Special Advantages
From Ascension Sojourns
Special Advantages are just that Advantages for non-human beings. Advantages are part of a being’s natural abilities, just as Birds have Wings. Many or most of these may be familiar from the Revised edition Bygone Beastary, or from the Charms sections of Forged by Dragons fire. The charms that M20 moved into advantages had been give as advantages in prior books.
| Advantage | Cost | Description | ||||||||||||||||
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| Alacrity | 2/4/6 | Damn, you’re fast! Capable of bursts of inhuman speed, you can strike before most people can think. Each two points spent in this Advantage, up to the maximum six points, allows you to spend a Willpower point and take one extra action within a single turn. That six-point Advantage, for instance, would let you act four times in a single turn for the cost of one Willpower point. Subsequent Willpower points spent that turn do not add up, however; six points let you act four times in one turn no matter how many Willpower points you spent that turn. This bonus lasts only one turn per point of Willpower spent that turn; if you need to burn Willpower in order to move like the wind, however, you can do so for as long as your Willpower lasts. Ref: M20 G&M, 201 | ||||||||||||||||
| Armor | 1 - 5 | Thanks to thick hide, armored plates, warty skin or some other form of innate protection, your character gains extra soak dice, and can soak lethal damage as well. For double the usual cost — that is, two freebie points per point of protection — she can soak aggravated damage, too. This armor isn’t invisible, though; in most cases, it’s pretty obvious, and for every three points in protection, the character loses one point of Appearance. (This penalty does not apply to animals or beasts with natural armor — turtles, alligators, dragons, and so forth.) As an optional rule, the Storyteller might decide that an aimed blow (typically +3 difficulty, although the specific penalty depends upon the nature of the armor) can bypass that protection. The normal cost for Armor can be found on the chart; ar-mor that soaks aggravated damage costs double these amounts. Ref: M20 G&M, 201
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| Aura | 3 pt. Advantage, or 3 pt. Supernatural Flaw | (Staff Note: This would apply on top of the coded Aura system in place.) Uncanny radiance surrounds you. Perhaps you shimmer with holiness, reek of death, smolder with the essence of the Pit, or otherwise reveal an affinity for a given element through your very presence. The specifics depend upon the sort of creature you are and the essential nature of your true self: An infernal entity projects an unholy aura (scent of brimstone, unnerving chorus of damned-soul voices, and so forth), an elemental conjures phenomena related to its home element (breeze, flickering flames, dampness, blooming plants, that sort of thing), an embodiment of technological principles radiates cold perfection… you get the idea. As an Advantage, this Aura ripples the localized environ-ment surrounding the entity in question. It doesn’t inflict damage upon the area or on characters within that area, but it can be rather unnerving to folks who have reason to fear such entities. People and entities opposed to the nature of this creature (like demons in the presence of an angel, or vice versa) feel compelled to flee unless they spend a Willpower point to remain in the aura-bearer’s vicinity; if they stay, such creatures suffer a +3 addition to the difficulty of all rolls they make against the character who radiates the Aura. More neutral characters, meanwhile, can’t help but notice the pervasive effects of this entity: withering or flourishing plant-life, shining light or glowering darkness, faint music, metallic clanging, or a buzz of flies, and other similarly environmental effects. While those effects won’t influence system modifiers, they speak volumes — for good and ill — about the nature of the entity in question. The character can spend a point of Willpower to suppress the Advantage for one scene, at which point, a witness needs to make a successful Awareness roll, difficulty 7, to discern the character’s true nature. Otherwise, the Aura manifests as a matter of course, without any form of “activation” required or any duration set on the length of its effects. As a Flaw, this Trait cannot be suppressed. The Aura betrays the character’s nature whether he wants it to be obvious or not. Ref: M20 G&M, 202 | ||||||||||||||||
| Aww! | 1 - 4 | Cuteness excuses a multitude of sins. In your case, you’re so adorable that people tend to give you more slack than your activities deserve. Every point in this Advantage adds one die to the Social rolls you make based upon endearing yourself to someone through your sheer cuteness. This power works in any form, but it grants only half of the usual bonus (rounded up) when you’re in a human guise. Ref: M20 G&M,202 | ||||||||||||||||
| Bare Necessities | 1 / 3 | Physical shape-changing typically deals only with the body itself. A radical shapeshift — say, from woman to wolf — usually forces the character in question to spend a turn or more either stripping down before changing, or else wiggling out of the discarded clothing and possessions afterward. With this Advantage, however, you can shape-change with your clothing and small possessions intact, and then carry them over with you when you return to your natural form. * 1 pt - you can retain your clothing and small items that are worn close to your skin (wallets, watches, knives strapped to your leg, etc.) * 3pt - you can meld small carried items as well: backpacks, swords, a walking stick, and so forth. The carried items must be small and light enough to be held in one hand; a pistol could be transformed and carried this way, but an AR-15 could not. The transformed items essentially disappear when your character shapeshifts, and they cannot be used or taken away if they were being worn or held at the time of transformation. When you change back to your natural form, however, the items are wherever they were when you shifted shape. Unless it involves some technological method (like small compartments that open within a robot and stow the items inside that robot’s body), this Advantage is essentially magic. The Storyteller might rule that sophisticated technologies (computers, firearms, cell phones, etc.) transformed by magic might malfunction when the character changes back to her natural form. Although this malfunction check would involve a successful roll of Stamina + Technology, difficulty 7, for non-mages (and a Willpower + Avatar roll with that same difficulty if the Storyteller allows Awakened mage characters to take this Advantage), a character whose paradigm is based on hyperscience instead of natural magic can simply define the Advantage with anime-like technologies. (ST discretion). Ref: M20 G&M, 202 | ||||||||||||||||
| Bioluminescence | 1 - 3 | Fireflies. Anglerfish. Certain forms of mold. And you. Like those luminescent beings, your body — or parts of it — can glow, and you can turn this self-contained light on and off at will. * 1pt - that glow is roughly as bright as an average cell phone, and it cannot be focused or directed. * 2pts - it’s either brighter (like a halogen flashlight) or directable * 3pts - it can be both Generally, this light allows you to illuminate a small area, as if you’re holding a hand-held light source. Directable luminescence, however, could be used to blind a character for a turn or so with a successful Dexterity + Perception roll. The difficulty for the latter application depends on the target’s sensitivity to light, the contrast between light and darkness, potentially protective gear, cover, distance, and so forth, and ranges from 4 (a point-blank flash in some surprised person’s eyes) to 10 (trying to blind a protected and hostile opponent). Beyond 15 feet or so, however, this Advantage illuminates an area but isn’t strong enough to blind someone at range. Ref: M20 G&M, 202 | ||||||||||||||||
