ExMod/ModernAbyssalDrive
by JC McCormick (Balthasar)
Eye For Demolition
Cost: 1 mote Duration: Instant Type: Reflexive Minimum Drive: 1 Minimum Essence: 1 Prerequisites: None
Possessed of a refined sense of cause and effect, the Abyssal may unfailingly judge how much damage exactly they may do with a vehicle, or easily locate a vehicle which will do large amounts of damage. Activating this Charm to examine a single vehicle informs the Abyssal how high the frame rating of the vehicle is. Activating this Charm to examine a collection of vehicles (such as a parking lot) allow the Abyssal to find the most dangerous of the bunch.
Casualty of the Road
Cost: 1 mote per -1 die Duration: Instant Type: Reflexive Minimum Drive: 1 Minimum Essence: 2 Prerequisites: Eye For Demolition
Vehicles are beautiful things to an attentive deathknight - so complex, so full of weak and flawed components. Weaving his own necrotic Essence into the fabric of Eternity, the Exalt tears at the edges of a nearby vehicle's components. Every mote spent activating this Charm subtracts one die from the Drive pool of a victim within a distance no greater than (the Abyssal's Drive x 10) yards, as the insides of their vehicle begin to slowly disintegrate. This Charm may not reduce a Drive pool to an amount lower than the victim's permanent Essence. Every use of this Charm inflicts a single die of damage upon a nonmagical vehicle, as its components decay, and its descent into disrepair is hastened.
Breakneck Pace Meditation
Cost: 2 motes Duration: Instant Type: Reflexive Minimum Drive: 2 Minimum Essence: 2 Prerequisites: Casualty of the Road
In moments of strong danger and lethal possibility, the fearless Chosen of Death truly shine. They have seen so much darkness, so much Death, so much that man ought not, the merest suggestion of mortal peril is a laughable distraction. Activating this Charm grants the Abyssal a free, reflexive Drive action while he is traveling fast, or very fast, and has two motes committed to the effect. While this Charm is active, the Abyssal's vehicle uses and needs no fuel.
Wavering Phantom Practice
Cost: 5 motes Duration: Instant Type: Reflexive Minimum Drive: 4 Minimum Essence: 3 Prerequisites: Breakneck Pace Meditation
Not wholly of this world any longer, the deathknight reflexively floods himself and his vehicle with a fountain of spectral Essence. They become so permeated with this ghost-magic for an instant, that they burst into soulfire momentarily and pass through any obstacle of the living world. An Exalt may activate this Charm before a collision with an inanimate surface, to pass through the surface harmlessly. This Charm is ineffectual in the Underworld, where all things bear the same spectral taint of immaterial death.
Reckless Volition
Cost: 10 motes, 1 willpower Duration: One scene Type: Simple Minimum Drive: 4 Minimum Essence: 2 Prerequisites: Breakneck Pace Meditation
The most honored slaves of the Gods Beneath Existance cannot stop all the time for paltry concerns. Wreathed in half-real shadows and seeming dark and massive in contrast to everything else around it, the Exalt's vehicle rolls onward unceasingly, as the legendary Juggernaut once did. Activating this Charm renders the deathknight's vehicle immune to damage from collisions it causes, while traveling fast or very fast, for the remainder of the scene. Additionally, these collisions are unrealistically violent and explosive, necrotic essence augmenting the fabric of possibility so much that vehicles driven by extras are instantly destroyed and thrown aside in blazing balls of wreckage after a collision, all without slowing the deathknight down in the slightest. While this Charm is active, the Abyssal's vehicle uses and needs no fuel.
Marching Avatar of Ruin
Cost: 10 motes, 1 willpower Duration: One scene Type: Reflexive Minimum Drive: 4 Minimum Essence: 3 Prerequisites: Relentless Volition
The best of Death's minions know when to fight, and when to walk away. For the remainder of the scene, if any vehicle the Abyssal operates takes enough raw damage to leave it totaled, the Abyssal takes no damage at all. This is a perfect soak. Additionally, instead of puttering to a halt, the vehicle detonates spectacularly when it is totaled, dealing its frame rating in lethal damage to everything less than (the character's permanent Essence x 5) yards away except the Abyssal. Avoiding this explosion is a Dexterity + Dodge roll, at a difficulty equal to the character's permanent Essence. Finally, it will never take more than two turns to find a new, nearby vehicle with a frame rating similar or greater to the detonated vehicle (unless there is plainly no chance of this occuring - in the middle of the Sahara, for example).
