SolarMelee/Terk
Tiger's Dazing Claw
• Cost: 5 motes
• Duration: Special
• Type: Supplemental
• Minimum Melee: 4
• Minimum Essence: 2
• Prerequisite Charms: Hungry Tiger Technique
The character takes on the aspect of the playful tiger, using his paw to bat the victim back and forth, confusing and stunning it. The character can use any weapon, including being unarmed, but MUST do bashing damage (in most cases, this means the character must make the attack at a difficulty of 1) or the attack will not work. If the character successfully hits his opponent, of which does not have to actually cause damage, the opponent makes a Stamina + Resistance roll against a difficulty equal to the attackers Essence score. If the roll passes, the character only takes a -1 to all actions for the rest of the turn, including any subsequent parries and such (this penalty is cumulative up to -3). If the roll fails, the attacker loses all actions for half the character's melee score in turns, except for reflexive charm based actions. On a botch, the victim cannot act for the character's full melee score in rounds, and is knocked prone for this duration. This charm is explicitly allowed to be in combos despite its non-instantaneous duration, and it is also allowed to be in combos of other abilities.
Comments
Saw your post over at the Freedom Stone forums, and as I'm too lazy to sign up for a forum account, I came here to respond. Really? This is a brawl charm. It's stealing brawl's schtick of inflicting stunning penalties, and you even allow the attack to be made unarmed. Melee can NEVER be used unarmed. It's the ability's only weakness, especially for Solars. Melee can use melee weapons, brawling aids, and martial arts weapons, but it cannot be used unarmed, even with a charm. Well. Maybe a Sidereal charm. They dodge with performance, after all. Anyway, beyond the fact that it is a brawl charm, it's terribly overpowered. Super-terribly overpowered. Completely taking away dice actions for two rounds? On a somewhat uncommon Attribute+Ability roll? That's nuts. That's a 'save or die' scenario for almost anyone. And if the roll succeeds, the effect is worthless. A -1 penalty for him, and a -2 penalty for everything else you're doing that round due to split action penalties. Take away the insane primary effect, and the secondary is only useful when combo'd to a counterattack charm.
All that said, the idea isn't bad, it just needs to be far more limited. If it's going to be a melee charm, you need to take out the ability to use an unarmed strike. Then, cheapen the essencd cost and take out the ability to absolutely sap someone's power to act. Inflicting a penalty, not a bad idea. I'd limit it though, and give the flavor more finesse. Maybe this is a dueling maneuver that inflicts a penalty on the other guy's rolls when attacking or defending? Make it hit for more than just -1, perhaps -Ess for the turn? Then, it becomes a tactical maneuver that could be devastating without being utterly broken. As it stands, you could use this charm until it stuns, attack for a round, use this charm until it stuns, attack for another round, and so on. Unless the other guy is a combat twink, he wouldn't have a prayer. -- Ketrus