| Blending | 1 | This creature has the ability to alter their appearance to match the dominant attributes of their surroundings, much like a chameleon. Creatures with this power can either slowly acclimate to their surroundings, requiring at least a scene, or they may quickly acclimate through a successful Wits + Survival roll, difficulty 8. Creatures with either Quintessence or Gnosis may spend a point to immediately blend into their environment. Successfully Blending causes a +2 difficulty to perceive the creature with any natural sense. Ref: M20 G&M, 202 | ||||||||||||||||
| Bond-Sharing | 4 - 6 | Certain legendary creatures — most notably witch-familiars and heart-bonded companions — can share perceptions, thoughts, and even certain abilities with their close friends. This Advantage allows you to exchange such communions; a horse may “move as one” with his rider, a dolphin might share water-breathing with his land-born lover, a bear could confer healing powers upon his totem-sister, and so forth. Such mystic bonds may be shared only between close companions. If one “partner” gets harmed or killed, the other partner suffers awful pain. Game-wise, this Advantage creates a “bridge” between partners, allowing them to share a certain ability or range of abilities. * 4pt - Your companion can use one of your senses; or withstand one environment (intense cold, underwater, fire, etc.) that’s native to your character. * 5pt - she can go anywhere you can go (including, in an Avatar Storm chronicle, through the Gauntlet without harm (Avatar Storm not in play here.); or — by sharing your senses — feel anything you can feel. * 6pt - she can do both at the same time. This “bridge” stretches roughly half a mile but works best when both characters remain in close proximity. At the Storyteller’s discretion, a Stamina roll might be necessary to form a “link” across distances of 300 feet (or 100 meters) or more. Such bonds require intense connection and trust. Each partner imparts a bit of their essence with the other one. If one partner suffers, the other partner feels pain even if they’re not bond-sharing at the time. The death of one partner inflicts agony upon the other — a few levels of bashing damage, if nothing else, possibly an incapacitating psychic shock if the partners were especially intimate. Sharing also involves an act of will; both partners must make a conscious decision to “connect” each time they share abilities or perceptions. Such bonding sends a powerful surge of energy between both partners — a communion that the partners may share simply for enjoyment’s sake. Incidentally, neither partner needs to be human; though it’s odd to see such levels of connection between, say, a dog and a gryphon, stranger things have happened. Ref: M20 G&M, 203 | ||||||||||||||||
| Cause Insanity | 2 pts. per die | Staff restrict the usage of this advantage to Staff-ran plots. As this could be a triggering effect for some players. Consciousness is fragile. With this Advantage, a creature can rattle the cage of sanity and provoke temporary fits of madness. Generally possessed by entities of cosmic horror or stunning beauty, this power provokes hallucinations, derails trains of thought, and forces the target to doubt her grasp on reality. Especially among mages, this ability can have fearsome consequences. A target of this Advantage must be within visual sight of the creature who inflicts the madness. The player with this Trait spends one point of Willpower, and rolls one die for every TWO Points spent on this Advantage. The target’s Willpower Trait provides the difficulty for that roll. A single success forces the targeted character to assume a Derangement (Mage 20 (core), pp. 649-650) for one day per success rolled. If that target is a mage, three successes or more also force that mage to make a Willpower roll (difficulty is that mage’s current Paradox + 2), or else suffer one level of Quiet, too. (See Mage 20 (core), pp. 555-556, for details.) | ||||||||||||||||
| Claws, Fangs, or Horns | 3 / 5 / 7 | Unlike frail, soft humans, you possess natural weaponry: slashing talons, gnashing fangs, goring horns, or perhaps a combination of all three. These hardy attacks inflict lethal, sometimes even aggravated, damage in addition to your natural strength and mass. They can’t be removed without ripping or cutting off body parts, and so you’re never really without the ability to hurt someone. * 3pt - you one form of attack * 5pt - you two of them * 7pt - obtain all three forms Each type of attack allows you to use certain combat maneuvers, as shown below. (See the Mage 20 entries for “Bite” and “Claw,” p. 420.) For the normal cost, these attacks deal out lethal damage; for double the usual cost, that damage becomes aggravated. With certain types of characters (cats, demons, etc.), the claws or fangs might be retractable — a minor benefit that does not cost additional points. Other kinds of beasts might have “horns” on the back or tail, claws on wings, rending “teeth” embed-ded into tentacles, and so forth. In all cases, the cost of these attacks comes from the type of attack (claws, fangs, or horns), not from the number of attacks a given character can use.
Human characters can possess these sorts of attacks, of course; cybernetics, mutations, prosthetics, surgically implant-ed weaponry, Life-Sphere Enhancements, and other forms of physical alteration may bestow the gifts that Mother Nature has so carelessly forgotten to give her human children. Ref: M20 G&M, 204 | ||||||||||||||||
| Deadly Demise | 2 / 4 / 6 | Certain enemies take you with them when they go. Often associated with zombies, robots, poisonous fungus-folk, and other beings with innate capacities for self-destruction, this Advantage inflicts damage on everyone nearby when the character goes to meet its maker. If that character drops below the Incapacitated health level, thanks to attacks which inflict lethal or aggravated damage, then the character screams, explodes, or performs some other final strike against its enemies on the following turn, dealing out damage as per the chart below. The blast radius for this final strike is roughly 30 feet (nine meters). If the character is some sort of vehicle, or is otherwise carrying other characters in its body, arms, or what have you, then those other characters meet a messy demise unless they manage to escape before the blast. Run!
Ref: M20 G&M, 204 | ||||||||||||||||
| Dominance | 1 pt. | You have a naturally commanding demeanor, or an elevated place in the social hierarchy of your people or species. Therefore, you gain three additional dice to any Social interaction within the appropriate groups, and also reduce the difficulties for your Intimidation or Leadership rolls by –2. Ref: M20 G&M, 204 | ||||||||||||||||
| Earthbond | 2 | A bond with your surroundings helps you perceive trouble and respond to possible threats. Rules-wise, this Advantage reduces the difficulty of your perception rolls by -2 if you’re trying to spot potential trouble. Maybe your keen senses help you hear, smell, feel, or otherwise perceive trespassers; perhaps you’ve got passive sonar or high-tech scanning devices. Maybe the wind speaks to you. Whatever the reason, you’re seldom surprised by anything that’s not teleported to your location, stepping in from the Umbra, or otherwise using unusual methods to surprise you. Ref: M20 G&M, 204 | ||||||||||||||||
| Elemental Touch | 3 / 5 / 7 / 10 / 15 | Wherever you go, an element responds to your presence. Perhaps breeze rises when you flick your hair; maybe you call down lightning with your rage. Whatever the source of this bond might be, you are one with an element, and it responds to your commands. Game-wise, this Advantage grants a limited amount of control over a single element that’s associated with your character. Because this bond works through mystical associations, that element must be natural and “pure”: fire, earth, wood, air, a given metal, and so forth. That said, mod-ern “para-elementals” can supposedly manipulate plastics, glass, alloys, and other products of elemental technology. The element and bond, therefore, depends upon the concept of your character and its connection to his world. The degree of control you can exert upon the element in question de-pends on the amount of points invested into the Advantage, as shown on the chart below. Once that element responds, however, you don’t maintain much control over what it does afterward. Calling up an inferno to cook your hot dogs, then, might be a very bad idea!
