FrivYeti/EssencePlagueCannon
Back to Artifacts
Back to Artifacts
Essence-Plague Cannon
Artifact 2
Speed 5, Accuracy +2, Damage 8*, Rate 1, Range 75, Cost 3/2 (2/0, 2)
A terrifying weapon from the dying days of the Shogunate, the Essence-Plague cannon was designed by the Dragon-Blooded artificer Colbery Veran and medicial genius Kyril Aurum. Aurum, fascinated by the Great Contagion even as he was repulsed by it, studied its effects in a desperate attempt to cure its ravages, only to realize to his surprise that he could translate many of its effects into a deadly weapon.
The Essence-Plague cannon functions by distilling the Essence of its user into a twisted horror, which writhes through its target's Essence. On a successful hit, the cannon does not deal damage as usual. Instead, damage is soaked by the target's Essence rating - ordinary soak Charms may not be used to increase this total. Dice of post-soak damage are then rolled normally. Each damage success, instead of reducing health levels, costs the target two motes of Essence (from either their Personal or Peripheral pools, at the discretion of the target's player). If a target has no motes of Essence remaining, damage is applied directly to them as aggravated damage. This is a Sickness effect, and characters with Charms that resist magical disease can do so. Consider the cannon to have a Morbidity and Magical Treatment difficulty of 4 for the purpose of Charms that resist disease based on its ratings.
The only known copy of the Essence-Plague cannon is forged from green jade and created by distilling a sample of the Great Contagion, and its concepts do not lend it well to most magical materials. However, a cunning artificer could reproduce the cannon by using soulsteel instead of jade and instilling it with virulent Underworld Essence, creating new and deadly weapons.
Notes
This artifact was written up based on ideas and first-stage design concepts done by TheCleverMonkey, who sadly does not have a wiki page at this time. - FrivYeti
