••• Dark Night of the Soul
As her mastery of Despond advances, a character can plunge her target into a despair so profound he no longer cares about anything else. The victim struggles to muster the will to do anything but brood on his own failures and misfortunes — and, perhaps, seek relief in drink or drugs. Even protecting his own existence seems futile, though a fi ght is one of the few things that can break the target out of his dolor.
A skilled user of Despond can also create more precisely tailored forms of despair. A person who loses the desire to exist may attempt reckless actions he would never contemplate otherwise. On the streets, people talk about robbers or muggers who seek “death by cop,” and prostitutes who take clients everyone else can see are dangerous. Higher social strata have their own forms of self-destructive risk-taking, from taking up “extreme sports” without proper training to telling the boss what you really think of him. Any deed that makes other people wonder, “Is he trying to get himself killed?” can happen because of Dark Night of the Soul.
A skilled user of Despond can also create more precisely tailored forms of despair. A person who loses the desire to exist may attempt reckless actions he would never contemplate otherwise. On the streets, people talk about robbers or muggers who seek “death by cop,” and prostitutes who take clients everyone else can see are dangerous. Higher social strata have their own forms of self-destructive risk-taking, from taking up “extreme sports” without proper training to telling the boss what you really think of him. Any deed that makes other people wonder, “Is he trying to get himself killed?” can happen because of Dark Night of the Soul.
Effect
Dramatic Failure: The target feels great! He felt a little blue for a moment, but shook it off and counted his blessings. The target regains a spent Willpower point, if this is possible.
Failure: The target does not feel any Depression because of Despond.
Success: For the rest of the scene, the target’s player must succeed at a refl exive Resolve + Composure roll to attempt any feat challenging enough to require a dice roll. Failure on this roll indicates that the feat occurs at a –3 penalty. “Any feat” includes defending himself from attack. If a victim of Dark Night of the Soul faces combat, however, that single roll suffices to keep him fighting through the entire battle.
Alternatively, the attacking character can suggest a particular self-destructive course of action. Dark Night of the Soul cannot make a target consciously seek extinction but can remove most of the target’s sense of self-preservation. For the rest of the scene, the target effectively has a very specifi c, additional Vice that involves taking dangerous chances. For instance, a target who’s anxious about money might impulsively try robbing a bank using nothing but his outthrust fi nger in his pocket. Other people can try to talk the victim out of his bout of self-destruction, but resisting the new compulsion costs the target a point of Willpower, just like any Vice.
Exceptional Success: The effect of Dark Night of the Soul lasts until the next sunset.
Failure: The target does not feel any Depression because of Despond.
Success: For the rest of the scene, the target’s player must succeed at a refl exive Resolve + Composure roll to attempt any feat challenging enough to require a dice roll. Failure on this roll indicates that the feat occurs at a –3 penalty. “Any feat” includes defending himself from attack. If a victim of Dark Night of the Soul faces combat, however, that single roll suffices to keep him fighting through the entire battle.
Alternatively, the attacking character can suggest a particular self-destructive course of action. Dark Night of the Soul cannot make a target consciously seek extinction but can remove most of the target’s sense of self-preservation. For the rest of the scene, the target effectively has a very specifi c, additional Vice that involves taking dangerous chances. For instance, a target who’s anxious about money might impulsively try robbing a bank using nothing but his outthrust fi nger in his pocket. Other people can try to talk the victim out of his bout of self-destruction, but resisting the new compulsion costs the target a point of Willpower, just like any Vice.
Exceptional Success: The effect of Dark Night of the Soul lasts until the next sunset.
Material Components
Cost: 1 Vitae
Gestures & Ritual
Dice Pool: Manipulation + Persuasion + Despond versus subject’s Composure + Blood Potency
Related Discipline
Effect Casting Time
Contested; resistance is reflexive.
Level
3
Applied Restriction
Suggesting a course of action that’s out of character for the victim but isn’t immediately self-destructive and might distract him from Depression, such as persuading a teetotaler to get drunk, gives a –1 modifier to the attacker’s dice pool. Nudging the target into an actively self-destructive course of action takes a –2 modifi er. Of course, a course of action that accords with a Virtue or Vice of the target partly counters this penalty with a bonus.