Ref: M20 G&M, 204-205 | ||||||||||||||||
| Empathic Bond | 2 | A lesser version of Bond-Sharing, this Advantage helps you reach into the emotional state of another person (not necessarily a human person) and sense or influence those emotions as if you possess the Mind 1 Effect Sense Thoughts & Emotions. (Mage 20 (core), p. 519.) Because this bond can be a two-way street, you’ve also acquired enough discipline to shield your feelings and surface thoughts, as described in the same Mind 1 entry. Even with such shielding, though, you feel things rather intensely, and probably keep to yourself a lot, if only to protect yourself from the barrage of other people’s passions. A character with this Advantage almost certainly has the Empathy Talent, too, and the combination of both “gifts” can feel extremely vulnerable to the character that possesses both. Unlike Bond-Sharing’s intimate connection, this em-pathic talent can touch anyone with whom you want to share it. A surge of fellow-feeling can influence the mood of that other party, too, if you spend a point of Willpower to do so. Empathy can be a tricky gift to have, though, and it shades into some ethically dubious territory if you use it without your target’s prior agreement. As detailed in the How Do You DO That? entry “Questions of Consent” (pp. 119-120), messing with someone else’s feelings may be “traditional” in terms of fiction and folklore, but that doesn’t necessarily make it okay. REf: M20 G&M, 205 | ||||||||||||||||
| Extra Heads | 2 pts. per head | For better and worse, this Advantage grants you a friend that never leaves your side… or your shoulder, for that matter.Game-wise, this Trait provides one additional head for every two points spent on the Advantage. This benefit also provides two extra dice (per head) for Perception-based rolls; increases the difficulty for mind-control attacks against you by +2 per head (difficulty 10, maximum); and allows each head to make a bite attack (at the usual dice pools) if your target is within reach. The downside, of course, is that each head also has its own personality, and those personalities might not always get along. Ref: M20 G&M, 205 | ||||||||||||||||
| Extra Limbs | 2 pts. per limb | Like an octopus or a Hindu deity, you possess more prehensile limbs than an average human or another beast of your kind… like, say, a 10-legged octopus or two-trunked elephant. In game terms, each extra limb adds one die to your dice pools if you’re using several limbs to perform multiple actions ). Also, you use your highest dice pool, not your lowest, when performing those multiple actions. If you could use your extra limbs to perform several related activities, or to attack several targets at once, then you may perform one action for every two limbs involved. An animated six-armed Krishna statue, for instance, could perform three attacks per turn. This benefit, however, applies only to activities where extra limbs would allow your character to do something that a character with a “standard” number of limbs could not do; that six-armed statue could attack three people and / or attack one person three times, but six legs would not make him run any faster than a person with two of them could run. Ref: M20 G&M, 205 | ||||||||||||||||
| Ferocity | 2 pts. per point of Rage | You seethe with uncanny fury and may turn that fury to your benefit. In game terms, you gain a Trait called Rage, and may use it to perform extra actions, shrug off injuries, or tear through your enemies with primal ferocity. For every two points in this Advantage, your character receives one point of Rage. By spending a point of that Rage, you may: add one automatic health level to a successful hand-to-hand non-magical attack (that is, a bite, a slash, and so on); perform one additional action without using your lowest dice pool ); ignore wound penalties for one turn; or penetrate two points of an opponent’s armor with a single hand-to-hand attack. Under normal circumstances, it takes at least one day of rest to recover spent points of Rage. Certain situations, how-ever, can rouse that fury again and restore one point of Rage. These situations depend upon the nature of your character and her channel to such primordial wrath. A nature-guardian, for instance, might be infuriated by destructive trespassers in her domain, while an embodiment of vengeance regains a point of Rage if she sees a person commit some act that demands violent retribution. The downside of this Advantage is obvious: On some level, you’re always angry. Beyond an irritable temper and an unnerving edge to your personality, you also have the Trait: Berserker / Stress Atavism for free. Thus, you’re often one bad moment from a meltdown that could injure companions, enemies, and innocents alike. Ref: M20 G&M,205 | ||||||||||||||||
| Flexibility | 2 | You may be a snake, or other creature that is capable of bending, squishing, or twisting yourself around. This flexi-bility allows you to perform maneuvers that might otherwise be impossible, like twisting yourself into a pretzel, reaching through a window to unhook a lock, or squeezing through a space too small for someone to squeeze through otherwise. This Advantage adds two dice to any Athletics roll where such Flexibility would benefit you (escaping ropes, grappling an opponent, and so forth). You may also tuck yourself into spaces that a creature of your size would not usually be able to squeeze into, and might (depending on the situation) be able to slither between bars, coil around branches, and so forth. Ref: M20 G&M, 205 | ||||||||||||||||
| Hazardous Breath | Variable | With a gust of breath, a ripple of quills, or some other minor exertion, you can hurt and perhaps kill your prey at a distance. Epitomized by the deadly halitosis of dragonkind, this Advantage allows a character to fire off some nasty sur-prises. The attack itself isn’t based upon the Trait — it can take whatever form you desire. Demon-bound servitors can spit flames, while woodland elementals could spray clouds of thorns or poison gas. * For Every 5 pts - you in-flict one health level of lethal damage with your attack on a successful roll of Dexterity + Brawl (difficulty 7) * 7pts per level - that damage can be caustic (acid, Greek fire, toxic gas), dealing out an additional level of damage per turn until it’s washed off, scraped away, or otherwise neutralized. *For double the cost (either 10 points for most attacks or 14 points for caustic ones), it can be aggravated. Any target that can soak the appropriate type of attack can try to soak your “breath weapon.”You can employ this attack once per scene for every point of Stamina your character possesses. An attack that affects several targets at once (like a cone of flames or a toxic storm) hits one additional target for every success above the first — two targets at two successes, four targets at four successes, and so forth. The range of those attacks depends upon the nature of that assault; a “pinpointed” lightning strike generally reaches further than a localized cloud of gas.For details about toxins, electricity, fire, and other assaults, see “Environmental Hazards” in Mage 20, pp. 435-444. Ref: M20 G&M, 206 | ||||||||||||||||
| Healing Lick | 3 / 6 | You can repair a certain amount of external damage — gashes, slashes, and the like, as opposed to venom or broken bones. * 3pt - you can heal one health level of bashing or lethal damage per turn of licking * 6pt - you can heal a level of aggravated damage the same way. In both cases, that healing also eases the pain of injuries, spreading a sense of calm along with the obvious relief from torn tissues and flowing blood. Ref: M20 G&M, 206 | ||||||||||||||||
| Homing Instinct | 2 / 4 | You know where you’re going even if you don’t consciously think about it. An inner GPS (which, if you’re a cyborg or robot, may be an actual GPS) guides you toward your destination. This Advantage won’t cover the distance for you — you still need to do that part yourself. Despite confusing circumstances and tangled paths, however, you’ll eventually make it home. * 2pt - you can home in on that location from anywhere in the mortal side of Earth * 4pt - for four points, you can home in on it from anywhere When faced with obstacles and obstructions, you may need to make a Perception + Awareness roll in order to get your bearings toward your destination. The difficulty of that roll depends on the circumstances involved:
