Page 154 - Hunter - The Vigil
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                                                          T THE BLEEDER|EQUALIZER GRENADE
                Success: Instead of inflicting damage

            to the target’s Health, the “Bleeder” causes   FIELD MODIFICATION:
            a vampire, ghoul, or any creature that con-
            sumes and stores blood in its own body to               THE BLEEDER
            lose one Willpower (or the equivalent)
            per success rolled. This Willpower physi-  The Bleeder was designed to work on
            cally leaves the creature’s body in rivulets   vampires and other hemovores, and Task Force:
            or sprays of blood, with velocity and force   VALKYRIE scientists have had their greatest
            increasing with successes. If more successes   successes on implementing the technology to
            are rolled than the target has remaining   disrupt vampiric feeding. While not nearly
            blood in its system, extra successes roll   as reliable, a Bleeder can be fi eld modifi ed to
            over into lethal damage.               bleed the vital energy that empowers other
                Exceptional Success: Not only does   supernatural creatures.
                                                     Action: Extended (fi ve successes required; each
            the target lose a large amount of stored   Action:
            blood, but it also suffers lethal damage   roll represents one hour of tinkering).
                                                     Dice Pool:
            equal to one half the number of successes   Dice Pool: Intelligence + Science; if the
            rolled due to the violence with which the   hunter performing the modifi cation does not
            blood leaves its body. Blood vessels liter-  have an Occult Specialty relating to some
            ally explode; skin and muscle are torn by   type of entity that uses the newly targeted
            the force of the exsanguination.       form of energy, he suffers a -3 penalty on
                Special: The “Bleeder” does not have   the roll.
                                                     Roll Results
            quite the same explosive interaction with   Roll Results
                                                     Dramatic Failure: The Bleeder’s components
            non-vampiric blood, but the energy it    Dramatic Failure:
            pours out can cause premature breakdown   overload and melt down into useless slag,
            of blood cells or the restriction of blood   either due to user error or VALKYRIE security
            vessels. Against creatures without a stored   safeguards.
                                                     Failure: No progress is made toward the
            pool of blood, the weapon inflicts intense   Failure:

            headaches and malaise: successes on an at-  modifi cation.
                                                     Success:
            tack roll are taken not as damage, but as   Success: Progress is made toward modifying
            penalties to the target’s actions, to a maxi-  the Bleeder to target a different supernatural
            mum of -5 dice. The penalty lasts for five   energy source, such as the Essence used by

            turns and is often accompanied by a nose-  ghosts, spirits and werewolves or the mana
            bleed.                                 used by witches. A Bleeder will work against
                                                   any type of creature that uses the energy
                   Equalizer Grenade               to which it is attuned. A Bleeder cannot be
                       (•••; Renewable)            modifi ed to target Willpower. An individual
                The old phrase “monsters in human   Bleeder can only be set to bleed one form of
            skin” has its element of truth, but there are   power at a time. In addition, the modifi cation
            things out there in the dark that hide behind   reduces the weapon’s damage rating to +1.
                                                     Exceptional Success:
            only the thinnest veneer of humanity. Some-  Exceptional Success: As above, but the weapon
            times, when a Task Force: VALKYRIE strike   retains its full +3 damage bonus.
            team storms some unholy nightmare’s den,
            what looks like a few hillbillies and drifters
            turns into a wall of fur and muscle and savage sharp teeth. The   equalizer grenade pulses in a pattern that causes focused microsei-
            Equalizer grenade helps to level the playing fi eld.  zures in that portion of the brain that seems to govern shapeshifting.
                Studies performed on captured monsters of various classi-  The grenade is harmless to humans, and in fact to anything not at-
            fications have revealed a commonality amongst many: when a   tempting to alter its form, but the microseizures flood neural chan-


            living creature changes its shape, no matter the method behind   nels with “white noise” that effectively blocks shapeshifting.
            it, a surge of erratic brain activity buried deep in the sensory   Throwing an equalizer grenade is a Dexterity + Athletics
            cortex immediately precedes the change. VALKYRIE scientists   roll (see The World of Darkness Rulebook, p. 67). The grenade
            have speculated that this is the brain trying to process the senso-  has a “Damage” of 4, but instead of inflicting Health damage,

            ry overload of radical body morphism, but the truth is countless   any living creature within five yards of the grenade whose Size is

            vivisections have been unable to give any conclusive answers.   less than the total “damage” is unable to change its shape for fi ve
            Nevertheless, VALKYRIE munitions experts were able to engi-  turns and must return to its natural shape. Remember that to cal-
            neer the equalizer grenade from the test data.     culate a grenade’s damage, you roll a number of dice equal to the
                Function: Operating on the same principles that cause certain   Damage, in this case 4, and add the successes to the base Damage

            patterns of brightly flashing lights to induce epileptic seizures, the   rating (see The World of Darkness Rulebook, p. 178).
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