Brawl
Charms
Ferocious Jab
Cost: 1 mote
Duration: Instant
Type: Supplemental
Minimum Brawl: 1
Minimum Essence: 1
Prerequisite
Charms: None
The character infuses his anima with
Essence, making his strikes much more damaging. On a successful attack, the
character may count his extra successes twice for the purposes of determining
damage. The Essence for this Charm may be spent after the character rolls the
attack.
Fists Of Iron Technique
Cost: 1 mote
Duration: Instant
Type: Supplemental
Minimum Brawl: 3
Minimum Essence: 1
Prerequisite
Charms: Ferocious Jab
The character suffuses her fists with
Essence, hardening them into deadly weapons. Until her next action, her
hand-to-hand strikes do lethal damage, and she can safely parry lethal damage
blows with her hands. However, she is no faster than normal and so, generally,
cannot parry incoming arrows or magical attacks without a well-described stunt.
Ox-Stunning Blow
Cost: 1 mote per die
Duration: Instant
Type: Simple
Minimum Brawl: 4
Minimum Essence: 1
Prerequisite
Charms: Fists of Iron
Technique
The character concentrates her anima around
her fist and smashes it into her enemy, stunning and disorienting him. The
character makes a normal attack with her Dexterity + Brawl. If successful, the
attack does no normal damage but, instead, does a base of one point of stunning
damage for every mote spent on the Charm. This stunning damage is soaked as
bashing damage, but can only be soaked with the target’s Stamina. Extra
successes on the attack add to damage as usual. However, rather than doing
health levels of damage, each success on the damage roll imposes a -1 penalty
to the target’s dice pools for a number of turns equal to (7 - the target’s
Stamina).
The Exalted using this Charm cannot spend
more motes of Essence to power this Charm than twice his Strength, and the
Storyteller may rule that certain types of opponents (mechanical constructs,
shambling corpses or giant man-eating trees, for example) are too sturdy or
insensible to be stunned by the character’s mighty blows.
Dragon Coil
Technique
Cost: 3 motes per turn
Duration: Varies
Type: Simple
Minimum Brawl: 4
Minimum Essence: 1
Prerequisite
Charms: Fists of Iron
Technique
The character may wrap his opponents in his
mighty arms and crush the very life from them. The character makes a clinch
attack as normal, but the attack does the character’s Strength + Essence + 2 in
lethal damage, while the subject of the clinch does only the normal Strength +
2 bashing. If the target attempts to escape the clinch, the character
performing the Dragon Coil Technique may add his Essence in automatic successes
to the reflexive roll to resist the escape attempt. If the target also has
Dragon Coil Technique, she may choose to activate it as her action on
subsequent turns and do her Strength + Essence + 2 in lethal damage as well.
Maintaining this Charm over multiple turns prevents the character from using
simple and supplemental Charms but does not prevent the use of reflexive
defensive Charms.
This Charm is not compatible with Hammer on
Iron Technique or other Charms of the extra action type and cannot be placed in
Combos with them.
Thunderclap Rush
Attack
Cost: 3 motes
Duration: Instant
Type: Reflexive
Minimum Brawl: 3
Minimum Essence: 1
Prerequisite
Charms: Ferocious Jab
The character pours Essence into quickening
her motions and rushes aggressively toward her enemy. She automatically wins
initiative over a single opponent. Characters cannot split their dice pools on
the turn they use Thunderclap Rush Attack. Two characters using Thunderclap
Rush Attack in competition roll for initiative normally.
Hammer On Iron
Technique
Cost: 4 motes, 1 Willpower
Duration: Instant
Type: Extra Action
Minimum Brawl: 4
Minimum Essence: 2
Prerequisite
Charms: Thunderclap Rush
Attack
The character suffuses his body with
Essence, turning him into a virtual killing machine, with arms like pounding triphammers. He gains a number of additional attacks equal
to his Essence but must make all his attacks against the same target. Hammer on
Iron Technique cannot be Comboed with defensive
Charms that allow the character to dodge or otherwise avoid attacks, but may be
combined with those that allow her to soak or ignore damage.