Your instinct allows you to keep track of a moving goal even if you’re moving, too. If you lose the path, you’ll need to concentrate on finding it again (possibly while using Meditation, Esoterica, Area Knowledge or some other Ability suited to your character). At some time soon, however, you’ll be on your way again. Distance can slow you down, but your heart (or technology) knows its way home. Ref: M20 G&M, 206 | ||||||||||||||||
| Human Guise | 2 / 4 | You have a human form you can wear when required. * For the two-point version of this Advantage you present a few tells. These could be semi-visible gills, cat eyes, or hints of your reptile scales poking out from under that neat human skin you’ve thrown on. The two-point version of this Advantage comes with one dot in Appearance. Your tells can be covered up with makeup and or the right type of clothing, but it’s fairly clear that you are not quite what you appear to be. *The four-point version of this Advantage gives you a completely normal human guise with no obvious tells. Powers and abilities that can uncover a being’s true form are the only way to discern that you are something other than a mild-mannered reporter (or whatever). Ref: M20 G&M, 206 | ||||||||||||||||
| Human Speech | 1 | Simply put, you can speak in human languages even if “your kind” can’t normally do so. Whether through magic or physical mutation, you have the ability to form human words that most folks can understand. Granted, you still need to know the language in question — this Advantage gives you the talent to speak, not the knowledge to speak fluent Lakota, French, and Classical Greek. Ref: M20 G&M, 206 **You must buy Linguistics to get a language, or if Linguistics is maxed, purchase the language for 3 xp, typically post-chargen** | ||||||||||||||||
| Information Fount | 5 pts. | You know the weirdest shit! Thanks to a strange connection to the Collective Unconscious (or maybe just a great mind for trivia), you manage to make deductions, observations and connections that puzzle other, lesser minds. The traditional talent of oracles and familiar spirits, this ability grants you insight into things you probably shouldn’t know but manage to wrap your head around anyway. Now, if only other people could just understand what the hell you’re talking about… In game terms, this Advantage allows you to make astute (if not necessarily accurate) observations about things if you successfully roll Awareness + a related Ability. The Ability in question should be related to the situation you’re trying to understand: Martial Arts to note a detail about an oppo-nent’s fighting style, Etiquette to recognize your host’s taste in silverware, Streetwise to spot a Hell’s Angel in disguise, and so forth. This information, however, comes across in poetic and often fractured observations; like the classic rock fanatic who declares out of nowhere that Chris Squire is famous for playing “a Rick with a pick,” your proclamations might not be understood or appreciated by anybody else. From a roleplaying standpoint, this Advantage gives the player / Storyteller plenty of opportunities for fun, es-pecially if other characters (and players) have no idea what the bloody hell your character is going on about. Game-wise, another player might need to roll Perception or Intelligence + Enigmas in order to make sense out of the tidbits offered up by the Information Fount. It’s more fun, of course, to just roleplay everything out. Oracles and familiars, after all, have rich traditions of saying things that wind up mangled in translation. Ref: M20 G&M, 207 | ||||||||||||||||
| Intangibility | 8 / 10 | Like a certain madly grinning cat, you can fade from sight (8 pts.) and perhaps become totally incorporeal (10 pts.) as well. Certain ghostly creatures might use this Advantage to become corporeal instead, attaining physical substance from a normally intangible form. Unlike Stepping Sideways, this shift doesn’t bring the character into the Penumbra – it just changes his relationship with the physical world. The Cheshire Cat, for example, didn’t run off to join the werewolves; he just… disappeared. An invisible character still exists in a physical form, and can be heard, smelled, tackled, and so forth if someone man-ages to spot him. Rank 1 magickal perceptions can sense the invisible character if the player makes a successful Perception + Alertness roll at difficulty 9. Other forms of paranormal senses (vampiric Auspex, for instance) can do the same thing with the same sort of roll. While intangible, that character remains immune to most normal sorts of physical harm. Bullets, winds, fire and so forth pass right through him. Magickal spells, True Faith, and other sorts of paranormal attacks, however, affect him in the usual ways. A normal bullet or fire can’t touch that disappearing asshole, but an enchanted bullet or blast of hellflame is a different matter entirely. While in this invisible or intangible state, the character cannot attack anyone else, either, except through magick or other paranormal powers; even then, an attacking character immediately becomes visible again. To shift from one state to another, the character’s player spends one point of Willpower. No roll is necessary, and the shift takes place on the following turn. During that transition, the character assumes a phantasmal half-visibility which is hard to see (Perception + Awareness, difficulty 8) if he hasn’t been spotted already, but which re-mains vulnerable to physical attacks until he becomes fully incorporeal. For two points of Willpower, the character can change states immediately. Either way, it takes another point of Willpower to return to the character’s normal state; if he runs out of Willpower before he can do so… well, tough luck, kittyhead. The character gets stuck that way until he recovers enough Willpower to shift to a different state. For reasons that should be obvious, this Advantage may be restricted to non-player characters. Your Storyteller has the final say regarding this uncanny talent and the creatures that might possess it. Ref: M20 G&M, 207 | ||||||||||||||||
| Mesmerism | 3 / 6 | With a frightening glare or bewitching enticement, you can freeze prey (3 pts.) or draw it to you in a mild trance (6 pts.). Perhaps you’re a siren with fascinating secrets that you sing about to draw trespassers to their doom; or a ghost-dog whose predatory gaze locks her target in place while the hunter ends the chase. Specifics depend upon the creature in question, but only one method works for you. You could be a singer of charming songs, but if so then your gaze is merely pretty, not especially hypnotic. System-wise, this Advantage requires the right sort of contact with your prey (a gaze, a song, a touch, and so forth) followed by a roll of Charisma + Intimidation. If your mes-merism depends on enticement, then Seduction could work in place of Intimidation. Either way, the difficulty is 6, and you need to collect at least one success for each point of your prey’s current (not permanent) Willpower. So long as your prey doesn’t object to your influence, this could employ an extended roll; if he does resist you, though, then the roll would be extended and resisted instead – for details, see Mage 20, p. 389-390. A botch on your part negates the mesmerism… and because he’s wise to you now, you cannot attempt to mesmerize this character again. A successfully mesmerized character feels frozen or enchanted – even if he suffers violence – for at least three turns; after that, he can try to break free using a Willpower roll. The difficulty for that roll begins at 8, and then drops one level lower until the character escapes that predatory influence. By that time, of course, the hypnotic critter may already have begun to feast. Ref: M20 G&M, 207 | ||||||||||||||||
