Charms/WillowsInfernalAthletics
Infernal Athletics
Spiritually derived from Cecelyne. Thanks to haren for lots of good input on effects and Charm names.
Charm Count: 8
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Effortless Sirocco Tempo
- Cost: 5 motes
- Type: Reflexive
- Duration: One Scene
- Min. Athletics: 2
- Min. Essence: 1
- Prereq Charms: None
The Infernal takes on the aspect of the desert wind, hot and weightless. For the remainder of the scene, he has near-perfect balance, and can stand or run at full speed across things that are too narrow or weak to ordinarily support him - blades of grass, strands of wire cast through the air, and so forth.
Diametric Balancing Step
- Cost: 2 motes
- Type: Reflexive
- Duration: Instant
- Min. Athletics: 3
- Min. Essence: 2
- Prereq Charms: Effortless Sirocco Tempo
With this Charm, the Infernal can perform impossibilities of grace - running up plumes of smoke or racing along the path of a gaze. He can walk across metaphors or non-solid things like water and clouds of gas, as long as they have a definable boundary. This Charm affects the entire turn's movement. As with the Solar Spider-foot Style, if the Infernal fails to spend Essence on this Charm during a turn where he is standing on a fluid or anything that cannot support him, he falls.
Walking the Reverse Path
- Cost: 3 motes
- Type: Supplemental
- Duration: Instant
- Min. Athletics: 4
- Min. Essence: 2
- Prereq Charms: Diametric Balancing Step
This Charm twists the link of fate between a person's motions and their motion; it makes him slide backwards when he runs forward, drift upward into the sky as he climbs down into a valley, and so on. It does not permit the victim to move where he cannot ordinarily go, however, so if he tries to dive into a lake, he will briefly fall upwards, and then fall down again once his intention is spent. To move where he intends, the victim must roll Wits + Athletics for each action, at a difficulty of the Infernal's Manipulation. If he fails, he wasts his action trying to compensate for the Charm's effect. This effect persists for a number of turns equal to the Infernal's permanent Essence. To inflict the curse, the Infernal must touch the target; the Charm supplements the action of touching. This can be performed with a hand-to-hand attack. This Charm is explicitly permitted to be in a Combo with Charms from other Abilities.
Bewildering Sandstorm Perspective
- Cost: 3 motes per dot
- Type: Simple
- Duration: One Scene
- Min. Athletics: 3
- Min. Essence: 3
- Prereq Charms: Diametric Balancing Step
This Charm unlinks the Infernal's interactions with space, allowing him to instinctively follow the gaps between Essence flows, the path of least mystical resistance. This has the disconcerting effect that, to observers, parts of the Infernal's body seem to rearrange themselves, to vanish and blink back into being unpredictably, as the Charm positions his body in the best possible place for that moment. The Infernal doesn't experience this, however; to him it seems as though the world is what is shattered and twisted. For every 3 motes spent on this Charm, the Infernal increases his Dexterity by a dot; he may not add more Dexterity than his Athletics score.
Ascending Exultation Fugue
- Cost: 3 motes
- Type: Simple
- Duration: Varies
- Min. Athletics: 4
- Min. Essence: 3
- Prereq Charms: Bewildering Sandstorm Perspective
With this Charm, the Infernal bouys his heart with hope and joy; for as many turns as his Compassion, he may fly like a bird. As per the Solar Charm Eagle Wing Style, the Exalt moves with a speed up to triple her sprinting distance per turn, but must move no less than half her sprinting distance per turn or she will have to land and end the Charm. She cannot maintain an altitude higher than three times her normal vertical leaping distance above whatever flat, stable surface lies beneath her, but can 'climb' higher obstacles by zooming along the vertical surface.
In addition to the minimum speed required to maintain flight, the Infernal must maintain a joyous attitude to manipulate the Essence patterns of this Charm properly; an antagonist may, as an action, taunt the Infernal with a Performance or Presence action at a difficulty of the Infernal's Willpower. Success means that the Infernal has been demoralized and the Charm ends, and the Infernal cannot reactivate it until he has regained a point of Willpower. If the Charm is interrupted in this way, the Essence patterns take some time to unravel fully; subtract the Infernal's vertical leaping distance from the distance he falls.
Song of the Unfettered Heart
- Cost: 7 motes, 1 Willpower
- Type: Simple
- Duration: One Scene
- Min. Athletics: 5
- Min. Essence: 3
- Prereq Charms: Ascending Exultation Fugue, Outlook-Sweetening Serenade
This Charm extends the abilities of the Ascending Exultation Technique; the character adds his Compassion to his Athletics or Dexterity for the purposes of calculating his maximum speed and altitude, and whenever his flight is interrupted in a scene, he need not reactivate the Charm; he may simply sing a short verse describing things that bring joy to his heart, a standard difficulty Perception + Performance roll.
Castle of Many Hills
- Cost: 7 motes, 1 Willpower
- Type: Extra Actions
- Duration: Instant
- Min. Athletics: 4
- Min. Essence: 4
- Prereq Charms: Walking the Reverse Path, Bewildering Sandstorm Perspective
The Infernal snatches out with his Essence, bending space so that he stands in many places. He may perform actions equal to his permanent Essence this turn. These actions can originate from any place within sight of the Infernal's location when he activated this Charm, and he may finally appear in any of those locations when the Charm ends. All these actions must be uses of the same Ability. He may not, however, perform actions in five different places and then appear in a sixth where he did nothing; neither can he shoot five arrows at an opponent from five mountaintops and then appear at his side and cut him down with a sword. This Charm is explicitly permitted to be in a Combo with Charms of other Abilities.
Countless Locust Insurgence Style
- Cost: 10 motes, 1 Willpower, 1 lethal Health Level
- Type: Independent Actions
- Duration: Instant
- Min. Athletics: 5
- Min. Essence: 5
- Prereq Charms: Castle of Many Hills
The Infernal breaks the ties between time, space, and himself, moving through each with the grace and deliberateness he chooses. Though the strain of doing so is very tiring, he may take his Athletics in fully independent actions this turn. Fully independent actions follow exactly the same rules as taking single actions on multiple successive turns, except that:
- Only one turn actually passes, which matters for some Charm effects and durations.
- Characters who have split dice pools can interweave their actions. For example, they can split one action's dice pool between an attack and a parry, taking another action in between.
- The character only moves once.
- Characters cannot also use extra action Charms and Combos containing those Charms when taking more than one independent action.
This Charm is explicitly permitted to be in a Combo with Charms of other Abilities.