Sledgehammer Fist
Punch
Cost: 3 motes
Duration: One turn
Type: Simple
Minimum Brawl: 1
Minimum Essence: 1
Prerequisite
Charms: None
The character can suffuse his body with
Essence, concentrating his anima until it is a crackling nimbus around him, and
become capable of great destruction. This Charm must be used to attack
inanimate objects and doubles the amount of damage the character does after
extra successes are added but before the object’s soak is applied. This
increase in Strength does not add directly to combat damage, though it may
assist the character in causing indirect damage (for example, by causing a
tower to collapse on top of his opponent).
Crashing Wave
Throw
Cost: 2 motes
Duration: Instant
Type: Simple
Minimum Brawl: 2
Minimum Essence: 1
Prerequisite
Charms: Sledgehammer Fist
Punch
The character tightly focuses his anima,
making him able to apply his Strength more effectively. In addition to doing
normal damage, the character also throws his opponent on a successful attack.
The target is hurled a number of yards equal to the character’s Strength + his
extra successes on the attack roll. This attack cannot be blocked, only dodged.
A target who strikes a solid object takes dice of damage equal to the number of
yards she would have continued flying had the object not been in the way. This
damage is typically bashing but can be lethal if (for example) the object is
covered in sharp steel spikes.
Obviously, the target can also suffer
serious injury if she is tossed over a cliff or off a ship at sea.
Heaven Thunder
Hammer
Cost: 3 motes
Duration: Instant
Type: Supplemental
Minimum Brawl: 3
Minimum Essence: 1
Prerequisite
Charms: Sledgehammer Fist
Punch
The character fully concentrates his anima,
gathering dense Essence around his fists. Not only do the character’s unarmed
attacks do normal damage, they also hurl his opponents
great distances. For each health level of damage he inflicts before soak, the
target is hurled backward a yard, as per the effects of the Crashing Wave Throw
Charm.
Shockwave
Technique
Cost: 4 motes
Duration: Instant
Type: Simple
Minimum Brawl: 4
Minimum Essence: 1
Prerequisite
Charms: Crashing Wave Throw
The character burns with Essence,
increasing her strength and agility to superhuman levels. She seizes one
opponent and picks him up bodily, using him to strike another foe. The
character makes one attack roll against the primary target. The attack cannot
be blocked, only dodged. If successful, this attack does no damage, but the
attacker may immediately make a reflexive Brawl attack at her full dice pool
against another target within hand-to-hand range.
If the second attack is successful, both
the targets take bashing damage equal to the character’s Strength + the extra
successes on the Exalted’s reflexive attack. The second
target may parry or dodge to reduce damage or avoid the attack, but if the
attack is parried, the character being used as a club takes bashing damage
equal to the Strength of the Exalted swinging him around + the number of
successes the parrying character rolled to block the attacks.
If the Exalted hits with her second attack,
both targets are left in a heap on the ground and must spend an action to
return to their feet. If the second attack misses, the character being used as
a club is hurled a number of yards equal to the Exalted’s
Strength, in a direction of the Exalted’s choice, as
if he had been successfully attacked with the Crashing Wave Throw Charm.
Irrepressible
Bravery Tactic
Cost: 3 motes per success
Duration: Instant
Type: Reflexive
Minimum Brawl: 3
Minimum Essence: 2
Prerequisite
Charms: Thunderclap Rush
Attack
A master warrior must have complete
knowledge of his surroundings and the progression of the fight. For a Solar who
has mastered this technique, the battle flows around him, and he makes
instinctive use of everything that surrounds him and the constant, shifting
nature of the fight to his advantage. Brawlers with this Charm have a
reputation for foolhardy bravery and dumb luck, for they make use of surprising
and spectacular aspects of the fight, turning seemingly hopeless situations to
their advantage. Any time a Solar gains bonus dice from a stunt, the Solar may
spend 3 motes per stunt die to convert each die into an automatic success. The
die isn’t rolled and is simply counted as a success. To use this Charm, the
stunt must make use of the Solar’s surroundings or
some ongoing aspect of the fight (such as his opponent’s last attack), or the
Solar must perform a surprisingly brave or foolhardy act. For the purposes of
this Charm, the bonus dice gained from the Daredevil or Signature Style Merits
count as stunt dice.