| Musical Influence | 6 | You are a veritable Pied Piper of Hamlin, capable of leading those around you into temptation… or wherever else you’re looking to take them. This Advantage confers the power to motivate, suppress, heighten or demoralize the emotions of those who hear your music. You could be a wolf howling to terrify his prey, or a faun channeling the ecstatic powers of Pan. You call the tune, and your audience is inspired to dance to it as you will. To use this power, the player rolls an appropriate Social Attribute + an appropriate Ability. The Traits in-volved depend on what form the music takes, and what the character hopes to inspire with it. A carnal tune might employ Charisma + Seduction, while beating the war-drums combines Manipulation + Leadership or Intimidation. You could use some unusual combinations, too; a song that blends Appearance with Torture could provide an unsettling soundtrack for delicious atrocities. The difficulty of this roll is the target’s Willpower. Additional successes let you influence larger groups of peo-ple. Although that influence lasts only so long as you keep playing (or singing, or whatever), its emotional effects can linger for quite a while afterwards. If your audience realizes you’re playing them (so to speak), they can shrug off the effects of your charm. Music’s funny, though; even when people have decided they don’t care for a given song or singer, they often find themselves haunted by those feelings long after the music ends. The difficulty of this roll is the target’s Willpower. Additional successes let you influence larger groups of peo-ple. Although that influence lasts only so long as you keep playing (or singing, or whatever), its emotional effects can linger for quite a while afterwards. If your audience realizes you’re playing them (so to speak), they can shrug off the effects of your charm. Music’s funny, though; even when people have decided they don’t care for a given song or singer, they often find themselves haunted by those feelings long after the music ends. Ref: M20 G&M,208 | ||||||||||||||||
| Musk | 3 | tink, tear gas, the reek of fetid trash you call your home, “the funk of 40,000 years,” or whatever other avenue for sensory repugnance strikes your fancy. Thankfully, you can turn this rank odor off when you want to. The stench when you chose to deploy it, though, is impressive. System-wise, this Advantage deploys a rancid stench upon command. Characters affected by the smell add +2 to the difficulties of all of their rolls (Arete rolls included) until they manage to escape the area. Characters with senses keener than the average human’s sense of smell (that is, most animals, werebeasts in general, vampires with enhanced senses, people with the Merit: Acute Senses, and so forth) add +4 to their difficulties instead. A Stamina roll may overcome this penalty (difficulty 7 for most people, difficulty 9 for those with a sharper sense of smell); even then, however, those people feel seriously ill. Like a skunk, you can spray other characters with said stench. This requires a Dexterity + Athletics roll, difficulty 7 for targets within roughly 10 feet (or three meters), +1 difficulty for every 10 feet after that. Each success showers one target with musk; until they can wash it off, your stench follows them around, inflicting the usual penalties and making them extremely unpopular to be around. Characters without a sense of smell, of course, are not affected by this miasma, though it might produce a gross film of residue as well. Your smell lasts for a day or so before wearing off, and although its worst effects inflict penalties only within 10 feet or so of their point of origin, the pungent vapors make life unpleasant in a much larger area than that. Ref: M20 G&M, 208 | ||||||||||||||||
| Mystic Shield | Variable | Certain critters are especially resistant to magic of all kinds. With this Advantage, you may be one of them. This resistance might come from innate anatomical properties, paranormal stability, an aura of protection cast by some force greater than human willworkers, Technocratic Primium, or simply a bone-deep power older and more potent than mortal whims. Perhaps you’re just really damned lucky. For whatever reason, spells slide past you, bounce off of you, fade in effect, or simply disappear. In game terms, you get one die of countermagick for every two points spent on this Advantage; when utilized against other forms of magic (vampiric Disciplines, Garou Gifts, changeling cantrips, and so forth), this Advantage adds +1, for each two points spent, to the difficulty when other characters use such powers against you. This Advantage, however, maxes out at five dice. (10 pts.) This protection, though, is not effortless or constant. To use it, you must declare that your character is shielding herself from the spell. Essentially, you’re using a dodge ma-neuver (Mage 20, p. 411), in order to avoid the spell’s effects. If caught unaware, asleep, or otherwise unable to avoid the enchantment, you’re as vulnerable to magic as anybody else. Ref: M20 G&M, 209 | ||||||||||||||||
| Needleteeth | 3 | Thanks to strong, sharp teeth and powerful jaws, you can bite through up to three levels of armor when chowing down on prey. This Advantage enhances biting attacks only, and leaves gaping, bloody wounds behind. Ref: M20 G&M, 209 | ||||||||||||||||
| Nightsight | 3 | You can see where other folks remain blind. So long as a little bit of light remains, you can see normally. Even in total darkness, a roll of Perception + Alertness (difficulty 8) reveals vague outlines of your surroundings. Certain atmospheric conditions (smoke, mist, dust storms, and so forth) may screw with your perceptions, though, at the Storyteller’s discretion. Despite the name of this Advantage, your “sight” might involve echolocation, sensitive whiskers, tactile perceptions, and other keen senses. Such senses, however, might not function at a distance, and could be obstructed under certain circumstances: tangled undergrowth, conflicting vibrations, having your whiskers plucked, and other hindering situations. Ref: M20 G&M, 209 | ||||||||||||||||
| Omega Status | 4 | There’s power in being the one nobody pays attention to. Disregarded by all but the most astute observers, you slink through the shadows of your pack or warren, apparently inconsequential but, in truth, more watchful and conniving than anyone gives you credit for being. Oh, you’re the lowest of the low as far as your fellow creatures are concerned. As certain humans learned long ago, however, slaves, outcasts and servants make the finest spies. Unlike the Omega Flaw, this Advantage does not penalize your Social rolls. Instead, it lowers the difficulty of certain rolls – Scrounging, Stealth, Streetwise, and Subterfuge – by -2 when you perform those tasks within the group that despises you. Obviously, this group must be a significant part of your life. There’s no point in purchasing this Advantage if you’re not hanging with the pack. In large social hierarchies, though (such as a Technocratic Construct, a large Tradition Chantry, a network of cultists, a Nephandic Labyrinth, and so forth), the ability to skulk around under everyone else’s noses can be a useful talent for a character with quiet ambitions and vengeful plans. Ref: M20 G&M, 209 | ||||||||||||||||
| Paradox Nullification | 2 - 6 | A metaphysical gift allows you to consume the energies of Paradox. Although this “feast of nettles” is far from pleasant, you may be willing to endure it on behalf a valued friend or ally… for a price, of course! Story-wise, these prickly clouds of energy resemble briars or fog lit by fireflies and strobed with strange lightning. The smell and taste of such energies depends upon their Resonance but consuming them tends to be rather… bracing would be a nice way to put it. Oh, the things you do for these so-called “Awakened ones!” Game-wise, a character with this Advantage can open his mouth and swallow certain amounts of Paradox. These amounts correspond to the ratings of the Familiar/Companion Background (Mage 20, p. 316) (except that they don't because the authors messed something up. We are using the chart below, not the reference above.), and reflect familiars with lesser or greater abilities. In order to devour Paradox energies, the familiar must be within arm’s reach of his mage — a necessity that explains a lot about the closeness between mages and their familiars.