Archaic Manifestation Method
Cost: 10 motes, 1 willpower Duration: One scene Type: Simple Minimum Drive: 5 Minimum Essence: 3 Prerequisites: Marching Avatar of Ruin, Wavering Phantom Practice
Vehicles come, and they go again, too. The slaves of nothingness, of all people, will never stop to mourn this passing: they must go on, for much in this Eternity still lives. With this Charm, an Abyssal need never seek a new vehicle after an old one has expired. Shadows gather, pooling around a nearby solid surface nebulously for a moment's pause. After this pause, a modern-seeming vehicle wrought of ancient abandoned motors and sleek black soulsteel emerges, drawn forth from the deepest pits of the Labyrinth, where the devices of man are collected and dissected. The black soulsteel is so dark, it seems to engulf all light that touches its surface, save that of crimson pits of blazing soulfire that act as head lamps. When purchasing this Charm, the Abyssals's player must determine the statistics of his vehicle. He recieves an amount of points to spend equal to the Exalt's (Drive + Essence) x 3 to spend creating the vehicle along the guidelines at the bottom of /LiteDramaDriveSystems. Once set, the statistics of the vehicle cannot be changed - it is a part of the deathknight's personality, now, be it a tank, jet ski or motorcycle. Later uses of this Charm simply call it or its likeness forth again from the Labyrinth. If at a later time the Abyssal's Essence or Drive scores increase, the vehicle also improves a number of points proportionately to his improvement. While this Charm is active, the Abyssal's vehicle uses and needs no fuel.
I like :) These shall be adapted to the Crunchy Drive system when I get around to it.
I do have a question, tho- What's the point of Reckless Volition? It just seems to make your car explode... - DariusSolluman
Reckless Volition, or Marching Avatar of Ruin? Reckless Volition detonates other cars when you collide with them (at least, those driven by extras) - kind of an Abyssal version of Flow Through Traffic. Instead of deftly weaving between cars, the Abyssal plows straight through them. The explosive tossing effect just gets them out of the way for good.
Marching Avatar of Ruin DOES just blow up your car. Heh. The point of the Charm is abortive... Falling from a bridge? Use Marching Avatar - your car explodes, and you swim out of the wreckage, tenacious and unharmed. Find another dangerous car when you get back to the highway, and Breakneck Pace your way back after that damned golden motorcycle... Good thing you weathered it down with Casualty of the Road while you were chasing it.
*tries to devise a proper rewording; he must've thought about the Charms so much he forgot to tell anyone else what they actually do* :-D Balthasar
Right! Marching Avatar of Ruin is the one I meant. Thanks for picking up on that :)
Although for it's height, it's EXTREMELY speed bumpy. It'd be like requiring that a Sorcerer learn Unconquored Self before any other spell. Yeah, there are times when it'd be handy, but they're very few and far between.
Also, how does Causality of the Road interact with Artifact vehiciles? Since those are usually immune to such effects... And are the dice penelties permanent until repaired (attached to the car) or instant? - DariusSolluman
Hmm. Alright! You've convinced me! I'll revamp Marching Avatar, and I know just how! Also, I'll put a bit in about artifact vehicles :-)
Majorly off-topic, I think I've come up with an idea of Crucibles I really like! - Balthasar
Cool Charms. I like them. I have an idea for an Abyssal Drive Charm, that makes the car and the Chosen's driving style intimidating to anyone attempting to confront the car directly, though I have no idea how the Charm should look like. Any ideas? Jiba
My problem with Archaic Manifestation Method is that, if you have the minimum prereqs for the Charm, you create a vehicle that isn't even worth Resources 4. Shouldn't an Abyssal's personality manifest something on par with an artifact vehicle? I mean, even scaling up, you're basically making a cool pinnacle Charm into a last resort. I'm not sure if this is a problem with your Drive system or the Charm itself, but.. it bothers me, 'cause I want to use it at some point. -- Will, not signed in.
- That's partially the fault of the ExMod/LiteDramaDriveSystems, which has a lot of vehicle-worth flaws in the mechanics. For example, the example Ford Explorer given at resources 3 actually comes out to a resources 5.2 vehicle. I've a feeling that the worth of this charm can be 'fixed' once the Lite Drive System itself is point-balanced. - GregLink , now taking it upon himself to revise the Lite Drive System ASAP
- Finished. I've put up new creation rules, about 10 sample vehicles, including KITT and the A-team van, and included 5MM bonuses. I'm looking for comments desperately, as I put up quite a bit of new stuff there, and need it 'ok'ed before I can go ahead and re-format it to be the new system. Since people working on Abyssal drive charms obviously care about the system, I figure I'll fish for help here. So yeah, go ahead and comment on the ExMod/LiteDramaDriveSystems ! - GregLink