Dancing With
Strife Technique
Cost: 3 motes
Duration: Instant
Type: Reflexive
Minimum Brawl: 3
Minimum Essence: 3
Prerequisite
Charms: Irrepressible Bravery
Tactic
A master warrior must have complete
knowledge of his opponent, understanding the true extent of the danger he
faces. The greatness of Solars can only manifest when
faced with foes of equal greatness, and those who have mastered Dancing with
Strife Technique understand this principle, throwing themselves at greater and
greater foes to feel the joy of battle. Anytime the Solar successfully defends
himself from an attack that received no less than (the Solar’s
Essence or 5, whichever is higher) successes, he may activate this Charm and
gain a temporary point of Willpower. This Charm does not allow the Solar to
gain more temporary Willpower than his permanent rating.
Supremacy Of War Method
Cost: 1 mote per die
Duration: One scene or until used
Type: Reflexive
Minimum Brawl: 5
Minimum Essence: 3
Prerequisite
Charms: Inevitable Victory
Meditation, Dancing with Strife Technique
A true warrior has mastered himself, his
battlefield and his foes. Every movement, every attack, every action of his
foes only increases the mastery of the Solar’s combat
technique as he is driven to prove his supremacy upon the field of battle.
Anytime an enemy takes an action against the Solar, either an attack or a
defense, the Solar may reflexively activate Supremacy of War Method in
response. The Solar may commit 1 mote per success his opponent made on his
roll. At any time during the following scene, the Solar may add a number of dice
to any Brawl roll up to the number of motes committed to Supremacy of War
Method. Each die added reduces the Essence committed by 1 mote. A Solar must
choose to add dice to his roll before, not after, he makes his roll.
Activating Supremacy of War Method counts
as a Charm use for the turn, but gaining bonus dice does not. For example:
Michael is attacked by an Immaculate who scores seven successes on his attack
roll. Michael spends 7 motes on Supremacy of War Method. On the following turn,
he makes an attack, adds seven dice to his dice pool and chooses to activate
Ferocious Jab.
A Solar may activate Supremacy of War
Method multiple times in a scene to increase his total committed motes, but he
may never have more motes committed to Supremacy of War Method than his Wits +
Brawl. Dice added through Supremacy of War Method are derived from a Charm and,
thus, are subject to all associated limitations.
Ascendant
Cost: 10 motes, 1 Willpower
Duration: One turn
Type: Simple
Minimum Brawl: 5
Minimum Endurance:
5
Minimum Essence: 4
Prerequisite
Charms: Supremacy of War
Method, Bloodthirsty Sword-Dancer Spirit
By combining his pure, instinctive
awareness of combat mastered through Supremacy of War Method with the raging
fury mastered through Bloodthirsty Sword-Dancer Spirit, the Solar unlocks a
deadly secret of his anima. In a fantastic display of power, the Solar’s anima flares to full totemic glory, and within that
pillar of divine light, the Solar is reshaped, his body marked by his totem and
the colors of his anima. A Night Caste with the totem of the wolf might gain a
long, thick mane of grey hair, sharpened teeth and violet or golden eyes, and a
Dawn Caste with the totem of the snake might gain a long, sinuous tattoo of a
serpent upon his body and eyes of violent crimson. In this temporary state of
power, the Solar’s player adds his character’s
Essence in automatic successes to any combat rolls made, excluding damage
rolls, though the number of successes he adds may not exceed the number of dice
rolled, excluding bonus dice gained from Charms. This Charm lasts only a short
time and threatens to enrage the character if sustained for too long. Once
Ascendant Battle Visage has expired, the character may reflexively renew it. Doing
so costs him no Essence or Willpower. Instead, for each turn he extends
Ascendant Battle Visage, roll his highest Virtue. Each success increases his
Limit by 1. Should the Solar suffer Limit Break during the use of this Charm,
he frenzies as per Bloodthirsty Sword-Dancer Spirit, and Ascendant Battle
Visage’s bonuses remain for the rest of the scene. The actual effects of the
Limit Break itself, including the bonus to Willpower, begin after the scene
ends.