Ref: M20 G&M, 209 | ||||||||||||||||
| Quills | 2 / 4 | Like a porcupine or hedgehog, you possess sharp, spiny quills. Anyone unfortunate enough to rub you the wrong way, as the saying goes, winds up getting hurt. With a muscular flex or two, you might also be able to fire these quills into some poor opponent’s face. And should you happen to grapple that opponent instead, your foe will be having a very bad day. The two-point version of this Advantage bestows a col-lection of quills on the character’s skin. A high-tech character might possess cybernetic needles or hidden spines instead. Once activated, those quills puncture skin, often lodging in the target until they can be (while inflicting additional damage) removed. A character who strikes or lands against that set of activated quills suffers an “attack” from the spines, rolling one die for each dot in his Strength and then taking the result as lethal damage. If he takes three health levels or more after trying to soak that damage, the quills lodge in his skin and must be removed; until they are, he cannot recover that damage because the quills keep ripping the wounds open, scraping muscles and organs, seeping infection into the wounds, and so on. Removing the quills demands at least one turn for each health level of damage taken. The process inflicts an additional, unsoakable health level of damage, although the character can recover once the quills have been removed. If the spiny character assaults another person with her quills, the attack inflicts her Strength + 1 in lethal damage. The usual rules about lodged quills still apply. That attack demands a Dexterity + Brawl roll, difficulty 6, and counts as a hand-to-hand maneuver. If that maneuver is combined with a successful grapple attempt, martial arts, dirty fighting, or some other refinement, then the quills add one automatic health level of damage on top of the usual damage for that attack. For four points, the spiny character can shoot her quills at distant enemies, too. This attack employs a Dexterity + Athletics roll, difficulty 7, and fires the quills up to roughly 30 feet (10 meters) or so. Shields and other barriers automatically deflect the quills, however, though that layer of protection soon winds up featuring an impressive display of spines. Your character can launch one quill-enhanced attack for each point of Stamina she has; after that, the quills are depleted, and must be regrown, restocked, or what-have-you. As an optional rule, the Storyteller might allow these spines to inflict aggravated damage instead, for double the usual cost. Ref: M20 G&M, 210 | ||||||||||||||||
| Rapid Healing | Variable | Wounds don’t sideline you for long. Although you lack the startling regenerative powers of werecreatures, your body heals at an amazing rate. This Advantage accelerates the usual recovery rate for injuries. Every two points spent on this Trait moves you one category higher on the Healing Damage charts (see “Health and Injury,” Mage 20, p. 406). If, for instance, you were taken to Mauled by bashing damage, two points would allow you to heal in one hour rather than the usual six hours, and four points would allow let you heal those injuries almost immediately. Lethal and aggravated damage, of course, takes longer to heal. Even then, though, this Advantage helps you recover more quickly than usual. Story-wise, such characters remain hardy and healthy despite the battering they endure. With six or eight points spent on Rapid Healing, such crea-tures can shrug off most forms of harm. Ref: M20 G&M, 210 | ||||||||||||||||
| Razorskin | 3 | Like a shark, a thorny devil, or some other creature with sharp defenses, you have skin that shreds anything that touches you. When something tries to grab you, your assailant regrets that decision immediately. If you gets hit by another creature using Brawl or unarmed Martial Arts (that is, someone who brings his bare skin into contact with your own), then that char-acter suffers an attack of his own Strength + 1 in lethal damage. Unless you can shapeshift or otherwise cover or transform your skin, this Advantage is always active. Those wishing to be intimate with you will have to be either incredibly careful or particularly resilient. Ref: M20 G&M, 210 | ||||||||||||||||
| Regrowth | 2 / 4 / 6 | The blood of the hydra flows in your veins… or at least, it seems that way sometimes. To an extent, you can regrow severed body parts. It’ll hurt, and it takes time. Given enough opportunity, however, your body can restore itself. * 2pt - you can regrow fingers, horns, claws, a tail, or some other secondary appendage * 4pt - you can regrow gouged eyes, severed limbs, a ripped-out tongue, and a secondary organ or two if their absence won’t cause immediate death. * 6pt - you must be burnt to ashes, dissolved in acid, poisoned to death by sickness or toxins, or otherwise consumed entirely before the restoration process ends for good. Again, this is a painful process. The Advantage does not in any way alleviate the agony of losing body parts, and the damage heals at a steady pace unless it’s being enhanced by other magical means. A severed finger or missing eye takes roughly a day to grow back; damaged limbs or non-essential organs take three days or so before they’re functional again, and essential organs, your head, your spine, and other com-plex, essential body parts demand a week or so. Missing limbs will start out small and then grow back gradually (again, as per Deadpool), and organs will function poorly until they’ve been restored to health. Penalties for things like missing legs or blinded eyes are yours to endure, and you must spend a point of Willpower in order to regrow vital organs, your heart, your head, and so forth. Still, given enough points in this Advantage and plenty of time to heal, you can survive almost anything… Except fire or acid. If such caustic or cauterizing sub-stances are applied to the injured area, you’re not growing that part back again without some serious favors owned to high-powered magical healers. Ref: M20 G&M, 210 | ||||||||||||||||
| Read and Write | 1 | Although you’re an animal, or an alien, or whatever it is you are, you’re fully capable of reading and writing in whatever human languages you know. If you don’t know a given language, then you’ll need to learn it before you can read or write in it. Given your physical form, you might have certain difficulties with, say, holding a pen, opening a book, or typing on a laptop. Assuming you’re able to access the method of reading or writing, though, you can comprehend its contents as well as any human could. Ref: M20 G&M, 210 | ||||||||||||||||
