Visceratika
“Why place statues in graveyards? Stone does not mourn.” — Ferox
Atop the marble spires of ancient cathedrals, hunched stone guardians stare down at the city, keeping a watchful eye on the streets. With the power of Visceratika, you can harden your skin and become one with stone, much like the angelic and demonic gargoyle carvings of old. Members of the Gargoyle bloodline were slaves when they first evinced this discipline, as rituals cast repeatedly upon them somehow became permanent, fusing with their magical nature. It is an enigma within the vampiric world — and more so, since the bloodline can teach its proprietary power to others.
Possessing Visceratika notably toughens and hardens a vampire’s skin, tinting it with faint shades of grey. For a Gargoyle, this makes very little difference, as even without learning Visceratika, Gargoyles appear as though they are made of stone. However, when other vampires learn this power, it causes a mild but noticeable alteration of their appearance.
Visceratika Test Pool: The Visceratika wielder uses her Mental attribute + Athletics versus the target’s Mental attribute + Willpower.
Contents
• Skin of the Chameleon
When you activate this power, you naturally blend in with your surroundings. While not invisible, you become less noticeable, and those around you simply don’t tend to pay attention to you, even though they realize you are there.
System: Expend 1 Blood and use a simple action to activate Skin of the Chameleon for one hour. You must be currently unobserved by mortals in order to activate Skin of the Chameleon. Thereafter, so long as you draw no attention to yourself, mortals will assume that you are an expected and legitimate part of their surroundings. They assume you have an authentic reason to be there, and they will not question your presence. If asked afterwards, they will describe you in generalities. Even if your appearance is particularly bestial or horrific, like a Gargoyle or a Nosferatu appears, so long as you take simple steps to avoid attention, such as wearing a hat or turning up collar, and do nothing to make people notice you, mortals in your area will ignore you.
You can interact with mortals while under the effect of this power, so long as you do not startle them or give them any reason to scrutinize your appearance. After such a conversation, the mortal will only remember you as a bland seeming individual with the proper credentials to be present and very little more. If you use another power, threaten, or attack anyone, or otherwise draw attention to yourself, this power immediately ends.
Skin of the Chameleon fails if you attempt to enter a private location. This power might allow you to wander through a crime scene, but it cannot be used to enter a top secret laboratory or walk unnoticed into someone’s home.
Focus [Perception]: Your Skin of the Chameleon works on supernatural creatures, such as vampires, as well as mortals. Supernatural creatures who encounter you can make an opposed challenge using their Mental attribute + Willpower versus your Mental attribute + Stealth. Characters with Auspex receive a bonus to this test equal to the number of Auspex powers they possess. Elder powers count towards this bonus, but techniques do not.
•• Scry the Hearthstone
Buildings have memories, and stone can carry echoes unperceived by the human ear. By touching any part of a building, such as the wall, ceiling, or floor, you can remotely sense any individuals inside, similar to a bat using sonar.
System: By spending 1 point of Blood and spending a full turn in concentration, you get a complete sense of a building’s layout and inhabitants at that moment. You receive accurate information about the building’s design — where each room is, whether there are secret passages or hidden chambers, and so forth. You also learn the location, approximate size, and general type (humanoid or animal) of all living (and undead) things within. This building may be as large as a mansion; to acquire detailed information about a massive superstructure or a skyscraper, your Storyteller may require you to activate this power once every few floors.
Focus [Perception]: You can utilize Scry the Hearthstone by expending a simple action, rather than a full turn of concentration.
••• Bond With the Mountain
You have an innate understanding of earth, stone, concrete, and metal, and can shape and mold even the hardest natural substances as easily as you would a handful of clay.
System: Spend 1 Blood and expend a standard action. By physically grasping a portion of stone or manufactured stone-like material, such as concrete, brick, or other masonry, you can twist or shape it as though it were soft and malleable. By using this power, you can even shape a safe haven for yourself within such material, sealing any gaps behind you after you crawl inside. You can create corridors or openings and pass through them, leaving no trace of such travel behind. A character using Bond With the Mountain can shape three cubic feet of stone with one standard action, and can move through such material in this manner at one step per round.
Those wishing to notice or locate a Gargoyle who is using Bond With the Mountain to shelter inside a wall or other material must succeed in a challenge, using their Mental attribute + Investigation versus the Visceratika user’s Physical attribute + Stealth. When a character using Heightened Senses comes within two steps of a person hidden by Bond With the Mountain, the character with Heightened Senses automatically realizes that someone is nearby, although she does not know who, or precisely where, to find that someone. A character who has been forewarned by Heightened Senses in this manner receives a +3 bonus to her challenge to notice and locate the Visceratika user.
Focus [Wits]: You can shape and move through metal and metal alloys, as well as stone.
•••• Armor of Terra
Where lesser practitioners of Visceratika can alter their skin to gain the appearance of rock, you can actually modify yours to acquire the hardness of stone as well. When you activate this power, your skin takes on the coloration of granite, marble, or another type of stone, hardening your features into sharp lines and rigid planes.
System: Spend 1 Blood and expend your simple action to toughen your skin to the hardness of stone for one hour. While Armor of Terra is active, your armored skin has the Hardened and Ballistic qualities. While affected by this power, your appearance may be considered a breach of the Masquerade. Armor of Terra is not mundane armor, and attacks that normally pierce armor do not pierce or ignore the effects of this power.
Focus [Wits]: Your Armor of Terra additionally has the Full Body quality, but unlike the standard drawback of Full Body armor, your altered skin can be hidden beneath normal clothing, or by powers such as Obfuscate.
••••• Stone Strength
Like stone itself, you become hard and impenetrable. Stone does not burn and cannot be pierced. With the use of this power, you shield yourself from two of the greatest banes of vampiric existence and borrow strength from the earth to provide defense.
System: By expending 1 Blood and spending a simple action, you transform your body to the hardness of stone. While in this form, you do not take damage from fire, and flaming or incendiary attacks deal normal damage to you. Further, because your organs are as hard as stone, you cannot be staked. While affected by this power, your appearance is a clear breach of the Masquerade. Once activated, this power lasts until the next sunrise.
Stone Strength is a transformative power and cannot be combined with other transformative powers. You can end this transformation at any time by expending a simple action. Stone Strength’s transformation is a rock-like version of a character’s normal (humanoid) form, and characters in this form can use weapons.
Focus [Wits]: While this power is active, you take half damage from sunlight (round up). This is an exception to the rule that prevents a vampire’s powers from reducing the damage she receives from sunlight.
