Celerity

Not all vampires are slow, meticulous creatures. When needed, some vampires can move fast — really fast. Celerity allows Assamites, Brujah, and Toreadors to move with astonishing swiftness, becoming practically a blur. The Assamites use their speed in conjunction with stealth to strike quickly and viciously from the shadows before they are noticed. Brujah, on the other hand, simply like the edge that the power gives them against overwhelming odds. The Toreador are more inclined to use Celerity to provide an air of unnatural grace to live performances or for an extra push to complete a masterpiece on time, but they can be as quick to draw blood as any assassin or punk when angered.

System: Each point of Celerity adds one die to every Dexterity-related dice roll. In addition, the player can spend one blood point to take an extra action up to the number of dots he has in Celerity at the beginning of the relevant turn; this expenditure can go beyond her normal Generation maximum. Any dots used for extra actions, however, are no longer available for Dexterity-related rolls during that turn. These additional actions must be physical (e.g., the vampire cannot use a mental Discipline like Dominate multiple times in one turn), and extra actions occur at the end of the turn (the vampire’s regular action still takes place per her initiative roll). Normally, a character without Celerity must divide their dice if she wants to take multiple actions in a single turn. A character using Celerity performs his extra actions (including full movement) without penalty, gaining a full dice pool for each separate action. Extra actions gained through Celerity may not in turn be split into multiple actions, however.

Celerity +6 Usually, elders progress in Celerity according to the existing progression – more dots mean more dice and potential actions a turn that are available, and levels 6 through 9 have those powers available at each level, as normal. Similar to other Disciplines at level 6 or higher, though, alternative powers exist. If the elder wants to purchase an alternative power instead of the typical progression, she can, but she forfeits the capacity an extra Dexterity die and potential for an extra action to gain the special power instead. She can go back later and purchase the “normal” dot of Celerity later, as desired. Note that it isn’t possible to “skip” levels of progression for the normal Discipline – an elder with Celerity 7 that buys Projective at level 6 needs to go back and buy the normal level 6 power before getting the access to his level 7 power that grants the capacity for up to seven Dexterity dice or actions in a turn.

Doubletalk
This is a combo Discipline and requires Auspex 2 and Obfuscate 1.

The Toreador are talented diplomats and politicians, but the Kindred who uses this power may literally hide an entirely different message within their speech. When a Toreador uses Doubletalk, she conveys an entirely different message between and underneath another sentence spoken normally. To most listeners, it looks and sounds like normal conversational placeholders and body language. But for those who know what to look and listen for, it is possible to hold a secret conversation in plain sight, behind an innocuous interaction.

System: When a character speaks in Doubletalk, the player rolls Intelligence + Expression (difficulty 6). If the roll succeeds, the character may seamlessly insert a phrase into her conversation. A failure means the character can’t be understood. A botch means the character accidentally spoke her phrase aloud. The listener then rolls Perception + Subterfuge (difficulty 6). If the roll succeeds, the character may understand the intended message. At the Storyteller’s discretion, this difficulty may be modified for circumstances — it’s more difficult over the phone or in a noisy area, and impossible in text messages. A failure means the character heard nothing, while a botch indicates that he completely misinterpreted what the character said.

Experience cost: 12

Scalpel Tongue
This is a combo Discipline and requires Presence 1.

Catty repartee is both an art and a vice among the Kindred of Clan Toreador. Those who cannot compete effectively in the arena of cruel wit are unlikely to earn the respect of their Clan members. Toreador higher up the ladder, then, must have the ability to scathe others with words if they are to maintain their positions. Scalpel Tongue mixes the same quick thinking that guides the body as it moves at accelerated speeds with the Toreador’s prodigious social aptitudes, allowing the Kindred to immediately generate a barbed quip so stinging (due to the emotion-enhancing effects of Presence) that it shames the target into silence. Of course, the Toreador themselves are so constantly surrounded by the vicious wit of their own Clan that they inevitably develop a thicker skin. They may play up the melodrama of insult and offense, but even the sharpest barbs come to wash over them like water off a duck’s back. This power has a subtle downside: if another Toreador detects that she had to use a Discipline to come up with such a stinging retort (such as the user of Scalpel Tongue botching her roll), it could have a negative impact on how others in the Clan perceive her. Why would she need to use powers if she didn’t have an inferior wit? In such a case, the user will have a +1 difficulty on Social rolls against other Toreadors for the rest of the night, including future uses of Scalpel Tongue.

System: Roll Wits + Empathy against a difficulty of 7. If the user of this power does not know his target well, difficulty is increased by one, due to not knowing what buttons to push to achieve the greatest verbal impact. The barbed comment stings the target into silence for one turn per success, or double that if the target is not a member of Clan Toreador. Spending one Willpower negates this effect.

Experience cost: 6

Forced March
This is a combo Discipline and requires Fortitude 2.

Forced March allows the Assamite to cover ground quickly. This power cannot be used in combat but can aid the Assamite in moving with great speed without the debilitating vitae cost of conventional Celerity.

System: The Assamite spends a number of blood points equal to half his Celerity rating, rounded up. For a number of hours equal to his Fortitude, the Assamite multiplies his normal running speed by his Celerity rating. Thus, an Assamite with Fortitude ••• and Celerity •••• who could normally run at around four miles per hour (six kph) could use this power to run at a speed of 16 miles per hour (25 kph) for up to three hours.