Knockout Blow
Cost: 3 motes + 2
motes per additional die
Duration: Instant
Type: Supplemental
Minimum Brawl: 4
Minimum Essence: 3
Prerequisite
Charms: Ox-Stunning Blow
With greater skill
and Essence comes greater power and control. This Charm allows the character to
precisely gauge the amount of damage he is causing. Punches enhanced by this
Charm cannot accidentally do lethal damage to the target. If the player rolls
more health levels of damage than the target has remaining health levels, all
remaining damage is ignored. If the damage rolled is insufficient to knock out
the target, then the attacker can roll additional dice in an attempt to do
enough damage to knock the target out. The character may buy additional damage
dice at 2 motes per die. These dice are bought and rolled one at a time as a Reflexive
Action, and a character can continue buying and rolling them for as long as he
can pay for them. A character cannot buy dice to gain additional damage levels
beyond those required to knockout the target.
Characters can
easily run out of Essence if they use this Charm repeatedly. If a character
runs out of Essence while using this Charm, count all damage dice that have
been paid for. This Charm cannot be used if the character is wielding Tiger
Claws or any other weapon or magical effect that causes his punches to do
lethal damage.
Pounding Hammer of Devastation Technique
Cost: 7 motes
Duration: Instant
Type: Supplemental
Minimum Brawl: 5
Minimum Essence: 5
Prerequisite
Charms: Heaven Thunder Hammer
The character
concentrates vast amounts of Essence around her hands, allowing her to inflict
terrible wounds. The character’s blow does lethal damage. In addition, when
used against a living target, this Charm adds a bonus to the base damage of the
attack equal to the attacking character’s Permanent Essence. However, this
Charm is far more effective when used against inanimate targets. If the
character attacks an inanimate object, add a number of damage levels equal to
four times the attacking character’s Permanent Essence. A single such punch or
kick can knock down a sturdy oak door or break a hole in a ship’s hull large
enough to walk through.
Adamantine Fists Of
Cost: 7 motes, 1 Willpower
Duration: One
scene
Type: Supplemental
Minimum Brawl: 5
Minimum Essence: 6
Prerequisite
Charms: Heaven Thunder Hammer, Hammer on Iron Technique
Essence concentrates around the character’s
hands, infusing them with great and lasting power. For the next full scene, the
character adds a number of levels of damage equal to twice her Permanent Essence
to all Brawl attacks. When this Charm is performed, the caster can also specify
whether these attacks will do bashing or lethal damage. Using this Charm, the
character can even choose to do bashing damage when wielding a weapon that
would normally cause his blow to do lethal damage.
Inevitable Victory
Meditation
Cost: 3 motes, 1 Willpower
Duration: Until used
Type: Simple
Minimum Brawl: 5
Minimum Essence: 1
Prerequisite
Charms: Fist of Iron Technique
A master warrior must have complete
knowledge of his own skills and prowess. With a moment of focus, the Solar
centers himself and secures his knowledge of victory. When the perfect
opportunity to strike comes, the Solar will know and make full use of the
opening. Unlike the meditative nature of martial arts, this technique is
trancelike, similar to the perfect, blood-tinted awareness of victory that
cold-eyed berserkers receive.
The Solar takes a moment to focus himself
into his trance, letting his skill reach an instinctive level, and then, his
player rolls the character’s Wits + Brawl, adding a number of successes equal
to the Solar’s Essence. The Solar may spend a
Willpower point on the roll for an automatic success, augment it with any
appropriate Charms or use any other appropriate, normal method for improving
the success of this roll. The Solar’s player notes
the number of successes he received on the roll. At any time for the remainder
of the scene, the Solar may reflexively replace the results of any single Brawl
roll with the successes rolled during the activation of Inevitable Victory
Meditation. Inevitable Victory Meditation replaces the previous roll in its
entirety, and any bonuses that applied to the previous roll, including dice or
successes gained from Charms, Virtues or Willpower points, are lost. After
Inevitable Victory Meditation has replaced a Brawl roll, the Charm expires, and
the character must activate it again if he wishes to reap its benefits once
more. A Solar may freely end the Charm prematurely if, for example, his player
rolls poorly upon activation and wishes to try again for a better result. While
activating Inevitable Victory Meditation counts as the Solar’s
Charm use for the turn, replacing the successes of a roll does not. A Solar may
wait for his opponent to roll for his defense before replacing the successes of
his attack roll. A Solar may not have more than one instance of this Charm
active at any given time.