| Shapechanger | 3 / 5 / 8 | Certain creatures may change their forms in radically different ways. With this Advantage, your character shares that gift. Though you’re not one of the legendary Changing Breeds, your physical body is less… established than those of other beings. A miraculous talent possessed by witches, spirit-animals, totem-blessed people, certain Bygones, and especially wise beasts, this inheritance violates “normal” phys-ics and biology, yet conforms to older laws of poetic reality. This Trait lets your character assume different forms. All of the natural abilities of a non-magical form (wings, speech, swimming, sharp teeth, etc.) become your character’s own capabilities, although special ones (fiery breath, spirit-walking, and so forth) must be purchased as Advantages. The same rule applies to abilities that are not natural to the new body: A man who wishes to become a talking pig, for example, must still purchase the ability to form human speech with the pig’s anatomy. In most cases, your Attributes and Abilities remain un-changed unless those physical characteristics are incompatible with your new form (a mouse, for instance, with a Strength of 5). No other object shares your ability to change, and so you must discard clothing, armor, weapons and so forth every time you transform. Such transformations typically demand one turn, although extreme shifts in size and mass might take a turn or two longer than that. An innate shapechanger retains her mind and personality when she changes forms. The things she knows in one body carry over into other physical shapes. Characters who can sense auras or perceive paranormal effects might notice the shapechanger’s true nature with a Perception + Awareness roll, difficulty 7. That shapechanger’s scent remains more-or-less consistent through her various incarnations; she might be a wolf who smells like a woman, or a woman who smells like a wolf, or a being whose smell doesn’t seem quite “natural” to the body she “wears” at the time. The number of forms you can attain depends upon the points spent upon this Advantage: • (3 points) One alternate form (hawk, lynx, woman, shark). • (5 points) Any form within a limited range (cats, hu-mans, birds, equines, and the like). • (8 points) You can assume any form, although you must purchase Advantages to cover things like venom, armor, radical changes in size and Attributes, and so forth. Ref: M20 G&M, 210 | ||||||||||||||||
| Soak Lethal Damage | 3 | Thanks to a hardy frame, thick skin, great size, elemental materials, or some other physiological gift, you can soak lethal damage as if it were bashing damage instead. Ref: M20 G&M, 211 | ||||||||||||||||
| Soak Aggravated Damage | 5 | As with Soak Lethal Damage, above, you can soak both lethal and aggravated damage. Ref: M20 G&M, 211 | ||||||||||||||||
| Soul-Sense / Death-Sense | 2-3 | Animals are closer to the natural processes of the universe, and are often extremely sensitive to spirits and the closeness of death. This Advantage, therefore, provides you the ability to sense such spirits. You may be an animal yourself, or perhaps some other being with a sense for the life-forces of those around you. Dogs, cats, psychopomps, and other liminal entities frequently have this Advantage. Some people might be “blessed” with similar abilities, and they often work as palliative-care workers, doulas, midwives, and other folks with deep affinities for life and death. With the two-point version of this Advantage and a suc-cessful Perception + Awareness roll, you can sense the vampire in a crowd, the spectre lurking in the graveyard, or perhaps the Pattern Spider about to manifest on the material side of the Gauntlet. You may also be able to sense an impending birth, or the flowering of life within the womb. With the three-point version of this Advantage, you have the ability to see the auras of those who will soon face and overcome death, or perhaps notice the entropic threads around a person who’s headed to their doom. Such insight can give you enough time to intervene, or it might just be something you note and then move on with your existence. This Advantage, sadly, doesn’t give you any sort of moral compass to go along with it. Ref: M20 G&M, 211 | ||||||||||||||||
| Speed | Variable | You’re a lot faster than you look. For every two points spent on this Advantage (up to a maximum of 10 points), you add + 2 yards (or meters) to your Base Move on the ground. That Base Move can be found on the Movement Rates chart in Mage 20 (core), p. 401. Thus, six points spent on Speed gives you a Base Walk of 13 yards, a Base Jog of 18 yards, and a Base run of 26 yards. If you can fly as well, this Advantage also adds + 5 yards to your Base Fly movement for every two points spent. Therefore, that same six points also allows a winged character a Base Fly of 25 to 35 yards per turn. You do not have to purchase a separate Speed Advantage for flying, though you must have some innate ability (wings, levitation, etc.) in order to use that additional speed in the air. This Advantage does not add to temporary flight powers, such as flying carpets, levitation spells, and so on; the ability to fly must be a natural part of your character first. Due to the heavy resistance involved, this Advantage does not confer extra swimming speed, though an exception might be made (Storyteller’s option) if the character is native to the water. Ref: M20 G&M, 211 | ||||||||||||||||
| Spirit Travel | 8 / 10 / 15 | Like a mage with Spirit-Sphere Arts, you can step across the Gauntlet and travel into certain Otherworlds. Unlike mages, you don’t suffer the effects of the Avatar Storm, but may be bound to only one or two of the Umbral layers. In all cases, you must have some consistent method of passing through: stepping into mirrors, diving through reflective pools, jumping through fire, vanishing in a puff of brimstone, and so forth. Because this gift comes from an affinity for certain energies and essences, your character’s nature influences the sorts of Realms you travel into when you cross the borders. An angel will gravitate toward the heavenly reaches of the Astral World, while a sinister kitten could step into the Underworld. Very few creatures can walk freely into all of the Three Worlds, and so the Storyteller may decide that certain layers or Realms are off limits to your kind. Game-wise, this Advantage gives you five dice to roll against the local Gauntlet rating. The speed of your crossing can be found below. Each crossing costs one point of Willpower, and it extends only to the character in question unless a mage uses some sort of magick to “ride” your character beyond the Gauntlet. Basic Spirit Travel lets you enter one Umbral layer: The Middle Umbra, the Astral Umbra, or the Dead Umbra. For 10 points, you can travel into two of those layers, and 15 points allows you to reach all three.
