff them with dark bindings. Can be used four times.

Runes

The tome allows you to scribe any of these runes, using Scribe Rune. Simply pick the rune you want, and wait until completion. Scribing a rune deals minor damage, since you need to cut your wrists to get the necessary blood.

Name	Description	Invokers Required
Offer	Instantly converts a normal crewmember on top of it to the cult, healing him for 75% of his brute and burn damage, and spawning an arcane tome. Does not work on mindshield-implanted crew. If the target is dead, uneligible for conversion or is the required sacrifice target, they'll be sacrificed instead, gibbing them and creating a soulstone that can be used to power a construct.	1 to sacrifice, 2 to convert, 3 to sacrifice the objective
Form Wall	This rune magically thickens the air above it when used, stopping everything trying to pass through it, including cultists. Invoke the rune to toggle this effect, at the cost of some damage. When activated, it also activates nearby wall runes for free, but turns off after 90 seconds.	1
Blood Boil	When invoked, it saps some health of the invokers to send three damaging pulses to anyone who can see the rune. These pulses do respectively 25/50/75 damage split evenly between brute and burn. When the effect is over the rune will briefly set fire to anything over it. Some species, such as golems, do not have blood, and thus are immune to this rune.	3
Electromagnetic Disruption	This rune causes a large EMP, disabling machines and, more specifically, cyborgs, in a large area. However, the rune will be consumed on invoking. The more people invoke the rune at once, the bigger and stronger the EMP gets. It's deleted after being used.	1-9
Raise Dead	Whenever someone is sacrificed on a Convert rune, they add one (global) charge to this rune. Placing a cultist corpse on the rune and activating it will bring it back to life, expending one charge.	1
Teleport	This rune warps everything above it to another teleport rune, which you can choose from a list.	1
Summon Cultist	This rune allows you to summon any cultist to the rune. This works across Z-levels, including the escape shuttle. It's deleted after being used.	2
Astral Communion	This rune allows you to leave your mortal body and become a ghost. This comes with all those benefits of being a ghost -- being able to communicate with other ghosts, seeing invisible, and so on. You can re-enter your body the same way as you re-enter corpse as a regular ghost. The body itself slowly receives damage while you are ghosted, and the rune will automatically keep your body anchored to the rune itself.	1
Manifest Spirit	This rune allows you to manifest ghosts as semitransparent homunculi, which are effectively weak, humanoid cultists with no self preservation instinct. To sustain these homunculi, you must remain on the rune, and each homunculi you have summoned will cause you damage.	1
Create Talisman	This rune transforms paper into powerful magic talismans. You put a paper on top of it, invoke it and choose which one you want to create. After a brief channel, it will convert the paper into a talisman. For possible Talismans and their effects, see above.	1
Summon Nar-Sie	This rune tears apart dimensional barriers, calling forth the Geometer. To draw this rune you needs a free 3x3 space around you. Starting to draw this rune creates a weak 3x3 forcefield and alarms the entire station of your location. Requires 9 invokers. Can only be invoked, if all other objectives are fulfilled.	9

Structures

By using a construction talisman on platsteel, you are able to get runed metal. With it you can build several structures, with unique powers. You can unanchor cult buildings by hitting them with your tome.

Name	Description	Cost
Altar	A bloodstained altar dedicated to Nar-Sie. By using it, you are able to create a Eldritch Whetstone, to sharpen your weapon, a Zealot's Blindfold, which lets you see in he dark or a Flask of Unholy Water, which heals cultists. After using the altar, it needs some time to recharge.	5 runed metal
Forge	A forge used in crafting the unholy weapons used by the armies of Nar-Sie. By using it, you are able to create a Shielded Robe, which creates a powerful shield around the user, a Flagellant's Robe, which makes you faster, but at the cost of increased damage or a Nar-Sien Hardsuit, for space walks. After using the forge, it needs some time to recharge.	5 runed metal
Pylon	A floating crystal that slowly heals those faithful to Nar'Sie. Also slowly turns the surrounding floor into engraved floor.	3 runed metal
Archives	A desk covered in arcane manuscripts and tomes in unknown languages. Looking at the text makes your skin crawl. By using it, you are able to create a Supply Talisman, the one a cultist gets at the start of the round, a Veil Shifter, a 2 use random teleporter for medium distance or a Shuttle Curse, which when used, delays the escape shuttle for 2 minutes. You can only use a certain amount of shuttle curses each round. After using the archives, it needs some time to recharge.	2 runed metal
Runed door	Only opens for cultists. Useful securing your base, but a dead giveaway that a cult is onboard.	3 runed metal