Experience cost: 12

Leaps and Bounds
This is a combo Discipline and requires Potence 2.

Through this intersection of strength, speed, and will, the Brujah can leap amazing distances, whether to evade foes or flee a burning building.

System: The Brujah multiplies all vertical and horizontal jumping distances by the lesser of her Celerity or Potence. The player does not need to roll anything to make the jump but, at the Storyteller’s discretion, may need to roll Dexterity + Athletics (difficulty 4) to land safely depending on the environment.

Experience cost: 12

Scourge of Alecto
This is a combo Discipline and requires Presence 4.

An obscure power often found among older Idealists, Scourge of Alecto allows the Brujah to chain his own Beast and then, through an act of supreme will, unleash it within the body of someone else nearby. Doing so does not alter the Brujah’s own propensity for frenzy, but it can inflict both damage and frenzies upon his enemies.

System: The player must spend a point of Willpower while the character spends a full turn concentrating on a single target (which may be mortal, vampire, or any other type of supernatural character). Then the player rolls the Brujah’s permanent Willpower (difficulty equals target’s current Willpower). Each success inflicts one level of bashing damage as the Brujah’s manifested fury attacks the target from the inside. Additionally, if the target is someone normally susceptible to frenzy, she must immediately roll to resist it at a +2 difficulty.

Experience cost: 18

Shadow Feint
This is a combo Discipline and requires Obfuscate 2.

Shadow Feint combines the characteristics of Celerity and Obfuscate to blur the perceptions of her enemies.

System: At the beginning of any turn in which the Assamite has activated Celerity and in which her first action is an evasive one, the player may spend an additional blood point to activate Shadow Feint. For the rest of the turn, the difficulty of all rolls to target the Assamite increase by +2, to a maximum of 9. This is an Obfuscate power and cannot affect any vampire whose Auspex exceeds the Assamite’s Obfuscate.

Experience cost: 12

Burning Wrath
This is a combo Discipline and requires Potence 3.

Among the purest expressions of Brujah fury, this power lets the vampire focus her anger through her vitae and then through her fists.

System: This power costs 1 blood point and lasts for a scene. Any Brawl attacks augmented with this power inflict aggravated damage.

Experience cost: 18

Eyes of Blades
This is a combo Discipline and requires Auspex 2.

The Assamite can use her preternatural speed to evade or parry a flurry of attacks.

System: At the start of the character’s combat turn, the player spends two blood points and one Willpower point. This counts as activating Celerity for a turn. During this turn, the character may take no action other than selfdefense, but she can defend herself with her full dice pool (whether dodging or parrying) against every attack made against her on that turn.

Experience cost: 15

Projectile
Despite the fact that a vampire with Celerity moves at incredible speeds, any bullets he fires or knives he throws while in this state don’t move any faster than they normally would. Scientifically minded Kindred have been baffled by the phenomenon for centuries, but more pragmatic ones have found a way to work around it. Projectile enables a vampire to take his preternatural speed and transfer it into something he has thrown, fired, or launched.

System: Projectile requires the expenditure of a blood point. In addition, the player must decide how many levels of his character’s Celerity he is putting into the speed of the launched object. Thus, a character with Celerity 6 in addition to Projectile could decide to put three dots’ worth of speed into a knife he is throwing, and use the other three dots as dice or potential extra actions as per normal. Each dot of Celerity infused nto a thrown object becomes an automatic success to the attack’s damage roll, assuming the weapon or projectile actually hits.

Flower of Death
In combat, speed kills. A proper application of Celerity in combat can turn even the meekest Cainite into a walking abattoir. How much more deadly, then, is a vampire with the ability to utilize his preternatural speed to the utmost in combat? Flower of Death allows a vampire to take his Celerity and apply it in full to each hand-to-hand or melee attack he makes.

System: Flower of Death costs four blood points, but the spectacular effect is well worth it. Once the power is in effect, the vampire’s bonus dice for Dexterity rolls get added to every dice pool for attack the character makes (even if the roll doesn’t use Dexterity) until the end of the scene. Further, even if the Kindred uses some of his Celerity dots for extra actions during the scene, these extra dice are still available. The effect is limited to hand-to-hand or melee weapon attacks — firearms, bows, and other ranged weapons are excluded — but does grant the attacker additional dice for damage rolls. Flower of Death is not cumulative — it is impossible to “layer” uses of the power over one another to create astronomical dice pools.

Zephyr
Zephyr produces an effect vaguely similar to one of the legendary comic book-style uses of enhanced speed, allowing its practitioner to run so fast he can run across water. Particularly successful applications of Zephyr allow a vampire to go so far as to run up walls and, in at least one recorded instance, across a ceiling.

System: Zephyr requires the expenditure of one point of blood and one point of Willpower. Unfortunately, Zephyr requires such extremes of concentration that it cannot be combined with any form of attack, or indeed, with most any sort of action at all. If a character using Zephyr feels the need to do something else while moving at such tremendous speeds, a Willpower roll (difficulty 8) is required. Needless to say, botches at Zephyr speed can be spectacular in all the wrong ways. Most times, a vampire moving at such a rate of speed is barely visible, appearing more as a vampire-shaped blur than anything else. Observers must succeed on a Perception + Alertness roll (difficulty 7) to get a decent look at a Kindred zooming past in this fashion.