I thought I would share some changes I made to Tattered Fates in case anyone is interested:

*********SPOILERS**********

So I have basically changed the ultimate aim of the Beloved and the nature of the Widower/steel clock etc. I always thought it was a bit odd that there was the Spider Bride with a Halo device and the Widower with 'life preserving maguffin #2' that both basically lived forever. So I thought I would change the Widower to be a series of people given the powers granted by the office over the course of time. So the people of the planet always saw the same shape shifter (if they saw it at all) even though down the years it was different people. This sets it distinctly apart from the spider bride.

So I thought is this a reward or a curse? Living a long time but trapped in this city, killing people to order and the rest of the time… I decided it was the sort of thing that you would only wish on your worst enemy. So I thought Erasmus Haarlock would do this to the assassin that killed his wife and daughter. He makes him the Widower and then forges the Steel Clock.

I was thinking about Erasmus Haarlock's journey and I thought that in Dead Stars it states that he tried lots of things to go back in time and change what happened. So the Steel Clock could be one of the things he tried. I am having it as a failed time machine. Only not completely failed just a forunner of the Blind Tesseract machine that he eventually built. What it can do is turn back time, but not far enough and only to one thing, and only during the Festival of Tattered Fate. When he realises that it can't do what he wants he ties the Widower to it and uses it to make him relive over and over somehing horrible - probably the actual unwilling transformation process itself or maybe the kill. So this is a big reason why the Widower wants to escape the horror of its existence.

The Beloved doesn't know all of these details but he knows that the power of the Widower can be transferred, and only during the festival. So he wants to transfer it to himself so that he becomes practically indestructible. Obviously the PCs want to stop this, but exaclty how and who gets the power (if anyone) is the interesting part. The Widower iteself just wants to be free. At this point I think he doesn't care if the power gets transferred as long as he gets free of the clock.

I think this makes more sense compared to a vague - the Beloved wants to use scions to control the Widower, nowhere does it explain how this might work or what happens to this control when Harrlock himself returns.

Any thoughts, comments or suggestions welcome.

First of all I do not see a problem with the Spider Bride and the Widower being sort of immortal. Furthermore, I do not get how the widower is a series of people as you say and at the same time is the assassin (which was in fact a woman as mentioned in Dead Stars) that killed his wife and daughter.

Regarding the Blind Tesseract, I am not that sure but did he really build it or did he just find it beneath Mara?

If the Beloved wants to transfer the power of the Widower and the Widower himself wants to be free and do not care whether his power gets transferred, you would have some kind of broad consent between these two in my view. Though according to the adventure you should not have any consent but instead a serious conflict between these two characters. I think it is important for the scenario that the Beloved thought he can control the Widower with the help of the scions/blood of Haarlock or at least unleash a lot of havoc.

Otherwise fine to me, though should take care how to give the PCs most of that information without giving it away straight.

Thanks for your thoughts, in reply to your comments:

The Widower has supposedly been around for the whole history of Quaddis, so if it has been a series of people the assassin is just the last in the line.

My understanding of the Blind Tesseract is that Haarlock found the place and then built the device to access its power.

Sorry if I wasn't clear - the Widower doesn't want to lose the power, just be free of the Steel Clock. So there is no consensus with the Beloved and the Beloved needs the blood to complete the transference/control the power (basically two ways of saying the same thing).

I ran it straight the first time and it was fine I just felt this is a bit of an improvement and ties in better with the way I want to run the finale.