One of the scariest and most amazing of the abilities in the mental arena is the ability to speak through only the mind and be able to hear other’s thoughts. Going even beyond that, though, is the ability to alter those thoughts into anything of the user’s choosing and make the victim do, or believe, whatever the user chooses. This is an ability that all mental users would love to possess and many have to some varying degree or another.

Anomalous Cognition is similar to Telepathy in that the user can speak to others with only their mind. The Cog, as they are called, is much more powerful than that of the Telepath as they are born with the ability rather than having it granted by an outside force. Also, the Cog will have their ability from birth and thus usually will have grown up with the ability to enjoy much more focus than that of the Telepath.

A Cog is able not only to speak with someone through their thoughts, but is also able to feel their feelings, hear their inner thoughts, sway their emotions, sway their desires, alter their perception of reality, change their beliefs and even cause them to remember or forget anything that the user chooses. Due to this, they are shunned from most societies and feared by all. (Note: A Rattle will attack a Cog on sight.)

A Cog has the ability to alter the perception of anyone one the field within their area of effect. If the creature, minion, etc. has less will than that of the Cog (Note: if the creature, minion, etc. doesn’t show Will Points, then they are set at 150 Will) then the Cog can actually control their actions. It will cost 25 pts. of Will per Control, but this is virtually limitless. As long as the Cog has control, the creature, minion, etc. will do whatever the Cog chooses. However, to have them attack their own teammates, the Cog must expend 25 pts. to alter the perception, 25 pts. to alter the belief and then 25 pts. to make the action happen. Beyond that, they can have the minion, creature, etc. block an attack, drop a weapon, etc. by only using the single 25 pts. for the single action. This makes the Cog extremely powerful but has its own drawbacks. As long as the Cog is controlling another creature, minion, etc. they are not controlling their own thoughts for that round. Thus they are left vulnerable to attack. (Treat this like Fatigue).

The Cog can control more than one being at a time, but it becomes more costly with each being controlled in this way. If the Cog controls a single being it is 25 pts. per action. If they are controlling 2-5 it becomes 35 per action. If more than 5 then it becomes 50 pts. per action which has to be paid for each individual that is being controlled. This can cause even the most powerful of Cog’s to be very careful of their Will points.

Anomalous Cognition has certain drawbacks as well. The Cog will suffer from massive migraines that are incapacitating. Journey’s that lead them out of towns or away from civilization are fine, but their mind will have to adjust to the shielding that is no longer needed to keep them from hearing everything at once. The same is true going into a city or town, but they have to add more shielding. This will cause momentary issues with the Cog where they will have to wait outside of a city until they adjust rather than just going straight in. This alteration of their shields becomes easier over time, but is something that is very hard to adjust to quickly, thus the brain begins to pound due to the stress added or relieved from the action. Due to this, a Cog that is not focused can easily be overcome with the emotions, thoughts, etc. of an entire city and go into shock due to it. This is how most of them get defeated, in the middle of a battle, they lose focus or concentration and begin to “hear” and “feel” everything around them, disorienting them for several rounds and causing them to be susceptible to attack. This is why most Cogs do not travel alone and rarely venture into new cities without good cause.

Note: The Cog is partly empathic due to their abilities, which makes it so that when they are on the field with someone else, the longer they are with them the more of their traits they will pick up. Taking long journeys with companions will cause the Cog to begin taking on their traits rather they wish it or not. (This means if the person they are going with believes that the world will end in a few years, then by the end of a month’s journey, the Cog will have started to question if the world would end in a few years.  A year with this may even have the Cog believing it themselves.) Be very careful who you run with if you are a Cog.

Note 2: The Cog can not use their abilities on none sentient beings and can not affect beings that have been augmented through technological means. They can have some effect on them, but the machines (this is only if the machines are in the mind or heads of the beings. If it is just an arm or leg that was technologically advanced then the Cog can still affect them but their ability is muted by 1/4.) make the Cog disoriented when trying to affect the being. This has not been explained in full due to the lack of studies, but it is known that Gridlok has come across five of these Cogs that were extremely powerful and the most any of them were ever able to do to him was make him say something he didn’t mean to say. Beyond that, he slaughtered them all. (See Gridlok)