Ref: M20 G&M, 212 | ||||||||||||||||
| Spirit Vision | 3 | In game terms, your Spirit Sight lets you sense the Penumbra in your immediate surroundings. Most times, this vision overlaps your perceptions of the material world, which can get confusing and occasionally alarming if you stray, perhaps, into an area with a hostile spiritual landscape. (A battlefield, a haunted house, a Nephandic Node, and so forth.) By taking a moment or two to focus on one realm or the other, you can concentrate on either the material world or the Penumbra without being distracted by the other side. Most often, however, you seem flighty and distracted, occasionally talking to people who, as far as most folks are concerned, aren’t really there. The entities on the other side of the Gauntlet, meanwhile, can usually tell if you perceive them… and they might not be happy about being so exposed. Ref: M20 G&M, 212 | ||||||||||||||||
| Telepathy | 2 / 4 / 6 | You might not be able to speak with your mouth, but you can speak with your mind. This Advantage allows, for example, a sword, a horse, or a quivering pool of sentient goo to hold conversations with anyone who understands what that character is trying to say. The recipient of the telepathy must be able to comprehend your conversation, of course, though certain phrases or empathic bursts may transcend a language barrier. (Roll Intelligence + Empathy, Etiquette, Intimidation or other appropriate Traits as needed.) That party may also, with a successful resisted Willpower roll, block out what you’re trying to say. You can talk, but they aren’t compelled to listen. Assuming both parties want to talk, and can understand what the other one is saying, you’re able to silently converse with one other character within an unobstructed range of sight (2 pts.); with one other character for each point of Willpower you possess (4 pts.); and perhaps transcend obstacles and talk to characters you already know and have bonded with, even when you cannot see each other, across distances of roughly a mile or so (6 pts.). For organic and spirit-beings, this Advantage reflects a psychic or spiritual communion; tech-oriented characters may be using communication devices instead. However the telepathy is defined, outside parties cannot hear it unless they employ a suitable method (psychic power, the Mind Sphere, radio transmissions, etc.) to tap into it and spend a point of Willpower in order to do so. You might be using transmission technology, but if so, it’s not the sort of tech the average listener can access or employ. Ref: M20 G&M, 212 | ||||||||||||||||
| Telekinesis | 3 / 5 / 8 / 12 | With the power of your mind, antigravity hypertech, mystic energy, or what-have-you, you can lift and — to a slight degree — manipulate objects from a distance, without physically touching them. Doing so requires a successful Willpower roll, and the difficulty of that roll depends upon the weight and accessibility of your target, combined with the effect you’re trying to have on it.
You must be able to see your target in order to influence it with this Advantage, and the cost of the Trait determines the maximum amount of weight you can lift: | ||||||||||||||||
| Tides of Fortune | 5 | Invoking the fickle currents of fortune, you can employ a combination of the spirit powers Bad Luck Charm and Good Luck Charm. Instead of spending a point of Essence, you must spend a point of Willpower to confer ill or happy fortune upon the target of your whims. Ref: M20 G&M, 213 | ||||||||||||||||
| Tunneling | 3 | You have the ability to create a tunnel in the ground. You might eat the dirt like a worm, or you might burrow it out of your way like a badger, marmot, or rabbit. Either way, you move through the earth at half your walking speed. You can either create a tunnel or just push the earth out of your way. If you create a tunnel, it is the same size as your body. If you’re a magickal rabbit, you still only create tunnels the size of a regular rabbit. If you’re a giant, 10-foot tall rabbit, well… it that case you make pretty large bunny warrens, don’t you?Ref: M20 G&M, 213 | ||||||||||||||||
| Unaging | 5 | You don’t age. Perhaps you’ve found a way to restore your telomeres, or perhaps you are just mystically reinforced against the rigors of time. Regardless of how, you don’t age. This Advantage is useful for telling stories across the ages and would make an interesting bridge between stories told during the era of the Sorcerer’s Crusade and modern nights. Ref: M20 G&M, 213 | ||||||||||||||||
| Universal Translator | 5 | Thanks to sophisticated tech or godlike knowledge, you can understand and communicate in any language you encounter. If you’ve never encountered a particular form of communication before, you’ll need to make an Intelligence + Empathy roll in order to puzzle it out. The difficulty for this roll is generally 6 but could go as high as 9 if you’re trying to sort out an especially arcane language, like the waving fronds of a plant-spirit or the shifting colors of an alien species’ body hair. To translate a language, you must first be able to perceive it as a language. Telepathic communications or subtle symbolic codes are beyond you unless you’re able to recognize them for what they are. Your understanding, too, tends to be literal unless you’ve had enough contact with your subjects to rec-ognize their slang, sarcasm, cultural references, and so forth. Ref: M20 G&M, 213 | ||||||||||||||||
| Venom/Poison | Variable | A sting from an insect or a swipe from a platypus spur can really ruin someone’s day. Like those creatures, you possess an innate venom or poisonous touch – a weapon whose effects may well be worse than the injury that injected that assault. Your venomous power comes attached to a particular attack: claws, teeth, a stinger, barbs, needles, and so forth. In order to deliver your agonizing payload, you need to penetrate your target’s defenses with that attack, and then inflict at least one health level of lethal damage after your target tries to soak it. Assuming you manage to break his skin and inject the toxin, the damage from this Advantage takes hold. In game terms, your Venom / Poison inflicts two ag-gravated-damage attacks from the Toxins chart in Mage 20, p. 442. For every three points in this Advantage, your toxin inflicts one health level’s worth of injury. Essentially, those three points purchase one level of Toxin Rating, as per that chart. The first level strikes during the turn that follows the attack; the second level strikes three turns later. For five points per level (instead of three), your poison may be delivered through skin contact rather than injury. In this case, anyone who touches your bare skin with their bare skin suffers the effects. Sadly, you cannot turn this attack off; it poisons people whether you want it to or not. In such cases, hoodies, gloves and long pants are your friends. Ref: M20 G&M, 213 | ||||||||||||||||
| Wall-Crawling | 4 | Thanks to biology, mutation, or device, you can cling to and climb across sheer surfaces as quickly and easily as you can walk. This talent works without a roll or activation, although you might need to make a Dexterity + Athletics roll in order to hang on under extreme circumstances: icy walls, strong winds, driving rain, and similar situations. Ref: M20 G&M, 213 | ||||||||||||||||
| Water Breathing | 2 / 5 | Born or adapted to an aquatic environment, you may breathe as easily under water – for two points – as you breathe air above it. For five points instead of two, you don’t need to breathe at all. If you cannot normally breathe on dry land, then you might purchase this Advantage in order to live as the proverbial fish out of water. Either way, there’s not much point in buying this Trait if don’t plan to spend lots of time going from one environment to the other. Ref: M20 G&M, 214 | ||||||||||||||||
| Webbing | 5 | Like a certain do-gooding wall-crawler (or certain less-benevo-lent predatory arachnids), you can spin webs that connect surfaces and entrap enemies. That web may be synthetic or natural; regardless of its composition, your webs are sticky, persistent, and strong. Standard webbing has six soak dice, and it can take at least three health levels’ worth of damage before it breaks. A victim trapped in your web must roll three successes or more on a Strength roll (difficulty 8) in order to pull free from that webbing. At the Storyteller’s discretion, however, a stronger, thicker, or more-intricate web might demand five successes or more before the trapped character can escape. To employ webbing, the player rolls her Dexterity + Athletics. A web-spinning character, though, can purchase an Athletics specialty called Webspinning in order to hone her web-based expertise. With or without that specialty, the chart below reflects the difficulty of various feats:
Ref: M20 G&M, 214 | ||||||||||||||||
| Wings | 3 / 5 | Put simply, you can fly. For three points, you may fly up to the normal human jogging speed (13 yards per turn); for five, you can cover 20 yards per turn. Despite the name of this Advantage, your character does not necessarily have physical wings — she could levitate, hover, or simply take to the skies under her own power. Ref: M20 G&M, 214 |
Books
M20th Gods & Monsters (M20 G&M)