Constructs

Robust cultists will likely want to enlist the services of a few constructs. To create a construct, a cultist requires:

A filled soul stone, either by sacrificing a human, or capturing a soul manually with a stone from a supply talisman or an artificer.
An empty shell, either by using a construction talisman on 25 metal sheets, from an artificer, or from a starting talisman.

When the filled soul stone shard is used on an empty shell, the cultist will be allowed to choose the desired construct to create. Keep in mind these guys are pretty much a dead giveaway that there is cult activity on the station, so try to be covert about it in the beginning.

A complete guide to constructs can be found here. Artificers will poop out new soulstones and shells, wraiths can kill the AI, and juggernauts are great tanks.

Threats to the Cult

Even with access to a large amount of different runes and talismans, there are still several threats to the cult on the station.

Ratvar Scum

The followers of Ratvar want nothing more than do summon their machine god, so it can take revenge on our beloved Nar-Sie. Due to their connection to Ratvar, they or their constructs can not be converted, but they also can´t convert followers of Nar-Sie. As such, Ratvarian magic will be more effective against Nar-Sian cultists. The opposite is also true; much of Nar-Sie's magic is more effective against Ratvar's servants.

Security and the Chaplain

Even the best prepeared cultists will have trouble to defend themselve against the united power of security .Especially if the Chaplain Helps them. The Chaplain is able to turn normal water into Holy Water, which will turn cultist back to normal people, if it stays long enough in their system. The Chaplain is also immune to cult magic and his bible is able to make hidden runes visible.

Tips

Cultists can know a rune's name and effects by examining it.
Your tome is a robust burning weapon.
The chaplain is immune to your magic. Don't attempt to use talismans on him, or you will get discovered and beheaded.
Keeping a shade in a soulstone with you will allow you to use two-person runes by yourself, by releasing and then recapturing the shade.
Cultists often find a use for medibots. Having a single bot with a low threshold, backed up with the odd bruise pack, can allow a tiny number of cultists to summon and arm a vast number of ghostly warriors to their aid. A single bot can juggle multiple people at once, if they are relatively close to each other. Pylons also serve this purpose very well.
Engineering staff during cult are top-priority converts, as they can sabotage telecomms for you, or build secret bases in space.
Are you cult? Got talismans? You can store them on a clipboard, and nobody ever checks clipboards, especially if you're QM or another role that spawns with them. Right-click the papers to label them and keep track of their effects, or just examine them.
Get some platsteel either from mining, stealing it from robotics, engineering or EVA storage, or deconstructing reinforced walls/tables if you are desperate.
Drag paper bins onto you to pick them up. A single paper bin holds 30 papers, and that's 30 potential talismans!
Always be ready to summon a cultist in trouble. He will likely not be able to call for help on the cult chat, so keep an eye on normal comms. Even better if you have someone in Astral Communion to warn you.
Astral Communion is an incredibly powerful exploration tool, and ghosts can give you precious hints.
The EMP rune's area of effect scales with invokers, and can hit most of the station if placed in a central enough spot, effectively working as a powersink. Combine this with crowbars for free access everywhere.
Are almost all other cultist dead? Get a medibot and create a ghost army with Manifest Spirit and arm them with Talismans of Arming.
Manifest Spirit is also useful for getting those missing cultists you need for the Nar'Sie rune.